Nathan Bangs · 3 of 28

Chapter 3. From the Death of Bishop Asbury to the Close of the General Conference of 1816. · Part 2

Such was the general state of things in Connecticut, when some circumstances happened which resulted in the overthrow of this legal hierarchy, and placed all the religious sects upon an equal standing, both in civil and religious affairs.

During the war of 1812-1815, the militia of that state were called out, by order of the general government, to defend the people against the apprehended depredations of the enemy. The authorities of the state, however, refused to let their militia serve under United States’ officers, but they were marshaled under those appointed by the state. The consequence was, that the general government refused to pay the expense of the campaign. After the restoration of peace, the state of Connecticut petitioned Congress to refund the amount which the state had expended in paying for the services of the militia during the late war, a part of which was granted by the general government, and paid into the treasury of the state. The legislature of Connecticut, with a view to conciliate all parties, resolved that the money thus refunded should be divided among the several religious denominations, which was accordingly done; but, in the estimation of the Protestant and Methodist Episcopalians and Baptists, the division was so unequal, such an undue proportion being given to the Congregationalists, that they took offense, some of them refusing to receive what was awarded to them, and all united to protest against the proceedings as illiberal, unequal, and unjust. This led to a union of effort between the dissatisfied denominations against the standing order; and, seizing upon the occasion as an auspicious moment to assert their rights, they succeeded in calling a state convention, by which the old charter of Charles II was abrogated, a bill of rights promulgated, and a new constitution framed and adopted, which abolished church taxes and exclusive privileges, and put all sects upon an equality in respect to civil and religious rights; and thus they enfranchised the proscribed portion of the community, making all alike dependent on the voluntary principle for the support of the clergy and other incidents of divine worship.

This result was hailed as an auspicious period by the friends of equal rights, both in and out of the churches, as it did away the odious distinction between the privileged order, who had been so long established by law, and the various sects which had sprung up in the state, some of whom were nearly as numerous as were the Congregationalists themselves, and, when united with the others, formed a decided majority.

This was breaking the last link of legal tyranny in religious matters in our country — with the exception, perhaps, of some of its relics which are dangling upon the civil code of Massachusetts — by proclaiming to all the rights of conscience, according to the laws of nature, of God, and the fundamental principles of our national constitution.

Having noticed these matters, because they had and still have a bearing upon our history, I shall now proceed in the narration of the affairs of our Church in their regular order.

The death of Bishop Asbury, as related in the preceding chapter, left us with only one superintendent, Bishop McKendree, and he was in a very delicate state of health. He continued, however, to discharge his official duties, and was much supported in his labors by the good countenance of his brethren in the ministry and membership.

The number of Church members for 1816 shows that the increase was small, as the country had not yet fully recovered from the shock it had received from the late war, nor was the spirit of revival and reformation in that holy and vigorous exercise, by which it had shown itself at some former periods. Indeed, a disputatious spirit, in respect to some points of church government, engrossed too much of the time and attention of many, it is to be feared, to the neglect of the “weightier matters of the law, judgment, justice, and the love of God.”

Numbers in the Church: Whites This Year: 171,931; Last Year:167,978; Increase: 3,953 — Colored This Year: 42,304; Last Year: 43,187; Decrease: 883 — Total This Year: 214,235; Last Year: 211,165 — Increase: 3,070 — Preachers This Year: 695; Last Year: 704; Decrease: 9.

It will be perceived from the above that there was a decrease of nearly nine hundred colored members. This was owing to a defection among the colored people in the city of Philadelphia, by which upward of one thousand in that city withdrew from our Church and set up for themselves, with Richard Allen, a colored local preacher and elder in the Methodist Episcopal Church — at their head.

We have already had occasion to notice the labors of the Methodist ministry in behalf of the colored population of our country, both free and enslaved. Many thousands had become members of the Church, and were in general orderly and exemplary in their conduct; and some of those who were free had acquired wealth and respectability in the community. Among these converted Negroes a considerable number, possessing gifts for the edification of their brethren, had received license to preach, and several had been ordained deacons, and a few to the office of local elders.

Among the latter was Richard Allen, of Philadelphia. By habits of industry and economy, though born a slave in one of the southern states, he had not only procured his freedman, but acquired considerable wealth, and, since he had exercised the office of a preacher and an elder, obtained great influence over his brethren in the Church. By his assistance, and the assistance of their white brethren, they had built them a decent house of worship, and were regularly organized into a Christian church, according to our disciplinary regulations, and were put under the pastoral oversight of a white elder, stationed by the bishop presiding in the Philadelphia conference.

Under this state of things all seemed to go on well and prosperously. Mutual affection and confidence between the white and colored congregations, not in that city only, but also in most of the populous cities and villages in the Union, promised the most happy results of their united endeavors to promote their temporal and spiritual welfare. This harmony, however, was, by some untoward circumstances, interrupted. Mutual distrust and dissatisfaction succeeded, until finally Allen, and those who had been brought under his influence, separated themselves from the Methodist Episcopal Church. This occurred in the month of April, 1816.

At the secession they organized themselves into an independent body, under the title of the “African Methodist Episcopal Church,” adopting our doctrines as their standards, and, as far as their circumstances would seem to allow, our form of discipline for their government. At their first General Conference, held in April of this year, Richard Allen was elected to the office of a bishop, and was consecrated by prayer and the imposition of the hands of five colored local elders, one of whom, Absalom Jones, was a priest of the Protestant Episcopal Church. Though the circumstances which led to this secession produced some exasperation of spirit on both sides, at the time, yet it is stated by one of their first ministers, that they have prospered considerably in various parts of the country. At their conference in 1828, one of their elders, Morris Brown, was elected and ordained a joint superintendent with Richard Allen; and after the death of the latter, in 1836, Edward Watters was set apart with the usual forms of consecration, as a joint superintendent with Mr. Brown.

Whether they are better or worse off than they would have been had they remained in connection with the Church and ministry to which they were indebted for their spiritual and ecclesiastical existence, is more than we have the means of knowing. Be this as it may, the secession created for the time considerable uneasiness among our colored congregations in New York city and some other places, which resulted in their separation also, although they did not all arrange themselves under the banners of Allen. They adopted the itinerant mode of preaching, and have spread themselves in different parts of Pennsylvania, New York, New Jersey, Maryland, and Delaware states, though it is believed that their congregations, out of the city of Philadelphia, are generally small, and not very influential. There are also some in the western states, and a few in Upper Canada. The exact number belonging to this party I have not been able to ascertain.

In the more southern states, the “Allenites,” as they were called, by way of distinction, could make no favorable impression, as their preachers were not recognized by the laws of the states, and the slave population who were members of our Church had the character of our white ministry pledged as a guarantee for their good behavior.

This conference assembled in the city of Baltimore, on the first day of May of this year, and was composed of the following delegates: —

New York Conference: William Anson, Nathan Bangs, Laban Clark, Samuel Draper, Nathan Emory, Freeborn Garrettson, Aaron Hunt, Samuel Merwin, Daniel Ostrander, William Phoebus, Peter P. Sandford, Eben Smith, Henry Stead, Thomas Ware, Ebenezer Washburn, Elijah Woolsey.

New England Conference: Oliver Beale, Elijah Hedding, Asa Kent, David Kilborn, Joseph A. Merrill, Philip Munger, George Pickering, Martin Ruter, Solomon Sias, Joshua Soule, Charles Virgin, Eleazar Wells.

Genesee Conference: Dan Barnes, William Case, Abner Chase, George Gary, Charles Giles, George Harman, Chandley Lambert, Seth Mattison, Isaac Puffer, Henry Ryan

Ohio Conference: Charles Holliday, Benjamin Lakin, Marcus Lindsay, Samuel Parker, Isaac Quinn, James Quinn, John Sale, David Young, Jacob Young,

Tennessee Conference: James Axley, Peter Cartwright, Thomas L. Douglass, Samuel Sellers, Jesse Walker.

South Carolina Conference: Daniel Asbury, Henry Bass, Solomon Bryan, Samuel Dunwody, John B. Glenn, Hilliard Judge, William M. Kennedy, Thomas Mason, Lewis Myers, James Norton, Anthony Senter, Alexander Talley, Joseph Tarpley, Reuban Tucker.

Virginia Conference: John C. Ballew, Philip Bruce, Thomas Burge, Edward Cannon, Matthew M. Dance, Ethelbert Drake, Cannellum H. Hines, William Jean, Thomas Moore, Minton Thrift.

Baltimore Conference: Thomas Burch, Christopher Frye, Enoch George, Alfred Griffith, Jacob Grober, Andrew Hemphill, Hamilton Jefferson, Nelson Reed, Stephen G. Roszel, William Ryland, Asa Shin, Henry Smith, Beverly Waugh, Joshua Wells.

Philadelphia Conference: William Bishop, Henry Boehm, John Emory, Sylvester Hill, Stephen Martindale, Lawrence McCombs, Robert Roberts, Solomon Sharp, John Sharpley, Asa Smith, Joseph Totten, John Walker, George Woolley.

The first thing which arrested the attention of all, and which seemed to spread a melancholy gloom over the house, was the absence of our venerated senior bishop, whose death and character I have recorded in the preceding volume.

After making preparations for the removal of his remains from the place of their first sepulcher, his valedictory address was read to the conference, which appeared to have been left in an unfinished state, containing merely the heads of what he would probably have drawn out at greater length, had his declining health permitted. It shows, however, the same intense and enlarged desire for the permanency and prosperity of the Church by which he had so long been characterized, expressed in his usually sententious [pithy, concise, moralizing — DVM] style, and concluded with an earnest exhortation to the conference to hold fast the doctrines and discipline under the influence of which they had been hitherto bound together, blessed, and prospered.

After the conference was organized, by the appointment of a secretary, and attending to the usual preliminary business, Bishop McKendree, who, by the death of Bishop Asbury, was the only surviving superintendent, delivered to the conference an address — a copy of which I have not been able to find in the general state of the work, and the necessity of adding strength to the episcopacy. He also made such suggestions as he thought fit in respect to future movements for the general peace and prosperity of our extended work. This address, and Bishop Asbury’s valedictory, were referred to appropriate committees, the reports of which will be noticed in due time.

The Rev. Messrs. Black and Bennett, of Nova Scotia, attended this conference as delegates from the British conference, in order to adjust, if possible, certain difficulties which had arisen in Canada, particularly in the lower province, out of what had taken place during the late war. As this sanguinary conflict had occasioned a temporary separation between us and the brethren in that country, the societies in Montreal and Quebec had petitioned the mission committee in London to supply them with preachers, and their petition had been granted and preachers sent. This occasioned some uneasiness in the minds of our preachers in that country, and led to unhappy collisions between the two bodies of Methodists, which resulted finally in the separation of the Methodists in those provinces from the jurisdiction of the Methodist Episcopal Church, and their union with the Wesleyan Methodists in England.

Some correspondence had taken place between our bishops and the Wesleyan Methodist conference, in relation to this unhappy affair; and at this General Conference the following letter was received from the missionary committee of London, and submitted to the conference, in connection with communications from the Rev. Messrs. Black and Bennett, in behalf of the British connection, and Rev. Messrs. Ryan and Case, in behalf of the brethren in Canada. The letter, which follows, it appears, was addressed to Bishop Asbury, in answer to one they had received from him. It is as follows: —

“New Chapel, City Road, London, Feb. 7, 1816

“Very Dear Sir: — It is by the particular request of the last British conference that we, as members of the missionary committee, address you, and our brethren in the United States, whom we very highly esteem as fellow-citizens of the saints, and fellow-laborers in the vineyard of our common Lord; most fervently wishing that peace, righteousness, and joy in the Holy Ghost may abound in you and by you, to the praise of God and the glory of his grace.

“On reading your last very kind and affectionate letter, we sympathized with you, knowing how much it must have affected your mind, after being favored with so much spiritual prosperity, to have to lament a ‘decrease of members in your societies;’ but we trust, since it hath pleased Divine Providence to cause the terrors of war to cease, and to restore the invaluable blessing of peace between the two countries, that by this time you hail the dawn of a more auspicious day, and see the returning glory of the Lord revealed, and the quickening power of the Spirit diffusing its reviving influence, and that the voice of joy and rejoicing is heard in the congregations of the righteous, ‘Glory to God in the highest, peace upon earth, and good-will toward men.’ Our united prayer and supplication for you is, ‘O Lord, we beseech, O Lord, we beseech, send now prosperity!’

It is with gratitude to the Lord of all that we can say, he is still extending his kingdom among us, by the instrumentality of the preached word; and his servants have had much consolation in their labors, by seeing sinners powerfully convinced of sin, penitents born of God, and believers sanctified by the Spirit. God has lately been reviving his work in various places, particularly in the city of Bristol, at Salisbury, &c.: in the former place several hundreds have been brought to the knowledge of God their Saviour. We can assure you we love this ‘good, old-fashioned religion,’ of a deep conviction for sin, a clear sense of justification by faith, and entire sanctification of the soul from all moral pollution, as well, if not better than ever. Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who hath blessed us, and does even now bless us, with these spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ Jesus: and we ever pray with increasing desire, ‘Thy kingdom come.’

“Our blessed Lord has greatly favored us with success in our missionary efforts, particularly in our new stations in the eastern world, Ceylon, &c., though this has been attended with its afflictive circumstances. Since the death of our venerable, highly esteemed, and much lamented friend and brother, Dr. Coke, our beloved brother Ault has been removed from a sphere of useful labor to his great reward. The other brethren are still preserved in their useful labors. A Buddhist priest of considerable learning has been converted to Christianity, and is now engaged in translating the Scriptures into two of the native languages. Several Moormen or Mohammedans have also received the truth, and are becoming useful preachers of the word of life; and thousands of the poor heathen flock to hear the joyful tidings of the gospel. Our missionaries have begun to build a large chapel, house, school, printing-office, &c., at Columbo, and have received the liberal support of the inhabitants. These buildings are to cost seven thousand dollars, six thousand of which have been already subscribed by the inhabitants. We have lately sent five more missionaries to that quarter of the globe, and one more is shortly to sail for Bombay. Thus the Lord is enlarging his kingdom, ‘even from the rivers to the ends of the earth.’

“We rejoice in the ardent Christian affection you express toward your brethren in this country; and be assured they entertain the same lively feelings and sentiments of brotherly love toward you and your fellow-laborers in the Lord; and should we be favored with a visit from you or them, it would give us inexpressible pleasure to give you the right hand of fellowship, and every expression of our sincere Christian regard.

“To preserve a mutual good understanding, and the unity of the Spirit, and, as far as possible, a co-operation in promoting the good work of the Lord, we feel it our duty to state to you a subject of local difference, which to us has been painful, and which we feel a delicacy in stating, but to which we are compelled from the necessity of the case, that the word of the Lord be not hindered. In consequence of application being made to the British conference from the society at Montreal, a missionary was sent to that place, and received as the messenger of the gospel of peace; but we are sorry to learn that some misunderstanding has taken place between brothers Strong and Williams, our missionaries, and brother Ryan, your presiding elder for Lower Canada. From the former we have received a statement of their proceedings, and from the latter a letter of complaint. We have also received a letter from brother Bennett, the chairman of the Nova Scotia district, who has visited Montreal, &c., and reported to us his proceedings.

“Upon a review of the whole, and from the most serious and deliberate consideration we are led to conclude that, considering the relative situation of the inhabitants of Montreal and of Canada to this country, and particularly as a principal part of the people appear to be in favor of our missionaries, it would be for their peace and comfort, and the furtherance of the gospel, for our brethren to occupy those stations, especially the former, and to which we conceive we have a claim, as a considerable part of the money for building the chapel and house was raised in this country. We trust our American brethren will see the propriety of complying with our wishes with respect to those places; not to mention their political relation to this country, which, however, is not of little importance, for we are conscious that their general habits and prejudices are in favor of English preachers, being more congenial to their views and feelings, which should certainly be consulted, and will tend to facilitate the success of the gospel, and their spiritual prosperity. As your and our object is mutually to diffuse the knowledge of him whose kingdom is not of this world, and by every possible means to promote the immortal interests of men, let us not contend — we have one Master, even Christ — but give place to each other, that the word of the Lord may have free course, run, and be glorified. We cannot but hope, that from the contiguity of the labors of the brethren belonging to the two conferences, the spirit of unity and love will be promoted, and by this measure a more perfect reciprocal intercourse established. As you have kindly invited our esteemed brethren, Messrs. Black and Bennett, to take a seat in your conference, we have directed them to pay you a visit at Baltimore for this purpose, and to amicably arrange and settle this business, whom we trust you will receive as our representatives and as brethren.

“Praying that our mutual love may abound yet more and more, and that we may ever enjoy and rejoice in each other’s prosperity, till the whole earth is filled with the glory of God, we remain your truly affectionate brethren in Christ Jesus.

(Signed for and in behalf of the committee.) “James Wood, Treasurer, Joseph Benson, James Buckley, Secretary.”

This letter, together with the written and verbal communications from the brethren above mentioned, was referred to a committee, and the following report, which was concurred in by the conference, will show the result of their labors: —

“The committee appointed by the General Conference to confer with Messrs. Black and Bennett, delegates appointed by the London Methodist Missionary Society to represent the British connection to this conference, and, if possible, to make an amicable adjustment of certain differences between our Church and the British connection, relative to Upper and Lower Canada, beg leave to submit the following report, viz.: —

Your committee have had several friendly interviews with the above-mentioned delegates on those subjects, and they are happy to state that there appears to be an earnest desire to have all existing difficulties terminated to the peace and mutual satisfaction of both parties, and to perpetuate the Christian union and good understanding which have hitherto existed.

It appears from written communications, as well as from verbal testimony, that unhappy dissensions have taken place in Montreal between certain missionaries sent (at the request of a few official members of the society in that place, in time of the last war) by the London Missionary Society, and some American preachers, which have terminated in the division of that society.

Although the late hostilities between the two countries separated, for some time, those provinces from the immediate superintendency of the Methodist Episcopal Church in America, yet all the circuits (except Quebec) were as regularly supplied as circumstances would admit of with American preachers.

It furthermore appears, from written and verbal communications, that it is the desire of the great majority of the people in Upper and Lower Canada to be supplied, as heretofore, with preachers from the United States.

In the two provinces there are twelve circuits and one station, (Montreal,) which have eleven meeting-houses, which have been hitherto supplied by American preachers.

“These things being duly considered, together with the contiguity of those provinces to the western and northern parts of the United States, your committee respectfully submit the following resolutions: —

“Resolved by the delegates of the Annual Conference of the Methodist Episcopal Church, in General Conference assembled,

That we cannot, consistently with our duty to the societies of our charge in the Canadas, give up any part of them, or any of our chapels in those provinces, to the superintendence of the British connection.

That a respectful letter be addressed to the London Methodist Missionary Society, explaining the reasons for the above resolution.”

A letter was accordingly addressed to the missionary committee of London, explanatory of the reasons which led to the conclusions stated in the above report, and requesting that the preachers of each connection might be permitted to occupy in peace their respective fields of labor; but, whatever might have been the pacific disposition of the two bodies of Methodists in Great Britain and the United States, and however sincere and ardent their desire for mutual good understanding and brotherly affection, there were local feelings existing in the societies in some places, particularly in Montreal and Kingston, which could not be so easily satisfied; hence the society in the former place remained in a divided state, one party being supplied from England, and the other from the United States: and thus Judah continued to vex Ephraim, until, after a lapse of some years, an amicable arrangement was made between the British and American connection.

It was beyond all controversy that the present state of the work required an additional number of bishops. Accordingly the committee on the episcopacy reported as follows in reference to this subject, which was concurred in by the conference: —

“1. It is the opinion of your committee that the state of the superintendency, in consequence of the ever to be lamented death of our venerable father, Bishop Asbury, and the impaired state of the health of Bishop McKendree, and the increasing extent of the work, is such as require immediate and adequate strengthening;” and hence they recommended that two additional bishops be elected and consecrated.”

On May 14, Enoch George and Robert Richford Roberts were elected by ballot, the former having fifty-seven and the latter fifty-five votes out of one hundred and six that were cast. They were accordingly consecrated in due form, and, after the adjournment of conference, entered upon their peculiar work with zeal and energy.

The effect of the numerous locations on the ministry, and the want of more efficient means for its intellectual improvement, induced this conference to appoint a committee to take these subjects into consideration, and, if practicable, provide an adequate remedy. And as the report of this committee, and the action of the conference thereon, had a very important bearing upon these interests, the report, as it was adopted by the conference, is given entire.

“The committee of ways and means, appointed to provide a more ample support of the ministry among us, to prevent locations, and the admission of improper persons into the itinerancy, have taken the subjects committed to them under serious consideration. They have found, with serious concern and deep regret, that, in the present state of things, there exist many evils, which threaten to undermine that system of itinerating preaching which, under the blessing of God, has been so successful in spreading the gospel of Jesus Christ.

The small pittance allowed to our preachers, and, in many places, the inefficient means used to insure even that, we conceive to be one reason why so many of our useful ministers are induced to locate. Groaning under the pressure of poverty now, and looking forward to a superannuated state, without adequate means afforded them for a comfortable support in the decline of life, they sink under the melancholy prospect, and reluctantly retire from the field, that they may provide a morsel of bread for themselves, their wives, and children.

The many locations, from these and other causes, have a manifest tendency to weaken and embarrass the itinerancy, by obliging us to fill up the vacancies with persons not competent to the work assigned them, and to commit the administration, in some of its important branches, to the hands of young and inexperienced men.

To the same causes we may attribute the many partial locations, that is, families of traveling preachers which are immovably fixed. Their scanty allowance furnishes an excuse (whether justifiable or not, your committee presume not to determine) for combining farming, mercantile business, &c., with the ministration of God’s word. This practice, in the opinion of your committee, exceedingly embarrasses the general superintendency, in the frequent changes which, in the discharge of its duty, are unavoidable. In consequence of this, either those whose families are thus located must be subject to distant removals from their families, or others must be exposed to the inconvenience of frequent and distant removals, to make way for those who are in this partially located state.

We perceive a manifest defect among us, occasioned in some measure by the multiplicity of locations, in regard to ministerial qualifications. Although a collegiate education is not, by your committee, deemed essential to a gospel ministry, yet it appears absolutely necessary for every minister of the gospel to study to show himself approved unto God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed. Every one, therefore, who would be useful as a minister in the Church, should, to a sincere piety and laudable zeal for the salvation of souls, add an ardent desire for useful knowledge; — he should strive by every lawful means to imbue his mind with every science which is intimately connected with the doctrine of salvation by Jesus Christ, and which will enable him to understand and illustrate the sacred Scriptures. But the early departure of many from the work of the ministry among us, of those whose piety, zeal, talent, and mental improvement justified the expectation of their extensive usefulness in the Church, and the manifest indifference of some who remain with us to this important branch of ministerial duty, thus stripping the Church of some of its brightest ornaments, not only exposes her nakedness, but loudly calls for the prompt and vigorous interference of the General Conference. To obviate these evils, and to secure to the Church a succession of holy, zealous, and useful ministers, becomes at this time, in the humble opinion of your committee, the imperious duty of this conference. To accomplish these very desirable objects, your committee beg leave to recommend the following resolutions, viz.:

Resolved.

That it shall be the duty of the presiding elders and preachers to use their influence to carry the rule of Discipline relating to building and renting houses for accommodation of preachers and families into effect. In order to this, each quarterly meeting conference shall appoint a committee, (unless other measures have been adopted,) who, with the aid and advice of the preachers and presiding elder, shall devise such means as may seem fit to raise moneys for that purpose. And we furthermore recommend to each annual conference to make special inquiry of its members respecting this part of their duty.