Ratio disciplinae fratrum Nov-Anglorum. A faithful account of the discipline professed and practised; in…

The People of GOD, whose Customs have this Relation given of them, have not the Vanity to think, that their Works are perfect before GOD, or, that in their Discipline they perfectly Answer the Rules for the •vang•li•l Church State, left unto us by our A•ended SAVIOUR. And yet the Essentials & Substantials of the Discipline in these Churches, doubtless are so Defensible by the Sacred ⟨p. 195⟩Scripture, and so conformable to the Primitive Pattern, and so evidently subservient unto the Grand Intention of the Church State, even the PIETY wherein all Good Men are United, that they do well to think, that it would be a most foolish & sottish Thing to desert them. If the Churches have their Deficiencies, in any Points, that want either to be Corrected, or to be Improved, it is no more than what is to be Expected, until the Antichristian Apostasy be expired. Nor must it be concealed, that the Churches of New England are not without sad Instances of some, and some Tendencies to more, Apostasy. 'Tis possible that some Good Men abroad, would upon the Sight of the Account that has been given of the Discipline observed in these Churches, be ready to say as Vergerius did when he read the Discipline observed in the Churches of Bohemia; I would to GOD, I were among you! But he must not be called, A Calumniator, who informs them, That they will not find New England a New Jerusalem. Tho' the Body of the People are a Sober, Honest, Industrious, & well disposed sort of Men; Unexceptionably Loyal to the British Sceptre; & Hospitable to Strangers (who yet often treat them with a strange Indignity and Ingratitude, and such as would never be endured without the greatest Resentments in any other Country!) and the common People are better acquainted with Religion, than in any other Country upon the Face of the Earth; Yea, some whole Towns have not so much as One Family in them, which does not maintain a Religions Worship of GOD our SAVIOUR, or so much as One Person that is known to walk disorderly; Nevertheless ⟨p. 196⟩there is found among them, too much Cause to complain of a Gradual and a Growing Apostasy from the Religious Disposition that signalized the first Planters of the New-English Colonies. The Spirit of this World has too far brought a Death upon the Spirit & Power of Godliness;