Books: Neville Trueman the Pioneer Preacher
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William Henry Withrow >> Neville Trueman the Pioneer Preacher
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On Saturday night a rousing prayer-meeting was held in the log
meeting-house. Fervent exhortations were given, for the preachers
looked for immediate results of their labours, and they were not
disappointed Several of the brethren and sisters "got happy," and
expressed their religions enjoyment in hymns and spiritual songs
often of rugged rhythm, but, sung with fervour as they were, they
seemed to bear up the soul as on wings to the very gate of heaven.
Most of these hymns had a refrain of simple yet striking melody,
in which every one in the house took part. A great favourite was
the following:
"O the house of the Lord shall be filled
With glory, hallelujah!
With glory, hallelujah!
With glory, hallelujah! Amen
"Let the preachers be filled with thy love.
Sing glory, hallelujah! etc.
"Let the members be filled with thy love,
Sing glory, hallelujah! etc.
"And the work of the Lord shall revive,
Sing glory, hallelujah! Amen!"
The tide of religious feeling rose higher and higher. The standing
invitation of Methodism to weary souls seeking the forgiveness of
their sins, was given. Several persons presented themselves at the
"penitent bench," most of whom were enabled to rejoice in a sense
of conscious pardon.
Sunday was indeed a "high day" at the old Ancaster log meeting-
house. From near and far, in sleighs, on horseback, and on foot,
came methodist worshippers, and found hospitable welcome with the
families of the neighbourhood. First there was love-feast at nine
o'clock. The cruel war had not left unscathed that rustic
congregation. There were rusty weeds of woe,--a black ribbon, a
bit of crape, or a widow's cap,--that bore witness to the loss of
husband or son in the sad conflict. The empty sleeve, pinned
across the breast of one stout young fellow, showed that the
strong right arm with which he had hoped to fight his battle of
life, and hew out a home in the wilderness, had been buried in a
gory trench with the bodies of his slain friends and neighbours.
But their temporal sufferings seemed to have driven these simple-
minded people nearer to the source of all comfort and consolation.
Many of the experiences and hymns had quite a martial ring. One of
the latter was as follows:
"Ye soldiers of Jesus, pray stand to your arms.
Prepare for the battle, the Gospel alarms.
The signal of victory, hark! hark! from the sky;
Shout, shout, ye brave armies, the watchmen all cry,
Come with us, come with us,
Come with us in love,
Let us all march together to Heaven above.
"To battle, to battle, the trumpets do sound,
The watchmen are crying fair Zion around;
Some shouting, some singing, salvation they cry,
In the strength of King Jesus, all hell we defy.
Come with us," etc.
As this was taken up by one after another and welled into a grand
chorus, it was impossible not to share the enthusiasm that it
created. Another prime favourite was the following:
"Jesus, my king, proclaims the war;
I want to die in the army;
Awake, the powers of hell are near,
I want to die in the army.
"'To arms! to arms!' I hear the cry,
'Tis yours to conquer or to die,'
O the army, the army, the army of the Lord!
I want to die in the army."
The god-fearing Canadian yeomanry, as they sang these strains,
nourished at once their religious feelings and their patriotic
enthusiasm. They felt in their hearts that love of King and
country, and their valiant defence and self-sacrifice on their
behalf, were also an acceptable service to God.
After the love-feast was a short intermission, during which a
luncheon of seed-cakes, comfits and doughnuts were eaten as a
preparation for the after service. Elder Ryan, whose warm,
emotional Irish nature had been deeply affected by the experiences
of the love-feast, preached one of his most spirit-stirring
sermons. It was like the peal of a clarion calling to the battle
of Armageddon the warriors of God against the powers of darkness.
He was interrupted, but not the least disconcerted, by
exclamations of "Amen!" "Hallelujah!" "Praise the Lord!" They
seemed rather to give wings to his eloquence, for soaring in
still loftier flights of eloquence.
After the sermon the Sacrament of the Lord's Supper was
administered to those devout worshippers. By these sacred
ordinances, amid the carking cares and tribulations of the present
life, were kept in view the far more important realities of the
life that is to come, and the souls of the people were enbraved
and strengthened for the conflicts, both literal and figurative,
to which they were called.
CHAPTER XVI
THE PROTRACTED MEETING.
The day after the Quarterly Meeting, Elder Ryan drove to his home
if home it could be called, where he spent not one-tenth part of
his time--at the Twenty Mile Creek. Neville who travelled thus
far with him, thought nothing of the twenty miles walk to the
Holms, where he had left his horse.
One of his plans for the spiritual welfare of his scattered flock,
was the holding of a series of protracted meetings at the various
settlements. One of these was held at the wooden school-house of
the little hamlet of Queenston. An old pensioner of the
Revolutionary War had gathered a few children together and taught
them their catechism, and as much of "the Three R's" as he knew.
He was a staunch Churchman, but had a friendly feeling to the
Methodists, because Mr. Wesley had been himself a clergyman of the
Established Church.
The meeting awakened a deep and wide-spread interest. The awful
scenes of carnage and death, of which the little village and its
immediate vicinity had been the theatre, seemed to have brought
the realities of another world more vividly before the moral
consciousness of the community. Moreover there were few families
that had not lost some friend or acquaintance, or perchance--
A nearer
One atill, and a dearer
One yet than all other.
Under these chastening influences many hearts were peculiarly open
to the reception of divine truth. The gracious invitations of the
Gospel, and the warnings and admonitions of the Law, were alike
faithfully and affectionately urged by the young preacher. It was
a characteristic of the preaching of the times that it had in it a
strong back-bone of doctrine. It was very different from the
boneless jelly-fish-like preaching we sometimes hear,--vague and
indefinite, without a single clear conception from beginning to
end.
A very profound impression was made by one sermon especially, on a
subject on which Neville seldom preached, but which on this
occasion was strangely impressed upon his mind. The text was that
sublime Scripture and its context: "And I saw a great white
throne, and Him that sat on it, from whose face the earth and the
heaven fled away; and there was found no place for them."
The solemn impression of the sermon was greatly deepened by the
singing, to a weird wailing sort of tune, of the hymn which
followed. The hymn, whose majesty of imagery--a majesty derived
from the Scriptures themselves--and whose resonant cadence gave it
much of the character, in English, of the sublime _Dies Irae_,
in Latin, was as follows:--
"The chariot! the chariot!--its wheels roll in fire,
As the Lord cometh down in the pomp of His ire;
Lo! self-moving, it drives on its pathway of cloud,
And the heavens with the glory of God-head are bowed.
"The trumpet! the trumpet! the dead all have heard,
Lo! the depths of the stone-covered charnel are stirred!
From the sea, from the earth, from the south, from the north,
All the vast generations of men are come forth.
"The judgment! the judgment!--the thrones are all set,
Where the Lamb and the white-vested elders are met!
There all flesh is at once in the sight of the Lord,
And the doom of eternity hangs on His word."
A picket of soldiers was billeted in the village, several of whom
attended the meeting ostensibly for the purpose of making game of
the "Yankee preacher." But such was the intense earnestness of the
man and the spiritual power that attended his message, that all
attempts to "make game" of the services were soon abandoned, and
not a few who "came to mock remained to pray."
A deep seriousness pervaded the entire neighbourhood. The usual
winter amusements and dancing parties were, to a great extent,
forgone--and even the utilitarian paring bees in the great farm
kitchens were shorn of much of the fun and frolic and divinings of
the future by means of apple-parings thrown over the left
shoulders, or apple-seeds roasted on the hearth. The present was
felt to be too sad, and the future too full of foreboding to
encourage fore-readings of the book of fate. The great revival was
the subject of fireside conversation at many hearths, and of deep
questionings in many hearts. Some of the most notorious ill-livers
of the neighbourhood had experienced the emancipating spell of the
Truth that maketh free, and were no longer the slaves of vice and
drunkenness.
Katharine Drayton pondered these things in her heart. She was
conscious of many good impulses, and her life had been marked by
many generous and noble traits. But she felt in her inmost soul
that these alone would not suffice. She could not from her heart
repeat the words which she often sang in the congregation with her
lips,--
"Jesus, thy Blood and Righteousness,
My beauty are, my glorious dress;
'Midst flaming worlds in these array'd.
With joy shall I lift up my head.
"Bold shall I stand in thy great day,
For who aught to my charge shall lay?
Fully absolved through these I am,
From sin and fear, from guilt and shame."
She still felt an aching yearning of her soul for a perfect
sympathy that she had never known since her mother died. Often as
a little child, in some childish grief or trouble, she had flung
herself on that loving mother's bosom and wept out her sorrow
there. And now, with the burden of the dreadful war impending like
a hideous night-mare on her soul; with her constant foreboding and
solicitude for her brother, so thoughtless--nay reckless in his
daring--a yearning for his soul's immortal welfare, if he should
be stricken down untimely, even more than for his body, she felt a
deep soul-longing for--she knew not what--but for some support and
succour for her filtering spirit. She knew not that it was the
wooing of the Celestial Bridegroom for the young love of her soul;
that it was the voice of the Heavenly Father, saying, "Daughter,
give me thy heart."
One night, heavy with a weight of care, and full of vague yet
terrible apprehensions of the future, she flung herself upon her
pillow and bursting into tears, sobbed out the pitiful cry, "O
mother, mother! see thy sorrowing child." As she lay sobbing on
the pillow, she seemed to hear a voice of ineffable sweetness,
whispering to her soul the words of a familiar Scripture: "As one
whom his mother comforteth, so will I comfort thee."
The holy words inspired a sense of hope and confidence in her
soul, and led her to lift up her heart in prayer to that loving
Saviour who hath promised to send the Comforter to them that
mourn. As she knelt in prayer in her little chamber, the moonlight
flooding with radiance her white-robed form like the exquisite
picture described in Keats' St. Agnes' Eve, and pound out her
whole soul to God, she felt the sweet assurance of acceptance
filling her heart as the Master said once more: "Daughter, be of
good cheer, thy sins are all forgiven thee."
She felt, however, that if she would experience the fulness of
that Divine comfort she must not seek to hide it in her heart, but
confess it before men. And from this she experienced an
involuntary shrinking. Her nature was one susceptible of great
depth and tenderness of feeling, but it was also one
constitutionally reserved and sensitive. She knew, moreover, that
such an act as joining the Methodists would be exceedingly
distasteful to her father, whom she loved with a deep and
impassioned affection. He had made the Methodist preachers welcome
to his house with the characteristic hospitality of a Virginia
gentleman, and because he respected their character and work; but
he himself retained his allegiance to the Church of England, which
he seemed to think identified with his fealty to the King.
Almost unconsciously the thought of Captain Villiers obtruded
itself into Katharine's mind, not without some misgivings as to
his opinion of the course which she felt to be her duty. Not that
for a moment she entertained the thought of any right on his part
to influence her performance of duty, or of any purpose on hers to
be influenced by him.
Accompanied by her brother Zenas, Kate, on the next evening,
attended the protracted meeting. The school-house was crowded.
Towards the close of the service, those who had, since the last
meeting, accepted the yoke of Christ, were asked to confess Him.
"That," thought Kate, "means me; but how can I do it?" She had
never even dreamt of speaking in public. It seemed impossible. But
she heard the words sounding in her ears, "Whosoever will confess
Me before men, him will I also confess before My Father which is
heaven." Necessity seemed laid upon her; yet she shrank from the
ordeal.
At this moment a pure, sweet, contralto voice began to sing with
great fervour of expression, which gave assurance of the deep
feeling with which the words were uttered, a hymn of rather
uncouth rhythm, with an oft-repeated refrain which, however,
thrilled many a heart. It ran as follows:--
"Come, ye that love the Lord,
Unto me, unto me;
Come, ye that love the Lord,
Unto me;
I've something good to say
About the narrow way,
For Christ the other day
Saved my soul, saved my soul--
For Christ the other day saved my soul."
"He gave me first to see
What I was, what I was;
He gave me first to see
What I was.
He gave me first to see
My guilt and misery
And then He set me free.
Bless His name, bless His name,
And then He set me free, bless His name!"
As if constrained by a spell-like influence, Kate rose to her
feet, and in a modest but clear and concise manner made her
confession of filial trust in the Saviour, and of conscious
adoption as His child. When this young and timid girl had thus
taken up the cross of confession, others were emboldened to follow
her example. One after another paid their tribute of thanksgiving,
while at intervals glad songs of praise welled forth from greatful
hearts. Some of these, great favourites at the time, are now
almost unknown. A general characteristic of these songs was a
simple refrain, first sung as a solo, but gradually taken up by
one after another, till a grand chorus rose and swelled like the
organ chant of the winds among the neighbouring pines. One of
these, sung to an exultant measure, ran thus:--
"O brothers, will you meet us
On Canaan's heavenly shore?
O brothers, will you meet us
Where parting is no more?"
CHORUS.--"Then we'll march around Jerusalem,
We'll march around Jerusalem,
We'll march around Jerusalem,
When we arrive at home."
Another, of touching pathos--with tears, as it were, in every
line, and often bringing tears of greatful emotion to many an eye,
sung as it was to a sweet plaintive air--ran thus:--
"Saw ye my Saviour? Saw ye my Saviour?
Saw ye my Saviour and God?
Oh! He died on Calvary,
To atone for you and me,
And to purchase our pardon with blood.
"There interceding, there interceding?
Pleading that Burners might live--
Crying, 'Father! I have died!
Oh! behold My hands and side!
O forgive them, I pray Thee, forgive."
Another, of similar strain, thus set forth in a sort of recitative
the story of the resurrection of our Lord:--
"Oh, they crucified my Saviour,
They crucified my Saviour,
They crucified my Saviour,
And they nailed Him to the cross.
"Then Joseph begged His body, etc.,
And he laid it in the tomb.
"Oh, the grave it could not hold Him, etc.,
For He burst the bars of death.
"Then Mary came a-running, etc.,
A-looking for her Lord.
"Oh, where have you laid Him, etc.,
For He is not in the tomb.
"Oh, why stand ye gazing? etc.,
Oh, ye men of Galilee?
"Don't you see Him now ascending! etc.,
There to plead for you and me.
"By-and-by we'll go to meet Him, etc.,
Where pleasures never fade."
While the incomparably superior lyrics of Wesley and Watts were
generally sung in the public service of the Sabbath, when the
preacher gave out the hymns from the book; yet these simpler and
ruder strains were the greater favourites at the revival meeting.
By these the godly forefather's of Methodism in Canada nourished
their souls and enbraved their spirits for the heroic work in
which they were engaged, of consecrating the virgin wilderness to
God.
CHAPTER XVII.
HEART TRIALS.
"Well, Kate," said Zenas, as he and his sister rode homeward
through the solemn moonlight and starlight, "You have burned your
boats and broken down the bridge. There is no going back."
"I hope not, Zenas," she replied, "but I feel very much the need
of going forward. I have only made the first step yet."
"Well, you've started on the right line, anyhow. It was a plucky
thing to do. I did not think it was in you. You are naturally so
shy. I wish I could do the same myself, but I haven't the
courage."
"Don't think of yourself, Zenas, nor of your comrades; but of the
loving Saviour who died for you and longs to save you."
"Upon my word, Kate, it made me feel more what a coward I am to
see you standing before the whole meeting than all the preaching I
ever heard."
"I felt that I ought, that I must," said Kate, "but after I rose I
forgot every one there and spoke because my heart was full. O
Zenas, just give up everything for Jesus; be willing to endure
anything for Jesus; and you'll feel a joy and gladness you never
felt before. Why, the very world seems changed, the stars and the
trees, and the moonlight on the river were never so beautiful; and
my heart is as light as a bird."
"I wish I could, Kate. I remember I used to feel something like
that about Brock. I could follow him anywhere. I could have died
for him."
"Well, that feeling is ennobling. But much nobler is it to enlist
under the Great Captain, the grandest teacher and leader the world
ever knew; and what is better far, the most loving Saviour and
Friend."
With such loving converse, the brother and sister beguiled the
homeward way. As Kate retired to her room a sweet peace flooded
her soul as the moonlight flooded with a heavenly radiance the
snowy world without. Zenas, on the contrary, was ill at ease, and
tossed restlessly, his soul disturbed with deep questionings of
the hereafter, during much of the night.
As Kate sat at the head of the table next morning, where her
mother had been wont to sit, some of her dead mother's holy calm
and peace seemed to rest upon her countenance. So thought her
father as he looked upon her.
"How like your mother you grow, child," ha said when all the rest
had left the table.
"Do I, father? I hope I shall grow like her in everything. I have
learned the secret of her noble life. I have found her best
friend," and she modestly recounted her recent experiences.
Little more then passed, but a few days afterwards, the Squire
took occasion, when he was alone with his daughter, to say, "I
hope you are not going to join those Methodists, Kate. I respect
religion as much as any one; but I think the Church of your father
ought to be good enough for you. You've always been a good girl. I
don't see the need of this fuss, as if you had been doing
something awful. Besides," he went on, a little hesitatingly, as
if he were not quite sure of his ground, "besides it will mar your
prospects in life, if you only knew it."
"I don't understand you, father," replied Kate, with an expression
of perplexity. "You have always thought too well of me. I know my
life has been very far from right in the eyes of God. I feel I
need pardon as much as the worst of sinners."
"Of course we're all sinners," went on the old man. "The Prayer
Book says that. But then Christ died to save sinners, you know;
and I'm sure you never did any thing very bad. But what I mean is
this: You must be aware that you have made a deep impression upon
Captain Villiers, and no blame to him either. He is an honourable
gentleman, and he has asked my permission to pay his addresses. I
asked him to wait till this cruel war is over, because while it
lasts a soldier's life is very uncertain, and I did not wish to
harrow up your feelings by cultivating affections which might be
blighted in their bloom. Nay, hear me out, child," he continued,
as Kate was about to reply," I did not intend to speak of this
now, but the Captain is a strict Churchman, and so were his
ancestors, he says, for three hundred years, and he would not, I
am sure, like one for whom he entertains such sentiments as he
does toward you, to cast in her lot with those ranting
Methodists."
Kate had at first blushed deeply, and then grew very pale. She
however listened to her father patiently, and then said quietly,
but with much firmness, "I respect Captain Villiers very highly,
father; and am very grateful for his kindness to us all, and
especially to Zenas when he was wounded. I feel, too, the honour
he has done me in entertaining the sentiments of which you speak.
But something more than respect is due to the man to whom I shall
entrust my life's keeping. Where my heart goes, there will go my
hand; there, and not elsewhere."
"Pooh! pooh, child. Girls are always romantic, and never know
their own mind. You will think better of it. I'm getting to be an
old man, Kate, and would not like to leave you unsettled in life
in these troublous times. You owe me your obedience as a daughter,
remember?"
"I owe you my love, my life, father, but I owe something to
myself, and more to God. I feel that my taste and disposition end
that of Captain Villiers are very different, and more different
than ever since the recent change in my religious feelings. It
would be at the peril of my soul, were I to encourage what you
wish."
"Nonsense, girl. You are growing fanatical. You never disobeyed me
before. You must not disobey me now."
Kate smiled a wan and flickering smile of dissent; but to say more
she felt would be fruitless. A heavy burden was laid upon her
young life. She knew the iron will that slumbered beneath her
father's kind exterior; but she felt in her soul a will as
resolute, and with a woman's queenly dignity she resolved to keep
that soul-realm free. In her outward conduct she was more dutiful
and attentive to her father's comfort than ever; but she felt
poignantly that for the first time in her life an injunction was
laid upon her by one who she so passionately loved which she could
not obey. She found much comfort in softly singing to herself in
that inviolate domain, the solitude of her own room, a recent
poem which she had clipped from the _York Gazette,_ and
which, in part, expressed her own emotions:--
"Jesus, I my cross have taken,
All to leave and follow Thee;
Naked, poor, despised, forsaken,
Thou, from hence, my all shalt be;
Perish every fond ambition,
All I've sought and hoped and known,
Yet how rich is my condition!
God and heaven are still my own!
"And while Thou shalt smile upon me,
God of wisdom, love, and might,
Foes may hate, and friends may shun me
Show Thy face and all is bright.
Go, then, earthly fame and treasure!
Come disaster, acorn, and pain!
In Thy service, pain is pleasure;
With Thy favour, loss is gain.
"Man may trouble and distress me,
Twill but drive me to Thy breast;
Life with trials hard may press me,
Heaven will bring me sweeter rest.
O 'tis not in grief to harm me,
While Thy love is left to me;
O 'twere not in joy to charm me,
Were that joy unmixed with Thee."
CHAPTER XVIII.
CHIPPEWA AND LUNDY'S LANE.
During the remainder of the winter the domestic history of the
household at The Holms was unmarked by any incidents. The
discharge of her homely duties and kindly charities to the people
of the devastated village of Niagara who still lingered in the
neighbourhood engrossed all the time and energies of Katharine
Drayton. These wholesome activities prevented any morbid breedings
or introspections, and furnished the best possible tonic for the
strengthening of her moral purposes. Captain Villiers found
frequent opportunities of visiting The Holms. His manner to Kate
was one of chivalric courtesy; but, with a self-imposed restraint,
he studiously endeavoured to repress any manifestation of tender
feelings. Kate was cordial and kind, but as studiously avoided
giving an opportunity for the manipulation of such feelings had it
been contemplated.
Neville Trueman was engaged in special religious services night
after night for nearly the whole winter at several appointments of
his circuit. The revival influence seemed to widen and deepen as
the weeks went by. He often called to invite Zenas to these
meetings. At times the young man seemed strangely subdued and
docile, and Neville rejoiced over what he considered the yielding
of his will to the hallowed influences of the good Spirit of God.
At other times he seemed wilful and wayward, or even petulant and
testy, giving evidence of the resistance of his human will to the
Divine drawings of which he was the subject. At such times the
faith of Neville was sorely tried; but his patience and
forbearance were never exhausted, and the sisterly affection and
tenderness of Katharine were redoubled. Zenas would then break out
into self-upbraidings and self-reproaches; and Kate, not knowing
what to say, said little, but, in the solitude of her chamber,
prayed for him all the more.
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