[bourinot] builders OF NOVA SCOTIA B3 



which were cultivated and tended with such loving care by his father and 

 mother, who brought with them their fine English tastes and habits. For 

 more than sixty years, after he had left the Bar, for which he was 

 educated, and joined the Baptist Church in 1827, he exerted a remarkable 

 influence in its affairs, especially in connection with Acadia College, which 

 he was proud to see established on a firm foundation long before his death. 

 Originally connected with the Church of England, and educated in old 

 King's, he formed an association with the Granville Street Baptist Church 

 when it was established nearly thi-ee-quarters of a century ago, principally 

 by individuals who had recentl}' separated from the communion of the 

 Church of England — notably the Honourable James W. Johnston, the 

 Pryors and others of high standing in the social and political life of the 

 province.^ U]) to that time the Baptists were, as a body, poor, illiterate 

 and unimportant in every sense, from a worldly point of view. The 

 ministry were ignorant and even antagonistic to regular theological or 

 liberal training. The conversion of such men as Dr. Crawley, with 

 superior intellectual powers and learned attainments, brought about a 

 remarkable change in the mental development and numerical growth of 

 the Baptist Church in the Maritime Provinces, where it still occupies a 

 position much in advance of that held by the same body in other parts of 

 the Dominion. Dr. Crawley was in every sense a gentleman, not simply 

 by artificial training, but by natural instincts inherited from a fine strain 

 of blood. He was dignified and urbane, full of benevolent sympathy for 

 young and old, and the language in which he clothed the elevated 



1 See " Origin and formation of the Baptist Cnurch in Granville Street, Hali- 

 fax, N.S., constituted on the 30th September, 1827, in which some notice is taken of 

 the influence of Evangelical truth and of the motives which induced a recent 

 separation from the Church of England. Halifax : Printed at the Nova Scotian 

 Office, 1828." Svo. See also in this connection a series of interesting articles on the 

 " History of St. Paul's Chuich," by the Reverend G. W. Hill, D.C.L., in the Collections 

 of the N. S. Hist. Soc, for 187S, 1879-80, 1882-83, vols. I, II, III. Dr. Hill gives copies 

 of the original documents showing the nature of the serious dispute, which com- 

 menced in 1824 and ended eventually in the secession of a number of influential people 

 from the Church of England. The difficulty originated with the appointment by the 

 Imperial Government of the Reverend Robert Willis, afterwards Archdeacon, to the 

 rectorship of St. Paul's on the elevation of Dr. Inglis to the Episcopal See vacant by 

 the death of Bishop Stanser. The members of the congregation were generally in 

 favour of the appointment of the Reverend John Thomas Twining, who had been for 

 nearly eight years assistant to Dr. Inglis, and strenuously resisted the contention — 

 undoubtedly right in law — that it was the prerogative of the Crown to choose a suc- 

 cessor to the rectorship of the parish. Dr. Willis was "inducted " in due course, as 

 the Crown refused to give up its right, and the Society for the Propagation of the 

 Gospel, which contributed to the support of the church, also selected the new 

 rector as its missionary. The schism was too deep to be bridged over by any con- 

 ciliatory counsels, and such men as the Honourable James W. Johnston, who had 

 very democratic ideis as to the control of parochial affairs, ere long joined the 

 Baptists and gave them new vigour. I remember perfectly well the Venerable 

 Archdeacon Willis who remained in charge of the parish for forty years, and won, as 

 Dr. Hill, his successor, very truly says, " by his conciliatory spirit and benevolent 

 course of life the good-will of the people." 



