MB AMERICAS PRISBYTERIAS
AND
GENESEE EVANGELIST.
A Religious* and Family Newspaper,
IS THB INTEREST OP THE
Constitutional Presbyterian Church.
PUBLISHED EVERT TUUH . DAT,
AT THE PRESBYTERIAN HOUSE,
1334 Chestnut Street, (2d story,) Philadelphia.
Rev. John W. Heart, Editor and Publisher.
Rev. B. B. HotehUn, Editor of News and
Family Departments.
Rev. 0. P. Busb, Corresponding- Editor,
Rochester, N. T.
THURSDAY, JULY 20, 1865.
CONTENTS OF INSIDE PAGES.
Second Pace—The Family Circle :
Godin all, and all in God-The Clouded Intelleot-
A Singular but Good Report-Eva-The Singing-
Master's _ Explanation—Christian Cheerfulness-
Threo Pnends-A Little Child’s Prayer—Family
Worship—The Blessing of Sorrow. 9
Rural Economy: Over-wdfk-Hovv to Kill Weeds
—The Japan Pinks.
Third Page—Editor’s Table:
Book Critioisms-Tho Great Printers Stephens-An
nouneements of English Publishers.
Newspaper Reviews.
Sixth Page—Correspondence :
"Search the Scriptures”— Trip to the Gulf of St.
Lawrence Celebration at Newburg, New York—
Captivity among the Rebels—A Chaplaincy Earned.
Seventh Page—Religious Intelligence :
Presbyterian—Congregational—Methodist— Baptist
—Episcopal—Lutheran—The Jews—Temperance-
Seamen—Missionary—Miscellaneous—ltems.
HIGH AND LOW CHURCH EPISCOPACY:
WHICH IS LEGITIMATE?
The Episcopal Church, both in England
aiid in this country, seems doomed to inces
sant agitation. There is such an amount
both of truth and error of the most radical
sort included in its comprehensive pale,
that such agitation must be expected. Nor
can this branch of the Church escape the
difficulties of reconstruction, common to all
denominations, at this crisis of our country’s
history. But it is not of these last that we
would now speak. It is of that renewal of
the conflict between the High and Low
church parties which has just broken out,
and winch exhibits more vigor, and which
seems more likely to produce serious oon
sequences than any previous conflict on this
fielcT in our country.
Never were Low ohurchmen more hold,
or more demonstrative; never, we think,
in a generation, have they, in such promi
nent places, gone so far in their advances
towards other denominations; or so fully
ignored the barriers of prelaticexclusivism,
as in the proceedings of their clergy in and
around New York city, during the past fall
and winter. In 1844, Mr. Barnes wrote of
the low church clergy; “they never asso
ciate with ministers of other denominations
as Christian ministers; they never invite
them to preaoh for them, but uniformly
say when the question comes before them,
that they cannot reciprocate an act of min
isterial courtesy of this kind.”*
Mr. Barnes could not make this state
ment after what has happened during the
fall and winter in and about New York
city. On the occasion of the opening of a
new Episcopal church in Brooklyn, the
Church of the Messiah, March 30, clergy
men of no less than five different denomina
tions, by invitation of the rector, Mr. Thrall,
took part in the services. Other instances
upon which we cannot now lay our fingers,
quite as significant of the length to which
these Low churchmen are prepared to go, oc
curred about the same time, and declarations
were frequently heard like that made by Rev.
John Cotton Smith, at a meeting of de
nominations for the promotion of Christian
Union in New York city, viz : that he re
garded his Episcopal ordination as essen
tial indeed to the well being, though not
to the being of a church, and that he con
sidered Presbyterian ordination as perfectly
valid.
Ou the other hand, as if not to be out
done by the evangelical party, the High
churchmen took the opportunity of the
appearance of an official of the Greek church
in New York, to show the strength of their
regard for the hierarchical aud prelatical
bodies from which tjiey are so slightly
separated. This Greek priest was allowed
the use of Trinity church, in which to per
form the entire ritual of that semi-pagan
body to whioh he belonged. Thus the
wall% of exclusiveness seemed about to go
down on every side, and the Episcopal
church ran no small risk of losing its dis
tinctive character.
These movements, on both sides, show a
great advance beyond anything previously
seen in the Episcopal church of this coun
try. The Low church party especially dis
tinguished themselves by an unwonted de
gree of boldness and persistency. And
our readers are aware that about the first of
June, the Bishop of the Diocese, Rev.
Horatio Potter, D.D., took the alarm, and
issued his Pastoral Letter, calling these
brethren, especially of the Low church,
solemnly to account for these disorders, re
minding them that- they were sworn to sus
tain the laws of the church, the spirit and
intent of which they were plainly violating,
and declaring that in his official capacity he
knew of no ministry outside of the fold of
the *Episoopal church.
What has been the effect of this pasto
ral ? At first, there was great silence; but
"if any thought it the silence of submission,
were greatly mistaken. Under that
♦Essays and Reviews, I. 365.
New Series, Vol. 11, No. 29.
silence, there was buried a world of consul
tation and preparation, and now the air of
the Episcopal church resounds with its ripe
results. There is not the remotest idea of
submission, hut, on the contrary, a sturdy,
manful, outspoken defence of the course
pursued, and a vigorous effort right over
the head of the Bishop, to prove that course
better Episcopacy than his own. Rev. Dr.
Tyng, now, as twenty years ago, a leader in
the movement, having written a personal
letter in defence of his course to the bishop,
has been requested by forty of his fellow
clergymen in the vicinity of New York,
constituting the “Protestant Episcopal Cleri
cal Association,” to publish the : letter,
which has been done; and it now stands
as the declaration of the entire body.
Several other pamphlets have appeared
arguing the same side with great vigor and
boldness. The great point made by Dr.
Tyng is, that high church exclusiveness,
denying validity to all churches and all
ordination outside of the pale of the Epis
copacy, is a modern innovation; and that
true, primitive Episcopacy, in England and
in this country, is fairly represented by the
Catholic course, which he and his asso
ciates in this movement have been pursuing.
He says :
“Notone of our earlier bishops, from the
English consecration, assumed this High
Church ground. Neither White, nor Madi
son, nor Bass, nor, so far as I have known or
heard, Provost or Moore, professed to stand
upon that platform. The open and earnest
vindication of the scheme began with Bishop
Hobart, who was consecrated in 1811.
The rise of High Churchism in the Epis
copal church in this country is a phenome
non which has, therefore, lain entirely
within the-observation of Dr. Tyng, as one
born and brought up in the church. He
was prepared for the ministry by Bishop
Griswold, of whom he thus speaks:—
“In his retired parish in Bristol, Rhode
Island, Bishop Griswold’s ministry had been
very remarkably blessed with revivals of re
ligion. His people were much accustomed to
conference meetings, prayer-meetings, and
familiar lectures, in all of which the Bishop
greatly delighted and excelled. In these
meetings, though they were always opened
with a_ short selection from the Prayer-Book,
the privileges of extemporaneous prayer, and.
of lay exhortation in a variety of forms were ,
freely and habitually adopted by the people,
in the presence and with the approval of the
Bishop. The first public display of the High
Church scheme was in a series of attacks in
2he Gospel Adyocate, a periodical established
by Dr. Jarvis in Boston, which were written
by him. The Bishop defended himself in
some essays, the publication of which was re
fused in The Gospel Advocate, but which were
afterwards published in a Tract on Prayer-
Meetings.”
“By Bishop Griswold I was prepared for
my ministry. _ I was instructed by him in the
system of faithful ministration which he
practised, and which I have endeavored faith
fully to maintain. The Prayer-Book and the
Canons generally were the same then as now.
If my life has been a life of perjury, so was
the life of Bishop Griswold. In the free use
of extemporaneous prayer on all other occa
sions than the regular public worship of the
Church, in preaching without restraint wher
ever he was invited to preach, in invitations
to ministers of other churches to preach in his
church, in a free and friendly union in re
ligious exercises with all who loved the Lord
Jesus, Bishop Griswold set me the example,
and gave me_ my direction. I adopted hia
system of ministry, and I have endeavored to
carry it out in all my subsequent career.”
Going back to the English Church of the
Reformation, by an induction of particu
lars, Dr. Tyng endeavors to show that
High Church exclusivism was no part of
its policy. He says :
“The English Church has never received
this scheme, from the Reformation down to
this day. Its introduction has always been
opposed and contended with, as a novelty
which the church had never received. The
character of the Archbishops of Canterbury
in the whole line of their testimony from the
Reformation, has been the solemn witness
and token of the opposite decision. From
Oranmer down to Sumner, they have trans
mitted no such scheme to their successors.
The only conspicuous name among them
adopting the scheme is the ill-fated Laud.
While all whose names have given honor to
their station, like those whom I have men
tioned, and Wake, and Reeve, and Tennison,
and Tillotson, and Seeker, and others like
them, have presented no such doctrine as the
doctrine of the church over which they so
honorably presided.''
What is to be the issue of this struggle
does not appear. We cannot but admire
the spirit and ability shown by these evan
gelical brethren in maintaining a position
so honorable to their catholicity and their
piety. Twenty years ago, Mr. Barnes
declared that the evangelical part of the
Episcopal church must succumb to the
High Church, as alone truly consistent
with the standards and spirit of the body, or
must abandon it. Since that time, the
struggle has gone forward with varying in
dications. Just before the .war, High
Churchism gave some evidences cf power,
which we miss at preseut. The leading
journals of the denomination are, we should
judge, in the hands of the Low churchmen.
The -‘high" organ in New York city, the
Church can.scarcely be supporting
itself. The Churchman went down at the
very outbreak of the war. Has this party
in the church suffered on account ot its
prevailing, though not total, lukewarmness,
to use no stronger word, during the national
PHILADELPHIA, THURSDAY, JULY 20, 1865.
struggle? Is the Low Church now reap
ing the benefits of its hearty sympathy with
the government and the great moral inter
ests at stake in the war ? We do not know,
but it is certain they are acting like men
conscious of strength, if not fully masters
of the situation. No less than forty of their
clergy in New York city and vicinity, have
applauded and sustained their patriarch in
his bold rejoinder to his bishop. There is
little appearance of succumbing to the High
church, or of shaking off the dust from; the
soles of their feet, and leaving the old
Church. Claiming, as Low ohurchmen, truly
to represent it, and endeavoring to conform
its practice to their views, they seem much
more likely just now to make the church
too hot for the exclusives. We have no
doubt great good will result from the agita
tion.
A RICHMOND RELIGIOUS PAPER.
The Christian Observer is being issued
in Richmond every other week, on a small
dingy single sheet, at §4 in advance, “ pay
able in Federal currency.” The change to
a regular weekly issue is promised “as
soon as we can find means of circulating
the paper.” The tone of the last number,
July 6, is somewhat more careful, but not
less artful and perverse than before. An
argument, which it contains, for entire
and cordial submission to the powers that
be, meaning the United States Govern
ment, would be very good indeed, if it
were not for the application made to the
previous state of things in the South.
Rebels are defended and loyalty is preached
from the same text and in the same para
graphs. Doth a fountain send forth at the
same place sweet water and bitter ? Can
a fig tree bear olive berries, or a vine figs ?
Which did Paul, in the 13th of Romans,
design to uphold, usurpation or legitimate
authority? Would Jeff. Davis and Mr.
Lincoln have been the same to him after the
election of 1860 ?
For men who voluntarily put themselves
‘under the dominion of rebel leaders, who
left the- scene’ of legitimate authority, and
volunteered the aid of the religious press:
to promote rebellion, to plead that they
were only following Paul's command of
obedience to the powers that be, is a de
gree of mendacity, of perversion of the
Scripture, and of cool impudence which
can only be looked for among those who
justify the starvation of rebel prisoners,
and who leave their own Northern rela
tions to*tie, unheeded'and uncared for, in
rebel dungeons, branding them, when in
their fresh graves, as outlaws, and. worthy
only of the burial of an ass !
This argument on Duty to Civil Rulers,
contains sentences like the foljgwing :
“The duty of the citizen then, is not
changed, even if the Government be the
worst the world ever had.” “ The apostle
commands obedience to it [the Roman go
vernment] even after it' became a misera
ble abortion, and had forfeited every claim
to respect,” &c. What suoh language
means, all understand. If, however, it is
true now, was it not true- in 1861 ? Has
Dr. Converse got light on the passage in
Scripture, which he had not then? Was
the authority of our government lesß tole
rable then than now ? Is submission any
more a duty now than it was then ? “ This
language addressed to men living under
these [Roman] rulers, strikes the reader
with astonishment. But his duty is, never
theless plain. Render therefore (that is
because God has appointed these monsters
as your rulers) to all their dues,” &c.
How far such language will go towards
reconciling men in the South to their new'
condition, and how much sincerity there is
in it, we will leave our readers to j udge. Its
animus may he further seen in the conclu
ding sentence: “If suspicion [of the
loyalty of returning Southerners] rests any
where, does it not rest on the integrity and
veracity of thos§ who profess to have been
disloyal to the government under which
they were living the last four years ?” A
climax of unparalleled impudence ! Dr.
Converse claims and expects to be counted
more loyal than the hunted Union men of
East Tennessee ! A base Northern rene
gade who went South, as Gustavus Smith
of New York, did, to help on the rebellion,
now dares, in his hollow submission to its
overthrow, to put himself in the scale with
those true Union men of the South, who
risked- everything in opposing it! We sus
pect General Terry and Governor Pierpont
have their own opinions on such a subject.
In an article on the action of the two As
semblies, the editor repudiates them both,
and says both Assemblies are determined
there shall be no union between them and the
Southern Churches. Of the East Tennes-’
see Presbyteries lately incorporated in our
body, and of the proposed visit of ten
Northern ministers, he says : “In two or
three Presbyteries in East Tennessee, there
are small minorities, who, in the absence of
most of their members, have assumed the
names and powers of ftie judicatories to
which they belonged. These minorities in
vited the General Assembly to send men to
that field. We do not know of any other
Presbytery or even a congregation which
this Committee can divide in all the South.”
Among other items of interest we select
the following:—Dr. Eagleton’s church
i a t Murfreesboro, has been destroyed, and
■some of its wealthiest members are almost
■totally ruined by the war. The Presby
tery of Abingdon j Southwest Virginia, met
at Christiahimirg, June I‘. Present, eleven
ministers and eight ruling elders. Corres
ponding members from Lexington, Hope
well and Roanoke Presbyteries were pre
sent. The organization of a new church of
thirty-one mepabers and four ruling elders
is reported. Rev. D. B. Ewing, of West
Hanover Presßytery was received into
membership, and arrangements were made
to install him at Bell Spring, July 2. Mr.
P. C. Morttin, candidate for the ministry,
asked jtnd obtained leave to withdraw from
the care of the Presbytery. Adjourned to
meet at Wytfieville in September. Politi
cal matters do not seem to have been
touched. The Presbytery of Abingdon is
a new body, not being on our own roll of
'57, nor upon the minutes of the other
branch.
In Portsmouth, Va., Presbyterian ser
vice has been kept up by the elders officiat
ing. Rev. I. W. K- Handy, former pastor of
one of these churches, is in Richmond. In
Norfolk, Rev. Dr. Armstrong has resumed
his position as pastor of the Presbyterian
church. He, like Mr. Handy} has been in
prison. The Trinity Episcopal church is
used as a hospital for United States colored
troops. The High street Presbyterian
church, Portsmouth, is used as a school for
persons of the same color. The pastor has
been a rebel chaplain and is now at Lex
ington, Va. A Bible Committee of the
city of Richmond, Rev. F. B. Converse
chairman,; has been organized. The whole
stock of .the Virginia Bible Society was
burned at the; fell of the city. The Obser
ver quotes with applause, the laudatory ac
count of Bev. John Chambers’ forty years’
pastorate, which surprised so many readers
of the New York Observer , three or four
weeks ago. Notice is also taken of the re
ports of the speeches of Messrs. Reeve
and Thompson (colored members) on the
floor of the Assembly at Brooklyn, and the
Observer pretends to be surprised at the
marks of ability Bhown by colored men.
“Is it complimentary to the abilities of the
body,” he asks, “ that its best speakers are
colored men ?” Can there any good thing
come out of Nazareth ? Dr. Converse is
living in “Nazareth,” and he evidently
thinks not. Behold he shall see it with
his eyes; -but shall not partake thereof.
The despised" race will one day he found
triumphing oyer the base men who would
pervert a Presbyterian church and a Re
publican form of government to the mon
strous work of oppressing and debasing
them to all generations.
THE NORTH AMERICAN REVIEW AS
A MALIGNANT.
For the third time, this would-be ora
cle and judge of literary merit, comes to
the attack of Dr. Gillett’s noble and in
valuable monument of ecclesiastical bio
graphy, The Life and Times of John
Hubs. The pertinacity of these attacks
is something unheard-of in the higher
walks of American criticism, and fur
nishes good ground for suspicion that it
is not merely in the interest of honest
and impartial criticism that they are
written. Or has the North American
Bedew suddenly become more concern
ed for truth and accuracy in religious and
ecclesiastical history, than all the eccle
siastical organs in the country ? Is the
Life find Times of John Huss, such a
portentous literary event that it must
needs occupy the critics of a journal of
belles lettres merely, on three separate
occasions, with perhaps more to come ?
Has it been before the public for eighteen
months, and has the examination been
such a serious matter, that only now the
discovery of extensive “ plagiarisms” has
been reached ?
Yes, that is the cry in the last article..
Plagiarism ! If anything was wanting
to show the animus of the attacks, we
have' it in this assanlt, involving the
moral character of the author of John
Hnss. Any one acquainted with the
characteristic frankness, truthfulness and
simplicity of Dr. Gillett, will know at
once how to estimate such a charge. It
is one easily made and one to which
almost every great work in literature
has been subjected. Milton’s Paradise
Lost, Bunyan’s Pilgrim’s Progress,
Shakespeare’s Plays, Coleridge’s Hymn
to Mont Blanc have, we believe, all been
charged with plagiarism. It is the con
G-enesee Evangelist, ISTo. 1000.
The delicate manner in which the Inde
pendent treats the same personage is charac
teristic of that journal’s position on matters
of faith regarded by the great body of Chris
tians as vital.
J.. Stuart Mill is the Liberal candidate for
Parliament before the voters of Westminster.
His opponent is a Mr. Smith, “head of the
greatest news agency in the world,” whose
friends bring against the eminent philosopher
a charge of atheism, founded upon a passage
in one of his works, wherein he affirms, in
substance, that he would not worship a being,
however powerful he might be, who was not
what the human soul and conscience could
declare good. In this country, such a charge,
founded upon such evidence, would be gener
ally spurned as the offspring of religious big
otry and intolerance; _ but in England it may
perhaps have more weight.
Professor Tayler Lewis has come forward
as a champion of the equal right of the freed
people to full citizenship in our country.
He thus writes to the Christian Intelligen
cer in answer to the objection that “suffrage
is not a natural right.”
But “suffrage is not a natural right.” Ad
mit, it, we say. The objection is not to the
position, but to such an application of it. It
venient resource of all maligners who
wish to put on the air of critics. They
forget that there is a liberty accorded
to all writers to use the materials
accumulated in the past, to any de
gree not destructive of the claims of
their own work to originality. All that
the North American critic has proved in
regard to the unacknowledged citations
in “John Huss,” is the due diligence
with which the author has availed
himself of such materials, while making
the “Life and Times”the splendid monu
ment of his own powers of thought, judg
ment, elucidation and style.
We have had no thought in this of
writing a refutation of the charges made
by the Review. We doubt not the mat
ter 'grill receive proper attention from
competent hands.
THE RELIGIOUS PRESS.
The Congregationqjist, answering some
inquiries of a correspondent as to the mean
ing of the phrase, “ Substance of Doctrine,”
gives a column of explanation from which
we quote the following sentences :
In Congregational usage, the phrase “sub
stance of doctrine” always has this meaning:
that the doctrines of the Confession are
assented to substantially as therein set forth,
and not that the Confession itself is sub
scribed verbatim et literatim , as though ft
embodied the substance of all Scripture.
. . . Of course a man can honestly de
clare that he accepts a symbol “ for substance
of doctrine,” though he rejects or qualifies
certain phrases of that symbol. Indeed, this
is the only way in which a man of indepen
dent thought can honestly accept any public
and general symbol of faith.
In a word, then, the phrase “substance of
doctrine” has been used in New England
theology from the beginning as a declaration
of Congregational liberty. It is not a modem
evasion of the old confessions; it expresses
the spirit and intent of the fathers at Cam
bridge, at the Savoy, and at Saybrook. The
imposition of a creed, the subscription ot ar
ticles verbatim et literatim, begets dishonesty,
and tends to demoralization. Butour fathers
were called unto liberty. They disowned any
intention to impose upon others a form of
words, or to exact a literal subscription to
article of faith. “We do not assume to our
selves,” said the Synod at Saybrook, “that
•anything.be taken upon trust from us.” In
the Confession which they then affirmed, it
is taught that “ in the unity of the Godhead
there be three persons of one substance, pow
er, and eternity; God the Esther, God the
Son, and God the Holy Ghost. ’ ’ This all be
lievers in the Trinity will accept as the sub
stance of the doctrine. But the Confession
adds, “the Father is of none —neither begot
ten, nor proceeding; the Son is eternally be
gotten of the Father; the Holy Ghost etern
ally proceeding from the Father and the Son. ’ ’
This is metaphysical theorizing, and does not
belong to the essence of the doctrine. Dr.
Bushnell accepts it; but shall he charge pro
fessor Lawrence with heresy in rejecting it?
or with dishonesty in delaring his belief in the
Savoy Confession, while he does not assent
to its metaphysical exposition of the Trinity ?
The Cambridge Synod has answered such
inquiries. It declared its adherence to the
Westminster Confession “for substance of
doctrine,” and then illustrates its meaning
by a reference to ‘ 1 vocation and other words, ’ ’
which are “ capable of a larger, or more strict
sense and use,” and are “ not intended to hind
apprehensions precisely in point of order or
method. ’ ’
The Christian Intelligencer has the fol
lowing paragraph on a topic discussed in
our columns last week :
In a recent letter of Mr. John Stuart Mill,
he says : —“ I defy any one to point out in
my writings a single passage that conflicts
with what the best religious minds of our
age accept as Christianity.” This has a very
strange sound to one who has read Mr. Mill’s
article on Comte, in the January number of
the Westminster Review. So far as we re
member, he expressed no dissent from the
theological bearings of Positivism, and in
one place hinted that the prominence given
to Satan in the ordinary faith of the Church
assimilates Christianity to Polytheism. But,
in truth, Mr. Mill’s challenge, bold as it
seems, amounts to nothing. Who are “ the
best religious minds ’ ’ of our age ? If they
be such as the late Theodore Parker, or Mr.
Maurice, or Baden Powell, or the West
minster reviewers, then Mr. Mill is quite
safe. But this is simply one heresiarch or
errorist bolstering up another. If our re
collection of Mr. Mill’s views be correct, he
rejects creation, incarnation, miracle, provi
dence, atonement, special grace, and final
retribution, as these points have been held
by the great body of Christians from the
beginning. If this be so, Mr. Mill’s claim
to be a Christian is a case of false pretence
wholly unworthy of a philosopher.
terms.
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proves nothing in respect to the great question
now before this nation; it does not touch the
real point in the case, any more than another
proposition which we have seen lately pre
sented as conclusive in this matter, namely,
that citizenship does not involve the right of
voting, and which is not so clear, if we take
suffrage, in its widest sense, as denoting some
measure and means of representation in the
State. Is there any such thing as political
equality in the broad sense of our Declaration
ol Independence? If there is,’can the propo
sitioiythat direct individual suffrage is not a
natunu right be reconciled with it? We
think it can be, and in the simplest way. The
colored man has not a natural right to vote,
the white man has not a natural right to vote;
but every man has a natural right to become a
voter. We _ mean by this, that every man,
black or white, unconvicted of crime, and who
holds any kind of membership in the State,
by birth or otherwise, has a natural right, by
virtue of such membership and its implied
representation, to obtain those conditions, be
they easy or difficult, which the State, in
its wisdom, may have connected with this
or any other political franchise. He has a
natural right to obtain them, if he can obtain
them in the use of the natural powers that
God has given him to be thus used. He has
a natural right to be unhindered in such at
tainment by anything in the law laying class
exclusions, or insurmountable obstacles of any
kind in Ms way, that are not thus laid in the
way of every other man. Nothing for or
against any that is not equally for or against
ml —nothing by law we mean —this is the
natural birthright of every child born in a
free State. This, and this alone, is political
equality, however much we may distinguish
it from natural or social equality. The denial
of it i§ the denying of any possible sense to
the famous assertion contained iu our Decla
ration of Independence, or if that declaration
be true, it is a denial of the proper humanity
of those who are thus prevented by law in the
attaining that which their natural powers are
capable of attaining, and which is left attain
able to other men born in no higher, no lower,
condition of natural right, God may have
made, or permitted, inequalities physical or
mental; with that the law has nothing to do.
There may be social rigidities, reasonable or
unreasonable; these the law cannot well pre
vent. The way may be hard, harder for
some than for others, but it should be an open
way, as far a'- the law is concerned, for all
humanity.
Suffrage should be made difficult, but there
should be the same difficulty—the same legal
difficulty, we mean —for all. The law may
impose conditions, but there should be the
same conditions for all. The right of voting
may be made a high privilege instead of a
right to be abused and contemned. A wise
State may make it precious by making it
dear; it may demand knowledge, it may de
mand the acquisition of a certain amount of
property, or of an interest in the soil, ,or any
thing which regarded as the means,
however imperfect, of securing some degree
of moral and social worth ; but these should
be demanded alike of all; the way should be
left open to all, and when attained they should
secure the precious right to every man whose
unhindered natural powers have enabled him
to reach the prize thus offered to the free
competition of all.
The Boston Recorder is in a mighty
good humour over the action of the late
Council, tfie enunciation of doctrinal prin
ciples being precisely after that journal’s
heart. It quotes from our notice of the
Council, and comments as follows :
We must notice the leading editorial of a
valuable paper, differing from us much more
in polity than in creed —the American Pres
byterian, the central organ of the “New
School” Presbyterians in Philadelphia.. Such
words cheer us. Our steadfastness in the
faith, our determination that the action of a
Council shall be more than “the resolves of
a mass meeting ” —nay our intended aggres
siveness, meets its approval. With the
author of this we should love to contend till
we die —contend which of us and whose
forces shall quickest and widest spread the
principles of our common ancestors. Let
our Presbyterian brethren redouble their
exertions or we shall beat them. We will if
we can, and we hope we can.
A GREAT ENTERPRISE SUFFERING.
We call attention to the statement of
facts in regard to the financial condition
of the American Board, in another part
of the paper. The deficiency, even upon
the most economical basis of calculation,
is very large. The churches can meet
it; we think they will meet it, but it is
matter of regret that the deficiency has
been allowed to reach such a height and
that such an embarrassment has been
suffered to hang upon the plans and
measures of the executive officers. They
have a trying position, and deserve the ad
miration, the thanks, and the prayerful
and liberal sympathy of the churoh for
standing in their lot so faithfully.
We cannot find that the Boston Con
gregational Council took any notice of
the Board in their proceedings, notwith
standing Dr. Anderson was a member.
Why was this ?
A Philadelphia Pastor Retain
ed.—The West Arch street Presbyterian
Church of this city, (0. S.) occupying,
on the comer of Eighteenth and Arch
streets, one of the finest church edifices
among us, has long been involved in
difficulties, chiefly financial, under the
discouragements of which its able and
highly esteemed pastor, Rev. Dr. Ed
wards, was induced recently to offer his
resignation. To prevent the disruption
of the pastorate, a Committee of Pres
bytery came into counsel with the con
gregation. The result was so far suc
cessful as to prevent the dismissal of
the pastor, and to furnish good hope
that the church will be relieved of its
embarrassments and enter upon an era
of prosperity. Dr. Edwards is a gen
tleman whom we should greatly regret
to spare from the ministry of Philadel
phia.