PEESBYTEEIANS. 



637 



clined to enter the union, and now call them- 

 selves the " Associate Synod of North America " 

 and the "Associate Eeformed Synod of New- 

 York." The former body consists of 4 Presby- 

 teries, 12 ministers, 40 congregations, 514 fami- 

 lies, 1,091 members. The contributions for 

 benevolent purposes were $326.07. The lat- 

 ter has 16 ministers and about 1,600 commu- 

 nicants. 



Besides these two bodies, there is, in the 

 Southern States, the "Associate Eeformed 

 Presbyterian Church South," with about 70 

 ministers. 



VI. EEFORMED PRESBYTERIANS. Of these 

 there are two organizations, the "General 

 Synod of the Eeformed Presbyterian Church " 

 and the "Synod of the Eeformed Presbyte- 

 rian Church." The statistics of the General 

 Synod were: Pastors, 77; number of fami- 

 lies, 3,026; number of communicants, 8,487; 

 contributed to foreign missions, $6,482.68; 

 home missions, $2,340.93; freedmen's mis- 

 sions, $3,429.86; seminary, $1,424.16; and 

 all other objects, $25,676.26. The "Synod" 

 has 63 ministers and 5,821 communicants. The 

 General Synod of the Eeformed Presbyterian 

 Church met at Pittsburg, Pa., in the latter 

 part of May. Its action was not favorable to 

 the policy of a general union of the Presbyte- 

 rian Churches. It went so far as to adopt reso- 

 lutions in favor of union with those churches 

 whose doctrines, order, and worship, corre- 

 spond with its own, and appointed a commit- 

 tee to correspond on the subject. It confined 

 its invitation, however, to the United Presby- 

 terian Church, and the Eeformed Presbyterian 

 Synod. In other respects the General Synod 

 manifested a fixed -determination to adhere to 

 its order unchanged, especially to those rules 

 forbidding the singing of hymns or any compo- 

 sitions but those of divine inspiration. Mr. 

 George -H. Stuart, formerly President of the 

 United States Christian Commission, who had 

 often joined with congregations of other de- 

 nominations in singing hymns, and had com- 

 muned in churches differing in doctrine and 

 orders from the Eeformed Presbyterian, was 

 censured for his offence against the rules of 

 the Church, and suspended from his offices and 

 membership until he should acknowledge his 

 error, and submit to the law and authority of 

 the Church. A disclaimer and repudiation of 

 this action of the General Assembly has been 

 addressed to the public, signed by thirteen of 

 the delegates who voted against it. 



VII. CUMBERLAND PRESBYTERIAN CHTTRCH. 

 The following estimate of , statistics was 

 given in 1868 by a leading paper of this 

 Church : Communicants, 130,000 ; ministers, 

 1,500 ; general assembly, 1 ; synods, 24 ; pres- 

 byteries, 99. 



The General Assembly of the Cumberland 

 Presbyterian Church met at Lincoln, 111., May 

 21. It was the largest that had convened in 

 the history of the Church. The publishing 

 interests of the Church continue in a prosper- 



ous condition. The receipts for the year were 

 $6,991.24, making the total capital of the es- 

 tablishment $12,208.98. A memorial was pre- 

 sented asking the Assembly to declare affirma- 

 tively upon the following propositions : 



1. That things secular and civil belong to the State. 



2. That things moral and ecclesiastical belong to 

 the Church. 



3. That in regard to things which are mixed, being 

 partly secular and civil, and partly moral and ecclesi- 

 astical, the secular and civil aspects belong to the 

 State, but the moral and ecclesiastical aspects "belong 

 to the Church. 



4. That it is the prerogative of the Church of 

 Christ to sanction correct morals, to express its 

 views through the pulpit, the press, and the various 

 judicatures, on all moral questions, regardless of 

 civil codes or political creeds. 



The answer adopted by the Assembly reit- 

 erated the statement of the Confession of 

 Faith on the first proposition. It considered 

 the second " not respectful to the State, as a 

 power ordained of God. For there are many 

 moral questions over which the State has 

 jurisdiction also." It is agreed substantially 

 with the third, judging that in questions of 

 divided jurisdiction, while the Church is to be 

 free and untrammelled in her teaching and ad- 

 judication, she must be wise and prudent, and 

 will find ample instructions in her just and 

 scriptural standards. It declared agreement 

 with the fourth, except as to the phrase " civil 

 codes," and that while it is the prerogative 

 and duty of the Church to reprove and rebuke 

 all sin, and approve and establish all righteous- 

 ness and true holiness, she should not put her- 

 self in an attitude of defiance or disregard for 

 the civil laws of the land. 



VIII. THE ESTABLISHED CHURCH OF SCOT- 

 LAND. The General Assembly of this Church, 

 which met on the 21st of May, resolved against 

 the disestablishment of the Irish Church, by a 

 vote of 211 to 81. A committee was appointed 

 to inquire into the alleged evils of patronage, 

 and to consider what modifications could be 

 made. The number of communicants was re- 

 ported at 259,861. The contributions to society 

 and benevolent funds were as follows : Home 

 purposes, 132,954 4s. 8%d. ; foreign missions, 

 20,883 5s. 6<Z.; other assembly schemes, 11,- 

 265 Os. Wd. ; total 165,093 11s. Ofd. 



IX. FREE CHURCH OF SCOTLAND. The Gen- 

 eral Assembly of this Church voted, 427 to 105, 

 in favor of a union with the United Presby- 

 terian Church. The Irish disestablishment 

 question was not voted on in the General As- 

 sembly at its regular session, but a meeting of 

 the Commission of the Assembly, on the 17th 

 of June, voted 99 to 34 in favor of disestab- 

 lishment. 



The contributions to society and benev- 

 olent funds were as follows : Sustentation 

 fund, 128,549 7s. Qd.- local building fund, 

 56,279 3s. 5fd. ; congregational fund, 126,- 

 843 17s. 4^d. ; missions and education, 66,- 

 729 16s. 11^.; miscellaneous, 17,652 6s. 10d.; 

 total 395,559 12s. 4%d. 



X. UNITED PRESBYTERIAN SYNOD OF GREAT 



