That such churches should be self-governed followed
almost as a matter of course. Their meeting in the name of Christ
secured His presence among them and the guidance of His spirit in their
doings. But it is always important to remember that their essential
characteristic is not either democracy in church government or dissent
from the Establishment, but the positive witness to purity of membership
and to the sole headship of Jesus Christ just described. The Wesleyan
Church, the parent of the whole great Methodist movement, arose at the
end of the 18th century from somewhat similar reasons. There was never
anything schismatic in the spirit of John Wesley, but when he found that
the rigour and stiffness of Anglicanism made a free spiritual witness
almost impossible, he was driven, like the Nonconformists of the
Elizabethan times, to set up separate churches. While it is quite true
that the great principle for which English Nonconformity has stood is
now almost universally accepted, and that what may be called the
negative witness of the Free Churches is much less necessary than it
used to be, there is still room for their positive contribution to the
religious life of the country, for their witness to freedom,
spirituality, and the rights of the people in the Church.
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