Throughout the war there was a disposition on the part of some army officers to compel ministers of southern sympathies to conduct "loyal" services--that is, to preach and pray for the success of the Federal government. It was especially easy to annoy the Episcopal clergy, on account of the formal prayer used, but other denominations also suffered. In one instance, a Methodist minister was told that he must take the oath (this was soon after the surrender) and pray for the President of the United States, or he must stop preaching. For a time he refused, but finally he took the oath, and, as he said, "I prayed for the President; that the Lord would take out of him and his allies the hearts of beasts and put into them the hearts of men, or remove the cusses from office. The little captain never asked me any more to pray for the President and the United States."[633] In the churches the situation at the close of the war was not promising for peace. Some congregations were divided; church property was held by aliens supported by the army; "loyal" services were still demanded; the northern churches were sending agents to occupy the southern field; the negroes were being forcibly separated from southern supervision; the policy of "disintegration and absorption" was beginning. Consequently the church question during Reconstruction was one of the most irritating.[634] SEC. 8. DOMESTIC LIFE Society in 1861 During the early months of 1861 society was at its brightest and best. For several years social life had been characterized by a vague feeling of unrest. Political questions became social questions, society and politics went hand in hand, and the social leaders were the political leaders. The women were well informed on all questions of the day and especially on the burning sectional issues that affected them so closely. After the John Brown episode at Harper's Ferry, the women felt that for them there could be no safety until the question was settled. They were strongly in favor of secession after that event if not before; they were even more unanimous than the men, feeling that they were more directly concerned in questions of interference with social institutions in the South. There was to them a great danger in social changes made, as all expected, by John Brown methods.[635]