Vol 2, pages 1-100 - My Primitive Methodist Ancestors
Vol 2, pages 1-100 - My Primitive Methodist Ancestors
Vol 2, pages 1-100 - My Primitive Methodist Ancestors
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PRIMITIVE METHODIST CHURCH.<br />
VOL. II. BOOK II. CONTINUED.<br />
CHAPTER XII.<br />
THE BEMEESLEY BOOK-ROOM, 1821-43.<br />
fXPERIENCE, temperament and policy all combined to make Hugh Bourne<br />
publisher and pressman. His character had been shaped and a new<br />
direction given to his life by the printed word. Though naturally taciturn<br />
and, like Moses, "not eloquent<br />
. . . but slow of speech and of a slow<br />
tongue," he was communicative through another medium than that of speech. All<br />
along he obeyed a pretty steady impulse to express himself in manuscript and type<br />
to externalise his own convictions and his impressions of the facts before him, as his<br />
life-long journalising, and his innumerable memoranda respecting past and current<br />
events clearly show. In all this he was the direct opposite of William Clowes, who<br />
was averse from the use of the pen. For him the inside of a printing-office had few<br />
attractions, yet, like Aaron, he was naturally eloquent, and could "speak well."<br />
Moreover, as a practical man, Hugh Bourne knew what power there was in the press<br />
as an instrument of propagandism ; and, as one of the founders and directors of a new<br />
denomination, he may have had the ambition to copy, in his own modest way, the<br />
example of John "Wesley whom he so much admired who was one of the most<br />
voluminous authors and extensive publishers of his own, or indeed of any, time. So<br />
Hugh Bourne's publications ranged from a somewhat bulky Ecclesiastical History to<br />
a four-page collection of " Family Receipts," which tells how to relieve a cow choked<br />
with a turnip, and how to provide a cheap and wholesome travelling dinner for fourpence.<br />
Whence, it will be seen, that the doings of Popes and Councils as well as the small<br />
details of domestic and personal economy, alike came within the purview of his printed<br />
observations.<br />
These characteristics and habits may be seen at work in Hugh Bourne even before<br />
1811. In proof of this, note the printed account of the first<br />
camp meeting, hot from<br />
the press, that was scattered by thousands ;<br />
the " Rules for Holy Living " distributed<br />
on camp-grounds, and even slipped through the broken panes of Church windows ;<br />
his<br />
A