In this same year, 1826, Cavendish and New London were disjoined from Princetown and formed into a congregation, which for a brief period was under the supervision of the Reverend Hugh Dunbar, who, after retiring from the active ministry, became one of the strongest pioneers in the educational system of the pro- Vince.”9

13. UNIQUE PASTORATE OF THE REV. DONALD MCDONALD

“Any treatment of the Presbyterian Church in this province would be altogether inadequate and eminently unfair to a very large section of the community which would fail to notice and at the same time to emphasize and to appreciate the unique services of the Rev. Donald McDonald. He arrived on the scene early in 1827 and continued with unabated zeal and vigor for the space of forty years to proclaim what was to him “the glorious gospel of the blessed God.” His figure is an outstanding one in the Island’s story. Homeless and a peripatetic, he went about from place to place and from home to home, a veritable apostle, whose success can only be measured, from the human standpoint, by the veneration of those who acknowledged that under God he was the means of leading them into the paths of righteousness, and by the respect and wonder in which his memory is held by the descendants of those who, drawn by the magnetism of his personality, attracted by his fearless denunciation of sin, and softened and soothed by his heartfelt sympathy, gathered around him and constituted the largest congregation in the history of the Canadian Church. Whatever opinion may be held as to the peculiar manifestation denominated ‘the works,’ there can be but one opinion as to the piety and devotion of the people to whom Rev. McDonald and his successor ministered abundantly and successfully for the long period of seventy-six years. Rev. McDonald always claimed that his organization represented the Church of Scotland and while there was no official connection during his lifetime, the Church of Scotland later granted official recognition to the Rev. Donald McDonald and the succeeding ministers, Rev. John

Goodwill, Rev. MacLean, Rev. MacDougall, and Rev. Campbell.”"0

14. MANY SACRIFICES OF THE FIRST PRESBYTERIAN SETTLERS RESULT IN SOME SUCCESSES FOR THE CHURCH

“The Glasgow Colonial Society for promoting the moral and religious interests of the Scottish settlers in British North America was formed in 1825, and the church was training her own ministers by means of the far-famed academy in Pictou and the theological instruction afforded by Dr. McCulloch, a man of the most brilliant at- tainments and most intense devotion, and well-fitted to adorn any theological in- stitution. The pioneers named from the coming of Doctor MacGregor, the first mis- sionary, to that of Rev. McDonald, who stands out a solitary figure in many respects, were men of intellectual strength, of high ideals, of moral enthusiasm, of

pure and holy motives, to whom the cross of the crucified was the dearest thing in life.

89 Fullerton, op. cit., p. 308A. 90 Fullerton, op. cit., pp. 308A-309A.

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