lowers from Hackensack, who went to the father and said, "Your child is unlawfully baptized, because Dom. Haeghoort is under censure, and can neither preach nor administer the sacraments." The New York ministers have had much trouble to satisfy the man. 4. We turn to the Raritan congregation, made vacant by the death of Dom. John Frelinghuysen, where for two years they have been left almost without any divine service, although the congregation is large and scattered, and affords work for more than two ministers. Matters now are little better. A great part of the congregation was induced to call Dom. Fryenmoet, (a fugitive minister, who had been compelled to leave his place through danger of the public foe;) but a committee or Circle of the Cœtus was called in, who did what they could to remove him, and now have succeeded, an account of which, we doubt not, you will receive from the sufferer. The consequences of this cannot be other than bitter, all the service now being rendered by those who call themselves the Cœtus, to the dissatisfaction of the greater portion of the people. All these things make the name of Cœtus hateful to all who have any knowledge of the Netherlandish Church constitution, which allows no lordship over God's heritage. Consequently, their congregations, from time to time, are divided: the congregations of New York, Albany, Kingston, and many others, abide by their purpose to have nothing to do with the Coetus; others issue their calls with the condition that the minister shall not be a member of it, as the congregations of the Manor of Livingston, Claverack, etc., have already done; and we are assured that the congregation of Long Island, made vacant by the death of Dom. Curtenius, never will consent to accept a minister who belongs to the Cœtus. Our daily experience teaches us that it is needless to state what injury and reproach these proceedings must cause the Netherlandish congregations from those who are without. 5. No less trouble was occasioned to the congregations of Hackensack, Schraalenbergh, and Paramus, by Dom. John H. Goetschius and Henry Frelinghuysen, who, having in a clandestine way become possessed of a copy of the letter of the Rev. Classis of Amsterdam to the Consistory of New York, spread it abroad among them, reading it everywhere, and making special explanations of it after their own liking, with extreme contempt of those who had neither part nor lot in that disorderly Cotus action. Goetschius and his brother were not ashamed to say that we, the ministers who did not act with them, were already censured by the Classis, and that the censure would presently come home to us. 6. It is impossible, Rev. Sirs, to mention everything. In one word, the laws of the Coetus are trampled upon and despised by them. They receive members into the body against its fundamental articles. They let students preach, and those who have authorized them they let go away unpunished. Henry Frelinghuysen and Dom. Goetschius's brother have, without any call or commission, officiated for more than two years as ministers in congregations, except that they did not administer the sacraments. They speak with the utmost con tempt of excellent ministers. And they care for nothing, can gain their end, whether with order or without, as a the last meeting of the so-called Coetus brethren, when linghuysen would have constrained the Assembly by fo hands upon him, without the order of the Classis; and compelled to turn him out of the Assembly, and to rebuke associate, the so-called Dom. Goetschius, who said, "We ciphers long enough; if we cannot gain our end, let us Presbyterians, whose ordination is as good as that of the N ish Church." Here we conclude, in the expectation that, so far as you will check these unruly proceedings, that the alienation m come greater, and we not be compelled, for lack of an answ our complaints regularly before the Rev. Synod itself; f weary of the difficulties. And this we hope you will the yourselves bound to do, because you cannot be unaware of esteem which the most of the congregations cherish for the Amsterdam, and that the subjects of the King of Great 1 North America care as little for the irregular censures of tious Assembly as they do for those of Rome. Love, good counsel, and tact, with mutual consideration a gence, must be exercised here, or our congregations will be to and another communion built upon our ruins. If we force upon congregations against their will, who yet are to pay the ers, the plan will never succeed. Men will rather go over churches, or else live without public worship, as is the case n hundreds, if not thousands, of so-called Christians in this lan grief of all who love the welfare of Zion. With the highest esteem, Rev. and Honored Brethren, we s ourselves your obedient servants and fellow-laborers, G. HAEGHOORT, Letter of the Conferentie to the Rev. Classis of Amsterda As cold water to a thirsty soul, so is good news from a far co as Solomon says. And we wish that we were able to refresh pained with evil tidings. But, in the present state of things, you cannot take it amiss that we appear with those matters which we think that we, as subordinate to the Rev. Classis of Amsterdam, are bound to state to you, to whom our ecclesiastical affairs should be presented. And we hope that this will not be considered an annoyance, but as the discharge of our duty, with a view to the removal of burdens, so that our congregations may prosper and have peace. The undersigned have deemed it one of their highest duties to appoint a Conferentie of ministers, (to which Dom. Erickson and Van Sinderen were invited, of whom the latter has testified his entire concurrence with us, and the former could not attend on account of indisposition,) to deliberate upon the welfare of the congregations, and to present it to you, not at all out of passion or quarrelsomeness, or to bite and devour; but because we see that day by day our foundations are undermined, and harmony is more and more impaired, which must end in the downfall of our churches here. To hinder this so far as we can, we here declare our honest intention to be that you, by your great wisdom and power, may help us, so far as we stand under the same constitution, to guard those under us, and keep our churches in the old doctrine and discipline. I. We greatly wished that you had sent a special answer to us, inasmuch as we, as a committee, have sent to you the articles of the last Cœtus, held Sept., 1754, (since which we recognize none as lawful,) and therein protested against the proceedings of the brethren, who still call themselves a Cœtus. We were driven off by the imperious course of Dom. Theod. Frelinghuysen, who took upon himself, without the order of any one, to put the congregations under a Classis here; and besides, to erect an academy, the professors of which he had already named, and the support of which he intended to draw from Holland. He even thought to obtain a doctorate from Holland or Germany, (as appears from a letter of Professor Brunnings, at Heidelberg,) in which he has not yet succeeded. They retain the answers received, and make it appear by their writing as if they were the upholders of the Church, when they are really the desolaters of the temple, and the special cause of the troubles, as can be plainly shown by the following instances: II. Let not that expression seem harsh, since it can be proven by facts, such as the following: 1. What is the most manifest proof that any are the cause of troubles? Is it not that they unlawfully lay censures upon Consistories, and even whole congregations, with their ministers, as Dom. Haeghoort, Curtenius, Schuyler, and others; and when the Classis ordered them to be removed, (which they did, as appears from their own letter to the Consistory of New York, and that of Professor Curtenius to his uncle,) they do not take them off, but leave ministers and congregations in that state, (although by the intelligent it is not esteemed such,) to take offence thereat, and be continually grieved? When any impose a public censure which the higher judicatory orders them to remove, does it not behoove them, if they are under the Assembly, as they unjustly pretend, to remove the censure in public, themselves peace-makers? The more especially since t wrote that the Classis had arranged everything to mutual not one of which arrangements has been made known have been kept back. They talk now of a request which some of them mad how could we grant such a request, when they do not same grounds as they formerly did, and we observe them who have broken our laws, and daily continue to do so? we cannot go to them, but they must come to us, and d selves before us for their disobedience to the decision of by which all the congregations were bound. 2. Another proof is found in the making of candidates an A minister thus qualified is approved in some congregatio jected in others; nay, in the same congregation some will others deny, his right to preach and administer the seals of nant. This has made confusion, and in the end will make m was the case when the brethren made Henry Frelinghuysen Goetschius candidates in a meeting of two or three ministe of the Assembly, and afterwards in the same way ministers. the former has already died, yet his brother from Albany, his funeral sermon, defended from the pulpit his ordination, a to open the eyes of the people, saying that it was time to l from the Classis, and that they who recognized a foreign autho in danger of falling into the hands of the King's counsel; w duced a great excitement in the congregation, so that a larg of them went home, and did not return to the afternoon ser thus men, instead of preaching God's Word to the edification of munity, cast strange fire upon the altar, which also has been other places, to the prejudice of their lawful ministers. A latter, he has been called from one place to another, witho either candidate or minister, for we think that to receive a call only to ministers, and not to students or candidates. Yes gained as much by performing other ministerial duties as by ing, if not more. Thus they proceeded in the spring to make a candidate Hardenberg, whose character is stated in part in the compl Raritan, and afterwards, even last week, made him the min Raritan; and further, two other candidates, one Van Nest, ca Fishkill and Poughkeepsie, and one Barcalo. 3. The Cœtus is now an apple of discord, its disorderly proc appearing so plainly that many have their eyes opened; and are against children, and children against fathers, as to the law or unlawfulness of the same. And thus a terrible dissension is Already Dom. Marinus has refused baptism in his congregati could not give such power, and that those who depended thereon were Papists, even announcing their meeting as if it were a Synod. 4. Another instance of injury to the Church is seen in the complaint of a committee from the North Branch portion of the congregation at Raritan, of which the following is an abstract: (1.) The origin of the disputes there was in the neglect of the Consistory of Raritan and the associated congregations to provide suitable ministerial service after the death of Dom. Jno. Frelinghuysen, only three or four sermons having been preached by Low Dutch ministers in the course of two years. (2.) Dom. Fryenmoet, fleeing before the public enemy, came to North Branch, and was several times asked by the Consistory there to officiate, which he did with so much acceptance that many members of the four united congregations requested that he might preach in all the churches; but the Consistory in the other three villages refused, no doubt because of their engagements to a certain Hardenberg, who had married the widow of Dom. Frelinghuysen. The adherents of Dom. Fryenmoet, being by far the greater number in the four congregations, bestirred themselves to obtain a subscription to have him called for their lawful minister, but the Consistory opposed this with all their might, and the dispute rose so high that each party called in the Circle to settle it. The proceedings of the Circle were so manifold, withal not obscurely showing partisanship, that we cannot relate them. But we must mention one thing, viz., that the adherents of Dom. Fryenmoet promised to raise the whole salary for him, and offered further, if the others would call any lawful minister whom they preferred, (seeing the congregations required two,) that they would assist in paying him; still they could not agree, and. Dom. Fryenmoet had to go away. (3.) An elder and two deacons in North Branch, consulting together without the knowledge of two elders and another deacon, their associates, requested Dom. Leydt to preach there and choose a new Consistory. When the time came to carry out the plan, they made it known to the others, and wished them to aid in making the choice; but they protested against it, as almost the whole congregation afterwards did, as being opposed to the Church Orders, and the ancient usage of that Church. Notwithstanding, the election was had, and immediately after, the ordination also, which compelled the remaining lawful members, after the lapse of four months, (for they could not side with the newly chosen, and the old ones, who went out, would not act with them,) to make with their Consulent, Dom. De Ronde, a new filling up of the Consistory, in order to heal the breach, and as such they have sought to maintain the Church in the right. (4.) The new Consistory, together with the Consistories of the three other villages, have made and executed a call upon the so called student Hardenberg, who was examined and qualified before the congregation as minister by those who style themselves the Cœtus, who yet had no proper business with that call; not only because of the things above stated, but because the student was an unfit person, not |