APPENDIX.

Ir affords us a high degree of satisfaction to know that at this period in our history a lively and increasing interest is felt in the life and opinions of the distinguished individual, who, by his faithfulness and zeal in a good cause, entitled himself to the appellation of the father of Universalism' in this country. We regard it as a favorable omen, that multitudes are at this time disposed to award him the meed of their approbation, and cherish a heartfelt respect for his name and virtues to rescue his fair fame from the reproaches cast upon it by the opponents of the truth he promulgated, and bestow upon his doctrinal views that candid attention which their importance demands. Seldom have men of the next generation understood the motives, appreciated the labors, or so fully shared the triumphs of a predecessor, engaged as he was in a conflict with érrors at once venerable, and pernicious.

We do not claim for the venerated Murray the credit of having invented a new system of religion; nor do we place him on a level with those who have gained a short lived notoriety by defending creeds which they themselves had made. Neither should we feel justified in awarding to him the honor of having discovered truths before unknown. Nor do those who find most in his talents and character to admire, feel over anxious to have him ranked with the greatest reformers that have ever lived. But we claim for him the honor of having been the friend, and to the full extent of his ability, the benefactor of mankind. It may be confidently affirmed, that his public and private labors were not less useful than those of many whose fame, or to speak more correctly, whose notoriety exceeds his own. The very genius and spirit of his religion forbid that posterity should add any thing to the humble, yet significant title, by which he chose to be distinguishedthat of a 'Promulgator of glad tidings'.

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Compared with Calvin, Luther, Wesley, and others who have at different periods risen into notice, and labored, industriously, and perhaps successfully, uproot old errors, that new ones might be established in their stead, he may, at first, seem less deserving of our admiration and respect; but when we consider that his object was to disenthrall the mass of mind-to elevate the moral nature of our species-and to induce mankind to seek for truth, rather than to be satisfied with their present attainments;-and when we consider that though he was reviled―persecuted-stoned-he did not return railing for railing-that his hands were stained with blood, nor his lips polluted with cursings, we feel, deeply, and gratefully, that when the mist of error and prejudice shall have been dispelled by the sun-light of truth and righteousness, it will be known, and every where confessed, that the first promulgator of Universalism in this country, imitated, more closely than many other reformers, the examples of the great Master of christians, and that his memory may be associated with all that is lovely and of good report.

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His object was a benevolent one. He labored to bring the moral affections of mankind under the influence of those high, sacred, and ennobling principles, which a kind heaven has disclosed in the plan of salvation by free and impartial grace;—to adorn this earthly paradise, not with the productions of another world, but with the indigenous fruits and flowers of this,-to water them with the dews of heaven, that the love of God, shed abroad in the hearts of mankind, might produce righteousness and peace. And when we consider that the sentiments which he promulgated were entirely at variance with the religious views which had long prevailed in this country, and that, by preaching them, he exposed himself to every kind of opposition, we are at a loss to account for that heroic fortitude which led him to go forward in the discharge of the duty imposed upon him, or the success which attended, and has followed his exertions, without admitting that he was directed and sustained by a particular providence.

We need not apologize for introducing into this appendix to the Life of Murray, the following beautiful and highly interesting extract from a discourse, delivered on Nov. 4, 1832, at Norwich, N. Y. by Rev. A. B. Grosh, as it will give the reader a just idea of the fruits of Mr. Murray's exertions in the day of small things.

"From what trifling circumstances do the greatest events seemingly take their rise! What apparently chance-produced beginnings does God choose as the causes of rovolutions in states, communities, and denominations! There are individuals now living, who were old enough in 1770, clearly to remember now, events that then transpired. Suppose yourself such a one, and to have stood on the banks of the Delaware in September, of that year-what might you have seen? You might have beheld a European merchant vessel returning down the river from Philadelphia, whither it had sailed on a piece of false information-you might have seen the vessel, by another mistake, driven into Cranberry Inlet nearly wrecked-you might have beheld part of its loading transferred from the vessel to a sloop, and a sorrowing stranger placed as a guard over it-you might have seen the vessel sail out of the Inlet; but, by a sudden change of wind the sloop prevented from following. Destitute of provisions for himself and the hands under his command, the melancholy stranger might have been seen going on shore to purchase some. He might have been watched as, wandering in the noble forest and resolving to bury himself, and his talents, and his usefulness, in some such retired spot, he came to a log house in that beautiful wild, and, directed by its inmates, pursued his way to another house in search of fish, a sample of which he had seen. There you might have beheld a tall man, rough and advanced in years, refuse to sell, but offering to bestow on the stranger as many of the finny heap before them, as he wanted. Had you continued your observations you might have witnessed and heard the friendly, yet earnest altercations which succeeded, and continued, at intervals, for several days, between this inhabitant of the New World, and the stranger from the Old. You might have heard the aged resident insisting that the sorrowing stranger should preach to them on the following Sunday, and the latter as earnestly declaring that he would depart for New York by the first fair wind.

But the wind changed not. Sunday came, and found the sorrowing stranger still the guest of his hospitable friend, and, reluctantly, indeed, he consented to deliver his message. Trembling and tearful you might have seen him delivering his gospel message to an auditory gathered out of the wilderness, in a house erected, as the host declared, expressly for him, and such as preach

ed the same gospel-in a temple where never before had preacher promulgated the same glad tidings.

Suppose you had been there sixty two years ago, and heard that sermon-delivered in despite of so many opposing circumstances, resolves, and determinationsdelivered in consequence of so many trifling, but unaccountable chance-occurrences, as some would call them -Yes; suppose you had heard that sermon, so full of love and benignity-overflowing your partial creed of mingled blessings and cursings with universal and impartial grace and that you had then gone your way in the levity of youth, and the forgetfulness of indifference and prejudice.

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Now change the scene. Suppose that now, after three score years have elapsed, you were to journey over these States, scarcely remembering that early occurrence of your life, but observantly regardful of the changes which half a century has produced in the theological views, and religious feelings of the people of this new and rising empire.

You could not but hear of Universalists as the fifth (if not the fourth) in order, in point of numbers, respectability and talent, among the denominations of the land. You would hear that, though persecuted, calumniated, and contemned, they were among the greatest reading people in the Union; having no less than nineteen or twenty periodicals, issuing every month at least one hundred thousand sheets to twentyfive or thirty thousand subscribers, and among at least thrice that number of regular readers. You would find a Universalist Convention of the New-England states, attended by nearly fifty preachers and hundreds of lay delegates-that the States of Maine, Connecticut, New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania, and South Carolina had each their State Conventions-that in Massachusetts, Vermont, New Hampshire, and other States, similar Conventions were being organized that a United States' Convention was talked of, and measures commenced for its formation-that Associations exist in North Carolina, Indiana, and other States where conventions are not yet organized-that, in the United States, there are upwards of six hundred Universalist societies and congregations; more than one hundred meeting houses owned by them, or in part, and about three hundred preachers-that, in the southern and western States the doctrine is extending its progress faster than preachers can follow to proclaim and defend it,

while, in the eastern and middle States, ministers, laymen, and even whole societies, are embracing this calumniated doctrine, and coming over to its avowal and support. You would also find that this sect, which is everywhere spoken against,' is awaking to a just sense of its duty and importance, and is freeing itself from the fetters of dependence-has established two Seminaries of learning; has devised, and is about progressing to completion with two others, and has taken a stand of disinterested love to untrammelled science and knowledge, which must ultimately cause many a partial and bigotted institution to tremble under the power of reformation to the very centre, or to crumble to dust in the jarring conflict of their slavish measures with purified public opinion.

Astonished, beyond measure, at the numbers, industry, talents, extent, influence, and rapid spread of a denomination whose very name, most probably, had never saluted your ear sixty years ago, you would seek to ascertain the origin of a people differing so widely in sentiment from all others in the land, and increasing, so rapidly, in despite of the united opposition of all the other denominations. What would be the increase of your wonder on being informed, that the sorrowing and solitude-seeking stranger, whom you beheld, in September, 1770, (sixty two years ago,) driven into Cranberry Inlet as by accident-whom you saw so providentially detained there-whom you noticed straying, as by chance, to the hospitable mansion of the rude, unlettered, but kind-hearted POTTER-whom you heard with tears, prayers, and supplications, declining to exercise the functions of a preacher-whom you saw watching, with much anxiety, but in vain, for a change in the wind to carry him to New York before the coming Sunday, and thus forever release him from appearing before a congregation-whom you heard with inuch weakness and trembling, break the hushed stillness of that forest-embowered meeting-house, by proclaiming the Gospel with demonstration and power, that lonely, sorrowing stranger was JOHN MURRAY-the first avowed Universalist preacher in the United Statesand that sermon, you then heard, was the first Universalist sermon preached in America-and that meeting-house, built expressly by the pious and venerable Thomas Potter, for one of God's own preachers,' is the first Universalist meeting-house erected in the Americas by the hands of man!"