Close by the parish church stood the Hall, the great house of the Lord Marquis of Normanby who in 1694 made Mr. Wesley his domestic chaplain.  The Marquis was a rake, and he and his mistresses gave the poor clergyman many searchings of heart.  There was one who took a fancy to Mrs. Wesley and would be intimate with her.  Coming home one day and finding this visitor seated with his wife, Mr. Wesley went up to her, took her by the hand and very fairly handed her out.  It cost him his living:  but the Marquis, being what is called a good fellow in the main, bore him no grudge; nay, rather liked his spirit, and afterwards showed himself a good friend to the amount of twenty guineas, to which the Marchioness (but this is more explicable) added five from her own purse.

By good fortune the living of Epworth fell vacant just then, and in accordance with some wish or promise of the late Queen Mary, to whom he had dedicated his Life of Christ, Mr. Wesley was presented to it, a decent preferment, worth about 200 pounds a year in the currency of those times.  But by this time his family was large; he was in debt; the fees to be paid before taking up the living ate farther into his credit; a larger house had to be maintained, with three acres of garden and farm-buildings; and his new parishioners hated his politics and made life as miserable for him as they could.  They were savage fighters, but they found their match.  In 1702 they set fire secretly to the parsonage-house, and burned down two-thirds of it.  In the winter of 1704 they destroyed a great part of his crop of flax.  This was the year of Blenheim, and upon news of the victory Mr. Wesley sat down to commemorate it in heroic verse.  The poem (published in the early days of 1705), if inferior to Mr. Addison’s on the same occasion, ran to five hundred and ninety-four lines, and contained compliments enough to please the great Duke of Marlborough, who sent for its author, rewarded him with the chaplaincy of Colonel Lepelle’s regiment, and promised him a prebend’s stall.  The Dissenters, who (with some excuse, perhaps) looked upon Mr. Wesley as that worst of foes, a deserter from their own ranks, using their influence in Parliament and at Court, had him deprived of his regiment and denied the stall.  In April Queen Anne dissolved Parliament, and in May the late Tory members for the county of Lincoln, Sir John Thorold—­and the Dymoke who then held—­as his descendant holds to-day—­the dignity of Royal Champion, fought and lost an election with the Whig candidates, Colonel Whichcott and Mr. Albert Bertie.  The Dissenters of course supported these; and Mr. Wesley, scorning insults and worse, the unpopular side:  with what results we may read in these extracts from letters to the Archbishop of York.

Epworth, June 7th, 1705.