YALE UNIVERSITY
LIBRARY

THE LIBRARY OF THE
DIVINITY SCHOOL

THE

ECONOMY OP METHODISM

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IN A SERIES OF PAPERS.

By THOMAS E. BOND, Sen., M. D.

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PUBLISHED BY LANE & SCOTT,
200 MULBEKRY-STREET.
JOSEPH LONGKING, PRINTER.
1852.

Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1852, by
G. LANE & L. SCOTT,
in the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the Southern District of New- York.

INTRODUCTION.

" History is philosophy teaching hy example." In all the
affairs of life, it is found safer to derive rules of action from the
common experience of men, than to he governed by speculative
theories, built upon abstract principles, which may, for all we
know, be false or inapplicable. It is true that these abstractions
may be tested by experiment ; but the experiment may cost too
much. It may subvert and overturn those rules of action which
had been found to direct us safely, notwithstanding the imper
fection incident to all human systems ; and it may leave us with
out the ability to return to them. For the undue indulgence of
the imaginative faculty increases and invigorates it, until reason
and judgment succumb to its sway ; and the " balance of power"
in the intellectual faculties is lost. In this state of the mind the
imagination, always closely allied to the passions, riots in the full,
unchecked sovereignty of its influence.
Let us apply these remarks to systems of government. History
teaches, that when any people or nation release themselves from
absolutism by revolution, if they attempt to build up a govern
ment on abstract notions of civil rights, without due attention to
the lessons of human experience, they inevitably fall into anarchy.
And it is as universally observed, that whatever be the evils which
anarchy brings in its train, such a people are not led to retrace
their steps, and to stop at the point of well-balanced government,
established upon the broad ground of expediency, and adapted to
the condition of man as he is — not as he should be. The imagina
tion having the lead, suggests an infinity of abstractions and
visionary theories, until, finally, the evils of successive experi
ments drive them to take refuge in absolute despotism.
The history of France, and the South American republics, fur
nish examples which illustrate the above remarks ; while Holland
and the United States, on the contrary, settled their governments

iv INTRODUCTION.
upon no such abstractions. Whatever of these may he found in
our declaration of independence, when our fathers came to form
a constitution and establish a government, they were governed
by the lights of history and human experience ; and they devised
a government full of checks and balances, which is now the great
example of the world.
Thus it is that abstract speculations operate in the formation
of civil governments ; but they are still more objectionable,
because still more mischievous, in the institution of ecclesiastical
government. In the former, the people may rightfully prescribe
the number of officers they will have, with their several powers
and prerogatives, and the manner of choosing them. The supreme
power resides in the people. But in Church government, the
supreme power is acknowledged to reside in one only Lord and
Lawgiver, to whose authority all must submit implicitly ; and it
is furthermore admitted, that He also selects and appoints officers
who are to execute his commandments. The first commandment
is, " To preach the gospel to every creature, baptizing them in —
into — the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost ; teaching
them" — those who voluntarily submit to His government — " to
do whatsoever I have commanded." Nothing more — nor nothing
less. Nothing more ; for they may not teach " for doctrines the
commandments of men." This was the great sin of the Jewish
teachers, or rabbis. Nothing less ; for this would be taking
away from his commandments.
The next commandment is, that these officers shall take the
" oversight" of the Church, as those who must give an account
of the members to God ; and it would seem to follow, that they
must devise the " rules and regulations " which are necessary to
the execution of the trust confided to them — the preaching of the
gospel, and the oversight of those who are converted by their
ministry. It is not allowed them by their Lord to legislate for
the Church of Christ ; this is his own, exclusive prerogative.
They may not " teach for doctrines the commandments of men,"
nor subject the believers to any other moral obligations than
those which are found in the divine code ; but to execute the moral
discipline enjoined by this code, requires " rules and regulations"
adapted to the particular condition and circumstances of those
over whom the Holy Ghost hath made them overseers or pastors.
Should they exceed the 1'**"+= "+* +lr» an+lim-ifv TvrAsnribprl Tiv TTirv,

INTRODUCTION. V
who is Head over all things to the Church, and assume to be
" lords over God's heritage," they would thereby withdraw their
allegiance from Christ, and it would become the duty of every
" member of his body " — all who acknowledge " Jesus Christ as
Lord" — to renounce their pastoral oversight, and betake them
selves to prayer to the Lord of the harvest, to send forth labourers
into his vineyard.
Church government, then, cannot bear any just analogy to a
commonwealth, or a republic — the essential element of which is,
that the whole system of government is a conventional agreement,
or compact, which may be modified from time to time by those
who framed it, as circumstances may require; or he utterly
changed by the governed, — for the Church of Christ is his
kingdom; he holds the absolute sovereignty over it, having
enacted, not a constitution under which legal statutes may be
passed by subordinate human legislators, but a complete, perfect
code of laws, which no man or council may repeal or alter, add to
or subtract from, and obedience to which is promised by every
subject of this kingdom. True, every one who enters the Church,.
must do so voluntarily. He must consent to the government ;
for our gracious Sovereign compels no one, nor does he authorize
his officers to compel any to become subject to the laws by which
his Church is governed, and all who attempt this, violate the
laws of Christ. There is, therefore, no similarity, nor anything
in common between civil government, originating in conventional
compact, as all civil governments ought to do, and ecclesiastical
government, which originated in the divine sovereignty ; and the
institutions of the one cannot be conformed to those of the other.
To sum up the whole matter, this world is a revolted province
of God's universal empire, and its inhabitants are exposed to the
most awful retributions individually, unless by some means they
obtain pardon. These means have been provided by divine wisdom
and compassion, and messengers have been appointed by God him
self to proclaim a general amnesty — to offer not only pardon, but
everlasting life, to every one who accepts the conditions, and sub
mits to the rightful government of the " King of kings, and Lord
of lords." And there is contained in this proclamation of mercy,
all that is necessary as a rule of life, and the promise of all the
aid we require to enable us to walk in the path of obedience ; and
among other nrovisions, the publishers of it are commanded to be

Vl INTRODUCTION.
pastors over those who embrace the gracious offers of their Ke-
deemer King, taking the oversight of the flock as those who must
give account to the great Shepherd. Such pastors, divinely
charged with such duties, cannot, in the language of the Gene
ral Conference of 1828, " suffer their authority, in these respects,
to be authoritatively controlled."
The following pages will expose a long-continued effort
to " reform " the Methodist Episcopal Church upon principles
diametrically opposite to those on which Church government can
be rightfully based. "With the " Eeformers " the Church is a
republic, and our ecclesiastical system they contended ought to
be conformed to the free institutions of our country.
The opposition very soon became bitter and malignant. The
episcopacy was represented as a fraud practised upon the Church,
not only without Mr. Wesley's sanction, but contrary to his judg
ment and purpose, and maintained by fraud and forgery ; and
the itinerant ministers were not only particeps criminis, but
usurpers, tyrants, &c.
All this was endured for more than seven years ; and little
was written in defence of the Church. Doctor Emory, however,
published a " Defence of our Fathers," in reply to Alexander
M'Caine's " History and Mystery of Methodist Episcopacy ;" and
the work was so triumphant a vindication of the validity and
authenticity of our episcopacy, and so clear and unanswerable a
refutation of all the slanderous allegations of Mr. M'Caine against
our " Fathers," that even his associates and compeers considered
the publication of his pamphlet as the most unfortunate incident
which happened to the reform movement during the war they
maintained against the Methodist Episcopal Church.
The " Appeal to the Methodists," which commences the present
volume, was published in 1827. Other editions followed, hut
they were soon sold, and the work, in the language of the press,
has been for many years "out of print." It preceded the
" Defence of our Fathers," but does not enter upon the defence
of our episcopacy, because the writer of the Appeal knew that
work was in better hands. It is chiefly confined to the inquiry
as to the abstract right of the laity to a lay representation in the
General and annual conferences, together with the " expediency"
and "practicability" of the measure. The writer enjoyed pecu
liar advantages in the investigation of these questions ; for

INTRODUCTION. vn
although the "Wesleyan Eepository," a periodical devoted to
the cause of reform, had been published in Philadelphia for seve
ral years, the seat of war had been transferred to Baltimore, and
the Eepository substituted by the " Mutual Eights," without the
least regard to the interests or the feelings of the editor of the
former paper, who had, it was said, sacrificed much in sustaining
it at the outset, purely from devotion to the cause he advocated.
All this was disregarded, however, by the " Sabeans," as the
editor called them, in Baltimore, and his subscribers were served
with the " Mutual Eights." This periodical was instituted by a
convention of reformers, held immediately after the close of the
General Conference of May, 1824, which was held in the City of
Baltimore. Men of very distinguished ability took part in this
convention. Dr. Jennings, the president, and Dr. Francis
Waters, the secretary, were both scholars and popular local
ministers ; and there were others of no little renown. Most of
these resided in Baltimore, and the author of the Appeal, also
residing there, had frequent opportunities of discussing with
several of them the various subjects connected with the reform
movement. He was thus made acquainted beforehand with all
the arguments which could be brought to sustain the changes
proposed in our ecclesiastical polity, and had also the oppor
tunity of having his own arguments in opposition to those
changes passed through the scrutiny of reform logic, and of
receiving again from this crucible the pure gold, separated from
whatever baser metal they had been mixed in his hands. The
arguments have, too, the advantage of having been applied to a
case really existing, and meeting opposite arguments actually
offered, and not supposititious, cases, and arguments which might
be alleged not to be the true questions in debate.
The work will be found as applicable to the present as to for
mer times. The author has the gratification to know that the
pamphlet did much good at the time it was issued. Many who
had been brought to favour reform by the specious arguments
and vehement declamation of reformers, but who had not com
mitted themselves to party array and compact, changed their
opinions upon reading it, and remained firm in their attachment
to the institutions of our fathers ; and the members and minis
ters of the Church, generally, were confirmed in their adhesion
to Methodism as it is, undisturbed by the visionary theories of

vm INTRODUCTION.
reform. And this was effected, too, without the adventitious
ornament of rhetorical style. The writer expressly declared, he
should have rejected such a dress had it offered ; for " truth
needs no ornament : all she borrows from the pencil is deform
ity." A plain summary of the arguments by which our Church
economy is sustained was that which was wanted then, and it is
supposed to be needed still. It is hoped, therefore, that our Book
Agents will do the Church an acceptable service by offering it to
all who desire to be informed on the subject.
The " Narrative and Defence," &c, which follows the "Appeal,"
was written for a committee who preferred complaints to the
"preacher in charge" of Baltimore City Station, against mem
bers of the " Union Society of Baltimore," on account of cer
tain slanderous publications in the " Mutual Eights," — a peri
odical edited by a committee chosen annually by the society
aforesaid, and acting in its behalf, — and for which publications
the members of said society were held individually responsible,
unless they condemned, and disclaimed all partnership in them by
withdrawing from an association whose evil proceedings they
could not control. The charges were sustained, and the offenders
were expelled from Church fellowship. But pending the trials
protests were published, and announced in the city papers, against
the proceedings of the committee, and the preacher in charge.
The Church authorities, it was alleged, were not competent to
try " Eeformers." There were two opposing parties in the
Church, and neither could rightfully try the other. The pros
ecuting committee could not follow the example of the accused,
and appeal to the public while the trials were pending. All they
could do was to ask a suspension of public judgment, and to pro
mise a plain " narrative and defence of the proceedings " after
the trials should be concluded. This was done, and the work now
presented is a reprint of the justification offered by the committee.
The brethren who preferred and sustained the charges were
men of sound judgment, and generally esteemed both in and out
of the Church for their piety and high Christian character and
deportment, and their "Narrative and Defence" was accepted
very generally by the Christian public, as a sufficient vindication
of the Church proceedings in the cases to which it referred. We
republish it, however, chiefly because it contains the best com
mentary extant on some very important rules of discipline, and

INTRODUCTION. is
will be useful as a guide to all who may hereafter be placed in
circumstances similar to those in which the brethren of the
Church in Baltimore were placed by the reformers of 1827-8.
The rule of discipline which forbids the "endeavouring to sow
dissensions in any of our societies, by inveighing against either
our doctrines or discipline," was one of the rules which the mem
bers of the Union Society were specifically charged with vio
lating; and it will be found that the word "inveighing" is
taken in the sense of "vehement railing and reproach" — not
calm and dispassionate discussion, or temperate argument in
favour of altering our rules. Another charge was, "Speaking
evil of ministers," and the rule on this subject was defined to
mean by "evil-speaking" unjust reproach, slander, calumny; so
that the truth cannot come under the definition of the term,
however severe the reproach may be. On the whole, we think the
practical illustrations of our Discipline, which the " Narrative and
Defence" affords, will justify the giving it a place in this volume.
But may it not be useful in a still more important respect ?
The work contains a concise history of transactions which will
afford lessons of wisdom to all ecclesiastical reformers in time to
come. " Eeformers," says Mr. Wesley, " generally commence by
condemning others ; we" — his associates at Oxford — " begin by
condemning ourselves." This was right and safe ; and perhaps
their subsequent success was in a great degree owing to this
manner of beginning. Those who read the " Narrative and De
fence," will see reformers in a different mood and temper ; and
the reader will marvel that Christians and Christian ministers
could possibly indulge in such rancour and bitterness — such
vindictive and uncharitable language — and even in downright
slander and calumny. If he be a reformer, he will look at the
extracts from the " Mutual Eights " as at a beacon admonishing
him of the danger to which he is exposed, from the opposition he
must encounter, of losing his temper and violating the law of
Christian kindness and charity. He will find the strong have
fallen. " Let him who assuredly standeth take heed lest he fall."
We have also inserted the " Eeport of the Committee on Peti
tions and Memorials," adopted unanimously by the General Con
ference of 1828, with annotations by the author of the Appeal.
This was published in the " Itinerant," a periodical, in newspaper
form, published in Baltimore and edited by the Eev. Melville B.

X INTRODUCTION.
Cox, who afterward went to Liberia as a missionary and died
there. It was issued twice a month for three years, and then
discontinued, as no longer necessary to the defence of the Church.
The work contains many valuable papers on the controversy then
existing, and contributed by writers of great ability. Many of
these papers deserve preservation, and we regret that we cannot
add them to this volume without inconveniently augmenting its
size and price. The Conference Eeport is an invaluable docu
ment, in which legislative power is explicitly disclaimed, and the
Scriptural views of pastoral oversight are clearly stated. It
was, however, vehemently assailed by the reform convention, and
the Notes were written in its defence, — with what success the
reader will judge.
Soon after the Conference of 1828, the reformers seceded from
the Church and " set up for themselves." At their convention in
1828, they passed "Articles of Association" for the reformed
Churches ; and, at the next convention, in 1830, they formed a
constitution and form of government for " The Methodist Pro
testant Church." A review of the " Articles of Association " and
of the "Constitution" will be found in this volume, published
originally in the " Itinerant." It was the first opportunity
afforded to ascertain the specific changes which our radical breth
ren intended to effect in the economy of the Methodist Episcopal
Church, had we consented to be " reformed" after their fashion ;
and we proceeded to compare the new system of Church polity
with that which they had renounced. The reader will see how
much easier it is to innovate than to reform.
The other papers, taken likewise from the Itinerant, and
included in this volume, all relate to the subject of controversy
during the ruthless war waged upon our Church, or to incidents
growing out of it, and will all be found illustrative of the grave
questions of ecclesiastical polity brought under review.
Finally, we have added, in an Appendix, some remarks on the
late reform movement in Philadelphia. This, we hope, we have
done in a kind and Christian spirit. If we have not, we have
not fulfilled our intention or duty, and shall very much regret
it, as the brethren concerned have, by their prudent and inoffen
sive proceedings, eminently entitled themselves to the most
courteous treatment from us, and the Christian regards of the
whole Church.

CONTENTS.

Page
AN APPEAL TO THE METHODISTS, IN OPPOSITION TO THE CHANGES
PROPOSED IN THEIR CHURCH GOVERNMENT  9
A NARRATIVE AND DEFENCE OF THE PROCEEDINGS OF THE ME
THODIST EPISCOPAL CHURCH IN BALTIMORE CITY STATION  57
MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES  137
Report of the Committee on Petitions and Memorials, adopted by the General
Conference, 1828  139
Annotations on the preceding Report  150
Remarks on Dr. Jennings's " Review of the Methodist Magazine and Quarterly
Review, on Petitions and Memorials."  175
The Convention  214
A Review of the " Conventional Articles for the Associated Methodist Churches." 219
A Review of the Constitution and Discipline of " The Methodist Protestant
Church."  257
Remarks on an Address to the Members of the Methodist Episcopal Church in
Queen Anne's County  303
Answer to Vindicator  309
General Conference Resolutions, 1828  311
Mr. Stilwell's Letter  322
Truth always Safe  324
A Word to "Nathan."  329
Who are the Persecuted?  332
Notice of the Periodical entitled " Methodist Correspondent."  336
Mr. Snethen's Second Reply to Mr. O'Kelly  350
Review of the Reform Controversy  363
To the Public  368
APPENDIX  379

AN APPEAL TO THE METHODISTS,

IN OPPOSITION TO

THE CHANGES PROPOSED IN THEIR CHURCH
GOVERNMENT.

Human experience which is always contradicting theory, is the only test of truth.— Johsson
It should be repeated until it comes into the currency of a proverb, to innovate is not to
reform. — Bueke.
Knowledge puffeth up, but charity edifieth.— Paul.

DEDICATION

To Rev. Nicholas Snethen.

Rev. Sir, — Besides the common vanity of authors, which leads them to
prefix to tlieir works the names of celebrated men, I have other reasons
for inscribing the following pages to you. You have condescended to
notice my " book " while yet in embryo, and before its merits could .pos
sibly be appreciated. We have your gracious promise, that " if it should
turn out to be in any measure what you suspect it will be, I must look out
for something more than visionary theories."
I was at first doubtful whether or not the. remarks in the Mutual Rights,
No. 32, over the signature of Spectator, were intended for me ; for although
I was designated by my professional appellation, and was conscious of
having signified an intention of writing in defence of our Church polity,
and, moreover, did not know of any other doctor who had done so, yet,
as I was also described as a " learned and profound divine,'' a conscious
unworthiness withheld me from appropriating the remarks to myself.
Spectator did not, however, leave us long to doubt ; in a subsequent num
ber, the doctor was pointed out as one of the signers of a publication
which appeared in the " American and Commercial Daily Advertiser," of
a particular date, — and as there were no doctors who signed that publi
cation except Doctor Roberts and myself, and as Doctor Roberts had never
proposed to write on the subject alluded to, the application of your remarks
to me was inevitable.
The compliment, then, of " learned and profound divine," to one who
had scarcely passed his novitiate in theology, must be understood as a
ruse de guerre, intended to raise public expectation to a pitch which it

12 DEDICATION.
was hoped the author could not reach, and thereby lessen his chance of a
patient and impartial reading; for it would be great vanity to suppose,
that this misapplied compliment had originated in the many rumours
with which you seem of late to have been so wofully beset.
And if we were not left to conjecture who was the object of your threats
and denunciations, neither could there be any doubt as to the real name
of the author of them. Spectator claims to himself the honour of being
the father of the revolutionary project which so unhappily agitates our
Church, for "when V he "began to write on the subject of reform he had
but one colleague." 'Tis he, then, that sits on the whirlwind and directs
the storm ; and you, sir, have too long occupied that " bad eminence "
to have remained unknown. And besides, Spectator, in the course of his
desultory observations, mentions other circumstances of his own history
that leave no doubt as to his real name.
You have been so good as to promise, that if my "book cannot be
answered," you will yourself "announce my victory;" but the manifest
perturbation of temper in which you write, and which I will do you the
justice to say, is unlike your former self, and the prejudice you manifest
against the author, leave him very little hope of a favourable decision,
whatever may be the weight of his arguments ; yet I cannot but be flat
tered by the intimation that you intend to enter the lists with me. It
will greatly lessen the disgrace, and alleviate the mortification of defeat,
to be vanquished by one so celebrated in controversy. Should I be slain
by so renowned a warrior, my humble name will be immortalized, for it
will float down the stream of time in company with the history of his
achievements. Occupying the high and commanding station of author and leader of
this wonderful reformation, you will be mortified to learn that your cre
dulity has been shamefully played upon and abused by " rumour with her
thousand tongues," to whom you have been so fondly listening. To say
nothing of the report respecting what you have "heard" that Bishop
George said, and which I am authorized to affirm has been totally mis
represented, you have been entirely misled in all that you have written
respecting myself: you had heard that I had written " a book," which at
that time was not true; you had, nevertheless, understood it had been
"considerably circulated in manuscript," and, what is worse, you had
heard from " second and third hands much eulogy upon it !" Who could

DEDICATION. 13
have been the authors of this gratuitous eulogy upon a book they
had not seen, and which was not yet written, it is impossible to
imagine. But this is not all, — under the influence of these teazing hearsays, you
have represented me as a deserter from the cause of radicalism.
I have, you say, "been in your citadel," and have "become acquainted
with your camp ;" and must prepare to pay up " an old score to the
reformers." Now, sir, let me ask you, When was I in " your citadel," or
in "your camp?" Was I ever a member of any "Union Society," — an
advocate for lay and local delegation — or an enemy to the Methodist
Episcopal government ? Never, sir ; and as to possessing myself of your
secrets in order to " spring a mine," whatever I may have suspected, I never
knew until now that you had any in your " camp." You had always led
us to believe that all your measures were openly avowed. I was not
therefore apprized before, that you and your friends were engaged in a
secret conspiracy against the Church. Heretofore the oldside brethren
have had none of these " lights to aid them ;" they ought to be much
obliged to you for the information, as, although they may not be disposed
to " spring a mine," it will be their duty to counteract one designed against
themselves. Your charge of desertion, sir, is another of those stratagems of war
which your skill in controversy enables you so dexterously to employ.
You hope, by this odious charge, to anticipate any influence which my
"book" might possibly have on the reformers; well knowing that per
sonal prejudice against an author, is an impenetrable shield against his
arguments. But, sir, is it any crime for a man to change his opinions ? Do you not
use arguments from the pulpit ; and what do you intend by them, if you
do not design to change people's opinions ? A man may be ashamed of
having held wrong opinions, but certainly not of having changed them.
Was it then the mistaken notion you were under, that I was a truant to
the doctrines of radicalism, that occasioned me to fall under the heavy
weight of your displeasure? This would be strange, "passing strange,"
because you yourself furnish me, in your own example, a justification, not
only for change, but for entire revolution in opinion on this subject. You
were once not only the advocate of our present form of Church govern
ment, but the chosen champion of Mr. Asbury and the Conference, against

14 DEDICATION.

Mr. O'Kelly and his "republican Methodism,"— and performed your task,
too, with great zeal and success.
Mr. O'Kelly, it seems, complained of having "suffered much for the
cause of truth and liberty." He claimed to be "the advocate of liberty
and equality,"— and "an enemy of despotism and oppression,"— yet you
told him, " By the help of grace, we will hold fast our union and integrity.
If any man among us should attempt to attack either, we will note that
man, and admonish him as a brother ; if he still persist to cause division*
among us, either in doctrine or discipline, we will have no more fellowship
with him." And again : " Mr. O'Kelly need not think to frighten us with
scare-crows, — we are not to be terrified into Ecclesiastical Republicanism,
by an imaginary dread of falling into Popery." "By the help of grace,"
sir, you and your brethren banished ecclesiastical republicanism from the
Church, and we had ceased to hear of it these many years, — and now
we have this same ecclesiastical republicanism "returning to us like a
thief from transportation," under the " alias " of reform.
It was not then for having, as you supposed, changed my opinions, that
I have incurred your displeasure and am threatened with chastisement, —
nor could it be for intending to write a "book" in defence of our Church
government, for reformers have all along complained of our not writing.
Perhaps the real cause of your wrath may be found in a remark which I
have already quoted : " When you first began to write on the subject of
reform, you had but one colleague." You are the father of this great
project, — and perhaps men are as much attached to their intellectual as
their corporeal progeny. We know, moreover, that the fondness of a
parent is not diminished, but is rather increased, by the deformity of his
offspring. In proportion as the defects of organization threaten its life,
will the tenderness and solicitude of the parent be awakened ; even utter
hopelessness will not remove or appease his anxiety. Thus it may be with
you, — you cannot bear to have the deformity of your bantling pointed out
to you, — and it would be cruel to ridicule the fondness, and sport with the
feelings of a fond father, did he not absurdly insist that all should look
upon the rickety urchin with the same partiality as he does himself.
But whatever occasioned your severe animadversions, the consequences
are to be dreadful indeed ! The cry of the commander has given to the
whole army an object of pursuit and vengeance. Already one of your
subalterns has echoed the war whoop, and " On, brethren, on !" will re-

DEDICATION. 15
sound from the centre to the circumference. Itinerant, local and lay
reformers, all "united against one poor" doctor, "are fearful odds." The
subaltern alluded to has already distinguished me as the "chief officer of
the star-chamber, to my Lord of Canterbury." Notwithstanding I have
the misfortune to be out of favour with you, I will do you the service to
rebuke the indiscreet ardour of this recruit, lest he should do you more
harm than good by his temerity. Let him know, then, that his fictitious
signature has not concealed him as well as he intended; we have had a
peep under his mask, and would advise him to be careful in future not to
expose his ignorance in print. The star-chamber was a civil not an
ecclesiastical tribunal, for it was composed of the judges of the realm, and
the king's privy council ; whatever part, then," My Lord of Canterbury" took
in the proceedings of the court, he acted in the capacity of a civil, not an
ecclesiastical officer. He was there by the appointment of the king, as a
member of his privy council, not in his quality of archbishop. Let him
keep his learning- for the pulpit — a rhetorical flourish ad captandum
vulgus may pass, as well as crude geological arguments, when mixed
up with the desultory matter of a very long sermon ; but it may not
be so safe to place either before the public through the medium of the
press. In sober seriousness, my dear sir, I was not aware of having done or
said anything to alarm your " pride " or to excite your " prejudice " until
Spectator informed me that I " had not been sparing in means to rouse
and aggravate both." In truth I had always loved and esteemed you ;
and when I saw you climbing the steep and slippery ascent to revolution
ary distinction, my affection remained unabated, though I was compelled
by a sense of duty to take an opposite course. I still wait with painful
anxiety, to see the result of the desperate game you are playing. You
never can reform the Church after your fashion : but you may rend it ; and
have cause after all to lament your fatal success. Among those who in
the dismemberment of the Church will follow in your train, there may,
and probably will be, many good men " wrong in their opinions, but right
in then- sentiments : " but there will also follow, those turbulent, discon
tented spirits, who are impatient of all control ; and all those who are
against our Discipline, because our Discipline is against them. With
such discordant materials to arrange — such a heterogeneous mass to or
ganize — you will have work enough upon your hands ; and perhaps some

16 DEDICATION.
future adversary may address you in the language which, on a similar
occasion, you addressed to Mr. O'Kelly : —
" Where are the societies which Mr. O'Kelly and his brethren have
formed, of those who have been converted by their instrumentality, since
they have been separated from the Episcopal Methodists ? Where are the
seals to their ministry, the living epistles written upon the fleshly tables
of the heart, known and read of all men? Perhaps the inquiry is pre
mature. It is a work of time to organize a society. The Republican
Methodists have not had much leisure to call sinners to repentance. For
these seven years most of their attention has been taken up in exposing the
evils of episcopacy, correcting its abuses, and opening the eyes of the poor
deluded people who are sinking under the billows of despotism ! When
they have fully exposed the ambition, the chicanery, and the lucrative views
of bishops; when they have turned the people's ears away from hearing
their delusions ; when they shall have written a few more ' apologies,''
' appeals ' and ' epistles to the elect lady and her children,'' lo ! then
they will turn to the Gentiles. Then, indeed, we may expect to see the
happy result of a system so purely evangelical"
You will then perhaps regret, that you had not profited by the remark
so often heard from your old friend Mr. Asbury : " Local men have local
views." You have, however, done me one essential service by your remarks :
you have taught me to count the cost of this undertaking — the friendships
it will dissolve and the animosities it will awaken. I am free to confess
that the fearful aggregate is appalling. To a Christian it must be a pain
ful sacrifice of feeling, and to a professional man a sacrifice of interest.
For I am aware that in controversies the friendships which grow out of
similarity of views and unity of effort, subside with the occasion which
gave rise to them ; while the enmities remain after the cause of the con
test shall have long passed away. Nothing but a firm conviction of duty
could have induced me to write ; and he who hesitates between duty and
inclination is undone.
I am, sir, with wounded feelings, but unabated affection,
Your brother in Christ,
THE AUTHOR.

AN APPEAL

The Wesleyan Methodists have long attracted the attention of all classes
both in Europe and in America. Their origin was confessedly at a time
of great moral and religious darkness, in which the Scriptural doctrines
of justification by faith only, and the sensible witness of it in the soul of
the believer, were heard as strange things, and those who preached them
were denounced as fanatics and enthusiasts. Yet, within less than a cen
tury, a few evangelical missionaries have caused these gospel truths to be
known and almost universally acknowledged, in every country they have
visited, and by every people to whom they have had access. We do not
mean that all have received them, so as to become the subjects of their sav
ing influence ; but the truths which at first were everywhere opposed, have
now obtained the general assent of those to whom they have been preached.
A few good men, of plain sense, and (with two or three exceptions) with
out extraordinary talents or learning, have effected this moral change, in a
large portion of Christendom. Having set out with the single object of
" spreading Scripture holiness over the land," they kept their purpose steadily
in view, and without the aid of wealth, or the patronage of power, have suc
ceeded to an extent which is the wonder and astonishment of the world.
Let it be remembered that no original purpose of establishing a separate
sect or denomination of people, entered into the design of Mr. Wesley and
his coadjutors. They only desired to waken up the different Protestant
denominations, and particularly the Church of England, to a just ap
prehension of the renovating influence of gospel truth, and of the import
ance of Christian discipline. The circumstances which subsequently led
to the formation of separate societies were altogether unforeseen ; and the
gradual organization of that system of Church polity which now distin
guishes the Methodists, seems to be as much the work of a superintending
Providence as any other part of their history.
It will not be denied that there had always been in the Church of Eng
land, and in the dissenting denominations, both before and at the time

18 AS APPEAL.
when Mr. Wesley instituted his system of missionary ministration, many
pious and evangelical clergymen ; but their light was hidden as under a
bushel. Confined to a narrow sphere of operation, their usefulness was
necessarily limited to the congregations to whom they ministered. ^ It was
the itinerant system that enabled Mr. Wesley and the preachers in con
nexion with him, to dispense the word of life in every place and to all
classes of the people — to preach the gospel to the poor— to follow those
who did not come to church, into the hedges and highways, and to turn
the outcasts of mankind from darkness to light, and from the power of
Satan to God !
The good that has been done by the Methodists would be very inade
quately estimated, if it were measured by the numbers they have gathered
into their own societies, numerous as they are. For although they have
been led by circumstances to establish a separate and independent commu
nity, they have nevertheless been made gi'eatly instrumental in effecting
their original purpose ; that of awakening the slumbering zeal, and stirring
up the diligence of the other Christian denominations. The success with
which their missionary plan of operation has been attended, has excited
the attention and directed the efforts of other churches to this primitive
method of propagating the gospel ; and though many other circumstances
have contributed to urge on the mighty effort which is now making by
the different Protestant denominations, both in Europe and America,
to send the gospel to every land, and people, and tongue under heaven,
nothing has had so much agency in originating and forwarding this glo
rious design, as the itinerant missionary plan of the Methodists.
In our own country especially, the ecclesiastical economy of the Method
ists has been, and still is, peculiarly adapted to the circumstances of the
people. A sparse population, scattered over an immense territory, could
not be congregated so as to support a settled ministry. The peculiar
organization of our itinerating system obviated this difficulty, and the
gospel has been carried to the very houses of the people. A number of
small congregations collected in different and remote settlements, have
supplied, by their separate contributions, a pecuniary support to the min
istry, which no single congregation could have furnished. As the popula
tion became dense, and their benevolence was awakened and directed by
the influence of religion, they were enabled to send the gospel to the new
settlements, which were continually forming in the interior of the country.
The emigrants had no sooner reached the wilderness than the ministers of
the gospel appeared amongst them, and they were saved, in a good degree,
from the ignorance and the barbarism which inevitably follow the privation
of religious instruction. A circumstance that was related to me by my
brother, the late Rev. John Wesley Bond, who accompanied Bishop
Asbury, for several years, in his annual travels through the United States,

AN APPEAL. 19
will serve as a fine illustration of the above remarks. The aged and vener
able bishop was preaching to a congregation assembled in the woods, on the
borders of one of the western States. It was during the late war, and imme
diately after the battle on our northern frontier, in which the militia in the
service of the United States had refused to cross the lines, to the assistance
of the regular troops, then engaged in an unequal contest with the enemy.
The preacher having urged home upon his auditory the truths of the
gospel, in his own pointed manner, appealed to their own recollections, for
the circumstances which proved the disinterestedness with which the Me
thodist preachers had always come amongst them. "We followed you
to the wilderness," said he, " when the earth was our only resting place, and
the sky our canopy ; when your own subsistence depended on the preca
rious success of the chase, and consequently you had little to bestow on
us. We sought not yours but you. And now show us the people who
have no preacher, and whose language we understand, and we will send
them one ; yes, we will send them one : for the Methodist preachers are
not militia, who will not, cross the lines ; they are regulars, and they must
go."* This remark is the best explanation which can be given of that system
which has enabled the Methodist preachers to surmount the many physical
and moral obstacles which everywhere seemed to block up their way. It
consists in an evangelical itinerant ministry, under the direction of a gene
ral superintendent, clothed with the authority of distributing the labour as
circumstances may require ; while at the same time these itinerating
preachers, that they may also afford the benefits of a pastoral ministry to
then- converts, are empowered in their collective capacity, to make such
prudential regulations as may be necessary for the enforcement of Chris
tian discipline, both amongst themselves and the people of their charge.
The rapid growth of the Methodist Episcopal Church, under its present
economy, is certainly without parallel in modem times. There are now
living in this city three members of the first society formed by the
Methodists in Baltimore, which consisted of only fourteen members. The
society now contains more than five thousand members. They have nine
houses of public worship, and probably one-third of the population of the
city (who attend public worship anywhere) attend Methodist preaching.
The Rev. Wm. Watters, lately deceased, was the first American Methodist
preacher who had a seat in conference. He took his seat in that body in
the year 1773, when the conference consisted of but ten preachers in all.
There are now more than one thousand four hundred travelling preachers
in the American connexion, and from four to five thousand local preach-
* The good bishop unintentionally touched a patriotic feeling by his allusion to the
recreant militia, and the whole multitude took off their hats and gave him three cheers.
The bishop was alarmed. " John, I went too far," said he ; "I went too far, John."

20 AN APPEAL.
ers ; while the members exceed 300,000, and are rapidly increasing in
numbers. When it is considered that we retain none in fellowship who
are known to live in the practice of vice of any kind, or who indulge in
any of those fashionable amusements which have a tendency to alienate
the heart from spiritual things, it will be admitted that there must exist
something peculiarly efficient in a plan of operation which has suc
ceeded to such an astonishing degree, in despite of human prejudice and
passion, in establishing a moral government which exercises a positive and
unrelenting control over all the natural propensities of the human heart.
It would be as illiberal as unjust to allege, that this success was wholly
owing to any peculiar doctrines enforced by the Methodist ministry. Our
doctrines are avowedly those of the Protestant Episcopal Church ; and all
our tenets which we hold to be essential, are held in common by most
other Protestant denominations. This great and wonderful success, must
then have been owing to the missionary character of our ministry, — a
body of evangelical preachers, itinerating over the continent under the
direction of a general superintendent, with power to distribute the labour as
circumstances may require. To submit to such absolute direction, re
quired on the part of the preachers great sacrifices of feeling, and incal
culable privations of personal comfort. Nothing could induce any man
to submit, and patiently persevere in such submission, but a firm convic
tion of the necessity of the measure ; for he not only consents to give up
his right of selecting the place of his labours, but to be sent to a people
who make no stipulations with him for his support. He is neither to ask
nor expect any guarantee for even food and clothing. He must rely im
plicitly on Providence and the bounty of his brethren, for his maintenance.
The people on their part, in order to support this itinerant plan of minis
terial labour, have consented to surrender the right of choosing their
pastor, and permit these missionaries to make the regulations by which
the whole Church, preachers and people, are to be governed in spiritual
things — which, after all, amounts to no more than authority to enforce the
moral discipline of the Bible. The whole system, in fact, is a system of
sacrifices, made for the purpose of promoting the great interests of the
. Redeemer's kingdom,— not with the selfish view of securing advantages
to ourselves, but to enable us to send the gospel to those who are either
too poor to pay for it, or too ignorant to know the value of it, and there
fore do not desire it. It is this great object, which has led us to make the
¦sacrifices which have characterized our history, and carried the renovating,
redeeming influences of the gospel into the dark places of the earth, the
abodes of ignorance and vice, for more than a century past ; and he who
is now unwilling to make them, may notwithstanding be a very good
man — nay, a good Christian— but he is unfit for a Methodist, and the
sooner he renounces the profession the better for the Church.

AN APPEAL. 21
It is this system of Church government — so simple in its structure, and
efficient in its operation ; so tested by experience, and justified by success ;
and, withal, so sanctified in the feelings and affections of our people, by
the endearing associations with which it stands connected — that we are now
called upon, not to modify, but radically to change ; not to mend in some
of its less important details, but to alter in its fundamental principles, and
to substitute for it a speculative scheme of government, inapplicable to our
circumstances, and therefore impossible to be effected, — a scheme founded
on abstract notions of natural rights, but which none of its advocates have
attempted to exhibit in any visible or tangible shape or form, and, there
fore, they have carefully avoided the discussion of the parts most important
in any system — namely, its practicability and expediency. Happy for us
the scheme is not new. In Europe it has had its day of noise and strife,
and has ceased to agitate the Church ; and in this country, Mr. O'Kelly
started it more than thirty years ago, left the Church, and drew off several
of the preachers with him. He lived to see the ruins of the visionary
fabric he had laboured to erect, and to mourn over the desolation which
he had brought upon that part of the vineyard where, as a Methodist
preacher, he so faithfully and usefully laboured, but which he had after
ward turned out to be ravaged and destroyed by "republican Methodism."
The formidable phalanx now arrayed against us, may, it is feared, do us
much harm ; but we will take protection under that strong Arm which
has heretofore defended us. Hitherto our history has shown that the
great Head of the Church had appointed us for a special work in his vine
yard, and that he superintended and directed the labour ; opening the
way before our ministry ; qualifying and sustaining them in their arduous
labours, under circumstances which would have discouraged any but such
as were assured of the Divine support, and who were prepared to believe,
in hope against hope. Great conflicts await us, but out of all the Lord
will deliver us : while he is with us, the more we are oppressed, the more
wo shall multiply and grow. Let us be faithful to our calling— let us
watch unto prayer. The present revolutionary scheme of our disaffected
members will share the fate of all the similar projects which have preceded
it. Our children will read of it in history ; but ere they take our places
in the Church, the troubled waters shall have heard the voice of Him who
says to the winds and the waves, " Be still," and they obey his voice.
The changes contended for by the reformers, are certainly such as, if
effected, must alter all the fundamental principles of our ecclesiastical
polity — and the present contest will mark the most interesting period in
the history of Methodism. Our separation from the Church of England
was a change of much less importance, as the connexion was at any time
more nominal than real. That Church never was permitted to exercise
any control or jurisdiction over the Methodist societies, either in England

22 AN APPEAL.
or America ; and in fact the change was only perceived by our people, in
the administration of the ordinances by those who had not derived their
authority from that Church. The original principles of our institution
remained unimpaired by the separation; the missionary system of min
isterial operation still directed the conferences; and the superintendent of
the Methodist Society acquired no new powers under the new denomina
tion of bishop of the Methodist Episcopal Church, except the right of
ordaining ! But the changes now contended for, go to alter the whole
system, — to subvert the original principles of the compact between the
ministry and the membership ; to reclaim rights, which had been hereto
fore surrendered on both sides for the common good, — and to substitute a
plan not yet defined, and perhaps undefinable, based on abstract metaphysi
cal rights, which are supposed to be inherent in the members of the Church.
Before we consent to the adoption of these revolutionary projects, it
will certainly be our duty carefully to examine them ; to ascertain if
there be nothing visionary in their nature — nothing inapplicable in their
provisions, or destructive in their tendencies.
To enumerate and comment upon all the changes which have been
proposed in our government and discipline, would swell this volume to
an undue size, and might impose too heavy a tax upon the time, both of
my readers and myself. It is, moreover, unnecessary, because our re
formers have agreed to merge, for the present, all other questions of change
in the one great effort to effect such an alteration in the government as
may provide for an immediate representation of the local preachers and
laity in the General Conference ; justly calculating that when this alter
ation is obtained, they may easily introduce whatever other changes they
may have in contemplation. Upon the propriety and utility of this fun
damental change, then, must this controversy turn ; and we propose to
examine, in the first place, the claim of right which has been urged in
favour of this measure, and then the expediency and practicability of the
measure itself. And first, of the right of representation, set up by the re
formers. It will be unreservedly conceded that, if the right to demand this pri
vilege can be clearly established, it necessarily puts an end to all contro
versy ; for no religious man or body of men can, with a good conscience,
withhold what it is the right of another to possess. If, then, our reformers
have shown, either from Scripture authority or from the natural rights of
man, a right to send delegates to the General Conference, or otherwise to
participate immediately in the legislative power of the Church, it must be
accorded to them without limitation or reserve, whenever a majority shall
demand it. We will, therefore, endeavour candidly and fairly to examine
these pretensions ; and we hope for a patient and impartial hearing.
The grounds on which these claims of right are rested, have not been

AN APPEAL. 23
so distinctly stated by their advocates as we could have wished — they have
been rather assumed as incontrovertible, than supported by argument :
but when arguments have been employed, they have been drawn from two
sources : — First, the Holy Scriptures ; and, secondly, the political rights
recognised by the civil institutions of our country. To the first, namely,
the Holy Scriptures — the great charter of the Christian Church — the
appeal would be final if they supported the claim. But we have not been
able to find in these sacred records, anything which goes to sanction the
pretensions set up by our reformers ; on the contrary, we believe the
Scriptures no where prescribe any form of government for the Christian
Church. This, however, is only our opinion — formed, indeed, after a patient
examination of those passages of Scripture which have been most con
fidently appealed to by the advocates of the different Church governments
which have been established in the Christian world, but still an opinion
which may be erroneous ; and if our opponents can make out a form of
government, prescribed in the New Testament, as essential to the consti
tution of the Church of Christ, we promise, for ourselves, an implicit sub
mission to its mandates — we will neither cavil nor reason about it ; but
yield to such authority, an entire and unqualified obedience.
In the meantime, however, we may state some of the reasons for the
opinion we have given, that the Scriptures have prescribed to the Church
no particular form of government for the regulation of her outward eco
nomy ; for we do not include in the idea of government the moral dis
cipline of the Church, any more than her religious tenets.
After an attentive perusal of the controversy which has been so long
maintained by the different denominations of Christians, each endeavour
ing to show the Scriptural authority for their different forms of govern
ment, we have not found any one of those advocates who satisfactorily
supports the superior claims of his Church; and the controversy is still
maintained by the different sects, each appealing to Scripture, and each
supporting their appeals by arguments so specious and plausible as to leave
the impartial inquirer in the utmost doubt and perplexity. Now we can
not believe that anything which is essential to the economy of the Church
of Christ, has been so vaguely defined, as to elude the honest and patient
inquiry of even a man of plain common sense, much less %f men of such
learning, piety, and ability, as have engaged in this controversy.
Under the Mosaic dispensation, the Levitical economy was made essen
tial to the constitution of the Church. It could not be altered, or super
seded by any human authority ; and hence it was described and enjoined
with a particularity and exactness, which was not, and could not, be mis
understood. The different orders of the priesthood, the family from which
they were to be taken, their authority and their several duties, their dress,
the time and the manner of making the offerings and performing the sacri-

24 AN APPEAL.
fices, in short, all that belonged to it, was prescribed with a precision of
language, and a circumstantiality of detail, which left no room for mistake
or misapprehension. If this is not the case under the Christian dispensa
tion, it must be because there does not exist the same necessity for it.
The Jewish Church was instituted with a different design, and therefore
required a different organization. Its institutions were especially designed
for a particular family, and accordingly the rites and ceremonies of the
Church could only be performed at an appointed place. Such an economy
could only be preserved amongst an insulated people, where the whole
nation was under a Theocracy. Christianity, on the contrary, was origin
ally designed to diffuse itself over the whole world, — to establish itself in
all countries, however different their forms of civil government might be
found, and without pretending to interfere with any of the existing political
establishments : with this design, any particular form of Church govern
ment was wholly incompatible ; and therefore none was imposed — at least
none was made essential to the existence of the Christian Church. It is
obvious that had any external organization been made essential, there
have been times of persecution when in some of those countries where the
gospel has been planted there could have been no visible Church at all.
Wherever there were two or three believers in Christ, they constituted a
Church, though they might be all members of the same household, and
though there was no minister (in the common acceptation of the word)
amongst them ; for Christ himself, according to his promise, was in the
midst of them. As these families of believers coalesced into communities
the Church was enlarged, and they were left to adopt such prudential re
gulations, from time to time, as occasion might require; and we believe
this to be the simple origin of all that has been known in the world under
the denomination of Church government.
We further infer the liberty of any body of Christians to adopt that
form of government which they deem most expedient, from the fact that
God has, at different times, manifested his approbation of the efforts of the
different sects and denominations, by especial effusions of the Holy Spirit :
under their ministrations, sinners have been awakened and converted •
believers quickened and built up in their most holy faith ; and at this time
the mighty missionary efforts which are making in the heathen world, are
owned and blessed by the great Head of the Church, whatever be the
distinguishing appellation of the missionary, or the sect under whose
Church government he may have arranged himself. We think, therefore,
that whatever infinite Wisdom owns and blesses cannot be wrong ; or, at
least, not essentially wrong : or, in other words, if the Author of our reli
gion had appointed or ordained any particular form of government, per
petually obligatory on the Christian Church, he would not sanction a de
parture from his own institutions, by manifesting his presence and power

AN APPEAL. 25
amongst those who have seceded from them ; neither would he have left
those institutions to the uncertain conjectures of fallible men, or to the
vague inferences which can be drawn from a few incidental remarks in the
Holy Scriptures.
If, however, this reasoning appear to our opponents to be inconclusive,
we fairly leave them the task of pointing out the exclusive Scripture plan
of Church government ; and if they will not insist upon changing our
economy until they have performed this task, we will be satisfied — ere
that time the millennium will have commenced, and we shall have no further
occasion for doubtful disputations.
We proceed, in the next place, to consider the argument drawn from the
natural inherent rights of mankind — namely, that of being entitled, either
in person or by their representatives, to have a voice in the legislature by
whose acts they are governed. On this argument the changes have been
rung with incessant reiteration. We have been reminded that it is the
birthright of every American ; and to withhold it, is the utmost stretch of
despotism and tyranny. And our reformers have fondly compared their
efforts to obtain this privilege in the Church to our national struggle for
independence ! Now, after such long and loud complaints, one would
naturally suppose that those who made them had really been deprived of
some rights which had appertained to them, either as men or as Christians ;
that when they complain of tyranny and despotism, they are labouring
under some grievous oppression, from which they had been heretofore
endeavouring ineffectually to free themselves, but under which they were
still held by the unrelenting hand of arbitrary power — of usurped and
tyrannical authority : and yet nothing of all this has happened. The com
plainants are under no government but such as they have voluntarily put
themselves under, and which they can, at any time, renounce. They have
been deprived of no rights or privileges, either as men or as Christians,
but such as they voluntarily surrendered for the common interest of the
community of which they became members, and which they can reclaim
when they please ; yet this is all the tyranny of which they have to com
plain. On this ground alone they have compared their brethren who dif
fer with them to the " officers of the British crown," who could not see the
justice of the claims made by the Americans. It is certain, however, that
we never should have complained of these officers of the crown, or of the
king either, had they been willing to allow us the rights which we freely
accord to our reformers — namely, the right to renounce their allegiance,
and of setting up for themselves.
Let us, however, examine this pretension, so confidently relied upon by
our reformers, more analytically ; and we beg leave once for all to say,
that we do as cordially and as fully approve the principles of liberty and
equality of rights acknowledged by the Constitution of these United States,

26 AN APPEAL.
as do our brethren, the reformers. We believe that the people have a
natural inherent right to make a constitution and form of government, and
to alter or amend it, or substitute another at their sovereign will and plea
sure. But we assert that these rights grow out of our civil relations, and
do not necessarily belong to us as members of any institution into which
we have voluntarily entered, for the plain reason that we do not bear the
same relation to the one as to the other.
To make the particular application of this general remark, we contend
that no argument drawn from the supposed analogy between our member
ship in the Methodist Episcopal Church and our own citizenship as mem
bers of the civil community can be valid, because no such analogy exists,
or can exist.
The argument stands thus : — Reformers say it is the right and privilege
of every citizen of the United States to be represented in the legislature of
his country ; and, therefore, it is the right, and ought to be the privilege,
of every member of the Methodist Episcopal Church to be represented in
the General Conference, or legislative department of the Church. We
answer, that the " therefore " in the above argument is a non sequitur.
The conclusion does not follow from the premises — the two governments
are totally dissimilar in their origin, in their authority, and in the design
of their institution.
And, first, they differ in their origin. The government of the United
States originated with the people. The people, therefore, were necessarily
antecedent to their rulers, and to the Constitution under which they act,
and hence are the only legitimate source of all power and authority in the
government. The power that created can, of right, destroy or alter the
Constitution when they deem it proper.
The government of the Methodist Episcopal Church originated with the
ministry, and the lay members voluntarily entered into the association,
under the regulations made by Mr. Wesley and his successors,— the right
to make new regulations, or to alter the old ones, being reserved to the
preachers in the very terms of the compact. The preachers, therefore,
existed in fact before the people or lay members of the Church. The
government was originally, and of necessity, in their hands, and we were
by them invited to the privileges provided for us in the economy they
had instituted. They cannot, therefore, be charged with the assumption
of a power which does not legitimately belong to them; for it is no other
power than has been virtually conceded to them by every one who has
entered into_ the connexion, and become a party to the original compact
Here, then, is a manifest dissimilarity in the relation which the members
of our Church bear to their government, and that which subsists between
the citizens of the United States and the government they have instituted
Let it be remembered, that we are not now arguing the propriety or the

AN APPEAL. 27
impropriety of changing our Church polity — that is a question we propose
to discuss presently — we are only showing that the claim of right, growing
out of analogy, cannot be sustained : we, therefore, proceed to the next
point of dissimilarity in the relations we sustain as citizens of the United
States and as members of the Church ; 'namely, the authority claimed and
exercised by the civil and ecclesiastical governments to which we belong.
The authority of the civil government is coeval with our birth. It
claims our allegiance from the very circumstance of our being born within
tlie pale of its jurisdiction ; and long before we are admitted to the right
of suffrage, or a participation in any legislative enactment, our property,
our liberty, and our life itself, depend for their preservation on the author
ity of the government : our obedience to the laws of the country does not
depend on our individual consent to them, either before or after we arrive
at age ; we may consider them grievous and oppressive, but we have no
alternative but to obey. In short, we are born under the jurisdiction of
the government, and the allegiance which is claimed of us is independent
of our choice. We can in no way withdraw from this allegiance but by
abandoning our country ; and circumstances may place even this option
out of our power. There arises, therefore, from the nature of our civil
obligations, a right to participate, in person or by proxy, in the enactment
of the laws by which we are to be governed, as soon as we are deemed
capable of exercising this right with advantage to ourselves and the com
munity. But change the nature of these obligations — make membership
in the community and obedience to the laws a matter of choice — and the
rights which belong to the former relation no longer remain. The rights
and the obligations are necessarily reciprocal. Where obedience is neces
sary and compulsory, the corresponding rights are natural and inherent ;
but where the obedience is voluntary, the privileges are conditional, and
are, in extent, no more than are stipulated for in the contract between
those who govern and those who are governed. Now this is precisely the
relation we sustain to the Methodist Episcopal Church. We were not
bom members of it ; owed no natural allegiance to its government ; it did
not extend its jurisdiction over us in our infancy, nor until we voluntarily
entered within its pale. There was no necessity, either physical or moral,
for our becoming members of this Church instead of any other. Our
becoming members was a voluntary act, done with a previous knowledge
of all the rights we were required to surrender, and the privileges we
acquired by the contract. We could not carry with us into this voluntary
association any natural rights incompatible with the contract we then
entered into ; and if the right to participate in the legislative power was
no part of the conditions we stipulated for, can we now complain, that we
are deprived of this right, or that it is improperly withheld from us ?
Surelv not. If to this we add that there remains to us the right of throw-

28 AN APPEAL.
ing off our allegiance to the government, of dissolving the obligations we
have voluntarily taken upon ourselves, what becomes of the analogy which
has been so strangely instituted and insisted upon between our civil and
ecclesiastical relations ? or what of the charge of usurpation and tyranny,
which has been so repeatedly made against the ministry of our Church ?
The rights which a Methodist, whether local preacher or layman, pos
sesses, as such, are purely conventional. They are not natural, but ac
quired rights ; and they are known and determined by the articles of
association, contained in our book of government and Discipline. The
Church is a voluntary association, entered into for religious purposes ;
whoever enters into its communion is entitled to all the privileges and
immunities which the articles of association hold out to him, and to no
more. If he finds, upon experiment, that the religious advantages he
acquires, do not compensate him for the sacrifices he is required to make,
he has an indefeasible right to withdraw from the commimity, and thereby
release himself from the obligations imposed by his membership ; but he
has no right to demand of the Church to change her economy for his
accommodation. ¦ To all this it is objected that many of the members entered the Church
at so early a period of life, as not to be competent to decide on the pro
priety or impropriety of the system of government under which they
placed themselves. Now this is readily admitted ; nay, we will go far
ther, and admit that many who enter the Church at mature age do so
under circumstances of religious excitement, which do not admit of a calm
and deliberate examination of our principles of government.
The Church, nevertheless, has done all that is incumbent upon her to
do in the matter. Her book of Discipline and government has been pub
lished, and is everywhere to be found ; and if those who enter her com
munity do not make themselves acquainted with it, certainly she cannot
be charged with the neglect : all that can be expected of her is, that when
the minor arrives at proper age, and the feelings of those more advanced
in life shall sober down, so that both shall have an opportunity to recon
sider what they have done, if they repent of their engagements, she shall
permit them to dissolve the contract, and seek elsewhere a connexion
more in accordance with their views and feelings. Surely it cannot be
contended that their neglect, or tlieir involuntary ignorance, entitles them
to claim a right to alter the original terms of the compact — or, in other
words, to change the Church government to suit their convenience. But
is it not a fact after all, that those who enter our Church, both young and
old, obtain all the advantages which they contemplate by the connexion ?
Whether they enter as penitents or professors, it is the religious privi
leges of the Church which they desire to enjoy— Christian fellowship and
communion, our class-meetings, our prayer-meetings, and our love-feasts 

AN APPEAL. 29
the means of being good, and of doing good, are all the inducements
which lead them to form the connexion. The dignity of being legislators
and governors are amongst the after thoughts, which do not arise until
they become, in their own estimation at least, of more consequence, and
entitled to such distinction in the Church.
But, again, it is contended by reformers, that a member of the Church,
who has contributed to the support of the ministry, and to the erection of
houses of worship, has thereby created a pecuniary interest in the com
munity, and this pecuniary interest entitles him to claim a representation
in the Church, or at least to indemnification, if he finds himself compelled
to dissolve his connexion with it. To this we answer, that with regard
to his contributions for the support of the ministry, he has had the benefit
of their ministration while he contributed to their maintenance ; if he has
not had the equivalent — if he has not been amply compensated — it must
have been his own fault. And with regard to his contributions for the
building of churches, they were not exacted by the conditions of his mem
bership. They were voluntary donations, by which he did not acquire
any property in those churches — they were given to erect free houses of
worship, to which all have a right to come and hear the gospel. If the
Methodist preachers have any peculiar privileges, with regard to the right
of occupying the pulpits in these houses, this also was a part of the inten
tion of the donors. The intention being in all respects fulfilled, no just
ground of complaint can remain to those who choose to change their
relation to the Church. Let it be remembered that our churches have
been built by those who are now dead, as well as those who are living —
by those who are not members of the Church, as well as those who are ;
. the intention of all was the same, and this intention has been fulfilled
whenever a Methodist Episcopal meeting-house has been erected — if it
continues such, and under the regulations which existed at the time of its
erection ; but if it cease to be a Methodist Episcopal meeting-house,
or if the seats cease to be free, then we shall not have fulfilled the inten
tion of the donors, and shall have violated the obligation which we entered
into with them. The claim of individual pecuniary interest, then, will not
bear out our brethren in their fancied rights, as whatever has been
acquired by them, (if anything has been acquired,) belongs equally to
thousands who never were members of the Church at all : and conse
quently, if our reformers have acquired by their contributions a right of
representation, the same right has been acquired by all who have so con
tributed ; and many of these will be found, not only not members of our
Church, but members of other religious communions.
We come now to the consideration of the third particular, in which we
said our Church government differs necessarily from every civil govern
ment ¦ namely, in the design of its institution. Civil government is insti-

«
30 AN APPEAL.
tuted to promote or secure the peace and welfare of the community which
is included within the mutual compact. Their own interest is the only
object to be provided for, and therefore no more natural rights are sur
rendered, no more individual interests are sacrificed, than are necessary
to secure the great object of the association. Such a community is not
expected to provide for the welfare of any who are without the pale of its
jurisdiction ; for those who contribute nothing to the common stock, can
not be entitled to receive from the contributions of others.
Now, the object and design of our religious association is essentially
different from this. It is true, we propose by our connexion to increase
the religious advantages of our members ; but then we have another ob
ject in view — our system is essentially a missionary one, it is intended
for the good of those who belong not to the community — to send the gos
pel, as we have said, to those who are too poor to pay for it, or too igno
rant to appreciate its value, and therefore do not desire it. Is it, then,
strange that such an association, formed for purposes so widely different
from those which influence us in the organization of civil compacts, should
also differ from civil government as much in its structure and provisions
as it does in its design ? Will not such a religious community be neces
sarily called upon to make sacrifices of individual rights and advantages
which it is not at all necessary to make as members of civil society ? To
combine the twofold advantages of providing pastors for the Church and
missionaries for the world, our ministry sustain this double relation, and
fulfil the duties incumbent upon both : the regulations required by such
an arrangement, being such as chiefly relate to the distribution of minis
terial labour, the right of making such regulations has been left to the
ministry themselves ; and the people, or laity, have moreover rehnquished
the right of electing their own pastors, because the exercise of this right
was incompatible with the plan of an itinerating missionary ministry.
It will be admitted that the laity have thus given up important privi
leges ; but it remains to be proved that they have not been compensated
for the rights they have surrendered, — whether, without taking into the
account the good done to others by our plan of periodically changing
ministers, the members themselves are not greatly benefited by it. But
when we consider the missionary design as forming the groundwork of
our government, there can be no doubt of the necessity we are under of
relinquishing these rights.
But if this original missionary design called for important sacrifices on
the part of the laity, did it not demand a still more important surrender
of natural rights on the part of our itinerant ministers ? They not only
relinquish the right of selecting their own field of labour, but submit to the
absolute disposal of a general superintendent, whom they have clothed with
authority to send them to any part of the United States and even into

AN APPEAL. 31

are

Canada ; and that, too, without any guarantee from those to whom they
sent, that they shall be supplied with even the necessaries of life. They
agree to go, depending entirely for the support of themselves and their
families on the voluntary contributions of those amongst whom they are
sent to labour.
We can conceive of no sacrifices of individual rights, comforts, and
conveniences, superior in amount or importance to those which our travel
ling preachers are thus called upon to make, in order to fulfil the primitive
missionary design of our institutions. When we consider the unhealthiness
of some of the circuits, the poverty of others, and the labour which is
required on all of them, we will be led to wonder at the zeal and the dis
interestedness which has influenced so many to forego the comforts
of domestic life, and the inestimable advantages of independence, to
offer up life, liberty, and all the pursuits of temporal happiness, for
the single privilege of preaching to others the unsearchable riches of
Christ. We hope we have succeeded in showing very sufficient reasons why
our ecclesiastical economy is not, and could not be, modelled on the plan
of the civil government of our country ; that, differing in the essential par
ticulars of origin, design, and the obedience which they claim, they could
not be expected to be the same in structure and organization, or that the
members of the one should be entitled to the natural rights and privileges
which necessarily belong to the citizens of the other.
Having disposed of the claim of natural right in the laity of our Church
to a representation in the General Conference, we next proceed to consider
the expediency of introducing such an innovation in our system of ecclesi
astical polity. And we repeat, in the commencement of this inquiry, that
it is exclusively on the question of expediency that the controversy ought
to turn. The object and design of our organization being agreed upon,
it will be admitted that no changes ought to be made which would in
their consequences frustrate or retard the primary objects of our associa
tion : changes predicated on metaphysical speculation are always hazard
ous ; because there is no foreseeing their consequences, or the endless
succession of changes to which they may lead. To mend that which
experience has proved to be defective, or to introduce new regulations
which it has pointed out as necessary, is not liable to the same objections,
because no change is admitted until it is required by existing circumstances,
and its utility acknowledged.
If, for instance, we- admit a lay delegation into the General Conference
on the ground of its being the natural right of the laity, the same argu
ment will hold good in reference to their choice of their preachers, of their
class-leaders, stewards, and all the officers of the Church ; and on the
same principle the preachers might claim the right of exercising a choice

32 AN APPEAL.
as to the place where, and the people amongst whom, they will bestow
their labours : all these changes in our economy will grow legitimately
out of the admission of this single principle. But if a lay delegation were
admitted on the simple principle of utility or expediency, on the conviction
that such a change in our economy would promote the common interest
and the common design of our preachers and people, no other innovation
could follow it unless supported by the same claims, and none will object
to useful changes however numerous they may be.
What our system would become, if we were to consent to new model it
on the abstract metaphysical principles so strenuously insisted upon by the
reformers, is not now left to conjecture. A part of our disaffected members
have already left us, and from different sections of the United States dele
gated representatives to meet in convention in the city of New- York, for
the purpose of creating a constitution and form of government for the
religious body by whom they were chosen. They did meet at the time
and place appointed. The system of ecclesiastical polity which they
devised has been printed and published, and we desire no better illustra
tion of our previous remarks than this system affords. There were in this
clerical and lay convention men of the highest standing both for piety and
talents — men who had heretofore stood as high in the estimation of the
Methodists themselves, both as ministers and men of natural and acquired
ability, as any of the reformers who still remain amongst us. And yet the
abstract principles for which they had contended, and for which our reform
ers still contend, forced upon them the admission of a regulation by which
the laity elect their preachers — a regulation which it requires no extraor
dinary sagacity to see is totally incompatible with an itinerant ministry,
but which, however, the convention aforesaid declare it to be their inten
tion to institute and support.
From this view of the subject we cannot but regret that our reformers
have spent so much of their time in the discussion of abstract principles
— we regret that they have not met the question on the broad ground
of utility, and directed their efforts to show the advantages which would
result to the Methodist community from the changes they propose in our
economy. We shall commence this inquiry into the expediency of a lay and local-
preacher representation by an important concession to the advocates of
the measure, which is, that although wo do not admit any abstract natu
ral right in the laity and local preachers to claim such a representation,
yet we do admit that if they can clearly show that such a measure would
promote the interest of the whole Methodist family, and the great design
of " spreading Scripture holiness over the world," then there will be a
moral obligation on the part of those who can grant the privilege to do
so without delay ; and we will add, that we have no doubt of the willing-

AN APPEAL. 33
ness of our preachers to grant it whenever such a contingency may happen.
As there is but one object common to both preachers and people, it will be
as much the interest as the duty of the ministers to make such a change
in our government, as soon as they shall be convinced of its tendency to
promote the common good.
In estimating the advantages and disadvantages of a lay and local-
preacher representation in the legislative* department of the Church, we
are met at the outset by an almost insurmountable difficulty. The propo
sition has not yet assumed any determinate shape or form. As we have
before remarked, the reformers have chiefly employed themselves in dis--
cussing the abstract principle. They have not condescended to give us
any plan by which this principle can be applied to our peculiar circum
stances as a Church. Some important questions remain to be settled
amongst themselves, relative to this matter, which they seem afraid to
agitate, lest the discussion should make a breach in their own ranks. We
recollect that, some time ago, the local preachers contended warmly for a
separate delegation, and considered the proposal made by some writer in
the Wesleyan Repository, to unite them in a common representation with
the laity, as tending to degrade them from their ministerial character. Of
late the local preachers seem to wave the claim, without, however, com
mitting themselves, by any stipulations or engagements, to give up the
right altogether. When this question comes to be decided between the
lay and local-preacher reformers, we shall be mistaken if it is very har
moniously adjusted. Meantime, however, we are left to conjecture which
. of the three following plans of distributing the representatives among our
ministry and membership have the greatest number of advocates.
1. The General Conference to consist of an equal number of travelling
preachers, local preachers, and laymen.
2. To consist one half of travelling preachers, and the other half to be
taken from the local preachers and laity indifferently ; or,
3. To be composed, according to the Rev. Mr. Shinn's plan, of local
preachers and laymen exclusively, — the travelling preachers to " be con
tent with being the executive officers of the Church," without participating
in the legislative power at all.
It is obviously a very difficult thing to determine what will be the effect
of introducing the representative principle into our economy, without pre
viously ascertaining what shape it is to assume, or under what modifica
tions it is to be adopted: for although there are some objections common
to all the above propositions, there are others which are peculiar to each.
If, for instance, we adopt the first, we shall have quite an anomaly in
° We use the words legislature and legislative in an accommodated sense ; strictly
speaking, the General Conference has no legislative powers— no power to make laws, but.
only "rules and regulations" to carry the laws of the Bible into effect.
3

34 AN APPEAL.
legislation. Three distinct representations, charged with the particular
interests of, and responsible only to, their own constituents, yet forming
one legislative assembly, which, in the exercise of its functions, must often
enact regulations applying exclusively to the constituents of one of these
delegations. This will, indeed, be a novel exhibition— such a one as the
Christian world has not yet seen ; the invention is worthy of the great
talents boasted by the reformers. It will be legislating at triangles, if it
shall be found possible to keep the different sides of the triangle equal.
Of this, however, we might doubt, had we not been often assured that the
reformers possessed all the talents of the Church.
But, whether we adopt the first or the second proposition, the great re
publican principle of natural right must be given up, as the representation
will not be apportioned with any regard to numbers. Such a constitution
can only be based upon a distinct acknowledgment of privileged orders,
claiming, in virtue of their privileges, a delegation wholly disproportioned
to their numerical claims. Where will be the republicanism of allowing
1400 travelling preachers, or 3000 local preachers, as many representa
tives as 300,000 lay members of the Church ?
As to the third proposition, it is almost too absurd to admit of serious
consideration. It is not, indeed, liable to the same objection, as the two
former ; it is democratic enough, in all conscience. But the idea of ex
cluding travelling preachers from the legislature of the Church, while
nine-tenths of the business to be transacted there, must always, and ex
clusively, relate to travelling preachers ; and while the information abso
lutely necessary to do any one act which such a conference could be called .
upon to do, could only be derived from these preachers, is a scheme which
we had not supposed would have occurred, even to the wildest fancy,
much less to the sober judgment of a Methodist minister.
We shall direct our examination to the second plan, both because, of the
three, it is the least objectionable, and because it is the one which we
have heard approbated by those reformei's whose judgment we are most
inclined to respect.
But before we proceed to examine the details of this scheme of repre
sentation, we deem it prudent to inquire, Where is the necessity for it?
What good is expected to be accomplished by it ? or what evils is it in
tended to remedy ?
Is it intended to alter our articles of religion ? The orthodoxy of these
articles has not been questioned, even by our disaffected members them-.
selves. Are the lay and local members of the conference to effect any change in
the moral discipline of the Church ? With this, also, our opponents have
publicly expressed their satisfaction. Li fact, the Church did not make it,
and, therefore, must not alter it It is none other than that which is pre-

AN APPEAL. 3S
scribed by the gospel itself. Neither have the reformers signified any dis
satisfaction with our order of worship, or the mode of administering the
ordinances. Now there remains nothing more in our economy, in reference to the
laity, except those prudential regulations, which have been deemed neces
sary to enable the pastors of the Church to execute and enforce the discipline.
Of these regulations, the principal complaint has been against class-meeting,
as a term of membership, and the mode of bringing a delinquent member
to trial. (Vid. Wesleyan Repository, vol. i, p. 329.) The first, namely,
class-meeting, we believe, the membership are not disposed to abolish ; on
the contrary, the great majority of the Church consider it an indispensable
provision, while we retain an itinerant ministry. Of the last, namely, the
mode of trying a member accused of immorality, we will not say that it
cannot be improved ; but we do say that it is easier to find fault with it
than to mend it. The conference, however, have already had their atten
tion turned to this subject, and are certainly well disposed to make any
alteration which may promote the interests of the Church.
Is it then to legislate on the temporal concerns of the Church, that lay
men and local preachers are necessary in the General Conference ? The
General Conference have never attempted to interfere authoritatively with
our temporal matters. The regulations they have made on this subject
have been only recommendatory, for they have never annexed any penalty
to the breach of them. It is true they have proposed measures, by which
funds are to be raised, to build houses of worship and to support the
ministry; but no member of the Church, or any 'particular society, has
ever been disowned for refusing to comply with them ; and they are de
parted from whenever local circumstances render the general provision in
applicable or inexpedient. The General Conference have never considered
themselves authorized to levy taxes upon the laity, or to make any pecuni
ary contribution a condition of membership in the Church.
But it is said that it is dangerous to trust the ministry with exclusive
legislative power, — that when they have been so trusted, they have always
abused the trust ; and we are referred to Church history, particularly of the
Popish hierarchy, for the truth of the assertion. To this we answer, that
in every instance of abuse to which we are referred, the Church was united
with the civil power. It was the unholy alliance between the Church and
the State that elevated the ministry above dependence on the voluntary
contributions of their flocks for support, and taught them to worship mam
mon instead of the living and true God. It was the secular arm which
enforced obedience to their mandates, when, being corrupted by the deceit-
fulness of riches, they taught for doctrines the commandments of men. It
was the wealth and endowments with which the civil power had enriched
the Church, that introduced luxury and idleness, pomp, and show, and

96 AN APPEAL.
ignorance, and all manner of corruption into the priesthood. It was thus
$at the purity and simplicity of the gospel were obscured, and antichrist
assumed the government of Christendom.
Now we will ask any man of common sense, whether there is in our
economy anything which bears the most remote resemblance to all this.
Our preachers are totally dependant upon the voluntary contributions of
the laity ; and we, thereby, have over them a positive and absolute con
trol ; for whenever their flocks shall withdraw their support, the preachers
will be under the necessity of abandoning their present pastoral relation,
and of betaking themselves to some secular occupation. These contribu
tions depend for their continuance on the affection which the laity bear to
their pastors. There can, therefore, be no danger of these pastors attempt
ing to exercise any tyrannical authority over them. The case may be
altered when we come to be governed by local preachers, who do not sus
tain the same dependant relation to the Church.
The travelling preacher who depends for bread, both for himself and his
family, upon the good-will of the lay brethren, can have no temptation to
any unwarrantable or odious exercise of authority over them. He will
not desire to alienate the affections and incur the hostility of those whose
friendship is so necessary to him. On the contrary, it will require no
inconsiderable degree of firmness, and piety too, to support him in the due
administration of discipline. There is more danger of his indulging a
culpable lenity than of his exercising unwarrantable power.
But, on this subject, we are not left to conjecture. We can refer to our
own history for proof of the fact, that our travelling ministry are not too
fond of power to give it up when the good of the Church requires its
relinquishment. They have voluntarily parted with power, and very
important power too. It will be recollected that they once exercised the
right of taking into their own body any candidate for the ministry whom
they thought proper to receive, without any recommendation from the
laity- They have long since relinquished this right ; and now no person
is received without a recommendation from a quarterly-meeting conference,
which is chiefly composed of laymen. And he does not, ordinarily, get
this recommendation without a previous one from the class of which he is
a member. .Again : the stewards of circuits — officers, whose duties so essentially con
cern the travelling preachers — were formerly appointed by the preacher in
charge. They must now be elected by the quarterly-meeting conference.
But this is not all. Formerly, the preacher received and turned out
members, without consulting any other authority — and, perhaps, in the .
infancy of our Church, it was necessary he should have this power; but
as soon as this necessity ceased, the right of expelling was relinquished, ¦
and a trial by his, peers secured to every accused member of the Church,

AN APPEAL. 3ft
together with the right of appeal to the quarterly-meeting conference, in
case he thought justice was not done him. We have, therefore, the best
possible assurance that our preachers covet no power but such as may be
necessary to the good of the Church ; and that whenever the authority
now vested in them can be more advantageously deposited elsewhere, they
will relinquish it without regret or delay.
It would then appear that this wonderful representation, so strenuously
contended for, is almost without an object, — at any rate, none of sufficient
importance to justify our running any great risk, or incurring great dan
ger, in the attainment of it ; for I suppose it will not be contended that the
laity, or local preachers, ought to interfere in making those regulations
which exclusively relate to travelling preachers, namely, the location of
the different annual conferences, with their several metes and bounds, and
the distribution of missionary labor ; the Book Concern and the Charter
Fund, which are their own exclusive property; the hearing and deter
mining appeals from the annual conferences, which can only relate to, and
be made by, travelling preachers. Nor will it, I hope, be contended that
the local preachers or laity ought to elect the bishops, seeing that they
exercise no authority whatever over them, but do exercise great authority
over the itinerant ministers, having power to send them to any part of the
United States. This would be so obviously unfair and unjust, that we do
not suppose it would be claimed by the laity ; and we are sure that the
travelling preachers ought not to submit to it if it were claimed.
If it be contended that these bishops have too much power, we have
but one reply to make — namely, that they have no power over any but
travelling preachers. The travelling preachers gave them the power, and
they can take it away. If they continue to delegate this power to the'
bishops, it is because they believe it indispensably necessary to the welfare
and prosperity of the Church. It is a noble and generous sacrifice on the
part of the preachers, which ought greatly to endear them to the people
of their charge.
Now when we subtract from the business of legislation, which comes
before the General Conference, all which exclusively relates to itinerant
preachers, and all which is no longer a matter of discussion, because uni
versally consented to by preachers and people, we think the conclusion
we have drawn is safe — namely, that there remains no purpose of legisla
tion which would justify the revolutionary project to introduce a lay and
local representation into the General Conference.
If then, we can show that the attempt to introduce into our economy a
lay and local representation will endanger the peace and harmony of the
Church and tend to loosen the bonds which have heretofore held us
together and enabled us to do so much good in the world, it will become
us to pause and consider before we enter upon experiments which propose*

,38 AN APPEAL.
to us uncertain and problematical benefits, while the evils to be encoun
tered are immense and inevitable. We would not impugn the motives ot
individuals, but there may be some who have private and personal ends to
answer by this unhappy controversy; and if there be, we do not expect
them to weigh our arguments ; their object will be to produce excitement,
to arouse the passions, to alienate the affections of the people from the
travelling preachers, and to carry their point at all events and at all haz
ards. To do this, however, it is not their policy to come out all at once
with a clear development of their object. They will pause at every step,
and feel the public pulse ; as the fever increases they will proceed, and the
moment of delirium will be seized to finish the great work of destruction.
We proceed to inquire what would be the probable effects of intro
ducing into our economy the change proposed by the reformers.
The present number of travelling preachers in our connexion we may
set down in round numbers at fourteen hundred, this calculation being
sufficiently exact for our argument. The representation from this body
of preachers in General Conference is fixed at one in seven, which will
make the General Conference to consist of two hundred members. If we
reduce this representation one-half, to make room for the lay and local
delegation, it will give the travelling preachers a representation of one to
every fourteen : as we may estimate two preachers to a circuit, it will take
seven circuits to send a delegate to the General Conference from the trav
elling preachers ; and as the lay and local representation is to consist of
an equal number, it will take the same number of circuits to send a lay
or local delegate.
The first question to be decided will be, how the lay and local delegates
are to be chosen ? No candidate can be proposed, who will be known,
personally, to one in fifty of the Methodists of the seven circuits which
compose his electoral district : and therefore they cannot judge of his fit
ness to represent them. Take a case from the circuits which lie immedi
ately in the vicinity of the city of Baltimore — viz., Harford, Great Falls,
Baltimore, Severn, Montgomery, Frederick, and Prince George's circuits ;
can any member of the Church be selected from any one of them, who
is known personally, or even by reputation, to one in fifty of the members
on the other circuits ? If not, how will they be able to judge of the quali
fications of those who may be proposed as candidates for their suffrages?
To obviate this difficulty, in the election of delegates by the members
immediately, it will be necessary to institute an electoral college — com
posed of electors, chosen in each circuit separately, who shall meet at
some appointed time and place, and choose a representative for the Gen
eral Conference. These electors can only be chosen by the members in
the class-meetings, for it will not be possible to assemble them together at
one place, in order to take their votes. It will be a consequence growing

AN APPEAL. 39
out of this arrangement, that each of the candidates for the honour of
representing us in the General Conference, will have his elector in every
circuit composing the district, who will be pledged to vote for said candi
date, in the event of his being placed in the electoral college — precisely as
it is now in this State in the election of President of the United States,
and as it is in this city in the election of our mayor. We have now the
preliminary arrangements for the combat, and the issue will be easily fore
seen. The several candidates for the electoral college must of course visit
the different class-meetings in the circuit, to set forth the pretensions and
superior qualifications of the person whom he has been led to prefer, as a
representative to the Church legislature. These claims may at first be
modestly set forth — but presently opposition will enlist and warm his
feelings; as the time of the election draws nearer, and the contest be
comes doubtful, pride and partisan zeal will enter the lists. The disgrace
and mortification of defeat, the glory and triumph of victory, urge on the
combatants, and the " On, brethren, on !" of the Rev. Mr. Snethen,* will
everywhere be heard, animating the competitors, and encouraging the
contest. The feelings of the members will soon catch the kindling fire — personal
friendship for the candidates, or the interest they may feel for the measures
they severally propose to carry in the General Conference, cannot fail of
effect ; parties and caucuses will be formed, which will necessarily alienate
their affections from each other ; brotherly love no longer continuing,
strife, and envy, and malice, evil-speaking, misrepresentation, and slan
der, will take the place of those fruits of the Spirit, peace, long-suffering,
and meekness, and of that humility which has so long taught us each to
esteem the other better than himself. From such scenes, the more pious,
humble, and retiring, though obviously the most competent part of the
membership, will seek to hide themselves, and mourn over calamities they
cannot control ; while the froward and assuming, the vain and the self-
conceited, will be brought forward, and obtain, by their party zeal and de
sire of distinction, the suffrages of their brethren. Beloved reader —
brother in Christ— I am no prophet, neither the son of a prophet, but I
venture to predict without the spirit of prophecy, that this is but a very
faint representation of the scenes which will certainly follow the changes
which you are urged to effect in the government of the Methodist Church.
Our class-meetings, heretofore so blessed to us as a peculiar privilege,
where we have been accustomed to speak and to think only of spiritual
things, will then become, over this whole continent, so many arenas for
electioneering strife and contention ; where brother will seek to traduce
and misrepresent brother, in order to lessen his influence in an approach-
° See the war-whoop address in the Mutual Bights, vol. iii, page 213.

40 AN APPEAL.
ing election ; and where feuds and personal enmities will be engendered,
fearful in their consequences, and interminable in their duration.
I care not whether elections in our Church be for preachers, class-
leaders, or delegates to the General Conference, or the annual conferences,
only make them of sufficient importance to excite competition, and awaken
that desire for distinction which finds a place in eveiy human bosom until
it is cast out by perfect love, and the same destructive consequences will
inevitably follow, as long as man continues what he is — a weak and falli
ble being. Brethren, are you prepared for all this ? Can it be possible
that your itinerant ministers have governed the Church so badly, have
so entirely forfeited your confidence, as to render it necessary thus to
jeopardize the peace and prosperity of the Church ? We cannot beheve
it ; for we have seen nothing in their measures or in their administration
but what has manifested the most ardent desire for your happiness, here
and hereafter : and we do most sincerely believe that no people were ever
favoured with a ministry who could more appropriately appeal to them in
the language of the apostle, " Receive us ; we have wronged no man, we
have corrupted no man, we have defrauded no man," and " ye are in our
hearts to die and to live with you." We shall be told, perhaps, that our
fears and predictions are all imaginary; that Christians cannot be led
into the improprieties and disorders which we have described. Would
that it were so ! But to beheve it, were to resist the evidence of both his
tory and experience. Who can doubt the piety of the Presbyterians, and
the Puritans, in the reign of Charles the first, and during the protectorate
of Oliver Cromwell; yet, who that has the cause of religion at heart,
does not blush for the excesses into which they ran ? And were we at
liberty to advert to circumstances which have taken place among the re
ligious denominations in our own country, and even in some Methodist
societies, they would fully justify all our anticipations. But some of those
scenes are too recent, and the wounds received in them are not sufficiently
healed, to make it safe to expose them. Many of the actors are yet living,
and could not bear it ; and we are taught to tread lightly even on the
ashes of the dead.
But we are unfortunately too well furnished with examples much nearer
home. The history of this controversy bears irresistible testimony to the
position, that a profession of religion will not save us from the conse
quences incident to opposition and contest among the professors. Let
any man look over the pages of the Wesleyan Repository and the Mutual
Rights, and doubt this position if he can. He will see the merciless
.gladiators cutting and thrusting without pity or remorse ; though they
have still some shame, for their faces are concealed. He will see a periodi
cal work which was probably intended, originally, as a medium through
which brethren might calmly and dispassionately interchange their senti-

AN APPEAL. 41
ments ; but which the heat of debate, and the mortification of disap
pointed ambition, have converted into a vehicle of anonymous slander and
misrepresentation. Yet the editors and the Union Society, who support
the work, are all Methodists ; and some even Methodist preachers !
After this example who can doubt the excesses into which we would be
hurried by the heat of party feeling, in a periodically-contested election
for Church officers or representatives ?
The melancholy fact is, that all are not Christians in heart who are so
in profession ; and among those who are sincere, many are weak and
credulous, and are easily led astray by those who have less piety but more
address and cunning than themselves. We have had to lament that
many of our members are led into indiscretions in civil elections ; but
when you add to the ordinary excitements of an electioneering contest, the
invigorating influence of mistaken, but honest religious zeal, we should
expect to see our Church elections exciting more passion, enthusiasm,
and intolerance, than are evinced by the partisans of any other cause
whatever. It would be some alleviation of the evils which we anticipate from these
Church elections, if the effects would subside after the immediate causes
of the excitement were withdrawn, — if those who became embittered
against their brethren, by opposition and defeat, would cool down after
the election was over, and return to their former good feelings and reli
gious intercourse. But this would not be the case. The disappointed
candidates would be impelled by their self-esteem to attribute their want
of success to anything rather than a want of proper qualifications. They
would cover the disgrace of defeat, by imputing to their more successful
rivals improper measures and unfair dealing, and indemnify their morti
fied pride by withdrawing from the Church, and taking with them all the
partisans over whom they could exert sufficient influence ; and thus a
fruitful source of schisms and divisions would be incorporated into the
very constitution of the Methodist community.
In civil society the disappointed candidates for office, and their partisans,
may complain of ill treatment in an electioneering canvass ; but they have
no means of revenging themselves on the community. Whatever be
their mortification or their resentments, they must, nevertheless, sit down
quietly and obey the laws, and pay their taxes as heretofore. They can
not withdraw from the community, or renounce their allegiance, without
abandoning their country ; and to do that may be more inconvenient than
to digest their mortification at home. In short, their connexion with the
community is matter of necessity, and not of choice. But religious socie
ties are not held together by necessity, but by the bond of love. When
ever, therefore, they cease to be " kindly-affectioned one to another," their
union is a rope of sand, which the slightest incident will break. While

42 AN APPEAL.
this bond of love and Christian fellowship remains unimpaired, no
force or fraud, no peril or danger, can dissolve their connexion ; but ar
ray them in opposition, the one to the other, and their separation is
inevitable. But there is another objection to the proposed lay and local representa
tion in our Church, which hes at the very root of the matter. The fact
is, that if we were to consent to run all the risks, and encounter all the
evils which these elections would inevitably produce, we should, after all,
have a representation in name only, not in reality. I suppose it will be
admitted that the representative should always be responsible to his con
stituents ; and to make him so, his constituents should have some means
of ascertaining how he deports himself in the legislative body to which
he is sent. Now with regard to representatives from the laity and local
preachers of our Church, this would be impossible. It has been already
shown, that it would be impossible for one in fifty of them to have any
personal intercourse with him, or even to know him ; and as there will
be no stenographers employed to publish his speeches, or his votes
and proceedings, it could not be ascertained whether he properly repre
sented the sentiments of his constituents or not. That part of the Con
ference proceedings which is necessarily embodied in the Disciphne, would
be known as the general result of their deliberations, but the individual
part which the different members of the Conference took in these mea
sures, would not be known to one in a hundred of their constituents —
much less could they know what measures had been severally proposed
and advocated by them, and which were rejected by the Conference.
The sum of the whole is, then, that this mighty representation would be
a solemn farce after all, without any adequate object in the Conference,
and acting without that salutary sense of responsibility which the super
vision of then- constituents alone can impose.
We will now proceed to inquire into the practicability of the scheme.
Suppose the delegates elected, and the next question to be asked, is, Who
is to bear their travelling expenses to and from the Conference — tlie
delegate, or his constituents ? And how are they to be provided for during
the session ? If it be answered, that their expenses will be borne as those
of the travelling preachers are now provided for ; we reply, that the case
of the one kind of delegates is not at all similar to that of the other. In
the first place, the preachers, on their road to and from the Conference,
labour all the way in their vocation. They are everywhere received and
entertained as missionaries — as a kind of common property, in which
every member of their Church has an equal interest. The preacher, on
his part, is accustomed to be entertained by the membership without
making any pecuniary compensation ; he has only to preach to them, and
to pray with them, and they consider themselves amply remunerated.

AN APPEAL. 43
Now, it will not be so with tlie lay delegates. They must travel as other
laymen do. They will not condescend to ask for accommodations of
strangers, but will pay for them at the public houses.
If the reader will pardon a homely illustration, for the sake of its appo-
siteness, we would say that there would be about as much difference
between the expenses of a travelling preacher and a layman getting to
Conference, as between a sailor and a landsman getting to Europe. The
preacher and the sailor " work their passages ;" the layman and the
landsman must pay for theirs. A veteran preacher, at the General Con
ference of 1820, came from South Carolina, without expending more than
two dollars, and that was chiefly for ferriage.
In the second place, we know that some difficulty has been always ex
perienced in providing for the preachers at the General Conference ; and
hence it may be fairly questioned, whether the members would accommo
date the lay delegates at all : and, on the other hand, as these delegates
will not have been accustomed to receive gratuitous entertainment of
strangers, they will not feel free to receive two or three months' board for
nothing. If this should turn out to be the case, then we must add the
expenses of boarding, lodging, &c, to the travelling expenses of the dele
gate ; and without any allowance for the loss of time, or for the injury
which his business will sustain by the negligence or improvidence of those
who superintend his affairs while he is from home, the expenses of a dele
gate will be no inconsiderable sum.
" We think it will be impossible for the distant sections of our Church
to find men who are able to meet these expenses, and give the time
which the duties of a delegate will necessarily require. They cannot be
found amongst any of those whose personal attention is necessary to
their callings in life. The farmer, the merchant, the lawyer, the phy
sician, and the tradesman, cannot spare the time, even if they could
afford the expense ; and the idle may not furnish the very best materials
for representatives to the Church legislature.
If, however, men of wealth and leisure can be everywhere found, as
willing as they are able, to go at their own expense to the General Con
ference, it would become a question of no ordinary interest to the Metho
dists, whether they ought to adopt a system of government which would
make rich men absolutely necessary to them, or which would exclude
from their councils the brethren of less fortune, though, possibly, possessed
of better gifts and more experience.
Let it also be remembered, that if we make rich men necessary to us,
we cannot exercise discipline over them ; and if our discipline is given up,
our existence as a Church will not long survive it.
We think it must be obvious, that before the Methodists can have a lay
and local representation, they must provide funds to meet, at least, the

44 AS APPEAL.
¦expenses of the delegates, if not to make them some compensation for
their loss of time while engaged in the service of the Church. To raise
these funds in some districts will be utterly impossible, for they are not
able to pay their preachers the small stipends to which they are entitled.
It is well known, that in many, if not most of the conferences, such is the
amount of deficiences in the circuits, that after all the collections from
the other circuits and stations are brought into conference, the preachers
seldom have been able to divide amongst those who are deficient, more
than fifty cents in the dollar.
We are at a loss to know how those circuits which cannot pay their
preachers, are to raise the money to pay lay and local delegates.
But this is not all. The remote districts, many of which are among
those that are least able to pay their delegates, will have to incur much
greater expenses than those which are located nearer the General Confer
ence, as their delegates will have farther to travel. This would not only
be oppressive, but unjust. As the representation is intended for the com
mon benefit, no one part of the membership ought to pay more than
another. From these considerations, it will appear, that the representatives must
be paid out of some common fund, to be provided by the whole Church :
and, further, that this fund, as it is intended to meet expenses that must
certainly accrue, cannot be looked for from sources that are uncertain or
contingent ; and, therefore, must not depend upon the voluntary contribu
tions of the members of the Church. It can, then, only be raised by direct
taxation ; and to levy this tax, will be one of the many new powers which
must be given to the General Conference when constituted as the re
formers would have it. To levy a tax, without having the power to en
force the collection of it, would be an absurdity ; and I can see but one
means of enforcing the collection, and that will be, to turn those out of the
Church who do not comply with the requisition. Here, then, will be a
new condition of membership, and we hope there are few of us who would
consent to hold our membership upon any pecuniary condition whatever.
But if we do consent to this tax, how shall it be levied ? Will it be
by an equal assessment on property ? or will it be a poll tax ? The first
would be vexatious, and give rise to endless disputes, and the other would
be both unjust and oppressive. In short, look at this Utopian scheme
On whatever side you will, if you only bring it near enough to see it in its
details, it will appear equally absurd and impracticable.
It may be alleged, however, that if the right of representation be granted,
and each electoral district be allowed to raise, by individual subscription,
the amount necessary to pay then- own delegate; those who do not send
delegates, will have no right to complain, if others, more liberal, should
avail themselves of the privilege.

AN APPEAL. 45--
We reply, that this would be true, in reference to those who have the
means, and decline to avail themselves of the advantages accorded to
them, but will not apply to those who cannot send delegates for want of
the means : these would have a right to complain ; not, indeed, because
others enjoyed a blessing in which they could not participate, but because
their former situation was made worse, by the advantages accorded to
their wealthier brethren. This will be obvious from the following con
siderations : — the regulations by which the whole Church is now governed,
are made by those who have no local or fixed residence ; they may be in
Maine one year, and in Alabama or Missouri the next. They can there
fore have no local preferences or partialities. Circulating through the
whole connexion, they not only have a common interest and a common
feeling with the members on each and every part of their pastoral charge,
but they necessarily acquire a knowledge of the local circumstances and
particular necessities of our membership, in the different sections of the
United States. Now, if the interests of the laity were confided to a partial
representation, chiefly, if not entirely, composed of delegates from the cir
cuits and stations in the vicinity of the General Conference, the situation
of those sections which could not be represented by their own delegates
would be very materially altered for the worse. They will then be legis
lated for, not only by those who are in no way responsible to them, but by
those who do not even know them, and, of consequence, are totally unac
quainted with their sentiments or their circumstances. So far, then, from
enjoying new privileges by the contemplated changes in our ecclesiastical
pohty, they would be robbed of the equal advantages which they now
enjoy. It is easy to foresee, without pretending to any extraordinary sagacity,
that such a state of things would necessarily bring about a dismember
ment of our ecclesiastical union. The more remote annual-conference dis
tricts, not being able to send representatives to the General Conference,
where the other districts were represented, would withdraw from the con
federacy, and institute a legislature of their own more conveniently located.
And if this should be the case, what can we promise ourselves from a local
or lay representation in the Church government, which will compensate
us for the loss of those benefits which we, as well as society at large, have
heretofore derived from that community of effort, consolidation of means,
and unity of purpose, in which all the parts and members of the great
Methodist family at present harmonize, and by which we have been held
in the unity of the Spirit and the bond of peace ?
Here we had intended to have concluded our observations ; but since
most of the foregoing pages were written, we have been favoured with a
plan of representation and of reform, by the Rev. Alexander M'Caine. It'
will be necessary to bestow a few remarks upon this scheme, notwithstand-

46 AN APPEAL.
ing the author has taken pains to have it understood to be entirely his
own, and that he is not authorized to speak for his coadjutors in the cause
of reform. When, however, we advert to the acknowledged talents of the,
author, the high standing he occupies in the ranks of radicalism, and
the experience which he has had, both as a travelling and local preacher,.
we must be led to suppose, that if a better plan could have been devised
he would have fallen upon it ; and that, therefore, the outline before us is
the ne plus ultra of human invention and contrivance.
We give the following abstract of Mr. M'Caine's plan of Church govern
ment : —
" First. Let the name of bishop, and the episcopal office, as it now ex
ists among us, be put away forever.
" Second. Abolish the office of presiding elders.
" Third. Let each annual conference be clothed with legislative powers,
under the restrictions of a legitimate constitution.
" Fourth. Let each annual conference be composed of itinerant minis
ters who have travelled a given number of years ; together with represen
tatives from the local ministry and laity.
"And let the preachers of each annual conference be stationed by
their own superintendent ; or by the superintendent, and a committee of
travelling preachers, elected annually from among themselves for that
purpose. " Fifth. Let each annual conference elect its own superintendent, whose
period of service should not continue more than four years  .
" Sixth. Let the General Conference be composed of the superintend
ents and a given number of representatives from the annual conferences.
Let their attention be confined to doctrines, alterations or amendments
of the constitution, general missions, and such other business as cannot
well be confined to any one annual conference. The qualifications of its
members, and its powers and jurisdiction, to be defined and settled by the
constitution. " Seventh. Let the local ministers and the laity be. represented in the
legislative department of the Church, whether legislation be assigned to
the general or annual conferences."
The reader will perceive, in the first place, that all we have said on the
danger of elections in our Church will apply with fourfold force to the
above plan ; for, instead of an election once in four years for representa
tives to the General Conference, we must have one every year for
delegates to the annual conferences. Nor is this all ; these conferences
are to be annually agitated by an election for a stationing committee, and
once in four years for delegates to the General Conference, and a superin
tendent. The tempest of electioneering strife will never cease. The sun of

AN APPEAL. 47
peace and reconciliation will scarcely break forth before we shall again hear
the rumbling thunder. There will be no interval in which bleeding charity
may heal her wounds — when the rekindled sympathies of brotherly kind
ness may again unite the broken bonds of Christian affection and love.
Secondly. The expenses of the delegates will be doubled by this plan, —
for we shall have two sets of them, one to the annual and another to the
General Conference. The preachers now entitled to a seat in the Balti
more Annual Conference are about one hundred and thirty; the same
number of local and lay delegates will give an aggregate of two hundred
and sixty persons, to be provided for by the members of the Church
where the annual conference holds its session. This would be utterly
impracticable, and Mr. M'Caine seems to be aware of it, for he proposes to
exclude all the travelling preachers from the annual conference who have
not travelled "a certain number of years ;" now, if, he reduces the number
by excluding all who have not travelled ten years, he will still have a con
ference of lay, local, and itinerant delegates, for whom any station would
find it difficult to provide. In the meantime, the travelling preacher who
had laboured nine years or under, would be excluded from a seat in the.
conference where his character undergoes an annual scrutiny, — where the
committee and superintendent who have the control of his destiny — who
appoint, or send him to labour where they please — are chosen without his
vote or concurrence ; and elected, too, in part, by local preachers, over
whom the superintendent and stationing committee are to have no control
whatever, and who labour in the ministry or let it alone, as they please !
This is too bad. If the Methodists are prepared to add to the already
heavy burdens and hardships of their travelling preachers the grievous
oppression proposed by Mr. M'Caine, the time of our dissolution as a
community is nearer at hand than our worst enemies could have expected.
But the office of presiding elder is to be abolished. We own that we
had been led at one time to think these officers no longer necessary : but
we find, upon more particular inquiry, that our situation did not com
mand a view of the whole ground. " Local men have local views," and
we looked only to city stations, and small, long-settled circuits : an enlarged
view of our widely-extended connexion, together with the information we
have received from those who have been long and extensively engaged in
the work, have led us to change our opinions ; and those who are desirous
of making no changes but such as are recommended by obvious utility, are
referred to the observations on this office, in the notes to our Discipline, pub
lished in 1798. Whenever the presiding elders shall cease to be necessary,
the office will be abolished by the preachers themselves, as they can have no
motive for retaining the office when it has become useless to the Church.
But Mr. M'Caine is not satisfied with destroying the office of presi
ding elder. He insists, also, on destroying our episcopacy — that is, our

48 AN APPEAL.
general superintendency — and electing a superintendent for each conference.
Now, we would ask, under this arrangement how will the different confer
ences contribute to the supply of each other's necessities ? How are the
preachers to be sent out of one conference district to another ? How is the
Carolina Conference, for instance, to be aided by the surplus preachers in
the Baltimore Conference. Each conference possessing a separate and in
dependent control of its members, may refuse to part with any of its preach
ers whatever be the necessity for their assistance in other districts ; or, if,
they be willing to part with any, they may not inchne to send away those
whose talents and usefulness qualify them for the service required else
where. The interchange must be a subject of negotiation between the
different conferences, and will require each to keep near the others
authorized plenipotentiaries, or other diplomatic agents. Instead of this
complicated machinery, how simple and efficient is the present plan!
The bishops or general superintendents, elected by the representatives of
the whole body of itinerant preachers, travel throughout the whole work,
preside at the several annual conferences, make themselves acquainted with
the wants of each, and are clothed with power to distribute the labourers
as the wants of the different parts of the vineyard may require. They are
thus the common bond of connexion between the different annual confer
ences — the common representatives of their various wants, and the medium
through which they severally minister to each other's necessities.
But Mr. M'Caine would not only break this common bond of union,
but the more certainly to effect the dissolution of the ecclesiastical
confederacy which so happily subsists between the different annual
conferences, he would clothe each conference with legislative powers, by
which can only be meant the power to make discipline, and the regula
tions according to which discipline is to be exercised and enforced. The
consequence would be, that each conference would have a discipline of its
own, and what would be forbidden to a Methodist in one conference might
be allowed and sanctioned in another ; we should thus be dissociated by
the very terms of membership, and be no longer brethren of the same
household and family.
It is true, the author of this scheme proposes to hold us together by a
General Conference, composed of lay, local, and itinerant delegates from the
several annual conferences ; but independently of the difficulty and expense
of assembling them, the reverend author seems greatly at a loss to find them
business after he gets them together, as he had already clothed the annual
conferences with legislative powers. He seems to have had in his eye the
different State legislatures, and the Congress of the United States ; but the
fatal want of analogy which runs through this whole scheme of modelling
the Church polity upon the plan of our civil institutions, is peculiarly ob
vious here. There are no foreign relations to manage and provide for 

AN APPEAL. 49
no foreign commerce to regulate — no judicatories to establish — no taxes
to levy — no imposts to lay, &c, &c. The projector is, therefore, under
the necessity of confining his Methodist congress to mending the constitu
tion and the doctrines of the Church. Our doctrines, we hope, are not
now to be settled ; and as to the constitution which he proposes, we have
never heard of a government that had declared to the world a determina
tion to revise and amend their constitution and form of government every
four years. It is true, all good governments provide the means of mend
ing their constitution when experience shall have shown it to be defective ;
but Mr. M'Caine is the first who ever proposed a plan of government in
which the supreme legislature should be required to meet periodically to
tinker at the constitution. As to the general missions he speaks of, it is
obvious that no conference which meets only once in four years, could
superintend or provide for any mission whatsoever. Our missions have
heretofore been conducted by those annual conferences who were located
nearest the field of labour ; and there the business ought to remain, what
ever other schemes of reform be adopted.*
But the author is not tenacious of his plan; only grant a lay and
local representation in the legislature of the Church, and he is willing to
give up all the other "items" of his project. "But representation from
the local ministry and laity, by the help of God, he will never relinquish."
We must say, that if he believes all that he has written in the previous
part of his book, and would be satisfied with this, he offers a base and
disgraceful compromise. If we believed, as he asserts, that the govern
ment of the Methodist Episcopal Church originated in falsehood, and has
been perpetuated by fraud and forgery, we would disdain to make any com
promise at all with the authors of it : we would be satisfied with nothing
which did not go to overthrow the whole establishment, and wipe from
the remembrance of all men this foul blot on the character of Methodism.
Mr. M'Caine ought to have given us his plan for defraying the expenses
of his double delegation. He must have discovered that local preachers,
at least, are not disposed to attend conferences at their own expense, and
without some compensation for their time. They have had a conference
of their own, in which they have been permitted to manage their own
affairs, in their own way, ever since 1820. One of these conferences was
. assigned to each presiding-elder district, a small space, compared to the
extent of an annual-conference district; yet, in most places, they either
never met at all, or have dissolved themselves, finding it impossible to in-
. duce the local brethren to attend, on account of the expense and loss of
time which was involved in the duty.
It must not be alleged that the business which the local conferences
3 When this was written, we had no foreign missions, except, perhaps, something of
that character in Liberia. 4

50 AN APPEAL.
were empowered to do, was not of sufficient consequence to induce then-
attendance ; for they alone could grant and renew licenses to local preach
ers—had an appellate jurisdiction, in the case of any of their members
who might think themselves aggrieved in any court below — and, more
over were alone authorized to recommend each other to deacon's and
elder's orders. Nay, in the memorial of the Baltimore local or district
conference to the General Conference of 1824, (Vide Wesleyan Reposi
tory, vol. iii, page 476,) they speak in the highest terms of the utility
of this association ; and felicitate themselves and the connexion generally
on the practical good already experienced from them. And yet this very
district conference, at their last meeting, did not consist of more than ten
out of, perhaps, one hundred members.
Upon the whole, the reverend and learned author's scheme of representa
tion — the result of seven years' discussion in the Wesleyan Repository,
and the Mutual Rights — is more imperfect in its organization, and destruc
tive in its tendencies, than any of the plans heretofore suggested. The
publishing of it, however, will have one good effect — it will confirm the
opinion now entertained by the great body of our ministry and member
ship, that there is no analogy between civil governments and ecclesiastical
communities ; and, therefore, that all attempts to model the regulations
of the one upon the institutions of the other are necessarily futile and im
practicable. We proceed now to make a few remarks on some lighter matters, which
could not well be brought in before. And first, we have been repeatedly
told that nothing is required by the reformers, but what obtains in the
economy of other Churches. We assert, on the contrary, that nothing like
the government proposed by our reformers exists in any Church with which
we are acquainted ; unless it be that which was adopted by the seceders
from the Methodist Episcopal Church, who held their convention in the city
of New- York during the past year, and who have so handsomely parodied
and burlesqued the declaration of independence of these United States.
The representative government proposed by our reformers, so far as we
can judge of it from the general outlines they have given, is not at ah on
the plan of the Protestant Episcopal Church in this country: for they
have a house of bishops as an independent branch of the legislature, the
members of which, individually, hold their situation for life ; and col
lectively, have a veto or negative on all the acts of the lower house, com
posed of clerical and lay delegates. As to the argument in favour of the
practicability of a lay delegation in our Church, drawn from the attend
ance of such delegates in the State and general conventions of the Pro
testant Episcopal Church, we admit, that we may find it practicable too
when we can consent that our delegates shall require nothing more to
make them eligible than the mere circumstance of their attending public

AN APPEAL. 51
worship in our congregations, and contributing to the support of our
ministry — when we agree to delegate the power of legislating for the
Church to those who are not communicants, make no profession of ex
perimental religion, and who are not subject to the discipline of the
Church. We may, perhaps, find among these enough who are able to
bear the expenses of such a dignity ; but in the Church not many rich
men are found, as it is no easier for rich men to be saved now than in
the primitive age of Christianity.
But if the proposed government does not resemble the Protestant
Episcopal Church, much less does it conform to that of our Presbyterian
brethren ; for with them there are no popular, periodical elections for lay
delegates. The ruling elders alone being ehgible, and these officers being
appointed for life, or during good behaviour, a man may be a Presbyte
rian all his lifetime, and never have an opportunity to show his conse
quence, or try his popularity, in a contested election for lay delegates.
The Congregationalists and Baptists having no general legislative as
sembly, do not of course furnish the model from which our reformed plan
of government is to be drawn : and as to the Friends, there is never any
voting among them, on any occasion whatever ; and perhaps there is no
part of the peculiar government of that exemplary people which has
tended so much to preserve them in peace and fellowship, as this feature
of their very interesting economy.
Among the complaints which have been made against our present
system of government, the originator and leader of the projected reforma
tion denounces the rule of our Discipline which requires the meeting in
class as a condition of membership. (Vid. Wes. Rep., vol. i, p. 329.)
He contends that it is an unscriptural condition, and that the Church has
no right to impose it. It is not objected that these meetings are useless,
or hurtful; on the contrary, they are acknowledged to be a means of
grace, eminently calculated to promote the spiritual interests of the Church,
— and we may add, that to a Church under the direction of an itinerating
ministry they are indispensable ; for such a ministry could not, without
the aid of this, or some similar institution, effectually execute the duties
of a pastor. The limited term of a preacher's appointment to any cir
cuit or station, renders it impossible for him to form an intimate personal
acquaintance with the members of his charge, and hence he could not
know whether they were walking as becometh the gospel, — whether they
were individually growing in grace, or backsliding in heart from God.
Without it, no moral discipline could be enforced, no pastoral duties
performed, or any unity of sentiment in doctrines preserved amongst the
members of the Church. Now, surely, that which is confessedly necessary
to the promotion of piety, peace, and love — without which the spirituality
of the Church would decay, and her communion be thrown open to those

52 AN APPEAL.
who have neither the fear of God before their eyes, nor his love in their
hearts— cannot be without Scripture wan-ant. The propriety of such con
ditions of communion must be clearly inferable from the doctrines and
precepts of the gospel, which the Church is bound to inculcate and en
force upon all her members. But if the reformers insist upon changing
the rule which makes it obligatory upon our members to meet in class
because there is no positive Scriptural command for it, they must also give
up infant baptism, and the administration of the communion to females,
for there is no such commandment for either the one or the other.
Before we conclude, we must be allowed to enter our protest against
the appeal which has been made to the world against our government
and discipline ; because we deny the competency of that tribunal to try the
matter at issue. We deny it, not only on constitutional but On Scriptural
grounds. We are commanded by an authority higher than that of any
temporal power not to be conformed to the world ; and, of course, may
not make any compromise with it, in anything which relates to our duty
as Christians. The people of the world may come to us, but we must not
go over to them, in matters concerning either our doctrines or discipline.
The tribunal, then, before which the Rev. Mr. Shinn has arraigned the
Church, has no jurisdiction in the case, either original or appellate.
Besides, this tribunal has long since prejudged the case ; and the charge
of tyranny, and inordinate love of power, which is preferred against us,
will be considered as conclusively proved, when the reverend prosecutor
shall have cited against our Church the restrictions imposed on her mem
bers, in reference to dancing, card-playing, and theatrical amusements.
The world will, no doubt, consider these as very arbitrary restrictions on
the natural rights of our members ; but we shall not repeal them, nor
suffer the violation of them, with impunity, notwithstanding.
The appeal which our reformers have made "to the citizens of the
United States " against us in this controversy is, therefore, equally futile
and cruel : futile, because it is not borne out by any plausible pretext ;
and cruel, because it is intended to enlist the political feelings of the
community against their brethren, in order to compel them, by persecu
tions from without, to submit to changes in their Church polity, which
sophistry and abuse from within had failed to accomplish. If our
reformers should succeed in making our fellow-citizens believe that we
have become, or are in danger of becoming, enemies to the government of
our country, by the peculiar organization of our ecclesiastical econony—
and thereby bring upon us all the evils and sufferings of a political perse
cution—they may gratify their revenge, but they will, nevertheless, fail
in their ulterior object. We have not so learned Christ as not to be
willing to suffer for righteousness' sake. While we continue to believe
our present regulations tend to promote the best interests of the Redeemer's

AN APPEAL. 53
kingdom, we will not abandon them, though we are called to suffer the loss
of all temporal things. While we so believe, they are, as respects us, identi
fied with the whole system of truth and righteousness ; and, in such a cause,
we are commanded, by the Redeemer himself, not to fear them who can kill
the body, and after that have nothing more that they can do, — but to fear
Him who, after he hath killed the body, can cast both body and soul into hell.
We confess, however, that we entertain no fears from the ruisrepresenta-
tions which have been made to the public with respect to our Church
government, or its anti-republican influence upon the members of our
religious community. The public cannot be expected to be much interested
in our family disputes and differences ; and, as to our politics, we are
known to be as much divided in opinion as any other part of the community.
Our reformers, with all their fine declamation, will not be able to convince
our fellow-citizens that our ecclesiastical polity exerts any unfavourable
influence on our political opinions, — or that it has any political influence
at all, — when it is well known that the Methodists have been divided on
every measure which has agitated the country since the adoption of the
constitution. The public will not believe the Methodist system of govern
ment is inimical to the state, while they perceive that it has obviously
made those who have come under its discipline better citizens, as well as
better men. We hope our countrymen will permit us still to regulate
our Church affairs in our own way, — and that if they condescend to
judge of our ecclesiastical system at all, they will judge of the tree by the
fruit it bears, and not by the fine metaphysical speculations of our dis
affected brethren. We hope they will not attempt to force us, notwith
standing the appeal of our reformers, to model our Church government on
the plan of the civil government of our country, excellent as it is ; for,
really, it does not suit us — we are not competent to the management of
so complicated a machinery; and the simple design of our association
renders it totally unnecessary to us — it would " embarrass us with too'
much reaulation.'"' Besides, we doubt whether our reformers are aware
of the consequences that would grow out of this principle of conformity.
If we admit the political obligation to conform our ecclesiastical polity to
the civil constitution of our country, it would follow, that in every country
to which the Methodists shall hereafter carry the gospel aud succeed in:
forming a Church, they will be under the same necessity to conform their
Church government to the existing civil establishments of that countiy —
whether they be republican, monarchical, aristocratical, or absolutely
despotic. And, what is worse, the Methodist Episcopal Church must,
on this principle, not only change her present government, but we must
have two governments, — for a part of the Church is in Canada,* where
8 The Canada Annual Conference was, at the time this was written, a part of the Me
thodist Episcopal Church.

54 AN APPEAL.
the civil government is monarchical. If it be true that an argument
which proves too much refutes itself, no argument was ever more com
pletely overthrown than that which is drawn from the constitution of
the United States in favour of the revolution in our Church government,
contended for by our reformers. CONCLUSION.
We have shown, in the preceding observations, that the question which
the Methodists are called upon to decide is one of no ordinary importance.
It is not about some modification or amendment of the present system
that we contend. The question to be settled is, whether we will abolish
the present system of Church pohty, under which we have so long pros
pered, and through the instrumentality of which so much good has been
done, and adopt a new one ; whether, refusing to profit by the lessons of
experience, we shall let go what we have proved to be good, and enter
upon a course of experiments in Church government, — experiments, too,
which propose advantages, the attainment of which is at least doubtful,
but which involve, in their consequences, evils fearful in amount and inter
minable in duration. To this we object, because, —
1. We have seen that we are not bound to enter upon these experi
ments by Scriptural authority ; for the Scriptures have imposed no exclu
sive form of government on the Church, but have left her to regulate her
outward economy according to the circumstances in which she may hap
pen to be placed.
2. We have shown that the right of representation in the laity and
local preachers is not, and cannot be, founded on an analogy between the
natural rights of the citizen and the conventional rights of a member of
our Church, for no such analogy exists. It is vain to appeal to the civil
institutions of our country, or the principles on which they are so happily
founded, in support of these fancied rights ; for our civil and ecclesiastical
governments have no attributes in common with each other. They ori
ginated differently — are instituted with intentions totally different — and
severally exercise an authority in which there is no one point of resem
blance. The specious appeal, then, to our political feelings is declamation,
not argument — it may amuse, but it cannot convince us ; we must have
some better reasons for the measure before we risk an experiment, the
result of which no sagacity can fully appreciate, and the evil effects of
which no human wisdom may be able to repair.
3. We have insisted that no changes ought to be made which have no
better foundation than abstract metaphysical speculation on the natural
rights of mankind : because such speculations are endless ; and if once
admitted as principles on which changes in our government are to be

AN- APPEAL. 55
predicated, there is no anticipating the results or the consequences. We
have not objected to any alterations, the utility of which can be clearly
pointed out ; but we are not willing to alter our economy on any other
terms. That which experience has proved to be eminently useful, we beg
leave to retain, however it may be cavilled at by would-be metaphysicians
and philosophers : for we are exhorted to prove all things, and hold fast
that which is good ; and we believe the advice is as wholesome as the
authority is unexceptionable.
4. The utility or expediency of a lay and local representation has not
been shown by the reformers. As we have seen, they have contented
themselves with the discussion of the principle in the abstract, without
condescending to tell us how it can be applied with advantage, or even
with safety, to our peculiar circumstances as a Church.
5. The reformers have not pointed out any object of legislation, which
remains to be effected by our General Conference, that demands the aid
of an additional body of delegates : and we have seen that if we subtract
from the business of the Conference, all that is already done to the satisfac
tion of our reformers, and all that relates exclusively to the travelling
preachers, there will remain no subject of legislation which could justify
us in putting anything to hazard for the purpose of effecting the wonder
ful project with which we have been so long entertained. And we think
it is clearly obvious, that it would put to hazard much that has been here
tofore deemed of vital importance. All that is valuable in peace and con
cord, all that is commendable in brotherly kindness and charity, would be
put in jeopardy at every successive election ; and how many elections it
would give rise to, it is impossible to foretell.
6. There is one argument against the utility and even the fundamental
principle of this scheme of representation, which, if the reader has not par
ticularly remarked, we beg him again to review, both because we think it
most conclusive, and because it applies with equal force to all the different
plans which have been suggested, or which can be proposed, on this subject.
It shows the relation of the delegate to his constituents to be necessarily
irresponsible, from the impossibility of their exercising that oversight of his
individual doings which would be necessary to secure the faithful representa
tion of their sentiments and circumstances in the legislature of the Church.
7. Of the impracticability of this scheme of reform, we think the impar
tial reader will, by this time, have been fully convinced. We have clearly
demonstrated that it cannot be effected without authorizing the conference
to levy a direct tax on the members, and of expelling from the Church
all who refuse or neglect to pay the imposition.
The consequences which would grow out of such a measure as this are
not at all conjectural, whatever may be said of the " visionary theories-"
which belong to the contemplated reformation.

56 AN APPEAL.
In short, the project presented by our disaffected members, is a bold
and reckless innovation, for the adoption of which we have neither the
plea of necessity, the prospect of utility, nor the sanction of experience.
Necessity there cannot be, because it is acknowledged that the success of
the present system, in effecting the great objects of its institution, is with
out parallel in the modem history of the Christian Church. The utility
of the proposed changes is not the ground on which their advocates have
uro-ed them, or on which they have relied for success. And as to experi
ence, all the lessons which it teaches go to show that every system of
Church polity is dangerous in proportion to the contests for pre-eminence
and distinction which it will produce ; for these contentions must inevita
bly loosen the only bonds by which a Christian community can be held
together — namely, those of charity and brotherly-kindness. And we con
fidently believe, that whoever considers, without partiality or prejudice,
the whole project of revolutionizing our Church government, will arrive at
this conclusion — namely, that the whole scheme is impracticable ; and to
attempt it, would inevitably destroy our itinerant ministry, weaken the
connexion which now subsists between the several annual conferences, and
ultimately produce a dismemberment of the Church.
We submit this appeal to the Methodists, with confidence that it will
be read with attention and considered with care, on account of the impor
tance of the subject. We delayed writing for a long time, with the hope
that some person more competent, and who had more leisure, would have
performed the task : in this we were disappointed ; and nothing remained
but to do our duty, as well as we could. If our arguments are solid, they
will not fail of effect on account of the imperfect manner in which they
are exhibited — " for truth needs no ornament ; all she borrows from, the
pencil is deformity." We should have avoided decoration and ornament
even if it had offered : we " designed plain truth for plain people."
We will add what, we are sure, will give satisfaction to the lovers of
peace on both sides, whatever may be their opinions of all the rest of our
book — namely, that when our local brethren among the reformers shall
abate somewhat of their pretensions, and the lay reformers shall be satisfied
with a representation based on the broad ground of expediency alone,
without any reference to abstract principles, we have terms of pacification
to propose, on which we think all parties may safely meet and happily
unite. These terms, however, are, as yet, our own, having never com
municated our views to any member or minister of the Church of either
party : and while the reformers continue in their present temper it will
probably be useless to propose anything which does not quadrate with
their " visionary theories." It must not be inferred that we think any sort
of lay or local representation necessary. If we propose anything, it will be
only for the sake of peace.

A NARRATIVE AND DEFENCE

THE PROCEEDINGS OF THE METHODIST EPISCOPAL CHURCH IN
BALTIMORE CITY STATION,

CERTAIN LOCAL PREACHERS AND LAY MEMBERS OP SAID CHURCH,

THE PERSONS WHO PREFERRED AND SUSTAINED THE CHARGES.

Put them in mind— to speak evil of no man.— Titus iii, 1, 2.
Speak not evil one of another, brethren. — James iv, 11.
Wherefore, laying aside all malice, and all guile, and hypocrisies, and envies, and all evil-
speakings, etc. — 1 Peter ii, 1.
For individuals to do wrong in their social or Church capacity, is a greater crime than to
do wrong in their individual capacity; because their official acts will be more extensive in
their influence, and of course the injury will be greater.— Asa Shinn, M. E., vol. iii, p. 12.

INTRODUCTION.

Soon after the proceedings detailed in the following pages had
commenced, "Dr. Jennings's Protest and Argument" was an
nounced in the " American," a daily newspaper of this city, as
follows : —
" Just published, Dr. Samuel K. Jennings's Protest and Argument against the
proceedings of Ms prosecutors in the Baltimore City Station, who have com
bined to prefer charges against him and others, which charges when analyzed,
assert that local preachers and lay members of the Methodist Episcopal Church
have no right to become members of the ' Union Society,' nor to publish the
'Mutual Rights.'
" Nee spes libertatis erat, nee cura peculi. October 1, 1827."
This was certainly a novel procedure. The committee before
whom he had appeared and made his protest and argument, had
not decided upon his case ; and from the nature, number, and
length of the passages in the " Mutual Eights " referred to in the
charges which had been exhibited against him, it was obvious that
a speedy decision was not to be expected. To appeal to the pub
lic before the decision was had, was an open insult to the judica
tory constituted under the Discipline to try the case, and to the
Church which had authorized and required the measure. The
Protest itself showed an evident design to enlist public feeling in
his favour, and thus to intimidate the Church authorities, and to
forestall the opinion of the Methodists, by making an erroneous
impression as to the nature of the prosecution. It was the obvi
ous policy of this and the numerous protests and other publica-

CO IKTEODUCTI05T.
tions which soon followed, to induce the community to believe the
members of the Baltimore Union Society were persecuted for their
opinions ; that an attempt was making to deprive them of the
liberty of speech and of the press ; and that the allegations against
them would apply with equal force to reformers elsewhere. The
reader will find in the following pages, that nothing of this kind
was done or intended to be done by the Church ; that it was not
the liberty of speech or of the press, but their licentiousness, that
the Church designed to curb or to punish. But weighty consider
ations forbade any other measure, calculated to counteract the
efforts which were so insidiously making to impose upon the com
munity, except that of soliciting a suspension of public opinion on
the subject, until it would be proper to place the whole matter
fairly before them. The members of the Church who had pre
ferred the charges, therefore published the following request, im
mediately under the advertisement of the Doctor's Protest, &c ;
to wit : —
" Doctor Samuel K. Jennings having endeavoured to forestall the opinion
of the Methodist public, by publishing the proceedings in his case before the
decision of the committee could be known — all who feel any concern in the
matter, are respectfully requested to suspend their judgment until the pro
ceedings shall have terminated, when a plain statement of the whole affair will
be published. " George Earnest,
" Jacob Rogers,
" Isaac N. Toy,
" Samuel Harden,
" Alexander Tearley,
" John Berry,
" October S, 1827. " Fielder Israel.?'
This was immediately followed by the following rejoinder by
the doctor : —
" Dr. Samuel K. Jennings has not ' endeavoured to forestall the opinion of
the Methodist public, by publishing the proceedings of his case before the de
cision of the committee could be known.' The decision of the committee was
of no importance to him. He considered the case as not coming within the

INTRODUCTION. 61
jurisdiction of the preacher in charge, and accordingly protested against the
competency of the tribunal before which he was summoned to appear. He
knew that the jury, that is, the committee, partook in the appointment of his
seven accusers, and therefore protested against them as having prejudged his
case. He viewed the prosecutions which have been set on foot in this city,
as the harbingers of a general persecution of the friends of religious liberty in
the Methodist Episcopal Church throughout the United States, and therefore
conceived it to be his imperious duty to publish his protest against such un
righteous doings, for the information of reformers at a distance.
" The pretensions of these seven men and their coadjutors as censors of the
press, if sustained, are sufficient to alarm the whole community. Dr. Jennings
is not accused of any immorality, and yet he is prosecuted with the avowed in
tention to excommunicate him, because he, with others, has used the press, in
pointing out the despotic character of the government of the Methodist Epis
copal Church, and investigating the executive conduct of her travelling minis
ters, who have taken upon themselves the entire government of the Church, to
the exclusion of the local ministers and the whole body of the people. When
a plain statement of the whole affair shall have been given to the public, and
the entire plan of this persecution shall have been developed, the disinterested
part of the community will understand more fully the propriety of the course
which Dr. Jennings has taken.
" October 4, 1827."
A plain statement of the whole affair is now before the public,
and whether " the disinterested part of the community will now
see more fully the propriety of the course which Dr. Jennings
and his associates" have taken, is not for us to say. Our readers
will, no doubt, claim the privilege of deciding for themselves.
All we ask is a patient and impartial hearing.

NARRATIVE AND DEFENCE.

The undersigned, members of the Methodist Episcopal Church in Balti
more city station, who, in obedience to a high sense of duty to God and
to the Church, have presented and sustained charges of improper conduct
against certain local preachers and lay members within the said station,
think a due respect for the opinion of their brethren, here and elsewhere,
requires of them a fair and candid statement of the whole procedure, to
gether with the reasons which impelled them to so important a measure.
From the time that they announced this intention, and requested a sus
pension of opinion until it should be proper to fulfil it,* they have been
urged by many of their friends to hasten the publication, without awaiting
the decision of the Church judicatories, before whom the cases were to be
tried, or to whom an appeal would lie, if the decision should be adverse
to the accused. It was alleged in support of this measure, that some of
those who had been cited to trial had published their protests and de
fences, not only to the Church but to the world ; and therefore had no
claim to the delicacy which would otherwise forbid any measure tending
to prejudice their cases before the tribunals who had an appellant juris
diction in the premises. But we were restrained by the consideration,
that the irregular conduct of a part, ought not to be attributed to the
whole ; and we could not in our publication avoid the application of our
remarks to all the accused. Late measures of the Union Society, in which
we beheve there was a common participation, might have released us
from all restraint. At a meeting called for the purpose,f they have passed
0 See the Introduction.
t In the proceedings of this meeting, as published, there is an artful endeavour to make
the public believe that the meeting was composed of Methodists, not members of the
Union Society. But if we except the females who composed a considerable proportion
of the assembly, and the males who were not members of the Church at all, together
with those friends of the Church authorities who went there merely to witness the pro
ceedings, it will be found that according to the capacity of the house, as ascertained by
the Union Society on a former occasion, the balance of the meeting must have been com
posed chiefly of the members of the Union Society, who, it is not denied, were present,
and voted for the resolutions and address as published.

64 NAEEATIVE AND DEFENCE,
a set of resolutions, not only justificatory of themselves, but condemning
and defaming the pastor of the church, and all who participated m the
proceedings against them. Before these proceedings had resulted in any
decision whatever, they have not only constituted themselves judges in
their own case, but have, by summary process, tried and condemned
the constituted authorities of the Church, without permitting them even
to say a word in their own defence. But notwithstanding we were fully
aware of the erroneous impressions which the statements so prematurely
and improperly published were calculated to make, we have deemed it
our duty to avoid anything which might have the least effect in preju
dicing the cause of the accused with the Church judicatories to whom
they might appeal. The whole proceedings having terminated, we hasten
to redeem the pledge heretofore given ; namely, to give, as soon as it
should be proper to do so, a fair and full account of the whole matter.
It has not been, and we presume it will not be, pretended, that we were
induced to take these measures from any personal hostility to the accused.
We have had no misunderstanding of a personal nature with any of these
brethren. On the contrary, with many of them we have been on terms
of intimacy, and entertained for them the most friendly regards, cemented
and endeared by Christian communion and fellowship ; and we had no
reason to doubt that these feelings were reciprocated. We declare, in the
fear of God, we love them still, and are as willing as ever to render them
any proper act of kindness and friendship : we have then a right to hope,
that whatever opinion may be formed of the propriety of the measures
we have taken in relation to these brethren, we shall at least obtain credit
for the purity of our motives.
But it has been alleged that we acted under the influence of ministe
rial authority, — that we obeyed the dictum of the preacher in charge,
while he himself was put in motion by " persons at a distance high in
authority." This charge has been made by Dr. Jennings in his Protest,
and has been reiterated here and elsewhere. We can only meet this
charge with a positive and unqualified denial. We know that the mea
sures taken in relation to the accused did not originate with the preacher
in charge, nor do we believe that he was even informed that such mea
sures were in contemplation until they were resolved upon ; and as to the
bishops, who we suppose were intended by the " persons at a distance
high in authority," we are sure that the proceedings must have considerably
progressed before they were informed of them at all. But men whose re
sponsibilities sit so easily upon them may make what assertions they please.
The fact is, that although the Union Society would persuade the public
that the lay members of our Church are tyrannized over by their ministers,
and are dissatisfied with the government, and that it is the cause of their
lay brethren that they are so strenuously pleading, yet it is by these voiv

NARRATIVE AND DEFENCE. 65
lay brethren that they have been arraigned, and brought to trial, and that,
too, without any itinerant suggestion or influence whatever.
Great pains have been taken to impress the public mind with the be
lief that the accused have been persecuted for a mere difference of opinion
with their brethren on the subject of Church government, and that we
wish and design to restrict the liberty of speech and the freedom of the
press. This, however, is very far from being the fact. We regret indeed
that any disagreement should exist in the Church on any subject calcu
lated to awaken undue excitement, or to give rise to strife and contention
amongst brethren who have heretofore harmonized both in sentiment and
effort ; but we have never wished to prevent our brethren who differed
from us in opinion from fully and fairly discussing the subject of Church
government in general, or of ours in particular. We are not aware that
any injury would arise from such a controversy, if it were conducted with
proper temper, with a strict regard to truth, and to the feelings and
characters of all concerned. In these declarations we believe we speak
the sentiments of our brethren generally. We have a common interest
in the prosperity of the Church, and cannot be injured by any changes in
our ecclesiastical economy which will promote the original design of our
institutions — " the universal spread of Scripture holiness." We enjoy no
secular advantages from the present order of things. The benefits we
derive from our connexion with the Methodists are purely spiritual ; and
whatever would tend to increase these, could not fail to be as much a
subject of rejoicing to us as to any of our brethren. We are prepared to
follow the leadings of Providence, as the Methodists have heretofore done,
and to adapt our economy to the circumstances of time and place in such
a way as may be deemed best calculated to promote the glory of God and
the salvation of mankind. We have no desire, therefore, to suppress in
quiry or prevent discussion ; and we have no reason to believe that our
brethren, either of the ministry or membership, have any wish to do so.
Our complaint against the members of the Union Society is not on ac
count of their opinions on the subject of Church government, nor for the
honest and candid expression of their opinions ; but for the misrepresenta
tion of the motives and conduct of our ministers, and for endeavouring
to sow dissensions in the Church by inveighing against the discipline.
Nor do we understand by "inveighing" the temperate expression of
opinion, or calm and dispassionate argument in favour of changing any
part of our discipline — but we understand it to mean ." vehement railing,"
" abusive censure or reproach." Our opponents; will allow us this defini
tion because it is stated and contended for in the " Mutual Eights " by
Mr. Shinn. (See Mutual Rights, vol. ii, page 142.) That the finding fault
with, and proposing alterations of, our discipline are not considered as vio
lations of our discipline is sufficiently manifested by the fact, that numer-
5

66 NARRATIVE AND DEFENCE.
ous petitions were sent up to the last General Conference which did all
this, yet they were nevertheless respectfully considered, and a general an
swer returned in a circular from the Conference.
Wo repeat then, that it is not for being reformers themselves, or for en
deavouring to make reformers of others, nor for uttering and publishing
their opinions on the subject of reform, that we complain of the members
of the Baltimore Union Society ; but we complain that they have em
ployed against their brethren in the ministry, and against the discipline
of the Church, the severest invectives and the most vehement railing.
They have impugned the motives of our venerable bishops and our itiner
ant ministers with unrelenting severity; and accused them, without the
shadow of proof, of conduct which would render men odious even in
civil society, and how much more in the Church of God. They represent
them to the world as usurpers, — as tyrants and despots, " lording it over
God's heritage," — as exercising an arbitrary authority, which was at first
" surreptitiously " obtained, and which has been perpetuated by print
ing and publishing a falsehood in the preface to our Book of Disciphne,
and by forbidding the people to inquire into the truth of the affair : nay,
more, they are represented as holding opinions and exercising a " domina
tion" highly dangerous to the civil liberties of the country, — as being
wolves among the lambs of the flock, and wolves, too, who openly show
their " teeth and claws," — and to cap the climax, nearly one hundred of
these ministers, constituting the Baltimore Annual Conference, the faithful
pastors over at least thirty thousand souls, are stigmatized as " abandoned
tyrants," as performing '' a laboured deed of hard-earned infamy." From
the extracts which we shall give from the " Mutual Rights," it will be
shown that all this has been said of our itinerant ministers : and for these
unjust accusations, for these vehement railings, we hold the Union Society
accountable; because they have been uttered and published by an edi
torial committee elected by the society, and who profess to act as its
agents, and under its supervision and control. If there be individuals in
the Union Society who disapprove of the measures which have been pur
sued, but who had not sufficient influence to prevent or control them, let
them disavow their participation in these measures by leaving the society,
and they will exonerate themselves from the blame ; but while they do
not disavow these measures — while they so far countenance them as to
let these highly reprehensible publications go out to the world under the
sanction of their name and influence — they cannot complain if they are
considered as accessary to the evil which has been done, and may yet be
done, by the periodical of which we complain.
Some of our friends at a distance, and some even here, have intimated
a wish that the proceedings against the members of the Union Society
had been deferred until after the ensuing General Conference shall have

NARRATIVE AND DEFENCE. 67
decided on the question of reform. But from what we have now stated,
it will be seen that, as it respects the accused, it is of no consequence
what may be the determination of the Conference in relation to lay. and
local representation. It is not for advocating such a representation that
we complain of the accused, but for the means they have employed to
effect their object, if such indeed was then only object. Whatever else
the General Conference may do, we are sure they will not acknowledge
the right of professing Christians to abuse and defame one another : and
if, as some expect, they should make some rule of discipline, calculated
more effectually to preserve the peace of the Church, it is obvious that
such a rule could not have any retrospective operation — any " ex post
facto " application — and therefore could not be brought to bear on the cir
cumstances under which the Church now suffers. The peace of the
Church must be preserved, and the character of her members and minis
ters protected from unjust aspersions, whatever be the fate of the much-
agitated question of reform. To do this is all that we have had in view ;
and to decline any responsibility which may devolve on us in doing what
we conceive necessary to the accomplishment of this object, would, we be
lieve, be a criminal dereliction of duty.
That the design of the leading members of the Union Society of Balti
more has been to sow dissension in the Church is not only inferable from
what they have published, but also from the effect which1 these publications
have had in this station. How peaceful and prosperous was the state of
¦ the Methodist Episcopal Church in Baltimore a few years ago! What
love and harmony everywhere prevailed among our ministers and mem
bership ! What unanimity in our official meetings — what zeal and holy
fervour in our classes, our love-feasts, our missionary societies and Sabbath
schools ! We loved one another as brethren of the same household and
family. We rejoiced in the one hope of our calling, and united in one
common effort to promote the cause of God and religion in the world.
The rich contributed liberally of then substance for the support of the
poor, and the strong hastened to. sustain the infirmities of the weak ; all
seemed animated with a desire to bear one another's burdens, and so fulfil
ti^e law of Christ. It will probably be acknowledged by all, that there
never appeared to be more deep piety in the Church, manifesting itself by
the works of'iinercy and the laboiu-s of love, than at the period of the
establishment of trie JTnion Society in Baltimore. It is true that the
Wesleyan Repository had beev-, circulated amongst us for some time pre
viously ; but its circulation was very - limited, and consequently its influence
was but slightly felt. The fire however was secretly kindling, and a. few
ambitious spirits were prepared to avail them ¦ selves of the first opportunity
to fan it into a flame. Some of the most inflanmuatory writera for, that
periodical resided in and near this city, and were alreasrjy heated by the

68 NARRATIVE AND DEFENCE.
controversy, and by some private griefs, to such a degree as gave plain
intimations of hostile designs against the episcopacy, if not against the
itinerant system itself. Whoever will read the letters of " Martin Luther"
to the senior bishop, the review of "Bangs on the Episcopacy," and "A
Sincere Querist and a Member of a Class" on class-meeting as a term of
membership, cannot fail to discover the buddings of that bitter fruit which
has since ripened in such fatal profusion.
Just before the meeting of the General Conference of 1824, some inter
est existing on the subject of reform, and the opinions of brethren being
very various in relation to it, a general meeting (though not official) of the
male members in the city was called, for the purpose of effecting a com
promise, and of uniting in a memorial to the General Conference. At this
meeting a committee was appointed to draft a memorial and report to a
subsequent meeting. The committee was purposely composed of brethren
who were known to differ in opinion on the subject of lay and local rep
resentation, but who were generally esteemed moderate men. These
brethren, acting in the spirit of compromise, reported a memorial, which,
after undergoing some slight amendments, was passed, signed by the
chairman and secretary,* and laid before the Conference. The ground of
Compromise was, that on the one side the claim of " right " to a lay del
egation should be waved, and a distinct acknowledgment made that the
claim ought to rest entirely on the " expediency " of the measure ; and on
the other, that those who desired a lay delegation should embody in the
memorial whatever they could say in favour of its "expediency" or
probable utility. On the other subjects embraced in the memorial there
appeared to be no difference of opinion.
That part of the memorial which related to representation was in the
following words, to wit : —
" Under these views we have been led to turn our attention to the sub
ject of a lay delegation to the General Conference. In presenting this
subject to your consideration, we would wave all that might be urged on
the natural or abstract right of the membership to this privilege. We are
content to admit that all governments, whether civil or ecclesiastical, ought
to be founded, not on considerations growing out of abstract rights, but ~>n
expediency, that being always the right government which best secures the
interests of the whole community. With regard to the ex-p^diency of the
measure, then, we may urge that such a delegation- would bring into the
Conference much information with regard i' to the temporal affairs of the
Church, which the ministry cannot well be supposed to possess. They
would feel less delicacy in origin'ating and proposing measures for the
relief of the preachers' families than the preachers themselves, as they
Could not be subjected^ thereby to the imputation of interested motives,
° Tbaomas Kelso, chairman, and Thomas E. Bond, secretary.

NARRATIVE AND DEFENCE, 69
and they would, by being distributed everywhere amongst the member
ship, aid by their personal exertions and influence the success of such
measures, and awaken more generally than has hitherto been done,
the attention of the Methodist community to the great interests of the
Church. " We are aware of the constitutional objections to this change in our
economy. We know that you are clearly prohibited by the very first
article of the constitution under which you act from adding to the confer
ence any delegation not provided for in that rule ; but we believe that an
opinion expressed by the Conference, and approved by the episcopacy^
would induce the annual conferences to make the necessaiy alteration ia
the constitution, and we submit the consideration of the whole matter to
the calm and deliberate attention which we are persuaded its importance
demands, and which we do not doubt it will receive, determined cheerfully
and cordially to submit to your decision."
For this memorial, as the basis of compromise, all the leading reformers,
who are now members of the Union Society, voted, and most of the old-
side brethren who attended the meeting. We advert to these facts to
show that the brethren in Baltimore, who have not seen the necessity of
the contemplated innovation upon our Church economy, so far from
denying the privilege of others to petition for them, or to argue in
favour of them, united with those who wished to have such changes
in a memorial in which the reformers said all they wished to say in
favour of their measures. It will be seen that the memorialists sub
mitted the whole matter to the Conference, with a promise cheerfully to
abide their decision.
During the session of Conference, however, some of the reformers, aban
doning the principles of the compromise, formed themselves into a separate
society, and forthwith proceeded to issue proposals for the publication of a
periodical paper, to be called " The Mutual Rights." Departing from the
principles which had been agreed on, they now claimed a direct represen
tation in the General Conference as the natural and social right of the
local preachers and lay members ; and the consequence which naturally
followed was, that all who resisted this claim were tyrants, and despots,
and monarchists, &c. This consequence was predicted at the time, and
the event has fully verified the prediction, as we shall presently show by
the quotations we shall make from " The Mutual Rights " itself.
The formation of the Union Society was in fact the organization of a
schism, the erection of " imperium in imperio," and forms a distinct era h*
the history of this controversy. But for this unfortunate step the discus
sion of the various projects of reform might have gone on without pro
ducing any general and injurious excitement in the Church; the argu
ments on each side might have been presented with calmness and been

70 ' NARRATIVE AND DEFENCE.
weighed without prejudice ; and truth clearly and frequently exhibited would .
ultimately have prevailed, whether it had decided for or against the pro
posed changes. The temerity of individuals who, in the prosecution of the
inquiry, should have indulged any undue violence, or vented any personal
spleen, would have been repressed by the rebuke of public feeling and
sentiment ; they would have stood alone and unsupported by party array
and compact. The identity of interest, feeling, and object, which neces
sarily exists between our ministry and membership, would have insured
success to any proposals for altering our economy which could have been
shown to be necessary for the common good. But the organizing a
separate, secret society within the pale of the Church incorporated the spirit
of: party in its very constitution. The members of such an association
could not help feeling that they had drawn a line of separation between them
selves and their brethren who differed with them in opinion ; that they were ,
in some sense adversaries ; and how difficult is it for adversaries to love one
another. In this associate and systematic opposition to the government
of the Church, they had a right to expect their brethren would look upon
their efforts to make proselytes with distrust and jealousy; that they
would be opposed as a hostile party ; and that under whatever plausible
pretexts they had associated, they would be suspected of a real design
either to overawe the government, or to prepare an extensive secession
from the Church if they should fail in modelling it according to their own

We have no hesitation in saying that we believe many, nay, a large
proportion, of those who have entered the Union Society of Baltimore, en
tered it simply with a view to effect what they believed would be a salu
tary reform in the government of our Church, but it was not difficult to
foresee that such a society would soon come to be governed by a few
master spirits who possessed other views, — men who, from superior talents
and management, would acquire a covered, yet absolute ascendency over
their associates. Whatever ambitious projects these leaders might in
dulge, it could not be expected they should avow them. When accom
plished, they were to appear as the result of uncontrollable necessity. If
a Congregational plan of Church government was contemplated, it was not
at all necessary to declaim against the itinerant system — nay, this might be
extravagantly praised ; all that was necessary to be done was to alienate
the affections of the people from the itinerant preachers, and this could be
accomplished by representing them as " tyrants and despots, lording it
over God's heritage." Meantime the Union Society would rally under its
banners all who had, or supposed they had, any cause of dissatisfaction
with the disciphne of the Church, or those who administered it. How
ever various and discordant their views, all would be taught to look to the
contemplated reform as a sovereign remedy for their several grievances, —

NARRATIVE AND DEFENCE. 71
whether because all slaveholders, however circumstanced, were not ex
pelled from the Church, or because females were not permitted to occupy
our pulpits, or because they had felt the wholesome rod of discipline
themselves, or because they had been offended by some bishop or itinerant
preacher, or because, as local preachers, their merits had not been duly
appreciated, all would be reformers. The heterogeneous materials
could be easily moulded by these leaders to suit their pmposes. If the
recruits were at first lukewarm they would soon imbibe the esprit du corps.
Their zeal could not fail to be inflamed by the warm addresses which would
be poured forth at their frequent meetings. Impassioned declamations on
liberty and equality — the glorious news of the success of the cause which
would be said to come from all quarters, in despite of the unhallowed
efforts of the priesthood to prevent it, would at once elicit the joy and
arouse the indignation of the hearers, and, " On brethren, on !" would be
come the watchword of the party.
This unhappy state of things could not fail to be aggravated by the
conflict of personal controversy. The brethren no longer consulted one
another upon the subject of reform as having one common interest in the
question — they debated and contended as opposite parties, each determined
on victory. The bond of mutual confidence and brotherly love was broken,
and the unhappy consequences began to be felt, not only in our religious
meetings, but in families, carrying strife and discord even to the family
altar. We will not say that none but the members of the Union Society
acted or spoke indiscreetly in this state of excitement; they were obvi
ously the aggressors, but some of the other side might, and probably did,
indulge too much temper and speak unadvisedly. A general disposition
to forbear, however, prevailed among the friends of the Church, and a
manifest reluctance existed to use any means of defence but those of ex
postulation and entreaty. The leaders of the Union Society, on the con
trary, emboldened by the impunity with which they were permitted to go
on, ventured at length upon measures which exhausted all forbearance,
and cut off the last, lingering, fondly-cherished hope of reconciliation.
During the session of the annual conference in this city in April last,
the Rev. D. B. Dorsey was accused of recommending and circulating the
" Mutual Rights," which the conference thought an " improper periodical
work," from the temper and spirit in which it was conducted. In the
course of his trial he made such declarations, and avowed such prin
ciples, as induced the conference to request the bishop to leave him with
out an appointment for one year. It was known, in fact, that his health
did not justify his taking an appointment, and that he would have been
compelled to take a superannuated relation had no allegations been pre
ferred against him. It was thought, therefore, that the measure resorted
to was the mildest by which the conference could express its disapproba-

72 NARRATIVE AND DEFENCE.
tion, as it did not affect him in a pecuniary point of view. From the de-
cision of the annual conference Mr. Dorsey took an appeal to the General
Conference, and here the matter ought to have been permitted to restf—
at least until the final decision was had on the appeal. Soon after the re
cess of the conference, however, the appellant sent a statement of the case to
the editors of the " Mutual Rights," and this statement was in part sustained
by the communications of two anonymous writers. On this ex parte testi
mony, the Union Society held a meeting, and passed resolutions, which
they published in the newspapers, in which the conduct of the conference
was condemned and denounced in very severe terms.
Two of these resolutions were in these words ; namely : —
" Therefore, Resolved, first, That the conduct of the late Baltimore
Annual Conference, in the case of the Rev. Dennis B. Dorsey, was oppres
sive in its character, and not warranted by the Scriptures, nor the Disci
pline of the Church.
" Resolved, secondly, That in the opinion of this society, the confer
ence in thus oppressing Mr. Dorsey, has evinced a determination not only to
withhold representation from the membership and local ministry, but also
to keep them in ignorance of the true principles of Church government."
We do not think it necessary here to enter into the vindication of the
Baltimore Annual Conference — that has been already done ; but we do
not hesitate to say, that the history of no modern Church furnishes a pa
rallel to this outrage on all the social obligations which grow out of Church
membership : nearly one hundred ministers of the gospel, — many of them
venerable for their age, and all beloved for their usefulness and piety, — the
laborious pastors over at least thirty thousand souls, are tried, and condemn
ed, and denounced in the public newspapers, by a self-created society, and at
the time, too, a part of the pastoral charge of these very ministers ; and
that, too, without giving them the privilege accorded to the worst crim
inals — of coming into court, pleading to the indictment, examining the
evidences, and of making their defence. And all this, too, when the per
son complaining had cited them before a higher tribunal, and one of
whose competency neither party had ever intimated any doubt ! Some
thing like this we have seen and deplored in political electioneering — but
never before, and we trust in God never shall again, in a religious so
ciety. Whatever sympathy the Union Society expressed for their martyr
Mr. Dorsey, it could be easily perceived that they greatly rejoiced in the
occurrence. The cry of persecution was worth a thousand specious argu
ments, if they could but make out a plausible pretext for the complaint :
and it must be acknowledged they made the most of appearances. They
wrote, and published, and circulated, their highly-coloured statements,
with an industry worthy of a better cause ; and as no timely effort was
made to counteract them, a very extensive ferment was produced by their

NARRATIVE AND DEFENCE. 73
statements. Meanwhile the " Mutual Rights" teemed with invective and
abuse against the denounced ministry. The Rev. N. Snethen, in an ad
dress to reformers, tells them they are " lambs among wolves." These
itinerant preachers, says he, "have all the teeth and all the claws, and
therefore every man may be made to fear." The advice of our Saviour
to his followers, to be " wise as serpents and harmless as doves," is per
verted into an exhortation to employ the wisdom of " the serpent." In
short, the world are advertised that our itinerant ministry are wolves, and
that they no longer deem it necessary to appear in sheep's clothing, but
intend to carry their point by " teeth and claws." If he is believed, in
vain will these ministers of Christ go into the hedges and highways to
bring sinners to repentance, — who would believe their report, or who would
attend their ministry ? And who would supply their place ? Why, Mr.
Snethen and his reforming brethren among the local preachers, to be sure.
Outrageous as was this address, it was destined to be outdone and thrown
into the shade, by a writer under the signature of " Vindex," whose com
munication appeared in the "Mutual Rights" the May following. This
reckless assailant transcends all decency of invective. The decision of the
Baltimore Conference in relation to Mr. Dorsey, is denounced as "an
overbearing act of an abandoned tyranny ; " "a laboured deed of hard-
earned infamy ! " And the conference was stigmatized with the odious
appellation of a " star-chamber court."
About this time, or a little before, the " History and Mystery of Method
ist Episcopacy, by Alexander M'Caine,'' made its appearance, in which our
present ecclesiastical government was represented as surreptitious — a fraud
practised on the membership by the bishops and travelling preachers — im
posed upon them in the name of Mr. Wesley, without his sanction, and
even contrary to his express commands ! And it is more than intimated
that this surreptitious government was supported by the suppression of
documents, garbling of statements, the forgery of dates, and falsifying of.
records ! All these allegations were known to be unfounded ; and they
have since been clearly disproved by Dr. Emory in his able " Defence of
our Fathers." What added greatly to the indignation with which Mr.
M'Caine's work was read by the friends of the Church, was, that it was
written by a minister of long standing among us, who had been raised to
distinction by the connexion, who was a file-leader in the Union Society,
and who stated in his preface, that " the result of his investigation was
read before the Union Society of reformers in Baltimore ; and the writer
ivas requested to print it for the information of his brethren." This de
claration was corroborated by the fact, that many members of the Union
Society circulated the work with the utmost industry, that they had
contributed largely to aid the publication, and rejoiced over it as a lever
which was to overturn the whole superstructure of our Church polity. The

74 NARRATIVE AND DEFENCE.
Union Society was thus identified with Mr. M'Caine in the publishing and
circulating of his pamphlet. And although they have since denied (and
Mr. M'Caine has concurred in the denial) that they ever took a vote on
the subject, yet the co-partnership in the whole business cannot be
doubted.* We may add, that most of the unfounded allegations made
against Mr. Asbury, Dr. Coke, and the travelling preachers who composed
the Conference of 1784, in Mr. M'Caine's pamphlet, are reiterated in the
Mutual Rights. It was evident now to the most incredulous that these
measures could not be the work of reformers, but of revolutionists, — their
object could not be to amend, but to destroy; and there were combined
in this effort men, and means, and a recklessness of consequences, which,
threatening the existing institutions of the Church with destruction, afforded
no hope that any permanent and well-ordered superstructure would ever
be erected on the ruins.
All hope of returning peace was now cut off, and those who had all
along discouraged the enforcement of discipline on the offenders, lest it
should afford them the plea of persecution with which to enlist the feel
ings of the community, began reluctantly to yield to the absolute neces
sity of the measure. In fact human patience, even the meekness of
Christianity, could endure no more. They saw their beloved pastors and
ministers, through whose instrumentality they had been brought to, or
preserved in, the hope of the gospel, and who had encountered and endured
all sorts of privations in their laborious and unremitting efforts to bring
others to the enjoyment of the unsearchable riches, held up to the scorn
of the world, their characters assailed and their usefulness hindered, by
those whose duty it was to protect and sustain them, while the enemies
of godliness were rejoicing as those who had taken great spoil. Even
Christians of other denominations began to inquire whether the Metho
dists had no discipline, by which such improprieties could be punished
and the reproach rolled away.
° The circumstances as they occurred in the Union Society, when Mr. M'Caine read
his manuscript, were thus detailed afterwards by a prominent member. " Dr. Jennings
made a motion, that the society print the work at its own expense. This motion was
seconded by Rev. Daniel E. Reese, and was likely to prevail, when a layman observed,
that there could be no doubt that all who should be concerned in the publication, would
be liable to be expelled from the Church ; that although he approved the work, and
would subscribe for it, yet if he were on a committee to try the publishers of it under
a charge of violating the Discipline, he should, as an honest man, be obliged to find
them guilty. The local preachers, he said, might be, and no doubt would be, protected
by the district conference ; but the laymen would have to go before the quarterly-meet
ing conference, and would certainly be expelled : he was therefore opposed to the mo
tion. The motion was withdrawn, or at least not acted upon," The lay member's
opinion with respect to what the district conference would do in the case, was probably
predicated on the fact, that the local preachers who were members of the Union Society
in Baltimore, usually constituted a majority of the district conference ; few members
of that body finding it convenient, or being disposed to attend its meetings.

NARRATIVE AND DEFENCE. 75
In this state of things, a meeting of a considerable number of the
male members of the Church took place, in consequence of the invitation
of one or two brethren, exclusively with a view to the publication of a
statement of facts in relation to the case of Mr. Dorsey, and a defence of
the conference. After some discussion, it was determined to appoint a
committee to take the subject into consideration, and to report to a subse
quent meeting, to be called by notice given in all our churches in both
stations on the following Sabbath. The business of the meeting being
accomplished, it was about to break up, when it was suggested, that, inas
much as great discontent prevailed in the Church, on account of the
impunity with which the Union Society were permitted to publish their
unfounded accusations and illiberal remarks in reference to their brethren,
it was necessary that some measures should be taken to remedy the evil ;
and after some desultory conversation it was agreed that the undersigned
should inquire into the matter, and take such measures as they should,
after mature deliberation and inquiry, deem necessaiy.
After a careful examination of the periodical and the pamphlet com
plained of, the undersigned were unanimously of opinion that they con
tained such unjust statements and cruel imputations, that their authors
and publishers ought to be dealt with according to our Disciphne ; and
they determined forthwith to visit the members of the Union . Society, to
admonish them of their error, and expostulate with them on the evil
which their publications had already produced in the Church — the dissen
sions, strife, and contentions which they had so obviously effected, and
would necessarily diffuse and aggravate if persisted in. Therefore, pre
paratory to such a course, we made an effort to obtain the names of the
members of the Union Society, by addressing the following note to Mr.
John Chappell, president of the Society : — Baltimore, August 17, 1827.
The undersigned, believing that the members of the Baltimore Union
Society have violated the Discipline of the Methodist Episcopal Church,
and being desirous to have a friendly interview with them previous to
instituting charges against them, if necessary, therefore we respectfully
request to be furnished with the names of the members of the said Union
Society. George Earnest,

To Mr. John Chappell,
President of the Baltimore Union Society.

Jacob Rogers,
Isaac N. Toy,
Samuel Harden,
Alexander Yearley,
John Berry,
Fielder Israel,

si

i*

76 NARRATIVE AND DEFENCE.
To which the following reply was given : — Bai/ttmore, August 21st, 1837.
Dear Brethren, — Waving for the present any objections that may
lie against the authority under which you act, I have to inform you that
the next meeting of the Baltimore Union Society will be held on the first
Tuesday in September, at which time your communication requesting "to
be furnished with the names of the members of said Union Society " shall
be laid before them, immediately after which meeting I will inform you of
the result. In the meantime I remain, yours respectfully, John Chappell.
To Messrs. George Earnest, Jacob Rogers, Isaac )
N. Toy, Samuel Harden, Alexander Yearley, >
John Berry, Fielder Israel.
And subsequently we received the following communication and resolu
tion of the Union Society on the subject : — September oth, 1827.
Dear Brethren, — The following preamble and resolution, passed by
the Union Society, is respectfully submitted. Yours, &c.
John Chappell.
Union Society, Baltimore, September 4, 1827.
" Whereas brothers George Earnest, Jacob Rogers, Isaac N. Toy, Samuel
Harden, Alexander Yearley, John Berry, and Fielder Israel, have requested,
by a note addressed to the president of the Union Society of the Methodist
Episcopal Church, the names of the members of the said society ; and have
stated, as a reason for said application, their belief that the members afore
said ' have violated the Discipline,' and have intimated a design to ' institute
charges against them, if necessary :' therefore,
"Resolved, That the president be instructed to request those brethren
to state particularly what part of the Discipline they beheve those members
have violated, and in what particular instance or instances.
"We beheve those brethren owe us the above information in virtue of
the attitude which they have voluntarily assumed in relation to this
society, and also that it is needful to our acting understandingly on their
application." Having failed to obtain the names, we commenced visiting such of the
members as were known to us. Two of the brethren waited upon the
Rev. Dr. S. K. Jennings. They report their interview with the doctor to
have lasted about two hours. They were received with politeness, and the

NARRATIVE AND DEFENCE. 77
conversation which ensued was conducted on both sides with perfectly good
temper, and with a good degree of Christian feehng. The two brethren
chiefly adverted to the effects which had been produced by the measures
pursued by the Union Society in Baltimore ; the injury which the Church
had sustained by the inflammatory publications in the "Mutual Rights"
and the public papers ; the unfounded allegations against our ministers,
and the abusive epithets which had been applied to them. They adverted
also to the " History and Mystery of Methodist Episcopacy," by Mr. M'Caine,
a work which had been read in manuscript before the Union Society, and
which, they understood, was approved and recommended by the members
of that society. They called the doctor's attention to former times, when
he had been so useful, and when the Church enjoyed so much peace and
concord, when he had so happily contributed to build us up in the faith
of the gospel, and when we were kept in the unity of the Spirit and the
bond of peace. They contrasted our former peaceful and happy state
with the present agitated and divided condition of the Church, now that
party spirit and party feelings had entered even into families, and set hus
band and wife, parents and children, at variance. They urged the doctor
to take the necessary steps to restore harmony, love, and peace to our
afflicted Zion ; and tracing all the evils which the Church now suffered to
the Union Society, and the improper publications which had emanated
from that source, they represented the necessity of his using his influence
to procure a dissolution of the association, or of his withdrawing from it,
and of ceasing to publish any work characterized by the violent spirit in
which the " Mutual Rights " had been heretofore conducted. The brethren
stated explicitly that they did not wish or require the doctor to make a
sacrifice of conscience or of principle — he could still be, and avow himself
a reformer, and could speak, write, and petition, in a temperate and Chris
tian-like manner in favour of reform, and yet retain the love and confidence
of his brethren ; and, what was of still more consequence, return to his for
mer usefulness in the Church, — but, inasmuch as the Union Society and
"Mutual Rights" had become so completely identified with the evils of
which they complained, they deemed it indispensable that he should
dissolve his connexion with them.
On the part of the doctor it was admitted that there were some expres
sions in the " Mutual Rights " which were severe, and of which he disap
proved ; but yet the sentiments were true, and that the Union Society
intended to proceed in their usual way regardless of consequences. They
would not be deterred from their course by the prosecutions which he
understood were intended. As to the "History and Mystery of Methodist
Episcopacy," he said it was not published by the Union Society, nor upon
their responsibility; but he thought the publication of it at this time
rather a fortunate circumstance, as an opportunity was thereby afforded

78 NARRATIVE AND DEFENCE.
to the Church to rebut the charges by proper evidence, if it could be done,
before the time should pass in which the evidence could be collected. He
talked much of the liberty of speech and of the press, and of their rights being
guaranteed by the constitution of the United States and those of the individual
States ; complained of the neglect and silence with which the Church had
treated their opinions and arguments ; and as to what we required of him,
he considered it an attack on his natural and rehgious rights, and if we
proceeded in the prosecution he would appeal to heaven and earth against
the glaring injustice. The brethren informed the doctor that they did not
wish to infringe his rights, but that it could not be his right to sow dissen
sions in the Church by publishing such statements as were to be found in
the periodical of which they complained ; nor could it be anybody's right
to defame and abuse others, as our ministry and even our venerable fathers
who slept in Jesus had been defamed and abused in the " Mutual Rights."
They stated how impossible it was for most of those who would read that
work to have access to the necessary information to enable them to form
a correct judgment on the cruel allegations which had been made, and
how readily the enemies of our Church, and of godliness in general, would
believe them without any examination at all. But nothing could move
the doctor, or induce him to yield anything of the right he claimed to
publish whatever he deemed necessaiy to the cause of reform. The inter
view however terminated as it began, in the most friendly manner — and
it was with feelings of surprise as well as mortification that they heard the
doctor, at his subsequent trial before the committee, speak of then atten
tions to him as " a pretended godly visit." It was sincerely intended, and,
as they thought, sincerely received, as a visit enjoined by our obligations
as Christians to a Christian minister ; and although their object in making
it was not effected, they had, and still have, the unspeakable consolation of
having discharged, to the best of their ability, a Christian duty to a mis
guided and erring brother.*
Some of us visited other members of the Union Society; but, with a
few exceptions, were not received with the urbanity and kindness which
characterized the conduct of Dr. Jennings. The Rev. J. R. Williams
grossly insulted one of us in his own house. Mr. M'Caine sent us word
not to visit him, as he should take it as an insult, and should probably
insult us ; and finally the president of the Union Society informed us that
it was useless to visit the members, as they had determined not to yield
° The brethren complained of some leading reformers, who contend, in opposition to
the Discipline, that we ought not to make class-meetings a condition of Church member
ship. The doctor replied that he did hold it to be wrong to make class-meetings a test of
membership in the Church, aud that the New Testament was his discipline. They replied
it was lamentable to contemplate the state of disunion in the Church which that prin.
. ciple would lead to.

NARRATIVE AND DEFENCE. 79
or make any concessions. We have since learned that a meeting of the
society was called on the occasion, and after some warm addresses, a pledge
was given, by the holding up of hands, to stand by each other and to
abide the consequences together.
Thus circumstanced, nothing remained but to lay our complaints before
the Church, and accordingly the following charges and specifications were
handed to the preacher in charge against eleven local preachers, to wit : —
Rev. Dr. S. K. Jennings, Alexander M'Caine, John C. French, James R.
Williams, Daniel E. Reese, John Valiant, William Kesley, Thomas M'-
Cormick, Luther J. Cox, John S. Reese, and Reuben T. Boyd ; and
twenty-five lay members, to wit : — Messrs. John Chappell, John Kennard,
John J. Harrod, Thomas Mummey, Ebenezer Strahan, Arthur Emmerson,
Lambert Thomas, Thomas Patterson, Levi R. Reese, John Hawkins, John
P. Howard, Wesley Starr, John P. Paul, Joseph R. Foreman, William K.
Boyle, Samuel Jarrett, Thomas Jarrett, Samuel Guest, George B. Norther-
man, Samuel Krebs, Samuel Thompson, Thomas Parsons, John Coates,
John Stinchcomb, and Jessee Comegys.
"  is charged with endeavouring to sow dissensions in the society

or Church in this station or city, known by the name of the Methodist
Episcopal Church, and with the violation of that general rule of the Dis
cipline of the said Church or society which prohibits its members from
doing harm, and requires them to avoid evil of every kind ; and especially
with violating that clause of said general rule which prohibits speaking
evil of ministers.
" Specification I. Because the said  , while a member of the
Methodist Episcopal Church aforesaid, did heretofore attach himself to, and
become a member of, the society called ' The Union Society of the Metho
dist Episcopal Church in the city of Baltimore,' — which Union Society is
in opposition to the Discipline, in whole or in part, of the Methodist Epis
copal Church aforesaid.
" Specification II. Because the said  , as a member of the said
Union Society, is directly or indirectly, either by pecuniary contributions
or his personal influence, aiding, abetting, co-operating, or assisting in the
publication or circulation of a work called ' The Mutual Rights of the
Ministers and Members of the Methodist Episcopal Church,' printed under
the direction of an editorial committee, appointed by, or who are mem
bers of, the Union Society aforesaid, — which work or publication, called
'The Mutual Rights of the Ministers and Members of the Methodist
Episcopal Church,' contains (among other things) much that inveighs
against the Discipline of the Methodist Episcopal Church aforesaid, in
whole or in part, and is in direct opposition thereto ; and that it is abusive,
or speaks evil of a part, if not most, of the ministers of that Church, —

80 NARRATIVE AND DEFENCE.
the general tendency of which work or publication has been to produce,
and continues to produce, disagreement, strife, contention, and breach of
union among the members of said Church in this city or station.
" Specification IH. Because the said  , as a member of the
Union Society aforesaid, did advise, request, or recommend the publica
tion of a pamphlet, entitled, 'The History and Mystery of Methodist
Episcopacy,' written by the Rev. Alexander M'Caine, in which various
declarations and assertions are made, without proper proof or just founda
tion, calculated to disgrace and bring reproach upon the Methodist Epis
copal Church aforesaid, its ministers and members ; and which declara
tions and assertions are well calculated to produce, increase, and heighten
the disagreement, strife, contention, and breach of union alluded to in the
second specification.
" For proof of which, the publication entitled ' The Mutual Rights of
the Ministers and Members of the Methodist Episcopal Church,' is referred
to ; and particularly, —
No. 1, page 31. Constitution of Union Society of Baltimore.
7, " 261. Essay on Church Property, No. 1 and 2, by Rev. N.
Snethen.
Jos. Walker's Letter, Alabama.
53. Luther on Representation.
Timothy's Address to Junior Bishop.
Dissenter. Rev. A. Shinn's Appeal.
Granville Union Society.
Vindex. Sovereignty of the Methodists in the South.
Address of N. Snethen.
Union Society on D. B. Dorsey's case.
Address. Neale.Centreville Proceedings.
" And also the said pamphlet entitled, ' The History and Mystery of
Methodist Episcopacy,' — with such other documentary or oral proof as
the undersigned may deem expedient to exhibit or produce.
"George Earnest,
Jacob Rogers,
Isaac N. Toy,
Samuel Harden,
Alexander Yearley,
John Berry,
Fielder Israel."
"Baltimore, September 7, 1827."

25,

CC

26.

27,

Lb

53.

29,

u

108.

30,

Li

147.

32,

a

199.

33,

u

214,

34,

a

270. ib.
248.

35,

a

277.

36,

a

301. 308.322.

NARRATIVE AND DEFENCE. 81
The preacher in charge caused each of the persons accused to be fur
nished with a copy of the charges and specifications, as above, and noti
fied them of the time appointed for their trials severally. The committee
appointed to examine the cases of the local preachers (except Mr.
M'Caine's case) were the Rev. John W. Harris, Samuel Williams, and
Thomas Bassford.
The committee on Mr. M'Caine's case were taken two from the country
and one from the East Baltimore station, to wit : — Rev. Samuel Gore,
Nicholas Harden, and Edward Hall.
The committee appointed to try the lay members were brethren Baltzer
Schaeffer, Thomas Kelso, Alexander Russell, Thomas Armstrong, John
W. Berry, and William M'Conkey, Jun.
After these charges had been laid before the preacher in charge of the
station, Dr. Bond, who had not yet relinquished the hope that some con
ciliatory course might be devised, by which the necessity of further pro
ceedings before the constituted authorities of the Church might be removed,
and who had not heretofore taken any part in the measures which had been
adopted in reference to the accused, ventured alone and without our know
ledge upon the business of negotiation. Having a particular intimacy with
the Rev. J. S. Reese, and reposing great confidence in his understanding,
piety, and prudence, the doctor communicated his intentions to him.
Mr. Reese met the offer with readiness, and promised to be the bearer of
any proposals the doctor might be disposed to make to the Union Society.
Accordingly the following proposals were sent ; to wit : —
" September 15, 1827.
"Whereas, the Union Society of reformers have assigned as their
motive in forming the association, the attainment of unanimity in their
intended memorial or petition to the next General Conference ; and
whereas that object is expected to be accomplished by the General Con
vention of reformers which is to take place in November next, I am dis
posed to use my personal influence to procure (so far as that small influ
ence may extend) a suspension of proceedings before the Church, upon
the following conditions ; to wit : —
" First. When the convention shall have terminated its session, the
Union Society shall be dissolved, and not re-organized, in the present or
any other foTm, until after the next General Conference.
" Secondly. That the periodical called the ' Mutual Rights,' if continued
at all, shall be strictly confined (so far as relates to the controversy with
respect to our Church government) to dispassionate, temperate discussion ;
and that no allusions to individuals or attribution of improper motives to
any individuals or to the rulers of the Church, shall at any time hereafter
appear in that periodical. 6

82 NARRATIVE AND DEFENCE.
"To secure the fulfilment of the last condition, each number of that
work, in the proof-sheets or the materials before they are printed, shall be
submitted to three persons chosen mutually by the reformers and the com
mittee who have preferred charges against some of them, who shall be
authorized to expunge all objectionable passages therefrom.
" In making this proposition I wish it to be distinctly understood that I
act alone and as a mediator, and that I have not consulted with any of
the old-side brethren on the subject, nor with any reformer except brother
John S. Reese. Thos. E. Bond.
To Rev. J. S. Reese.
The Rev. Mr. Reese returned the above proposals, stating that the paper
had been read in the Union Society, but that no order had been taken
upon it ; nor was he authorized in any way to continue the negotiation.
It is needless to add that the doctor relinquished his hopes and did not
again tender his mediation. We have heard it objected to the above pro
posals, that they were not official, but the mere propositions of an indi
vidual, and therefore could not be received by the Union Society. But it
must be obvious that in this stage of the business no official propositions
. could be made by the Church authorities, because it had not been officially
determined that any offence had been committed, much less had the nature
of the offence and the satisfaction due to the Church been ascertained:
any compromise then which could take place must be between the accusers
and the accused ; and between these the doctor proposed to become the
mediator. If the terms were objectionable, they might have been modified had the
negotiation continued. They were obviously only propositions of com
promise, and might have been properly met by propositions from those to
whom they were offered, and ultimately the negotiation might have termi
nated in a way mutually acceptable.
But the fact is, the proposition was received as the effect of intimidation ;
it was thought, by the leading members of the Union Society, that the
measures already taken were not intended to be followed up. The Church
authorities it was believed would not dare to proceed to extremities ; and
if we are not misinformed, the doctor's proposals were styled in the Union
Society " a flag of truce," and treated with the utmost contempt and deri
sion. Meantime the proceedings against the accused went on. Some of
those who had been cited to trial refused to appear. Of those who did
appear, a few only condescended to make any defence. The rest contented
themselves with technical objections to the proceedings, to the committees
who were appointed to try them, and to the preacher in charge, who had
cited them to trial and who presided during the proceedings.
After having patiently heard all that the accused chose to say or read

NARRATIVE AND DEFENCE. 83
in their defence ; and after a long and minute investigation of the periodi
cal and pamphlet, which were adduced in evidence on the part of those
who had preferred the charges, the committees came unanimously to the
following decisions, to wit : —
In the cases of the laymen. "That the charges, together with the first
and second specifications, were sustained." The third specification was
not sustained. To support the third specification those who preferred
the charges had relied entirely upon the declaration heretofore quoted from
the preface of Mr. M'Caine's "History and Mystery," namely, that uthe
result of his investigation was read before the Union Society of Reformers
in Baltimore ; and the writer was requested to print it for the information
of his brethren" The accused having denied that the Union Society had
ever officially made such a request, and Mr. M'Caine himself declaring
that he did not mean to convey that idea, the committees very properly
found that the third specification was not sustained. The charges and
specifications against the local preachers being the same as those against
the lay members, (except in the case of A. M'Caine,) and the evidence in
support of the allegations behig also the same, the committee on their
cases gave the same verdict, with this addition, in pursuance of the require
ments of the Disciphne, " that they be suspended until the meeting of the
next district conference."
In the case of Mr. M'Caine, the charges, together with the first and
second specification, were the same as in the other cases : the third specifi
cation was in the following words : —
" Specification ILL Because the said Alexander M'Caine, as the author
of a book or pamphlet entitled, ' The History and Mystery of Methodist
Episcopacy,' has therein made, without proper proof or just foundation,
various declarations and assertions calculated to disgrace and bring re
proach upon the Methodist Episcopal Church aforesaid, its ministers and
members; and which declarations and assertions are well calculated to
produce, increase, and heighten the disagreement, strife, contention, and
breach of union alluded to in the second specification."
The committee found that the charges and specifications were all sus
tained, and suspended him according to Discipline, until the meeting of
the ensuing district conference.
One of the laymen who had been charged (brother Coates) was
acquitted ; and brothers Comegys and Stinchcomb appearing agreeably
to notification, and those who preferred the charges not attending, claimed
to be discharged, and their plea was admitted. It appears that there had
been some misunderstanding as to the time of trial, on the part of those
preferring the charges. For this, however, the Rev. Mr. Hanson thought
the accused were no way answerable, and accordingly dismissed the
charges.

$4, NARRATIVE AND DEFENCE.-
None of the lay members availed themselves of their privilege of appeal
to the quarterly-meeting conference, and of course they were expelled.
Previously to their expulsion, however, the preacher in charge addressed to
each of them a note, proposing terms on which they might yet retain
their membership. The district (or local preachers') conference having
refused to hold their regular session, the cases of the suspended local
preachers, according to the express provisions of the Discipline, came up
before the succeeding quarterly-meeting conference of the Baltimore city
station. The suspended preachers had previously sent to the president of
the conference their protest, both against the dissolution of the district
conference, and the competency of any tribunal short of the General Con
ference to take cognizance of their cases ; which protest was read. The
president having announced, officially, that the district conference, accord
ing to the record of its proceedings, was dissolved, the quarterly-meeting
conference, after the ordinary business had been done, took the cases of
the suspended preachers up in order.
At this period of the proceedings, the following incident occurred : —
A communication to the conference, from Doctor John C. Green, of Vir
ginia, was handed to the president by the secretary, and ordered to be
read. In this communication Dr. Green informed the conference, that he
came to Baltimore for the purpose of mediating a reconciliation between
the Church and the accused members and ministers. He transmitted to
the conference certain letters which had passed between himself and Dr-
Jennings on the subject, and asked a suspension of proceedings for twenty-
four hours. The best feelings pervaded the conference on this interesting
occasion, and a motion being made to adjourn until the next evening, it
was carried without a dissenting voice. The next evening, (Thursday,)
the doctor communicated no progress in the negotiation ; but informed
the conference that he had made a proposal to the Union Society, who
were to meet the same evening, to appoint a committee to confer with a
similar committee to be appointed by the conference. From a compliance
with this request, the conference were prevented by insuperable difficul
ties. To appoint such a committee, would be to justify all that had been
alleged by the accused, of the predetermination of the members to con
demn them. How wero the committee to know what satisfaction to re
quire for the Church, of those whom the Church had not yet officially
decided to be guilty of any offence at all ? For it must be distinctly kept
in view, that the committee who had previously sat on the cases now
before the conference, were only a committee of inquiry. The trial of
their cases could only take place before the quarterly-meeting conference.
But another, and, if possible, a still greater objection to the proposal was,
that the committee with whom the conference committee were intended
to negotiate, were to be appointed by the Union Society, a body not recog-

NARRATIVE AND DEFENCE. 8fi
nised by our Discipline, and of whom the Church could demand nothing,
as many of the members of that society had not yet been brought to trial
under any allegation whatever.
All that the conference could do, as a judicatory before whom tlie sus
pended preachers were ruled for trial, was done. It adjourned its session
from day to day, in order to afford an opportunity to those lay members
who might yet wish to appeal, and for the suspended preachers, to place
their cases before the conference under the most favourable circumstances.
If they believed themselves in any degree culpable, or if Dr. Green, the
mediator, should be of the opinion, and should be able to convince them
that they owed any satisfaction or atonement to the Church, they would
of course act accordingly ; and the conference thought it a duty to afford
time for the adjustment. The several adjournments were, — from WednesJ
day until Thursday, then until Friday, and lastly until Monday, when
the doctor informed the conference that the negotiation had been broken
off, by the Union Society declining to hold further communication
with him upon the subject. It is proper to mention that the doctor
stated frequently, while in town, that he had left home and undertaken
the negotiation without any solicitation from any person in this city, — and
we believe that no person here knew of his intention until he avowed it
himself after his arrival. To have failed in his laudable design, is no
doubt a source of painful regret ; but he ought to be consoled with a
consciousness of having done his best, and in the best way, and perhaps
as much as any man could have done under like circumstances: we are
sorry we had it not in our power to congratulate him on the success of
his pious endeavours, but we can and do tender him our thanks, our love,
and our esteem.
The conference, after the failure of the negotiation had been announced,
proceeded with the trials severally, and such was the effect produced by
the reading of the passages from the "Mutual Rights," on which the
charges rested, that although much difference of opinion was known to
have previously existed among the members in reference to the cases
before them, yet there was no dissenting vote on the motion to expel. It
ought to be observed that most of the suspended local preachers did not
attend, and those who were present declined making any defence, nor did'
any of them take an appeal to the annual conference ; so that the decision'
was final.
It is now ascertained that a great proportion of the conference, so far
from having made up their opinion before the trial, as has been so often
alleged, had not even read the "Mutual Rights " at all, and therefore could
not have made up a premature verdict. We are aware that it has been
intimated that the conference, consisting of more than one hundred men,
were the mere tools of the preacher in charge. If any can believe this

86 NARRATIVE AND DEFENCE.
slander we shall not attempt to disturb their credulity. We should think
the conference degraded by any defence against this vile and unfounded
insinuation. The final resolutions of the conference, in the cases severally, (except Mr.
M'Caine's,) were as follows : —
" Resolved, 1st. That the charges against  , with the first and
second specifications, are sustained.
" Resolved, 2d. That the third specification is not sustained.
"Resolved, 3d. That  be expelled the Methodist Episcopal
Church, unless he withdraw forthwith from the Union Society, and pro
mise not to be engaged hereafter in any publications that inveigh against
our discipline or government, or speak evil of ministers — and signify his
intention so to do before the final adjournment of this conference."
The above conditions were not complied with, nor any other satisfaction
offered. In Mr. M'Caine's case the decision was the same as in the others, except
that the third specification was sustained, and that no conditions were
appended to the vote of expulsion.
We will now make a few remarks on the objections which were made
to the committees of trial and to the proceedings had in the premises,
after which we shall give the extracts from the periodical called " Mutual
Rights," upon which the charges have been sustained, and close with a
few observations on the whole matter.
The protests and objections so confidently made and so pertinaciously
insisted on against the committees appointed to try the cases severally of
the local preachers and the lay members, chiefly rested on the want of
conformity in the appointment, and in the proceedings generally, to the
practice which obtains in courts of criminal jurisprudence. We may
therefore entertain the hope that when these great reformers shall have
remodelled the Church " after their fashion," we shall, among other pro
mised blessings, " enjoy all the glorious uncertainties of the law." We shall
then substitute our little Book of Discipline by massy folios of common
law, and statute law, with commentaries of learned length, and reports of
ponderous magnitude. We shall have a goodly number of ecclesiastical
lawyers, establish courts, appoint judges, with their attending clerks and
other officers, who will keep us to all the rules of special pleading and
legal technicalities. We may then enjoy the inestimable privilege of
occasionally defeating the ends of justice by a technical objection to an
indictment, and see persons take their places in our class-meetings, and at
the communion, whom everybody knows to be guilty of the worst offences,
but who have eluded a fair trial by the subtlety of counsel. What a won
derful reformation we have in prospect, and how ardently ought it to be
desired by all good Methodists !

NARRATIVE AND DEFENCE. 87
We have heretofore considered our Church judicatories as merely moral
tribunals, in which a few plain, pious men, were deemed capable of decid
ing whether an accused brother had violated his religious or social obliga
tions, as ascertained and pointed out by the Bible and our Discipline;
how one found to have so offended could be reclaimed from the error of
his ways ; or the effects of evil example prevented, and the reproach rolled
away from the Church of Christ. We had never thought that there was
any great difficulty in such an investigation, or that the rules by which
such an inquiry was to be conducted could be, in their nature, very obscure
or complicated. The Methodists had heretofore been led to think that men
of plain common sense, with the necessary piety and integrity, were fully
competent to judge in such matters both of the law and the fact. But it
seems that both we and our fathers have walked in great darkness.
In vain we allege that we have hitherto lived happily under these regula
tions. This, we are told, was attributable to our ignorance ; we did not
know and justly estimate our privileges ; all these things are now to be
reformed. The right to challenge jurors, it is alleged, is acknowledged in all civil
ized and Christian countries. We will not cavil at this sweeping declara
tion, although it might perhaps be shown that there are civilized and
Christian countries where the trial by jury does not exist at all. We
admit, however, that all civilized and Christian countries ought to adopt it
as a civil institution of inestimable value : but it does not follow that pre
cisely the same regulation ought to be, or even can be, adopted in Church
government accompanied with the right to challenge jurors: and we may
safely assert, that such a right, as exercised in our courts of law, does not
obtain in any Church judicatory of which we ever heard. In the Protes
tant Episcopal Church we believe that persons deemed unworthy are for
bidden the communion, at the will of the pastor alone. In the Presby
terian Church, the trial of members accused of improper conduct takes
place before the " session," composed of the minister and the lay-elders, all
holding their office for life or during good behaviour ; and deputations
from the " sessions " constitute all the superior judicatories, who exercise
appellate jurisdiction in the Church. In the Baptist and Congregational
Churches, trials for violation of discipline take place before the whole
Church, and we believe the accused does not possess the privilege to except
against any member's right to sit on his case. Surely it cannot be with
out good reason that the privilege of challenge, either peremptorily or for
cause, accorded to persons indicted for offences against the laws of civil
society, are not recognised in any Church judicatory whatever. Why it
has not been, and cannot be, provided for by any such explicit regulation
is indeed very obvious. It would require that there should exist, some
where in the Church, an authority to compel the service of jurors and the

88 NARRATIVE AND DEFENCE.
attendance of • witnesses, * and to call them from a great distance if occa
sion should require. But it is obvious that no Church can clothe any of
its officers with such powers. We readily admit, that in selecting com
mittees our preachers ought to set aside any man who is known to enter
tain or to have expressed any personal hostility to the accused member.
We know of no instance where they have refused to do so ; and were they
to refuse, the quarterly-meeting conference, upon an appeal, would not
fail to redress the injury. In the cases under consideration no such objec
tion was made to any member of the committees for trial. The objections
were — first, that the members of the committees of trial had, at a meeting
held at Dr. Roszell's academy, participated in the appointment of a com
mittee to prosecute ; and, secondly, that they had voted for certain resolu
tions and an address at a meeting held in the Baptist church, in Pitt-street,
Old Town, in which certain writers for the "Mutual Rights" and the
Baltimore Union Society were called " the enemies of Methodism."
To the first we may answer, that no committee was appointed at the
meeting in Dr. Roszell's academy for the purpose of preferring charges
against the members of the Union Society. Certain members of the
Church were requested to inquire into the causes which had produced the
existing agitations in the Church in this station ; but they were left with
out instructions and without responsibility to the meeting, as to any mea
sures they might be led to take in consequence of the inquiry. Many,
and perhaps most, of the persons at that meeting cherished the hope that
the violent measures of the Union Society would be desisted from, upon
proper remonstrance with the members of that association.
The second objection is more specious, and requires particular considera
tion. In the address complained of, no individual is named as being
responsible for the publications in the " Mutual Rights " — nor is any opinion
given that the writers or publishers of that work ought to be expelled from
the Church. Mr. M'Caine's pamphlet indeed was alluded to, and the
work as well as the motives which dictated it were spoken of in terms of
very severe reprehension ; but the committee appointed to try him were
taken, two from the country and one from the East Baltimore Station, and
were not at the meeting alluded to, nor in any way concerned .with the
address. The objection, then, is confined to the expression in the address,
as applied to the Union Society — " The enemies of Methodism." Whether
the voting for an address in which this was said of the Union Society dis
qualified the members of the committees from serving on the trials of any
" During the trials we have been giving an account of, the tribunals, so far from having
the power to oompel the attendance of witnesses, appeared to have no authority to compel
answers to interrogatories put to the witnesses who were present. Some of the officers
and private members of the Union Society positively refused to say whether the persons
under trial were members of that society or not.

NARRATIVE AND DEFENCE. 89
member of that society, charged with inveighing or railing, and evil-speak
ing, will depend upon the import of the allegation itself; and we assert
that, in the only proper meaning of the expression in the address, it does
not imply any offence, either against good morals or our Disciphne.
What is Methodism ? Surely it must be that which distinguishes the
Methodists from other denominations of Christians. But what is it that
so distinguishes us ? Certainly not our doctrines, for these are none other
than those of the Church of England and of the Protestant Episcopal
Church. Mr. John Wesley and Mr. Fletcher, whose writings are the
standard authorities of our Church, were both ministers of the Church of
England, professed entire belief in her doctrines, and appealed to her
articles and homilies, as well as to the Scriptures, in support of the religious
tenets which they inculcated and defended. What is it then that consti
tutes the distinguishing appellation of " Methodism f " Plainly and obvi
ously the peculiar ecclesiastical economy of the Methodists: and to be
thought inimical to this economy, it was not supposed the Union Society
would consider a reproach, because they had often avowed it ; and certainly
those who alleged it never intended to convey the idea that those who
were opposed to the leading principles of this economy might not be good
men and good Christians. With " Methodism," thus defined and as thus
understood by the authors of the address, the Union Society have been
finding fault for the last three years, and the leaders of it for a much longer
term, and it is now rather too late to deny that they are its " enemies."
That those who voted for and published the address complained of by the
accused, understood the term " Methodism " as we have explained it, is
obvious from the address itself, for they speak of our ecclesiastical economy
as "that wholesome discipline which governed our fathers and distinguished
them as a peculiar people" We believe, also, that the Union Society have
understood the term in the same sense, for we suppose that when they
complain in the "Mutual Rights" of "the sovereignty of Methodism in
the. South," they do not intend to complain of the influence of the Metho
dist doctrines. It is admitted then, that those who voted for the address
of the male members of the Methodist Episcopal Church in the Baltimore
City and East Baltimore stations, have denominated the members of the
Union Society of Baltimore " enemies of Methodism," that is, of the peculiar
economy of the Methodist Episcopal Church, and they have repeatedly
avowed it themselves ; but in doing so the committees had not prejudged
the cases of the accused on the charges now preferred against them —
namely, of inveighing (i. e. railing) and evil-speaking — and hence were not
disqualified to try the matter at issue between the Church and the accused.
Whether the decision which these committees have given in the cases sub
mitted to them have been just, will be left to the reader, after he shall
calmly and dispassionately have read the extracts from the "Mutual

90 NARRATIVE AND DEFENCE.
Rights," upon which those who preferred the accusations relied to sustain
them. For ourselves, we have no doubt that every impartial man will,
after such examination, concur in the judgment of those committees.
Extracts from the periodical called " The Mutual Rights," published
by an editorial committee elected annually by the Union Society of
Baltimore.
Extracts from the "Constitution of the Union Society of the Methodist Episcopal
Church in the City of Baltimore."
" Article 2. The officers of this Society shall consist of a president, two
vice-presidents, a treasurer, a secretary, a corresponding committee of
three members, and an editorial committee of four ministers and four
laymen, all of whom shall be elected annually by ballot."
" Article 1. It shall be the duty of the editorial committee to inspect
all original and selected matter that may be presented for publication in
the ' Mutual Rights,' and to suffer no matter to be published in that work
until it shall have received the approbation of a majority of said com
mittee ; to employ a person to print the necessary number of copies of
forty octavo pages each per month ; to solicit subscribers and patrons for
the publication ; and, generally, to do all matters and things which, in
their opinion, are calculated to promote the circulation and usefulness of
the work." — Vol. i, pp. 20, 21.

From the above extract it will be seen, that the editorial committee
are elected annually by the Union Society, and are consequently the
agents of that Society in the publication of the periodical called the
"Mutual Rights." On this principle the members of the Baltimore
Union Society have been held responsible for the unfounded allegations
against the characters of our ministers, and the abusive epithets so liber
ally bestowed upon them in that work.
Extracts from " An Essay on Church Property, by the Rev. Nicholas Snethen."
" Our Church property as well as power, are, in effect, in the hands or
under the control of the superintendents, and should the constitutional
test obtain, will destroy all hopes of any legal or regular change for the
better. This controlling or disposing power over public property in men
who hold an office for life, is one of the essential principles of an absolute
government, and by an extension of territory must continue to increase
indefinitely. The disclaiming all right or pretension to taxation by the
General Conference amounts to nothing hke a check upon the power of
the superintendents over property ; but does in fact tend to promote it
Were it in the power of the travelling preachers by any means to secure
an immediate support from the people, they might use the people's money

NARRATIVE AND DEFENCE. 91
to control the power of the episcopacy ; but in the present state of things
they can neither occupy the houses nor receive the people's voluntary con
tributions without an official signification of the executive will.
" All the travelling preachers are at the disposal of the superintendents,
and so long as there shall be more preachers than there are places to sup
port them, the surplus number must be dependent; and to make this
dependence universal, no preacher has any security that his lot to ' turn
out ' may not come next. It avails nothing that the public property is in
the keeping of trustees or stewards. If the houses cannot be taken from
the preachers, the preachers may be taken from the houses. The mem
bers of the Church have in reality no Church property, and the travelling
preachers have none in effect. The latter are tenants at will, and at the
end of each year may be removed. Are we not virtually acting over
again St. Peter's patrimony and Peter pence ? In monarchies public pro
perty is vested in the crown, and, of course, in him who wears it ; hence
we hear of ' his majesty's arms and armies,' and kingdom, &c, — of ' we,
by the grace of God,' — and of ' the pope's bull,' (bulla,) seal affixed to his
official acts. By ' the grace of God ' is meant the ' divine right,' &c." —
Ibid., pp. 261, 262.
" The hundred successors of Mr. Wesley who compose the British Con
ference, unite in themselves all the powers and functions that are exercised
by our General Conference and superintendents. They are all bishops de
facto. Our ordination conveys nothing which Mr. Wesley did not give
to them. He was not a partial father, much less did he disinherit his
first-born ; we congratulate our British brethren in this thing, that they
have good sense enough not to run after names and shadows. There is
neither divine nor human obligation binding on our General Conference
to confer a life office on any man. We know to a certainty that Mr.
Wesley never meant to confer any power for hfe upon the superintendents
which he and Dr. Coke ordained, for he actually had it in contemplation
to recall Mr. Asbury ; of such an event Mr. Asbury was so well aware,
that he took special care to prevent it, by getting himself elected superin
tendent by the American preachers." — Ibid., p. 263.
" The consequences of exclusive proprietorship in public property in the
Catholic Church is well known, and has long been seriously deplored ;
but it seems that we take no warning from the experience of others. We
have fully set forth our determination to participate with our elder brethren
in evangelizing the world. The General Conference, in their address, con
template a meeting between the British missionaries and ours, somewhere
on the eastern coast of Asia or Japan. But when Methodism shall thus
have encircled the globe, will any regard be paid by the missionaries and
their senders to the mutual rights of the ministers and the people of the
Methodist Episcopal Church ? No such thing. These senior and junior

92 NARRATIVE AND DEFENCE.
brethren will divide the Methodist Church property of the universe between
them, without listening to any intimation that the accumulation of so
much wealth might seem to savor of monopoly or avarice, and might
possibly be made to minister to ambition."— Ibid., p. 265.
"We have said that Mr. Wesley was rich in Church property; and
that he knew and felt he was so. We say the same of our superintend
ents ; they too know and feel that they have a hold on the public pro,
perty, in virtue of the absolute prerogatives of their office, sufficiently firm
to enable them to dispossess any preacher whenever they may think
proper. It is to no purpose to say, they cannot convert this property to
their own private use. There is no reason to suppose they would do so,
if they had the title in fee. Kings are not wont to use the property of
the crown for then own private benefit, or in other words, to impoverish
themselves as kings in order to enrich themselves as individuals. It is not
to be supposed that the holders of absolute power will be less ambitious
than prodigal or covetous monarchs. The glory of superintendents is pro
portionate to the amount of property they have in then possession. Every
house that is built, and every collection that is made, adds to their conse
quence, by increasing their influence. Poor bishops of rich diocesses are
not common ; and poor universal bishops are much less so. The travel
ling preachers also, while their imaginations are dazzled with the idea of
their share in the title of property, secured by deed to the General Con
ference, feel rich and look down upon the poverty of local preachers ; then-
exclusive right to seats in the conferences, is, indeed, so flattering to their
vanity, as in most instances to blind them to the actual state of things.
Few of them can be brought to reflect steadily upon the fact, that they
are little more than trustees for the bishops, who as soon as they are
elected and inducted into office, are no longer responsible to them. . The
power or privilege of electing to an absolute office for hfe, is the most dan
gerous that can be vested in any body of men. The importance that
such electors are prone to attach to themselves, is pleasantly ridiculed in
the story of the cardinal and the pope. The cardinal, when he wanted a
favour, reminded his holiness that he made him pope ; who, wearied at
length with his importunity, replied, ' then let me be pope.' " — Ibid., p. 285.
" Our superintendents are not only chosen members of the conferences
and presidents for life, with the power of choosing the presiding elders and
stationing all the preachers, but, to make them as independent as possible,
they are pensioners on the book fund, to the full amount of all demands.
The Discipline, by putting no check upon their power, presumes they can
do no wrong. In one point of comparison it must be confessed, that the
American itinerant preacher seems to have the advantage of the British ;
but another view of their condition will convince any one that none of
these seeming advantages can be realized. In England, travelling

NARRATIVE AND DEFENCE. 93
preachers who have fulfilled their probation, are ehgible to the vacancies
in the Conference. With us they become members of the annual confer
ence, and eligible to a seat in the General Conference, and, of course,
nominal proprietors of the Church property. Here their glory ends.
Innocence or neutrality gives no security to our preachers, to an equality
of appointments. Every preacher, as well as the presiding elders, may
become a minister to the episcopacy. Probationers may manifest greater
zeal for the prerogative than men of long standing and experience. Of
fences must needs come, and do often come, in despite of the greatest
prudence. No travelling preacher can protect himself against episcopal
suspicion, or jealousy, or displeasure ; and however unjustifiable a bishop's
feelings may be, he may retain them through life, and perhaps transfuse
them into the breasts of his colleagues. It is possible, indeed, that they
cannot all be united in a proscription ; but is it not infinitely more impro
bable, that fifty men will withhold their votes for a presidency, year after
year, from every one who will not imbibe their prejudices ? The chances,
therefore, of being driven or persecuted out of connexion in the two sys
tems, bear no proportion. Though a hundred men may be as true to
their common interests as one or five, and a feeling of dependence must
be engendered in both instances, yet it is of the utmost importance to
weaken and conceal the feeling as much as possible.
" It is a maxim with some, and every four years of experience serves to
eonfirm them in it, that if a preacher is not prepared to go all lengths in
episcopal measures, he will do well to decline an "election to a seat in the
General Conference. More than one travelling preacher might, perhaps,
feelingly repeat, in regard to Baltimore, with a member of the synod of
Dort, ' O Dort, Dort ! O Baltimore, Baltimore ! would to God I had nevei
seen thee !' The hero of opposition may return to his work, complacent
in the consciousness of his own integrity, unawed by the fear of man ; but
the eye of episcopal vigilance is upon him. His health declines ; the afflic
tions of his family, and cares and wants multiply upon him. He needs a
house at hand, for he cannot move afar off; he wants medicine and bread !
To which of the saints will he now turn, to which of his friends say, 'Pity
me, O my friends, for the hand of God hath touched me ?' What ! can
he want a house, and a home, and the means of support, who inherits all
houses and property to the exclusion of local preachers and the laity ?
Can a member of that General Conference, to whom so many thousands
have been deeded, become a houseless wanderer, a penniless stranger,
among a strange people ? Where now has the spirit of sympathy and
fellow-feeling fled ? O ! where are his brethren whose turn may come
next ? Is there no power in this heaven and earth to save him from the
dread of starvation ? None. How is this ? Plainly thus. When all is
given away nothing remains. The General Conference have given the

94 NARRATIVE AND DEFENCE.
bishops a life power over that very property which the donors vested in
themselves. When they are made to know the worth of this property,
by the want of it, at that very juncture they may be made to feel that
they can enjoy no part of it. And is there no remedy ? Are bishops and
presiding elders all past feeling? Perhaps there is one open door left;
what executive purpose can be so inflexible as not to relent when executive
measures have converted a poor and needy opponent ? O ! we hope that
none of these elder brethren will refuse to join the music and dancing when
one who was lost is thus found."— Ibid., pp. 286, 287.
REMARKS.
It is asserted in the above extracts that all our Church property belongs
to the bishops ; that Mr. Asbury "took especial good care to get himself
elected superintendent by the American preachers ; that the bishops are
chosen members of the General Conference ; that there is no check upon
their power ; that they are considered infallible, and, finally, are pensioners
upon the book fund to the amount of all demands." We defy any man
to find, in the same number of lines, in any book in the world which makes
any pretensions to truth, as many assertions which are as entirely destitute
of foundation. 1st Our bishops have no claim, either in law or in equity, to any
Church property whatever. Their names do not appear in any deed by
which property has been conveyed to the Church, either for burying
grounds, meeting-houses, or parsonages. The whole body of travelling
preachers, with the bishops at their head, would be legally incapable of
selling or of conveying any of this property, or of converting it to any
other use than that for which it was designed by those who purchased the
ground or erected the houses, and for which it is held in trust by the trus
tees of the Church, who are always either laymen or local preachers. The
right to preach in our meeting-houses is secured to the travelling preachers,
but it is not in the power of the General Conference to hold or to confer
on others any right of property in them.
2dly. The bishops, as such, are not members of the General Conference
at all. One of the bishops presides, ex-officio, in the Conference, and has
the casting vote in case the members should be equally divided upon any
question before them. But this is the only participation they have in any
legislative privilege in the Church ; and this can only be enjoyed by one
of them at a time.
3dly. The bishops have no authority to draw a single dollar from the
book fund on their own order, whatever their necessities may be. It is
true that the family expenses of the bishops are supplied from the book
fund — because, as they belong to no circuit or station exclusively, they
could not be supphed in any other way. But the bishops are not privileged

NARRATIVE AND DEFENCE. 95
to be " pensioners on this fund to the amount of all demands" "in order
to render them as independent as possible." On the contrary, the General
Conference designates a committee of travelling preachers to fix the amount
which shall be allowed for the bishops' table expenses, and the book agents
cannot exceed by a single cent the amount of such allowance. So that
these independent bishops are nevertheless dependent on the travelling
preachers for bread both for themselves and their families.
4thly. It is alleged that there is no check upon the bishops' power, and
therefore it must be presumed that they " can do no wrong." What will
the reader think of this assertion when he learns that these bishops have
no power over any other persons but the travelling preachers ; that these
preachers delegated this power, and can at any time restrict it or reclaim it
to themselves, and even abolish the episcopal office, if they deem it expedi
ent to do so. The General Conference never fail to appoint a committee
on the episcopacy at every session, which committee, composed generally
of one delegate from each annual conference, take the administration of
the bishops under their consideration, and to them any complaint may be
made against the episcopal administration. The bishops are not only liable
to expulsion or deposition upon impeachment, but we have been again
and again reminded in the " Mutual Rights " of the fact, that the Confer
ence deposed two of their bishops or superintendents, simply by leaving
their names off the Minutes. How then can it be alleged that there is
•' no check upon their power " — and that they are thought " incapable of
doing wrong ?" Their power, we have seen, is under the immediate control
of those who have conferred it, and who cannot attribute infallibility where
they have thought it necessary to exercise a salutary supervision, by a
committee from their own body at every General Conference.
In order to show the reader the absurdity of the declaration that " the
Disciphne, by putting no check upon the power of the bishops, presumes
they can do no wrong," we will refer him to the Discipline itself, page 26,
questions 4th, 5th, and 6th — to wit : —
" Question 4. To whom is the bishop amenable for his conduct ?
" Answer. To the General Conference, who have power to expel him for
improper conduct, if they see it necessary.
" Question 5. What provision shall be made for the trial of a bishop, if
he should be accused of immorality in the interval of the General Con
ference ?
" Answer. If a bishop be accused of immorality, three travelling elders
shall call upon him and examine him on the subject ; and if the three
elders verily beheve that the bishop is guilty of the crime, they shall call
to their aid two presiding elders, from two districts in the neighbourhood
of that where the crime was committed, each of which presiding elders shall
bring with him two elders or an elder and a deacon. The above-men-

96. NARRATIVE AND DEFENCE..
tioned nine persons shall form a conference, to examine into the charge
brought against the bishop ; and if two-thirds of them verily believe him
to be guilty of the crime laid to his charge, they shall have authority to
suspend the bishop till the ensuing General Conference, and the districts
shall be regulated in the mean time as is provided in the third and fifth
sections : but no accusation shall be received against a bishop, except it be
delivered in writing, signed by those who are to prove the crime ; and a
copy of the accusation shall be given to the accused bishop.
" Question 6. If a bishop cease from travelling at large among the peo
ple, shall he still exercise his episcopal office among us in any degree ?
" Answer. If he cease from travelling without the consent of the General
Conference, he shall not thereafter exercise the episcopal office in our
Church." The allegation against Mr. Asbury, " that he took special good care to
get himself elected by the American preacloers," is the " unkindest cut of
all." Mr. Asbury refused to be superintendent of the Methodist Episcopal
Church unless he should be elected by the free suffrages of his brethren.
And was it not praiseworthy to do so ? He might have been superinten
dent by Mr. Wesley's appointment, as Dr. Coke was, (though he also was
received by a vote of the Conference,) but he would not exercise authority
over any but those who consented to confer it upon him ; and this is called
" taking special good care to get himself elected by the American
preachers !" And this is said too by a man who, in the lifetime of the good
bishop, was his bosom friend and travelling companion, and who, after his
death, eulogized him in a funeral sermon in terms of unqualified panegy
ric as a " good man," a " good minister," and a " good bishop !" 0
shame, where is thy blush ?
In the above quotation, the picture which the writer has drawn in the
last paragraph, of the intolerant persecuting spirit of our bishops, can only
find a parallel in the Romish inquisition. To starve the healthy depen
dent into submission to arbitrary power, would probably be considered
sufficiently odious in a civilized, not to say Christian community ; but to
deprive the sick opponent of shelter and food and medicine, until he is
forced into improper compliance with episcopal prerogative, is a hardihood
of cruelty at which the heart sickens, and at which the soul of an ordinary
inquisitor would revolt. The wretch who could be guilty of such barbarity
ought to be deemed to have renounced all affinity with his species, and
hunted down as the common enemy of mankind. Can any man believe
that such a monster is to be found among the venerable bishops of the
Methodist Episcopal Church ? If Mr. Snethen, or the editorial committee
who publish the accusation, know the man, and the facts, why not name
the one, and point directly to the other? Why these cruel innuendoes,
which may be ignorantly applied to the innocent? But we defy them

.NARRATIVE AND DEFENCE. 97
to produce the least shadow of proof. We know the men who are thus
mercilessly assailed ; and the travelling preachers, whose suffrages have
placed them in their present parental relation to the Church, know them
well. Long have they laboured and suffered for the Church, and endured
with patience the privations to which their vocation has subjected them.
Everywhere esteemed for their works' sake, and loved for their personal
virtues, the whole community will hear with indignation the allegations
of these partisans, who seem to act on the principle, that the end they
have in view will justify any means they may employ to effect it. The
paper in the "Mutual Rights," from which we have quoted, was pub
lished in March, 1825. At the General Conference of 1820, a motion
was made and carried, to restrict the episcopal prerogative in the appoint
ment of presiding elders. The resolutions providing for this restriction
were subsequently suspended for four years ; and the General Conference
of 1824 continued the suspension for four years longer. Now, as there
were no other measures of the Conference which tended to abridge the
powers heretofore exercised by the episcopacy, it must be in reference to
the part which the preachers who composed these conferences took in this
measure, that the bishops are accused of exercising such unrelenting cru
elty to those who were opposed to their prerogative. It happened, how
ever, that a majority of the bishops themselves favoured the restrictive
resolutions, and the rest made no opposition but on constitutional grounds ;
and we assert, without the fear of contradiction, that no preacher has ever
received less favour from the bishops on account of the part he took in
relation to this question. On the contrary, we challenge a comparison of
the appointments of those who favoured the restrictive resolutions with
those who were opposed to them ; and we pledge ourselves to show that the
best appointments have been given to those who were opposed to the episcopal
prerogative. What atonement, then, can the author and the publishers of
this cruel accusation make to these venerable ministers of the gospel and
overseers of the flock of Christ, and to the outraged feelings of the Church
over which they preside, for the injury they have designed them? We
leave them to answer this question at a tribunal where all our accounts
will be one day finally and impartially adjusted.
It cannot be pretended that the calumny we have quoted above, is not
meant to describe what has occurred; but what may be anticipated.
There are in the allusions of the author, a specification of place and time
and a circumstantiality of description, which necessarily point out an
individuality of application both as to the oppressor and the oppressed.
And the sombre picture of the stern and inflexible tyranny of the episco
pacy, which nothing but humble submission can appease, is only equalled
by the profligacy of those " elder brethren," those panders to power and
prerogative, who are represented by the author as joining the music and
7

98 NARRATIVE AND. DEFENCE.
dancing over the converted starveling— the broken-hearted victim of
episcopal cruelty and oppression !
It may be asked by the reader, how it was possible for the reverend
author of the publication from which we have made the above extract, to
be betrayed into such an indiscretion ; as it will not be denied, that he had
long been esteemed as an able minister and a pious, amiable man. The
answer will afford a caution which ought to be treasured up by every
Christian, however high his attainments. The author was endowed by
nature with genius rather than with a discriminating judgment. His fine
imagination delighting to indulge in the uncontrolled exercise of its
powers, despised the cold lessons of common sense and experience ; but
the brilliancy of his fancy, combined with a ready utterance, gave irre
sistible charms to his eloquence, and he necessarily became a popular
preacher. Such a mind is wont to revel in mighty projects and imprac*
ticable schemes ; and at the moment of penning the essays we have cited
from, the author was " climbing the steep and slippery ascent to revolu
tionary distinction." He was not only a partisan, but the leader of a
party,— and with reference to our Church government and its administra
tion,, he looked upon everything through the spectacles which party spirit
had furnished him. Through this medium, eveiy opponent and every
measure of opposition is made to take the hue with which party feehng
discolours them, and the author mistook for realities what were the mere
visions of a disturbed and fervid imagination.
But what shall we say of those who published these ravings of a dis
ordered fancy ? who with calm dehberation laid them before the public
as sober realities? Reader, are you a Christian? then shun faction as an
evil influence which, if indulged, will inevitably destroy the spirit of love
and of meekness, and substitute for them, malice and revenge and every
evil work. Extract from the same.
" Our bishops must be flattered, or then power must be resisted. But
flattery is easier and more pleasant than resistance to oppressive power.
Itinerant and local preachers, and members of the Church, therefore, will
discover a proneness to flatter bishops. For the same reason, local preachers
and members will feel disposed to flatter itinerant preachers. But can any
reason be assigned, why the private member of the Church, should despise
local preachers, or that they should manifest an indifference or aversion
towards each other ? Evidently, when the awe that the wealth and power
of office inspires is no longer felt, or ceases to operate under the disguise
of flattery, the mind experiences a re-action, and seeks to revenge itself
upon the name, or form of the office, deprived of its attributes. Let the
property and power which is really in our bishops, and nominally in the

NARRATIVE AND DEFENCE. 99
itinerant preachers, be transferred to the local preachers, and the publie
feehngs will also be transferred. The flatterer pleases himself by his flat
tery, while he seeks to please those whom he flatters. And this pleasure
proceeds from the relief which the mind experiences from the uneasy or
painful sensation of fear. Mankind are sparing of their flattery towards
those of whom they have nothing to hope, and from whom they have
nothing to fear. The president of the United States is not flattered as a
king ; but would be, "if his power were as much feared. We are aware,
that an intimation, that our bishops and itinerant preachers are feared by
the members and the local preachers, will be repelled with great indignar
tion. Indeed, our whole theory of feeling in this case, will be considered
as visionary and erroneous. Our statement is nevertheless true, and ad-r
mits of the clearest demonstration. Mr. Wesley was gi'eatly flattered, and
so was Mr. Asbury. They, indeed, mistook these expressions for the marks
of love, and so did those who made them ; but though it is not to be
doubted that there was much sincere affection, this was to the men. Their
property and power were feared ; and as was the fear, so was the flattery*
Some of our bishops, we perceive, will be much flattered to the south and
west of the Susquehanna, and much and deservedly loved too. But it
does not now seem probable, that they will receive much eulogy from the
north and east. If this shall prove to be the fact, will not the limits of
their praise be the limits within which their power will be feared ? We
beg that these remarks may be attended to, and carefully kept in mind.
These are the data, on which we have predicated the separation of the
north and the east, from the south and the west Where their power is
not flattered it will be resisted. This is not an unwarranted assertion ; it
is not a new case ; it is the thing that hath already been. Leaving Mr.
Wesley's name out of the minutes is a parallel instance, and may be traced
to a similar cause. The absence of the man, disclosed the workings of
the fear : had he been present, flattery would have concealed it all. Traces
of a similar operation may be observed in Dr. Coke's visits. His power
was not half so much to be dreaded as Mr. Asbury's ; and yet the confe
rence required articles to curb it, while he was in England. Of all the IU
lusions which the human mind practises upon itself, none is more wonder
ful than that which takes place in the case of flattery. We always had
occasion to notice, that Mr. Asbury placed his chief reliance for the ascen
dency of his influence upon his presence. Where trouble was, there was
he \"—Ibid., pp. 288, 289.

What a disgusting picture is here drawn of Mr. Wesley, our bishops
and travelling preachers ! — the one catering for praise, the others fawning
and cringing to power and prerogative, and flattering these tyrannical pre-

slflO NARRATIVE AND DEFENCE.
fates as though they had places and offices of immense emolument in their
gift. As. Mr. Snethen travelled with Mr. Asbury, he may be allowed to
know better than anybody else, what means he himself employed to ac
quire the bishop's confidence and procure his favour. Whether Mr. As
bury permitted Mr. Snethen to flatter him, we cannot say ; but we protest
against his attributing the same disingenuous policy to the other itinerant
ministers who were his contemporaries. Some of them are yet living to feel
the unkind and unwarranted accusation; and of some who are dead, we
say with confidence, they were made of sterner stuff than to flatter human
vanity, pride or power. That they loved and honoured Mr. Asbury is in
deed very true, and never were love and reverence more justly and appro
priately bestowed. But the writer says: "We always had occasion to no
tice, that Mr. Asbury placed his chief reliance for the ascendency of his
influence upon his presence. Where trouble was, there was he." And
where, we would ask, should the shepherd be when the flock is in danger ?
And if any part of the flock of Christ is in " trouble," where should he he
who is appointed to watch over the flock ? We knew Mr. Asbury, and
we speak advisedly when we say, "his chief rehance for the ascendency
of his influence" was placed in the singleness of heart with which he sought
to promote the great interests of the Redeemer's kingdom upon earth —
upon the purity and disinterestedness of his motives, which his brethren
saw exemplified, in every action of his long and devoted life — and upon the
blessing of the Great Head of the Church, to whom he could appeal for
the rectitude and sincerity of his every purpose. These, together with his
acknowledged ability, gave him his great ascendency in the councils of
the Church — and for the truth of this assertion, we appeal, if proof be
thought necessary, to Mr. Snethen's funeral sermon on the death of this
venerable servant of God. O party spirit ! thou fell destroyer of peace
and concord, love and union, do not the living furnish victims enough to
make up the hecatombs which are to be offered upon thy altar — must thy
Votaries also scatter on the sacrifice the ashes of the dead 1
Extract from "Nehemiah,5 on the expediency of allowing to the Local Ministry and
Laity a Representation in the General Conference."
i "Convinced as they (the reformers). are that they have everything on
their side that would justify them in the sight of God, in the eyes* of the
world, and in the demands of their own consciences, to withdraw, is it to
be expected that they will continue to submit to those who withhold their
rights? To remain would be hopeless. To remain in the connexion
would be to remain to be made the butt of the contumely and insult of
every one opposed to reform. If nothing be done in favour of the refor
mation it will be construed into a total defeat, and will so inflame their
° Alexander M'Caine..

NARRATIVE AND DEFENCE. 101
opponents as to induce them to add further injuries to the grievance
already felt. What, then, can the reformers promise themselves by con
tinuing in the connexion in the event of a total denial of their claims ?
Can they hope that, by continuing to suffer, justice will be done them in
the end ? Alas ! injustice, like death, has neither eyes to see the miseries
of its subjects nor a heart to feel for the wounds which it inflicts. Every
symptom of patience, and every returning period, will only encourage
tiieir oppressors to be firmer in their denial, and will induce them to
augment the distresses of the distressed. Can they, under this vieW
of the subject, calculate upon the common courtesies and civilities of life?
They cannot. For, even at the present, and while the cause is depending^
the shafts of reproach are frequently hurled at them, even from the pulpit.
" We will now suppose that the General Conference, rigidly adhering
to the present system, with all its features of injustice, reject the petitions
which may be presented for a representation. We will suppose that those
friendly to an equitable Church government, based upon representation,
will then proceed to take such measures as will be deemed necessary to
form themselves into a Church — will not many of our best and oldest
local preachers be of that number ? Will not many of the most intelligent
and respectable laymen and their families be of the number ? Will not
some who are at present in the travelling connexion, and who are ground,
as it were, between the upper and nether millstones, on account of their
liberal sentiments, be of that number? We have no doubt of these
things. How whole districts of country may be affected by the forma-,
tion of a new connexion we cannot tell, but we shall neither be surprised
nor mistaken in our calculation if societies were to withdraw by scores,
from a Church whose ministers, if they speak the truth, would rather see
them go into sin, and finally go to hell, than allow a representation in
the lawmaking department of the Church. — Ibid., pp. 478-479.
REMARKS.
We have here a plain, unequivocal development of the ulterior views
of the Union Society. They are determined to carry their measures,
whether with or without the consent of the majority, or to leave the:
Church. They call the travelling preachers " oppressors of their brethren,"
and declare that these " oppressors " have neither eyes to see the " mise-:
ries " of their flock nor hearts to feel for their " wounds ;" nay, that theys
would rather see their flocks go into " sin," and finally into " hell," than'
to accord them their rights. Gracious Heaven ! are these men Methodists'?
and are they speaking of the whole body of itinerant Methodist preach
ers? A few, indeed, are excepted, who, they say, however, are ground-
between "the upper and nether millstones for their liberal sentiments."/
If this is the language of love, what would be the language of hatred ?

102 NARRATIVE AND DEFENCE.
Would a deist represent a Christian ministry in more odious colours?
Yet the writer of the above' extracts assumes the venerated name of
"Nehemiah." What a pity he did not take the much more appropriate
signature of " Sanballat !" Nehemiah, chap. iv.
Extract from a " Letter from the Baltimore Union Society to a Member of the Bedford
Union Society, Tennessee."
" We have, for a long time, been sufficiently well informed respecting
the great dissatisfaction of many intelligent brethren, who are, at the same
time that they are fast friends to the doctrine of holiness which we have
received as a common legacy from the great founders of Methodism, [we
hope it had a higher origin,] are nevertheless unwilling to be tributary
to the perpetuation of a system of government which, in their opinion,
is forging fetters for themselves and their posterity." — Ibid.,
vol. ii, p. 90. Extract from " An Answer to the * Querist,' by Bartimeus."°
"If they [the travelling preachers] go on and enslave the people, the
consequence will be, that they will ultimately and inevitably enslave them
selves and their children after them." — Bbid., p. 37.
Extract from a " Letter to the Editors of the Mutual Rights."
" Is it not a possible case, that some of our rulers may be looking for
ward to an establishment, especially as they claim a divine right to
absolute government over those whom they have been the instruments of
converting from the error of their ways ; and truly, if they have this
divine right they should have it established by law, to keep the ' restless
spirits ' down." — Paid., p. 46. REMARKS.
It will be thought strange by our brethren who are not enlightened by
the "Mutual Rights," that these dark designs of our ministry should
have been so long earned on without detection. To be "forging fetters
for us and our posterity," " enslaving the people " and " looking forward
to an establishment," that is, a Church established by law, by which they
may " keep the restless spirits down," is a terrible and treasonable con
spiracy indeed. Our brethren of other denominations ought to look
sharply about them, and come speedily to our assistance, lest we be all
enslaved together ! We put it to the consciences of our brethren to say,
whether our itinerant preachers are such men as would be likely to har
bour such treasonable designs against the Church and their country?
whether they have ever sought to exercise authority, even of a pastoral
kind, over any but those who voluntarily put themselves under their care
° Rev. Asa Shinn.

NARRATIVE AND DEFENCE. 103
as spiritual guides? whether with few exceptions they have not kept
aloof from all political affairs— esteeming it their only business to preach
a full, free, and present salvation to a lost and ruined world? and
whether that can be " reform" which is to be accomplished by such slander
and misrepresentation as we have quoted ?
Joseph Walker's Letter to the Editorial Committee.
" Alabama, Dallas county, May 19, 1826.
" Dear Brethren, — A few days ago a friend put five or six numbers
of the Mutual Rights into my hand to read. It gave me heartfelt satis
faction to know that the spirit of reformation is at work in our favoured
country, and, especially, that it has begun in the Methodist Episcopal
Church, where it is so much needed. When we look back and think of
the privations, and sufferings, and fightings through which our fathers
struggled in the revolutionary war for the attainment of civil liberty and
rehgious mutual rights, and then turn round and see all the principles of
liberty trampled upon by our travelling preachers, in their conferences and
in their administration of Church government, it is enough to grieve a
heart of stone. I can but weep to see our Zion so oppressed. I am the
son of an old patriot of the State of Pennsylvania. I have been a
preacher in the Methodist Episcopal Church more than twenty years, and
have been ordained deacon and elder. My house has been all that time
a place of retreat and rest for the travelling preachers, and of constant
resort for the brethren. Having, therefore, had frequent opportunities, I
have intimated to bishops, presiding elders, and travelling preachers, the
propriety and necessity of reform. They have commonly replied, it might
be right, perhaps, and that those who wished reform, could withdraw
whenever they might see proper. I was led to pause ! I pondered within
myself! O, the depth of spiritual wickedness apparently in high places!
O, the curse of ingratitude ! Good Heavens ! thought I, filled with aston
ishment, how many hundreds of dollars have I and many others spent for
the exclusive use of the Methodist Episcopal Church ! She has been our
constant care, and for her we have laboured for twenty years and more ;
and never have we received one dollar of reward. Indeed, some of us,
like the apostle Paul, would rather have died than have been deprived of
this our glorying in the cross of Christ. And after all, if we object to
our condition of living under continual oppression and privation, we may
go out of society in search of rehef! And, if we should take them at
their word and go, then our characters would be destroyed. Nothing
would save us from reproach if we cease to be called by this name.
" I was personally acquainted with Bishop Asbury. I have heard him
converse with the Rev. Hope Hull, who was a friend to reform, and I
easily collected the information that our Church government was framed

104 NARRATIVE AND DEFENCE.
chiefly by subjects of Great Britain. Of course I never wondered much
that such men should have shaped their code, and made their ecclesiastical
laws according to their own model. But when I consider that nearly all
our present preachers are Americans ; when I consider how excellent and
powerful is the republican spirit which prevails in these United States, and
how equal the civil laws under which we live ; when I see how carefully our
civil and religious liberties are secured to the people of every possible variety
of denomination, I am compelled to ask the question, Is not the form of our
Church government and the manner in which it is administered, an open
insult to the constitution of the United States ? It surely is, and were it fully
investigated and exposed to public view, such a despotic institution would
make a bad appearance before the observation of a religious republic.
The power of the itinerancy in this part of the country is already in a
trembling condition. All that is necessary is for the people to be freed
from the terrors of the gag-law. The people, generally, think rightly, if
they only dare to speak out. For my part I was bom in the year 1776,
and a warm current of the blood of freemen runs through my veins. I
delight to entertain a just sense of man's equal rights in Church and
State. My son-in-law, Ebenezer Hern, is now, and for several years has
been, a presiding elder in the Mississippi Conference, and my oldest son,
R. L. Walker, is a travelling preacher in the same conference. These
facts serve, with other considerations, as you may suppose, to make me
more sohcitous for a change in our Church government ; for I do not wish
to see any of my family have a part in holding the reins of a government
which is administered in unrighteousness.
"There are many things which I would be glad to communicate;
but I am aware that my zeal in so good a cause, after having been so
long suppressed, may be in danger of rising too high. I must, therefore,
come to a close.
" I send you ten dollars. You will be so good as to send me one copy
of your first volume ; if convenient, send it bound. Also, six copies of
your second volume. I have procured no subscribers for them as yet, but
I will see to it that they shall be well circulated.
" Any use you may think fit to make of these my remarks will have
my approbation. I try to live before God, independent of tlie frowns or
smiles of men. My name is Joseph Walker ; my place of residence is
Dallas county, State of Alabama.
" I will conclude with saying, that in the whole extent of my reading
in ancient or modern history, I have not met with any notice of a single
order of people, except the Roman Catholics and Methodists, whose preach
ers convene without the consent of the people, make laws for the govern
ment of the people, and afterwards turn round and execute those laws. I
have been wide awake to the cause of reform fifteen years or more. But

NARRATIVE AND DEFENCE. 105
the subject not being popular, I have been compelled to speak of it only
in confidence. Men of the best minds in our itinerancy are of the same
opinion. How can it be otherwise ? But supremacy and self-preservation
keep most of them silent. Let us be of good courage, for we have nothing
to fear. Let us be faithful to God, and the cause of equal rights and the
world will be secured without firing a gun, or shedding of blood." — 3id.,
pp. 26, 27, 28.' Extracts from " Luther * on Representation."
" Messrs. Editors, — With much interest I have perused several num
bers of your Mutual Rights. The friends of reform speak very intelligibly
the language of the American family. They reiterate the theme of those
who gloriously repose in the stillness of Thermopylae, Marathon, Chseronea,
Pharsalia, and Monmouth. They resist the same principle which slew the
martyrs, slaughtered Poland, assailed America, and was vanquished.
That principle is despotism. At this plain word some will cry out, ' Trea
son!' or, what is tantamount, 'Apostasy!' 0, Messrs. Editors! how
profoundly I regret that truth will apply this hateful characteristic to any
part of Methodistical polity, the Searcher of hearts alone can tell. For
sixteen years have the sympathies of my heart, and the energies of my
mind, (such as they be,) been deeply interested in behalf of your ZiOn.
During that time I have lingered with fond solicitude about your outer
courts, (not having shared in her councils, though of her priesthood;) I
have willingly hewn her wood and drawn her water, all the while hoping
that her leading chieftains would roll away this reproach from her honour,
banish this cloud from her beauty, purge this poison from her vitals, dig
this volcano from her foundations, and enable her to walk forth in all her
native beauty, fan as the moon, clear as the sun, and terrible as an army
with banners, the praise of the whole earth. Until the last General Con
ference I viewed this despotic trait in her polity as the offspring of casual
ties — a sort of wild exotic, which, by some mishap, had sprung up in the
garden of the Lord — a wandering demorii which had insinuated himself
into our paradise unobserved, and, like Milton's toad at the ear of Eve,
infused into the genius of our Church portentous dreams and dreary
visions. I looked to that General Conference for an achievement worthy
of primitive Christianity and American Methodists. My fond imagination
displayed to my view an august assembly of holy men hurling this mon
ster from the heights of their Salem, a spectacle to an admiring nation.
But O, cruel disappointment! Methodism has lost one of her richest
laurels ; never did an epoch, of her history give to her rulers so distin
guished an opportunity of shedding an immortal lustre upon her own name
and their own memories. But that circular, the ominous offspring of her
° Supposed to be written by a local preacher by the name of Hill, in North Carolina. "

106 NARRATIVE AND DEFENCE.
labour, too barren to merit criticism, serves only to mortify the best friends
of Methodism, and to legalize oppression." — P>id., pp. 53, 54.
"But when those representatives of the itinerancy, who alone elect
them, presume to legislate for all the locality and laity of the Methodist
Church, what assumption can be more unwarrantable — what system more
oppressive ? In case of grievance, where shall the locality and laity look
for redress ? They have no check upon their lawgivers. The members
of the General Conference are all pledged to their itinerant brethren who
sent them there ; and the itinerancy in mass are all indirectly pledged to
the episcopacy : hence the episcopacy is frequently strengthened, and the
itinerancy is always guarded ; but the rights of the laity and locality are
trampled on." — Paid., pp. 55, 56.
"O! is the religion of Jesus with all its enrapturing joys, the soul with
all its indescribable powers, heaven with all its inconceivable glories, and
hell with all its unutterable- horrors — are these matters so trivial, that we
leave them to the winds, to the speculations of self-created conclaves,
while we guard the sanctuary of our civil, our momentary rights so
inviolably ? Illustrious prophets and martyrs, had you been thus pliant,
instead of sailing through the bloody storms of time to endless rest, you
had smoothly glided down to hell ; instead of leaving your track to glory
a living galaxy of heavenly light, the heavy clouds of the second death
would now fling their thunders upon your weather-beaten spirits ; instead
of handing down to posterity the word of life, pure and undefiled, you
had bequeathed to the world a darkness more dreary than that which
fell on ancient Egypt. But, ye reverend spirits of Europe and Asia,
you have fought the good fight, and laid hold upon the crown of life.
It is for us American Methodists, to prostrate ourselves at the foot of
a spiritual aristocracy, and say, Let us eat our own bread, and wear our
own apparel; but let us be called by your name. It is for us to cower
at the foot of that principle in ecclesiastics, which was chastised by our
forefathers upon the agents of a civil despot. It is for us Methodists to
take the humiliating responsibility of shamelessly encouraging a spiritual
domination, in the face of free America. It is for us, the emancipated
sons of conquering chieftains, to rivet those chains upon our descendants
which were torn from our hands, if we only give them the name of reli
gion." — Md., pp. 56, 57.
" But, Messsrs. Editors, valuable as your paper is, the friends of reform
must appeal to the public through other mediums in union with that.
You encounter a well-organized, artful, enterprising opposition, which
spreads through almost every city, village, and neighbourhood, from
Maine to Georgia. Their first effort is to conceal to the utmost the
disquietudes and grievances which exist in our Church, and to lull a
spirit of inquiry to rest. Where this is impracticable, they arraign the

NARRATIVE AND DEFENCE. 107
motives of the reformers with uncharitable and uncivil severity. Your
own paper, if I have not been sadly misinformed, having been branded
as a sort of libel upon the Church, published by desperate designers, has
been kept out of the hands of valuable men, to whom it was addressed,
and left to linger in postoffices. 0, how I regret to know the men,
and the character they sustain in society, who are employed in this
midnight stabbing ! Could I believe in transmigration, I might imagine
that some of the Jesuits expelled from Europe had taken up their
residence in the bodies of some i  [itinerants] in the United States.
Parsimony is a stronghold, to which very successful appeals are made.
The local reformers want salaries, city settlements, &c, and the great men
(in common style) want to send the little men home, who serve cheaply,
&c. To the last of these charges I plead guilty with all my heart ; for I
have long believed, that if the Church could exercise the right of suffrage,
she would sift the talents of her ministry, and secure the best for her
service. But the fallacy of the other subterfuges of the anti-reformers
bears its own characteristic. The majority of suffrages will always be
among the laity, they will therefore have it in their power to check
abuses, and, under a well-balanced form of government, those presumers
who grasp so greedily after power, would sink into merited contempt, while
modest worth would be duly promoted. I say you must appeal to the
public through other mediums ; you have passed the Rubicon, there is
no returning without a sacrifice of principle, without abandoning your
Church to her degraded destiny. If you suffer another General Con
ference to legislate for you, I am ready to say, Prepare for tame submis
sion or banishment. Your missionaries should now be on the highways
of the nation, and in the pulpits of your Church ; and the friends of
reform should send then private communications everywhere. You have
the prejudices of many years arrayed against you, and that still inglorious
repose which undisturbed power, artfully administered, gives, refuses to
part with its slumbers." — Ibid., pp. 58, 59.
" Those who are now securely enthroned on the summit of the cloudy
Olympus of power, when they shall feel the mount quake and tremble
beneath them, will become solicitous to know what is the matter, and
not before."— Poid., p. 62. REMARKS.
We learn from this writer that the Methodist Episcopal Church is such
a despotism as was resisted by the Greeks and Romans, and by the
Americans at Monmouth ; that it is predicated on the same principles as
that which " slaughtered Poland" and " slew the martyrs ;"¦ that it is an
" assumption of authority " that is an usurpation ; nay, an " unwarranta
ble and oppressive assumption," and the " rights of the laity and locality

108 NARRATIVE AND DEFENCE.
are trampled on,"— our conferences are " self-created conclaves ;" that if
the prophets and martyrs had been as pliant as we Methodists, they "had
smoothly glided down to hell," and " the heavy .clouds of the second
death would now fling their thunders upon their weather-beaten spirits ;"
but they fought through " bloody storms " and escaped, while we, stupid^
cowering, insensible Methodists, run the risk of "hell" and the "heavy
clouds," nay, the " thunders of the second death," rather than prevent all
these terrible calamities, by sending the writer and a few more of his radi
cal local brethren to the General Conference. Instead of this, he says,
"we prostrate ourselves at the foot of a spiritual aristocracy," and
"shamelessly encourage a spiritual domination." These violent de
nunciations and invectives might have been taken for the ravings of a
madman, had they been published by himself; and the author would
have been considered rather as a subject for a hospital than an object of
reproof or punishment. But they have been adopted by the editorial
committee of the Union Society, and given to the world as the sentiments
of reformers ! The communication is dated North Carolina, May, 1 825 ;
and if we have not mistaken the author, the publication, had it come out
under no other sanction than his own proper name, would have been a
very harmless thing indeed. These "midnight stabbing" "itinerants,"
into whose bodies (could he beheve in transmigration) he should imagine
the Jesuits had entered, can only feel these cruel aspersions when they are
authorized by men of standing and character ; such as conducted the
work in which they have been published. We ask the editorial com
mittee then, Can they be " aristocrats " who have been recommended by
the laity and received by the ministry, and who hold their offices during
good behaviour ? If the tenure of their offices constitute them aristocrats,
then are all the civil judges of our land aristocrats. Can they be despots
and oppressors, whose authority no man is bound to obey a moment
longer than he pleases ; who exercise no power over any but those who
voluntarily intrusted them with it, and who subsist upon the voluntary
bounty of those they govern. Our ministers themselves have taught us
to esteem them only as the servants, not the lords of the Church ; watch
ing over the flock of the great Shepherd and Bishop of our souls, as they
who must give an account to God. Such we still esteem them, and shall
persist, notwithstanding what the Union Society have said of them, to
love and honour them greatly for their works' sake ; at least so long as
they shall continue to be as they have heretofore been, examples to the
flock of Christ.
As to the letter of Mr. Joseph Walker, we deem it unnecessary to com
ment upon it. As the impotent rage of perhaps a valetudinary, and cer
tainly of an angry man, it can only derive importance from the sanction
which the Union Society have given to tlie abuse which he so liberally;

NARRATIVE AND DEFENCE. 109
bestows on the itinerant preachers. If Mr. Walker's manners are not
better, he has certainly more honesty than Luther, for he gives his name.
The Union Society have recognised them both as partisans, and are justly
chargeable with a participation in the calumny and evil-speaking which
abounds in both of the communications.
Extracts from "Timothy's5 Address to the Junior Bishop f of the Methodist Episcopal
Church."
" I think it is pretty clear from Moore's life of Mr. Wesley, that Dr.
Coke exceeded his authority in the affair of a third ordination, and in
taking to himself and Mr. Asbury the name of bishop. The forming a
Church government which gives all ecclesiastical power to the ministry
was a bold step. But bishops stop not here ; the creation of presiding
elders, who are the special agents of the bishops, has given them a degree
of power over the whole Church, which really looks alarming. And now,
four of our bishops divide the whole work of these United States between
them, and our senior bishop is arched over the zohole. What does this
look like ? In fifty years power has marched farther in the Methodist
Episcopal Church, than it did in the first three centuries of the Primitive
Church ; and yet with all these facts before you, the people are admonished
to abstain from reading the Mutual Rights, and to let such investigations
alone! GOD FORBID!"— Vol. iii, p. 112.
" We should be more inexcusable than the members of the Christian
Church, in the rise of Popery, if we were to suffer our spiritual rulers to
enslave us ; we have many advantages unknown to them, particularly the
printing-press, — what a blessing this- has been to the world! what a
scourge to wild and lawless ambition !" — Paid.
" To me it does appear to be a duty which we owe to the glorious
Author of our holy religion, to our fellow-Christians, and to posterity, to
discuss this subject before the whole Church, that the slumbering sons of
ova Zion may be roused and kept awake, with an attentive eye fixed on
the stealing march of ecclesiastical power. We have seen what
the Christian Church was in its origin, we have seen what it grew to in
process of time. The people trusted too much to the goodness and infal
libility of the ministry : and the preachers seeing this, took advantage of
it, and went on increasing their own power until the Church was mined.
Let the Methodist Episcopal Church take warning. The wreck of one
fallen Church now covers the world, and what has happened to the
Church of Rome may happen to us if we are not careful, vigilant, pray
erful, and resolute." — Paid., p. 113.
¦ " Is even sober inquiry on the part of our people so terrifying to our
junior bishop ? O my dear sir, let your present palpitations teach you, if
" Rev. Of. Brown, an itinerant minister. f Bishop Hedding.

110 NARRATIVE AND DEFENCE.
nothing else will, that all is not right in our Church government, and that
to assuage your fears you must lessen your power ; nothing is more alarm
ing to men in your situation, than even a just reaction of public feeling.
Still you oppose the Mutual Rights for fear of agitating our people; did
Luther, and Calvin, and Zwingle and their coadjutors feel the force of this
argument ? Did they abandon their holy enterprise, for fear of disturbing
his holiness, in St. Peter's chair, for fear of agitating the Church of Rome?
JtVb verily, they did not ; nor will we.
" I am inclined to think that no branch of the Christian Church has,
for several centuries, been in such a dilemma as ours. We are in a strait
betwixt two, — between ' agitating ' the Church, on the one hand, (if calm
discussion will agitate it,) and the bold march of ecclesiastical power on the
other. If we let power march on, the Church is ruined. If we attempt
by our investigations to arrest it in its course, the Church it seems will he
'agitated.' Under a conviction that there is some analogy between the
natural and moral world ; that as the ebbing and flowing of the tide has
a tendency to purify the ocean ; and that thunder storms tend to purify
the atmosphere which surrounds our earth ; so, also, does the agitating of
the great political, ecclesiastical, philosophical, and rehgious questions, by
which the attention of the community has now and then been arrested,
tend, more or less, to political, ecclesiastical, philosophical, and moral
purity. Under a conviction of these things I have been led to adopt my
present course, with a fixed determination to be troublesome to lovers of
power and prerogative so long as I live." — Paid., p. 114.
" As to your advice to 'be still and say nothing, until we stand on the
floor of the General Conference,' I can only say, that the delegates for that
body are yet unknown, and perhaps arrangements may be made by ' cau
cusing ' or otherwise to leave reformers all at home. (The like has been
heard of.*) In such an event are we to be kept out of General Conference
by stratagem, and forced into silence too ? This will be very hard indeed ;
a few such attempts have been made. They succeeded, and a few more
will make a new Church. Brethren ought to be above stratagem when
they elect their delegates; surely we are far gone after the mother of har
lots when we can practise pious frauds ! Every honest man should aban
don the Church, as he would abandon a sinking ship, so soon as she deter
mines on carrying her measures by trick, stratagem, or pious fraud. It is
to be hoped the episcopacy will have nothing to do with these things. If
they do, I here advertise them, that they, and not the reformers, must bear
the blame if commotion shall ensue." — Rid., p. 116.
" ' The bishop has some fears for his power, or why all this exertion
against reform ? Bishop and travelling preachers have all the power in the
government of our Zion, and this address plainly says, that by the grace of
0 Witness the Baltimore Conference at Winchester, 1824.

NARRATIVE AND DEFENCE. Ill
God or otherwise, they mean to keep it ; a love of power always marches
onward, crying, Give, give ! And men of great prerogatives are rarely
known to yield them in order to secure the general welfare.' In short, sir,
your hand seemed to be against every man whose hand might be against
the episcopal and ministerial power of our Church. You took your stand
against all who would ask you, for Christ's sake, for the Church's sake,
for peace' sake, to let some of your ecclesiastical power fall into other
hands." — Poid., p. 117.

This writer would really alarm us if we could bring ourselves to believe
all his forebodings. But, as we know his premises are false, we cannot
doubt the fallacy of his conclusions. " And now four of our bishops," he
says, " divide the whole work of these United States between them, and
our senior bishop is arched over the whole . What does this look like ?"
Why really it looks very like an archbishopric ; and from this the author
naturally comes to the conclusion that "in fifty years power has marched
farther in the Methodist Episcopal Church than it did in the first three
centuries of the primitive Church ! Mr. M'Kendree is then an archbishop !
We were not prepared for this. We had considered Mr. M'Kendree as
superannuated, and as having for some years declined the arduous duties
of the episcopacy, — devoting indeed his remaining strength to the cause
to which he consecrated his youth and his riper years, but leaving the
administration of the government almost wholly in the hands of his junior
associates in the episcopal office. We believe, moreover, that this exemp
tion from the burden and cares of office was asked and obtained from the
General Conference : and now he is to be accused of usurping an archi-
cpiscopal authority ! The gray hairs of this veteran ought to have saved
him this taunting appellation. His faithful labours, his devoted life, his
long and invaluable services to the Church, and even his many infirmities,
ought to have shielded him from this biting sarcasm — this unfeeling insult.
The author well knew that there existed no legal superiority among the
bishops, whatever preference might be accorded by the juniors to the age
and experience of the elder incumbent of the episcopal office. Doctor
Jennings, in his defence " intended to have been delivered " before
the district conference, rings the changes on the circumstance of his being
an " aged minister." How much did he respect the feelings of aged
ministers when he inserted in his periodical this bitter philippic against this
good old man — this aged, venerable minister of the Lord Jesus Christ ?
But the doctor was reforming tlie Church, " after his fashion," and the
bishop, as well as most if not all the senior itinerant ministers, stood in his
way, and he could not therefore consent to spare them.
There does not appear, even from the writer's own showing, that there

112 NARRATIVE AND DEFENCE.
was anything amiss in the junior .bishop's valedictory address to the Pitts
burg Conference. There was an exhortation to peace and concord— a wish
expressed that the preachers should avoid agitating the Church, by discus
sing amongst the members the subject of changing our form of government,
and this we presume applied as well to those who were opposed to the
change as to those who were in favour of it. The bishop no doubt thought
that the preachers might lessen their usefulness, if they enlisted themselves
as partisans in this dispute, which has already excited too much feeling ;
and he very properly advised them to postpone the discussion, until by
themselves or their representatives, they should have an opportunity calmly
and deliberately to consider it on the floor of the General Conference,
where only it could be determined. He further advised them not to aid
in the circulation of the " Mutual Rights," and we think the extracts from
that work which we have given fully justify the advice of the bishop. He
could not believe that a Methodist preacher ought to give countenance or
currency to a work in which his brethren and fellow-labourers are calum
niated and abused. From this advice, however, the most unwarrantable
inferences are drawn as to the bishop's motives and principles. The writer
ascribes to him a thirst for power and desire of domination, which is only
equalled by the papacy. " We should be more inexcusable," says he, " than
the members of the Christian Church -in the rise of popery, if we were to
suffer our spiritual rulers to enslave us; we have many advantages un
known to them, particularly the printing-press, — what a blessing this has
been to the world, what a scourge to wild and lawless ambition ! " — vol. iii.
P. 112. He advises us to " keep an attentive eye on the stealing march of
ecclesiastical power." And he intimates an apprehension lest what has
happened to the Church of Rome may happen to us. He infers from the
bishop's address, without any reason whatever, that he is an enemy to re
ligious liberty. The address he supposes meant that " to obey was enough
for the people," — bishops govern in all the plenitude of their power by
." a divine right, which ought not to be examined or called in question."
And he proposes to hold Mr. Hedding up to the political execration of the
people — for he says, " I do, sir, think it my duty, to hold your conduct
up to public view, that all men may know, what a genuine friend to the
rights of man you are ; and how entirely republicanism governs all your
movements?' Now would not any man infer from all this vituperation
and abuse, that the bishop had greatly infringed upon the author's rights,
or uttered some opinions on the subject of government subversive of our
civil institutions 2 Yet nothing of this had happened. He had only dis
suaded the preachers from aiding the circulation of a slanderous publica
tion, and exhorted them to such conduct as he thought necessary to pre
serve them in the unity of the Spirit and the bond of peace.
As to the "stealing march of ecclesiastical power" which is complained

NARRATIVE AND DEFENCE. 113
of, the writer knew that the march had been retrograde. The ministry
have much less power than formerly ; and the lessening this power was
the voluntary act of the ministry. They once expelled members from the
Church at will, and appointed stewards and made preachers, without any
reference to the people — none of these powers now remain with the preach
ers ; and as to the superintendents, they have less power now than Mr.
Wesley's general assistant had before the revolutionary war, — that is,
than Mr. Asbury had before he was made bishop, — for then he dismissed
preachers from the travelling connexion whenever he thought it proper or
necessary. What bishop has any such power now ? In fact they have
no power, but that of making the preachers' appointments, that is, of dis
tributing the labourers as the state of the vineyard may require ; and this
they do by the authority of the preachers themselves. All this was known,
we suppose, to the editorial committee of the Union Society — for we would
not suppose them ignorant of their discipline and the history of their Church.
We infer then that they published this writer's remarks knowing that they
were unfounded. Yet they allege " they have not been charged with any
immorality !" They must excuse us if we entertain a different opinion.
We have heard that the writer (Timothy) who is a member of the Pitts
burg Conference, made some explanations or apologies to his brethren in
conference, which were accepted. This however makes no atonement for
the offence of those who published his remarks — they have offered no apo
logy for their participation in the affair.
Extracts from "Miscellaneous Remarks, by Dissenter."3
" I confess it is a source of peculiar gratification to me to see the spirit
of determined inquiry so extensively diffused among our people, notwith
standing conference lectures, pulpit hints, and class-room lessons to prevent
it. These warning voices so often lifted up in our hearing are the evident
misgivings of power, and so many proofs that our arguments in favour of
reform are felt even by those who affect to despise them. A fourth of my
prefatory remarks was, that although much good feeling may be lost in
this controversy, yet, as the present and future interests of the Church
require it, reformers ought not to blench from their purpose, whatever
social sacrifices they may be called upon to make, but ought to continue
in the Church, and multiply and vary their efforts, until the existing
anomaly of government in the Methodist Episcopal Church shall revert to
its primitive Wesleyan standard, in which state, if we can credit Mr.
Wesley's declarations, it was never intended that the Methodists should
become an ecclesiastical establishment, headed by an episcopal hierarchy,
consisting of an indefinite number of incumbents, all possessing the same
powers and ruling the same diocese. The model for such a state of things
° Rev. H. B. Bascom.
8

114 NARRATIVE AND DEFENCE.
is not to be met with in, the whole range of Church history, except when
four individuals at the same time claimed by divine right the chair of
popedom in the Roman see. If the reader is startled at this, let him recol
lect that things that are alike in their nature and progress will be com
pared by the human mind, and classed accordingly." — Ibid., pp. 148, 149.
" We cannot expect to succeed immediately in the great objects we
have in view. I have no hope that the next General Conference will do
anything for us. We have too many men in power, bishops and would-be-
bishops, that are hovering over the nucleus of ecclesiastical aggrandizement,
and already laying their plans to prevent the election of reformei's to the
General Conference, to indulge the hope, even for a moment, that we shall
be able to accomplish much in any short time. But the fact that they are
thus industrious to defeat the objects of reform is the proof of our success.
Let them manoeuvre, let them caucus, let them buy men by the 'sale of
¦indulgences :' all will ultimately operate in our favour, and only multiply
our friends." — Paid., p. 149.
" But Mr. Wesley seems not to have contemplated an episcopacy in any
shape. It is, to be sure, asserted, in the preface to our Book of Discipline ;
but the oldest preachers in the United States, with whom I have conversed
and corresponded on this subject, never saw the warrant. It has been
called for by friends and foes for thirty years, but is not yet forthcoming.
If such warrant exists, why is it that we can learn nothing about it ?"— r
Ibid., p. 152.
" But until such document or warrant from Mr. Wesley be produced, /,
as an individual, must, of necessity, continue to doubt the historical probity
of the preface to our Book of Discipline, in relation to this particular." — Paid.
" What had Wesleyan Methodism to do with our self-created and self-,
styled episcopacy? For, I repeat it, Dr. Coke was only set apart as a
superintendent of the American Methodists, and not ordained to a third
office as a prelatical bishop. The ceremony of separation was only
intended to confer Mr. Wesley's authority to oversee the American Method
ists upon another, as Mr. Wesley could not attend to them in person. What
did original Methodism know of our order of presiding elders ? — one man
having power to appoint seventy, to overrule and remove at pleasure four
teen hundred ? Where in the annals of original Methodism did the framers
of our Discipline meet with the ceremony of ordination for a bishop ?" —
Paid., p. 153.
" The improvements proposed in our present form of government are
openly denounced as 'innovations.' This is somewhat singular, when
every man of information knows that our whole system of episcopacy in
the United States is, to all intents and purposes, an ' innovation ' upon the
genius and plans of Wesleyan Methodism, and one expressly disapproved
and disavowed by Mr. Wesley." — Paid., p. 154.

Narrative and defence. 115
Extract from " An Appeal to the Good Sense of the Citizens of the United States, by Rev.
• Asa Shinn."
" P. S. — If the Baltimore brethren think me visionaiy in supposing the
reformers will finally be successful, let me explain myself. I do not think
any sudden reformation either practicable or desirable, but that the cause
will advance gradually and surely. Do I suppose this will be done with
out opposition ? Far from it : I believe the powers that be, ' from the
episcopal chair down to the foundling's stool,' will strain every nerve to
crush us ; that the reformers will have to advance like men struggling
against wind and tide, against rain and snow, and hail, and thunder, and
lightning. The minds of many, I expect, will storm and rage, as though
they really believed we intended to pull down the moon, or as though
they thought our success would destroy morality, civilization, Methodism,
and Christianity ! And all this will be nothing more nor less than an
anxious, trembling effort, to support the wonderful sacredness of human
authority! The world has been so long befooled with delusion, that
many appear disposed to act as though they believed that if it were not
for the great prop of human authority it would be doubtful whether
Almighty God would be able to take care of the Christian world." — Paid.,
p. 212. Extract from "Presbyter0 to the Editors of the Mutual Rights."
" Now the object of these remarks, Messrs. Editors, is to show that our
episcopacy has nothing to do with original Wesleyan Methodism, and is
disowned by it. It cannot, therefore, be in any way essential to our pros
perity; for the history of the British Methodists and that of the American
Methodists for eighteen years, proves clearly and indubitably that its
alleged importance in order to the success of Christianity among us, is a
perfectly gratuitous assumption, unsupported by reason, history, or com
mon sense. On the other hand, if our bishops and their pertinacious
supporters as high-toned Episcopalians, ill as it may look, (for such they
really are,) would yield and distribute throughout the different depart
ments of the Church that part of their power that has come into their
hands ' surreptitiously,' it would abate the honest inquietude of thou
sands, it would remove the just apprehensions of the discerning, and bring
worthy multitudes into the bosom of the Methodist Church, whose names,
as things now are, will never adorn our calendar. Of the truth of these
remarks I have no doubt ; and surely one who has travelled as a Methodist
itinerant preacher at least fifty thousand miles, may be permitted to speak
' on a subject that hes so near his heart, and is vitally connected with the
individual and social interest of living and unborn millions ! With these
remarks, Messrs. Editors, I close; but as I have passed the Rubicon, you
may hear from me again about the ides of March."— Paid., p. 232.
'•Rev. H. B. Bascom.

116 NARRATIVE AND DEFENCE.
Extracts from « Reasons in Plea for Reform in the Government of the Methodist Epis
copal Church, by Neale."5
" 4th. From the preceding facts it appears, that the introduction of
episcopacy among the Methodists in the United States, so far from being
' recommended' by Mr. Wesley, was expressly disapproved and forbidden,
and the proceedings of the General Conference of 1784, in establishing
diocesan episcopacy among us, was in open violation of the instructions
of Mr. Wesley ; and I now take the liberty of saying to the Rev. William
M'Kendree, Enoch George, Robert R. Roberts, Joshua Soule, and Elijah
Hedding, that a statement on this subject, to which I find their names
subscribed, in the preface to our Book of Discipline, is believed by many
to be a perversion of historical fact, and they are hereby publicly
called upon to furnish some evidence of the truth of the aforesaid state
ment ; or leave us to infer, that such evidence cannot be produced. In
justice, however, to these distinguished individuals in the Methodist Epis
copal Church, I would say distinctly, I believe they are all innocent of
having made this statement originally, but they have made it their own,
by giving it the sanction of their names, as I have not been able to learn
that this preface has ever been sanctioned by any General Conference : if
it has, upon learning it I shall make (should God preserve my life) a
similar call on the next General Conference, as the proper organ of informa
tion : at present the bishops appear to be the only responsible persons,
and on them I call. Should the policy of the cabinet induce them to
remain silent, as heretofore on similar occasions, I shall take the liberty
of thinking they cannot answer me, without damage to their own cause,
which, it would seem, must be supported by silence. 5th. As it is in
proof before the reader that Methodist episcopacy can derive no support
from the name or sanction of Mr. Wesley, both having been definitely
withheld, so also does it admit of proof that the great body of the Metho
dist ministers and members in the United States were not consulted at all
in the adoption of this enormously mis-shapen system of aristocratic
government. It was the undivulged project, the favourite scheme of a
few master spirits, who meeting in secret conclave and excluding the
junior members even of their own body, (as living witnesses declare,)
acknowledging no constitutional rights, and comprehending no legislative
privileges as belonging to any except themselves, proceeded to the hasty
formation of the present plan of government among us, and unblushingly
palmed it upon posterity as tlie offspring of Mr. Wesley's wisdom and
experience. 6th. The spurious origin of Methodist episcopacy, is to be
inferred from the fact that those veiy individuals who made these preten
sions, were unsettled and felt misgivings on the subject.
* Rev. H. B. Bascom.

NARRATIVE AND DEFENCE. llT
"Dr. Coke, in a letter to Bishop White of Philadelphia, doubts the
power of Mr. Wesley to confer legitimate episcopal authority ; he does the
same in a letter to the bishop of London, written subsequently, in both
of which he modestly asks for re-ordination." — Paid., pp. 310, 811.
" In the present preface to our Book of Discipline, the adoption of our
present form of government is attributed to the express instructions of
Mr. Wesley ; but the venerable Wesley has, unequivocally, disavowed the
honour, and n» one has ever shown or quoted the document, paper, or
verbal instructions of Mr. Wesley. It is now nearly a year since all our
bishops were respectfully invited to furnish information on this subject, if
they had any to furnish ; they have not even deigned a reply of any kind :
passing by the uncourteousness of such an act, and the insult it offers to
the wishes of inquiring thousands, who, it is known to the bishops, feel a
deep interest in the subject, I shall plead their apology, by taking it for
granted that they would have replied if they had been able to do so, without
defacing the beauty of those ' institutions received from their fathers,' many
of whom are still living ; or, perhaps, like the Chinese historians, they are
unacquainted with their own origin because their living fathers conceal it.
" But finally, Mr. Asbury pleads his authority as a Methodist bishop,
on the following grounds : — ' 1st. Divine authority. 2d. Seniority in
America. 3d. Election of the General Conference, 1784. 4th. Ordina
tion of Coke, Otterbine, Whatcoat, and Vasey. 5th. Because the signs of
an apostle were found in him.' See Asbury's Journal for May, 1805,
3d vol., page 191. No ' succession ' directly hinted at here, no allusion to
Mr. Wesley. On this expose of the arcana of Methodist episcopacy, I
would only say : it is plain, Mr. Asbury is here speaking of himself as a
bishop of the third order, and superior to presbyters. Of his 'divine
authority ' we can say nothing, only we know it was not received from the
Scriptures. As to ' seniority ' we have yet to learn that it ever creates any
new civil or religious rights. With regard to the vote of the ' General Con
ference ' electing Mr. Asbury, it is only necessary to observe, they might
have acted unadvisedly in this vote of the Conference of 1784 as well as
in others ; and we know that many of the acts of that very Conference have
been since repealed, as improper and disadvantageous. On the subject of
' ordination,' as it was only an ordination by presbyters, we cannot admit
its ' episcopal validity,' if more be meant than a presbyter. As it respects
the last item, the signs of an apostle can only be seen in an apostle, and
of course have not been seen since the apostolic age. Thus the reader will
perceive that our ' fathers ' acted a palpably inconsistent part in the introduc
tion of episcopacy among us, and have been under the necessity (created by
their own indiscretion) of acting an equally awkward, and I fear posterity will
think, ridiculous part in defending themselves against the charge of a reck
less usurpation of unwarranted power."; — Ibid., pp. 312, 313.

118 NARRATIVE AND DEFENCE.

REMARKS.
The first remark we have to make upon the preceding quotations, is,
that the studied endeavour of the Union Society of Baltimore to make the
reformers elsewhere beheve that they did not sanction Mr. M'Caine's
" History and Mystery," is frustrated by the obvious coincidence between
the assertions in their own publications and Mr. M'Caine's pamphlet.
Much as we disapprove of Mr. M'Caine's conduct, we do npt think he has
been well used by his brethren of the Union Society. Since the masterly
refutation of all the allegations in the " History and Mystery," by Dr.
Emory, in his able " Defence of our Fathers," the members of the Union
Society not only deny their having recommended the publication, but have
almost wholly ceased to defend it. Now although, for reasons heretofore
given, they did not vote as a society to recommend it, yet there can be no
doubt of their having generally encouraged him to publish the work ; and
we have seen that they reiterated most of his opinions and unfounded
assertions in the " Mutual Rights." To leave him now to bear alone the
obloquy and disgrace he has incurred in the common cause is neither fair
nor honourable, and the stratagem is as hopeless as it is unfair. The
copartnership is obvious, and the mutual rights and mutual responsibilities
will be ascertained and adjudged accordingly by the public
In the quotations from the " Mutual Rights " which we have selected,
the reader will find it expressly asserted, that " Mr. Wesley does not seem
to. have contemplated an episcopacy in any shape. It is, to be sure, asserted
in the preface to our Book of Discipline ; but the oldest preachers in the
United States with whom I have conversed and corresponded on this sub
ject never saw the warrant." They had seen, nevertheless, Mr. Wesley's
letter of ordination to Dr. Coke. " But until such document or warrant
from Mr. Wesley be produced, I, as an individual, must of necessity con
tinue to doubt the historical probity of the preface to our Book of Discip
line in this particular." And " Neale " says of our episcopal government,
that this " enormously mis-shapen system of aristocratical government was
the undivulged project, the favourite scheme of a few master spirits, who,
meeting in secret conclave, and excluding the junior members even of their
own body, (as living witnesses declare,) acknowledging no constitutional
rights, and comprehending no legislative privileges as belonging to any
except themselves, proceeded to the hasty formation of the present plan of
government amongst us, and unblushingly palmed it upon posterity as the
offspring of Mr. Wesley's wisdom and experience." Again : its origin is
termed "spurious" and "surreptitious," and it is said that those who
made it " were unsettled and felt misgivings on the subject." Wicked it
seems they were, and wicked enough to palm a falsehood upon their breth
ren and upon posterity, though they were not past all feeling— not quite

NARRATIVE AND DEFENCE. 119
reprobate — for they had some qualms of conscience about it. The Mach
iavellian policy, however, prevailed, and they have continued to republish
this falsehood in every succeeding edition of the Disciphne down to the
present time. The present bishops have moreover made this wickedness
" their own by giving it the sanction of their names." But this is not all.
To perpetuate this shameless imposition, these bishops are represented as
" caucusing," " manoeuvring," and " buying men by the sale of indulgen
ces," all over the United States. The " sale of indulgences " being one of
the many evil practices charged upon the Church of Rome, has a specific
meaning ; but if we are startled at this, as well as other identifications
with the Romish hierarchy even in the darkest period of her history, we
are reminded that " things that are alike in their nature and progress will
be compared by the human mind and classed accordingly."
We do not propose to enter upon a regular defence of our fathers.
That has been already done in the answer to Mr. M'Caine, which we
have just alluded to. But we would ask, What has Mr. M'Caine alleged
against Mr. Asbury and Dr. Coke, together with the Conference of 1784,
which is not in substance repeated in these extracts ? Most of the worthies
of that Conference have fallen asleep in Jesus ; they are enjoying the
reward of their labours, where the wicked cease from troubling and the
weary are at rest. Some of their contemporaries still live, to edify the
Church by their ministry and by their holy example. The surviving
veterans who were in that Conference, (to say nothing of those who are
gone,) we cannot beheve would either originate or connive at a false
hood. Mr. Wesley's ordination of Dr. Coke — his appointment of the doctor as
superintendent of the Methodists in America — his nomination of Mr.
Asbury as joint superintendent — his Liturgy prepared for us as an " epis
copal Church," in which are contained the different forms of ordinations for
deacons, elders, and superintendents — are all matters of notoriety and of
record. That the Conference published what they had done immediately
after the session terminated, is also certain, for we have the original edition
of the Minutes now before us. And in these Minutes they designate the
Church by the appellation of the "Methodist Episcopal Church." This
took place several years before Mr. Wesley's death ; and that the con
duct of Dr. Coke, Mr. Asbury, and the Conference of 1784, both as to
the form of Church government they adopted, and the particular designa
tion of " Episcopal Church," by which they denominated it, met his entire
approbation, we have the most unequivocal evidence. We admit that he
disapproved of the title of " bishop," which was some time afterwards given
to the superintendents, and for this he had particular reasons; which,
however, were peculiar to him, and grew out of his relation to the Estab
lished Church of England, but could not be expected to have the same

120 NARRATIVE AND DEFENCE.
influence upon us, who had dissolved that relation, both as citizens and
as a religious society. We " stood fast in that liberty wherewith God had
so strangely made us free." As an " Episcopal " Church, we thought proper
to call our " episcopoi " by the title which our translators of the Bible used
in translating the original Greek word— namely, " bishops." But we had
taken the title, and formed a constitution under the appellation of the
"Methodist Episcopal Church," for years before the title of bishop was
known amongst us; and, in fact, whether our episcopoi had been called
superintendents, overseers, or bishops, we should still have been an epis
copal Church. As to the charge of our having at any time considered
our bishops as a distinct ministerial order, contradistinguished from, and
superior to, presbyters or elders, it has no foundation in fact. The very
circumstance of our having acknowledged the right of elders to ordain, is
a sufficient refutation of the allegation. We consider the episcopacy a
superior office in the Church — not a distinct ministerial order ; and this
is the light in which it has been considered ever since its institution.
What, then, can justify or extenuate the abuse which has been poured
upon our ministry by the Union Society, or their agents, the editorial
committee ? We do not complain of them for differing m opinion with
their brethren in reference to the necessity or propriety of perpetuating
our episcopal form of government ; but we contend that their moral and
social obligations are violated by thus defaming the characters, and
unjustly impugning the motives of our ministers, by thus charging them
with palming a " surreptitious," " spurious episcopacy," upon the Church,
and perpetuating their usurped authority by " printing and pubhshing a
falsehood," " caucusing," " manoeuvring," and " buying men by the sale of
indulgences." Dr. Jennings, when he complained so dolefully of the injuries inflicted
upon him, " an aged minister," ought to have reflected that, as one of the
editorial committee of the " Mutual Rights," he had assailed the spotless
reputation of men who laboured in the ministry before he knew what
religion was — nay, perhaps before he was born ; some of them, indeed,
are happily beyond the reach of calumny or detraction : but their friends
still live, and retain the most lively recollection of their worth. He can
not suppose that the characters of such men as these were, can be held up
to public odium without wounding the feelings of their friends and spirit
ual children who still survive— nor, indeed, without affording matter of
rejoicing to the infidel and the profligate, and greatly injuring the cause
of God. If there were any just grounds for the accusations, we should be
grieved, but we would not complain. We might even then think that it
might be wise, as well as kind, to throw the mantle of charity over the
errors of the dead, if not of the living, especially when it is admitted that
they did much good in their day and generation ; yet if any were dis-

NARRATIVE AND DEFENCE. 121
posed to do otherwise, we love truth enough to submit in silence. But
when these accusations are totally destitute of truth, and only got up to
subserve a party purpose, we cannot and dare not be silent — for Jerusa
lem's sake we will not hold our peace. That the allegations were not
believed even by those who made them is sufficiently obvious. They
could not, upon any other supposition, consent to wave their objections
to the rest of a system of government represented to have been gotten up
in fraud, and sustained by falsehood, intrigue, manoeuvring, and selling
indulgences, provided it might be so altered as to give them a greater
participation in the management of the concern. Yet this has been
most kindly offered ! — as may be seen by reference to their printed
memorial to the General Conference.
Extract from "The Sovereignty of Methodism in the South, by a Virginia Methodist."
" Suppose some president of the United States should succeed to estab
lish himself in the presidential chair for life, and should have a law enacted
forbidding the citizens, on pain of imprisonment, banishment, or death, to
' inveigh ' against the government, either by objecting to any of its laws,
by petitioning for their repeal, or using any argument, through the me
dium of speech or of the press, to evince their impropriety; would not
the American people find this to be a ' gag-law,' a hundred degrees worse
than any they have ever yet had to complain of ? And in what would
such a law differ from our present 'gag-law' in the Discipline, on supposi
tion that it is to be so explained as to sanction the administration of Ben
ton Field ? It will require all the clerical talents of old Virginia to point
out any difference, excepting that the latter only involves the Church
penalty of expulsion : in principle, they would be precisely the same ; and
this principle, with a sufficient enlargement of power in the hierarchy,
would soon bring the Christian community again under the penalties of
corporeal punishment. Yet this tyranny is sanctioned by the Virginia
Annual Conference !
" An orthodox brother took an early opportunity to give the public the
following information : — ' We have had a fine conference, and the appoint
ments of the preachers you will receive in a few days. Three bishops
attended — Bishop M'Kendree, whose health and spirits are better than
usual, and Bishops Roberts and Soule, who are in good health.' Why,
herein is a marvellous thing, that the preacher in charge had several mem
bers expelled from the Church, in defiance of all law, both human and
divine, and yet ' a fine conference,' with ' three bishops ' at its head, and
could not discover this to be ' mal-administration.' The next number of
the Christian Advocate (the 27th) contains a more full account, in which
we are informed ' the venerable Bishop M'Kendree addressed them in a
very affectionate and feeling manner. He then concluded with an ex-

122 NARRATIVE AND DEFENCE.
hortation to holiness,' upon which the conference afterwards ' adopted the
following resolution :" That the doctrine of holiness, recommended by
our Discipline, and forcibly impressed in the address of the bishop, be
duly weighed and enforced by the members of this conference.
"It is hoped 'the members of this Conference,' in 'duly weighing
the subject of Christian holiness, will try to acquire just views of its na
ture and extent; and that while they justly expostulate with those who
oppose the doctrine, as being advocates for sin, they will not forget to
raise a warning voice against those who make professions of holiness and
sanctification as a cloak for their sins. By what tests is it to be ascer
tained that a man is not sanctified? They are such as the following:
' He that saith he is in the light, and hateth his brother, is in darkness
even until now.' 1 John ii, 9. ' If a man say, I love God, and hateth his
brother, he is a liar.' 1 John iv, 20. ' But why dost thou judge thy bro
ther ? or why dost thou set at naught thy brother ? for we shall all
stand before the judgment-seat of Christ' Rom. xiv, 1 0. ' But Diotrephes,
who loveth to have the pre-eminence among them, receiveth us not, . . . prating
against us with malicious words : and not content therewith, neither doth
he himself receive the brethren, and forbiddeth them that would, and
casteth them out of the Church.' 3 John 9, 10. For a man who is in the
habit of such conduct as is thus condemned by the divine laws, to get up
in love-feast and say, ' At the last pTayer-meeting, or at the last camp-
meeting, I was sanctified,' is an insult to God and to all Christian mo
rality. Alas ! how many thousands are zealous advocates for the doctrine
of sanctification, and are ready to fly into a passion in defence of Christian
perfection, who are merely fond of the sentiment, not because they have a
true hungering and thirsting after righteousness, but because the doctrine
is a distinguishing peculiarity of Methodism ! The doctrine of holiness
is valuable beyond expression, and may be justly regarded as the great
consummation of Christianity ; but sectarian partiality appears to corrupt
everything it touches ; and such are the mysteries of human nature, that
it would be no matter of surprise if the time should come, when a man
would be ready to cut his brother's throat in defence of the doctrine of
Christian perfection. In what way our Virginia brethren intend to ' en
force ' the ' doctrine of holiness,' they have not explained : perhaps their
conduct will hereafter explain it." — Paid., pp. 261-263.
" A keen-eyed opponent will be likely to perceive, with terrible indig
nation, that we are waging war against 'the episcopacy!' Yes: this
absolute sovereignty is the centre point of our opposition ; while it stands
in its present mighty energy all reformation is hopeless, and an increase
of moral darkness and corruption will be inevitable. We have no quarrel
with our present bishops : we believe them to be good men ; and that
none of them have become, by many degrees, so corrupted by this same

NARRATIVE AND DEFENCE. 123
great ' episcopacy,' as many of their tame underlings and dependants have
become." — Paid., p. 264.
Extracts from " An Address to the Friends of Reform, by N. Snethen."
" Dear Brethren, — You have heard of what was done in the bounds
of the Virginia Conference, and will hear of the proceedings in the Balti
more Annual Conference, in the case of Dennis B. Dorsey. I notice this
last case as a proof of the fact that the itinerant preachers have taken a
stand against reform, or representation, which must change our relation to
them. We are no longer to consider ourselves as standing upon the open
and equal ground of argument with those brethren in behalf of a principle,
but as the supporters of what we conceive to be truth and right opposed
by power. From the beginning I have considered the avoiding of written
discussion by almost all the itinerant preachers on the old side as omi
nous of this issue, and have not ceased to anticipate the time when a dis
play of the plenary powers in their hands would, in effect, place us as
lambs among wolves, and call upon us to be ' wise as serpents and harm
less as doves.'
"I understand the text in its original application, 'I send you forth as
lambs among wolves,' that is, with truth and right, among those who have
both the power and disposition to resist your principles and to destroy
you, but I give you no means of self-defence, but the wisdom of the ser
pent tempered with the harmlessness^if the dove. We have all along
asserted that there is power enough in the rulers of the Methodist Episco
pal Church to excommunicate us all, and we are still of the same opinion ;
but, if any one should doubt it, let him remember that the body of men
of whom we mean to ask for a fish may give us a scorpion ; that the very
General Conference of 1828 may make rules, if they conceive they are not
already made, to reach every reformer.
"Our relation, I say, was changed, in point of fact, from the day the
power of the itinerant preachers waked into action. The most distinguished
preacher, who should advocate the principle of representation, would find
himself obnoxious to power, as well as the least member of the Church.
No man among us has power to oppose to power ; and truth or right, in
the mouth of a minister, would not lose its lamb-like helplessness, when
assailed by the power of a majority of itinerant preachers. This majority
have all the claws, and all the teeth, and therefore every man may be
made to fear.
" This fact, brethren, we ought not, by any excitement of zeal, to lose sight
of for a moment. I therefore repeat it : truth or right in the grasp of
power is like lambs among wolves. Hitherto reformers have spoken and
written freely and openly ; they have had no secrets ; the wisdom of the
serpent was not necessary. The charge of imprudence, and the general

124 NARRATIVE AND DEFENCE.
cast of all the objections brought against them, goes to show that power
was not roused— that the prey, though within reaching distance, was not
seized. Henceforth the character and conduct of Methodists must
rapidly change. On the side of power there will be fierceness, and on
the side of right concealment. Threatenings and suspicions will mightily
prevail. A name has already been demanded, — not, I presume, to satisfy
curiosity or to confute arguments, but for punishment, or at, least impeach
ment. "Heretofore it is doubtful if a single travelling preacher has written for
the Wesleyan Repository or the Mutual Rights who was not known to his
superiors. The writers themselves often confided their proper names to
their brethren, and so they felt not like lambs among wolves ; but a few
examples in the annual conferences will put an end to this kind of gener
ous rivalship. Travelling preachers themselves will be thus painfully
taught the wisdom of the serpent — taught to elude power by policy.
What a temptation will this prove to trespass upon the innocence of the
dove ! Brother Dorsey, it seems, was advised by his friends (in this advice
I did not participate) not to answer any question which might criminate
himself. This refusal to answer questions, this putting the conference
upon the proof of his guilt, made a part of his offence. Whom then did he
thus offend ? No one but the members of the annual conference. Now
mark, brethren, the importance of this whole transaction — not to brother
Dorsey merely, but to us all. Let»this procedure be established as a pre
cedent, and of what avail will the maxim of our Master be to us ? How
can we maintain the harmlessness of the dove ? — how escape the jaws of
power without dissimulation ? Surely, if we have no right to keep our
own secrets among those who make a man an offender for a word, we
have no means of self-preservation but in the unqualified wisdom of the
serpent." — Paid., pp. 248-250.
"I deem it proper, brethren, in this portentous change, in this state
of our affairs, that you should hear my voice, should see my name. It
will, I know it will — it must be asked, now the time is come to try men's
souls, Where is Philopisticus ? Where is Adynasius ? Where is Senex ?
Where is the man who was among the foremost to challenge us to the
cause of representation? Where is Snethen ? I trust that while he is amono-
the living but one answer will be given to this question ; he is at his post,
he is in the front of the contest, he is shouting, On, brethren, on ! and if he
fall, it will be with a wound in his breast, and with his head direct towards
the opponent." — Paid., p. 251.
Letter addressed to the Rev. Dennis B. Dorsey by a travelling preacher.
" My Dear Sir, — Not knowing you personally nor the place of your
residence, I ask the privilege of addressing you through the medium of the

NARRATIVE AND DEFENCE. 125
' Mutual Rights,' for approving and recommending of which you now stand
suspended as a Methodist travelling preacher! The Baltimore Annual
Conference of the Methodist Episcopal Church, with three or more bishops
present to direct,and shape its measures, have, by a solemn resolution,
after several days' dehberation, officially decided that a presbyter in the
Church of God deserves punishment and disgrace because he adopts
opinions and sentiments on the subject of Church government which are
received and acted upon by a large majority of Protestant Christians
throughout the various divisions of the religious world ! I cannot pause,
my brother, to write the many denunciations that common sense, through
out an outraged community, will pronounce upon this overbearing act
of abandoned tyranny ! But I hasten to inquire, Why were you selected
as the victim, the sole victim, when it was in proof before them that others
were in the same condemnation ? Why did not my lord of Canterbury,
who ' rides in the whirlwind and directs the storm ' among you, and by
whom even bishops are tithed at will, together with the active and zealous
doctor, the principal officer in his ' star chamber,' select a goodly number
of victims, and offer an appalling hecatomb at once? Was it because
Heaven had deprived you of health ? Was it because you were remote
from home and friends ? Was it because, like your Master, you were
poor, and with the humble sharer of your fortunes ' had scarcely where to
lay your head V Did they wish, by increasing your mental inquietude, to
strengthen the desolation without, and so send you to a premature grave ?
Or was it intended by the horror of the example made of you, to say to
other reformers, ' If you have the word, we have the sword ?' I cannot re
frain from asking where three or four members of the Baltimore Confer
ence were during this laboured deed of hard-earned infamy ? Did
they sit by in inglorious silence ? But, my brother, be not discouraged ;
recollect that the great father of us all, as Methodists, was, by a similar
body^ and m the same city, forty years ago, declared unworthy of name
or place in that communion in the bosom of which you now find your
self honourably degraded. When Mr. Wesley was informed of this, he
declared in a letter, now in my possession, that the American bishop had
' no more connexion with him.' But I trust you will not so decide in re
lation to your blinded and prejudiced brethren — ' yet a little while,' and
this stupid, laudean zeal will be cooled in the humiliation and disgrace of
your persecutors ; public indignation will chastise their pitiful pretensions
to lordly inquisition over the rights and consciences of those who have too
much intelligence and too much candour to think and act by their pre
scription ! To conclude, my dear sir, I beg you to accept the best wishes
of a stranger ; ' faint not in the day of evil ;' the honorary overthrow you
have sustained for the rights of conscience, will make strangers your
friends : on hearing of the treatment you and others received at the Balti-

126 'NARRATIVE AND DEFENCE.
more Conference, ten or twelve persons within my charge have declared
for reform, and are ready to aid you with their influence and purses.
Wishing the speedy restoration of your health, and that you may hve to
see the curse of religious oppression banished from the Church and the
world, — I remain yours in the kingdom and patience of Jesus Christ.
" April 27, 1827. VlNDEX."*
—Ibid., pp. 270, 271. REMARKS.
The Virginia Conference, it seems, had refused to annul the verdict of an
inferior Church judicatory, by which some of the disaffected members of
the Church had been expelled. This was the unpardonable sin for which
the author of" The Sovereignty of Methodism in the South " reviles them
so bitterly. He sneers with ineffable contempt at the account, which he
says an old-side brother took an early opportunity to give of the Virginia
Conference, in the Christian Advocate. This " fine conference, with three
bishops at its head," is the object of the most bitter irony. The venerable
Bishop M'Kendree concluded a very affectionate address to the conference,
with an exhortation to holiness of life ; and the conference, deeply affected
with the importance of the subject, " adopted the following resolution :"-—
" That the doctrine of holiness, recommended by our Discipline, and forci
bly impressed in the address of the bishop, be duly weighed and enforced
by this conference." This pious determination of the conference is most
contemptuously sneered at by the writer, and he insinuates pretty clearly
a suspicion that their pretended concern upon the subject of hohness and
sanctification is only a " cloak for their sins." To be sure, he does not
positively say so ; but no man of candour who reads his remarks will
hesitate to say, that he intended his readers should make such an applica
tion of his innuendoes. He gives some Scripture quotations, by which he
purposes to show what sanctification is not, but which really describes very
wicked men ; and all this with a sly insinuation that the members of the
Virginia Conference sat for the picture. " It would be no matter of sur
prise," he says, " if the time should come, when a man would be ready to
cut his brother's throat in defence of the doctrine of Christian perfection.
In what way our Virginia brethren intend to enforce the ' doctrine of holi
ness' they have not explained : perhaps their conduct will hereafter explain
it." And from the account he has given of these brethren, he leaves us
everything to fear from their method of enforcing the doctrine ! He de
clares, however, that " we [the reformers, we suppose] have no quarrel with
our present bishops : we believe them to be good men ;" at least, com
paratively so, for they believe " that none of them have become, by many
degrees, so corrupted by this great ' episcopacy ' as many of their tame un~
derlings and dependants have become." What an exalted degree of good-
0 Rev. H. B. Bascom.

NARRATIVE AND DEFENCE. 127
ness does he attribute to the bishops — they are not, by many degrees, as
corrupt as their own tame underlings and dependants ! The Methodist
reader will perceive, by the last paragraph of the extract, an express
avowal of the main object contemplated by the reformers. They are, he
says, at war with the episcopacy, as the centre point of opposition. They
had all along told us that they only wanted a local and lay representation
in the General Conference !
The act of the Baltimore Conference which excited the wrath of Mr.
Snethen and Vindex to such a tremendous height, was simply denominat
ing the " Mutual Rights " " an improper periodical work," and requiring
Mr. Dorsey, one of the preachers composing the conference, to cease from
recommending and circulating it — which was nothing more than requiring
him to desist from propagating slander. This, however, he not only
refused to do, but after he had made a declaration of intentions and an
avowal of sentiments totally inconsistent with his social relations and
engagements to the Church, he concluded by the most cruel insult on the
feelings of his brethren — " I have read the Mutual Rights, sir, for myself,"
said he, addressing the president, " and think highly of the work, and recom
mend it to every member of this conference." The conference left Mr.
Dorsey without an appointment for one year, and he forthwith betook
himself to the pious work of circulating not only the " Mutual Rights,"
but Mr. M'Caine's " History and Mystery of Methodist Episcopacy." On
the character of the latter work it would be useless to comment. Suffice
it to say, that a deist, who had any respect for his character, would have
been ashamed of writing it
For this necessary measure towards Mr. Dorsey, Mr. Snethen calls the
ministry who composed the Baltimore Annual Conference, " wolves " —
and wolves too who are at war with the lamb-like harmlessness of the
members of the Church — against whose ferocity there was no defence but
by concealment — who had "all the teeth and all the claws, and therefore
every man may be made to fear." He advises his brethren, therefore, to
take refuge in the wisdom of the serpent, and conceal their movements.
He himself, however, is above all such pmdent measures. He had told
us before that he was the leader of the mighty revolution which was in
progress. " When he first began to write he had but one colleague."
The reformers would be totally dismayed at the sight of these "teeth and
claws," if not encouraged by the voice of their captain. " I deem it-
proper, brethren, in this portentous change, in this state of our affairs,
that you should hear my voice, should see my name. It will,- 1 know it
wil] — it must be asked, now the time is come to try men's souls, Where is
Philopisticus ? Where is Adynasius ? Where is Senex ? Where is the
man who was among the foremost to challenge us to the cause of repre
sentation ? Where is Snethen ? I trust that while he is among the living

128 NARRATIVE AND DEFENCE;
but one answer will be given to this question— he is at his post, he is in
the front of the contest, he is shouting, On, brethren, on ! And if he fall, it
will be with a wound in his breast, and with his head direct towards the oppo
nent." He ought to have said enemy, as opponent is too mild an appella
tion for antagonists such as he describes— " wolves " with such formidable
" teeth and claws !"
Vindex is not a writer to deal in figurative descriptions of the enemy.
He was a late recruit, and proselytes often find it necessary to establish a
reputation with their party, or to do away all suspicion of their sincerity, by
manifesting extraordinary zeal for the common cause. He, therefore, does
not mince the matter, but in the overflowings of his wrath denounces the
conference as a star-chamber court. Our ministers of the Baltimore Annual
Conference are, according to this writer, not only tyrants, but " overbear
ing," "abandoned," "infamous" tyrants.
We cannot comment on such language as this. It so outrages all
decency as to set both criticism and commentary at defiance.
It may be, however, important to let the reader know what Dr. Jennings
and his local-preacher associates in the Baltimore Union Society, who pub
lished these violent invectives and denunciations against our ministers,
thought of them a few years ago, before he and his friends had become so
effectually reformed. At the district (local-preachers) conference of 1820,
the Rev. Dr. Jennings, James R. Williams, and William Kesley, were
appointed " a committee to prepare and publish from the Journals, minutes
of the district conference, accompanied with an address to the local
preachers of the Baltimore District." They performed their duty ; and the
address, signed by the above committee, contains the following high com
mendation of our ministry, and the order of things which then existed and
which does still exist in our Church.
" Under the providence and grace of God, the Methodist Church is fa
voured with a ministry corresponding to the order of things which pre
vailed in the days of the primitive simplicity and power of the
gospel. Our itinerant elders and missionaries are called to make haste
and spread the glad tidings of peace and good-will far and wide, as their
work may direct, whilst we are expected to assist in building up and
establishing them that believe, within the circle in which we move."
All was right in 1820, — travelling preachers and local preachers, each oc
cupying their proper stations in the Church, and both uniting in the good
work of the gospel ministry ! The Union Society was nevertheless foTmed
in 1824, and the publication of the Mutual Rights commenced in August
of the same year. The first volume of the work contains some of the most
inflammatory of the preceding extracts, and the severest remarks on the
itinerant ministry which in 1820 corresponded to tlie order of things which
prevailed in the days of the primitive simplicity and power of the gospel !

NARRATIVE AND DEFENCE. 129

CONCLUSION.

The reader will bear in mind that the foregoing extracts are taken from
a periodical called the " Mutual Rights ; " that this periodical is pub
lished monthly by the Union Society of Baltimore, under the immediate
superintendence of a committee elected annually by the society ; and that
the members of that society, as well as the editorial committee, were
members of the Methodist Episcopal Church. Their membership in this
Church was a voluntary act, to which they were in no way constrained,
or even solicited, and could be renounced whenever they pleased. We
have given only a small specimen of the bitter revilings and defamation
pubhshed in their periodical against- the pastors of our Church. The
work consists of three octavo volumes, besides the monthly numbers from
August last. No limits which we could reasonably prescribe to ourselves,
would contain all the exceptionable matter to be found in this most extra
ordinary publication. We have, however, given enough to show the ab
surdity of the cry of persecution, which has been raised by those who have
been held amenable to Christian discipline for their unfounded attacks upon
the reputation of their brethren. It certainly cannot be pretended that
they have been persecuted for righteousness1 sake.
Our brethren who may have hastily made up their opinion against the
proceedings of the Church in Baltimore, from the protests and other publi
cations of the accused members, will now have an opportunity to review
the whole affair, and cannot fail to perceive the fallacy of the allegation
so often reiterated against us, that we persecuted these members of our
Church in order to prevent investigation and suppress inquiry on the
subject of reform. Dr. Jennings, in " an address intended, when written,
to have been delivered before the district conference," not only repeats
this stale and groundless allegation, but attempts to show that the pub
lishers of the " Mutual Rights" are justified in speaking evil of ministers
by the example of Mr. Wesley. He quotes, from Moore's Life of Wesley,
instances, in which he says Mr. Wesley " exposed the conduct of the min
isters of the Church of England, in a language as strong and pointed as
any of the writers in the Mutual Rights have ever used in respect to any
minister in the Methodist Episcopal Church." But in order that the ex
ample of Mr. Wesley in this particular should avail the doctor .and his
associates, it will be necessary for them to show that Mr. Wesley's alle-
o-ations against those ministers of the Church of England were as un
founded as those made in the Mutual Rights against our ministry mani
festly are. For, with due deference to the doctor's superior learning, to
speak that which is true is not " evil-speaking," however severe it may
be. Evil-speaking, according to the definitions of the word in Johnson

130 NARRATIVE AND DEFENCE.
and Walker, means " slander," " defamation," " calumny." The doctor's
defence, then, ought to have been a very different thing from what we find
it Instead of declaiming on reform, and the iniquity of endeavouring to
prevent it, he should have set himself to prove the tmth of the aUegations
made by him ahd his associates against our bishops and other ministers.
If he had shown them to be trae, the charge of " evil-speaking" could
not have been sustained, although injuring the reputation of another by
publishing his faults or failings can only be justified by some apparent
necessity for the disclosure. " And shall we," says the doctor, " accuse
the author of the General Rules [Mr. Wesley] of speaking evil of min
isters, because he there published the truth concerning those ministers who
opposed themselves to hinder his work ? I will not." No, indeed, nor
we either: for the apostle Paul, who expressly enjoins it upon us, "to
speak evil of no man ;" and the apostle Peter, who exhorts us to " lay
aside all malice, and all guile, and hypocrisies, and envies, and all evil-
speakings," equally condemned the conduct of men of all ranks and con
ditions in life, in terms of very severe rebuke. If the doctor, then, can
prove what has been alleged both against the living and the dead in the
Mutual Rights, he will not only stand acquitted of " evil-speaking," but
prove conclusively the necessity of a thorough reform, not only of our
government, but of our morals. We confidently beheve, however, that no
attempt will ever be made to substantiate charges of such a heinous nature
against the ministers of our Church.
May we not hope that even our brethren of the Queen Anne Union
Society, who have scolded us so immercifully, will, upon reading our state
ment and defence, come to have a better opinion of the Methodists in
Baltimore ? Perhaps they may yet do us the justice to believe, that we
are as far as they can be from being " ready to expel a Christian from our
society because he dissents from us in opinion upon Church government,
or thinks proper to utter his dissent." We assure them, if such dissen
tients only confine themselves to truth in their statements, and keep within
the bounds prescribed by the law of Christian charity in their remarks,
we shall not question their right to inquire into the fitness and propriety
of our ecclesiastical pohty. We hope, moreover, that the learned judge
who makes so conspicuous a figure in that association will interpose the
ermine of justice in favour of our annual conference, whose case has been
so hastily and severely condemned by that society. His honour will
recollect that the cause was decided solely upon ex-parte testimony, and
henee the verdict might, a priori, be suspected to be unjust. We have
now, we think, adduced sufficient evidence to show that the Baltimore
Annual Conference were not to blame for having denominated the Mutual
Rights an " improper periodical work," nor for leaving Mr. D. B. Dorsey
without a ministerial appointment, because he refused to desist from circu-

NARRATIVE AND DEFENCE. 131 '
lating a work in which his brethren in the ministry were so mercilessly-
defamed and abused. We therefore pray, that his honour will please to
grant a new trial.
When the Queen Anne's Union Society shall consent to review what
they have said, both of the Church in Baltimore and of our annual con
ference, they will find a material discrepancy between their first and their
last publication. We are told in the last, that "they [the travelling
preachers] can do or say what they please against the Disciphne or each
other with impunity ; but if a local preacher or private member dare to
say they are not immaculate, or do wrong, they are accused of speaking
evil of ministers, and are tried and expelled :" but how will this declara
tion comport with their former address, in which they complain so bitterly
of the proceedings against Mr. Dorsey, a travelling preacher, for circu
lating the Mutual Rights ? Surely both these complaints cannot be true,
for they are directly contradictory. Again : they mention, among the good
designs of the writers for the Mutual Rights, " that they laboured to show
that our Church government was based on monarchical principles, and
originated by our beloved founder, Mr. Wesley, before the declaration of
independence." The declaration of independence we believe took place in
July, 1776, and our Church government was instituted in December, 1784.
Our brethren will not take it unkind, if, after we have called their atten
tion to these oversights, we venture to suggest the necessity of keeping
their matters better posted up, and of being more cautious and circum
spect in pronouncing sentence upon their brethren. We shall at all
times be thankful for their advice, and for reproof when deserved ; but
we confess it would be more acceptable if it were given in better temper.
Justice requires us to admit, however, that our brethren of the Queen
Anne's Union Society were, from their distance from the scene of these
proceedings, liable to be imposed upon, and therefore we can readily
excuse their misapprehensions of our motives and actions. But what
shall we say of the committee appointed by the convention of reformers,
(which met in Baltimore in November last,) " to inquire into the alleged
grounds of the trials," &c, then going on in this station ? This com
mittee say in their report, as adopted and pubhshed by the convention,
that " from the evidence before your committee, it appears that the afore
said local preachers have been suspended, and the lay members tried, and
some of them expelled, purely on the grounds of their holding dissent
from, and publishing their objections to, some parts of tlie form of our
Church government and its administration. The committee do not deem
it necessary to exhibit before the convention, in detail, the particulars of
these trials, as the committee has not been able to obtain any information,
contradicting the printed reports of these trials, in the hands of most, if
not all, the members of this convention." Now we would ask, what

132 NARRATIVE AND DEFENCE.
"testimony" this committee had "before them?" Was it not wholly
ex-parte ? Were not the " printed reports of these»trials," of which they
speak, the accounts which the accused themselves had published, in order
to forestall public opinion ? The committee had, it seems, been appointed
to inquire into the " alleged " grounds of the trials — and surely whatever
they might believe as to the real grounds, they have not given the
grounds alleged for the prosecution. The charges and specifications which
had been furnished to every one of the accused might have satisfied the
committee of this fact : but if they had intended to fulfil the duties of
their appointment, as set forth in the resolution of the convention, the
means were within their reach. Those who preferred and sustained the
charges, the committees who tried them, and even the pastor of the Church
who presided at the trials, were at hand — but no inquiry was made of
them. And why ? They certainly were competent to say on what
alleged grounds the trials had been predicated : but the committee might
have obtained information in this way, which would not have suited their
purpose. They therefore confined themselves to the testimony of the
accused and expelled members themselves, and their report was shaped
accordingly.* It was, we suppose, on the authority of this report, that
the convention said in their address, "Ministers have been suspended,
members have been arraigned for trial, and an extraordinary combination
systematically organized to break up the Union Society of the city of
Baltimore ; and all this has been done merely because they have advocated
in the Mutual Rights a lay representation in the legislative department
of the Church." It is difficult to repress the indignation which neces
sarily arises from a view of such pitiful management as this. There is so
much of electioneering trick and contrivance in the whole procedure — so
obvious a design to get up something that might serve a party purpose
where the truth may not be known — that we are ashamed to see it prac
tised by men professing godliness ; and we are still more humbled when
we have to own this committee was composed of Methodists ! — and of
Methodist reformers too ! We cannot admit the propriety of such mea
sures even in political conflicts. Christians, we think, cannot be allowed
to conform either to the spirit or practice of the world, even in civil con
tests for office or emolument ; but if it cannot be prevented under such
circumstances, we beseech our brethren to let neither the spirit nor prac
tice come any farther — let them not pass within the veil of the holy sanc
tuary, the Church of God.
The vehement railings against our itinerant ministry, for not consent
ing to model our government according to the wishes of the reformers,
3 The members of the committee were "Brothers Willis Harris, of North Carolina;
William Disney, of Ohio ; William S. Stockton, of Philadelphia ; Charles Avery, of Pitts
burg ; and Nicholas Snethen, of Maryland."— Proceedings of General Convention, page 7.

NARRATIVE AND DEFENCE. 133
are manifestly as unjust as they are cruel, reformers themselves being
judges. They have told us again and again, that the members are not
yet prepared for the change — that we are not yet sufficiently enlightened,
either to appreciate its utility or to carry it into effect if it was granted;
This is repeated in amount, more than once, by Mr. Shinn, and is
responded by more than one other writer in the Mutual Rights. It will
moreover appear, from the showing of reformers themselves, that at the
last General Conference, among the veiy few members of the Church
who petitioned for a change in the government, there existed great dif
ferences of opinion as to what that change ought to be. One of these
differences was very important indeed, namely, whether the local preach
ers should be separately represented in the Conference, or be amalgamated
with the laity. To prevent this discrepancy in their future petitions, has
been one of the specious reasons assigned by reformers for organizing
Union Societies.
Now it wiU not be denied, that our itinerant ministers found the
Methodist Church government where it now is — in the hands of the
ministry ; and as the reformers teU them that the membership are unpre
pared for a change — as one in a hundred have never asked for it — and
as those who did desire it, were not able to agree amongst themselves on
a plan of reform — with what propriety can the traveUing ministry be accused
of oppression and tyranny, with withholding the rights of the laity,
and lording it over God's heritage, for not having made the innovations
contended for by the Union Society of Baltimore ? The question now
is, not whether the contemplated alterations be right or wrong. If
we were to admit that nothing had been proposed but what might be
justly claimed, yet the General Conference have never yet had an
opportunity to act on the measure with a due regard to the wishes of the
membership. The allegations, then, against the itinerant ministry are
utterly unfounded, according to the showing of the Union Society them
selves. The master spirits who have so agitated our Church of late, cannot, how
ever, claim the merit of originality, either for their pretensions or their
measures. Mr. O'KeUy and Mr. Hammett preceded them in this country ;
and the following extract from D. Isaac's " Liberty of the Pulpit defended^"
page 24, will show that our brethren in England have passed through a
similar conflict.
Mr. Isaac says, " A few turbulent spirits, some years ago, agitated the
Methodist society — [in England.] The burden of their song was, that
the preachers were tyrants, and the people suffering the most grievous
oppression ; that nothing could save the connexion but a new constitution^
founded upon what they termed ' more liberal principles,' &c. The preach
ers, conscious of their own integrity, and of the attachment of the mem-

134 NARRATIVE AND DEFENCE.
bers in general to the old plan, refused to concede what was so peremptorily
demanded. "The 'friends of the people,' as they were pleased to style themselves,
separated, formed their new constitution, and invited the people to enter
into the glorious liberty of the children of God. It turned out that about
one in eighteen joined the new connexion, so that one was the people, and
the other seventeen were nothing at aU. Of those who left the old and
joined the new connexion, a large proportion returned to the fold of
Christ before two years had elapsed. History ftirnishes innumerable
examples of this kind. The one had a right to withdraw if he felt
dissatisfied, but he had no right to attempt the imposition of his new
yoke upon the necks of his brethren."
Having thus given a faithful exhibit of the proceedings in relation to
certain members of the Union Society in this city, together with the
motives and reasons which impeUed us to the measure, we venture
to appeal to all our brethren, whether they be those who favour the
opinion that the present organization of our Church polity ought to be
essentially altered, or those who are opposed to such changes — whether
they are itinerant preachers, local preachers, or laymen — provided they be
friends of peace, lovers of God and the brethren — we appeal to them, we
say, with confidence for the propriety, nay, for the necessity of the
measures which the Church in Baltimore has pursued in relation to her
offending members.
Mr. Wesley had told us, repeating it, perhaps, from one of the ancients,
that as the soul and body made a man, so the spirit and discipline made
Christians. It will be acknowledged that the Church had a choice of dif
ficulties ; she must permit her wholesome disciphne, which had heretofore
hedged in the fold, to be trampled down and destroyed, or she must lose
a part of her members. The latter appeared to be by far the least evil of
the two, and therefore was preferred.
We would put it to our brethren who favour reform, whether it ought
to be effected by such means. What advantage would be reaped by the
most salutary changes in our Church government, or by the establishment
of a system of ecclesiastical polity which should be the wonder, the admi
ration and model of the Christian world, if, in the achievement, the char
acter and the standing of your ministry should be destroyed ?^-if, in the
party violence by which the revolution had been effected, the world had
been taught to look on your travelling ministry as tyrants, whose power
had been wrested from them by the people they had enslaved, by means as
despicable as they were wicked ? What access could such degraded min
isters be expected to have to those whom they sought to call from error
and sin, and what influence over those who should continue under their
charge?

NARRATIVE AND DEFENCE. 135
In political contests the government may be changed, and aU who
administer it may be dismissed from office, because the people can
appoint new rulers and administrators ; but we could not substitute our
ministry, the great Head of the Church having reserved to himself the
right to call and qualify the preachers of his gospel and the pastors of his
Church. We have now redeemed the pledge which we gave in an early stage of
these proceedings, namely, that we would, after the proceedings should have
terminated, publish a plain statement of the whole affair. We submit the
statement to the consideration of our brethren here and elsewhere, with
some anxiety, we confess, though not on our own account ; for although
it would be a source of great satisfaction to us to find we had acted so as
to meet the approbation of our brethren generally, yet their censure cannot
deprive us of the consolation we enjoy, from the consciousness of having
been actuated by the purest motives, and the most sincere desire to pro
mote and to secure the peace and prosperity of the Church. But we
cannot repress the anxiety we feel for the verdict they shall give, because
the interests of the whole Methodist Episcopal Church, and consequently
the interests of the thousands who depend on her ministry for the word
of life, are involved in the decision. If you sanction the violent measures
of the Baltimore Union Society against our itinerant ministers,- — if you are
of opinion that the cruel imputations, and unfounded allegations, not only
against those who have ceased from their labours and gone to their reward,
but against those who now occupy their places and bear the ark of the
Lord, ought to be permitted and suffered by the Church, — the time is come
when we have nothing left us but to inscribe " Ichabod " on the institu
tions of Methodism — institutions which have carried the light of truth into
the dreary abodes of darkness and sin, and by which the primitive design
of preaching the gospel to the poor has been so successfuUy accomplished :
then, indeed, the glory wUl have departed from Israel. " But, beloved,
we are persuaded better things of you, and things which accompany salva
tion, though we thus speak."
We are your brethren in the bonds of a peaceful gospel.
George Earnest,
Jacob Rogers,
Isaac N. Toy,
Samuel Harden,
Alexander Yearley,
John Berry,
Fielder Israel,
Baltimore, February 4, 1828.

136 NARRATIVE AND- DEFENCE..
P. S. — The reader will please to notice the following correction : —
In page 81, the six laymen from whom the several committees of trial
were constituted are called a "committee," which might lead the reader
to suppose they all served in each case ; this, however, was not the fact.
The several committees consisted occasionally of three, but for the most
part of five members — never of six.

MISCELLANEOUS AETICLES.

REPORT OF THE COMMITTEE ON PETITIONS AND MEMORIALS, ADOPTED BY THE
GENERAL CONFERENCE, 1828.
ANNOTATIONS ON THE PRECEDING REPORT.
REMARKS ON DR. JENNINGS'S " REVIEW OF THE METHODIST MAGAZINE AND
QUARTERLY REVIEW, ON PETITIONS AND MEMORIALS."
THE CONVENTION.
A REVIEW OF THE "CONVENTIONAL ARTICLES FOR THE ASSOCIATED METHOD
IST CHURCHES."
A REVIEW OF THE CONSTITUTION AND DISCIPLINE OF " THE METHODIST PRO
TESTANT CHURCH."
REMARKS ON AN ADDRESS TO THE MEMBERS OF THE METHODIST EPISCOPAL
CHURCH IN QUEEN ANNE'S COUNTY.
ANSWER TO VINDICATOR.
GENERAL CONFERENCE RESOLUTIONS, 1828.
MR. STILWELL'S LETTER.
TRUTH ALWAYS SAFE.
A WORD TO " NATHAN."
WHO ARE THE PERSECUTED?
NOTICE OF THE PERIODICAL ENTITLED "METHODIST CORRESPONDENT."
MR. SNETHEN'S SECOND REPLY TO ME. O'KELLY.
REVIEW OF THE REFORM CONTROVERSY.
TO THE PUBLIC.

MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES

REPORT OF THE COMMITTEE ON PETITIONS AND MEMORIALS,
ADOPTED BY THE GENERAL CONFERENCE, 1828.
Mr. Editor, — The report of the committee on petitions and memorials,
adopted by the General Conference at its late session in Pittsburg, Pa., has
been so grossly misrepresented by our enemies, that we are induced to request
you to republish it with the addition of a few notes. It is a very valuable
document, in which the committee have evinced a clear comprehension of the
subject submitted to their consideration, and in which they have given a
condensed but perspicuous view of the leading principles of our ecclesiasti
cal polity. The arguments, or rather the sophistry upon which the claims
of the revolutionists rest, are met by reasoning so cogent and so clear that
it has not been, and we venture to say it wOl not be, refuted, though there
has been no want of either industry or ingenuity in the many writers by
whom it has be^n assailed.
The committee who penned and the Conference who adopted the report
have been attacked with a fierceness and vindictiveness of vituperation,
sufficiently indicative of the utter despair into which their adversaries were
thrown by the arguments they could not answer, and the facts which it
was vain to deny. As the report could not be successfully met by fair
argument, a shameful resort has been had to a direct and wilful misrepre
sentation of its language and meaning. The cause of the party was to be
sustained, whatever became of truth .and fair dealing. Accordingly we
find the assailants first giving their own conceptions of the meaning of the
Conference without quoting from the report. These are followed by others
of their party quoting the words of the first writers as the language of the
report itself; and having made the Conference say what they pleased, they
hold up to ridicule, not the principles or doctrines avowed in the report,
but " the man of straw " which had been created by their own morbid
imaginations.

140 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
You have stated in your prospectus, that the " Itinerant " was not intended
for aggression, but for defence ; and it is to defend the supreme council of
our Church from unjust aspersion, and the principles they have avowed
from misrepresentation, that we solicit the use of your columns.

REPORT
Of the Committee on Petitions and Memorials, adopted by the General
Conference of the Methodist Episcopal Church at its late session in
Pittsburg, Pa., May, 1828*
" The committee to whom were referred certain petitions and memorials,
for and against a direct lay and local representation in the General Con
ference, submit the following report :—
" Of those which propose this revolution in our economy, that which
has been received from a convention of certain local preachers and lay
members, held in the city of Baltimore in November last, is presumed to
embody the general views of those who desire this change, and the chief
arguments on which they rely. In framing a reply, in the midst of the
various and pressing business of a General Conference, it cannot be rea
sonably expected that we should enter into minute details. Our remarks,
of necessity, must be confined to a few leading topics, in a condensed, yet,
we trust, an intelligible form.
" As to the claim of right to the representation contended for, if it be a
right which the claimants are entitled to demand, it must be either a natural
or an acquired right. If a natural right, then, being founded in nature, it
must be common to men, as men. The foundation of rights in ecclesiasti
cal bodies, in our opinion, rests on a different basis. If it be alleged to be
an acquired right, then it must have been acquired either in consequence
of becoming Christians or of becoming Methodists. If the former, it
devolves on the claimants to prove that this right is conferred by the Holy
Scriptures, and that they impose on us the corresponding obligation to
grant the claim. That it is not ' forbidden ' in the New Testament is not
sufficient ; for neither is the contrary ' forbidden.' Or if the latter be
alleged — namely, that it has been acquired in consequence of becoming
Methodists — then it must have been either by some conventional compact
or by some obligatory principle in the economy of Methodism, to which,
as then organized, the claimants voluntarily attached themselves. Neither
of these, we believe, either has been or can be shown. And until one at
least of these bo shown, the claim of right, as such, cannot, we think, have
been sustained.
° This report, we believe, was adopted by the General Conference without a dissenting
vote.

REPORT OF COMMITTEE ON MEMORIALS. 141
" But do the memorialists mean to say that they are entitled to their
claim as a matter of right, against the judgment and the voice of a con
fessedly very large majority of their brethren, both of the ministry, travel
ling and local, and also of the lay members ? or that in these circumstances,
on any ground, the claim ought to be admitted ? We could not have
believed them capable of so strange a position, had they not declared the
opinion as prevailing among themselves, ' that the extension of the princi
ple of representation to the members and the local preachers of the Church
by the General Conference, in compliance with a petition of this kind, at
this conjuncture of time, would do more toward conciliating good feeling,
restoring lost confidence among brethren, and confirming wavering minds,
on all sides, than any other measure which can be adopted.'
"Now we ' speak advisedly ' when we say, that, in our judgment, such
a measure, ' at this conjuncture of time,' would have a precisely contrary
effect. The ministers assembled in General Conference, coming so recently
from all parts of the great field of our missionary labours, and having had
throughout its whole extent free and constant intercourse both with travel
ling and local preachers, and also with our lay members, are, certainly, at
least as weU prepared as the memorialists could have been to form a cor
rect judgment on this point ; and their calm and deliberate judgment is
clearly and unhesitatingly as above stated. This we believe, too, to be the
true state of the question, after it has been so zealously discussed on the
side of the memorialists for now nearly eight years, during almost the
whole of which time, until very recently, the discussion has been conducted
almost exclusively by their own writers.
" We are aware that it has been assumed, by some at least of those
writers, that this repugnance to the change proposed, on the part of so
great a proportion both of our local preachers and lay members, to say
nothing of the itinerant preachers, is the result of ignorance or want of
intellect. This we conceive to be at least not a very modest assumption.
Our opinion, on the contrary, is, while we freely admit that there are men
of respectable information and intelligence who desire the change, that
there are, nevertheless, veiy many .more, of at least equally respectable
information and intelligence, who are opposed to it, whether on the ground
of right, of consistent practicability, or of utility.
" With regard to our local brethren particularly, it is our decided judg
ment that the privileges and advantages in which they have participated,
in this country, have much rather exceeded than fallen short of what
was contemplated in their institution, in the original economy of Method
ism, as founded by the venerable Wesley, either in Europe or in America.
We cannot but regret to perceive, that the addition of privilege to privi
lege seems only to have had the effect of exciting some of our brethren to
claim still more and more, and now to begin to demand them as matters

142 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
of positive and inherent right. We are happy to be able to say > some'
only of our local brethren; for of the great body, even of themselves, we
beheve better things, though we thus speak. If, indeed, our members
generally are tired of our missionary and itinerant system, and wish a
change, then we could not be surprised if they should desire to introduce
into our councils local men, whose views, and feelings, and interests, in the
very nature and necessity of things, could not fail to be more local than
those of itinerant men. And if to so powerful a local influence should
be added, as would be added, the tendencies and temptations to locality
which, in despite of all our better convictions, too often exist among our
selves, from domestic and personal considerations of a pressing character,
we are free to confess our fears of the dangers to our itinerant economy
which, in our opinion, could not fail, in time, to be the result. Now the
preservation of the great itinerant system, unimpaired, in aU its vital
energies, we do conscientiously beheve to be essential to the accomplish
ment of the grand original design of the economy of Methodism, to
spread Scriptural holiness over these and other lands.
" The memorialists, we know, disavow any intention or desire to impair
those energies, or to injure this system. Be it so. They can, however,
only speak for themselves. They know not what may be the views of
those who may come after them. And, in any event, our argument is,
that the change proposed would, in its veiy nature, and from the inevita
ble connexions of causes and effects, tend graduaUy perhaps, yet not the
less uncontrollably, to the results which we have mentioned.
" We know also that it has been insinuated that we adhere to the con
tinuance of our present polity from motives of personal interest For
protection against such unMndness and injustice we rest on the good
sense and candour of the community. It cannot but be weU known that
our present economy bears with a peculiar severity upon the personal and
domestic comforts of the itinerant ministry. And even an enemy could
scarcely fail to admit that were we reaUy ambitious of worldly interest,
and of personal ease and domestic comfort, we might have the discern
ment to perceive that the surest way to effect these objects would be to
effect the changes proposed, and thus to prepare the way for the enjoy
ment of similar advantages, in these respects, to those now enjoyed by
the settled ministry of other Churches. And, indeed, were such a change
effected, and should we even still continue itinerant, considering that, from
the necessity of things, our wealthy and liberal friends would most gener
ally be selected as delegates, we do not doubt that the change proposed
might probably tend to increase our temporal comforts. We think this
the more probable, because, if such a direct representation of the laity
were admitted, their constituents might ultimately become obliged, by
some positive provisions, fully to make up and pay whatever allowances

t REPORT OF COMMITTEE ON MEMORIALS. 143
might be made to the ministry ; which allowances, in this event, might
also more properly acquire the nature of a civil obligation. At present
our economy knows no such thing. The great Head of the Church him
self has imposed on us the duty of preaching the gospel, of administering
its ordinances, and of maintaining its moral discipline among those over
whom the Holy Ghost, in these respects, has made us overseers. Of these
also — namely, of gospel doctrines, ordinances, and moral discipline — we do
believe that the divinely-instituted ministry are the divinely-authorized
expounders ; and that the duty of maintaining them in their purity, and
of not permitting our ministrations, in these respects, to be authoritatively
controUed by others, does rest upon us with the force of a moral obliga
tion, in the due discharge of which our consciences are involved. It is
on this ground that we resist the temptations of temporal advantage which
the proposed changes hold out to us.
" On this point we beg, however, that no one may either misunderstand
or misrepresent us. We neither claim nor seek to be ' lords over God's
heritage.' In the sense of this passage, there is but one Lord and one
Lawgiver. We arrogate no authority to enact any laws of our own,
either of moral or of civil force. Our commission is to preach the gospel,
and to enforce the moral discipline, established by the one Lawgiver, by
those spiritual powers vested in us, as subordinate pastors, who watch
over souls as they that must give an account to the chief Shepherd. We
claim no strictly-legislative powers, although we grant that the terms
'legislature' and 'legislative' have been sometimes used even among our
selves. In a proper sense, however, they are not strictly applicable to our
General Conference. A mistake on this point has probably been the
source of much erroneous reasoning, and of some consequent dissatisfac
tion. Did we claim any authority to enact laws to affect either life or
limb, to touch the persons or to tax the property of our members, they
ought, unquestionably, to be directly represented among us. But they
know we do not. We certainly, then, exercise no civil legislation. As to
the moral code, we are subject, equally with themselves, to one only Lord.
We have no power to add to, to take from, to alter, or to modify a single
item of his statutes. Whether laymen or ministers be the authorized
expounders and administrators of those laws, we can confidently rely on
the good Christian sense of the great body of our brethren to judge.
These well know, also, that whatever expositions of them we apply to
others, the same are applied equally to ourselves, and, in some instances,
with peculiar strictness.
" No man is obliged to receive our doctrines merely because we believe
and teach them, nor unless they have his own cordial assent. Neither is
any man obliged to submit himself to what we believe to be the moral dis
cipline of the gospel, and our duty to enforce, unless he believes it to be

144 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
so also. In this view, at least, it cannot require any great share of either
intelligence or candour to perceive some difference between our spiritual
and pastoral oversight and the absolute sway of*the ancient ' Druids,' and
of the despots of ' Babylon and Egypt,' and of ' India and Tartary.' The
subjects of their lawless power became so not by choice, but by birth.
Neither had they the means, whatever might have been their desire, of
escaping its grasp. Even in more modem days, and under governments
comparatively free, the right of expatriation, without the consent of the
government, has been denied. We do not subscribe to this doctrine, if
applied to either Church or State. The right of ecclesiastical expatriation,
from any one branch of the Christian Church to any other which may he
preferred, for grave causes, we have never denied. Nor can we keep, nor
are we desirous to keep, any man subject to our authority one moment
longer than it is his own pleasure. We advert to this topic with great
reluctance, but the memorialists compel us. If they wiU cease to compare
us to despots, to whom we bear no analogy, we shaU cease to exhibit the
obvious distinction. TiU then it is our duty to repel the imputation, so
obstructive of our ministry. Expatriation, either civil or ecclesiastical, if
we may continue this application of the term, may be painful, and attended
with sacrifices. But we should certainly think it preferable to perpetual
internal war. If our brethren can live in peace with us, in Christian
bonds, we shaU sincerely rejoice, and be cordially happy in their society
and fellowship. But we entreat them not to keep us embroiled in perpet
ual strife. Our united energies are needed for higher and nobler purposes.
" We have been repeatedly told, in effect, that the doctrines, the moral
discipline, and the peculiar Christian privileges of class-meetings, love-
feasts, &c, in the Methodist Episcopal Church, are approved and esteemed,
by the various memorialists themselves, above those of any other branch
of the Christian Church. Does it not then clearly foUow, by their own ad
mission, that, with all the faults of our government, this state of things has
been preserved and mainlined under the peculiar administrations of our
itinerant system ? And who will undertake to say that, under a gracious
Providence, which has thus led us on, this has not, in a great measure at
least, been the result of the distinctness of our polity from that of most
other Churches ? And who wiU undertake to say that, were the changes
proposed adopted, we should not gradually, though at first perhaps almost
imperceptibly, begin to go the way of others ? We speak to Methodists.
They will judge, what we say. The moral results of our past and present
polity have been tried. Its fruits are before us, and confessed by the
world. Tlie experiment proposed, in connexion with an essentially-itinerant
system,, is untried. Its results, at best, must be problematical ; and in
our opinion, there is no prospect of gain that can justify the hazard.
" With regard to our local brethren particularly, they have themselves

REPORT OF COMMITTE ON MEMORIALS. 145
explicitly said, that they ' ask for no distinct representation of the local
preachers.' So far as this question is concerned, therefore, by their own
consent, they can only be regarded as amalgamated with the laity : and
our lay brethren, we apprehend, would not readily consent to its being
considered in any other light.
" Were we disposed to retort the insinuation of sinister personal motives,
how easy would it be for us to suggest that some of our local brethren
who have deserted the itinerant field, (perhaps from its toils and priva
tions,) and others who have never been pleased to leave domestic comforts
and temporal pursuits to encounter its labours and sacrifices, may be so
zealous in accomplishing the proposed change in order to cut up, or to
bring down, the itinerant system to a nearer approximation to their tem
poral convenience ; so that, in time, they might come, without the sacri
fices at present necessary, to participate both in the pastoral charge, and,
alas ! in the envied pittance of those who now devote themselves wholly
to the work, and are absolutely dependant for daily subsistence on the
mere voluntary contributions of those whom they serve : (a check on their
power indeed !) Such an imputation would be quite as kind and as true
as many of those which are so liberally heaped on us. This course of ar
gumentation, however, we deem unworthy of Christian brethren, and shall
leave it for those who think their cause requires it. The man who can
beheve, or who can endeavour to persuade others, that we adhere to our
present itinerant system for tlie sake of personal convenience, ease, or in
terest, or with the view of benefitting our posterity more than the posterity
of our brethren, may be pitied, but he places himself beyond the reach
either of reasoning or of rebuke.
" The memorialists were sensible that ' a plan ' of their proposed
changes had been urgently called for, and seem to have been well aware
that rational and conscientious men could not feel free to enter upon
so great a revolution, in a system of such extent and of such connexions,
without a plan, clearly and frankly developed, and bearing the marks of
having been carefully and judiciously devised. The memorialists, indeed,
say, that, ' independently of other considerations,' they were ' disposed to
avoid the attempt to form a plan, out of deference to the General Confer
ence.' It would have been more satisfactory to us to have known what
those 'other considerations' were. From some other circumstances, we
cannot but apprehend that they probably had more influence in keeping
back the expose of 'a plan' than the one mentioned here, of — 'deference
to the General Conference.' On our part, we frankly confess ourselves
incompetent to form any satisfactory plan, on any principles which we
believe to be equal and efficient, and consistent with the energies and
greatest usefulness of our extended missionary system. We think it,
therefore, unreasonable, at least, to ask of us to contrive ' a plan.'
10

146 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
"So far as we can judge from any experiment that has been made in
Europe or in America, we cannot perceive any great advantages which
could be promised to the Church from the proposed change. Nor has the
late convention in Baltimore afforded to our understanding any additional
argument for its efficient practicability. Agreeably to the journal of that
convention, one hundred persons were appointed to attend it, of whom
fifty-seven only did attend, namely, from the State of New-York, one ;
North Carolina, two ; Ohio, four ; District of Columbia, four ; Pennsylva
nia, seven ; Virginia, ten ; and Maryland, twenty-nine. Now that con
vention had been urgently caUed, by repeated public advertisements, and
was expected to be held but a few days to discuss subjects represented as
of great importance and deep interest. Liberal invitations were given,
and comfortable and free accommodations pledged. Yet, notwithstanding
the novelty of the assembly, the pleasantness of the season, and other
inviting circumstances, a very few more than one half of the whole num
ber appointed attended. And had it required two-thirds of that number
to constitute a quorum, as in our General Conference, after aU their labour
and expense, no business could have been done, for there would have been
no quorum. Of the number that did attend, too, it wiU be perceived that
a majority of the whole were from the State of Maryland, within which
the convention was held; and, including the neighbouring District of
Columbia, a decisive majority. This exhibits a practical proof that, were
a lay delegation even admitted, the consequence would be, that the extre
mities of our Church would not be, in fact, represented at all, but would
be subjected to the overwhelming control of those within the vicinity of
the seat of the Conference; a state of thuigs which, we beheve, is not
desirable. This may serve also, perhaps, to account, in some measure, for
the great zeal which some of our brethren have exhibited in this cause,
particularly in the State of Maryland and the adjoining district, and in the
city of Baltimore, where the General Conference has usually been held.
Were it established that the General Conference should always be held in
St. Louis or New-Orleans, or any other remote part, we cannot but think
that the zeal of some, in that case, would probably be very much abated.
Even they would scarcely be willing to travel so great a distance, at so
much expense and loss of time, to remain three or four weeks at a General
Conference. " In another document, issued by the convention above alluded to, they
say, ' We have been labouring with great attention and perseverance to
put the public in possession of our views as fast as we can.' They have
also had in circulation for many years a monthly periodical publication,
for the express purpose of diffusing their views and advocating their cause,
besides the institution of what have been called Union Societies, and of
late a convention. Yet, after aU these exertions, the great body of our

REPORT OF COMMITTEE ON MEMORIALS. 147
ministers, both travelling and local, as weU as of our members, perhaps
not much if any short of one hundred to one, still oppose their wishes.
This, as before said, has been assumed to be from ignorance or want of
intellect, or from some worse principle. But we believe it to be the result
of a firm and dehberate attachment to our existing institutions and econ
omy — an attachment which we have the happiness of believing to be
increased, rather than diminished, in proportion to the development of the
details of any plans which the memorialists have yet seen fit to exhibit.
We put it, then, to the good sense, to the Christian candour, and to the
calmer and better feelings of our brethren, whether it be not time to cease
to agitate and disturb the Church with this controversy? — at least, if it
must be continued, whether it be not time to divest it of that acrimony
and virulence which, in too many instances, we fear, has furnished fit
matter for the scoff of the infidel and the reproach of common enemies ?
If this state of things be continued, how can it be said, ' See how these
Christians love one another?' It grieves us to think of it. We weep
between the porch and the altar ; and our cry is, ' Spare, O Lord ! spare
thy people, and give not thine heritage to this reproach.'
" We know that we have been charged with wishing to suppress free
inquiry, and with denying to our ministers and members the liberty of
speech and of the press. Our feelings, under such reiterated and widely-
circulated charges, would tempt us to repel them with strong expressions.
If reviled, however, we are resolved not to revile again. But the charge
we wholly disavow. Our ministers and members, of every class, are
entitled to the full liberty of speech and of the press, equally with any
other citizens of the United States, subject solely to the restrictions and
responsibilities imposed by the laws of the land, by the obligations of
Christianity, and by the existing regulations under which we are volun
tarily associated, as Methodists and as Methodist ministers. The rule
in our Disciphne, 'sec. vii, p. 91,' [new edition, p. 88,] of which some of
the memorialists complain, never was intended (and we are not aware that
it has at any time been officially so construed) to suppress such freedom
of inquiry, or to deny such liberty of speech and of the press ; provided
such inquiry be conducted, and such liberty be used, in a manner consist
ent with the above-mentioned obligations. The design of the rule was to
guard the peace and union of the Church against any mischievous false
brethren, who might be disposed to avail themselves of their place in the
bosom of the Church to endeavour to sow dissensions, by inveighing
against our doctrines or discipline, in the sense of unchristian railing and
violence. Any other construction of it we have never sanctioned, nor will
we. In this view of this rule we cannot consent to its abolition. On the
contrary, we regard it as a Christian and useful rale, and particularly
neeessary, at the present time, for the well-being of the Church. It is

148 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
aimed against licentiousness and not against liberty. In the State, as well
as in the Church, it is found necessary to subject both speech and the
press to certain legal responsMities, which undoubtedly operate as
restraints, and tend to guard against licentiousness, by exposing offenders
to penalties corresponding to the extent of their abuse of liberty. And we
confess ourselves among the number of those who, with statesmen and
jurists, as well as divines, maintain that even a despotic government is
preferable to a state of unbridled anarchy.
" By insinuations of the above description, and by others of an analo
gous character, attempts have been made to excite against us the jealousy
and suspicion of statesmen and politicians, and of the constituted authorities
of the civil government. This low stratagem we have always regarded as
peculiarly deserving the rebuke of every generous mind, even among our
opponents : and we cannot believe otherwise than that it had its origin
either in some distempered mind or some perverted heart The memo
rialists wish the government of the Church to be assimilated to that of
the State. We think, on the other hand, that as there neither is nor
ought to be any connexion between Church and State, so neither is there
any obligation or necessity to conform the government of the one to that
of the other : that both then origin and their objects differ ; and that to
aim at conforming them to each other would be more likely, in the course
of human events, to terminate in their amalgamation, than the course of
denying such analogy, and maintaining the two jurisdictions on their
peculiarly-distinctive bases, under regulations adapted to the objects for
which they were severally designed. In the instances of civil and religious
despotism alluded to by the memorialists, as recorded in history, the powers
of Church and State were combined, and no means were left to the people
of appealing or of escaping from the one or from the other. The first
step towards producing such a state of things would be to bring ministers
of religion and officers of State into a nearer alliance with each other, and
thus graduaUy to effect an assimilation of views, and feelings, and interests.
The way being thus prepared, politicians and statesmen might be intro
duced into our ecclesiastical councils, and, by a ' mutual ' combination, aid
each other in the accumulation of power and influence. We do not
affirm that any of the memorialists seriously meditate such designs. But
we do say, that, according to our understanding of the natural tendency of
things, the change proposed is just such a one as would be most likely to
be adopted by men of policy for the accomplishment of such an object; and
that, in the present state of the world, nothing would be more impohtic than
the continuance of our present economy with any such ambitious schemes
in view as some, we fear, and must say, have malevolently insinuated.
"With regard to what have been called 'Union Societies,' we consider
the organization of these distinct bodies within the bosom of the Church

REPORT OF COMMITTEE ON MEMORIALS. 149
as the baneful source of the principal evils which of late have so painfully
afflicted and distracted some portions of our charge. Such associations,
within the pale of the Church, have arrayed and combined all the work
ings of the spirit of party in their most pernicious and destructive forms.
They have drawn a hne of separation between those who compose them
and their brethren, as organized and systematic adversaries. They have
separated chief friends ; they have severed the most sacred and endearing
ties ; and have caused and fomented discord and strife in circles before dis
tinguished for peace and love. And under whatever plausible pretexts they
may have been instituted, the Church generally, we believe, has regarded
them as calculated, if not designed, either to obstruct the due adminis
tration of discipline, by overawing the administration of it, or to prepare
an organized secession, in case they should fail in modelling the Church'
according to their wishes. With these associations numbers, we have no
doubt, unwarily became connected at first, from various views, who now'
feel a difficulty in disentangling themselves. If, however, the real object
of their original institution was to secure an identity of views in the com
munications to be presented to this General Conference, that object having'
been now accomplished, we affectionately and respectfully submit it to the
peacefully-disposed among our brethren who may yet compose them,
whether there can yet be any remaining obligation to continue in them ;
and whether, in fact, they ought not now to be dissolved. In our opinion,'
considering what have been their past operation and effects, the general
peace of the Church can never be restored and settled on any firm and
lasting basis till this shall be done.
" We might add much more, but the time fails us. We entreat our
brethren to be at peace. It is our earnest and sincere desire. In order to
it, on our part, we have advised, and do hereby advise and exhort, all our
brethren, and all our ecclesiastical officers, to cultivate on all occasions the
meekness and gentleness of Christ ; and to exercise all the lenity, modera
tion, and forbearance which maybe consistent with the purity of our insti
tutions, and the due and firm administration of necessaiy discipline, the
sacrifice of which we could not but deem too costly, even for peace.
"In conclusion, we say to brethren, 'If there be, therefore, any conso
lation in Christ, if any comfort of love, if any fellowship of the Spirit, if
any bowels and mercies, fulfil ye our joy, that ye be like-minded, having
the same love, being of one accord, of one mind. Let the peace of God
rale in our hearts, to the which also we are called in one body ; and let
us be thankful. Whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things are just,
whatsoever things are lovely, whatsoever things are of good report, if there
be any virtue and any praise, let us think on these things. Let all bitterness,
and wrath, and anger, and clamour, and evil-speaking be put away from
us, with all malice. And may the God of love and peace be with us.' "

150 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.

ANNOTATIONS ON THE PRECEDING " REPORT."

NOTE I.
The memorialists had promised to " take an argumentative view of this
question, (of right,) in a form somewhat different from those which had
become most familiar, and which had been frequently found to fail to con
vince individuals." The claim, it seems, had faUed to be sustained by
"familiar" arguments — that is, by common sense; and the new "argu
mentative views " were to be borrowed by the claimants from far-fetched
and absurd analogies. It is contended by the memorialists, that abso
lute monarchies, hierarchies, and aristocracies, have deprived their subjects
of their rights ; and that, therefore, the Methodist Episcopal Church has
deprived its members of their rights ! But the " therefore," must ob
viously be a non sequitur, unless the memorialists can show that the
Methodist Church is a monarchy, a hierarchy, or an aristocracy, which
certainly cannot be done, without confounding the most obvious distinctions.
The travelling ministry neither claim nor exercise any arbitrary autho
rity over the locality or membership. The authority they exercise is purely
pastoral, and they do not obtain it without the consent and recommend
ation of the laity and local preachers. None are subjected to their au
thority but such as have voluntarily put themselves under it, and who can
release themselves from it whenever they please. The pastors, moreover,
are dependant upon the voluntary contributions of their flocks for then-
subsistence. How absurd is it, then, to compare this ministerial super
intendence with the despotisms, either civil or ecclesiastical, which at any
time have been established in the world ! The despotisms to which the
memorialists have adverted, would lose all their terrors, if deprived of the
purse and the sword. If no person could come under then domination,
but by choice — if their subjects could renounce their allegiance when they
pleased — and if, while they acknowledged allegiance, they held their rulers
in check, by keeping them in absolute dependence upon the bounty of
their subjects for the necessaries of life, there would be little to complain
of, even in the absolute monarchies, hierarchies, and aristocracies, to which
the complainants have alluded.
But all the sophistry of the memorialists is met by the Conference with
a plain, common-sense refutation ; the most vexatious thing, by-the-by,
which can possibly be thrown in the way of a sophist or a would-be meta
physical philosopher. If the memorialists have an abstract right to repre
sentation in the General Conference, it must be either a natural or an

ANNOTATIONS ON THE PRECEDING REPORT. 151
acquired right. The reader, we presume, never heard of any other right.
To which, then, of these two kinds of right does the claim belong ? If it
be a natural right, it belonged to them in a state of nature, while they
were yet enemies to God by wicked works, and aliens to the common
wealth of Israel. Nay, more, if it be a natural right, it belongs, as the
report alleges, " to men as men ;" consequently, to all men : and the mon
strous absurdity will follow, that every man, in the United States at least,
is entitled to be represented in the General Conference of the Methodist
Episcopal Church.
But is it an acquired right? If it is, when was it acquired? Did
they acquire this right by becoming Christians ? Then it must be con
ferred and defined by the Holy Scriptures, the great charter of Chris
tianity. Let this be shown, and we will neither resist it, nor reason about
it, but yield to that authority the most prompt and unqualified submission.
This, however, is not now pretended. The memorialists themselves did
not urge their claims as founded upon Scripture warrant. On the con
trary, it is now generaUy admitted, that the Scriptures have not enjoined
any particular and exclusive form of Church government; and, conse
quently, that any associated body of Christians have a right to institute
such a form as they may find best adapted to the circumstances in which
they may have been providentially placed.
The absurdity of the claim, as a right acquired by the profession of
Christianity, is moreover rendered sufficiently obvious by the consequences
which would follow the admission of such a principle. It would neces
sarily foUow from it, that the other denominations of Christians, as well
as Methodists, have a right to be represented in the General Conference
of our Church ; as a right common to Christians must appertain to all
Christian sects and denominations !
But if the right does not appertain to the common profession of Chris
tianity, was it acquired by becoming Methodists ? That it was not, is
obvious from the fact, that it is nowhere found in the terms and conditions
to which we consented when we became Methodists. It is not contained
in our book of government and discipline. The absence of such a recog
nition of this supposed right, is the very subject of complaint with the
memorialists ; and therefore could not have been already provided for by
any previous conventional compact or agreement. " The rights which
a local preacher or layman possesses, as such, are purely conventional.
They are not natural, but acquired rights ; and they are known and de
termined by the articles of association contained in our book of discipline
and government. The Church is a voluntary association, entered into for
rehgious purposes. Whoever enters into its communion, is entitled to all
the privileges and immunities which the articles of association hold out to
him  and to no more. If he find upon experiment, that the religious

152 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
advantages he acquires do not compensate him for the sacrifices he is re
quired to make, he has an indefeasible right to withdraw from the com
munity, and thereby release himself from the obligations imposed by his
membership — but he has no right to demand of the Church to change her
economy for his accommodation."
The arguments of the Conference have not been fairly met by our ad
versaries — they cannot be refuted ; for they are founded upon the immu
table principles of truth. The opposition have attempted to evade their
force by aU the subtlety of metaphysical sophistry; and like people
dancing a minuet, they have always left off where they began. For
want of argument, they have next resorted to ridicule — they have jeered
and laughed, and no doubt persuaded themselves that they were exceed
ingly witty ; but, after all, the positions taken by the Report remain un
moved and immovable. The rights claimed must be either natural or
acquired, or they are no rights at all ; and that they are neither the one
nor the other, is too obvious to require any further argument or illustration.
Somebody in the Mutual Rights has inquired whether the rights of the
traveUing preachers are natural or acquired ; and if acquired, When was it
done ? The question has been anticipated and answered : " The govern
ment of the Methodist Episcopal Church originated with the ministry, and
the lay members voluntarily entered into the association under the regula
tions made by Mr. Wesley and his successors, — the right to make new
regulations or to alter the old ones, being reserved to the preachers in the
very terms of the compact. The preachers, therefore, existed, in fact,
before the people or lay members of the Church. The government was
originally and of necessity, in their hands, and we were by them invited
to the privileges provided for us in the economy they had instituted.
They cannot, therefore, be charged with the assumption of a power which
does not legitimately belong to them ; for it is no other power than has
been virtually conceded to them by every one who has entered into the
connexion and become a party to the original compact." In short, the
authority exercised by the itinerant preachers over the membership, is not
of natural inherent right, but has been acquired by the voluntary consent
of every individual member of the Church.
It must be a subject of regret to all who are interested in the peace and
prosperity of Zion, that the question of altering our Church economy was
ever made to turn upon abstract rights, rather than upon the utility of
the changes proposed. The whole family of Methodists having but one
common interest — namely, the spread of the gospel in the world and the
increase of holiness amongst ourselves— the question to be considered, both
by preachers and members, obviously was : What maybe done to promote
these great objects ? And if it were found that there were any defects
either in our economy or in the administration of it, which had rendered,

ANNOTATIONS ON THE PRECEDING REPORT. 153
or were likely to render, our mutual efforts less successful than they might
be made, it would have been easy to apply or to originate the remedy.
Thus, if upon due consideration it had been found that the introduction
of a lay or local delegation into our General Conference, would increase
our usefulness to others and promote evangelical piety among ourselves,
all the members would have united in the amendment, and the preachers
could have had no interest, either temporal or spiritual, in opposing it;
for in both respects their interests are essentially connected with the pros
perity of the membership. It could not indeed have been expected or
desired, that the proposition should have at first met the approbation of
aU, either of the preachers or members. It is wise, perhaps, always to
examine with jealousy and strict scrutiny, innovations which propose
fundamentally to change systems long established, and which in their
operation have been productive of extensive benefit, — which have become
familiar by usage, and sanctified by associations and feelings which cannot
be transferred, and which are not easily obliterated or subdued. But all
that would have been necessary to final success, would have been to sug
gest a plan of the proposed constitution, in all its details, and to have
examined it, not only as a whole, but in all its parts, with reference to its
application to the particular circumstances, habits, and objects of the
Methodist community. The different views of those who turned their
attention to the subject, would have been thus elicited. The whole
amount of wisdom and experience in the connexion would have been
brought to bear upon the subject ; whatever was imperfect in the plan
would have been supphed, and whatever was unnecessary or dangerous
would have been given up. Untrammelled by the metaphysical specula
tions of either civilians or theologians, but keeping steadily in view the
utility and practicability of the changes proposed, we should finally have
adopted a better system, or have generally agreed to continue our present
polity. We had hoped, at one time, that this course would have been
taken. This hope was founded upon a memorial sent up to the General
Conference of 1824, by a very large meeting of the male members of the
Methodist Episcopal Church in Baltimore city station, which was voted
for by most, if not all, the leading reformers in the place. In this memo
rial it was admitted that no good government, whether civilor ecclesiasti
cal, was ever founded upon the abstract principles of natural rights ; that
the only basis upon which government could safely rest, was the broad
ground of expediency ; and the memorial went on to show the opinion
of the meeting, as to the expediency of a lay delegation. Immediately
after the adjournment of Conference, however, the ground was changed.
A periodical publication was announced ; and to show the new principles
upon which the reformers were determined to act, the paper was called
" The Mutual Rights of the Mmisters and Members," &c.

154 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
The periodical was conducted in conformity with the principles then
avowed. The expediency of a lay and local delegation was no longer
considered or discussed ; and even the practicabnity of the measure, con
sistently with the union, harmony, and efficiency of an itinerant ministry,
was kept entirely out of view. The discussion was confined to the abstract
right of representation immediately from the people, in what they were
pleased, however improperly, to style the legislative department of the
Church ; and, of course, all the members who opposed the scheme were
represented as venal slaves, and the panders to power ; while the preach
ers, who declined to introduce an innovation not sanctioned by five in a
hundred of the membership, were denounced as tyrants and despots;
nay, as "overbearing abandoned tyrants," who "would rather see their
flocks go into sin, and finally into hell, than to grant them their rights."
All the evil consequences which have resulted from the controvei'sy, have
grown out of this unfortunate change of principle. The claim of right
could not be sustained by those who advocated it ; but it furnished them
with an opportunity to ring the changes upon those political principles
which are so deservedly popular among us, without feehng, at the same
time, under the necessity of showing their application to the subject they
professed to discuss. They were republicans. The people of this country
were republicans, and would sustain them in the demand for a republican
Church government, right or wrong ; and the Church was arraigned before
the tribunal of the world to answer for her economy.
We remembered, however, that Robespierre, Danton, and Marat, were pro
fessedly furious republicans ; and when they and their confederates had, by
incessantly distracting the people with their abstract principles of political
philosophy, defeated the wise intentions of the great and good Lafayette, who
aimed to establish a government suited to the genius and adapted to the
circumstances of the French nation, they established, and for a long time
maintained, one of the most absolute and unrelenting despotisms that ever
afflicted and disgraced mankind. We were not disposed to enter upon a
course of experiments in Church government for the mere pleasure of ex
perimenting, although the proposition was urged upon us with all the
zeal and prancing eloquence of a French revolutionist. The examples be
fore us had been too recently exhibited, and the effects too terrible to be
forgotten. It was to the same spirit of innovation, the same recklessness
of consequences and disregard of the lessons of experience, which actuated
our reformers, that may be attributed the cruel mockery of human hope,
and the disappointment of the best and dearest anticipations of mankind,
by the bloody scenes and fatal termination of the French revolution.
That wild and visionary philosophy which proposed to resolve society into
its original elements, in order to build it up anew — which, despising the
sober lessons of experience, persists to propose schemes of government,

ANNOTATIONS ON THE PRECEDING REPORT. 155
adapted not to the condition of man as he is, but to man as he should be
— has reared and dedicated to the fabled deities, Belial and Moloch, the
gods of false reasoning and of murder, a column more useful, and we
hope more durable, than the pyramids of Egypt — a column erected with
the bones and cemented with the blood of millions of its unhappy victims.
The genius of history, in pity to mankind, has inscribed upon its summit
a lesson to be read by every nation, and kindred, and tongue under heaven :
"Let no man deceive you by a vain and deceitful philosophy."
" True philosophy is reason teaching from experience." " Repeat
it until it comes into the currency of a proverb — To innovate is
not to reform."
Alas ! the sacred names of liberty, ¦ republicanism, rights of man, phi
losophy, have aU been abused in more countries than in one, to purposes
of selfishness and personal ambition. Those who have desired to possess
authority and distinction, have found a ready way to their object by be
coming the most violent declaimers in favour of liberty and equality.
Our reformers professed to be republicans, and yet they insisted upon
subverting and revolutionizing our Church government, not only without
the consent, but contrary to the wishes of the great body of their brethren,
both preachers and laymen. But then, they claimed all the talents and
intelligence of the Church ! The rest were too ignorant to be consulted on
the subject ! The committee and the General Conference, however, had
a different and much more favourable opinion of the intelligence of the
membership. They knew them to be generally opposed to the innova
tion, and they respected their sentiments. Apart from all other objections
to the scheme of reform proposed by the memorialists, it was sufficient for
the conference to know that such a revolution in our ecclesiastical economy
would be disapproved by more than ninety-five in a hundred of all who were
interested in it. It would have been equally unjust and anti-republican
to have granted the petition of the memorialists. But this is not the only
sample our reformers have given us of their republicanism. After abusing
o»r preachers as despots, and the members as slaves, they have left us,
and instituted a system of their own, which, while it amuses the lay mem
bers with a show of republicanism, effectually secures to the local preachers
all the powers of the government ! We are told, however, that " they
were not prepared for the measure ; they had no examples before them ;
they had not sufficiently discussed the subject ; and hence, the system is
defective." The examples of all the Christian Churches in the world were
before them. They had been discussing this very subject for more than
seven years, and had so far matured their views as to assure the General
Conference that the adoption of them was necessary to the peace and
prosperity of the Church. What a fine situation we should have been in,
if the Conference had taken their word for the assertion, and adopted their

156 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
schemes ! We should have had the inexpressible consolation of being
assured, that although the system for which we had exchanged our long-
tried, and eminently-successful institutions, was imperfect, nay, totally im
practicable ; yet we should have the pleasure of trying our hands at it
again after a while ! The reader may be tempted to levity by such egre
gious absurdity, but he whl be recalled to sobriety and seriousness, by the
recollection that in these absurdities may be involved the interests, the
eternal interests, not only of the authors of these wild and visionary pro
jects, but also of hundreds of simple, good-meaning people, who are mis
led by their influence and example. NOTE II.
The Report of the committee on petitions and memorials, as adopted by
the General Conference of 1828, is now fairly before our readers ; and we
shall proceed to notice the objections which have been urged against it by
our enemies. When the Report was read in the Conference, Mr. Shinn,
one of the leading reformers, was so impatient for its adoption that he
immediately moved the Conference to adopt it, without making the slightest
objection to any j>art of it, and without waiting to hear whether any other
member had any objections to urge. The gentleman also joined in the
unanimous vote of the Conference by which it was adopted, and thereby
sent it to the Church, with all the doctrines and sentiments it contained,
with the sanction of his approbation. He now tells us that one of the
motives which actuated him was, that the objectionable positions taken in
the Report could be easfly refuted. But if so, was it not his duty to have
refuted them in Conference — to have pointed out to the supreme council
of the Church the heterodoxy of the opinions advocated by the committee,
and thereby saved the Church, of which he was a pastor, and the annual
conference which had delegated him to represent it from the injury and
disgrace which he now thinks were incurred by the unadvised adoption
of a report containing the most antichristian claims on the part of the
ministry ? »
He alleges, however, that he knew it was useless to make any effort
from the result of previous endeavors. But although to have been repeat
edly defeated in his opposition to similar measures might have justified
him in ceasing from useless exertion, it could by no means warrant his
advocating or even acquiescing in measures which his judgment disap
proved, and which he believed would do great injury to the Church.
But is it true that Mr. Shinn had been favoured before the reading of
the Report with any opportunity in the General Conference to advocate the
changes proposed in our Church government by the memorialists, or to
refute the arguments by which these changes were resisted ? We believe
not. The appeals of Mr. D. B. Dorsey, and Mr. Wm. Pool, had, been

ANNOTATIONS ON THE PRECEDING REPORT. 157
before the Conference, and Mr. Shinn had been appointed by the appellants
as their representative. The duty thus assigned him had been discharged
to his utmost ability ; but these cases did not necessarily involve the gene
ral subject embraced in the Report, and Mr. Shinn, as their advocate, care-
fiuly avoided blending them in his argument. He confined himself, as it
was proper he should do, to the special pleading which the cases demanded,
and endeavoured to show that the decisions of the Baltimore Annual Con
ference in the premises were not according to, or sustained by, the Discip
line of the Church. In the arguments for and against the appeals, the
question about the propriety of altering our Discipline did not and could
not arise. The decisions of inferior judicatories could only be annulled or
affirmed by the General Conference, according to the rules and regulations
of the Church as they existed at the time. The propriety of altering such
rales and regulations was not therefore argued or suggested during the
discussion which took place in the General Conference upon the several
appeals of Rev. D. B. Dorsey or Rev. Wm. Pool ; nor was there any other
occasion which could give an opportunity for discussion upon this subject
until the Report of the committee upon the petitions and memorials, which
prayed fop alterations in our ecclesiastical economy, was read in the Con
ference. Mr. Shinn had not, therefore, ascertained by any previous experi
ment which he had m|de what were the views of the Conference in refer
ence to the wonderful reformation which he and his coadjutors had pro
posed to effect in our Church government, much less had he ascertained
the opinion of that body upon the doctrines and principles contained in
the Report. Yet he not only permitted his brethren to adopt a Report con
taining principles and avowing opinions which he deemed then, and con
tinues to believe, highly objectionable and dangerous, but led them into
the error both by precept and example. He not only moved its adoption,
but voted for it himself, and that too without apprizing his brethren that
there was anything in the Report which he did not entirely approve.
At the time of the transaction to which we have referred, and which we
witnessed, we really did believe that the clear and distinct renunciation of
any strictly-legislative authority which the Report contained had satisfied
Mr. S. ; that he no longer found any necessity for a lay delegation in a
body professing to claim no authority to make laws for the government of •
the laity or ministry either, and therefore had resolved to desist from further
controversy on the subject. These were our impressions at the time when
the Report was adopted ; and we retained them until we received the
melancholy news of the mover's mental alienation, to which he himself so
feelingly adverts. The circumstances were then sufficiently accounted for
without supposing the mover to have been influenced by the motives to
which we at first attributed his conduct in regard to the Report ; and we
certainly should never have brought against him the charge of inconsis-

158 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
tency, had he permitted the .affair to rest without further animadversion.
But Mr. S., after his restoration, has attempted to justify his motion to adopt
the Report and his voting for it also, upon the ground that it contained
some important concessions, and the objectionable parts could be assailed
with advantage before the public. And he has accordingly assailed it
with the utmost severity, but, we believe, with less success than he antici
pated. The course which he pursued, and which he still, in his sober
senses, justifies, unhappily quadrates with that system of management which
has governed the movements of many of Mr. Shinn's associates in this
revolutionary project ; but we confess we were disappointed in finding that
he could be induced, by any consideration, even under all the assimilating
influence of party spirit, to pursue such a course of pohcy.
Mr. Shinn seems, by certain allusions in the Mutual Rights, to have
attributed the remarks of " A friend to peace," and the review of his
pamphlet by " Silas Hopewell," (a fictitious signature,) to us. We beg
leave to correct this error. We should be glad to claim the honour of
having written these papers could we do it with justice ; but they are not
ours. Mr. Shinn may be assured that he has faUen into abler hands.
Other writers have done that for us which we readily confess we could not
have done so well ourselves ; but they have confined their remarks to Mr.
Shinn's pamphlet, and it now remains for us to^ condense the desultory
objections to the Report, which are scattered through the Mutual Rights,
under a few general heads, and to reply to them severally and fairly. In
doing this we shaU be under the necessity of discriminating between what
our opponents charge the Report with saying and what it really says, as
much that has been alleged to be contained in it, or which has been inferred
from it, can neither be found in the Report nor fairly deduced from any
thing it does contain. It is alleged, for instance, by writers in the Mutual
Rights, that the General Conference declares, in the Report, that the local
preachers and laymen of our Church " have no rights either natural or
acquired." But there is no such expression in the Report, nor in any other
document published or passed by the Conference. The Report contends
that the lay members and the local preachers of the Methodist Episcopal
Church have no abstract natural right to seats in the General Conference ;
and that they did not acquire this right by becoming members or local
preachers, because it was no part of the agreement or compact into which
they entered.
But it does not assert that they have no other natural rights as men,
or acquired rights as citizens and Christians. Again it is asserted the
General Conference contend that" they, (the Conference,) being the divinely-
instituted overseers of the Church, have a divine right to govern the Church
without control ;" yet there is nothing of this kind in the Report. On the
contrary, the Report disclaims on the part of the Conference any authority

ANNOTATIONS ON THE PRECEDING REPORT. 159
to legislate for the Church at all ; and it only claims for them, in common
with aU the other pastors of the Church of Christ, a right to preach the
gospel, administer the ordinances, and to expound and enforce the moral
discipline of the Bible. Even this authority they do not claim a right to
exercise over any but those who voluntarily consent to it, neither their
ministrations nor their expositions being obhgatory upon any but those
who choose to receive them.
The terms, " divinely-instituted ministry," have been spumed and scoffed
at by some as though the divine Founder of Christianity did not institute
or promise to perpetuate a ministry in his Church at aU ; while others
deride the terms on the ground that they are apphed exclusively to the
travelling preachers of the Methodist Episcopal Church ; yet the Report
makes no such exclusive claim. It claims only that the divinely-insti
tuted ministry are the divinely-authorized expounders of gospel doctrines,
ordinances, and moral discipline, and that they are ministers of the gospel.
But it would be useless to mention all the misrepresentations of the
language and meaning of the Report which have been resorted to by its
various assailants. We have adverted to a few only, in order to show our
readers the necessity of consulting the Report itself whenever they hear or
read anything against it, and for this purpose we have spread the docu
ment itself before them. Dismissing, without further remark, the abuse
which has been so lavishly bestowed upon the Report for what is not to
be found in it, or inferred from it, we shall proceed to notice the objections
which have been urged against the principles and opinions really avowed
by the Conference. NOTE in.
Of the opinions and principles avowed in the Report, the following are
the most prominent and important, to wit : —
That the Christian ministry was instituted by divine authority, and that
the great Head of the Church continues to perpetuate a living ministry in
his Church, by calling and qualifying such as he approves for this good
work ; that such as are thus appointed have a divine authority, by virtue
of their commission, to preach the gospel, to administer its ordinances, and
to maintain its moral discipline, are, of course, authorized to explain or
expound them ; and that, in regard to the duties thus required of them
by Him who called and appointed them to the work, they are under a
moral obligation not to permit their ministrations to be authoritatively
controlled by others. They are bound by the tenor of their com
mission. They must obey the commands of Him who hath sent them,
and cannot, for any prospect of temporal advantage, abate one iota of
these commands.
It is the commandment of the Lord contained in their commission,

160 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
" Go into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature," They
are bound to comply with this requisition to the utmost of their ability,
both in regard to the field of labour assigned them — "all the world" —
and in regard to the subjects to whom they are to preach the gospel—
namely, "to every creature." The travelling ministry cannot, therefore,
compromise with the laity in these respects. No temporal advantages
can wan-ant them in confining their individual labour to single congre
gations, at the bidding of their lay brethren, unless they conscientiously
believe that their usefulness would be augmented by the arrangement.
Nor can they obey any determination of their lay brethren which should
prescribe to them what they are to preach. They are bound by their
commission to preach the gospel, the whole gospel, and nothing but the
gospel. The commission of Christ is directed to the ministry, and not to
the laity ; and woe to the ministers who preach not the gospel, or who, for
any temporal advantage, suffer themselves to be authoritatively controUed,
in this respect, by any human power.
Suppose, then, that a lay delegation were admitted into our General
Conference, and that this delegation were to procure the passage of some
rule by which the ministry were abridged in the limits of their labours,
and required to settle permanently among our congregations. It is
obvious that the ministry could not comply with the rule any farther than
they deemed it consistent with their ministerial commission. They are
accountable to the great Head of the Church only for the manner in which
they fulfil the duties assigned — not to them in common with the laity, but
to them exclusively. It follows, then, that all the regulations by which
the preachers are to cany on their own work ought to be made by them
selves, because they only are responsible for its execution.
Suppose, on the other hand, the lay delegation were to abridge the
authority of the ministry to preach the gospel — the glad tidings of salva
tion — a free, full, and present salvation, to every creature — to all men, and
to all sorts of men ; suppose they should be prohibited from offering all
the privileges and blessings of the gospel to any but a certain class of men,
denominated the " elect," it is obvious that the ministry could not suffer
themselves to be " authoritatively controlled " in this respect without viola
ting their commission, which recognises no such limitation.
The Report, therefore, justly alleged that they could not suffer their
ministrations, in this respect, to be authoritatively controlled. Again:,
suppose that in reference to the ordinances the laity were to insist that
baptism and the Lord's Supper should be administered to all who desired
them, though they might not bring forth fruits meet for repentance, or
even profess penitence at all, will it be contended that the ministry could
suffer themselves to bo « authoritatively controlled » in this matter « Could
they, ,n obedience to any earthly authority, permit the sacred ordinances of

ANNOTATIONS ON THE PRECEDING REPORT. 161
the gospel to be thus " trodden under foot of men ?" They dare not. They
have said that they are under a moral obligation not to do so, and they
ought to have added, the obligation was not only a moral but a religious
one. Every enlightened Christian will respond to the declaration, that in
the discharge of these obligations their " consciences are involved."
From the ironical and contemptuous manner in which our opponents
quoted the language of the Report immediately after its publication, we
had feared that they meant to deny the divine institution of the Christian
ministry altogether. The intention, however, is now disavowed by the
highest authority among them, although nothing is said by way of apol
ogy or explanation of the taunting and indecorous manner in which the
phrase, "divinely-instituted ministry," has been alluded to by their
writers. Nor do we find any direct exception to the assertion of the
Conference, that it is made the duty of the ministry to preach the gospel,
administer its ordinances, and maintain its moral disciphne; nor is it
denied that they are divinely authorized to explain or expound both the
doctrines and moral discipline of Christianity. To what, then, do our
opponents object ? Why, we are told that the ministry must prove some
thing more before they establish the position that "all legislative, judicial,
and executive authority in the Church belongs to them." But the claim
to these prerogatives, as of divine right, is. nowhere asserted in the
Report. The Report nowhere says that the divinely-instituted ministry
are the divinely-authorized legislators, judges, and executive officers of the
Church ; it only claims for them the authority, by divine appointment, to
preach the gospel, administer its ordinances, and enforce its moral discip
line. We have nothing to do, therefore, with the claim which has been
objected to, for it has not been set up at any time by the Conference. On
the contrary, the Conference has expressly disavowed any strictly-legisla
tive powers whatever.
" The Church," says the Report, " has but one Lord and one Lawgiver."
"We arrogate no authority to enact any laws of our own, either of moral
or of civil force." " We claim no strictly-legislative powers." " The terms
legislature and legislative are not strictly applicable to our General Confer
ence." " As to the moral code we are subject, equally with themselves,
(the laity,) to one only Lord. We have no power to add to, to take
from, to alter, or to modify, a single item of his statutes." To what
purpose, then, is it to argue against the claim of the General Conference
to a divine right to " all the legislative, judicial, and executive authority in
the Church, when the Conference has not only not claimed any such right,
but expressly disavowed it ?"
The Report is a valuable document, not only to the Methodists, but to
the world. It defines the limits of ecclesiastical authority, with a distinct
ness and perspicuity which we do not recollect to have seen elsewhere.
11

162 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
No Church council, whether composed of ministers or laymen, have, in a
proper sense, any legislative powers. The laws for the government of
the Christian Church and Christians individuaUy, were enacted by the
one Lawgiver, or by those whom he especiaUy authorized to establish
them. AU that is left for Church councils to do, is to make such pru
dential regulations or rales as may best enable them, under the circum-
• stances in which they may be providentially placed, to fulfil, and carry into
effect, the laws imposed by the great Head of the Church. To repeal, to
alter them, or to substitute human for divine laws, is to renounce alle
giance to our rightful Lord and Sovereign; but to obey and enforce
them, may require rales and regulations, which, in the nature of things,
could not have been provided for in the statutes of Christianity, because
these rules must vary with the variable condition and circumstances of the
Christian Church. Thus it is a law of Christianity, common to ministers
and laymen, that every disciple of Christ shaU give according to his ability,
for the relief of the poor, and for the support of the gospel. But the law
could not provide the manner of making these donations, the means by
which they should be coUected, nor the method of distributing them. All
this must be done according to such conventional rules and regulations,
as the prudence and wisdom of the Church may from time to time direct
Again : the laws of the Christian code forbid immorality, and annex as
a penalty for the commission of it an exclusion from the Church ; but how
;the*Church shall proceed in ascertaining whether a member of the Church
be guilty of an alleged immorality, is not expressly prescribed, because
a general regulation might, from the particular circumstances of the
Church, have become not only inapplicable, but even impracticable. The
imode of procedure, under such circumstances, must therefore be provided
by some conventional rule. No Church has a right to alter the statute,
and to tolerate immorality; it can only provide the measures best calcu
lated to carry the laws into effect.
These pmdential " rules and regulations " are made in the Methodist
Episcopal Church, under certain constitutional limitations, by the General
Conference, which is composed exclusively of ministers ; and our oppo
nents have most unaccountably fallen into the error, that the Report
asserts they have a divine right to do so. The Report, however, nowhere
asserts this, nor is it to be inferred from anything in the Report. The
right to preach the gospel, to administer its ordinances, and to enforce
its moral discipline, is indeed claimed as of divine appointment ; but this
does not imply a right to make those conventional regulations by which
the divine statutes which impose duties common to ministers and lay
men are to be carried into effect in any particular Church. Those
commands which are directed exclusively to ministers, and which, as
they say, rest upon them with the force of moral obligations, they must

ANNOTATIONS ON THE PRECEDING REPORT. 163
fulfil according to their understanding of their meaning, and therefore
according to regulations adopted by themselves. But whatever is com
mon to all, may, without any violation of the divine injunction or authority,
be provided for by the common consent, obtained in any way which may
be deemed most expedient.
On what ground, then, it may be asked, does the Conference claim a
right to make these conventional regulations ? We answer, as we have
often answered before, the authority was originally, and of necessity, in
the hands of our preachers ; and the membership, generally, are of opinion
that it would be injurious to our welfare, as a Church, to alter this part
of our economy. In short, the power was at first exercised, from necessity,
and it has since been acquiesced in and continued from expediency. The
Report itself states, that the preachers coming from all parts of their
extensive field of labour, were weU acquainted with the sentiments and
feelings of the membership, and were assured that those who desired to
revolutionize our economy, constituted a very small minority of the Church.
The Conference could not, under such circumstances, have granted the
demands of the memorialists, without a manifest disregard of the wishes'
and feelings of their brethren, both of the ministry and membership.
NOTE IV.
Mr. Shinn explicitly admits that the ministry is "bound, in duty, to
preach the gospel, administer its ordinances, and maintain its moral dis
cipline," — and this is all that the Conference claim as of divine right.
But then he insists that the private members have an equal right, both
to judge of the doctrines of the gospel, and to be co-workers with the
ministry in maintaining its moral discipline; and that "all Christians
have a right to read the Bible, and this right they have by nature and
by Christianity." Did the reverend author mean to insinuate that these
rights had been denied by the Conference ? If he did, he is certainly mis
taken ; and if he did not, his readers will be in danger of misunderstand
ing him, as it will not be readily perceived why he should, in replying
to the Report, argue in favour of rights which have not been questioned.
The Conference says expressly : " No man is bound to receive our doc
trines merely because we beheve and teach them, nor unless they have
his own cordial assent. Neither is any man obliged to submit himself to
what we believe to be the moral discipline of the gospel, and our duty
to enforce, unless he believes it to be so also." Is not this a very distinct
recognition of all that Mr. Shinn claims in favour of the private members,
as belonging to them "by nature and by Christianity?"
The tmth is, Mr. Shinn, as well as the late convention, in their oppo
sition to the Report, everywhere confound the authority claimed by the

164 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
Conference "for tlie Christian ministry," "to preach the gospel, admin-:
ister its ordinances, and. maintain its moral disciphne" — which the.
Report says was given by the great Head of the Church himself, —
with the authority exercised by tlie Conference, to make those prudential
rules and arrangements which may be found necessary for the due execu
tion of the divine laws, which never have been claimed as of divine right,
¦ but only upon the ground of expediency and compact, or conventional
agreement. In the memorial, to which the Report is intended as a reply, the travel
ling preachers were compared to the ancient Druids, — the despots of
Babylon, of Egypt, of India, and of Tartary. It was incumbent on the
Conference to disclaim all such arbitrary authority over any persons what
ever; to show that they only claimed, in common with others who are
called to the ministry, a divine right to preach the gospel to such as were
willing to hear them, to administer its ordinances to such as were willing
to receive them at their hands, and to enforce its moral disciphne over
such as voluntarily place themselves under their pastoral care ; but that
they claimed no right to compel any one to hear them preach, to receive
the ordinances at their hands, to come under their pastoral charge, or 'to
adopt, without conviction, their expositions of the doctrines and moral dis
cipline of Christianity. Every one must judge for himself, and act from
his own convictions of duty ; because every one must give an account of
himself to God. The Conference did not mean to assert, nor to insinuate, that
all that appertained to our ecclesiastical economy was of divine appoint
ment. The allegation is gratuitous; and in making it, our adversaries
have been disingenuous and unjust. If the Conference had designed to
assert that our form of government was expressly and exclusively enjoined
by the word of God, they would have rehed upon this warrant for its
defence ; it would have been unnecessary to go into any arguments to show,
as they have done, the expediency and utility of our present polity.
"Thus saith the Lord," certainly supersedes, with Christians, all other
authority, and renders superfluous all other reasons for submission and
obedience. We are now prepared to meet the objection to the Report most rehed
upon, both by Mr. Shinn and the convention, to wit : — That if the divinely-
instituted ministry have a divine right to certain privUeges, the local
preachers, as being ministers by the same divine authority, are clothed
with the same rights by the divine command. Why, then, do the trav
elling preachers exclude them from a community of privileges and com
mon exercise of ministerial authority? We have endeavoured to state
the objection in the strongest terms, and to place it in the clearest light..
We wish not to evade the force of it, and readily acknowledge it requires
deliberate consideration. If the travelling preachers have deprived their

ANNOTATIONS ON THE PRECEDING REPORT. 165
brethren, the local preachers, of any rights which appertain to them as
ministers, they are bound to rectify the en-or, and hasten to restore to them
their rights ; and if they have withheld privileges which belong to the
local ministry in common with all other ministers of the gospel, they
ought to withhold them no longer, lest they be found to violate the com
mands of the " one Lord and Lawgiver." Let us then carefuUy examine
the case ; and, as the writer himself is a local preacher, he hopes at least
to do justice to his own side of the question.
We have seen what is claimed by the Conference in favour of the
Christian ministry, — namely, a divine authority to " preach the gospel,
administer its ordinances, and maintain its moral discipline;" and a right
to expound or explain them without being authoritatively controlled in
the exercise of their ministerial functions. Now what part of this authority
is denied to the local preachers ? They exercise their right to preach the
gospel and administer its ordinances whenever recommended by the local,*
or quarterly-meeting conferences. They enforce and expound the moral
discipline of the gospel, as preachers ; and, for the most part, as class-
leaders, when they are desirous or willing to do so. The only authority
then to which they are not admitted in common with the travelling
preachers, is that of executing the discipline of the Church as pastors of
the flock.
But has the authority been withheld from them by the travelling
preachers ? Certainly not. They do not exercise it, because they have
alleged that although they believe themselves called to preach the gospel,
yet their temporal circumstances, or other hinderances, prevent them from
devoting themselves exclusively to the ministry, — "giving themselves
wholly" to the work, and "taking an oversight thereof." They therefore
occupy an auxiliary relation to the regular pastors of the Church, and are
usefully employed in the common cause, whenever their secular affairs
afford them an opportunity to labour. It is, then, or it ought to be, provi
dential circumstances which prevent their taking a pastoral oversight of
the Church, and maintaining its moral discipline by the due enforcement
of its laws.
We do not undertake to say that all our local preachers are prevented
by the necessity of circumstances from devoting themselves entirely to
the work of the ministry. Some may not desire to do so : and if this be
die case, these are not fit to be pastors or preachers either. Those who
burn with a Christian zeal for the salvation of souls, will exceedingly
desire to be unfettered and loosened from all secular concerns that hinder
them, in any degree, from performing the great work to which they are
called ; they only submit to their local relation from inability to do more
° It must be remembered that at this time the local preachers had a conference of
their own.

16$ MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
in the vineyard. Meantime their secular affairs do not aUow them to take
an oversight of stations or circuits, and to exercise that part of the pas
toral authority which consists in a proper enforcement of discipline. The
situation they occupy, is the one to which they profess to have been called
in the order of Providence, and not one which has been assigned them by
the itinerant ministry in contempt of their rights. No man who has
paid the least attention to our economy will say, that it would be for the
interest of our Church to commit the pastoral care of our people to the
local preachers ; or that it would be consistent with the social and relative
duties of the local ministry to neglect their secular affairs, in order to
perform the duties which such authority would necessarily impose. From
all which it is clearly shown, that the only authority claimed by the Report
for the ministry as appertaining to them in virtue of the divine commis
sion, which is not exercised by the local preachers, is one which they are
prevented from exercising by the providential circumstances in which they
are placed or profess to be placed ; and not by any disposition on the
part of their itinerant brethren to withhold from them their rights.
It may also be alleged, that the members of our Church, individually,
joined it under an arrangement by which their pastoral ministry were
bound to give themselves whoUy to the work, and to labour in any part
of the vineyard which might, from time to time, be assigned them. The
itinerant ministry cannot alter this arrangement and transfer our members
to a settled or local pastoral ministry, without violating the compact with
the membership, who have never desired to be so transferred. It will not
be questioned that the membership are as much averse to such a change
as the traveUing preachers can be ; and it would be outraging aU moral
and rehgious obligation to make it without their consent.
But perhaps it is not so much the pastoral charge of circuits, stations,
or societies that is claimed for the local ministry, as a right to seats in
the supreme council of the Church, — an exclusive right to which, Mr.
Shinn says, " is claimed, but not proved in the Report," in favour of the
toavelling preachers. " The assumption," says he, " appears to involve the
Conference in a fearful responsibility ; for if ministers, in virtue of being
moved by the Holy Ghost to preach the gospel, are bound, in conscience,
to exercise aU the rights contended for in the Report, how dare the General
Conference forbid three thousand local ministers to exercise their divine
rights, or put it out of their power to perform their ministerial functions
enjoined on them by the force of a moral obligation ?" We have shown
that aU the rights which are claimed " in virtue of being moved by the
Holy Ghost to preach the gospel," are conceded to the ministry by Mr.
Shinn, and enjoyed by the local preachers — as far as their circumstances,
in their own estimation, enable them to exercise these rights and discharge
the duties which they necessarily imply. For the rest, the Conference

ANNOTATIONS ON THE PRECEDING REPORT. 167
have not claimed the authority of making " social rules," not provided in
the Scriptures, by virtue of any divine authority. They make these
"social rules" under the authority vested in them by the compact or
" social" agreement which has been entered into with them by every indi
vidual member and every individual local preacher in the Church.
That the local preachers among our adversaries did not consider them
selves entitled to representation in the General Conference as ministers, is
evident from the memorial of the convention to which the Report is a
reply. In this memorial, the local preachers neither claim nor petition
for any distinct representation. They admit their secular character, by
asking to be identified with the laity, in the electing and serving as dele
gates to the General Conference. The Conference took up the claims
of the local reformers where they had placed these claims themselves.
In this respect they had voluntarily relinquished or disavowed any pre
tensions to a separate representation ; and the Conference reply to the
common petition by arguments against the utility and practicability of the
innovation, which are alike applicable to both classes of the memorialists.
In short, our readers will perceive that none of the powers or privileges
claimed in the Report as appertaining to the Christian ministry in virtue
of their divine ministerial commission, are withheld from the local preach
ers by their itinerant brethren, although the latter do exercise a pastoral
authority which is not exercised by the former, in consequence of their
secular engagements, or other avowed hinderances ; and that the necesr
sity of these secular engagements, or these insurmountable hinderances,
have been urged by the local preachers themselves, as a ground of exemp
tion from the pastoral duties performed by the travelling preachers. The
exclusive right to constitute our General Conference is not claimed in the
Report in virtue of any divine institution or authority. The right is a
conventional one, which has been sanctioned by every member of our
communion, whether local preacher or layman ; and whether this part of
our economy ought to be altered, is a question of expediency only, which
has been decided in the negative, by at least ninety-five in a hundred of
aU the members of our Church, whether ministers or laymen.
NOTE V.
Having shown in our previous numbers that the General Conference
had never made the high ecclesiastical pretensions attributed to them by
our adversaries, and that the ministerial claims asserted in the Report of
the committee on petitions and memorials, are none other than those which
are admitted by all Christian Churches, and which are founded upon the
indubitable authority of Holy Scripture, we have waited to hear what
our adversaries could say in vindication of their contemptuous sneering at

IBS MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
the doctrine advanced, in the Report — namely, that the Christian ministry
was a divine institution, being originally instituted by the Divine Au
thor of our holy religion himself, and perpetuated by the same authority
in all ages of the Church. We have waited in vain. Our adversaries
have been compelled to change their ground. It was found, that to deny
the divine institution of the Christian ministry, was not only untenable,
but would be arraying themselves against most other Christian denomi
nations, as well as against the Methodists. They, therefore, affect to
understand the Report as claiming for the itinerant Methodist preachers
exclusively the authority of the divinely-instituted ministry ; and although
no such pretension is to be found in the Report — though its language
cannot be tortured into such a meamng — yet they have continued to assert
it, without offering either proof or reference, with a dogged pertinacity,
which could only be sustained by the opinion that their partisans seldom
read anything on this controversy but the " Mutual Rights."
They have gone stiU further. They have asserted, in the very face of
the Report itself, that the General Conference claims, in virtue of the
exclusively-divine institution of the Methodist ministry, a divine right to
exercise aU the powers of government over the Church, whether legisla
tive, executive, or judicial. In vain does the Conference declare in the
Report that they claim no strictly-legislative powers whatever ; that they
" an-ogate no authority to make any laws of their own, either of moral or
civil force." Still is it reiterated with a hardihood which cannot blush,
that the authority is claimed by the very document in which it is so ex
plicitly disavowed. It is an unhappy necessity which obliges us to con
tend with such adversaries.
Mr. Shinn, indeed, perceiving that the plain and unequivocal dis
avowal of legislative powers by the Conference could not be misun
derstood by any who would be at the pains of consulting the Report
itself, endeavours to show that the declaration is at variance with
fact ; that the Conference have exercised the authority to make a penal
statute, in enacting the rule which requires the meeting in class as a con
dition of Church membership. He contends that this requisition by the
Conference amounts to a claim to " add to, alter, or modify the standing
laws of our Divine Master." He asks, " Have not some such rules been
already enacted by the General Conference ? " And he answers the inter
rogatory, by quoting the rule of Discipline in reference to those who
habitually neglect, or who refuse to meet their class. " Let him who
has the charge of the circuit exclude them, showing that they are laid
aside for a breach of our rules of Discipline, and not for immoral conduct"
" Does not this," says Mr. Shinn, " give our rules of Discipline equal au
thority to exclude members from the Church that the divine laws them
selves possess ? and what is this but adding to his statutes 2"

ANNOTATIONS ON. THE PRECEDING REPORT. 169
As this is the only instance in which the practice of the General Con
ference is alleged, even by our adversaries, to contradict their disavowal
of legislative authority, we deem it important to examine the objection
carefully and dispassionately. Another writer in the Itinerant has ad
verted to the objection, and has endeavoured to show that the obligation
to meet in class is to be found in the Bible. We do not hesitate to ac
knowledge candidly, that although the argument is ingenious — and we
have great respect for that writer's opinions — yet we are not satisfied with
his proofs. We think the Scripture quotations which he has furnished
do not apply with sufficient precision to the point at issue. It has not
been clearly proved to our apprehension, that the Scriptures make it the
duty of all Christians to attend class-meeting, or any similar institution ;
and therefore it can only be the duty of Methodists, in consequence of their
having individually contracted an obligation to do so. A Methodist, in com
mon with all other Christians, is bound to fulfil his engagements ; and if, in
his social compact with his brethren, he has stipulated to meet them in
class-meeting, for purposes deemed essential to the common welfare, his
contract has all the force of a moral obligation. Let it be distinctly under
stood here, that we speak of obligation in the legal sense of the word.
The inducements which influence us to attend class-meeting, strong and
numerous as they are, are not now the subject of discussion.
We wish to meet Mr. Shinn's objection fairly, and therefore we will
state it explicitly.
The General Conference had been frequently accused of arrogating
supreme legislative powers ; and in the memorial from the radical conven
tion in Baltimore, these powers were compared to those once exercised by
the ancient Druids, and the despots of Babylon, Egypt, India, and Tartary.
To aU this the Conference reply, by unequivocally declaring that they
claim no strictly-legislative authority of any kind whatever. They only
exercise, by the consent of the Church, the power to make such prudential
regulations as are found necessary to administer and enforce the laws al
ready enacted and enjoined upon all Christians, by the one only Lord
and Lawgiver.
Our adversaries allege, that the practice of the Conference is at variance
with this declaration, because they have made a rule by which a person
may be expelled from Church fellowship for not attending class, and this,
they say, is adding to the divine statutes. To this we answer : —
First. The rule alluded to was not enacted by the General Conference
at all. It was introduced into Mr. Wesley's societies in England before
there were any Methodists in America ; and it originated, too, with the
membership, incidentally. - The following account of it is given by Mr.
Wesley himself : —
"But when a large number of people was joined, the great difficulty

170 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
was to keep them together ; for they were continually scattering hither and
thither, and we knew no way to help it. But God provided for this also,
when we thought not of it." It happened that " Mr. Wesley met the chief
of the society in Bristol, and inquired, ' How shall we pay the debt upon
the preaching-house ?' Captain Foy stood up and said, ' Let every one in
the society give a penny a week, and it will easily be done.' ' But many
of them,' said one, ' have not a penny to give.' ' True,' said the captain,
' then put ten or twelve of them to me ; let each of these give what he
can weekly, and I will supply what is wanting.' Many others made the
same offer. So Mr. Wesley divided the societies among them, assigning a
class of about twelve persons to each of these, who were termed leaders.
" Not long after, one of these informed Mr. Wesley that, calling on such
a one in his house, he found him quarrelling with his wife. Another was
found in drink. It immediately struck Mr. Wesley's mind, ' This [class-
meetings] is the very thing we wanted ; the leaders are the persons who
may not only receive the contributions, but also watch over the souls of
their brethren.' The society in London being informed of this, willingly
followed the example of that in Bristol, as did every society from that time,
whether in Europe or America. By this means it was easfly found if any
grew weary or faint, and help was speedily administered; and if any
walked disorderly, they were quickly discovered, and either amended or
dismissed." The usefulness of the regulation led to its universal adoption as a social
compact, and from that time every one who entered the society in Eng
land, or the Church in America, came under a personal and individual
obhgation to conform to it so long as he continued in the connexion.
This was the state of things at the time of the adoption of our present
form of Church government; and the General Conference, so far from
being under any necessity of enacting a rule requiring the members to at
tend class-meeting, found them already united under this social obhgation,
and they would certainly have destroyed, the connexion if they had abol
ished it. It was not, and never has been, submitted to as a law, but has
always been sought and prized as an inestimable privilege.
Whether, therefore, the rale be right or wrong, the General Conference
are not chargeable with enacting or imposing it. If it could be shown to be
an improper condition of membership, it would prove nothing against the
declaration of the Conference, that they claim no strictly-legislative powers.
Secondly. The Scriptures evidently require of the pastors of the Church
a faithful oversight of the flock. They are directed to watch over them as
those who must render an account of them to God. It is their duty to
instruct the ignorant, support the weak, comfort the afflicted, confirm the
wavering, and repress the froward. By a settled pastor, permanently re
sident among his flock, this may, perhaps, be done by frequent domiciliary

ANNOTATIONS ON THE PRECEDING REPORT. 171
visits ; but by an itinerating ministry, it can only be accomplished by
means of some such institution as our class-meetings. It is, however, ob
vious that, if the Scriptures impose pastoral duties upon the ministry, the
membership are bound to place themselves in such a relation to their
ministers as will enable them to fulfil these duties : and hence, they who
prefer an itinerating ministry, are bound to submit to such regulations as
may be necessary to the due and faithful discharge of ministerial obliga
tion. . It will not, we presume, be denied that our itinerating ministry is a
Scriptural institution; and hence, whatever be essential to its existence
and usefulness, may be properly required of those who voluntarily put
themselves under the pastoral care of such a ministry.
Thirdly. When a Methodist refuses to meet his class, he virtually with
draws from the Church. He renounces the social obligation into which
he entered when he became a member of the community. He puts it out
of the power of the pastors of the Church to fulfil their ministerial duties
to him ; and as they can no longer watch over him, they cannot be ex
pected to be responsible for him, or to admit him to the communion, his
fitness for which they have no longer any means of ascertaining. He is,
accordingly, by our rale of Disciphne, " laid aside," and not expeUed for
immoral conduct If it be alleged that a man does not, properly speak
ing, withdraw from the Church, unless he accompanies the- act by some
corresponding declaration, in word or writing, we answer, that the Church
possesses no authority to require a written or verbal withdrawal, or any
explicit renunciation of Church privileges ; and is, therefore, compelled to
consider an actual removal from pastoral oversight as a withdrawing from
Church membership. The rule, then, which requires a Methodist to meet
in class, is not a penal statute added to the divine laws — it is a voluntary
social contract, which, when not fulfilled, implies a renunciation of the
compact, which it is admitted every one has a right to make, whenever he
repents his engagements ; but he cannot dissolve the compact, and still re
tain the privileges which grow out of it. The obhgation and the benefits
which accrue from it, cease at the same time.
But whence this unceasing quan-el with class-meeting in the " Mutual
Rights," as a term of Church membership? There is nothing in this
whole controversy which shows more clearly a disposition to cavil for
cavilling's sake. Our adversaries admit all that we allege as to the utility
of class-meetings. They even admit explicitly, that a neglect of them by
our members is always accompanied with; if it is not preceded by, a de
clension in religion, and generally by a positive backsliding both in heart
and life ; and yet they wiU not permit us to require of our members to
meet in class. They have instituted class-meetings themselves, and made
it obligatory upon their members to meet in class ; they have, in fact, no
other rule upon the subject than what is found in that part of our Dis-

172 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
cipline which they have adopted ;* and yet, for more than eight years they
have been quarrelling with us for making class-meetings a condition of
Church membership. Mr. Shinn does not, perhaps, consider these as
"unblushing absurdities." All disinterested observers, however, will, we
apprehend, adopt a different opinion.
The committee on petitions and memorials observe, that "we (the
itinerant ministers) have been charged with wishing to suppress free inquiry,
and with denying to our ministers and members the liberty of speech and
of the press. But the charge we wholly disavow. Our ministers and
members of every class are entitled to the full liberty of speech and of the
press equally with any other citizens of the United States." Mr. Shinn, in
his review, quotes this passage of the Report, and then says, " But if this
liberty of speech and of the press is allowed to our ministers and members
equally with any other citizens of the United States, how is it that minis
ters and members have been expelled for not giving up the ' Mutual Rights,'
merely because the work is a periodical ? This seems to be implied by
the terms proposed by the General Conference for the restoration of peace.
But surely citizens of the United States have as much authority to issue a
periodical publication as to enjoy the liberty of the press in any other way
whatever. Was it merely because this work was inflammatory, or because
it was obnoxious ? Then why did the General Conference propose that
no other periodical publication be devoted to the same controversy ? The
Conference did not assume the right to require this ; but what did the
inferior tribunal require in their process of expulsions ?"
To all these interrogatories we answer, that the General Conference would
have made no requu-ements at all of those who had been expelled from the
Church, if the terms of union had not been offered by the expelled members
themselves. During the session of Conference propositions were made to
" the committee on the itinerancy," by certain friends and authorized repre
sentatives of the expelled ministers and members in Baltimore, who had
given to one or more of these representatives a carte blanche to make,' in
their name, "any concessions which* Christians ought to make or Chris
tians ought to require." Among the concessions offered, were the discon
tinuance of the Mutual Rights, and an acknowledgment that " publications
have appeared in the said Mutual Rights, the nature and character of
which were unjustifiably inflammatory, and do not admit of vindication ;
and that others, though for want of information or unintentionally, have
yet, in fact, misrepresented both' individuals and facts ; and that they regret
these things ;" and also " the abolition of the Union Society."
The committee on the itinerancy approved the conditions, and prepared
a report accordingly. But before it was submitted to the Conference, the
3 So in their first "Articles of Association." We think the rule underwent some
modification afterward.

ANNOTATIONS ON THE PRECEDING REPORT. 173
inquiry was suggested, whether the proposition to discontinue the publica
tion of i the Mutual Rights implied a discontinuance of any periodical pub
lication devoted to this controversy. If it did not, then peace and the
restoration of good feeling would not foUow ; for the mere change of name
would not make any change in the spirit and character of the periodical.
While a party paper was continued, individual writers would feel them
selves supported by party array and compact, and would indulge in a vio
lence which, if they stood alone, would be rebuked by the common feeling
of the community. It had never occurred to the committee, while these
concessions were under consideration, that any intention existed to take
advantage of the equivocal expression in the proposition to discontinue the
" Mutual Rights."
But when it was suggested that it might only mean that the name of
the periodical should be changed, and that it should be published in a
newspaper instead of a pamphlet form, it was deemed proper to make the
inquiry. This inquiry resulted in the declaration of four of those repre
sentatives, that they considered the proposition as pledging those concerned
to a total abandonment of any periodical devoted to the controversy, and
they were willing to make the proposition more explicit. One representa
tive, however, though he acknowledged that the proposition fairly implied
what was understood by the committee to be its meaning, yet he would
not consent to alter the proposition. This person was Mr. Shinn himself;
and as his consent was considered by those associated with him in the
negotiation to^be essential to any agreement which might be made, the
negotiation was broken off. It was subsequently resumed by a member
of the Conference, and the propositions offered by the representatives of
the expelled members were accepted by the Conference as conditions upon
which they might be re-united to the Church, except that the proposal to
discontinue the Mutual Rights was made more definitely to express an
agreement to discontinue the publication of any periodical devoted to this
controversy. It was at the same time distinctly understood, that the
"Itinerant," &c. — proposals for which had been issued — should not be
published. Now, if Mr. Shinn, in his propositions to the Conference, on the part of
his expelled associates, did intend to propose the discontinuance of any
periodical devoted to this controversy, why does he complain of the Con
ference for having proposed this measure as one of the " terms for the
restoration of peace ?" If he did not intend so much, then his intentions
were at variance with his declarations at the time the offer was made ; and
moreover, the proposal was "calculated, if not intended," to take his
brethren in, as it must be utterly indifferent whether an offensive publica
tion was called Mutual Rights, Wesleyan Repository, or by any other
appellation.

174 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
Mr Shinn asks why the inferior tribunals of the Church expelled mem
bers for not giving up the Mutual Rights ? We answer, that the individuals
alluded to persisted to recommend and circulate a work which he himself
acknowledged contained matter " unjustifiably inflammatory, misrepresent
ing both individuals and facts." This they did, not only as individuals,
but in their associated capacity as members of Union Societies. From this
conduct they refused to desist ; and hence it became necessary, not only for
the peace of the Church, but for the preservation of the moral and religious
character of the Methodist community, to expel them from our communion.
It was not for patronizing " a periodical publication," which might be as
harmless as any other medium of communication, but for issuing and
recommending a publication of the character which Mr. Shinn had pro
nounced the "Mutual Rights" to be, together with other unjustifiable
proceedings, that they were expelled. The expulsion, therefore, was just,
according to Mr. Shinn's own showing.
Permit us, in conclusion, to ask Mr. Shinn to review his conduct in this
matter. Was it fair-play to offer propositions of compromise on the part
of his expeUed friends, and then, without letting the public know what part
he had taken in the matter, Condemn the Conference for proposing unjusti
fiable " conditions for the restoration of peace ?" Was it fair to represent
the Church judicatories as abridging the liberty of speech and of the press
by expelling members simply for publishing and patronizing a periodical
publication, when he himself had acknowledged that the periodical aUuded
to was one which was unjustifiably inflammatory, and misrepresented both
facts and individuals ?
We sincerely believe that if Mr. Shinn were not influenced by party
spirit he could not have been betrayed into. such disingenuousness. Our
observation has long since convinced us, that under the dominion of this
powerful and aU-assimilating agency, the conduct of men cannot be antici
pated from calculations made upon the ordinary principles of human
action.

REMARKS ON DR. JENNINGS'S REVIEW. 175

REMARKS ON DR. JENNINGS'S "REVIEW OF THE METHODIST
MAGAZINE AND QUARTERLY REVIEW, ON PETITIONS AND
MEMORIALS."

Dr. Jennings commenced, in the thirty-fourth number of the "Mutual
Rights," what he calls " A Review of the Methodist Quarterly Review on
Petitions and Memorials," which has been continued in numbers down to
the present time. The doctor has adopted, with great fidelity, the modern
method of reviewers, which consists in saying as little about the book
under review as possible, after giving its title. We had expected, from
the heading of the articles, some discussion of the very important topics
contained in the Report on Petitions and Memorials. In this reasonable
expectation we have been totally disappointed ; but, instead of it, we have
a reiteration of the doctor's protest against the proceedings of the Church
judicatories, by which he was tried and expelled — a protest which was
pubhshed while his trial was yet pending, and circulated with great indus
try, with a view to forestall public opinion, while the friends of the Church
were withheld from publishing any contradictory statements, lest they
should thereby prejudice the cause of the accused. The doctor proceeds,
however, not to review the " Methodist Magazine and Quarterly Review,"
but the Narrative and Defence of the proceedings of the Church in Balti
more, in reference to those who had been expelled from her communion ;
and as he has fallen into many errors in regard to facts, as well as
reasoning, in the course of his remarks, we hope that he wUl not be
offended if we presume to set him right in both respects. The errors in
relation to facts and circumstances are easily shown; our reasoning must
abide the decision of our readers.
But, may we be permitted, before we proceed to the examination of the
doctor's statements, or his arguments, to ask, .Why does he consider it
such a great injury to be disowned by the Methodists ? If the Church is
as despotic in her government, as corrupt in her ministry and membership,
and as hopeless in her obstinate adherence to error, as he and his friends
have been wont to represent her, why should he desire to continue in her
communion? Nay, if they have not misrepresented our Church when
they have accused her ministers of being hostile to civil liberty, and the
economy of the Church as tending to the overthrow of the republican
institutions of our happy country ; if, in the doctor's own language, we are
" forging fetters both for the present generation and for posterity," how
could he tolerate and countenance such a treasonable combination by
remaining among us ? If he believed the Methodist Episcopal Church

176 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
dangerous to the liberty and prosperity of his country, how could
he pray for her success ? And would he contmue a member of a
community for whose success he dare not pray ? The truth is, that if
these allegations against us were anything more than rhetorical flourishes—
if they were believed by those who made them— the doctor and his asso
ciates ought not to have laid us under the necessity of expeUing them.
They ought to have renounced our feUowship, and made haste to repair
the injury which they had done their country, by having so long aided us
in building up a Church, and diffusing an influence so dangerous to the
best interests of mankind.
But if these things were asserted without being believed, — what then \
Could those who made them reasonably expect the Church to endure this
unjust reproach from children brought up and nurtured in her bosom,
without any effort to repel the charge ? In either case, surely, the least
that could be expected from the meekness of our holy religion itself was,
that the accusers should be required to sustain or retract the charges ; and
if neither alternative was complied with, that the offenders should be cut
off from the communion of the Church, until, by confession and repent
ance, they should have atoned for the injury ! This was done ; and not
withstanding the strenuous efforts made by the accused to prejudice the
pubhc mind pending the trials, by the ciy of persecution and tyranny, a
plain "Narrative and Defence" of the proceedings justified the Church
before the Christian public. So conclusive and triumphant was this
defence of the Church, that, at the succeeding General Conference, the
persons who had been expeUed made a formal confession of the impro
priety of their conduct, and would have been received again into the
Church, had not the ambition of a few leading men, to be at the head of
a sect, defeated the conciliatory arrangement
The overwhelming effect of the " Narrative and Defence " has at length
imposed upon the doctor the hopeless task of counteracting its influence.
He commences by a fanciful account of the previous arrangements for the
prosecution, which we shall presently show to be wholly unfounded'*, and
then proceeding to the circumstances of the trial itself, he endeavours to
show that the whole proceeding was unfair, because, as he alleges, the
Church being divided into two parties, the reformers could not be fairly
tried. Finally, the doctor proceeds to a formal justification of all the
slander and calumny contained in the extracts from the Mutual Rights,
which had been published in the " Narrative and Defence " as the grounds
of impeachment before the Church judicatories.
We shall patiently follow the doctor through his elaborate defence, if
he concludes it in any reasonable time. The hypothetical account of.
preliminary arrangements for the prosecution, and the special pleading
on the nature and circumstances of the trial, are already before us, and

REMARKS ON DR. JENNINGS'S REVIEW. 177
will furnish us with matter enough for a few numbers; meantime the
doctor is toiling through the bog and mire of the extracts with the
most commendable painstaking industry. If we should never overtake
him, it may be no disadvantage to the reader, as no sophistry can
conceal or disguise the falsity and wickedness of the writings for which
the doctor and his friends have been excluded from the Methodist
communion. The preliminary remarks of the reviewer are all intended to impress the
reader with the opinion that he was expelled from the Church because he
differed in opinion with his brethren on the subject of Church government.
It is of the utmost importance to his cause to establish this position, and,
accordingly, no pains have been spared to establish it ; for if such were the
fact, it must be owned that it could not be justified either by the Scrip
tures or Methodist Discipline. The position, however, rests solely upon
the assertion of those whose interest it is to sustain it. Those who pre
ferred the charges against the doctor disavowed any wish to interfere with
the rights of private judgment; neither did they wish to restrain the
prudent expression of opinion, either by speech or writing. It was the
licentious exercise of these rights of which they complain. It is therefore
aU lost labour to prove the impropriety of expelling reformers for their
opinions on Church government, or for the arguments by which they
publicly sustained their opinions ; because the doctrine is admitted — no
one controverts it : and therefore the only debatable question is, Were the
means taken by the reviewer and his associates, to carry their views into
effect, in accordapce with the obligations imposed by our holy religion ?
Can they justify the bitter reviling of our ministry, which abounds in the
periodical party paper which they published with so much zeal ? Can
they sustain the accusations against the living and the dead, which they
have uttered with a fierceness and a rancour which would scarcely be
tolerated in political partisans ? If they can, why we have been wrong in
expelling them. If they cannot, then we are justified in the sight of
God and man ; we could do no less than expel them, seeing they refused
all atonement for their offences, or even to promise amendment.
But the doctor thinks we had taken alarm at the progress of reform
principles, and therefore resolved to expel the reformers in Baltimore, in
order to prevent the propagation of their opinions in the Church. And
was it not time to take the alarm, seeing they had already organized
"imperium in imperio," a government within a government — a secret
society, in which demagogues were permitted to denounce and defame the
best men in the Church, and inflame the passions of the simple men whom
they had decoyed into their associations, against their pastors, whom they
represented as tyrants and despots, aiming not only at ecclesiastical, but
civil domination ? Was it not cause of alarm to see an editorial com-
12

178 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
mittee elected by the parent of these secret societies, publishing a periodical
paper, in which the most holy and useful ministers of the Church were
held up to public odium 'and scorn, as guilty of the basest hypocrisy,
falsehood, and even forgery ; and the whole body of our travelling ministry
as so utterly and hopelessly depraved, as to be " willing to suffer their
flocks to go into sin, and flnally into hell, rather than grant them their
rights?" Doctor Jennings himself had very emphaticahy announced to
us the danger the Church was in, some years before his expulsion. He
had advertised us at a local conference, that " a train had been laid from
Georgia to Maine, and it only required the application of the match to blow
up the whole concern';" and the temper and spirit in which the " Mutual
Rights " was conducted, gave certain evidence that there were not wanting
persons to apply the match, and rejoice at the fatal explosion. We believe
there were few of the friends of the Church who did not look with appre
hension on the revolutionary efforts which were everywhere in progress,
but the doctor gives us credit for too much sagacity and forecast, when he
attributes to us such maturity of arrangement and unity of purpose in the
proceedings which took place in Baltimore.
Among the previous arrangements for the prosecution, the doctor re
iterates the assertion, that the whole proceedings originated with the
bishops. This assertion, so confidently made at first, was pointedly and
positively contradicted in the " Narrative and Defence ;" and although it is
now so confidently repeated, it is not, and never has been, sustained by one
particle of evidence. If the suspicion was natural to one heated as the
writer was by party strife at the time he first admitted it, what excuse
shall we make for persisting in the declaration after the assurances which
have been given that he was whoUy mistaken ? Are the brethren who
conducted the prosecution so entirely destitute of moral honesty as to be
unworthy of credence, when they testify to a plain matter of fact in which
they could not be mistaken ? Such an imputation would betray, in any
one who made it, a total recklessness in regard to his own reputation.
Yet, in the sixth page of the Narrative and Defence, they say, " It has
been aUeged that we acted under the influence of ministerial authority—
that we obeyed the dictum of the preacher in charge, while he himself
was put in motion by persons at a distance high in authority." This
charge has been made by Dr. Jennings in his Protest, and has been re
iterated here and elsewhere. We can only meet this charge with a posi
tive and unqualified denial. We know that the measures taken in rela
tion to the accused did not originate with tlie preacher in charge, nor do
we beheve that he was even informed that such measures were in con
templation until they were resolved upon ; and as to the bishops, who, we
suppose, were intended by the " persons at a distance high in authority,"
we are sure the proceedings must have considerably progressed before

REMARKS ON DR. JENNINGS'S REVIEW. 179
they were informed of them at aU. But men whose responsibilities sit so
easily upon them, may make what assertions they please. The fact is, that
although the " Union Society " would persuade the public that the lay
members of our Church are tyrannized over by their ministers, and are
dissatisfied with the government, and that it is the cause of their lay
brethren that they are so strenuously pleading, yet it is by these very lay-
brethren that they have been arraigned and brought to trial, and that, too,
without any itinerant suggestion whatever.
Among the circumstances to which the doctor resorts to sustain his alle
gation against the bishops, is one which, in order to derive the necessary
aid from it, he is obliged to misrepresent entirely. Speaking of the pro
ceedings of the district conference, he says, " It gave me but little concern
that the colored men also had been enlisted against us. But the trans
action went far to satisfy me that I had taken a true view of the object of
the men in power, and that I was correct in my former declaration, that
the prosecution was put in motion by persons at a distance high in
authority. Some objection was made to the propriety of calling on the
coloured preachers to vote in the case, when one of them arose and declared,
in justification of his right, that he and others had waited on the bishop
when he was last in the city, and the ' bishop told us,' said he, ' to go to
this conference and insist on our rights, for we had as good a right to
vote as any man in the conference, and if he were in the chair he would
call to order and put down any man who would oppose our right to vote.'
By this honest declaration of the coloured man it came out, not only that
the bishop approved the prosecutions, but that, if he did not assist in
projecting the plan for dissolving the district conference, he knew it was
intended, and gave it the aid of his authoritative influence over the coloured
preachers. The transaction afforded proof of a conceited design, in which
the bishop, presiding elder, the preacher in charge of West Baltimore
station, and the whole body of official men, had conspired to secure our
condemnation" Now, what will the reader think of the doctor's "proof" of this terrible
conspiracy, when he learns that this coloured preacher did not say that
he and his brethren had held a conference with the bishop the last time
lie was in the city ; but that the conference to which he alluded was held
with one of the bishops soon after the organization of the district confer
ence, which was several years before the occasion of voting on the doctor's
case had occurred, and before it could possibly have been anticipated.
Again : the only bishop who had been in the city since the prosecution
then pending had been determined upon, or even designed, was the Rev.
E. George, and it was not to him that the coloured preacher alluded at
all. When the conversation with the bishop was held, there could have
been no design to dissolve the district conference ; for it was previous to its

180 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
having been tested by experiment, and the coloured preachers were anx
ious to be instructed as to the privileges they might claim under the rule
establishing these conferences. We wish we could apologize for the above
palpable misstatement of fact, by supposing that the doctor had, under
the excitement of the occasion, misunderstood the coloured preacher ; and
such was our opinion when the doctor and his party published their Protest
against the dissolution of the conference, immediately after the occurrence,
in which they make the same mistake, except that they make the coloured
preacher say, " when the bishop was in town," while the doctor makes him
say, " we called on the bishop when he was last in the city'' But we are
not at hberty now to suppose the doctor mistaken, for, in the reply to the
Protest ahuded to above, the meaning of the coloured preacher was ex
plained ; and if the explanation had been doubted, the coloured preacher
who made the remarks was always at hand to answer any inquiry on the
subject. The local preachers who voted for a dissolution of the confer
ence, say, in their reply to the Protest, " We are told in the ' Review,'
that one of the coloured men said in the conference, ' we are aware of our
privileges, for when the bishop was in town, he told us to go to the con
ference and insist upon our rights, for we had as good a right to vote as
any man in the conference, and if he were in the chair he would call to
order and put down any man who should oppose our right to vote.' We
are certain, however, that the coloured preacher stated, that the coloured
men were not careful to insist upon their right to vote, and especially
upon questions in which the characters of white men were involved ; and
we think also, he added, that in this last particular, they were governed
not only by their own sense of propriety, but also by the advice of a
bishop. We have noticed this allusion to a bishop, however, chiefly to
do away the impression which has been made by it — namely, that the
advice had been given by Bishop George, when last in Baltimore, a little
before the session of the district conference, and with reference to the cases
which would necessarily come before that body. The advice was given
some years ago by another bishop, on application made to him by the
coloured preachers, for his opinion as to their privileges in the conference
under the Discipline, and therefor? could not have been intended to bear
on circumstances which at that time could not have been foreseen."
Has the doctor adopted new views of moral duty, as weU as new opi
nions on Church government ? How else could he 'for party purposes
reiterate a charge against so good a man as Bishop George, which first,
perhaps, originated in mistake, but which had been so clearly disproved
that not a shadow of probability remained. We confess, when we look
at the many erroneous statements in the doctor's review, we are half in
clined to adopt the maxim of the great English moralist, " Faction seldom
leaves a man honest, however it may find him."

REMARKS ON DR. JENNINGS'S REVIEW. 181
We have shown that the only fact adduced by the doctor, in support
of his charge against the bishops, is assumed and gratuitous ; that the
coloured preacher did not, and could not say what the doctor alleges he
said, and, moreover, had it been said, it would have been untrue. Of all
this our reviewer had been apprized ; and yet, with the hardihood of a
trae partisan, he fearlessly reasserts it all, and even ventures to add a very
important improvement to the statement formerly given by himself and
his associates in their Protest. But we are told by the doctor, that " at
least oneJialf the subscribers to the ' Mutual Rights ' have not had suffi
cient opportunity to be informed, as their names were not on the list when
the fourth volume of the Mutual Rights, which contains the principal
documents, was published ;" and perhaps most of the original subscribers
have derived their information, in reference to this controversy, exclusively
from the " Mutual Rights," and therefore the doctor might safely say what
he pleased. We shall adduce, in the sequel, still further evidence that he
is not at all scrupulous in availing himself of this advantage.
Having, as he supposes, fixed upon the bishops the charge of origi
nating and authoritatively dictating the prosecution, the doctor proceeds
to the arrangements for the tragedy. The next agents in the fearful con
spiracy, we are told, were the Rev. J. Frye, presiding elder, and the Rev.
J. M. Hanson, the preacher in charge of the station ; who, it is alleged,
were " put in motion by men at a distance high in authority ;" and who,
in obedience to their orders, enlisted the official members of the Church
in this crusade against hberty — the "concerted design, in which the
bishop, the presiding elder, the preacher in charge of West Baltimore
station, and the whole body of official men, had conspired to procure the
condemnation" of reformers.
So heavy a charge against such men as Joseph Fiye and James M.
Hanson ought not to be admitted without good evidence ; yet the doctor
seems to expect it to be credited upon his ipse dixit alone. He does not
affect to offer either facts or testimony to sustain his allegation, but asserts
it with a confident assurance, which, could only have been wan-anted by
indubitable evidence. We are sincerely sorry to place the doctor in so
disadvantageous a light before the public; but we should be unjust to
other men, of at least equal importance in society, if we failed to expose
the injustice with which he has assailed them. The matter stands thus : —
It had been a primary object with Dr. Jennings, and others confederated
with him, to effect a revolution in our Church. To accomplish this pur
pose, they deemed it necessary to destroy the confidence which the mem
bership reposed in their itinerant ministers, by representing them as
tyrants, despots, popes, &c. He had been accused by certain laymen of
the Church of evil-speaking, of railing, and of endeavouring to sow dis
sension among his brethren. The accusation had been brought before the

182 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
proper judicatories of the Church by laymen, and he was expeUed. But
in conformity with his original plan of operations, it was now of great
importance to represent this prosecution as the work of these tyrants,
despots, and popes; and as the agency of the laymen could not be
denied, he found it necessary to represent the bishops and other itinerant
ministers as secretly instigating the laity to action. At first this was
only insinuated, and the insinuation was met by a plain and positive
denial ; yet, after more than two years have elapsed, the insinuation is
substituted by a broad and unqualified assertion, unsustained by one
tittle of evidence, either positive or circumstantial.
This cannot be permitted to pass without reprehension. The doctor
must either sustain his charge by evidence, or forfeit his reputation with
the public. The allegation he makes is no trivial matter. If true, it
would be considered by reformers as not only an act of tyranny, but as a
mean, unmanly exercise of influence, which would render its authors un
worthy of public trust or private confidence ; and we confess that, differ
ing with them in almost everything else, we should agree with them in
these sentiments. But we defy the whole body of our enemies in this
matter. There is not a shadow of evidence, or even probability, in the
charge. The bishops, so far from having dictated the measures taken in
relation to those who have been expelled from the Methodist Episcopal
Church in Baltimore, were not apprised of them untU the trials before
the several committees had terminated, and therefore could not have dic
tated anythmg in reference to them, either to the presiding elder or the
preacher in charge. Bishop George, it will be recollected, came to town
after the laymen had been expelled, and the local preachers had been
suspended by the several committees. On his way to the city he got the
first intimation of the state of affairs here, and we know from his owu
declaration that he doubted the propriety of the proceedings until some
time after his arrival. As to the other bishops, we beheve tile first intel
ligence of the proceedings which reached them was through the press,
which we all remember groaned with protests and defences, written and
published by the doctor and his friends, before the higher judicatories had
convened. In reference to the bishops, therefore, the doctor's charge,
though so positively made, is whoUy untrue ; nor is he more fortunate in
his allegation against the presiding elder and the preacher in charge. The
former had no part or lot in the matter, until it was brought before him
as president of the district conference ; nor had the latter any agency in
the affair until compelled by his official duty to act upon the formal accusa
tion presented by some of the most respectable lay members of the
Church. If it be alleged that for these assertions we offer no proof, we
answer, it is not expected of us to prove a negative. The onus probandi
rests with the accuser. We call upon the doctor for his proofs. If he

REMARKS ON DR. JENNINGS'S REVIEW. 183
allege tiiat the nature of the case renders it difficult to procure the neces
sary testimony, we shall admit the plea, but it will afford no excuse or
paUiation for the unfeeling and injurious accusation he has made without
any proof at aU. Unless the proof be given, the doctoT will not only
stand convicted of bearing false witness against his neighbour, but the
whole plan of his review is frustrated. He wUl have faded to show the
" overbearing act of abandoned tyranny," which he would fix upon the
ministry ; and the truth of the declaration contained in the Narrative and
Defence, which he affects to disbelieve, remains unmoved and immovable —
namely, that " the fact is, that although the Union Society would per
suade the public that the lay members of our Church are tyrannized over
by their ministers, and are dissatisfied with the government, and that it is
the cause of their lay brethren that they are so strenuously pleading, yet it
is by these very lay brethren that they have been arraigned and brought to
trial ; and that, too, without any itinerant suggestion or influence whatever."
Having disposed of the charges against the bishops, presiding elder,
and preacher in charge of the station, let us inquire whether the con
spiracy of " the whole body of official men to secure the condemnation" of
the doctor and his friends is better sustained.
The reader will recollect that the official body against whom the allega
tion is made, consists of near- one hundred persons ; that some of these
are connected by ties of -consanguinity with some of those who were
expelled, and that most of the members of this body were upon terms of
intimacy and friendship with the leading reformers up to the time of their
expulsion. Under such circumstances, the doctor will have it that a
secret conspiracy had been concerted by " the whole body of official men,"
to expel him and his friends at the bidding of the bishops, the presiding
elder, and preacher in charge ; and that all the preparatory arrangements
were made without any part of the secret escaping, except just so much
as the "whole body" chose to make public. Now, in the doctor's own
language, " Is not this a queer thing ?" It can find no parallel, except in
freemasonry, if indeed the freemasons have any secrets which concern
anybody but themselves. These secret preparations, according to the
doctor's account, occupied several months, and were perfected with an
ability and forecast which would have done credit to a Talleyrand or a
Metternich. Even the "Narrative and Defence" was prepared long before
the events it records, and the proceedings it defends, had transpired ; and
the extracts from the Mutual Rights which make the " pith " of the book,
he is "fully satisfied" were made, and he thinks were shown to the
bishops before their mandate was issued. What a pity the doctor had
not turned his attention to writing romances! His imagination might
then have indulged in such fictions without any detriment to his veracity ;
and this supposed conspiracy would have furnished the incidents of a

184 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
tragical story worthy of his genius. But as he professes to be.serioMs,
the reader will naturally inquire upon what evidence the statements are
founded. The evidence, however, is not furnished; but the doctor posi
tively asserts the whole to be true, and he will think the reader very
querulous if he does not believe upon such authority.
The first thing the conspirators found it necessary to do, was " to find
some one, a fast friend to the government of the Church, with sufficient seal,
and a competent degree of ingenuity, so to manage matters, that in the
event of a refusal on the part of reformers to receive the dictates of the
intended prosecutors, and a consequent recourse to expulsion, the Methodist
Episcopal community and the world might be made to believe that the
Church took no authoritative step to prevent reform ; that the prosecutions
were entered upon, and carried into effect, by lay brethren, ' without any
itinerant suggestion or influence whatever ;' they ifhe lay brethren) being
offended, not with our labours to bring about reform, but with the manner
in which we were endeavouring to accomplish our object"
The reader wiU agree with us, that to find a person with " a competent
degree of ingenuity" to do all this, before the proceedings had taken
place — to write the history of a war before the declaration of it, and to
defend the measures resorted to by one of the belligerents throughout the
whole war, before any of these measures had been adopted — would be no
easy task. Yet the person was found, we are told ; and the prosecutors
had their courage screwed up by reading their defence before they had
commenced their operations ! Gentle reader, wiU you do the doctor the
favour just to swaUow this camel ? Pray don't boggle at it, for we shall
have heavier demands upon your complaisance presently. The doctor is
an intrepid writer, and has as little compassion for his reader as for his
antagonist. The "Narrative and Defence" had placed him in so un
favourable a light before the community, that some desperate effort was
necessary to recover the vantage-ground he had taken, by giving his
defence to the world before his trial had terminated ; and having resolutely
determined to do or die, he is not at all particular as to the means he employs.
The allusion in the above paragraph was intended as a personal
insult. The person who assisted the brethren who conducted the prosecu
tion in preparing their defence, never concealed his agency in the matter.
It was known to everybody who took any interest in the affair, and to
none better than to Dr. Jennings. We do not, therefore, hesitate to say,
that he has, in the above declaration, wantonly assailed the reputation of
a man who had never intentionally injured him in any other way than
by defending the Church to which he belonged against the assaults of
her enemies; that, in order to avenge himself for this opposition, the
doctor has asserted what is positively untrue. The extracts which com
pose the "pith" of the Nan-ative and Defence, were, it is true, made by

REMARKS ON DR. JENNINGS'S REVIEW. 185
the person to whom he alludes,* and the comments were written by him ;
but neither the one nor the other were ever shown to the bishops, nor to
the brethren who met at William Brown's. The writer was not at that
meeting at aU ; and not a single extract was made by him, not a com
mentary, nor a single line of the Narrative and Defence written, (except
the documents which are necessarily incorporated in it,) until after the
whole proceedings had terminated. What, then, will the generous reader
think of this attack- upon the writer of the Narrative and Defence ? The
obvious design of it cannot be misunderstood. He is to be represented as
having been so anxious for the expulsion of reformers, as to prepare a
book showing how their expulsion could be defended and justified ; and
then as urging others to take the measures he had not the courage to
pursue himself. And all this is alleged, not only unjustly, but without
the least scintilla of evidence to support it. The accuser tells us he is fully
satisfied of the fact ; but what has produced this satisfaction he has not con
descended to say, except that he tells us of a conversation with Mr. Harden,
(one of the prosecutors,) from which he infers that the Nan-ative and De
fence was written before the proceedings which it records had taken place.
"I am not informed," says the doctor, "with positive certainty, that
the entire plan of the intended book was laid antecedent to the appoint
ment of the seven prosecutors ; but I am fully satisfied that some one or
more had been employed in making the selections from the Mutual
Rights which constitute the pith of the Narrative and Defence. It is
very probable that they were made and submitted to the five bishops,
and some other distinguished traveUing preachers, who were in the city a
short time before the first caucus was held at Mr. William Brown's. And
I cannot avoid the supposition, that it was previously understood that this
selection in the intended form of the Narrative and Defence, when it
should appear, would serve to justify a course of prosecutions and expul
sions, if that should become ' necessary ' for the accomplishment of their
object. The knowing ones had their eyes on this when they met at Dr.
Roszell's school-room. And when I called on Mr. Harden, and took
occasion to intimate the possibihty of scandal to the Methodist Episcopal
Church, if they should go on with their contemplated prosecutions, he
said to me in reply, 'We are prepared to meet all consequences; and
when we shall have wound up our proceedings, and laid before the public
such extracts from the Mutual Rights, &c, as we shall be able to make,
together with our comment upon them, we have no doubt about being
sustained by the public' "
In the preceding remarks we have shown the falsity and absurdity of
all that is said about the preparation of the Narrative and Defence before
° Many of the papers from which the extracts were made, had been indicated pre
viously in the charges exhibited against Dr. Jennings and his associates.

186 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
the proceedings it details and defends had transpired ; and in the latter
clause of the above extract, the reader will see all that the doctor relies
upon to sustain his assertion. Mr. Harden, he alleges, spoke in anticipa
tion of extracts from the Mutual Rights, and certain commentaries which
were to be laid before the public. But if we admit the doctor's version of
this conversation, it will not sustain him ; for, by his own account, Mr. H.
spoke only of extracts which were yet to be made, not of any that were
already prepared. By what mode of reasoning, then, does the doctor ar
rive at the conclusion, that the extracts and commentaries had been pre
pared so early as the spring of 1827, "when the five bishops were in
town," when the conversation with Mr. H. did not take place until the
following autumn? But the following certificate will show that Mr.
Harden did not, in the conversation alluded to, say one word about ex
tracts from the Mutual Rights, or commentaries upon them, or intimate
any intention to publish anything upon the subject of the proceedings be
fore the Church. Of this we are sure, because the first suggestion of the
necessity of such a measure was given to Mr. H. by the writer of these
remarks, when Mr. H., in his own counting-room, showed him the adver
tisement in the newspapers, announcing Dr. J.'s protest. Mr. H. at once
admitted the propriety of the suggestion, and immediately wrote the fol
lowing advertisement, which, after being signed by the other brethren who
were associated with him in the prosecution, was published in the news
papers : —
" Dr. Samuel K. Jennings having endeavoured to forestall the opinion
of the Methodist public, by publishing the proceedings in his case, before
the decision of the committee could be known, aU who feel any concern
in the matter are respectfuUy requested to suspend their judgment until
the proceedings shall have terminated, when a plain statement of the
whole affair wiU be published. George Earnest,
Jacob Rogers,
Isaac N. Toy,
Samuel Harden,
Alexander Yearley,
John Berry,
Fielder Israel."
The promise made in the above advertisement, was subsequently ful
filled to the letter. The " Narrative and Defence " grew out of a pledge
to the public, occasioned by Dr. Jennings's protest, and had not been
previously prepared, or even thought of. Let it be remembered, that the
doctor's protest was published some time after his conversation with
Mr. H., and therefore Mr. Harden could not, in that conversation, allude
to the publication of extracts and commentaries, for the best- of all rea-

REMARKS ON DR. JENNINGS'S REVIEW. 187
sons, namely, because no publication on the subject was then intended,
or had ever been proposed.
We have been furnished with the following certificate by Mr. Harden,
which, we think, settles the matter beyOnd all controversy : —
" Dr. Jennings has published, in the Mutual Rights, an account of a
conversation with me, in which he attributes to me some remarks which
I positively -declare were not made. I did not allude in that conversation
to any intention to publish anything whatever on the subject of the pro
ceedings before the Church, on charges preferred by myself and others
against Dr. J. and his associates ; such an intention did not exist at that
time. It was first suggested by the advertisement in the newspapers an
nouncing Dr. J.'s protest, which was published some time after my con
versation .with him. I appeal to all who were concerned with me in these
measures for the truth of my declaration, that we had not designed to
publish a Narrative and Defence, or extracts from„the Mutual Rights
with commentaries, until we were compelled to promise a plain statement
of the whole affair, in order to obviate the effect of Dr. J.'s protest, which
was published before the trial had terminated, and which we thought gave
a very unfair representation of the matter.
"I further declare, that the extracts from the Mutual Rights, with the
commentaries upon them, which were published in the ' Narrative and
Defence,' were prepared after the trials had terminated ; that they were
read to myself and those associated with me, from time to time, as they
were written and amended according to our suggestions : so that nothing
can be more erroneous than Dr. J.'s supposition, that the extracts and
commentaries were either seen or written before the proceedings before
the judicatories of the Church had been concluded. In this I cannot be
mistaken ; for the copy of the Mutual Rights from which the extracts
were made, was procured for me, and put into the hands of the writer of
the Narrative and Defence, after the trials were ended.
"Baltimore, December 18, 1830. Samuel Harden."
It appears, then, that the doctor's memory in regard to this conversation
has been wonderfully assisted by two years' cogitation. He had, during
the incipient state of the proceedings, insisted that the prosecution was not
designed to be followed up. Those engaged in it would not dare to push
things to extremities. They only designed to frighten reformers, and deter
them from publishing the Mutual Rights, and to induce them to dissolve
the Union Society. When, however, the proceedings were followed up to
the final expulsion of the doctor and his associates, and the Narrative and
Defence so fairly and unanswerably justified the measure, he persuaded
nimself that it must have been prepared before the prosecution commenced ;
and that it was this work, got up by " one who was a fast friend to the

188 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
government of the Church, with sufficient zeal and a competent degree of
ingenuity," which inspired the prosecutors with courage to accuse and
arraign such great men, baeked as they were by a host of satellites " in the
fuU tide of successful experiment."
It wm be perceived that the comparative estimate which is to be made
of the different statements given by Mr. H. and Dr. J. of their conversa
tion is not to be settled by the comparative accuracy of the memories of
these gentlemen. Accurate and retentive as Mr. Harden's memory is
known to be, his recollection of the matter is corroborated and rendered
indubitable by the fact that he could not advert to a publication which he
had never thought of, and which had never been suggested to him by any
person whatever. Thus is the feeble prop taken away from the mighty
superstructure which the doctor had reared with so much pains and labour.
It has turned out, like most of the doctor's projects, a castle in the air.
The doctor, it wiU be remembered, accuses the bishops with authorita
tively dictating the prosecution ; but we have shown that they were not
even informed of the intention of those who conducted the prosecution,
nor of the proceedings, until they had considerably progressed.
The presiding elder and preacher in charge are accused of obeying the
dictum of the bishops ; but the bishops could not have dictated measures
of which they were unapprized. Moreover, it is well known that the pre
siding elder would willingly have avoided the only part which he took in
the affair, as president of the district and quarterly-meeting conferences.
If his advice had been followed, the whole proceedings would have been
stayed until after the ensuing session of the General Conference. Not that
he doubted the justice of the measure, but he thought the expediency of
it at least questionable. These sentiments he frequently uttered at the
time, without any reserve, and therefore he could not have been in the con
spiracy ; neither could the preacher in charge have been " put in motion
by men at a distance high in authority." He had, as we have heretofore
seen, received no orders from them. But he did his duty. He received
the accusation when presented by men of the highest standing in the
Church, and, according to the Discipline, brought the offenders to trial.
They were tried by their peers and finally expelled, and the sentence has
been ratified by all who have examined the proceedings with candour and
impartiality ; the doctor's protest to the contrary notwithstanding.
As a specimen of Dr. J.'s fairness and candour, we will eall the reader's
attention to a note which he appends to the passage we have quoted at the
commencement of this article. He quotes the following passage from the
Narrative and Defence : " And as to the bishops, who we suppose were
intended by the ' persons at a distance high in authority,' we are sure
that the proceedings must have considerably progressed before they were
informed of it at aU ;" and then remarks, "By then own acknowledgment

REMARKS ON DR; JENNINGS'S REVIEW. 189
it would seem then that much preparatory work was done before the
bishops were in the city at that time," namely, in the spring of 1827.
With great deference for the doctor's logic, we think this a wow sequitur —
a conclusion which does not follow from the premises. We had said that
the proceedings had considerably progressed before the bishops heard of
them. The proceedings commenced in the fall of 1827. The bishops had
not been in town since the previous spring. How then does it foUow that
much preparatory work had been done before their visit ? It foUows, on
the contrary, that nothing had been done, or they would have been informed
of it. The doctor talks of " competent ingenuity ;" but the ingenuity which
could represent a positive denial of a fact as an " acknowledgment of it"
is " competent " to anything which may suit a party purpose.
We shall, hereafter, show that in reference to other individuals, the
doctor has been as unfair and unjust in his statements, as he has been in
the case of the "bishops, the presiding elder, the preacher in charge, and
the whole body of official men."
Having slyly assigned to Dr. Bond the contrivance and arrangement
of the fearful conspiracy against the reformers, Dr. Jennings now intro
duces him as condescending to manage an underplot, by proposing terms
of compromise to the Union Society, which were afterwards to make a
figure in the Narrative and Defence. We shall give Dr. Jennings's own
account of this affair, that the reader, who may not have the " Mutual
Rights" of March 5, 1830, by him, may not be deprived of the opportu
nity of giving due consideration to the heavy charge, as well as the very
different account which we shall give of the transaction. We ask of our
readers a calm and deliberate examination of this matter; because, if
injustice has been done an individual, either by misrepresenting his actions,
or unjustly impugning his intentions, there is no other tribunal to which
we can appeal, in this case, but that of public opinion ; and however ex
alted the station Dr. Jennings may occupy as a reformer, he cannot place
himself out of the reach of this tribunal. If we fail to show, that in the
present instance he has misrepresented both actions and intentions in
respect to Dr. Bond, and that he has done so knowingly- --yes, reader,
knowingly, — with all the necessary evidences of the whole tmth before
him, then let his accusations be sustained, and the guilty suffer the odium
he deserves; but if we do show it — clearly, satisfactorily show it — why,
then let the shafts of malice recoil on him who hurled them. The fol
lowing is the passage in Dr. Jennings's Review, to which we wish to call
the reader's particular attention, viz. : —
" But before the trials commenced, Dr. Bond took occasion, on his own
responsibility, to offer terms to the Union Society, which, if accepted, he
ventured to engage for the prosecutions that they should be dismissed."
(See Narrative and Defence, pp. 81, 82.)

190 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
" The first intention of this overture was, if the Union Society would
agree to meet it with their approbation, to accomplish the same objects,,
[heretofore spoken of;] the dissolution of the society, and the destmction or
neutralization of the 'Mutual Rights.' 'The Union Society shall be dis
solved,' said he, in his proposals, ' and not reorganized in the present or
any other form.' And all papers intended for publication in the Mutual
Rights, 'shall be submitted to three persons chosen mutually, by the
reformers and the committee who have preferred charges against some of
them, who shaU be authorized to expunge all objectionable passages there
from.' Of course no paper could have been published, unless it had the
approbation of men in the confidence of the worst enemies of reform ;
and every candid reader must see, that such an arrangement was more
offensive than the demands made by the prosecutors themselves. What
man, not under the influence of blind passion, could have proposed to his
feUow-citizens terms so degrading ? But these propositions were not terms
of brotherly compromise, offered in the true spirit of conciliation. Charges
were already preferred against us, and the dread consequences of excom
munication were held up, in terrorem, over our heads ; so that these appear
ances of accommodation were in reality inquisitorial dictation of the most
offensive kind, made the more repulsive by the obliquity which marked
the manner of their introduction."
" There was also a second intention in making these overtures. If the
Union Society should reject these terms, then this kindly interference of
the doctor was to make a fine figure in the Narrative and Defence, and
be additional proof of the ' obstinacy ' of reformers."
The first objection we have to make to this statement of the reviewer,
is, that it is not tme that Dr. Bond made overtures to the Union Society,
"which, if accepted, he ventured to engage for the prosecutions tliat they
should be dismissed" And, moreover, that the misrepresentation is made
by Dr. Jennings, with the very propositions to the Union Society before
him, for he quotes the page of the Narrative and Defence which contains
them; and that so far from engaging that the prosecutions should be
dismissed upon the acceptance of the conditions, Dr. Bond only promises
" to use his personal influence (so far as that small influence might extend),
in procuring a suspension of the proceedings before the Church. And lest
this promise should go for more than it is worth, he adds : " In making
this proposition, I wish it to be distinctly understood that I act alone, and
as a mediator; and that I have not consulted with any of the old-side
brethren on the subject, nor with any reformer, except brother J. S. Reese."
But having given a full-length quotation of what Doctor Jennings has
said in reference to Dr. Bond, and his propositions to the Union Society,
we wiU give from the Nan-ative and Defence, and from the page quoted
by Doctor Jennings, too, the communication made by Dr. Bond to the

REMARKS ON DR. JENNINGS'S REVIEW. 191
Union Society, with the observations by which they are accompanied in
that pamphlet. (See Narrative and Defence, pp. 81, 82.)
" After these charges had been laid before the preacher in charge of the
station, Doctor Bond, who had not yet relinquished the hope that some
conciliatory course might be devised, by which the necessity of further
proceedings before the constituted authorities of the Church might be
removed, and who had not heretofore taken any part in the measures
which had been adopted in reference to the accused, ventured alone and
without our knowledge upon the business of negotiation. Having a par
ticular intimacy with the Rev. J. S. Reese, [a local-preacher reformer,] and
reposing great confidence in his understanding, piety, and prudence, the
doctor communicated his intentions to him. Mr. Reese met the offer with
readiness, and promised to be the bearer of any proposals the doctor might
be disposed to make to the Union Society. Accordingly the foUowing
proposals were sent ; to wit : — " September 15th, 1827.
" Whereas, the Union Society of reformers have assigned as their
motive in forming the association, the attainment of unanimity in their
intended memorial or petition to the next General Conference; and
whereas that object is expected to be accomplished by the General Con
vention of reformers, which is to take place in November next, I am dis
posed to use my personal influence to procure (so far as that small influence
may extend) a suspension of proceedings before the Church, upon the
following conditions, to wit : —
"First. When the convention shaU have terminated its session, the
Union Society shaU be dissolved, and not reorganized, in the present or
any other form, until after the next General Conference.
" Secondly. That the periodical called the " Mutual Rights," if con
tinued at all, shall be strictly confined (so far as relates to the controversy
with respect to our Church government) to dispassionate, temperate
discussion ; and that no allusions to individuals, or attributions of im
proper motives to any individuals or to the rulers of the Church, shall at
any time hereafter appear in that periodical.
" To secure the fulfilment of the last condition, each number of that
work, in the proof-sheets or the materials before they are printed, shall
be submitted to three persons chosen mutually by the reformers and
the committee who have preferred charges against some of them, who
shall be authorized to expunge aU objectionable passages therefrom.
" In making this proposition I wish it to be distinctly understood that I
act alone and as a mediator ; and that I have not consulted with any of
the old-side brethren on the subject, nor with any reformer except brother
John S. Reese. Thomas E. Bond.
" To Rev. J. S. Reese."

192 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
"The Rev. Mr. Reese returned the above proposas, stating that the
paper had been read in the Union Society, but that no order had been
taken upon it, nor was he authorized in any way to continue the negotia
tion." It is needless to add, that the doctor relinquished his hopes, and
did not again tender his mediation. We have heard it objected to the
above proposals, that they were not official, but the mere propositions of
an individual, and therefore could not be received by the Union Society.
Bilt it must be obvious, that in this stage of the business no official prop
ositions could be made by the Church authorities, because it had not
been officiaUy determined that any offence had been committed, much
less had the nature of the offence, and the satisfaction due to the Church,
been ascertained : any compromise, then, which could take place, must be
between the accusers and the accused ; and between these the doctor pro
posed to become the mediator.
" If the terms were objectionable, they might have been modified, had
the negotiation continued. They were obviously only propositions of
compromise, and might have been properly met by propositions from
those to whom they were offered, and ultimately the negotiation might
have terminated in a way mutually acceptable.
"But the fact is, the proposition was received as the effect of intimida
tion. It was thought, by the leading members of the Union Society, that the
measures already taken were not intended to be foUowed up. The Church
authorities, it was believed, would not dare to proceed to extremities ; and if
we are not misinformed, the doctor's proposals were styled, in the Union
Society, ' a flag of truce,' and treated with the utmost contempt and deri
sion." That the reader may have, at one view, the contrast between what Dr.
Jennings charges Dr. Bond with promising, and what he did, in fact,
promise, we will place the statements in opposite columns, and then, if the
reader finds Dr. Bond guilty of the charge, he is heartily welcome to give
what credence he pleases to the motives by which he is represented as
having been actuated : —
Dr. Jennings. De. Bond.
"But before the trials commenced, Dr. "I am disposed to use my personal
Bond took occasion, on his own respon- influence to procure (so far as that
sibility, to offer terms to the Union small influence may extend) a suspen-
Society, which, if accepted, he ventured sion of proceedings before the Church,
to engage for the prosecutions that they upon the following conditions:" — "In
should be dismissed." — See Narrative and making this proposition, I wish it to be
Defence, pp. 81, 82. distinctly understood that 1 act alone, and
as a mediator, and that I have not con
sulted with any of the old-side brethren on
the subject, nor xvith any reformer, except
brother John S. Reese."

REMARKS ON DR. JENNINGS'S REVIEW. 193
Now, whether my reader happens to be friend or foe, Episcopal Method
ist or Methodist Protestant, I submit it to his honest decision, whether
there is a word in Dr. Bond's communication to the Union Society,
like engaging, on the acceptance of the conditions, that the prosecutions
should be dismissed ? On the contrary, could he have been more cautious
in guarding against such an inference than by telling the society that he
acted alone, as a mediator, and without counsel, advice, or concert ; pledg
ing only what little influence he might have to procure a suspension of the
proceedings before the Church ? Yet Dr. Jennings, with the propositions
before him, positively and unequivocally asserts that they contained a
pledge that the prosecutions should be dismissed! We positively declare
that we have no pleasure in thus exposing the delinquencies of a man
who once held so distinguished a rank in the Church. A sectarian
triumph would be a poor compensation for the common injury which is
thus inflicted upon our holy profession. There is no cause of rejoicing in
the fall of a man who has made such high professions as Dr. Jennings ;
for, although it may lessen his abihty to injure a particular branch of the
Church, yet, at the same time, a weapon is placed in the hands of the
scoffer at all religion, by which he assails, with effect, the common cause
of Christianity itself. Nothing but imperious necessity could have induced
us to make the exposure. We had no other alternative left us but to sink
under the charges made against us, or to show that they were unfounded.
If the doctor finds himself upon a bed of thorns, he must console himself
with the reflection that he made it for himself.
But it may be asked, What motive could induce Dr. Jennings to mis
represent so entirely the propositions made by Dr. Bond to the Union-
Society ? A little consideration will make the motive but too apparent.
Dr. Bond had been represented as the secret agent of the bishops in
getting up and sustaining the conspiracy — " the fast friend to the govern
ment of the Church, with sufficient zeal, and a competent degree of inge
nuity," to prepare a Narrative and Defence beforehand, in order to show
how the expulsion of reformers could be justified ; and in perfect keeping
with this allegation, he is now represented as having authority to dismiss
the prosecution, and to say to the Church authorities, " Hitherto shall ye
go, but no farther." How else could he engage, upon his own responsi
bility, that the prosecutions should be dismissed if his proposals were
accepted ?
Having imputed propositions as coming from Dr. Bond which he never
made, Dr. Jennings next proceeds to assign the motives in which they
originated. The first design, he alleges, was " the dissplution of the Union Society,
and the destruction or neutralization of the Mutual Rights."
It will be seen by reference to the propositions themselves, that they
13

!94 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
only proposed the dissolution of the Union Society, after the object for
which it was said to have been instituted should have been accomplished.
It had always been aUeged, that reformers had been compelled to form
these associations in order to procure the necessary unanimity in their
petition to the General Conference, the want of which had been found a
serious objection to their petitions presented to the Conference of 1824.
It was therefore proposed, as a measure of conciliation, that after this ob
ject should have been attained by the convention, which was to take place
in November, the society should be dissolved until the result of their
petition should be known, when, if their wishes were not met by the General
Conference, the propositions allowed the reorganization of the society.
Was there anything unfair in this ? It was known to the reformers, that
many of their brethren had fears that there existed other views in the
formation of the Union Society ; or, at least, that other views had entered
into the motives for its perpetuation, — that some of the leaders had the
dernier resort of secession steadily in view, and looked to these societies as
a convenient organization for the fulfilment of ulterior designs. Was it
not proper, then, to ask the society to give a proof of the sincerity of their
professions, by dissolving the association after the professed object of their
formation had been attained ? Yet Dr. Jennings says it was " an in
quisitorial dictation of the most offensive kind." As to the destruction,
or neutralization of the Mutual Rights, the doctor, we admit, knows best,
whether restraining the editors within the bounds of " dispassionate tem
perate discussion," and forbidding personal mvective and abuse, would
have destroyed or neutralized the periodical, which had so long rioted in
the luxury of slander and defamation. If such would have been the
effect of the restraints proposed, all that we have to plead in defence of
the proposition is, that it looked to " a consummation devoutly to be
wished " by every friend of truth and righteousness.
But it is alleged, that if these were the first intentions, there was an
ulterior purpose which the author of the propositions had in view, and
which was in perfect keeping with the rest of the conspiracy which, he had
formed — namely, " to procure the condemnation of reformers." In the
development of this " drama," as the doctor calls it, it wiU be recollected
that he alleges that a " Narrative and Defence " had been prepared at the
outset by the author of these very propositions, and the conciliatory propo
sal, if rejected, would make a very pretty episode in the tragedy. " If the
Union Society should reject the terms," says the reviewer, " then this
kindly interference of the doctor was to make a pretty figure in the ' Nar
rative and Defence,' and be additional proof of the obstinacy of reformers."
How mortifying it is to be obliged always to spoil the doctor's pretty play
with such obstinate, intractable things as matters of fact ! But so it will
always happen to writers of historical plays and romances. Some Mar-

REMARKS ON DR. JENNINGS'S REVIEW. 195
plot wiU always be pointing out the anachronisms, the misnomers, and the
contradictions of the true history of the matter. It will be recollected by
the reader, that we have heretofore shown that the " Narrative and De
fence " was not thought of until it was suggested by the doctor's protest ;
and this protest was pubhshed some time after the propositions were made
to the Union Society by Dr. Bond. How, then, could the propositions be
intended to make a fine figure in the " Narrative and Defence 2" But
why should Dr. Jennings infer any unworthy purpose from the propo
sitions, or attribute any sinister design to their author? We answer,
solely because Dr. Bond had written an "Appeal to the Methodists, in
opposition to the changes proposed in their Church government ; " and
because he had called a meeting of the male members of the Church, who
were not members of the Union Society, for the purpose of publishing,
under their sanction, a defence of the Baltimore Annual Conference,
which had been assailed in the " Mutual Rights," and through the me
dium of the newspapers, by Dr. J. and his associates, with the most
shameful violence. From these two circumstances, Dr. J. inferred, that
Dr. Bond had been selected by the bishops and their agents, to manage
a conspiracy, for the purpose of expelling the reformers from the Church.
And hence he could not believe he was sincere in his mediation : and if
we have not been misinformed, Dr. J. himself effected the rejection of the
propositions, calling them " a flag of trace," and treating them with the'
utmost contempt ; so that they had no chance of a fair hearing by the
society, over which he exercised at that time so much influence as to get
the members, at a certain meeting, to pledge themselves not to comply,
individually, with any terms which might be offered. So that, whatever
they might afterwards hear which might go to change their views, they
were not at liberty, even for conscience' sake, to make any individual
concessions to the Church. They were to stand or fall together, right or
wrong. We were not permitted, of course, to witness these transactions
personally, but we were informed of them at the time ; and it will be
recollected, that the president of the society told the brethren who waited
upon him, that it was useless to visit the members individually, as they
had agreed not to withdraw from the Union Society.
It is stated in the Nan-ative and Defence, that at the time Dr. Bond
made his propositions to the Union Society, he had taken no part in the
measures which had been adopted in relation to the accused. Yet Dr.
Jennings does not hesitate, in spite of the testimony of the seven brethren
whose names are subscribed to the " Narrative and Defence," to represent
him as the soul -of the conspiracy. The declaration of these gentlemen
would be taken by any jury which could be selected from among their'
fellow-citizens, exclusive of reformers ; yet Dr. Jennings does not hesitate
to contradict their statement, without the slightest evidence on which to

196 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
impugn their veracity. Their declaration, however, is literally true. Dr.
Bond was so far from originating the prosecutions, that it is well known
to all concerned in them, that he was opposed to them, from the advan
tage which he supposed the enemies of the Church would derive from the
cry of persecution, which would be sounded throughout the continent,
right or wrong. His plan was, fairly to write them down ; and he gave
it as his opinion, even at the meeting in Dr. Roszell's school-room, that
in so good a cause this could easuy be done. He moreover expressed
his concern that so little had been done to give those who had been car
ried away by the siren song of reform, an opportunity to form proper
views of the proposed innovations on our Church economy. There were,
however, wiser heads and firmer nerves in the Church, and the only mea7
sures, perhaps, which could have saved the Church were adopted, and
pursued with a steadiness and propriety which did honour to those who
devised, and to those who executed them. We know that the drawing up
of the charges and specifications has been attributed to Dr. Bond. But
whatever credit he may have derived from this opinion, he is compelled
to relinquish it. He had no part nor lot in the matter, nor does he know
who was the author of them, though he supposes they were drawn up by
one of the brethren who preferred them. Doctor Jennings wUl, therefore,
find that he has been stabbing at a man for a supposed offence, of which,
in reality, he was entirely innocent; and, after aU his malignity, will per
ceive that the offer of mediation made to the Union Society might have
been sincere and well-intended, notwithstanding the contumely with which
he has treated it We leave the doctor for the present to digest the
repast we have provided for him ; and hereafter shall show that he has
been as unfortunate in his strictures upon the conduct of Dr. Green, as he
has in his attack upon Dr. Bond.
It will be recollected by our readers, that about the time of the session
of the quarterly-meeting conference in this city, before which the trials of
Dr. Jennings and his confederate local preachers were to take place, Dr.
Green, of Virginia, arrived in Baltimore, and immediately opened a con-es-
pondence with Dr. Jennings, proposing to become a mediator between the
Church and those who had been accused of violating her Discipline. This
friendly interference he declared to be entirely voluntary, and unsohcited by
any person or persons whatever. The declaration is to be found in his
letters to Dr. Jennings, and we presume that all who know Dr. Green will
deem his own word sufficient to establish the fact that he had not been
sent for by any person nor solicited to interfere in any way with tlie pend
ing prosecutions. Yet Dr. Jennings has the hardihood and cruelty to
charge this minister of the gospel, whose character is without reproach,
with double dealing and falsehood. He roundly asserts that "Dr. Green
was sent for," and suffered himself to be made a tool of, permitting his

REMARKS ON DR. JENNINGS'S REVIEW. 197
communications to be influenced or dictated by Dr. Bond, the agent of
the bishops in this " conspiracy." From what we have seen of Dr. Green,
he is not a man to be dictated to by anybody. He made up his mind as to
his course before his arrival ; and his first letter to Dr. Jennings was writ
ten before he had seen any person connected with the prosecutions on
either side, and, we believe, before he had conversed with any member of
the Church, except Mr. Charles A. Warfield, at whose house he stayed
during his visit to Baltimore. So far was he from receiving instructions,
that he positively declined convei-sation upon the subject, or disclosing his
views until he should receive Dr. Jennings's reply ; after which, if the reply
afforded ground of hope, he said he should be glad to hold conversation
with any person, of either side, on the subject of his proposed mediation.
In all the doctor's deportment during his negotiation there was manifested
a sincere desire to restore the accused brethren to the fellowship and con
fidence of the Church, if it should be found possible to do so without pros
trating her wholesome discipline ; and the illiberal attack upon his
character and motives in Dr. J.'s review, is as unjust as it is ungenerous.
That the reader may have the whole matter before him, we shall quote
from the "Mutual Rights" of March 5th, 1830, the remarks in reference
to Dr. Green, and then some extracts from Dr. Green's letters to Dr. Jen
nings, as published in the " Narrative and Defence." Dr. Jennings
says : —
" For the same purposes, and to give still greater formality and notoriety
to their pretensions to make peace, Dr. Green was sent for. They would
then be prepared to say that these two doctors, both disinterested, had
used their influence to prevail on the reformers to accept terms of recon
ciliation, but they had ' obstinately ' rejected them both.
" Had Dr. Green come to use his influence in reviving the patience and
meekness of our prosecutors ; had he exerted himself to dissuade them
from their tyrannical and repulsive proceedings, that they might seek an
understanding with us, upon principles of equality and brotherly love, then
indeed he would have merited the reputable appellation of a mediator.
But, as he came to reiterate the same offensive propositions which were
obviously intended to effect the utter destruction of reform, we were com
pelled to consider him an insidious enemy. And that his mediatorial
propositions were drawn up under the influence and advice, if not the dic
tation, of Dr. Bond, we can have no doubt. A note was picked up among"
the papers swept from the conference room addressed to Dr. Bond, bearing
date the same day that Dr. Green wrote his first letter. It was to inform
Dr. Bond that Dr. Green had arrived, and to request him to come up to
dinner, or soon afterwards. And although Dr. Green says, in his second
letter, ' I set out from my family and my home with the intention to volun
teer as a mediator in this case, without being solicited to do so by any one,'

J 98 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
yet the manner of this note, and other circumstances, have led me to
beheve that he was expected. A certain young man of the old side,
whether advisedly or not, said he was sent for. If I could believe that he
was not expected I would most readuy ; and I have no expectation that
he wiU say he was not." — Mutual Rights, March 5, 1830.
In the above extract Dr. Jennings accuses Dr. Green of a downright
falsehood in declaring that he " set out from his family and home with the
intention to volunteer as a mediator in the case, without being solicited to
do so by any one ;" for he asserts positively, notwithstanding this declara
tion, that " Dr. Green was sent for'' But he does not think the doctor is
so hardened as to persist in the falsehood, for he says he has " no expecta
tion that he wiU say he was not expected." We, on the contrary, have
no doubt of Dr. Green's saying what he has heretofore said upon this sub
ject. All we know and all we have heard of that gentleman, goes to
confirm us in the high opinion we have been led to entertain of his charac
ter. Whatever he has asserted will need no other confirmation, notwith
standing the ungenerous and unfeeling effort to impugn his veracity. His
declarations in reference to his visiting this city, and the negotiation he
conducted with so much benevolence and abihty, wUl be seen by the fol
lowing extracts from his letters, as published in the appendix to the Nar
rative and Defence.
Dr. Green's first letter to Dr. Jennings contains the foUowing declara
tions : — " I have long viewed, with feelings of deep regret, the unfortunate
schism in our Church in this city, and can no longer be an idle spectator
of the melancholy scene. I have travelled near one hundred miles to
volunteer in the work of mediation between the contending parties.
" I have not mentioned this subject to any of your stationed preachers.
" I take the whole responsibility of the correspondence upon myself.
"I shall defer my con-espondence with my brethren on the side of the
constituted authorities of the Church until I receive your answer, which I
hope you will return by the bearer of this letter, or as soon as con
venient." In his second letter he says : "lam under the influence of no man. If
all the men in Baltimore were to unite in one combination they could not
induce me to take any course which my judgment did not approve.
" I assure you again that I am still acting on my own individual responsi
bility. I have no assurance that the Church will accede to the above
terms ; I only give it as my opinion that she ought to accede to them.
"I set out from my family and home with an intention to volunteer as
a mediator in this case, without being solicited to do so by any one ; but
should God in his wisdom and goodness make me successful, I shall not
rejoice alone. Hundreds of my brethren will rejoice with me ! Yea, there
will be joy among the angels in heaven."

REMARKS ON DR. JENNINGS'S REVIEW. 199
These are Dr. Green's declarations in the premises, and we would ask
if it was possible to say in stronger terms that he came here without solici
tation, and obeyed neither the dictation nor the influence of any person or
persons in the negotiation he had voluntarily undertaken? Yet the
reviewer has " no expectation that he wiU say he was not expected."
Dr. Jennings in his reply to Dr. Green's first letter says, in reference to
his proposal to offer himself as a mediator, "Judging from your letter,
and from what I have learned of your character, perhaps there is no man
in the Baltimore Conference who would be more kindly received by us all
in that amiable capacity." What then has Dr. Jennings since known or
heard of Dr. Green's character, to authorize him now to charge the man
of whom he had been so favourably, and we will add, justly impressed, '
with the meanness of lending himself as a tool to others, and with dis
simulation and falsehood in the mediation which he professed to under
take from the purest motives of Christian benevolence ? This much is
charged in the extract we have given; and there follows in the same
number of the Mutual Rights, a letter to Dr. Green, which is said to have
been written immediately after the failure of the negotiation, which Dr.
Jennings " is not sure was ever forwarded" but which contains the most
.unjustifiable aUegations against Dr. Green, charging him with the most
culpable motives in the whole intention and management of his nego
tiation, and it is made a matter of great rejoicing that the reformers had
escaped his " snare."
These are allegations of no ordinary moment. If true, the high stand
ing which Dr. Green has heretofore sustained as a Christian and a minister,
is gone forever. But if unfounded, what atonement can Dr. Jennings
make to an abused public, to Dr; Green, and to his innocent, helpless
children, upon whom any stain upon the reputation of their father must
necessarily descend ? We propose to examine the grounds upon which
these allegations rest; and if the reader will give us his attention, we shall
show these accusations to be as untrue as they are malignant.
The principal circumstance which is mentioned as sustaining the decla
ration that " Dr. Green was sent for," and acted under the direction of Dr.
Bond, and consequently, that he asserted a falsehood in stating that he
came to town " unsolicited " and was under the " influence of no man," is,
that " a note was picked up among the papers swept from the conference
room, addressed to Dr. Bond, bearing date the same day that Dr. Green
wrote his first letter. It was to inform him that Dr. Green had arrived,
and to request him to come up to dinner, or soon afterwards." It seems,
then, that because Dr. Green, a physician and a Methodist preacher, arrived
at Mr. Charles A. Warfield's, and Mr. W. invited his own physician, who
was also a Methodist preacher, to dine with his guest, or to caU on him
in the afternoon, there must have been some previous understanding

20,0 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
and appointment between these three persons— and, under existing circum
stances, the appointment must have related to the " conspiracy " against
the reformers ! This is the reasoning upon which the whole of the heavy
charges rest. The following letter from Mr. Warfield to Dr. Bond will
serve to elucidate an affair which could only have been misinterpreted by
prejudice and party spirit : —
" TO THE REV. DR. BOND.
"Dear Sir, — I perceive that Dr. Jennings, in a communication publish
ed in the Mutual Rights of March 5th, 1830, has aUuded to a note written
to you, informing you of Dr. Green's arrival in Baltimore, and inviting
you to call on him as soon as convenient. This note, which he says was
swept out of the conference room, he adduces as a proof that Dr. Green
had been ' sent for,' and made use of in effecting the objects of those who
wished to expel him and his associates from the Church.
" The note to which the doctor alludes I suppose to have been written by
myself, and I deem it proper that I should correct the mistaken inferences
which Dr. Jennings has drawn from it.
"Dr. Green had placed in my hands a manuscript which he intended to
publish, and had requested me to submit it to your inspection. This
manuscript had no relation to the controversy existing in the Methodist
Episcopal Church. I had received no intimation of the doctor's intention
to visit Baltimore until the very day of his arrival ; and when he came to
my house, I immediately invited you to call and see him, because, having
requested me to submit his manuscript to your perusal, I supposed it
would gratify him to see and converse with you.
" I never had any reason to suspect that any person had solicited Dr.
Green to come to Baltimore as a negotiator, or mediator, nor for any other
purpose connected with the trials then pending before the Church ; and
if I had entertained such a suspicion, the positive declaration he made to
the contrary would have entirely removed it.
" I am confident that Dr. Jennings has given place to en-oneous suspicions
with respect to Dr. Green. He came to Baltimore as a peacemaker,
without having been solicited or advised to the measure by any person
whatever. His efforts as a mediator were dictated by the purest benevo
lence ; and whatever may be thought of the terms of reconcmation he
proposed, the motive by which he was influenced entitles him to the love
and esteem of all good men. Yours, with much respect,
" Charles A. Warfield, of A."
That "the head and front" of Dr. Bond's " offending" in this matter
may be known, we will add that he was prevented by professional duties
from availing himself of the invitation to dinner, but he caUed in the

REMARKS ON DR. JENNINGS'S REVIEW. 201
evening and stayed till a late hour, during which time the manuscript
alluded to in Mr. Warfield's letter was read, and he learned that Dr.
Green had that day made a communication to Dr. Jennings, proposing
himself as a mediator in the affair then pending before the Church. Dr.
Bond expressed his approbation of the design, and his earnest desire that
it might eventuate in the restoration of peace and harmony. He also
expressed a wish to know the terms of compromise intended to be offered ;
but Dr. Green declined stating the proposals he designed to make, until
after he should receive Dr. Jennings's reply, when, if there appeared to
be any hope of effecting the object he had in view, he would be willing
to hold conversation with any of the brethren on either side of the ques
tion, who should do him the favour to call upon him for that purpose.
Dr. Green dined with Dr. Bond the following day ; and if he did not after
ward do the like honour to Dr. Jennings or any of his friends, it was
because they did not invite him. In answer to a hint given by Dr. Jen
nings in a postscript to his first letter, Dr. Green says, " In reply to your
postscript, I have only to say, that I have not a single acquaintance among
the reformers of this city, and therefore hope it will not be expected of
me to visit those whom I know not, and who have no knowledge of me.
When the way shall be opened for a friendly intercourse with them, I
shall be free to embrace the opportunity." Yet, after having declined or
• neglected to " open the way for friendly intercourse," Dr. Jennings, in the
letter which he intended to have sent, tells Dr. Green that " by mingling
with our persecutors, either imperceptibly or by design, you forgot the
object of your visit and undertook the office of a minister for the tyran
nical party, in order to aid them in establishing their authority over us."
Can there be anything more preposterous and absurd ? After this expla
nation, we put it to the good sense of the reader, whether there was any
thing in the note which was swept out of the conference room, to justify
the declaration that " Dr. Green was sent for ;" or anything in the circum
stance of Dr. Bond's calling upon Dr. Green by Mr. Warfield's invitation,
which wan-ants the assumption that Dr. Green acted under the " influence
and advice, if not the dictation, of Dr. Bond." Yet Dr. Jennings says
there is " no doubt of it ;" and Dr. Jennings is " an honourable man."
It cannot be fairly expected of the accused that he should prove the
negative — that is, that he is not guilty of the charge alleged against him.
The accuser is bound to prove the truth of the charge ; and as no proof
has been offered, we might fairly claim a verdict for Dr. Green without
further controversy. But if our readers will for once excuse a work of
supererogation, we wUl point to a fact in the histoiy of Dr. Green's negotia
tion, which proves conclusively that he did not take his measures under
the influence or dictation of Dr. Bond. It will be recollected that among
the propositions made by Dr. Green to the quarterly-meeting conference,

202 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
there was one to appoint a committee to confer with a similar committee
to be appointed by the Union Society, and that the pending negotiation
should be transferred to said committees. This proposition was opposed
in the conference by Dr. Bond, and was rejected for the reasons he
assigned. (See Narrative and Defence, page 84.) Now is it possible that
Dr. Bond would have advised Dr. Green to make a proposition to the
conference which he himself intended to oppose ? The notion is too
absurd to be entertained byany rational man.
Dr. Green wUl pardon us for entering so minutely into his clefence. We
are aware that where he is known our vindication will be whoUy unneces
sary : but the calumny which we have refuted has been circulated where
he is not known ; and though the opinion of strangers may be of little
consequence to him personally, yet the reputation of a minister must be
of consequence to every part of the Church, and ought not to be slan
dered with impunity.
But what is it that has given Dr. Jennings a right to assail the fair
reputation of such a man as Dr. Green, with such positiveness of assertion,
without feeling himself under any obligation to furnish anything but vain
and puerile surmises, in proof of his wanton and cruel allegations ? Is it
by virtue of his election to the head of a new sect, that he claims an
exemption from the common obligations of social hfe ? Is it the privilege
of a reformer to impute to men of the most unblemished reputation, the "
foul crimes of hypocrisy, fraudulent pretences, double dealing, and lying?
How else did he dare to assert that Dr. Green was not honest in his pro
fessions as a mediator, but under the mask of disinterested benevolence
came as the tool and instrument of others, to spread a " snare" for the
reformers ; and that notwithstanding his declaration that he came without
" solicitation," he was not only invited but " sent for," and submitted to
the influence or dictation provided for him beforehand ?
The fact is, Dr. Jennings was wholly incapable of appreciating the mo
tives or character of Dr. Green. He was a partisan, and could not bring
himself to believe that there were men who could rise superior to the
party feeling of the moment, and look at the circumstances before them
without prejudice or partiality. Nothing puts one of your manceuverers
so much at fault as the open, undisguised manner of Dr. Green. There
was a candour, a directness, and a dignified bearing in his manner of nego
tiating, utterly inconsistent with Dr. Jennings's notions of diplomacy. He
had nothing to conceal or disguise, and therefore his propositions were
plain, palpable propositions, which could neither be misunderstood nor
evaded. They were at the same time so reasonable, so essentially neces
sary to the restoration of peace, that it was found by the leaders of the
Union Society, as dangerous to reject them unequivocally, as it would
have been ruinous to the ulterior designs of the party to accept them ; and

REMARKS ON DR. JENNINGS'S REVIEW. 203
it was therefore necessary to find a pretext for breaking off the negotiation.
The pretext was found in the refusal of the quarterly conference to appoint a
committee to negotiate with the committee of the Union Society, and Dr.
Green was dismissed by the reformers. Dr. Jennings could not think it
possible that Dr. Green was sincere in the friendly disposition towards
reformers which he professed. A party man himself, he could not con
ceive how a Methodist could see through any other medium than party
spirit. The doctor reminds us of a man of whom we have somewhere
read, who, having divided the world into only two classes — knaves and
fools — when he met with an honest man, did not know what to make
of him or where to put him. Though everything in the deportment of
Dr. Green corroborated his declarations, that he came as a volunteer, with
out solicitation, and with the benevolent desire to mediate a reconciliation
which might be mutually advantageous to the Church and the reformers,
such benevolence was incredible ; and Dr. Green was accordingly ranked
among " the bishops, the presiding elder, the preacher in charge of the
station, and the whole body of official men, who had entered into a con
spiracy to procure the condemnation of reformers." We have now shown
that the assertions in reference to Dr. Green, are quite as destitute of sup
port as any which Dr. Jennings has made in regard to the other dramatis
personce, so incontinently introduced in his " drama," as he so appro
priately denominates this imaginary conspiracy.
If the reader has followed us through our former remarks, he will have
seen that the whole of Dr. Jennings's fanciful " conspiracy " has passed
away as " the baseless fabric of a vision." Not a single fact is found to
sustain his heavy charges, either against " the bishops, the presiding elder,
the preacher in charge of Baltimore city station, or the whole body of
official members." Nor is there a vestige of truth in the ungenerous and
unchristian accusations against Dr. Green or Dr. Bond.
The accusation against the bishops was founded exclusively upon the
remarks made by a coloured preacher in the Baltimore District Conference.
But the coloured preacher did not make the remarks attributed to him ;
and of this, we are informed, Dr. Jennings is himself now satisfied. He
has ascertained that the conversation to which the coloured preacher
aUuded, was not held with Bishop George, but with Bishop Soule, and
took place more than a year before the session of the district conference.
Consequently, the advice of the bishop could not have been given in
reference to the trial of Dr. Jennings and his confederates, which at that
time could not have been foreseen without the spirit of prophecy, which
certainly Dr. Jennings would not attribute to one of our bishops. The
inquiry lately instituted by the doctor ought to have been made before he
ventured to bring his railing accusation against such a man as Bishop
George, as the same* means of investigation were always at hand. It

204 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
shows, however, some degree of condescension in so confident an assailant
to examine his ground at all ; and we assure him, that if he will persevere
in the inquiry, he will find his suspicions with respect to all the other per
sons imphcated in his supposed conspiracy, equally as groundless as he
now finds the culpable and dishonest agency he had assigned to the
bishops. We must now direct our attention to some strictures upon the proceed
ings of the Church, which we find scattered through the review without
any regard to method or arrangement. The doctor thinks the brethren
in Baltimore were incompetent to try him, because they were avowedly
opposed to reform. " The judge, the prosecutors, and the committee,"
says he, " were all of one party, and had all prejudged our case. If a
majority of reformers had been permitted to sit in judgment, they would
certainly have decided in our favour. The whole court were anti-reformers,
and they decided against us."
It will be recollected that in the charges exhibited against Dr. Jennings
and his associates, they are not complained of on account of their being
reformers ; nor is it alleged that they have uttered and pubhshed opinions
in favour of reform. They are charged with sowing dissensions in the
Church by inveighing (that is, vehemently railing) against the Disciphne -t
and with evil-speaking, that is, with slandering and calumniating their
brethren, both the living and the dead. If, then, the doctor's reasoning
be just — if a reformer could not be brought to trial before those who were
opposed to all reform — he could not be brought to trial at all ; for he
admits, that if reformers were to try him, he would "certainly" be
acquitted. It follows, then, that a member of a rehgious community has
nothing to do but to start some novel opinions, procure a few adherents,
and organize a party in the Church, and he is at once placed beyond the'
reach of discipline. His partisans, we are told, would certainly acquit him,
and those opposed to his views are incompetent, because they wUl, neces
sarily, have formed opinions adverse to the views and principles of the
accused. He may, therefore, in the furtherance of his schemes, traduce
and vilify his brethren with impunity. Whatever he deems necessary to
promote the views of his party he may do, according to the doctor's
sophistry; for those opposed to him have prejudged his case, and are
therefore incompetent to try him.
To what consequences would such doctrines lead? Suppose that,
instead of endeavouring to reform our government and discipline, the
doctor had undertaken to reform our doctrines; and, having adopted
Unitarian opinions, had so successfully propagated them as to have made
a considerable "party" in the Church. Suppose, moreover, that in his
zeal to remodel our doctrines after his own fashion, he had used the same
means as were employed to overthrow the government of the Church,

REMARKS ON DR. JENNINGS'S REVIEW. 205
according to his logic he could not have been brought to trial, because
none would have been competent to try him. His own party would,
according to his own showing, decide in his favour ; and all the rest of
the members of the Church, not being Unitarians, would have prejudged
his case, and would therefore be incompetent jurors. A man who had
committed treason might as well chaUenge all his jurors because they had
never wavered in their attachment to the government of their country.
But the truth is, that the charges against Dr. Jennings had nothing to do
with his being a reformer. The same slanderous publications would have
subjected him to expulsion had he been ever so firm a friend to the gov
ernment of the Church. The committee who suspended, and the quar
terly conference who condemned him, had nothing to do with his views of
Church government The opinions he held upon that subject have been
freely expressed in a memorial to the General Conference ; and so far from
subjecting the memorialists to any prosecution, they had been respectfully
considered and answered. The only questions which arose upon his case
were : — First, Were the papers adduced by those who accused him pub
lished by him ? Secondly, Are the statements contained in them true or
false? and thirdly, If not trae, are they slanderous, and published with
the evU designs of sowing dissensions in the Church and injuring the
reputation of her ministry ? Men of as high moral standing as any
in our community have decided these questions against him, and who
ever impartially reads their " Narrative and Defence " will sustain the
decision. To show that the statements we have given above correspond with
those of the brethren who preferred the charges against Dr. Jennings, we
shaU quote what they have said on the subject in the Narrative and
Defence : —
" Great pains," say they, " have been taken to impress the public mind
with the belief that the accused have been persecuted for a mere difference
of opinion with their brethren on the subject of Church government, and
that we wish and design to restrict the liberty of speech and the freedom
of the press. This, however, is very far from being the fact. We regret,
indeed, that any disagreement should exist in the Church, on any subject
calculated to awaken undue excitement, or to give rise to strife and con
tention amongst brethren who have heretofore harmonized both in senti
ment and effort ; but we have never wished to prevent our brethren, who
differed from us in opinion, from fully and fairly discussing the subject of
Church government in general, or of ours in particular. We are not
aware that any injury would arise from such a controversy, if it were
conducted with proper temper — with a strict regard to truth, and to the
feelings and characters of aU concerned. In these declarations we believe
we speak the sentiments of our brethren generally. We have a common

206 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
interest in the prosperity of the Church, and cannot be injured by any
changes in our ecclesiastical economy which will promote the original
design of our institutions — ' the universal spread of Scripture holiness !'
We enjoy no secular advantages from the present order of things. The
benefits we derive from our connexion with the Methodists are purely
spiritual, and whatever would tend to increase these could not fail to be as
much a subject of rejoicing to us as to any of our brethren. We are
prepared to foUow the leadings of Providence, as the Methodists have
heretofore done, and to adapt our economy to the circumstances of time
and place, in such a way as may be deemed best calculated to promote
the glory of God and the salvation of men. We have no desire, there-1
fore, to suppress inquiry or prevent discussion ; and we have no reason to
believe that our brethren, either of the ministry or membership, have any
wish to do so. Our complaint against the members of the ' Union Soci
ety' is not on account of their opinions on the subject of Church govern
ment, nor for the honest and candid expression of their opinions ; but for
the misrepresentation of the motives and conduct of our ministers, and for
endeavouring to sow dissensions in the Church by inveighing against the
discipline. Nor do we understand by ' inveighing ' the temperate expres
sion of opinion, or calm and dispassionate argument in favour of changing
any part of our discipline — but we understand it to mean ' vehement railing,*
' abusive censure or reproach.' Our opponents wiU allow us this definition,
because it is stated and contended for in the ' Mutual Rights,' by Mr. Shinn.
That the finding fault with, and proposing alterations of, our discipline,
are not considered violations of our discipline, is sufficiently manifested
by the fact, that numerous petitions were sent up to the last General
Conference, which did all this, yet they were nevertheless respectfuUy
considered, and a general answer returned in a circular from the Con
ference. " We repeat, then, that it is not for being reformers themselves, or for
endeavouring to make reformers of others, nor for uttering and publishing
their opinions on the subject of reform, that we complain of the members
of the Baltimore 'Union Society;' but we complain that they have
employed against their brethren in the ministry, and against the discipline
of the Church, the severest invectives and the most vehement railing.
They have impugned the motives of our venerable bishops, and our itin
erant ministers, with unrelenting severity — and accused them, without the
shadow of proof, with conduct which would render men odious even in
civil society, and how much more in the Church of God ! They represent
them to the world as usurpers ; as tyrants and despots, ' lording it over.
God's heritage ;' as exercising an arbitrary authority, which was at first
'surreptitiously' obtained, and which has been perpetuated by printing
and publishing a falsehood in the preface to our Book of Discipline ; and

REMARKS ON DR. JENNINGS'S REVIEW. 207
by forbidding the people to inquire into the tmth of the affair. Nay,
more : they are represented as holding opinions, and exercising a ' domina
tion,' highly dangerous to the civil liberties of the country ; as being
'wolves among the lambs of the flock,' and wolves, too, who openly
'show their teeth and claws;' and to cap the climax, nearly one hundred
of these ministers, constituting the Baltimore Annual Conference, the
faithful pastors over at least thirty thousand souls, are stigmatized as
' abandoned tyrants,' as performing a ' laboured deed of hard-earned in
famy.' From the extracts which we shall give from the ' Mutual Rights,'
it wiU be shown that all this has been said of our itinerant ministers : and
for these unjust accusations, for these vehement railings, we hold the Union
Society accountable, because they have been uttered and published by an
editorial committee elected by the society, and who profess to act as its
agents, and under its supervision and control. If there be individuals in
the Union Society who disapprove of the measures which have been pur
sued, but who had not sufficient influence to prevent or control them, let
them disavow their participation in these measures, by leaving the society,
and they wiU exonerate themselves from the blame. But whUe they do
not disavow these measures — while they so far countenance them as to
let these highly-reprehensible publications go out to the world under the
sanction of their name and influence — they cannot complain if they are
considered as accessary to the evU which has been done, and may yet be
done, by the periodical of which we complain."
In the conclusion of their "Nanative and Defence," their standard
work, as Dr. Jennings calls it, these brethren say : —
" Our brethren who may have hastily made up their opinion against
the proceedings of the Church in Baltimore, from the protests and other
publications of the accused members, will now have an opportunity to
review the whole affair ; and cannot fail to perceive the fallacy of the
allegation so often reiterated against us, that we persecuted these mem
bers of our Church, in order to prevent investigation and suppress inquiry
on the subject of reform. Dr. Jennings, in ' an address, intended, when
written, to have been delivered before the district conference,' not only
repeats this stale and groundless allegation, but attempts to show that the
publishers of the 'Mutual Rights' are justified in speaking evU of minis
ters by the example of Mr. Wesley. He quotes, from Moore's Life of
Wesley, instances in which, he says, Mr. Wesley ' exposed the conduct
of the ministers of the Church of England, in a language as strong and
pointed as any of the writers in the Mutual Rights have ever used, in
respect to any minister in the Methodist Episcopal Church.' But in order
that the example of Mr. Wesley, in this particular, should avail the doctor
and his associates, it wiU be necessary for them to show, that Mr. Wes
ley's allegations against the ministers of the Church of England, were as

208 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
unfounded as those made in the Mutual Rights against our ministry
manifestly are. For, with due deference to the doctor's superior learn
ing, to speak that which is true is not 'evil-speaking,' however severe it
may be. EvU-speaking, according to the definitions of the word in John
son and Walker, means ' slander,' ' defamation,' ' calumny.' The doctor's
defence, then, ought to have been a very different thing from what we
find it. Instead of declaiming on reform, and the iniquity of endeavour
ing to prevent it, he should have set himself to prove the truth of the
allegations made by him and his associates, against our bishops and other
ministers. If he had shown them to be true, the charge of ' evil-speaking '
would not have been sustained, — although injuring the reputation of
another, by publishing his faults or failings, can only be justified by
some apparent necessity for the disclosure. 'And shaU we,' says the
doctor, ' accuse the author of the general rules [Mr. Wesley] of speaking
evil of ministers, because he there published the truth concerning those
ministers who opposed themselves to hinder his work? I whl not'
No, indeed, nor we either ; for the Apostle Paul, who expressly enjoins it
upon us, ' to speak evil of no man,' and the Apostle Peter, who exhorts
us to ' lay aside all malice, and aU guile, and hypocrisies, and envies, and
all evil-speakings' equally condemned the conduct of men of all ranks
and conditions in life, in terms of very severe rebuke. If the doctor then,
can prove what has been alleged, both against the living and the dead,
in the Mutual Rights, he will not only stand acquitted of ' evil-speaking,'
but prove conclusively the necessity of a thorough reform, not only of
our government, but of our morals. We confidently beheve, however, that
no attempt will ever be made to substantiate charges of such a heinous
nature against the ministers of our Church."
The review contains some severe animadversions upon the conduct of
the Baltimore Annual Conference, because they declined to interfere with
the decisions of the judicatories below. The conference decided that the
appellants, not having appeared before the quarterly-meeting conference,
but contumaciously disregarded its citations, were not entitled to an appeal.
And was not this decision of the annual conference in strict conformity
with the Discipline and with all law and usage? Could the conference
entertain the appeal of those who had set at defiance the Discipline of the
Church and refused to appear before the tribunals appointed to try them ?
Had they a right to step over all the primary tribunals, and because they
had set up for reformers go up with their cases at once to the court of
appeals ? Surely not. But then they say they had protested against tlie
competency of the inferior tribunals to try their cases, and therefore might
properly resist their authority. But was it ever known that a person
objecting to the competency of a court in his case, claimed a right to decide
the question of competency ? We apprehend that the decision of the ques-

REMARKS ON DR. JENNINGS'S REVIEW. 200
tion of competency rests with the court itself; and if the court maintains
its competency the objector wiU be held to trial, notwithstanding his objec
tions. If it be a case in which an appeal is aUowed, as in aU civil actions,
the aUeged incompetency of the court below may be a ground of appeal,
but certainly will not authorize the objector to refuse to obey the citations
or mandates of the primary court in the incipient state of the proceed
ings. But, in fact, the protest entered by Dr. Jennings and those concerned
with him, not only denied the right of the quarterly-meeting conference to
try them, but also the competency of the annual conference. They sent
up their memorial to this conference, however, and now the doctor com
plains terribly that this body declined to do him justice, notwithstanding
he had previously alleged that none but the General Conference was com
petent to decide upon matters of so much importance as were involved in
his case. Into what strange absurdities and inconsistencies are men hunied
by party spirit !
Dr. Jennings, in his review, takes pains to collect and reiterate most of
the stale and oft-refuted charges of unfairness in the course of his trial.
The preacher in charge of the station is again charged with preparing the
way for the unanimous condemnation of the accused by the quarterly-
meeting conference. Never was there a charge more unjust or unfounded.
Mr. Hanson's conduct in the whole proceedings has passed through the
most fiery ordeal of his adversaries, and was subjected to the strictest,
scrutiny by the General Conference. His justification has been made
manifest to every impartial inquirer to whom the means of investigation
have been afforded. His defence, published in the Appendix to the Nar
rative and Defence, [original edition,] will sufficiently justify this opinion,.
In the account Dr. Jennings has given of the proceedings in Baltimore,
he complains that the editors of the Mutual Rights and the members of
the Baltimore Union Society generally, were held accountable for publica
tions in that periodical which were written by other persons under ficti
tious signatures ; and he inquires why the names of these writers were not
demanded, and proceedings had against them as the authors, instead of
instituting prosecutions against the publishers of the offensive papers?
We answer. In the first place, that the Church had no right to demand
the names of the authors, and the editorial committee would not have been
bound to make the exposure.
Secondly. The writers were believed to reside out of the jurisdiction of
the Church in Baltimore, and we had no right to dictate to the Churches
elsewhere the course which it might be proper to take in the premises.
The sister Churches had the exclusive right to bring under dealings- any
of their offending members — we neither claimed nor desired any jurisdic
tion over them. 14

210 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
Thirdly. We held the publishers and writers to be equally culpable, and
therefore equaUy obnoxious to expulsion from the Church. The complain
ant seems to suppose that an editor may publish what he pleases, provided
he gives up the name of the author when demanded. But this is not law
in either Church or State. An indictment at common law wiU he against
the printers and venders of a libel as well as against the writer, and the
punishment of one by no means exonerates the others. A contrary sup
position' involves the grossest absurdity, as the ends of justice would always
be defeated by the printers and publishers of libels, who would take care
to find an author out of the jurisdiction of the court, and, therefore, beyond
the reach of punishment. But if neither the common law nor any statute
law exonerates the printers and publishers of libels from punishment upon
giving up the writer's name, much less can they escape condemnation upon
Scriptural grounds. If the publications in the Mutual Rights were
"unjustifiably inflammatory," and "misrepresented both individuals and
facts," as some of the writers themselves have confessed, we ask, was Dr.
Jennings more excusable for publishing than the authors were for writing
them ? Can a Christian, and a Christian minister, pubhsh to the world
the most serious accusations against his brethren, nay, against any human
being, without knowing them to be true, and be guiltless in the sight of
either God or man ? Will it avail him anything to say, I did not write the
accusations — I only published them — when he thereby gave the slanders
an extension and a currency which they could not otherwise have had ? Is
there any man of common sense and common honesty who will say that
the publisher is not as guilty as the author ? We think not ; and, there
fore, the Church was justifiable in holding Dr. J. amenable to discipline
for such publications, whether he gave up the real names of his corres
pondents or withheld them. His agency in the publications being unde
niable, the only ground of defence shoidd have been to prove their tmth ;
but this was not attempted by either writers or publishers, and as no
atonement was proffered, nothing was left to the Church but the painful
operation of excision.
Under this view of the subject, what would it have availed the doctor
if Mr. Hanson had postponed his trial until he had written to and con
sulted all his correspondents ? Their permission to give up their real
names would not have lessened his offence by a single iota. He was not
charged with writing any paper in the Mutual Rights under a fictitious
signature, but with publishing them ; and if the writers had been exposed
and expeUed, the doctor would not thereby have escaped the punishment
to which his own acts had justly exposed him. There is, therefore, no
justice in his complaint against Mr. Hanson, for not postponing the trial
in order to indulge him in long and useless correspondence with the writers
of the offensive publications.

REMARKS ON DR. JENNINGS'S REVIEW. 211
The doctor's remarks upon the Conference Report on petitions and memo
rials, and upon the propositions of compromise which were voted by that
body, are so blended together that the reader must have all the documents
before him, or have a very distinct recollection of them, to correctly under
stand the reviewer. We do not propose to follow him in his discussion of
these matters. They have all been canvassed before, and the reader, by
consulting the Itinerant, may be enabled to make up his opinion without
further assistance from us. But the doctor has not spared the General
Conference. He would seem to wish that body to assume an authority
which in no wise appertains to them ; namely, to annul the acts of the
quarterly conferences and the annual conferences, in cases in which these
judicatories are vested, by the Discipline, with appellate and final jurisdic
tion. Private members have an appeal to the quarterly-meeting confer
ences ; and local preachers to the annual conferences ; and, under the
Discipline, these appeals can go no farther. But when such a man as Dr.
J. is concerned, he would have the General Conference to interfere and .
assume a power unknown to the constitution, annulling the acts of all the
competent judicatories of the Church ; and that, too, in favour of those
who had refused to appear in answer to the citations from the authorities
who, by this very General Conference, had been vested with jurisdiction
in the premises. We hope we shall be excused for declining to enter
into any argument- in order to show the absurdity of such pretensions or
claims. The reader wiU remember that we have shown the doctor grossly mis
taken in all the grounds upon which he rests his charge of " conspiracy "
against the " bishops, the writer of the Narrative and Defence, the pre
siding elder, the preacher in charge, and the whole body of official men "
in the Baltimore city station. But if we were permitted to indulge in
mere suspicions, might we not adduce better reasons for suspecting that
the doctor, and some of his associates, had entered into a "conspiracy"
quite as culpable as that which he has charged upon others ? We will
not assert it ; but were we of the reform school, we should have suspected,
long ago, that the doctor had entertained views, and planned schemes,
which did not accord with those which were generally professed by re
formers. We should have been led by the measures adopted by the
doctor and those more immediately in his confidence, to suspect that he
entertained an inveterate hostility to the whole itinerant system, and de
signed its utter overthrow; or if this could not be accomplished, the
establishment of a new sect under his own control.
We have been credibly informed that Dr. Jennings has said he was
aware of the radical defects in our system, before he entered the Church ;
and that he mentioned his objections to some presiding elder, who put
this very significant question to him : " If you wished to drive the hogs

gjL2 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
out of the garden, how would you proceed,? would you stay outside of
the fence, or come into the garden ?" The application was obvious, and
the doctor came into the garden to turn the hogs out. He delayed the
execution of his work, however, for some years, and in the meantime
taught us to think the garden was in a very flourishing condition. We
all remember how he used to eulogize the economy of Methodism from
the pulpit and in private conversation, telling us, in no measured terms of
commendation, that nothing like it had blessed the Church since the apos
tolic age. Yet all this time he knew the hogs were in the garden, and
he had intended from the first to turn them out. These hogs were, we
suppose, the travelling preachers ; but a fit opportunity had not offered to
turn them out, though the doctor had entered within the enclosure.
The favourable moment arrived, however, and the doctor was not slow
in embracing the opportunity. The subject of a lay delegation in the
General Conference had begun to be canvassed, and might have been
canvassed with good temper for an indefinite period, by all who had no
thing in view but the common good and prosperity of the Church. The
question, after having been fuUy discussed, would have been disposed of
according to the light which had been elicited by the discussion, and all
would have acquiesced in the decision. But, then, none would have de
sired to impair the itinerant system, and the doctor and his particular
friends would have gained nothing by the controversy. The hogs would
have remained in the garden, and no new sect would have arisen to ele
vate the doctor to distinction as their leader.
It was now that a new plan of action was devised, and_ forthwith carried
into execution. The episcopacy was to be assaded, as the right arm of the
itinerancy ; and it was assailed with a violence and audacity of assertion
which has been seldom equalled and never surpassed. Meantime, the
" Mutual Rights," under the direction of the doctor and a few choice
spirits, assumed a tone of violence, and indulged in a latitude of abuse,
which entirely changed the state of the controversy. Now, we ask, why
was aU this, if there existed no conspiracy to carry matters beyond a lay
delegation ? Why was the success of the primary measure compromitted
by the attack upon the episcopacy, and the slander of the living and
tiie dead, but to urge reformers beyond the moderate measures which they
originally contemplated ; or to produce such excitement as to effect ex
pulsions and secessions in order to establish another and independent
sect ? It wiU not be forgotten that the violence of the leaders in Balti
more so disgusted many of the reformers elsewhere that they withdrew
from the ranks ; and one of them, of no ordinary distinction, said, " I am
a reformer — but those men are revolutionists."
It is true, that all this while we were told that the Union Society was
formed and sustained to prevent secessions from the Church ; and we be-

REMARKS ON DR. JENNINGS'S REVIEW. 213
lieve that most of the members themselves believed the declaration : but
we are equally satisfied that the leaders had other views ; and that it had
been long determined either to equalize pastoral authority between the
travelling and local preachers, or to divide the Church. In conformity
with this determination, we know that a letter was written from Balti
more, long before any prosecutions were commenced, to a travelling
preacher who was supposed to favour reform, but whose views of reform
were always confined within very reasonable limits, informing him, that
the Union Society was ripe for secession " whenever they said the word,"
and they were anxious to ascertain what assistance they might expect
from the travelling preachers. In short, were we of the reform party, we
should deem ourselves justified in attributing the total fauure of the
scheme of lay delegation, more to the "conspiracy" gotten up in Balti
more, among certain leaders of the party, than to any other circumstance
whatever, — a conspiracy which was not less inimical to the interests and
views of the party generally, than to the welfare of the Methodist Episcopal
Church. And it was no point of honour or consistency to accompany
them, when they were expelled for conduct which was not justified by
necessity, nor sanctioned by the general opinion of reformers.
The doctor proceeds in his review to justify the defamatory publications
in the Mutual Rights, which were made the ground of the charges on which
he was expelled from the Church. Large extracts from these pubhcationa
were made in the "Narrative and Defence." The extracts were given
fairly and at large ; and they were commented upon freely. The doctor, .
in his attempted justification, so garbles and disjoints them, that no person
would recognise them as the papers alluded to in the "Narrative and
Defence," if he were not advertised by the writer of their identity. We
shall not follow the reviewer through his herculean undertaking. Long
before he cleanses the Augean stable all interest in the controversy will
have subsided, and reform will have passed to the tomb of the Capulets.
And, besides, we may fairly turn the doctor over to his friends who repre
sented him and his associates at the General Conference, and who, by their
authority, acknowledged the publications which the doctor now attempts
to justify, as unjustifiably inflammatory, misrepresenting both individuals
and facts. It was distinctly stated at the Conference that these represen
tatives were authorized to make these acknowledgments, and they were
made by Messrs. Snethen, Shinn, and Bascom, three of the principal
writers whose papers were complained of, and from whose writings the
extracts were made which were pubhshed in the "Narrative and Defence."
After these acknowledgments we, with due deference, suppose that Dr.
Jennings's defence is wholly gratuitous, and any further effort on our part,
to show their trae character and tendency, would be a work of superero-r
gation.

214 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
THE CONVENTION.

Mr. Editor, — We are not of those who look with indifference to the
approaching convention of those who have assumed the name of reformers ;
on the contrary, in whatever point of view it be contemplated, it is a mea
sure which will awaken the deepest solicitude. Although there may be
some who wUl come to the convention heated by the collision which has
preceded the meeting and reckless of the consequences which may grow
out of it, and some who hope to consummate designs which, though con
cealed, were in view from the commencement of the unhappy controversy
which has so long disturbed the peace of the Methodist community, yet
we cannot doubt but there wiU also be some who are averse to carrying
measures to extremities, who hesitate to leave the Church in which they
have been nurtured and in which they may have enjoyed the felicity of
having been extensively useful to others. Whatever angry feelings may
have been produced by the opposition their fond schemes have encoun
tered, they will, now that the crisis is approaching, feel some reluctance
to cut asunder the ties of brotherhood by which they have been so long
united to the Methodists, and to dissever forever those endearing con
nexions which have been cemented by a thousand prayers, and hallowed
by the recollections of mutual conflicts and mutual triumphs in our
Christian warfare. These wiU pause, fearfully pause, before they give
their voices in favour of a separation from the Church — before they agree
to rush themselves, or to hurry others, into the uncertainties of an untried
experiment, in which, peradventure, hope may be disappointed, and that
which now appears to be a plausible theory may vanish into air, leaving
not a wreck behind. They wiU surely investigate closely the reasons
which may be assigned for a measure pregnant with such momentous
consequences. Leaving to others the difficult task of estimating the
advantages which the contemplated new Church promises, permit us to
ask, What are the grievances and hardships which impel them to the
measure of separation ? We wfll not conceal that we are of those w'ho
contend that the claim to a lay and local representation in the General
Conference cannot be sustained upon the ground of right: but, even
upon the supposition that such a claim were just and indefeasible, it will
not be contended that the claim is of such a nature as not to be surren
dered if the common good requires it. It will not be said, or at least it has
not been asserted, that we are bound to insist upon the exercise of this
nght if its exercise would lessen the benefits we now derive from our asso
ciation as Methodists, and diminish our means of being use J^ wold.

THE CONVENTION. 215
If, then, it is agreed that we may forego the exercise of this right, the only
question to be decided is, whether it would contribute to the common
good to introduce such a change in our economy ; and this question could
only be settled by the voice of the Church. Now, wUl it be said that the
voice of the Church is in favour of the change ? On the contrary, may
it not be safely asserted that nine-tenths of the Church, ministry and
membership, are opposed to the innovation? Surely, then, the refusal of
the General Conference to make so important an alteration in our ecclesi
astical polity, not only without the consent, but directly in opposition to
the wishes of the great body of the membership, cannot be a justifiable
ground of secession from the Church ; and those who advocate such a
measure upon no better ground, must not expect to be allowed the name
of republicans, notwithstanding they have so confidently denied their
brethren any participation in the glory of the appeUation.
But it has been asserted that our Church denies to its members the
liberty of speech and of the press, and thereby precludes the discussion by
which only useful and necessary changes may be brought about. If the
frequent reiteration of this allegation had induced any to believe it true,
they must have been undeceived by the resolutions of the last General
Conference, in which the right to interdict such publications is expressly
disavowed, and in which the proposition that periodical papers, devoted to
the existing controversy, should be discontinued, is accompanied by a pro
vision that any person should be at liberty to publish whatever he pleased
upon his own individual responsibility — a license as broad as we enjoy
under the civil government of our country. We hope it is not necessary
to say that every Christian Church, as well as every well-organized civil
government, makes a just and necessary distinction between the liberty of
the press and its licentiousness.
But we are informed that there are those amongst the reformers who
feel themselves bound to leave the communion of our Church, because
some who have been engaged with them in the cause of reform have been
expelled,^-and it is a point of honour to suffer with them ! Now, we
admit that those who justify the slanderous and inflammatory publications
for which these were expelled, and who advised them, when cited to
answer before the Church judicatories, to make no atonement or satisfac
tion to their injured brethren, — we admit, we say, that they ought to
sustain them, unless they have repented of the evU of their doings. But
if they condemn those publications, they are surely not bound to relinquish
their , relation to the Church which has been blessed to their edification
and comfort, because others thought proper to incur expulsion by improper.
speaking or writings.
But is it not obvious, that the leading men amongst those who have
been expelled, designed from the beginning to bring about this state of

216 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
things, should they fail to mould the Church to their liking? It
must not be expected that we should point to any avowal of this design,
because such a disclosure would have frustrated their purposes, by open
ing the eyes of those who were blindly following in their train. The
secession, " when accomplished, was to appear to be the result of uncon
trollable necessity." A very cursory review of their measures, however,
will show that their conduct is not to be explained upon any supposition
but of a fixed intention either to carry their views in reference to our
Church government into effect, or to procure an extensive secession if they
failed. s
It will be recollected, that after numerous auxiliary branches had been
added to the Union Society of Baltimore, most of whom had, perhaps, no
views beyond uniting in a memorial to the General Conference in fa
vour of a lay and local representation, at this juncture of time, " The
History and Mystery " was, after having been read and canvassed in the
parent society, published to the world. Why was this pubhcation, so
foreign to the object which was to engage the undivided efforts of the
Union Societies — a work, too, got up in a manner so highly calculated to
excite bad feelings and awaken hostihty — thrown upon us by the leader of
reform in Baltimore, and sanctioned by his associates, nay, gloried in as
an engine which was to overturn the whole superstructure of Methodism ?
To say nothing of the teeming publications in the Mutual Rights, of a
similar character and tendency, which soon followed, it will be recoUected
that the M'Cainites could not conceal the gratification they felt at the crisis
they had brought about, when the Church discipline was made to bear
upon them. They anticipated the excitement which the cry of persecu
tion, right or wrong, would occasion ; and they calculated that party spirit
would be aroused to a pitch which prudence and discretion could not
restrain, and that many would foUow them to a point from which retreat
would be exceedingly difficult, if not impracticable. Accordingly, the local
preachers refused to make their defence before the quarterly-meeting con
ference, nor did they take an appeal to the annual conference. The lay
members, without exception, declined an appeal also. All attempts at
conciliation were rejected with contempt and derision ; and to block up
every avenue to their return, they hastened, without consulting their
associate branches, to purchase a church, and set up a separate sect. In
the same spirit and temper they rejected the resolutions of the General
Conference in their favour, although they were predicated upon propo
sitions made by their own representatives, and certainly within the range
of their instructions.
Upon the whole, it is easy to discern, that the M'Cainites had from
the onset laid their schemes within view of a separation. They have only
met what they designed to produce ; and it remains to be seen how many

THE CONVENTION. 217
will be taken in their toils, and hurried by their counsel to engage in a
war of extermination against those with whom they have heretofore con
gregated in the house of prayer, and with whom they may yet associate
in Christian fellowship, without any sacrifice of religious principle, or
conscientious scruple whatever.
To those who are still members of the Church, and who propose to
take a part in the convention, we would appeal in favour of the many
whose final estate may be involved in the consequences of the deter
mination they are about to make. Pardon our presumption, if you
esteem it such, for the sake of our motives. We do not expect our
remarks to pass for anything more than they are worth ; on the contraiy,
we anticipate the probability of their failing to claim the regard to which
they may have been justly entitled, on account of the medium through
which they are presented. We have, however, no choice of mediums ;
and nothing is left us, but to discharge our duty the best way we may.
Permit us, then, to ask, Can anything but matters of conscience justify a
rending of the body of Christ ? Is a mere speculative opinion, involving
neither in its nature or consequences any article of faith or religious duty,
a proper warrant for the terrible consequences which wul inevitably grow
out of the contemplated secession ? Can you stand justified before God,
to endeavour, for such trivial causes, to sow and to perpetuate party feuds
and strife among brethren who have heretofore loved one another as
members of one family, having one common interest; to divide circuits,
break up classes, and carry discord " even to the family altar ; " to cripple
ministerial effort and missionary operations, by dividing their friends, and
turning their attention from the common interests of Zion to party contests
and personal altercations ? Have you duly weighed the whole matter,
aside from any party views or purposes ? Are you aware, that among
those who may be led to foUow you, many will be influenced by their
confidence in men, not measures ? Some of these may happen to be
weak in faith, and unfitted by constitution, by habit, or by religious expe
rience, to hve in a storm. They may not be able to preserve a Christian
temper, a quiet spirit, amidst the agitated elements which your decision
may put in motion. May not these be turned out of the way, and utterly
lose their souls, while you are disputing and contending about straws ?
We admit, that if this thing is with you a matter of conscience, you are
bound to obey its dictates according to the light you have. If you cannot
live in our Church, and preserve a conscience void of offence towards God
and man ; if you cannot abide in your present relation to us, and still
grow in grace, you have no option — you are bound to leave our com
munion. But is this the case ? Do you not acknowledge the Methodist
Church to be a living Church, where the gospel is faithfuUy preached, the
ordinances duly administered, and the membership generally pious?

218 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
Indeed, it is not of evils already experienced, that complaint is generaUy
made, but of those which are anticipated. Few complain of injuries
already sustained under the operation of our present institutions, but of
such as they apprehend may hereafter occur to others. They contend
not for themselves, but for posterity. But would it be wise to put the
weak in jeopardy, by inviting them to fierce contentions, and risk the
deplorable consequences of a famUy feud, to avoid a possible contingency,
but one which may never happen ? We do not deny, however, that cases
of individual hardship, and even of oppression, may have happened under
the administration of our Church government ; but it must likewise be
admitted, that equal hardship and oppression have occurred in every
Church, and will be possible under the most perfect system of ecclesias
tical polity which the wisdom of man can contrive. Nay, instances of a
similar kind happen every day in courts of civil and criminal jurispru
dence, under a system of laws which the wisdom and experience of ages
have vainly endeavoured to perfect.
Remember, in the decision you are about to make, you are not only
fixing your own spiritual relations, but those also of many who are looking
up to you for advice and example. Are you sure, that under an economy
yet to form, you can be prepared to supply them so amply with the word
of life, and the means of instruction and encouragement, as they are now
supplied ? Without this assurance, you cannot lead them away without
compromitting these eternal interests; and to seduce them from the enjoy
ment of religious advantages necessary to their spiritual welfare merely to
increase a party, or to make a formidable array in the eyes of the world,
would be as much worse than inflicting upon them any bodily injury, as
the soul is more valuable than the body.
We confess we have no fears of the ultimate safety of our Church.
Trouble and great conflicts we have had and shaU yet have, and of a kind
too which are most grievous and most difficult to sustain— " troubles
amongst false brethren ;" but the issue must be right. If we have a field
of labour assigned us by the Lord of the vineyard, we have only to be dili
gent and faithful to our duty, and we shall be strengthened to overcome
difficulties and to sustain afflictions until whosoever letteth be taken away.
In short, if we are doing the work of the Lord, he wiU provide the ways
and the means of accomplishing that which he hath required of us, if we
are found faithful to our trust. It is not therefore for the stability of our
Church that we apprehend anything from the secession ; for if it be of God
they cannot overturn it, and if not, the sooner it is overturned the better.
But we anticipate with great anxiety the probable decision of the conven
tion ; because we believe the present welfare and perhaps the eternal happi
ness of thousands to be involved in the decision. C.

REVIEW OF THE CONVENTIONAL ARTICLES. 219

A REVIEW OF THE " CONVENTIONAL ARTICLES FOR THE ASSOCIATED
METHODIST CHURCHES,"
AGREED UPON IN A CONVENTION OF THE DELEGATES OP THE FRIENDS OF
REPRESENTATION, HELD IN THE CITY OF BALTIMORE, NOVEMBER 12, 1828.

"It is observed in the history of innovation, that the indirect and unforeseen conse
quences of every great change of an existing system are more numerous and extensive
than those which had been seen and calculated upon, whether by those who advocated
or those who opposed the alteration." — Walter Scott.
The right of any body of Christians to form a constitution and establish
themselves as a separate and distinct sect we wiU not attempt to controvert,
provided they keep within the limits prescribed in the great charter of our
Christian privileges contained in the Holy Scriptures. And although sepa
ration from the fellowship of a Church which we have voluntarily joined
is not a light matter, yet, whenever any number of Christians conscien
tiously believe that by such a secession they will be able to do more for the
glory of God and the salvation of men than they can effect by retaining
their membership in the Church to which they belong, they are bound to
secede. In doing this, however, they ought to be careful to give no
unnecessary offence to others ; they are bound, in Christian charity, to
allow as much honesty of purpose and uprightness of intention to the
brethren from whom they separate, as they claim for themselves. If, con
scious of their own superior endowments, they fear not to enter upon a
course of experiments in Church government, they should feel tenderly for
those who, thinking more humbly of themselves, prefer the safer path of
experience. In short, they should be contented with the flattering pros
pects which are held out to thein in a system contrived by their own
superior wisdom, and with having offered the benefits of their talents to
those whom they leave behind. They have no right to rail at others,
much less to misrepresent both their conduct and character to the world.
Allowing, then, all that the seceders from our Church claim for them
selves, as respects the right of separating from our communion, we should
not have deemed it proper to animadvert upon the defects of their new
system had they not prefaced it with a string of declarations and slander
ous denunciations against us, as false and unfounded as they are uncharita
ble. In looking over the long list of " whereases," by which the articles
alluded to are prefaced, we do not find a single fact alleged, or a single
motive assigned, in reference to the Church they are about to leave, which
is not either wholly unfounded or grossly misrepresented.

220 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
Neither the General Conference nor the annual conferences have ever
claimed a divine right to legislate for the Church, as is asserted by this
preamble. On the contrary, the General Conference, at its last session,
formally and explicitly renounced the right of legislating for the Church,
in the proper and strict sense of that term. They avow that the laws for
the government of Christians have been made by the great Head of the
Church himself. It, therefore, only remains for his ministry to preach his
gospel, to explain and enforce both its doctrines and discipline, and to adopt
such prudential rules and regulations as may best enable them to discharge
these duties. Neither is it true that any have been expeUed from our
Church for their opinions upon Church government, or for communicating
those opinions to others, either by writing or speaking. Those who have
been expelled, and who are alluded to in the preamble, have been disowned
by their brethren for assailing the characters of their brethren with all the
rancour and bitterness of political partisans. And it is remarkable, too,
that the rules of disciphne under which they were charged are adopted
into the new code, and are thereby, sanctioned by the free and voluntary
act of those who heretofore complained of them as so grievously oppressive.
Leaving for the present, however, the further consideration of this extra
ordinary preamble, we shaU hasten to review the articles which it intro
duces, and inquire what are the benefits which the Church would have
derived from the adoption of the innovations proposed by our disaffected
brethren, or rather, what are the evils into which we should have plunged
had we yielded to the clamour and turbulence with which their theories
and projects were urged upon us. It is but fair to infer, that what has
been done by the separatists for themselves, is the same which they desired
we should have done for them ; and that the constitution and form of
government which they in their congregated wisdom have made, would
have constituted the economy of the Methodist Episcopal Church, had it
been modelled according to their wishes. Indeed, we are told so by the
convention itself in their preamble ; for we are informed, that " they will
now of necessity meet the demand which has been so often made by their
opponents, to exhibit a plan explanatory of the changes which they desire."
We must, therefore, in reviewing these conventional articles, or new
Church constitution, consider its provisions in application to the Methodist
Episcopal Church, and inquire how far we acted wisely in resisting the
strenuous endeavours of our disaffected brethren to change the fundamental
principles of our economy. And we rejoice that we have at length the
opportunity, so long denied, of ascertaining precisely the extent of the
revolution from which we have escaped.
. The first article recognises, as part of the economy of the new asso
ciation, all that belongs to our Church polity, " except where contravened
by some other article." The separatists were thus saved from all the

REVIEW OF THE CONVENTIONAL ARTICLES. 221
necessity of settling their articles of religion, and their moral discipline,
and even much that pertains to its administration. They are not now
prepared, we apprehend, to estimate the obligations they owe to those
who have saved them from the difficulties which would have grown out
of the settlement of such matters. If, however, we estimate the difficul
ties of erecting an entire new building by the total failure to mend any
part of an old one, after aU the pains the projectors have taken, we may,
perhaps, have some faint conception of the magnitude of the under
taking. Before we proceed to a regular review of the articles, we beg leave to
introduce one of them, which, as a sweeping provision covering all the
rest, we cannot postpone ; because it gives a peculiar cast of character to
the whole business of reform, as contemplated by the seceders. It is the
only article in which an attempt is made to innovate upon the moral dis
cipline of our Church ; and from the gross impropriety both in principle
and tendency of this one, we are thankful that it is the only one. We
aUude to the fifteenth article — which reads in the latest edition as fol
lows : — -
" Nothing contained in these articles shall be so construed as to inter
fere with the right of property belonging to any member of this associa
tion, as recognised by the laws of the State within the limits of which
the member may reside."
By this article of the new constitution, the Church is precluded from
exercising any control over its members in any matter relating to property,
provided it be legally vested in them. No matter how unjustly one mem
ber may retain the property of another, if he be legaUy authorized to do
so, the aggrieved member can have no redress before the Church judica
tories ; and the injustice, however manifest to all men, may be persisted
in without incurring the forfeiture of Church membership or Christian
privileges. Cases innumerable may be. supposed by our readers, in which this
article would compel the Church to sanction fraud and injustice ; and con
tinue in her communion men who would be deemed dishonest, not only
at the tribunal of Christian morahty, but by the common honesty of the
world. Civil laws can only provide for the general application of the
rules of justice, even when they are intended to be most rigorously just
It is not possible to provide against aU the advantages which the artifices
of men may take of a law which, though good and wholesome in its
general provisions, may be unjust and iniquitous in its application to
individual cases. Thus it may be absolutely necessary that the laws of
the State should bar, by a statute of hmitation, the recovery of claims
which the claimant has neglected to demand for a certain term of years.
Not that a debt can be cancelled by the debtor's having avoided the pay-

222 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
ment of it for any term of years whatever; but the law presumes the
payment, from the neglect of the creditor to prosecute the claim, and the
State has an unquestionable right to say what shaU be received, in courts
of judicature, as evidence of the payment of a debt. It is easy to see
what would be the consequences of abolishing the statute of limitation.
Every man would be compelled to preserve his receipts with perpetual
vigilance, and even to provide for their perpetuation through all succes
sive generations, lest, in some future age, claims should be revived after
the evidence of their liquidation was lost. But, notwithstanding the
necessity and general equity of such laws, it is obvious that the most
unjust advantages may be taken, under their provisions, of the simplicity,
the negligence, or even the benevolence and lenity of creditors. He who
avails himself of such means to avoid the payment of a just claim, of
whatever standing, is not only dishonest, but an enemy of social order —
perverting the very institutions which are intended to promote and secure
the ends of justice, to the purposes of fraud. Under the article we have
quoted, it will be seen that the judicatories of the new Church are pro
hibited from interfering with any rights of property belonging to their
members, if such rights be recognised by the laws of the State in which
they may reside. Their members are therefore at hberty to plead the
statute of hmitation, in bar of any claim, however just, without thereby
incurring a forfeiture of membership, or even bringing upon themselves
the censure of the Church !
Again : by this article a member may hold and possess any species of
property, however inconsistent with good morals the participation in such
property may be. He may not be allowed to attend theatrical exhibitions ;
but he may hold as many shares of theatre stock as he pleases. He may
not play at billiards ; but he may own a bUhard-table, and let it out to
others — provided he take out a license according to law. He may not
be a privateersman ; but he may hold " a right of property " in the vessel
employed in privateering. In short, it would be endless to enumerate
the instances in which a member of the new association might avail
himself of this rule to retain his membership, whUe violating the most
obvious precepts of Christian obligation.
We have been told, by a member of the convention, that the article
we have been noticing was intended to apply exclusively to the rights of
property in slaves. It will, nevertheless, be seen, by looking at the rule
itself, that it does, in fact, apply to any species of property whatever ; and
being a constitutional article, it is a part of the paramount law of the
community who have enacted it No individual part of the Church can
repeal, alter, or modify its provisions. It must continue in force, what
ever be the mischief it may occasion, until repealed by some subsequent
General Convention.

REVIEW- OF THE CONVENTIONAL ARTICLES. 223
But if it be tme that the article was intended to prohibit, by a consti
tutional provision, any interference on the part of the annual conferences
with the right of the members to hold or to traffic in slaves, we confess
we regret it more than any of the many errors into which the convention
have fallen. For the credit of our common profession, we would rather
that we were allowed to attribute the manifest impropriety of the article
to an oversight in the makers of it, to hurry or inadvertency, or to any
thing, rather than a direct intention to acknowledge " a right of property in
human souls." Posterity wiU scarcely beheve it possible, that a Christian
Church, organizing itself for the first time in the enlightened nineteenth
century, commenced, by conceding to avarice and worldly prudence a
primary precept of Christianity : " Whatsoever ye would that men should
do to you, do ye even so to them ; for this is the law and the prophets ;"
that they compromised with the world, by surrendering to it a right to
hold fellow-beings in involuntary slavery, — having an arbitrary control
over them, which the Almighty himself does not exercise over the crea
tures he has made; for he compels no man to do either good or evil.
We could wish, not only for the sake of our common profession, but. for
the sake of the violated rights of humanity, that our brethren had not done
this thing ; that they had not conceded it as a right to their members, not
only to hold slaves, but to engage in the horrid traffic in human beings
which disgraces our country.
We are aware of the delicacy of touching this subject at all. We
know the advantage which we shall give our opponents in certain sections
of the country, by the observations we have made: but we cannot —
nay, we dare not — make any compromise upon this subject ; for he who
does so, betrays the cause of Christianity.
But although we deny that there is any Scripture rule to warrant, or
other rule of moral justice to authorize the practice of slavery as it exists
in this country, yet we are ready to concede that in our efforts to procure
the emancipation of slaves, and in enforcing it by Church discipline, much
circumspection and prudence ought to be used. We should be careful to
keep in view that the great end of the gospel is to better the condition of
man in this world, and prepare him for happiness in the next. Certain
States of the Union have put it out of the power of their citizens to free
their slaves. They may indeed discharge them from their service, and
disclaim all right to hold them in servitude, but they do not thereby make
them free, as the law allows, perhaps makes it obligatory on, others to
enslave them. The condition of the slave would certainly not be bettered
by exchanging the service of one who fears God, for that of one who does
not feel the force of religious obligation. Under such circumstances, our
Church, although she fearlessly avows her opposition to the principle, is
nevertheless compelled to permit the practice of slavery by her members ;

224 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
still, however, asserting the right and exercising the authority of melior
ating the condition of the slaves who may be held by them. If enough
has not been done upon this subject where the laws of the State aUow
more it is to be regretted; and it must be admitted, that no subject
requires more wisdom and caution in the exercise of ecclesiastical discip
line, than the one to which we have referred. But the seceders from our
Church have, by acknowledging a right of property in slaves, and for
bidding any interference with such rights, given up the principle upon
which any future efforts might be based to do away the evil. They have
done more. They have authorized the traffic in slaves to any extent ; and
under this article of their constitution, the cruel and relentless slave-trader
may not only put Christianity to the blush, but outrage the common
feelings of the community, by presenting himself at their communion
table. Nay, preachers and people may engage in the trade without let or
hinderance, since no article of their constitution is to be so construed as
to interfere with their rights of property in slaves. We do not wonder that
the intention of this article was concealed. It would not have done
to announce its true design, by speciaUy confining it to " rights of property
in slaves," because the feelings of many who have joined in the great
work of reform, would have revolted at such direct justification of a prac
tice they had always looked upon as immoral. The specification, how
ever, ought to have been made, notwithstanding its odiousness, because in
the endeavour to cover the intention of the article, the convention has,
as we have shown above, opened the dopr to other evils, formidable both
in number and magnitude.
When the printed edition of the articles first appeared, the words " of
property belonging to " were not found in the fifteenth article. The rule,
therefore, permitted the members of the association to do as well as to
possess whatever the law of the State authorized. Upon pointing out
the dangerous license which this article afforded to any member of the
association who was inclined to avail himself of it, one of the members
informed us that nothing more was intended by it, than to secure to the
members the liberty of speech and of the press. The article, however,
soon became a common topic of convei-sation, and, although the conven
tion had broken up and most of the members had gone home, the article
was revised and a new edition issued, making it read as we have quoted
it. We have been told that the error arose from an omission by the.
transcriber. The correction, however, is fatal to the "hberty of speech
and of the press," as it leaves tlie " odious gag-law " of our Discipline,
which forbids the sowing dissensions by inveighing or unchristian railing,
among those which were adopted by the convention in their first article.
Alas for the infirmities and inconsistencies of poor human nature ! Our
would-be reformers have justified slavery, and forbid all interference with

REVIEW OF THE CONVENTIONAL ARTICLES. 225
their right to traffic in human flesh, while their vociferations about liberty
and equality were yet sounding in our ears ; and have adopted " a gag-
law," while they were complaining of the restrictions their brethren had
imposed upon the liberty, or rather the licentiousness, of speech and of
the press !
To conclude, it is entirely indifferent how the framers of the article we
have been reviewing may attempt to explain or modify it. The principle
upon which it is founded, is totally, radically wrong, and therefore no
modification of it can make it right. It is an attempt to lower the
standard of Christian morals to the weakness and imperfection of human
legislation; to make the obligations of Christian duty succumb to human
authority. The moral precepts by which Christians are to be governed are
enacted by infinite wisdom and purity, and are enforced by higher and
holier sanctions than human laws. They admit of no evasion, nor authorize
any compromise with either the spirit or practice of the world. We must
obey God rather than man. The article is therefore totally improper in
any system of Christian discipline or ecclesiastical government.
The articles will be taken up in regular succession. Two things
we are certain to make very evident in our subsequent remarks : — ¦
First, That it is much easier to find fault with our Church government
than to improve upon its provisions ; and, secondly, that if it were true,
as has been charged, that our people are under the arbitrary domination
of the travelling preachers, the new Church only presents a choice of
evils — the liberty of transferring our allegiance from itinerant to local
preachers. We have already shown the result of the only effort which the con
vention of reformers made to innovate upon our moral discipline ; and
from the sohtary sample we have exhibited, we think it wiU not be
regretted by their best friends that they did not proceed farther. We
have understood that many charitable people have been led to suppose
that the consequences of the rale we alluded to, in reference to slavery,
were not foreseen by the framers of it. We assure them, however,
that the rale was adopted solely in view of that subject, and for this
we have the authority of some of the framers of the constitution them
selves. We are, however, led to hope that many of the other evils grow
ing out of its adoption were not foreseen, notwithstanding the boasted
talents of the convention, otherwise we charitably hope the rule would
have been restricted to the right of property in slaves, however desirable
it might have been to conceal this deformity. We shall now inquire
whether this assembly of reformers were better versed in the science of
Church government than in morals.
The first two articles read in the revised edition as follows : —
" I. The articles of religion, general rules, means of grace, moral dis-
15

226 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
cipline, rites and ceremonies of the Methodist Episcopal Church, are hereby
declared to be the rales of faith and practice for those societies which may
unite in this association ; and the mode of administering the same is
hereby adopted, except where contravened by some other article"
" II. Each society or Church shall have the sole power to admit serious
persons into full membership, and to regulate its own temporal concerns,
in accordance with these articles. The stewards to be elected by the male
members, over the age of twenty-one years, and the leaders by the
respective classes annually."
Our readers wnl bear in mind what we have apprized them of in our
former remarks — namely, that we intend to inquire into the fitness and
propriety of the new constitution, as a substitute for our present economy.
We should have had nothing to do with the pohty of the separatists, if
they had not introduced it by a preamble complaining bitterly of the
Methodists for not having acceded to their wishes, in reference to the
innovations they proposed to make upon our government and discipline.
The articles profess moreover, "to exhibit a plan explanatory of the
changes they desire," in order to " meet the demand which has been
often made by their opponents;" and as this is the first "plan" they
have ever condescended to give us, we are for the first time indulged with
an opportunity of examining the merits of the " reform," for which they
have so long and so urgently contended.
We hope, therefore, we shall not be thought to be querulously inter
fering with the convention, about the order and arrangement of their
own household affairs. When folks go to housekeeping, they may be
safely permitted to manage their affairs in their own way. We are only
desirous to justify ourselves for having refused to permit them to alter our
arrangements, and to model them according to their fashion, in despite of
the wishes of the great body of our people. We wish to show that under
the regulations proposed in the new " plan," we could not keep house at
all, and, therefore, were not to blame for rejecting their counsel, or resist
ing the vehement demands with which they urged upon us their projects
of reform.
The change proposed by the second article in the mode of admitting
members into the Church, we deem inexpedient for several reasons. We
have known no society or Church in which all the members were qualified
to decide in such matters, in all cases. A large majority of many of our
societies will often be found to consist of young members, whose know
ledge of the varieties of human character is necessarily very limited. It
cannot be expected of such, that their religious zeal and fervour should
be sufficiently attempered by the maturity of Christian experience or
Christian knowledge. By such, nothing would be required of a candi
date but his own professions, provided they were accompanied with the

REVIEW OF THE CONVENTIONAL ARTICLES. 227
outward manifestation of the same ardour of feehng by which they them
selves were animated. The caution and prudence of the senior and more
deeply-experienced members, would be received as the dictates of mere
worldly policy, and would be overruled accordingly. The reception of
the apphcant would have to be decided by votes — not weighed, but countedi
The admission of the candidate would depend upon other contingencies
than that of his real fitness ; and thus persons would often be introduced
into the fellowship of the Church through the hasty and inconsiderate
zeal of the junior members, whose rehgious concern, being the fugitive
effect of suddenly-excited feeling, would evaporate in an ebullition of pas
sion, and leave them with no fixed and abiding principles of action ; and
as such principles alone can sustain a religious and self-denying Christian
character, the Church, in all such cases, would suffer in all her members
the obloquy and reproach of individual delinquency.
It will, perhaps, be answered, that this odium has been often incurred
under the present regulations of our Church, and this wUl be readily
admitted ; but the aUegation, so far from weakening, reaUy strengthens
our objections to the new plan. If under an economy where the appli
cant must pass the ordeal of frequent examination in class-meeting, and
finally be admitted by the pastor, upon his own knowledge of the candi
date and upon the recommendation of his class-leader, whose duty it is to
examine him freely and fully upon the subjects of Christian doctrine and
experience, for at least six months ; if, we say, under such restrictions, im
proper persons still find their way into our communion, what would be
the consequences of making their admission depend upon the acclamation
of a whole society — a society where men and women, young and old,
and even chndren have an equal right of suffrage ?
The foregoing remarks are made upon the presumption that the mem
bers, individually and collectively, intend to do right. But it is easy to
conceive a state of things, in which, under the new plan, the admission of
partisans, reputed to be " serious persons," may greatly subserve the pur
poses of a party in the society, in respect to some of the many elections
provided for in the new constitution. If an election of stewards, leaders,
or delegates to the annual conference or General Conference be a con*
tested matter in the society, it may become the temporary interest of the
different parties to procure the admission of auxiliaries, whether they be
fit associates in a religious community or not. In such cases, what strife
and contention would be engendered, and what schisms would be created
by the disappointed ambition of rival candidates, when they failed to pro
cure the admission of their friends and supporters !
But this is not aU. The gospel, in its renovating efficacy, often reaches
the most degraded castes of society, especiaUy in our cities. If such, under
the -influence of the most contrite feelings, become applicants for admission

228 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
into the Church, it will be necessary, under the new constitution, that the
character of the appUcant should be canvassed before the whole body,
when, of course, those who object to the admission wm have a right to
state their objections and expose the whole of a character over which
both Christian charity and prudence would desire to cast a veil. The
applicant may be rejected, and the very next day the whole town would
know both of the rejection and the reasons for it If by the Church be
meant a class, then the applicant, if he has occupied a degraded rank in
society, may apply to a class which, under the authority to refuse admis
sion to any whom they deem less honourable than themselves, may be
abundantly too genteel to admit an outcast. Their rejection fixes a
mark of reprobation upon him, and he must go without the benefit of
Christian fellowship until he can find a class composed of those who have
been taken from a walk of life as degraded as his own.
Under our regulations the preacher in charge admits upon trial, and
after a probation of six months, if the class-leader, whose business it is to
make himself acquainted with the moral character and Christian expe
rience of the candidate, be free to recommend him as one who continues
to evidence his desire of salvation by an upright life and Christian conver
sation, he is admitted into full membership. In the country, where the
candidate is generally known, no other precautions are necessary to pre
vent impositions ; but in cities the practice is for the preacher to bring the
application before the leaders' meeting, and if no proper objection be
urged, the preacher announces the admission at the next love-feast In
this process there is no unnecessary exposure of faults or failings, even in
reference to those who are not received into the Church. The select body
of leaders alone hear the objections, and if any injury is done to the repu
tation of those who have been refused admission, it is known only to
those whose official standing in the Church is a guarantee for their pru
dence. Upon the whole, we think the impartial reader, who carefully compares
the new plan of admitting members into the Church with that which we
have so long practised, will agree with us, that it is much easier to inno
vate than to reform. The separatists wUl find, after their scheme shall
have been as long subjected to the infallible test of experience as ours has
been, that it was not without reason that we hesitated to enter with them
the regions of fancy and speculation. "We are satisfied yet to adapt our
system of government and discipline to men as they are, and as they ever
have been. It will be time enough to conform them to the occasions and
requirements of men as they should be, after so desirable a change shall
have passed upon human nature.
The innovation upon which we have been commenting is not a novel
pretension in our Church, at least in principle. In the excellent notes

REVIEW OF THE CONVENTIONAL ARTICLES. 229
upon our Discipline, written at the request of the General Conference, by
Dr. Coke and Bishop Asbury, and published in the year 1798, the subject
is placed in so clear a light, that we shall transcribe their remarks for the
benefit of our readers. The edition of the Disciphne which contained this
commentary is now out of print, and, we presume, that to most of our
readers the weighty arguments and forcible observations of those apostolic
men, and fathers of American Methodism, will be as new as they are
useful. We are not ashamed to own that, notwithstanding the cruel and
unjust aspersions which have been made upon the characters of Dr. Coke
and Bishop Asbury, by the M'Cainites, our veneration for their memories
remains unabated. Their zeal for the cause of tmth and righteousness,
their entire devotion of time, talents, and property to the great work of
evangelizing the world, which they kept steadily in view, never losing
sight of it for a moment, and to which object they sacrificed every personal!
consideration of comfort and convenience, assures us of their sincerity ;
while their acknowledged talents, their deep piety, their long and varied
experience, wUl enforce their opinions and their advice upon the Method
ists, in every succeeding generation, with sanctions that go at once to the
understanding and the heart with conviction. The bishops in their com
mentary, (pages 74-76,) say : —
" He [the preacher in charge] is also to receive members upon trial, and
into the society, according to the form of the Discipline. If this authority.
were invested in the society, or any part of it, the great work of revival
would soon be at an end. A veiy remarkable proof of this was given,
several years ago, by a society in Europe. Many of the leading members of
that society were exceedingly importunate to have the whole government
of their society invested in a meeting composed of the principal preacher,'
and a number of lay elders and lay deacons, as they termed them. At last
the preacher who had the oversight of the circuit was prevafled upon^
through their incessant importunity, to comply with then- request. He
accordingly nominated all the leaders and stewards as lay elders and lay
deacons, with the desired powers. But, alas ! what was the consequence ?
The great revival which was then in that society and congregation was
soon extinguished. Poor sinners, newly awakened, were flocking into the
Church of God as doves to their windows. But, now, tlie wisdom and
prudence of the new court kept them at a distance till they had given full-
proof of their repentance: 'If their convictions be sincere,' said they,
' they wiU not withdraw themselves from the preaching of the word on
account of our caution ; they themselves wUl see the propriety of our con
duct' Thus, whilst the fervent preacher was one hour declaring the wil
lingness of Christ immediately to receive the returning sinners, the wisdom
of the lay elders and deacons would, the next hour, reject them even from
being received upon trial, unless they had been before painted sepulchres,

230 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
inwardly full of dead men's bones and rottenness. The preacher who had
the eharge of the circuit nearly broke his heart, to see the precious souls
which God had given him kept at a distance from him, and thrown back
again upon the wide world by the prudent lay elders and deacons. How
ever at his earnest entreaty, he was removed into another circuit by the
Conference, under whose control he acted, to enjoy the blessings of the
Methodist economy. The revival of the work of God was soon extinguish
ed, and the society, from being one of the most hvely, became one of the
most languid in Europe.
"Glory be to God, all our societies throughout the world, now (1778)
amounting to upwards of 160,000, have been raised, under grace, by our
ministers and preachers. They, and they only, are their spiritual fathers
under God, and none others can feel for them as they do. It is true, that
on great revivals the spiritually-halt, and blind, and lame, will press in
crowds into the Church of God; and they are welcome to aU that we can
do for their invaluable souls, till they prove unfaithful to convincing or
converting grace. And we whl not throw back their souls upon the wicked
world, whilst groaning under the burden of sin, because many on trial
quench their convictions, or perhaps were hypocritical from the beginning.
We would sooner go again into the highways and hedges and form new
societies, as at first, than we would give up a privilege so essential to the
ministerial office and to the revival of the work of God.
" ' The Master of the house [God] said to the servant, Go out quickly
into the streets and lanes of the city, and bring in hither the poor, and the
maimed, and the halt, and the blind. And the servant said, Lord, it is
done as thou hast commanded, and yet there is room.' He obeys his
God without asking permission of any society whether he should obey him
or not. ' And the Lord said unto the servant, Go out into the highways
and hedges, and compel them to come in, that my house may be filled.'
Luke xiv, 21-23. The servant answers not to his God, I will comply with
thy command as far as my society, or my leaders or stewards will permit me.
Again: the Lord says to Ezekiel, chapter xxxiv, 2-10, 'Son of man, pro
phesy against the shepherds of Israel, prophesy, and say unto them, Thus
saith the Lord God unto the shepherds ; Woe be to the shepherds of Israel.
The diseased have ye not strengthened, neither have ye healed that which
was sick, neither have ye bound up that which was broken, neither have
ye brought again that which was driven away, neither have ye sought that
which was lost. And they were scattered, because there is no shepherd ;
and they became meat to all the beasts of the field, when they were scat
tered. Therefore, ye shepherds, hear the word of the Lord ; As I live,
saith the Lord God, surely because my flock became a prey, and my flock
became meat to every beast of the field, because there was no shepherd,
neither did my shepherds search for my flock ; therefore, O ye shepherds,

REVIEW OF THE CONVENTIONAL ARTICLES. 231
hear the word of the Lord ; thus saith the Lord God ; Behold I am against
the shepherds ; and I will require my flock at their hand, and cause them
to cease from feeding the flock,' &o. Now what pastors, called and owned
of God, would take upon themselves this awful responsibility, if others could
refuse to their spiritual chUdren the grand external privilege of the gospel,
or admit among them the most improper persons to mix with and corrupt
them. Truly, whatever the pastors of other Churches may do, we trust
that ours wiU never put themselves under so dreadful a bondage. It is in
vain to say that others may be as tender and cautious as the pastors ; for
the pastors are the persons responsible to God, and, therefore, should by
no means be thus fettered in their pastoral care. And those who are
desirous to wrest out of the hands of ministers this important part of their
duty, should rather go out themselves to the highways and hedges and
preach the everlasting gospel, or be contented with their present providen
tial situation.
" Besides, the command of our Lord, Matt, xxviii, 19, 'Go ye, therefore,
and teach all nations, baptizing them,' &c, is addressed to pastors only —
to his disciples, and through them to all his ministering servants to the end
of the world. But if ministers are to be the judges of the proper subjects
of baptism, which is the grand initiatory ordinance into the visible Church,
how much more should they have a right to determine whom they will
take under their own care, or whom God has given them out of the world
by the preaching of his word ! For ministers to spend their strength, their
tears, their prayers, their lives, for the salvation of souls, and to have both
themselves and theirs under the control of those who never travailed in
birth for them, and, therefore, can never feel for them as their spiritual
parents do, is a burden we cannot bear. Thus it is evident that both rea
son and Scripture do, in the clearest manner, make the privilege or power
now under consideration essential to the gospel ministry."
We have noticed that part of the second article which relates to the
mode of admitting members into the Associated Methodist Churches, and,
we hope, have shown that the innovation would be exceedingly dan
gerous to us, if ingrafted upon our economy. We must now refer to
the change made by this article in the condition of membership. In
the General Rules of our society, it is required of those who enter
our communion, that "they have a desire to flee from the wrath to
come, and to be saved from their sins ;'' and that they continue to
manifest a desire of salvation by a life and conversation conformable
to this desire. And then follows a particular specification of gospel
requirements, which are deemed by the Church as necessarily written
by the Holy Spirit upon every truly-awakened heart. These General
Rules have been adopted by the convention, except where contravened
by the articles of association ; and among those which are so contravened,

232 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
we find the condition of admission into the Church. The second article
says, " Each society or Church shaU have the sole power to admit serious
persons into full membership : " so that the only demand made of those
who apply for admission, is, that they be " serious persons " — a demand
so indefinite, that we do not know its precise boundaries ; but we are very
sure that it will include many classes of " persons " who have not even
" the form of godliness," much less seeking the power of it. It wiU, how
ever, afford our opponents an advantage over us, by inducing members to
enter their pale who are not prepared to comply with the terms upon
which we receive members. Whited sepulchres — Christians " from the
teeth outwards " — may find aU they want in the new Church. It is now
no longer a reproach to be a member of a Christian Church; it has even
become reputable to be so ; and those who desire Church membership
from worldly motives, will naturaUy seek a Church which requires nothing
more of them than that they shaU have the reputation of being " serious
persons." The new condition of membership is in perfect keeping with
the fifteenth article. The slave-dealer, however unrelentingly he drives
his trade, the man who dishonestly pleads the act of limitation to avoid
the payment of a just debt, and the avaricious wretch whose bowels of
compassion are not moved while he strips his brother of his bed and casts
him into prison, may, nevertheless, be a very " serious person." In short,
the change is a trap, very well calculated to catch the rich, who are wiling
enough to acquire the reputation of being Christians, provided it can be
had without the sacrifices which Christianity requires. To this advan
tage our opponents are welcome. Rich men are not necessary to us ;
though many of them have found us very necessary to them when they
have been brought to seek the salvation of their souls. Methodism will
cease to be a blessing to the world whenever the Methodists receive and
retain among them those who are too rich, too honourable, or too fuU of
worldly wisdom, to submit to the discipline of the Church. Both our
prosperity and usefulness depend upon our steadfastly adhering to our
original conditions of membership — " a desire to flee from the wrath to
come, and to be saved from their sins ;" and the giving evidence of their
desire of salvation by an upright walk and a Christian conversation, as is
more fully expressed in our General Rules.
The second article furthermore provides, that " the stewards shall be
elected by the male members over the age of twenty-one years, and the
leaders by their respective classes annually."*
° There is something mysterious connected with the word, " annually," as it appears
in the revised edition of the Conventional Articles. It is not to be found appended to
the second article in the first edition, nor does it appear in the articles as published in
the "Mutual Rights," although the paper containing them was issued subsequently to
the revised edition, published in a pamphlet form. It will not be expected of us to
account for this fact — our readers are quite as well qualified to do so as we are.

REVIEW OF: THE :CONVENTIONAL: ARTICLES. 233
With respect to the election of stewards by the members, under certain
modifications of the privilege, we confess we cannot see any particular
objection ; and under our economy they are elected by the quarterly-
meeting Conference, composed, for the most part, of laymen and local
preachers. The preacher in charge, however, has the nomination ; and
when it is considered, that upon the faithfulness and zealous endeavours
of the stewards, particularly on the circuits, the preacher's support chiefly
depends, it will not be thought unreasonable that he should have such a
participation in the appointment of these officers. This is the rather
necessary, because, while in office, the stewards are in no way amenable
to the pastor for the discharge, of their official duties ; but are accountable
only to the conference which elects them.
But under the new economy, the stewards are not made accountable
anywhere for their official conduct. They are not like class-leaders, to be
elected annually, and in the nature and fitness of things can only be respon
sible to their constituents, while the constitution provides no way in which
these constituents can bring them to account for any official delinquency,
except it amount to such immorality as would deprive them of Church
membership. How strange that men, making such high pretensions as
our reformers, should commit such egregious blunders in legislation !
Concerning the new mode of appointing class-leaders, we have much to
say, and much which it greatly interests the members of our Church
deeply to reflect upon. This is one of the innovations of which we have
been most afraid from the beginning. It is among those which are most
plausible in theory, but most dangerous in practice, of all the changes
which have been proposed in our economy ; and its introduction would
require little else to destroy our whole system of itinerant ministration,
and make the Methodists a curse rather than a blessing to the whole
Christian world.
Of all the institutions of Methodism, none, except the itinerant ministry
itself, is of half the importance, or has had half the effect in promoting
the cause of religion, as class-meeting. It is not easy for the members or
ministry of other communions to appreciate the value of class-meeting to
us ; because they are not necessarily required by those who are provided
with a settled ministry. The minister who resides permanently among
his flock, can, in various ways, make himself acquainted with his com
municants, and personally give the particular instruction, reproof, or
exhortations which may be suitable to their individual cases. His per
sonal intercourse with his charge, will, if he be anxious to make the
inquiry, make him acquainted with the religious standing of every indi
vidual whom the great Shepherd has placed under his care ; and he may
find the suitable time and place for the necessary inquiries and advice.
But to an itinerant ministry this is impossible. His time is chiefly occu-

234 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
pied in riding and preaching ; and his transient sojourn at any one place,
does not afford him time to become personally acquainted with' a great
proportion of his flock, much less to have that full and unreserved com
munication with them, which would enable him to ascertain their religious
state, and to give the religious instruction which their particular circum
stances severally require. To supply this lack of service, our class-leaders
come in aid of the travelling preachers. They are, in fact, auxiliary/pas
tors of the Church, watching over the souls of their brethren, and leading
them, both by precept and example, to work out their salvation. They
should be, and mostly are, men of irreproachable character, of deep piety,
and much experience. Residing among the members of his class, the
leader necessarily becomes acquainted with their deportment in society ;
and from their connexions and occupations in life, can infer the peculiar
temptations to which they are liable. He is, therefore, prepared to guard
them, by suitable admonitions, against the temptations which may most
easily beset them, and to give them advice and encouragement under
circumstances of peculiar trial. Through the class-leaders, the itinerant
pastor, whose services are extended over a wide field of labour, becomes
acquainted with the state of the society, and is directed to such as par
ticularly require his care, either from affliction of body or mind ; and also
such as, walking disorderly, require to be dealt with according to the
directions of Discipline. Without these agents, our great missionary
work could not be carried on. Those who are gathered into the fold of
Christ by the preaching of the word, would be mostly lost for want of
pastoral care. The ministry would know httle or nothing of the religious
state of the membership, and the communion of the Church would become
a by-word and a reproach, even among the men of the world.
The appointment of the class-leaders — so necessary to the pastors in ful
filling the duties imposed by their commission, to feed the flock of Christ,
taking the oversight thereof — has been, of course, given to the preachers
in charge of circuits and stations, who are chiefly responsible to God for
the souls committed to their care. To take from them this prerogative
would be to compel them to commit the souls whom God had given them
for their hire to the keeping of those whose gifts and qualifications they
deemed inadequate to the trust, and over whom they could exercise no
control, however the societies might decline in spirituality through their
negligence or incapacity. It is true, that a preacher, recently come to the
charge of a circuit or station, may not be able alone and unaided to select
the most proper person to fill a vacancy which may have happened among
the class-leaders, nor will he pretend to do so. He can always find senior
brethren, stewards, local preachers, &c, to advise with upon such an occa
sion; and as he can labour under no temptation to make an improper
selection designedly, he will not fail to resort to the best counsel he can

REVIEW OF THE CONVENTIONAL ARTICLES. 235
find. And it is a remarkable fact in the history of our Church, that the
members are very much attached to their class-leaders, each preferring their
own, no matter how he may be excelled by others in talents or gifts. In
fact, the cementing influence of these little spiritual associations can only
be known to those who have enjoyed them and have entered into their
spirituality. In these httle meetings the soul is at once softened by
sympathy and invigorated by example ; is melted into tenderness by those
who mourn their unfaithfulness, whUe the experience of those who are
strong in faith encourages the weak to redouble their diligence and to
" press toward the mark for the prize of their high calling of God in Christ
Jesus." They are mutually comforted by their mutual faith. No worldly
motives, no temporary purposes, can have any influence here. Shut out
from the world and its anxious cares, they here think and speak only of
the concerns of their souls. The leader, possessing the confidence and love
of the members, speaks freely and folly to the case of each, reproving,
exhorting, and comforting, as the case may be, with all long-suffering and
kindness. While the law of love governs his heart he is not afraid to
probe to the bottom every wound, and however searching be his inquiries,
and however close be his advice, it is received in a corresponding spirit ;
and the man must be inconigible who is not benefitted by such religious
fellowship and communion.
Into these spiritual associations, those soul-cementing little bands, it is
proposed, by the new system of government, to introduce the demon of
discord, by an annually-contested election for class-leaders. Every class is
to be converted into an arena for contending partisans, and it requires little
sagacity and less Christian experience to anticipate the result. We object
to the innovation, —
First. Because those best fitted by their piety would not be candidates
in such a contest. The most pious are always the most retiring. They
who are best acquainted with their own hearts will always be best apprized
of their own weaknesses and infirmities, and wUl have the humblest opinion
of their gifts. They will, therefore, gladly dechne the responsibUities for
which true humility wm always suggest they are incompetent, and the
field will be left open for the froward and the aspiring — as unfit as they
are anxious to acquire pre-eminence in the Church. We have never yet
seen a man who considered himself eminently qualified for the office of a
class-leader who was reaUy fit for it ; nor have we seen any who have been
forward to enter into the ministry that have not given melancholy proof
that they had run before they were sent.
This is a fact that developed itself very early in our Church, and perhaps
in most other Churches. It has its origin in the very constitution of human
nature. The Rev. Charles Wesley was well apprized of this truth, and has
expressed it in his peculiarly-pointed manner : —

236 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
"How ready he is to go,
Whom God has never sent ;
How cautious, diflident, and slow,
His chosen instrument I"
Second. In the competition for class-leaders each class wUl necessarily
be divided, and it cannot fail to happen, that some warmth, if not bitter
ness of spirit, wiU be created. The person elected wdl come to the dis
charge of his very delicate duties with the certainty that a minority of the
¦class were opposed to , his election. Will he be under no temptation to
think less favourably of his opponents than of his supporters ? It would
be requiring more strength of mind than usually pertains to men, however
good they may be, to suppose them not susceptible of this bias. But if
he could be superior to such weakness, is it to be expected of aU or even
most of the minority, that they will be equally free from such influences ?
And if not, how will they receive the close dealing which a class-leader is
bound to use with those placed under his care ? When, in the strict dis
charge of his official duty, he points out anything which he judges blam-
able in their deportment, nothing is more certain than that some would
attribute it to the feelings which had arisen in the mind of the leader
toward them, in consequence of the part they had taken in the previous
election. How impenetrable must such an opinion render them to the
rebuke or even the advice of the leader !
Third. In the city stations the female classes meet separately ; and how
it will comport with prudence or discretion to agitate these with annual
elections for leaders we submit to the serious consideration of our brethren,
especiaUy as they cannot have the acquaintance with the candidates and
with their deportment in the world which might govern the male electors
in their choice. But in some, nay, most of the classes, a majority of the
members, male and female, are too young and have too little experience
to be qualified to judge at all of the qualifications which fit a man for the
important duties of a leader. With such persons, zeal and fervour is every
thing ; and a good singer, with a competent store of camp-meeting songs,
would have an incalculable advantage in the election. The sobered feel
ings of the veteran, war-worn Christian, his prudent councils and wise pre
cautionary advice, though essentially necessaiy to the young converts, are
far less to their taste than the fiery zeal and enthusiastic devotional exer
cises of those whose feelings are less under the control of an enlightened
understanding and well-disciplined judgment. We have known men in
our day, who, though unstable as water, and not at all exemplary in their
deportment before the world, from the warmth of their pubhc exercises, and
an unaccountable ability to waken up such feelings in others, would have
outpolled, in a class of young people, the best men and the best class-
leaders in the connexion. What would become of the Church if the

REVIEW OF THE CONVENTIONAL ARTICLES. 237
instruction and disciphne of our young members were committed to such
leaders, is easy to foretell without the spirit of prophecy.
Fourth. Suppose it should happen, as it often has happened, that the
majority of a class, and the leader, too, become lukewarm in religion, a
negligence of duty, and a manifest want of spirituahty pervading the
whole — the leader neglects the class, and the class neglect to assemble
themselves together in their class-room. The few who retain their stead
fastness mourn over the declension, but have no power to remedy the evil.
The majority love to have it so ; they love to enjoy the society of the vain
and the thoughtless, and to enter into those frivolous amusements in which
their former spiritual enjoyments have been dissipated and lost. The
leader sees no harm in such innocent trifling, and yet neither the one nor
the other wish to forfeit their membership, because there is some degree
of obloquy attached to expulsion. The heart of the pastor may bleed in
vain over these thoughtless sheep whose souls God had committed to his
care, but he has no remedy. A faithful, spiritual leader might yet
reclaim them ; but the blind have the selection of their guide, and prefer
one who will indulge them, and who is little less, or perhaps more, blind
ed than themselves. The pastor must mourn in silence or remonstrate in
vain. The ruin is inevitable. The leader and his class ultimately back
slide entirely, both in heart and in life, merely because the pastors of the
Church, together with the senior part of the membership, have no power
to interfere.
The innovation is an absurdity, because it proposes to take from the
itinerant ministry the choice and appointment of those agents through
whom only they can fulfil their pastoral duties to the Church ; and gives
no power to change them, however unfit they may be found to answer
the purposes of their appointment; and it is moreover founded in the
absurd supposition that all who enter our Church come into it fully
prepared to judge of the qualifications necessary to those who are to be
charged with their instruction in all the doctrines and duties of holiness.
Fifth. The innovation would not effect what it proposes, even were
the evils it brings with it less than we estimate them. It proposes to
give each member the privilege of meeting with the leader of his choice ;
but as every class would be more or less divided in the election, a part
must necessarily meet under a leader whom they have not only not
chosen but whom they have rejected. Under the present system, the
members have at least an opportunity of selecting a leader from among
those who have been constituted such; and as they have not been
taught to look forward to an annual election for leader, nor solicited
by rival candidates or their friends " for their votes and influence," they
are generally satisfied with, and edified by, those they have chosen.
Upon the whole, we feel humbly thankful to God for having been

238 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
saved from the sore evil of an annual election for class-leaders. And the
Christian community have common cause of rejoicing with us, that those
little associations of Christians, denominated class-meetings, distributed
over our country, diffusing the benefits of Christian love and religious fel
lowship in their several neighbourhoods, have not been converted into so
many arenas of electioneering conflict and strife, biting and devouring one
another, and bringing reproach, not only on themselves, but upon the
common cause of Christianity.
. The leading objection, which from the beginning has been urged
against the innovations proposed in our ecclesiastical pohty, is, that the
changes, if made, would destroy our itinerant system, and eventually
produce in its stead a congregational system, or some other plan of
government recognising a settled pastoral ministry. It is true that the
advocates of these innovations professed no intention to destroy our itiner
ant plan ; on the contrary, they would have persuaded us that they were
its best friends. But it was easily foreseen that the principles upon
which they acted, and the measures they adopted to effect their purposes,
would as inevitably produce such a result as if it were intended. Many,
however, continued to think the innovators sincere in their professions of
attachment to the plan of an itinerant ministry, even up to the time of
their late convention. It required a development of their whole scheme,
in its practical details, to undeceive them, and this development has
been made to the satisfaction of every friend of Methodism who is not
weak enough to be misled by mere names. The constitution and form
of government adopted by the convention, whUe it proposes an itinerant
plan of operation, makes the itinerancy a subordinate appendage to the
great system. It requires, indeed, of the itinerant ministers all the sacri
fices and privations to which our plan subjects them — a submission to the
appointments which are assigned them, whatever sacrifices of personal or
domestic comforts such submission may involve, — while those who make
these appointments are elected by laymen and local preachers, over
whom the appointing power can exercise no authority whatever. These
are terms upon which no man ought to consent to be an itinerant preacher ;
and if any do so, they will soon tire of the service in which they have
engaged. To serve masters of their own choosing — to commit to those
whom they themselves have selected, an absolute disposal of aU that con
cerns their own temporal convenience, and the comfort and happiness of
their families — is aU that ought to be expected even of travelling preachers;
but to require of them to submit to such authority, when vested in those
whom they have not chosen, and over whom they have, and can have, no
control — task-masters, who have been appointed over them by others,
who do not themselves feel the weight of the power they have created— is
too much to expect of human nature, and more, perhaps, than can be

REVIEW OF THE CONVENTIONAL ARTICLES. 239
conscientiously conceded. Our travelhng preachers submit to the appoint
ment of the bishops, who may send them to labour in any part of the
United States. They do this because they beheve the great plan of mis
sionary operation in which they are engaged cannot be carried on without
lodging somewhere the absolute power of distributing the labourers. They
have, therefore, committed this power to those who, having participated,
and continuing to participate with them in then- labours and privations,
have entitled themselves to their confidence ; and who, partaking of the
common suffering, and devoted to the common cause, have no local inter
ests to subserve and no private ends to gratify ; and, moreover, are pre
pared to sympathize with them in their sufferings, not only with a parental
solicitude, but from an experimental acquaintance with their privations and
sacrifices. The bishops have been selected, and the authority with which
they are invested has been conferred, by the preachers over whom they
exercise it ; and this authority may be withdrawn or modified at the will
of those who conferred it, and over whom it is exercised. But under
the new system, the local preachers and laity, who make up a very large
majority of the annual conferences, are to make the preachers' appoint
ments, either in the collective body, or in such other way as they may
direct ; and in whatever manner this may be done, the travelling preach
ers, constituting a feeble minority in the conference, can make no resistance
to the absolute domination of the laity and local preachers.
If the above allegations against the new system be just, we think it
will be admitted by the most sceptical, that no permanent and efficient
itinerancy can be established upon the principles of government adopted
by the convention ; and that they are just, a very cursory review wiU be
sufficient to show.
By. the sixth article it is provided that aU the ordained ministers, trav
elling and local, shall have a seat in the annual conferences, and that
there shall be a lay delegation equal to the whole number of ministers in
said conferences ; and it is subsequently provided, that these conferences
shall provide the mode of stationing the traveUing preachers, who shaU
be bound to submit to such appointment ; and that the president elected
by the conference, shall have the absolute disposal of these travelling
preachers, during the year for which he is elected. It wiU be seen that in
the constitution of these conferences the travelling preachers will bear a
very insignificant part. They wiU probably be out-numbered, as ten to
one by the local preachers, without taking the laymen into the account,
who make up one-half of the conference. The appointing power with all
its absolute prerogatives may therefore be lodged exclusively in the hands
of local preachers or laymen, over whom this tremendous power cannot
be exercised in any way whatever. The travelling preachers are expected
to yield implicit submission to those whose authority they have not con-

240 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
ferred, and cannot limit or restrain ; and those, too, who do not participate
in their privations and sufferings, and who cannot therefore be supposed,'
either justly to appreciate their amount, or properly sympathize with those
who endure them. Add to all this that each annual conference has the
power to make rules and regulations for its own government, and for the
government of the circuits and stations within its bounds, limited only by
the constitution, and it will be seen that the travelling preachers are to
submit, even after their appointments, to such regulations as may be
imposed upon them by the laity and local preachers, who constitute the
great body of the annual conferences; and, in short, will be reduced to
the simple condition of domestic missionaries, doing whatever duty their
task-masters may assign them, and that too without any stipulated com
pensation. We know that a late commentator has aUeged that the travelhng
preachers and the laity, constituting a majority in the annual conferences,
wfll at aU times be able to " keep the local preachers in order." But it
must not be forgotten that the local preachers wiU be more likely to pos
sess undue influence with the laity than the itinerant preachers. They
will come up together to the conference ; will be identified in the local
interests of their stations or circuits ; wul be often found aUied by mar
riage or consanguinity, and always by vicinity of residence and habitual
intercourse. The local preachers being speakers by profession, the lay
delegates will be dependent upon them for the necessary representation of
the particular circumstances and wants of their constituents, and whk from
all these circumstances, acquire an influence over the lay delegates which
cannot be acquired by the small proportion of travelhng preachers who
will be found in the conference. It will even be in the power of the local:
preachers to exert much influence in the election of the lay delegates ;
because from their ministerial services they will be extensively known
among the membership, and cannot fail to give a powerful support to
those candidates whom they may favour with their recommendation. It
may be alleged further in support of the presumption, that the local
preachers will acquire an undue preponderance in the new system, — that
the history of all Churches who have adopted a confederated form of
government, and have admitted a lay delegation into the councUs of the
Church, shows that the laymen are very remiss in their attention to their
delegated duties ; and even in the late convention, the local preachers
constituted a majority of the assembly. Whatever therefore may be the
privileges of the laity, the ministry will eventually have the business of
legislation pretty much to themselves ; and of these, the local preachers
in the new Church will constitute an overwhelming majority, and thereby
secure in fact all the power to themselves.
Thus the tendency of the system we are reviewing is inevitably to con-

REVIEW OF THE CONVENTIONAL ARTICLES. 241
gregationahsm and a local ministry. The privations are all on the part
of the travelling preachers, whUe the advantages are aU in favour of the
local preachers.; and, as if the result were foreseen and provided for, each
society or Church is, by the third article of the constitution, separately
and distinctly vested with the right of property in the houses they may
bmld for the purposes of public worship, or for parsonages, or which may
be built for them by the contributions of their brethren.
Whenever, therefore, they may prefer a local to a travelhng preacher,
they may settle one, and refuse the use of the pulpit to the minister sent
to them by the conference, as weU as all contribution for his support.
The travelling preacher may spend his strength and his health in preach
ing the gospel, and in raising societies and Churches, but his local brethren
will enter into his labours and reap all the temporal benefits of his
ministry. The right which the Methodist Episcopal Church secures to her travel
ling preachers of occupying the pulpits in the several churches which
belong to the stations or circuits where they may be appointed to labour,
is all that is secured to them, as regards the Church property ; and this
privilege has been loudly complained of, and represented by our adver
saries as vesting an absolute right of property in the bishops: because
they have the right, " not of taking the houses from the people, but of
taking the preachers from the houses." Absurd as this allegation is, it is
rendered still more obviously so by the fact that, although the bishop may
change the preacher, yet he must fill the appointments if there be labourers
enough at his disposal. And he is moreover amenable for his conduct to
those who appoint him, and over whom he exercises his authority. The
Methodist houses of worship are considered as the common property of
the Methodists, both preachers and people. They are often, with this view,
erected chiefly by the contributions of those who have no personal occa
sion for their use. The necessity for the erection of a meeting-house in
any place being ascertained, all we require is, that it shaU contribute when
erected, its quota of facility to the common missionary purpose for which
we are associated ; and that it be so settled, as not to be, under any cir
cumstances, diverted from the use for which it was erected.
It is weU that this article has made known the localizing system of our
reformers. Who will contribute to the erection of a house of worship which
is destined to follow the vicissitudes of religious opinion which may take
place in any separate and isolated society ? Under the operation of this
rule, should the societies vested with a right in these houses renounce
the doctrines of Christianity, and become Unitarians, or followers of Mr.
Owen, the houses would, nevertheless, continue their property, and might
be converted to any use which suited then purposes.
It may, however, be asked, whether the General Conference of the
16

242 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
associated Methodist Churches may not so alter the present constitution
as to make it more favourable to an itinerant system. To this we answer,
that the complexion of the General Conference is still more adverse to the
interests of the traveUing preachers than the annual conferences. In the
latter, the itinerant ministry are at least sure of being present ; but from
the General Conference they may be excluded altogether. The repre
sentatives are to be chosen by the annual conferences, in which, as we have
shown, the traveUing ministry wUl constitute a very smaU minority ; and
there is nothing in the constitution which requires that any portion of
them shall be chosen as representatives to the General Conference. The
supreme councU of the Church may therefore be composed of local preach
ers and laymen exclusively, notwithstanding that, if an efficient itinerancy
be intended, the measures which wiU be the subjects of deliberation in
that body must chiefly relate to the great missionary operations of the
Church, and consequently to the duties and labours of the traveUing
preachers. If any wiU be itinerant preachers on such terms as these,
they are welcome to the crown of martyrdom they covet ; we shaU not envy
them the glory of suffering in such a cause. Indeed the absurdity of the con
ventional articles is so apparent, upon the supposition that they were reaUy
designed to provide for an itinerant system of ministration, that we can
not admit the supposition at ah. The itinerancy has always been a
popular part of Methodism, — and avowedly to abandon it would have
frustrated aU the plans of the leading separatists. They could have pro
cured no foUowers from among the membership, had they proposed at
once a congregational government and a settled ministry. When this
comes to pass — and come it necessarily must — it wul be represented and
deplored as the result of uncontrollable necessity. Meantime, they were
under the necessity of throwing out a tub to the whale, as their predeces
sors were in the New- York convention ; and, in about the same length
of time, the " Associated Methodists " wiU have about as many regular
itinerant ministers as the memorable "Methodist Society" have.
We are aware that at first there wUl be preachers who wiU enter the
list of itinerancy, calculating on their own personal popularity for the
influence they hope to exercise in the Church and its councUs. They
well know that some degree of firmness and stability must be acquired by
the Church authorities, before they can venture to control their choice of
stations or circuits. The very paucity of their numbers will, in the outset,
occasion them to be courted, and flattered, and followed, by those whose
party sphit must be gratified by producing, through the agency of travel
ling preachers, contention, strife, and division in our Church : when the
strife is over, and they cease to make proselytes ; when a division of the
spoU is to be made, and the preponderance of local influence begins to be
felt, they can locate also, and thus have at least an equal chance in the

REVIEW OF THE CONVENTIONAL ARTICLES. 243
scramble for churches and congregations, which will inevitably occur.
The people in the mean time wiU be cured of their itinerant prepossessions.
Pains have heretofore been taken to alienate the affections of our mem
bership from their- itinerant ministers, by the most cruel imputations upon
their characters, and the most slanderous misrepresentations of their
motives. It will be against the travelling preachers that the disciples of
the separatists wiU be taught to wage a war of extermination. Hatred to
the itinerant ministers will be easily extended to tlie itinerancy itself, —
and then everything wiU be adjusted to the hiring of the seceding local
preachers. We expect to be misrepresented by our adversaries ; but let us not be
misunderstood by our brethren of other denominations : we entertain no
hostility to congregational Church government, nor to any other system
of ecclesiastical pohty which provides for and supports a settled ministry.
We readily acknowledge the right of every Christian Church to judge for
themselves, as to the way in which they can best provide for their own
spiritual welfare, and greatly rejoice in the good which has been done,
and is still doing by them, under the various forms of government, and
different plans of operation which they have instituted. Perhaps the
great Head of the Church has permitted us thus to differ in things indif
ferent, for the purpose of multiplying effort, and varying the means of
spreading the gospel ; and we would not complain of the evident tendency
of the system which has been adopted by the separatists from our Church
towards Congregationalism, if they did not urge upon us the adoption of
then schemes, and bitterly revUe us, because we tenaciously adhere to the
institutions under which we have long prospered, and which have enabled
us to be extensively useful in the common effort to diffuse Christianity
throughout the world. We have, as a people, endeavoured to follow the
leadings of Providence from the beginning, and we cannot change our
present plan of operation until it shall please God to point out to us some
other plan by which we can do more good. Meantime, the circumstances
of our origin and our whole history clearly point to an itinerant system
of ministration as our particular calling. This appears to be the portion
of labour which has been assigned by the Lord of the vineyard to us as a
people. We do not deem ourselves called to substitute or render unneces
sary the labours of others, or the efforts of other Churches, but to supply
their lack of service— to carry, or send the gospel to those who could not
be reached in the ordinary methods to which a settled ministry are neces
sarily limited. Our whole system is essentially a missionary one, pro
posing to furnish an evangelical ministry, not only to those who desire
it, but to those who are too ignorant to know the value of the privilege,
and therefore cannot be expected to ask for such services. Other Churches
may furnish ministers to those who call them— and we are happy that

244 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
those who ask can have : but to call and settle a minister, implies that
those who do so, have already been brought to understand and experience
the benefits of the gospel ; and, moreover, that they have the means and
are willing to provide for the support of a minister. But when all who
are willing to call and settle ministers are supplied, many precious souls
wul be destitute of the word of life, who are nevertheless included in the
commission given by our Lord to his disciples, " Go into all the world,
and preach the gospel to every creature." To supply these, however,
requires a system of missionary operation in which the personal comforts
and conveniences of the missionaries can scarcely be consulted at all ; and
such is our itinerant system. And the labours of our ministers are as
necessary to other Churches as to our own. Ministers of other denomi
nations often find settlements, in consequence of the religious interest which
has been waked up in a neighbourhood by a Methodist itinerant, who,
labouring in his vocation as a missionary, had visited it, and carried to
the very doors of the people the blessings of the gospel. It is true, that
such a system requires sacrifices of the membership as well as of the min
istry. When the minister cannot be allowed to choose his place of labour,
the membership must relinquish their right of choosing the minister who
may be most acceptable to them ; and those who are able, must feel the
rehgious obligation of supporting a ministry who are perhaps labouring
among a people whom they have never seen. These are thought by
some to be great sacrifices ; but, generally speaking, we have not found
them so. On the contrary, we believe we have been greatly benefitted
by the an-angement, even in our best established societies ; and that the
itinerant, system has greatly tended, not only to the spread of the gospel,
but to preserve in the Church a zealous, laborious, and self-denying
ministry. The tenacity with which the Methodists adhere to their itinerancy, and
the firmness with which they resist all innovations upon the system by
which it has heretofore been perpetuated, will not be surprising to our
brethren of other denominations, when they reflect that it has been much
blessed to us ; and that we have been led to consider this feature of our
economy, not only as the distinguishing feature of Methodism, but as the
part of our plan which has been most efficient in that vast field of mis
sionary labour which we have so long occupied, and by which we are
encouraged to hope for still more extensive usefulness in the world. We
ask nothing of our adversaries, but that they wiU let us alone. The world
is before them, and there is ample room for their utmost exertions to
reclaim sinners, and organize them into Churches, We shall throw no
impediments in their way, if they design to pursue this good work But
it cannot be their calling to sow strife and dissension among brethren. If
they prefer their local system, let them enjoy it. Following the best light

REVIEW OF THE CONVENTIONAL ARTICLES. 245
we have, we shaU adhere to the institutions of our fathers, until some
opening of Providence shall unequivocally direct us to a better course.
Nothing, in the new system of Church government, adopted by the late
convention of reformers, has so much disappointed the public expectation,
as the total abandonment of those republican principles which had been
their constant theme during the seven years' war which they had waged
against the Methodist Episcopal Church. We had been led to suppose,
that nothing would satisfy these " free-born sons of America," as they
fondly styled themselves, but a Church government founded upon the
principles and copying the institutions of the civil government of our
country. It was the want of this conformity in the polity of our Church
to the constitution of the United States, that was made the ground of
incessant reproach and declamation against us, by those who insisted upon
a total change in our ecclesiastical economy. In vain did we allege the
necessary and essential difference between Church and State governments.
In vain did we show that they were totally dissimilar in their origin, in
the authority with which they were intrusted, and in the design of their
institution ; and that it could not therefore be expected or desired, that
institutions so entirely different in their nature, should be ahke in their
organization. In answer to all this, though it was found impossible to
reason, it was nevertheless found very practicable to declaim ; and the
changes were incessantly rung upon the popular topics of hberty and
equality, and the civil rights acknowledged by the constitution of our
country to reside in the people. We were thus authorized to suppose the
new constitution and form of government would be based upon the prin
ciple that all power resides in the people ; and that the exercise of this
power, in enacting and executing the laws, would be committed only to
the representatives of the people or membership of the new Church.
It could not fail to surprise those who had given credit to the loud and
long professions of republicanism which had been made by the leaders
of this wonderful reformation, that they commenced their career in consti
tution-making by a direct acknowledgment of the rights of privileged
orders in their government ; orders, too, not only distinguished by min
isterial privileges, but to whom were allowed superior advantages and
authority in legislation. It was not, indeed, expected that the new system
would recognise in the people, that is, in the membership, a common right
to preach the gospel, because the framers of it had all along admitted that
this right could only be conferred by divine authority. But they had
strenuously insisted at the same time, that the ministry had no superior
claims in the government of the Church, and in this respect could only
participate in the common privUege of legislating in person, or by their
representatives. If so, why did the convention admit the whole body of
the ministry into the annual conferences, and a representation from them

246 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
in the General Conference, equal in number to that from the membership ?
for this, although not secured, seems to have been intended. Nothing
can be more essential to the existence of a republican government, than
representation apportioned according to numbers ; yet if the proportion
between the membership and the . ministry in the new Church shall be
anything like that which exists in the Church from which they have
seceded, the ministry will be to the membership as httle more than about
one to one hundred, and, of course, this promised paragon of excellence
in Church government — this liberty and equality system — turns out to be
one in which one local preacher embodies in his own puissant httle self,
as much legislative and executive authority as one hundred of the common
people !
It will avail nothing to urge in justification of this feature in the new
constitution, that in the Methodist Episcopal Church the government
is intrusted to the travelling preachers ; because we have never pretended
to be influenced in our ecclesiastical economy by the abstract principles
which have been so strenuously contended for by our opponents. We
admit that our Church government is based upon the broad principle of
utility. Our itinerant ministry having a common interest with the mem
bership, and being enabled by their occupation to acquire a more perfect
and comprehensive understanding of the general interests and wants of
our community, we have been willing to leave to them the adoption of
such prudential regulations as may be necessary to carry into effect the
common purpose of our association, namely, " to spread Scripture holi
ness over the earth ;" and we do this with perfect safety while we have
confidence in the piety and intelligence of our ministry ; while, from their
itinerant life, they are prevented from forming those isolated associations
which would tend to localize their interests or circumscribe their views ;
and while they continue entirely dependant upon the voluntary contribu
tions of the membership for their maintenance. In short, on the ground
of expediency, which we assume as the foundation of our polity, we have
many reasons to urge in favour of the existing regulations of our Church,
and it will afford us the same justification when circumstances shall induce
us to change them. But our reformers have never assailed the utility of
our institutions, nor proposed to change them on the plea of expediency.
They were deterred from this course by the amount and stubbornness of
the facts that stood in their way. The utility of our institutions is attested
by their success — a success without parallel in the modern history of the
Christian Church. They could only be assailed by abstract disquisitions,
and by contrasting them with popular political principles, with which in
their nature and application they had nothing to do.
We were therefore held up to the community as enemies to the govern
ment of our country, because we did not conform our economy to the rep-

REVIEW OF THE CONVENTIONAL ARTICLES. 247
resentative system, so happhy adopted as the basis of our civil institutions.
Our opponents had therefore pledged themselves that when they " set up
for themselves " they would conform their Church pohty to the civil con
stitution of our country. Instead of this, however, they have instituted a
government, with just enough of democratical appearances to induce the
membership to accept it, while, in fact, the local preachers are clothed with
such powers and privileges as enable them to engross all the authority,
both legislative and executive, in the Church. This is the more unac
countable because there was neither necessity, utility, nor safety, in making
this sacrifice of the principles for which the reformers had so zealously con
tended. That there was no necessity for it, they have themselves acknow
ledged ; for, in their petition to the last General Conference, the former
convention had expressly prayed, that the local preachers might be identi
fied with the laity in the representation which they desired to have in that
body. The local preachers abandoned all claim to a distinct and separate
delegation from their own body, and even to the privilege of being united
with the delegation from the itinerant ministry. Such privileges could not,
therefore, be deemed necessaiy to the good of the Church, or they would
have been prayed for, or, at least, the claim to them would not have been
renounced. The utility or even safety of the membership thus succumb
ing to local-preacher domination, we hope we have clearly disproved. If
anything more was wanting we might add, that many of the circumstances
which make it safe in the Methodist Episcopal Church to commit authority
to the itinerant preachers are wanting in the body to which the new Church
has given it The permanent residence of the local preachers within cir
cumscribed districts of country, not only precludes them from acquiring
that knowledge of the general state of the Church essential to the adapta
tion of general provisions for her welfare, but also tends to localize their
interests and feelings. "Local men have local views." Moreover, they
are exempted from that wholesome dependence upon the laity for the
temporal support, both of themselves and families, which, with us, infalli
bly preserves the balance of power. Nor is there in the new Church any
substitute for this wholesome check upon the authority of their local-
preacher legislators. They are no way amenable to the membership for
their acts or doings. They are not the representatives of the people. The
people are not their constituents, and therefore cannot, as is necessary in
all representative governments, express by their votes their opinions in
regard to their legislators or the laws they have enacted. If, as we are
told by a late essayist in the Mutual Rights, " money is power," it wiU be
obvious that it is unsafe to commit legislative authority to those over whose
money matters the community exercises no control, and whose claim to
the right of legislation is, at the same time, beyond the reach of those for
whom they legislate. Hence it was unwise, as well as antirepublican, in

2A8 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
the laity of the new Church to give such an overwhelming influence to
their local preachers, who were in no way dependant upon them, when
they had felt such fearful apprehensions from the power of itinerant
preachers, whose whole authority the membership could annihilate by
simply tying their purse-strings.
Upon the whole it is obvious that, even in reference to the balance of
power between the ministry and membership, the laity of the new Church
have changed their situation for the worse ; and this was the only change
they ever hoped to make for the better. They always admitted that in
the Methodist Episcopal Church the gospel was faithfuUy and effectually
preached, the ordinances duly administered, the moral discipline unexcep
tionable, and the membership generally pious. But then, the government
was not sufficiently republican, — the preachers were not sufficiently
responsible. The preachers, however, subsisted by their bounty, and
therefore could do nothing to the prejudice of the membership without at
the same time compromitting their own interests. Nevertheless, to avoid
this imaginary ScyUa they have run into a real Charybdis ; for they have
in effect given up the reins of government to local preachers, over whom
they have no such salutary check or control ; and, instead of a republican
government, have established one, the distinguishing feature of which is
a privileged order, and the predominating principle of which is its irre
sponsibility to the people.
The mention of money matters brings to our recollection a radical defect
which we noticed in looking over the articles of association. There is no
provision for paying the expenses of the- delegates, either lay, local, or
itinerant, to and from the General Conference. The local and itinerant
delegates may do well enough perhaps without such a provision — they
may preach and levy contributions on their way. But what are the lay
delegates to do ? If no provision is made by the circuits or stations in
which they reside, nor by the General Conference, one of two things must
fake place, — either the lay delegates will not generally attend when the
Conference is at a great distance from their residences, or the delegation
must be selected from the rich members, who can, individually, bear the
expense, to the utter exclusion of those whose circumstances in life will not
justify the expense. Even of the richer part of the membership, few will
be found so situated as to be able to leave their families for two or three
months without great inconvenience : so that the selection must be confined
chiefly to those who are rich, who have no families, and no business ; and
these will be hopeful legislators, in general, for a Church ! If the delegates
from a distance do not generally attend, the business must be done by
those living in the vicinity of the Conference, and the wants and wishes of
remote districts cannot be attended to, the inevitable consequence of which
will be a dissolution of the confederacy ; and when this takes place, into

REVIEW OF THE CONVENTIONAL ARTICLES. 249
how many fragments the associated Churches will be broken it is impossi
ble to imagine.
If, on the contrary, the circuits and stations are expected each to pro
vide for the expenses of their own delegates, the result will be the same.
Some will be found too poor to avad themselves of their privileges ; and in
aU the more remote circuits and stations the inequality of the burden
will be a just subject of complaint, which, if not removed, must dissolve
the association. The expenses of a delegate from some places must exceed
that of others a hundredfold. It will therefore be contended, and justly,
too, that expenses incurred for the common benefit should be equally borne
by all. The funds out of which the delegates are to be reimbursed must,
of course, be a common one, and its supply must not be left to the uncer
tain result of voluntary contribution, but must be collected by the equal
apportionment of a general taxation. As the ministiy have a distinct and
separate delegation, they ought, in all conscience, to pay their own repre
sentatives, which, supposing their delegates to incur the same expenses as
the lay delegates, would be one-half of the whole amount of the levy.
This will be a heavy assessment, when we consider what a large representa
tion they are to have in proportion to their numbers. Even the blessings
of authority are not without their inconveniences. In this instance the
power will be retained, but we shall be mistaken if an effort is not made
to make a more equable distribution of its accompaniments.
We shall probably be told that the late convention afforded an instance
of the willingness of the delegates elected by the membership to attend
to their duties without compensation. We are not sure,, however, that
the expenses of many were not borne by those who sent them ; and the
record of the absentees, even under the circumstances of the extraordinary
excitement in which the convention was got up, gives fearful presage of
what will happen when party spirit has subsided. The delegation was
also confined to those whose places of residence were either in the vicinity
of Baltimore, or to such as were engaged in commercial pursuits, and who
had other business in this city.
Extraordinary efforts were hkewise made for the occasion, some idea of
which may be formed from the fact that, in a neighbouring circuit, after
advertising for a month in the newspapers, that a meeting of reformers
would take place on a certain day at the county town, to elect delegates
to the convention, nine persons met and elected six representatives ! The
partial representation which was obtained in the last convention is there
fore of itself sufficient to show that something more must be done to insure
a general return of delegates from all parts of the Union to the supreme
council of the Church. In short, when men undertake to do business in
which others have an equal concern, they entertain the reasonable expec
tation that the expenses attending the transaction wm be bome equally by

250 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
all parties ; and the most that could be expected of the delegates is, that
they will serve without any compensation for their loss of time, and this
is more than many can afford to do. The result of the whole is, that the
means of paying the expenses of the delegates must be certainly provided
for by the Church. The only adequate and certain means that can be
devised is taxation, and hence the new association have only the choice
between taxation and dissolution.
When this necessity of resorting to taxation in a Church government,
constituted according to the notions of our reformers, was suggested, some
time ago, in the "Appeal to the Methodists," the objection was met simply
by the question, " Could not the delegates be instructed by their constitu
ents not to tax them ?" To which it was only necessary to reply, that
they certainly might ; but this would not remove the difficulty, inasmuch
as it would still remain necessary to meet by some other means the expenses
of the delegates to the General Conference.
We are told, however, that if the articles of association are faulty they
can be mended ; and, indeed, they remind us of what the facetious Butler
says of some religious creeds, which
 " Were intended

For nothing else but to be mended."
The idea of mending such a disjointed, incongruous system as the one
we have been reviewing, is in the last degree absurd. It reminds us of
the reply of Pope's postilion to his master's frequent ejaculation, " Lord,
mend me." " Mend you !" said the postilion, looking at his crooked
back and general deformity ; " it would not be half as much trouble to
make a new one." There are in the system as many defects at least as
there are articles, any one of which would be fatal to the success of the
whole scheme. In fact, the principles upon which it is based are not
only wrong but absurd ; and therefore the superstructure can neither be
repaired nor remodelled to any useful puipose. The builders must lay a
different and more solid foundation before they can erect a budding of such
magnitude and utility as they propose.
Those who speak confidently of mending the present constitution of the
new Church at the next convention, have taken a very superficial view of
the articles of association. Some alterations of minor importance may be
made, because it may not be the interest of the local preachers to oppose
them ; but none will or can be effected that will go to lessen their prepon
derance in the government of the Church, because the ministry will pos
sess a representation in the convention equal to that of the laity, and can
thereby prevent any changes which may be prejudicial to their interest.
It is in vain, then, that the constitution provides, in theory, for its own
amendment. Any effort to curtail the powers or privileges of the local

REVIEW OF THE CONVENTIONAL ARTICLES. 251
preachers, will be defeated by their own delegation and the influence
they cannot fail to have over their personal friends among the lay repre
sentatives. It wUl not, therefore, be in the power of the next convention
to lessen the relative proportion of ministerial delegates in that body,
unless the preachers themselves desire it; and this we think is not a
probable contingency. Alterations allowed by the constitution may be as
impracticable as if they were forbidden. The constitution of the State of
Maryland, according to its provisions, may be So altered by the people as
to restrict the right of suffrage to freeholders only ; but it is obviously as
much impossible to effect such an alteration, as if it were prohibited en
tirely ; because a large majority of the voters are interested in preventing
it : and, for the same reason, it will be impossible to effect any alterations
in the provisions of the articles of association, which give undue weight
to the ministry in the government of the new Church. They will possess
in the very body which only can change the constitution, an equal num
ber of votes and a superior amount of talents and influence. The local
preachers will therefore continue to possess a paramount authority in the
Church government they have already formed, in spite of the siren song
about liberty and equality with which they have been for the last seven
years beguiling their enchanted hearers.
We proceed to notice some other provisions in the new constitution,
which are worthy of attention. It will be recollected that among the
regulations of our Church, none were so much complained of by our
reformers, as the rule respecting such as should be convicted of " endeav
ouring to sow dissensions in the Church, by inveighing against our doc
trines and discipline ;" and the rule providing the method to be pursued
in the trial of members who should be accused of violating the Discipline.
It wul, therefore, surprise our readers to learn that the reformers have
adopted the first, without any alteration whatever, into their new code ;
and the other they have also admitted with this additional provision, " that
nothing therein contained shall be so construed as to deprive an accused
member of the right to challenge," — a provision which cannot be practi
cally admitted without rendering the expulsion of a member impossible,
if he desires to retain his membership. It will be perceived that the right
to challenge is not restricted in any way whatever. It is not limited to a
right to challenge for cause ; it is a right to challenge peremptorily any
person, and any number of persons, who may be appointed on the com
mittee, without assigning any reason for it whatever. So that if the
accused shall only persevere in challenging, he may not only escape con
viction, however guilty, but elude all the efforts of the Church to bring
him to trial. How tmly it has been said, that "to innovate is not to
reform /" The right to object to any person who may be summoned to
try a case involving the character or interests of one against whom he

252 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
had shown himself prejudiced, requires no ecclesiastical statute, without
supposing great depravity in the administrators of discipline ; and should
such depravity exist, its effects would be prevented by the superior judica
tory, having appellate jurisdiction in the case ; but to give a right to chal
lenge peremptorily, and that without limitation, is to defeat the ends of
justice altogether, and to expose the communion of the Church to open
profanation. Our reformers must try their hands upon this article again,
whatever they may do with the rest. In its present shape it will never
do. It is of itself sufficient to destroy all the ends of Christian disciphne,
and a few more abortive efforts to improve upon our Discipline, wUl, at
least, have one good effect : they will teach innovators that, though no
human system of government can be absolutely perfect, yet it is often much
easier to point out defects than to mend them.
We know that the General Conference have anxiously desired to im
prove that part of our Discipline which relates to the trial of offending
members, and have had under their consideration at different times, a
variety of propositions to this effect; but hitherto none have been pro
posed which were not more defective than that which they proposed to
amend. We venture to promise on the part of the General Conference,
that they will readily make any proper change in this matter, which may
be suggested to them by either friend or foe. It is alike their interest and
then duty to do so. But let him who advises an alteration be sure that
he understands the matter ; that his situation commands a view of the
whole ground. Let him not form his opinion upon views which he may
have taken of city stations or circuits, where the societies are numerous,
but adapt his plan to all the great variety of circumstances in which our
membership are found in our widely-extended connexion. Many a plausi
ble scheme, when viewed in the abstract, will be found to be utterly inap
plicable to the circumstances of the people for whose benefit it is designed.
The celebrated John Locke, author of the well-known work on the human
mind, prepared, at the request of the proprietors of North Carolina, a con
stitution and form of government for the people of that colony, which was
found upon the experiment so utterly inapphcable to the state of the popu
lation, that it was, after some feeble attempts to estabhsh it, totaUy laid
aside ; and the woodsmen met together and adopted a few simple regu
lations, much more suitable to their circumstances than the recondite pro
duction of that distinguished metaphysician. It should also be remem
bered by all constitution-manufacturers, that it is not by the want of laws
only that a society, whether civil or ecclesiastical, may be placed in diffi
culties — they may be equally "embarrassed by too much regulation."
And in the instance to which we have alluded above, the members Of the
new association may find it as inconvenient and as dangerous to their
peace and prosperity, to have introduced a rule into then discipline, by

REVIEW OF THE CONVENTIONAL ARTICLES. 253
which the most unworthy members may hold their membership in defiance
of all the constituted authorities of the Church, as, to have risked the im
probable contingency of an accused member being refused the privnege
of objecting to a hostile committee ; especiaUy, as such mal-administra-
tion would always find a corrective in the quarterly-meeting conference,
unless a universal corruption had pervaded the Church ; and in that ease,
a good man would not be very anxious to retain his membership.
But there is one effort at emendation, which seems to give the separatists
great satisfaction ; and it would seem hard to deprive them of at least one
subject of gratulation, to console them for the manifest and total failure
in the other parts of their code. The effort, too, comes to us with such
an air of piety, that we would incline to commend it, if it were only for
the habihments in which it is dressed ; for pious endeavours are always
entitled to respect, though the opinions by which they are directed be
ever so en-oneous. But, with all our disposition to be merciful, we can-
hot spare our reformers this one matter of rejoicing. It is, notwithstand
ing its imposing appearance, an error, and it is our duty to expose it ;
that when, at their next convention, they commence reforming their
recently-reformed code, they may correct this among other defects. We
allude to the provision in the fifth article, which enacts, that " the first busi
ness of the quarterly conference shall be, to inquire into the official and
rehgious characters of all its members."
Dr. Jennings, in his remarks on the conventional articles, lately pub
lished, chuckles over this rule of discipline, as a matter of great triumph
over the old-side brethren. This rule may be practised, he says, in some
quarterly-meeting conferences of our Church ; but for such practice there
is no rule of Discipline. Now we confess we did not know that such
a practice ever did obtain among us anywhere ; and we are very sure it
ought not to be introduced, either as custom or discipline, for this obvious
reason, that it would preclude all the lay members of the conference from
the benefit of an appeal, if they thought themselves aggrieved by the
decision of the conference, in reference to any matter which might be
aUeged against their religious characters. If upon such inquiry any alle
gations should be made against a layman, the conference must do one of
two things, — either appoint a committee to investigate the charges, or
bring the member to trial before their own body. In the latter case, there
would be no superior judicatory to whom an appeal would lie ; and in the
former, the accused must appeal from the decision of the committee to the
quarterly-meeting conference who appointed it, and before whom the
charges were made, — that is, the member must appeal to the grand-jury
who originated the indictment. In our annual conferences and district
conferences this practice obtains ; but tlie members of these conferences
have an appeal to higher Church judicatories. But to subject class-

254 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
leaders and stewards, who are mostly laymen, to the same regulation,
would be cmel and unjust, because it would deprive them of a privUege
common to all the rest of their brethren. It is common among us for
the quarterly-meeting conference to inquire into the official conduct,
gifts, and qualifications of the members, but never into their moral or
religious characters. They are to be dealt with as other members of the
Church are, for any irrehgious or immoral conduct, and have the same
right of appeal. Upon a review of the matter, we think that Dr. Jennings
wiU himself perceive, that the Methodist Episcopal Church had very good
reasons for not requiring the quarterly-meeting conferences to pass upon
the religious 'characters of their lay members, except upon appeals from
the decisions of inferior tribunals.
But it would be endless to point out all the defects in the conventional
articles of the new association. We have already exhibited the funda
mental errors in this new scheme, to which the reformers had looked
with so much confidence, as promising to show a pattern of excellence
to all Christian denominations. But we must be permitted to trespass a
httle longer upon the patience of our readers, in order to show, that if the
system was founded upon any practical principles, it could not be carried
into effect, for the want of essential provisions which have been entirely
overlooked by the convention.
For instance, it is provided that the annual conferences shall be com
posed of " all the ordained ministers, and an equal number of lay dele
gates ;" but the constitution does not provide for the apportionment
of the lay delegates among the several Churches, circuits, or stations. It
will be easy to ascertain how many ordained ministers there are within
the bounds of the conference, and consequently the aggregate amount of
lay delegates who wUl be entitled to sit in that body ; but the ratio of
representation is nowhere settled by the constitution. Hence it wUl be
impossible for any Church, circuit, or station, to ascertain how many dele
gates they are to elect. Some may send too many, and others too few.
The Church in Baltimore, for instance, may send so many as to give
them undue weight in the conference, — and other Churches may supply
so few, that the lay delegates wiU not, upon the whole, constitute a legal
proportion of the conference^ and hence the acts of the body will be
illegal, the membership not being adequately represented. If it be said
that the annual conferences can remedy this defect, and apportion the
delegation among the Churches according to numbers, or otherwise, we
answer, that there must first be an annual conference before this arrange
ment can be made; and yet the arrangement must be made before the
first conference can be legaUy constituted ! A strange dUemma this to
be placed in, — and that, too, by men who thought themselves competent
to reform all the weU-tested regulations of our Church. Again : suppose the

REVIEW OF THE CONVENTIONAL ARTICLES. 255
apportionment of the delegates to be somehow or other settled six months
before the election, yet the relative proportion between the ordained min
isters and the lay delegates may be changed, either before or at the con
ference. The candidates for orders, who may obtain the necessary recom
mendations in the interval, wUl be ordained by the president* and two or
more elders, according to the constitution, either before or at the meeting
of the conference, and will then be entitled ex officio to a seat in that
assembly; thus rendering all its acts invalid, by increasing the list of
ministerial members beyond the constitutional proportion. These diffi
culties are absolutely insurmountable ; no human ingenuity can either
elude or remedy them. The provisions of the constitution cannot be
carried into effect; and therefore the associated Churches must either
agree to disregard them, and act without a constitution, or call another
General Convention forthwith. Even the General Convention which,
according to article sixteen, is to meet in November, 1830, will not be
able, according to the present organization, to remedy the evil ; because
there is the same want of any provision ascertaining the ratio of repre
sentation from the several annual conferences to the convention. It is
nowhere said that the annual conferences shall be represented according
to their numbers ; and hence each conference is at liberty to send as many
delegates as it pleases. The consequence may be, that any one or more
of these conferences desirous to introduce particular provisions into the
constitution, may insure success by a numerous and disproportionate dele
gation. One thing, and one thing only, seems to be carefully provided
for in the conventional articles — namely, that there should be a quantum
sufftcit of local-preacher influence in all the departments of the new govern
ment ; and so it will inevitably remain, whatever alterations may be made
hereafter in other respects.
Upon the whole, we confess we did wait with some degree of anxiety,
during the "ten days' agony" of the convention, for the result of their
deliberations. We did anticipate a system somewhat more plausible and
imposing than the articles we have been reviewing ; and consequently,
that many would be led astray by its speciousness, and by an appeal to
the political sentiments common to the Methodists with all the rest of our
countrymen. Our fears were instantly dispelled, however, when we per
ceived that the new constitution was as anti-republican in its principles, as
it was impracticable and absurd in its provisions. And now that the
result is known, and our Church has escaped from the storm of passion
0 Was it an oversight, or was it by design, that the convention did not require the
president to be taken from the body of ministers, although he is, during his continuance
in office, invested with episcopal powers ; having a right to ordain ministers, and to
make all necessary changes in the appointments of the travelling preachers? For any
thing to the contrary in the constitution, these presidents or bishops may be laymen!

256 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES,
and party spirit which had threatened to shake it from its foundation and
overwhelm it in in-etrievable ruin, we feel like a mariner who, having en
dured a night of tempest when no human skiU or power could guide him
in safety, looks back in the morning, after the winds have been hushed
and the clouds have dispersed, and Sees on either hand the rocks amidst
which an unseen hand had guided him in safety. WhUe he cannot but
shudder at the recollection of the dangers to which he had been exposed,
the full tide of gratitude rushes upon his heart, and fills his soul with the
delicious, absorbing sensation of thankfulness — thankfulness to Him who
is the only sure and certain refuge in time of trouble. Here, then, we
raise our Ebenezer ; for hitherto the Lord hath brought us. Our enemies
" have imagined a vain thing." They set themselves to destroy the work
of the Lord — a work he had owned and blessed, and made tributary to
the salvation of thousands. Their efforts have faUed. Neither cunning
nor force have been able to move us. On the contrary, we have been
compeUed by our sufferings to " remember aU the way in which the Lord
our God hath led us" — to go back to first principles — to reassure our
selves of their correctness, and having done so, to cleave with fuU purpose
of heart to the Lord, and to abide in the institutions of " our fathers."

CONSTITUTION OF METHODIST PROTESTANT CHURCH. 257

A REVIEW OF THE CONSTITUTION AND DISCIPLINE OF
"THE METHODIST PROTESTANT CHURCH."

The convention of reformers which assembled in the City of Baltimore,
in 1828, constructed and published "Articles of Association," which we
reviewed in the Itinerant — a periodical got up for the defence of the
Church, by the Methodists in Baltimore, and continued monthly, from
November 12th, 1828, to October 26th, 1831, under the editorship of
the Rev. Melville B. Cox, who, subsequently, was sent to Liberia as a mis
sionary, where he terminated his labours with his life, uttering with his
latest breath the exhortation to us who survive him, " Though thousands
fall, let not Africa be given up."
The review of the conventional " Articles of Association," taken from
the " Itinerant," will be found in a preceding part of this volume. They
were found so utterly defective, as to be wholly indefensible, and were, of
course, to be amended. Accordingly another convention was held in the
same place, in November, 1830, at which was adopted the name and
title of " The Methodist Protestant Church, comprising the Associated
Methodist Churches." The convention also adopted a " Constitution of
the Methodist Protestant Church," containing a preamble and seventeen
articles. The former articles of association had been before the ministers
and members of the Churches for some two years — had been canvassed
and discussed with great earnestness — and it was supposed the convention
of 1830 would have collected all the hght which had been elicited by the
discussion, and would come up prepared to show the world the very per
fection of wisdom in Church government The foUowing review of the.
document, also republished from the " Itinerant," will enable the honest
reader to estimate its true value : —
The seceders from tlie Methodist Episcopal Church having finally settled
and established their form of government, it becomes a subject of inquiry of
some importance to the Christian world, to ascertain what improvements
their erudite labours have suggested in ecclesiastical pohty. After the
abstract speculations upon the " Mutual Rights '' of ministers and laymen,
and the impassioned declamations against tyranny and oppression, with
which the pulpit has rung, and the press has groaned for the last ten
years,, it is natural that we should be somewhat curious to learn what has
been done by these great advocates of hberty and the rights of man since
they have thrown off the shackles of authority and set up for themselves.
17

258 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
But those who have still adhered to the Methodist Episcopal Church,
are much more concerned in this inquiry than the members of other reh
gious communities. We do not attribute perfection to our ecclesiastical
economy, and our whole' history shows that we have always altered it
whenever an alteration was recommended by an apparent utility. If,
then, anything has been invented by our opponents which we might adopt
with advantage, we should not hesitate to graft it upon our system ; or
if any imperfection in our government and discipline has been remedied
by the new plan, we should not feel it a degradation to leam wisdom
even from our enemies. But if, on the contrary, we find that nothing-
has been mended, that the fine theories with which we have been enter
tained are contradicted by experience, and that what was made plausible
when abstractly considered, is found inapplicable to the particular exi
gencies and circumstances of our religious community, we shall continue
to live contented under an economy which, though it be not free from all
objections, we do not know how to mend, and which has not been im
proved upon by our neighbours.
We shall not, therefore, be thought querulous in undertaking this review
of the constitution and discipline of the Methodist Protestant Church,
especially as we only design to contrast it with the economy which it pro
fesses to have improved. We design to give no just cause of offence, and
cannot suppose that any will be taken, since a review has been already
published by an advocate of the new plan, in which it is contrasted with
the old system, greatly to the disadvantage of the latter.
But before we commence our remarks upon the new Church govern
ment itself, we must be indulged in a few observations upon the succinct
history of Methodism with which it is prefaced. We had hoped that,
having fairly declared then independence, the reformers would have exer
cised the right which we readily accord them, of forming a Church govern
ment to suit their own views and notions, without unnecessarily perpetuating
the controversy with those whom they had left, by reiterating accusations
against us which they knew to be exceedingly offensive, and which we
have always averred to be unjust. If, indeed, they designed to wage a
perpetual war with us, this preface was exactly calculated to fulfil their
intention ; but this does not correspond with the professions they have
made and are still making. They profess to desire peace, and an inter
change of those kind offices which so happily obtain between the Episcopal
Methodists and most of the sister Churches ; and yet they have prefaced
then book of Discipline with a list of alleged grievances which cannot fail
to enlist and perpetuate the most hostile feelings among their members
against the members of a Church with which they affect a desire to culti
vate and maintain the most friendly relations.
We could have forgiven the arrogance which induced them to associate

CONSTITUTION OF METHODIST PROTESTANT CHURCH. 259
their visionary innovations with the real reformation effected by the instru
mentality of the Wesleys, notwithstanding these innovations tended to
destroy all the efficient parts of Mr. John Wesley's plan for proclaiming
the gospel to the ends of the earth. Vanity is too natural an infirmity to
awaken surprise or excite indignation ; and besides, we had been accus
tomed to it. We had long been amused with the self-complacency of
reformers. We had often found them most incontinently associated with
Luther, and Calvin, and Melancthon, and the other worthies who broke
the shackles of Popery and delivered the Christian world from superstition
and ecclesiastical tyranny. We were, therefore, prepared for any extrava
gance of this nature, but we had hoped that they had been convinced of
the evil which a perpetuation of their quarrel with us would do to their
own cause, and that they would avoid it for their own sakes, though the
interests of the common cause of religion should fail, as it had failed, to
influence them. We have been disappointed. Their book of Discipline
is prefaced by a summary of their complaints against the Methodist Epis
copal Church which are as untrue as they are injurious. While they con
tinue these, no cordiality of feeling can be restored. The Methodist
Episcopal Church would, by any reciprocation of ministerial services,
tacitly admit the aUegations to be just, and must therefore keep aloof from
' any propositions of this nature. We deny that the reformers were expelled
from the Church for proposing or advocating changes in our ecclesiastical
economy. We never did complain of temperate discussions on this sub
ject ; but we disowned the disaffected members in Baltimore for publish
ing and circulating slander and calumny, both against the living and the
dead. And for this we have the acknowledgment of at least three of their
principal writers, who also professed to be authorized by those who had
been expelled to make the acknowledgment in their names.
Perhaps the preparatory remarks were not authorized by the convention ;
and we are more inclined to this opinion because we know there were some
men of talents in that assembly, and the preface is so meagre and con
temptible, considered merely as an abridged history, as to be totally
unworthy of any dehberative body. We hope if this pitiful production
has been foisted into the legal code of the Methodist Protestant Church by
some meddling, officious individual, it will be disavowed, as while it con
tinues to be apparently sanctioned by the Church, it must prevent every
approach to reconciliation and Christian fellowship.
Before we proceed to the consideration of the new code, we must make
a few more preliminary observations.
It had long been urged as an objection to the proposed lay and local
representation in the General Conference of our Church, that it would be
impossible for the distant conferences to send delegates ; they would not
be able to find brethren of sufficient wealth and leisure to serve as dele-

260 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
gates ; that those who are best qualified to render such services as would
be required of delegates are generaUy engaged in avocations which demand
their personal attention, and could not be absent from home from two to
three months without sustaining great injury and pecuniary loss.
The result, it was contended, would be that the annual conferences
which were remote from the seat of the General Conference would be
represented by the conferences more immediately in the vicinity of the
General Conference, and would, therefore, be governed by men not chosen
by them, and whose location would prevent them from acquiring an ade
quate knowledge of the wishes and interests of their distant brethren, or
whose local partialities would necessarily influence their measures. It was
further urged that this would place these remote districts in a worse situa
tion than at present. The traveUing preachers are prevented by then-
itinerating life from forming those sectional partialities, and as they are
constantly migrating, they could not find any personal gratification in
favouring one part of their field of labour to the injury of the rest.
The prediction as to the partial representation which would take place
under the new plan has been verified by the results, as given by the list
of ministerial and lay delegates in the convention which fonned the con
stitution we are about to review. The whole number of delegates elected
to the convention was one hundred and thirteen. Of this number sixty-
eight were elected from the Maryland Conference (within the limits of which
the convention met) and the two immediately adjoining conferences of
Pennsylvania and Virginia, constituting about three-fifths of the whole
number. Of the delegates elected from these conferences, only twelve of
the sixty-eight were absent, while one half of the delegates from Ohio
failed to attend.
The absent ministerial delegates, traveUing and local, were only eight,
while the absentees among the lay delegates amounted to twenty-two.
The Ohio Conference, which it is probable contains more members than
any other, had but eight delegates in the convention, whUe the Pennsyl
vania Conference had twenty, and the Maryland Conference had twenty-
six. It will be seen by these statements what the Methodist Episcopal Church
had to hope from the much-vaunted representative plan of government so
violently insisted upon by her disaffected members. Under all the influence
of party heat aid the novelty of the enterprise, the reformers faUed to pro
cure anything like a decent representation from any of the distant parts
of the country. Ohio only elected sixteen, and one half of these did not
find it convenient to attend ; and it is likely that had the convention held
its session in any place with which the merchants of Ohio had no com
mercial relations the delegation would have been still further dimin
ished.

CONSTITUTION OF METHODIST PROTESTANT CHURCH. 261
In our intended review we shaU chiefly attend to the departures from
our own system which we find in the new plan of Church government.
These will be chiefly found in the constitution and discipline. Most of
the positions which the convention call " elementary principles," may be
either true or false, without detriment or advantage to the system which
is said to be founded upon them ; and hence we shall find some of the
provisions of the new code in direct opposition to this bill of rights.
The best way to make a comparative estimate of the advantages and
disadvantages of the two schemes of government under consideration is,
to compare the different provisions they have severally made to effect the
objects which both profess to consider essential to the accomplishment of
the great purposes of their organization. Among the leading intentions
of both plans, the most prominent is, certainly, the institution or the per
petuation of an itinerant ministry. To this feature in our ecclesiastical
economy the Methodists, both in Europe and America, have chiefly
attributed the success they have had in spreading the gospel ; and who
ever attentively reads our history wiU arrive at the same conclusion.
We are not unmindful of other peculiarities of Methodist economy ; but
we think we speak the sentiments of our brethren generally, both of the
ministry and laity, when we say that all the rest would have been com
paratively inoperative without an efficient itinerant ministry.
The fundamental principle upon which this plan of ministration is based
will be easily perceived, if we contrast it with any plan which allows or
maintains a settled pastoral ministry. The latter supposes the people to
call the preacher of the gospel to labour among them, and to stipulate with
him the terms upon which he is expected to perform the required services ;
the first supposes the preacher to call the people into the fellowship of the
gospel, and, consequently, that he goes to them without any stipulation
whatever. In the one case we must suppose the people to have been pre
viously brought to know, and in some measure to appreciate the value of,
the gospel, and therefore to desire its ordinances ; in the other case we
may suppose them ignorant of the nature and design of the gospel, of
their own need of its influences, and of any of the many blessings which'
it brings to those who receive it ; and, consequently, we may suppose
them very far from feehng any disposition to call a minister of the gospel
to labour among them. Nay, as the heart of man is naturally averse to
good and inclined to evil, we should be sustained as well by history as by-
rational inference, if we were to suppose him much more disposed to per
secute the messengers of salvation than to invite or desire their ministry.
The different plans of settled, stationary ministration, then, supply preach-'
ers of the gospel to those who call them, and who are able and wiUing to'
afford a pecuniary compensation to those they may call ; the itinerant"
plan proposes to provide a ministry who shall be sent to call those who'

262 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
do not know or appreciate the value of the gospel, and therefore do not
desire it, or who, if they do desire it, are too poor to pay for it.
It wiU be perceived at a glance that such a plan must be executed by
the ministry at great personal sacrifices. They must forego or exchange
aU the endearments of home for a life of toU among strangers, and that,
too, without any stipulation or security for personal support or sustenance,
much less of any provision for sickness, old age, or decrepitude. But this
is not all. The plan cannot be made efficient without lodging somewhere
an authority to distribute the labourers over the great field of labour.
Otherwise some might be supplied abundantly, while others were desti
tute, and even the most needy might be most neglected. It will be
readily acknowledged that this authority to appoint the preachers their
places of labour is a tremendous investment of power wherever it may be
deposited) and, accordingly, the preachers in the Methodist Episcopal
Church have been careful to place it in the hands of men of their own
selection, whose experience in the work gives them confidence in then-
wisdom and discretion, and whose characters afford a guarantee for their
impartiality and parental feelings. Even in such hands this power is not
left without control. It is regulated and hmited in its exercise, and may,
if abused, be withdrawn, or transfen-ed to other hands, by those who alone
feel its exercise, and who alone can suffer from its abuse. Bishops have
been, and therefore can again be, deposed, and, in point of fact, are elected
every four years ; and elected, too, by those only over whom their author
ity is, or can be, exercised.
But with all these regulations, so onerous are the duties, and so numer
ous are the privations required of a travelling preacher, that the tempta
tions to location are ever operating injuriously upon the great missionary
work. Many of the circuits are so unprovided with decent accommodations
for a preacher's family, and in other respects afford so inadequate a provision
for his necessities, that, as the weight of his family increases, any prospect
of bettering his temporal circumstances is almost irresistible. The Church
is thus often deprived of the wisdom necessaiy in her councUs, which can
only be acquired by long experience in ministerial duties. It is there
fore a desideratum in our ecclesiastical economy to devise some means
of counteracting the tendency to location among our travelling preach
ers, without, at the same time, impairing the efficiency of our present
plan. But the new plan is so far from correcting this evil tendency, that it
makes the same requirements, and imposes the same obligations upon the
travelling preachers, who are bona fide such, whue it takes from them the
control of the executive power by which these demands are enforced, and
leaves them entirely without adequate redress or remedy in case of the
abuse of this power.

CONSTITUTION OF METHODIST PROTESTANT CHURCH. 263
The appointing power, so essential to the itinerant system, can only
operate oppressively upon the traveUing preachers, because it is only exer
cised over them. It has no operation in relation to local preachers or lay
men. They receive no appointments, and are not directed in any part of
their religious duties by this authority ; much less can it interfere with
their temporal comforts or interests. We insist, therefore, that in all fairness
and equity, wherever or with whomsoever this appointing power is. lodged,
the person or persons exercising it should be selected by the travelling
preachers, and should be responsible to them only for the proper exercise
of an authority which affects them exclusively, or in a degree which places
all other interests below consideration. It is no matter whether this
power be reposed in a bishop, a president, a committee, or a " conference :"
if those who exercise the power are not appointed by those over whom it
is exercised; if their choice may be controUed by the suffrage of others
who are not pledged to the same submission and obedience ; and finaUy,
if those who are appointed to exercise this authority are not responsible
for their administration to those whom they command, then they who
are bound to obedience are slaves, and in the instance before us the ser
vility is as unnecessary as it is degrading to the ministerial character.
In the Methodist Protestant Church the preacher's appointments are
made by the annual conference, or in such mode as the conference may
from time to time appoint. The conference is composed of one-half lay
men and one-half ministers ; and whether the appointments are made by
the president of the conference or a stationing committee, in either case
the appointing power will receive the authority to dispose of the preachers
from the laity as well as the ministry, although the power thus conferred
cannot affect the laymen at all. If the appointments should be made by
the president of the conference, they will have participated equally in his
election ; and he wiU be amenable to the laity as much as to the preachers
for his administration, although he cannot exercise the authority conferred
by his election over the humblest layman of the conference. He will,
moreover, be dependant upon the laity exclusively for his support, as he
must derive it from circuits and stations within his conference district ; and
hence he must comply with the wishes of delegations from the wealthier
circuits or stations, as these only can contribute anything towards his
salary. Thus the preachers who place themselves under the stationing
power of the conference, will have committed themselves to an absolute
authority, not created by themselves, but authorized by their lay masters,
who, participating equally in the elective franchise, and holding the purse-
strings in their own hands, will bind upon them burdens which they wUl
not touch with one of their fingers. Now we appeal to any considerate,
disinterested man, if this is fair ? If the traveUing preachers consent, for
the good of the Church, to go wherever they may be sent, whatever per-

264 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
sonal saciifices it may cost, ought they not, in all reason and fairness,' to
be allowed the choice of the person to whom is committed the power of
appointing them their several stations or circuits ? Is it possible that
ministers who preserve any respect for themselves, will continue long in a
connexion where a master is appointed over them by those who do not
participate in their privations and sufferings, and who cannot therefore
sympathize with them ; and a master, too, who is not responsible to them
for any abuse of the absolute authority over them with which he has
been invested by others.
But this is not all. Under the constitution the annual conferences may
select any mode of making the preachers' appointments which they deem
expedient. They may, therefore, delegate this authority to a committee
of laymen, or, what is most likely, to the president, aided by an advisory
committee of laymen. The laity wiU then send the preachers out as mis
sionaries, under the direction and dictation of their lay brethren, without
any of the prerogatives of a pastoral ministry. For this they will plead
the necessity as well as the republicanism of the measure ; for we have
seen that the republicanism of reformers means anything which suits
their convenience. Whether such a course be probable or not, it is cer
tain that under the constitution it may be adopted, and it is strange that
so important a matter should have been left so entirely discretionary with
the annual conferences.
Another power vested by the constitution in the annual conferences, is
the providing of means and adopting measures to raise the salaries of the
travelhng preachers. There is no method appointed or enjoined by the
constitution or the discipline to effect this object ; and as no measure can
be adopted by annual conferences without the consent of a majority of
the lay members, the preachers must be veiy accommodating in relation
to their privueges, or their lay masters wiU " veto " the money bhls, and
leave them without the assistance of " the committee of ways and means."
We have no hesitation in asserting that an efficient itinerant ministry
cannot be sustained upon these principles. That ministers may be found
who wiU submit to place their dearest interests, then health and family
comforts, at the disposal of a single individual, is not now matter of con
jecture, because it has been done in our Church ever since its organization.
But then this individual has been, and must continue to be appointed by,
and responsible to, those whose destinies he thus controls. That there will
be found ministers of any value who will submit to the same absolute;
authority, when the authority is confen-ed by laymen who are not sub
ject to the authority they confer, remains to be ascertained by the experi
ment which the convention has instituted. For ourselves we anticipate
the result with confidence. Were there no other errors in the new plan-
but that which relates to the appointing power, we should consider it

CONSTITUTION OF METHODIST PROTESTANT CHURCH. &65
fatal to the whole scheme of reform, so far as that scheme contemplates
an efficient itinerant ministry.
We have all along assumed the position, that the reformers intended
to provide for the perpetuation of an itinerant ministry ; and we are
authorized to do so, not only from their general professions, but from the
restriction imposed upon the General Conference by the seventh section of
the tenth article of their constitution, which says, " No mle shall be passed
to abolish an efficient itinerant ministry, or to authorize the annual con
ferences to station their ministers and preachers longer than three years
successively in the same circuit, and two years successively in the same
station." That such a mode of ministerial operation cannot be carried on
successfully without an absolute authority somewhere to appoint the
preachers their circuits and stations, will be obvious to all who reflect ma
turely on the subject ; and as it requires no ordinary degree of disinterest
edness and devotion to induce a minister to submit to the privations and
hardships which such a scheme will necessarily impose, the submission
cannot be expected of him, unless the authority to which he commits all
his temporal interests is delegated by himself, and the person who holds
it is made responsible to him for the proper exercise of the prerogative. In
the Methodist Episcopal Church the itinerant preachers have this pro
tection; but we have shown that in the new scheme the appointing
power is held or delegated jointly with the laity and local preachers, and
whoever may exercise the prerogative is responsible, not to the traveUing
preachers exclusively, but to an annual conference, composed in part of
local preachers and laymen, over whom this tremendous power, affecting
indirectly " life, liberty, and all the pursuits of happiness," cannot be
exerted. To sustain an itinerant plan of ministration upon such a basis,
is as hopeless as it is absurd.
We will proceed to examine another provision of the new plan, in refer
ence to the perpetuation of an itinerant ministry ; and we are greatly
mistaken if we shall not be able to show, not only that it is fatal to any
scheme of extensive itinerant operation, but also to the union of the Me
thodist Protestant Church, under any modification of their constitution and
disciphne which shall preserve this extraordinary provision.
We allude to the manner in which the Church property is to be held
under the constitution of the new Church.
In the Methodist Episcopal Church, our meeting-houses are considered
as the property of the whole Church ; and hence the land on which they
are erected, is deeded to trustees " in trust, that they shall erect and build,
or cause to be erected and built thereon, a house or place of worship, for
the use of the members of the Methodist Episcopal Church in the United
States of America, according to the Rules and Discipline," &c. ; " and
in further trust and confidence, that they shall at all times, forever here-

266 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
after, permit such ministers and preachers,, belonging to the said Church,
as shall from time to time be duly authorized by the General Conferences
of the ministers and preachers of the said Methodist Episcopal Church, or
by the annual conferences authorized by the said General Conference to
preach and expound God's holy word therein," &c.
It will be perceived, that while the use of our meeting-houses is secured
to the members of the Methodist Episcopal Church in the United States
of America as , places of public worship, the right to occupy the pulpit for
the purpose of " expounding God's holy word therein," is secured to our
travelling preachers. The trustees cannot, without violating their trust,
transfer, by sale or otherwise, these places of worship to the members of
any other Christian denomination, or exclude the travelhng preachers from
the pulpits.
This arrangement is every way just and equitable ; for our places of
worship are generally, if not always, erected by contributions collected,
not only from the members of the Church who reside in the vicinity, but
from those who live in distant neighbourhoods, as every member of the
Church, however remote, has a common interest in the bmlding, and the
purpose for which it is erected. Many who are not members of the
Church, contribute liberally to these objects ; but whoever contributes,
does so with a specific object — namely, to erect a Methodist meeting
house ; and therefore it would be unjust to aUow either the trustees or
the male members of the Church, who happen to occupy any one of these
houses, to divert these contributions to any other purpose than that for
which they were originally designed. We may also observe, that in most
instances these houses are built partly through the personal exertions of
the preachers on the circuit, and these exertions are made with the under
standing that they and their successors shall be secured in the right to
occupy the pulpits when they have opportunity : they cannot, then, be
deprived of this privilege without downright injustice. Our meeting
houses being thus secured, according to the intentions of the contributors,
to the whole Methodist connexion, cannot be alienated by those who ordi
narily worship in them ; and hence no change of rehgious opinions among
these members can affect the security of our places of worship, and the
travelling preacher's right to the pulpit cannot be denied or withheld,
although the trustees, and a majority of the members of the Church who
attend worship in any particular house, should become Unitarians, or
adopt any other religious belief. The house would remain the property
of the connexion at large, and the preacher could not be refused admission
to the pulpit. He would thus have the means of comforting and strength
ening those who remained steadfast. The minority who adhered to the
original conditions of occupancy, could not be driven out by those whose
opinions had changed, and who would, therefore, be desirous to call a

CONSTITUTION OF METHODIST PROTESTANT CHURCH. 267
minister whose doctrines accorded with their own views or opinions. It
is therefore obvious that this part of our economy is as it should be. To
alter it, would be a long step towards congregational government.
It will be remembered, however, that this part of our economy was
among the first that was assailed by the advocates of reform. In the first
volume of the " Mutual Rights," it was not only complained of, but mis
represented even to caricature. We were told that " all our Church pro
perty belonged to the bishops," although no deed for Church property in
the United States contained the name of either of the bishops. But it
was alleged the houses belonged to the bishops, because the bishops ap
pointed the preachers, and the preachers had a right to the pulpits. And
we were caUed upon to look to our rights, and to wrest this dangerous
prerogative from the travelling preachers. We could not perceive, how
ever, that any danger could arise from securing to our pastors the use of
our pulpits, or that we could possibly perpetuate our plan of a general
itinerancy, if those to whom the pastoral care of the Churches tvas com
mitted could be excluded from our meeting-houses by the caprice of the
trustees, aided by a few disaffected members, who, from change of opinions,
either in matters of faith or Church government, might desire to change
then ministers. We therefore obstinately refused to be reformed in this
matter ; and upon a careful examination of what has been done by
the reformers themselves, we shall find no cause to regret our pertina
cious adherence to our long-tried regulations in regard to this important
subject. In the economy of the new Church, it is provided by the fourth article
of the constitution, that "An associated Church or society shall be com
posed of any number of members residing sufficiently near each other to
assemble statedly for public worship, and to transact its temporal busi
ness." " And every Church or society shall have power, by the concurrence
of two-thirds of its qualified male members, present at any meeting called
for the purpose, to purchase, build, lease, sell, rent, or otherwise obtain
or dispose of property for tlie mutual benefit of the Church." And in the
Discipline, under the head of " General Duties of Trastees," it is provided
that " it shall be the duty of the trustees to hold the property of individual
churches in trust, for the use and benefit of the members thereof ;" and,
moreover, that " the trustees shall have power, when authorized by two-
thirds of the male members, over the age of twenty-one years, assembled at
a regular meeting for the purpose, to purchase, build, repair, lease, sell,
rent, mortgage, or otherwise procure or dispose of property, and on no other
conditions whatever."
It requires very little sagacity to perceive that the above provisions of
the new Church tend necessarily to a congregational plan of government,
and ultimately to strife, litigation, and division in the individual Churches

268 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
themselves. If any individual Church should at any time be dissatisfied
with the preacher sent to them by the conference, they may caU and settle
one either temporarily or permanently, for the circuit preacher has no legal
right to occupy the pulpit. It is accorded to him of mere courtesy, and
he may be legally ejected at any time by the vote of two-thirds of the
male members, over the age of twenty-one years, this being a sufficient
warrant to the trustees, not only to sell or rent the property, but to other
wise dispose of it.
If two-thirds of the male members of any individual "associated
Church" change their rehgious opinions, they may, in spite of the estab
lished creed of the other Churches of the association, call and settle a
minister whose doctrines accord with their newly-adopted opinions. And
thus one-third of the male members over twenty-one years of age, with
all who happen to be under the legal age, and the whole of the females,
who generally constitute a majority of every Church, may be deprived of
the benefit of a house of worship, which they had contributed to build,
and have the mortification to see it appropriated to the use of a denomina
tion with whom they cannot conscientiously hold religious communion.
Nor is this all. The brethren in other districts, and also those of other
denominations who contributed to the purchase of the property, or the
erection of the house, will see then best and most charitable intentions
frustrated, and their pecuniary contributions diverted to a purpose which
they may sincerely believe hostile to the interest of Christ's kingdom.
Those who, approving the rehgious tenets of the Methodist Protestants,
have contributed to their encouragement, may find themselves unwittingly
aiding the propagation of doctrines which they deem subversive to the
fundamental principles of Christian theology, and consequently the best
interests of man.
But, at least, that which has happened before may happen again ; and
it is a matter of historical record, that even the great and well-deserved
influence of Mr. Wesley in his societies could not prevent the trustees of
certain churches, built chiefly by his own exertions, from calling and
settling ministers, independent of his authority ; and in one instance, if
not more, they succeeded in seducing a favourite and most promising
preacher from his allegiance and duty, and ejected Mr. Wesley himself
and all the preachers of his connexion from their pulpit. It was thus that
the venerable founder of Methodism was compelled to alter his original
plan with regard to the settlement of meeting-houses erected by those in
connexion with him. He was taught by experience that it would be
impossible to perpetuate an itinerant ministry if the houses erected by
their exertions could be alienated from the original purpose for which they
were designed, by a few trustees, whose wealth gave them an influence
which ought to be accorded to piety alone ; or, while a popular, insinua-

CONSTITUTION OF METHODIST PROTESTANT CHURCH. 26.9
ting preacher, availing himself of the appointment of some preacher of
less pretensions, or less showy abUities, could make a party, sow the seeds
of discord, and reap, as the reward of his treason, a handsome settlement
for life.
Under the present regulations of the new Church, any "individual
associated Church" who may be displeased with the preacher sent to
them by the conference, may call their favourite preacher and employ
him for such term as may be agreed upon, and the travelling preacher
may betake himself to the woods. And as the richer Churches alone
will be likely to do so, he may enjoy the blessedness of preaching to the
poor only — the rich wUl consider it their privilege to take care of them
selves.* There is, however, one redeeming advantage in the arrangement we
have been considering. Tlie individual Churches, as they grow weary of
" reform," may return to their first love. They may -find it their duty to
do their first works over again, and return to the bosom of the Church
from which they have so causelessly separated. Their meeting-houses
may then aid in the propagation of the gospel through an efficient itiner
ant ministry — a purpose for which they were no doubt erected, but a
purpose which they are certainly not destined to fulfil in their present
relation. Those who recollect the quarter from which the attack came will have
seen, before now, the reason why our plan of settling Church property did
not please the assailant. He had been a popular travelling preacher, but
having bettered his temporal prospects by marriage, he sat down to culti
vate his rich domains with his own slaves, and to rail at the tyranny of
Methodist bishops, whose voluntary servitude was less tolerable than that
of this preacher's slaves. But the fashion of this world passeth away.
The farm and the slaves could no longer be retained, and a good minis
terial settlement was a resource which may be reasonably supposed to
have presented itself in a very seducing aspect. Under the existing
economy of the Methodist Episcopal Church, however, this could not be
oompassed. The economy was, therefore, to be changed, and our preacher,
heretofore a zealous opponent of democracy in civil politics, became the
apostle of democracy in Church government. What a glorious scramble
we should have had for churches and settlements had we consented to be
reformed ! The " individual associated Churches" who were rich enough
to settle a minister, might have attracted the light of the bright constel
lation which, we are told, embodied all the talents of the Church. How
justly are we now reproached with being too ignorant to understand or
appreciate the wonderful reformation proposed to us, and as possessing
just dogged obstinacy and common sense enough to beheve that a system
° This teas prediction ; it is now history.

270 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
which had worked well for a century could not be safely subverted, and
quietly to determine to let well enough alone.
We think it will have been made apparent that the settlement of our
houses of worship upon " individual associated Churches " is incompatible
with a plan of general itinerant ministration. And as our whole history
shows this to have been, in the order of Providence, our peculiar caUing,
we should have been manifestly unfaithful to the trust assigned us by the
great Head of the Church had we compromitted this great missionary
plan of operation by alienating the houses devoted to this purpose, or plac
ing them in the hands of men whose local views and sectional feelings, or
whose pride or prejudices might lead them to prefer a settled ministry.
From what has been said, it will be apparent to eveiy impartial reader,
that if the reformers of Methodism really designed to institute and perpetu
ate an efficient itinerant system of ministerial operation, they have been
very unfortunate in the leading provisions of their system. The appoint
ing power is so disposed of as to be at the same time less efficient in its
exercise and more oppressive to its subjects ; and the Church property is
held by so precarious a tenure that a few men in each " individual asso
ciate Church" may alienate it from the confederation, and deprive the
traveUing ministers of both the use of the pulpits and the pastoral over
sight of the flocks. We shall proceed to examine some other provisions
of the new plan, with reference to their adaptation to the distinguishing
feature of Methodism — namely, itinerancy.
We keep this part of our ecclesiastical economy constantly in view,
because it is essential to us as a religious community, and because we have
from the beginning of this controversy believed and alleged that the pro
posed reform would greatly impair, if not wholly destroy it. We were
assured, however, by our reforming friends, that no such design was medi
tated. The itinerant system, they said, was as deeply rooted in their affec
tions as in ours ; and as we were not at hberty to attribute to them any
covert design or want of sincerity, we could only suppose that the neces
sary tendency of the measures proposed was not perceived by those who
urged them upon us. They have now had an opportunity to make a new
system, untrammelled by our interference ; and as they have instituted an
itinerant system and declared it unalterable by any council of the Church,
except a general convention, we must suppose, not only that they are sin
cere in their professions of regard to this peculiarity of Methodist economy,
but that the system they have devised for its peipetuation is the same
which would have been provided for us had they been permitted to reform
us after their own fashion. If, then, the defects in their plan are fatal to an
itinerant system of ministerial labour and pastoral oversight, no minor
amendments of our economy would have made an adequate compensation
for the destruction of that which is essential to our existence.

CONSTITUTION OF METHODIST PROTESTANT CHURCH. 271
Let us now examine the provisions of the new plan in regard to class-
meeting, and inquire how far this institution is made by reformers to sus
tain the itinerant preachers in the discharge of their pastoral duties.
It will be recollected, that at a very early period in the history of this
controversy some strictures on class-meeting were published in the " Wes
leyan Repository," over an anonymous signature. The papers were known
to be written by Mr. Snethen, who has claimed to be the originator of the
" reform " movement, and who, for a long time, was considered its leader.
It was contended by the writer that the Methodist Episcopal Church had
imposed an unscriptural condition of membership upon her members, by
requiring them to meet in class. It was, nevertheless, admitted that this
institution was of essential. benefit to the membership, and greatly pro
moted their growth in grace. The writer went so far as to admit that the
neglect of class-meeting generally marked a declension of piety ; but still
he contended that the Church had no authority to enjoin it, because it
was nowhere expressly authorized in the Scriptures.
On the other hand, it was contended that it was the duty of every indi
vidual Christian to do whatever would promote his spiritual welfare,
because this was enjoined by the Scriptures ; and if in the religious com
munity to which he voluntarUy belonged, any particular institution was, by
general consent and general experience, acknowledged to have this effect,
he was bound by every religious obligation to attend to it. Secondly, it
was alleged that every member of the Church had joined it with a perfect
knowledge of this requirement, and had, therefore, consented to the obliga
tion and pledged himself to its fulfilment. To neglect his class would
therefore be a violation of his contract, and subject him very justly to
expulsion. But the right to make class-meeting a term or condition of member
ship with us, does not rest exclusively upon its acknowledged usefulness
in quickening the zeal and prompting the piety of our members ; nor
upon the voluntary obligation which every individual member assumed
by joining the Church. The right was predicated of the relation which
necessarily subsists between the members of a Church and their pastors.
If it be the duty of the pastor to " feed the flock of Christ, taking the
oversight thereof" — to watch over their souls as he who must give an ac
count to God — it can be no less the duty of the members to place them
selves under such circumstances as may enable the pastor to discharge
these duties. In an itinerant system this cannot be done by any other
plan than class-meetings ; or, at least, no other plan has yet been pro
posed, or devised, which meets the necessity : the traveUing preacher can
not take care of his flock without the intervention of some subordinate
oversight, through which he is made acquainted with the individual state
of the members ; and with us this oversight is exercised by the class-

272 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
leader, a person selected and appointed by the preacher, and responsible
to him for the faithful discharge of his duty.
It will be easUy seen why this institution is not necessary, or, at least,
not essentially so, to those who are under the care of a settled resident
minister. Their pastor being acquainted with them individually, and
residing among them, can make himself acquainted with their religious
state, and adapt his advice to their necessities, and, if necessary, protect
the communion from the intrusion of improper communicants, and the
cause of religion from the reproach which always follows a desecration of
her sacraments. But the itinerant minister, hurrying with rapidity from
appointment to appointment, with only time to preach, meet the class,
and visit the sick, could know little of the life and conversation of the
communicants, or their individual growth or decay in religious knowledge
and experience, and must be dependant upon his helper, the faithful class-
leader, for information on these subjects, so essential to the proper dis
charge of his duty.
Having heretofore treated of this matter very fully,* we only glance at
it now, in order to show the bearing which the new plan will necessarily
have upon the itinerant operations of the Methodist Protestant Church.
The strong sensation which was produced in the Methodist community
by Mr. Snethen's attack upon class-meeting, and the manifest injury it
did to the cause of reform, induced him to desist ; and though some of his
adherents still maintained his views, yet most of them became loud in
their praise of this institution, and professed the utmost zeal for its per
petuation. They repelled, as an injurious slander, the imputation of
hostility to this part of our economy ; and we have no reason to doubt,
that most of those who enlisted under the banners of reform believed, that
after they had effected all the contemplated changes in the economy of
the Methodist Episcopal Church, class-meetings would remain in all their
purity and obligation. Wo believed, however, at the time, that this was
not the design of their leaders, and the event has now put the question
beyond all doubt. They have not abolished class-meetings; but they
have so changed their character as to render them of little value to the
Church, if they do not, as we sincerely apprehend, become the sources of
great disquietude and dissension. Our reasons for this opinion we shall
proceed to show : —
•In the first place, they have taken the appointment of class-leaders from
the pastor of the Church, and made them elective,' annually, by the
members of the class.
In our review of the conventional articles, we showed, at some length,
the evils which would necessarily grow out of a periodica] election of
° See "Eeview of the Conventional Articles of Association," in a preceding part of
this volume.

CONSTITUTION OF METHODIST PROTESTANT CHURCH. 273
class-leaders, and beg leave to refer the reader to that review for what it
would be useless to repeat at this time. But it will be easily perceived,
that under the new plan the class-leader is not the agent of the preacher, is
not responsible to him for the faithful performance of his duties, or for any
performance of them at all. He may neglect to meet his class as often
as he pleases, and if he can secure a majority of votes he will retain his
commission, although this majority may be made up of the junior part
of the members, who, it will not be pretended, are ordinarily best quali
fied to judge of the proper qualifications for a leader, whose office it is to
instruct them in the doctrines and duties of Christianity. Indeed, it is
not among the least evils of this arrangement, that it supposes all who
enter upon a religious course of life to be immediately possessed of the
knowledge and experience which will enable them discreetly and safely to
exercise the right of choosing their instructors. The supposition is at war
with all experience and observation. Professors do not come into the
Church like the fabulous Minerva from the head of Jupiter, full-grown at
their birth. They know at first but little of the devices of Satan, and per
haps less of the deep depravity and corruption of their own hearts. They
are found to be much more impelled by the impulse of feeling, than led
by the sober exercise of judgment ; and hence, with the young members,
zeal and passionate declamation, a good voice, and a little spice of the
ranter, will be irresistible characteristics in the qualifications of a class-
leader ; and, unfortunately for the new scheme, votes are to be counted,
not weighed.
In reference to the auxiliary relation of the class-leader to the pastor, the
new plan annihilates it entirely. The class-leader is no way responsible
to the pastor ; and if he entertains any ill-feeling toward him, he may de
cline any communication whatever. Or if the leader should diffuse
among his class doctrines which the pastor believes to be inimical to their
spiritual improvement, or should he be found not to possess the requisite
qualifications for his station, the pastor may see the fruits of his labour
perishing for want of proper culture ; yet he has no remedy, although
the souls committed to him by the Great Head of the Church are to be
required at his hands.
But this is not aU. Class-meeting in the new scheme is not made a
condition of membership. The members of the Methodist Protestant
Church are not bound to meet in class in order to retain their relation
to the Church. Such an obligation is nowhere imposed by the Discipline,
and is strictly prohibited by the constitution, and by what are called the
elementary principles upon which the constitution is based.
It is true that it is made the duty of a class-leader to meet his class
once a week ; but it is nowhere made the duty of the class to meet him.
He must keep a register of his class, and mark the absentees : but for
18

274 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
what purpose does not appear ; for the absentees incur neither penalty nor
punishment by neglecting or refusing to meet. And, indeed, the class-
leader himself may neglect aU his official duties without losing either
his membership or his office. His membership cannot be forfeited but
by immorality, or the propagation of unscriptural doctrines ; and for his .
office, he is dependant upon the votes of his class exclusively. Nor can
the General Conference mend this defect, as it is a part of the constitu
tion itself, which cannot be altered but by a General Convention.
The constitution declares, by the second article, that "there is only one
condition required of those who apply for membership in an Associated
Methodist Church, viz. : a desire to flee from the wrath to come, and to
be saved by grace, through faith in our Lord Jesus Christ; with an
avowed determination to walk in all the commandments of God blame
less. But those who may continue therein, must give evidence of this
desire and determination, by conforming to such rules of moral discipline
as the word of God requires." A member, therefore, does not forfeit his
membership by neglecting to meet in class, as it will not be pretended
that it is among the " moral rales of disciphne which the word of God
requires." If, indeed, a member of the new Church made upon his
admission any engagement or covenant to attend class-meeting, it might
be argued that a neglect or refusal to fulfil his promises would be an
immorality, and therefore subject him to expulsion. But he makes no
such stipulation, either positively or tacitly ; because no such requirement
is found in the Discipline of the Church.
Indeed, as the constitution and the "Elementary Principles" both forbid
any such requirement, the attending class-meeting could not be made a
condition of membership. The fifth article of the " Elementary Principles ''
asserts, that " Church trials should be conducted on gospel principles only;
and no minister or member should be excommunicated except for immor
ality, the propagation of unchristian doctrines, or for the neglect of duties
enjoined by the word of God." And in the tenth article, fourth section,
of the constitution, it is provided, that "no rule, except it be founded on
the Holy Scriptures, shall be passed, authorizing the expulsion of any
minister, preacher, or member ;" and this also is one of the articles which
the General Conference cannot alter.
We have shown that, under the new plan, class-meetings are provided
for those who like them ; but there is not in the Discipline any rule
which makes it obligatory upon the members of the Methodist Protestant
Church to attend class-meeting ; and if any rule of Discipline could, by
any possible inference, be made to imply such obligation, the constitution,
and even the elementary principles on which it is based, forbid such an
interpretation. Under such a discipline, we would ask how an itinerant preacher is to

CONSTITUTION OF METHODIST PROTESTANT CHURCH. 275
oversee his flock? An individual oversight is wholly impracticable, as
he has neither time nor opportunity for the work. Class-meeting affords
him no opportunity for personal inquiry, as many of the members may
neglect or refuse to meet him there ; and as the class-leader cannot, and
ought not, to be required to make domiciliary visits for pastoral purposes,
to the utter neglect of his temporal affairs, the preacher has no means of
becoming acquainted with the life and conversation of those whose names
are found upon the Church record, and to preserve the holy communion
or the love-feasts from the intrusion of those who walk unworthy of the
Christian profession. We have not thought ourselves at liberty to advert
to the necessity of class-meetings in our economy, as an important part of
our financial arrangements ; — the disinterested reform preachers might
spurn the mercenary argument. To us, we admit the institution to be
necessary on this account, as we are yet worldly-minded enough to think
the poverty and privations of a minister are his misfortunes, and no part
of his religion. But if we confine ourselves to the spiritual advantages of
class-meeting, we might be permitted to ask, What would have become.
of the Methodist Episcopal Church, had she consented to be reformed in
this matter after the fashion of the new Church ? How speedily would
the dissolution of our whole superstructure have foUowed an innovation
which would have placed the membership beyond the reach of pastoral
oversight, and exposed our altars to desecration and contempt, — which
abohshes class-meeting as a condition of membership, although it is
admitted by reformers themselves that it is an important "means of
grace," and that a neglect of it generally, if not always, marks a declen
sion of piety ! From such reform, good Lord dehver us.
We come now to the consideration of the provisions of the new Church
for the trial of members accused of " propagating heretical opinions, of
immorality, or neglect of duty." The rules adopted by the Methodist
Episcopal Church on this subject, have been some of the principal grounds
of complaint with our adversaries. They have been denounced as both
arbitrary and unjust, and, therefore, as fearfuUy jeopardizing the Christian
and even the civil rights and privileges of the membership. It was there
fore expected that they were fully prepared not only to alter but to amend
these rules when, in forming a new government, they were left to their
own discretion, with aU the lights of experience to guide them. That they
have altered the plan, is true ; but that they have made it better, remains
to be ascertained by experience. We have been very far from thinking
our rules on the subject of Church trials unexceptionable, and we know
that the whole system has been frequently brought into review by the
General Conference of our Church with the best disposition in the world
to improve it, but hitherto they have not been able to devise any other
provisions which would not be liable to greater objections than those' by

276 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
which we are now governed ; and we have looked in vain to the Disci
pline of the new Church for the emendations which, if they had been fur
nished, would be readily approved and gladly copied.
It wiU be fairly acknowledged, that the authority given to the pastors
in our Church to select the committee of trial is liable to abuse, if the pas
tor be under the influence of improper feelings towards the accused; but
we know of no system of jurisprudence, civU or ecclesiastical, which is not
liable to abuse by the officers appointed to execute it. On the other hand,
the pastor is often subjected, by the exercise of this power, to the resent
ment of the delinquent and his friends, when he has discharged his duty
with the utmost faithfulness and impartiality. It would, therefore, be
desirable to relieve the pastor of a duty which, in its strict though impar
tial exercise, may awaken feelings in some portion of his flock which may
hinder his usefulness as a minister. The prerogative cannot be very desira
ble to a minister which may make enemies but cannot make him friends,
and in the exercise of which he must encounter and come into personal
collision with the hostilities awakened by the just exercise of disciphne,
resisted by self-love, the most ungovernable and unyielding of aU human
passions. It would, therefore, be very desirable to our preachers to shift
this responsibility to other shoulders, if it could be transferred with safety
to the Church. To Methodist preachers such an exemption would be
peculiarly desirable, as from their entire dependence for support upon the
voluntary contributions of those to whom they minister, they are more
liable to suffer than the pastors of other Churches from any offence which
they may give in the administration of disciphne. It is, then, from neces
sity, not choice, that our ministry continue to bear this burden. And we
repeat the declaration — the General Conference have sought earnestly to
alter this part of our economy, but have not hitherto been able to discover
a plan which, while it offered a greater exemption from responsibility to
the minister, did not, at the same time, open the door to evils of much
greater magnitude. We shall presently proceed to inquire whether the
Discipline of the new Church, in regard to the trial of delinquent mem
bers, has obviated the difficulties and remedied the imperfections of which
they complained while yet in our communion. But it will be necessary
first to consider more particularly the nature and propriety of the objec
tions which have been urged against us on this subject It is admitted
that in our Church the pastor selects the committee to try a member
against whom charges have been preferred, and that there is no express
provision of Discipline which recognises the right of the accused to chal
lenge any member of the committee, either peremptorily or for cause. It
is believed, however, that no instance has occurred in which the minister
has refused to change a committee-man when a proper and reasonable
objection has been urged ; and, moreover, the General Conference have

CONSTITUTION OF METHODIST PROTESTANT CHURCH. 277
explicitly declared that such a refusal would be considered a dereliction of
duty, for which the pastor would be highly censurable. If the right to
challenge has not been distinctly acknowledged, it is because it was found
impossible so to restrain the exercise of the right as to secure the proper
administration of disciphne. In courts of criminal jurisprudence authority
is vested in the sheriff to summon jurymen from any part of the county
or district in which the court has competent jurisdiction. A neglect or
refusal to obey such summons is punishable in a summary manner by the
court with such pains and penalties as may enforce obedience ; but it is
obvious that no ecclesiastical officer or judiciary is, or ought to be, vested
with such power, and, therefore, a like right of challenge in Church trials
might be made to defeat all the righteous purposes of ecclesiastical disci
pline. Even in criminal courts the difficulty is often one of great magni
tude ; but then, if the criminal challenge one venire after another for years,
he is still kept in confinement, and prevented from doing further injury to
society. But a member of a Church would continue in communion, pend
ing the proceedings, and the very notoriety of his offence would offer the
greatest obstacle to the just exercise of discipline.
If the alleged offence has been publicly committed, it will, of course, be
generally known and talked of. The particular circumstances of the case
will be understood by all the members of the Church as well as others,
and, of course, their opinions will have been formed and expressed before
the trial is instituted, and the notorious offender has only to exercise his
right of challenge for cause, and all who have formed an unfavourable
opinion on his case must be dismissed. Meantime the minister has no
power to compel the attendance of committee-men from a distance, nor any ¦
means of compensating them for their loss of time, or to defray the expenses
incurred by them in the fulfilment of the duty required by the Church ;
and hence the veiy notoriety of the offence secures the offender from pun
ishment, and subjects the communion of the Church to reproach and dese
cration. " To retain on a committee," says the Rev. Mr. Hanson, " men whose
personal hostility to the accused might divert their minds from the real
merits of the case, and thereby prevent the due administration of justice, is
what I believe no Methodist preacher would knowingly do ; but to dismiss
brethren, lest their love and respect for the character of the Church should
lead them to condemn the schismatic and defamatory acts of her members,
would be a strange proceeding indeed."
We cannot, perhaps, explain ourselves better, than by a quotation from
the " Narrative and Defence" of the proceedings in Baltimore in certain
Church trials, which were the subject of loud and universal complaint and
denunciation among our adversaries. After the lapse of some years, it is
gratifying to review opinions formed and expressed under circumstances

278

MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.

so weU calculated tobias the judgment through the influence of the feel
ings, and to find nothing which maturer reflection would require us to
alter. It is said in the Narrative and Defence, pages 86-88 : —
" The protests and objections so confidently made and so pertinaciously
insisted on, against the committees appointed to try the cases severally, of
the. local preachers and the lay members, chiefly rested on the want of
conformity in the appointment and in the proceedings generally, to the
practice which obtains in courts of criminal jurisprudence. We may
therefore entertain the hope, that when these great reformers shall have
remodelled the Church ' after their fashion,' we shall, among other pro
mised blessings, enjoy all the glorious uncertainties of the law. We shall
then substitute our little book of Disciphne by massy folios of common
law and statute law, with commentaries of learned length, and reports of
ponderous magnitude. We shall have a goodly number of ecclesiastical
lawyers, establish courts, appoint judges, with their attending clerks, and
other officers, who will keep us to all the rules of special pleading and
legal technicalities. We may then enjoy the inestimable privilege of occa
sionally defeating the ends of justice, by a technical objection to an indict
ment, and see persons take their places in our class-meetings and at the
communion, whom everybody knows to be guilty of the worst offences,
but who have eluded a fair trial by the subtilty of counsel, What a won
derful reformation we have in prospect, and how ardently it ought to be
desired by all good Methodists !
'' We have heretofore considered our Church judicatories as merely
moral tribunals, in which a few plain, pious men were deemed capable of
deciding, whether an accused brother had violated his religious or social
obligations, as ascertained and pointed out by the Bible and our Discipline ;
how one, found to have so offended, could be reclaimed from the error of
his ways — the effects of evil example prevented, and the reproach roUed
away from the Church of Christ. We had never thought that there, was
any great difficulty in such an investigation ; or that the rales by which
such an inquiry was to be conducted, could be, in their nature, very obscure
or complicated. The Methodists had, therefore, been led to think that
men of plain common sense, with the necessary piety and integrity, were
fully competent to judge in such matters, both of the law and the fact.
But it seems that both we and our fathers haye walked in great darkness.
In vain we allege, that we have hitherto lived happy under these regu
lations. This, we are told, was attributable to our ignorance. We did
not know and justly estimate our privileges. All these things are now
to be reformed !
" The right to challenge jurors, it is alleged, is acknowledged in. all civil
ized and Christian countries. We will not cavil at this sweeping decla
ration, although it might, perhaps, be shown that there are civilized and

CONSTITUTION OF METHODIST PROTESTANT CHURCH. 279
Christian countries where the trial by jury does not exist at aU. We
admit, however, that all civilized and Christian countries ought to adopt it
as a civil institution of inestimable value ; but it does not follow that pre
cisely the same regulation ought to be, or even can be, adopted in Church
government, accompanied with the right to challenge jurors; and we
may safely assert, that such a right, as exercised in our courts of law, does
not obtain in any Church judicatory of which we ever heard. In the Pro
testant Episcopal Church, we believe that persons deemed unworthy are
forbidden the communion at the will of the pastor alone. In the Presby
terian Church, the trial of members accused of improper conduct, takes
place before the ' session,' composed of the minister and the ruling elders,
aU holding their office for life, or during good behaviour ; and deputa
tions from the ' sessions ' constitute all the superior judicatories who exer
cise appellate jurisdiction in the Church. In the Baptist and Congre
gational Churches, trials for violation of discipline take place before the
whole Church, and we believe the accused does not possess the privilege
to except against any member's right to sit on his case. Surely it cannot
be without good reason that the privilege of challenge, either peremptorily
or for cause, accorded to persons indicted for offences against the laws
of civil society, are not recognised in any Church judicatory whatever.
Why it has not been, and cannot.be provided for by any such exphcit
regulation is, indeed, very obvious. It would require that there should
exist somewhere in the Church, an authority to compel the service of
jurors, and the attendance of witnesses,* and to call them from a great
distance if occasion should require. But it is obvious that no Church can
clothe any of its officers with such powers. We readily admit, that in
selecting committees, our preachers ought to set aside any man who is
known to entertain, or to have expressed, any personal hostility to the
accused member. We know of no instance where they have refused to
do so ; and were they to refuse, the quarterly-meeting conference, upon an
appeal, would not fail to redress the injury."
It has been alleged, however, that the quarterly-meeting conferences to
which the injured member has a right to appeal, is chiefly composed of
class-leaders, who are appointed by the preacher, and may be removed by
him at pleasure. To this we may reply, that it could seldom if ever happen,
that the preacher under whose administration the appeal is made, had
appointed any considerable proportion of the class-leaders in a quarterly-
meeting conference, although they all would, at some time or other, have
°, " Durin" the trials we have been giving an account of, the tribunals, so far from
having the power to compel the attendance of witnesses, appeared to have no authority
to compel answers to interrogatories put to the witnesses who were present. Some of
the officers and private members of the Union Society positively refused to say whether
the persons under trial were members of that society or not."— Narrative and Defence.

280 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
been appointed by a preacher. And, secondly, that although a preacher
may remove improper leaders, yet, for the exereise of his discretion in this
matter, he is responsible to the annual conference, and would be subjected
to censure if he were to remove useful leaders to effect any purpose of his
own. Add to this, that his daily bread depends upon the good opinion
of his flock ; and it will be easily seen that the removal of leaders for the
purpose of influencing the decision of a quarterly conference, would be a
measure of such hardihood, as a preacher in his right senses would hardly
venture to adopt.
The authority which, in this respect, is committed to a preacher, is like
that which is vested in the commander of an army. It is necessary that
the commander should be intrusted with power, which may be abused to
the great damage of those under his command ; but his country holds
him amenable for the judicious exercise of his power, and the abuse of it
will subject him to censure and punishment under the decision of a court
martial. So, if a preacher abuse his trust, to the injury of the Church,
coasplaint may be lodged against him to the annual conference, to whom
he is responsible for his official as well as moral conduct If to this it be
answered, that the annual conference is composed entirely of ministers,
and would, therefore, justify one of their own members, right or wrong,
we have only to say that he who -has the .misfortune to belong to a
Church whose whole ministry are thus corrupt, will scarcely deem expul
sion an injury or a misfortune. If he be a good man he will not wait to
be disowned by such a ministry — he will hasten to disown them.
After all, however, we are free to confess, that this part of our economy
is founded, like most other parts of it, in the mutual confidence of minis
ters and members. It is supposed that a minister of the gospel wUl feel
and act in accordance with his sacred calling ; that he will love the souls
whom Christ has purchased with his own blood too well to purposely
turn them out of the way, or to willingly deprive them of Christian
fellowship and communion, unless they have rendered themselves utterly
unworthy of such privileges. If he be the representative of the good
Shepherd he will love the sheep, and will feed them, and delight to lead
them into fruitful pastures ; but if he be a wolf in sheep's clothing he may
do mischief to the flock — nor do we know how to guard effectually against
such a contingency. To deprive the pastors of the Church of all power
which may be abused, would leave them destitute of the power to protect
the sanctuary of the Lord.
But let us see what steps the new Church, which was to be a paragon
of excellence, has done in this matter : —
In the third section of the fourteenth article of the constitution,- it is
provided that " No member shall be expelled or deprived of Church priv
ileges, without an impartial trial before a committee of three or more lay

CONSTITUTION OF METHODIST PROTESTANT CHURCH. 281
members, or before the society of which he is a member, as the accused
may require." This is one of the constitutional articles which the General
Conference of the Methodist Protestant Church cannot alter; and we
undertake to show that it renders the expulsion of the worst criminals,
under certain circumstances, impossible.
Whether by the society be meant the class, or the whole associate
Church, the effect wiU be the same. Some offences are of so gross and
obscene a character as to render it highly indecorous to bring them before
females of any age, much more young females. No female, of the least
delicacy, would consent to hear the evidence in such cases, especially in
the presence of men ; and yet the accused might legally object to be tried
unless they attended. It is well known that females constitute a large
majority of most country classes and societies, where the male and female
members always meet together. If, then, in any trial of an accused
ir.ember, the females absent themselves, the assembly could not be called
the class, or society, and therefore would not be competent to try the
case. The delinquent would therefore elude a trial altogether, for he
could not be legally brought before a committee, because the constitution
gives him the option of being tried by a committee, or before the society.
Again : it will happen, as it has often happened, that a class or society
will consist of only five or six members, and of these each individual may
belong to the same family, or may be allied by consanguinity or by mar
riage. Any accusation brought against a member of this society must, if
the accused require it, be tried by his own relatives. Will any man
say that, under such circumstances, the Church has a fair chance for a
verdict ? Will the wife and the children disgrace themselves by expelling
the husband and the father from the Church ? Yet such is the amend
ment which radicalism would have made in our discipline.
But if a member, accused of any offence, shall not elect to be tried by
the whole -society, then the Discipline provides that " the accused shall
nominate two persons in full membership and good standing ;" the class
of which he or she is a member shall nominate two more members, in
like good standiug ; and the four persons thus chosen shall appoint a
fifth, which five persons shall constitute a competent court of trial. But
should the accused neglect or refuse to nominate as above provided, when
timely notice shall have been given, the presiding minister shall nominate
two members of the committee on behalf of the accused; provided,
however, that the accused shall have the right to challenge any person
chosen as a committee-man by the class, by assigning satisfactory reasons
for so doing, of which the class shall judge ; and provided, also, that
the presiding officer shall have the right to chaUenge the choice of the
accused, by showing just cause, of which the class shall judge." If the
committee find the person guilty, they must also adjudge the penalty.

282 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
Thus it wUl be seen, that the trial of a Church member is turned into
an arbitration, and the accused has the privilege of selecting two persons
whom he has been able to bias, or whom he knows to be in his favour,
and these two friends have a fair chance of procuring a third member of
the committee whose views they have previously ascertained, which three
persons will constitute a majority of the committee. If, with all these
advantages, the accused, whatever his case may be, suffers himself to be
convicted, he wiU be a fitter subject for a lunatic asylum than for the exer
cise of Church discipline. '
Let it be recollected that, however unjust the decision of the arbitrators
may be, the Church has no appeal. The preacher has no authority to cany
the case before the quarterly-meeting conference, either for the purpose of
procuring a new trial or for final adjudication. Even if the committee should
find the accused guilty of the grossest violation of the laws of God and
man, they may name the slightest penalty, such as a rebuke from the
preacher, and there is no redress, — the criminal -will still be entitled to all
the privileges of the Church which he has grieved and disgraced. We do
not mean that the discipline professedly tolerates immorality, but that the
power of naming the penalty, which is given to the committee without
reserve, limitation, or control, gives the authority to assign the most
trivial and inadequate punishment to the greatest violations of moral and
religious obligation ; because, however contrary their decision may be to
the provisions of the discipline of the Church, it is final. No superior
judicatory can annul the award, for it cannot be legally brought before
any other.
We have now given a fair view of the constitution and discipline of the
new Church, in reference to the trial of accused members ; and, of course,
of what the framers of it intended to do for us, if we had consented to he
reformed : and we cheerfully submit the question to every impartial
reader — Ought we to have consented to be reformed after " this fashion !"
In the new code, the general and annual conferences are styled " legis
lative assemblies," and under the constitution as it now is, may exercise
powers which we, who have been represented as the passive slaves of our
itinerant preachers, should be very unwilling to delegate to either minis
ters or laymen.
The " elementary principles " contain the following declaration : — "The
Church has a right to form and enforce such rales and regulations only
as are in accordance with the Holy Scriptures, and may be necessary, or
have a tendency to carry into effect the great system of practical Chris
tianity." "Whatever power may be necessary to the formation of rules
and regulations, is inherent in the ministers and members of the Church;
but so much of that power may be delegated, from time to time, upon a
plan of representation as they may judge necessary and proper."

CONSTITUTION OF METHODIST PROTESTANT CHURCH. 283
" It is obligatory on ministers of the gospel, to be faithful in the dis
charge of their pastoral and ministerial duties ; and it is also obligatory
on the members, to esteem ministers highly for their works' sake, and to
render them a righteous compensation for their labours"
It will be perceived from the above extracts, that while the Church is
prohibited from passing any rules and regulations which are not in ac
cordance with the Holy Scriptures, it is at the same time declared to be
the right of the ministry, and, of course, in accordance with the Holy Scrip
tures, to claim a righteous compensation for their labours ; and therefore
the Church has a right to pass such rales and regulations as may be
necessary to enforce this claim. Accordingly, we find that the General
Conference has power " to fix the compensation and duties of the itinerant
ministers and preachers, and the allowance for their wives, widows, and
children ; and also the compensation and duties of the book agent,
editor, &c, &c, and to devise ways and means for raising funds." And
the annual conferences have power " to make such rules and regulations
as may be necessary to defray the expenses of the itinerant ministers,
preachers, and their families ; to raise the amount of their salaries, as
fixed by tlie convention, and for all other purposes connected with the
organization and continuance of said conferences." From all which it
follows, that the " legislative assemblies " have power to levy and collect
taxes for the compensation of the ministers and preachers, and for all the
other puiposes in the above enumeration ! and that these taxes may be
either a poll or property tax, or both, if the " legislative assemblies " of
the Church judge it expedient. That this inference is not drawn from
any forced construction of the provisions of the constitution and discipline
we are examining, but that it is fairly and legitimately made out, will
be admitted by any impartial reader who will carefully examine the
premises. It is stated explicitly, that the Church has a right to make and enforce
upon her members any rales and regulations which are in accordance
with the Holy Scriptures, and none other. So far, very well. But it is
further declared, that the members are bound, (of course, by the Holy
Scriptures,) to render the ministers a righteous compensation for their
labours ; and, moreover, that to secure this compensation, as ascertained by
the General Conference, the annual conference shall have power to make
such rules and regulations as may be necessary ; and, therefore, if neces
sary, they may raise the requisite funds by taxation, and enforce the col
lection under the penalty of expulsion from Church membership.
Let it be remembered, that the constitution before us recognises these
Church councils as "legislative assemblies." They have, therefore, a
right to make laws, and laws are nugatory and useless unless some
penalty is annexed to the violation of them. But the only penalty which

284 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
a Church can enforce or exact in this countiy, is Church censure or expul
sion. It follows, therefore, that as the powers vested in the Church to
raise the preachers' salaries, by such means as the legislative assemblies
may deem necessary, is " in accordance with Scripture," the Church has a
right to expel from her communion any member who may refuse to pay
his assessment for the " righteous compensation " of the preacher.
The members of the Methodist Protestant Church have the consolation
of having granted these constitutional powers to their legislative assem
blies, through their own representatives, if, indeed, the lay delegates voted
for the granting of these powers, for the majority of the convention con
sisted of ministers. Yet I very much doubt whether they wm be found
to submit very patiently, when the powers so liberally granted come to be
exercised. They were promised a cheap ministry ; and, perhaps, the false
statements which from the beginning of the controversy were made in
reference to the " salaries " of our bishops and presiding elders, made
more converts to reform than all the arguments of reformers. They will
now find they have made a bad exchange, in a pecuniary point of view
at least; and however "reform" may have subdued their feelings, they
will nevertheless be often compelled " to feel in their pockets."
As for us Episcopal Methodists, we have never admitted even the idea of
" compensating our ministers for their labour." We have considered it
our duty to afford them support — to furnish them and their families food
and raiment ; but " compensation " is a term entirely new to us in appli
cation to our preachers, and like the other innovations which have been
dignified by the name of reform, we see no good reason for adopting it.
To compensate them for their labour, would, we apprehend, be infinitely
beyond our means ; and indeed we should be greatly at a loss how to
estimate their services. Compensation would imply not only payment for
actual labour, but for the sacrifices necessarily imposed by the service re
quired of them. We know of no rule in arithmetic by which these sacri
fices could be estimated, and if the labours are to be valued by the
benefits we have derived from them, payment is the most hopeless idea of
which we can conceive.
Hitherto, however, we have not been required by our ministers to
enter into any pecuniary stipulations with them, even for support, much
less for " compensation." They have never assumed to be legislators,
and therefore have not arrogated the dignity or prerogatives of " legislative
assemblies." On the contrary, the last General Conference of the Method
ist Episcopal Church (1828) expressly disavowed aU legislative authority
over the Church. They only claim, as a Church council, composed of
the pastors of the flock of Christ, the right to execute the laws which the
great Head of the Church has promulgated, and to adopt such prudential
rules as may be necessary for that purpose. They have not found in

CONSTITUTION OF METHODIST PROTESTANT CHURCH. 285
the code of the Christian Lawgiver, any law which requires the lay mem
bers of the Church to enter into a stipulation with their pastors and
ministers, to allow them a " compensation for their labours," and therefore
they have imposed none. They find, indeed, what is equally obvious to us,
" that they who preach the gospel should live of the gospel ;" and that,
therefore, the members of the Church are under a moral obhgation to
contribute of their worldly substance to the support of those who devote
themselves whoUy to the ministry ; but it is like the moral obhgation to
relieve the necessities of the poor, to visit the sick, &c, — the contribution,
whether of money or time, must be a free-will offering. The Church can
not regulate by law the amount of each member's proportion, nor cen
sure or punish those who either give stingily or who refuse to give at all ;
and for this plain reason : such contributions are nowhere in the Scriptures
made conditions of Church membership, nor are they plainly inferable
from any general requisition imposed as a term of communion in the
Bible. The Church, therefore, cannot impose them without assuming
legislative authority, — a power nowhere conferred in the Holy Scriptures.
How far each one of us has done his duty as the stewards of his Lord's
bounty, or how far we have failed to support the gospel and supply the
necessities of the poor, according to the means which Providence has placed
in our power, cannot be questions of Church discipline, but must be reserved
to the judgment of the great day. The delinquents in these respects, are
the tares which must be suffered to grow with the wheat until the harvest,
lest in rooting them out we should root out the wheat also.
We know not how this authority to " legislate," which has been assumed
by the Church councils of the new Church, may be viewed by others, —
but we are free to confess that it was among the innovations which we
most dreaded of all that were proposed by our reformers during the whole
revolutionary movement. We saw from the first, that a lay delegation in
our General Conference would essentially change the relation between
the ministers and the laity. Under the existing economy, the preachers
had no right, and had never assumed any, to impose a pecuniary stipula
tion on the membership, as a consideration for their ministerial services,
for the plain reason that we were not present, either in person or by repre
sentatives, in the body where the preachers' allowances were ascertained.
The preachers had a right to say for themselves that they would not receive
more than a certain amount, but they could not say that the members
upon a circuit or station should pay any amount whatever. The mem
bership neither sit in their assembly, nor make their appointments, — and,
therefore, if they receive the preacher sent to them, it must be a voluntary
act, and the support they give must be a voluntary contribution — a free
will offering.
But change the constitution of tlie General Conference. Give the

286 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
immediate representatives of the people a seat in that body, and it foUows of
necessity that any salary which may be allowed the preachers becomes obli
gatory upon the membership, and I am not sure that the stewards of the
circuit or station would not be legally bound to pay the uttermost farthing.
This is the state of the new Church. The membership, by their votes in
the convention, decided that they were bound to "make the preachers a-
righteous compensation for their labours." They also fixed the amount
of his salary. In the annual conference they participate in the appoint
ing power, which assigns the preachers their several stations and circuits,
and are fuUy empowered, as members of that body, to take the necessary
measures to raise money for the payment of the preachers' salary. The
stewards of the circuit seem, therefore, bound to pay him his claim, thus
ascertained and allowed, without delay or abatement ; but if the claim
cannot be recovered of the stewards by an action at law, the members of
the Church are bound, both in honour and honesty, to pay the debt they
have contracted, — the " compensation " they have allowed by a solemn
act of legislation, passed by their representatives.
We have said that we dreaded this innovation ; and we did so, first,
because, if the obligations which grow out of it are scrupulously fulfilled
— and surely they ought to be fulfilled — the necessity of levying taxes is
inevitable. If any be covetous, they will not contribute unless they are coerced;
and the honest member, who considers himself, bound by the acts of his
representatives, will find himself compelled to make up the deficiencies of
the members who love their money better than their word. This would
be a grievance too intolerable to bear, — and as the stipulation is binding,
there could be no alternative but to levy upon the membership according
to their respective abilities ; or, adjudging each member to be equally
benefitted by the services of the preacher, to lay a capitation tax.
Secondly. As " the best of men are but men at best," and preachers very
much like other men — that is, Christian men — we should greatly fear the
consequences of placing them beyond the reach of their immediate flocks.;
that is, we should deem it unsafe to make their support or their " com
pensation " dependant upon anything else than the love and sympathies
of those to whom they minister. That the danger we apprehend is not
visionary, we appeal to the records of the Christian Church in all its ages,
and we are persuaded that the wise man spoke wisely, when he said,
" The thing that hath been, it is that which shaU 'be."
This, then, is the result of the mighty clamour we have heard about
representation. The members of the Methodist Episcopal Church deny
to their Church councils any legislative authority, civil or ecclesiastical.
They have no power to tax them, nor to impose upon them any term of
communion not sanctioned by express warrant of Scripture, or clearly

CONSTITUTION OF METHODIST PROTESTANT CHURCH. 287
inferable from the doctrines or precepts of Christianity. These powers
have never been exercised, and are frankly and explicitly disclaimed.
We, therefore, are willing to commit to our ministers the regulations
necessary to the great work to which they are called, — the propagation
of the gospel, and the oversight of the flock ; and without stipulation in
respect to hire, or "compensation," we contribute voluntarily what we
deem adequate to their support, as God may give ability ; or, if we do
not, we hold ourselves amenable only to Him who searcheth the heart,
and who wUl reward every man according to his work. Having neither
legislation to do nor taxes to levy, we desire neither the expense nor trouble
of lay representation, — we have no faith in works of supererogation.
Our reformers, on the contrary, have dignified their superior councils
with the title of "Legislative Assemblies.'' These assemblies may, there
fore, make laws and enforce them by ecclesiastical sanctions. They do not,
we hope and believe, claim the right of repealing the laws heretofore made
by the great Lawgiver ; neither do the Romanists ; but as they claim the
right of legislation, they must deem the Christian code incomplete, and,
therefore, requiring some supplementary statutes. We are not told, because
we suppose they do not yet know, when the canon will be completed.
Perhaps they may apply to father Peter for the musty traditions upon
which he has been wont to draw when nothing was found in the Bible to
suit his occasions. Or peradventure their pretension may be a revival of
the old claim of " mother Church," to enforce the same submission to
the decrees of councils as all Christians acknowledge to be due to the
Scripture canon. But whatever be the pretension, if they have legislation
there ought to be representation. If their legislative assemblies can make
laws affecting property and Church membership, let them see to it, and be
vigilant to watch the progress of those ecclesiastical and civil legislatures.
But let them be honest; and when they promise, by their representatives,
to give their preachers certain salaries let them redeem the pledge, and let
their people know that they who are fairly represented ought to be equally
taxed ; for there is no other way by which pecuniary representative obliga
tions and engagements can be fulfilled.
We had noticed, in looking over the constitution, doctrines, and discip
line of the.new Church, that there was to be found no expression of opinion
favouring the doctrine which so universally prevahs in the Methodist Epis
copal Church, and, we believe, in all the evangelical Churches— namely,
that they who rightfully preach the gospel and administer its ordinances
are called thereunto by the Holy Ghost. This opinion, however, is founded
upon Scripture and sustained by experience. It is, as we said before, pro
fessed by all the evangelical Churches, and wherever there has been a
decline of piety and Christian zeal in any branch of the Church, it has been
preceded or accompanied by some practical departure from this leading

288 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
principle of the Christian system, although the profession has been, for the
most part, retained. So in the Church of England, the candidate for holy
orders "trusts that he is moved by the Holy Ghost" to preach the gospel,
although he has neither part nor lot in the matter himself, and though his
life and conversation abundantly shows that his views in entering into the
priest's office are entirely mercenary. The doctrines remain the same,
though an unholy alliance with the State has rendered them entirely nuga
tory. And in the state of the different, established Churches we find suffi
cient proof that so essential is the doctrine of a divine call to the ministry,
that any departure from it, either in principle or practice, is sure to intro
duce a worldly-minded, covetous, carnal ministry, and aU the consequences
of their unholy ministration.
From the time when God called us to be a people, and thrust out the
Wesleys and their sons in the gospel to preach a full, free, and present
salvation, they spoke with one voice on this subject. They uniformly and
unitedly declare that it was not of choice but of necessity that they entered
upon the work. They were pressed in spirit, and could find no rest until
they obeyed the call. In the history of the " Preachers' Experiences,"
collected and published by Mr. Wesley, we find but one testimony on this
subject. None of them entered upon their labours or offered themselves
to the work because they thought themselves peculiarly fitted by either gifts
or grace for the duty ; on the contrary, a conscious deficiency in both these
respects led them strenuously to resist the impression which they felt.
Some of them struggled against these impressions long and steadfastly,
even to the loss of health and all personal enjoyments. Nor were they
satisfied until their brethren urged their compliance, and it pleased God to
make manifest to others the validity of their call by the success which,
through his blessing, accompanied their labours.
The necessity of a special supernatural call to. the ministry has not only
been universally admitted by us from the beginning, but it has had a
practical influence on the whole economy of Methodism. We have looked
for the evidences of this caU as a sine qua non, whenever one of our brethren
has presented himself as a candidate for the ministry. If the candidate
had given satisfactory evidence of a gracious work in his own soul, had
clear and consistent views of gospel truth, and professed to believe himself
called of God to the work of the ministry, we have only waited the con
firmation which the fruit of his labours only could give, that this caU was
genuine. Every Methodist knows how easily we have been satisfied in
respect to what are called gifts or natural endowments, and they also know,
that experience has justified us in this matter. It is a fact attested by our
whole history, that the most useful of our ministers have entered upon the
work with very little of that kind of preparation which the wisdom of this
world would deem essential to success. Nay, we will go farther, and say

CONSTITUTION OF METHODIST PROTESTANT CHURCH. 289
that we have never known an instance of failure where there was the evi
dence of a deep conviction of the worth of souls and the danger to which
the unconverted were exposed, accompanied by ardent zeal for the glory
of God, and that love — that all-pervading love for perishing sinners — which •
nothing can excite but the love of God shed abroad in the heart. Let a
preacher of the most common natural endowments, and even less literary
acquirements, have the above-mentioned preparation, and withal a firm
and abiding conviction that the great Shepherd of souls has called and
appointed him to gather sinners into his fold, and his success is certain.
Let him be faithful, and he who has called will qualify him for the work.
It is for the glory of God that the success of the gospel should not depend
upon the natural powers of the preacher, but upon the power of Him by
whom he is sent, that the excellency of the power should be seen to be of
God, not of man. Let us never lose sight of first principles. If there be no
special call to the ministry, we have been deceived from the beginning ; and
the success which has crowned the original plan and design of the Wesleys is
the most inexplicable thing in human history. They designed, from the first
institution of a ministry without classical literature or collegiate qualifica
tions, to revive, in the other Churches, and especially in the Established
Chinch, the principles and practice of primitive Christianity ; and they
have shown that now, as in the beginning, God is in no wise dependant
upon institutions of human learning for the instruments which may be
necessary to effect his great purposes of love and mercy to man. He still
takes his messengers, the heralds of salvation, indifferently from the hum
bler avocations of life or from the feet of Gamaliel ; but, in all instances,
he who " would be wise must become a fool, that he may be wise." God
alone can call and qualify for his own work.
We have said before, that these opinions were held abstractly by other
Churches, but they had ceased to influence them, in regard to practice,
when Mr. Wesley commenced his ministiy. Seminaries had been estab
lished and endowed, where boys were sent to be prepared for the ministry,
as for any other business ; and yet these, when admitted, were made to
declare they were inwardly moved by the Holy Ghost to enter upon this
trade or profession ! By the blessing of God upon the labours of the
Methodist ministry, light has pervaded all the Churches, in a greater or
less degree, upon this subject ; and though in the Church establishments
the practice of educating boys for holy orders still obtains, the absurdity
and inconsistency of it begins to be generally acknowledged, and the
practice wiU be abandoned as soon as the "livings" of the ministry,
now secured by law, shall be dependant on the voluntary contributions of
the people.
In proof of this, it will be observed, that, in this country theological
schools are established, not professedly to educate for the ministry those
19

290 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
who desire to follow preaching as a trade, but to give the necessary
instruction to those who are supposed and who profess to be called to the
work. And hence, education is afforded more or less gratuitously to all
who are believed to have this call, and whose circumstances require such'
aid. It does not fall in with our present purpose to examine the propriety
of this greatly modified plan of making preachers. We have pointed to it
only to show the universal prevalence of the opinion which obtains in ah
the Churches, that no man can rightfuUy or conscientiously enter upon the
work of the ministry without being convinced of a personal special call
thereto by "the Lord of the harvest."
Conformably to these opinions, the Methodist Episcopal Church retain
in their Discipline a distinct recognition of the doctrine that none may
enter her ministry without the special appointment of the Holy Spirit.
The tenth section of our Discipline treats " of the trial of those who
think they are moved by the Holy Ghost to preach."
" Question. How shaU we try those who profess to be moved by the
Holy Ghost to preach ?
"Answer. 1. Let the foUowing questions be asked, viz.: — Do they
know God as a pardoning God ? Have they the love of God abiding in
them ? Do they desire nothing but God ? And are they holy in all
manner of conversation ?
" 2. Have they gifts (as weU as grace) for the work ? Have they (in
-some tolerable degree) a clear, sound understanding, a right judgment in
the things of God, a just conception of salvation by faith ? And has
God given them any degree of utterance ? Do they speak justly, readily,
clearly ?
"•&. Have they the fruit ? Are any truly convinced of sin and converted
to God by their preaching ?
" As long as these three marks concur in any one, we believe he is
called of God to preach. These we receive as sufficient proof that he is
moved by the Holy Ghost."
Of all this there is not a word in the new constitution or Discipline.
The Methodist Protestants acknowledge no special agency of the Holy
Spirit in making their preachers. They do not require of their candidates
any profession or declaration that they think they are moved by any
divine influence to enter upon the great duties of preaching the gospel,
administering its ordinances, and taking the oversight of the flock of
Christ. All that we find on the subject is in the article in their Discip
line, headed " Quarterly Conference," and is contained in the third section,
as follows : —
" 3. The first quarterly conference in each conference year shall appoint
a committee of examination to assist, advise, and examine candidates for
the ministry. It shall be the duty of the committee to see that the candi-

CONSTITUTION OF METHODIST PROTESTANT CHURCH. 291
dates pursue the course of reading prescribed by the Discipline ; to examine
them occasionally on doctrines and religious experience; and when they
shall have made the necessary attainments, to give them a written testi
monial of their quahfications. But no committee shaU give a testi
monial except the candidate be a man of unexceptionable moral character,
genuine piety, and have respectable attainments — at least an abUity to
state and defend the leading doctrines of Christianity.
" No person shaU be licensed to preach except he present a testimonial
from the committee of examination.
"The following questions shah be put to each candidate, and if he answer
them satisfactorily he may be licensed : —
" Have you faith in Christ ; and are you striving to be holy in heart,
and in all manner of conversation ?
" Have you any other motive in requesting license to preach than a
desire to be instrumental in edifying the Church of God, calling sinners to
repentance, and saving your own soul and those that hear you ?
" Do you believe that the Holy Scriptures of the Old and New Testa
ments contain aU things necessary to salvation ?
"Have you examined our constitution and Discipline ; do you approve
of them, and are you willing to comply with their requirements ?
" Are you solvent ?"
We have been long apprized of the opinions of some of the "reformers"
in our city upon this subject. We have heard them not only deny the
special call of the ministry, but treat the notion with ridicule and con
tempt ; yet we had not supposed the opinion to have prevailed so exten-*
sively as to effect the expulsion of this essential doctrine from their code.
The fact, however, is not now to be denied, and we view it as ominous of
other grievous departures from first principles in future.
Perhaps some of our readers may be charitable enough to attribute
what we allege rather to omission than design — they will not be disposed
to beheve that so fundamental a principle in the Christian system has
been purposely left out of the constitution and Disciphne prepared by the
congregated wisdom of the reformers. If any of our readers be so char
itably disposed we respect their sentiments, but we must correct their
opinions. If they wUl be at the pains of consulting the official paper of
that Church, of May 13th, 1831, they will find, under the editorial head,
and of course from the agent appointed by the convention to express
their views and opinions, an article which clearly develops the doctrine
they hold on this subject. We have not room for the insertion of the
whole article, but we extract, for the satisfaction of the reader, such parts of it
as may more immediately relate to the subject under consideration : —
" We cannot refrain from blaming those Christians who, with talent*
every way calculated to advocate the interests of religion', and administer

202 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES. >
its blessings to willing multitudes, refuse to exercise their gifts in the most
effectual and appropriate way. It wUl not do to plead the want of a ' call'
to the ministry, or of a ' direct commission from the Holy Ghost ' to preach
the gospel. Look abroad over the earth, and behold how many are asleep
in their wickedness, dead in trespasses and in sin. Can you not find a
voice — do you not feel it your imperious duty to cry aloud, 'Awake,
thou that sleepest ! arise from the dead ?'
" Yes. Christ speaks to each of his followers as he spake to Peter,
' Lovest thou me ?' ' Then feed my sheep !' And every one of his follow
ers must accomplish the command as God has given him abUity. If you
have the talent, stand up in the great congregation and declare the mar
vellous works of the Almighty. If you do not, be fearful lest God call you
to a reckoning for the nonimprovement of your gifts." The editor goes
on to complain, that while sinners are sleeping and Christians are falling
these talented men " coldly fold their arms in quietude, saying, God has
never commissioned me, I have no call from the Spirit. This will not do.
Have you sincerity towards God ? Do you feel conscious of an ability to
understand the Scriptures ; rightly to divide the word of truth ; to pro
claim its doctrines, denounce its threatenings. and administer its promises ?
Then are you inexcusable if you hold your peace." — Mutual Rights and
Methodist Protestant, May 13, 1831.
It wUl be seen by the above extract, that the organ of the convention
considers a " consciousness of ability " a sufficient authority to preach the
gospel, — nay, to preach it to wUling multitudes in " the great congrega
tion." It will not do, we are told, to wait for any supernatural call or
qualifications — for any direct commission from the Holy Ghost. If the
aspirant is " conscious " of the ability, he must go to work.
Now we not only disagree with this organ of the Church, but we hold
opinions directly adverse to his, and we are sure that the observation of
aU judicious Christians will sustain us. We believe that a consciousness
of " abUity to understand the Scriptures ; rightly to divide the word of
truth ; to proclaim its doctrines, denounce its threatenings, and administer
its promises," would be rather a disqualification for the ministerial calling:
It would argue great pride and presumption for a man to have such a
conceit of himself ; and certainly pride and presumption are bad ingredients
in the qualifications of a preacher of the gospel. One so filled with high
notions of his talents would not be likely to be approved by Him who said,
" I am meek and lowly in heart." On the contrary, he who feels the
importance of the work, and who is really best fitted for it, will always
have the most humbling views of himself. Yet such men are always ready,
because they conceit they have, as the editor say's, " talents every way cal
culated to advocate the interests of religion and administer its blessings to
willing multitudes"

CONSTITUTION OF METHODIST PROTESTANT CHURCH. 293
Mr. Charles Wesley has veiy forcibly described the character of both the'
suitable and unsuitable messenger of Christ in four short lines : —
" How ready he is to go,
Whom God has never sent ;
How cautious, diffident, and slow,
His chosen instrument .'"
In conformity with the notion that no special call of " the Lord of the
harvest " is necessary to furnish labourers for the gospel field, but that
those who are themselves conscious of the talents necessary for the work
of an evangelist may take upon themselves this " office and ministry," we
find the foUowing notice of an intended institution in the paper aUuded to
above : —
" It is contemplated, by some benevolent persons of our communion in
this city, to form an education society, for the benefit of those among us
who may wish to devote themselves to the ministry."
Nothing more is necessary than a wish to devote themselves to the
ministry. Now, if our friends of the new Church will only establish such
a society, with the necessary funds, and then guarantee a good salary to
all who wish to devote themselves to the ministry, I will engage to insure
them as many preachers as they may require ; and I will further engage
that they shall, every man of them, be " conscious of their own ability " to
do everything which may be reasonably required of them. 0, are there
none in the Methodist Protestant Church who will rise on the Lord's side,
and vindicate the right of tile great Head of the Church to call and to
qualify his own ministers ? - Many of their preachers were once preachers
with us. They severally professed, before they received license, to beheve
they were " moved by the Holy Ghost to preach the gospel." Do they
now renounce the profession ? Did they deceive us, or were they them
selves deceived ? We recollect that many years ago we heard Mr. Snethen
advocate the cause of a brother who came before a quarterly conference
for a license to preach. The applicant had been a preacher, but, under
some strong temptation, had withdrawn from the Church. Saving
repented of his foUy and been restored to membership, he now applied for
a restoration of his ministerial functions. The brethren hesitated and W[
Snethen pressed his petition. We shall never forget his glowing de-*1^"
tion of the feelings of a man " called of the Holy Ghost " to prfl , .
o-ospel. He described it as a "fire in his bones," which con*--^ed r".m \
day and by night, until he became "obedient to the j^enly calling ;
and he warned the brethren of " the awful respon^mty of restraining the
servant of God who had bis commission in his heart to caU sinners to
repentance." Mr. Snethen, therefore, did believe,/™™ his own experience,
in the divine call to the ministry. We have no reason to beheve he has
renounced this belief, as he was not a member of the convention. WUl r-

$94 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
not yet raise his voice and venture to show his brethren their error ? Will
he not venture, while he is yet spared, to do his utmost to save a people
whom he has greatly contributed to lead out of our fold from a mistake
which threatens to overwhelm them with the curse of a worldly, vain, and
self-seeking ministry. We hope he will ; and may God give him suc
cess! At all events, the Episcopal Methodists will abide in the belief that He
who hath " ascended up far above aU heavens, that he might fill all things,
gave some, apostles ; and some, prophets ; and some, evangelists ; and some,
pastors and teachers ; for the perfecting of the saints, for the work of the
ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ." Eph. iv, 10, 12. And
we must continue to look to him only for pastors and teachers. We
must not attempt either to make them without his " caUing " or to mend
those whom he does caU, in theological seminaries. We will rejoice when
he selects a Paul from among the learned, nor will we be less thankful
when he shall eall a Peter from among the fishermen. He loveth the
Church, and if we abide in his love, we shall never want for pastors or
teachers taught of him and fitted for the duty he has assigned them. To
him be the glory throughout all ages. Amen.
Every one who has looked into the controversial writings of our adver
saries, wiU have perceived how fondly they are wont to dweU upon the
unalterable and inalienable right of representation. The most vehement
declamation has been incessantly poured forth against us, because our
'< legislature," as they absurdly call our General Conference, is composed
exclusively of itinerant ministers : and this continues to be their theme,
notwithstanding the Conference has formally disavowed all claim to legis
lative-authority over the Church ; and we have shown that in our whole
history no instance can be cited in which such power has been exercised,
, ;T\e Methodists have always acted upon the conviction that the laws,
a& well as the doctrines, by which Christians, coUectively or individuaUy,
ate to be governed, are plainly laid down in the Bible ; and that no
Church councU has a right to repeal, alter, amend, or add to them. All
that any ecclesiastical body is authorized to do in the matter, is simply to
1°"s4yide such prudential regulations as may be necessary to the propagation
°J X doctrines, and the execution of these laws. To illustrate this view
ot eccle*^caj aut]10nty) take a particular case : — It is a law of the gospel,
that the h^gfoie dmnkard shall be expelled from Church communion.
NW, '* Wl11 n^ be pretended that any Church council has a right to
make any new law in this case, or to repeal or modify the original statute.
What, then, remains for the Church to do in- the premises ? Simply to
execute the Jaw. But to do so, some mode of proceeding must be pre
scribed by which the fact shall be ascertained ; that is,, by which it shall
^^ascertaiped whether a member accused of drunkenness is, or is not,

CONSTITUTION OF METHODIST PROTESTANT CHURCH. 295
guilty of the charge ; and the proceedings prescribed by the Church in
such a case we call a prudential rule or regulation, in contradistinction to
the law which it is intended to enforce. The law must remain the same
under aU the varying circumstances of the Church. The rale by which
it is enforced, may, and indeed must necessarily change, according to the
particular condition of the Church. For although the design of the rule
must always be the same, yet the fitness of its provisions will always
depend upon the state of the people for whose use it is intended.
What we have said of the law in regard to drunkenness, wUl apply to
every other law of the gospel. No Church has a right to enjoin upon her
members either more or less than is commanded by the one only Lord
and Lawgiver ; but every Church is bound to enforce all the precepts of
the gospel upon her members, and to visit delinquencies with such penal
ties, and such penalties only, as are prescribed in the Christian code. The
proceedings to be instituted, in order to ascertain the guilt or innocence of
a member, is left to the discretion of the Church, because no particular
rule could be adapted to the ever- varying external circumstances of time
and place.
After the experience of a century, the great body of Methodists are con
firmed in the opinion, that the making of these prudential rales and regu
lations may be safely confided to their travelling ministers. First. Because
from the immediate and constant superintendence of the Church, they are
necessarily taught by experience how to adapt these rules to the peculiar
condition of our people.
Secondly. Because being identified in interest and feehng with the mem
bership, and absolutely dependant upon them for the supply of their tem
poral wants, they can be under no temptation to make any rule which will
tend to injure the Church ; but, on the contrary, must be induced by every
motive which ordinarily operates upon the minds of men, to promote the
general and individual prosperity of the people whom God hath committed
to their charge.
Thirdly. Because the rules in regard to moral discipline, having been
long tested and approved by the membership, are found to require very
little alteration ; while the great business of Conference is to devise ways
and means to fulfil, to the utmost possible extent, a commandment given
exclusively to the ministry — namely, " Go preach my gospel to every crea
ture." As the ministry are answerable to God for the faithful execution
of this command, we deem it right to let them make their own regulations
in regard to it, both because we cannot release them from or divide with
them responsibility which their ministerial duty imposes, and because we
modestly presume that their general observation and practical experience
render them more competent than we can be, to devise the best plans of
executing their great missionary operations.

296 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
And lastly, because they have never done anything to forfeit our con
fidence. In the whole histoiy of the Church it cannot be shown that any
rule has been made which violated the rights or injured the interests of
the membership. On the contrary, it can and has been shown, that the
General Conference has, from time to time, as the improvement of the
Church authorized it, transferred to the laity prerogatives and powers
originaUy vested in the ministry, and that, too, without any demand or
petition from the lay members.
Under the regulations heretofore adopted we have prospered beyond
all human calculation, and have been saved from the agitations and strifes
of contested elections, as well as from the expense of lay delegations ; and
until some obvious necessity shall make it proper to change our economy,
we have concluded " to let well-enough alone." In short, whUe we con
tinue to be satisfactorily represented by our itinerant ministers, we are
content to forego any other representation in the General Conference.
But we are told that the right of equal and individual representation is a
natural and inalienable right ; and, therefore, we have no authority to commit
the making of rules and regulations of any sort to our traveUing preachers.
We aUege, on the contrary, that all government is founded in social
compact, and is, or ought to be, intended to promote the common good
of the community. The community have, therefore, a right to adopt the
form of government which they deem best calculated to promote the
general interest and welfare ; and hence, if the Methodist community
beheve that the objects of their association wUl be better secured by their
present plan than by any other, they have a right to adhere to it In
other words, if they think that under existing circumstances they wUl be
better represented by travelhng preachers than by laymen, they are under
no moral or rehgious obligation to change the composition of the General
Conference. But if it be trae that the right to be equally represented in the supreme
council of the Church be common and inalienable, how wUl the Methodist
Protestant constitution abide the test ? Is the representation equal ? Cer
tainly not. It distinctly acknowledges at least two privileged orders in
legislative power. The " stationed "* ministers enjoy a representation equal
in amount to the whole membership, although they do not probably bear
the numerical proportion of one to three hundred ; and the " unstationed
ministers " have a delegation, on certain occasions, vastly disproportioned
to their numbers. Are these natural rights ? or have they been conceded
on the ground of expediency ? They are certainly not natural rights, nor
are they conferred by Scriptural authority. They rest, then, exclusively
on the ground of expediency ; and it follows, therefore, that whatever
° The distinctive appellations of " traveUing " and " local " preachers do not obtain in
the new organization. It recognises only " stationed " and " unstationed" preachers.

CONSTITUTION OF METHODIST PROTESTANT CHURCH. 297
alteration the Church may hereafter think it expedient to make in this
respect, may be lawfully and rightfully made. But, then, it follows also,
that if the Methodist Episcopal Church deem it expedient to have no lay
delegation at all, we have the same right to intrust the whole to our itin
erant ministers, as the Protestant Methodists have to confer the one-half;
as neither the one nor the other is consonant to the notions they have propa
gated about abstract natural rights, but is solely justified by expediency.
But we should like to know by what authority the new Church have
excluded females from all participation in their government. If on the
principle of natural inalienable rights, we are totally at a loss for the
argument on which this exclusion is founded. Nor will the political
reasons upon which females are excluded from a participation in civil
government avail them. In civil society women are supposed to be repre
sented by their fathers or husbands, whose interests are necessarily iden
tified with their daughters or wives respectively. But in the Church this
is not the case. The wife or daughter may be a member of the Church,
while a husband or father is not. They are not, as in civil government,
necessarily members of the same community, and, therefore, the female
members of the Church may have no voice, either positively or virtually,
in the " law-making department," and consequently, according to the defi
nition of the new bill of rights, they " are slaves !" This is a conclusion
which no sophistry can evade, and truly " the age of chivalry is gone."
If the sages of the new Church should allege Scriptural authority for
excluding females from all participation in Church government, we shall
not think ourselves bound to contest the ground ; but we shall insist that
they alter their definition of slavery : for otherwise they will be under
the necessity of admitting that the author of the Christian religion had
made women slaves ; and that Church communion and fellowship, while
it elevates and ennobles men, degrades females from the natural rights
and privileges of human nature.
The exclusion of females must, therefore, rest, as their other rules do,
upon the expediency of the measure, and thus the whole controversy be
tween the old Church and the new, is reduced to the simple question,
Which government is best calculated to effect the common objects of the'
association, to wit, the spread of the gospel over the world, and the- pro
motion of individual piety among their members ? So far as we can anti
cipate results from the probable effects of human regulations, we have
given our opinion heretofore. On the side of the Methodist Episcopal
Church we have experience to guide our calculations ; on the other side
it is an untried experiment, the success of which can only be estimated
by its likeness to institutions of a similar, though not exactly of the same
kind, which have heretofore been made in the Christian world, and which
have disappointed the fondest hopes of their authors. Our reformers have

298 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
started a little too late. The age of visionary speculation is passing away,
and we are entering upon an era of common sense and matter of fact.
Nothing will hereafter pass for knowledge in phUosophy which is not sus
tained by experiment; or in government, which is not predicated. upon
utility. The Abbe Seyes and the other constitution-makers of the former
French revolution would find dull sale for their wares at the present time,
even in revolutionary France. Men have learned that laws cannot be
made in anticipation of their wants, but must be adapted to their neces
sities ; and that speculative innovations upon government are seldom
adapted to the peculiar condition and circumstances of those for whom
they are intended. The government which is to provide for human wants
cannot be made in advance of the occasions which require its numerous
provisions ; but must be suggested by these wants as they are developed
by time and circumstances. Government must provide for man as he is,
not for man as he should be.
Under the new constitution, a preacher cannot be transfen-ed from one
annual conference to another without his consent. So that however full
some conferences may be, where the adequate provision made for
preachers may induce them to congregate, the conferences which offer less
pecuniary inducement may go unsupplied, however destitute of tlie word
of life.
We look upon this provision of the new Church as among the many
grievous departures from the primitive design of Methodism, to send the
gospel to those who are too poor to pay for it, or too ignorant to know
the value of it — to promulgate in the dark and desolate places of the earth
the glad tidings of salvation, by a company of missionary preachers,
who pledge themselves to go where they may be sent, by those whom
they have appointed to distribute the labourers through the vineyard.
Whenever this original design shall be abandoned, or be frustrated by
self-seeking or love of ease in the preachers of the Methodist Episcopal
Church, the glory will have departed, and the tendency to congregational
government will be certain and inevitable.
We had long since suggested, that the want of general superintendents
in the new Church, would render it impossible to unite the different
annual conferences in a common interest and effort. It will be found
impossible for each conference to have the particular information in regard
to the state and condition of the others, which is necessary to enable them
to act intelligently for the common good. General superintendents are
essentially necessary to the confederated conferences, not only as a com
mon bond of union, but as a common medium of communication and
intelligence. It is only through persons having a common oversight of
all the work in each conference that the preachers can be profitably
appointed according to their several abilities, and the particular exigencies

CONSTITUTION OF METHODIST PROTESTANT CHURCH. 299
of the circuits and stations. But as if this were not enough to contend
with in the new scheme, the frarners of the constitution have made it
optional with a preacher, whether he wUl leave his particular conference
district or not. He may not be refused if he wishes to go, nor sent if he
declines going. With such impediments in the outset, a general confeder
ated itinerancy is wholly impracticable. The union is a rope of sand. It
wiU crumble to pieces upon the slightest agitation.
But while we anticipate the effect of an express provision in the new
scheme to secure a traveUing preacher from being transferred from one
conference to another without his consent, we ought not to forget that
systems of the most perfect organization may be impaired, and even des
troyed, without directly altering any of their fundamental principles.
Innovations slide in imperceptibly, and that which is occasionally toler
ated to suit a temporary purpose, first becomes precedent, then custom,
and finaUy custom becomes the paramount law.
We should not have discharged our duty to the Methodist Episcopal
Church if we were to neglect an admonition on this subject. We have
reviewed the constitution and Discipline of the new Church chiefly with
a view of showing its unsuitableness as a system for the government of the
Methodist Episcopal Church, and our inquiries have convinced us that
our safety and usefulness depend chiefly upon the preservation of our
economy in its pristine simplicity and ' energy. But we are also con
vinced that this cannot be done without a frequent recurrence to first
principles, and unabating watchfulness against innovations in practice as
well as in theory.
The original power of the superintendents to station the preachers has
not been curtaUed by any rule of the General Conference. They have the
right, without restriction or appeal, to transfer preachers in acceptable
standing from one conference to another, as they may deem it necessary
for the general good. But is this power, so necessary to the common
welfare, not in fact abridged by the force of custom ? Has it not become
an odious exercise of prerogative to transfer a preacher without his con
sent ? And is it not generally understood that this will not be done ? If
these questions are answered in the affirmative, we do not hesitate to say
that it is time to look the evil in the face and hasten to remove it. It is
a grievous departure from first principles, which has grown out of a
spirit of accommodation, dangerous to the very existence of Methodism,
as known and understood by Mr. Wesley and Mr. Asbury, and by all
those whose labours laid the foundation of our present prosperity.
We are aware of the inconveniences which often attend transfers to
distant conferences, but we are not aware that these inconveniences bear
more heavily upon the preachers now than in former times, and yet the
memoirs of our old preachers will show that they visited most of the

300 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
settlements in the United States in the course of their itinerant life, and
hence they continued their usefulness and acceptableness down to the
latest period of their ministry. It was a remark of one of our olden-time
preachers, that " Mr. Asbury was so constantly in the habit of sacrificing
all his own comforts and conveniences to the welfare of the Church, that
he would not permit any desire to accommodate the preachers to compro-
mit this primary object." And much as we sympathize with our preach
ers, we would not that any relaxation in this principle should take place
in the exercise of the episcopal prerogative. It would finally effect the
destruction of both preachers and people.
The conferences, as the number of preachers increase, are divided, and
the boundaries of the districts are necessarily narrowed. The necessity
for such divisions arises from the inconvenience of congregating in large
bodies, in small towns and villages, where the. friends are not sufficiently
numerous to accommodate the preachers. Some of the preachers have
families too large to be provided for, except in a few circuits and stations,
and to those they are sent in succession, until they excite as little interest
as local preachers, and for the same reason ; when these same preachers
might be continued in all their primitive acceptability and usefulness if
they were transferred to conferences in which they were strangers. It
is in vain to complain of the love of novelty in the hearers. It arises
from causes too deeply fixed in human nature to be resisted or controlled.
Our business is not to control it, but to take advantage of it. This was
Mr. Wesley's opinion, and he was so good a judge of human nature
that it is not safe to differ with him. Perhaps, indeed, the superior
advantages of an itinerant ministry depend more upon this propensity of
mankind than upon any other cause ; and, if so, we should be exceedingly
cautious how we forego the advantages we have heretofore possessed, by
confining the sphere of any minister's labours within the narrow boundaries
of one annual conference.
Another practice which has grown into custom, and is fast obtaining
the force of law, is the continuing presiding elders in their several districts
uniformly for four years. We apprehend this to be dangerous to the pri
mitive spirit of our institutions, for the following, among other reasons :—
First. If they are seldom changed when no complaint exists, or no unfit
ness appears, it will, after a time, become a reproach to him who is changed,
and will require considerable explanation to remove from the minds of the
people the suspicion that something improper in the conduct of the presi
ding elder has occasioned the removal. Secondly. From the great extent
of the work assigned to the superintendents, they cannot obtain the
necessary knowledge of the individual preachers or circuits to make the
appointments, without deriving the requisite information from the presiding
elders. But the presiding elder, by continuing, or expecting to continue, long

CONSTITUTION OF METHODIST PROTESTANT CHURCH. 301
in the same district, becomes partial in his views and feelings. The inter
ests of his own immediate field of labour present themselves to him with a
force and freshness which greatly impairs his vision. The general interest
is not, perhaps, lost sight of, but it is too remote to come info competition
with the pressing necessities of his own flock. Meantime his own imme
diate interests may sway his judgment. The provision for himself and
family may depend, in a good degree, on the kind of preachers which
may be sent into his district, and the bishop, whose duty it is to make
the appointments, finds himself embarrassed by the conflicting opinions
of his council. Now, a frequent removal of the presiding elders from
one district to another would prevent all these inconveniences, especially
if their destinations were kept profoundly secret until all the other appoint
ments were finally made. The particular interest of a presiding elder's
district would have a less localizing effect if he were not sure he should
return to it, and he would be better fitted to take a general view of the
work and of the appointments which would best promote the common
good. At any rate, the experiment is easily made, and cannot be attend
ed with any permanent evil consequences, while it seems to be required
by circumstances, and will be evidently justified by the primitive spirit
and practice of Methodism. Having said so much upon the necessity of
preserving the original vigour of the itinerancy, and of the means of
effecting that object, it would be unfair if we did not advert to the duty
of the membership to give all possible aid in accomplishing this good
work. j
It must be obvious that if it is the duty of the preacher to go where he
is sent, it is equally the duty of the membership to receive him cordially
and affectionately. Dictation to the bishops would be as destructive if
assumed by the membership as if claimed by the ministry, and a refusal
to receive would be as great and as fatal a departure from Methodism as a
refusal to go. Remonstrance on good grounds may be allowed in either
case ; but an ultimate determination to submit to what may be deemed
individual hardship is indispensable if the efficiency of our itinerant plan
is to be preserved. If one circuit or station claims the right of selecting
or nominating its preachers, all may claim the same privilege, and then
the very foundation of the whole system would be destroyed. For the
same preachers would be chosen by many circuits and stations, and, ulti
mately, would be set up to the highest bidder. The rich would be grati
fied and the poor left to their poverty and privations. It would no longer
be the boast of Methodism that the poor have the gospel preached unto them,
and the great Head of the Church would speedily remove our candlestick
out of its place. An intimation of this sad privation may be seen of all
men, in the fact that in the whole history of our Church there has not, to
our knowledge, occurred a single instance in which the pertinacious deter-

302 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
mination of any circuit or station to have a certain preacher, has not, if
gratified by the bishops, terminated in mortification and disappointment, if
in nothing worse. And, on the contrary, appointments which at first were
thought injudicious, but which have been submitted to in humble depen
dence upon the blessing of God, have often turned out the most happy
that could have been made. He whose own observation does not furnish
examples to justify these remarks has been a very inattentive observer of
our history.
Again, that our primitive plan of itinerancy may be preserved in all its
efficiency, the membership ought to make such pecuniary arrangements as
may enable the bishop in his appointments to suit the preacher to the place,
instead of being compelled, by the weight of his family, to suit the place to
the preacher. This may be done without offering any pecuniary induce
ments to young men to enter the ministry. A plan of this kind is in suc
cessful progress in the Baltimore Conference, under the direction of " The
Preachers' Aid Society." The constitution was pubhshed some time ago
in the Christian Advocate, and in the Itinerant, and we are happy to inform
our brethren of other conferences that it has, so far, succeeded beyond our
most sanguine expectations. FinaUy, we would say of our whole economy
what Mr. Wesley said of the General Rules, — do not mend, but keep it.
But then to keep it we must frequently recur to first principles, and watch
with jealousy against innovations of a practical as well as of a theoretical
nature — against such as glide in insidiously, as weU as those which are
openly proposed. None can destroy Methodism but the Methodists them
selves, whether by open assault or unwatchfulness.

REMARKS ON QUEEN ANNES COUNTY ADDRESS. 303

REMARKS ON AN ADDRESS TO THE MEMBERS OF THE METHODIST
EPISCOPAL CHURCH IN QUEEN ANNE'S COUNTY,
PUBLISHED IN THE CENTREVILLE TIMES AND PUBLIC ADVERTISER,
AND SIGNED, ROBERT SPARKS, CHAIRMAN, AND THOMAS C. BROWNE,
SECRETARY.

To enter into a particidar examination and refutation of the prefatory
remarks of the separatists would not comport with the convenience of the
writer nor, perhaps, of the editor of the " Itinerant." We shall only make
a few passing observations upon the preliminary parts of the address, and
chiefly confine ourselves to the causes which the separatists assign for their
secession. The presiding-elder question,* to which they allude, is a question of expe
diency in which the travelling preachers only are interested. However it
may be decided, it can in no way affect the original principles of Methodism
or of Methodist Church government. Neither are we concerned to inquire
upon what grounds it is asserted in the address, that " the Methodist Church
government in England is freer than that of the Methodist Episcopal
Church in America," nor inquire into the truth of the assertion that the
government of the British connexion " is very similar to that of the Asso
ciated Methodist Churches." We suppose that in England, as in America,
people only become Methodists by choice, and cannot be compelled to sub
mit to the government of the Church a moment longer than they please.
We hold the membership, therefore, alike free under both governments.
They have no bishops nor presiding elders in England, we are told ; and
we reply, they have not the same occasion for them that we have. They
have but one conference, which meets annually ; and aU the preachers being
present, they can be stationed by a committee chosen at the meeting. But
it is obvious that this arrangement would not meet the necessities of a
connexion having seventeen confederated conferences, one of which may
include more square miles than is contained in all England. These can
not act in union, nor distribute the ministerial labour as the wants of the
different conferences may require, without a common superintendency.
This superintendency was instituted by Mr. Wesley, and although he
objected to the name of bishop on account of his connexion with the
Church of England, yet, as bishop is the Scriptural appeUation of a Church
overseer, and as we had dissolved all political and ecclesiastical connexion
with the Church of England, we have just called our general superintend
ents by the appellation given to such officers in the Bible — namely, bishops.
° The manner of selecting them, — whether by the bishops, or by the annual confer
ences,  was a subject which, at one time, greatly agitated the Church.

304 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
Let it be remembered, however, that although Mr. Wesley preferred the
name of superintendent to that of bishop, yet his general superintendents,
and even his general assistant, exercised more authority than our bishops
do. In fact, the bishops exercise no authority in the Church except in the
appointment of the preachers. No one feels their power, therefore, except
those who conferred it upon them, and who can abolish the office or restrain
the prerogative when they deem it expedient to do so.
Our brethren in England have no more occasion for presiding elders
than for general superintendents. The density of their population enables
them so to circumscribe their circuits, that a chairman of a district can
superintend the concerns of more circuits, without being absent from his
own regular appointments, than we include in a presiding elder's district.
Our reformers seem never to reflect, when they are comparing systems of
government, upon the different circumstances of the people for whom the
systems are designed ; and what is worse, in the present instance, they do
not seem to understand the structure of the governments of which they are
speaking. We should like to know in what part of its economy the
Methodist Church government, as established by Mr. Wesley, is " very
similar to that of the Associated Methodist Churches." We confess we
did not know that anything like the constitution of the "Associated
Churches " had ever been instituted before, either for civil or ecclesiastical
purposes. We had been led to think it perfectly " sui generis."
But we hasten to consider the causes which have impelled the
separatists to secede from our Church. The first of these is the pro
ceedings against reformers in Baltimore city station, and in the Baltimore
Annual Conference.
With regard to this ground of complaint, we refer our readers to a " Nar
rative and Defence " of these proceedings, published in Baltimore, by the
brethren who conducted the prosecutions before the Church, and the defence
of the Rev. Mr. Hanson, the preacher in charge of tlie station. It will be
seen by this pamphlet, that the persons expelled were not condemned for
being reformers, nor for endeavouring to make reformers of others, — not
for entering nor belonging to Union Societies, or inducing others to do so,—
not for uttering and publishing their sentiments on Church government
in general, nor of ours in particular ; but for the grossest slander, calumny,
and detraction, — for publications so inflammatory, abusive, and unfounded,
that they scarcely find a parallel in our party newspapers, during the heat
of a contested election. Extracts from these" publications are given in the
" Narrative," and an impartial public are left to decide upon the propriety
of the course which the Church in Baltimore was compelled to take.
In the case of Mr. Dorsey and the Baltimore Annual Conference, the
address sets forth that Mr. Dorsey was expelled for recommending the
Mutual Rights to a friend :" but he not only recommended them to this

REMARKS ON QUEEN ANNE'S COUNTY ADDRESS. 305
friend, but insulted his brethren in conference, by recommending them
to " every member in the conference ;" by openly renouncing the obliga
tions he took upon himself at the time of his ordination, declaring that he
made them in ignorance, and that if he had it to do over again he would
insist upon qualifying them ; and, finally, by circulating Mr. M'Caine's
" History and Mystery," declaring he believed it to be true.
In the " Address," the dissolution of the district conference, in Balti
more, is said to have been effected by the votes of coloured preachers ;
¦whereas the votes on the question of dissolution, were eighteen for it, and
fifteen against it, counting the votes of the suspended preachers in the
negative. It is true that all the coloured preachers voted for the disso
lution; but there was a majority of three in favour of the dissolution
without counting the coloured preachers at all. The coloured preachers,
however, were as much entitled to vote upon this question as the white
preachers. The conference would not have been dissolved, had not the
suspended ministers insisted upon a right to vote upon their own trials, —
a principle which, if admitted, would be destructive to all Christian discip
hne. Upon the whole, we ask nothing more for the Church in Baltimore,
than a fair and candid examination of the cases as presented in the " Nar
rative and Defence," comparing the statements with the publications on
the opposite side, — and, whether the examiner be a new-side or an old-
side man, the proceedings must be justified. Many, who had been exceed
ingly prejudiced in favour of the expelled members before they had an
opportunity to hear both sides, have changed their opinions entirely upon
reading the "Narrative and Defence;" and we hope that all who wish to
make up an impartial judgment, will suspend their opinions until they give
this publication a candid reading.
The second reason assigned for the secession is, the high pretensions
said to be made by the late General Conference. It is stated in the
Address, that the reformers "petitioned the General Conference for a
recognition of the principle of representation, when a majority of the
Church should demand it,— pledging themselves that they would be satis
fied to remain in her bosom, if they would do so, until a majority was for
a lay delegation." What shall we say to this declaration ? That it is not
true, may be seen by consulting the petition itself. The petition or
memorial of the convention of reformers which met in the city of Balti
more in November, 1827, and which is the only one to which "the Con
ference replied," contains no such proposition — no such promise — no
such pledge or engagement as that alluded to in the extract we have
given from the Address. The memorial of the convention did not ask
for a lay delegation when a majority should require it, nor promise that
reformers would remain in the Church, upon such " recognition," until a
majority were for lay delegation. There is no room for evasion here.
20

306 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
The memorial alluded to either proposed what is aUeged or it did not.
If it did, it can be readily shown by quoting the language of the docu
ment itself, which was published in a pamphlet by the direction of the
convention, and is, therefore, accessible. If the memorial contains no
such proposition, and no such stipulation, then we leave all men to judge
what credit is due to the statements of our oponents, heated as they are
by party excitement. Whoever wiU take the pains to examine the petition
to the General Conference, will find that so far from proposing or intimat
ing a design to wait for an expression of the will of a majority of the
Church, the petitioners, or memorialists, expressly declare it to be their
opinion that a lay and local delegation are necessary for the peace of the
Church " at this conjuncture of time." And one of the reasons assigned
by the Conference for not complying with the wishes of the memorialists,
is founded on the wen-known opposition to the measure by a vast
majority of the membership.
But this is not all. In the Address it is stated that the General Con
ference replied to this proposition of the reformers, that they had no right
to representation, "natural or acquired, and that they (the Conference)
being the divinely-instituted overseers of the Church, have a divine right
to govern the Church without control !" This is given in the Address not
only with quotation marks, as if it were extracted from the reply of the
Conference, but is put in italics, as if to draw particular attention to the
high assumption of authority it includes. Now we assert, that this extract
is not to be found in any paper issued by the Conference. They have
nowhere nor at any time assumed such prerogatives ; and we promise to
acknowledge all the separatists have done to be right, if they wiU make
good their assertion in this respect The authors of the Address will
not surely claim, among their other rights, a right to misquote the lan
guage even of the General Conference. Yet most certainly the Conference
have never made use of the language attributed to them ; nor made the
pretensions which such language would imply. The Report of the Com
mittee on Petitions and Memorials, as adopted by the General Conference,
has been published, and is before the Church and the world. If it con
tains the language quoted in the Address, it can be easdy shown, and our
readers can appeal to it for themselves. Meantime, we assert that the
Conference, so far from claiming a right to govern the Church without
control — either by divine or human authority — disclaim any legislative
authority at all over the Church, in the strict and proper meaning of the
term. " We neither claim nor seek," say the Conference, " to be lords over
God's heritage. In the sense of this passage, there is but one Lord and
one Lawgiver. We arrogate no authority to enact any laws of our own,
either of moral or of civil force. Our commission is to preach the gospel,
and to enforce the moral discipline established by the one Lawgiver, by

REMARKS ON QUEEN ANNE'S COUNTY ADDRESS. 307
those spiritual powers vested in us, as subordinate pastors who watch over
souls, as they that must give account to the Chief Shepherd. We claim
no strictly-legislative powers, — although we grant that the terms legis
lative and legislature have been sometimes used even among ourselves.
In a proper sense, however, they are not strictly applicable to our General
Conference." The Conference, it appears by their report, beheve that the
great Head of the Church has given all the doctrines, and enacted all the
laws which can be binding upon Christians. AU that remains for any
Church councU to do is, to institute prudential regulations, by which these
doctrines may be extensively preached, and by which the moral disciphne
of the Bible may be enforced among such as have voluntarily submitted
to be governed by it. These regulations have been heretofore made and
adapted to the particular state of the Methodist Church, by the travelling
preachers. The spiritual and temporal interests of these preachers being
identified with the prosperity of the Church, and having, by their occupa
tion, an opportunity of becoming more generally acquainted with the
various wants and circumstances of the connexion than the laity can be,
the great majority of the membership are satisfied to leave these pruden
tial regulations to their itinerant ministry ; and the more so, because long
experience has tested the safety and utility of the arrangement.
Finally, it will be seen, that of the causes assigned in the Address for
separation, not one of them has now, nor ever had any existence.
1st No person has been expelled from the Church in Baltimore, or
elsewhere, for being reformers, nor for uttering or publishing their senti
ments upon Church government ; nor does the Discipline of the Church
authorize such a measure.
2d. The authors of the Address have been entirely mistaken as to what
was asked of the General Conference by the reformers, in the memorial
sent up by the General Convention held in Baltimore, in November, 1827 ;
and in which convention we believe the separatists were represented by
delegates. In proof of their mistake in this matter, we refer them to the
memorial itself, as published by authority of the convention, which is
certainly good authority with the authors of the Address.
3d. They have been imposed upon with regard to the reply of the
Conference to their memorial, and, in their Address, have attributed lan
guage to that body which they certainly never used, and pretensions
which they never made. For our assertion we do not appeal to any
individual authority. The answer of the Conference is before the
world, embodied in the form of a Report of the Committee on Peti
tions and Memorials, which was unanimously adopted and ordered to be
printed. Charity, which hopeth all things, obliges us to hope that the authors
of the Address did not wilfully misrepresent the facts to which we have

308 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
alluded. They must have been misled, and will retract the errors into
which they have been unfortunately hurried by this unhappy controversy.
But then, as the reasons by which they have attempted to justify their
secession will be found unsupported by the facts on which they had sup
posed them to rest, they must either find some other justification, or
honestly repent of the evil and return to the Church from which they
have so causelessly separated.

ANSWER TO VINDICATOR. 309

ANSWER TO VINDICATOR.
Mr. Editor, — The article in ninth number of the Itinerant, over the
signature L.,* seems to have given much umbrage to the editor of the
Mutual Rights, as well as to one of his correspondents. I beg leave to
notice the remarks of each of these assailants, through the medium of
your paper.
Mr. Dorsey, in a note appended to his appeal to the General Conference,
as pubhshed in the Mutual Rights of the 20th of March, says, " A writer
in the ' Itinerant ' who perhaps heard this appeal read in the General Con
ference, mistakes and says, 'I declared that I believed it, (Mr. M'Caine's
History and Mystery,) to be true.' How far this writer can be relied on
for veracity, I leave to the reader to determine."
The reader, however, will not, I presume, determine this matter untU he
has heard me in my defence, after which I shall cheerfully abide his decision.
Mr. Dorsey would mislead his readers into the erroneous supposition
that the assertion concerning him was founded upon the following words
in his appeal, which he supposes the writer heard read in the General
Conference, to wit : " As I was not accessory to the origination or produc
tion of the work, (the History and Mystery,) I ought not to have been
made accountable for its contents, unless it had been proved that I had
professed to believe it certainly true, and had recommended it accordingly."
Now if L. had founded his assertion upon this passage in Mr. Dorsey's
appeal, it would certainly have been a mistake, and a very unpardonable
one too. But the fact is, that L. had no allusion to Mr. Dorsey's appeal
at all. And this Mr. Dorsey must have known, because L. had stated
this declaration of Mr. Dorsey's as one of the charges made against him
at the time of his expulsion, which of course preceded his appeal. Mr.
Dorsey could not have forgotten that he had published a pamphlet as
well as written an appeal. This pamphlet is entitled, "A Review of an
Address, professing to be a Vindication of the Baltimore Annual Con
ference," &c, and upon the seventeenth page ¦ contains the declaration
upon which L. founds the assertion of which Mr. Dorsey complains, and
for which he has the effrontery to impugn the writer's veracity. " Further
more, as no one of the bishops had answered the letters of Mr. M' Caine
on tlie subject, (the History and Mystery?) we really tliought he was cor
rect ; and as those letters and the work generally contained subjects of the
greatest moment to the Church, we were convinced that she should see it
and examine for herself." a Written by Dr. Bond,

310 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
The reader wUl see by the above extract from Mr. Dorsey's pamphlet,
that L. was justified in what he charged Mr. Dorsey with saying, in refer
ence to the History and Mystery of Methodist Episcopacy.
The imputation of a want of veracity made against L., the reader will
now dispose of as he pleases. But how will Mr. Dorsey atone to his
readers for the deception he intended to practise upon them ? We con
fess we had heretofore thought Mr. Dorsey rather a dupe than a deceiver.
We had been led to think he had been practised upon by those who had
less honesty of purpose, but more cunning than himself; but this con
temptible trick goes far to change our opinion. It was long since appre
hended by those who entertained favourable opinions of Mr. Dorsey, that
his intimacy with the author of the History and Mystery, boded no good
to his morals ; and this pitiful stratagem shows but too clearly that he
has been rather too long in bad company.
To the knight who so valorously challenges us to combat, threatening
us with the further effects of his ire if we do not prove what we have said
in reference to those who were expeUed from the Methodist Episcopal
Church in Baltimore, and whom, though we do not know him with his visor
on, we take from his dolorous wailing to be him of the rueful countenance,
we beg, with all due and knightly courtesy, to say, we decline his chal
lenge and despise his threats. We have no sort of inclination for works
of supererogation. The task he would impose upon us, has been already
performed, perhaps much more to the satisfaction of all honest inquirers,
than to his own. If, however, he be in earnest in his inquiry, we refer
him for aU he can reasonably require, to the " Narrative and Defence " of
the proceedings he alludes to, published by the brethren who conducted
the prosecutions. Let him read, learn, and inwardly digest.

GENERAL CONFERENCE RESOLUTIONS, 1828. 311

GENERAL CONFERENCE RESOLUTIONS, 1828.

The conciliatory resolutions of the late General Conference, which we
republish below, together with the remarks of Dr. Emory, the mover of
the resolutions, will be read with interest by all our friends into whose
hands they have not heretofore fallen. The grounds upon which the pro
posals of the Conference have been so indignantly rejected by the expelled
and seceding members of our Church, in whose favour they were passed,
are perhaps not generally understood ; and even the judicious observations
of the mover, though they sufficiently set aside the objections which have
been made in the Mutual Rights by those who rejected them, do not ren
der it superfluous to make further explanations, for the satisfaction of those
who are unacquainted with the history of these resolutions.
It is well known that sometime previously to the sitting of the last
General Conference, certain local preachers and lay members were expelled
from the Church in Baltimore, for having published a number of the most
inflammatory papers, in which our brethren of the ministry, both the
living and the dead, were most shamefully traduced and calumniated.
For these foul calumnies they refused to make any atonement to the
injured feelings of their brethren, or any satisfaction to the laws of God,
which as imperatively forbid slander and defamation, as they forbid any
other vice. When arraigned under the rules of the Church, and caUed to
answer before the authorized judicatories, they not only contemned the
authority of these judicatories, but boldly avowed that no Church autho
rity could hold them amenable for what they had done — the cause in
which they had embarked was of so much importance, that no restraints
ought to be imposed upon them : by all which we could understand nei
ther more nor less than that they were to be permitted to " do evil that
good might come of it." Some refused to make any defence at all, and aU
declined an appeal to the superior Church judicatories, who possessed an
appellate jurisdiction in the premises. Elated with the idea of erecting
another Church, the leaders of the party were far from desiring to com
promise the matter, or to retain their membership amongst us. The Church
in which they had long professed to be so happy, and into which they had
all along endeavoured to entice others, had all at once become such a
horrid despotism, that " free-born sons of America '' could no longer
tolerate it ; and they called upon all men, good and bad, to watch its pro-

312 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
gress with a vigUant eye, lest it should some day overturn the civU liber
ties of the country, and bind the world with fetters more galling than
priestly domination had ever yet forged. The moderate views of some
who claimed to be reformers, were little more to the taste of the M'Cainites
than the opinions of downright old-side men. Nothing short of a radical
upturning and overturning, and a new modelling of the Church after their
own fashion, would satisfy them ; for nothing less could ever give them
the distinction they coveted. It is only in a boiling pot that the sediment
rises to the top, " and bubbles dance amidst the foam." In the midst of
these open violations of all order and propriety, they, nevertheless, had the
shameless effrontery to teU the world in their numerous publications, that
they had been expelled the Church, for " dissenting with their brethren on
the subject of Church government ;"" and such were their expectation
from the cry of persecution which was set up, that they already imagined
the Methodist Episcopal Church was tottering to its faU. A plain " Nar
rative and Defence " of the proceedings against them, however, set the
matter right in the eyes of the public. It was easUy shown, by extracts
from their own publications, that it was not for their opinions on Church
government, which they had long held and might stiU have held with
impunity, but for their violations of all the obligations of Christian charity
and Christian fellowship, that their brethren had disowned them ; and the
piteous cry of persecution ceased to command the sympathy of any but
their satellites.
Notwithstanding the M'Cainites had declined an appeal to all the inter
mediate judicatories, they nevertheless sent up a memorial to the General
Conference, setting forth their grievances, and praying for redress. Let it
be remembered, that to this body they had no appeal; but then com
plaints against the administration of the presiding elder and preacher in
charge, might perhaps be a subject of legitimate investigation before the
Conference. Their memorial was respectfully received and read by the
Conference, and refei-red to the committee on the itinerancy.
At this time it was understood that a gentleman who had been de
puted by the disaffected and expeUed members in Baltimore, together with
four other persons then in Pittsburg, was authorized to make certain con
cessions on the part of the " expelled," provided they might thereby be again
received into the Church ; and that their instructions authorized them " to
offer any concessions which Christians ought to ask or Christians ought to
make." Accordingly these concessions were offered to the committee to
whom the memorial had been referred, who deeming them such as ought to
be accepted, in the hope of restoring peace and harmony, were about to re
port favourably, until it was suggested that perhaps one of the concessions
proposed did not mean quite as much as it seemed to import : that when it
was proposed to discontinue " The Mutual Rights," it was only intended to

GENERAL CONFERENCE RESOLUTIONS, 1828. 313
alter the name of the periodical. The inquiry was made of those who had
sent in the propositions ; and although four out of five of the negotiators
were, as it was said, of the opinion that the proposition implied the dis
continuance of the periodical altogether, and under any form, and that no
lasting peace could be effected without such a measure was adopted, yet
the dissentient negotiator was of so much consequence that the stipulation
could not be made without him. The " committee on the itinerancy,"
who could not but approve of the proceedings on the part of the Church
in Baltimore, were now reluctantly compeUed to decline reporting upon
the concessions proposed by the representatives of the complainants. No
good could grow out of reunion, unless it was to be followed by peace
and harmony among those who should be thus united ; and this was not
to be expected while a periodical firebrand was to be regularly thrown into
the midst of a society already heated by unhappy collisions and contests.
It was thought that no lasting union could be effected under the circum
stances existing in Baltimore, unless there was a mutual desire for recon
ciliation ; and this could only be manifested by mutual concessions and
sacrifices. On the one side injuries were to be forgiven and confidence
restored ; on the other side, there must be acknowledgment and a cessa
tion of hostility ; and as the terms proposed, though they offered some
indemnity for the past, yet afforded no security for the future, it was
deemed inexpedient to impose upon the Church in Baltimore any neces
sity to receive again those who had been expelled, or who had withdrawn
in consequence of such expulsions. The committee on the itinerancy did
not, therefore, feel authorized to base upon the concessions made by the
representatives of the complainants any terms of pacification.
The hope of peace and reconciliation, however, was not abandoned;
and Dr. Emory, after consulting with the representatives of the com
plainants and the preacher in charge of the Baltimore station, submitted
to the Conference the resolutions which are published below. Let it be
distinctly understood, that the concessions and acknowledgments required
by the resolutions, were none other than those which had been offered in
the first instance to the committee on the itinerancy, except as regards
the discontinuance of the " Mutual Rights ;" and even here they only
make that clear and explicit, which was before acknowledged to be fairly
implied — namely, that by the proposition to discontinue the "Mutual
Rights," the negotiators did not mean that the name of the periodical
should be changed, but that the paper itself should no longer be published.
Why one of the brethren engaged in the negotiation, refused to make the
proposition thus explicit, after the ambiguity was pointed out, whUe he
was understood to admit that it was the meaning they were originally
intended to convey, it was impossible at that time to divine; and,
although it can be easily accounted for now, the subject is too delicate for

314

MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.

further remark. It wUl be seen by the preamble to the resolutions, that
they were passed with the " hope " that there existed a mutual desire for
peace and reconcUiation. This hope was authorized by the mUd and
amiable deportment of those who had been selected as the representatives
of the expeUed members, and by the readiness of the preacher in charge
of Baltimore City station, to accept the terms of the compromise as far as
he was concerned, or could sanction them. Dr. Emory remarked, when
he presented the resolutions, that they were the result of much consultation
with those interested upon both sides of the question ; that he had not
only the approbation of those who had been considered as the friends of
the expelled members, but of the Rev. Mr. Hanson, who had presided
during the trial, and who was still in charge of the station where the expul
sions had taken place, and also of a member of the Baltimore quarterly-
meeting conference, known to be present. The resolutions passed almost
unanimously, Mr. Hanson and all the delegation of the Baltimore Con
ference voting for them. No doubt was entertained of the acceptance of the
terms proposed by the resolutions, but what arose from an opinion still
entertained by some, that reconciliation with the Church was not really
desired on the part of the expelled members ; and this opinion was but
too faithfully con-oborated by the result. They were rejected by the
Union Society in Baltimore, with indignation and contempt The autho:
rity of those who made the stipulations for the expelled members was
disavowed by the leaders of the party in Baltimore, and they continued to
assail the Church with the bitterest revilings, and to reiterate the outcry
of persecution and tyranny.
It was objected by some, that conditions quite as favourable, and even
more so, had been offered them before they were expeUed ; and this was
very true. But it was also true, that it was known when they refused
those terms before their expulsion, they were under the infatuated notion,
that the Church authorities would not dare to proceed to extremities with
them. They did not believe their brethren of the ministry, or of the
laity, would have nerve enough to risk the consequences of expelling men
of their rank and consequence.. Having found themselves mistaken, and
moreover, having seen that their complaints had ceased to make the
impression which they at first made upon the public, it was hoped
they were brought to better temper, and the propositions of their friends
at the General Conference confirmed this opinion. The Church in Balti
more, however, no longer had it in their power to propose such favourable
conditions. Those who had been expelled could only return under the
provisions of the Discipline, which require at least six months as the
term of probation. Some act of the General Conference was therefore
necessary, to enable the preacher in charge to receive the laymen into fuU
membership, and the local preachers with all their ministerial privileges,

GENERAL CONFERENCE RESOLUTIONS, 1828. 315
without subjecting them to the usual probation ; and this authority was
afforded by the resolutions to which we have alluded.
It has been objected to the resolutions that they ought to have been
imperative with respect to the reception, by the quarterly-meeting confer
ence and preacher in charge, of the expelled members, upon compliance
with the conditions proposed. But it would have been obviously wrong
to have made measures' imperative upon one side, while no authority
could be exercised or claimed over the other. It was, moreover, explicitly
stated in the preamble, that the resolutions were passed with a view to
enable the Church authorities in Baltimore to fulfil intentions of kindness
already entertained by them towards those they had been under the
necessity of expeUing. It was not the design of the General Conference to
compel a reunion, if there existed a repugnance to the measure on either
side ; because such an union would have been a source of endless strife
and contention, instead of promoting peace. . Moreover, it would have
been manifestly improper for the General Conference to have taken the
expeUed members into the Church by an imperative and unconditional
order to the stationed preacher, because that body could not know the
moral standing of all of them. Some might, for aught that was known
by the Conference to the contrary, be living in open sin — it was, there
fore, highly necessary to leave their admission to the sound discretion of
the official members of the station.
After all, perhaps the true cause of the rejection of the terms proposed
by the Conference, remains to be told. While the negotiations were pro
gressing at Conference, as above detailed, an under-plot was going on,
under the management of the representative sent by the expeUed mem
bers immediately from Baltimore. This was to induce the bishops, upon
the readmission of the expelled members and seceders, to set them off as
a separate charge and appoint them a minister. This would have afforded
them a safe lodgment within the citadel itself, from which they might
annoy the Church with perfect impunity. No discipline could possibly be
brought to bear upon them, whatever means they might employ to carry
on their plans of reform. They might then slander and defame all who
were opposed to them without the possibility of incurring either Church
censure or expulsion. Whoever the pastor of the Church might have
been, he would have found his hands completely tied, notwithstanding
the despotic authority which has been attributed to travelling preachers.
They could only be tried by one another ultimately, even had the preacher
sought a committee from a neighbouring circuit or station, as they would
have constituted a quarterly-meeting conference, who would necessarily
have had an appellate jurisdiction in all cases whatsoever. This was the
boon for which they were willing to make concessions. The boon was
not granted, and could not with propriety or even safety be granted ; and

316 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
without it, membership in the Church was not desirable. In any other
relation they would not be permitted to carry on hostUities against their
brethren. We cannot help feeling mortified at this attempt upon the part of our
opponents, because it argues a great contempt for the understanding of
those to whom the application was made, to suppose they could be
imposed upon by so shallow an artifice. Was it thought possible that
the execution of discipline could be committed to those who were known
to be irreconcilably opposed to its provisions ? Was it not known that
the reformers in Baltimore were nearly all opposed to class-meeting as a
term of membership? And had not the Mutual Rights teemed with
invectives against the rale of discipline which forbids local preachers to
retail spirituous liquors ? To say nothing, then, of the right claimed by
them to write and publish whatever they pleased, however slanderous and
defamatory, so it was calculated to aid their schemes of reform, how could
it be expected that a society, composed exclusively of such materials,
should assist the pastor in enforcing the regulations to which we have
aUuded above ?
By the rejection of the terms proposed by themselves through their
representatives, aU the kind intentions of the Conference towards their
expeUed brethren have been frustrated, and the labours of love, into
which the amiable mover of the resolutions entered so ardently, have
failed to effect the good he designed to do ; but neither can lose their
reward. Although those for whom the benefit was designed have
returned them evil for good, yet their reward is sure ; for tlie blessing of
the peace maker will unquestionably be accorded to all who endeavour
to make peace, however unsuccessfully the effort may eventuate.
RESOLUTIONS OF THE GENERAL CONFERENCE, ALLUDED TO ABOVE.
" Whereas an unhappy excitement has existed in some parts of our
work, in consequence of the organization of what have been called ' Union
Societies,' for purposes and under regulations believed to be inconsistent
with the peace and harmony of the Church ; and in relation to the char
acter of much of the matter contained in a certain periodical publication,
called 'Mutual Rights,' in regard to which certain expulsions from the
Church have taken place ; and whereas this General Conference indulges
a hope that a mutual desire may exist for conciliation and peace, andis
desirous of leaving open a way for the accomplishment of so desirable an
object, on safe and equitable principles, therefore,
"Resolved, l. That in view of the premises, and in the earnest hope
that this measure may tend to promote this object, this General Confer
ence affectionately advises that no further proceedings may be had in any

GENERAL CONFERENCE RESOLUTIONS, 1828. 317
part of our work against any minister or member of the Methodist
Episcopal Church, on account of any past agency or concern in relation
to the above-named periodical, or in relation to any Union Society as
above mentioned.
" 2. If any persons expelled as aforesaid, feel free to concede that publi
cations have appeared in said ' Mutual Rights^' the nature and character
of which were unjustifiably inflammatory, and do not admit of vindica
tion ; and that others, though for want of proper information, or uninten
tionally, have yet, in fact, misrepresented individuals and facts, and that
they regret these things ; if it be voluntarily agreed, also, that the Union
Societies, above alluded to, shall be abolished, and the periodical caUed
' Mutual Rights ' be discontinued at the close of the current volume, which
shall be completed with due respect to the conciliatory and pacific design
of this arrangement, then this General Conference does hereby give autho
rity for the restoration to their ministry or membership respectively, in the
Methodist Episcopal Church, of any person or persons so expelled as afore
said, provided this arrangement shall be mutually assented to by any
individual or individuals so expelled, and also by the quarterly-meeting
conference, and the minister or preacher having the charge in any circuit
or station within which any such expulsion may have taken place ; and
that no such minister or preacher shall be obliged, under this arrangement,
to restore any such individual as leader of any class or classes, unless in
his own discretion he shall judge it proper so to do ; and provided,
also, that it be further mutually agreed, that no other periodical publica
tion, to be devoted to the same controversy, shall be established on
either side; it being expressly understood, at the same time, that this,
if agreed to, wUl be on the ground, not of any assumption of right to
require this, but of mutual consent, for the restoration of peace ; and
that no individual will be hereby precluded from issuing any publication
which he may judge proper on his own responsibility. It is further
understood, that any individual or individuals who may have withdrawn
from the Methodist Episcopal Church, on account of any proceedings in
relation to the premises, may also be restored, by mutual consent, under
this arrangement, on the same principles as above stated."
REMARKS BY THE MOVER OF THE RESOLUTIONS.
"The above resolutions were founded on the supposition of a 'mutual
desire ' for ' coalition and peace.' On any other supposition they would
neither have been proposed nor passed. The expeUed persons in Balti
more, either having not obeyed the citations of the Church to appear
before inferior judicatories, or having not availed themselves of the inter
mediate appeUate judicatories, for .the redress of alleged grievances, were

318 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
not entitled to come before the General Conference either as appeUants or
complainants. From the representation of individuals desirous of effecting
a compromise, that body, nevertheless, consented to depart from a regular'
course, in order to leave open a door for general pacification, and for the
restoration of the expelled persons, on certain conditions, by mutual con
sent. It was never intended to force them upon the society in Baltimore
without consent — for this, instead of effecting peace, would only have
been renewing and increasing discord. The expelled persons, by their
own voluntary acts, had precluded themselves from aU right to demand
this ; and to have done so would, moreover, have been manifestly unjust
to the society in Baltimore, over which the General Conference had juris
diction, but none whatever over the expelled persons. What respect
would have been paid by the latter to any positive resolutions of the
General Conference, if not exactly conformed to their wishes, may be
inferred from the contempt with which they have rejected those which
were passed in an intended milder form.
" It was never the design of those resolutions to lay a snare for the
expelled persons, by requiring them first to make the concessions stated,
and then to subject them to the mortification of being nevertheless rejected
by the quarterly-meeting conference and the preacher in charge. This has
been insinuated ; but it is an insinuation which does great injustice both to
the mover and to the supporters of the resolutions. It was openly stated
on the floor of the General Conference, that the preacher in charge of the
Baltimore City station did, and would, concur in the resolutions, and
would acquiesce, on his part, in the restoration of the expelled persons, if
the resolutions should be accepted on their part This was stated in the
presence of the preacher in charge of that station and also to several Of
the friends and agents of the expelled persons, by whom it was presumed
it would be communicated. There was good reason to believe also, from
the best information possessed, that they would be concurred in by the
quarterly-meeting conference of Baltimore on the recommendation of the
General Conference. And, at all events, if they had been concurred in by
the expelled persons and yet rejected by the quarterly-meeting conference
or by the preacher in charge, such a state of things could not have failed
to give the former a great advantage, both before the Church and the
world. Had a real desire of peace and reunion existed, nothing would
have been easier than to ascertain whether, if the basis proposed by the
General Conference should be accepted by them, such an union would be
effected. And this could easily have been done without actually making
the concessions required till this fact had been ascertained. As to the
preacher in charge, it had been already ascertained and stated. But the
truth is, when a measure is not desired there is nothing easier than to
make objections to it.

GENERAL CONFERENCE RESOLUTIONS, 1828. 319
" The resolutions were purposely deferred till towards the close of the
Conference in order to obtain the fullest information and to make them as
unexceptionable as practicable to all parties. Several friends of the expelled
persons, who were in Pittsburg at the time of proposing the resolutions,
were consulted respecting them. Some modifications were made at their
instance ; and, as to the form and extent of the concessions to be made,
they were copied, nearly verbatim, from a written paper furnished for the
purpose by a member of the General Conference, who was understood to
be a particular friend of the expelled persons. The chief alteration made
in it was to abridge and soften some of its expressions. In that paper the
proposed concession is positive — not only that pubhcations " may " have
appeared, but that many publications have appeared in " Mutual Rights,"
the nature and character of which were inflammatory and do not admit of
vindication, " and that this was regretted and deplored." The original is
now in the possession of the mover of the resolutions, and was used by him
in drawing them. The paper is marked " inofficial," and was to be so
considered. Yet it was stated at the same time, by the individual above
aUuded to, in the presence of several concerned, that there was sufficient
authority to believe that the concession above mentioned, in the positive
form and to the extent stated, would be agreed to. The mover of the
resolutions is compelled to make this statement in self-defence.
" It has been asserted that ' the resolutions provide that no further dis
cussion shall be had on the subject.' If the reader will look over the reso
lutions he may convince himself that there is no such provision in them,
nor anythmg which amounts to it."
The expelled persons themselves, as a measure of " conciliation," pro
posed to discontinue the " Mutual Rights," at the close of the current vol
ume. But it seems now that they had a private design, at the same time;
to establish in its place another periodical, (to be devoted to the same con
troversy,) under another name, and to be published weekly instead of
monthly. How far this would have been likely to promote " conciliation "
the reader must judge.
The General Conference proposed that, by mutual consent, no periodical
publication, to be devoted to the existing controversy, should be earned on
by either side ; for proposals had actually been issued, in Baltimore, for
such a publication in vindication of the Church as weU as on the other side.
This proposal was not from any unwillingness to meet such a discussion,
either periodically or otherwise, and certainly not with intention to pro
vide that " no further discussion should be had on the subject." The
object was to lay a ground for a sincere reunion, in affection and good feel
ing, as well as in form, which it was believed, in the existing excitement,
could not be effected if such & periodical controversy should be continued.
It was expressly stated that individuals woidd be at liberty even if the above

320 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
conciliatory arrangement should be mutuaUy agreed to, to publish what
they might think proper on their individual responsibility. It has been
objected that this meant on their individual " peril." Be it so. And sq
it ought to be. And no man should be unwiUing to bear his own
burden. It has been objected also that the resolutions left the " odious gag-law"
unrepealed. Now the rule thus styled means nothing more than that persons
shall not avail themselves of a place in the bosom of the Church to " endear
vour to sow dissensions by inveighing against our doctrines or discipline)
in the sense of unchristian railing and violence." So the General Confer
ence have declared, and that no other construction of the mle wUl be sanc
tioned. It seems, then, that the expelled persons wish the privUege of
being in the Church, to endeavour to sow dissensions, by " unchristian
railing." In any other view their return to the Church, as it now appears,
could not be of much consequence to them ; for they maintain that it
would puzzle even ecclesiastical lawyers and doctors to prove that it is "an
iniquitous act to withdraw from the Methodist Episcopal Church," and that
their return was not so much " for any personal consideration," because
individuals among them, who understand the importance of the question,
" wUl be found," they say, " generally, perhaps in every instance, to have
within their reach resources sufficient for their own personal comfort."
They wished to be regarded as the offendec?, not the cffiending party.
That the General Conference thought otherwise, is now pretended to be
considered a great insult. Their eye was fixed more upon doing the Church
service, by giving the General Conference an opportunity to wipe off, not
their disgrace, but the disgrace of the Church, and to restore them in spite
of " Hanson " and " the quarterly-meeting conference," who " were known,"
they say, " to be the most offensive to them of any men." AU this, it
seems, they would have considered very " respectful " and " conciliatory."
And when all this should have been done, with the abolition of the " odious
gag-law," and license given to raU and to endeavour to sow dissensions
without restraint, the General Conference might, perhaps, have been as
liberally lauded as it is now abused, especially if they had been constituted,
as was proposed, a separate charge in Baltimore City, where they could
have operated as a thorn, not in its side only, but in its heart. All this
has opened our eyes. And so long as such a spirit is perceived to exist as
those gentlemen continue to exhibit, the mover of the resolutions is as weU
satisfied with their fate as those of the expeUed persons can be by whom
they have been rejected.
It seems that both those who have been expelled and those who have
withdrawn, still insist on reforming the Church of which they are no longer
members. Not because they " tax either preachers or people with want
of piety or zeal," but, on the contrary, " give them ample credit for their

GENERAL CONFERENCE RESOLUTIONS, 1828. 321
usefulness, morality, and holiness :" not because they " declaim against the
Methodist doctrine as incomprehensible, irrational, and antichristian," but
" embrace it in all its parts as consistent and scriptural :" not because they
" desire to cause secessions and" divisions," (although they, in effect, invite
and exult in them,*) but these gentlemen seem stiU to consider it a most
intolerable grievance, that, after all their declamation, ninety-nine hun
dredths, or more, of the whole body of Methodists, preachers and people,
continue stupidly and obstinately insensible of the outrageous tyranny by
which they are ground and oppressed, and wUl not be convinced that if
our reformers had a hand in the management of matters they would very
speedUy redress their wrongs and terminate their sufferings.
In conclusion, we wiU submit two questions only to the candid and the
conscientious. 1. Are there not in the world false doctrines and wicked
practices enough to employ the time and talents of our reforming brethren,
without wasting their strength on the " polity " of the Methodist Episcopal
Church, even admitting that it may not be exactly what they wish it to
be ? 2. And can it be a commendable work of Christian piety, for such
cause, or in retaliation for supposed wrongs, to endeavour to spread and
foment disaffection and dissatisfaction among those who at present may
be peaceful and satisfied, in a Church admitted to be sound in doctrine
and holy in disciphne ? If human passions be consulted, we know the
answer. If, on the contrary, we consult conscience and the divine word,
with an eye to eternity, it may be different.
0 " Fifty-two persons," they say, " lately joined, nearly all members of the Methodist
Episcopal Church, and most of them of very long standing ; many more are preparing to
follow their example." These are some of the first-fruits of Union Societies, instituted, as
we have been told, to prevent secessions. 21

322 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.

MR. STLLWELL'S LETTER.

Mr. Editor, — In the twentieth number of the Mutual Rights, there is
a letter from Mr. Stilwell, of New-York, which contains some important
information. Mr. StilweU commences by complaining of " the assertion,",
which, he says, is " made by the enemies of reform in the Methodist Epis
copal Church, that secessions from this Church never prosper." This Mr.
Stilwell is a seceder from our Church, and adduces the success of his own
party in contradiction of the assertion to which he aUudes. Let us see
how the account which he himself gives of the secession he effected, bears
upon the question.
He tells us, then, that the secession took place in 1820, in the city of
New- York, and is still in existence ; that he has received since that period
fourteen hundred persons, either as members or upon probation ; but that
two Churches have separated from him since the formation of the society,
and that from this and other causes, his society has been reduced from
fourteen hundred to " upwards of five hundred members." What a con
clusive proof of the prosperity and success of the seceders ! He teUs us,
moreover, that his society was not represented in the Baltimore Conven
tion. " The ministers, whose names were printed as delegates from the
society in New- York, belonged, not to that society, but were members of
a body once in connexion with them." All these ministers then, and how
many more he does not say, have seceded from the seceders since they
formed " The Methodist Society in New- York," besides two whole Churches
in the city itself! Why, this is worse than the wonderful exploit of the
King of Spain, who " With forty thousand men
Marched up the hill and then marched down again !"
Mr. Stilwell and his associates don't march together either up or down,
but, severally, wheel to the right or left as inclination suggests, and march
to all the different points of the compass.
Mr. StilweU says, " our Disciphne has not been altered since fust
formed." A discipline has, however, been since made and published,
claiming to be the discipline " of the Methodist Society," as agreed upon
by a convention held by delegates from the society, convened from dif
ferent parts of the United States. We would not be troublesome to Mr.
StilweU, but it would be satisfactory to know why he did not attend that
convention, which met in the city of New- York, his place of residence ;
and which was charged with the great interests of the seceding societies

MR. STILWELL'S "LETTER. 323
from the Methodist Episcopal Church. We are the more desirous to
have some explanation of this matter from Mr. Stilwell himself, because
we have heard it intimated that he was prevented from attending the con
vention by the known prevalence of the disposition among its members
to establish a regular itinerant system of ministerial labour. He was sup
posed to be too comfortably fixed in New- York, to be willing to submit
to the necessary rotation which such a system would require. He was
wiUing to let those itinerate who could do no better. We thank him for
his letter, however. It exhibits a perspicuous view of the materials of
which secessions from the Methodist Episcopal Church are usuaUy formed,
and affords some important facts to aid us in forming an opinion as to
their final result.

324 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.

TRUTH ALWAYS SAFE.

Mr. Editor,— Vindicator, in the last number of the Mutual Rights,
has undertaken to show that the persons expelled from our Church in
Baltimore, were condemned for being members of the Union Society, and
for uttering and publishing their sentiments on Church government He
promises to sustain these allegations, by quotations from the charges pre
ferred against them, as published in the " Narrative and Defence of the
proceedings." In these quotations, however, the charges are left out entirely, and only
one of the specifications and a part of another are given — which taken
separately, suited his purpose ; but which quoted entire and taken in con
nexion with the charges, proves directly the contrary to that which he
had asserted. This practice of garbling documents is an old trick with
our reformers ; and it is one which, if allowed, would enable an atheist
to prove his opinions from the Bible. The charges and specifications may
be found in the Narrative and Defence, and the reader may see what
reliance is to be placed upon Vindicator's quotations.
The reader will see, moreover, that membership in the Union Society,
was not the ground of complaint against those who were expelled ; but
the acts and doings of tliat society, in which they participated by their
agents, the editorial committee. A Union Society might have been as
harmless and inoffensive as any other association, and therefore member
ship in it could only become culpable by its acts and proceedings. It is
true that the first specification by which the charges are sustained, aUeges
that the accused were members of the Union Society of Baltimore, because
it was necessary to show that fact, in order to their being held responsible
for the acts of that society ; but the second specification points directly
to the particular offences of which, as members of the Union Society, the
accused had been guilty. To show that membership in a Union Society
was not the ground of complaint against Vindicator's friends, we may
remark, that the allegations made against them could not have been made
and sustained against the members of any other Union Society in the
world ; because none other participated in the election of the " editorial
committee" who published the Mutual Rights, and therefore could not
be held accountable for the inflammatory and slanderous papers contained
in that periodical.
Vindicator alleges that his friends were expelled for publishing their
sentiments upon Church government, because the second specification

TRUTH ALWAYS SAFE. 325
alleges that they published the Mutual Rights, which he would fain have
his readers think was simply a work upon Church government. But if
the reader will take the pains to read the whole of this specification, he
wiU find that a very different character is given to this periodical ; and if
he will, moreover, look at the essays pointed to as proving its character,
he wUl find the allegation amply sustained. We admit that the accused
were expelled for publishing certain papers in the Mutual Rights ; but the
charges and specifications show, at the same time, that the objection to
these papers was, not that they contained opinions upon Church govern
ment, or that these opinions were erroneous, but to the personal invectives
and misrepresentation they contained.
The letter of Mr. Hanson, to which Vindicator refers in support of his
position, not only requires as a condition upon which those who had been
found guilty should avoid the penalty of expulsion from the communion
of the Church, that they should withdraw from the Union Society, and
thereby show their individual disapprobation of its proceedings, but also
required that they should " in future withhold their aid from such publi
cations and measures as are hkely to cast reproach upon our ministers,
and produce a breach of union among our members." Mr. Hanson's
letter, therefore, does not afford Vindicator any support whatever, but on
the contrary is greatly against him ; and as the propositions of Dr. Green
and Dr. Bond, they were only propositions of compromise, in which
neither the culpability nor innocence of those to whom they were ad
dressed could with propriety be assumed, and therefore can have no
bearing whatever upon the question now at issue.
As to some other authorities referred to by Vindicator, he must pardon
us if we do not admit their validity. Their evidence could not invalidate
the documentary proof to which we have access, even if they were impar
tial ; but when we consider the part they have taken in the matter under
consideration — that they are parties in the affair — we hope we shall, not be
thought very uncivil if we neither admit them as witnesses nor as umpires
in the dispute.
We now cheerfully submit the whole matter to our readers. We
have not deemed it necessary to say a word in reply to the personal
allusions and imputations which Vindicator has allowed himself to indulge
in, because they really have nothing to do with the subject in dispute.
If Vindicator was so conscious of the untenable ground he occupied, as
to deem it necessary to divert his readers from the subject of controversy,
by abusing his opponent, we have no occasion for such stratagems, and
have not resorted to them. For any further information which the reader
may desire, we again refer to the Narrative and Defence of the proceed
ings in the premises — only we admonish the inquirer to read for himself,
and not to rely upon Vindicator's quotations.

326 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
The editor of the Mutual Rights, some time since, made an unchristian
attack upon the character of L.,* whose real name he professes to
know, — giving his readers to understand that the person who assumed
that signature has no regard for truth. He founds his aUegation upon
L.'s assertion, that Mr. Dorsey f had circulated the " History and Mys
tery," declaring that he believed it to be true ; and he very charitably
supposes that the assertion was founded upon his Appeal to the General
Conference, where L. was present, and which Appeal contains no such
declaration. In reply, we informed Mr. Dorsey that our assertion was not based
upon his Appeal at aU, but upon a pamphlet which he published before
his Appeal was read or written. In proof of this we quoted, from the afore
said pamphlet, the sentence which contained the declaration upon which
our assertion was founded ; and, moreover, showed that having alleged
his circulating the History and Myttery, together with his declaration of
credence in the statements therein contained, to be one of the causes of
his expulsion from the Church, we could not have aUuded to his Appeal to
the General Conference, which was not and could not have been presented
until after his expulsion.
Mr. Dorsey, in reply, does not deny the correctness of our quotation
from his pamphlet, and yet he has not the magnanimity to take back his
shameless imputation upon our veracity. He persists that our assertion
was at first hazarded from a mistaken apprehension of the language of
his Appeal, and that the quotation from his pamphlet was subsequendy
hunted up to sustain our veracity. And why does Mr. Dorsey believe
this? Because we were, he says, at the General Conference. What
then ? Why, being at the General Conference, we must have heard his
Appeal, and must have misunderstood it, or wilfully misrepresented it.
Yet he will not allow that we had any recoUection of his pamphlet at all,
although it was published and circulated in this city, — where, if Mr.
Dorsey be rightly informed, we did then, and do now reside. But this
is not all. If Mr. Dorsey be right in his conjectures as to the real name
of L., of which he intimates he has proof, he" knows there are special
reasons why we should have read and recollected his pamphlet, as the
person to whom he alludes was one of a committee who reported the reso
lutions and address to which Mr. Dorsey's pamphlet professed to be a reply.
But Mr. Dorsey thinks that circulating the Histoiy and Mystery,
" believing the author was correct," is a very different thing from cir
culating the work " believing it to be trae." What he means by tlhW-
unless he thought the author " correct " in publishing what was not true,
because "none of the bishops had answered his letters," — we confess
we are at a loss to imagine. We think the declaration in the pamphlet
0 One of the signatures of Dr. Bond. fRev- Dennis B. Dorsey, one of the expelled.

TRUTH ALWAYS SAFE. 327
not only impfies that Mr. Dorsey thought the "History and Mystery" to
be true, (as he now admits that he did,) but that the author was "cor
rect" in publishing those truths, notwithstanding the personal injury they
were calculated to do, because the exposure was necessary for the good
of the Church. If Mr. Dorsey, however, insists that a man may be " cor
rect" in publishing what is not trae, although the publication be calcu
lated to wound the feelings and injure the character of his brethren, we
should deem it useless to contend with him. Such morals may, for aught
we know, belong to a new code, which is to be brought in with the other
blessings of the wonderful reformation in which he js engaged.
Mr. Dorsey, however, fairly acknowledges that he " certainly did believe
the Histoiy and Mystery to be true," although, for certain reasons
which he does not think fit to communicate, he "neither avowed nor
intended to avow such a belief in his pamphlet." And this is the man
who told the Conference that he "would not suffer any man or set
of men to trammel his rational faculties in their search after truth ;" and
apprized them that he "should take the liberty of promulgating his
opinions in any manner he thought proper !" After this, we had not
expected an avowal that he had been restrained by any personal con
siderations from avowing his opinions, especially in a matter which he
deemed so important to the interests of the Church.
To conclude : If Mr. Dorsey believes that our assertion, that he circulated
the History and Mystery, declaring he believed it to be true, and that this was
one of the charges made against him at the time of his expulsion, rested
upon a mistaken apprehension of the language of his Appeal, or a wilful
misrepresentation of it — notwithstanding our assurances to the contrary,
accompanied with a quotation from his pamphlet, showing the ground of
our assertion; and, in fact, notwithstanding the utter impossibility of
alleging the language of his Appeal as the ground of accusation against
him at his trial, which preceded his Appeal: if, moreover, he believed
the History and Mysteiy to be true, as he now unequivocally says he did ;
if he beheved, as the author of that work asserts, that Mr. Asbury and
Dr. Coke presented an address to George Washington, president of con
gress — although he never was president of congress at any time-Hhat
this address was presented in 1785, although in the body of the address
the bishops speak of the constitution of the United States, which was not
adopted until 1788 ; and congratulate General Washington upon his
election to the presidency of the United States; and although the pre
sident, in his reply, returns his acknowledgments for their congratulations
on his election, which did not take place until 1789; that Mr. Asbury,
the doctor, or some person for them, altered the date of his address, from
1785 to 1789; that they took the name of bishops for the first time on
this occasion, in order to appear before so august a personage in their best

328 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
dress — although the appeUation of bishop was not, in fact, applied to the
superintendents until some time afterwards ; we say, if Mr. Dorsey can
believe all this, we cannot conceive of a more useless and unnecessary
work in which "any man, or body of men," could engage, than in
endeavouring to " trammel " such a man's rational faculties.

THE TRUE STATE OF THE CASE.
Mr. Editor, — Mr. Dbrsey, in the last number of the Mutual Rights,
declines further altercation with L., unless he will give his real name ; and
yet Mr. D. had ventured formerly to intimate that he knew the real name
of the author. Besides, it was against L., under his assumed signature,
that Mr. Dorsey made his allegations, and against whom he was bound
to sustain them, or acknowledge his error. Our readers will perceive that
he has done neither the one nor the other ; but in backing out, he assures
his readers that his retreat is not to be attributed to " pusillanimity," but
to the advice of his friends, who seem at length to have convinced him
that prudence is the better part of valour.
To cover his retreat, however, Mr. D. ventures, in the face of all the
facts in the case, to tell his readers that L. does not deny the principal
facts on which his shameless imputation against our veracity was founded.
Now we did and do deny, that we had mistaken the language of his ApL
peal to the General Conference, or that we had predicated what we had
said in reference to him upon that Appeal at all ; nay, we proved that it
was impossible that we could have done so. And these were the principal
facts, and the only facts, which he had aUeged in the note of which we
complained, and in which he gave his readers to understand that our
veracity was not to be relied upon. We did, moreover, quote a passage
from a pamphlet, published by Mr. D., long before his Appeal was pre
sented to the General Conference, by which all that we had said in refer
ence to his circulating the History and Mystery was fully sustained ; and
yet he tells his readers we have not denied " the principal facts" upon
which his cruel and unchristian aspersion of our character was founded.
It is, however, some consolation to perceive that Mr. D. feels ashamed
of his conduct ; and that his friends who have advised him to retreat, are
also mortified on his account. We hope he will not suppress the emotion :
" where there is yet shame, there may in time be virtue."

A WORD TO " NATHAN." 329

A WORD TO " NATHAN."

Mr. Editor, — The " review of the conventional articles " has greatly exaspe
rated a writer in the Mutual Rights who assumes the signature of "Nathan."
He does not attempt to defend the articles, however, but consoles himself
with the prospect of remedying their defects by the aid we have afforded,
and by " the more safe and certain light of practical experience."
We confess we are gratified by the intimation, that our radical brethren
mean at length to listen to the sober dictates of " practical experience."
It was precisely to this test that we have always appealed in favour of the
institutions of Methodism ; and we may yet indulge a hope, that when
our quondam friends shall turn away from the ignis fatuus of abstract
metaphysical speculation, and take for their guide " the more safe and
certain light of practical experience," they may be reconducted to the
altars of that Church in which the writer says, " Many of them have
expended their youthful blood — have been hewers of wood and drawers of
water — have cheerfully shared in her reproaches as well as partaken of her
spiritual advantages ; — in a word, have grown gray in the service of God."
We hope they may again find from " practical experience," the institu
tions of the Church from which they have so causelessly separated, " owned
and blessed," as he says they have heretofore been, " to their own salvation,
as weU as many of their families."
But Nathan is very angry with us for having "denounced" him as
one of the late convention, " as an enemy of that Church in whose com
munion he had spent upwards of twenty-two years." Now this is very
fastidious, to say the least of it. He was one of the convention, and yet
will not allow us to consider him an enemy of our Church ! Pray, were
they our friends who adopted the preamble to the conventional articles, and
the " reply " to the report of the committee on petitions and memorials
adopted by the late General Conference ? If these were our friends, we
are at a loss to know what our enemies would have done.
But ./Wend Nathan charges us with "speaking evil of ministers as well
as of laymen," because we said, " Our enemies have imagined a vain
thing. They have set themselves to destroy the work of the Lord — a
work he had owned and blessed to the salvation of thousands." To this
charge we confidently plead not guilty, because we believe the aUegation
to be true ; and to speak that which is trae is not evil-speaking, how
ever severe it may be. Evil-speaking, according to the definitions of the

330 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
word by the best lexicographers, means " slander," " defamation," " cal
umny ;" and truth cannot come within any of these definitions.
We had endeavoured to show in the Review, that the innovations so
strenuously insisted upon, would, if adopted, graduaUy sap the foundations,
and nltimately overthrow the whole system of itinerant ministration insti
tuted by Mr. Wesley, and perpetuated by his successors. This system we
believed, and do stUl believe, to be the " work of the Lord." We think
it is not the work of human contrivance or premeditation, but that Mr.
Wesley was led to its institution, as well as to those prudential regu
lations by which it has been sustained and rendered so abundantly suc
cessful in spreading Scripture holiness over these and other lands, by
Providential direction. Nay, that Mr. Wesley not only did not originally
design such a plan of operation, but that he was overruled and brought
to its adoption, contrary to aU the prejudices of his education. We do
not mean to say that the plan of operation pursued by the Methodists
is exclusively the work of the Lord. Many other denominations of
Christians, no doubt, have their portion of work assigned them by the
Lord of the vineyard ; and we hope they wUl industriously and success
fully occupy until he come. We only contend, that the itinerant system
is the calling of the Methodists ; and that the Lord has owned and blessed
them in the exercise of this calling, and made them the instruments of
salvation to thousands.
Now, it is this work which we said our enemies had set themselves to
destroy. And that they would have destroyed it root and branch, had
they been permitted to reform the Church after their fashion, is not now
a matter of speculation. The system they have adopted for themselves,
and which they tell us they had designed for our Church government, is
so absurd and incongruous as to find no advocates even among them
selves. We could not have maintained our itinerant operations under
such a system for a single year. A succession of revolutionary schemes
would have agitated us from the centre to the circumference of the con
nexion, and have made us a prey to eveiy enemy.
But we have not charged the convention with setting themselves to
destroy what they believed to be the work of the Lord. They may have
considered the system which we deem the work of the Lord as the inven
tion of men — perhaps a plan which was "surreptitiously" mtrodueed
by " overbearing, abandoned tyrants," — and if so, that the devil had a
hand in it ; and, therefore, by destroying it they were doing God service.
Perhaps they did not intend to destroy it at all — notwithstanding their
measures tended so inevitably to such a result. Wiser men have done
infinite mischief while they were actuated by the best motives. If they
meant well, we hope they will find mercy, seeing that the evil was done
" ignorantly in unbelief."

A WORD TO "NATHAN." 331
As to our friend's threat of making his appeal to the more unprejudiced
judgment of other denominations, we understand him. He knows, as
well as we do, that there have always been«among other denominations of
Christians those who were jealous and envious of the success of the
Methodists — those whose sectarianism restrained their charity within
the limits of their own communion ; and who, therefore, advocated the
cause of our opponents, not because they approve either then creed or
their notions of Church government, but because they hope to see us
crippled by the strife, and our success impeded by the division, which has
grown out of the controversy. We rejoice, however, in the belief, that
the great majority of our brethren who differ with us in some unessential
doctrines, and in forms of Church government, consider us useful auxilia
ries in the common cause, and wish success to the efforts we are making
to promote the great interests of religion. The day of sectarian feehng is
passing away. Those who love Christianity for its own sake, rejoice to see
it spreading over the world, whoever may be the instruments of its exten
sion. AU such, in whatever community of professors they may be found,
only contend with us who shall do and suffer most in the cause of truth
and righteousness, and we have good reason to beUeve, are greatly grieved
at the useless and unnecessary family feud which has been wakened up
in our Church. The mere sectaries we have found, and expect still to find,
aiding and abetting our enemies, and uniting with them to hinder our
success. But we have found, and stUl look to find, sympathy and
encouragement among those whose zeal for the salvation of men carries
them beyond the narrow limits of sectarian interests and prejudices.
But " Nathan " is not content with the judgment he anticipates from
our Christian brethren — he threatens us with an accusation at a more
awful tribunal ; even at the final judgment, he and the other members
of the convention, in fearful array, are to be our accusers, for having
reviewed and exposed the defects of then conventional articles. It has
been well said by. a great man, that "there is but one step between the
sublime and the ridiculous." The members of the convention may
perhaps have matters of more importance upon their hands in the day
in which they shall be called to give an account of their stewardship.
Perhaps they may be caUed to give an account for having rendedthe
body of Christ, and turned the simple out of the way. The precious
souls who may be lost in the fierce contention they have created and con
tinue to peipetuate with so much zeal, may be required at their hands.
Charity obliges us to hope that they did not design the evil they have
done, and that, therefore, the sin will not be laid to their charge ; or if
they did design it, that some instrument of heavenly mercy may be as
successful in bringing them to repentance, as Nathan's namesake was
in awakening the king of Israel to a sense of his kiquity.

332 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.

WHO ARE THE PERSECUTED?

Mr. Editor, — Our opponents have been greatly aided in effecting their
designs by the cry of persecution, which they have raised and sounded so
long and loud against our Church. Many, it is feared, have had their
sympathies enlisted by the cry, and without stopping to inquire into the
justice of the complaint, have been led to take part with the supposed
sufferers. It may be worth while, however, to inquire whether the Church
has not been persecuted, instead of those whom she has been compelled
to separate from her communion, or who, after inflicting a thousand
wounds, have abandoned her altars ; because if this should turn out to
be the fact, the complainants wUl, instead of being entitled to the public
sympathy, deserve reprehension as persecutors of their brethren.
The trae statement of the case is then as foUows : — Certain ministers
and members of our Church take it into their heads to reform our Church
after a fashion of their own — to revolutionize our whole ecclesiastical
economy. To effect this object, they set up a printing-press, and issue a
periodical teeming with abuse against their brethren. The institutions of
the Church, under which we have prospered so long, are assailed with
most unchristian violence, and the ministry denounced with the most
odious epithets. Our beloved pastors, endeared to us by their labours of
love, their sacrifices and their success in spreading the gospel with all its
attending influences and blessings, are held up to public odium as tyrants,
" overbearing, abandoned, infamous tyrants ;" as ambitious despots, dan
gerous to the public safety ; as " forging fetters for us and our posterity;"
as men who " would rather see their flocks go into sin and finaUy into
hell, than grant them their rights ;" as using the basest stratagems-
caucusing, electioneering, and manoeuvring all over the continent, to pre
serve a power which was at first obtained by fraud, falsehood, and cunning
craftiness ; as being " wolves with teeth and claws," and not disinchned
to use them against the innocent, harmless flock. This is a very brief
summary of what they published' and circulated, with a zeal and industry as
cruel as it was unrelenting. If any man doubt it, let him read the " Wes
leyan Repository" and the "Mutual Rights ;" or, if he has not time to
wade through these volumes, let him examine the extracts given in the
" Narrative and Defence" of the proceedings of the Church in Baltimore;
and if he be impartial, he will not only admit the full amount of what
we have alleged above, but acknowledge the half has not been told him.
Well, what becomes of Church discipline all the while? It is dormant.

WHO ARE THE PERSECUTED? 333
The weU-affected part of the membership, as weU as the ministers, bear
with unexampled patience all this unjust railing and abuse for seven long
years. They individually remonstrate and entreat; but their remon
strances and entreaties do but inflame their adversaries — their patient
endurance of wrongs is accounted pusiUanimity, and threats and denun
ciations are multiplied. Emboldened by the impunity with which they
are permitted to carry on the war, they proceed to stiU more offensive
measures. They an'aign a whole conference of ministers before the tri
bunal of their Union Societies, and without affording them the semblance
of a trial, or an opportunity of defence, condemn them in the bitterest
terms, and publish these denunciations in the public newspapers, their
own vehicle of defamation being deemed insufficient to give them the
necessary publicity.
Those who had long mourned and wept over these disorders, but who
had still retained a hope that concihatoiy measures might yet allay the
strife, now gave up " the last, lingering, long-cherished hope of reconcUia
tion." Christian meekness and forbearance could do no more — could
suffer no more. The Discipline is enforced, and some of the principal
offenders, refusing all satisfaction or atonement, are cut off, and immedi
ately the terrible ciy of persecution is sounded ; and even pending the
trials before the Church judicatories it is heard and echoed from Georgia
to Maine. But in the name of common sense and of Christian charity^
we ask, Who have been persecuted ? those who set up the ciy of persecu
tion, or the much-aggrieved Church, who is compelled to exclude them
from her communion ?
With those who are expelled others voluntarily retire, either because
they had been co-workers with them, or because they were otherwise iden
tified in feeling and interest with them ; and these too reiterate the cry of
persecution. They too have been persecuted out of the Church !
At length a General Convention is called, and delegates from the disaf
fected in different sections of the country assemble in Baltimore. They
create a constitution and form of government for a new Church ; publish
their conventional articles of association, accompanying them with a pre
amble containing the bitterest invectives against the Methodist Episco
pal Church. Yet these very delegates who had thus instituted a new
Church, in direct opposition to ours, and appointed agents to carry their
plans into effect, persist to claim their membership in the community from
which they had obviously seceded. Nay, in some instances the very agents
appointed by the convention to form Churches upon the plan agreed upon
by the delegates, still claimed to exercise, not only the rights of member
ship, but of ministers of the Methodist Episcopal Church, against which
thev had received official authority to act as agents of the convention.
In some circuits and stations this course was very properly and promptly

334 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
resisted ; and those who attended the convention and whose names were'
appended to the articles of association, were considered as having with
drawn from the Church : in other places they were only removed from
official stations in the Church : and in others the Church authorities were
so afraid of the cry of persecution that no notice was officiaUy taken of the
delinquency. The lamentable cry of persecution, however, had been so
long used with effect that it was not to be restrained by any course which
could be taken. Those who were dealt with as having withdrawn from
the Church, cried aloud and spared not. Those who were not noticed
determined to provoke expulsion, that they might be furnished with the
same talismanic word, and accordingly entered our Churches, read their
articles of association, commented on them to the disparagement of our
discipline, and finally invited the societies to join the new Church ! And
where this was not allowed, Or any efforts were made to counteract their
designs, the whole neighbourhood was deafened with the cry of persecu
tion. Risum teneatis, amid. Can anything be more ridiculous ? Are
not the complainants themselves the bitterest persecutors of their patient
and enduring brethren ?
And now that they have finally left us, do they not essay by all possi
ble means to take away our churches ? Do they not avaU themselves of
their influence to induce trustees, to whom has been committed the safe
keeping of our meeting-houses, to betray the sacred trust reposed in them,
and to divert those houses from the only use for which they were designed
by those who erected them or who contributed to their erection? Do
they not seek to avaU themselves of every legal informality which may
be found in the instruments by which our houses of worship have been
conveyed to us, and which obviously originated in the honest simplicity of
those who drew them, who never apprehended that these houses, devoted
to the worship of God, would ever become subjects of litigation ? Suppose
that in a deed, intended to convey a piece of ground to the Methodist
Episcopal Church for the purpose of erecting thereon a house of worship,
the word "Episcopal" has been left out; is not the intention as apparent
as if the word were found in it a thousand times ? And is not the equity
of the case quite as clear without the word as with it ? Can any legal
defects in our titles give the associated Churches a claim to our property,
when they were not in existence when these conveyances were made?
Even in a strictly-legal point of view this is impossible : but a Christian
has only to inquire into the equity of the case ; for " he that is only law-
honest is a dishonest man." Alas ! those who have complained so loudly
of persecution have been the bitterest of persecutors, to the full amount of
their power. They have persecuted their brethren with a perseverance
that never tired and a zeal as unrelenting as death.
We put it to the common sense, to the consciences of our readers, to say

WHO ARE THE PERSECUTED? 335
who, in all of what we have spoken, have been persecuted ; those who have
undertaken to reform us after their fashion, and by such means, without
the consent of five in a hundred of our membership, or we, against whom
the complaint is made ? For people to complain of tyranny, and oppres
sion, and persecution, when the just and retributive punishments of the law
are felt, is natural ; for " No man e'er felt the halter draw,
With a good opinion of the law."
But to excite public sympathy it ought to be shown that they are "per
secuted for righteousness' sake."

336 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.

NOTICE OF THE PERIODICAL ENTITLED " METHODIST
CORRESPONDENT."

Messrs. Editors, — We have lately been favoured with a perusal of
the "Methodist Correspondent," a paper published in Cincinnati. The
title is evidently a misnomer, as no reason can be assigned for the appeUa-
tion of " Methodist." The paper is quite as anti-methodistical as the old
" Mutual Rights," of which, from its features, we suppose it to be a lineal
descendant. In the seventeenth number we were amused with a com
munication headed " B, in reply to C," in which there is a most ludicrous
display of impotent rage.
We had begun to think our great reformers were disposed to exercise,
in reference to the review of their constitution and disciphne, the same sound
discretion by which they had been governed in regard to our friend C.'s
review of the conventional articles. When we cannot satisfactorily answer
an opponent, the next best thing is to observe a profound silence on the
subject. An ineffectual effort at defence only betrays the weakness of the
cause it would defend, and exposes this weakness to those whose party feel
ings keep them ignorant of the arguments of every assailant, until they are
injudiciously presented to them by the indiscreet zeal of their leaders.
As it was manifestly impossible to make a successful defence against the
review of their constitution and discipline, we had begun to applaud the
patience of our radical brethren, which enabled them to bear in silence the
utter demolition of the stupendous fabric they had reared with so much
pains and labour, and which they had announced as the model which all
Christian Churches should follow. But it was too much, it seems, to
expect of human nature. They had not determined to submit in silence,
and bear the cruel dissection without giving vent to their agony. They
had only been like Tarn O'Shanter's wife,
" Knitting their brows like gathering storm,
Nursing their wrath to keep it warm."
The accumulating steam had collected until the " Con-espondent " found it
necessary to open a safety-valve, and having found vent the vapour has
issued with a loud but very harmless roaring. In short, Mr. B is in a vio
lent passion and beats the air most furiously.
"And who, pray," he asks, "is this Mr. C. ? He is neither a bishop
nor presiding elder ; he is not a preacher in charge, nor even an itinerant.
Why should a man who is nothing more than a mere local preacher, be

NOTICE OF THE "METHODIST CORRESPONDENT." 337
allowed to dictate to the whole episcopacy, ministry, and membership of
the Methodist Episcopal Church, or prescribe the conditions on which they
are to become friendly with us."
It would seem, then, that " C." would have been justified in prescribing
these conditions if he had been " a bishop, a presiding elder, a preacher in
charge, or even an itinerant !" But for a mere local preacher to give an
opinion in such matters is not to be endured. How long is it since our
radical friends have fallen in love with bishops and presiding elders, and
learned to speak so contemptuously of local preachers ? • We had been
taught to think that these titles, to which they accord such high rights,
were as offensive to them as Satan himself, and that local preachers were
the very pink of orthodoxy, and the most .fit and proper persons in the
world to gOvern the Church. Upon reflection, however, we recollect they have
dropped the appellation of " local preachers," and have substituted the very
significant cognomen of " unstationed preachers." . We stUl think, how
ever, that this is a distinction without a difference, and that " a rose by
any other name would smell as sweet." C. wUl not, therefore, readUy
forgive Mr. B. for the mortification he has endured from being announced-
to the world as a " mere local preacher."
But, in sober seriousness, would B. have thought better of the review
if it had been written by "a bishop, a presiding elder, a preacher in
charge, or even an itinerant?" On the contrary, would he not have
alleged that such assailants of the new constitution and discipline were
writing in defence of their own "inordinate and surreptitiously-obtained
powers and prerogatives ?" Who then could, with more propriety, defend
the economy of the Methodist Episcopal Church than a local preacher ?
As he derives no temporal emoluments from this economy, and does not
participate in the envied powers and prerogatives it confers, his defence,
at least, must be allowed the merit of disinterestedness ; and as radical
local preachers have been foremost among those who have complained
of oppression in our Church, the injustice of such complaints can be
in no way so satisfactorily shown as by the abiding attachment of those
who, if there had been any oppression, must necessarily have felt their
portion of the evil.
But " C." has said that the allegations against the Methodist Episcopal
Church, contained in the preface to the new constitution and discipline,
were offensive and unjust, and that while they remained there the Episco
pal Methodists could not, without tacitly ^nuflsrag their truth, give the
right hand of fellowship to those who thus unwarrantably abused and
traduced them. They could not reciprocate ministerial services with those
who had taken pains, in the only official act of their confederacy, to
hold them up to public odium as tyrants, and despots, and lordhngs over.
the rights and consciences of men. And is not all this obviously true ?
22

338 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
We have always and do still deny that we ever wished to restrict the
liberty of speech or the press — we have only punished their licentious
ness. Of arguments in favour of a change in our Church polity we
have not, and do not, complain ; we have only insisted that abuse and
slander was not argument, and that inveighing and railing were not to be
tolerated in a Christian community. It is trae we have expeUed from our
communion members of Union Societies, because some, by their author
ized agents, committed these offences, and others publicly justified and
circulated the slanders, and refused to disavow them or make any atone
ment. For the truth of all this we appeal to the publications themselves,
or to the selections from them as published in the Narrative and Defence
of the proceedings in Baltimo»e.
We have long since submitted the issue to the opinion of the public,
and are willing to abide the verdict. The preface to the new Discipline
is a reiterated declaration of hostilities which originally declared a war
of extermination. An effort has been made to destroy the standing and
character of our ministry, and to rob us of our altars ; and now that the
effort has failed the belligerent party affect to desire peace, whUe they
expose the hollowness of the pretension, by prefixing to their new code
an order of council as impotent as it is unjust and ungenerous. And
yet, while they thus add insult to injury, they hold out the hand of
peace !
But to the review. C. had shown that the new code had destroyed all
possibility of sustaining an itinerancy in their connexion, by placing the
stationing power in the annual conferences, composed one-half of laymen.
The travelling preachers could not be expected long to submit to the
exercise of an absolute authority over them by laymen and local preach
ers, who were not themselves subject to this authority. They could not
long endure that those laymen and local preachers should lay upon them
burdens which none of them would touch with one of their fingers.
That in the Methodist Episcopal Church the travelling preachers were
stationed by persons of their own choice, who were amenable to them
for the exercise of their authority, and who themselves were partakers! of
their labours and privations. To all this it is answered, that the "Pro
testant Methodists love itinerancy as well as the Episcopal Methodists;
that they love it as a general advantage to Christianity, and wish all
Churches to adopt it :" and to all this we reply that C. has nowhere pre
tended to determine how much the Protestant Methodists love itinerr
ancy — he has only shown that they have taken effectual measures to
destroy it.
But B. denies that the episcopal authority to station preachers in the
Methodist Episcopal Church is restrained at all, or that the bishops are
amenable to the General Conference for the official exercise of prerogative

NOTICE OF THE " METHODIST CORRESPONDENT." 339
in this respect. Now we assert, that every General Conference appoints
a committee on the episcopacy, whose duty it is to examine everything in
relation to these officers of the Church ; and should this committee report
unfavourably upon the conduct of one of the bishops, and should the report
be sustained by the Conference, the bishop would be censured or deposed
without the formality of any other trial.
Wnen it suited their purpose the radicals reminded us that this had
been done, and therefore could be done again. They pointed to our
Church history for the fact, that even Mr. Wesley's name was left off the
minutes by a vote of the General Conference ; and it is a feet, also, that
the same thing happened in the case of Dr. Coke. The precedent,
therefore, has been set, and set, too, under circumstances that show the
bishops to be absolutely at the disposal of the General Conference in
respect to their official authority ; for, in the cases above aUuded to, one
was left off the minutes from the apprehension that he intended to recaU
Mr. Asbury to England, and the other because he remained in England
beyond the period assigned by the Conference for his return. It is true
Mr. Wesley's name was restored the following year, when the Conference
discovered that their apprehensions were groundless ; but this fact sustains
the authority which we contend for, as belonging to the General Confer
ence. C. was right, then, notwithstanding the blustering of his antago
nist, when he asserted that "bishops had been, and therefore can be
again, deposed, and, in point of fact, are elected every four years." Yet
Mr. B. asks, " When was a Methodist bishop deposed ?" He will find the
answer to his question in the " Mutual Rights " — authority which, with all
his boasted hberty, he dare not question.
But Mr. B. contends that laymen and local preachers are "equally
interested with the traveUing preachers in the exercise of the stationing
power." If the traveUing preachers of the new Church can admit this,
we certainly have no right to quarrel with the assertion, but we must be
aUowed to say that we had formed a different estimate of the privations
and sufferings of a travelhng preacher.
It is trae that we have some preferences to gratify in the appointment
of the preachers, but we had not been in the habit of comparing these
gratifications, or our disappointments when we were not gratified, with
the deep solicitude which an itinerant minister must feel in regard to the
place to which his allotment may faU. Whoever comes to us, we still
retain all our temporal advantages. Our chances or facilities to make
bread and procure raiment for our families wiU be stUl the same : but the
appointment of a preacher may make an awful difference to him in this
respect ; and we cannot help thinking that an abridgment in the articles
of either food or clothing, is a matter of more "interest" than to be
deprived of the pleasure of hearing a favourite preacher. However, this

3.40., MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
is only our opinion — our "reformed" friends must be, allowed to think for
themselves ; but we ready do think that such harmless opinions might be
aUowed to pass without procuring for our friend C. the harsh epithetof *
" a warm and persevering bigot." Nor do we think that such epithets
wiU increase the weight of B.'s arguments, or mend a single error which
C. has shown to exist in the new code.
B. tells us that " the moment a bishop is ordained, no General Confer
ence has any control of his executive power as long as he lives, unless he
can be so convicted of some crime as to be expeUed from the Church".
and we are defied " to put our finger upon a sentence in the Discipline
yhich makes a bishop responsible to anybody for the exercise of the sta
tioning power." The Discipline expressly defines the duties of the bishops,
and restricts the stationing power by express provisions, and, moreover,
declares that they are "amenable to the General Conference for their
conduct," and "may be expelled by the Conference for improper conduct"
as weU as for immorality. Now, will anybody say that a neglect to fulfil
the duties imposed by the Discipline, or transcending his authority, would
not be " improper" conduct ? Have we not here another proof that those
who have so unmercifuUy abused our Discipline, never have taken the
pains to consult its provisions ?
C. had asserted that "in point of fact the bishops were elected every,
four years," and B. tells him he "might as weU have asserted that the.
King of England and the Emperor of Russia are elected every four years."
We wiU admit the parallel if B. wiU show that the supreme councils
of these countries have ever deposed their monarchs by simply leaving
their names off the list of officers ; and that their majesties have no stand- .
ing armies to enforce their claim, right or wrong. We have given the
precedent in the case of Methodist bishops, and B.'s friends, far from
denying it, have urged it against us as a high misdemeanour. We hold
• C, therefore, justified in saying that officers whose conduct is subjected to
examination by the supreme council every four years, and who may be
discontinued if not approved, " are in point of fact elected every four
years." At every General Conference the question occurs, " Who are the
superintendents or bishops?" If, in the answer to this question, any,
bishop's name be left out, he ceases to exercise his functions, and if he
continue in the connexion, he must fall into the itinerant ranks. It is,
true that no General Conference would venture upon such a step unless
imperious necessity caUed for it ; but that they may, if such necessity
exist, exercise the authority, is beyond all question.
But C. has given- still greater offence. He has shown that the new
code authorizes the trustees of any Church, upon the recommendation of
two-thirds of the male members over twenty-one years of age, " to sell,
lease, mortgage, or otherwise dispose of" the Church property ; and hence

NOTICE OF THE " METHODIST CORRESPONDENT." 341
two-thirds of the male members over twenty-one years of age, may, with
out the consent of one-third of such members, the consent of any male
member under that age, or any one of the females who generaUy consti
tute a large majority of the members, seU or lease the Church to a Uni
tarian or any other minister, or may turn the travelling preacher out of
the pulpit, and employ a local preacher in his place. B. replies that it is
true " two-thirds of the male members have the authority to purchase,
build, seU, lease, rent," &c* " But all this is to be done for the mutual
benefit of the Church, so that the one-third, the minority who did not give
their votes for tlie sale, are secured by the constitution in their proportion
of the property or price." And why not the minors and the females?
We suppose, however, that B. does not exclude them — he only forgot
them. Either way it must be acknowledged that our friend C.'s sagacity
failed him in this matter. He did not advert to the fact that after our
radical friends had taxed the generosity of all their friends and neigh
bours of other denominations, or of no Christian denomination, to buUd
them a Church, they may coolly sell the property and divide the money
among themselves !• We thank Mr. B. for the hint, and we hope the
public wUl profit by it. We hope our reformers will in future head all
their subscription papers for building churches with this information.
Common honesty demands it of them, although it might prevent some
from subscribing very liberally if they knew that their subscriptions,
instead of being applied to the erection of a permanent house of worship,
might be appropriated to the buUding a house to be sold for the " mutual
benefit of the members of the Church," who would each be entitled to
their " proportion of the price."
B. retorts upon C. that the trustees of Methodist Episcopal churches are
authorized to sell or mortgage the property " under certain circumstances."
He forgets to state under what circumstances this may be done ; we shall
be at the pains of refreshing his memory. If the trustees, in purchasing
or building, shall have contracted a debt which the society is unable to
pay, they are liable of course to be sued, and therefore are authorized to
sell or mortgage the property in order to pay the debts of the Church.
But under no " otlier circumstances" can they alienate a house of worship,
or convert it to any other use than that which was originaUy designed by
the contributors in and out of the Church. We have no chance, there
fore, of speculating on public liberality ; but under radical contrivance and
arrangement, their members may drive a profitable trade by begging
money and budding houses to be sold and the "price" divided in due
proportion among them. B. has done us, and perhaps the community,
an essential service by pointing out this, in addition to the numerous
3 What a convenient thing an et cetera is sometimes ! Mr. B. did not like to add " and
otherwise dispose of."

342 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
blunders which C. has shown to have been committed by our " reformers,"
in their much-lauded constitution and discipline.
To conclude, B. is mistaken in supposing our friend C. to be " a mere
local preacher ;" he is a doctor to boot, and it must be acknowledged that
his prescriptions are operating admirably. Another such emesis of bUe,
and we shaU expect to hear that B. is somethmg better. We recommend
to him, if he is convalescent, to take, by way of a tonic and prophylactic,
a moderate quantity of the preparation of wormwood prescribed by C. in
the last number of his review. It may secure him from an undue secre
tion of gaU, and consequently from a relapse into the radical fever.
(Philo. C.)

NOTICE OF THE "METHODIST CORRESPONDENT." 343

NOTICE OF THE PERIODICAL ENTITLED "METHODIST CORRESPONDENT."
— CONTINUED.

Messrs. Editors, — We have been greatly amused in looking over the
reply of B. to C. in the Methodist Correspondent. B. continues in the
same bad temper, and scolds most sadly, because C. has had the temerity to
examine the new constitution and discipline, and point out its defects.
He admits, however, that their rules with respect to the trial of members
are wholly indefensible ; but this, he says, is not the only instance in
which the deliberations of the convention were misguided by the spirit of
democracy — rather a queer acknowledgment for one of the peculiar
friends of the people ! We recollect, that when the errors of the con
ventional articles were pointed out, a radical writer in the Mutual Rights
told us, that they were the sticklers for itinerancy who spoiled the wise
plans of the convention. In the last convention the sticklers for itinerancy
gave way, and the democrats obtained the ascendency, and to these hot
headed democrats Mr. B. thinks are to be charged the absurdities of the
new code. We confess we are sorry to hear so bad an account of our
friends the democrats, but we hope they may yet be tamed, and brought
to a more sober way of thinking.
But B. assures us they really mean to insist upon class-meeting as a
condition of membership ; and he insists, moreover, that the meeting in
class is " enjoined by the word of God." " This gentleman (C.) has yet
to learn that it will be pretended that the meeting in class is among the
rules of moral disciphne which the word of God requires." We advise
Mr. B. to hasten on to Baltimore, and do his utmost to convince his
brethren here that they have misunderstood the Discipline of the new
Church, and the word of God. Class-meeting is not considered by the
Protestant Methodist Church here as obligatory upon the members, and
membership may be maintained without it. It will, moreover, be recol
lected by all who have read the Wesleyan Repository, that among the
bitterest complaints urged against the Methodist Episcopal Church, by Mr.
Snethen, was the unscriptural requisition to meet in class as a condition
of membership.
This complaint was echoed by most of Mr. Snethen's foUowers in this
place, and he claims to be the father of the reformation. B., however,
has strangely misunderstood, or wilfully misrepresented C. on the subject
of class-meetings. He accuses him of saying, that class-meetings are
"unwarranted" and "unsupported by Scripture." Now C. has no-

¦ 344 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
where said this. He has indeed admitted, that this institution is nowhere
specifically enjoined in the Scriptures; but surely he has constantly
endeavoured to show, that it is warranted by the relation which subsists
between the Christian pastor and his flock. In the first volume of the
Itinerant, page 202, after showing the origin of class-meetings, and that
they were not instituted or imposed by the General Conference, he urges
the Scriptural argument expressly and pointedly : he says, —
" Secondly. The Scriptures evidently require of the pastors of the
Church, a faithful oversight of the flock. They are directed to watch
over them as those who must render an account of them to God. It is
their duty to instruct the ignorant, to support the weak, comfort the
afflicted, confirm the wavering, and repress the froward. By a settled
pastor, permanently resident among his flock, this may be done, perhaps,
by frequent domiciliary visits ; but by an itinerating ministry it can only
be accomplished by means ,of some such institution as our class-meetings.
It is, however, obvious, that if the Scriptures impose pastoral duties upon
the ministry, the membership are bound to place themselves in such a
relation to their ministers as wUl enable them to fulfil these duties; and,
hence, they avho prefer an itinerating ministry are bound to submit to
such regulations as may be necessary to the due and faithful discharge, of
ministerial obligation. It wUl not, we presume, be denied, that our itine
rating ministry is a Scriptural institution ; and, hence, whatever is essen
tial to its existence and usefulness, may be properly required of those who
voluntarily put themselves under the pastoral care of such a ministry.
:" Thirdly. When a Methodist refuses to meet his class, he virtually
withdraws from the Church. He renounces the social obligation into
.which he entered when he became a member of the community. He
puts it out of the power of the pastors of the Church to fulfil their minis
terial duties to him ; and as they can no longer watch over him, they
cannot be expected to be responsible for him, or to admit him to the
communion, his fitness for which they have no longer any means of ascer
taining. He is accordingly, by our rule of discipline, ' laid aside,' and
not expelled for immoral conduct. If it be aUeged that a man does not,
properly speaking, withdraw from the Church unless he accompanies the
act by some con-esponding declaration, in word or writing, we answer, that
the Church possesses no authority to require a written or verbal with
drawal, or any explicit renunciation of Church privileges, and is therefore
compelled to consider an actual removal from pastoral oversight as a
withdrawal from Church membership. The rule, then, which requires a
Methodist to meet in class, is not a penal statute added to the divine
laws — it is a voluntary, social contract, which, when not fulfilled, implies
a renunciation of the compact, which it is admitted every one has a right
to make whenever he repents of his engagements; but he cannot dissolve

NOTICE OF THE « METHODIST CORRESPONDENT." 345
the compact andstiU retain the privileges which grow out of it. Th'e
obligation and the benefits which accrue from it cease at the same
¦time." In the Appeal to the Methodists, page 51, the same writer says: —
"Among the complaints which have been made against our present
system of government the originator and leader of the projected reforma-
¦ tion denounces the mle of our Discipline which requires meeting in class
as a condition of membership. (Vide Wes. Rep., vol. i, page 329.) He
contends that it is an unscriptural condition, and that the Church has
no right to impose it. It is not objected that these meetings are useless
or hurtful ; on the contrary, they are acknowledged to be a means of
grace eminently calculated to promote the interests of the Church : and
we may add, that to a Church under the direction of an itinerating min
istry they are indispensable; for such a ministry could not, without the
; aid of this or some simUar institution, effectually execute the duties of. a
pastor. The limited term of a preacher's appointment to any circuit or
station, renders it impossible for him to form an intimate acquaintance
with the members of his charge, and hence he could not know whether
they were walking as becometh the gospel — whether they were individu
ally growing in grace, or backsliding in heart from God. Without it no
moral discipline could be enforced, no pastoral duties be performed, or any
unity of sentiment in doctrines preserved among the members of the
Church. Now, surely that which is confessedly necessary to the pro
motion of piety, peace, and love — without which the spirituality of the
Church would decay, and her communion be thrown open to those who
have neither the fear of God before their eyes, nor his love in their hearts
— cannot be without Scripture wan-ant. The propriety of such conditions
of communion, must be clearly inferable from the doctrines and precepts
of the gospel, which the Church is Aound to inculcate and enforce upon all
her members. But if the reformers insist upon changing the rule which
makes it obligatory upon our members to meet in class, because there is
no positive Scriptural demand for it, they must also give up infant bap
tism, and the administration of the communion to females, for there is no
such commandment for either the one or the other."
Yet B. says, that C. contends that class-meeting is " unsupported," and
" not wan-anted by the word of God," and yet justifies the Methodist
Episcopal Church in making the meeting in class a condition of member
ship. The truth is, C. contends that every Methodist is bound to meet in
class, because he has promised to do so when he joined the Church ;
because they are admitted to be necessary under our itinerant economy,
to enable the pastors of the Church to fulfil the duties enjoined upon them
by the word of God ; and because they are admitted to be eminently useful
in promoting the edification of the Church. But he does not allege a

346 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
positive Scriptural command for their institution; on the contrary, he
would admit that if any other plan or scheme could be invented, which
would better secure the objects designed to be accomplished by class-
meeting, it ought to be adopted. But if for class-meeting we had a " thus
saith the Lord," we would not be at hberty to substitute anything in its

But is Mr. B. aware of what wfll be the consequence of his insisting
that class-meeting is " among tlie rules of moral discipline enjoined by the
word of God ?" Is he aware that he not only unchristianizes aU other
sects and denominations of Christians who have not adopted them, but
that he also impeaches the Christian profession of his brethren of the Pro
testant Methodist Church here and elsewhere, who understand the rales of
moral discipline enjoined by the word of God, as well as the constitution
and discipline of his Church, differently from himself? But without this
".pretension," it was impossible for B. to show that the new Church had
made the meeting in class a condition of membership. They have not
done so, unless the attendance upon class-meeting be among " the rules
of moral discipline which the word of God enjoins." Whether the omis
sion was intentional, or whether it occurred in the confusion which " the
democracy " of the assembly occasioned, we do not know ; but that no
member of the new Church can be constitutionally compeUed to attend
class-meeting, will be clear to any impartial reader.
It is trae that B. shows abundant proof that social, religious meetings
are enjoined upon the foUowers of Christ : but these are not necessarily
class-meetings. They may be prayer-meetings, or any other meetings
for religious worship ; and therefore aU Mr. B.'s flourishing about these
religious meetings, goes for nothing ; or else aU the Episcopalians, Pres
byterians, Baptists, <kc, who have no class-meetings, are guilty of a vio
lation of the apostolic injunction, not4o forsake the assembling of them
selves together as the manner of some is, — an allegation which we think
Mr. B. is not yet ready to make.
C. has asserted, that a member of the Protestant Methodist Church
cannot be excluded from communion for refusing or neglecting to attend
class-meeting ; B. most strenuously asserts the contrary, and is in very
high temper about it. Let us then suppose Mr. B. to be a class-leader in
the new Church, and that he has the misfortune to have received a mem
ber who, after a time, ceases to attend his class, either from declension of
piety, or from that spirit of " democracy " which, he says, marred the
plans of the convention. Let us see how he would deal with the delin
quent We propose the following dialogue : —
Mr. B. Brother L., I have called to inquire why you have so long neg
lected your class ?
L. Why, brother B., I do not find class-meeting very profitable to me ;

NOTICE OF THE " METHODIST CORRESPONDENT." 347
and I think I can employ my time more profitably in reading the
Scriptures, and other good books, on Sunday morning before I go to
Church. B. It is strange you do not find class-meetings profitable, when so
many thousands have found them among the most edifying means of
grace. L. I think I am as good as a great many who regularly go to class ;
and I am sure that I can improve my mind better by reading, than by
meeting with a parcel of people who know no more than myself.
B. But are you not bound by the discipline to meet in class, as one of
the means of grace, upon pain of expulsion ?
L. No, sir ; the constitution provides that " no minister or member
shall be excommunicated, except for immorality, the propagation of un
christian doctrines, or the neglect of the duties enjoined by the word of
God." The absenting myself from class constitutes neither of the above
offences, and therefore I am not liable to be disowned for doing so.
B. Pardon me, brother ; class-meeting is among the rules of moral dis
cipline enjoined by the word of God ; for the apostle expressly charges
us " not to forsake the assembling ourselves together as the manner of
some is."
L. True, sir ; but I fulfil the injunction of the apostle when I go to
Church, to the communion, or to prayer-meeting. It is nowhere said in
Scripture, that these assemblies mean class-meeting. A moral or religious
duty must have a " thus saith the Lord " for it. My Episcopalian and
Presbyterian neighbours have no class-meetings, nor other private meet
ings ; and will you say that there are no moral and religious men among
them ? Are they all guilty of a violation of one of the " rales of moral
disciphne enjoined by the word of God ?" Besides, I have been to Balti
more lately, the very metropohs of reform, and I find our brethren there
do not so interpret the discipline. They know their liberties under our
glorious constitution, and are not to be priest-ridden, nor ridden by class-
leaders either. You may bring me to trial as soon as you please. I will
give you Mr. Snethen himself for it. I have the Wesleyan Repository.
Whether B. would cite the absentee to trial or not, I am not prepared
to say ; but I am sure that if he did, the verdict would acquit him, if jus
tice were done according to law.
Mr. B. seems displeased that we should have spoken so confidently of
the success of the Review ; and yet the perturbation which B. manifests is
no slight evidence that its effect is not greatly overrated. " The practice
of the itinerant writers in praising one another," he says, " is of long stand
ing." This is an assertion which he does not condescend to sustain by a
single proof: but if it were true, how does it apply to either C. or Philo C. ?
We are not right certain that we understand what is meant by itinerant

348 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
writers. An itinerant writer would strictly mean one who writes whUe he
is travelling, and then it would seem to' be intended for travelhng preach
ers. But neither C. nor Philo C. are travelling preachers ; and hence the
remark has no application whatever. " Mr. C," we are told, " has received
many a soothing compliment, long before Philo C. made his appearance."
True, but the most direct and " soothing compliments" have been paid by
the best writer, and one of the most honest men on the side of reform.
Mr. Shinn, in his " Review of the Appeal to the Methodists," returns his
thanks to the writer for the temper and spirit in which it is written ; and
very lately has said, " it is the very best book that has been written during
this whole controversy." No " itinerant writer " has ventured upon such
a " soothing compliment " to the author ; and Mr. B. wUl not venture to
impugn the authority from which it emanated. He ought, therefore, to
have spared us his taunts about compliments.
As an apology for the many defects in the new code, which cannot be
concealed or defended, we are told that the convention had such a multi
plicity of business to do, that everything could not be done ; and besides,
they were greatly annoyed by the " spirit of democracy," alias radicalism.
Now we do not so much complain of what the convention did not do, as
of what they have done. They have made Church trials a fruitful source,
not only of litigation and strife, but of grievous scandal ; and withal ren
dered Church discipline whoUy inefficient by making it impossible to
remove a cunning, artful offender, who, for sinister purposes, desires to
retain his membership. They have made the tenure of Church property
insecure, in relation to the confederacy, and put it in the power of a small
minority of any "individual associate Church" to convert the meeting
house, built by general subscription, to their own individual advantage, or
to turn it over to any heterodox sect to whom they may incline. They
may sell the house and distribute the money among the members of the
" individual associate Church," to the total exclusion of all the other con
tributors ; or they may employ a Unitarian or Universalist preacher, and
exclude the ministers of the Protestant Methodist Churches from the pul
pit. They have, by omitting any recognition of the right of the great
Head of the Church to call and qualify his own ministers, virtually asserted
that any man or woman has a right to assume this office without any divine
call ; and the editor of the official paper has not only asserted this prin
ciple, but laboured it out most heartily. They have released their members
from the obligation of class-meetings, although they affect to institute an
itinerant plan of ministration, and have therefore left the pastors of the
Church without any means of ascertaining the religious deportment of
their flocks. Their altars are thus exposed to desecration, without help or
remedy, unless they give up their itinerancy for a settled ministry. The
only hope which B. can entertain is, that when they shall be delivered

NOTICE OF THE. "METHODIST CORRESPONDENT." 349
from the " spirit of democracy," which, he says, so mischievously operated
in the last convention, the reformers will re-reform their government ;
and may we not entertain the hope, that when there shaU come to be a
" right spirit in them," they wUl return to their first love, and seek a re
union with the Church they have so causelessly forsaken ?

350 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.

MR. SNETHEN'S SECOND REPLY TO MR. O'KELLY.

It will be recoUected that Mr. Snethen excused himself for having so
severely chastised Mr. O'Kelly, his predecessor in reform, by aUeging
that his reply to that gentleman was written at the request of Mr. Asbury
and the Methodist Conference, and therefore he is only entitled to be con
sidered as the secretary of the Conference. I am truly sorry that a man
we had so highly esteemed should have placed himself in circumstances
which make it necessary to avow that he had, at the bidding of any man,
or body of men, controverted and ridiculed with apparent sincerity prin
ciples and opinions which he held to be really true. But since this avowal
was made, a second reply from Mr. Snethen to Mr. O'KeUy has been put into
my hands ; and as Mr. Snethen has accused me of writing merely " to show
how well I can write," I wiU in my turn show how weU Mr. Snethen could
write when he was inspired by a good theme. The pamphlet before us
was printed in PhUadelphia, by S. W. Conrad, in 1802, and is entitled,
" An Answer to James O'Kelly's Vindication of his Apology, and an Ex
planation of the Reply. By Nicholas Snethen." We shah be liberal in
our extracts from this pamphlet, because Mr. Snethen does not profess
to write as secretary to Mr. Asbury and the Conference, and may be
supposed in this instance to give his own views and sentiments. How
he wiU reconcile his testimony to the fact that Mr. Wesley recommended
the episcopal form of government with his recent conduct, in aiding and
abetting the author of the "Histoiy and Mystery," we leave to reformers
to divine ; for ourselves we see no way of escape. But to the book : —
" To the friends of Bishop Asbury, and the General Conference of the
Methodist Episcopal Church.
"Respected Brethren, — To whose patronage could a subject of
this kind be so properly committed as to yours, whose unshaken attach
ment in every varying scene prove you to be friends indeed ? The differ
ence of your interests, your modes and habits of life, and even prejudices
by education, serve only to display the genuineness and sincerity of your
affection as Christians ; for what but Christian love can bring men of
different nations, avocations, and religious opinions, into the same unvary
ing and constant unity and friendship ?
" Many of you know what was old Methodism, and are competent to
judge what changes, if any, have taken place from the beginning ; and I

MR. SNETHEN'S SECOND REPLY TO MR. O'KELLY. 351
am persuaded that you are well satisfied that the same spirit now animates
the body, and that no radical alterations have been effected in the great
principles of our exceUent predecessors. Many of you have had the con
fidence of Mr. Asbury, and must know if he has swerved in any measure
from his first profession.
" I speak, brethren, with the greater confidence upon this subject, as I
know that, notwithstanding your different interests, it is impossible for
you all to be blinded by prejudice ; for your wisdom and discernment are
sufficient to enable you to judge in this matter, and your goodness and
integrity wiU not suffer you to pervert the truth.
" Union of affection appears to me to be the greatest of all relative
ties; to think and speak ahke, however desirable, is nothing in com
parison to this. We all have our opinions, — mine differ from those
of many of my friends, — and though I have the greatest complacency and
confidence in my favourite notions, yet I cheerfully offer them, under ex
isting circumstances, at the shrine of brotherly love ; being fully persuaded,
that for any one to differ from me in what I believe to be Scriptural involves
no moral guilt : nay, what is more, I do not think that my brethren would
be purer in their intentions, and more disposed to do good, if they, should
thiuk exactly as I do in those points where we differ.
" Sensible that men's opinions are seldom, if ever, formed or corrected
in the heat of controversy ; and that their sentiments and characters are
different things, to be treated in a different manner, I so calculated the
Reply, that it should principally fix upon those charges in the Apology
which involved personal consequences, and only touched upon the subject
of government so far as to establish certain principles on which to discuss
this important point. When Mr. O'Kelly has fully proved all the charges
he has alleged against the bishop and Conference, and beaten us quite out
of the field, it will be time enough to proceed upon government.
" My conscience does not accuse me of any intention or design to mis
represent and thereby to injury M. O'Kelly's character ; nor do I believe
that you would patronize me in so doing.
" In brotherly love, I am, &c., "Nicholas Snethen.
" Baltimore, April 25th, 1842."
" Mr. Asbury's charaoterhad been assailed before upon a simUar occasion,
and he found friends to step forth in his defence. In the present case he pre
pared an answer to Mr. O'Kelly ; but his friends advised him to leave the
business in the hands of his sons in the gospel. 'This is he,' Mr. O'Kelly
says in his preface, ' who always keeps behind the screen.' During those
unhappy divisions which rent the bosom of the Church in Charleston, Mr.
Asbury visited it annually ; and he has not spent less than one-twelfth of

352 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
his time in Virginia since the division by Mr. O'KeUy. The rest of.the;
time he has indeed been behind the screen, that is, out of sight of the
societies in Charleston and Virginia. But what has he been doing behind
the screen ? How did he spend his time there ? One might follow him
behind the screen to the banks of the Kennebec in the east; to the bor
ders of the lakes in the north ; over the Alleghany and Cumberland Moun
tains to the west ; and over the Savannah River to the south. These are
the screens which have hidden Mr. Asbury from his brethren and from his
friends in Virginia. Mr. O'Kelly was never behind those screens ; he
knows not what has been done, is doing, or to be done there. But many
of our preachers know that the bishop has more to do and to suffer there
than in those settlements where a man has a plentiful table every day to
eat at, and a good bed every night and a ceded room to sleep in. If Mr.
O'Kelly would leave his beloved haunts through the midlands of North
Carolina and Virginia, and take one round behind those, screens ; if he
would travel, faint and weary, over the rocks of the north and the hUls of
the west ; if he should have to encamp a few nights on the bare ground,
cold and wet, at Richland Creek, the Hazel Patch, and Cumberland River ;
if he should be crowded in a hut with a parcel of hunters and promiscuous
travellers, I think he would then have new ideas, and be able to expose
Methodist episcopacy in a much juster light than he has yet done."
" I seriously think the Apology was the author's worst day's work and
that it had been happy for him and perhaps hundreds in Virginia, if he
had never made it; but this is a matter of opinion merely, and must
remain in a great measure secret, until that day ; then shaU it be known
how many have perished for lack of knowledge who would have heard the
gospel of their salvation had not their minds been prejudiced against its
faithful preachers by Mr. O'Kelly's writings.
" As for Reuben Ellis, if the expressions which are attributed to him in
the preface are as correct as the character there given him, many who
were intimately acquainted with him will give them to the winds from
whence they came. ' That violent episcopalian :' nay, this was not the
character of Mr. Ellis ; he never was a son of violence, but slow to speak,
slow to wrath, a man of great sweetness and equanimity of temper, who
seldom, if ever, carried anything to extremes. It is trae he was a faithful
friend to the Methodist Episcopal Church, and to this day his name is pre
cious to hundreds of her members.
"Vindication, page 6 : 'He evades it entirely and never answers that
grand question, nor offers to explain or defend their episcopal government'
I really thought that I had not only attempted, but actually written many
things, both to explain and defend the episcopal government against Mr.
O'Kelly's misrepresentations and attempts to destroy it."
" Vindication, page 7 : ' Here I deny the election of Dr. Coke and Francis

MR. SNETHEN'S SECOND REPLY TO MR. O'KELLY. 353
Asbury, by the suffrage of the American Conference. Now for the proof
I appeal to their own records.' But do those records say they were not
elected ? If not, why appeal to them ? The election of the bishops is
well consistent with the minutes. The Conference might agree to acknowl
edge Mr. Wesley, and yet elect Dr. Coke and Mr. Asbury ; Mr. Wesley
might ordain Dr. Coke and direct him to ordain Mr. Asbury, and yet they
might be elected, there is no contradiction ; in all this, make the most of
' our records ' and the ' notorious fact,' and they only prove that the bishops
had the appointment and approbation of ' dear Wesley.' "
" Vindication, page 8 : ' Now let the impartial reader judge where truth
lies and do me justice.' Nay, the impartial reader cannot judge right
without hearing both sides of the question. But Mr. O'Kelly says, page 7,
' he could qualify he heard no talk of an election there.' Does he mean
that he could take his oath upon the holy evangelists of Almighty God,
that Francis Asbury was not elected by the suffrage of the Conference held
in Baltimore, in 1784 ? Oaths are solemn things ! When Dr. Coke dis
closed Mr. Wesley's intention that Mr. Asbury should be ordained, he
refused to accept the ordination without the election of the preachers ; for
he knew it was not proper to attempt to serve the American connexion
without their consent, as they were to be constituted a separate body, not
subordinate to the British connexion. To obtain the election of the super
intendents or bishops was a special part of the design of calling that Con
ference. Dr. Coke, in his sermon at the ordination of Bishop Asbury,
says expressly, in presence of the members of that Conference, page 8,
' We have every qualification for an episcopal Church which Alexandria
possessed for two hundred years, our bishops or superintendents having
been elected or received by the suffrages of the whole body of our minis
ters through the continent, assembled in General Conference.' And in the
Minutes of that Conference, page 11, it is said, in a N. B. to question 26,
' No person shall be ordained a superintendent without the consent of a
majority of the Conference.' In addition to this, read the following testi
mony, viz. : ' We whose names are undersigned, do testify that we were
members of the Conference held in Baltimore, in the year of our Lord
1784, and that the method of deciding all questions in said Conference
was by voting, and that Mr. Asbury was elected as is asserted in the
Reply, page 9, by a unanimous vote.
' Edward Dromgoole,
Ira Ellis,
William Waiters,
Leroy Cole,
John Hagerty.'
" Now, impartial reader, if Mr. O'Kelly has nothing more to say in his
own ' vindication,' you may judge where the tmth lies and do him justice."
23

354 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
"Vindication, page 10 : 'He undertakes to refute a charge against the
bishop, when it has no appearance of a charge, only the circumstance was
mentioned to keep up the thread of my history.' It is a pity that the
thread of his history cannot be kept up without mistakes and errors. But
if Mr. O'Kelly did not design this as a charge, why does he not give up
the case ? It will, perhaps, appear in the sequel veiy much like a charge,
both in the Apology and the Vindication. The Apology says that Bishop
Asbury was opposed to a joint superintendent ; the Reply says he was not ;
and the Vindication asks, page 9, ' What is the difference ?' The differ
ence is the same as it is between right and wrong, or (if the reader will
allow the expression) between tmth and falsehood. Dr. Coke says,- that
Mr. Asbury acquiesced in the appointment, as did the Charleston Confer
ence. Mr. Bruce says, ' Mr. Asbury convinced him that he was not opposed
to the appointment' Mr. Whatcoat says, Mr. Asbury was not opposed
to his being a joint superintendent with himself. See Reply, pages 3, 10.
But ' Francis,' it seems, ' said but little.' O that he had always kept such
a watch upon the door of his lips whUe in the presence of Mr. O'Kelly
and men of his disposition ! Vindication, page 10 : 'In the ninth verse I
make mention of the origin of the title bishop at a district conference even
hi 1787. Three times four and four times three is aU the difference between
the report and the reply.' If the reader can have patience he may try the
question by the rule of simple multiplication. Apology, verse 3 : ' Francis
directed the preachers whenever they write to him to title him bishop.'
Reply, page 11 : 'The Conference advised that every one should use his
own choice ; and that those who doubted the propriety of reverend might
give the simple name with the official character, as bishop, elder, or dea
con.' Are these accounts as near alike as twelve and twelve ? Apology,
ibid. .- ' They did so, and this was the beginning of our spurious episcopacy.'
And why not of our ' spurious ' eldership ? Reply, ibid. : ' To attempt to
give an account of the beginning of Methodist episcopacy, which is so well
known, in order to show the fallacy of Mr. O'Kelly's account, would be to
trifle with common sense and to sink the reply into contempt' Vindica
tion, page 11:' We both agree that the title bishop was born at the said
district conference, and on account of its low and untimely birth I deem it
'spurious episcopacy.' Judicious reader, if you can deign to cast an eye
over the Apology and the Reply, tell me if you can see any agreement
between Mr. O'Kelly and myself about this matter. Vindication, page 11 :
'This episcopacy is the disputed point, and the proctor passeth by the
mountain without notice !' Looking over the Apology I was a httle
startled, at first view, with an object of some apparent magnitude ; but on
examining it more attentively I found it was a little heap of Mr. O'Kelly's
absurdities, around which he had raised the mist of error and the fog of
deception, in order to magnify it into a mountain. If the origin- of

MR. SNETHEN'S SECOND REPLY TO MR. O'KELLY. 355
Methodist episcopacy must be dated from the first mention of the name
bishop as a character of the superintendents, it must be dated from the
Conference of 1784. See Dr. Coke's sermon upon Mr. Asbury's ordina
tion, page 8 : ' Our bishops or superintendents have been elected by our
ministers assembled in General Conference.' The American preachers in
1784, by Mr. Wesley's advice and consent, agreed, by a majority of votes,
to form themselves into a separate body, to be caUed the Methodist Epis
copal Church in America. Francis Asbury, who had acted for a number
of years under Mr. Wesley as a general assistant, was elected by a unani
mous vote, to be one of the bishops or superintendents over the said
Church. " At the same Conference one Mr. James O'Kelly, since famous as the
author of a division in this Church, and of a book he calls an Apology, was
ordained an elder to administer the sacraments in the said Episcopal
Church. I hope he does not think I wish to ' evade ' these facts ; if I
had any design in not recurring to them in the Reply, except their being
intimately known, it was that I might not seem to expose the ingratitude
and inconsistency of Mr. O'Kelly in traducing his fathers in religion and
the ministry, and yet continuing to act as an elder by virtue of the ordina
tion he obtained by the laying on of the hands of the bishops of the Metho
dist Episcopal Church, which he calls a ' spurious episcopacy.' See the
Minutes, question 3 : 'As the ecclesiastical as well as the civil affairs of
these United States have passed through a very considerable change by
the revolution, what plan of Church government shaU we hereafter pur
sue ? Answer. We will form ourselves into an Episcopal Church, under
the direction of superintendents, (otherwise bishops,) elders, deacons, and
helpers, according to the form of ordination annexed to our hturgy, and
the form of discipline set forth in these minutes.' I would ask Mr. O'KeUy
what new powers Mr. Asbury or the superintendent obtained by being
called bishop? What alteration followed 'the origin of what he calls
' spurious episcopacy' in the year of our Lord 1787 ? Did not eveiythnig
remain as it had done from the year 1784 in all the connexion? See
Minutes, page 11, question 26 : ' What is the office of a superintendent ?
Answer. To ordain superintendents, elders, and deacons ; to preside as a
moderator in our conferences ; to fix the appointments of the preachers for
the several circuits; and in the intervals of the conference to change,
receive, or suspend preachers as necessity may require, and to receive
appeals from the preachers and people and decide them.' Vindication,
page 10 : ' But I well remember his introduction to the proposal of that
title, viz. : I dislike the long Latin name superintendent' Perhaps I may
show hereafter my reasons for doubting Mr. O'Kelly's word in this instance :
but supposing he did dislike a ' long Latin name,' was that a crime ? A
man, I hope, is not to be blamed for preferring a short Scriptural English

356 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
word to a long Latin one not used in Scripture. It appears from Dr.
Coke's sermon that he used both the terms, but preferred the Latin one,
and the Conference afterwards advised that any preacher should take his
choice. " In regard to the word bishop in our English Bibles, if I recollect right,
Dr. Watts, in his logic, conjectures that it is a Saxon corruption of the
Greek word for which it stands in the translation, formed by omitting the
vowel e and changing p into b, — a common case in the old language ; in
Saxon perhaps pronounced biscop by abbreviating the Greek termination,
hence softening the word into modern English bishop, overseer, or super
intendent. Now suppose that when Mr. O'Kelly became the head of a
party he had caUed himself by the Greek name presbyter, or by the Latin
name senator, and after two years, disliking the Latin or Greek name,
should have proposed to his fraternity to call him by the English word
elder, would it be proper to caU such an alteration in a word or name the
beginning of his ' spurious ecclesiastical republicanism ?'
" Vindication, page 11 : ' We come now to the place of Mr. Wesley's
expulsion from the Methodist Episcopal Connexion. In the Reply (page 15)
the proctor acknowledges this dreadful act' I do not find anything like
an acknowledgment of ' this dreadful act ' in the Reply. How could Mr.
O'Kelly say so ? I gave several hints in the Reply which I hoped would
have induced Mr. O'KeUy not to renew this subject ; but instead of being
satisfied, I find he has taken up about four pages of the Vindication on this
subject. Vindication, page 14 : 'The whole process of the case,' (that is,
Wesley's expulsion.) Nay, ' Wesley's expulsion ' was not ' earned through
the Conference * nor anywhere else. Mr. Wesley was never expelled from
the Methodist Episcopal Church. The proposal which was made by Bishop
Asbury and agreed to by the Manikentown Conference, and the process
and the termination of the plan of the Fluvanna Conference were trans:
mitted by Mr. Asbury to Mr. Wesley when the war ended in the acknowl
edgment of American independence.
" Dr. Coke was despatched to America with authority to establish an
independence, on the hierarchy of the Church of England, by ordaining the
American preachers, <fec. Mr. Asbury would accept of no powers from
the doctor without the consent and choice of the preachers who were
caUed to meet in Conference. Among the rules oflered by the doctor was
one designed to preserve the future union between the British and Amer
ican Methodists. Mr. Asbury objected to it, in the form it was proposed,
as unreasonable and highly improper; he thought, as the societies in
America had continued for a number of years without any such obliga
tion, to require it immediately after the peace would be attended with
unhappy political consequences, as it was a well-known circumstance that
Mr. Wesley had written in favour of the British ministry : but the doctor

MR. SNETHEN'S SECOND REPLY TO MR. O'KELLY. 357
contended for it, and Mr. Asbury agreed to submit if it met with the
approbation of the preachers. The obligation being laid before the Con
ference, met with opposition ; but it passed in the form in which it was
printed in the minutes. See page 2, question 2 : ' What can be done in
order to preserve the future union of the Methodists ? Answer. During
the life of the Rev. Mr. Wesley we acknowledge ourselves his sons in the
gospel, ready in matters belonging to Church government to obey his
commands. And we do engage, after his death, to do everything we
judge consistent with the cause of religion in America, and the political
interests of these States, to preserve and promote our union with the
Methodists in Europe.' The first and only effect of this obligation was the
nomination of Richard Whatcoat for a superintendent. Mr. Wesley
could not positively appoint him ; for notwithstanding the acknowledg
ment, the same Conference made a rule (see Minutes, page 11,) that 'no
person shall be ordained a superintendent without the consent of a major
ity of the Conference.'
" Mr. Asbury consented to receive Mr. Whatcoat, as did the Charleston
Conference. At Rough Creek the appointment first met with opposition,
and, according to Mr. O'Kelly and Dr. Coke, they were the principal par
ties in the dispute. The doctor, no doubt, contended for the rule to obey
Mr. Wesley. Now what arguments could Mr. O'Kelly make use of but
such as would go directly to renounce Mr. Wesley's authority ? He tells
us, indeed, that he argued against the nomination from the consideration
that two heads would make two bodies — an argument altogether worthy
of Mr. O'Kelly. A correct mind would have said three, and then fact
could be opposed to show the fallacy of the proposition. Dr. Coke and
Mr. Asbury did not make two bodies.
" The Baltimore Conference, which was that year the largest and most
respectable in the connexion, being specially called, and consisting of all
the preachers who chose to attend, was much more spirited and resolute in'
their opposition. Dr. Coke sat as president and made the proposal of Rich
ard Whatcoat according to Mr. Wesley's orders. It was asked if they were
called upon to ratify the appointment implicitly, or to vote discretionally and'
according to their own judgments. This involved a very serious question;
Dr. Coke insisted upon the minute to obey Mr. Wesley. On the other
hand, it was asserted that the Methodist societies had been declared a sep
arate body; that the Conference had established a rule for voting, and1
precluded from the superintendency any person who should not have a
majority of votes for that important office ; and that being circumstanced
as they were, it would be attended with less evil to renounce the minute
by which they had agreed to obey Mr. Wesley, than to give up the right
of voting, as one or the other must follow by consequence. The vote was
at length taken — not whether Mr. Wesley should be expelled from the

358 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
Methodist Episcopal Church, but whether the conference ought not to
reject the agreement to obey Mr. Wesley in all matters belonging to
Church government? The question was carried, and the conference
thus declared that they would not implicitly obey Mr. Wesley, or any
other man ; the minute was rejected, and as the conference saw no want
of a third superintendent at the time, they refused to elect one.
" Had Mr. Wesley come to America the connexion would have received
him with open arms, and, I suppose, all the preachers, except one, who
has such an antipathy against 'Englishman human heads,' &c, would
have rejoiced in the opportunity of acknowledging themselves 'dear
Wesley's' sons in the gospel. How many conferences does Mr. O'Kelly
suppose there were in 1787 ? If there was treachery in not carrying the
case through all the conferences, why not lay the blame upon Dr. Coke,
' he being senior.' Surely if the doctor could overrule and have a Gen
eral Conference appointed at the request of Mr. O'Kelly and friends, he
could overrule and prevent Mr. Wesley from being expelled in the way
the Apology and Vindication say he was. But 'Dr. Coke' and 'Mr.
Wesley ' blamed Mr. Asbury, not because ' he had taken a few chosen
men, and in a clandestine manner expelled John, whose surname was
Wesley, from the Methodist Episcopal Church.' O no ! they never thought
him guUty of such conduct. Dr. Coke blamed Mr. Asbury for the time
being in the hurry, because he did not stir up a hornet's nest. He thought
that Mr. Asbury ought to have done more than consent to receive Mr.
Whatcoat — that he could have exerted his influence with the preachers to
let the printed obligation remain.
" Mr. Asbury was the only English preacher who adopted the American
country, and was determined to stand or fall with the cause of indepen
dence ; all the rest returned, and one, at least, was not very well affected
towards him and Mr. Asbury's intentions ; and Mr. Wesley was requested
to keep a watchful eye over the great water. When the news went to
England that the American preachers had refused to elect Mr. Whatcoat,
one of the preachers who had been upon the continent was not backward
in declaring that ' he was a true prophet, and that " Frank Asbury," ' so'
he called him, 'was at the bottom of the whole business.' Dr. Coke,
upon his return to Europe, made matters more plain, and Mr. Wesley
wrote to Mr. Asbury blaming him for not rising up and declaring that
unless the preachers would continue to acknowledge the printed obligation
he would leave the continent.
" Now, if I might be allowed to show my opinion, I should blame Mr.
Asbury and the conference for ever consenting to obey Mr. Wesley in any
matter respecting Church government, contrary to their own judgment,
and should applaud them for renouncing the obligation ; and, indeed, it
appears to me that this very circumstance wiU bear very hard upon Mr.

MR. SNETHEN'S SECOND REPLY TO MR. O'KELLY. 359
O'Kelly's sincerity. If he is reaUy such an enemy to British influence as
he pretends to be, why does he endeavour to fix so much blame upon the
rejection of Mr. Wesley's unlimited authority over the Methodist connexion
in America ? As for the talk in the Vindication about the ideal expulsion,
some persons, for aught I know, may think it witty and pretty, but unhap
pily it wants foundation ; it is hke budding castles, and houses, and fields
in the air. There are some apparent mistakes upon this subject which
need rectifying.
" Mr. Wesley had recommended the episcopal form of Church govern
ment which admits of grades of office.
" The Conference having sanctioned the episcopal mode of government*
chosen the superintendents, and made a few general rules in addition to
those parts of the general minutes which they adopted, they dissolved
their sitting without making any rule for a succeeding meeting of a like
nature. The work soon spread beyond the expectation of the most san
guine. The societies became large and numerous, and a number of active
and zealous young men were found among them, who soon displayed gifts and
graces adequate for the work of the ministry. Mr. Asbury being looked
up to on all occasions, was overburdened with care and labour. A consti
tution naturally tender began to sink beneath the weight of constant
fatigue and application, and to heighten his difficulties he discovered the
appearance of some of the first principles of a schism, which, if carried
into effect, must divide the connexion, and destroy the traveUing plan.
" The work was very prosperous in all the counties south of James
River ; and among the preachers who became conspicuous in that revival,
perhaps none attracted more general attention than Mr. James O'KeUy.
Many circumstances contributed to favour his popularity. Indulged by the
superintendent, his station was much more permanent than any other preach
er's ; forward on all occasions to assert his own consequence ; naturaUy
sanguine in his temper,, and aU glowing with zeal for the ' unparaheled
blessed Methodism,' he was a chief among the young preachers ; nor had
he less influence over the people, whose passions were generally suscep
tible and exquisite.
" It was among this people that Mr. O'KeUy laboured, first as a circuit
preacher, and afterwards as a presiding elder. The societies in general
were in their first love, and so much engaged in devotion as to have but
little inclination for criticism. As there were but few elders, the presid
ing elder was followed everywhere by crowds of hearers. In many
places the ordinances could not be administered for the want of elders.
Mr. Asbury could not help seeing that something must be done ; but he
thought to call the preachers from the extremities of the connexion to a
General Conference would have been attended with almost insuperable
difficulties. Many of the societies would have been left in their infant

360 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
state for weeks or months without a preacher, the number of local
preachers then being veiy small.
i "In the hurry of incessant and complicated labour and care, Mr.
Asbury fixed upon the plan and recommended the council.
" It met accordingly, and having proceeded to business, Mr. O'Kelly,
who was one of the council, submitted a manuscript to obtain consent
to have it pubhshed ; but it was disapproved, and he felt sensibly on this
occasion; and being displeased, he became a violent opposer of the
council. " Things soon began to wear a different aspect, and a less discerning
mind than Mr. Asbury's might have seen that matters were drawing to a
crisis. Mr. O'KeUy still maintained, in a great measure, his popularity in
his district ; but frequently incidents transpired which ' served to develop
hidden principles, and fix the great outlines of his character. He ad
ministered discipline with a high hand in almost every part of his district
Complaints were murmured of his precipitate and violent excommunica
tions. Mr. Asbury's borders were continually extending in every direction.
The council business was embarrassed. Letters began to be circulated,
and public conversations were frequently about the spirit of the times. . So
many circumstances combined, that it was no longer a matter of doubt
what part Mr. O'Kelly meant to act. It was easy to be seen that he
never meant to quit Virginia. No alternative would be accepted but a -
General Conference under the auspices of Dr. Coke. Inflammatory letters
were despatched in various directions. However, when the General
Conference met, every question that came before them was determined by
a majority. One fair trial here fixed the strength of the parties. It was
so in this instance. A motion was made for an appeal,* which was lost
by a great majority. Mr. O'KeUy was now convinced that he had not the
influence which he expected in the General Conference. He found that
he could not carry his measures; the mortification and disappointment
was too great for one so unaccustomed to contradiction : he, therefore,
refused a submission to the General Conference, and withdrew himself
from the 'Union.' Hence, it appears that nothing would satisfy him,
excepting the Conference would be raled and governed by him. He now
fell out with the Conference, as he had done before with the council.
Now, from this view of the subject, one may obtain a pretty correct notion
of the transactions of Mr. O'Kelly, respecting the bishop, the council)
the General Conference, &c.
" We have already seen that sufficient provision was not made for the
government of a growing body. The great defect seems to have been in
putting too much duty upon the superintendents. The strongest govern
ments are those in which power is most properly divided, and placed in
° An appeal by a preacher against his appointment by the bishop.

MR. SNETHEN'S SECOND REPLY TO MR. O'KELLY. 36 1
the hands of those who are the best qualified to administer it. Mr.
Asbury seems to have been placed in the situation of a father over a num
ber of men, some of whom felt none of the relative ties of a son, and
were men aspiring at an independence of the authority of the bishop,
which he held by the suffrage of the Conference."
" No man could see, no man could feel the difficulties under which the
connexion laboured, so well as Mr. Asbury ; for no man could take the
same view of it, and hear the same complaints. To his grief he heard
the loudest complaints from Mr. O'Kelly's district. The plan of the
council, which was adopted to save the connexion from the threatening
danger, appeared defective, and did not remedy the existing evils; at
most, it only gave temporary relief. Nothing but a General Conference
could give satisfaction. Had Mr. O'Kelly in this aimed at uniting the
preachers and preserving the connexion, he had done a good work."
" When Mr. O'Kelly insisted upon a General Conference, he insisted
upon a good thing, but in an improper spirit, and for wrong ends, as the
sequel plainly proved. Mr.' Asbury sought the welfare of the travelling
connexion ; and wished to do something, if possible, to unite the preachers,
that they might stand upon rules, and not upon the passions of men. Mr.
O'Kelly sought his own will and glory, and wanted to spend his life some
where not far from the banks of the Roanoke ; otherwise where his self-
will or popularity might direct him."
"The General Conference happily hit upon the means and end both.
The connexion then first felt its real strength ; and to their praise, they
used it with great wisdom, firmness, and moderation. They determined
that no elder should reside in any one district for more than four years
successively ; and thereby prevented any future attempt to secure a per
petual presidency in a favourite district. The General Conference was
convinced by painful experience that the bishops and annual conferences
were not able to provide against the evils in which the connexion might
be involved : therefore a succeeding Conference was appointed to meet at
the expiration of four years. In the mean time Mr. O'Kelly exerted his
unremitted efforts to divide the classes, and disaffect the preachers in his
old district : nevertheless, to his great mortification, tlie bonds of union
grew stronger ; he could not succeed agreeably to his wishes. This was
owing, probably, to two causes : — First. During the last years of his pre
sidency he had ruled as with a rod of iron ; his oppressive hand was
severely felt ; and the people soon saw the difference between his adminis
tration and that of his successor. Second. When Mr. O'Kelly began to
form societies, he courted the favour of those over whom he had lorded
it ; and even admitted into his connexion backsliders whom he himself
had excluded from the Methodist Church."
" These are facts too glaring to be denied. Many who had been well

362 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
affected to the man were forced to see those inconsistencies, and were
astonished, and convinced that his motives were not pure."
" Any one who reads Mr. O'Kelly's account of Methodism might conr
elude, without better information, that the 'old' Methodists were a
people destitute of all written rules, and that through the influence of Mr.
Asbury the present Methodists are embarrassed and fettered with new
rules calculated to destroy their liberty : which conclusion would be
en-oneous. The fact is, those alterations which have taken place, have
tended directly to give greater privileges to local preachers and private
members. The excellencies of old Methodism, which Mr. O'KeUy
endeavoured to destroy, have been preserved by the General Conference,
which we hope wiU be a body of sufficient influence to continue the
union." " Vindication, page 38, ' Mr. Hammet, formerly a Methodist minister,
gives us an original letter of Mr. Wesley's, written to his friend. It
appears that this letter was written to Mr. Beverly Allen. This is the
man whom Mr. O'Kelly calls his " friend." What a friend ! The reader
may judge how little dependence is to be put upon a letter written in
answer to erroneous information received from such a source of friendship.
The unsuspicious Mr. Wesley, not aware of any envious or insidious
designs in his correspondent, wrote to Mr. Allen under an impression
received from wrong information. This letter was given to Mr. Hammet.
Mr. O'Kelly seems to unite in this astonishing scheme of friendship, and,
hke Joab's friendship to Abner, uses this letter as a spear, to stab the
character of Mr. Asbury and the Conference. What ungenerous insinua
tions and insidious arts wUl men make use of to gratify their disappointed
ambition ! " Come, see my zeal for the Lord," said Jehu, when his lead
ing motive was to effect his own ambitious and selfish purpose.' "

REVIEW OF THE REFORM CONTROVERSY. 363

REVIEW OF THE REFORM CONTROVERSY.

Messrs. Editor, — As you are about to bring your labours to a close, will
you permit one who has taken a deep interest in the controversy which
has chiefly occupied your columns, and looked from the beginning with
no ordinary anxiety to the result, to take a cursory retrospect of the strag
gle through which we have passed, and mark a few of the leading
incidents in its history.
It will be recollected, that in the commencement of the conflict, those
who set up for reformers, contented themselves with assailing existing
institutions without offering any plan or form of government in their
stead. In vain we asked them what they desired to do or to have done.
They had agreed to destroy the superstructure which had been erected
by our fathers, but it seems they had not yet agreed among themselves
upon even the outline of the buUding which was to be erected upon its
ruins ; yet they vehemently insisted that we should pull down the old
house, and live in the woods until a new one could be raised.
The only idea which seemed to be held in common by the reformers
was, that we should take for the model of our ecclesiastical polity the
civil institutions of our happy country. And it was chiefly the deep-rooted
attachment of every American citizen to the political government under
which he lived, that gave currency and success to the efforts of those who
proposed to fashion our Church economy after the same model. The,
republicanism of the proposal was worth a thousand arguments ; for it
could not fail to reach the heart, and every one knows how much the
judgment is biassed by the affections. The torrent would have been
irresistible, had it not been met by a counteracting tide of affection for
those religious institutions which had enabled our predecessors to spread
the gospel through the length and breadth of this good land, and to bring
thousands under its redeeming and saving influences, in spite of the diffi
culties which, in addition to the ordinary impediments which are found
in all countries, and at all times, were presented by the immense extent
and sparseness of our population. Between those two opposing impulses,
we had time to pause and consider the question, Whether the institutions
best adapted to the ends of civil government were equaUy proper for
effecting the objects contemplated by religious associations. The investi
gation resulted in a firm and abiding conviction, that the nature and
objects of civil and ecclesiastical governments were of necessity so dis-

364 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
similar, that the institutions of one formed no safe or useful model for the
other. We do not pretend that all have entered into this inquiry and
deduced this conclusion by the process we have pointed out. On the
contrary, we believe that a large proportion of the Methodist community
have given but little attention to the speculations on either side of the
controversy. They have remained steadfast in their attachment to our
government and discipline, because of the great amount of good which
had been effected under their provisions, and because the evUs anticipated
by reformers had never been felt. They judged the tree by its fruit, and
were satisfied.
Meantime, there were found enlisted under the banners of reform all
who desired distinction and pre-eminence, which they saw could only be
attained by a revolution. Among these, and in the foremost rank, were
some who had formerly been popular and useful travelling preachers, but
who, having grown weary of the toils and privations of an itinerant life,
had located, but who still pined after the distinction and influence they
had enjoyed when actively engaged in the great missionary work. These
found means to enlist many of the local preachers in their schemes who
had never travelled ; and, finally, when they found the aid of the laity
necessary to the accomplishment of their projects, they suddenly became
the peculiar friends of the people, and liberty and equality became the
constant theme of many, and of some, too, whose arbitrary and tyi-annical
conduct, when formerly clothed with a little brief authority, had been the
scandal and the grief of the Church.
Sanguine of success, the revolutionary project was urged on by means
which not only violated the obligations of Christian brotherhood, but
which were prohibited by the comity of civilized life. But writers and
speakers supplied by invective and abuse what was wanting in argument,
and all who hesitated to enter into the visionary measures of the levellers
were denounced either as tyrants or the slaves of tyrants. The most stre
nuous efforts were made by the writers in the periodical paper devoted to
the cause of reform, to alienate the membership from the travelling preach
ers, and, of course, nothing was left undone which could render them odious
in the estimation of the Church and of the world,
They were represented as exercising a domination as cruel and unrelent
ing as the Druids, and as claiming the infallibility of Popery itself. ¦ To
support these allegations cases were cited which, by suppressing part of
the facts and circumstances, and discolouring the remainder, and eluding
detection by giving only certain initial letters for the names of the
parties, led their readers to hate itinerant preachers as the common
enemy of mankind. Indeed, it was pretty clearly insinuated that they
were dangerous to the civil liberties of the country, as they aimed at an
ultimate political supremacy, and held the membership in such absolute

REVIEW OF THE REFORM CONTROVERSY. 365
slavery as to be able to use them, whenever their numerical force should
justify the attempt, as the willing instruments of their elevation to supreme
power. It will hardly be credited by posterity, that men who had been
fostered in the bosom of Methodism, — who had been taken from the
lowest and most illiterate ranks of society, and raised to distinction in the
Church, and social elevation in the community, by its influence, — should
have represented its institutions as having a tendency to debase and
enslave the human mind, and its founders and martyrs as being the
veriest cheats and impostors that ever disgraced the world. And, indeed,
nothing but the baneful influence of party spirit, now inflamed by the
hope of success, and again maddened by the apprehension of defeat and
mortification, can afford a parallel to such enormity of ingratitude and
recklessness of character.
This violence, however — as violence often does — defeated its own pur
pose. The membership, who from their infancy had been acquainted
with itinerant preachers, were disgusted with the caricature which had
been given of them by those who pretended to be reformers, and became
indignant at the slander which was periodically poured forth against
them, through the press and the pulpit. They rose in their might and
demanded justice against the perpetrators of these offences, and justice
was done. The offenders were either cut off from Church fellowship or
withdrew, and with them, we regret to say, many of their deluded follow
ers. Nearly four years have elapsed since the separation, and ample
time has been allowed to our great reformers to show to the world what
they intended to do for the Methodist Episcopal Church, had they been
permitted ; and the result is, that they have demonstrated beyond all
doubt what we had before suspected — namely, that had we admitted half
their innovations we should have been irretrievably ruined. Our itiner
ancy would have been subverted, and a congregational government insti
tuted. We should have lost our missionary character, and with it the
extensive usefulness which even our enemies have attributed to our minis
try. A succession of electioneering strife and contention would have
converted even our class-meetings into the arenas of battle, and the
greatest evil that could have befallen a young convert would have been
to be admitted into one of these classes. .Our general superintend
ency, and with it the confederacy of our conferences, would have
-been dissolved at a single blow, and the Church, broken up into frag
ments, could have united in no common effort or plan of usefulness, and
nothing would have remained to us but the empty name of Republican
Methodists, while the former glory would have forever departed from the
Church. But the best of all is, God has been, and is still, with us. The boast

366 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
ings of our enemies have been vain. No weapon formed against us has
been suffered to prosper. We had been confidently assured by our adver
saries that the itinerancy were divided upon the question of reform, and
that the East and the North would be arrayed against the South and the
West. The trial came, and, except a solitary deserter here and there,
the itinerancy remained firm in their attachment to the institutions of our
fathers. Differing in opinion upon some minor matters, they felt their
pastoral obligations too strongly to entertain for a moment the thought
of rending the body of Christ for mere speculative opinions; and we
believe that at no period of our histoiy did there prevail more universal
love, and harmony both in opinion and object, than now exists among
our ministry, both travelling and local, throughout the whole field of
labour in America and Europe. Nor has their success ever been greater
than since the secession of our disaffected members. Tie minutes of
conference, for the last four years, show an increase, both of ministers and
members, unparalleled in the history of Methodism ; while before us the
prospect opens with increasing brightness and glory. The crucible of
investigation through which our institutions have been made to pass has
only tested their utility, and occasioned them to be more highly appreci
ated ; and the whole body will hereafter cleave to them with purpose of
heart, as a bond of union and strength which no effort of our adversaries
can rend asunder.
We had been told that the spirit of reform had pervaded the great
body of the membership, and that "whole classes, by scores and hun
dreds, were ready to secede." The trial came, and what was the catas
trophe ? Even here, in the very metropolis of reform, some two hundred
were expelled or withdrew. A large proportion of these were females,
whose relation to the leading men among reformers necessarily urged
them to the measure.
In a Church containing six thousand members the seceders were scarcely
missed, and their departure only regretted on their own account. And
never, since the organization of the Church in Baltimore, have we
enjoyed greater prosperity than during the period which has elapsed
since our disaffected brethren left our communion. God has abundantly
blessed us with peace and concord, while he has added continuaUy to
our numbers, beyond any former example. To him be the glory, for in
the Lord Jehovah is all our strength and all our hope. We might
add, that all our information from abroad goes to assure us that our
adversaries have done us as little harm elsewhere as in Baltimore. In
deed in most places they have not been felt at all ; and where they have
succeeded in any degree, the impression is passing away, and will shortly
be forgotten, or only remembered as a monitory lesson against the ever-
restless spirit of innovation. •

REVIEW OF THE REFORM CONTROVERSY. 367
The frequent divisions in Christian Churches suggest a question which
every professor of religion is bound to consider, and which it seems is
seldom reflected upon by most who separate themselves from the Churches
with whom they have been in communion. The question is, Can a fol
lower of Christ righteously separate from the Church of which he is a
member, for any other than conscientious reasons ; that is, without
being required to believe some doctrine which he cannot beheve, or to do
or suffer something which he cannot conscientiously do or suffer ? Such
were the causes which produced the reformation effected by Luther and his
coadjutors ; and some of these causes also compelled the separation of the
Methodists in America from the Church in England. We have not time
to discuss this question, but we will take occasion to say before it is
answered in the affirmative, we ought to inquire whether mere matters of
opinion ever produced secession in the Church during the time in which
she was blessed with the direction of the apostles ?
It wUl be recollected that Paul and Peter differed at Antioch about a
Very important point of discipline. Paul contended that the Gentile con
verts should not be compelled to submit to the requirements of the cere
monial law of Moses ; while Peter, though he was the first of the apostles
who was sent to the Gentiles, thought it prudent to indulge the prejudices
of his countrymen, and subject the Gentiles to Jewish observances. But,
although Paul withstood him to the face, and charges him with dissimu
lation, we hear nothing of their setting up two Churches at Antioch.
The question, though vastly important, yet involved no essential principle
of Christian faith, and therefore every one was required to be fully per
suaded in his own mind, and to act accordingly. It was a question of
discipline, not of faith ; and, therefore, was mere matter of opinion, not
of conscience; but we wonder how long a matter of such importance
would be agitated in a modem Christian Church, before we should hear
from one side or the other, the cry of " To your tents, O Israel !" Yet, if
it was wrong in primitive times, it is equally wrong now to divide
Churches for any other cause than an inability to comply with the requisi
tions of the Church with a good conscience.
If the seceders from our Church upon simple questions of discipline,
have not heretofore inquired whether the act could be justified upon Chris
tian principles, we hope they wiU yet think of it, and we now leave them
to their own reflections.

368 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.

TO THE PUBLIC.

I avail myself of the last number of the Itinerant to say something of
myself and the part I have taken in the unhappy controversy which has
so long, and, I wiU add, so unnecessarily agitated the Methodist Episcopal
Church. Aware that it is hardly ever safe for a man to speak of himself,
or his own personal concerns, nothing but a sense of duty could impel me
to the performance of a task as unpleasant to me as it may be uninterest
ing to my readers. The task has been postponed until the last opportu
nity offered by our periodical paper is ready to pass away, and a similar
one is not likely to occur. It is hoped that the readers of the Itinerant
will not complain if a few columns of the paper should be occupied in the
vindication of one who has heretofore disregarded the personal attacks
of the common adversary, and devoted himself exclusively to the defence
of the Church.
Few men, even among the wise and the good, bear opposition patiently;
but when ambition and party spirit enter into their plans, every opponent
becomes an enemy, who, if he cannot be answered, must be ruined ; or
at least his arguments must be deprived of aU the favour which a fair
reputation would bespeak for them. Accordingly the humble efforts which
I have made to preserve the institutions of a Church in which I have
been nurtured from my youth, have brought upon me the fiercest wrath of
her enemies, and I have been slandered and misrepresented in all quarters
without restraint or decency. It is true that this was in some measure
anticipated when I entered into the controversy ; but having made up my
mind to enlist for the war, nothing remained but to do my duty and abide
the consequences. In the dedication of the Appeal, I told Mr. Snethen :
" You have, however, done me one essential service by your remarks.
You have taught me to count the cost of this undertaking — the friend
ships it will dissolve, and the animosities it will awaken. I am free to
confess that the fearful aggregate is appalling. To a Christian it must be
a painful sacrifice of feeling, and to a professional man a sacrifice of
interest. For I am aware, that in controversies, the friendships which
grow out of a similarity of views and unity of effort, subside with the
occasion which gives rise to them ; while the enmities awakened remain
after the cause of the contest shall have long passed away. Nothing but
a firm conviction of duty could have induced me to write : and he who
hesitates between duty and inclination is undone." But forewarned as I

TO THE PUBLIC. 369
was of the consequences of my temerity in entering into the controversy,
I made a very inadequate estimate of them. The personal animosity
evinced by my opponents has transcended all calculation ; and if I am yet
able to provide for a large and helpless family, it is in despite of their
utmost efforts to prevent it. I do not, however, regret the course I have
taken, because my conscience approves it as imposed by my duty to God ¦
and the Church, and I have learned not " to fear them that can kiU the
body, and after that have nothing more that they can do; but to fear
Him who, after he hath killed the body, can cast both soul and body
into hell."
I shall not disgust the reader with any account of the private mischief
or injuries which have been done, or intended me, by some reformers in
this city and elsewhere. One of the wickedest and most malicious of
these enemies I have spared from public shame and contempt, when he
was completely in my power, through pity for him and respect for his
worthy family ; and the rest I shall leave to their own consciences, and to
Him who hath said, " Vengeance is mine, and I will repay." It is my
intention only to notice some of the principal charges which have been
brought against me through the press, and to show that they are as unjust
as they were intended to be injurious.
The first accusation in order of time, is, that I am " a deserter from the
cause of reform." This was more than insinuated by Mr. Snethen in the
Mutual Rights, as soon as he heard 6f my intention to write in defence
of the Church. It has been positively asserted by one, and reiterated in
effect by many correspondents in the same paper, and finally the late
editor accuses me of falsehood for denying it, and attempts to prove the
allegation by quoting a memorial to the General Conference of 1824, to
which my name is affixed as secretary to the meeting from which the
memorial emanated. Of this memorial I will speak presently, but would
previously state fairly and fully how far I ever went as a reformer.
My readers will recollect that for a long time the only question which
agitated the Church was, whether the rule in our Discipline which directs
the mode of selecting the presiding elders should or should not be
altered. I admit that I did incline to the proposed alteration, and
favoured the plan provided by what are generally known as the " sus
pended resolutions;" and in this view I only coincided with a majority of
the bishops, and at one time with at least three-fourths of the General
Conference which passed the resolutions. It is true that a majority of
the same Conference did afterwards suspend the operation of these reso
lutions for four years, and that the last General Conference finally repealed
them ; but I had no more to do in their suspension or repeal than I had
in their original adoption. This is the utmost extent to which I ever went
in reform, except that I always have insisted that our economy ought
24

370 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
more explicitly to define and provide for the Church relation of children
baptized by our ministry.
But to justify the charge of desertion, it ought to be shown that I had
at least changed my opinions in regard to the above-mentioned altera
tions in our Disciphne, if I have not actually opposed them. This, how
ever, is not the fact; I have never intimated any change of opinion in
this respect, nor have I seen any good reason to change it. It is true I
do not consider them of so much importance as to justify altercation or
strife among brethren. We aim at the same object, and shall agree as to
the best means of accomplishing it when they become equaUy apparent
to all. In the mean time we must patiently wait for the direction of Divine
Providence, preserving the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace ; but
in regard to myself, I aver that I have not renounced any opinion in
regard to the matters alluded to, or any other principle which I have
advocated at any time during this controversy. The charge of desertion,
therefore, is wholly untrue.
It may however be asserted that I deserted reformers, if I did not desert
reform. I answer that the reformers deserted me. They formed a
" Union Society " which organized party spirit, and established a paper
which advocated principles to which I had been always opposed. From
this combination I did not withdraw, for I never entered it. I never
deserted the advocates of lay or local delegation, for I never was with
them. Neither can I be charged with deserting the M'Cainites, for I
never enlisted in the war against the episcopacy or the episcopal form of
government On the contrary, I have uniformly and steadily expressed
the opinion that this feature of our economy was essential to the pros
perity and even the preservation of the Methodist Church in this country.
With what propriety, then, can I be called " a deserter from reform ?" The
leading principle of reformers will be admitted to have been, a direct
representation from the laity and local preachers in the General Con
ference. That I have always been opposed to this, all the principal
reformers of our city know, if they would testify ; yet the late editor of
the Mutual Rights charges me with advocating a lay delegation, and
adduces in proof of it the memorial heretofore mentioned.
As this memorial is the only proof relied on, it may be well to give
some explanation of my connexion with it. In the interval between the
General Conferences of 1820 and 1824, the subject of reform excited great
interest here, and in many other parts of the country. It will be remem
bered that some of our oldest and most respectable brethren had been led
to suspect all who advocated the change in reference to the appointment
of presiding elders, as entertaining ulterior views more dangerous to the
Church than even this much-dreaded measure. In conformity with these
opinions, they got up a memorial to the Conference, which many who advo-

i i

TO THE PUBLIC. 371
cated the change thought did them great injustice, — and a meeting was
caUed of all parties, which met at the Conference-room, over the parsonL
age, in Light-street This meeting appointed a committee to draft a
memorial to the Conference, expressive of their real views ; and the com
mittee were required to report at an adjourned meeting. The committee
consisted of Thomas Kelso, David Harryman, Lambert Thomas, John J.
Han-od, and myself. Of these, Messrs. Thomas and Harrod were in favour
of claiming a lay delegation to the General Conference as the right of the
membership. I do not recollect whether Mr. Harryman expressed his
views upon this occasion or not ; but Mr. Kelso and myself were opposed
to a lay delegation altogether. In this state of parties a compromise was
proposed, and it was finally agreed that the advocates of lay delegation
should explicitly abandon the claim of right, and ask for a delegation on
the ground of expediency only, — in which case they would, of course,
be permitted to say whatever they could say to prove the utility of the
measure. I was appointed to write the memorial, and it was written in
conformity with this compromise. That part of the memorial which relates
to representation is as follows : —
" Under these views, we have been led to turn our attention to the subject
of a lay delegation to the General Conference. In presenting this subject to
your consideration, we would wave all that might be urged on the natural or
abstract right of the membership to this privilege. We are content to admit
that all governments, whether civil or ecclesiastical, ought to be founded, not
on considerations growing out of abstract rights, but on expediency ; that
being always the right government which best secures the interests of the
whole community. With regard to the expediency of the measure, then,
we may urge that such a delegation would bring into the Conference much
information with regard to tlie temporal affairs of the Church, which the
ministry cannot well be supposed to possess. They would feel less deli
cacy in originating and proposing measures for the relief of the preachers'
famUies than the preachers themselves, as they could not be subjected
thereby to the imputation of interested motives ; and they would, by being
distributed everywhere among the membership, aid, by then personal ex
ertions and influence, the success of such measures, and awaken, more
generally than has hitherto been done the attention of the Methodist
community to the great interests of the Church.
"We are "aware of the constitutional objections to this change in our
economy. We know that you are clearly prohibited, by the very first
article of the constitution under which you act, from adding to the Con
ference any delegation not provided for in that rale ; but we believe that
an opinion expressed by the Conference, and approved by the episcopacy,
would induce the annual conferences to make the necessary alteration in
the constitution ; and we submit the consideration of the whole matter to

372 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
the calm and deliberate attention which we are persuaded its importance
demands, and which we do not doubt it will receive, determined cheer
fully and cordially to submit to your decision."
It will be perceived that the memorialists not only wave the claim of
" right," but admit all governments, whether civil or ecclesiastical, ought
to be founded exclusively on expediency, or utility ; and they promise,
after submitting their reasons for a change, cheerfully to abide the decision
of the Conference. How well some of them kept their promise is well
known ; but perhaps it is not as well known as it ought to be, that all
the principal reformers in the city were present at the meeting to which
the report of the committee was submitted, and voted for the memorial !
For myself, I obtained all I wished for. I had no objection to the advo
cates of lay delegation presenting to the Conference their reasons for
desiring the privilege, but I always objected to any changes predicated on
abstract rights ; because, if once begun, there was no foreseeing the amount
of speculative innovation to which it might lead. But if I am accused
of being an advocate of lay delegation because I voted for this memorial,
what must be said of the reformers who voted for it ? Does it not con
tain principles which they now renounce as heretical beyond all human
endurance ? But if they allege that they voted for the memorial because it
was the best they could get, I answer, so did I ; and I cheerfully submit
to the reader's decision who had the best of the bargain.
The next charge to be considered is the one which was made by an
anonymous writer in the Mutual Rights, over the signature of "Vindex."*
The charge is, that I was secretary to my Lord of Canterbury's Star-
Chamber Court, in the trial of Dennis B. Dorsey.
By the Star-Chamber Court he is understood to mean the Baltimore
Annual Conference, and by my Lord of Canterbury, a venerable member
of that body,f whose age and acknowledged usefulness ought to have pro
tected him from this rude attack. I shall not attempt to give even a profile
of this aged minister's character ; but I will say of him, he was never
known to desert a friend in his need, either through cowardice or selfish
ness. Vindex knows who has done so. He knows who, under a fictitious
signature, blustered most valorously in favour of Mr. Dorsey, but who
turned craven when in the General Conference he had a fair opportunity
to defend him. He knows who quailed before this very Lord of Canter
bury, when, on the floor of the General Conference, he replied to Mr.
Dorsey's Appeal, and held up Mr. "Vindex" to the contempt he had so
justly earned. Moral courage is thought by some to be a natural endow
ment, and therefore he who wants it is not to be reproached but pitied;
yet we cannot help feeling some degree of contempt for the man who
stmts and vapours when out of reach of danger, and declines the combat
° Rev. Henry B. Bascom. f The Rev. Stephen G. Roszell.

TO THE PUBLIC. 373
when it is offered. Vindex caUs me the " pugnacious secretary of the
prosecuting committee." Be it so ; but he cannot charge me with stab
bing my adversary in the dark, or with betraying or forsaking my
friends. When in the dedication to the Appeal I aUuded to Vindex's accusa
tion, that I had conducted or aided in the prosecution of D. B. Dorsey,
I did not deny the charge, lest it should imply a disapprobation of the
proceedings of the conference in the case ; but my views of the matter
having been long since before the public, let Vindex now leam that the
accusation is wholly false. So far from having any agency in the matter,
I did not even hear of the proceedings until a few hours before the final
decision of the case. The gentleman whom he calls " my Lord of Canter
bury" had never spoken to me on the subject; nor had I exchanged a
word with him on any subject, except in the presence of Mr. Harrod —
one of the reformers — during the whole conference. What apology can
he make, therefore, for having, under a fictitious signature, brought an
unfounded and railing accusation against a man who had always treated
him with marked attention and respect, and from whom he had recently
parted in amity ? How will he excuse himself for having applied an
injurious appellation to me, merely from a gratuitous supposition, which
nothing but malignity could engender ? Mr. Vindex will find that those
whose cause he serves, though they may applaud the treason, will never
theless despise the traitor.
Dr. Jennings made some silly charges against me in the Mutual
Rights, which really were so absurd, and so impossible to be true, that
they did not perhaps justify any notice of them ; yet I did reply through
the Itinerant, and took some pains to convince the doctor of his error.
He has, nevertheless, recently pubhshed a book, in which the charges are
reiterated, without any additional evidence, and no notice whatever is
taken of the points in my vindication which are essential to the defence.
He will, probably, hear from me again.
Mr. M'Caine, with characteristic zeal, has made me the subject of his
theme, both in and out of the pulpit, even while he occupied the enviable
station of President of the Virginia Radical Conference. I hope his hear
ers were as much edified as I have been gratified by the notice taken of
me by so great a man. For though Mr. M'Caine " crept to the topmast
through the lubber hole," he was a real, not a "spurious" bishop of the
" Ancient Dominion," and took pains to introduce me to many great peo
ple, who, but for his kind interference, might never have heard of a person
of so little consideration in the world. The wonder is, how a man who tells
us lie really shook hands with the Governor of Virginia could condescend
to notice so humble an adversary. But, all joking aside, the president is
somewhat excusable for abusing me. It must be allowed that I spoke of

374 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
his "History and Mystery," and the spirit in which it was written, in no
measured terms. Besides, he was the first to give us a new plan of
Church government, which I handled so rudely that it had the misfortune
to faU so enthely to pieces that neither himself nor any of his friends
have attempted to put it together again, or even to mention it from the
day of its dissolution to the present hour. Yet in regard even to Mr.
M'Caine I have never travelled out of the record. I have forborne to say
anything of his personal character. He has not done so by me, and some
have thought I would be justified in retaliating with severity. Indeed, it
is generaUy conceded that when a witness shows prejudice, or passion, or
enmity, to either party, it is fair for those who are injured by his testimony
to prove him unworthy of credence ; but, then, Mr. M'Caine's prejudice,
passion, and enmity, are so outrageous, that any impartial jury would
refuse to credit him, even upon oath. When he assails my character in
distant places, before strangers who have come to hear the gospel, I can
not faU to find an advocate in the honest feelings of his auditory ; and the
truth is, Mr. M'Caine has, in such instances, done himself irreparable
injury, without effecting, in any degree, his malignant object in regard to
me. Every man who has enemies ought to desire them to be just such
violent, indiscreet enemies as Mr. M'Caine. Enemies whose malignancy
looks out in their countenances, and beta-ays itself in every word and
action, are impotent in exact proportion to their rage. Give them suffi
cient room and you are safe. But in addition to the moral considerations
by which I have been influenced, I have avoided, in the whole of this
controversy, any attack upon the private character of those who assailed
me, because it really could not possibly be brought to bear on the subject
in dispute. The arguments on either side are wholly independent of the
personal character of the disputants. If, for instance, I were to descend
to personalities, and could show that Mr. M'Caine, whUe a travelling-
preacher, used his pastoral authority more for the gratification of his vin
dictive passions than for the good of his flock ; that in his intercourse
with both preachers and people he was ever quarrelsome and litigious ;
that as a friend he was treacherous, and as an enemy vindictive and unre
lenting ; and that in his domestic relations he was an unfeeling savage, —
all this would leave whatever there is of argument or fact in the " History
and Mystery" just as it now is. The reader will not understand mc to
say or insinuate that I could prove such things. Mr. M'Caine's late eleva
tion to a presidential dignity will save the reader from any mistake on
this subject ; but I mean to say, that if I were to prove it, it would be
useless labour, as the subjects of controversy would be the same afterwards
as before. I shall therefore let Mr. M'Caine pass for just what he is worth
in the individual estimation of my readers. If I mistake not, that estima-

TO THE PUBLIC. 375
tion is too well settled here and elsewhere to be hereafter lowered by
blame or exalted by panegyric.
I cannot notice all the reformers who have vented their spite against me
through the Mutual Rights, and its legitimate offspring in Cincinnati.
The reader's patience would be exhausted, and the remaining columns of
the Itinerant filled before I should be half done; It may, however, be
proper, once for all, to put my readers on their guard against one of the
stratagems of those who assail either my personal character or my
writings. They are in the habit of pretending to -quote passages from
what I have written, while they ready give what I never wrote or thought.
The honest reader will, therefore, do me the justice always to consult the
"original before he credits the quotation.
Vindex, pretending to quote from my dedication of the Appeal, alleges
\hat I assert the Star Chamber Court never took cognizance of ecclesias
tic)! matter*. I had said no such thing ; yet he vapours away with his
authorities to prove what never was and never could be controverted. It
is trie I had asserted that " the Stav Chamber was a civil, not an ecclesi
astical tribunal ;" but everybody kndws that civil courts, even in this
country take cognizance of ecclesiastical matters. That the Star Cham
ber Gov't was a civU tribunal cannot be disputed. The reader has only
to tarn to Hume's History of England to see that the court was formed
of tie km/ a privy council, and the judges of the civil courts. It is true
tVnt ar> <v>leaiastic might be a member of the privy council, and,
consequently, of the Star Chamber Court; but this incidental eircum-
stHiice did uot change the natm - of the court itself, — it was stUl a civil,
hot aii w desiastical tribunal. In England the ministers of the Established
Church are often commissioned' as justices of the peace ; but as justices
of the peace they are civil, not ecclesiastical officers. In short, Vindex
has changed the proposition, and "made it ridiculous by making it his
own." But a false quotation of a more serious character is given by a writer
in the Cincinnati radical paper, which, if true, would have fixed upon me
the charge of downright falsehood. It is said, in the "Narrative and
Defence," that at the time when I made certain propositions to the Union
Society, I had " taken no part in the measures which had been adopted in
reference to the accused." This was strictly true : but the writer alluded
to above makes me say I had "previously tak^, no part in the controver
sy," although I had published the "Appeal to the*Methodists" months
before these propositions were made ; and he triumphs as though he had
totally destroyed my reputation. These two instances are fair samples of
the candour and fairness of those I have had the fortune to encounter in
this memorable controversy. I will trouble the reader with no more of
these instances, but only reiterate my caution to be on their guard when-

,376 MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES.
ever they see what purports to be a quotation from anything I have writ
ten on the subject of reform.
It may be asked, Why all this enmity to an individual who has only
exercised his " natural right" to defend the Church of which he is a mem
ber, against those who assailed her institutions, the character of her
founders, and her ministry ? I waited long and patiently, in the expecta
tion that our enemies would tire in the strife, or that some one else would
appear in the breach ; untU at length our adversaries demanded a reply,
and urged that if we had anything to say in our defence, it was our Chris
tian duty to publish it, that they might be brought to a better mind.
Yet, when my intention to write was announced, Mr. Snethen assailed mc
most furiously, and " let slip all the dogs of war." Within a few days
after the publication of the Appeal, one of my most intimate friends told
me, while he held the pamphlet in his hand, that he had changed his pki,
sician, les\ I should take advantage of some opportunity to put him out of
the way. The reader must not suppose that the man who said this
believed what he said, or that he was naturally of a sour, vindictiv, tem
per. On the contrary, he is constitutionaUy kind and amiable ; a ad so
far from being of a morose temper, he is remarkable for his goodbanour
and faeetiousness. But he was a heated partisan, and party spirit, is
wont to assimilate everything to its own likeness. I stood in tib«.»tT"?f
a favourite, long-cherished scheme, and he could not brook tlie op^. -.tf.-.-n.
If I had no other quarrel with radicalism, I should never forgive i; l»i ks-
priving me of the friendship of John Jolley Harrod. As Prince Hal said-
of his facetious companion, Falstaff, " I could have better spared a better
man." Let it be remembered, that the enmity which was brought upon me by
the " Appeal," was not elicited by the temper in which the pamphlet was
written ; for my reviewer, Mr. Shinn, presented me his thanks for the good
spirit with which I conducted the argument, and holds the work up as an
example to all who should afterwards enter the lists of controversy ; hut
it is simply for presuming to oppose the contemplated revolution in our
Church ; and I have been asked, why I did not keep quiet, and let the
itinerant preachers defend the government. This, perhaps, would have
been the most prudent course, according to the suggestions of worldly
policy. My only apology for not adopting it is, that I could not do so
with a good conscience. I owed everything I enjoyed to the Methodists.
My parents were among the first-fruits of Methodism in this country, and
within the pale of its communion they lived and died happy in the Lord,
An only sister and an only brother were early brought to the knowledge
of the truth as it is in Jesus, through the instrumentality of the Methodist
ministry, §nd were nurtured in the bosom of the Methodist Episcopal
Church, until they ripened for heaven and entered into their rest For

TO THE PUBLIC. 377
myself, I also was taken early in life into fellowship with this people, and
owe to them, as instruments in the hands of a good and gracious God, all
I enjoy in this world, and all I hope for in the world to come. They
watched over me with pious and parental care in my youth. They have
borne with my frailties in riper years, and sustained me in my weak
nesses, and soothed by their sympathies all the afflictions of my life. A -id
when the destroyer came, could I, without the basest ingratitude, 1
with calm indifference on the threatened desolation ? In the allotm
of Providence, I was placed in the most favourable circumstances to le;
the true nature of the contemplated revolution, and to discuss, from tin..
to time, with the leading reformers personally, all the subjects connected
with tlieir project. No person who was not similarly circumstanced,
could have been as well prepared for the controversy. Hence I was led
to believe that, though wholly unpractised in such warfare, it was my duty
to enter the lists, and I would have done so at the hazard of all earthly
possessions and comforts. The result is, that I have received much per
sonal abuse, and incurred the utmost enmity of some whose ambitious
projects I have humbly contributed to frustrate ; yet I have preserved a
good conscience, and am thereby amply compensated. I have lived to
see the Church out of danger from the storm which once threatened to
uproot all her institutions from their foundations. The clear blue sky is
again seen, and the rainbow of divine mercy is again the consolation of
Israel. To God be all the glory. " Praise the Lord, O my soul ; and
forget not thou all his benefits." Let all the people say, Amen !
It only remains to announce to the readers of the Itinerant, what is
already pretty generally known, that my contributions to its columns will
be found over the letters C. L. I. O., and over the signature Philo C. The
author's real name was not withheld for disguise or concealment, but sim
ply to avoid the appearance of parade and ostentation. The practice of
writing over fictitious signatures is justified by the example of the greatest
and best men of this, as well as of former times, and can only be repre
hensible when statements are made, or facts asserted, which require a
responsible voucher. I have never concealed my name under such cir
cumstances.
Thomas E. Bond.

APPENDIX

THE PHILADELPHIA REFORM MOVEMENT.
It is a cause of great gratulation to the Methodist Episcopal Church that
the brethren who originated this movement commenced by a repudiation
of the " radicalism " of former times ; and that the " committee of twenty,"
and, finally, the " convention," preserved the same plan and feeling. They
assume no antagonism between the travelling ministers and the laity and
local preachers of the Church, but very justly look upon the present orga
nization as originating from the necessity of circumstances, but which
circumstances, they think, have so changed as to require material changes
in the governmental regulations of our Church polity. The question of
change is, therefore, a question of expediency, or utility, which may bo
safely discussed, and finally acted upon, without any insurrectionary
movement ; and if the alterations should be found, upon examination, to
be unnecessary, and fraught with danger, they may be given up by their
present advocates without any abandonment of principles, or any sense of
mortification at the failure of the scheme, — there will be no mortified
pride to avenge by secession and the organization of an " opposition line."
After due examination, we shall be led to make whatever changes in our
polity may be judged necessary or useful by the Methodist community as
a whole, including ministry and laity ; or, finding no changes in the car
dinal principles of our government necessary or safe, we shall be content
to wait the openings and leadings of Providence, and in the mean time
abide in our calling, individually contributing our share, as we have
ability, to the common purpose of Methodist combination and effort — the
salvation of the world by the propagation of the gospel, and the building
each other up in holiness.
But, had the " radicals " of former times succeeded in effecting their
revolutionary purposes, the episcopacy, the right arm of the itinerancy,
must have been lopped off; and the itinerant ministers themselves, having
been warred with as tyrants, despots — nay, "overbearing, abandoned

380 APPENDIX.
tyrants" — so unfeeling, so unrelenting, as "to suffer their flocks to go
into sin, and finally into hell, rather than grant them their rights" — the
ministers, we say, thus denounced, could only be conquered and subju
gated by power, and only be suffered to continue in the community in a
state of vassalage, and under strict police regulations. Under such
circumstances, the best thing that could have happened to Methodism
would have been that the name should have been blotted out, and have
passed away from the memory of all men.
The editor of the " Methodist Protestant " has taken great offence at
the repudiation of "radicalism" by the brethren engaged in the Philadel
phia movement. He insists that their cause is one with the heroes of the
revolution who instituted the Methodist Protestant Church, and that it was
very unkind and unjust to denounce those who had fought and suffered
for the same principles. But the editor mistook the views and objects
of the reformers of the present time. These have no quarrel with their
itinerant ministers — do not denounce them as usurpers of power and pre
rogative — but " esteem them highly for their work's sake." They have not
adopted the " radical " slander with which our episcopacy was assailed as
" spurious and fraudulent," " based on falsehood and sustained by forgery."
On the contrary, they consider our bishops as trae episcopoi, their institu
tion well agreeing with the practice of the primitive Church, and essential
to the efficiency of our itinerant mode of ministerial operation.
But the editor does not take into view these distinctions. He only
looks at the common purpose of a lay delegation, and considers this as
identifying the present movement with that which eventuated in the
establishment of his denomination. But even in this particular there is
so striking a difference in their principles of action as sufficiently distin
guishes the one from the other. The "radicals" claimed a lay delegation
as a matter of right ; the present reformers as a matter of expediency or
utility, calculated, as they think, to invigorate our itinerant system. The
former insisted upon conforming our Church government to the civU insti
tutions of our country ; the latter propose no model from without, but only
urge such changes as are best suited to the occasion. Consequently, while
one claimed changes with vehement railing and fiercer denunciations,
with appeals to the world and the political feelings of the citizens, and
with threats of disruption or secession, the other calmly appeals to the-
judgment of the Church for the intrinsic propriety and probable usefulness
of the modifications they propose. So that, differing entirely with the
radicals in everything else, they only agree with them in proposing lay
delegation, while they base the proposition on principles so different as to
render all approach toward identification impossible. We pity the editor
of the " Methodist Protestant," but really have no consolation to offer him.
Ho will, we think, be disappointed in the expectation of another radical

APPENDIX. 381
war in the Methodist Episcopal Church, and consequent accession to his
denomination. The Philadelphia brethren did right. They commenced
by repudiating " radicalism,'' and, we believe, they were sincere. Their
subsequent proceedings have all been in conformity with their declaration
in their primary meeting, at which they called the convention.
Having thus admitted the claim of the brethren engaged in the present
reform movement to a patient hearing, and the scheme of reform which
they propose to a calm consideration, we shall proceed to examine it with
out bias or prejudice. In whatever will contribute to the efficiency and
usefulness of our Church, we have a common interest with all the minis
ters and laymen of our fellowship ; and we would not object to any pro
posed changes upon any other grounds than that of their tendency to injure
us as a religious community, or that they are uncalled for by any want
or exigency of the Church.
The convention petition the General Conference to provide for, and
admit into the annual and General Conferences a lay representation,
equal in number to the ministers composing the annual conferences, and
to the delegates composing the General Conference. We find the pream
ble and resolutions in the " Philadelphia Christian Advocate," a paper
recently established with a view to the discussion of the proposed altera
tions in our Church government. With respect to this paper, the editor
of the Christian Advocate and Journal observes, after some words of
commendation, in which we concur : " It is open to the argument on lay
delegation, although the editor does not propose to go into the discussion
himself. A certain Mr. ' Nedlit ' enters the list against Dr. Bond, and prob
ably will take charge of the controversy on the side of the laymen. Brother
Tilden may esteem himself extremely fortunate in having secured so able
an antagonist to the 'Champion of Methodism as it is.' The old hero
will have to look out, or he will soon lose his foothold." Now we
apprehend our friend, Dr. Peck, has not shown his usual discernment
and editorial sagacity in the above remarks. The editor of the Philadel
phia Christian Advocate not only " intends to go into the discussion," but,
we opine, has actually entered it over the signature of " Nedlit," for having
secured whom as a correspondent the doctor congratulates him. If he
will only take the pains to spell the nam de guerre, " Nedlit," from right to
left — that is, backwards — he will find it to be the name of the editor,
"Brother Tilden" himself; and as to his having entered the lists with
"Dr. Bond," we have not so understood him. He does indeed assume
an antagonist position at the outset, but does not maintain it. He does
not aver that Dr. Bond has not shown that the Methodist itinerant
preachers are not "aristocrats," and the Church government not "an
aristocracy;" but he labours to prove that the government is not a
" democracy," — a position which Dr. Bond is so far from denying, that he

382 APPENDIX.
does most rehgiously pray that it never may become such ; conscientiously
believing that a democratical ecclesiastical polity would utterly destroy our
whole itinerant system, root and branch. The editor and Dr. Bond are,
therefore, not opponents, but fully agreed so far. What they may become,
when the editor shaU come to give our Church government a distinguish-,
ing appellation, can now only be a matter of conjecture.
We pass over the preamble, and all the resolutions but those which
give the plan by which lay delegation is proposed to be effected. This
plan is, —
" First. That every circuit or [and] station should be allowed annually,
at the last quarterly conference for the year, or otherwise, to elect one lay
delegate (who by virtue of his election shaU be a member of the annual
conference) — with the right to vote on eveiy question, except on passing on
the character or the trial of preachers— for every effective minister in full
connexion, whom such circuit or station supports.
" Secondly. That the delegates thus elected join their clerical brethren
in1 an election, at such time and in such manner as the Discipline may
prescribe, in electing delegates, clerical and lay, in equal numbers, to the
General Conference ; the expenses of all the delegates, clerical as weU as
lay, to be paid as such expenses are now paid."
It has been objected to this " plan," that it does not meet the demand
of a delegation from the lay members of the Church ; being taken from
the quarterly-meeting conferences, the members of which bodies are not
elected by the laity. But it must be remembered that the convention did
not propose to base their plan on the abstract right of the lay members
of the Church to representation, either in the annual conferences or in the
General Conference, but only on the ground that a lay delegation would
be useful in the councils of the Church ; and it was indifferent how the
delegation was procured, so that pious, competent laymen composed it ;
and they avoided one of the most dangerous consequences to be appre
hended from the proposed experiment, by avoiding popular elections in
the Church. And we have no hesitation in saying, that they have pro
posed the only plan of selecting the delegates, which can even be tried as
an experiment, without destroying, by electioneering strife and conflict,
the peace and harmony of the Church, and finally sundering the
only ligament by which religious fellowship can be maintained, — namely,
brotherly-kindness and charity.
If, for instance, they had can-ied the elections into the classes, requiring
each class to elect annually one lay member, and the persons so elected
to constitute an electoral college, from which a delegation should go up to
the annual conferences, how fearful the agitations which would grow out
of the arrangement ! We need not pursue this subject farther now. Ithas
been fully examined and illustrated in the "Appeal," with which this

APPENDIX. 383
volume opens, and to which we refer the reader. The convention have
been guided by a sound discretion, and a practical knowledge of human
nature, in their plan for procuring the delegates.
But after all the commendation to which we have thought the conven
tion entitled, we think there are insuperable objections to their plan of
innovation upon the ecclesiastical arrangements under which we have,
hitherto, so efficiently fulfilled our calling as Methodists. In the first
place, we cannot perceive the necessity or the utility of a lay delegation in
the General Conference. The General Conference was instituted in 1784,
and assembles every fourth year ; and our little Book of Disciphne con
tains the result of its deliberations for the space of more than sixty years,
so far as the government of the Church is concerned. Now if we subtract
from this little book all that no one desires to alter, and which the
General Conference, even with the concurrence of the annual conferences,
cannot constitutionally alter, — namely, our "Articles of Religion;" all
which they cannot alter without the concun-ence of three-fourths of the
members of all the annual conferences, present and voting, — namely, the
fixed ratio of representation ; the rule which secures a " general itinerant
superintendency ;" the permanency of the " General Rules ;" the privilege
of our ministers and members in regard to trial by their peers, and right
of appeal; and the appropriation of the "produce" of the Book Concern
for the benefit of the necessitous ministers, their wives, widows, and chil
dren ; and subtract also all that exclusively relates to the preachers and
their itinerant work, their peculiar duties and services, together with the
ordination and sacramental services, we shall find that what remains, and
is applicable to the laity, will be reduced to one or two pages ; and in
this we think not one in a thousand is prepared to ask for any changes
at all. Where, then, can be the necessity or the utUity of so expensive
and hazardous an alteration in our economy as is proposed by the con
vention ?
The only condition of admission into the Church, is " a desire to flee
from the wrath to come, and to be saved from our sins ;" and member
ship once obtained, cannot be forfeited but by some crime " clearly for
bidden by the word of God," and " sufficient," in the judgment of the
society of which the accused is a member, or a select number of them,
" to exclude a person from the kingdom of grace and glory." Surely a
lay delegation of Christian men would not desire to make a rule less
stringent than this ; they would not desire to throw open the commu
nion of the Church to persons living in the practice of crimes clearly
forbidden in the word of God. What, then, could a lay delegation do
for us in the General Conference to better secure the rights and privileges
of the laity?
The fact is, that the great business, almost the exclusive business, of

384 APPENDIX.
the General Conference is, to consider and pass " rules and regulations "
to secure the efficient execution of the itinerant plan of ministerial opera
tion, which, from our origin, has been the distinguishing feature of Method
ism ; and these " rules and regulations " they who are wholly devoted to
the work must be best qualified to make ; and to them it ought to be
left, without lay interference or control. If we turn to any Journal of
General Conference proceedings, we shall find that all the standing com
mittees are appointed with a view to the business of Conference above
stated: they were, in 1848 — the latest General Conference — committees
on the episcopacy, the itinerancy, boundaries of annual conferences,
the Book Concern, missions, and the state of the Church. In none of
these, except the last two, could a lay delegation interfere with the least
propriety ; and we do not see what aid they could bring to the Conference,
even in the consideration of missions and the state of the Church. The
first, as well as the last, is essentially connected with the itinerancy. The
information acted upon must be derived from itinerant ministers, and
must relate to the work assigned to the ministry. The intimate connexion,
therefore, of the General Conference, as now composed, with these sub
jects, must make them better acquainted with them than any lay dele
gates could be, and qualify them better to act upon all questions in rela
tion to them. The necessity or the utility of a lay delegation to the
General Conference, therefore, does not appear.
But if the " convention " had shown ever so great advantages to be
expected from a lay delegation in the General Conference, they have failed
to propose any practicable or feasible plan to provide for the expenses
which would be necessarily incurred by it. They propose that the expenses
of both the clerical and lay delegates be paid as they are now paid
— that is, by the collections raised in the stations and circuits for this pur
pose, as far as they will go, and by drafts on the Book Concern for the
balance. But we can hardly believe the laity would be willing to make
the necessitous preachers — the superannuated, the worn-out preachers —
their wives, widows, and children, pay for the lay advantages which are
thought by the convention to be offered by this change in our economy ;
and such must be the case if the large deficit in the collections are to be
made up by drafts on the Book Concern. The collections do not meet
the expenses of the clerical delegates by a considerable sum, and they
have no resource but to draw on their own Book Concern to make up the
deficiency, however reluctant they may be to divert any portion of its
" produce " from the beneficiaries for whom it was intended. But the
expenses would be greatly augmented by a lay delegation, as laymen
would feel very delicate about accepting the hospitalities accorded to trav
elling preachers, which have been so long practised among us, as to be
identified with our itinerant system. And, besides, the clerical delegates

APPENDIX 385
have no claim for anything but their expenses, as their aUowance on their
several stations and circuits is made without any deduction for the time
occupied in attendance at the General Conference ; but the lay delegates
must be taken, for the most part, from men of business, farmers, mechanics,
tradesmen, and merchants, whose time is money, and who could not afford
to be away from home for six weeks or two months without some remu
neration. It is no easier for rich men to get to heaven now, than during
our Saviour's and his apostles' time ; and hence now, as then, few such
are caUed. And if we had them in sufficient numbers, it would not be
safe, either for them or us, to become dependant upon them. The con
vention has given us this hint ; and we cordially subscribe to its propriety.
If we have lay delegates, they must be sought among those who are best
qualified for usefulness in the relation they are intended to sustain, what
ever be their worldly circumstances ; and many, if not most of those, could
not serve the Church as delegates to the General Conference at their own
charges, without doing injustice to their families. Whoever takes an
enlarged view of the matter, will perceive, that however frugal the allow
ance for lay-delegate services may be, that although the number of members
in the General Conference is not increased by the plan of the convention,
the amount of money required will be greatly augmented. The rehef
from private hospitality, both in getting to Conference and during its ses
sion, cannot be relied upon as now. Our brethren may not be free to
accord it, and lay delegates would not be free to accept it. Yet expenses
which must certainly be incurred, must be provided for by means as cer
tainly operative ; and it will never do to draw upon a fund provided for neces
sitous ministers, their wives, widows, and children, to pay the expenses of
lay delegates. The only resource will be to grant new powers to the
General Conference. It must be authorized to levy taxes, either a poU or
property tax ; and what would come of this, it is easy to foresee. How
happy it is for our Church, that we are under no necessity to plunge into
these difficulties ! It would be Talleyrand's paradox over again. The
thing would be, at the same time, inevitable and impracticable.
But let us look to the proposition for a lay delegation in the annual
conferences. It is not proposed to enlarge the number of members to the
General Conference by the addition of lay delegates; the number of
clerical delegates is to be diminished by deducting one-half for the accom<-
modation of the lay representatives ; but in the annual conferences this
cannot be done. All the elders, deacons, and preachers on trial, must be
there; for the character of each and eveiy. one of them, personal and
official, must be subjected to scrutiny before 4he conference. Now, add
to the present members of any one of our annual conferences an equal
number of laymen, and where can they assemble and find accommoda
tion ? There are few, if any, places within the boundaries of any annual
25

386 APPENDIX
conference in which such accommodation could be found, and in most of
them it would be impossible. The only alternative would be an encamp
ment in the woods : and even this would require a large outlay for tents,
provisions, &c. ; and, in the nature of things, the laity would have to sup
ply the " committee of ways and means," and " foot the bill." And, after
all, the question occurs, Cui bono — for whose good — are all these difficul
ties and inconveniencies to be encountered? We can see no object or
good purpose to be answered by it, except the election of delegates to the
General Conference be such ; and we have seen that such an election ^
would not secure the services of the delegates : the difficulties multiplying
at every successive step, until they become absolutely insuperable.
One remark more on the "plan" of the convention. It restricts the
action of lay delegates in the annual conferences. They are not to par
ticipate in the proceedings in respect to the examination of character, or
trial of preachers ; but there is no limitation of action in the General
Conference. We suppose, therefore, that the lay delegates are to par
ticipate in the action of the Conference, on appeals from the annual con
ferences by ministers who consider themselves aggrieved by the decisions
of these bodies ; and in the election of bishops, and the scrutiny always
instituted by a standing committee into their moral and official conduct.
But would this be fair on the part of the laity ? Would it be fair to sit
as judges in the case of ministers on trial, the result of which may be
expulsion, whUe the laymen are secured, in such cases, by a trial and an
appeal before laymen only ? And would it be fair for laymen to partici
pate in the election of a bishop, and in the review of the administration of
bishops, whose power over the ministers— and which powers have been con-
fen-ed by them for the good of the whole Methodist community — would it be
fair and equal, we say, for the laity to participate in the appointment of
bishops, whose powers are necessarily so nearly absolute over the travel
ling preachers, while they cannot lay a finger on a layman ? Ought not
the bishop to be chosen by those over whom he exercises his prerogatives ;
and ought he not to be responsible to them for the exercise of his powers
of office ? We think there can be, among men of reason and religion,
but one answer to this question.
After all this will it startle our readers if we suggest a " plan," by
which an enlarged co-operation of the laity, by their counsel and advice,
may be essentially serviceable, and easily secured ? Our financial con
cerns have, within the last twenty years, greatly multiplied ; and we
apprehend that the very duties of our ministers preclude them from
generally acquiring the knowledge of financial matters, which is necessary
in the management of the various enterprises of the Church, which require
the collection and expenditure of money ; such as the support of the minis
try, missions, Sunday schools, colleges, academies, and other auxiliary insti-

APPENDIX. 387
tutions, for extending literature and religion. These, we think, make it
important for the annual conferences to caU upon the laity for a committee
of ways and means to assemble with them at their annual sessions ; and,
together with a committee of ministers appointed by the conference, to
take under their consideration all matters of finance, and report the result
of their deliberations to the conference for final action — the lay members
of the committee to have the privilege of speaking and voting on all such
subjects whUe under tiie consideration of the body.
We think such a committee could be very readily procured from the
several boards of stewards within the bounds of the annual conferences.
The stewards of each presiding-elder district might choose one or two of
their members to act in this capacity ; or the quarterly conferences might
delegate the power to select such a committee to an electoral college of
lay members, elected by themselves severally — the college taking the
committee for conference, either from their own body, the stewards of the
conference district, or from the body of the laity at large, within the same
bounds. The laymen thus chosen, together with the members of con
ference appointed to act with them, might be authorized to act through
the year — corresponding, and meeting, or communicating by deputations
on the interests with which they were charged, and personaUy aiding in
the measures taken to raise funds, and in collecting the information in
these respects for the government of the conference at the next session.
But we need not go into the details of the plan. If the scheme is thought
advisable, the particular provisions may be safely left with the several
annual conferences who desire the aid proposed. We are not aware that
any action of the General Conference is requisite to authorize such a mea
sure by the annual conferences ; but of this the General Conference now
at hand can judge. We have suggested the above measure as seeming to
be in conformity with the advice of the apostles on an occasion somewhat
similar, as recorded in the sixth chapter of " The Acts." We believe " it
is not reason " now, any more than then, that ministers of the gospel
" should leave the word of God and serve tables," or unnecessarily encumber
themselves with financial affairs. Let us so relieve them of these burdens,
that they may " give themselves continually to prayer, and to the ministry
of the word."
We find in the Nashville Christian Advocate, the details of a plan of
lay co-operation in the Tennessee Annual Conference of the Methodist Epis
copal Church, South, which we suppose to be the lay delegation referred to
by one of the members of the " convention." We do not know whether
the General Conference of the Church, South, took any previous action
on the subject ; nor whether aU the annual conferences have adopted the
same plan. But we have been assured, that where this scheme of finan-

388 APPENDIX.
cial operation has been put in motion, it has worked well, admirably well,
and without any increased friction of the itinerant machinery. We give
the Tennessee provisions in extenso for the information of all concerned.
Let aU be done as in the presence of Him who purchased the Church
with his own blood, and searcheth the hearts and trieth the reins of the
children of men. A FINANCIAL SYSTEM -
For the Tennessee Annual Conference of the Methodist Episcopal
Church, South, adopted at Lebanon, December, 1851.
1. At each session of the annual conference there shall be a joint board
of stewards, composed of laymen and travelhng 'preachers.
2. There shall be one lay steward from each presiding elder's district,
who shall be elected by ballot at the district stewards' meeting, when
assembled for the purpose of estimating the claims of the presiding elder,
who shaU attend the annual conference, and shall have the right to speak
and vote in the conference on all subjects relating to the finances of the
Church. There shall be an equal number of stewards elected by baUot from
among the travelling preachers, who shall continue in office until the
close of the ensuing annual conference, one of whom shaU be chosen by
the joint board of stewards as their chairman.
I. It shall be the duty of this joint board of stewards,
1. To receive the funds of the conference and divide the same among
the necessitous claimants according to the pro rata amount of their several
claims under the Discipline.
2. To estimate the probable amount that it will -be necessary to raise,
to meet the aUowance to the bishops and aU the claimants in the bounds
of the conference for the ensuing year, and to apportion the same among
the several districts in the bounds of the conference to the best of their
ability. 3. They shall examine the reports of the several recording stewards of
each circuit and station, and take such action thereon as may be deemed
prudent, in order to improve our financial condition, and promote unifor
mity in the method and fidelity in the execution of the duty of stewards.
4. It will be expected of each member of the joint board of stewards,
that they use their influence to promote the financial interest of the
Church, and that the chairman of the board shall keep up a correspond
ence with the lay representative from each district, and shall, by written
communications, or public addresses, do all he can to improve the finances
of the Church.
5. The joint board of stewards shall report its proceedings to the

APPENDIX. 389
annual conference before the close of its session for its correction and
adoption. H. The duties of the annual meetings of the district stewards in
addition to that already laid down in the Discipline.
1. To appoint or elect by ballot one of the stewards of the district, who
shaU represent the same at the ensuing annual conference as a member of
the joint board of stewards, who shaU hold his office for one year, or until
the ensuing annual meeting of the district stewards ; and that this repre
sentation may not faU, they shaU also elect an alternate, and if by death
or from any other cause a vacancy should occur, the presiding elder of
the district shall appoint a steward to fiU the vacancy until the ensuing
annual district meeting.
2. The chairman of the district stewards' meeting shaU immediately
forward to the chairman of the joint board a certificate of the election of
the representative, with his address, so that the chairman of the joint
board may correspond with him (if need be) in order to promote the
object of his appointment under this charter.
3. In addition to the estimated and disciplinary aUowance to the pre
siding elder, they shall divide the amount assigned by the joint board of
finance to the district, as conference collection, among the several circuits
and stations of the district, which amounts, so divided, shall be reported
to the meetings of the stewards in each circuit and station in the bounds
of the district. The presiding elder shaU also take a minute of these
several appropriations.
4. This district stewards' meeting shall be held as soon as convenient
after the close of the annual conference. This meeting shaU consist of
one steward from each circuit and station. The presiding elder shall fix
upon the time and place for said meeting, and shah give each steward
notice of the same.
HI. There shall be a meeting of the stewards of each circuit and station,
as soon as convenient after the district stewards' meeting, the time and
place to be appointed by the preacher in charge.
1. To make a liberal and prudent appropriation for the family expenses
of their preacher, — if a young man, for his board ; if a married man, for
the boarding of himself and famUy, if that should be thought best ; but
should he wish to keep house, in that case let them secure him a
suitable house, with such furniture as may be necessary, fuel, table
expenses, and, if need be, servants' hire, together with all other matters
calculated to render the preacher's family comfortable, — so that the
preacher may be enabled to give the whole of his time to the service of
the Church. Let the amount necessary for the support of the preacher's
family be added to his quarterage claim, as it is called, and the result
shall be the official appropriation to the preacher.

390 APPENDIX,
2. They shaU receive the report of their representative in the district
stewards' meeting of the amount appropriated to be raised by them, both
as it regards the claims of the presiding elder, and also the amount neces
sary to be raised as a conference collection, — the quarterage of the pre
siding elder, and his claim for famUy expenses, to be regarded as one com
mon claim, and in like manner to be provided for.
3. They shaU divide the several amounts among the several classes and
congregations of the charge according to their numbers, and as far as they
may be able to judge, according to their abihties and privileges.
4. They shall divide the classes or congregations of the charge into
sections, assigning each section to a particular steward, whose duty it shall
be to superintend the financial interest of the Church in the section
assigned him.
5. The amount assessed for conference funds, called conference coUec-
tions, shall be kept separate from other moneys, and shaU be raised by
public coUections from the congregations, or by private donations.
6. The steward of each section shall see that these and aU other public
collections are faithfully made in due time, and repeated, if necessary ; and
should the conference coUection faU short of the amount assessed in his
section, he shaU himself make, or cause to be made, a faithful effort to
supply the deficiency by private contributions.
7. The stewards of each circuit and station may make a joint fund of
aU the moneys to be raised for the preacher or preachers of the charge, and
presiding elder. The preacher or preachers of the circuit and stations
Shall settle with the recording stewards of the charge ; and the presiding
elder shaU have his final settlement at the annual conference with the lay
representative of his district, who shall be a member of the joint board, of
stewards ; and should there be a surplus after paying the presiding elder,
it shall be paid over to the lay representative of his district, to be placed
by him in the hands of the joint board of stewards for distribution.
These settlements shall always be made in writing, and shaU be placed in
the hands of the joint board of stewards for their examination and
approval. 8. As soon as possible each steward shall inform the classes composing
his section of the amount assigned to them, and the leader or class col
lector, as the case may be, shall ascertain of each member what he or she
is willing to pay for the support of the gospel for the year, and record the
same in a book kept for that purpose. The amount may be divided into
four instalments, and paid quarterly. Let the stewards of each circuit
and station use their best efforts to meet all the claims against them
quarterly. 9. Each steward shall circulate, or cause to be circulated, within his
bounds, where he may deem it expedient, a subscription-paper, in aid of

APPENDIX. 391
the same object, among those persons not members of our Church, but
who attend upon our ministry. He is also authorized to raise public col
lections in the congregations for the same purpose.
10. At each quarterly meeting, the stewards, after settling with the
preacher or preachers, and presiding elder, shaU make a written exhibit
to a meeting of the Church of the state of the finances, the amount
received from each class and other sources, together with the deficiencies,
if any, of each class, and give such advice and instruction as circum
stances may require.
11. At each annual meeting of the stewards of the circuits and stations,
the name of each steward shaU be called, and strict inquiry be made into
his fidelity and influence in carrying out our financial system ; and if for
any cause a member of their board should be found deficient, their chair
man shaU report his case to the ensuing quarterly meeting, by which he
shall be removed from office, and the preacher in charge, after consul
tation with the stewards, shall nominate a brother to fill the vacancy.
12. The recording steward of each circuit and station shall keep a book,
in which he shall keep a faithful record of every financial transaction con
nected with the business of the stewards under this charter. He shall also
make a written report of the joint committee of finance of all the moneys
received by his board, and how disposed of ; of the settlements with the
presiding elder and preacher or preachers of the charge ; also the surplus
moneys, if any be forwarded to them, together with the conference col
lections. 13. Each presiding elder shall cause to be spread upon the journal of
the quarterly-meeting conference for each circuit and station within his
district, and also upon each recording steward's book, a fuU copy of this
financial plan, and shaU read in the quarterly-meeting conference, at least
once a year, in the several charges within his bounds, that part of this
plan which refers to the duties of circuit stewards.
14. The recording stewards are requested to report to the joint board
of finance in the following manner : —
15. Annual Report of the Recording Steward of  Circuit, for
the  to the Joint Committee of Finance, of his settlement with the
presiding elder and preacher or preachers of  Circuit, the moneys
transmitted to the conference.

THE end.