JT-02-1808

1808 Our travels were bounded in form of a circuit, which we performed in four or five weeks. Every round turned up new trials, temptations and scenes. The many lonesome and disconsolate feelings, that revolved in my mind, could be but faintly painted by the most vivid imagination.

About the fourth time, in going round our appointments, it was frequently observed to my companion, what proficiency, what unparalleled improvement I had made! I now began to find the attention and kindness of the people, drawn towards me, which taught me something more of human nature. I now learned, when a person could not help himself, and was in essential need of a friend, he seldom found one, and when he could do without friends, he generally could find them plenty under that name. In April, 1808, brother Reeves left me, and started for Tennessee. I continued on the circuit, till the last of May, and saw that the Lord had revived his work in many places, and souls were converted. In the last of May, I left this part of the country, and directed my way for my native place in N. Carolina. During this time, I had expended the amount of my funds I had started with, which was $40; but at the time I was starting for Carolina, a man put five dollars in my hand, which I regarded as an instance of God’s goodness to me. In June. I preached to a large congregation, on the old camp ground, where I had received my convictions. Many who came to laugh at me, as they had done before, were constrained to weep, and many of the professors rejoiced and gave praise to God. I held several meetings in the neighborhood, and saw the tears mourner, and heard the shouts of happy Christians. In the latter part of June, I bade adieu to my mother and brother, whose eyes were now filled with tears, and started to travel on a route assigned me, in the higher parts of Virginia. In five days I reached my circuit, at Major Ward’s, on Staunton river, Campbell county, Virginia. In this journey I was, while preaching, insulted with scurrilous language, at Pittsylvania Court House, and at Ward’s springs. From Major Wood’s, I went to New London. Thence on Sunday, I preached at a place called the Tabernacle. Here a Methodist preacher encountered me. He said, he could not see for his part, how any person could be so blinded, as to pretend to go about the country preaching, and be connected with no society, and bound by no discipline! I replied that I belonged formally to the people, who professed as much religion as he seemed to have, and that I had that book, the Bible, for my discipline; whence all creed-makers, pretended to derive their authority for their disciplines, and if theirs were good, of course mine must be much better. My circuit included Campbell, Bedford, Amherst, Nelson, Buckingham, Prince Edward and Charlotte counties. From Tabernacle, I went on and crossed James and Tie rivers, and came in among the hills and spurs of the south side of the Blue Ridge mountain. Here many of the people appeared to be rude, uncultivated, and apparently hardened in sins. But the Lord gave my words access to some of their hearts--some professed religion under my ministration, in those regions. The country is truly picturesque in the summer season, exhibiting in rich variety, the features of sublime and awful solitude, and the fascinating charms of rural scenery. At Stony point meeting house, I held meeting, where a revival commenced; several souls were professedly brought to the knowledge of the truth, and added to the church, and many of the brethren were comforted and built up in the faith of the gospel.

I now obtained the name of the boy preacher, and from motives of curiosity, &c., my congregations were generally large, and it pleased the Lord frequently to attend my discourse with the energy of his holy spirit, to many of their hearts. In Charlotte county, a Methodist preacher undertook to give me a little drubbing, in public, by telling the congregation I was one of the tail end of the Methodists--an O’Kellyite, and the people should be aware of such renegades, &c. I observed, the Methodists as a body, had not only one head, but three, which made it a monster; but that I had not until then, considered upon its having a tail, but according to him it had one. But I thought he was mistaken about its having dropt from the body, for it had just struck me, that as every member of the body is included between the head and the tail, the Bishops must be the head, and the class leaders the tail of the Methodist church; and that it yet cleaves to the body, and as related to me I truly never made any part of this apparatus. And as respected being an O’Kellyite, I was no more one, than he was an Asburyite, and I could not see why the one should not be as respectable as the other. Not long after this a Baptist preacher of great celebrity, and rhetorical powers, tried his skill in a congregation against me, and after ridiculing my rotten Arminian, Mushroom doctrine, observed to me, I ought to go home, and stay there till I had read and studied Dr. Gill’s Body of Divinity. I informed him that I had read Dr. Gill, and had found the dry bones and skeleton of a body, but could find no meat nor nourishment on it, to feed my soul. In Charlotte county, on Big Fallen, I preached in a neighborhood where a revival commenced. Several professed faith in Christ, and many were awakened to a sense of their sins. Some were taken with the exercise of the jerks, which was a new and strange thing to the people, and the first instance of the kind I had seen in Virginia.

Thence I preached in Campbell Court House, and again at Major Ward’s. In this route, I included upwards of two hundred miles, and attended about thirty-five preaching places. In October, I left the South, and went over on the north side of the Blue Ridge. On Craig’s creek, I preached several times to weeping congregations. Thence I went over a high mountain, and preached several times on the sources of Sinking creek, where I constituted a church, under the Christian name, Here at old brother Peck’s, a Methodist preacher opposed me in public, and declared that the Scripture was not a sufficient rule to govern the church, as I had said, unless it had eyes to see and a mouth to speak, &c. The people became offended at his spleen, and abruptly dismissed themselves. Thence I made for Raleigh, in N. Carolina, to a Union meeting. In my journey, I passed through Fincastle, Liberty, New London, Major Ward’s, Pittsylvania Court House, Danville, Casewell Court House, Hillsborough, and arrived in Raleigh on the second day of the meeting. On my way, in the solitary pine-deserts, lying between Pittsylvania Court House and Danville, I lost my way, and was under the necessity of tying my horse to a bush, and I took my lodgings by the side of an old tree, for the night. This was a time and a place for poetical fancy, and Christian meditation! In Raleigh, I met with many preachers, collected from different quarters, and all seemed united in the glorious cause of Christian liberty, and in the free communion of the children of God. The meeting lasted four days, in which time, several were converted and added to the church. On Tuesday, I left Raleigh, and went on in the company of B. Raney, for Haw river, my native place, and tarried all night with the pious James O’Kelly. This man as a Christian, as an orator, as a reformer, as the father of the Christian Society, (so called) and as a man of strong mental abilities, needs not the eulogiums and the panegyric of my pen, to recommend him. This was an instructive and happy night to me. In two days from this place, I arrived at my mother’s. I preached several times to attentive and weeping assemblies among my old acquaintances. I then, by request, met with the Presbyterians at their sacramental occasions, at Hawfields, Enon, Cross roads, &c. At these meetings the great work of the Lord was marvelous among the people. Here I found the Presbyterians were as noisy and seemed to have as much religion, as any people I had seen. In November, I started westward, and preached at Big Buffalo, Guilford Court House, &c., and on the Little Yadkin ; at widow David’s, &c. I crossed the Blue Ridge at Flour Gap. Here I had the most extensive and delightful prospect of creation, I ever had. Around me the tremendous spurs of the mountain, projected their lofty heads, and with frowning majesty seemed to overlook the clouds! Thence I could see the distant hills and little mountains thrown, as it were, by a careless hand, yet in beauteous order, over distant lands below!! Numerous farms, with many rural and picturesque scenes, rose into review, watered by purling rills and gurgling brooks, while distant Yadkin rolled along. Yonder stands Ararat, or the Pilate mountain, about forty miles distant, rising like an awful pyramid, crowned as with a turret, of three hundred feet in perpendicular height, on the lofty mountain’s top! I went on to my brother Moses’ on Chestnut creek, in Grayson County, Va., with whom I lived in the days of my affliction. I now commenced preaching to those who had seen me while I lay tortured, as man thought, on the gloomy borders of death! Religion was yet little known among these people. It pleased the Lord to awaken a number to a sense of their need of a Savior, while I taught them the way of life. From this time, a revival began in those regions. In December, I bade adieu to my brother and family, and went into Wythe county, and preached at Newel’s lead works, on New river. Thence I turned my course to the route, I had been traveling the summer preceding. The weather was now excessively cold, and I was but thinly clad. I crossed Little and Big Reed Islands, bold and rapid mountain streams. In the latter, my horse stumbled and wet me. My clothes soon became frozen, and to keep my feet from freezing, I drew my stockings, and walked with dry leaves in my shoes. The country was thinly settled, and I had no opportunity of eating or warming, till sometime in the night. In three days I came again to one of my old homes, in Bedford county, and felt glad and thankful to God for his mercies, and for his preserving care towards me.

I now went on preaching, on the route I had traveled the summer previous, with unremitted zeal, exposures of body, fatiguing labors, and with an intense application to reading and study.