On this page

• Text (1)

  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.

  • 

    Untitled Article

• Transcript

  • 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.

    Additionally, when viewing full transcripts, extracted text may not be in the same order as the original document.

    Untitled Article

    the Presbyterian interest . How far his prediction has been verified I will leave it to others to determine ; but thus much may be

    fairly said , that the conduct pursued afterwards by some of the , non-subscribing ministers certainly did not tend to uphold the dissenting interest . Two or three of

    them left the ministry entirely , several went over to Arianism , and not a few conformedto the established church . This is a curious fac £ and shows how easily some

    gentlemen , who could not conscientiously digest one article , made up their minds all at once to swallow thirty-nine . This circumstance seems to afford some

    colour for Mr , Robinson ' s -observation , that something else besides a zeal for religious liberty , was at the bottom of the proceedings in that assembly . Let not the reader imagine that I am friendly to creeds and confessions of faith . I detest them when

    made necessary to Christian communion , or as a passport to civil office ; nor do I think that the magistrate has a right to impose subscription even to the bible itself . From the period of the

    Salters' Hall controversy , we may properly date the decline of the Presbyterian interest ; for though m&ny of their congregations continued to . flourish long after that period , yet the seeds of dissolution then sown , have been

    advancing in a progressive state towards maturity . The fruit of this declension has been the total extinction of many once flourishing societies ; and those which still survive will , I doubt not , ere long , arrive at the same conclusion . As the bulk of non-cQaformists

    Untitled Article

    a century ago were Presbyterians , so their churches were more nu * merous than those of the other denominations . At the time of the ejectment many persons of

    quality and of considerable influence in the country * wore of this profession . These having attached themselves to the ejected ministers when in prosperity , did not forsake them in a tiaie of

    trouble . Considerations of policy , combined with a superficial acquaintance with their principles ,

    induced some , indeed , to forsake the religion of their forefathers . But in the room of these there arose others who proved generous friends of the oppressed , thereby evincing the folly and madness of persecution . The countenance

    of these persons gave confidence to the ejected ministers , and the respectability which most of them had acquired for learning , piety

    and diligence in their profession ^ procured them large and ivealthy congregations . This was pretty much the state of things during the lives of the first race of .

    niinisters . In the next generation , however , affairs put on a * cliiTerent aspect . Death had thinned the rank& of those noble personages who patronized the cause of noil- * conformity ; and their successors discovered that it was not the road

    to emolument and honour . A state of persecution is in many respects favourable to tlie cause of the sufferers . It excites inquiry , and draws forth the commiseration

    of many persons who would otherwise be strangers to their principles . But in a time of peace the same feelings are not so easily roused , nor are the circumstances of that conspicuous nature as to excite attention . This , Mr . Edi-

    Untitled Article

    On the Decline of Presbyterian Congregations . 59

• Citation
  • Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Feb. 2, 1810, page 59, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2401/page/11/