USA > Connecticut > A complete history of Connecticut, civil and ecclesiastical, from the emigration of its first planters, from England, in the year 1630, to the year 1764; and to the close of the Indian wars > Part 53
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The writers on this side of the question, who began the controversy, insisted, That the consociation could not have jurisdiction of the affairs of any particular church, without her consent : That the church itself had the sole right of determining whether the difficulties arising in them, were of such a nature as could not be issued without much disquiet or not ; and that they must desire the as- sistance of the consociation, or, at least, consent to their hearing and judging in the case, or they could claim no ju- risdiction with respect to it. They insisted, that to con- strue the seventh article of discipline in such a sense, as to allow an aggrieved minister, or aggrieved members of a church, to apply to the consociation, was contradictory to the first article, which secured to the elder or elders of a particular church, with the consent of the brethren of the same, a right to exercise discipline, according to the rules of God's word, in relation to all scandals which should fall out within the same. They pretended, that this article was explained by the subsequent, or eighth article, which did not allow an offending brother to call the consociation, un- less the church gave her consent, until after she had pro-
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Book II. ceeded to his excommunication. They would allow of no
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difference, in this case, between an aggrieved minister or 1759. brother, and an offending brother .* Says Mr. Hart, "In Mr. Hart's every view of this article then, (that is the VIIth,) it is far reasoning from justifying the members of Wallingford church, in ap- on the sub- plying to the consociation, as they did, with their com- plaints, or the consociation in pretending to take cogni- zance of them, without the churches consent. The cases they judged of, were not of that kind of difficulties intend- ed in the article ; but if they had been such, in that case, the complainants could have had no right to apply to the consociation, for judgment upon them, without the consent of the church." He asserted, " That the church and so- ciety had determined Mr. Dana's qualifications for the pas- toral office in that church, and that the case was issued in the church before the complainants applied to the conso- ciation ; and this determination (he says) by our civil and ecclesiastical law must be decisive, and govern the dissent- ing members, unless they could shew an error in the churches judgment, and that they have chosen a man for their pastor, disqualified, according to the word of God, and our ecclesiastical constitution, for that office. As they thought so, and had objections of heretical doctrines against him, their appeal from the churches judgment, by our constitution, and according to the universal practice of these churches, was, not to the consociation, but to the council chosen by the church, to manage the affair of the ordination ; and whose judgment of the candidate's fitness for his office, is decisive and final.t And the bringing such difficulties to this council, is the only probable method of issuing them without great disquiet to the churches in which they arise. And if the consociation, instead of in- termeddling with that which did not belong to them, had dismissed the complainants, with directions to carry their complaints against Mr. Dana to the ordination council, as the only proper judges of them, I believe that church and society would have been in peace. But for the consocia- tion, in such a case, to receive the complaints of a few dis- satisfied members against the churches pastor elect, and force themselves upon the church and candidate, as judges of the case, in contempt of the churches right, in electing both her pastor and the council that are to be the final judges of his qualifications for his office, and in contempt of the ordination council then sitting ; and for them to pre- tend to bar the ordination till their claim of authority to
* See Mr. Todd's narrative, and Mr. Hart's vindication of the ordina- tion at Wallingford, p. 14,15, 16. tp. 17, 18.
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take cognizance of the case is acknowledged ; this is the Book II. most unlikely method in the world to prevent great disqui- ets in the church, in issuing such difficulties among them. 1759. The art of man, I believe, cannot devise a more probable, a more effectual way to throw a church into the greatest confusion and incurable contentions. But the VIIth arti- cle recommends the carrying of difficult cases to the conso- ciation, by way of prevention of the disquiets that are like- ly to arise from other methods of issuing them. This kind of difficulties, therefore, cannot possibly be comprehended in this article. The framers of it cannot be imagined to have been such dunces as to have recommended this to the churches as a likely method of issuing such difficulties, without great disquiet to the churches in which they arise, namely, that any member of a vacant church, who is ag- grieved with the choice the society and church have made of a person for their pastor, shall have a right, without the consent, and contrary to the mind of the church, to call in the consociation to sit in judgment on the candidate, in re- lation to any complaints of scandal or heresy he is pleas- ed to bring against him ; and this too after the church has nominated their ordination council. Doubtless, it never came into their thoughts, that any of their successors would understand this article in this sense.
" I fear, sir, you will think I have been to long on this article : but the present disputes about its sense, and the great stress which is laid upon it, in the justification of the consociation's claim of jurisdiction in the Wallingford cas- es, rendered it necessary to examine it critically."* He observes further, "that by our ecclesiastical constitution, our consociations have right of jurisdiction only of such ecclesiastical or spiritual causes as are of a criminal na- ture ; only in cases of heresy or scandal : that they have no stated times of sitting : that they have no power of con- vening themselves, undesired by those who, by our consti- tution, have a right to call them into business, nor of tak- ing any case whatever under their cognizance, ex officio, but such only as are brought before them by proper per- sons, authorised by the constitution, or our ecclesiastical law, for that purpose."t He declares that the present contest between the united consociation and the church at Wallingford is the most important controversy that ever was managed in these churches. ""Tis a strife of power in the hands of the consociation, destructive of the most important rights of particular churches."# He insinuates that the council acted under the influence of a party zeal
* Page 13. + Page 20. Page 43,
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Book II. for orthodoxy, and animated by a love of dictating, and lust of preeminence and power .* He represents the judg- 1759. ment of the council, not only as unconstitutional, but high- ly ridiculous ; and he declares, that the reason of his un- dertaking in this controversy was, that " the rights and liberties of all our consociated churches were at stake : and that it was clearly the duty of their ministers to under- take their defence, when they were invaded by any of their own order, or when our associations or consociations go into measures, under pretence of constitutional power and authority, directly tending to destroy the balance be- tween power and liberty, to turn consociational power into tyranny, and introduce slavery into the place of liberty."t Thus wrote Mr. Hart.
This was the cry, that the liberty of the churches was in danger ; that the consociation at Wallingford were ty- rants, influenced by a lust for power, and some of the worst motives, and had put a new and unreasonable con- struction upon the Saybrook agreement. Every method was taken to alarm and prejudice the churches, and throw odium upon the united council. They were conscious of none of those imputations put upon them. They consid- ered the construction put upon the constitution as per- fectly absurd, inconsistent with the law of the colony ap- pointing the meeting of the elders and messengers at Say- brook, the object of which appointment, as expressed by the act, appears to have been to amend the defects which the legislature had been made sensible of, both from their own observation, and by the complaints of others, by a more explicit asserting of the rules given for that end in the holy scriptures :{ and with the express articles and main design of the constitution, which was to fix the limits of neighboring elders and churches, to bring them into a more intimate union with one another, and provide them fixed judges, and more explicit rules of judging according to the scriptures. Agreeably to this general design, the council knew that the IIId article of discipline provided that all cases of scandal which should fall out within the circuit of the aforesaid consociations, should be brought to a council of the elders, and also messengers of the church- es within the said circuit, i. e. the churches of one conso- ciation : That the VIIth article made express provision, that an aggrieved minister or member, should apply to the council of the consociated churches of the circuit, to which the said church belongs : and that the subsequent, or VIIIth article, was so far from explaining it away, that it corrobo- # Page 37, t Page 45, # See the law in vol. i. of this Hist. chap. xix.
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rated it, by saying, there is not the same liberty to an of- Book II. fending brother, which is doubtless here opposed to the aggrieved brother, and distinguishes one from the other. 1759. They could not conceive that an aggrieved pastor or broth- er could be considered as one and the same, with an offend- ing one ; and that they should have no redress in any case, but be left wholly in the power of the church, to abuse, and tyrannize over them, let their prejudices, passions, and in- justice be ever so great. This would be to put them in a far worse sltuation than civilians are in matters of far less moment. If they are injured by error in judgment, or by illegal prosecutions, they have redress by appeals or peti- tions. To suppose that the constitution made no provis- ion for the aggrieved, who might be greatly injured and op- pressed, would be to view it as making no provision against one of the great defects which it was designed to remedy. The united council considered the construction put upon the constitution by the ordaining council, and Mr. Hart, as one wholly unfounded, and calculated merely to serve a turn.
With respect to an ordination council, or any other ec- clesiastical council, distinct from the consociation, it was considered as having no warrant by the constitution, and a mere creature of the imagination. There was not so much as an intimation of it in the constitution. They imagined that it was so far from this, that it fully excluded all other councils with respect to any thing ecclesiastical. The second article is in these words : " that the churches which are neighboring to each other, shall consociate for mutual- ly affording to each other such assistance as may be requi- site, upon all occasions ecclesiastical." This, they were persuaded, included ordination, as one of the most impor- tant ecclesiastical occasions. They had proceeded slow- ly, with the utmost deliberation ; they had employed all their wisdom, and all proper means, in their opinion, to preserve the church and society from a division : they us- ed their influence with the minor party to bring them to submit the whole affair, and unite with their brethren, in the settlement and support of Mr. Dana, upon this single condition, that he should prove himself orthodox upon his examination ; and they used all their influence with the ordination council, to persuade Mr. Dana to concede to the proposal ; but they would not advise him to do it, nor would he comply with it, nor suffer himself to be question- ed by them. The council, therefore, considered them- selves as greatly injured and abused. As the ordination council had told their own story, and, with Mr. Hart, had
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Book II. sounded the alarm, and grieviously reproached them, it was judged expedient to take up the pen, and vindicate 1759. their doings before the public tribunal.
The Rev. Mr. Eells, who had been one of the scribes of the united council, wrote a narrative of the transactions of the council, supplying such facts and circumstances as Mr. Todd omitted, noticing some of those things in his narrative which he judged severe, uncharitable, and calcu- lated to render his brethren of the council odious and con- temptible. He also made such general remarks as he sup- posed were necessary for the vindication of the council.
Mr. Ho- The Rev. Mr. Hobart, of Fairfield, replied in particular bart evinc- to Mr. Hart, in vindication of the council at Wallingford, showing that they had assumed no powers inconsistent with the rights of congregational churches at large, and conse- quently could not be inconsistent with the ecclesiastical constitution of the colony, and no more than it was the original design of the Saybrook agreement to give them.
He shows that, "all congregational churches have al- lowed ecclesiastical councils to be an ordinance of Christ, and to derive their authority from Him :" that they allow a decisive power to them ; and he insists, that it would be strangely inconsistent to assert, that councils are a divine institution, and yet to deny them the right of deciding those controversies which were regularly brought before them ; or to suppose the parties interested in such decisions, at liberty to regard, or disregard them, as they please.
He clearly evinces, by quotations from the best authors, " that congregational churches, though not united in con- sociations, have a right to enquire into the conduct of a particular church, upon the complaint of any of its mem- bers, or even upon common fame, and to proceed to a sen- tence of non-communion, in case the church refuses to give an account of its conduct, or obstinately persists in its er- rors and disorders." He quotes from the apology of the congregational ministers in England, in 1644, this declara- tion : " We agree that in all cases of offence, the offending church is to submit to an examination, by other neighboring churches, and on their persisting in their error, or miscar- riage, they are to renounce all christian communion with them, till they repent. It is a maxim to be abhorred, that a single society of men, pretending to be endowed with a power from Christ, to judge them of the same body, should arrogate to themselves, an exemption from giving an ac- count, or being censurable of any other."* He shows, that with these sentiments of the congregational divines in Eng-
* Pages 4, 5, 6, 7.
es the rights of congrega- tional churches.
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land, our forefathers in this country fully agreed. He Book II. quotes Dr. C. Mather, in his account of the discipline of the New-England churches, in which he allows that a person 1759. censured by a particular church, may call a council, which, finding him greatly injured, may, if no other measure will answer, by a solemn act, withdraw communion from that church, or from as many in it as will go on to abet and maintain the unjust sentence which has been passed in it. And he maintains, that "it is one of the principles of these churches, that the neighbouring churches, upon the motion of their pastors, may, without any call from the church, (or from any in the church,) where gross mischiefs do notori- ously happen, upon the justly believed report of those mis- chiefs, meet in council, to take course about them."
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He proceeds further, to prove, that the ordination and settlement of a minister, is one of those cases which are al- lowed to require an ecclesiastical council ; and in which, by congregational principles, a particular church ought not to proceed without the approbation, or concurrence of others. He quotes Dr. Increase Mather, whose words are, " In momentous matters of common concern, particular churches should proceed with the concurrence of neigh- bouring churches. So, in the ordination of a pastor, much more in the deposing of one. Thus it has ever been in the churches of New-England." He also quotes the resolution of the synod of Boston, in 1662, which includes, in the cases in which churches ought to seek and accept help from, and give help to one another, " matters of more than ordinary importance, as ordination, translation, and depo- sition of elders."
Shows the
Having shown what were the rights of congregational alteration churches at large, while they were unconsociated, he pro- made by cceded to show what alteration was made, either in the consocia- churches constitution, or rights of ecclesiastical councils, by congre- ting. gational churches uniting in consociations, or how these things stand in the churches of Connecticut, since the Say- brook agreement.
Here he observes, that the ecclesiastical councils in Connecticut have, undoubtedly, as large and extensive rights and authority, at least, as those which were not thus limited : that in all the debates relative to the consociation of churches, there had never been the least intimation of lessening the rights and authority of councils, by their consociating : that it must, therefore, be granted, that the councils in Connecticut, were an ordinance of Christ, vest- ed with all the rights of congregational churches at large, to hear complaints of irregularities and disorders in par-
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Book II. ticular churches : that they are judges of the morals and qualifications of all probationers for the ministry ; and no 1759. minister may be settled in, or removed from a particular church, without their approbation, or concurrence ; and that they had a decisive authority, or a right to enforce their determinations by ecclesiastical censures, at least by a censure of non-communion, or withdrawing from such as walk disorderly. He then evinces, that if the councils consisting of consociated churches, be only councils of which the Saybrook agreement allows, that they must have the right of exercising this whole authority.
That the consociated churches are limited in calling councils to those churches with which they are united in consociation, and that these are the only councils accord- ing to the Saybrook agreement, he endeavours substantial- ly to prove, as he conceived that on this the whole contro- versy turned. For this purpose he states, that the great alteration made by the churches entering into consociation, is this : The churches consociated are confined, with re- spect to their councils, to the pastors and churches of their own particular consociation, while other churches pick and Advantage choose their councils from all parts of the country. "And of conso- ciated churches. the great and invaluable advantage of consociated coun- cils, is, that they have certain known judges to decide their disputes, vested with authority to carry their judgments into execution ; and, consequently, have a certain way to have their controversies issued, and the greatest security of having it done in an impartial, just, and equitable man- ner : while such as are not consociated, must unavoidably be liable, either to have their disputes endless, or to have them decided in such a way, as prodigiously exposes them to partial and unrighteous judgments."
That the councils of congregational churches in Con- necticut, are limited to their several districts, he argues from " the nature of that union of churches, which we call a consociation."
'They are limited to their own districts, ture of their union. " Congregational churches, when they enter into conso- ciation, agree to come into a more strict and intimate union with each other than they were before, or than other church- by the na- es stand in to each other. They agree to this, to derive some advantages from it. And in consideration of those advantages, they consent to give up all those liberties which are inconsistent with this union. It is, doubtless, consistent with union for a particular church to manage its own affairs, (which do not affect the other churches united with it,) by itself, or without consulting them; but in af- fairs of a public nature and of general concern, such as
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require the counsel, assistance, or approbation of other Book II. churches, the other parts of the united body, called a con- sociation, have a right to be consulted ; and, in some cases, 1758. to interfere, though they are not invited nor desired. And for a particular church, in such cases, obstinately to refuse to submit to the judgment of the whole, is a breach of the agreement, and exposes it to be cast out of the union, or to have the sentence of non-communion declared against it.
The choice and settlement of a minister, is a matter of a public nature, and of general concern ; every church be- longing to the same consociation has an interest, and a very important one, in it ; and that not only as, on account of their situation, they and their children, will be likely to be affected by the good or bad principles and practices of a neighboring minister, which is the grand reason why, in churches not consociated, neighboring ministers and churches are judged the proper ones to assist at ordina- tions ; but upon a much more important account, and such an one as arises from the consociation of churches. The pastor of one consociated church stands in a very near re- lation to every other church in the same consociation : for he is as such a member of the association, and has a right. to sit in all the councils of the consociated churches of that district. Now Mr. Hart allows that the associations are made, in some sort, guardians and inspectors of vacant churches ; and though he contends that particular church- es may send where they please for ordination councils, yet he admits that, in other affairs that require a council, they are limited to the consociation, whose determination is de- cisive and final. Now let us see whether, on Mr. Hart's own principles, a particular churches' settling a minister against the declared judgment of the other churches united with them in consociation, be not inconsistent with this union.
"Every church in the consociation is liable to become vacant, and, consequently, to have this minister for one of its guardians and inspectors ; it is liable to have such dis- putes and contentions arise in it as require the judgment of an ecclesiastical council, consequently, to have this min- ister for one of the judges, and perhaps the very man on whose vote in council a final and decisive judgment in its most important concerns may depend. Now, is it agreea- ble to such an union, or even consistent with the common rights of mankind, for a consociation, consisting of perhaps twenty churches, to have a guardian, an inspector, a judge, over them all, appointed by one of them, not only with-
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Book II. out the approbation, but against the declared judgment. and public protestation of the other nineteen. Every 1759. man of common sense must own that this is unreasona- ble, and even absurd ; and yet, there is no avoiding it, but by allowing that consociated churches, in calling councils, and particularly ordination councils, are limited to the churches united with them in consociation ; and it is ev- idently inconsistent with the very nature of the union to do otherwise.
" The same thing may be argued from the end and de- sigu of churches thus uniting. It is some inconvenience in the constitution of any civil or religious society that puts them on making alterations in it. Congregational church- es, not formed into consociations, found this defect in their constitution, that, in the choice of councils at large, there was room for great partiality. The contending parties, in a divided clurch, must either unite in what they call a mu- tual council, that is, one in which each party nominates an equal number of ministers and churches ; in which case, it was sometimes found that the council, when met, would be equally divided, and so could come to no determination in the case ; or else each party must send for a distinct coun- cil, of their own picking and choosing ; which councils fre- quently gave contrary judgments ; which rendered contro- versies endless, introduced confusion, and turned the church of Christ into a mere Babel. As no other remedy for this evil could be contrived, proposals were made for the consociation of churches. There neither is, nor can be, an effectual security against these evils, in any other way, than by limiting churches to the consociation which they belong to, in calling councils. Accordingly, our wise predecessors, in the synod of Saybrook, agreed to come into consociation, without having any exempt cases. And after all Mr. Hart has said, I believe men, in general, will think it most reasonable to interpret a law in such a sense that it may answer its end, and prove a remedy for the mischief it was designed to remove."
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