The San Francisco call., 1898-09-10
GREAT BISHOP
 OF METHODIST Rev. J. F. Hurst Will Preach on Sunday. THE GROWTH OF THE CHURCH AUTHOR OF MANY STANDARD
 RELIGIOUS WORKS. 4 Famous Divine Who Has Travelled Around the World and Held
 Many Exalted Positions.
 His Career.
THE GROWTH OF THE CHURCH
AUTHOR OF MANY STANDARD
 RELIGIOUS WORKS.

The remarkable growths In the United States during the present century are not confined to material prosperity or the ln- crease of population. The increase in the Christian church has far outstripped our advance In population The most remark able increase known to the Christian has been that of American Methodism, as the following figures show
 Methodism planted in United States in 1776.
 Methodist Episcopal Church, organized 1!S4, with l5, 0G0 members. Now, total of Methodist communicants, 5000, 00o representing corstitu- entcy of 24, GOO 00O. Original E. Church, B. eo0.e0 communicants. 12o0O.0Oo constituents. 2. .0o 900 Sabbath school children. IT, 46S pastors, l5,000 local preachers. All under direction of IS active general superintendents of which Bishop Hurst Is one. Churches 26.114; parsonages. l0 263: property value SIPS, GOO 000 Colleges and universities 53. Total number of schools. 221. Students 4S. 00O Value of property and endow- ments, less debts. s3O.O0o eco.
 The secrets of this unprecedented de- velopment are many. Not the least among them is an aggressive policy and a wise selection of leaders, one of the greatest of whom Is the subject of this sketch and who will preach Sunday morn ing in the historic Howard-street church, between Second and Third streets, at Il o'clock.
 John Fletcher Hurst, LID, Bishop of the Methodist Episcopal church. was born near Salem, Dorchester County, Md. August r, 1884. He prepared for col lege at Cambtidge Academy, and grad
 
 teaching ancient languages for two years at the Hedding Institute, New York, he went to Germany, where he studied the ology in the universities of Halle and Heidelberg. On his return to the United States, In the latter part of 1858, he en- tered the Newark conference and here had fI appointments in Irvington, Passaic, Elizabeth and Staten Island. In the au- tumn of 1866 he took charge of the theological department of the Mission In stitute of the German Methodist church in Bremen, Germany, which was after ward removed to Frankfort-on-the- Main, under the name of the Martin Biblical Institute, of which he continued as di- meantime, Russia, the Scandinavian countries, France, Switzerland, Italy, Great Britain. Greece, Syria and Egypt In 1871 he returned to the United States to become professor of historical theology in the Drew Theological Seminary at dent of that institution in 1873, retaining his chair of historical theology.
 Dr. Hurst has published a History of Ea1se 6unss Marfrs 6f Bbe G6 the Hs1r1 T2e Outlines of Church History" and ''Our Theological Century" He has translated and edited Hagenbach's History of the Van Oosterzee's Lectures in Defense of St. Johns Gospel" Lange's "Commentary on the Epistle to the Romans" the Moral Essays of l.. Annaeus Seneca, tian Church. in two volumes. and has now about completed for the press his tory of Methodism, in three parts, in six folio volumes.
 pacy at the early age of 46, almost with out precedent in Methodism, and has since traveled all over the world in the administration of his office.