Morning journal and courier., 1891-02-02
0f9 Yapra aailg alQ1otaiag Egoaraal aud Goarier.
principles of church government as form

principles of church government as form u1ated in the Saybrook platform of 1708.
 Here in Connecticut there were many moderate Presbyterians in Congregational magnify the independence of the local church, but leaned toward the subordina- ton of the churches to a synod or council They desired some ecclesiastical organiza- ton that could exercise something more than an advisory influence over the several churches. They were unwilling to recog- nize state church in which the power to regulate would be vested in the general court, although they endorsed the effort of the court to adjust differences and re- store harmony. The tendency in many quarters was in the direction of state church and congregational hierarchy. Saltonstall was dismissed from his church and became governor of the united colo nies. Backus says: "He was 8 great politician and he exerted all his in huence to raise the ministerial power as hi; h as possible. Whatever influences combined to make possible an attempt at ecclesiastical domination over the inde- pendent local churches, it is nevertheless true that the general assembly in 1708, being made sensible of the defects in church discipline, do hence ordain and require that the ministers of the several
  gates of the churches shall meet together at their respective county towns, there to deliberate on methods and rules for the same and to elect members of an assembly to be held in Saybrook at the charge of the public treasury of the colony, when the results of these deliberations shall be con- pared and form of ecclesiastical disei- pline drawn up." Accordingly twelve ministers and four laymen met at Say | brook and formulated the Saybrook plat form which established the consociational system of supervision with which we are | familiar. The platform was adopted by
 the synod and approved by the general | assembly.
 Consociated churches were thus estab- ished by law, and churches declining to
 adopt the Saybrook- Hartford, church-state platform were simply "allowed to exercise worship and discipline in their own way" What generous concession on the part of
 the establishment to the principle of church l independence! ''The system continued the legally established one in the state until 1784 and the voluntarily accepted method
 of the majority of the churches much
 longer"
 This church belongs to the system in
 augurated at Saybrook in 170S and is in- | cluded in the 'New Haven East Consocia- l tion." The session which was held in this
 church on the 9th of last October was the
 one hundred and eighty-frst annual meet
 ing. The churches, however, in this soci- ety under the leadership of Pierpont, the
 pastor of the First church, instruct
 cd their delegates to the first meet ing in 1709 to take care to secure our Con-
 gregational privileges" and they were
 careful to adopt written interpretation
 of the Saybrook platform before they or
 ganized the consolation. think I inter
 pret aright the spirit of the membership of
 this church to-day when I affirm that you
 would guard with equal care the Congre-
 gational privileges of the local church.
 The halfway covenant wrought it's evil
 legally established order visiting the
 churches in the state and subordinating
 the churches to the synods or consociationa
 also accomplished it's evil work and died
 as an established order, though in modi-
 fled form it lives, shorn of it's offensive
 power. The age of Jonathan Edwards is
 responsible for the death of both.