book ii

., chap. 7.

[804] It had been used, however, all this time, in the Minutes, as explanatory of the word “superintendent.” The Minutes say that, “following the counsel of Mr. John Wesley, who recommended the episcopal mode of Church government, we thought it best to become an episcopal Church, making the episcopal office elective, and the elected superintendent, or _bishop_, amenable to the body of ministers and preachers.” Minutes, vol. i., p. 22. New York, 1840. It was not in the bishops’ address to Washington in 1789 that the title was first _personally_ assumed. The Discipline of 1787 so used it. Emory’s History of the Discipline, p. 82. But, as we have just seen, the title was inserted in the Minutes of the Organization of the Church (1784, 1785) as synonymous with “superintendent.” Minutes 1785, vol. i., p. 22. Wesley’s letter of reproof to Asbury was written before the bishops’ address to Washington.

[805] See his circular letter to the American Societies, Drew’s Coke, chap. 5.

[806] Bishop (Saxon, bischop) is a corruption of the Latinized Greek word episcopus. Its analogy to the second and third syllables of the latter is obvious.

[807] Drew’s Life of Coke, chap. 5.

[808] Drew’s Life of Coke, chap. 5.

[809] Smith’s History of Methodism, vol. i.,