Boynton and his Church, heretofore Presbyterians, have recently
become Congregationalists. This has given great umbrage to the
Presbyterians. Congregationalism is rapidly gaining ground in the
Western World, and seems destined there, as in England since Cromwell's
time, to swallow up Presbyterianism. I make no invidious comparison
between the two systems: I merely look at facts. And it does appear to
me that Congregationalism--so simple, so free, so unsectarian, and so
catholic--is nevertheless a powerful absorbent. It _has_ absorbed all
that was orthodox in the old Presbyterian Churches of England; and it
_is_ absorbing the Calvinistic Methodists and the churches named after
the Countess of Huntingdon. It has all along exerted a powerful
influence on the Presbyterianism of America. The Congregational element
diffused among those churches occasioned the division of the
Presbyterian Church into Old School and New School.
Mr. Boynton is what a friend of mine called "intensely American." He
has lately published, under the title of "Our Country the Herald of a
New Era," a lecture delivered before the "Young Men's Mercantile
Library Association.
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