Note 9 — IX. GROWTH OF DENOMINATIONAL CONSCIOUSNESS.

Probably Dr. William G. Eliot, of St. Louis, was the first Unitarian minister to make a systematic use of this rite. He prepared a brief manual for use in his church, the preface to which bears date of December 6, 1868. Seth C. Beach, while minister in Dedham, printed a paper on the subject in the Unitarian Review, January, 1886. He held a confirmation service in the Dedham church, April 25, 1886. At a meeting of the Western Sunday School Society, held in Cincinnati, May 12, 1889, Rev. John C. Learned, read a paper on The Sacrament of Confirmation.