ls secretly
favoured the separation of the colony from Great Britain. The Wesleyan
Methodists, a numerous body, were doubly impelled to oppose Mackenzie
and all who favoured his cause. The quarrel between Mackenzie and the
Rev. Egerton Ryerson has already been referred to.[252] Mr. Ryerson was
in those days one of the most prominent figures in Upper Canadian
Methodism, and in conjunction with his brothers, exerted a predominant
influence among the members of that body. At the time of the general
election of 1836 he was absent from the Province on a mission to
England, whither he had gone to obtain a charter for the Upper Canada
Academy, and to solicit subscriptions for the establishment and
maintenance of that institution, which subsequently developed into the
University of Victoria College. But the reverend gentleman's arm was
far-reaching, and stretched across the broad expanse of the Atlantic. In
common with a large and respectable portion of the Upper Canadian
population, he cherished a feeling of personal contempt for Mackenzie,
whose character he thoroughly despised, and whose projects he regarded
as prejudicial to the welfare of the colony. The publication of the
baneful domination letter had convinced him that rebellion and
separation were among the cherished schemes of the Radicals. To all such
schemes he was prepared to oppose his firmest resistance, for his
loyalty was of the perfervid order, and his dislike of Mackenzie
probably imparted additional zeal to his opposition. As has been seen,
Mackenzie, with the aid of Hume, Roebuck and other British statesmen,
had succeeded in creating in the minds of the English public
considerable sympathy for Canadian Reform. To counteract this influence
Mr. Ryerson, under the signature of "A Canadian," contributed a series
of letters to the London _Times_. They were vigorously written, and
attracted much attention, not only in England but in Canada, where they
were republished in the columns of the Tory newspapers, and where they
were circulated in pamphlet form as a campaign document. Mr. Ryerson
also wrote to leading members of the Methodist body in Canada, urging
them to cast all their influence for Government candidates, and against
the revolutionary policy of the Radicals. His appeals served their
purpose, and the great bulk of the Wesleyan Methodists of Upper Canada,
who had theretofore supported Reform members, went over to the side of
the Government. In many constit