If
this be true, it argues that such former addresses can no more
than the last, be fairly called addresses of the body of the
clergy, or be so represented or receive - This Layman, as he calls
himself, mentions the convention in one of his performances, as
acting like "other corporate bodies," at the meetings of which the
presence of a majority of the members may not be necessary to
warrant their proceedings; but he does not incline to answer my
question, viz. When and by whom they were incorporated? But if
they had been a corporate body, the members should have been duly
warned of the matters to be transacted, as well as the time and
place; otherwise, who does not know that their proceedings must be
invalid? To be sure if, without such notification, not a sixth
part of them should be present, which is the fact, no one in his
senses would plead that they could with fairness be called the
proceedings of that corporate body - However, thus it has been
represented by the Layman: The reverend addressers themselves,
call their address, "An address of the ministers of the
congregational churches in the province," and his Excellency
receives it very kindly, as coming from so "respectable and
venerable a body " - Whatever some of those reverend gentlemen, (I
care not how small a number is supposed, for I would be tender of
the character of the cloth,) I say, whether some of them might not
think, that if the address was supposed to be the declared
sentiment of the whole body of the clergy of the province, it
would be further supposed, to speak the sentiments of the whole
body of the people of the province, and whether they were not
under this temptation to give their address so pompous an
introduction, I will not presume to say; I shall only in my usual
way, and with my usual modesty, as the Layman witnesses, ask
whether there is not reason to think it.
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