In the midst of much doubt and perplexity, he turned westward and finally reached Caneridge, Bourbon County, Ky., where he remained for a few months, then returned to Virginia. ORDAINED TO THE MINISTRY In the fall of 1798 he received a call from the united congregations of Caneridge and Concord, through the Transylvania Presbytery. He accepted, and a day was appointed for his ordination to the ministry. Knowing that at his ordination he would be required to adopt the Westminster Confession of Faith, as the system of doctrine taught in the Bible, he determined to give it a very careful examination. This was to him almost the beginning of sorrows. He stumbled at the doctrine of the Trinity as therein taught, and could not conscientiously subscribe to it. Doubts, too, arose in his mind on the doctrines of election, reprobation and predestination, as then taught. He had before this time learned from those higher up in the ecclesiastical world the way of divesting those doctrines of their hard, repulsive features, and admitted them as true, yet unfathomable mysteries. Viewing them as such, he let them alone in his public discourses and confined himself to the practical part of religion, and to subjects within his depth. But in re-examining these doctrines he found the covering put over them could not hide them from a discerning eye with close inspection. Indeed, he saw that they were necessary to the system, without any covering. He was in this state of mind when the day for his ordination came. He determined to tell the presbytery honestly his state of mind, and to request them to defer his ordination until he should be better informed and settled. When the day came a large congregation assembled, but before the presbytery convened he took aside the two pillars—James Blythe and Robert Marshall—and made known to them his difficulties and that he had determined to decline ordination at that time. They labored, but in vain, to remove his difficulties and objections. They asked him how far he was willing to receive the Confession of Faith. To this he replied, “As far as I see it is consistent with the Word of God.” They concluded that that was sufficient. The presbytery then convened, and when the question, “Do you receive and adopt the Confession of Faith as containing the system of doctrine taught in the Bible?” he answered aloud, so that the whole assembly could hear, “I do, so far as I see it consistent with the Word of God.” No objection being raised to this answer he was ordained.