History of the Christian church (Volume 5) online

and in 1842 built a church for the congregation. In
1843 li^ founded Der Luther aner, a semi-monthly. In
1847, with twenty-two pastors and two candidates,



The Christian Church in America. 295

there was formed the most aggressive body of I^uther-
ans the last three centuries have seen. April 26th the
Synod of Missouri was founded, and the Theological
Seminary removed to St. Louis in 1849. From 1843,
Walther was in controversy with the Buffalo Synod.

The most prominent Lutheran of this period, and
the leader of the General Synod, was Samuel S.
Schmucker (1799-1873). After two years
spent in the University of Pennsylvania, gchmucker.
he graduated from Princeton Theological
Seminary in 1820. The next year he was ordained.
He was a leader in the General Synod from 1823 to
1870. In 1822 he prepared the "Formula for the
Government and Discipline of the Lutheran Church,"
which was afterwards adopted by the General Synod.
He was pastor (i 820-1 826) at Frederick, Md. From
1826 to 1864 he was professor in the Gettysburg
Theological Seminary. In 1846 he attended, at Lon-
don, the first session of the Evangelical Alliance.
He did not believe the Augsburg Confession was in-
fallible. He was earnestly Evangelical in spirit.
More than one hundred publications came from his
pen.

In 1850 there were 1,603 churches, ^^ ^,_^.

^ . statistics.

1,400 ministers, and 163,000 communicants
in the Lutheran Church.

Thk Moravians.

In this era the Moravians steadily pursued their
mission work. They were very successful among the
Cherokee Indians in Georgia, but it was largely over-
thrown by the forced removal of the Indians. They
also founded new settlements at Goshen, Ind., 1831;



296 History of the Christian Church.

Camden, N. Y., 1834; Hopedale, Pa., 1836. Of
greater import, even, were the changes in the internal
constitution. In 1844 the Council decided to abolish
the peculiar institution of an exclusive religious estab-
lishment. In 1848 the American Province was made
independent of Herrnhut. In 1850 there were 31
churches, 27 ministers, and 3,027 communicants
among the Moravians.

Thk Friknds.

The Friends, or Quakers, in America experienced
the same division which carried the most ancient
Churches of the Puritans' faith into the camp of the
Unitarians. The main agent in this division was
Elias Hicks.

Hicks was a great traveler and preacher. He had
imbibed extreme Unitarian views. In his teaching,
Jesus Christ was a mere man, and the Holy Scriptures
were unnecessary, and even an impediment, to a re-
ligious life. He was zealous, upright, and a man of
strong will. He and his followers placed great stress
on morality, which was the essence of religion for
them. As many were members of the Society by
right of birth only, and without personal religious ex-
perience, and as the Separatists inclined to a more
liberal Church polity and usage, it was not strange
that Klias Hicks had a large following. The first
local division took place in 1822. The separation
into the Orthodox and Hicksite Churches was made
in 1 827-1 828. The English Friends remained in fel-
lowship with the Orthodox Church.

As both sides claimed to be the rightful represent-
ative of the original Friends in America, the courts



The Christian Church in America. 297

were called upon to decide as to the title of the
Church property. In New Jersey the property was
divided according to the membership. In Pennsyl-
vania, which was the stronghold of the Friends, the
country meeting-houses were given to the Hicksites;
and Westtown Boarding-school, founded in 1799, with
the Frankfort Asylum for the Insane, came to the
Orthodox. The Hicksites were in the majority ex-
cept in Indiana and Ohio. The visits of Jonathan
and Hannah Backhouse from England, 1 830-1 835,
aroused attention to the Bible among the Orthodox.
First-day schools were established. This more ag-
gressive spirit was encouraged by the visit soon after
of the celebrated English Quaker, Joseph Gurney.
This was resented by Joseph Wilbur, who founded
the Wilburite Yearly Meeting, which drew several
thousands from the Orthodox in Ohio.

The Hicksite Friends, while personally estimable
in the relations of life, and upright and often philan-
thropic, had, of course, no great amount of religious
zeal. Hence they did not grow. In 1830 they counted
31,000 members; in 1890 but 21,000, though they
established First-day Schools. The Orthodox con-
trolled the Providence School, Providence, R. I., and
in 1833 founded Haverford School, at Haverford, Pa.,
which, since 1856, has won a worthy name as Haver-
ford College. Guilford School, at Guilford, N. C,
was founded in 1837. The Friends of both divisions
were earnest Abolitionists and temperance reformers.
The most celebrated American Friend was the Anti-
slavery Quaker poet, John G. Whittier (i 807-1 892),
who was, his life long, in communion with the Ortho-
dox Society.



298 History of the Christian Church.

In 1800 it was estimated that there were 50,000
Friends ; in 1850 the Orthodox Friends were estimated
at 70,000; Hicksites, 25,000.

Thk Protestant Episcopai, Church.

In this era the Protestant Episcopal Church may be
said first to cast off its intimate relation to the Church
of England and to have begun an independent exist-
ence. Formally this was done in the latter years of
the preceding century, but only from 181 1 did it cease
to be thought of as, in a sense, a foreign Church and
connected with the unpopular party of the Revolu-
tion. It became a recognized force in American so-
cial and religious life from the consecration, at the
same time, of John Henry Hobart as Assistant Bishop
of New York, and Alexander V. Griswold as Bishop of
the Eastern Diocese, which included all New England
except Connecticut and Vermont. Soon after came
the consecration of Richard Channing Moore as Bishop
of Virginia. These men, with such men as John
Stark Ravenscroft and Philander Chase, laid broad
and firm the foundation of the new order of things.
They, like all religious leaders of those days, were
pioneers, and the smallness of their resources and the
amount of their hardships should never be forgotten
by those who would estimate their work and their
worth.

The Protestant Episcopal Church shared in the
general movement which led to the establishment of
Sunday-schools, the founding of theological semin-
aries, and the opening of foreign missions. The Gen-
eral Theological Seminary at New York was founded
in 182 1, and in 1823 that at Alexandria, Va. In 1829



The Christian Church in America. 299

the mission to Greece was begun; in 1835 the Domes-
tic and Foreign Missionary Society was organized.
In 1835 the first missionaries were sent to China, and
the next year to Africa. The first Sisterhoods were
begun at New York in 1845.

In an Episcopal Church much depends upon the
character, piety, and energy of the Episcopate ; this is
especially true in the formative stage of the growth
of the Church as well as in the great crises of its ex-
istence.

In these years men of more than ordinary devo-
tion and piety laid their molding hand on the infant
Church.

This was true of the ablest of them, John Henry
Hobart (i 775-1 830), who may well be called the first
American Bishop of New York, as his
predecessors were more colonial than ''^^Hobart "^^
otherwise in their feeling and relations.
Bishop Hobart made his Church a living force in
New York City. Under him the days of apology
and defense were past ; he made it confident and ag-
gressive.

Born in 1775, Bishop Hobart graduated at Prince-
ton in 1793, and was trained for the university by
Bishop White. In 1800 he became assistant to the
rector of Trinity Parish, New York City. In 1804 he
published "Companion for the Altar," and in 1807,
"Apology for Apostolic Order and its Advocates," the
result of his controversy with Dr. John M. Mason.
He had been, since 1797, secretary to the House of
Bishops and to the Diocesan Convention. May 29,
181 1, he was consecrated Assistant Bishop of New
York, and upon the death of Bishop Moore in 18 16



300 History of the Christian Church.

he succeeded him as Bishop of New York. He was
greatly interested in the founding of the General
Theological Seminary, and was Professor of Pastoral
Theology from its opening until his death. There he
exercised great influence, as well as in the administra-
tion of his diocese. In 1811 there were 28 clergy in
the Dioceseof New York; in 1830, 127. In 1823-1825
he was in Europe. He published in London two vol-
umes of " Discourses Preached in America."

Bishop Hobart was the first of American High
Churchmen who greatly influenced the clergy. In
experience and spirit he was Evangelical, but would
have nothing to do with the American Bible Society;
he tried to stop the prayer-meeting at St. George's ; he
would have had no sympathy with parochial missions,
or revivals, or Young Men's Christian Associations.
His motto was " Evangelical truth and apostolic order."
Bishop Hobart was not only an able man, but a man
of the highest character. His opponent. Dr. John M.
Mason, said, " Were I compelled to intrust the safety
of my country to any one man, that man should be
John Henry Hobart." Hobart College, at Geneva,
N. Y., founded in 1825, since i860 has borne his
name.

Alexander V. Griswold (i 766-1843) had the sin-
gleness of purpose, the self-sacrifice and devotion,
which would have made him successful
^^Griswold.^' i^ any Church. His father sided with
Great Britain in the War of the Revolu-
tion, and the son was unable to complete his course
at Yale. But while there he was soundly converted.
In 1786 he was confirmed in the Protestant Episcopal
Church. He married and began the study of law,



The Christian Church in America. 301

but felt he must enter the ministry. Rough and hard
was his pathway. He must support himself and wife,
and many a night he studied, stretched on the floor
that he might use the light of the chimney fire. The
parishes he served were poor, and in the summer, in
his earlier ministry, he used to work in the fields to
help out his scanty support. His bishopric was
poorer still, and for twenty-four years from his elec-
tion he was sustained by his services as rector at
Bristol, R. I., 1811-1830; and at Salem, Mass., 1830-
1835. In 1795 he was ordained deacon and priest.
He taught school winters, and ofiiciated in Connecti-
cut parishes until 1804, when he became rector of St.
Michael's, Bristol, R. I. In 181 1 he was consecrated
Bishop of the Eastern Diocese, in which the only
strong Churches were at Boston, Providence, and
Newport. From 1838 he was the senior bishop in
the Church. Bishop Griswold did the work of an
evangelist, and there were powerful revivals under
his labors. He in large part founded his Church in
Maine, New Hampshire, Massachusetts, and Rhode
Island, and everywhere he deepened and intensified
the spiritual life. His saintly character and abundant
labors make fragrant hi« name.

Richard Channing Moore (i 762-1 841) was a reviv-
alist and Evangelical Low Churchman of the type
which would have delighted the heart of i^,chard
John Wesley. He was born in New York Channing
City of a prominent family, and had both
studied and practiced medicine before he entered the
Christian ministry. He was rector at Rye, N. Y.,
1 787-1 789. In 1789 he became rector of St. Andrew's,
Staten Island, where he remained for the next twenty



302 History of the Christian Church,

years, and his son succeeded him. His power as a
preacher here had marvelous attestation. Having one
evening preached the usual sermon, none of the hear-
ers rose to go away. A gentleman arose and said to
the rector, "None of the people are prepared to go;
they wish another sermon." The second sermon was
even more impressive than the first; the spell was
upon the people, and Dr. Moore was compelled to
preach the third sermon, and then to dismiss the people
because, if they were not exhausted physically, he was.
From 1809 to 18 14 he was rector of St. Stephen's, New
York, where the communicants rose from thirty in
number to four hundred. May 18, 18 14, at Philadel-
phia, he was consecrated Bishop of Virginia. At that
time there were only four or five active clergy in the
diocese. Bishop Moore was a fervent preacher.
Though much under the influence of Bishop Ho-
bart, he believed in prayer-meetings, and was an
earnest revivalist. Bishop Moore worked with the
American Bible Society, and founded the Theological
Seminary at Alexandria, Va. Bishop Moore was op-
posed to the Oxford Movement. His monument was
the reconstructed Church in the Old Dominion, with
nearly 100 clergy and 170 churches at his death.

Even more strange it seems to find among Episco-
palian bishops John Stark Ravenscroft (i 772-1 830).
He left William and Mary College in 1789;
RavenSroft. ^^^^ Went to Scotland. He was not con-
verted until he was thirty-eight years old.
He was a local elder among the Republican Method-
ists. He did not become a deacon until the age of
forty-five. At fifty-one he was made Bishop of North
Carolina. In his preaching, as in his experience, he



The Christian Church in America. 303

was a strong Evangelical. He preached the law so
that one of his hearers said to him, "O, sir, you have
made me feel as I never did before ; God is greatly to
be feared." He was respected for his rigor and ear-
nestness in spite of his brusqueness, but was a thorough
High Churchman. He found four churches in his
diocese, and left twenty-seven.

The pioneer bishop of the Protestant Episcopal
Church of this time was Philander Chase (i 775-1851).
Bishop Chase was born in Vermont and
educated at Dartmouth College. While ''ch^f.^'
there he became an Episcopalian. In 1798
he was ordained deacon. He then went to Western
New York, and founded Churches in Utica, Auburn,
and Canandaigua. From 1805 to 181 1 he was rector in
New Orleans; from 181 1 to 1817, at Hartford, Conn.
In 18 18 he removed to Salem, Ohio. There were then
five Episcopal clergymen in the State. They elected
Chase their bishop, and he was consecrated J'ebruary
II, 18 19. In 1824 he went to England and raised
funds for his college. With the $20,000 thus obtained
he founded Kenyon College, at Gambler, Ohio. Both
the college and the town bear the names of English
noblemen who became patrons of his enterprise.
Bishop Chase was president of the college from its
birth in 182 1 until 1831, when a difference with the
trustees led to his resignation of his bishopric and his
relations to the college. For the next few years he
was a farmer and missionary in Michigan, and then
removed to Illinois. In 1835 three clergymen met
and elected him Bishop of Illinois. The same year
he again went to England, and returned with $10,000
for his Jubilee College. In 1839 he visited the South



304 History of the Christian Church,

on the same errand and was successful in putting the
institution on its feet. He was the first bishop of two
great States and founded two colleges. The Episco-
palians of Connecticut founded Trinity College, Hart-
ford, in 1824. In 1800 there were in the Protestant
Episcopal Church 320 congregations, 264 clergy, and
11,978 communicants. In 1850 the numbers rose to
1,350 churches, 1,595 clergy, and 89,359 communi-
cants.

The Methodist Episcopai, Church.

The best organized and disciplined, and the most
thoroughly effective and aggressive, Evangelical Chris-
tian Church in America in this half century was the
Methodist Episcopal Church. It was the child of the
Evangelical Revival of the previous century, and was
true to the traditions of its parentage. Its itinerant
ministry was the most effective form of pioneer evan-
gelism the Christian Church had yet seen. It made
the best use of, and secured the largest results from,
an uneducated ministry that a Church has ever known.
At its head was Francis Asbury, who, as a pioneer
missionary and bishop, made a record of labors, hard-
ships, and achievement which has never been surpassed.
His devoted piety, heroic endurance, and thorough dis-
cipline, and yet, withal, thorough Americanism, im-
pressed itself upon the preachers and membership of
the infant Church. Undoubtedly he was autocratic,
and no man in our day should have the power in
the Christian Church that Asbury possessed ; but in
spite of almost insurmountable obstacles he held the
Church together, and laid the foundation of all further
progress. No bishop of any Church in America has in-
spired the reverence with which men regarded Francis



The Christian Church in America. 305

Asbury. In his forty-five years of labor in America
the membership had increased from 600 to 2 1 1 ,000.
He traveled 270,000 miles, preached 16,000 sermons,
and ordained 4,000 preachers.

The era of Asburian evangelism may be said to
have closed in 1820. In this period the Book Con-
cern, established in 1789, and removed to New York
in 1804, flourished, and thus raised the intellectual
life of both preachers and people. The Sunday-school
movement, which had begun in America under As-
bury in 1786, and which was recommended by the
Annual Conferences in 1790, spread with the progress
of the Church. Jesse Lee, Freeborn Garrettson, and
William McKendree, with Joshua Soule and Nathan
Bangs, were the strong men of the Church in these
days. It was a period of fervid evangelism. The
great revival of 1 800-1 805 was followed by those of
1 807-1 808 and 1 8 15-18 16, which were general through-
out the country. But with the Methodist itinerants,
each was a revivalist, and each year was a revival year.
There were degrees of success, of course ; but this
was the rule. In these years the great question fo*-
the future of the Church was the Constitution of tht
Delegated General Conference. The plan was drawn
up by Joshua Soule, assisted by William McKendree.
It encountered, and seemed likely to be shattered by,
the opposition of Jesse Lee ; but by a concession he
was won, and the first General Conference, the supreme
legislative and judicial body of the Church, and the
body which elects the bishops and to whom the whole
Episcopate is responsible, began its sessions in 1812.
This act marked the passage of the Methodists in
America from a society, or sect, or denomination, to
20



3o6 History of the Christian Church.

a Church, with full powers of discipline, legislation,
and expansion. The General Conference sat under
Restrictive Rules which provided that it should not
change the Articles of Religion nor the General Rules,
nor do away with Episcopacy or the itinerancy, nor
abolish the right of trial and appeal of accused preach-
ers or members, nor appropriate the produce of the
Book Concern or of the Chartered Fund except for
the benefit of the preachers or their families. Each
General Conference could fix the ratio of representa-
tion, which was at first one in five members in full
connection of the Annual Conferences. These restric-
tions could be changed by the vote of the Annual
Conferences, concurred in by a two-thirds vote of the
General Conference. V/ithin these very wide limits
the General Conference had full legislative power and
discretion in the Church. Until 1872 it was composed
solely of ministerial delegates from the Annual Con-
ferences. In 1872 lay delegates were admitted. In
1900 they were equal in numbers with the clerical
delegates, and in 1901 a Constitution was adopted
which still further defines and limits the action of the
General Conference. The Constitution can be changed
by the vote of two-thirds of the Annual and Lay Elec-
toral Conferences and two-thirds of the General Con-
ference. The General Conference meets in May every
four years.

In these years the subject of slavery was present

at each General Conference. In 1808 all matter in

the Discipline against private members

holding slaves was stricken out. In 1804

preachers were forbidden to hold slaves; but North

Carolina, South Carolina, and Georgia were excepted



The Christian Church in America. 307

from the rule. In 181 2 the question of slavery was
left to the Annual Conferences.

lu these years also came a division of the Church
on the color-line. In 1793, Richard Allen, a colored
layman, erected at his own cost the Bethel African
African Church in Philadelphia. In June, Methodist
1799, Bishop Asbury ordained Allen a dea- c*'"''*^'*^^-
con, the first ordination of a colored man to the Chris-
tian ministry in the United States. In 1800 the col-
ored people of New York built the Zion Church. In
18 1 6 the African Methodist Episcopal Church was
organized, and held its first General Conference.
Richard Allen was elected its first Bishop.

In New York, in 18 17, the African Methodist
Episcopal Zion Church was organized.

In 181 2 the General Conference refused to forbid
local and other preachers to sell intoxicat-

^ Temperance.

mg liquors, and postponed the considera-
tion of lotteries. In 181 6 the General Conference for-
bade preachers to sell liquor.

The Church spread rapidly in these years ; it was
soon planted in Upper and Lower Canada in 1802-
1804; and in Indiana in 1802, in Illinois Extension
in 1807, Methodist preachers began their of the
work. The pastoral term of itinerants in
1804 was made two years, and such it continued to be
until 1864. In 18 1 6 a course of study was marked
out for those desiring to enter the itinerancy. Meth-
odism had always been a missionary organization.
Missionaries were sent to the West Indies in 1786,
but the American Methodists organized their Mission-
ary Society in 1819. In 1800, Richard Whatcoat
( 1 736-1 806) was elected bishop. In 1808, William



3o8 History of the Christian Church.

McKendree (i 757-1 835) was chosen to the same
office. In 1816, Enoch George (1767-1828) and Rob-
ert R. Roberts (1778-1843) were elected bishops.

In 1820 it became evident to many that the
Church must have her schools. In 181 8, Wilbur

Fisk had said there is not an institution of
^n ^830.^^ learning in American Methodism. Asbury

had tried, but every attempt ended in a
failure. Not only did Cokesbury College, at Abing-
don, burn down, but also Asbury College, at Balti-
more. Ebenezer and Bethel Schools in Virginia and
in Kentucky failed of permanent success. In 181 8,
Wesleyan Academy was founded at New Market,
N. H., but failed to win a permanent foundation;
in 1826 it opened at Wilbraham, Mass., under Wilbur
Fisk, and began a career of great prosperity and use-
fulness.

In 1822, Augusta College, Kentucky, was founded,
the first of Methodist colleges to receive a charter. In

1824, Cazenovia Seminary, in New York, was founded,
and Kent's Hill, in Maine, in 1827. With these early
schools came the establishment of the Methodist peri-
odical press ; Ziori's Herald was founded at Boston in

1825, and The Christian Advocate in New York in

1826, The Sunday-school Union was organized in
1827.

The chief controversy of these decades arose over

the question debated in every General Conference,

whether presiding elders should be elected.

Election of The ablest men in the Church advocated

Presiding ^\^^ measure. In 1812 it was lost by a ma-

Elders. . . - ^ .

jority of five ; in 18 16 the majority against
it was eighteen. In 1820 the vote for it was sixty-



The Christian Church in America. 309

one; that against it twenty-five. Joshua Soule de-
clared it unconstitutional, and declined ordination to
the Episcopacy because of this action. Bishop Mc-
Kendree held the same views. On account of this
opposition, this legislation was suspended. In 1824,
after an active canvass, the resolution to elect pre-
siding elders was lost by a majority of two. What-
ever be our opinion as to the merits of the question,
there is no doubt that the General Conference had
power to make this change, and that Soule and Mc-
Kendree were wrong in this ground for their opposi-
tion. In 1824, Joshua Soule and Elijah Hedding
were elected bishops.

The action of the General Conference in regard to
the election of presiding elders, and the position
assumed on the question by Bishop Soule,

,• • r • T Tv/r o - Methodist

caused just dissatisfaction. In May, 1827, Protestants,
was formed the " Associate Methodist Re-
formers," who became the Methodist Protestant
Church, November 2, 1830. The leaders were Nicho-
las Snethen, Alexander McCaine, and Asa Shinn.
They desired a Church in which laymen should be
represented in Annual and General Conferences, and
they had no desire for presiding elders or bishops.