REVEREND AND DEAR BROTHER,--I would gladly know the issue of your Synod. We did profess we could not be concluded[515] by the Synod of Fife's [overtures] of union, but upon condition of the taking off the censures of our brethren, which we think injuriously are inflicted. Much is promised to us for the remedying of these censures. I shall believe when I see their performances. I hope you will see that the brethren get no wrong, or the house of God in their persons; and send me a line of the conclusion of the Synod in that business. The paper of union is very general, and comes to no particulars: it only tells the good of union, and contains some obtestations to us that insinuate the unsavouriness of irregular courses; yet we thought it not safe to yield to any union of that kind, so long as our brethren are under the censures.[516] I much doubt of their honest meaning, and that barriers in the way of entrant ministers and elders be revived. And I see no engagement, so much as verbal, for purging; but the contrary practice is here. Mr. Robert Anderson[517] is as much opposed as if he were the most corrupt sectary or Jesuit.
[515] Determined finally.
[516] Murray, and the other Protesters in the Synod of Perth, acted upon a similar principle. As an instance of this, we may adduce the following extracts from a paper entitled, "The desires of the brethren of the Protesting judgment in the Synod of Perth under-subscribing, unto the Moderator and remanent members of the Synod." They desire, "1st, That the Synod will declare and enact, that none of the Acts made by the two controverted Assemblies at St. Andrews, Dundee, and at Edinburgh, in the years 1651 and 1652, appointing censure upon such as will not acknowledge the constitution of these Assemblies, and will not submit unto the Acts thereof, shall hereafter be of force within the bounds of this Synod.... 3. That the Synod will declare and enact, that notwithstanding of the supposed censures inflicted upon Mr. James Guthrie, minister at Stirling, and Mr. James Simpson, minister at Airth, by the pretended Assembly at St. Andrews and Dundee, and of the approbation or intimation thereof by the Synod, that the said Mr. James Guthrie and Mr. James Simpson are lawful standing ministers of the Gospel in the respective charges of Stirling and Airth, and capable to sit and vote in the Synod and in their own Presbytery, and of every other ministerial privilege and employment" (Wodrow's MSS. vol. xxvii.).
[517] A minister who is mentioned again in Letter CCCLXV.
My wife remembers her to you. Remember me to your own bed-fellow. Grace be with you.
Your own brother,