The Prevenient Piety of Samuel Wesley, Sr.

For the better part of two centuries, Wesley scholars have been given a picture of the family of John Wesley that focuses positively upon the relationships of John and his brother Charles and his mother Susanna. What has come down to us about John Wesley's father_Samuel Wesley, Sr._is a mixture of good and bad character traits, mostly seemingly inconsequential with respect to the making of Methodism under John and Charles. Now with Arthur Torpy's work, we have reason to think differently. Samuel…