John Wesley's Life And Ethics

This book analyzes John Wesley's personal and social ethical thought by placing him in social location and examining his ethics biographically. Stone argues that in the case of John Wesley, the Christian traditions provide a biblically informed, deontological ethic of love. This ethic is grounded in Christian community to form the individual, and in social reform to transform the nation within the limits of Christian realism concerning human nature and social order. In broad strokes, the book covers the ethical reflection and teaching of Wesley and at appropriate points places it in comparative perspective with other eighteenth-century contributors to ethics and social thought. Ethical topics addressed in the volume include: abolition, vocation, family, money, the social nature of humanity, politics, economics, imperial relations, and war and peace.