herefore adopted. And every effort was made to intensify
the feelings and widen the breach which already existed between the two
sections of the Methodists. This was the more easily done by the appeal
which was made to the national prejudices of Methodists of British
origin, as against the alleged republican tendency of their colonial
brethren.[96] In this effort the ruling party were publicly and
privately aided by members of the Missionary Committee in London. To
discuss this question now would be practically useless. None but actors
in the scenes and conflicts of those times could realize the strong,
even bitter, feelings which existed in the chief towns between the two
parties at the time. Cherished sentiments of loyalty, strong home
feelings, and orthodox Methodist principles, were appealed to, and
alternately asserted their influence on opposite sides in the contest.

Added to the difficulty which Dr. Ryerson experienced in conducting the
clergy reserve controversy was the fact, that many Methodists of British
origin fully sympathized with the claims of the old national and
historical Church of England--they held that it was _ipso facto_ the
"established" church in every British Colony, as often asserted by the
Missionary party.

As the clergy reserve question gradually became the absorbing topic of
discussion in the country (with Dr. Ryerson as one of the chief leaders
in that discussion), it was natural that so important a matter should
receive the attention of Conference. This it did at an early date. In
1837 strong resolutions were passed upon the subject, which excited much
uneasiness among the English Missionary party. The Rev. W. H. Harvard,
President of the Conference, in writing to Dr. Ryerson on the subject
after Conference, said:--

Since I came away from the Conference, I have been greatly
concerned as to the anti-church impression likely to be made on the
mind of our people by our recent resolutions of Conference; and I
would fain engage your interest with Rev. E. Evans, our Editor, to
accompany them with some saving paragraph on the general principle
of an establishment which may keep our people from the danger of
imbibing the principle of dissent, the operation of which will
always foster a religious radicalism in our body, and the influence
of which our fathers at home strongly deprecate. I think with you,
that in the altered circumstances of our