1. Gaining knowledge is a good thing, but saving souls is a better. 2. By this very thing you will gain the most excellent knowledge, that of God and eternity. 3. You will have time for gaining other knowledge, too, only sleep no more than you need, "and never be idle, nor triflingly employed." But, 4. If you can do but one, let your studies alone. We ought to throw by all the libraries in the world, rather than be guilty of the loss of one soul.

§ 2. "The people will not submit to it." If some will not, others will, and the success with them will repay all your labor. O let us herein follow the example of St. Paul! 1. For our general business, Serving the Lord with all humility of mind: 2. Our special work, Take heed to yourselves and to all the flock: 3. Our doctrine, Repentance toward God, and faith toward our Lord Jesus Christ: 4. The place, I have taught you publicly, and from house to house: 5. The object and manner of teaching, I ceased not to warn everyone night and day, with tears: 6. His innocence and self-denial herein, I have coveted no man's silver or gold: 7. His patience, Neither count I my life dear unto myself. And among all other motives let these be ever before our eyes: (1) The Church of God, which he hath purchased with his own blood: (2) Grievous wolves shall enter in; yea, of yourselves shall men arise, speaking perverse things.

¶ 141. Write this upon your hearts, and it will do you more good than twenty years' study. Then you will have no time to spare: you will have work enough. Then likewise no Preacher will stay with us who is as salt that has lost its savor. For to such this employment would be mere drudgery. And in

order to do it, you will have need of all the knowledge you can procure, and grace you can attain.

1142. The sum is, Go into every house in course, and teach everyone therein, young and old, to be Christians inwardly and outwardly: make every particular plain to their understandings: fix it in, their minds: write it on their hearts. In order to this,

there must be precept upon precept, line upon line. What patience, what love, what knowledge is requisite for this! We must needs do this, were it only to avoid idleness. Do we not loiter away many hours in every week? Each try himself; no idleness is consistent with a growth in grace. Nay, without exactness in redeeming time you cannot retain the grace you receive in justification.

¶ 143. Why are we not more holy? why do we not live in eternity? walk with God all the day long? why are we not all devoted to God, breathing the whole spirit of missionaries? Chiefly because we are enthusiasts; looking for the end without using the means. To touch only upon two or three instances: Who of us rise at four, or even at five, when we do not preach? Do we know the obligation and benefit of fasting or abstinence? How often do we practice it? The neglect of this alone is sufficient to account for our feebleness and faintness of spirit. We are continually grieving the Holy Spirit of God by the habitual neglect of a plain duty. Let us amend from this hour.

¶ 144. In order to guard against Sabbath-breaking, evil-speaking, unprofitable conversation, lightness, expensiveness or gayety of apparel, and contracting debts without due care to discharge them, 1. Let us preach expressly on each of these heads.

2. Read in every Society the Sermon on Evil-speaking. 3. Let the Leaders closely examine and exhort every person to put away the accursed thing. 4. Let the Preachers warn every Society that none who is guilty herein can remain with us. 5. Extirpate out of our Church buying or selling goods which have not paid the duty laid upon them by government. Let none remain with us who will not totally abstain from this evil in every kind and degree. Extirpate bribery receiving anything, directly or indirectlyfor voting at any election. Show no respect to persons herein, but expel all that touch the accursed thing. And strongly advise our people to discountenance all treats given by candidates before or at elections, and not to be partakers, in any respect, of such iniquitous practices.

CHAPTER II.

MINISTERS AND THE ANNUAL CONFERENCE.

L. Reception on Trial.

¶ 145. A Preacher is to be received on Trial by an Annual Conference.

¶ 146, § 1. But he must (1) present a recommendation from the District Conference (or, where no District Conference exists, from the Quarterly Conference) of which he is a member, duly signed by the President and Secretary thereof; (2) give to the Annual Conference satisfactory evidence of his knowledge of the studies prescribed for candidates

for Reception on Trial; and (3) have previously deposited with the Committee on Conference Relations, written answers to the following questions, namely:

(1) Are you in debt so as to embarrass you in the work of the Ministry?

(2) Will you wholly abstain from the use of tobacco?

NOTE.-Like answers shall also be required of Ministers proposing to come to us from other Churches.

§ 2. Observe! Taking on Trial is entirely different from admitting a Preacher into Full Membership. One on Trial may be either admitted or rejected without doing him any wrong; otherwise it would be no trial at all.

¶ 147. While he is on Trial the Annual Conference alone has jurisdiction over the question of his authority to preach, and his continuance on Trial shall be equivalent to the renewal of his License to preach. If he shall be discontinued, he shall be a member of the Quarterly Conference of the Charge where he resides at the time; and, if he is not a Deacon or Elder, his License shall expire unless renewed within one year. ¶ 198, § 4.

¶ 148. When an unordained Preacher is received on Trial in an Annual Conference, and is regularly appointed to a Charge by the Bishop presiding in said Conference, he shall be authorized, as long as the above conditions exist, to solemnize Marriage according to the laws of the State in which he lives.

¶ 149. At each Annual Conference those who are received on Trial or are admitted into Full Membership shall be asked whether they are willing to devote themselves to the missionary work, and a list of the

names of all those who are willing to do so shall be taken and reported to the Corresponding Secretaries of the Missionary Society; and all such shall be considered as ready and willing to be employed as Missionaries whenever called for by any of the Bishops.

II. Admission into Full Membership.

¶ 150. A Preacher on Trial who has been employed in the regular itinerant work on Circuits or Stations, or as instructor in one of our institutions of learning, for two successive years from the time he was received on Trial, may be admitted into Full Membership in the Annual Conference after he has given satisfactory evidence of his knowledge of the first two years of the Conference Course of Study, and after the examination before the Conference prescribed in ¶ 151.

¶ 151. In admitting a Preacher at the Conference into Full Membership, after solemn fasting and prayer, he shall be asked, before the Conference, the following questions, with any others which may be thought necessary, namely:

1. Have you faith in Christ?

2. Are you going on to perfection?

3. Do you expect to be made perfect in love in this life?

4. Are you earnestly striving after it?

5. Are you resolved to devote yourself wholly to God and his work?

6. Do you know the General Rules of our Church? 7. Will you keep them?

8. Have you studied the Doctrines of the Methodist Episcopal Church?