rises, at the cottage-doors of the shepherds, from those who love them and who come out at sunset and listen, sometimes long, for the answering music that shall tell them that, from the pastures where they find verdure and danger, the herdsman, though belated, is coming homeward with all his flock. The song that flies from cot to cliff, and from cliff to cot, ceases never until man and herd are brought safely to home and rest. In such expressive sympathy will you find yourselves. with your absent brethren, when in due course you hear from them by and bye. Our overtures that were sent across the seas brought responses that thrill the heart like a heroic song. They seem to say: "We have cast our net on the other side of the ship. We shall find. The master said so. It is filling; we cannot leave it till we bring it safe, unbroken to the land!"

From the mountains of the west others sent answers of regret, but so praiseful that their cheer comes very close home. "Thank God for our ninety-and-nine. We seek those that remain, that have been given to us; when they are found -it will not be long-we will come home; then, friends, we will have rest, and rejoice together." But I am not unmindful how the time speeds on to-day. The fervent grip of your hands with one another has already had its spell, and the irrepressible interchange of news and assurance, a longer charm. So the Anniversary will quickly weave its shining golden thread across and through the texture of the onward extending life.

God bless you, friends, and give you cheer when you must go again from the restful holiday to the waiting field, but a brimful, New England Thanksgiving welcome to you while you stay!

1

Historical Address.

BY PROFESSOR WILLIAM THOMPSON.

To some who favor us with their presence this morning, the establishment and early fortunes of the Theological Institute of Connecticut are a familiar story. They were old enough in 1834 to read and hear what was said and done by its advocates and opponents. They have not been indifferent observers of its ongoings from one decade to another. But of the men who started the enterprise, and of its singular experiences, few of you retain from personal knowledge a clear impression. The survey now proposed is chiefly for a younger class of hearers, more or less curious to learn how the Seminary fared while it remained at East Windsor Hill.

"New England Theology" is an ambiguous phrase. The varieties of belief denoted by this term at different periods have always been spoken of with special reference to Congregationalists. Before the time of Pres. Edwards, New England divines held the Calvinistic views embodied substantially in Willard's Lectures on the Assembly's Catechism. Whatever modifications of theological belief were afterwards adopted, the system remained essentially the same, and it has long been customary to name as its chief expounders and advocates in the last century Edwards, Bellamy, and Dwight. Its more recent representatives in New England were Woods and Tyler. The views held by these writers differ but little from those embodied in the creeds of New England churches from the earliest period in their history to a very recent day. They are sometimes designated as "Old Calvinism," sometimes "Old School Theology."

The tenets set forth by a class of theologians claiming to be "consistent Calvinists," led by Drs. Emmous and Hopkins,

have been styled in some quarters "New England Theology." But what these eminent divines taught as "improvements" on the doctrinal system long accepted among us never gained a currency sufficiently wide to justify this title.

More recently the speculations of Dr. Nathaniel W. Taylor and his associates have been known to a moderate extent by the same name. They are more properly known as the "New Divinity of New England," or "New Haven Divinity." In the year 1822 the Theological Department of Yale College was organized in its present form, and Dr. Nathaniel W. Taylor was appointed professor. The founder of his professorship required that as a condition of holding office the incumbent should give his assent to the Saybrook Platform, the doctrinal part of which instrument is in full accord with the Assembly's Catechism. It was the accredited formula of a large proportion of the Congregational churches in New England.

Not long after the inauguration of Dr. Taylor it became known to some of his intimate ministerial friends, of whom Dr. Nettleton was one, that he held theories and speculations not in agreement with the acknowledged standards of orthodoxy. In his Concio ad Clerum, preached Sept. 10, 1828, sentiments and hypotheses were avowed which awakened widespread anxiety. Two years before this Prof. Fitch preached a sermon on "Sin," which was generally considered as antagonistic to evangelical doctrine. Various attempts were made to prevent open controversy, but they proved futile. Personal expostulation, correspondence, conferences of representative men, all failed to quiet the rising agitation or restrain the New Haven divines from advocating their sentiments through the press.

The tenets of Dr. Taylor which created disquietude, it is believed, may be fairly stated as follows:

First. God could not have prevented all sin in a moral system.

Second. Mankind came into the world with the same nature in kind as that with which Adam was created, and the

fact that his posterity uniformly sin is due to the circumstances in which they are placed.

Third. Self-love is the primary cause of all moral action. The exact form of the thesis was in these words: "Of all specific voluntary action the happiness of the agent, in some form, is the ultimate end."

Fourth. Antecedent to regeneration the selfish principle is suspended in the sinner's heart, so that he ceases to sin and uses the means of regeneration with motives that are neither sinful nor holy.

In the leading religious quarterly of New England at that time, the Christian Spectator, these dogmas were set forth with great earnestness, eloquence, and skill by eminent divines, who shared the prestige of our chief literary institution, and of the general respect and confidence won by their eminent attainments and services. To protest publicly against the sentiments avowed by such writers, holding exalted positions and assured of powerful support, was a step from which ministers of the gospel and intelligent laymen naturally recoiled. But there seemed to be no option. Individual remonstrances and entreaties had failed to prevent the wide dissemination of theological sentiments believed by many to be fraught with incalculable mischief. This apprehension of danger was deeply felt by Jeremiah Evarts, Gov. John Cotton Smith, Drs. Tyler, Nettleton, Humphrey, Griffin, Ebenezer Porter, Woods, and other leading men in New England and in various quarters. If any persons were competent to estimate correctly the difference between the New Haven Theology and what the Congregational churches and ministers of New England generally and firmly believed to be the teachings of the Divine Word, they were found among those who struck the first note of alarm. The more thoroughly the New Haven Divinity was examined, the more clearly it appeared to be antagonistic to biblical views of the divine government, human depravity, regeneration, and the essential difference between the motives that govern renewed and unrenewed men. Perhaps the time has not yet come for an impartial

judgment on the merits of the controversy and the spirit in which it was conducted. With some confidence, however, an unbiased inquirer may be referred to what was written at the most exciting stage of the discussion by Drs. Dow, Nettleton, Tyler, and Woods, as seldom marred by asperity or unfairness. Such a reader would not fail of seeing that these men were profoundly moved in view of doctrinal innovations imperiling the purity of revivals and the spiritual vigor of the churches.

No branch of the new divinity awakened more general fear and regret than what was currently styled at the time "Regeneration by self-love." Near the fatal close of his long illness Dr. Nettleton was visited by his old ministerial friend, the acknowledged leader of the new movement, with whose views he had been sorely grieved. Shortly after the interview he wrote to his distinguished visitor, concluding his letter as follows: "I would cherish the hope that your own religious experience is at variance with some things which you have published; particularly on the subject of self-love, and the great doctrine of regeneration. It does seem to me I experienced all which you make essential to regeneration, while, as I now fully believe, my heart was unreconciled to God. And this is the reason that leads me to fear that what you have written will be the means of deceiving and destroying souls. I say this with the kindest feelings and with eternity in view. Receive it as my dying testimony and as an expression of my sincere love."

With such positive convictions respecting the views persistently advocated in high places as "great improvements" on the old theology thirty-six Connecticut Congregational ministers met in convention at East (now South) Windsor, Sept. 10, 1833,"for the purpose of consultation and taking such measures as may be deemed expedient for the defense and promotion of evangelical principles." The sessions were held in a small ancient brick school-house about half a mile north of the present Congregational church. The more prominent members of the body were Drs. Samuel Spring, Asahel Nettleton, Nathaniel Hewitt, Daniel Dow, G. A. Calhoun,