THE PANOPLIST, AND MISSIONARY MAGAZINE UNITED. FOR THE YEAR ENDING JUNE 1, 1809. VOLUME I. NEW SERIES. CONDUCTED BY AN ASSOCIATION OF FRIENDS TO EVANGELICAL TRUTH; UNDER THE PATRONAGE OF THE MASSACHUSETTS, HAMPSHIRE, BERKSHIRE, MAINE, AND RHODE ISLAND MISSIONARY SOCIETIES. ASTOR LIBRARY JEW YORK BOSTON : PUBLISHED BY FARRAND, MALLORY, AND CO. The three former volumes of the Panoplist in numbers, or in half binding, may Samuel T. Armstrong, Printer, Charlestown. 1809. THE first volume of the PANOPLIST AND MISSIONARY MAGAZINE is now completed. The design of this publication, and the principles on which it was to be conducted, are fairly before the public, and cannot have failed to commend themselves to the approbation of all, who delight in the honor of God and the best interests of men. These it has been our endeavor to hold constantly and sacredly in view; and, whatever judgment may be passed upon our labors in other respects, we have a testimony, we trust, in the public mind, that we have not violated the professions, with which they were commenced. Illy prepared indeed should we have been for an undertaking of this kind, had we calculated on giving universal satisfaction, and answering fully all the wishes of all our readers. Among six or seven thousand readers, living in all parts of these States, an immense variety of particular humors, tastes, and views must exist; and an attempt to accommodate ourselves to them all would be as chimerical, as the issue of it would be mortifying. Our utmost hope in this regard, has been, to meet with some advantage, those feelings, desires, and objects, in which the greatest number of christians can unite, which are intrinsically the most important, and to which the circumstances of the times require the most general and vigilant attention. This hope we have the satisfaction to believe has not been altogether a vain one. If an increasing discrimination of the essential principles of the gospel and interests of the church-an increasing union and harmony among the friends of evangelical truth-and an increasing public patronage, even beyond our most sanguine expectations, may be regarded as any evidence of success in our undertaking; we pleasingly assure ourselves, that we have no occasion for despondency; but abundant reason, on the contrary, to thank God and take courage. Happy indeed should we have been, had no necessity existed for the animadversions and censures, which, by a sacred sense of duty, we have been constrained to introduce, particularly into the department of Reviews. But, |