whole Connexion. And while
many were transported with rage, great numbers took my part. The feeling
in my favor was both strong and very general. One-third of the whole
Connexion probably separated from my opponents, and formed themselves
into a new society. Several ministers joined them, and had not the
chapels been secured to the Conference, it is probable that the greater
portion of the community would have seceded. As it was, the existence of
the Body seemed in peril, and the leaders found it necessary to strain
every nerve to save it from utter destruction.

And they were not particular as to the means they used. Before my
expulsion even my enemies had considered me a virtuous, godly man, and
acknowledged me to be a most laborious and successful minister. Now they
fabricated and circulated all manner of slanderous reports respecting
me. One day they gave it out that I had broken my teetotal pledge, and
had been taken up drunk out of the gutter, and wheeled home in a
wheelbarrow. Then it was discovered that I had not broken my pledge, but
I had been seen nibbling a little Spanish juice, so it was said I was
eating opium, and killing myself as fast as the poison could destroy me.

At another time it was said I had gone stark mad, and had been smothered
to death between two beds. A friend came, pale and dismally sorrowful,
to condole with my wife on the dreadful catastrophe, and was himself
almost mad with delight when he found that I was in the parlor writing,
as well and as sane as usual.

Then it was reported that I had applied for a place in the ministry
among the Calvinists, though I had up to that time professed views at
variance with Calvinism, and had even objected to be a hired minister.
When I called for the names of the parties to whom I had made the offer,
and engaged to give a large reward if my slanderers would produce them,
they found it was another Joseph that had applied for the place, and not
Joseph Barker. But the death of one slander seemed to be the birth of
two or three fresh ones. And sometimes opposite slanders sprang up
together. "If he had been a good man," said one, "he would have stopped
in the Connexion quietly, and waited for reform!" "If he had been an
honest man," said another, "he would have left the Connexion long ago,
and not remained in a community that he thought in error." I had been
"too hasty" for one, and "too slow" for another. One wrote to assure me
that I should die a vio