History of the Church of the United Brethren in Christ by Daniel Berger, Part 1, Chapter 16

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History of the Church of the United Brethren in Christ

by Daniel Berger

CHAPTER XVI

THE GENERAL CONFERENCES OP 1845 AND 1849

I. EXTENDING THE BOUNDARIES.

^p.279 The period from 1841 forward marks a rapid expansion of the Church, especially in the newer regions westward. In all of the conferences, now nine in number, there was much activity, but some of them were reaching out into districts far beyond their original limits. The Wabash Conference, for example, which, at its organization in 1835, embraced all of northern Indiana, was now extending its boundaries until it included all of the State of Illinois, with outposts in Iowa and Wisconsin. Starting with twelve ministers and six charges, it reported in 1842 fifty preachers, thirteen applicants for license, and some twenty circuits and missions. So earnestly was the work pressed forward that in the year 1842 there were reported net gains in membership amounting to two thousand one hundred and forty-four. At the session of the Sandusky Conference for the same year there appeared fifteen applicants for license to preach. The number of ministers in this conference had advanced in ten years from twenty-five to sixty-one. Revival meetings of great power were occurring in many places, and large numbers were being added to the Church. -This expansion of the work was largely encouraged by the organization of local or home missionary societies within a number of the annual conferences. These societies were preparing the way for the formation of the central and more far-reaching ^p.280 organization, the Home, Frontier, and Foreign Missionary Society, in 1853. The previous provision of the General Conference for the organization of a general missionary society, already referred to, had proved ineffectual, while the work of local organization continued. These local societies, by providing means for the extension of home and frontier work, proved very efficient in pushing the work into regions where the name of the United Brethren Church had not before been heard of.

Up to this time, and for some years later, no general statistics of the Church were preserved, the neglect growing out of a traditional feeling that Zion should not be numbered. The number of ministers and of circuits or charges was kept. A table prepared by Bishop Hanby from the reports for 1845 shows that in the five years preceding there was an advance from three hundred and eighty-seven ministers to five hundred and eighty-one, an increase of one hundred and ninety-four, and in charges from ninety to one hundred and eighty, the number being just doubled.¹ The lay membership, as estimated by the best authorities, was about thirty thousand.

II. THE NINTH GENERAL CONFERENCE—1845.

The General Conference of 1845 gave attention chiefly to such routine business as comes up at any session, but it also gave proof of a progressive spirit, as will presently be seen. The conference was held at Circleville, Ohio, commencing on May 10. The nine annual conferences were represented by twenty-four delegates. The list of names shows a number of strong men as members of this conference. In addition to the Kumlers, father and son, as bishops, we find the names of Russel, of Pennsylvania, and Glossbrenner and Markwood, of Virginia, all of whom ^p.281 became bishops, each giving great distinction to the office. Another member from Virginia was J. Bachtel, one of the most courageous men who ever stood with a small minority in defense of principles in which he believed. From Muskingum Conference was Alexander Biddle, the only surviving member of this General Conference, as also of the historic conference of 1841. From Scioto were E. Vandemark and Joshua Montgomery; from Miami, George Bonebrake; from Indiana, Henry Bonebrake. All of these men were accounted as "giants in those days," and some of them for many years afterward.

This conference has the distinction of being the first to lead in the encouragement of education in the Church. A resolution was adopted, providing that suitable measures be devised for the establishment of an institution of learning, and commending the subject to the favorable attention of the annual conferences. This resolution, after full discussion, was happily adopted by a nearly unanimous vote. The subject will be found more fully referred to in an appropriate place in this volume.

In its election of general church officers this conference made radical changes. On counting the ballots for bishops it was found that an entirely new board had been elected, namely, J. J. Glossbrenner, John Russel, and William Hanby. David Edwards, afterward Bishop Edwards, succeeded Mr. Hanby as editor of the Religious Telescope, and the paper was ordered to be issued weekly.

An important step was taken in providing a course of reading for licentiates in the ministry. This was the beginning of what has since grown into a very complete system of study, and of inestimable value in the equipping of young men for the broadening requirements of the ministerial office.

Four new conferences were authorized—the East ^p.282 Pennsylvania, the Illinois, the St. Joseph, and the Iowa, and provision was made for the division of the Indiana.

The General Conference of 1841 had requested some of the older ministers then living to furnish to a committee, consisting of C. Smith, J. Erb, and J. Russel, "all the facts in their possession in relation to the rise, etc., of the United Brethren in Christ in America," the committee being charged with the duty of preparing from the materials so furnished a history of the Church. The movement seems to have resulted in complete failure, and at the General Conference of 1845 the subject was brought up again. The conference then appointed Henry G. Spayth to undertake the work. With many advantages in his favor, Mr. Spayth found the task by no means an easy one. After some delay he set about the work, and, finally, in January, 1850, he completed his manuscript. Careful revision followed, and the history was issued in 1851. Every student of this work will be impressed with its great value as an early and trustworthy source of materials for United Brethren history. With his education chiefly in the German language, Mr. Spayth's style is frequently found defective, and one could wish that some things had been given more fully. But the work proves the possession on his part not only of extensive knowledge of the subjects treated, but a discriminating grasp of the causes which led up to the founding of the Church and its subsequent development through the early part of the present century.

III. THE TENTH GENERAL CONFERENCE—1849.

The tenth General Conference convened at Germantown, in Montgomery County, Ohio, on May 14, 1849. Thirty-seven delegates, representing thirteen conferences, were in attendance. The presiding bishops were Russel, Glossbrenner, and Hanby.

^p.283 Aside from the usual business pertaining to any General Conference, including the election of general officers, only a single subject awakened much interest. This was the subject of secret societies, destined not many years afterward to acquire so large a place in the counsels of the Church. In 1833 the rule against Freemasonry had been adopted by the General Conference. Since then the subject had rested in quiet, except in 1841, when the prohibition clause against secret combinations was adopted as a part of the Constitution. Some minor orders, especially the Sons of Temperance, had now grown into prominence. A considerable number of the younger people of the Church had become connected with the latter order, generally in the belief that as Freemasonry was particularly named in the law incorporated in the Discipline, connection with the Sons of Temperance was not prohibited. An ordinance intended to cover the entire field of secret combinations was offered by Caleb W. Witt, of the White River Conference, in the words:

Freemasonry, in every sense of the word, shall be totally prohibited, and there shall be no connection with secret combinations (a secret combination is one whose initiatory ceremony or bond of union is a secret); and any member found connected with such a society shall be affectionately admonished twice or thrice by the preacher in charge, and if such member does not desist in a reasonable time he shall be notified to appear before the tribunal to which he is amenable; and if he still refuses to desist he shall be expelled from the Church.

The motion to adopt this measure into the Discipline led to a long and almost wholly one-sided discussion. The members earnestly opposing the adoption were Jacob Bachtel and Jacob Markwood. Mr. Markwood, afterward bishop, later assumed radical grounds against secret orders, while Mr. Resler, who here spoke and voted for adoption, was one of the earliest and most vigorous among the ^p.284 liberals. The ordinance was adopted by a vote of thirty-three to two, Markwood and Bachtel voting nay. Burtner and Rhinehart asked to be excused from voting. Thus the General Conference entered upon the more severely restrictive legislation which was subsequently followed by so strong a reaction.

At this conference David Edwards was first called to the episcopal service, the work to which the remainder of his life was given. Bishops Glossbrenner and Erb were reelected, the latter after having been out of the office for four years. Bishop Hanby was again returned to the Religious Telescope; David Strickler was continued on the Fröhliche Botschafter, and Nehemiah Altman, who had served during the previous term under appointment by the board of trustees, was elected publishing agent. Mr. Altman was a Jew by birth. His conversion to the Christian faith occurred at Lewisburg, Ohio. He entered the ministry soon after, and his abilities, united with energy and vigilance, soon came to be recognized. After his connection with the Publishing House ceased, he removed east, became a member of the Pennsylvania Conference, and did efficient service as a pastor, his principal work being done in the city of Baltimore.

The conference remained in session twelve days.

IV. PERSONAL NOTES.

1. J. J. Glossbrenner, D.D.

Among the bishops elected by the General Conference of 1845 was one whose name must ever stand as one of the most eminent in the first century of the Church, that of Jacob John Glossbrenner. Bishop Glossbrenner was born in Hagerstown, Maryland, on July 24, 1812, and was of German descent. His parents were ^p.285 members of the Lutheran Church, and the baptism and early training of their children were in that denomination. The father died when Jacob was in his seventh year, and the mother was left with the care of four children, ranging in age from four to eleven. The sons, as soon as they were old enough, were put to learning trades, Jacob being apprenticed to a silversmith and watchmaker in Hagerstown when he was fourteen years of age. He was converted at the age of seventeen, under the preaching of William R. Rhinehart, then a young presiding elder in the Hagerstown, or original, Conference, and joined the United Brethren Church. He was appointed soon after as leader for a class of young persons, mostly about his own age, and in this work he devoted much time to the study of the Scriptures, acquiring thus early that habit of close Scripture study which characterized all his life. In the spring of 1830, at a camp-meeting in "Washington County, when he was in his eighteenth year, he was surprised by being handed a license to exhort. The license was signed by Rev. George A. Guething, son of Rev. George A. Guething, the friend of Otterbein. Mr. Guething told him he might also preach as opportunity offered, or his older brethren desired him. A year later, the Virginia Conference having then been formed by division of the original conference, he attended the session of that body, in Shenandoah County, Virginia, and became one of its members. Thus in the nineteenth year of his age began the ministerial career of a young man who was destined to fill so illustrious a place in the labors and the growth of the Church during the half century which followed, a career which was not to be interrupted for a single year until the Master called him to his great reward. After three years of service as a circuit preacher he was chosen, then in his twenty-second year, to the office ^p.286 of presiding elder, which position he filled for four consecutive years. From the beginning he gave large promise of the eminence to which he attained as a preacher. He rose rapidly in success and acceptance with the people. In 1837 he was elected to the General Conference, and again in 1841 and 1845. He was thus a member of the two General Conferences by which the Constitution of the Church was formed. When chosen to the office of bishop he was in the thirty-third year of his age. Thus his more direct labors for his own conference, for which he cherished to the end of his life the tenderest regard, were suddenly brought to a close, while he entered upon that broader field which gave his service to the entire denomination.

There are two aspects of Bishop Glossbrenner's life which have in a special sense left a permanent impression. One of these relates to his character as a presiding officer. Here he rose to a height but rarely attained. It would be difficult to find, either in ecclesiastical or civil life, a finer development of the qualities requisite to the head of an assembly than was possessed by Bishop Glossbrenner. In presiding over conferences, and especially the General Conferences, he was ever on the alert, so that nothing ever escaped his attention. He possessed a calm poise and power of control which never forsook him, and in the multiplication of motions, of every class, following in quick succession, and in the peculiar intricacies of business which sometimes arise, he was never confused. His rulings on parliamentary questions were clear, strong, and just, so that doubt as to their correctness rarely found expression. In the discussion of issues where members were sharply divided into parties, his own preferences were never manifested while he sat in the chair, and all speakers were treated with the utmost impartiality. If he felt that he ought to express his sentiments on any particular issue, ^p.287 he did so after the vote was taken, giving the conference the benefit of his judgment and counsel.

The second aspect in which Bishop Glossbrenner rose to an unusual eminence was in his character as a preacher. It was in the pulpit that his extraordinary powers found their freest play. His sermons, thoroughly prepared in all their details, though extemporaneously delivered, were models of compactness and strength. Never were sermons preached that abounded more richly in appropriate Scripture quotation, or conveyed more forcibly the great truths of the inspired Word. Dr. Drury, in his "Life of Bishop J. J. Glossbrenner, D.D.," says: "It is not too much to say that he was recognized by persons of all degrees of culture as one of the grandest preachers of the gospel that our land has produced. Once having preached a dedicatory sermon, a number of ministers of other churches being present, a very clerical and able Episcopal minister became so excited over the grand scriptural sermon of Bishop Glossbrenner that he rushed up to the pastor of the United Brethren congregation, saying: 'It is wonderful, wonderful, indeed! Never has there been such preaching since the days of St. Paul. That man ought to be set up somewhere as a model for all other preachers to copy!'"²

In his private and social life Bishop Glossbrenner possessed qualities that made him ever a welcome guest and companion in the homes of the people among whom so large a part of his time was necessarily spent. Warm, genial, kind, sometimes indulging in humor, but always discreet and eminently Christian, he was everywhere received with open doors and open hearts. He knew well also how to enter into the afflictions and sorrows of others. A lady of wide experience remarked of him that the ^p.288 sweetest, tenderest, most sympathetic prayer she ever heard uttered in the sick-room was by Bishop Glossbrenner, his great, warm heart pouring itself out in fervent supplication in behalf of the sick one.

On the attitude of the Church toward secret organizations he was properly classed with the liberals, always doubting the wisdom of extreme legislation, but supporting the law in his administration.

During the period of the War of the Rebellion Bishop Glossbrenner was prevented from attending to the duties of his district. Residing within the lines of the Confederate armies, he was subjected to all the strict necessities laid upon non-combatants. He might have come north during the earlier stages, but he chose to remain—wisely, as the event proved—with the Church in Virginia, to do what he could to prevent the flock from becoming scattered. His prudent demeanor, both as to speech and acts, enabled him to do this, and thus to render to the Church during those stormy days an invaluable service. He was generally believed by the Confederate officers to be in sympathy with the Union cause, but as he gave no direct offense he was left undisturbed, and was even sometimes asked to preach to the Confederate soldiers. He had the fullest confidence and respect of General Stonewall Jackson and other leaders of the Confederate armies. Near the close of 1863 he applied to the Confederate authorities for a pass to come north, to visit the spring session of the Pennsylvania Conference, as also the northern half of the Virginia Conference. A pass was issued to him by Jefferson Davis, at the request of Colonel Baldwin, then in the Confederate Congress. The only restriction laid upon him was that he should reveal nothing as to the strength or location of the Confederate armies. The delays he met prevented him from reaching the Pennsylvania Conference in time for ^p.289 its session. He spent a while among friends at Chambersburg and elsewhere, and then, receiving a pass from Major-General Couch, commander of the department of the Susquehanna, he returned to Virginia. The same restrictions were laid upon him by General Couch as on the Confederate side when he came north. Near the close of the War, in the spring of 1865, Bishop Glossbrenner came north again to attend the General Conference at Western, Iowa. Previous suspicions that he had been disloyal to the Union were here repeated by some, and the bishop declined to preside over the conference until his loyalty could be vindicated. He was invited by the conference to make a personal statement at an hour named. His defense of his course, and his deep earnestness and manifest sincerity, taken in connection with all his past record for integrity and honor, completely swept the conference. A strong resolution of confidence and approval was then offered by a member, and was carried by the nearly unanimous vote of the conference, only two members being found to dissent.

A long period of service was, in the providence of God, allotted to Bishop Glossbrenner. He lived to a ripe old age, and for ten quadrenniums, or fully forty years, he was in the active superintendency. They were years of toilsome labors, of extensive travels, of great efficiency, and abounding fruits. But old age came at last, and the time when the laborer must rest. The General Conference of 1885, at Fostoria, Ohio, on account of his failing strength, did not think it wise to impose on him further the duties of an active bishop, but, unwilling that after so long and honorable a career he should die out of the harness, it created for him the office of bishop emeritus. He was then elected to this office by an almost unanimous vote, only two members dissenting.

During the quadrennium just past he had been bereft ^p.290 of his faithful wife, who for more than fifty years had walked by his side, and now the time was approaching when he, too, should pass over the river. His growing infirmities increased upon him, and toward the close of the year 1886 it became apparent that the end was drawing near. His home during a good part of his life was at Churchville, Augusta County, Virginia, and here after the death of his wife he lived with his son-in-law. Here he was visited by many of the ministers and friends from near and far. Among the visits which he most appreciated was that of his long-time friend, Mr. John Dodds, of Dayton, Ohio, who made the trip to Virginia expressly to see him once more. To him he said, "If I could preach again, just once more, I would preach Jesus; I would preach from his words to the disciples on the Sea of Galilee, 'It is I; be not afraid.'" Afterward he said, "My title is clear, not because I have preached the gospel, but alone through the love and mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ." Dr. Drury, in relating this, continues: "After Mr. Dodds had bidden him good-bye, leaving him lying in his bed, quiet, but deeply affected, he started to leave the house. The family also stepped outside. Looking back, they saw the bishop standing near the door, having gotten out of bed unassisted. With hand uplifted and streaming eyes he said: ' Brother Dodds, tell the brethren it is all right. My home is over there.'"

The end came on January 7, 1887, when he calmly fell asleep. His age was seventy-four years, five months, and thirteen days. For fifty-six years he had been a minister, and forty-two years a bishop, and so remarkably was health sustained during this long period that not a single year was' lost from active work. His remains were laid to rest on January 11 in the cemetery at Churchville. Bishop Weaver, agreeably to the request of Bishop Glossbrenner, ^p.291 preached the funeral sermon, paying a tender and eloquent tribute to the memory of his departed associate.

It is more than an ordinary delight to linger over this grand and beautiful life, but the necessary limitations of this sketch forbid further extension. The reader is referred to the admirable Life of Bishop Glossbrenner, by Prof. A. W. Drury, D.D.

2. John Russel.

Another strong man elected by this conference to the office of bishop, a typical pioneer of the early days, was John Russel (in the original German, Roszel). Mr. Russel was born on March 18, 1799, at Pipe Creek, Maryland, one of the places near Baltimore which Bishop Otterbein often visited, and where his grandfather, an immigrant from Germany, was converted under Otterbein's preaching. His parents were devout in their religious life, and he was brought up under the most careful instruction. He was converted at an early age, and soon was found, at the request of his brethren, leading meetings, and delivering earnest spiritual exhortations, though without any thought of the future work which awaited him. When he was approaching young manhood, he was apprenticed to a blacksmith, learned the smith's trade, and was afterward provided by his father with a set of tools to carry on the business. It was not long, however, until he realized that the Lord had other work for him. With his father's consent the forge and hammer were abandoned, and he started for a conference which was held in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania. Here he was licensed to preach, Bishop Newcomer signing his credentials. All the East being still included in one conference district, the bishop took him with him to Virginia, where he started him on a circuit. He was then in his nineteenth year, with but ^p.292 limited education and experience, but with his heart aflame with the great theme which he brought to the people. His second year was in Pennsylvania, his circuit again being large, and appointments often difficult to reach. When his horse broke down, he was nothing daunted, but continued his long journeys on foot. The third year, being then twenty years of age, he responded to the calls for ministers from what was then still thought of as the "far west," and came to Ohio. He joined the Miami Conference, and was appointed to his first charge in the district which afterward became the Scioto Conference. Here he toiled industriously as a circuit preacher and presiding elder, after the true pioneer manner, until he was called east to become pastor of the Otterbein Church. He preached with equal facility in the German and English languages, frequently repeating a sermon in German if it was first preached in English, or in English if it was first in German. Often he read a text first in one language and then in the other, and next announced the divisions of his sermon in both, then following with one division in both languages, and so on alternately to the end.

Mr. Russel was twice elected to the general superintendency of the Church. He was first a delegate to the General Conference of 1833, then of 1841, taking part in the framing of the Constitution of the Church. He was again a member in 1845, and by that conference was elected bishop. Retiring from the office after one term of four years, he was again chosen in 1857, this time to superintend especially the German work. He again served one term.

In person Bishop Russel was tall, straight, strongly built, and of dark complexion. He wore his hair combed straight back over his high, arching brow, letting it fall well down toward his shoulders. His carriage, manner of ^p.293 address, and general bearing all indicated a man much above the average—a man, indeed, born to rule. He was firm in his convictions, did not easily let go a principle he once fully espoused, and yet was open to the light of advanced ideas.

Mr. Russel was among the first to see the necessity for a publishing house for the Church, was a member of the first board of trustees appointed to originate it, and so sincerely did he give himself to its support that he sold his property to obtain money to get the enterprise started, loaning to it the proceeds of the sale on long time and at low interest. In 1840 he began to publish, in Baltimore, a German monthly periodical called Die Geschäftige Martha, which, in 1841, was merged into the official German paper established by the General Conference. To the cause of education he was for many years less friendly, fearing that colleges, if built by the Church, would become what were then frequently called "preacher factories." It is related that a former president of Lebanon Valley College, with the view of enlisting the Germans of eastern Pennsylvania in the support of the college, invited Bishop Russel to visit the institution and preach a sermon. In due time the bishop came, and preached a sermon from the words, "Das Wissen bläset auf" ("Knowledge puffeth up"). The sermon was so effective in the opposite direction from what the president expected that in speaking of it he remarked that he would try in the future to manage the Germans without the bishop's help. On this subject, however, he materially relented toward the close of his life, so that he gave the sum of ten thousand dollars to the Pennsylvania and East Pennsylvania conferences for the purpose of educating theologically the ministerial candidates in the conferences. The gift, however, was hampered with such conditions as to make ^p.294 their fulfillment difficult. On another subject, like many others of the foremost men in the Church, he changed his attitude. In the General Conference of 1841 he assisted in putting into the Constitution the clause against connection with secret orders. He was present at the General Conference of 1869, an interested listener to the discussion of two and a half days, after which he said to a friend that "he could live very happily and contentedly in the Church if the conference should adopt the proposition of the liberals."³ Had he lived to the time of the recent conflicts, there can be little doubt that his position would have been found with Glossbrenner, Weaver, Dickson, and Castle, all of whom at one time supported the restrictive legislation of the Church.

During the later years of his life his home was with his son-in-law, a Mr. Guething, near Keedysville, and only a short distance from the great battlefield of Antietam. His house was taken for a Confederate hospital, and filled with sick and wounded soldiers. Bishop Russel remained, giving to the unfortunate men all the help he could. Age at last began to tell upon his strong frame, and the time came when he was to pass into the beyond to join the company of the immortals. His death occurred on December 21, 1870, he being in the seventy-second year of his age. Bishop Dickson preached an appropriate sermon on the funeral occasion.

Bishop Russel will long be remembered as a man of strong personality, of cheerful disposition, of ready wit, often indulging in practical jokes, as devoted to the Church, enduring in the fullest measure the privations and hardships of an early itinerant's life, and as one of the real builders in some of her interests, while honestly averse to others, and his name will remain as worthy of a high place on the roll of the eminent men of the past.

^p.295 3. William Hanby.

The third bishop elected by the General Conference of 1845 was Rev. William Hanby. Mr. Hanby was born in Washington County, Pennsylvania, on April 8, 1808. His childhood life was passed in poverty. When yet quite young he found a good home in the family of a farmer of the Society of Friends, where he remained until the age of seventeen, when he desired to learn the trade of a saddler, and was apprenticed to a man named Good. His master proved himself quite the reverse of what his name suggested, and young Hanby found his condition one of absolute slavery. At the age of twenty he came to Ohio, finding employment at the town of Somerset. At twenty-two he was converted, and soon after felt the divine impulse summoning him to the work of the ministry. In 1831, at the age of twenty-three, he was licensed to preach, and joined the Scioto Conference. His first charge, like many of that day, had nearly thirty appointments, and required four weeks to make the round, with an average of about one sermon a day. For his first year's service, with a wife to provide for, he received the sum of thirty-five dollars. But he had other and richer emoluments, for under his preaching there were converted and added to the Church that year about one hundred souls. In those days the prayer was often heard for ministers that they "might have souls for their hire." Very frequently it was almost their only compensation, but it was a reward which many having larger salaries might well covet. In 1834, the second year of his itinerant life, he was elected presiding elder, and in 1837 he was chosen a member of the General Conference, which convened at Germantown, Ohio, where he was elected general agent and treasurer of the newly organized Publishing House at Circleville. In 1839 he was elected editor of the Religious Telescope, ^p.296 its first editor, Rev. William R. Rhinehart, having resigned. In 1845 he was elected bishop. He served in this office four years, when he was again elected editor of the Religious Telescope, with duties of publisher added. In 1853 his more public connection with church service ended, but he served for many years on some of its boards, as a trustee of Otterbein University and also of the Publishing House.

Of the large family of Mr. Hanby, two, a son and a daughter, became widely known; the first, the Rev. Benjamin R. Hanby, to the musical world, through his popular songs, chiefly among them "Darling Nelly Gray," which joined a powerful influence to that of Mrs. Harriet Beecher Stowe's "Uncle Tom's Cabin," in forming that tide of anti-slavery sentiment which was finally to sweep the dark curse from our land;⁴ the other, Mrs. A. L. Billheimer, who with her husband accomplished valuable pioneer missionary work in Africa, and has since been prominently identified with the Woman's Missionary Board.

Mr. Hanby died at his home in Westerville, Ohio, on May 17, 1880, being a little past seventy-two years of age. In his closing days he gave numerous expressions showing that his trust was unshaken in the near presence of death. The last words he was heard to utter were, "I am in the midst of glory." An incident of thrilling interest which occurred not many days before his death was recalled at ^p.297 his funeral by - Rev. J. S. Mills, now Bishop Mills, then pastor of the church at Westerville. Joseph Cook had been brought to the university to deliver a lecture, and hearing of Mr. Hanby's spiritual condition, and that earlier in his life he had frequently aided slaves fleeing for their freedom, desired to call upon him. The visit was made in company with Mr. Mills and President Thompson, of the university. Mr. Mills says of the interview: Mr. Cook "listened with marked interest to the words spoken by the suffering man. He spoke of his sympathy with Mr. Cook's work in the field of Christian science [using the term in its higher sense], and expressed his happiness at being permitted to see him; at the close of which Mr. Cook said, 'I have come for your blessing,' and taking in his hands both the hands of the bishop, he reverently bowed his head while Mr. Hanby gave to him the earnest benediction, 'May the blessing of the Lord God be upon you and upon your work.' Mr. Cook responded, 'And may we meet in the city that hath foundations.' Mr. Hanby finished the quotation, 'Whose builder and maker is God.' To which the great scholar replied, 'Even so may it be.' Every one was thrilled as this Spirit-prompted ritual was uttered, and in perfect silence, which no one dared to break, the visitors passed solemnly out."⁵

A most important service was rendered to the Church by Mr. Hanby in the preparation of its history from about the year 1825, where its first historian, Mr. Spayth, left it off, down to the year 1850. It is in greatly condensed form, but has served a valuable end. Mr. Hanby was personally cognizant of much of what he wrote, and other materials were gathered from events of recent date. The book was published in 1851, in connection with Mr. Spayth's history.

^p.298 4. David Edwards, D.D.

David Edwards.

Among the strongest figures that look down to us out of the past, is that of Bishop David Edwards. It is just a little over twenty years since he was called to his reward, but he is remembered with a distinctness as of yesterday. In height a little above medium, firmly built, with shoulders sloping upward toward a strongly outlined and well-covered head, and with an earnest face and deeply-set, searching eyes, his picture is sharply photographed on the memory. In the pulpit he was a man of might, preaching sermons with a clear ring, penetrating often with keenest search the hidden things of the heart, making men fear and tremble as under the very eye of God, at other times portraying the rich things of the gospel in such glowing colors that the sermon seemed like a triumphal march.

Bishop Edwards was of Welsh birth, his early home being amid the mountains of north Wales. He was born on May 5, 1816, of an ancestry which preserved almost unchanged through centuries their strong race characteristics. From this ancestry and from the rugged hills among which his early childhood years were spent he doubtless derived in large part those sturdy qualities which so strongly marked his life. In 1821 his parents, with the family of children, came to America, remaining in Baltimore, Maryland, for two years, after which, in 1823, they removed to Delaware, Ohio. They were members of the Presbyterian Church. The father dying in 1825, David, three years later, when he was twelve years old, entered a woolen factory, to learn the trade of carding and cloth dressing. At seventeen he left home, with the benedictions of his pious mother, to find more remunerative employment in mills near Lancaster, Ohio. Here, a year subsequently, he attended a ^p.299 protracted meeting held by the United Brethren, and was soon after converted. His religious life at once came to be marked with such sincerity and earnestness that those about him saw evidences of a divine call to the work of the ministry. He was not himself a stranger to this thought, for the same feeling had been with him quite early in his life. He tells us that at the age of seven he was impressed that he would be called to be a minister, and that from that time on he sought the Lord in secret and led a moral life. In the Sunday school and under preaching he often wept and poured out his heart in prayer. Thus from his childhood the oil of the divine consecration was upon him.

On May 23, 1835, just about a year after his conversion, and when he was but a few days past nineteen years of age, he received quarterly-conference license to preach, and soon after entered regularly the itinerant work, at first as an associate with Rev. M. Ambrose, who was his pastor when his license was given. His first regular circuit had twenty-eight appointments, and required four weeks and three hundred and sixty miles of. travel for one round. His membership throughout his life was in the Scioto Conference.

Few men probably have entered upon a ministerial career with greater misgivings as to their personal fitness for the work. An exceedingly sensitive nature brought him frequently into the deepest discouragement over what he felt to be failures in the pulpit. And yet great success attended his ministry. On every charge he served, his earnest preaching wrought conviction, and large numbers were added to the Church. At Circleville, where he became pastor in 1844, the phenomenal increase in membership from one hundred and twenty-five to seven hundred and sixteen within a single year was reported. ^p.300 In 1845 he was elected to the office of presiding elder, and the General Conference which convened soon after, in May, 1845, most unexpectedly to himself, elected him editor of the Religious Telescope. Writing was never an easy task or a pleasurable employment to Bishop Edwards. Throughout his life he wrote only when a sense of duty impelled him. When he accepted the duty laid upon him by his brethren, that of editing the Religious Telescope, he took up what he felt to be an irksome task. But he undertook the work with the same profound sense of direct responsibility to God with which he preached the gospel. In his choice of subjects and in his manner of treating them, this feeling was ever present. His range of leading subjects may be regarded as somewhat circumscribed. The one subject to which he gave more thought and more discussion than to any other was that of personal holiness. Dr. L. Davis, his biographer, says:

"The great subject on which the mind and heart of Mr. Edwards were employed more than any other,—indeed more than all others,—. . . was holiness of heart and life. This was his central thought on all questions of church life and spirit. In this field, at least, he was at home. And no wonder, for it was with him a rich experience. He made the Telescope ring with this subject as it never did before nor has since. It inspired his best editorials, and governed very largely the selections made. The proclamation of the subject in his first editorial became the keynote for correspondents throughout the entire term. In a word, everything was made to bend to this one all-absorbing theme. No mind was ever more indefatigably employed, no heart ever more fully poured out, in connection with the definition and advocacy of this doctrine than were the mind and heart of David Edwards." To ^p.301 this delineation Dr. Davis adds the discriminating remark, "It is doubtful if the particular doctrine of entire sanctification has ever been stated more clearly, more profoundly, and in a way less liable to objection, than as stated by him."⁶

The sustained and earnest treatment of this subject in the editorials of the Religious Telescope by Bishop Edwards, during the four years of his editorship, had a very marked influence upon the thought of the Church. Other writers for the columns of the paper gave this subject special prominence, and many of the ministers throughout the denomination pressed it earnestly upon the attention of the people. As a result the spiritual life of the Church was greatly quickened, both in the pulpit and the pews, and it is safe to say that there was a depth of religious experience attained such as is not always witnessed in meetings held for the special promotion of holiness.

The General Conference of 1849 reelected Mr. Edwards to the office of editor. But he had wearied with the duties of writing, and promptly declined, preferring to devote himself entirely to the ministry of the word. Bishop Hanby, who had preceded him as editor, and had served four years as bishop, was then elected in his stead, and Mr. Edwards was immediately elected to the office of bishop. In this office he served with unremitting toil until his labors ceased at the call of the Master.

Bishop Edwards was a man of strong prejudices, believing intensely in whatever he espoused, yet open also to conviction to opposite views. The secret-society question loomed into great prominence during the last twenty-five years of his life, and he was found on the radical side. He was not, however, so unreasoning and unrelenting as were some, and was disposed, when the evils of excessive ^p.302 legislation became so apparent, to favor a more lenient policy. He died before the crises of 1885 and 1889 came. Had he lived to that time, there is every reason to believe that with Bishop Dickson, and many others of the best men among us, his loyalty to the Church he had so long and earnestly toiled to build up would have risen above devotion to any one principle of polity.

Bishop Edwards spent nearly the whole of his life in what was then called the West. He presided over the Ohio District, and over the districts east and west of the Mississippi River. His last appointment was to the East District, which fixed his residence during his closing years in Baltimore. He served twenty-seven years in the office of bishop, the last three on the East District, and forty-one years in the ministry. He retained his great power in the pulpit as long as his physical strength remained. He was smitten down in the ripe maturity of his great powers, his age being sixty years, one month, and one day. His death occurred in the bishop's parsonage at Baltimore, on June 6, 1876. His remains were brought to Dayton for interment, and after appropriate services were laid to rest in the beautiful Woodland Cemetery.

¹See Spayth's History, p. 289.

² Life of Glossbrenner, p. 286.

³ Pioneer Address of Prof. H. Garst, D.D., at Miami Conference session, 1896.

⁴ It is of peculiar interest to note that an expurgated edition of this popular song was prepared by the publishers for circulation in the South, those features which might offend Southern feeling being carefully eliminated. The song had an immense sale, equaled, it was said, by only one other song ever published. It could be heard sung in almost every home in the North, and widely in its altered form throughout the South. Both the words and the music were Mr. Hanby's production. Mr. Hanby was a graduate of Otterbein University, and a preacher for a few years of brilliant promise, when failing health and death ended his career. This reference to his song is justified by the fact of its large influence, through its tender and pathetic power, in molding the sentiment of the people of the North on the character of slavery as an institution in our national life.

⁵ Thompson's Our Bishops, p. 359.

⁶ Life of Bishop David Edwards, D.D., by Lewis Davis, D.D., pp. 78, 79.



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