On Sabbath morning the 11th of April I preached for the Rev. Mr. Blagden, in the Old South Church. This is a large old-fashioned square building, having two galleries, one above the other, on three of its sides. It is rich in historical recollections. Here Whitfield preached. Here patriotic meetings were held even before Faneuil Hall was built; and here the British troops were quartered at the time of the Revolutionary War. Here, too, the lamp of truth was kept feebly burning when all around had sunk into darkness and heresy. At the commencement of this century, the ministry in all the other Congregational Churches in Boston had become Unitarian. In the Old South, however, there were a few people, eight in number, who formed a “Society for Religious Improvement.” They could not at first pray together; they only read the Scriptures and conversed on religious subjects. But they grew in wisdom, fervour, and zeal, and were eventually the means, not only of reviving religion in the Old South, but also of giving an impulse in Boston which is felt to this day. Church after church on orthodox principles has been instituted, till there are in Boston more than a dozen large and vigorous churches of the Congregational order; and the Old South, the honoured “mother of churches,” has had her “youth renewed like the eagles.”

But how came Congregationalism to be so deteriorated? It was owing to its having been made the State religion. All were at first taxed for its exclusive support. This was felt to be unjust and oppressive, and it brought the favoured system into bad repute.