The Book Of Religions

So late as the year 1700, eighty years after the landing of the Pilgrims, there were, in all the New England States then settled, but one Episcopal church, no Methodist church, and, with the exception of Rhode Island, not more than half a dozen Baptist churches. At that time, however, there were one hundred and twenty Congregational churches, composed of emigrants from Europe and their descendants, and thirty others composed of converted Indians. The great mass of the descendants of the early settlers of New England are Congregationalists, maintaining, substantially, the same views of church order and religious faith which their venerated ancestry sacrificed home, and country, and life, to maintain and perpetuate.

The present number of Congregational churches in New England is about fifteen hundred; and in the Middle and Western States there are about fourteen hundred and fifty; although the mode of church government adopted by some of them is, in some degree, modified by the "Plan of Union" with Presbyterians. These churches contain, as nearly as can be ascertained, about one hundred and ninety-four thousand communicants.

Recently, symptoms of dissatisfaction with the "Plan of Union" have extensively developed themselves, particularly in New York, Ohio, Missouri, Illinois, Wisconsin, and Iowa; and the probability now is, that a pure Congregational mode of church government will soon be generally adopted by the descendants of New-England Congregationalists, who are scattered over the great West.

These Congregational churches are more particularly denominated Orthodox than any other churches in the United States, and adhere to the doctrines of Calvin or Hopkins.

PUBLICATIONS. -- The Orthodox Congregationalists publish a great number of periodicals, the principal of which are the Boston Recorder, the New England Puritan, Boston, Mass.; the Christian Mirror, Portland, Me.; the Congregational Journal, Concord, N. H.; the Vermont Chronicle, Windsor, Vt.; the Congregational Observer, Hartford, Ct.; and several in the Western States, which are sustained partly by Congregationalists and partly by Presbyterians.