have been added to the church within the bounds of this Presbytery during last year forty-five.

The Presbytery of Louisville consists of six ministers who are settled in the state of Kentucky, and five in the state of Indiana. Of the congregations under the care of this Presbytery the greater part have been organized and furnished with a regular dispensation of gospel ordinances within the last five years. There have been added to the church within the bounds of this Presbytery during last year eighty-five. The number of congregations is thirty-one.

There has been collected within the bounds of the Synod, during last year, for missionary and other charitable purposes, $951 11 cents. And the demand for missionary labours and additional ministers within the bounds of Synod is great and pressing.

As to the real state of religion within the bounds of the Synod of Kentucky, it is extremely hard to form any thing like a correct opinion. The ministry, it is hoped, are at their posts, devoted to their work; preaching the word, being instant in season and out of season. Attention to the public preaching of the word, and a disposition to be active in supporting and propagating the gospel, are evidently on the increase, and the spirit of peace and brotherly love mark the churches generally. Bible classes, and public and private prayer meetings, and the monthly concert of prayer, are attended to with interest and advantage in the most of the congregations.

Yet still the difficulties and discouragements are numerous and great. Errors of a damnable nature are

boldly propagated in almost every county. Upon an average not more than one half of the population attend regularly public worship any where. The addition to the churches in connection with the Synod, and to other evangelical churches within the bounds of Synod, are few when compared with the population, or with the number of baptized persons to whom the gospel is regularly preached. The contributions to the support of Missionary and Education Societies are small when compared with the contributions which are made for these purposes in other sections of the christian churches, or when compared with the wealth which the members of the church within the bounds of Synod have at their command. The religious instruction of youth, on the part of parents, is evidently much neglected, and family worship, it is to be feared, is not very punctually attended to.

The Sabbath is often profaned in a great variety of respects by the members of families who bear the christian name, and, generally speaking, there is a great deal of indifference with respect to the divine authority instamped upon the ordinances of the gospel, so that a mere difference of opinion about a very trifling matter, for instance about the occupiers of the pews in the church, will occasion sometimes very considerable disturbances in congregations which were considered as flourishing.

Yet notwithstanding all these and similar discouragements, the members of Synod believe that they are labouring under the authority and protection of their Lord and Master, and labouring in the very spot where

he has fixed them; they would therefore thank him for what he has been pleased to do by them, and take cour age.

Hitherto hath the Lord helped them, and the promise of the divine protection and of the divine blessing to rest upon his own word and his own ordinances, is as good as ever. They would wish for a faith to be more dependant upon the good word of promise than they have hitherto been, and to continue to devote their time and best talents their Master hath committed to them to his service, and leave the results of their labours to him who views the end from the beginning.

According to the official report of 1823, the state of the Synod stood thus.

The Presbytery of Louisville, consisting of twelve ministers, some in Kentucky and some in the state of Indiana, was, at the meeting of the Synod of 1823, divided, so that the seven members, who are settled in Indiana, might constitute a new Presbytery, to be known by the name of Salem, leaving the Presbytery of Louisville wholly within the state of Kentucky, te consist of five members.

In reviewing the state of religion as connected with the origin and progress of the Synod of Kentucky, we have to lament over a great deal of what has probably been unhallowed controversy. Previous to the organization of the Synod, the churches and good men were much divided on the subject of Psalmody, and a great deal of personal rancour was mixed with the discussions on that subject. The New Light doctrines and the affair of the Cumberland Presbytery occupied a very large share of judicial proceedings and of public notice during several of the following years.

The churches of Kentucky have also suffered much from the fluctuating state of society, occasioned by uncertainty in rights of land, and by a disposition to emigrate whenever the sale of a farm in an old settlement will procure three or four farms in a new settlement. And in many of these movements little evidence is given of much concern on the part of the parents for the spiritual advantage of their rising offspring.

Many evils have also been the result of having ministerial labour divided and subdivided between a number of churches and congregations, and the support from the whole so inadequate, that the preacher, if he has a family, is still obliged to turn his attention partially to some other occupation for a support. Upon a calm review of all the churches in Kentucky of every name, we are persuaded that it will be found that ali that is connected with religion, and the personal comfort of those who minister in holy things, are in a desi! rable and promising state just in proportion as ministerial labour has been concentrated. A man to be really

useful to any people as a preacher of the gospel, must live in the midst of these people, and must worship with them generally every Sabbath. After forty years experience of extended, divided charges, and the results generally languishing congregations, and a half starved ministry, it is certainly worth while to make the experiment of the pastor of a church living at home, in the bosom of his own family, and devoting his labours, and his prayers, and his attention of every kind, to his own immediate neighbourhood. We say a pastor of the church, living at home in the bosom of his own family, for it is none of the least of the evils of the system of which we complain, that the greater number of the present pastors of the churches in Kentucky are under the necesity of leaving their own families at least one half of their Sabbath days. And were there no other evil attending the system, this alone would be with us a strong reason of protest against the whole arrangement.

But notwithstanding all these open and well known difficulties, and a thousand difficulties of a still more appalling nature, which are known only to the individuals upon whom they press, the gospel of God's Son has been and is preached with success by the members of the Kentucky Synod. And it is hoped that with the blessing of their Lord and Master they will be encouraged to continue to be an example of the believers, in word, in conversation, in charity, in spirit, in faith, in purity, so that when they shall be individually called to give in their account, their rejoicing may be the testimony of their conscience, that in simplicity and godly