^MANUAL 
 
 OF 
 
 SOUTHERN METHODISM 
 
 INCLUDING 
 
 CHURCH HISTORY, DOCTRINE 
 POLITY, A^D MISSIONS 
 
 n^ 
 
 EDITED BY DR. H! M. HAMILL 
 
 ADVANCED CIRCLE COURSE 
 
 NASHVILLE, TENN. ; DALLAS, TEX. ; RICHMOND, VA. 
 
 PUBLISHING HOUSE M. E. CHURCH, SOUTH 
 
 SMITH & LAMAR, AGENT? 
 
 1913
 
 COPYRIGHTED BY 
 
 SMITH & LAMAR, AQENTS, 
 
 1909.
 
 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 THIS book is part of the "Advanced Circle 
 Course" for the training of Sunday school 
 workers in the Methodist Episcopal Church, 
 South. It is based largely upon the earlier 
 book of the Circle Course entitled "Doctrines 
 and Polity of the M. E. Church, South," as 
 written by Drs. Tillett and Atkins for the 
 Teacher-Training Department when organ- 
 ized in 1901. In accordance with the interna- 
 tional teacher-training standards adopted by 
 our own and other denominations in 1908, 
 the book is now enlarged and revised. In ad- 
 dition to most of the matter contributed by 
 Drs. Tillett and Atkins, sections upon Church 
 History and Missions have been introduced, 
 and the book in its present form consists of 
 four instead of two sections, as follows: 
 Church History, by Dr. H. M. Hamill; Our 
 Methodist Doctrines, by Dr. W. F. Tillett; 
 Our Methodist Polity, by Dr. (now Bishop) 
 James Atkins ; Church Missions, by Dr. E. F. 
 Cook. 
 
 As a condensed handbook the little book, 
 in addition to its use in teacher-training, de- 
 serves a place in the home of every Southern 
 Methodist preacher and layman. 
 
 (3)
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 SECTION ONE. 
 CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 PAGE. 
 
 I. The Ancient Church 9 
 
 II. Protestantism 23 
 
 III. Methodism 37 
 
 IV. Southern Methodism . 49 
 
 SECTION TWO. 
 
 DOCTRINE. 
 
 V. Distinguishing Features 67 
 
 VI. The Holy Scriptures 76 
 
 VII. The Bible Doctrine of Man 87 
 
 VIII. The Doctrines Pertaining to Personal 
 
 Salvation 97 
 
 IX. The Doctrine of the Church. . 110 
 
 SECTION THREE. 
 
 POLITY. 
 
 X. The General Rules 121 
 
 XI. The Conferences of Methodism 146 
 
 XII. The Itinerancy 155 
 
 XIII. Our Connectionalism 166 
 
 (5)
 
 MANUAL OF METHODISM. 
 
 SECTION FOUR. 
 
 MISSIONS. 
 
 XIV The Bible a Missionary Book 179 
 
 XV' The Modern Missionary Awakening. .. 190 
 
 XVI World-Wide Missions A Brief Survey. 200 
 
 XVII Missions of the M. E. Church, South.. 214 
 
 XVIII Missions in the Sunday School 239
 
 SECTION ONE. 
 
 CHURCH HISTORY, 
 
 AS RELATED TO THE 
 
 METHODIST EPISCOPAL CHURCH, 
 SOUTH. 
 
 BY DR. H. M. HAMILL, 
 
 Superintendent of Training Work. 
 
 (7)
 
 INTERNATIONAL TEACHER-TRAINING 
 STANDARDS. 
 
 As ADOPTED IN 1908 BY THE AMERICAN CHURCHES. 
 
 FIRST (OR ELEMENTARY) STANDARD COURSE. 
 
 1. Not less than fifty study periods. 
 
 2. Not less than one school year of forty weeks for 
 
 completing the course. 
 
 3. A minimum of twenty study periods on the Bi- 
 
 ble, and a minimum of seven study periods 
 each on the School, the Teacher, and the 
 Pupil. 
 
 4. Written examination and passing grade of not 
 
 less than seventy per cent. 
 
 5. Award of Church Diploma and International 
 
 Seal. 
 
 ADVANCED STANDARD COURSE. 
 
 1. Not less than one hundred study periods and not 
 
 less than two school years of study. 
 
 2. A minimum of forty study periods on the Bible, 
 
 and of ten each on the School, the Teacher, 
 the Pupil, Church History, and Missions. 
 
 3. Written examination on completion of each sub- 
 
 ject or section, and passing grade of seventy 
 per cent. 
 
 4. Award of Advanced Church Diploma and Inter- 
 
 national Seal. 
 
 (8)
 
 I. 
 THE AXCIEXT CHURCH. 
 
 B.C. 4-A.D. 1517. 
 
 Under five divisions, in order, the story of 
 the Ancient Church will be summarized : 
 
 1. Organization, B.C. 4-A.D. 100. From 
 the birth of Christ to the death of John, the 
 last of the apostles. 
 
 The ancient world in Christ's time was 
 centered about the "Great" or Mediterranean 
 Sea, his native Palestine occupying the stra- 
 tegic junction of Asia, Africa, and Europe. 
 Through this small country poured much of 
 the commerce of the ancient world, and into 
 it came the leaders of many nations. At 
 the time of our Lord's advent certain con- 
 ditions met in singular conjunction and 
 aided in the organization of his kingdom and 
 Church. In all lands, as in Palestine, Home 
 held the nations in subjection, and her gov- 
 ernors, garrisons, post roads, and especially 
 her laws, were everywhere in evidence. The 
 Greek language, too, was universally the 
 medium of educated intercourse, and the 
 Greek "Septuagint" version of the Old Testa- 
 
 (9)
 
 10 CHUBCH HISTORY. 
 
 inent and the Greek Gospels and Epistles of 
 the New Testament were accessible even to 
 the common people. In nearly all cities and 
 towns the Jewish synagogue, with its rolls 
 of Jewish Scriptures and its worship of the 
 one true God, furnished a place for preach- 
 ing and teaching. Add to this the fact that 
 among all nations at this time, especially the 
 Jews, in response doubtless to the Hebrew 
 prophecies and the brooding Spirit of God, 
 there was a profound expectation of the ad- 
 vent of the Messiah. 
 
 Christ's ministry, when he came, was to 
 the perverted Jewish sense a mockery of their 
 hope and ambition. Four brief years were 
 devoted to healing diseases and working mira- 
 cles, to teaching the multitudes, to clashings 
 with Jewish hierarchy, to training the 
 Twelve as his successors and as missionaries 
 and evangelists among all nations; ending 
 in his thirty-fourth year in the death of a 
 malefactor upon the Koman cross, followed 
 by his resurrection and ascension. Then 
 came the descent of the promised Holy Spir- 
 it upon the newly born "mother Church" at 
 Jerusalem, again at Samaria, at Caesarea, and 
 at Antioch; the admission of the Gentiles; 
 the three missionary tours of Paul ; the writ-
 
 THE ANCIENT CHURCH. 1 
 
 ing of the New Testament by eight inspired 
 men ; the martyrdom, according to tradition, 
 of all the apostles save John ; the beginnings 
 of dire persecution at home and in foreign 
 countries, closing this first century of or- 
 ganization with the banishment and death 
 of John, last of the apostles and successor to 
 Paul, about the year A.D. 100. 
 
 2. Extension, A.D. 100-313. From the 
 death of John to the Decree of Toleration by 
 Constantine, the Roman Emperor. 
 
 After the Apostolic Age, which closed with 
 John's death, came what are called the "Sub- 
 Apostolic" and "Patristic," which include 
 the first four centuries of Christianity. Jeru- 
 salem had fallen, but the "Holy Land" con- 
 tinued to be a center of Christian interest 
 and influence. Antioch in Syria became the 
 great missionary and Gentile city, where 
 believers were first called "Christians." 
 Ephesus was the seat of Christian influence in 
 Asia Minor, Alexandria was the great Chris- 
 tian city of Africa, and Rome a the im- 
 perial city and prison home of Paul, held 
 high eminence among all Churches. Other 
 Christian centers of note were Philippi, Cor- 
 inth, and Smyrna. Among the greater lead- 
 ers of the extending Church during this period
 
 J2 CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 were Ignatius, martyr at Rome, Polycarp, 
 martyr at Smyrna, Justin Martyr, Irenaeus, 
 Tertullian, and Origen, greatest of all patris- 
 tic writers and apologists of the early Church. 
 Leadership, in most cases, was the inevitable 
 credential to martyrdom. Twelve imperial 
 persecutions occurred during the first three 
 centuries A.D., chief of which in extent and 
 severity were those under the Emperors 
 Nero, A.D. 64-68; Domitian, 95-96; Trajan, 
 104-117; Marcus Aurelius, 161-180; Decius, 
 250-253; and last and worst Diocletian, SOS- 
 SIS. As in all ages and lands, the Church 
 grew and strengthened most w r hen its foot- 
 prints were marked with its holiest blood. 
 
 It was during these centuries, beginning in 
 the second, that the New Testament canon 
 as it now stands was finally determined. For 
 a time certain books, as 2 Peter, James, 2 and 
 3 John, Jude, were accounted as "disputan- 
 ta," or doubtful. Translations into the Syriac, 
 Latin, Coptic, and Ethiopic were made. Her- 
 esies began to appear; and as the centuries 
 passed and the Church became corrupted, 
 their number increased greatly. The one 
 overshadowing heresy of the earlier Chris- 
 tian Church was known as "Gnosticism.'' 
 John, before his death and in at least two of
 
 THE ANCIENT CHURCH. 13 
 
 his books, found it necessary to condemn it 
 sharply, and after his death it spread widely 
 and perilously throughout the Church as a 
 most plausible and dangerous doctrine. It 
 was a mixture of Oriental and Platonic phi- 
 losophy with Judaism and some Christian 
 elements, denying that Christ was truly di- 
 vine, but an emanation only of deity. It 
 taught that matter was evil and that sin was 
 in matter, not in spirit, which led to asceti- 
 cism or bodily self-punishment on the one 
 part, and on the other to bodily indulgence of 
 the grossest and vilest forms. 
 
 3. Controversy, A.D. 313-590. From the 
 Edict of Constantine to the accession of 
 Pope Gregory I., the first recognized u Pope." 
 
 Persecution ended for a long season upon 
 the coming to the throne of Constantine the 
 Great as Koman Emperor, A.D. 306-337. At 
 first ruler of the so-called Eastern Empire, 
 he overthrew the Emperor Licinius in the 
 Western Empire, and in A.D. 313 published 
 throughout the world his famous edict of full 
 toleration of Christianity. The motive to his 
 great deed is accredited to his Christian 
 mother, Helena. In A.D. 325 the Emperor 
 convened the first general council of the 
 Church at Nice, its chief purpose being to
 
 14 CHUBCH HISTORY. 
 
 settle the controversy over the Arian heresy, 
 which widely prevailed and which taught 
 that Christ was created and was not of the 
 same substance with the Father. The coun- 
 cil condemned the heresy and cast out its au- 
 thor and chief propagators. 
 
 In A.T.). 465 began the series of barbaric 
 invasions of Rome and the Empire, led by 
 Vandals and Moors. At this time the bishop 
 of Kome for the first time began to assume 
 the title of "Papa" or Pope, though until 
 Gregory I. the title was vigorously resisted. 
 To this period also belongs the founding of 
 the earlier missions of the Church, notably in 
 Abyssinia by ^Edesius, among the Goths by 
 Ulfilas, in Ireland by St. Patrick, in Scotland 
 by Columba, and in Britain by unknown mis- 
 sionaries. Successive councils decreed the 
 celibacy of the clergy, and the consequent 
 viciousness of this class soon began to ap- 
 pear. It was at this time, too, that the 
 Church began the canonization and worship 
 of its martyrs and saints, of the Virgin Mary, 
 and of images. The Church for centuries 
 was vexed with controversies upon all pos- 
 sible ecclesiastical and Scriptural matters. 
 Councils were convened to adjust them at 
 Constantinople A.D. 381, at Ephesus 431, at
 
 THE ANCIENT CHURCH. 15 
 
 Chalcedon 451, and again at Constantinople 
 553 all for the purpose of silencing the 
 warring factions and giving official condem- 
 nation or commendation to the doctrines in 
 question, most of which had to do with the 
 nature of Jesus Christ. Among the great 
 leaders in these famous and often bitter con- 
 troversies were Origen of Alexandria, A.D. 
 185-254; Dionysius, of the same city and 
 time; Arius, who died 336; Chrysostom, 347- 
 407 ; Pelagius, 370-440 ; and foremost of them 
 all, Augustine, 354-430. 
 
 4. The Dark Ages, A.D. 590-1270. From 
 the accession of Pope Gregory I. to the close 
 of the Crusades. 
 
 The Middle or "Dark Ages" as they are 
 called, lie between the ruin of the Roman 
 Empire and the revival of learning and re- 
 ligion in Europe known commonly as "Prot- 
 estantism." The Roman Empire, for centu- 
 ries the noblest patron of law and learning 
 and of civilization generally, began to break 
 to pieces A.D. 476 under the fierce irruption 
 of northern barbarians. As the power of the 
 State decreased the power of the Church 
 increased, though not in spiritual ways. 
 Gregory I., the first to be formally acknowl- 
 edged as universal bishop or "Pope," was a.
 
 J6 CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 fitting illustration of the growing rapacity 
 and insolence and wanton abuse of power 
 both spiritually and secularly on the part 
 of the Komish prelates. As one writing of 
 this age says: ''Faith became credulity; the 
 spirit of reverence was changed to cringing 
 servility; the light held out by the Church, 
 though not extinguished, was largely ob- 
 scured." Monasticism began to flourish. 
 Those who ought to have been the preachers 
 and teachers of the unsaved masses shut 
 themselves within monasteries and convents 
 in selfish and luxurious, often in vicious, in- 
 dulgence. Begging monks were encouraged, 
 and at one time there were twenty-three rec- 
 ognized monastic orders, among whom were 
 the Benedictine, the Carmelite, the Domin- 
 ican, the Franciscan, and later the Jesuits. 
 Beginning in asceticism and in study of the 
 Scriptures, these orders commonly grew 
 wealthy, corrupt, and insolent, and their 
 spacious endowed monasteries were centers 
 of profligacy and of persecution. Yet to 
 them it is just to say that we owe not a lit- 
 tle of the literature and scholarship that sur- 
 vived the Dark Ages. Of all the centuries 
 of this darkness the tenth was the worst, 
 to which belonged Pope John XII., who was
 
 THE ANCIENT CHURCH. 17 
 
 guilty of almost every conceivable crime. 
 After him a few years later came Pope 
 Benedict IX., who "committed murder and 
 adultery openly," and "robbed the pilgrims 
 at the graves of the martyrs and turned 
 Kome into a den of thieves." 
 
 Mohammed and his successors, with sword 
 and crescent, for nearly two centuries 
 broke in upon the darkness and corruption 
 of Europe. Mohammed was born A. I). 570, 
 and at the age of forty assumed the role of 
 prophet of God, greater than Christ. Fleeing 
 from enemies to Medina A.D. 622, his 
 brief and wonderful career began. Dur- 
 ing the seventh century his armies swept 
 over Western Asia and Europe like a flame. 
 Mohammed died in A.D. 632, but his "ca- 
 liphs" took possession of Persia and Asia 
 Minor, attacking Constantinople; then con- 
 quered North Africa, and crossing into Spain, 
 founded the Moorish Kingdom, scaled the 
 Pyrenees, threatened Gaul, and finally, at 
 Tours, A.D. 732, were hopelessly shattered 
 by the ' "Hammer of God," Charles Martel. 
 Mohammedanism was built in a sense 
 upon the Scriptures and recognized the one 
 God and Jesus Christ, but maintained the 
 "Koran" as its Bible to be God's latest reve- 
 2
 
 18 CHURCH HISTOEY. 
 
 lation and Mohammed his last and greatest 
 prophet. 
 
 After Mohammedanism, as the next great 
 event of the Dark Ages, were the "Crusades," 
 seven in number, into the East for the recov- 
 ery of the Holy Land and Holy City, espe- 
 cially of the Holy Sepulcher, where Christ 
 was said to have been entombed. During the 
 seventh century these had become the prey 
 of the conquering Mohammedans. The Cru- 
 sades were at first organized by Walter the 
 Penniless and Peter the Hermit, who led the 
 First Crusade, which later, under Godfrey 
 de Bouillon, resulted in the recovery of Jeru- 
 salem, A.D. 1099. Bernard of Clairvaux led 
 the Second Crusade in A.D. 1147. In A.D. 
 1187, after Saladin, King of the Saracens, 
 had retaken Jerusalem from the Crusaders, 
 a Third Crusade was led by Kichard Coeur 
 de Lion and others. There followed the 
 Fourth in A.D. 1204, the Fifth in 1229, the 
 Sixth in 1248, and finally the Seventh in 
 1270. In the main they failed of their pur- 
 pose, yet they brought together into a bet- 
 ter fellowship the nations of Europe, and 
 gathered from the East the best of its learn- 
 ing and spirit, and in general broke the long 
 stagnation of the Dark Ages.
 
 THE ANCIENT CHURCH. J9 
 
 5. The Awakening, A.D. 1270-1517. From 
 the Crusades to the German Reformation. 
 
 The Crusades, despite the loss of hundreds 
 of thousands of lives and vast treasures of 
 money, were a decided step toward religious 
 progress and purity. Yet stronger than the 
 Crusades as an instrument in arousing the 
 Church was its dire corruption and the 
 wickedness and cruelty of its leaders. In 
 Italy, France, Germany, and especially in 
 Spain, the Romish Church had set up the 
 "Inquisition," the most brutal of all agen- 
 cies erected in the holy name of Christ, and 
 incomparably be3'ond the barbarities of pa- 
 gan persecutors. It was at this juncture that 
 the conscience of the Church was further 
 aroused by Pope Leo X., who, through Tetzel 
 and others, sought to raise money by sale of 
 papal "indulgences" for all manner of sins. 
 Another sign of awakening was the uprising 
 here and there of communities and individ- 
 uals in protest against papal degeneracy and 
 aggressiveness. Among these communities 
 were the "Albigenses" of France, in the thir- 
 teenth century ; the Waldenses, who began at 
 Lyons, 1179. Of individuals were John 
 Wyclif of England, 1320-84, translator into 
 English of the Scriptures, and William Tyn-
 
 20 CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 dale a century later, with John Huss, 1369- 
 1415, and greatest and boldest, Savonarola 
 of Italy, 1452-98 all of whom became mar- 
 tyrs to Christian courage and loyalty. Along 
 with these pioneers of religious reform was 
 a noble line of intellectual reformers, like 
 Abelard and Bernard, Aquinas and Duns 
 Scotus, and Bacon, chiefly of the thirteenth 
 and fourteenth centuries. The three great 
 universities of Bologna, Paris, and Oxford 
 also aided greatly in relighting the fallen 
 torches of learning and religion, and it was 
 said of them that their "Greek learning had 
 risen from the grave with the New Testa- 
 ment in its hand." That the minds and 
 hearts of the nations were being aroused was 
 further shown in the discovery of a new con- 
 tinent by Columbus, 1492, and by the inven- 
 tions that Providence gave through chosen 
 men to aid in reforms. One has truly said 
 of certain great discoveries of this age of 
 awakening, that "gunpowder made liberty 
 possible, while the printing press made it a 
 fact."
 
 THK ANCIENT CHURCH. 21 
 
 THE ANCIENT CHURCH. 
 
 Summary of Chief Events. 
 
 [After learning what these names and dates 
 stand for, commit them thoroughly to memory.] 
 
 4 B.C. Birth of Christ. 
 
 27 A.D. Baptism of Christ. 
 
 30 A.D. Crucifixion ; Kesurrection. 
 
 37 A.D. Martyrdom of Stephen. 
 
 38 A.D. Conversion of Paul. 
 
 48-58 A.D. Paul's three Missionary Tours. 
 58-62 A.D. Paul prisoner. 
 66-68 A.D. Paul's Martyrdom at Home. 
 70 A.D. Destruction of Jerusalem. 
 100 A.D. John's death at Ephesus. 
 165-167 A.D. Martyrdom of Ignatius, 
 Justin Martyr, and Polycarp. 
 313 A.D. Edict of Toleration. 
 410-465 A.D. Rome assailed by Goths. 
 530 A.D. Clerical celibacy commanded. 
 590 A.D. Gregory I. with title of "Pope." 
 570 A.D. Mohammed born. 
 732 A.D. Mohammedanism shattered. 
 766-814 A.D. Reign of Charlemagne. 
 871-901 A.D. Reign of Alfred the Great. 
 1073-85 A.D. Pope Gregory VII. 
 1096-1270 A.D. The Seven Crusades. 
 1129 A.D. Inquisition begun.
 
 22 CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 1320-84 A.D. Wyclif, the reformer. 
 1369-1415 A.D. John Huss, reformer. 
 1452-98 A.D. Savonarola, reformer. 
 1453 A.D. Constantinople taken. 
 1492 A.D. Discovery of America.
 
 tt 
 
 PBOTESTANTISM. 
 
 A.D. 1B17-1739. 
 
 THE word "Protestantism" stands for that 
 great providential movement that broke the 
 evil domination of the Roman Catholic 
 .Church, reformed its worst abuses, set in 
 motion the influences that have largely 
 stripped it of secular authority, curtailed 
 the power of popes and bishops, and finally, 
 and we trust forever, abolished such ec- 
 clesiastical institutions as the Inquisition 
 and "auto da feV' This much upon the neg- 
 ative side. As a positive force Protestant- 
 ism restored religious liberty and freedom 
 of conscience to worship God after one's own 
 convictions and to be protected therein by 
 the State. Largely too it has purified the 
 Church by separating it from all unholy al- 
 liances with the State, and by giving the 
 Bible to the people in their own language. 
 It has restored to scriptural orthodoxy and 
 purity certain great doctrines of the Apos- 
 tolic Church, as that of the Holy Trinity, the 
 divinity of Jesus Christ, the inspiration of 
 the Bible, the right of the individual in mat- 
 
 (23)
 
 24 CHURCH HISTOKY. 
 
 ters of faith. If not in mere increase of num- 
 bers, } r et in the uplifting of the race and 
 amelioration of its suffering, in the en- 
 lightenment of the ignorant and the main- 
 tenance of pure morals, in the extension of 
 righteousness both in the nation and the in- 
 dividual, in great intellectual as well as 
 spiritual quickenings throughout the world, 
 Protestantism, though only four centuries 
 old, has gone incomparably beyond the best 
 that the Catholic Church has achieved in fif- 
 teen centuries, and this without pandering 
 to the vices and ambitions of worldly leaders 
 or invoking the authority of secular kings 
 and princes. 
 
 Protestantism formally begins with the life 
 and ministry of Martin Luther. For con- 
 venience of study it will be presented in five 
 periods : 
 
 1. The German Reformation, A.D. 1483- 
 1546- From the birth to the death of Lu- 
 ther. 
 
 While other factors already named in the 
 preceding chapter entered into the German 
 Keformation, it was under God the master- 
 ful monk, Luther, who largely brought the 
 Reformation to success. All agencies with- 
 out him would probably have come to
 
 PROTESTANTISM. 25 
 
 naught; with him they became mighty 
 weapons offensive and defensive. Luther 
 was born at Eisleben A.D. 1483, and died 
 1546. He came from a humble home, and 
 was destined by his parents for another vo- 
 cation than the priesthood. , Yet after his 
 college life had ended he was so impressed 
 by the sudden death of a friend that he en- 
 tered a monastery, was ordained priest in 
 1507, and assigned to a professorship in the 
 University of Wittenberg. In 1517 he issued 
 his famous Ninety-Five Theses or proposi- 
 tions against the Catholic doctrine of for- 
 giveness of sin and its sale of indulgences 
 through Tetzel and others. He was excom- 
 municated by Pope Leo X. in 1520, and was 
 summoned before the Diet of Worms in 1521 
 for trial, but refused to recede or recant. 
 He published to Germany three strong ad- 
 dresses entitled "An Address to the German 
 Nobility," the "Babylonian Captivity of the 
 Church," and "Christian Freedom," urging 
 in these an independence of papal rule, de- 
 nying all sacraments save baptism and the 
 Lord's Supper, and demanding spiritual lib- 
 erty for all persons. He was greatly aided by 
 the learning of Melanchthon, by the friend- 
 ship and help of Frederick of Saxony, by
 
 2(> CHUBCH HISTORY. 
 
 the Swiss Keformer Zwingli (1484-1530), 
 by John Calvin, the Genevan Reformer ( 1509- 
 64), and by the famous Erasmus. The final 
 seal of success was put upon the efforts of 
 Luther and these helpers by the "Peace of 
 Augsburg" in 1555, which allowed thence- 
 forth a conditional choice between Roman- 
 ism and Protestantism and equal protection 
 to both. 
 
 The Reformation passed quickly from Ger- 
 many into Denmark under Christian III. ; 
 thence into Norway and Sweden, and to a 
 limited extent into France under Francis 
 I. The city of Geneva in Switzerland be- 
 came a new center of Protestantism under 
 John Calvin, who was born in France, was 
 famous as a student at the University of 
 Orleans, took part in the opposition to the 
 papacy, wrote with great force his "Insti- 
 tutes of the Christian Religion," became aft- 
 er Luther the head of the Reformation, and 
 was author and apologist of the widespread 
 and long-dominant system of theology known 
 as "Calvinism." 
 
 2. The English Reformation, A.D. 1546- 
 1660. From the death of Luther to the 
 death of Cromwell and end of the Common- 
 wealth in England.
 
 PROTESTANTISM. 27 
 
 The so-called English Keforraation was 
 simply an offshoot from that of Germany. 
 Protestantism passed, somewhat in devious 
 ways, into the countries of Europe, and by 
 indirection soon reached England and Scot- 
 land. Henry VIII. of England, crafty, 
 lecherous, and treacherous, at first sought to 
 engage Luther in controversy, for which he 
 was dubbed by the pope "defender of the 
 faith." But partly because of a growing in- 
 dependency of England against the Conti- 
 nent, and particularly because of his rup- 
 ture with the pope over his refusal to divorce 
 Henry's wife, Catherine of Aragon, the King 
 in 1532 issued his declaration of independ- 
 ence of papal authority, and his Parliament 
 in 1534 passed in confirmation the "Act of 
 Supremacy," which declared the king and 
 not the pope to be the supreme head of the 
 English Church. King Edward VI. (1547- 
 53), successor to Henry, was an out-and-out 
 Protestant, and had as his counselors such 
 wise, heroic advisers as Kidley, Latimer, and 
 Hooper. The Book of Common Prayer was 
 put forth in the English language. After 
 Edward's early death came the blotch on the 
 page of England's history, the reign of 
 "Bloody Mary" (1553-55), who restored
 
 28 CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Catholicism, burned at the stake Ridley, Lat- 
 imer, Hooper, and Cranmer, and very many 
 others. Elizabeth, the "Good Queen Bess," 
 succeeded Mary, and restored Protestantism 
 during her reign (1558-1603), and main- 
 tained England in the forefront of the Refor- 
 mation for more than forty years. The 
 "Thirty-Nine Articles of Religion" of the 
 English Church, from which our Methodist 
 Articles are abridged, were put in form. 
 The terms "Independent," "Puritan," and 
 "Nonconformist" were applied to the dis- 
 senters. Some of the Independents were 
 driven to Holland, and from thence came 
 later to America. King James, whose reign 
 (1603-25) followed Elizabeth's, played fast 
 and loose with all parties, but took time to 
 secure to the English-speaking race the first 
 great and enduring English version of the 
 Scriptures, the Bible most commonly in use 
 in our time and known as the "King James 
 Version." Cromwell's strong leadership 
 (1649-60) made the English "Common- 
 wealth" the chief supporter of Protestantism. 
 In opposition to the widespread and ag- 
 gressive system of theology proclaimed by 
 John Calvin there was raised up providen- 
 tially one who gave to the world a far gentler
 
 PROTESTANTISM. 29 
 
 system, known after his name as "Arminian- 
 ism," constituting a body of doctrine that lies 
 at the foundation of Methodism, and is fast 
 supplanting the harsher features of Calvin- 
 ism. James Arminius (1560-1609) was pastor 
 in Amsterdam, then professor at Leyden, and 
 leader of the "Kemonstrants." The "Kemon- 
 strance" exactly opposed, point by point, the 
 "five points" of Calvin, and maintained: (1) 
 Conditional election; (2) unlimited atone- 
 ment; (3) partial depravity ; (4) resistible 
 grace; (5) possible lapse from grace. 
 
 3. The Counter Reformation, A.D. 15^0- 
 1648. From the organization of the Jesuits 
 to the Peace of Westphalia. 
 
 The Catholic Church, alarmed by the 
 swift spread of Protestantism and the defec- 
 tion of so many of its followers, set up a 
 counter-reformation that did much to arrest 
 the progress of Protestantism in all coun- 
 tries. The method was twofold : to check its 
 growth by any means, fair or foul, whatever; 
 and to institute missionary enterprises for 
 the occupancy of such countries as were yet 
 unreached by Protestantism. The Council 
 of Trent, which met in 1545 and continued 
 several years in session, was a vigorous effort 
 to drive Protestantism from within the Cath-
 
 30 CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 olic Church. That Council reenacted many 
 of the repulsive features of the Romish 
 Church, and rekindled the bigotry and the 
 hatred of the Church for everything that 
 made for the freedom of the individual con- 
 science. At this time too arose the Order of 
 the Jesuits, 1540, with Ignatius Loyola as 
 its famous or infamous head, the chief work- 
 ing maxim of the Order being expressed in 
 the words, "The end justifies the means," 
 which meant that any command of the deca- 
 logue or any law of the State might be bro- 
 ken if only it be done to advance the Cath- 
 olic Church and the interests of the Order. 
 Not all of the Order were evil-minded men. 
 Francis Xavier, for instance, who gave his 
 life to missionary labor in India, China, and 
 Japan, and some of the nobler Jesuits who 
 came to North America and sought to civi- 
 lize and evangelize the Indians and hardly 
 less savage white settlers, deserve lasting 
 honor and gratitude. 
 
 Along with Jesuitism and as a formidable 
 agent of the counter-reformation was the re- 
 organization of the "Inquisition," of whose 
 earlier cruelties mention has been made. 
 On St. Bartholomew's Day, August 24, 1572, 
 in France, a hundred thousand Huguenots,
 
 PROTESTANTISM. 31 
 
 men, women, and children, were slain in the 
 darkness of the night. Two years later, when 
 Henry IV. came to the throne, by the Edict of 
 Nantes religious liberty and protection was 
 thenceforth promised to French Protestants. 
 Finally, after the "Thirty Years' War" (1618- 
 48), which had as its chief issue the cause 
 of Protestantism, came to an end in the 
 "Treaty of Westphalia," it brought equal 
 rights and liberties to Protestants and Cath- 
 olics. 
 
 4. The Wesleyan Movement, A.D. 16^8- 
 1739. From the Treaty of Westphalia to the 
 organization of the English Methodist Church. 
 One of the darkest pages of modern his- 
 tory is that which pictures England, France, 
 Germany, and even America toward the close 
 of the seventeenth and the first half of the 
 eighteenth centuries, at the time that Wesley 
 and his coadjutors were unwittingly mak- 
 ing ready for the greatest revival of religion 
 in the history of Protestantism. Spiritual 
 earnestness seemed to have gone from the 
 churches; morals were at the lowest ebb; 
 not one in five hundred of the common 
 people of England could write his name: 
 drunkenness, gambling, and licentiousness 
 were the trinity of national and popular
 
 32 CHUBCH HISTORY. 
 
 vices, even among men of the cloth. Christ's 
 name was rarely heard except in blas- 
 phemy, and it was deemed the mark of an 
 educated class that it derided religion and 
 made mock of the Bible. Bishop Kyle said 
 of the age: "There was darkness in high 
 places and darkness in low places; darkness 
 in the court, the camp, the parliament, the 
 bar; darkness in country and darkness in 
 town ; darkness among the rich and dark- 
 ness among the poor a gross, thick, reli- 
 gious and moral darkness; a darkness that 
 might be felt." Pressense', writing especially 
 of France, his own country, said: "Nothing 
 is so sad as the religious history of this coun- 
 try." "In England and Germany a parching 
 wind blows over hearts and minds." Presi- 
 dent Dwight, of Yale, writing of America, 
 said: "From France, Germany, and Great 
 Britain the dregs of infidelity were vomited 
 upon us." 
 
 At such a time as this the hand of Divine 
 Providence was making ready through the 
 Wesleyan reformation for a mighty religious 
 awakening, an age of spiritual as well as 
 intellectual power and progress not equaled 
 in the history of the Church. Out of the 
 depths had come up before God the cry of
 
 p 
 
 PROTESTANTISM. 33 
 
 the ignorant, the hunger of the lost for some- 
 thing better than the husks of infidelity and 
 the poison of sin, and God answered by giv- 
 ing the world the ministry of a handful of 
 chosen men. "There was a man sent from 
 God whose name was John" Wesley! In 
 1730 his first "Methodist Society" was organ- 
 ized in London, and this formal beginning of 
 the "Wesleyan Movement" was made, further 
 details of which will be given in succeeding 
 chapters. 
 
 5. American Protestantism, A.D. 1607 to 
 the present time. 
 
 Protestantism found a congenial home 
 and larger opportunity for growth in Amer- 
 ica, which had from the beginning encour- 
 aged the coming of the oppressed, whether 
 politically or religiously, from all lands. In 
 no nation have Catholic and Protestant, Jew 
 and Gentile dwelt more at peace or been freer 
 from persecution for the sake of conscience. 
 
 The first distinctly Protestant Church to 
 colonize in America was the English Epis- 
 copal or Church of England. The Cavaliers 
 who came to Virginia were stanchly Epis- 
 copalian, and from 1607 to the present time 
 that Church has maintained its stronghold 
 in the "Old Dominion," as an illustration of 
 3
 
 34 CHURCH HISTOBY. 
 
 the permanency of a church settlement in 
 contrast with a merely social or political 
 settlement. Its first American General Con- 
 vention was organized in 1785. The Puri- 
 tans and Pilgrims (or, as now styled, the 
 Congregationalists), first came to Plymouth 
 Rock on the coast of Massachusetts, and lat 
 er spread throughout New England, where 
 their descendants still maintain a domina- 
 ting position and influence. The Reformed 
 Dutch Church, now called "The Reformed," 
 came to Manhattan Island, the site of New 
 York City, in 1623. The Baptists, under the 
 leadership of Roger Williams, settled in 
 Rhode Island, where they continue to occu- 
 py the foremost place among the Churches. 
 The Lutherans began in New York in 1669. 
 The Presbyterians immigrated to America in 
 large numbers during 1660-88, and in suc- 
 cessive later migrations from the Old World. 
 The first Presbyterian General Assembly was 
 held in 1789. The Methodists came from 
 Great Britain to New York and Maryland 
 and began organizing churches in the year 
 1766. The first Methodist Conference was 
 held in Philadelphia in 1773; and the Meth- 
 odist Church of America was formally organ- 
 ized in 1784. The first formal Catholic im-
 
 PROTESTANTISM. 35 
 
 migration to America was in 1632, under 
 Lord Baltimore, to Maryland; though at oth- 
 er points in the South, notably Santa F, St. 
 Augustine, and New Orleans, and along the 
 Mississippi Valley, earlier Catholic settle- 
 ments had been begun, some of which soon 
 disappeared. 
 
 SUMMARY OF PROTESTANTISM. 
 
 [After learning the facts, memorize thoroughly 
 the dates.] 
 
 A.D. 
 
 1483 Birth of Martin Luther. 
 
 1509 Birth of John Calvin. 
 
 1517 Luther's Theses against the Pope. 
 
 1520 Luther excommunicated. 
 
 1534 Act of Separation. 
 
 1540 Founding of Order of Jesuits. 
 
 1545 Council of Trent. 
 
 1553-58 Bloody Mary's reign. 
 
 1571 The Thirty-Nine Articles of Keligion. 
 
 1572 Massacre of St. Bartholomew. 
 Edict of Nantes. 
 
 English Episcopal Colony in America. 
 King James Version of Scriptures. 
 Coming of Puritans to Massachusetts. 
 Dutch Reformed settle New York.
 
 36 CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 1632 Catholics come to Maryland. 
 
 1639 Baptists colonize Khode Island. 
 
 1648 The Peace of Westphalia. 
 
 1660 Presbyterians come to America. 
 
 1669 Lutherans settle in New York. 
 
 1739 First Methodist Society organized.
 
 III. 
 METHODISM. 
 
 A.D. 1739-1844. 
 
 1. The Wesley Family, A.D. 1690-1791. 
 From the birth of the father to the death of 
 John Wesley. 
 
 The ancestry of the Wesley family was dis- 
 tinguished in English history for five hun- 
 dred years. The name can be traced to Wil- 
 liam, first Baron of Wellesley, in 1343 A.D. 
 From one branch came Arthur Wellesley, 
 Duke of Wellington. The line is noted for 
 the number of its distinguished preachers 
 and scholars. The grandfather and great- 
 grandfather upon the paternal side, and the 
 grandfather on the mother's side were sturdy 
 Nonconformist preachers, who opposed the 
 doctrines and practices of . the English 
 Church. 
 
 The Wesley family, from which sprang, in 
 the eighteenth century, our Methodism, had 
 tkeir home in the village rectory of Epworth, 
 Lincoln County, on the eastern coast of En- 
 gland. The family numbered twenty-one 
 the father and mother, Samuel and Susanna 
 
 (37)
 
 38 CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Wesley, and nineteen children, nine of whom 
 died in infancy. Three sons and seven 
 daughters grew to manhood and womanhood, 
 all of whom, except the eldest, were born at 
 Epworth. The three sons were Samuel, John, 
 and Charles. Samuel, the eldest child, was 
 born in London in 1690, and came to distinc- 
 tion as a man of learning, but was overshad- 
 owed by his younger brothers. The seven 
 daughters who grew to womanhood, in order 
 of birth, were: Emilia, Susanna, Mary, Me- 
 hetabel, Anne, Martha, Kezia. All except 
 Kezia, who died in early womanhood, mar- 
 ried ; and all of them inherited the talents of 
 their parents. 
 
 Eev. Samuel Wesley, A.M., father, was an 
 English Episcopal clergyman. He was born 
 in 1662, and died in 1735 at Epworth, which 
 he had served as rector for thirty-nine years. 
 He began his ministry in London in 1668, 
 and married Susanna Annesley in that city 
 in 1689. He was a prolific author and poet, 
 especially a writer of hymns. He was the 
 steadfast counselor and helper of his sons, 
 John and Charles, in their efforts at laying 
 the foundation of Methodism. The spirit of 
 the reformer was upon him throughout his 
 laborious and pious life. His last word to
 
 METHODISM. 39 
 
 Charles, on his deathbed, was: "Be steady. 
 The Christian faith will surely revive in this 
 kingdom." 
 
 Mrs. Susanna Wesley, wife of Samuel and 
 mother of John and Charles, is one of the 
 noblest figures in church history. She was 
 born in London in 1G69, and was the twenty- 
 fifth child of Kev. Samuel Annesley, D.D., a 
 distinguished Puritan divine, who was known 
 as the "St. Paul of the Nonconformists." 
 Mrs. Wesley's father was nephew to the Earl 
 of Anglesea, and her maternal grandfather, 
 John White, was a leading member of Parlia- 
 ment. She was devoted to her family as few 
 women have been, conducting a daily school 
 for her children with such success that sev- 
 eral of them became distinguished scholars. 
 She was accomplished beyond most women. 
 Dr. Adam Clarke said of her : "Such a woman, 
 taking her for all in all, I have not heard of, 
 I have not read of, nor with her equal have I 
 been acquainted." 
 
 Kev. John Wesley, A.M., thirteenth child 
 of the Wesley family, the illustrious founder 
 of Methodism, was born in the Epworth 
 Rectory in 1703; and died in the parsonage 
 adjoining the City Road Chapel in London 
 in 1791, in the eighty - eighth year of his
 
 40 CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 life. He was elected Fellow of Lincoln 
 College, Oxford, at twenty-three, by rea- 
 son of his brilliant record in the university; 
 was ordained an Episcopal clergyman by 
 Bishop Potter at the age of twenty -two; was 
 three years a missionary to Georgia, chiefly 
 at Savannah, under Governor Oglethorpe; 
 and at the age of thirty-five entered fully 
 upon his long and heroic itinerant ministry 
 in Great Britain as an organizer and preach- 
 er of Methodism. He was a minister sixty- 
 five years. He reformed Great Britain, or- 
 ganized Methodism, formulated its constitu- 
 tion, polity, and doctrines, instituted its Con- 
 ferences, and left many thousands of Meth- 
 odists in his Churches. He wrote (or com- 
 piled) for his Methodist people more than 
 two hundred books and pamphlets. As re- 
 former and apostle, he stands in history sec- 
 ond only to St. Paul, whether judged by the 
 extent of his labors or the far-reaching influ- 
 ences of his ministry. His body rests in the 
 little graveyard of City Road Chapel, Lon- 
 don, surrounded by the tombs of Clarke, 
 Watson, Benson, Bunting, and others of his 
 helpers. In Westminster Abbey is a tablet 
 to his memory, on which are inscribed his 
 prophetic words : "The world is my parish."
 
 METHODISM. 4l 
 
 Kev. Charles Wesley, A.M., ranks closely 
 with his brother John in the founding of 
 Methodism. The executive ability of the lat- 
 ter was reenforced by the sacred music which 
 Charles gave to the worship of early Meth- 
 odism. From the beginning of Metho- 
 dism to his death he assisted his brother in 
 preaching and in organizing Methodism. 
 Charles Wesley was said by Southey to have 
 written the "finest lyric in the English lan- 
 guage." He was the writer of many hymns, 
 which are to be found in the hymnals of the 
 churches. First of all is his hymn, "Jesus, 
 Lover of my soul." 
 
 2. Organization of Methodism, A.D. 1739- 
 1791. From the first "Society" in London to 
 John Wesley's death. 
 
 John Wesley wrote: "The first rise of 
 Methodism was in November, 1729, when 
 four of us" [the Holy Club, increasing later 
 to thirteen members] "met together at Ox- 
 ford; the second was at Savannah, Ga., in 
 April, 1736, when twenty or thirty persons 
 met at my house; the last was in London, 
 May, 1739, when forty or fifty of us met to- 
 gether every Wednesday evening." 
 
 W T hile these meetings led to Methodism, 
 the real origin was Wesley's formation of the
 
 42 CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 "United Society" in London in 1730. The 
 first Methodist church building was erected 
 by Wesley in Bristol, England, in 1739. The 
 second church building was reared upon the 
 site of the London "Foundry," from which 
 it took its name, in 1740. Connected with 
 it were rooms for Wesley's preachers, an or- 
 phans' home, a "book room," a free dispen- 
 sary, etc. The most famous of English Meth- 
 odist churches, the "City Road Chapel," Lon- 
 don, was built by Wesley in 1778. 
 
 The first Methodist week-day school was 
 established by Wesley at Kingswood, En- 
 gland, for the children of the colliers, prob- 
 ably as early as 1739. Wesley himself rode 
 the first regular Methodist circuit in 1742, 
 and then organized circuits for his preachers 
 throughout Great Britain. The first class 
 meeting was held at Bristol, England, in 
 1742, and grew out of a suggestion to use the 
 class as a means of paying a church debt. 
 The first copy of our "General Rules" was 
 published over the names of John and 
 Charles Wesley in 1743. The first Annual 
 Conference was convened by Wesley at Lon- 
 don in 1744, and included six clergymen and 
 four lay preachers. The first "book room," 
 or publishing house, was established by Wes-
 
 METHODISM. 43 
 
 ley in the Foundry Church building, Lon- 
 don, in 1748. The first "missionary" collec- 
 tion was raised at Newcastle, England, in 
 1767, for the American Indians. The first 
 Methodist college was built by the Countess 
 of Huntingdon in 1768, at Trevecca, Wales, 
 for young men who, as Methodists, were be- 
 ing persecuted at Oxford University. Wesley 
 instituted and edited the first Methodist 
 periodical, the Arminian Magazine, a month- 
 ly, at London, in 1778. The first Bible Soci- 
 ety known, the "Naval and Military Bible 
 Society," was organized by Wesley in Lon- 
 don in 1779, twenty-five years before the 
 British and Foreign Bible Society began. 
 The first Methodist Sunday school was formed 
 at Bolton, England, in 1785. It was the first 
 in the world to use unpaid teachers. 
 
 3. Methodism in America, A.D. 1735-1784- 
 From the first Methodist preaching to the or- 
 ganization of American Methodism. 
 
 The Wesley/5 and Whitefield, along the At- 
 lantic seaboard (1735-37 and later) were the 
 first founders of American Methodism. In 
 1760 came Philip Embury and Eobert Straw- 
 bridge, Irish local preachers; Embury or- 
 ganizing Methodism in New York City in 
 1766, Strawbridge probably earlier in Mary-
 
 44 CHUfiCH HISTORT. 
 
 land. Capt. Thomas Webb, a British officer, 
 organized Philadelphia Methodism in 1767. 
 Robert Williams, an English local preacher, 
 was the Virginia pioneer, in 1768. Richard 
 Boardman and Joseph Pilmoor were sent 
 from England in 1769 as the first itinerants. 
 William Watters, of Maryland, became the 
 first native itinerant in 1773. Thomas Ran- 
 kin, sent over by Wesley, held the first An- 
 nual Conference in Philadelphia in 1773. 
 Jesse Lee, of Virginia, planted Methodism 
 in New England in 1789; Thomas Ware, of 
 New Jersey, in Tennessee and North Caro- 
 lina about the same time; William Losee, of 
 New York, in Upper Canada in 1791; To- 
 bias Gibson, of South Carolina, in the South- 
 west Territory, around Natchez, in 1799; 
 Jesse Walker, of Tennessee, beginning in 
 1805, organized Methodism in St. Louis and 
 later in Chicago. 
 
 Among the many historic Methodist 
 churches of America, the following exhibit 
 the progress of the Church: "Sam's Creek," 
 Maryland, erected about 1766, of which 
 Bishop Asbury wrote, "Here Mr. Straw- 
 bridge formed the first society in Maryland 
 and America, " John Street Church, New 
 York City, built in 1768, oldest in the North ;
 
 METHODISM. 45 
 
 "St. George's," the historic center of Phila- 
 delphia Methodism, built in 1769; "Lovely 
 Lane Chapel," Baltimore, 1774, in which, in 
 1784, the Methodist Episcopal Church was 
 organized; "Barrett's Chapel," Delaware, 
 1780, in which Coke and Asbury planned the 
 organization of American Methodism; the 
 church near Lexington, Ky., 1787, in which 
 Asbury held the first Conference west of 
 the Alleghanies; the "Blue Meetinghouse," 
 Charleston, S. C., 1787, the first Methodist 
 Church in that city of Wesleyan ministry; 
 the Portsmouth Church (near Portsmouth, 
 Ohio), 1801, the oldest in the Northwest Ter- 
 ritory; the "Spring Hill Church," near 
 Natchez, Miss., 1807, oldest in the South- 
 west; the "McKendree Church," near Jack- 
 son, Mo., 1807, the first west of the Missis- 
 sippi, in which four pioneer Conferences 
 were held; the "Old Tobacco House," of 
 Washington, D. C., which served as a meet- 
 inghouse for Washington Methodism from 
 1807 to 1811. President Jefferson attended 
 services in this building. 
 
 4. The American Organization, A.D. 1784- 
 1844- From the organization at Baltimore 
 to the division at New York. 
 
 Methodism ia America was formally or-
 
 46 CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 ganized as "the Methodist Episcopal Church" 
 in December, 1784, at Lovely Lane Chapel, 
 Baltimore, by the "Christmas Conference" 
 convened by Coke and Asbury, with sixty 
 out of eighty-three traveling preachers in 
 attendance. Coke was appointed bishop by 
 Wesley, and Asbury was elected bishop by 
 this Conference. The first regular General 
 Conference after this organization was held 
 at Baltimore in 1792, and the third, also at 
 Baltimore, in 1796, at which six Annual Con- 
 ferences were erected, as follows: the "New 
 England," the "Philadelphia," the "Balti- 
 more," the "Virginia," the "South Carolina," 
 and the "Western." Not until 1808 was a 
 native bishop, William McKendree, of Vir- 
 ginia, elected. Among the institutions of 
 Methodism established during this period 
 were the "Book Concern," in 1789, under 
 John Dickins, "book steward;" the Metho- 
 dist Magazine, in 1797; the "Missionary So- 
 ciety," organized in 1819, Bishop McKendree 
 the first president; the "Sunday School So- 
 ciety," in 1827, the first of its kind in Amer- 
 ica. In 1828 the Methodists of Canada, upon 
 their request, were set apart as an independ- 
 ent body. In 1844, upon the issue of slavery, 
 the Church by vote of the General Conference
 
 METHODISM. 47 
 
 was divided, and the Methodists of the South 
 organized, in 1845, the Methodist Episcopal 
 Church, South. 
 
 SUMMARY OF AMERICAN METHODISM. 
 A.D. 
 1703 John Wesley born. 
 
 1728 John Wesley ordained. 
 
 1729 "Holy Club," called "Methodists." 
 1735-37 Wesley in Savannah. 
 
 1739 First Methodist Society organized. 
 
 First Methodist "Chapel" at Bristol. 
 
 First Methodist circuit organized. 
 
 Class Meetings begun. 
 
 General Kules published. 
 
 First Methodist Conference. 
 
 First American Methodist Society. 
 
 Philip Embury preaches in New York. 
 
 John Street Church, first building. 
 
 Kobert Williams in Virginia. 
 
 Boardman and Pilmoor. 
 
 First American Conference. 
 
 American Methodism organized. 
 
 Asbury organizes first Sunday school. 
 
 Missions to slaves. 
 
 Jesse Lee in New England. 
 
 First General Conference, Baltimore.
 
 48 CHUBCII HISTORY. 
 
 1808 McKendree, first native bishop. 
 
 1820 Formation of Missionary Society. 
 
 1828 Canadian Methodism organized. 
 
 1844 General Conference divides Church.
 
 IV. 
 SOUTHERN METHODISM. 
 
 A.D. 1&&-1909. 
 
 1. Southern Methodist Pioneers, A.D. 1760- 
 1850. From Strawbridge to Jesse Boring. 
 
 Every Methodist should hold in reverence 
 the heroic men who took their lives in their 
 hands and planted our Southern Methodism. 
 It is a fact worthy of note that much of 
 American Methodism, in all its sections, was 
 founded by men from the South. After 
 Strawbridge, Williams, Watters, Owen, and 
 the earlier company of pioneers, came the 
 following native leaders : 
 
 Along the Atlantic Seaboard, beginning 
 about 1764, Francis Poythress and Philip 
 Bruce, in Virginia; Thomas Humphries and 
 Isaac Smith, in the Carolinas; Hope Hull 
 and Eichard Ivey, in Georgia. 
 
 In the Holston Country were John Tun- 
 nell and Thomas Ware. 
 
 In the Cumberland Country, from the 
 Ohio Kiver to the Gulf, the chief pioneers 
 were: Benjamin Ogden, Peter Massie, Wil- 
 liam Burke, and John Page. 
 
 In the lower Mississippi Valley were To- 
 4 (49)
 
 50 CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 bias Gibson, Eichmond Nolly, and William 
 Winans; in the upper "Valley" were Jesse 
 Walker, James Gwin, and John Travis. 
 
 Among the Methodist preachers who first 
 carried the gospel to the Southern tribes of 
 Indians were William Capers, Isaac Smith, 
 and Alexander Talley. 
 
 As early as 1829 the South Carolina Con- 
 ference, followed by other Conferences, be- 
 gan missions among the negro slaves; and 
 among the foremost founders of negro mis- 
 sions were James O. Andrew and William 
 Capers. On the latter's tomb are the words : 
 "Founder of Missions to Slaves." 
 
 In the then Far West, which stretched 
 from Texas to the Pacific, were Martin Ruter 
 and Robert Alexander in Texas, and on the 
 Pacific Coast, Jesse Boring. 
 
 Four "mother" Conferences originally in- 
 cluded the entire South the "Baltimore," 
 the "Virginia," the "South Carolina," and 
 the "Western," which last extended from the 
 Lakes to the Gulf, west of the Alleghanies. 
 In 1796 the General Conference organized 
 definitely these Conferences and fixed their 
 bounds. All later Southern Conferences, as 
 we now have them, have grown from these 
 four "mother" Conferences.
 
 SOUTHERN METHODISM. 5J 
 
 Of the historic churches of Southern Meth- 
 odism "Lovely Lane Chapel," Baltimore, 
 Md., stands first as the place where Amer- 
 ican Methodism was formally organized. 
 "Ellis's Preaching House," in Sussex Coun- 
 ty, Va., is noted as the site of three suc- 
 cessive pioneer Annual Conferences, in 1782, 
 1783, and 1784. "Cumberland Street 
 Church," Charleston, S. C., was the first 
 Methodist Church to erect "galleries for the 
 slaves." "Masterson's," near Lexington, Ky., 
 was the first Methodist church west of the 
 Alleghanies. The "Stone Church," Nash- 
 ville, Tenn., was built near the "Square," as 
 the oldest, and here, on October 19, 1800, 
 Asbury, Whatcoat, and McKendree preached 
 all on one day. "Midway," in Amite County, 
 Miss., was the mother of many famous West- 
 ern standard bearers. "Knobb Chapel," New 
 Orleans, on Bienville Street, was served by 
 William Winans, first New Orleans pastor. 
 The first church in Texas was built at San 
 Augustine under Ruter. "Union Street 
 Church," in Petersburg, Va., now occupied 
 by the Colored Methodist Episcopal people, 
 to whom it was given, is the famous church 
 in which our first General Conference met 
 in 1846. Our oldest and most noted pioneer
 
 52 CHUBCH HISTORY. 
 
 Pacific church was built at San Jose", Cal. 
 The "Wesley Monumental," in Savannah, 
 Ga., the gift of all Methodism, fittingly com- 
 memorates the origin and the founder of 
 American Methodism. 
 
 2. Southern Methodist Growth, A.D. 1846- 
 1909. From the first General Conference to 
 the present time. 
 
 Southern Methodism was instituted by its 
 first General Conference at Petersburg, Va., 
 May, 1846, with sixteen Conferences, 455,217 
 members, and two bishops. This Conference 
 began the work of foreign missions, extended 
 later as follows: China, 1846; Mexico, 1871; 
 Brazil, 1873; Japan, 1886; Korea, 1896; 
 Cuba, 1898. In 1854 the United States Su- 
 preme Court decreed a division of Church 
 property between the Methodist Episcopal 
 Church and Southern Methodisrn. In 1870 
 lay delegates were admitted to General and 
 Annual Conferences; and the Colored M. E. 
 Church, under our sanction, and with two 
 colored bishops, was organized from our ne- 
 gro members. From the sixteen Annual Con- 
 ferences of 1846, forty-five, including eight 
 Mission Conferences, have grown. Thirty 
 bishops have been elected, ten of whom at this 
 date (1909) are living.
 
 SOUTHERN METHODISM. 53 
 
 Taking the statistics of 1907 as a guide, 
 the total number of traveling, or "itinerant," 
 preachers of our Southern Methodism is 7,- 
 188, which includes bishops, presiding elders, 
 connectional officers, and missionaries in 
 foreign fields. The number of pastoral 
 charges that is, stations or circuits is 
 5,642. As there are 1,725,4(57 members in 
 our Church, this would give an average of 
 240 members to the preacher. Our Church 
 has 10 living bishops, nearly 300 presiding 
 elders, about 30 connectional or general 
 officers (including editors in charge of Con- 
 ference papers), 281 foreign missionary 
 workers, 872 supernumerary and superan- 
 nuated preachers (chiefly the latter). The 
 number of local preachers is 4,703. This 
 gives a grand total of 11,891 Southern Meth- 
 odist preachers. 
 
 3. Our Bishops, A.D. 1844-1909. From the 
 division to 1909. 
 
 Including Soule and Andrew, who w r ere 
 received as its first bishops by the first Gen- 
 eral Conference of 1846, thirty bishops have 
 served our Southern Methodism to date of 
 1909. Of these, twenty have died. Bascom 
 was elected in May and died, the September 
 following, holding the office about three
 
 54 CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 months. Parker and Haygood served only 
 three and six years respectively. Tigert was 
 ordained in May and died in November. 
 Haygood was one of the very few in Church 
 history to decline election to the high office, 
 yet he was again elected at an ensuing Con- 
 ference. Galloway was thirty-seven when 
 elected; Early was sixty-eight, the maximum 
 in age at election. 
 
 Counting our line of bishops from Coke 
 (1784) to Janes (1844), the last bishop 
 elected by the undivided Church, and then 
 from Soule, the first bishop of the M. E. 
 Church, South, to Atkins, elected in 1906, 
 the total in whose bishopric we have direct 
 part is forty-two. Of these, the average age 
 at election was forty-eight years, and their 
 average years in office about twenty-one. 
 
 Bishops of Methodist Episcopal Church, 
 South. 
 
 Joshua Soule, ordained 1824; died March 
 6, 1867. 
 
 James Osgood Andrew, ordained 1832; 
 died March 2, 1871. 
 
 William Capers, ordained 1846; died Jan- 
 uary 29, 1855.
 
 SOUTHEKN METHODISM. 55 
 
 Robert Paine, ordained 1846; died Octo- 
 ber 19, 1882. 
 
 Henry Biddleman Bascom, ordained 1850 ; 
 died September 8, 1850. 
 
 George Foster Pierce, ordained 1854; died 
 September 3, 1884. 
 
 John Early, ordained 1854; died Novem- 
 ber 5, 1873. 
 
 Hubbard Hinde Kavanaugh, ordained 
 1854 ; died March 19, 1884. 
 
 William May Wightman, ordained 1866; 
 died February 3, 1882. 
 
 Enoch Mather Marvin, ordained 186G ; died 
 November 26, 1877. 
 
 David Seth Doggett, ordained 1866; died 
 October 27, 1880. 
 
 Holland Nimmons McTyeire, ordained 
 1866; died February 15, 1889. 
 
 John Christian Keener, ordained 1870 ; 
 died January 19, 1906. 
 
 Alpheus Waters Wilson, ordained 1882. 
 
 Linus Parker, ordained 1882; died March 
 6, 1885. 
 
 John Cowper Granbery, ordained 1882; 
 died April 1, 1907. 
 
 Robert Kennon Hargrove, ordained 1882; 
 died August 3, 1906.
 
 56 CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 William Wallace Duncan, ordained 1886; 
 died March .2, 1908. 
 
 Charles Betts Galloway, ordained 1886. 
 
 Eugene Russell Hendrix, ordained 1886. 
 
 Joseph Staunton Key, ordained 1886. 
 
 Atticus Greene Haygood, ordained 1890; 
 died January 19, 1896. 
 
 Oscar Penn Fitzgerald, ordained 1890. 
 
 Warren Akin Candler, ordained 1898. 
 
 Henry Clay Morrison, ordained 1898. 
 
 E. Embree Hoss, ordained 1902. 
 
 A. Coke Smith, ordained 1902; died De- 
 cember 27, 1906. 
 
 John J. Tigert, ordained 1906; died No- 
 vember 21, 1906. 
 
 Seth Ward, ordained 1906. 
 
 James Atkins, ordained 1906. 
 
 4. Southern Methodist Boards, A.D. 1840- 
 1909. The Board of Missions is the Parent 
 Board, and was organized in 1846, with of- 
 fice in the Publishing House, Nashville, Tenn. 
 Its executive officers are a Secretary-in-Chief 
 and several Assistant Secretaries, together 
 with office Secretary and Treasurer. It oper- 
 ates mission stations in China, Japan, Brazil, 
 Mexico, Korea, Cuba, and has charge of work 
 in the Mission Conferences in the United 
 States. It supports twenty foreign schools
 
 SOUTHERN METHODISM. 57 
 
 and five hospitals and dispensaries. Its or- 
 gan is Go Forward. 
 
 The Sunday School Board was organized 
 as now in 1870. It is managed by a General 
 Sunday School Board, of which the Sunday 
 School Editor is ex officio Chairman, and aid- 
 ed by Annual Conference Boards. Its officers 
 are the General Sunday School Board, the 
 Sunday School Editor and Assistant Editor, 
 and the Superintendent of Training Work. 
 It supervises and directs all home and for- 
 eign Sunday school work, and prepares and 
 issues all Sunday school literature, and also 
 directs the teacher-training work of the 
 Church. The number of Sunday schools re- 
 ported in 1907 was 14,955; of officers and 
 teachers, 113,654; of Sunday school pupils, 
 1,127,359. 
 
 The Woman's Board of Foreign Missions 
 was organized in 1878. Its executive officers 
 are the Corresponding Secretary and Assist- 
 ant Secretaries, the Treasurer, and the Ke- 
 cording Secretary. Its papers are the Wom- 
 an's Missionary Advocate and the Little 
 Worker. This Board operates in the same 
 countries with the Parent Board. It con- 
 ducts or aids seventy-five schools; also two 
 hospitals.
 
 58 CHUBCH HISTORY. 
 
 The Board of Church Extension, organized 
 in 1882, looks after the purchase of lots and 
 buildings for Church or parsonage uses. Its 
 office is in Louisville, Ky., and the work is 
 under a Corresponding Secretary. Since or- 
 ganized it has aided about 5,000 churches 
 with loans. 
 
 The Woman's Board of Home Missions was 
 organized in 1886, and helps to build parson- 
 ages, maintains mission stations among our 
 foreign population in the United States, and 
 conducts city and rescue missions and schools. 
 Its executive officers are a General Secretary, 
 Associate Secretary, Kecording Secretary, 
 and Treasurer. Its official paper is Our 
 Homes. It maintains 14 schools and 24 city 
 mission centers. 
 
 The Epivorth League Board, organized in 
 1890, is directed by the Corresponding Sec- 
 retary and Assistant Secretary, and has as 
 its official organ the Epworth Era. It su- 
 pervises and assists the organized League 
 work of the Church, and provides and directs 
 "Culture Courses" biblical, literary, and 
 historical for the Epworth Leagues. In 
 1907 there were in operation 3,663 Epworth 
 Leagues and 127,924 members. 
 
 The Board of Education, organized in 1894,
 
 SOUTHERN METHODISM. 59 
 
 supervises our system of church schools. Its 
 officers are a General Board, a Correspond- 
 ing Secretary and Assistant Secretary, and a 
 "Commission of Ten" to unify and fix stand- 
 ards. The system of schools at present in- 
 cludes: One central university, 15 colleges, 
 47 unclassified institutions, 52 academies, 12 
 schools not meeting requirements for acad- 
 emies, 2 special institutions, 5 schools for ne- 
 groes, and 50 institutions in foreign fields 
 under control of Mission Boards. The Board 
 also has in charge Paine Institute and Lane 
 College for negroes. 
 
 The Advocate Family is an important aux- 
 iliary to the Church, both spiritually and 
 educationally. It has 10 papers serving our 
 Southern Methodism, chief of which is the 
 Christian Advocate, the connectional organ, 
 the editor of which is elected by the General 
 Conference. The editors of other Advocates 
 are chosen by the patronizing Conferences. 
 The other members of the Advocate family 
 are: The Alabama Advocate, the Arkansas 
 Methodist, the Central Methodist, the South- 
 ern Methodist, the Baltimore, New Orleans, 
 North Carolina, Raleigh, Southern, St. Louis, 
 Texas, Weslej/an, West Virginia, Western, 
 and Pacific Advocates.
 
 60 CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 The Methodist Review is edited by the 
 Book Editor and assistant, who also edit the 
 General Minutes, the Book of Discipline, the 
 Church Hymnal, the Course of Study, and 
 the Church Catechisms. 
 
 The Publishing House, founded in 1854, is 
 located at Nashville, Tenn., with branch 
 houses at Dallas, Tex., and Shanghai, China. 
 Its directing Agents, two in number, are 
 elected quadrennially by the General Confer- 
 ence. 
 
 5. World-Wide Methodism. Of the twen- 
 ty-eight bodies or divisions of world-wide 
 Methodism, eleven are in foreign countries 
 and seventeen in America. Of these, only one 
 body, the Calvinistic branch, chiefly in Wales, 
 differs in doctrine. In polity there are main- 
 ly minor differences. 
 
 SUMMARY OF SOUTHERN METHODISM. 
 
 1845 Southern Methodism organized. 
 
 1846 First General Conference. 
 
 1848 Missions begun ; Dr. Taylor to China. 
 
 1866 Fifth General Conference at close of 
 war; lay delegates enacted; proba- 
 tion abolished; pastoral term ex- 
 tended to four years from two.
 
 SOUTHERN METHODISM. gj 
 
 1870 Laymen members of General Confer- 
 ence. 
 
 1870 Colored M. E. Church set apart. 
 
 1878 Woman's Missionary Society organ- 
 ized. 
 
 1881 First Ecumenical Conference. 
 
 1882 Church Extension Society organized. 
 1894 Epworth League organized. 
 
 1899 Branch Publishing House at Dallas. 
 
 1900 Joint Commissions appointed. 
 
 1902 Twentieth Century Offering for Edu- 
 cation ; Joint Foreign Publishing 
 House. 
 
 1906 Commissions on Vanderbilt University 
 and on Eestatement of Keligion ap- 
 pointed. 
 
 1906 "Methodist Church of Japan" set 
 
 apart; new Nashville Publishing 
 House. 
 
 1907 Laymen's Missionary Movement begun. 
 
 SOME OLD WORLD METHODISMS. 
 
 Members. 
 
 Wesleyan 808,301 
 
 New Connection 46,689 
 
 Independent 9,147 
 
 Primitive 210,173
 
 62 CHUBCH HISTORY. 
 
 Members. 
 
 United Free 103,019 
 
 Australasia 145,805 
 
 NEW WORLD METHODISMS. 
 Report of 1906. 
 
 Methodist Episcopal 2,910,779 
 
 Methodist Episcopal, South (report 
 
 of 1907) 1,725,467 
 
 Methodist Protestant 183,894 
 
 Free Methodist 30,271 
 
 Methodist of Canada 317,717 
 
 Wesleyan Methodist 17,909 
 
 Congregational Methodist (white). 24,000 
 
 Congregational Methodist (colored) 319 
 
 New Congregational Methodist. . . . 4,022 
 
 Independent Methodist 2,569 
 
 Evangelist Missionary 3,014 
 
 Primitive 6,976 
 
 Union American M. E 18,500 
 
 Zion Union Apostolic 2,346 
 
 Colored M. E 214,987 
 
 African Union Meth. Protestant . . 3,887 
 
 African M. E 842,023 
 
 African M. E. Zion 596,305
 
 SOUTHERN METHODISM. 63 
 
 DENOMINATIONAL NUMERICAL BANK. 
 
 U. 8. Government Report, 1906. 
 
 Members. 
 
 Methodists 6,429,815 
 
 Baptists 5,073,823 
 
 Lutherans 1,841,346 
 
 Presbyterians 1,723,871 
 
 Disciples 1,235,294 
 
 Episcopal 1,232,149 
 
 Congregationalists 687,042 
 
 Koman Catholic 10,915,251 
 
 The above figures are taken in part from 
 the Yearbooks for 1907 of the Methodist 
 Episcopal and Methodist Episcopal Church, 
 South.
 
 SECTION TWO. 
 
 THE DOCTRINES 
 
 OP THE 
 
 METHODIST EPISCOPAL CHURCH, 
 SOUTH. 
 
 BY REV. WILBUR F. TILLETT, D.D., 
 
 Dean of the Theological Faculty of Vanderbilt 
 University. 
 
 5 (65)
 
 V. 
 
 DISTINGUISHING FEATURES. 
 
 METHODISM represents a distinct system of 
 Christian doctrine, and also a type of Church 
 polity. Methodists are not one the world 
 over in their ecclesiastical polity: some are 
 episcopal, some presbyterial, and some congre- 
 gational. But all Methodists are practically 
 a unit the world over in the type of theology 
 which they hold. Most of the cardinal doc- 
 trines of Methodism are held in common with 
 all evangelical Christian Churches. Such, 
 for example, are the inspiration and divine 
 authority of the Holy Scriptures, the Triuni- 
 ty of the Godhead, the divinity of Christ, the 
 fall of man and the universal sinfulnessof the 
 race, justification by faith, the necessity of 
 regeneration, the future and eternal existence 
 of all men after death, and many other simi- 
 lar doctrines of the highest significance. 
 
 But there are certain other doctrines which, 
 though not held exclusively by Methodists, 
 have at least been more strongly emphasized 
 
 (67)
 
 68 THE DOCTRIHES OF METHODISM. 
 
 in the faith and preaching of Methodism than 
 in any other branch of the Christian Church. 
 Among these may be mentioned the follow- 
 ing: .the moral free agency and accountability 
 of man,' the unlimited atonement of Christ, 
 the witness of the Spirit testifying to the re- 
 generate man of his acceptance with Godj- the 
 possibility of apostasy,' and the attainability 
 of entire holiness in this life. 
 
 Methodism has been the instrument in the 
 hands of God of saving during the century 
 and a half of its existence not less perhaps 
 than fifteen to twenty millions of immortal 
 souls. This result, which is without a prece- 
 dent in the history of the Christian Church, 
 is to be attributed in no small degree to the 
 intensely earnest and practical character of 
 its theology. " It was not new doctrine but 
 new life that the Methodists sought for them- 
 selves and for others," says Bishop McTyeire 
 in the opening sentence of his "History of 
 Methodism." But the history of the Chris- 
 tian Church has established the fact that 
 progress in the spiritual life and maintenance 
 of sound doctrine are vitally related to each 
 other. 
 
 The doctrinal system of Methodism is some- 
 times designated as "Arminian theology."
 
 DISTINGUISHING FEATTJBES. QQ 
 
 This designation connects it with the name of 
 James Arminius (1560-1609), a noted theolo- 
 gian of Holland. As Martin Luther and his 
 fellow-reformers, although reared in the 
 Church of Rome, were led by their enlight- 
 ened convictions to protest against what they 
 considered the corrupt practices and false 
 teachings of this Church, and were for that 
 reason called Protestants, so James Arminius 
 and his associates, although first instructed in 
 the strict teachings of high Calvinism, felt com- 
 pelled to utter a remonstrance against certain 
 extreme Calvinistic doctrines concerning pre- 
 destination, election, reprobation, etc., and 
 were for that reason called Remonstrants. 
 The celebrated "five points" of Calvinism, 
 setting forth the peculiar and distinctive doc- 
 trines of that system of theology, were offset 
 by the no less distinctive "five points" of 
 Arminianism, viz.: (1) Conditional election 
 that is, God elected to salvation those who, he 
 foresaw, would freely repent of their sins and 
 believe in Christ, and to reprobation those 
 whose willful impenitence and unbelief he 
 foresaw. (2) Jesus Christ died alike for all 
 men, but only those who repent and believe 
 will secure the saving benefits of his atoning 
 death. (3) The ability of fallen man to re*
 
 70 THE DOCTRItfES OF METHODISM. 
 
 pent and believe is of grace and not of nature, 
 and spiritual renewal or regeneration is en- 
 tirely of the Spirit's operation. (4) Never- 
 theless divine grace and the influence of the 
 Spirit are not, as Calvinism affirms, irresistible; 
 but may be resisted by man, who is a moral 
 free agent, and who, though he may be con- 
 victed of sin against his will, is never con- 
 verted against his will. (5) The possibility 
 of a truly regenerated man falling away from 
 his saved estate and being finally lost was first 
 left an open question, but was soon decided, 
 as the logic of the system required that it should 
 be, in the affirmative. 
 
 The doctrinal system of Methodism is also 
 designated as "Wesleyan theology." This 
 designation associates it with the names of 
 John and Charles Wesley. John Wesley 
 (1703-1791) was perhaps the greatest reform- 
 er, preacher, and evangelist that has ever ap- 
 peared in England. Methodism is but one of 
 the many results that have come from his life 
 and labors. John Wesley's theology was in- 
 tensely evangelical and practical, and, like 
 that of the apostle Paul, was to a large extent 
 colored by his own religious experience. He 
 accepted the system formulated by James Ar- 
 minius and the Remonstrants of Holland, in
 
 DISTINGUISHING FEATURES. f\ 
 
 all the points wherein that system differed 
 from Calvinism. But he did something more 
 for it than accept it. Arminian theology, as 
 it was formulated by the Remonstrants, was, 
 as an intellectual system of doctrine, logical, 
 self -consistent, and true; but it was cold; it 
 was lacking in the warmth and intensity of 
 spiritual life; it needed to be quickened by 
 the faith and the fire of an evangelical experi- 
 ence. This is exactly what John Wesley did 
 with it and for it. He carried it, as it were, 
 to the altar, and there it was baptized with 
 the Holy Ghost; and, surcharged with evan- 
 gelical life and converting power, it was sent 
 forth upon its world- wide mission of evangel- 
 ization. In Methodism we find the doctrines 
 of Arminius put into practice as living truths, 
 made matters of personal religious experience, 
 and utilized as mighty spiritual forces for 
 saving souls and spreading the kingdom of 
 Christ. |_In Wesleyan theology the intensive 
 power of the gospel to save each individual 
 from all sin is as much emphasized as is its ex- 
 tensive power to save all sinners, whoever 
 they may be and whenever and wherever 
 they may liveH 
 
 In 1784 John Wesley reduced the thirty- 
 nine Articles of the Church of England to
 
 72 THE DOCTRINES OF METHODISM. 
 
 twenty-five in number, and abridged and oth- 
 erwise altered some of those which he retained. 
 These he sent to America by Thomas Coke, 
 whom he had ordained bishop, and they were 
 accepted as the general creed of Episcopal 
 Methodism in America. They have ever 
 since occupied a foremost place among our 
 doctrinal standards. 
 
 John Wesley's sermons also have always 
 been numbered among the leading ' ' doctrinal 
 standards" of Methodism. They may be 
 lacking here and there in the accuracy and 
 uniform self -consistency of doctrinal state- 
 ment that we have a right to expect in works 
 of dogmatic theology, but what they lack in 
 these respects they more than gain in the 
 spiritual power that belongs to them as 
 sermons glowing with a living Christian ex- 
 perience and setting forth the great truths 
 that pertain to man's salvation. Richard 
 Watson's "Theological Institutes" may not 
 be altogether up to date, but they have in 
 them a theology that is well adapted to the 
 world's conversion and upbuilding in the spir- 
 itual life. Adam Clarke, the first great repre- 
 sentative commentator of Methodism, showed 
 by his able and scholarly expositions of the 
 Holy Scriptures how thoroughly faithful to
 
 DISTINGUISHING FEATURES. 73 
 
 the Bible were the doctrinal teachings of 
 Methodism. 
 
 Charles Wesley, the poet-preacher and the- 
 ologian, rendered a service to the theology of 
 Methodism scarcely less important and far- 
 reaching than that of his brother John. He 
 gave happy expression in verse to all the 
 great doctrines of Christianity, and he was 
 especially happy in the hymns which he wrote 
 embodying the more distinctive doctrines of 
 his faith. These hymns became at once im- 
 mensely popular with the people, and gave 
 wings, as it were, to the doctrines they em- 
 bodied. A sermon put into a song doubles 
 its power for good. Nor did these doctrinal 
 hymns of Charles Wesley simply meet a local 
 and temporary need; they have an abiding 
 value, and have carried, in the most effective 
 manner possible, the doctrines they contain 
 into the hymnals of all Christian Churches 
 the world over. While John Wesley's hymns 
 are not numerous, and are mostly translations 
 from other languages, they are in no way in- 
 ferior to those of Charles Wesley either in 
 poetic merit or doctrinal value. Jt is in por- 
 traying those doctrines which are matters of 
 religious experience that the Wesleyan hymns 
 are richest both in variety and in intensity of
 
 t4 THE DOCTRINES OF METHODISM. 
 
 utterance. The great reformation in Germa- 
 ny in the sixteenth century owed much to the 
 fact that Luther was a poet as well as a 
 preacher, and embodied all his leading doc- 
 trines in simple and popular hymns that were 
 adapted to the common people as well as in 
 sermons and theses that were adapted to the 
 learned. But the Wesleyan reformation owed 
 even more to its hymns. " Let me write the 
 songs of a people," said one, "and I care not 
 who may write their laws; I will govern 
 them." " Let me write the hymns of a 
 Church," said another, "and I care not who 
 may write her creeds and ponderous volumes 
 of theology; I will determine the faith of her 
 membership." The Methodist hymn book 
 has always been reckoned among the doctri- 
 nal standards of the Church. It has ever 
 been one of the most effective of the agencies 
 employed for indoctrinating the people in 
 that type of evangelical Christian faith which 
 is known the world over as Methodist theology. 
 But the designation of Methodist theology 
 as "Arminian " and "Wesleyan " must not be 
 misunderstood. Methodist theology is first 
 of all and above all biblical. Every evangel- 
 ical Church recognizes the Bible as the source 
 and foundation of its theology. It is after
 
 DISTINGUISHING FEATUBE8. 75 
 
 all simply a question of the proper interpreta- 
 tion of the Bible. Calvinism is a logical and 
 self-consistent system of doctrine which finds 
 its starting point and its determining princi- 
 ple in the eternal decrees of Jehovah, and in- 
 terprets the entire revelation contained in 
 the Bible in accordance with that doctrine. 
 Methodism also has a logical and self -consist- 
 ent system of doctrine which in like manner 
 is based upon the Bible, but it finds its start- 
 ing point and determining principle in two 
 doctrines that mutually necessitate and sup- 
 'port each other viz., the moral free agency 
 ofman and the imlimifoifl ^j-onement of Christ; 
 and we may say that every other doctrine of 
 Methodist theology is a logical outcome of 
 these two doctrines. Methodism, therefore, 
 claims that its theology is the theology of the 
 New Testament, the theology of Christ and of 
 Paul. It is that simple and primitive type of 
 theology which began to be preached in its 
 completed form on the day of Pentecost, and 
 has never since been without its true witness- 
 es in any age of the Church's history. It has 
 needed, however, to be restated and reformu- 
 lated ever and anon. Such was the service 
 rendered by James Arminius and John Wes- 
 ley, and by others before and since their day.
 
 VI. 
 THE HOLY SCRIPTURES. 
 
 WHAT doctrine does Methodism hold con- 
 cerning the Holy Scriptures? This is best 
 answered by first asking another question: 
 What does the Bible teach concerning itself ? 
 The Bible teaches, we answer, that "All Scrip- 
 ture is given by inspiration of God, and is 
 profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for cor- 
 rection, for instruction in righteousness: that 
 the man of God may be perfect, thoroughly' 
 furnished unto all good works." It teaches 
 that "prophecy came not in old time by the 
 will of man: but holy men of God spake as 
 they were moved by the Holy Ghost; " and that 
 " God, who at sundry times and in divers 
 manners spake in time past unto the fathers 
 by the prophets, hath in these last days spo- 
 ken unto us by his Son." Moses is represent- 
 ed as having received directly from God the 
 Ten Commandments, which are with us to 
 this day, and whose high moral character 
 well befits their claim of a divine origin. 
 "The word of the Lord came unto me, say- 
 ing," is the preface with which the proph- 
 ets begin their messages. These remarkable 
 (76)
 
 THE HOLY SCB1PTTJBES. 77 
 
 claims demand of us that we make serious in- 
 quiry as to their import. If this Book is 
 what it claims to be, no man can afford to ig- 
 nore or neglect its teachings. ' ' These [things] 
 are written," says St. John, in concluding the 
 fourth Gospel, and it is in a sense equally 
 true of all Scripture, "that ye might believe 
 that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God; and 
 that believing ye might have life through his 
 name." 
 
 These quotations cover the three main 
 questions which we need to ask concerning 
 the Bible, and suggest the proper answers to 
 them: (1) Where did the Bible come from? 
 We answer that it is divine in its origin, in 
 that its cardinal and distinguishing doctrines 
 were revealed by God to man. (2) How did 
 God reveal these facts and doctrines? We 
 answer: Through certain chosen men whom 
 the Holy Spirit inspired as trustworthy or- 
 gans for the communication of the divine 
 will. (3) What purpose are these inspired 
 Scriptures designed to fill in the divine econ- 
 omy as it concerns man? We answer: They 
 are a divinely provided guide for man in all 
 matters of a moral and spiritual nature, espe- 
 cially such as pertain to his faith and conduct 
 here and bis life in the world to come. Thus
 
 78 THK DOCTRINES OF METHODISM. 
 
 we have the three theological terms, revela- 
 tion, inspiration, and the canon, answering 
 the three questions as to the whence, the how, 
 and the what of the Holy Scriptures. 
 
 God reveals something of himself and of 
 his will through nature and providence, but 
 this general revelation has always proved in- 
 adequate to meet man's spiritual needs, being 
 insufficient to impart a true and satisfactory 
 knowledge of God, of the way of salvation, 
 and of the immortality and destiny of the 
 soul. That religious knowledge which fallen 
 man needed but could not secure from nature, 
 God has supplied in a supernatural manner by 
 revelation. It is these divine or supernaturally 
 revealed facts and truths which, as collected 
 together within the Bible, constitute it a di- 
 vine Book. Nevertheless, the Bible is not 
 wholly divine; it is rather divine-human, for 
 much that is contained in it is human in its ori- 
 gin and did not need to be divinely revealed. 
 This unrevealed portion of the Bible is, in fact, 
 the larger portion. It is, however, a faithful 
 and trustworthy record, quite as much as is 
 that portion which records the divine revela- 
 tions. The human elements furnish the lit- 
 erary and historical framework for holding 
 the divinely revealed truths. The divine rev-
 
 THE HOLY SCRIPTURES. 79 
 
 elations contained in the Bible are of trans- 
 cendent importance, and so far give character 
 to the volume as a whole that it is common, 
 and not inappropriate, to designate it as the 
 Book of Revelation. 
 
 What is the evidence that the Bible contains 
 supernatural revelations ? The divine authori- 
 ty of the Bible depends upon the truth of the 
 claim that it contains supernatural revelations; 
 and if this be true, the claim ought to be sup- 
 ported by supernatural evidence. And it is. 
 The prophets who claimed to have received 
 divine revelations proved the truth of their 
 assertions by working miracles. When Moses, 
 for example, announced to the children of Is- 
 rael in Egypt that he had received a revela- 
 tion and a command from God in the desert, 
 they immediately and very naturally demand- 
 ed proof of such a claim. The God who had 
 given the revelation had provided for this 
 reasonable demand, and empowered him to 
 work miracles. In some instances the vindi- 
 cation of the divine claim on the part of the 
 prophet was found in the fulfillment of pre- 
 dictions which he uttered concerning the fu- 
 ture. In yet other instances the revelations 
 announced by the prophets as coming from 
 God were self-evidencing that is, weue in.
 
 gO THE DOCTRINES OF METHODISM. 
 
 their nature so thoroughly accordant with the 
 moral character of God and man's religious 
 needs that they carried their own evidence in 
 them, and hence did not need to be supported 
 by miracles or predictions. Our reason, there- 
 fore, for believing that the Bible contains .di- 
 vine revelations is found in part in the mira- 
 cles the prophets apd the apostles wrought, 
 in part in the fulfillment of their predictions 
 of future events, in part in the intrinsic moral 
 excellence of the doctrines taught, and finally 
 in the uplifting and ennobling moral influence 
 the Bible has had upon the character of all 
 the nations and individuals that have believed 
 and followed its teachings. 
 
 But the passages of Scripture which were 
 quoted above seem to teach not only that God 
 has made revelations of his will from time to 
 time, but that it was his will that a trustwor- 
 thy record should be made of these revelations. 
 They imply that the Holy Spirit exercised an 
 influence upon those who wrote the books of 
 Holy Scripture such as cannot be claimed for 
 the writers of any other books. This special 
 influence of the Holy Spirit upon the minds 
 of the biblical writers was designed to prevent 
 them from making hurtful mistakes in the 
 statements they should give of the great mor-
 
 THE HOLY SCRIPTURES. 81 
 
 al and spiritual truths of religion, and in an 
 important sense to make their words God's 
 words, and their book to be God's Book. 
 This is what is meant by saying that the bibli- 
 cal writers were ' ' inspired. " St. Peter speaks 
 of a certain scripture " which the Holy Ghost 
 spake by the mouth of David." The author 
 of the Epistle to the Hebrews uses inter- 
 changeably the expressions " the Holy Ghost 
 testifieth " and "one [that is, the writer] in a 
 certain place testifieth." In other words, 
 what the inspired writer says God says. 
 
 To affirm that the biblical writers were in- 
 spired does not mean that they lost their hu- 
 man individuality and freedom, and were 
 turned into machines. The inspired proph- 
 ets and apostles were not shorthand report- 
 ers. Only in a few instances do they tell 
 us that they wrote down the very "words 
 which the Holy Ghost teach eth." In the Ten 
 Commandments we have the very words of 
 God. But as a rule the expression of the 
 thought, even when it was revealed, was de- 
 termined by the individual writer, whose 
 style and other mental peculiarities may be 
 seen everywhere in his writings. There may 
 be several accounts of the same events, all 
 differing in the words used, and yet all be 
 6
 
 82 THE DOCTRINES OP METHODISM. 
 
 equally true and accurate. The great pur- 
 pose of inspiration is to secure truth in the 
 records, not uniformity and sameness of state- 
 ment. The four evangelists record very much 
 the same events, and yet they differ both in 
 literary style and, as a rule, in the words used; 
 but all are equally true and equally inspired. 
 The various books of the Bible are as genu- 
 inely human and as thoroughly marked by the 
 individual characteristics of their human au- 
 thors as if they had been written by unin- 
 spired men. To recognize the distinctly hu- 
 man element in the Bible is not to detract 
 from its moral value, but rather to add to its 
 value for man's guidance, even as the human- 
 ity of Christ makes him a better Saviour than 
 if he had possessed no human nature at all. 
 Truth is none the less true because uttered by 
 human lips. Christ is none the less divine be- 
 cause he had a genuinely human nature. 
 
 But the strongest of all arguments in proof 
 of the doctrine of biblical inspiration is the 
 manner in which Christ refers to the Scrip- 
 tures, and the absolute divine authority which 
 he attributes to them. To him and to the 
 apostles they were none other than God's own 
 words. Our Lord made distinct reference to 
 David's inspiration when he asks: " How then
 
 THE HOLY SCRIPTURES. 83 
 
 doth David in spirit call him Lord? " If the 
 Old Testament was written by divinely in- 
 spired men and possessed of divine authority, 
 how much more the New, which was the full 
 and final expression of the revealed will of 
 God! We believe in the New Testament 
 chiefly because of what it tells us of Christ; 
 and in the Old Testament chiefly because of 
 what Christ tells us of it tells us by the way 
 he used it and appealed to it as the very word 
 of God. Perhaps the best possible definition 
 which we can give of the Holy Scriptures is 
 drawn from their relation to Christ, thus: 
 "By the Holy Scriptures we mean, (1) those 
 ancient sacred books of the Jewish Church 
 which Christ and his inspired apostles used 
 and appealed to as of divine authority; and 
 ( 2) those sacred books of the New Testament 
 which set forth the life and teachings of our 
 Lord, and which were written by or under the 
 direction of his apostles." Christianity be- 
 lieves in the Person first, and in the Book sec- 
 ond. It is the divine-human Person that makes 
 the Book, not the divine-human Book that 
 makes the Person. Christianity could live 
 without a Book, but it could not live indeed, 
 it could not be at all without the Person of 
 Christ.
 
 84 THE DOCTRINES OF METHODISM. 
 
 The Canon of Holy Scripture, then, is noth- 
 ing more nor less than that collection of sacred 
 books which were written under the guidance 
 of the Holy Spirit, and the primary object of 
 which was to meet man's moral and religious 
 needs. They incidentally contain history, bi- 
 ography, chronology, philosophy, science, etc. , 
 but they were not written primarily to teach 
 any of these things, and the entire accuracy 
 of their statements concerning questions of 
 this kind is a matter of absolute insignificance 
 as compared with the great moral principles 
 and spiritual truths that are the distinguishing 
 features of the Christian religion. It is in 
 reference to these truths that we appeal to it 
 as the divine and authoritative word of God. 
 
 The word " canon " means, literally, a rule; 
 and the Holy Scriptures are a canon in that 
 they are a divine rule of faith and practice, a 
 standard of doctrine and ethics. The word 
 " canonical" is also applied to the Holy Scrip- 
 tures to distinguish them from books which 
 were not regarded as inspired and of divine 
 authority, such as the Old Testament Apoc- 
 rypha. 
 
 There is every reason to believe that the Old 
 Testament Scriptures, as we now have them, 
 are substantially identical with the Scriptures
 
 THE HOLY SCRIP-TUBES. g5 
 
 which Christ and the apostles used. These 
 Scriptures of the old covenant are not called 
 old because they are antiquated and obsolete; 
 for, although the dispensation for which they 
 were immediately written has long since come 
 to an end, having served its purpose, these 
 ancient Scriptures have an abiding significance 
 and value. A large part of the Old Testament 
 is occupied exclusively with setting forth the 
 ritual and ceremonial law of the Jewish 
 Church, which is not now binding and has 
 never been since the day of Pentecost; but, so 
 far as they embody God's moral law, they are 
 of as much authority now as they ever were, 
 and are of equal authority with the New Tes- 
 tament. Inasmuch, however, as transitory 
 and now obsolete precepts are intermingled 
 with those which are of perpetual obligation, 
 the Old Testament must be read and inter- 
 preted with intelligent discrimination. 
 
 All inspired books are of importance, but 
 some are of more importance than others. That 
 portion of the Bible which transcends in mor- 
 al value all other parts of the Bible is the four 
 Gospels. Christianity is a historical religion. 
 Its Founder is a Person who lived at a definite 
 time and place, and the Gospels purport to 
 give a trustworthy record of the leading facts
 
 86 THE DOCTRINES OF METHODISM. 
 
 of his life, his sayings and doings. The whole 
 question as to whether or not there is a super- 
 natural religion in the world depends upon the 
 historical trustworthiness of these Gospel rec- 
 ords. If any records in the literature of the 
 world are entitled to credence, these surely 
 are. Paul probably wrote his Epistles many 
 years before the Gospels were written. Four 
 of the Pauline Epistles (Romans, First and Sec- 
 ond Corinthians, and Galatians) are univer- 
 sally admitted by well-nigh all classes of theo- 
 logians and critics to be genuine, and to come 
 from about the middle of the first century. 
 These Epistles establish the fact beyond a 
 doubt that Christ was at that time regarded 
 as a divine-human Being, who had died upon 
 the cross and had risen again from the dead. 
 These are the main facts of supernatural reli- 
 gion viz., the incarnation of Christ and his 
 resurrection from the dead. If these are true, 
 the Gospels are fully confirmed, and the ex- 
 istence of a supernatural religion, with its su- 
 pernatural Christ, is established. This, we 
 saw at the outset, is the supreme and final end 
 for which the Scriptures exist : ' ' That ye might 
 believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of 
 God; and that believing ye might have life 
 through his name."
 
 VII. 
 THE BIBLE DOCTRINE OF MAX. 
 
 IF God is the chief object of divine revela- 
 tion, man, we may say, is the principal subject 
 of revelation. The inspired Scriptures are ad- 
 dressed to man and are largely about himself, 
 his nature and needs, his duty and destiny. 
 The Scriptures give us four views of man: 
 first, primitive man, in his unfallen state, as 
 God made him, innocent and pure; second, 
 man in his fallen state, as he made himself, 
 sinful and depraved; third, man in a state of 
 gracious ability, as Christ made him by his 
 redeeming work; fourth, man in a state of re- 
 generation or restoration to the divine image, 
 as the Holy Spirit is ready to make all those 
 who come unto God by Christ. In this chap- 
 ter we shall consider man as originally created 
 and as fallen. 
 
 The only rational account we have of man's 
 origin, that in Genesis, makes him to be the 
 last and highest product of creation; and this 
 is equally true whether the inspired narrative 
 be explained literally or as truth taught in 
 allegorical and symbolical form. This high- 
 est of God's earthly creatures is possessed of 
 
 (87)
 
 gg THE DOCTRINES OF METHODISM. 
 
 two natures, physical and spiritual, in one per- 
 sonality. Man is allied to lower animals in 
 his physical nature, but to the angelic world in 
 his spirit. His material or physical nature is 
 sometimes called flesh and sometimes body. 
 His immaterial nature is designated some- 
 times as soul and sometimes as spirit. It is 
 in man's immaterial or spiritual nature that 
 we find the real seat of manhood. It is this 
 spiritual nature that gives him his conscious- 
 ness and reason, his intellect, sensibilities, and 
 will, his conscience, his capacity for sin on 
 the one hand and for holiness on the other, 
 his capacity for the worship and service of 
 God, his likeness to God, his divine sonship 
 and immortality. Man is represented in the 
 Bible as having been created in the image of 
 God, endowed with reason and moral free 
 agency, placed under moral laws, obedience to 
 which results in holy character, and disobe- 
 dience to which is sin and results in'sinf ul char- 
 acter. His life here is probationary in that his 
 character as formed here determines his desti- 
 ny in the world to come. 
 (The supreme purpose of God in creating 
 man seems to have been to make possible the 
 highest ideal of creaturely holiness and happi- 
 ness.) There was need in the universe of a
 
 THE BIBLE DOCTRINE OF MAX. gQ 
 
 creature whose highest happineaa would bo se- 
 cured b^ his highest holiness; and this holiness, 
 in turn, would secure the highest glory of the 
 Creator. The holiness of a free being is a 
 higher type of holiness than any kind of holi- 
 ness that might characterize a being who 
 should be necessitated by the will of the Cre- 
 ator to be and do what he is and does, and the 
 former holiness would glorify the Creator far 
 more than the latter possibly could. The lat- 
 ter could glorify God only as a house does its 
 builder, while the former would glorify him as 
 a dutiful and obedient son does his father, a 
 righteous citizen his ruler, or a brave soldier 
 his leader. But in order for God to make holi- 
 ness possible it was absolutely necessary for 
 him to make sin possible. But while God 
 made sin possible by creating free moral agents 
 and placing them in a state of probation, he 
 did not make sin actual. It was man, not 
 God, who made sin actual. God, we may say, 
 would not have made sin possible if he could 
 have secured the highest ideal of holiness in 
 man without such possibility. But there are 
 some things which even omnipotence cannot 
 do; it cannot do an impossible thing, and the 
 creation and probation of a free being who 
 cannot sin are an impossibility. But the high-
 
 90 TH E DOCTRINES OF METHODISM. 
 
 est ideal of the Creator as embodied in man, 
 the moral free agent, would have been realized 
 if 8in had forever remained simply a possibil- 
 ity and had never become an actuality. That 
 ideal has been realized in one, and only one 
 the Son of Man. But the first Adam was as 
 free from sin when he came from the hands of 
 his Creator as was the infant born of the Vir- 
 gin. The first man was under no necessity to 
 sin. He was free. 
 
 We may say, then, that while man's first es- 
 tate was thus one of innocence and purity, two 
 alternatives were before him as a moral free 
 agent: holiness and sin. But the life and pro- 
 bation of the first pair had not been of long 
 duration before, by an abuse of their moral 
 freedom, innocence and purity gave place to 
 sin and guilt. The history of mankind, from 
 that time on^ is the history of a fallen and 
 sinful race. The "fall of man" is a phrase 
 which is commonly used in theology to de- 
 scribe man's loss of original righteousness and 
 his coming under the dominion of sin. The 
 fall of Adam is regarded as the fall of the 
 race, because of the fact that he was not only 
 the natural head, but in such a sense the fed- 
 eral head and moral representative of the race, 
 which was seminally in him, that certain con-
 
 THE BIBLE DOCTRINE OF MAN. 9J 
 
 sequences of his sin were entailed upon them. 
 But Adam's relation to the universal sinful- 
 ness of the race is a matter of secondary im- 
 portance as compared to the undeniable fact 
 that all men are by nature sinful and stand in 
 need of a Saviour. 
 
 The Bible uses various expressions to define 
 the nature of sin. The essence of sin is self- 
 ishness, sotting one's own will in opposition 
 to the will of the Creator, or willful trans- 
 gression of the law of God. Sin is "enmity 
 against God. " The sinner is one who has de- 
 throned God, the rightful ruler, from his seat 
 of authority in the heart, and has set himself 
 up as ruler instead, and the result is a state of 
 internal moral anarchy. The fact that the 
 will of the creature so often manifests its 
 disobedience to the commands of God, by 
 yielding to the solicitations of the fleshly or 
 animal nature, has given rise to calling sin 
 "the flesh" or "the carnal mind." The seat 
 of sin, however, is in the inner spiritual man, 
 in the heart, and not in the flesh. Outward 
 acts are sins only in so far as they are expres- 
 sions of inner volitions, dispositions, and 
 states. "Out of the heart proceed evil 
 thoughts." If the tree is evil, its fruit must 
 be evil. The look of the eye that comes
 
 92 THE nOCTRINES OF METHODISM. 
 
 from lust in the heart does pot need the out- 
 ward act to make it sin. The decision to 
 commit murder, or even the hate of the heart 
 that may lead to murderous volition, makes 
 one a murderer in the eyes of God^. There 
 are different degrees of guilt. / .There may be 
 sins oj culpable thoughtlessness and igno- 
 rance,-NBins of surprise in which one is over- 
 taken in a fault,"sins of deliberate choice and 
 malice aforethought,^ sins that involve the 
 breaking of a solemn covenant,* and sins 
 against the Holy Ghost, in which the sinner, 
 by persistence in willful wrongdoing, passes 
 beyond the possibility of being renewed 
 again unto repentance, and hence beyond the 
 possibility of pardon. (Matt. v. 28, xv. 19; 
 1 John iii. 4; Rom. viii. 6-8; Mark iii. 29; 
 Heb. vi. 6.) 
 
 A 
 
 But sin is not only a voluntary transgression 
 of the law of God; it is also, according to the 
 definition of St. John, any want of conform- 
 ity to that law. Sins often repeated beget a 
 habit of sin. Sinful habits long continued in 
 beget sinful character. Sin in the first, in- 
 stance always involves a consciously evil act, 
 but the oftener a man sins the more does sin 
 become to him the law of life, and the less 
 does the element of consciousness enter into
 
 THE BIBLE DOCTRINE OF MAN. Q3 
 
 his sinning. Whenever a man thus, by long- 
 continued violations of God's law, reaches the 
 point where conscience ceases to rebuke him 
 for his violation of God's law where he 
 ceases to feel painfully the guilt of his sins, 
 where sin has become the law of life to him, 
 has become, as it were, the natural thing to do 
 then he has become possessed of a sinful char- 
 acter. This is sometimes called acquired de- 
 pravity, as distinct from voluntary sin, or the 
 sin of nature, as distinct from willful sin. 
 Sinful character is the result of sinful volitions 
 and acts, but when character is formed it be- 
 comes a predisposing cause of the volitions 
 and acts that result that is, a man does not 
 come from the hand of his Creator a bad man; 
 he becomes a bad man only as a result of his 
 own evil volitions and evil deeds; but when 
 he has thus become a bad man, then the re- 
 verse is true, and we may say of such a one 
 that he does evil because he is a bad man. 
 We thus see what willful sin is, and also its 
 relation to moral depravity and to sinful char- 
 acter. 
 
 But there is such a thing as inherited de- 
 pravity as well as acquired depravity.; It is 
 commonly called original sin, and may be de- 
 fined as that "corruption of the nature of
 
 94 THE DOCTBINE8 OF METHODISM. 
 
 every man, that naturally is engendered of the 
 offspring of Adam, whereby he is very far 
 gone from original righteousness, and of his 
 own nature inclined to evil, and that con- 
 tinually." That all men do from their very 
 infancy manifest a tendency to do wrong 
 rather than to do right; that children left to 
 themselves as they grow up will do that which 
 is morally wrong rather than that which is 
 right is one of the most undeniable of all 
 moral facts. If the Church creeds and the 
 biblical writers were silent about it, we still 
 could not fail to recognize this universal sin- 
 fulness of man. As this bias to sin charac- 
 terizes man from his very infancy, it may 
 reasonably be inferred that it is inherited. 
 Hence it is sometimes called "birth sin." 
 Many think it unfortunate that it ever should 
 have been called "sin" or "guilt;" think 
 that these terms should have been reserved 
 for willful sin. Methodists do not believe 
 that the guilt of Adam's sin was imputed or 
 charged to his descendants in any sense ex- 
 cept that certain consequences of his wrong- 
 doing (as is more or less true of every par- 
 ent's wrongdoing) were entailed upon his 
 offspring, j Nor does the inheriting of a bias 
 toward sin involve any culpability or guilt
 
 THE BIBLE DOCTBINE OF MAN. 95 
 
 whatever until a child arrives at an age of 
 moral accountability and can bring the sin- 
 ward tendencies of his nature under the do- 
 minion of grace, but refuses to do so. Then 
 he may justly be held responsible and punish- 
 able for it and its consequences.] 
 
 Another phrase that is used in this connec- 
 tion, and is much misunderstood, is "total 
 depravity." It is a term Unit was coined by 
 theologians who took a view of original sin 
 and its effect that Methodists do not indorse. 
 This term and also that of "original guilt" 
 are quite consistent with the cardinal doc- 
 trines of Augustinian theology, but whenev- 
 er they appear in Methodist theology (as they 
 sometimes do) they call for definition and 
 explanation. There is, as we have seen, 
 both inherited and acquired depravity. We 
 believe that a man may, by persistent, willful 
 sin, acquire a character that is totally depraved. 
 But the theological phrase "total depravity" 
 refers to man's state as affected by the fall of 
 Adam and by inherited depravity, and car- 
 ries along with it the idea that all men in 
 their natural state are totally depraved and 
 devoid of all good. To say that sin has af- 
 fected every part of man's nature (body, mind, 
 heart, soul, spirit, etc.), that it is total, ex-
 
 06 THE DOCTRINES OF METHODISM. 
 
 tensively considered, is undoubtedly true; 
 but to say that all men until regenerated are 
 totally depraved in their moral nature (a 
 massa perditionis, as Augustine said), totally 
 devoid of all good, as bad as they can possi- 
 bly be that is a statement not in accord with 
 Methodist theology.; Methodists believe that 
 the atonement of Christ embraced all men in 
 its saving benefits; and that, while men are not 
 actually saved by it until they accept Christ 
 by faith, yet many of its general benefits have 
 extended to all men from the very beginning 
 of the history of the race, and precede per- 
 sonal salvation. There is some good in all 
 men, even in unregenerate human nature, 
 which is therefore not to be regarded as to- 
 tally depraved. But, while this is true, Meth- 
 odist theology affirms that whatever of good 
 is found in unregenerate men is an effect of the 
 atonement, and therefore due not to nature 
 but to grace. If the fallen race had been 
 suffered to exist and propagate itself unre- 
 deemed, it would have become totally de- 
 praved, but God did not suffer it to go unre- 
 deemed. All men, as a result of the atone- 
 ment, have gracious ability to meet the con- 
 ditions of salvation.
 
 VIII. 
 
 THE DOCTRINES PERTAINING TO 
 PERSONAL SALVATION. 
 
 IF we say that " God the Father plans, God 
 the Son executes, and God the Holy Spirit ap- 
 plies," we have a formula which states with 
 approximate accuracy the specific work of 
 each of the three persons of the Trinity in the 
 great work of human redemption. The exe- 
 cution of the divine plan of redemption was 
 committed to the Son, and as fulfilled it is 
 called the atonement. The application of the 
 atoning work of Christ to the actual salvation 
 of men is the work of the Holy Spirit, whose 
 gracious influences act upon and cooperate 
 with the free will of man. It is but another 
 method of stating the same great truth to say 
 that the originating cause of man's salvation 
 is the love of God, the meritorious cause is 
 the sacrifice of Christ, the efficient cause is 
 the power of the Ht>ly Spirit, and the deter- 
 mining cause is the free will of the redeemed 
 sinner. In this chapter we are especially con- 
 cerned with the two elements last named. 
 
 Personal salvation is a result of cooperation 
 " (07)
 
 98 THE DOCTBINES OF METHODISM. 
 
 between God and man, between the divine and 
 the human will. Although salvation is of 
 God's free grace, it is none the less of man's 
 free choice. While man cannot save himself, 
 neither can God save him, in keeping with the 
 revealed principles of his moral government, 
 unless man himself chooses to fulfill the con- 
 ditions of salvation. As a mere matter of 
 power, of course the omnipotent divine will 
 can cause the finite human will to do any- 
 thing, to put forth any volition whatsoever; 
 but such a divinely necessitated human voli- 
 tion could not be free, and in the matter of 
 personal salvation man is entirely free to ful- 
 fill or not to f ulfili the conditions of salvation. 
 The Bible represents God as being without par- 
 tiality and no respecter of persons. God our 
 Saviour "will have all men to be saved and to 
 come unto the knowledge of the truth," and is 
 "not willing that any should perish, but that 
 all should come to repentance." Personal sal- 
 vation and damnation, therefore, are not de- 
 termined by election and nonelection in eter- 
 nity, but by the free wiH of man. ^The con- 
 dition of fallen man as affected by the atone- 
 ment is one of gracious ability to fulfill all 
 conditions necessary to salvation; but while 
 his present moral ability is of grace, that
 
 PERSONAL SALVATION. 99 
 
 grace itself is free and not arbitrary and irre- 
 sistible. 
 
 If the work of personal salvation be ana- 
 lyzed and separated into its various parts, it 
 may be said to consist of the following ele- 
 ments: (1) Conviction of sin, which is that 
 work of the Holy Spirit upon the conscience 
 of the sinner by which he is awakened and 
 made to realize his sinful and lost condition; 
 (2) repentance, which is such godly sorrow on 
 account of sin as leads to the forsaking of all 
 sin and the confession of sin; (3) faith, or that 
 belief of the mind and trust of the heart by 
 which the penitent sinner accepts Jesus Christ 
 as a personal Saviour; (4) justification, which is 
 something done for us, being that act of God 
 by which he pardons all the past sins of the 
 penitent believer; (5) regeneration, which is 
 something done in us, being that act of God by 
 which he breaks the dominion of the sin of na- 
 ture and creates us anew, which transforma- 
 tion is called the new birth and is followed 
 by adoption into the family of God; (6) the 
 witness of the Holy Spirit to the spirit of the 
 regenerate believer, testifying to his pardon 
 and adoption, and producing a divine convic- 
 tion of salvation; (7) sanctification, which as 
 commonly denned refers to that work of the
 
 100 THE DOCTRINES OF METHODISM. 
 
 Holy Spirit, in cooperation with the regener- 
 ate spirit, which separates the soul from all 
 sin, carrying on the work begun in regenera- 
 tion, and completing it in Christian perfection. 
 
 The first six elements enumerated above 
 constitute "conversion," as this term is popu- 
 larly used. * There are three salvations spoken 
 of in the Bible. "Repent of thy sins and be- 
 lieve in the Lord Jesus, and thou shalt be 
 saved;" this is the first. "Work out your 
 own salvation with fear and trembling;" this 
 is the second, and it is a continuous, pro- 
 gressive work. "He that endureth to the end 
 shall be saved;" this is the third, and refers 
 to final salvation at the last day. A clear 
 knowledge of all these doctrines may not be 
 necessary to salvation, but there can be no in- 
 telligent type of piety that is not based upon 
 both an intellectual and an experimental knowl- 
 edge of all that the Scriptures represent as 
 necessay to salvation. 
 
 Conviction of sin is a result of the Holy 
 Spirit's application of the preached word and 
 
 * If the term ' ' sanctification ' ' be used in its strictly 
 Scriptural sense, it also is included in conversion. 
 But the common theological use of that term refers* 
 it to a work of grace, either progressively or instan- 
 taneousiy wrought, subsequent to " conversion. "
 
 PERSONAL SALVATION. 101 
 
 the divine law to the heart and conscience of a 
 sinner, and is often irresistibly produced; but 
 while the sinner may be convicted against his 
 will, and in spite of efforts to the contrary, yet 
 he is not irresistibly converted. Under con- 
 viction he is free either to resist the wooings 
 of the Spirit or to follow the Spirit's leadings 
 on to repentance and faith. [_A moral free 
 agent is never more free than in that intense 
 and critical moment when he is irresistibly 
 awakened and brought to a knowledge of his 
 true condition. " It is the most critical and re- 
 sponsible moment in all his life; for then it is 
 that his eternal destiny is hanging in the bal- 
 ance, and nothing but the will of the free agent 
 can determine which way the scales of destiny 
 shall be made to turn. Conviction of sin is 
 one of the chief offices of the Holy Spirit, as 
 Christ promised: "When he is come, he will 
 reprove [convict] the world of sin, and of 
 righteousness, and of judgment." (John xvi. 
 8. ) And he began this work on the day of his 
 coming at Pentecost: " Now when they heard 
 this, they were pricked in their heart, and said 
 unto Peter and to the rest of the apostles, Men 
 and brethren, what shall we do ? " (Acts ii. 37.) 
 Repentance and faith are man's work, the 
 only office of the Holy Spirit here being to
 
 
 102 THE DOCTRINES OF METHODISM. 
 
 graciously aid man in fulfilling these human 
 ^ Conditions of salvation. The necessity, na- 
 ^*~<--ture, and benefits of repentance may be shown 
 in these words of Scripture: "Except ye re- 
 ^pent, ye shall all likewise perish." (Luke 
 ^xiii. 3.) "Let the wicked forsake his way, 
 and the unrighteous man his thoughts: and 
 let him return unto the Lord, and he will 
 have mercy upon him; and to our God, for 
 he will abundantly pardon." (Isa. Iv. 7.) Of 
 faith it is said: "Without faith it is impossi- 
 ble to please God: for he that cometh to God 
 must believe that he is, and that he is a re- 
 warder of them that diligently seek him." 
 (Heb. xi. 6.) "Believe on the Lord Jesus 
 Christ, and thou shalt be saved." (Acts xvi. 
 31.) This means to accept Christ as a per- 
 sonal Saviour. Confession of sin and confes- 
 sion of Christ prove that repentance and faith 
 are true. Justification and regeneration, on 
 the other hand, are entirely God's work; with 
 them man has nothing to do, save that he per- 
 forms the conditions on which the pardon and 
 regeneration of his soul are suspended. Jus- 
 tification is the pardon of sin, and is condi- 
 tioned not on our good works but on our 
 faith: "To him that worketh not, but belie v- 
 eth on him that justifieth the ungodly, hia
 
 PKKSONAL SALVATION. 103 
 
 faith is counted for righteousness." (Rom. 
 iv. 5.) To the penitent the promise is: "I 
 will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember 
 their sin no more." (Jer. xxxi. 34.) But a 
 deeper work than this is necessary: "Ex- 
 cept a man be born again, he cannot see the 
 kingdom of God." (John iii. 3. ) This is re- 
 generation; it also is conditioned on faith: "As 
 many as received him, to them gave he power 
 to become the sons of God." (John i. 12.) 
 
 In the Cal vinistic system regeneration comes 
 first; and faith, repentance, and justification 
 follow. Faith is, according to Calvinistic 
 theology, the first act of a regenerate soul. 
 Regeneration, (which is confused with "ef- 
 fectual calling") and irresistible grace, must 
 needs come first because the fallen human 
 race are regarded as totally depraved, as ab- 
 solutely dead in sin, to exact conditions of 
 whom would be like demanding acts of a phys- 
 ically dead man as a condition of imparting 
 life to him. If God had from all eternity 
 unconditionally elected certain ones to salva- 
 tion, and foreordained the means and the time 
 of their efficacious call and conversion; if it 
 were true that regeneration comes first, and 
 faith and repentance follow, then would the 
 preaching of the gospel to the unconverted
 
 104 THE DOCTRINES OF METHODISM. 
 
 and the call of sinners to repentance and sal- 
 vation seem to be a useless work, and the 
 present mode of preaching the gospel and 
 pressing the claims of the Christian religion 
 upon the consciences of sinners could not be 
 justified. More faithful to Scripture is that 
 theology which teaches that man, though fall- 
 en, and in a sense morally dead, is yet recog- 
 nized as a living and responsible moral agent, 
 endowed graciously with ability to seek and 
 obtain salvation through divinely appointed 
 conditions (repentance of sin and faith in 
 Christ), on the fulfillment of which God gra- 
 ciously pardons all his past transgressions, 
 and so transforms his sinful moral nature as 
 to deliver him from the dominion of sin and 
 make him a new creature in Christ. It is of 
 the greatest importance that we have true 
 scriptural views concerning the doctrines of 
 personal salvation. We should make no mis- 
 take in answering the question of the awakened 
 sinner: "What must I do to be saved?" 
 
 It may be asked why personal salvation on 
 God's part consists of both justification and 
 regeneration. Why would not justification 
 alone or regeneration alone suffice to make 
 complete the salvation of a soul?.. The an- 
 swer is not far to seek. It is because there
 
 PEBSONAL SALVATION. 105 
 
 are two kinds of sins actual sin, or voluntary 
 transgression of the law of God; and the sin 
 of nature, which consists of both original sin 
 and the reflex influence on moral character of 
 repeeted acts of sin, From both of these 
 kinds of sin man needs to be saved. Justifi- 
 cation, or pardon, concerns actual sin alone, 
 and has nothing to do with the sin of nature; 
 and so repentance also is of actual sins, and 
 not of original sin. Regeneration, on the 
 other hand, has to do exclusively with the sin 
 of nature original sin and the habitus of sin, 
 or hereditary and acquired depravity. A 
 tendency toward disease (consumption, for 
 example) may be inherited, or it may be 
 superinduced by acts of imprudence or by 
 sickness, or it may be both inherited and 
 superinduced; and if so, the two tendencies 
 run together and become one. And so it is 
 with fallen man: he inherits a bias toward 
 sin ; and this is strengthened by the effects of 
 actual sin, both alike calling for that divine 
 act which is designated as regeneration. If 
 man were simply justified, and not at the same 
 time regenerated, his past sins would be par- 
 doned; but he would be left under the domin- 
 ion of his sinful nature, and would necessarily 
 continue to sin. <. Hence regeneration is rep-
 
 1()6 THE DOCTRINES OF METHODISM. 
 
 resented as "breaking the dominion of sin," 
 "cleansing the moral nature," "being born 
 again," "created anew." Acts of sin may be 
 compared to the black characters written upon 
 a sheet of paper; the sin of nature, to discol- 
 oring elements that enter into the very fiber 
 of the paper itself. The blotting out of sins 
 (Acts iii. 19) is the pardon of all actual trans- 
 gressions, but another and different act is re- 
 quired to cleanse and purify the sin-polluted 
 nature of man. Justification and regenera- 
 tion always take place at the same time. 
 
 Conviction of sin is the witness of the Spirit 
 to the sinner's true condition, and so the wit- 
 ness of the Spirit to the regenerate believer 
 may be called conviction of salvation. It is 
 thus that the Holy Spirit both begins and 
 crowns the work of personal salvation. The 
 soul that undergoes all these experiences is a 
 genuine and a happy convert, and nothing 
 less than an experience of all these elements 
 of personal salvation entitles one either to re- 
 ceive from God, as a sacred seal to his salva- 
 tion, the witness of adoption and the assur- 
 ance of sonship, or to be regarded by man 
 as a new creature in Christ Jesus. "The 
 Spirit itself beareth witness with our spirit, 
 that we are the children of God." (Rom.
 
 PERSONAL SALVATION. 107 
 
 viii. 16.) "He that believeth on the Son of 
 God hath the witness in himself." (1 John 
 v. 10. ) But what the child of God is conscious 
 of is not "the witness of the Spirit," but the 
 fact of being saved. It is the office of the Holy 
 Spirit to convince him of this fact. But this 
 blessed assurance that belongs by right to 
 every child of God should not be confused with 
 a certain ebullition of joy that sometimes ac- 
 companies certain ' ' happy conversions. " The 
 latter is a thing of temperament ; some have 
 it and some do not; moreover, it "comes and 
 goes." But the true witness of the Spirit is 
 not a thing of temperament, it does not ' ' come 
 and go ; " but is a birthright to be claimed by 
 every child of God, no matter what his temper- 
 ament. 
 
 "Quit your meanness, and be saved," may 
 pass for a "short method of salvation" and 
 "religion made easy," and may be followed 
 by shaking the preacher's hand and joining 
 the Church; but it is not the full and com- 
 plete salvation from sin that is described in 
 the Bible. Conviction of sin, repentance, 
 faith, justification, regeneration, the witness 
 of the Spirit all these are necessary to make 
 a genuine Bible Christian. Nor have we any 
 right to make personal salvation any simpler
 
 108 THE DOCTRINES OF METHODISM. 
 
 or easier than the Bible makes it. When con- 
 version is based upon an intelligent under- 
 standing and a genuine experience of all these 
 elements of salvation, then, and then only, 
 does it mean experimental religion and impart 
 spiritual power. Nor should we recognize any 
 conscious sin as compatible with the regen- 
 erate state except to be abhorred and forsaken, 
 pardoned and cleansed, as soon as it is seen by 
 the child of God. This ideal of holiness and 
 freedom from sin is the birthright privilege 
 and duty of every child of God from the very 
 moment of his regeneration; and we must not 
 lower God's high standard to rpake it fit man's 
 shortcomings. 
 
 Great as is the work above described in the 
 salvation of a soul, it is not all that is to be 
 done; indeed, it is nothing more than entrance 
 upon the Christian life. And the Christian 
 life does not consist in merely retaining' what 
 has been thus attained. The victory over sin 
 has not yet been fully and finally won; the 
 first great battle has been successfully fought, 
 and the long warfare has begun. All sin "in 
 sight" was given up at and in "conversion;" 
 but other sin will presently come in sight as 
 the Christian advances and his spiritual vision 
 grows clearer. And all holiness and love
 
 PERSOXAT, SALVATIOX. 1Q9 
 
 and duty in sight were welcomed, and assumed 
 according to the degree of knowledge and 
 faith then possessed.; but knowledge and 
 faith will increase, and soon it will appear 
 that if the character attained in justification 
 and regeneration was regarded as "perfec- 
 tion," it was a very imperfect perfection. 
 Sinlessness, entire holiness, the perfect life 
 that is the ever-advancing goal that is ahead 
 of the regenerate child of God. 
 
 Christian perfection is the. name given to this 
 doctrine which holds a place of highest hon- 
 or in Methodist theology. Perfection is a 
 term which the Scriptures use in describing 
 the ideal religious experience and character 
 which has been made possible by divine grace. 
 Methodism, taking the term from the Bible, 
 teaches that it is not only a possibility and a 
 privilege, but the duty of every child of God to 
 attain unto that type of Christian experience 
 and character, and to lead that life that may 
 be fitly described by the term "Christian per- 
 fection." As to what is to be accomplished 
 progressively and what instantaneously, and 
 whether or not Christian perfection is a 
 ihing to be "professed" these are points 
 of secondary importance about which Metho- 
 dists do now differ, and always have differed.
 
 IX. 
 THE DOCTRINE OF THE CHURCH. 
 
 OUR ' Thirteenth Article of Religion con- 
 tains the following definition of the Chris- 
 tian Church: "The visible Church of Christ 
 is a congregation of faithful men, in the which 
 the pure word of God is preached, and the 
 sacraments duly administered according to 
 Christ's ordinance, in all those things that of 
 necessity are requisite to the same." 
 
 This excellent definition suggests: (1) The 
 relation of the Church to Christ, its divine 
 Founder, whose ' ' ordinances " are its laws. (2) 
 The Church is organized Christianity, not an 
 aggregation of detached and unrelated units, 
 but a visible "congregation" or collection of 
 men bound together by a common relation to 
 Christ and to each other, and organized for the 
 accomplishment of a definite purpose in the 
 world. (3) It is composed of "faithful men" 
 that is, men who possess both faith in 
 Christ and fidelity to Christ, to secure which 
 type of character in its membership proper 
 conditions of admission to the Church and a 
 proper discipline over those in the Church must 
 be enforced. (4) The first function of the
 
 THE DOCTRINE OF THE CHURCH. Ht 
 
 Church is the teaching or preaching of the 
 word, which must be committed mainly, 
 though not exclusively, to those especially 
 charged therewith and trained therefor that 
 is, the Christian ministry. (5) The sacra- 
 ments, baptism and the Lord's Supper, are to 
 be duly administered. (6) There are some 
 things which "of necessity are requisite" to 
 the Church and its sacraments, and other 
 things which are not of necessity required 
 in other words, essentials and nonessentials in 
 religion. In the former there must be unity; 
 in the latter there may be liberty. 
 
 While it is most common to designate the 
 Church as the Church of Christ, it is none the 
 less appropriately called the Church of God 
 and the Church of the Holy Spirit. It is the 
 Church of the Triune God. It is first of all 
 called "the church of God" (Acts xx. 28) 
 or the "household of God" (Eph. ii. 19). 
 As such it has existed from the beginning, 
 and is, in a sense, one in all ages. From the 
 beginning of time there have always been 
 true believers in God, and these have consti- 
 tuted the true Church. 
 
 The Church is most frequently and appro- 
 priately designated as the Church of Christ, 
 because it is founded upon his divine-human
 
 THE nOCTRTXES OF METHODISM. 
 
 person and work, upon his life and teaching, 
 upon his atoning death and resurrection, upon 
 his session at the right-hand of the Father, 
 and his intercession for the saints. The new 
 order of things which Christ came to estab- 
 lish, he usually designates as his kingdom, 
 the "kingdom of God," or the "kingdom of 
 heaven." Only twice does he use the word 
 "Church" (ekklesia), the one case referring 
 to a local assembly of Christian people (Matt, 
 xviii. 17), and the other being the classic pas- 
 sage in which he refers to the visible organi- 
 zation of Christian believers for all time, and 
 announces the faith, the foundation, and the 
 perpetuity of the Church : ' ' He saith unto them 
 [his disciples], But whom say ye that I am? 
 And Simon Peter answered and said, Thou 
 art the Christ, the Son of the living God. 
 And Jesus answered and said unto him, Bless- 
 ed art thou, Simon Bar-jona: for flesh and 
 blood hath not revealed it unto thee, but my 
 Father which is in heaven. And I say also 
 unto thee, That thou art Peter, and upon this 
 rock I will build my church; and the gates of 
 hell shall not prevail against it." (Matt. xvi. 
 15-18.) When Christ said to Peter, "Upon 
 this rocJc I will build my church," he prob- 
 ably referred to St. Peter's confession, "Thou
 
 THE DOCTRINE OF THE CHUBCH. 
 
 art the Christ, the Son of the living God;" 
 the one great truth contained in which viz. , 
 the divinity of Christ is the true rock of 
 faith upon which the Church is built. Some 
 think that Christ referred to himself as "this 
 rock;" others, that he referred to St. Peter 
 as a representative of the apostles, whose work 
 and inspired teachings were, in an important 
 sense, to constitute the foundation of the 
 Church. 
 
 The Church, again, is the Church of the 
 Holy Spirit. The beginning of the Christian 
 Church as a visible organization took place on 
 the day of Pentecost. For this beginning 
 Christ's work is shown by the Gospel records 
 to have been preparatory. Not until our 
 Lord's revelation concerning the nature of his 
 spiritual kingdom was complete, and not un- 
 til his atoning death and resurrection were 
 become historical facts, had the time come for 
 the historical beginning and foundation of 
 the Church. (^The Church is the organ which 
 the Spirit uses for the accomplishment of his 
 work in the world. The Spirit can and does 
 work under any outward form of Church 
 government. That is the truest Church that 
 can furnish, in the number of souls saved 
 through its agency, the most indubitable and 
 8
 
 114 THE DOCTRINES OF METHODISM. 
 
 abiding evidence of possessing this supreme 
 credential: the presence and power of the 
 Holy Spirit.) 
 
 The visible Church, in the widest sense of 
 that term, includes all Churches and all mem- 
 bers in all Churches who acknowledge Jesus 
 Christ as their Head and trust in him and him 
 alone for salvation. These constitute but one 
 spiritual body, as viewed by Christ the Head. 
 The true scriptural unity is not so much one 
 of outward form as of inward life; it is a uni- 
 ty based on a true confession of faith in one 
 God, who is Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. It 
 is entirely consistent with this idea of scrip- 
 tural unity that there should be many reli- 
 gious denominations within the Church of 
 Christ, 
 
 There is a distinction to be made between 
 the outward and visible Church, which is com- 
 posed of all professing Christians, and the 
 true spiritual and invisible Church, which is 
 composed only of real and true Christians. 
 While the visible Church will always contain 
 in its membership some who are not in the 
 invisible and spiritual kingdom of Christ, yet 
 an effort should be made to make the two cor- 
 respond as nearly as possible. The Church 
 of the New Testament is composed of the
 
 THE DOCTRINE OF THE CHUECH. H5 
 
 saved: " The Lord added to them day by day 
 those that were being saved." (Acts ii. 47.) 
 Before any one is admitted to full member- 
 ship in the Church, he should give evidence 
 not only of his sincere "desire to flee the 
 wrath to come and to be saved from his sins," 
 but also of "the genuineness of his faith;" in 
 other words, he should give credible evidence 
 of having exercised such repentance and faith 
 as are laid down in the New Testament as the 
 conditions of salvation. This will secure, ap- 
 proximately at least, a membership of truly con- 
 verted people. If these scriptural conditions 
 of salvation be required as the conditions of 
 admission to the Church, and discipline be 
 duly enforced, then will the visible Church 
 be made as pure and spiritual as is possible 
 here on earth, and then only will the Church 
 be a "congregation of faithful men." 
 
 The Christian ministry is a divine vocation 
 in that only those may enter it who are di- 
 vinely called thereto. We believe that the 
 Holy Spirit chooses those whom he would 
 have to preach, and indicates his choice of 
 them by making an inward impression upon 
 their minds as to their duty in this regard. 
 But the Church also must sit in judgment on 
 those who feel called to preach, and thus "try
 
 THE DOCTRINES OF METHODISM. 
 
 the spirits to see whether they be of God or 
 not." The Christian ministry, as its name 
 indicates, is first of all an office of service. 
 Ministers are servants of Christ and of the 
 Church. The most important function of the 
 ministry is to preach the word. The salvation 
 of sinners and the edification of believers de- 
 pend upon their fidelity to this part of their 
 work. If the "pure word of God" is to be 
 preached, the ministry must be educated in a 
 right understanding and interpretation of the 
 Bible; otherwise false and fanatical doctrines 
 may be drawn from the word of God by mis- 
 interpretation and unsound exegesis. 
 
 Methodism recognizes but two institutions 
 of the Church as sacraments: Baptism and the 
 Lord's Supper. The Church retains the prim- 
 itive and apostolic custom of baptizing in- 
 fants. While it is the rule that the children 
 only of Christian parents (or guardians) are 
 presented for baptism, yet the Church teaches 
 that the right of a child to Christian baptism 
 grows out of his own relation to Christ, rath- 
 er than that of his parent or guardian. As 
 to the mode of baptism, Methodism favors 
 pouring or sprinkling as more simple and 
 symbolic of the "washing of regeneration," 
 but allows perfect liberty on the part of adult
 
 THE DOCTRINE OF THE CHURCH. 
 
 applicants for Church membership to choose 
 either of these modes or immersion. The 
 Lord's Supper is regarded as a memorial serv- 
 ice and a means of grace of more than ordi- 
 nary sanctity. It is the privilege and duty of 
 every member of the Church to partake regu- 
 larly of this sacrament as opportunity offers. 
 If our doctrine of the Church be true, every 
 branch of the Christian Church is free to de- 
 termine its own polity or form of govern- 
 ment. The value of each can be tested only 
 by time and experience. The polity of Meth- 
 odism has been on trial for about a century 
 and a half; and that of Episcopal Methodism 
 for a little over a century, during which time 
 it has been constantly undergoing modifica- 
 tions and adaptations to new conditions as its 
 growth and ever- widening mission seemed to 
 demand. Judged by its history in the past 
 and its efficiency and rapid growth at the 
 present time, it is doubtful whether any branch 
 of the Christian Church, under the guidance 
 of the Holy Spirit, has ever devised a more 
 scriptural and efficient form of government 
 than that of the Methodist Episcopal Church, 
 South. It behooves every student of Christian 
 doctrines to give it a careful examination.
 
 SECTION THREE. 
 
 METHODIST EPISCOPAL CHURCH, 
 SOUTH. 
 
 BY BISHOP JAMES ATKINS, D.D. 
 
 (119)
 
 X. 
 
 THE GENERAL RULES. 
 
 THE Church of Christ is an aristocracy of 
 virtue. It is the only one which has serious- 
 ly and successfully battled for a place among 
 men. Truly it is a kingdom of grace, but the 
 only end of that grace is holiness of character 
 and life. Tender and all-giving as Jesus was 
 in his attitude toward penitent men, nothing 
 can exceed his burning candor in laying down 
 the conditions of discipleship. These condi- 
 tions would be indeed harsh if the power of 
 execution were not furnished from above. 
 But by the divine reenforcement all things 
 are possible, and most moral achievements 
 easy, to men who believe. A life of self-de- 
 nial is the natural order for one in whom the 
 supreme act and purpose of self-abnegation 
 have gone before, and a life of heroic moral 
 doings is easy to a man who is moved upon by 
 the Spirit of God. 
 
 The moral code of Methodism is contained 
 in what are called the General Rules. These 
 rules have thrown their gracious, helpful do- 
 minion over many millions who in these more 
 than one hundred and fifty years of our his- 
 
 (121)
 
 OUR POLITY. 
 
 tory have gone from the self-denials and la- 
 bors of this life into the rewards of another. 
 There are now about seven millions within 
 the Methodist fold who are confessedly walk- 
 ing by the same rules. 
 
 The only condition required of those who 
 seek membership in our Church is "a desire to 
 flee from the wrath to come, and to be saved 
 from their sins." 
 
 This surely is broad enough, and yet when 
 interpreted in the light of the Rules it leaves 
 nothing to be added. It certainly excludes all 
 who have a desire to flee from the wrath to 
 come and to be saved in their sins. 
 
 Those who have this desire to be saved 
 from wrath and sin will, if the desire be gen- 
 uine, give evidence of it in three ways: 
 
 First, by doing no harm that is, avoiding 
 evil of every kind. 
 
 Secondly, by doing good to loth the bodies 
 and souls of men. 
 
 Thirdly, by attending upon the ordinances 
 of God. 
 
 THE THINGS FORBIDDEN. 
 
 Taking the name of God in vain. 
 
 This includes: 
 
 (1) Profane swearing and all forms of curs-
 
 THE GENERAL RULES. J23 
 
 ing, especially such as involve the preroga- 
 tives of the Deity. There is much sinful 
 swearing which does not contain the name of 
 God, but implies it. He who curses his fel- 
 low-man, with or without the mention of 
 God's name, assumes a place of judgment 
 which belongs to God only. 
 
 (2) Perjury, or intentionally false swear- 
 ing, in which God is called to witness to 
 the truth of what is false. This indicates 
 the utmost baseness of character, and the 
 penalties of the civil law against it are justly 
 severe. 
 
 (3) All sacrilegious and other vain or light 
 uses of the name of God. 
 
 (4) All idle swearing, which long ago 
 Chaucer pronounced a "crudeness," and 
 which is now, and must ever remain at the 
 least, an act of incivility, and lead the way to 
 more serious and more hurtful forms of the 
 offense. 
 
 The name of God stands for his character, 
 and therefore the breaking of the third com- 
 mandment is one of the most dangerous and 
 debasing of sins. 
 
 Profaning the day of the Lord, either by 
 doing ordinary work therein, or by buying or 
 selling.
 
 124 OUR POLITY. 
 
 The three great doctrines taught by the 
 Sabbath as we now have it are: 
 
 (1) That God is the Creator of all things; 
 
 (2) that Christ is risen from the dead; and 
 
 (3) that all our time belongs to God. 
 
 "The Sabbath, in its spiritual aspect and 
 meaning, is one of the strongest defenses of 
 the inspiration of the Bible and of the divin- 
 ity of the religion which it reveals. It is 
 man's day and God's day; more thoroughly 
 man's day because completely God's day. 
 It is their united time, time of fellowship, 
 hour of communion, opportunity for deeper 
 reading, larger prayer, and diviner consecra- 
 tion." (Joseph Parker.) 
 
 Christianity has no more important institu- 
 tion than the Holy Sabbath. It would be 
 difficult to overestimate the value of the day 
 both to individuals and to communities. The 
 demand for it is laid in the physical constitu- 
 tion of man and the laboring animals. Not 
 only was the Sabbath made for man, but man 
 was made with reference to a Sabbath, so that 
 in this regard, as well as in other things, it is 
 to the best interests of man in his present 
 state to obey God's commands. Such a rest 
 is necessary to the highest sanity of the indi- 
 vidual and the community, and hence it is
 
 THE GENERAL RULES. 125 
 
 that the Sabbath is one of the greatest safe- 
 guards of personal and national life. It 
 therefore becomes the duty not only of every 
 true religionist and philanthropist, but of 
 every true patriot, to advance by all means a 
 proper keeping of the Sabbath day. 
 
 It will be noted that in the divine institu- 
 tion of the Sabbath it was made a day of 
 rest, not of recreation. One of the worst 
 evils of modern times is the habit of using 
 the Sabbath as a day of recreation, and even 
 of dissipation. It behooves all the teaching 
 agencies of Christendom to set themselves 
 against this pernicious drift by teaching in 
 the home, the day school, the Sunday school, 
 and the church how rightly to use the holy 
 Sabbath. 
 
 Jesus said that the Sabbath was made for 
 man, not man for the Sabbath; and in say- 
 ing this he was breaking from off the Sab- 
 bath those burdensome conditions which the 
 traditions of the Jews had placed upon it. 
 The divine Sabbath had been so obscured by 
 them as to be wholly lost sight of. The re- 
 ligious teachers who were objecting to Christ's 
 use of the Sabbath for works of mercy were 
 teaching the people that a man should not wear 
 .shoes with tacks in them on the Sabbath,
 
 126 OUR POLITT. 
 
 lest the grass should be thereby crushed, 
 and thus amount to a sort of mowing; and 
 that a tailor should not place a needle in 
 his coat late in the day before the Sabbath, 
 lest he should forget and leave it there, and 
 thus bear a burden on the Sabbath day. 
 These are but samples of much foolishness 
 which was in vogue in that day, and which 
 perverted God's day so as to make it a burden 
 instead of a blessing. Now Christ, instead of 
 abrogating the Sabbath or implying that it 
 was to be used for recreation, was but re- 
 storing it to its original place as a day of rest 
 and religious improvement. 
 
 It seems that there were in the days of 
 Isaiah some who took the recreation view of 
 the Sabbath, and the words of the greatest of 
 the old prophets are sufficient to fully cover 
 the case now. God, speaking through him, 
 says: "If thou turn away thy foot from the 
 sabbath, from doing thy pleasure on my holy 
 day; and call the sabbath a delight, the holy of 
 the Lord, honorable; and shalt honor him, not 
 doing thine own ways, nor finding thine own 
 pleasure, nor speaking thine own words: then 
 shalt thou delight thyself in the Lord; and I 
 will cause thee to ride upon the high places of 
 the earth, and feed thee with the heritage of
 
 THE GENERAL RULES. 127 
 
 Jacob thy father: for the mouth of the Lord 
 hpth spoken it." (Isa. Iviii. 13, 14.) 
 
 Let it be noted that the command to work 
 on the other six days is as explicit and as bind- 
 ing as that which requires us to rest on the 
 seventh. 
 
 Drunkenness, or drinking spirituous liquors 
 unless in cases of necessity. The Methodists 
 from the beginning have been a temperance 
 people, and they are still such, not in theory 
 only but in practice. The American Metho- 
 dists constitute, perhaps, the strongest single 
 phalanx in the nation against this mammoth 
 evil. But there needs to be the most thor- 
 ough and constant teaching on this subject, in 
 order that no generation of our young people 
 shall be liable to repeat the folly and sin of 
 drinking for lack of information. There is 
 no sphere in which it is truer that eternal 
 vigilance is the price of liberty. 
 
 Intemperance is the costliest and most de- 
 structive sin of mankind. It is this in itself, 
 and in addition it leads in very many cases to 
 every other form of sin. It is the mother of 
 crimes. Intoxicants, even when used under 
 the rule in "cases of necessity," ought to be 
 used with the utmost caution and under the 
 restraints of an enlightened conscience. The
 
 128 OUR POLITY. 
 
 story of the man who was bitten by a snake 
 and was given whisky for it, though not new, 
 is exact and apt. The bite got well, and in 
 due time the snake died, but twenty years 
 later the man was still taking the medicine. 
 
 All in all, total abstinence is the best rule, 
 because the only one that is absolutely safe. 
 
 (a) Fighting, quarreling, brawling; (b) 
 brother going to law with brother; (c) return- 
 ing evil for evil, or railing for railing; (d) 
 the using many words in buying or selling. 
 
 (a) These things are but little less than 
 barbarous, and are wholly out of harmony with 
 that spirit of fraternity which is ever a mark 
 of the truly regenerate man. 
 
 (5) As a rule, litigation even for righteous 
 claims is harmful to one's relations and influ- 
 ence. In most cases it is better both morally 
 and financially to pay a lawyer to keep you 
 out of the courts than to take you through 
 them. 
 
 (c) "Evil for evil, or railing for railing," 
 embodies the spirit of the old order of ' ' an 
 eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth," which 
 Christ distinctly condemned. 
 
 (d) "Let your communication be, Yea, 
 yea; Nay, nay: for whatsoever is more than 
 these cometh of evil." Talk straight to the
 
 THE GENERAL RULES. 129 
 
 point, and when you have done turn to some- 
 thing else. 
 
 The buying or selling goods that have not 
 paid the duty. 
 
 The days in which these rules originated 
 were days of much smuggling. The govern- 
 ment was being constantly defrauded by ship- 
 pers and merchants who in various ways were 
 avoiding the payment of the lawful duties. 
 This was simply stealing from the govern- 
 ment, and those who knowingly took part in 
 the benefits were partners with the thieves. 
 Of course no truly Christian man could do 
 such a thing. The principle involved still 
 abides. 
 
 The tariff may be right or it may be wrong; 
 but in either event the man who knowingly 
 deals in goods which have not paid it is cer- 
 tainly wrong. 
 
 There is a very loose notion abroad as to 
 the obligation on the part of the individual to 
 deal fairly and justly with the government 
 and with corporations. An honesty which 
 does not deport itself with exact righteous- 
 ness in relation to both is not worthy of the 
 name. 
 
 The giving or taking things on usury, i. e. , 
 unlawful interest. 

 
 130 OUR POLITY. 
 
 The word "usury" is from the Latin word 
 usus, which in this connection means "so 
 much for the use of" that is, any interest 
 whatever. It is in this sense that the word 
 is used in the Bible. It retained this sense 
 until within the last three centuries. The 
 Jews were forbidden by the law to take any 
 interest from each other for the use of money 
 or other commodities. Hence under their 
 law any interest was usury. Usury now 
 means unlawful interest that is, interest at 
 a higher rate than that provided for in the 
 law of the State within which the business is 
 transacted. The terms "giving" and "tak- 
 ing" seem to include him who borrows at un- 
 lawful interest as well as him who lends. It 
 must, nevertheless, be allowed that the two 
 cases are quite different as to the moral ele- 
 ment involved. 
 
 Uncharitable or unprofitable conversation, 
 particularly speaking evil of magistrates or of 
 ministers. 
 
 This is an exceedingly important rule. The 
 power of speech is one of the greatest and 
 most dangerous dignities conferred upon 
 man. "Out of the abundance of the heart 
 the mouth speaketh." Purity of speech is 
 one of the highest signs of a noble and re-
 
 THE GENERAL RULES. 
 
 fined nature. Coarseness and baseness of 
 speech can come from but one source. Men 
 do not often make mistakes in their esti- 
 mate of it. The crudest men know that low- 
 ness of speech is unbecoming the children of 
 God. 
 
 Uncharitable speech indicates a harsh and 
 uncharitable mood, if not a fixed disposition. 
 It always inflicts two injuries, one upon the 
 victim of it and the other upon the author. 
 Charity even toward one's enemies is one of 
 the strongest pledges of trueness toward one's 
 friends. Uncharitable talk when once begun 
 knows no limits. It is like a fire in a field, 
 which does not burn according to metes and 
 bounds, but by its own heat and the material it 
 finds in all directions to feed upon. 
 
 The unprofitable conversation referred to in 
 the rule means light and trashy talk, such as 
 is common among gossips and gabblers, and to 
 which young people are especially liable if 
 not rightly guarded against it. The unfur- 
 nished mind finds it much easier to prate about 
 things of no value than to prepare for season- 
 able and profitable talk. But unprofitable 
 conversation also includes more serious and 
 thoughtful talk which lacks a pure and 
 helpful purpose. This is even more to be
 
 132 UR POLITY. 
 
 avoided than idle and meaningless conversa- 
 tion. - 
 
 Speaking evil of rulers and ministers is a 
 very common fault. It seems to be assumed 
 by many that any exaltation in office implies 
 the right of the people to make a sort of tar- 
 get of the man thus exalted. Nothing is far- 
 ther from the truth. Such men deserve the 
 sympathy and the support of those whom 
 they represent in so far as these can be con- 
 scientiously given. All faithful men occupy- 
 ing places of trust and power realize that the 
 higher they go as men reckon height, the 
 heavier their responsibilities become and the 
 more burdensome their duties. Men, wheth- 
 er magistrates or ministers, who serve the 
 people faithfully have a right to the moral 
 support of the public. To discount this by 
 evil-speaking is a wrong to the men and often- 
 times a crime against the civil or religious in- 
 terests which such men are set to serve. 
 
 If rulers or ministers are either incompe- 
 tent [or unfaithful, let a change be made in 
 a constitutional way. Evil-speaking corrects 
 nothing. 
 
 In general, the habit of reckless criticism 
 within the household needs to be most careful- 
 ly guarded against. Much infidelity is bred
 
 THE GENERAL HULES. 133 
 
 in children by indiscriminate and indiscreet 
 criticism of the preacher and the preaching. 
 Whoever destroys in himself or another a 
 genuine reverence for superiors in years, in 
 attainments, in position rightly used, is fool- 
 ishly cutting from above him the rounds of 
 the ladder by which he would rise to higher 
 things. A true reverence, especially in young 
 people, is one of the most beautiful and 
 charming of virtues, and is the spring of un- 
 numbered blessings to society. It is the very 
 chivalry of man's moral nature, and adorns 
 every stage of life as nothing else can do. 
 
 Doing to others as we would not they should 
 do unto us. 
 
 This is merely the negative statement of 
 the golden rule, and includes all forms of in- 
 jury to our fellow-men. 
 
 Doing what we know is not for the glory of 
 God: as. 
 
 The putting on of gold and costly apparel. 
 
 A display of extravagant and vainglorious 
 finery is always unbecoming in the children 
 of God. This is no doubt the spirit aimed at 
 in this rule. Any such interpretation of it as 
 would lead the Church to regulate the per- 
 sonal habits of its members in regard to their 
 attire has long since ceased. It is, neverthe'
 
 134 OtTR POLITY. 
 
 less, well for all to have due regard to situa- 
 tion and ability in their dressing. The use of 
 jewelry or fine clothing to the exclusion of a 
 liberal part in the benevolent movements of 
 the Church is wrong beyond question, and 
 shows a low and selfish disregard of the 
 claims of others for the necessities of life and 
 for mental and spiritual enlightenment. It 
 indicates a spirit which is far from the spirit 
 of Christ. "If any man have not the Spirit 
 of Christ, he is none of his." 
 
 The taking such diversions as ca/nnot be used 
 in the name of the Lord Jesus. 
 
 The language of this rule clearly implies 
 that there are diversions which may be taken 
 without injury. Diversions which are not in 
 themselves harmful to health or character, 
 when not used to excess so as to become a 
 waste of time or a dissipation, may be used 
 with profit. 
 
 What those diversions are is left to the 
 intelligence and conscience of the individual 
 believer, except as to those which have been 
 commonly condemned by men as evil, or have 
 been pronounced against by the authorities of 
 our Church . These prohibited amusements are 
 dancing, card-playing, theater-going, attend- 
 ance upon race courses^ circuses , and the like.
 
 fHE GENERAL RULES. 
 
 Chief among these offenses is the modern 
 dance. The bishops, in their address to the 
 General Conference of 1874, speak on the 
 point as follows: "An explicit utterance was 
 given by order of the last General Confer- 
 ence, in our pastoral address, on 'Worldly 
 Amusements.' We now repeat that utter- 
 ance. We abate none of its teachings with 
 respect either to manifest inconsistency of 
 such indulgences with the spirit and profession 
 of the gospel, or the perils which they bring 
 to the souls of men. . . . Among these 
 indulgences ... is the modern dance, 
 both in its private and public exhibition, as 
 utterly opposed to the genius of Christianity 
 as taught by us." 
 
 The General Conference of 1890 appointed 
 a special committee of fifteen to prepare an 
 address on the spiritual state of the Church. 
 The report of this committee was adopted by 
 the General Conference and published in the 
 Discipline of that year. In that report is 
 found the following language: 
 
 "In this same condemnation, as equally 
 contrary to the Scriptures, which declare that 
 'the friendship of the world is enmity against 
 God,' to our General Rules, and to the vows 
 which our members have voluntarily assumed,
 
 136 OUR POLITY. 
 
 this General Conference would include card 
 playing, theater-going, attendance upon race 
 courses, circuses, and the like. These offenses 
 are likewise justifiable grounds of discipline." 
 
 The General Conference, having adopted 
 this report, took the following action: 
 
 "Resolved, That inasmuch as the deliver- 
 ances of our bishops, as contained in their 
 quadrennial addresses to the General Confer- 
 ence from time to time, and as quoted at 
 length by the Special Committee of Fifteen, 
 have declared dancing, theater-going, card- 
 playing, and the like worldly indulgences, to 
 be contrary to the spirit of Christianity, and 
 violative of the General Rules and moral dis- 
 cipline of our Church, as also of the vows 
 of our Church members; we therefore heart- 
 ily indorse the aforesaid deliverances as con- 
 taining the just and correct interpretation of 
 the law in the premises, and as such this 
 General Conference accepts the same as hay- 
 ing equal force and authority as if contained 
 in the body of the Discipline." (1497, Dis- 
 cipline of 1890.) 
 
 These utterances and acts put the position 
 of our Church on these diversions beyond 
 question. In this regard the Methodist 
 Church articulates and authoritatively states
 
 THE GENERAL RULES. 
 
 what all the leading Churches hold. Espe- 
 cially is this true of the modern dance, which, 
 though practiced by many Church members 
 in the various denominations and is even con- 
 nived at by some communions, is approved 
 by no Church in Christendom, and is severe- 
 ly condemned by most. 
 
 A consensus of religious opinion running 
 through many ages of trial and embracing 
 many peoples touching the injurious nature of 
 any practice is itself an almost unanswerable 
 argument against such practice. But a care- 
 ful examination into the data upon which the 
 Church has made up and holds its estimate of 
 the dance will furnish ample proofs to every 
 age that the practice is thoroughly carnal, 
 wars against spiritual interests, and brings 
 much detriment to the spiritual life of many 
 who engage in it. 
 
 But let it be noted that a wise administra- 
 tion of discipline in regard to these things 
 will never be harsh. It is sometimes very 
 difficult for young persons to see in these di- 
 versions what the Church sees. While all 
 sane young persons can see that a vow delib- 
 erately made and deliberately and habitually 
 broken involves sin, it is still best to ree'n- 
 force them with such knowledge of the in-
 
 1.38 OUB POLITY. 
 
 herent or incidental evil of these practices as 
 will make them both clear and strong in their 
 own views against them. A wise discipline 
 will, therefore, always be by instruction, by 
 patience, and in the main by persuasion. 
 
 TJie singing those songs, or reading those 
 fooks, which do not tend to the knowledge or 
 love of God. 
 
 The songs and books of a people are the 
 mightiest factors in determining of what char- 
 acter a people shall be. Singing and reading 
 are, therefore, suitable subjects for advisory 
 rules on the part of the Church which would 
 bring its members to the highest and best. 
 This rule does not mean that we are to sing 
 no songs or read no books except such as are 
 distinctly religious in character, but rather 
 that we shall avoid all such as are pernicious 
 or empty of substantial good. In Mr. Wes- 
 ley's time there was very little that was 
 wholesome and edifying in the literature of 
 the day, and much that was bad, and he did a 
 truly great work in expunging, recasting, 
 and making books for his people to read. 
 There is now no more important interest for 
 parents and religious teachers to look after. 
 Many a young person has been ruined by 
 making a companion of one bad book.
 
 THE GENERAL RULES. 
 
 Softness or needless self -indulgence. 
 
 There is no room for a lazy man in the 
 kingdom of God. A self-indulgent and ease- 
 seeking person cannot fairly claim to be a 
 follower of our Lord, who himself came not 
 to be ministered unto but to minister, and who 
 went about doing good. The servant is not 
 above his Lord. It is every man's duty to be 
 diligent, not only in spiritual concerns but 
 also in temporal affairs. No amount of 
 wealth or opportunity for ease can free a man 
 from the obligation to pursue with alacrity 
 some chosen field of service. 
 
 Laying up treasure upon earth. 
 
 Mr. Wesley in one of his sermons gives 
 three great mottoes on this subject: (1) Make 
 all you can. (2) Save all you can. (3) Give 
 all you can. Make all you can consistently 
 with perfect integrity and the rights of oth- 
 ers. Save all you can that is, waste noth- 
 ing. Give all you can consistently with your 
 plain obligations. Mr. Wesley himself made 
 much, wasted nothing, gave everything. Had 
 he been a man of family, he probably could 
 not have made so much, wasted so little, or 
 given all. Nevertheless, he preached the 
 right doctrine and gave the right example 
 concerning earthly treasures. Some wag has
 
 OUR POLITY. 
 
 said pithily at least that the maxim which 
 governs the business world of to-day is: 
 "Make all you can, and can all you make." 
 Perhaps no desire is more universal and more 
 hurtful to spiritual life than the desire to lay 
 up treasure upon earth. The Church is by 
 no means free from it, and there is much 
 need of sound teaching in order that our peo- 
 ple may be saved from an inordinate love of 
 the world. 
 
 Sorrowing without a probability of paying r , 
 or taking up goods without a probability of 
 paying for them. 
 
 This is virtually obtaining money or goods 
 under false pretenses, which is a misdemean- 
 or under the laws of many, perhaps most, of 
 the States. Thoroughgoing honesty is one of 
 the most valuable fruits of the gospel, and is 
 one of the most charming traits in Church 
 members as they are looked upon by the eyes 
 of the world. There are honest pagans; 
 shall any Christian be less? 
 
 The next section of the Rules, on doing good, 
 is given so clearly and in such detail as to need 
 no comment. It is as follows: 
 
 It is expected of all who continue in these so- 
 cieties that they should continue to evidence 
 their desire of salvation^
 
 THE GENERAL RULES. 141 
 
 Secondly, by doing good, by being in every 
 kind merciful after their power, as they have 
 opportunity, doing good of every possible sort, 
 and, as far as possible, to all men: 
 
 To their bodies, of the ability which Godgiv- 
 eth, by giving food to the hungry, by clothing 
 (he naked, by visiting or helping tJiem that are 
 sick or in prison j 
 
 To their souls, by instructing, reproving, or 
 exhorting all we have any intercourse with; 
 trampling underfoot that enthusiastic doctrine 
 that "we are not to do good unless our hearts 
 be free to it." 
 
 By doing good, especially to them that are of 
 tlie household of faith, or groaning so to be; 
 employing them preferably to others, buying one 
 of another, helping each other in business; and 
 so much the more because the world will love its 
 own, and them only. 
 
 By all possible diligence and frugality , that 
 the gospel be not blamed. 
 
 By running with patience tfie race which is 
 set before them, denying themselves, and taking 
 up their cross daily; submitting to bear the re- 
 proach of Christ, to be as the filth and qffscour- 
 ing of the world, and looking that men should 
 say all manner of evil of them falsely for the 
 Lord^s sake.
 
 142 OUR POLITY. 
 
 It is expected of all who desire to continue in 
 these societies that they should continue to evi- 
 dence tlielr desire of salvation, 
 
 Thirdly, by attending upon all the ordinances 
 of God; such are, 
 
 The public worship of God. 
 
 There is much strength in fellowship, no 
 matter what the issue; especially is this the 
 case in spiritual things. No man is so strong 
 as not to need the ree'nf orcement which comes 
 from communion with those of like mind and 
 heart. The doctrines of the Fatherhood of 
 God and the brotherhood of man stand very 
 close together. He who has lost his sense of 
 fellowship would do well to look closely into 
 i\\Q foundations of his faith. The great de- 
 fection of Thomas against his Lord was due to 
 his being absent from the first prayer meeting 
 after the resurrection. "Forsake not the as- 
 sembling of yourselves together, as the man- 
 ner of some is." When the Pentecost came, 
 the disciples were of one accord in one place. 
 The divine presence is promised to the assem- 
 blies of the saints. 
 
 The ministry of the word, either read or ex- 
 pounded. 
 
 Jesus ordained that the world should be 
 saved by the preaching of the gospel. There
 
 THE GENERAL BULKS. 143 
 
 is no substitute for preaching. It has regu- 
 lated the ethical state of men through the ages 
 more than any other influence, and will prob- 
 ably continue to do so to the end. 
 
 Paul asks: " How can they hear without a 
 preacher '? " It may also be asked: "How can 
 he preach without hearers ? " It is the plain 
 duty of every member who can to attend regu- 
 larly upon the ministry of the word, and espe- 
 cially upon that of his own Church. All the 
 good ends of good preaching are helped by 
 good hearing. 
 
 The Supper of the Lord. 
 
 Our Lord, who while living made himself 
 of no reputation, left of himself when depart- 
 ing no monument except that he made of the 
 perishable elements, bread and wine, a remem- 
 brancer. Even this is conditioned upon love 
 and faith upon the part of those who eat and 
 drink. He did not designate a place, a time, 
 or a quantity. He said in substance: Do this 
 as oft as ye shall do it in remembrance of me. 
 The use of this holy sacrament is both a privi- 
 lege and a duty. Many have been deterred 
 from it by foolish and superstitious conceits. 
 He eats and drinks worthily who eats and 
 drinks with faith, and, it might be added, 
 with a sense of his own unworthiness,
 
 144 OUR POLITY. 
 
 It ij the place of the stewards in each charge 
 to procure and arrange the elements for the 
 sacrament. This should always be attended 
 to in a becoming way. In some places there 
 is much neglect. A neat pitcher, however 
 cheap, is better than the bottle which some- 
 times appears. There is no occasion in con- 
 nection with which there is more reason that 
 all the proprieties should be carefully ob- 
 served. 
 
 Family and private prayer. 
 
 There can be no spiritual life without prayer. 
 It is 'She Christian's vital breath. " The neg- 
 lect of it is always followed by religious de- 
 cline. The great movements of the Church 
 can be marked by the presence of men and 
 women who were mighty in prayer princes 
 who prevailed with God. 
 
 The family altar is the birthplace of rev- 
 erence and devotion as is no other place on 
 earth. Parents who allow their children to go 
 into the severe ordeals of life without its hal- 
 lowed memories and fruits commit a great 
 wrong against their offspring. 
 
 Searching the Scriptures. 
 
 One might as well expect to become a great 
 lawyer without studying the common law or 
 the statutes of his State as to become a robust
 
 TUB GENERAL EULES. 145 
 
 Christian without a thorough knowledge and 
 frequent reading of the word of God. It is 
 the sword of the Spirit, and he who fights sin 
 in himself and others must know and constant- 
 ly use it. The tendency to turn all Scripture 
 study out of the family into the Sunday school 
 is pernicious. The home is the best place for 
 readying and studying God's word. 
 
 Fasting or abstinence. 
 
 This rule has fallen very much into disuse. 
 It is, nevertheless, an important one. There 
 are occasions in religious life and effort for 
 which fasting or abstinence is an almost nec- 
 essary preparation. It is wholesome for the 
 body, quickens the mental faculties, tends to a 
 sense of dependence by impressing us with the 
 perishable nature of our bodies and of all ter- 
 restrial life, leads to gratitude for material 
 gifts, and in many ways helps toward a more 
 spiritual order of living. 
 10
 
 XI. 
 
 THE COISTFEREISTCES OF METHODISM. 
 
 The assembly name of Methodism in all its 
 branches is the word "Conference." The 
 spirit and purpose of Methodist assemblies is 
 very well conveyed by this term, which means 
 a meeting together in order to confer touch- 
 ing all the persons and interests which lie 
 within the domain of the Conference. 
 
 The Methodist Episcopal Church, South, 
 has five kinds of Conference : Church, Quarter- 
 ly, District, Annual, General. 
 
 1. The Church Conference is composed of 
 all the members of the local Church and resi 
 dent members of the Annual Conference. 
 The pastor is the chairman. A secretary is 
 elected annually by the body. This Confer- 
 ence is very much like a family meeting in 
 which all the interests of the household may 
 be freely discussed and all local interests 
 looked after, and is invaluable in quickening 
 all the interests of the Church. 
 
 The Church Conference is directed to meet 
 once a month in stations, and at least once 
 every three months at each appointment on 
 (146)
 
 THE CONFERENCES OF METHODISM. J4J 
 
 circuits. For order of work see Discipline, 
 191. 
 
 #. The Quarterly Conference. This body 
 meets, as its name implies, once a quarter, or 
 four times in each Conference year. It is 
 composed of all the traveling and local preach- 
 ers residing within the circuit or station, with 
 the exhorters, stewards, trustees, and class 
 leaders of the respective circuits, stations, and 
 missions, together with the superintendents of 
 Sunday schools who are male members of the 
 Church, the secretaries of Church Confer- 
 ences, and the presidents of Senior Epworth 
 Leagues, when eligible. The chairman of the 
 Quarterly Conference is the presiding elder 
 or, in his absence, the preacher in charge. 
 For order of work see Discipline, ^ 87. 
 
 3. The District Conference. This meeting 
 is held once a year in each district at such 
 time as the presiding elder may appoint. 
 The District Conference is composed of all 
 the preachers in the district, traveling and 
 local, and of laymen, the number of whom 
 and the mode of their appointment each An- 
 nual Conference determines for itself. The 
 chairman of the District Conference is a 
 bishop or, in his absence, the presiding elder. 
 For order of work see Discipline, 1 72.
 
 148 OUB POLITY. 
 
 4.. The Annual Conference. This Confer- 
 ence is composed of all the traveling preach- 
 ers in full connection with it and four lay rep- 
 resentatives from each district. The lay mem- 
 bers are chosen annually by the District Con- 
 ference, and participate in all the business of 
 the Conference except such as involves minis- 
 terial character. The number and bounds of 
 the Annual Conferences are determined by the 
 General Conference. The time of each meet- 
 ing is appointed by the bishop in charge, and 
 the place is fixed by the Conference. The 
 President of the Annual Conference is one of 
 the bishops or, in his absence, a member of 
 the Conference elected by ballot. The presi- 
 dent thus elected discharges all the duties of 
 a bishop except that of ordination. 
 
 This is by far the most important, though 
 not the highest in authority, of all the Con- 
 ferences of Methodism. It has executive su- 
 pervision of all the interests of the Church 
 within its prescribed bounds, such as furnish- 
 ing the people with the gospel, Home and 
 Foreign Missions, Church extension, Sunday 
 schools, Epworth Leagues, and Christian 
 education. It has also large powers of initia- 
 tion. Indeed, much of our General Confer- 
 ence legislation originates as to the thought
 
 THE CONFERENCES OF METHODISM. 149 
 
 and plan within one or more of the Annual 
 Conferences, and no constitutional matter 
 passed upon by the General Conference can 
 become law without the approval of three- 
 fourths of the members of all the Annual Con- 
 ferences. 
 
 The Annual Conference passes at each ses- 
 sion upon the personal life and official admin- 
 istration of every preacher who is a member 
 of it. The method adopted in this is as open 
 and clear as possible. The name of each man 
 is called in open Conference under the ques- 
 tion, "Are all the preachers blameless in their 
 life and official administration ? " The answer 
 must be audible and without ambiguity. If 
 a negative answer be given by anybody, lay 
 or clerical, the law provides for an immediate 
 investigation, and the acquittal of the accused 
 or the imposition of proper penalties, the 
 extremest of which is expulsion from the 
 ministry and the Church. The right of ap- 
 peal belongs to every member who is con- 
 victed of any crime. That appeal is to the 
 General Conference next ensuing. If a mem- 
 ber be tried and acquitted, there can be no ap- 
 peal: the decision of the Annual Conference 
 is final. The Annual Conference has the 
 right to locate one of its members for ineffi-
 
 150 OUB POLITY. 
 
 ciency or imacceptability. Such action does 
 not imply anything against the personal char- 
 acter of the one so dealt with. 
 
 We have forty-four Annual Conferences. 
 Five of these are in foreign countries, and 
 one lies partly in Mexico and partly in the 
 United States. 
 
 5. The General Conference. This body is 
 composed of an equal number of traveling 
 preachers and laymen, elected by the several 
 Annual Conferences. The maximum and min- 
 imum ratios of representation are fixed by what 
 is called the Second Restrictive Rule. Within 
 the limits thus fixed the General Conference 
 may determine from time to time such ratios 
 as it may deem advisable. The present ratio 
 is one clerical member for every forty-eight 
 members of each Annual Conference, and an 
 equal number of lay members. The latest 
 General Conference (1906) was composed of 
 two hundred and ninety-two members. 
 
 The President of the General Conference 
 is one of the bishops or, if all the bishops 
 should be absent or disabled, a member of 
 the body elected by ballot. The bishops are 
 not members of the General Conference oth- 
 erwise than as Presidents of the body when 
 in session.
 
 THE CONFERENCES OF METHODISM. J5J 
 
 The General Conference is the only legis- 
 lative assembly of the Church, and its busi- 
 ness is largely transacted through estab- 
 lished committees, very much as in other leg- 
 islative bodies. The standing committees 
 are fourteen in number, and are as follows: 
 Episcopacy, Revisals, Boundaries, Itinerancy, 
 Missions, Sunday Schools, Epworth League, 
 Education, Temperance, Finance, Church 
 Extension, Publishing Interests, Colportage, 
 Appeals. 
 
 The General Conference, being a delegated 
 body, representative of the whole Church, 
 has power to do whatever it deems best for the 
 interests of the Church within the limits pre- 
 scribed in the Six Restrictive Rules. It has 
 power also to alter any of these rules except 
 the first, which relates to the making of any 
 change in our Articles of Religion. The 
 method prescribed for altering any of the 
 other five is given in a proviso to the Sixth 
 Rule. It provides that the proposed change 
 shall pass the General Conference by a two- 
 thirds majority, and then be ratified by 
 three-fourths of the members of the sever- 
 al Annual Conferences present and voting. 
 Such proposals of change may originate with 
 the Annual Conferences. In that event the
 
 152 OUB POLITY. 
 
 order is reversed, and a three-fourths vote 
 in the Annual Conferences must be followed 
 by a two-thirds vote of the General Confer- 
 ence. 
 
 The General Conference meets once in four 
 years in the month of April or May, and at 
 such place as it may select. 
 
 In the interim of the General Conferences 
 the work prescribed by it is carried forward 
 under the direction of the following 
 
 GENERAL BOARDS. 
 
 (1) The Book Committee, which has full 
 supervision of all our publishing interests. 
 and to which all connectional officers are 
 amenable for their official conduct till the 
 meeting of the General Conference. This 
 committee is composed of thirteen members, 
 six clerical and seven lay, elected by the Gen-, 
 eral Conference, on nomination of a special 
 committee appointed by the bishops. It elects 
 its own chairman and secretary quadren- 
 nially. 
 
 (2) The Board of Missions, which consists 
 of a President, Vice President, Secretary, 
 Treasurer, and seventeen managers, elected 
 by the General Conference quadrennially. 
 The bishops and the Secretary of the Board of
 
 THE CONFERENCES OF METHODISM. 
 
 Church Extension are ex officio members of the 
 Board. 
 
 The Board of Managers has full charge of 
 all foreign missionary affairs, such as the 
 raising of funds and their application, the 
 selection of candidates for the work, and the 
 supervision of all the interests of the Church 
 in foreign fields. 
 
 This Board has also an Assistant Secretary, 
 elected by the Board quadrennially. 
 
 (3) The Sunday School Board. ^This Board 
 consists of six members, five elected quad- 
 rennially by the General Conference, and the 
 Sunday School Editor, who is elected quad- 
 rennially by the General Conference, and who 
 is ex officio chairman of the Board. To this 
 Board belongs the general management of all 
 Sunday school interests throughout the 
 Church. 
 
 (4) The Ep worth League Board, consisting 
 of thirteen members, six clerical and six lay 
 and one of the bishops, who is ex officio Presi- 
 dent of the Board. Besides the President and 
 General Secretary, who is elected quadren- 
 nially by the General Conference, the other 
 officers are three Vice Presidents and a Treas- 
 urer, who are elected quadrennially by the 
 Board.
 
 154 OUR POLITY. 
 
 (5) The Board of Education, which is com- 
 posed of fifteen members, elected by the 
 General Conference on nomination of the 
 Committee on Education. The Board elects 
 its own President, Vice President, and Re- 
 cording Secretary, who also acts as Treasurer. 
 The Corresponding Secretary, known as the 
 Secretary of Education, is elected by the 
 General Conference. 
 
 It is the duty of this Board to supervise all 
 the educational interests of the Church, as 
 provided for in Chapter XII. of the Disci- 
 pline. 
 
 (6) The Board of Church Extension, which 
 consists of a President, Vice President, Cor- 
 responding Secretary, and Treasurer, and 
 thirteen members, elected quadrennially by 
 the General Conference, and continuing in 
 office until their successors are elected and 
 accept. The bishops and Secretary of Board 
 of Missions are ex officio members of the 
 Board. For a full statement of the work com- 
 mitted to this Board see Discipline, 11386- 
 399. 
 
 All these Boards meet once a year, usually 
 in the month of May, and in the city of Nash- 
 ville, except the Board of Church Extension, 
 which meets in Louisville, Ky.
 
 XII. 
 THE ITINERANCY. 
 
 THE Methodist itinerancy is the most per- 
 fectly organized obedience the world has 
 yet seen to the great commission: "Go ye 
 into all the world, and preach the gospel to 
 9 very creature." 
 
 The two commands of the commission are 
 to go and to preach. 
 
 A Church which was the chief exponent of 
 that phase of Arminian theology which teach- 
 es that all men are free to be saved, and that 
 nothing stands in the way thereto except their 
 own agency, could not logically stop short of 
 claiming the world for its parish. To visit 
 that parish with the gospel was the great 
 economic problem with which it undertook 
 to deal in the production of an itinerant plan 
 for the preaching of the gospel. 
 
 Every one entering our traveling connec- 
 tion solemnly pledges himself to go any- 
 where to preach the gospel, whither the ap- 
 pointing power may send him. This does not 
 mean simply anywhere within that Annual 
 Conference with which he connects his for- 
 
 (155)
 
 156 OUB POLITY. 
 
 tunes, but anywhere within the range of a 
 reasonable demand for his services. 
 
 This leads me to remark that the Metho- 
 dist itinerancy is as general as the episcopa- 
 cy. Every preacher who unites with any 
 Conference thereby joins the traveling connec- 
 tion that is, joins the ministry of Southern 
 Methodism to go whithersoever the bishop 
 may see such need of his services as justifies 
 his appointment. This is the economic fact 
 upon which the transfer power of the bishop 
 is based. Otherwise the transfer power would 
 become nothing more than a power of per- 
 suasion, and as a matter of authority amount 
 to nothing. It is proper to say here that our 
 bishops usually, perhaps unexceptionally, con- 
 fer with a preacher to be transferred from 
 his own to another Conference, so as, in a 
 good measure, to secure his assent before he 
 is appointed. The bishops, nevertheless, have 
 the power to transfer a preacher to any field 
 within our boundaries without his consent, and 
 even against his will in the case. It is due to be 
 said here that, inasmuch as our itinerancy is as 
 general as our episcopacy, and as our Church 
 confers upon the bishops the right to transfer 
 preachers without any final right on the part of 
 the preachers to refuse, such preachers, when
 
 THE ITINERANCY. 
 
 transferred, have the same right to considera- 
 tion and fellowship as those who have been 
 members of the receiving Conference from 
 the beginning. As a matter of fact, the 
 transfer has to forego many things which are 
 peculiarly dear to a Methodist preacher in 
 order to serve the Church by obeying the or- 
 der of Providence and the appointing power 
 to the extent of leaving his own Conference 
 to take work in another. 
 
 But the life work of nearly all our preach- 
 ers is within the bounds of the Annual Con- 
 ference with which they first connect them- 
 selves. Within those bounds every man is 
 appointed to his work each year by the bish- 
 op who presides. The bishop alone is the 
 responsible appointing power. This does not 
 mean that no others exert an influence. The 
 bishop receives much advice, a large amount 
 of which he is no doubt wise in disregard- 
 ing. But so vast a movement as the itin- 
 erancy does not leave so vital a matter to 
 haphazard. The bishops are furnished with 
 the best system possible for obtaining coun- 
 sel of the most seasoned kind in regard 
 to both the preachers to be appointed and 
 the fields to be served. For the full vindi- 
 cation of this position it is necessary that we
 
 158 OUB POLITY. 
 
 glance at the order of work within the Con- 
 ference. 
 
 Each Annual Conference contains quite a 
 large territory, sometimes a whole state, 
 sometimes a half state, and so on, according 
 to the population to be served, etc. The lar- 
 gest Conferences have from one hundred and 
 fifty to two hundred pastoral charges, em- 
 bracing from sixty to one hundred thou- 
 sand Church members. Each Conference is 
 divided into a number of presiding elders' dis- 
 tricts, from ten to twelve, according to the 
 number of charges in the Conference. These 
 districts usually contain from twelve to twen- 
 ty pastoral charges. The presiding elder, 
 appointed annually by the bishop, has charge 
 of the district, and his duties in general are 
 to preach on four occasions in each pastoral 
 charge, to preside over the Quarterly and 
 District Conferences, counsel with the preach- 
 ers for their own improvement and for the 
 benefit of the Church, and to see that all the 
 interests of the Church are looked after. 
 This office is one of very great importance, 
 and when duly magnified stands second only 
 to that of a bishop. It involves heavy labors^ 
 large responsibilities, and vast opportunities. 
 
 This leads us back to the question of the
 
 THE ITINERANCY. 159 
 
 appointing power and the usual method of its 
 exercise. All the presiding elders of an An- 
 nual Conference compose a council which has 
 come to be called the bishop's cabinet. Usual- 
 ly the presiding bishop calls the presiding 
 elders to meet him daily, and they together 
 go carefully over the charges, examining into 
 the work of the preachers, and making a ten- 
 tative appointment of each to a place. There 
 are frequent revisions of these appointments 
 before they are ready for announcement at 
 the close of the Conference. Not only does 
 the bishop have the full benefit of the counsel 
 of these chosen advisers^ but any preacher or 
 layman has access to the presiding elders and 
 the bishop to show any view he may hold in 
 regard to men and places. But after all, the 
 responsibility for every appointment is with 
 the bishop, who, if he should choose, has 
 power to change all the appointments agreed 
 upon by the presiding elders, including the 
 places of the presiding elders themselves. 
 
 It has been said by some that this order 
 places too much power in the hands of the 
 bishops. This might be true under certain 
 conceivable conditions. But so long as wise 
 men do not put themselves to great trouble 
 to do foolish things, or good men to do bad
 
 1GO OUB POLITY. 
 
 things, in either case without reward and in 
 full view of persuasive penalties, there is no 
 danger of the misuse of this peculiarly sacred 
 power. 
 
 As to our -preachers, we hold strongly that 
 God calls those whom he would have to pro- 
 claim his message, and that such a call implies 
 a call to thoroughly prepare for the best use 
 of the holy office. 
 
 When one is inwardly persuaded of his call 
 to the ministry, he is, if on examination found 
 worthy, recommended by the Quarterly Con- 
 ference of the charge to which he belongs for 
 license to preach. This recommendation is 
 now to the District Conference. Formerly 
 that is, from the time of our organization till 
 1894 the licensing of preachers was by the 
 Quarterly Conference. The District Confer- 
 ence receiving the recommendation examines 
 into the gifts, graces, and usefulness of the 
 candidate; and, finding him worthy, grants a 
 license for one year, which must thereafter be 
 annually renewed until the local preacher thus 
 made is ordained a deacon. This ordination 
 comes in due course, by vote of the An- 
 nual Conference, in four years, provided 
 the local preacher has done satisfactory work 
 and is recommended by the District Confer-
 
 THE ITINERANCY. JgJ 
 
 ence for this order. If the local preacher thus 
 made desires to join the traveling connection, 
 he procures a recommendation from the Dis- 
 trict Conference to the Annual Conference for 
 admission on trial. At the session of the An- 
 nual Conference he is examined by two com- 
 mittees touching his gifts, attainments, and 
 suitableness for this work. If found worthy, 
 and if he be needed, he is admitted on trial 
 by a majority vote of the Annual Conference. 
 He is not then a member of the Conference, 
 but is a local preacher on trial to become a 
 member. If at the expiration of two years 
 he has proven his fitness for the work, and 
 passed satisfactory examinations ep the course 
 of study for the two years, he is by order of 
 the Conference ordained a deacon and admit- 
 ted into membership in the Conference. If 
 he continue for two years more to demon- 
 strate his fitness for the work, and pass the re- 
 quired examinations on the course of study for 
 the third and fourth years, he is ordained an 
 elder. 
 
 When once admitted into membership in 
 the traveling connection, there are five ways 
 of going out: To withdraw; to die; to be ex- 
 pelled for immorality, as provided for in the 
 Discipline; to ask for and receive a location; 
 11
 
 162 OUR POLITY. 
 
 and to be located by vote of the Conference 
 for inefficiency or unacceptability. When lo- 
 cation occurs, either by request or by the un- 
 solicited vote of the Conference, the one thus 
 located remains a local preacher. 
 
 It should here be noted that the work of a 
 local preacher is chiefly to preach within the 
 charge to which he belongs, under the direc- 
 tion of the preacher in charge, and to assist in 
 all manner of religious work as opportunity 
 may offer. The local preacher pursues some 
 other vocation for a livelihood, and usually 
 receives nothing for his services as a preach- 
 er. The local preacher has been, through 
 most of our history, a great power in the 
 Church. With the multiplication of reg- 
 ular pastors, and a decrease in the size of 
 pastoral charges, by which most of our peo- 
 ple are furnished with frequent opportuni- 
 ties for hearing the word, there has come 
 a decline in our local ministry which is to 
 be much regretted. There is still room for 
 the constant employment of thousands of 
 such godly and devoted men, and the seer 
 who can suggest a plan by which the local 
 ministry can be restored to its pristine pow- 
 er and spiritual glory will confer a lasting 
 Benefit upon foe Church. The English M>th-
 
 THE ITINEBANCY. 163 
 
 odists, amidst their crowded conditions, are 
 making great use of it. 
 
 Within the Annual Conference, and apart 
 from those who are in the active work, there are 
 supernumerary and superannuated preachers. 
 "A supernumerary preacher is one who is so 
 disabled by affliction as to be unable to preach 
 constantly, but who is willing to do any work 
 in the ministry which the bishop may direct 
 and he may be able to perform." "A super- 
 annuated preacher is one who is worn out in 
 the itinerant service. " Superannuated preach- 
 ers are supported in whole or in part, usually 
 in part, and a very small part at best, out of 
 the superannuates' fund a fund raised chiefly 
 by collections throughout the Annual Confer- 
 ence for that purpose. 
 
 The highest place in our ministry is that of 
 bishop, or General Superintendent. Our bish- 
 ops are elected by the General Conference, 
 which, as we have seen, is a delegated body 
 composed of an equal number of traveling 
 preachers and laymen. Bishops are in every 
 way amenable to the body which makes them. 
 The life and official administration of each is 
 passed under review once in four years. This 
 is done in what is known as the Committee on 
 Episcopacy. Any preacher or layman in the
 
 164 OUR POLITY. 
 
 connection may come, by letter or in per on, 
 before this committee with any complaint he 
 may wish to make. It thus happens that our 
 bishops' lives are lived in the open like those 
 of all our preachers. No class is held to a 
 stricter accountability; and yet there is in 
 that Committee, as elsewhere, a profound 
 reverence for the office and for those who 
 are called to fill it. This is largely due to 
 the unimpeachable integrity and purity of 
 those who have been occupants of that 
 place. We have never had a case of trouble 
 with a bishop on moral grounds, and none 
 of a serious nature on grounds of adminis- 
 tration. 
 
 The College of Bishops meets once a year, 
 in the month of May, to consider all the inter- 
 ests of the Church committed to them. There 
 is an annual assignment made of each bishop to 
 the work of the ensuing year. This is done 
 through a committee of bishops appointed for 
 that purpose by the College. 
 
 There is no class of preachers among us to 
 which is assigned so long and varied a list of 
 duties as to our bishops. Their responsibili- 
 ties are of the largest, and their fields of labor 
 practically boundless. This will be readily 
 seen by reading, in Chapter III. , Section 2, of
 
 THE ITINERANCY. 165 
 
 the Discipline, what the Church provides that 
 its bishops shall do. 
 
 The bishops, being general superintendents, 
 are supported by the general Church out of 
 funds collected for the purpose within each 
 Annual Conference. Bishops who have be- 
 come superannuated, and the widows and chil- 
 dren of deceased bishops, are sustained in the 
 same way. Both the salaries and allowances 
 are fixed by recommendation of the Commit- 
 tee on Episcopacy.
 
 XIII. 
 OUR 
 
 WE may say, without any disparagement 
 of other forms of Church government, that 
 there is one element in Methodism which sur- 
 passes anything hitherto known in Church 
 organization. That feature may be called 
 the genius of it rather than a mere element. 
 We refer to its connectionalism. We call it 
 the genius of Methodism because it pervades 
 with its spirit every part of the system from 
 the reception of a preacher on trial to the 
 bishopric or general superintendence, and is 
 in all the work of the Church from the exten- 
 sion of church - building within the home 
 field to the giving of the gospel to every 
 creature. By connectionalism we mean that 
 summation of conditions by which the whole 
 Church is present in a good sense wherever 
 any part of it exists that is, each part is in 
 vital relation to all the others. The most in- 
 experienced preacher in the humblest field is 
 there in effect by the appointment or will of 
 the whole Church. The Church brings this 
 appointment about by the simplest and most 
 rational method possible. It is through the 
 (166)
 
 OUR CONNECTIOXALISM. 167 
 
 bishop, who has a wholly general relation, and 
 who is as truly subject to appointment by his 
 peers as the pastors are to appointment by 
 him. He has his work assigned him once a 
 year, and each time his field is as liable to be 
 within China or Brazil as in Tennessee. But 
 this general superintendence, which is thus 
 free from local prejudices, is not a haphazard 
 matter. The bishop does his work after 
 counsel from the presiding elders, whose busi- 
 ness it is to know in as far as possible both the 
 man and the field. The bishops themselves 
 are elected to this work by the whole Church 
 in a delegated assembly, which is composed 
 of traveling preachers and laymen in equal 
 numbers, and the bishops are constantly ame-. 
 nable to this body for the way in which they 
 exercise this appointing power as well as all oth- 
 er functions which belong to the office. It is 
 in this way that the whole Church makes the 
 appointment of any preacher, whether he be 
 the pastor of the remotest mission, with its 
 peculiar hardships, or the episcopacy, with its 
 fullness of care and responsibility. This 
 principle finds most impressive illustration 
 when an Annual Conference meets in its last 
 session to receive the appointments. In the 
 whole body not a man knows certainly what
 
 108 OUR POLITY. 
 
 his field of labor will be until the pronounce- 
 ment falls from the lips of the bishop, the 
 man through whom the Church appoints him. 
 These men are not less ardent in their at- 
 tachments because of the fact that their sys- 
 tem makes them cosmopolitan in their sym- 
 pathies and habits of thought. No men have 
 stronger individuality or more definite pref- 
 erences than Methodist preachers. They go, 
 nevertheless, whithersoever they are sent with 
 a good cheer which is utterly inexplicable to 
 those who do not understand the workings of 
 our system. There is no truer exhibition of 
 moral sublimity in all the organizations of 
 men than an Annual Conference receiving the 
 appointments. 
 
 There is not to be found elsewhere in hu- 
 man history such a combination of self -sur- 
 render and pure democracy as is found in the 
 Methodist itinerancy and its loyal acceptance 
 by the Church. The self -surrender element 
 is found in the Catholic Church, especially in 
 its Jesuitism, but the democracy is not there. 
 With the Romanists everything proceeds from 
 a so-called infallible pope; with the Metho- 
 dists everything, including its ministry 
 throughout, is of the Church. The self- 
 surrender of the Methodist preacher, while
 
 OUR CONNECTIONALISM. 100 
 
 in a broad and high sense ausolute, is yet un- 
 der guard of a democratic order so thorough 
 and complete as to take out of it all elements 
 of mere chance and as far as possible all dan- 
 gers from mere personal prejudice. In other 
 words, his surrender is not to any man or 
 committee of men, but to the whole Church 
 for the good of the whole. Not only so, but 
 the surrender of the right, on the part of the 
 preacher, to choose his field of work is an- 
 swered back to by the surrender, on the part 
 of the congregation, of its right to choose a 
 pastor. And yet there is no lack of intelli- 
 gent counsel both ways. A practical outcome 
 of this order is that probably no Church is bet- 
 ter satisfied with its pastors, and no preachers 
 more unselfishly devoted to their people. 
 
 As it is in the ministry, so it is in the work 
 of the Church. The Church itself in. general 
 council determines what work shall be under- 
 taken of a general order, and by a rational 
 method determines what part of the work 
 shall be done by each part of the Church, and 
 thus stands back of the individual pastor, as 
 he proceeds to his task, and furnishes the 
 pledge of its assembled wisdom to each con- 
 gregation as it goes forward with the achieve- 
 ment of its part of the whole. It will be
 
 170 OUR POLITY. 
 
 easily seen that this plan greatly reenforces 
 the individual invention of the pastor, and, 
 when the pastor is wholly lacking in inven- 
 tion, provides for a safe and harmonious 
 schedule of Church work. 
 
 In the connectional order of Methodism 
 the Boards of Management are truly General 
 Boards. Each Annual Conference has its own 
 Boards, but in addition to superintending lo- 
 cal or Conference interests these Boards have 
 a connectional side. They execute within the 
 Annual Conferences the plans of the General 
 Boards. The General Boards are created by 
 th<* General Conference every four years, and 
 in all the interests committed to them they 
 stand for the General Conference in the in- 
 terims of its meetings. In this way the will 
 of the general Church or General Confer- 
 ence is made to run on without lack of 
 authority or resources as surely and as suc- 
 cessfully as if each interest were under the 
 immediate direction of the General Confer- 
 ence itself. As a result of this arrange- 
 ment, whatever these Boards undertake, 
 within the limitations put upon them, be- 
 comes a matter for the whole Church, in the 
 doing of which the honor of the Church is 
 involved, and in which the loyalty of every
 
 OUR CONNECTIONALISM. 171 
 
 charge to the will of the general Church comes 
 into play. 
 
 There are certain things which stand related 
 to this connectional organization very much 
 as in geometry a corollary is related to a the- 
 orem and its processes of demonstration. 
 Logically considered, they are "obvious con- 
 sequences," whether they have as yet mate- 
 rialized into a part of our polity, as some of 
 them have, or stand forth only in the form of 
 a logical demand that the Church shall use 
 them. 
 
 One of these corollaries is the transfer 
 power, which is born of the relation of our 
 general superintendency to our general itiner- 
 ancy as set forth in the discussion of "Our 
 Itinerancy." 
 
 Two other conclusions which connectional- 
 ism was bound to reach, and did reach long 
 ago, were a connectional organ and a connec- 
 tional publishing interest. How well these 
 have worked, we have all seen long ago. 
 Some years ago, when the Publishing House 
 became involved to a point of practical insol- 
 vency, the connectional spirit was appealed 
 to, and a process was begun which resulted 
 quickly in its recuperation, and brought it in 
 a short while to foundations which are among
 
 172 OUR POLITY. 
 
 the securest in modern commerce. The same 
 thing was illustrated in the payment in one 
 year of a missionary debt of more than one 
 hundred and thirty thousand dollars without 
 diminishing the regular collections for that 
 interest. This magnificent result was largely 
 due to the fact that when the Secretary, Dr. 
 Morrison, went forth on his mission he was 
 as much at home and in authority in San 
 Francisco as he was in Nashville, where the 
 offices of the Boards are located. Again the 
 rallying of the connectional spirit, and the 
 use of the connectional opportunity, saved 
 the cause. 
 
 But there are two other conclusions which 
 are inevitable from the connectional order of 
 Methodism, which are just beginning to be 
 realized as a part of the polity of the Church. 
 One of these is a connectional system of edu- 
 cation. The present Board of Education has 
 taken steps which unquestionably tend in that 
 direction, and some progress has been made 
 toward practical results. Indeed, the act of 
 the Board of Trust of Vanderbilt University 
 and of the General Conference in making 
 that institution the university of the whole 
 Church gives promise of a thoroughly re- 
 lated and compacted system which will en-
 
 OUR CONNECTIOXALISM. 17.) 
 
 able us to lead the van, not by the sacrifice of 
 other great schools, but by an order which 
 will help them all, and which will reach 
 down and clasp hands with the public school 
 system so as to conserve rather than in any 
 sense surrender the Methodist element in 
 them. 
 
 But perhaps the finest conclusion, and one 
 which we are barely entering upon, is the 
 creation of a connectional fund for our super- 
 annuated preachers. The doing of this is an 
 easy thing under a proper plan and with the 
 right time limits. This is a matter in which 
 we can much better afford to go slowly than 
 not to go at all. The lifetime of a Church is 
 a long stretch. So long as our itinerancy 
 continues, the worn-out preacher without re- 
 sources is to be a stupendous fact in our 
 Church life. The General Conference of 
 1902 determined upon the raising of five 
 million dollars for this purpose. The sources 
 chiefly relied upon under that order are pop- 
 ular collections and bequests. Other sources 
 will probably be put under contribution later. 
 There are at least two others which might 
 be used with great profit to the fund. The 
 first of these is a certain per cent of the pop- 
 ular collection in every charge. The stiinu-
 
 174 OUB POLITY. 
 
 lating effect of such a movement would make 
 the remaining per cent a larger amount than 
 that which is now raised for the same pur- 
 pose, and would result in the bringing of 
 this great claim clearly before our people. 
 The second is a fixed percentage of the clear- 
 ings of the Publishing House. 
 
 After all, nothing of an economic kind 
 would have a better effect in guarding our 
 ministry against the danger of the contin- 
 uance of inefficient men in the traveling con- 
 nection. Such a fund would bring a better 
 service and a greater dignity to the Church, 
 and a larger sense of security to the faithful 
 men who are toiling on amidst galling limita- 
 tions to serve their generation by the will of 
 God. 
 
 It is easy to see that the Methodist polity, 
 when operated according to its design, is an 
 organization of tremendous force and un- 
 equaled flexibility. The system is capable 
 of a vast impact, one which is scarcely re- 
 sistible within the domain of the Church's 
 work. But from the fact that our polity is 
 a perfect concatenation of parts that is, a 
 chain of essential links it follows that a 
 want of strength or adjustment at any point 
 affects the efficiency of the whole order. It
 
 OUR CONNECTIONALISM. 175 
 
 implies, therefore, an extraordinary respon- 
 sibility for all those who have any vital con- 
 nection with the operation of the system. 
 
 From what has been said concerning the 
 relation of parts in our system, it is not diffi- 
 cult to see that we are at the farthest remove 
 from the congregational system. The two 
 orders are as unlike as possible. They will 
 not mix. Whether the congregational order 
 could be improved by the organic adoption 
 of certain features of our polity is a curious 
 question on which we do not desire to enter; 
 but that any tendency toward congregational- 
 ism, or even broader forms of localizing, 
 works detriment to our interests there can 
 scarcely be any question. It is a question 
 whether or not there is such a tendency in 
 some sections among us. We have occasion- 
 ally seen symptoms which look in this direc- 
 tion, but nothing which indicates a serious 
 change of thought, only a loss of sympathy. 
 It is well, however, for every pastor and 
 teacher to keep careful and statesmanlike 
 guard over the loyalty of the people to 
 connectional order and interests.
 
 SECTION FOUR. 
 
 MISSIONS. 
 
 BY REV. EDMUND F. COOK, 
 
 Secretary Educational Department Board of Missions, 
 Methodist Episcopal Church, South. 
 
 12 (1T7)
 
 XIV. 
 THE BIBLE A MISSIONARY BOOK. 
 
 The doctrine of missions does not rest upon 
 any particular passage or passages in the Bi- 
 ble, but upon the fundamental conception of 
 the whole Book. The Bible in every essential 
 element is missionary. It reveals a universal 
 God and Father, a world-wide redemptive 
 scheme, and a Saviour whose love and power 
 encompasseth all nations of the earth. The 
 whole Bible, then, is the basis of our mission- 
 ary obligation. 
 
 MISSIONS IN THE OLD TESTAMENT. 
 
 If we but think of God's universal claims 
 as we come to the study of the Old Testament, 
 we shall find a missionary sweep in revelation 
 which will carry us infinitely beyond the an- 
 cient tribal conception of God and lift us in- 
 finitely above the pharisaism of the Jews. 
 
 God has been careful to reveal universal 
 claims and a scheme of world- wide redemp- 
 tion. His missionary plan for the world runs 
 through the whole of the Old Testament. 
 
 (170)
 
 180 MISSIONS. 
 
 1. There is deep missionary significance in 
 God's promise to Abraham. 
 
 "Now the Lord had said unto Abram, Get thee 
 out of thy country, and from thy kindred, and from 
 thy father's house, unto a land that I will show 
 thee: and I will make of thee a great nation, and 
 I will bless thee, and make thy name great; and 
 thou shalt be a blessing: and I will bless them 
 that bless thee, and curse him that curseth thee: 
 and in thee shall all families of the earth be 
 blessed." (Gen. xii. 1-3.) 
 
 2. There is deep missionary significance in 
 God's commands. 
 
 It is Jehovah's purpose to maintain world- 
 wide supremacy and to lead all nations back 
 to himself. So in the first commandment, 
 
 "Thou shalt have no other gods before me" 
 (Ex. xx. 3), 
 
 he banishes all other gods and all other re- 
 ligions. The modern argument, therefore, 
 that Christianity is for America, Buddhism 
 for China, and Hindooism for India is as ab- 
 surd and presumptuous as the Jews' assump- 
 tion that Jehovah is the God of the Hebrews 
 only. 
 
 3. There is deep missionary significance in 
 the utterance of the prophets.
 
 THE BIBLE A MISSIONARY BOOK. J8| 
 
 Tsaiah, the great statesman and reformer 
 of Judah, had a world-wide vision. 
 
 "And it shall come to pass in the last days, that 
 the mountain of the Lord's house shall be estab- 
 lished in the top of the mountains, and shall be 
 exalted above the hills; and all nations shall flow 
 unto it." (Isa. ii. 2.) 
 
 He saw the unlimited scope of God's purpose 
 in Israel viz., the promulgation of the gos- 
 pel to the ends of the earth. 
 
 "Behold my servant, whom I uphold; mine elect, 
 in whom my soul delighteth; I have put my spirit 
 upon him: he shall bring forth judgment to the 
 Gentiles. ... He shall not fail nor be discour- 
 aged, till he have set judgment in the earth: and 
 the isles shall wait for his law." (Isa. xlii. 1-4.) 
 
 The great prophet sees also every living soul 
 as a subject of redeeming grace and voices 
 God's all-inclusive invitation. 
 
 "Ho, every one that thirsteth, come ye to the 
 waters, and he that hath no money; come ye, buy 
 and eat; yea, come, buy wine and milk without 
 money and without price. . . . Behold, thou 
 shalt call a nation that thou knowest not, and na- 
 tions that knew not thee shall run unto thee be- 
 cause of the Lord thy God, and for the Holy One 
 of Israel; for he hath glorified thee." (Isa. Iv. 1-5.)
 
 
 132 MISSIONS. 
 
 Jeremiah, prophesying at a time of great 
 disturbance within the nation, was not con- 
 cerned wholly with the fate of his own people. 
 
 "O Lord, my strength, and my fortress, and my 
 refuge in the day of affliction, the Gentiles shall 
 come unto thee from the ends of the earth, and shall 
 say, Surely our fathers have inherited lies, vanity, 
 and things wherein there is no profit. Shall a man 
 make gods unto himself, and they are no gods? 
 Therefore, behold, I will this once cause them to 
 know, I will cause them to know mine hand and 
 my might; and they shall know that my name is 
 The Lord." (Jer. xvi. 19-21.) 
 
 Ezekiel, a Jewish prophet in the time of the 
 Babylonian captivity, was solicitous not only 
 for the Jew, but also for the nations round 
 about. 
 
 "Thus saith the Lord God; In the day that I 
 shall have cleansed you from all your iniquities 
 I will also cause you to dwell in the cities, and the 
 wastes shall be builded. And the desolate land shall 
 be tilled, whereas it lay desolate in the sight of all 
 that passed by. . . . Then the heathen that are 
 left round abon you shall know that I the Lord 
 build the ruined places, and plant that that was 
 desolate: I the Lord have spoken it, and I will do 
 it" (Ezek. xxxvi. 33-36.) 
 
 "And I will set my glory among the heathen,
 
 THE BIBLE A MISSIONARY BOOK. Jg3 
 
 and all the heathen shall see my judgment that I 
 have executed, and my hand that I have laid upon 
 them." (Ezek. xxxix. 21.) 
 
 So also Amos, Zechariah, Jonah, and others 
 have their missionary message. 
 
 4. Tlwrc is a deep missionary tone in the 
 sonc/s of DarifJ. 
 
 "Nothing is more striking in the Psalms 
 than the unquestioning and natural direct- 
 ness with which they embrace the heathen, 
 the nations, as equally included with Israel 
 in the purpose and the kingdom of God." 
 (Dean Church.) 
 
 "Ask of me, and I shall give thee the heathen for 
 thine inheritance, and the uttermost parts of the 
 earth for thy possession." (Ps. ii. 8.) 
 
 "All the ends of the world shall remember and 
 turn unto the Lord: and all the kindreds of the na- 
 tions shall worship before thee. For the kingdom 
 is the Lord's: and he is the governor among the 
 nations." (Ps. xxii. 27, 28.) 
 
 "The earth is the Lord's, and the fullness thereof; 
 the world, and they that dwell therein." (Ps. xxiv. 
 1.) 
 
 "He shall have dominion also from sea to sea, 
 and from the river unto the ends of the earth." 
 (Ps. Ixxii. 8.)
 
 184 MISSIONS. 
 
 MISSIONS IN THE NEW TESTAMENT. 
 
 Jesus Christ is the supreme representative of the mission- 
 ary conception of the New Testament. Only on the hypothesis 
 of the offer of salvation to all men and of Christ's purpose that 
 the gospel should be preached to all the world can the words 
 and acts of Jesus be understood. (Bishop Bashford.) 
 
 A World Saviour Proclaimed. 
 
 "And the angel said unto them, Fear not: for, 
 behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, 
 which shall be to all people. For unto you is born 
 this day in the city of David a Saviour, which is 
 Christ the Lord." (Luke ii. 10, 11.) 
 
 God's World-Wide Love and Purpose in the 
 
 Gift of a Saviour. 
 
 "God so loved the world, that he gave his only- 
 begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him 
 should not perish, but have everlasting life." (John 
 iii. 16.) 
 
 The Saviour's Conception of His World-Wide 
 Mission. 
 
 "For the Son of man is come to seek and to save 
 that which was lost." (Luke xix. 10.) 
 
 "And if any man hear my words, and believe not, 
 I judge him not: for I came not to judge the world, 
 but to save the .world." (John xii. 47.) 
 
 The Master's Missionary Purpose. 
 
 "And this gospel of the kingdom shall be 
 preached in all the world for a witness unto all
 
 THK mni.K A MISSIONARY BOOK. Jg5 
 
 nations; and then shall the end come." (Matt, 
 xxlv. 14.) 
 
 The, Master's Missionary Teaching. 
 
 The Pharisees believed that God was the 
 God of the Jews and excluded all other na- 
 tions from the kingdom. Against this selfish 
 and exclusive view the Master directed much 
 of his teaching. 
 
 In the opening words of the pattern prayer 
 Jesus teaches the fatherhood of God and the 
 brotherhood of man. Who would dare pray, 
 "Our Father," and then limit the kinship of 
 God to a single tribe or nation. Dr. O. E. 
 Brown declares : "He who says 'Our Father' is 
 either a missionary or a hypocrite." To pray 
 in sincerity "Our Father" is to feel the passion 
 of brotherhood that runs through the whole of 
 the missionary movement. "Thy kingdom 
 come, thy will be done on earth as it is in 
 heaven" can never be offered as a prayer by 
 one who would exclude from Christ's king- 
 dom a single nation or tribe on earth. 
 
 "Every parable Jesus spoke, every principle 
 he enunciated is of universal application. 
 How can one interpret the parables of the 
 lost piece of money, or of the lost sheep over
 
 186 MISSIONS. 
 
 which the shepherd rejoices more than over 
 the ninety and nine who went riot astray, and 
 yet limit the teaching of Jesus to the Jews 
 alone? Such a limitation is a contradiction 
 of these parables. The parable of the great 
 supper teaches the call of nations in the high 
 ways and the hedges as well as of individuals. 
 The parable of the prodigal son is spoken es- 
 pecially to warn the Jews that the Gentiles 
 may yet return to God and find a welcome 
 home." (Bishop Bashford.) 
 
 The Master died rather than give up his 
 missionary purpose. The Jews would have 
 gladly made him king and set him upon a 
 temporal throne as the antagonist of Rome. 
 They pleaded with him to that end. But his 
 was a spiritual kingdom, planned for the race 
 and destined to include all nations. 
 
 The Master's Post-Resurrection Command. 
 
 "And Jesus came and spake unto them, saying, 
 All power is given unto me in heaven and in earth. 
 Go ye therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing 
 them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, 
 and of the Holy Ghost: teaching them to observe 
 all things whatsoever I have commanded you: and, 
 lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end of the 
 world. Amen." (Matt, xxviii. 18-20.)
 
 THE BIBLE A MISSIONARY BOOK. IgJ 
 
 The Missionary Programme of the Apostolic 
 Church. 
 
 "Then opened he their understanding, that they 
 might understand the scriptures, and said unto 
 them, Thus it is written, and thus it behooved 
 Christ to suffer, and to rise from the dead the third 
 day: and that repentance and remission of sins 
 should be preached in his name among all nations, 
 beginning at Jerusalem. And ye are witnesses of 
 these things." (Luke xxiv. 45-48.) 
 
 "But ye shall receive power, after that the Holy 
 Ghost is come upon you: and ye shall be witnesses 
 unto me both in Jerusalem, and in all Judea, and in 
 Samaria, and unto the uttermost part of the earth." 
 (Acts i. 8.) 
 
 The Missionary Lesson for Peter. 
 Peter was primarily the apostle to the Jews, 
 Imt under his first great sermon men from ev- 
 ery nation heard and were saved. (Acts xi.) 
 Even this remarkable fact did not fully win 
 him from Jewish narrowness ; so God gave 
 him a special lesson, in the sheet let down 
 from heaven, to teach him that all nations 
 were included in his kingdom. (Read Acts 
 x. 9-48.) 
 
 Paul the Great Missionary to the Gentiles. 
 
 God's missionary plan for Paul was well 
 defined in the mind of the Master, but it was
 
 188 MISSIONS. 
 
 given to Paul step by step. To Ananias the 
 whole scheme was outlined as follows: 
 
 "But the Lord said unto him, Go thy way: for he 
 is a chosen vessel unto me, to bear my name before 
 the Gentiles, and kings, and the children of Israel: 
 for I will show him how great things he must suf- 
 fer for my name's sake." (Acts ix. 15, 16.) 
 
 Paul's Missionary Call. 
 
 "But when it pleased God, who separated me 
 from my mother's womb, and called me by his grace, 
 to reveal his Son in me, that I might preach him 
 among the heathen; immediately I conferred not 
 with flesh and blood." (Gal. i. 15, 16.) 
 
 Paul's Missionary Conviction. 
 
 "One Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and 
 Father of all." (Eph. iv. 5, 6.) 
 
 "I am debtor both to the Greeks, and to the Bar- 
 barians; both to the wise, and to the unwise. So, 
 as much as in me is, I am ready to preach the gos- 
 pel to you that are at Rome also." (Rom. i. 14, 
 15.) 
 
 Paul's missionary activity is a vindication 
 of God's purpose of world conquest. His 
 epistles are strong in defense of this policy, 
 and he ever opposes vigorously the narrow- 
 ness of the Pharisees of his times.
 
 THE BIBLE A MISSIONARY BOOK. IgQ 
 
 John's Message. 
 
 John the beloved gives us a crowning mes- 
 sage of unsurpassed missionary significance. 
 
 "And I saw another angel fly in the midst of 
 heaven, having the everlasting gospel to preach unto 
 them that dwell on the earth, and to every nation, 
 and kindred, and tongue, and people." (Rev. xiv. 
 G.) 
 
 "And the Spirit and the bride say, Come. And 
 let him that heareth say, Come. And let him that 
 is athirst come. And whosoever will, let him take 
 the water of life freely." (Rev. xxii. 17.)
 
 XV. 
 THE MODERN MISSIONARY AWAKEN- 
 
 THE LARGER MOVEMENT. 
 
 The theme of missions is not new. We have 
 seen in the preceding chapter that missions 
 has a large place in the scheme of the Old 
 Testament, and that the central theme of the 
 New Testament is "Salvation through Christ" 
 for all the world. 
 
 The first two centuries of the Christian 
 Church were marked by decided missionary 
 activity. The movement began on the return 
 of the disciples from the Mount of Transfig- 
 uration and continued, though with lessened 
 activity toward the last, until the beginning 
 of the fourth century. 
 
 During the mediaeval period of Church his- 
 tory, however, missionary activity practically 
 ceased. It was a time of theological discus- 
 sion and the rule of dogma. Mr. Blisswell 
 says: "Under such conditions it was scarcely 
 surprising that active mission work, at least 
 (190)
 
 THE MOUEKX MISSIONARY AWAKENING. 191 
 
 in the East, should cease. The Church was 
 too busy assimilating the barbarians at home 
 to pay much attention to the barbarians be- 
 yond." 
 
 Only in the vision and personal effort of a 
 few men was the missionary spirit manifested 
 in this period. The spirit was not shared by 
 the age, and the effort was purely persona). 
 The world is richer, however, and the history 
 of the Church ennobled by the missionary 
 record of a few missionary spirits produced 
 by that unmissionary day. The list begins 
 with Ulfilas and ends with Raymond Lull a 
 noble company living in the spirit of Christ, 
 but out of touch with their times. 
 
 The reawakening of the Church to mission- 
 ary activity was begun by William Carey in 
 1792. As a result of his awakening what is 
 called the modern missionary movement was 
 inaugurated. Carey was a humble cobbler by 
 trade, but became so interested in the study 
 of heathen nations and world conditions that 
 he gave himself to extended research. It was 
 a vision of human need growing out of these 
 studies that awoke in his heart a sense of 
 personal responsibility and a new sense of the 
 Church's obligation to give the gospel to the
 
 J92 MISSIONS. 
 
 lost and ruined world. In that great sermon 
 from the theme, "Expect great things from 
 God; attempt great things for God," Carey 
 started missionary fires which, in less than 
 one hundred years, enkindled a new flame of 
 missionary zeal in every great denomination 
 on the globe and started a flaming evangel 
 that has already encircled the earth. Carey 
 left behind him in England the first mission- 
 ary society organized for the propagation of 
 the gospel among the heathen and set sail 
 for India in the early summer of 1793. 
 
 Carey's call to advance was taken up in 
 England by Howers and Venn, on the Conti- 
 nent by Yanderkemp and Janicke, in Ameri- 
 ca by Mills and Judson. In a few years the 
 movement swept through every Christian 
 land, and organization for work among the 
 heathen rapidly took shape. 
 
 The Baptist Society for Propagating the 
 Gospel among the Heathen was organized in 
 May, 1792; the London Missionary Society 
 (nonsectarian), in 1795; the Church Mission- 
 ary Society, in April, 1799; the Wesleyan Mis- 
 sionary Society, in 1814 ; the Glasgow and Ed- 
 inburgh Societies, about the same time. 
 
 To us special interest attaches to the move-
 
 THE MODERN* MISSIONARY AWAKENING. 193 
 
 merit in America. The sailing of Carey and 
 the formation of the London Missionary So- 
 ciety aroused great interest in America, and 
 in 1706 the New York Missionary Society was 
 founded, chiefly by the Presbyterians, al- 
 though the Baptists and Reformed Dutch 
 were represented. In 1797 the Northern Mis- 
 sionary Society was formed for the same 
 work. The greatest impulse given to mission- 
 ary interest in America, however, came from 
 Samuel J. Mills and his friends at Williams 
 College in their Haystack Prayer Meeting, 
 held in August, 1806. Here, while in conver- 
 sation and prayer, there came to these five 
 young men a new vision of the world's need 
 and a new sense of the gospel's power to meet 
 this need. In meeting the objection offered 
 by one of the company, "It is impossible to 
 evangelize the heathen," young Mills sounded 
 the slogan of world conquest when he said: 
 "We can do it if we will." A direct result of 
 the missionary interest and enthusiasm of 
 these young men and their offer to preach the 
 gospel to the heathen w*as the formation of 
 the American P>oard of Commissioners for 
 Foreign Missions, the organization of which 
 was effected in 1S10. At the time the five 
 13
 
 194 MISSIONS. 
 
 students of Williams College met for prayer 
 and the study of missions there were but seven 
 mission boards or societies in the world. To- 
 day every important denomination in Europe 
 and America is organized for the work of 
 evangelizing the heathen nations, and the 
 movement of missions is represented by nearly 
 four hundred boards and societies. 
 
 Following the establishment of the Ameri- 
 can Board of Commissioners the American 
 Baptist Board was organized in 1814, fol- 
 lowed by the Methodist Missionary Society 
 in 1819. From the beginning the new era in 
 missions has been characterized by the organ- 
 ization of denominational mission boards for 
 the collection and application of funds in 
 heathen lands, and in most cases by wisdom 
 and success in administration. 
 
 Woman's Work. 
 
 A striking feature of the modern mission- 
 ary movement is the strength and thorough- 
 ness of the women's organization for mission- 
 ary work at home and abroad. About 1861 
 a movement began for the organization of 
 the women of the Church into missionary so- 
 cieties. Gradually all the denominations
 
 THE MODERN MISSIONARY AWAKENING. 195 
 
 were reached by this movement, and all have 
 enlisted the women in one form of organiza- 
 tion or another in the great work of missions. 
 They are to-day a mighty factor in the mak- 
 ing of a missionary Church at home and in 
 furthering the interests of the kingdom 
 through all the departments of Christian work 
 on the mission field. 
 
 SUPPLEMENTAL AND AUXILIARY AGENTS. 
 
 During the latter years of this new mission- 
 ary period the providential opening of hea- 
 then lands to the gospel and the consequent 
 widening of the missionary opportunity of 
 the Church brought on demands for a more 
 widespread missionary awakening of the 
 Church at home and for rapid extension of 
 the work abroad. 
 
 Providential answer to these demands is 
 found not only in the quickened denomina- 
 tional missionary conscience, but in a num- 
 ber of excellent supplemental and auxiliary 
 agents of the Church in the great missionary 
 enterprise. A brief statement as to the his- 
 tory and scope of the chief of these agents is 
 given below. We offer the best authorities on 
 each.
 
 196 MISSIONS. 
 
 The Student Volunteer Movement. 
 
 The Student Volunteer Movement for Foreign 
 Missions was called into being in 1886 primarily to 
 raise up among the students of North America a 
 sufficient number of capable missionary candidates 
 to meet the requirements of the various missionary 
 societies or boards. To help these candidates or 
 student volunteers in the preparation for their life 
 work has been recognized from the beginning as 
 falling within the purpose of the Movement. An- 
 other object is to develop among students who are 
 to remain in Christian lands either as pastors or 
 as laymen a sense of responsibility to sustain and 
 reenforce the foreign missionary enterprise by intel- 
 ligent sympathy, by the giving of money, by prayer, 
 and by aggressive effort on behalf of the world's 
 evangelization. The field embraces all colleges, 
 universities, and other institutions of higher learn- 
 ing in the United States and Canada. (Mott's 
 Report, 1902.) 
 
 Foreign Department of the Y. M. C. A. 
 
 In close connection with the organization of 
 the Student Volunteer Movement was the develop- 
 ment of a Foreign Missionary Department in the 
 Y. M. C. A. As the college work of the Association 
 had expanded so that there were organizations in 
 over two hundred and thirty colleges, and as the 
 Conferences at Northfield had quickened the spir- 
 itual life and the sense of fellowship, there arose 
 an interest in and a feeling of responsibility for
 
 THE MODERN MISSIONARY AWAKENING. I*)? 
 
 young men, particularly for the students in mis- 
 sion lands. A long journey by L. D. Wishard 
 through those lands, with a vivid report of the con- 
 ditions and the wonderful opportunities, occasioned 
 the formation of a special department for the pur- 
 pose of organizing similar associations both for stu- 
 dents and other young men. The work was com- 
 menced with characteristic promptness, and in 1889 
 the first Secretary, David McConaughy, went to 
 India to inaugurate a work second to none in the 
 whole department of missionary activity. (Bliss.) 
 
 World's Student Federation. 
 
 Meanwhile other similar movements had been 
 inaugurated. There had come into being, in addi- 
 tion to the American Intercollegiate Y. M. C. A. 
 (1877), the British College Christian Union 
 (1891), the German Christian Students' Alliance 
 (1893), the Scandinavian University Christian 
 Movement (1895), and a Student Christian Move- 
 ment in mission lands. In August, 1895, repre- 
 sentatives of these movements met at the ancient 
 Swedish castle of Vadstena, on the shores of Lake 
 Wettern, for the specific purpose of uniting in a 
 great federation the national intercollegiate move- 
 ments of the world. The result was the World's 
 Student Christian Federation. (Bliss.) 
 
 The Young People's Missionary Movement. 
 
 This Movement is interdenominational, under the 
 direction of twenty representatives nominated by
 
 108 MISSIONS. 
 
 the Home and Foreign Mission Boards of the United 
 States and Canada, and -nineteen laymen chosen 
 from the various Churches. Although it is inter- 
 denominational in organization, it directs all mis- 
 sionary activity through the boards into denomi- 
 national channels. It is a missionary education as- 
 sociation, preparing and publishing mission study 
 text-books and other literature for the Mission 
 Boards. It prepares literature for the missionary 
 education of the Sunday school, syndicated mate- 
 rials for missionary treatment and illustration of 
 the lessons of the International Series susceptible 
 of such treatment, and offers aid in Sunday school 
 conventions and institutes. It trains persons in 
 summer conferences and metropolitan missionary 
 institutes for mission study and other leadership 
 in their Churches. Its purpose is through these 
 agencies to deepen the spiritual life and to increase 
 the missionary activity among the young laymen 
 and the seventeen million members of the young 
 people's societies and Sunday schools. The genius 
 of the Movement consists in that it exists to serve 
 the Mission Boards, for whom and by whom it is 
 directed, preparing only the literature which they 
 
 use and training leaders for their denominations. 
 
 (Michener's Report, 1908.) 
 
 The Laymen's Missionary Movement. 
 
 In November, 1906, some men were celebrating 
 
 the centennial of the Haystack Prayer Meeting rn 
 
 Fifth Avenue Presbyterian Church, New York. The 
 
 zeal of Mills and his companions stirred their
 
 THE MODERN MISSIONARY AWAKENING. 19<) 
 
 hearts, and the Laymen's Missionary Movement was 
 born. 
 
 The purpose of the Movement is thus expressed 
 by Mr. Capen, President of the Interdenominational 
 Laymen's Missionary Movement: 
 
 "1. To project a campaign of education among 
 laymen, to be conducted under the direction of the 
 various boards. 
 
 "2. To devise a comprehensive plan, in conjunc- 
 tion with said Board Secretaries, looking toward 
 the evangelization of the world in this generation. 
 
 "3. To endeavor to form through the various 
 boards a Centennial Commission of Laymen, fifty 
 or more in number, to visit as early as possible the 
 mission fields and report their findings to the 
 Church at home." (Aim and Scope.)
 
 XVI. 
 
 WORLD-WIDE MISSIONS A BRIEF 
 SURVEY. 
 
 Since Carey landed in India the great con- 
 tinents of Asia, Africa, and South America 
 and the islands of the sea have been invaded 
 by an army of heroic missionaries who have 
 gone forth proclaiming Christ Saviour and 
 King. 
 
 At first they faced closed doors and met op- 
 position, persecution, and martyrdom. The 
 missionary call in the early days of the nine- 
 teenth century was a call to heroic sacrifice 
 and service. Heroes indeed were the men and 
 women who responded. The miracles of mod- 
 ern missions attest the quality of their faith 
 and work. The progress to-day of the king- 
 dom of Christ in every land witnesses to the 
 power of our risen Lord and reaffirms the 
 blessedness of suffering with him in behalf of 
 a lost and ruined world. The missionary call 
 of to-day is the call of world-wide oppor- 
 tunity. 
 
 A brief survey of a few of the great mission 
 (200)
 
 WORLD-WIDE MISSIONS A BRIEF SURVEY. 201 
 
 fields will suggest the lines upon which the 
 kingdom is advancing in all lands, and will 
 indicate in part the results of the modern mis- 
 sionary movement. 
 
 China. 
 
 Total area, 4,277,170 square miles; popula- 
 tion, 400,000,000. 
 
 The Chinese are a people with a history 
 running back perhaps forty-five centuries, 
 when their institutions, their language, arts, 
 government, and religion had begun to develop 
 on lines from which no departure has ever 
 been made. 
 
 The leading religions of China are Con- 
 fucianism, Taoism, and Buddhism. Most of 
 the people practice all three on different oc- 
 casions and for different purposes. Confu- 
 cianism is really a great system of ethics, with 
 many elements of truth. Taoism has become 
 "blank materialism," with uneducated and ig- 
 norant priests, almost universally despised, 
 but regarded as indispensable evils. Bud- 
 dhism owes its strength to the defect of Con- 
 fucianism in not teaching a future existence 
 and retribution.
 
 202 MISSIONS. 
 
 Protestant missions in China began with 
 liobert Morrison in 1807. Four forms of mis- 
 sion work have become well established: (1) 
 Evangelistic, (2) literary, (3) educational, 
 (4) medical. The object of mission work is 
 thus tersely stated by Bishop Bashford: "It 
 is carried on with the purpose of giving every 
 person in the Chinese Empire a knowledge of 
 the gospel as speedily as possible, of leading 
 men and women to a personal union with 
 Christ, of building them up in Christian char- 
 acter, and of creating as rapidly as possible 
 a self-supporting native Church." Let us 
 add: And of laying the gospel of Christ at 
 the very foundation of China's new life. 
 Dr. A. H. Smith, after thirty years in China, 
 summarizes results as follows: "Christian 
 missions have brought to China a new con- 
 ception of God, a Father loving, caring for, 
 and teaching his children. They have be- 
 stowed upon the Chinese a new idea of man 
 as by creation and by redemption the child of 
 God. They have wrought a wonderful spir- 
 itual transformation not in isolated instances 
 only, but upon a large scale and with lasting 
 effects. The call now is for Spirit-filled, 
 thoroughly equipped leaders. In addition,
 
 WORLD-WIDE MISSIONS A BRIEF SURVEY. 203 
 
 Christianity as a real leavening force in West- 
 ern civilization has brought about the wonder- 
 ful changes that have taken place and are 
 now taking place in the material life, the ed- 
 ucational system, the government, and the so- 
 cial customs of the Chinese." 
 
 Statistics, 1901. Ordained missionaries, 
 830; unordained missionaries, 744; mission- 
 aries' wives, 1,134 ; other missionary women, 
 1,061; native workers, 9,444; stations, 789; 
 out-stations, 3,920; communicants, 191,985; 
 adherents not communicants, 136,126; con- 
 tributions on field, Mexican money, $311,346; 
 day schools, 2,383; pupils, 50,910; higher in- 
 stitutions, 208 ; students in same, 9,751 ; Sun- 
 day schools, 1,118; Sunday school scholars, 
 46,010; industrial schools, 11; students, 594; 
 foreign men physicians, 236; foreign women 
 physicians, 104 ; hospitals or dispensaries, 
 461; patients during one year, 1,125,422. 
 (Authority, Smith.) 
 
 Japan. 
 
 Area, 162,000 square miles ; population, 46,- 
 000,000. 
 
 The Japanese are a remarkable people, in- 
 tellectual, aesthetic, vivacious, patriotic. Na-
 
 204 MISSIONS. 
 
 tional weaknesses appear as a natural result 
 of the defects in their religious and social sys- 
 tems. 
 
 The religions of Japan are Shintoism, Bud- 
 dhism, and Confucianism. Shintoism, or an- 
 cestor worship, contains many degrading su- 
 perstitions which have in a large measure 
 been abolished by the entrance of Western 
 learning. Buddhism is marked by both strong 
 intellectuality and weak ignorance. Scholar- 
 ly Buddhists believe in no Creator, but accept 
 an endless evolution, with unerring causes and 
 effects, and man can escape from the wheel 
 of necessity and the evils of existence only by 
 being absorbed back into the unconscious en- 
 ergy .that pervades all things. The religion 
 of the masses is a superstitious idolatry. There 
 is much corruption among the priesthood, 
 but a strong reform movement has set in. 
 The methods of Christian work are being 
 studied and adopted into Buddhism, and they 
 seek for the secret of Christian earnestness. 
 Confucianism, though not called a religion, 
 has much to do with molding the moral life 
 of the people. 
 
 Japan was opened to the world by Com- 
 modore Perry July 7, 1853. The missionary
 
 WORLD-WIDE MISSIONS A BKIEF SURVEY. 205 
 
 entered in 1859. Since that time a marvelous 
 transformation has been wrought in the coun- 
 try, and Japan in almost every line of en- 
 deavor is abreast of the most progressive na- 
 tions of the world. The missionary was fierce- 
 ly resisted until 1873; 1873-88 marked a 
 I>eriod of popularity and progress ; 1888-1000, 
 a period of reaction ("a morbid nationalism, 
 constantly transforming itself into the hatred 
 of foreigners, became epidemic") ; 1900-08, a 
 period of unprecedented success in establish- 
 ing Christian influence and popularizing 
 Christian institutions. 
 
 Evangelistic, educational, medical, philan- 
 thropic, and literary work is conducted by 
 the missionaries. "When we consider that the 
 government of Japan, the laws, the courts, 
 education, and the family are being formed 
 on Christian principles that recognize the 
 worth and dignity of every man, woman, and 
 child, that the worship of sun and moon 
 has virtually ceased, that the grosser forms 
 of idolatry have been abandoned, that the 
 moral teachings of Christ have become a part 
 of the ethical treasures of the people, that 
 the 'friends of Christianity' number far more 
 than its professors, that Christian thought
 
 206 MISSIONS. 
 
 has affected the old religions to a remarkable 
 extent, we need not hesitate to say that, in 
 spite of the evils of heathenism that remain, 
 no other nation has ever been so rapidly per- 
 meated with Christian knowledge as has 
 Japan." (I)e Forest.) 
 
 Statistics, 1901. Missionaries, men and 
 women, 883; native workers, men and women, 
 1,535; stations and out-stations, 1,214; 
 schools, 156; pupils, 12,205; hospitals and 
 dispensaries, 13; publishing houses or print- 
 ing establishments, 5 ; professing Christians, 
 65,036. (Authority, "The Blue Book.") 
 
 India. 
 
 Area, 1,766,597 square miles. Population, 
 294,361,056. 
 
 In India we find a conglomerate race, many 
 languages, a people with a peculiar genius 
 for degrading religion. 
 
 The three dominant religions are Hinduism, 
 with 207,104,026 adherents, Mohammedan- 
 ism, with 62,458,077, and Buddhism, with 9,- 
 476,759. There are at least six other reli- 
 gious faiths, with adherents numbering from 
 18,000 to more than 8,000,000. Perhaps no-
 
 WORLD-WIDE MISSIONS A BBIEF SURVEY. 207 
 
 where on earth is there a more intensely reli- 
 gious people; yet it is equally true that no- 
 where can there be found more degrading su- 
 perstitions or corrupt religious practices than 
 in India. 
 
 William Carey was the pioneer of Protes- 
 tant missions. He began his labors in India 
 in 1792. The work has advanced in the face 
 of almost insuperable difficulties. Every line 
 of usual missionary effort has been estab- 
 lished, with great emphasis upon Christian ed- 
 ucation. The results have been most gratify- 
 ing. From 1891 to 1901 the increase of Chris- 
 tian population was four times as rapid as 
 that of the whole population. The later pe- 
 riod has been marked by a decided deepening 
 and strengthening of Christian influence in 
 the nation. 
 
 Statistics, 1907. Missionaries, men and 
 women, 3,850; native workers, men and wom- 
 en, 32,654; stations and out-stations, 8,312; 
 schools, 10,692 ; pupils under instruction, 409,- 
 339 ; hospitals and dispensaries, 295 ; publish- 
 ing houses or printing establishments, 12; 
 professing Christians, 1,152,847, (Authority, 
 "The Blue Book.")
 
 208 MISSIONS. 
 
 The Moslem World. 
 
 The number of Mohammedans is about 225,- 
 000,00050,000,000 in Africa, 170,000,000 in 
 Asia, and 5,000,000 in Europe. 
 
 Islam is a religion of degradation. Some 
 of its evil effects are: The idea of a God in- 
 consistent and ignoble, with a corrupt proph- 
 et and leader; low moral standards; divorce- 
 ment of profession and practice; sins of all 
 kinds winked at and condoned, justified by 
 the example of the prophet Mohammed ; wom- 
 an degraded; the home wanting; belief in a 
 hereafter of selfish indulgence; fatalism; 
 stagnation ; and corruption. 
 
 The Moslem world is the neglected mission 
 field of the world. Kaymond Lull, the first 
 missionary to Moslems, was martyred on June 
 30, 1.315. There was then a lapse of five cen- 
 turies in the work of Christianity for the fol- 
 lowers of Islam. Henry Martyn, who went 
 to India in 1800, was the first modern mission- 
 ary to Moslems. Up to the present day the 
 story of missions to Moslems is the story of 
 individual consecration and heroic sacrifice, 
 rather than of great mass movements of. the 
 Church. 
 
 Startling figures are presented showing the
 
 WORLD-WIDE MISSIONS A BRIEF SURVEY. 209 
 
 vast number of Moslems to whom the gospel 
 has never come. In Africa "the situation is 
 as if the United States, with her eighty-seven 
 million people, had one missionary in Main? 
 and another in Texas, and no gospel in be- 
 tween." In Asia there are forty-five million 
 wholly nnreached, "a challenge to faith and 
 in some cases a rebuke for the neglect of the 
 Church." 
 
 In India almost all of the work for the vast 
 Mohammedan population is indirect and cas- 
 ual, though there have been some encouraging 
 results. 
 
 Following are statistics from some of the 
 wholly Moslem lands : 
 
 Turkey. Missionary societies at work, 15 ; 
 stations and out-stations, 569; missionaries, 
 404; native workers, 1,545; schools, 700; 
 scholars, 36.618; hospitals, 25; publishing 
 houses, 3; professed Christians, 79,000; com- 
 municants, 21,000. Much of this work is done 
 among the Jews and decadent Oriental Chris 
 tians. 
 
 Persia. Societies, 4; stations and out-sta- 
 tions, 183; missionaries, 100; native workers, 
 280; schools, 1S; scholars, 3,834; hospitals 
 and dispensaries, 1(5; printing house, 1; pro- 
 14
 
 210 MISSIONS. 
 
 fessed Christians, 5,051 ; communicants, 3,- 
 000. 
 
 In Sumatra and Java Christian missions to 
 Moslems have been attended with great suc- 
 cess. Large numbers have been won to Christ, 
 as many as 20,000 in Java alone. (Authority, 
 Zwemer. ) 
 
 Pagan Africa. 
 
 Area, 11,500,000 square miles; population, 
 90,000,000 pagans, 50,000,000 Moslems, 9,000,- 
 000 nominal Christians, including all white 
 residents. 
 
 The pagan African is nature's spoiled child. 
 Human life is cheap, infanticide common ; 
 marriage, a virtual slavery for the woman, is 
 entered into early in life; polygamy is the 
 common practice; laziness characterizes the 
 man, and in the simple and savage life woman 
 is the burden bearer. Where there is contact 
 the temptations of a corrupt civilization are 
 legion. 
 
 Fetichism, the religion of pagan Africa, is 
 a religion of darkness. Superstition, belief in 
 a multitude of evil spirits, malignant gods, 
 the efficacy of every sort of charm, witchcraft, 
 human sacrifice, cannibalism, revolting bru-
 
 WORLD-WIDE MISSIONS A BRIEF SURVEY. 211 
 
 tality, nauseating licentiousness are its char- 
 acteristics. There are, however, faint gleams 
 of truth; the idea of a supreme God is per- 
 sistent. 
 
 Christian missions in Africa began with 
 Kobert Moffat in 1817. David Livingstone 
 went to Africa in 1841. His heroic life and 
 work made possible the illumination of the 
 Dark Continent. There are obstacles to be 
 overcome in mission work in Africa. Among 
 them are polygamy, domestic slavery, the ex- 
 istence of six hundred languages and dialects, 
 the climate with its prevalent and virulent 
 malarial fever, unscrupulous and corrupt Eu- 
 ropeans, the unsympathetic policy of the Eu- 
 ropean governments, the liquor traffic, race 
 prejudice, Kornan Catholic opposition. But 
 among the allies of Christianity may be men- 
 tioned the efforts of the governments of Eu- 
 rope toward the suppression of the slave 
 trade, the liquor traffic, pagan brutalities, do- 
 mestic slavery and polygamy, and the scien- 
 tific investigation of the problems of climate 
 and peculiar diseases and the tendency toward 
 greater uniformity of languages and their re- 
 duction to writing. 
 
 Statistics. Ordained men, 1,172; unor-
 
 212 MISSIONS. 
 
 dained men, 654 ; missionaries' wives, 787 ; 
 missionary women, 503 ; native workers, 16,- 
 308 ; stations and out-stations, 6,734 ; com- 
 municants, 281,011; adherents, 613,248; day 
 schools, 3,573 ; pupils, 202,748 ; higher institu- 
 tions, 147; students, 8,501; men and women 
 physicians, 81 ; hospitals or dispensaries, 127 ; 
 patients treated in one year, 225,862. (Au- 
 thority, Naylor.) 
 
 South America. 
 
 Area, 7,000,000 square miles. Population, 
 37,903,809. 
 
 The people are an ignorant or thoughtless 
 multitude, following blindly in the footsteps 
 of their fathers, who inherited a form of re- 
 ligion without its power. Their religion is 
 Roman Catholicism formal and corrupt. 
 Holiness and the life hid with Christ in God 
 have disappeared, and morality and religion 
 do not often coexist. There is, however, a 
 tendency to freedom of religious belief due 
 to the reaction of a minority against the an- 
 cestral faith. 
 
 More than twenty North American socie- 
 ties, eight from Great Britain, one from Con- 
 tinental Europe, and other international so-
 
 WORLD-WIDE MISSIONS A BBIEF SURVEY. 213 
 
 cieties are represented. There are different 
 situations and complications in the various 
 republics. The greatest need in all, however, 
 is the Bible and education. The missionaries 
 are very hopeful as to Protestantism's future 
 in South America. 
 
 Statistics. Ordained missionaries, 255; 
 laymen, 190; wives, 201; other women, 117; 
 male physicians, 6; native workers, 688; sta- 
 tions, 224 ; out-stations, 271 ; communicants, 
 30,469; adherents not communicants, 28,764; 
 day schools, 170; pupils, 11,989; higher insti- 
 tutions, 14; students, 868; patients treated, 
 6,100. (Authority, Beach.)
 
 XVI T. 
 
 MISSIONS OF THE METHODIST EPIS- 
 COPAL CHURCH, SOUTH. 
 
 The Board of Missions of the Methodist 
 Episcopal Church, South, was authorized and 
 its members were elected at the General Con- 
 ference of 1840, sending out its first mission- 
 ary in 1848. 
 
 The Woman's Board of Foreign Missions 
 was authorized by the General Conference of 
 1878, and very soon thereafter perfected its 
 organization and began work. 
 
 The General Board has administered funds 
 on the frontier and in destitute regions of the 
 regular work since 1846, and has contributed 
 largely to the progress of our Church in the 
 West. 
 
 The General Conference of 1906 authorized 
 the Home Department of the General Board 
 in order to better meet the complex problems 
 of the growing city, industrial activity, and 
 immigration. 
 (214)
 
 MISSIONS OK THE M. E. CHURCH, SOUTH. 215 
 
 The Woman's Home Mission Board was au- 
 thorized by the General Conference of 1886, 
 and has done an excellent work, pioneering in 
 several lines of needed missionary activity. 
 
 China. 
 
 Work was opened in Shanghai by Dr. 
 Charles Taylor in September, 1848. He was 
 joined by Dr. J. Jenkins in 1849. These were 
 followed by W. G. E. Cunnyngham in 1852, 
 J. W. Lambuth, D. C. Kelley, and W. Belton 
 in 1854, and Young J. Allen and M. L. Wood 
 in I860. On account of the Civil War in 
 America no more recruits came to the mission 
 until 1875, when A. P. Parker arrived on the 
 field. From that time recruits have contin- 
 ued to come, from one to five or more almost 
 every year. The mission occupies the south- 
 ern end of Kiangsu and the northern end of 
 Chekiang Provinces, one of the most densely 
 populated regions in China. All forms of 
 missionary work are carried on evangelistic, 
 educational, medical, literary, woman's work, 
 etc. 
 
 Evangelistic. The territory occupied is di- 
 vided into three presiding elders' districts: 
 Shanghai, Soochow, and Huchow. In some of
 
 210 MISSIONS. 
 
 the established Churches Moore Memorial, 
 in -Shanghai, for instance all the services of 
 the Church are held regularly. Evangelistic 
 services are conducted also in the various 
 chapels in the hospitals, schools, etc., and a 
 successful Bible woman's work is conducted 
 in connection with the representatives of the 
 Woman's Board. The number of accessions 
 to the Church last year was 307. 
 
 Educational. Great emphasis is laid by 
 our mission on Christian education. It is the 
 aim to have one or more day schools connect- 
 ed with every station and middle schools in 
 all the prefectural cities leading up to the 
 higher institutions viz., Soochow University, 
 established in 1899, ranking as one of the two 
 greatest educational institutions in China ; 
 the Anglo-Chinese College, in Shanghai, for 
 boys and young men, opened in 1881; McLain 
 Training School, at Sungkong, opened in 
 1899. 
 
 Eight boarding schools are conducted by 
 the Woman's Board in China: McTyeire 
 School for Girls in Shanghai, the Laura Hay- 
 good Memorial and the Davidson Bible School 
 in Soochow, the Susan B. Wilson and the 
 Hayes-Willdns Bible Schools in Sungkong,
 
 MISSIONS OK THE M. E. CHURCH, SOUTH. 217 
 
 the Virginia and the Memphis Schools in Hu- 
 chow, and a medical school in connection 
 with the Soochow Woman's Hospital. They 
 have, in addition, thirteen day schools, with 
 390 pupils enrolled. 
 
 Medical. The Soochow Hospital, built in 
 1883, and the Soochow Woman's Hospital to- 
 gether treat 30,000 patients a year. Medical 
 work has also been carried on in Huchow. 
 
 Literary. Dr. Y. J. Allen made many note- 
 worthy contributions to Chinese literature. 
 Some one has said that his books "have hurled 
 the Chinese gods from their pedestals." Oth- 
 ers of our workers have done valuable work 
 of this kind, among them Dr. and Mrs. J. W. 
 Lambuth, Dr. A. P. Parker, Rev. George R. 
 Loehr, Mrs. Alice S. Parker, Prof. N. Gist 
 Gee, and Mrs. R. S. Anderson. 
 
 Statistics.* Missionaries, 70; native work- 
 ers, 195 ; organized Churches, 27 ; self-support- 
 ing Churches, 8 ; Church members, 2,190 ; Sun- 
 day schools, 53; Sunday school scholars, 2,- 
 573; Epworth Leagues, 32; Epworth League 
 members, 892; boarding schools, 12; pupils, 
 
 *Figures include wives of missionaries and work 
 of the Woman's Foreign Missionary Society.
 
 218 MISSIONS. 
 
 953 ; day schools, 22 ; pupils, 683 ; hospitals or 
 dispensaries, 2; patients treated, 32,069; to- 
 tal value of mission property, $367,425. (Au- 
 thority, "A Century of Missions in China" 
 and Annual Report of Board of Missions, 
 1908.) 
 
 Japan. 
 
 We began work in Japan in 1886. The 
 progress has been steady. In May, 1907, the 
 Methodist Church of Japan was formed by 
 the union in one body of the Methodist Epis- 
 copal Church, South, the Methodist Episcopal, 
 and the Methodist Church of Canada. This 
 united Church begins with more than 11,000 
 members and 100 Japanese preachers under 
 the leadership of Bishop Y. Honda, who was 
 their own almost unanimous choice for bish 
 op. The educational work and much of the 
 evangelistic field continue under the foster- 
 ing care of our missionaries, who will remain 
 in an advisory and cooperative relation with 
 the leaders of the new Church while their 
 Conference membership is with the home Con- 
 ferences. There is every prospect of widened 
 influence and of a great future before the 
 Methodist Church of Japan, which has been
 
 MISSIONS OF THE M. E. CHUBCH, SOUTH. 210 
 
 launched under the most auspicious circum- 
 stances. 
 
 Evangelistic. Our mission is divided into 
 three districts: Kobe, Hiroshima, and Mat- 
 suyama. The results of the evangelistic work 
 show an increase in membership for the past 
 year of 307, and "everywhere the general state 
 of the Church is good. Church activity indi- 
 cates a healthy growth spiritually and finan- 
 cially, and harmony and peace prevail in all 
 the Churches and among the workers." 
 
 Educational. Kwansei Gakuin was estab- 
 lished at Kobe in 1889. It comprises a Bib- 
 lical Department, which gives full theological 
 training to native preachers, and an Academ- 
 ic and College Department, with a total en- 
 rollment of 228. 
 
 Palmore Institute, at Kobe, had last year a 
 total enrollment of 500. 
 
 The Lambuth Memorial Bible School for 
 Christian women workers had 15 students en- 
 rolled, and has done much good work of a 
 missionary character among the people of 
 Kobe. 
 
 The Hiroshima Girls' School, established in 
 1889, with its enrollment of over 700 in the 
 Academic Department and 225 in the Kinder-
 
 220 MISSIONS. 
 
 garten Department,, is doing a magnificent 
 work. 
 
 Statistics. Missionaries (including their 
 wives), 36; native traveling preachers, 14; lo- 
 cal preachers, 24; members, 1,776 (increase, 
 203); Sunday schools, 62; scholars, 5,401; 
 Epworth Leagues, 14; members, 379; organ- 
 ized Churches, 22; Churches self-supporting, 
 3; boarding schools, 3; pupils, 1,278; day 
 schools, 7; pupils, 534; total collections on 
 the field, f 3,927.34; total value of mission 
 property, $103,767.50. (Authority, Annual 
 Report. ) 
 
 Korea. 
 
 The mission was opened in 1895 by Bishop 
 Hendrix and Dr. C. F. Reid at the earnest re- 
 quest of the Yun family. Mr. T. H. Yun, an 
 active member of the Church, while occupy- 
 ing important official positions, has now con- 
 sented to devote his entire time to our edu- 
 cational work, and has charge of the school at 
 Songdo. The setting apart of Korea as a sep- 
 arate mission was consummated at the last 
 session of the China Mission Conference, of 
 which it has heretofore been a part. 
 
 Evangelistic. The mission comprises one
 
 MISSIONS OF THE M. E. CHURCH, SOUTH. 221 
 
 presiding elder's district. The evangelistic 
 work is carried on by the native Christians, 
 and u in every section there are villages and 
 hamlets where little groups of inquirers are 
 gathered, earnestly seeking the light." The 
 field is "white unto the harvest/' and "with 
 an adequate number of workers our mission- 
 aries believe that in ten years they can evan- 
 gelize the part of the country allotted to us." 
 
 Educational. The Anglo-Korean School 
 was opened in 1906 at Songdo, with T. H. Yun 
 as President. The total enrollment for the 
 last term was 118. It is being made a strong 
 force in the general education of the people 
 as well as in the specific instruction of the 
 students. Our mission has also a share in the 
 Union School for boys in Seoul, which is do- 
 ing good work. A Biblical Institute for the 
 training of native preachers and workers has 
 been projected. 
 
 The Woman's Board has four boarding 
 schools Tallulah Hargrove and the Girls' 
 Boarding School in Songdo, Lucy Cuninggim 
 Boarding School in Wonsan, and the Caro- 
 lina Institute in Seoul with a total enroll- 
 ment of 90. They have also 150 pupils in their 
 five day schools.
 
 222 MISSIONS. 
 
 Medical. Work is carried on in Wonsan, 
 where are located two dispensaries treating 
 3,000 or more patients annually, and in Song- 
 do, where between 500 and 1,000 patients are 
 treated through the dispensary located there. 
 
 Statistics.* Missionaries, 34 ; native work- 
 ers, 48 ; organized Churches, 181 ; self-support- 
 ing Churches, 89; Church members, 1,988; 
 Sunday schools, 33; Sunday school scholars, 
 1,770; boarding schools, 6; pupils, 346; day 
 schools, 8 ; pupils, 232 ; hospitals or dispensa- 
 ries, 3 ; patients treated, 1,852 ; total value of 
 mission property, f 69,000. (Authority, An- 
 nual Keport, 1908.) 
 
 Work was begun in Brazil in 1874. The 
 field has been divided into two Conferences 
 of six districts in all. 
 
 Evangelistic. "Access to the masses of the 
 people with the gospel message is all the time 
 becoming easier, and there is a growing desire 
 upon the part of an increasing number to 
 hear the word of life. The Church in Brazil 
 
 *Figures include wives of missionaries and work 
 of the Woman's Foreign Missionary Society.
 
 MISSIONS OF THE M. E. CHURCH, SOUTH. 223 
 
 shows a disposition to meet this increasing 
 opportunity. The statistics indicate a healthy 
 condition and encouraging growth." There 
 was a gain in membership during the past 
 year of 307. 
 
 Educational. Granbery College, at Juiz de 
 Fora, with an enrollment of 291, has a prop- 
 erty valued at $93,000. The college has aca- 
 demic, theological, pharmacy, and dental de- 
 partments. It has gained a reputation for 
 faithful and honest work and wields a great 
 power for good. 
 
 The Woman's Board conducts the Colegio 
 Americano in Petropolis, Mineiro College 
 in Juiz de Fora, Isabella Hendrix Institute in 
 Bello Horizonte, and other boarding schools 
 in Piracicaba, Ribeirao Preto, and Porto 
 Alegre. The enrollment in their boarding 
 schools is 130, and in the day schools 630. 
 
 Medical. Considerable work is done in 
 connection with the Central Mission, in Rio 
 de Janeiro. Several hundred patients are 
 treated annually through the dispensary. 
 
 Statistics.* Missionaries, 55 ; native work- 
 
 *Figures include wives of missionaries and work 
 of the Woman's Foreign Missionary Society.
 
 224 MISSIONS. 
 
 ers, 91; organized Churches, 44; self-support- 
 ing Churches, 5 ; Church members, 5,368 ; Sun- 
 day schools, 73; Sunday school scholars, 2,- 
 884; Epworth Leagues, 43; Epworth League 
 members, 1,830; boarding schools, 7; pupils, 
 421 ; day schools, 6 ; pupils, 631 ; total value 
 of missionary property, $409,990. (Authori- 
 ty, Annual Eeport, 1908.) 
 
 Mexico. 
 
 Our work in Mexico was begun in 1873. 
 The mission comprises three Conferences of 
 seven presiding elders' districts in all. Evan- 
 gelistic, educational, medical, and literary 
 work is carried on. 
 
 Evangelistic. One of the most encouraging 
 facts about our work in this field is the grow- 
 ing revival spirit. Until recent years revivals 
 were rare. Now they are becoming common. 
 The missionaries report a growing interest in 
 such work. The native preachers are becom- 
 ing imbued more than ever with the revival 
 spirit. There were 410 accessions to our 
 Church in Mexico last year. 
 
 Educational. Colegio Wesleyano, a train-
 
 MISSIONS OF THE M. E. CHURCH, SOUTH. 225 
 
 ing school at San Luis Potosi for native 
 preachers, had 19 students last year. 
 
 Laurens Institute, at Monterey, had a total 
 enrollment last year of 446, a faculty of 15 
 teachers, and a property worth about $85,000. 
 "Such an institution must touch in a very 
 vital manner the youth of Mexico and do 
 much toward shaping the destiny of this na- 
 tion." 
 
 The boarding schools of the Woman's 
 Board are : Laredo Seminary in Laredo, Cole- 
 gio Ingles in Saltillo, boarding school in San 
 Luis Potosi, Mary Keener Institute in the 
 City of Mexico, Institute Colon in Guadala- 
 jara, MacDonell Institute in Durango, and 
 Palmore College in Chihuahua. The total en- 
 rollment in these schools and in their day 
 schools is 2,300. 
 
 Medical. Hospital Monterey, where nearly 
 30,000 patients were treated last year, of 
 whom the great majority were charity pa- 
 tients, "is doing a world of good." 
 
 Literary. Translations of Professor Kod- 
 riguez: Spanish hymn book, Sunday school 
 literature, "The Life of Wesley," "The Chil- 
 dren's Crusade," Sheldon's "System of Chris- 
 tian Doctrine," and others, 
 15
 
 226 MISSIONS. 
 
 Statistics.* Missionaries, 56 ; native work- 
 ers, 223; organized Churches, 108; self-sup- 
 porting Churches, 3 ; Church members, 6,815 ; 
 Sunday schools, 136 ; Sunday school scholars, 
 5,157 ; Epworth Leagues, 37 ; Epworth League 
 members, 1,377; boarding schools, 9; pupils, 
 1,766; day schools, 10; pupils, 1,060; hos- 
 pital or dispensary, 1; patients treated, 29,- 
 653; total value of mission property, |508,- 
 557. (Authority, Annual Keport, 1908.) 
 
 Cuba. 
 
 The regular mission was established in 
 Cuba in 1898. 
 
 Evangelistic. The Conference held in Cuba 
 last January was said to be "the most satis- 
 factory, the most hopeful and harmonious we 
 have yet had in the island." That is saying 
 a good deal ; but it is justified by the improve- 
 ment in the number, quality, and better train- 
 ing of the native ministry, by the evidences 
 that the work is solidifying and assuming 
 organic form, by a more competent Church 
 officiary and more orderly methods in Church 
 
 *Figures include wives of missionaries and work 
 of the Woman's Foreign Missionary Society.
 
 MISSIONS OF THE M. E. CHURCH, SOUTH. 227 
 
 affairs, by the steady advance toward self- 
 support evident in all directions, and by the 
 general accessibility of the people to the word 
 of life. The increase in membership for 1908 
 was 482, a net gain of almost twenty per cent. 
 
 Educational. Four colleges are conducted 
 with 19 teachers and a total enrollment of 
 345, and three day schools with an enrollment 
 of 45. 
 
 The Woman's Board has two boarding 
 schools Colegio Eliza Bowman, in Cienfue- 
 gos, and the Irene Toland School, in Matan- 
 zas with an enrollment of 322. 
 
 Statistics.* Missionaries, 30 ; native work- 
 ers, 44 ; organized Churches, 37 ; Church mem- 
 bers, 2,847; Sunday schools, 44; Sunday 
 school scholars, 2,847; Epworth Leagues, 17; 
 Epworth League members, 675; boarding 
 schools, 6 ; pupils, 667 ; day schools, 3 ; pupils, 
 45 ; total value of mission property, $232,223.- 
 71. 
 
 Summary. Missionaries, 281 ; native work- 
 ers, 639; organized Churches, 421; self-sup- 
 porting Churches, 108; Church members, 20,- 
 
 *Figures include wives of missionaries and work 
 of the Woman's Foreign Missionary Society.
 
 228 MISSIONS. 
 
 984; Sunday schools, 401; Sunday school 
 scholars, 20,632; Epworth Leagues, 143; Ep- 
 worth League members, 5,153; boarding 
 schools, 43; pupils, 5,431; day schools, 56; 
 pupils, 3,185; hospitals or dispensaries, 6; 
 patients treated, 63,574; total value of mis- 
 sion property, $1,690,963.21. 
 
 Collections. For foreign missions, $540,- 
 523.54; for home missions, $268,080; for 
 Church Extension, $133,617; for Woman's 
 Foreign Missionary Society, $226,192.88; for 
 Woman's Home Mission Society, $442,861.- 
 59. Total, $1,611,275.01. (Authority, Annu- 
 al Keport, 1908.)
 
 XVI 1 1. 
 MISSIONS IN THE SUNDAY SCHOOL. 
 
 Why should we emphasize mission study in 
 the Sunday school? 
 
 In systematic and thorough missionary ed- 
 ucation lies the foundation of the future mis- 
 sionary progress and success of the Church. 
 If ever the Church is made ready for her ever- 
 enlarging opportunity to take the world for 
 Christ, a generation must be educated in the 
 gospel and history of missions. Education 
 implies the teacher, the text-book, the pupil, 
 the class hour, etc. These are found in the 
 Sunday school; and as an organized depart- 
 ment of the Church the Sunday school is in 
 shape to do this work without additional ma- 
 chinery or organization. The Sunday school 
 takes the pupil in the formative period, and 
 can through proper instruction train him to 
 missionary faith and obedience. The Sunday 
 school, therefore, has the making of the mis- 
 sionary conscience and character of the 
 Church of the future. 
 
 (228)
 
 230 MISSIONS. 
 
 How shall we introduce the theme of mis- 
 sions into the Sunday school? 
 
 1. By the selection of a Missionary Com- 
 mittee. 
 
 The committee should consist of from three 
 to five members, representing the different 
 grades of the school, and should be represent- 
 ed by one of its members on the Missionary 
 Committee of the Church. The pastor and 
 superintendent of the school should be mem- 
 bers ex officio. The missionary superintend- 
 ent or chairman, with the committee, should 
 have general charge of the cultivation of the 
 missionary life of the Sunday school, espe- 
 cially through the use of the missionary poli- 
 cy for the Sunday school provided by our 
 Church, or such parts thereof as may be 
 adapted to the local school. Each member of 
 the committee should have some definite work 
 to do, such as being responsible for one or 
 more of the points of this policy. 
 
 2. By the making of a missionary atmos- 
 phere. 
 
 This can be done (1) by the introduction 
 of missions in the worship of the Sunday 
 school. This is effected by the occasional 
 reading from the Scriptures of a missionary
 
 MISSIONS IN THE SUNDAY SCHOOL. 231 
 
 lesson, the frequent mention of missions and 
 the missionaries in prayer, and the selection 
 of missionary songs. It is not well to call 
 special attention to the fact 'that they are mis- 
 sionary in sentiment, but just use them as 
 other lessons and as the other songs are used, 
 and the silent, educative influence will surely 
 be felt. 
 
 (2) By a monthly missionary programme 
 so arranged and rendered as to be interesting 
 and instructive. This programme can be 
 made strong and effective without interfering 
 with the regular lesson period. Materials are 
 abundant, and suggestive programmes can 
 easily be had. Prayer and faithful work on 
 the part of the committee can make this one 
 of the most delightful features of the Sunday 
 school work. A separate missionary pro- 
 gramme for the Primary Department is sug- 
 gested whenever expedient. 
 
 (3) By the use of pictures, charts, and 
 maps hung on the wall and occasionally re- 
 ferred to, with an application of the lessons 
 they suggest. 
 
 (4) By the occasional introduction of mis- 
 sionary curios, with brief explanation of their 
 use, etc., or by the reading of a letter from
 
 232i MISSIONS. 
 
 some missionary in whom the pupils are es- 
 pecially interested, or by reference to a bul- 
 letin board containing fresh missionary facts 
 and news items. 
 
 3. By the study of the Bible as a missionary 
 book. 
 
 Provision for this will be made each year 
 through the missionary interpretation of all 
 the lessons of the International Series, which 
 are clearly susceptible of missionary treat- 
 ment. Besides this, our Church offers in the 
 regular Sunday school literature a distinctly 
 missionary lesson at the end of each quarter 
 as a substitute for the review. 
 
 Supplemental Bible study in missions can be 
 made very profitable, and may be carried on 
 in various ways that will suggest themselves 
 to the resourceful teacher. 
 
 4. By a, supplemental course in missionary 
 biography and history. 
 
 The Bible furnishes the principles, but it is 
 not enough to teach only what the Bible con- 
 tains on this subject. In a very real sense the 
 Acts of the Apostles must be read in the light 
 of the deeds of modern apostles ; and even our 
 Lord's life and great missionary purpose can 
 be better understood and will have more
 
 Itf THE SUNDAY SCHOOL. 233 
 
 meaning to the child if Jesus is conceived as 
 actually carrying out that purpose in the 
 world to-day; and still more so if there is fur- 
 nished evidence that Jesus, according to his 
 promise, is still present with those who are 
 going among all nations to carry the truth 
 concerning him. The simple, beautiful sto- 
 ries of real men and women who grew up in 
 Sunday school, perhaps, and who are to-day 
 carrying the truth of Christ to the Christless ; 
 their self-sacrifice and loving devotion to the 
 people they are trying to save ; the actual ex- 
 periences of missionaries in dealing with the 
 natives; stories about the native Christians, 
 their peculiarities, their conversion and trans- 
 formation, and their truly Christian fidelity 
 all these things w r ill lend a reality and a 
 vividness to missions that no amount of dis- 
 cussion of the abstract conditions and obliga- 
 tions can produce. Excellent materials for 
 such studies are now available. 
 
 5. By a Course of Mission Study for Teach- 
 ers. 
 
 This is provided for in the Teacher-Train- 
 ing Course. The trained missionary teacher 
 could solve the problem of missionary educa- 
 tion. A more extended study of missions
 
 234 MISSIONS. 
 
 than is provided for in this course is desirable. 
 What, then, can be done to further help the 
 teachers in this work? Is it practicable for 
 the Sunday school teacher to take a wider 
 course of study in missions? "The teachers 
 already have their hands full with their reg- 
 ular Sunday class work and with their teach- 
 ers' Study Circle Course." That is true; but 
 this circle course is regularly completed in 
 ten months. Why should not the circle then 
 take up a course in mission study? Excellent 
 courses are available through the Education- 
 al Department of the Board of Missions. If 
 there is no Study Circle in the Sunday school, 
 the teacher can have access to the Corre- 
 spondence School of the Methodist Episcopal 
 Church, South, which offers an excellent 
 course of training in the mission study text- 
 books selected by our Church. 
 
 6. By putting missionary books in the Sun- 
 day school library. 
 
 Every Sunday school ought to have a good 
 missionary library, even though a small one. 
 The children should have the best and most 
 interesting missionary books placed in their 
 hands. 
 
 "The 1905 Sunday School Missionary Li-
 
 MISSIONS IN THE SUNDAY SCHOOL. 
 
 brary," selected by Drs. H. M. Hamill and W. 
 R. Lambuth, is especially recommended. It 
 is in two sections, Section A and Section B. 
 The books of the first are adapted to the needs 
 of boys and girls, and the second section is 
 made up of such books as teachers and older 
 scholars will need. Either of these sections 
 is sent postpaid for $5, or both for $10. The 
 missionary section of the Sunday School Li- 
 brary should include missionary magazines 
 and leaflet literature, etc. 
 
 The Young People's Missionary Movement 
 has recently published a set of ten volumes of 
 splendid stories, strong in missionary interest 
 and influence. These books are so full of 
 thrilling adventure and stirring fact as to 
 catch and hold the youthful reader and at the 
 same time to draw him close to the Master in 
 his loving purpose to save the world. This 
 set and other missionary books should be in 
 every Sunday school library. The price of 
 the set ($5) places it in the reach of all. 
 
 7. By asking for a monthly missionary of- 
 fering. 
 
 In this care must be exercised to give full 
 information as to where the money goes and 
 how it is spent. A share in the support of a
 
 236 MISSIONS. 
 
 mission station or school, with an occasional 
 report from the missionary in charge, deepens 
 interest and is wonderfully educative in mis- 
 sionary faith and liberality. Because mis- 
 sionary giving belongs indispensably to mis 
 sionary education, and because more Sunday 
 schools probably observe this than any other 
 missionary educational feature, there may be 
 danger of mistaking a means for an end. The 
 purpose of missionary education in the Sun- 
 day school is not to raise money, but the pur- 
 pose in raising money is primarily to serve 
 as one of the educational means in the rear- 
 ing of a missionary Church. 
 
 8. By frequent use of missionary history, 
 'biography, incidents, and news in illustrating 
 Bible lessons. 
 
 No field of illustration is so rich and none 
 more accessible to the teacher. Faith, love, 
 sacrifice, and heroic obedience find their 
 highest exemplification in the splendid lives 
 and noble service of the missionary. 
 
 9. By a plan for the promotion of definite 
 and intelligent intercessory prayer. 
 
 Leading the pupils into the habit of defi- 
 nite prayer for missionaries and missionary 
 objects will deepen their spiritual life and
 
 MISSIONS IN THE SUNDAY SCHOOL. 237 
 
 wonderfully quicken the missionary interest. 
 Prayer cards, calendars, and prayer lists may 
 be used with profit. 
 
 (Materials for use in the plans suggested 
 in this chapter can be secured from the Edu- 
 cational Department, Board of Missions, M. 
 E. Church, South, Nashville, Tenn.)
 
 
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 THE REVISED CIRCLE COURSES. 
 
 The books are named in the order in which students 
 are urged to study them, though this order is advisory 
 and not compulsory. Order of Smith & Lamar, Agents, 
 Publishing House, Nashville, Tenn., and Dallas, Tex. 
 The School, if it can possibly afford it, should in part 
 or whole pay the cost, especially for the Circle class of 
 young people in training to teach, except as any prefer 
 to own and can pay for the books. 
 
 THE FIRST COURSE. 
 
 The "Legion of Honor Teacher-Training Lessons." In 
 one volume, Revised Edition of 1908, Parts 1 and 2. In 
 manilla binding, 25 cents. In cloth, 40 cents, postpaid. 
 
 ADVANCED COURSE. 
 
 1. "The Sunday School Teacher." (Same as hereto- 
 fore. ) 
 
 2. "The Bible and Its Books." (Same as heretofore, 
 with slight revision in form only.) 
 
 3. "Manual of Southern Methodism," containing the 
 "Doctrine and Polity" of former Circle book, but now 
 enlarged by addition of Church History and Missions. 
 
 4. "The Organized Sunday School." (Same as hereto- 
 fore, with some revision.) 
 
 5. "The Sunday School Pupil." (Additional to the 
 old Circle Course.) 
 
 The five books of the Advanced Course, in cloth only, 
 at $1.70 per set, postpaid. Orders for individual books 
 filled at 40 cents each, postpaid. 
 
 SPECIAL INFORMATION. 
 
 Revised Circle Leaflet. This revised leaflet will be 
 sent to all Sunday school superintendents, pastors, or 
 teachers applying to Dr. Hamill for it. 
 
 Students of the Old Course. Students now at work 
 upon the three appointed books of the old Circle Course 
 will not be disturbed or in any way discredited by the 
 revised plan, but will receive full credit for work now 
 being done. But if in addition to these three books they 
 shall complete the two other books of the "Advanced 
 Course" "The Organized Sunday School" and "The Sun- 
 day School Pupil" they will be awarded the "Advanced 
 Course Diploma" with the International Seal. 
 
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 University of California 
 
 SOUTHERN REGIONAL LIBRARY FACILITY 
 
 305 De Neve Drive - Parking Lot 17 Box 951388 
 
 LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA 90095-1388 
 
 Return this material to the library from which it was borrowed.