Part I.

The Union Movement and the Coming Assembly, November, 1904.

So late as August 27th, 1904, Rev. Dr Gibb writes to the 'Outlook' on the question of Union, and in his letter indicates his strong conviction that nothing that has happened or has been written ought to deter the Presbyterian Church of New Zealand from going forward with his present Union movement. We have been informed time and again that this movement was not to be proceeded with unless there was practical unanimity for going on within the Church. Such was the argument at the beginning; and although it has plainly appeared during the past year that the Church is far from unanimity on the wisdom of the proposal, yet Dr. Gibb has intimated his intention of doing his utmost to induce the Assembly to give his Committee a mandate, in the name of the Church, to go forward to frame a basis of doctrine and polity, to be submitted in due course to the Church. On the merely abstract question of the desirability of giving to the Assembly's Committee authority to continue negotiations with a view to framing a basis of doctrine and polity, the Presbyteries of the Church have been greatly divided. Of the fifteen Presbyteries, eight have voted for the "abstract" proposition as above, while seven have voted for terminating the movement for an incorporating union, and in favour of seeking only fraternal organised co-operation in Christian work. I do not need to rehearse the arguments which have been so ably stated on both sides in all the Presbyteries. I am here concerned only with the net result, and it has been abundantly evident to the impartial observer that the Church s seriously divided on the question. So seriously divided is it, that, if the question at issue were the permission of a mere form involving a departure from use and wont, the superior Court of the Church would hesitate on the introduction of the innovation. The issue at stake, however, involves the very existence of the Church, to say nothing of her present peace and usefulness; and, therefore," unless there had been substantial unanimity, no superior Court of a Presbyterian Church would ever think of giving its sanction to a proposal involving her very existence. Nevertheless, Dr. Gibb, with that jaunty optimism that characterises him, is prepared to go on with his movement, and that being so, it is desirable that there should be the fullest information before the Church on the whole subject.

At the rising of last Assembly Dr. Gibb's new Articles of the Faith were, so he announced, before three Churches as the doctrinal basis unanimously agreed to by the three Committees of the Presbyterian, Methodist, and Congregational Churches. And some time later ('Outlook,' December 5, 1903) the Convener of the Congregational Committee, in his report proposed to be submitted to the Congregational Union, wrote as follows: "The Committee have had several meetings, and have also conferred with the Committees of the Presbyterian General Assembly and the Methodist Conference. The annexed draft, entitled 'Articles of the Faith,' which has been assented to by the two Committees, has been carefully considered, and is regarded as the basis on which negotiations for Union may most hopefully be continued." His report went on to recommend "the adoption of the Articles" on certain conditions. The same might have been expected from the Methodist Committee. It was evident at once that the task of those who believed Dr. Gibb's proposals for Union to be disastrous alike to the Presbyterian Church and to the Christtian people of New Zealand as a whole, would be enormously increased if favorable consideration, not to say sanction, even "provisionally," should be hastily given to the Articles of the Faith by these Churches, under the belief that they had already been sanctioned, after careful consideration, by a very large Presbyterian Committee, which included the two Theological Professors. The most unwelcome task fell to my lot of pricking this bubble, and demonstrating with a fulness that has not been gainsaid, that this whole representation, so far as the Presbyterian Committee is concerned, was the child of an over-wrought imagination. The Presbyterian Committee, as such, never really considered the Articles, much less sanctioned them. The whole thing dwindled down to the smallest, if significant, dimensions. The Articles of Faith that Dr Gibb had heralded throughout New Zealand as the product of the profound labours of the Committees of three Churches, and as the doctrinal basis of their Union, were discovered on closer investigation to have been the sole product of the wisdom of three Presbyterians; the said Articles, as is apparent from simple inspection, not having undergone any appreciable doctrinal change from the time when they emerged from the Council of Three to the present hour. 'True it is that the Council of Three were none else than Dr Gibb and the two Presbyterian Theological Professors, who, up to this present have not vouchsafed any light on what they wish to be under stood by these wonderful Articles of Faith.

At all events, the investigation I was led to publish made it abundantly manifest that these precious Articles never had any proper sanction of the Presbyterian Committee. So far from expressing the mind of the Presbyterian Church as a whole, they were only a sort of gunpowder plot on a small scale: Dr Gibb in the role of Guy Fawkes! The net result was page 5 that there were no Articles submitted to either the Congregational or Methodist Churches; and both Churches, with much grace, resolved to abide events.

A little later the "abstract question" of Union began to come before the Presbyteries of our Church. The Americans have a saying: "You can see a great scope of field through a chink in the fence"; and undoubtedly the Articles, when they came to be looked at, were no small chink in Dr Gibb's theological fence. Consequently, when the "abstract question" came at first before Presbyteries, there was a disposition to view the Union movement through this chink in the fence. It is through this chink that I have viewed it, and will continue to view it, and nothing will reconcile me to it.

Not that for one moment, however, would I impute or suggest any disloyalty toward our grand old Presbyterian Church on the part of the great body of my brethren, who, many of them, have served her longer and better than I, and yet have I voted within the last few months in favour of the absract proposition—Union. These brethren say in effect, and say justly, that so far as the abstract question is now concerned, and so far as a doctrinal basis is now concerned, and so far as the Church and Assembly are concerned, there is a clean slate. Yes, that slate is clean; and it is to keep it clean that I have laboured ever since another slate, inscribed with Dr Gibb's Articles of Faith, was passed round in that wonderful Assembly report. But no thanks to Dr Gibb. and some others that might be named, that the slate of the Assembly and the Church is clean. He would have had the Assembly "provision-ally adopt" his slate as a doctrinal basis, so as to be before the Church at this moment for her signature. Moreover, with perfect frankness he has declared since the Assembly: "What that basis—the future basis—will be either in respect of doctrine or polity remains to be seen. It is not in existence now, and no man has any right to say what it will contain or what it will exclude. It is conceivable that the doctrinal basis may be the very Articles of the Faith which have so deeply perturbed the spirit of your correspondents. Revs. P. B. Fraser and I. Tolly." Further, he wrote: "If my friends persist in assailing these withdrawn Articles, I shall be prepared to defend every syllable of them, and to show their profound harmony with the deepest convictions of Catholic Christendom, and their adequacy to stand as the doctrinal basis of a United Church." Yes, though Dr Gibb has cleaned his slate once more, who, I ask, controls the pencil that is to write afresh? The Articles have never really been "withdrawn"; they are only in a state of suspended animation. It is true, we are promised that the new Creed will not be written up quite so fast as the one "withdrawn"; but the programme is to get there all the same. "My impression is," says Dr Gibb, "that the people, or many of them, require to be educated in this matter. The educational process has begun, and you may rest assured that it will go on until page 6 Union is accomplished, however long it may be." "Go slow," is the watchword now, however, while the Church goes to school to its new "Shortest" Catechism.

In view of the discussions that have taken place, Dr Gibb prudently proposes a change of method—though not of object. Not that I have any right to object to that. He and those who think with him, if they have resolved that it is best for the advancement of Christ's Kingdom to unite with Methodists and Congregationalists on such a doctrinal bass as he has "framed," have a perfect right to do so; only, those! of us who think differently have an equal right to decline to follow him at any pace. No doubt more will follow him if he goes at a slower pace than at his reckless speed of last Assembly. It is enough for many of us, however, to know the terminus ad quem in order to decline to embark with Dr Gibb for pilot. That he promises not to shock our nerves by going at top-speed, as heretofore, forms no inducement Nor will the well-meant soothing syrups offered by his kindly fellow-travellers be any more helpful to that end. True, some of them, whom we honour greatly, who have no intention of following Dr Gibb in his revolutionary creed-making, think that "the Church," in honour bound, having gone so far, is bound to go farther, till she comes to what they are pleased to call a "stone-wall." When the blind lead the blind, however, unfortunately there is not always a stone-wall to coma up to, but only a ditch to receive them. And this in my application of it implies not more than error of judgment; but is not the result the same? May not the ditch even be a precipice? and the end the same—disaster to our beloved Presbyterian Church, and much wounding of brethren? After ten years' negotiations and much heart-burning among brethren, the Free Church of Scotland had to abandon her efforts for Union with the United Presbyterian Church, because she had I come to a "stone-wall." The opposition was felt to be insuperable at the time. "What a pity!" exclaims Dr Walker, the historian of the Church—" what a pity it was that they did not say so at once! How many heart-burnings might thus have been avoided!"

Now, the latter half of this motion was moved at the last Assembly by Rev. G. B. Inglis, and seconded by Rev. J. K. Elliott, as follows:—" That it be remitted to the Union Committee to consider, along with the Committees of the Methodist and Congregational Churches and any other Churches, whether in the meantime a Representative Council could not be set up which would consider and devise methods for the practical co-operation in Christian work and progress of the various Churches in New Zealand, until such time as God in His providence may open up the way for a closer union, and report to next Assembly." This motion, I may say, is on the lines of the original overture I moved in the Clutha Presbytery, which was carried unanimously there, and in the Synod of Otago and Southland, and consequently it has been alleged that I myself am responsible for the Union movement I now seek to terminate. If one is responsible for a counter-action which defeats, and was intended to defeat, one's own action, then, no doubt, I am the real author of Dr Gibb's Union movement and all that it contains. But reasoning of that sort is not convincing, and bears its own refutation on its bosom. Now, how did Dr Gibb treat that motion last year? What did he say? "With regard to co-operation, no man had had more experience of it than he had, and his own conviction as to its movements was that they had little value. The real value lay in Union. To carry the principle of co-operation might be to kill this Union movement." This was, indeed, a surprising assertion, that co-operation among the Churches is of little value—and likely to kill Union! Churches that cannot agree to co-operate ought forthwith to unite! "Co-operation of little value!" Better acquaintance with each other likely to kill Union! No doubt, if it is not co-operation, but creed revision conducted by Dr Gibb and his associates that is desired, then co-operation is not of immediate value to that end. Probably it would "kill" Dr Gibb's "Union" movement; but I do not think that such an event would be so dire a calamity to the Presbyterian Church or the other Churches concerned as Dr Gibb appears to imagine. Any way, it may be reasonably asked: What need is there for any more specimens of doctrinal Articles from the hands of Dr Gibb's Committee? Ex uno disce omnia! The spectacle is certainly not edifying to the Church nor convincing to a sceptical world. And neither edifying nor convincing would it be to a Lord Chancellor! Verbum satis sapienti.