New Series, Yol. IV, !N"o. 31.
$3 00 By Kail. $3 50 By Carrier. S
50cts Additional after three Months. • }
gmmtait Ifaslqhmit.
THURSDAY, AUGUST 1, 1867.
THE PROVIDENCE AND THE SPIRIT OF GOD
IN THE HISTORY OF OUR CHURCH.
It is worth considering how large a pro
portion of our,additions this year, have been
retained and have entered into the' structure*‘
of the Church. Reckoning the losses; by
death at two per cent, per annum * and not
noticing the fact that perhaps more than ;
one-half of the additions by certificate are; •
mere transfers from; one part of.the Church
to the other, it can be shown; that we ihave
utilized, so to speak, 14,146 off he 20,889 a
dditions, or 68 per cent. , The usefulness of i
the previous year’s work, with: 1-7,238 re- ,
ported additions, may be represented by 56
percent.; in 1865 we utilized. 69; per ceofei
In 1864, when we, added a total of 10,834 we
utilized 47 pfcr cent.; in 1863; only 37 per 1
cent.; in ’62, 43 per cent;; in’6l we saved but
27 per cent., losing nearly; three-fourths Of
the reported additions. ,In 1860, with.nearly
ten thousand additions, we did not make up
our losses by death and removal, being
weaker at the end than the beginning; dn
1859, with a large total of fifteen thousand
reported additions, we lost in numbers still
more largely, the decline, after allowing for
deaths, being 118 per cent, of the reported
additions It must be remembered that it
was in those two years we finally cleared
our minutes of the Southern secession.
If we survey the whole field, as presented in
these statistics, from the triennial Assembly
of 1846, down to the Assembly of 1863, when
the dead point was finally passed, and when
the Old School showed their sagacity, no
less than their fraternal feeling, by sending
us their first delegation; we shall have a pe
riod of twenty years, in which we calculate
that one hundred and fifty thousand were
added to our numbers from the world and
from other Churches, with a net result of
a loss of nearly five thousand in the returns'
of 1863, as compared with the minutes of
1846. In other words, allowing for three
thousand deaths per' annum, we have a total
of ninety-five thousand reported additions,
which, or the equivalent of which, we have
given away to other denominations. From
ten to twenty per cent, of these probably
went to the Episcopalians; perhaps ten per
cent, fell away, in that time, to errorists of
various sorts —Millerites, Morrisites,, &c,, or
sunk away in the remote Weßt, in California
or in the mining regions, silently losing
their place upon the registers ofthe churches,
twice dead, plucked up by the I ‘roots. But
the lion’s share of these spoils has fallen to
the South, to the Old School and to the Con
gregational Churches. In these three di
rections, we have sent from 60,000 to 70,000
members in the twenty years just indicated.
Fourteen thousand Southern members left
us in a body in 1857. Ho wonder they
thought they were grinding us to powder,
and expected soon to come in to a general
inquest and casting of lots upon our remains.
But all the while there remained a stubborn
kernel, a kind of.anvil of about 135*000 mem
bers, which sent off a good many sparks in
the beating, but which was never visibly
moved by the process. And while the un
congenial, unbelieving, unenduring, undis
cerning elements were peeling off, the ob
servers of Providence and students of his
tory and friends of Calvinistic orthodoxy
without rigidity, the men of Issachar in our
body, were quietly organizing, planning,
consolidating, and embodying the true ge
nius of the Church in proper modes of de
nominational activity; disentangling it from
unpropitious alliances, and at every step ofthe
way oalmly seeing churches, presbyteries and
synods falling away under the trying pro
cess; until the War and the Proclamation of
Emancipation suddenly revealed the extra
ordinary sympathy between the spirit of
the age and the position of the Hew School
Presbyterian Church. In the year 1863, we
had finally parted from all that did not be
long to us, had reached the lowest point,
numerically, of our history of twenty years,
had got down to the rock of Hew School
principles, and found the masses of our coun
trymen and the policy of the nation gravi
tating to the same broad principles. We
went out from the Church of Our ancestors
as a protest against ecclesiastical, tyranny
and Southern domination; under thq mar
tyrdom of unpopularity and ill success, we
bore our testimony, for a quarter 1 of a cen
tury, to the value of a just liberty of opin
ion in the Church and against'human sla
very; wfien God, in the providence of war,
seemed graciously to mark bis approval of
our'principles and gave us the great onward
impulse we are now enjoying. r
There have been, especially; throe critical
periods of our history, in each of which the
hand of God was signally manifest. (1) The
forming period; that time, when in fear, and
yet with the inspiring sense of manly re
sistance-to a great wbong, the sixty thou
sand of the Excinded Synbds with their
■ forty-thousand friends, went forth from the
venerable fold, and essayed to preserve that
genuine' American Presbyterianism which
had fallen into such unmerited discredit and
'suspicion there: Would the movement show
any vitality? Could it hold.itsown against
the prestige of orthodoxy, legitimacy, and
pdssession; enjoyed .by the other body? God
answered the question, ; by the revivals of
1842 and 1 ’43. 1 The' scarcely formed Church,
half doubting whether it had a right to be,
‘suddenly found converts like doVes flocking
tolts windows. ■ In the 33;000 additions by
profession made to the churches in the first
five years 6f our existence, the Eord seemed
most opportunely and igraciously tio ‘recog
nize our right to a place among the acknow
ledged instrumentalities for-extending His
kingdom. In 1846, eight years 1 after the or
ganization, 1 the communicants numbered
145,416, showing a gain of 45,000, exceeding
the figures-of ; any but the last two years of
the, Church’s! history, and exceeding in'
amount iany gain made in any other given
period. - !
(2) The Southorn Secession of 1837. At
that gloomy- day,' every- omen was believed
to be against us. Our spoedy dissolution
was confidently predicted. The utterances
of our enemies were never more oracular.
The virus of slavery, which we had endea
vored to extract, seemed to be everywhere,
like a cancer. A new conflict had to'be In
augurated-.with; such of its representatives,
as toour sorrow, elected to remain among
us. The American Presbyterianls one of
the landmarks of that conflict. Five Synods,
20 Presbyteries, 150 ministers, 263 churches,
and 14,000 members, as nearly as can be
calculated, left-us at a single occasion, while
many of the opposite extreme - forsook'us,
because the measures which were sufficient
to drive away the South, were not sufficient
ly ultra for them. The plans of denoinina
tioaal action,! with the exception 1 of the-
Church Erection Fund, were in their for
mative stage;; Home Missions were repre
sented by our Church Extension Committee 1
with an >s3ooo, and ah existence
barely tolerated by the body. The nuiii
bers of our highest court sunk* in two years;
from 225 to 187. ‘
But at this critical point came the great
revival of 1858 and ’59 ; when, in one single
week, as- many as fifty thousand conversions
were reported over the whole country; Our
own Church entered with alacrity and zeal
upon the blessed work. The Assembly of
1858 met when it was at its height; and the
Harrative of the State of Religion then
adopted, shows how utterly fears-and doubts
were swallowed up in heavenly joy at that
time. “The millennium,” says that impas
sioned document, “ may even now be break
ing upon our enraptured vision/’ “This
blessing came to encourage her [the Church’s]
members and her ministry, and to inspire
them with-new confidence in the power of
Christ. . . . This vital force sets allthe ma
chinery in the Church in motion, for the
Spirit of the living God is in the wheels. . .
A lively interest is expressed by the Pres
byteries in the plans adopted for extending
the borders and increasing the efficiency of
the Church, that she may meet her weighty
responsibilities.” In two years, our churches,
of which the Horthern ones only reported,
received 19,833 members on profession, just
double the number received in the two years
following, and more than making up losses
by secession and by death. This great spir
itual impulse was like apreternaturally high,
tide to a vessel stranded where ordinary
tides were of no avail. It helped us over
the bar. It gave us strength and cheer in
stead of despondency and gloom. Coming
the very next year after the secession, it
was so opportune as to seem a special Pro
vidence to our Church.
(3) The third instance of Divine interpo
sition, is that which we are actually experi
encing at this time, and which is common
PHILADELPHIA, THURSDAY, AUG?
to the experience of most bodies of Chris
tians in our land. It is the recovery from
the depressing effects of the war. Our nu
merical strength was less in the first year
ofthe war, than in any time for twenty years.
And in the first three years we gained less
than one thousand members- In 1862 we
had the smallest number of additions by
profession over reported. But, mingled
with the closing scones ofj the 'war, came the
news of a new and glorious visitation of the
Spirit. The Dove of Peace and Salvation
eame. back and brooded over the 'agitated
churches. The wastes of war were repaired
by the fruits of righteousness, as the gory
battle-field is ‘ transformed by the waving
harvests of the following summer. In-two
years from the close, of the war, we find our r
selves'in the enjoyment of greater ingather
ings than ever before, and far' exceeding in
numbers'and in all the elements of denomi
national strength*and vitality, any previous
attSuimient of our Church.
Thus it 'appears, that the Providence of
God* in the form of revivals, has brought us
timely and indispensable puccbr in critical
seasons; has met us as we patiently shaped
our policy, and has filled the channels of
activity just when they seepied dry, usele&s
and likely to be abandoned, with the rush
ing tide of Hiß own spiritual life aud ener
gies! Revival influences, utilized by the de
nominational machinery vye had prepared
for them, have been the very condition, the
sine qua non of the existence of. a Church,
which, like our own, has been bearing mar
tyr testimony to unpopular, truth, through
ail its history. The Holy Spirit must heeds
pour oil'upon the fire behind, while so many
streams of water are beirjg directed upon it
in the front. , j
Owing thus more to I revivals, perhaps,
than any 'other denomii ation, or at least
being able to trace thoir necebsary connec :
tion with our existence anti prosperity more
readily than any other, itj|would seem to' be
the dictate of Christian tradom in our peo
ple, to pray for revival#,study their na r
ture, and, as far as human instrumentality
is to be spoken of in this connection, to
labor to promote them in all -our churches.
Especially should we labor and pray for
what the Harrative of 1858 hoped waß al
ready to be seen in the Great Awakening of
that year: “ the inauguration of a grand and
perpetual Revival Era.”
THE ANTI-CAPITAL PUNISHMENT HERESY.
The Independent, in its leader of July 4th
on the Fate of Maximilian, announces itself
opposed to all capital punishment, whatever.
Its language is : ,
Ever and everywhere, we are opposed to capital
punishment; whether for high crimes or low,
whether upon small offenders or great. We hold
with Jeremy Rentham that “ the worst use you-can
put a man to is to hang him.” We desire the uni
versal abolition of the scaffold —the universal inter
diction ofthe death-penalty. In some of the states
of the American Union a better system of public
punishment prevails; W e hope to see it prevail in
ail. The hangman’s rope is not an instrument of
civilization; it is a relic of barbarism.
It i then proceeds to argue that if ever
capital punishment was. deserved, it was by
Maximilian, and classing Jefferson Davis
with the late Emperor as the two greatest
criminals of the 19th :century, it adds :
; The only vindication possible to the American
Government for its release of Jefferson Davis is a
consistent policy by the Government,, in future, of
non-punishment of any and all criminals by death.
Thus at length, the ill-concealed religious
Universalism of the Independent finds ap
propriate expression in open opposition to
capital punishment.'
The Independent believes the worst use to
which you can put a man is to hang him.
Suppose we hold the Independent fast to that
declaration. Its real meaning is the plain,
literal one, viz: that the community does
worse in hanging a murderer than the mur
derer did in slaying his victim. It means
that the solemn judicial act by which the
community shows its just abhorrence of
crime, is worse than the stealth, the malig
nity, THE CRIME of Murder.. It means
that the real criminal is the public con
science, the law A and its executors, while the
true object of commiseration is the murder
er; suffering the'penalty of his crime.
Our opinion is somewhat different. ¥e
believe the worst use you can put a man to
is to murder him, and the next worse use is
to expose him to the peril of murder by re
laxing the rigor of the law against the
crime. The first concern of society is, and
should he, with the lives of good and law--
ST 1, 1867,
I abiding, citizens. The treatment of crimi
.sals is wholly subordinate to that end, and
.not a Aeld chieily for the disjilay of a hu
manity as false and dangerous as it is weak.
Ever since the woful failure of our gov
ernment to bring to condign punishment the
leading rebels of the South, and its indis
criminate use of the pardoning power, we
have, felt certain of the disastrous effect of
such a policy upon public sentiment. Never
theless, it is our opinion that the large ma
jority of the Horth are untainted by this
most perilous of political heresies. Hine
tenths pf the readers of the, Tribune tolerate
its anfi-capital punishment articles, as . the
mere private, crotchets of a concern, which
on'.the whole, is the best newspaper in
America, and therefore to be borne with in
1 * , , )" »? ’. v 1 - ’ i. ■ •' ' > ■' ■
thesq whims, though utterly repudiated as
doctrines. . We believe the case will be
found to be the same with the readers of the
Independent.
-THE PRINCETON REPERTORY OR RE
UNION.
The closing article for‘the July number,
just issued, is devotedtotheGeneral Assem
bly .which met' at Gincinn&ti: It upholds
the action of; that body upon the Declara
tion and Testimony, but it argues at length,
and in the genuine style and spirit of Prince
ton,-against the Re-union measures acted
upon in that Assembly. The writer of the
'article maintains that “the very principle
which constitutes the sum and substance of
the plan of union’;’ is “that- men should be
allowed ;to say they adopt our system who
notoriously do not adopt it.” He specifies
three, ways, in which the formula -of sub
scription to the j Confession of Faith has been
ana still is interpreted. First, Subscription
to every proposition contained in the Con
fession; Second, Adopting “the system Of
doctrine;” Third, The view that by:the sys
tem of doctrine contained ih the 1 Confession,
is meant the essential doctrines-of'Christ
tianity, and nothing more.
-With-»-degree oi arrogance, which would
be amazing if we did not know it of old*
the writer undertakes to show thatthe Hew
School branch of the Presbyterian Church
in this country have practically adopted and
still hold this latter view of subscription!
We can scarcely bring ourselves to believe
that the writer, be it Dr. Hodge or any
other person of ordinary good sense and in
formation in that branch of the Church,
credits, his own astounding and mendacious
assertion. , Its falsehood is too transparent
to need exposure. The appeal may safely
be made to the general religious public, who
instinctively recognize the Calvinistic posi
tion of our body, and whose ministers know
full well that an ex animo subscription to-the
Calvinistic, system, as laid down in the stand
ards of our Church, is a necessary prerequi-'
site to admission into our Presbyteries.
It is but a short time since the matter
was fully tested in a well-known case in this
city. An Independent Methodist preacher,
of decided ability and popular qualities, with
a numerous and respectable congregation,
felt his way for admission 1 into our body;
but before he reached the threshold of any
of our Church courts, he learned from inter
views with two of our most decided Hew
School inen, that the attempt would be ut
terly futile, and he desisted. Such would
be the‘inevitable result in where
the grand principles of Calvinism were not
plainly recognized by the applicant.
The article elopes with a paragraph which
sounds like a threat to the Union men*of
the other branch. The heaviest artil
lery has been reserved till 'the last. The
writer says:—
“If the view of this subject given above
be correct, it necessarily follows that the
Old School would be guilty hot only of a
great moral wrong, should it accept of the
proposed plan of union, but would forfeit the
moral right to all endowments whether of
churches or boards or seminaries. . . . We
say nothing of the legal question. That is
beycfhd our province.”
We are informed that there are those in
the other branch who do consider the legal
question within- their province, and are con
templating action in accordance with the
above views.
“When the Cat’s away, the Mice will
PLAY-”— The value of the moderate on-the-fence
Bishop Potter is likely to be realized in the dio
cese which he-has left to attend the Pan-Angli
can , Council in Lambeth. During his absence
Genesee Evangelist, No. 1106.
I Ministers $2.50 H. Miss. $2OO. v
1 Addressl334 Chestnut Street.
Rev. Stephen H. Tyng, Jr. preached in a Meth
odist Episcopal Church in ihe diocese of New
Jersey, in spite of the repeated remonstrances of
•a neighboring Rector, who it seems has a right
.to dictate’what shall or shall not be done by a
brother Episcopalian in a Methodist Church if
it lies , within the bounds of his parish. The
case has been laid before the Standing Commit
tee of the Diocese of New York, and is to be
made the ground of a canonical prosecution. The
absurdity of the whole matter is plain from the
fact that the Protestant Episcopal Church has
•authorized ho local division of its dioceses, and
as an old High Church rector in this city has
often said, “ the parish lies within the four walls
of the Church/’
. If, however, the High Church are in earnest
in wanting to fight it out, bn this line, we have
no doubt that they will have enough to do all the
rest of the summer.
“My belief is, that the New-school Church, as a
body, hold the Calvinistic, system that is here de
fined —that they hold it just as we do, considering
them as a body, and that on the basis of this sys
tem, in its fair historical sense, we can stand to
gether. There are individuals in that Church, and
theremay be individuals in our branch of the Church,
who hold views on certain points not in harmony
with the system, but they mast look to that in the
two great bodies prepared to be united, and to be
organically one, and we can then be governed by
such interpretations as shall then prevail.”
So spoke, the moderator of the last O. S.
Assembly, Dr. Gurley, commenting upon
proposed terms of Re-union, especially the
doctrinal basis contained hi the second arti-h
cle. And no man in the Assembly of the
other branch has seemed more fully to under
stand the true exigencies of the case, or more
closely to approximate the position of tole
ration of minor differences on which alone
re-union is practicable, than he. And yet
the closing words of the extract from his
address, which we have italicised, show us
that explanations are still necessary,, even
if Dr. Gurley and his associates persuade
the mass of their branch to take the liberal
•ground which they occupy.
We do not like the implicatidn contained
in these -words, that a different interpretation
of the standardsjrnax prevail in the re-united
body, from that which is recognized in the
negotiations for union; nor the implication
that we may find ourselves “ governed by ”
such an interpretation, when we have cut
loose from our old organizations and lost
their protection. The simple principle of
reunion must be, that every man now stand
ing rectus in ecclesia, in either branch of the
Church, must be guaranteed an equally good
standing in the re-united Church, and must
be assured of such good standing, so long as
he does not depart from the received interpre
tation of those standards at the time of re
union, in the branch of the Church to which
he then belonged. 1
_ It is of course impossible to bind the Pres
byterian or any other Church to any pecu
liar developement of doctrine in the future.
But it is possible to bind men to respect
great and palpable rights of conscience, and
of church standing, existing at the commence
ment, or at any stage of such developement.
If the two branches of the Presbyterian
Church are united, it is possible that new
and better views of truth will prevail; but it
is also possible that the developement may be
in the direction of greater rigor, as it has been
in times past; the “Old School” are fifty per
cent more numerous than the New; such in
terpretations as shall then prevail, are
most likely to be tinged with the views of
the majority. Be it so; the point we make
is, that those whose views on doctrine do
not accord with the majority, shall not
“ then be governed ” i. e. be liable to be
disciplined by the majority, as Dr. Gurley’s
remarks would seem to imply. If we have
misinterpreted those remarks, we shall he
glad to be corrected. Meanwhile, as utter
ances of perhaps the fairest and most satis
factory man who has been heard on the
subject in the other branch, they seem to
us to demonstrate most effectually the need
for more explicit terms in the doctrinal
basis of re-umon.
Methodsit. —The Methodist congregation in the
Trappe district, Somerset county, Maryland, has se
vered its connection with the Philadelphia -Confer
ence, and joined the Methodist Episcopal Church
South. In the Philadelphia Preachers’ Meeting
it was announced that church property in Accomac
county, Va., which was seized by the M. E. Church
South, and which is valued at $60,000, would in all
probability be returned to the M. E. Church to which
it rightfully belongs. More money, however, is re
quired to defray the expenses connected with the
prosecution of the suit. The case was referred to a
Committee;,