WILSON'S APPEAL, &c.

To the Moderator and Members of the Synod of Cincinnati, to meet in Dayton, on the 3d Thursday of October, 1835.

DEAR BRETHREN,

I appeal to you, from the proceedings and definitive sentence of the Presbytery of Cincinnati, in the case of charges brought before them, by me, against the Rev. Lyman Beecher, D. D.

For this appeal I offer the following reasons.

1. The Presbytery is chargeable with neglect of duty.They neglected to take up the charges till five months after they were tabled; and then deferred the trial two months longer, for which delays, they have assigned no reasons. (See dis. chap. 4, sec. 23.)

2. When they took up the charges, they made an ambiguous record as unkind as it was unjust to the prosecutor.

3. During the trial, Dr. Beecher was permitted to introduce much irrelevant matter, and irrelevant testimony.

4.

The Prosecutor was not permitted to read a letter over a responsible name, which was offered to the court as containing correct information on an important subject; but Dr. Beecher was permitted, when making his defence, to read several letters to influence the judgment of the court.

5. The judgment rendered, was unjust, injurious and erro

neous.

6. On one of the charges the Presbytery did not decide. 7. The Presbytery disregarded the rule of discipline, (chap. 5th, section 13th,) and they also disregarded the injunction of the Synod on the subject of exercising the discipline on those who " use words and phrases that disturb the peace of the

Church."

8. The Presbytery formed a creed for Dr. Beecher, not expressing what he believed and taught, when he published the sermons in question,-not what he admitted he preached in the 2d Presbyterian church in Cincinnati, but what they understood him to profess at the time of his trial.