e to whom I had first listened: the eye was still
brilliant, the face still sallow, but wrinkled now, and the voice and
manner still fervent and earnest; and the great mind, though not the
same, still powerful. It was that venerable, good man, Lovie Pierce,
the father of the great and eloquent bishop. What has he not seen?
what changes, what trials, what triumphs! Generations before his eyes
have passed into eternity; the little handful of Methodist communicants
grown into a mighty and intelligent body; thousands of ministers are
heralding her tenets all over the Protestant world--mighty in learning,
mighty in eloquence--yet none surpass the eloquence, the power, and the
purity of Lovie Pierce.

When I first heard him, Bishop Asbury, William Russell, and he were
nursing the seed sown by John Wesley and George Whitefield, a little
while before, upon the soil of Georgia. All but Pierce have long been
gathered to their fathers, and have rest from their labors. He still
remains, bearing his cross in triumph, and still preaching the
Redeemer to the grandchildren of those who first welcomed him and
united with him in the good work of his mission. How much his labors
have done to form and give tone to the character of the people of the
State of Georgia, none may say; but under his eye and aid has arisen a
system of female education, which has and is working wonders throughout
the State. He has seen the ignorant and untaught mothers rear up
virtuous, educated, and accomplished daughters; and, in turn, these
rearing daughters and sons, an ornament and an honor to parents and
country. Above all, he has seen and sees a standard of intelligence,
high-breeding, and piety pervading the entire State. The log-cabin
gives way to the comfortable mansion, the broad fields usurping the
forest's claim, and the beautiful church-building pointing its taper
spire up to heaven, where stood the rude log-house, and where first he
preached. He has lived on and watched this growing moral and physical
beauty, whose germs he planted, and whose fruits he is now enjoying in
the eighty-fourth year of his age, still zealous, still ardent and
eloquent, and a power in the land. Should these lines ever meet his
eye, he will know that the child whose head he stroked as he sat upon
his knee--the youth whom he warned and counselled, loves him yet, now
that he is wrinkled, old, and gray.

From parents such as I have described, and under the teaching of such
m