Louisiana and Aaron Burr 283 



the Methodists and Baptists were the only sects 

 powerfully represented. The great revival of 1799 

 was mainly carried on by Methodists and Baptists, 

 and under their guidance the Methodist and Bap- 

 tist churches at once sprang to the front and be- 

 came the most important religious forces in the fron- 

 tier communities. 49 The Presbyterian Church re- 

 mained the most prominent as regards the wealth 

 and social standing of its adherents, but the typical 

 frontiersman who professed religion at all became 

 either a Methodist or a Baptist, adopting a creed 

 which was intensely democratic and individualistic, 

 which made nothing of social distinctions, which 

 distrusted educated preachers, and worked under 

 a republican form of ecclesiastical government. 



The great revival was accompanied by scenes of 

 intense excitement. Under the conditions of a vast 

 wooded wilderness and a scanty population the camp- 

 meeting was evolved as the typical religious festival. 

 To the great camp-meetings the frontiersmen flocked 

 from far and near, on foot, on horseback, and in 

 wagons. Every morning at daylight the multitude 

 was summoned to prayer by sound of trumpet. No 

 preacher or exhorter was suffered to speak unless he 

 had the power of stirring the souls of his hearers. 

 The preaching, the praying, and the singing went 

 on without intermission, and under the tremendous 

 emotional stress whole communities became fervent 

 professors of religion. Many of the scenes at these 



49 McFerrin's "History of Methodism in Tennessee," 338. 

 etc. ; Spencer's "History of Kentucky Baptists," 69, etc. 



