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THE RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF

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NEW ENGLAND

KING'S CHAPEL LECTURES

John Winthrop Platner
William W. Fenn
George E. Horr
Rufus M. Jones

George Hodges
William E. Huntington
John Coleman Adams
William L. Worcester

CAMBRIDGE
HARVARD UNIVERSITY PRESS
LONDON: HUMPHREY MILFORD
Oxford University Press
IOI7

copyright, 19 i 7
harvard university press

M

lye 500
U2.i£ CoP" £-

PREFACE
THE chapters of this book were prepared and delivered
as lectures under the auspices of the Lowell Institute
in King's Chapel, Boston, in the winters of 1914-15 and
1915-16. The Committee in charge of the lectures consisted
of representatives of the Harvard Divinity School and the
affiliated schools, Andover Theological Seminary, and the
Episcopal Theological School, Cambridge.
One deficiency the Committee sincerely regret. It ap
peared impossible to secure either for the lectures or for
the book an historical narrative from a member of the
Roman Catholic communion. The Committee feel that the
book ought not to be issued without at least some word
recognizing the contribution which that Church has made to
the Religious History of New England.

CONTENTS

I. THE CONGREGATIONALISTS  i
John Winthrop Platner
Brown Professor of Ecclesiastical History, Andover Theological Seminary
i. The Beginnings of Congregationalism ... 3
2. The Period of Church Dominance .... 22
3. Religion and Theology in the Eighteenth Century . 38
4. Modern Congregationalism  56
II. THE REVOLT AGAINST THE STANDING ORDER . 75
William W. Fenn
Dean and Bussey Professor of Theology, Harvard Divinity School
1. Popular Movements  77
2. The Unitarians . . . . 97
III. THE BAPTISTS ... . . .135
George E. Horr
President and Professor of Church History, Newton Theological Institution
IV. THE QUAKERS . . . 177
Rufus M. Jones
Professor in Haverford College
V. THE EPISCOPALIANS . . .... .203
George Hodges
Stone Professor of Homiletics and Pastoral Theology, and Dean,
Episcopal Theological School, Cambridge
1. Before the American Revolution.  205
2. After the American Revolution . . . 227
VI. THE METHODISTS . 249
William Edwards Huntington
Sometime President of Boston University
1. Personal and Institutional Forces . . . . .251
2. Practical Bearings of New England Methodism . . 273
VII. THE UNIVERSALISTS .  295
John Coleman Adams
Pastor of the Church of the Redeemer, Hartford, Connecticut
VIII. THE SWEDENBORGIANS . .  323
William L. Worcester
President and Professor of Scripture Interpretation, Homiletics, and Pastoral
Duty, New-Church Theological School, Cambridge

1
THE CONGREGATIONALISTS
JOHN WINTHROP PLATNER

THE CONGREGATIONALISTS
I. THE BEGINNINGS OF CONGREGATIONALISM
THE ecclesiastical forms under which the rehgious his
tory of New England was begun, and through which
that history long continued to unfold itself, were for the most
part Congregational. Throughout the colonial period, and
well down into the nineteenth century, Congregationalism
was the dominant church polity, and the churches of that
order remain even today the most important Protestant
bodies in New England. In view of the large influence which
New England has exercised upon the rehgious, social, and
educational life of the country at large, it must be evident
that, altogether apart from the intrinsic interest of the sub
ject, a review of Congregationalism is likely to throw light
upon many sides of our national history, and to reveal the
working of some of the most significant forces which have
ever operated within the territory of the United States.
For Congregationalism is the expression of a certain type
of life and character, — self-dependent, God-fearing, indus
trious, capable, and highly conscientious, — the qualities on
which alone enduring social and political institutions can be
reared. Bishop Creighton's judgment, the judgment of a
trained historian but not an ecclesiastical sympathizer, was
hardly an exaggeration of the facts, when he said that
Congregationalism " stamped upon the early colonies of
America the severe morality and patient industry which
have trained a nation." And the late Lord Acton, also a
trained historian, but even less than Creighton an ecclesias
tical sympathizer, paid his ungrudging tribute to the Puritans

4 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
in general, and Independents in particular, when he said,
" The idea that rehgious hberty is the generating principle
of civil, and that civil liberty is the necessary condition of
rehgious, was a discovery reserved for the seventeenth
century. . . . That great political idea . . . has been the
soul of what is great and good in the progress of the last two
hundred years. "
It is this chapter of New England history that we are to
review together, so far as the narrow limits of our time
permit. Travelling northward one hundred and forty-six miles
from London, on the old post-road leading to York and
Edinburgh, one comes to the quiet hamlet of Scrooby,1
inhabited by scarce two hundred persons, but boasting, as
its most interesting possession, an ancient manor house, once
belonging to the archbishop of York, but now a shrine of
Congregationahsm and the goal of pious p lgrimages from
New England. Here at the opening of the seventeenth cen
tury dwelt William Brewster, master of the post, and here,
careful to avoid publicity, assembled from time to time a
little group of earnest men and women, belonging to the
advanced party of English puritans, — men and women who
were not content to remain within the established church,
however its forms and ceremonies might be modified, but
felt constrained, in loyalty to the Word of God, to withdraw
from all ecclesiastico-political entanglements and, as Brad
ford puts it, to " join themselves (by a covenant of the Lord)
into a church estate, in the fellowship of the Gospel." From
this little society of " the Lord's free people " proceeded
the impulse which, a few years later, resulted in the first
permanent settlement of New England.
1 Scrooby is in Nottinghamshire, near the borders of Lincolnshire and York
shire. The nearest railway station is Bawtry.

THE CONGREGATIONALISTS 5
The movement for which these men of Scrooby stood was
the outcome of many influences, not all ecclesiastical, yet for
the most part religious. It represented one branch, — and
for many years only a minor branch, — of the great Puritan
party, which also included conforming Puritans, Presby
terians, Anabaptists, and perhaps non-separatist Independ
ents.1 What differentiated the men of Scrooby from their
fellow puritans was their thorough-going ecclesiastical
democracy, which might perhaps be called their thorough
going protestantism, only protestantism had not yet become
fully conscious of its logical goal. The beginnings of the
movement are traceable much earlier than the days of
William Brewster. The first church organization of the
independent type is by some believed to have been the
" Privy Church " of Richard Fitz, in London, which goes
back at least to the year 1571. Others would regard the still
earlier Plumbers' Hall congregation, which met in 1567, as
the oldest. But so far as direct and permanent influence is
concerned, the original centre of the Congregational move
ment seems to have been in the county of Norfolk, and
particularly the town of Norwich, where Robert Browne
began his work about the year 1580, and where local condi
tions were especially favorable to the development of popular
self-governing associations.
Recent investigation has shown that Norfolk was the home
of many gilds, semi-religious in character, whose statutes
might easily have suggested a form of constitution for
churches of the independent order.2 Furthermore, nearly
twenty years before Browne organized his separatist move
ment there, at least one of the regular parish churches of
1 Champlin Burrage finds ground for believing that at first not all the inde
pendent puritans were separatist in principle. See his Early English Dissenters,
I, pp. 281, 310.
2 See an article by J. W. Thompson, in the American Historical Review, April,
1913, p. 503.

6 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
Norwich, St. Andrew's, had already acquired a measure of
self-government through the purchase of the right of patron
age, whereby it gained the power to call and to dismiss its
own ministers.1 John Robinson, the honored Pilgrim pastor,
thought meanly of this arrangement, which he held to be a
poor substitute for the liberty of the New Testament. The
passage expressing his opinion is worth quoting:
St. Andrew's is not possessed of that poor liberty it useth by any
immediate spiritual right from Christ, as the body from the head, the
wife from the husband, — but by a simoniacal purchase from the
patron, as the most profane assemblies in the kingdom (in which not
a man feareth God) might purchase it, — and so that spiritual liberty,
which Christ hath bought with his blood and wherein all Christians
ought to stand fast, they buy with a piece of money, committing
herein simony as great as Simon did.
Yet the bare existence before their eyes of a church actually
possessed of a measure of local control, must have encouraged
the separatists to renewed exertions for their more worthy
cause. At any rate it was not long after Robert Browne
removed from Norwich to Holland, that he pubhshed his
famous Treatise of Reformation without Tarrying for Any,
in which are clearly set forth the principles of separatism
and independency.2 It remains to this day one of the most
valuable summaries of Congregationalism ever written.
Two other champions of early English Congregationalism,
Henry Barrowe and John Greenwood, deserve special men
tion, for they were martyrs to the cause they had so ably
served. The one was trained as a barrister, the other as a
clergyman, but both became leaders of a non-conforming
congregation, known in the history of independency as the
1 Burrage: New Facts concerning John Robinson, p. 21. Channing calls atten
tion to a similar condition of things prevailing in a church in the town of Boston,
in Lincolnshire. See his History of the United States, I, p. 288.
2 Old South Leaflets, No. 100. Issued from the Old South Meeting-house,
Boston.

THE CONGREGATIONALISTS 7
London-Amsterdam church. Daniel Neal, in his History of
the Puritans, has preserved a highly interesting account of
the formation of this church, and of its simple rites and
ceremonies, including the church covenant, the mode of elec
tion of officers by the people, their induction into office, and
the manner of administering baptism and the Lord's Supper.1
The views of Barrowe and Greenwood, showing some diver
gence from strict Brownism, and lodging more power in the
eldership, are conveniently summarized in the " Confession
of the London- Amsterdam Church," written in 1596.2
The distinctive features of the churches which these men
undertook to establish are found not in creed but in polity.
The creed of early Congregationalists was Calvinistic, as was
that of aU their fellow puritans. " It is well known," writes
Increase Mather in 1680, " that as to matters of doctrine
we agree with other reformed churches; nor was it that,
but what concerns worship and discipline, that caused our
fathers to come into this wilderness." The marks whereby
Congregational churches desired to be known were the inde
pendence of the local congregation, its constitution under
a covenant, the absence of an episcopate, the conception
of the ministry as exercising delegated powers of a purely
spiritual nature, reliance upon the sole authority of Scrip
ture, and the separation of church and state. Not all these
principles however were the exclusive possession of Congre
gationalists; other protestants, with equal justice, could
lay claim to some of them. And not all of them were con
sistently applied. Nevertheless, they represent the plat
form on which our New England forefathers stood, and the
manner of church they aimed to rear, — a church in which
was the potency of a richer life and a larger liberty than they
themselves at first enjoyed.
1 History of the Puritans, I, pp. 543 ff. (2d ed. London, 1732.)
1 Text in W. Walker's Creeds and Platforms of Congregationalism, pp. 41-74.

8 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
Two features of this simple church organization deserve
especial attention, viz., the covenant and the ministry. The
former was the organic or fundamental law, by which alone
a church could exist. In principle it is closely parallel to
the famous Mayflower Compact, whereby the Pilgrim com
pany created their " civil body politic," and began their
existence as a state. Governor Bradford's description of the
church, formed to be sure before their departure from the
old world, sounds like this civil compact transferred to the do
main of religion. They " joined themselves (by a covenant
of the Lord) into a church estate, in the fellowship of the
Gospel, to walk in all his ways, made known, or to be made
known unto them, according to their best endeavors, what
soever it should cost them, the Lord assisting them." * By
such mutual agreements did the subscribers bind themselves
to an orderly community life, in the one case as a body politic,
in the other as a body ecclesiastic. And thus the foundations
of American democracy, in civil and religious life, were laid
together. Ecclesiastically the subscribers to the covenant gained
thereby all the rights and powers which the Lord had be
stowed upon his church in the Gospel. They beheved that
those rights and powers, in fact all the workings of the
Christian brotherhood, were precisely defined and described
in the New Testament, more particularly in the letters of
the Apostle Paul and in the Pastoral Epistles, and to these
writings appeal was constantly taken for direction and ad
vice. There was no court of appeal beyond them. The free
churches, based upon covenants, were held to be New Testa
ment churches, valid and sufficient against all the hierarch
ical and ecclesiastical usurpations of history.
1 Bradford adds, with touching simplicity, " And that it cost them something,
this ensuing history will declare." History of Plymouth Plantation, p. 31 (ed.
W. T. Davis).

THE CONGREGATIONALISTS q
With regard to the second feature of their polity, the
ministry, the founders of Congregationalism rejected the
traditional view of clerical orders, and maintained the simple
theory that the ministry is not an order at all, but merely
an office. The "minister" of a church was the man chosen
and set apart, from among their own number, to be the
pastor and teacher of the rest. He was their " bishop," if
they pleased to call him so, — which they usuaUy did not,
bishops being unpopular persons among the English separa
tists. He had no ecclesiastical superior, and according to
the early New England practice, he lost his rriinisterial
standing when he ceased, for any reason, to hold a pastoral
charge. According to this theory, there was no such thing
as a minister, apart from the church he served.1 This simpli
fied conception of the ministry, pushed through so coura
geously by its advocates, was based in the last analysis
upon the ancient and highly respectable theory of Jerome,
that in the New Testament the terms bishop and presbyter
are used interchangeably for the same officer in the churches.
(Jerome, Epistles 69 and 146.) It is the theory accepted
and maintained by many Protestant churches, and it has
found distinguished advocates, like the Late Bishop Light
foot, even within the Episcopal communion. But of course
the Congregationalists went a step beyond their brethren
in other denominations, in rejecting the entire conception of
clerical orders.
The congregations or brotherhoods with which we are
immediately concerned, boldly declared their independence,
under God, from the established religion of the English
realm, and their self-sufficiency as churches, wherever they
might find themselves; and thus they re-affirmed the in-
1 This extreme view, represented by the Cambridge Platform, was never ac
cepted by the entire body of Congregationalists, and has long since ceased to be
advocated.

IO RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
alienable right of the individual in all matters of religion,
which had been one of the most momentous implications of
the protestant movement. Taking the apostolic churches
as their standard, — from which they beheved that the or
ganized Christian world had grievously fallen away, — they
pronounced severe judgment upon others, and laid them
selves open to many a charge of uncharitableness, which
their opponents were quick to bring against them.1 Yet
uncharitableness is very apt to characterize earnest men
who, in the face of apparently overwhelming opposition, are
engaged whole-heartedly in the most serious affairs of life.
The first little company of separatists came to New
England in 1620. It was a church migration, and may be
described geographically as the Gainsborough-Scrooby-
Leyden-Plymouth church. They left their own mother
country as fugitives; they left in turn the place of their
temporary sojourn in Holland; and on they came to the
American wilderness, — half of their number to die within
the first six months, and the other half to lay foundations
upon which we are still building.
In comparison with the settlers of the Plymouth planta
tion, those who came ten years later to Massachusetts Bay
were a multitude in number. And their views of the nature
of the church were at first not exactly the same. No better
description of the spirit and temper which animated the
leaders of the great migration can be found than the well-
known words of Francis Higginson to his fellow passengers,
when, in the year 1629, their ship was off Land's End and
headed westward: " We do not go to New England as
1 " Their chief crime was their uncharitableness, in unchurching the whole Chris
tian world, and breaking off all manner of communion in hearing the Word, in
public prayer, and in the administration of the sacraments, not only with the church
of England, but with all foreign Reformed churches, which though less pure ought
certainly to be owned as churches of Christ." Neal, History of the Puritans, I,
P- 379-

THE CONGREGATIONALISTS II
separatists from the church of England, though we cannot
but separate from the corruptions in it, but we go to practice
the positive part of church reformation, and propagate the
Gospel in America." Similarly, two generations later, the
Rev. John Higginson, son of Francis, writing in his old age
an " attestation " for Cotton Mather's Magnolia, said of
these voluntary exiles, that they " came into a wilderness for
that very end, that hence they might be free from human
additions and inventions in the worship of God, and practice
the positive part of divine institutions, according to the
Word of God."
But whatever may have been the precise shades of eccle
siastical opinion held at first in Salem, Boston, and Charles-
town, the churches there established, in the early days of
the Bay Colony, were Congregational churches, and they
all promptly adopted the fundamental principles for which
the Pilgrim Fathers at Plymouth stood.
One of the best examples of the early New England Way
is found in the proceedings of the Salem colonists in setting
up their church. First they formulated this simple covenant :
" We covenant with the Lord and one with another, and do
bind ourselves in the presence of God, to walk together in
all his ways, according as he is pleased to reveal himself unto
us in his blessed word of truth." Next they elected Samuel
Skelton as their " pastor," and Francis Higginson as their
" teacher." Then, to quote from the invaluable contem
porary letter preserved for us in Bradford's History:
Mr. Higginson, with three or four of the gravest members of the
church, laid their hands on Mr. Skelton, using prayer therewith. This
being done, there was imposition of hands on Mr. Higginson also.
The full significance of this simple narrative can be grasped
only when one remembers that both these men were already
ordained clergymen of the Church of England.

12 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
The mode of procedure at the formation of the Charles-
town-Boston church, the following year, was essentially the
same, Governor Winthrop and the Rev. John Wilson being two
of the four charter members. Other churches were organized
throughout the colony, as the tide of immigration strength
ened and the number of settlements increased.1 In Win-
throp's Journal the entries run like this: "A church was
gathered at Dedham," or " A church was gathered at the
Mount" (Mount Wollaston). The methods pursued in all
prove the widespread acceptance of the principle laid down
by Thomas Hooker, in his Survey of the Summe of Church
Discipline, " The church, as Mum essentiale, is and may be
before officers." This puts Congregationalism in a nutshell;
it is the essence of the whole matter.
A few of the churches of New England were organized
before reaching America, such as the church at Plymouth
and the first church in Dorchester. A few, like the church in
Newtowne, removed bodily from their original place of
settlement to another, — in this case, Hartford. With the
growth of the larger settlements the first parish was some
times set off into two, or even more, and town divisions
usually followed the same lines. The relation between church
and community was much closer in colonial New England
than is sometimes supposed.
The connection between church and state was also close,
in spite of their theoretical separation, — so close in fact that
the government of Massachusetts Bay has often been de
scribed as a theocracy. The people of New England were
steeped in the conviction that they had been chosen and
were led of God, and that every part of their life was under
His divine control. No human government could be firmly
1 The exodus, within a decade, of twenty thousand persons from their English
homes and their settlement in the Massachusetts Bay colony, constitute one of
the most significant instances of race-migration which history can show.

THE CONGREGATIONALISTS 1 3
estabhshed, unless based upon the divine. The principles of
this divine government were clearly set forth in Scripture,
and to the Scriptures one must look if one would learn the
will of God. The way of the churches was plainly described
there; and there too was legislation for the community.
Accordingly the colonists made a double appeal to the Bible,
as to a God-appointed constitution for the church and for the
state, ¦ — with the natural result that their type of govern
ment during all the early years was decidedly theocratic.
Furthermore, large numbers of ministers came to New
England, — nearly one hundred of them in the first twenty
years, — and nearly all accepted parish charges. These
ministers were for the most part graduates of the University
of Cambridge, the nursery of puritanism, and they repre
sented a much higher professional type than the clergy who
went to Virginia and Maryland, where their influence was
comparatively slight. The high intellectual and spiritual
level on which the New England ministers stood, and the
popular respect which they immediately gained, greatly
strengthened the theocratic tendency. They were con
stantly consulted by the magistrates and governors, not
only on matters pertaining to rehgion, but also on questions
of colonial pohcy and legislation. Their advice was freely
given, sometimes even before it had been asked; yet it was
never unwelcome. In 1635, the Rev. John Cotton drew up, for
the use of the General Court, a law-code based upon " Moses,
his judicials," and this, or something like it, formed a large
part of the groundwork of the legislation in the Bay colony
for many years. Citations of BibUcal authority were deemed
conclusive in the court room, and capital punishment long
continued to be inflicted for a variety of offences specified in
the book of Leviticus.
This mixture of law and religion of course gave rise to
difficulties, and aroused criticism. It was the persistent

14 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
exercise of jurisdiction over offences " against the first table
of the law" (i. e., against the first four commandments of
the decalogue) that provoked the open hostihty of Roger
WUUams against the authorities, and caused him to protest
that the things of God and the things of Caesar should not
thus be confounded, — a protest which brought him into
trouble. Yet for more than a generation the theocracy
maintained its hold upon the colony, and when at last it feU,
it was only after bitter controversy, and amid the lamenta
tions of the conservatives, who sincerely believed that the
days of New England's greatness were ended.
It is a curious fact that democracy, the very thing towards
which the Congregational movement tended, should have
been so much distrusted by the early New England leaders,
as it stiU is today by some of their successors. In a letter
to Thomas Hooker, Winthrop once " expostulated about
the unwarrantableness and unsafeness of referring matter
of counsel or judicature to the body of the people, quia the
best part is always the least, and of that best part the wiser
part is always the lesser." John Cotton frankly expressed
his disbelief that God ever ordained the democratic form of
government, either for church or for commonwealth, adding
this poser, — " If the people be governors, who shaU be
governed ? " It was not the first time that a great cause
has been promoted by those who profoundly disbeheved in it.
To maintain the purity and propriety of the colony, and
to perpetuate the chosen governmental system, the magis
trates of Massachusetts Bay watchfuUy supervised aU per
sons who came within its borders. It was entirely natural
and praiseworthy that they should exclude such obviously
undesirable citizens as Thomas Morton, of Merrymount
fame, and Sir Christopher Gardiner, along with the " comely
young woman " with whom he set up his irregular residence
at Neponset. Less justifiable, however, seems the exclusion

THE CONGREGATIONALISTS 1 5
of the " Antinomians," of whom Anne Hutchinson was
chief, and of the Quakers, and all persons leaning towards
episcopacy. The attitude of the New England standing
order towards dissenters was not unhke that in the mother
country, only with the roles reversed. Our forefathers were,
no doubt, intolerant; they made no claim to be anything
else. They closed their doors against dissent. They hmited
the franchise to members of recognized churches. They
levied public taxes for the support of religion in the towns.
But they did these things because only through such means
could they assure stability for their institutions, and prevent
political and ecclesiastical disintegration. All their pre
cautionary measures were but the outward expression of a
fundamental rehgious loyalty.1 They would not tolerate a
godless government or a merely secular society; everything
should be permeated by the divine life, and based upon the
divine authority to which they had solemnly pledged them
selves from the first moment of their high adventure. As
a result, they estabhshed a commonwealth so homogeneous
in character, that it retained many of its distinctive features
for nearly two hundred years.2
The so-called Antinomian Controversy, which broke out
only a few years after the settlement of Boston, was the first
serious internal disturbance that the colonists were caUed
upon to face. A variety of causes, — poUtical, ecclesiastical,
and social, — combined to render it acute. Mrs. Hutchin
son, a gifted but indiscreet woman, was the centre of the
controversy, and the chief sufferer from it, but the governor
and the ministers were also involved. Mrs. Hutchinson's
1 The whole matter was thus briefly and accurately summed up by the late
Professor Diman: " The support of religion, not the endowment of any specific
church establishment, was what they had in mind."
2 Professor Barrett Wendell, in his Literary History of America, calls attention
to the effects of this social homogeneity and isolation upon the remarkable develop
ment of American literature in the nineteenth century.

1 6 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
dismissal from the Boston church, as well as from the colony,
after an unfair trial, reflected little honor upon the elders
and magistrates, but showed with the utmost distinctness
that no irregularities of behef or of conduct would be tol
erated in Massachusetts.1
Some of the Congregationalists of New England tended
to favor a presbyterial system of church government, and it
was an open question for a time whether a few of the churches
might not adopt that pohty. In Newbury, for instance,
such a tendency was clearly discernible, and a synod was
convened at Cambridge to consider the whole matter.2 After
friendly consultation, the council, to quote Winthrop's
words, " concluded against some parts of the presbyterian
way." As a matter of fact the Massachusetts churches
never proceeded very far in the direction of Presbyterianism,
but in Connecticut and certain districts of Long Island there
was much less hesitation, as we shaU see.
More conspicuous and permanent was the Baptist move
ment from the days of Roger WilUams onward. After an un
successful effort to estabUsh himseh within the jurisdiction of
Massachusetts, Williams journeyed southward and laid the
foundations of the Providence Plantations, where later he
developed his anti-paedobaptist views and put them into
practice. The Baptist churches, being Congregational in
polity, should not be regarded as a strange or novel denomi
nation in New England, however unwelcome they may have
been made there. The points of difference relate to church
membership and to the sacrament of baptism, — not to the
mode of organizing the churches. But the points of dif
ference have proved to be stronger, and have been more tena
ciously held, than the points of agreement. Particularly
1 An interesting account of Antinomianism may be read in Charles Francis
Adams's Three Episodes of Massachusetts History.
2 This assembly is not to be confounded with the well-known Cambridge Synod,
which met four years later.

THE CONGREGATIONALISTS 1 7
in the early days there was hostile feehng between the two
denominations, and every effort was put forth by the standing
order to suppress the Baptist movement at the very outset.
The most significant event in early Baptist history, next
to the work of Roger WiUiams, was the conversion of Presi
dent Dunster, of Harvard CoUege, about the year 1650.
Dunster's withdrawal from Congregational feUowship, and
his acceptance of Baptist principles, startled the adherents
of the standing order, and greatly encouraged the few strug
gling representatives of the Baptist cause. To allay public
alarm, and refute the threatening " errors," Jonathan
Mitchell, pastor of the church in Cambridge, " preached
more than half a score of ungainsayable sermons " in defense
of the " comfortable truth" of infant baptism. But not even
these ten discourses, or the open opposition of the author
ities, sufficed to prevent the gathering of the first Baptist
church in Boston a few years later. .
The unpleasant impression produced upon the modern
mind by the firm resistance against all manner of " innova
tions," Baptist or any other, is partially offset by a feeUng
of satisfaction over the whole-hearted devotion to the wehare
of the surrounding Indian tribes, displayed by some of the
colonists. To convert the Indians to Christianity had indeed
been one of the avowed aims of the settlers of New England,
but the engrossing activities and the hardships of pioneer
life had left them httle room for missionary labor. Yet at
least one minister, John Eliot of Roxbury, carried mission
ary responsibility on his heart, devoting long and patient
labor to the acquisition of the Indian language, until he
qualified himself to use it in preaching to the red men of
Nonantum.1 He also translated the Bible for their dauy use,
1 An interesting almanac, prepared by Samuel Danforth for the year 1649, con
tains a chronological table of events, in which we find this entry: 1646, " Mr. Eliot
began to preach to ye Indians in their own language."
Eliot's Indian Bible was printed in Cambridge, on the press of Stephen Daye.

1 8 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
and his efforts were rewarded by the gathering of an Indian
church at Natick. Similar efforts were put forth by the
Mahews at Martha's Vineyard, and thence in time came
an Indian lad to Harvard CoUege, to receive his degree of
Bachelor of Arts in 1665.
Notwithstanding Eliot's disinterested labors in their be
half, Christian work among the Indians lagged. He seems
to have had no successors who were equal to the task, and
the indefatigable diarist, Judge Sewall, is presently found
piously lamenting the futility of all efforts for the conversion
of the natives, and even venturing to imply a criticism of
the divine inactivity in the matter. He writes to Stephen
Dummer that he is persuaded it would be " a most acceptable
sacrifice to God importunately to beseech him to put his
hand to that work, and not in a great measure, as it were, to
stand and look on." But neither prayers nor efforts seemed
to avaU, and King PhUip's War finally put an end to active
missionary propaganda in Massachusetts. Such measures
as were taken thereafter for the conversion of the Indians
were due chiefly to the Society for the Propagation of the
Gospel in New England, which had been organized by the
Long Parliament in consequence of the interest aroused in
England by what Eliot had done.1
What may be regarded as the opening chapter of New
England Congregationalism ends with the historic Cam
bridge Synod, of which the most important sessions were
held in the year 1648. This was the first and only general
synod of the free churches of New England during the entire
colonial period, and it had no successor until the Albany
Convention of 1852. Some fifty churches, from aU four of
the federated colonies, were represented by their elders and
The few surviving copies, — rarissima, among collectors, — are probably the least
read books in the world at the present time.
1 This society must not be confounded with the later (Anglican) Society for
the Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign Parts, which dates from 1701.

THE CONGREGATIONALISTS 1 9
messengers, and the Synod felt itself qualified to consider
any problem of church government or discipline, although
it had no direct legislative authority. Its most important
conclusions are embodied in the Cambridge Platform, drawn
up for the most part by Richard Mather, which sets forth
what we may regard as the general ecclesiastical practice of
the period.
The substance of the Platform may be inferred from its
definition of the church:
A Congregational Church is, by the institution of Christ, a part of
the militant visible church, consisting of a company of saints by call
ing, united into one body, by a holy covenant, for the public worship
of God and the mutual edification one of another, in the fellowship
of the Lord Jesus (Platform, II, 6).
This definition states with the utmost clearness the funda
mental tenet of Congregationalism, namely, the autonomy
of the individual church. The Platform proceeds to assert
that the church is " before, and independent of " its officers;
that there is no visible universal church, that is, none greater
than a congregation "which may ordinarily meet in one
place " ; but that the churches have a sort of collective life
by means of the mutual exercise of " feUowship." The
name, " Independent," instead of Congregational, is not
approved. In England, however, that denominational name
became in time very popular.
The question of a creed came before the Synod, but it was
decided that no new formula was needed. The Westminster
Assembly of Divines had just completed its Confession of
Faith, and this, being a good Calvinistic symbol, was adopted,
for substance of doctrine, by the Cambridge Synod. There
was, however, some objection to the article on " Vocation,"
with regard to which a few of the New England fathers ap
pear to have cherished doubts. Thus, from the first, the
Westminster Confession took its place in the religious history

20 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
of America; it was re-adopted, with a few slight modifica
tions, by the Boston Synod of 1680, and remained for gen
erations the accepted doctrinal standard of New England
Congregationalism. The action of the Cambridge Synod met with practicaUy
unanimous approval throughout New England, after the
scruples of a few of the most strongly individualistic churches
against any and every effort after coUective action had been
overcome. There was no attempt to put the new standards
into force untU they had been approved by the several
churches, which alone, it was insisted, possessed the power
to legislate, each for itself. After approval had thus been
secured, the General Court of Massachusetts officiaUy en
dorsed the Platform, which in effect conferred upon the
churches which it represented a quasi-estabhshment. Con
gregationalism was indeed, from that time on, the standing
order of New England.
We must not leave the Cambridge Synod without noticing
an incident at the opening of its most important session,
which iUustrates the vivid consciousness of the divine
presence, always cherished among the colonists. During
the sermon a snake wriggled into a seat near the pulpit,
and, after causing some natural commotion, was killed by
one of the elders. The incident was not allowed to pass
without pious interpretation. " Without doubt," writes
Winthrop in his Journal, " the Lord discovered somewhat
of his mind in it. The serpent is the devU; the synod, the
representatives of the churches of New England. The devil
had formerly and lately attempted their disturbance and
dissolution; but their faith in the seed of the woman over
came him and crushed his head " (Journal, II, pp. 347 f.).
WhUe the churches were thus consolidating their govern
ment and discipline, the western drift of population had
already begun, carrying organized religion with it. Among

THE CONGREGATIONALISTS 21
the first migrations was that of Thomas Hooker and his
flock, from Newtowne (Cambridge) to what was destined
to become the important city of Hartford. Others went
from Watertown, Dorchester, and Roxbury, to estabhsh
settlements at Wethersfield, Windsor, and Springfield. The
town and church of New Haven were founded but little later,
under the leadership of John Davenport and Theophilus
Eaton. AU these churches had their origin prior to the
year 1640, and aU played an important part in the develop
ment of the Connecticut vaUey and southern New England.
In pohty, however, some of them diverged from the Massa
chusetts pattern, and we shaU presently have an opportunity
to see how, in the Saybrook Platform, the Connecticut
churches leaned towards the Presbyterianism of their
neighbors on the west.

II. THE PERIOD OF CHURCH DOMINANCE
Within twenty years from the first settlement of Boston,
ecclesiastical and civil society had become securely estab
hshed, and were in good working order throughout the Puri
tan communities which together made up New England.1
The life of the inhabitants was simple, in comparison with
ours, yet it was dignified and on formal occasions even cere
monious. Apart from general care for the public safety,
which the hazards of frontier life rendered imperative, the
chief occupations were manual labor of various kinds, read
ing, and the exercises of religion. " It is never to be for
gotten," wrote John Higginson some years later, " that our
New England is originally a plantation of rehgion, and not
a plantation of trade. If any man among us makes religion
as twelve, and the world as thirteen, let such a man know
that he hath neither the spirit of a true New England man,
nor yet of a sincere Christian." This plan of life was indeed
that of the leading spirits, among the laity as well as among
the clergy, throughout the period before us. There were
no public amusements and no newspapers. Travel, being
attended with some risk, was attempted only within narrow
hmits, unless forced by necessity; it was never a means of
recreation. The stated services of the Sabbath, together
with the Thursday lecture, furnished decorous opportunity
of meeting friends and neighbors, and supplied to the people
their chief intellectual as well as spiritual stimulus.
The meeting-houses were plain to severity, but dignified,
and sometimes their lines were not without architectural
beauty. Greater emphasis was laid upon social distinctions
than we should have expected to find, and the seating
1 The region of Rhode Island ought perhaps to be excepted, not because it was
not Puritan, but because its institutions developed along somewhat different lines.
See I. B. Richman, Rhode Island; its Making and its Meaning. 2d ed. 1908.

THE CONGREGATIONALISTS 23
arrangements of the churches were carefuUy worked out with
this in view. To each seat was assigned a social valuation.
In time this was reduced to a system. Thus in Deerfield, in
1 701, it was officially determined that " the fore seat in the
front gallery shall be equal in dignity with the second seat
in the body of the meeting-house." Inferior seats were set
apart for domestic servants and for slaves. In the Presby
terian church at Newburyport, built about the middle of the
eighteenth century, one may stUl see the pews in one corner
of the gallery, where negro slaves were seated. On the other
hand, the elders and deacons had seats of especial honor near
the pulpit, and usuaUy facing the congregation.1
On the Lord's Day there were two preaching services, the
first in the morning, earUer than is now customary, and the
second early in the afternoon. Scripture reading (with
comments), prayer, psalmody, and a sermon, made up the
order of exercises. Nothing in the slightest degree suggestive
of Uturgical worship, — not even " dumb reading," — was
for a moment tolerated.2 The Bible version in common use
among the first settlers was that of Geneva, not the King
James Version, which was slow in supplanting it. Sternhold
and Hopkins's metrical version of the Psalms was available
for the singing, but before long New England had a version
of its own, — the Bay Psalm Book, which was the first book
printed in the colony. Fuller's quaint criticism of the
1 See D. W. Howe, The Puritan Republic of Massachusetts Bay, chap. 8, where
much interesting information about ecclesiastical customs, etc., is presented.
The importance attached to social position in early New England finds further
proof in a practice of the two colleges, Harvard and Yale, whereby the names of
their students were arranged, not alphabetically, but according to their social
standing. See the Quinquennial Catalogues. The alphabetical arrangement be
gins at Yale with the class of 1769, and at Harvard with the class of 1773. The older
custom came to an end just in time to permit graduates of the two colleges to join
in the social creed of the Declaration of Independence, that " all men are created
equal." 2 " Dumb reading " was a term of reproach, applied to the custom of reading
from the Bible without comments, as in the church of England.

24 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
former would apply equaUy well to the latter; the authors
" had drunk more of Jordan than of Helicon." In fact they
felt free from any necessity to drink of Hehcon at all, and
frankly admitted it. " The Lord's Altar," said they, " needs
not our poffishings; Ex. 20."
The Psalms were " lined off," and one of the better singers
in the congregation was appointed to " set the tune." Judge
SewaU was for many years leader of the singing at the Old
South Church, and his Diary records a melancholy experi
ence, when by reason of age he had ceased to be acceptable
to the young people, in the exercise of this important func
tion. " In the morning," he writes, " I set York tune; and
in the second going over the gallery carried it irresistibly to
St. David's, which discouraged me very much." There was
no help from any musical instrument, for organs were held
in contempt by the Puritans. " One groan in the spirit,"
said Sir Edward Deering in the Long Parliament, " is worth
the diapason of aU the church music in the world." And so
thought the New England fathers.
Certain ceremonies which, to modern thinking, are properly
regarded as rehgious, were by the early colonists deemed
secular, for reasons which might be logical, but seem to us
inadequate. Such were marriages and funerals. These were
held to be no affair of the church, since aU may marry, if
they wiU, and aU must die. The ceremonies of the church
were solely for the elect. The precedent was set at Plymouth
at the very beginning of the colony's existence. According
to Bradford's History,1 " May 12, [1621,] was the first
marriage in this place, which, according to the laudable cus
tom of the Low Countries, . . . was thought most requisite
to be performed by the magistrate, as being a civil thing,
. . . and nowhere found in the Gospel to be laid on the min
isters as a part of their office." This precedent was long
1 Bradford's History of the Plymouth Plantation, p. 116.

THE CONGREGATIONALISTS 25
observed by the Congregational churches of New England.
Palfrey could find no instance of prayer at a funeral earlier
than 1685, nor any instance of a marriage by a minister
before 1686.
The religious observance of even the most important festi
vals of the ecclesiastical year was studiously avoided, as
savoring of prelacy if not of popery. Even so late as the
eve of the American Revolution, Ezra StUes thought it
worthy of record that a young Baptist minister in Newport
had ventured to preach a Christmas sermon. " So this looks
more hke keeping Christmas than anything that ever before
appeared among the Baptists or Congregationalists in New
England " (StUes, Diary, I, pp. 324^). The weU-known
incident of certain new-comers in Plymouth, who had con
scientious scruples against working on Christmas Day, and
accordingly were excused from their appointed tasks, — but
who afterwards were found to entertain no scruples whatever
with regard to play, and accordingly were punished, — is
related by Governor Bradford with sardonic humor.
The exercise of church discipline was usuaUy entrusted to
the elders, although usage was not uniform in this regard.
The early church records prove that disciphnary cases were
not infrequent. Judgments were pronounced in accordance
with the Scriptures, especially the Mosaic laws. But some
offences which, with us, would naturaUy be thought to faU
under the jurisdiction of the church, were then tried by civil
magistrates, and vice versa. The two kinds of jurisdiction
were closely and intimately related, as they had been in
Geneva, and, under a very different ecclesiastical system,
in Roman Catholic Europe during the Middle Ages.
On rare occasions church discipline seems almost to have
broken down, owing to the operation of forces so purely
Tinman as to provoke a smUe from the modern reader. This
was the case in the early days in Boston, when magistrates

26 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
and elders attempted to cooperate in enforcing sumptuary
regulations, but without success:
The court, taking into consideration the great disorder general
throughout the country in costliness of apparel, and following new
fashions, sent for the elders of the churches, and conferred with them
about it, and laid it upon them, as belonging to them, to redress it,
. . . which they promised to do. But little was done about it; for
divers of the elders' wives, etc., were in some measure partners in this
general disorder.1
There were forces at work in New England to which even
the leaders of the theocracy were obhged to submit. But
instances of defeat were not common, and on the whole,
judicial process in the state, and disciplinary process in the
church, went on uninterrupted to their appointed ends.
The latter half of the seventeenth century witnessed many
political and religious changes in Massachusetts, of which
the former were more obvious, but the latter were not less
real. King Phihp's War, which was both disastrous and
costly, wrought disturbing effects upon morals and religion.
The mission to America of Edward Randolph, described as
a royal messenger, but in fact a spy, embittered the colonists
against the Enghsh government, and their bitterness was
intensified by the revocation of the colonial charter and the
appointment of a royal governor in the person of Joseph
Dudley. He was presently succeeded by Sir Edmund Andros,
who landed in Boston shortly before Christmas, 1686, and
brought with him a pomp and circumstance to which puritan
New England was unaccustomed and which it cordiaUy dis
liked. He brought also the cross of St. George, which was
rehgiously obnoxious, and a body-guard of red-coats, who
distributed contempt and profanity among the people. By
no means least, in the catalogue of his offences, was the in
troduction of episcopacy, which flaunted its hated cere-
1 Winthrop's Journal, I, p. 279.

THE CONGREGATIONALISTS 2J
monies in the very face of the ministers and elders, now
helpless to prevent them. An Anglican clergyman, Robert
Ratcliffe, landed in Boston in 1686, and with him begins the
celebration of the sacraments and the conduct of public
worship according to the Book of Common Prayer. " Baal's
priest," some of the puritan fathers contemptuously dubbed
him. A church was organized the same year, and as none of
the existing congregations would lend its place of worship
for such an unscriptural purpose, the Episcopalians were
forced to hold their first services in a small room in the town
house. The Old South meeting-house was finally compelled
to open its doors to the royal governor, — they were in fact
forced open on a Good Friday, — and thus the Episcopal
enterprise went lamely on until the completion of the first
King's Chapel.
News of the revolution which overthrew the Stuarts and
brought WilUam of Orange to the throne of England was
eagerly and joyfuUy received in Massachusetts Bay, and
was foUowed by a local uprising in Boston which resulted in
the arrest and imprisonment of Andros and Randolph, and
the downfaU of their government. MeanwhUe Increase
Mather, the leading figure among the ministers of New
England, by patient and skillful diplomacy abroad, secured
a new charter, under which Plymouth and the Bay Colony
were united, and seh-government once more became a possi
bility, although governor and council were stUl appointed
by the crown. From this time onwards, until the Revolu
tionary War, aU the American colonies developed on the
same general fines, politically speaking. " Everywhere the
Assembly claimed for itseh the powers and privUeges of
the House of Commons, and everywhere it denied that the
Council bore any resemblance to the House of Lords." l
Thus the colonists continued quietly to train themselves
1 Charming, History of the United States, II, p. 248.

28 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
in the art of self-government, and to prepare for independ
ent national hfe, as part of the United States of America.
It was impossible for Increase Mather, notwithstanding
aU his skUl and all his personal interest, to secure under a
new charter such exclusive privileges for the churches of the
standing order as they had enjoyed under the old. Here
and there a church of another denomination had already in
vaded territory formerly occupied by the Congregationalists,1
and even among the Congregationahsts themselves voices
were heard, criticizing the conservatism typified by the
Mathers. The signs of change were small, but unmistakable,
and there was anxiety among the upholders of the old
theocracy. Most significant of the emergence of a changing spirit was
the formation in Boston in 1699 of a new church, without
consultation with the neighboring churches and without per
mission from the magistrates, — the Brattle Street Church,
— whose early history is intimately connected with that of
Harvard College. Among the fourteen original members
were two college tutors and the college treasurer. The first
minister was Benjamin Colman, a Harvard graduate, who,
instead of seeking ordination in the regular way at the hands
of the elders of New England, was ordained to the ministry
by the Presbytery of London, and assumed his pastorate in
Boston without further ceremony. " A wandering Levite,
who has no flock," was Increase Mather's picturesque and
BibUcal phrase, descriptive of Colman's ecclesiastical irregu
larity. The prospective members of the new church issued a mani
festo in which they declared their allegiance to the West
minster Confession of Faith, but at the same time advocated
1 In 1679 a Baptist meeting-house was erected in Boston, but only by the ruse
of concealing its ecclesiastical purpose from public knowledge. The first Episcopal
Church was built in 1689.

THE CONGREGATIONALISTS 29
certain novelties in worship and disciphne. They would
have from their pulpit " dumb reading " of the Scriptures,
instead of reading with comments by the minister; they
would abandon the requirement of public " relations " from
persons joining the church; they would permit others than
church members to have a voice in the selection of a pastor;
and they would admit to baptism the children of parents who
had not entered into covenant feUowship with them.
This programme was viewed by the older churches of
Boston as lawless and highly reprehensible, but the time-
spirit can be seen at work in aU its innovations. The
abandonment of " relations " marks the recognition of the
impropriety of exposing the soul's innermost experiences to
the pubhc gaze. Religious reticence was destined greatly to
increase with the lapse of years, and indeed to proceed so far
that at last it would be hardly an exaggeration to say, as did
President Quincy, of Harvard CoUege, that rehgion had
" withdrawn from the domestic altar to the retirement of
the mind."
The admission to baptism of children whose parents were
not church members introduces us to the consideration of
what was called the " Hah- way Covenant," — an institution
which played an important part in the history of Massachu
setts, since it had pohtical as weU as ecclesiastical impUca-
tions. It was customary in the churches to require evidence
of regeneration, as a condition of admission to membership,
and this evidence was expected to be clear and unmistakable.
Only persons in full covenant membership were entitled to
present their chUdren for baptism. But what was to be said
of baptized persons who reached maturity without con
sciously experiencing regeneration? Were they, or were
they not, entitled to any of the privileges of the church ?
There was long and earnest discussion of these questions.
They were brought before local synods, and even came into

30 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
the legislature, in connection with the question of the fran
chise. Some churches refused to consider any baptized
person as an outsider, yet it was not easy to determine pre
cisely what his ecclesiastical privileges should be.
In the end a qualified sanction was given to the practice
of admitting all baptized persons to HaU-way Covenant
membership, — " associate membership," it would now be
caUed, — whereby, upon condition of " owning the cove
nant " and promising to conform to the discipline of the
church, they received certain hmited privileges, such as the
right to present their own chUdren for baptism. UsuaUy
they were not admitted to the Lord's table, although a few
instances of that occurred, nor did they as a rule obtain the
franchise. Nevertheless, the formal recognition of a class
of church members, not consciously regenerate and not under
fuU covenant obligations, inevitably tended to relax the old
strictness, and to weaken the hold of the churches upon the
popular imagination. New England puritanism was un
questionably somewhat secularized in the process, but a
counter change was wrought in the eighteenth century by
the Great Awakening, which did much to recover the lost
ground. The foundation of the Brattle Street Church, with all the
attendant circumstances, unquestionably loosened the hold of
the conservatives upon Harvard College and upon the church
life of Boston. But they were reluctant to be set aside, and
made strenuous efforts to maintain their position. Early in
1700, Increase Mather published his Order of the Gospel, a
controversial work in which he rebukes the recent " innova
tions," and, along with a constructive statement of the
standing order and discipline, expresses the hope that the
churches wUl pray for the college, " that God wiU ever bless
that society with faithful tutors that wUl . . . not hanker
after new and loose ways." The year after the pubhcation

THE CONGREGATIONALISTS 3 1
of this querulous book, Mather retired from the presidency
of Harvard, and thereafter confined himseU to his pastoral
labors in the Second Church of Boston, where his son, Cotton
Mather, was associated with him, and eventuaUy became
his successor. So high, however, was the esteem in which
he was held, — for he was without question the foremost
minister in America, — that his advice and counsel were
constantly sought on aU sorts of matters pertaining to edu
cation and reUgion, and for many years he exercised an
influence not unlike that of a bishop in the Episcopal com
munion. Only among the progressives were the Mathers
less highly regarded, since they seemed to represent a super
seded order. Their last days were tinged with the melan
choly that enters into the souls of men who see the world
shpping by them, and are powerless to hold it back.
Among the factors which contributed to discredit the
Mathers, — although its influence was not immediate or
decisive, — was the part they played in the persecution of
aUeged witches. In this sad and tragic episode in New
England history one may see how much of fear and how
much of superstition stUl hngered among the most intelligent
of men. America, however, was not unique in cherishing the
delusion of a behef in witchcraft. Indeed the persecutions in
New England were mUd in comparison with what took place
in parts of Europe. For the belief was general, and to many
persons it seemed inseparable from behef in the Bible and
in God.1 The prevalent ideas on the subject were clearly set
forth in Cotton Mather's Discourse on Witchcraft, preached
in Boston in 1689. In the course of this elaborate discussion
of the subject, Mather finds two proofs that witchcraft
exists; the testimony of Scripture, and the evidence of
1 Sir Thomas Browne, the famous physician and philosopher, could say: " I
have ever believed, and do now know, that there are witches. They that doubt of
these do not only deny them, but spirits: and are obliquely, and upon consequence,
a sort, not of infidels, but atheists " (Religio Medici, I, p. 30).

32 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
experience. For the former he appeals to the narrative of
the Witch of Endor (I Sam. xx), and for the latter, he cites
examples from recent history. New England was regarded
as an especiaUy favorable scene for diabolical operations,
since it was a wUderness, — in which by preference devUs
were beheved to dwell, — and their resentment at being
dispossessed, especially by the chosen people of God, could
easUy be understood. Hence the violence of their hostihty,
as evidenced by the outbreak of cases of " possession " in
Salem and in Andover.
There was an official investigation, by a commission ap
pointed by the governor, and in the year 1692, when the
epidemic reached its climax, there were twenty executions,
mostly by hanging.1 But the popular excitement died out
almost as quickly as it had arisen, and some of those who
had been most active in the persecutions afterwards re
pented, and pubhcly confessed their grievous error. But
neither Increase Mather nor his son Cotton betrayed any
consciousness of having been mistaken, much less did they
confess it. On the contrary, their confidence in the local
triumph of diabolism seems to have remained unshaken. As
in the beginning the land was the abode of evU demons, so in
the end the devil would claim his own. In a sermon preached
at Harvard CoUege, late in 1696, President Mather cast a
horoscope of the future, and cast it direfuUy: "It is the
judgment of very learned men," said he, " that, in the glori
ous times promised to the church on earth, America wiU be
HeU." The foundation of Yale CoUege at Saybrook, in 170 1, was
welcomed by the Boston conservatives, as a ray of hope in
an age of increasing darkness. Its founders were heartUy
1 There had been about a dozen executions before this time. For the docu
ments, see the important collection of Narratives of the Witchcraft Cases, edited
by G. L. Burr, New York, 19 14.

THE CONGREGATIONALISTS 33
in sympathy with the Boston group, and dihgently sought
their counsel, which was readily given. Judge SewaU out
lined in advance a programme of study for the new coUege,
which should fortify the students against every encroach
ment of error.
Let them read the Confession of Faith set forth by the Assembly
of Divines at Westminster, which is turned into good Latin. . . . Let
the President be enjoined to read and expound the Scriptures in the
Hall morning and evening de die in diem. Let the scholars be obliged
to obey the President. . . . Let the entire course of exercises be
severely and strictly exacted without dispensation to any (Letter to
James Pierpont, Sept. 17, 1701).
The students of this institution at least were to walk in
the way's of the fathers, and not to hanker after anything
new or loose !
Cotton Mather was instrumental in securing for the new
college a) substantial benefit, in the fortune of Elihu Yale,
and thus indirectly deserves the credit of having provided
the institution with a name. But hardly had Yale been es
tablished in its permanent home, New Haven, when starthng
news went broadcast, bringing consternation to the Congre
gational world, and above all to the conservative party.
The Rector, Timothy Cutler, and the tutor, had gone over
to episcopacy! This was, if possible, a more serious schism
than that of Harvard's president to the Baptists seventy
years before. The sensation in ecclesiastical circles can be
imagined. President Woolsey, speaking at the one hundred
and fiftieth anniversary of Yale, said: " I suppose that
greater alarm would scarcely be awakened now if the theo
logical faculty of the coUege were to declare for the Church
of Rome, avow their behef in transubstantiation, and pray
to the Virgin Mary."
As if to add insult to injury, Cutler came to Boston, where,
the very year of Increase Mather's death, he assumed

34 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
charge of Christ Church, the second church of the Episcopal
order to be estabhshed in the town. Presently, in company
with the rector of King's Chapel, he apphed to the General
Court for instatement as an Overseer of Harvard College!
This apphcation was of course refused, but it is not without
interest to find that now Benjamin Colman is the champion
of the estabhshed order, for it is he who rephed to the
argument of the petitioners, and showed that only Congrega
tional " teaching elders " were ehgible for the office of Over
seer of the college. Later on, during the great evangelistic
movement, we find Mr. Cutler issuing violent and abusive
attacks upon the work of Whitefield and his associates. And
it must be said that much of his energy appears to have been
absorbed in protests of various kinds. He scattered them
freely along the pathway of his life, and through them per
haps some good was ultimately wrought. Even in very-
ancient times the prophetic spirit was able to discern that,
amongst more easily recognizable blessings, the Lord also
sent hornets (Deut. vn. 20).
As in the Bay Colony, so too in Connecticut, the coUege
and the churches were from the beginning very intimately
related, and the one cannot properly be studied without the
other. At Yale this connection was perhaps more faithfuUy
preserved than at Harvard, for until recent times every
member of the college corporation, as well as every president,
was an ordained minister. How close this association was
at the beginning, appears in 1708, when the churches were
convened in synod, by order of the General Court, and met
in connection with the college commencement. The Say-
brook Synod was to the Congregationalism of that section
of New England what the Cambridge Synod was to Massa
chusetts. It formulated and defined the pohty of the
churches, setting the standard to which aU should conform.
But the Saybrook Platform exhibits marked differences

THE CONGREGATIONALISTS 35
from the Cambridge Platform, and to understand them we
must glance backward at the course of events in England
during the period immediately following the Act of Tolera
tion. At that time English Presbyterians and Congregation
alists found themselves drawing together in a conscious
fellowship, and it so happened that just then Increase
Mather appeared among them, on his mission in behalf of
a new charter for the Massachusetts Colony. Mather lent
all his considerable influence to the promotion of the con
solidation. The two groups of churches actually did adopt
a compact, known as the " Heads of Agreement," under
which it was hoped that complete union might be attained.
But like aU such irenic programmes this was a compromise,
and, on the part of the Presbyterians, almost a complete
surrender. It was accurately described, by an English Con
gregationalist who recognized its weakness, as " no more
than a verbal composition, or a number of articles industri
ously and designedly framed with great ambiguity, that
persons retaining their different sentiments about the same
things, might yet seem to unite." x One is not surprised,
therefore, to learn that this nominal agreement lasted only
a short time in England, passing swiftly into neglect. But
in America it had an important influence, for the alhance
between Presbyterianism and Congregationalism, which it
depicted, commended itseh to the ministers of Connecticut,
and its substance was incorporated into the Saybrook Plat
form. Here then is the source of that presbyterial tend
ency which has so often been noticed among the churches
of southwestern New England.
MeanwhUe several of the ministers in Massachusetts,
desiring to stem the tide of change and to restore the old
strictness and sobriety, met together and prepared a plan
1 Quoted by Walker, Creeds and Platforms, p. 446.

36 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
for the systematic organization of associations of ministers,
consociations of churches, and standing councils, which,
when examined, was found also to approximate towards the
presbyterial way. It was formaUy embodied in the " Pro
posals of 1705," issued by a committee representing at least
five of the existing ministerial associations of Massachusetts.1
The Mathers urged the adoption of these Proposals, which
led Ezra Stiles to charge them with having endeavored " to
presbyterianize the New England churches, by resolving aU
under ecclesiastical judicatories " {Diary, I, p. 37), but the
plan faUed to meet with approval and was dropped. In
Connecticut, however, the Proposals received a more cordial
welcome, and the Saybrook Platform adopted with but httle
change their principles of church government and discipline.
Against all these presbyterianizing measures there arose
a champion of ecclesiastical democracy, in the person of
the Rev. John Wise, of Ipswich, who defended the hberties
of the churches with all the weapons of learning, logic, and
irony.2 So vigorous and well presented were his arguments,
that his books were re-issued, as pohtical tracts, at the time
of the Revolution; for the same course of reasoning which
would convince a man of the validity of a democratic church,
might also convince him of the validity of a democratic
state. The General Court of Connecticut was weU disposed
towards the churches, and so was Governor SaltonstaU, who
was himseU a minister; they approved the conclusions of
the Saybrook Synod, and proceeded to enact the Platform
into law. Toleration of dissent from the standing order was
1 There had been purely voluntary associations of ministers in New England
from a very early day, but they assumed no ecclesiastical jurisdiction. They seem
to have met less frequently after the Cambridge Synod, but were revived towards
the end of the century.
2 See his books entitled, The Churches' Quarrel Espoused, 1710, and Vindication
of the Government of the New England Churches, 1717.

THE CONGREGATIONALISTS 37
however secured. The Saybrook Platform remained in
force until 1784, when, by a revision of the statutes, it was
omitted, and thereby practically repealed.1
It is clearly evident that Connecticut Congregationahsm
was different in type from that of Massachusetts, and the
churches were at no pains to conceal it. In 1799, the Hart
ford North Association went so far as to declare that its
churches were "not Congregational"; and in 1805, the
General Association, with reference to the Saybrook Plat
form, called it " the ecclesiastical constitution of the Presby
terian church in Connecticut." Such words could never
have been used to describe the condition of things in Massa
chusetts where the Cambridge Platform guided the action
of the churches. But it is hardly surprising, in view of the
course of events in Connecticut, to find the churches there,
at the beginning of the nineteenth century, entering into
fraternal relations with the General Assembly of the Presby
terian church, and undertaking a common task in the ex
tension of organized religion westward, under the " Plan of
Union," to be considered later in our study.
1 In 1818, the adoption of a new constitution by the state placed all churches
upon an equality before the law.

III. RELIGION AND THEOLOGY IN THE EIGHTEENTH
CENTURY
To understand an age, one must know what books the people
read. It is not difficult to answer that question for the New
England of the eighteenth century. The people read the
Bible, and Pilgrim's Progress, and Baxter's Call to the Un
converted, and Law's Serious Call to a Devout and Holy
Life; and their children studied the New England Primer.
I do not mean to say that no other books than these were
accessible to our ancestors, or that nothing else was ever
read, but the books I have mentioned were among the classics
of Puritan hterature, and some of them were certain to be
found in every home. Their perusal stimulated introspection,
and cultivated a type of rehgious life which easily might,
and not infrequently did, become morbid. And at the best,
while it no doubt strengthened moral purpose and deepened
piety, it ignored certain fundamental human instincts, and
left undeveloped certain valuable capacities. Its one-
sidedness is seen in the " memoirs " of prominent men and
women, which are in no proper sense biographies, but for
the most part records of rehgious experience and expressions
of pious sentiment. The same is true of much of the corre
spondence of the period, so far as that has survived. Even
within the nineteenth century, one can find numerous in
stances of memoirs which lack all ordinary biographical
information, and letters which are religious essays and
nothing more.
There was, however, a more ambitious native hterature,
deahng, of course, with rehgion, and the Massachusetts Bay
Colony had its Milton in the person of Michael Wiggles-
worth, and its epic in The Day of Doom. The literary merit
of the poem was not remarkable, but it was widely read, and
not without a shudder. It related how, at the last great
38

THE CONGREGATIONALISTS 39
day, non-elect infants would argue their desperate case with
the Almighty, and argue in vain. The closing scene depicts
the unfortunate infants, with heroic resignation and unim
peachable orthodoxy, acknowledging the justice of the
sentence of condemnation pronounced upon them:
The glorious King thus answering,
They cease, and plead no longer;
Their consciences must needs confess
His reasons are the stronger.
The chief prose work of the early colonial period was Cotton
Mather's Magnolia, which has been caUed the prose epic of
New England. It is an extraordinary combination of history,
theology, and controversy, — aU permeated by the author's
particular prejudices and superstitions, — but invaluable to
the student of the period.
The New England Primer had a large and uninterrupted
circulation for more than one hundred years, and it was the
text-book for several successive generations of children.1
It opened with the alphabet, as all weU ordered primers
should; then were given lists of short and easy syllables;
then lists of words, of growing difficulty. In its general
form it was modelled after similar books pubhshed in Eng
land, but it contains significant changes. The Elizabethan
primers usuaUy had the cross of Malta i>h) at the beginning
of the first row of letters of the alphabet, but the New Eng
land Primer omits the priestly symbol. It wiU have none
of the " cris cross row " (Christ's Cross row) of its prelatical
predecessors, but wiU be avowedly puritan. The distinctive
feature of the Primer was the alphabetical series of rhymed
couplets, beginning, In Adam's fall
We sinned all
1 It was first printed about 1690. Paul Leicester Ford estimates that it had an
average annual sale of more than twenty thousand copies for at least one hundred
and fifty years. See his monograph, The New England Primer (New York, 1899).

40 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
and ending with the triplet, Zacchaeus he
Did climb a tree
His Lord to see.
With each was a decorative illustration of the incident to
which the lines referred. To many a New England boy was
assigned the unwelcome, but not very difficult, task of
committing the entire series to memory, — as a punishment.
What was just said about Puritan antipathy to the symbol
of the cross finds further iUustration in the successive re
visions of the Primer. The earliest edition had for the letter
J this couplet: Sweet Jesus he
Died on the tree
and there was an accompanying picture of the cross. But
this was presently omitted, and in its place we read,
Job feels the rod,
Yet blesses God.
It was not the doctrine of the crucifixion which offended,
but the pictorial representation of it. Good evidence of
this exists in an edition of the Primer issued shortly after
the Great Awakening, in which practically all the secular
rhymes of the older editions are replaced by others of a re
hgious nature. Under the letter C, the earlier editions had
the worldly-wise hnes, The cat doth play,
And after slay.
The new edition has the strongly evangehcal
Christ crucified
For sinners died.
But now there is no picture of the crucifix. Behef in the

THE CONGREGATIONALISTS 41
atonement, wrought by the sacrificial death of Christ, was
general in puritan New England. But the sign of the cross,
like the cross itseU among men of the ancient world, was a
stumbling-block and foolishness.
The Primer also contained the Shorter Catechism, the
Apostles' Creed, the Ten Commandments, and the Lord's
Prayer. The Poem of John Rogers, first of the Marian
martyrs, and his picture, as he was burning at the stake,
surrounded by his large and sorrowing family, wiU perhaps
be remembered by some who read these pages. New Eng
land's special contribution to the Primer was John Cotton's
" Spiritual Milk for Babes, drawn out of the Breasts of both
Testaments," which had considerable currency as a cate
chism for the young, although it never was so widely used
as the Shorter Catechism of the Westminster divines.
On such food as this was the youthful mind of New Eng
land nourished for generations. It made life serious, but it
gave it rehgious motive and direction, which the more lati-
tudinarian ages have often lacked. There was, however,
beginning in the eighteenth century, a new body of reading
matter coming into existence, in the shape of newspapers.
The Boston News Letter began pubhcation in 1704, and in
the course of fifteen years, built up a circulation of three
hundred copies. The Boston Gazette dates from 1719, and
the New England Courant from only two years later.1 Be
fore very long we meet with the New England Weekly Journal,
and the Boston Evening Post. Here, indeed, were the humble
beginnings of a new era, the era of the newspaper, — that
indispensable modern convenience, which has done so much
to inform men, and at the same time to destroy their interest
in the great hteratures of the world.
1 Justin Winsor describes the Courant as " bold and saucy." It certainly lacked
respect for tradition, and even ventured to print some of the hymns of Isaac Watts,
suggesting that they be substituted for the Psalms in public worship.

42 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
Reference has already been made to the evangelical re
vival of the eighteenth century, commonly known as the
Great Awakening, and we must now turn to a consideration
of the leaders of that movement, particularly Edwards
and Whitefield, two of the most impressive figures in the
rehgious history of America.
In the year of the new Massachusetts charter there was
graduated from Harvard College Timothy Edwards, who
became pastor of the church in Windsor Farms, Connecticut,
and remained there for sixty-three years. He married a
daughter of Solomon Stoddard, the well-known minister at
Northampton, whose pastorate was also of notable length,
covering sixty years. From this union was born, in the year
1703, a son who was destined to become the foremost philos
opher and theologian of America, — Jonathan Edwards.
John Wesley, the evangelizer of England's common people,
was born the same year. The foundations of Petrograd
were being laid under Peter the Great. The Royal Academy
of Berlin was only three years old, and Leibnitz was its
president. Bayle's Dictionnaire Historique et Critique, of
which the second edition had just appeared, was profoundly
stirring the European world. Voltaire was a boy of ten. At
home, Yale College had just been founded, to become the
nursery of Edwards and many of his followers.
The youthful Edwards exhibited extraordinary precocity.
At the age of nine he wrote a serious discussion of the philoso
phy of materialism. At thirteen, he read Latin, Greek, and
Hebrew. At seventeen, he was graduated from college with
the highest honors. Soon caUed to a tutorship at Yale, when
the coUege was face to face with a grave crisis, caused by the
defection of its rector and tutor to Episcopacy, it feU to
Edwards's lot to recover the institution from this staggering
blow, and set it anew upon its appointed pathway. He suc
ceeded, but at the cost of much labor and peace of mind.

THE CONGREGATIONALISTS 43
" I have now," runs his Diary (June 9, 1724), " abundant
cause to be convinced of the troublesomeness and perpetual
vexation of the world."
Three years passed, and Edwards accepted the associate
pastorate, with his grandfather, of the church in Northamp
ton, where he remained for twenty- three years, until dismissed
on account of his opposition to the HaU-way Covenant, and
because his rigorous moral standards were disliked by the
young people. To the lasting discredit of what is now,
by way of tardy atonement, the " Edwards Church " of
Northampton, he, the foremost thinker of New England, at
the very height of his powers, was cast out, to shift for him
self and his family as best he might. Half a dozen years
followed of frontier life among the Stockbridge Indians,
where he wrote his Treatise on the Freedom of the Will, and
he was then called to become president of the infant College
of New Jersey. He removed to Princeton, but only to die
within two months from the effects of inoculation for the
smallpox.1 With Edwards begins a new period in our rehgious history,
a period characterized on the one hand by revivalism and
on the other by the appearance of theological parties and
the growth of denominationalism. He himseU was the
founder of one of the most influential schools of theology
produced by America, known as the " New England School,"
which lasted for more than a century. And it was in no
small measure a reaction against Edwardeanism that pro
duced the hberal movements which have played so interest
ing and significant a part in modern New England thought.
1 A genealogical study of Edwards's numerous descendants reveals very interest
ing facts. It has been computed that there are among them presidents of eight
colleges, about one hundred college professors, more than one hundred lawyers,
sixty physicians, thirty judges, eighty holders of important public office, twenty-five
officers in the army and navy, and almost numberless clergymen and missionaries.
See Edith A. Winship's article on "The Human Legacy of Jonathan Edwards,"
in the World's Work for October, 1903.

44 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
Most persons have at least heard of Edwards's sermons
on the terrors of future punishment, but few are famihar
with his finer and more characteristic sermons on " Man's
Dependence," and " Spiritual Light." His " Treatise on the
WUl " remains his most famous work, but the essays " On
the Rehgious Affections," " On Virtue," and " On the End
of God in Creation," are quite as valuable as an index to
his thinking, and would of themselves have ensured him a
permanent place in the history of rehgious hterature. He
was intensely interested in the subject of conversion, and
analyzed the soul's experience with the utmost keenness.
It was not primarily the psychological importance of the
phenomena which attracted him, but rather the fact that
here he witnessed the workings of the Holy Spirit upon the
human heart and wiU. He sought to trace each step of the
process, and to describe it accurately for the benefit of others.
The revivals, which began in 1735, afforded ample oppor
tunity for such investigations, and one may read of a typical
case, in the Life of the Rev. David Brainerd. The reahty
and decisiveness of Brainerd's conversion are thus set forth
by Edwards :
The dispositions and affections which were then given him, and
thenceforward maintained in him, were most sensibly and certainly,
perfectly different in their nature from all that ever he was the sub
ject of before, or that he ever had any conception of . . . . It is further
observable that his religion all along operated in such a manner as
tended to confirm his mind in the doctrines of God's absolute sover
eignty, man's universal and entire dependence on God's power and
grace, etc. . . . Now where is there to be found an Arminian con
version or repentance, consisting in so great and admirable a change ?
(Edwards's Works, I, pp. 664 f. New York, 1858).
Yet Edwards was far removed from sympathy with the
fanatical type of revivalism practiced by some less cultivated
preachers, and he aUudes to it with severity, lamenting that

THE CONGREGATIONALISTS 45
there have been " so many pretences and appearances of
what is caUed experimental vital rehgion," which, in the
end, " have proved to be nothing but vain, pernicious
enthusiasm " (Works, I, p. 662).
The Great Awakening was immensely stimulated by the
preaching of a young Enghsh clergyman, George Whitefield,
who made seven visits to America, and showed himseU the
greatest popular preacher of his time, and one of the greatest
of all time. His audiences overflowed the largest churches,
and it was estimated that, in the open air, he sometimes
addressed as many as twenty thousand persons. Like his
contemporary, John Wesley, he preached assiduously, aver
aging two sermons a day for most of his active hfe. In aU it
is said that he preached about eighteen thousand sermons.
And they were by no means short. The day before his
death he preached one hour and fifty-five minutes.1 The
effects of his oratory were remarkable, and whole commu
nities were transformed through his influence. But he yielded
to the temptations which beset popular revivahsts, adopting
a tone of censoriousness towards churches and ministers, and
denouncing the coUeges, where, he said, the light had become
darkness. He himseU, in his turn, was severely criticized,
not only by individuals, but also by the coUeges and the
newspapers.2 Even the gentle Edwards felt constrained on
one occasion to administer to him a reproof.
The general description of Whitefield and his work given
by Benjamin Franklin, who knew him personaUy, is so
candid and so fair, that it deserves to be quoted at length:
1 At Exeter, N. H. See Stiles's Diary, Nov. 12, 1770.
2 " The Testimony of the President, Professors, Tutors, and Hebrew Instructor,
of Harvard College, against the Rev. George Whitefield and his Conduct," issued
in December 1744, and the " Declaration of the Rector and Tutors of Yale College
against George Whitefield," issued in February, 1745. Timothy Cutler, then rector
of Christ Church, Boston, abused Whitefield roundly, and he was ridiculed in the
columns of the Boston Evening Post, which had lately come into existence.

46 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
In 1739 arrived among us from Ireland the Rev. Mr. Whitefield, who
had made himself remarkable there as an itinerant preacher. He was
at first permitted to preach in some of our churches; but the clergy,
taking a dislike to him, soon refus'd him their pulpits, and he was
oblig'd to preach in the fields. The multitudes of all sects and de
nominations that attended his sermons were enormous, and it was
matter of speculation to me, who was one of the number, to observe
the extraordinary influence of his oratory on his hearers, and how much
they admir'd and respected him, notwithstanding his common abuse
of them, by assuring them they were naturally half-beasts and half-
devils. It was wonderful to see the change soon made in the manners
of our inhabitants. From being thoughtless or indifferent about
religion, it seem'd as if all the world were growing religious.1
A breathlessly enthusiastic account of the field preaching
of Mr. Whitefield in Connecticut is found in an old diary,
kept by an illiterate farmer named Nathan Cole. This teUs
us how Cole and his wtfe, in feverish haste, rode twelve miles
on horseback to hear the great preacher, and it thus de
scribes the impression his appearance produced upon them :
He looked almost angellical a young slim slender youth before
some thousands of people & with a bold undainted countenance . . .
it solumnized my mind & put me in a trembling fear before he began
to preach for he looked as if he was Cloathed with authority from ye
great god, & a sweet sollome Solemnity sat upon his brow. . . . 2
There were naturally many who defended Whitefield
against aU aspersions, and heartily endorsed his work.
Benjamin Colman and Thomas Prince were instrumental
in securing a statement, signed by ninety ministers, in which
they bore pubhc testimony to the value of the revival meet
ings, and as for their general popularity, that was obvious
enough to all beholders. It is estimated that during the
twenty years from 1740 to 1760, one hundred and fifty new
1 Autobiography, edited by William Macdonald, 1905, p. 125.
2 Quoted from the unpublished diary, by Dr. G. L. Walker, Some Aspects of
the Religious Life of New England, Boston, 1897, p. 91.

THE CONGREGATIONALISTS 47
churches were estabhshed in New England.1 To this num
ber should be added many more in the central and southern
colonies, — for Whitefield traveUed widely and preached
everywhere. Gains were registered by aU the churches,
Baptist, Methodist, Presbyterian, and even Episcopalian, —
as well as by the Congregationahsts. But it should be added
that the increase in membership in the Episcopal church
was due in part to the reaction against the revivals, felt by
members of the other churches, who disliked Whitefield's
extravagances, and withdrew from the churches where they
were encouraged. A fresh interest in Christian education
led to the foundation of Dartmouth College, as an outgrowth
of Moor's Indian Charity School at Lebanon, Connecticut,
and also to the foundation of Princeton CoUege, so that
both these institutions may be regarded as indirect fruits
of the revival movement.
One of the by-products of the Great Awakening was an
outbreak of simon-pure Congregationalism in eastern Con
necticut, in the shape of a series of local separations from
the dominant ecclesiastical system of the Saybrook Plat
form. The persons most actively engaged in it were ignorant
and humble folk, like Nathan Cole, but very much in earnest,
and insistent upon their right to conduct their rehgious affairs
after their own fashion. They beheved in evangehsm of the
vigorous, enthusiastic type, and they were impatient of the
conservatism with which they were surrounded. The last
synod ever caUed by the colonial authorities of Connecticut
was convened to consider these irregularities, and its ad
verse action was foUowed by legislation by the General
Court, making separation from the standing order Ulegal.
As a consequence, the people who had formed conventicles,
— just as the progenitors of New England had done across
1 The population of New England about the middle of the eighteenth century
has been estimated by Justin Winsor at four hundred thousand persons.

48 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
the sea, — found themselves persecuted for their faith. So
vigorous was the action against them, that we even hear of
the expulsion of two students from Yale CoUege in 1744 for
the offence of having attended a separatist meeting. The
movement, however, was not weU organized or efficiently
led, and it died out without permanently affecting the course
of ecclesiastical history. Yet it is of interest to the student
because of the anomalous situation which it created, in
bringing a commonwealth whose origin lay in Puritan
separatism into the position of a persecutor of independent
movements within its own body.1
Another of the effects of the Great Awakening, and not
the least important, was the formation of theological par
ties, and the sharpening of such doctrinal distinctions as
already existed. Thenceforward polemical preaching flour
ished in New England, and theological hberahsm entered
upon a vigorous and successful stage of its career. The
Edwardean system, under the name of " New England
Theology," or Hopkinsianism, was transmitted, through a
hne of able thinkers and writers, almost to our own day.
Joseph BeUamy and Samuel Hopkins, with Edwards himseU,
constituted the great triumvirate, and among their best
known successors were Nathanael Emmons, Jonathan
Edwards, Jr., and the elder Timothy Dwight. Some of the
members of this school, like President Finney and Professor
Nathaniel W. Taylor, mark a departure from the severities
of the system as handed down to them, which simply means
that they construed more liberaUy than their associates the
Hopkinsian principle of theological " improvements." All
these divines were Calvinists, but they maintained that their
Calvinism was an improvement upon Calvin's. They taught
that aU holiness consists in disinterested benevolence, and
1 S. L. Blake, The Separatists, or Strict Congregationalists of New England.
Boston, 1902.

THE CONGREGATIONALISTS 49
that aU sin consists in selfishness. The supreme test of a
man's faith was held to be his wiUingness to be damned for
the glory of God. The searching nature of this test, when
applied to a sensitive conscience, is admirably depicted by
Mrs. Stowe, in The Minister's Wooing, which is one of the
best pictures of the rehgious hfe of New England ever
painted.1 Ezra Stiles, who, although an evangehcal, was not him
seU in sympathy with the new divinity, records a striking
incident which fell under his immediate observation, and
seemed to him to supply the reductio ad absurdum of the
whole Hopkinsian movement. It was the case of a Mr.
Dawson, an independent Baptist minister of Newport, in
the very year when Samuel Hopkins was caUed to the pas
torate of the Congregational church of that town. I quote
from Stiles's letter describing Dawson: 2
He preaches that it is sinful for the unregenerate to pray at all;
to use the Lord's Prayer in particular, for if they said the truth, they
would say. ... " Our Father which art in Hell," our father, the
Devil: that unregenerate are to use no means at all, there are no
means appointed for them; . . . they are more likely, or at least as
likely, to be seized by grace, not using than using means. Particu
larly, as to attending his preaching, he asked them what they came
there for, he had nothing to say to them, only to tell them they were
heirs of damnation, and that would do them no good nor hurt. . . .
None but saints were the subjects of his preaching or ordination; and
[he] forbid at length the promiscuous congregation to sing with them,
or pray with them, — • and only a dozen or so now sing. ... So that
he does the thing thoroughly, — he makes no pauses or reservations.
Now this, at this time, is a very wonderful looking-glass J [Italics mine.]
In this " looking-glass " Stiles would have had all ad
herents of the " new divinity " behold their likeness, if only
1 The student should consult F. H. Foster's Genetic History of the New England
Theology, Chicago, 1907.
a Letter from Ezra Stiles to the Rev. Chauncey Whittlesey, March 6, 1770.
Diary, I, pp. 40 f.

50 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
they would carry out their principles to logical complete
ness. But that seldom happens in theology, for the sufficient
reason that its materials transcend the laws of logic. Too
many factors are involved to permit any one of them free
operation at the expense of the rest.
Over the issues raised by the Edwardeans the ranks of
orthodoxy were divided, as we have seen, into Old Calvinists
and New Divinity men, and this cleavage runs through
nearly a century, never involving organic separation, but
furnishing repeated occasions for debate. The party name,
" Old Calvinists," did not come into use at once, but only
by degrees, to distinguish them from the other group. Dr.
Leonard Bacon once described them as " Calvinists of a
mitigated type." They did not deny that salvation was
wrought by divine grace, according to the sovereign wiU of
God, but they did encourage the use of " means," such as
prayer, church attendance, Bible reading, pious meditation,
and righteous hving, — which the thorough-going Hopkin
sian repudiated, as in no possible sense efficacious for salva
tion. Through such " means," the Old Calvinists believed
that man might place himseU in the way of receiving the
grace of regeneration, although he could not earn it. Their
position marks a slight approach to the Arminianism which
Edwards so severely reprobated. The foundation of Andover
Theological Seminary, in 1807, may be said to mark the rec
onciliation of the two wings of orthodox Congregationalism.
Over against both these orthodox groups stands the " new
Arminianism," against which Edwards contended through
out aU his later life. Enemies of Calvinism alleged that it
was antinomian in its tendency, that it failed to offer any
sufficient ethical motive, that it placed stumbhng-blocks in
the way of men, and that their own view of rehgion, which
laid greater emphasis upon moral responsibility, must al
ways present the stronger appeal. It was a revival of the

THE CONGREGATIONALISTS 5 1
theological issues which had been fought over in Holland in
the days of Arminius, and in the ancient church during the
Pelagian controversy. Popularly the issue might be stated
thus: Calvinism holds that God saves men; Arminianism
holds that men help to save themselves. The more radical
view, that men save themselves, which of course would empty
the term " salvation " of all Christian content, was not
advocated by anyone in the early days of New England liber
alism. The most vigorous protests were directed against
those aspects of Calvinism which, as the hberals believed,
were degrading to human nature and made an artificial
distinction between the morahty of the regenerate and that
of the unregenerate. " The best actions of the unregenerate,"
said Experience Mayhew, one of the earhest of the liberals,
" are not properly called sins." x
Jonathan Mayhew, son of Experience, preached that "re
generation is conditioned on the earnest efforts of good men
to obtain it," and this position may be said to have held the
field among aU advocates of an advanced theology. Jona
than Mayhew went further than most of his contemporaries,
even among the hberals, in reviving Arian views of Christ,
and setting aside the orthodox doctrine of the Trinity. He
thus anticipated the development of Unitarianism in the
nineteenth century. More moderate was the position of
Charles Chauncy, pastor for many years of the First Church
of Boston. His sympathies were in line with the doctrinal
relaxation, but he was a conservative-hberal, and his
influence was large and beneficent in an age of increasing
theological difficulty. Towards Mayhew, Chauncy stood
in somewhat the same attitude that Channing afterward
occupied towards Theodore Parker.
As we reach the period of the American Revolution, it
may fairly be said that, in New England, the Arian views of
1 See his Grace Defended, 1744.

52 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
Christ were no longer a novelty, that the orthodox view of
original sin was widely contested, and that the doctrine of
eternal punishment was much in doubt, if not openly re
jected by many. Conditions were becoming favorable for
the formation of the Universahst and Unitarian denomi
nations, — the two groups of organized liberals of America.
There was, however, another rehgious movement, very
different in origin and nature from those we have noticed,
which operated powerfuUy to modify the strictness of Ameri
can theology, and that was Methodism. John and Charles
Wesley, in the course of their remarkable evangehstic work
in England, vehemently opposed certain tenets of Calvinism,
and most emphaticaUy declared that men are responsible to
God for their conduct, and have no excuse for idly waiting
for the Holy Spirit to convert them. At the same time, they
heartUy beheved that conversion was a supernatural change.
This type of Arminianism was presented in the form of
earnest rehgious appeal by preachers in the field, not by the
ologians in the study, and it laid hold on the popular imagi
nation with singular power, winning thousands of converts.
The first Methodist preacher to visit Boston was Jesse
Lee, who in 1789 conducted open-air meetings on the Com
mon, with a large attendance but little apparent result.
" The Word took but httle hold on the mind of the hearers,"
— was Lee's mournful verdict upon his visit. In fact,
Methodism did not make much progress in New England
untU after the beginning of the nineteenth century, yet its
theological influence was doubtless at work there, affecting
even those who were outside its pale. In Methodism one
could find visible evidence of the fact that evangehcal re
hgion Uved, and Uved potently, apart from some of the most
cherished theological behefs of puritanism. That may fairly
be said to have been a discovery for New England. And by
it the whole Christian world was enriched.

THE CONGREGATIONALISTS 53
The period of the American Revolution was a time of
difficulty for all the churches, but particularly for those,
like the Episcopal and Methodist, which had close connec
tions with the mother country, and were, through the Angli
can establishment, in some sense under its jurisdiction.
When, in 1769, Ezra StUes includes among the " trials and
difficulties " which are troubling his mind, " concern for the
Congregational churches, and prevalence of Episcopacy and
wickedness," we should be far astray if we regarded the
statement as a piece of sectarian bitterness, and even more
so, if we thought him endeavoring to be humorous. The
fact is that the ambitious schemes of the Episcopal church
in New England were hardly less a cause of the revolt of the
colonies than unjust taxation, or any of the other oppres
sive acts against which the colonists complained. John
Adams, writing in 181 5, of the views and suspicions of New
Englanders fifty years before his time, remarked that " if
Parliament can erect dioceses, and appoint bishops, they
may introduce the whole hierarchy, establish tithes, forbid
marriages and funerals, estabhsh rehgion, and forbid dis
senters." In other words, the colonists feared that, through
the church, the Enghsh state could greatly strengthen its
hold upon America. The immediate fear was that bishops
might be introduced into New England, but the war brought
aU such apprehensions to an end.
The other churches were less seriously affected by the
Revolution. Their forms of organization enabled them to
continue their institutional life, with no more interrup
tion than would be inevitable under the circumstances,
and they readily adapted themselves to the changed pohtical
conditions brought about by the union of the colonies into
the United States of America. During the eighteenth cen
tury it had been generaUy, although not universaUy, be
heved that the civil government might and should lend its

54 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
support to organized religion. But when the federal con
stitution was adopted, and again in the series of new state
constitutions which foUowed, the principle of the separation
of church and state was recognized as the best possible for
the new repubhc. This change of opinion was due to several
causes, among them being the multiplicity of rival sects,
which made it impracticable to extend public favors to any
of them; the positive objections to any connection between
government and religion, felt by many; and the rise of the
theory of the secular state, through the influence of Jefferson
and his sympathizers, who in their turn had been influenced
by the French political philosophy of the period. It became
a settled principle of the American people that church and
state should be kept apart for the good of both. Every
attempt to abandon this principle has met with open and
so far effectual opposition. Yet it is to be observed that the
change was not effected at once in aU parts of New England.
In the towns especiaUy, which retained most of their old
autonomy, the pubhc support of the churches did not cease
in Connecticut until 1818, and in Massachusetts not until
1833- The closing years of the eighteenth century witnessed the
consohdation of the rehgious forces of the country, the
creation of new ecclesiastical machinery where it was needed,1
and a fair start of the various denominations under the com
petitive system which the divorce of church and state
rendered inevitable. The equahzing of ecclesiastical oppor
tunity, and the mutual recognition of one another's rights,
was still a novelty, and it long continued to impress foreign
observers, as it had impressed one in the town of Philadel
phia, before the outbreak of the Revolution: " Papists,
1 The Methodists, for instance, received a " Superintendent " from John Wesley,
and the Episcopalians secured ordination for their bishops at the hands of the Non
jurors of Scotland and the Archbishop of Canterbury, thus uniting the long sepa
rated English lines.

THE CONGREGATIONALISTS 55
Episcopahans, Moravians, Lutherans, Calvinists, Method
ists, and Quakers passing each other peacefuUy and in good
temper on the Sabbath, after having broken up their re
spective assemblies." x The spectacle astonished this Euro
pean visitor, for such concord was unknown across the sea.
It has become so familiar to us that we have lost aU sense
of its significance and of its intrinsic worth.
The changes which had come over the rehgious aspect of
New England during one hundred years may be exhibited
by a statistical summary. About the year 1 700 New England
as a whole contained one hundred and ten Congregational
churches and one Episcopahan church. About 1800, there
were in Massachusetts alone three hundred and forty-four
Congregational churches, besides one hundred and fifty-one
of other denominations. Among the latter were ninety-
three Baptist, twenty-nine Methodist, fourteen Episcopahan,
eight Quaker, four Universahst, and two Presbyterian
churches.2 The first Roman Cathohc church in New Eng
land was built in Boston in the year 1800.3
Our statistical summary suggests what was the fact, that
thus far, Presbyterianism had made httle headway in New
England. That little was due for the most part to the
coming of a Scotch-Irish company to Londonderry, New
Hampshire, in 1720. Here was organized the first genuine
Presbyterian church of New England, and here that pohty
has remained in vigorous life through aU the intervening
years.
1 See Diman, Orations and Essays, p. 216.
2 J. S. Clark, Historical Sketch of the Congregational Churches in Massachu
setts, Boston, 1858.
3 As Dr. O'Gorman puts it, " In all New England there was no building worthy
the name of church until Dr. Matignon, in 1800, began the erection of one on
Franklin Street in Boston." (History of the Roman Catholic Church in the United
States, p. 282.) O'Gorman gives the Roman Catholic population of Boston in
1798 as two hundred and ten persons.

IV. MODERN CONGREGATIONALISM
The spirit of individualism was always strong in New Eng
land. It is inherent in aU forms of protestantism, but showed
itseU especiaUy in connection with the Puritan movement,
both in England and in America. And as the eighteenth
century drew near its close, there were heard, with increas
ing clearness, voices of protest against the traditional Cal
vinistic teaching. They were demanding release from the
intolerable burden of behef in inherited guUt, under which
the souls of men were staggering, and the recognition of a
moral order in which the son should no longer bear the in
iquity of the father, but everyone should be judged according
to his own ways. They demanded a simplification of the
Christian message, and their summons marks the transition
from what has been caUed the metaphysical to the ethical
period in our religious history.
We have seen that many factors entered into this move
ment of emancipation, but among them we must not over
look the beginnings of the historical study of the Bible, under
the leadership of Protestant scholars in France and Germany,
which necessitated a reconstruction of current ideas respect
ing the authority of Scripture, and a changed conception of
the development of Christianity. Nor may we overlook
the growth of modern democracy, with its social readjust
ments and their bearing on the rehgious ideas of men. Mr.
Lecky would attribute almost aU the transformations of
religious behef to this cause. " If," he writes, " in the sphere
of religion, the rationalistic doctrine of personal merit and
demerit should ever completely supersede the theological
doctrine of hereditary merit and demerit, the change wiU
mainly be effected by the triumph of democratic principles
in the sphere of politics." x But into the discussion of this
1 Quoted by Professor Diman, Orations and Essays, p. 233.
56

THE CONGREGATIONALISTS 57
attractive theme we cannot enter here. We must rather
consider the hberalizing forces which proceeded from within
Congregationahsm itself, and which exhibited the historical
working out of certain distinctive traits of the New England
character. Unitarianism, broadly speaking, stands for an abrupt
emancipation from scholastic orthodoxy. In its organized
form, it presents one aspect of an inteUectual and theologi
cal development, very much broader than itself, which is
clearly traceable in aU the leading protestant churches of
Europe and America, and from which aU have reaped sub
stantial benefits. Just as in the ancient church the Gnostic
movement may be, and has been, described as the " acute
heUenization of Christianity," — so in modern protestant
ism the Unitarian movement might be described as the
acute liberalization of Christianity. And just as, in the
former case, it is clear that Gnosticism was not the cause,
but rather one immediate effect, and that the most conspic
uous, of deep, underlying causes, working towards the for
mulation of the comprehensive ancient cathohc system, —
so, in the latter case, it is equally clear that Unitarianism
was not the cause, but rather one immediate effect, and
again the most conspicuous, of deep underlying causes,
working towards the formulation of a simpler, more com
prehensive, more ethical, and not less Christian, programme
for the churches of the modern world. Regarding the
Unitarian movement from this point of view, one may
reasonably hope to avoid envelopment in the dust and smoke
of theological battle, and to measure with some degree of
justice the value of its service to the cause of religious
progress. It so happens that, on the ecclesiastical side, the first
steps in the creation of an organized body of liberals were
taken among the constituents of this very church where we

58 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
are now gathered. King's Chapel lost most of its original
members in consequence of the Revolution, for they were
Tories. Hardly was the war over, and the federal govern
ment securely established, when the congregation worship
ping here elected and instaUed a hberal minister in the person
of James Freeman, and introduced drastic modifications of
the liturgy, expunging most of the trinitarian phraseology.
This first Unitarian church in America may be dated from
1785, the year when the altered book of worship was offi-
ciaUy adopted.1 The formal induction of Mr. Freeman into
office, as " Rector, Minister, Priest, Pastor, teaching Elder,
and pubhc Teacher " of the rehgious society of King's
Chapel, did not take place untU two years later, in November,
1787. The ordination ceremony was performed by the senior
warden, setting a precedent which has ever since been fol
lowed.2 Under the old regime, when the Chapel was stiU
subject to Anglican control, it held the right of presentation
and chose its own rectors, and this right was recognized by
the Bishop of London. But the induction of the incumbent
into office by the congregation, through its local officers,
acquired a new significance after the separation of the colo
nies from the mother country and the mother church. The
essentiaUy Congregational character of these proceedings
has often been pointed out, and it has especial interest for
orthodox Congregationahsts at the present time, when
modifications of pohty, looking in the opposite direction,
are in favor with many leaders of the denomination.
This act of independent ordination was much discussed
and bitterly criticized, and it was repudiated by the other
Episcopal churches of New England. But defenders were
not lacking on the Congregational side, especiaUy among the
1 The first revision consisted chiefly of changes suggested by the English liberal,
Dr. Samuel Clarke. There were further revisions in 181 1, 1828, and even later.
2 Application for Freeman's ordination had been made to the recently conse
crated American bishop Provoost, of New York, but without success.

THE CONGREGATIONALISTS 59
advanced liberals. Dr. Belknap, pastor of the Federal
Street church, gloried that it had been performed " without
any affected communication of sacerdotal effluviae." His
exultant and perfervid rhetoric is worth quoting:
Then was cut the aspiring comb of prelatic pride, — then was
undermined the pompous fabrick of hierarchical usurpation; — then
was pricked the puffed bladder of uninterrupted succession; while
the eye of liberty sparkled with joy, and the modest face of primitive,
simple, unadulterated Christianity brightened with the conscious
smile of a decent, manly, substantial triumph.1
The Pilgrim church in Plymouth, and a large number of
the churches of eastern Massachusetts, one after another
adopted Unitarianism as their faith, and the divisions which
ensued were marked by a bitterness of feehng which lasted
through the century. Only one of the colonial churches of
Boston maintained its orthodoxy, the Old South. Within
a radius of twenty-five to thirty miles from the State House,
a majority of the " first parishes " swung into hne with the
new movement, and Harvard College aUowed its sympathy
and cooperation to be seen in the election of a liberal,
Henry Ware, to the HoUis Professorship of Divinity. But
Unitarianism was narrowly localized, and for a long time
met with little favor beyond the limits mentioned.
In opposition to the rising tide of liberalism, we find the
Hopkinsians and Old Calvinists joining forces in the estab
lishment of Andover Theological Seminary, with generous
provision for the training of orthodox ministers. On its
faculty were soon to be found some of the ablest defenders
of the older faith. Party publications began to appear, and
learned disputations were put forth by champions on both
sides of the great controversy. In the columns of the
Monthly Anthology and the Christian Disciple one might
1 From an article in The Centinel, quoted by Greenwood, History of King's
Chapel, p. 196.

60 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
read what the liberals believed and desired, while in the
Panoplist and the Spirit of the Pilgrims were published the
defences of the orthodox. Professor Leonard Woods of
Andover published a series of Letters to Unitarians, and
Professor Ware of Harvard, a simUar series of Letters to
Trinitarians and Calvinists. The Convention Sermon gave
opportunity for the public discussion of both sides of the
questions at issue. Channing's sermon at the instaUation
of Jared Sparks in Baltimore (1819) fired a liberal broad
side, to which Professor Moses Stuart, — the ablest of aU
the disputants, — issued a reply. This in turn evoked a
counter-reply from Professor Andrews Norton. And so the
battle raged. A large part of the energies of Congregational
ism in eastern Massachusetts for an entire generation were
absorbed by this acute and bitter theological controversy.
The organization of the American Unitarian Association
in 1825 gave denominational existence to what before had
been simply the liberal party of Congregationalism. The
chief point of attack upon orthodoxy was not in the field of
theology proper, as the name " Unitarian " would seem to
imply, but in that of anthropology. It was the Calvinistic
view of human nature which provoked Channing's bitter
arraignment of traditional dogmas. Only later was atten
tion shifted to the doctrine of the Trinity. And the best
service which the hberals rendered to rehgious progress was
in helping to free the minds of men from their burden of
belief in inherited guUt.
Emerson's " Divinity School Address " (1838), and Theo
dore Parker's sermon on " The Transient and Permanent
in Christianity" (1841), shortly followed by the death of
Dr. Channing, who had been the acknowledged leader of
the older hberals, introduced a new chapter in the develop
ment of American Unitarianism, more radical than the first
and more obviously a departure from historical Christianity.

THE CONGREGATIONALISTS 6l
From this time onward there may be said to have been a
conservative and a hberal party among the Unitarians, as in
most other protestant churches of modern times.
Where churches were divided in opinion and a split was
threatened, as was often the case, a momentous question
arose, viz., which fraction constitutes the real church, and
which the schismatic body. This question was hotly con
tested, for upon its decision depended the name, the records,
and the property of what might be an ancient and wealthy
church. The issue was not so simple as it might appear, for,
under the laws of the commonwealth, two distinct organi
zations were involved, the church and the parish. Where
a clear majority of the church members remained orthodox,
as in the church at Sandwich (99 out of 113), they natu
raUy supposed that the rights and property would remain
theirs. But the parish, Unitarian by a majority of two or
three,1 contended that in it resided aU the legal rights, and
the case being taken to the courts, a decision was given in
favor of the parish. A simUar decision was handed down
by the Supreme Court of Massachusetts in the Dedham
case, which formed a precedent for aU subsequent action.
It ran as foUows:
When the majority of a Congregational church shall separate from
the majority of the parish, the members who remain, although a
minority, constitute the church in such parish, and retain the rights
and property belonging thereto.
The action of the courts affected eighty-one churches,
and it has been computed by Dr. Dexter that under it three
thousand nine hundred church members surrendered church
property and records to one thousand two hundred and
eighty-two, — the ratio being about three to one.2 The many
1 The vote was taken on a motion to dismiss the (orthodox) minister, Jonathan
Burr. 2 H. M. Dexter, The Congregationalism of the Last Three Hundred Years,
p. 619.

62 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
orthodox majorities in the churches of eastern New England
were not only astonished at the decision of the court, but
profoundly indignant. They were astonished, because they
saw that, according to the court, a church in and of itseU
had no legal existence whatever. Thus, Chief Justice Parker
declared that " a church cannot subsist without some re
hgious community to which it is attached." And again,
"As to aU civil purposes, the secession of a whole church
from the parish would be an extinction of the church." And
the orthodox majorities were indignant, because property
and rights were seen passing into the legal possession of
minorities, a transaction which seemed to them to violate
every inherited principle of fair play. They beheved that
the action taken under the court's ruling was httle short of
" legalized plunder." And as a natural consequence, we
find in many places two rival bodies, each claiming to be the
" First Church," although legally only one of them, — and
that usuaUy the liberal, — was entitled to that name.
In point of law, which is after all what the courts had to
pass upon, it is difficult to see how any other decision was
possible than the one actuaUy rendered. But in point of
equity, the case is different. And one of the cheering signs
of recent years has been to find the two branches of some of
the ancient churches entering into fraternal agreements,
which frankly recognize the justice of their mutual claims.
An instance in point is that of the two churches in Cam
bridge, which in 1899, through friendly negotiations, agreed
thenceforward to be known respectively as " The First
Church, Unitarian," and "The First Church, Congrega
tional," — a happy solution of a long standing difference.
One immediate consequence of the doctrinal controversy
at the beginning of the nineteenth century was the founda
tion of theological schools, to take the place of the inade
quate provision for ministerial education furnished by the

THE CONGREGATIONALISTS 63
coUeges and by private training in the homes of ministers.
We have already noticed the establishment of Andover
Seminary in 1807. This was the chief centre of Congrega
tional education for many years, and its plan of organization
and curriculum furnished the model for all the schools which
came after it. A second Congregational seminary was es
tabhshed at Bangor, Maine, in 1816. A few years later we
find a differentiation taking place at the colleges, and instead
of a single professorship of divinity, — which had long been
the rule both at Harvard and at Yale,1 — a department of
theology was estabhshed, on the general plan of the inde
pendent schools already mentioned. Thus the Harvard
Divinity School comes into separate existence, foUowed soon
by Yale; the former Unitarian, and the latter Trinitarian. As
the Yale School soon exhibited a theological tendency too
hberal for some of its natural constituents, another insti
tution was started at East Windsor HiU. This was dominated
by the conservatives, and later was removed to Hartford,
under the new name of Hartford Theological Seminary.
The detachment of theological instruction from the col
lege curriculum and its incorporation into a separate depart
ment resulted not only in marked improvement in the
facihties for theological training, but also in a further secu
larizing of the coUege proper; so that, in modern times, one
hears the complaint that in the coUeges too little rather than
too much attention is devoted to rehgion. The beginnings
of this change are found about the year 1800.
American Congregationahsm has proved itself remarkably
productive of educational institutions of the higher grades.
Within the confines of New England, besides Harvard and
Yale, there are at least eight collegiate institutions which owe
1 The Hollis professorship at Harvard was founded in 1721, and had only three
incumbents before the appointment of Henry Ware. At Yale the Livingston (now
Chittenden) professorship of divinity was founded in 1746. It had four incum
bents prior to the establishment of the department of divinity in 1822.

64 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
their origin to Congregational zeal and enterprise. These
are, in the order of their foundation, Dartmouth, Williams,
Bowdoin, Middlebury, Amherst, Mount Holyoke, Smith, and
WeUesley. The last three suggest one of the most striking
changes which have occurred within the realm of the higher
education in modern times, — the opening of coUege doors to
women. Outside of New England, Congregational enterprise
has been no less marked, in connection with the drUt of
population westward, especiaUy since i860. Some twenty
coUeges of good standing, scattered through the West, are
proof that Christian education is still one of the cardinal
principles of the denomination.
In connection with the westward expansion, although in
one of its earlier stages, a scheme of cooperation, known as
the " Plan of Union," was worked out between the General
Congregational Association of Connecticut and the Presby
terian General Assembly. This provided for combined effort
in planting new churches through central New York and
northern Ohio, and declared that in each case the church
should decide for itself with which of the two denominations
it should be affiliated. A similar privilege of choice was
provided for the ministers. The Plan contemplated that
both Presbyterians and Congregationahsts would probably
be found in most of the churches thus formed, and it was
believed to provide with fairness for the interests of both.
In entering into this irenic project, the latent presbyterial
prochvities of Connecticut Congregationalists found fresh
expression. The Plan of Union was weU conceived, but in actual opera
tion it brought ecclesiastical advantage to the Presbyterians.
Their presbyteries were geographicaUy nearer and more
accessible; their pohty seemed to the new churches more
compact and stable; and, most important of aU, it was a
pohty into which an independent church might readily

THE CONGREGATIONALISTS 65
enter, by voting to apply for membership, but out of which
no church might pass without the approving vote of its pres
bytery. " On Congregational principles," said Dr . A. H.
Ross, " a church may, by majority vote, carry itseU and its
property into a wiUing Presbytery; but on Presbyterian
principles no church can withdraw from an unwilling Pres
bytery by majority vote." Large numbers of churches,
which would naturaUy have been Congregational, became
Presbyterian under this Plan.
On the other hand, the prevaihng theology of these newly
founded churches was of the New England type, and espe
ciaUy of the type represented at New Haven by Professor
Nathaniel W. Taylor, a teacher of marked ability, but
doctrinally displeasing to many conservative Congregation
alists, and even more so to Presbyterians. The type of
theological liberahty, known as " Taylorism," stamped the
young Presbyterian churches as objects of suspicion in
the minds of Old School Presbyterians. At the meeting of
the General Assembly in 1837, the conservatives found them
selves in the majority, and seized the opportunity to abrogate
the Plan of Union. They claimed that it was null and void
from the beginning, inasmuch as the General Assembly of
1 801, which made the Plan, had no right to treat with the
General Association of Connecticut, which was not a national
body and in any event could not speak or legislate for the
churches that composed it. And the Assembly went on to
exscind four entire synods made up of the union churches.
It remained for the Congregationalists to act, but this was
difficult, for opportunities of collective action were not
offered by their pohty. When, however, the Albany Con
vention was assembled (1852), and the Congregationahsts
found themselves together for the first time since the colonies
had become a nation, the question was brought up. The
Convention cherished no delusions as to how the Plan of

66 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
Union had actuaUy worked. " They have milked our Con
gregational cows," said one speaker, " but they have made
nothing but Presbyterian butter and cheese." There was
httle to be done except declare the Plan abrogated, which
the Convention proceeded to do. It thus disappears from
history. The Albany Convention was the first general gathering
of Congregationahsts since the Cambridge Synod of 1648,
and it naturally leads us to the consideration of denomina
tional development, as seen in the National Council of more
recent times. A preliminary council, held in Boston at the
close of the Civil War, marks the first step towards what has
become a fixed institution, although the original caU for this
meeting did not contemplate its recurrence at stated inter
vals. Indeed, it was stiU a question whether Congrega
tionahsm provided any place for councils as a part of its
denominational machinery. Over five hundred delegates
were in attendance at Boston, and the two fundamental
questions of faith and order received a large share of the
CouncU's attention. On both there was vigorous debate, and
considerable differences of opinion were developed. The
main achievements of the Council were the adoption of an
admirable statement of polity, presented by Professor Park
of Andover, and a hastily prepared and on the whole rather
insignificant statement of behef, known as " The Burial
HiU Declaration " (1865).
The former statement runs as foUows:
Resolved, that this Council recognizes as distinctive of the Congre
gational polity, — First, the principle that the local or Congregational
church derives its power and authority directly from Christ, and is
not subject to any ecclesiastical government exterior or superior to
itself. Second, that every local or Congregational church is bound to
observe the duties of mutual respect and charity which are included
in the communion of churches one with another; and that every
church which refuses to give an account of its proceedings, when kindly

THE CONGREGATIONALISTS 67
and orderly desired to do so by neighboring churches, violates the
law of Christ. Third, that the ministry of the gospel by members of
the churches who have been called and set apart to that work implies
in itself no power of government, and that ministers of the gospel not
elected to office in any church are not a hierarchy, nor are they
invested with any official power in or over the churches.1
With regard to this document, Professor Walker remarks
that " a Mather or a Cotton would have looked with aston
ishment on the statement that the duly estabhshed ministry
implies 'no power of government,'" and points out also
that it gives expression to the more democratic type of
Congregationalism, which had been developed in New
England. The question of creed involved more difficulty, for it
appeared, in the course of the discussion, that there was
some objection to the employment of the term Calvinist,
to describe the theological position of the members of the
Council. This objection evoked a spirited protest from
Professor Park, which has been widely quoted: " We are
Calvinists," he said, " mainly, essentiaUy, in all the essen
tials of our faith. And the man who, having pursued a three-
years' course of study, — having studied the Bible in the
original languages, — is not a Calvinist, is not a respectable
man." Whatever may be the merits of his argument, with
regard to which there is obviously room for difference of
opinion, the CouncU finally allowed the offensive name to
pass. But the statement of faith was a sentimental com
promise, proposed at a meeting held on Burial Hfll, on
an excursion to Plymouth. It stood, indeed, as the only
coUective declaration of Congregational beUef since the adop
tion of the Westminster Confession in the seventeenth cen
tury, but it was for the most part ignored by the churches,
as it fuUy deserved to be.
1 Walker, Creeds and Platforms, pp. 567 f .

68 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
The regular series of National Councils begins with that
held in Oberhn, in 187 1, to celebrate the two hundred and
fiftieth anniversary of the landing of the PUgrim Fathers.
A constitution was adopted providing for a triennial session,
at which there should be discussion of matters of denomi
national interest, but no legislation. Judicial powers were
likewise excluded from the CouncU's province. Plans were
formulated whereby the churches and Congregational asso
ciations should be proportionately represented at the
Councils, and a declaration on the unity of the church was
put forth, which in substance has since been several times
repeated, with irenic intent.
There have been in aU sixteen sessions of the National
Council, meeting until very lately at three-year intervals,
but now bienniaUy, in accordance with a revision of the
constitution adopted in 19 13. The sessions have seldom
been attended by much more than one-haU the number of
delegates entitled to be present, showing that many of the
Congregational churches have not interested themselves in
the cause of united denominational action. But the history
of recent years indicates a growing interest in the CouncU,
and a behef that it can wisely and safely be made to serve
the common interests of the churches, which, in the absence
of some such central body, might perhaps suffer. These
recent developments, with the demand for increased effi
ciency and a more compact polity, recall the Proposals of
1705, and the provisions of the Saybrook Platform. But
little objection is now raised, and little fear of too great
centralization is expressed, — so accustomed are we to
the existence of similar movements in our modern indus
trial and pohtical life. The traditional principle of local
independence for the individual church is thought to be
sufficiently safeguarded, by repeated assertions of its
inviolability.

THE CONGREGATIONALISTS 69
In pursuance of action taken at the Council held in St.
Louis, in 1880, the preparation of a new creed was under
taken by twenty-five commissioners who had been carefully
selected to represent the various theological tendencies dis
cernible among Congregationalists at the time. The result
of their deliberations was the so-caUed Commission Creed
of 1883. It was put forth by the commissioners themselves
without further endorsement, " to carry such weight of
authority as the character of the Commission and the in
trinsic merit of their exposition" might command. The
Creed was in fact sufficiently comprehensive to suit the more
progressive members of the Commission, and too much so
to suit the most conservative, three of whom refused to sign
it. Among the signers were President Seelye of Amherst
CoUege, Dr. Henry M. Dexter, editor of TheCongregationalist,
Professor George P. Fisher of Yale, Dr. William M. Taylor,
pastor of the Broadway Tabernacle church of New York,
Dr. Alexander McKenzie of Cambridge, and Dr. Lyman
Abbott of Brooklyn. The three who refused to append their
names were Dr. E. K. Alden, Professor W. S. Karr of Hart
ford Seminary, and Dr. E. P. Goodwin.
The new creed proved acceptable to the churches in
general, and was adopted by many of them as the statement
of their faith. But the rapidity with which modern protes
tantism has moved away from the older dogmatic thinking
is shown by the fact that, at the expiration of only thirty
years, the churches have thought it desirable to frame a new
and stiU shorter creed. The Preamble to the Kansas City
formula1 does indeed reaffirm the aUegiance of Congrega
tionalism to " the faith which our fathers confessed, which
from age to age has found expression in the historic creeds
of the church universal and of this communion," yet when
one passes on to examine " the things most surely believed
1 Adopted by the National Council in 1913, at Kansas City, Mo.

70 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
among us," one finds them comprised in a very brief state
ment, about as long as the Nicene Creed, but strikingly dif
ferent in character. Where that tried to be minute and
precise, — and succeeded, — this tries to be general. And
it succeeds. But if it has comparatively little to say of the
great historic affirmations of the Christian faith, it emphati-
caUy declares the church's duty to serve the world, in full
accord with the modern note of social responsibility. The
creed is perhaps as good a one as could be framed at present,
and it pledges all who sign it to the active exercise of Chris
tian living, which is more than can be said of some of the
doctrinal formulas of the past.
The most notable Ulustration of the vitality and efficiency
of the loosely organized Congregationahsm of one hundred
years ago is to be found in the formation of the American
Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions. This re
markable organization with its world-wide interests was
born and bred in New England and has its legal home in
the ancient commonwealth of Massachusetts. It was New
England energy, New England devotion, and New Eng
land money, that made Congregational foreign missions
possible, and that without the intervention of ecclesiastical
machinery. The voluntary association of like-minded men
and the zealous cooperation of the theological school at
Andover combined to create a great philanthropic and re
ligious enterprise, whose influence has reached out to the
farthest boundaries of the earth. The Board's missions,
schools, coUeges, hospitals, and institutions for manual
training, now encircle the globe, and their reflex influence
upon the churches at home has proved to be of the highest
value.1 Other enterprises of large scope and usefulness were under
taken from time to time, as the nineteenth century pro-
1 See W. E. Strong, The Story of the American Board, iqio.

THE CONGREGATIONALISTS 7 1
gressed and as the work of home missions, church building,
and education began to caU for better organization and
equipment. These denominational activities were entrusted
to voluntary societies of national scope, which have fulfilled
their trust with commendable devotion and success. They
have recently been brought into organic connection with
the National CouncU.
It has been said that the religious history of America faUs
into three periods: first, the metaphysical, covering most
of the colonial era; secondly, the ethical, including the
Unitarian movement; and thirdly, the aesthetic, hmited
to the last haU-century. Whatever may be the propriety
of such a division, there can be no doubt that recent years
have witnessed a marked development of certain kinds of
aesthetic appreciation and ambition which were lacking
before. Altered forms of ecclesiastical architecture, the
enrichment of public worship, and the general abandonment
of Puritan simphcity, all are signs of a refinement of taste,
but perhaps also of a chrninished conviction of the immediate
presence of God, which was such a notable trait of the early
New England character. Recent sessions of the National
CouncU have approved and issued forms of public worship,
for optional use in the churches; forms for the Communion,
for baptism, marriage, and the burial of the dead, for ordi
nations, and for the dedication of church buUdings. To
supply the material for all these, the Book of Common
Prayer has been liberaUy, although not exclusively, drawn
upon. Many modern Congregationalists have welcomed these
changes, and have made increasing use of them; whether for
good or UI, remains to be determined. It would certainly be
a serious loss to our free churches if the dignity and stateli-
ness of the older Puritan worship were to disappear. For
they were the external signs of a brave and manly spirit,
seeking to worship God, who is spirit, in spirit and in truth.

72 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
The development of a stately ritual has sometimes been
interpreted as a mark of decaying faith. " Religious ideas,"
said Lecky, " die like the sun; their last rays, possessing
little heat, are expended in creating beauty." Just as, when
daylight wanes, the sky above our heads takes on its tran
sient glories, — crimson and gold, melting into the softer
tints of old rose, lavender, opals, and amethyst, until dark
ness drops her veil over the fading twilight, and the day is
done, — so the waning forces of religion, having lost their
vital power of warmth, lose themselves in the fair colors of
the evening sky. I would not be understood as giving to
this sentiment an unqualified approval. Then were the his
toric worship of Christendom one long expression of deca
dence. Yet it undeniably contains an element of truth, to
which modern Congregationahsts may weU take heed.
Congregationalism has always proved itself productive of
men qualified for leadership through their nurture in the
phUosophy of individualism. In this respect the nineteenth
century was no exception to the rule. Without attempting
anything like a complete catalogue, we may single out the
names of Moses Stuart, pioneer Biblical scholar of America,
who taught philological methods which have led the way
for aU his successors, not only in his own department of the
Semitic languages but also in the classics; and Leonard
Bacon, eminent as pastor and denominational leader, who
with moderation and diplomatic skill guided the churches
of New England through many difficult years; and Mark
Hopkins, beloved president of Williams CoUege, the fore
most educator of youth of his time, to know whom was
esteemed a liberal education; and Horace BushneU, seer
of visions hidden to the many, who was faithful to the spirit
of the past, yet able to interpret for his feUow ministers the
theology of the future; and Henry Ward Beecher, greatest
pulpit orator of his generation in America, whose voice was

THE CONGREGATIONALISTS 73
never silent, nor his pen idle, in the presence of injustice
and human wrong. These names stand out distinctly, yet
beside them are others which offer no unworthy contrast to
their fame. There are many who have deserved well of
God and man. Every lover of light and progress should
pray that the succession faU not in the years to come.
The New England of the twentieth century is not the
New England of the Puritans, nor even that of fifty years
ago. Permanent changes have come over every aspect of
its life; the old social homogeneity is gone, never to return,
and the institutions which gave it character have, to a large
degree, gone with it. We now behold a heterogeneous indus
trial population, drawn from many foreign nationalities and
crowded into our great cities, and an idle summer population,
at seashore and in the mountains, drawn from the leisure
classes far and near. Many types of religion and irreligion,
undreamed of by the fathers, have taken root among us.
Everywhere lie new problems for organized Christianity.
Our free churches, with their elasticity and power of adap
tation, should prove capable of discharging their new tasks.
But to do so with success, they need a faith as strong, and
a devotion as overmastering, as our fathers brought with
them to these shores, when, in the fear of God and in humble
rehance upon His almighty aid, they laid the foundations
of a Christian state, and estabhshed churches dedicated to
freedom, truth, and human brotherhood.

II
THE REVOLT AGAINST THE STANDING
ORDER
I. Popular Movements
II. The Unitarians
WILLIAM W. FENN

THE REVOLT AGAINST THE
STANDING ORDER
I. POPULAR MOVEMENTS
IN a recent book entitled A Century's Change in Religion,
Dr. George Harris, honored ex-President of Amherst
CoUege, amusingly suggests that the standing order in
Connecticut was so caUed from the Congregational habit of
standing, while Episcopalians knelt, during prayer time. In
simUarly playful vein one might derive the term from the
fixedness of the churches, standing pat, as it were, behind
apparently impregnable intrenchments of creed and cult and
custom, with no aspiration for advance or dread of dislodge-
ment. In reahty, however, the designation implies no more
than that the Congregational churches constituted the estab
lished church, from which aU others were regarded as dis
senters. In their several communities each was the church
of the town, serving the whole town and supported by a
tax levied proportionaUy upon aU the inhabitants.
With certain qualifications to be made hereafter, such
was the situation in Massachusetts at the beginning of the
last century, but already there were signs of disaffection
towards this standing order. In the present lecture two of
these movements of dissent, popular in character, are to be V
considered, namely the Free WiU Baptists, and the Chris- v
tians, each of which traces its origin in New England to a
single individual, the former to Benjamin Randall of New
Hampshire, the latter to Abner Jones of Vermont. Benja
min RandaU was born in Newcastle, New Hampshire, in
77

78 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
1749, and was converted in 1770, shortly after the death of
Whitefield, and partly in consequence of feelings awakened
by it. RandaU's " exodus through the churches " is of
interest as typical of the contemporary religious drift. He
was brought up in the Congregational church, but his warm
religious nature and, in particular, his sympathy with the
preaching of Whitefield, found httle satisfaction in the cold
and arid type of piety then prevailing in the Congregational
churches, and consequently he soon set up a private meeting
for prayer in his own house, which was frowned upon by the
local pastor. SimUarly, at the time of the Great Awakening,
those who sympathized with it found most of the churches
of the standing order chiUy and uncongenial and as a result
became Separates, or New Lights, founding churches, some
of which afterwards became Baptist. Following the same
course, and convinced by his study of the Scriptures that
immersion of adult behevers was the only true mode of
Christian baptism, RandaU next joined a Baptist church.
But he soon found that here was no resting place for his
adventurous spirit. At this time the Baptist churches in
New England were Calvinistic in theology, and RandaU,
who had come to see in Jesus " universal love, a universal
atonement, a universal caU to man, and felt confident that
none could ever perish but those who refused to obey,"
found his eager desire to preach a free Gospel blocked by
the strict Calvinistic doctrines of election and limited
atonement. Nevertheless he preached, but was soon caUed
to account by his Baptist brethren, who, U they did not
actuaUy disfeUowship him, marrif ested such a spirit of oppo
sition to him and the work he was doing that again he went
forth out of the camp and in 1780 organized a church in the
town where he then hved, New Durham, New Hampshire.
This, like churches already existing in Canterbury and Crown
Point, was at once Arminian in doctrine, holding to free

POPULAR MOVEMENTS 79
wiU, and Baptist in practice, because it maintained believers'
baptism by immersion. Not untU some time afterwards
was the name of Free WiU Baptist accepted, after the simple
designation Baptist had been rubbed off by controversy
and before the more comprehensive name of Free Baptist
came to be generaUy preferred. The movement thus begun
spread with amazing rapidity throughout eastern New Eng
land revealing a wide-spread popular dislike for the stand
ing order. Its preachers going beyond New England soon
f eU in with groups of people who had reached substantiaUy
the same views independently — Free, or Open, Communion
Baptists in western New York, Separate Baptists in Ken
tucky and elsewhere, some of whom, although not aU, were
gathered into Free WiU Baptist feUowship. I say not aU,
for it should be remembered with praise that when in 1839
one Dr. Housley appeared before the General Conference
as representative of several thousand persons in Kentucky
holding Free Will Baptist sentiments and seeking fellow
ship, the overtures were promptly refused on the discovery
that many of these sympathizers, including Dr. Housley
himseU, were slave-holders.
Of the honorable history of these Free WiU Baptist
churches in New England, I cannot speak at length. Henry
Ward Beecher is reported to have said that they were al
ways on the right side of every moral question and on the
evangelical side of every controverted doctrine; and the
tribute was weU deserved. Although their early preachers
were illiterate men, and, for reasons soon to be mentioned,
there was a prejudice in the denomination against an edu- ,
cated ministry, some of the itinerants sought to make good
their literary deficiencies by private study and, in order that
their successors and the youth of the denomination might
have privUeges which they themselves had never enjoyed,
set to work to convert the feUowship to their point of view

80 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
by awakening an interest in education. The labor was hard
and often discouraging, but successful: a book concern was
estabhshed, The Morning Star was taken over, academies
were set up, and Bates CoUege was founded. FinaUy after
a most creditable career, seeing that the Baptist churches
in general had mitigated their Calvinism and were upholding
substantiaUy the same principles which they had champi
oned from the beginning, the Free Baptists returned to the
fold from which RandaU and his friends had regretfuUy
departed and as a separate denomination died in glory.
The Christians trace their origin to a certain Abner Jones
who was born in Royals ton, Massachusetts, in 1772, but
soon moved to Vermont where, in the town of Lyndon, the
first Christian church in New England, and so far as he
knew, in the modern world, was organized in 1801. Per-
sonaUy this Abner Jones does not impress one quite so
favorably as RandaU. He seems to have been of a roving
temper, never continuing long in one stay, shifting easUy
from doctoring to preaching and back again, gaining local
fame as a cancer doctor in possession of a secret cure, — a
rather flighty spirit in contrast to RandaU's sohdity; never
theless he had come upon a noble idea, even nobler perhaps
than RandaU's. It was that aU party designations degrade
the foUowers of Christ, who should bear and honor their
Master's name alone. Although he himself was ordained
by the Free WUl Baptists it was with the express under
standing that he would never acknowledge the name, al
though he would work in feUowship with them, as he would
with any foUowers of Christ of whatever name who would
work with him. Elder Jones was a versifier, writing "pomes "
which aU came in rhyme somehow, and one of these effu
sions sets forth his cardinal principle:

POPULAR MOVEMENTS 8 1

MY CREED

Of all unscriptural names that are
In christian churches claimed so fair,
'Gainst them I enter my dissent;
On Christ's sole name my mind is bent.
The church of Rome and England too,
Are names of men, which once were new;
The highly boasted Baptist name,
And Methodist are all the same.
The Presbyterian, polite,
And Universalist so light,
The honest Quaker, thee and thou,
Are merely names of men, I trow.
Disciple, follower, christian, friend,
For these I equally contend!
With every other scripture sound,
In Gospel rule that can be found.
Altho' these names, I do reject,
Yet those who hold them I respect
As brethren in the Lord of life;
So live in love and quit all strife.
My fellowship in Christ is bound
To all those souls where love is found
Of every order, sect, and name, —
In Christ I count them all the same.
At first the relations between Christians and Free WUl
Baptists were close and cordial, but the two bodies gradu
aUy drew apart. Under the influence of Ehas Smith, the
Christians were led to appear sympathetic with Universal
ism, or at least with the doctrine of the annihUation of the
wicked. Moreover, in their aversion to unscriptural terms,
the Christians were reluctant to speak of the Trinity, for
example, and were supposed to be verging towards Uni-

82 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
tarians with whom, however, they had no commerce. Be
sides, their preachers, like those of the Free WiU Baptists,
in their journeyings over the country fell in with isolated
groups who sympathized with their principles and in some
cases had actuaUy taken the name Christian to the exclu
sion of every other. The Christian Connexion of the West
which now has its headquarters in Dayton, and the great
company of the Disciples or Campbellites, some of whom
call themselves simply " Christians," arose quite independ
ently of the New England Christians, although often con
fused with them in the popular mind. There are stiU to be
found hereabouts a few Christian churches, but they are
few, ninety-four according to the Government Report of
1906, and weak, and their affiliation is now with the West
ern Connexion, although in the case of such as have survived
from the original New England movement the affiliation is
rather tenuous.
Having referred to the traveUing preachers of the Free
WUl Baptists and the Christians, let me here speak very
briefly of them and of their biographies. Fortunately many
of them were in the habit of keeping journals which found
their way into print, and I know of no books richer in human
interest than these memoirs and none which throw more
hght upon the hfe of New England farming communities
during the first half of the last century. The biographies,
in most cases the autobiographies, of Fernald, Jones, and
Ehas Smith among the Christians, of RandaU, Phinney,
Marks, Stinchfield, Young, Colby, and Bowles among the
Free WiU Baptists, are a comparatively unworked mine of
rich material. These were all uneducated men, not one of
whom had received the equivalent of a modern high-school
training, but they were of quick understanding in the fear
of the Lord, and their originaUy large endowment of mother
wit was increased by their experience with aU sorts and con-

POPULAR MOVEMENTS 83
ditions of folk on the country-side. Not for them, the formal
meeting-houses with pews remote from the pulpit propped
high above them at what LoweU caUed the natural angle of
somnolence; they preached usuaUy in school houses, barns,
and private houses, where they could see the whites of their
auditors' eyes and read their shifting moods of approval or
dissent. So they became incomparable practical psycholo
gists, knowing how to reach the hearts of their hearers.
Being men of the people they knew how their fellows thought,
and spoke the language of the field and the "village store with
occasional flights, or faUs, into rhymes hke those which dis
figured the local poetry column of the country newspaper.
Their nearness to the people in the meeting places was sym
bolic of their nearness to them in every respect. Their
words went home because they had not far to go. From
mind to mind haU the circuit of the world may he, but heart
to heart is very near. Besides, although there were a few
impostors, nobody could suspect these wandering preachers,
when properly accredited, of selfish or sordid motives. Preach
ing was not a mere trade with them, there was no money
in it. Often they would ride off on a long journey of many
hundred mUes with but a few cents in pocket, and return
with even less than when they started. They had no stated
salary; a coin pressed into the hand by a friendly Ustener who
" didn't want to steal his preaching," and whose kindness,
whether the gift were a shilling or a dollar, was often grate
fully acknowledged in the Journal, enabled them to pay their
toUs, and their keep when hospitality faUed, but that was
ah.1 Why should they leave their occupations to undergo
these hardships, and subject their families to even greater,
unless they reaUy felt the Lord's caU to labor for the souls
1 " I had spent more than two months in Canada and travelled five hundred
miles. The people generally were kind and Hberal. Though among strangers and
often lodging at public houses, my expenses, besides some repairs, had not amounted
to fifty cents." (1827), Marks, p. 174.

84 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
of men. So reasoned the common people, not unwisely,
and their confidence foUowed their logic. These itinerant
preachers were men of power: some, like Fernald, were
gifted with physical strength, and voices which when uphfted
in prayer or preaching reached the ears of sinners a mUe or
even two mUes away with subduing and convincing power;
others were of fragile frame, Uke John Colby, early marked
for death and swaying the hearts of men like messengers
from the invisible world — but aU of them were men of
force and their influence upon the popular religious life of
New England was incalculable. The principal point, how
ever, is that these preachers were successful because they
gave articulate utterance to sentiments which were potent
but unformulated in the hearts of the common people.
Their homely speech revealed the thoughts of many minds.
In them, therefore, we discover a protest against the stand
ing order which had to do mainly with three points, — ¦
pohty, creed, and experimental religion.
With respect to pohty, the objection was to certain eccle
siastical usages connected with the caUing and settling of
ministers, especiaUy the holding of church councUs, which
were deemed unscriptural, and particularly to the practice
of supporting the churches by a public tax, in which they
were at one with the Baptists. The history of the last-
mentioned usage must be briefly recapitulated. Before
Endicott's company saUed for Salem, the New England
Company contracted with Bright, Higginson, and Skelton
to come over with the planters as ministers. Their salaries
were to be paid one-haU by the planters and one-haU from
the Joint Stock, afterwards changed to the Common Stock,
of the Company. Immediately after the arrival of Win
throp's Company, however, provision was made for the
support of WUson and PhiUips by assessment upon aU the
colonists save those of Salem and Mattapan, where other

POPULAR MOVEMENTS 85
arrangements already existed. In Boston, Cotton came out
strongly for voluntary support, and afterwards none of the
churches in Boston was ever supported by public tax. Else
where, also, the voluntary system was favored, but it soon
appeared that on account of unwiUingness to contribute on
the part of those who were not members of the church the
amount raised was insufficient to maintain properly the
minister, or ministers, and consequently a demand arose
that since aU the inhabitants of a town did, or might, enjoy
the privUeges of the Gospel, aU should pay for its support.
Both the Massachusetts Law of 1638 and the Recommenda
tions by the Commissioners of the United Colonies in 1644
recognize the voluntary system in principle but declare that
if a man refuses to contribute he may be assessed. This is
the view also of the Cambridge Platform. But a law of
163 1, refusing the franchise to all who were not church
members, precluded all the inhabitants of a town save those
who were in fuU communion with the church from any voice
in the choice of a minister or in the management of church
affairs. Therefore these outsiders were naturaUy averse
to paying for the support of a minister in whose selection
they had not been consulted, and for the maintenance of
public worship from the most sacred and precious rite of
which • — the Lord's Supper — they were excluded. As
Enghshmen, they claimed the right to enjoy the Communion
here as in the mother country, but this was denied them
unless they should first be chosen into membership after a
somewhat inquisitorial examination and the presentation of
a Spiritual Relation, nor until the adoption of the Half-way
Covenant were they authorized to offer their children for
baptism unless at least one parent was in full communion.
But even the Half-way Covenant applied only to baptized,
although non-communicating, members of the churches
here, and conferred no right to the franchise. Obviously,

86 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
therefore, their resentment would be heightened if they
should be compeUed to pay for the support of such a church,
but this soon came to pass. By an act of 1654, the County
Courts were empowered to order the selectmen of a town to
assess aU its inhabitants for ministerial support. This was
upon complaint laid before the Court; but later the Court
was instructed to take the initiative by ordering the Grand
Jury for each County " to present aU abuses and neglects
of this kind in order that God may continue his favorable
presence." The course of legislation indicating the drift of
popular opinion is reasonably plain. TheoreticaUy the
voluntary system was honored, but in practice it was found
not to work satisfactorUy and to be in need of supplement
ing by enforced assessment. When the old order ceased
with the recalling of the original charter, and, with the ad
mittance of aU freeholders to the franchise without religious
qualifications, one objection to the assessment principle
was removed, but the principle of taxation was positively
affirmed by the act of 1692. During the provincial period
this principle underlies aU the legislation. But other and
graver difficulties soon appeared. In the earlier days, un
wiUingness to contribute might sometimes be ascribed to
meanness, or indifference to religion and the public weUare,
but subsequently the Courts had to deal also, and in
creasingly, with persons who refused as a matter of con
science to pay their town assessments for religious purposes.
Quakers, who disbelieved in a hireling ministry, and Bap
tists — Anabaptists as they were popularly caUed — took
it UI that they were taxed against their consciences for the
support of hireling, or paedo-baptist, preachers and de
manded exemption. The existence of such persons is noted
in an act of 1702, but apparently no exemption was made
in their favor untU by pressure from England it was enacted,
with certain qualifications, in behalf of the Episcopalians

POPULAR MOVEMENTS 87
in 1727. In the very next year, 1728, we find a similar law
exempting Quakers and Anabaptists, alleging a scruple of
conscience. From this date until 1833, when the principle
of public taxation for the support of worship was formally
abandoned, there is a long string of exemption laws which
it would be tedious to rehearse. They were designed to
guard against the extension of exemption to persons who
claimed relief out of mere stinginess and not on the ground
of conscience, but provisions of such a character always
prove most irritating to the best of those who are affected
by them, and so antagonism to the system was steadily on
the increase. In the Constitution of 1780 the principle of
assessment was again formaUy recognized but along with it
is the provision that on application any man's tax may
be paid to the minister of the church which he attends
and there is also the significant sentence, " No subordination
of any one sect or denomination to another shaU ever
be established by law." This would seem to have been
sufficiently equitable, granting the fundamental principle, to
sUence aU reasonable objections, but in practice there proved
to be many grievances. Upon a Baptist for example the
tax might be levied and collected, but if there were no
Baptist minister resident in the town upon whose minis
trations he could regularly attend, the tax might be turned
in to the support of the Congregational minister. Besides,
practicaUy, the whole matter lay in the hands of the asses
sors, or selectmen, and if they decided unjustly it was for
the party injured to sue — a long and costly process. It is
not surprising then that this system of public taxation for
the support of the ministry with aU its abuses and griev
ances became a source of exasperation and resentment
against the standing order. In the memoirs of Free WiU
Baptist and Christian preachers one finds abundant refer
ences to the dislike entertained for the system. The feehng

88 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
which was fundamental to these protesting denominations
led to unfortunate consequences, for it tended to leave the
support of their ministers entirely to the good wiU of the
people, and that could not invariably be depended upon.
It was only after a severe struggle that the wiser leaders
succeeded in arousing a denominational sentiment in favor
of the decent and regular maintenance of the ministers.
More important, however, than the opposition to the
polity of the standing order was the protest against its
doctrine. Most of the itinerant preachers were of Baptist
antecedents, — that is, they had come to believe that the
Congregational churches were unscriptural in their views
concerning baptism; but if paedo-baptism cannot stand the
test of Scripture, can Calvinism ? Here was the point of
departure and, more specificaUy, the doctrine of election
which was central in Calvinism. Nearly every memoir gives
evidence of the effect of this doctrine upon the mind of
the child who afterwards became a missionary. One may
be cited as typical — from the hfe of BUly Hibbard, a
Methodist itinerant in Berkshire County.
When this BiUy Hibbard was a boy of eleven or twelve,
he fell into the habit of profanity, which seemed to him
source and sum of aU his wickedness. One day sitting be
fore a bright and hot open fire, it occurred to him that in
such a fire he must he to all eternity. Hence, he sought to
repent for all his sins, but found so many that he feared he
should not hve to remember them aU and repent of them
sufficiently. Feehng that it was useless to pray for himseU,
he resolved to intercede for other sinners and whUe doing
this he had an overwhelming religious experience. Then
he fell in with a religious neighbor:
I heard him say that God had decreed all things whatsoever cometh
to pass, sin not excepted, and that God had elected from before the
foundation of the world all that ever would or could be saved; and

POPULAR MOVEMENTS 89
the rest were reprobated so that they could not be saved. Of the
elect, he said they might live here in sin and wickedness all their days,
until a little before the breath went out of their bodies, and then God
would by his special grace convert them, and take them to Heaven.
Of the reprobates, he said, they might have conviction of sin, and
repent and live apparently very religious lives, so that we might think
them very good Christians; but God would never convert them;
and though they might lead moral and seemingly religious lives until
they were eighty or ninety years old it would only work out for them
an aggravated damnation, for God had fixed them for it by his eternal
decree, while the elect could not possibly commit a sin that could in
any wise endanger their salvation. If a man committed murder many
times, or hung himself, and he was only one of God's elect, he would
be pardoned and taken immediately to heaven; that good works, or
faith, or anything we could do was no condition of our salvation, for
it was unconditional, that it all depended on the covenant of grace
and this covenant of grace he represented as being wholly with the
Father and the Son before the foundation of the world; that the
Father then gave all the elect to his Son, if he would die for them,
and the rest were left and reprobated.
With these sentiments the neighbors seemed to agree,
and the minister also, hence with becoming modesty Hib
bard supposed they must be true, although they horrified
and dismayed him. How could he know that he was elect ?
He thought of a sign, but dared not venture, lest the result
should be unfavorable; he undertook a jump, so long that
he supposed he could not cover it without divine assistance
— and then slyly shortened it, but on achieving the jump
doubted whether the Lord's assistance had been needed or
given; he flogged himself that he might remember to live
faithful to God in the hope that so he might become of the
elect, but through it aU this thought disturbed his mind:
" If you are elected to be saved, you wiU be saved; and
if you are reprobated to be damned, you wUl be damned;
and why need you pray so much ? " FinaUy, he came al
most to the point of hanging himself, thinking that U he

QO RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
were reprobated, longer hfe would only add to his eternal
misery. Undoubtedly, poor little BiUy Hibbard had faUen in
with extreme Calvinists, and his doubts and misgivmgs
were not whoUy just, or, in their legitimate form, unanswer
able, yet he was typical of many whose anxious and horror-
stricken hearts were crying out agamst the doctrine of
election. Moreover, so closely knit is the Calvinistic system
that to pluck but a single thread unravels at last the entire
fabric. With denial of predestination goes, logicaUy, re
jection of Umited atonement. True, the Hopkinsians had
introduced the moral government theory, which, in contrast
with the penal theory in the form either of equivalence or
satisfaction, did permit the preaching of a general atone
ment, but the Free WiU Baptists and Christians whom we
now have in view seem to have been quite unaware of this
development. Living in the interior of New Hampshire and
Vermont, they knew little of the Hopkinsians, and their
contact was mainly with the Old Calvinism, emphasizing
election, limited atonement, and the perseverance of the
saints. But is this Scriptural ? How can election be recon
cUed with the general invitations with which the Bible
abounds ? With biting sarcasm, Lorenzo Dow caUed Cal
vinists " the A-L-L Part men " by which he meant that
where all occurs in the Bible they read and interpret it
part. As the very name imphes, the Free WiU Baptists
preached human freedom as against divine sovereignty in
predestination, and in this they and the Christians were at
one. With this was associated a doctrine of universal atone
ment becoming efficacious for every man who sincerely
beheves in Christ and is regenerated by the Holy Ghost.
A favorite way of putting it was that every man is elected
when he beheves, or, in cleverer phrase, every man is elected
who votes for himseU. So these itinerant preachers went

POPULAR MOVEMENTS QI
from settlement to settlement, yes from house to house,
preaching a free Gospel, proclaiming that salvation is " fully,
freely, and sincerely offered to aU men upon the sole con
dition of repentance toward God and faith in our Lord Jesus
Christ." As regards the third point: that experimental rehgion,
by which was meant what would now be caUed the religion
of experience, or emotional as distinguished from inteUectual
religion, was at low ebb in this country, as in England, dur
ing the eighteenth century can hardly be doubted. True,
there was here the Great Awakening, as in England there
were the Wesleyan movement and the Evangelical revival,
but both here and there the Establishment was unmoved
save to hostUity. In this country the successors of Edwards
showed much evangehstic fervor, especiaUy under the moral
government theory of the atonement, which warranted the
proclamation of a free Gospel only theoreticaUy hampered
by the doctrine of election; but the rank and file of the Con
gregational clergy, particularly on the country-side, droned
the pulpit hours away in most tedious fashion. Oft-threshed
straw is poor fodder for man or beast. One who for his sins,
or his students, is compeUed to wade through the sermons
of the period, — no, wade is not the word, for that suggests
moisture, of which there is hardly a trace in the Sahara of
dryness, — emerges from his wearisome task with genuine
compassion for those who had to listen and could not skip
save in moments when nature's sweet restorer gave tem
porary rehef from the doctrines of grace. To use Dr.
Holmes's figure, the sermons were like Passover bread, holy
but heavy. The preachers were like that hapless clergyman
on the snowy day in the Concord meeting-house of whom
Emerson writes:
The snowstorm was real, the preacher merely spectral, and the
eye felt the sad contrast in looking at him, and then out of the window

92 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
behind him into the beautiful meteor of the snow. He had lived in
vain. He had no one word intimating that he had laughed or wept,
was married or in love, had been commended, or cheated, or chagrined.
If he had ever lived and acted, we were none the wiser for it. The
capital secret of his profession, namely, to convert life into truth, he
had not learned. Not one fact in all his experience had he yet im
ported into his doctrine. This man had ploughed and planted and
talked and bought and sold; he had read books; he had eaten and
drunken; his head aches, his heart throbs; he smiles, and suffers;
yet was there not a surmise, a hint, in all the discourse that he had
'ever lived at all. Not a line did he draw out of real history. The
I true preacher can be known by this, that he deals out to the people
his life, — life passed through the fire of thought. But of the bad
preacher, it could not be told from his sermon what age of the world
he fell in; whether he had a father or a child; whether he was a free
holder or a pauper; whether he was a citizen or a countryman; or,
any other fact of his biography. It seemed strange that the people
should come to church.
Although Emerson was writing of a Unitarian clergyman
in the second quarter of the nineteenth century, his descrip
tion is true to the ordinary preaching in the pulpits of the
eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries throughout New
England. Of course, there were radiant exceptions, but they
shine out against a background of gloom. There are many
obvious reasons for this, such as the diversion of interest
on account of war, the example and influence of the mother
country, the dread of enthusiasm accentuated by the ex
cesses of the Great Awakening, the haunting feeling derived
from Calvinistic theology of the futility of preaching save for
the edification of the regenerate, — but the country folk often
attributed it to the over-education of the minister. " The
Lord eddicates his own preachers." It is said that of the
two hundred and seventy-one Congregational preachers in
Massachusetts, in 1776, there were but three who had not
received a coUege education, and according to rustic logic
sapless preaching was the result. Doubtless some here

POPULAR MOVEMENTS 93
present recall the " pennyrial hymns " sung years ago in
neighborhood meetings — why they were caUed pennyrial
nobody seems to know, but perhaps it was because of their
•homely savoriness — and with the " pennyrial hymns "
went pennyroyal preaching. And the people hked it, al
though it had to do almost exclusively with the need and
the way of salvation. Some ten years ago, I chanced to
meet the Rev. Charles G. Ames on Boston Common and as
we walked on together, remembering that he had begun
his career as a Free WiU Baptist preacher, I remarked that
I had just been reading the life of an old friend of his, David
Marks. Mr. Ames stopped short and stared at me as if he
were gazing down an interminable vista of years — "You
reading the life of David Marks ! Why I set up the type of
that book in the old Morning Star office in Dover! Yes,"
he continued, meditatively, " I remember hearing David
Marks preach. There was a big crowd and he began very
slowly and solemnly, ' FUty years hence all of us will be in
eternity — where ? ' " That Mr. Ames remembered the
words is significant; probably most of those who heard
them did.
The need of salvation because of the nearness of death, the
certainty of judgment, and the agonies of heU, upon this
the preachers dwelt with morbid insistence. It is hard for
us to realize the terrible oppression of the human heart and
mind under such gloomy teachings. And what is worse,
even little children were forced to hve in the sombre shadows.
Of course they could not help being more familiar with death
than chUdren are nowadays. The large famUies and high
mortality, the smaU and crowded houses which made death
bed scenes unavoidable — these tended to accustom phU-
dren to the vaUey of the shadow. But there was more than
this, more than this, for, in order to give them a realizing
sense of death and doom, parents made the most of the actual

94 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
occurrence of death and kept its certain coming before the
minds even of little children. The same David Marks of
whom I was speaking a moment ago gives us a typical
example of this:
As early as I was susceptible of instruction and capable of reflec
tion, the truth that all must die, and appear before God to account
for their actions, was solemnly impressed on my mind. At the age
of four years, a sense of death and judgment caused awful feelings to
pervade my soul; particularly one day, when I was alone, amusing
myself with burning the tow of flax, the dreadful agony of the wicked
in hell represented in the Word of God as burning with unquenchable
fire was instantly brought to mind. Looking into the flame, I thought
how exceedingly dreadful even one moment would be in this fierce
burning; then turning my eyes towards the heavens, I said within
myself, how will my soul endure if yet in sin, at the great Judgment
Day, when God shall appear and set the world on fire ? Finally I
concluded that I would descend into a well when that period should
arrive, and going immediately to my mother, told her my resolution.
Ah, my son, said she, the water will boil and the earth will burn. An
other expedient was suggested. I thought I would hew out a place of
retreat in a rock and there hide myself, closing the entrance. On
naming this she replied, But the rocks will melt. My sorrows increased,
but on reflection I hoped ere that time should come, life might be
ended and my body buried in the earth; so, telling my mother I
hoped by this to escape, she said — My child your hope is vain, for
the dead will awake and come out of their graves. My last expedient
it now appeared would fail; and retiring to a field my anguish became
great, while reflecting that my parents were Christians but I was a
sinner; tears flowed profusely, and putting my hand on my bosom, I
cast my eye toward heaven and said, God be merciful to me a sinner.
Now existence was a burden; the burning of the tow recurred to mind,
and I earnestly wished that I was something inanimate, even if it were
tow, that I might not feel the vengeance that would fall upon the
wicked. Once as my mother laid me down to rest, she said, Soon my
son, you will exchange the bed for a grave and your clothes for a
winding sheet. Often after this when I lay down at night, my bed
reminded me of the grave and my sheets of the grave apparel. Serious
thoughts of death and judgment continued to exercise my infant
powers.

POPULAR MOVEMENTS 95
Little wonder that when at the age of fifteen David
Marks left his home to take up the hfe of a travelling
preacher, he frequently began his sermon with the solemn
repetition of three words: Death, Judgment, Eternity—
a practice which, in substance, as Mr. Ames was witness,
continued through his lUe. One wishes that David Marks
were an exception, but the biographies of his coadjutors in
the field contradict the wish. They were blood-curdling
preachers dealing out horrors with a lavish hand. Natu
raUy their hearers got the thrills which they usuaUy f aUed to
get in the village meeting-house, where simUar doctrine was
taught but not in so pungent a way.
There was, however, in the conventicle one vast improve
ment upon the meeting-house — the former opened a way
of escape which the latter hardly knew. What must I do
to be saved ? When an aroused penitent put this question
to the coUege-trained, village minister, what was the reply ?
What could it be on Calvinistic premises according to which
man can do absolutely nothing towards his own salvation
lest his merit should detract from the fulness of God's glory ?
The best that could be said was that his penitent frame was
evidence that God's spirit was working within him and
would carry the work forward to perfection provided he were
of the elect. But this must have been depressing counsel.
The traveUing preacher, however, was not baffled — there
was something for the penitent to do, ask for prayers, come
to the anxious seat, forgive your neighbor the wrong he has
done you, make a complete surrender to Christ and signahze
your consecration by baptism and a way of life eschewing
cards, dancing, and worldly frolics in favor of sober and
solemn thoughts concerning death and hell.
Naturally, the conventicles often became scenes of mad
ness. We read of meetings lasting through the night in
which men and women feU to the floor, sometimes dumb

96 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
and rigid, sometimes writhing and shrieking in agony, of
visions, and prophecies, and the like; but the more experi
enced of the preachers grew suspicious of such demonstra
tions and were disposed to discourage them. And one must
never forget that notwithstanding regrettable extravagancies
and the wholesale dispensation of terrors there was real hfe
in it aU, life protesting against the hard conventionahty of
the standing order and its hopeless Calvinism. The gueriUa
warfare was crude but effective. Yet, contemporaneously,
there was going on a movement within the standing order
of a totaUy different character, organized and academic, of
which we shaU have to speak in the next two lectures upon
the Unitarians.

II. THE UNITARIANS

In the course of the last lecture, it was incidentally observed
that Christians were suspected of dallying with the hberal
party of the standing order, afterwards caUed Unitarians,
although in fact there were no relations between them. Yet
the suspicion was natural, for in some respects the two
groups closely resembled each other. The Liberals studiously
ignored or plumply denied the doctrine of the Trinity, and
Christians fought shy of the word as unscriptural. Jones
and his foUowers held that in some way the death of Christ
availed for the forgiveness of sins, and so did most of the
Liberals, yet neither party was disposed to speculate, stUl
less to dogmatize, concerning the why and the wherefore.
Both were severe against " man-made " formularies and
pointed to the Bible as their sole and sufficient creed. If
Christians renounced party names, the Liberals objected
stoutly to a new denominational distinction and afterwards
aimed to be, and boasted that they were, a non-sectarian
sect. And yet with aU these points of similarity, I should
be exceedingly surprised to learn that either Freeman or
Charming ever visited either of the haUs, or, afterwards, the
little chapel at the corner of Summer and Sea Streets, where
the Christians worshipped, or so much as knew Abner Jones
by sight.
The reasons are obvious, if not whoUy creditable to the
Liberals. For one thing, theirs was an academic movement
and carried the Harvard stamp. Appended to John Wilson's
Elegy on John Harvard, preserved in Cotton Mather's
Magnolia, is a quotation from one of Arrowsmith's Anti-
Weigelian Orations, applied to Harvard CoUege, which prays
that it may be "so tenacious of the truth that it shall be

98 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
easier to find a woU in England or a snake in Ireland than a
Socinian or Arminian in Cambridge," and could the particular
faith of the Mathers have prevailed, the prayer would have
been answered. But even while Increase Mather was nomi-
naUy President of the CoUege, his frequent absences threw
its management into the hands of Leverett and Brattle, who
represented a progressive tendency, and from that time on,
the CoUege developed away from the creed of its founders
untU it became a veritable breeding-place of Arminians and
Massachusetts " Liberals." AU of the ministers of the party,
and many of its laymen too, were graduates of Harvard, and
the CoUege was governed by men who sat on Sunday in the
pews, or stood in the pulpits, of Liberal churches. The
wealth and respectabUity and culture of Boston were with
them. The Christians, on the other hand, were obscure and
humble laboring folk and their preachers carried no academic
degrees. It was distinctly a popular, as Unitarianism was
an aristocratic and academic movement — they were in
different orbits which never intersected. Another reason is
that the Christians were opposed to the standing order,
' whUe the Liberals stood inside it, fully approving. It is true
that the latter were not in sympathy with the traditional
theology, yet they were strong for the tradition of Congre
gationalism as a form of church polity, and saw no reason
why Trinitarians and non-Trinitarians might not worship
together in its free feUowship. They had no wish to be
come-outers, and I suppose it was undoubtedly for this
reason among others that they consorted not with the
Christians. What has just been said partly explains a fact which
puzzles a visitor to New England, in case he be interested in
rehgious matters, namely that many of the " First Churches "
hereabouts are Unitarian. In most cases they do not bear
the name save perhaps in inconspicuous letters on the sign-

THE UNITARIANS 99
board, sometimes they call themselves simply the First
Church, or even the Congregational Church, of the town, but
they are Unitarian nevertheless in denominational affiliation.
How has this come to pass, asks a curious visitor, that the
oldest churches are homes of one of the most recent heresies ?
To answer this inquiry is the purpose of today's lecture.
With the exception of King's Chapel, the history of which
begins in Episcopalianism, aU the early Unitarian churches in
New England belonged originaUy to the standing order and
developed within it. The story of King's Chapel has been
so fully and admirably told by the Rev. Henry W. Foote,
a former minister, in his Annals of King's Chapel and is so
weU known, that it need not concern us at present. We
shall restrict ourselves therefore to the Unitarian churches
which have their beginnings in ancient Congregationalism,
and waive also the recondite and intricate question as to
the earhest representatives of the " heresy," for indeed the
growth was very gradual, continuing through two or even
three generations, and the break when it occurred was one
of the " critical points in the continuity of natural phenom
ena" — to borrow Professor Shaler's fehcitous phrase. In
many cases, as for example the First Church in Boston, there
was no sharp break at aU and the original covenant of the
church, like that of many another of the earliest churches, was
so broad and untheological in character — a covenant of life
purpose and not a creed — that it has been retained unal
tered and unabridged even to this day. In so slow a process,
therefore, it is manifestly impossible to fix beginnings, and
our best course is to take up the story at some definite
pdint where the differences are clearly recognizable. To go
no farther back, then, than the beginning of the last century,
we find at that time three pretty distinctly marked parties
in the standing order of New England. By far the largest
of the three was the group of Moderate Calvinists who held

IOO RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
to a vaguely mitigated Calvinism. God was sovereign, but
to some extent and in some way man was somehow free and
responsible. Regeneration was by an immediate act of the
Spirit as the pure effect of God's free grace, but it was weU
for man to avaU himseU of the means of grace, go to church,
read his Bible, and pray, yes, perhaps even attend the Com
munion, so that, at least, the Spirit would not have to travel
far afield on his regenerating errand. Of course, here was
palpable inconsistency, but the Moderates did not know it,
or, if they knew it, did not care. But there was a party
composing the right wing of Congregationalism who did
know and care. As they rightly reasoned, What is the use
of being Calvinists at aU unless thorough's the word ? So
they, Edwards and his adherents, caUed themselves "Con
sistent Calvinists," fearlessly pushing constructive principles
to their extreme logical issues. God's absolute sovereignty
in election and reprobation, man's helplessness and total
moral inabihty on account of the sin of Adam, — to these
doctrines, and their logical corollaries and consequences,
they consistently adhered. Two things, however, they held
for which we may properly magnify them: the first was a
moral government theory of the Atonement which theoreti-
caUy, at least, opened to aU mankind the benefits of the
death of Christ while at the same time robbing Universalism,
as it then was, of its most cogent plea. The second, of in
definitely greater significance, was a moral ideal of surpass
ing grandeur. Edwards is popularly known as the preacher
of almost incredibly cruel heU-fire sermons, or, among
philosophers, as author of a book on the Will which is more
often praised than read, but his powerful claim upon the
honorable memory of mankind lies in the surpassing moral
ideal contained in his treatise " On the Nature of True
Virtue." Perceiving that an act gets its moral quahty
from the motive that inspires it, or more accurately from the

THE UNITARIANS IOI
attitude and spirit it betokens, Edwards taught that true
virtue consists only in love to Being in general, or, specifi-
caUy, to God considered either as the sum of aU Being or as
containing within himself the largest amount of Being in
the whole universe, and since no one could have this love
unless born of God by the regenerating work of the Holy
Spirit, it foUows that no unregenerate man can have true
virtue or do anything in the way of good works towards his
own salvation. Before such a lofty ideal as this, how shabby
and contemptible appeared the morals of the Moderates
and how thoroughly consistent is the doctrine that salvation
can be only of God's sovereign grace. It was this moral
ideal which afterwards was pointedly expressed in the in
quiry — Are you wiUing to be damned for the glory of God ?
which probed to the very depths of a man's soul. What it
really meant was, whether a man did love God so supremely
that supposing God had decreed he should be among those
useful only in their damnation, he would rejoice even thus
to show forth His glory. Of course the faUacy is that when a
man had arrived at the point where he felt willing to make
this ultimate sacrifice he could feel reasonably certain that
it would not be required of him, but, even so, behind the
question lay the most exalted moral ideal ever conceived by
the mind of man. Such then were the Hopkinsians or Con
sistent Calvinists, logical, enthusiastic, aggressive, who com
posed the right wing of New England Congregationalism.
Then there was the left wing, the Liberals, who also took
Calvinism seriously and logically, and deliberately rejected
it. Thorough's the word, on the left as on the right. In fact
both wings pushed out simultaneously and each stimulated
the growth of the other. This is no time or place for a state
ment as to how these Liberals came to their radical views: —
doubtless the English influence during the prerevolutionary
period, proceeding from Deistic authors as weU as from

102 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
churchmen like TUlotson, was in part responsible; perhaps
afterwards the French influence helped; probably the
broadening effect of foreign commerce contributed; but
the important fact is that there the Liberals were, on the
left of Congregationalism, certainly not Calvinists, and with
equal certainty quite unwUling to be caUed Unitarians.
And this not as seeking to conceal their real opinions, — of
whom or what can they have been afraid, save of a schism in
the ancient order, which they did indeed honorably dread, —
but because in truth they were not Unitarians according to
the usual connotation of that term both here and in England.
In that they beheved in the divine unity, they were Uni
tarians, but so were Jews and Mohammedans; yet, unlike
most English Unitarians, they were not necessitarians,
religious materiahsts, or Socinians, nor did they share the
political opinions generaUy characteristic of the group.
Upon this point, however, more must be said in the next
lecture — at present it is sufficient to present this group of
Liberals as the left wing of Congregationalism.
Such was the condition of things at the beginning of the
century — there were these strongly marked differences
with possibUity of division, but in that event it was by no
means clear where the line of cleavage would run — would
the Moderates aUy themselves with the Hopkinsians or the
Liberals ? Two events answered the question. The elec
tion of Henry Ware as HoUis Professor of Divinity in
Harvard College was one, and the founding of Andover
Theological Seminary was the other. The former aligned
Moderates in opposition to the Liberals and the latter sig
nalized the union of Hopkinsians and Moderates. So the
line was drawn and the Liberals were on the lonely side of it.
The result was that notwithstanding earnest protestations
and pleas on the part of the Liberals, the old Congrega
tional order was spht asunder and the Liberals were com-

THE UNITARIANS 103
peUed to organize for mutual feUowship and support.
Inevitably there was bad feeling on both sides. It has
frequently been observed that there is no rancor like that
between theological opponents who fight for the glory of
God as if the very devU were in them. In general, this is
probably owing to the fact that rehgious interests are very
deep, lying near the inmost springs of feeling and hence
bringing out, when aroused, the essential natures of men.
In a little book on Ohver CromweU, Frederic Harrison has
a keen analysis of Puritan character under Puritan theology
in which he says: " It depended very much on the zealot's
own nature whether the result was good or bad. A great and
wise man had his greatness and his sagacity intensified, for
his own soul was transfigured to himself. A man of self-
reliance had his wiU heated to a white heat, for he knew
himself to be the chosen instrument to work out the decrees
of the Almighty. And so the self-sufficient man treated aU
who opposed him as the enemies of God. It was a form of
behef which could bring out aU the good and aU the evU of
the heart." What is here said of Puritanism is equaUy true
of religion in general, when hving and momentous. The
zealot identifies his cause with the divine wUl and so
becomes resolute and relentless, counting his opponents
wickedly hostile to God and hating them accordingly. Con
sequently, notwithstanding the high character of the men
involved in this New England controversy, the very fact
that it concerned religion, which was on both sides a deep
and commanding interest, elicited powerful feelings which
were often unjust and uncharitable and hence of course
unchristian. Besides, there were exacerbating elements in
the situation which sharpened general, into keenly personal,
feehng. WhUe the election of a HoUis Professor of Divinity in
Harvard CoUege was pending, Professor Eliphalet Pearson,

104 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
then acting President of the CoUege, stoutly maintained in
the Corporation, as the Rev. Jedidiah Morse, a graduate of
Yale, and minister of the First Church of Charlestown, did
in the Board of Overseers, that the terms of the HoUis en
dowment required that the incumbent should be a Calvinist.
Into the merits of the contention it is not for us to enter.
Suffice it to say, that the opinion did not prevaU in the
governing boards, and Henry Ware of Hingham, one of the
Liberals, was elected. Shortly afterwards, in May, 1806,
Dr. Webber was chosen president. Whereupon Professor
Pearson, an opposing candidate, resigned his professor
ship, and shortly afterwards withdrew to Andover, where
he took the lead in founding Andover Theological Sem
inary. Dr. Morse, who had been the foremost opponent
of Dr. Ware in the Board of Overseers, seems to have been
rather credulous and suspicious, with perhaps a trace of
what in anybody but a minister might be caUed cantanker-
ousness in his disposition. Unhappily he became involved
in a hterary squabble of almost incredible pettiness, which,
however, greatly embittered him. There was in Boston a
certain Hannah Adams, a literary lady of very local and
temporary renown, who published in 1799, a History of New
England, which she proposed afterwards to abridge and pub
lish in less expensive form. Before she could do this, how
ever, Dr. Morse and Dr. Parish brought out a Compendious
History of New England, which was briefer and less expen
sive than Miss Adams's original history, and was regarded
as an attempt to forestaU the market for her intended
abridgement. In addition, there were vague accusations
that her earlier work had been improperly used, plagiarized
in fact, by the reverend authors of the Compendious History.
As it happened Miss Adams had many friends among the
Liberals of Boston who took up her cause, and for ten years
a tempest raged in the tea-pot. AU this is of no importance

THE UNITARIANS 105
now save for the effect it produced upon Dr. Morse. He
beheved, doubtless with perfect sincerity, that the whole
cpntroversy had as its efficient cause a desire on the part of
the Liberals to punish him for the decided stand which he
had felt himseU bound to take " against (to quote his own
words) that powerful and overbearing influence which was
exerted in effecting the election of the Rev. Dr. Ware to his
present office, and which has operated since in completing
an important revolution in the religious character of that
ancient and venerable institution." It matters not whether
this view was correct or not, certainly he entertained it as
a settled conviction, and its effect upon his feeling depended
upon his belief of the fact rather than upon the fact itseU.
Dr. Morse must have been uncomfortable in Charlestown,
a Yale man not theologicaUy sympathetic with the neigh
boring Harvard ministers, and deeply distressed by the signs
of theological change which he saw all around him — and
then this attack upon his reputation which he beheved to
be inspired by theological animosity — what wonder if he
lost his head and let bitterness into his heart!
But whatever may have been the part taken by personal
feehng in the case of Pearson and Morse, the mass of the
clergy and laity were little affected by such trivial matters.
And there was abundant occasion for profounder feeling.
Harvard CoUege was founded to provide a supply of learned
ministers for the churches, and for a century and a half it
had admirably discharged that function. But it appeared
that the College which had held the loyalty of aU, to the
funds of which pious souls had contributed, some out of
their sufficiency, others out of penury, had faUen into the
hands of a party who were determined to make it a training
school of ministers out of harmony with the theological past
and doctrines dear to the heart of the contemporary rehgious
hfe of New England. So religious feeling was outraged and

106 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
bad blood was stirred up. Epithets were bandied back and
forth. The Liberals no more liked to be called infidels than
their opponents would have liked to be caUed fools. Neither
side had a monopoly of piety or inteUigence. Of course
it was crueUy unjust to brand high-minded conscientious
men, such as composed the Liberal party, both clergymen
and laymen, with deceit, evasion, and hypocrisy, and re
sentment was natural on both sides. To caU bad names
always stirs up bad blood. Epithets are the epitaphs of
good wiU. But the iU feeling was increased and consoUdated
by a most unfortunate event with far-reaching consequences
— I refer, of course, to the controversy which found its legal
settlement in the famous Dedham Case.
For a correct understanding of this crucial point it is
necessary to recall the history of the relations between the
church on the one hand and the town, precinct, or society
on the other with respect to the settling of ministers. In
colonial times, the church alone was authorized to caU and
settle a minister with no reference whatever to the other
inhabitants of the town, aU of whom, however, were liable
to taxation for the support of a clergyman in whose selection
they had had no voice. Of course, since church members
alone possessed the franchise, others had no right to vote
in any of the affairs of the town and were expressly forbidden
by colonial law to meddle with ecclesiastical matters. At
the beginning of the provincial period, after the religious
qualification for voting had been abolished, a law was passed
conferring the right of election upon the town, but this was
promptly changed, and by the law of 1693, it was provided
that the church should elect the minister and, when its choice
should be concurred in by the town, the whole town should
become liable for bis support. But suppose the town should
not concur ? This was provided for by the law of 1695,
which decreed that in case of such disagreement the church

THE UNITARIANS 107
should caU a councU: if its decision were favorable to the
church, the town must acquiesce; if unfavorable, the church
must proceed to a new selection. Under this law, the prac
tice became general, although not universal, of electing a
minister by concurrent vote, the church taking the lead,
although occasionaUy by agreement the church and the
town, or parish, voted together. In the BUI of Rights, how
ever, it was enacted that " the several towns, parishes, pre
cincts, and other bodies politic, or religious societies, shaU,
at all times, have the exclusive right of electing their public
teachers and of contracting with them for their support and
maintenance." By the Law of 1799, the churches were con
firmed in their accustomed privileges respecting divine wor
ship, church order, and discipline, but apparently this
provision did not include the choice of minister, which re
mains where it was left by the Constitution in the hands of
the town or society. This was a most extraordinary provision,
for it exactly reversed the colonial principle and aUowed
the church as such no rights whatsoever in the selection of
a minister. It has been suggested by high authority that
the phrasing was influenced by the practice of Brattle Street
Church, where many of the most prominent legislators wor
shipped, which had long been accustomed to the calling of
a minister by church and parish acting together as one.
However this may be, it may weU be doubled whether the
full import of the law was apprehended by either its framers
or the people who adopted it. In fact, examination of the
law in connection with earlier enactments, and the provi
sions empowering the Legislature to require the towns to
provide Gospel privileges and to enjoin the inhabitants to
attend public worship, suggests that the article in question
was intended to preclude the Legislature from imposing a
minister of its own choice upon the town (as had been
possible under earlier laws) so that the phrase exclusive right

108 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
was intended to exclude the Legislature. However that
may be, there the law stood subject to interpretation by
the courts should occasion arise.
And occasion did arise. It became necessary for the First
Parish and Church in Dedham to procure a new minister.
The society elected Mr. Lamson, whose sympathies were
with the Liberals, but for that very reason the church was
opposed. Nevertheless the society, with the advice and
consent of a councU, proceeded to ordain Mr. Lamson as
minister of the church and parish. Whereupon the majority
of the church seceded, among them the deacons in whose
custody was certain property belonging to the First Church.
I say the majority of the church seceded, because that was
admitted in the trial as a matter of fact, although Dr. Lam
son emphaticaUy affirmed that the concession was made
only in order to secure a decision on first principles and that
in reahty it was a minority of the church which withdrew.
Such of the members of the church as retained their con
nection with the parish appointed new deacons, who sued
their predecessors, still claiming to be deacons of the First
Church in Dedham, to recover the property belonging to
the church. So the case came before the courts and was
decided by an opinion rendered at the October term (1820)
of the Supreme Court by Chief Justice Parker. In brief,
the opinion was as foUows. The property of the church
vests in the deacons of the church to be used for the support
of public worship in the town or parish to which the church
belongs whereof they are deacons. The church, being an
unincorporated organization and incapable of existing apart
from a society, must be identified by its connection with a
parish. Hence, the First Church of a town is the church
which is in connection with the First Parish. The Court
even went so far as to hold that " as to aU civU purposes,
the secession of a whole church from the parish would be

THE UNITARIANS 109
the extinction of the church, and it is competent to the mem
bers of the parish to institute a new church or to engraft
one upon the old stock if any of it should remain, and this
new church would succeed to aU the rights of the old in
relation to the parish." Furthermore, the Court held that
in conformity with the provision of the Constitution the soci
ety was whoUy within its rights in caUing and settling Mr.
Lamson without regard to the protest of the church, which
had no rights in the premises. Thus, the decision of the
Supreme Court was whoUy in favor of the Liberals and by
virtue of it in aU cases where church and society disagreed
in the choice of a minister, and the former or any portion
thereof withdrew, the meeting-house and aU the endow
ments of the church remained with the church in connection
with the original parish. Hence it is that many of the First
Churches in New England are now in Unitarian feUowship.
To say that this decision provoked a storm of indignant
protest from the Conservative party would be putting the
case quite too mildly. But its worst effect was to bring the
bad blood, already stirred, to the boiling point of wrath.
The Unitarians who feU heir to the property of the ancient
churches were accused of robbery and plunder. As a boy
in one of the Congregational churches in Boston I used to
hear, although not from the pulpit, that " the Unitarians
stole our churches " and it was not untU many years after
ward that I learned that the " robbery " was by order of the
Supreme Court of the Commonwealth.
Even at this late day, it takes but httle to fan the embers
of outraged feeling into a hot flame of resentment, but per
haps a word may be permitted from one who stands far
enough removed in time from the controversy to have none
of the original feeling, and whose early prejudices were
wholly with the conservative side, as to the way in which
the old dispute appears to one, at least, of the present genera-

I IO RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
tion. That the decision of the Supreme Court was legally
sound must be assumed. It would be presumptuous for a
layman, whether Unitarian or Orthodox, to question it.
And indeed the Constitution was perfectly explicit in vesting
the society alone with the right to elect a minister. But
the law had not changed the usage, which continued to be
as it had been for more than a century, that the church took
the lead in electing, leaving the parish or society to concur
if it saw fit. The practice and the law therefore did not agree,
but, as the Court pointed out, legal questions must be de
cided by the law and not by custom. But it was precisely
that conflict between law and custom which added bitter
ness to the controversy. Should a church of God's elect
have its minister appointed for it by a society of technical
" reprobates," in whom the Spirit of God was not and who
had no living connection with the great Head of the Church ?
Such a view was monstrous in the eyes of piety. No wonder
that feeling ran hot and high. And let me frankly say that
this seems to me just one of the cases where it is necessary
to distinguish clearly between law and justice. A distin
guished Chicago lawyer once remarked to me that the
courts are not an agency for the establishment of ideal
justice, but are simply part of the police system of the state
for the settling of disputes. Law and Justice are not neces
sarUy identical. Of course, ideally they should be, and in
fact, ordinarily, substantial justice is reached on legal prin
ciples, but frequently, in practice, cases arise where the dis
tinction is indispensable if one would honor his sense of
justice on the one hand and retain his respect for the law on
the other. The highest sense of justice in a community is
often in advance of legislation. That the decision of the
Supreme Court was in harmony with the law, as the law
then was, must be conceded. No one famUiar with the repu
tation and character of the Supreme Court of Massachusetts

THE UNITARIANS III
can for a moment suppose that its decision was affected
by the theological predilections of its members, whatever
they may have been. But one may grant this and yet, with
all respect to the Court, be permitted to affirm that its de
cision does not seem equitable, particularly in view of the
practice which had prevailed here in New England, both
before and after the adoption of the Constitution. Yet, one
may ask, would it not have been decent and honorable, not
withstanding the decision, for those whom it favored to
make fair division of the property thus put into their hands
and share proportionaUy with the seceders ? Yes, that
would have been just, and in Dedham U the seceders from
the parish who held the property had made such a propo
sition (so far as I can ascertain there is no evidence that
they did), the Unitarians would probably have been wiUing
to accept the compromise and the case would have been
kept out of the courts; but, since the funds were trust funds,
after the Court had decided as to their proper trustees,
would it then have been lawful to put them, or any portion
of them, into the hands of those who according to the Court
were not their legal custodians ? The bitter misfortune
through aU this painful controversy is that the case was per
mitted to go to the courts at aU, but when it actuaUy came
before the Court it of course had to be settled in accordance
with law. And one can but admire the splendid loyalty to
conscience which inspired the conservatives to depart from
an organization which they deemed hostUe to the Christian
faith and accept the clearly foreseen consequences entailed
by the separation. They were wiUing, be it said to their
glory, to forfeit the accumulations of years, to labor and
sacrifice in the upbuilding of new churches which should
perpetuate the ancient creed. The law was against them,
but a zeal for the truth as they saw it led to spiritual results
far exceeding their material loss.

112 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
By 1825, then, the Unitarians were weU established in
Boston and eastern New England, with some churches in
the interior of Massachusetts which looked to Harvard
CoUege for their ministers. But on the whole the back coun
try was untouched by this Unitarian movement: for their
ministers, the churches had, as a rule, Moderate Calvinists
who were now definitely arrayed against the Unitarians.
But at this very time, currents of population were setting
towards the cities, the most energetic and enterprising young
men and women from the country towns began to stream
into Boston. What foUowed may be told best in the words
of Theodore Parker, who a few months before his death
wrote thus:
No sect had ever a finer opportunity than the Unitarians to advance
the rehgious development of a people. But they let it slide, and now
they must slide with it. In 1838 the Unitarians were the controlling
party in Boston: the railroads were just getting opened and it was
plain the Protestant population of the town would soon double. Young
men with no fortune but their character would come in from the coun
try and settle and grow rich; the Unitarians ought to have welcomed
such to their churches; to have provided helps for them and secured
them to the Unitarian fold. Common pohcy would suggest that course
not less than a refined humanity. But they did no such thing: they
loved pecunia pecuniata, not pecunia pecunians. They were aristo
crats and exclusive in their tastes, not democratic and inclusive. So
they shoved off these young country fellows, and now rejoice in their
very respectable but very httle congregations. The South of Boston
is not in the Unitarian churches. A church of old men goes to its grave,
one of young men goes to its work.
In the main Theodore Parker was right. The newcomers
into the city brought with them for the most part prejudices
against the Unitarians implanted in their home churches on
the countryside, and there was no attempt to remove those
prejudices and welcome them to the Unitarian churches.
Even those who came from Unitarian homes in the back

THE UNITARIANS 113
country found their warmest welcome here in orthodox
churches. One speculates sometimes what would have
happened, for example, if Dwight L. Moody, coming from
a Unitarian home and church in Northfield, had been re
ceived into one of the Unitarian churches of Boston as he
was into Mount Vernon Church, although his reception even
there cannot be called exactly cordial. May a Boston boy
bear witness to the fact that in the seventies neither he nor
any of the common people among whom he lived would
have presumed to enter this buUding (King's Chapel) at
the time of worship, any more than he would have had the
impudence to enter, unbidden, a private residence on Beacon
Street. I do not say that this feeling was just: I do aver
that it existed as an inheritance from an earlier time. And
the fact is that on the whole young men and women coming
from the country found their religious homes elsewhere
than among the Unitarians. And so appears a striking
anomaly. The Unitarians were liberal in theology but con
servative in weUnigh everything else. The orthodox
churches were fining up with young men who were conserva
tive in theology but progressive in almost everything else.
That does not put the case quite fairly for, theologically,
the Unitarians, whUe liberal, were not progressive. They
believed that they had returned to the oldest and purest
form of Christianity, so that in a very real sense they held
themselves to be, theologicaUy, the true conservatives.
They believed stoutly in divine revelation, especiaUy through
Christ, but also in the New Testament, and indeed in the
Bible as a whole when correctly interpreted; they had no
notion of progress beyond what was written, especiaUy in
the words of Christ. The Unitarians were the cult of the
arrived, but in orthodox churches fiUed with vigorous, am
bitious, progressive youth from the countryside there was
the worship of pUgrims.

114 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
Into the further history of the Unitarians, externaUy con
sidered, I do not care now to enter. In addition to what has
been said, it should be observed that the material progress
of their churches was hindered by other causes. They
were Congregationalists to the core with an almost morbid
dread of ecclesiastical domination which might interfere
with individual hberty, hence there was a deeply rooted
prejudice against organization and central control even of
the most elementary and indispensable kind, which has per
sisted even to this day and has undoubtedly hampered their
efficiency. Furthermore, this same respect for individual
freedom has given them also a prejudice against what is
caUed proselyting, which has extended to missionary work,
home as weU as foreign, and to the rehgious education of
their young people. This has given rise to queer misunder
standings. It has been said, for example, that the Unitarians
have no confidence in their own religion, else they would be
more active in its propagation, since one who knows he has
a good thing is always prompt to push it. In reality, how
ever, the argument should run in precisely the opposite
direction: it was the very confidence in their own religious
convictions which encouraged the Unitarians to believe
that they would make their way by their own reasonable
ness, and this because they trusted so fully the inherent
reasonableness of mankind. They themselves had been led,
very gradually, to their position and they believed that all
men were under similar guidance and therefore would come
to it eventuaUy of their own motion. Meanwhile, why
should they force the educative process ? This was oddly
analogous to the Calvinistic view against which they were
vehemently protesting, but they were unconscious of the fact,
and their attitude of rehgious inactivity appeared to them
as the logical outcome of their fundamental faith in the dig
nity of man as a reasonable being. That they have taken

THE UNITARIANS 115
but little interest in foreign missions is undoubtedly true,
but it must be remembered that untU very recent times the
motives appealed to for foreign missionary interest and the
methods employed in the prosecution of the work could not
commend themselves to Unitarians. They did not beheve
that the heathen world was tumbling into hell over the
Niagara of death. On the contrary, they believed that
God in his fatherly mercy was guiding aU his children and
that through other faiths and forms than the Christian he
was bringing them to himself. Hence, they could not in
consistency with their deepest convictions participate in
foreign missionary work as it was conducted until very
recently. They would have sympathized, for example,
much more cordially with Cyrus Hamhn's work than did the
American Board. Nor has their home missionary work
been particularly extensive or effective for somewhat the
same reason. To be sure, after the Civil War came a period
of organization in which some of the old prejudices and fears
have disappeared. But the progress of Unitarianism during
the last seventy-five years has been theological rather than
material, and of this I propose to speak in the next lecture.
II
In the last lecture, whUe using, as I frequently did, the
terms " Liberal " and " Liberal Christian " to designate the
left wing of the standing order I was painfully reminded of
the feehng which once came over me on reading in a Chicago
newspaper an advertisement of a convention of " Liberal
Physicians " to be held in one of the smaller cities of IUinois.
There was no subsequent account of the proceedings by
which one could ascertain the principles and methods of the
organization, nor were there illustrations to show what man
ner of men the delegates were. Unfortunately, the latter
omission left a reader's fancy free to conjure up a picture of

Il6 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
the company — glib and pretentious " Smart Alecks " dis
persed among pompous white- whiskered " old doctors "
wearing frock coats and white ties, aU blatantly declaiming
against the " regulars " of whatever school. It was not an
agreeable picture, and very likely it was wholly unfair, yet
it inspired a strong and enduring dishke for the word in
ecclesiastical usage. If the designation means open-minded,
free from prejudice, equaUy ready to discard the false, not
withstanding its antiquity, or to accept the true despite its
novelty, then indeed the appellation is honorable: but by
the same token it is impudent to make of it a party name as
U aU others than those bearing the label were besotted with
prejudice, stupid and ignorant conformists in thought and
practice. A simUar objection was expressed by Channing,
who in a letter to Thacher, under date of June 20, 1815,
wrote as foUows :
I have used the phrase or denomination Liberal Christians because
it is used by the Reviewer [in the Panoplist, of Dr. Morse's American
Unitarianism] to distinguish those whom he assails. I have never been
inclined to claim this appellation for myself or my friends, because as
the word liberality expresses the noblest qualities of the human mind,
— freedom from local prejudices and narrow feelings, the enlargement
of the views and affections, — I have thought that the assumption
of it would savor of that spirit which has attempted to limit the words
orthodox and evangelical to a particular body of Christians. As the
appellation, however, cannot well be avoided, I will state the meaning
which I attach to it.
By a Liberal Christian, then, I understand one who is disposed to
receive as his brethren in Christ all who in the judgment of charity,
sincerely profess to receive Jesus Christ as their Lord and Master.
He rejects all tests and standards of Christian faith and of Christian
character, but the word of Jesus Christ and of his inspired apostles.
He thinks it an act of disloyalty to his Master to introduce into the
Church creeds of fallible men as bonds of union or terms of Christian
fellowship. He calls himself by no name derived from human leaders,
disclaims all exclusive connection with any sect or party, professes

THE UNITARIANS 117
himself a member of the Church Universal on earth and in heaven,
and cheerfully extends the hand of brotherhood to every man of every
name who discovers the spirit of Jesus Christ.
According to this view of Liberal Christian, they cannot be called
a party. They are distinguished only by refusing to separate them
selves in any form or degree from the great body of Christ. They
are scattered, too, through all classes of Christians. I have known
Trinitarians and Calvinists who justly deserve the name of Liberal,
who regard with affection all who appear to follow Jesus Christ in
temper and life, however they may differ on the common points of
theological controversy. To this class of Christians, which is scattered
over the earth, and which I trust has never been extinct in any age,
I profess and desire to belong. God send them prosperity ! — In
this part of the country Liberal Christians, as they have been above
described, are generaUy though by no means universally, Unitarians
in the proper sense of that word.
I have given this long quotation because it shows the
spirit which animated Channing and his friends in the dis
tressing days just preceding the pitiable schism in Congre
gationalism. And from Channing that spirit never departed,
as many weU-known utterances at successive stages of his
career abundantly prove. He was " always young for
hberty " and was acknowledged by Theodore Parker as
leader of the progressive party in Unitarianism, a fact of
which excellent people who used to caU themselves Chan
ning Unitarians seemed quite unaware, but it was only
natural that in the thick of the controversy when mean
accusations were rife and ugly epithets were flying, and
hitting, many of his followers should have failed to show their
leader's generous and progressive spirit. And it must also
be said that notwithstanding this genial and genuine irenic
temper, which alone they would have the term Liberal con
note, the members of the group did hold to opinions decidedly
different from those of their opponents, of which they were
equaUy tenacious, and from which, in general, they had no
notion of departing by way either of retreat or advance.

Il8 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
To describe these opinions and to show the historical de
velopment which did ensue within the denomination as a
whole, notwithstanding the Unitarian orthodoxy depre
cated by Channing, is our task today.
At bottom, both Liberals and Conservatives were agreed
in accepting a revelation from God to a sinning and erring
world: on the one side, this revelation was generally re
ceived without inquiry, traditionaUy and as of course, whUe
on the other it was rationally upheld by the twofold argu
ment from miracles and prophecy, the Jachin and Boaz of
the temple of revelation. Both parties, then, believed in
special revelation, divinely communicated, and both held
that this revelation was in the Bible. The Unitarians were
more ready than their opponents to acknowledge progress
in the revelation, esteeming the New Testament of higher
value than the Old and the teachings of Jesus as highest of
aU — but this difference was practicaUy observed rather
than theoreticaUy avowed. Moreover, they preferred to
speak of the Bible as the record of a revelation rather than
as the revelation itself, but this too was a distinction in
stinctively felt and practically effective of tener than formally
acknowledged. In the Christian Examiner for July, 1830,
is a flat-footed declaration of the Unitarian view:
We lay our hand strongly then upon the foundation — the Bible.
We say, There is a communication from heaven. There is light
supernaturally communicated, and attested, to those Heaven-
commissioned prophets and apostles, who, in their turn, have simply,
naturally, each after the manner of his own age, his own style, his own
peculiar habits of thought and feeling, imparted it to us. There are
truths recorded, beyond the human reach of the men who delivered
them, and they are truths dearer to us than life. Right or wrong in
our conviction, this is what we believe.
Avowing thus, like their opponents, belief in the Bible and
in revelation, the Unitarians went on to say that in order to

THE UNITARIANS 119
apprehend the revelation the Bible must be rationally inter
preted. The tendency of the other party was to teach that
the Scriptures must be literaUy beheved whether their teach
ings were rational or not, but the Unitarians were as confi
dent as the Schoolmen that Reason and Revelation speak
with one voice since God is author of both. May I digress
for a moment to say that at this point both parties were
wrong and that, as we have now come to see, the historical
principle of interpretation must be employed. The Bible
can be interpreted rationally only in case it was aU written
rationally and with a reason in the writer like that in the
interpreter, but both of these implicit assumptions are un
tenable. To assume in advance that everything in the Bible
must be rational, as we conceive the rational, leads almost
inevitably to cruel rackings of the text and to ingeniously
false exegesis. The Unitarians then were wrong in their
fundamental principle of interpretation, although granting
the common premise of revelation they were more nearly
right than their critics, not only because revelation is not
revelation untU appropriated within a context of thought,
but also because they had at least an inkling of the historical
method, for the writer just quoted referred to individual
peculiarities of style and the very form and pressure of the
age as affecting the mode in which the divine message was
imparted. That is to say, the eternal truth has to be enucle
ated from its historical form, and for this undertaking the
historical method is indispensable.
What then did the Bible rationaUy interpreted teach ?
The Unitarians differed from the Orthodox at four main
points. (1) They believed that the Scriptures teach the strict
and simple unity and not the trinity of God. That the doc
trine of the trinity was irrational, not one of them doubted,
and this, indeed, was admitted on the other side, yet with
the important difference that it was held to be beyond, not

120 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
contrary to, reason, and as part of the revelation to be ac
cepted by faith. But the Unitarians denied that it was part
of the revelation, holding that the Bible teaches consistently
throughout that God is one. It must be remembered, for
a correct understanding of this phase of the discussion, that
in New England, at that time, the doctrine of the trinity,
always swaying between tritheism and SabeUianism, had
swung pretty far over to the tritheistic side and the threeness
was made far more prominent than the oneness of God.
The Unitarian protest can be fairly judged only with refer
ence to the contemporary views against which it was directed.
In reality, the historic creeds of the Christian Church are
scrupulous to safeguard both the identity and the distinc
tions of the Godhead, so that, theoreticaUy, Trinitarians
are no less strenuous for the unity of God than Unitarians.
But, unfortunately, nobody in New England at the beginning
of the last century seems to have understood the historical
significance of the Catholic creeds, nor had the modern
philosophical interpretation of the trinity as denoting the
essential and eternal principle of diversity in unity appeared
above the horizon. At the time, trinity meant baldly three
persons in the plain, prosaic Boston sense of the term per
sons, subsisting in the one Being of a personal God similarly
understood, and to the Unitarians that seemed both irra
tional and unscriptural; hence, they supposed it necessary
to deny the trinity, in order to affirm the unity, of God.
(2) If now the strict and simple unity of God is main
tained, what about Christ ? This brings us to the second
point of difference, the nature of Christ, and here one
cannot do better than quote again from Channing's letter
to Thacher:
The word Unitarianism as denoting opposition to Trinitarianism
undoubtedly expresses the character of a considerable part of the
ministers of this town and its vicinity and the Commonwealth. But

THE UNITARIANS 121
we both of us know that their Unitarianism is of a very different kind
from that of Mr. Belsham. We agreed in our late conference, that a
majority of our brethren believe that Jesus Christ is more than man,
that he existed before the world, that he literally came from heaven
to save our race, that he sustains other offices than those of a teacher
and witness to the truth, and that he still acts for our benefit and is
our mtercessor with the Father. This we agreed to be the prevalent
sentiment of our brethren. There is another class of Liberal Chris
tians who whilst they reject the distinction of three persons in one God
are yet unable to pass a definite judgment on the various systems
which prevail as to the nature and rank of Jesus Christ. They are
met by difficulties on every side, and generally rest in the conclusion
that He whom God has appointed to be our Saviour must be precisely
adapted to His work, and that acceptable faith consists in regarding
and foUowing Him as our Lord, Teacher, and Saviour, without de
ciding on his nature or rank in the universe. There is another class
who believe the simple humanity of Jesus Christ: but these form a
smaU proportion of the great body of Unitarians in this part of our
country, and I doubt whether of these one individual can be found
who could conscientiously subscribe to Mr. Belsham's creed as given
in the Review.
With respect to the nature of Christ, then, the majority
of the Unitarians of Channing's time were probably Arians,
although there were a few Socinians among them. But aU
of them laid stress upon the humanity of Christ, which,
although the Church had labored hard to maintain it equaUy
with his divinity, had actuaUy faded into the background of
the mind of New England Protestantism, and indeed, of
Christians as a whole, if it had not actually vanished. Here
the Unitarians were rendering greater service than they real
ized, for they were recaUing to the mind of Christendom the
man Jesus, fixing attention upon his character and example,
and this, let me repeat, was a service which might have
been, and indeed has been, gratefully accepted and acknowl
edged by many who are stiU at one with the ancient creeds
in affirming both his full humanity and his full divinity.

122 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
As regards the nature of Christ, as weU as the unity of God,
there was ample room in the historic creeds of the church
for the affirmations of the Unitarians as weU as for those of
their opponents — but neither party was historical in knowl
edge, stiU less in mental temper and attitude. Nor does
either seem to have had the faintest conception of the mean
ing of Cathohc. Both equated it with Roman Cathohc,
and thought only of priests and the Pope, Guy Fawkes and
St. Bartholomew's Eve. Whether the Catholic creeds are
really credible, whether opposite statements can be brought
into inteUigible unity by mere juxtaposition and shrewd
distribution of emphasis, is quite another matter and does
not concern us here. My present point is that so far as
mere statement goes there was room in the comprehensive
creeds of the Cathohc church for the fundamental doctrines
of both sides — but neither party knew it.
(3) The third point in dispute has to do with the
nature of man. It must be remembered that one feature of
Edwards's movement was an exaggerated emphasis upon
the Augustine-Calvin doctrine of human depravity. It was
held that on account of the sin of Adam all his posterity had
come under the curse of God as sinners, deprived of the
supernatural endowments which their first ancestor had lost
by his transgression and so depraved in nature as to be
incapable, unaided by divine grace, of doing anything good
in God's sight. To this doctrine of the depravity of man the
Unitarians opposed their teaching of the native dignity of
man. Not that they held formaUy to a doctrine of Crea-
tionism as against Traducianism, teaching that human souls
come fresh and pure out of the being of God dowered with
original righteousness — they did not carry their idea so
far as that, for they were not quite so " innocent " as they
have been represented. Moreover, Edwards had shown that
Creationism could be quite compatible with the doctrine of

THE UNITARIANS 1 23
depravity. But they did believe that in man, particularly
in his reason and conscience, were divine elements unim
paired by the traditional faU of Adam, and that if by culti
vation these elements became preeminent and controUing,
as they certainly might, man would be good even in the
sight of God. There is a standing gibe that one who was born
in Boston has no need to be born again. The Unitarians
held that regeneration was not needed to implant in man
divine elements which, just because he was a man were in
him naturaUy and originally. Furthermore, they believed
that most of the evUs from which society suffered were due
to this low opinion of man, which induced those in power
to treat him as if he actuaUy were what Calvinism believed
him to be, and that with true appreciation of the inherent
and inahenable dignity and worth of man cruelty and op
pression would cease. Thus to honor man carried with it
respect for his reason and moral sense and the obhgation to
educate his inteUigence. If the Unitarians have been dis
tinguished for their interest in educational and phUanthropic
movements, it is due largely to this firmly-held conviction
as to the worth and the dignity of the individual man as
chUd of God, made in his image and retaining divine quah-
ties notwithstanding his ignorance, weakness, and sin. As
for the comphcity of the whole race in Adam's sin, that was
denied as both irrational and unscriptural.
(4) With the view as to the nature of man, goes a doctrine
concerning salvation. Of course, if man is whoUy destitute
of divine quaUties they can become his only through com
munication from God himself, and thus the doctrine of re
generation may be made to appear necessary. If, on the
other hand, the divine is already in him, even in the most
degraded and depraved, needing only to be awakened and
emancipated, then the idea of regeneration becomes super
fluous. Long before, during the century between Anne

124 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
Hutchinson and Jonathan Edwards, the doctrine of regener
ation, although stUl formaUy avowed, had fallen into
abeyance. The dread of immediate revelation by the direct
operation of the Spirit, enthusiasm as it was called, engen
dered by the Hutchinson troubles and strengthened by the
Quakers, led naturally to the neglect of the idea that the
Spirit acts directly in the work of regeneration and to empha
sis upon the means of grace. Continuing, and more definitely
avowing, this theological tendency, the Unitarians held that
God ever takes sides with the human reason and conscience,
aiding every good endeavor, guiding every upward aim, upon
whom, therefore, man may confidently rely while he strives to
walk in the way of righteousness. To apprehend adequately
the significance of this doctrine one must set it against the
dark background of the prevaihng New England dogma,
but for this we have no time today. Suffice it to say that
the whole scheme of salvation as then commonly held
appeared to them unworthy of God. They were unable to
beheve that an innocent person could justly receive punish
ment due to the real offender, or that righteousness on the
one hand, guUt on the other, could justly be transferred or
imputed. Imputed righteousness was in their eyes but a
sham and a make-believe. For the real thing they supremely
cared and they were daring enough to beheve that God did
too. Nor were they dismayed by a sense of the awful holi
ness of Him in whose sight the very heavens are unclean,
before whom human goodness can but lay its hand upon its
mouth in abject humility, for " He knoweth our frame, He
remembereth that we are dust." Let me add that this gave
rise to a comparatively new type of piety in Christianity.
Through the Middle Ages the ideal of piety could be fuUy
realized only in the separated life of the professionaUy
" religious." Luther would have no double standard, one
for the monk, another for the layman, but apphed the idea

THE UNITARIANS 1 25
of the religious life to the ways of common folk. This
developed into the type of piety characteristic of New Eng
land Unitarians. It was reverent and devout, a piety of
the understanding and the wUl far more than of the emotions,
caUing for strict and honorable fidelity in aU the relations
and to aU the obligations of hfe, but lacking in the glow and
fervor of feeling. There was about it a square-toed solidity
and integrity — sixteen ounces to a pound and one hundred
cents to a doUar, — which commands respect but fails to
kindle the imagination. This was the ideal of piety arising
naturaUy out of Unitarian thought, about which much more
might be said to advantage if time aUowed.
Around these four points, then, the controversy raged,
but the difference was deeper than these — a difference of
spirit and attitude. " These men are of another spirit than
we," said Luther of the Zwinglians, and rightly. Dr. Hedge
used to say that instead of Unitarianism the movement we
are considering should have been caUed Humanism — and
in truth it was at heart a human protest against a lop-sided
doctrine of divine sovereignty which robbed man of aU real
freedom and worth. I would emphasize this, because with
out it the subsequent course of thought cannot be rightly
understood. Man is God's chUd, made in His image and
object of His love; his reason and conscience are divine
witnesses to truth and right, and when governed by them
he walks in the ways of God, safe in his Father's love and
care. The God in whom their opponents believed — a God of
election and reprobation, capable of dooming an entire race
because its ancestors disobeyed, a God of arbitrary wiU and
discriminating grace — seemed to them simply an immoral
being and they frankly said so. But this condemnation
was in the light of reason and moral sense which to the
orthodox were but wandering fires compared with the clear
shining of revelation as they understood it.

126 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
So the lines were drawn. The Congregational order was
divided and the two parties went their respective ways.
It is for us now to foUow the course of the Unitarian
theology. Do reason and the Bible really speak with the same voice,
and U they appear to disagree which is to be foUowed ?
This was obviously a fundamental question certain to arise
as thought and time went on. Channing said: " If after
a deliberate and impartial use of our best faculties a pro
fessed revelation seems to us plainly to disagree with itself
or clash with great principles which we cannot question,
we ought not to hesitate in withholding from it our belief.
I am surer that my rational nature is from God than that
any book is." So Channing: but on the other hand Parker
reports that in the Harvard Divinity School he was taught
by Professor Henry Ware, Jr., that U there appeared to be
any contradiction between the reason of man and the letter
of the Bible, Christians must foUow the written word, for
" you can never be so certain of the correctness of what takes
place in your own mind as of what is written in the Bible."
Here, then, were the opposite tendencies within Unitarian
ism, and of the two Channing's ultimately prevaUed. Its
victory was due not to Channing's influence so much as to
the progress of knowledge in many directions. Biblical
criticism undermined the argument for revelation resting
on prophecy, and scientific study did the like, more slowly,
for the argument based on miracles. Enlarging acquaintance
with other religions made more than doubtful the supposed
uniqueness of Bible teaching and so became adverse to behef
in particular revelation. At last Theodore Parker appeared
boldly denying the final authority of the Bible and the reality
of revelation ab extra. But Parker was strong for the worth
of man, it was the spring of aU his anti-slavery activities,
and the higher the appreciation of humanity, not only as it

THE UNITARIANS 1 27
is but also as it may become, the easier to include Jesus
within its compass. Moreover, emphasis upon the character
of Jesus which was taking the place of prophecy and miracle
in support of the doctrine of revelation, together with ac
knowledgment of the divine possibilities of perfection in all
men, tended in the same direction. So, little by httle and as
the convergence of many different lines of inquiry, those
who caUed themselves Unitarians were bringing religion
within the sphere of the natural and the human. Was the
result to be deism, or natural religion, to the entire rejection
of the Supernatural ? So it appeared, and the orthodox
cried triumphantly, " We told you so! From the beginning
infidelity was latent in Unitarianism and now it has become
patent to aU men." With pathetic indignation the Uni
tarians denied that it was so, and begged that they be not
held responsible for Parker's utterances, which indeed did
not represent at aU the Unitarian orthodoxy of the time.
But if Parker's criticism was sapping the idea of revelation
and so bringing the supernatural within the domain of the
natural, a contrary tendency in him, indicated by his " in
tuitions," was leading in the opposite direction, to the in
clusion of the natural within the supernatural. And here
we meet Emerson with his teaching of the supernaturalness
of the natural. Draw if thou canst the mystic line
Severing rightly his from thine;
Which is human, which divine.
God, the one in aU, shining through aU commonplaces and
aU mysteries, enlightening man from within, propulsive
force toward aU perfection — • this was Emerson's sublime
message. If, as Emerson complained, the Unitarians of his
time had forgotten that men were poets, his song made them
mindful of their divine inheritance. With Emerson comes

128 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
the great turning point in the theological history of Uni
tarianism. Remarkably enough, his influence was immeasurably aided
by the progress of scientific research. The One in aU of which
he spoke seemed to be affirmed by the theories of conserva
tion of energy and matter, and most of aU by the doctrine
of evolution which he had poeticaUy anticipated. So the
doctrine of immanence became central in Unitarian theology
and preaching. In its light most of the old questions lost
significance or presented themselves in quite different forms.
If earher Unitarians had put the accent on Arians, the fol
lowers of Emerson threw it on the Unit. The unity of God
and of man, — with God on the one hand, with the world on
the other, — this was the fuU-throated paean of the prophets,
thinly imitated, it must be confessed, by many a twitterer
besprinkled with the spume of Transcendental speech but
unbaptized into the depths of its thinking. On the whole,
however, this was in Unitarian theology a period of thinking
in terms of the comprehensive and universal, an age of
reconcUiation which sweetly resolved all differences into
a large and amiable synthesis. Accordingly views once
vehemently opposed came to be regarded as partial glimpses
of universal truth. Theology became one with religion,
wherein aU inteUectual differences expired. " When I rest
in perfect humility, when I burn with pure love, what can
Calvin or Swedenborg say ? " Moreover, wherever Emer
son's influence extended among Unitarians, the type of
piety underwent a wondrous change — brogans were trans
formed into the winged sandals of Hermes. Only after a
generation did the problems arising out of this habit of
thought demand attention — but problems there were. For
if God be in aU, then he is in the terrible as weU as in the
lovely, in the earthquake which overthrows cities and in
the fire which consumes man's most treasured possessions,

THE UNITARIANS 1 29
no less than in the stiU smaU voice in the human soul. If
God is in aU, can he be a moral God ? Furthermore, if man
is thus incorporated in nature, does it not foUow that he,
hke nature, is under the reign of law, and what then becomes
of his freedom ? Thus it becomes evident that the course
of Unitarian thought presents one of the most remarkable
curves in aU theological history. It began as a human
protest against Calvinism with its immoral God and its
denial of human worth and freedom, only to swing round
into a Calvinism of immanence where the goodness of God
and the freedom of man must again be doubted U not
denied. From Edwards to Emerson, from the Calvinism
of transcendence to the Calvinism of immanence — that
was the spiral curve of progress, and today the Unitarians
have been brought by the course of their own thinking to
the same problems which their fathers faced in different
form, only now they are problems arising out of their own
thoughts and not from those of their opponents. The spiral
is complete and a new period in Unitarian theology must
now begin.
To the same point have many of their former adversaries
been brought, although by somewhat different paths. They
too were students of the Bible and accepted the results of
criticism, they too followed the investigations of science,
they too learned to know other rehgions, they too learned
of Emerson and Emerson's teachers. It is not for us here
to trace the course of orthodox thinking but a few sug
gestions may be in order.
The crux of Calvinism had always been how God could
be just and stiU punish men who had no freedom and hence
could have no responsibUity. To remove this difficulty
Edwards introduced into New England thinking a distinc
tion which he deemed aU important between natural and
moral abUity. The distinction has become so nearly obso-

130 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
lete now that when a few years ago in the course of a lecture
before the Harvard Summer School of Theology I ventured
to expound it, a veteran Congregational minister came to
me afterwards and with tremulous voice remarked that it
had carried him back to the days of his youth and almost
made him feel young again. Memory of the incident em
boldens me to repeat the explanation here. Suppose I
should be asked to do an errand on Washington Street
immediately after the close of this lecture, and on leaving
the church should be so unfortunate as to break my leg —
in that case I could fairly plead a natural inability to do
what was asked of me. But U I were lazy or churlish and
therefore refused, my inability would be moral and not
natural. Now, according to Edwards, man has natural
abUity to do the wiU of God, aU the machinery for execut
ing this will is at his command as truly as it is at that of
a regenerate man, but it is man's wUl that is at fault —
hence man has perfect natural abUity to perform aU the
commandments of God, and having natural ability he
may justly be punished notwithstanding his total moral in
ability. It was a nice distinction, looking, U one may say
so with aU deference, like an attempt to worry out barely
enough freedom for a man to be decently damned on, but
it was used to exceUent purpose and had unanticipated
consequences. Preachers, especiaUy those of the revival
sort among the Hopkinsians, dwelt upon natural abUity
with ever increasing emphasis, which however rested,
as time went on, more upon the noun than the adjective.
They whispered natural and shouted ability. Meanwhile
the doctrine of moral inabUity sUpped imperceptibly away,
untU, almost before it was realized what was happening,
the distinction was out of mind, fuU abUity was getting
itseU preached, and the preachers were trying to persuade
themselves and others that nothing else had ever been

THE UNITARIANS 131
meant. So to aU intents and purposes the anti-Unitarian
ministers had dropped the doctrine of divine sovereignty
and were affirming human abUity and freedom as stoutly
as their old-time opponents. Indeed, it is probable that
there are very few Trinitarian churches in New England,
even in the remote back country, where the old doctrine of
man would be any more acceptable today than it would in
the Unitarian church across the village green.
At other points also there has been change. In Emerson's
Journal for 1842, is this significant entry: " Edward Wash
burn told me that at Andover they seU shelvesfull of Cole
ridge's Aids to Reflection in a year." Coleridge stood for the
same cast of thought as Emerson and Robertson and Maurice,
and in particular, BushneU was strongly influenced by him
and in his turn deeply influenced PhiUips Brooks. Unitarians
often flatter themselves that they have produced the change
which has come over New England orthodoxy and doubtless
they deserve some of the credit, or blame, but their direct
influence seems to me slight compared with the general
influences to which both they and their neighbors have ahke
been exposed. May I very briefly specUy two or three of
the changes.
The doctrine of the Trinity is interpreted to mean the
doctrine of a differentiated unity. If this is what it means
I suppose it would be unobjectionable to most Unitarians,
although they would wonder a little why the differentiation
should be merely threefold and not coextensive with the
race and indeed with the whole world, where individual
distinctions are supposed to be protected from swamping
by this doctrine taken phUosophically. There is also a
joyous recognition of the humanity of Christ, and the doc
trine of the two-fold nature is sometimes held to mean that
in him as in us aU there was both a conscious and a subcon
scious being, or in more scientific terms a nature inherited

132 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
from the past and a nature prophetic of the future, an animal
inheritance and a forward-driving spirit. That is not at all
what the doctrine originaUy meant; but if that is what it
means now, I fancy there would be little Unitarian objection
to the idea, which instead of separating Christ from human
ity now integrates him with the race by the implication —
in him as in us all. The dogma of human depravity has
suffered an amazing transformation either into a doctrine
of heredity, reaching back not to Adam but to animals, or
into an affirmation of the social nature of man and the influ
ence upon him of his environment. Satisfaction and moral
government theories of the atonement have largely given
place to one or another form of the moral influence theory,
which is not in the least offensive to Unitarians. So the two
bodies have arrived each in its own way at substantiaUy
simUar theological conclusions on the points once at issue.
Furthermore, the social spirit has seized upon both alike.
Solidarity not individuality is the master word on both
sides. Individual sin is preached less pungently than of old
but both sides vie with each other in the trenchancy of their
condemnation of social sin. What must I do to be saved ?
is now a social cry, and I fancy both parties are in reasonable
accord in holding that the way of salvation is the way of
hfe that was in Christ Jesus. The same problems are before
both. In the course of events both have been led to about
the same position and are facing the same theological and
social problems with virtuaUy identical mental habits and
equipment, and in the same spirit.
At the beginning of the last century, Andover Theological
Seminary and the Harvard Divinity School symbolized the
divided feUowship. Each went its own way for a century,
but exactly one hundred years after its establishment
Andover removed to Cambridge and now both schools are
working together and their students mingle indiscriminately

THE UNITARIANS 133
in class-rooms and in friendly fellowship. Neither school
has sacrificed one iota of its independence, each is as autono
mous as it ever was, but they work together in happy good
feUowship. May we not hope that this will prove an effec
tive symbol of a reconcUiation yet to come between the two
parts of the ancient Congregational order, in which each shaU
maintain its own integrity and both shaU labor together at
the social and theological problems which lie before them
both! Should this indeed come to pass, the words used at
the Commencement of 1909 by President LoweU in confer
ring an honorary degree upon one of the Andover Trustees
who had labored zealously and successfuUy for the affiliation
would take on prophetic meaning, — " Charles Lothrop
Noyes — pastor and preacher — who in these latter days
has helped to bring nearer together those whom the blindness
of man had put asunder."

Ill
THE BAPTISTS
GEORGE E. HORR

THE BAPTISTS

THE Reformation in England developed three distinct
stages and the present situation of English-speaking
Protestantism represents survivals of each of them. The
Estabhshed Church of England represents the first stage.
It is characterized by two features — the repudiation of the
papal supremacy and a reformation in doctrine. The second
stage is represented by historic Puritanism, which, in addition
to the repudiation of the papal supremacy and a reformation
in doctrine, sought to reform ritual. This movement, be
ginning in the vestment controversy, came to stand for a
simpler form of worship, and a more democratical polity.
The third stage is represented by Separatism, or Independ
ency, and adds to repudiation of papal supremacy and a
reformation of doctrine and of ritual and polity, a fresh
criticism and analysis of the Church itself.
The early English Separatists were confronted by a con
ception of the Church which regarded it as a great corpora
tion, practicaUy coextensive with the nation. Archbishop
Whitgift spoke for Elizabeth when he said that the English
commonwealth was the English church. That is the theory
that Hooker elaborated twenty years later in his Ecclesiastical
Polity. The early English Independents, foUowing Robert
Browne, said that a man is not necessarUy a Christian be
cause he is an Englishman, and one who is not a Christian
has no title to membership in a Christian church. The
Independent or Separatist movement, which gave birth to
the English Congregational and Baptist denominations, was

138 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
based on a conviction that a church should be composed only
of those who are Christians, that is, of those who have per-
sonaUy exercised faith in Christ.
In the eyes of the Independents a church is not a corpora
tion composed of persons who are held together by some tie
of locality, birth, or principle of succession. It is a body
of professed behevers in Christ. The tie that holds them
together is that of a common spiritual experience. The
continuity and vitality of the organization reside in the
possession of the spirit of Christ. Men are not born into the
feUowship of the Church. They enter it as their own
voluntary act by divine grace.
A shipwrecked company cast on a desert island, rescuing
a New Testament from the waves, may have their hearts so
touched by the Gospel and so respond to Christ that they
may constitute as valid a church as was ever founded. They
may have the essential notes of a true church, — faith in
Christ, confession of Him, association for worship, work, and
discipline. The Baptist group among the Independents applied this
central principle in a more thoroughgoing manner than their
Congregational brethren. Probably at first only a few real
ized the implication of the simple statement that what gives
one a title to membership in a Christian church is that
inward response of the soul to Christ that constitutes
Christian faith.
This emphasis upon spiritual experience led a few far-
visioned men to see that it logicaUy involved the principle of
rehgious hberty and the separation of church and state. If
this personal response of the soul to Christ is so precious that
it is the heart of rehgion, then it must be voluntary, abso
lutely without restraint. It is a grievous wrong to any soul
to coerce its hfe toward God. As a matter of fact, it cannot
be done, and the attempt to do it by the power of the State

THE BAPTISTS 1 39
results in innumerable hypocrisies. This is not to say that
there are not many sincere believers when the power of the
State is used to maintain and propagate religion; it is to
say that these behevers are not and cannot be produced by
the State.
Professor Platner has caUed your attention to the Gains-
borough-Scrooby church of Independents. From the
Scrooby branch came the church at Leyden and Plymouth,
Massachusetts. From the Gainsborough branch, after a
migration to Amsterdam and a return to England, came the
first Arminian Baptist Church in London, which in 1611
issued a Confession in which occurs this declaration:
The magistrate, by virtue of his office, is not to intermeddle with
rehgion, or matters of conscience, nor to compel men to this or that
form of religion or doctrine, but to leave the Christian religion to the
free conscience of everyone and to meddle only with political matters.
Christ alone is the King and Lawgiver of the Church and Conscience.
Robert Browne twenty years before had approached this
position, but recent discoveries of his lost writings make it
clear that he was very far from rising to this height. And
Professor Masson in his Life of Milton, quoting these clauses
in the Confession of 16 11, says that this
is the first expression of the absolute principle of liberty of Conscience
in the public articles of any body of Christians. Thus from a dingy
meetinghouse somewhere in Old London there flashed out first in
England the absolute doctrine of liberty of conscience. . . . Not to
the Church of England, however, nor to Scottish Presbyterianism,
nor to English Puritanism at large, does the honor of the perception
of the full principle of liberty of conscience and its first assertion in
EngUsh speech, belong. That honor has to be assigned, I beheve, to
the Independents generaUy, and to the Baptists in particular.
It should be noticed that this doctrine of rehgious liberty
is to be sharply distinguished from the doctrine of Toleration
with which it has often been confused. Toleration is for you

I40 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
to say to me, I wUl permit you to exercise such practices in
religion. Liberty is for you to say to me, I do these things
not because you allow me, but because I have a right to
foUow my conscience independently of your permission.
Toleration involves a permission that might rightfully be
withheld. Liberty involves a right not dependent upon
another's allowance.
Your attention has already been caUed to the fact that
among the Separatist movements was the so-caUed London-
Amsterdam Church led by Greenwood and Francis and
George Johnson. The so-caUed Jacob-Lathrop-Jessey Church
in London was one of the heirs of this organization, and it
was in this church that there arose the discussion about
baptism which fixed the lines of division on this matter
between the Baptists and the Congregationahsts. Just as
there emerged in the Gainsborough-Scrooby Church a party
which saw clearly and strongly emphasized the principle
of religious liberty, so in the Jacob-Lathrop Church there
emerged a party which came to hold the views of the modern
Baptists as to the subjects of baptism and as to the form of
the ordinance.
Three matters were under discussion in this church which
should be sharply distinguished: — First, successional bap
tism; in other words, was there an unbroken line of baptized
persons from the days of the Apostles through whom what
was caUed ' ' valid ' ' baptism had been transmitted ? Secondly,
behevers' baptism; in other words, could the ordinance be
rightfully administered to anyone except after his confession
of personal faith in Christ ? This question of course was
answered in a way that involved the most sweeping denial of
the scripturalism of infant baptism. Thirdly, what was the
mode of baptism enjoined in the New Testament ? This
question was answered by the Baptist party to the effect
that clearly immersion was the only Scriptural mode.

THE BAPTISTS 141
In this discussion in the London church everything for a
time was inchoate and unsettled. Some held to successional
and believers' baptism and scrupled at immersion; others
to behevers' baptism; others to infant baptism and immer
sion, which was the position of the rubrics of the Established
Church. But there emerges from this discussion the Con
fession of 1644, representing eight churches, which declared
that religious liberty is the right of every Christian man, that
baptism should be administered to believers only and that
the only mode is immersion.
It is not clear just what mode of baptism the General
Baptists who put forth the Confession of 16 11 practiced.
Probably it was immersion, but by 1633 it is clear that both
the General or Arminian Baptists and the Particular or
Calvinistic Baptists were moving strongly to the positions
taken in the Confession of 1644, — Rehgious Liberty, Be
lievers' Baptism, and Immersion.
Behind aU this movement in England was the influence of
the Anabaptism of the Continent dating a fuU century
earlier. It had two forms, the German and the Swiss. The
German was more socialistic than the Swiss and the ex
tremists of the party had brought a reproach upon the whole
movement from the outrages and immoralities of Minister.
This stigma stiU abides in Germany and even Ranke identi
fies the religious hfe of Providence, Rhode Island, with that
of Minister. This identification was one reason for the bad
odor in which the Baptists, or Anabaptists as they are caUed
in the old documents of New England, were held. Anabap
tism connoted much the same notions as Anarchism does to
the modern mind.
The genius who rallied the scattered fragments of Ana-
baptism after the disgrace of Minister was Menno Simons,
whose name and influence are perpetuated in the Mennonite
churches of Holland and of this country. But long before

142 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
the English movement that I have attempted to describe
crystallized in the Enghsh Confessions of 1611 and 1644,
the Anabaptists of the Continent were maintaining the doc
trine of religious liberty, of believers' baptism, and inclining
toward the practice of immersion. And while it is difficult
to trace organized churches of refugee continental Baptists
in England, it is clear that the influence of smaU groups was
strong upon the rising tide of Baptist sentiment in the ranks
of the Separatists.
In view of these circumstances it is not strange that there
should have been an infiltration of Baptist ideas into the
earliest settlements of New England.
The outstanding iUustration of this, of course, is the career
of Roger Williams. John Fiske has admirably characterized
the character of Williams, and his great contribution to re
ligious and pohtical thought which caused Bancroft to class
him with Newton and Kepler as a benefactor of mankind.
I quote his comprehensive and judicial paragraph:
Among all the Puritans who came to New England there is no more
interesting figure than the learned, quick-witted, pugnacious Welsh
man, Roger Williams. He was over fond of logical subtleties and de
lighted in controversy. There was scarcely any subject about which
he did not wrangle, from the sinfulness of persecution to the propriety
of women wearing veUs in churches. Yet with aU this love of contro
versy there never lived a more gentle and kindly soul. Within five
years from the settlement of Massachusetts this young preacher had
announced the true principles of religious liberty with a clearness of
insight quite remarkable in that age. . . . The views of WUliams, if
logicaUy carried out involved the entire separation of church from
State, the equal protection of all forms of religious faith, the repeal
of aU laws compeUing attendance on public worship, the abolition of
tithes and of aU forced contributions to the support of religion. Such
views are today quite generaUy adopted by the more civilized portions
of the Protestant world, but it is needless to say that they were not
the views of the seventeenth century in Massachusetts or elsewhere
(The Beginnings of New England, pp. 114-115).

THE BAPTISTS 143
Many attempts have been made to remove from the
authorities of Massachusetts Bay the reproach of having
banished Williams under cruel conditions. Dr. Henry M.
Dexter is probably correct in his contention that the Massa
chusetts Bay Company " was simply a private corporation
chartered by the Government for the purposes of fishing,
real estate improvement, and general commerce." Un
doubtedly, the Company was within its strictly legal rights
in banishing WUliams or anyone else to whbm it took a
dishke. But this is not the defence of the banishment put
forth by contemporaries. They knew weU that the Massa
chusetts Bay Company was far more than a trading corpora
tion. The promotion of a profitable stock company was not
at aU the aspect of the enterprise that made an appeal to
twenty thousand Enghsh Puritans. The impulse that led
to this great movement and continued throughout it was
weU expressed by the Rev. Francis Higginson when he said:
" We go to practice the positive part of church reformation;
and propagate the Gospel in America " (Magnolia, 1629,
III, sec. 1, p. 12).1 Bitterly as the Baptists suffered from
the Massachusetts Bay theocracy, they do it the credit of
not attributing to it narrow secular motives. John Cotton
and John Winthrop were conscientious men. They did not
apprehend the principle of religious liberty. They only
thought, like Saul the persecutor, that they were doing God
service. In his speech on the dissolution of Parhament in 1655,
CromweU described the fault of both Presbyterians and Inde
pendents when he said:
Is it ingenuous to ask hberty and not give it ? What greater hypoc
risy for those who were oppressed by the bishop to become the greatest
oppressors themselves so soon as their yoke was removed ?
1 Cf. John White in Planters Plea.

144 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
There is some reason for doubting whether or not WUliams
at the time of his conflict with the Massachusetts Bay Colony
apprehended the principle of religious liberty as clearly as
did the London Baptists of 1611. Certainly at that time he
made no statement of it that matches the admirable clearness
and precision of the paragraph relating to this matter in the
creed of the Smyth-Helwys Church. The strong probabUity
is that though one of the grounds of his offence and a princi
pal accusation brought against him was his doctrine that
magistrates might not punish breaches of the first table (and
it can be shown that each of the points of conflict with the
Massachusetts authorities, — such as the necessity of com
plete separation of the colony from the Enghsh Church, the
UlegaUty of the patent, the impropriety of using the cross
on the military colors, the wrongfulness of compeUing attend
ance at public worship, and the sacrUege of requiring an
unregenerate person to take the oath, — are more or less
closely connected in logic with his central principle of re
ligious liberty), yet the clear and masterly apprehension of
that principle which we see in The Bloudy Tenent of Persecu
tion for Cause of Conscience was the product of the growth
of his ideas, and their clarification by experience and reflec
tion. History is rendering a tardy justice to the memory of
WUliams. The circumstance that the leaders of the Bay
Colony were almost without exception university men,
skilled in letters, gave them a marked advantage in impress
ing their views upon posterity. The defenders of WiUiams
have not always been a match for their opponents, but
WiUiams is his own best defender. A man who could win
and hold the friendship of Sir Edmund Coke, John Winthrop,
Sir Harry Vane, and John MUton, and enjoyed " close dis
course" with Oliver CromweU, is his own best champion,
and the new appreciation of WiUiams's personaUty and of

THE BAPTISTS 145
his contribution to the cause of human liberty has come from
the more careful study of his own works.
The literary style of Roger WiUiams, like that of John
Cotton, is somewhat crabbed and involved. They wrote
with haste, and poured forth their ideas upon paper without
much care as to their order or best expression. But occasion-
aUy WiUiams, in writing on religious hberty, is conscious of
wings and takes an almost lyrical flight. For example, in
speaking of the armies of truth he frames a sentence that is
worthy of MUton or of Jeremy Taylor. " The armies of
Truth," he says, " like the armies of the Apocalypse, must
have no sword, helmet, breastplate, shield, or horse, but
what is spiritual and of a heavenly nature."
The church which WiUiams gathered in Providence has
generaUy been regarded as the first Baptist Church organ
ized in America, March 16, 1639, though this is contested by
those who hold that the church organized by John Clarke
at Newport antedates this. It is certain that those who had
been Baptists in England found, on emigrating to Massachu
setts Bay, that hving was more comfortable in Rhode Island.
We should not omit to notice that Roger WiUiams's con
nection with the Providence church was short. He parted
with the company he had gathered because of his doubts
about the validity of his own baptism. The apostolic suc
cession had been interrupted and apostolic authority had
ceased. In this curious contention, carrying over the ideal
of apostolic succession to baptism, as the Established
Church in England had apphed it to the ministry, we have
the echoes in America of the discussion which at that very
time was agitating the Jacob Church in London.
It is of interest to note that Henry Jacob subsequently
emigrated to Virginia; and John Lathrop in 1634, accom
panied by about thirty members, emigrated to New England,
settling in Scituate and subsequently in Barnstable. This

146 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
leaven of Anabaptism frequently reappears in the ecclesias
tical history of New England.
The bitter animosity of the Massachusetts Bay theocracy
to the Baptists is shown by the following statute of the
General Court, November 23, 1644:
For as much as experience hath plentifuUy and often proved that,
since the first rising of the Anabaptists, about one hundred years since,
they have been the incendiaries of commonwealths and the infectors
of persons in main matter of religion, and the troublers of churches in
aU places where they have been: — and that they who have held the
baptizing of mfants unlawful have usuaUy held other errors or heresies
together therewith, though they have (as other heretics use to do)
concealed the same, tiU they spied out a fit advantage and opportunity
to vent them by way of question of scruple: — and whereas divers of
this kind have, since our coming into New England, appeared among
ourselves, some whereof have (as others before you) denied the ordi
nance of magistracy, and the lawfulness of making war, and others
the lawfulness of magistrates, and their inspection into any breach
of the first table: — which opinions if they should be connived at by
us, are like to be increased among us, and so must necessarUy bring
guUt upon us, infection and trouble to the churches, and hazard to
the whole commonwealth,
It is ordered and agreed that if any person or persons within this
jurisdiction either openly condemn or oppose the baptizing of mfants,
or go about secretly to seduce others from the approbation or use
thereof, or shaU purposely depart the congregation at the adminis
tration of the ordinance, or shall deny the ordinance of magistracy or
their lawful right or authority to make war, or to punish the outward
breaches of the first table, and shall appear to the Court wilfully and
obstinately to continue therein after due time and means of conviction,
every such person or persons shall be banished from the colony.
The reasons for this extreme hostUity of the Bay Colony
leaders to the Baptists are probably threefold.
In the first place, as I have already suggested, the Baptists
were identified in the public thought with the Minister
fanatics. The term Anabaptist came to have much the same
connotation we now attach to the label Anarchist. It was

THE BAPTISTS 1 47
a general term of opprobrium. It is now clearly established
that some at least of the Miinster party, so far from being
in any true sense Baptists, came to practice infant baptism.
But the German and Swiss reformers took little pains to
examine or treat fairly the men who carried their own prin
ciples further than they desired.
In the second place, the denial of infant baptism undoubt
edly involved a most insidious and effective attack upon the
Massachusetts theocracy. Rev. Thomas Cobbet, minister
in Lynn and afterward in Ipswich, in a letter to Increase
Mather, states this clearly. He says:
And I add theyr very principle of makeing infant Baptisms a nullity,
it doth make at once all our churches, & our religious CivUl state and
polity, and aU the officers & members thereof to be unbaptized & to
bee no Christians & so our churches to bee no churches; & so we have
no regular power to choose Deputies for any General Court, nor to
choose any Magistrates (Mass. Hist. Coll., Vol. XXXVIII, p. 291).
A third reason for this hostility to the Baptists was that
the idea that a sound body pohtic could possibly be built on
the principle of religious hberty was totaUy inconceivable
to the Bay Colony people. The HaU-Way Covenant was
the utmost concession that could be made, and that almost
rent apart the theocracy. Furthermore, some of the earlier
experiences of the Providence Plantations with fanatics and
disturbers were not such as to commend the doctrine of
religious liberty for which the Baptists stood.
The Newport church appears to have been more zealous
and to have been led by abler men than the Providence
church. John Clarke, the pastor, was an educated man and
had some property, Mark Lucar, a leading member, had
been prominent in the Jacob-Lathrop church in London and
Obadiah Holmes appears to have been educated at Oxford.
In 1649 an attempt was made by these men to organize
a church at Seekonk, now Rehoboth. Roger WiUiams in a

148 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
letter to Governor Winthrop refers to this movement in
these words:
At Seekonk a great many have lately concurred with Mr. John
Clarke, and our Providence men, about the point of a new baptism
and the manner by dipping; and Mr. John Clarke hath been there
lately and hath dipped them. I believe their practice comes nearer
to the first practice of our great Founder, Christ Jesus, than other
practices of rehgion do (Narrag. Club, Vol. VI, p. 188).
Seekonk was within the territory of the Plymouth Colony,
but the Massachusetts Bay people, although they could not
deal with the matter directly, sent a note to Plymouth
(October, 1649) m which they said:
Particularly we understand that within this few weeks there have
been at Seakunke thirteen or fourteen persons rebaptized (a swift
progress in one town), yet we hear not if any effectual restriction is
entended thereabouts. Let it not, we pray you, seem presumption
in us to mind you hereof, nor that we earnestly intreate you to take
care as well of the suppressing of errors as of the maintenance of truth
(Mass. Col. Records, Vol. Ill, p. 74).
But the heresy could not be kept out of the Bay Colony
any more than out of Plymouth. Referring to the Ana
baptists in the Colony in 1646, Gov. Winslow said, " We
have some hving among us; nay some in our churches of
that judgment " (Magnolia, II, p. 459).
The hostihty to the Baptists soon had three concrete
manUestations in the Bay Colony. The first was the whip
ping of Obadiah Holmes.
In July, 1651, the Massachusetts authorities learned that
Clarke and Holmes and Crandall from Newport were on a
visit to a fellow Baptist in Lynn, WUUam Witter. It ap
pears that whUe the visitors were holding a service in Wit-
ter's house they were arrested and subsequently removed
to Boston. Clarke and CrandaU escaped with heavy fines,

THE BAPTISTS 149
but Holmes was imprisoned untU September, when he was
publicly flogged on his bare back. " It was grievous, as
the spectators said, the man striking with all his strength
with a three-corded whip, yea spitting on his hands three
times." A second specific act of hostUity was the deposition of the
first President of Harvard College, Henry Dunster, because
he had espoused Baptist views.
Henry Dunster was matriculated at Magdalene CoUege,
Cambridge. It is worthy of note that John Harvard at
Emmanuel CoUege was for two years a fellow student at
Cambridge with Dunster. Cotton Mather speaks of Dun
ster as having exercised his ministry in England. Dunster
arrived in Boston toward the latter end of the summer of
1640, at the age of twenty or twenty-one. Soon after his
arrival he purchased a property in Boston at the northeast
corner of Court Street and Washington Street — where the
Ames BuUding now stands — but he had scarcely settled in
his new home before he was caUed to the presidency of the
college at Cambridge (August, 1640). " Mr. Henry Dunster
is now President of this college," wrote Captain Johnson in
his W onder-W orking Providence, " fitted from the Lord for
the work, and by those who have skUl that way, reported
to be an able Proficient in both Hebrew, Greek, and
Latin languages, an Orthodox Preacher of the truths of
Christ, very powerful through his blessing to move the
affections." Harvard was only a school when Dunster took charge.
He is usuaUy reckoned as its first president, since the man
who had had charge for two years was dismissed for un
worthy conduct. Dunster served as President for fourteen
years, and Quincy says of him: " He united in himself the
character of both patron and President, for poor as he was,
he contributed at a time of its utmost need one hundred

150 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
acres of land towards its support; besides rendering to it,
for a succession of years, a series of official services, weU-
directed, unwearied and altogether inestimable."
President Dunster was apparently led by the treatment
accorded Clarke and Crandall and Holmes to examine the
matter of baptism for himseU. He found, as he says, that
" AU instituted Gospel worship hath some express word of
Scripture but Paedo-baptism hath none." In October, 1654,
Dunster was compeUed to resign the presidency, after having
been indicted by the Grand Jury for " disturbing the ordi
nance of infant baptism in the Cambridge Church." Cotton
Mather says: — " His unhappy entanglement in the snares
of Anabaptism filled the overseers with uneasy fears, lest
the students by his means should come to be ensnared."
Quincy, in his History of Harvard College, says of Dunster:
" No man ever questioned his talents, learning, exemplary
fidelity, and usefulness." Dunster removed to Scituate in
the Plymouth Colony, where he became the successor of
Chauncy, and Chauncy became his successor at Harvard.
He died February 27, 1659.
From one point of view the Harvard Overseers were hardly
more fortunate in the successor of Dunster. They elected
Rev. Charles Chauncy, the pastor at Scituate, fellow of
Trinity CoUege, Cambridge, England. He had come to Ply
mouth from England in 1638. It was known that he held
to baptism by immersion only. Some of the Plymouth people
worked to secure Mr. Chauncy as assistant pastor, and gave
him the liberty of baptizing " as he was persuaded," provided
that those who desired " to be otherwise baptized" by another
minister should have this privUege. Mr. Chauncy would not
agree to this plan, and removed to Scituate. The Scituate
church appears to have sheltered aU parties. Some held to
immersion only, some to adult immersion only, and some to
immersion of infants as weU as adults.

THE BAPTISTS 151
A third illustration of intolerance was the attitude of the
theocracy toward the organization of a Baptist church in
Boston. The movement began in Charlestown and appears
to have had the sympathy of President Dunster. The story
of the fines and imprisonments decreed upon this faithful
group has often been told. For a time the little band had
its home in Thomas Gould's house on Noddle's Island in
the harbor, now East Boston, but in 1669, some of the mem
bers acquired a smaU house, then building, on Salem Street,
Boston, probably with a view of having it transferred to
the church. The church bought the house and the land on
which it stood February 9, 1670, but the stir which this
action aroused led the General Court to enact a law the fol
lowing May, prohibiting the erection and use of a house of
public worship without the consent of the freemen of the
town and license of the County Court, or special order of
the General Court, on penalty of forfeiture of house and
land to the county.
The Baptists appear not to have attempted to occupy this
house before February, 1680. It seemed to them that they
had a perfect right to do so, notwithstanding the colonial
law, for Charles II, in the interests of Episcopacy, had
directed the colonial authorities to aUow aU Protestants
hberty of conscience. The Court, however, acting upon the
colonial law, ordered the marshal to naU up the doors of the
Baptist meeting-house. The original order is preserved in
the First Baptist Church of Boston. The royal decree,
however, proved stronger than the colonial law, and after
suffering some further annoyance the little band was per
mitted to use its property.
John RusseU, who became the second pastor of the church
in July, 1679, foUowing Thomas Gould who died October,
1675, wrote an account of the sufferings of the Boston Baptist
Church which was printed in England, with a preface signed

152 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
by the leading pastors of the Enghsh Calvinistic Baptists.
But during the forty years that had elapsed since the banish
ment of Roger WiUiams from Massachusetts Bay in October,
1635, great things had happened in England. The Long
Parliament, the CivU War, the Commonwealth, the execu
tion of Charles I, the Protectorate of CromweU, and the
restoration of the Stuarts, had followed in rapid succession.
England had been successively High Church Episcopalian
under Laud, Presbyterian under the Long Parliament and
the Solemn League, Independent and Baptist under Crom
weU, and EpiscopaUan again under Charles II. The Pres
byterians and Independents and Baptists had undergone
the suffering and humUiation of St. Bartholomew's Day,
1662, when two thousand of the ablest and most saintly of
the English pastors had been deprived at a stroke of their
pulpits. Whatever the English Independents of 1635 might
have been in regard to toleration, in 1680 they were broad-
minded and charitable. The English Independents had
moved on to a full appreciation and acceptance of Roger
WiUiams's great doctrine; the New England Independents
" stuck," to use John Robinson's phrase, where their fathers
had left them. These London ministers show in this preface
to RusseU's tract their amazement that those who had
come to the New World to escape persecution should
persecute their brethren. " For one Protestant Congre
gation," they say, " to persecute another, where is no
pretence to infaUibility in the decision of aU contro
versies, seems much more unreasonable than the cruelties
of the Church of Rome towards them that depart from
their superstitions."
The Enghsh Independents had advanced much further
toward the recognition of the rights of conscience than their
Massachusetts brethren. The Bay Colony represented a
type of thought that prevaUed in England two generations

THE BAPTISTS 153
before, and that type had been perpetuated in New Eng
land, whUe the Independents of Old England had advanced
toward modern ideas.
There were at least two incidents that contributed toward
a different attitude of the standing order as to the Baptists
at the close of the seventeenth century. WUliam Turner,
who was one of the group of Charlestown Baptists that or
ganized the church on Noddle's Island, greatly distinguished
himseU in defence of the Colony. In 1670 Turner was in
prison, though AUen and Oxenbridge of the First Church
and aU the deputies in the Legislature voted for his release,
but the magistrates in the Governor's Council were set
against it. " Above thirty weeks," he says, " I have been
lying in prison, to the possible ruin of my headless family.
I am ready to serve this country to the utmost of my abUity,
in aU civil things. In faith and order God alone can satisfy
a poor soul."
In the year 1675, when King Philip launched his con
spiracy against the Enghsh settlers, Turner, mindful of the
promise he had made in prison five years before to serve the
country, offered to the magistrates to raise a company among
his friends and acquaintances to fight the Indians. At first
Turner's offer was refused, but the next year when the for
tunes of the war were turning against the settlers, and the
flames of burning buUdings filled the sky from Casco Bay
to Stonington, the magistrates came to Turner, begged him
to renew his offer and raise his company. Turner recruited
his company mainly from the members and adherents of the
First Baptist Church. The officers were members of the
church. Elder Drinker was heutenant, Philip Squire ser
geant, and Thomas Skinner clerk. There are thirteen names
in the hst of the Company he sent to Boston which corre
spond with the names of the members of the First Baptist
Church, and there are twice as many more in this hst of men

154 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
whose mothers, wives, or sisters belonged to the Baptist
Church. On February 21, 1676, Captain Turner began his march to
Northampton. King PhUip's headquarters were at North-
field, and he had another camp at the FaUs of the Connecti
cut, which bear today the name of the doughty Baptist
captain, Turner's FaUs. The surprise that Captain Turner
sprang at this point is a notable episode in New England
history and even Increase Mather was enthusiastic in his
recognition of the brave exploit.
A second incident that contributed to the good feeling
between the Boston Baptists and their Congregational
brethren was the attitude of the Mathers toward the Bap
tists at the ordination of the Rev. Ehsha CaUender as pastor
of the Baptist Church. At this service the right hand of
feUowship was given by the aged Increase Mather, and his
son Cotton Mather preached the ordination sermon. The
appreciation of this courtesy of the Mathers on the part of
Thomas HoUis, a wealthy London Baptist, led him to direct
his benevolence to Harvard CoUege. The Holhs famUy
contributed the largest amount to the funds of Harvard
CoUege — about six thousand pounds — that it received
from any one famUy untU weU along in the nineteenth
century. We must remember that money was then worth
about five times its value today. II
Possibly the HaU-way Covenant has sometimes been over
emphasized as a principal cause of the Unitarian separation.
The First Church of Boston, which strenuously opposed the
covenant and caUed John Davenport from New Haven to
become its pastor in order that that valiant defender of
orthodoxy might lead in Boston against the weaker brethren,

THE BAPTISTS 155
ultimately became Unitarian, while the Third Church, the
Old South, which was organized in support of the HaU-way
Covenant, was the only one of the Boston Congregational
churches that did not become Unitarian.
The discussions, however, that centred about the Cove
nant inevitably had one effect. They caUed fresh attention
to the reasonableness and scripturalness of the Baptist po
sition, that if baptism had any such close relation to church
membership as aU parties believed it had, only those who
gave some evidence of possessing the Christian character
should be baptized. The circumstance, however, that the
position of the conservatives endorsed the essential correct
ness of the Baptists, did not make the Baptists any more
tolerable to some of the standing order. StUl, in almost
every community there were some who, however much they
might dislike the Baptists, were broad-minded and fair-
minded enough to see that the acknowledged evUs of the
HaU-way Covenant were a lurid commentary on the perU
of departing from the principle that the true basis of church
membership must be found in personal Christian experience.
The most important single factor in promoting the growth
of the denomination was the Great Awakening itseU. In
1740, the third generation of the settlement of New England,
the religious impulse that a century before had created the
theocracy of the Massachusetts Bay Colony had nearly died
out. The causes of this declension have been sufficiently
indicated. The second Baptist Church in Boston, now the
Warren Avenue Church, was not formed until 1743, as a
result of the opposition of the Rev. Jeremy Condy, pastor of
the First Church, to the Great Awakening, as the Edwards-
Whitefield Revival came to be known. The Baptist Church
at Kittery, Maine, organized in 1682, was broken up by
fines and imprisonment, and some of its prominent members,
emigrating to South Carolina, gathered in what is now the

156 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
First Church of Charleston, the only Baptist church founded
in the Southern colonies in the seventeenth century. In 1 765,
the Rev. Hezekiah Smith, a graduate of Princeton, founded
the First Church, HaverhiU, the oldest Baptist church north
of Boston.
The immediate result of the Great Awakening was to run
a Une of division through New England Congregationalists,
separating the formal adherents of the churches from those
in whose hves religion was a vital experience. The majority
of the Congregational ministers and churches opposed the
revival, and it must be said in fairness that the eccentricities
and fanaticism that developed in certain places gave some
warrant for the antagonism. On the other hand, we can but
feel, as we read the records and journals of the period, that
a substantial reason for the opposition was the very f ormality
and spiritual deadness into which many of the churches and
members had sunk. The Baptist churches also shared in
this rehgious declension, but their insistence on a regenerate
membership had prevented their reaping the harvest of
evU that the Congregational churches had gathered from
the HaU-way Covenant. The Baptists at first do not seem
to have been enthusiastic about the religious movement,
but graduaUy they came into a warmer sympathy with it.
The Congregational churches that supported the revival
came to be known as New Lights. And between the New
Light Congregational and the Baptist churches there rapidly
developed sympathies and affinities which led to some of the
most interesting developments of the century.
In some cases the New Light members of Congregational
churches sought membership in Baptist churches. In other
instances they formed New Light congregations alongside
the old Congregational churches.
The religious history of Middleborough, Massachusetts,
is typical. Here Isaac Backus became pastor of the New

THE BAPTISTS 157
Light Congregational church. But soon various questions
asserted themselves. What was the Scriptural authority for
infant baptism ? What is the status of the baptized chUd
in relation to the church ? What is the standing in the
church of those who, though they were baptized in infancy,
unmistakably are not living a Christian life ? Such ques
tions greatly troubled Mr. Backus. At one time he preached
a sermon repudiating infant baptism and advocating immer
sion. A few days later he withdrew from these positions,
but ultimately, after two years during which he was " much
tossed in his mind," he became a convinced advocate of the
Baptist principles. The course of Mr. Backus made a
serious division in the church and five councils reviewed the
situation. At length Mr. Backus became the founder of the
First Baptist Church in Middleborough, of which he was
pastor for fifty years.
Backus, though a man of excellent parts, had not enjoyed
a coUege training, but he so improved his opportunities for
general culture that his History of the Baptists, originaUy
pubUshed in three considerable volumes, is one of the stand
ard works for the religious history of New England in the
seventeenth century, and George Bancroft characterizes
Backus as " one of the most exact of our New England
historians " and his work as marked by " ingenuousness,
clear discernment, and determined accuracy."
In other towns there was no such discussion as at Middle
borough. The New Light congregation at once or gradually
became a Baptist church.
In the development of the denomination after the Great
Awakening there were three outstanding events.
i. The gradual achievement of rehgious liberty.
From the very beginning the General Court of Massachu
setts had provided for the support of the Christian ministry
by taxing all the people. By the law of 1638 it was provided

158 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
that " every inhabitant who should not voluntarUy con
tribute to aU charges, both in church and commonwealth,
proportionately according to his ability, should be compeUed
thereto by assessment."
The second charter of Massachusetts (1691) though grant
ing equal hberty of conscience to aU but Roman Cathohcs,
required each town to have a minister who should be sup
ported by pubhc taxation, and in 17 18 the General Court
authorized a tax for buUding and repair of meeting-houses.
In 1728, however, Baptists and Quakers were exempted
from poll taxes for the support of ministers and it became
Ulegal to take their bodies in execution to satisfy any such
ministerial rate or tax assessed upon their estates or faculty,
" provided that such persons do usually attend the meetings
of their respective Societies assembhng upon the Lord's Day
for the worship of God, and that they live within five mUes
of the place of such meeting." The names of the Baptists
and Quakers who might thus escape the poll tax were ascer
tained by the County Court, which through its clerk sent
hsts of the names to the assessors of each town or precinct.
Backus in his quaint manner remarks about this legislation:
Here we may see that arbitrary power is always the same nature,
in every age, and every country. " Go ye, serve the Lord: only let
your flocks and herds be stayed," said Pharaoh. Let their poUs be
exempted, but their estates and faculties be taxed, said Massachusetts.
Herein they imitated him; but in two other points they went beyond
him. " Go not very far away," said Pharaoh; Go but five miles, said
Massachusetts; though many of their own parishioners, from that
day to this, must go much further than that to meeting. Neither did
Pharaoh require a list of the people upon oath as these did (Backus,
Vol. I, pp. 577-578).
That year the imprisonment of two Episcopalians, twenty-
eight Baptists, and two Quakers for refusing to pay minis
terial taxes on their estates led to an appeal to the Assembly,

THE BAPTISTS 1 59
which added an act (November 19, 1728) to exempt estates
and faculties as well as poUs " under the same conditions and
hmitations as they were before," but these exemptions were
to continue only to May, 1733.
It would be tedious to recount the minute changes in
exemptions and time limits under which the exemptions were
vahd that were enacted by successive General Courts. The
topic of the rights of Baptists, Quakers, and Episcopalians
was always under discussion. In some places, as at Stur-
bridge, the laws were executed with great harshness and
cruelty; in other towns the practice was more lenient.
The action of the General Court in 1752, and afterwards
in 1757, in requiring three other Baptist churches to testify
that the church whose members sought exemption certifi
cates belonged to their denomination, was regarded as so
unjust that steps were taken and money collected to carry
the matter to England.
Most of the Baptist churches were connected with the
Warren Association, and the injustice of the law and the
abuses under it were so exasperating that a Committee on
Grievances was appointed, of which Isaac Backus was chair
man for ten years from 1772.
In 1774, Backus addressed a letter to Samuel Adams in
which, arguing from the ground on which Adams was pro
testing against British oppression, namely, that it was essen
tial to liberty that representation and taxation should go
together, Backus made the point that since people do not
vote for their representatives in the legislature on account
of their ecclesiastical qualifications, these representatives
had no right to impose ecclesiastical taxes. The taxes laid
by the British Parliament on America are not more contrary
to civU freedom than these Massachusetts taxes are to the
very nature of liberty of conscience which is an essential
article in our charter.

l6o RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
When the opposition to British oppression came to a head
in 1774, and a meeting of the representatives of the colonies
was summoned in Pluladelphia, September 5, 1774? the
Baptists were weU represented in the New England dele
gation. Among them was President Manning of Brown
University, Dr. Stephen Gano, and Isaac Backus. The
presentation of Baptist grievances, however, made so little
impression that John Adams is reported to have declared
that a change might as well be expected in the solar system
as that the great Puritan State would abohsh its ecclesias
tical laws.
The Baptists incidentaUy suffered at this time in a new
way, for their protest against the injustice with which they
were treated gave color to the charge of their enemies that
they made their own grievances more prominent than those
of the whole people. Backus met this charge in his address
to the Congress of Massachusetts, in which he said:
The Baptist churches in this Province as heartily unite with their
countrymen in this cause as any denomination in the land, but they
denied the right of the General Court to impose upon Baptists the
burden of a ministerial tax as they denied the right of the British
Government to impose on the colonists the tax of three pence in a
pound on tea!
The only immediate modification of the law pressing so
severely on Baptists which was accomphshed by the War of
Independence — that great outburst of resistance to measures
that the colonists regarded as oppressive — was that the
revised Constitution of Massachusetts asserted " the right
and duty of the legislature to authorize and require the
several towns, parishes, precincts, and other bodies pohtic,
or religious societies, to make provision at their own expense
for the institution of the public worship of God." The
actual working of this provision was that where Baptists
were a majority they might elect a Baptist as minister of

THE BAPTISTS l6l
the town. In reality it gave to the majority of Massachu
setts citizens the right which the Princes of Germany ac
quired under the famous principle known as cujus regio, ejus
religio. The situation which this compromise created theoreticaUy
made the position of the Baptists somewhat easier. Certainly
it gave their standing in the community a political and social
recognition which up to this time they had lacked. A de
nomination could not be treated as a company of fanatics
who were to be unclassed, when they had a legal right, U
they could muster sufficient adherents, to elect from their
own number the minister of the town. But this was not the
goal the Baptists had set before themselves. In fact, they
showed as little appreciation of governmental recognition as
the French Protestants manifested when Catherine de
Medici flung them a morsel of royal recognition. This law
was in no sense the goal of the Baptists. They did not want
to rule the New England towns on any such terms. To their
thinking it would be exactly as unjust for them to rule their
neighbors as it was for their neighbors to rule them.
PracticaUy, however, this new legislation did almost
nothing to ameliorate their condition. Persecutions did not
cease. Ministerial taxes were assessed and goods were
attached. A curious development took place at what is
now Arhngton. A Baptist church was organized there in
1 781, and a pastor was secured in 1783. The members of
the Baptist Church were assessed for the support of the
Congregational ministers. Thereupon the Baptists sued
the assessors and obtained a judgment in the County Court,
which was reversed in the Supreme Court. It was suggested,
however, by one of the attorneys in the case that the Bap
tists might sue the money they had paid out of the hands of
the assessors and apply their ministerial taxes to the support
of their own minister. This was actuaUy done at Arlington

1 62 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
and the precedent was foUowed in other places, but Backus
and the other leaders regarded this course as indefensible.
The number of churches that resorted to this device is
not readUy obtainable, but it must have been considerable.
In 181 1, Chief Justice Parsons decided that a religious society
must be incorporated by law to have the privUege of this
rebate. A great petition signed by many thousands of persons of
every cast of religious doctrine was presented to the Legis
lature, requesting that the existing laws should be "so
revised and amended that aU denominations of Christians
may be exempt from being taxed for the support of rehgious
teachers, excepting those whose ministrations they volun
tarily attend." This was the occasion when the famous
John Leland addressed the House. " The petitioners pray,"
he said, " for the right of going to heaven in that way which
they beheve is most direct, and shaU this be denied them?"
In answering the objection that to grant complete religious
liberty would be to affront religion and bring unknown judg
ments on the State, he said: " Since the Revolution, all the
old States, except two or three in New England, have es
tablished rehgious liberty on its true bottom; and yet they
are not sunk with earthquakes or destroyed with fire and
brimstone." Looking back the comparatively short distance of less
than a century, it is almost inconceivable that Massachu
setts should have faUen so far behind the general movement
of the age and have been so reluctant to come to an act of
common justice. The innate conservatism and sense of
privilege of a standing order, old prejudices, and sometimes,
it is to be feared, the bitter spirit in which rights were as
serted, aU operated to keep Massachusetts far in the rear of
other States. President Eliot composed for one of the in
scriptions for the World's Fair at Chicago in 1893, this sen-

THE BAPTISTS 1 63
tence: Toleration in religion the best fruit of the last four
centuries. If this is a true judgment, Massachusetts was
slow, very slow, in appreciating it. At length, in 1833, after
coming before the Legislature at several sessions, an amend
ment forever separating Church and State in Massachusetts
was ratified by the people. And the long struggle in which
Baptists had been the most prominent was closed with a
triumph. 2. The second event that contributed to the strength of
the Baptists was the new interest in education.
In the first hundred years of American history three col
leges had been founded, — Harvard in 1636, WiUiam and
Mary in 1693, and Yale in 1701. During the next four
decades twelve coUeges were established. The first four
were as follows : the CoUege of New Jersey (now Princeton)
in 1746; King's CoUege (now Columbia University) in 1754,
the University of Pennsylvania in 1755, and Brown Uni
versity in 1764.
Harvard and Yale were controlled by the Congrega
tionalists, the College of New Jersey by the Presbyterians,
the University of Pennsylvania, King's College, and WUliam
and Mary by the Episcopahans.
The reasons that led the Baptists to found a coUege at
Providence have been variously stated. Some of them wiU
not bear examination. For example, it has often been as
serted that the religious tests at the existing coUeges put
Baptist students under peculiar disabUities. But there is
nothing in the charters of Harvard, Yale, King's CoUege, or
the University of Pennsylvania to bar Baptist students,
whUe at Harvard some of the HoUis scholarships were by
preference given to Baptists.
But, however liberal the coUege charters, there can be
no doubt that there was considerable social discrimination
against Baptist students. They did not belong to the ruling

164 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
caste, and there can be no doubt that the coUege students of
the day, reflecting the disposition of the Congregational
churches toward the Baptists, made the lot of Baptist stu
dents uncomfortable. The potent reason, however, that led
the Baptists to found a coUege was the rapid growth of the
denomination after the Great Awakening in 1740, and the
appreciation on the part of the leading men of the great need
of education among the rank and file of the churches.
In 1740, there were but twenty-one Baptist churches in
aU New England, eleven of them in Rhode Island. In 1768
the Baptist churches in New England numbered sixty-nine,
and by 1790 they had increased to two hundred and eighty-
six, having a membership of more than seventeen thousand.
There is no such record of rapid growth on the part of any
other denomination in the entire history of New England.
This increase in members and influence brought the Baptists
to seU-consciousness, and at once they saw that if they were
to hold their own they must have a coUege in which, whatever
the charters of existing coUeges might say, the entire scho
lastic and social influence of the college should not be per
petually drawing Baptist students away from their faith.
Harvard inscribes on one of her gates a beautiful sentence
from a contemporary letter:
After God had carried us safely to New England, and wee had
buUded our houses, provided necessaries for our livelihood, rear'd
convenient places for God's worship, and settled the CiviU Govern
ment; One of the next things we looked for was to advance Learning,
and perpetuate it to Posterity; dreading to leave an Uliterate ministry
to our churches, when our present Ministers shall lie in the Dust.
The devotion and the vision that founded Harvard in
1638, founded Brown, one hundred and twenty-six years
later, in 1764. The college did not 'originate in Rhode
Island, but in that other centre of Baptist influence, the
Philadelphia Association. In 1756 the Association had

THE BAPTISTS 1 65
established an academy at HopeweU, New Jersey, under the
care of Rev. Isaac Eaton. In the papers of David HoweU,
the first professor in Brown University, there is this memo
randum: Many of the churches being supplied with able pastors from Mr.
Eaton's Academy and thus being convinced by experience of the great
usefulness of human literature to more thoroughly furnish the Man
of God for the most important work of the Gospel ministry, the hands
of the Philadelphia Association were strengthened and their hearts
encouraged to extend the design of promoting literature in the Society
by erecting on some suitable part of the continent a College or Uni
versity which should be principally under the direction of the Baptists.
It is evident that the purposes of the founding of Harvard
and Brown were similar, but the charter of Brown discloses
a conception in the minds of the founders of the relation of
education to the welfare of the whole community that could
only have been inspired by a large outlook upon the function
of education. The preamble to the charter gives this reason
for the establishment of the coUege:
Institutions for liberal Education are highly beneficial to Society,
by forming the rising generation to virtue, knowledge and useful
literature; and thus preserving in the community a succession of men
duly qualified for discharging the Offices of life with usefulness and
reputation. A letter written by Isaac Backus to an English friend the
year after the coUege was founded shows how the leaders
looked at this enterprise. He writes:
One grand objection made use of against Believer's Baptism has
been that none but ignorant and iUiterate men have embraced the
Baptist sentiments. And there was so much color for it as this, namely,
that ten years ago there were but two Baptist ministers in aU New
England who had what is called a liberal education; and they were
not clear in the doctrines of grace.

1 66 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
In another letter written ten years later he aUudes to the
fact that Baptists who had sent their sons to Harvard and
Yale, " have been disappointed, as the clergy have found
means to draw them over to their party."
I need not recount the various steps by which the New
Jersey Academy became Brown University. The leaders
were James Manning, the first president of the coUege, a
graduate of Princeton; Morgan Edwards, a graduate of
Bristol College, England; and Hezekiah Smith, a graduate
of Princeton; with Isaac Backus. This was the quartette
that carried the great enterprise through to completion.
And Baptists have seldom had in one generation four men
of superior capacity and devotion.
The charter of Brown University has sometimes been
characterized by those who have not studied our early college
charters as narrow, because it puts the control of the coUege
in the hands of the Baptists, who have a majority both on
the Board of FeUows and on the Board of Trustees.
The charter divided the government of the coUege among
the representatives of the Baptists, the Friends, the Congre
gationalists, and the Episcopalians. These denominations
must be represented in the government of the coUege. The
coUeges established before Brown had seU-perpetuating
governing boards, which almost without exception, and
naturaUy enough, filled vacancies with their coreligionists.
Thus it came about that without charter provision, there
was not the slightest difficulty in coloring the coUege in
struction and making the coUege influence a powerful direct
factor in the hfe of the denomination which founded the
coUege. At Harvard and Yale and Princeton this feature
of the college work was so emphasized that ultimately each
coUege became identified with a peculiar type of theology. At
Brown, in addition to obligatory representation of four denom
inations on the governing board, it was expressly enjoined by

THE BAPTISTS 167
the charter that "the sectarian differences of opinion shaU
not make any part of the public and classical instruction."
It is one of the paradoxes of the evolution of institutions
that colleges which remain firmly attached to certain de
nominations through prescription and the seU-perpetuating
power of their governing boards should be characterized as
non-sectarian, whUe a college that makes specific provision
for the inclusion on its governing board of four religious
bodies should sometimes have been characterized as nar
rowly denominational.
It was a day of smaU things, of smaU things at Cambridge
and New Haven as weU as at Providence. But the seed
planted in Providence was good, and Brown University has
been one of the principal factors, not only by what it has
accomphshed itself, but what it has inspired other commu
nities to attempt in raising the educational standards of
Baptist ministers and laity.
In 181 5, the Maine Literary and Theological Institution,
now Colby CoUege, was established at WaterviUe, Maine.
In 1825, the Newton Theological Institution was founded
at Newton Centre. Brown, Colby, and Newton have been
the principal agencies of New England Baptists for higher
education. Brown has sent out six thousand nine hundred
and eleven men; Colby, about one thousand five hundred;
and the Newton Seminary, one thousand six hundred and
seventy-five. Professor Brastow of Yale in his work, The Modem
Pulpit, probably did not overstate the case when he gave
these institutions the principal credit for raising the educa
tional equipment of the American Baptist ministry. In
addition to the two coUeges and the seminary the Baptists
have weU equipped academies in aU the New England States
except Rhode Island, and in Maine four academies act as
the principal feeders of Colby CoUege.

1 68 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
The founding of Brown University at Providence was an
indication of the interest of New England Baptists in edu
cation, and the cause of still deeper interest. Taking the
country as a whole, the Baptists were indifferent to educa
tion, and in most cases hostUe to specific training for the
ministry, even when they appreciated hterary culture. The
success of the New Light preachers in winning large numbers
of converts and in organizing churches produced the con
viction that the Gospel needed no aids from human learning,
and that, on the contrary, the educated minister would tend
to rely on his own resources rather than upon the aid of the
Divine Spirit. This was especiaUy true in the South.
When New England Baptists estabhshed the Seminary
at Newton, the first to be organized by American Baptists
exclusively for theological training, it confronted strong oppo
sition. It only succeeded in commending itseU by its product
and when it was seen that Newton graduates were quite as
successful in winning converts as the untrained ministers,
and that they reached classes of the community inaccessible
to the uneducated preachers, the opposition was lessened.
One result of ministerial training was that the Baptists,
whose growth had been largely confined to the rural sections,
began to make substantial gains in the cities. This demon
stration and the impulse that came from it made the New
England Baptists the educational leaders of the entire de
nomination. The educational pioneers of the West and
South, for the most part, were trained in New England.
During the last twenty-five years there has been something
like an educational revival throughout the whole denomi
nation and large sums have been given to our institutions.
The clearest-sighted of our leaders see that in the perpetua
tion and enlargement of this enthusiasm hes, from a human
point of view, the fairest prospect of continued denomina
tional efficiency and progress.

THE BAPTISTS 1 69
An incidental but important marufestation of the opening
of men's eyes to larger horizons was the founding of The
Watchman, a weekly religious newspaper, in Boston in 1819.
The relation of its press to a religious community is like that
of the circulation of the blood to the body. It brings part
into relation with part, carrying nutrition and stimulus to
the whole organism. Almost from the first, The Watchman
became a recognized power. During the middle years of
the last century, before newspapers and magazines were
multiplied, The Watchman held a place in the life of the
average Baptist household only second to the Bible.
3. A third factor of great importance in the life of the
denomination was the development of the missionary im
pulse in work both at home and abroad. In this history
the one name of Adoniram Judson stands forth preeminent.
Judson graduated from Brown University in the Class of
1807, and from Andover Theological Seminary in 18 10.
In 1 81 2, Judson, with three other young missionaries,
was sent to the Far East by the American Board of Com
missioners for Foreign Missions, which had been recently
organized. On the long voyage he busied himself in a study
of the Scriptures relating to baptism, for he knew that he
should meet in India the Enghsh Baptists. As a result of
his study he became convinced that the Baptists were right
in their view of the ordinance, and he was baptized in Cal
cutta, September 6, 1812. Soon after his companion,
Luther Rice, foUowed his example. When Judson's letters
to Rev. Dr. Thomas Baldwin of Boston and to Rev. Dr.
Lucius BoUes of Salem, announcing his change of view and
appealing to the American Baptists for help, were published,
Baptists recognized the appeal as a divine caU, and May 18,
1814, eleven States and the District of Columbia sent dele
gates to a meeting in Pluladelphia. The result was the or
ganization of " The General Missionary Convention of the

170 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
Baptist Denomination in the United States of America for
Foreign Missions." This is the first considerable work in
which American Baptists were united.
In a certain sense the rapid increase of Baptist churches
after the Great Awakening was the first factor in creating
a denominational consciousness and from that had come
Brown University, but it was the missionary enterprise in
augurated in these circumstances, and led by a man like
Judson, of rare scholarship, of apostohc devotion, and of a
fibre to sustain sufferings that rank with those of the early
martyrs, which transformed a group of churches that were
as a lump of clay, incapable of transmitting a vibration from
particle to particle, into a block of marble responsive through
its entire mass to every impulse.
The record of what was at first accomphshed appears
meagre in the light of our larger undertakings of recent years.
It is reported that the contributions of the first year were
one thousand two hundred and thirty-nine doUars, and for
the first ten years only seventy-three thousand dollars. The
question soon arose whether work among the American
Indians was not as truly foreign as work in India and Bur-
mah. There was a general conviction that it was, and the
impulse from Judson' s appeal led to the establishment of
missions among the Indian tribes. In 1826, when we had
nine missionaries in Burmah, we had sixteen among the
American Indians.
Undoubtedly many mistakes were made. For one thing,
too much was attempted. Judson and Rice profoundly be
heved in an educated ministry. It seemed to be a legitimate
thing for the Missionary Society to found a university.
This was done and Columbian University was established
at Washington, D. C. But when funds that were needed in
Burmah were used in Washington, it became evident that
the Society must bend its energies to one task. Fortunately,

THE BAPTISTS 171
however, it was out of their educational interest that there
came the theological schools in Hamilton, N. Y., in 18 19,
and in Newton in 1825. The Society, however, continued
the work among the Indians.
In 1826, there was so much discouragement about the
financial outlook of the Society that the Baptists of Massa
chusetts offered to become responsible for its care and
maintenance. This offer was accepted and the headquarters
of aU the foreign missionary work of the Northern Baptists
has been in Boston since that time. Up to 1845 the Society
represented the denomination in the entire country, but in
that year " The Southern Baptist Convention " was or
ganized with headquarters at Richmond, Va. The division
was whoUy on the issue of slavery.
The responsibUity assumed by the Baptists of Massachu
setts with regard to this work has proved larger, perhaps,
than our fathers imagined. But the Baptists of New Eng
land have ralhed splendidly to their great task, and they have
amply fulfiUed that venturous pledge.
Just now there is a persistent attempt to remove the head
quarters of the Society either to New York, the financial
centre of the country, or to Chicago, which is nearer the
geographical centre. New England wiU not look unmoved
on this transfer, but she may safely challenge either New
York or Chicago, in any years to come, to do better pro
portionately than Boston has done.
It is impossible to say how much the interest in foreign
missions among Baptists that dates from the appeal of
Adoniram Judson and Luther Rice has done for the Baptist
churches of the United States. Practically, it made them
a denomination. It enlisted them in an enterprise that in
terpreted to them anew the Christian Gospel: it broadened
the range of their sympathies and interests to the compass
of the globe, and it created a new sense of common brother-

172 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
hood. The centennial year of our foreign missionary work
was observed last summer, and it was noticeable how in
both North and South there was a common recognition of
the fact that Judson's appeal, long preceding any division
between North and South, had created a common history
and a common consciousness in which reside the fairest
hopes for a perfect reunion of these two sections of our
present denominational life.
Previous to 1832 there had been sporadic attempts to
evangelize the expanding West, but the movement to enlist
the resources of the entire Baptist membership of the States
of the Atlantic Seaboard came from New England. Dr.
Jonathan Going of Worcester, and Dr. Lucius Bolles of
Salem made a tour of the West and reported that the time
was ripe " to arouse the Baptist community throughout the
United States to systematic and vigorous efforts in the cause
of domestic missions and that a general home mission society
should be formed." The result was the formation of the
American Baptist Home Mission Society in 1832, with
headquarters in New York City, where they have since re
mained. Last year the total income of the Foreign Mission
Society was $1,114,420, and of the Home Society, $673,166.
A few words are proper concerning the type of theology
that has prevaUed in the Baptist churches of this country.
In England there have been from the first both Calvinistic
and Arminian Baptists. The latter, known as General Bap
tists, made their influence felt chiefly in Virginia, but they
have never been a numerous body. The Baptists of New
England were for the most part Calvinists, and when they
became Arminian they became so because they were mod
erate Calvinists, and moderate Calvinism shades off in
evitably into Arminianism. StiU, we have had churches in
the North, like the First Church, Providence, that have

THE BAPTISTS 1 73
always been Arminian. The Southern Baptist churches,
except the smaU number that trace from the Enghsh General
Baptists, have been Calvinistic, with the PhUadelphia Con
fession, which is the Westminster Confession slightly revised
to bring it into conformity with the Baptist doctrine of the
church, as their symbol.
It cannot be fairly said that Baptists, as a whole, are either
Calvinists or Arminians. Both types have been cultivated
and recognized. The principal reason for the predominant
Calvinism of the South is probably to be found in the fact
that the South was largely evangelized from the Philadelphia
Association. And an incidental occasion for the Arminianism
of some of the New England Baptist churches was their
reaction from the Calvinism of the New England Congre
gational churches, at whose hands the early Baptists suf
fered so many injustices.
In the South and West, and to a smaU extent in the North,
the extreme Calvinistic churches carried out their views of
the divine sovereignty to the extent of opposing missions
and evangelization of aU kinds; indeed, they were hostUe
to any form of Christian activity. These bodies have become
practicaUy negligible.
In the North an interesting revolt from the Calvinism of
the New Hampshire churches was led by Benjamin RandaU.
In September, 1770, RandaU, then a godless youth, heard
Whitefield preach at Portsmouth. Two days after this
Whitefield died at Newburyport. RandaU was greatly im
pressed by Whitefield's death, and became an active Chris
tian. Five years later he withdrew from the Congregational
Church of which he was a member, on account of infant
baptism, and united with the Baptist Church of Berwick,
Maine. RandaU appears to have had remarkable power and
success as an evangelist. His preaching was of the type of

174 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
Wesleyan Arminianism. By reason of this he was disfellow-
shipped by a local councU of Calvinistic Baptist churches,
and thereupon he organized at New Durham, N. H., in
1780, a church in sympathy with his views. This is the
mother-church of the so-caUed Free WUl Baptists. The per
sistence of the regular Baptists in caUing these dissidents
" Free WUlers " led them to adopt the name, but it is not
of their original choice. By 1810 the connection had 130
churches, no ministers, and 6,000 members.
In 191 1, the date of their union with the Regular Baptists,
the Free Baptists had two weU equipped colleges, HiUsdale
CoUege, Michigan, founded in 1855, and Bates CoUege in
Lewiston, Maine, founded in 1863, with a number of schools
of the lower grade, 834 churches, 914 ministers, and 33,600
church members.
The happy union of the Free WiU and the regular Bap
tists on October 5, 191 1, did much to solve the vexed com
munion question for the Northern Baptist churches. The
Free Baptists for the most part practiced open communion,
and the regular Baptists restricted communion; in other
words, they held that the communion was only rightfully
administered in Baptist churches to believers who had been
immersed. At one time this question threatened to become
an issue that might readily lead to division. The union of
which I have just spoken has resulted in putting this whole
matter strictly within the jurisdiction of the local church.
In general, it may be said that whUe there have been dif
ferences and divisions among Baptists like those just cited,
their doctrinal position throughout their history in the
United States has been strongly evangelical. There has
been no appreciable movement toward Unitarianism, as
there has been among the Arminian Baptists in England.
Considering the looseness of their ecclesiastical organization,

THE BAPTISTS 1 75
and the comparatively slight esteem in which they hold
creeds, this substantial unity as to the teachings of the
Gospel has been marvellous.
The development of organization among Baptists affords
an unwritten chapter in recent history. The independency
of the local church has always been a cardinal tenet. In
early days it was exceedingly difficult to induce Baptist
churches to combine in an association or convention. The
Warren Association of churches was formed with the utmost
difficulty. When in 1767 the representatives of the church
met under the leadership of James Manning and Hezekiah
Smith to organize an association, only four saw their way
clear to unite in the enterprise. These were the Warren
of Rhode Island; the HaverhUl, BeUingham, and Second
Middleborough of Massachusetts. Even Isaac Backus, who
afterwards came to recognize the great value of the coopera
tive work, held back. His church wrote that they " waited
until they could be satisfied that the Association did not
assume any jurisdiction over the churches."
Notwithstanding the fact that most Baptist churches in
the United States are members of a local Association, the
churches are jealous of their independency, and the Associ
ation's powers are simply advisory. State Conventions,
which are simply larger associations of churches for mission
ary purposes within the States, are organized in every State.
In the New England States the State Conventions admin
ister considerable funds for helping the weaker churches,
for evangelization, and of late years for missions among our
foreign population. Every attempt to constitute Conven
tions on a system of representation from the Associations
has been firmly resisted. The unit of representation, both
in the Association and in the State Convention, has always
been the local church.

176 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
The total number of Northern Baptists at the present
time is 1,291,668. The Southern Baptists number 2,552,633,
and the colored Baptists, 1,984,952. The total number of
Baptists in the United States of aU names is 6,129,467, mak
ing it the second largest Protestant denomination in the
United States. In New England there are 1,333 Baptist
churches, with 165,383 members.

IV
THE QUAKERS
RUFUS M. JONES

THE QUAKERS
THE Quakers came into existence as a distinct religious
Society during the period of the Enghsh Commonwealth,
though the work of preparation for their movement had been
under way since the beginning of the Reformation.1 The
leader of the movement and the founder of the Society was
George Fox, who was born in Leicestershire, of humble but
rugged, God-fearing parents in 1624, and who began his
mission as an itinerant lay preacher in 1648. From the year
1652, when Fox fell in with bands of religious " Seekers "
in the northern counties, the movement grew rapidly, at
tracted wide public notice, and because of its radical, un
compromising views and practices brought much persecution
upon its exponents.
Fox and his foUowers called themselves at first " the
chUdren of the Light," because they professed to be led,
guided and inspired by a divine and heavenly Light, reveal
ing the Truth to their souls, and they called their preachers
" the publishers of Truth." Later, by a happy insight, they
adopted the name " Friends," and, as they did not approve
of applying the word Church to any denomination or branch
of Christendom, since it belonged to the whole body uni
versal, they took the more modest word, and caUed them
selves " the Society of Friends." By the public, however,
almost from the first, they were nicknamed " Quakers," prob
ably because in their meetings they trembled with a physical
resonance, stirred by their deep and intense emotions.2
' I have traced the steps of this preparation in my Studies in Mystical Religion,
1908, and Spiritual Reformers in the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries, ior4.
2 George Fox assigned the origin of the name, " Quaker," to an incident in a
court of justice (Journal, I, p. 58) but the psychological ground for the name is
recognized by many early Friends. 179

l8o RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
The movement was, from its earhest beginning, outreach-
ing and missionary in spirit. Its exponents were possessed
with a faith that they had rediscovered " primitive Chris
tianity " and they leaped to the conclusion that they had
found a fresh and hving way which would spread and become
a world-Christianity. In this faith they undertook " the
hazards and hardships " of propagating it, not only at home
but " overseas " as weU.
The earhest Quaker messengers to reach the American
continent were two women, Ann Austin and Mary Fisher,
who landed in Boston in July, 1656, though " the seed of
Truth," as the Quakers caUed their message, was planted
at a period almost as early on Long Island and on the shores
of Maryland. The Massachusetts officials took excessive
care that the inhabitants of their colony should not be
harmed or corrupted by these emissaries, and they were
soon sent back to Barbadoes, from which island they had
come. The messengers who finaUy succeeded in planting
the " seed " in New England were eleven Friends who came
over in the ship " Woodhouse " in 1657. Their first suc
cessful groups were formed in Newport, Rhode Island, and
in Sandwich and Salem, Massachusetts, and graduaUy in
the face of great opposition the movement spread through
aU the New England colonial settlements except those in
Connecticut. The officials of Massachusetts determined to protect their
colony from the " invasion " and they adopted the most
stringent methods of deahng with what seemed to them a
rehgious perU. Four Quakers were executed, excessive fines
were imposed, and a system of " frightfulness " was put
into operation in the shape of unmerciful whippings. It
was aU in vain. The movement grew and increased, as
though it fed on persecution, and the authorities were finaUy
led to grant their unwelcome visitors a more peaceful re-

THE QUAKERS l8l
ception. By the year 1700, the Quakers had become very
numerous in New England and they continued to be a grow
ing body untU after the period of the Revolutionary War.
During the nineteenth century they slowly declined, and
they now have a membership of about four thousand in the
New England States. There are in aU about one hundred
and twenty-five thousand Quakers in America and about
twenty-three thousand in Great Britain and Ireland.
The foUowing chapter is an attempt to give the reader an
impression of the Quaker type of Christianity not so much
in its external form and appearance as from the inside and
as a living, operating, spiritual and social force.
There are two types of religious leaders, both of whom
have played great roles in history, though I do not mean to
imply that they can be divided off from one another by any
absolute gap, like that which separates the sheep from the
goats. There are, in the first group, leaders who are pledged
and dedicated to remote ideals, that is to say, to ideals which
seem for the moment unattainable and Utopian, and who
nevertheless utterly refuse to scale their ideal down or to
compromise for the sake of quick but partial gains. By the
inspiration and kindling of earlier prophets, or by what
Emerson caUs " stricter obedience to celestial currents,"
the leader of this first type sees through the complex and
tangle of events and situations and seizes a truth which all
men in some happier and more golden age wiU recognize as
true. When he has once seen it, this vision transforms aU
his ideas and strivings and aims. It spoils forever for him
aU lower attainments, aU half truths, aU gains which must
be won through the barter or surrender of a possible better.
He will be obedient to that vision regardless of aU cost. He
wUl bear witness to the fuU light which he has seen, even
though he can compel nobody else in the heedless world of

1 82 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
his generation to see it. He may only cry in the wUderness,
but at aU events he wiU cry, and he wiU proclaim that highest
thing his heart knows.
There are, in the second group, the great practical leaders
whose eyes are always focussed on results. They under
stand their age and they know for what it is ripe and ready.
They anticipate what the rest about them are incipiently
thinking and they voice and interpret the movings and striv
ings of the rank and file. They know by a kind of instinct
how far their contemporaries can be carried and they wiU
not overhurry, they wiU not outrun the speed of those
whom they propose to bring along and they wiU make grace
ful bends and curves and wide detours round the obstacles
that lie between them and the goal. If they cannot get aU
they want, they wUl at least get something.
Both of these methods have proved effective in history,
and they are both types of leadership which have won the
" weU-done " of after ages, and, 1 beUeve, the " well-done "
of the divine Spectator of events. We must not underrate
leaders who do not immediately march straight across
country to Canaan the moment they glimpse it from some
Pisgah, but who with patient struggle and with much give
and take on the road, succeed in bringing the multitude a
httle nearer to a promised land and in firing them all with
a hope of Canaan some day. Hosea Biglow has some wise
words on this point:
Theory thinks Fact a pretty thing,
An' wants the banns read right ensuin' ;
But Fact wont nowise wear the ring
'Thout years o' settin' up an wooin'.
The Quakers, however, who came to New England in the
mid-seventeenth century belonged to my first type. They
had a kind of click of certainty in their souls, which sent them

THE QUAKERS 1 83
forward without any reserves or doubts, without any Us or
buts, without halting reflections or sub-conscious inhibitions.
Their leadings were accepted once for aU as divine caUs and
intimations and, that point being settled, they could not do
otherwise than follow where their inner star took them. This
infallibUity of conviction brings with it peculiar difficulties
and handicaps and it produces a type of character that seems
to others narrow and stubborn, but this note of the "fiery
positive " adds immensely to the driving force of a move
ment, and in the case of the Quakers it brought a fresh ele
ment of intensity and of daring venture into the religious
life of New England.
About the last thing any self-respecting Englishman of
the seventeenth century would have dreamed of would have
been such a radical reconstruction of the Christian Church
as to put women on precisely the same level as men, and to
wipe out aU sex-distinction in matters of religion. Just this
innovation the Quakers actuaUy made.
The serious attempt to constitute the church of both men
and women and to give to women all the spiritual privileges,
rights, duties, and functions which belonged to men had
once before been tried in the history of Christianity. The
Montanists of the second and third century, possessed with
enthusiasm for the restoration of prophecy, and for the for
mation of a church guided by prophets rather than one
governed by bishops, threw the door wide open for women;
proposed a type of church in which both sexes shared alike
and, not only in theory but in practice as well, raised women
to the full spiritual stature of men. While this SibyUine
movement was at its height women prophesied, taught,
baptized, consecrated the Eucharist, and had aU the priv-
Ueges of martyrdom and sainthood, as that extraordinary
document, The Passion of Saint Perpetua, vividly shows.
But this movement was ruthlessly stamped out, and the

184 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
church which was to do the work of the Middle Ages was so
organized that not only was no woman ehgible to office or
position in the hierarchy, but no man even, who was married,
could share in it.
The Reformation swept away the cehbate priesthood and
wiped out the convent within the Protestant domain, but
it left the church severely masculine in aU its higher activi
ties and functions. Even if they had desired to make the
innovation and constitute the reformed churches of both
men and women, the reformers with their conception of the
infallibility of Scripture would have been confronted with the
impasse of St. Paul's words : "Let the women keep sUence in
the churches, for it is not permitted them to speak. If they
would learn anything let them ask their husbands at home."
The Quakers did not discuss the woman problem; they
made no announcement of principles or of programme, but
they inaugurated a movement in which from the very first
the agelong discrimination against women was entirely
absent. Here is an entry in Fox's Journal for the year 1667 :
" I advised the setting up of a girls' school at ShackleweU,
for instructing them in whatsoever things are civU and use
ful in creation." And as the Quaker movement made
progress and developed, there came into existence a church
organization in which personality, gUts, and specific quali
fications were the only tests of fitness for service — the
divine right, not of kings and not of bishops, but of common
men and women was here recognized and quietly practiced.
And once again women had aU the privileges of martyrdom,
as the story of Mary Dyer grimly Illustrates.
The most striking trait of the Quakerism which came as
an unwelcome invasion of New England was its emphasis
on experience — what William James caUed " inwardness."
Boston had already, in 1636 and 1637, had its peace of mind
disturbed by an exhibition of this type of rehgion in the

THE QUAKERS 1 85
persons of Anne Hutchinson and her friends, who claimed
to have got beyond " the covenant of works " and to have
come, with comfort and joy, into " the covenant of grace."
These early enthusiasts insisted that other Christians were
bound in the strait-jacket of legalism, whUe they had
found their freedom and had entered into an immediate
contact with the weUs of truth and were aware of the direct
bubbhngs of life in their own souls. This mystical element
of rehgion, which was weU-nigh stamped out in the vigorous
suppression of the Hutchinsonians, the Quakers revived and
re-incarnated wherever they planted their meetings. Quaker
mysticism was, however, quite unlike that expounded in the
mystical classics, such as the writings of Dionysius, of Eck-
hart and Tauler and the two golden books: " German
Theology " and " The Imitation of Christ." The Quakers
were very weak in metaphysics. They had no plulosophical
passion for absolute unity. They were not perplexed by the
problem of multiphcity. They took the world quite naively
as their senses found it, and, in a general way, their God was
the God of rehgion rather than the God of metaphysics or
theology. They discovered something in their own soul, in
their own inner consciousness, which seemed not of them
selves, nor of man. When they returned home, as they put
it, to the shekinah in their own deeps, they felt with awe
that they were covered by a hving presence and brought into
first hand, experimental, relation with the Root and Ground
of aU true LUe. One of these men, who was martyred on
Boston Common for his faith, in much simplicity declared
that he found himself fUled immediately with LUe and Power
and heavenly Love from that presence which did " mightily
overshadow me," and another one of them, who, likewise,
was faithful unto death, has left his personal testimony:
" I was fLUed with the Love and Presence of the hving God
which did ravish my heart when I felt it; for it did increase

1 86 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
and abound in me like a Uving stream." They knew very
httle psychology, and they furnish us no profound analyses
of their experiences, as St. Augustine has done of his, but
there is directness and sincerity and honesty and restraint
in their accounts which make one sure that something
dynamic and transforming came into their lives, something
that raised them out of the ordinary level, something which
made the reahty of God absolutely sun-clear to them. They
caUed their experience " the birth of the immortal Seed,"
or " the birth of God," or " the birth of Christ " in their
souls. And they swung out into the full faith that the God
who as Spirit brooded hke a mother-dove over the vast waste
of chaos, and brought a world to birth, had now again in love
brooded over their own souls and brought His spiritual Life
to birth in themselves. God, then, was no longer worlds of
space away, sundered by a bridgeless chasm from man. He
was as near as the dew to the grass or the sunlight to the
flower, or as the truth is to the mind that knows it. The
means of communication between God and man was in their
thought no longer hmited and confined to an ancient revela
tion which was miraculously sent across the chasm. The
human heart is always oracular and revelation is a fact of
aU ages and of aU lands for obedient souls that have come
home to the holy place within. Not once alone, by a stu
pendous interruption of the processes of his world, did God
bring forth his Son, but rather the bringing forth of his Son
is the unending and eternal spiritual event of human history
and is occurring wherever men let the divine Life have its
way unhindered in them. Revelation in Scripture was to
these Quakers revelation indeed, but, wonderful as it was, it
only indicated what man was capable of, and was thus a
guarantee and prophecy of the breaking forth of more light
through the ages. Christ was for them God personaUy re
vealed and in Him they reverently beheld the union of God

THE QUAKERS I 87
and man, but this triumphant fact of Galilee carried with it
for them the immense implication that God and man were
of such a nature that they belonged together and that God
could always and everywhere pour his Life into man if man
said yes and did his part toward the companionship. Pri
marily this faith rested upon and grew out of experience, and
it was dynamic faith only so long as it was rooted and
grounded in living experience of this mystical type. When
it was translated into the patois of controversial tracts and
hardened^ down into a static theory of the inward Light, it
became, like the shorn and shaven Samson, weak and inef
fectual for battle purposes. A dogma asserted in a book is
no match for an experience alive and throbbing in a man,
and Quakerism lost its marching power in proportion as it
dropped from its stage of inward mystical vision to a paper
stage of assertion about an abstract principle.
One of the boldest of the experiments which the Quakers
made was their creation of a new type of meeting for wor
ship. Convinced as they were by their own living experience
that God is an environing Spirit and near of access to our
finite spirits, they leaped to the conclusion that the main
function of worship is direct communion with God. If so,
it cannot be done by one person for another. As the attain
ment of culture, or taste, or technical skill requires long and
patient effort, so communion with God calls for personal
preparation of soul, for practice of the presence of God, and
for the slow cultivation of the inner eye and ear. If the end
to be sought in religion is the acquisition of a set of views
and beliefs, or the inteUectual mastery of an ancient revela
tion, then the sermon becomes a necessary instrument, and
the centrepiece in the order of divine service wiU be a logical
and persuasive interpretation of doctrine. The congregation
wiU " gather round " the expert minister who speaks for
them and to whose word they listen. The Quaker thought

1 88 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
httle, probably too httle, of interpretation. The possibUity
of direct experience, of new revelation, of immediate com
munion, seemed to him so paramount over everything else
in the world that he buUded his entire congregational gather
ing round that. The meeting was not held in order that those
present might hear a sermon, however freighted with truth;
it was held in order that men and women might bring their
hves into conscious fellowship with God and find the living
streams of the eternal fountain of Life flowing in their own
spirits. They hit upon group-sUence as the fittest psycho
logical climate for communion, and with no appeal of any
kind to outward sense and with nothing to direct thought
or focus attention they came from their widely scattered
homes and sat down in solemn hush, positively expectant.
Some few of them went off into an unmoved quiet and veri
fied the words of the psalmist: " He giveth his beloved
sleep." Others let their minds wander as they listed and
experienced the usual zigzags of the flight of unguided asso
ciation. But the inner " remnant " concentrated and centred
down into a contemplation that was intensely active, and
marked by strong emotion. For them the silence was like
pauses in music during which no notes are sounded and yet
the power and significance of the musical piece, far from
being interrupted, are gathering depth and volume for a
new and intensified burst of harmony. They knew not how
it worked, but by a subtle telepathy, which they neither
named nor understood, the corporate presence of all helped
each to reach a deeper stratum than the superficial one of
every day pursuits, and the concentrated aspiration and
upward yearning somehow took the soul of the worshipper
out beyond its usual margin where it felt refreshed and fed
with the water and bread of hfe.
Quite naturaUy this exercise — with its stern requirements
— did not appeal to everybody. The group was bound to

THE QUAKERS 1 89
be smaU and select and specialized. Only those who had
formed inward habits of concentration, who could leave the
affairs of time and space where they belonged and could
attain an intensified and heightened hush found the Quaker
method of worship of much value. To the undisciplined and
lazy soul the sUence dragged along in almost unendurable
tedium. To the sensitive spirit, inwardly eager and alert,
and ready to pay the full cost of direct feUowship with God,
there came an abiding spiritual fecundity. It consequently
became necessary for the Quakers to propagate their re
hgion very largely through persons who had acquired a
pecuhar aptitude and habit of mind, and in the eighteenth
and nineteenth centuries they were naturaUy compelled to
depend largely upon their own offspring for the Quaker
" apostolic succession." The chUdren were taken to meeting
from their earliest years. Twice each week they sat in the
stUlness with their elders and experienced whatever power
was there to be felt. The habit of sitting still was formed
almost as early as the dawning of a consciousness of self.
The expectant attitude of the group, the corporate faith
that God was to be found within had a silent but no less
effective sub-conscious influence upon the little people whose
feet dangled below the hard bench. Every meal at home was
preceded by a pause of silence and though little was said in
explanation some sense of feUowship with God was associated
with the custom. The morning meal was always foUowed —
regardless of what occupations pressed — by a solemn
Scripture reading and by a period of sUent worship during
which in some subtle way the hfe of the united family was
lifted up and linked into the enveloping Life of God, so that
the children came very early to assume and feel that God
was a hving and organic part of their family. The approved
books which were read aloud in the evenmg and from which
the children in some measure formed their rehgious ideas

190 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
were journals and biographies of Quaker worthies who had
kept the faith and suffered for their truth. This simple
genre literature worked in the same direction as the meetings
and the famUy " sittings " did, and helped to repeat and
propagate the Quaker type.
The meetings for worship, however, were by no means
whoUy silent. The silence was not thought of as an end in
itseU. It was practiced, like a sacrament, as a means of
communion and feUowship, and it was done in confident
expectation that one or more of the group would be brought
up into spiritual fecundity and be moved to offer a prayer
which would voice the corporate need of the meeting or to
utter a message which would express the word of God for
the occasion. AU true ministry, according to the prevailing
Quaker theory, was prophetic utterance. I do not mean, of
course, that the speaker foretold events, but rather that he
or she — for there was no distinction of sexes — spoke as a
divine messenger and under a preparation and anointing
from above. This " ministry of unction " was not primarily
the interpretation of Scripture, but it was rather the revela
tion of fresh and present truth. It was not a logical dis
course linked up with therefores and wherefores, nor did it
bear the marks of study. It was fused with emotion, some
what rhythmic, strongly tinctured with biblical style and
phraseology, loosely knit and Ulustrative of sub-conscious
processes of association, but at its best vital and pentecostal.
It avoided doctrine, but it opened out the meaning of hfe
and made duty and obedience the everlasting things by
which men hve. The best thing about this ministry per
haps was the conviction which it produced that the God who
equipped David long ago for his tasks and who met Saul the
persecutor in the way and turned him into a mighty apos
tolic instrument, was stiU reveaUng Himself through men.
Without any theological training whatever, and without

THE QUAKERS 191
any homiletic skiU, the Quaker ministers somehow succeeded
in drawing upon their accumulated stock of spiritual expe
rience and, in favored moments, they succeeded in reach
ing even higher sources of grace, so that they often refreshed
their listeners and sometimes made God seem very real and
near at hand. The meeting for worship was thus a practi
cal experiment in group-mysticism and in lay-religion, com
pletely freed from ecclesiasticism and ritual.
The Quaker method of pastoral care of the flock was
another novel experiment. For centuries the pastoral care
of the flock in the church and the moral oversight of its
members had been assigned in the main to the local minister
in each parish. He had a double mission laid upon him, to
expound the gospel as preacher and to shepherd the flock
as pastor. The Friends had no such cure of souls in their
system. They had, as we have seen, no one in their local
meetings set apart to do the preaching. It was the business
of the corporate group, under the guidance of the Spirit, to
produce its ministry out of its own abounding spiritual hfe.
And so, too, it was assumed that a local church, without
any specialized shepherd, would as a corporate body minis
ter to the daily moral and spiritual life of those who com
posed the group. GraduaUy it appeared that this plan
pushed the democratic ideal quite too far and for the sake
of practical efficiency a differentiated band of overseeing
Friends had this care of the flock definitely laid upon them
about the middle of the eighteenth century. They were
caUed Overseers. They took up the task in that spirit of
devotion and with that sacred sense of responsibility which
have always been the characteristic source of strength in the
Quaker movement. These overseers were for the most part
ordinary men and women, like the rest of the group, without
any special training, gifted only in good common sense, in
balance and poise of character, in the elemental human

I92 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
quahties which breed trust and confidence, and endowed of
course, as aU Friends were in this period, with an unques
tioning faith in divine inward help and Ulumination for their
assistance. They proved to be, through the succeeding
generations foUowing their appointment, a source of real
spiritual strength and of moral control to the numerous
groups in which they quietly, unostentatiously labored,
and their ministry of discipline and of counsel saved many
from breaking anchor and drifting on the rocks. The Over
seers were, like conscience among primitive peoples, negative
in their scope. They dealt adequately with deviations from
" good order " and were quick to discover when one of the
flock was going astray, but they were not quite so wide
awake to the greater possibilities of positive leadership as
they should have been and they did not as fuUy reaUze the
importance of convicting men of righteousness or of attract
ing them toward goodness as one could wish. But the period
I am deahng with was in all walks of life strongly legalistic
in its temper, and the principle of restraint suited the ideals
of the time better than did the higher principle of moral
contagion. It is also true that these moral guardians of the flock very
often confounded moral issues with their own peculiar no
tions of piety. What they caUed " simpUcity " or " plain
ness " came to bulk in their minds as a matter equally big
in importance with the moral imperatives. To be " plain "
or " simple " meant to dress in the approved garb of the
society; to use singular pronouns, " thou," " thee," and
" thy," to a single person; to discard titles such as " Mr."
and " Mrs." and aU unnecessary or insincere compliments;
to shun worldly forms of amusement; to forego music; to
keep free of entanghng affiances of marriage with any per
son of the world, that is, with one not a Friend, and to avoid
business occupations or social relations which involved a

THE QUAKERS 193
strain on consistency to the Quaker ideals. After aU these
things, which we should now perhaps caU " ceremonial,"
the argus-eyed Overseers were supposed to look, and they
were expected to report whether the flock was " clear " or
" not-clear," but they did not stop with the ceremonial;
they went the fuU way on and endeavored to keep the mem
bership to pure, clean, holy lives.
For the practical accomphshment of their tasks the over
seers had an interesting set of " Queries " which formed a
kind of moral measuring rod that was frequently applied
to the hves of the members. The New England Queries
were as follows :
1. Are all meetings for religious worship and discipline duly at
tended ? Is the hour observed ? And are friends preserved from
sleeping, and all other unbecoming behavior therein ?
2. Are love and unity maintained among you ? Is detraction
guarded against ? And where any differences arise, are endeavors
used speedily to end them ?
3. Are friends careful to bring up those under their direction in plain
ness of speech, behavior, and apparel ? To restrain them from read
ing pernicious books, and from the corrupt conversation of the world ?
Are they good examples herein themselves ? And are the Holy
Scriptures frequently read in their families ?
4. Are friends careful to avoid the use of spirituous liquors, except
for medicine ? The unnecessary frequenting of taverns, and places
of public resort ? And to keep in true moderation and temperance, on
the account of births, marriages, burials, and on other occasions ?
5. Are the circumstances of the poor, and of such as appear likely
to need assistance, duly inspected, and their necessities relieved, or
they assisted in such business as they are capable of ? Do their chil
dren freely partake of learning, to fit them for business ? And are
they, and other friends' children, placed among friends ?
6. Are parents and heads of families, with the young and unmarried,
careful that all proceedings with respect to marriage be conformable
to our discipline ?
7. Do you maintain a faithful testimony against the payment of
priests' wages, bearing arms, training, or other military matters ?

194 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
Against being concerned in property taken in war, buying or vending
goods suspected to be run, and against making false entries, to evade
the payment of duties ?
8. Are friends careful to inspect their affairs and settle their ac
counts ? Are they punctual to their promises, and just in the payment
of their debts, and careful to live within the bounds of their circum
stances ?
9. Are friends careful to have all their marriages, births, deaths,
and burials duly recorded ? Are there any friends removed from, or
come amongst you, without certificates ?
10. Do you take due care regularly to deal with all offenders, in
the spirit of meekness and wisdom, without partiality or unnecessary
delay ? And is judgment placed where it appears necessary, in the
authority of truth, according to our Discipline ?
These Queries were read, in whole or in part, four times in the
Preparative Meeting, four times in the Monthly Meeting,
four times in the Quarterly Meeting, and once in Yearly Meet
ing, so that a good Friend was exposed to them thirteen
times in a year. A solemn hush followed the reading of them,
and each member was given an opportunity to enter into a
private confessional under the aU-seeing Eye, and he could
search his soul as with a candle to see whether he himself
was " clear." Then once a year in aU the successive meet
ings carefuUy prepared answers were read, discussed, and
summarized as a digest of " the state of the Society." This
periodic reexamination of conduct and spirit had a profound
sub-conscious effect and wove certain community ideals into
the very inner substance and texture of the members. It
was obviously enough a system of narrow piety. It missed
much of what forms the sub-soU of our present day social
aspirations, but it was admirably adapted for the cultiva
tion of a type of simple unreflective goodness and it produced
beyond question very acute individual consciences.
There was a strong puritanic tincture in the religion of
the New England Quakers throughout their history. They

THE QUAKERS 195
were, as I have said, uncompromising. They had a deep-
seated fear of the contaminations of the world. They often
favored restraints and indulged in negations, and they were
bent on a root and branch extermination of all marks of
superstition and apostacy, which had, they believed, crept
into the Church. They were, therefore, always in danger
of forming a hard, stern type of person, oversatisfied with
his own righteousness, critical of that of others. CompeUed
more or less to withdraw and contract in order to guard
their consistency, it was easy for them to grow uncouth in
manner and sour in temper. But something almost the
opposite happened. As John Woolman puts it, " some
glances of real beauty might be seen in their faces." We
New Englanders have always been chary of the word "saint,"
and we instinctively leave all fixing of " calendars " to the
powers above, but there was in the best Quaker characters,
of both men and women, a fine mingling of strength and
humility, a union of rigorous application of judgment to
oneself with tenderness for others, a palpitating fear of sin
joined with immense confidence in the forgiving love of
God. The best specimens, even in the backwoods meetings,
revealed a refined and sublimated nature, not only sweet
and fragrant, but often radiant and full of grace. They
were, best of all, unconscious of the shine on their faces, and
those who had the clearest marks of triumphant goodness
were the ones who were making the most unrelenting fight
with the subtle sins of which only a near-saint knows. The
Quaker poet Whittier, who himself was a consummate iUus-
tration of the type, has given us a very happy description
of one of these everyday saints:
And if her life small leisure found
For feasting ear and eye,
And Pleasure, on her daily round,
She passed unpausing by,

196 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
Yet with her went a secret sense
Of ah things sweet and fair,
And Beauty's gracious providence
Refreshed her unaware.
She kept her line of rectitude
With love's unconscious ease;
Her kindly instincts understood
AU gentle courtesies.
An inborn charm of graciousness
Made sweet her smile and tone,
And glorified her farm-wife dress
With beauty not its own.
The dear Lord's best interpreters
Are humble human souls;
The Gospel of a life like hers
Is more than books or scrolls.
From scheme and creed the light goes out,
The saintly fact survives;
The blessed Master none can doubt
Revealed in holy lives.
I come, finally, to a brief consideration of the ideas which
formed, as WiUiam James would say, " the keel and back
bone " of the Quaker faith. The rehgious ideas to which I
now refer were for most Friends imphcit and presupposed
rather than reflectively matured. They were, like the math
ematics of the spider and the honeybee, woven into the
fabric of daUy hfe rather than consciously envisaged or
exphcitly formulated. If you asked a Friend what he be
heved, he replied that he would lend the inquirer a copy of
Barclay's Apology. It is, however, quite possible to discover
by the help of printed sermons, annual Epistles, biographical
Journals, and the survivals of personal memory, what formed
the hving marrow of the faith of these untheological Chris
tians of a previous generation.

THE QUAKERS 1 97
The primary idea, the spring of their religion, was pro
found belief in a living, present, near-at-hand, environing
God, who has deahngs now with the souls of men, and is
carrying on in the world today, as of old in Galilee and
Judaea, his revealing and his redemptive work. The Christ-
revelation was possible and was genuinely real just because
God is inherently in nature and character a Person who can
come into intimate contact and relationship with men —
because he is an Immanuel God. The unbroken and con
tinuous work of the divine Spirit through the ages — even
ages that were dark — ¦ is also possible and is also genuinely
real, because God is as essentially self-reveaUng as is the
mid-day sun.
With this root idea was linked also an idea imphed in it,
namely, that man was somehow kindred with God and al
ways and everywhere a recipient of divine love. They knew
that he was sadly damaged and strangely complicated with
sinful tendencies, but they stUl insisted that he was made for
feUowship with God, and that he bore in the very structure
of his soul a point of junction with the eternal, and was al
ways within reach of home and Father. If any soul lived
in the dark his eclipse was an eclipse which he himself made,
for the divine sunlight is unsetting and never withdrawn.
They did not anticipate the evolutionary view and were
loyal to the story in Genesis, but they could not adopt the
miserabUism of a ruined world and a ruined man. Somehow
God was here and somehow he was operating in the soul as
an unsundered and undefeated presence.
Salvation for them, again, was not a forensic scheme. It
was a process of life, culminating triumphantly. The most
penetrating and adequate account of it which any ancient
New England Quaker gave is that expressed in the eighteenth
century writings of a fine old Quaker itinerant minister of
Rhode Island, Job Scott. Scott's view is the prevaUing

198 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
Quaker idea. To be saved is to be inwardly washed and
cleansed and brought into vital relation with the divine
resources of life. Until " the old man with his deeds " is
dead, until the love of sin is conquered by a higher love,
salvation has not come to pass, " however one may boast of
imputed righteousness and cry peace, peace." Christ him
self, that is, the divine nature, must be born and formed in
the soul. There must be a death to sin and a rising in new
ness of life, and the Christian who is to walk with the saved
must be ready to go the whole way with Christ, both in
suffering and in joy, untU grace and truth have their com
plete and triumphant work in him.
But the Quakers, in spite of their seeming individualism,
were always, at least implicitly and in practice, dedicated
to a social ideal. Their worship involved a social group.
Their meetings for the care of the church were extremely
democratic and yet all business was done in unity or not at
all. They believed in the divine possibilities of aU men and
women. In their visions and ideals for the race they saw,
dimly perhaps and in the mist, but yet they saw a kingdom
of God — a real world of men — divinely changed and in
wardly assisted, living in peace, living in love, living in posi
tive cooperation, and exhibiting in this earthly hfe the
traits and the spirit of the eternal City of God.
They were, as I have been indicating, a mystical people,
intent upon realizing what WiUiam James has caUed " a
rehgion of veracity rooted in spiritual inwardness," but
they were fuUy as much absorbed in the problem of human
betterment, in the task of remaking the social world, as
they were in getting their own inward peace. They fuUy
shared the practical spirit of their interesting contemporary,
the famous " Digger," Gerard Winstanley. Winstanley in
one of his remarkable tracts wrote: " My mind was not at
rest because nothing was acted; and thoughts ran in me that

THE QUAKERS 199
words and writings were all nothing and must die; for action
is the life of all and if thou dost not act thou dost nothing."
For them, to see an idea, to discover a truth, was to practice
it and put it into play.
Even the Quaker peculiarities were, in inception, an ex
pression of their desire for social reform. They said " thee "
and " thou " to everybody because it was the prevaUing
custom then to say " you " to important persons, upper
class people, and " thou " to the common man, and they
resolved to wipe out the distinction between upper person
and lower person and to maintain one standard of address
for man as man. Their odd " testimonies," as they caUed
them, which in time became more or less devoid of signifi
cance and hardly more than badges of a peculiar people,
were in their origin protests against sham and hoUowness,
against customs and forms of etiquette which were a burden
to the life and which buried the person under a rubbish of
meaningless mannerisms, or under the weary weight of stupid
fashions. They refused to take a judicial oath because they
maintained that there should be only one standard of truth-
teUing, — to make one's plain word on aU occasions as heavy
as an oath. They took the idealist or Utopian position that
war must be utterly abolished in the interest of human
rights, and that every form of capital punishment must
cease, and that too at a time when it was inflicted for more
than two hundred offences.
They did not so much think these conclusions out as feel
their way to them, somewhat as Tolstoy has described, in
his " Confessions," his own conclusion on seeing a man exe
cuted: " I understood, not with my mind, but with my
whole being, that no theory of the reasonableness of any
present progress can justify this deed; and that though
everybody from the creation of the world, on whatever
theory, had held it to be necessary, / knew it to be unneces-

200 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
sary and bad." Exactly thus the Quakers felt and feel about
taking hfe in any form or for any reason.
They attacked not only the savagery of the criminal code,
but the barbaric prison as weU, urging, often to a heedless
world, that prisons should be for correction and reformation,
not for vengeance. The Quakers took care of their own poor
and they endeavored to create a new social conscience toward
poverty and the public responsibUity for it, which found its
finest expression in the Quaker saint of the eighteenth cen
tury, John Woolman. They were the prime movers in the
establishment of what was in the seventeenth century the
novel custom of having a single, fixed, price for goods and
merchandise, and they became, from the beginning of their
career, champions of the less favored races and of the man
who, for any reason, was hampered or handicapped.
They had advanced ideas of the rights of the people to
govern themselves and they worked out these ideas on a
large scale in colonial America. In Rhode Island the
Quakers held the governorship for thirty-six terms and for
more than a hundred years they formed a leading influence
in the political affairs of the colony. They founded Pennsyl
vania and shaped its development until the stormy period
of the French and Indian wars. They held the proprietor
ship of New Jersey and governed it until it became a royal
colony. Many of their members were in office in Maryland,
and under the governorship of the famous Quaker, John
Archdale, they profoundly shaped the political development
of the Carohnas.
But whUe they have thus, like John the Baptist, been
forerunners in great causes and have been loud voices crying
in the wUderness, they have not known how to grow and
expand with the growing world. They have shown a tend
ency to be over-interested in themselves, to spend their
energies on the preservation of their own peculiarities and

THE QUAKERS 201
to treat their discoveries as " sacred principles " to be held
and guarded rather than as truths to be propagated and
risked in the stern siftings of evolving society. If they once
more return to the robust spirit of their founders and gain
again the braver temper of these early innovators they may
have even yet a new era of hfe.

THE EPISCOPALIANS
GEORGE HODGES

THE EPISCOPALIANS
I. BEFORE THE AMERICAN REVOLUTION
THE first Episcopahans who appeared in New England
came as members of unsuccessful expeditions. In
these undertakings the prime mover was Sir Ferdinando
Gorges, commander of the port of Plymouth.
In 1605, George Weymouth had explored the Kennebec
River for forty mUes, had set up a cross as a mark of posses
sion, and had carried away with him several kidnapped
natives. These Indians had been taken into Sir Ferdinando's
household, and their enthusiastic descriptions of their native
land had impressed him greatly. In 1607, an attempt was
made at permanent colonization. Settlers were sent over
who found Weymouth's cross, and on the spot thus conse
crated a religious service was held by Sir Richard Seymour,
who was to be the chaplain of the colony. This was the first
service conducted by any English minister of religion within
the territory now caUed New England. The plans of the
settlers were defeated, however, by frost and fire. In the
midst of an uncommonly cold winter their houses were
burned, and they set sail for home.
Sir Ferdinando, undiscouraged, undertook presently a
larger enterprise. In 1620, King James graciously presented
to him and other patentees the entire coast of New England
from Narragansett to the Bay of Fundy. The company who
came to take possession of this territory were concerned not
only in the better establishment and regulation of trade but
in " the advancement of religion in those desert parts."
They had a missionary purpose. Being good churchmen,
205

206 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
they intended not only to enjoy the privileges of reUgion, but
to admit to these privileges their new neighbors, the Indians.
They entered New England in the name not only of the
crown but of the church. Thus, with Robert Gorges, Sir
Ferdinando's youngest son, the commander of the expedition,
came the Rev. William MoreU, to whom was committed, " I
know not," says Bradford, " what power and authority of
superintendancie over the churches, and sundry instructions
for that end." It was a matter in which the religious com
munity already existing at Plymouth was naturaUy interested.
The Massachusetts expedition, however, like its prede
cessor in Maine, failed. Gorges with most of his foUowers
returned to England. But MoreU continued on for the space
of a year. He was a very quiet gentleman, and showed no
disposition to assert his powers of episcopal supervision.
Indeed, it was only at the time when he finaUy went to
Plymouth to take passage from that port to London that
he informed the brethren as to the nature of his original
errand. MeanwhUe, he employed what he caUed his " melan
choly leisures " in writing a poem in Latin hexameters and
translating it into Enghsh verse. This was printed in London,
on his return in 1625, under the title, " New England, or A
Briefe Ennaration of the Ayre, Earth, Water, Fish, and
Fowles of that Country. With a Description of the Natures,
Orders, Habits, and Rehgion of the Natives." Bradford
says that he never showed his authority, or made any use
of it, because " it should seeme he saw it was in vaine."
Two of MoreU's friends stiU remained and spent the rest
of their lives in New England. When the Puritans came
over from Salem in 1629 to begin the settlement of Charles
town, they found Samuel Maverick proprietor of Noddle's
Island, or Chelsea, and WiUiam Blackstone proprietor of
the three mountains and other lands adjacent, now covered
by the city of Boston.

THE EPISCOPALIANS 207
They said of Maverick that he was " a man of loving and
courteous behaviour, very ready to entertaine strangers, yet
an enemy to the reformation in hand, being strong for the
lordly prelatical power." Although a layman he seems to
have been a stouter and much more aggressive churchman
than his clerical neighbor the Rev. WiUiam Blackstone, who
may have been intended as assistant to Mr. MoreU had the
plans of the colony been carried out, and who was quite as
unobtrusive a person as his chief, and quite as unregardful of
his duty to convert the Indians or the Puritans. His famous
saying, " I have come from England because I did not like
the lord bishops, but I cannot join with you because I would
not be under the lord brethren," indicates his place in the
ascending and descending scale of churchmanship. He was
content to live beside his spring of clear water, in the midst
of his green farm, watching the progress of the fruit trees
which he had planted. It is said that afterwards, in the
Providence Plantations, " near to Master WiUiams, but far
from his opinions," he resumed the exercise of his ministry;
but the name " Study Hill " which he gave to his new resi
dence, in what is now Lonsdale, R. L, shows the direction of
his real interests.
Two other early Christians of the Episcopal sort in New
England were not only equaUy lacking in any definite con
tribution to reUgion in these parts, but rather contributed —
so their Puritan neighbors said — to irreligion.
Already, in 1622, Thomas Morton had established him
self with a little congenial company at Merrymount, in the
present town of Quincy. There he combined the custom of
reading the prayers according to the rubrics of the church
with a manner of life which displeased and alarmed his more
sober neighbors. He was even more frank than Blackstone
in expressing his opinion of Puritans; he preferred Indians.
" I found two sorts of people," he says, " the one Christians,

208 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
the other infidels; these I found most full of humanity, and
more friendly than the other." It is no doubt true that
Morton was " more addicted to the feasts than to the fasts
of the church." He kept Christmas with much festivity,
and worshipped — the Puritans said — " the Roman God
dess Flora " by leading his household in a merry dance about
a Maypole. But Samuel Maverick found him a " gentle
man of good qualitie," and John Fiske says that the accusa
tion brought against him of setting up a " Schoole of athism "
was probably " based upon the fact that he used the Book
of Common Prayer." He did undoubtedly introduce an
element of serious danger into the situation by providing
bis friends, the natives, with rum and muskets. The com
bination menaced not only the peace but the very existence
of the settlements. Myles Standish came up from Plymouth
and dispersed the men of Merrymount. Endicott came over
from Salem and cut down the Maypole.
About the same time the Plymouth people were having
difficulty nearer home with another churchman, the Rev. John
Lyford. He had come over, by the appointment and at the
charge of the merchant adventurers who financed the Ply
mouth Colony, to be the pastor of the congregation. The
Plymouth people had desired Robinson of Leyden, but an
unfriendly majority sent Lyford in his place. The independ
ence of the parish was so far respected as to leave them free
to reject him U they wished. And this seems to have ap
peared not altogether unlikely. " We have sent you a
preacher," said the company, " an honest, plaine man,
though none of the most eminente and rare. About choosing
him into office use your owne hberty and discretion. He
knows he is no officer among you, though perhaps custom
and universahtie may make him forget himseU." At the
same time they sent a carpenter, who, they said, " is thought
to be the fittest man for you in aU the land, and wUl no doubt

THE EPISCOPALIANS 209
doe you much good." They had great confidence in the
carpenter. Under these difficult conditions Mr. Lyford entered upon
such duties as devolved upon an Episcopal minister set in
charge of a Separatist Congregation. The episcopal ele
ments in the situation he immediately adjusted to the en
vironment by behaving himself, on his first arrival, with
" that reverence and humUitie as is seldom to be seen,"
desiring to join their church, and being received into it after
a "large confession of his faith, and an acknowledgement of
his former disorderly walking. ' ' It was found, however, after a
little, that the new pastor, together with John Oldham, who
became his close friend, was writing letters to the company
fiUed with criticism of the brethren. The matter was a seri
ous one, for the colony was dependent on the company. And
the governor was certain of the guilt of Lyford, having taken
the precaution to open and read his letters. It appeared
by this correspondence that Lyford and Oldham and other
conspirators intended to withdraw from their neighbors and
set up a pubhc meeting apart, and, as they expressed it,
" have the sacraments." They were accordingly put on
trial for schism and sedition, and, with abundant aUowance
of time whether for repentance or for preparation, were
sentenced to expulsion. Bradford says nothing about the
use of the Prayer Book as one of their offences, but Morton,
in his New English Canaan declares that their essential
transgression consisted in their loyalty to the Church. " The
booke of common prayer," said their adversaries, " what
poore thing is that, for a man to reade in a booke ? No, no,
good sirs, I would you were neere us, you might receave
comfort by instruction — give me a man that hath the guiftes
of the spirit, not a booke in his hand."
Lyford and Oldham came up to Naumkeag, where they
joined Roger Conant in a scheme for a new settlement of

2IO RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
which Conant was to be the governor, Lyford the minister,
and Oldham the trader with the Indians. But Lyford, in
response to " a loving invitation," went to Virginia, where
he shortly after died. It was in celebration of the peaceful
adjustment of differences between Conant's men and Endi-
cott's men that Naumkeag was caUed Salem. In 1629, for
the further preservation of this peace, the brothers Brown,
Samuel and John, were sent away. The settlers had defi
nitely organized themselves into a Congregational Society,
after the pattern of Plymouth. The Browns protested and
declared that so far as they were concerned they would
continue to use the Book of Common Prayer. They were
informed that there was no convenient place in New England
for the use of that book, certainly not in Salem. They
were put on board the next returning ship, and sent to
England. Meanwhile, the enthusiasm of Sir Ferdinando continued.
Leaving for the moment the Puritans of Massachusetts in
possession, he secured in 1635, a grant of the country between
the Kennebec and the Merrimac, to which was given the
name of Maine. For this province he planned a government,
under a royal charter, in which religion was established ac
cording to the doctrines and disciphne of the Church of
England. The Rev. Richard Gibson was the first minister in
this district, having his church and parsonage at Ports
mouth, N. H. The second minister was the Rev. Robert
Jordan of Casco, now called Portland.
This situation, with an Episcopal colony north of the
Merrimac and a Puritan colony south of it, was most dis
pleasing to the Puritans, one of whose chief purposes in
coming to these shores had been to get as far away as possible
from prelatical Episcopalians. It was therefore with much
satisfaction that they discovered that the Merrimac, instead
of proceeding in a straight hne from west to east, had a

THE EPISCOPALIANS 211
sharp turn in it, and came down out of some unknown region
in the north; for the boundary line was described in the
charter as three miles north of the Merrimac. Where then
did that river begin ? Endicott sent men up to find out, and
they located the source of the river in Lake Winnepesaukee.
There on a convenient rock they cut the name of John Endi
cott, and their own initials : E. J. for Edward Johnson, who
wrote the Wonder-Working Providence of Sion's Saviour,
S. W. for Captain Simon WUlard. The inscription is legible
to this day. Then they measured from a point three miles
north straight across the map and thus established the upper
boundary of Massachusetts on a line running from Lake
Winnepesaukee to Casco Bay. By this ingenious procedure
the Puritans by a single motion of a pencil along the edge
of a ruler, included within their own lawful possessions
practicaUy aU of the Episcopal colony that was worth hav
ing. That was in 1652, when the Commonwealth was in
power in England. Already Dr. Gibson, for opposing the
encroachments of Massachusetts, had been put out of his
parish. Mr. Jordan, persisting in the use of the Prayer
Book, baptizing children, and using the service of marriage,
was several times fined and imprisoned. When he died, in
1679, there was no Episcopal minister remaining in the whole
territory of New England.
Of course, in a sense, aU of the Puritan ministers were
Episcopalians. They had been ordained in the Church of
England. In the Anglican Communion, then as now, there
were two parties, Low Church and High Church. The
adjectives indicated the importance which they attached
to the Liturgy and to the Episcopate. Under the ill-advised
urging of the High Church brethren, led by Archbishop
Laud, the Low Church brethren had come to the conviction
that the Liturgy and the Episcopate were of no importance

212 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
whatever. They were in the curious position of Episco
palians who disused the Prayer Book and defied the bishops.
Thus, Higginson, taking leave of England, in 1629, said,
" We wiU not say, as the separatists were wont to say at
their leaving of England, ' FareweU, Babylon! fareweU,
Rome! ' but we wiU say, FareweU, dear England! fareweU,
the Church of God in England, and aU the Christian friends
there! We do not go to New England as separatists from
the Church of England; though we cannot but separate
from the corruptions of it; but we go to practice the positive
part of church reformation, and propagate the gospel in
America." And Winthrop said, " We esteem it an honor
to caU the Church of England, from whence we rise, our dear
mother, and cannot part from our native land, where she
speciaUy resides, without much sadness of heart and many
tears in our eyes. For acknowledging that such hope and
faith as we have obtained in the common salvation we have
received in her bosom and sucked it from her breasts, we leave
itnot, therefore, asloathing that milk wherewith we were nour
ished there; but, blessing God for parentage and education
as members of the same God, shah always rejoice in her good,
and unfeignedly grieve for any sorrow that shaU ever betide
her, and, whUe we draw breath, sincerely desire and endeavor
the continuance and abundance of her welfare, with the
enlargement of her bounds in the kingdom of Christ Jesus."
These men were churchmen. John Cotton was a church
man; so were Hooker and Shepard. John Harvard was a
churchman. The name " Puritan," by which they were
caUed, meant what " Low Churchman " means today, and
designated a party not outside the church but within it.
That their low-churchmanship, beginning with non-con
formity to detaUs which they considered unessential, widened
presently into separation, was due in part to the long space
of ocean which lay between them and England, and to their

THE EPISCOPALIANS 213
natural neighborliness with the godly separatists of Ply
mouth, but stiU more to the war which embittered the old
controversies with the tragedies of battle. It was not Win
throp, nor Higginson, but Charles and Laud who carried the
New England Puritans outside the Church of England.
When the Commonwealth and the Protectorate were over,
and the crown and the church were together restored in
England, the division in religion on these shores was empha
sized by the pohtical situation. The Puritan colony of
Massachusetts was made a royal province, and in 1686, the
ship which brought Joseph Dudley to be president of Massa
chusetts, Maine, and New Hampshire, brought also the
Rev. Robert Ratchffe to conduct the services of the Book
of Common Prayer in Boston. Thus came the Church
of England in company with the tyranny of the Stuarts.
The Puritans were quite right in identifying the religious
with the political situation. Governor Cranfield of New
Hampshire had written to England to express his humble
opinion, as a churchman, " that it will be absolutely neces
sary to admit no person into any place of trust, but such as
wiU take the sacrament and are conformable to the rites of
the Church of England." This was a proposition to com
pletely reverse the existing order, to disestablish the Puritan
theocracy and put the Church of England in the place of it.
Cranfield said further, " I utterly despair of any true duty
and obedience paid to his Majesty untU their coUege be
suppressed and their ministers silenced." The endeavor to
put these ideas into effect in New Hampshire had not been
successful. But nobody could safely predict the immediate
future in Massachusetts.
When, therefore, Judge Sewall wrote in his Diary under
date of Sabbath, May 30, 1686, " My son reads to me in
course the 26th of Isaiah, and we sing the 141st psalm, both
exceedingly suited to the day wherein there is to be worship

214 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
according to the Church of England as 'tis called, in the town-
house by countenance of authority," we look for expressions
of pious fear and righteous indignation. The Isaiah passage
might have been taken by an unprejudiced reader to welcome
the advent of true religion: " Open ye the gates, that the
righteous nation which keepeth the truth may enter in."
But the psalm uttered the emotions of the Puritan soul:
" Lord, I cry unto thee, make haste unto me. Incline not
my heart to any evil thing, to practice wicked works with
men that work iniquity, and let me not eat of their dainties.
Our bones are scattered at the grave's mouth, as when one
cutteth and cleaveth wood upon the earth. Keep me from
the snares which they have laid for me, and the gins of the
workers of iniquity. Let the wicked fall into their own nets,
whilst that I withal escape."
It was a week later, on June 6, that the building was actu
aUy used for the first time. Apphcation had been made for
the use of one of the three meeting-houses, but had been
refused, and the service was said in " the library room in
the east end of the town-house," on the site of the present
building of the Old State House. At the same time wardens
were elected, and " Mr. Smith the joiner " was employed
to make twelve benches to seat the congregation. In the
middle of August the senior warden was asking Judge SewaU
for a contribution toward the building of a church, " and
seemed to go away displeased," says Sewall, " because I
spake not up to it." Meanwhile, we learn from a letter
written by Edward Randolph, who was the most zealous
churchman in these parts, that the company of the faithful
was increasing beyond expectation. They had left the
library of the town-house for the Exchange, where they had
" Common Prayer and two sermons every Sunday, and at
seven o'clock in the morning on Wednesdays and Fridays
the whole service of the church."

THE EPISCOPALIANS 215
In December of that year, Sir Edmund Andros became
governor. On the very day of his arrival he asked for a
meeting-house in which the church service might be held,
suggesting some adjustment of time so that the Episcopa
lians and the Puritans might use the same building at dif
ferent hours on the same day. The Puritan ministers met
and agreed that they " could not with a good conscience
consent that our meeting-house should be made use of for the
Common-Prayer worship." Saturday of that week was
Christmas Day, and the governor, who had absented him
self from the Thursday Lecture, went to the church service
twice. Nothing of further importance happened until Lent.
Then on the Tuesday of Holy Week, the governor viewed
the three meeting-houses. On Wednesday, he sent Randolph
for the key of the South Church. We teU him, says Judge
SewaU, " that we can't consent to part with it to such use."
No matter; on Good Friday, March 25, 1687, the sexton,
" Goodman Needham, though he had resolved to the con
trary, was prevailed upon to ring the bell, and open the door
at the governor's command." Note is made that Smith the
joiner and HiU the shoemaker were " very busy about it."
On Easter Day, the Episcopahans met in the South Meeting
house at eleven, teUing the proprietors to come at half-past
one, but the service lasted until after two. " 'Twas a sad
sight," says Sewall, " to see how fuU the street was with
people gazing and moving to and fro, because they had not
entrance into the house."
This arrangement was so inconvenient, and served so
continually to increase the common enmity against the in
vading church, that the governor and his councU took a
corner of the burying-ground and proceeded there to erect
another buUding for their own undivided use. The founda
tions were laid in October, 1688, and the first service in the

2l6 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
new church was said on Sunday, June 8, 1689. Already,
however, in England the Restoration had been followed by
the Revolution. Out went King James, in came King
William. Before the church was completed, Randolph and
Andros were expeUed; within a month after the first ser
vice, the Rev. Robert Ratchffe prudently returned to
England. The enthusiasm of the Puritans exercised itself
upon the buUding, whose windows were broken, and its
doors and waUs defiled with filth (a contemporary record
says), " in the rudest and basest manner imaginable."
Thus ended the second chapter in the history of the Epis
copahans in New England.
The affiliation of the churchmen with the House of Stuart
has obscured the fact that they were contending for religious
hberty. It is true that they were of the same temper and
disposition as the Puritans themselves and opposed the Puri
tan unUormity in the hope of establishing an Episcopal uni
formity in the place of it. They were thus behind Roger
WiUiams, the Baptist, and WiUiam Robinson, the Quaker,
who were their partners in substantiaUy the same business;
for WiUiams and Robinson asked only the right to hve in
Massachusetts in peace. But they were on the general level
of their age. Puritans and churchmen agreed in their con
scientious insistence on the principle of uniformity in rehgion.
They disagreed in their idea of the rehgion under whose
authority aU men must be brought. It is nevertheless a fact
that in the history of New England their two negatives made
one great affirmative. Randolph and Andros — naturaUy
maUgned by their Puritan neighbors but honest and devout
gentlemen notwithstanding — dealt a blow against intoler
ance, under which the whole substance of the Puritan ad
ministration staggered. They succeeded, in spite of the
Puritans, in building in Boston a church of their own kind,
and in securing freedom to worship God in their own way.

THE EPISCOPALIANS 217
The third attempt of the Episcopahans to cultivate the
reluctant soU of New England was directed by the Society
for the Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign Parts.
As early as 1649, a Society for the Propagation of the
Gospel in New England had been projected, but the behead
ing of King Charles and the pohtical and ecclesiastical
changes which ensued had prevented its organization. In
1 66 1, King Charles II had incorporated " several persons
into one Society or Company for Propagation of the Gospel
in New England and parts adjacent in America." The pur
pose, as set forth in the charter, was to convert the " heathen
natives." It was remarked, however, in the same document,
that it was " the unhappiness of New England and the ad
joining parts to be first planted and inhabited by persons
who were generally disaffected to the church by law estab
hshed in England," and it was felt to be necessary to provide
for a " regular and orthodox ministry to be sent and settled
among them, to remove those prejudices under which the
people generally labored, and to promote, as much as pos
sible, an agreement in faith and worship in order to the
recommending our holy religion to unbelievers." As the
century came to an end, and further changes in politics
suggested further changes in religion, it seemed wise to found
a society which should take under its charge the advance
ment of religion not in New England only, but in other
colonies also. The Society for the Propagation of the Gospel
in Foreign Parts was accordingly estabhshed in 1701. This
society sent over, as a travelling missionary, the Rev. George
Keith. Keith was already acquainted with America, having been
a Quaker preacher in Philadelphia. He arrived in Boston
in June, 1702, and was kindly received both by the governor
and the deputy-governor and by the Rev. Samuel Miles and
the Rev. Christopher Bridge, who had succeeded Robert Rat-

21 8 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
chffe as minister in charge of what Keith in his Journal caUs
the Queen's Chapel. There he held forth in a manner which,
he says, " did greatly alarm the independent preachers."
Increase Mather immediately printed a reply to Keith's
sermon, and Keith printed a reply to Mather. On Wednes
day, July i, the missionary attended the commencement
exercises at Harvard College, and " having heard Mr. Sam
uel Willard, president of the college, at the said commence
ment maintain some assertion that seemed to me," he
says, " very unsound, the next day I writ a letter to him in
Latin, showing my great distaste to those his assertions."
Keith printed his letter, Willard printed a reply to Keith,
and Keith printed a reply to WiUard. In this aggressive
manner the representative of the Society began his mission.
His chief controversy, however, was with the Quakers,
whose errors he knew by personal experience. In Lynn, in
Salem, in Hampton, in Dover, then in Newport, and other
places in Rhode Island, he appeared in Quaker meetings to
the great disturbance of the peace. Thence he went to
New York, and to Philadelphia, and even, as he said on the
title-page of his Report, to " Caratuck," in North Carohna.
Keith spent two years in this peregrination, caUing to
gether the people of the Church of England, holding services
according to the Book of Common Prayer, and advising the
Society in London as to the places to which they might send
regular and orthodox ministers to the best advantage.
The seed thus planted in New England came first to flower
and fruit in Rhode Island. The Society sent to Newport
the Rev. James Honeyman, aUowing to the minister an annual
stipend of fifty pounds, and fifteen pounds in addition " to
wards furnishing and adorning their church with a chahce,
patten, cloth for pulpit and communion table, and other
ornaments." A church was buUt then in 1702, and in 1703
the minister and vestry reported that they were buUding a

THE EPISCOPALIANS 219
steeple and enlarging the church by a new gaUery. This
structure is stUl standing, as is also the Narragansett
Church, erected in 1707. St. Michael's Church was founded
in Bristol in 17 19, and St. John's Church, then caUed King's
Chapel, in Providence, in 1722.
The original seal of the Society showed a ship with sails
set arriving at these shores, in the prow a black-gowned
parson holding an open Bible, and on the land the heathen
natives hastening from aU directions with outstretched,
welcoming hands. This vision of the conversion of the
Indians was never realized. The heathen natives proved
to be actively hostile. The work of the Society affected
only the Enghsh settlers. It consisted in part in giving
much-needed financial aid, helping to pay salaries and to
buUd churches; but stiU more, in providing the new parishes
with ministers of good character. The Society was exceed
ingly careful about the men whom it selected. Their records
were examined, testimonials were required from their bishops,
excellent suggestions were made as to the details of their
grave demeanor, and they were expected to make regular
reports of their ministrations. If they laid themselves open
to serious complaints from their parishioners or others, they
were recaUed. Even the manner in which they conducted
their inevitable controversies was examined. Mr. John
Checkley of Boston was so zealous, animated, and outspoken
in his defence of episcopacy that he found it difficult to get
a bishop to ordain him.
This high standard of clerical character was stiU further
maintained by a remarkable series of accessions to the min
istry of the Episcopalians from the ministry of the Congre
gationahsts and Presbyterians. The first of these converts
was the Rev. Timothy Cutler.
In 1722, at the close of the commencement exercises of
Yale CoUege, the president and faculty requested a confer-

220 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
ence with the trustees, and presented to them an extraordi
nary statement. " Reverend Gentlemen," they said,
" having represented to you the difficulties which we labor
under in relation to our continuance out of the visible com
munion of an Episcopal Church, and a state of seeming op
position thereto, either as private Christians or as officers,
and so being insisted on by some of you (after our repeated
declarations of it) that we should sum up our case in writing,
we do (though with great reluctance, fearing the conse
quences of it) submit to and comply with it: And signify
to you that some of us doubt the validity, and the rest of
us are more fuUy persuaded of the invalidity, of Presby
terian ordination in opposition to Episcopal, and should be
heartily thankful to God and man if we may receive from
them satisfaction therein, and shall be wUUng to embrace
your good counsels and instructions in relation to this im
portant affair as far as God shall direct and dispose us to do."
This statement was signed by the two gentlemen who then
composed the Yale faculty : Cutler, the president, and Daniel
Brown, the tutor; and also by five Congregational ministers.
President Woolsey, recalling the event on the occasion of
the one-hundred-and-fif tieth anniversary of the founding of
the college, said, "I suppose that greater alarm would scarcely
be awakened now if the theological faculty were to declare
for the Church of Rome, avow their belief in transubstanti
ation, and pray to the Virgin Mary."
The fear of the consequences which the signers frankly
confessed was immediately justified. The trustees asked
for the resignations of Brown and Cutler, and voted to re
quire of their successors before taking office a declaration
of assent to the Saybrook Confession of faith and an assur
ance of opposition to " prelatical corruptions." Cutler
and Brown started at once for England to be ordained, and
with them went Samuel Johnson, one of the Congregational

THE EPISCOPALIANS 221
divines. Brown died of smallpox, the besetting plague of
ocean travellers at that time, but his friends returned, Cutler
to Boston, Johnson to Stratford in Connecticut. That was
in the spring of 1723.
On the 15th of April in that year was laid the corner-stone
of Christ Church, Boston, and in September Dr. Cutler
became the first rector of that parish. The first service was
said in the completed church on the 29th of December.
The buUding remains to this day, in excellent condition,
recently restored, the oldest house of worship in the city.
In 1735, Trinity Church was built in Boston by a parish so
financially substantial as to need no aid from the Venerable
Society. The Rev. Addington Davenport was the first rec
tor. Peter FaneuU contributed a hundred pounds towards
the purchase of an organ.
Already, in 1715, St. Michael's Church had been built in
Marblehead. The second rector, the Rev. David Mosson,
after a ministry of nine years, removed to Virginia, where
he had as a parishioner George Washington, at whose mar
riage to Mrs. Custis he officiated.
In 1 71 2, the Society had appointed a minister to take
charge of a congregation in Newbury in consequence of a
serious division of the Congregationahsts concerning the
location of a church building. This buUding having been
erected on Pipe-stem HiU, the people who wanted it on " the
plains " became Episcopahans.
Meanwhile, the Episcopalians were prospering in Con
necticut. It was after the Revolution that President Ezra
StUes of Yale noted in his diary a list of some twenty dis
quieting signs of the times which, he said, kept him awake
at night. One of these he described as " an alarming increase
of wickedness and episcopacy." The increase of episcopacy
started with Johnson. When he and Brown and Cutler
began to read Church of England theology in the library of

222 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
Yale CoUege, there was not an Episcopal minister in the
colony. When Johnson settled in Stratford and in 1724
completed the building of a church, he was the only clergy
man of his order in that part of the country. Then came
Henry Caner, of the class of 1724, whom Johnson instructed
in theology, and who afterwards became rector of King's
Chapel in Boston. " A love to the Church," wrote Johnson,
" gains ground greatly in the coUege. Several young men
that are graduates, and some young ministers, are very
uneasy out of the communion of the Church, and some of
them seem much disposed to come into her service." Two
of these, Pierson and Brown, went to England for ordination.
Samuel Seabury, whose son became the first bishop of Con
necticut, came in from the Congregational ministry. So
did Beach of Watertown, Punderson of Groton, and BUss
of Hartford. Within twenty years from the beginning of
Johnson's ministry fourteen churches had been built. Pun
derson became the first rector of a parish in New Haven,
and built a wooden church on the site stUl occupied, at a
time when it was said that the door-sill of the new buUding
was wide enough " to furnish seats for aU the men of the
Episcopal famUies in the town."
In 1729, the Episcopal Church in Rhode Island, and
throughout the New England colonies, was reinforced by
a visit from Dean Berkeley.
George Berkeley, dean of Derry and afterwards bishop of
Cloyne, was already a phUosopher of eminent distinction.
His Principles of Human Knowledge, published in 1709,
had begun a revolution in speculative science. He had pro
pounded his characteristic theory that nothing exists apart
from mind. This theory had not prevented him from form
ing a conviction of the incalculable importance of the Ameri
can colonies. He foresaw for these settlements a vaster
future than was dreamed of by any of his countrymen. He

THE EPISCOPALIANS 223
perceived the Star of Empire moving toward the West.
Berkeley was so attractive a person that Miss Vanhomrigh,
Dean Swift's friend, bequeathed him half her property after
meeting him once at dinner. It is not surprising, therefore,
that he should have been able to persuade Sir Robert Wal-
pole to look with favor on his plan to found a college in
the Bermudas for the benefit of the Americans. Walpole
promised a grant of twenty thousand pounds to endow this
institution, but suggested that Berkeley would be more
likely to get it if he went to America. Eventually, the
promise came to nothing, but Berkeley's residence here for
two years was productive of great good.
Mr. Honeyman of Newport was in the midst of his sermon
on a Sunday morning when word was brought him that the
Dean of Derry had arrived, and he came down from the
pulpit, closed the service, and led the whole congregation
to the landing to meet him. Johnson of Stratford came to
consult him concerning the charter of the College of PhUa-
delphia, now the University of Pennsylvania, and concern
ing the charter of King's CoUege, now Columbia University.
Johnson had dechned the presidency of the former of these
institutions, to which he was nominated by Benjamin Frank
lin, and had accepted the presidency of the latter. Berkeley's
ideas directed the original course of each of these Episcopal
foundations. The great immediate value of his residence,
however, was in the fact that the Episcopal Church possessed
in him a representative whose intellectual distinction and
saintly character every Puritan minister in the country
recognized. The next influential churchman to visit these shores was
George Whitefield. He came to Boston in 1740 in the time
of the Great Awakening.
Jonathan Edwards in Northampton and George White-
field and John Wesley in London had discovered a new way

224 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
to become a Christian. They had each of them entered into
a new consciousness of God and a new assurance of salvation
through a psychological experience. Among the factors of
this experience were an awful horror of heU, a profound sense
of sin, a definite perception of Christ as the Saviour of their
individual soul, and a resulting spiritual confidence and joy.
They began to lead others along the steps of this experience.
The results were astonishing. In a time of general unbehef
and unusual indifference to religion they were able to appeal
effectively to the conscience of thousands, and to bring
them to conviction. The fear of hell which they aroused
in their auditors as the beginning of their new treatment of
souls, and the certainty of heaven with which the treatment
was completed gave rise to scenes of extraordinary emotion.
Nothing quite like it had ever taken place among such
multitudes. By a natural process of reasoning, based on the actual
results of the method, the preachers of the new way were led
to maintain that it was the only way. Not by the sacraments
of baptism and the Holy Communion, not by Christian
nurture and gradual growth in grace, not by the hving of a
holy hfe, were people to enter into the Kingdom of God, but
of a sudden, with great violence, through a passionate emo
tional experience. And presently the leaders did not hesitate
to say that nobody was a Christian, no matter how good, —
no Episcopal clergyman with his Book of Common Prayer,
no Puritan minister with his orthodox theology and his
austere righteousness of life — nobody was a Christian
unless he had passed through this experience of definite
conversion. Whitefield came preaching this new doctrine. He was
an ordained minister of the Church of England, but his
churchmanship was of a piece with that of the Puritans of
the early colonization of Massachusetts who considered the

THE EPISCOPALIANS 225
liturgy and episcopacy as of no importance. It made no
difference to Whitefield where he preached, whether in an
Episcopal church or in a Congregational meeting-house, or
on Boston Common. All ministers looked alike to him,
whether they wore surplices or Geneva gowns. Indeed, he
included them all alike under the condemnation of being
little better than the heathen unless they had been con
verted. Dr. Colman of the Brattle Street Church invited White-
field to Boston. Dr. Cutler, meeting him in the street, said
to him frankly, " I am sorry to see you here "; to which
Whitefield replied, "So is the devU." He visited Ipswich,
Marblehead, Salem, Newburyport, and Portsmouth, preach
ing everywhere to vast multitudes. In Cambridge he spoke
at the coUege: " scarce as big," he said, " as one of our least
coUeges at Oxford " and " not superior in piety." He found
the tutors and students reading " bad books "; meaning, as
the context shows, the theological works of Archbishop
Tillotson. " Boston," he wrote in his journal, " is a large
populous place, and very wealthy. It has kept the form up
very weU, but has lost much of the power of religion."
" The pride of lUe," he said, " is to be seen in their assem
blies. Jewels, patches, and gay apparel are commonly
worn by the female sex. I observed little boys and girls
commonly dressed up in the pride of life, and the infants
that were brought to baptism were wrapped up in such finery
that one would think they were brought thither to be initi
ated into, rather than to renounce, the pomps and vanities
of this wicked world."
Dr. Cutler described Whitefield's visit, in a letter to a
friend: Whitefield has plagued us with a witness. It would be an endless
attempt to describe the scene of confusion and disturbance occasioned
by him; the divisions of families, neighborhoods and towns; the con-

226 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
trariety of husbands and wives; the undutifulness of children and serv
ants; the quarrels among the teachers; the disorders of the night;
the intermission of labour and business; the neglect of husbandry
and the gathering of the harvest. ... In many communities several
preaching, and several exhorting or praying, at the same time, the
rest crying, or laughing, yelping, sprawling or fainting. This revel
in some places has been maintained many days and nights together.
When Mr. Whitefield first arrived here, the whole town was alarmed.
He made his first visit to church on a Friday, and canvassed with
many of our clergy together, and belied them, me especially, when he
had gone. Being not invited into our pulpits, the Dissenters were
highly pleased, and engrossed him; and immediately bells rang, and
all hands went to lecture. This show kept on all the while he was here.
The town was ever alarmed; the streets were filled with people with
coaches and chairs, ah for the benefit of that holy man. The con
venticles were crowded; but he rather chose the Common, where
multitudes might see him in ah his awful postures; besides, in one
crowded conventicle, six were killed in a fight before he came in; but
he ever anathematized the Church of England, and that was enough.
After him came one Tennant, a monster, impudent and noisy, and
told them they were ah Damned! damned! damned ! This charmed
them, and, in the most dreadful winter I ever saw, people wallowed
in the snow, night and day, for the benefit of his beastly brayings.
That this description was not due to prelatical prejudices
appears from a like account given by Dr. Chauncy of the
First Church. He says that Whitefield spoke in every
sermon about the unconverted ministers, calling them carnal,
unregenerate wretches, and enemies of Christ, the worst
He had. The people, he adds, were praying, screaming,
singing, and jumping up and down, " the whole with a very
great noise to be heard at a mUe's distance."
The effect of the Great Awakening upon the Episcopal
Church was, in part, to set a further separation between
the Episcopahans and their pious neighbors. The church
men held aloof from the revival meetings, and were thought
to have no vital piety. At the same time the sobriety of the
Episcopal services, and the quietness and general sanity of

THE EPISCOPALIANS 227
the Episcopal system, attracted into the church considerable
numbers of persons whom the methods of the revival
preachers had repeUed. They were of the mind of the man
on whose tombstone in the Copps Hill burying-ground is the
inscription: " He was an enemy to enthusiasm," — meaning
by " enthusiasm " the unrestrained emotion and the dis
orderly behaviour of the disciples of Whitefield.
Then the political situation grew every year more tense,
and here again the Episcopalians were on the unpopular
side. Not aU of them — Washington was a churchman, —
but a good many of them, especially among the clergy.
The Church of England was their mother church; they
prayed regularly for the King. The representatives of the
English government were most of them churchmen. So
were many of the landed proprietors, owners of fine houses,
as in Cambridge, on Brattle Street, caUed Tory Row, or
Church Row, the adjectives being considered synonymous.
The plain people in the pleasant parishes were quite as likely
as their Puritan neighbors to cast in their lot with the
patriots, but the wardens and their families, and the clergy,
linked to England by a thousand ties of association and
relationship and affection, were likely to be royalists. On the
1 8th of April, 1775, it was the sexton of Christ Church who
hung the lanterns in the tower to direct the midnight ride
of Paul Revere. On that very day the rector, the Rev.
Mather Byles, Jr., handed in his resignation.
II. AFTER THE AMERICAN REVOLUTION
The benefactions of the Society for the Propagation of the
Gospel had been a great help, but also a serious hindrance,
to the Episcopal churches of New England. The Society was
most generous, and by its assistance buildings were erected
and salaries were paid, but the effect was to provide the

228 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
parishes with ministers who had been born and brought up
and educated in England, and who were dependent for their
hving upon the English church. In Connecticut, owing
to accessions from the Congregationalists, there was a con
siderable number of native clergymen, but elsewhere the
conditions were such as to connect the Episcopal clergy with
England in bonds both of dependence and of affection such
as did not exist in any other communion. The liturgy with
its prayers for the King laid a further burden on the Episco
pal conscience.
The result was that the American Revolution, which
affected aU the churches, brought the Episcopal Church to
the very edge of extinction.
When the war was over only two parishes survived in
Maine, one at Gardiner and the other at Portland, and
neither of them had a minister.
In New Hampshire there were two parishes, one at Ports
mouth, the other at Claremont. The Portsmouth parish
had had for its rector the Rev. Arthur Browne, who appeared
at the marriage of Lady Wentworth in the Tales of a Way
side Inn. The Claremont parish had been organized by the
Rev. Samuel Peters, whose General History of Connecticut
contained the famous spurious collection of forty-five Puri
tan regulations, known as the " Blue Laws." In 1775, the
rector, the Rev. Ranna Cossit, wrote to the Society: " I have
constantly kept up public services, without any omissions
for the King and royal family and likewise made use of the
prayers for the High Court of Parliament and the prayers
used in time of war and tumults. The number of my parish
ioners and communicants in Claremont are increased, but
I have been crueUy distressed with fines for refusing entirely
to fight against the King. In sundry places where I used to
officiate the church are all dwindled away. Some have fled
to the King's army for protection, some are banished and

THE EPISCOPALIANS 229
many are dead." He added, " I have been by the committee
confined as prisoner in the town of Claremont since the 12 th
of April, 1775; yet God has preserved my life from the rage
of the people." That was in 1779. In 1794 a meeting of the
parish was held to " see upon what terms they will join the
Congregational people in hiring Mr. Whiting." Mr. Whiting
was " to officiate alternately at the church and at the meeting
house." But this endeavor after Christian unity the Con
gregational people declined.
In Rhode Island there were four parishes, — Trinity, New
port, St. Paul's, Kingston (the " Narragansett Church "),
St. Michael's, Bristol, and St. John's, Providence. The
Bristol church was burned by British soldiers. The rector
of the Providence church, in July, 1776, "was pleased to
absent himself from duty, though very earnestly requested
to keep up the worship, saying he could not, as prayers for
King George were forbidden."
In Massachusetts there were fourteen parishes. But Dr.
Caner of King's Chapel, on the occasion of the evacuation
of Boston by the British in 1776, had fled to Nova Scotia,
in company with a considerable part of his congregation.
He left a memorandum stating that " an unnatural rebellion
of the colonies against his majesty's government obhged
the loyal part of his subjects to evacuate their dwellings and
substance, and take refuge in Halifax, London, and else
where. By which means the public worship at King's
Chapel became suspended and is likely to remain so until
it shall please God in the course of his Providence, to change
the hearts of the rebels, or give success to his majesty's arms
for suppressing the rebellion."
In the minute-book of the vestry of Christ Church, Boston,
there are two blank pages between the 6th of September,
1774, and the 31st of March, 1779. On the second date the
rector was desired to prepare a proper form of prayer for

230 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
Congress, for the several states, and for their "success in the
present important contest," to be used daily in the church.
Such prayers had been used in Trinity Church, by the Rev.
Samuel Parker, during the Revolution, and the parish had
been maintained in consequence.
The Rev. East Apthorp had left the pleasant house which
he had buUt for his residence in Cambridge, which his Puri
tan neighbors called in derision the " bishop's palace," and
had gone to England. Christ Church, used for barracks by
the Revolutionary soldiers, had been cleared for divine service,
at the request of Mrs. Washington, on the last day of 1775,
but thereafter, until 1790, stood empty, open to the weather.
Only five clergymen were found in Massachusetts in 1787
to sign a protest against the ordination of James Freeman.
In Connecticut, when the Revolution began, there were
twenty Episcopal clergymen and forty parishes. At the
end of the war there were fourteen clergymen remaining,
but in the midst of diminished parishes, and subject to the
suspicion and the ill-wiU of their patriotic neighbors. The
church in Fairfield had been destroyed when General Tryon
burned the town. The church in New London had suffered
a like fate at the hands of Benedict Arnold. The church in
Norwalk lay in ashes. Other church buUdings had been
plundered and defaced, some by British soldiers, some by
patriots. Of the clergy, some had fled, some had been im
prisoned, some had been mobbed. Mr. Graves of Norwich,
persisting in praying for the King, had been " brought ex
peditiously to the level of the floor." Mr. Beach in the course
of a bold sermon against rebellion had been fired at by an
aggrieved parishioner; the mark of the buUet is stUl to be
seen in the sounding-board of the church at Redding.
Under these hard conditions the Episcopalians of New
England gathered themselves together when the storm of
war was past. They were a feeble folk, few in number,

THE EPISCOPALIANS 23 1
deprived of the financial assistance on which they had de
pended, and under suspicion both in religion and in politics.
They were commonly considered to have neither piety nor
patriotism; having held aloof both from the Great Awaken
ing and from the Revolution. They were held to be the
votaries of a foreign religion, which was identified in the
general mind with aristocracy, and monarchy, and tyranny,
and with malignant opposition to the freedom of the colonies.
At a time when almost everybody hated England, these
brethren belonged to the Church of England.
And they had no leader. More serious than the distrust
and enmity of their neighbors was this radical weakness.
In a church called Episcopal because it is administered by
bishops, they were without a bishop.
This lack had long been felt. In the Southern colonies the
church had been discredited by unworthy ministers over
whom there was no official supervision. In New England,
the Society had exercised an authority which had prevented
such a situation; but, even so, every candidate for holy
orders was obhged to go to England for his ordination. The
journey was not only long and expensive but dangerous.
Passengers across the ocean were in peril of smallpox from
within and of pirates from without. Johnson wrote to the
Bishop of London " that a considerable number of young
gentlemen, of the best educated among us, for want of
Episcopal ordination, decline the ministry, unwiUing to
expose themselves to the dangers of the sea and distempers;
so that the fountain of aU our misery is the want of a bishop,
for whom there are many thousands of souls in this country
who impatiently long and pray."
This appeal, with many others like it, was met in England
with indifference, and in this country, especiaUy in New
England, with hostUity. In England, the American planta
tions seemed exceedingly remote and of smaU importance

232 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
and the minds both of statesmen and of churchmen were
occupied with imperative problems at home. In New Eng
land the bishops were thought of not as spiritual but as
pohtical persons, agents of oppression, enemies of hberty,
successors of Archbishop Laud. John Adams, considering
the matter with an unprejudiced mind, said that " the ob
jection was not only to the office of a bishop, though that
was dreaded, but to the authority of Parliament, on which
it must be founded. The reasoning," he said, "was this:
There is no power less than Parliament which can create
bishops in America. But if Parliament can erect dioceses
and create bishops, they may introduce the whole hierarchy,
establish titles, establish religion, forbid dissenters, make
schism heresy, impose penalties extending to hfe and limb
as well as to Uberty and property." A cartoon, perhaps in
caricature of the seal of the Society, represented a bishop
in the prow of a ship, pelted with books and other missiles
by angry colonists on the shore, and crying, " Lord, now
lettest thou thy servant depart in peace." The protesting
mob are caUing out, " No Lords, spiritual or temporal, in
New England ! "
This opposition was found even among churchmen. As
late as 1785, the clergy and laity of South Carohna agreed
to meet in convention with their brethren of the other states
only on condition that they should never be compelled to
have a bishop. The idea of a missionary bishop had no place
in the general mind. Almost everybody pictured a bishop
as a prelatical and domineering person having his residence
in an Episcopal palace, from which he emerged only to go
about in a coach drawn by four horses. It was felt that there
were few roads in America convenient for a coach-and-four.
When, however, the successful Revolution effected the
complete political independence of the colonies, the situation
was greatly changed. The Congregationalists and Presby-

THE EPISCOPALIANS 233
terians, while they stiU disapproved of bishops, were not
now afraid of them. Accordingly, in March, 1783, when the
independence of the United States had become an accom
plished fact, though before the formal proclamation of peace,
ten of the fourteen clergy of Connecticut met at the rectory
of St. Paul's Church in Woodbury and elected a man to go
to England to seek Episcopal consecration.
Samuel Seabury who was chosen for this difficult mission
was the son of a Congregational minister who had entered
the Episcopal Church. He had graduated at Yale in the
class of 1748, had studied both medicine and theology, and
in 1753 had been ordained in England. During his rector
ship of St. Paul's Church, Westchester, N. Y., from 1766
to 1775, he had taken the royalist side in the pohtical con
troversies of the day, and was believed to be the author of
the anonymous " Westchester Farmer's Letters " in debate
with Alexander Hamilton concerning the proceedings of the
Continental Congress. A mob of Whigs had seized upon
him; he had been for six weeks in prison in Connecticut;
he had fled for safety to the King's army in New York where
he was made chaplain to a regiment. In selecting so pro
nounced and unrepentant a Royalist the Connecticut clergy
apparently had regard to the minds of the Enghsh bishops
rather than to the sentiments of patriotic Americans.
The English bishops, however, found themselves unable
to grant Seabury's request. He could not, under the politi
cal circumstances, take the customary oath of aUegiance to
the King; and they could not, without an act of Parliament,
dispense him from it; and Parliament was unwUling to act,
being doubtful of the effect upon the American people with
whom they were concluding a treaty of peace. Then Sea-
bury turned from the English bishops to the Scotch.
The Scotch bishops were under no obligations to Parlia
ment. Their predecessors, in 1688, had refused to change

234 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
their aUegiance from James to WiUiam, and thereafter had
actively interested themselves in various plots to bring back
the House of Stuart. They had therefore been disestab
lished, their churches had been destroyed, and a law was
stUl on the statute books forbidding more than five of their
adherents to meet together for the services of religion. The
church in Scotland was divided between the clergy who had
been ordained by English bishops, and the clergy who had
been ordained by the Scotch bishops. The Scotch bishops
were in proper standing ecclesiasticaUy, but they had no
standing whatever pohticaUy. The old rigor of party hatred
had been much diminished by the lapse of years of peace,
but the Scotch bishops had their own prayer book, some
what different from the English, and were traditionaUy,
though no longer actively, regarded as rebels. They were
able to sympathize with a rebel from America. The fact
that Seabury was in the curious position of being a rebel
and a royahst at the same time commended him still further
to their confidence. For they themselves were in a like
position. The appeal of Seabury to the Scotch bishops was accord
ingly successful. In 1784, in Aberdeen, Kilgour and Skinner
of that diocese, and Petrie of Ross and Moray, laid their
hands upon his head. Skinner in his sermon gave some
offence by remarking that the Scotch bishops paid more
heed to the acts of the Apostles than to acts of Parliament.
Seabury, who preached in the afternoon, somewhat startled
the congregation by his freedom of gesture and volume of
voice. On the whole, however, the service was rather more
satisfactory than that which was held three years later when,
in the chapel of Lambeth Palace, the archbishops of Canter
bury and York, with others, consecrated WiUiam White
bishop for Pennsylvania, and Samuel Provoost bishop for
New York. The congregation was very smaU, consisting

THE EPISCOPALIANS 235
mainly of Canterbury's household, and the sermon, preached
by a chaplain, " had very little reference to the particularity
of the occasion."
Seabury, when he returned, brought with him the com
munion office of the church in Scotland, which he had prom
ised to introduce so far as he was able into the church in
America. In 1785, he met the clergy of his diocese, and
ordained four men to the diaconate. Thus, at last, there
was a bishop in these parts.
Unhappily, the satisfaction of New England in this accom
plishment was not shared by the Episcopalians of the other
states. They looked askance both at the Scotch bishops as
persons out of favor with the Church of England, and at
Seabury, who as a royalist would probably be out of sym
pathy with the patriots of America. It seemed to them that
the ten parsons of Connecticut who had thus proceeded to
get a bishop had made a bad beginning and had acted
prematurely and presumptuously. In the confused state of
public opinion, while the colonies as separate and sovereign
commonwealths were considering with some hesitation
whether to unite in a single nation, or not, it was possible
for the moment that New England might be left to have
its own Episcopal Church independent of its neighbors.
During Seabury's absence a general convention had been
called to meet in Philadelphia in September, 1785, but so
strong was the feeling against the action of Connecticut
and so uncertain was the bishop as to the reception which
might be given him, that he stayed away, and the repre
sentatives of New England with him. The convention
proposed a constitution which should unite the churchmen
of all the states in one ecclesiastical communion, voted an
address to the archbishop and bishops of the Church of
England asking for the Episcopal succession at their hands,
and at an adjourned meeting, in 1786, received a reply which

236 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
enclosed an act of Parhament authorizing the consecration
of bishops for America. This happy state of things had been
much assisted by the American minister at the court of St.
James, John Adams of Massachusetts, who with his own
hand had presented the address to the Archbishop of Canter
bury, with satisfactory explanations and commendations.
In 1789, White and Provoost having been made bishops
in England, the general convention met again in PhUadelphia.
They formally invited Bishop Seabury, expressing by reso
lution their confidence in the vahdity of his consecration,
and Seabury accepted the invitation. In the absence of
Provoost, who refused to attend if Seabury was to be there,
the House of Bishops consisted of Seabury and White. Peace
and fraternity prevailed. The constitution which united
the Episcopal churches, and which stiU governs their legis
lative action, was signed on the second of October, in the
same room in the State House in which Congress had signed
the Constitution of the United States.
The two documents, belonging to the same time and
place, and dealing with like conditions, contain interesting
resemblances. In the political paper colonies which had
now become states, and in the ecclesiastical paper colonies
which had now become dioceses, were brought together on
the basis of a written constitution. Provision was made
both in the state and in the church for representative
government. Corresponding to the Federal Congress was
the General Convention, each made up of two houses,
bishops answering to senators and deputies to representatives.
The church did not venture quite so far as the state in the
direction of monarchy. It made no provision for the presi
dent or general executive officer, but only for a presiding
bishop, holding office by virtue of seniority, having no very
important duties, and carefuUy prevented from reminding
anybody of Archbishop Laud.

THE EPISCOPALIANS 237
An important matter which had already engaged the at
tention of Bishop Seabury was the case of King's Chapel
in Boston. The rector and many influential members of
the congregation having left the town, the Congregationalists
of the Old South Meeting-house moved into the Chapel
while their own place of worship was being put in order after
its occupation by British soldiers as a riding-school. The
Old South people used the church one-half of the day, and
the King's Chapel people the other half. The vacant pews
were sold to new proprietors. The wardens invited the Rev.
Samuel Parker of Trinity Church to come over with his
congregation and occupy the chapel, but the invitation was
dechned. They then appointed Mr. James Freeman to
officiate as lay reader. And Mr. Freeman presently apphed
to Bishop Seabury for ordination.
The political situation at that time was reflected in the
current theology. Along with the revolt against the tra
ditional forms of government there was a widespread dis
content with the traditional orthodoxy in religion. The
doctrine of the Trinity was subjected to serious criticism.
A tentative revision of the Book of Common Prayer, under
taken by the General Convention of 1785, proposed to omit
not only the prayers for the royal family but both the
Athanasian and the Nicene creeds; and, although the Nicene
Creed was eventuaUy retained, the fact that the proposal
to remove it commended itself at the moment to representa
tives of the church is indicative of their state of mind.
Dr. Provoost, three days before his election to be bishop
of New York, wrote to Dr. White, just elected to be
bishop of Pennsylvania, " The doctrine of the Trinity has
been a bone of contention since the first ages of Chris
tianity, and wiU be to the end of the world. It is an
abstruse point, upon which great charity is due to differ
ent opinions, and the only way of securing ourselves from

238 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
error is to adhere to Scriptural expressions, without turn
ing into definitions."
The mind of Mr. Freeman was sympathetic with the cur
rent desire to state the doctrines of religion in their simplest
terms, and to free the church from the metaphysics of the
ology and the entanglements of doctrinal debate. In 1783,
being chosen rector of King's Chapel, he revised the Book
of Common Prayer for the use of his own congregation.
Every rector at that time was revising the Prayer Book,
more or less, in the absence of any general authoritative
action. Freeman only went somewhat further than the
others. He went so far, however, as to alarm Seabury, who
on his return as bishop in 1785, dechned to ordain him.
When Provoost returned as bishop in April, 1787, Freeman
brought his case to him. But even Provoost hesitated to
give him ordination, and suggested a reference of the matter
to the General Convention. Freeman, however, waited no
longer. In November, 1787, he was ordained " rector,
minister, priest, pastor, teaching elder and public teacher "
by his senior warden, acting for the congregation.
" Then," said Dr. Jeremy Belknap of the Federal Street
Church, " there was cut the aspiring comb of prelatical
pride, — then was undermined the pompous fabric of hier
archical usurpation, — then was pricked the puffed bladder
of uninterrupted succession; whUe the eye of liberty sparkled
with joy, and the modest face of primitive, simple, unadul
terated Christianity brightened with the conscious smUe of
a decent, manly, substantial triumph." The smUe was too
conscious to be altogether agreeable.
The neighboring Episcopal ministers protested. " Where
as," they said, " a certain congregation in Boston, caUing
themselves the first Episcopal Church in said town, have,
in an irregular and unconstitutional manner, introduced a
liturgy essentiaUy different from any used in the Episcopal

THE EPISCOPALIANS 239
churches in this Commonwealth, and in the United States,
not to mention the Protestant Episcopal church in general,
and have also assumed to themselves a power, unprece
dented in said church, of separating to the work of the min
istry, Mr. James Freeman, who has for some time past been
their Reader, and of themselves have authorized, or pre-
tendedly authorized, him to administer the sacraments of
Baptism and the Lord's Supper; and at the same time most
inconsistently and absurdly take to themselves the name
and style of an Episcopal church, we, the ministers of the
Protestant Episcopal Church, whose names are under
written, do hereby declare the proceedings of said congre
gation, usuaUy meeting at the Stone Chapel in Boston [as
the buUding was then caUed] to be irregular, unconstitu
tional, diametricaUy opposite to every principle adopted
in any Episcopal Church; subversive of aU order and regu
larity, and pregnant with consequences fatal to the interest
of religion."
The first name signed to this vigorous but ineffectual
protest was that of Edward Bass, rector of St. Paul's Church,
Newburyport. Bass was a descendant of John Alden and
PrisciUa Mullens, and a graduate of Harvard College in the
class of 1744. He took his master's degree in 1747, when in
his thesis he answered in the affirmative the question, " WUl
the blessed in the future world, after the last Judgment,
make use of articulate speech, and wiU that be Hebrew ? "
Bass entered the Congregational ministry, but soon after
foUowed the example of some of his brethren and sought
episcopal ordination, going to London for that purpose.
Becoming rector at Newburyport he had continued in his
parish and maintained the services of the church throughout
the Revolution. He had omitted the state prayer, and had
devoted himself to spiritual rather than pohtical duties.
" Temperate and untform in the discharge of the duties of

240 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
his mission," said his wardens, " his conduct has been such
as could give just cause of offence to no party." Even so,
he did not escape being " pursued along the street by near
two hundred persons who pelted him with dirt and stones
and treated Mm with the most indelicate language."
When the war was over, Bass with his spirit of moderation
and his discretion in counsel was the leading Episcopal
minister in New England, outside of Connecticut, with the
exception of Parker of Trinity. Parker was the natural per
son to be made bishop, but he dechned. Bass was accordingly
elected to that office, and was consecrated in PhUadelphia
in 1797, being the first bishop consecrated in America.
After a useful but uneventful episcopate of six years, he
died and was succeeded by Samuel Parker, who, however,
died only a few weeks after assuming office. The next bishop,
after a space of six years, was Alexander Viets Griswold.
When Mr. John De Wolfe of Bristol, in 1804, went to Har-
rinton in Connecticut, to fetch back the Rev. Mr. Griswold
to be the new rector of the Bristol parish, he found the parson
at the plow, " under a broad-brimmed hat, in patched short
clothes, coarse stockings and heavy shoes." Griswold had
been brought up on a farm, where, however, in the evenings
by the light of a pine knot he had read through the entire
hbrary of the Rev. Roger Viets, his uncle. No man understood
better the life and disposition of the plain people. There
was nothing prelatical about him. Seabury, upon occasion,
had worn a mitre, intending thereby to offend his neighbors
the Congregational parsons, who had been heard to say that
they were as much bishops as he was : he would show them
what a real bishop looked hke. But a mitre upon Griswold
was as unimaginable as a royal crown upon Abraham Lin
coln. Wherever he went he dispeUed a cloud of Puritan
prejudices. The Puritans were even free to confess that
Griswold had some measure of vital piety. Shortly after

THE EPISCOPALIANS 241
his election to the episcopate there was a revival of religion
in his Bristol parish which stirred the whole town. He was
known to hold prayer meetings, a religious exercise which
had no standing among proper Episcopahans.
Griswold became bishop of the Eastern Diocese, which
included all of New England except Connecticut. He found
twenty-two parishes in this district, served by sixteen clergy
men. Trinity (Boston), Trinity (Newport), and St. John's
(Providence) were strong and wealthy. Christ Church
(Boston), St. Paul's (Newburyport), St. Michael's (Bristol),
St. Paul's (the " Narragansett Church "), St. John's
(Portsmouth), and St. James's (Great Barrington) were
self-supporting, but unable to contribute much towards the
salary of a bishop. Griswold retained his rectorship at
Bristol. Even so, he had to live within narrow financial
hmits. He understood the economies of the country clergy
and, on that account, was so much the more a welcome guest
in their houses. He went about his great diocese, travelling
in stage coaches over bad roads through rain and snow,
preaching the gospel in meeting-houses and on hillsides, and
encouraging his scattered congregations. He was a mission
ary bishop.
The episcopate of Griswold, beginning in 181 1, and ending
in 1843, carried the Episcopahans of New England out of the
period of depression into the period of dissension.
These stages of progress were not peculiar to this com
munion but belong to the general history of the Christian
church in this country. At the beginning of the nineteenth
century there was an ebb tide in rehgion. It was due in
part to the reaction which foUowed the Great Awakening.
In 1770, at Newburyport, Whitefield had preached his last
sermon. He stood in the doorway of the parsonage in the
dark of the evening holding a hghted candle in his hand and
preached till the flame sank in the socket; then he went

242 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
upstairs, and died that night. It was a symbol of the whole
situation. The flame of emotion which had been kindled in
New England waned into a weary indifference. The enthu
siasm and excitement of the revival meetings gave the con
verts a distaste for quiet services. The new way of becoming
a Christian, by a psychological experience rather than by
sacraments and patient nurture, had brought great numbers
of people into the churches, but it had not succeeded in
keeping them.
The ebb tide was also due in part to the absorbing
pohtical interests of the time. After the War of the Revo
lution men were engaged in the great task of estabhshing
the institutions of the new government. This absorbing
work, proceeding in the midst of discussions in which
every citizen took part, so filled the general mind as to
crowd out, for the moment, the old interest in religion.
Congregations listened eagerly to political orations, and
deserted the preachers unless they preached pohtics. A
third influence, added to the spiritual reaction and to the
pohtical enthusiasm, was a popular unbehef imported from
France. It was not altogether without reason that timid
persons in New England hid their Bibles lest Thomas Jef
ferson should get them. Jefferson got a good many of them
by a process akin to the transformation in the fairy stories
when the treasure of jewels is changed into common stones.
Thomas Paine was stUl more successful. Every New Eng
land viUage had its militant atheist who stopped sober citi
zens at the post office when they came to get their mail and
robbed them of their faith. The new French fashion of
infidelity, like the new French gowns and bonnets, affected
the remotest hamlets of Vermont and Maine. In the col
leges, the churches were extinct. At Yale, at Harvard,
institutions founded for the purpose of training young men
for the ministry, it was possible to find one or two professing

THE EPISCOPALIANS 243
Christians, but no more. At the College of William and
Mary, in Virginia, the students freely debated " whether
there be a God," and " whether Christianity has been bene
ficial or injurious to mankind." The Episcopal Church
shared in this profound discouragement. In Virginia,
Chief- Justice MarshaU believed that it was too far gone to
be ever revived. In New York, Bishop Provoost thought it
would die out with the old colonial families.
This depression gradually changed into reverent faith
and confidence, into new interest and progress, as it had
done a thousand times before, and will do a thousand times
again. In the course of nature, after the ebb tide came the
flood. But the flood had its own disquieting consequences.
With the new enthusiasm, and the restored interest in reh
gion, came divisions of parties and controversial battles
between them. The period of depression was followed by
a period of dissension. Outside the Episcopal Church the dif
ferences appeared mainly in matters theological: the debates
had to do with doctrines : the Trinitarians and the Unitarians,
the Orthodox and the Liberals, the Old School and the New en
gaged in animated discussion. Within the Episcopal Church
the differences appeared mostly in matters ecclesiastical.
The Church was growing. In 1832, Vermont became a
diocese by itself . In 1843, Rhode Island; in 1844, New Hamp
shire; Maine in 1847 elected their own bishops. Then came
the Oxford Movement. It was in 1845 that John Henry
Newman went to Rome. The debates which ensued brought
out the differences between the High Church and the Low,
between the Catholic Episcopalians and the Protestant Epis
copalians. Eastburn had now succeeded Griswold as bishop
of Massachusetts. In November, 1845, the bishop officiaUy
admonished the rector of the Church of the Advent.
That parish had been organized " with a view to secure to
the inhabitants of the north-western portion of the city the

244 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
ministrations of the Protestant Episcopal Church; and more
especiaUy to secure the same to the poor and needy in a
manner free from unnecessary expense and aU ungracious
circumstances." The first service was held on Advent
Sunday in 1844, and the rector was the Rev. WiUiam Cros-
weU. The congregation met in an upper room on Merrimack
Street, near Causeway. When Bishop Eastburn came for
the purpose of confirmation, making his first visit to the
new parish, what he saw displeased him much. He wrote
a letter about it to the clergy of the diocese. " I observed,"
he said, " to my inexpressible grief and pain, various offen
sive innovations upon the ancient usage of our church. In
the form of the communion table; in the decorations of
golden candlesticks and of a large wooden cross by which it
is surmounted; and in the postures used in front of it by
the assistant minister ... I perceived with sorrow super
stitious puerihties of the same description with those which
already, in the case of another parish church of this diocese,
had caUed forth a public expression of disapprobation, first
from my reverend predecessor, now resting from his labors,
and subsequently from myself." The reference was to the
church in Nantucket, whose former rector was now the assist
ant at the Church of the Advent. The objectionable pos
ture consisted in kneeling before the table instead of at one
of the church chairs. The bishop proceeded further to
characterize the ritual as " chUdish," as bearing an" offen
sive resemblance to the usages of that idolatrous papal
communion against which our Prayer Book so strongly pro
tests," and as hkely to " expose the Church of our affections "
to the " ridicule and contempt " of " aU sensible and en
lightened persons of other Christian bodies."
The vestry rephed, very courteously, that their com
munion table was a very plain piece of furniture, made of
pine wood, having four unmistakable legs, and looking quite

THE EPISCOPALIANS 245
unlike a Roman altar, and that their candles were never
burned except at night, for purposes of iUumination, and
were used in preference to " gas fixtures or globe lamps."
Indeed, the arrangements of the chancel, so far as they repre
sented the Oxford Movement at all, appear to have intro
duced the new ways in the very mildest form. But the
bishop would have none of them. And there the matter
rested. The bishop refused to visit the parish for confirma
tion till the offensive ornaments were removed, and the rector
and vestry refused to remove them. Each side exhibited
that perseverance of the saints which in sinners is caUed
obstinacy. The Church of the Advent was fighting another battle
in that old war for liberty of conscience and the right of dif
ference in which the Puritans had been engaged in England.
They were maintaining their freedom to order their own serv
ice, within reasonable limits, in their own way. They were
asserting that High Churchmen as weU as Low Churchmen
had a right to live in Massachusetts. Roger WiUiams had
made the same claim for the Baptists, and Mary Dyer for
the Quakers. William Croswell was their blood relation.
They were aU of the same mind and spirit. And they aU
accompUshed their great purpose. The period of discussion,
both within and without the Episcopal Church, was a time
of stress in New England, but the result was the establish
ment of the freedom to worship God, in a sense far wider
than even the forefathers of Plymouth dreamed of.
When the Civil War began it looked for a moment as if
the Episcopalians of New England might again be found on
the unpopular side. Having stood, a little detached minority,
against the Great Awakening and against the American
Revolution, it was possible that they might stand aloof from
the struggle to abolish slavery and preserve the Union. The
factor of personal friendship entered into the situation as it

246 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
had done in the War of Independence. The clergy of the
Episcopal Church in New England knew their brother clergy
of Virginia and the other Southern States in an intimacy
which had no paraUel in other communions. This was the
result of meeting in the long sessions of the General Conven
tion. So Bishop Hopkins of Vermont declared himself
with great plainness on the Southern side. He published a
pamphlet in which he maintained that the Southern States
had a right to secede, and in which he argued that negro
slavery was sanctioned by the Bible. Abraham kept slaves in
Ur of the Chaldees, why should they not be kept by Abraham
Lincoln in Springfield, IUinois ?
Happily, however, the Episcopal Church was now too
strong to be dominated, or even represented, by any indi
vidual bishop. In spite of Bishop Hopkins, the General
Convention adopted a loyal resolution, and prayed for the
success of the Government. Bishop Hopkins, on the one
side, continued stoutly in his unpopular conviction, while
Bishop Mcllwaine of Ohio, on the other side, went to Eng
land at the request of President Lincoln to present the North
ern cause to the sympathetic understanding of the English
Church. The general effect was to demonstrate again that
among the Episcopalians are to be found very different
varieties of citizenship as well as of churchmanship. Hopkins
and Mcllwaine, differing in pohtics, CrosweU and Eastburn,
differing in ritual, were all aUke in good standing in the
hospitable church.
Meanwhile, the church continued to grow in numbers and
in influence. Trinity College, at first caUed Washington
CoUege, had been founded as early as 1823. The Berkeley
Divinity School was established in 1850 at Middletown,
Connecticut, and the Episcopal Theological School at
Cambridge, Massachusetts, in 1867, for the preparation of
men for the ministry. St. Paul's School at Concord, New

THE EPISCOPALIANS 247
Hampshire, Groton School and St. Mark's in Massachusetts,
St. George's School in Portsmouth, Rhode Island, Pomfret
School at Pomfret, sent out year by year increasing classes of
privileged youth to college, and then to places of influence
in the community. Out of the periods of depression and of
dissension the church entered into the period of its present
prosperity. PhiUips Brooks is the characteristic figure of
this time, whose ministry is still a living memory.
The Episcopalians, even now, are not a numerous people.
There are three hundred clergymen in Massachusetts, and
more than two hundred in Connecticut, eighty in Rhode
Island; but only fifty- two in New Hampshire, forty-four
in Vermont, and thirty-seven in Maine. The strength of
the church is in the cities. The communicants in New Eng
land, aU told, faU a little short of a hundred and fifty thou
sand. But the influence of a church in the community is
often out of proportion to its numerical strength. In Con
necticut in the old time, when the Congregationalists were
the standing order, the Episcopalians were described as
" sober dissenters." The adjective is still applicable. They
are for the most part conservative persons, cherishing their
traditions, adverse to change, highly appreciative of order
in government and in worship. They differ from aU their
neighbors in being at the same time Catholic and Protestant.
Some of them are more Catholic than Protestant, and some
are more Protestant than Catholic, but these are the two
ecclesiastical parties in the church, like the political parties
in the nation; agreeing and disagreeing, on the whole, for the
general good. There are now few in either party who are
stiU of the mind of their predecessors in New England who
said, " We are aU good churchmen: we maintain an offensive
demeanor towards them that are without."

VI
THE METHODISTS
WILLIAM EDWARDS HUNTINGTON

THE METHODISTS
I. PERSONAL AND INSTITUTIONAL FORCES
THE historian of New England Methodism cannot weU
avoid reference to the roots of its denominational life
in old England. There is a vital nexus between the cen
turies as we mark them off in our chronology; and a living
bond that binds the salient events in any great movement
in religious or in secular history. Methodism stands for one
of the distinctive movements in modern Christianity. We
get at the temper, purpose, and significance of a pohtical
party, or a rehgious denomination, by learning something
of the " movers " of the particular organism examined,
which makes history and takes a distinct place in the orderly
progress of civUization.
To one man in the eighteenth century aU branches of
Methodism, in all quarters of the world, look back, as the
prime mover of the generic body to which all are affiliated, —
that man was John Wesley. Living in an age of religious
formalism and degeneracy, he lifted up a standard of per
sonal devotion and piety that was never doubted or im
peached. Sprung from the great middle class in which, and
below it, aU over the British Isles, there was much of gross
ignorance and superstition, he would not begin his active
life before he had been trained in the best learning that
Oxford could give him. Reared in the Estabhshed Church,
he would not rebel against its order, though he could not be
restrained in his activities by limitations which he considered
unreasonable and obstructive to his mission for the spiritual

252 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
redemption of England. Two facts in John Wesley's career
are so conspicuous and of such wide influence in the progress
of Methodism that they deserve mention for the purpose I
have in view. One of these facts, that has an immense sig
nificance for modern Christianity, is that Mr. Wesley made
preaching the Gospel the chief business of his long and
marveUously active Ufe. He was no less " burdened " with
his message to feUowmen than were the Hebrew prophets
who " cried aloud " and " spared not," " lifting up the voice
like a trumpet." His sermons, as we now read them, were
not sensational, or remarkable in literary style or captivating
imagery; but were clear, straightforward discussions and
appeals, and their main drift and purpose was to stir the
conscience, to break through the crust of unbelief and rouse
men to repent and have faith in God. The preaching of
Wesley had a special emphasis given it by the very opposition
he met from authorities of the Estabhshed Church. His
message was not welcomed by Churchmen; so he went to
the fields. Without churchly surroundings, very frequently
with no accessories such as we conceive to be necessary for
Christian worship and the spiritual effectiveness of religion,
Wesley and Whitefield were the great preachers of the eight
eenth century. The impression they made upon their age
was lasting. Glad tidings, Wesley conceived, were given to
the world to be published; and in ten thousand sermons, to
multitudes of hungry souls, he preached up and down the
highways of England the " unsearchable riches of Christ."
Another fact in Wesley's hfe and labors was his power to
organize, by buUding his foUowers into simple but effective
organic relations. This was a marked quahty of his genius.
He was not content with great audiences, emotional up
heavals of whole communities, starthng conversions, or
tempestuous excitement when rehgious fervor was so violent
as to unman men and leave them prostrate and strengthless.

THE METHODISTS 253
He was too profound an interpreter of true religion to be
satisfied with simply exercising his power to move great
audiences and stir men into religious conviction and the
personal acceptance of the Christian faith and practice. He
was glad to start men into a new life, help them to break
away from old bondages of irreligion and sin; but he had a
more permanent thing in mind as he gave his converts and
followers the supporting power of organization, to bind them
in sympathetic feUowship, to consolidate their influence, to
make possible a wider dissemination of gospel truth than
his own personal labors, marveUous as they were, could
accomplish. His classes formed for the spiritual growth
and encouragement of their members, his societies banded
together under the somewhat stringent ethical and religious
rules that Wesley formulated, his Conferences in which the
preachers of this new phase of Christianity formed a brother
hood for united and effective service as ministers of practical
religion, — aU these forms of organic life in early Methodism
in England were products of Wesley's systematizing genius.
Whitefield had superior gifts as a preacher, but he did not
have John Wesley's power to strengthen and make perma
nent the results of his preaching by the use of such social
mechanism as Wesley had the skiU to originate and vitalize.
When Methodism crossed the Atlantic, the two outstand
ing traits that were conspicuous in John Wesley's career, and
which I have just mentioned, came with it in the persons
and work of those who, in our colonies, began laying the
foundations of the Methodist Episcopal Church (as it after
wards became) in America. I am reminded by this King's
Chapel, in which we are assembled, that as early as 1736,
Charles Wesley on returning through Boston to England
from Georgia, where he and his brother John had under
taken some missionary work under the auspices of the
Established Church, preached both in King's Chapel and

254 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
in Christ Church, Boston; but this event antedated even
the beginnings of the distinctive movement of Wesleyan
evangehsm. The first of Wesley's missionaries did not come
to our New World tiU 1769. Richard Boardman, 1772, and
WiUiam Black, 1784, were among the earliest of these pio
neers to visit New England. Both these men attempted to
establish a society in Boston, but failed of support. At
length, Freeborn Garrettson, a flaming spirit, tireless in
labors, ranging up and down the North Atlantic States with
unquenchable zeal and remarkable abUity both as preacher
and organizer, made a visit to New England, passing from
Litchfield, Connecticut, through Hartford and Worcester
to Boston. On the 4th of July, 1790, he preached in Dr.
Mather's church, on Hanover Street, and subsequently
made some efforts to gather the nucleus of a Society of
Methodists, but the fruits of his labors were not conspicuous.
On this very itinerary of Garrettson's he met, on his way to
Providence, another feUow-protagonist of Methodism, Jesse
Lee, who, with the same evangelistic spirit as his own, was
now preaching his way through New England. A Virginian
by birth, with no special training for his work as a preacher,
but of great force of character, Lee started upon his career
in that memorable year 1776, then but eighteen years of
age; at first, simply holding cottage meetings, for he did not
undertake regular ministerial work tiU 1783 and was not
ordained till 1790. His heart was drawn out especiaUy
toward New England, although his first work was done in
North Carolina. The open field here, the lack of any forms
of rehgious life such as Methodism fostered, kindled in Jesse
Lee a kind of apostolic passion for attempting a new work
in these young New England States. A Congregational
minister and historian, Dr. Joseph B. Clark, said:
In his doctrinal teaching, Jesse Lee, the pioneer of Methodism in
these parts, suited such as were of Arminian tendencies; in his fervent

THE METHODISTS 255
style of address he was acceptable to many warm-hearted Calvinists
tired of dull preaching 1 The wild enthusiasm of the quakers had long
smce disappeared, and their numbers were diminishing. The martyr
spirit which animated the first generation of Baptists had subsided
with the removal of their civil disabilities, and their religious zeal suf
fered a proportional decline. If Jesse Lee had not come into Massa
chusetts, some one else pressed in spirit, like Paul at Athens, " when
he saw the city wholly given to idolatry," would have found utterance,
and would have had followers.
No missionary, ancient or modern, ever set out with a more
earnest purpose to serve the cause of the Christian faith, than
did Jesse Lee, as he rode on horseback and without escort
through the rough highways of New England. At Norwalk,
Connecticut, he began his ministrations and had but a smaU
group of hearers gathered at the roadside. At New Haven
the Court House was opened to him, where President Stiles
of Yale CoUege was one of his hearers. His first circuit of
one hundred and thirty mUes included over twenty preaching
appointments; but no marked success was gained in win
ning converts or in organizing societies. The opposition
felt, and often expressed, by the pastors of the Congrega
tional body was a serious obstacle to Lee's work. They
looked upon aU Methodist preachers as heralds of strange
doctrines, and as enthusiasts who were likely to kindle fires
of fanaticism which would endanger the standing order of
Congregationalism. Lee's services under the Great Elm on
Boston Common, where multitudes hstened to his sermon,
were among the notable beginnings of Methodism in Boston.
But more successful were his labors in Lynn, where he gath
ered a company of co-workers and planted the seed which
sprang up and has borne fruit a hundred fold, making Lynn
one of the strongest centres of Methodism in New England.
Lee's outfit as a preacher was comparatively hmited. His
education was elementary; but his courage, devotion, and
faith, his readiness to enter untried and rugged fields, made

256 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
him the man for the time and the work. He was buUt on a
large plan; his voice was big and sympathetic, his heart was
large, with great, unselfish motives. He had a keen sense
of humor and a vital faith that makes hght of difficulties and
sacrifices, can carry heavy burdens brave-heartedly, and
make rehgion attractive and beautiful by a personality that
everybody loves to meet. Jesse Lee's name stands for a
certain type of early Methodist preachers in America and
New England that has a remarkable record in evangehsm.
Francis Asbury, who became the first Bishop of the
Methodist Episcopal Church, was of a different mould; a
stronger mind, and of a personality more nearly after the
pattern of John Wesley than any other early American
leaders of Methodism. The two great elements of power
found in John Wesley, which I have mentioned, were also
conspicuous in Francis Asbury. He was a tireless and effec
tive preacher and a skilful organizer. Born in England in
1745, of humble ancestry, he did not have Wesley's advan
tage of liberal learning; but, by great industry and studious
tastes he put himself through such discipline in Greek,
Hebrew, and general literature as gave him good standing
as an educated man for that time. He was not buUt or
trained for a theologian or a scholastic leader. He was
rather predestined by nature and by early circumstances to
be a crier in the wUderness — the American wUderness of
the eighteenth century. His very limitations were in some
measure his strength. For a delicately trained man to have
undertaken the work that Asbury did, some one has said,
would have been to attempt to feU American forests with a
Sheffield razor. He began preaching at the age of eighteen,
entered the regular itinerant ministry at twenty-one, and
at twenty-six gave himself to the missionary work in Amer
ica. Thirteen years later he was made the first Bishop of
the Methodist Episcopal Church and ordained in 1784. He

THE METHODISTS 257
started from England with a purse of ten pounds, a suit of
clothes and two blankets — the gifts of friends; these were
his only outfit. He entered at once upon a work that was
a constant succession of sacrifices and even of suffering.
His horse was his usual means of journeying, and his annual
tour averaged six thousand miles, through untracked forests
and unbridged streams. Of slender physical resources, he
braved all variations of climate and all hostUities of wUd
beasts and wUd men with dauntless courage, and with an
inflexible purpose to help found in this western world the
empire of righteousness. His tours were from the Atlantic
seaboard to the Mississippi Valley. He was constantly on
the move. Sometimes a great revival broke out under his
preaching, — as when in 1776, in the very midst of the Revo
lution, he wrote from Virginia in his Journal, — "I preached
from Ezekiel's vision of the dry bones ; and there was a great
shaking! I was obliged again and again to stop and beg
the people to compose themselves, but they could not. Some
on their knees and some on their faces were crying mightUy
to God aU the time I was preaching." " This wonderful
revival," he says, " spread through fourteen counties in
Virginia, and burned its way into adjacent Colonies."
Asbury was, as he caUed himself at one time, "as an iron
pUlar and a waU of brass." In firmness and discipline he
lacked nothing of what a great leader should be. But he
was likewise tender-hearted in his evangelism, always win
ning men into the service and faith of the Gospel. When he
landed in PhUadelphia to begin his work, there were only
six hundred Methodists in America; at the end of his career,
one hundred and ninety thousand members were reported
at the General Conference of 181 2. His work for New Eng
land was conspicuous; for he presided at twenty-five Con
ferences, and gave unstintedly of his services among the
young societies that needed the sanction and impulse which

258 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
only a great leader could give. He did not have a warm
welcome in Boston. His Journal has this comment:
I felt much pressed in spirit as if the door was not open. ... I have
done with Boston until we can obtain a lodging, a house to preach in,
and some to join us. Some things here are to be admired. Of their
hospitality I cannot boast. In Charleston, South Carolina, wicked
Charleston, six years ago, a stranger, I was kindly invited to eat and
drink by many — here by none.
But after a more successful visitation in Lynn he wrote:
Here we shall make a firm stand, and from this central point shall
the hght of Methodism and truth radiate through the State. ... I
am led to think the Eastern Church [the Congregational] will find this
saying true in the Methodists, viz., " I will provoke you to jealousy
by a people that were no people, and by a foolish nation will I anger
you." A better feehng soon prevaUed; for an original record
shows that in the period 1795-97, when the first Methodist
church was buUding, subscriptions were made (of from five
to ten doUars each) by Rev. John T. Kirkland, afterwards
president of Harvard College, Rev. James Freeman, pastor
of King's Chapel, Rev. John Murray, founder of Universal
ism, and Rev. Jedidiah Morse, pastor of the First Church
in Charlestown.
Enough has been now said to show that the beginnings in
New England of this Christian denomination that we are
studying were exceedingly small. Self-sacrificing, heroic
souls were engaged in strengthening and enlarging its bound
aries; for nearly seventy-five years the gain in numbers
and in material equipment was modest, but substantial.
During this period the religious life of Methodists showed
more distinctively the traits of Wesley's followers in Eng
land. The idiosyncrasies of the sect were more apparent.
The camp meeting, the class meeting, hortatory preaching,
demonstrative forms of worship, simplicity and even barren-

THE METHODISTS 259
ness in the meeting-houses, were some of the marks that
earlier New England Methodism bore, and which in this
region are now far less conspicuous, if not entirely obliterated.
Dr. Daniel Dorchester has thus described the churches:
The first Methodist Church buildings were simple structures made
of unplaned boards, entirely without paint; often, for several years
unfinished. For seats they had rough planks, laid on blocks, and no
backs. The pulpit was the carpenter's bench used in the erection of
the building, pushed to one end of the room and a single board nailed
upright upon the front and another short board flat on its top, made
a resting place for Bible and hymnbook. Even such plain meeting
houses were often embarrassed with debts.
As we read of the support that most of those pioneer preach
ers received, we are reminded of apostolic times, when
scantiest resources were given to those who were the heralds
of the faith. In the year 1800 it was agreed by the General
Conference that the annual aUowance for each preacher
should be $80, $80 for his wife, $16 for each child under seven,
and $24 for each child between seven and fourteen. In 1803,
twenty-six preachers received about $47 each. So constant
was the deficit that appeared each year, below the amount
the New England preachers should have received, that as
late as 1825 the shortage was $14,517, and incomes were in
those trying years only from 30 per cent to 70 per cent of
what was expected. Today, in most of the denominations,
there are stirring appeals heard for endowments that shall
provide a much more reasonable average salary for pastors
of small flocks. A vigorous campaign is now in progress to
raise an endowment fund of $5,000,000 to help poorly paid
Methodist preachers. Those heroic men of one hundred
years ago would have thought our minimum salary of today
($500 or $ 600) a munificent living.
But strenuous conditions of Ufe have often produced
heroic men. The Spartan theory was that conditions must

250 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
be made rigorous in order that the Greeks of that time should
be discipUned to heroic standards. It is certain that easy
circumstances, luxurious settings for domestic and rehgious
life and activities, do not of themselves tend to produce the
strongest types of character. Neither does poverty of itseU,
and of necessity, make for nobility in human character.
There must be deep-set in the soul itself a principle of life,
and standards of character, not dependent upon outer cir
cumstances, whether of opulence or of destitution. Those
early American preachers, hke Jesse Lee, Francis Asbury,
Wilbur Fisk, were representative of a real nobUity in the
annals of our race; untitled, with no crests or equipage,
but with plain clothes, simple fare, slenderest income,
they " wrought righteousness," stopped the mouths of
ecclesiastical lions, quenched the violence of fiery perse
cution, out of weakness were made strong, and obtained a
good report through faith.
There was just enough opposition to Methodism in New
England to make it earnest, fearless, compact, and vigorous
in meeting the situation. Sometimes harsh things were said
and done. Abel Stevens, the historian of Methodism, puts
in one paragraph samples of the treatment that some of
these itinerants suffered: " Sabin was knocked down and
struck on the head to the perU of his life with the butt of a
gun; Wood was horsewhipped; Christie was summoned
out of bed to answer to a charge of violating the laws by
marrying a couple of his people; Willard was wounded in
the eye by a blow, the effect of which was seen through his
life; Kibby was stoned while preaching; and Taylor was
drummed out of town." Parsons Cooke, pastor of the First
Church in Lynn, wrote a whole volume, A Century of Puri
tanism and a Century of its Opposites, in which he poured out
his vials of wrath upon the Methodists. We cannot over
look the fact that the coming of the Arminian theology into

THE METHODISTS 26 1
New England, in the preaching of these pioneers, was a
distinct chaUenge to the disciples and preachers of Calvinism.
It was John Wesley against Jonathan Edwards, as far as
certain theological concepts were concerned. Edwards's
theological teachings had permeated the orthodox churches;
and doctrinal preaching was the predominant style of pulpit
address. On the other hand, the itinerants emphasized the
experimental side of the Christian faith. The appeal was
made to the heart, the conscience, the springs of moral hfe,
and not primarily to the powers of reasoning and the ability
to measure the force and cogency of dialectics. Moreover,
the itinerants stood upon a wider platform of appeal, as
interpreters of the divine administration, in the moral gov
ernment of our world. Instead of preaching a hmited atone
ment, and a divine foreordination that doomed certain
souls to eternal darkness, the new gospel, which was simply
the old re-emphasized, opened the way of life to " whoso
ever wiU." The whole accent of the gospel message was
different, and with what results I shall endeavor to show
later. I am not aware that the fundamental doctrines of
Methodism have changed since those days of debate. But
some of the fundamentals of Congregationahst theology
have either changed or been practicaUy eliminated from
the orthodox preaching of today.
That Methodism has made its advances, not only in New
England but in its wider American fields, by employing in
its ministry many untrained, or half-trained, men, is often
spoken of as a reproach to the denomination. But, whUe
this weakness in its ministry is being steadily overcome (for
it has been a weakness) there has been and is a condition of
illiteracy in our communities that paUiates the fault, if such
it can be rightly called, of letting uneducated men be religious
leaders and preach the gospel with some intellectual stam
mering. That condition prevaUed very widely in New Eng-

262 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
land, and in aU other parts, during the first two hundred
years after the Pilgrims set their feet upon our shores. Lack
of schools, scarcity of books, strenuous habits of daily hfe
necessary in order to wrest a living from crude circumstances,
made it impossible for the larger portion of communities to
find their way to any high state of learning or intelhgence in
things hterary or scientific. The Wesleys, in choosing men
to aid them in the evangelistic work that they led, were glad
to use men who were of earnest religious life and had some
gift in public address, even if they were not all, like them
selves, university graduates. So long as a wise leadership
is in control, the Church of Christ would seem to be justified
in doing what the Great Teacher himseU did in selecting as
his first ministers men from common life with no uncommon
outfit — except that they were illuminated and moved upon
by the Holy Spirit of God to declare His truth to feUowmen.
Every age in Christian history has had its quota of such
preachers. As the general level of intelligence in any nation
or community rises, in just that proportion will it be neces
sary that those who teach religious truth, and stand as oracles
of a divine message, be inteUectuaUy qualified for this high
function by the best culture available.
I am thus led to mention one striking example of a Meth
odist preacher who in some respects represented the class
of an uneducated ministry, but in other respects stood out
alone as possessed of a genius that made him notable. This
man was Edward T. Taylor, " Father Taylor," of the Boston
Seaman's Bethel. Born in Virginia, in very humble con
ditions, he was persuaded, when seven years old, by a sea
captain to take up a sailor's Ufe, which he followed for ten
years. At seventeen he wandered into a religious service
held in Bromfield Street Church by Elijah Hedding (after
wards bishop), was moved by the appeals, gave his heart to
God in a new act of surrender, and resolved to be a preacher

THE METHODISTS 263
of Glad Tidings. But he was scarcely able to read, and yet
people were attracted to him " by his fervor, simplicity, and
humor." It was not thought advisable, however, for so
ilhterate a young man to be led into the ministry; and he
was soon off at sea again, this time in a United States pri
vateer, in the war service of 1 8 1 2 . His ship was captured and
he, with the crew, was thrown into a British prison in Hali
fax. Here he exercised the " gift that was in him " and his
shipmates much preferred his prayers and sermons to those
of the prison chaplain, who at the petition of the prisoners
was relieved in favor of Taylor. Here he really began his
remarkable ministry. So ignorant was he that he could not
read his own text: the Bible must be read to him; but
little by little he mastered the rudiments of learning, keep
ing steadUy on after the months of his captivity, preaching
in Saugus, as he had opportunity, peddling on week days
and farming a little to earn a livelihood; then taking charge
of a feeble flock at Marblehead; then, for nearly ten years,
preaching successively in seven or eight different towns on
Cape Cod, in southern Massachusetts, and in Rhode Island.
In 1828, he was caUed to take charge of the Seaman's
Bethel, Boston, a rehgious home especially for sailors, a
non-sectarian church. It was largely supported by Uni
tarians, but the pulpit, by the agreement, was to be occupied
by a Methodist preacher, appointed by a bishop of the
Methodist Episcopal Church. Here Taylor found the field
for which he was by nature, gifts, and experience admirably
adapted. Within four years he was the acknowledged popu
lar pulpit orator of Boston. Here is a vivid description of
Father Taylor by one of his closest friends — Cyrus Bartol,
a Unitarian :
No American citizen, Webster, Clay, Everett, Lincoln, Choate, has
a reputation more impressive and unique. He belonged to no class.
In any dogma he was neither leader nor led. He stands for the sea,

264 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
and his fame has been borne by thousands of ships, by marmers who
christened bim " Father," into every port of the globe.
Dr. Bellows said of him :
He had a heart as tender as his mind was strong, and his imagina
tion was Protean; and this gave such a sympathetic quality to his
voice and his whole manner that more than any speaker of power we
ever knew, he was the master of pathos. Who can forget how rough
sailors, beautiful cultivated Boston girls, men like Webster and Emer
son, shop-boys and Cambridge students, Jenny Lind, Miss Bremer,
Harriet Martineau — everybody of taste or curiosity who visited
Boston — were seen weeping together with Father Taylor ?
Such was one of the unlearned itinerants of the nineteenth
century New England Methodism. Of course he was a rare
genius. But it may fairly be presumed that there were many
unlettered preachers like Taylor, weU-read only in the
Scriptures, but unlike Taylor, having no gift in oratory,
whose hearts were burdened with messages of divine truth.
They were not blest with a briUiant imagination and yet
their eyes had seen a vision of spiritual things, and their
tongues could not withhold the story of what they had
seen and felt in their own experience.
We turn now to another personality that had great influ
ence in shaping the course of events for New England
Methodism — WUbur Fisk. He represented another rank
of preachers and leaders. His preparation was from a
Christian home of modest means, and by coUegiate study
such as he could gain by one year at the University of
Vermont and two years at Brown University, from which
he was graduated in 181 5. His power resided in a weU-
balanced mind, a kind heart, a fervent desire to do good,
and a broad outlook upon the world with its crying need of
the hght and blessings of Christianity. By the natural
qualifications of Mr. Fisk, it was to him that the selecting

THE METHODISTS 265
officers turned, when Wilbraham Academy was opened in
1826, as to a man well-fitted to be its first principal. Four
years later, in 1831, Wesleyan University was organized at
Middletown, Connecticut, and he was elected its first presi
dent. His services as one of the early Methodist educators
in New England was noteworthy. When he entered the
ministry in 1818, there was not a single hterary institution
of any note under Methodist patronage. He felt deeply the
necessity of such means of training, both for the ministry
and the laity, and gave himself to the cause of Christian
education with great devotion and zeal. When elected
bishop in 1836, he declined the office, saying, " I believe I
can do more for the cause of Christ where I am than I could
as bishop." As a preacher he was one of the foremost of
his time. A flexible, sympathetic voice, an attractive face,
a native and compeffing dignity of manner, and a fervor in
pulpit address that stirred his audiences made him an effec
tive minister of the faith wherever he was heard. At both
Academy and CoUege he proved himseU to be the attractive
and efficient leader of youth. Both these institutions re
ceived a lasting impression from his character and work.
He believed that education in secular things needs to be
coordinated with discipline in morals and religion, in order
to be most worthy and produce the best type of human
, character. Whatever may be said of the weakness of the
denominational school, coUege, or university on the side of
a wide patronage, it is true that the religious note in the
educational programme can be more clearly sounded in such
an institution. If, however, a kind of pseudo-piety is made
to take the place of high standards in scholarship, that is
bad. Neither is it good if a dry intellectuaUsm, a cynical
spirit of criticism toward the whole realm of spiritual truth
and the fundamentals of Christianity, crowd out of student
hfe the wholesome power of religion that makes all learning

266 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
clearer and more effective. Fisk taught and exemplified in
his own weU-balanced and elevated character that fine
relationship between culture and religion which is such a
desideratum in our modern educational schemes. Since
his time there have been estabhshed in New England six
Methodist academies besides WUbraham, and here in our
city, Boston University. Without exception these institu
tions — Boston and Wesleyan Universities, WUbraham,
TUton, Kent's HiU, Montpelier, Poultney, Bucksport, and
East Greenwich Academies — all have not only the religious
auspices of the denomination that fosters them, but what is
far more important, they have distinctive rehgious influ
ences and instruction at work, as educational forces, along
with the scholastic regimen. No one can measure the good
done by these educational institutions. Wesleyan University
has been the inspiration and the strength of hundreds of
leading minds who have gone out into nearly every impor
tant department of American life, — social, civic, economic,
educational, religious, — and have won distinction. Boston
University has graduates in every continent, — men and
women well equipped for conspicuous and responsible tasks.
In the service of the Christian faith, in the wide field of
education, in the realm of pohtical service and statecraft,
in the legal profession at the bar and on the bench, in medi
cal practice and advancement, this University has sent out
its weU trained graduates for the past forty years and more,
into aU quarters of our nation and to many distant fields of
service. It is impossible in my limited time to give even the
list of names of those who made these educational institu
tions what they have become. Men of great breadth of
pubhc spirit and utmost generosity have buUt the material
equipment; men of almost prophetic vision, and of keen
appreciation of what modern education should be, have been
administrators and teachers.

THE METHODISTS 267
A denomination must be judged by its fruits, — not simply
in the count of members, lay and clerical, but in the varied
leadership it furnishes for the Christian civUization in
which it is one factor. A university allied to the religious pro
gramme which a Christian church naturaUy makes for itself,
although not attempting a too strict propagandism of formal
religious thinking or practice, has a function of importance
to fulfill that is not narrow or unworthy. Boston University
was fortunate in its founders. Isaac Rich, Jacob Sleeper,
Lee and WiUiam Claflin, Edward H. Dunn, Alden Speare,
Roswell R. Robinson, are the names of men who will always
be remembered as the fathers of the institution. WiUiam
Fairfield Warren was its educational founder, whose bow
stUl abides in strength, — a man of the same high ideals
that inspired Wilbur Fisk. President Warren had the imagi
nation to plan large things for the University, realizing that
standards must be high and great even though they can only
be attained by gradual stages of growth and by approximate
achievements. His broad plans for university instruction,
his unswerving faith in the fortune of the institution as he
looked patiently through the years of its early struggles,
made him the man for the time and the task. Of noble
Christian character, a thorough scholar in oriental and cos-
mological lore, he administered for more than thirty years
the affairs of the University and all the while held aloft the
torch of exemplary learning.
While we must omit many names of those who have been
eminent teachers in the New England universities that have
been mentioned, there was one man who taught in the higher
ranges of philosophical and religious thinking in Boston
University for nearly forty years, whom we cannot fail to
mention, — Borden P. Bowne. He began his work here in
1876. Before coming hither he had already published a
critique of Herbert Spencer's general philosophic positions.

268 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
His contention was against the materiahstic trend of the
English evolutionists, led by Darwin and Spencer; and his
steady purpose was to construct a phUosophical system em
bodying such a theory of evolution as would not be obnox
ious to Christian revelation and a spiritual conception of
the universe and its first Great Cause. His teaching was
given in a period when just such trenchant criticism of
materiahstic phUosophy was needed as proceeded from his
lecture-room. Students from all quarters, especiaUy theo
logical students, eagerly crowded his courses. They felt
that this new voice was sounding a clear note of confidence
that Christianity had nothing to fear from philosophy if
the philosophy were well grounded and clearly reasoned
through. Loyal to the fundamental positions of Methodism,
he had no timidity in leading the thought of his denomination
to new and larger outlooks for both phUosophy and faith.
His conceptions of theism were clearly on the side of Chris
tianity in its great affirmations. The Ground of the universe
to his thinking is not simply a driving Force working in some
what uncertain methods through vast spaces and measure
less aeons of time; but rather a personal Being, intelligent,
unresting, transcendent in wisdom and power, and yet
immanent in aU his laws and aU his works, bringing to pass
the marvels of an evolving order, because evolution means the
unfolding of His purposes and His thought for the universe.
Bowne's period of teaching was also in a time when biblical
hterature was submitted to most searching analysis and
criticism. So far as his teaching could properly include a
phUosophy of revelation, his trumpet gave no uncertain
sound. The Bible is not inerrant, and yet it contains a clear
revelation of the gracious purpose of God for men. In
authorship, it has the mark of human limitations, and yet
the greatness of its spiritual messages to the world bear the
character of divinity. He did not underrate the work of

THE METHODISTS 269
reverent biblical scholarship; but to him the body of revela
tion is like the clear light of the sun, in which the spots on
its surface do not dim its glory. His theological conceptions
were more true to biblical standards than are those of
Eucken; his theistic postulates were more intelligible than
Bergson's; his view of evolution took the whole question
out of Spencerian materialism and joined it to such a con
ception of the universe and its Creator as accords with a
thoroughly Christian philosophical system of thought. His
teachings, though not unchaUenged in some quarters, have
been widely accepted, not only among the clergy of Method
ism; for, in England, and in Germany, in the educational
institutions of Japan and China, his philosophical books
have had the serious attention of the best thinkers as real
contributions to the study of some great problems of human
thought. There is no single institution in New England that has
done more for the rehgious interests of Methodism than
the one whose history we wiU now trace in a few closing
paragraphs. At Newbury, Vermont, in the year 1840, the
Theological Society of Newbury Seminary was organized.
This was only an attachment to the Academy then flourish
ing, and consisted of a few students who were looking
toward the ministry. The teachers were the Principal of the
Academy and the Rev. Osman C. Baker, later, in 1852, made
bishop. The studies were essay writing, criticism, discus
sion, preaching, a curriculum quite in contrast with theo
logical courses of today. This simple round of exercises was
soon enlarged to take in the study of Hebrew, courses of
lectures, and theological text-book instruction. In 1844, the
Rev. John Dempster became the head of the school, a man
of unusual abUity, born and reared in Scotland and a gradu
ate of Edinburgh University. Under his administration the
scope of the Institute was extended, an attractive offer of a

270 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
location and building from Concord, N. H., was accepted,
and with the name of the Methodist General Bibhcal Insti
tute the school was estabhshed in 1847, by a New Hampshire
charter at Concord. For twenty years the Institute did its
work there. Opening with two professors and ten students,
in 1867 its faculty was more than doubled and there were
thirty-three students in attendance. In twenty years two
hundred and ten men had been graduated. Then this school
for itinerants again itinerated, and was established in this
city, under the name of the Boston Theological Seminary.
It found a temporary home in Pinckney Street, and in 1869
removed to the new Wesleyan BuUding on Bromfield Street.
In that year Boston University was incorporated, William
Claflin being Governor of Massachusetts. The natural
growth of the Seminary soon suggested that it be united
with the University as an integral part of the larger whole,
and in 187 1 legislative authority was granted and the Semi
nary became, what it has been ever since, the School of
Theology of Boston University. The College of Liberal
Arts, the School of Law, and the School of Medicine were
soon added as departments of the University, each to work
out its own special destiny, under the auspices, support,
and control of one common Board of Trustees. It was not
untU 1886 that the School of Theology was able to leave its
hired apartments on Bromfield Street and gain a home of
its own. A mansion on Mt. Vernon Street was offered for
sale; the University trustees bought the property, refitted
it for both dormitory and school purposes, and made it the
New England headquarters for theological training of
Methodist ministers. In recent time, through the bounty
of generous friends, a dormitory has been added on Louis-
burg Square, and a new structure containing a chapel,
library, lecture-rooms, and gymnasium has been buUt next
to the main buUding on Chestnut Street.

THE METHODISTS 27 1
For the past three years only coUege graduates have been
admitted as candidates for the S.T.B. degree, and even
with this restriction the annual attendance has been over
two hundred. They come from all quarters of the country
— except the Southern States — the Middle West especiaUy
sending from some of the best of the denominational coUeges
and the State universities picked men of excellent equipment
and promise.
This is a thoroughly New England institution. Planted
in our chief city, it finds the advantages of the metropolis
far greater than any superficial disadvantages. It is a great
means of culture for young men to be in the very centre of
its throbbing hfe, where the tides of business pour through
the streets, where aU conditions of human society are found
side by side, where religious institutions of most diverse
forms and tenets are estabhshed, phUanthropies are in opera
tion, education is at work in every field of inteUectual ad
vance, where music and art have their seats of influence and
open their opportunities to the eager minds of youth. For
a theological school to be in touch with aU this vast aggre
gate of human interests, achievements, and vital forces is
stimulating and enriching to a very high degree. It is diffi
cult to see how a young man can prepare for the clerical
profession in such environments and turn out a duU preacher.
And yet this strange result does sometimes occur!
Generous offers came from the authorities of Harvard
CoUege when the School removed here from Concord, open
ing its great privileges to this institution, as it has since done
to the Episcopal Theological School and to the Andover
Theological Seminary, U the Trustees would locate it in
Cambridge. But they decided for Boston, and time has
already shown the wisdom of the choice. Nearly fourteen
hundred men have found their ministerial equipment here
and have gone forth, some to uttermost parts of the world,

272 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
to preach the Gospel. There has been a steady and weU-
ordered increase of courses of study in the progress of events.
Some disciplines, like Hebrew, have taken a less conspicu
ous place than formerly; new fields of investigation in
Sociology, in Missions, in Rehgious Psychology and Pedagogy
have been opened. This School has the honor of being the
first institution in the world to set apart and maintain a
distinct professorship for the comparative study of Religions,
an invaluable training for those especiaUy who expect to
enter oriental missionary work.
Dr. Patton, long the president of Princeton Theological
Seminary, said at the inauguration of his successor last
October, " Princeton Seminary is a fortress and is committed
to the defense of Christianity." President Hibben, on the
same occasion, in his address, dissented from Dr. Patton's
simile and said, " Modern warfare has proved the futUity
of the fortress, and the fortress at the present time in the
affairs of the Christian world has but one function, namely,
to throw wide its gates in order that those within may ad
vance for a sortie which marks the beginning of an aggressive
campaign. We believe that in the day before us there wiU
extend the long hne of an aggressive campaign across the
battle-fields of Europe, and into Asia, and which wiU finaUy
girdle the whole earth. Let us therefore of every nation
and of every tribe, of every creed and ritual, whatever our
name or sign, come together in harmonious and united
ranks, moving forward toward that ultimate victory which
wiU inaugurate a new era of universal peace and good wiU
among men."
The Seminary of theological learning that we have been
considering is acting under this latter conception. This is
the ideal for Methodism. It is what New England needs,
and what the world needs — an institution that is the train
ing ground for active and aggressive campaigning against

THE METHODISTS 273
the prince of the power of the air, against spiritual wicked
ness, in high places and low places, wherever the foes to
human life and human society lurk — " organized evU, in
justice, inhumanity, the scorn of God, and hostihty to the
law and love of Christ."
A Christian denomination in our time has a new set of
demands upon it that must be met if its life is to be efficient.
Creed-making is not now in order. Looking backward is
not the right direction for the vision that is to discover the
wiU of God for our age. The cloister is behind us. Intoler
ance is slowly vanishing. Superstition in rehgion is fading
away. What Methodism has been doing in practical ways,
and by its genius should do more effectively in the coming
age, will be considered in my second lecture.
II. PRACTICAL BEARINGS OF NEW ENGLAND
METHODISM
The Pilgrims brought with them two things which had much
to do in shaping the New England type of American life, —
a Calvinistic theology and an independent, or Congregational,
form of church polity. It was natural for the descendants
of those sturdy pioneers, and for their successors — immi
grants from Great Britain especially — to feel that the Con
gregational association of independent churches on these
shores held a substantial primacy as a witnessing body for
the Christian faith. As this feehng of primacy came to be
widely held, and even proclaimed, the feehng grew into a
behef and the behef exhaled itself into a kind of atmosphere,
in which Congregationahsm " hved and moved and had its
being " with a fair degree of complacency. Nothing dis
turbed the serenity of this atmosphere untU Christian con
fessions, other than that formulated at Geneva by John
Calvin, edged their way into these colonies along the North
Atlantic coast. Baptists under the lead of an Enghsh

274 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
preacher appeared as early as 1635. Roger Williams ob
tained a charter and founded the colony of Rhode Island
in 1644, with the provision that freedom of conscience should
be a fundamental right. But that same year Massachusetts
issued laws against Baptists, imprisoned several in 1651,
banished others in 1669, and in 1680 the doors of a Baptist
meeting-house in Massachusetts were naUed up! Repre
sentatives of the Established Church of England fared
scarcely better in the Old Bay Colony; for in 1629, Governor
Endicott shipped off two members of the Church of England
without ceremony — even though they were of the original
patentees of the Massachusetts Bay Colony. Quakers in
those times (in the seventeenth century), who were at aU
defiant of magistrates, were punished crueUy and some were
even put to death. Methodists were also subject to like
opposition. Endicott's doctrine was, " God forbid that our
love of truth should be so cold that we should tolerate error."
But it is not my purpose to dweU on the hostilities that
Methodists were caUed to face, and to outhve, within the
borders of New England. Only so far as it was necessary
in order to obtain an equal chance of enjoying religious
hberty did the preachers of Methodism engage in polemics.
They felt that the genius of their faith was constructive.
It was their business to buUd, not to fight; to preach against
sin, not against dogmas ; to make the gospel attractive and not
repulsive, and win men into the faith and foUowing of Christ.
The most serious reaction against the Calvinistic theology
of New England was the emergence of Unitarianism. This
movement, or protest, was led by men of high character and
intelligence, and within New England especially had great
influence among the refined and inteUigent elements of
society. Unitarians of the School of WiUiam EUery Chan
ning, Henry Ware, George Putnam, Rufus EUis, James Free
man Clarke, Andrew P. Peabody, and Edward Everett Hale,

THE METHODISTS 275
represented the wealth, cultivation, and public spirited
citizenship of Boston during several decades of the nine
teenth century. So far as prestige was concerned, in the
intelligence of its membership, in the ability of its preachers,
in the philanthropic activity of its churches, in devoted and
efficient service to the State, by noble citizenship, the Uni
tarian Church was a strong rival of Congregationalism for
superiority in Boston and Massachusetts. Methodism was
by its genius and purpose destined to take its course of pro
cedure not in the wake of Congregationalism, nor could it
enter into alliance with the Unitarian movement. It was
less rationalizing than Unitarianism in its interpretation of
the Scriptures, and in its analysis of the divine nature and
government; but more liberal than Calvinism in its phUos
ophy of salvation. So Methodism was a distinct factor in the
theological aggregate represented by the various churches.
We must assume that Methodism was conscious of a definite
kind of religious service to be done by its membership for
the world. This distinctive work was partly determined by
its machinery. An itinerant ministry, short pastorates, a
connectional bond between societies that consohdates effort
and influence, official oversight by men set apart to super
intend (for the bishops were, and are, simply officers set
apart, not ordained, to a special office of supervision), —
aU such organic features of the denomination made it
natural for the church to keep steadily interested in its own
form of rehgious service, and work out its own destiny.
But this organic body has always recognized the need of
keeping in friendly relations with other Christian churches.
Loyal to its own fundamental principles, holding the faith
as a good steward, it has also been ready to show the friendly
and hospitable spirit toward others of different name and
type at every point of contact which community service
presents.

276 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
1. The theological tenets of Methodism — such as the
doctrine of the trinity, the atonement, the free will of man,
the expulsive power of divine love in the human heart, the
necessity of the new birth, and the doctrine of the resurrec
tion — stiU stand as the buttresses of the denominational
beliefs; but, it must be said at the same time, the emphasis
is placed not so much upon the acceptance of any dogma,
when a new member seeks admission to the Methodist fold,
as it is upon the experience by which the child, or the man,
may be able to say, " I know that I have passed from death
unto life"; "whereas 1 was blind, now I see"; "old
things have passed away, aU things have become new."
The principal confession is that the current of a new life
begins to move in the deeps of the soul; the vision is cleared
of film and cloud, and is opened to a new realm of spiritual
things; the old material region of actual experiences is
Uluminated by a new Ught that transforms and glorifies it,
making it a new world. I cannot discover, however, that
there is among the people of Methodism any rigid uniformity
of opinion where men are caUed upon to define in exact
language what they severaUy hold in explicit terms as their
doctrinal behef in the trinity, or the atonement, or escha
tology. The difficulty that always lies in these doctrines of
the faith, eluding by their transcendent scope aU scientific
accuracy of definition, makes them rather the background
of Christian thinking and religious service than the very
tools of practical work. I do not thus underrate or slur the
great elemental doctrines of Christianity; for it is the glory
of our faith, and not a reproach, that it contains these vast
themes to chaUenge human thought. No theologian can do
them full justice, no philosopher sees clear through the veU
that shuts off the supernatural realities from our fuU under
standing. Here is a body of Christians, lay and clerical,
organized, differentiated by a common purpose and common

THE METHODISTS 277
hopes, for what ? The whole history of this body for which
we are speaking is an answer. Methodism has gone out into
its work under the commission of its Lord — " go ye into
aU the world and preach the Gospel to every creature." It
is instinct with life. It stops at no artificial frontiers. It
passes by no class, or race, or human conditions. It is in the
world to help to save it from aU that degrades and imperUs
the human soul. It will not aUow wealth to paralyze its
energy; nor poverty to chill its ardor. It has no separate
ministries for the rich or the poor, the black or the white
man, the learned or the unlettered. " The world," with its
boundless needs in spiritual things, " is its field."
2. It is interesting to mention the fact, showing that
New England is the starting ground of large movements,
that it was from Boston that Dr. and Mrs. William Butler
went in 1856, under commission from the central authority
of the Missionary Board, to undertake Christian work in
India. They had scarcely gained a foothold there when
the Sepoy Rebelhon burst over the very scene of their
labors, and the family fled to the mountains for their hves.
The storm of rebeUion, after much bloodshed and social
upheaval, was at last stiUed, and those dauntless mission
aries, the Butlers and their associates, laid the foundations
of what became a great Christian work for Hindu paganism;
so that when Mrs. Butler, as a widow, revisited the scene
of their labors in 1906, she found in that JubUee year that
the seed they had planted in the days of darkness and danger
had in fifty years brought forth fruit a hundredfold, and
thousands were numbered in that once heathen community
as faithful foUowers of Christ. That same man of apostohc
zeal, Dr. Butler, having retired, after his years of service,
from the India mission, sought another field of evangelizing
work and was commissioned to a difficult task in Mexico
in 1873. With remarkable success he and his family, with

278 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
other associated workers, centralized their labors in Mexico
City, gathered societies in many other towns, buUt churches,
and put the leaven of a wholesome type of Christianity into
that great country which so sorely needs the cleansing and
the enlightenment of a " pure and undefiled religion " to
save its people from anarchy and destruction. Dr. John
W. Butler, worthy son and successor of his father, has held
steadfastly to his post, as the head of the Mexican mission
work, after his father's death, — even through some of the
most threatening periods of revolution since President Diaz
withdrew from the government.
An important missionary organization originated in Boston,
when eight women of large and prophetic vision formed the
nucleus of the Woman's Foreign Missionary Society of the
Methodist Episcopal Church in the year 1869. From that
initial meeting of those leading minds there has grown a
great organization whose well-conducted machinery en
gages the devoted interest of thousands of women, whose
systematic efforts in raising funds for the support of workers
in oriental fields result in very large annual contributions.
Last year this Society raised for foreign missions $931,780.
This great rehgious force is also of New England origin.
One of the first missionaries to go to a foreign field from New
England was the Rev. MelviUe B. Cox, who in 1833 estab
lished a mission on the west coast of Africa; but hved only a
few months. The Rev. James Mudge entered upon editorial
work in India in 1873, where he did most efficient service,
through a gifted pen, for the missionary field in South Asia.
Since his return from the Orient, he has done unstinted serv
ice to the cause of missions, as wefl as to the general religious
welfare of his church, by his abundant writings, which have
appeared in books and periodicals. His History of the New
England Conference is full of stirring accounts of the religious
progress of the denomination.

THE METHODISTS 279
3. An association of Methodist laymen began in 1854 the
enterprise of publishing a religious paper. The Unitarians
have had the Christian Register; the Congregationahsts
their organ under their own name, which has just celebrated
its centennial; the Baptists, The Watchman; the Univer
salis ts their paper of the same name. Zion's Herald was in
the field as early as 1823, a denominational mouthpiece for
New England Methodism especiaUy. It has always been
independent of any ecclesiastical control, and has claimed
and used the right to discuss freely the broad interests of
the church, and all questions that touch the moral and re
ligious welfare of the community. Some of the most gifted
men in the church have been in the line of editors, such as
Abel Stevens, Gilbert Haven, Charles Parkhurst. This
layman's enterprise has been so well conducted that the
paper has won a distinguished place as a religious journal,
and its material success is witnessed by the noble buUding
on Copley Square that is not only the home of Zion's Herald
but the headquarters of the varied clerical and lay interests
of the denomination in New England.
4. It has been a fundamental principle in Methodism to
seek the cooperation of Christian women in the life and
service of the church. Women have not yet been granted
ordination to the ministerial functions, but they are now
ehgible to membership in the General Conference, the law
making body of the denomination, and in the officiary of
individual societies they are likewise possible members.
New England Methodism has not been backward in falling
in with a general movement, not confined to this church,
but wide-spread in Europe and in the United States, which
enlists women in a well-systematized service of charity and
social uplift. Here, as elsewhere in Methodism, the Dea
coness Association is the name for this class of Christian
work. In 1890 this arm of church service was established

28o RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
in Boston; it has since been widely extended throughout
New England and the larger cities of the United States.
The principal features of this organization are, first a Train
ing School, where young women are instructed for a certain
time in the duties of the deaconess and in such courses of
study as are necessary in order to give the candidate a fair
equipment for becoming an instructor to the unfortunate
and the ignorant whom she is to meet in the homes of poverty
and destitution. Almost immediately after the Association
was estabhshed, a hospital was found to be a necessity.
Offers of money came, interest was roused, and in 1896, a
large and weU-furnished hospital was built, which has been
doing its beneficent work with the cooperation of many of the
chief physicians of Boston. Another Deaconess Hospital
was established in Concord, Mass., — the gift of Charles
Emerson, a nephew of Ralph Waldo Emerson, and was
equipped by citizens of Concord. The benevolent spirit
toward this Association was contagious, and by a gift made
in 1 913, a home for Aged Methodist Women was also estab
hshed in Concord, and in that peaceful valley has become
the beautUul home for many who otherwise might spend
their declining years in discomfort, or even in want. The
function of the deaconess in church hfe is reaUy that of an
assistant to the pastorate. She ministers, but does not
preach. In a hundred delicate ways she carries to homes
that are not what they ought to be sympathetic teaching,
not only in matters purely religious, although the comfort
and the warning of the Gospel of Christ are always felt in
the messages she bears; but, in lessons of order, cleanliness,
good taste, the care of children, — the whole round of famUy
conditions and relations — the deaconess is the messenger
of light and blessing. There is a doubt in many minds
whether this self-sacrificing work should be done so nearly
without compensation, as it is done. The work is too trying,

THE METHODISTS 28 1
the office is too valuable as an aUy, to ask noble young women
to give themselves to it for an income that is a mere nothing
when compared with that of the average teacher in our
public schools.
5. One of the chief problems for modern Christianity to
solve for the great municipalities where there is a dense
population, the comminghng of many races, and aU sorts and
conditions of human life, is how to leaven these masses with
moral and religious power. The regularly organized churches
of all names have felt the insistence of this broad problem.
It is proper to mention here one among several institutions
in Boston that is doing great service for the social uplift of
the depressed people of our city, whose scope and power is
so great as to command wide attention, the Morgan Memo
rial. Its origin and early history are interesting. Henry
Morgan was its founder, a man of somewhat eccentric
methods, independent, philanthropic, warmly evangelistic,
a lover and helper of the poor and despised. He felt a call
to go after outcasts. He was a revivalist and opened a
mission in 1859 in the old Music HaU. Then the Boston
Union Mission Society was organized and, with Mr. Morgan
as its chief executive, there developed the very elements
which now characterize the greatly enlarged institution. In
1868, James Freeman Clarke's church on Indiana Place was
sold at auction and purchased for the growing work by Mr.
Morgan. This became the centre of his remaining efforts,
and when he died he left the Chapel property by wUl to the
Benevolent Fraternity of Churches in Boston, — on con
dition that the rehgious work of the institution should be
in control of the Methodist Episcopal Church, whUe the
Unitarian body should furnish material support and over
sight. But finaUy, in 1912, the controlling Board for the
entire work, instead of being limited to the representatives
of two, was made to include members from several denomi-

282 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
nations. This work is one of the most successful examples
of the institutional church. It is planted in one of the most
cosmopohtan districts in the world. Within haU a square
mile are quartered fifty thousand persons. Twenty national
ities are brought together, or have drifted together, here;
ninety-seven per cent are of foreign birth or extraction; and
about five per cent are Protestant. Saloons and vicious
resorts are abundant. This section was once respectable;
in recent years of bad repute but for this institution. What
is its work ? In the first place, it reaches after the chUdren,
giving instruction in their most teachable years to the young
people who have httle or no home instruction, and are not
ready for public schools. There is carpentry work for boys,
lessons in housekeeping for girls. There is opportunity for
training in music and other refinements. There is a study-
room, where chUdren who are in the public schools may have
a quiet resort to prepare their lessons, and where there are
teachers to help them in their problems. A gymnasium, a
club-room, a game-room, are also provided, so that recreation
may be a part of the daUy life of these children who resort
to this Common School for Life. But, above aU, the re
hgious training of chUdhood is not overlooked or sUghted.
Children form the choir on Sundays; they are ushers and
take up the offerings. They hsten to a real sermon, not
smaU talk, or mere stories, but earnest appeals meant to
engage their best thought on the highest themes. There is
a real chUdren's church. Then, as we turn to the work for
the adult life of the South End, under Morgan Memorial aus
pices, there is found the same wise planning for a thorough
going regimen. The insistent fact is always kept in mind that
human wrecks are at the very doors of this church, and the
doors are open. Rescue work is the dominating interest in
the hearts of those who are doing the service here. The
rehgious note is the deepest in the message that Morgan

THE METHODISTS 283
Memorial is sounding forth to that community of fifty
thousand. The derelict is warned of his danger, shown the
possibUities of finding a regenerate life; hope is kindled in
almost hopeless souls, an atmosphere of sympathy, faith,
and prayer envelopes the poor slave of appetite and passion,
and he makes a start toward a better manhood and a re
deemed life. On such foundations it is possible to buUd
men up in character and usefulness. Safeguards are sup
plied; a reading-room, club-rooms, baths are open for whole
some influences to take the place of the old noxious ones.
Then comes the whole ingenious plan by which industrial
opportunity is opened to those who have no place elsewhere
to earn their way. They are given a chance. They are
helped over a period of discouragement and destitution.
Morgan Memorial is a great workshop, as weU as a
church. Motor trucks are driven through the resident dis
tricts of Greater Boston once a month to gather cast-off
articles from a thousand homes — clothing, shoes, furniture,
paper, crockery — all sorts of material; and this vast con
glomerate is here disinfected, sorted, repaired, renewed,
remodeUed, by skilled workers in this great workshop,
and thus becomes merchandise which at low prices is avaU-
able to the people of the district who have httle money to
spend, but are sure that what they buy is worth every cent
that is paid. The industrial aspects of this institution are
simply the reflection of that profounder work that is going
on aU the time, as human life, taken at its lowest levels of
moral character and efficiency, is graciously led step by
step up out of the " miry clay " up to the clean and bracing
heights of Christian manhood. The success of this remark
able work of Morgan Memorial in its recent development is
due to the genius and consecration of Dr. Edgar J. Helms,
whose faith, ingenuity, heroic perseverance, and devotion
have made his efforts fruitful of such great results as appear

284 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
in the establishment and progress of this great institution.
There wiU soon be dedicated a new buUding for worship to
be known by the inclusive name of " The Church of AU
Nations." There is no reason why such a general plan of rescue and
reformatory work could not be duplicated in many cities.
It would be hard to find a section of any great city where
the conditions for christianizing the social disorder are
harder than here in our own South End. Dr. Helms has
attacked the problem with an undaunted faith that the
Christian religion can deal with aU the elements of the
situation. The degrading passions, the grovelling appetites,
the loathsome vices, the squahd homes, the discouraged,
broken-down characters that otherwise would riot in their
uncleanness and woe, are now met by this organic power,
wholesome, cheering, cleansing, and in the moral desert an
oasis appears. I can only mention the Medical Mission
maintained since 1893 at HuU Street, and the Immigrants'
Home, established in 1888, in East Boston; both, agencies
of untold good.
Methodism is using active forces for reaching the larger
aggregates of the foreign population in Boston and other
cities in New England. At the North End in Boston, a
Mission Church for Itahans has been sustained for many
years. Devoted laymen, as well as clergymen, have given
both material and religious help to this work. It has been
found that a native Italian could best lead the enterprise and
meet the problems which naturaUy rise and tax ingenuity
and faith. A young man is now in charge of the mission, the
Rev. C. M. Panunzio, who, as an immigrant boy, struggled
his way through academy and college, mastered the Enghsh
language, and has become a preacher of rare ability and
persuasive power. In Worcester, there is a large community
of Swedes who have become a seU-supporting body of

THE METHODISTS 285
Methodists, having their own Conference organization of
Swedish preachers. In LoweU a steady work is going on
among the Greek population, which has become numerous
in recent years. Thus, at many points the aggressive en
deavors of the denomination are bringing promising results
for the cause of christianizing the masses of immigrants
who are crowding within our borders. Single-handed no
denomination can hope to do more than a smaU share of
this work. Here is a field for that cooperation of Christian
forces that seems possible for the Federation of Churches
to accomplish. The Federation in Massachusetts is now
chartered, has at least thirteen denominations and two
thousand churches in its ranks, and is using its combined
influence in support of desirable legislation against manifest
social dangers. It is interested in social service problems,
in philanthropies, and in the question of putting new hfe
into the rural church and community, which is often so
barren in religious things as to be almost pagan. Its Com
mission for Social Service was appealed to by the last Meth
odist Conference in Boston " to make active efforts for the
redemption of the individual and society; to urge aU pastors
to cooperate with every agency in their communities looking
toward social improvement; to insist that highest property
rights and human rights are one, and to get each community
to attack in its own way whatever problem is most in need
of solution."
In looking back through the annals of New England
Methodism, one is struck with the decided change that has
graduaUy taken place in the institution of the Camp Meet
ing; for it was, during the first half of the nineteenth cen
tury, a distinct factor in the rehgious life of Methodism.
At Eastham, at Martha's Vineyard, at Sterhng, and many
other points in the New England States, the annual gather
ing in tents was the chief rehgious event of the year. Emi-

286 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
nent preachers were heard, vigorous appeals were made
to the indifferent and the ungodly, crowds flocked to the
meetings, and many were led from darkness to hght by these
services in tented groves. But in recent years there has been
a decided faUing off in attendance upon these gatherings,
and the emphasis of religious effort has been in part with
drawn from such occasional and sporadic means of grace,
and given rather to the orderly programme of religious
nurture in the churches, and the steady unremitting work
that goes on without spectacular accompaniments.
Methodism has not been backward in showing its interest
in the great moral movements which belong to New England
history. In the anti-slavery agitation which culminated in
the Civil War the annals of this denomination show that
the debates in conferences and conventions were of most
vital character. After William Lloyd Garrison began
pubUshing the Liberator in 1832, popular indifference to the
institution of slavery was disturbed, and discussion began.
There were radicals and conservatives on this question, as
upon most great issues, and the leading preachers of New
England Methodist churches were not all on one side. It
was felt by the radicals that Wesley's denunciation of slavery
was right when he caUed the slave trade " the sum of aU
vUlanies "; at any cost, they said, the institution of slavery
ought to be abohshed. A more moderate party, of which
Wilbur Fisk was a leader, said that there were consistent
Christians who owned slaves, and the whole question should
be so treated that Southern Methodist slaveholders would
not take offence. The Church, North and South, should be
saved from a schism, and some means adopted, if possible,
that would secure the final abolition of slavery and also
preserve the unity of the Methodist Episcopal Church.
Fisk and his party proposed the colonization of the colored
people; but this scheme did not appeal to the radical

THE METHODISTS 287
brethren. In 1842 a few leading radicals withdrew from the
Methodist Episcopal Church and formed a new organization,
named the " Wesleyan Methodist Church." This secession
did not attract a large following, and only increased the zeal
of the anti-slavery men, who determined to debate their
cause through to victory within the ranks of the Methodist
Episcopal Church. FinaUy, in 1844, the General Conference
settled the issue between the pro-slavery and the anti-
slavery wings of the church. The South demanded that the
fact of slaveholding should be no bar to any official place in
the church; the North refused this demand. On this rock
the split occurred; the Methodist Church, South, was formed
as a separate body, and the New England radical leaders
were satisfied that their cause had triumphed by this separa
tion, which relieved the Northern Methodists of any feUow
ship with slavery. AU through the ecclesiastical struggle,
and beyond that period to the close of the CivU War, the
part that New England Methodism took in the agitation
which made anti-slavery influence powerful and finaUy
triumphant was not uncertain or insignificant.
Methodism has also a clear record in another great moral
interest that is not provincial, or sectional, but touches a
World problem; and that is the cause of temperance. In
this, as in the anti-slavery cause, the people of Methodism
are not united as to the best means of promoting the cam
paign against the evils of strong drink, — its manufacture
and its use. Some choose to be advocates of Federal pro
hibition, others of State constitutional prohibition, others
of prohibition by State legislation; some give their efforts
to the Total Abstinence Society, others to the Anti-Saloon
League. There are advocates of local option as the best
means of fighting a persistent and sometimes mahgnant foe.
But the principle upon which aU unite is that the forces of
intemperance must be boldly and unflinchingly met, and

288 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
finaUy vanquished. New England is sorely vexed by the
demon of intemperance. The cities are too often dominated
by the rum power, and rural communities are not free from
the bhght of this curse. In the Methodist Annual Con
ferences, therefore, the theme of the temperance cause is
always at the front, and renewed devotion is pledged by the
ministry for unanimous and increasing efforts to extirpate
this evil from society.
How does the Methodist Church polity answer to the re
ligious needs of our New England conditions ? This church
has hved long enough in this section to demonstrate its
modes of procedure, to give evidence of its temper and pur
poses, and to point to its actual successes in winning its way
among the sisterhood of churches. In the year 1800 its New
England membership numbered nearly 5,000. In the next
thirty years the total reached was over 44,000; and in i860
it was nearly 104,000. The average yearly increase for the
nineteenth century was 1570. At present, the aggregate
membership for the New England States is about 168,000.
Statistics show that the increase was much more rapid in
the first half of the nineteenth century than it has been since
1 860. The great increase by immigration of a Roman Catholic
population in the latter period, and a constant decrease of
native New England families, may help to account for this
fact. Of aU the bishops elected to be the chief officers of the
denomination from the beginning, twelve per cent have
been New England born. These things indicate that the
people have been awake to their opportunities, have sown
beside aU waters, and gathered the fruit of their labors in
many fields; and may be taken as witnesses to the effective
ness of the special agencies that Methodism has used.
It has been thought by some interested observers that
the short pastoral terms, limited first to one year, then

THE METHODISTS 289
lengthened from time to time to two, three, and five years,
weakened the effectiveness of the Methodist ministry. The
time limit having finaUy been removed by the General Con
ference, the Methodist pastor may now hold his place as
long as seems best to him and his flock, and the appointing
power. But, either from the general conditions prevaUing
among aU denominations, which conditions do not favor
long pastorates, or because the Methodist ministry long ago
formed the habit of frequent changes, and the habit is not
broken, there are very few pastoral terms that extend be
yond five years. However, when the average length of
pastorates in the Congregational and Baptist churches in
New England is less than five years, there seems stiU to be
some justification for the proposition mentioned in some
quarters that a time limit might be restored. I have already
alluded to the fact that the early ecclesiastical conditions
here, formed under the principle of independency in each
parish, had a marked influence upon the entire rehgious hfe
of New England. It has been asked, how does the lack of
complete independence in the churches of the Methodist com
munion get on in this atmosphere, among these traditions,
working alongside of supposedly freer organizations ? We
answer, the churches have about aU the liberty that they
can wisely use, and bishops do not often venture to exercise
arbitrary power over the ministers, or societies, feehng per
haps the influence of the general spirit of independence,
natural to our democracy.
Two or three facts may now be appropriately mentioned
which are larger than any provincial interests : for the con-
nectional forces which play through the entire denomination
make it impossible to consider any one section, like New
England, as very different from any other. And yet there
is a distinction that sometimes differentiates one region of
denominational hfe from another.

290 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
1. There is less conservatism in New England than in the
West, anomalous as this fact may appear, since the general
spirit of the West is venturesome, bold, and eager for new
things. A common opinion among New England Methodists,
for example, is that our Articles of Rehgion are many of them
antiquated and quite meaningless to this generation, having
been taken largely from the Thirty-nine Articles of the
Estabhshed Church of England, which were formulated in
a time when there was a bitter conflict between Romanism
and Protestantism. The issues of Christianity are now
vastly different. New England has raised a serious doubt
whether it is wise for a great denomination to carry from age
to age, in its Book of Disciphne, a set of creedal statements
which do not reflect in the best way the fundamental behefs
of the church in this time. Why should the age of Henry
VIII, or Edward VI, give to twentieth century Methodism
its principal articles of rehgious behef ? Some New England
representative minds are not content with the conservatism
that holds fast to a " creed outworn," or outhved, in the
progress of thought and by the changed conditions of Chris
tianity. When it is said it is weU to retain some of the sym
bols of an ancient faith which were beaten into shape under
fierce and determined polemics, it may also be proclaimed
that whUe the past may have some claim upon our historic
sense, and even our veneration, the insistent hfe of our own
time demands that the statement of fundamental beliefs
be such as a chUd may comprehend, and worthy of the
assent of any modern Christian.
2. It is often the case that the exaggeration, or over
working, of a principle in an organization of any kind has
unfortunate results and does not make for success. Expan
sion has been a principle in the hfe of Methodism ever since
Wesley said, " the world is my parish." He was tireless in
his purpose to gather foUowers in every quarter of Great

THE METHODISTS 29 1
Britain. His representatives in America were of the same
spirit. The new conditions in this new world seemed to lend
themselves to fostering this aggressive, exploring, missionary
spirit. But in New England there is a reaction noticeable
which results from attempts to expand too widely. There
have been too many feeble societies started where there was
no hope for, and no need of, a new enterprise. The idea of
federation as a counter to this error is beginning to make
itseU felt in locahties where expansion would naturaUy
lead toward extinction. In the settled conditions of New
England the old methods of the itinerant clergy, who like
flying scouts foUowed up every highway and every trail
where scattered families dwelt, cannot find place.
There is one prominent religious interest that is felt very
widely in the ranks of modern Protestantism, and is receiving
considerable attention in the churches of New England; that
is, the great desire on the part of many leaders of thought
in the different church bodies for a closer bond of feUowship.
" Church Unity," if it means one organic body that would
include all of the disunited members of the Protestant famUy
of churches, seems to most men whose opinions are weU
based, impracticable and Utopian. Some advances may be
made toward a more compact and efficient order in Protes
tantism. For example, it is an anomalous and a reproachful
condition for Methodism to show, in its national statistics,
that there are sixteen varieties of Methodists in the United
States. There are also fifteen varieties of Baptists, twelve
varieties of Presbyterians, twenty-one varieties of Lutherans !
It seems to some watchmen on the towers of New England
that effective steps might be taken in the direction of unity
by the denominations so prolific in " varieties," if the minor
differences that now mark these fragments could be sunk
out of sight and the fragments be brought together. Nego
tiations are now going on between the Methodist Episcopal

292 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
Church and the Methodist Episcopal Church, South, which
it is fervently hoped wiU result in the reunion at least of
these two bodies separated because of slavery in 1844. If
the denominations first mentioned could lead the way in
such a consohdation, they would serve a great purpose and
would heal some of the divisions in Protestantism which seem
unnecessary and obstructive to the progress of our common
faith. Such movements would be first stages in what might
later become a stiU more comprehensive uniting of Christian
forces; but there are no very significant signs in our sky
that there wUl be any speedy working of a centripetal power
that wiU move aU Protestantism toward " one fold." There
is a singular persistency in religious types; perhaps this
loyalty is a characteristic of New England churches espe
ciaUy. Whatever it is that shapes the type — whether
dogma, or ritual, or authority, or freedom; once the partic
ular form in ecclesiastical things is estabhshed, or set, the
tendency is for that type to persist.
After aU superficial matters in Christianity are harmoni
ously settled, the fact remains, and will always remain, that
the deepest, finest, and most effective elements of our faith
cannot be confined to any sectarian boundaries, and do not
depend upon the wiping out of aU confessional distinctions.
There might be as much danger of secularizing Christianity
if there were one vast Protestantism organized in one body,
as there is in one hundred and fifty separate rehgious bodies
that now exist in the United States. The spiritual lUe that
should be common to Christians of every name is the one
supreme interest that is immeasurably superior to visible
or organic unity. In some sections of New England last
year there was a decrease in the membership of Methodist
churches, in others an increase is reported. Numbers,
whether increasing or decreasing, do not tell the whole story.
Is ltf e increasing — the life of genuine piety, seU-forgetful,

THE METHODISTS 293
generous, dynamic ? Is this kind increasing in any fold,
under any name whatsoever ? Then, if it is, we rejoice : for
the Head of the Church Himself must rejoice. If we have
interpreted Methodism correctly, this is its temper toward
aU other faiths in New England and in Christendom; and
it is also learning to deal kindly, patiently, helpfuUy with
the poor, misshapen religions of paganism.
In the year 1866, the centenary year for American Method
ism, a great Convention met in Boston composed of twelve
hundred delegates from all the New England States, to
celebrate the work of the denomination for its first hundred
years in this nation. Many of the chief interests of the
church were discussed by leading men. A stirring service
was held under the great Elm in Boston Common where
Jesse Lee had preached in 1790. The Convention closed
its three days' session by a thronged Festival in Music HaU.
Bishop Simpson, the preeminent orator of all Methodism
in that time, made the final address. Some of his searching
appeals are worth our attention today. He said: "Why
this Convention ? We have taken each other by the hand.
You go back to Maine, to Rhode Island, to Vermont, to
New Hampshire, to Connecticut, feeling that you are mem
bers of one great brotherhood, cemented together by the
strongest ties, and going forth to work in harmony with the
great Christian denominations of the land, in bringing this
world nearer to Christ. This is the great work. Let us
preach the glorious doctrines of the Gospel as set forth by
our fathers. We have nothing to take back, nothing to
abate. Wherever we go, let us proclaim the glad tidings of
great joy. ... I think Methodism has done much, and I
rejoice; but there is a great deal that is not accomphshed.
I would infuse the spirit into the church, if I could, of
counting nothing accomplished while anything remains to
be done. Though rejoicing in the past, let us gird ourselves

294 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
afresh and consecrate ourselves to the work before us.
While we are reconstructing the nation, let us reconstruct
society and bring the world to the foot of the Cross of Christ.
This is our great mission, — God help us to perform it."
And aU the people said, Amen.

VII
THE UNIVERSALISTS
JOHN COLEMAN ADAMS

THE UNIVERSALISTS
IN the early days of the old Bay Colony, there ran
through the dense forest of the Berkshire Hills a slender
trail from the bottom-lands of the Connecticut to the vaUey
of the Hudson. It was the great Indian thoroughfare by
which the silent bands of the aborigines on their war-raids
crossed the ranges that divided their territories. That was
the route followed by the first road-builders of the settle
ments; its grades and directions guided the engineers who
staked out the railway which stUl bears its laden trains from
east to west; and recently a smooth and durable roadway
has been constructed for automobiles along those same con
tours, by which hundreds of swift cars now daUy pass from
vaUey to vaUey. Crowds now travel where the dusky scout
once trod a weary path of privation and perU. So the theo
logical thought of New England today easily moves along
the hnes once traced in spiritual travail by a brave and
hardy group of souls, in much jeopardy of good name and
standing. The earliest of them are as shadowy and uncertain
, a band as the makers of the Mohawk Trail. Who can tell
the names of the first keen-sighted souls alert to see the
foregleams of the Larger Faith in the final harmony of all
souls with God ?
Some think they discern the figure in that paragon of
statesmanship and inteUectual chivalry, Sir Harry Vane, the
younger, whose broad and radical views seem to have in
cluded a belief in the salvation of aU flesh. He certainly
declares his belief that the Christ " is become the ransom
for aU sinners; and not for those only who so beheve as
that they shaU be saved, but for the whole world." He
297

298 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
were a worthy forerunner in the way, and we may fairly
place him in the van. The early annals of the stirring town
of Marblehead record the daring affirmation of one Joseph
GatcheU, being, as his contemporaries wrote into the county
court records, " instigated of the diviU " to say that " he
would be a very imperfect Saviour " who dehvers only a
part of his people from heU. Samuel Gorton of Rhode
Island, in 1637, dropped a phrase which has remained in
the minds of the rehgious ever since, when he declared that
" there is no heaven but in the hearts of men; no heU but
in the mind." But the early voices that heralded the dawn
of a new rehgious faith and spirit were faint and few in the
seventeenth century.
The warning notes of the coming controversy began to
be heard in the middle of the eighteenth century. Jonathan
Mayhew of Boston, breaking with the theology of his time
on the whole doctrinal front, the Theodore Parker of his
day, Arminian, Liberal Christian, Independent, and Sepa
ratist, anticipated the Universalism of Hosea BaUou in
renouncing at once the doctrines of the trinity and of ever
lasting punishment. The forcefulness of his attack on the
latter doctrine may be gauged by the heat of his critic and
assaUant, John Cleaveland of Ipswich. His great influence
and popularity throughout New England imply a wide
spread diffusion of his views and no small following in the
churches. His eminent contemporary, Charles Chauncy,
kept Boston astir with his sermons and writings in open
advocacy of the faith in the salvation of all souls, as weU as
of the divine unity. The pastor of the First Church was an
aggressive Universalist before Murray or BaUou ever
scandalized the orthodoxy of the town with their heresies.
StiU later Jeremy Belknap added himself to the leaders of
what Mr. Cooke graphically styles, " the silent advance of
liberahsm " in the centre of New England's religious thought.

THE UNIVERSALISTS 299
In Connecticut, Joseph Huntington, an eighteenth century
Horace BushneU, born out of due time, published a work
with the stimulating title Calvinism Improved, whose cir
culation would have set many minds to thinking, had not
his pious and evangelical daughter burned up the greater
part of the edition. These are but a few of the many pro
phetic souls who early saw the light of the Larger Faith and
followed its leadings.
Such leaders and champions of a great idea convey a hint
of large defections from the popular creeds. Such speech
must have secured a hearing to match it. This probability
is confirmed into a certainty by the outcry that was raised
over the heresies thus made public. When Chauncy's
pamphlet Salvation for All Souls appeared, a book was pub
hshed in Connecticut which was announced as " a humble
attempt to support the sinking truths of God against some
of the principal errors raging at this time." Its preface
spoke of the " low state of religion and the awful floods of
error " which prevaUed, and singled out the prevalent
" Origenism (or the doctrine of Universal Salvation) as
lying nearest to the root of aU the impiety and wickedness
now leading the fashion in places of pubhc resort." Such
expressions of offended orthodoxy do not necessarily mean
any serious breach in the established faith, but they do point
to much theological unrest and revolt. When John Murray
preached in Gloucester in 1774, he was surprised to find
" dweUers in that remote place " who had embraced the
doctrines of his own teacher, James ReUy. It was about
these days that in four adjoining towns in New Hampshire
five pastors of Congregational churches became Universalists,
all but one of them being dismissed for their heresy. The
marked accessions to the new sect of the Universalists from
the Baptist churches is another evidence of the extent and
the force of the revolt from Calvinism unimproved.

300 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
It was in the year 1774 that John Murray, speaking after
the fashion of this world, " drifted " into New England and
found his way to Gloucester, Massachusetts. A more rever
ent description of his advent would be to caU it a providential
guidance. The story of this pioneer of organized Univer
sahsm in America reads hke a spiritual romance, almost a
rescript of the story of Jonah the " prodigal Prophet."
Like that rebeUious servant of Jehovah, he was fleeing by
ship from the voice of duty and of God, in great inward
depression and gloom, especiaUy repressing in himseU the
caU to prophesy in the spirit of the Larger Faith. Like the
son of Amittai, he was removed from his ship by a marvel
no less startling than the adventure of the Hebrew, and again
set face to face with his mission through the faith of a simple
man who persuaded him to dehver his word in the httle
church he had buUt in absolute trust that such a preacher
would come to it as now appeared. For four years he sought in
vain for any group of people who saw the light as he did, untU
in the port of Gloucester he found " a few persons . . . upon
whom the hght of the gospel had more than dawned." Here
was organized the first Universalist Church in America. It has
passed through many vicissitudes, many persecutions at law,
many theological assaults, many spiritual depressions, but stiU
hves as "the Independent Christian Society of Gloucester."
The bent of John Murray's mind was strongly Calvinistic,
and was shaped by the curious theological scheme set forth
by James Relly, of England, in his book entitled Union,
the contention of which was that aU men have been brought
into the favor of God by the righteousness of Jesus Christ,
as truly as U each one had suffered and obeyed in his own
person. The redemption thus achieved must be honored by
the Divine Being, and therefore the salvation of the whole
family of mankind is assured. Murray was not an original
thinker; he originated no system of theological thought;

THE UNIVERSALISTS 3OI
he accepted and proclaimed the ideas of another. This fact
enables us to give credit where credit belongs and declare
the connection between James ReUy and the first organized
attack upon the intrenched Calvinism of the New England
churches. James ReUy made John Murray, and John
Murray made the beginnings of the Universalist Church in
America, here in New England, on the rocks of Cape Ann.
The time was ripe, long before the pacifist Unitarians in the
bosom of the standing order were ready to take it by the
forelock, when the break should be made with the old the
ology, and organization and the count of heads be begun,
in behalf of the new theology. Such an hour presented itself
in the early church, when Christianity had to part from
Judaism or else atrophy into a faction of the mother-church.
Such an hour recurred when Luther was disfeUowshipped
and forced to organize his protest and contest its right to be
and to spread. The hour struck anew in the eighteenth
century, and it found John Murray and a handful of Uni
versalists after his fashion ready to stand for the Larger
Faith. For a generation before the Unitarians had found
themselves, the Universalists were in the field, organized,
enlisted and doing hot work in the firing fine for the truth.
When the first rally of the Unitarians took place in the Berry
Street Chapel in 1820, this little band had been organized
and growing for nearly forty years. Their system has passed ;
but the harvest from that seed-church is stUl being reaped
throughout New England and the whole land. To Murray
also must be assigned the high credit of striking the keynote
of modern preaching in his joyousness and triumphant con
fidence in the glorious outcome of the conflict with sin and
its sequences. The mood of modern rehgious teaching has
been a buoyant optimism, its message one of hope and faith,
of confidence in the divine resources, of behef in the imper
manence of evil. When Murray cried in the wUderness of

302 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
Calvinism, his voice was as of one who brought good tidings
of great joy, who pubhshed peace, who proclaimed, " Thy
God reigneth." It was time for such a herald. Men were
heart-sick over the dreary message of God's wrath, of man's
depravity and inabihty, of impending doom and endless
wreckage and ruin. This man stood in the pulpit with a
heart fuU of gladness. With him came a new spirit into
the heart of American religion.
The work of John Murray had been going on for some
thirty years, when a new force appeared upon the field of
battle for the Larger Faith. Hosea BaUou, coming to ma
turity, excommunicated from a Baptist Church, joined him
self to the Universalists, and in ten years' time became the
scarcely questioned leader of their thinking forces. His
reputation spread rapidly throughout New England as a
remarkable preacher, and under the contagion of his spirit,
the converts to the faith grew rapidly. But more important
yet, the very faith itself, under the lead of this masterly and
straightforward inteUect, was converted from the hybrid
orthodoxy of Murray, and planted squarely upon the sound
foundations of Broad Church theology, where it has ever
since rested. Murray's system was a curious blend of John
Calvin and James ReUy. It was orthodoxy newly roofed
and made tenable to humane and reasonable minds. It was
an alteration in the current theology which furnished an
excuse for remaining on the premises. But BaUou, through
his preaching and his memorable book, A Treatise on Atone
ment, opened the way for many grateful hearts to new and
ampler ideals, to a reasonable and humane conception of
God and his moral purposes. In his Treatise is the first
assembling of aU the points of the liberal theology of the
present day, the anticipation of the common doctrines from
which, in later years, that wonderful trio of New Englanders,
BushneU, Beecher, and Brooks, preached the old New Eng-

THE UNIVERSALISTS 303
land theology out of court. The claim is indisputable that
A Treatise on Atonement covers every point in the later
system which we caU " the New Theology," save only its
view of the origin of the Scriptures. It taught the unchang
ing love of God as the supreme trait in the godhead; his
eternal fatherhood; man's sonship to God; the mission of
Jesus as the reconcUer of man to God; the certainty of
punishment for sin; and the final salvation of all souls.
Mr. George Willis Cooke affirms that it " had smaU influ
ence on the current of rehgious thinking outside the Uni
versalist body." Be that as it may, it was the message which
reformed the theology of the men who were to reform the
thought of the American Church. Whether direct or in
direct, its effect was the same. It was the first book to out
line in fuU the principles of the Larger Faith in America.
It wiU yet be recognized as one of the great works of New
England's theologians.
It is to be noted that with the advent of BaUou and his
foUowers the policy of the Universahsts in New England
became more distinctly aggressive toward the ruhng forces
in the church. Hitherto they had seemed to hope that they
might preach their heresy and at the same time retain their
standing in the ranks of orthodoxy. Like the Unitarians,
whose pacific temper long deterred them from an open
break with the standing order, they would gladly have re
mained under the old standards and maintained the old
feUowship. They had not yet reahzed the " irrepressible
conflict " that was impending, nor the implacable hostility
they must face. The forces of the Old Theology were bent
on war; they had no thought or purpose of compromise.
The new heresy was " the abomination of desolation."
The doctrine must be extirpated and its adherents plucked
out, root and branch. There could be no concord between
Christ and Belial; and Behal must be cast forth, with aU

304 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
his iniquity. The Universahsts of New England were swift
to recognize the chaUenge of opposition, to appreciate its
meaning, and to raUy aU their slender forces for the conflict.
The spirit in them was that of Captain Parker at Lexington
Green, " If they want a war, let it begin here." Hence, it
happened that the first organized body in New England to
attack the intrenched ecclesiastical and theological forces of
the majority was the httle group of rehgious societies caUed
UniversaUsts. Let us linger a moment here, in the interests of clearness
and historic justice. The Universahsts of New England
chose the pohcy of theological militancy thirty years before
their later affies, the Unitarians, were forced into the same
attitude. That pohcy included, not merely the rejection of
the doctrine of eternal punishment, but the whole " scheme
of salvation " as held by orthodox Christians and by the
heretical Calvinists who foUowed John Murray. Nothing
could be farther from the fact than the assertion, which
amounts to a detraction, that Universahsm has been a
single-track theology, beginning and ending in the final
harmony of aU souls with God. It is impossible, in the good
providence of God, to put a copyright or a patent upon the
truth; because truth is the common right and possession
of mankind. But were it possible, and had the early Uni
versahsts of New England looked to their selfish interests,
two-thirds of the Protestant ministers of that territory
today would be paying theological royalties to the heirs and
assigns of BaUou and others. After its restatement by
Hosea BaUou, UniversaUsm in New England and elsewhere
became a system, not a dogma. It dared deny the whole
series of cohering misconceptions of the Gospel which was
backed by the popular churches — the trinity, the faU of
man, the total depravity of the race, the governmental
theory of the atonement, salvation by faith alone, and end-

THE UNIVERSALISTS 305
less punishment. It is the senior Unitarian body in this
country, since, twenty years before the Unitarians were
organized for their splendid campaign of theological reform,
the Universahsts of New England were a solid, aggressive
body committed to the doctrine of the unity of God. A
whole generation before Horace BushneU pleaded in Con
necticut for a more Christian interpretation of the Atone
ment, these Universalists were standing for a doctrine to aU
intents the same as his. Seventy years before Beecher and
Brooks were winning men to the modern conception of the
fatherhood of God, they were suffering theological and social
ostracism for their advocacy of the same sublime epitome
of the Gospel. The Unitarian statement of " The Things
commonly beheved among us" — originating, I beheve, with
James Freeman Clarke — contains a fine phrase, " salvation
by character." That, too, was a clear teaching of these
early prophets of the Larger Faith. It was to a body of
doctrine as broad, as inclusive, as coherent as this, that
these pioneers in the campaign against Calvinism conse
crated their hves and aU their powers. It is an inversion
of the facts to caU these people the narrow partisans of
" one idea." To them, as to their descendants, the doctrine
of the final harmony of aU souls with God was but the key
stone of an indestructible arch, resting on the one side upon
the nature of God and on the other upon the nature of man.
To change the figure and the point of view, the doctrine of
eternal punishment was the vital salient in the orthodox
line of battle; U the enemy's front were pierced here, nothing
could save it from confusion and defeat. Two great facts
in theological logistics the early Universahsts consciously
or unconsciously felt and acted upon. From the theological
point of view, if the force and reahty of the dogma of endless
punishment could be destroyed, aU the associated dogmas
would go with it; U, for instance, there were no eternal heU,

306 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
why should there be any need of a substitutional atone
ment ? From the psychological standpoint, it was clear
that the surest and quickest way to arouse the interest of
the average man was to hold the great controversy to the
point at which it bore the hardest upon himself and his own
personal destiny. That they seized on these two ideas and
made them the basis of their campaign for a half century
proves them to have been theological strategists of the first
order. Not because John Murray began the warfare so, nor
yet because their minds were not large enough to take into
account other and most vital matters, but because they per
ceived that here was the most vulnerable point of the popu
lar faith, they made their " drive " at it early and always
and incessantly. The results of the long debate have
demonstrated their polemical astuteness.
For more than thirty years after the landing of John
Murray the outward growth of the Universahst foUowing
was but meagre. At the beginning of the nineteenth century
there were about thirty-five societies for the support of the
faith, mostly in New England. They were variously grouped
in eastern Massachusetts, in lower New Hampshire and
Vermont, along the coast of Maine, in and around Provi
dence, and through the country regions of Connecticut.
They were somewhat loosely organized according to con
gregational usage, exceedingly sensitive independencies, too
jealous of their liberties to cultivate their unities. In 1792
one of these societies reported at a gathering of the faithful
that " the brethren of this place seem averse to system, and
generaUy walk as seemeth right to every man." A letter
from Newport, Rhode Island, about the same year describes in
most ingenuous fashion the extreme of feehng on this subject
and the absurd sequences of the pohcy. " Those at Newport
join neither with the world nor with each other. They are
afraid of years and of months and of days; and to avoid

THE UNIVERSALISTS 307
being tangled with what they deem a yoke of bondage, they
keep from even the appearance of assembling at any time."
These were representative utterances concerning the inde
pendency which builds its waUs so stout against authority
that it shuts out aU the vantage of fraternity. For the most
part these new Separatists kept as much aloof from friend
as from foe, and the long mistake was begun of an extreme
Congregationalism which permits every parish to do as it
may please, with no reference to what its associates are doing
or desiring to do. It has taken a century to redeem the
denomination from this early error, and the end is not yet.
AU the way along the years the Universalist Church has been
handicapped and hindered by the individualism of its mem
bership and the independency of its societies.
But the parishes and preaching stations throughout New
England multiplied and grew, and the instinct to cooperate
led to the formation of a few " associations," as they were
caUed, and now and then to the holding of a more important
gathering under the name of a " convention." The most
memorable and important of them was held at Winchester,
New Hampshire, in 1803. It was composed of societies
represented by twenty clerical and twenty-two lay dele
gates. The chief business of this convocation and the work
for which it wiU always be remembered, was the adoption of
a statement of belief, put forth in the name of the " Churches
and Societies of Universalists of the New England States,
assembled in General Convention."
The Profession of Belief adopted at the session at Win
chester, New Hampshire, a. d., 1803, is as follows:
Article I. We believe that the Holy Scriptures of the Old and
New Testaments contain a revelation of the character of God and of
the duty, interest, and final destination of mankind.
Article II. We believe that there is one God, whose nature is
Love, revealed in one Lord Jesus Christ, by one Holy Spirit of Grace,

308 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
who wih finahy restore the whole family of mankind to holiness and
happiness. Article III. We beheve that holiness and true happiness are
inseparably connected, and that believers ought to be careful to main
tain order and practice good works; for these things are good and
profitable unto men.
This was the famous Profession of Belief, known as the
" Winchester Profession." The Profession was the first
exphcit statement in the form of creed, articles, or profession,
of the great fundamentals of what has come to be known as
" hberal Christianity " or " the new orthodoxy " or " broad
church theology." It was the affirmation of a body of men
who had been converted from the Calvinism of Murray to
the liberalism of BaUou. They were Arminian, Unitarian,
Universahst. The preaching and the influence of BaUou
had already swung the majority of those whom they repre
sented to the new theology, in aU its essentials. The Pro
fession was the direct outcome of the principles which for
a good haU century had been leavening the religious thought
of the land. It sounded the note of freedom from the stand
ing order of the church and ran up the colors of an independ
ent body, resting on the new doctrines affirmed. It is the
document in which the new theology — the theology which
starts from the fatherhood of God and proceeds consistently
to the final and universal harmony of the moral creation —
was first set forth in a creed. It was thus at once the Magna
Charta and the Declaration of Independence of the Broad
Church in America. It was the assertion of the fundamental
truths on which the subscribers planted themselves and it
was the proclamation of their intent to claim their rights to
a free ecclesiastical hfe, in the service of those truths. The
adoption of this creed was an event of the first importance
in the religious history of the country. For it definitely
marked the birth of a new theology, the renaissance of the

THE UNIVERSALISTS 309
primal Gospel of Jesus Christ. It was the signal for organi
zation and for aggression among the friends of the Larger
Faith. It was a distinct stimulus to the controversy and
rising temperature which at length forced the Berry Street
Conference and the Unitarian schism. It was the ensign
of the vanguard of the New Theology. It stood for the
Universal Fatherhood of God; for man's Sonship to God
as typified in Jesus Christ; for the Atonement as the recon
ciliation of man to God; for the Certainty of the Penalties
of sin, here or hereafter; and for the final Harmony of all
souls with God. It is one of the great fundamental docu
ments of New England's history. Those whose heritage
includes the Mayflower Compact and the Connecticut
Charter and Fundamental Orders ought to hold in equal
esteem and honor this first creedal statement of the organi
zation which led the struggle for the Larger Faith in America.
Let it be said at this point, lest this claim of priority in
behalf of both Hosea BaUou and the Winchester Profession
seem to savor of vainglory, that the claim is made in the
Commonwealth which prides itself upon Plymouth Rock
and Concord Bridge and Lexington Green and Old Ironsides
and Harvard University. It is here accounted an honor to
have sprung from the forerunners of the world's good, and
to keep their memories fresh. It is still counted a fine thing
in New England to have inherited, in blood or in belief from
the prophets or from the prophecies of law and hberty and
to remind men of both. It is equally an affair of filial honor
and religious loyalty to remind a forgetful generation of
who first lifted up the standards of the Larger Faith in this
glorious corner of the universe, and the truths for which
they stood in array against the legions of a relentless Cal
vinism. As long as the sculptured Minute Man chaUenges
the visitor to Concord Bridge, or " The granite spike that's
druv thru Bunker HiU " is cooled by the east winds of

3IO RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
Boston Harbor, so long you must bear with those who pay
honor where honor is due, to the men who set the pace and
took the initiative in the conflict for man's emancipation
from the tyranny of a false gospel.
The Winchester Profession stUl stands as the historic and
official statement of faith of the Universahst Church in
America. It was supplemented in the year 1901 by a state
ment of the Principles of Universahsm which the Profession
was held to contain. This statement was accompanied by a
declaration that " neither this nor any other precise form
of words is required as a condition of feUowship, provided
always that the principles above stated be professed." That
saving clause prevents once for aU any narrow and over
scrupulous disputes about particular words and phrases,
and demands, as a condition of feUowship, only a broad and
reasonable agreement as to the great truths held up as the
standard of faith and teaching. Thus the spirit of the his
toric Profession is preserved and a new and perennial lease
of hfe conferred upon it.
One of the features of the eighteenth century Ecclesiasti
cal Affairs, was the long and stubborn struggle of the dis
senting sects — and they were many and strange — to
secure and maintain their freedom from the standing order,
the Congregationahsm of New England. The compulsory
tax for the support of preaching was not so obnoxious when
aU were of pretty much the same theological way of thinking;
but as differences arose and factions separated themselves
from the estabhshed churches, the injustice of the enforced
support of the state's church and minister, whUe maintain
ing reUgious services and organizations of their own, became
an acute issue. Of course it involved the Universahsts.
John Murray's society in Gloucester became defendants in a
long and costly suit at law, which, however, in June, 1786,
was decided in their favor, and gave them the right to their

THE UNIVERSALISTS 3II
own funds for the support of a minister after their own
faith. This decision encouraged them and had a distinct
bearing on subsequent cases of the same type. One of these
was the famous litigation of Christopher Erskine of Clare
mont in 1802, who, being " sued for the non-payment of
Congregational ministerial taxes, prayed for counsel." The
courts gave adverse judgments, but in 1805 the Legislature
of New Hampshire passed a statute recognizing Universahsts
as a distinct sect.
It was for a long time held, as a denominational tradition,
that the Winchester Convention in 1803 had for its main
purpose the adoption of such a form of church government
as should meet the general doctrine held by the courts of
New England, that however dissenting sects might differ
from the standing order in theological belief, they could
not claim exemption from the tax to support the ministry
of the Congregational Church unless they could show that
they held to a different form of organization and ecclesiastical
government. But as the action of the Convention did not
furnish such a plan, but left the churches represented practi-
caUy under a congregational pohty; and as the adoption of
a different theological creed did not, under these circum
stances, relieve them from the claims and demands of the
established order, it may be assumed that the object of
the Convention was rather to furnish a working system for
the good of the churches concerned, than to make a stronger
foundation for their legal demands for release from the
double support of rehgious worship which the courts ruled
was their duty. Moreover, the Convention issued a long
and exphcit address to the Universahsts in New Hampshire,
caUing upon them to face the unfavorable action of the courts
as " serious, solemn, and awful truths," whose consequences
were bound to be dangerous and disastrous to their posses
sions and their liberty, but calling upon them to stand fast

312 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
in the faith and not " to make a compact with iniquity."
This fact conclusively proves that the Convention itseU
looked for no relief through the adoption of a creed, but
sought rehef from this crying injustice through other chan
nels. Help came, as was hoped, when the New Hampshire
legislature, by the special act referred to, recognized the
Universahsts as a distinct sect and declared them entitled
to the same privUeges and immunities as any other denomi
nation. GraduaUy the disestablishment of the church was
effected throughout New England, last of aU in Massachu
setts, in 1834, and, as WiUiston Walker says, " New England
CongregationaUsm reverted to its original system of volun
taryism." Every rehgious movement is subject to its schisms, and
the Universahst body had its experience of secession at a
very early date. This episode of the denominational history
took place in New England. In 181 7, a debate was begun
over the teaching of the Scriptures concerning the duration
of the punishment of the wicked, which started in the most
friendly spirit but led to heat and bitterness and culminated
in the separation of a number of ministers and congregations
from the main body of behevers in the final salvation of aU
souls. It was a whoUy unnecessary and futUe discussion
which need not have affected the integrity of the denomina
tion nor jarred its unanimity. It arose from a proposition of
Hosea BaUou, then of Salem, to Edward Turner of Charles
town, to discuss with him the question whether the Scrip
tures teach the doctrine of the punishment of the wicked in
the future hfe. BaUou's proposal was peculiar in his offer
to take either side of the question, a fact which indicates
that at this time the doctrine of no future punishment did
not hold a very important place in his theological system.
Apparently the purpose was to engage in a harmless exer
cise in polemics. Probably, U the debate had ended with

THE UNIVERSALISTS 313
the arguments of the two principals, very httle would have
been heard of it. But the contagion of dispute spread among
some of the younger and less judicious of the brethren, and
much mischief ensued.
Among the early Universalists in America the doctrine of
a limited term of punishment for the wicked in the future
was not questioned. John Murray inherited the doctrine
from his spiritual father, James ReUy. Elhanan Winchester
was of the same mind, and was even ready to suggest a
matter of fifty thousand years as a possible limit. It is
admitted that the PhUadelphia Articles of Faith, adopted
as the creed of the convention of churches in 1790, had the
assent and personal revision of Benjamin Rush, a disciple of
Elhanan Winchester. Hosea BaUou himself, in the earher
period of his thinking, made no objection to this teaching.
Probably the major part of the preachers and laity of that
day assumed that the penalties for sin held over into the lUe
to come. About the year 1793, Abel Sargent of Pennsyl
vania became a vigorous defender of the doctrine of no
future punishment, and Caleb Rich of Massachusetts, from
whom BaUou received his first instruction in the faith,
" openly contended that aU the (evU) consequences of sin
were confined to the present hfe." For more than two
generations this type of Universahsm waxed stronger and
asserted itself with great vehemence. It was wholly aside
from the main contention of the denomination to lay such
stress upon this minor point of theological affirmation.
Ample room was afforded in organization and in creedal
statements for both parties to stand together. As early as
1 79 1, when the PhUadelphia Convention was asked to define
the position of the Universalist Church upon the question
of future punishment, it made answer in this wise:
Unbelievers do die in their sins; such wih not be purged of their
sins or unbehef by death, but necessarily must appear in the next

314 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
state under all the darkness, fear, and torment and conscious guilt,
which is the natural consequence of unbehef in the truth. What may
be the duration or degree of this state of unbelief and misery, we know
not. But this we know, that it hath one uniform and invariable end;
namely, the good of the creature.
That ought to have been a broad enough platform for aU
parties. But there are certain minds whose interest centres
in detaUs and who insist on an orthodoxy as inflexible in its
by-laws as in its constitution. It was the men of this temper
who swept the Universalist body away from its original and
tolerant position and committed it for more than a haU-
century to a partisan attitude. BaUou and Turner soon
finished their dialectical diversion. In the words of Dr.
Fisher, " The debate ran on in the shape of fourteen letters
that were published in the denominational paper, the Gospel
Visitant." Then the contest closed, not because either
side surrendered, or claimed the victory, but because a
mercUul Providence ordained that the Visitant should cease
to be published. But the dogs of controversial war were
unleashed, and were bound to run their course.
The most conspicuous leaders in the long wrangle, both
theological and ecclesiastical, which ensued, were two
clerical Hotspurs, Thomas Whittemore, editor, preacher,
and born controversialist, and Adin BaUou, restorationist,
abolitionist, prohibitionist, communist, spiritualist, pacifist
• — one of the most remarkable souls that New England has
produced. Others of weight and abUity ranged themselves
on either side — Paul Dean, the assistant of John Murray
at Boston, Edward MitcheU of New York City, Edward
Turner of Charleston, one of the original disputants, these
standing with Adin BaUou; whUe Walter Balfour, a writer
of power and note, Hosea BaUou, and the majority of the
younger men of the period, formed the foUowing of Whitte
more. The controversy that ensued was neither educational

THE UNIVERSALISTS 315
nor edifying. It became a riot of newspaper communica
tions and pamphlets, " appeals " and " replies," " inquiries "
and " declarations," personalities and recriminations, with
the maximum of heat and the minimum of light. Much
bitter feeling was stirred and the usual issue of such undis
ciplined differences befell. In 183 1, a convention of Restora-
tionists — ministers and delegates — • was held at Mendon,
Massachusetts, and a separate organization formed com
prising about twenty clergymen and an uncertain number of
laymen. The seceding body had a short hfe, and in 1841,
held its last meeting. The Restorationists as a sect appear
no more.
But time and reason bring their strange and unlooked-for
revenges and compensations. " The blood of the martyrs
is the seed of the church," and the discomfiture of the
Restorationists in this campaign was in a few short years
offset by the swing of practicaUy the whole denomination
back to the original position of the founders, untU today the
entire Universahst church is frankly of the conviction that
not only do we " get our punishment as we go along " —
to revive a theological colloquialism of the former days — but
that it may go a long way with us into the future.
In 1878, the Universahst ministers of Boston and vicinity,
after weeks of deliberation, adopted a statement concerning
the views then prevaUing, whose closing paragraphs are as
true today as then, and may be said to have closed for aU
time this division of faith in the church:
In respect to death, we believe that however important it may be
in removing manifold temptations and opening the way to a better
life, and however like other great events it may profoundly influence
man, it has no saving power. Salvation, secured in the willing mind
by the agencies of divine truth, light, and love, essentiaUy represented
in Christ — whether effected here or in the future life, is salvation by
Christ, and gives no warrant for the imputation to us of the " death
and glory " theory, alike repudiated by ah.

316 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
Whatever differences may exist among us in regard to the future,
none of us beheve that the horizon of eternity wih relatively, either
largely or for a long time, be overcast by the clouds of sin or punish
ment, and in coming into the enjoyment of salvation, whatsoever that
may be, ah the elements of penitence, forgiveness, and regeneration
are involved. Justice and mercy will then be seen to be entirely at
one, and God wih be ah in ah.
In justice to Hosea BaUou and as a part of any fair state
ment of the theology of the Universalists of New England,
it ought to be said that BaUou's views upon the future did
not by any means form one of the cardinal points of his
theology. He himseU protested against the prominence
given them, as weU as against the misrepresentation they
suffered. His contention was twofold. First, that punish
ment is contemporaneous with sin, begins with it, and con
tinuously accompanies it. Secondly, that the changes in
the environment and condition at death wiU so influence the
soul, as to overcome its revolt against the Divine and bring
it to a quick penitence. He would never admit that he
beheved death to be the saviour of man; and he resented
the imputation that he taught, as Channing charged, that
death has power to purify the soul. He maintained that
the only difference between himseU and other believers in
the Larger Faith was a difference as to the intensity of the
means of grace and the speed at which they would operate.
To put the whole matter in a word, BaUou seems to have
conceived of the beginnings of the life after death as resem
bling a continuous revival season, whose tense conditions
and impressive experiences could not faU to change whoUy
the temper of the sinner and to overcome the perversions
of his wiU. In the words of his biographer, Dr. Safford,
" he beheved that the soul on arriving at immortality, with
earthly and sinful desires aU gone, wiU immediately behold
such heavenly iUumination as wUl cause a glad forgetfulness

THE UNIVERSALISTS 317
of the things behind and a pressing forward to the things
before. This result of glorious salvation, however, he be
heved would be effected by no arbitrary means or inter
ference with the individuahty or the free choice of the souls,
but by the moral power of the Father's all-conquering love."
It is no easy task to set forth the traits of one's ancestors
either in the flesh or in the faith. But so much miscon
ception and distortion of the character and spirit of the
Universalists of New England has controUed, almost un
questioned, the popular mind, that the estimate of sym
pathy and a common point of view wiU do no harm. It
was inevitable that the heretics from the ancient faith should
suffer aspersion at the hands of those whose cherished dog
mas they dared to doubt. It was equaUy certain that the
early attitude of those whom they opposed determined the
kind of warfare which was adopted. Theological heresy was
still counted one of the cardinal sins, when the pious people
of Gloucester proposed to run John Murray out of town.
Plainly, if the Universahst were to exist at aU sociaUy or
ecclesiasticaUy, he must stand up in his own defence. He
must become a militant. This was the more imperative in
the case of the plain man of the people, such as most of the
Universahsts were. He who has little wealth, small political
influence, scant education, no assured social standing, if he
becomes a heretic, must look to his fighting abihties. He
shaU have use for them. Here was a reason why the Uni
versahst and Unitarian temper and policies in the advance
ment of the truths they held in common, varied so widely.
The former were liable to social ostracism and to business
hardships on account of their opinions. They were branded
as atheists and traveUers toward the pit. It was deemed
disreputable to attend their meetings or to read their books.
Their services were obstructed and their characters assaUed.
Little wonder that their resentment was roused and the

318 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
sense of injustice intensified their hostihty toward the system
they were opposing. Their Unitarian affies, on the other
hand, were secure in their social position, were reassured by
the culture and learning of the clergy who led them and the
influential laymen who gave weight to their movement.
With no social or business handicaps, nor any serious rupture
with old conditions, the Unitarian temper was less heated
in controversy, less aggressive in policy. As a matter of
fact, the Unitarian of the early century preferred the feUow
ship of the men and churches from whom he was sundered
by aU his theological convictions, but who were his social
intimates, co-graduates of Harvard and Yale, and feUow-
members of the bar, the bench, and the board of trade, to
affiliation with the people who stood next to him in religious
conviction. This condition was also one of the reasons why
there was so httle cooperation between the two bodies.
The difficulty was more social than anything else. The old
New England of the post-revolution days had a good deal
of the caste spirit stUl surviving from the colonial times.
Another of the effects of the pohcy, aggressive and rebel
lious, of the new sect, was to attract to its ranks aU classes
and conditions of ethical and rehgious malcontents, a host of
those who had any grievance against the established churches,
and make the denominational standards a raUying-point for
whatever was anti-orthodox. These recruits brought no
sympathy with the deep religious spirit of the new faith,
they had no share in its spiritual aspirations or observances.
They throve on the air of controversy and when they betook
themselves to the pages of the Scriptures, they opened them
only to bring forth chapter and verse that should confute
and confound him that was of the opposite part. Many of
the societies which they formed were hardly more than theo
logical clubs, to afford a hearing for ministers whose sole
function was to batter at the walls of the Calvinistic Bastile.

THE UNIVERSALISTS 319
That New England Universahsm was able to purge itself
of these unwholesome and unwelcome elements was proof
of its essential soundness and spirituality. But their indif
ference to the deeper rehgious implications of the faith, their
aversion to the emotional elements and factors of the re
hgious nature, their faUure to grasp the new motive to
missions which so far transcended the older, — all these
hmitations and defects constituted a serious hindrance to
the right development of the spirit of the founders and real
prophets of the church.
For from the beginning untU now, the heart of New Eng
land Universalism has been aglow with a true rehgious hfe.
The genius of that crusade against the theology of decrees,
depravity and damnation, has always been rehgious. It
has kept to the road in which it was started by the perfervid
Murray and the devout and reverent BaUou. Despite the
shortcomings of those who aUied themselves with it for
nothing but the fight against orthodoxy, it has kept faith
with the fathers in the maintenance of its Christian standing
and spirit and expression. It has grown in grace and in the
knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ; it has
patiently sought the profounder meanings of its own high
caUing; it has learned its own relation to world-evangeliza
tion; it has striven against the tides of a material age to a
more prayerful and spiritual temper and consecration; it
has trained its young life in personal loyalty to the Christ;
it has responded almost as a unit to every real reform; it
has been quick to interpret the meaning of the new caU upon
the churches to champion the great social ideals which shall
recognize the common origin, the common interests, the
common destiny of the whole human race. Its faith has
been more than a theological idea. It has been vitalized
by godly living. Its record has been more than a history
of controversy. It is a sum of saintly lives. Every church

320 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
that bears its name has its separate roster, and from the httle
shrines in the lull-towns of New Hampshire and Vermont
to the great churches in the metropolitan centres, there are
memorials of these saints of the new and Larger Faith, the
apostles of the rising truth. They are its epistle, known and
read of aU men, bearing witness to the steadfastness with
which the church of their love and loyalty has grown from
the principles of the fathers to the fuUer interpretation of
the sons.
Of the outcome of this century of debate and controversy,
it remains to be said that it gives these heirs of the men who
are responsible for it nothing but solemn satisfaction and a
deep gratitude to God. It has been the privilege of our time
to see the great contentions of these reformers finding ac
ceptance among the thinking people of all sects and denomi
nations. The harsher doctrines of election and reprobation,
of infant damnation, of total depravity and the judicial
theory of atonement have generaUy been repudiated and
are no longer recognized as entitled to a place in a reputable
modern creed. Multitudes have come to hold the doctrine
of the trinity in a fashion so vague as to be scarcely dis
tinguishable, save in its phrasing, from Unitarianism. Dr.
Chapin used to declare that the modern doctrine of endless
punishment bore the same relation to the old dogma as a
harmless domestic cat to the aboriginal tiger. The whole
religious climate has been so modified that the harsher dog
mas can no longer live in New England. As a necessary re
sult of this evolution of theological sentiment, it has come
to pass that those who have striven for this new status are
no longer the objects of persecution, hardly even of suspicion.
Universahsm has served its apprenticeship as a heresy, and
now finds itself in good standing among the acceptable inter
pretations of the Gospel. Each in its turn the several churches
have outlived the stigma of heterodoxy and achieved the

THE UNIVERSALISTS 321
standing of orthodoxy, and now it is the turn of the Larger
Faith. The spirit of the new times is upon us aU. The
passing of the old bitterness, the softening of theological
asperities, the advent of the day of fellowship and of co
operation, have abated the old animosities, and replaced
them with a finer spirit of tolerance. For the generous share
which this church has had in the glorious consummation,
we who are its sons are proud and grateful. We can devoutly
say, as we survey the past out of which we have come, and
look into the future which invites us, "These aU having
obtained a good report through faith received not the prom
ises, God having provided some better thing for us, that they
without us might not be made perfect."
What those better things may be no man can prophesy.
But they are certain to include the merging of effort in the
new issues which challenge all Christian men, and the sub
merging of old differences, which grow less and less as the
larger temper pervades the life of society. It does not need
to imply the loss of identity, nor the weakening of loyalty
to the standards about which cluster the haUowed memories
of a great conflict for the freedom and the joy of a nobler
faith. If with the lapse of time something of the old dis
tinctiveness must also pass away, it wiU only be as the old
New England characteristics have been lost through their
wider diffusion and assimUation over a wider area and
through a vaster constituency. New England has escaped
from its corner and pervaded the haU of a continent; Uni
versalism has overflowed its denominational dykes, and now
irrigates the sentiment of aU the churches. What crops
shall be harvested from the new soU we know not. The
future, like the past, is with God.

VIII
THE SWEDENBORGIANS
WILLIAM L. WORCESTER

THE SWEDENBORGIANS
THE beginning of the New Church (commonly known as
Swedenborgian) in America is associated in an interest
ing way with the founding of the nation. The Rev. Jacob
Duche, a minister of the Church of England, and rector of
Christ Church in Philadelphia, has been caUed the first
New Churchman in America. When the Continental Con
gress first met in 1774, Duche1 was called to conduct an
opening service and to make the first prayer in Congress.
John Adams in a letter to his wUe wrote of the great appro
priateness of the Scripture that was read, and of the fervor
and ardor, the earnestness and pathos and eloquence, of the
prayer, in which Duche prayed for America, for Congress,
for the Province of Massachusetts Bay, and especiaUy for
Boston, of whose bombardment they had heard on the
previous morning.1
The same Jacob Duche was instrumental in planting the
New Church in New England. Living for a time in practical
banishment in England, " not being wiUing," so the record
reads, " to go aU lengths with the Revolutionists," he there
interested the Rev. WUUam Hill in the doctrines of the New
Church, and this man made two visits to America, in 1794
' It is probable that the Rev. Jacob Duche must yield the distinction of having
been the first to advocate publicly the doctrines of the New Church, in America, to
James Glenn, of whom we shall presently speak. There is evidence that before
his departure for England, in 1777, Mr. Duche had in his library a set of Sweden-
borg's works in Latin; but the first direct evidence of his being acquainted with
the contents of the volumes is during the early part of his stay in England. Mr.
Duchfi returned to America in 1790, but in the meantime James Glenn had visited
the country in 1784, and given public lectures on the doctrines. See Rev. Jacob
Duch6 D. D., by William B. Hayden, New Jerusalem Magazine, Vol. XXXVIII,
pp. 496, 501. 615; also The Rev. Jacob Duche, by Charles Higham, New-
Church Review, Vol. XXII, pp. 210, 404. 32s

326 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
and 1796, for the sake of spreading a knowledge of the doc
trines, the second time remaining permanently in this
country. Mr. HiU is described to us by a lady whom I weU
remember.1 She met him at the home of Mr. Andrew
Craigie, in Cambridge, now known as the Longfellow house,
Mr. Craigie being one of those who became interested in the
new teachings. It appears that Mr. HiU had a special desire
to find a reception for the New Church at Harvard CoUege,
and he gave to the CoUege Library Swedenborg's Arcana
Coelestia, in eight large Latin volumes, and perhaps other
works of Swedenborg. These books, about twenty years
later, were the means of awakening the interest that Mr.
HiU had hoped for. A group of strong men in the class of
1818, with others who were in coUege at the same time,
became interested in the doctrines through the books given
by Mr. HiU, and were among the founders of the organized
New Church in New England.
One of this group of students was Thomas Worcester,
whose father, Noah Worcester, had broken away from Cal
vinism, and had already exerted an influence upon rehgious
thought in New England by his hberal views as published
in his Bible News of the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, and as
first editor of the liberal magazine, The Christian Disciple.
Noah Worcester is even better known for his tract, A Solemn
Review of the Custom of War, which is stiU in active service,
and for his pioneer labors in the cause of peace. Thomas
Worcester, son of Noah, had learned of Swedenborg's works
through an older brother, Samuel, and had heard also of the
ArcanaCoelestia given by Mr. HiU to the CoUege Library; and
in 1816, he returned to college as a junior, with the purpose
of finding and reading the work. I quote his own account
of his experience in finding the books:
1 Early Recollections of the New Church in Boston, by Miss Margaret G. Cary,
New Jerusalem Magazine, Vol. XXX, p. 391.

THE SWEDENBORGIANS 327
Upon my return to college, after I had begun to read Swedenborg,
I went to the library the second time to see if I could find any of his
works. The hbrarian looked into the catalogue again, and found the
alcove and shelves where they ought to have been, but they were not
there. Then we began a thorough search. We looked through the
whole library, in place and out of place, but could not find them.
Then we began to think of other rooms. At that time the library was
in the second story of the west end of Harvard Hah. In the east end
was a large room, called the " Philosophical Room," and between
this room and the library was a smah room, which for want of a better
name was called the " Museum." It was filled with rubbish, old
curiosities, cast off, superseded, and obsolete philosophical apparatus,
and so forth, all covered with dust. We could see no reason for hunting
here, except that we had hunted everywhere else, without finding
what we wanted. There was a long table in the room. Upon it, and
under it, were piles of useless articles; and beyond it were shelves
against the wall, where various things were stored away. On the under
shelf, as far out of sight as possible, I saw some books. I told the
librarian, and he went round and worked his way until he got at them,
and found that the large books were volumes of the Arcana Coelestia.
There were also several other works of Swedenborg, ah of them
covered with dust. I immediately got an order from President Kirk-
land, giving me authority to take the books and keep them in my
room; and this I did for the rest of my college life. By what means
or for what purpose these " Heavenly Doctrines " were cast out
of the library of Harvard College must be left to conjecture. Of
the fifty thousand or sixty thousand volumes then belonging
to the library, these were the only ones that were treated in
this manner. The fact seems to represent the state of the New
Church at that time (Biography of Thomas Worcester, by Sampson
Reed, pp. 17, 18).
The group of Harvard students who became interested
in the New Church through these volumes rescued from
oblivion in the CoUege Library were Thomas Worcester,
J. H. Wilkins, Warren Goddard, WiUiam Parsons, and
Sampson Reed, aU of the class of 1818; Theophilus Parsons
(later Dane Professor of Law in the Harvard Law School),
Caleb Reed, T. B. Hayward, John Angier, Nathaniel Hobart,

328 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
and T. G. Worcester, students in the classes of 1815, '17,
'20, '21, and '23.
But earher than this awakening of interest among Har
vard students, there had been a beginning of interest in the
doctrines of the New Church among a few men and women
in Boston, strengthened by the influence of Mr. HiU, but
dating from a few public lectures given in Boston in 1784
by James Glenn, a Scotchman, who has already been referred
to as probably the first to advocate pubhcly the doctrines
of the New Church in America. Mr. Glenn also lectured
in PhUadelphia, and sowed seeds of the New Church among
the native Indians in Demerara, British Guiana, seeds
which are still growing and bearing fruit. The few interested
persons in Boston began in 181 7 to meet regularly for read
ing and study of the Scriptures and the doctrines of the New
Church; and this little group, soon strengthened by the
Harvard students, became the nucleus of the Boston Society
of the New Jerusalem, which was organized August 15, 1818,
and incorporated by the Legislature of Massachusetts in
February, 1823 — the first organized body of the New
Jerusalem in New England. Societies had already been
organized in Baltimore, PhUadelphia, Cincinnati, and New
York. It is perhaps impossible for us in this day of freedom and
tolerance to realize fuUy the difficulties within and without
which beset these pioneers of the New Church a hundred
years ago. In part their hardships were the same that were
experienced by the early Universalists and Unitarians, who
rebeUed against the standing order, and were at that time
waging war with the Calvinism so strongly intrenched in
New England. EquaUy with these hberals, the New Church
was at war with the old-fashioned Calvinism and its doc
trines of predestination, vicarious atonement, and salvation
by faith alone. But on the other hand it was almost equaUy

THE SWEDENBORGIANS 329
at variance with the liberal bodies. Its position was lonely
in the extreme, — a mere handful of people, commonly
regarded with suspicion, misunderstood, treated with con
tempt and ridicule, in not a few cases cut off from associa
tion with relatives and former friends. Thomas Worcester
once told me that in the early days of his ministry in Boston
there was hardly a respectable minister in the city who dared
to be civil to him. And when a school was opened for the
chUdren of the church, it was in part to protect the chUdren
from the treatment which they received in other schools.
Yet it was not altogether fear of personal rebuff which led
the first members of the New Church in Boston to meet
privately, and a httle later, when services were established,
to question seriously whether to invite the pubhc to their
meetings. They could not bear to see things, which to them
were sacred and more dear than life itself, subjected to ridi
cule. It is recorded that at one of the religious meetings, a
Christmas service, shortly before the organization of the
Society, the little group were so disturbed by the presence
of a single stranger, Miss Hannah Adams, who came evi
dently out of curiosity, that they could not carry out the
exercises as planned, and limited the service to a Scripture
reading.1 If it is true, as is often charged, that the members
of the New Church are backward in announcing the doc
trines which they hold, in pubhc and in private, it may be
in part a natural consequence of the conditions which sur
rounded them two generations ago. They may have kept
a certain reserve and timidity after the cause for it has
passed. This is not the whole story; there is a brighter, happier
side to the picture; and as an early instance of friendhness
to the New Church, let us record at once that at the first
1 Address before Boston Society, by Sampson Reed, New Jerusalem Maga
zine, December, 1837.

330 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
observance of the Communion by the Society after its
organization, in 1818, the plate for the service was lent
them from King's Chapel.1
Before going forward with our narrative, it seems neces
sary to describe briefly the writings of Swedenborg and the
doctrines there set forth, which appealed to a few persons
with such convincing power and were so earnestly condemned
and feared by others. We need to know what the New
Church represents in order to understand its relation to the
rehgious thought and lUe of New England a hundred years
ago and since that time.
Emanuel Swedenborg hved and wrote in Stockholm,
Sweden, during the provincial period of New England. He
was born in 1688, and died in 1772. He is best known as a
man of science and a philosopher, the last few years having
witnessed a marked revival of interest in the man and his
science, which is finding expression in the pubhcation of a
new and sumptuous edition of his scientific works by the
Royal Academy of Sciences of Sweden. If you glance at
the volumes written by Swedenborg, as they stand on the
shelves of a library, you are amazed at their amount and
the industry which could have produced them. If you
arrange the volumes chronologicaUy, you note an interesting
sequence in the work. The earlier books are scientific and
philosophical. The first of these deal with mathematics and
the mineral kingdom. Large volumes treat of the mining
and smelting of copper and iron; and it wih be remembered
that Swedenborg's official position was that of Assessor in
the CoUege of Mines, a member of the committee in charge
of the mining interests of Sweden. Other volumes deal with
the origin of forms and forces. It is here, in his Principia,
that Swedenborg announces his theory of the nebular origin
1 Reminiscences of the New Church in Boston, by H. G. Foster, New
Jerusalem Magazine, Vol. XXXI, p. 161.

THE SWEDENBORGIANS 331
of the solar system, similar to the theory of Kant and
Laplace, but antedating the announcement of the theory
by Kant by twenty-one years and the announcement by
Laplace by sixty- two years. During this period of interest
in mechanics and abstract science, Swedenborg amused him
self with many inventions. A list of inventions in a letter
of 1 7 14, includes several which have a decidedly modern
sound; a submarine, a machine gun, a mechanical musical
instrument, a flying machine, and a method of ascertaining
the desires and affections of the minds of men by analysis.
Glancing along the row of volumes, we pass from me
chanics and metaUurgy to the study of the human body,
undertaken with the avowed purpose of coming through
knowledge of the body to knowledge of the soul. To this
group of books belong seven or eight volumes, representing
thorough study of the physical organs and functions, and
especially of the brain. In these volumes discoveries of
modern science are anticipated, not always proved, by the
modern laboratory method, but stated confidently on ra
tional grounds. The discussion passes over the border from
physiology to psychology, showing the author's eagerness-
to be reaching the knowledge of the soul to which the whole
work was directed. Here also he demonstrates that the way
of advance in knowledge from the physical to the spiritual
is by recognition of the correspondence between higher and
lower forms of lUe, and of influx from the higher into the
lower. The divine Word, though beyond and above the
range of study yet attempted, is referred to with reverence
and almost with awe, as the divine statement of the true
order of social life and individual life which is reflected in
the order and the unity of mutual service ruling in the
physical body.
Swedenborg had now come as near to a knowledge of the
soul as he could come from the side of natural science. There

332 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
foUowed a short transition period in which he was preparing
with aU thoroughness for study of God's Word; and then
with a clear conviction that he was called by the Lord to
renounce aU worldly ambitions and to apply himself to this
sacred task, he began his great Bible studies. The first of
these that Swedenborg himseU published was the Arcana
Coelestia, a study of Genesis and Exodus. He was engaged
upon this work eight years, and pubhshed it in as many vol
umes. Later he made two studies of the Book of Revelation,
only one of which he himself pubhshed. These Bible studies,
made as Swedenborg himself believed under special iUumi
nation from the Lord, constitute the larger part of his theo
logical work. The order of the divine hfe and the true order
of human hfe unfolded to him in the Scriptures, and the
nature of this order, was made more clear by conscious asso
ciation with angels and with the order of heaven in which
they hve. As the study of the Lord's Word advanced, the
principles of this true order, this true Christian lUe, grew
clear, and crystaUized out in short doctrinal works. A group
of such works follows each of the great Bible studies. After
the Arcana Coelestia, were written and published Heaven and
HeU, The New Jerusalem and its Heavenly Doctrines, The
Last Judgment, and some smaller works. After the first
study of the Book of Revelation were written The Doctrine
of the Lord, The Doctrine of the Sacred Scripture, The Doctrine
of Life, The Doctrine of Faith, The Divine Love and Wis
dom, The Divine Providence, The Doctrine of Charity, with
several smaUer works; and later foUowed Conjugial Love,
and finaUy a gathering up of doctrine in systematic form in
The True Christian Religion. Let it be remembered — a
fact demonstrated by the order and relation of the books —
that Swedenborg's theological work was a work of Scripture
exposition, and that the doctrines which he advanced crys
tallized out of the study of the Bible. And this accords

THE SWEDENBORGIANS 333
with his own declaration that nothing of the doctrine of the
New Church was given him by any angel, but by the Lord
alone, while he read the Word.1
It is necessary further to state briefly the doctrines which
Swedenborg taught from the Word, and which were seeking
a home in the rehgious atmosphere of New England. The
essential doctrines are sometimes stated by Swedenborg as
two; the acknowledgment of the Lord, and a life of charity,
which is a life of obedience to the Ten Commandments;
and sometimes as three (subdividing one head of the briefer
statement) : the acknowledgment of the Lord, the acknowl
edgment of the holiness of the Word, and the life of charity.
A few words in explanation of each of these three heads.
By acknowledgment of the Lord, Swedenborg means the
recognition of the Lord Jesus Christ as God with us; an
acknowledgment of the mind as the nature of the Lord and
his relation to us is rationally explained, and an acknowledg
ment of the heart as his presence and saving power are ex
perienced in lUe. From the day when the God of infinite
love made men, he had revealed himself to them according
to their need; and when men were so far under the power
of evil that only the immediate divine presence could stem
the tide, he came to them. The Gospel account of his
coming is accepted as literally true. The divine life breathed
upon the virgin mother and took to itself from her, and so
from the human race, a nature like their own. In this
nature God could be with men where they were; that nature
could be tempted in aU points like as we are. In temptations
more grievous than we can know, he overcame every form
of evU, and extends his saving power to us. This was
redemption. The work that he did for aU mankind we see
in miniature in that scene on the shore of Gahlee, when the
Lord cast out the devils from the man possessed, so fierce
1 True Christian Religion, No. 779.

334 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
that no man could bind or tame him, and he was found
sitting at the feet of Jesus, clothed and in his right mind. It
is a picture of the redemption wrought for aU mankind.
Men were free, with his help, to live weU if they would.
But what did it amount to, if the Saviour presently went
away and left mankind as helpless as before ? He did not
go away: " Lo, I am with you alway," was his promise.
By the Lord's combats with evU and his victories, his human
nature was glorified, to use his own word. All that was im
perfect, all that was finite and limiting in his humanity was
graduaUy removed, replaced by the divine, tiU in him dwelt
aU the fullness of the Godhead bodUy. It is to this human
nature glorified that Swedenborg applies the name, the
Divine Human. In Jesus Christ glorified is the trinity of
Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. The acknowledgment of the
Lord is the recognition of this very present Helper, and
dependence upon him in meeting the temptations and the
duties and pleasures of every day.
By acknowledgment of the holiness of the Word, Sweden
borg means the recognition that the Sacred Scripture is
divine and is the means, as we read it reverently, of holding
us in the divine light and power. The divineness of the
Word does not necessarUy imply that it is historically true
in every statement of history or of science, nor ideal in every
moral precept; many things in the letter of the Word, like
the language in which it is written, were taken from the im
perfect minds of men, else it could not have been received
and preserved by them; but the Word is divine because
everywhere within the letter which kUleth is the Spirit which
giveth hfe. Everywhere in the Word, even in every line,
there is deeper meaning relating to the spiritual hfe of every
man, and inmostly to the Lord. Incidents of the Scripture
narrative are local and temporary in form, but they are
universal in their deeper meaning, applying to all men, in

THE SWEDENBORGIANS 335
all places, at aU times. Some precepts of the Word may in
their hteral form become obsolete, but they are in their
deeper meaning forever true and full of divine life and power.
" Heaven and earth shall pass away (human states and condi
tions are forever changing) , but my Word shaU not pass away."
The key to the deeper meanings of the Word is given by
Swedenborg in the science of correspondences, which he
foreshadowed in his philosophical works ; a science as broad
as natural science itself, for it studies all natural things to
recognize the human and divine forces which they embody
and express. The study puts one in sympathy with the wise
ancients, who read deep lessons of life in nature and who
spoke and taught in parables. Applied to the Scriptures,
it shows them to be divine parable, containing exhaustless
lessons of divine and human life.
It will be seen that this doctrine of the infinite life and
spirit within the letter of the Word gives a new test by which
to determine the canon of Scripture. Certain books com
monly included in the canon, notably the Proverbs and Job
in the Old Testament, and the Acts and Epistles in the New,
as judged by this test cannot be regarded as strictly of the
Lord's Word. Questioned by friends about the writings of
the apostles and Paul, Swedenborg replied that they are
good books for the church, insisting upon the doctrine of
charity and its faith as strongly as the Lord Himself has
done in the Gospels and the Book of Revelation; that it
was necessary that doctrinal matters should be presented in
the direct manner of the Epistles, but that they are written
in a different style from the Word, and have not the infinite
depth of meaning. Swedenborg often quotes Paul in support
of points of doctrine.1
FinaUy, the third head of Christian faith declared by
Swedenborg to be essential: the lUe of charity, or what is
1 Letter to Dr. Beyer. Documents, No. 224.

336 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
the same, a lUe of obedience to the Ten Commandments,
recognized as laws of God. The meaning is, that Christian
hfe consists in repenting of evUs and desisting from evils,
which are forbidden by the Commandments, and this not
merely from policy or because common opinion or civU law
requires it, but in obedience to God, and in reliance on his
help, and then in doing good for his sake. This motive in
resisting evU and doing good is the only motive which goes
to the root of the matter, removing not only the wrong ac
tions but the desire and the thought of evU: this motive
alone can do good works which are free from the defiling
spirit of self-trust and pride.
These, in the briefest possible phrase, are the doctrines
which crystallized out of Swedenborg's Bible studies, and
were presented by him, with proofs from Scripture and from
reason in his doctrinal works. This statement seemed neces
sary to enable us to understand the relation of the New
Church to its environment in New England a hundred
years ago, and its relation to the changes of religious atmos
phere in New England since that time.
Thus prepared, we go back to the establishment of the
Boston Society of the New Jerusalem, in 1818. Thomas
Worcester was at that time chosen reader: he was ordained
as pastor of the Society in 1828, and held the position tiU
1867, a period of service of nearly fifty years. In 1859, the
Rev. James Reed became assistant minister of the Society,
and is its pastor stiU, his term of service now covering fifty-
seven years. Since 1902, Mr. Reed has been assisted by the
Rev. H. Clinton Hay, as associate pastor. The long pas
torates weU Ulustrate the even tenor of the way which the
Society has foUowed. It met in several haUs for a time
and buUt its present church on Bowdoin Street in 1844-45.
The membership of the Boston Society is now reported as
four hundred and seventy-three. It must be remembered

THE SWEDENBORGIANS 337
also that several societies in the neighborhood of Boston are
in fact offshoots of the church in Boston. This is true of
the societies in Waltham, Newtonville, Brookline, Roxbury,
and Cambridge, which now have an aggregate membership
about equal to that of the parent society. Societies of the
New Church also exist in nine other Massachusetts towns:
Abington, Bridgewater, Brockton, Elmwood, FaU River,
Lancaster, Mansfield, Springfield, and Yarmouthport. These
Massachusetts societies, together with societies in Provi
dence, R. I., and in Manchester and Contoocook, N. H., are
united as the Massachusetts Association of the New Church,
and this Association joins other Associations in other parts of
the country and Canada to form the General Convention of
the New Jerusalem in the United States of America.
It may be of interest to speak briefly of the origin of the
group of societies in Abington, Bridgewater, Brockton, and
Elmwood, for these aU owe their beginning to the influence
of one man, the Rev. HoUand Weeks. Mr. Weeks was
pastor of the First Church of Christ, in Abington, an able
Congregational minister. About 1818, at the time the soci
ety was formed in Boston, Mr. Weeks became interested
in the doctrines of the New Church, and preached them.
He was soon called to account, and was tried by a councU
of churches in 1820. The council found that Mr. Weeks
did not hold the generally received doctrine of the resur
rection of the body, but believed in an immediate spiritual
resurrection; that he did not hold the doctrine of three
persons in the Godhead, nor the orthodox doctrine of the
atonement, but believed in a Trinity subsisting in Him,
" in whom dweUeth aU the fullness of the Godhead bodily ";
that he held that aU prayer should be directed to Christ as
God, clothed in a divine body and a human form; that he
believed that as " the earth abideth forever," the sun and
moon wiU continue to rise and set, as they do now, to aU

338 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
eternity; Mr. Weeks had replied to the charge on this
point simply in the words of Ecclesiastes, " I believe that
' one generation passeth away, and another generation
cometh; but the earth abideth forever '" ; that he had read
Swedenborg's treatise on sexual evUs, in connection with the
preceding treatise on conjugial love, and found nothing in
it which, as he understood it, he disapproved; he found the
teaching to exalt conjugial love as eminently pure and holy
and to condemn the evils.
Let me say, in passing, that the charge of teaching a doc
trine leading away from the purity of marriage, which was
made with other charges against Mr. Weeks, and which has
occasionaUy been made against the New Church, rests on
the grossest misunderstanding of its teaching. I beheve
that there is not in the world a doctrine which exalts the
purity and sanctity of marriage as does the doctrine of the
New Church; or which shows so clearly the evUness of aU
impurity of act or thought or feehng; or which leads so
directly to the divine help needed to hve up to this high
standard. This I solemnly affirm, and I should not fear to
maintain it before any fair-minded tribunal.
The councU in Mr. Weeks's case further contended, at
length, in its report that it is unreasonable to ask men to give
serious attention to the teachings of Swedenborg, when their
authority has not been attested by convincing signs. Mr.
Weeks was dismissed from the Congregational Church. The
interest awakened by him gave rise, as stated, to four New-
Church Societies in Massachusetts. Mr. Weeks entered
the ministry of the New Church, founding societies in
Detroit, Mich., and Henderson, N. Y., and did missionary
service, frequently, as the record states, addressing audiences
of twelve hundred to fifteen hundred persons.
The Weeks trial has a broader interest, as iUustrating the
attitude of New England Calvinism toward the doctrines

THE SWEDENBORGIANS 339
of the New Church a hundred years ago. The editorial
comment of the Boston Recorder of September 2, 1820, in
printing the account of the trial is possibly a stUl truer re
flection of popular opinion. It refers to the strenuous efforts
made in various sections of the country to give currency to
Swedenborgianism. "Not that we much fear," says the
editorial, " the extensive prevalence of a system so much
better suited to the age of darkness long since past than the
present." Grouping Swedenborgianism with Socinianism
and Universalism, the editorial adds, " It becomes us to
weep rather than smile at aberrations of mind which involve
consequences so tremendous to the individuals given up to
those strong delusions — so injurious to the honor of Chris
tianity — so fatal to thousands who find in the divisions of
Christians an argument against the reality of religion itself."
It should be said, that both the report of the council and
the editorial are kind in their personal references to Mr.
Weeks.1 We may put with the Weeks trial one other case, that of the
Rev. Baman N. Stone and the Society of Fryeburg, Maine,
and this at a much later date, in 1877. The doctrines of the
New Church were first made known in Maine by the Rev.
Dr. WiUiam Jenks, a Congregational minister in Bath. Seven
years later another advocate appeared in Gardiner, whose
interest had been awakened through the Rev. WiUiam HiU,
who gave the books of Swedenborg to Harvard CoUege.
Societies were formed in Bath and Gardiner, that in Bath
developing considerable strength. In 1840, the Rev. Samuel
F. Dike became pastor, and continued so for fifty years, a
man of deep scholarship, and widely known and widely in
fluential, especiaUy in connection with educational institu
tions of the State. In 1836 a society of the New Church
was organized in Portland, and in 1878 a society in Fryeburg.
1 See account of the Weeks trial, in New Jerusalem Messenger of May 2 1 , 1884.

340 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
The experience in Fryeburg was in some respects a repeti
tion of the experience of the Rev. Holland Weeks in Abing
ton. " On the 22d of April, 1877," to quote the records of
the Fryeburg Society, " Rev. Baman N. Stone, who for three
years had been the settled pastor of the Congregational
Church, made pubhc acknowledgment that, for several
years, he had been reading the works of Emanuel Sweden
borg, and after much earnest study had now come to a fuU
acceptance of their doctrines and claims. At the same time
he read a letter resigning his pastorate. The Mutual Coun
cil, which was accordingly caUed, May 2d, unanimously
advised the immediate dissolution of the pastoral relation.
Among other things in the ' Result,' it was declared: ' We
desire also to express, as representing the Congregational
body, our utter and absolute dissent from the views of
Swedenborg, and that we hold in common with all religious
sects that it is a fatal error; and further that we believe
that the Word of God is given to men in a form and in a
language which can be understood by the use of ordinary
human study and by the ordinary human mind without the
teachings of Emanuel Swedenborg, but by the iUumination
of the Spirit promised to accompany the Word.' "
Mr. Stone withdrew, but was soon recalled to Fryeburg
to become the pastor of a new society, which became a
regular society of the New Church.
If these cases are taken as illustrating the attitude of
New England Calvinism toward the New Church, it should
be noted first of aU that Mr. Weeks, and Mr. Stone, and Mr.
Jenks, the pioneer of the New Church in Maine, who ac
cepted the doctrines of the New Church, were Congregational
ministers. But the council in each case represented the
old-fashioned Calvinism which recognized the New Church
as absolutely opposed to its fundamental doctrine of the

THE SWEDENBORGIANS 341
vicarious atonement and salvation by faith alone, and to
other doctrines which made one with this.
In what relation, on the other hand, did the New Church
find itseU with the liberal thought active and growing in
New England, represented by the Universalists and Uni
tarians ? I have said that the New Church found hardly
more in common with the liberals than with the orthodox,
which made their position extremely lonely — a mere hand
ful of people holding to a great idea. The New Church and
the hberals were at one in opposing the tri-personal idea of
God and the vicarious atonement, but they looked in quite
different, if not opposite, directions for the religion which
should take the place of Calvinism. The difference was
essentiaUy this: the hberals felt a new hght shining, a new
air blowing, and they sought for new and rational interpre
tations of Christian faith and experience. With them it
was to be an evolution. They knew not whither they were
going, but they trusted to the power of human reason to
lead them to safe harbors. The New Church beheved that
all real advance in spiritual life draws its vitality from reve
lation, and that the province of reason is to receive revela
tion understandingly, to confirm it and apply it. It beheved
that God had revealed in his Word, and in the opening of
his Word through Swedenborg, the ideal toward which men
should be hving; toward which all his providence is tending;
which wiU be realized as men cooperate with him. This
opening of the Word they beheved to be the promised second
coining of the Lord; and the church to grow from this
reveahng they beheved to be the New Jerusalem promised
in the closing pages of the Scripture.
Liberal thought was not attracted by these claims; its
trend was away from acknowledgment of the sole divinity
of the Lord Jesus Christ and the acknowledgment of the

342 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
supreme holiness of the Word, which were vital doctrines
with the New Church. There was, too, a definiteness and
positiveness, a tone of finality, about the New-Church
teachings which was not pleasing. To use the figure of a
dearly loved leader in the rehgious hfe of New England,
Phillips Brooks, he preferred the breaking hght of dawn to
the fuU blaze of day. There is a truth here, and a lesson
for the New Church to learn; but it is an error to suppose
that the acceptance of a definite ideal and of clear-cut doc
trines kills imagination and robs life of its charm and in
spiration. It is far otherwise if the ideal is a divine ideal;
then each truth learned invites to a thousand more; the
wonder and the mystery grow. It is so in the study and
practice of a natural science; it is no less so in learning and
hving the truth of heavenly hfe.
Perhaps the relation of liberal New England thought to
the New Church is best seen in Ralph Waldo Emerson and
the group of theologians, preachers, and literary people in
and around Boston of whom he was the central figure, a
group in which we may include Theodore Parker, James
Freeman Clarke, Edward Everett Hale, and other dis
tinguished men and women. These liberal minds were in
touch with the group of Harvard students already mentioned
who became devout members of the New Church. There
was a close and lasting friendship between Emerson and
Sampson Reed. Swedenborg in their time was a frequent
topic of conversation in social and literary circles; lectures
were given to acquaint the public with him; magazine
articles and books appeared, to interpret, to expound, and
to refute his views. There are many and extended refer
ences to Swedenborg in the essays and letters of these leaders
of liberal thought showing the admiration and the hesita
tion felt toward Swedenborg and his teachings. The hesi
tation and the disagreement on vital points is implied in

THE SWEDENBORGIANS 343
the fact that these men did not identify themselves with the
New Church. I may be pardoned if I quote very briefly a
few of their more favorable expressions. This from Theo
dore Parker, in a letter to Albert Sanford, in 1853:
Swedenborg has had the fate to be worshipped as a half-god, on
the one side; and on the other to be despised and laughed at. It
seems to me that he was a man of genius, of wide learning, of deep
and genuine piety. ... The Swedenborgians have a calm and re
ligious beauty in their hves which is much to be admired.1
It is hard to quote briefly from James Freeman Clarke.
In his essay on "The Use of Time" he names Swedenborg
with Voltaire, Wesley, and Franklin, and says:
Perhaps no four men of the century exercised a greater influence
on the age than these. Swedenborg's thought has been slowly filter
ing into philosophy and theology, spiritualizing both. . . . His
thought, so subtle and so deep, is gradually conquering the materialism
of philosophy and theology, and so bringing down what he cahed the
New Jerusalem.2
Edward Everett Hale in a lecture said:
Swedenborgianism has done the liberating work of the last century.
. . . The wave which Swedenborg started lasts to this day. . . .
The statements of Swedenborg's rehgious works have revolutionized
theology.3 Emerson's essay on Swedenborg, in his Representative
Men, written partly in high commendation and partly in
disparagement is perhaps too weU known to be quoted; it
also needs to be read entire to be fairly estimated. Emerson
valued highly the httle book Observations on the Growth of
the Mind, by his friend Sampson Reed. He sent a copy of
1 Life and Correspondence of Theodore Parker, by John Weiss, New York,
1864, vol. I, p. 356.
2 Self-Culture, by James Freeman Clarke, Boston, 1882, pp. 76-82.
3 Life and Mission of Emanuel Swedenborg, by Benjamin Worcester, Boston,
1883, p. 416, and letter from Mr. Hale to the Rev. Clarence Lathbury in regard to
the same, May 21, 1909.

344 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
the book to Carlyle, and later in response to Carlyle's curi
osity respecting the author and his church, he wrote with
mingled praise and ridicule of the Swedenborgians, and
concludes: " They are to me, however, deeply interesting
as a sect which I think must contribute more than aU other
sects to the new faith which must rise out of aU." 1
Such expressions may help us to complete our picture of
the httle band of New Churchmen in New England, between
Calvinism on the one hand and Uberahsm on the other. It
remains to speak briefly of the work done by the New-
Church body, the use made of its opportunity. We remem
ber at the same time that there have always been an indefi
nite but considerable number of the foUowers of Swedenborg
who have remained in their former church relations and
have not favored separate organization. Among these have
been some of the deepest students and ablest expounders
of the doctrines, notably the Rev. John Clowes, rector of
St. John's Church, Manchester, England. The work of the
organized New Church is aU that can be definitely reported.
Even this is made more difficult by the fact that the constit
uency is greatly scattered, a few in almost every town,
nowhere many. In New England the organization counts
today but twenty-two societies with a membership of one
thousand eight hundred and fifty.
This httle body have sought to extend the influence of the
truth which is so precious to them by pubhc worship, by
schools conducted under the care of the church, and by the
pubhcation and distribution of the works of Swedenborg and
other New-Church books. A school for children of the New
Church was opened in Boston in 1836 and continued a httle
more than seven years. In 1857 the New-Church Institute
of Education was chartered, and in 1864 this corporation
assumed charge of a New-Church school already estabhshed
1 Correspondence of Carlyle and Emerson, letter of November, 1834.

THE SWEDENBORGIANS 345
(in i860) in Waltham. The Waltham School has been at
tended by one thousand three hundred and twenty-seven
pupils. The New-Church Theological School, founded by
the General Convention of the New Jerusalem, — one of
two New-Church Theological Schools in America, and one
of three in the world, — has been located in Massachusetts,
at first in Waltham, then in Boston, and, since 1889, in
Cambridge. One hundred and thirty-six students have at
tended the Theological School. At present, ten are in attend
ance, from our own and several foreign countries, and about
one hundred persons are pursuing some study with the school
by correspondence.
The strongest centres in this country for the printing and
distributing of New-Church hterature have been in New
York and Philadelphia. From these two centres, aside from
sales, approximately seven hundred thousand volumes of
Swedenborg have been given, either free or on payment of
postage, to hbraries and to ministers, and countless smaUer
pubhcations have been distributed. New England has also
done work in printing and distributing. The New Jerusalem
Magazine was estabhshed in Boston in 1827, and, with two
interruptions, has continued to the present time, under the
names of New Jerusalem Magazine, New-Church Magazine,
and New-Church Review. The Review is now pubhshed by
the Massachusetts New-Church Union, which maintains a
bookstore at 134 Bowdoin Street. For two different periods
a children's New-Church magazine has also been pubhshed.
The publication of Swedenborg in Boston was begun in 1794,
the year of Mr. HiU's first visit, and by various agencies
probably one hundred thousand volumes of Swedenborg in
substantial form and two hundred thousand in cheap paper
editions have been issued from Boston. The fifty members
of the New Church in Connecticut have also carried on an
extensive distribution.

346 RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND
What has been the result of these efforts to extend a
knowledge of the New Church, and to awaken an interest
in its doctrines ? The Lord alone knows. The opinions
quoted above from James Freeman Clarke and Edward
Everett Hale, that Swedenborg's thought has been spirit
ualizing both philosophy and reUgion; that Swedenborgian
ism has done the hberating work of the last century, and
that the statements of Swedenborg's rehgious works have
revolutionized theology, if they refer to effects consciously
derived from Swedenborg, are doubtless exaggerations. If
they include the unconscious influence of these writings, they
are probably understatements of the truth. The httle or
ganization of the New Church makes no claim to being the
great New Church of God; that Church is something far
more grand, far more universal; it includes the great multi
tude that no man can number; but we beheve, as already
stated, that the opening of the Scriptures, by iUumination
from the Lord, through the writings of Emanuel Swedenborg,
with the fuUer experience of divine help thus made possible,
is the promised second coming of the Lord; and that the
holding and teaching and living of the doctrines so revealed,
by those who receive them and recognize their source, be
they many or few, is essential to the continuance of that light,
and to its increase unto the perfect day.
" It is certain," wrote Swedenborg, a hundred and fifty
years ago, " that a new church, which is the New Jerusalem,
wUl exist." Why ? On what did he base this certainty ?
Not upon evidence of such a church in his own day, for there
were but a handful of men who cared for the new doctrines
from the Holy Word which he knew must form the founda
tions of that church; not upon the eager reception of the
books containing these doctrines, for they lay unopened in
the libraries to which they had been given. The confidence
in a new church was not based on any outward evidence, but

THE SWEDENBORGIANS 347
on the fact that this church is foretold in God's Word. " It
is certain that a new church which is the New Jerusalem,
wiU exist," he wrote, " because it is foretold in the Apoca
lypse." x To the New Church, the vision of the Holy City
in the closing pages of the Scripture, into which are gathered
the promises of the Old Testament and the Gospels, is the
Lord's revealing of the Christian life which shall be realized
in its time. It is not a vision to be realized only in heaven;
the Holy City was seen descending out of heaven; " the
tabernacle of God is with men"; " the kingdoms of this
world are become the kingdoms of our Lord, and of his Christ;
and he shall reign forever and ever." To the New Church
the essential principles of that blessed Christian hfe stand
out clear and sure: the acknowledgment of the Lord; the
acknowledgment of the holiness of the Word; and the hfe
of obedience to the Ten Commandments. To the New
Church this is not a vision to be enjoyed for an hour, and
then to be dismissed from the mind; it is not a dream, but
a rational ideal of Christian life for the individual and for
society. It is a Divine ideal surely to be realized upon earth,
" for the mouth of the Lord hath spoken it "; it is a Divine
promise, to be kept ever in mind and heart; to be our guide,
our strength, our joy, in aU our going out and coming in, as
we work and pray for its fulfillment.
1 Apocalypse Revealed, No. 547; also letter to Dr. Beyer, Documents, Vol. II,
p. 383-

INDEX

INDEX

Abington, Mass., 337.
Acton, Lord, 3.
Adams, Hannah, 104, 329.
Adams, John, 53, 232, 236, 325.
Albany Convention of 1852, 18, 65,
66.
Ames, Charles G., 93.
Andover, Mass., 32.
Andover Theological Seminary, 50,
59, 63, 102, 104, 131-133, 271.
Andros, Sir Edmund, 26, 27, 215,
216.
Antinomian controversy. See Hutch
inson, Anne.
Anti-slavery movement, 245, 246,
286, 287.
Arianism, 51, 52, 121.
Arhngton, Mass., 161.
Arminianism, 50-52, 78, 98, 141,
172-174, 308.
Asbury, Francis, 256, 260.
Austin, Ann, 180.
Backus, Isaac, 156, 157, 159, 160,
162, 165, 166, 175.
Bacon, Leonard, 72.
BaUou, Adin, 314.
BaUou, Hosea, 298, 302-304, 308,
3°9, 3^3, 314, 316, 319-
Bangor Theological Seminary, 63.
Baptists, 16, 17, 25, 49, 78, 79, 86-
88, 137-176, 299.
Barnstable, Mass., 145.
Barrowe, Henry, 6, 7.
Bartol, Cyrus, 263.
Bass, Edward, 239, 240.
Bates College, 80, 174.
Bath, Maine, 339.
Bay Psalm Book, 23, 24.
Beecher, Henry Ward, 72, 73, 79,
3°2, 3°5-

Belknap, Jeremy, 238, 298.
Bellingham, Mass., 175.
BeUows, Henry W., 264.
Berkeley, George, 222, 223.
Berkeley Divinity School, 246.
Bishops, American, 53, 231-236.
Blackstone, William, 206, 207.
Books, read in New England, 38-41.
Boston, n, 12, 17, 29, 30, 52, 85,
151, 154, 206, 213, 214-216,
225, 254, 255, 258, 284, 328,
329, 344, 345-
Brattle St. Church, 28, 30, 107.
Christ Church, 34, 221, 227, 229,
254-
Church of the Advent, 245.
First Baptist Church, 17, 151,
153-
First Church, 51, 99, 154, 155.
First Methodist Church, 258.
Morgan Memorial 281-284.
Old South Church, 24, 27, 59,
i5S, 215-
Second Baptist Church, 155.
Society of the New Jerusalem, 336,
337-
Trinity Church, 221, 230, 241.
See also King's Chapel.
Boston Synod, 20.
Boston University, 266, 270-272.
Bowne, Borden P., 267-269.
Bradford, WiUiam, 8, 24.
Brewster, WiUiam, 4, 5.
Bridgewater, Mass., 337.
Bristol, R. I., 219, 229, 240, 241.
Brockton, Mass., 337.
BrookUne, Mass., 337.
Brooks, PhiUips, 131, 247, 302, 305,
342.
Brown, Samuel and John, 210.
Brown University, 163-168.

351

352

INDEX

Browne, Robert, 5, 6, 137, 139.
Burial HiU Declaration, 66, 67.
BushneU, Horace, 72, 131, 302, 305.
Butler, WiUiam, 277.
Calvinism: Consistent Calvinists, 100, 101.
Hopkinsians, 48-50, 59, 90, 101,
102, 130.
Moderate Calvinists, 99, 101, 102,
112.
New Divinity men, 50.
New England Theology, 43, 48.
Old Calvinists, 50, 59, 90.
Cambridge, England, University of,
13-
Cambridge (Newtowne), Mass., 12,
16, 17, 62, 150, 227, 230, 337, 345.
Cambridge synod and platform, 16,
18-20, 34, 35, 85.
Camp meetings, 285, 286.
Canterbury, N. H., 78.
Channing, WiUiam EUery, 60, 116,
117, 120, 126, 316.
Charlestown, Mass., n, 12, 151,
153, 206.
Chauncy, Charles, 51, 150, 226,
298, 299.
Chelsea, Mass., 206.
Christian Connexion, 82.
Christians, 77, 80-84, 87, 88, 90,
93, 97, 98.
Church and state, 7, 12-15, 2°, 25,
36, 37, 47, 54, 61, 62, 84, 106-109,
137-139, 157-163, 310-312.
Claremont, N. H., 228, 229, 311.
Clarke, James Freeman, 305, 342,
343-
Cleaveland, John, 298.
Cobbett, Thomas, 147.
Colby CoUege, 167.
Coleridge, Samuel Taylor, 131.
Colman, Benjamin, 34, 46, 225.
Columbian University, 170.
Conant, Roger, 209, 210.
Concord, Mass., 280.
Concord, N. H., 270.
Congregational Creed of 1883, 69.

Congregational national councils,
68.
Congregationahsm, 3, 7-9, 12, 19,
35-37, 47, 58, 66, 67, 137, 138, 312.
Congregationahsts, 3-73, 137, 140,
154, 156, 161, 163, 166, 210, 219,
228, 232, 340.
Connecticut, 16, 21, 34, 36, 46, 47,
54, 64, 65, 230, 299, 306, 345.
Contoocook, N. H., 337.
Cotton, John, 13, 14, 41, 143, 145,
212.
Covenant, 8.
Craigie, Andrew, 326.
Creighton, MandeU, 3.
Customs :
New England Puritans, 22-26, 28,
29.
Quakers, 187-194.
Cutler, Timothy, 33, 34, 219-221,
225.
Dartmouth CoUege, 47.
Deaconess Association, 279, 280.
Dedham case, 61, 106, 108-112.
Deerfield, Mass., 23.
Democracy, 8, 14, 36, 56.
Dike, Samuel F., 339.
Disciples (CampbeUites), 82.
Dorchester, Mass., 12, 21.
Dover, N. H., 218.
Duche, Jacob, 325.
Dunster, Henry, 17, 149, 150.
Dyer, Mary, 184, 245.
Eastburn, Manton, 244.
Eastham, Mass., 285.
Edwards, Jonathan, 42-45, 100,
101, 122, 129, 130, 223, 261.
EUot, John, 17, 18.
Elmwood, Mass., 337.
Emerson, Ralph Waldo, 60, 91, 92,
127-129, 131, 342, 343.
Episcopal Theological School, Cam
bridge, 246, 271.
EpiscopaUans, 9, 26, 27, 33, 34, 47,
53, 55. 58, 86, 137, 158, 159, 166,
205-247, 252.

INDEX

353

Fairfield, Conn., 230.
FaU River, Mass., 337.
Fisher, Mary, 180.
Fisk, Wilbur, 260, 264-266, 286.
Fiske, John, 142, 208.
Foreign Missions, 70, 115, 169-172,
277, 278.
Fox, George, 179, 184.
Free WiU Baptists, 77-80, 81, 82-
84, 87, 88, 90, 93, 95, 174.
Freeman, James, 58, 230, 237-239,
258.
Fryeburg, Maine, 339, 340.
Gainsborough church, 139, 140.
Gardiner, Maine, 228, 339.
Garrettson, Freeborn, 254.
GatcheU, Joseph, 298.
Glenn, James, 325, 328.
Gloucester, Mass., 299, 300, 310,
3*7-
Gorges, Sir Ferdinando, 205, 206,
210.
Gorton, Samuel, 298.
Great Awakening, 42, 45-47, 78, 91,
92, 155, 156, 223, 224, 226, 241.
Great Barrington, Mass., 241.
Greenwood, John, 6, 7.
Griswold, Alexander Viets, 240, 241.
Hale, Edward Everett, 342, 343.
Half-way covenant, 29, 30, 43, 85,
154-156.
Hampton, N. H., 218.
Harrison, Frederic, 103.
Hartford, Conn., 12, 21, 254.
Hartford Theological Seminary, 63.
Harvard CoUege, 17, 18, 23, 28, 29,
34, 45, 59, 63, 97, 98, 105, 112,
132, 133, 149, 15°. 154, 163-166,
218, 225, 242, 271, 326-328.
HaverhiU, Mass., 156, 175.
Hedge, Frederick H., 125.
Hibbard, BiUy, 88-90.
Higginson, Francis, 10, 11, 143, 212.
Higginson, John, 11, 22.
HiU, WiUiam, 325, 326.
HoUis, Thomas, 154.

HoUis professorship, 59, 102-105.
Holmes, Obadiah, 148-150.
Honeyman, James, 218, 223.
HopeweU, N. J., Academy, 165, 166.
Hopkins, Mark, 72.
Hopkinsianism. See Calvinism.
Huntington, Joseph, 299.
Hutchinson, Anne, 15, 16, 124, 185.
Indians, 17, 18, 43, 47, 170, 171.
Ipswich, Mass., 36, 147.
Jacob, Henry, 145.
Jacob-Lathrop-Jessey Church, Lon
don, 140, 141, 145, 147.
Jenks, WiUiam, 339, 340.
Johnson, Samuel, 220-223, 231.
Jones, Abner, 77, 78, 80-82, 97.
Judson, Adoniram, 169-171.
Kansas City formula, 69, 70.
Keith, George, 217.
King's Chapel, 27, 34, 58, 99, 113,
215, 218, 222, 229, 237-239, 253,
33°-
Kingston, R. I. (Narragansett
church), 219, 229, 241.
Kirkland, John T., 258.
Kittery, Maine, 155.
Lancaster, Mass., 337.
Lathrop, John, 140, 141, 145, 147.
Lebanon, Conn., 47.
Lecky, W. E. H., 56, 72.
Lee, Jesse, 52, 254-256, 260.
Liberal Christians, 50-52, 57-60,
97, 98, 101-106, 108, 113, 116-
118.
Litchfield, Conn., 254.
London, 5, 139-141, *44, 145, *47-
London- Amsterdam Church, 7.
Londonderry, N. H., 55.
Lonsdale, R. I., 207.
LoweU, Mass., 285.
Lyford, John, 208-210.
Lyndon, Vermont, 80.
Lynn, Mass., 147, 148, 218, 255.

354

INDEX

Maine, 167, 205, 210, 243, 306.
Manchester, N. H., 337.
Mansfield, Mass., 337.
Marblehead, Mass., 221, 263, 298.
Marks, David, 93-95.
Martha's Vineyard, 18, 285.
Massachusetts, 12-20, 26-32, 35, 36,
54, 55, 59, 61, 62, 84-88, 98, 99,
106-112, 142-163, 180, 206-219,
221, 229, 230, 243-245.
Masson, David G., 139.
Mather, Cotton, 31-33, 39, i54-
Mather, Increase, 7, 27, 28, 30-32,
35, 154, 218, 254.
Mattapan, Mass., 84.
Maverick, Samuel, 206-208.
Mayhew, Jonathan, 51, 298.
Meeting-houses :
Methodist, 258, 259.
Puritan, 22.
Mendon, Mass., 315.
Mennonites, 141.
Methodists, 52, 53, 88, 251-294.
Middleborough, Mass., 156, 157,
175-
MoreU, Robert, 206, 207.
Morse, Jedidiah, 104, 105, 258.
Morton, Thomas, of Merrymount,
14, 207, 208.
Murray, John, 258, 299-302, 304,
306,308,310,313,317,319.
Mysticism, 185-187.
Nantucket, 244.
Narragansett church, Kingston, R.I.,
219, 229, 241.
Natick, Mass., 18.
New-Church Theological School,
345-
New Durham, N. H., 78, 174.
New England Primer, 39-41.
New Hampshire, 173, 213, 243, 299,
306, 311, 312.
New Haven, Conn., 21, 222, 255.
New Lights (Separatists), 47, 48,
78, 156, 157, 168.
New London, Conn., 230.
Newbury, Mass., 16, 221.

Newburyport, Mass., 23, 239, 241.
Newport, R. I., 49, 145, 147, 180,
218, 229, 241, 306, 307.
Newton Theological Institution, 167,
168, 171.
NewtonviUe, Mass., 337.
Northampton, Mass., 42, 43.
Norton, Andrews, 60.
Norwalk, Conn., 255.
Norwich, Conn., 230.
Norwich, England, 5, 6.
Oldham, John, 209, 210.
Oxford Movement, 243-245.
Park, Edwards A., 66, 67.
Parker, Samuel, 240.
Parker, Theodore, 60, 112, 117, 126,
127, 342, 343-
Pearson, EUphalet, 103-105.
Pennyrial hymns, 92, 93.
Peters, Samuel, 228.
PhUadelphia Convention and Arti
cles of Faith (Universahst), 313.
Plan of Union (Congregationalist
and Presbyterian), 37, 64-66.
Plymouth Colony, and Plymouth,
Mass., 10, 12, 24, 25, 27, 59, 139,
148, 150, 208.
Portland, Maine, 210, 228, 339.
Portsmouth, N. H., 210, 228, 241.
Presbyterianism, 16, 21, 28, 35-37,
55, 64, 65.
Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign
Parts, Society for the, 18, 217,
219, 227, 232.
Propagation of the Gospel in New
England, Society for the, 18, 217.
Providence, R. I., and Providence
Plantations, 16, 145, 147, 148,
163, 172, 207, 219, 229, 241, 254,
306, 337.
Provoost, Samuel, 234-238, 243.
Quakers, 15, 86, 87, 124, 158, 159,
166, 179-201, 217, 218.
Quincy, Mass., 207.

INDEX

355

RandaU, Benjamin, 77, 78, 80, 82,
173, 174-
Randolph, Edward, 26, 27, 214,
216.
Ranke, L. von, 141.
Ratcliffe, Robert, 27, 213, 216-218.
Redding, Conn., 230.
Reed, James, 336.
Reed, Sampson, 327, 343.
ReUy, James, 299, 300-302, 313.
Revolution, American, 52, 160, 228-
231, 242.
Rhode Island, 22, 197, 200, 218, 222,
229, 243, 298.
Rich, Caleb, 313.
Robinson, John, 6.
Robinson, WiUiam, 216.
Roman CathoUcs, 55, 158, 288.
Roxbury, Mass., 17, 21, 337.
Rush, Benjamin, 313.
Salem, Mass., 11, 32, 84, 180, 209,
210, 218, 312.
Sandwich, Mass., 180.
Sargent, Abel, 313.
Saybrook, Conn., 32.
Saybrook synod and platform, 21,
34-37, 220.
Scituate, Mass., 145, 150.
Scott, Job, 197.
Scrooby, 4, 10, 139, 140.
Seabury, Samuel, 233-237, 240.
Seekonk (Rehoboth), Mass., 147,
148.
Separatists in Connecticut. See New
Lights.
SewaU, Samuel, 18, 24, 33, 214, 215.
Simpson, Matthew, 293.
Smith, Elias, 81, 82.
Springfield, Mass., 21, 337.
Standing Order, 20, 77, 98. See
Church and state.
Statistics :
Baptists, 164, 176.
Christians, 82.
Episcopahans, 247.
Free WiU Baptists, 174-
Methodists, 288.

New England churches in 1700
and 1800, 55.
Quakers, 181.
Swedenborgians, 337, 344, 345.
Universalists, 306.
Sterling, Mass., 285.
Stevens, Abel, 260.
Stiles, Ezra, 25, 36, 49, 53, 221, 255.
Stockbridge, Mass., 43.
Stone, Baman N., 339, 340.
Stratford, Conn., 221.
Stuart, Moses, 60, 72.
Sturbridge, Mass., 159.
Swedenborg, Emanuel, 326, 327,
330-336, 340-347-
Swedenborgians, 325-347.
Taylor, Father, 262-264.
Taylor, Nathaniel W., 65.
Theocracy. See Church and state.
Trinity CoUege, Hartford, 246.
Turner, WUUam, 153, 154.
Unitarians, 52, 57-61, 71, 97-133,
237-239, 274, 275, 301, 304, 305,
308, 312, 317, 318, 320, 328, 341.
Universahsts, 52, 100, 297-321, 328,
34i-
Vane, Sir Harry, 144, 297.
Vermont, 243, 246, 306.
Waltham, Mass., 337, 345.
Ware, Henry, 60, 102, 104, 105.
Ware, Henry, Jr., 126.
Warren Association of Baptist
Churches, 159, 175-
Warren, R. I., 175.
Warren, WiUiam Fairfield, 267.
Watertown, Mass., 21.
Weeks, HoUand, 337-339-
Wesley, Charles, 253.
Wesley, John, 42, 52, 54, 223,^251-
254, 261, 262, 286, 290, 291.
Wesleyan University, 265, 266.
Westminster Confession, 19, 20, 28,
33-
Wethersfield, Conn., 21.

356

INDEX

White, WiUiam, 234, 236.
Whitefield, George, 34, 45-47, 78,
223-226, 241, 253.
Whittemore, Thomas, 314.
Wigglesworth, Michael, 38.
Williams, Roger, 14, 16, 142-145,
147, 216, 245.
Winchester, Elhanan, 313.
Winchester Profession of Belief
(Universalist), 307-310.
Windsor, Conn., 21, 42.
Winstanley, Gerard, 198.

Winthrop, John, 12, 14, 20, 26, 143,
144, 212.
Wise, John, 36.
Witchcraft, 31, 32.
Wolsey, Theodore D., 33, 220.
Worcester, Mass., 254, 284.
Worcester, Thomas, 326, 327, 329,
336.
Yale CoUege, 23, 32-34, 45, 48, 63,
105, 163, 166, 219, 220, 222, 242.
Yarmouthport, Mass., 337.

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