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Epilogue IN SEPTEMBER 1772, RECENTLY ORDAINED AND COMMISSIONED PRESBYTErian pastor David McClure arrived in northeastern Ohio hoping to minister to the Delaware Indians living along the Muskingum River. His journey westward had included a stop at Brotherton, New Jersey, where he met with John Brainerd and the remnants of the Christian Indian congregation begun by Brainerd’s older brother a quarter century earlier . McClure would return there the following summer and spend several days with a discouraged Brainerd, who was distressed by the ‘‘little success of his labours’’ amid a flock that, beset by alcohol abuse and dismal prospects for the future, shrank yearly. The new missionary could only call Brainerd’s charges ‘‘a poor race of beings.’’1 McClure’s trek west in 1772 also included a visit to the Moravian village of Kuskuskies in western Pennsylvania. There he observed a well-ordered community of Delaware living and worshiping with several German Moravian missionary families. McClure attended morning and evening prayer with them in a log church adorned with religious paintings of the life of Christ. The services, all in the Delaware language, consisted of short sermons preceded by ‘‘devout hymns.’’ ‘‘In singing,’’ McClure noted, ‘‘they all, young & old bore a part, & the devotion was solemn & impressive. . . . Their hymns are prayers addressed to Jesus Christ, the lamb of God, who died for the sins of men, & exhortations & resolutions to abstain from sin . . . & to live in love & the practice of good works, as he has given us example.’’ Already moved by the holy sounds he heard, McClure waited on his interpreter, Joseph Peepy, to help him make sense of the texts. Peepy was a well-known translator and one sought out by missionaries, for he himself was a Delaware Christian convert, brought to faith under the tutelage of the Brainerds. Before the two men traveled on to their principal destination, McClure marveled at the Germans’ success: 200 ENCOUNTERS OF THE SPIRIT The Moravians appear to have adopted the best mode of Christianizing the Indians. They go among them without noise or parade, & by their friendly behaviour conciliate their good will. They join them in the chace, & freely distribute to the helpless & gradually instill into the minds of individuals, the principles of religion. They then invite those who are disposed to hearken to them, to retire to some convenient place, at a distance from the wild Indians, & assist them to build a village, & teach them to plant & sow, & to carry on some coarse manufactures.2 Finally at New Comer’s Town (Kighalampegha), the largest Delaware settlement on the Muskingum, McClure readied himself for his new ministry. He was barely unpacked, however, when he discovered that his stay was to be short-lived. The town’s Delaware council decided that it would be best for all concerned if McClure returned home, and told him so within two weeks of his arrival. In that time, area natives had already been communicating the same message to the missionary in less formal ways. For much of the fortnight, for example, a good portion of the community, which had close to a hundred families, indulged in a ‘‘drunken frolic,’’ hardly the sort of welcome McClure was hoping for. He did manage to preach on consecutive Sundays, as well as on several weekdays, to Indian audiences. But he found most of his listeners disinterested or confused by what he said or didn’t say. Under those circumstances , he was thankful for the pious efforts of Peepy, who followed up his sermons with emotional appeals of his own: ‘‘My Interpreter, who appeared deeply impressed at the melancholy condition of his countrymen , conversed with great freedom, fluency & feeling on their spiritual state. With tears flowing from his eyes, he told them many solemn truths, and made an affectionate and serious application of the discourse to them.’’3 Delaware resistance to McClure was expressed perhaps most tellingly in a series of objections raised by the speaker of the council. First he wondered why the ‘‘Almighty Monetho’’ (Manitou), who was the creator of all things and father of all peoples, would send the Bible to whites and not to Indians. He argued that in lieu of the Bible, ‘‘the Great Monetho has given us knowledge here, (pointing to his forehead) & when we are at a loss what to do, we must think.’’ McClure privately described this contention as a ‘‘deistical objection, founded in the pride of erring reason, and more than I expected from an uncultivated heathen .’’ Publicly, he responded by trying to make a case that within God...

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