leadership of Thomas Oxnard, who had been an Episcopalian. Having been
supplied with the works of Priestley and Lindsey through the generosity of
Dr. Freeman, he became a Unitarian; and his personal intercourse with Dr.
Freeman gave strength to his changed convictions. A number of persons of
property and respectability of character joined him in accepting his new
faith. In writing to his friend in November, 1788, Mr. Oxnard said: "I
cannot express to you the avidity with which these Unitarian publications
are sought after. Our friends here are clearly convinced that the Unitarian
doctrine will soon become the prevailing opinion in this country. Three
years ago I did not know a single Unitarian in this part of the country
besides myself; and now, entirely from the various publications you have
furnished, a decent society might be collected in this and the neighboring
towns."[53] In 1792 an attempt was made to introduce a revised liturgy
into the Episcopal church of Portland; and, when this was resisted, a
majority of the congregation seceded and formed a Unitarian society, with
Mr. Oxnard as the minister. This society was continued for a few years, and
then ceased to exist. The members joined the first Congregational church,
which in 1809, became Unitarian.[54] Also in 1792 was organized a
Unitarian congregation in Saco, under the auspices of Hon. Samuel Thatcher,
a member of Congress and a Massachusetts judge.[55] Mr. Thatcher had been
an unbeliever, but through the reading of Priestley's works he became a
sincere and rational Christian. He met with much opposition from his
neighbors, and an effort was made to prevent his re-election to Congress;
but it did not succeed. The Saco congregation was at first connected with
that at Portland, and it seems to have ceased its existence at the same
time.[56]
In 1794 Dr. Freeman wrote that Unitarianism was making considerable
progress in the southern counties of Massachusetts. In Barnstable he
reported "a very large body of Unitarians."[57] Writing in May, 1796, he
states that Unitarianism is on the increase in Maine, that it is making a
considerable increase in the southern part of Massachusetts, and that a few
seeds have been sown in Vermont. He thinks it may be losing ground in some
places, but that it is growing in others. "I consider it," he writes, "as
one of the most happy effects which have resulted from my feeble exertions
in the Unitarian cause, that they have introduced me to the knowledge and
friendship of some of the most valuable characters of the present age, men
of enlightened heads and benevolent hearts. Though it is a standing article
of most of our social libraries, that nothing of a controversial character
should be purchased, yet any book which is presented is freely accepted. I
have found means, therefore, of introducing into them some of the Unitarian
Tracts with which you have kindly furnished me. There are few persons who
have not read them with avidity; and when read they cannot fail to make an
impression upon the minds of many. From these and other causes the
Unitarian doctrine appears to be still upon the increase. I am acquainted
with a number of ministers, particularly in the southern part of this
state, who avow and publicly preach this sentiment. There are others more
cautious, who content themselves with leading their hearers by a course of
rational but prudent sermons gradually and insensibly to embrace it. Though
this latter mode is not what I entirely approve, yet it produces good
effects. For the people are thus kept out of the reach of false opinions,
and are prepared for the impressions which will be made on them by more
bold and ardent successors, who will probably be raised up when these timid
characters are removed off the stage. The clergy are generally the first
who begin to speculate; but the people soon follow, where they are so much
accustomed to read and enquire."[58]
In 1793 was published Jeremy Belknap's biography of Samuel Watts, who was
an Arian, or, at least, held to the subordinate nature of Christ. This book
had a very considerable influence in directing attention to the doctrine of
the Trinity, and in inducing inquiring men to study the subject critically
for themselves. In 1797 Dr. Belknap became the minister of the Federal
Street Church in Boston, and his preaching was from that time distinctly
Unitarian. Dr. Joseph Priestley removed to Philadelphia in 1794, and he was
at first listened to by large congregations. His humanitarian
theology--that is, his denial of divinity as well as deity to
Christ--probably had the effect of limiting the interest in his teachings.
However, a small congregation was established in Philadelphia in 1796,
formed mostly of English Unitarians. A congregation was gathered at
Northumberland in 1794, to which place Priestley removed in that year.
In the year 1800 a division took place in the church at Plymouth, owing to
the growth there of liberal sentiments. These began to manifest themselves
as early as 1742, as a reaction from the intense revivalism of that
Period.[59] Rev. Chandler Bobbins, who was strictly Calvinistic in his
theology, was the minister from 1760 until his death in 1799. In 1794 a
considerable number of persons in the parish discussed the desirability of
organizing another church, in order to secure more liberal preaching. It
was recognized that Mr. Robbins was an old man, that he was very much
beloved, and that in a few years the opportunity desired would be presented
without needless agitation; and the effort was therefore deferred. In
November, 1799, at a meeting held for the election of a new pastor,
twenty-three members of the church were in favor of Rev. James Kendall, the
only candidate, while fifteen were in opposition. When the parish voted,
two hundred and fifty-three favored Mr. Kendall, and fifteen were opposed.
In September, 1800, the conservative minority, numbering eighteen males and
thirty-five females, withdrew; and two years later they organized the
society now called the Church of the Pilgrimage. The settlement of Mr.
Kendall, a pronounced Arminian,[60] was an instance of the almost complete
abandonment of Calvinism on the part of a congregation, in opposition to
the preaching from the pulpit. In spite of the strict confession of faith
which Dr. Robbins had persuaded the church to adopt, the parish outgrew the
old teachings. Mr. Kendall, with the approval of his church, soon grew into
a Unitarian; and it was fitting that the church of the Mayflower, the
church of Robinson and Brewster, should lead the way in this advance.
As yet there was no controversy, except in a quiet way. Occasionally sharp
criticism was uttered, especially in convention and election sermons; but
there was no thought of separation or exclusion. The liberal men showed a
tendency to magnify the work of charity; and they were, in a limited
degree, zealous in every kind of philanthropic effort. More distinctly,
however, they showed their position in their enthusiasm for the Bible and
in their summing up of Christianity in loyalty to Christ. Towards all
creeds and dogmas they were indifferent and silent, except as they
occasionally spoke plainly out to condemn them. They believed in and
preached toleration, and their whole movement stood more distinctly for
comprehensiveness and latitudinarianism than for aught else. They were not
greatly concerned about theological problems; but they thoroughly believed
in a broad, generous, sympathetic, and practical Christianity, that would
exemplify the teachings of Christ, and that would lead men to a pure and
noble moral life.
[Sidenote: Growth of Toleration.]
That toleration was not as yet fully accepted in Massachusetts is seen in
the fact that the proposed Constitution of 1778 was defeated because it
provided for freedom of worship on the part of all Protestant
denominations. The dominant religious body was not yet ready to put itself
on a level with the other sects. In the Constitutional Convention of 1779
the more liberal men worked with the Baptists to secure a separation of
state and church. Such men as Drs. Chauncy, Mayhew, West, and Shute were
desirous of the broadest toleration; and they did what they could to secure
it. As early as 1768, Dr. Chauncy spoke in plainest terms in opposition to
the state support of religion. "We are in principle," he wrote, "against
all civil establishments in religion. It does not appear to us that God has
entrusted, the state with a right to make religious establishments. But let
it be heedfully minded we claim no right to desire the interposition of the
state to establish the mode of worship, government or discipline, we
apprehend is most agreeable to the mind of Christ. We desire no other
liberty than to be left unrestrained in the exercise of our principles, in
so far as we are good members of society.... The plain truth is, by the
gospel charter, all professed Christians are vested with precisely the same
rights; nor has our denomination any more a right to the interposition of
the civil magistrate in their favor than any other; and whenever this
difference takes place, it is beside the rule of Scripture, and the genuine
dictates, of uncorrupted reason."[61] All persons throughout the state, of
whatever religious connection, who had become emancipated from the Puritan
spirit, supported him in this opinion. They were in the minority as yet,
and they were not organized. Therefore, their efforts were unsuccessful.
Another testing of public sentiment on this subject was had in the
Massachusetts convention which, in 1788, ratified the Constitution of the
United States. The sixth article, which provides that "no religious tests
shall ever be required as a qualification to any office," was the occasion
of a prolonged debate and much opposition. Hon. Theophilus Parsons took the
liberal side, and declared that "the only evidence we can have of the
sincerity and excellency of a man's religion is a good life," precisely the
position of the liberal men. By several members it was urged, however, that
this article was a departure from the principles of our forefathers, who
came here for the preservation of their religion, and that it would admit
deists and atheists into the general government.
In these efforts to secure religious toleration as a fundamental law of the
state and nation the Baptist denomination took an active and a leading
part. Not less faithful to this cause were the liberal men among the
Congregationalists, while the opposition came almost wholly from the
Calvinistic and orthodox churches. Such leaders on the liberal side as Dr.
David Shute of the South Parish in Hingham, Rev. Thomas Thatcher of the
West Parish in Dedham, and Dr. Samuel West of New Bedford, were loyally
devoted in the convention to the support of the toleration act of the
Constitution. In the membership of the convention there were seventeen
ministers, and fourteen of them voted for the Constitution. The opinions of
the fourteen were expressed by Rev. Phillips Payson, the minister of
Chelsea, who held that a religious test would be a great blemish on the
Constitution. He also said that God is the God of the conscience, and for
human tribunals to encroach upon the consciences of men is impious.[62] As
the Constitution was ratified by only a small majority of the convention,
and as at the opening of its sessions the opposition seemed almost
overwhelming, the position taken by the more liberal ministers was a sure
indication of growing liberality. The great majority of the people,
however, were still strongly in favor of the old religious tests and
restrictions, as was fully indicated by subsequent events. The Revolution
operated as a liberalizing influence, because of the breaking of old
customs and the discussion of the principles of liberty attendant upon the
adoption of the state and national constitutions. The growth of democratic
sentiment made a strong opposition to the churches and their privileges,
and it caused a diminution of reverence for the authority of the clergy.
The twenty years following the Revolution showed a notable growth in
liberal opinions.
Universalism presented itself as a new form of Calvinism, its advocates
claiming that God decreed that all should be saved, and that his will would
be triumphant. In many parts of the country the doctrine of universal
salvation began to be heard during the last two decades of the eighteenth
century, and the growth of interest in it was rapid from the beginning of
the nineteenth. This movement began in the Baptist churches, but it soon
appeared in others. At first it was undefined, a protest against the harsh
teaching of future punishment. It was a part of the humanitarian awakening
of the time, the new faith in man, the recognition that love is diviner
than wrath. Many persons found escape from creeds that were hateful to them
into this new and more hopeful interpretation of religion. Persons of every
shade of protest, and "infidelity," and free thinking, found their way into
this new body; and great was the condemnation and hatred with which it was
received on the part of the other sects. In time this movement clarified
itself, and it has had a positive influence for piety and for nobler views
of God and the future.
Of much the same nature was the movement within the fellowship of the
Friends led by Thomas Hicks. It was Unitarian and reformatory, influenced
by the growing democracy and zeal for humanity the age was everywhere
manifesting.
In the border states between north and south began, during the last decade
of the eighteenth century, a movement in favor of discarding all creeds and
confessions. It favored a return to the Bible itself as the great
Protestant book, and as the one revealed word of God. Without learning or
culture, these persons sought to make their faith in Christ more real by an
evangelical obedience to his teachings. Some of them called themselves
Disciples, holding that to follow Christ is quite enough. Others said that
no other name than Christian is required. They were Biblical in their
theology, and unsectarian in their attitude towards the forms and rituals
of the church. In time these scattered groups of earnest seekers for a
better Christian way, from Maine to Georgia, came to know each other and to
organize for the common good.
With the rapid growth of Methodism the Arminian view of man was widely
adopted. The Baptists received into their fellowship in all parts of New
England, at least, many who were not deeply in sympathy with their strict
rules, but who found with them a means of protesting against the harsher
methods of the "standing order" of Congregationalists. Their demand for
toleration and liberty of conscience began to receive recognition after the
Revolution, and their influence was a powerful one in bringing about the
separation of state and church. Those who were dissatisfied with a church
that taxed all the people, and that was upheld by state authority, found
with the Baptists a means of making their protest heard and felt.
In all directions the democratic spirit was being manifested, and
conditions which had been upheld by the restrictive authority of England
had to give way. The people were now speaking, and not the ministers only.
It was an age of individualism, and of the reassertion of the tendency that
had characterized New England from the first, but that had been held in
check by autocratic power. There was no outbreak, no rapid change, no
iconoclastic overturning of old institutions and customs, but the people
were coming to their own, thinking for themselves. In reality, the people
were conservative, especially in New England; and they moved slowly, there
was little infidelity, and steadily were the old ideals maintained. Yet the
individualism would assert itself. Men held the old creeds in distinctly
personal ways, and the churches grew into more and more of independency.
The theological development of the eighteenth century took two directions:
that of rationalism and a demand for free inquiry, as represented by
Jonathan Mayhew and William Bentley; and that of a philanthropic protest
against the harsh features of Calvinism, as represented by Charles Chauncy
and the Universalists. The demand that all theological problems should be
submitted to reason for vindication or readjustment was not widely urged;
but a few men recognized the worth of this claim, and applied this method
without hesitation. A larger number followed them with hesitating steps,
but with a growing confidence in reason as God's method for man's finding
and maintaining the truth. The other tendency grew out of a benevolent
desire to justify the ways of God to man, and was the expression of a
deepening faith that the Divine Being deals with his children in a fatherly
manner. That God is generous and loving was the faith of Dr. Chauncy, as it
was of the Universalists and of the more liberal party among the
Calvinists. Their philanthropic feelings toward their fellow-men seemed to
them representative of God's ways of dealing with his creatures.
[1] Levi L. Paine, A Critical History of the Evolution of Trinitarianism,
105. "Nathaniel Emmons held tenaciously to three real persons. He said,
'It is as easy to conceive of God existing in three persons as in one
person.' This language shows that Emmons employed the term 'person' in
the strict literal sense. The three are absolutely equal, this
involving the metaphysical assumption that in the Trinity being and
person are not coincident. Emmons is the first theologian who asserts
that, though we cannot conceive that three persons should be one
person, we may conceive that three persons may be one Being, 'if we
only suppose that being may signify something different from person in
respect to Deity.'"
[2] E.H. Gillett, History and Literature of the Unitarian Controversy.
Historical Magazine, April 1871; second series, IX. 222.
[3] Letter to Scripturista by Paulinus, 18.
[4] William S. Pattee, A History of Old Braintree and Quincy, 222. When a
copy of Dr. Jedediah Morse's little book on American Unitarianism was
sent to John Adams, he acknowledged its receipt in the following
letter:--
QUINCY, May 15, 1815.
_Dear Doctor_,--I thank you for your favor of the 10th, and the
pamphlet enclosed, entitled American Unitarianism. I have turned
over its leaves, and found nothing that was not familiarly known to
me. In the preface Unitarianism is represented as only thirty years
old in New England. I can testify as a witness to its old age.
Sixty-five years ago my own minister, the Rev. Lemuel Briant; Dr.
Jonathan Mayhew, of the West Church in Boston; the Rev. Mr. Shute,
of Hingham; the Rev. John Brown, of Cohasset; and perhaps equal to
all, if not above all, the, Rev. Mr. Gay, of Hingham, were
Unitarians. Among the laity how many could I name, lawyers,
physicians, tradesmen, farmers! But at present I will name only
one, Richard Cranch, a man who had studied divinity, and Jewish and
Christian antiquities, more than any clergyman now existing in New
England.
JOHN ADAMS.
Also see C.F. Adams, Three Episodes of Massachusetts History, 643; and
J.H. Allen, An Historical Sketch of the Unitarian Movement since the
Reformation, 175.
[5] History of Hingham, I., Part II., 24, Memoir of Ebenezer Gay, by
Solomon Lincoln.
[6] Sermons, 1755, 83.
[7] Ibid., 103.
[8] Ibid., 119.
[9] Ibid., 125.
[10] Ibid., 245.
[11] Sermons, 1755, 50.
[12] Ibid., 82.
[13] Sermons, 1755, 83.
[14] Ibid., 65.
[15] Ibid., 62.
[16] Ibid., 63.
[17] Ibid, 268, 269.
[18] Sermons, 1755, 275, 276.
[19] A. Bradford, Memoir of the Life and Writings of Rev. Jonathan Mayhew,
D.D., 36.
[20] Ibid., 464.
[21] Letter from his daughter, quoted by Bartol, The West Church and its
Ministers, 129.
[22] Sermons, 293
[23] C.A. Bartol, The West Church and its Ministers.
[24] Reply to Dr. Chandler, quoted in Sprague's Annals of the Unitarian
Pulpit, 9.
[25] Remarks upon a Sermon of the Bishop of Landaff, quoted by Sprague.
[26] Chauncy's many published sermons and volumes are carefully enumerated
by Paul Leicester Ford in his Bibliotheca Chaunciana, a List of the
Writings of Charles Chauncy. He gives the titles of sixty-one books
and pamphlets published by Chauncy, and of eighty-eight about him or
in reply to him.
[27] Sprague's Annals, 49; W.J. Potter, History of the First Congregational
Society, New Bedford.
[28] Sprague's Annals. 42.
[29] George Batchelor, Social Equilibrium, 263, 264.
[30] Ibid., 265.
[31] Sprague's Annals, 131.
[32] Father of the essayist of the same name.
[33] Joseph Priestley, 1733-1804, was one of the ablest of English
Unitarians. Educated in non-conformist schools, in 1755 he became a
Presbyterian minister. In 1761 he became a tutor in a non-conformist
academy, and in 1767 he was settled over a congregation in Leeds. He
was the librarian of Lord Shelburne from 1774 until he was settled in
Birmingham as minister, in 1780. In 1791 a mob destroyed his house,
his manuscripts, and his scientific apparatus, because of his liberal
political views. After three years as a preacher in Hackney, he
removed to the United States in 1794, and settled at Northumberland
in Pennsylvania, where the remainder of his life was spent. He
published one hundred and thirty distinct works, of which those best
remembered are his Institutes of Natural and Revealed Religion, A
History of the Corruptions of Christianity, and A General History of
the Christian Church to the Fall of the Western Empire. He was the
discoverer of oxygen, and holds a high place in the history of
science. He was a materialist, but believed in immortality; and he
believed that Christ was a man in his nature.
[34] C.S. Osgood and H.M. Batchelder, Historical Sketch of Salem, 86. "He
took strong Arminian grounds; and under his lead the church became
practically Unitarian in 1785, and was one of the first churches in
America to adopt that faith."
[35] George Batchelor, Social Equilibrium, 270.
[36] Ibid., 267.
[37] Ibid., 283.
[38] E. Smalley, The Worcester Pulpit, 226, 232.
[39] See the Unitarian Advocate and Religious Miscellany, January, 1831,
new series, III. 27, for Aaron Bancroft's recollections of this
period. In the same volume was published Ezra Ripley's reminiscences,
contained in the March, April, and May numbers. They are both of much
importance for the history of this period. Also the third volume of
first series, June, 1829, gives an important letter from Francis
Parkman concerning Unitarianism in Boston in 1812.
[40] Life of Ashbel Green, President of Princeton College, 236.
[41] Life of Archibald Alexander, 252.
[42] Convention Sermon, 12, 13.
[43] Sprague, Annals of Unitarian Pulpit, 131.
[44] Ibid., 159.
[45] This is the statement of his daughter.
[46] Theophilus Lindsey, 1723-1808, was a curate in London, then the tutor
of the Duke of Northumberland, and afterward a rector in Yorkshire
and Dorsetshire. In 1763 he was settled at Catterick, in Yorkshire,
where his study of the Bible led him to doubt the truth of the
doctrine of the Trinity. In 1771 he joined with others in a petition
to Parliament asking that clergymen might not be required to
subscribe to the thirty-nine articles. When it was rejected a second
time he resigned, went to London, and opened in a room in Essex
Street, April 1774, the first permanent Unitarian meeting in England.
A chapel was built for him in 1778, and he preached there until 1793.
He published, in 1783, An Historical View of the State of the
Unitarian Doctrine and Worship from the Reformation to our own Times,
two volumes of sermons, and other works. In 1774 he published a
revised Prayer Book according to the plan suggested by Dr. Samuel
Clarke, which was used in the Essex Street Chapel.
[47] Four Generations of a Literary Family: The Hazlitts in England,
Ireland, and America, 23, 26, 30, 40, 43, 50; Lamb and Hazlitt:
Further Letters and Records, 11-15.