harmony prevailed. The sermons and addresses were peculiarly impressive; and it was evident that the ministers and friends of the Independent churches in North Wales have been greatly encouraged and strengthened by the visit of the English Deputation, so that here is ground to hope that it will prove a lasting blessing to the churches of the principality.

CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE AMERICAN CHURCHES.

GENERAL ASSOCIATION OF CONNECTICUT.

This body of Congregational ministers and churches consists of twelve distinct associations, which comprises 243 churches. It held its last annual meeting at the house of the Rev. Leonard Bacon, in New Haven, on the 18th of June, 1840, when thirty-five delegates were present from the association, besides the representatives of six corresponding bodies.

A letter from the Congregational Union of England and Wales having been read, a committee was appointed to draw up a reply. The following letter was prepared by them, and adopted by the meeting:

"New Haven, June 18, 1840. "The General Association of Connecticut to the Congregational Union of England and Wales.

"Beloved brethren in Christ-It gave us joy to hear read, at the opening of your present session, your truly fraternal letter, under date of May last. It was very pleasant to receive the expression of your sympathy and love, and to know, that on the ground of our common faith and common interests, we have a remembrance in your prayers.

"Be assured, dear brethren, that our hearts are drawn to you, not only by the ties of our common Christianity, but by the remembrance of our origin, as formed among the churches of your land; and most heartily do we reciprocate every expression of fellowship and love contained in your very acceptable epistle.

"By what means your communication of March, 1838, together with the documents mentioned as sent with it, failed of reaching us, we know not. But neither has come to hand; and it is owing to this, and not to any indifference to intercourse with you, that our correspondence, so pleasantly begun, has for some time past been interrupted. We joyfully resume it, and while we feel that your churches and ours are bound to each other by ties, so many and so strong, that fellowship between them cannot but be sweet and endearing, we wish to add, that we shall be most ready to hold intercourse with you, either by mutual delegation, or by interchange of documents and correspondence.

"The printed minutes of our present meeting, accompanying this, will make you acquainted with the general state of our churches. We are just now closing the annual session of this body, which has been one of much interest and harmony. We bless our heavenly Father for the sweet influence of his grace upon us and our churches, and while we praise him for the past tokens of his favour, we go home to the work he has assigned us, with new confidence in his love, and with brighter hopes of his assisting grace in future.

"Our prayer for you, dear brethren, and for the churches in connexion with you, is, that the God of peace and love may dwell among you, and give great success to all your endeavours to build up the kingdom of our common Lord. We hear with joy of what you are doing to extend the triumphs of the cross in your own and in other lands; and especially of your praiseworthy and most successful efforts in the great cause of human rights and African emancipation. May your zeal and success in these good works be greatly increased, and the friends of Christ all over the earth

soon be united in putting forth their utmost energies for the advancement of the great cause of religion and freedom throughout the world.

"Most heartily, beloved brethren, do we unite, in the prayer expressed in your letter, that your country and ours may abide in peace, that no war or strife may arise between the parent and the daughter people,' who should always be as one. The heart sickens at the thought, that between two great Christian nations, like yours and ours, on whose mutual efforts and continued co-operation the advancement of the cause of God in our world so greatly depends, there should ever exist anything but mutual attachment and the most kindly good feelings. Let our united prayers ascend to the God of nations, that he may preserve your country and ours in firm and ever enduring peace. We bid you farewell, dear brethren, in the name of the Lord, and wish all grace and peace to be multiplied to you, from God the Father, and Jesus Christ our Lord. Signed on behalf of the Association,

"DAVID D. FIELD, Moderator.

"Thomas Smith, Scribe. Henry N. Day, Assistant Scribe."

Congregational Library, Blomfield-street, Finsbury, London, July 12th, 1841.
To the General Association of Connecticut.

Beloved Brethren IN CHRIST-Your fraternal letter to the Congregational Union of England and Wales, dated 18th of June, 1840, in reply to a communication from the Union to you of the previous May, was received in due course, and was presented to the annual assembly of the Union, at an adjourned meeting held on the 14th of May last. It was welcomed as a pleasant token of your Christian affection. It gave joy to the brethren present, as assuring them of your readiness to maintain fraternal relations and correspondence with their body-a privilege and pleasure they very highly prize. The assembly gave directions to their executive committee to reply, in its name, to your letter with all affection and respect-a duty they now proceed with great pleasure to perform.

We much regret the loss of the letter addressed to you in March, 1838, and the long delay in the private hand to which it was entrusted, of that to which you have so promptly and fraternally responded. We will henceforth avail ourselves of the excellent post-office arrangements of the two countries, by which letters can, with so much speed and certainty, be exchanged. For pamphlets, the favour of private conveyance may be more suitably sought, as the charges of the London post-office on such packets are very heavy. But any medium will be welcome to us by which we may be enabled to secure the pleasures and advantages of a regular correspondence with your beloved association. The printed documents you mention, have safely reached us. We greatly value them, for the information of your affairs they contain; and we shall carefully preserve them as records of your body, and tokens of your fraternal kindness. Nor will we fail to transmit for your use whatever documents printed by us we can suppose suitable to inform or interest you, respecting our affairs. We deem it most profitable on all accounts that one body of Christians should know the estate and affairs of another; and we think that such mutual acquaintance between societies of believers is doubly pleasant and profitable, when reciprocally communicated from one to another, in the spirit and for the promotion of fraternal sympathy.

We are far from having abandoned the intention of sending a second delegation to visit and salute in our name the various bodies of beloved Christian brethren in your country, with whom it is our happiness to correspond. The accomplishment of this purpose we find attended with serious difficulties, and wait some favourable opportunity to open the way before us; but as soon as we discern such an occasion, we shall gladly avail ourselves of it; and you may be assured, dear brethren, that no

delegation from us will cross the Atlantic without instructions to use every effort to obtain personal conference with all the associated bodies of Congregational churches in New England. We look forward with pleasing expectation to the time when this design may be effected.

Many and strong are the ties, beloved brethren, that bind you and us in sympathy and love. Our common Christianity is indeed the first and noblest of them all. Love to the Divine Saviour, his glorious Gospel, his blessed cause, is indeed the root and bond of our love to each other. But this general primary feeling of affection among the disciples of Christ, is between us made more close and effectual by many points of remarkable specific agreement. In the great family of Christians we are near kinsmen. It is not so much that we are of the same national stock-for we regard you as Englishmen, dwelling in America-but that in our national history your forefathers and ours adopted the same opinions, shared in the same struggles, endured the same sufferings; and it was for religion and conscience that we are separated from our brethren of the same people; your forefathers by exile abroad, ours by persecutions at home-and we and you still equally retain the same distinctive views for which our forefathers witnessed and suffered. The doctrines of the Gospel as they interpreted them, we still hold. The spirit of the Gospel as they received it, still animates our churches. The polity of the Gospel as they administered it, we still, with few modifications, maintain. And when, after the lapse of two centuries, we trace the working and the results of our cherished principles-you, in the new form of society founded by your fathers expressly to be their depository and exemplification-we, in that old and venerable and beloved nation, wherein all the institutions, records, interests, and feelings of society, have been all along adverse to them-what causes do we respectively discern for gratitude, satisfaction, and sympathy! Are not our peculiar views of Christianity proved by long experience to be most favourable to the truth, purity, and power of the Gospel? to the liberty, intelligence, and welfare of men? Do we not find the strongest reasons, in such a review, to venerate our fathers, to adhere to our principles, to love one another? We must mutually own the good hand of our God upon us, that we are not now as churches blighted by heresy, torn with divisions, or sunk in apathy, with "a name to live while we are dead." Causes for humiliation are with us many. We doubt not you would readily make a like acknowledgment. But with both you and us causes for gratitude are also many and great; while every reason for humiliation on the one hand, or for gratitude on the other, will be well improved, if employed to quicken to more vigilance, and to rouse to more activity.

We rejoice to hear of your welfare; we give thanks on your behalf for all the blessings with which your churches have been visited. We offer earnest prayer for your enlargement, prosperity, and peace. For ourselves, we doubt not, you will rejoice to be informed, that, amidst many and serious difficulties, we are still cheered by proofs of the Divine blessing: our churches grow and multiply, our pastors are faithful and energetic, our efforts to extend the Gospel at home, in the British colonies, in the heathen world, are prosecuted, we believe, with increased vigour and liberality. The agitation and controversies incident to the present period, in our country, are, we are persuaded, on the whole, made to subserve and advance the interests of truth. We still rejoice in the continuance of peace between our respective nations, and pray that it may long, that it may to the end, remain unbroken. For nations with free and liberal institutions, with representative governments and commercial greatness, peace must be the true policy. To the churches planted in those nations, and intent on using all their advantages of science, wealth, navigation, freedom for the spread of the glorious Gospel, their peace must be beyond expression important and dear. As the God of heaven giveth peace upon the earth, in what way is it so

likely to be obtained, to be prolonged, as by the prayers of the churches of Christ, when they plead for peace, that they may use its advantages for the extension of his kingdom?

Brethren, on our part this fraternal correspondence is indeed refreshing; we invite your further communications, and with all affection commend you to the love and grace of God, our Saviour.

Signed by direction of the Committee of the Congregational Union of England and Wales. A. WELLS, Secretary.

The following fraternal letter has also been transmitted to the Congregational Association of New York State, in answer to a communication from that body, agreeably to the instructions of the last Annual Assembly of the Union :

Congregational Library, Blomfield Street, Finsbury,
London, June 14, 1841.

To the General Congregational Association of the State of New York,
U. S. North America.

BRETHREN GREATLY BELOVED IN OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST,-Two most welcome and highly valued communications from you to the Congregational Union of England and Wales, were laid before the recent annual assembly of that body, at an adjourned meeting held on the 14th of May last, one bearing date 11th of May, 1840, and the signatures of the brethren, John Smith and G. R. Haswell, as the Committee appointed by the meeting of your association, at which a communication from us was read, to reply thereto on its behalf. This letter from our Union, dated 10th of July, 1839, would seem to have been long delayed by the individual to whose care it was forwarded for you. Your other valued letter is of date 29th August, 1840, signed by the rev. brethren, Lebbeus Armstrong, as moderator of the meeting at which it was adopted, and by E. Parmely and J. R. Page, scribes; and is a reply to a letter forwarded by the committee of this Union to your Association, by your beloved messenger to us, the Rev. G. R. Haswell.

These letters, beloved brethren, awakened feelings of affection and joy in the minds of the Committee of this Union when first received and perused by them; and when presented to the annual assembly of our body, were received by the brethren with the same gladness, respect, and love. This correspondence with other confederated bodies of Congregational churches, is deemed by the brethren of this Union equally important and delightful-a most happy means of promoting mutual love, and of advancing great principles-it it only thought to have been too long neglected; and now, when too late adopted, to be on our part too feebly conducted. The assembly left it in charge with their executive committee to reply, in its name, to your affec tionate, powerful letters, directing them to express all that personal love and respect which is cherished for you, as a body of honoured brethren in Christ, and all that attachment to our common principles, which we trust decays not, but grows and increases among the British churches and their pastors. We do not feel sufficient for this work. We ask wisdom from above. We implore heavenly direction that we may so express the fulness of love and the force of truth, as to awaken in your hearts and minds, beloved brethren, entire and powerful sympathy, for this is the communion of the servants of Christ, to love one another in harmonious convictions of his mighty and sacred truth—this is the end of our mutual correspondence, that your communications should cheer and delight, stimulate and confirm us, and that ours should, in like manner, move and benefit you. And when it is remembered how many minds with us may so receive impulse from you, or with you from us-how

important the position occupied by all these servants of Christ at this juncture in relation to the church and the world-how vital to the cause of truth, and to the salvation of men, the principles for the defence of which they are set-it must be perceived and felt that our epistles should be impregnated with truth, power, and love, imparted from on high.

We revert again, beloved brethren, with joy to the unity of the faith as it is held by you and us. Indeed, we are one in Christ: we have the same theology, the doctrines of grace held according to godliness-the same polity, the management of its own affairs by each church of Christ, under warrant and command immediately from him, without the control of any human authority-the same great principle on which to build all our faith, by which to regulate all our practice, the Bible only is the statute-book of Christians. We recognize with delight our entire community of sentiment on questions of polity, intelligence, and philanthropy cognate to religion and subservient to its interests-you no less than we, and we no less than you, would liberate, educate, harmonize all mankind. We would have no slavery or persecution, no craft of priests or ignorance of people, no hateful wars, no obstructions of commerce, no human legislation and force in the kingdom of Christ. Our principles, our position, our interests, our sympathies, all assign to us a difficult, but an honourable and blessed task, as the pledged antagonists of these frightful evils, by which Christianity has been so long corrupted, the world so long desolated.

Your letters show that you can sympathize with us in the difficulties peculiar to Congregational churches, it would seem, wherever found. Even in your free states, where political disabilities on account of religion have been long unknown-where no state religion creates odious distinctions between believers in Christ equally upright and equally virtuous, you find the greater worldly attractions of some religious communities, in which at the same time evangelical truth and edifying ordinances may be enjoyed, operate to draw many from your fellowship. Indeed, beloved brethren, our true position may be perceived and estimated without difficulty. We are witness-bearers against every thing worldly in the churches of Christ. We would reduce them to the lost simplicity of the Gospel. We would impartially apply to them the canons of the New Testament. This renders our body obnoxious of course to the advocates of worldly authority, or conformity in Christ's kingdom. The course which our convictions of truth and duty require us to pursue is of a nature in many cases to draw on us even more hostility from some bodies of our fellowChristians than from the world itself. But we must not for this alter our coursewe need not on this account suspect it to be wrong, but rather feel it to be confirmed as both right and necessary. Christianity at this juncture as much needs to be purified as to be spread. There is a work as necessary to be done among the churches to purify them, as among the nations to convert them. Then will the churches be mighty and prepared to regenerate the world, when they are themselves reformed and revived by receiving in love the whole truth of Christ. But indeed, beloved brethren, if there be in these views any truth-if Congregational churches have indeed the honour to be chosen of Christ as witnesses to his holy will in matters so momentous-how great should be their watchful care that their good be not evil spoken of their truth not made to appear unlovely and repulsive-their witness borne with as much meekness and love as courage and constancy.

To us, beloved brethren, it has appeared that hitherto the Congregational body has not been alive to its responsibilities, or wise and energetic in its movements. There has not been enough of combination, correspondence, mutual understanding. The unions of our churches in the several provinces of the British empire, and in the several states of the American confederation, and the correspondence of these unions by interchange of letters and delegates, will serve greatly to remedy this evil.