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learnt from the following sentence. "Therefore our opinion is, that the said Barzillai Hathaway, Asahel Hathaway and wife, by acknowledging in writing sent in to the pastor of this church, that it was irregular for them voluntarily to absent themselves from the communion, be considered worthy of the fellowship of this or any orthodox church.” Wonderfully liberal!

Upon the whole, Sir, this is the worst case of orthodox oppression which has come to my knowledge. For all the aggrieved were orthodox in sentiment, and of good Christain standing. The question was one of religious liberty. And a more daring attempt to deprive worthy individuals of their sacred rights cannot be found in the annals of congregationalism. I can assure you that I am not alone in this opinion. I have received a letter from Zech. Eddy Esq. on this very subject, in connexion with the documents of the case. I have no liberty for its publication. But as it contains the decided views of a distinguished orthodox layman on a most important topic, I shall give you a few extracts from it, hoping he will duly appreciate my motives, and pardon my liberty. Here are his words. "Sir, you perceive the enclosed proceedings regard the question of religious freedom, and the councils were both orthodox. I made no small noise about the first result, and sent my complaints far and wide among the orthodox clergy. My complaint remains. Although the second result is sufficient for my sister to get admitted into an orthodox church, yet my complaint is, that a large portion of the small clergy are stickling for the principles of the first result, and show a spirit unfriendly to true freedom; - that the question was. known to be pending by, at least, all the leaders to whom the letters missive were sent, and that they forebore to attend the council and to settle the question themselves, so as to promote by example the true principles of religious liberty, leaving it to a few country clergymen to revise the doings of Mr. Storrs's council, if they dared. Now I want practical evidence that the orthodox clergy, as a body, do not approve of his result. They have all heard from me and know my views and feelings, and they know I am a man, who, as well as my friends and connexions, am determined to be heard. The conduct of several individuals of these leaders has not pleased me since the result of the second council; they are afraid or unwilling to come out, and they work also secretly to do away the effect of that result, saying, that it is of no weight, because a mutual council first decided otherwise; willing, as I think, to see ecclesiastical power dominate, although, not only particular Christians, but the church should be ruined. The advice of an orthodox council must be paramount to right; and, though wrong, stand, like the laws of the Medes and Persians, unalterable. Popery is no worse. Dr. Beecher and Dr. Codman and the rest knew me, and they knew the noise I was making. They did not come to the council. The question still stands - What are the principles of

the orthodox clergy on this subject? There is no question relating to religious freedom so important as this. It was on this very point that all the miseries of dissenters and nonjurors were experienced. Can we not leave a particular Christian church when we please, without drawing fire, temporal and spiritual, or both, after us? We ought to know. If we cannot, let us warn our children; a little unwariness here may prove their ruin. I have been a coadjutor to this order of the clergy. Consociationism is no better than Popery. Congregationalism allows all separate societics to chose their own teachers and to retain them, and for a legal cause to depose them; also to form churches and to disband them, as they please. Church order without Christian` liberty is slavery, or rather ecclesiastical tyranny. Let this matter be probed to the bottom. I am willing people should be searched out in this matter, and their intolerance exposed." The italics are his own. Such, Sir, is a specimen of the spirit which is somewhat prevalent among orthodox layman. Were I at liberty to communicate one half of my knowledge on this subject, I could state facts which would make your ears tingle. A friend of mine has been travelling in different parts of the commonwealth, and conversing with the independent yeomanry of our land, and could you know only a small part of what has been said by substantial orthodox Christians on this very subject, you would begin to tremble on your throne. The result of the whole is this. The leaders of the orthodox are suspected of evil designs. The exclusive system is reprobated. The assumptions and oppressions of the clergy are discovered. And the day of retribution is fast approaching. Letters, p. 147. Review, pp. 58, 59.

VII. TRACTS.

Under this section, I endeavoured to expose the unrighteous and self-righteous principles upon which your leaders are acting in the distribution of religious tracts. In order to give a definite and particular statement of facts, I related some of the proceedings of the orthodox in East Sudbury. You have merely denied the truth of one or two unimportant assertions, and then advanced several weighty charges against the members of the unitarian society in that place. I will therefore notice your remarks and accusations.

1. Speaking of the state of society in East Sudbury, I made the following statement. "They all attend a unitarian meeting. One of your disorganizers enters the peaceful fold, and succeeds in turning some of the flock from their prosent pastor." Your "highly respectable correspondent" gives a counter statement, which I am now able to prove incorrect by the following testimonials of the Rev. Mr. Wight. These are his words. "The Reviewer would have given a more full and impartial account of the principal circumstances of the separation to which he has reference, if he had ascertained and stated the following facts respecting it. 1. The minister refer

red to, while he could not enter into every measure which two or three of the brethren of the church, under the influence of a strong religious excitement, wished him to adopt, was willing and happy to encourage and assist them in all their good desires and endeavours, so far as he could do it consistently with his views of order and expediency. 2. In compliance with their wishes and with the unanimous consent of the church, he held meetings on the days of the monthly concert and also weekly, in which he afforded to those of them who desired it, full opportunity to give exhortations and to lead in prayer. 3. While he could not in opposition to the advice of all the other brethren of the church, and to the sentiments of the great body of the people, comply with their request that he should invite the members of the Suffolk Association to hold meetings in the town, he always expressed and manifested a willingness to exchange with any ministers whom they wished to hear; or if it was not convenient for any of them to exchange with him, to invite them to preach at his sacramental lecture. 4. The day before he received their request to be dismissed from the church, the principal of them invited him to a conference, in which he declared to him, that if he would consent not to exchange with any unitarian ministers out of the Association, and if he would invite the members of the Suffolk Association, who had already commenced their labors without his concurrence, to hold meetings in the town, they would remain, and that otherwise they must separate." Such, Sir, is the modest defence of this minister, whose character for veracity, honesty, prudence, and Christian holiness stands as high as that of any other divine in the country. And you perceive that his statements completely refute the assertions of your anonymous correspondent, who has been meddling in affairs with which he has no proper acquaintance. Letters, p. 156. Review, p. 36.

2. I also stated that the orthodox secession took from the annual salary from five to ten dollars. The truth of this statement you deny. I will give you the correct state of the case from the proper officers. "The first year after the orthodox society was formed, it was thought best that the minister of the first parish should consent that no estate remaining in the parish should be taxed higher according to its valuation than it was the year before the formation of that society. The deficiency in the salary this year amounted to twenty-four dollars and some cents. The second year the tax was laid on the same principle, and in consequence of property coming into the society, and of the increased valuation of the wood-land, the deficiency in the salary amounted to ten dollars and twenty-two cents. For the last year, the third since the formation of the orthodox society, the number of polls belonging to it was twenty-four, and the whole number of polls in the town two hundred and twenty." Thus you perceive the nature of my mistake. At the time of writing I was informed verbally that the de

ficiency was" about ten dollars," and in this way, fell into the slight error which I cheerfully correct. I ought also to say for the credit of this people, that the deficiency was readily made up by individual subscriptions. Letters, p. 156. Review, p. 37.

3. You charge the unitarians with "beating drums, besmearing cushions, and throwing rotten eggs" at the orthodox ministers who went to aid the seceders. That some such things were done I do not deny. But by whom were they done? By the unitarians? — by professing disciples? Are such measures sanctioned by unitarianism? — or do they meet the approbation of unitarian Christians? You know better. Why then did you mention such actions? Suppose the infidel should denounce orthodoxy, because so many in orthodox societies are guilty of intemperance, quarrelling, profaneness, theft, falsehood, and debauchery. Would you regard such a statement as sound argument? Would you not affirm that orthodoxy did not sanction such doings, and that they were reprobated by orthodox Christians; and that whenever professing disciples were convicted of such crimes, they were disciplined? And should you not regard this as a sufficient refutation of such a calumny? How then could you condescend to make assertions which serve but to condemn yourselves? Not only so. Bringing such proceedings to the light must operate most forcibly against your denomination. For every body knows that those who engage in such transactions make no pretensions to piety. But, Sir, the evils charged upon the orthodox are perpetrated by your most prominent, most zealous, most sanctimonious church members, and ministers. And an attempt

to justify their irregularities, by the mention of those low measures adopted by the irreligious, renders your proceedings more criminal, and your defence much more feeble. But this is not all. Under the garb of piety, you sow divisions, discords, revilings, and enmities in families, neighbourhoods, and societies. Are the evils you inflict any the less severe, because perpetrated under a holy name, and with a disfigured countenance? Are not these evils, in themselves considered, really greater than those of which you complain? I am not saying this to justify any species of iniquity. But, Sir, you should remember that the "world's people" are made of flesh and blood as well as orthodox ministers, and that their rights are equally dear and sacred; and that you may do them much greater injury under the name of religion, than they can do you under that of immorality. Review,

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p. 36. 4. Referring to one of the seceding deacons in this place, you make the following statements. "He" (Mr. Whitman) may recollect the case of a physician in a neighbouring town, who was once a deacon of the unitarian church, and who, by his faithful attendance and skill, had secured the confidence and patronage of all around him; but no sooner did he become orthodox, and attend an orthodox meeting, than he began to be reproached and forsaken. His unitarian neighbours

immediately invited another physician to settle among them and take his place; and even his former minister, who for years had been favored with his services gratuitously, dismissed him at once, for the new comer, and advised his people to do the same." Your statement contains two charges, one against Mr. Wight, and the other against his society. I will notice them in this order.

In answer to your charge against the Rev. Mr. Wight, I am happy to present you with the following extract from his letter to me in relation to this subject. "With respect to what is said of the treatment of the physician by his former minister, you may say, that if the writer of the Review had inquired of the physician, he could have told him that his minister was not wanting in manifesting a suitable sense of his kindness and attention in his professional services, and that the conferring of gratuitous benefits was not altogether confined to one of the parties. If he had inquired of the minister himself, he might have learnt from him, that he had nothing to do in the introduction of another physician into the town, that no one could regret more than he the circumstances which rendered it unsuitable for him to continue to apply to a physician who had taken ground which was virtually in opposition to his church and society; and that the assertion, that he advised his people to dismiss the old physician and employ the new one, is entirely untrue; as, although he has ever had a high opinion of the skill and merit of the latter, he has been particularly careful to guard against all interference in this respect, and never has given such advice to any member of his society or to any other person." You thus perceive that your statement is proved altogether false from the highest authority. I would merely ask, whether your "highly respectable correspondent" has not dismissed his physician for a much less satisfactory reason than the unitarian minister could assign, and whether he also has not received much greater and more valuable gratuitous services.

In answer to your charge against the unitarian neighbours of the seceding physician, I present you the following letter from the most respectable individuals in the town. "In the Review of your Letters to Professor Stuart, we noticed the following paragraph" [the one already quoted.] "As the above paragraph is supposed to relate to transactions in this town, and as it seems intended to imply that the physician was abandoned and forsaken for no other reason than his embracing orthodox sentiments and attending orthodox meetings, we have thought it due to truth and our own character, as liberal Christians, to give a correct representation of the affair. For we consider that the character of many of the society is aspersed by the above statements. And as we have been informed that you are about to answer publicly the above Review, we will endeavour to go back to the origin of the case, and relate the principal causes which led some of

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