THEIB AUTHORS AND OKIGIN. 125
with its lay-preaching, its services in rooms and in the open air, its separate societies, and its elaborate arrangements for discipline was eschewed by the adherents of the Establishment as irregular, so that he had no alternative but to work sepa rately. John Wesley was a good writer and preacher, and possessed extensive learning. He was a man of unfailing per severance, great self-denial, large liberality, singular devoted- ness to the Master s service, and eminent piety. But perhaps his most remarkable gift was the power he possessed of making men willing to fall in with his purposes, and of organizing systematic action for the benefit of his followers.
About the year 1750, Wesley married Mrs. Vizelle, a widow with four children. But the union was not congenial, and after leaving her husband again and again, Mrs. Wesley left him in 1771 not to return. She died in 1781. W T esley left no children. He died in London, after a short illness, on the 2nd of March, 1791, in the eighty-eighth year of his age.
His prose works are too numerous to name. They appeared soon after his death in a collected edition of thirty-two vols. They include " A Translation of Thomas-a-Kempis ; " "A Collection of Moral and Sacred Poems, from the most celebrated English authors, 1744," in three vols. ; some " Histories ;" and his own "Journal;" but they are chiefly theological. Mr. W T esley also established, in 1780, the " Arrnmian Magazine," afterwards called the " Methodist Magazine," and continued to edit it till his death.
Mr. Wesley regarded singing as an important part of public worship. He published a collection of tunes for the use of his followers, and did much by his own personal efforts to encourage psalmody.
He made the first Wesleyan "Collection of Psalms and Hymns," in 1738, and translated for it some German hymns. Several of these translations are used in the " New Congre gational Hymn Book ; " his name and the date of his translations are given under the names of the authors of the original pieces.
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