ing to indicate the mind of Providence that the cause which they professed would be maintained, began to think of measures which would tend to the permanent establishment of the Presbytery in this country. The principal settlement of the adherents to the Associate Presbytery, was in Octorara and Oxford, in Lancaster county, Pennsylvania. From these places Mr. Gellatly received a call to become their stated pastor. This call he accepted, and accordingly made these places the principal scene of his labors, and his residence so far as the general interests of the now thriving society, and the frequent calls to labor in new places, would permit. The term of Mr. Arnot's appointment being limited, it was necessary he should return to his congregation and family. The demand for more laborers was, in the meantime more pressing and increasing. The Associate Synod of Edinburgh being informed of the circumstances of the Presbytery, resolved to send them more ministerial aid. Accordingly the Rev. James Proudfit was sent over, before the expiration of Mr. Arnot's appointment. Thus the Presbytery was continued ; and as soon as practicable after Mr. Arnot's return, Messrs. Matthew Henderson and John Mason were sent over; and Mr. Smart, also, near the same time, who remained but a short period, and returned to Scotland. * Mr. Arnot having returned home, greatly aided the cause of the Presbytery, by his influence with the Synod, and among the people. He continued to take a peculiarly deep interest in the prosperity of the Associate Church in America during the whole period of his long and useful life. Several ministers and probationers arriving from Scotland, the affairs of the Presbytery continued in a prosperous condition; but without any occurrence worthy of special notice, until after the death of Mr. Geliatly; which event took place March 12, 1761; a little less than five years after his arrival.† The loss of this eminent servant of Jesus Christ, who had been so completely identified with the interests of the Associate Church in America, produced a deep sensation, not only throughout the infant society in this country, but also among its friends in Scotland. He was removed in the forty-second year of his age, and from a sphere of usefulness from which the highest expectations might reasonably have been entertained. Two grandsons of Mr. Smart's are now in the ministry, in the Associate Church, in this country. † See Appendix A. But the church's loss was his gain. His Great Master saw fit to remove him from a field of labor which his bodily constitu tion, already enfeebled by too much exposure, was but little qualified to endure; and from a scene of contention and trouble, which shortly came upon the church; to that place of repose, where the wicked cease from troubling, and the weary are at rest." The applications to the Presbytery for supply of preaching, were no longer confined to the eastern section of Pennsylvania. Petitions were numerous from various parts of Pennsyl vania, New-York, Virginia, and the Carolinas.* Several ministers and probationers having been sent in, and some having returned, the intercourse between the Presbytery and Sy nod was frequent and harmonious; and nothing occurred to interrupt this harmony until the year 1765. In the preceding year the Rev. Dr. Thomas Clark, belonging to that division of the Secession, called the Burgher Synod, emigrated, with the greater part of his congregation, from Ireland to this country. The people who emigrated with him, divided when they arrived in New-York; a part went to Long Cane, in South Carolina; the remainder, with their minister, went up the Hudson, and after remaining a short time near Stillwater, removed to a place then called New Perth, now Salem, Washington county, New-York. Mr. Clark, whose views of the grounds and principles of the Secession seem to have been very distinct and clear, made application to the Associate Presbytery for admission. After some conference with him, and explanation, certain articles were drawn up, explana tory of the terms upon which he was received, and upon which he consented to join the Presbytery. The basis of these articles was a recognition of the Secesssion Testimony. His admission took place in 1765. This transaction appears to have been entered into, in good faith, and with the best intentions, both upon the part of the Presbytery and of Mr. Clark; and were it not for what shortly followed, it might not have been worthy of particular notice. For Mr. Clark seemed to give up, wholly and sincerely, all connexion with, and partiality for, the peculiarities of the Burgher Synod. The drawing up and signing of articles of admission distinct from the public, and already ratified standards of the church, however consistent with them, seems to have been the only error in this matter, into which the Presbytery fell. But to this may, doubtless, be traced the step taken by the * Life of Marshall, page 7. + lbid. page 10. Presbytery two years afterwards, in the case of Messrs. Telfair and Kinloch; which led to the interruption for some time, of the intercourse between the Presbytery and Synod. Mr. Telfair and Mr. Kinloch, both from the Burgher Synod in Scotland, the former ordained, the latter a probationer, made application also to be admitted into the fellowship of the Presbytery, in the year 1769. They agreed to and subscribed the same articles which Mr. Clark had subscribed, but not without some alterations and additions, which were, however, deemed small and unimportant at the time by the Presbytery. In the additions it was expressly stipulated that "neither party shall justify the Burgess oath, nor the censures inflicted on those who held the lawfulness of it; and that they look upon themselves as standing on the same footing as before the rupture." It was further agreed that the individuals should not be required to break off any connection which had subsisted between them and the body to which they had respectively belonged in Scotland.* It may be justly viewed with some surprise, that men as discerning and honest as Mr. Marshall, and some others who were then in the Presbytery, did not see the absurdity of such a course, on the part of the Presbytery. For, notwithstanding that the Secession Testimony was recognized, as containing the principles upon which they united, yet the individuals admitted understood it as a union between themselves as Burghers, and the Associate Presbytery, as Anti-Burghers: and the former considered themselves still subordinate to the Burgher Synod in Scotland.† Had it been practicable to have followed up this plan, the Presbytery would have been a mixture of various denominations, subject to the jurisdiction of two distinct religious bodies: the difference between the two Synods in Scotland, being still on the increase. This measure was, however, much disapproved of by the Synod of Edinburgh, and not well received by the people. The Synod complained that the Presbytery received some, on terms different from that of simply assenting to the publicly received standards, which was the term upon which all should be received; and they for some time refused to grant them any further supply.‡ * Vindication of the Associate Presbytery, page 8. In the trial concerning the Spruce-street Meeting-House, more than twenty years afterwards, Mr. Telfair declared on oath, before Judge Rush, that this was his understanding of it. ‡ Marshall's Life, page 10. It is, however, due to the Presbytery to state, that the members had not the most distant idea of abandoning any of their publicly espoused principles, or of dropping any part of that Testimony, which they were maintaining in common with their brethren of the Associate Synod in Britain. The main thing they seem to have had in view, was, the obtaining of more help for their numerous and destitute vacancies. But in this they were disappointed, for both these men soon went back to Scotland, and joined their former connection; and the Presbytery became more helpless than ever; as the Synod had now ceased to send them assistance. The Presbytery now began to feel the unpleasantness of its condition, and most of the members to see the impropriety of the course they had pursued. They, therefore, instructed the people to apply themselves directly to the Synod for supply, which they accordingly did, and with the desired effect. In answer to this new application from the people, the Synod in 1770, appointed on a new mission to America, Messrs. John Smith and John Rodger, with particular instructions, to require the Presbytery to annul the union with the Burgher Brethren, and obliterate the minute respecting it.* Upon the arrival of these brethren in 1771, a meeting of the Presbytery was called at Pequa, Pa., June 5th of that year; when Messrs. Rodger and Smith laid before the Presbytery the instructions which they had received from the Synod. To the first requisition of the Synod, viz: "To dissolve the union with the Burgher Brethren," the Presbytery unanimously agreed, stating in the minutes, that Presbytery "now found, that in making the union with the Burgher Brethren they had taken some steps inconsistent with the subordination to the Synod to which they have been, and are subordinate; and they are determined that for the future they shall have no ministerial communion with them, until they lay the case before Synod, and receive instructions from them."+ From this language, and the unanimity with which it was adopted, it is manifest that the Presbytery was now sensible of the error that had been committed in receiving into fellowship persons, who were maintaining, to any extent, an ecclesiastical connection different from, and in some things opposite to that, to which they had now acceded. A society thus constituted could not exhibit that mark of the true church, which God has promised his people shall enjoy, when "He will give them one heart, and one way." Such a society of * See Appendix B. + See Appendix C. Jer. xxxii. 39. professing christians could not "be perfectly joined together in the same mind, and the same judgment."* With the other particular in the instructions of the Synod, the Presbytery declined complying. As the minute recording the admission of the Burgher Brethren, was a correct record of the transaction, it was thought proper it should stand as such; and the minute recording the acknowledgment of the Presbytery's error in that act, would be sufficient to counteract the evil influence, the former minute might have as a precedent. The Synod appears to have concurred in this judgment of the Presbytery from their acquiescing in it. Messrs. Rodger and Smith considered the demand of the Synod materially complied with, on the part of the Presbyte ry; they accordingly took their seats as members of the Pres bytery. In this whole transaction, also, the brethren of the Presbytery appeared hearty; for the Moderator, the Rev. James Proudfit, stated to Mr. Telfair, who returned from Scotland this year and claimed his seat in Presbytery, that "the union between him and the Presbytery was dissolved, and that it was very sinful in them ever to have made it.”† Thus terminated the connection between the Associate Presbytery and the Burgher Brethren, which indeed never deserved the name of a union; though it was not made on as loose terms as that which was afterwards formed with the Reformed Presbytery; for the Secession Testimony was adopted as the bond of it; yet, being gone into irregularly, it no doubt had its influence in paving the way for that union which trampled the Testimony under foot, and rent the Associate Body in pieces. About the same time that these difficulties existed between the Presbytery and Synod, a correspondence was opened be. tween the Synod of New-York and Pennsylvania, (now the General Assembly,) and the Associate Presbytery of Pennsylvania, respecting a union between these two bodies. Com. mittees of correspondence were appointed, and some terms, or basis of union, were proposed; and during the years 1770, and 1771, several papers on the subject passed between the two bodies, through their committees. But their views were found to be so widely different on several important points, that the plan was finally abandoned as hopeless. It was soon manifest, that the two bodies in their then present views, were not sufficiently agreed to walk together.‡ * 1 Cor. i. 10. Vindication of the Presbytery. Marshall's Life, page 15. |