Nathan Bangs · 17 of 23

Chapter 8. From the Close of the General Conference of 1808, to the Commencement of the General Conference of 1812. · 1811

For several years past our country had been much agitated “with rumors of war,” sometimes with France, at other times with Great Britain, and not infrequently both assumed a belligerent attitude toward the people of America. This state of things had an unfavorable bearing upon the minds of religious people, as it led to frequent collisions on political subjects, on which the country was nearly equally divided. In the latter part of this year the note of preparation for hostile movements was sounded through the country, and Great Britain was selected as the chief object of warlike feeling.

It is not the design of this history to enter into any detail of the causes which led to this state of feeling, nor to discuss or give a judgment on the merits of the questions that were at issue, any further than they had a bearing upon the interests of pure religion. That strong political feeling, more especially of a partisan character, which involves heated discussions and personal recriminations, is unfriendly to the advancement of true and righteousness, must be evident to all acquainted with human passions and the biases arising from long-cherished prejudices. And in a country where freedom of speech and of the press is allowed to all, these discussions often terminate in a settled hostility destructive of that peace and brotherly love which characterize holy and devoted Christians.

Notwithstanding these strong symptoms began to show themselves in the country about this time, attended with their usual concomitants, yet through the persevering efforts of God’s servants the work in which they were engaged was generally prosperous, and many were gathered into the fold of Christ.

In the latter part of this year and beginning of 1812, the southwestern part of our country, particularly Missouri and Louisiana, was terribly shaken by earthquakes, by which the minds of the people were much alarmed, and it seemed to give a temporary check to the flood of emigration, which had been setting in that direction with such astonishing rapidity. They soon recovered, however, from the shock, and the streams of emigrants resumed their wonted course, and the march of improvement went gradually on. It led, in the mean time, many to serious reflection, and thus the workings of divine Providence in the physical world were overruled for the good of its inhabitants. While the earth was trembling and quaking beneath their feet, many were induced to call on God for mercy and salvation.

It will have been perceived from the preceding pages of this history, that in the early plantation of Methodism, especially in the new countries, the people were compelled to hold their meetings in private houses, in barns, and often in groves. As, however, the societies increased in number, it became necessary to erect houses of worship. This work, so essential to the prosperity of the cause, at first went on very slow, particularly in the country places, and often some obscure site was selected, remote from the center of population, where an indifferent building was erected, thus sacrificing convenience to a paltry economy. This unwise policy began to be injuriously felt in some places, and means were used to counteract it; but it was with much difficulty that the people could be generally brought to appreciate the importance of attending to this thing with that liberality and energy which its necessity demanded.

It would seem, indeed, that many of the members of our Church in some places had been accustomed to contribute so little for the support of the institutions of Christianity, that they apparently cherished the erroneous idea that they could be sustained almost literally “without money and without price.” Hence the tardiness with which they came forward to build houses of worship, and the stinted manner in which they contributed for the support of the ministry and ordinances of religion.

These evils, perhaps unavoidable in some cases, in the circumstances in which they were placed, no doubt prevented a more steady and rapid growth of the societies in many places, and furnished a plausible excuse for the numerous locations we have been compelled to record.

Another defect, and which arose, in some measure, out of the ones just mentioned, was the neglecting to occupy the young and thriving villages which were rising into being by the hand of industry, in the new countries. In these countries the Methodist preachers were the gospel pioneers, and for many years, in various places, the people had no other preachers who “cared for their souls.” They were accustomed to go among them in their lonely retreats, preach in their log buts, hold their quarterly meetings in barns or in the woods, and they seemed to have been so long accustomed to this mode of preaching and living, that they almost forgot, in many instances, to provide themselves with better accommodations; and before they were aware of it, other denominations came, took possession of the villages, erected houses of worship, and thus drew the weightier part of population around them. How much has been lost to the Methodist Episcopal Church by this neglect, who can tell? Latterly, however, a remedy has been, in some measure at least, provided, though it has been, in too many instances, after the damage had been sustained, and we have profited more by our losses than by prudent foresight.

Another inconvenience began to he sensibly felt; and that was the want of parsonages for the accommodation of preachers families. It is true that the General Conference of 1800, at the suggestion of Dr. Coke, had passed a resolution, recommending to the circuits to prepare convenient houses, and to have them furnished with heavy furniture. But, excepting some of the larger cities, this recommendation had been little heeded, and hence those preachers who had families were obliged either to locate or submit to the inconvenience of moving their families to circuits without having any place provided for them, or were compelled to purchase or hire a permanent residence for their families, and then go wherever they might be sent, however distant from their residences. These evils began to press heavily upon the connection, and it was plainly seen that, unless removed, must eventually very much impede, if not entirely stop, the wheels of the itinerancy.

In the early days of Methodism, as most of the traveling preachers were unmarried, these embarrassments were not so sensibly realized; and in most instances the zeal for God’s house would so entirely “eat up" the cares of this world, that those devoted men God seemed regardless of their fare, “counting all things but loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus;” for the sake of winning souls to him they were willing to forego, not only the riches and honors of the world, but also all the endearments of domestic life.

At this time the case was somewhat altered. Many had families, some of them large and growing. To move these from place to place, without having a house prepared to shelter them, was an inconvenience, and more especially with the scanty allowance provided for their support, to which many thought themselves not called to submit. This, no doubt, was one cause of the numerous locations from one year to another. And though the embarrassments arising from this source are not yet wholly removed, yet the efforts which began to be put forth about this time, and which have been continued with various degrees of success, have supplied a partial remedy, and it is to be hoped that the efforts will not be slackened until every station and circuit shall have its parsonage, suitably furnished and comfortably supplied with the necessaries of life.

But with all these disadvantages, many parts of the country were visited with outpourings of the Spirit of God, so that the work steadily advanced both in the Atlantic and in the northern and western states.

This year bishop Asbury crossed the St. Lawrence into Upper Canada. After meeting the New England conference, which assembled this year in Barnard, in the state of Vermont, he took his departure on his intended tour into Upper Canada, a place he had long desired to visit. On Wednesday, June 26th, he crossed the Green Mountains, visited Middlebury, and preached in the court house, and afterward set forward a subscription paper for building a house of worship in that place, fully believing, as he said, that “the Lord would visit Middlebury.” He then passed on through Vergennes, Charlotte, and Plattsburgh, in each of which places he stopped and preached, until he arrived, after a fatiguing journey through the woods and swampy roads, at the Indian village of St. Regis, situated at the mouth of the river of that name, which empties into the St. Lawrence river. At this place he was ferried across the St. Lawrence, which is here nearly three miles in width. The first place he stopped at was Evan Roy’s in the town of Cornwall, where there was a flourishing Methodist society, one of the oldest in the province.

On landing in Canada, he says, “My strong affection for the people of the United States came with strange power upon me when I was crossing the line,” and he inquires, with much apparent feeling, “Why should I have such new feelings in Canada?" No doubt that associations were called up by this visit which he little expected to realize in this world. He had left his native land in his youth — had struggled through the difficulties of the Revolutionary War — a war which eventuated in the severance of the United States from the land of his birth — had lived to see these states rising and flourishing, and the Church whose affairs he had been called to superintend, numbering within its bosom six hundred and thirty-six traveling preachers, and 174,560 members — and now, in the sixty-sixth year of his age, and fortieth of his ministry in this country, he found himself once more under the shadow of his paternal government, in a distant province of the empire, among a people who had been raised up by his sons in the gospel, professing the same faith and adopting the same modes of worship with those with whom he first united himself in the mother country. Amid such reflections, how could it be otherwise than that “strange feelings should come over" him? And more especially as he must then have anticipated the near approach of another war between the United States and that government from which he had expatriated himself for the sake of building up His kingdom whose government shall have no end.

The bishop passed along up the banks of the St. Lawrence, stopping and preaching in the most considerable places, gathering information from his own observation and the communications of others respecting the state of things in Canada, until he arrived at Kingston, where he preached in a new chapel the people had erected in that place. He says: — “Our ride has brought us through one of the finest countries I have ever seen. The timber is of a noble size; the cattle are well shaped and well looking; the crops are abundant, on a most fruitful soil. Surely, this is a land that God the Lord hath blessed.” And of the people he says: — “My soul is much united to them.”

On Monday July 15th, he left Kingston, and crossed the lake in an open boat, in which he says they “had a tremendous passage,” to Sacketts Harbor. After his arrival, he remarks: — “Well, I have been to Canada, and I find it like all other stations in the extremities — there are difficulties to overcome, and prospects to cheer us. Some of our laborers have not been so faithful and diligent as we could wish.” On meeting with his colleague in the episcopacy, He says: — “My spirit rejoiced on meeting with dear Bishop McKendree" — and they jointly attended the Conference, which assembled on the 20th of July at Paris, Oneida county, in the state of New York.

From this conference the bishops shaped their course through the western parts of New York and Pennsylvania, to Ohio, Kentucky, and Tennessee, and thence through the southern states; preaching to the people and attending the conferences as usual. Speaking of the South Carolina Conference, bishop Asbury remarks: — “Scarcely have I seen such harmony and love.” — I received letters from the extremities and the center of our vast continent, all pleasing, all encouraging.”

During this long and tedious journey, the bishop speaks of suffering much from bodily affliction, sometimes to that degree, from an obstinate inflammation in his foot, that he could scarcely walk, and at other times he was obliged to desist from active labor altogether, not being able either to ride or preach. In these seasons, however, he employed himself in reading, prayer, and meditation, and in answering the numerous letters he was almost daily receiving from the presiding elders and others; for it may be observed that it was one part of the duty of a presiding elder to give information to the bishops, once a year at least, of the state of religion in his district. this, together with other correspondence, imposed no small tax upon the time and labor of the bishop to answer, as he was in the habit of doing, all these letters. But in the midst of all these things, he says: — “I limped about, sung, talked, and prayed. My consolations exceedingly abound, though my sufferings are great.” — “Dr. Coke says fifteen hundred miles in nine weeks — I may say sixteen hundred miles in sixty days.” Such were episcopal labors in those days!

These extensive travels were less or more the practice of most of the preachers in the new countries, with only this difference, that these latter were performing their regular round of duties in a circuit from two to four hundred miles in circumference, once in four weeks. As late is 1810, according to the testimony of a writer in the Pittsburgh Conference Journal, in the Monongahela district, then under the charge of Rev. Joshua Monroe, there were eleven circuits, comprehending all the country from lake Erie southward, to the head of Tyger’s Valley, and from the summit of the Allegheny mountains to the Ohio river, including a portion of western Virginia, the whole of western Pennsylvania, and a considerable portion of the northeast corner of the state of Ohio. At that time Pittsburgh was in a circuit which embraced Greenburgh, Somerset, and Connellsville, in which there were four hundred and twenty-eight members of the Church. In Pittsburgh itself, in which there are now two large churches, with a membership of about one thousand three hundred, the Methodists assembled at that time in a private room prepared for that purpose, and had only about forty church members, and some of even these were from the adjacent country. In Meadville, (where we now have a college and a stationed preacher,) in Erie, Mercer, and Franklin, all which were then included in Erie circuit, there were no societies.

This year, 1811, Erie circuit employed two preachers, James Watts and James Ewen, and the number of church members had increased to five hundred and one, scattered over an extent of country which now includes several presiding elders districts.

The Pittsburgh circuit, which was this year under the charge of James H. Hanson, numbered five hundred and twenty-four members, though the society in the city was still small. Within the limits of their two circuits, there is now a large portion of two annual conferences, five entire districts, besides parts of some others, and not less than twenty-two thousand members of the Church. So greatly has the work enlarged in that field which was brought under culture by those men of God. It has since been divided and subdivided into smaller and more compact enclosures, and put under the care of a proportionate number of husbandmen, that it might bring forth fruit more abundantly, and that its fruit may remain.

Forty-five preachers located this year, nineteen were returned supernumerary, fifteen superannuated, and two expelled. Five, namely, Thomas Daughaday, Thomas Budd, William Keith, William Hunt, and Gideon A. Knowlton, ended their labors in peace, leaving behind them many testimonials to their fidelity and success in the “ministry of reconciliation.”

One trait in the character of William Keith, mentioned in the notice of his death, is worthy of remembrance and of imitation — that is, clearness of conception, readiness of utterance, and comprehensiveness of argument. It has often been remarked that he possessed the happy art of expressing much useful matter in a few well-chosen words.” It is added, “The happy, and sometimes astonishing effects of his ministry, demonstrated that he was sent by Jesus Christ to declare unto mankind the awful truths of Heaven, and to beseech sinners to be reconciled to God.”

There was indeed a sweetness of manner, a persuasiveness of argument, which accompanied the public administrations of William Keith, that wrought upon the heart of the auditor, attracted his attention, and won his affection, in a manner which he could hardly resist. His intelligent countenance, the melody of his voice, the harmony of his sentences, and above all, the apparent sincerity with which he spoke, commanded the respect and inspired the confidence of all who were not prejudiced against the truth; and even many of these, on hearing him, have been overcome by the charming and persuasive eloquence with which he addressed them. He was, as was most evident, deeply imbued with the spirit of his Master, and this gave an unction and a pungency to all he said.

In the early part of his ministry he was employed chiefly in western New York; and for some cause, unknown to the writer, he was induced to leave the Methodist Church and connect himself with another communion. He very soon, however, repented of his error, published a recantation, and was most cordially readmitted into the bosom of the church of his first love. He could hardly ever forgive himself this step, but adverted to it upon his dying bed as a source of grief to his mind.

The two last years of his ministry he spent in New York, and the people appreciated his labors highly as a faithful and useful minister of Jesus Christ. Here also he ended his days with a lingering consumption, beloved and respected by all who knew him, leaving a testimony behind him more satisfactory than all the gold of Ophir — for he departed in the full hope of immortality and eternal life.

Of William Hunt, it is said that he professed to enjoy, and exemplified the grace of “perfect love" — that few excelled him in the branches of learning which he pursued — that he was thoroughly versed in the sacred Scriptures — sound in doctrine, and an accurate judge of gospel order and discipline, illustrating in his own life the purity and excellence of that religion which he recommended to others.

In addition to his exhibiting the graces of a Christian minister, it is said of Gideon A. Knowlton that he was so remarkably distinguished for his punctuality in attending to his appointments, that it became proverbial among the people in stormy weather, “It is Knowlton’s appointment; he will be there; we must attend.” How worthy of imitation!

Of Thomas Budd, it is said that he possessed strong natural abilities, had an improved mind, was remarkably frank in his manner, and of the strictest integrity in all his conduct.

Thomas Daughaday was an acceptable and useful preacher, manifesting an ardent thirst for the salvation of souls, and was an example of meekness and patience in his life, and departed full of the hope of immortality.

Numbers in the Church: Whites This Year: 148,835; Last Year: 139,836; Increase: 8,999 — Colored This Year: 35,732; Last Year: 34,724; Increase: 1,008 — Total This Year: 184,567; Last Year: 174,560 — Increase: 10,007 — Preachers This Year: 668; Last Year: 636; Increase: 32.