lively stones prepared by the great Master-builder, an ecclesiastical
body holding the grand doctrines enunciated at Westminster and Dort, and
the principles of Presbyterian polity embraced at the Reformation by the
purest churches on the continent and in Britain; it will also be a
beautiful point in the history of this infant Church that the
under-builders employed in shaping and arranging the stones, were
messengers of two different (though not differing,) churches in the two
great nations on either side of the Atlantic."

The course of Mr. Douglas met with the decided approval of their
Secretary, and, as he had reason then to believe, and has since fully
learned, with the approval of their Church.

We also sent a communication to our Church, addressing it to General
Synod. We directed it to the care of one of our prominent ministers, for
a long time Secretary of the Board, with the request that it be laid
before the Church, using language as follows: "You will, doubtless,
receive this paper some months before the time for the next meeting of
that Body [General Synod]. We would suggest therefore, that the paper be
published, that the members of the next General Synod may have the
matter before them, and be the better prepared to make such disposition
of it as the subject may demand. We feel that the subject is one of very
grave importance," &c.

Our communication was laid before the Board of Foreign Missions. They
designated it a _Memorial_, and decided that they had no right to
publish it. Of course we had no means of publishing it ourselves. It was
laid before Synod among other papers of the Board. The action of Synod
on the subject was as follows (Minutes of Synod, 1857, pp. 225-227):