The Journals & Notebook of
 Nathan Bangs 1805-1806, 1817

 

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Bangs on the duties of a Methodist preacher
Bangs Letters to Young Ministers of the Gospel 188-193

1. I advise you to be much in private prayer and meditation. In order to do this, avoid all company except such as your duty as a Christian Minister calls you to mingle with. Only visit as a Minister of Christ; letting every inviter know that he must receive you in that character, or not at all. The sick, and the poor, you must visit, or offend Christ.

2. Keep you own secrets, and let others keep theirs. The observance of this rule will save you much time, much trouble, and many heart burnings.

3. Rise early in the morning, not allowing the birds to be beforehand with you in praise to God.

4. Be always neat, not fine, in your clothing and person. A sloven disgraces the pulpit.

5. The moment you find any one to suspect your sincerity in conversation, stop talking.

6. Never ask the counsel of any man who envies you, or who entertains suspicions of the purity of your motives.

7. Never contradict a low slander. Let the slanderer have all the credit of his lying report.

8. When you find a person always contradicting you, resorting to dogmatisms instead of using arguments, leave him to himself. He acts not from judgment, but from a testy disposition, which Omnipotence alone can change.

9. When you find a person always finding fault, passing over a thousand excellencies with "frigid indifference," and seizing upon infirmity or an accidental blunder, with the avidity with which a vulture would seize his prey, let him pass with you only as a wayfaring man. Never make him a companion. These two last advices apply only to those who consider themselves your equals. When called to instruct the ignorant, to reclaim the vicious or the wandering, you must persevere, whatever insults you meet with, until hopes gives up to despair.

10. I have often thought of a saying of Cotton Mather, that when you are most sincere and zealous, you will meet with the greatest opposition. Let not this discourage you. He that proclaims war against hell must expect hell's rage.

11. Let the ignorance of others instruct you to be ashamed of their defects; the wise to be emulous of their virtues; the haughty to be meek; the avaricious to be benevolent; the indolent diligent; the disdainful to be kind and affectionate to all; the testy and clownish to be patient and gentle. There is one enemy I would, above all, have you, if possible, keep at a distance. It is not the devil; he cannot hurt you unless you first hurt yourself. It is not your own heart, though that is sufficiently deceitful of itself to destroy you; and therefore you must pray to God, to give you a constant victory over inordinate self-love. It is, then, a self-conceited, ignorant, dogmatical, overbearing, affected, envious, whining man, who would attempt to teach you, to dispute with you, or to inspire you with a concept of self. If you will stand against such a fellow, and keep your temper without a blush, I'll pronounce you not a philosopher, nor an able minister, but what is incomparably better than either, a Christian hero, who has conquered self. But when you find such persons—and they are by no means scarce—if you cannot run from them, I advise you to put a bridle on your tongue; and while they beat you over the head and eyes, suffer in silence; only lift up your heart to God for both yourself and them.

12. In certain companies, you had better be taken for a fool than to have it suspected that you have the least confidence in your own judgement. Choose the former, therefore, in most cases when so circumstanced; for if you must suffer from such kind of beings, you may, by letting them think you a fool, save them from the sin of wilfully slandering you as such, because they are determined, right or wrong, that you shall never have the reputation of a wise man.

13. If it should so come to pass in the course of your ministry, in consequence of a faithful discharge of its duties, that you should rise to eminence and celebrity, wonder not if the venom of envy should be shot at you [...].

 

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Edited by Scott McLaren
Book History Practicum
University of Toronto