Congregationalists, would gain only an apparent accession of strength at the cost of consistency, spoiling itself as a system both by the measures that should win them, and by their influence when won; and finally, that a time would come, which it was no gain to stave off by expedients, when the two systems would resume their integrity, and be compelled after all to learn to deal with each other in the same field on terms of coördinate denominations.

Time was when there were in this country the two distinct and integral polities of Congregationalism and Presbyterianism, and no third thing between them. The one held the hill country of the East, and the other went down to dwell in the midland and the South. And for many years they wrought thus, each in its field after its kind. But in process of time the Northwest was discovered, and at once the children of each began to pour forth into that open world. Presbyterian organizations first take the field, and possess the chief points of population and influence. But as the multitudes flock in from the East, and the commingling goes on, the policy of ecclesiastical amalgamation is adopted. A scheme of comprehension and absorption is devised. Such was the import of the Plan of Union. But as the experiment proceeds, the New England spirit is found stronger than had been anticipated, and requiring more and more of concession and modification, on the Presbyterian side, to retain it in connection. It was also an infectious spirit ; it breathed something of its own freedom into the more rigid and summary processes with which it was brought in contact. Thereupon commenced throughout the debatable field, a series of Presbyterian abatements, and structural modifications, somewhat Congregationalizing that system, and awakening the hope in some quarters, that the result might be a new Northwestern system; neither this nor that, but combining the excellences of both. But the problem was not to be solved so. The difference lies deeper than in modes and usages; and the attempt to ignore the radical diversity of principle and spirit in the two polities, and form a unity by their aggregation, was only entangling the issue the more.

At length the General Assembly awoke to a sense of what was going on in the Northwest. It had never for a moment contemplated any such modifications of its system, as probable or allowable. It took the alarm as soon as the deterioration became visible. It would have no more of the Plan of Union. Instead of simply absorbing and assimilating Congregationalists, it was corrupting Presbyterianism! Accordingly the plan was repudiated by the General Assembly before the rupture of

that body in 1837. But it had done its work, and the Assembly saw clearly that the tendencies it had set in motion would not be arrested by the mere withdrawal of the Plan. New Englandism had infected the body of the Northern and Western Synods, and it was deemed necessary at last to amputate at a stroke, all that mass of adulterated and degenerate Presbyterianism.

The world has been often told and importuned, to believe that the great schism in the Presbyterian Church proceeded almost wholly on grounds of doctrinal unsoundness in the exscinded Synods. Serious diversities had, indeed, grown up between the doctrinal views of New England, and of the General Assembly; but the real cause which was for years constantly exasperating these differences, and which at last effected the disruption, was the New Englandized phase of Presbyterianism, that was spreading under the auspices of the Plan of Union. That which opened their eyes to the enormity of the New England Divinity, was the fact, that the New England order and spirit were penetrating and spoiling their Presbyterianism. So much is confessed, even by Mr. Cheeseman in his desperate attempt to stretch the doctrinal disagreements to such amplitude as would justify the act of excision. In his aggravating book,* he says: "When that act is carefully examined, it will be found that it excommunicated no one, and that it really separated no single Presbyterian minister or church from the General Assembly. While it disowned, as unconstitutional, organizations compounded of Presbyterian and Congregational churches, it made provision for all who were truly Presbyterian, and gave them specific directions as to the course, which under their peculiar circumstances it was expedient for them to pursue;" which course was, to come out from these contaminated associations, organize separate and thoroughly Presbyterian Presbyteries, and so doing, prove themselves meet for the fellowship of the Assembly.

New School Presbyterianism was exscinded not only as heterodox, but as having ceased to be truly Presbyterian. It had clean departed from the Book of Discipline. It was no longer fitting that this relaxed style of Presbyterianism should be retained in their fellowship, and encouraged to go on spreading the leaven of unsoundness. The Plan had already been eschewed; and now this intermediate quiddity, which it had produced, this composite New School product, styling itself Presbyterian, must be repudiated also.

But that this was the real ground of the proceeding, and that

* Differences between Old and New School Presbyterians, p. 17.

the corruption of their system in the rejected Synods, was regarded as a fruit of the Plan of Union, let the General Assembly testify for itself.

the

"Whereas, as it is expressed in Act 2, adopted by that Assembly (of 1838,) it was never the intention of the General Assembly to cause any sound Presbyterian to be permenently separated from our connexion; but it is, and always was, desire of the Church, that all, who really embrace our doctrine, love our order, and are willing to conform to our discipline, should unite themselves with us; and moreover, as the General Assembly has no idea of narrowing, but would rather extend its geographical limits, so as to unite in bonds of the most intimate fellowship every evangelical church, like-minded with ourselves, throughout every portion of our beloved country, therefore,

"1. Resolved, That it is hereby declared by the General Assembly, that, in requiring an adherence to our church on the basis of the Assemblies of 1837 and 1838, they did not create, nor introduce any new basis of Presbyterianism, but required an adherence to the true and only basis of our organization and communion, viz: the doctrinal standards and constitutions of our church as founded on the word of God-a deplorable departure from which has been suffered through the operation of the Plan of Union."-Minutes of 1842.

"This Assembly, having in former years fully declared that it was not its intention' to cause any sound Presbyterian to be permanently separated from our connexion; and having provided a mode of return to our body, on principles which have seemed adapted to preserve the purity and peace of our churches, consider it inexpedient to take any further action on the subject at this time. Yet the Assembly would reiterate its desire to see all sound Presbyterians reunited in one communion, according to the doctrine and policy of our standards, and would affectionately invite all such to seek this union in the ways that are now open to them."-Minutes of 1850.

But let us now see if these relaxations of Western Presbyterianism did not sustain the charge of a radical departure from their system. It has been the most effective imputation against our brethren in the West, that they were not Congregationalists of the good old New England sort, having departed in some way, never specified, from the quite excellent system of their fathers. But they who made this charge-who were they? Not Presbyterians by their own Book-discarded by the genuinely Presbyterian Assembly, and daily admonished by their own Book-abiding brethren among them, that they had spoiled their system by their fond inventions! For there remain not a few who are Presbyterians in the ranks of the New School, among them, but not of them, and sighing over their conscious misplacement. And these cease not to testify against these modifications, as a vital departure from their system. But let us specify some of these changes.

(1.) Adherence to the Plan of Union became after a certain date, a token of lukewarm and relaxed Presbyterianism. The Plan itself, from the first, was as inconsistent with the Presbyterian standards as it was unfriendly to Congregationalism. And as soon as this was seen by its fruits-as soon as it was

obviously failing to effect the comprehension of Congregationalists except at the cost of an intolerable vitiation of their system-Presbyterianism repented of the Plan and put it away. Strange that it ever assented to a scheme which departed from their standards, by providing for the introduction of unordained committee-men from Union churches, just as if they were real Elders, into all their judicatories even up to the General Assembly; and in allowing the settlement of ministers of either denomination over churches of the other, and providing for their trial, in ways unknown to the Book. But when the original sin of the plan developed itself in most un-Presbyterian results, it was dropped, and the whole vice of its nature and its fruits were thenceforth imputed to the New School. Not the least of their offenses, in the estimation of the Old School Assembly, is the very qualified adherence which they have continued to give to a scheme which was corrupting their judicatories and loosening the foundations of their system.

(2.) The practice of a rotation in the Eldership, which has been very extensively conceded to the wishes of Congregationalized Presbyterian churches, is a transgression of the inmost law of that system. Presbyterianism in its organizing idea is Elderism, and change here changes the whole polity. Its spirit demands, and the letter of its statutes requires, that this fundamental office be permanent. Here the system has the hiding of its power. Except by deposition for heresy or scandal, the official character of Elder can never be demitted. This was very naturally the point at which the New England spirit felt the pressure and sought relief. No demand has been so common and so urgent in Presbyterian churches leavened with Congregationalism, as that for breaking up the permanent lodg ment of a power so little responsible in the same hands. It seemed a gain, how great in reality we need not now inquire, to change their rulers, and by frequently remanding the office to the choice of the church, impose at least an indirect responsibility where they could secure no other. The demand has been granted wherever it has grown imperious; and this concession. has often retained a church in nominal Presbyterianism, which had otherwise followed its real affinities and ranged itself under the other system. The innovation has always met with resistance, and been indirectly reprobated, though winked at, by General Assemblies, year by year. It has now become embedded in their churches as a precious right and a great popular victory, which they would sooner surrender all the residue of their Presbyterianism than give up. Had our brethren in that region departed in any such measure from the order of New

England, how would the ears of men have tingled with the noise of their apostasy!

(3.) The Presbyterianism of the West has been led to forget its own spirit and law, in preferring Voluntary to Ecclesiastical Boards for the conduct of Christian benevolence. This also was a New England infusion under the Plan. The present movement in the New School Assembly is the resolute effort of the real Presbyterianism in it, under the name of Church Extension, to revivify its system and rectify its position on this point. Sifted to its elements, it rests upon a consciousness that the deepest law of its system has been violated, by throwing its charities into channels not ecclesiastically controlled. True Presbyterianism transacts no charity so, unless in self-forgetfulness, and is now everywhere feeling its way out of its mistaken alliances. It is now able to reclaim itself in respect to the Education Society; and the Tract, and Home, and Foreign Missionary Societies-how long will these detain them on their way back to the principles of their polity? The action of the last New School Assembly only uttered to the world a conviction widely and urgently felt by leading members of that body, and which is preparing to act what it has uttered.

(4.) Congregational sentiments, permeating their churches. under the Plan of Union, led to another emendation of Presbyterianism under New School auspices, as soon as it was set free by the act of excision. This was the surrender of appellate jurisdiction by the new General Assembly. It was an effort to obviate a great objection to their polity, especially in minds of Eastern training, viz: its tendency to perpetuate ecclesiastical litigation and scatter its details and its mischief through all portions of the Church, by appeals from the inferior courts to the General Assembly as a supreme National Judicatory. The New School cut short the right of appeal at the Synod; but in dropping the appellate character of the Assembly, they dropped another underlying idea of Presbyterianism. That idea is thus stated in the note to Chap. XII, of the Form of Government.

"The radical principles of Presbyterian church government and discipline are:-that the several different congregations of believers, taken collectively, constitute one church of Christ, called emphatically the church;-that a larger part of the church or a representation of it, should govern a smaller, or determine matters of controversy which arise therein;—that, in like manner, a representation of the whole should govern and determine in regard to every part; and to all the parts united; that is, that a majority shall govern: and consequently that appeals may be carried from lower to higher judicatories, till they be finally decided by the collected wisdom and united voice of the whole church.".

Retaining this exposition of radical principles, the New School, in their edition of the Book, amended in 1840 to