Transcription contributed by Martie Callihan 21 December 2004

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Religious statistics and materials for a history of the progress of religion are not readily accessible in a country where there is no State-Church or Governmental support of religion. The State of Ohio requires full statistical reports to be made annually of the condition and growth of the schools maintained by public taxation, but the chief matters pertaining to religion, which have been noticed by State or National statisticians are the number of church organizations and church edifices, the amount of church sittings or accommodations for public worship and the value of church property; and our information concerning these is derived chiefly from the census returns of the United States since 1850.

According to the census of 1850, there were, in Warren County, sixty church edifices valued at $82,400; in 1870, these had increased in number to

The aggregate church accommodations, or sittings, in the county, were returned in 1850 at 22,295, and, in 1870, at 26,050. Comparing these figures with the population of the county at the same dates, and making but a slight deduction from the population for infants, the sick and the infirm, it appears that at both periods there were seats in the churches for more than the entire population of the county who could attend public worship.

The statistics of churches given in census returns do not in all cases agree with the statements put forth by the denominational organs of the various sects. The census superintendents have their own point of view and apply tests different from those known to the compilers of religious year-books and registers. It should be borne in mind, too, that reports of the number of church edifices, their accommodations and value are not always true measures of the religions activity of a community. A strong denomination with numerous churches, may often strengthen itself by suffering a weak church to cease to exist when it becomes unable to support itself. There are churches which find a place on the rolls of a denomination, and may be enumerated in census returns, which, having a legal title to an edifice, and maintaining some kind of an organization, have ceased to gather congregations, to support a minister or to conduct any of the services of public worship. It is not easy to determine the number of churches in a given area for the reason that it is not easy to determine what constitutes a church to entitle it to a place in an enumeration. On this point, the superintendent of the ninth census of the United States' remarks: "A church to deserve notice in the census must have something of the character of an institution. It must be known in the community in which it is located. There must be something permanent and tangible to substantiate its title to recognition. No one test, it is true, can be devised, that will apply in all cases; yet, in the entire absence of tests, the statistics of the census will be overlaid with fictitious returns to such an extent as to produce the effect of absolute falsehood. It will not do to say that a church without a church-building of its own is, therefore, not a church; that a church without a pastor is not a church; nor even that a church without membership is not a church. There are churches properly cognizable in the census which are without edifices and pastors, and, in rare instances, without a professed membership. Something makes them churches in spite of all their deficiencies. They are known and recognized in the community as churches, and are properly to be returned as such in the census."

The most numerous denomination in Warren County is the Methodist Episcopal, which has a church in almost every neighborhood. Next in numbers are the Presbyterian, Regular Baptist, Old School and New School, and the Christian. By the last-named is meant the Christian denomination, formerly frequently termed New Lights, and not the followers of Alexander Campbell, or Disciples of Christ, who are also popularly called Christians. Of the Disciples of Christ there are but one or two small organizations at present in the county. Other denominations found in the county are the Orthodox Friends, Hicksite Friends, Universalist, United Brethren, Roman Catholic, Lutheran, Reformed (late German Reformed), Cumberland Presbyterian, Free-Will Baptist, United Presbyterian, Methodist Protestant and the Shakers. Several of the last-named have but a single church organization within the limits of the county. A small number of persons are believers in the phenomena known as spiritual manifestations, and occasionally meet for religious exercises or to receive spiritual communications, but no regular organization of Spiritualists is known to exist in the county.

Great changes have taken place in the mode of public worship since the first rude churches of hewed logs sprung up Beside the green fields. In the former days, sermons were from an hour and a half to two hours in length, while the other services were protracted by long prayers and commentaries on the chapter read from the Scriptures, to a length that would now be thought unendurable. Often there were two services separated by an intermission of fifteen minutes. During both services, horses, in the absence of a society for the prevention of cruelty to animals, stood, without food or water, haltered to trees from which they gnawed the bark. The autumn sun was low in the horizon before the benediction was pronounced and the worshipers departed, some to distant homes. The singing was not artistic. The innovation of singing hymns without lining them out caused many a difficulty in the older churches. Sometimes there was a compromise between the opposing parties, and one hymn each Sunday was sung without being read line by line, and the others in the old way. A new-tune, which all could not sing, caused some to grieve. The introduction of a choir or of a musical instrument caused serious dissension. Instrumental music was not common in the rural churches until after the introduction of the cabinet organ. The sin of wearing elegant attires and adornment with broidered hair, or gold, or pearls, or costly array, was a favorite topic in the pulpit. Flowers on the sacred desk would have been considered as ministering to a worldly vanity. The most beautiful comedies and the sub-

It cannot be doubted that there was less harmony among the different denominations formerly than now. The religious men of former generations were sincerely and intensely sectarian. They believed that they had "thus saith the Lord" for their distinctive tenets. They believed themselves to be and were determined to remain rigidly "orthodox"—a term which, according to Dean Stanley, "implies, to a certain extent, narrowness, fixedness, perhaps even hardness of intellect and deadness of feeling, at times, rancorous animosity." Sermons were more controversial and doctrinal than now. It can hardly be doubted that, with the increase of culture and refinement in the clergy and laity, have come a larger religious sympathy and a higher and a broader view which would break down the party wall of sectarianism and sweep away the petty restrictions on thought and opinion.

The early Presbyterian and Baptist Churches were severely Calvinistic, and their pulpits dwelt more frequently and more strenuously than their modern successors on the five points of their creed—predestination, particular redemption, total depravity, effectual calling and the certain perseverance of the saints. The terrors of the eternal torment of the wicked were more frequently and more vividly portrayed than in the modern days. The belief in a material fire in hell for the future and endless punishment of the unregenerate was common in all the churches. The doctrine of a literal fire in hell was preached by Rev. J. B. Findlay and other early Methodist preachers, in which they followed the explicit teachings of the sermons of John Wesley. It is doubtful if a person known to be a disbeliever in eternal punishment would have been suffered to remain a member of any of the early orthodox churches; today a belief in the final holiness and happiness of all mankind is not an insurmountable bar to a place among the laity of the evangelical denominations. Excepting the Quakers, nearly all the religious persons among the pioneers were rigid Sabbatarians, and the first day of the week was not with them a day for social enjoyment or recreation. Too often it left with it upon the minds of the young no pleasing memories. Children who were kept constantly at work six days in the week, by poor parents who had bought land on credit, and must pay for it with hard labor, were required on Sunday to go to church, a considerable distance on foot, to listen to long sermons; and, after returning home, to spend much of the rest of the day on their feet reciting the catechism, or to sit and hear read the Bible and Baxter's Saints' Everlasting Best.

But let us not judge the religious men of former days harshly. They were noble men and the county owes them a debt of gratitude. The high place in education, morals and religion Warren County has ever maintained is due largely to the life and work of the early religious teachers. We cannot believe in all things as they believed, but we cannot fail to recognize their virtues and their worth.

Most of the changes in the religious beliefs and modes of worship that have taken place since the establishment of the pioneer churches are not such as result in modifications of creeds and articles of faith. They are the result of inevitable tendencies, and are brought about, not so much by theological discussions, as by the changes in human modes of thinking, feeling and believing, which, taken together, we call the spirit of the age. The advance of the refinements of civilization may render the religious doctrines of good men in one age repugnant to those of the next.

It is now impossible to determine when Sunday schools were first estab-

The Warren County Sabbath School Union was organized at a meeting held at the Congregational Church in Lebanon, May 17 and 18, 1864. The object of the union, as declared in its constitution, is "to unite all evangelical Christians in the county in efforts to promote the cause of Sabbath schools, in co-operation with the State Sabbath School Union, aiding in establishing new schools where they are needed and awakening an increased interest and efficiency in Sabbath school work." The association holds annual conventions of two days' sessions, which are usually largely attended.