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238 On the Decline of Presbyterian Congr...
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Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
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To The Editor Of The Monthly Repository.
nisters of the Presbyterians have uniformly displayed considerably more learning and science than those of the other dissident
denominations , from the time of the ejection to the present day . Whatever may h ^ ive been the original cause , whether accident or some other , the fact is pretty certain ; and every thing which we bow see has proceeded frou ^ it in the
most natural and easy progress . To a more learned ministry , were attached the more wealthy and better educated persons who espoused similar views . The questions of presbytery and
Congregationalism had no great weight with the laity , whatever it had with the ministers .
Among a people of this character and condition- taste and
refinement , whicn were diffused with rapidity within this period , found drdent cultivators . It was the same in the established church .
Both sects outran the multitude , and were in a great measure abandoned by them , who were too much distanced to continue the
race . The establishment was not so much deserted as these
dissenters - Its splendour created an attachment not easily sacrificed . Its ministers , shackled by settled creeds , had not departed , so far as their presbyterian brethren , from the gross corruptions of the rude community .
The objects to which the taste and learning of dissenters were directed , were pointed out by their circumstances . Polite literature engaged tbeir attention less than it did that of their neighbours of the church * No fact can be
better proved than this . Dissenting from that church on a religious account , it was religion which
To The Editor Of The Monthly Repository.
princi p ally interested them . While others were enriching their , age with works of imagination , and adding to the treasure of English classics , the presbyterian clergy were making' discoveries in the
regions of evangelical truth , and extracting the riches of the book of God . Their opinions were gradually refined , their religious opinions insensibly underwent a material change .
But the change was not popular . The majority of their countrymen remained stationary . -The mass of those who con ^ tktited the -oilier sects , being in humbler statiohs ,
and connected with a less literary priesthood , made ho sensible pro - gress in improvement . It is long before the majority of mankind acquire intellectual proficiency . Three centuries have made little
alteration in the acquirements and knowledge of the English nation * The nineteenth century finds our countrymen , generally speaking , in religion , where the reformer * left them , A small body of men , in the establishment and out of
it , told the world the tale of their change with caution . They laboured to disarm hostility . The burden of their public teaching was candour , candoiir . They were successful . Those whom they
addressed laid down their bigotry . But they proceeded beyond the mark to which they were directed ; and , under the name of candour , imbibed a deadl y and torpid indifference . The work of re .
formation was at a stand . Their clergy did not venture to inculcate boldly the truths which themselves had learned , to publish frankly the discoveries which they had made . t * heir humble brethren , however , not finding tht
238 On The Decline Of Presbyterian Congr...
238 On the Decline of Presbyterian Congregations .
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), May 2, 1810, page 236, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/mrp_02051810/page/20/
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