Gospel, soon learned to plead a tender conscience, in order to save their money, and joined themselves to the denomination which could help them on to heaven at the least expense.

As another cause of debility and desolation, may be noted the defections occasioned by the restoration of evangelical doctrine and discipline. The revivals of 1740 were the commencement of a reformation in this State, which has brought the churches back to the doctrines and discipline of our fathers. A change so great, however, and so contrary to human depravity, fortified as it was by custom, was not to be accomplished without resistance. Accustomed to the immunities of the half way covenant, and pleased with this selfrighteous, dilatory method of preparation for heaven, the unconverted were alarmed at the demands of immediate repentance, and offended at the distinction which now began to be made between the righteous and the wicked. It was not till after nearly half a century of controversy, in the progress of which many churches were shaken, and many societies enfeebled, that the point became established, that a credible profession of religion is indispensable to church membership; and that the seals of the covenant are to be applied to none but the members of the visible church and their children.

Another cause of desolation, more limited in its operation, but not less disastrous in its effects where it has operated, has been, the timid policy of forbearing to preach plainly those doctrines which offend, and of shrinking from a vigilant, efficient discipline in the church, lest these things should interrupt the peace, and endanger the stability of the congregation. It has been called prudence; but experience has shown it to be a prudence, which, in the beginning, surrenders at discretion to the enemy, to keep him quiet; which substitutes policy for duty, and relies on temporising expedients, instead of the protection and blessing of God, in the fearless performance of duty. The uniform effect has been, weak hands

and a faint heart to the minister; the loss of personal usefulness, the suspension of divine influence, the decline of vital piety, immorality and error in the church, and impiety and licentiousness without; until, at the death or dismission of the pastor, the church has become almost extinct, and the congregation is conducted to the verge of ruin.

A later cause of decline and desolation has been the insidious influence of infidel philosophy. The mystery of iniquity had, in Europe, been operating for a long time. The unclean spirits had commenced their mission to the kings of the earth, to gather them together to the battle of the great day of God Almighty. But when that mighty convulsion took place which a second time burst open the bottomless pit, and spread darkness and dismay over Europe, every gale brought to our shores contagion and death. Thousands, at once, breathed the tainted air, and felt the fever kindle in the brain. A paroxysm of moral madness and terrific innovation ensued. In the phrensy of perverted vision, every foe appeared a friend, and every friend a foe. No maxims were deemed too wise to be abandoned, none too horrid to be adopted; no foundations too deep laid to be torn up, and no superstructure too venerable to be torn down, that another, such as, in Europe, they were rearing with bones and blood, might be built. As the institutions of Connecticut, however, were built upon a rock, and were defended by thousands not yet bereft of common sense and moral principle, a few experiments evinced that such foundations could be shaken only by the slow progress of undermining. It remained, therefore, to extend the mania till it should subtract from their defence, and add to the host of assailants a number sufficient to accomplish the work. With great feigned reverence, therefore, were the Bible and catechetical instruction exiled from the school. The polluted page of infidelity everywhere met the eye, while its sneers and blasphemies assailed the The specious argument of leaving children uninstructed, that they might at a riper age, choose their own religion

ear.

without bias, gave leisure for depravity to mature its alienating prejudices, for lies to extend their influence, and for vicious habits to establish their unresisted dominion. The result was a brood of infidels, and heretics, and profligates; a generation prepared to be carried about, as they have been, by every wind of doctrine, and to assail, as they have done, our most sacred institutions.

But the time at length arrived, when all the preceding causes were enlisted as auxiliaries merely, and invested with double potency, by political violence and alienation.

The origin and progress of these collisions of party need not be traced, nor is it the object of this discourse to weigh the contending parties in the scales of justice, to ascertain their relative guilt, and measure out a retribution-a work which belongs to God and the judgment of the great day. But the effects of this unhappy controversy have been such upon this once peaceful State, that the combatants on both sides, have occasion to sit down and weep together over the desolations which the conflict has occasioned: for it has been keen and dreadful, and, like the varying conflict of battle, has marred and trodden down whatever has stood within the range of its commotion. On every field over which it swept, abiding traces are left of its desolating career, families divided, neighbors and friends embittered, ministers and people alienated, churches divided, and the numbers of seceding denominations multiplied, with all those bitter feelings which contention and wounds are calculated to inspire. At the present moment, there is scarcely an ecclesiastical society in the State which has not experienced a diminution of its numbers, or a seceding denomination, which has not been established or augmented by these political contentions.

To the preceding causes must be added, if we speak the whole truth, the direct enterprise of religious denominations to augment their numbers.

Feeling as all minorities ever have felt, and impatient to exchange the inconveniences of weakness for the advantages

attached to numbers, and confident, as all denominations are, of being exactly right, a deceitful heart might easily mistake the combined impulse of proselyting zeal and restless ambition, for unmingled zeal for the Lord of hosts; and might verily think that many things ought to be done to pull down the standing order; which things, also, as the circumstances of the times have favored, have been done.

The operation of all these causes has been greatly facilitated by the change made in the law for the support of the Gospel, in order to accommodate it to the changes in religious opinion which had gradually taken place in the State. It was the fundamental maxim of the fathers of this State, that the preaching of the Gospel is, in a civil point of view, a great blessing to the community, for the support of which, all should contribute according to their several ability. This law, while the inhabitants of the State were all of one religious creed, was entirely efficacious, and secured to the people of the State, at least, four times the amount of religious instruction which has ever been known to be the result of mere voluntary associations for the support of the Gospel.*

*It has been said that the Gospel will support itself, and that civil laws have nothing to do with the support of the Gospel. If it be meant that the Gospel will exist in the world though we should neglect to support it in Connecticut, it is true; but if the meaning be, that God will continue to us a faithful ministry and bestow his blessing upon it, though we should withhold the means for its competent support, it is not true. The certain continuance of the Gospel in the world, no more ensures its continuance where the proper means are neglected, than the certain continuance of seed time and harvest in the world, prove that the people of Connecticut may neglect to plough and sow, and still expect an abundant harvest.

And with respect to the manner in which religious instruction shall be provided, no plan has ever yet been adopted so effectual as legislative provisions, which shut out individual discretion, and require every man to pay for the support of the Gospel according to his property. The experiment has been fairly made on our right hand and on our left, of what may be expected from voluntary associations and contributions for the support of divine institutions; and the result is, that at least four times more religious instruction is secured by legal provision, than has ever been provided to any considerable extent by voluntary discretion. Even in this State, since the evasion of the law has become practicable and common, the amount of religious instruction provided by themselves by that portion of our population who have reserved to their own discretion what they will give, has dwindled in nearly the same proportion. One sabbath in three is probably about the medium amount of religious instruction which they think fit to provide for themselves or their families, or, to use their own language, which the Gospel provides for itself.' This too, is falling off, in the face of a general, contrary example, and in spite of antecedent education and habit. What then is to be expected from the next generation, and what is to be the destiny of this State and its institutions, should an increasing portion of our population grow up in such comparative ignorance? If any portion of the instruction which God has provided for men is important, the whole is proportionably more important. If one sabbath in three is important, each of the other two is equally important; if

But, at length, the multiplication of other denominations demanded such a modification of the law, as should permit every man to worship God according to the dictates of his conscience, and compel him to pay only for the support of the Gospel in his own denomination. The practical effect has been, to liberate all conscientious dissenters from supporting a worship which they did not approve-which the law intended; and to liberate a much greater number without conscience, from paying for the support of the Gospel anywhere, and progressively to diminish the amount of religious instruction and moral influence in the State-a thing which the law did not intend. While it accommodates the conscientious feelings of ten, it accommodates the angry, revengeful, avaricious, and irreligious feelings of fifty; and threatens by a silent, constant operation, to undermine the deep-laid foundations of our civil and religious order.

The vital principle of our system, that every man shall pay according to his property for the support of religious instruction, as a public civil benefit, and for the preservation of morals and good order in the State, is gone. Every man

a total loss of sabbaths would be a calamity, the loss of two out of three is a calamity of equal relative amount; if two sabbaths instruction lost is of no consequence, the one sabbath enjoyed is of no consequence, and the sabbath itself is good for nothing. So far as religious instruction on the sabbath is the cause of religious knowledge and of moral habits, nothing can be anticipated but the increase of ignorance, and irreligion, and immorality, in proportion to the decline of the means of instruction and restraint. Nor is this all; the families who have worship to attend only one sabbath in three, will not attend that sabbath as punctually, as those who attend statedly, upon weekly instruction. Two sabbaths of indolence, and vagrancy of thought and conduct, will more than dissipate the instruction and efface the impression of the third. No community and no family by observing only one sabbath in three, can hold their own against the current of depravity and the power of temptation.

If these views are correct, it is deplorable to witness with what thoughtlessness and disregard of consequences, men will cut themselves off, and cut off their families, and, by consequence, successive generations of posterity, from at least two thirds the amount of that religious instruction and restraint which God has provided to bless them in time, and to qualify them for heaven. All this would be lamentable, if the remaining portion of instruction was as good in matter and manner, as the whole, which they have abandoned. But in the feverish haste of revenge, or the narrowness of avaricious savings, how little is thought of the importance of truth. Oh! 'tis enough to make angels weep, to see whole families of precious, immortal children, unconscious of their doom, cut off at once by this rash act of a father from the hearing of the truth, to famish by hearing nothing, or to be poisoned by hearing error. Oh! how will such rash deeds appear in the day of judgment, when the wretched father, undone by his folly, shall find himself surrounded by his family, ruined by his anger, or destroyed by his parsimony! How must their agony torture him, and their cries harrow up his soul! What imprecations from a long line of descendants, will assail his ears, and what anguish wring his heart, while he goes away with them into everlasting punishment, "where their worm dieth not and their fire is not quenched!”