TABLE OF CONTEXTS. 1834-1835

THE

ORTHODOX PRESBYTERIAN.

No. LXI.

OCTOBER, 1834.

VOL. VI.

MISSIONARY MEETING OF THE GENERAL SYNOD OF ULSTER AT DUNGANNON.

TO THE EDITOR OF THE ORTHODOX PRESBYTERIAN. SIR,

AGREEABLY to your request, I shall proceed to offer to your readers some remarks upon the late Missionary Meeting of the General Synod at Dungannon. As you have already published the resolutions that were adopted, it will not be necessary that I should refer to them particularly. I shall, therefore, content myself with a general comment on the most important, premising, however, that on a subject on which so much has been said already, you are not to expect much originality, either in the way of argument or illustration.

The great object, I may observe, in general, which all the measures adopted had in view, was to impart a missionary character and spirit to the whole church with which we are connected, by calling into action those powers and aptitudes to missionary operation, which, though latent and undeveloped hitherto, have all along been an essential portion of the Presbyterian constitution. Strange, indeed, that with such an admirable mechanism, our church should have ever lost an interest in missionary schemes. When planted in this northern province of the island, a spirit of expensive enterprize and Christian daring burned within the bosoms of her sons. Much did they mourn the darkness of this our country-sorely did they toil for its illumination-often did they concert together for the enlargement and establishment of Zion. A blessing rested on their labours-an abundant increase recompensed their toils. The Presbyterian temple was reared in strength and beauty upon the sure foundation-the banner of the cross waved over it triumphantly-within its walls were thanksgiving and the voice of melody. I need not tell the story of that sore degeneracy which our church sustained, when the holy and beautiful house became a desolation—when the lamp within the sanctuary burned with a sickly ray, and

A

strange fire was offered on its altars. The experience of our own short-lived day can testify to all these melancholy reverses, inasmuch as it was but the other year that they were all before our eyes in mournful contrast with the zeal and faithfulness of former days. Divided in religious sentiment, it was not possible that any great or noble enterprizes could engage the attention of our ecclesiastical assemblies, and, accordingly, their members often met and separated, as though no gospel were to be proclaimed beyond the limits of their own peculiar territory; or if an occasional attempt was made upon that of the enemy, it was but feebly and imperfectly sustained. I reiterate a common, I had almost said a hacknied, sentiment, in saying that a great work has been commenced among us→→→ a work which God hath wrought; for however much we may applaud some of the human agents who were concerned in it, yet it is to the God of the church that the church's renovation ought to be ascribed. Well, therefore, might the church declare, at the commencement of the late missionary proceedings, that her most fervent gratitude was due to the King of Zion, for all the good that has already been accomplished; and well may every genuine and true-hearted Presbyterian rejoice in the late transactions and enactments of his church, as her harbinger of better days.

As the Synod was not assembled, however, to dilate upon the past, but to deliberate for the future, it was acting altogether in the spirit of a reforming church, when it immediately after recorded its humiliation and regret that so little had as yet been done in furtherance of its missionary operations. It is, indeed, too true, that we have great reason to be humbled for the scantiness of our attainments, and the pitiable and paltry nature of our services, when compared with our high pri vileges and responsibilities, as a church of the Lord Jesus Christ. For is it not a fact, that there are whole districts, even of that territory we call our own, where spiritual desolation reigns? Have we not in many things a name to live, while we are comparatively dead? Is there not among those of us who minister at the altar, too much of the spirit of a cold and calculating selfishness, and too little of the high, selfdenying spirit of that sacred profession and name we bear? Instead of seeking the enlargement of the church at home and abroad, do we not often rest contented if we can only retain in our communion the same amount of respectability and numbers that belonged to it when we undertook the ministerial charge? Where are our longings for the conversion of