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Posted by Murrisk on May 19, 2003 at 20:15:31:
John Wesley (1703-1791) was ordained a priest of the Church of England in 1728. In 1738 John Wesley and his brother Charles returned from missionary work in Georgia. Wesley's passionate sermons upset the local clergy and they closed their pulpits closed to him. To overcome this problem Wesley resorted to outdoor preaching, and in 1739 he built the first Methodist Chapel in Bristol. During his lifetime he is estimated to have covered about 225,000 miles in Britain and Ireland, mostly on horseback and preached 40,000 sermons. Wesley crossed the Irish Channel forty-two times. He first entered. Dublin Bay, on Sunday morning, August 9, 1747. On May 24, 1762, he climbed the Reek and wrote this in his journal:
“ 24th May 1762: "I went with two friends to see one of the greatest natural wonders in Ireland, Mount Eagle, vulgarly called Crow-Patrick (sic). The foot of it is fourteen miles from Castlebar. There we left our horses, and procured a guide. It was just twelve when we alighted; the sun was burning hot, and we had not a breath of wind. Part of the ascent was a good deal steeper than an ordinary pair of stairs. About two we gained the top, which is an oval, grassy plain, about a hundred and fifty yards in length, and seventy or eighty in breadth. The upper part of the mountain much resembles the Peak of Teneriffe: I think it cannot rise much less than a mile perpendicular from the plain below. There is an immense prospect, on one side toward the sea, and on the other over the land; but as most of it is waste and uncultivated, the prospect is not very pleasing." It was a warm summer and he spoke of violent heat continuing for eight days towards the end of May 1762. On a later visit, in 1785, he laid the foundation stone for the Methodist church at the Rock Square corner of the Mall. It was reportedly built under the patronage of the Lord Lucan of the time. Interesting glimpses of certain aspects of Irish life during 1748-1789 are presented in the compilation from Wesley’s journal at Offalyhistory.
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