USA > Connecticut > Contributions to the ecclesiastical history of Connecticut > Part 8
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With the same reverent regard to the authority of Christ's Word as law, the confessions of our faith were framed. When the Saybrook fathers came to their work in 1708, they found a time-honored symbol drawn from the Word of God by the Westminster divines, in 1643. Five years later, after careful examination and comparison with the Bible, it was adopted by the framers of the Cambridge Platform at Boston .- Still again in 1680, a synod in Boston placed this Confession on more thorough trial, according to the Law and the Testimony, and with slight, verbal alterations, made by the Independents at the
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Savoy, London, in 1658, it was again adopted as the teaching of scripture, and the faith of the churches.
After all these trial-processes, by the best minds and hearts, the most learned and self-denying of the age, the fathers at Saybrook once more bring it, sentence by sentence, to the Di- vine standard, and, upon this "diligent inquiry, solicitous search, and faithful prayer," commended it to the churches of Connecticut, as "well and fully grounded upon Holy Scrip- ture."
In its general type of doctrine, it was termed Calvinian, not that Calvin invented it, or gave it authority or efficacy. For it had been germinating in the church long before John Cal- vin's day, and by God's grace, made him what he was, one of the most lucid expounders and illustrious exemplifiers of its truth, by his life of laborious self-denial and love. It was also, in its main features, Lutheran and Augustinian, yet older than either of these distinguished men, whom it drew, the one from the dead body of forms and will-worship, and the other from the pride of the philosophies, evincing by these and similar sublime moral victories, that it is the power of God and the wisdom of God unto salvation to them that believe. In the present century, it has fought with Unitarianism in New Eng- land, and conquered :- with the vaunting hosts of German Rationalism and conquered; and on the same field, with the subtlest forms of spiritualistic Pantheism and conquered. And now it is abroad, in the name and by the power of the Lord, making conquests from Brahmanism, Buddhism and Moham- edanism, causing the wilderness of heathendom to bud and blossom as the rose.
The impugners of this Puritan theology have pronounced upon it as contracted, contradictory and adverse to the culture and advancement of the age. But these pronouncings are contradicted by every fair rendering of the facts of history. These show that the profoundest masters of wisdom and of reason-the most pains-taking and successful students in his- tory, philosophy and the Divine Word, have been the products of its power, and the producers of all the worthiest advance- ment and culture. In the judgment of Bancroft, our most philosophic historian, the Calvinian theology, instead of being
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narrow, illiberal, or irrational, "combines and perfects the sym- bolic wisdom of the Orient, and the reflective genius of Greece ; conforming to reason, yet enkindling enthusiasm, guaranteeing absolute freedom, yet invoking the inexorable re- straints of duty ; awakening the inner man to a consciousness of his destiny, and yet adapted with exact harmony to the outer world." Of President Edwards, the most profound, yet prac- tical New England representative of this theology, the same his- torian has more recently said, " All his teachings bear the marks of universality, and he looked to the establishment of his views as reasonable. The practical character of his system, in its adaptation to Christian life and action, is worthy of partic- ular observation. On the one hand it has ever asserted against the pride and pomp of human oppressors, the doctrines of divine sovereignty and election, thus giving individual freedom to society, under the* restraints of self-imposed divine law. On the other, looking to the mediation of Christ, as the manifested fulness of the Godhead, in union with the equally complete, the recovered and fully developed manhood for the world's highest weal, it places 'love as the central point of its view of creation, and the duty of the created.' "' This is the judg- ment of historical criticism upon the doctrinal system of our churches, rendered by the most dispassionate and impartial ex- aminers. It bears the marks of universality because of its de- rivation from the Word of the Universal Lord and Father of all ; because it has from the beginning, been in the bosom of the living, universal church, and has ever fully met the deepest spiritual needs of the universal fallen humanity.
The third grand principle of Congregationalism, completes its basis-Christ's spirit the life of the Church.
The former two find their complement in this, not in the Pan- theistic theory of an identity of substance and life in God and man, but of a fallen, dependent creature, dead in sin, yet cre- ated anew in Christ Jesus unto all holy obedience. The com- mencement of this new life in man is regeneration, and makes him like Christ ; and the fellowship of the regenerate consti- tutes, in its vital principle, the church. Without this, it fails, whatever may be its doctrines, polity or activities. And what- ever of these in the church, does not minister to this Christ-like
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life in its members is useless, and does not belong to it. And whatsoever obstructs its free and full on ward, conquering move- ment in the individual soul, or the church, is anti-Christ ; and however time-honored, corporate or organic, must be thrown off. In this view our Puritan fathers were most solidly grounded. As everything in the vegetable and animal kingdom holds a subservient relation to the vital principle, so they believed it was divinely arranged to be in the church. This spirit of Christ, which is the life of the church, is central, and works as in its Head, from the interior outward. The law and order which Christ has established, are its normal forms, and the con- ditions of its freest and most salutary activities. Little by little it works the soul free from its prejudices, errors and sins, and brings it into the completed likeness of Christ. It incorporates into the church whatsoever of human susceptibilities, senti- ments or culture is homogeneous, and beats back and destroys whatsoever in humanity is antagonistic, which it does not trans- form into an ally.
Hence from this central and vital principle of our polity, Congregationalism is charitable and catholic as well as discrim- inating. It believes in " the Holy Catholic Church," and em- braces in it all who, by faith and obedience, embrace Christ as the head. It opens its communion to all who are in commun- ion with Him, while it makes compromises with none in their errors, or in the evil of their life. Hence, too, the Congrega- tional idea of unity lies deeper, and is more vital than that of uniformity. The true apostolic succession is in the doc- trine, life and labors of the apostles, with apostolic results. It is a " unity of the spirit, " with "diversities of gifts," like the law of the vegetable world, which holds all the divers plants and trees, buds and blossoms, fragrance, fruits and beauty- all by the central, organific unity of life, as living subjects of the same vast kingdom.
" All that believe," said Cromwell to the Long Parliament, " have the real unity, which is the most glorious because in- ward and spiritual, in the Body, and to the Head."
Our fathers loved their church-order, because it was so sim- ple, so scriptural, and tended to what is superior to any mere polity-to the truth of doctrine, purity of morals and the life
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of Christian love. And the history of New England from the time the Mayflower moored at Plymouth, amply justifies their preference. Where are churches marked by a more patient and prayerful study of the Scriptures, or a more profound, yet rational reverence for their sovereign wisdom and authority, as a rule of faith and life ? Where those distinguished by a purer and more salutary doctrine, or the application of more deep, practical, heaven-guided thought to the great problems of man's being, duties and destiny? Where, since the age of the apostles, has faith wrought out more amply and legitimately the works of godlike charity to the poor at home, and the hea- then abroad, than has this faith of Eliot and Mayhew, of Ed- wards and Brainard, of our Harriet Newells and Mrs. Judson's ? Where has been nurtured a purer social ethics, that has made the family more a seminary of all that is pure and lovely and of good report, and raised around the marriage covenant, the sacred center of the family, its heaven-high walls of defense ? Where are found such systems of instruction for all classes, such philanthropic and charitable institutions for the poor, the deaf, the dumb, and the blind ;- such Christ-like exertions for mitigating the miseries of this life, and inspiring hope for the life to come, as have sprung up here in New England, where the doctrines and polity of our fathers, for nearly two centuries and a half, have had their existence and action ? In what place or period, in, or out of New England, has the reverse of this been most realized in history,-or the picture been most marred or darkened by the vices of men and their demoralizing doc- trines ? Just where this Bible faith and ethics have been most resisted and impugned.
Thus, by an appeal to that trial-word of Christ the Lord, " By their fruits ye shall know them," the faith of our fathers stands historically verified as genuine, and their doctrine as substantial truth. They are verified by the constant endeavors after moral perfection, by the transparent sincerity and self-de- nial which they have produced, and by a free obedience to ev- ery word of the Supreme from the life-forces of truth and love which they have occasioned.
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THE CATHOLICITY OF CONGREGATIONALISM.
BY REV. THEODORE WOOLSEY, D. D., PRESIDENT OF YALE COLLEGE.
The subject of President Woolsey's address was the Catho- licity of the Congregational Body. Having attempted after many months to revive his recollections of his address, the speaker was able by the aid of very brief notes to give the fol- lowing outline :
Holding in his hand an ancient copy of the Saybrook Plat- form, which had come down from President Stiles, as an heir- loom of the Presidents of Yale College, he read from the heads of agreement, assented to at the time when the Saybrook Plat- form was arranged, that the ministers of Connecticut, as others had done before them, received the doctrinal Articles of the Church of England, the Confession or Catechisms, shorter or larger, of the Westminster Assembly, and the Savoy Confes- sion to be agreeable to the word of God. This readiness to re- ceive various expositions of their faith as equivalents, and the habit of accepting them for substance of doctrine, shows the independence of Congregationalists upon any human standards. Connected with this independence is their catholicity.
But what is catholicity ? The speaker, while confessing that perhaps his conception of it was not quite as definite as it ought to be, defined it :
1. To be a preponderance of belief, and of interest in the Church Universal, while the particular church or form or polity takes the background in the mind.
2. It consists in an overlooking of things wherein Christians differ, and a disposition to unite in common fundamental doc- trines.
3. It is manifested by a readiness to cooperate with other Christians in movements of religion and benevolence. Those who lack the catholic spirit separate themselves from general efforts, and feel that their field lies in promoting the interests
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of a particular church or denomination; they suspect true Christian union ; they suspect the theories of other Christian bodies as being heretical or unchristian ; in short the reasons for separate action accumulate before their minds, while those for joint action become faint and few, until they can scarcely contemplate religion in its brightness, but only as it is colored by the goggles of their own sect.
It was then asked whether Congregationalism has a catholic tendency. That it has such a tendency was argued from sev- eral facts. First, we see willingness to cooperate, without thinking of sectarian advantage. Instances of this were drawn from the old agreement, or plan of union between the Gen- eral Association of Connecticut and the General Assembly, and from the cooperation in the American Home Missionary Society, in which, to say the least, the churches of New Eng- land never asked, and never would have asked, but for move- ments begun by others, whether they were not doing more than their share.
Another proof was derived from great liberality in doctrine. The Congregationalists have always put faith before forms, and have thought lightly of forms : they might, notwithstanding, have been narrow in doctrine, had not the free spirit of the in- dividual and of the single independent church promoted free- dom of thought among them, and given rise to smaller differ- ences of opinion amid agreement in fundamentals. The ac- tive spirit of theological inquiry, which has been prevalent in New England, shows that the churches exercise no repressing influence on religious speculation ; and the alarms which are continually `given out, that they are breaking away from the moorings of the gospel, show that churches nearly akin to them in theology, but unlike them in constitution, cannot understand or receive such freedom.
Still another illustration of the catholic spirit was drawn from the ease and freedom with which Congregationalists pass over into another denomination. The Church Universal is the highest idea at home, and when they find the essential el- ements of that idea realized elsewhere in their emigrations, their chief religious want in regard to a church is satisfied.
But how, it was asked, does Congregationalism promote the
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catholic spirit? Two ways were mentioned. First by the simplicity of its worship and organization. It may be lia- ble to the reproach of being naked and disjointed, of being bare bones without flesh, and of being a collection of atoms forming no whole. Whether this reproach be just or not, this is cer- tain : that no great organized body comes between the partic- ular church and the holy Church Universal, to catch and detain the affections as they rise up toward the lofty idea of a Chris- tian community, or to produce party spirit, and sectarian zeal, and mingle a certain selfish interest in efforts for the noblest of causes.
Again, the power of the laity in the Congregational churches favors a catholic spirit. Whether the just balance of power is attained in their system or not may be questioned ; but this seems to be sure, that where the clergy have the chief or sole power, a large catholic feeling becomes nearly impossible; that an order of ecclesiastics, placed above, depresses a laity placed below, and by this depression, if it would support its power by argument, must make the church narrow and exclusive. The laity, enjoying power, will not be apt to use that power fur- ther than for the purpose of promoting their own freedom, for they are not officers ; but the officers, having acquired power, will use it to control the private members of the church, and must maintain themselves by a theory opposed to the doctrine of parity in the body of the faithful.
THE FIRST CHURCH IN CONNECTICUT.
BY REV. JOEL HAWES, D. D. OF HARTFORD.
MR. MODERATOR :
I am sure that my brethren in the ministry know well how perplexing it is to a speaker to have several subjects before his mind at the same time, and not know which one to select as the theme of his address. I find myself in just such perplexity at this time. When requested a few weeks since to say some- thing on the present occasion, my thoughts fixed upon a sub- ject which seemed appropriate, and which, having much occu- pied my mind of late, I intended to make the topic of present remark. " It is the means of improving and extending our Congregationalism." But since I came here I have doubted whether I could do any thing like justice to the subject in the few minutes allowed me. And besides, being, as you know, naturally of a rather timid make, I feared that if I should give full utterance to my sentiments on the subject in question, I might disturb the feelings of some of my too independent brethren, and so I thought it best to pass it by. I then pro- posed to be silent. But as I could not willingly be excused, I shall confine myself to a few remarks on the first church estab- lished in Connecticut. I feel a delicacy in speaking on that subject in this presence, as it comes too nearly in contact with myself. But I wish to forget, and to have my hearers forget, for the time, that I have any connection with the church of which I am to speak, and to say what I have to say simply as a matter of history.
The first church established in this State removed from Newtown, now Cambridge, Mass., to its present locality in Hartford, in the early part of June, 1636,-just two hundred and twenty-three years ago this month .* Its founders were,
* As it was claimed by one of the speakers at the late meeting at Norwich that, not
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as Cotton Mather calls them, a "choice collection of men" from Braintree and its vicinity in Essex county, England. A portion of them came to this country in 1632, and settled at Newtown. There, on the 11th of October the next year, having been joined by several others who came over the pre- ceding month with Messrs. Hooker and Stone, whose ministry they had enjoyed in England, they were organized into a church, and the two distinguished men just named were or- dained its pastor and teacher. It was the eighth church estab- lished in New England, and the first in Connecticut. It came through the wilderness with its pastor and teacher, and about one hundred souls ; and after a wearisome journey of fourteen days over hills and valleys, and rivers and swamps, the compa- ny of pilgrims arrived on the banks of the " beautiful Connec- ticut," and set up the standard of the cross on the spot where the church now has its home, and where it has, from the first, maintained uninterruptedly the worship of God and the ordi-
the church in Hartford, but the church in Windsor was the first established in Con- necticut, it seems proper briefly to state the facts in the case.
The church in Windsor was organized in Plymouth, England, January, 1630, and Messrs. Warham and Maverick were constituted its pastors. It removed to this coun- try the summer following and commenced a settlement in Dorchester. The church in Wethersfield was organized in February, the same year, at Watertown, and Rev. Mr. Phillips became its pastor.
The church in Hartford was organized Oct. 1633, at Newtown-now Cambridge, and Messrs. Hooker and Stone were ordained its pastor and teacher.
The question in regard to removing to Connecticut began to be agitated in each of these churches about the same time. Some of the members visited Connecticut as early as 1632 or 1633. A small company established themselves at Wethersfield in 1634, and made, it is believed, the first settlement on the river.
During the summer of 1635 several of the people of Dorchester congregation re- moved to a point on the river near the Plymouth trading house, and prepared to lay the foundations of the town of Windsor. In the autumn of this year a company of sixty persons, among whom were many women and children, set out on their tedious march for this new country. Most of these settled in Hartford. As yet no church existed in the State. There were individual Christians but no organized church.
In June, 1636, as stated in the text, the church at Newtown removed with its pastor and teacher, and settled in Hartford. This then was the first church estab- lished in the State. There were settlers at Windsor as there were also at Wethers- field, but no church, no minister, no preaching, nor ordinances. Rev. Mr. Phillips never removed with his people to Wethersfield. Rev. Mr Maverick, pastor of the Windsor church, died in 1636, and Rev. Mr. Warham his colleague, did not remove to Windsor till the September following.
The question whether the church in Hartford or the church in Windsor was the first established in the State, is in itself of very little importance. But one does not like to be put in the wrong when he knows he is in the right.
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nances of the gospel. It has had ten pastors-I am the tenth, and nine of them lie buried with the people to whom they preached. . It has never dismissed a minister-a fact which speaks well for the church and also for the ministers who have served them in the Lord ; and I account it a far higher honor to be found in this succession of faithful servants of God, than I should, to be numbered in what is proudly claimed, in certain quarters, as the Apostolical succession. The church, establish- ed at the first on sound, evangelical doctrine, has maintained essentially the same doctrine through every successive genera- tion of its membership. Slight deviations there may have been, but never such as to shake or mar the fundamentals of faith, its first faith. Always Calvinistic, always holding the great essentials of New England orthodoxy, it has never swung from the foundation on which it was built by Hooker and Stone, nor been carried about or disturbed by any of the many winds of doctrine that have swept over the land ; and it deserves to be mentioned as an interesting historic fact, that just the periods when evangelical doctrine was held in highest esteem in the church, and preached most plainly from the pul- pit, have been the periods of the church's greatest spiritual prosperity and growth. Hooker and Stone were marked men in their day, especially the former. He has been called " the light of the New England churches, and the oracle of the Col- ony of Connecticut ;" and his influence, there can be no doubt, did more than that of any other man to give form and order to the churches of this State. He was the father of the sys- tem of consociation. It was a favorite and oft repeated re- mark of his-" We must have the consociation of the churches, or we are ruined ;" and the good working of the system for a hundred and fifty years shows that he did not attach too much importance to it. It has exerted a most happy and efficient influence in preserving the faith and order of our churches, and it has secured to them a measure of peace and prosperity, un- surpassed by any other equal number of churches in the land. The first church in Hartford is a consociated church, and such, I trust, it will ever remain, as sure I am that it will, so long as it conducts orderly and well, but should it shake off this charac- ter and become unsettled in faith, or impatient of rule and or-
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der, it will be quite likely to break off from consociation and unite with others to pull down the system as a useless and hurtful incumbrance to the churches. And this, I am sorry to believe, is one of the unhappy tendencies of our times. There is, I fear, a growing disposition among many to break down the order of the churches established by our fathers and fall back into loose independency. That the effect of this will be to weaken our churches and gradually to open the way for the coming in of error and misrule, I have the deepest conviction ; and with this conviction, I cannot forbear to repeat, for the ad- monition of all whom it may concern, the language of two of the venerable fathers of New England, uttered by them just before they ascended to their reward in heaven. " We do earnestly testify that if any who are given to change, do rise up to unhinge the well established churches in this land, it will be the duty and the interest of the churches to examine whether the men of this trespass are more prayerful, more watchful, more zealous, more heavenly, more universally con- scientious, and more willing to be informed and advised, than those great and good men who left unto the churches what they now enjoy ; if they be not so, it will be wisdom for the children to forbear pulling down with their own hands the houses of God which were built by their wiser fathers, till they have better satisfaction." You see how the subject on which I first intended to speak will intrude itself into my mind. I wished to show that it is no time to weaken or to cut asunder the few bands that bind the several parts of our Congregational- ism together. They need rather to be strengthened and drawn closer together so that there may be more compactness and organic unity in our denomination both in this State and throughout the land. We want, our whole denomination wants, a common platform of faith and order, a declaration, or manifestation of doctrine and polity, which shall operate as a band of union to our entire body, and serve both to bind us together in unity of faith and action, and to declare to all who may wish to know, distinctly, and fully, who and what we are ; what we believe ; and what we do in the order and gov- ernment of our churches ; a fact which cannot now be learnt from any general document of acknowledged authority.
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