To form churches in this way, would only be to multiply communities of merely nominal Christians.
The brethren admitted, that their labors had been too little adapted, hitherto, to awaken religious feeling among the people.

The reasons assigned for this were, the absorbing demands of the press and of education; the habits of preaching and laboring formed under past unfavorable states of the field; and finally, a painful impression of the suffering that converts must endure, with no civil power to interpose between them and their persecutors.
To counteract the first of these causes, it was decided to suspend the printing for a year; and the seminary was revived, which had been suspended in 1842, to counteract the second.

The remedy for the last two, was a more perfect reliance on the Holy Spirit and the divine energy of the Gospel.

It was the general opinion, that education in all its parts should bear a fixed proportion to the frequency, spirituality, and power of the more formal preaching.

Nor was it less clear, that the press should be kept strictly subservient to the pulpit.
The most remarkable call for preaching, at this time, was at Hasbeiya, a village of four or five thousand inhabitants, situated at the foot of Mount Hermon.1 Druzes and members of the Greek Church made up the population, with some Greek Catholics, Moslems, and Jews.