Cause of your Blessed Lord & Master and may you still go on in His Strength to win many Souls to Righteousness every one of which will be a bright Gem in the glorious Crown with wch the Great God Man will wreathe your Temples in the great day of his appear 8 Amen and Amen ! . . .
William A. Whitehead, editor, Documents relating to the Colonial History of the State of New Jersey (Newark, 1885), VIII (i), 84-86 passim.
101. A Plan for American Bishops (1758)
BY ARCHBISHOP THOMAS SECKER
Seeker was archbishop of Canterbury at this time. This letter is selected out of several of similar tenor. Dr. Samuel Johnson, Rector of King's (now Columbia) College, was much interested in the scheme. For its political effects, see No. 147 below. — Bibliography: Palfrey, New England, V, 245-255; Winsor, Narrative and Critical History, VI, 243-245; Channing and Hart, Guide, § 133.
ALL these things will contribute, directly or indirectly, to facilitate what we must ever pray and labour for, till we obtain it, the establishment of Bishops of our Church in America. This I have long had at heart : and not only said but written a great deal in favor of it to such as I hoped might be brought off from their prejudices, either wholly or in some measure. Nor, unsuccessful as the attempts have been shall I ever abandon the scheme, as long as I live. But pushing it openly at present would certainly prove both fruitless and detrimental. They alone are judges of opportunities, who know the dispositions and influences of persons and parties : which cannot always be explained to others. The design when some years ago it seemed to be in great forwardness, received a most mortifying check, by means of an unseasonable step, which a worthy and able prelate took to promote it, and of which its opposers made their advantage. The time is not yet come for retrieving the ground then lost : though I believe the King to be well disposed ; and those, whom he consults, to be, in general, either not averse, or only so through groundless fears. But in the mean while, both you and we may be seeking occasions, in friendly and seemingly accidental discourse, and with better effect as we can truly affirm, that no plan for this purpose lies now, or will be laid soon before our superiors, to shew men, that nothing was ever intended, at which Christians of any denomination have cause to be alarmed : but merely a provision
