364 LIFE AND CORRESPONDENCE OF I'HE [^792 



you, that tlie day may not be far distant when Providence shall open 

 the door, and we shall avail ourselves of the opportunity for so good a 

 work. But if this be a duty, how much more so is the extending of aid 

 to those who are of one faith and one baptism with ourselves, but who, 

 from unavoidable causes, are without those means of public worship 

 whicli the Divine Author of our religion has accommodated to the 

 wants and weaknesses of human nature ; and which he saw to be, on 

 those accounts, necessary for upholding tlie profession of his name. 



The promise of Christ, to be with his Church to the end of the world, 

 will never fail; and yet particular branches of the universal church may 

 either flourish or decline, in proportion to their continuing in a pure 

 profession and suitable practice on the one hand, and to their falling 

 into error, or indifference and unholy living, on the other. However 

 prosperous, therefore, the beginning of our Church in this new world 

 hath been, she will have little reason to look up for a continuance of 

 the Divine blessing if, when she contemplates so many members of her 

 communion "scattered abroad, as sheep having no shepherd," she does 

 not use her diligence to bring them within Christ's fold, and to secure 

 to them a stated administration of the ordinances of his religion. 



Such was the care, in times past, of the bishops and of the most 

 eminent of the clergy and of the laity of the Church of England for the 

 fellow-members of their communion, when struggling with the difficul- 

 ties of settlement in the then infant colonies, now the independent 

 States of our confederated republic. The very existence of our Church 

 in some of these States must be ascribed, under the blessing of God, to 

 the aids, to wliich we here look back with gratitude. The degree of 

 her prosperity in every one of them must have been owing, more or 

 less, to the same cause: and therefore the example is what we ought, in 

 reason, to imitate; so as to consider our brethren on the frontiers as not 

 to be deserted because they are distant, but, from their remote situation, 

 as the especial objects of our concern. 



In accomplishing that labor of love, which has been projected by the 

 convention, we shall be doing what may be expected of us, not only as 

 Christians, but as good citizens of a land of liberty and law, the best 

 security of both being moral principles and habits; which can only be 

 derived from the influence of religion on the minds of the people. For 

 however it may be contended by some, tliat the sense of religion is un- 

 connected with the duties of civil life, we owe it to God and to our 

 country to guard the members of our church against that licentious 

 principle, and accordingly to endeavor the extension of Christian 

 knowledge, as well with a view to temporal peace and prosperity as for 

 the securing of the immortal happiness of a better life. 



Under the impression of these sentiments, we hope for the concur- 

 rence of all tlie members of our church in the undertaking now proposed 

 to them: and intending, with the Divine aid, to exert our best abilities 



