The Church of England preached that man’s station in life was a reflection of his state of grace. The monarch was God’s vicar, and the power descending down the chain of being from the throne reached to the gentry and perhaps the artisans and no further. In this world of little hope and few options, John Wesley appeared on the scene. Where his brother Samuel followed the prescribed path for sons of the clergy—to become a stolid gentleman preacher in the Anglican Church, associating with the gentlemen