Sermons of the Late Nicholas Snethen, Minister ... in the Methodist Protestant Church
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Nicholas Snethen was an American clergyman, minister. He was also elected Chaplain of the United States House of Representatives for the Twelfth Congress.
Background
Nicholas was born on November 15, 1769 at Glen Cove, New York, United States (then known as Fresh Pond), the son of Barak and Ann (Weeks) Snethen. On his father's side he was of Welsh descent. Barak Snethen cultivated a farm and operated a flour mill, sending his product to New York in his own schooner. Nicholas spent much of his early life on the farm and the schooner.
Education
Through private study he acquired a competent knowledge of English and a usable knowledge of Greek and Hebrew.
Career
When Snethen was about twenty-one the family moved to Staten Island, and in 1791 to Belleville. Here Snethen came under the influence of Methodism and professed conversion. In 1794 he entered the ministry of the Methodist Episcopal Church and for four years served circuits in New England.
In 1799 he was appointed to Charleston, and was ordained elder there in 1800. The following year he preached in Baltimore and in 1801-02 was traveling companion of Bishop Asbury. For the next three years he preached in Baltimore and New York.
Between 1806 and 1809 he retired temporarily from the active ministry, but then, until 1814 he preached at Fells Point, Baltimore, Georgetown, Alexandria, and Frederick. While at Georgetown he became chaplain of the House of Representatives.
Later, he completely retired to his farm, and in 1816 became a candidate for representative in Congress, but was defeated. During the controversy which followed the revolt of James O'Kelly against the episcopal authority of Asbury in 1792, Snethen took Asbury's side, issuing in 1800 A Reply to O'Kelly's The Author's Apology for Protesting Against the Methodist Episcopal Government (c. 1798), and, a year or so later, An Answer to O'Kelly's Vindication of An Apology (1801).
At the General Conference of 1812, however, he identified himself with the faction favoring lay representation in the Conferences and limitation of the powers of the bishops. He also contributed to the reform monthly, Mutual Rights, published at Baltimore beginning in 1824. He prepared the memorial to the General Conference of 1828 asking for reform. That body turned a deaf ear to the request, and in November 1828 the Reformers convened in Baltimore and projected the establishment of the Methodist Protestant Church.
He made his slaves free and moved to Sullivan County. Subsequently he removed to Louisville, and later to Cincinnati, where he continued to labor in the ministry of the Church he had helped to establish. In 1834 he returned to Baltimore to edit Mutual Rights and Methodist Protestant in conjunction with Asa Shinn. In 1836 he conducted a theological school in New York founded by the Methodist Protestant Church. Moving West again in 1837, he became head of a manual labor college, founded by Ohio Conference at Lawrenceburg, which survived but a year.
His last activities were spent in the Territory of Iowa, where he attempted to establish a school in Iowa City known as Snethen Seminary. Before it was fairly under way, however, he died at the home of a daughter in Princeton.
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Connections
In 1804 he married Susannah Hood Worthington, daughter of Charles Worthington of Frederick County, Maryland, and came into possession of a farm and some slaves.