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March 10, 1909. THE PRESBYTER!
INTERESTING HISTORY.
The Northern Methodist Board of Bishops recently
assigned Bishop Neely to New Orleans for his residence
during the quadrennium. There are three small
congregations of white people, two of them being of
German constituency, and a large number of congregations,
some thirteen or fourteen, of colored people
connected with that body in New Orleans. On Bishop
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of the white churches. A number of ministers took part
in the welcome. Among them were several ministers
of the Methodist Episcopal, South. In his response to
the very cordial welcoming addresses, the Northern
Bishop was tactless enough to claim that his church
was the "mother church of all American Methodism, to
which all the Methodists in the South used to belong."
Naturally this claim has greatly stirred our brethren
of the Methodist Church, South. They most justly
claim that their church was not a secession from another
church, leaving the latter still the "mother
church," but that the original church was peacefully
and harmoniously divided into two separate but coordinate
jurisdictions, both ermallv. successor* to the
original body. In proof of this they cite the resolution
of division, which was as follows:
"Resolved, by the delegates of the several anitual conferences
in general conference assembled, That should
the annual conferences in the slave-holding States find
it necessary to unite in a distinct ecclesiastical connection,
the following rule shall be observed with regard
to the Northern boundary of such connection: All societies,
stations and conferences adhering to the church
of the South, by a vote of a majority of the members of
said societies, stations" and conferences', shall remain
under the unmolested pastoral care of the Southern
church; and the ministers of the Methodist Episcopal
Church shall in nowise attempt to organize churches or
societies within the limits of the church, South, nor
shall they attempt to exercise any pastoral oversight
therein, it being understood that the ministry of the
South reciprocally observe the same rule in relation to
stations, societies and conferences adhering, by vote of
a majority, to the Methodist Episcopal Church; provided
also, that this rule shall apply only to societies,
stations and conferences bordering on the line of division,
and not to interior charges, which shall, in all cases,
be left to the care of that church within whose territory
they are situated."
This resolution and the division brought about under
it was adopted by the General Conference of the one
original body in 1844. A few years later the Northern
wing repudiated it and declared that the division was
a secession. Against this act of abrogation and declaration
it is rightly charged that, after its separation, one
of the divisions of the original body could not in common
sense undo what the original body had done. And
the matter having been carried into the Supreme Court,
that court, in two distinct cases, declared the two
churches to be co-ordinate and ordered common property
to be divided between them accordingly.
All this claim on the part of our Southern brethren
Bishop Neely characterizes as a dragging of matter
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AN OF THE SOUTH. 7
"from its burial in the dust of forgotten history."
Exactly so. He has forgotten history else he might
have spoken differently. He needs to be reminded of
it. Had he remembered it a little better perhaps he
would have made a pleasanter speech. Had his whole
church remembered it better it would not have thrust
itself so much, against the spirit and words of the
original agreement, into places where by that agreement
it was to keep out. It is quite needful for him and
all of his order of mind and spirit to "bury" history
and the compacts of the past, in order to support the
notion of the "Americanism" of the so-called "mother
church" and to uphold the charge of sectarianism
against the other churches whi6h adhere faithfully to
the compact entered into, when the original church
agreed to divide into two parts.
THE PRACTICAL ARGUMENT.
The sacraments of the Church must be, from the very
nature of the case, universal in applicability and elements.
The Church is universal. Its ordinances must
be the same. All times, all peoples, all places, all
classes, all conditions, must have the same ease'and readiness
of application in them. No rite or method or element
in an ordinance intended for universal application
will meet this end, which is not applicable to every indi
viauai who will oeneve in l.nrist. regaraiess ot nis
health, his occupation, his climate, his abode, the season
of the year, the nature of his work, or the position he
holds. Any alleged provision that is not thus universally
applicable has not the first requisite for a sacrament
of a universal Church.
Hence, in ordering the sacraments of his Church, the
Head of the Church chose the simplest elements, such
as are universally found among men, and such as every
believer may safely and easily use, and in such smallquantities
that neither climate, health, poverty nor any
other consideration mav nrevent the believer from re
ceiving them in safety and without needless sacrifice.
Bread is universal. Wine may be had anywhere. A
little water may be had even out in the heart of a desert.
The smallness of the quantity to be used guards
against eyil results to health or habit, as well as against
useless expense or waste in the mere symbolism. If a
pool or tank isneedful for baptism, many believers
would have to forego the blessed privilege of this act
of obedience. The ghastly accounts which now and
then appear of the immersion of dying people in a bath
tub produce a feeling of revulsion. The cutting of the
ice in winter that zealous professors may be dipped ex
cues mure riuicuie iur ine unwisaum, man respect ior
the faith of the ardent subject. As God's word expressly
forbids making a whole meal or a fete of the Lord's
Supper, so by parity of reasoning, we may judge that
ne does not demand of the believer a whole bodily submergence
in water to make the act legitimate baptism.
A seal on a deed does not haye to be enough wax and a
die or stamp big enough to cover the whole document,
but only just enough to bear witness to its genuineness
and authority and to show that it has been approved by
the proper official.