A HISTORY OF LANCASHIRE 



are evidence of the complete change which had come over English Dissent. 

 The object of the association was to suppress If possible the terms fresDy- 

 terian 'and 'Independent.' It did not succeed in doing that, for the terms 

 .till survived. But it succeeded in doing something more : it broke down 

 all the boundaries between the two terms, and made them almost mdistm- 

 guishable For in the terms of the association*" the Independents gave up 

 fheir root idea that in each congregation the seat of government lay not m 

 the minister but in the fellowship of church members possessing power to 



ordain a minister. r „ j •, 



Such was the confusion of terminology in 1700. What followed next ? 

 Presumably when the voluntary associations fell into abeyance from sheer indif- 

 ference the component parts retreated each to the shadow of their old names. 

 In Evans' MS. list of the Dissenting churches 1715-27, preserved in the 

 Dr. Williams' library, the churches are marked P (Presbyterian), I (Indepen- 

 dent), and A or B (Anabaptist or Baptist). In Lancashire he enumerates 

 forty-eight Dissenting meeting-places. Of these he marks forty-three as 

 Presbyterian, four as Independent, and one as Anabaptist. Throughout the 

 country at large the assertion is made (and may be allowed) that half the 

 Dissenting congregations were styled Presbyterian. All that these figures 

 prove is the chaos that had descended upon the term itself. It had become 

 a generic term almost devoid of specific meaning. Of the forty-three chapels 

 which are styled Presbyterian in 171 8 in the above list twenty-two at least 

 became and now are Unitarian, and at least six became and now are Indepen- 

 dent. Only three out of the whole list, Risley, Tunley, and Warton, are now 

 represented by Presbyterian chapels.*'" 



These are the links by which the modern Presbyterians of Lancashire 

 can claim association with the hazy Presbyterian churches of the Old 

 Dissent, and in the case of every one the link is broken by almost a century's 

 intervening Independency. 



The simple fact would thus appear to be that the Presbyterian churches 

 in Lancashire, so far from being the oldest, are actually the youngest there, 

 and in addition represent a distinct importation. The renaissance of Presby- 

 terianism in England which marks the years 1820—76 was due to the Evan- 

 gelical movement of 1 8 i 2 in the Church of Scotland, though a few isolated 

 attempts at a similar propaganda had taken place earlier in the county.*'" 



In 1 83 1 a Lancashire Presbytery was formed by the United Secession 

 (afterwards the United Presbyterian) Synod, but in 1836 this Presbytery only 

 numbered five charges, and of these only four were in Lancashire, viz. Oldham 

 Street and Rodney Street, Liverpool ; St. Peter's Square, Manchester ; and 

 Ramsbottom. In the latter year a convention met at Manchester, and as a 

 result the Lancashire Presbytery and the North-west of England Presbytery 

 were formed into a synod, and from that moment the movement began to 



"' 'Heads of the Agreement' of the London ministers in 1691. 



*" Risley Chnrch became Unitarian in the eighteenth century and was only secured by the Presbyterians, 

 in 1836 by a Chancery decree. Warton Church became Congregational, and so remained up to 1847, when 

 the deeds passed mto Presbyterian hands. Tunley or Mossy Lea Church became Independent, and very 

 possibly during a part of the eighteenth century (during at least the ministry of William Gaskell, 1776-7) 

 bocinian or Unitanan. Its connexion with the Scottish Presbyterians was accomplished as a completely new 

 departure during the ministry of Robert Dinwiddle, 1797-1 835. 



"» These efforts were at Blackburn, Wigan, Liverpool, Bolton, and Manchester. 



