On September 25, 1740 George Whitefield wrote a letter to John Wesley. This letter was in response to a letter recently received (in the colonies) from Wesley (in England). Wesley had evidently argued for his doctrine of sinless perfection in this letter, while denouncing the doctrines of grace also known as Calvinism. Whitefield’s response includes the following paragraph:
Besides, dear Sir, what a fond conceit is it to cry up perfection, and yet cry down the doctrine of final perseverance! But this and many other absurdities you will run into, because you will not own Election. And you will not own election because you cannot own it without believing the doctrine of Reprobation. What then is there in reprobation so horrid? I see no blasphemy in holding that doctrine, if rightly explained. If God might have passed by all, He may pass by some. Judge whether it is not a greater blasphemy to say, ‘Christ died for souls now in hell’. Surely, dear Sir, you do not believe there will be a general gaol delivery of damned souls hereafter.
Quoted from George Whitefield, Volume 1 by Arnold Dallimore, p. 575.
