Early Methodists

For over 45 years, John Wesley's headquarters in London was the Foundery, a former royal arsenal which had stood empty since an explosion in 1716. In 1739, Wesley acquired the lease for £115, spent £700 repairing and equipping it and held the first service on 11 November. It became the home of the first Methodist society in London. It was a multi-purpose building, with two entrances, one into the preaching house and the other into the living quarters, band-room, schoolroom and book room where Methodist publications were stored and sold. There was also stabling for horses. The preaching house held 1,500, men and women separated Moravian-style. The living quarters included rooms for Wesley, his mother during her closing years, some of his preachers and a number of poor widows. He insisted on a common table for the whole family. Luke Tyerman, Life of John Wesley Vol 1, pp. 271-2: The band-room was behind the chapel, on the ground floor, some eighty feet long and twenty feet wide, and ...

THE LIFE OF MR. SILAS TOLD CONTAINING MANY INSTANCES OF THE INTERPOSITION OF DIVINE PROVIDENCE IN HIS FAVOUR, WHEN AT SEA AND IN HIS SUFFERINGS ABROAD: TOGETHER WITH AN ACCOUNT OF THE CONVERSION OF SEVERAL MALEFACTORS, THROUGH HIS INSTRUMENTALITY. WRITTEN BY HIMSELF. THIRD EDITION, CORRECTED. Those who go down to the sea in ships, Who do business on great waters; They have seen the works of the LORD, And His wonders in the deep. Psalm 107:23-24 LONDON: PRINTED FOR G. WHITFIELD, CITY-ROAD, 1796. TO THE READER. MR. SILAS TOLD was a man of good understanding, although not much indebted to education. In his life are many remarkable instances of Divine Providence, some of which are of an extraordinary kind; yet we may easily credit them, if we consider, on the one hand, that he was a person of eminent veracity, and on the other, that he relates what he saw with his own eyes, and heard with his own ears. I believe those very passages will be of use to serious and candid readers. JOHN WESLEY....