elements of those popular sciences.

But it would take up too much room to notice all the unauthorized
statements of Mr. Wesley on this subject. We have said enough to show
how the most conscientious and best-intentioned man may err on
theological subjects, and what need young Christians have to be somewhat
critical and careful in adopting and testing their religious opinions.
There are other sermons of Wesley which are as much at variance with
Scripture as the one we have had under notice. I have not his sermons at
hand just now, but if I remember right, his remarks on the righteousness
of the Scribes and Pharisees, in his sermon on that subject, are quite
at variance with the statements of Christ.

And Wesley was one of the best, one of the most honest and
conscientious, one of the most single-minded men on the face of the
earth. No man, I imagine, was ever more anxious to be right,--no one was
ever more desirous to know and teach God's truth in all its purity, and
in everything to do God's will and bless mankind. And he knew and chose
the right standard of truth and goodness, and honestly endeavored to
conform to it both in thought and deed and word. Yet he could err in
this strange and wholesale way. What then may we expect from other
theological writers? Many of the theologians whose writings influence
the Church were _not_ very good men; they were selfish, ambitious, proud
and worldly. Some were idle, dreamy, careless, godless. And others, who
were piously disposed, never deliberately adopted the Bible as their
rule of faith and practice. They never set themselves to conform to it,
as the standard of truth and goodness. They adopted or inherited the
faiths or traditions of their predecessors, never suspecting them of
error, and never inquiring whether they were true or not. The idea of
testing or correcting either their way of thinking or their way of