Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
13
JOHN WESLEY AND METHODISM
The name “
Methodist
” was a term of abuse used by John Wesley's fellow Oxford students,
because of the methodical way Wesley and his followers ordered their lives. However, it wasn't
until his “conversion” at a Moravian prayer meeting in Aldersgate (marked by a large memorial
outside the Museum of London) in 1738, that Wesley decided to become an independent field
preacher. “I felt my heart strangely warmed” was his famous description of the experience.
More verbal and even physical abuse followed during which Wesley was accused of being,
among other things, a papist spy and an illegal gin distiller. Yet despite his lifelong dispute with
the Anglican church, despite commissioning preachers, and bequeathing more than 350
Methodist chapels serving over 130,000 worshippers, Wesley himself never left the Church of
England and died within it, urging his followers, where possible, to do the same.
41-year-old, insanely jealous, wealthy widow he married, and who eventually left
him. Wesley himself lived his last two years in the Georgian
house
to the right of
the main gates, and inside you can see bits of his furniture and his deathbed, plus
an early shock-therapy machine with which he used to treat members of his
congregation. Wesley's
grave
is round the back of the chapel, in the shadow of a
modern o
ce block.
Bunhill Fields
City Rd • April-Sept Mon-Fri 7.30am-7pm, Sat & Sun 9.30am-7pm; Oct-March closes 4pm •
!
Old Street
Appropriately enough,
Bunhill Fields
, the
main burial ground for Dissenters or
Nonconformists (practising Christians who were not members of the Church of
England), lies across the road from Wesley's Chapel. Following bomb damage in the
last war, most of the graveyard is fenced off, though you can still stroll through on
the public footpaths under a canopy of giant London plane trees. The three most
famous graves have been placed in the central paved area: the simple tombstone of
poet and artist
William Blake
stands next to a replica of writer
Daniel Defoe
's, while
opposite lies the recumbent statue of
John Bunyan
, seventeenth-century author of
The Pilgrim's Progress
.
Whitechapel High Street and Road
Whitechapel High Street
lies at the heart of the old East End, and - along with its
extension, Whitechapel Road - follows the route of the old Roman road from London
to Colchester. Starting in the west at Aldgate, the City's eastern gateway, the street is
still a good barometer for the current East End and is worth a stroll for a glimpse of
London that's only a stone's throw (and yet light years) from the City.
Whitechapel Art Gallery
77-82 Whitechapel High St • Wed-Sun 11am-6pm, Thurs until 9pm • Free •
T
020 7522 7888,
W
whitechapel.org •
!
Aldgate East
The East End institution that draws in more outsiders than any other is the
Whitechapel Art Gallery
,
housed in a beautiful, crenellated 1899 Arts and Crafts
building by Charles Harrison Townsend. The gallery's facade has been embellished with
a smattering of gilded leaves by the sculptor Rachel Whiteread - cast from the original
arts-and-craft Tree of Life reliefs on either side - while the gallery's extension to the east
into a former library (doubling the gallery's size), sports a modern copper weathervane
featuring the philosopher Erasmus seated backwards reading a book. The gallery was
founded by one of the East End's many Victorian philanthropists,
Samuel Barnett
.
His motives may have been dubious - “The principle of our work is that we aim at
decreasing not suffering but sin”, he once claimed - but the legacy of his good works is
still discernible across the East End. The gallery now puts on innovative exhibitions of
contemporary art, and has a great bookshop and café-restaurant.
