:

"Waiting to receive thy spirit,
Lo, the Saviour stands above;
Shows the purchase of His merit,
Reaches out the crown of love."

So died happy John Wesley. Happy in life, happy in death. And the secret
of his happiness was the secret he proclaimed to thousands of boys and
girls, as well as men and women, all over this England of ours.

"O boys, be strong in Jesus;
Let those around you see
How manly, pure, and generous,
A Christian boy can be.

"O maidens, live for Jesus,
Like Him, be kind and true;
And let the love from God above
Rule all you say and do.

"Then all the boys and maidens,
When life and work are o'er,
Will hear from One, the words 'Well done,'
And rest for evermore."

* * * * *

If ever you go to London, you must visit City Road Chapel, for there
John Wesley was interred, on the 9th of March, 1791, aged nearly
eighty-eight years.

A great deal was put on his tombstone which you could not understand,
but it tells how this servant of God laboured to bring men and women to
know Jesus Christ, and how the lives and hearts of many thousands were
changed by his preaching.

In Westminster Abbey, too, you will see a marble tablet erected to his
memory, and that of his brother Charles. Though churches shut their
doors to him in life, his memory is now so lovingly respected, that the
finest Cathedral in England has sought to do him honour.

In one of the topmost rooms in the tower at Kingswood School, John
Wesley's bedstead has recently been discovered. Merely a collection of
poles and a piece of old sacking, it lay there many a long year, only
seen by the man who went up the tower to wind the clock. Now it is put
together, and set in a place of honour; and any of us may see the bed on
which John Wesley slept, when he visited the boys and girls at
Kingswood.

Here, too, we may see his chairs and books, and a gown, now torn, which
he used to wear. The Governor of New Kingswood still sits in the
high-backed oak chair in which John Wesley sat; and grafted on several
of the trees in the orchard, are shoots from the very pear tree which
was planted in the garden of Old Kingswood by the Founder of Methodism.

[Illustration]

FLETCHER AND SON, PRINTERS, NORWICH.

CAT