Page:The Galaxy, Volume 6.djvu/102

88 Let us add to this, pay of 8,000 preachers at, say, $600 - - 4,800,000

And expenses of 11,000 churches, at $400. - . . 4,400,000

A sum of yearly contributions of .... $7,133,308

See also what they were able to do with a slight movement. The year 1866 arrived, the one hundredth anniversary of Methodism in America. A few of their wise men—if they were wise?—said, let us raise an educational fund. They raised the sum of $8,397,662, and the machine felt no strain.

Before pointing out any particulars of this organization, or attempting to touch the secret of its power and success, allow me to ask a moment's attention to this "Methodist Book Concern;" and bear it in mind that it was started by these poor travelling preachers, and is and has been carried on by them, not by shrewd business men; and that it is "not to make money, but to do good."

In the year 1836, after being ruined by a disastrous fire, it started again with a mixed capital, estimated at $281,650. In thirty-one years it has added ninety-seven per cent. to its capital, and has paid out three hundred and eighty-three per cent. in dividends to Church purposes. And in this period three-quarters of all publishing houses have gone to ruin. Is godliness indeed great gain?

These poor preachers have shown a great capacity for organization. The New York Concern has now four depositories—at Boston, Buffalo, Pittsburg and San Francisco. It publishes Bibles, hymn-books, over two thousand different books, and various periodicals, as has been said. It not only has these books and papers and tracts written, but it prints and binds and sells them; and it makes money by all this, without making that its end and purpose. And what does it do with its money? The last report (1868) will show.

The profits, $164,735 09, for the term, have been applied as follows:

Dividend declared in 1864 to 52 annual conferences, each $400 - $20,800 00

Our share of the deficiency to meet General Conference expenses 3,811 81

Other incidental expenses ..--.- 1,346 42

California Christian Advocate - -. - . 4,000 00

Pacific Christian Advocate ...... 4,000 00

Our share of bishops' salaries and travelling expenses - - 79,894 50

Whole amount paid by order of General Conference - - 113,852 73 Added to the Capital Stock ...... 50,882 36

Total $164,735 09

"Its agents and editors, like its employés generally have worked for a mere living compensation"—this is their own testimony. Filthy lucre has not spurred them on to do this work.

It is time now to refer to the origin of Methodism, so that we may, if possible, discover the sources of its power and the secret of its growth. It is strange, and yet it is true, that out of the classic cloisters of Oxford, out of the conservative and consecrated shades of the English Church, came this rough, fervent, urgent child of religion. In the year 1729 existed there the "Holy Club," composed of John and Charles Wesley (then twenty-six and twenty-one years of age), Morgan, an Irish commoner, and Kirkham, of Merton College. They read together, walked together, prayed together. They fasted twice a week and received the Communion once. They were a sort of monks, and in danger of becoming sick, and morbid, and foolish, and useless. But Morgan