In South Carolina. 595 



time of sickness or danger, the Conference should 

 never employ that man again," binding measures of 

 the like nature continued to be adopted whenever cir- 

 cumstances seemed to require them. Every member 

 of the Conference forfeited his status as a traveling 

 preacher who could not annually stand the examina- 

 tion on the catechism of ministerial duty, made to 

 embrace these several points of obligation which had 

 been solemnly adjudged indispensable for one devoted 

 wholly to God and his work. 



The change which in later years has taken place, 

 both in the ministry and membership of the Church, 

 and which has been observed and regretted by the old 

 preachers, is thus described by Dr. Pierce: 



I beg leave to say that the evil (loss of power in preaching in 

 proportion to advancement in learning) is not properly attributable 

 to learning itself. If there is any evil at all it must of right be 

 attributable to some sort of abuse of learning in the ministry of 

 Christ. But how could this thing possibly come in to make the 

 great difference that there is between the present time and the im- 

 mediate power of Methodist preaching in other days, illustrated by 

 such men as George Dougherty or Thomas Darley down to about 

 the period (1808) of the admission of Bishop Capers into the Con- 

 ference? When I read the Epistles of the apostle to the Corinthian 

 Church, and hear him give them the reasons why he preached to 

 them in a plain and practical way, it strikes me that I see how it is 

 that a learned ministry produces a loss of power in the preaching 

 of the word. St. Paul gloried in nothing but Jesus Christ and him 

 crucified. This he preached to the Corinthians, and his preaching 

 was not with enticing words of man's wisdom, but in demonstration 

 of the Spirit and of power. And why was all this said if it was 

 not designed to teach us that the sum and substance of St. Paul's 

 preaching was a declaration of the testimonies of God ? Now, when 

 a man prepares himself as the old Methodist preachers did, and 

 makes a powerful manifestation of the word of God, and he believes 

 it and speaks it as such, although there may be here and there a 

 rhetorical error or a misconception of a principle of philosophy, yet 

 God will not withdraw his power from the word because it is not 



