SOURCE: “Élie Halévy and the Birth of Methodism,” in Transactions of the Royal Historical Society, Vol. 25, 1975, pp. 1-20.

In the following essay, Walsh evaluates Halévy's observations on the creation and growth of the Methodist movement in 1738-39.

Probably the most famous passages in Halévy's work are those attributing England's immunity from revolution after 1789 to the influence of Methodism. The ‘Halévy thesis’ encouraged, though it did not begin, a debate which still fizzes, jumps and occasionally explodes. Little attention has been given to Halévy's first essay in Methodist history, The Birth of Methodism in England, which appeared in La Révue de Paris in 1906, even though one of its central themes prefigured his famous thesis. After decades of neglect, this has been disinterred, translated and excellently introduced by Bernard Semmel.¹ Compared with Halévy's major writings it is thin and slightly documented, for much...