Youth
John Wesley was born in 1703 in Epworth, 23 miles (37 km) northwest of Lincoln, the fifteenth child of Samuel Wesley and his wife Susanna Wesley (née Annesley). His father was a graduate of the University of Oxford and a Church of England rector. In 1689 Samuel had married Susanna, twenty-fifth child of Dr. Samuel Annesley, a Dissenter pastor. Wesley's parents had both become members of the established Church of England early in adulthood. Susanna bore Samuel Wesley nineteen children, but only ten lived. In 1696 Wesley's father was appointed the rector of Epworth.
At the age of five, Wesley was rescued from the burning rectory. This escape made a deep impression on his mind, and he regarded himself as providentially set apart, as a "brand plucked from the burning" quoting Zechariah 3:2. As in many families at the time, Wesley's parents gave their children their early education. Each child, including the girls, was taught to read as soon as they could walk and talk. In 1714, at age 11, Wesley was sent to the Charterhouse School in London (under the mastership of John King from 1715), where he lived the studious, methodical and—for a while—religious life in which he had been trained at home.
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Famous quotes containing the word youth:
“Colleges, in like manner, have their indispensable office,—to teach elements. But they can only highly serve us, when they aim not to drill, but to create; when they gather from far every ray of various genius to their hospitable halls, and, by the concentrated fires, set the hearts of their youth on flame.”
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