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ON

MISCELLANEOUS SUBJECTS,

BY THE

BISHOPS OF THE METHODIST EPISCOPAL CHURCH,

AND THE

SENIOR PREACHERS OF THE OHIO AND NORTH
OHIO CONFERENCES.

"Now there are diversities of gifts, but the same Spirit," 1 COR. xi: 4

To pursue learning for its own sake, or as our end, is sowing to the wind, and
reaping the whirlwind; but to pursue it for Christ's sake, and for the advance-
ment of his cause, is one of the noblest employments out of heaven, and cannot
be neglected without great personal guilt, and great injustice to the Church,"
REV. ALFRED BARRETT, Wesleyan Minister.

Cincinnati:

PUBLISHED BY L. SWORMSTEDT & J. H. POWER,

FOR THE METHODIST EPISCOPAL CHURCH, AT THE WESTERN BOOK CONCERN,
CORNER OF MAIN AND EIGHTH-STREETS.

R. P. THOMPSON, PRINTER.

Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1849, by

SWORMSTEDT & POWER,

In the Clerk's Office of the District Court for the District of Ohio.

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WHO would write a preface if he could avoid it? "Tis like cultivating, in an ungenial soil and inhospitable climate, an unsightly plant, which, when mature, yields fruit that no one relishes-scarce any one so much as looks at. But we are told, a book must have a preface such is the fashion; and, in some things, even Methodists must conform to custom, useless though it be. Moreover, the book may fall into the hands of some one who might wonder why it was published, and, after spending much time in inquiring into its origin, suffer no little distress from disappointed search. In mercy to such a purchaser, we proceed; and as he would, probably, not be satisfied without ascending to the very grandfather of the project, we state, explicitly, that, on the day of the year of "" the presiding elder of the Delaware district, North Ohio annual conference, while seated before a cheerful fire, with his thinking cap resting on the organ of causality, was visited with a thought that caused both his eyes to sparkle. On the evening of the same day, meeting with the stationed preacher of Delaware and two of the professors of the University, he gave utterance to his favorite conception in language which caused both the ears of every one of them to start. It must be understood, that there had been some conversation in the University on the subject of erecting a college chapel. Such a building was found indispensable, as the present edifice contained no room sufficiently large to accommodate the pupils, when assembled for devotional exercises. But, being destitute of money, prohibited from building on credit, and without the hope of persuading the public to extraordinary munificence, despair seemed about to settle upon us, when, on the occasion referred to, the presiding elder made the following announcement: "Gentlemen, give me your names, and I will build you a chapel, without subjecting you to a cent's expense." Marvelous! What! a preacher build a chapel!—an itinerant, too!-and not cost a cent! If the presiding elder had been inclined to humor, the statement would not have occasioned much surprise; but he is a grave man, unused to joke; nor is he prone to Quixotic enterprises; but one who counts the cost before he lays the

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