IMAGE EVALUATION TEST TARGET (MT-3) // 1.0 1.1 a 12.0 Its lit u ■UMk IE IL25 IH 1.4 1.6 Fho1ogra[diic Sdences Corporation 33 WIST MAIN STRUT WiBSTH.N.Y. 14SM (716)t72-4S03 CIHM/ICMH Microfiche Series. CIHM/ICMH Collection de microfiches. Canadian Institute for Historical Microreproductions / Institut Canadian de microreproductions historiques Technical and Bibliographic Notas/Ncta* tachniquas at bibliographiquas Tha Instituta has attamptad to obtain tha bast original copy availabia for filming. 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TO WHICH IS SUBJOINED AN APPENDIX, COKTAINIKO A LETTER FROM THE REV. DR. AIDER TO LORD JOHN RUSSELL, IN ANSWER TO THE REV. MESSRS. RTERSON's LETTER TO THAT NOBLEMAN : WITH OTHER ILLUSTRATIVE PAPERS. LONDON : PUBLISHED BY JOHN MASON, 14, CITY- ROAD; AND SOLD AT C6, PATERNOSTER-ROW. 1841. w It .'■■■'»' PREFACE. The Union between the British Wesleyan Conference and the Provincial Conference of Upper Canada, was formed in the year 1833. Great hopes were entertained that, by the blessing of Almighty God, such a Union would afford important spiritual advantages, especially to the Indians and destitute Settlers of that country, many of whom were " as sheep having no shep- herd." Nor were these hopes wholly disappointed. But, in consequence more particularly of two unfriendly agencies, — ^the intemperance of party poUtics, and the insidious zeal which some persons in Upper Canada have employed to alienate the Annual Grant which had been pledged by the British Crown and Government to the Wesleyan Missionary Society, for the prosecution of its Christian objects in that Province, — it has become necessary, on the part of the British Conference, for- mally to dissolve the Union which had previously existed for the space of seven years. From the posture of affairs in Upper Canada, now nearly eighteen mouths ago, the British Conference of 1839 deemed it expedient to appoint a Special Committee, whose office r should be to "decide finally in all matters relating to the Jnion between the British Conference and the Upper-Canada Confer- ence, and to our Indian Missions in Upper Canada." In the spirit of concihation the Rev. Dr. Alder had, in the same year, been deputed to attend the Provincial Conference of Upper Canada, and to remonstrate, among other matters, on the Rev. Egerton Ryerson's perverse and re-iterated violation of that agreement into which he had entered in 1833, on behalf of him- self and his brethren, concerning the prudent management of the " Christian Guardian," the official organ of that body, to preserve its pages from being prostituted to petty purposes of colonial politics : a promise repeated by him in a writ- A 2 PREFACE. ten communication, which, at his express request, was laid before t)ic Missionaries composing the Lower Canadian District, at their Annual Meeting in May, 1834; and which was, in the following month, embodied in a Resolution, and unani- mously adopted by the Members of the Upper-Canadian Con- ference, then assembled in the town of Kingston. Notwith- standing the continued breach of these oft-repeated pledges, the Members of the Special Committee appointed by the British Conference were still unwilling to proceed to decisive measures, so long as they could persuade themselves that any fair and safe ground remained for the amicable adjustment of differences. At a Meeting which they held so late as March, 1840, they continued to hesitate, and to wait for better days. They were constrained, however, in the following month, to adopt a more determined mode of conduct, in consequence of information received from an authentic and unquestionable source, that serious attempts were making to interfere with the continuance of the Annual Grant above-mentioned. That information induced an application to Lord John Russell for an interview on the subject. The following copy of a Letter from R. Vernon Smith, Esq., Under Colonial Secretary, containing the answer to this application, it seems proper in this place to insert. ex " Downinff-street, Apnl I5th, 1S40. "Sir, " I AM directed by Lord John Russell to acknowledge the receipt of your Letter of the 8th iust., requesting, on behalf of the Wesleyan Missionary Society, an interview with his Lord- ship on matters affecting the operations of the Society in Upper Canada, and requesting his Lordship's attention more especially to the claim of the Society's Annual Grant of £700, which they have hitherto enjoyed from the Revenue of that Province. " His Lordship desires me, in reply, to inform you that he has already received from the Governor- General a Despatch on the subject to which your Letter relates, accompanied by a representation from Mr. Ryerson explaining the nature of the financial relations between the British Wesleyan Conference in England and the Conference of the Wesleyan Methodists in PREFACE. V Upper Canada, niid urging the claim of the Intter to the exclusive management of the Yearly Grant. " Under these circumstances, it appears to his Lordship that the most convenient course will be to afford the British Wes- Icyan Conference in England the opportunity of discussing the proposal which Mr. Ryerson has made. lie has, therefore, directed me to furnish you with a copy of that gentleman's com- munication, and to acquaint you that he will be ready to con- sider any objections which the Wesleyan Missionary Society may have to lurge to a compliance with the proposal wliich it contains. " I have the honour to be, &c., (Signed) " E. Vernon Smith." ^ " To the Rev. R. Alder, " Wesleyan Mission-House, ' ' " 77, Hatton-Garden." - -. On the receipt and perusal of the preceding Letter, it was thought needful that the members of the Special Committee on Canadian affairs should again meet with as little delay as circumstances would allow. They were accordingly convened on Wednesday, April 29th, 1810, when they unanimously passed five Resolutions, which form the first Document in the ensuing sheets. That Document, with the others which follow in due order, and with Dr. Alder's recent Letter to Lord John Russell, and other illustrative Papers, which it was judged right to subjoin in an Appendix, will, it is presumed, supply the reader with a sufficient history of the whole transaction concerning the dissolution of the Union between the British and Upper- Canadian Conferences, and with a reply to all that seems to be of real weight in the Pamphlet which the Messrs. Ryerson have published to the world. It is a painful task to engage in any thing which carries the appearance of collision between two kindred religious commimities. But such a task has been rendered unavoidable in the present case by the singular movements of the oppos- ing party ; and it is hoped that, in the performance of it, the British Wesleyan Conference and the Members of its official Committees have not disregarded the claims which arc PREFACE. due to their character and their cause. To speak plniuly, and ■omotimes strongly, befits the integrity which they would always labour to preserve; but to cherish at the same time unfeigned affection towards " all them that love our Lord Jesus Christ in sincerity," and to search out what is good rather than what is evil in every one with whom they may have to do, are services which they owe to the law of divine charity, and which they would faithfully discharge in humble dependence on Him in whom aU charity dwells, and from whom its blessings descend on the otherwise forsaken and wretched children of our race. John Hannah, Secretary of the British Wealeyan Conference. London, January 2Sd, 1841. RlH The The Pro Pp CONTENTS. DOCUMENTS. I. Pace. RlsOLUTioxs of a Committee appointed by the Britiili Conference of 1830 to decide Anally in all Matten relating to the Union existing between the British Conference and the Upper«Canada Conference, and to tha Indian Missions in Upper Canada, 77* Hatton-Oarden, Wednesday, April 20th, 1840 II. The Resolutions of the Upper-Canada Conference of 1840 on the Subjects ,. referred to in the preceding Article : with the Address of that Conference to the British Conference 3 III. The Answer of the British Conference to the Address of the Upper . jm, ■ ■ y- •■•■■'■" Extracts of Letters from the Rev. William Lord, Ex-President of the Upper- Canadian Conference, to the Rev. Dr. Alder G4 IV. Letter from the Secretaries of the Wesleyan Missionary Socity in England to his Excellency Sir George Arthur 6C V. Letter from the Rev, Dr. Alder to the Rev. Joseph Stinson, dated January 14th, 1840 C7 "": - . i '■ ' " :' . - .. ■ '..',-....- -'. . " C .■■ , VI. i - • ■ Extract of a Letter from the Rev. Dr. Alder to the Rev. Joseph Stinson, Presi- dent of the Upper-Canada Conference, dated New.York, Oct. 9th, 1839 ••• 71 VIL Remarks on some of the Statements, &c., contained in the Pamphlet lately published by the Rev. Messrs. W. and £. Ryerson : in a Letter addressed to the Rev. Robert Newton, President of the British Conference, by the Rev. William Lord 72 '''' ' v' " vm. ■ .' - '... ■' " "• ' " . ■ Extract of a Letter from one of the Ministers of the Wesleyan Methodist Connexion in Upper-Canada, dated Amherstburgh, Upper Canada, July 10th, 1840, to the Rev, Dr. Alder «2 i-'t .l\ \. M ,1 :■-■ i-i ■:,■■> r<;- ,;;; ^. :j !i -Vv, il, U~ .. i:'i .;, - T ^..i .' r. ,..-.. : -. - r ■ :.. : v.;J. , . . v: <^ • v ... ^ - ■ .■ ■ 1- " t' ^: . ■••? -V- ■■■■ >■ • • • -■••:•• -•■ ■• V ■■ ' DOCUMEISTS, 4cC' :-i:' !:■:?,»'>- RESOLUTIONS OF A COMMITTEE APPOINTED BY THE BRITISH CONFERENCE OF 1839 TO DECIDE FINALLY IN AI/L MAT- TERS RELATING TO THE UNION EXISTING BETWEEN THE BTITISH CONFERENCE AND THE UPPER-CANADA CONFER- ENCE, AND TO THE INDIAN MISSIONS IN UPPER CANADA, 77, HATTON-GARDEN, WEDNESDAY, APRIL 29th, 1840. The Committee, having before them various documents showing that some of the pledges given at the last Canadian Conference have not beou fulfilled, especially in the conduct of the Rev. Egerton Ryer- 8on in the management of the " Christian Guardian ; " and also a Letter from Mr. Under-Secretary Vernon Smith, addressed to Dr. Alder, stating that a representation had been received from Mr. Ryer-' son, urging the claim of the Upper-Canada Conference to the exclusive management of the yearly Grant received by the Wesleyan Missionary Society, which Letter was accompanied by a Despatch from the Governor-General of Canada on the subject, and inclosing a copy of Mr. Ryerson's Letter to His Excellency, have come to the following Resolutions :— I. That just grounds of complaint exist agjunst the Rev. Egerton Ryerson, particularly on the following points : — 1. That Mr. Ryerson, as it appears to the Committee, in his recent communications with the Governor- General, and on other occasions, has virtually and practically superseded the Rev. Joseph Stinson, the regularly-appointed President of the Upper-Canada Conference, and therefore the official Agent and Representative of the Wesleyan Body in Upper Canada during the interim of its sittings; and has thus acted with great and culpable irregularity. 2. That, in the judgment of this Committee, Mr. Ryerson has dis- covered an utter want of ingenuousness and integrity in thus attempt- ing to gain the possession, on behalf of the Canadian Conference, in whole or in part, of the Grant made by the Crown to the Wesleyan Missionary Society; and that he has, in this matter, committed a flagrant violation of the obligations arising from the Union between the two Conferences. 3. That the "Christian Guardian," of which Mr. Ryerson is the DOCUMENTS RELATINQ TO / ilJ Editor, instead of being conducted, according to express stipulation and promise made to Dr. Alder, and the direction of the Canada Confer- ence, as a religious paper, has become more than crer a political and party organ ; and that Mr. Ryerson's attempted defence of its proceed- ings by an allusion to the alleged official authority of the " Watchman" newspaper in England, is founded in a gross misrepresentation of facts, inasmuch as the British Conference has no political or religious organ whatever but its own recognised periodicals, and as none but the proprietors and Editors of the " Watchman," not one of whom is a Minister, are responsible for its contents. II. That the Committee are fur from implicating the whole or any part of the Members of the Upper-Canada Conference in these unjusti- fiable proceedings of Mr, Ryorson, and cannot but hope that they will utterly repudiate them at their next annual sitting, and mark the sense which they entertain of such a dishonest attempt to deprive the Wesley.in Missionary Committee of their just and righteous claims on the plighted faith of the British Crown and Government, by partial, clandestine, and unauthorized representation, in such manner as the nature of the case requires ; and that they will place the " Christian Guardian," if it must be continued as a newspaper at all, in such hands as will at least secure the fulfilment of the oft-repeated promise, that it shall be exclusively a religious publication. The Committee are the more encouraged to hope that the Conference will adopt this course from the report of Dr. Alder, that various Members of that Body had expressed to him the deepest grief at the political course pursued by Mr. Ryerson in conducting the " Christian Guardian," and their ear- nest desire to maintain unimpaired, on just and proper principles, the Union which now exists between the two Conferences. III. If, however, this reasonable expectation should be disappointed, and a majority of the Canada Conference, at their next sitting, should be found to support and encourage such proceedings as those of which the Committee complain, it will be their painful duty to recommend to the next British Conference to dissolve the Union which at present subsists between the two Connexions, and to adopt such measures for the maintenance and extension of the Indian Missions in Upper Canada as may appear to be necessary. IV. That the Committee are deeply sensible of the injury to the cause of God, and to the interests of the Province, which may be anticipated from a dissolution of the Union, and are anxious, if possi- ble, to prevent its occurrence ; of which anxiety the British Confei- ence have given repeated proof, by the deputations they have sent to Canada, and the other measures they have adopted. If, therefore, the Canadian Conference should deem it to be its duty to send a Repre- sentative to the next British Conference, for the purpose of offering any explanations, or of making proposals with a view to perpetuating the Union, or, should that be found impracticable, for the purpose of making such arrangements as may prevent unseemly and unchristian stipulation and !!anada Confer- a political and of its proceed- " Watchman" resentation of al or religious 1 as none but B of whom is a > whole or any these unjusti- that they will nd mark the ;o deprive the !ous claims on nt, by partial, lanner as the le " Christian in such hands promise, that nittee are the )t this course at Body had } pursued by »d their ear- rinciplcs, the lisappointed, ting, should se of which recommend h at present leasures for in Upper ury to the ch may be IS, if possi- sh Confer- ive sent to refore, the i a Repre- >f offering rpetuating purpose of nchristian WESLEYAN METHODISM IN UPPER CANADA. V collisions betwcc^i members of the two divisions of the same great family, the To ittee assure the Canadian Conference that such Representative . ■.:'. be received with cordial affection by the British Conference, and that every attention will be paid to his statements and representations. V. That, whatever may be the result of these affairs, the Committee take it for granted that no objection or opposition will be offered to the Wesleyan Missionary Committee's retaining its direction of the Indian Missions in Upper Canada, — Missions which they were instru- mental in saving from ruin, and on which they have expended so large a proportion of their attention and of their funds : but should any objection or opposition be offered from any quarter to their doing so, the Committee, in virtue of the power vested in them by the British Conference, recommend and direct that, under no circumstances, shall any one of the Missions amongst the Aborigines be voluntarily iiban- ^oned by the Wesleyan Missionary Society. Elijah Hoole. 'J7, Hatton-Garden, Lo7idon, " , '■ . ■ '^i April 30th, 18i0. ^4^ f • . ,.,;fs, THE RESOLUTIONS OF THE UPPER-CANADA CONFERENCE OF 1840 ON THE SUBJECTS REFERRED TO IN THE PRECEDING ARTICLE ! WITH THE ADDRESS OF THAT CONFERENCE TO THE BRITISH CONFERENCE. Friday, June 19th. — After the most mature consideration of the several subjects referred to in the Resolutions of the Committee of the English Wesleyan Conference, dated, 77? Hatton-Garden, London, April 29th, 1840, the following Resolutions were adopted : — * Resolved,— I. That we cannot recognise any right on the part of the Committee to interfere with the Canada Conference in the management of our own internal affairs, (except as provided for by the Articles of Union,) * The following Resolution on this subject had been previously proposed to the Upper-Canadian Conference, and lost by a very large majority : — <' That this Conference has heard, with great surprise and regret, of Brother Egerton Ryerson's attempt to deprive the British Wesleyan IMissionary Committee of the Annual Grant received by them from the Imperial Government, to enable them to extend their Alissions in this Province ; and that they utterly repudiate such proceedings on the part of Mr. Ryerson, not only as irregular and unauthorized, but directly opposed to a Resolution adopted by this Conference at its last session, rescinding the second, fifth, and sixth Resolutions passed by this Conference in June, 1837, on the subject of the Grants in question, because those Resolutions were represented by Mr. Alder as interfering with the usages of the British brethren, and calculated materially to retard their interests." * "' D 2 \ :/ DOCUMENTS RELATING Ta and especially with our views and proceedings on the question of ihe Clergy Reserves ; as we are precluded by the Articles of Union with the English Conference from all claims upon its funds, and as our own uncontrolled action and interests have always been reserved and admitted in relation to the question of the Clergy Reserves. II. That, as the Articles of Union between the English and Canada Conferences expressly secure to the Canadian Preachers all their rights and privileges inviolate, we consider it at variance with the letter and spirit of those Articles, and an anomalous and alarming precedent, for the Committee in London to accuse and condemn a Member of this Conference, and then to enjoin upon us to carry their sentence into execution on pain of a dissolution of the Union. :>> III. That, whilst we have always maintained, and are resolved i^i maintain, to the fullest extent, the dignity and authority of the office of President, as provided for in our Rules and in the Articles of Union, we are impelled, by an imperative sense of duty, to decline acceding to the claim put forth by the Committee in London, — that the President appointed in England is to be regarded, by virtue of his office, as "the Agent and Representative of the Wesleyan Body in Upper Canada " in the transaction of affiiirs with the Government, in which the interests of our Church are involved ; as we have always, in anticipation of such transactions, appointed a Committee or Represent- ative to guard and represent the views and interests of our Church ; especially as this Conference, at its last session, appointed the Rev. Egerton Ryerson as its special Representative to confer with the Government on matters affecting our civil and religious rights and interests ; and we can discover no good reason to depart from an established and proper usage. lY. That it appears to this Conference that a proper regard to the rights and interests of the Wesleyan-Methodist Church in Canada, rendered it the imperative duty of the Rev. Egerton Ryerson to con- fer and correspond with His Excellency the Governor-General of Canada on our financial affairs ; and we fully concur in the exposition which Mr. Ryerson has given of the financial relations between the English and Canadian Conferences, in his Letter to the Governor- General, dated, Toronto, January 17th, 1840. And whilst we disclaim any wish to interfere with the legitimate claims of the Wesleyan Mis- sionary Society upon the faith and liberality of Her Majesty's Govern- ment, we learn, with feelings of gratitude, that the rights and interests of the Wesleyan Body in this Province have been brought under the consideration of Her Majesty's Secretary of State for the Colonies by His Excellency the Governor-General ; and we are prepared to sub- mit to the decision of the proper authorities respecting them. V. That, in reference to the last Resolution of the Committee in London, declaring their intention, under any circumstances, to claim, and, if possible, to secure, the possession of the Indian Missions in Upper Canada, this Conference, considering that those Missions, with , VTESLEYAN METHODISM IN UPPER CANADA. ^0 two or three exceptions, were established by our exertions prior to 1833, (when the Articles of Union were agreed to,) and that they have, in a great measure, been supported by funds obtained in this Province, and sustained chiefly by the ministrations and labours of Canadian Preachers and Teachers, cannot regard it as reasonable, or our providential duty, under any circumstances, to relinquish our pastoral connexion with those Missions which were established pre- viously to the Union. YI. That firmly believing, as we do, that the Resolutions of the Committee in London have been adopted upon erroneous impressions ; and being satisfied that our fathers and brethren in England have not intended, nor could intend, any thing unkind towards the members of this Connexion, or unjust to its interests ; and deeply anxious as we are to maintain inviolate and unimpaired the principles and Articles of Union between the English and Canadian Conferences ]^ and being determined to do all in our power to prevent the dissolution of the Union, therefore resolved, — ^That a delegation be sent to the Wesleyan Conference in England, to lay all the matters referred to in these Resolutions before that venerable Body, and to use all proper means to prevent collision between the two Connexions. Resolved, — ^That the delegation to be sent to England on the sub^ jects of the foregoing Resolutions, cousiat of two. Proceeded to ballot for Representatives to England : Votes, Egerton Ryerson, 51 ; William Ryerson, 43 ; several scattering votes. Egerton and William Ryerson were declared duly elected. . •• ' , , Moved by W. Case, seconded by Egerton Ryerson, and Resolved, — That our respected brother, the Rev. Joseph Stinson, be requested to accompany our delegation to England, to confer upon the matters pending between the British and Canadian Connexions. To the President and Members of the British Wesley an Conference. > Rev. and very dear Fathers and Brethren, While we sincerely regret that we have not received your usual parental and welcome Address, we cannot omit renewing our assur- ances of respect and affection, and acquainting you with our interests and affairs. We desire to maintain, with undiminished interest, and uninterrupted regularity, the pleasure and profit of frank and confi- dential intercourse in the true spirit of Christian and Methodistic unity and love. We desire to feel grateful to Almighty God for the mercies and blessings of the past year. Notwithstanding the excitement and fluc- tuations of society in general, the Head of the Church has graciously preserved and blessed us, and given us an accession of one thousand one hundred and sixty-four members. The cidtivation of the Mission n DOCUMENTS RELATING TO field continues to advance and improve ; and encouraging openings, in different directions, demand at once renewed exertions, and the exer- cise of lively and cheering hope. In connexion with the various branches of the Methodist family throughout the world, we have joyously and profitably engaged in the celebration of the Centenary of Methodism. Contributions have been made to our Funds, in memorial of the institution and first Centenary of Methodism, and as an humble thank-offering to Almighty Qod, which we trust will materially contribute to the extension and pros- perity of our Zion; and information has been diffused, and holy emotions awakened, which cannot fail to result in the most cheering and permanent benefit. ' We have great pleasure in again expressing our very high esteem and earnest affection for our respected President and the Superintend- ent of Missions, the Rev. Joseph Stinson. We have the fullest confidence in his piety, integrity, and abilities, after an acquaintance of several years ; we cherish a deep sense of his indefatigable and use- ful exertions in the important situations in which he has been placed ; and we earnestly request his appointment to the Presidency of our Conference for the ensuing year. We are truly thankful for the increasing efficiency of the Upper- Canada Academy. lu the several departments of government, tuition, and general management, the Institution has experienced a decided improvement, and afforded us sincere satisfaction during the past year ; and we confidently look forward to its still greater success in elevating and forming the intellectual and moral character of the Province. In parting with our excellent friend and brother, the Rev. Matthew Richey, A. M., who, since the opening of the Institution, has held the office of Principal, we desire to express our high and affectionate esti- mate of his piety, learning, and abilities. We have been greatly delighted and edified by his pulpit ministrations and labours ; and we devoutly pray that, wherever his lot may be cast, he may largely par- take of the Divine benediction, and be abundantly prospered in his work of faith and love. We deeply regret that we have not been favoured with a visit firom your highly-esteemed Representative to the American General Confer- ence, the Rev. Robert Newton. We have felt greatly disappointed in his return to England without attending our Conference, and afford- ing us the very peculiar profit and delight of his intercourse and counsels. We also deeply regret that any misapprehensions have arisen, or any diversity of opinion obtained, to threaten the harmony and cordial co-operation of the British and Canadian Connexions. We most anxiously desire to strengthen and perpetuate the Union which now happily exists, and to adjust, satisfactorily, all points of difference between us ; and, to accomplish these ends, we have appointed the Rev. Egerton Ryerson, and the Rev. William Ryerson, Representa- «'ESX.EYAN METHODISM IN UPPER CANADA. 7 tires to attend your approaching session of Conference. We repose the fullest confidence in their character and abilities, and cherish a strong hope that all things may be settled on a siue and permanent foundation. We are also happy to add that our respected and beloved President kindly consents to accompany them for co-operation and aid, in compliance with our earnest and unanimous request. And now, dear Fathers and Brethren, we are about to repair to our respective fields of labour, determined to devote ourselves afresh to God ; fervently praying that we may all be enabled to keep the unity of the spirit in the bond of peace, and to co-operate with the utmost cordiality, diligence, and success, in the great and glorious work which God hath given us to do. And " to the only wise God our Saviour, be glory and majesty, dominion and power, both now and ever." Amen. Signed, by order, and in behalf, of the Conference of the Wosleyan- Methodist Church in Canada, assembled at Belleville, this 20th day of June, 1840. .i-t- * »• „ .. . ' , . , EoERTON Ryerson, 5'ecre/ary. M- THE ANSWER OF THE BRITISH CONFERENCE TO THE ADDRESS OF THE UPPER-CANADA CONFERENCE. Dear Brethren, In proceeding to answer your Address, the receipt of which we hereby acknowledge, we cordially avail ourselves of the opportunity to present our sincere congratulations to you on the success which God has given you in the various departments of your labour during the past year. Most earnestly do Ave pray that a large effusion of Divine influence may more abundantly prosper your efforts to spread Chris- tianity in the earth, and especially to oppose the evil effects of latitudi- narianism, and the aggressions of Popery, in the Canadian portion of Her Majesty's colonial empire. But we ought not to conceal from you our painful apprehensions that the present movements of your Connexion may endanger its spiritual prosperity ; and we are anxious that in all things you may be directed aright, and that these events may be so controlled and over-ruled by the gracious Providence of God, that the Gospel may not be hindered. We must also express our feelings of disappointment that your Address contains so brief and unsatisfactory an allusion to the important subject of the continued Union of the British and Canadian Conferences. This sub- ject has most painfully occupied a very large portion of the time and attention of the Conference and its Committees during the present ses-» sion. We deeply regret that, while you declare that you " most anxious ly .fe'i.: DOrtTMENTS RELATIKO TO ■ •iJ.'^'i "' desire to strengthen and perpetuate the Union which now happily exists," you should have rejected, by a large majority, the moderate Resolutions first proposed in your Conference on the subject of the Annual Grant of the Imperial Government to the British Wesleyan Missionary Committee, and have adopted others, the effect of which was virtually to dissolve the Union ; and also that, in order more fully to identify the Canadian Conference with the offensive proceedings of one of your Body, against whom the most serious complaints were made by the Canadian Committee in this country, and in disregard of all courtesy and propriety, you have sent him as one of your Repre- sentatives to the British Conference ; thus giving your highest sanction to the whole of his proceedings, and obviously intending to throw upon us the odium of not redeeming our pledge, that " such Repre- sentative should be received with cordial affection by the British Con- ference, and that every attention should be paid to his statements and representations." We are sorry that the first visit of the Rev. William Ryerson to our Conference should have been made under circum- stances which precluded the possibility of giving him that very cordial reception which he would otherwise have received, and to which his character and talents so well entitled him. The early dissolution of our Union with you is a result which we unfeignedly deplore; for, although that Union was not sought or desired by us in the first instance, and its perpetuation could not have been attended with any advantage to the Connexion in Great Britain, we hoped it might give vigour and effect to your own labours ; and we are convinced that it would have been especially important in diffusing the spirit, and establishing the regulations, of an older and more perfect religious economy throughout the province of Upper Canada, to the great spiritual profit of your people, and to the extensive and permanent benefit of your country, in furthering all the objects which can be desired and promoted ^y an enlightened patriotism. We do not hesitate to express our deep conviction that a fearful responsibility rests upon those who have rendered necessary the deci« sions of our Conference, and entailed results which, without the utmost prudence, and an entire devotedness to the great business of the Chris- tian ministry, may seriously endanger the interests of religion. Under the altered relations of the two Connexions, we deem it right explicitly to state to you that, while on the one hand we regard it as our bounden duty to occupy with zeal and diligence the posts which the providence of God assigned to us previously to the Union, and to maintain the positions which in all fairness and equity belong to us on account of the labour and expense which we have bestowed upon them, we are at the same time most anxious that the allotment of the country before us should be without strife ; and that you should dis- tinctly understand the principles by which we propose to be guided in all our future labours in Canada, — principles which you must at once perceive to be both just and liberal. WESLGYAN METnODISM IN UPPER CANADA. 9 Ic 18 our wish and determination to avoid all designedly diyisire measures ; to repress an unchristian spirit of controversy ; and, " as much as licth in us, to live peaceably with all men." We trust that, in our mutual endeavours to occupy the wide field which Divine Providence opens before us, we shall pursue our respective labours in the spirit of brotherly kindness and charity, and that " Ephraim will not envy Judah, nor Judah vex Ephraim ; " and our fervent prayer, both on your behalf and our own, is, that " grace, mercy, and peace may be multiplied unto us through the knowledge of God, and of Jesus our Lord." For farther information, we refer you to the accompanying Resolu- tions of the Conference, and of the Committee " appointed to take the most judicious and Christian measures, in conjunction with the Rer. Egerton Byerson and Eev. William Ryerson, as Representatives of the Upper- Canadian Conference, that the formal dissolution of the Union may not be accompanied with any thing that might produce embittered feelings, or injure mutual charity." Signed, iti behalf and by order of the Conference, John Hannah, Secretary. IV. PROCEEDINGS AND DECISION OF THE CONFERENCE ON MATTERS RELATING TO THE UNION BETWEEN THE BRITISH CONFERENCE AND THE UPPER-CANADA CON- FERENCE, AND TO OUR MISSIONS IN UPPER CANADA. The Conference last year appointed a Special Committee to decide finally in all matters relating to the Union existing between the British Conference and the Upper-Canada Conference, and to our Indian Missions in Upper Canada. A large Committee was also this year appointed by the Conference, to investigate the proceedings of the aforesaid Committee of last year, — to consider the Resolutions whvRh were adopted by the Upper-Canada Conference of 1840, — and to receive the commimications of the Rev. Egerton Ryerson and Rev. William Ryerson, the Representatives deputed by the Upper-Canada Conference to attend the British Conference. The Committee last named sat several days, and at length presented a copious Report to the Conference, which Report received a few verbal alterations and additions, and on the whole of which, as thus amended, the decision of the Conference was then given. I. THE REPORT OF THE COMMITTEE. During the long and careful examination of the important subjects referred to the Committee, various Documents were read or largely quoted, and oral testimonies received, comprising the following Articles : — 10 .«'■■(. DOCCMENTS nELATINQ TO I 1. Dr. Alder's Statement of the Proceedings of the Committee appointed by the British Conference for the Affairs of Upper Canada in 183U. 2. Articles of Union between the British Conference and the Conference of Upper Canada, drawn up in 1R33. 3. The Rev. John Beecham's Statements and Explanations in illustration of the aforesaid Articles of Union. 4. The Rev. Oeorge Marsden's Explanatory Statement respecting the Note appended by the Upper-Canada Conference of 1833 to the fith clause of the 6th Article of Union, and the first Payment of the Government Grant for our Missions in Upper Canada. ft. Statements of the Rev. Edmund Grindrod, Rev. William Lord, and Rev. Joseph Stinson, who have been Presidents of the Upper-Canada Conference ; and also of the Rev. Matthew Richey. 6. Letter from the Rev. Egerton Ryerson to Dr. Alder in 1834. 7. Extracts fVom the Minutes of the Upper-Canada Conference, held in Toronto in 1837, on Government Grants for religious purposes, — involving principles which might have been pleaded by the Government as a reason for withholding from the Wesleyan Missionary Society the Grant pledged to that Society n-om the Casual and Territorial Revenue for the support and extension of our Missions amongst the Indians and destitute Settlers in Upper Canada ; and which, in point of fact, did induce the Local Government to decline for a time to renew, in conformity with the instructions of the Secretary of State for the Colonies, the payment of the suspended Grant. 8. Extracts fVom Letters of the Rev. Joseph Stinson, under the dates of October and November, 1838, and January, 1839, — showing that the peace of our Societies in Canada was disturbed through an habitual and zealous interference with secular and party politics by the « Christian Guardian ; " which paper, being the avowed and official organ of the Upper-Canada Conference, virtually involved the British Conference, during the subsisting Union, in a common responsibility as to principles and consistency. 9. Dr. Alder's Letter to the Rev. Joseph Stinson, dated London, January 14th, 1839, on the subjects referred to in the above-named Letters of Mr. Stinson. 10. Letter of the Secretaries of the Wesleyan Missionary Society to the Lieutenant-Governor, Sir George Arthur, dated London, February 8th, 1839, announcing the mission of Dr. Alder to our Societies in British North America, and to the Upper-Canada Conference,--disclaiming, on the part of the Wesleyan Mis- sionary Society, all participation in the responsibility attached to certain publications on questions then agitated in Canada, — and expressing their anxiety to maintain the honour and consistency of our religious cliaracter, and to preserve " all the Societies, with whom they are in any degree identified, in habita of loyalty and peace, and of exclusive devotedness, in their collective and ecclesiastical relations, to the great work of promoting the spiritual and eternal interests of manlcind." 1 1. Letter of the President of the British Conference, the Rev. Thomas Jackson, to the Rev. Egerton Ryerson, complaining of his official advocacy of principles in the' " Christian Guardian " inconsistent with, and opposed to, the principles held and often declared by the British Conference. 12. Extract from the Minutes of tlie Upper-Canada Conference, held at Hamilton, in June, 1839, containing the settlement of matters in dispute up to that period, and an amicable arrangement for the future. u.tvy >■ i 13. Extracts from the " Christian Guardian " on the same subject, 14. Dr. Alder's Letter to the Rev. Joseph Stinson, dated New-York, October 9th, 1839. 16. Extracts from the Letters of the Rev. Joseph Stinson and Rev. Mattliew Ricliey to Dr. Alder in 1839 and 1840. IG. Memorial addressed to the Governor-General by the Rev. Joseph Stinson, WE8LETAN METHODISM IN CPPER CANADA. u President of the Upper-Canada Conference, and Superintendent of our Mitaiona in Upper ConMla, and by the Rev. Alatthew Richey, Superintendent of Toronto. 17. Letter to Dr. Alder from Mr. Vernon Smith, M.P., Under-Secretary of Sute for the (Jjlonim, dated Downing-Street, 1840, inclosing, by order of liord John Hussell, an important communication of the Rev. Ef^erton Ryerson's to the Govemor-Qeneral, and which Mr. Vernon Smith's Letter describes as respecting the Ornnt to the Wesley an Alissionary Society. 10. Dr. Alder's Letter to the Right Honourable liord John Russell, Her Majesty's principal Secretary of State for the Colonies, in reply to Mr. Vernon Smith's communication. 10. Resolutions of the Committee appointed by the British Conference of 1830 to decide finally on all matters relating to tlic Union existing between the British Con- ference and the Upper-Canada Conference, and to our Indian Missions in Upper Canada, held at 77, llatton-Uardcn, London, on Wednesday, April 29th, 1840 ; which Resolutions specify the three distinct allegations, or matters of complaint, to whicli reference is made in the Resolutions of this Committee hereinafter inserted. (Sec Resolution 1.) 20. Correspondence of the Rev. Egerton Ryerson with the Oovemor-Oeneral of Uritisli North America. 21. Resolution on (iovemment Grants for Religious Purposes, subtnitted by Dr. Alder to the Upper-Canada Conference at Hamilton, in 1830. 22. Address of the Upper-Canada Conference, held at Belleville, in June, 1840, to the British Conference. ^ 23. Resolutions, in accordance with the views of the British Conference, which were proposed to the Upper-Canada Conference in 1840, and negatived by a large majority. 24. Resolutions of the Upper-Canada Conference in 1840, carried by a large majority, after those last-mentioned were negatived. 25. Report of the Committee on British Canadian AiTairs, held at Newcastle^ upon-Tyne, on Friday evening, July Slst, 1840. In connexion with the recital or quotation of the preceding docu- ments, the Bev. Egerton Ryerson and Rev. William Ryerson, as Representatives of the Upper-Canada Conference, were also heard at very great length ; and every other method was used, at several suc- cessive Meetings, to obtain a full exposition of the case. After all which, the Committee agreed to recommend the following Resolutions to the Conference : — I. That the three allegations, or m&tters of complaint, contained in the Resolutions of the Committee on Canadian Affairs, at their Meet- ing on the 29th of April last, and forwarded by that Committee to the Upper-Canada Conference, are regarded as fully proved: and that, after seriously considering the explanations and defence of the Rev. Egerton Ryerson and Rev. William Ryerson, the Representatives of the Upper-Canada Conference, on these points, and giving them the full weight to which they might be deemed to be entitled, the Com- mittee are decidedly of opinion that the Representatives of the Upper- Canada Conference have entirely failed to establish a justification ; inasmuch as it appears that, notvvithstaniling all they have stilted and explained, there existed, — 1. A practical superseding of the Rev. Joseph Stinson, as Tresident, .A". DOCTMENTH RBLATINO TO } 1)j communicating ivith the Governor- General separately, and without his knowledge, and by acting without him, and without the Committee of the Upper-Canada Conference,— of which Committer Mr. Stinion wa« a member, and Chairman, (ex-qfficioy) — on matters affectiing the permanency of the Government Grant to the Wesleyan Missionary Society. 2. A violation of the obligations arising from the Union, in not opposing, but rather countenancing, the payment of our Grant in a cer- tain contingency, not to us, but to the Upper-Canada Conference, for other and different purposes. 3. The decidedly and prominently political character of the " Chris- tian Guardian," in violation of pledges given to us and to the Upper- Canada Conference from 1833 to 1839. II. That, after a most careful examination of the complicated and difficult subjects which have engaged the attention of the Committee appointed by the British Conference of 1839, to decide finally in »iU matters relating to the Union existing between the British Conference and the Upper-Canada Conference, and to our Indian Missions in Upper Canada, and after having, in the course of a very protracted discussion, had abundant proof of the wisdom, care, and kindness which the aforesaid Committee have manifested in relation to the affairs of Upper Canada ; the present Committee are unanimously of opinion, that the members of the Committee on Upper-Canadian affairs, particularly in the Resolutions adopted at their Meeting in London, on Wednesday, April 29th, 1840, and transmitted to the Upper-Canadian Conference, have strictly adhered to those great principles which have always guided the Wesleyan Body ; and that they are therefore entitled to the thanks of the Conference for the important services which they have rendered to the common cause of Wesleyan Methodism. III. Aflber a close consideration of the Resolutions of the Upper- Canada Conference of 1840, in answer to the Resolutions of our Com- mittee on Upper-Canada affairs, at their Meeting on i^pril 29th, 1840, it was resolved,— 1 . That this Committee is most happy to perceive that one of these Resolutions, which determines that the "Christian Guardian" shall cease to be a political paper, and shall be confined to purely religious and literary subjects and articles of religious intelliponco> u, lo that "jxtent satisfactory : but that the unqualified reservation of the '' Clergy-Reserve Question," — a reservation already so construed and abused as to be pleaded in justification of an almost unlimited discus- sion* of great and general principles on Ecclesiastical Polity, held sacred by th\^ Body ; — and the absence of any adequate security for a more faithfdl observance of this Resolution than has been maintained with respe 't to r'imi't r pled^.es repeatedly given from 1833 to 1839 j — in connexion witii the fact that a direct negative was simultaneously given 10 ano'her series of Resolutions, which would have been much WE8LEYAN METHODISM IN rPPER CANADA. more explicit and latitfnctory en the acrcral auhjccts referred to ;— ore circumstances which the Committi' deeply regret, and cannot but regard with distrust and disapprobation. 2. That on the other important topics cmliruccd in the Resolutions of our Committee on Upper (*unadu Aitiiirs, dated April 29tli, 1840, the Resolutions of the last Upper-Canada Conferpnce appear rather to imply an acquiescence in the evils complained of, and an official adop- tion of them, than a cordial determination to prevent their future recurrence by substantial and efficient measures ; and seem to evince that there is a decided difference between the two Conferences on the construction of the Articles of Union, in reference to funda- mental principles essential to the good working of the Union, and which the Committee are of opinion that the British Conference cannot abandon without compromising its own consistency and public reputa- tion, inasmuch as it cannot safely be identified in views add responsi- bility with any Body, however respected, over whose public proceedings it is denied the right and power of exerting any oificiul influence, so as to secure a reasonable and necessary co-ordinate but efficient direction, during the continuance of the Union. IV. That, in the judgment of this Committee, nothing has occurred, in the whole course of these negotiations, to shake the confidence of the Conference in the Rev. Joseph Stinson and Rev. Matthew Richey ; and that the members of the Committee cannot but express their hearty esteem and approbation of the ability, fidelity, and diligence, with which these respected brethren have performed the duties officially confided to them. V. That, notwithstanding the grounds of grievance and complaint on which the Committee have felt it to be their duty to express >o strong an opinion, they are aware of the desirableness of maintaining the existing Union between the two Bodies, for reasons which relate to the general interests of our common Christianity, and to the continued con- nexion of the Province with the Mother Country. Yet, in their judg- ment, that Union can be advantageously maintained only by the strict and undeviating adherence of our Upper-Canadian brethren to the following principles and regulations : — 1. That the continuation of the Government Grant to the Wesleyan Missionary Society be cordially assented to and supported by our Upper- Canadian brethren, even if its payment should be ultimately transferred, as proposed in the " Clergy-Reserve Bill," lately passed by the Imperial Parliament, from the Casual and Territorial Revenue, on which it is now placed, tc the Clergy-Reserve Fund in that Province ; and that, as it appears thuc the payment of the Grant has actually been again sus- pended, ind is at present withheld, to the great inconvenience and embarrfi sment of our Missions in Upper Canada, the Rev. Egerton Ryerson shall addn ^ Uftcr to Lord John Russell, disclaiming any intention or wish to deprive i le "Wesleyan Missionary Society of the Grant of jE700 per annum, He ired to that Society as a fixed charge for 14 DOCUMENTS RELATING TO Missionary purposes in Upper Canada, — requesting that its regular payment may be continued, — and assuring his Lordship that any other construction which may have been put upon his letter to the Governor- in-chief, was founded in a misapprehension of his meaning. 2. That the " Christian Guardian," or whatever Newspaper or Peri- odical may in future be recognised as the Oflficial Organ of the Upper- Canadian Conference, shall entirely abstain from all party political rea- sonings and discussions, confining its expressions of opinion to religioiis and literary topics. 3. That such Ofiicial Organ admit and maintain all the acknow- ledged principles of the Wesleyan-Methodist Connexion ; and that, in seeking for a right understanding on this point, the Committee have especial reference to that principle of our Body, which asserts it to be the duty of civil Governments to employ their influence, and a portion of their resources, for the support of the Christian religion. ; - The Committee recommend, in conclusion, that the Conference now remit the whole affair to the management of a Special Committee, whose duty it shall be to draw up a statement, in a more detailed man- ner, of the points on which full satisfactior will be expected from the Conference of Upper Canada, and to make such a Report of the Reso- lutions of that Body thereupon as may enable our next Conference, assembling in Manchester, to determine finally the course which, in reference to this Union, it may then appear proper to adopt in the set- tlement of the whole affair. II. THE DECISION OF THE CONFERENCE. ' The Report above inserted was presented to the Conference, and read in the hearing of the Rev. Egerton Ryerson and Rev. William Ryerson, Representatives of the Upper-Canada Conference. They desired a copy of it, which was accordingly handed to them ; and they retired to examine its several parts. When they returned, they were again heard at length, and mutual explanations were made on several points to which they demurred. In the end, they frankly and expli- citly declared it as their opinion, that the Upper-Canada Conference, of which they are the Representatives, would never be induced to accede to the views which are contained in the aforesaid Report, and con- cerning which such serious misunderstandings have arisen; and that the maintenance of such views on the part of this Body would be regarded by the Upper-Canada Conference as a virtual dissolution of the Union. Upon hearing this, the Conference was reluctantly led to the conviction, that a continuation of the more intimate connexion established by the Articles of 1833 is quite impracticable. The Con- ference could not overlook the fact, that the pacific Resolutions which had already been proposed to the Upper-Canada Conference of 1840 by some of its Members, were negatived by a large majority ; and that, from the statement of the Rev. Egerton Ryerson and Rev. William Ryerson just made, the same disposition evidently remains, and clearly WESLEYAN METHODISM IN UPPER CANADA. m o precludes a farther perpetuation of the Union. But the Conference wishes to express its A'aternal and affectionate feelings towards the Upper-Canadian Brethren, whose continued and increasing prosperity in the enjoyment of " all spiritual blessings," and in the extension of all beneficial spiritual influence, it earnestly desires ; and while the relation subsisting between the two Conferences may henceforth be simply that which marks two independent sections of the great Methodist Family, it is devoutly hoped, and implored at the hands of our most merciful God, that they, and all other parts of the same Family, may always preserve towards each other such sentiments of sincere Christian friendship as become those portions of the Church of Christ which agree in many points of Doctrine and Discipline, closely bearing, as they firmly believe, on the best interests of mankind. And in order that every arrangement may be made in the kindest and most affec- tionate manner, the Conference deems it right to confide the whole affair to a Special Committee, who shall be invested with full authority to act, during the interval between this time and the next Conference in Manchester, in all matters connected with this subject, and espe- cially to take measures, in conjunction with our General Missionary Committee, for the future prosecution of our work in the United Province of Canada, and of our Missions among the Aborigines and Destitute Settlers ; — with power also to add to their number, and to appoint from among themselves such Sub -Committees as may be thought advisable. It is likewise recommended, that the Rev. Egerton Ryerson and Rev. William Ryerson be invited to attend the said Com- mittee, or any Sub-Committee or Deputation which may be appointed by it, with a design to render every plan and disposition of affairs as amicable as possible. On the whole subject, therefore, the Conference resolves, unanimously,— I. That the first four Resolutions contained in the preceding Report of the Committee, as those Resolutions are revised and amended, be received and adopted by the Conference. II. That as, for the reasons above suggested, a perpetuation of the Union between the British and Upper-Canadian Conferences is judged to be impracticable, the fifth Resolution contained in the aforesaid Report, under all the circumstances in which the subject is now pre- sented for the decision of the Conference, cannot be received and adopted ; but that the following Committee be appointed, with all the powers already mentioned, to take the most judicious and Christian measures, in conjunction with the Rev. Egerton Ryerson and Rev. William Ryerson, as Representatives of the Upper-Canadian Confer- ence, that the fonnal dissolution of the Union may not be accompanied with anything that might produce embittered feelings, or injure mutual charity ; viz.^ the President and Secretary of the Conference, the Rev. Messrs. Richard Reece, Richard Treffry, Thomas Jackson, John Scott, John P. Haswell, Edmund Grindrod, Thomas Galland, James Dixon, Joseph Taylor, Peter M'Owan, Matthew Richey, Joseph Stinson, it'. 16 DOCUME>fTS RELATINO TO George Marsden, William Lord, Robert Wood, Barnard Slater, John Bigg, William Bennett, William M. Bunting, John Davis, sen., John Bowers, William Atherton, Richard Waddy, Isaac Keeling, Timothy Ingle, John Mason, jun., Samuel Jackson, William Yevers, Joseph Fowler, William Barton, Francis A. West, Samuel D. Waddy, together with the Missionary Secretaries. III. That the above-named Committee shall hold its first Meeting in Manchester, on Wednesday, August 19th next, and its subsequent Meetings as may be found convenient or necessary. !*' V. lA^ PROCEEDINGS OF THE SPECIAL COMiMITTEE ON CANADIAN AFFAIRS, AT ITS FIRST MEETING, HELD IN MANCHESTER, ON WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 19th, 1840; AND OF THE SUB- COMMITTEE WHICH WAS APPOINTED BY THE ABOVE- NAMED SPECIAL COMMITTEE TO CONFER WITH THE REV. EGERTON RYERSON AND REV. M'lLLIAM RYERSON, ON THURSDAY, SEPTE3IBER 3d, 1840. Pursuant to the last Article in the preceding Decision of the British Conference, the Members of the Special Committee on Canadian Affairs assembled in Manchester, on Wednesday, August 19th, 1840 ; and, with an earnest desire to conduct every thing in the most Christian and amicable manner, according to the instructions which they had received from the Conference, resolved, — That a Sub-Committee, consisting of the President and Secretary of the Conference, the Missionary Secretaries, and the Rev. Messrs. Richard Reece, William Atherton, William Lord, Joseph Stinson, Matthew Richey, John Scott, Edmund Grindrod, Thomas Jackson, John Mason, jun., Isaac Keeling, John P. Haswell, and John Bowers, shall be, and hereby is, appointed to meet the Rev. Egerton Ryerson and Rev. William Ryerson, the Representatives of the Upper-Canada Conference, at 77) Hatton- Garden, London, on Thursday, September 3d next ensuing, at ten o'clock in the forenoon, for the particular pur- pose of having a free and friendly conversation with them on matters now pending between the British smd Upper-Canada Conferences. When the above Resolution was communicated to the Messrs. Ryerson, it appeared that they had made arrangements to sail for Canada on Tuesday, September 1st, and that they could not be prevailed upon to delay their departure a few days longer. An invita- tion was afterwards sent to them by a messenger, asking them to meet Mr. Scott and a few other friends, meaning such Members of the Sub-Committee as were then in London, on Saturday, August 29th. They signified to the messenger that they would reply to that invita- WESLEYAN METHODISM IN UPPER CANADA. 17 rd Slater, John »vis, sen., John eling, Timothy fevers, Joseph addy, together tion. But no reply was ever received. The Messrs. Ryerson left England at the time they had purposed. Just before their departure, however, they addressed a lengthened letter to the Secretary of the British Conference, which, with many other papers and documents, they had also published in a separate pamphlet. But, notwithstanding the precipitate departure of the Messrs. Ryerson, the Members of the Sub-Committee met at the time and place appointed; and unanimously passed the following Resolu- tions : — CANADIAN VCHESTER, THE SUB. E ABOVE. 'ITH THE RYEHSON, ion of the mittee on y> August ing in the istructions I. That, since the primary object of this Meeting, which was to have a free and friendly conversation with the Messrs. Ryerson on m..'tt€rs now pending between the British and Upper-Canada Conferences, ."s precluded by their early departure from England, a Meeting of the whole Special Committee on Canadian Affairs shall be convened on Tuesday next, September 8th, at twelve o'clock, and, by adjournment, on the two following days, at the Centenary-Hall, Bishopsgate-Street- Within, London ; that each Member of that Committee shall immedi- ately be furnished with a copy of the Messrs. Ryerson's pamphlet, in order that he may be the more fully prepared to deliver his sentiments concerning it; and that the General Committee of the Wesleyan Missionary Society shall be requested to hold a Meeting on Wednesday, September 9th, with a design to consider such proposals as the Special Committee on Canadian Affairs may deem it right to submit to them on Missionary arrangements and proceedings in Canada. II. That Mr. Richey be requested to proceed forthwith to Upper Canada, for the purpose of being on the spot to supply our friends there with such information and explanations as can be afforded only by one who was present during the discussion of the whole business at the late British Conference, and which, being timely given, may prevent much anxiety and misconstruction. VI. RESOLUTIONS OF THE SPECIAL COMMITTEE ON CANADIAN AFFAIRS, AT ITS SECOND MEETING, HELD IN THE CEN- TENARY-HALL, BISHOPSGATE-STREET-WITHIN, LONDON, ON TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 8th, 1840, AND, BY ADJOURN- MENT, ON THE TWO FOLLOWING DAYS. Agreeably to the summons of the Sub-Committee, as mentioned in the document last preceding, the Special Committee met at the time and place above-named ; and, after a minute and patient investigation of the several particulars which were brought under their considera- tion, unanimously agreed to the following Resolutions :— , ,^ c 18 DOCUMENTS RELATIwa TO I. That this Committee would be very far from doing justice to its unfeigned sentiments, were it not strongly to express its surprise and regret that the Messrs. Ryerson did not afford to the Sub-Committee, which was appointed at Manchester on the 19th of August last, any opportunity of meeting and conversing with them on matters of great moment to the Upper-Canada Conference. Although, in consequence of those sittings ia which the Committee on Canadian Affairs, (appointed during the meeting of the late British Conference,) and the Conference itself, listened for an unprecedented length of time to the statements and explanations of the Messrs. Ryerson, the Conference was de- tained several days at Newcastle; and although one of the main objects for which a Representative from the Upper-Canada Confer- ence had been invited to England was, that, if he should fail to satisfy the British Conference of the propriety and usefulness of continuing the Union between the two Conferences, he should then endeavour to arrange the terms of separation in the most fair and amicable manner ; yet, when the Messrs. Ryerson were earnestly desired to remain a very short time longer, for the purpose of making such arrangements, or of having friendly interviews with the Sub-Committee for that end, they could not be prevailed upon to delay their departure, or even to accept of the invitation which was sent to them that they might, before their departure, meet such Members of the Sub-Committee as were then in London, for the sake of so necessary an object. The surprise of the Committee at this haste and inattention is not lessened by the reply, already inserted by anticipation in the pamphlet which the Messrs. Ryerson have published, — that they gave notice at New- castle of their intention to leave England on the 1st of Septem- ber, (a notice which was never understood by the Newcastle Committee or the Conference to have been received,) because the intention to hasten their departure frorn the Conference before its sit- tings were closed, and before it had time and opportunity finally to conclude its proceedings and decision on the affairs of Upper Canada, was alike surprising, aud irreconcilable with the views entertained by this Committee concerning the importance of the business which then remained to be adjusted. II. That this Committee also deeply regrets the circumstance that the Messrs. Ryerson have judged it expedient, previously to their pre- cipitate departure, to publish a pamphlet on the subject of the Union of the two Conferences and its Dissolution, — a publication, the ten- dency of which is to hinder and embarrass, if not to prevent, any such friendly adjustment as a Meeting of the Sub-Committee and the Representatives might have happily accomplished. The Committee is at a loss to understand why the Messrs. Ryerson should have deemed it proper to consign their papers to the press in such haste that, while some documents are given to the public which possess no particular relevancy or importance to the case at issue, others are omitted which they themselves profc^a to regard as " of importance." It is matter of ««g justice to its IS its surprise and > Sub-Committee, August last, any matters of great > in consequence ffairs, (appointed i the Conference > the statements erence was de- "e of the main Canada Confer- Id fail to satisfy 8 of continuing n endeavour to icable manner ; •d to remain a arrangements, 'e for that end, re, or even to t they might, Committee as object. The is not lessened nphlet which ►tice at New- of Septem- ■ Newcastle because the efore its sit- ty finally to t. per Canada, ertained by which then stance that their pre- the Union i» the ten- any such and the omittee is e deemed »at, while 'articular id which natter of :<4 WESLGYAN METHODISM IN UPPKR CANADA. flf regret with the Committee that the Messrs. Ryerson should have appealed to the public at all in the present stage of the business ; and especially that, having so determined, they should send forth a partial pamphlet, from which the public cannot possibly decide on the whole merits of the case. The Committee cannot but express its strong dis- approbation of such a proceeding, and regard it as another proof of that want of a conciliatory spirit which has marked all the proceedings of the Upper- Canadian Representatives. III. That a copy of the pamphlet of the Messrs. Ryerson having been furnished to each Member of this Committee, in order to a separate and private examination of its contents ; the principal reason- ings and allegations which it contains having been considered ; and the explanations and answers of Dr. Alder, Mr. Lord, and Mr. Stin- son, having been heard, the Committee deliberately concurs in the conviction that the chief objections urged by the Messrs. Ryerson in their Letter to Lord John Russell, and in their Letter to the Secretary of the British Conference, and the pretended discrepancies which they allege as being found in the Documents to which they reply; have been most satisfactorily met and explained. IV. That, in particular, it is made apparent, by reference to the financial accounts of the period in question, that Dr. Alder's state- ments with respect to the Missions of the Upper- Canada Conference, can be irrefragably sustained against the remarks and insinuations contained in the said pamphlet. The Messrs. Ryerson broadly state, in their Letter to Lord John Russell, dated August 20th, 1840, that, " in the printed Reports of the" Missionary " Society's Agent in Upper Canada, embracing the same period," that is, from August, 1833, to December, 1839, " the total amount reported to have been expended in that Province, ip connexion with the Missions, is £13,475. 1*. 4//. sterling, £4,331. 17*. 7d. less than the sum stated by Mr. Alder. The manner in which this sum of £4,331. 17*. 7d. sterling has been expended has not been stated in the Society's Reports, either in London or in Canada. It remains for Mr. Alder to explain." From this extract it is evident that the Messrs. Ryerson had seen the Society's General Report published in London, as well as the Local Report published in Canada ; and, therefore, that tbey can plead no excuse on the ground of ignorance. Now the simple and undisguised fact of the case is this. The Local Committee in Canada publishes a Report of those moneys only which are expended in the Province for Missionary purposes, under its own supervision. But there is another and a large portion of the expense connected with these Missions, which is laid out under the immediate direction of the General Committee, and of which the Local Committee can take no official cognizance^ but all of which appears in the duly -audited accounts of the Parent Society. Thus the sums advanced under the eye of the Local Committee amount to what is named in the Local Report, from inhich the Messrs. Ryerson draw their statement. But other sums c 2 i:! r-1 M £ il J m DOCUMENTS IlELATING TO were expended, under the proper direction of the General Committee. Jbr the outfit and passage of the General Superintendent of the Canadian Missions and his family^ and for their support from 1833 to 1839,— ^r the occasional support of a young man as the Presi- dent's Assistant^— for the out/it and passage of five Missionaries to Canada,— for the out/it, passage, and other expenses, ordinary and extraordinary, of Messrs. Lord and Harvard, as Presidents of the Upper-Canada Conference, — and towards the expenses op Mb. Eqerton Ryerson during his stay in England in the year 1837. Yet, strange and incredible as it may appear, all these items, which were expended in connexion with the Missions in Upper Canada, are entu-ely overlooked and omitted by the Messrs. Eyerson. When the whole is laid together and summed up, as it has been in the presence of this Committee, it is found that Dr. Alder's statement is perfectly correct. V. That, in reference to the alleged want of cordiality and courtesy in the reception of the Messrs. Ryerson at the British Conference, it is not correct to say that the Conference, or its official Representatives, as such, treated them otherwise than in a respectful and friendly manner : — for they were courteously introduced by the President in form, at the first convenient opportunity, at the same time and in the same way that Messrs. Stinson and Richey were ^troduced. Mr. Egerton Ryerson, strangely deputed, not merely to give information, but, formally and officially, as one of the Representatives, respecting matters in which his own conduct and proceedings were especially the subjects of complaint, admits that, for his part, he could not with probability calculate on being received with the same friendliness as on former occasions. And as to those Members of the Conference against whom chiefly, (i^ individuals, these complaints are aimed, the SINCERITY which is a part of their character as Britons and Wesleyans would not admit of their exhibiting appearances of cordiality which, in the circumstances, could not really exist; nor would Christian PRUDENCE admit of their having frequent and unrestrained communi- cation with a person of whose unfaithfulness, slipperiness, and disregard of the implied confidence of friendly interviews, they had been con- vinced by painful experience.* • The following Extract of a Letter from the Rev. .Joseph Fowler, Superintendent of the Newcastle-upon-Tyne West Circuit, may not unfitly be introduced here. It is dated, Newcastle, September 8th, 1840, and addressed to the Rev. William Barton, one of the Sub-Secretaries of the Wesleyan Conference. *' Had it been practicable, I should like to have been present at your Meeting in London ; but distance, duty, &c., rendered it impossible. I am sorry the Messrs. Ryerson are not with you. The * Official Communication ' of which they speak was an amended or more correct copy of the Resolutions. I believe it was stated by the President that this would be forwarded in the co Tse of a few days ; and, for that purpose, we were requested to inquire their adcrei s. The note on pages 84, 85," of the Messrs. Ryerson's pamphlet, " is as unmerited as it is offensive. As well might Mr. Marriott," Treasurer of the General Chapel Fund, a gentleman who was #■ eral Committee, itendent of thl port from 1833 as the Presi- ^isshnaries to ordinary and ?sidents of the 3NSE8 OP Ma. IN THE YEAR 1 these items, ms in Upper ssrs. Ryerson. »s been in the 1 statement is and courtesy iference, it is 'resentativesy and friendly President in 2 and in the luced. Mr. inibrmation, > respecting pedally the i not with iness as on Conference wmed, the W"esleyans ity which, Christian communi- disregard >een con- irintendent here. It William Meeting in e Messrs. ey speak ^s stated ys; and, 'ages 84, As well wlio was WESLEY AN METHODISM IN UPPKR CANADA. Ml VI. That, with respect to the Documents enumerated in the New- castle Committee's Report to the Conference on these Canadian affairs, and the objections and insinuations of the Messrs. Ryerson concerning the mode of selecting, arranging, and describing them, it is plain that the Newcastle Committee did not profess or intend to give, in the list of Documents, the arguments on either side, which had been read, stated, or quoted ; and that the said Documents were arranged chiefly with regard to the relation and mutual dependence of the subjects. The Newcastle Committee had neither time nor inclination for any such wilful misarrangement or designedly partial summary of the con- tents of the Documents in question as are imputed by insinuation in the remarks of the Messrs. Ryersun, and which this Committee indignantly and entirely repudiates. The object of the Newcastle Committee, in preparing such a list of the Documents and Statements which had been brought forward, was simply to show to the Confer- ence that all the evidence which the parties regarded as essential to an investigation of the case had been produced and considered. Nor is it true, as the Messrs. Ryerson insinuate, that certain documents are omitted. They are comprised in Number 20 of the List of Docu- ments, under the general but sufficiently explicit title of ''' Correspond- ence of the Rev. Egerton Ryerson with the Governor-General of British North America." VII. That this Committee regrets to perceive, in the same publica- tion, numerous additional proofs of the disingenuous spirit in which Mr. Egerton Ryerson has conducted his part of the whole affair ; with grievous examples of the introduction of matter totally irrelevant, of insidious mis-statement, mystifying prolixity, and injurious insinuation, which, though not in all cases literally false, are calculated to produce all the effect of falsehood. VIII. That this Committee hereby records its deliberate and serious not likely to be treated with disrespect or neglect, — " as well might Mr. Marriott complain, and with as much reason. But suppose they," the Messrs. Ryerson, " had been treated in this matter as uncourteously as their pamphlet represents, the ' Authorities of the British Conference,^ as the writer designates them, were not responsible for that act. Whoever was to blame, thej/ teere not. The case was this : Long before I knew that it was our duty to make provision for Mr. Marriott, or that any Deputation whatever was coming from the Canadian Conference, our friends had received notice of the Ministers they were to expect, and were fully engaged to take as many as they could accommodate. Some Ministers had actually arrived ; and the rest were on their way. We had, therefore, no alternative but either to send them," Mr. Marriott and the Messrs. Ryerson, " to Sunderland, or, if they remained in Newcastle, to hire lodgings. It was said they must remain in town ; and the best and only thing we could do, was done. For Mr. Marriott and tlie Messrs. Ryerson we hired rooms, &c. I mentioned to Mr. £. Ryerson my regret that we had not been able to place them in the families of some of our friends, and stated the reason, adding, I hoped that they had been comfortable ; and his answer was,— I believe the very words, but I am sure to the eflffect, — * Exceedingly comfortable ; every thing to our mind.' After this, to write about being < sent to a solitary boarding-house as a leper,' is too bad ! " 22 DOCUMENTS nELATlNU TO protest against various vituperative passages in the pamphlet of the Messrs. Ryerson, which cannot now be distinctly noted and exposed as their character and tendency deserve, — which are as groundless and misleading as the parts remarked upon in the preceding Resolutions, —and which also might be as effectually refuted. But to answer minutely and at length all the objectionable parts of such a pamphlet would, in the opinion of this Committee, be a culpable waste of time, and a trespass on the attention of our friends, who, from the speci- mens already given, may easily infer the character of the whole. IX. That, therefore, this Committee will only, in conclusion on tTiId subject, record its solemn assertion of the utter want of all regard to truth, justice, and peace, implied in the final sentence of the Preface to the Pamphlet of the Messrs. Ryerson, which describes the ground assumed by us as involving only " the intolerance of party feeling, matters of Bhillings and pence, doubtful questions of human expediency, and assumptions of prerogative and power, as novel as they are unjust and inexpedient." To this the Committee briefly reply as follows : — 1. It is NOT TRUE that party-feeling has produced the remonstrances of the British Committee and Conference against the habitual inter- meddling of Mr. Egerton Ryerson and of the " Chrlctian Guardian" in matters of party politics. Those remonstrances have been equally directed against all the various interferences of Mr. Egerton Ryerson as a Christian Minister, and of the " Christian Guardian" as the Official Organ of a Religious Community ecclesiastically identified by the Union with British Methodism, which have occurred in the last seven years, during which period Mr. Egerton Ryerson and the " Guardian" have successively and in turn supported different administrations, and opposite systems of colonial policy. Our objection has ever been to such puiUicol interferences being officially^ and under the collective influence of the Canadian Methodists as a Religious Body, practised at all^ and not to the particular direction given to them at any specific period. The Letter of the Missionary Secretaries to Sir George Arthur, and that addressed by Dr. Alder to Mr. Stinson, under the date of January 14th, 1839, both given in the AppenJix * to these Resolutions, will sufficiently illustrate this matter. 2. As to " matters of shillings and pence," the Committee think that attempts, suuh as those to which Mr. Egerton Ryerson has been proved to be a party, to alienate from the Wesleyan Misp;Ionai'y Society a Grant for religious purposes in Canada, to which the Royal Faith was pledged to that Society in 1832, do not involve mere matters of pecuniary consideration, but are a direct and criminal violation of moral principle and honour. Such a suggestion about " shillings and pence " is particularly unbecoming, when it is considered that all the pecuniary benefit of the Union was, in this case, received by Canada, {ind that a heavy pecuniary expenditure, over and above the sum • See Appendix, No». IV. V. WESLEYAN METHODISM IN UI'PBR CANADA. fP granted by the Home Government, and the proceeds of the Canadian Auxiliary Society, was incurred, from purely benevolent and Christian motives, by the British AVesleyan Missionary Society, and paid rmt of its General Fund. 3. That as to the " doubtful questions " and " assumptions of pre- rogative and power," to which the paragraph refers, this Committee maintains that the British Conference alone has the right of deciding with what class of principles it can honourably, and with a due regard to its own consistency and long-cherished views, be publicly identified, and a correspondent right to dissolve a Union with any other Body whatever, which deliberately and tenaciously persists to advocate by its recognised Agent, or in its Official Organ, other and opposite prin- ciples of which it conscientiously disapproves ; and that as to the alleged assumption of power, all the power which the British Confer- ence or its Representatives have ever wished to exercise was the fair and legitimate influence which it ought in all reason to possess in refer- ence to any other Ecclesiastical Body which seeks to have " Union with it," and with which, not at all for its own sake or benefit, but for the benefit of that other Body, it has consented to be in public opinion in a great measure identified. This Committee, with perfect confidence, reiterates the sentiment expressed by the Committee on Canadian Affairs to the last Conference, (see Minutes of 1840, page 124,) that the British Conference " cannot safely be identified in views and responsibility with any Body, however respected, over whose public proceeding!) it is denied the right and power of exerting any official influence, so as to secure a reasonable and necessary co-ordinate but efficient direction, during the continuance of the Union." The peremptory denial of any such right by the Canadian Conference was of itself a virtual abandonment of the Union, and rendered just and necessary its recent and formal dissolution. X. That it was, as already expressed, the earnest wish of this Com- mittee to adjust in a friendly manner, and in conjunction with the Representatives of the Upper-Canadian Conference, those measures which might be requisite or desirable to prevent painful collision between the two Conuaxions ; and while it is deeply to be regretted that this wish has been disappointed through the precipitate departure of the Messrs. Ryerson, and by the hasty publication of their oflensive pamphlet, this Committee, nevertheless, considers it right and useful to proceed as far as possible in its purposed endeavours to adopt such principles and arrangements as may prevent unseemly strife between two kindred religious Bodies ; and therefore agrees in the following principles as those which should be adopted and mainUUned in carry- ing into effijct the Dissolution of the Union ; namely : — 1. To fall back upon the status quo, as it existed immediately before the formation of the Union ; including the actual occupation, by Missionaries in connexion with the British Conference, of Kingston, Toronto, and the St> Clair Mission, and including also the General a.»»>*,s*r!-' 84 DOCOMENTS RGLATINft TO -» •> -'nif 1 Right* which the British Conference possessed before the Union, and with which the Cnnadiun Conference, in the interval between its separation from the Methodists of the United States' Connexion and its Union with us, had no power of interference, of establishing Missions wherever there should be found great spiritual destitution among Settlers or Indians, or of extending our work wherever there is what the Wesleyan Missionary Committee may deem necessity, and a sufficient call of duty. ' 2. To retain those Missionary Establishments among destitute Settlers or Indians, which have been formed since the Union, or which have been to a considerable extent supported by the Funds of the Wesleyan Missionary Society. n 3. In the exercise of the rights ihus claimed, to avoid any needless and vexatious division of the Societies in Connexion with the Upper- Canada Conference, or the doing of anything in a spirit of strife and contention ; and to maintain, as fully as possible, an amicable and Christian relation and deportment towards the Ministers and Societies of the Upper-Canada Conference. XI. That, in conformity with the principles above-mentioned, thig Committee recommends, and in this recommendation it has the entire concurrence of the Wesleyan Missionary Committee, that the follow- ing Stations be retained, as having been occupied previously to the Union ; namely, Kingston, Toronto, and the St. Clair Mission ; and that the following Stittions be occupied by us on the ground that they are Missionary Establishments which, in the::^ present localities, have been commenced under the direction of the Wesleyan Missionary Society, or on which its funds have been larj-:;!/ expended; namely, Aldersville, including the Manual-Labour School for Indian children, established and supported by us, Goderich, Warwick and Adelaide, Barrie and Coldwater, Guelph and Amherstburgh. N. B. The Station at Lake Superior, being included in the general arrangement into which the Missionary Society has entered with the Honourable Hudson's Bay Company, will, of course, be continued • This principle is substantially a reiteration of that which was avowed and main- tained by the Wesleyan Missionary Committee in February, 1832, in its correspond- ence with the Upper-Canada Board of Missions. The proof of this will be found in the following Extract, taken from the Minute-Book of the Wesleyan fllission- ary Society, under the date of February 15th, 1832, and a copy of which was sent to the Upper-Canada Conference : " That, notwithstanding these views of the Committee, Messrs. Ryerson and Jones were informed, that the Committee intend nothing as to Upper Canada contrary to that brotherly kindness which ought to exist between two kindred religious Bodies ; but that they shall not consider that principle at all contravened, should they fix Missionaries in places of consider- able population, although the Canadian Conference may have Societies in such places, the population being such as to afford reasonable ground to conclude that there is a sufficient sphere of labour for each ; much less that it would be any infringement of the said principle, should a Alission be planted among Settlers not yet provided with religiouB ordinances." . y. iOlfttm WESLEY AN METHODISM IN UPPER CANADA. Si9 under the direction of the Ocnerul Superintendent of our Missions in the Western District of Canada. XII. That this Committee deems it advisable that the places pro- posed to be retained in Upper Canada, shall, in connexion with our numerous existing Stations in Lower Canada, be classed as the Eastern and Western Districts^ under the general head of Canada. The Rev. Joseph Stinson is hereby appointed, in the name and on the behalf of the British Conference, to be the Chairman, as well as the General Superintendent of Missions, in the Western ^District. And, in order to promote the brotherly union and harmony of our Mis- sionaries, and the Societies under their care, in the UnitedJProvincc, a Committee of Consultation i,sjifi.reby appointed for the present year, which Committee shall consist of the Rev. Messrs. Stinson and Harvard, being the Chairmen of the two Canada Districts, and the Rev. Messrs. Case, Richey, Evans, Lusher, and^Squbes, with power to add to their number. Mr. Stinson shall be the Chairman, and Mr. Richey the Secretary, of the said Committee, the Members of which are directed to confer frequently by letter or personal interviews, especially on subjects affecting the stability and prosperity of our work, or the general interests of our Missions. The Committee aforenamed is authorized to meet at such times and places as the Chairman shall deem necessary, and to make or sanction such alterations of the Stations in the Province as need shall require until the ensuing British Conference. To the same Committee is confided the general duty of transacting affairs, on behalf of the Wesleyan] Missionary Society, with the OflBicial Authorities in the United Province of Canada. The Chairmen of the two Canada Districts are also advised to make such arrangements as may admit of the attendance of both Chairmen at the regular Annual Meeting of each District. XIII. That this Committee deems it worthy of the consideration of the Missionary Committee, and the ensuing British Conference whether, the disciplinary system of Districts being still maintained in our North American Missions, it would not also be useful to hold, once in three years, a British North American Conference, to be constituted of Members chosen, or allowed to attend, from the District Meetings in the several Provinces, and to be presided over, when practicable, by a Minister from England, appointed by the Conference for that purpose. XIV. Finally, That this Committee cannot conclude its present deliberations without devoutly imploring the blessing of Alinighty God on the Christian labours which shall hereafter be pursued in the British Dominions of North America, whether by the British Confer- ence in the United Province of Canada, in Nova Scotia, New Bruns- wick, Newfoundland, and the territories of the Hudson's Bay Com- pany, or by the Upper-Canada Conference, in its peculiar department of ministerial service, and in its separate capacity. It has been a painful task to animadvert on several topics which have been pressed on the Committee's attention ; but that task would, in its issue, be still W DOCCMENTI RBLATINO TO MBTnODISM IN TPPEIl CANADA. more painful, if it were aufTercd to abate or quench the unfeigned affec- tion which shall live in the truly Christian heart when all strife dies. The law of Dirine charity imposes obligations which it is not in the power of partial and temporary misapprehension to relax or destroy among those who ** love our Lord Jesus Christ in sincerity," and who, for his name's sake, thirst for the extension of His truth and mercy. To promote the triumphs of yital Christianity among the Settlers and Indians of British North America, the ftuthful servants of our great Master, on both sides of the Atlantic, have ** laboured, and have not fainted." Nor shall the fruit of their labours fail. Let them still pursue their honour- able course, through '* evil report and good report, as deceivers, and yet true ;" and let them not doubt that *' God, even our own God," will more abundantly " bless " them. They are striving to build the Lord's spiritual temple in scenes where the melody of prayer and praise has been but seldom heard ; and, in the presence of the most formidable obstacle which may arise to discourage their efforts and restrain their zeal, they too are taught to say, with the meek confidence of faith and hope, *' Who art thou, O great mountain ? before Zerub- babel thou shalt become a plain : and he shall bring forth the head- Stone thereof with shoutings, crying, Grace, grace imto it." (I ■m-^ ■} iffcc- Tho Br of tiose lie's the tish oth vas made by the Imperial Government to the Missionary Committee before any Union between the British and Canadian Con- ferences was contemplated. It is a fact, that the arrangements connected with the Grant were agreed upon before any overture of Union had been made or accepted. It is a fact, that if no Union had been formed between the Conferences, the Missionary Committee Avould have extended their Missionary 'operations in Upper Canada, and would TO LORD JUIIN nUftSKLL. Iiave received the Grant ; which Grunt, as I have shown your Lord-* slup, has invariahly been paid to their Agent in that Province. Besides, my Lord, the Messrs. Ryerson, in their letter to your Lord- ship, liavc embodied extracts from one Letter addressed by Colonel Rowan to the Rev. A. Green in the year ItJSS, and from another udilrcssed by the Earl of Kipon to Lord Olenelg in the year 1({30, for the purpose of making it appear that, in the view of the Government, the Provincial Conference in Upper Canada possesses at least an equal right to the Grant with the Missionary Committee. Now, if in their judg- ment such be the character of those Documents, how can they assign, as a reason for having admitted the exclusive right of the Missionary Committee to the control of the Grant, the absence of all proof to the contrary until the investigation which was instituted by the Governor- General in 1840, when, for some years previous to that period, they Imd been in possession of Documents, which they now tell your Lord- ship prove that the Missionary Committee possessed no -such right? With such Documents before him, and with such an opinion of their character, how could Mr. E. Ryerson assure Lord Sydenham, in January, ]840, that His Excellency was mistaken in supposing that the Grant had been made to the Wcsleyan Body in Upper Canada, or in aid of its funds ; and then a few months afterwards, in an official communicaiion to your Lordship, appeal to those veiy Documents as furnishing evidence that, when the Grant was bestowed, the Govern- ment supposed that the Provincial Conference in Upper Canada had an interest in it ? A second reason assigned by the Messrs. Ryerson for the admission, on the part of themselves and their associates, of the right of the Missionary Committee to the exclusive control of the Grant, is, that " it had always been paid out of the Casual and Territo- rial Revenue with which they had alwnys felt and declared they had no right to interfere ; " and yet, in the same Letter, they intimate to your Lordship that they might have complained of having been over- looked in the Distribution of Annual Grants from that fund to the Wesleyan Missionary Committee in London, and to four other Chris- tian denominations in Upper Canada; and they further add, as a gi'ound of complaint against the Agents of the Missionary Committee in Upper Canada, that they had refused to grant to them a portion of the proceeds received from this very fund, for the payment of debts due on Chapels which had been erected ; although at that very time the Agents thus complained of were drawing large sums of money from the funds of the Missionary Committee, which, in addition to the Allowances received from the Crown, were expended in supporting Mis- sionaries and Schoolmasters, and in the erection and repairs of Chapels and School-Houses in Upper Canada. Now, my Lord, if, as the Messrs. Ryerson state, they and the Upper- Canada Conference admitted the exclusive right of the Missionary Committee to receive the Royal Donation of which they are now seeking to deprive them, on the ground that "they have always felt and avowed that they had no 40 APPENDIX.— DR. ALDCns LKTTKn t I right to interfere " with the Fund from which it wna derived, why do they take credit to themselves for not having complained of your Lordship's predecessors in office for having overlooked them ? And why do they find fault because the Agent of the Missionary Commit" tee did not permit them to meddle with a matter in which they state that *' they had always felt and avowed that they had no right to interfere ? " And, furthermore, my Lord, how, under these circum- stances, could Air. Egerton Ryerson do, what he and his brother inform your Lordship ho did, — apply to Lord Sydenham for a rJrant for their Academy to be made a fixed charge on that very Fund respecting which they state that " they had always felt and declared they had no right to interfere," and in this way secure for themselves an early and permanent Grant from the Clergy Ileservc Fund ? Nor was this proposal submitted to the Governor-General, in consequence of that " developement of all the circumstances connected with the Grant" which was the result of His Excellency's investigation; for Mr. E. Ryerson's attempt to add a new charge to that Fund, with ivhich he and the Provincial Conference had "always felt and declared they had no right to interfere," led to the very investigation to which they attach so much importance; and, eventually, to a proposal for inflicting an undeserved injury upon the "Wesleyan Missionary Committee, by depriving them of a Grant secured to them, and, as I trust I have proved to your Lordship's satisfaction, to them only, on the faith of the Royal Word ; and a Grant too which they have faithfully appropriated to the pious and benevolent purposes for ■which it was originally bestowed. No, my Lord, another reason than the one assigned by the Messrs. Ryerson existed for their having so long "admitted the claim of the Wesleyan Missionary Committee to the exclusive control of the Grant ; " and that is, the force of evi- dence, the principal parts of which I have submitted to your Lordship, evidence which can neither be successfully denied, nor ingeniously explained away. So clear and forcible is this evidence, so familiar is it to the Messrs. Ryerson themselves, that, while informing your Lord- ship of the new light in which they profess to have looked upon the claims of the Missionary Committee since January last, they expressly assert the fact for which I contend, that this " Grant was made to the Missionary Committee." Nor is this surprising. The Members of the Provincial Conference know, and the Messrs. Ryerson know, that, in the year 1832, at a period when it was extremely doubtful whether the Union which is now dissolved would ever be formed, I announced to them that the Missionary Committee had entered into arrangements with the Government, by which they stood pledged to multiply their Agents in Upper Canada, on account of which pecuniary aid was to be furnished from the Casual and Territorial Revenue ; and that, whether the two Conferences agreed to form a Union or not, the Mission- ary Committee would fulfil its engagements under the direction of the Jiiitish Conference, whatever course that Assembly might adopt TO LORD JOHN nUNaELL. towards the Conference in l^ppcr Cnnada. They know that they can- not chiim or receive pecuniury aid from the (joverninent for purely spiritual purposes, without an utter ahandonmcut of their own recorded and repeated sentiments and declarations. The Messrs. Ilyerson have indeed communicated to your Lordship .iiformotion which, I am sure, will occasion no small degree of surprise to all ranks and classes of Her Majesty's subjects in Canada ; which is, that my "oft-repeated statement, that both Mr. Kyerson ond the Canada Conference had repeatedly declared * that it is wrong for Churches to receive aid for religious purposes from the State,' is utterly unsup- ported by evidence, and contradicted by numerous facts." AVhy, my Lord, there is scarcely a child in l^pper Canada who can read, that will not be surprised at such a declaration ! Happily for me, the evidence is published, and is accessible to every one who is dis- posed to examine it. The facts of the case are on record, and were recorded by Mr. Egerton Ryerson himself; and io these I make my appeal from bold and unsustaincd disclaimers, and from loose and general statements, which may be susceptible of various and even opposite interpretations. I submit, in the first place, in evidence, the following olticiul declara- tion on this subject, inserted by authority in the official Organ of tLj Upper-Canada Conference, on the 27th of November, 1833 : — " That, without questioning the beneficent intentions of His Majesty's Guvernment m appropriating lands and granting sums of money for the support or the Ministers of one or more churches, it i* our decided opinion that there ought not to be any State Church or State Churches in Canada ; " That the whole proceeds ol tV.c Clergy Reserves ought to bo applied to the general diffusion of education among all classes of inhabitants ; " That no Clergyman of any Denomination ought to be supported by Government Grants or Appropriations ; " That Ministers of all Denominations ought to be supported by the voluntary contributions of the people. ' " We have only further to add that the day in which a portion of the Clergy Reserves should be received as an endowment for the support of the Methodist Clergy, would be, in our opinion, the day of death to Methodism, as to its primitive character and usefulness. " These views and reasons we have stated explicitly at the Colonial Office in London ; they are therefore known there where the question is to be decided." In the year 1837, the following Resolution, in connexion with others, was adopted by the Upper-Canadian Conference : — . ..; " That, at its last two Annual Meetings, this Conference has expressly stated that no public or Government Grants have ever been made to this Body, and that it desired no other support for its Mem- bers than the voluntary contributions of Christian liberality." ti / APPENDIX. — DR. ALDERS LETTER I The following Resolution was drtiwn up, and presented by me to the Provincial Conference at its Session in June, 1839, for the purpose of securing peace and union ; and was rejected by a large majority, on the ground that it involved principles opposed to all their former declarations and professions on the subject to which it relates : — " Resolved, That while this Conference still maintains the opinion which we have so frequently expressed, that it would be unwise and inexpedient to invest any particular Church in this Province with the entire amount of the Clergy Reserves, or with Ecclesiastical Authority over the property or the consciences of the Members of other Churches, we are of opinion that it is a wise and Christian duty for the Government to afford, and for Christian Churches to receive, pecuniary Grants for the purpose of providing the means of Religious Instruction for the mass of the people ; especially for the benefit of the Indian Tribes and the destitute Settlers in this Province." Now, my Lord, it may be asked, Who led the opposition to the last Resolution? The answer is, The Messrs. Ryerson! Who drew up the other Resolutions and statements which I have just quoted, and who caused them to be published and circulated, as con- taining an explicit avowal of the principles and views of the Provincial Conference of Upper Canada? Mr. Egerton Ryerson, who, in connexion with his brother, has told your Lordship, that my state- ment on this subject " was utterly unsupported by evidence." If such evidence is not to be deemed competent testimony, how is any fact to be established ? Besides, at the very time when they thus explicitly repudiated Government Grants for religious purposes, such was the lamentable deficiency of pastoral instruction and oversight in the country, that the same individual who framed the above Resolutions ofiicially announced that " in many places Avhere there should be regular service every Sabbath, there is preaching only once a fortnight, and sometimes only once in four weeks ; " in consequence of which, the people " were kept in a state of infancy in regard to many characteristic qualifications of a well-instructed religious community." Such, my Lord, according to the statement of Mr. E. Ryerson, was the ufi'ecting amount of religious destitution at the time when the Provincial Conference was explicitly proclaiming, through its own organ, its disapprobation of Governm' nt aid for the increase and support of Christian Ministers, and its deliberate opinion that " Ministers of every denomination should be supported by the voluntary contributions of the people," and that " the whole proceeds of the Clergy Reserves should be appropriated to education^ uses and purposes." And I will here add, my Lord, that the real effect of the proposal for transferring the Annual Grant, now paid to the Wesleyan Missionary Committee, to the Messrs. Ryerson and their associates, would be, — to diminish the number of Chris- tian Ministers employed by the Missionary Committee amongst the Indians and destitute Settlers, for the purpose of affording assist- i TO LORD JOHN HUSSELL. 43 ance to a Literary Institution of comparatively little importance to the best interests of Upper Canada. And will your Lordship sanction that proposal? No, my Lord, I ara persuaded that you will not identify your character as a Christian Statesman with a measure, which would lessen the means of instruction, by the Christian ministry, in Her Majesty's province of Upper Canada, in many parts of which the people are, if not altogether, at least almost destitute of the means of grace and salvation. No wonder, my Lord, that incen- diaries and traitors should have disturbed the tranquillity of that fine Province, seeing there is such a lamentable lack of religious instruction, and, as the consequence of that, such a degree of ignor- ance of those great principles which constitute at once the ornament and the defence of the social edifice, and on which, for its security and permanency, it must be based. It is offered as a reason why . the promise of the Crown to the Wesleyan Missionary Committee should be violated, that a strong conviction has been produced in the mind of His Excellency, Lord Sydenham, " that the Canada Conference should alone be regarded as the head and representative of the Wesleyan-Methodist Church in Canada; that the Grant which had been made to the London Wesleyan Missionary Committee out of the Canadian Casual and Territorial Revenue, operated injuriously rather than beneficially to the interests of the Conference of the Wesleyan-Methodist Church in Canada, and was not distributed in a manner, and did not accomplish the objects, contemplated by the Imperial Government when that Grant was made ; and ought to be distributed in a different manner hereafter." Such are the views wliich the >Iessrs. Ryerson have imputed to the Governor-General ; and, whether they are right or wrong in so doing, such unquestionably are their own views. I shall therefore deal with this verbiage as representing the impres- sions which those gentlemen are anxious to make on your Lordship's mind, rather than as expressing the deliberate conviction of Lord Sydenham on this subject ; and, in doing this, I shall remark upon them with greater freedom, as proceeding from such a source, than as if they had emanated from his Lordship. It is, my Lord, most unreasonable to require that " the (Upper) Canada Conference should alone be regarded as the head and represen- tative of the Wesleyan-Methodist Church in Canada," seeing that the Wesleyan Ministers, Societies, and Congregations in Lower Canada, as well as in all the other British American territories, including those belonging to the Honourable the Hudson's-Bay Company, with the single exception of the Province of Upper Canada, are placed under the exclusive pastoral direction and control of the British Conference ; and neither have acknowledged, nor intend to acknowledge, in any sense, the headship of the Provincial Conference. Such a claim is incompatible with one of the principles on which the Union between, the British Conference and the Provincial Conference was founded ; 44 APPENDIX. — DR. ALDERS LETTER I l! if . in the formation of which it was intended to secure to the former " the right and power of exercising a reasonahle and necessary degree of official influence and direction in the puhlic proceedings of the latter Body," as well as to secure to the Upper- Canadian Preachers and societies ' those rights and privileges which belonged to them as Ministers and members of that branch of the Wesleyan Con- nexion. This is evident from Colonel Rowan's letter to Mr. Green, quoted by the Messrs. Ryerson ; from which it appears that it was expected by the Colonial Government that one eiffect of the Union would be to bring Wesleyan Methodism in Upper Canada more under the control of the British Conference : nor was this a groundless expectation ; for the official Address from the Provincial to the British Conference, dated Hallowel, Upper Canada, August 18//j, 1832, contains the following paragraph : — *' We have adopted, and direcj;ed our Secretary to transmit to your Missionary Committee, a series of Resolutions agreed to by this Conference, making proposals and recommending the adoption of measures, by which the Methodist societies in Upper Canada, the neighbouring provinces, and the whole British empire, may be united in one body, under the superintendence of the comrnon parent of Methodism throughout the worlds — the Wesleyan Conference." It would, indeed, have ill accorded with that character for wisdom and prudence which the British Conference has acquired, if it had con- sented to enter into arrangements by which it became to no inconsi- derable degree responsible for the proceedings of another Body, without securing to itielf an efficient direction and control in the public pro- ceedings of that Body ; especially when the position and influence of the Wesleyan Conference of Great Britain is taken into consideration. All this may be deemed very objectionable by those persons who, like Mr. E. Ryerson, are the advocates of the late Lord Durham's views of Colonial Responsible Government, and who condemn your Lordship's constitutional and moderate sentiments on that question ; men, whose own views on the same subject, if practically carried out, would be found incompatible with the due and proper exercise of wholesome authority on the part of the Imperial Government in Her Majesty's Colonies, as well as with their continued subjection to the Mother Country. But it is not the less my duty, (for the reasons which I have assigned,) to protest against the doctrine, now for the first time proclaimed, that the Ministers associated in one part of Canada, as a Provincial Con- ference, are alone entitled to be regarded by Her Majesty's Govern- ment as the "head and representative of the Wesleyan- Methodist Church in Canada," and much less that they should be so regarded under present circumstances. Admitting, however, for the sake of argument, the accuracy of the statement put forth by the Messrs. Ryerson on the assumed pastoral headship of the Provincial Con- ference, it by no means follows that Mr. E. Ryerson was correct in stating to the Governor-General, as he did in that Letter, which— TO LORD JOHN RUSSELL. 4& tvithout the knowledge and consent of the President and otlier Mem- bers of the Conference to which he belongs, and with whom he was in duty bound to have acted on the question of the settlement of the Clergy Reserves— he addressed to His Excellency for the purpose of securing the transfer of the Grant from the Missionary Committee to his own Conference, " that any grant intended to beiiefit the Wesleyan- Methodist Church in (Upper) Canada ought undoubtedly to be placed at the disposal of the Conference of that Church," unless the writer meant, in addition to the multiplication of the agencies employed by the Methodist Church, and its consequent increase of efficiency and usefulness in the Province, some direct pecuniary advantages to the Ministers and members of that community. For if all the money which is granted be faithfully applied to the furtherance of objects identified with the interests of Methodism in Upper Canada, those interests, in connexion with the spread of that form of Christianity, may be as effectually promoted by a direct Grant to the Missionary Committee, as though it were given to, and distributed under the exclusive direction of, the Provincial Conference connected with that Colony. Indeed, as your Lordship is aware, the principle for which I contend is distinctly recognised in the Act of the Imperial Parliament -fi -» • v f' > • approbation of the Clergy Reserves. According to some of^fP^^r^ tin; V ! uses of that Act, it is provided that the proceeds of such por- tions of them as are granted to the Church of England shall be expended under the direction of " the Incorporated Society for Propa- gating the Gospel in Foreign Parts ; " and yet both the Clergy and Laity of that Church in Upper Canada justly and confidently expect as much benefit from that arrangement as if those proceeds were confided to their exclusive management. At the same time, I wish it to be distinctly understood that I ' utterly disclaim any intention to interfere with any just claim which the Provincial Conference may make for pecuniary aid from the Imperial or the Colonial Government. If they have been led, from any considerations whatsoever, to change their sentiments on the subject of Religious Grants; if they are wiser and better -informed on this question in 1840 than they were in 1837 and in 1339 ; if they are now prepared substantially and practically to adopt the principle which they indignantly rejected, when it was proposed for their acceptance at the Conference held at Hamilton little more thao seventeen month .,t o. *' that it is a wise and a Christian duty for a Government to afford, and for Christian Churches to receive, pecuniary Grants for the purpose of providing the means of Religious Instruction ; " let them urge their just claims on the attention of Government with as much earnestness and perseverance as they please : but, in the midst of the new light which they have so very recently received, and under the new feelings with which it has inspired them in reference to Religious Grants, let them not attempt to interfere with the plans and arrangements of the Wesleyan Missionary Committee in connexion with the spiritual / u APPENDIX DR. ALDEItS LETTER V. Hiterests of Upper Canada. Let them not, while professing to seek justice for themselves, act unrighteously towards others, by claiming that Grant for "the benefit of the Upper-Canadian Conference," which, as their ovvu official Records repeatedly declare, belongs of right to the "Wesleyan Missionary Committee, — not for the benefit of any Conference in or out of Upper Canada, but for the benefit of the Aboriginal Tribes and of the Destitute Settlers in that Province. It is impossible, my Lord, that the payment of a Grant applied to such a purpose can have operated " injuriously " on the interests of the Provincial Conference in Upper Canada, unless the Messrs. Ryer- son are prepared to admit, or to prove, that a Body of Christian Ministers have interests at variance with the spread of truth, and with the operations of Christian benevolence amongst classes of human , , ; beings, who are either altogether ignorant of Christianity, or who are [M placed in circumstances which are unfavourable to their improvement in the knowledge and practice of the duties which Christianity teaches and enjoins ; — an opinion which ought not for a moment to be enter- tained of the Ministers of the Provincial Conference ; men, who, whatever may be stated by their Representatives to your Lordship, , never uttered one word of complaint on the unfavourable operations of '*''^^'''"'* * the Grant upon their interests until Mr. E. Ryerson set them the example in 1840 ; but, on the contrary, have, in their official com- munications to the British Conference, always so expressed them- selves as to induce a belief of their entire satisfaction and cordial approval of the purposes to which the Grant is applied. And no wonder; for the bestowment of the Grant upon the Wesleyan Mis- sionary Committee deprived the Provincial Conference of no pecuniary < or other privilege which it^bad before enjoyed. If the Grant had not i been made to the Missionary Committee, it would not have been paid ] to the Provincial Conference ; because, as I have shown your Lord- ship, that Conference objected to Government Grants for the support of Christian Ministers ; for which and other reasons, the Government of that period had no intention to ofi'er any Annual Grant to its Mem- bers. 'The Government Grants paid to the Wesleyan Missionary Committee, amounting to between £3,000 and £4,000, have been wholly expended in promoting the religious improvement of Upper Canada ; and more than double that amount has been advanced by the Treasurers of the Missionary Society in London for the same pur- pose. The Agents employed in this service were, with one or two exceptions, Members of the Provincial Conference ; the course which they pursued for accomplishing the end of their Mission, was entirely approved by that Conference; and the great objects which they endea- voured to promote, and which, by the Divine blessing, they did so promote as to secure the approbation of that Assembly, are precisely of that character which proves them to be identified with those great moral results, for the sake of which only it is desirable that "Wesleyan Methodism should exist and be encouraged in any portion of the TO LORD JOHN UU8SELL. 47 British Empire, or of the world. And, in addition to the important « considerations which I have already enumerated, it should be remem- \ bered that the results which followed the arrangements entered into on the part of Government with the Wesleyan Missionary Committee, especially in the affair of the Union between the British and the Pro- vincial Conferences, were of immense importance to the Wesleyan j Connexion in Upper Canada, by securing for it adviintages, pecuniary j as well as moral, which it had not before enjoyed ; and which, but for ', the incurable political tendencies of Mr. E. Ryerson, would have been long and most beneficially felt and enjoyed. Year after year the Provincial Conference has, in its official Documents, acknowledged substantially all that I have stated, while not a single word of complaint is to be found contained in any one of those Documents on the unfavourable operation of the Grant upon its interests ; and yet the Representatives of that Body officially inform your Lordship, in opposition to all these facts, that the Giant made to the Wesleyan Missionary Committee has "operated injuriously, rather than bene- ficially, to the interests " of the Provincial Conference. It remains for your Lordship to determine whether the Annual Grant, at present secured to the Wesleyan Missionary Committee on the faith of the Crown, shall be continued or not. But I trust that I have fully proved, in this and in ray former Letter on the same subject, that it was originally promised to them, irrespective of any ecclesiastical arrangements effected, at a subsequent period, between the British and the Provincial Conferences; — that this has always been acknowledged in the official proceclings of the latter Body respecting it since the Union ; — and that this view Ci the casd~^ has invariably been taken and acted upon by the Imperial and Colo- nial Authorities up to the close of the last year, when Mr. E. Ryerson, according to his own showing, submitted, without authority, to the Governor-in-Chief, Documents selected by himself for a particular purpose, the examination of which, it is stated, induced His Excel- lency to adopt, and to recommend to your Lordship, the determina- tion that the Grant should be placed under the management of the Upper-Canada Conference. Having established these points, in con- nexion with others intimately connected with them, I trust, my Lord, that you will not permit the existing arrangement to be disturbed, especially for such reasons as are assigned by the Messrs. Ryerson in their Letter to your Lordship. It is urged as a reason why your Lordship should comply with the request of the Messrs. Ryerson, that " the Grant was not distributed in a manner, and did not accomplish the objects, contemplated by the Imperial Government when the Grant was made, and ought to be dis- tributed in a different manner hereafter." If, my Lord, the opinion thus expressed were as just as I know it to be erroneous, it would, I readily admit, furnish a good and sufficient reason for calling upon the Wesleyan Missionary Committee, either to distribute the Grant for thp / I 7 F 48 APPENDIX. — DR. ALDfin's LETTEtt \i i (' I I accomplishment of those objects for which it was originally hestowecl and accepted ; or, otherwise, to si Tender it back to the Imperial Government. But I submit to yo Lordship that, even in that case^ it would not be a proper and equi) a course of proceeding towards the Committee, at once to deprive thum of the Grant, without having first ascertained whether they would or would not adopt the one or the other of the above alternatives. My Lord, the opinion referred to is, as will be seen from the evidence which I have produced, as unfoimded in fact, ns it is unjust to the Missionary Committee. No portion of it has been either misappropriated or misapplied. In enter- ing into arrangements with the Government, affecting the religious interests of Upper Canada, the Committee was not influenced by sectarian, much less by mercenary, motives or considerations. They did not then, nor do they now, ask for a Grant to be appropriated for the benefit of the British Conference. They could not allow them- selves to present, nor could they expect the Government to comply with, so selfish a request. It was the wish of His Majesty's Government, at the commencement of the year 1832, that the Com- mittee should extend their operations in Upper Canada. That wish was officially conveyed to the Committee, accompanied by an offer of pecuniary assistance to enable them to do so. They at once entered into the views of the Government, and promptly offered their services in a cause so intimately connected with the great object which it is the first wish of the Wesleyan Missionary Committee to promote in every part of the world, as is the spread of Christianity in a country in which, according to the testimony of Mr. E. Ryerson, " many of the people are in a state of infancy in regard to many of the characteristic qualifications of a well-instructed religious community." Deeply impressed with the amount of religious destitution which, the Com- mittee had reason to believe, existed in Upper Cai^ada, and rao:re especially in the New Settlements in that Province, us well as with the affecting statements which were made to them in 1831, by Messrs. George Ryerson and Peter Jones, respecting the state of the Indian Missions ; (those two gentlemen having been deputed to visit England for the purpose of procuring pecuniary aid towards their support, in consequence of the inability of the Provincial Conference in Upper Canada to obtain, in that Colony, the means necessary for their main- tenance and efficiency ;) and, true to the generous principles which govern all the operations of the Society, the Committee not only agreed to do all that the Government requested, by providing suitable Agents, but to co-operate in so good a work still further by the appro- priation of a portion of their own annual income, to the ext mt, at least, of £1,000 sterling per annum. Nor did the Missionary Com- mittee limit its benefactions to that amount, large as it is when viewed in connexion with their means, and with the extent of their operations within and beyond the limits of the British Empire ; for, instead of expending only £1,000 a-year on their Upper-Canadian Missions, To LORD JOUN RUSSELL. 40 tliey actually paid, as I stated to your Lordship imder date of the 29th of April of the present year, ii9,147. 2s. Qd. of their own Funds, in little more than six years, over and above all that was raised in the Province and received from the Government during that period. This", my Lord, is my reply to the charge, that " Mr. Alder and his friends wish to grasp every farthing of a disposable revenue from their Brethren in Upper Canada ; " — a charge which no one better knew to be utterly groundless than the Messrs. Ryersou, at the time when they introduced it into their Letter to your Lordship. No, my Lord, the Missionary Committee claim nothing more than the sum secured to them on the faith of the Crown ; and they claim that, not for them- selves, but for the benefit of the Indian and the emigrant, for whose ■welfare they have already expended much, and propose to expend more, of their own disposable revenue. The difiPerence between the Messrs. Ryerson and my friends consists in this, that, while those gentlemen are endeavouring t o obtai n a Grant which belongs to others, *' for the benefit of the Wesleyan-Methodist Church in Canada," the latter are endeavouring to retain their own Grant, that they may con- tinue to expend it, not for the benefit of any particular Church, but on the improvement of that portion of Her Majesty's subjects in Upper Canada, who, according to the testimony of Mr. E. Ryerson, are, in consequence of the paucity of Christian Pastors in various parts of that Province, " in a state of infancy in regard to many character- istic qualifications of a well-instructed religious community ; " and also for the benefit of the thousands of the Red Men, roaming in the forests of the far West, in a state of Heathen ignorance, as well as of personal and social wretchedness. These, my Lord, are the objects of the care of the Wesleyan Missionary Society ; these are the objects for whose benefit they claim the Grant. "We crave it on the behalf of persons who are endeavouring to force a scanty support for themselves and their families from the soil of the wilderness, to the cultivation of which their time and their strength are, of necessity, exclusively devoted ; and who must either have Christian instruction gratuitously provided for them, or otherwise live and die in a state of religious des- titution. We claim it, also, on behalf of the Aborigines, who carry with them all the evils and miseries, while they remain strangers to the benefits, of that state of civili^iation from which we derive so many and such important advantages. These, my Lord, I repeat, are the objects of the benevolent care of the Wesleyan Missionary Committee. These are the clients for whom they plead ; and I am sure that your Lordship will not lightly regard the claims which their necessities give them to your kindest and most efiicient protection. The Jlissionary Committee leave it to the Messrs. Ryerson and others to claim public aid for the benefit of particular Churches. All that they desire or ask is, that they may be allowed to keep the Grant which has been gra- ciously bestowed upon them by the Crown, — a Grant which they have faithfully appropriated, and which they intend always faithfully to I V 50 APPENDIX. — DR. ALDEUH LimKU \L I appropriate while it may be continued to them, for the benefit of tho poor emigrant, and of the still poorer Indian, the impoverished and degraded representative of Tribes which were once the undisputed owners and occupants of the entire country. Is it too much to ask, my Lord, that out of the entire proceeds of a disposable Canadian Revenue, dtJ700 per annum should be secured for their benefit ? Such also, my Lord, is the answer which I have to make to the representation, that " the Grant was not distributed in a manner, and did not accomplish the objects, contemplated by the Imperial Govern- ment." What the Grant was intended for on the one part, and received for on the other, has been already shown ; and its application to those objects by the Missionary Committee has materially contri- buted to the diffusion of Christian knowledge and piety amongst those classes of Her Majesty's subjects in Upper Canada, whose benefit it was originally designed to promote. The Schools in our Indian villages, generally, have been kept in a state of great efficiency ; and one on the Manual- Labour System has been commenced and supported at much expense to the Society, but with great advantage to the necessarily-limited number of Indian children of both sexes, who have been, or are, gratuitously boarded and educated at that Establishment ; an Establishment which the Committee have made arrangements for rendering still more beneficial to the offspring of a deeply-injured and too long-neglected race. The hours of the day are judiciously appro- priated to the acquisition of religious and secular knowledge, and to the study and practice of several useful and mechanical arts by the male scholars, and cf various household duties by the females. Every- thing connected with this important Station is placed under the super- intendence of the Rev. William Case, the Father of the Indian Missions in Upper Canada, a man who has devoted a large portion of his valuable life to their improvement, and who for many years pre- sided over the Upper-Canadian Conference, and directed its affairs. In common with other Preachers who formerly belonged to that Body, he has felt it to be his duty to withdraw from an Assembly which has sustained, and still sustains, Mr. E. Ryerson in his politico-religious character and proceedings, as well as in his unjust interference with the Religious Grant, and to place himself under the direction of the Wesleyan Missionary Committee. Mr. Case is greatly assisted and cordially supported by Shahwundais, (John Sunday,) the duly- appointed and acknowledged Chief of the Ojibewas at Alderville, on the Rice Lake, where the School is established, and formerly a native Minister in connexion with the same Conference. This Chief visited England a few years ago, at the expense of the Wesleyan Missionary Committee ; and, during his residence in this country, his attachment to British connexion, customs, and interests, was greatly strengthened, of which he has furnished repeated proofs since his return to Canada. As soon as he ascertained that the British Conference bad dissolved its connexion Avith the Provincial Conference to which he had before TO LORn JOHN RUSSP.Lt. 51 lielongcd, he also left the Alcssrs. Ryorson and their frieniU, and is now under the exclusive direction of the Wesleyan Missionary Com- mittee. The consistent and exemplary conduct of the Indians con- nected with our Missions in Upper Canada upon all occasions, during the last seven years, but more especially when called upon to perform niili*^ary duties in the camp and in the field with the militia and regular forces during the rebellion, — the loyalty, the promptitude, the piety, the sobriety, and the spirit of subordination which they dis- played in the perilous circumstances in which they were then placed, — the habits of industry which they have acquired, — the diminution of sickness and of deaths amongst them, as in the case of the Lake St. Clair Mission, — afford the surest tests by which to judge of the real state of things, and furnish the best answer to the pitiful attempt which the Messrs. Ryerson have made, in their Letter to your Lord- ship, to disparage the results of the management of those Missions by the Parent Committee in London. I respectfully refer your Lordship, for further information on this subject, to a communication which I have the honour to enclose from the Rev. William Case, dated Belle- ville, (Upper Canada,) July 20th, 1840 ; and addressed to the Rev. Joseph Stinson, the then President of the Provincial Conference. It may suit the convenience of men like the Messrs. Ryerson to judge of the state of a Christian Community by the varying number of its Members, rather than by its growing order, its intelligence, and the more exemplary performance of Christian duties and obligations : but I need not remind so acute an observer of men and things as your Lordship is known to be, that a numerical increase in a Church is by no means a proof that that Church is accomplishing the high purposes which such Associations are designed to promote ; and that the very process by which these great results are legitimately promoted, tends very frequently to lessen its numbers, by the removal or withdrawal of unworthy members from its pale. Such was indeed the case to a great extent in the particular instance specified by the Messrs. Ryerson, as your Lordship will perceive by a Letter, dated Hdli,, Sept. 12th, 1840, from the Rev. William Lord, who for two years resided in Canada, and during that period presided over the Provincial Conference. Yes, my Lord, it is a well-ascertained fact, that political considerations and interests were the principal causes of those varia- tions in the number of the Members under the care of that Conference, to which the Messrs. Ryerson seem to attach so much importance. > The approbation which that Body obtained from Provincial dema- gogues during the seven years immediately preceding the Union was a blot ou its escutcheon ; and when those men could no longer hope that any portion of the moral influence which it possessed might be wielded , by them for the purpose of embarrassing the Local Executive, and of promoting those (then) secretly-cherished revolutionary designs and purposes which were afterwards avowed and acted upon, they arrayed tlicinselves against it, and assailed it with a degree of bitterness and E 2 r)2 APPENDIX. — DR. alder's LETTER malignity proportioned to the disappointment which they experiencett at the anticipated overthrow of their evil designs and machinations. As the Union between the two Conferences no longer exists, those Members who withdrew from the Methodist^ Societies when it was fonned, Tiavihg''now no^ccasion to dread the growth of British influ- ence, may return to the folds which they had abandoned; and an oppoftumTywilT thus be afforded to the Messrs. Ryerson to dilate on the advantages resulting to that particular form of Methodism in Upper Canada of which they are the guides, v:. consequence of its entire separation from and independence of the British Conference, the influence of which has been so baneful to its interests, by having deprived it so long of the presence and support of such formerly alienated Members. In making these statements, I do not wish to bT> nhderstootl as insinuating or expressing any opinion inconsistent with * that degree of respect which I have been accustomed to entertain, and which I have not unfrequently avowed in England and in British ,^ North America, for the Members of that Body generally, much less of its Ministers ; nor would I have alluded to such topics at all, if the , nature of the communication from the Messrs. Ryerson to your Lord- ' ship had not placed me under the necessity of doing so. It should be J remembered also, that there were other causes for that large accession of Members to the Methodist Societies in Upper Canada which took place within a fetv years before the latter part of the year 1833 ; the principal of which was the large amount of emigration from the Parent State to that Province during that period, especially from the year 1830 to the Autumn of 1832. Very many of the Emigrants, with their families, had been connected with Methodism in various parts of the United Kingdom long before their departure from their native shores ; and they generally, as a matter of course, connected themselves with the Methodist Church in Upper Canada, and formed no small portion of the nine thousand one hundred and four Members referred to by the Messrs. Ryerson ; — an^ increase which, I take leave > to state, it would have been jnpre becoming in them to have ascribed to the zealous and successful exertions of Wesleyan Ministers in England and in Ireland, rather than, as they have done, by implication at least, to the non-existence of the Union which was afterwards formed with the British Conference ; a Union which they themselves first sought to form, and, (in marvellous inconsistency with their own representations as to its effects on their Connexional interests,) of the dissolution of which they so loudly complain. As early as the month ~1 of June, 1832, 1 was informed by a high authority in Upper Canada, ; that, up to that time only, in that year, upwards of twenty thousand persons had arrived in the country, and that one-third of them at least were from England ; many ojf whom were Methodists, as were, also ' many others from the North and other Sections of Ireland. Since the year 1834, the numerical increase of the Methodist Soci- eties in Upper Canada has been powerfully affected by that decrease I TO LOKD JOn.N IllTSSKLL. 5S in the amount of emigration from the Parent State, which has been the consequence of the dread inspired by the ravages of the cholera in Canada, the breaking out of the rebellion there, as well as by the pre- ference which has of late been given to our Colonics in the Southern Hemisphere. These facts were well known to the Representatives of the Pro- vincial Conference wlien they addressed your_ Lordship. In an Address from that Body to the British Conference, "the common parent of Methodism throughout the world," dated June 16th, 1830, and signed ' Egeuton Ryehsun, Secrclarij," it is stated as follows : — " To the many emigrants from the Mother Country, and especially to the professors and families of Wesloyan Methodism," (referring to those then settled in Upper Canada,) " we continue to direct our most anxious attention. Many of them retain their piety in all its sim- plicity and purity, and do honour to the Connexion and country from whence they came." On reviewing all the facts connected with the bestowment of the Grant, and of the purposes to which it has been applied, I am unwill- ing to believe that Lord Sydenham ever felt or expressed the strong conviction respecting its application, and the effect of that application on the interests of the Upper- Canadian Provincial Conference, which tlie Messrs. Ryerson have ascribed to His Excellency. I am the more unwilling to give credence to such an allegation, because, judging from the charge of inadvertence publicly imputed by Mr. E. Ryerson to Mr. Vernon Smith, in consequence of that gentleman's having put the only fair construction on his Letter to the Governor-General of which it is susceptible, and also from the contents of their reply to my Letter to your Lordship, they do not appear to consider carefully the scope and meaning of the terms and forms of expression which they employ ; or, if they do, they must be peculiaily unfortunate in misun- derstanding what has been said or written by others, especially in all matters in which they take a deep personal interest. But if in this instance they are correct in their interpretation, and if, as they have stated, such a representation has been made by the Governor-General to your Lordship, then I must respectfully but frankly observe that, if the authority of His Excellency's representation is to be pleaded against the well-established claims of the Wesleyan Missionary Society, the " convictions " of others of Her Majesty's Representatives who have administered the Government of Canada, and one of whom is still in the Upper Province, are not entitled to less consideration on such a subject ; and I am therefore placed under the necessity of appealing from the " conviction " of his Lordship, founded only on an investigation of documents furnished by Mr. E. Ryerson, and originat- ing in an application from that individual, to " convictions " founded on personal connexion with the very matters to which those documents relate : I must appeal from Lord Sydenham to Lord Seaton and tq Sir George Arthur. II APPENDIX. — DR. Al,l)i;nii LETTEK i y- I In making this appeal, I am far from intending to oxpreHC anytliiir^ disrespectful to the present Gorcrnor-in-Chief of British North Ame- rica. If he have expressed such a " conriction," no doubt ho feels it, and feels it strongly, or he would not have assumed such a degree of responsibility as is involved in his endeavour to carry it out : but, for that very reason, it becomes the duty of those to whose claims and proceedings that "conviction "is so adverse, io show that it does not accord with the real facts of the case, or with the equally conscientious " conviction " of his predecessors in Canada, who, from the circum- stances in which they were placed, possessed a more complete know- ledge than his Lordship of everything connected with the entire trans- action. But, my Lord, what is to be thought of the proceedings of Mr. E. Ryerson, in connexion with the avowal of the " strong convic- tion " said to have been expressed by the Govemor-in-Chief ? That gentleman has informed your Lordship that '* ho had always admitted the exclusive right of the Missionary Committee to the exclusive con- trol of the Grant " in question ; and that, when His Excellency expressed a different opinion, *' he assured him that he was mis- taken." Mr. E. Ryerson knew that the view which ho then ex- pressed had always been asserted by the Missionary Committee, and recognised and admitted by the Provincial Conference in Upper Canada : he was well aware that the Agent of the Missionary Commit- tee in that Province confidently relied on the continuance of the Grant to enable him to meet the pecuniary claims for which he was responsible, and that the Parent Committee participated in the con- fidence of their Agent : and yet he not only gave no notice of the / intentions of the Governor-General, respecting the transfer of the I Grant, to the Committee at home, or to their Agent in the Province, j (who was also President of the Upper-Canadian Conference,) which, from the nature of his engagements as a Member of a Provincial Con- \ ference in connexion with the British Conference, duty and honour < required him to do ; but, on the contrary, he furnished documents to His Excellency which fortified his " strong conviction " that the Grant ought to be distributed in a different manner hereafter; and His Excellency's Despatch to your Lordship on the subject was accompa- nied by a Letter from Mr. E. Ryerson, designed to deprive the Missionary Committee, which was at the same time ignorant of his movements, of the management of that Grant which he had so often openly professed belonged exclusively to them. It is no palliation, much less does it furnish a sufiicient excuse, of such conduct, to allege that Messrs. Stinson and Richey made certain statements on the subject of the Clergy Reserves to Lord Sydenham, during an interview to which they had the honour of being invited by his Lordship ; and that, on the following day, they embodied in a Memorial representations on the same subject, with which Mr, Ryerson was soon afterwards made acquainted, and of which he disapproved. For if even those gentle- men, in maintaining what they believed to be the rights and interests TU LOI(l> JOHN llUHitKIX. r>5 of llio I'urent Cunnexiun, liuci uctod inconHiNtcntly with their publio duties and engngoments to the Provinciul Confurcnco, that funiiHhed no good reason why Mr. E. Uycrson ahouhl avail himself of the tcnjporary influence which political considerations had then secured for him in the affiiirs of Upper Canada, to commit u great wrong towards a Society to which he owed great ohligations ; and to become u party to measures, which, if they had succeeded at that time, would not only have had the effect of securing " a new distril)Ution of the drant," or, in other words, its transfer from the Wcsleyan Missionary Committee to the Provincial Conference, but would, as he must huvo known, have had the further effect of depriving the Committee of all claim on the Clergy Reserves under the Act sent home from Canada for the final adjustment of that question ; and of that, my Lord, Mr. E. Uyerson was well awure. Timnks to your Lordship, the attempt failed. It was the knowledge that such designs had ueen formed, and were likely to prove successful, which prompted MessrM. Stinsou and Uichey to take the steps which they did to secure the iutorosts cf the Missionary Committee, well knowing that those interns, i were ' :po8ed to great peril from the complexion of certain meosures then in pro- gross. Those measures grew out of Mr. E. Ryerson's "unofficial" intercourse with the Governor-General some lime before thfl 2d oi January, 1840, the day on which Messrs. Stinson and Ri(':i2_,, were first honoured with an invitation to the Government-IIouf. j on the sulyoct of the Clergy Reserves ; in proof of which it is only necessary to remind your Lordship that Mr. Ryerson's Letter was completed on that very day, — that same Letter which had been drawn up at " the request" of His Excellency, after previous verbal communications had been made, and various documents furnished to him, by Mr. E. Rycrson, on the subject of the Grant and the Clergy Reserve Fund. In directing your Lordship's attention to that part of the Letter from the Messrs. Rycrson, in which they impugn the accuracy of those Financial Statements which I have submitted for your Lordship's con- sideration, I crave permission to observe that it is a still more hazard- ous attempt to trifle with the ordinary rules of a)'« '• o- tic than even with those of a sound logic ; because it is more easily detected and made manifest. Principles may be artfully disguised, the real nature of facts and reasonings may be concealed by an jirtificial method of stating them ; but arithmetical data and conclusions are so plain that their truth or falehood cannot fail to be afc once perceived. This, if I am not greatly mistaken, the Messrs. Ryerson will long have cause to remember. One object which I had in view in preparing the communication which I had the honour of addressing to your Lordship on the 29th of April last, was to show, from Financial Statements, that the Provincial Conference of Upper Canada did not possess the means of adequately supporting and extending its Missionary operations in that Province, and that the Wcsleyan Missionary Committee, by taking these Mis- 50 APPENDIX. — DR. ALDERS LETTER \i \ ) sions under their care, " were inslrumental in saving them from ruin ; " a statement which I made on the authority of Mr. E Ryerson himself, who, as I informed your Lordship, urged his '^•rethren in Upper Canada to agree to the Union for this, amongst other reasons, — that they did not possess the means to support their Missions, and that, unk-ss the Wesleyan Missionary Committee took charge of them, they would he ruined ; and I may now add, that the same gentlemen made substantially the same declarations in the presence of a large Committee appointed by the British Conference to arrange the terms of Union in 1833, and also before the British Conference itself, as might be proved by the testimony of numerous and competent wit- nesses. But further evidence is unnecessary, as that is one of the facts stated by me which Mr. Ryerson has seen fit to overlook ; because, if he had noticed it at all, he must have admitted its truth. Unable as he felt himself to be to contradict that declaration, he nevertheless endeavours, by apparently minute and exact arithmetical calculations, to disprove the truth of his own official declarations to the British Conference. He has been at much pains to show that he was mis- taken at that time ; and I might admire such an excess of candour on the part of that gentleman, v.-ere it not that he has contrived to impute to me the mistake which originated with himself, by noticing only the Statement which I had the honour of submitting to your Lordship, and keeping out of sight his own declaration adduced by me in support of it. Permit me, my Lord, to show you that Mr. E. Ryerson's representation, made in 1832 and the following year, respecting the inability of the Provincial Conference to support the Indian and other Missions then under the care of that Body, was strictly correct, and that the Financial Statements made by his brother and himself in 1840 betray great inattention, or marvellous ignorance of the ordinary rules of arithmetic. It may be proper here to remark that, by the Report of the Cana- dian Missionary Society, embracing two years, from September, 1829, to September, 1831, there is exhibited a balance of £204. l*. 9d. due to the Treasurer ; that i?, the Society was in debt to that amount^ although there had been received from the United States, within the period embraced in the Report, no less a sum than £1,074. 10*. 2d. The Messrs. Ryerson have informed your Lordship that, in the year 1832, their Missionary Society, after having paid off its debts, had a balance in favour of the Treasurer amounting to £129. 7*- 5^rf. ; but, with that disingenuousness of which their Letter furnishes so many painful proofs, they entirely keep out of sight the fact, that they tvere whotiby those gentlemen. The real state of the case therefore is, that the sum collected in Upper Canada, (for the year ending October, 1833,) instead of being £1,038. 18*. 5d., as asserted in the above extract, is only £603. 1*. 6^d. The expenditure, (for the same period,) was £1,322. 19*. 4*. or more than double the amount raised in the Province ; so that the operations of that year would have involved the Society in an additional debt of £719. 17*. 9^rf., had it been solely dependent on itt Provincial resources. Such being tho state of the Society's Provincial Income, and feeling that but little, if any, further help could be expected from England or the neighbouring Republic, it is no wonder that Mr. E. Ryerson should state that, unless the Wesleyan Missionary Committee took charge of the Missions, they must be ruined for want of funds to support them; and it will be seen by your Lordship that I was fully justified in stating that the Missionary Committee had been 58 APl'ENDIX. — DR. ALDEU8 LETTER instrumental in saving the Missions in Upper Canada from ruin. Lest, however, any doubt should exist on this point, I beg leave to adduce not merely an. opinion, uttered in conversation, or in the warmth of debate, but the deliberate testimony of Mr. E. Ryerson, given on oath in a Court of Justice in Upper Canada, during the trial of a disputed chapel-case in that Province, which is as follows :— " In 1832, the Wesleyan Missionary Committee in London sent out the Rev. Mr. Alder, as their Representative and Agent, with a view to the appointment of Missionaries among the British emigrants in various parts of this Province. Mr. Alder had communicaticiis from the Committee in London to our Missionary Board in Toronto, which he delivered; communicating to the Board, at the same time, the objects of his Mission. Our Board admitted our inability to SUPPLY THE RELIGIOUS WANTS OP THE COUNTRY, but Stated, at length, to Mr. Alder, and, in writings to the Committee in London, the evils likely to arise from the existence of two Bodies of Methodists in this Province, — its infringement of the hitherto uni- versally acknowledged principle, that ' the "Wesleyan Methodists were one Body throughout the world,' — and the desirableness of uniting the means and energies of the two Connexions to promote the religious improvement of the Aboriginal Tribes and New Settlements op THE COUNTRY." In stating to your Lordship that, when the Wesleyan Missionary Committee took upon itself to support the Indian Missions, the moneys raised by the Upper-Canada Conference amounted only to the sura of £177. 10*. Id. sterling, my meaning was, that, during the first year in which the Committee assumed the responsibility of supporting those Missions, such was the actual amount raised within the bounds of the Upper-Canadian Conference for Missionary purposes. I took it for granted that my meaning would be at once understood, because that was the year Avith which our increased operations and expenditure in the Upper Province commenced ; and that, and not any preceding year, either proximate or remote, was the only period to which I for a moment supposed the expression in my Letter could be supposed to refer. But in this it appears that I wfis mistaken. The Messrs. Ryerson have put a construction upon that part of my letter which I never coiitempluied, and which I disclaim. The slightest attention, on their part, to documentary e^-idence which was in their possession, must have shown them, that I referred not to the year ending in 1833, (which they have assumed to be the case,) but to the year com- mencing in October, 1833, and ending in 1834; the period during which the Committee first took upon themselves the care and support of the Upper-Canadian Missions. I knew nothing, at that time, of what moneys had been raised for Missionary purposes by the Upper- Canadian Conference before that year; and could not, therefore, intend to refer to any earlier period. That my statement of the amount contributed in the Province, during the period to which alone TO LORD JOUN RUSSELL. m my observation was designed to apply, is quite correct, is proved by t)ie Messrs. Ryerson themselves ; who state that, during the first year of the Union between the British and Canadian Conferences, the time when the Missionary Committee took upon itself the responsibility of supporting the Missions, their Missionary receipts amounted to no more than £198. 6s. Q^d. currency ; making, in sterling, the sum specified in my former Letter to your Lordship. I feel that I have already trespassed too long on your Lordship's time and attention ; and yet I deeply regret that I am under the neces- sity of asking your indulgence a little longer, while I notice another attempt on the part of the Messrs. Ryerson to impugn one of the most important of the Financial Statements on this subject, which, by your Lordship's kindness, I have already been allowed to address to you. I refer, my Lord, to the attempt which they have made to throw dis- credit upon my account of the expenditure of the Missionary Com- mittee from August, 183.3, to December 31st, 1839, in connexion with the Upper-Canadian Missions. It amounted, as I have informed your Lordship, to if 17,806. 18*. llrf., as appears from the duly audited and published Accounts of the Committee, from which I have extracted the following Summary of Expenditure : — £,. s. d. Expended from Oct., 1833, to June, 1834, inclusive 2,906 16 4 1835, l,9.')2 H 6 1836, 2,451 9 3 1837, 3,013 10 7 1838, 3,279 14 5 1839, 3,152 13 10 From June, 1 839, the period when the Accounts were annually made up by the Agent of the Committee in Upper Canada, and sent home for examination, to the 31st of December, 1839, the General Superintendent expended in the Missions 1,050 £l7fiOG 18 11 These items make, as your Lordship will perceive, the exact amount exhibited in my TjCtter. The Messrs. Ryerson have compared the sums expended under the direction of the JUssionary Board in the Province with the total amount which the Upper-Canada Mission has cost the Parent Society during the same period ; and, finding a discrepancy between the two Statements of £4,331. 17*. 7d., they ask for an explanation of a matter of which they were personally cognisant when they wrote, and with which they had been, for six years before, perfectly familiar. If, indeed, they had made this discovery during their researches at "22, Cecil-Street, Strand," if they had then required information on such a 60 APPENDIX. — DR. ALDERS LETTER 7-' 1; ^'t subject, they miglit have obtained it, without any great inconvenience to themselves, on applying to one of the Missionary Secretaries, or to the Book-Keeper or Accountant at the Mission-House, 77? Hatton- Garden, — a locality well known to Mr. E. Ryerson. Or if they were unable to spare time to pay a personal visit, a Note would Lave accr s- plished every necessary purpose as far as the discovery of truth was concerned ; and if this had been their object, they would have done so. /■-* But they sought to awj' n suspicion and distrust respecting a matter \ which no one can exp'dn better than Mr. Egerton Ryerson himself. < Instead of affording --luch explanation, he has challenged me to ,' do so, and from ret>;>ect to your Lordship I shall most readily (^ respond to the call. The Committee, to whom is entrusted by the Conference the management of the affairs of the Wesleyan Missionary Society in con- ducting the widely-extended operations of that Institution, annually appropriate a certain portion of the funds placed at their disposal to each of the Districts in which the Missionaries and other Agents of the Society are employed, proportioned to the circumstances of each District, and to the general income of the Society. A portion of the sum thus appropriated is expended in defraying what are designated " Ordinaries ; " and these expenses come under the supervision of a Local Committee in the different Foreign Districts. Another portion of it is used for the payment of " Extraordinaries ; " which branch of Expenditure includes many items which are incurred in this country in connexion with the Society's Stations abroad, and which, — for that rea- son, as well as to secure a proper degree of control over the general expenditure of the Society, and for the better enforcement of its finan- cial regulations, — are accounted for to the Parent Committee only, and never appear in any Local Report. Under this latter head are included moneys paid to Missionaries in this country previous to their embarkation; — the outfit and passage of Missionaries and of their families ; — the return of Missionaries to this country on account of ill health and other causes ; — official and other publications sent to the Districts for the information of Missionaries ; — expenses connected with the general internal management of the Missions in each Dis- trict. From this statement, your Lordship will at once perceive the cause of the discrepancy between the exhibit of the Upper-Canada Local Reports, and the published Financial Reports of the Parent Society as furnished by me to your Lordship. The former shows the amount of " Ordinaries " paid and accounted for to the Mission Board in Upper Canada ; but it does not include the outlay on account of the " Extraordinaries " tinder those heads which I have enumerated^ and which, together with the sum expended between the end of June and the 31st of December, 1839, constitute in the aggre- gate the precise amount of difference between the exhibit of the General and the Local Reports which the Messrs. Ryerson have specified. I \ repeat, my Lord, Mr. E. Ryersoo, at least, was neither ignorant of the TO LORD JOHN RUSSELL. « 1 the principle on which the Committee conduct this part of the husiness entrusted to its care, nor of its application to Upper Canada. He and his brother must have known that the Local Keports, published in Upper Canada, contain uo account of the sums which have been expended, during the last six years and a half, for the support of the General Superintendent of Missions in that Province, including expences connected with his extensive and almost incessant travelling, and the occasional employment of an assistant d iring that period, amounting to upwards of £1,600 ; nor for the outfit and passage of five Missionaries and their families, including a portion of their salary and travelling expenses in England, amounting to upwards of £320; nor for the outfit, passage, and salary of Mr. Lord and his family ; nor of Mr. Harvard and his family ; the expenses connected with the latter alone amounting to £4t]']. 9s. 3d. Both tlrese gentle- men were sent out, at different periods, to preside over the Societies in Upper Canada, as well as to co-operate with the Agent of the Missionary Committee in promoting the interests of the Missions; and they both rendered most valuable services to the Methodist Socie- ties in the Province, — services which were obtained without any expense to the Provincial Conference, and which it gratefully acknow- ledged in its official Addresses to the Conference in Great Britain. 'Not do the Local Reports exhibit all the items of expense connected with the removal and support of other members of the British Con- ference, who have been sent and supported as Missionaries in Upper Canada, for public reasons connected with the state of the work there ; nor of the expense connected with my Mission to that Province in 1834, — a Mission which I was earnestly entreated by Mr. E. Ryerson to undertake, and which involved an outlay of £127 18*. \0d., money which^ if the testimony of the Messrs. Ryerson and the Provincial Conference, as well as that of the highest civil authority then in that Colony, be deemed of importance, was well expended ; — to say nothing of other matters, which I will not occupy your Lordship's time in specifying. All this, I repeat, my Lord, must have been known to the Messrs. Ryerson, and especially to Mr. Egerton, who might have recollected that the expenses incurred by the Missionary Committee on his accouni during his visits to England on the affairs of the Provincial Conference, never appeared in any Local Report. There are persons, my Lord,'^ who inscribe supposed injuries in marble and benefits on the sand ; L but they should n'.ither be envied nor imitated, much less should they \ be rewarded. 1 forbear alluding to other matters contained in the Letter from the Messrs. Ryerson, as an answer to such of them as are of any import- ance, in connexion with the present question, will be found in the accompanying Letters from the Rev. Messrs. Case and Lord. A general denial of the remainder is the only reply to which they are entitled. 02 Ari'RNI'TX. — DTI. AI-PEBS LETTER TO LORD JOHN RUSSELL. ft, n ; I know not, my Lord, vhat the Messrs. Ryerson mean when they assert that 1 have, in my former Letters to your Lordship, again and ngain assumed and stated that the Royal Word is pledged to the con- tinuance of the Government Grant, " in Us present form" to the Wesleyan Committee. If they mean hy the phrase " pnssoTit form " its continued payment IVom a particular hranch of the Pi-ovincial Revenue, I submit to yoiir Lordship that no such assmai/don or statement has been made by me : all that I ha^e assuiuod, stttt', d, or proved on this subject is, that the Grant is at present a iixed ciiarge on the Casual and Territorial Revenue of tlse Province, and vLfit, as such, the faith of the Crown is pledged to tlic Tommittee for the payment of ^700 per annum, to be expeij/led for Missionary purposes in Upper Canada. By the Act of the Imperial Parliament for the settlemer>, of the Clergy Reserves, it is provided that all suoh Clrunts shall be trans- ferred to that Fund, and shall first be paid. I assuage that the Q.- "<\t to the Sfiseionary Committee will be so transferred ; and i f.arnesiiy request »,?..< t the payment of it may be continued to them. Relying on tKe i'uth of the Crown, and on the provisions of an Act of the Imperii.! Parliiiment, and sustained by a consciousness of the fidelity with wa'fh. they have adhered to their engagements, the Wesleyan Misf-ionary Committee respectfully submit their claims to the consideration and decision of your Lordship. I'hat this decision will be in accordance with the reasonable expectations of the Commit- tee I cannot for a moment doubt. But should it prove otherwise, of this your Lordship may be assured that, deeply as they may regret such an issue, it will not diminish the respect which they entertain for your Lordship, nor alter their fixed purpose to do every thing in their power to promote the best interests, temporal and spiritual, of Her Majesty's subjects in Upper Canada. I have the honour to be, with the highest consideration and respect for your Lordship's character and station, Uj "ord, Your Lordship's most obedient, humble servant, RoHKRT Alder, Sec. Wcs. Miss. Soc. i APPENDIX. m II. LETTER FROM THE REV. WILLIAM CASE TO THE REV. JOSEPH STINSON, PRESIDENT OF THE PROVINCIAL CONFERENCE IN UPPER CANADA. Belleville, July 20th, 1840. Rev. and dear Sib, In the course of discussion a few days since in the Conference, n reference was made to the decrease of Members in the Indian Missions since the Union. The substance of my remarks in explanation, on that occasion, I beg to pen for your recollection, should you have occasion to use them. There has indeed heen a decrease of numbers in several places ; but sufficient causes for this are found in the following facts : — On the Grand River we have lost, in the MohaAvk Society, about seventy, by divisions entirely unconnected with any circumstances of the Union. Previously to this event, the minds of the Indians became unsettled through the influence of one who had been a useful Preacher among his Indian Brethren, but who, on a relapse into his former intemperate habits, was cut off, and his authority as a Preacher taken from him. He then set up for himself, and by various arts influenced a large body to secede. A timely interference saved them for the time ; but they became quite unsettled, and, by ihe wiles of another people, seventy Members were canied away from the Society. At the time of the Union, tAvo Societies on the American side, that is, at the Sault de Sante Marie, and Kevvawenon, on the south side of Lake Superior, were given up to the American Missionary Society at New- York. The Wyandott Society, near Fort Amherstburg, have principally removed to Sandusky, and now form a part of the "Wyandott Mission, under the direction of the Methodist Missionary Society in New- York. The decrease at the Credit Mission is to be attributed partly to removals to the Muncey Mission, and partly to circumstances of pecu- liar temptation from depraved white neighbours. Allow me to add my mature opinion that the Union has contri- buted greatly to the advancement of religion and benevolence in this country : — 1. The Canada Conference Missionary Society were freed from embarrassment by paying the sum necessary to free it from debt. 2. A more general interest in favour of the Missionary Cause was awakened throughout the country by the well-directed labours of the Superintendent of Missions, and others of our English and other Brethren, at numerous Missionary Meetings ; without which the general depression of the times, uufures^en at the time of the Union, would have operated most fatally on our m?ans for the support of the Missions. 3. The comfort of the Missionaries has beeii greatly promoted. 4. By extending the Gospel to many Emigrants, in the new Town- ships, which we could not have done without the timely aid we have received from the Missionary Committee in London. 5. By important assistance in building chapels and parsonages, both in the Indian Slissions and other places. /■' Cs 64 APPENDIX. 6. The establishment of a School, on the Manual-Labour System, at Alderville, in which the Indian youths are taught, in addition to the ordinary branches of reading, writing, geography, &c., the important duties of the house, dairy, needlework, &c. Without the funds aerived from the Missionary Committee, tve could not expect to carry on this important enterprise for the improve- ment of the youth, so essential to the general interest of the Indian Tribes. I could easily lengthen out the list of advantages, and would do so with pleasure, but for want of time. Believe me, Rev. and dear Brother, ; ■' ^ Very sincerely youi-s, " in the Gospel of Christ, William Case. '\x: III. EXTRACTS OF LETTERS FROM THE REV. WILLIAM LORD, EX- PRESIDENT OF THE UPPER-CANADIAN CONFERENCE, TO THE REV. DR. ALDER. Hull, September 12//*, 1840. My dear Sir, Having read the Letter addressed to Lord John Russell by the Rev. W. and E. Ryerson, dated August 20th, I am induced by a regard to truth and justice to forward to you a few remarks on one or two of the topics introduced into that document. ■ On these, and indeed on several other subjects in that production, I have the advantage of ^ personal knowledge obtained during a residence in Canada of about twenty months. I remark, first, on the falling off in their Missionary Funds. Messrs. Ryerson say, " This falling off was caused by dissatisfaction with the Union." This is very true ; but allow me to ask. What was the real cause of this dissatisfaction'? I deeply regret to be compelled to" state that it is to be traced to the then existing strong political feel- ing of the Methodist Church and congregations of tipper Canada. Before the Union, they had very generally imbibed the politics advo- cated in the well-known paper edited and published b;^ the notorious rebel M'Kenzie. After the Union was formed, and on Mr. E. Ryerson's return from England, the leaders of the movement party found that he had brought with him " impressions " unfriendly to their projects. With a very few exceptions, he was immediately most violently assailed by the conductors of the press ; attacks were also made upon him, and upon the Methodists, in the House of Assembly ; the Conference was represented as having sold itself to Government ; the Union became extremely unpopular among the Radicals and the ill-affected; and the Funds of the Missionary Society suffered in consequence. On arriving in the Province, in November, 1834, I found the Societies very generally, and some of the Preachers strongly, pre- judiced against the Union. I entered at once upon extensive travels, and visited several of the principal Societies. I stated, at all proper opportunities, that in the formation of the Union no reference was had by the British Conference to any class of politics, or to any party in AJ'PKNDIX. 85 thfc State ; that we wore not a poHtiral people, but onr great object, incliviciu'illy and collt'ctively, was to promote the religious benefit of the people, without interfering with secular politics. Mr. Stinson v united most zealously and efficiently with nie in holding Missionary \ Meetings, and in organizing [Missionary Societies, in which we were | aided by several of the Preachers in theii respective Circuits. We / commenced holding these Missionary Meetings early in the year 103.5 ; / and tlie result was, though one hnlf of the year had transpired, an [ increase from £198. 5.v. Q^d. to £fil2. Ms. 2^(1. In the following year the increase was larger, the sum raised being £1,192. 9.V. !. To the Rev. Dr. Alder. Hu/l, September 1(5///, 1840. Mv DEAR Sir, I no not recollect whether or not, in my Letter of the 14th, I referred to the claim set up by Mr. E. Ryerson to negotiate with the Governor, for the Conference, on the subject of the Grant. Lest I should not have done so, I beg now to state that I consider the claim of Mr. Ryerson as quite unfounded ; and I am greatly astonished by an assertion of the Messrs. Ryerson, to the effect that, during more than ten years, Mr. E. Ryerson has been appointed to the office of commu- nicating with the Governor on the affairs of the Conference. I know nothing of such an appointment ; it did not take place at either of the Conferences I attended, and over which I presided ; and I never heard F m APPENDIX. li of its existence until it was stated by Mr. Ryerson in our Conferencfl ' ommittee. I communicated with the Governor on all Conference and Connexional affairs while I was in the Province. Since the pub- lication of the Statement, I have spoken to Messrs. Marsden, Grindrod, and Stinson, ull of whom declare tncy never knew of such an appoint- ment. Our Canada Brethren must have a marvelloiis mode oi trans- acting business, when they can conceal such an important appointment from those who have presided over them in succession. At the Conference of 1830, a Committee was appointed, to whose guardianship the Clergy Reserve Question was confided, with the Pre- sident at its, head. Tnis was the business assigned to that Commit- tee, which Mild not be orderly or legally transacted without the presence or ku wledge of the President. But for Mr. E. Ryerson to communicate with the Governor on the subject of the Clergy Reserves, much more on that of the Grant to the Wesleyan Missionary Society, without even the knowledge of the President, who was also tne Super- intendent of Missions, appears to me to have been an outrage upon all propriety and order, in opposition to all precedent, and a virtual and practical superseding of the President in his oifice. I remain, &c.. To the Rev. Dr. Alder. William Lord. IV. LKTTER FROM THE SECRETAKIES OF THE WESLEYAN ftllS- SIONARY SOCIETY IN ENGLAND TO HIS EXCELLENCY SIR GEORGE ARTIH R. To His Excellency Major General Sir George Arthur, K. C. II., f Lieutenant-Governor of Upper Canada, 4'C. Wesleyan Mission-House, 77> Hatton-Garden, London, Feb. 8th, 1839. Sm, As Secretaries of the Wesleyan Missionary Society, our attention has been directed by various communications, and by documents which have appeared in the public papers, to the position in which the Methodists of Upper Canada appear to be at present placed in relation to Her Majesty's Government as to certain ecclesiastical questions of great difficulty and importance, lately agitated in that country. As it IS possible that, in some of the publications which have been produced by these discussions, principles may have been advocated by persons more or less connected with us, which are not in accordance with those to which the Wesleyan Methodists have long been pledged, we there- fore feel it to be our duty respectfully to inform your Excellency that we entirely and strongly disclaim all participation in the responsibility attached to such publications ; and we earnestly request that your Excellency will not for a moment consider us, or our Connexion gene- rally, to be accountable for any sentiments to which individual mem- bers or Ministers of our Body may have been induced to commit themselves. The whole subject, as far as those individuals are con- cerned, will undoubtedly be brought under the serious consideration of the ensuing Conferences in Canada and in Great Britain. In the !/onference conference B the pub- Qrindrod, II appoir)t- ! 01 trans - pointmcnt , to whose (i the Pre- t Commit- thout the Ryerson to Reserves, rv Society, the Super- e upon all irtual and I Lord. l'AN MIS- SNCY SIR C.//., [.ondotif (9. attention ocuments vhich the relation istions of As it roduced persons lith those re there- [ncy that Insibility Vat your \n gene- *1 mem- commit Ire con- iktion of In the APrfrN-mX. If TOPnn time, the Committee of tlio Wesleyan Missionary Society are anxious for the honour and consistency of our religious character, and for the preservation of all the Societies with whom they are in any degree identified, in liabits of loyalty and peace, and of exclusive devotedness, in their collective and ecclesiastiMl relations, to the great work of promoting the spiritual and eternal interests of mankind. They therefore have unanimously requested one of our nunii>cr, the Rev. Robert Alder, to undertake, on their behalf, a Special Mission to our Societies in British North America, and to repair forthwith to Upper Canada, with the view of accurately investigating the present state of our affairs in that Province, and of exerting his well-earned consideration and influence with our Ministers and people for the maintenance of those great Christian principlos by which the Wes- leyan Connexion has nitherto been distinguished. Mr. Aider has accepted the appointment; and proposes to embark for .Atnerica about the beginning of April. "We earnestly hope and pray that Almighty God will be pleased to bless and prosper him in this Mission of peace and friendship. We beg your Excellency's permission to avail ourselves of this opportunity to assure you of the deep and grateful sense which is che- rished by ourselves, and by the Committee for whom we act, of your uniform kindness to our Missionaries and people, in various parts of the world, and of the high esteem which we entertain for you, both in your personal and in your official character. That the special guidance and protection of Divine Providence may ever be vouchsafed to your Excellency in the arduous duties to which you are called, is our most sincere and fervent prayer. We have the honour to be, Sir, Your most obedient and very humble servants, Jabez Buntino, John Bbecham, Robert Alder, Elijah IIoole, Secretaries qf the Wes(eyan Missionary Society, T. LETTER FROM THE REV. DR. ALDER TO THE REV. JOSEPH STINSON. The Rev. Joseph Stinson, President of the Upper-Canada Confer- ence, and Genenu Superintendent of the Missions under the care of the Wesleyan Missionary Society in Upper Canada, addressed seTeral Letters to the Secretaries of the Wesl^an Missionary Society during the year 1838, complaining of the conduct of the Rev. E. Ryerson as Editor of the " Christian Guardian," the official Organ of the Canadian Conference ; in which he stated that Mr. Ryerson's writings not only disturbed the peace of the Church, but tended to alienate the minds of Her Majesty's subjects in that Province from the Government. In these communications, Mr. Stinson earnestly entreated advice from the Secretaries of the Wesleyan Missionary Society ; and, in compliance with his oft-repeated applications, the following Letter was addressed V 2 m AITKNIUX. to liim by Dr. Alder ; from wliich liCtter it will be seen !!..,c «t ucror W08 dcsignod by any party in this country to interfere with the Wes- leyua MuthodistN in Upper Ctuiixhi in the exprcHsion of their politi<\tt Bentinients, or in the excroisic of thdr politicid rights ; and that ull that was recjuired of them was, that, in Riving utterance to those senli- ments, and in exercising thotie rights, they should unite ns individuals with their fellow-citizens in the re.spective localities in which thoy re8i«le, and not act in reference to merely secular politics and parties in their religious and distinctive character as Methodists. To Ihe Rev. Joseph Sfinsoti, President of f fie Ifpper-Cnnada Conference, Toronto, Upper Canada. Weslef/an Mission-House, 77, Halton-Garden, London, January 14/A, ]«.'«). My dear TiRoTHKn, Your letters under the dates of Octoher , November 12tli, and November i2Gth, have been received and carefully considered by us ; and you will not be surprised to learn that the information which they contain has occasioned us groat uneasiness. As I may have occa- sion, in II short time, to send yuu a fuller and more formal expression of our sentiments on the grave and weighty questions to which your Letters refer, i shall, at present, satisfy myself with such a brief reference to them as may serve to put you in possession of our views on the princi- ples involved in your Communications. I cannot, however, thus briefly allude to the subject contained in your important Communications, already referred to, without express- ing to you, as I did last year to Mr. Harvard, the surprise and dissatisfaction which we felt on reading the Resolutions of the Cana- »• dian Conference of 1837 on the Clergy Reserves and Grants for Religious Purposes, which are inserted in the printed Minutes of the Conference for that year. We caimot but complain that Resolutions, bearing on arrangements entered into between His late Majesty's Government and the Wesleyan Missionary Committee before the Union took place between the British and Canadian Conferences, and •which arrangements were understood and recognised by both Confer- ences at the time when the Articles of Union were prepared and ratified, should have been adopted without any previous correspond- ence respecting them, either with the British Conference, or with the Missionary Committee ; and it is to us unaccountable that, up to the present time, no official explanation of these proceedings has been forwarded to us by the direction of the Canadian Conference, as it was but reasonable to suppose that the Second and Fifth of these Resolutions would be regarded by the Missionary Committee as inter- fering with matters placed, as we think, under their exclusive jurisdic- tion ; and so placed because of the objection entertained on the part of the Canadian Conference to receive Grants of Money from the Government for Religious Purposes, — an objection not at all felt by us, because we hold that it is one of the first and most important duties of a Government to provide for the Religious instruction of the people ; and therefore we claim, and shall continue to claim, from the Casual and Teriitorial Revenue the aid promised to the Missionary Committee by His late Majesty's Government towards the support of our Missions in Upper Canada. API'K.NUIX. Wo admit tliftt n (lirt'crence in circuinstancos botwcen ono country mill another, — ax, for instuncf, hotween an old and u nowly-settled country, — may render it necessary and e\j)edient that the principle involved in what in commonly called the " Chureh-und-State Quch- tion" shi>uld he so applied as to meet and adapt itself to thia (liU'erence ; but, under no eireunibtances, HJiould the principle itself he conceded or abandoned : and I do not lieHitate to state that, if it could be made to appear that, with regard to Upper (.'anadn, there is no alternative, but that the Government must either leave the religious instruction of the people to be provided for by what is called the *' Voluntary I'rinciple," or endow that branch of the Iteformed linglish Church which is established in the Province, it would be the duty of the Government to adopt the latter course, and to furnish that Church with pecuniary aid to be employed for that purpose, without indeed investing its Ministers with any ecclesiastical authority over the Ministers or Members of other Churches, and leaving nil other denominations in the sume circumstances in wbich they are at present placed. Here I must notice what, as it appears to me, constitutes an impor- tant part of the difference between the Editor of the "Guardian" and some of his Correspondents, and ourselves on this point. It is, as I understand it, a difference of principle as between them and us ; for they are opposed not to any particular application of a great princiide, but to the principle ilsclf. All their arguments, as far as I under- stand tlienj, are directed against an abstract principle, which we maintain to be reasonable, scriptural, and AVesleyan ; and not against any particular misapplication or abuse of it. Our venerable Founder maintained this principle inviolably ; and it has always been maintained by our Connexion. The extracts from Mr. Wesley's writings which are occasionally quoted on this subject, were intended, (as will appear from the context, as well as from other parts of his voluminous works,) to expose and condemn the abuses of National Religious Establishments, and not to censure or condemn the principle of a national recognition or endowment of Christianity, lie blamed Constantine, not because the Emperor maintained this principle, but because he so applied it as to secularize the Church by the influence of the world ; instead of carrying it out, as he might and should liave done, in order to evan- gelize the world by the agency of the Church. AVith all due deference to them, and Avith the utmost respect for the general talent and industry which their Communications display, I must be permitted to observe that they appear to have fallen into the same error on this one point with that class of writers who have charged Mr. Wesley with holcilo^ Jl^wtrines which he never tanght, and with inculcating opposite and contradictory views of the same doctrine, in different parts of his works ; and from precisely the same cause too ; namely, from not having duly considered the object which Mr. Wesley had in view in writing the paragraphs to which they appeal, and from judging of what he really believed and taught from detached portions of his writings, published at different times, under widely different circum- stances, and from very different objects, instead of drawing their conclusions from a careful examination of his various publications, and a diligent comparison of one part of them with another. The latter mode of proceeding is absolutely necessary to a right understanding of any author ; more especially of one who, like our founder, wrote to 70 API'RNUIX. much, and on so many dift'erent subjects, and who had so often to reply to such a niuhitude of dissimilar adversaries and opponents. It is the undoubted right of every Methodist in Upper Canada to form, and, on all proper occasions, to express his own opinionci on the Clergy Reserve, and on all other great public questions; but we think that, in giving utterance to their opinions, and, especially, in acting upon them, they should appear in the character of citizens, and not in that of Methodists. Instead of associating as Members of a Christian Church to oppose measures of which, in common \. .' others of their countrymen, they disapprove, they should unite witu their fellow-citizens in a respectful expression of their sentiments, and in the adoption of such comstitutional measures as, under the circum- stances, may be deemed necessary. And I must add, in behalf of ray colleagues and myself, that the official Organ of the Connexion should not be identified with such proceedings. We are well aware that the Editor is placed in very difficult circumstances ; that he has received much provocation,— and we make all due allowance for these things ; but we cannot help deeply regretting that, instead of having employed his excellent talents in defending and maintaining the scriptural character and object of Methodism, he has warmly engaged in the discussion of irritating topics, and is, as you state, aiming at *' the entire subversion of the Church of England, as an Establishment in the Province." Such, you say, is his policy ; and we have no reason to doubt that it is so, inasmuch as we perceive, from the columns of the *' Guardian," that he has committed himself to the advocacy of principles which are opposed to a national establishment of religion under any form. And I need scarcely add that we differ widely from him on this subject. We are anxious to maintain the Union which has been formed between us and our brethren in Upper Canada ; but it can be honourably and beneficially mtiintained only on the principles on which it was originally formed. We must, at all events, maintain our principles and our consistency. We cannot be identified with one class of principles in England, and with another in Canada. The *' Christian Guardian " is not, like the London " Watchman," an unofficial journal. It is the recognised organ of your Conference. It expresses the sentiments of the body ; and * * * * * *^ and ***** *^ which are understood to express the sentiments of various classes of Dissenters in this country, have not failer' to take advantage of the communication from the pen of brother Zgerton Byerson, inserted in the "Christian Guardian" of Wednesday, No- veml)ei — , for the promotion of their own party purposes. Under these circumstances, " without," as you express it, " arraying yourself against the ' Guardian,' " you should use all your influence with the Editor, to induce him to discontir ue that system of attack and recrimi- nation, whi(;h occasions you so much uneasiness, and of which you so jurly complain. If you should fail in your attempt, then it will be for you to consider whether you are not, as President of the Conference, empowered to interfere, officially and authoritatively, with the manage- ment of the Conference journal, and to require that, until the meeting of the next Conference, questions which '* tead to strife rather than to godly edifying" shall be excluded from its pages. I need hardly remind you that, according to one of the Articles of Union between the British and Canadian Conferences, it is agreed that the " Guar- dian " ^hall be a religious newspaper ; and although the Editor may, APPENDIX. 71 ■ten to s. ada to on the )ut we tilly, in IS, and rs of a n A. ' te witu its, and jircura- ' of my 1 should that the received things ; nployed :riptural . in the it "the it in the eason to umns of rocacy of religion lely trom hich has t; but it rinciples maintain with one la. The jan," an jnce. It *, and ments of to take i^gerton lay, No- Under yourself with the recrimi- you so ill be for nference, raanage- meeting r than to 1 hardly between « Guar- tor may, i nnd doubtless does, believe that the Article in question is not in the least degree affected by such communications as those to which I have alluded, we are of a different opinion ; and that ver)' circumstance ren- ders it the more necessary that you, as President, should pursue such a course as that which I have taken the liberty to bring under your consideration. At the next Conference we shall be able to interchange our sentiments, ;^nd to come to a satisfactory understanding on these great questions, either by letter or by deputation ; as, in addition to the weighty affairs connected with Methodism in Canada, there are various matters bearing upon the state and prospects of our societies in British North America generally, which require our immediate and best attention, it is by no means impr tbaMe but that a representative from this country will attend your approaci.:T»g Conference. In the mean time, let the attention of thr people be direv^ied to better things. It was not by proclaiming the doctrine of religious equality, but by aiming to spread scriptural holiness throughout the land, that the venerable Founder of Methodism accomplished so much good in his day ; and if we would share in his success, we should imitate his apostolic example. I cannot conclude this communication without expressing our entire satisfaction with your conduct in the painfully-embarrassing circum- stances in which you have been, and, we fear, are still placed. You have a difficult task to perform ; but He whom you serve can and will give you a large measure of " the spirit of love, of power, and of a sound mind," and thus " fit you for every good word and work." Con- tinue to adhere to the great principles of Wesleyan Methodism. Enforce them affectionately, but firmly, upon all those " over whom the Holy Ghost hath made you overseer." Maintain them, and, under the Divine blessing, they will maintain you. Avoid all extremes. Beware of the doctrine of expediency. Do that which is right, in a right spirit, ever remembering that the cause in which you are engaged is not yours, but his whom you " serve in the Gospel of his Son," nnd that He watches over and protects it continually. I am yours truly, RoBEHT Aldek. VI. EXTRACT OF A LETTER FROM THE REV. DR. ALDER TO THE REV. JOSEPH STINSON, PRESIDENT OF THE UPPEK-CANADA CONFERENCE, DATED NEW-YORK, OCT. 9th, 18.39. Having been prevented, by circumstances which I need not enume- rate, from accomplishing the principal object connected with my late visit to Toronto, — a visit which I paid at much personal inconve- nience, — I feel it to be my duty to address this communication to you, in order that you may bring the subject to which it refers under the immediate, consideration of the Book-Committee. I am induced to adopt this course, because a Committee was appointed by our last Conference, invested with full powers to determine, on my report, all matters connected with the continuance or otherwise of the relations now existing between the British Conference and the Conference in Upper Canada. And as my report and recommendation will depend, 72 iri'EXMX. in a great measure, on the pracliail airiying out, in the raanagCTnciifc of the "Christian Cjuardiau," of the Resolution respecting that periodi- cal which Avas solemnly re-enacted at the late Conference, it is of the utmost importance that I should be put in possession of your views and intentions on that point. It might be deemed unreasonable for me to ask for any further explanations on that point, were it not that, in my judgment, as well as in yours, and in that of other parties in England and in Canada, tlic " Guardian " has not been uniformly conducted in accordance witli the spirit of the Resolution in question. I refer particularly to the state- ment respecting the relation of the paper to Lord Durham's policiy, to the Editor's " Travelling Notes," and to the partial character of the " oontenjporary opinions." Under these circumstances, I beg leave, through you, respectfully to inquire of the Book-Committee, and of you as the President of the Conference, whether the " Christian Guardian" is to be, bouii Jide^ a religious journal; and whethtr all party politics are to be excluded from its pages. Is it to be made what the religious newspapers in this country are '{ Why should it not ? Much of the future peace and unity and prosperity of Methodism in Upper Canada depends upon the right settlement of this matter. I Know, and I write advisedly, that you cannot prevent a serious division in Upper Canada, unless this is done ; for if even the British Confer- ence were to maintain the Union on its part, there are not a few in Canada, both Preachers and people, who will not long continue to be identified as JVlethodists with party politics. Let me not be misunder- htood as if I wished to act upon your feai'S. Far from it. I merely state the facts of the case. 1 VII. REMARKS ON SOME OF THE STATEMENTS, &c., CONTAINED IN THE PAMPHLET LATELY PUBLISHED BY THE REV, MESSRS. W. AND E. RVERSON. JN A LETTER ADDttESSED TO THE REV. ROUERT NEWTOK, PRESIDENT or THE UKITISn CONFERENCE. My DEAR Sru, ^ Hull, Sept. hUh, 1840. I TAKE the liberty of addressing you on some of the topics con- tained in the pamphlet recently published by the Messrs. Ryerson. I say, some of the topic i\ because I do not design this Letter to be a regular and formal answer to the pamphlet, the publication of which 1 deeply deplore for their own sake, and for the sake of the Wesleyan- Methodist Churcli in Canada ; but I purpose to remark on some of its misleading statements and erroneous reasonings. The spirit of this production is as bitter and imchristian as its publication is uncalled lor, and its tendency, not to say its design, is exceedingly mischievous. The first point to which 1 shall call your attention, is the conduct of Mr. E. Ryerson in relation to the Government Grant. The Messrs. Ryerson very justly observe, (p. 97,) that this is the maui point; and are extremely anxious that Mr. E. Ryerson should appear inno- cent of the charge preferred against him in this particular. Nor do I wonder at this concern; for if the charge of the British Committee on Canadian atl'airs can be sustained, then the C!anada Conference will bp equally implicated with himself in the disgrace of a most dis- Al'J'KXMX. IS liouourable transaction, ns the ]\Ies3rs. Kyersoii state that he was '■' acquitted, sustaiiicd, aud honoured by" that Conference. Greatly should I have rejoiced, if, in the course of this painful investiga- tion, there had been even circumstantial evidence in favour of his innocence ; but I am compelled to say that, according to my con- victions, all the evidence was in proof of the correctness of the charge preferred against him. ]\Ir. E. Kyerson was charged with " an utter n, want of ingenuousness aud integrity in attempting to get possession, .' in behalf of the Canadian Conference, in whole or in part, of the S- Grant made by the Crown to the AVesleyan Alissionary Society." This ( charge the British Conference decided to have been " fully proved." -^ The Messrs. Ryerson inquire " upon what evidence ? " This question can be easily, and, to any unprejudiced person, satisfactorily, answered. 1. The truth of this "allegation" is justly inferred from his refusing to give a frank denial of being any way concerned in the matter, when pressed upon the subject in Conunittee. His replies were evasive, dis- ingenuous, and utterly unworthy of an honest man, not to say a Chris- tian Minister. 2. His intercourse with, and communications addressed to, tlie Governor-General, afford ample proof of its truth. From these it is apparent, — 1. That he applied for a Grant in aid of the Upper-Canada Academy. 2. That, subsequently to the Governor informing him that no addi- tional Grant could be made to the Wesleyan Body, and of his inten- tion to recommend to Lord John Russell a different distri >ntion of the existing Grant, that is, its transfer from the British to the Canada Con- ference, JMr. E. Ryerson, in his Letter of January 17th, pleads for the transfer in the following language : " I conceive, therefore, tiiat any Grants intended to benefit the Wesleyan-Methodist Church in Canada, ought undoubtedly to be placed at the disposal of the Conference of that Church." This Letter His Excellency transmits to England with Iiia own Despatch on the subject, which despatch Mr. r- verson was allowed to read, and, on its arrival, it is considered by Mr. ' emon Smith as an application for the Grant; for in his Letter to Dr. Alder he says, "The Governor General's Despatch was accompanied by a representation from Mr. Ryerson, explaining the nature of the linanoial relations between the British Wesleyan Conference hi England, and the Con- ference of the AVesleyan Methodists in Upper Canada, and urging the claim of the latter to the exclusive management of the Yearly Grant." This correspondence places it beyond reasonable doubt that Mr. Ryerson did attempt to gain ])ossession of the Government Grant, in whole or in part. It is quite evident that it was so understood at the Colonial Office, nor could it be understood otherwise, aud, I may also add, that it was so understood by the IMessrs. Ryerson themselves. " But the real ground of dissatisfaction," they state, (p. 99,) "is not that Mr. Ryer- son communicated with the Governor-General, but that his coninumica- tions were more successful, because more just and reasonable, than those of Messrs. Btinson and Richey." In what did the success of his coannu- nications consist? He applied for a Grant; — he subsequently stated, when writing on the subject, that "any Grants intended to l.'enefit the Wesleyan-Methodist Church in Canada, ought undoul)tediy to be placed at the disposal of the Conference of that Church." The Governor-General engaged to reconunend a diflcrent di'^tribution of the 74 APPENDIX. I J. N t. money, tliat is, in fact, its transfer from the British to the Canad i Conference ; and, as a first step to the transfer of the Grant, Sir. E. Ryerson has informed us that it is already suspended. This is the success of his communications ; and yet, after this admission, the Messrs. Ryerson wish us to believe that Mr. E. Ryerson never attempted to get possession of this Grant ! The tnith of the charge is more apparent still from the Letter of the Messrs. Ryerson, of Augv t 20th, addressed to Lord John Russell. Had Mr. E. Ryerson never attempted to gain possession of the Grant, he would, as an honest man, have rejoiced to pursue the course marked out for him by the British Conference ; he would cheerfully have written to Lord John Russell, " disclaiming any intention or wish to deprive the Wesleyan Missionary Society of the £700 per annum." But what is his course ? He unites with his brother in addressing a Letter to Lord John Russell, in which Letter they most strenuously plead for the possession of this Grant : and they assure his Lordship, that the Wesleyan-Methodist Church in Canada " Avill have just and permanent cause for strong dissatisfaction and complaint," if its distri- bution and control be not varied. (P. 4(>.) Thus does Mr. E. Ryerson persevere in seeking to attain his object, — the transfer of the Grant : and still it is affirmed that he has never attempted any such thing I I will now direct your attention to the singular mode adopted to screen Mr. E. Ryerson from the reproach which must inevitably attach to him, if he cannot divert attention from the main point In the first place, protection is sought by an appeal to the Governor-General. He proposes the following questions to His Excellency, in a Letter, dated June 5th : — " Did not your Excellency determine to write to Lord John Russell on the subject of the Grant to the Wesleyan Missionary Commi;,tee, in consequence of examining the document which related to it, and the Articles of Union between the British and Canadian Conference, and without any application on my part ? " The reply of His Excellency's Secretary is, " It" (the Despatch) " would have shovni, for instance, that His Excellency's communi- cations with the Secretary of State originated in an examination of the whole of the circumstances of the AVesleyan Body in Upper Canada, and of the documents relative to the Union between the British and Canadian Conferences which were submitted to him; and, upon this point, I am directed to add, in reply to your question, that this examination did not proceed from any request of yours, and that the Letter drawn up by you, in explanation of the financial rela- tions of the two Bodies, was prepared at His Excellency's request." The question at issue is not whether Mr. Ryerson did or did not apply to the Governor to write to Lord John Russell ; nor is it the question, what were the circumstances which induced the 'Governor to apply to his Lordship ; but simply, did Mr. Ryerson, in any way, attempt to gain possession of the Grant ? He did so, as I have already shown ; and the reply of His Excellency's Secretary neither affirms nor denies it. With what truth then can the Messrs. Ryerson make His Excellency say, (p. 92,) "That Mr. Ryerson had never applied to him on the subject of the Government Grant to the London Wesleyan Com- mittee," when his reply can admit of no such construction ? It is worthy of remark that the Messrs. Ryerson state, " That corre- spondence, part of which is quoted above, contains the complctcst APPENDIX. To nation Upper n the him ; stion, I, and rela- uest." apply stion, ply to |pt to ■own ; lies it. Ilency the ;om- lorre- Ictcst refutation of the allegations of your Committee on Canadian Affairs against Mr. Ryerson, which the nature of the case will afford." Then it is evident that Mr. lil. Ryerson stands convicted of the charge pre- ferred against him in all its extent, and without any palliation, although th<^ completcst refutation has been produced whkh the nature of the case will .n*»brd. Had Mr. E. Ryerson frankly acknowledged this, even thouf :i he might have entered into a justification 'y{ his conduct, it would ii^'ve been more honourable than the attempts which are insidiously :»jade to represent him as unjustly charged, when his own documents and speeches have proved the correctness of the allegations, or than involving, by misrepresentations and deceptive statements, a case ill its merits and circumstances perfectly clear, or than ascribing to the Governor a testimony which he never bore. It is proper here to take notice of the gross imd calumnious misre- presentation of the Messrs. Ryerson in professing to report what was said respecting the Governor in the Conference Committee. " We know," they state, " that the testimony of the Governor-General was very little regarded by our Committee ; that His Excellency was spoken of by Dr. Bunting and others as a person not to be relied upon ; and that Mr. Ryerson was much reprobated for identifying himself and the Canada Conference with the administration of such a man." When speaking of His Excellency, the word testimony was never used, nor any equivalent word, but opinion. Nor did Dr. Bunting, or any other person, use any expressions which implied that His Excellency was not to be relied upon. The opinion which His Excellency was stated to have given in reference to the original design of the Government in bestowing this Grant, was questioned, but not so as to reflect any doubt on his veracity, or to dispute the correctness of his testimony as a witness. And surely the Committee might doubt whether the Governor-General was correct in the views which he had taken, when he proposed a dis- tribution of the Grant, essentially different from that adopted by the Government who originally made it, and by all who have succeeded them in olfice, without meriting the accusation of having spoken of him as a person not to be relied upon. But Avhy has the word testi- mony been introduced, when opinion was the word used ? Was there not a purpose to serve ? The opinion of a person may be questioned with perfect courtesy, but his testimony cannot be doubted without just cause of offence. One of the writers knows too well what use can be made of a single expression not to have had, it is to be feared, a design in making this substitution. This instance of calumny and misrepresentation calls for the stronges*^^ expressions of disapprobation ' and indignation. It is au instance too gross to have resulted from inadvertency, too palpable and circumstantial not to have been designed. It is but too evident that it was intended to calumniate a i highly honoured individual, whose character, notwithstanding all the attacks made upon it, remains untarnished and beyond suspicion, and / whose laborious, disinterested, and able services in the cause of humanity and religion are beyond all praise. It was designed io bring upon our brethren in the Colony the displeasure of the Governor, and \ upon our Body in England the displeasure of the existing adminifitra- i tion. But the well -known and long-fixed principles of the Wesleyan / Conference and their Agents are too highly appreciated by Her Jllajesty's Government for any impression to be made in that quarter injurious to the Wesleyan Body, by the aspersions of men, one _of -h /- A ittrininiiiiiii I'lii raflriT '1:11 f TtiV^rffifflMlMiiiii^ n APPENDIX, S i f 1 V ■^ ivliom li;is long reiulcied himself notorious by labouring in the noMc •vocafion of opposition to every Governor, fcxcepting Lord Sydenhant, Svho, for the present, is favoured with his patronage and support. The Messrs. Ilyerson are equally incorrect when they state " that Mr. E. Ryerson was much reprobated for identifying himself and the Canadian Conference with the administration of such a man." The Committee expressed their surprise, and probably their displeasure, that a Minister in connexion with themselves should have been so entirely absorbed in secular politics ; and this feeling would have been expressed, whoever might have been at the head of the administration. It had no refer- ence to the administration of Lord Sydenham, nor to the politics of any party. How unaccountable are these misrepresentations, upon any prin- ciple of candour, of honour, of truth, not to say of Christian charity ! Supposing the above statements to have been correct, what good can result from publishing them ? But in this letter a new argument is adduced, and a new mode of appeal is adopted ; and, to make an impression, and to give the sem- blance of truth, it is introduced with all imaginary boldness and confidence, p. 3fi : " In reply to Mr. Alder's too oft-repeated state- ments, that both Mr. Ryerson and the Canadian Conference had repeatedly declared ' that it was wrong for Churches to receive aid for religious purposes from the State,' we may observe that it is utterly un- supported by evidence, and contradicted by numerous tacts. In 1834 to M'iSii, Mr. Ryerson, as the editor of the official organ of the AVesleyan Conference in Canada, defended, at large, the right of the Orown to appropriate, and the right of Churches to receive, aid from the casual and territorial revenue." And will Mr. E. Ryerson tell the Methodists and the people of '"'anada that he has not strongly and repeatedly enforced the doctrine, " that it is wrong for Churches to receive aid for religious purposes from the State ?" Will he deny that which every AVesleyan IMmister, every Methodist, all the reading puiiiic of Canada, nay, almost every child in certain circles, knows to be the fact ? AVill he deny that it was in consequence of the course taken by the Canadian Conference, and the " Guardian," that the pay- ment of the Grunt was suspended by Sir F. B. Head, and afterwards by Sir G. Arthur? Such a statement may pass where the "Guardian" has not been read, and where Government Grants have not been discussed ; but it will not pass in Canada. Does he not recollect that the Cana- dian Conference have always repudiated the Grant in question, and manifested a strong desire that it should be well understood that the odium of receiving it re?ted with the British Conference ? So strong has been the feeling ou his i ^ect, that tli e Ca nada Conference has always objected to the publication of this Grant in its Annual 5Iis- sionary Reports. The Messrs. Ryerson assufe Lord John Russell, " that in 1834 and 1835, Mr. Ryerson, as editor of the official organ of the Wesleyan Conference in Canada, defended at large the right of the Crown to appropriate, and the right of Churches to receive, aid from the casual and territorial revenue ;" and in the same Letter, (p. 44,) they state " that the Grant had always been paid out of the casual and territorial revenue, with the appropriations of which the Canadian Conference had always felt and declared it had no right to interfere, confining its discussions to the question of CL'rgy Reserves." IIow admirably consistent ! " In 1834 and 1835, the official organ defends at large appropriations from the casual and territorial revenue ; " but -UTEMMX. 77 of rong has trom (44,) Isual Idiaii Ifere, [low suds but " the Canadian Conference had always felt and declared that it liad no right to interfere with these appropriations." The official organ of the Conference and the Conference are at variance, the Editor him- self being judge. Far be it from nie to affirm that the Editor of tho^ " Guardian " has never pleaded in favour of Government Grants for religious purposes, as he has taken various sides of that question, as well as of others; but I will affirm that opposition to them has been hia general course. And in the letter, addressed to Dr. Hannah, (p. 104,) the ruling passion is betrayed in all its vigour. The Messrs. ttyersoii informed the Doctor that they objected to comply with the requirement of the English Conference, namely, " That their official organ should admit and maintain it to be the duty of civil Governments to employ tlieir resources for the support of the Christian religion." It is true, they wish to make it appear that they object to this requirement because it implies " the theory of a National Church Establishment." But does the employment of the resources of Civil Governments in support of religion necessarily involve an Establishment? Cannot, and docs not, the one exist without the other ? They knew right well that the Conference had no such object in view ; that their Organ was no more required to plead for a National Establishment in Canada than in Jupiter ; that it was only required to admit and maintain the principle which, it is stated, Mr. Ryerson ''defended at large in 1834 to 1835," but which in 1840 they indignantly reject. And they also knew that, if they stated they were required to plead for a National Establishment, it would succeed in raising a popular outcry in their favour, and throwing odium upon the British Conference. l*>om the , above, it is evident that, not only the " Guardian" and the Conference are at variance, but the Messrs. R^'erson are in opposition to Mr. E. Ryerson. The truth i=f, Dr. Alder's statement is correct. I am sorry to have to make those statements respecting brethren with whom I have laboured with great cordiality. To exonerate Mr. E. Ryerson from blame, an appeal is also made to the decision of the British Conference, which they represent as at vari- ance with itself. " In one part of your Itesolutions," say they, " you condemn Mr. E. Ryerson tor an utter want of ingenuousness and integrity, in attempting to obtain for the Canada Conference the Grant which had been given to the British Conference ; in another part of your Resolutions, you condemn him, (in respect to the same identical allegations,) for not opposing, but rather countenancing, the payment of our (Jrant in a certain contingency, not to us, but to tl.e Upper- Canada Conference. The one part of your decision, therefore, con- travenes and neutralizes the other, and completely refutes your allej;a- tion." Wherein is this decision contravened ? None bat the party concerned will be able to discern. The state of the case is this : Tlie ( ommittee, after a long, painful, and impartial investigation, regard the three matters of complaint as fully proved, i his conclusion they come to, after hearing at great length both sides. But, judging of the case from the "explanations and defence of th-? Rev. Messrs. E. and W. Ryerson," exclusive of the evidence produced bi/ the other party, and giving "full weight" to all they said during the twelve or thirteen hours in A-hich they occupied the time of the Committee by their addresses, " the Committee are decidedly of opinion that " tbey " have entirely failed to establish a justification," and t!u refore the evidence adduced which fu!'y proved, iu the judgment of the ) n APPENDIX. \ / Committee, the truth of the nllcgations, remained unshaken. Th6 Committee then proceed to state how far these "matters of com- plaint " are proA'ed to their satisfaction, notwithstanding the statements and explanations of the Messrs. Ryerson. In reference to what the Messrs. Ryerson call " the main point," they state, there existed a violation of the obligations arising out of the Union, in not opposing, hut rather countenancing, the payment of our Grant in a certain con- tingency, not to U8, but to the Upper- Canada Conference, &c. And is Mr. E. Ryerson, by this verdict, " substantially acquitted ? " No ; A there attaches to him the foul stain of having been a consenting party S to its transfer from the British Conference, to which it belonged, to ! the Canada Conference, and at a time when these Bodies were in *• fraternal Union. Had Mr^ Ryerson been convinced that the Canada Conference would prol)ably be injured by the change as to the funds upon which in future its payment should be charged, even this would not have jutjtified his proceedings. In such a case, he should have communicated with the British Conference or its Agents, and have firmly resisted any proposition to their injury, from whatever quarter it might have come. Honesty, honour, equity, and the obligations arising out of the existing Union, all required the adoption of this course. It will be remembered that, when Mr. E. Ryerson was attempt- ing to defend, before the Conference Committee, this part of his conduct, he stated that, the Governor having given it as his opinion that the Grant had not been rightly appropriated, it would have been highly improper in him to have disputed the correctness of His Excellency's opinion. It was his duty at once to submit, and act upon this new view. It would have been strange indeed, if Mr. E. Ryerson had ventured to dissent from the Governor! But, with his well known deference^ for Governors and their opinions, he might have stated, with great propriety, that this opinion was new ; that the Canada Conference had always been careful to deny any participation in the Grant ; that, should this opinion be acted upon, it would deeply injure the English Conference, with whom he was in cordial union ; and that, before any steps be taken, he must in justice communicate with the parties con- cerned. This would have been the straightforward, upright course. And I can assure him, if he had adopted this plan, the British Confer- ence would have amply proved that it was guided in its conduct towards the Canada Conference by the noble principles of Christian liberality and affection, and the result would have been satisfactory. But, instead of this honourable mode of procedure, there has been an attempt made, and by a professed brother, to deprive them of their right, by secrecy, by intrigue, by misrepresentation, and by an abandonment on his part of sentiments long professed and strongly maintained on this subject. And it is asserted that this view of the conduct in question is " substantial acquittal." If this be acquittal, where shall we find condemnation ? In this sense, one half of Her Majesty's subjects, who are favoured with a free passage to our antipodes, are " sub- stantially acquitted." They attempted, but they utterly failed, to establish a justification of their conduct. In reference to this Grant, I will only remark further that the Messrs. Ryerson speak as if Canada were not benefited by it. Where has it been expended ? The Canada Conference of 1837, in its Minutes, states " that the suras which were granted by His Majesty's Govern- ment to the Wesleyan Jlissionary Committee have been expended, (as ATPENTUX. tnny he seen by the printed Reports of the Auxilitiry Methodist Mis« sionary Society in this Province,) solely and entirely in the improve- ment of the long-neglected aboriginal Indian tribes and destitute settlers." Seveial thousands of pounds, in addition to this Grant, have been expended upon Canada by the British Conference during the last seven years, besides large sums which have been obtained in England, and through English influence, for educational purposes in Canada. Where then is the justice or the truth, not to say the generosity, of charging Dr. Alder and his friends with making *' efforts to grasp every farthing of a disposable Canadian revenue from their brethren in Canada ? " Will the Messrs. Ryerson single out the Repre- sentative of the British Conference, Avho has manifested this rapacious spirit ? and 1 Avill direct them to others who, though in labours more abundant, never received the smallest fraction of Canadian money. I will now direct your attention to the cause of the decrease in our Missionary Contributions after the formation of the Union. The Messrs. Ryerson say, " This falling off was caused by dissatisfactioi) with the Union." This is true ; but what caused this dissatisfaction ? * I regret to be compelled to state, that it is to be traced io the then existing strong political feeling of the Methodist Body in Upper Canada. Before the Union, many had imbibed the politics contained in the well-known paper, edited and published by the notorious rebel M'Kenzie. After the Union was formed, and after Mr. E. Ryerson returned from England, the leaders of the movement party found that he had brought with him "impressions" unfriendly to their projects. With a very few exceptions, he was immediately most violently assailed by the conductors of the press : attacks were also made upon him, and upon the Methodists, in the House of Assembly ; the Confer- ence was represented as having sold itself to Government ; and the Union became extremely unpopular with the Radical and ill-affected people, and, consequently, the funds of the Missionary Society suf- fered. On arriving in the Province in November, 1834, I found the Societies generally, and several of the Preachers also, strongly preju- diced against the Union. I entered at once upon extensive travels ; I visited several of the principal societies ; I stated at all proper oppor- tunities that in the formation of the Union no reference was had by the British Conference to any class of politics, or to any party in the State, — that we were not a political people, but that our great object, individually and collectively, was to promote the religious benefit of the people, without interfering with secular politics. Mr. Stinson united most zealously and efficiently with me in holding Missionary Meetings and organizing Missionary Societies, in which we were aided by several of the Preachers in their respective Circuits. We commenced holding these Missionary Meetings early in the year 1835 ; and the result was, though half of the year had expired, an increase of from £198. 5«. 8^rf. to £.'512. 3*. 2f - ™^y ^^^■> ^"y Representative of the British Conference, with the pro- C "J ^ ■i^a^ /^■lAjf ^ r ,<- i/V <"jf *.■" my opinion, the preservation ( i ] ] t i I 1 n a s 'l<-f^ ■ jj\ // Iliat " it bli, coii- tslovrtn- Ivoui' of liat was licles in ics as at Ifluence i»e, or, I |ie pro- in the [nciples to the ' estab - of the livation l..,. feared that some e in that feeling of de^'ree amongst the the President and I ■2-t^^ APPENDIX. 81 / of the Colony to the Parent State is chiefly owing to the same cause. /^, -> V Thousands will respond to these sentiments. • While, therefore, politics '■''''^*' have never been mixed up with our plans, our olnects, or our proceed- i*^*^ "^Su/a/ ings, the diifusion of the spirit and genius of Wesleyan Methodism >.^^ in Upp ninety-seven Conferences which have been held in England, if the many ( Conferences which I have attended have been fair specimens. Let ' me here observe that the Messrs. Ryerson, in various parts of their pamphlet, represent the authorities of the British Conference as Iiaving been influenced in their proceedings by high Tory political feeling. Nothing can be more \mtrue. They care not what the politics of their Canada brethren are, providing they avoid, (as all Wesleyan Ministers are required to do,) meddling with political parties or secular disputes, and attend to the work of saving souls, to which, as Ministers, they are called. They claim no right to interfere with their private sentiments. But I will now bring these remarks to a close. About twenty months I laboured, in Connexion with the Messrs. Ryerson and others, with great pleasure and with some success. From the Preachers and people I experienced much kindness, and received many marks of respect. The grateful recollections I have of the kind and cheerful hospitality which I invariably received on my numerous journeys, is too deeply engraved on my memory ever to be forgotten. For the best interests of the people of Canada generally, and for the religious pros- perity of the Wesleyan-Methodist Church in particular, I have felt a lively concern ; nor shall I cease to cherish an afi^ectionate regard for numerous respected friends, and to pray for the peace, the spirituality, and the increase of that Church. No one was more anxious than myself to maintain and strengthen the Union ; but when 1 was con- G / / \ / \ ■ ^ f HA^-^'-f ^ *^^% IMAGE EVALUATION TEST TARGET (MT-3) 1.0 I.I 11.25 Hi M |2.2 ui lili 1.8 U 11.6 III .> «y^ / HiotDgraphic Sciences Corporation m \ ^ <^ rv 4^ 6^ '^> 23 WEST MAIN STREET WEBSTER, N.Y. 14S80 (716)a73-4503 "% ^ "'"B^'* 82 APPENDIX. I '; 1"^^- U " ' r-^- ^ f -^ vinced that this could not be done without a sacrifice of principle and honour on the part of the English Conference, no one more readily consented to its dissolution. The Resolutions of the English Confer- ence, although they strongly censure a certain course of proceeding, contain no ''assumptions of novel and unreasonable prerogative," nothing, in my judgment, contrary to a fair and candid interpretation of the letter and spirit of the articles of the Union. It is true they provide a check or security against a violation of the great principles of Wesleyan Methodism ; a provision highly reasonable and necessary, as is evident from recent occurrences. Where a union involves responsibility of character and public reputation, there ought to be a " nght and power" to exert some *' official influence, so as to secure a reasonable and necessary co-ordinate but efficient direction." Without it, consistency could not be maintained, and character would be insecureT — The responsibility of dissolving the Union is tremendous; but, happily, it rests not with the British Conference, or its Agents. They have used every prudential means to perpetuate it, not sparing labour or expense. Their sincerity is manifest to all, in the conciliation and forbearance repeatedly extended to their Canada bKthren, when one pledge after another has been broken. They have strictly adhered to the spirit and letter of the Articles of Union. I regard the late Canada Conference as virtually dissolving the Union, as it sanctioned a course of proceeding known to be highly offensive to the British Conference, and which the latter considered unbrotherly and unjust. But the British Conference formally dissolved it : — they were oom> pelled so to do. They were informed by one of the Representatives, on healing the Report of the Committee read in Conference, which contained such recommendations as the honour. Christian consistency, and public character of the Conference required, on the one hand, and which a future good understanding with their Canada brethren required, on the other, that they could not recommend their Conference to com- ply with the Resolutions it contained. To prevent the agitation which would have existed during the year, it was wise in the British Confer- ence to terminate, in &ct, a Union which had already been virtually dissolved by the Canada Conference, and which was declared, by one of the Canada Representatives, virtually dissolved, if that Report should be adopted by the Conference. I am, my dear Sir, Yours, very respectfully and affectionately, William Lord. VIII. EXTRACT OF A LETTER FROM ONE OF THE MINISTERS OF THE WE8LEYAN.METHODIST CONNEXION IN UPPER CANADA, DATED AMHERSTBURGH, UPPER CANADA, JULY 10th, 1840, TO THE REV. DR. ALDER. Knowing, as I do, the deep interest you feel in all that relates to Methodism in Upper Canada, I presume at this time to address a few thoughts to you in reference thereto, and at the hazard of intruding upon your time, which, during the sittings of Conference, must be fully occupied. The importance of the affairs of Canadft at this msis, and APPENDIX. ^ land Idily Ifer- h" Ition they pples bary, Jives be a ire a Jhout Id be but, Vbey ibour and one M to late Moned witish 'just, com- tires, which rtency, d, and [uired, • com- »''hich >nfer- 'uallif y one eport D. OP *ER rLY i to p ew ing ^f Jiy Dd the deep anxiety which fills my ovm heart in reference to the future, form my apology for thus troubling you. During the last three years, I hare had frequent opportunities of ascertaining the true spirit of those whom, for convenience, we may call the leaders of the Canada Conference, and of knowing what are their real, though often concealed, sentiments in reference to the British Conference and Missionary Committee. My close intimacy with Mr. E. Ryerson, and connexion with the " Guardian " office for some time, opened my eyes on those subjects, and convinced me of the absolute necessity of standing aloof from these men and their measures, if I would either preserve my attachments to British Methodism, or retain my love of British supremacy. I have no hesitation in avowing my belief that, in all the operations of Mr. Ryerson, who certainly lea« the Canada Conference, he designedly aims at the completion of two objects, very nearly related to each other, namely, 1. The entire inde- pendence of Canadian Methodism, from all ecclesiastical connexion with the British Conference ; and, 2. The political independence of this colony, from all connexion with the parent State. It is because of these convictions that I have felt myself called upon to oppose Mr. Ryerson's measures in the District-Meeting of 1839, and in the Con- ference of 18sI0, and have therefore exposed myself to his personal attacks, which have been unsparingly bestowed upon me. It does not appear to me that the visit of the Messrs. Ryerson to England at this time can result in permanent good to *' Methodism , proper" in Canada, or have the tendency to perpetuate the Union on sound and honourable principles. In order to make a favourable impression upon the British Conference or Canada Committee, thev must dissemble or cloak their real views and intentions. And yet it has been said, since our Conference, by persons of both parties, that Mr. Ryerson would carry all his points ; that he could and would deceive the brethren in fkigland ; that he would make such plausible representations in England as to lead the majority to conclude that he, (Mr. E. Ryerson,) was guiltless and guileless. The most important affair which now occupies our attention, and which has more particularly called certain persons to England, is the attempt of Mr. E. Ryerson to obtain a transfer of your Government Grant to the control or disposal of this Conference. The letter to the Governor-General is drawn up in the same artful manner as character- izes the most of its author's productions. He generally writes so as to keep half his meaning to himself; and it does not seem possible that there can be another man in the world, whose writings require so much explanation, and ingenious quibbling, and special pleading, to prove their consistency. The Resolutions of the ( 'anada Committee are, in my opinion, exactly what they should be, and very properly describe the conduct of the person to whom they more particularly refer. The seven hours' mystification which Mr. Ryerson gave us at the Conference chanced not my mind in the least. He certainly asked for the Government Grant now received by the Missionary Committee. He did so without consulting the President, the Superintendent of Missions, or the Book Committee. He did so in defiance of all that is reasonable or righteous. You will, doubtless, be informed as to the manner in which Mr. Ryerson replied to the Resolutions of the Canada Committee in general. But I beg leave to make a remark or two on the principal argument set up in his defence. The substance of it G 2 ]■ ,f*V mm9mmfmmm(!mif!mmimm 84 APPEKOIX. N \ . :::i was that he did not ask a transfer of the Grant while it remained a chaige upon the casual and territorial revenue, but that, the Mission- ary Committee or British Conference having no claims upon the Clergy reserve, if that grant should be made a charge upon tne latter fund, it "ouffht undoubtedly" to be placed at the disposal of the Canada Conference. It was stoutly maintained that the British Conference had not and could not have any claim upon the Clergy reserve fund. Let it not be forgotton that the first paragraph in Mr. Byerson's letter to the Governor-General is intended to prove that the British Conference never had any ecclesiastical jurisdiction in Upper Canada. This position, though false, was nevertheless necessarily assumed, because without it Mr. Ryerson's corollary would not be very apparent. But there are various other assumptions connected with the last mentioned, which it it necessary to look at. It is assumed that, had not the Union taken place, the British Conference woidd not have had a name or place in this Province by this time, and that, THEREFORE, according to the proposed plan of dividing the reserves among the religious denominations, thev, of course, would have had no claim. But is this true in fact, or could it for a moment be imagined by any veasonable person ? Certainly not ! At the time of the Union, the British Conference had societies here ; arrangements were made, tfv making, for the extension of the work ; and there can be no manner of doubt that, had the Union never taken place, there would have been many large societies in various parts of the Province under the pas- toral care of the British Conference ; and, under the plan of dividing the reserves, that Body would have had a much larger claim than the mere amount of the Government Ghsnt in question. It appears, therefore, to me that their claim now is not to be judged of oy their actual position in the Province, but on other and more equitable principles. Besides, why make so much stir about rights, and the interests of the Canada Conference ? The British Conference would always expend every cent received from any of the funds of the Province in the Province itself, and not elsewhere. If, therefore, the sole object of the labours of the Canada Conference be the glory of God and the salva- tion of men, that end would be as really answered by a direct Grant to the British Conference, or apportionment of f es^rres, as though either were given to the Canada Conference. a the course pur- sued by the Canada Conference, however, there is only one of two things that can be a reason for their coxiUuct on this and other occa- sions ; — ^they either wish the extermination of British influence, or they fear the dissemination of unscripttural doctrines by British Mission- aries. The latter can scarcely be entertained by them ; the former is, therefore, the ground of action, r.s I have already intimated, and as is my decided opinion, forced upon m>3 by a succession of facts and incidents not otherwise to be interpreted. THE END. A LONDON : — PRINTED Br JAMBS NICHOLS, 46, UOZTON-80CARC.