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EOF06A The Eye of Faith, A History of Ohio Yearly Meeting Conservative. Chapter 6 Part A, Ministry of the Golden Age

• Bill Taber

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We trace the character of Ohio Yearly Meeting’s “Golden Age” ministry, where quietist discipline met public witness in prisons, schools and streets. Stories of Anne Branson, Elwood Dean and Daniel Mott reveal the cost of obedience, the power of silence and the risks of over-editing holiness.

• Quietism shaping tone, restraint and obedience
• Prophetic sensitivity alongside activist outreach
• Anne Branson’s severe integrity and tender counsel
• Elwood Dean’s musical preaching and human warmth
• Daniel Mott’s prayerful gentleness and nearness of eternity
• Decline of ministers after 1890 and likely causes
• A call to keep speech brief, weighty and alive

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SPEAKER_00:

Truth is one and the same always, though ages and generations pass away, and one generation goes and another comes. Yet the word and power and spirit of the living God endures forever, and is the same and never changes.

SPEAKER_01:

We are continuing to read from the Eye of Faith, a History of Ohio Yearly Meeting Conservative by William P. Tabor Jr. Chapter 6, Ministry of the Golden Age, 1874 to 1917. The chapter begins Central to the life of Ohio Yearly Meeting throughout its history has been its ministry. The characteristics of that ministry and the life of its ministers both shape the meeting and were shaped by it. While it might be an overstatement to say that there is a Pacific Ohio style of ministry, unique and distinct, it is probably true that Ohio ministry does have its own tone, its own particular point of view. Those whose entrance into the ministry had been in the eighteenth century, hence elsewhere than in Ohio bore the marks of quietism. Not surprisingly, that influence remained. Most of those honored in the records of both Orthodox and the later Wilburite branch of the yearly meeting, even into the present century, still bear the marks of the quietest Quakerism. The modern reader of some of the letters and journals of those friends may be shocked or even repelled by the pervasive sense of fear that seemed to have colored many of their lives. They feared disobedience of the light, which might command them to speak or to be silent, to act or to refrain from acting. They feared the devil and his ability to corrupt the good in human nature, in spite of those fears. However, these friends also wrote of the great peace which came when they obeyed. They referred often to the restorative, peaceful energy that came to them in long silent meetings or in opportunities, that spontaneous or planned silent worship, which might occur between two or more people at any time anywhere. Feeling, which today would be called intuition, played a primary role in the life of these friends. Today, those interested in parapsychology would probably describe such gifted friends as sensitives. Their contemporaries simply regarded the astonishing insights of Anne Branson and Esther Fowler and the powerful healing sympathy of Carl Patterson as the work of God. To be a quietist, however, was not all prayer, contemplation, insight, and ecstasy. The air was a decided activist dimension to the lives of these ministers. Many were very active in travel and preaching, and many were active in less conventional ministry, which led them to speak to strangers on the road, to preach in prisons and houses for the derelicts, to visit bartenders and ministers of other denominations, and to take their message to college, mines, and factories. By looking closely at the lives of some of the ministers, a few recognized by their meetings before 1890, and others recognized later, it may be possible to gain a sense of the style of ministry in Ohio yearly meeting. The life of Anne Branson almost spanned the century and provides a good example of the type of ministry and personal life which her contemporaries valued. On the one hand, she represents the stern, Puritan element so common among her leading contemporaries. On the other hand, her life and ministry are perhaps the most striking examples of a prophetic discernment so acute as to be painful to herself and either frightful or consoling to others. Born in 1808 to strict and careful Quaker parents, Anne Branson acquired from a birth a deep concern for truth and a fear for deviating from Quaker practice or from the slightest hint of divine leading. In the years following the Great Separation of 1828, she was among the many young people who at first supported Elisha Bates when the elders began to criticize him. She soon changed her mind, however, and struggled with herself in the classic manner until yielding to the inner call to be a minister in 1833. She was acknowledged by her meetings soon afterwards, and she preached and suffered through the generation long separation from the Gurnites by the era of good feeling which opened during the 1880s. She had long been revered and feared as a prophet. Anne Branson had a keen mind, and she was well educated and informed for her day. She loved poetry, quoting it in her sermons. She even wrote poetry, a small, frail person who spent months at a time in bed. She was sometimes carried in and out of a meeting because she was too weak to walk. In spite of her physical frailty, however, she often felt called to travel. When that happened, she was sometimes carried to the closed carriage which was to take her on a religious journey. Called the greatest seer our society has ever known, Anne Branson, had such a reputation for her prophetic insight that one who was not conscious that his robes were spotless might well cringe in her presence. Yet she could be very tender and encouraging to those who were open to her message. From painful and bitter experience she had learned to heed the least command of her inner guide to speak. If she did not obey, she would suffer uneasiness and confusion, or sometimes brief or even prolonged physical illness. On at least two occasions she believed that God sent an accident to punish her or warn her for her failure to obey. Accordingly, she was often led to stop her carriage and speak to people who she saw in the road or in fields, or to pause by a dwelling and say that she must enter with a message. On her visits to schools, she was led to speak to students individually. Often, after a meeting for worship, she would be led to individuals, sometimes even strangers, with a special message of warning or encouragement. She visited much of Quaker America, appointing dozens of special meetings and holding hundreds of opportunities and families. Even when she became quite deaf in the eighteen eighties, her gift remained strong, and she traveled on religious visits to Iowa, Kansas, Indiana, Canada, Philadelphia, as well as to meetings in Ohio. Although a powerful and elegant speaker, Anne believed it to be of great sin to speak beyond the guide, as to be silent when called to speak. Ministers must know judgment laid to the line in themselves and a careful watch set that they do not exceed their proper bands, when greatly exercised for the welfare of the people, as well as not to curtail or cut short what is given them to deliver. She wrote, No relief can be obtained by prolonging such communication. When the time came to stop, however, the burden and the exercise for the people continue. She also observed, I am greatly satisfied with silent meetings, when the presence of the Lord is felt to gather the mind in stillness, what can be more strengthening? Once it is reported when she was quite elderly, she complained after a meeting of much speaking. Oh how my heart was craving a silent sitting. Then she added, Where are the elders that those things be? Her death in eighteen ninety one must have seemed like the end of an era, and when her journal was published by the Meeting for Sufferings in eighteen ninety two, plans were made to give a copy to each family and yearly meeting. Elward Dean, eight years younger than Anne Branson, died in eighteen ninety after a life of extensive and sensitive ministry. He left no journal, although a small collection of his letters and comments of others about him were published in 1909. Unlike Anne Branson, who seems to have been tortured by her spiritual burdens, Elwood Dean had jovial had a jovial disposition. He was most always in a pleasant mood, which drew others to him readily. Like Anne and other ministers of this period, he was often led to hold meetings for the general population and for the inmates of prisons. A newspaper account of a meeting in Pittsburgh probably gives a good picture of Elward Dean as an outstanding minister of the Golden Age. The mayor announcement yesterday that a meeting would be held in Fifth Avenue Church, where Dr. Murray is the pastor, was sufficient to bring out a good sized audience, notwithstanding the pouring rain and the bad condition of the streets. The assembly of the people was not at all Quakerish in its general appearance. In fact, it was had a worldly appearance at first glance. The masculine portion of it was composed of the ordinary run of businessmen one sees every hour in the streets, attracted no doubt by mere curiosity, and as for the gentler sex, vanity and vexation of spirit were only too plainly written in their varied adornments. Away up in front there were a few exceptions to the general rule, and in the back of the pulpit with the pastor and the speaker of the evening, Elward Dean of Chesterfield, Ohio, with Joseph Stranton of Winona, Mr. and Mrs. Benjamin H. Whitefoot of Allegheny. At eight o'clock, the prevailing silence was broken by Mr. Dean, who rose and advanced to the stand, speaking in a quiet and rather musical tone that grew stronger and more pronounced as it proceeded. The speaker was a tall man, slenderly built and rather stooped shouldered. He had a frank, open face full of kindness and expressive of honesty and earnestness. He did not announce any text at first, but quoted the following verse as the groundwork of the dress. For we have not followed cunningly devised fables when we made known unto you the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but were eyewitnesses of his majesty, then followed a quite easy sermon, which was not less remarkable for its simplicity and absence of all attempt at finish than for the frequent quotations of Scripture, every one of which seemed exactly fitted for the special occasion and apparently occurring on the spur of the moment. Aside from this, the most noticeable feature of the address was the peculiar intonation in which it was delivered, a thing that is rather difficult to describe. It sounded as if the whole discourse had been molded into poetic lines of three or four words each, with an occasional line running over, and the whole pronounced with a rhythmical rolling accent on the final word of each line, and the following inflection, for instance, God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever should believe should not perish, but have everlasting life. How gracious his words, how precious his promises. Who should doubt? A gracious redeemer stands waiting and ready for all those that come on to him. Owadin made many journeys in the ministry, especially to the Philadelphia area, where he found great unity with some of the ministers. On one occasion, he and his wife were away from home for nine months, and she noted in her diary, after attending Ohio Yearly Meeting, we came to our home on a farm where we found things in such order as we might be expected as an absence of nine months. After describing the cost of staying away from the farm for so long, she concluded, Nevertheless, we may acknowledge that it is our interest as well as our duty to be at the divine disposal, and although this journey cost us much in every way, we find the retrospect produces peace of mind, which is worth obtaining at whatever the cost. Several of Elward's contemporaries wrote that he was sympathetic and gentle as well as a psychic person. Elward's fellow minister, Lois Tabor, when describing how one minister could often knowing inwardly about the concerns felt by another minister, made special mention of Elward Dean as having such sympathy. He loved flowers and enjoyed growing them, once saying that he never saw any that the devil made. He also loved children, though he had none of his own, and he often invited them to his home. One story about children in his home, while it does illustrate his indulgence of them, may also suggest a concern for appearances not untypical of him and other Wilburites. A group of children in his home, making a great deal of noise. He walked down to the road near his house and then walked a distance along the road in either direction to see if the noise was so loud that it might cause an evil report to spread. Like other ministers, he was drawn to visit the Quaker schools, especially the one room schools in his neighborhood. Irene Fowler, a child during the time of Elward's ministry, described such visits. Sometimes in the afternoon, Elward Dean, a Quaker minister, would come in and sit and listen to lessons until they were through. Books were then laid aside, and the teacher would read from the Bible. Such a silence fell. A glow of warmth from the old red stove, a sense of comfort all around, and a realizing of the presence within the midst. Elwood would then speak to us in his feeling way for our good. A short period of silence would follow, after which the school would be dismissed. The words of the speaker are not remembered, but the inspiration and spiritual oneness will forever linger with those privileged to be present. Another minister who died about 1890 was Daniel M. Mott, 1822 to 1892, also of the Pennsville Quarterly Meeting. Although Daniel's influence was not widely felt in his own time, he left neither journal nor significant letters to influence later generations, he is worth noting as an example of pronounced spirituality, which manifested itself in the magnetic love and gentleness. He was a man of much meditation and prayer, and he was short and impressive in testimony and not frequent, but he had a wonderful gift in prayer. Joseph E. Myers wrote He was gentle and indulgent. Children loved him, and animals felt secure and content in his presence. He possessed a spiritual magnetism which made him loved and respected by the community in which he lived. These qualities made him sympathetic and helpful to the sick and bereaved as well as to all young people, and he apparently showed loving interest in the colored people of the neighborhood as well. Daniel's spiritual experience intensified in the last weeks of his life. He had a foreknowledge of his own death and a frequent sense of a heavenly presence around him. In the last meeting he attended before his death, he spoke of a sudden death to come to someone there. It may be myself. To those in sympathy with him reported Joseph E. Myers, it seemed that a hollow shone around his head. Two days before his death, Daniel gathered his family to arrange his affairs. He reported that a voice had told him that the life on earth should not be long. On the next day he reported an experience. He had while sitting on his horse early that morning. Light had surrounded him, a holy presence enveloped him, and he felt that he was indeed been drawn into one of the heavenly places. Other pillar friends passed away within a few years of eighteen ninety, leaving the yearly meeting with noticeably fewer ministers and elders of that heroic stamp. The lack of new ministers took their place. Taking their places was mentioned in an eighteen ninety article in The Friend, which expressed amazement that there were so few leaders left in Ohio Yearly Meeting, and not even one recorded minister in Salem Quarterly Meeting. The writer felt that one generation of ministerial gifts had been lost, probably on account of the discouragements connected with the troubles of the last thirty years. Another cause may have been the awesome importance ascribed to appearing in the ministry. Almost all friends of the time regarded speaking in meeting as a matter to be taken very seriously indeed, and the stern and alert eldership which made friends painfully self-conscious about saying anything, not immediately called for by the Almighty God, was also an impediment to the ministry. Yet another factor may have been the way in which the editing of journals and memorials tended to present an almost impossible ideal as the norm for Quaker ministers. Elements of timidity and conformity in the Wilburite temperament were also probable factors, which helped explain why so few homegrown ministers appeared to be replacing the giants of the 1880s. How perceptions of the Quaker ideal was affected by the editing of Quaker documents can be seen in the case of John Heild, who lived from 1763 to 1841. It makes interesting reading, according to Middleton's Meetings Memorial. About the twenty-seventh year of his age, John yielded to an impression of duty which had cost him much exercise, and being careful not to go before his guide, he appeared mostly in a few words and not very frequently for several years, and as he increased in his gifts and his experience, he was acknowledged a minister by this monthly meeting about eighteen oh three. Two corrected copies of this memorial, one from the monthly to the quarterly meeting, and one probably from the quarterly meeting to the meeting of her sufferings, showed the process of editing personality out of ministers. First deleted was being of a cheerful disposition and is acceptable of tender sympathies of friendship under the sanctifying influence of divine grace, his company and converse were edifying. Also Kraused out was he said he freely forgave all who had said or done anything against him and desired it might not be laid to their charge, and he hoped those who thought he had injured them would forgive him, for he had nothing in his heart but love for mankind. The final editing in pencil, which was approved by the Meeting for Sufferings, deleted any mention of physical or mental weakness at the time of his death. An apparently unofficial biography of Asin Bailey, 1820 to 1905, did manage to describe her as a vigorous product of the frontier. She could outdistance boys in horseback riding, and she described her own girl herd as wild and thoughtless. And it also presented her as an intelligent and charming person. Nevertheless, it did delete from an early draft the following. She was very fond of poetry. She might have become something of a poet. It was easy for her to construct rhymes in her earlier years, and she was committed a great many poems which she used to like to say over to her children during her last sickness. She was fond of historical works, and in later years, with the return of the second sight, she read many books of this character. Essenti herself, in an injunction to her sons, near the end of her life, showed a tendency to edit personality. Never allow an angry word to pass your lips, she said. Such goodness may be genuine for an enlightened person over forty. But the evident attempt of Ohio friends to conform to such an idea has probably resulted in widespread repression, making it even harder to be open to the inner life from which the springs of ministry seemed to flow and increasing the distance between an ordinary member and a seer like Anne Branson. So remarkably close did she walk with the master that those who knew her best could but feel she was permitted to see how much of us could not have seen, and to hear that which we have not been able to hear. The awesomeness of speaking and meeting and the distance between such speaking and ordinary mortal life is indicated by most of the surviving accounts of the surrender to be a minister. Ascent Bailey was acknowledged by the at the age of forty after she had endured quite an inner struggle. Many times, said her biographer, the sayings of David came to her. How can I be son in law of the king? Rebecca Dews, 1822 to 1879, was so impressed with her distance from the king that she refused the call to speak in eighteen forty-five and had to suffer for eighteen years before it returned. His memorial said, As an elder, he was quick to discern any misapplication or wrong inference from a text, and careful to restrain communications in meeting without the savor of life, and on such occasions was not slow in suggesting that they make their remarks as brief as possible. For some time after the separation, until near the end of the period under review, our meetings were often burdened with these unsavorus lifeless discourses not only from members of the other body, but others with no connection and perhaps deranged. It seemed to be of the special providence of the elders to keep such would be preachers in check. When individuals of this class began to speak, the friends seemed to look to Aaron Frame to call them down, saying mentally Aaron will not stand for that. This concludes the reading of the beginning section of chapter six of the Ministry of the Golden Age eighteen seventy four through nineteen seventeen in the Eye of Faith, a history of Ohio Yearly Meeting Conservative by William P. Tabor Junior The podcast, The Just Heard, was a production of Ohio Yearly Meeting. It was read by Kent Palmer. The words from our introduction were written by Margaret Fell in sixteen sixty. The music was composed and sung by Paulette Meyer. More information at her website WWW Pauletmeyer dot com.

SPEAKER_00:

Truth is one and the same always, though ages and generations pass away, and one generation goes and another comes, yet the word and power and spirit of the living God endures forever, and is the same and ever changes.