History of Methodism in Maine, 1793-1886, Part 79

Author: Allen, Stephen, 1810-1888; Pilsbury, William Hacket, 1806-1888
Publication date: 1887
Publisher: Augusta, Press of C. E. Nash
Number of Pages: 1146

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In 1886, it appeared that the outstanding certificates of scholarship had been reduced to one hundred, most of which have been more or less used.

In June, 1884, Professor A. F. Chase was elected Principal.

At the annual meeting, June, 1886, voted to amend the third article of By-laws, so as to hold the annual meeting of trustees on Wednesday of Commencement week ; also voted to ereate a " Normal Department " in the sehool, and to create a " Department of Biblical Study."

Frequent lectures, often aecompanied with experiments, are given by members of the Faculty and others.

The institution has a valuable cabinet of minerals, affording ample facilities for the study of Geology and Mineralogy. It is furnished with good ehemieal and philosophieal apparatus, also globes, maps, charts, a telescope, scioptieon and caligraph, with appropriate drawings and illustrations in Natural History and Astronomy. The " Natural History Society " has a large and inereasing collection of mounted speeimens.

The extensive houses and grounds of Mr. F. H. Moses, Florist, are generously opened to students in Botany.

Connected with the institution are two flourishing literary societies, the Calorhetorian, sustained by the gentlemen, and the Eulalian, by the ladies. A reading-room is maintained, furnished with fifty papers, magazines and reviews, ineluding four dailies.

A literary paper, " The Ariel," edited and managed by the students, is published periodically.

a. F. Chase

199

CONFERENCE SEMINARY.

The school has a library of more than three thousand volumes, to which additions are constantly being made.

Prizes are awarded annually :

1. To that gentleman who shall excel in Declamation.

2. To that lady who shall excel in Declamation.

3. For excellence in Moral Science.

4. For excellence in Botany.

5. For excellence in Political Economy.

6. For excellence in Book-keeping.

7. The Principal's prize to that member of the Calorhetorian or Eulalian Society, who shall write the best English essay on the subject. The subject assigned for 1887 is, The Legitimate Methods for the Preservation of the Christian Sabbath.

The courses of study are :

1. The Academic.

2. The Classical.

3. Advanced course for ladies.

4. The Scientific.

5. The Commercial.

6. The Musical.

7. The Normal.

8. The Department of Art.

The summary of students for the academic year 1885, 1886, is as follows : Fall term, 147; Winter term, 123; Spring term, 132; total, 402.

CALENDAR.

Fall Term opens August 23, 1886.

Winter Term opens November 29, 1886. Spring Term opens March 14, 1887.

Tuition. Per term of thirteen weeks.

Common English (as basis), - - - $3.50

Each study in Higher English, Greek or Latin (extra),

1.00

Each study in Modern Languages (extra), - - 1.50

Oil Painting, -

- -

10.00

Water Color,

- 8.00 -

Crayoning, - - -

- 8.00 -

Crayon Portraiture, - - -

- 10.00

Perspective Drawing, - - - -

- 4.50

200

CONFERENCE SEMINARY.

Free-hand Drawing (twenty lessons),

1.50

Pastel,

8.00

China Painting, -

- 8.00

Piano or Organ (twenty lessons), -

9.00

Piano or Organ (ten lessons),

5.00

Harmony (twenty lessons),

9.00

Harmony (ten lessons), -

1.50

Use of Instrument (one bell per day),

1.00

Phonography (private),

5.00

Phonography (in class), -

2.00

Use of Caligraph (one bell per day), -

1.50

Incidentals, Library and Reading-room,

1.00

Chemicals and use of apparatus in Chemistry or Physics,

1.00

Commercial Department. Tuition.

Full Commercial Course, -

$25.00

Partial Course, one term, -

- 15.00

Single Entry Book-keeping, - - - 3.00 -

Penmanship, twelve lessons, -

- 1.25

Penmanship, twenty-four lessons, - -

- 2.00

Flourishing (Penmanship), -

- 4.50

Two terms are required to complete the course. No tuition is charged for the two daily recitations in academic studies connected with this course.

The make-up and organization of the several departments, in 1887, is as follows :

Board of Trustees.

J. H. H. Hewit, Esq., President.

Rev. W. H. Pilsbury, Vice President.

Rev. S. L. Hanscom, Secretary.

Hon. Hiram Ruggles, Treasurer.

Rev. A. Prince, Financial Agent.

Rev. A. Church, Rev. C. A. Plumer, Rev. S. H. Beale, Rev. C. B. Besse, Rev. W. T. Jewell, George Brooks, David R. Straw, Esq., R. B. Stover, W. F. Brann, Hon. Fred Atwood, Parker Spofford, Esq., Rev. M. W. Prince, Rev. C. E. Libby, Hon. James Weymouth, George M. Warren, A. M., Hon. Eugene Hale, Hon. Andrew P. Wiswell, Rev. J. W. Day, E. O. Thompson, M. D., C. C. Libby, M. D., Rev. G. G. Winslow.

5.00

Vocal Culture (in class, twenty lessons ),

201

CONFERENCE SEMINARY.

Prudential Committee.

Parker Spofford, W. H. Pilsbury, C. E. Libby, R. B. Stover, S. L. Hanscom.

Examining Committee.

Rev. G. R. Palmer, Rev. W. H. Williams, Mr. A. A. Littlefield, Mrs. R. P. Bucknam, Miss C. Homer, Rev. A. A. Lewis, Rev. J. W. Day, Rev. A. J. Lockhart.

Conference Visitors.

Rev. B C. Wentworth, Rev. D. H. Sawyer, Rev. W. H. Crawford, 2d, Rev. F. H. Osgood, Rev. A. W. C. Anderson.

Board of Instruction.

Rev. A. F. Chase, Ph.D., Principal,

Metaphysics and Mathematics.

Amanda M. Wilson, A. M., Preceptress,

Latin and Modern Languages. A. R. Sweetser, A. B., Natural Science.

J. F. Knowlton, Commercial Department and Phonography.

Wendell P. Parker,

Greek and Mathematics.

Eva F. Pike,

Music Department.

Emma E. Clarke,

Art Department.

Rosalie Blanchard,

Elocution.

Maud E. Muzzy,

Librarian.

S. P. LaGross,

Military Tactics.

Laroy Rogers,

Steward.

The Faculty, as a whole, is entirely satisfactory, and in entire harmony, in personal relation toward each other and the trustees.

The Principal and Preceptress, as educators and disciplinarians,

202

CONFERENCE SEMINARY.

were, in an extraordinary sense, to the manor born. Much more might be said in this direction, but for the apprehension that some jealous rival institution, in negleet of weighing in the scale of justice, or of equal rights, the obligation of doing to others as we would have others do to us, may enter our fold with tempting inducements, as has been done, because of financial inability to compete and protect ourselves.

Notwithstanding the Faculty work hard, some of them perhaps too hard, for small compensation, the trustees find themselves perpetually doomed, either to treneli upon the fund, or anticipate possible, and only possible, iueome. They are sometimes painfully pushed to their wits' end, under constraint of eireumstanees, and moved by a worthy and justified convietion that the institution must be sustained, or the church dwindle, it being impossible to keep the church in healthy working order against the outside odds.

In behalf of the trustees, as publie, and peeuniarily disinterested intermediaries, as well as in justifieation of further appeal to be made by the trustees to the generosity of the friends and patrons of the institution, the editor knowing whereof he affirms, takes the liberty to make the following statement and plea.

For years the reports of the treasurer and the steward have shown a balance of small average, annually, against the seminary, which defieieney has every time eome as a result, neither of defeetive book- keeping nor of extravagant expenditure in any of the departments, but has come of a fixed, but judicious purpose to adapt the school, in all its parts and departments, to the demands of the times, and to furnish education to the extreme of its possibilities, and to furnish suitable board at sueh rates as publie approbation will allow.

It is the publie that reaps the harvest of the trustees' anxious and careful sowing. All the trustees look for, or desire, is the satisfactory reeolleetion of having done what they eould for the best edueation of existing and coming generations.

It is, therefore, apparent that the publie gets the benefit of all its contributions, and the embarrassments of the seminary come of its doing more for the publie than the publie is doing for it; from which the eonelusion follows, legitimately and mathematically, that the institution is worthy of, and may in justiee ask, more attention and more liberal patronage, as well as contributions, donations and bequests, both at home and abroad.

203

WHAT NEXT? METHODISM PROVIDENTIAL.

CHAPTER XIII.

MISCELLANY.

What next? The important question, in this year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and eighty-six, in the order of events of vital interest to the churches, especially to the Methodist Episcopal church, is "what next?" We have not quite reached stagnation, but are we not dangerously near the line of demarcation? Has not the effort in the direction of revival in the church and outside come to be only spas- modic, of easy tiring, and too aimless to draw and hold the attention of the masses, converted and unconverted, to the subject of experimental and practical religion, a religion not only defensive, but aggressive? Humanity, ever agog after "something new," and ever cloying of the old: dissatisfied to-morrow with what is entirely satisfactory to-day, a circumstantial automaton, like the wind mill, moving while the wind moves it, or the water wheel revolving while the weight of water propels it, though, unlike both, requiring more wind or more water to-day than yesterday, to perpetuate uniform motion, cannot safely be left to itself, with no pilot to direct to safe mooring.

Human masses must be taken as they are found, and, if the "saints" would be "the salt of the earth," they must, while "harmless as doves," be "wise as serpents," hoping, by providentially suggested and adapted measures, to lead them to consider, and to see themselves as God sees them, and then to lead to the fold.

In this direction, and to this end, Methodism has always aimed, in the adoption and use of agencies, accepting and using the measures Divinely indicated. Indeed Methodism was born of Providence, and adapting its economy to the conditions of the age of darkness and spiritual death in which it had its birth, it has been a glorious success. Its very novelty drew the attention of the masses, gave it force, and brought. success of the very simplicity of its methods, from which it will not, even in this "advanced" and "ripe" age be politic to depart. And, incidentally, may not as much be said in defense and support of a limited pastorate, lest the pew as well as the pulpit occupant, both go to sleep, lulled by monotonous routine ?

The agencies, succeeding each other, that have been instrumental in keeping up a general interest in, and adding materially to the

204

CAMP-MEETING. QUARTERLY MEETING.

membership of the Methodist Episcopal church, may, with propriety here be briefly reviewed.

The campmeeting, thoughi not of Methodist origin, carly became in the east, a prominent and useful institution, and everywhere, in its first period, it was attended with revival, showing by a census taken, from twenty to one hundred conversions, beside always more or less convieted, who were afterward converted. These results came of the exclusive religious aim, purpose and use of the meeting, as a means of grace.

As a rule, some time during the week the sacrament was admin- istered, and Saturday morning the meeting was closed with an impressive parting ceremony. But the campmeeting, as it was, had its day, a protraeted and profitable day, though, of course, like all other good things of human origin, not without abuses.

The deeline of its power, and the waning of its usefulness has been, not altogether because of adding the worldly element of relaxation and reereation, so much as because of the wearing away of the edge of its novelty, as is seen in the like deelining, and barrenness of results when new sights have been chosen, and every precaution taken, and effort made to exelude the objeeted to, worldly element. The camp-meeting has only shared the history and result of all special religious helps.

As it was, the quarterly meeting was a means of grace, and a source of refreshing to the church, as the editor ean well remember it, in Maine and in New Hampshire almost sixty years ago. It was, over a wide spread territory, looked forward to with religious interest. A large congregation gathered sometimes from a seore of miles, and worshipped in the grove, the most eapaeious barn or hall. None expected to be admitted to the love feast without a ticket, being a slip of paper with a seripture text printed npon it. The saerament was administered as a matter of course.

Then came the four days meeting, which, because of its adaptation to the times, and the wants of the people, wonderfully accomplished its mission, as a means of grace.

Some of our most useful and most successful ministers, and best adapted to the times in which they lived, were the fruit of these special means, especially of the camp-meeting, whose conversion came of appar- ently aeeidental, though perhaps really providential attendance, attracted by the novelty and notoriety of the occasion.

And now, when through thesc media and others, personal religion

205

THE "EVANGELIST" METHOD. THE "SALVATION ARMY."

has come to be so wide spread, and the means of grace to be brought to every man's door, these long time helps in time of need are little more than matters of form, and the responsibilities are devolved upon pastors and individual churches and their members, each being responsible in its, and in his and her immediate sphere; which responsibilities it is greatly to be feared are not individually felt and appreciated according to the demand indicated.

The "Evangelist" method may do something in the absence of other method, but apparently it is not destined to fill the bill except in a narrow sphere. It has too much of formalism and method, not differing enough from the long accustomed order, to meet the demand of the times for something new to attract the outside masses.

The "Salvation Army" might do in India, or on the Congo, but it has too much of military comedy to meet, in the right direction, the demand of the age, or to make other than Salvation Army converts.

Again, and finally, we come back to the important question, difficult to answer till He, who sees the end from the beginning, shall suggest to prayerfully waiting minds. But the question is unanswered, nor do those who have responsibilities appear to be anxiously inquiring after the next step to be taken in the order of revival.

And the writer has only to suggest, as nothing else is now attracting special attention, may not the Sam. Jones and Sam. Small movement, however objectionable to minds under culture of the advanced age in which we live, be, in the order of the Divine economy, the element to meet the ever growing crave, or craze for something new. May not the unlikeness to former methods, be the element to draw and hold attention of the masses?

The question now is not so much how highly cultured minds would, in deliberation, look at, or would have it, as is it the thing essential to the demands of the era of novelty and entertainment in which our lines have fallen.

What meets the demand of the foreign element in Chicago may meet the demand of New England. If none can answer the question may it not be policy as well as prudence, to accept, lest we be found fighting against God?

[NOTE. This article was written in 1885.]

THE SUNDAY SCHOOL AND LIBRARY.

"To err is humam," and as all have responsibilities, and, at every step, it becomes each for self to reflect, to watch, to be ever on guard,

206

FIRESIDE AND PULPIT EDUCATION.

lest catastrophe come for want of due care, and lest, however we stand to-day, we fall to-morrow.

Churches have risen in purity, attained to strength and to meridian light, but, forgetting the rock whence hewn, and the pit whence digged, and departing from the way and means of their rise, their sun has gone down at noon, their light has gone out, and their strength is gone ; and, because of departing from the way and means of their risc, they have fallen. And none are so much in danger as those who see no danger.

Thus much is written, apologetically introductory to what the writer wishes to say, that, by some, may be considered gratuitous and uncalled for.

From his standpoint he sees danger of depletion and perversion to the church in this fast age, and in many directions, but he will now confine his writing to two ; one in the home, and the other, incidentally, in the ministry.

Fireside and pulpit moral and religious education and culture of children, whence must come church recruits, if they come at all, have, by common consent, been turned over to the Sunday school, which, with parental and pulpit co-operation, might do much ; but, separated from both, thic school may be an apology, but never an equivalent or a substitute.

The proverb, " train up a child in the way he should go, and when he is old, he will not depart from it," is well put. But in this advanced age, being brought up on the fiction of the Sunday school library, with little home and no pulpit training, they seldom wander into the way they should go; and here we find a conclusive reason for the dwindling of some, especially of our village congregations.

The modern order of progress, from infancy to manhood, is rapid and short in all its several stages. The infant soon enters the brief period of childhood, followed by an almost inappreciable youth ; and then comes green manhood and as green womanhood, when the old gent and madam must close their ears and eyes, and not be too inquisitive.

The Sunday school, in its origin, was an admirable and opportune conception of Robert Raikes, to fill a gap, and not as an equivalent or a substitute for fireside or pulpit moral and religious discipline, to which he was led on seeing on Sunday, in the suburbs of Gloucester, England, inhabited by the lowest class of the people, "a group of children, miserably ragged, at play," and was informed that on

207

THE SUNDAY SCHOOL AND LIBRARY.

Sunday the strect was filled with a multitude of wretches, who, having no employment on that day, spent their time in noise and riot, playing at chuck, and cursing and swearing.

The first organization in the United States was in Philadelphia, in 1791, whose constitution required that the instruction should be " confined to reading and writing from the Bible, and such other moral and religious books as the society may direct." And nowhere, in all the history of its introduction and intent do we find it claiming to be ought but a helper in morals and religion.

When, therefore, parents unburden themselves, and tacitly, but really, devolve the responsibility, positively and absolutely vested only in themselves personally, they betray their most solemn trust, and are without excuse. As the Sunday school neither can nor will assume it, then it falls to the ground.

A champion writer who never speaks unadvisedly, referring to the assumed eighty per cent. excess of wrong doers furnished by cities, says : " The city may be a worse place than the country to turn children loose in, but neither is wholesome for children treated in the careless fashions of our time." "It is probable that crime is not a city growth, but a growth to be found wherever the children are the heads of the family. The revival of family government by parents is the best remedy for a number of social disorders, which present equally novel and startling aspects in onr day." The same writer also says : " In the natural order of influence over the young, should be, first, the parents ; second, the pastor ; third, the Sabbath school teacher ; fourth, the day school teacher. In some families the bad boy across the street, or the giddy girl next door, has more influence than all these together."

To which the editor intelligently and meaningly now adds : as a matter of fact parents congratulate themselves on having passcd over their responsibilities of religious, ethical, social and mental culture, in fact, and pro forma to the schools ; washing their hands of the wrong doing of putting them outside the sphere of the pulpit and the pastor.

The modern Sunday school library is made up, not by selection from the ample and ever extending catalogue of the Methodist Publishing House, whose books are officially and carefully supervised before issue, nor of books of any real value as educators in art, science, history, literature, true etiquette, morals, or religion ; but of fiction, that can only please and vitiate ; the gist and animus of which the boys and girls soon find to be comprised in the last few pages, requiring but a

208

THE SUNDAY SCHOOL AND LIBRARY.

few minutes' reading to take in and dispose of the book, be it big or little. Not long ago a writer in the Christian Advocate, who, while le deplores the making up of Sunday school libraries of " electrified mush, tales of frothy sentimentalism, at twenty-five cents per volume, and hundreds of volumes to select from," at the same time apoligizes, by assuming that " the books of history, biography, &c., published in suitable form for Sunday school libraries, are very few indeed, and when found cost from one dollar upward." Neither the complaint nor apology is justified by faets. The trash is taken instead of the useful, because, as a superintendent said to the editor, " they will read, no others." To which the reply was, " then don't put in any." The eritic above referred to should know that it is the demand that makes both the supply and the price. In making up the account- current, the penny-a-liner will probably, as a rule, find a larger credit balance because of larger sales. As to supply, Dr. Buckley could furnish to minds, not depraved beyond recovery, a library of narrative of travel at home and abroad, that would be at the same time enter- taining, useful and cheap. The editor remembers that a quarter of a century ago, when fact, and not fiction, was the matter used for form- ing minds, while supervisor of public schools in a large town, he was authorized to put charts and a globe in each of the Distriet schools, and in one of the districts, having some half-dozen schools, a library ; and he had no difficulty in finding several libraries of different values, and ail of suitable books, made up by the Harpers, at satis- factory rates ; and he well remembers that the library selected, though of only useful books, was used to the literal wearing out.

The surrender, by parents, of all moral and religious instruction to the Sunday school, is working sadly in another direction. So far as the writer has knowledge, a very small per centage of the children, under ten years of age, of Methodist parents, attend preaching service, see the minister in the pulpit, or come within reach of the pastor, at home or abroad. A former missionary has well said, " We need, most of all, christian homes."

" Fathers, as well as mothers, are held responsible for the moral and religious training of their children. There is being developed a form of paganism in these christian lands, more barren than that of lieatliendom. The heathen have some religion. They at least worship their idols. But we have a large population which has no religion, no God, and no form of worship."

Recently, the following illustration of the legitimate results of such

209

THE SUNDAY SCHOOL AND LIBRARY.

reading appeared in our leading church paper. The subject was- " The suicide of a boy eleven years of age." "The father says of him that he was of a light hearted and affectionate disposition," and adds, "I had no occasion to correct or punish him, and there is noth- ing that I can think of that would make him take his life."

'. It appears, however, that the lad had taken for his ante-breakfast reading on that Sunday morning, a story in the family paper, headed, " Dying on the point of Honor, strange story of a Southern Duel." The writer then adds, "What an awful warning is this suicide to those parents who thoughtlessly allow their children to read sensational literature."

The Christian At Work says, on causes of crime, "Does any startled reader spring forward with the question : What is the cause of this awful record of murder and suicide? The answer is, we think, threefold, viz : infidel doctrines, cheap, fictitions, sentimental litera- ture, and the decadence of family training."

Reference. The difference between the story of " the boy suicide," or the " sentimental literature," and the Sunday school library, is in degree only ; and, on the universal principle of progression, the Sunday school scholar 'will as naturally take in the more, and then, the most sensational story, as he will, when hungry, take in food. Thus, as with another evil spirit, the greed grows and strengthens by what it feeds upon, till, even the most " blood and thunder " dime novel becomes too tame for the growing greed.

Time was when the church could, and did with confidence, look to the Sunday school, as to a nursery, for recruits ; nor did it look in vain. The conversion of an entire class was not a strange occurrence ; but the old time school, in its unpretentious form, can scarcely be identified in its modern fictitious and formal practice. In olden time the question was of fitness and profit, in modern time it is of enter- tainment ; then, in the order of responsibility, the parent first, and second the teacher led, now the boys and girls are usually ahead ; and, as a necessary consequence, they mature in transgression much nearer to their swaddling. New fiction has taken the place of the old fashioned Bible. Then it was the Bible without fiction ; now fiction without the Bible ; except, perchance, sometimes as a text book. And is it not questionable if its use is demanded, even as a text book ? Have not "leaflets," in the shape of "Teacher's Notes," and the " Lesson Leaf," taken the place of the Scriptures to their essential

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History of Methodism in Maine, 1793-1886, Part 79

Author: Allen, Stephen, 1810-1888; Pilsbury, William Hacket, 1806-1888 Publication date: 1887 Publisher: Augusta, Press of C. E. Nash Number of Pages: 1146

Author: Allen, Stephen, 1810-1888; Pilsbury, William Hacket, 1806-1888
Publication date: 1887
Publisher: Augusta, Press of C. E. Nash
Number of Pages: 1146