History Of Methodist Reform, Volume I - Media Sabda Org

Council, is proving too much for even a giant's strength. Snethen says, "It is well known what
immense labor and difficulty it cost Mr. Asbury to maintain the non-representative system." This
must have been the period referred to by him when he also wrote; "Age and soundness of mind are
indispensable requisites in church rulers qualities of rare attainment among itinerant men. In no labor
is the body or the mind so quickly worn out, as by constant traveling and preaching. Even the mind
of the great Asbury was for a whole year in a state of almost childlike debility, though he again
recovered its strength."
He holds the Conference at Uniontown, Pa., and then is down in Virginia again at the Leesburg
Conference, and makes this record: "To conciliate the minds of our brethren in the south district of
Virginia, who are restless about the Council, I wrote their leader [O'Kelly] a letter, informing him
that 'I would take my seat in Council as any other member,' and in that point, at least, waive the
claims of episcopacy; yea, I would lie down and be trodden upon rather than knowingly injure one
soul." He holds the Conference in Baltimore, September 6, 1790, and then at Duck Creek Cross
Roads, for the Eastern Shore of Maryland and Delaware. "One or two of our brethren felt the
Virginia fire about the question of Council, but all things came into order and the Council obtained."
He held a Conference in Philadelphia, and finds, under Dickins, "our printing is in a good state." The
last Conference for the year is held in New York, October 4. Sick, dejected at times, distracted about
the Council, it is simply wonderful to follow his Journal, as he rode horseback from state to state,
until he once more comes to Baltimore, where the second Council had been ordered to convene,
December 1, 1790. His record of it is: "The Council was seated at Philip Rodgers' chamber. After
some explanation, we all agreed that we had a right to manage the temporal concerns of the Church
and college decisively; and to recommend to the Conferences, for ratification, whatever we judged
might be advantageous to the spiritual well-being of the whole body. For the sake of union we
declined sending out any recommendatory propositions. We had great peace and union in all our
labors. What we have done the minutes will show. . . I have kept no Journal during the sitting of the
Council."
Lee furnishes the minutes of the second Council. " Q. What members are present? A. Francis
Asbury, bishop; Freeborn Garrettson, Francis Poythress, Nelson Reed, John Dickins, Philip Bruce,
Isaac Smith, Thomas Bowen, James O. Cromwell, Joseph Everett, and Charles Connaway." It will
be observed that O'Kelly is not present. Either he was not invited, for the Bishop selected the Elders,
or he refused to come. Three new and less well-known men are in it. "Q. What power does this
Council consider themselves invested with, by their electors? A. First, they unanimously consider
themselves invested with full power to act decisively in all temporal matters. And secondly, to
recommend to the several Conferences any new canons, or alterations to be made in the old ones."
Lee gives also several pages of the routine business, but there is no intimation that Asbury made any
surrender of his negative, as his letter to O'Kelly seems to suggest. Probably as it did not conciliate
him, Asbury dropped the subject. The last question was, "Where and when shall the next Council
be held? A. At Cokesbury College, or Baltimore, on the first day of December, 1792."
O'Kelly's account of the proceedings betrays the extreme of a fault-finding disposition. It is plain
that he is set in a purpose of resistance to Asbury, — he cannot condone the arbitrary expulsion of
himself and his preachers from the "Union." He wrote disaffecting letters to the preachers, opened
correspondence with Dr. Coke, now in England, and evidently succeeded in persuading him that