Belmont chronicle. [volume] (St. Clairsville, Ohio) 1855-1973, 1869-11-18
Union of Presbyterian Churches.

The Pittsburgh Gazette of Saturday,
speaking of the formal reunion of these
churches says:
Yesterday our city was the theatre of
one of the most important events of
modern times-the reunion of two grand
divisions of the Presby terian Church of
the United States, which, for almost a
third of century had been disunited,
and were known during that period re-
spectively as the Old School and New
School. Both in the interim had grown
nightly in numbers, power and lnfiu-
ence; both were pushing on their re-
spective missions, and planting churches
in the West, the South, and in foreign
lands, as well as in the older parts of our
country; both felt strong in the work
they had 10 do, and not sign of de-
crepitude was to be found in either. But
as years rolled on good men in both felt
more and more drawn together, and that
no good reason existed why they should
move in separate orbits, or why they
should not walk together in unity. They
desired to come together again, and it
has happened in this case as in all cases,
that 'fwhere there is will there is a
way.n Suffice it to say, that in the pre-
liminary negotiations this attractive
power of Christian love overcame all
difficulties,-andth there were maryland
now these two great organizations are
oue again, under the name of the Pres
byterian Church in the United States of
America.
For two days the two Assemblies met
in their respective plaees-the o. S. in
the First Church on Wood street, and
the N S. in the Third Church on Sixth
avenue, t. arrange matters for the final
union which had already been decreed
by the Presn steries. In the evenings
the members mingled for prayer and
social intercourse but the formal union
was fixed for Fric. Y morning (yester-
day) Not dissenting voice, nor an
exception, nor jar, nor a crook was
heard from first to last
At A. NJ. yesterday the two assem-
blies met as usual in their respective
places. At ten the members of the New
School left the Third church in process
sion, and walked down Sixth avenue
into Wood, street, and as they arrived
the members of the Old School body left
their church in the same order, and in
the street blended side by side and arm
in arm with their brethren from the
Third, and thus walked back, vid Fifth
avenue and Smithjeld street, to the
lnlru cuuTCu. WHICH, udu D66u h6DU
clear till the united procession should
arrive.
To every mind capable ofgraspjng the
scene in all its far reaching influences
upon the church and the world, the
spectacle was inexpressibly sublime
sublime in its simplicity, grand in the
total absence of all pageantry. Those
earnest men, with no outward trappings
to distinguish them from other men,
with hearts filled with joy and high re-
solve, representations of thousands of
churches and hundreds of thousands of
Christians, saw eye to eye and flowed
together in the sight of our people with
all the simplicity and humble bearing
that distinguished the great Master of
all when he walked amongst men.
1t is impossible to do justice to the
fervid bursts of eloquence with which
these united brethren greeted each other
when they got together in the church.
Everything was conducted with the
most perfect order; and when DIR. Fowler,
Moderator of the New School Assembly,
rose and gIasped the hand of DR..
Jacobus. Moderator of the Old, School,
and while the two men stood there with
both hands grasped, and both manifestly
under deep emotion, the vast assembly
burst into the grand old doxology,
sPraise God from whom all great bless
ings flow" it seemed the very acme of
the morally sublime.