ly Associations, have had
their Meetings whereat Ecclesiastical Matters of common Concernment are
considered: _Churches_, whose Communicants have been seriously examined
about their Experiences of Regeneration, as well as about their
Knowledge, and Belief, and blameless Conversation, before their
admission to the Sacred Communion; although others of less but hopeful
Attainments in Christianity are not ordinarily deny'd Baptism for
themselves and theirs; Churches, which are shye of using any thing in
the Worship of God, for which they cannot see a Warrant of God; but with
whom yet the Names of _Congregational_, _Presbyterian_, _Episcopalian_,
or _Antipaedobaptist_, are swallowed up in that of _Christian_; Persons
of all those Perswasions being taken into our Fellowship, when visible
Goodliness has recommended them: Churches, which usually do within
themselves manage their own Discipline, under the Conduct of their
Elders; but yet call in the help of _Synods_ upon Emergencies, or
Aggrievances: _Churches_, Lastly, wherein Multitudes are growing ripe
for Heaven every day; and as fast as these are taken off, others are
daily rising up. And by the Presence and Power of the Divine
Institutions thus maintained in the Country, We are still so happy, that
I suppose there is no Land in the Universe more free from the
debauching, and the debasing Vices of Ungodliness. The Body of the
People are hitherto so disposed, that _Swearing_, _Sabbath-breaking_,
_Whoring_, _Drunkenness_, and the like, do not make a Gentleman, but a
Monster, or a Goblin, in the vulgar Estimation. All this
notwithstanding, we must humbly confess to our God, that we are
miserably degenerated from the first Love of our Predecessors; however
we boast our selves a little, when Men would go to trample upon us, and
we venture to say, _Wherein soever any is bold (we speak foolishly) we
are bold also._ The first Planters of these Colonies were a chosen
Generation of Men, who were first so pure, as to disrelish many things
which they thought wanted Reformation elsewhere; and yet withal so
peaceable, that they embraced a voluntary Exile in a squalid, horrid,
_American_ Desart, rather than to live in Contentions with their
Brethren. Those good Men imagined that they should leave their Posterity
in a place, where they should never see the Inroads of Profanity, or
Superstition: And a famous Person returning hence, could in a Sermon
before the Parliament, profess, _I have no