CHAPTER LXIII.

JOHN KING (1726-1762),

MINISTER OF DROMARA.

1. A Letter to the Rev. Mr. Fisher of Glasgow respecting the conduct of Seceders in Ireland, dated Drummaragh, March 21st, 1748. [Republished in a pamphlet entitled A View of Seceders, pp. 35. Belfast, 1748.] W. D. K. 2. A Letter to the Protestant Dissenters in the North of Ireland, occasioned by some Teachers from Scotland called Seceders. By a Protestant Dissenter. 12mo, pp. 14. 1748. M. C. D.

JOHN KING was a Scottish probationer, who, having come to Ireland, was received into connection with the Synod of Ulster in 1719, and was ordained as minister of Dromara, in County Down, on the 14th of December, 1726.

From 1745 the Associate Presbytery, consisting of several ministers whom patronage and moderatism had driven out of the Church of Scotland, began to find a footing in Ulster, and to send over ministers and probationers to diffuse their sentiments and to gather adherents out of the congregations of the Synod. One of the fathers of the Secession, the Rev. James Fisher of Glasgow, visited the country himself in the spring of 1747, and preached in various districts. Many of the ministers, naturally enough, were suspicious of these Seceding preachers, and regarded them as unwarranted intruders, coming, under pretence of preaching the Gospel, to sow disaffection among the people, and to gather a flock out of pastures where they had no sheep

of their own. This was always the case when the minister, into whose bounds one of these evangelical raids was made, happened to be a New Light man, or was known to sympathise with New Light principles. But, on the other hand, some of the ministers and many of the people admired the courageous stand which the Seceders had made against patronage in Scotland, and thought that their ministrations in the North of Ireland would lend strength to the cause of orthodoxy and truth.

Among the ministers who cherished these friendly feelings to the strangers was the Rev. James Allen (1726-1752), minister of the new congregation which had broken off from Dr. Colville at Dromore, at whose house Mr. Fisher was "kindly entertained," and where he met with Mr. King of Dromara. Their conversation turned on the religious condition of Ulster, and the two ministers satisfied Mr. Fisher that they were favourably disposed to Gospel principles, that they deplored the unevangelical sentiments of some of their brethren, and that they meant to lay before the approaching Synod, about to meet in Magherafelt, a statement of grievances. These grievances, in the main, were that the terms of subscription to the Westminster Confession were not sufficiently stringent, and that false doctrine had crept into the Church, and was likely to spread among ministers and people. Mr. Fisher, from the conversation, was led to indulge the hope that, through the instrumentality of these two gentlemen, he would be able to lay a train which would result in the disruption of the Synod; that he could persuade the more evangelical of the ministers formally to withdraw from communion with their brethren, and thus create in Ulster a great secession which would give instant strength and stability to the new sect, that was then endeavouring to sow its principles far and wide over the country with all the ardour of the founders of a new faith. He advised that, should their representation be refused by the Synod, they ought to be provided with a protest, in which they could declare their seces

sion from the Synod, and claim the right to constitute themselves into a Presbytery, where they would be free to "prosecute the ends of a testimony for the purity of doctrine, worship, discipline, and government attained unto in the Kirk of Scotland, and solemnly engaged unto by the three kingdoms."

But when Mr. King thought over the matter with more care and deliberation, he did not consider it wise or expedient to adopt the extreme course which Mr. Fisher suggested. He had no ambition to be the founder of a sect or party. He was not convinced that he could do more for Christ outside the Synod than within it. No restraint was laid upon him in his present connection; nay, full liberty was given him to use his utmost efforts to advance the cause of Christ. He could not forget that the Synod only twenty years before had by a great effort cast from it the New Light ministers; and that although some of its members were not decidedly evangelical, yet every one of them had signed the Confession of Faith, and none of them had, so far, avowed either Arian or Arminian opinions. He considered, moreover, that were he to secede, he would leave behind him many in the Synod as thoroughly evangelical as himself, who could not see that the time for secession had yet come, and who could not bring themselves to think that secession was any certain remedy for every ecclesiastical evil. For these reasons Mr. King shrunk from the step suggested, and his representation of grievances resulted in the Synod of 1747 issuing a paper entitled The Serious Warning, in which they guarded their people against the errors and errorists of their times, not forgetting the Seceders themselves.

Mr. Fisher could not conceal his bitter disappointment, that a course of procedure from which he had hoped so much resulted in nothing, or in what he considered worse than nothing. He addressed a letter to Mr. King, dated 18th January, 1748, in which, under pretext of correcting some reports in circulation *See a copy of this paper in Killen, vol. iii. ch. xxvii. p. 264.

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regarding himself and his recent tour, he takes the opportunity to manifest the chagrin he felt that events had taken a turn so very contrary to the ardent expectations he had formed. This production was at once put into circulation among the members of Mr. King's congregation, and others in the North of Ireland. The minister of Dromara replied in a letter dated 21st of March, 1748, addressed to Mr. Fisher, in which he enlarged on the irregular way in which the Seceders had intruded among the congregations of the North, and justified his conduct and ecclesiastical position with some degree of success. Both letters were re-issued in a pamphlet at the suggestion of the Synod, which met at Magherafelt in 1748.

The Letter to the Protestant Dissenters, issued anonymously, but ascribed to Mr. King in Dr. Reid's Catalogue, was published that same year. It is an attempt to excite political prejudice against the new sect, as if they were disaffected to Government. If the tract was really written by King, it was scarcely worthy of him to come forth anonymously with such charges, when he had not ventured to make them in the letter to Fisher published with his name. Controversy, however, excites strong feeling, and men under the influence of strong feeling sometimes write, as well as say and do, things of which they themselves in cooler moments would, it is hoped, be ashamed. Mr. King died on the 9th of November, 1762.*

METHODS OF SECEDERS.

Why are these methods so chimerical and fantastic, and at the same time of so bad an aspect on Christianity? Here, so far as I can see, in effect all is done by some kind of magic in names. The Seceders got a name in this country, and I believe I sometime helped to it. Upon this, without further evidence, some people must have Seceder preachers. In order to this, they get a paper signed with some number of names and sent over to you, where names seem to have an all-empowering power, without your knowing any of those whose names these are, or why they are

*MS. Minutes of Synod: Reid's MS. Catalogue: King's Letter.

sent. Upon this, and as now having the state of a Church in a neighbouring kingdom duly laid before you, and as having that Church duly represented, in order to judge of her most intricate weighty affairs, when never a commissioner from said Church appears, you send over your delegates to disband our associations, though these were formed-I mean, our Congregational, Presbyterial, and Synodical-upon the plan of your own Confession of Faith. These delegates go on and manage still by the same engine of names. If they get a paper with some number of names-and a small number I am told will do, and very clandestinely obtained, and thus that they have the name of an invitation-they will come into any congregation and preach, without any concurrence of the minister or Presbytery to whom such congregation belongs, or making any apology or compliments to them; and there, upon the names that especially ministers have got, they will condemn ministers and judicatories, against whom never has anything been proven, or so much as alleged, if it was not behind backs, and first by the Seceders. Thus, and I need go no further, there is a management by a hitherto unknown power of names, in great defiance to the power of Christianity on men's hearts, and whereby its inviolablest obligations are horribly trampled upon. Can such things stand a revisal in one's cool thoughts where there is any ingenuous thought ?-Letter to Fisher, pp. 14, 15.

REASONS AGAINST A DISRUPTION IN THE SYNOD.

It is most certain, and unquestionably so in the eye of jealousy itself, that a very considerable number of the members of our Synod are as firmly attached to the doctrine of our Confession as any men whosoever. Now how could we part with these, which yet likely we might be obliged to, if we seceded from the Synod at that time; for they might not see cause for a secession at that time, though we might? And might not there be a great number of the members absent, as sometimes there is a vast number of absentees, that you would hardly say we are a Synod? And what could we propose by breaking with the Synod? They don't hinder us to preach sound doctrine, nor of any other duty; and may we not give a testimony to the truth to as much effect in our Synod, as anywhere else were we separated from it, and have error more effectually condemned? While our Synod keeps up the same profession, there is nothing inconsistent with our Confession of Faith; but they must condemn it synodically, or else be inconsistent with themselves, and then the world would justify our breaking with them: whoever gives not in to such condemnation of error and the erroneous, we can declare them not of our Synod, however great a majority these may be. But I need not proceed on such planning of things, now it manifestly appears that nothing we can do will be pleasing to you. You will either find or make faults, and all