heir instrumentality. Their relationship to those Churches
must have reference especially to local matters, for the proper
organization, and control, and development of the native churches, not
at all to be controlled by them. When they cease to be agents of the
Church at home, and become the proper _pastors_ of the native churches,
then will be the proper time to put themselves under the control of the
native churches, instead of the Church at home. We must not confound
_evangelization_ with _colonization_. Does any one imagine that Paul and
Barnabas, and Timothy and Titus, or any of them (for they were not all
apostles), had connection with the Church which sent them out, _only_
through the churches and ecclesiastical bodies organized by them? or
that they were in any sense under the control of those bodies?

The next and last "particular" of the Committee is "3d. That while the
Churches, three at least, are organized under and according to the
Constitution of our Church, it is, nevertheless, claimed that the
members of said Churches are not more members of the Reformed Dutch
Church here, than they are members of the Presbyterian Church of
England."

The words of this third "particular" are almost (not quite) accurate.
Yet they appear to us like special pleading. They would have been
strictly correct if they had run as follows: "These Churches are _all_
(why say, '_three at least_'?) organized according to (not
'_under_'--see pages 28-30) the Constitution of our Church. Therefore it
is claimed that they form a Church of our order in China, but that the
members thereof are neither members of the Reformed Dutch Church here,
nor members of the Presbyterian Church in England." Such are the facts.
It would have been better if the Committee had so stated them. The
effort is now made to divide these churches, and make three of them a
part of the Dutch Church in America.

There is one more paragraph in the report of the Committee which demands
notice. It is:

"Your Committee can easily understand how reluctantly our Missionaries
may have been, or may still be, to disturb, or alter, or modify the
relations of the Churches at Amoy. But they conceive it to be their duty
to say that feeling should never be allowed to take the place of
conscience, nor to discharge its functions; and so long as our
Missionaries claim to be subordinate to the authority of General Synod,
they should allow this body to assume the responsibility of