The  Council  also  referred  the  elaborate  statements  of
polity  that  had  been  laid  before  it  to  a  committee  of  twenty-
nine,  widely  representati\-e  of  Congregationalism  geograph-
ically, to  serve  as  a  basis  for  the  preparation  of  a  more
lengthy  treatise  on  polity,  which  the  committee  might  re-
port directly  to  the  churches.  The  result  was  the  publi-
cation in  1872  of  the  so-called  "  Boston  Platform," — a  care-
ful exposition  of  modern  Congregational  usage,  in  length
somewhat  resembling  the  "  Cambridge  Platform  "  of  1648.
But  though  it  bore  the  approving  signatures  of  the  twenty-
six  survi\-ing  members  of  the  committee,  and  was  in  e\'erv


A   STATEMENT  OF  POLITY.  40I

way  worthy  of  them,  its  very  length  and  elaborateness  have
prevented  it  from  coming  into  any  extensive  use.
The  Council  also  discussed  with  much  thoroughness  the
work  of  evangelization  in  the  West  and  South,  church-
building,  ministerial  education,  and  other  problems  of  the
advancement  of  the  kingdom  of  God.  It  is  needless  to  say
that  it  had  no  authority  to  bind  the  action  of  individual
churches,  and  that  it  was  not  a  judicial  body ;  but  its
influence  was  none  the  less  widely  felt,  and  it  contribu-
ted none  the  less  positively  to  Congregational  advance-
ment.
