Delegated General Conferences of both the Methodist Episcopal Churches in modifying this portion of the Discipline.*

It remains, in pursuance of our plan, to notice the action of the General Conference of 1808 with regard to Bishop. Coke, and also its action on the subject of slavery. This was the first time the Doctor had been absent from a General Conference. In 1804 his recall to America had been. made subject to the action of any three Annual Conferences. The Doctor in April, 1805, had married Miss Penelope Goulding Smith, a lady of ample fortune, who proposed to devote it to the advancement of the cause of missions, which lay so near her husband's heart and her own. In June, 1805, Dr. Coke addressed a circular to the American preachers, saying: "As long as he [Asbury] can regularly visit the seven Annual Conferences, you do not want me. But if he was so debilitated that he could not attend the seven Conferences, I should be willing to come over to you for life, on the express condition that the seven Conferences should be divided betwixt us [Asbury and himself], three and four, and four and three, each of us changing our divisions annually; and that this plan, at all events, should continue permanent and unalterable during both our lives."† This proposal, which strangely and unpardonably overlooked the position of Bishop Whatcoat, who was then engaged in the active discharge of his episcopal duties, and which took the plan of superintendency out of the hands of the General Conference as long as Coke and Asbury were both alive, the Conferences very properly declined. Bishop Coke addressed two letters to the General Conference of 1808, one with regard to his relations to American Methodism, dated Nov. 26, 1807, and the other, dated Jan. 29, 1808, explanatory of his negotiations with Bishop White, in 1791, which, in 1804, and afterwards, through a breach of * For details, see Gen. Conf. Journal, XII., 1892, pp. 94, 132, 170, 206, 227, 、 228, 390-400. For the debates, see Daily Christian Advocate, 1892, for May 11, 12, and 13.

An original copy of this circular, which Dr. Coke printed, addressed to Martin Ruter, lies before me.

confidence, had become public and had excited much “uncircumcised rejoicing" in the Protestant Episcopal body. These two letters, together with an address from the British Conference, were referred to two committees, one to report on the case of Dr. Coke, and one on correspondence.*

In his second letter, Coke briefly recapitulates the contents of the first," that if you judged that my being with you would help to preserve your union, and if I was allowed to give my opinion or judgment on every station of the preachers as far as I chose, and upon everything else that could come under the inspection of the bishops, or superintendents, you might call me, and we would settle our affairs in Europe as soon as possible and sail for America and be with you for life. Without your compliance in the latter pointnamely, in respect to a full right in giving my judgment-[ should be so far from being useful in preserving union that I should merely fill the place of a preacher." He explains at length his proposals for union with the Protestant Episcopal Church. In simple justice to Dr. Coke we must remember (1) that his office as a Methodist bishop did not deprive him of his position as a presbyter in the Church of England, which character he maintained, like Wesley, to the day of his death; (2) that the disastrous experiment of the Council had just failed; (3) that the O'Kelly and Hammett schisms were threatening the unity of American Methodism; (4) that no General Conference had yet been established; (5) that there was alienation between Asbury and Coke; and (6) that before his departure from the continent, Coke learned of Wesley's death, and was alarmed for the stability of English, no less than of American, Methodism. After mentioning most of these points, Coke, in his letter to the General Conference of 1808, continues:

I did verily believe then that, under God, the Connection would be more likely to be saved from convulsions by a union with the old Episcopal Church than any other way-not by a dereliction of ordination, sacraments, and the Methodist Discipline, but by a junction on proper terms. Bishop White, in two interviews I had with him in Philadelphia, gave me reason to believe

* Gen. Conf. Journals, I. 73.

that this junction might be accomplished with ease. Dr. Magaw was perfectly sure of it. Indeed (if Mr. Ogden, of New Jersey, did not mistake in the information he gave me), a canon passed the House of Bishops of the old Episcopal Church in favor of it. Bishop Madison, according to the same information, took the canon to the lower house. "But it was there thrown out," said Mr. Ogden, to whom I explained the whole business, "because they did not understand the full meaning of it." Mr. Ogden added that he spoke against it because he did not understand it, but that it would ha ve met with his warm support had he understood the full intention of it.

I had provided in the fullest manner in my indispensable, necessary conditions for the security and, I may say, for the independence of our discipline and places of worship. But I thought (perhaps erroneously, and I believe so now) that our field of action would have been exceedingly enlarged by that junction, and that myriads would have attended our ministry in consequence of it who were at that time much prejudiced against us. All things unitedly considered led me to write the letter and meet Bishop White and Dr. Magaw on the subject in Philadelphia.

.. Therefore, I have no doubt but my consecration of Bishop Asbury was perfectly valid, and would have been so even if he had been reconsecrated. I never did apply to the general convention or any other convention for reconsecration. I never intended that either Bishop Asbury or myself should give up our episcopal office if the junction were to take place.

Bishop Coke's letter to Dr. White had closed with the request," that if you have no thoughts of improving this proposal, you will burn this letter and take no more notice of it." On the contrary, in later years it was published by representatives of the Protestant Episcopal Church, in a diocesan controversy. In his Memoirs,* Bishop White Says, "Dr. Coke's letter was answered by the author with the reserve which seemed incumbent on one who was incompetent to decide with effect on the proposal made." No doubt the good Bishop of Pennsylvania, in later years, regarded this as a fair account of his share in a correspondence which issued in nothing. But in his reply to Bishop Coke, he said, "I can say of the one and the other [of two difficulties mentioned by Coke] that I do not think them insuperable, provided there be a conciliatory disposition on both sides," and again, "In this situation, it is rather to be ex pected that distinct Churches, agreeing in fundamentals, should make mutual sacrifices for a union than that any Church should divide into two bodies without a difference

* Page 197.

being even alleged to exist in any leading point. For the preventing of this the measures which you may propose cannot fail of success, unless there be on one side, or on both, a most lamentable deficiency of Christian temper." As a matter of fact, Bishop Madison's proposals for union passed the House of Bishops consisting then of four persons, Seabury, White, Provoost, and Madison-in the General Convention of 1792; but were thrown out in the House of Clerical and Lay Deputies.*

Commenting on this transaction a judicious authority says: It was to be a union, where both parties made concessions and got advantages, but neither was absorbed. . . He [Coke] verily thought each Church could bring to the other some element of strength in their day of weakness. .. The worst, the inexcusable part of this pragmatism is that Asbury was at his side when Coke wrote the letter, and was not taken into his confidence.†

Coke's letter to White bore date, April 24, 1791. April 25, Asbury records in his Journal, "I found the Doctor had much changed his sentiments since his last visit to this continent, and that these impressions still continued. I hope to be enabled to give up all I dare for peace sake, and to please all men for their good to edification." Thus Asbury was in an approachable mood, and Coke missed his opportunity. He declares, however, in his letter to the General Conference, that at Newcastle, Del., before sailing for England, he laid the matter before Asbury, "who, with that caution which peculiarly characterizes him, gave me no decisive opinion on the subject."

The final form of the action of the General Conference of 1808 in Bishop Coke's case was:

That the General Conference do agree and consent that Dr. Coke may continue in Europe till he be called to the United States by the General Conference, or by all the Annual Conferences, respectively; that we retain a grateful remembrance of the services and labors of Dr. Coke among us, and the thanks of this Conference are hereby acknowledged to him, and to God, for all his labors of love toward us, from the time he first left his native country to serve us; that Dr. Coke's name shall be retained on our Minutes after the name of the Bishops in a N. B.-" Dr. Coke, at the request of the British Conference, and by the consent of General Conference, resides in Eu

* Bishop White's Memoirs, pp. 195-199. † McTyeire, Hist. of Meth., p. 516.

rope;" he is not to exercise the office of superintendent or bishop among us in the United States until he be recalled by the General Conference, or by all the annual conferences respectively; that the committee of correspondence be and are hereby directed to draft two letters, one to the British Conference, the other to Dr. Coke, in answer to their respective letters to us, and therein communicating to them respectively the contents of the above resolutions.*

In his earlier letter to the General Conference Dr. Coke had suggested an "N. B. Dr. Coke (or Bishop Coke, as you please) resides in Europe till he be called to the States by the General Conference or by the Annual Conferences,' and thus the final action in 1808 was conformed very closely to his wishes. In their reply to Dr. Coke, the committee of correspondence say, among other things:

Your two letters were respectfully received and had a salutary effect upon our minds. . . . You may be assured that we feel an affectionate regard for you; that we gratefully remember your repeated labors of love toward us; and that we sensibly feel our obligations for the services you have rendered us. . In full Conference, of near one hundred and thirty members, we entered into a very long conversation, and very serious and solemn debate upon sundry resolutions which were laid before us relative to your case. Probably on no former occasion, in any Conference in America, was so much said in defense of your character and to your honor as a ministerial servant of God and his Church. Your worth, your labors, your disinterested services, fatigues, dangers, and difficulties to serve your American brethren were set forth pathetically, and urged with the force of reason and truth in an argumentative manner; and our candid and impartial judgments were constrained to yield to the conclusion that we were bound by the ties of moral and religious obligations to treat you most respectfully, and to retain a grateful remembrance of all your labors of love toward us.†

Thus amicably ended, as the event proved, relations which dated back to 1784. That Bishop Coke's prudence was not equal to his zeal, and that he more than once needlessly strained his relations with the American Conference, must be allowed by all. For the purposes of our history, these relations, as reviewed in detail in our pages for a quarter of a century from 1784 to 1808, may be summed up in the following paragraphs:

1. During the whole period of Bishop Coke's visits to

* Gen. Conf. Journals, I. 75, 76. † See Bangs, Hist. M. E. Ch., II. 196–226.