Clarksville weekly chronicle. (Clarksville, Tenn.) 1873-1890, 1881-06-11
For nlsI.op-xxllllam nnrr.
Franklin Review and journal.

For Bishop William barr.
Franklin Review and journal.
It may be suggested, after 4 peru
sal of this article, that it is none OF
our secular business to NEEDLE with
the serious and solemn affair aDCut
which it treats. We beg leave in
advance 10 enter a dissenting opin-
ion tosuch a view of the subject,
and hasten to urge that this isa land
of freedom of the press and freedom
Of thought and freedom of exWcs-
sion upon al matters. Besides, we
in manner and to certain meas
4 ure occupy the field OF religious
| journal, not for one but for all the
Il churches. In the matter OF collect
Il ing and expressing the popular viii
i upon all questions, we claim TO be
4 among the first. Certainly we are
iplaced in the most advantageous
position to gather in the feelings
and hopes and wishes of a large
] class of readers who live in a section
Iof country over which extends the
Jurisdiction of the largest, wealth.
i lest and most intelligent presiding
! elders district in the largest and old
4 est of the annual conferences Of the
! Methodist Episcopal Church South.
There are now living in this town
two or three very aged persons who
/ recollect distinctly that their most
/ hallowed memories cluster around
the pioneers who planted Method
] ism in this land. From the very
beginning the meeting of the con-
ferences and their lists of appoint-
ments have been looked TO with
more general interest than even the
biennial meetings ofour legislatures.
The old-fashioned circuit-rider was
| the most powerful educating force
| that has ever been seen in this coun-
try. The days of itineracy are the
heroic days OF. that church-days in
which the preacher went ahead of
civilization and camped and took
pot-luck with the sturdy and brave
hearted settlers who felled the for
ests and expelled the Wild beast and
the Indian from their lair and laid
the foundations of this goodly
structure which we enjoy to-day.
We have all been educated to
take a deep and abiding interest in
everything that pertains to the hon
or and glory and welfare of one of
the most potent forces of modern
times. We
As the season of the year is fast
approaching in which will be held |
all the district conferences at which |
the delegates to the annual confer |
ences are to be selected, who will in |
turn and at the proper time elect |
delegates to the general conference |
which meets in May next in the
city of Nashville, at which several
bishops are to be chosen, we take |
this opportunity of calling the at
tention of the entire connection to /
one man in the Tennessee annual |
conference who we think ought by
all means to be made one of the bish-
ops. William Burr is now the sta
tion preacher in the townof Shelby
vile in this state. He is in the full
enjoyment of "a sound mind in a
sound body" He is in the very
flower of his prime, healthy, hearty,
happy, laborious and thoroughly
consecrated to the great work for
which he was set apart at his 0rdi-
nation. He was born in Tennessee
and is a thorough-blooded TenneS-
sean. He has all the manly attrlh-
utes of his race, and its idosyncracies
as for that.
If there is n bishop living or dead
whose eyes FOR the first time opened
upon our sky, we cannot call his
name. The church has been won
derfully blessed in the lives and SER
vices Of its bishops since its organi-
zation, and against none of them
have we ought TO charge. The pres
ent college will compare faVOrably
in the purity OF their lives and i'm
the efficacy of their efforts with any
official body of the church in any
age or epoch uf its career. We must
be pard0ned for having State pride
in This matter especially so when
it will be seen at Il glance that our
has all the qualifications
for that high and holy place. From
his very bOyhood William Burr has
been at work as cireuit-rider, as |
elder and as a station
preacher. He has been thoroughly {
trained. He has irst-class executive
ability, coupled with sure-footed 1
Judgement and tempered by mercy \
and warm gushing sympathy. t
There are abler preachers than he q
both in the present college and in {
The ranks, but there is not in the {
former or latter his equal in all the a
splendid qualities which go TO make a
Ip an executive officer. Every in i
crest of his church is as dear to him t
Is the apple of his eye. The young S
men who are just coming in to en- C
ist under the old banner of their v
athers need their fathers friend s
md colleague to direct the fight and r
10 the training. The preachers, q
10Th young and old, now bearing
he burden and heat of the day, y
reed his kindly sympathetic nature
lis large experience and his thor
ugh knowledge of how and where
0 fight, to assist them in doing bat
lie. Their families and their wants
nd necessities will find in him Il
upervising agency which will look i
arefully to and search diligently =,
or the means to alleviate their y
roubles and smooth the rough and -
ugged corners of their every day -
ife. Above all, he would carry sun q
hine into every household from :.
he Ohio river to the Gulf and far "
ut to the Pacific Slope. "
In a conference which has pro- ~
Iuced a McFerrip, a Hammer, a =
ireen, and a score of others, the !,
nost effective workers in whiten- -
ng fields of religious effort, it is high n
ime that one of their number was ~ ~
made Bishop. If the Tennessee an VI
ual conference will take this mat -
er earnestly in hand William Burr =,
7ill in May next be elected Bish- - -
p, and the church will be greatly ~ ~
leSspd thereby y,