"A soldier for Jesus, hallelujah!
Love and serve the Lord."
Father Dickson read from the Bible as follows:—
"Our rejoicing is this, the testimony of our consciences, that in simplicity and godly sincerity, not with fleshly wisdom, but by the grace of God, we have our conversation in the world."
Father Dickson had many gentle and quiet ways, peculiar to himself, of suggesting his own views to his brethren. Therefore, having read these verses, he paused, and asked Dr. Packthread "if he did not think there was danger of departing from this spirit, and losing the simplicity of Christ, when we conduct Christian business on worldly principles."
Dr. Packthread cordially assented, and continued to the same purpose in a strain so edifying as entirely to exhaust the subject; and Dr. Calker, who was thinking of the business that was before them, giving an uneasy motion here, they immediately united in the devotional exercises, which were led with great fervor by Dr. Cushing.
CHAPTER XLII. THE RESULT.
After the devotional services were over, Dr. Calker proceeded immediately with the business that he had in his mind. "Now, brother Cushing," he said, "there never was any instrumentality raised up by Providence to bring in the latter day equal to the Presbyterian Church in the United States of America. It is the great hope of the world; for here, in this country, we are trying the great experiment for all ages; and, undoubtedly, the Presbyterian Church comes the nearest perfection of any form of organization possible to our frail humanity. It is the ark of the covenant for this nation, and for all nations. Missionary enterprises to foreign countries, tract societies, home missionary, seamen's friend societies, Bible societies, Sunday-school unions, all are embraced in its bosom; and it grows in a free country, planted by God's own right hand, with such laws and institutions as never were given to mortal man before. It is carrying us right on to the millennium; and all we want is union. United, we stand the most glorious, the most powerful institution in the world. Now, there was no need for you southern brethren to be so restive as you were. We were doing all we could to keep down the fire, and keep things quiet, and you ought not to have bolted so. Since you have separated from us, what have we done? I suppose you thought we were going to blaze out in a regular abolition fury; but you see we haven't done it. We haven't done any more than when we were united. Just look at our minutes, and you'll see it. We have strong and determined abolitionists among us, and they are constantly urging and pushing. There have been great public excitements on the subject of slavery, and we have been plagued and teased to declare ourselves, but we haven't done it in a single instance—not one. You see that Ruskin and his clique have gone off from us, because we would hold still. It is true that now and then we had to let some anti-slavery man preach an opening sermon, or something of that sort; but, then, opening sermons are nothing; they don't commit anybody; they don't show the opinion of anybody but the speaker. In fact, they don't express any more than that declaration of eighteen hundred and eighteen, which stands unrepealed on your records, as well as on ours. Of course, we are all willing to say that slavery is an evil, 'entirely inconsistent with the spirit of the Gospel,' and all that, because that's on your own books; we only agree to say nothing about it, nowadays, in our public capacity, because what was said in eighteen hundred and eighteen is all-sufficient, and prevents the odium and scandal of public controversy now. Now, for proof that what I have just said is true, look at the facts. We had three presbyteries in slave-holding states when we started, and now we have over twenty, with from fifteen to twenty thousand members. That must show you what our hearts are on this subject. And have we not always been making overtures for reunion—really humbling ourselves to you, brethren? Now, I say you ought to take these facts into account; our slave-holding members and churches are left as perfectly undisturbed, to manage in their own way, as yours. To be sure, some of those western men will fire off a remonstrance once a year, or something of that sort. Just let them do that; it keeps them easy and contented. And, so long as there is really no interfering in the way of discipline or control, what harm is done? You ought to bear some with the northern brethren, unreasonable as they are; and we may well have a discussion every year, to let off the steam."