An humble attempt to promote explicit agreement and visible union of God's people in…

There is much in Providence to show us our Need of it, and put us on desiring it. The great outward Calamities, in which the World is involved; and particularly the bloody War that embroils and wastes the Nations of Christendom, and in which our Nation has so great a Share, may well make all that believe God's Word, and love Mankind, earnestly long and pray for that Day, when the Wolf shall dwell with the Lamb, and the Nations shall beat their Swords into Plough-shares, &c. But especially do the spiritual Calamities and Miseries of the present Time, show our great Need of that blessed Effusion of God's Spirit: There having been, for so long a Time, so great a Withholding of the Spirit, from the greater Part of the christian World, and such dismal Consequences of it, in the great Decay of vital Piety, and the exceeding Prevalence of Infidelity, Heresy and all Manner of Vice and Wickedness; and especially in our Land and Nation; of which a most affecting Account has lately been published in a Pamphlet printed in London, and re-printed in Scotland, entitled Britain's Remembrancer; by which it seems that Luxury, and Wickedness of almost every Kind, is well nigh come to the utmost Extremity in the Nation; and if Vice should continue to prevail and increase for one Generation more, as it has the Generation past, it looks as tho' the Nation could hardly continue in Being, but must sink under the Weight of it's own Corruption and Wickedness. And the State of Things in the other Parts of the British Dominions, besides England, are very deplorable. The Church of Scotland has very much lost her Glory, greatly departing from her ancient Purity, and excellent Order; and has of late been bleeding with great and manifold […], occasioned by their Divisions ⟨p. 70⟩and hot Contentions. And there are frequent Complaints from thence, by those that lament the Corruptions of that Land, of Sin and Wickedness, of innumerable Kinds, abounding and prevailing of late, among all Ranks and Sorts of Men there. And how lamentable is the moral and religious State of these American Colonies? Of New-England in particular? How much is that Kind of Religion, that was professed and much experienced and practised, in the first, and apparently the best Times of New-England, grown and growing out of Credit?

There is much in Providence to shew us our Need of it, and put us on desiring it. The great outward Calamities, in which the World is involved; and particularly the bloody War that embroils and wastes the Nations of Christendom, and in which our Nation has so great a Share, may well make all that believe God's Word, and love Mankind, earnestly long and pray for that Day, when the Wolf shall dwell with the Lamb, and the Nations shall beat their Swords into Plow-shares, &c. But especially do the spiritual Calamities and Miseries of the present Time, shew our great Need of that blessed Effusion of God's Spirit: There having been, for so long a Time, so great a Witholding of the Spirit, from the greater Part of the christian World, and such dismal Consequences of it, in the great Decay of vital Piety, and the exceeding Prevalence of Infidelity, Heresy and all Manner of Vice and Wickedness; and especially in our Land and Nation; of which a most affecting Account has lately been published in a Pamphlet printed in London, and re-printed in Scotland, entitled Britain's Remembrancer; by which it seems that Luxury, and Wickedness of almost every Kind, is well nigh come to the utmost Extremity in the Nation; and if Vice should continue to prevail and encrease for one Generation more, as it has the Generation past, it looks as tho' the Nation could hardly continue in Being, but must sink under the Weight of it's own Corruption and Wickednes. And the State of Things in the other Parts of the Britsh Dominions, besides England, are very deplorable. The Church of Scotland has very much lost her Glory, gatly departing from her ancient Purity, and excellent Order; and has of late been bleeding with great and manild , occasioned by their Divisions