USA > Connecticut > Litchfield County > Cornwall > Historical records of the town of Cornwall, Litchfield County, Connecticut; > Part 6
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A majority of the town were unwilling to support their religious instructor, believing that they and their children could receive no religious benefit from his ministry; and the church, on the other
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hand, determined not to separate from their pastor ; and in this determination they were supported by the ministers and sister churches of the vicinity.
Had the pastor been in a regular manner impeached for immo- ralities, there would have been, no doubt, a very different state of things-but it was not so. Unchristian conduct was indeed charged on Mr. Gold by his accusers, but was not proved before the council. A minister of both Sharon and of Kent had been deposed for immorality.
Had the Cornwall minister been accused of conduct injurious to his reputation as a christian minister, so as to destroy his public character, there would have been no just reasons in his refusing to be dismissed.
Apprehending that they could obtain no redress by councils and from the sister churches, and feeling themselves exceedingly aggrieved, while, as they thought, equity was on their side, and the law of the state supported the pastor and the majority of the church, the major part of the town was exasperated greatly. There were, in this majority, very many of worthy christian char- acter, as well as quite respectable in community at large.
They were resolved that Mr. Gold should not have his salary, and that by a public town vote, so that Mr. Gold was obliged to commence a suit at law. A compromise, however, was effected. This majority claimed the right of holding the house of worship, and with force attempted to shut out Mr. Gold from the pulpit on a Thanksgiving day. Those who did this were prosecuted by the state's attorney, and by a court of law fined to a considerable sum. Having no other legal remedy to redress their wrongs, which they regarded as great, the majority of the town, in the year 1780, twenty-five years after Mr. Gold's ordination, formally, and as the law of the State allowed, separated from the society to which they had been united, and styled themselves, "Strict Congregation- alists." Those of them who had belonged to the church of Mr. Gold, formed themselves a new church with the name that the new society had assumed. The articles of faith by them adopted were entirely evangelical and conformable to the Calvinistic creed of Connecticut Congregationalists. By this act they were entirely separated from all connection with the Saybrook platform of church discipline and of consociations.
The old church connected with Mr. Gold regarded this separa- tion as censurable conduct ; but they did not undertake to deal
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with their separating brethren in way of discipline. That there was real piety in both of these churches, is unquestionable, and that an unchristian spirit, manifested in various ways, was charge- able on them both, is also evident. Which of them was the most aggressive to each other and the most guilty, is not to be decided by us, but is left to an impartial judge. Peace to the memory of those imperfect men. Paul and Barnabas separated from each other, having had " a sharp contention,"-but they are now united in the most glorious and happy union.
As a large proportion of these dissenters resided in the northern section of the town, this society has been denominated the north society.
In the course of a few months, the north society engaged the Rev. Mr. Bird to be their preacher, and who for a few years had been the pastor of a church in New Haven. He was a very respectable minister, of piety and fair talents. How long he con- tinued their preacher is now unknown. Afterward the Rev. John . Cornwall was their stated minister, officiating as a pastor for seve- ral years, though he was not installed as such. He had not a liberal education, but possessed a vigorous mind; not much culti- vated in general knowledge, but was well versed in the holy scriptures, and was sound in the faith and of. devoted piety. He was of eccentric manners in the pulpit, and in his mode of exhibit- ing and illustrating divine truth, which singularity was not pleasing to a refined audience ; yet from his simplicity, fervency of feeling, and love to the cause of religion, he would command the attention of an audience much more than many well educated men.
The ministry of Mr. Cornwall was blessed to the religious bene- fit of several of his hearers, notwithstanding the unhappy contro- versey between the two contending parties. He resided in the house now occupied by Carrington Todd, and in which he gene- rally preached. In 1785, the north society, by subscription, erected a house for public worship; it was nearly on the site of the present school-house, on the north of the mansion built by George Wheaton, Esq. It was small and never completely finished, and was taken down in 1826, when the present commodious congrega- tional church was built. Although these societies were separated, and Mr. Gold and Mr. Cornwall officiated to their respective people, party spirit still remained, to the detriment of vital piety, and of the enjoyment of friendship and social intercourse. Each of the societies felt the evil of separation. Frequently the
8
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thought and desire of reunion was intimated, until it was at length attempted, but without success. It was requisite that both the ministers should be dismissed. Mr. Cornwall did resign his charge; and Mr. Gold offered to relinquish his salary and pastoral charge, so soon as the two societies and churches should unite in settling a sound, learned, and suitable minister.
Before Mr. Cornwall left the town, all past disagreement that had subsisted between him and Mr. Gold was most happily settled on Christian principles, as they cordially forgave each other. In the autumnal session of the Connecticut Legislature, 1787, both Mr. Gold and Mr. Cornwall were the representatives of this town, and in the ensuing spring Mr. Cornwall was again elected and sent to the Assembly. The confidence of the opposers of Mr. Gold was again so reposed in him that they respectfully invited him to preach in the new house of worship of the dissenters. As about that time, the people seriously, and with many then sincerely, con- templated the reunion of the two societies, the Rev. Medad Rogers, a very respectable minister well adapted to harmonize the town, . was engaged to preach for a year. Mr. Cornwall, after he left this town, was for a number of years a zealous and faithful preacher of evangelical truth to a church and society of Congregationalists in Amenia, in New York State, bordering on Connecticut, in Dutchess County. He died there in a good old age, May 12, 1812.
The efforts to unite the two societies proved abortive; Mr. Rogers, with all his prudence and wisdom, could not prevent jeal- ousies and suspicions, and therefore left the place. He went to New Fairfield, where for several years he was a very worthy pastor.
One cause preventing the proposed union in Cornwall was in respect to the payment of Mr. Rogers' preaching; one party charged the other with the neglect of paying its due proportion, which the accused entirely denied.
All the first agents and principal actors of the Cornwall contro- versy have for several years gone to the grave. Peace be to their memory. They had their imperfections-and their virtues too. Several of them, of both parties, were undoubtedly persons of real piety, notwithstanding their contentions on earth.
Several families of the southwestern part of the town were annexed to the religious society of Kent, by the act of the Legis- lature; the boundary of the Cornwall Society on the south was about half a mile below Gen. Swift's, taking a mile or more of this
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town into the parish of Kent. A few families were in the same manner added to the ecclesiastical society of Warren, and many more were united to the society of Milton, including the Great Hill and the College Farms. This curtailment of territory on the south of the town lessened the south society of Cornwall and enlarged the north; the new dissenters and unlocated society, which formed the majority of the inhabitants of Cornwall, readily assented to these alterations, while the people that adhered to the old pastor were not a little dissatisfied, and complained much of the doings of their northern townsmen. Thus the two parties were not easily harmonized.
In the spring of 1790 the house of God built in the days of Mr. Palmer was taken down, and rebuilt with considerable enlarge- ment, having a little steeple added to it, and was situated in the east part of Cornwall valley. It had no bell until 1825, when the steeple was rebuilt.
The south society had a committee appointed by the General Assembly to place the spot of the church of the south society. But the north people took no part in the matter, determining not to move any further south to favor any union of the societies.
Mr. Gold relinquished his salary and his pastoral charge in an agreement with his church and people, but was not formally dis- missed. He died on the 29th of May, 1790.
The Rev. Mr. Smith of Sharon, with whom he had ever been intimate as a ministerial brother, preached his funeral sermon. The following is inscribed on Mr. Gold's monument in the ceme- tery :
" In whom a sound knowledge of the Scripture, extensive charity to the poor, unshaken fortitude in adversity, were united with uncommon discerning of the human heart, and shone conspicuously thro. an active and useful life."
During the thirty-five years of Mr. Gold's ministry, religion de- cayed in the country, through the baleful influence of political and military conflicts. The effects of the great revival of a few years before were not gone indeed, but the spirit of fervent piety was dying away. The French war, at the commencement of Mr. Gold's ministry, that closed in 1759, was soon succeeded by the quarrel between Britain and her American colonies that prepared the way for the revolutionary contest, produced a perpetual tumult in the country at large, while this town was involved in its own controversy respecting the minister. Religion, when externally
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persecuted with violence, lives and flourishes, if the church is pure and sound in doctrine, and retains in her bosom ardent love; but when those who should be " the light of the world " are contentious and feuds and animosities prevail, woe be to Zion.
Still in this dark period Cornwall church had some worthy Christian characters whose examples deserved imitation. The Rev. Mr. Gold's talents would have made him conspicuous in any situation. As a preacher he was not popular in speaking, though capable of writing good discourses. He had such sagacity, firm- ness of purpose, and fortitude, that had' he been a warrior he would have been no inferior military officer.
When Deacon John Harris and his associate, Deacon Phineas Waller, the first deacons here, died, is not known. The latter was one of those who became dissenters from Mr. Gold. Deacon Ben- jamin Sedgwick and Deacon Samuel Abbott were elected, officiated, and deceased during Mr. Gold's ministry. They sustained a worthy reputation. It is not known when they were elected. Not a church in the State was more favored with a worthy and judi- cious deacon than Cornwall was in Thomas Porter, Esq., who was elected deacon October 8, 1767, and continued in office till 1779, when he removed to Tinmouth, Vt. In June 24, 1773, Elijah Steele was chosen deacon. In a short time he became a Quaker in sentiment. Whether the church did anything in attempting to reclaim him, or in disciplining him, we now know not. Upon this defection of Deacon Steele, Judah Kellogg, Esq., was, in 1776, June 20th, elected deacon. It appears that after the removal of Deacon Porter no one was elected to this office during Mr. Gold's life, and Judah Kellogg, Esq., was the sole deacon of this church for a course of years.
Before Mr. Gold's decease, the Rev. Hercules Weston of Mid- dlebury, Mass., who was an alumnus of Dartmouth College, came here as a licensed preacher. He was patronized by Mr. Gold; and in 1792, June 20, was ordained pastor of Cornwall South Church, after having repeatedly preached to this society in two or three years preceding. He was installed by the north consociation of this county : formerly the churches of the county were united in one association and consociation ; but now the body had been divided. The Rev. Mr. Smith of Sharon, preached the ordination sermon from Acts xxviii, 15. "Whom when Paul saw, he thanked God and took courage." The charge to the pastor elect was given by the Rev. Mr. Mills of Torrington, and the right
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hand of fellowship was presented by the Rev. Mr. Starr of Warren.
The prospect of this people was not very promising at this time: the church was reduced more than one-half within ten years, by death, removals, and by the desertion of not a few. In 1782 there were in Mr. Gold's church, thirty-three male members, and a larger number than this of female professors. Now, no more than thirty members composing the church, and of which sixteen were male members, and fourteen females; a very singular fact, as in almost all Congregational and Presbyterian churches, female mem- bers are most numerous.
The sisters in the church, though they do not vote, are no incon- siderable part of the spiritual strength of a christian community.
Their prayers, private and domestic influence is immensely important: therefore, when females in a church are few, its pros- pects cannot but be gloomy and portentous.
Mr. Weston commenced his pastoral duty in very inauspicious circumstances. His health was very infirm when he first came to Cornwall.
The society was forming itself anew, and had continual alterca- tions with their dissenting brethren at the north. Mr. Weston was an ardent partizan for his people's cause. One of the most respectable citizens, Judah Kellogg, Esq., who was the only deacon of the church, considered the infirm health of Mr. Weston to be such that he ought not to be settled. After the ordination, Deacon Kellogg left the communion table, for which he was disciplined and excommunicated as an offender for a very high crime, and without the discrimination which the apostle Paul required in his directions.
Mr. Weston's health was such that, many times, and for weeks in succession, he was entirely unable to perform any pastoral duties. And during his eleven years' ministry the sacrament was not administered in more than three or four instances. Cases of dis. cipline relating to persons who had not united with the dissenting society, and had been members of the South church, and had deserted it, occasioned trouble. At this time the feelings of the two parties in Cornwall were to each other exceedingly unpleasant. And thus were the religious circumstances of Mr. Weston's church and people, until 1799, a period of uncommon interest in the county of Hartford and that of Litchfield for the revival of piety. In 1798 a very uncommon religious excitement, and greater than
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had been known in Connecticut for many years, took place in the town of Mansfield, Windham county. Soon after a revival was witnessed at Hartford, which spread through the county and in that of Litchfield, and of Berkshire, Mass. No religious revivals had been known since those of half a century before of so great extent as were seen now in the northwestern part of the State. Many towns were deeply interested in the subject of salvation. Now, for the first time, was Cornwall visited with a revival that excited public notice. Both the north and south societies were to some considerable degree blessed with the influences of the Holy Spirit. There were between twenty and thirty hopefully the sub- jects of regenerating grace in the society of Mr. Weston; several of whom were eventually united to his church, and became con- sistent professors. About the same number were added to the church of the other society. Never before had Cornwall witnessed a similar event. This interesting time was at the close of the last century and the first years of the present one. These religious excitements were remarkably free from those disorders and that wild enthusiasm which so much disfigured the revivals of fifty and sixty years before. Many thousands in Western Connecticut made a good confession before the world, and lived answerably to their christian views. Most of them have fallen asleep, but a few of them still remain, proving the sincerity of their profession.
The influences of the Divine Spirit were at the same time en- joyed in several other places in Connecticut and Massachusetts, accompanied with the most happy results. Also in Kentucky, about the same time and a little after, a religious excitement was widely spread, which was much more remarkable for bodily operations, produced by the impressions on the mind, than were witnessed in New England. Many were entirely deprived of the use of their limbs, or were convulsed with spasms; they were instantly cast down and sunk into a trance. In repeated instances persons were very strangely and involuntarily agitated in their limbs. But in New England such cases were very rarely known. This is an unquestionable fact, that those who had been most acquainted with the sacred writings, and had the best means of knowing divine truths, were far the least subjected to such singular phenomena. But to return from this digression. The society and church of Mr. Weston received from this revival an impulse of religious activity unknown before; at the same time the pastor's health decayed, and when the people needed the increased labors
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of a pastor's duty, Mr. Weston was very incapable of doing what he wished to perform and the circumstances of the people required. The venerable Mr. Mills of Torringford, with his associates in the work of God, Messrs. Gillett of Torrington, Starr of Warren, Hallock of Canton, and the excellent Mr. Hooker of Goshen, and other zealous ministers, were ready so far as they could to aid Mr. Weston in his infirmities, to promote the religious welfare of South Cornwall.
After continuing eleven years and one-half in his pastoral office, Mr. Weston was dismissed an account of his increasing ill health. Both pulmonary and nervous diseases afflicted him. He was a good economist. His wife, who was Miss Abigail Mills, of Kent, an excellent lady of good health, proved a helper in all respects, and having no children to provide for, he acquired a comfortable share of property, and retired to Kent, where he died, November, 1811, being supported in death by the promises of the Gospel. Had he been blessed with a firm constitution of body, he would have been an active and, no doubt, energetic minister. His mind was naturally vigorons. He was distinguished for a keenness of wit and a talent of sarcasm, so that those who knew him were not very ready to attack him with the shafts of satire, well knowing that they would be losers in such a conflict. In the course of his ministry, the subject of the standing of baptized children was seriously discussed by the church, and an opinion was stated in a written document, in Mr. Weston's handwriting, in which the church concurred with the pastor. This paper is still extant, expressing the belief that baptized children are to be regarded as in a covenant relation to God, but not to be allowed to be commu- nicants at the Lord's Supper, or to offer their children in baptism, without faith and repentance.
Some time previous to Mr. Weston's dismission, several candi- dates preached to the people.
In March, 1803, the writer of these historical sketches came here to preach as a candidate for settlement, while he anticipated a residence not longer than four or six weeks. "But it is not in man to direct his steps." His first preaching, on the 15th of March, was from the text, "Love worketh no ill to his neighbor, therefore love is the fulfilling of the law." Within ten weeks, he was invited by an unanimous vote of both the church and society to be their pastor. The salary offered was $420 only. Having been sought for, some time before he came to Cornwall, to preach
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as a candidate at Sunderland, on Connecticut river, Massachusetts, and receiving another and special request from that town, he went thither in June, and in six weeks was invited to settle there, with a salary equal to that offered at Cornwall. After hesitating for many weeks, he accepted the invitation of Cornwall. South Corn- wall had, with much effort, raised a fund for the support of a minister, the interest of which amounted toward $300. The people here were unanimous in their call, while those of Sunderland were not so perfectly united. Four church members objected- doubting whether the candidate possessed vital piety, as they found, after examining him, that his experience at his regeneration did not agree with theirs. He engaged to stay at Sunderland, provided those four dissenters would not oppose. They did not consent so to do, therefore he returned to Cornwall, and, on the 20th of November, 1803, was ordained. He was previously exam- ined by the association held in Torrington, before which body he preached, and he was approved to be allowed to accept the Corn- wall call. This rule is an excellent one, and prevents improper candidates from intruding themselves into the consociation of the churches. At that period, the north consociation of Litchfield County had the following pastors, viz .: the Rev. Messrs. Bordwell of Kent, Starr of Warren, Smith of Sharon (the father of Gov. Smith), Parker of Ellsworth, Crossman of Salisbury, Morgan of North Canaan, Hooker of Goshen, Gillett of Torrington, Robbins of Norfolk, Mills of Torringford, Lee of Colebrook, Hallock of Canton, Miller of Burlington, and Jerome of New Hartford.
Rarely has there been a more worthy association of pastors than those who have been now enumerated. They were closely united in christian and ministerial friendship, and of one accord in their views of divine truth. Every one of them had been more or less blessed with religious revivals; one of them, indeed, who preached sound doctrine, and had witnessed a revival among his people, was, in 1817, deposed from the ministry, after he had left his flock, for dishonesty. Every one of them is in the grave, and the writer of this statement is the only surviving associate of that body with which he had the honor of being once connected.
At the ordination of the writer, the Rev. Bezaleel Pinneo of Milford, the brother-in-law of the pastor-elect, preached from 2d of Timothy, ii, 15: "Study to shew yourself approved of God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth." It was an excellent discourse. Rev. Mr. Rob-
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bins, of Norfolk, who was moderator of the consociation, offered the consecrating prayer, the candidate, according to his own request, received consecration on his bended knees, on a platform stage prepared before the pulpit. Rev. Mr. Starr, of Warren, gave the charge to the pastor, and Rev. Mr. Hooker, of Goshen, pre- sented him the right hand of fellowship. It had not then become customary to give a charge to the church and people. The whole number of the church then, including several that had removed from the town and were not dismissed, was fifty-five-twenty-one males and thirty-four females. The confession of faith of this church was essentially defective, as the divinity of Christ, His atonement for sin by vicarious suffering, and other important principles of the Christian faith, were omitted. Therefore the pastor, in a few months, proposed to the church the articles of faith and the church covenant, the same that are now in use, and are published in the church manual prepared by the Rev. Mr. Urmston, in 1838. In May 4th, 1804, the church unanimously adopted it. Both Mr. Gold and Mr. Weston were sound in their doctrinal opinions; it was, therefore, a matter of surprise that such a lax creed was in use for so long a period.
It is now requisite to advert to the North Church and society. While the South Church had a creed exceedingly lax and such as Unitarians would readily admit, the other church at the north had adopted a creed very explicit and sound, declaring in language very copious, without the least reserve or ambiguity, all the tenets of that Saybrook platform, the church government of which they had formally rejected.
Thus, while the old church strenuously maintained the discipline and consociational polity of the Saybrook platform, and at the same time did not insert in her creed the doctrinal sentiments of that platform, the dissenting church received cordially those doctrines, but had rejected that which was less important, to wit, the church discipline and consociational principles. Each party in Cornwall was willing and even desirous to form a union. But the removal of the old meeting-house to Cornwall Valley, a mile beyond its former site, proved an insuperable obstacle to such a compromise. This obstacle became afterwards still more insupera- ble by the ecclesiastical fund of the south society, as the validity and existence of it depended upon the continuance of the meeting- house being in Cornwall Valley.
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