Springfield 1636-1886, History of Town and City, by Mason A. Green ...

252 SPRINGFIELD, 2636-1886.
to all the Couuecticut witnesses to appear at the May term in Spring-
field. But Mr. Clap and Kirtlaud had no taste for farther fight, and
in a joint letter to William Pynchon, Jr., in April, they query whether
a second Springfield journey would " not look with the aspect of an
unwearied pursuit of a personal controversie." This hint was taken,
and we find the dissatisfied on the 18th of November, 1736, taking a
receipt from the precinct committee for £6 18s., costs of court ordered
at the August session.
The young minister and a congregational principle had received
recognition, and Rev- Robert Breck began a ministry which extended
through half a centur3^
It is an iron}' of events worth mention, that fourteen years later
Jonathan Eldwards found himself compelled to make a plea against a
council of local ministers to investigate the issues between himself
and his Northampton church. He was reminded that in the Breck con-
troversy he had taken just the other view, objecting to the i)resence
of foreign ministers ; and his repl}' was that ordination councils and
advisory councils Avere two different things. Mr. P^dwards argued
that churches were not obliged in every case to " submit to the
neighboring ministers and them only." At the famous council of
February, 1750, at Northampton, Mr. Edwards returned to the sub-
ject by saying, among other things, " Mr. Stoddard & Mr. Williams
of Hatfield, formally went, when invited to a council at Norwich in
Connecticut and, if I naistake not, to another Council at Lebanon ;
which surely they would not have done if they had thought the law
of God and nature settled such an establishment in vicinities." And
we may add, to complete the record of this struggle in church polity,
that Mr. Edwards carried his point by securing invitations for min-
isters from the east to join the council. It sounds quite like fiction,
moreover, when we record the fact that Mr. Breck sat in this council,
and gave the casting vote which dismissed Edwards from his North-
ampton church.
Mr. Breck began his ministry under depressing circumstances.