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Intense, charismatic, indomitable, John Wesley lived according to rules established by the only woman living in his time who may have been his equal—Susanna Wesley, his mother. But women for Wesley were a special class of beings with spiritual sensitivity and with gifts for elevated conversation and correspondence. Throughout his life John Wesley was naturally attracted to women, and he attracted a wide range of women to him. Although he was disappointed in love and more so in his marriage, nevertheless, for spiritual comradeship, Wesley especially cherished contact with faithful women.

With men it was otherwise. From his father Samuel and his brothers, particularly Samuel and Charles, to his mentor William Law, to his Holy Club associates, to the Moravians Peter Boehler and Christian David, the early male influences on John Wesley were vigorous and deep, but he systematically transcended any single male influence and by 1738 was finally freely himself. Wesley had the gift of attracting men with the highest personal powers to himself and of organizing them effectively. He used men, he led men. But among men perhaps only his brother Charles was a real, lifelong friend. All other male relationships seem to have been professional in the highest sense—in doing God’s work.

So profound was the influence of Susanna Wesley upon her son John Wesley that she has been called “The Mother of Methodism.” But the force of her character was also an obstacle to John Wesley’s appreciation of women in general, for what woman could possibly have measured up to her?

Susanna Wesley’s regime at the parsonage was very strict even by eighteenth century standards. She bore many children—John was the fourteenth—but Susanna Wesley knew precisely what to do with them. She broke her children’s wills early so that their young minds could be formed in a wholly Christian fashion. Beatings were administered frequently, and the children learned to cry softly so that they would not be beaten again. Devotions were held before daybreak each day, and study was a normal part of the daily routine for all the family. Harsh cold and a sparse diet also prepared the way ahead for John.

Susanna and Samuel Wesley agreed in their manner of governing the home. The childhood of ministers’ children was a product both of the low salary paid to ministers and of the minister’ desire to maintain a dignity above any class distinction. Ministers were the educated class, and they prepared their children for the hardship of getting through the best schools without a family fortune behind them. John Wesley won scholarships and a fellowship to put himself through. In his journals and letters he never wrote of one regret for his childhood, and indeed again and again prescribed his own upbringing as the ideal Christian childhood.

In the year that Samuel Wesley died, his two sons John and Charles asked their mother whether they should proceed to Georgia to do the ministerial work for which they had been invited. She answered that indeed they should—even if she should never see them again. Her devotion to God called for the joyful sacrifice of all her children for His glory. Can there be any question why John Wesley, brought up with such a model of Christian sacrifice, was impatient with his early congregations for their easygoing ways?

John Wesley’s home was not exclusively dour and serious. He and Charles, being educated and eligible young men, naturally fell in with the upperclass society. In those days children in such circles amused themselves by assuming names and carrying on platonic or abstract philosophical correspondence. John was “Cyrus” and his first love was Sally Kirkham, who was “Varanese.” This relationship was different from that typical of contemporary youth. There was nothing whatsoever physical about it. The record in Wesley’s journal is in code and is sketchy—it is clear, though, that John Wesley was reticent even to tell the young girl that he was fond of her. She was the last person of her social position to whom Wesley was personally attracted except through his ministerial role.

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