III.-PRESBYTERIANS.

ON THE SETTLEMENT OF PRESBYTERIANS IN ULSTER,

And the Grants from the Crown for the Maintenance of their Clergy.

It is admitted that the settlement of Presbyterians in Ulster took place about the year 1610, in consequence of a Legislative encouragement held out to the Scotch, with a view of enabling the old Protestant settlers, chiefly from England, to preserve themselves from the inroads of the natives, whose efforts to throw off the English authority became very alarming.

The Scottish Colony was accompanied by its Ministers, who, by a comprehension and connivance, dictated by the necessity of the times, were put in possession of the tithes of the parishes of which they were ordained Pastors. It does not appear that their title to the tithes was ever strictly legal, but they certainly enjoyed them with the consent of the Bishops, and continued to be thus supported until after the death of Charles I., when they were deprived of them by the Commonwealth, because they protested against that most cruel murder, and refused to acknowledge the authority of the new Government. When Henry Cromwell came over, he allowed them a salary, in lieu of the tithes, of £100 a-year, though they never could be induced to acknowledge the usurpation of his father, Oliver.

At the Restoration, the parishes were all given to Episcopal Ministers, and the Presbyterian Clergy depended solely on the voluntary contributions of the people until some years after, when Charles II., pitying their distresses and remembering their attachment to the constitution in the reign of his father, and their zeal for his own restoration, bestowed upon them £600 a-year, with a promise of a farther grant, which his profuse

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habits prevented him from fulfilling. Towards the end of his reign, the payment of this bounty was suspended, and continued to be so during James II. It was restored by King William, and augmented to £1200. It remained thus on the Irish Establishment until the year 1785, when it received a farther addition of £1000 annually. This bounty was confined to the Ministers composing the Synod of Ulster and Presbytery of Antrim. About the same period, £500 a-year was granted to the Seceding Clergy, a description of dissenters from the Church of Scotland, and who had sent some missionaries into the North of Ireland, about fifty years ago. These, bringing their peculiar tenets with them, drew off a number of followers, chiefly of the lower and most ignorant class, from the old Presbyterians, and now constitute a Seceding Synod, composed of about forty Ministers.

In 1792, the Irish Parliament addressed his Majesty, and prayed he would grant a still farther allowance for the support of the Presbyterian Ministers of Ireland, when an addition of £5000 a year was granted. This last grant extended equally to the Ministers of the Synod, the Seceders, and the Southern Association. This association contains about sixteen congregations, mostly in a declining state at present. Two congregations in Dublin (Strand Street and Euston Street) belong to this association, and two (Mary's Abbey and Usher's Quay) belong to the Synod of Ulster. The proportion of the last grant, allotted to the Ministers of the Synod, is 3700 and odd pounds; and their annual dividend, from all the grants, amounts to about thirty pounds.

Besides these grants, issuing from the Irish Treasury, there is one peculiarly honourable to the Presbyterian clergy. It was bestowed by George I. out of the privy purse, as a mark of his approbation of their services in the affair of the Hanoverian succession. It amounts to £800, and is divided in equal moieties between the General Synod and the Southern Association; to the latter it affords about £25 a year; to the former it gives a small dividend of about £2, but highly

prized by the Ministers on account of the principle in which it originated, and still continues to be paid by his Majesty.

OUTLINE OF THE DISCIPLINE AND CHURCH GOVERNMENT OF THE GENERAL SYNOD OF ULSTER.

The great body of the Presbyterians of Ulster, being of Scottish origin, brought with them the principles and discipline of their Church at home, and their descendants in the Synod still continue to regard the Church of Scotland as their model in both. But, though the general resemblance be acknowledged, such differences have gradually taken place as might be expected between a National Church, having a legal sanction for its rules and regulations, and a Voluntary Association assembling under toleration, and whose authority depended entirely on opinion.

All the Presbyterians of Ulster were united under the care of the General Synod, as a supreme Ecclesiastical Court, until the year 1726, when the ministers of the Presbytery of Antrim, entertaining some opinions respecting the authority of the general Synod on the subject of subscription to the Westminster confession of faith, were excluded from the Synod, and formed a distinct church judicatory. This Presbytery, however, still kept up a friendly intercourse with the Synod, and a common interest in the royal bounty, and its ministers always sat as members of the Synod's interloquitors, in which matters, purely relating to temporalities, were considered, and in which elders had no vote.

The opinions of the Presbytery of Antrim respecting subscription have gained ground in the Synod; each Presbytery exercises its own discretion, and the subscribing and nonsubscribing members live in perfect harmony on this subject.

With respect to the discipline and church government among Presbyterians, in each congregation, the minister and some laymen called Elders compose a Session, which has cognizance of all matters relating to that particular congregation, with a

power to admonish, rebuke, or, finally, to exclude immoral and disorderly members.

From the decisions of the Session, an appeal lies to the Presbytery. This is composed of a number of ministers, with an elder from each congregation. The duty of the Presbytery is to inspect the behaviour of its members, to license candidates for the ministry, after a regular examination into their qualifications, to ordain ministers in vacant congregations, and to hear appeals or references from the Sessions. These Presbyteries are fourteen in number, and commonly meet every three months, unless called oftener on some special business. From the decisions of the Presbyteries, an appeal lies to the sub-Synods; of these, there are three, composed as the Presbyteries are, and having jurisdiction over four or more Presbyteries; and, from their decisions, an appeal lies to the general Synod, which meets annually in June, if no special business calls it oftener.

To this Synod returns are made by the several Presbyteries of the candidates licensed to preach, who are called Probationers, and of the ministers ordained or installed in vacant congregations. It hears appeals, enacts regulations, and exercises a supreme authority in ecclesiastical matters over the Sub-synods, Presbyteries, and congregations under its jurisdiction. It is constituted, as the Presbyteries are, of an equal number of Ministers and Elders, though the latter are not in the habit of attending, except on some very special occasions.

When a congregation becomes vacant from the death or removal of a Minister, it applies to the Presbytery under whose care it is placed for a hearing, commonly during four Sundays, of a Probationer, or, it may be, of an ordained Minister, that the people may have an opportunity of judging of his qualifications. After the candidate has fulfilled his appointment, a member of the Presbytery attends, (the congregation having previous notice) and takes the sense by vote of such as pay stipend respecting him. If a competent number vote in his

favour, a call is subscribed and put into his hands; he undergoes a course of second trial preparatory to his ordination, if a Probationer, when, if he accepts the call, and the people abide by it, he is ordained (if before ordained he is installed) in the pastoral charge of that congregation.

Formerly, a mere majority of votes decided the choice of a Minister, as in civil elections. But experience showed that great inconvenience flowed from the ascendency which this mode gave to the populace, and the Synod have many years ago settled that no Minister shall be presented with a call unless he has two-thirds of votes and two-thirds of stipend in his favour, which is called the Synodical Majority.

When this regulation was enacted, it was cheerfully acquiesced in, and its good effects have been acknowledged. It has corrected the democratic tendency of the old system, under which the mere numerical majority often appointed the Minister, in opposition to the wealth and respectability of the congregation.

In discipline, the Presbytery of Antrim observes nearly the same forms with the Synod, and the candidates for the ministry in both are educated, with few exceptions, in the University of Glasgow.

GENERAL SYNOD OF ULSTER.

The Rev. Dr. Robert Black to Lord Castlereagh.

Londonderry, April 27, 1799. My Lord-I have the honour to enclose a list of the Congregations under the care of the Synod of Ulster, in pursuance of the wish which your Lordship expressed to me some time ago. Various causes prevented me from being able sooner to comply with your Lordship's desire; the principal of them was the tardiness with which correspondence can be had with ministers in remote parts of the country little connected with post towns. I had many prejudices to encounter, and much misrepresentation to do away, as uncommon pains had been taken to excite distrust and alarm on this occasion. Ministers were