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0n the Decline of Presbyterian Congregat...
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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.
saty work ; while those who anticipated them by twenty years have dismissed the toil .- They are now delighting in the rich produce of their labour , and rejoicing in the blessing of that Providence which causes the sun of truth to operate as effectually on the religious , as the visible luminary does on the natural world . In the course of events , the Presbyterians , in fact , form a new interest of about twenty years standing . A new race has arisen , which has discarded , in a great measure , the indifference of the
people , on whose ruins they have stood . These have principles well defined , properly valued , aiid of confessed importance .
After much previous inquiry , which , for a long time , was attended with great uncertainty and hesitation , they have , at last , arrived at definite conclusions and
distinct views . They have now a rallying point around which those may assemble who daily leave the labyrinth of old opinions . They are no longer in danger of the alarming desertions which took
place in the times of uncertainty and indifference * Their members , being at last principled and informed , are in no great hazard of * revolting ; in none whatever of change or conversion . Since the Presbyterians have been displaced
by the Unitarians , who , in modern times , date but from yester * day as a body , no instance of a proper conversion has , I think , occurred . The gratuitous assertions of aa Evangelical Magazine are in this instance , as in others , not to be credited . Whatever name that publication may as-* ume , it is on record that all
To The Editor Of The Monthly Repository.
which it says is not , to use a com * mon phrase , gospel * It is next to impossible that an Unitarian should become a believer in a trinity of persons in the godhead , although he may become a man of the world , like numbers of all denominations . The uninformed belong not to their body . Such may be converted from any comonunity .
Since we have no longer many Presbyterian congregations , but Unitarian societies , the progress of no sect , that does not profess edly address the multitude , has been more rapid . None has equally succeeded in producing a
change of old and cherished opi « nions . The progress of others had little concern with such change . They find and leave the religious principles of men without any material alteration . We ought ra ~ ther to wonder at the success of
our doctrines than at their want of it ; we ought to wonder that so many are in a state so well suited to improvement ; that so many have b $ en ripe for the adoption of opinions , which indicate a high degree of religious
civilization . Let us not say , therefore , that Presbyterian congregations have declined , but that they have merely disappeared . They led the way to this day of light , but
have not lived to see it . Say rather , that anew interest has arisen , that it is yet small but increasing . It may be for some time small . It is natural that it should , when
it has so much anticipated the surrounding nation . But the nation also is advancing , though not rapidly . Many will stretch forward to overtake us , if we will
0n The Decline Of Presbyterian Congregat...
0 n the Decline of Presbyterian Congregations . 2 S £
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), May 2, 1810, page 239, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/mrp_02051810/page/23/
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