History of the M.E. Church, Vol. IV - Media Sabda Org

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Immediately after the Wilbraham Conference, Lee, agreeably to the vote of that body and the request of Asbury, hastened to New Rochelle, N.Y., where the bishop was awaiting him. Thence they journeyed southward, as we have seen, through all the Atlantic states as far as Georgia. He returned to New York, laboring night and day on the way, and on the 9th of July, 1798, left that city again for New England. On his route, Asbury and Joshua Wells overtook him. They tarried together over night, at New Rochelle, Asbury being still quite unwell. On the 13th they entered Connecticut. They pressed forward, holding meetings almost daily, through Rhode Island and Massachusetts into the heart of Maine. At Readfield they proposed to hold the first Conference in the province. The ecclesiastical year, 1797-8, had been the most prosperous one recorded thus far in the history of Eastern Methodism. Widespread revivals had prevailed, and the struggling cause had everywhere advanced, augmenting its membership by more than one third. The circuits were not much increased in number, but greatly extended, especially in Vermont, New Hampshire, and Maine, the former of which, though it had hitherto yielded no returns, now reported a considerable membership. Many new societies had been organized in all the New England states, several chapels erected, and a large band of local preachers formed and brought into effective co-operation with the traveling ministry. The plans, which had hitherto been incipient, now began to develop their power and results. There was a growing consciousness of stability and vigor, in the new communion, of no small importance to its efficiency; and the doctrines of Methodism -- so liberal and yet so vital -- began to be more generally approved, except by those who were officially interested in the maintenance of the theology which had hitherto prevailed. The truth had advanced victoriously among the new settlements in the wilderness of the Penobscot. The people welcomed the joyful sound, and more than a hundred and fifty were received into the Church. The divine flame had also spread along the banks of the Kennebec, and many had been turned from darkness to light. Great multitudes had been awakened and converted on Cape Cod; and in Connecticut, especially, the excitement extended as fire in stubble; Middletown, New London, Tolland, Reading, and Litchfield Circuits had made rapid progress, not only in numbers, but in the provision of chapels. Hibbard had been called out during the year from the local ministry, to assist the preachers on Pittsfield and Litchfield Circuits. He has left us an account of the revivals there, in which he says: "I think more than one hundred were awakened on these two circuits. Some joined the Presbyterians, and some the Baptists, and some the Methodists. The work of God in convicting, and converting, and sanctifying souls was very evident. Persecutions raged some on Litchfield Circuit, but the truth was in power; sometimes they fell as one shot down in battle, and would lay without strength from half an hour to two hours, when they would arise happy in God. Our Presbyterian brethren and others were afraid it was a delusion. But the revival of religion, having these extraordinary signs attending it, was highly necessary to confound dead formality. Some conversions were extraordinary. In one place I preached in a private house, where the man and his wife and one neighbor made all the congregation. The man and his wife professed religion, but their neighbor did not. However, before I came again in four weeks, that person was converted, and had reported around by what means this change was wrought; so that thereby many others came out, and I had about seventy to preach to, instead of three; and before long many could testify that God for Christ's sake had made that preaching, which some call foolishness, the happy power of salvation to their souls." Peter Vannest arrived in New England this year. We have seen that on receiving his first appointment in the Middle States, in 1796, he evaded it. He says: "They gave me an appointment,
yet I did not go out that year; but I suffered more affliction that year than I had for many years before. I did not know whether this was for disobedience or not, so I promised the Lord I would go if he would go with me. I went to Conference, and bishop Asbury said to me, 'I am going to send you to England; will you go?' I said, 'Yes, sir.' He said, 'I mean New England, and they are wise people there; it will be a good school for you. Last year I appointed you; now I will send you a great way from home, and you will not run away.' So I went on to Middletown Circuit, in Connecticut, in 1797." His record of his labors is full of incidents, characteristic of the man and the times. Though his name is on the list of probationers for 1797, it is not affixed to the Middletown appointment. The omission was doubtless accidental. He labored with widespread success on that circuit, along with Peter Jayne. "We traveled together," he says, "like David and Jonathan. At that time the societies were few and small, but remarkably kind to the preachers. At the first appointment I attended on the circuit, two men came to dispute with me; I kept to the Bible for help; they soon got out of argument. I told them that some men's religion was in their heads and not in their hearts -- cut their heads off and their religion was all gone. The people laughed at them and they went their way. They troubled me no more in that place. At that time we had but few chapels in New England; we preached in such places as we could get. At South Britain the society consisted of three members. I preached there in an underground kitchen. A young man came to the meeting with a pack of cards in his pocket, for company to go to a public house near by to play with; but the Lord smote him, sent him home to burn his cards, and spend part of the night in prayer to God to have mercy on his soul. He sought the Lord with all his heart, and soon after found peace. He lived some years happy in the Lord, died in hope, and, I trust, is in heaven. At a locality near this place, where wickedness prevailed, I went to preach, and gave out the hymn beginning with 'Blow ye the trumpet, blow.' A man, a deist by profession, said that the singing struck him like peals of thunder. He felt as if the judgment was coming, and he was not ready. Several were converted. At another place, about seven miles from Oxford, a man lived that had once belonged to the Methodist Church, but had lost his religion, and in a backslidden state he married a woman of no religion; when he began housekeeping he got reclaimed and found peace with God. He was not willing to eat his morsel alone, but wishing his neighbors to partake with him of the good things of God, invited me to come and preach at his house. The time appointed was very unfavorable; there was nearly two feet of snow, with a hard crust on it; and I had three appointments that day, and about fourteen miles to travel. When I came to the place the people looked at me as if I was as strange a being as they had ever seen. The next morning, while the man of the house was attending to his business at the barn, the woman and I got into conversation; she passed into a great passion, and declared that if ever I came there again she would have me carried away on a rail. But I made a regular appointment there, and soon got a good society. We held a quarterly meeting not far from that place, at Derby; the woman and her husband came to it, but the conduct of the former was such, that the presiding elder observed that he had never seen a woman possessed with so many devils before, yet that same woman got converted and became a very pious and useful member of the Church. What is too bard for the Lord to do? Glory be to his holy name forever! At another place, about three miles from the latter, I formed another society, but a number of men agreed to give me a ride on a rail. They came to meeting; after preaching they went out into the portico and made a great noise; I went to the door to speak to them; the man of the house took hold of me and pulled me back, and said that they wanted to get me out. I opened the door and said, Gentlemen, if you wish to see and hear how we meet class, please to walk in. They did so; I spoke to the class, and likewise to them, and prayed for all; they went away
Page 1 and 2: WESLEYAN HERITAGE Library HISTORY O
Page 3 and 4: HISTORY of the METHODIST EPISCOPAL
Page 5 and 6: BOOK VI CHAPTER I = PART 58 METHODI
Page 7 and 8: CHAPTER IX = PART 66 METHODISM IN T
Page 9 and 10: CHAPTER XV = PART 72 REVIEW OF THE
Page 11 and 12: disappearance of Coke, Asbury, What
Page 13: convened, a second time, in Wilbrah
Page 17 and 18: He returned again to New Jersey in
Page 19 and 20: Asbury pressed on westward with his
Page 21 and 22: congregation, and meanwhile advanci
Page 23 and 24: direction of the presiding elder, G
Page 25 and 26: traveled in Massachusetts, Rhode Is
Page 27 and 28: knowledge. His judgment was always
Page 29 and 30: He did great services and endured g
Page 31 and 32: of the itinerants. There was no one
Page 33 and 34: found adequate to the singular exig
Page 35 and 36: as a sail in a leaking canoe, and p
Page 37 and 38: [16] of his decease, sent home for
Page 39 and 40: passing through small villages; but
Page 41 and 42: HISTORY OF THE METHODIST EPISCOPAL
Page 43 and 44: God. The Scotchman could endure it
Page 45 and 46: [7] Conference till the next year.
Page 47 and 48: y his own hands, and his furniture
Page 49 and 50: there were three circuits, with thr
Page 51 and 52: performed incredible labors and tra
Page 53 and 54: Before he reached the last stanza h
Page 55 and 56: "in the wilds of Virginia, where he
Page 57 and 58: ed, and trembling with agitation. E
Page 59 and 60: this melancholy record. I never rea
Page 61 and 62: at Cabbin Creek, Ky., twenty thousa
Page 63 and 64: in that vast wilderness, and had no
Page 65 and 66:
poles. This was their bedstead. Som
Page 67 and 68:
Benjamin Lakin, Samuel Doughty John
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Gibson. "Here," say his brethren, "
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of the Little Miami River. On Thurs
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Circuit) for this year began at Moo
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Sale, J. Oglesby; Guyandotte, Asa S
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worst for stealing, fighting, and l
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twentieth they reached the scene of
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the toil and sufferings, of another
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ENDNOTES 1 See Extracts by Bishop M
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37 Rev. Dr. Trimble's Address at Oh
Page 87 and 88:
my father's neighborhood. The Confe
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attempted also to make local preach
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tireless apostle completed by the n
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to prepare forms of petition to the
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HISTORY OF THE METHODIST EPISCOPAL
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a change which it has always since
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Methodism was now entrenched in eve
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ENDNOTES 1 Bangs, (II, p. 171,) fol
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Methodists in other places, and wis
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are reported from Flint Circuit. Th
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Russell, fallen as he was from the
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ENDNOTES 1 Bangs, ii, 194. Dunwody'
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intensely bright by the grateful jo
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eached the furthest end of the piaz
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his humble shed and the chancel whe
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class-meetings, and to no small ext
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1 Minutes, 1858. ENDNOTES 2 Rev. Dr
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grandchildren were gay and playful;
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in a swamp on the Waccamaw Lake, a
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ENDNOTE 1 A few months ago, accompa
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Asbury, in the summer of 180, wrote
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means by which this necessary objec
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I should have to preach, but determ
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themselves, it was resolved that th
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ENDNOTES 1 Bangs, though his narrat
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directions, preaching as far as Buf
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and in the States, from the Ulster
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Conference sent over three missiona
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1814 Michael Coate, of New Jersey,
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1 Peck's "Early Methodism," p. 158.
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limits, when it will devolve upon t
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That very significant and convenien
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Channing, the elder Beecher, Wainwr
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in the eyes of the people, and grea
Page 155 and 156:
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own souls, because ye were dear unt
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Early in the spring of 1808 he retu
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seventeen preachers upon trial. The
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this meeting. Monday, 22d, I turned
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strengthened the whole denomination
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savage men, and venomous serpents."
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indescribable. At one time I saw at
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extraordinary learning, of tireless
Page 175 and 176:
oom; but, finding there no means of
Page 177 and 178:
By the end of our present period th
Page 179 and 180:
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some sixty or seventy souls. They a
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stacked away at the end of the cour
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olled over the whole Conference." H
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ashamed of yourselves?' which only
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living; I have outlived every membe
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iographer of the itinerant. Born in
Page 193 and 194:
Page 195 and 196:
gentleman. While the circles of fas
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His itinerant ministry in the West
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took a prominent part in the great
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to the people, and to go back to Na
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country. These were about to return
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of preachers had increased thirty-f
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1 Rev. F. C. Holliday, in Sprague,
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Astonishing, superhuman almost, as
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of "through the interior of Louisia
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their children. In ten years, I thi
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hates the nefarious practice. In th
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These extraordinary facts excited n
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15 I must remind the reader that I
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[3] and threatened to return home.
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he prepared for South Carolina, wit
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the expediency of increasing the nu
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1 General Conference Journal,, vol.
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itinerants he said, "See that every
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In our day (1866) the Methodist Boo
Page 233 and 234:
edifice was soon after provided in
Page 235 and 236:
in both hemispheres, and which prop
Page 237 and 238:
even romantic record, but our limit
Page 239 and 240:
He organized the Liberia Mission. H
Page 241 and 242:
and the moral prospects of the worl
Page 243 and 244:
Page 245 and 246:
ut we may well hesitate to admit th
Page 247 and 248:
They preached and suffered in Engla
Page 249 and 250:
ENDNOTES 1 An error in the Minutes
Page 251 and 252:
and great labors; his charity, his
Page 253 and 254:
directing the advancing Church with
Page 255 and 256:
history, and presents, in full vita
show all

History of the M.E. Church, Vol. IV - Media Sabda Org

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