WESLEY, CHARLES AND SAMUEL. 



WESSEL, JOHN. 



643 



character. Charles appears to have been naturally of a quiet and 

 domestic disposition, with little ambition or love of management and 

 power ; and, with all his sincere and fervent piety, so far from any 

 inclination towards asceticism, as to be rather a lover of laughter and 

 other joyous emotions, which his brother counted it almost a sin to 

 indulge in. Charles died in London on the 29th of March 1788. Two 

 of his sons, whom (contrary to his brother's wish) he had educated as 

 musicians, became very distinguished in their profession. 



WESLEY, CHARLES and SAMUEL, sons of the Rev. Charles 

 Wesley (see the preceding article), are both entitled to our notice as 

 remarkable instances of a distinct and unquestionable manifestation 

 of musical genius, during almost the earliest periods of infancy. 



CHARLES WESLEY was born in 1757 ; and the Honourable Daines 

 Barrington, who has devoted several pages of his ' Miscellanies' to the 

 youthful Wesleys, tells us, on the authority of their father, he, 

 Charles, could " play a tune on the harpsichord readily, and in good 

 time, when he was only two years and three-quarters old ; " and that 

 when ho played, his mother " used to tie him up by his backstriug 



to the chair, for fear of his falling Whatever tune it was, he 



always put a true base to it." He became a fine performer on the 

 organ and harpsichord ; at a time however when the art of playing 

 on keyed instruments, and indeed on all other musical instruments, 

 was far behind what it is in the present day, and only advancing to 

 that state of perfection which it hag since reached. He early in life 

 waa brought under the notice of George III., who was much pleased 

 with him, and he had the honour to entertain the king, in hours of 

 royal leisure, by his performance of Handel's music. He was also 

 much patronised by the upper classes, for the sake of his practical 

 skill, and highly esteemed by all for his moral worth, for the simplicity 

 of his manners, and his amiable qualities ; but, as too often happens 

 in instances of premature development of genius, the flattering pro- 

 mises of his youth were not fulfilled in future years. After attaining 

 a certain degree of excellence as a mere performer, he remained 

 stationary ; and, as regards composition, left not, we believe, any 

 proof that he had ever passed the boundaries of mediocrity. He held 

 during many years the appointment of organist to St. George's, 

 Hanover-square. He died unmarried in 1815. 



SAMUEL WESLEY was born in 1766. " The seeds of harmony," says 

 Mr. Barrington, " did not spring up in him quite so early as in his 

 brother, for he was three years old before he aimed at a tune. His 

 first was ' God save great George our King,' and such like, mostly 

 picked up from the street organs. He did not put a base to them till 

 he had learnt his notes." We may here add, that Mrs. Wesley a 

 very sensible woman, whose testimony may safely be relied on told 

 Mr. Banlngton that she had had "an elder son, who died in his 

 infancy, and who both sung a tune and beat time when he was but 

 twelve months old." Samuel from his cradle enjoyed the advantage 

 of hearing his brother's performances on the organ, and his superiority 

 may undoubtedly be partly ascribed to this circumstance. He was 

 not five years old when Handel's oratorio of ' Samson ' fell into hia 

 hands, and by this alone he taught himself to read words. Soon after 

 he learned, without instruction, to write. But before he had acquired 

 the art of transferring his thoughts to paper, he composed, in his mind, 

 much music. " Thus," states his father, " he set ' Ruth,' ' The Death 

 of Abel,' &c." He was eight years old, continues the same, " when 



Dr. Boyce came to see us He had by this time scrawled down 



his oratorio of ' Ruth.' The doctor looked over it very carefully, and 

 seemed highly pleased with the performance. His words were, ' These 

 airs are some of the prettiest I have seen : this boy writes by nature 

 as true a base as I can by rule and study.' " 



The young musician was now introduced into all companies as a 

 prodigy, and excited the astonishment of everybody, including the 

 most distinguished professors. Mr. Barrington fills pages in recount- 

 ing the marvellous things he not only did, but said ; for that acute- 

 ness which was so striking a feature in him when a man, was not less 

 oonspicuous in his youthful days. When about eight years of age he 

 received some instruction on the harpsichord, as well as in composition, 

 and at the same time studied the violin, to which instrument he 

 devoted much time, and completely mastered it. In 1777 he pub- 

 lished eight lessons for the harpsichord, and at this period had 

 acquired so much notoriety that his portrait was engraved, and is 

 said, by Mr. Barrington, to have been a strong resemblance. 



We have understood that he began to consider music as his pro- 

 fession when he had arrived at his twelfth year, but have in vain 

 endeavoured to trace his history during his progress from adolescence 

 to manhood. Concerning his general education, we must suppose 

 that it was attended to carefully, for he was a good Latin scholar, 

 was not ignorant of Greek, possessed some knowledge of Italian, and 

 had successfully cultivated that taste for polite literature which he 

 may be said to have inherited. From personal knowledge we can 

 state that his conversation was that of a man of letters accustomed to 

 the best society. His steady friend, Mr. W. Linley, introduced him 

 to Mr. Sheridan, at his villa in Surrey, where he passed two days, the 

 party consisting only of those three. That great wit and most dis- 

 cerning man some time afterwards said of his guest, " I am no judge 

 of Mr. Wesley's musical abilities, but I will venture to assert that his 

 intellectual powers and education would have enabled him to dis- 

 tinguish himself in any walk of life." 



Mr. Wesley's prospects were early clouded by an accident he met 

 with in 1787. In passing along Snow-hill one evening, he fell into a 

 deep excavation which had been prepared for the foundation of a new 

 building. It is supposed that the severe injury he sustained was the 

 source of that state of mind which subsequently checked the progress 

 of a career that promised to be BO brilliant. During seven years he 

 continued in a low desponding state, refusing the aolace even of his 

 favourite art. On his recovery however he prosecuted it with renewed 

 ardour, and then brought into notice the works of Sebastian Bach, at 

 that time alike unknown here and on the Continent. In 1815 he 

 suffered a relapse, and was again obliged to retire from public life 

 during another period of the game duration as the former. In 1823 

 he once more recovered, and up to 1830 was much engaged in various 

 professional pursuits. The disease then recurred, and it was evident 

 that his constitution was undergoing a great change. He now retired 

 from society, and became inactive; though on the Saturday imme- 

 diately preceding the day of his decease he exhibited his extempora- 

 neous powers to a friend, and composed some psalm-tunes. On the 

 Monday he took to his room, under a presentiment that he should 

 never quit it, which was too truly verified. He died two days after 

 on October the llth, 1837. 



Mr. Wesley produced many compositions, but few of them were 

 calculated to please the multitude. He wrote a grand mass for the 

 chapel of Pope Pius VI., for which the sovereign pontiff thanked him 

 in a Latin letter. He then made his ' amende ' to the Protestant 

 church by composing and publishing a complete Service for the use 

 of our cathedrals. He left a numerous family. 



WESSEL, JOHN, Latinised WESSE'LUS, a Dutch divine, was 

 born at Groningen in 1419. At an early age he lost his parents, and 

 was educated by a charitable lady, who afterwards sent him to the 

 college of the priests of St. Jerome at Zwoll, where he studied divinity; 

 but he never took orders, though this has been said. He continued 

 his studies at Cologne, where he perused with great zeal the theolo- 

 gical works of the Abbot Rupert, the manuscript of which was in a 

 convent at Deutz, opposite Cologne ; and being an accomplished 

 Greek and Hebrew scholar, he undertook to purify his religious 

 knowledge by reading the original sources of the Christian religion. 

 He was soon suspected of heterodoxy, and for this reason the univer- 

 sity of Heidelberg, where Wessel went to teach divinity, would not 

 admit him among the professors, on the ground that he was not a 

 doctor of divinity, and that they could not confer this dignity upon 

 him because he was a layman. Wessel consequently left Heidelberg, 

 and lived some years at Cologne and Louvain, where he made himself 

 a great name by his private lectures on divinity and philosophy. His 

 philosophical system was that of Aristotle, and his power of argumen- 

 tation was so great that few doctors ventured to engage in disputes 

 with him. Wessel made himself no less known by several treatises 

 on religion and the state of the church, and he attacked abuses with 

 as much boldness as learning and shrewdness. From Louvain he went 

 to Paris, then the theatre of violent disputes between the Realists, the 

 Formalists, and the Nominalists. Wessel at first attacked the For- 

 malists, but at last he became a Formalist himself. Notwithstanding 

 this change of principles, he maintained his name as one of the greatest 

 dialecticians of his time, and as such the public voice recognised him 

 by the surname of ' Magister Contradictionum,' which was probably 

 given him in Paris. A divine possessing the learning, the talents, and 

 the character of Wessel might have attained the highest dignities in 

 the church, at a time when the Hussites were defending their religious 

 principles for seventeen years against the thunders of the Vatican and 

 the armies of the Holy Roman empire; and when this war and the 

 degenerate state of the church led to the general councils of Pisa, 

 Constanz, Siena, and Basel. Francis della Rovere, general of the 

 Minorites, who became afterwards pope under the name of Sextus IV., 

 made the acquaintance of Wessel at an early period, and continued to 

 be his friend and patron. It is said that Wessel accompanied Francis 

 della Rovere to the council of Basel ; but as this council began in 

 1431, and was finished in 1443, Wessel must have been very young 

 when he went there, unless he was born in 1398, as some say, though 

 the best authorities agree that he was born in 1419. Francis della 

 Rovere, having been chosen pope in 1471, told his friend Wessel that 

 he was ready to bestow any favour upon him which he should desire, 

 and asked him if he would accept a bishop's see ; but Wessel declined 

 honours and dignities, demanding nothing but a Greek or Hebrew 

 bible from the library of the Vatican. After a sojourn of several 

 years at Rome, Wessel returned to Groningen, where he died on the 

 4th of October, 1489. 



Wessel is frequently called a forerunner of Luther, and justly so, 

 inasmuch as he tried to eradicate abuses and errors, and to restore the 

 Christian religion to its original purity. It seems that the doctrines 

 of Wycliffe had great influence upon him. But there is this remark- 

 able difference between Luther and Wessel : Luther attacked the 

 foundations of the Roman Catholic system ; Wessel only wrote against 

 particular doctrines, such as purgatory, the ban, indulgence, &c., and 

 he took his arguments from the philosophical systems of the middle 

 ages quite as often as from the simple truths of the gospel. He was 

 nevertheless suspected of heresy, and after his death some monks at 

 Groningen burnt a valuable part of his manuscripts. Wessel argued 

 that the pope was not infallible, and that general councils alone were. 



