CHAPTER XLIX.
1846-1848.
Re-Union of the British and Canadian Conferences.
During and before the period of the Metcalfe Controversy events were transpiring in Methodist circles in which Dr. Ryerson took an active part, and in which he was deeply interested.[130]
Important correspondence on the relations to each other of the British and Canadian Conferences took place in 1842. But as the issue of the contest between these Conferences was so prolonged, and involved so many important questions—religious and public—I think it desirable to give a brief preliminary outline of the origin of the difficulties between the two bodies. This is the more necessary, as Dr. Ryerson's own personal history and conduct became, from a variety of circumstances, most prominently mixed up with these controversies. His letters to the Government on the subject, and to the Missionary Secretaries, now first published, are also valuable Methodist historical documents—although they partake largely of a personal character—as he was the foremost figure in all of these connexional contests. They are highly characteristic of the courage and self-sacrifice of the writer.
Methodism, after its introduction into Upper Canada in 1790, was organized into a Church by preachers from the United States. In 1811, when Upper Canada was on the eve of being the theatre of war with the United States, several American preachers who had been appointed to Canada declined to come, while those here (Messrs. Roads and Densmore) applied to the Canadian Government in 1812 for leave to return to their own country.[131] Nevertheless, after the war, and on the representation of persons prompted by high churchmen, the London Wesleyan Missionary Society sent out missionaries to four of the larger towns in Upper Canada. This schismatical policy was pursued by the British Conference until 1820, when the American General Conference sent Rev. John (afterwards) Bishop Emory, as a deputation to that Conference to remonstrate. The result was that the following resolutions were passed by the British Conference in that year (1820):—
1. That as the American Methodists and ourselves are but one body, it would be inconsistent with our unity, and dangerous to that affection which ought to characterize us in every place, to have different societies and congregations in the same towns and villages, or to allow of any intrusion on either side into each other's labours.
2. That this principle shall be the rule by which the disputes now existing in the Canadas, between our missionaries, shall be terminated.