3

On the following day (Sept. 2d), In compliance with an invit-
ation from the Standing Committee of Alabama, I sent out to perform
such official acts in that Diocese as my other obligations would
allow. In this work I was laboriously engages until the meeting
of our ajourned Convention, in Columbia, South Carolina, on the
16th of October. During the tendays previous to that time I was
occupied with the Committee appointed in preparing a Constitution
and Canons for the action of the Convention. Of the members com-
posing that Convention, of the wisdom and good feeling which char-
acterised their deliberations, and of the work which they perform-
ed, I need not here speak, as their Journal has been widely dissem-
inated and now lies upon your table. The Constitution of our Church in the
Confederate States is now laid before you for your consideration
and ratification. Whilst I cordially approve its general provis-
ions, and acknowlege its superiority over that by which we have
heretofore been guided, I cannot but deeply regret that in giving
as name or title to out new organisation, one has not been chosen
expressive of out Apostolic and Catholic character in the place of
that which seemingly ranks us as one among the many sects of which
the last three centuries have been so prolific. If any form or
phrase of Chritianity on this Continent deserves the name of Cath-
olic, it is our own Anti-Roman, Anti-Sectarian Branch of Christ's Church.