Excerpt from History of Congregationalism: From About A. D. 250 to 1616 This volume contains the history of Congregationalism from about A. D. 250 to 1616. Much of it, consequently, is occupied with the history of the principles and doctrines now embraced by the denomination, rather than by the his tory of Congregationalists themselves. Though as a de nomination, we had no distinctive, organized existence um til near the close of the sixteenth century yet, inasmuch as some of our denominational peculiarities have always found advocates and friends, since the days of the apostles, - a very imperfect notion could be formed of our history, if these facts were entirely overlooked. But, in order to bring them out, it has been necessary to travel over a very extensive field of observation, and to introduce more of gen eral history than, at first thought, may seem strictly proper in a denominational work. The sources whence this history has been drawn, will sufficiently appear by reference to the margin. Original authorities have been appealed to whenever they have been within my reach and when they have not, the defect has been, in part at least, supplied, by comparing several second-hand authorities, and when it was possible, men of different views and habits of thought. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.