Susanna Wesley

6 SUSANNA WESLEY.
possibly being turned out of it, to the great regret
and sorrow of his parishioners,
who had learned to
love and trust him.
The inhabitants of the parish of St. John the Evangelist,
Friday Street, Cheapside, unanimously chose
him as their minister in 1652 ;
and though he speaks of
it as the smallest in London, it is evident that he
remained there six or seven years. He must have
married Miss White on his first settlement in the
metropolis. That he would gladly have gone elsewhere
is rendered probable by his declaration that
Cromwell twice refused to present him to a living
worth four hundred pounds a year, though he was the
nominee of the patron. In July 1657 the Protector,
however, gave Aunesley the Lord's Day evening lecture
at St. Paul's, which brought him one hundred and
twenty pounds a year; and twelve months after,
through the favour of Richard Cromwell, he was made
vicar of St. Giles', Cripplegate, against the wish of some
of the inhabitants, who at the Restoration petitioned
Charles II. for his removal. That monarch, however,
confirmed him in his living possibly because he did
not wish to make too rapid or sweeping changes.
Dr. Amiesley had been a prominent man among the
Puritan divines, whether he approved of the execution
of the "martyred King'' or no, for he had been one
of the commissioners appointed by the Act of Parliament
for the approbation and admission of ministers of
the Gospel after the Presbyterian manner. No doubt
he would have liked to have retained his living and
won the favour of the King, for his ancestral instincts
were likely to make him Royalist rather than Roundhead.
But when it came to a question of conscience
he was firm to his principles, and in 1662, when the