THE PRESBYTERIAN SYNOD.

Evening Star, Issue 3092, 16 January 1873, Page 2

THE PRESBYTERIAN SYNOD.

This Court began it( annual session in the First Church last evening, at half-past seven o’clock, by a sermon from the retiring Moderator fou ded on Deut., chap, i., 21— “ Behold the Lord thy Cod shall set the land before thee ; go up and possess it, as the Lord Cod of thy fathers hath said unto the : Fear not, neither be discouraged,’’—and Luke xiv,, 47 —“ Beginning at Jerusalem. ■’ The burden of the discourse was home evangelisation. The roll of the Synod was made up, and consists of the following ministers and elders: Presbytery of Dunedin: Revs. W. Will, Eut Takri; W. Johnston, Port Chalmers; D. M.'• Stuart, D D., Knox Chutch,• Dunedin; J. H. McNaughton, Anderson’s Bay; M. Wait, Green Island; W, Gillies. West Taferi; J M. Davidson, North Taieri; A. Greig, North-east Harbor; J. Copeland, M.D., North Dunedin ; J. Gow, St. Andrews j

id Alexander Blake, Kaikorai. llderg -Messrs N. Y. Wales, First Church ; William Martin, Green Island ; Walter iddell, North-east Harbor ; J. Allan, East aieri ; W. B M‘Kay, Port Chalmers ; J. . illar, St. Andrews; John Duncan, brth Dunedin J. Patrick, Anderson’s ay ; D. Fergusson, West Taieri ; and G. [eplmrn, Kaikoria. Presbytery of Clutha levs. J. M Allan, Waibola; William aunerman, Clutha ; J, Waters Warepa; [. Telford, Teviot; 0. Connor, Popotunoa ; . Chisholm, Tokomairiro ; J. M‘Ara Ballutha; and J. H. Cameron, Lawrence, lllers—J. Johnston, Clutha ; A. Anderson, □ch ( lutha; D. Sutherland, Warepa ; J. teohouse, Lawrence; D. M ‘ Aeill, Ralclutha; nd W- Adam, Wahola. Presbytery of Gothland ; Revs. H. >tobo, Invercargill; T. Alexander, Long Bush; A. Stevens, Wallaceown; D.Boss, Queenstown; 11. C. Morrison, iwi'.z ;rs; and C. S Ross, Kivertou. Rider, Jr J. Gumming, Riverton. Presbytery of )amaru —Revs. A. B. Todd, Oamaru; J. Ibristie, Waikouaiti; J. Kyley, Utepopo; nd P. Clark, Palmerston. Dr Stuart proposed as bis successor in the hair the Rev, Wm. JBanuerman. In doing o he spoke of the abundant ministerial abors of Mr Bannerman, especially in the arly days of the settlement, when his parish xtended from the Taieri River to the Eaglets. In those times when the country was vithout roads and the rivers without bridges, ie had heard it said that at the call of duty dr Bannerman was always ready for a tramp vhether of three miles or of thirty miles. J. sides noticing his great labors as a minister md a pastor, Or Stuart spoke with approbation of his large knowledge of the constiititutiou and his orv of the mother church, md of his deeply earnest, and at times somevhat combative services in connection with be planting and administration of the Preslerian Church in Otago. Mr Baunennan’s wsitipn in the Church, and his many labors (8 minister and clerk of hem in calling him to the highest distinction hey can confer on him - -l he distinction of wesiding over that venerable court. * The 'incoming Moderator then delivered iis address. He premised his remarks by hanking the Synod for the honor conferred ipoh ham in calling him to -preside at the mnual meeting of the supreme court of their Church —an honor which he would willingly lave foregone, conscious as he was that on nany accounts he was- less qualified for the losition it implied,.-»nd tbs duties it nu»osed. than the position he had hitherto occupied as a member and official of Synod. Jnder that consciousness, he bespoke the orbearance, indu geno* 3 , and especially au nterest in their prayers that needed grace or present position and duty might be p-anted to him, ahd thaWthe proceedings night be conducted with that orderliness md dignity which befitted, a rlmstian aslembly. He went on to say that in presiding mce more over the. Synod, he could not help •everting to the time when first he was Divileged to occupy a like position. Then be Church was m its infancy. A li tie lock it was, and few the pastors.' They mmbered but three, whose sphere of .abor, in conaequence' Cf the extensively mattered cond tiou of foe population, extended over au aijeamot grossly less than what is now the the lamely increased staff of minister that presently labored within the bounds of their Ohurch. These embraced well-nigh twelve times,the number that composed the minis, kerial portion of the sup eme court of the Church at the time he referred to—signifi3ant of the vast change in the matter of population which in the course of some sixteen years had taken place, and significant also of the fact that that injreased population was to a large extent one strongly attached, to and willing to support that branch of the Protestant Christian Church with which the earHiwr OSldnists af this part of New, Zealand were chiefly Houneeted. This, doubtless, was due in a great degree to the fact that a large proportion af the immigrants into Otago had been drawn from Presbyterian Scotland, who had uarrieti hiffier with fhem their love and appreciation for the Church of their fathers, finding it to be fully adapted to their cirHurastanoes in* new and progressive country —circumstances in many respite pp different bo the weil-established things and raiiiie of associations and inflnenge* prevailing in the land of their birth. It was with so little satisfaction he compared their present with their earlier position as a Church, affording as it did so strong a witness to the suitableness of their Presbyierian system for meeting the spiritual necest iities of a new and advancing country, and bo the wisdom of the arrangements adopted by the founders and early advisers of their Presbyterian Church in this land for the maintenance of: the gospel ministry and Harrying on the work of a Protestant • hrisbian Church in accordance with the demauds if an increasing and extending population. And he had this further satisfaction that, dong with his friend and brother, Mr Will, lie was privileged to take part in the early institution of the Church in its organised form on a true Presbyterian basis, and with Mm had been spared to witness the growth bo which it had attained, and to see their ministers and churches outspread throughout bhe laud wherever pbpulatfbn had located itself—earnests, he trusted, that as the still unpeopled portions of thsdr- land became Dccupied they should be privileged, as a Dhurch, to carry there also the gospel, and be instrumental, in a still higher degree, in securing that the land of their adoption should bear in its onward progress the charterer impressed oh it at the first as a land bearing on its forefront its adhesion to Protestant Christianity as essentially moulding its nitizens, not only in their individual but also n their social aud national relations, operations, and duties. That character it originally note ; that character it Still bears ; the result ao less of that order of things established within their borders at the beginning of their history in these lands, than of that constant flow to their shores of an increasing population in its largest proportion connected with their own Church—one with them in all the great essentials of the Christian faith. After some further observations on the same head, the rev. gentleman th s referred to thi subject of education : —“ Only when so acting—agreeably to His revealed mind and will, as disclosed in the pages of Scripture, as far aa these hear upon a nation’s duty—does a Protestant nation fulfil its duty, and act jonsistently with its own interest-yea, with its ordinary procedure when acting in its national capacity, and for the natisnal weal, points lost sight of in recent dismissions here and elsewhere throughout New Zealand in connection with the subjects of education and Sabbath observance—discussions certaiii to be renewed aud continued, till those on whom it fal s to guide to consistent national action shall apprehend aright the nation’s responsibility to Cod and to God’s truth, iti connection with its Protestant jharacter and privileges, and apprehending that, have the principle and the courage to ict accordingly. Such is not yet the case, judging from the opinions expressed both in Parliament aud elsewhere, in connection with hose discussions—opinions that would make ;he rule of our procedure iu such matters to ye the principles aud aims of the Church >f home, or those of the secularism tbat leuies to the nation auy responsibility to Jod and to God’s truth, and would have it o act asireq from such responsibility : both if which are opposed to the prevailing Proestaut character anti principles of the comminify aud the necessary action demanded iy its charcter and principles. The adoption f either as our guide would involv'd he nation in conduct inconsistent with its ssential character and necessary response duties, and lead to the anomaly of the naion acting- inconsistently with itself, apd he ordinary mode of procedure followed ip egard to whatever else engages the atten* ton of the nation and has action taken by b. That action is not made to depend upon he wishes of a few, but on The prevailing fpots of the community as a whole, Whep

the nation acts, it acta as a whole, as being a distinct entity, having a unity of being distinct from the individuals that compose it, or the associations in which individuals may form themselves for whatever purpose, whether religious, commercial, or polltical*; and its actions necessarily have a corresponding distinction, For that action there is not demanded universal agreement or approval, neither does it correspond with the wishes or requirements, supposed or real, of the few, but with the general mind or wants of the community. It involves, however, the few that disagree equally with the many that approve in the effects that follow. On the basis of this national unity, and thus its necessary action, the internal affairs of the nation are con ducted ; and on the same basis rest those relations, commercial and others, that sepa rate nationalities from each other. Jin principle recognised in regard to both "of tKese directions of national action is, that there is vested in the nation a supreme power operating on the common behalf a id dealing with the community as a whole, irrespective of the fact that of that whole thereto parts at variance with the action or with the object aimed at. That directing power rests in the hands of the national authorities, legislative and executive, on whom it falls to "act for the community, in its name, and in accordance with its prevailing character and requirements, and whose acts of government, whether bearing on the internal affairs of thi nation, whose representatives and officers they are, or bearing on its relations with other independent nationalities, became and are recarded as the actions of the nation without distinction of the individuals or classes binding on all, and for the effects of which the people as a whole are responsible. A declaration of war, for instance, made on the part of the Government of a country, engages the nation as a whole in war, involving in its costs no less than its direful consequences, alike those who approve of the war undertaken, and those who conscientiously and on religious grounds are opposed, as are Quakers, or those who may be opposed to the war entered ppou, on the ground that sufficient occasion has not been given to arm in vindication of honor stained or wrong committed Were either of these opinions to prevail throughout the community, war wotild then be impossible. Where they exist but do not prevail, their existence would neither prevent the war, nor free those so minded from bearing part of the cost, and sharing in the results, adverse or favorable, that follow. i-ueh the principle of national life, and such the necessary mode” of its action in operation forthe common weal. - Innoother way can i he nation act consistently with its duties and its interests as a nation, and on this—the common principle and mode of action wehave good reason to repudiate and oppose the demand that has been made, that in providing for the common weal a national system of education, the views, wishes, and aims, whether of secularists or of the Church of Pome, should determine,the character and limits of that system- to the extent of excluding the presence and influence of the Holy Scriptures., For the wishes and aims Of neither are, in aecord with, the requirements in this matter of the Protestant tianity that prevails throughout ouf borders, and of which it is a ; first principle that the young should be trained iq the knowledge, and to the practice of what. Scripture communicates, as essential to their being fitted for fulfilling the duties of life, social and private alike, when yoqng and in after yeaps. Up the fulfilment of these depend the peace an i -good order, and through them the prosperity of the commouwealtb, the one domain within which, national action, the action of the Slate, has its operation. To secure that fulfilment an education is required. which, to be effective, must embrace the truths that Scripture reveals, and the motives and influences it furnishes for everyday life. This is a necessary deduction from the f-ict that the State recognises the saertd Scriptures, not only as a revelation from God to man, but as the great teacher as to what man ought to be and to do, on wnich, in conjunction with the law of Nature, in the language of Blackstone, ‘ All human law depends- that is to say, no human laws should be suffered to contradict these. ') his is the position held by the word of God with ourselves, for, as it is under the British Constitution, so it is throughout British Cplomes. Bearing this in mind, and taking this in compaction with the many calls of the Divine Word itself, to train up the young in the nurture and admonition of the Lord, in other words, in the knowledge and practice of what Scripture prescribes—a duty to which the nation’s Protestantism lays on ail who acknowledge it, it seems the most unwarrantable violation of the common principles of national action, and the common procedure resulting therefrom, that in the matter of •ducation, filtered upoi by the State for the common good, the means of instruction God has given to fit for every good and holy work, and which the Protestantism of the people holds to be essential to the object of all education, private or public, should be sacrificed in order to carry out the wishes and aims and objects of a small minority ; in other words, that a minority should regulate the character and direction of a matter deemed so essential as to require national action, to the extent of shutting out as an element and means of school instruction and eduction, what the general agreement of the nation deems of first importance in gaining the end contemplated. If that exclusion be made the law of the land, it necessarily disfranchises the great Protestant commuity, in the all-important matter of education. It makes the minority the dominant power in the >■ tate, so far as its public system of education is concerned, and makes that system other than national in its character, as conformed to the wishes of the few, and not of the many. By such a system not only will the nation prove unfaithful to itself, but will play into the hands of those from whom has come the chief opposition to the spre «d of tho Divine word ; and who, whenever and wherever unaffected by the presence of Protestantism, have withheld all other knowledge needful for man, in other "words who have been the bitter enemi s of education. These results establish the proposition, that only when acting out the requirements of its Protestantism in its public acts, can the nation fulfil its duty, act consistently with itself and its own interests, hut not on the common ground of the ordinary principle and course of national action, do we maintain this proposition. We have higher ground and a higher principle whereon to rest it—viz , the ground, of the nation’s responribi ity to God; the principle that nations and iheir rulers (tieated m the Word of God as one and the same), are alike institutions of divine appointment, * possessing, like the individuals composing them, a distinct moral personality, capable of right and wrong, accountable to God, and therefore found to own and recognise His reve led word, acting in accordance with its requirements, in order to the fulfilment of their responsibility te God, for what they do and for what they resolve as his moral creatures.’” On this great principle, clearly evolved from the teaching of Scripture, and from the dealings of God with the nations of the earth throughout the whole history of man, we maintain the nation’s obligation to carry into all its acts and operations its Protestant Christianity, and make these harmonise with the requirements of the I ivine Word, at once the basis and the embodiment of its Protestant Christianity. He whrtse word it is, is the Gbd of nations. He is their great author. ‘ God,’ s'ays the Apostle Paul, ‘hath made of one blood all nations of men to dwell on the face of the the earth, and bath determined the times before appointed, and the bounds of their habitation. ’ As thus divine creation, 'creatures of God, God governs gallons with supreme sovreignty ; hence hia designation, ‘The Governor among the nations, the King of nations, the blessed and holy Potentate, the King of Kings and Lord of Lords.’ Fro» Him, as snob, all human

government derives its existence and its authority, and for His purposes hath it been appointed. * There is no power but of God ; the p iwera that be are ordained of God ; w* osoever resisteth the power resisteth the ordinance of Gofi,’ ‘the minister of God for thee to good.’ Deriving their existence from God and ever subject to Him, nations and their rulers are dealt with by God under a like system of rewa-ds Mid pnnishm. Nts, wherewith He deals with individuals, quickening by the one to national fidelity and gratitude, mil by the other punching national uniairlifuiness, and calling to national humiliation and repentance. In thus dealing with nations, no distinction of individuals is made, whether innocent or guilty, precisely as nationi themselves in the conduct of their internal affairs, or in de -ling with each other, ignore personal distinction. In time of peace the divine blessing J , health, and plenty are not confined to the good, nor are the wicked alone cut oft by war, pestilence, and famine. In the distribution of these, by which Jehovah, as the God of nations, rewards or punishes, lie acts according to the distinct entity or moral unity of nations, and by these His dealings with them, He proclaims that there is a national character and conduct, of which he takes account as the moral Governor of the universe ; in other words, that ‘ nations, like the im ividuals of which they are composed, have each a distinct personality, in such a sense that each acts and resolves, and that for the action and resolution it incurs a moral obligation, and is responsible to God.’ The relations of the individual, the family, the Church, the State are all considered with each other, and helpful, as God’s ordinances for the fulfilment of the duties He has required ; neither stmds in the way of the others, nor allows of interference with the end He has in their appointment. The family’s duties run not counter to those of the individual or the community, neither doe-* the church or state hinder the family or individual, nor conflict with each other. They are not antagonistic, but cooperative to the same great end--the good of men. and the glory of the Creator as guided and directed to this their common end by the same great rule—tine revealed word of God. The remaining observations were devoted to Sabbath observance, the rev. gentleman saying that to compel man to keep the Sabbath no authority could be exercised, save that of Him whose appoint meat the Sabbath was, and who had ordained it for its grand purpose, bo human power or authority hud the right to constrain it to the fnl dlment of what Jay between God and the conscience of man. Hut within that power it did lie to regulate and restrain the acts and operations of men, as individuals that interfered with the rights of conscience and the fulfillmmt of the duty which each man owed to his God. Freedom to worship God, as Gbd himself has ordained, was the inalienable right i f every man, and in that right he was entitled to be protected to the extent that the arrangements of society should be so regulatid that each man should be free to fulfil the high requirements of Him with whom each and all had to do. Such was not the case when the Sabb th was permitted to be made by any class or portion of the community a day of ordinary business and toil in making it a choice ou the part of these dependent upon them for their temporal subsistence, either to sacrifice their means of livelihood, or to forego the imperative duty cast upon every man to keep holy the Sabbath.

This Day. The Moderator took tho chair at eleven o’clock, and the first hour o: the forenoon meeting was spent in devotional exercises. CLUTHA PRESBYTERY. The Synod was requested to sanction the proceedings of the Clutha Presbytery with regard to the ordination of the Rev. Mr Bett at Tapanui; and in the moderation of a call at Lawrence. Sancb on granted, THE REV. MR ALVES. On the motion of the Rev. Dr. Stuart, it was resolved that the Rev, Mr Alves be included in the Sustentatiou Fund dividend. STUDENTS. It was reported from the Clutha Presbytery that one student had passed into his second year’s the logical curriculum under superintendence of the Presbytery. It was also reported that Mr Andrew Fleming, a student under the Dunedin Presbytery for four years, had accepted the rectorship of the Invercargill Grammar School, and was no logger under the Presbytery. OVERTURE ON THEOLOGICAL TRAINING. The Rev. Dr. Stuart proposed the following overture anent theological training of students :—“ Whereas the importance and nece-sity of training a Colonidly educated ministry is becomi g daily more apparent, (1.) because of the present difficulty of getting an adequate supply of ministers from the home country ; and (2.) because of the better adaptation of youths educated in our midst for the circumstances under which the work of the Church must be carried on for a time in a country drawing its population from divers nationalities : whereas the present training given through Presbyteries to students in divinity is confessedly inadequate and unequal; and lastly, whereas several young men now attending the arts classes in the University, with the view to the ministry in the Church, will in the course of a year or two require direct theological training, it is humbly overtured to the Synod to take the premises into consideration, in order to devise the means of more systematic instruction in theology.’ He thought that the urgency of the matter was felt and recognised by all. It was therefore to be hoped that an effort would be put forth to obtain without delay the services of a Professor of Theology at least He would move that a Committee be appointed to consider and report on the matter to next Synod. The Rev. M Watt seconded the motion, which was agreed to.