History Of Methodist Reform, Volume I - Media Sabda Org

is desperately broken, yet he keeps right on, and it is simply amazing to follow his path as laid down
in his Journal; he is over the whole expansive territory, from South to North, and from North to
South, with incursions to the West and back again. It is doubtful whether even Paul was such a
suffering traveler. But one idea possessed him: to be the prime mover of the Methodist machinery,
spurred by the conviction that Methodism and the salvation of souls were synonyms. He could not
consent to be chief among equals, even in the Episcopacy, until physical prostration so increased that
he literally dropped in his tracks.
It has been discovered how the project at the General Conference, of electing another Bishop in
view of Asbury's fast-failing health, was estopped by the accepted offer of Coke to remain in
America and act as Bishop, a plan in which Asbury concurred, to forestall the election of another,
though Coke remained in the country but four months afterward, embarking from Charleston, S. C.,
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apparently without Asbury's consent, so that for many months he was left alone. He struggled,
under burning fever and dropsical symptoms, northward, to meet, if possible, the Wilbraham
Conference in Massachusetts, September 19. At New Rochelle, N.Y., he utterly broke down, and
wrote a letter to Jesse Lee, appointing him to preside at the Conference. The next day, however, he
was again on his way, but had to return. There were some strong men now laboring in New England,
Enoch Mudge, Jesse Stoneman, Philip Wager, Joseph Michell, Evan Rodgers, Joshua Hall, Joshua
Wells, Shadrack Bostwell, Michael Coate, Peter Jayne, William Thacher, Lorenzo Dow, the last still
refused admission to the Conference, and Jesse Lee, the corypheus of them all. For the hard soil of
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New England they had met with phenomenal success. It was Asbury's opportunity to advance his
own plan for Episcopal support and in a letter to the Conference he proposed the appointment of
Jesse Lee, Richard Whatcoat, and Francis Poythress as "assistant bishops." Asbury knew what he
meant, and his meaning was plain enough. He was to be chief, not among equals, but among
assistants. He did not consent to be chief among equals until the election, in 1800, of Whatcoat as
Bishop. He was domiciled with the Sherwood family, who showed him much kindness and nursed
him back to traveling health, though that was not much. On the day before the Conference at
Wilbraham he writes "I feel strength of faith and body, as if I should be raised up again. I rode for
recreation, nine miles. The clouds are dispelling from my mind. . . . I wished to speak a poor African
whom I saw in a field as I went by. . . . Oh, it was going into the Egypt of South Carolina after those
poor souls of Africans I have lost my health, if not my life in the end. The will of the Lord be done!"
Again from his retreat, while the Conference was in session, September 23: "I received a letter from
Dr. Coke; . . . it is a doubt if the Doctor cometh to America until spring, if at all until the General
Conference. I am more than ever convinced of the propriety of the attempts I have made to bring
forward Episcopal men: first, from the uncertain state of my health; secondly, from a regard to the
union and good order of the American body, and the state of the European connection. I am sensibly
assured the Americans ought to act as if they expected to lose me every day, and had no dependence
on Dr. Coke; taking prudent care not to place themselves at all under the controlling influence of
British Methodists." Why his apprehension of the influence of the British brethren? Was it because
liberal sentiments were prevailing and liberal concessions being made, despite the reactionary efforts
of Coke, Moore, Pawson, Clarke, and others who acted together? Let a better reason be assigned,
if possible.
Before noticing the action of the Wilbraham Conference on the Bishop's suggestion for three
Assistants, it may be well to furnish a proof that this was but a revived idea of Asbury's. As early as