refer those, who are curious in these matters, to the very succinct and satisfactory account here given. It seems to us, that it is of no sort of consequence, in a practical view, whether a minister has any legal rights or not. If he have them, he cannot enforce them. And if he could, he ought not to wish to do so, since it can only be done at the sacrifice of those kindly feelings, and that mutual respect, without which his office must be as burthensome to himself, as it is useless to others.

"To apportion," as Dr. Bancroft observes, "the minister's compensation to his annual wants, on a declaration that this support will be continued through life, the parish taking the risk of sickness and infirmity, and refuse him a maintenance when providentially disenabled, all will acknowledge would be unjust. But no Congregational minister ever did, no one ever will, sustain himself in office by a legal process. Examine the history of ecclesiastical proceedings in this country, and it will be found, I believe, that in appeals to legal decisions, the people, without exception, have prevailed." And so, as we have said, they always will. A minister, who is wise, will find sooner or later, that the secret of his strength lies in an habitual consciousness of his weakness and dependence; will learn that no bond can be relied upon but the golden chain of mutual love; and will rest the adjudication of all his claims, in all respects, on that final tribunal where hearts come into judgment.

We come now to the second, and most interesting part of the Discourse before us, which relates to the Annals of the author's Parish. But as this interest is one of a local nature, we shall confine ourselves to some brief remarks on a few topics that may seem to have a peculiar claim to our notice. Of this description is the faithful but modest account the author gives of the efforts and sacrifices he was obliged to make in the earlier periods of his history. The religious society, with whose fortunes he has been, from the first and through the whole course of his ministry, associated, was composed of seceders from the first parish of the town of Worcester. "They consisted of sixty-seven men; most of whom were heads of families, and among them was a large proportion of the professional and distinguished men of the town, and a fair proportion of the farmers and mechanics."

Stated public worship was begun in March, 1785. A church was organized, and the pastor ordained in February, 1786.

The difficulties with which such little bands of Christians are obliged to meet, in asserting for themselves the rights of conscience, and in securing the preaching of what they deem a purer faith than the traditionary one of their fathers, are now no longer novelties in our religious annals. But the embarrassment and trials, to which this early association of Liberal Christians was exposed, are perhaps without a parallel in similar enterprises at a later day. We cannot, in the scanty limits to which we are restricted, so much as make a meagre summary of them. The seceders were not loved on account of their opinions. In the language of the late Lieutenant-Governor Lincoln, who advocated their claims for an act of incorporation before a committee of the Legislature, "The majority of our inhabitants are rigid Calvinists, the petitioners are rank Arminians." Their experiment of a voluntary association for religious purposes was then new in the interior of the State, and was looked upon, and even by many wise and good men, as a dangerous innovation. The parent society, out of which these rebellious children came, was not a little irritated and overbearing. Its minister, the Rev. Mr. Austin, could not exchange with a brother of his own faith, because this said brother had offered a prayer in Mr. Bancroft's pulpit. The clergy of the county, with some few exceptions, were hostile. Great difficulties arose in procuring sufficient funds to sustain the new society. The period was extremely inauspicious to the effort. The Revolutionary war had just closed. Paper money became no money at all. The fruits and products of the earth were of little value as exchangeable commodities. Taxes were high, and creditors were importunate. Under this general pressure, it was deemed inexpedient to assess an annual sum upon the parish, and monthly contributions were resorted to. The minister was, afterwards, compelled to settle with the members of his society severally, when and how he could, and why this alone did not break down his spirit, we cannot well understand. When a church was afterwards to be built, the experiment was thought to be too hazardous to be entered upon, unless the pastor would consent to relinquish one third of his legal salary, which, in the whole, was only five hundred dollars. This he complied with. And now, under the

pressure of all these adverse circumstances, what was the temper and bearing of our venerable friend, upon whom the pressure principally fell? Let him tell us:

"During these trying occurrences, I occasionally felt depression of spirits, and with difficulty could summon sufficient resolution to prosecute my professional labors. But I was firmly established in the belief, that the cause in which we were engaged was the cause of Christian truth, the cause of God, and I was unwilling to abandon it. I also knew that opponents were impatiently waiting for the prostration of a society which they deemed heretical; and shall I hesitate to confess, that I was unwilling to give them the triumph?

means.

"My income from the parish being quite inadequate to the support of a family, I was obliged to have recourse to extraneous We for years received as many boarders as our house would accommodate. I assisted several youth in their preparation for college or qualifying themselves for useful stations in busy life; through a long period I admitted in the forenoons of week days a number of the daughters and relatives of parishioners into my study, and gave them the best instruction in my power. The publication of Washington's Life yielded some profit; during several years I officiated as editor of one or another of our public journals.

"At no period was I destitute of cheering, animating supports, as numbers of the most substantial members of the society proved steadfast in their purpose, and continued my unwavering friends; they were persevering in their efforts to sustain our cause, and afforded me all the advice and assistance in their power. Encouraging appearances of success were not wanting."- pp. 21, 22.

Indeed the society, as a body, always seem to have duly appreciated the value of this excellent man and exemplary minister. Its almost unbroken harmony during the long period of fifty years, -long indeed for the endurance of any human connexion, —and this, too, amidst such discouraging and perplexing circumstances is equally honorable to minister and people. In the earlier periods of their connexion, moreover, he was continually receiving presents of various kinds, according to the ability and circumstances of the donors, which, considered as expressions of their respect and regard, of course possessed a value a hundred-fold beyond their own. And during the continental war in Europe, when all the means of livelihood rose greatly in price, he was aided by

special grants, and subsequently, as the society increased in numbers and resources, additions to his salary were made.

Still his efforts and sacrifices during the greater part of his ministry must have been great and trying indeed. His fidelity to his religious principles, and the firmness and consistency with which he maintained them, exposed him to the suspicion, or ill-concealed odium, or, what is scarcely better, the constrained courtesies of a large part of those, whose Christian sympathy he felt he had a right to enjoy. The condition of his society seemed to be repeatedly in a precarious state. Add to this, his professional income was wholly inadequate to his support. He was debarred, both by a sense of propriety and by a just deference to popular opinion, from all subsidiary means of increasing it, except those few and scanty ones, which were not considered disreputable to his clerical profession, but which, nevertheless, must have been pursued at the expense of time and labor which he would gladly have devoted to his appropriate duties and studies as a clergyman. A large family was dependent upon his sole exertions. Year after year, though passed in earnest labor, and in the practice of the strictest economy, and with every species of self-denial and retrenchment that his character as a gentleman and the claims of Christian hospitality would permit, he found his resources more and more straitened. He and his, like others, were subjected to the calamity of sickness with all its additional demands on a narrow income. But it is absolutely painful for us to go into this detail. Enough has been said for those who have the hearts to interpret it; and we have no words that will reach those who have them not. We allude to these circumstances here, mainly for the purpose of paying our humble tribute of respect to the Christian heroism of this venerable man, who, through successive years, in Godly simplicity and Godly sincerity, cheerfully, consistently, honorably, pursued the path of duty, thorny and rugged as it was; always faithful at his post, always the fearless assertor and champion of what he deemed to be the truth; always sustained by the approbation of his conscience; always looking to God, his present witness and final judge, in a clear, settled, and filial trust. This is selfsacrifice indeed, and not its wordy semblance. And it seems to us there is more of a genuine spirit and steady manhood, more of truly high endeavour, more of really elevated sentiment in

this calm, earnest, unfaltering devotion to the humble duties of his place and station, than is required in a host of that vulgar race of heroes, whom the world delights to honor.

It is an inquiry upon which we have no inclination or space to dilate, but still one we cannot but think worthy of the attention of thoughtful and philanthropic men, whether this is an insulated case, whether such conflicts as these, for life, with a scanty and insufficient professional income, are peculiar to our venerable friend; and, if it should be found on examination, that this is, by no means, the fact, but that there are many others suffering in silence and in hopelessness and from the same causes as he did, and that in consequence the moral and mental independence of clergymen is liable to be crippled, their efficiency impaired, their health shattered, and their lives, to a degree unexampled in any other class of men, prematurely closed,-whether, if this be the real state of the case, to any considerable extent, it is not a subject worthy of the faithful and affectionate attention of serious and liberal-minded men. We are sufficiently apprized

that

"Greatness and goodness are not means but ends,"

and require not to be informed, that all who preach the gospel need to be armed and inspired with a martyr's spirit; but still it seems to us a very grave inquiry, (leaving all individual cases out of the question, and disclaiming all personal references of every kind,) whether it is right, or wise, or expedient, or safe, to trust the supply of so great an interest of our religion as its preached word, to such an insecure tenure. Is there not great danger, moreover, in the state of things supposed, that we shall show to the myriads of observers on the other side of the Atlantic, who are looking to us with intense anxiety for a solution of the problem,- that the "Voluntary System," so called, as applied to the support of Religious Institutions, is a miserable failure?

To return from this slight digression, we are happy in congratulating the worthy subject of this notice, his more youthful associate, and the religious society with which they are connected, on the success that has attended their exertions for the

*See some facts on this subject stated in the "Christian Register," of March 12th, 1836.

VOL. XX. 3D S. VOL. II. NO. II.

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