vota,_ of Vorsteher and of elders,
probably to fill vacancies made by death. These Vorsteher were elected
annually and this constitution makes the elders serve for life. The
above document is followed by a carefully prepared constitution and
rules for the parochial school. We see that Muehlenberg avoided the
chief mistake of Brunnholtz in that he did not make the elders
appointees of the pastor, but gave their election to the whole
congregation.

The constitution of 1746, in St. Michael's, Philadelphia, proved even
more unsatisfactory as the congregation increased in size. The interests
at stake grew constantly larger, and the powers entrusted to the elders
could scarcely be so exercised that dissatisfaction should not arise.
The Elders elected the Pastor, they filled all vacancies in their own
number, they selected the Deacons, they decided all questions of the
purchase of property, and the incurrence of debt, and in all these
matters the congregation had no control. It was an almost inevitable
result that the pastor and schoolmasters should try to keep in friendly
relations to the elders, and thus they arrayed against themselves all
who were dissatisfied. Brunnholtz had died, 1757, and Heintzelman had
preceded him in 1756, and the elders had elected Handschuh as pastor,
who, though a devout and earnest man, had the most sickly pietism of any
of the Halle men, and was the weakest of all the Philadelphia pastors,
before or since; he was subject to very great prejudices and strongly
inclined to build up an ecclesiola of his own type within the
congregation. The resistance, estrangement and animosity toward the
existing arrangements, grew gradually to be so great that the peace and
unity of the congregation were threatened to such an extent that
vigorous measures must be taken. The congregation demanded a fuller
control of its own affairs, Handschuh and his elders sternly resisted
the demand, and were convinced that the world would fall if the whole
congregation were allowed to usurp the control which could only be
wisely exercised by a few selectmen. The peril and strife grew so great,
that after a long struggle it became an unavoidable necessity that
Muehlenberg should be recalled to his office as chief pastor, and a new
constitution prepared and adopted. Dr. Mann has presented, in chapter
xxii. of his life of Muehlenberg, a most admirable account of the whole
movement which resulted in the presentation of the new const