I must add, that all the other Clergy of oar Church in the above colonies, though not in t e Society's service, have observed the same line of conduct; and although their joint endeavours could not wholly prevent the rebellion, yet they checked it considerably for some time, and prevented many thousands from plunging into it who otherwise would certainly have done so. You have, doubtless, been long since informed by my worthy friends. Dr. Chandler' and Dr.

. 1 Thomas BRADBtrRT Chandler, D. D., was born in Woodstock, Conn, and graduated at Yale College the year 1745; he was appointed in 1748 Catechist at Elizabethtown N. J. In 1751, he went to Eng-. & was ordained Minister and became rector of his former parish in New Jersey. He published in 1767, '^An, Appeal to the Public in behalf (f the Ch->i,rch rf England in America;'' in support of a resident episcopate, and in 1774 he undertook to point out the dangerous consequences of resisting' parliament, in a tract entitled the << Friendly Address^'*

3 050 STATE OF THE

Cooper,^ to wnat an Leiglit our violences were risen so early as May 1775, when they were both obliged to fly from hence, and seek protection in England.

These violences have been gradually increasing ever since ; and this with tlie delay of sending over succours, and the King's troops totally abandoning this province, reduced the friends of government here to a most disagreeable and dangerous situation, particularly the Clergy, who were viewed with peculiar envy and malignity by the disaffected; for, althougli civil liberty was the ostensible object the bait that was flung out to catch the p(»pulace at large and engage them in the rebellion, yet it is now past all doubt tliat an abolition of the Church of England was one of the principal springs of the dissenting leaders' conduct; and hence the unanimity of dissenters in this business.