History of the Jumpers

Preface

Our apology for writing this book is this : I. — We beheve God has called us to the work. 2. — We love to work for God in spreading Scriptural holiness through the land.

3. — We desire to bless the world with spiritual bread. We expect to give an account in the Judgment for every word we have written. Our book is a child of prayer. Unceasingly have we prayed for the Spirit's direction ; the need of which we have felt especially, because our blindness compelled us to the unnatural method of writing through our son and daughter.

O ! Lord, if the book please Thee, give it the wings of a carrier dove, and prepare its way to the firesides of thousands ; and may it win many souls to Christ after we are dead. Amen!

THE AUTHOR.

Introduction

Religious demonstration has been a disturbing factor among formalists and religious pretenders whenever and wherever it has appeared.

As God is invariable, and in Him is no shadow of turning, the operation of His Spirit in man has ever been the same, while the opposition it has created has formed an important part of history from the slaying of Abel to the present time.

This volume contains a graphic pen picture of the outward demonstrations of joy, setting them in bold relief over against the opposition engendered by them.

Brother Henry with the hand of a master traverses the whole scope of the subject from Genesis to Revelation briefly introducing also the work of the reformers down to his own time. Feeling such an important work as this should not become extinct, the Metropolitan Church Association, finding that the original plates had been destroyed by fire, reproduced them from an old copy and once more the glad news of a joyful salvation was heralded abroad in a new edition of Mr. Henry's

8 Editot?iai. Introduction

book printed from new plates. Two editions were printed and disposed of in a period of about three years, when the plates were again destroyed by fire, January 1907, in the conflagration which swept the whole printing establishment of the Metropolitan Church Association out of existence.

By the blessing of God our new printery has been built and furnished with a modern equipment, and the plates reproduced with an entirely new set of illustrations.

We offer this book to our readers with a feeling of confidence that it supplies a great need in these days of worldliness and religious formality, that it , will tend to interest and enlighten unbelievers, to instruct and help those who are honestly seeking for light, to strengthen the true believer who could scarcely devote the time and research necessary to possess himself of these facts, and that it will provide an all round text book bearing on this important ipubject. With Brother Henry, who long ago passed to his reward, we pray, ''O, Lord, if the book please Thee, give it the wings of a carrier dove."

THE PUBLISHERS.

Contents

Chapter

1. rntroductory ....

2. Our Platform .... ■3. Platform Exemplified

Chapter I. — Introductory

The last book we gave to the wide, wide world, tc read and think about, was entitled ''Marriage of the Lamb, or Wedlock and Padlock, Temporal and Spiritual." The idea of wedlock is the union of man and woman in conjugal love; which is an emblem of the union of a sanctified soul with Christ in divine love. The idea of padlock, is a union without love either in the temporal or spiritual. The design of the book was to contrast true religion with false, the foolish virgins with the wise, a dead formality with the living power; and in the execution of this design a book was born containing four hundred and sixty large duodecimo pages.

One-fourth of the book was taken up in setting forth the birth of the new vv^orld, and the six days work laid out upon it by the King, in preparing it for the residence of His Son, whom He was about to give in marriage to the ''elect lady," of whom the Apostle John speaks. The first two or three days Vv^ere occupied in bringing order out of chaos, in raising the little hills and piercing the sky with lofty Chimborazos, in scooping out a place for the restless sea, and in furnishing the Bridegroom's palace and its adjacent grounds with beautiful adornments, and everything necessary to meet the wants of the intended occupant?. The palace was beautiful with its carpet of green , and close at hand the garden of the Lord was prepare 'j, with its lovely w^alks and fleecy mounds, bestudded and selvedged with unfading flowers of wondrous beauty, which filled the air with their fragrance ; at a little distance, on an elevated spot, appear vineyards and orchards, every vine and branch bending with beautiful and delicious fruit; and further oft' are seen the lofty pines and goodly cedars which raise their heads in silent grandeur from the summits of Lebanon.

The house and grounds in order, they were soon illuminated by a mighty chandelier, suspended from, the arched dome of heaven by an invisible chain, and by innumerable side-lights and reflectors, which look like angels' eyes peering down on sublunary affairs. Then the banquet was prepared for the nuptial festivities soon to take place. We look from our elevated standpoint, which commands a view of the whole plantation, and the sea which yesterday was quiet as a May morning, is now like a country school in the absence of the master. From the little red herring to the enormous leviathan, all are starting off on a matrimonial excursion, male and female. We look again, and this time we use our ears too, and behold another excursion party, which has chosen the air for its element. All, balloon-like, are inflated with hymeneal raptures. These are intended partly for the choir and partly for pot-pies. In the wisdom of the Creator all are coupled, male and female. And no two are alike. There is an endless variety of costume; and their songs are as varied as they are harmonious and sweet. We call them the choir, but it is not meant that they are a select choir. The King provided for congregational singing. He had no occasion to offer them a salary for doing what they loved so well. It was their chief joy to employ the powers bestowed upon them. So happy were they that they could not help singing. And so well did they perform their various parts, that there was not the slightest discord in their grand epithalamium.

And now appears the animal creation. All are intended for the household of the Son, from the creeping thing to the roaring lion and monstrous elephant. And now the sixth day's morning dawns. It is to be a coronation day. A lord and sovereign of all the lower orders of created existence is to be made. A triune council has been held. The Eternal Three had said, "Let us make man in our image, after our likeness." The decree of the council was executed, and man, the last and noblest work of God, appears bearing the image of the heavenly, and crowned with glory, honor and immortality. And now he is put in possession of his dominion. Everything that has breath passes before him, and receives from him a name; and as the vast caravan passes along, all do i8 History of Thk Jumpers

obeisance to him, and give utterance to joyful praises to Him who made him their ruler.

Think you not, dear reader, that the retrospective ear and eye of the patriarch of Uz were charmed with the scenes he describes when he speaks of the singing stars and the shouting of the sons of God at the laying of the foundations of earth? Previous to the birth of the great Napoleon's son, heavy cannon were placed within a short distance of one another, throughout the empire; and when it was announced to the happy father that a son was given, he placed the match to the first cannon, and in a moment all France resounded with the cannons' thunder and the prolonged shouts of a joyful populace. A similar scene, except the fire and smoke, transpired at the birth of the creation. All Heaven joined in the noisy triumph.

Here is the first recorded instance of singing and shouting; but, glory be to God, not the last that earth has known.

Come now, dear reader, and see in yonder woodland a lovely cottage, filled with peace and plenty. See the smoke from its chimney gracefully curling and ascending through the green foliage, like incense from the golden censer. You wait at the door listening to the rumbling tread of the porter in response to your rap. He springs the bolt, bids you enter, gives you a hearty welcome, and you find yourself seated cosily and securely in the old arm chair, and surrounded with a circle of warm and respected friends. We wish, in this first chapter, to lead you across the threshold of our subject, and introduce you to the inmates of our dwelling. And now that you are within our walls, we will treat you to the best we have and make you more than welcome.

The dish with which we will serve vou will be, Shouting, or Christian Triumph and Rejoicing, both cause and effect.

In our book entitled "Marriage of the Lamb," we had only room to talk about building the palace, and furnishing it, and its surroundings, preparatory to the marriage ceremony, and the flirtings, hesitations, palpitations, wooings and espousals of the elect lady, before she was willing to ''mitten" her old lovers, and to forsake all for the King's Son, to be His forever. We have had a pleasant time while attending the long list of weddings, from that of Adam and Eve in the bowers of Eden, to that of Cana of Galilee, which Jesus attended, including that of Abraham and Sarah, Isaac and Rebekah, Jacob and Rachel; and finally reached the time alluded to by John in Revelation. He heard a voice from the throne commanding all, small and great, to shout God's praise. All Heaven heard and obeyed the divine mandate. The celestial courts reverberated with praises, like the voices o,f ten thousand Niagaras, saying, "Alleluia, let us be glad and rejoice."

But a Pharisee inquires, "What is going on here? What is the meaning of this tremendous noise? It is enough to deafen a body." The happy saints reply, "The marriage of the Lamb is come, and his wife hath made herself ready;" and an angel now steps forward and cries out at the top of his voice, "Blessed are they which are called to the marriage supper of the Lamb." In this Scripture, reader, you will find the theme of this little book. In the previous volume we were occupied with the preparation and the wedding; in this we are to speak of the victories and rejoicings of the Lamb's wife ; and in another volume still, if Providence permits us to write it, we will show how the Father would have this Son's wife attired.

Chapter II. — Our Platform

A few years ago our American periodicals were burdened with the story of Japhet in search of his father; but we are going out in search of the agonizing groans, the hearty aniens, the loud hallelujahs, that routed the moles and bats from the crevices of log-cabins and from the more comfortable, no-steepled, and free pewed churches of former times. Where are these three friends now? Who has abducted them? The Pharisees have taken them off to a secret burial, and we know not where they have laid them. But we are in search of them, and shall do what we can to raise them to new life and to reinstate them in our sanctuaries.

We are now to introduce you, dear reader, to the subject of shouting and other external spiritual manifestations. And now let us take each a pilgrim's staff in hand, and travel through the sacred record, from the beginning of Genesis to the end of Revelation, and see what we can find appropriate to our purpose. David accumulated the materials for Solomon to build the temple, and the prophets and apostles shall furnish us with the goodly stones and cedars to construct this httle Hterary edifice. We shah build on the stable foundation — the written Word. Standing here, we defy the world. If God be for us who can be against us?

There are two pillars in the Christian temple which have always annoyed the devil: the Bible and Christian experience ; and as it is our business to disturb the old adversary as much as possible, we shall, while constantly referring to the law and the testimony, throw in, as occasion requires, a little of what we have seen and felt. It was a prominent characteristic of Methodists in olden times to relate their experience, and we are strongly inclined to seek the old paths and walk therein. When everything in the shape of theology fails, it is often the case that the simple relation of what the soul knows and enjoys will kindle the fire, which, like electricity, will leap from heart to heart until the great congregation will be dazzled by its light and melted with its heat; and if all are not fettered with a slavish fear of men, there will be a shout and perhaps a loud shout. The witness, as said Jesus to Nicodemus, speaks what he has seen and felt. . His soul is all aglow with feeling; and it is no wonder that words impelled by strong desire and burning love, go like grape shot to the hearts that listen.

We have often been amused while attending campmeetings and other large convocations, to find there the regular descendants of Nicodemus, like Saul, head and shoulders above the brethren, in their own conceit. How earnestly they endeavor to persuade some of the brethren that their reHgion is all imaginary! The brother or sister may say with tearful eyes that they love Jesus, that Jesus smiles and loves them too, that He cleanses them from all sin, and fills them with joy unspeakable, but these self-constituted censors wonderingly inquire, **How can these things be," and croak back their response, — ''enthusiasm," ''delusion." Blind leaders are these, who lead only into the ditch of moral impurity and death.

But suppose it true as these persons, ignorant themselves of the joys of God's salvation, seem to teach, that we cannot certainly know whether we are the sons of God or not; or what is the same, that we cannot tell the difiference between the service of Satan and the service of Jesus, between life and death, between darkness and light, we may get some consolation even from that supposition. In that case, so ignorant are we, God will throw us in with infants and idiots who know not their right hand from their left, so that we are bound for Heaven on the babies' or fools' boat if no other.

The subject of shouting has not been a matter of controversy between the Church and world only, but has become a kind of family quarrel. This controversy makes sad inroads upon the piety and efficiency of the Church. The day when all secrets are to be unfolded will show that it has done quite as much to recruit the vast army of backsliders, and to unnerve and weaken the Church, as any one of Satan's operations. And it seems to be waxing worse and worse every year in the Methodist Church. In almost every periodical we find this bone of contention. We see a writer, professing the faith of Christ, claiming to be on the same war-ship with the brother he persecutes, and to be led by the same captain, placing his big brogans on all spiritual demonstrations, especially if they do not agree in weight and measure with his balances and half bushel. The brother stepped on so heavily is grieved, of course, and thinks it duty to defend practices he loves.. Accordingly he calls on the prophets and apostles to endorse him. They back his paper without hesitation. And now he thinks his foes vanquished. He thinks his paper ought to pass, with holy men of old who spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost as his endorsers. But a paper thus backed will not be accepted by the children of the Pharisee; and next week out comes another old grey goose quill and tries to capsize the whole concern. Many of the readers are befogged at once. Timid as fawns that start at the rustling of a leaf, they know not which way to turn to escape their bewilderment. As Peter, while looking at the roaring wave, listening to the terrific thunder, and enveloped in darkness made more dense by the occasional lightning's flash, they are in trouble up to their chin, and perhaps sink to rise no more.

Alas ! how many do we hear confessing with tearful eyes and aching hearts, that they have lost the favor of God by trying to please our modern Uzzahs who are always for steadying the ark. Thousands have shrunk from a full consecration for similar reasons. As the last cord that binds them to earth is about to be severed, they hear a whisper that causes them to hesitate to cut it. What will be the consequences of an ;inreserved consecration to God, of soul, body and spirit? New duties tc perform and mortifying crosses to be borne. They shrink from these things. The reproach of loud shouting and falling under the Spirit's power is more than they can endure. They cannot sell all they have to buy the pearl of great price. They dare not sign the contract. And all the way down to the damp, dark grave, they carry sad hearts and wear gloomy faces.

If a stranger had overheard the Savior, as He taught His disciples on the green hills and mountain summits of Palestine, saying to them that He must go up to Jerusalem, and suffer many things at the hands of the Scribes and Elders and Pharisees, he would have inquired with astonishment, ''What ! go up to Jerusalem to suffer ? One would have supposed it the haven of grace." And well may strangers in this, the nineteenth century, be astonished at the fact that spiritual Christians must go up to Jerusalem to suffer the persecution of Pharisees. Fires are kindled and crosses are erected by backslidden class-leaders, by proud Pharisees in pulpit and in pew. Often have God's faithful been heard to pray, to agonize in prayer, that they might be able to endure the flames — to bear with fortitude the pains of crucifixion. Gog and Magog — a man-fearing and man-pleasing spirit — are the cause of much of th's evil. It is the popular devil that is now dragging more souls to Hell than any of his coadjutors.

O thou Traveler on the boisterous waves of Gennesaret, that entered the land of the Gergesenes, measuring swords with legions of devils and giving them a free passage to the depths of the sea in a herd of swine — if thine ear has not grown heavy and thine arm shortened, cast this Pharisaic devil out of thy Zion, and kennel him eternally in his native Hell. — Amen.

Chapter III. — Platform Exemplified

We do not intend, dear reader, to condemn persons for their silence, nor to commend any merely for their loud shouting. We are not called by the Holy Ghost to any such work. It is our design, as heretofore stated, to inquire what is the will of our heavenly Father in reference to this matter. The apostle Paul has ever been whispering in our ear, "Do you seek to please God or man?" and we remember that Jesus says, "How can ye believe, which receive honor one of another, and seek not the honor that cometh from God only." We desire to please God and to obtain the honor which He confers, and therefore intend to subject ourselves to the Spirit's dictation; and we hope to induce others to follow our example.

But before we advance further, that you may better understand our platform, and that we pass goodnaturedly along, and have a pleasant time while exploring our subject, permit us to relate, by way of illustration, an affair of recent date in which the author bore a conspicuous part. It occurred during a campmeeting we attended, of which Dr. Z. Paddock had the management. The names of Benjamin and Zechariah Paddock have always been music in our ears. When we were a flaxen-haired boy, a wild youth, these brothers and ministers of Jesus, as they went forth to sow in Litchfield Circuit, Herkimer Co., N. Y., scattered some good seed in the youthful furrows of our heart. Their songs and prayers and preaching watered by their tears, were not lost by the way side, although the tender blade did not appear for more than a quarter of a century.

At this meeting which occurred during the summer of 1857, there was a love feast called where thousands sat in open court, waiting to throw in their testimony for Jesus. In front of the stand was sitting with us a row of brethren, among whom were the Doctor and Bro. Gorham. And here let me say that Bro. Gorham was also one that held a high seat in our affections; from whose sanctified lips we heard the sacred doctrine of perfect love; through whom we received, as the instrument of God's grace, the white stone with a new name engraved upon it; and who conducted us into the land of Beulah, where we have lived ever since, by the grace of God, in its waving cornfields and fruitful vineyards.

When our turn came to bear witness to the joys of salvation, we arose with a cup brimful, and as we gave utterance to our feelings, the Angel of the Covenant plunged into the pool and so agitated the waters that every nerve of our body vibrated like a Jew's harp ;

"Raised on tip-toe and began to hop."

and as has often been the case on hke occasions, before and since, we were raised on tip-toe and began to hop, unable to control our motions, though perfectly conscious of our condition; and while trying to get back to our seat, hopped on the toes of the Doctor and other brethren, and finally fell back into their laps. This made no small stir in the camp. Some shouted, others wondered, and said they had never seen it after that fashion before. But the love feast went on until it blazed like the burning bush.

Just at this point another old acquaintance found his way to our side; one who is faithful in attendance at all the means of grace, rain or shine, in whose employ we served for many years for miserable wages. He is called the Accuser of the brethren. Of course he came with a message. He at once whispered in our ear that we had offended our dearest friends by our ridiculous performances. Dr. Paddock, says he, is never known to shout aloud and is never the subject of such peculiar exercises, and there are none of his numerous friends but will say he knows more of the heights and depths of salvation, than a poor blind man just blasted out of the mountain; besides he has eulogized your books more than any other man, and has given them wings to fly to firesides where they would not otherwise have reached, and now you have lost his friendship by disgracing the meeting. It may be tolerated, says he, by Gorham, for he sometimes shouts himself, but you have disgraced yourself in the eyes of the Doctor. By this time we had hauled in our horns, and shrunk back in our shell like a snail. We would willingly have been trampled upon by the meanest mortal on earth. We were in the predicament of Bunyan's pilgrim, when Apollyon had knocked his sword out of his hand, wounded him in the head, and laid him on his back. But he was one of God's invincibles, and at the critical moment shouted, ''O mine enemy, rejoice not against me, when I fall I shall rise ;" in a breath he was on his feet again, brandished his Jerusalem blade, and Apollyon cleared the track and Christian went on his way rejoicing. Soon we began to crawl out of our shell again, and determined to know whether the Accuser had told the truth or not; for sometimes he tells the truth when it will serve his evil purpose ; but then he mixes truth and falsehood, just as cotton and wool are mixed in woolen goods, so that it is sometimes difficult for the keenest eyed saint to separate the true from the false. According to our determination we told the Doctor all that he had told us. Now the Doctor is one of the German flutes of the Lord's band, and the furrows of his cheeks are always overflowing with tears of Christian love. ''Well," says he, ''that is all a lie ; I was greatly blessed ; and was exceedingly tried w^ith myself because I have no such ecstacies ; and now, Bro. Henry, I want to make a contract with you, — if you will never be tried with me for my stillness, I never will be tried with your shouting, hopping, and falling." Ah ! how delightful to our troubled spirit were the rich, silvery tones of his voice. The contract was signed and sealed with hearty amens in the presence of angels and God.*

Now, reader, you may fish something out of this story that will be for your advantage. You have a specimen of the manner in which the devil is operating throughout our Zion. He disturbs one brother or sister because they are never the subjects of extraordinary demonstrations of the Spirit; and at the same time tells the noisy ones that they would better stop their mouths and hide their heads. He sits in his great iron chair and laughs out of the corners of his mouth, to think that he has so adroitly killed two birds with one stone.

Can you tell, reader, why the devil is said to have one cloven foot? H you do not know, we can tell you. It is because he creates all the divisions among brethren. If he can only crowd this foot into the church, into families, into neighborhoods, where the Prince of Peace reigns, and all hearts are bound together like Joseph's sheaf, in unfeigned love, and then sow a few seeds of discord and curdle the sweet milk of fraternal love into bitterness and strife, he has gained a great victory; for "by whom a man is overcome, by the same he is brought into bondage." Someone has said that Satan was like a sun-fish. He would shrink himself to the thickness of a shingle, and slip so smoothly between two brethren, that they would scarcely perceive him ; then he would spread out his sharp horny fins until he had fixed a gulf between them as impassable as that between Dives and Lazarus. Alas ! how frequently have the peculiar exercises of which many are the subjects, been made the entering wedge of endless heart burnings and strife.

Not a thousand years ago, two sisters, who for years had walked together as church members, without a single discord to mar the harmony of their fellowship, were entirely alienated from one another. While on a visit to a neighboring society, one was awakened to the subject of holiness, sought and obtained it, and like Noah's dove, having found rest on the Ararat of perfect love, returned to her home with the green olive leaf in her mouth. She began to wave it as a token of victory. She exhorted others to come up to a higher standard, and as she testified of Jesus' saving power, the fire fell, and, as John fell as one dead at a glimpse of Jesus on the Isle of Patmos, she fell, though she had always been numbered among the orderly, and measured her full length upon the floor ; and as the giant oak, uprooted by the mighty storm king, bears down many smaller trees in its fall, this sister, overthrown by a mighty spiritual gale, in her fall, broke the bones of the new bonnet of her hitherto loving friend, demolished her fair fabric of artificials, and carried all, the poor sister's superficial religion in the bargain, down into the dust. This of course raised the devil. Faithful testimony, holy living, and slaying power always set him to roaring. "Think not," says the Author of holiness, "that I am come to send peace on the earth; I come not to send peace, but a sword." Wherever the Apostles went and preached, and they preached holiness, hi^ Satanic majesty was aroused; divisions were made in the Church; multitudes met to discuss the strange doctrine, and Pharisees took council together for the purpose of extinguishing the fire.

Shouting Cknuink And Spurious 33

But let us jog back to the old church. The congregation is dismissed. The sexton turns the key at a late hour, saying as he goes, "This woman is a setter forth of strange doctrines ; our old church has never witnessed such scenes before." The two sisters have separated, one going from the summit of Mount Tabor, with the wine of the kingdom sticking to her lips,the other from the valley of Limbo, with a dark cloud upon her brow, and a heavy weight upon her heart. As she presses out the bruises from her new bonnet, and readjusts her artificials, she says, "If such performances are the fruit of holiness, may Heaven deliver me from it." And now Satan whispers, through the lips of a member of the Church of Sardis, "This is all wild fire." "Yes," says the sister, "I am convinced of it. She may be a Christian ; I shall not judge her ; but hereafter she can have my seat to occupy as well as her own." On the next Sabbath she betakes herself to the Church of Sardis, where minister and people are so destitute of life and power as to be unable to raise a quarrel even with the world. The newly baptized sister now receives a gracious visit from her Leader and Pastor, both heavily burdened with a message. Their approaches are as regularly and carefully planned as in the siege of a towering fortress. They employ any number of friction wheels, well fitted for service by a plentiful supply of soft soap. But finally the germ of the matter is reached. The good sister is informed that her exercises are regarded as disreputable, and that if persisted in, the result will be, "To Let" would be written on many pew doors. But how does she endure the fiery trial, this crucifixion at the hands o! Pliarisees and Elders? Alas! she yields to temptation. She withholds her testimony. Her sun goes down under a cloud, and yes, yes, the light that was in her becomes gross darkness. And now the sisters are forever separated, and without a miracle of grace will sink forever.