ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses Thomas Wride’s multiple responsibilities as one of John Wesley’s preachers and his work as a physician. It first analyses his approach to preaching, including his use of the Bible and of theological works. Though he claimed to preach in the plain style favoured by Wesley and by observers such as Samuel Johnson, he may not always have done so, and some found his manner eccentric. His approach differed from that recommended by leading Methodist preachers such as John Pawson and Adam Clarke, who emphasised the need to avoid levity in the pulpit. Wride took seriously his work as a pastor, such as among children and in visiting the sick, which was not always the case in eighteenth-century Methodism. He saw himself as a disciplinarian. Wride was uncomfortable serving as an agent for Wesley’s publishing house, the Book Room, and with handling circuit finances. However, like many itinerant preachers, and indeed Anglican clergymen, he had a medical practice. Wesley himself offered such services and published a best-selling health manual, Primitive Physick. Though Wride used many popular remedies, to uncertain effect, he was unusual in also practising medicinal cannibalism, using powdered human skulls.
