Susanna Wesley
This is the story of Susanna Wesley, 1669-1742 Mother of Charles and John Wesley, who were founders of the Methodist Church. Susanna and her husband, Samuel, had nineteen children, ten of whom survived to adulthood. Her son Charles became a well-known hymn writer and her son John became the found of Methodism. Susanna was brought up in a Puritan home as the youngest of twenty-five children. As a teenager, she became a member of the Church of England. She became the wife of a chronically debt-ridden parish rector in an English village. She said, "I have had a large experience of what the world calls adverse fortune." Nonetheless, Susanna managed to pass down to her children Christian principles that stayed with them.
This is the story of Susanna Wesley, 1669-1742 Mother of Charles and John Wesley, who were founders of the Methodist Church. Susanna and her husband, Samuel, had nineteen children, ten of whom survived to adulthood. Her son Charles became a well-known hymn writer and her son John became the found of Methodism.
Susanna was brought up in a Puritan home as the youngest of twenty-five children. As a teenager, she became a member of the Church of England. She became the wife of a chronically debt-ridden parish rector in an English village. She said, "I have had a large experience of what the world calls adverse fortune." Nonetheless, Susanna managed to pass down to her children Christian principles that stayed with them.
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78 SUSANNA WESLEY.<br />
as one of the happiest times of her life. All day long<br />
she was busy, but in the evening she read either<br />
aloud or to herself, and was very happy and contented.<br />
In March 1709, about a month after the fire, Kezia<br />
was born, and proved to be the last of Mrs. <strong>Wesley</strong>'s<br />
children. That she should be ailing and delicate was<br />
only to be expected, considering what her mother,<br />
who was just forty years of age, had gone through.<br />
Five months later Mrs. <strong>Wesley</strong>, at the request of a<br />
neighbouring clergyman, wrote to him a little further<br />
account of the fire :<br />
" Epworth, August 24th, 1709.<br />
" On Wednesday night, February 9th, between the<br />
hours of eleven and twelve, some sparks<br />
fell from the<br />
one of the children's feet. She<br />
roof of our house upon<br />
immediately ran to our chamber and called us. Mr.<br />
<strong>Wesley</strong>, hearing a cry of fire in the street, started<br />
up (as I was very ill he lay in a separate room from<br />
me), and opening his door, found the fire was in his<br />
own house. He immediately came to my room, and<br />
bid me and my eldest daughters rise quickly and shift<br />
for ourselves. Then he ran and burst open the<br />
nursery-door, and called to the maid to bring out the<br />
children. The two little ones were in the bed with<br />
her;<br />
the three others in another bed. She snatched<br />
up the youngest, and bid the rest follow, which the<br />
three elder did. When we were got into the hall,<br />
and were surrounded with flames, Mr. <strong>Wesley</strong> found<br />
he had left the keys of the doors above-stairs. He<br />
ran up and recovered them a minute before the staircase<br />
took fire.<br />
strong<br />
When we opened the street-door the<br />
north-east wind drove the<br />
flames in with such
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