Produced by Jared Fuller
FIVE SERMONS
BY THE RT. REV. H.B. WHIPPLE, D.D., LL.D. BISHOP OF MINNESOTA
1890
PREFACE
My only excuse for printing these sermons is the request of friends who
could not secure copies of them. They are printed as delivered, and the
repetition of incidents was a part of the historical statement. The
Third and Fifth Sermons were preached without notes and reported by a
stenographer. H.B.W.
CONTENTS
I. SERMON AT THE OPENING SERVICES OF THE GENERAL CONVENTION,
OCTOBER 1889
II. SERMON AT THE FARIBAULT CELEBRATION OF THE CENTENNIAL
OF THE INAUGURATION OF GEORGE WASHINGTON, 1789-1889
III. SERMON AT THE SECOND ANNUAL MEETING OF THE MISSIONARY COUNCIL
IN WASHINGTON, D.C., NOVEMBER 1888
IV. ADDRESS IN LAMBETH CHAPEL, AT THE FIRST SESSION OF THE LAMBETH
CONFERENCE, JULY 3, 1888
V. SERMON AT THE FOURTH ANNUAL CONVENTION OF THE BROTHERHOOD OF
ST. ANDREW, IN CLEVELAND, OHIO, SEPT. 29, 1889
I. SERMON AT THE OPENING SERVICES OF THE GENERAL CONVENTION,
OCTOBER 2, 1889.
"We have heard with our ears, O God, our fathers have told us, what
work Thou didst their days, in the times of old."--PSALM xliv. I.
Brethren: I shall take it for granted that there is a visible Church;
that it was founded by Our Lord Jesus Christ, and has His promise that
the gates of hell shall never prevail against it. We believe that ours
is a pure branch of the apostolic Church; that it has a threefold
ministry; that its two sacraments--Baptism and the Supper of the Lord--are
of perpetual obligation, and are divine channels of grace; that the
faith once delivered to the saints is contained in the Catholic creeds,
and has the warrant of Holy Scripture which was written by inspiration
of God. On this centennial day I shall speak of the history and mission
of this branch of the Church of our Lord Jesus Christ.
It was a singular providence that this continent, laden with the bounty
of God, was unoccupied by civilization for thousands of years. America
was discovered by a devout son of the Latin Church, whose name--
Christopher, Christ-bearer, and Columbus, the dove--ought to have been
the prophecy that he would bear the Gospel to the New World. It was at
a time when Savonarola, with the zeal of a prophet of God and the
eloquence of a Chrysostom, was laboring to awaken the Church to a new
life. No nation ever had a nobler mission than Spain. That mission was
forfeited by unholy greed and untold cruelty. It was lost forever.
Other nations claimed the continent for their own. In the providence of
God; this last of the nations was founded by the English-speaking race.
I reverently believe that it was because they recognize as no other
people the two truths which underlie the possibility of constitutional
government, i.e., the inalienable rights of the individual citizen, and
loyalty to government as a delegated trust from God, who alone has the
right to govern. These lessons are intertwined with two thousand years
of history. They reach back to the days when the savage Briton came in
contact with Roman civilization and Roman law, and have been deepened by
centuries of Christian influences which have changed our savage fathers
into truth-speaking, liberty-loving Christian men.
More marvellous are the providences intertwined with the history of the
Church. It was planted by apostolic men, and numbered heroes like St.
Patrick and St. Alban before the missionary Augustine came to
Canterbury. Through all of its history it has been the Church of the
English-speaking race. The liturgy contains the purest English of any
book, except the English Bible, which was translated by her sons. The
ritual which Augustine found in England came from the East; and the
liturgy which he introduced was, by the advice of Gregory, taken from
many national Churches. The Venerable Hooker said: "Our liturgy was
must be acknowledged as the singular work of the providence of God." In
its services it represents the Church of the English-speaking race. The
exhortation to pray for the child to be baptized, the direction to put
pure water into the font at each baptism, the sign of the cross, the
words of the reception of the baptized, the joining of hands in holy
matrimony, the "dust to dust" of the burial,--are peculiar to the offices
of the English-speaking people. In the Holy Communion, the rubric found
in all western Churches, commanding the priest, after consecration, to
kneel and worship the elements, never found a place in any service-book
of the Church of England. The Book of Common Prayer has preserved for
us Catholic faith and Catholic worship.
The first English missionary priest in America of whose services we have
record was Master Wolfall, who celebrated the Holy Communion in 1578 for
the crews of Martin Forbisher on the shores of Hudson Bay, amid whose
solitudes Bishop Horden has won whole heathen tribes to Jesus Christ.
At about the same time the Rev. Martin Fletcher, the chaplain of Sir
Francis Drake, celebrated the Holy Communion in the bay of San
Francisco, a prophecy that these distant shores should become our
inheritance. A few years later (1583), divine service was held in the
bay of St. John's, Newfoundland, for Sir Humphrey Gilbert, and when his
ill-fated ship foundered at sea, the last words of the hero-admiral
were, "We are as near heaven by sea as by land." The mantle of Gilbert
fell on Sir Walter Raleigh, who was commissioned by Queen Elizabeth to
bear the evangel of God's love to the New World. The faith behind the
adventures of these men is seen in a woodcut of Raleigh's vessels at
anchor; a pinnace, with a man at the mast-head bearing a cross,
approaching the shore with the message of the Gospel. To some of us
whose hearts have been touched with pity for the red men, its is a
beautiful incident that the first baptism on these shores was that of an
Indian chief, Mateo, on the banks of the Roanoke. In May, 1607, the
first services on the shore of New England were held by the Rev. Richard
Seymour. Missionary services in the wilderness were not unlike those of
our pioneer bishops. "We did hang an awning to the trees to shield us
from the sun, our walls were rails of wood, our seats unhewed trees, our
pulpit a bar of wood--this was our 'church.'" It was in this church that
the Rev. Robert Hunt celebrated the first communion in Virginia, June
21, 1607. The missionary spirit of the times is seen when Lord De la
Warr and his companions went in procession to the Temple Church in
London to receive the Holy Communion. The Rev. Richard Crashaw said in
his sermon: "Go forward in the strength of the Lord, look not for
wealth, look only for the things of the kingdom of God--you go to win the
heathen to the Gospel. Practise it yourselves. Make the name of Christ
honorable. What blessings any nation has had by Christ must be given to
all the nations of the earth." The first act of Governor De la Warr, on
landing in Virginia, was to kneel in silent prayer, and then, with the
whole people, they went to church, where the services were conducted by
the Rev. Richard Burke. In 1611 the saintly Alexander Whittaker
baptized Pocahontas. Disease and death often blighted the colonies, and
yet the old battle cry rang out--"God will found the State and build the
Church." The work was marred by immoral adventurers, and it was not
until these were repressed with a strong hand by Sir Thomas Dale that a
new life dawned in Virginia.
The first elective assembly of the New World met in 1619. It was opened
by prayer. Its first enactment was to protect the Indians from
oppression. Its next was to found a university. In the first
legislative assembly which met in the choir of the Church in Jamestown,
more than one year before the Mayflower left the shores of England, was
the foundation of popular government in America. Time would fail me to
tell the story inwrought in the lives of men like Rev. William Clayton
of Philadelphia, the Rev. Atkin Williamson of South Carolina, and the
Rev. John Wesley and the Rev. George Whitefield, also sons of the Church
in Georgia.
The Church of England had no rights in the English colony of
Massachusetts. The Rev. William Blaxton, the Rev. Richard Gibson, and
the Rev. Robert Jordan endured privation and suffering, and were accused
"as addicted to the hierarchy of the Church of England," "guilty of
offence against the Commonwealth by baptizing children on the Lord's
Day," and "the more heinous sin of provoking the people to revolt by
questioning the divine right of the New England theocracy." An new life
dawned on the Church in America when, in 1701, there was organized in
England "The Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign
Parts." It awakened a new missionary spirit. Princess Anne, afterward
Queen of England, became its lifelong patron. The blessed work among
the Mohawks was largely due to her, and when these Indians were removed
to Canada and left sheperdless, their chief, Joseph Brant, officiated as
lay reader for twenty years. The men sent out by the society--the Rev.
Samuel Thomas, the Rev. George Keith, the Rev. Patrick Gordon, the Rev.
John Talbot, and others--were Christian heroes. No fact in the history
of the colonial Church had so marked influence as the conversion of
Timothy Cutler, James Wetmore, Samuel Johnson, and Daniel Brown to the
Church. Puritans mourned that the "gold had become dim." Churchmen
rejoiced that some of the foremost scholars in Connecticut had returned
to the Church. I pass over the trials of the Church in the eighteenth
century, to the meeting of the Continental Congress in 1774. It was
proposed to open Congress with prayer. Objections were made on account
of the religious differences of the delegates. Old Samuel Adams arose,
with his white hair streaming on his shoulders,--the same earnest Puritan
who, in 1768, had written to England: "We hope in God that no such
establishment as the Protestant episcopate shall ever take place in
America,"--and said: "Gentlemen, shall it be said that it is possible
that there can be any religious differences which will prevent men from
crying to that God who alone can save them? I move that the Rev. Dr.
Duché, minister of Christ Church in this city, be asked to open this
Congress with prayer." John Adams, writing to his wife, said: "Never
can I forget that scene. There were twenty Quakers standing by my side,
and we were all bathed in tears." When the Psalms for the day were
read, it seemed as if Heaven was pleading for the oppressed: "O Lord,
fight thou against them that fight against me." "Lord, who is like Thee
to defend the poor and the needy?" "Avenge thou my cause, my Lord, my
God." On the 4th of July 1776, Congress published to the world that
these colonies were, and of right ought to be, free. We believe that a
majority of those who signed this declaration were sons of the Church.
The American colonists were not rebels; they were loyal, God-fearing
men. The first appeal that Congress made to the colonies was "for the
whole people to keep one and the same day as a day of fasting and prayer
for the restoration of the invaded rights of America, and reconciliation
with the parent State." They stood for their inalienable rights,
guaranteed to them by the Magna Charta, which nobles, headed by Bishop
Stephen Langton, had wrung from King John. The English clergy had at
ordination taken an oath of allegiance to the British Crown. Many who
sympathized with their oppressed country felt bound to pray for King
George until another government was permanently established. Others,
like Dr. Provost, retired to private life. For two hundred years an
Episcopal Church had no resident Bishop. No child of the Church
received confirmation. No one could take orders without crossing the
Atlantic, where one man in five lost his life by disease or shipwreck.
At one time the Rev. William White was the only clergyman of the Church
in Pennsylvania. Even after we had received the episcopate, the
outlook was so hopeless that one of her bishops said, "I am willing to
do all I can for the rest of my days, but there will be no such Church
when I am gone." When William Meade told Chief Justice Marshall that he
was to take orders in the Episcopal Church, the Chief Justice said, "I
thought that this Church had perished in the Revolution." Of the less
than two hundred clergy, many had returned to England or retired to
private life. In some of the colonies the endowments of the Church had
been confiscated. There was no discipline for clergy or laity, and it
did seem as if the vine of the Lord's planting was to perish out of the
land.
On the Feast of the Annunciation, 1783, ten of the clergy of Connecticut
met in the glebe house at Woodbury to elect a bishop. They met
privately, for the Church was under the ban of civil authority, and they
feared the revival of bitter opposition to an American episcopate which
might alarm the English bishops and defeat their efforts. They did not
come to make a creed, or frame a liturgy, or found a Church. They met
to secure that which was lacking for the complete organization of the
Church, and thus perpetuate for their country that ministry whose
continuity was witnessed through all the ages in a living body, which is
the body of Christ. I know of no greater heroism than that which sent
Samuel Seabury to ask of the bishops of the Church of England the
episcopate for the scattered flock of Christ. You remember the fourteen
months' weary waiting, and when his prayer was refused in England, God
led him to the persecuted Church of Scotland. Now go with me to
Aberdeen; it is an upper room, a congregation of clergy and laity are
present. The bishops and Robert Kilgour, Bishop of Aberdeen, Arthur
Petrie, Bishop of Moray, and John Skinner, Coadjutor Bishop of Aberdeen,
who preached the sermon. The prayers were ended; Samuel Seabury, a
kingly man, kneels for the imposition of apostolic hands, and, according
to the godly usage of the Catholic Church, is consecrated bishop, and
made the first apostle for the New World. None can tell what, under
God, we owe to those venerable men. They signed a concordat binding
themselves and successors to use the Prayer of Invocation in the
Scottish Communion Office, which sets forth that truth which is
inwrought in all the teachings of our blessed Lord and His apostles,
that the communion of the Body and Blood of Christ is limited to the
worthy receiver of this blessed sacrament. The consecration of Seabury
touched the heart of the English Church.
In 1783 the Church of England did not have one bishop beyond its shores.
There are to-day fifteen bishops in Africa, six in China and Japan, and
twenty-three in Australia and the Pacific Islands, ten in India, seven
in the West Indies, and eighty-five in British North America and the
United States. Every colony of the British Empire and every State and
Territory of the United States has its own bishop, except the Territory
of Alaska.
On February 4th, 1787, the Rev. Dr. Samuel Provost, D.D., were
consecrated bishops in Lambeth Chapel, by John Moore, Archbishop of
Canterbury, William Markham, Archbishop of York, Charles Moss, Bishop of
Bath and Wells, and John Hinchcliffe, Bishop of Peterborough. The
sermon was preached by the chaplain of the primate. Our minister to
England, Hon. John Adams, urged the application of Drs. Provost and
White, and in after years wrote: "There is no part of my life I look
back with more satisfaction than the part I took--daring and hazardous as
it was to myself and mine--in the introduction of episcopacy to America."
Samuel Provost was a devoted patriot and one of the ripest scholars of
America. In the convention which elected him Bishop of New York were
John Jay, Washington's chief justice, Marinus Willet, one of
Washington's favorite generals, James Duane, John Alsop, R.R.
Livingston, and William Duer, members of the Continental Congress, and
David Brooks, commissary-general of the Revolution, and personal friend
of Washington. If less prominent in his episcopal administration,
Bishop Provost's name as a patriot was a tower of strength to the infant
Church.
Of Bishop White we can say, as John Adams said of Roger Sherman, "He was
pure as an angel and firm as Mount Atlas." He was beloved and
reverenced by all Christian people. When Congress declared the colonies
independent States in 1776, he at once took the oath of allegiance to
the new government. When a friend warned him that he had put his neck
in a halter, he replied: "I know the danger; the cause is just; I have
put my faith in God." In 1777 he was elected chaplain of Congress, and
held the office (except when Congress met in New York) until the capital
was removed to Washington. Francis Hopkinson, a distinguished signer of
the Declaration of Independence, and other loyal sons of the country,
were among those who elected him Bishop of Pennsylvania.
One hundred years ago today the representatives of the Church in the
different States met to adopt a constitution. There had been tentative
efforts to effect an organization and adopt a Book of Common Prayer, all
of which were overruled by the good providence of God. Many not of our
fold desired a liturgy. Benjamin Franklin published at his own expense
a revised copy of the English liturgy. The House of Bishops was
composed of Bishop Seabury and Bishop White. Bishop Provost was absent.
In the House of Clerical and Lay Deputies were the Rev. Abraham Jarvis,
the Rev. Robert Smith, and the Rev. Samuel Parker, who became bishops.
They met to show the world that the charter of the Church is perpetual,
and that the Church has the power to adapt herself to all the conditions
of human society. They met to consolidate the scattered fragments of
the Church in the thirteen colonies into a national Church, and secure
for themselves and children Catholic faith and worship in the Book of
Common Prayer. They builded wiser than they knew. They secured for the
Church self-government, free from all secular control. They preserved
the traditions of the past, and yet every feature of executive,
legislative, and judicial administration was in harmony with the
Constitution of the Republic. They gave the laity a voice in the
council of the Church; they provided that bishops and clergy should be
tried by their peers, and that the clergy and laity of each diocese
should elect their own bishop subject to the approval of the whole
Church. There was the most delightful fraternal intercourse between the
two bishops. In the words of our Presiding Bishop, "The blessed results
of that convention were due, under the guidance of the Holy Spirit, to
the steadfast gentleness of Bishop White and the gentle steadfast--of
Bishop Seabury." A century has passed. The Church which was then
everywhere spoken against is everywhere known and respected; the mantle
of Seabury, White, Hobart, Ravenscroft, Eliot, De Lancey, and Kemper has
fallen on others, and her sons are in the forefront of that mighty
movement which will people this land with millions of souls. While we
say with grateful hearts, "What hath God wrought!" we also say, "Not
unto us, O Lord, not unto us, but unto Thy Nave give the praise."
Surely, an awful responsibility rests upon a Church whose history is so
full of the mercy of God. We are living in the great missionary age of
the Church. There is no nation on the earth to whom we may not carry
the Gospel. More than eight hundred millions of souls for whom Christ
died have not heard that there is a Saviour. One of the hinderances to
the speedy evangelization of the world is the division among
Christians,--alas! both within and without the Church. Our Saviour said:
"By this shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if ye have love
one to another." Christians have been separated in hostile camps, and
often divisions have ripened into hatred. The saddest of all is that
the things which separate us are not necessary for salvation. The
truths in which we agree are part of the Catholic faith. In the words
of Dr. Dollinger, "we can say each to the other as baptized, we are on
either side, brothers and sisters in Christ. In the great garden of the
Lord, let us shake hands over these confessional hedges, and let us
break them down, so as to be able to embrace one another altogether.
These hedges are doctrinal divisions about which either we or you are in
error. If you are in the wrong, we do not hold you morally culpable;
for your education, surroundings, knowledge, and training made the
adherence to these doctrines excusable and even right. Let us examine,
compare, and investigate the matter together, and we shall discover the
precious pearl of peace and unity; and then let us join hands together
in cultivating and cleansing the garden of the Lord, which is overgrown
with weeds." There are blessed signs that the Holy Spirit is deepening
the spiritual life of widely separated brothers. Historical Churches
are feeling the pulsation of a new life from the Incarnate God. All
Christian folk see that the Holy Spirit has passed over these human
barriers and set His seal to the labors of separated brethren in Christ.
The ever-blessed Comforter is quickening in Christian hearts the divine
spirit of charity. Christians are learning more and more the theology
which centres in the person of Jesus Christ. It is this which worldwide
is creating a holy enthusiasm to stay the flood of intemperance,
impurity, and sin at home, and gather lost heathen folk into the fold of
Christ. In our age every branch of the Church can call over the roll of
its confessors and martyr, and so link its history to the purest ages of
the Church. We would not rob them of one sheaf they have gathered into
the garner of the Lord. We share in every victory and we rejoice in
every triumph. There is not one of that great company who have washed
their robes white in the blood of the Lamb, who is not our kinsman in
Christ. Brothers in Christ of every name, shall we not pray for the
healing of the wounds of the body of Christ, that the world may believe
in him?
We are perplexed by the unbelief and sin of our time. The Christian
faith is assailed not only with scoffs of old as Celsus and Julian, but
also with the keenest intellectual criticism of Divine revelation, the
opposition of alleged scientific facts, and a Corinthian worldliness
whose motto is "Eat and drink, for to-morrow we die." In many places
Christian homes are dying out. Crime and impurity are coming in as a
flood, and anarchy raises its hated form in a land where all men are
equal before the law. The lines between the Church and the world are
dim. Never did greater problems confront a council of the Church. An
Apostolic Church has a graver work than discussion about its name or the
amending of its canons and rubrics. I fear that some of this unbelief
is a revolt from a caricature of God. These mechanical ideas about the
universe are the outcome of a mechanical theology which has lost sight
of the Fatherhood of God. There is much honest unbelief. In these
yearnings of humanity, in its clubs, brotherhoods, and orders, in their
readiness to share all things with their brothers, I see unconscious
prophecies of the brotherhood of all men as the children of one God and
Father. Denunciation will not silence unbelief. The name infidel has
lost its terrors. There in only one remedy. It is in the spirit, the
power, and the love of Jesus Christ. Philosophy cannot touch the want.
It offers no hand to grasp, no Saviour to trust, no God to save. When
men see in us the hand, the heart, and the love of Christ, they will
believe in the brotherhood of men and the Fatherhood of God.
There was nothing which impressed your bishops in the late visit to
England more than the service in the cathedral at Durham. The church,
with its thousand years of history was thronged. The chants were sung
by two thousand choristers in surplices. The sermon was preached by the
Bishop of Western New York. This grand service was to set apart some
Bible readers and lay-preachers to go into the collieries to tell these
toilers of the love of Jesus Christ. The same awful problems stare us
in the face,--the centralization of swarms of souls in the cities; the
wealth of the nation in fewer hands; competition making a life-and-death
struggle for bread; the poorest sinking into hopeless despair; and the
richest often forgetting that Lazarus at his gate is a child of the same
God and Father. We, too, must send our best men and women wherever
there is sin, sorrow, and death, to work and suffer, and, if need be,
die for Christ.
We are living in the eventide of the world, when all things point toward
the second coming of our King. God has placed the English-speaking
people in the fore-part of the nations. They number one-tenth of the
human family, and I believe God calls them to do the work of the last
time. The wealth of the world is largely in Christian hands. There
never have been such opportunities for Christian work. Never such a
harvest awaited the husbandman.
You may tell me of difficulties and dangers. We have only one answer.
Sin, sorrow, and death are not the inventions of a Christian priest.
"There is only one Name under heaven whereby any man can be saved." We
have nothing to do with results. It is ours to work and pray, and pray
and work and die. So falls the seed into the earth, and so God gives
the harvest. When the Church sends out embassies commensurate with the
dignity of our King, it will be time to talk of failure. Is the kingdom
of Christ the only kingdom which has not the right to lay tribute on its
citizens? The only failure is the failure to do God's work. Was it
failure when Dr. Hill of blessed memory laid the foundation for that
Christian school which the wisest statesmen say is the chief factor in
the regeneration of Greece? Was it failure when James Lloyd Breck, our
apostle of the wilderness, carried the Gospel to the Indians? Did
Williams, Selwyn, and Patteson fail in Polynesia? Was it failure when
Hoffman and Auer died for Christ in Africa? Have your great-hearted
sons failed who have followed in the footsteps of the saintly Kemper,
and laid with tears and prayers foundations for Christian schools which
are the glory of the West? Has the Gospel failed in Japan, where a
nation is awakening into the life of Christian civilization? Never has
God given His Church more blessed rewards. The century which has passed
is only our school of preparation. The voice of God's Providence says:
"Speak to the children of Israel that they go forward." We have some
problems peculiar to ourselves. Twenty-five years ago four millions of
slaves received American citizenship. The nation owes them a debt of
gratitude. During all the horrors of our civil war they were the
protectors of Southern women and children. Knowing the failure of their
masters would be the guarantee of the freedom, there was not one act
that master or slave might wish to blot. We ought not to forget it, and
God will not. To-day there are eight millions. They are here to stay.
They will not be disfranchised. Through them Africa can be redeemed.
They ought to be our fellow-citizens in the kingdom of God. In a great
crisis of missions the Holy Ghost sent Philip on a long journey to
preach Christ to one man of Ethiopia. The same blessed Spirit of God
calls us in the love of Christ to carry the Gospel in the Church to the
millions of colored citizens of the United States.
Brethren, the time is short. Since our last council nine of our noblest
bishops have died. Since I was consecrated, fifty-four bishops have
entered into the rest if the people of God. It is eventide. A little
more work, a few more toils and prayers, and we who have lived and loved
and worked together shall have a harvest in heaven.
II. SERMON AT THE FARIBAULT CELEBRATION OF THE CENTENNIAL OF THE
INAUGURATION OF GEORGE WASHINGTON, 1789-1889.
"Then Samuel took a stone and set it between Mizpeh and Shen, and called
the name of it Ebeneser, saying, Hitherto hath the Lord helped us."--
1 SAMUEL vii. 12.
No words are more fitting on this Centennial day. One hundred years ago
George Washington was inaugurated the first President of the United
States. Words are powerless to express the grateful thoughts which
swell patriot hearts. Save that people whom God led out of Egypt with
His pillar of fire and His pillar of cloud, I know of no nation whose
history is so full of the bounty of God. This country was settled by
Englishmen. They were bound by ties of affection to the mother country.
They were not rebels, they were loyal, God-fearing men. The English
crown had violated rights which were guaranteed to them by the Magna
Charta, which brave barons, headed by Bishop Stephen Langton, had wrung
from King John and which under God has made English-speaking people the
representatives of constitutional government throughout the world. It
was not until every plea for justice had been spurned, their sacred
rights trampled upon, and the warnings of the wisest English statesmen
unheeded, that the American colonies resolved to be independent and
free. On the 5th of September, 1774, fifty-five delegates, from eleven
colonies, met in Smith's tavern, Philadelphia, and at the invitation of
the carpenters of that city adjourned to their hall. Questions arose as
to the numerical influence of the colonies. Patrick Henry voiced the
sentiment of Congress, "I am not a Virginian, I am an American." John
Jay, who represented the conservative element said, "We have not come to
make a constitution; the measure of arbitrary power is not full, it must
run over before we undertake to frame a government." It was proposed to
open Congress with prayer. Objections were made on account of the
religious differences of the delegates. Old Samuel Adams rose, with his
long white hair streaming on his shoulders (the same earnest Puritan who
in 1768 had written to England, "We hope in God that no such
establishment as the Protestant Episcopate shall ever take place in
America,") and said, "Gentlemen, shall it be said that it is possible
that there can be any religious difference which will prevent men from
crying to that God who alone can save them? Puritan as I am, I move
that the Rev. Dr. Duché, minister of Christ Church in the city, be
asked to open this Congress with prayer." John Adams, writhing to his
wife, said, "Never can I forget that scene. There were twenty Quakers
standing by my side and we were all bathed in tears. When Psalms for
the day were read, it seemed as if Heaven itself was pleading for the
oppressed: 'O Lord, fight thou against them that fight against me.
Lord, who is like unto Thee to defend the poor and needy. Avenge Thou
my cause, my Lord and my God.'" Although filled with indignation at the
blood which had been shed in Boston, Congress nevertheless issued an
appeal to the people of England: "You have been told that we are
impatient of government and desire independency. These are calumnies.
Permit us to be free as you are, and our union with you will be our
greatest glory. But if your ministers sport with human rights, if
neither the voice of justice, the principles of the constitution, nor
humanity will restrain them from shedding human blood in an impious
cause, 'we will never submit.' We ask peace, liberty and safety, and
for this we have laid our prayer at the feet of the king as a loving
father." The battles at Lexington, Concord and Ticonderoga preceded the
second meeting of Congress in May, 1775. Their plea for justice had
been spurned. The outlook was dark as midnight. These brave men
represented no government, they had no power to make laws, they had no
officers to execute them, they could not impose customs, they had no
army, they did not own a foot of land, they owed the use of their hall
to the courtesy of the artisans of Philadelphia. On the 12th of June
Congress made its first appeal to the people of twelve colonies, (
Georgia was not represented). It was a solemn call for the whole people
to observe one and the same day as a day of fasting and prayer "for the
restoration of the invaded rights of America and reconciliation with the
parent state." They who sought the protection of God knew that under
God they must protect themselves. All hearts turned to George
Washington, a delegate from Virginia, and he was unanimously chosen to
be commander-in-chief. When Congress met in July, 1776, the people had
been branded as traitors; the slaves of Virginia had been incited to
insurrection, the torch and tomahawk of the savage had been let loose on
frontier settlements, an army of foreign mercenaries had landed on their
shores, their ports were blockaded, an the army under Washington for
their defence only numbered 6,749 men. On the second day of July, 1776,
without one dissenting colony, the representatives of the thirteen
colonies resolved that "these United Colonies are, and of right ought to
be, free and independent States; that they are absolved from all
allegiance to the British crown, and that all political connection
between them and the State of Great Britain is and ought to be totally
dissolved." Two days later Benjamin Harrison, the great-grandfather of
our present president, the chairman of the committee of the whole,
reported to Congress the form in which that resolution was to be
published to the world, and the reasons by which it was to be justified.
It was the work of Thomas Jefferson, then aged thirty-three, and never
did graver responsibility rest on a young man than the preparation of
that immortal paper, and never was the duty more nobly fulfilled. In
the original draft of the declaration there was the allegation that the
king "had prostituted his negative by suppressing every legislative
attempt to prohibit or restrain this execrable commerce in human
beings." This was struck out, as Mr. Jefferson tells us, in
"complaisance to South Carolina and Georgia, not without tenderness to
Northern Brethren who held slaves." Time forbids my calling over the
roll of these noble patriots who signed their names to our Magna Charta.
There is John Adams, of whom Jefferson said, "He was our Colossus on
that floor, and spoke with such power as to move us from our seats."
Benjamin Franklin, printer philosopher and statesman. Roger Sherman, of
whom John Adams said, "He is honest as an angel and firm as Mount
Atlas." Charles Carroll, who, when a member said, "Oh, Carroll, you
will get off, there are so many Carrolls," stepped back to the desk and
wrote after his name, "of Carrollton." John Hancock, who, when elected
speaker, Benjamin Harrison had playfully seated in the speaker's chair
and said, "We will show Mother Britain how little we care for her, by
making a Massachusetts man our president, whom she has by proclamation
excluded from pardon." A friend said to John Hancock, "You have signed
your name large." "Yes," he replied, "I wish John Bull to read it
without spectacles." Robert Morris, the financier and treasurer of the
Revolution. Elbridge Gerry, the youngest member, the friend of Gen.
Warren, to whom Warren had said the night before the battle of Bunker
Hill, "It is sweet to die for our country." What a roll of names! the
silver-tongued Rutledge, brave Stockton, wise Rush, Lee--fifty-five noble
names, not one of whom who did not know that, as one member said, "If we
do not hang together, we shall hang separately." It was not timidity
which made any of the delegates hesitate to take the irrevocable step.
All the associations of their lives, all the traditions and memories of
the past bound them by ties of kindred and affection to the mother
country. They were venturing on an unknown sea; there were no charts to
guide them, no precedents to follow. The truth was, as Jefferson so
tersely said, "The people wait for us to lead the way. The question is
not whether by a declaration of independence we shall make ourselves
what we are not, but whether we shall declare a fact which exists." So
also John Adams said, "The Revolution was effected before the war
commenced."
I cannot tell the story of the seven year's war. The articles of
confederation were sent to the States in 1778, but the last of the
thirteen States, Maryland, did not adopt them until March, 1781.
Congress under he confederacy dealt with the States and did not have the
confidence or the love of the people. It required nine States to pass
any measure of importance. During the war the confederacy was a
pitiable failure. It issued bills which no one would take, its
certificates of indebtedness and promises to pay were so worthless that
it gave rise to the proverb, "Not worth a continental." Robert Morris,
the financier, pleaded hopelessly for help. Alexander Hamilton
denounced the confederation as "neither fit for war nor peace." Even
Washington, always hopeful, wrote in 1781: "Our troops are fast
approaching nakedness; our hospitals are without medicine; our sick are
without meat; our public works are at a standstill; in a word, we are at
the end of our tether, and now or never deliverance must come." At last
victory came--thanks to the generous assistance of France, to the heroism
of leaders like Lafayette, Baron Steuben, and hosts of others, who gave
us their fortunes and hazarded their lives for America, the war was
ended by the surrender of Lord Cornwallis. Victor Hugo said, "Napoleon
was not defeated at Waterloo by the allied forces. It was God who
conquered him." Who that remembers Trenton, Valley Forge, Saratoga and
Yorktown, will not say God fought for our Washington? In 1777 a Quaker
had occasion to pass through the woods near the headquarters of the
army; hearing a voice, he approached the spot, and saw Washington in
prayer. Returning home, he said to his wife: "All's well! All's well!
Washington will prevail. I have thought that no man can be a soldier
and a Christian. George Washington has convinced me of my mistake."
Peace was declared in 1783. I have a water-color of the building used
as the Department of State, in which the treaty of peace was signed--it
was a building 12 feet by 30.
In May,1787, delegates from all the States, except Rhode Island, met in
the state house in Philadelphia, with George Washington as president, to
draft a constitution for these United States. All the delegates were
convinced of the utter failure of the articles of confederation, all
were convinced of the need of a stronger government. Two parties
honestly differed and were determined to fight it out to the bitter end.
At one time it looked as if the convention must disband without
effecting its object. Franklin arose and said: "Mr. President, the
small progress we have made after five weeks is a melancholy proof of
the imperfection of human understanding--we have gone back to ancient
history for models of government--we have viewed modern states--we find
none of their constitutions suitable to our circumstances--we are groping
in the dark to find political truth, and are scarcely able to
distinguish it when presented to us. How has it happened, sir, that we
have not once thought of humbly applying to the Father of Lights to
illumine our understandings? In the beginning of the contest with
Britain, when we were sensible of danger, we had daily prayers in this
room for Divine protection. Our prayers, sir, were heard and they were
graciously answered. All of us have observed frequent instances of a
superintending Providence in our favor. To that kind Providence we owe
this happy opportunity of consulting in peace on the means to establish
our nation. Have we forgotten our powerful Friend? Do we imagine that
we no longer need His assistance? I have lived, sir, a long time, and
the longer I live the more convinced I am that God governs in the
affairs of men. If a sparrow cannot fall to the ground without His
notice, is it probable that an empire can rise without His aid? We are
told, sir in the sacred writings, that 'except the Lord build the house,
they labor in vain that build it.' I firmly believe this, and I also
believe that without His aid we shall succeed in our political building
no better than the builders of Babel. We shall be divided by our
little, partial, local interests, our projects will be confounded, and
we ourselves shall become a reproach and a byword to future ages. I
therefore beg leave to move that henceforth prayers imploring the
assistance of Heaven an its blessing on our deliberations be held in
this assembly every morning before we proceed to business, and that one
or more of the clergy of this city be requested to officiate." When the
Constitution was adopted, Franklin rose, and pointing to the speaker's
chair, on which was carved a sun half-hid by the horizon, said:
"Gentlemen, I have long watched that sun and wondered whether it was a
rising or a setting sun--God has heard our prayers, it is a rising sun."
This convention adopted the famous ordinance of 1787, which guaranteed
that slavery should never enter the north-west territory, and this,
under God, saved the nation in the hour of trial. The Constitution was
ratified by eleven of the States in 1788, and the first Wednesday in
January, 1789, electors were chosen in all the ratifying States, except
New York, where a conflict between the senate and assembly prevented a
choice. In Rhode Island and North Carolina no election was held. The
person receiving the highest number of votes was to be president, the
man receiving the next highest number was to be vice-president.
Washington received the whole number of votes, 69; John Adams received
34. They were elected the first president and vice-president of the
United States.