E-Books
In the E-Books section of this web site,
we will present a number of short works which have been long out-of-print. Most of these works will be presented in the portable document format (pdf), as it provides a way of preserving the format, typestyles, pagination, line breaks and other features of the document. Typographical errors appearing in the original text will be shown in red type.
| The History Behind the Reformed Presbyterian Church, Evangelical Synod by Dr. George P. Hutchinson [originally published by Mack Publishing Company, Cherry Hill, NJ, 1974; this digital edition prepared, under permission from Dr. Hutchinson, by the staff of the PCA Historical Center, 2009. All rights reserved.] |
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| Chapter 1: The Nature of Presbyterianism | |
| Chapter 2: The Reformed Presbyterian Church in America | |
| Chapter 3: The Reformed Presbyterian Church, General Synod | |
| Chapter 4: The Presbyterian Church, U.S.A. | |
| Chapter 5: The Broadening Church In the U.S.A. | |
| Chapter 6: The Presbyterian Separatist Movement | |
| Chapter 7: The Bible Presbyterian Church | |
| Chapter 8: The Evangelical Presbyterian Church | |
| Chapter 9: The Reformed Presbyterian Church, Evangelical Synod | |
| Chapter 10: The Necessity for Consistent Christianity | |
| 04/16/09 - Update: Broken links at chapters 3, 6 and 7 have been repaired. | |
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Memoir of Alexander McLeod, D.D., by the Rev. Samuel Brown Wylie |
Son of a distinguished minister of the Church of Scotland, Alexander McLeod was born on the Isle of Mull and felt God's call at an early age to be a preacher of the gospel. Bereft of his parents, he came to New York in 1792 at the age of 18. He taught Greek in Schenectady and graduated with honor from Union College in 1798. From the Princetown Church, N.Y., he studied theology under Rev. James McKinney. In 1800 he was called to pastor the churches of Coldenham and New York City, but he declined because there were slave-holders among those who signed the call. The Reformed Presbytery subsequently ruled that "No slave-holder should be allowed the communion of the Church"; and in 1802 he was ordained and installed in the joint charge.
After 1803 Dr. McLeod devoted himself to the rapidly growing congregation in New York City. He became known for his remarkable powers as a writer and preacher, taking a front rank among the ministers of his day. He was called by several denominations and different institutions of learning; but he declined all these honors for the sake of his own flock, where he remained until his death in 1833. In 1816 he helped organize the American Colonization Society (for freeing slaves and returning them to Liberia, Africa) and wrote its constitution. In 1830 he was elected Professor of Theology and editor of the American Christian Expositor, when this was established as the first R.P. church magazine.
McLeod was a lucid expositor of divine truth, vigorous in his arguments and practical in his applications. He could enchain the attention of an audience and bring conviction to the heart. He labored for the N.Y. Soc. for the Instruction of the Deaf and Dumb and the Amer. Soc. for Ameliorating the Condition of the Jews. He was a profuse writer, his publications including: Negro Slavery Unjustifiable (1802); Messiah, Governor of the Nations of the Earth (1803); Ecclesiastical Catechism (1807, and issued in a total of 12 editions); Lectures upon the Prophecies of the Revelation (1814, 4 editions - influentially postmillennial); The Life and Power of True Godliness (1816, 6 editions). It was he who composed Reformation Principles Exhibited (1806), most of the historical part of the R.P. Testimony, and the Book of Discipline, famous sub-standards of the Church along with the Westminster documents. His View of the Late War (1815, 2 editions) was a major defense of the U.S. government in the War of 1812, marked a shift away from the former Covenanter position of dissent from politics, and led to the split of 1833 - which Dr. McLeod, even while suffering from his final heart illness, sought (ineffectually) to forestall.
Other
E-books:
Thomas Cary Johnson's History of the Southern Presbyterian Church:
Thomas Cary Johnson is commonly noted as the biographer of Benjamin Morgan
Palmer. Less well known is his history of the Southern Presbyterian Church,
originally published in conjunction with the American Church History
series, in 1894. The text of this work is presented here to accompany
the Center's effort to digitize The
Southern Presbyterian Review, and because so little is readily
available on the history of the Southern Presbyterian Church, properly
known as the Presbyterian Church in the U.S. [1861-1983].
Please note that this history is posted solely for its value as a historical
document. Any statements in Johnson's book in support of the institution
of slavery or in support of racial supremacy should be clearly and obviously
understood to be rejected by the Presbyterian Church in America, by the
PCA Historical Center, and by the Center's director. The book is posted
here that we might learn from it as history, and that we might learn too
from its errors, as well as its truths. It should continue to amaze us
that highly valued leaders in the Church can be so very wrong about some
matters while still holding to vital truths about the Christian faith.
May God grant us the ability to see and repent from the sins we ourselves
are blinded to by our own culture today.
Citation: Johnson, Thomas Cary, The Southern Presbyterians,
in Volume XI of The American Church History Series (New York: The
Christian Literature Company, 1894), pages 313-479.
| The Thornwell Centennial Addresses [all in pdf format] | |
 James Henley Thornwell |
Title Page |
| Preface | |
| I. - Dr. Thornwell as a Preacher and as a Teacher, by the Rev. Thomas H. Law, D.D. of Spartanburg, SC. | |
| II.- Dr. Thornwell as a Theologian, by the Rev. Thornton Whaling, D.D., LL.D., Columbia, SC. | |
| III. - Dr. Thornwell as an Ecclesiologist, by the Rev. A.M. Fraser, D.D., Staunton, VA. | |