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bourhood, which are also used for Sunday-schools; so that our own people are now most agreeably accommodated, and an encouraging sphere of usefulness is opened before us.

The three Wesleyan chapels in Bath stand in a triangular position; and whether considered in relation to each other, or to the inhabitants of the whole city, they could not possibly be in better situations.

The good feeling of our society and friends has been strongly marked on this occasion. The collections made at the several services amounted to upwards of £54, notwithstanding that the usual

METHODIST EPISCOPAL THE Minutes of the Twenty-two Annual Conferences of the Methodist Episcopal Church in the United States of America have just come to hand; from

CONFERENCES.

Pittsburgh

Quarterly Collection was made on the preceding Sunday, when the Preachers mentioned a debt due to the CircuitStewards, and the collections that day in the two chapels amounted to £70. Since that time the Trustees have called their friends together to consult on the best method of reducing the debt on Walcot chapel £1000; and subscriptions to the amount of nearly £600 were immediately raised. May their liberal exertions be abundantly rewarded in the prosperity of their own souls, and in the success of that cause to which they have so generously contributed! THOMAS ROGERS.

Dec. 17th, 1834.

CHURCH IN AMERICA.
which it appears that the increase in the
societies, during the past year, is THIRTY-

NINE THOUSAND AND FORTY-EIGHT.

The following is the GENERAL RECAPITULATION. Whites. Col. Ind's. Total. 34,978 285 35.263 58,145 502 217 58,864

Tr.Preachers. Super'd.

135

6

Ohio

179

19

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6

3

3

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Increase this year.... 34,120 4,681 247

The reader will perceive that this is 20,035 less than the number reported in the Minutes of last year; as there was a mistake of that a nount, which was not discovered until too late to correct it.

SALISBURY WESLEYAN MISSIONARY COMMITTEE.

IN consequence of some misunderstandings, calculated to be prejudicial to the interests of the Wesleyan Missionary Society in this Circuit, arising from the misrepresentations of certain factious

publications, the Committee of the Salisbury Wesleyan Missionary Society, at a Meeting held December 11, 1834, after a candid and deliberate investigation of the facts of the case, being fully persuaded

2458 167

2232 168

39,048

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that the accusations and suspicions so invidiously circulated relative to the misappropriation of the Mission funds are utterly unfounded, and tend to unsettle the minds of the unwary, as well as to impede the progress of the work of God, unanimously resolve,

1. That this Meeting views with deep and painful regret the unprincipled and wieked attempts which are made in various parts of our Connexion to weaken the confidence of the [public in those respectable Gentlemen and Preachers who form the Committee for the management of the affairs of the Wesleyan Missions, to impair the funds of the Connexion generally, and the Missionary fund in particular.

2. That this Meeting regards with entire satisfaction the manner in which the Wesleyan Missionary Committee have hitherto conducted the multifarious and important operations of this Society, especially their wise and economical appropriation of its funds.

3. That this Meeting cordially approves of the Resolution of the Committee to avail themselves of the advantages offered by the establishment of a Theological Institution, as affording a more eligible and less expensive mode of preparing Missionary Candidates for foreign stations than any heretofore within their reach.

4. That this Meeting reposes the most implicit and cheerful confidence in the General Committee; regarding their respectability, piety, disinterestedness, their long-tried zeal in the cause of Missions, and the success which has crowned their faithful and unwearied devotedness to this cause in time past, as affording the most unexceptionable pledge of the rectitude and integrity of their future measures. And the Committee of the Salisbury Wesleyan Missionary Society gladly avail themselves of an opportunity of expressing their Christian sympathy for those calumniated individuals whose long and invaluable services in the cause of Missions, and of the Wesleyan Connexion, entitle them to the admiration and gratitude of every member of the Methodist body. And they hereby express their determination to stand by a cause so dear to their hearts, and men so honoured of God; and to increase, if possible, their efforts in promoting the funds of the Missionary Society.

5. That these Resolutions be printed, (without expense to the Missionary fund,) and circulated in the Circuit and District; and that the Editor of the WesleyanMethodist Magazine be requested to in sert them in the January Number of that periodical, and in the Missionary Notices.

FUNDS OF THE METHODIST CONNEXION.
THE attempt made by a number of
misguided men in Manchester and Liver-
pool, to persuade the Methodists through-
out the kingdom to withhold their con-
tributions from the general funds of the
Connexion, as a means of subverting the
established discipline and order of the
body, has called forth a strong and gene-
ral feeling of indignation both from the
Preachers and the lay-members of the
society; and we are greatly mistaken if
this iniquitous attempt to arrest the pro-
gress of the work of God, both at home
and on the Mission stations, and to de-
prive widows, and orphans, and worn-out
Ministers, of bread, will not call forth,
in the ensuing year, unexampled liberali-
ty for the furtherance of those holy ob-
jects which Methodism has ever had in
view. Many admirable Declarations of
attachment to the cause, and of a deter-
mination to support it, have been pub-
lished by different Circuits and Districts;
and it is but justice to the Methodist socie-
ties in the towns just mentioned, to state,
that no person of leading influence and
established character has identified him-

self with the agitators and revolutionists,
whose conduct has been so disgraceful to
Christianity. Some of the well-meaning
people, who had been misled by soft
words and fair speeches, have already
seen and acknowledged their error, and
have returned to their former religious
friends; and many others, in all probabi-
lity, will soon follow their example. The
following document, with the signatures
affixed to it, is worthy of being placed
upon permanent record.-Edit.
THE DECLARATION OF MEMBERS OF

THE COMMITTEES APPOINTED BY
THE WESLEYAN-METHODIST CON-
FERENCE, TO SUPERINTEND THE
MANAGEMENT OF THE GENERAL
FUNDS OF THE CONNEXION, IN
REFERENCE ΤΟ THE PROCEED-
INGS AND AVOWED OBJECTS OF
AN ASSOCIATION STYLING ITSELF
66
THE GRAND CENTRAL ASSOCIA-

TION," &c., &c.

AT a meeting of the London members of the General Committees appointed by the Conference to superintend the General Funds of the Methodist Connexion,

held on the 12th day of December, 1834, at the City-road chapel, it was resolved that the following "Declaration " be adopted, and submitted for signature to the absent members, both in town and Country:

WE the undersigned members of the several Committees appointed by Conference to superintend the General Funds of the Methodist Connexion, having learned with much pain and deep regret that a self-constituted Association, consisting of officers and members of the Weslevan-Methodist society, has been organized, under the name of the "Grand Central Association," for purposes subversive of the constitution of Methodism, to be accomplished by means of an attack upon its General Funds, feel impelled, by an imperative sense of duty, strongly to express our disapprobation of such proceedings, and of the unconstitutional attempts made to destroy the spirit of peace and good-will amongst us, by endeavouring to extend their baneful infuence throughout the whole Connexion.

1. We unhesitatingly declare, that the formation of such an Association is a positive and direct violation of the established constitution of Methodism ; an unwarrantable assumption of power wholly inconsistent with the brotherly compact of the Connexion; and tending to the subversion of the whole body; and we solemnly deprecate the unjustifiable and avowed intention of this Association to exercise their influence to induce the peaceable and well-disposed members of society in the undisturbed Districts to become parties with them in their unhallowed designs.

Entertaining as we do this view of the subject, it is unnecessary to inquire into the origin of these destructive designs; which, if accomplished, would leave to the Methodism established by our venerable Founder nothing but the name; and which are not alarming, only because they aim at so entire a subversion of the whole system, that we feel it next to impossible for our brethren to be generally seduced by the most specious appearance or plausible pretext that can be put upon them. But if poison be introduced into the system, (and the more insidious, the more dangerous it is,) an antidote becomes necessary. Nor do we deem it unnecessary in the present case, mixed up as the poison is with palatable and highsounding professions of regard for our "high spiritual interests," "rights of the people," "the fear of God," and, singularly enough, with a resolution to quire nothing new in the constitution of Me

re

thodism;" the first cogent proof of which is, that they seek to impose upon the Conference two Rules never heard of before!

While the dispute, which has been made a handle to these proceedings, was confined to its proper sphere, we did not deem it necessary to take any public steps to express our opinion upon them; believing that the ordinary tribunals of Methodism were competent to meet the case, and would do full justice to all parties; but when the authors of these proceedings, not content with troubling their own societies, became dictators to others, and, instead of applying to the proper and legitimate means for redress, if grievance there be, made no scruple to attempt, by violence and agitation, (not very Christian weapons of spiritual warfare!) the overthrow of our whole system, in order that they may "lord it over God's heritage," we can no longer be silent, believing it to be our duty, as we know it is our interest and inflexible determination, to stand fast by original Methodism in a steady, straightforward, and unalterable adhesion to it, as handed down to us and now administered, as we believe and declare, in all its pristine purity and effectiveness.

2. We consider the means proposed by the "Central Association" for effecting their purposes, by attempting to destroy the General Funds of the Connexion, unjust, unchristian, and cruel, to the parties dependent upon them, and to ourselves who, at much personal inconvenience and no inconsiderable expense, are conscientiously endeavouring to discharge the duties with which we have been entrusted in the management of them, and highly detrimental to the cause of God.

It is not necessary for us now to inquire into the merits of the original dispute;it is sufficient to know, that this "Central Association" has refused to allow it to be settled in the legitimate and constitutional mode long known, acknowledged, and acted upon in the Connexion; for no cause of complaint, however just or aggravated, can justify the use of unlawful means for redress, much less can it do this when a legitimate and competent tribunal exists. Those ages of darkness and despotism are for ever gone by,

In the Manchester Address of Nov. 6th, 1834, the brethren and sisters are exhorted

not

66 to lose sight of those high spiritual interests, which alone can sanctify whatever means may be employed for the reformation of abuses, or the advancement of the glory of God and the prosperity and happiness of his people."-(The words here printed in italics are not in italics in the original.) F

VOL. XIV. Third Series. JANUARY, 1835.

when it was held that "the end might justify the means;" a doctrine which glutted the dungeons of the Inquisition with victims, and bound martyrs to the stake; but which is totally opposed to the scriptural injunction to "do justice, love mercy, and walk humbly with God," or to "do unto others as we would that they should do unto us."

-as

What then are the just, loving, merciful, humble and reciprocal means by which the "Central Association" propose to accomplish their object?might be expected, they are in perfect accordance with the object itself,-"to withhold all supplies whatever of money, except those of the weekly contributions of class-money, and the quarterly contributions at the renewal of tickets," and to withhold their contributions "from the Missionary, Contingent, Chapel, and all Funds whatsoever under the control of the Conference, and confine ourselves," say they, "to the maintenance of the Preachers in our own Circuits." Thus, with that sort of generous and philanthropic spirit which might well be predicated of such proceedings, they would still selfishly and inconsistently provide for themselves the benefits of a Christian ministry by the mouths of the very men whom they so unceremoniously malign,and leave all the rest of the Connexion, and the world, in the arms of the wicked one, exposed to spiritual starvation; forgetting in their blind zeal the declarations of Scripture, "He that loveth God will love his brother also," and that there can be no good faith in saying, "Be ye warmed and be ye clothed," and withholding the things necessary thereto.

This resolution to confine themselves to the maintenance of the Preachers in their own Circuits has, in some sort, a plausible appearance, but is utterly inconsistent with the other part of the same Resolution, not to say with all right and Christian feeling. It was never before attempted to be shown that a man's services were adequately remunerated by his individual maintenance. Yet, while professing to maintain the Preacher in his Circuit, all support is to be cruelly and unjustly withheld from the Funds intended to maintain and educate his children. It was never heard of before in Methodism, that a Christian's duty was confined to the selfish enjoyment of his spiritual "morsel alone; yet it is proposed to withhold all contributions from the Contingent Fund, from which the pecuniary deficiencies in poor and newly-formed Circuits are to be made up. It might be comparatively harmless to the Circuits

where the Central Association originated, and to some few others which ought never to need its help, to recommend the withholding of contributions from this Fund, in order to serve their purposes, and to answer their ends; but if unhappily the recommendation should be followed to any considerable extent, what will be the effect upon those numerous Circuits which depend upon and yearly receive from this Fund, as their last resource, a supply for their deficiencies, if that supply be withheld for only one year?

Nor can we forget our aged and superannuated fathers in the Gospel, worn out in the services of the sanctuary, and their widows, whose wants, in age and sickness, are in some measure supplied by the Auxiliary Fund. From this poor pittance the "Central Association would cut off the supply, and leave those to whom many of us and of them, under God, owe our first spiritual impressions, exposed to penury, and dependent upon the cold and stinted charity of a thankless world. Is this, too, a holy jealousy for the honour of God and his cause? "Hearken unto me, O house of Jacob, and all the remnant of the house of Israel," saith the Lord: "Even to your old age I am he, and even to hoar hairs will I carry you; I have made, and I will bear; I will carry, and will deliver you."

The great principle of Mr. Wesley was, that the influence of Methodism should be bounded only by the ends of the earth; and in the true spirit of his memorable declaration, "The world is my parish," have the efforts and energies of Methodism been progressively and increasingly employed, and never to 80 great an extent as at present, by means of Missionary exertions. Yet our exertions are all to be paralyzed; the labour of many precious lives, the fruit of thousands of prayers,-the moral cultivation of barbarous nations, are all to be thrown away; the field, rendered fruitful by the blessing of God upon our endeavours, is again to become a desert, and the garden of the Lord a waste, howling wilderness which would require years of labour, and the expenditure of hundreds of thousands of pounds, to reclaim; not to mention the souls in the mean time pe rishing for lack of knowledge; and the devoted men who, with the lives of them. selves, their wives, and children in their hands, have gone to labour, and often to die, in distant, barbarous, and pestilential climes, for the love of Christ, and the salvation of souls, are to be left to perish in penury and want, not by the hands

of the savage, or of the declared enemies of God and his Gospel, but by the declared kindness of pretended friends, still professing to be members of one body and brethren in Christ, and all for the purpose of obtaining their unconstitutional objects and ends; and that, too, at a period when the world more than ever cries for spiritual help, and more doors of usefulness are wide open than the utmost contributions to the Missionary Fund will allow to be entered. When the glorious experiment of negro emancipation, for which we all so long ardently sighed, prayed, and laboured, demands, for more than eight hundred thousand of our fellow-subjects, the fostering care of our Missionary exertions to furnish the means which alone can enable them to appreciate the blessing of personal liberty, and lead them to that which will make them free indeed, is it possible that the great body of our societies can ever become so lost to all that is faithful and just, lovely and of good report, as to be influenced by a call, than which the world with all its opposition, obloquy, and persecution, could never devise any thing so completely subversive of whatever has hitherto been held dear and glorious by us all. It cannot be that when the reapers of the great ripe harvest of the earth are ready, the people of God should refuse them the sickle; or, that they will allow the awful malediction to be recorded in the book of remembrance against them, that while both at home and abroad "the labourer is worthy of his hire," "the wages of those who have reaped down your fields, and which is by you kept back, crieth against you."

The Methodist Connexion is essentially one body "fitly framed together by that which every joint supplieth." If any member of the body suffer for want of the supply necessary to its vitality, every other member, however remote or collateral, must suffer with it. Many of our chapels are burdened with heavy and oppressive debts, for which the Trustees, on the good faith of the particular societies around them, and on the general engagement of the whole body to support the Chapel Fund, have made themselves largely responsible. This is too well known and felt to need being dwelt upon; but let us reflect upon what must be the inevitable consequence of withholding, if for only one year, the supply necessary to enable that Fund to meet the pressing claims upon the Trustees; the consequence to individuals, to the societies, and to the people at large, would be

fearful. To most Trustees it would be highly inconvenient; to many ruinous; and to all, injustice and spoliation of too dark a character to be contemplated as the thoughtful and prayerful act of Christian men. To the societies and congregations the consequence would, in many instances, be lamentable indeed. Many of the houses of worship in which they have taken sweet counsel, and to which they have gone up as to the gate of heaven to worship, must pass into the hands of strangers, or be degraded to secular purposes, no longer to echo to the sound of salvation and the voice of melody. Shall this, too, be, and for the sake of that unholy alliance, the "Central Association," of a few misguided

men ?

3. While we feel anxiously concerned for the credit of the Methodist body, and for the honourable discharge of every pecuniary obligation under which it is laid by the extensive and extending liberality of its undertakings, we are yet more especially concerned for the spiritual interests of those whom a gracious Providence has brought into Christian fellowship with us, many of whom acknowledge how much they owe to this Connexion; but who, by the course recommended, are, we much fear, pursuing effectual means of separation from their highest Christian privileges and enjoyments. These, in the spirit of love and kindliest affection, we invite to abandon their mistaken opposition, and cease to wound their Master in the house of his friends. Let such remember, that "the beginning of strife is like the letting out of water."

4. Although we are not insensible to the fact that some partial and temporary injury may ensue to the Funds of the Connexion, from the criminal course pursued by this Association, we are firmly confident in the sound principles of an over. whelming majority of the Methodist body, in their attachment to the present constitution of our Connexion, and in the continuance of their wonted liberality in support of its general Funds; and, above all, being deeply and conscientiously impressed with the assurance that they were founded and are continued in the fear, and for the glory, of God, we have no doubt but his smile will still rest upon them.

Brethren, throughout all our societies, whose hearts are right with God, whose hands are ready to the work, whose object is neither power nor change, but the glory of God and the salvation of souls, on you we call : "Watch ye; "-" stand fast in the faith;""quit you like men;"

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