senters the right to maintain public worship. Following that act a movement arose in the vicinity of London to unite the two denominations. It appears to have been confined to the ministers, the churches as such taking no part in it. Increase Mather, then in England representing Massachusetts colony, his son Cotton tells us was most prominent in the movement, and that without him the union would not have been effected. It accomplished little in England, but like the Savoy Synod its results were remembered in this country long after they were forgotten abroad. The Presbyterians and Congregationalists about London soon got into a doctrinal controversy about a document written nearly fifty years before, but which was first published about the time the Union was formed; and the discussion speedily brought the Union to an end. The Heads of Agreement were sufficiently vague to avoid sharp dissent by either party, but they in the main represented the Congregational way at that time. They declared that the time and manner of regeneration are not to be insisted on as evidence of fitness for partaking of the Lord's Supper; that neighboring ministers should examine candidates for installation into the pastorate; that the officers of a church should manage its affairs, but that if the people object to their doings efforts should be made to satisfy them; that the churches should associate together for mutual advice and help, and that their advice ought to be followed.

These Heads of Agreement were adopted by the Saybrook Synod, but they did not furnish rules for that stricter government of the churches which the Legislature had called for. Therefore another docu

ment was prepared, consisting mainly of the draft of rules proposed by the New Haven county meeting, but modified by suggestions from the Hartford representatives leaning further toward Presbyterianism. It consisted of fifteen "Articles for the Administration of Church Discipline." These articles affirmed that the elder or elders of a church ought to administer church discipline; that the churches of each county should unite in a consociation; that all cases of scandal should be tried before a council of such churches; that all such cases should be decided by the majority vote of the council; that fellowship should be withdrawn from any pastor or church refusing to abide by such decision; that in any case of difficulty not satisfactorily settled by such a council, an appeal might under certain conditions be taken to a larger council; that a church might call a council of the churches with which it is consociated, but that an offending brother could not have the privilege without the consent of the church; that a council should be permanent till new delegates should be chosen. It was also provided that permanent associations of ministers should be formed to consider the interests of the churches, to examine candidates for the ministry, and to look after cases of ministerial heresy or scandal. To these associations churches wanting pastors were directed to apply, and in case any such church should not promptly seek a pastor the association should complain of its neglect to the General Court. The last of the fifteen articles recommended that the several county associations should meet annually by delegates in a general association.

The similarity of this scheme to that of the Pro

posals of 1705 is apparent. Indeed, the language of the fifteen articles is in some parts identical with that of the Proposals. The consociations of churches were intended to be, in effect, standing councils, and the ministerial associations were meant, not only to preserve the doctrinal and moral purity of the ministry, but to guard authoritatively the general interests of the churches. In Massachusetts the Proposals received no indorsement from the civil authorities. But in Connecticut the General Court, the month following the meeting of the Saybrook Synod, made its "Confession of Faith, Heads of Agreement, and Regulations in the Administrations of Church Discipline," a part of the law of the colony, ordaining "that all the churches within this government that are or shall be thus united in doctrine, worship and discipline, be, and for the future shall be owned and acknowledged established by law." The court ordered the symbols adopted at Saybrook to be printed and distributed at the expense of the colony. The volume, the first book ever published in Connecticut, was printed in New London in 1710.

The action of the synod and its confirmation by the General Court produced various effects. In each county a consociation of churches and an association of ministers were formed; in Hartford County two of each. Some individual churches opposed the system, with results which in later years caused sharp disputes. The New Haven consociation found it too strict and the Fairfield consociation too liberal. Each body placed on record its own interpretation of the rules of church discipline. New Haven inclined toward the principles of Congregationalism, laying special emphasis on the Heads of Agreement; but Fairfield, placing

a strict interpretation on the fifteen articles, practically constituted itself a court with power to declare sentence of excommunication against an offending church. The results of this ecclesiastical law will appear in the later history when we come to consider the Plan of Union entered into between Congregationalists and Presbyterians in 1801.

The Saybrook Platform ceased to be civil law in 1784 when the statutes of Connecticut were revised. When the present State constitution was adopted in 1818 all special privileges were withdrawn from the Congregational body, and all religious associations in the State were left purely voluntary. The true Congregational principle then prevailed. But though the churches were at that time legally disestablished the consocia tion system survived. In 1841 all except fifteen of the two hundred and forty-six Congregational churches of Connecticut were consociated, and in 1892 four consociations, the Fairfield East and West, the New Haven East and the Litchfield South, survived, with a membership of seventy-one out of three hundred and six churches. The authority of these bodies, however, has been more and more limited till the ecclesiastical government established by the Saybrook Synod has practically passed away. The integrity and sufficiency of each Congregational church in Connecticut is maintained as in every other State. Yet, as results of the movements we have described in Massachusetts and Connecticut, we have the local and general organizations of churches now to be found in every State and the associations of ministers, which still, in some parts of the country, examine and approve candidates for the ministry.

CHAPTER XII.

D

THE GREAT AWAKENING.

URING the entire first quarter of the eighteenth

century war was being waged, with greater or less intensity, between the New England colonies and the Indians; and during the preceding twenty-five years, since the beginning of King Philip's war in 1674, the country had known hardly a single year of peace. The French ceased active hostilities from the time of the treaty of Utrecht in 1713. But they continued to incite the Indians to pillage the English settlements, especially along the eastern frontier, and they killed or carried into captivity many of the settlers. War inflames the passions of men, and indisposes communities to a high degree of spiritual life.

Internal dissensions also engaged and at times absorbed the attention of the people. The adminis tration of Thomas Dudley, as governor of Massachusetts, from 1702 to 1715, was one continuous struggle between him and the representatives of the people in the Lower House, in which some of the ministers bore a not inconspicuous part. The career of his successor, Samuel Shute, was not much more peaceful. Cotton Mather had considerable influence in securing Dudley's appointment; but he afterward bitterly regretted it. Dudley had in his earlier years spoken of Dr. Increase Mather as his spiritual father; and at one time when Dudley was preparing for the