commonly accepted in his day. "The doctrine of a total ignorance and
incapacity to judge of moral and religious truths brought upon mankind by
the disobedience of our first parents," he wrote, "is without
foundation."[11] "I hope it appears," he says, "that the love of God and of
our neighbor, that sincere piety of heart, and a righteous, holy and
charitable life, are the weightier matters of the gospel, as well as of the
law."[12] "Although Christianity cannot," he asserts, "with any propriety
or justice be said to be the same with natural religion, or merely a
republication of the laws of nature, yet the principal, the most important
and fundamental duties required by Christianity are, nevertheless, the same
which were enjoined under the legal dispensation of Moses, and the same
which are dictated by the light of nature."[13] His great love of
intellectual and spiritual freedom finds utterance in such a statement as
this: "Nor has any order or body of men authority to enjoin any particular
article of faith, nor the use of any modes of worship not expressly pointed
out in the Scriptures; nor has the enjoining of such articles a tendency to
preserve the peace and harmony of the church, but directly the
contrary."[14] Such sentences as the following are frequent on Mayhew's
pages, and they show clearly the trend of his mind: "Free examination,
weighing arguments for and against with care and impartiality, is the way
to find truth." "True religion flourishes the more, the more people
exercise their right of private judgment."[15] "There is nothing more
foolish and superstitious than a veneration for ancient creeds and
doctrines as such, and nothing is more unworthy a reasonable creature than
to value principles by their age, as some men do their wines."[16]
Mayhew insisted upon the strict unity of God, "who is without rival or
competitor." "The dominion and sovereignty of the universe is necessarily
one and in one, the only living and true God, who delegates such measures
of power and authority to other beings as seemeth good in his sight." He
declared that the not preserving of such unity and supremacy of God on the
part of Christians "has long been just matter of reproach to them"; and he
said the authority of Christ is always "exercised in subordination to God's
will."[17] His position was that "the faith of Christians does not
terminate in Christ as the ultimate object of it, but it is extended
through him to the one God."[18] The very idea of a mediator implies
subordination as essential to it.[19] His biographer says he did not accept
the notion of vicarious suffering, and, that he was an Arian in his views
of the nature of Christ. "He was the first clergyman in New England who
expressly and openly opposed the scholastic doctrine of the Trinity.
Several others declined pressing the Athanasian Creed, and believed
strictly in the unity of God. They also probably found it difficult to
explain their views on the subject, and the great danger of losing their
good name served to prevent their speaking out. But Dr. Mayhew did not
conceal or disguise his sentiments on this point any more than on others,
such as the peculiar tenets of Calvinism. He explicitly and boldly declared
the doctrine irrational, unscriptural, and directly contradictory."[20] He
taught the strict unity of God as early as 1753, "in the most unequivocal
and plain manner, in his sermons of that year."[21] What most excited
comment and objection was that, in a foot-note to the volume of his sermons
published in 1755, Mayhew said that a Catholic Council had elevated the
Virgin Mary to the position of a fourth person in the Godhead, and added,
by way of comment: "Neither Papists nor Protestants should imagine that
they will be understood by others if they do not understand themselves. Nor
should they think that nonsense and contradictions can ever be too sacred
to be ridiculous." The ridicule here was not directed against the doctrine
of the Trinity, as has been maintained, but the foolish defences of it made
by men who accepted its "mysteries" as too wonderful for reason to deal
with in a serious manner. This boldness of comment on the part of Mayhew
was in harmony with his strong disapproval of creed-making in all its
forms. He condemned creeds because they set up "human tests of orthodoxy
instead of the infallible word of God, and make other terms of Christian
communion than those explicitly pointed out by the Gospel."[22]
Dr. Mayhew was succeeded in the West Church by Rev. Simeon Howard in 1767,
who, though he was received in a more friendly spirit by the ministers of
the town, was not less radical in his theology than his predecessor. Dr.
Howard was both an Arminian and an Arian, and he was "a believer neither in
the Trinity, nor in the divine predestination of total depravity, and
necessary ruin to any human soul."[23] He was of a gentle and conciliatory
temper, but his preaching was quite as thorough-going in its intellectual
earnestness as was Dr. Mayhew's.
[Sidenote: A Pronounced Universalist.]
Another preacher on the liberal side was Dr. Charles Chauncy of the First
Church in Boston, whose ministry lasted from 1727 to 1787. He was the most
vigorous of the opponents of the great awakening, both in his pulpit and
through the press. He wrote a book on certain French fanatics, with the
purpose of showing what would be the natural results of the excesses of the
revival; he preached a powerful sermon on enthusiasm, to indicate the
dangers of religious excitement, when not controlled by common sense and
reason; and he travelled throughout New England to gain all the information
possible about the revival, its methods and results, and published his
Seasonable Thoughts on the State of Religion in New England in 1743. He had
been influenced by the reading of Taylor, Tillotson, Clarke, and the other
latitudinarian and rationalistic writers of England; and he found the
revival in its excesses repugnant to his every thought of what was true and
devout in religion.
Dr. Chauncy was not an eloquent preacher; but he was clear, earnest, and
honest. Many of his sermons were published, and his books numbered nearly a
dozen. As early as 1739 he preached a sermon in favor of religious
toleration. At a later period he said, "It is with me past all doubt that
the religion of Jesus will never be restored to its primitive purity,
simplicity, and glory, until religious establishments are so brought down
as to be no more."[24] It was this conviction which made him oppose in his
pulpit and in two or three books the effort that was made just before the
Revolution to establish the English Church as the state form of religion in
the colonies. He said, in 1767, that the American people would hazard
everything dear to them--their estates, their lives--rather than suffer
their necks to be put under the yoke of bondage to any foreign power in
state or church.[25]
In his early life Dr. Chauncy was an Arminian, but slowly he grew to the
acceptance of distinctly Unitarian and Universalist doctrines. Near the end
of his life he Published four or five books in which he advanced very
liberal opinions. One of these, published in Boston in 1784, was on The
Benevolence of the Deity fairly and impartially Considered. This book
followed the same method and purpose as Butler's Analogy, and aimed to show
that God has manifested his goodness in creation and in the life of man. He
said that our moral self-determination, or free will, is our one great gift
from God. He discussed the moral problems of life in order to prove the
benevolence of God, maintaining that the goodness we see in him is of the
same nature with goodness in ourselves. The year following he published a
book on the Scriptural account of the Fall and its Consequences, in which
he rejected the doctrine of total depravity, and interpreted the new birth
as a result of education rather than of supernatural change. Thus he
brought to full statement the logical result of the half-way covenant and
the teachings of Solomon Stoddard, as well as of the connection of church
and state in New England. He saw that the method of education is the only
one that can justly be followed in the preparation of the young for
admission to a church that is sustained in any direct way by the state.
Dr. Chauncy's great work as a preacher and author[26] was brought to its
close by his books in favor of universal salvation. In 1783-84 he published
in Boston two anonymous pamphlets advocating the salvation of all men, and
these pamphlets made no little stir. In 1784 he published in London a work
which he called The Mystery hid from Ages and Generations, made manifest by
the Gospel Revelation; or, The Salvation of All Men the Grand Thing aimed
at in the Scheme of God: By One who wishes well to the whole Human Race. In
this book Dr. Chauncy made an elaborate study of the New Testament, in
order to prove that salvation is to be universal. Christ died for all,
therefore all will be saved; because all have sinned in Adam, therefore all
will be made alive in Christ. He looked to a future probation, to a long
period after death, when the opportunity of salvation will be open to all.
He maintained that the misery threatened against the wicked in Scripture is
that of this intermediate state between the earthly life and the time when
God shall be all in all. He held that sin will be punished hereafter in
proportion to depravity, and that none will be saved until they come into
willing harmony with Christ, who will finally be able to win all men to
himself, otherwise the power of God will be set at naught and his good will
towards men frustrated of its purpose. In the future state of discipline,
punishment will be inflicted with salutary effect, and thus the moral
recovery of mankind will be accomplished.
[Sidenote: Other Men of Mark.]
Another leader was Dr. Samuel West, of Dartmouth, now New Bedford, where he
was settled in 1760, and where he preached for more than forty years.[27]
He rejected the doctrines of fore-ordination, election, total depravity,
and the Trinity. In preaching the election sermon of 1776, he took the
ground of an undisguised rationalism. "A revelation," he said, "pretending
to be from God, that contradicts any part of natural laws ought immediately
to be rejected as imposture; for the deity cannot make a law contrary to
the law of nature without acting contrary to himself,--a thing in the
strictest sense impossible, for that which implies contradiction is not an
object of Divine Power." The cardinal idea of West's; position, as of that
of most of the liberal men of his time, was stated by him in one sentence,
when he said, "To preach Christ is to preach the whole system of divinity,
as it consists of both natural and revealed religion."[28]
In 1751 Rev. Thomas Barnard, of Newbury, was dismissed from his parish
because he was regarded as unconverted by the revivalistic portion of his
congregation; and in 1755 he was settled over the First Church in Salem. He
was an Arminian, and at the same time an Arian of the school of Samuel
Clarke. His son Thomas was settled over the North Church of Salem in 1773,
which church was organized especially for him by his admirers in the First
Church. He followed in the theological opinions of his father, but probably
became somewhat more pronounced in his Arian views, so that, after his
death, Dr. Channing called him a Unitarian. It is not surprising that the
younger Barnard should have been liberal in his opinions and spirit, when
we find his theological instructor, Rev. Samuel Williams, at his
ordination, saying to him in the sermon preached on that occasion, "Be of
no sect or party but that of good men, and to all such (whatever their
differences among themselves) let your heart be opened." On another similar
occasion Mr. Williams said that it had always been his advice to examine
with caution and modesty, "but with the greatest freedom all religious
matters."[29] It was said of the younger Barnard that he believed "the
final salvation of no man depended upon the belief or disbelief of those
speculative opinions about which men, equally learned and pious, differ."
When it was said to him by one of his parishioners, "Dr. Barnard, I never
heard you preach a sermon upon the Trinity," the reply was, "And you never
will."[30]
In 1779 Rev. John Prince was settled over the First Church in Salem, as the
colleague of the elder Barnard. He was an Arian, but in no combative or
dogmatic manner. He was a student, a lover of science, and an advanced
thinker and investigator for his time. In 1787 he invited the Universalist,
Rev. John Murray, into his pulpit, then an act of the greatest
liberality.[31] Another lover of science, Rev. William Bentley, was settled
over the East Church of Salem, as colleague to Rev. James Diman, in 1782.
The senior pastor was a strict Calvinist, but the parish called as his
colleague this young man of pronounced liberal views in theology. As early
as 1784 Mr. Bentley was interested in the teachings of the English
Unitarian, William Hazlitt,[32] who at that time visited New England. And
in 1786 he was reading Joseph Priestley's book against the Trinity with
approval. He soon after commended Dr. Priestley's short tracts as giving a
good statement of the simple doctrines of Christianity.[33] He insisted
upon free inquiry in religion from the beginning of his ministry, and not
long after he began preaching he became substantially a Unitarian.[34] In
1789 he maintained that "the full conviction of a future moral retribution"
is "the great point of Christian faith."[35] It has been claimed that Mr.
Bentley was the first minister in New England to take distinctly the
Unitarian position, and there are good reasons for this understanding of
his doctrinal attitude.[36] Dr. Bentley corresponded with scholars in
Europe, as he also did with Arab chiefs in their own tongue. He knew of the
religions of India, and he seems to have given them appreciative
recognition. The shipmasters and foreign merchants of Salem, as they came
in contact with the Oriental races and religions, discarded their dogmatic
Christianity; and these men, almost without exception, were connected with
the churches that became Unitarian. It may be accepted as a very
interesting fact that "the two potent influences shaping the ancient
Puritanism of Salem into Unitarianism were foreign commerce and contact
with the Oriental religions."[37]
The formation of a second parish in Worcester, in 1785, was a significant
step in the progress of liberal opinion. This was the first time when a
town, outside of Boston, was divided into two parishes of the
Congregational order on doctrinal grounds. On the death of the minister of
the first parish several candidates were heard, and among them Rev. Aaron
Bancroft, who was a pronounced Arminian and Arian. The majority preferred a
Calvinist; but the more intelligent minority insisted upon the settlement
of Mr. Bancroft,--a result they finally accomplished by the organization of
a new parish. It was a severe struggle by which this result was brought
about, every effort being made to defeat it; and for many years Mr.
Bancroft was almost completely isolated in his religious opinions.[38]
[Sidenote: The Second Period of Revivals.]
It must not be understood that there was any marked separation in the
churches as yet on doctrinal grounds. Calvinism was mildly taught, and
ministers of all shades of opinion exchanged pulpits freely with each
other. They met in ministerial associations, and in various duties of
ordinations, councils, and other ecclesiastical gatherings. The preaching
was practical, not doctrinal; and controverted subjects were for the most
part not touched upon in the pulpits. About 1780, however, began a revival
of Calvinism on the part of Drs. Bellamy, Emmons, Hopkins, and others; and
especially did it take a strenuous form in the works of Samuel Hopkins. The
New Divinity, as it was sometimes called, taught that unconditional
submission to God is the duty of every human being, that we should be
willing to be damned for the glory of God, and that the attitude of God
towards men is one of unbounded benevolence. This newer Calvinism was full
of incentives to missionary enterprise, and was zealous for the making of
converts. Under the impulse of its greater enthusiasm there began, about
1790, a series of revivals which continued to the middle of the nineteenth
century. This was the second great period of revivalism in New England. It
was far better organized than the first one, while its methods were more
systematic and under better guidance; and the results were great in the
building of churches, in establishing missionary outposts, and in awakening
an active religious life amongst the people. It aroused much opposition to
the liberals, and it made the orthodox party more aggressive. Just as the
great awakening developed opposition to the liberals of that day, and
served to bring into view the two tendencies in the Congregational
churches, so this new revival period accentuated the divergencies between
those who believed in the deity of Christ and those who believed in his
subordinate nature, and led to the first assuming of positions on both
sides. There can be little doubt that it put a check upon the friendly
spirit that had existed in the churches, and that it began a division which
ultimately resulted in their separation into two denominations.[39]
Such details of individual and local opinion as have here been given are
all the more necessary because there was at this time no consensus of
belief on the part of the more liberal men. Each man thought for himself,
but he was very reluctant to depart from the old ways in ritual and
doctrine; and if the ministers consulted with each other, and gave each
other confidential assistance, there was certainly nothing in the way of
public conference or of party assimilation and encouragement. A visitor to
Boston in 1791 wrote of the ministers there that "they are so diverse in
their sentiments that they cannot agree on any point in theology. Some are
Calvinists, some Universalists, some Arminians, and one, at least, is a
Socinian."[40] Another visitor, this time in 1801, found the range of
opinions much wider. In all the ministers of Boston he found only one rigid
Trinitarian; one was a follower of Edwards, several were Arminians, two
were Socinians, one a Universalist, and one a Unitarian.[41] This writer
says it was not difficult to find out what men did not believe, but there
was as yet no public line of demarcation among the clergy. There being no
outward pressure to bring men into uniformity, no institution or body of
men with authority to require assent to a standard of orthodoxy, little
attention was given to merely doctrinal interests. The position taken was
that presented by Rev. John Tucker of Newbury, in the convention sermon of
1768, when he said that no one has any right whatever to legislate in
behalf of Christ, who alone has authority to fix the terms of the Gospel.
He said that, as all believers and teachers of Christianity are "perfectly
upon a level with one another, none of them can have any authority even to
interpret the laws of this kingdom for others, so as to require their
assent to such interpretation." He also declared that as "every Christian
has and must have a right to judge for himself of the true sense and
meaning of all gospel truths, no doctrines, therefore, no laws, no
religious rites, no terms of acceptance with God or of admission to
Christian privileges not found in the gospel, are to be looked upon by him
as any part of this divine system, nor to be received and submitted to as
the doctrines and laws of Christ."[42] Of Rev. John Prince, the minister
of the First Church in Salem during the last years of the century, it was
said that he never "preached distinctly upon any of the points of
controversy which, in his day, agitated the New England churches."[43] The
minister of Roxbury, Rev. Eliphalet Porter, said of the Calvinistic
beliefs, that there was not one of them he considered "essential to the
Christian faith or character."[44]
[Sidenote: King's Chapel becomes Unitarian.]
These quotations will indicate the liberty of spirit that existed in the
New England churches of the later years of the eighteenth century,
especially in the neighborhood of Boston, and along the seacoast; and also
the diversity of opinion on doctrinal subjects among the ministers. It is
impossible here to follow minutely the stages of doctrinal evolution, but a
few dates and incidents will serve to indicate the several steps that were
taken. The first of these was the settlement of Rev. James Freeman over
King's Chapel in 1782, and his ordination by the congregation in 1787, the
liturgy having been revised two years earlier to conform to the liberal
opinions of the minister and people. These changes were brought about
largely through the influence of Rev. William Hazlitt, the father of the
essayist and critic of the same name, who had been settled over several of
the smaller Unitarian churches in Great Britain. In the spring of 1783 he
visited the United States, and spent several months in Philadelphia. He
gave a course of lectures on the Evidences of Christianity in the college
there, which were largely attended. He preached for several weeks in a
country parish in Maryland, he had invitations to settle in Charleston and
Pittsburg, and he had an opportunity to become the president of a college
by subscribing to the doctrinal tests required, which he would not do; for
"he would sooner die in a ditch than submit to human authority in matters
of faith."[45] In June, 1784, he preached in the Brattle Street Church of
Boston, and he anticipated becoming its minister; but his pronounced
doctrinal position seems to have made that impossible. He also preached in
Hingham, and some of the people there desired his settlement; but the aged
Dr. Gay would not resign. It would appear that he preached for Dr. Chauncy,
for Mr. Barnes in Salem, and also in several pulpits on Cape Cod. He gave
in Boston his course of lectures on the Evidences of Christianity, and it
was received with much favor by large audiences. The winter of 1784-85 was
spent by Mr. Hazlitt in Hallowell, Me., in which place was a small group of
wealthy English Unitarians, led by Samuel Vaughan, by whom Mr. Hazlitt had
been entertained in Philadelphia. Mr. Hazlitt returned to Boston in the
spring of 1785, and had some hope of settling in Roxbury. In the autumn,
however, finding no definite promise of employment, he returned to England.
He afterward corresponded with Dr. Howard, of the West Church in Boston,
and with Dr. Lathrop, of West Springfield. The volumes of sermons he
published in 1786 and 1790 were sold in this country, and one or two of
them republished.
It would appear that Mr. Hazlitt's positive Unitarianism made it impossible
for him to settle over any church in Boston or its neighborhood. In 1784 he
assisted Dr. Freeman in revising the Prayer Book, the form of prayer used
by Dr. Lindsey[46] in the Essex Street Chapel in London being adapted to
the new conditions at King's Chapel. He also republished in Philadelphia
and Boston many of Dr. Priestley's Unitarian tracts, while writing much
himself for publication.[47] In his correspondence with Theophilus
Lindsey, Dr. Freeman wrote of Mr. Hazlitt as a pious, zealous, and
intelligent minister, to whose instructions and conversation he was
particularly indebted.[48] "Before Mr. Hazlitt came to Boston", Dr.
Freeman wrote, "the Trinitarian doxology was almost universally used. That
honest, good man prevailed upon several respectable ministers to omit it.
Since his departure the number of those who repeat only Scriptural
doxologies has greatly increased, so that there are now many churches in
which the worship is strictly Unitarian."[49]
Beginning with the year 1786, several of the liberal men in Boston were in
correspondence with the leading Unitarian ministers in London, and their
letters were afterward published by Thomas Belsham in his Life of
Theophilus Lindsey. From this work we learn that Dr. Lindsey presented his
own theological works and those of Dr. Priestley to Harvard College, and
that they were read with great avidity by the students.[50] One of the
Boston correspondents, writing in 1783, names James Bowdoin, governor of
Massachusetts in 1785 and 1786, General Benjamin Lincoln, and General Henry
Knox as among the liberal men. He said: "There are many others besides, in
our legislature, of similar sentiments. While so many of our great men are
thus on the side of truth and free inquiry, they will necessarily influence
many of the common people."[51] He also said that people were less
frightened at the Socinian name than formerly, and that this form of
Christianity was beginning to have some public advocates. The only minister
who preached in favor of it was Mr. Bentley, of Salem, who was described as
"a young man of a bold, independent mind, of strong, natural powers, and of
more skill in the learned languages than any person of his years in the
state." Mr. Bentley's congregation was spoken of as uncommonly liberal, not
alarmed at any improvements, and pleased with his introduction into the
pulpit of various modern translations of the Scriptures, especially of the
prophecies.[52]
[Sidenote: Other Unitarian Movements.]