REFORMED PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH.

BY THE REV. JOHN N. M'LEOD, D. D.,

NEW YORK.

THE Reformed Presbyterian Church in the United States of America derives her origin from the old Reformation Church of Scotland. Her history, therefore, down to the period of her organization in this country, is necessarily involved in that of the parent church herself. It deserves remembrance to her honour, that Scotland was among the last of the nations to submit to the usurpation of the Church of Rome. Until the beginning of the eleventh century she possessed a Christian church which maintained her spiritual independence, and refused to bow to the Papal supremacy. But Antichrist at length prevailed, and substituted his ruinous formalism for the ancient Christianity. From the beginning of the eleventh to that of the sixteenth century," darkness covered the earth, and gross darkness the people" of insular as well as continental Europe.

With the sixteenth century, however, commenced that glorious revival of evangelical religion, the Protestant Reformation. Scotland felt its influence, and awoke from her slumber. John Knox of famous memory, had lighted his torch at the candle of God's word, which had just been rescued from under the bushel where Antichrist had hidden it for ages. He carried it through his native land, and her nobles, her people, and many even of the priests of Rome, were enlightened in the truths of the gospel. In the year 1560 Popery was abolished; the Bible was declared free to all; a Confession of Faith, containing an admirable summary of divine truth, was prepared; a book of discipline, declaring the government of the church to be presbyterial, was adopted; and all ranks of men in the nation bound themselves to each other and to God, in a solemn covenant engagement, to maintain and perpetuate the Reformation which had been established. This is what is usually denominated in Scottish history the "first reformation," or reformation from Popery.. And thus arose

the Reformed Presbyterian Church. For more than thirty years after this period, the church enjoyed great temporal and spiritual prosperity. But from the year 1592 to 1688, her history, with the exception of a twelve years' interval of rest and triumph, is one of warfare and suffering. Her most powerful enemies were unprincipled civilians. They sought to make her a mere engine of state policy, an instrument of their own despotism; and when she would not submit, they attempted to coërce her by the sword. During the greater part of the reigns of James VI., and his son and grandson, the first and second Charles, the Reformed Presbyterian Church was struggling for existence against the power of the state, which assumed an antichristian supremacy over her, and proceeded to dictate to her the doctrine, worship, and order she should receive and observe under pain of imprisonment, banishment, and death.

Adversity tests the character of systems as well as of men; and never was the worth of the Reformed Presbyterian system more signally manifested, than during the period the church was in the furnace of affliction. Thousands maintained her principles in the face of the persecutor. The life and power of godliness was most remarkably displayed, and multitudes of holy martyrs sealed with their blood the testimony which they held.

Of the interval of relief to which reference has already been had, it is sufficient to say, that it was the period between 1638 and 1650: the era of the Solemn League and Covenant; of the Westminster Assembly of divines; of the revolution which dethroned the first Charles, and asserted those principles of civil and religious liberty which all enlightened Christians and statesmen now regard as axiomatic and undeniable. This is the period of what is usually styled the "second reformation," and it was for a strict adherence to its principles that Cameron and Renwick, and their valiant coadjutors, were called to pour out their blood on the high places of the field. To these principles, as of universal importance and applicability, Reformed Presbyterians still avow their attachment.

In the year 1688, William of Nassau was called to the throne of the three kingdoms. He proceeded, among the first acts of his reign, to give a civil establishment to religion in his dominions. Episcopacy was established in England and Ireland, and Presbytery in Scotland, by the sole authority of the king and parliament, even before the assembly of the church was permitted to meet. And thus the old principle of the royal supremacy over the church was retained, and incorporated with the very vitals of the revolution settlement. The object of the civil rulers was, as usual, to make the church a tool of

the State. Into an establishment of this description the old consistent Covenanters could not go. They stood aloof and dissented from it as imperfect, Erastian, and immoral. The principal objections which they urged against incorporation with the revolution settlement, were: 1st. That the Solemn League and Covenant, which they considered the constitution of the empire, was entirely disregarded in its arrangements, and 2d. That the civil rulers usurped an authority over the church, which virtually destroyed her spiritual independence, and was at variance with the sole headship of the Redeemer himself. The world has just witnessed the spectacle of the large majority of the Scottish establishment becoming "dissenters" on this very ground: a testimony that the old Reformed Presbyterians were right. For more than sixteen years they remained without a ministry; but they were not discouraged. Though a small minority, they organized themselves into praying societies, in which they statedly met for religious worship. They exercised a watchful care over the moral and religious deportment of each other. They fostered the spirit of attachment to Reformation principles, and waited until God would send them pastors. And at length they were gratified. In the year 1706, the Rev. John McMillan acceded to them from the established church. In 1743 he was joined by the Rev. Mr. Nairne, from the Secession Church, which had been recently organized, and they with ruling elders constituted the "Reformed Presbytery." Through this, as the line of their connexion with the ancient church, the Reformed Presbyterians in this country received their present ministry. They had, however, a ministry as well as a people in the North American colonies, before the Reformed Presbytery in Scotland was organized by the Rev. Mr. McMillan and his coadjutors.

In the same series of persecutions which drove the Huguenots of France and the Puritans of England to these shores, many of the Scottish and Irish Reformed Presbyterians, were banished from their native lands, and scattered among the American colonies. In crossing the ocean and changing their habitation, they had not changed their religious attachments. And when first visited by the ministers who came to their aid, they were found with their children collected into praying societies, and fostering with care the principles of civil and religious freedom, for which they and their ancestors had suffered. Though the name Covenanter, like that of Puritan, was given them by way of reproach, they did not refuse it. Esteeming it their honour to be in covenant with God and with one another, to do their whole duty, they accepted the designation, and even attempted in a public manner, to practise the thing which it indicates. In the year

1743, aided by the Rev. Mr. Craighead, who had acceded to them from a synod of Presbyterians organized a few years before, the Covenanters in the colony of Pennsylvania, proceeded to enter into a solemn public engagement to abide by and maintain their principles. This transaction served to promote union among themselves, and to keep them distinct from the other religious societies which were forming around them.

The Reformed Presbyterian has ever been a missionary church. The presbyteries of that name in Scotland and Ireland saw the promising field beyond the ocean, and hearkening to the Macedonian cry that came from their brethren there, they sent them the aid they desired. In 1752 the Rev. Mr. Cuthbertson arrived in America from the Reformed Presbytery of Scotland. He served the church alone for nearly twenty years, and was greatly instrumental both in promoting the piety of those among whom he laboured, and fostering the spirit of opposition to British tyranny, which ultimately demanded and secured the independence of these United States. Being joined by Messrs. Linn and Dobbin from the Reformed Presbytery of Ireland, in 1774 a presbytery was constituted, and the church took her stand as a distinct visible community in the North American colonies.

In the year 1776 the declaration of American independence took place. It was hailed with joy by Reformed Presbyterians. They were opponents of the British government from both principle and feeling, and in proportion to their numbers they contributed largely to the success of the Revolution. They took an active part in the war. Some of them were members of the conventions which established the States' constitutions, and subsequently of their legislatures; and although they saw defects in the new government, they cordially recognised it as legitimate, and deserving of their conscientious support.

The visible unity of the Church of God is a fundamental principle of the Presbyterian system. The revolutionary and transition state of society for some time before the establishment of American independence, occasioned a neglect of this principle, and kept the church in a divided and inefficient condition. But on the settlement of a stable civil government by the American people, the minds of many in the different churches were turned to the subject of union. A union of the whole Presbyterian family on a basis of truth and order adapted to the age, country, and circumstances of the church in the American republic, was very extensively desired, and various attempts were made to secure it. The time, however, for this did not seem to have arrived. The results of the overtures for union in some in

stances were plans of correspondence and co-operation more or less extensive, and the nearest approach to the great object sought, was that union of formerly distinct bodies which gave origin to the Associate Reformed Church. This took place in the year 1782, between the presbyteries of the Associate and Reformed Churches. The united body took the names of its two constituent parts, and hence arose the "Associate Reformed Church in the United States."

A portion of the Associate Church, however, and one minister, with a large number of the people of the Reformed Presbyterian Church, did not approve of the union, or enter into it when consummated. And thus both these bodies, though diminished in numbers, retained their distinctive standings.

Within ten years after this event, four ministers emigrated from Europe, to aid in maintaining the Reformed Presbyterian cause. They were the Rev. James Reid, from Scotland, who returned to his own country when his missionary tour was accomplished, and Messrs. McGarragh, King, and McKinney, the latter of whom arrived in the year 1793.

The Rev. Messrs. Martin, King, and McGarragh, regulated the affairs of the church as a committee of the Reformed Presbytery in Scotland. But this was a mere temporary expedient, and its object having been answered, Messrs. McKinney, King, and Gibson, who had recently emigrated from Ireland, proceeded to constitute a Presbyterial judicatory independent of all foreign control. Mr. King did not live to meet his brethren at the time appointed, and in 1798, the Rev. Messrs. McKinney and Gibson, with ruling elders, proceeded to constitute the "Reformed Presbytery of the United States of North America." Thus the church took her stand on American ground. Her relations to the Reformed Presbyterians of the Old World, as there defined and since existing, are those of an independent sister church. And in proceeding to arrange her terms of communion, she at once declared that she adopted the Reformed Presbyterian system, only in so far as it presents common truth, and "binds to duties not peculiar to the church in the British Isles, but common in all lands." It was thus her determination to rear, not an exotic of foreign growth and culture, but a plant which would be at home on American soil, and furnish abundant fruit unto eternal life.

Soon after the organization of the presbytery, Rev. Drs. Wylie, Black, the late Dr. Alexander McLeod, and Rev. Mr. Donnely, were licensed to preach the gospel. They became efficient missionaries through the United States; the cause prospered in their hands; and in the year 1808, a synod composed of three presbyteries, was consti