The Mankato free press. [volume] (Mankato, Blue Earth County, Minn.) 1879-1924, 1903-07-03

the Established church and some from
other churches joined him, and these he
made pastors over his circuits
Then he undertook to furnish whole
some literature for his people. He pub
lished tracts on topics of vital impor-
lance to the religious and moral life of
society, issued cheap editions of classic
devotional books, published magazine,
and made his preachers, exhortors, and
leaders agents for distributing them
among the people. Methodism has con-
tinued this work of education through
the press. The Methodist Book concern
in America is the largest UNCONVENTIONAL
publishing establishment in the world.
Bishop Warren said awhile ago that If
| the issues of all other UNCONVENTIONAL
publishing houses of evangelical churches
were put into one scale, and thereto were
added the whole output of the American
Bible association, the Methodist Book
concern publications might be put in the
other scale, and would outweigh them
f, ALL
John Wesley had much to do with the
modern Sunday school movement. Han
nah Ball, a Methodist young woman
gathered ragged and dirty boys and girls
| in the streets of Wycombe, and organic
ed them into Sunday school in the
year 1863. How many other Methodist
Sunday schools existed before Robert
Raikes began his Sunday school work ten
or twelve years later is not known; but
| it is matter of history that when Robert
Raikes said one day, pointing to neg
lected children in the street: "What
| shall we do for these?" A Methodist
young woman who afterwards became
| the wife of Mr.. Bradburn, one of Yves
ley's preachers, replied: 'Let us teach
| them to read, and take them to church" "
| He acted on her suggestion, and she help
J children of Gloucester, and his account
of this school in The Gloucester Journal
was republished in London, and led to
the organization of Sunday schools by
all denominations. Rowland Hill, ia.
in, fho lc af
dism, started the first Sunday school in
that city, and Francis Asbury, our first
Methodist bishop, in America started the
, Sunday school work in America.
Wesley believed thoroughly in educa
ton. In the year 1880, from which
Methodism is commonly dated, he start
e2 his famous Kingswood school, and in
/ l744, at his first annual conference, pro-
posed the establishment of school for
the better education of his workers. In
America,sat the very beginning, Bishop
, Coke and Asbury organized Cokesbury
college, which was twice burned in few
years, and at the time of his death As.
bury had plans for establishing college
in every conference. Though this plan
was not carried out, Methodism hrs
given so much attention to the higher
education that we have now 225 schools,
some of which are seminaries and in
dustrial schools, and more than $4,000
students are in attendance at our in
stitutions Edward Everett Hale says
No other church in America has so sue
cessfully engaged in the work of edu-
cation as has the Methodist church,
The historian, Green, says that while
other men represented aspects. of the
Methodist movement, John Wesley EN-,
bodied it. He reached uncountable mul.
titudes with his voice, travelling in the
course of his ministry on horse back and
by coach about $4,000 miles, preaching
about 500 sermons a year, or not less
than 10000 in ALL He was man of
great learning, and an indefatigable pub
Usher. His own writings comprise lla
volumes, including a grammar in Eng
fish, one in French, one in Latin, one in
Hebrew, one in Greek. While his move
nent was religious, his genius for or
ganization and education was such that
his ideas and impulses have wrought
widely and deeply throughout the Anglo
Saxon world To very considerable ex-
tent, his religious ideas, even his theolo-
gical interpretations have become the
property of denominations which ridicul-
ed and prosecuted him. The coarse secra-