USA > Ohio > Ross County > Chillicothe > Ohio centennial anniversary celebration at Chillicothe, May 20-21, 1903 : under the auspices of the Ohio State Archaelogical and Historical Society : complete proceedings > Part 60
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Another great event soon drew national attention to Ohio - the adoption of her constitution.
Article 8, section 3, reads as follows :
That all men have a natural and indefeasible right to worship Al- mighty God according to the dictates of conscience. That no human
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authority can in any case whatever control or interfere with the rights of conscience. That no man shall be compelled to attend, erect, or sup- port any place of worship or maintain any minister against his consent and that no preference shall ever be given by law to any religious society or mode of worship; and no religious test shall be required as a quali- fication to any office of trust or profit.
With what wondering eyes the slaves of ecclesiastical des- potism in the old world must have read these words, one hun- dred years ago. Ohio gave religious liberty to her people for- ever. Even the non-conformist rate-payers of Great Britain must have read that article with a longing to break for Ohio at. once to found new homes for themselves and for their children.
Here then were two reasons why such a sifted population flowed into Ohio.
Physical liberty was guaranteed to all her citizens by the immortal Ordinance of 1787, and soul liberty, mind liberty, heart liberty, liberty of conscience, that priceless boon for the attain- ment of which gallant nations like the Swiss Republic and the Dutch Republic have fought even to the verge of annihilation, was given to the people of Ohio without the shedding of a drop of blood.
I have looked upon 580 instruments of torture used, every one of them, to coerce the human conscience, to compel men to think alike upon religious subjects.
I have wandered through the Tower of London and have seen the axes that were used to sever heads from the bodies of those of whom the world was not worthy because they would rather die than lie. Those terrible blocks upon which beautiful and noble heads were laid in the far away past are there still, to teach us faith in God and in the resistless march of humanity toward that better day so sure to come when religious liberty shall be proclaimed throughout the whole world.
Think what it would mean to the persecuted Christians of Turkey and the persecuted Jews of Russia to live under such a constitution as this.
A religion that denies religious liberty to others may be labelled Christianity but it is not Christianity. It needs but the testing time to show to the world that it is only veneered sav-
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agery. Such a revelation we have had from Russia within the past few days. There is nothing of the spirit of Christ in such a religion as that.
What other nations secured through seas of blood and Geth- semanes of anguish, Ohio was born into.
It was of course to be expected that all denominations of Christian people would share the enthusiasm for the young state.
The Moravians were first to come. Christian Frederick Post was the first to arrive in 1761. His was the first white man's cabin built in Ohio. The Moravians built the first house of worship in 1772 near where Marietta now stands, and here was the spot where the first colony of 47 persons came from New England in 1788 and founded the city of Marietta and there they found a Christian church which had been built 16 years before.
The Roman Catholics came in the early years of the century. Rev. Edward D. Fenwick, a Marylander, born in 1786- a Do- minican friar educated in France - was the first missionary to Ohio of the Roman Catholic faith. He came from Kentucky where Roman Catholicism had been already established about 1810, to visit the few families of his church which he found along the frontiers. In 1821 the Diocese of Cincinnati was cre- ated and included all the Northwest Territory. Mr. Fenwick was appointed by Pope Pius VII. as the first bishop. He then estimated there were 8,000 Roman Catholics in his jurisdiction, but about the year 1830 the migration from Ireland and Germany very greatly increased the population of that faith, since which time its growth has been steady.
The planting of the Protestant Episcopal Church in Ohio was done by faithful laymen. The prayer book was read in log cabins and rude school houses. Formal organization took place in September, 1809, at Boardman, Trumbull County. Rev. Phil- ander Chase preached the first sermon in Ohio at Covenant Creek, March 16, 1817.
Judge Solomon had read prayers in the woods for several years so that when the clergyman came he found fifty persons ready to be baptized.
The Evangelical Lutherans first came to Ohio with the waves of immigration from Pennsylvania, Virginia and North Carolina
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in the last decade of the eighteenth century. The first mission- ary pastors came over the mountains on horseback, baptized and confirmed the children of these pious Germans and organized the first congregations in 1802-1806. Soon the immigrants from Germany came in increasing numbers to the new state forming a not inconsiderable element of our religious forces. In army and legislative hall the members of this conservative church have ever been loyal and faithful to Buckeye principles of liberty. To- day Ohio Lutherans number 125,000 communicant members and support, in the state, three colleges, two theological seminaries, an orphans' home, a dozen periodicals and report over six hun- dred churches with a valuation of three million dollars.
The Presbyterians came early in the century and have been a mighty force for good in Ohio. They have been lovers of righteousness and haters of iniquity. They and the Methodists had many a battle for years, but the stern creed of John Calvin has softened a little with passing years and the Arminian and the Calvinist now work together in perfect harmony.
In the autumn of 1789 a number of Baptist families went down the Ohio River and began a settlement where the town of Columbia now stands. In 1790 the Reverend Stephen Gano or- ganized the first Baptist church and baptized three persons. Ohio has fully shared in the vast increase of the Baptist denomin- ation which now counts upon her muster rolls in the whole nation four and one-half millions of communicants and nine millions of a population.
Puritanism has made a wonderful contribution to the relig- ious history of Ohio. The colonizing of the Western Reserve was a sublime event. These colonists were the descendants of the Puritans of whom Macaulay wrote, "They thought so intently on one subject that they were tranquil on every other"; and con- cerning whom he further says, "The Puritans brought to civil and military affairs a coolness of judgment and an immutability of purpose which some writers have thought inconsistent with religious zeal, but which were in fact the necessary effects of it."
Even Hume the historian though a scoffer at Christianity says, "They, the Puritans, alone kindled and preserved the pre- cious spark of Liberty"; and Hallam says, "The Puritans were
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depositories of the sacred fire of liberty and revived its smolder- ing embers."
Carlyle speaks of Puritanism as "the last of all our hero- isms which was in all verity as noble a heroism as ever transacted itself on the earth." It gave England constitutional liberty and America political freedom, self-government and the beginnings of a true democracy.
Puritanism came to Ohio with the stern creed of John Cal- vin, John Knox and William the Silent and whatever defects that creed may have, it has so much of the truth of God and of his Gospel in it that it can build nations that. endure and conquer. There is iron in the creed and there was iron in the men who believed it.
The descendants of these men peopled the Western Reserve. Their children of to-day illustrate their moral fibre.
Is there any community on earth more law abiding, more true. to the lofty ideals of our holy Christianity than these descendants. of the Puritans ?
Time would fail to speak of all the denominations which were- here at the very beginning, but there is one more to which I must refer - the Methodist Episcopal Church.
Puritanism and Methodism have very much in common. Both movements were protests against the wickedness of the world and the worldliness of the Church. Both suffered fearful persecutions and both were triumphant at the last. They differed in creed, the one Calvinistic and the other Arminian, but they agreed in the great essentials. They believed in Christ Jesus as. the only Savior. They believed the Bible to be the Word of God and at last they saw that their objects and aims were one and that they ought to work together in perfect harmony! Meth- odism brought with her from England the itineracy, which was certainly a providential scheme for preaching the Gospel in the western world.
How wonderful it all seems as we look back upon it now. John Wesley was denied the pulpits of the established church and even the privilege of preaching in his own father's pulpit. He mounted his father's tomb and there he preached Jesus and the great salvation to the people. He was hooted at and scorned:
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and stoned and mobbed, but he went up and down through the United Kingdom for half a century until all opposition ceased and his fame grew into collossal proportions and all England joined in applause as he approached the end of his life-long labors and declared that he was ready to "cease at once to work and live." Never was there a finer illustration of the truth of Paul's declaration when he said, "We can do nothing against the truth but for the truth ;" as though he had said, "Every blow ye strike will be for the furtherance of the Gospel." If Wesley had been welcomed to the churches of England, we should never have had the itineracy of Methodism, that ecclesiastical, military system which enabled him even before he died to reach every part of Great Britain and that emboldened him to invade America.
That was a great day for Ohio and every other state when John Wesley said to George Shadford, one of his preachers, "George, I turn you loose on the continent of America. Publish your commission in the face of the sun." I have before me the record of the first conference of these itinerants that ever met in this country. It was held in Philadelphia in June, 1773, just one hundred and thirty years ago. It was composed of ten preachers. After several days deliberation the appointments were read. We can imagine that little band closing their session with Charles Wesley's parting hymn which has been sung by the Methodists ever since it was written.
And let our bodies part, To different climes repair, Inseparably joined in heart, The friends of Jesus are.
Then the question was asked, "How are the preachers sta- tioned ?"
New York, Thomas Rankin, to change in four months.
Philadelphia, George Shadford, to change in four months. New Jersey, John King, William Watters.
Baltimore, Francis Asbury, Robert Strawbridge, Abraham Whitwork, and Joseph Yearbay.
Norfolk, Richard Wright.
Petersburg, Robert Williams.
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And then they mounted their horses and rode away, some to the north and some to the south.
Never since the day when Jesus spread his pierced hands over the heads of his disciples at the Mount of Olives and sent them out to preach the Gospel has there been witnessed a sub- limer sight than that little band going out to preach the Gospel to the people, literally not knowing whither they went.
They were men of great ability. Francis Asbury would have graced the Senate of the United States, he would have graced the supreme bench of this country or of England, but these men went forth on a salary that rarely averaged as much as $64 a year. The people showed them abounding hospitality. Their preaching, their prayers, their songs made them welcome every- where. Year by year, they kept going farther west as their numbers increased. They followed the settlers into the valleys and over the mountains and in the closing years of the century they reached Ohio. The Western Conference was organized. It took in all the great West from the summit of the Alleghany Range to the limits of civilization. That Western Conference met in Chillicothe in 1807. The state of Ohio was at that time one great district. I have seen the minutes of that conference. Let me read them to you.
Ohio District, John Sale, presiding elder.
Miami, Benjamin Lakin, John Collins.
Mad River, Agget McGuire, Isaac Quinn.
Scioto, Anthony Houston, Milton Ladd.
Hock Hockin, Joseph Hayes, James King.
Muskingum, Peter Cartwright.
Little Kanawha, William Vermillion.
Guyandotte, John Klingham. White River, John Hellmuns, Sela Paine.
Licking, William Ellington.
A band of twelve men from whose labors came Ohio Meth- odism as it stands to-day, with its five great conferences, its 600,000 people, its $12,000,000 worth of church property, its schools and colleges all through the land.
Other denominations adopted the itineracy and one pastor was often given charge of four or five groups of believers. These
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itinerant preachers were strong men. It would be a delight had we time, to select from them a few types and describe them. Their immediate successors were such men as Bigelow, Christy, Raper and a host of others. Recently, I heard Joseph Parker, a great preacher of London, preach a magnificent sermon. I lis- tened to him with delight and I know that these men I have men- tioned would stand shoulder to shoulder with him if they were alive to-day and in the pulpit. They were scholarly men. What they lacked of education at the beginning, they gained by hard work. They studied on horseback. They studied in the cabins of the poor. Thousands were converted under their ministry. Think of men like Russell Bigelow getting a salary of $300 a year while the Archbishop of Canterbury, a very nice man and a very good man, but judging from his published sermons in no sense the equal of Russell Bigelow, receiving $75,000 a year for his salary. But these great men who helped to make Ohio what it is have received their reward in the results of their lives. They wove their lives into the destiny of Ohio and that destiny is to brighten forever beneath the smile of God. Therefore, they have found their reward. They had the strange and wonderful power to cause men to cry out, "What must I do to be saved?" and the story of their triumphs is among the most thrilling and wonderful in the history of the Church of God.
But the religious influences of Ohio did not altogether pro- ceed from the ministry. Christian homes abound, homes like that where Abraham Lincoln was reared, who was trained by his Baptist mother to love the Bible and to read it until his soul was filled with its great thoughts and he made it the guide of his life. No wonder that when he stood by his mother's grave he said, "All that I am or ever hope to be I owe to my angel mother." If you will look carefully into the lives of the greatest men Olio has ever produced, you will find that they came from such homes as this. U. S. Grant, who was incapable of an unmanly or an unchristian act, came from a Christian home. William Mckinley had a mother who was devotedly pious. She taught her boy to believe in God and revere his commands. He showed the result of her teaching and as he was dying drew the whole world nearer to God when he sang, "Nearer my God to Thee, nearer to Thee."
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Last Sabbath I heard Bishop Joyce preach. He told the fol- lowing incident. In one of his great congregations far out in Montana, he called upon all those who were willing to give their lives to Jesus Christ from that day forward to rise. Many re- sponded to his appeal and among them was the owner of the mine in which most of his congregation were employed. When the services were over, the mine owner came to the bishop and said, "I have not been inside of a church for seven long years. Why I am here to-day I can not understand. Your appeal brought to me sacred memories. When I bade my mother goodbye in old Scotland, she said, 'I want to say three things to you. Don't forget God. Don't forget your Bible. Don't forget your mother,' and while you were talking, my mother's face glided before me. That mine owner became a Christian. Several years after, he was injured in his mine and was taken home to die. Although called suddenly away from earth, he was ready. He said to his wife, 'I am glad I gave my heart to God that day when the bishop asked us to rise'."
Volumes might be written of such instances as this that came to the knowledge of the frontier preachers, and they were not slow to appeal to the holiest and most sacred impulses of the human heart. We can not trace the religious influences that made Ohio without taking this into account. Before we can do it ac- curately, we must catch the holy gleam on many a mother's face as she sorrowfully bids her boy goodbye and sends him out to seek his fortune in the new state. Yea, before we can trace ac- curately the religious influences that made Ohio, we must be gifted with spiritual insight to enable us to tell how the Holy Spirit of God, who convinces men of sin and of righteousness and of a judgment to come, calls men to repentance, awakens their consciences and as the supreme Teacher leads them into conscious fellowship with Jesus Christ. We must be able to tell how that Spirit dealt with each individual soul, for it is written that "He lighteneth every man that cometh into the world."
And now what of the future? Let us have no fears but go forward to meet it confident that all will be well. In 1857, I heard George D. Prentiss, the editor of the Louisville Journal, deliver a lecture on American Politics. It was as gloomy a lec-
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ture as I ever heard. He spoke of the Ship of State driving upon the breakers and he said, "The pilots are all dead." He referred to the death of Clay and of Webster; and then in his beautifully classic way he said, "Ulysses has gone forth to his wanderings and there is no one left at Ithaca strong enough to bend his bow. Atlas has gone to the shades of Erebus and there is no one left to support the falling skies" and he sat down and left us in the darkness. But God had a Ulysses that George D. Prentiss did not know about. He was in a tan-yard in Galena, Illinois. He had been trained by a Christian mother. And God had ready an Atlas in a law office in Springfield, Illinois, whose character had been moulded and fashioned by a noble Christian woman who taught him to fear God and nothing else. His name was Abraham Lincoln.
Let us go forward then to meet the future, believing that He who has brought us thus far will still be our guard and guide through all the coming years, and furnish us leaders in every great crisis.
TENT IN WHICH CENTENNIAL EXERCISES WERE HELD.
ADDRESS OF CHARLES FOSTER .*
Mr. President and Ladies and Gentlemen : I have no manu- script, and in fact until about ten minutes ago I did not know that I was even expected to talk, and besides that my landlady notified me that I must be home to dinner at half- past twelve or I would not get any- thing to eat. (Laughter and cries of "Its past half after twelve now; go on.")
Its past half-past twelve now, dinner is gone, and perhaps for that reason I may detain you a little longer than I otherwise would. (Laughter.)
Egotism as a rule is intolerable, but when fully justified it may be tolerated as is the case in the state of Ohio. (More laughter.)
CHARLES FOSTER.
We care but little to-day about the precise date on which the state was admitted into the Union, or whether Thomas Jefferson and his political associates performed the high political finan- ciering, so-to-speak - I don't want to use any harsher term - to secure the admission of the state without submitting to a vote of the people. What do these things matter when now, to-day, we have four and one-half millions of people, happy and con- tented, every one of them.
A condition exists in Ohio and in the whole country for that matter which does not exist anywhere else in the world. There is not a man in all this broad state and country in good health. who to-day can not make a living for himself, secure a home and lay up something besides.
* Stenographer's Report.
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Our friend, General Cowen, in his most charming paper undertakes to show and I think does show some reason for the extraordinary success of the people of this state of Ohio; for it is extraordinary. It does not happen to other states, and there must be some reason for it. He shows that the liberty-loving and best people of Western Europe, through Virginia and Massachusetts, were the first settlers of the state of Ohio, and the mingling of the blood of these people has produced this magnificent type of people that we now possess in this state. I have no doubt that that is one reason and a very potent reason, but it strikes me, my fellow-citizen, that there is another reason. Conditions exist in Ohio that do not exist in any other state in this Union. The great mineral, manufacturing, mercantile and farming interests exist in Ohio in about equal proportions. In other states one or the other of these great interests predominate; hence it is that these great interests operating upon the minds of our people so equally produce a level-headed sort of people (applause and laughter) while in other states one factor being potential makes the people of that state just a little lop-sided compared with the people of Ohio. (More applause and laughter.)
My fellow-citiens, I think perhaps if I stop I can yet get that dinner, and you have had this centennial discussion from all points and had many very able papers, and I do not care about continuing my speech because it won't get into that book of six- teen volumes.
Having said this much I desire to express my great gratifi- cation at meeting you and to compliment the officers of the Ohio State Archæological and Historical Society upon the success of their enterprise. (Great applause.)
ADDRESS OF BISHOP B. W. ARNETT .*
Mr. Chairman, Ladies and Gentlemen: (Cries of “What shall we do with the Colored Race?" "Hear him." "Hear him.")
I am more than pleased to be here, pleased because of the occasion that brings us together in the reception vestibule of the twentieth century. I am here to rep- resent in part ninety-six thousand Buckeyes of the buckeye color. (Laughter and applause.) We are not painted buckeyes, but are buck- eyes (more laughter) ; every one of us. You see it is our buckeye ; you have adopted it; we have the color and you have the buckeye. (Laugh- ter.)
If it were not so late I would like to go back one hundred years and speak of the grand work of the pio- neer fathers, but I know it is too late for that.
BISHOP B. W ARNETT.
My dear friends, in this grand work of laying the foundation of the Northwest Territory, no class of people in this land was more interested and had a deeper interest in its consummation than the race with whom I am identified, by blood, by history and by destiny, for the Northwest Terri- tory was the first gift to posterity, from the fathers that fought for the establishment of a country here whose cornerstone was that "God has created all men equal and endowed them with certain inalienable rights, among which are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness."
The Northwest Territory was the Ten Commandments ; the Northwest Territory was the Golden Rule; the Northwest Ter- ritory to us was the land of Canaan, the promise of liberty, of honey, and milk, and wine. (Laughter and applause.)
* Stenographer's Report.
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We have not always received the wine; we don't want it; as Doctor Thompson says, we can do without it; but there is this about it: In the organization of the Northwest Territory our fathers were in harmony with the spirit that laid the foundation of our republic. They believed what they said; they believed in the doctrine of the fatherhood of God and the brotherhood of man. But the subject with them was how to supply that; how to take the power of the strong and give it to the weakest; how to take the wealth of the wealthiest and distribute it among the poor ; how to take a race that was down and lift it up. For our fathers in the past hundred years their sons have solved that mysterious problem and to-day we stand in Ohio.
In 1802 my race was denied the oath in the courts; we were denied the right to carry a gun; we were denied the jury box; we were denied the cartridge box; and we were denied everything that was in those two boxes. But we have lived to see the chil- dren of the fathers who laid the foundation of this government, come up to the point where we are this day. There is not a statute on the books of the great state of Ohio that discriminates against any man or woman on account of race, color of previous condition (applause) ; we stand to-day equal before the law. A hundred years ago my race was standing with not a star appear- ing above the horizon ; no stars appeared above the horizon of our civilization except the two stars that guide the pilgrims of all nations-the Star of Bethlehem and the Star of Hope. For American citizens they are the brightest stars in the firmament of our civilization.
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