ΤΟ JOHN HENDERSON, ESQ. OF PARK. My Dear Sir, You have, in the Dedication of this Work to you, a token of the value which I attach to your ever-faithful friendship, and to the great encouragement which your most kind co-operation has afforded me in the discharge of varied duty. That you may be long spared to be a blessing to your friends; to promote abounding charity among all the friends of Christ; to give effective countenance to pure literature and evangelical religion; and to carry on those measures of benevolence which are the honour of our day and country-and some of which, under God, owe their being to none so much as to yourself—is the fervent desire and prayer of, My Dear Sir, Your Friend and Pastor, DAVID KING. PREFACE. A VOLUME which I published some years ago on the Ruling Eldership of the Christian Church was partly argumentative and partly practical. The argumentative part elicited some strictures from Drs Wardlaw and Davidson. In preparing a new edition I was led to reply to such objections; but I found the work assuming both a magnitude and a controversial character, altogether unsuitable to a simple manual for elders. I therefore changed my plan, and made the Third Edition of my treatise on the Eldership more specially didactic, with only a brief statement of the proof for the office of Ruling Elder, of which I there delineate the duties, and intimated my intention to merge the reasoning formerly employed, in such a general defence of Presbyterian Church Government as is now offered to the public. Under the circumstances just stated, I might |