_I imagined, that supposing your account of the_ Moravians _true, it would be impossible for any serious Christian to doubt of their being very wicked people_.――――I know many serious Christians who suppose it true, and yet believe they are, in the main, good men.――――_A much worse character, take the whole body together, cannot be given of a body of men._――――Let us try. “Here is a body of men who have not one spark either of justice, mercy, or truth, among them; who are lost to all sense of right and wrong; who have neither sobriety, temperance, nor charity: who are, in general, liars, drunkards, gluttons, thieves, adulterers, murderers.” I cannot but think, that this is a much worse character than that of the _Moravians_, take it how you will.――――_Let the reader judge how far you are now able to defend them_――――Just as far as I did at first. Still I dare not condemn what is good among them; and I will not excuse what is evil.
8. “_The_ Moravians _excel in sweetness of behaviour_.” _What though they use guile and dissimulation?_――――Yes.――――“_Where is their multitude of errors?_” _In your own journal.――――I have taken the pains to place them in one view in my remarks; the justness of which with all your art you cannot disprove._――――You have taken the pains to transcribe many words; all which together amount to this, that they (generally) hold _universal salvation_, and are partly _Antinomians_ (in opinion) partly _Quietists_. The justness of some of your remarks, if I mistake not, ♦has been pretty fully disproved. As to what you speak of my art, subtlety, and so on, in this and many other places, I look upon it as neither better nor worse than a civil way of calling names.
♦ “have” replaced with “has” per Errata
“_To this multitude of crimes ¹I am also an utter stranger.” Then you have charged them wrongfully.――――What do you account guile_, &c.――――I account guile, despising self-denial, even in the smallest points, and teaching that those who have not the assurance of faith, may not use the ordinances of God, the Lord’s supper in particular, (this is the real, unaggravated charge) to be faults which cannot be excused. But I do not account them all together _a multitude of crimes_. I conceive this is a vehement hyperbole.
¹ Second letter, page 84.
_The honour of religion_, said you, _and virtue trampled upon_? I answered, “_By whom? Not by the_ Moravians.”――――You reply, _And yet you have accused some of these as decrying all the means of grace_.――――No. What I accused them of was, teaching that an unbeliever (in their sense) ought to abstain from them――――“_Neither did I know, or think, or say, they were desperately wicked people._”――――_Your journal is before the world; to whom I appeal whether this has not so represented them._――――But how do you here represent your remark, and my answer? My paragraph runs thus, page 10.
“You go on――――_How could you so long, and so intimately converse with――――such desperately wicked people as the_ Moravians, _according to your own account, were known by you to be_?――――O Sir, what another assertion is this? _The_ Moravians, _according to_ your own account, _were_ known _by you to be desperately wicked people, while you intimately conversed with them_.”――――Utterly false and injurious! I never gave any such account. I conversed with them intimately both at _Savannah_ and _Hernhuth_. But neither then, nor at any other time, did I _know_, or think, or say, they were desperately wicked people. I think and say――――just the reverse, _viz._ That tho’ I soon “found among them a few things which I could not approve, yet I believe they are, _in the main, some of the best Christians in the world_.”――――After this, are _you_ the person, who complains of _me_, for imperfect and partial quotations?
I added, “You surprize me yet more in going on thus; _In God’s name_, Sir, is the contempt of _almost the whole of our duty, of every Christian ordinance to be so very gently touched_?” “Sir, this is not the case. This charge no more belongs to the _Moravians_ than that of murder.” _page 11_.
You reply, _Mr._ Spangenberg _and Mr._ Molther, _are accused by name. If falsely, I am sorry both for them and you._ Accused? True. But of what? Of the contempt of every Christian ordinance, of almost the whole of our duty? By no means. The plain case is, I accuse them of one thing, _viz._ “Teaching that an unbeliever should abstain from the ordinances.” You accuse them of another, “contemning every Christian ordinance, and almost the whole of our duty.” And this you would father upon me. I desire to be excused.
9. As to what I said in my letter to the _Moravian_ church, “You can hinder this if you will.――――Therefore if you do not prevent their speaking thus, you do in effect speak thus yourselves.”――――It may be observed, 1. That this letter is dated, _August 8, 1741_. 2. That from that time the _Moravian_ church did in great measure prevent any of their members speaking thus.