Philip Guiton, who has now been forty years in the ministry, published, in 1846, Histoire du Methodisme Wesleyan dans les lies de la Manche :— in 1864 he pub- lished a French translation of Rev. William Arthur's Tongue of Fire.
William J. Handcock, who travelled many years in the French Conference from 1838, published in French a Summary of the Laws, Organization, and Discipline of the English Methodists, in 1858, a pamphlet of 50 pages: — also An Exposition of the First Epistle of St. John, in 1861,
James Hocart has devoted forty-six years to the itin- erant ministry in France. He has published five ser- mons on sjiecial occasions — namely, Faith the Indispen- sable Condition to Success in the Ministry: — The Good Fight, preached at the ordination of Henry T. de Jersey in lS6o:—Tke Christian Pastor :— Purity of Heart:— and The Young Servant of Christ Encouraged. He has also revised a new edition of J/?-. Wesley's Sermons.
John Wesley Lelievre has translated and published in French Mrs. Phojbe Palmer's Way of Holiness :— and Faith and Its Effects : —also a small book, The Death of the Just.
Matthew Lelievre published in 1865 the Life of John
Louis Rostan, the French Missionary, which has recent- ly been translated into English by Rev. A. J. French, A.B., and published at the Wesleyan Conference Office, under the title of the .4 Ijnne Missiomu-y. He has also published, in French, The Life of John Hunt, Missionary to the Cannibals: — The Life and ]Vo)-k of John Wesley, a valuable biography, which has been published in Eng- lish, also, at the Conference Office : — also a Life of Paul Lelievre (1868, 133 pp.).
Luke Pulsford, who has now completed forty years of itinerant work in France — commencing his labors in 1841 — has published a Harmonized Collection of Tunes and Chants for Three and Four Voices: — also a Collec- tion of the Propter Names in the New Testament, dedicat- ed to the fathers, mothers, and children.
John Louis Rostan, the Alpine missionarj'- from 1834 to 1860, published Christian Perfection Explained from Scripiture. This was translated into English by a lady, with the title The Path Made Plain. He also publisli- ed an essay on Class-meetings and Christian Experience.
William Toase, one of the apostles of French Method- ism, published several Sermons in French: — 3Iemoirs of Mrs. Elizabeth Ai-rive: — and Rev. Richard Roharts, one of the first missionaries to France: — sl&o An Account of the Wesleyan Mission in France: — and Among the French Soldiers. He was sixty years a preacher.
IV. Presidents of the French Conference Charles
Cook, D.D., six years; Matthew Gallienne, twice; Pierre Lucas, twice; James Hocart, twelve years; Luke Puls- ford, twice ; Emlle F. Cook, A.B., twice ; Jean Paul Cook, A.B., twice; William Cornforth, twice — the first in 1852, the last in 1881, (G. J. S.)
WESLEYAN CONFERENCE, Irish, This is a convenient, if not exact, designation of the body of Methodists in Ireland,
I, Origin and History. — It is a curious and interest- ing fact that the Palatines, a body of German emi- grants, were the cause of introducing Methodism into Ireland ; and it is equally interesting to know that some of those very Palatines were the originators of Meth- odism in America. About the year 1709, these emi- grants, a set of sturdy Protestants, were ruthlessly per- secuted by the Romish bigots under Louis XIV, and compelled to leave their paternal home in Germanj% Some thousands settled in England, others went to America ; but about a thousand found a welcome on Lord Southwell's estate in the County of Limerick, Ire- land, Each family was allowed eight acres of ground on lease, at five shillings per acre ; and the government, in order to encourage the Protestant interest in the country, engaged to pay their rent for twentj' years. The leases were for three lives ; at the end of which ex- orbitant rents were demanded, and the tide of emigra- tion set in about 1760, which led some of the best fam- ilies to find a home in America; and soon afterwards Methodism was commenced in New York by some of those emigrants,
Methodism was introduced into Ireland in 1747 by a lay preacher named Thomas Williams, He formed a society in Dublin ; and during tlie game j'ear John Wesley made his first visit to Ireland, examined per- sonally the members gathered into fellowship, and found them strong in faith ; and wrote respecting those who gathered to his ministry, " What a nation is this ! every man, woman, and cliild, except a few of the great vul- gar, gladly and patiently suffers the word of exhorta- tion." Crowds gathered to hear him, including many wealthy citizens. He wrote in his Journal in August, 1747, " If my brother or I could have been here for a few months, I question if there might not have been a larger society in Dublin than even in London itself." After spending two weeks among them, he returned to London, and immediately afterwards sent his brother Charles, and Charles Perronet, of Shoreham, who re- mained more than half a year in the country reaping much fruit.
At Christmas following, John Cennick preached a ser-
WESLEYAN CONF., IRISH 924 WESLEYAN CONF., IRISH
mon ill Dublin on " the babe wrapped in swaddling clothes." A popish hearer, ignorant of the IJible, deemed the text a pure Protestant invention, and called the Jlethodists "Swaddlers" — a title which clung to them lor several generations. During Charles AVesley's visit many riotous proceedings were witnessed from the papists opposing the Methodists; people were killed, and mock trials were held, and the rioters escaped, the pa- pists being so much in the ascendant. God owned the words of the preacher. Charles Wesley was lirm, so were his followers; that firmness gave courage to the infant society. On the public Green, out of doors, Mr. Wesley often had as respectable a society as at the Foundry; and the power of the Holy Spirit was so manifest that the praj'ers and cries of the penitents often drowned the preacher's voice. Additions were made to the societj' almost daily, and the bulk of the communicants at St. Patrick's were usually Methodists led there by Mr. Wesley himself. During tliat visit Charles Wesley often preached five times in one day; he collected subscriptions, and had a better chapel erected. The Gospel reclaimed the people from error and sin, and persecution bound them together in bonds of affection.