He was senior editor of the Congregationalist (1849-1855), and an associate editor of the Christian Union from 1870.
Dale of Birmingham, the most influential Congregationalist in the closing decades of the 19th century, in whom lived afresh the high Congregationalism of the early Separatists.
Becoming a Congregationalist, he accepted in 1842 the chair of biblical criticism, literature and oriental languages at the Lancashire Independent College at Manchester; but he was obliged to resign in 1857, being brought into collision with the college authorities by the publication of an introduction to the Old Testament entitled The Text of the Old Testament, and the Interpretation of the Bible, written for a new edition of Horne's Introduction to the Sacred Scripture.
The Congregationalist (afterwards published in Boston) and the Churchman (afterwards published in New York) were also founded at Hartford.
There is also a Congregationalist theological college, built in 1869 at a cost of £12,000, and now affiliated with the university of Wales.