USA > Connecticut > The history of the Episcopal Church in Connecticut, Vol. I > Part 5
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" Reverend Gentlemen,- Having represented to you the difficulties which we labor under, in relation to our continuance out of the visible communion of an Episcopal Church, and a state of seeming opposition thereto, either as private Christians, or as officers, and so being insisted on by some of you (after our re- peated declinings of it) that we should sum up our case in writing, we do (though with great reluctance, fearing the consequences of it) submit. to and comply with it, and signify to you that some of us doubt the validity, and the rest are more fully persuaded of the invalidity of the Presbyterian ordination, in opposition to the Episcopal; and we should be heartily thankful to God and man, if we may receive from them satis- faction herein, and shall be willing to embrace your good counsels and instructions in relation to this important affair, as far as God shall direct and dispose us to it."
The paper was signed by the whole seven, and a true copy of the original, attested by Daniel Brown, is among the archives of the Society for the Propaga- tion of the Gospel in Foreign Parts. At the same time two other "pastors of great note gave their assent" to the declaration without signing it, " of
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whom the one, Mr. Bulkley, of Colchester, declared Episcopacy to be jure divino, and the other, Mr. Whit- ing, of some remote town, also gave in his opinion for moderate Episcopacy." The critical point was now touched. To remove the scruples of these gentlemen and give them "satisfaction" was an effort which required some little time and consultation. They were all entreated to reconsider their opinions and surrender their doubts, -but they must have good reasons directing and disposing them to this course ; and accordingly that earnest and sincere debate was held, over which Governor Saltonstall presided with such candor and politeness, and which has already been described as having taken place in the ensuing month, on the day after the opening of the Autumn session of the General Assembly. The minds and pens of the Congregational ministers were not idle in the intervening time. Joseph Webb, of Fairfield, writing to Cotton Mather at Boston, and speaking of what he termed "the revolt of several persons of figure among us unto the Church of England," said : "They are, the most of them, reputed men of consider- able learning, and all of them of a virtuous and blame- less conversation. I apprehend the axe is hereby laid to the root of our civil and sacred enjoyments, and a doleful gap opened for trouble and confusion in our churches. The churchmen among us are wonderfully encouraged and lifted up by the appearance of these gentlemen on their side ; and how many more will, by their example, be encouraged to go off from us to them, God only knows. It is a very dark day with us; and we need pity, prayers, and counsel." But what appears to have occasioned him personal uneasi-
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ness was the matter of ordination. He foresaw a possible turn in the approaching debate, which it would be difficult to meet. Several pastors in the colony, in the more ancient days of it, had been set apart to the ministry by laymen, and the pastors so ordained had acted in subsequent ordinations. His own ordination was of this kind, and had a connection with " the leather mitten that was laid on the head of the Rev. Mr. Israel Chauncey, of Stratford." If their antagonists should allow to Presbyters the power to ordain, they might accompany the admission with the remark, "Your ordination is not by Presbyters, but by laymen;" and the debate urged in this line would be more troublesome, and, he thought, " more damaging than all the arguments that could be brought for the necessity of Episcopal ordination."
Joseph Moss, of Derby, in a letter to the same divine, and bearing the same date, was in similar per- plexity. Though fully satisfied in his own mind that the truth was on his side, he yet confessed that he had not read much upon the controversy, and, there- fore, he would "be very glad to have some books that do nervously handle this point concerning ordination by Presbyters, whether good or bad."
Davenport and Buckingham, the ministers at Stam- ford and Norwalk, joined in bemoaning to their Bos- ton friends " the dark Providence " which they felt to be hanging over the entire colony. In reference to the College, they spoke of its pristine glory, and added, "But who could have conjectured that its name, being raised to Collegium Yalense from a Gymna- sium Saybrookense, it should groan out Ichabod, in about three years and a half under its second rector
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so unlike the first, by an unhappy election, set over it, into whose election or confirmation, or any act relat- ing to him, the senior subscriber hereof (though not for some reason, through malice or mistake bruited) never came."
These two ministers, and a few others of like tem- per, went so far as to charge Cutler with dishonesty or dissimulation in consenting to hold a position of such exalted influence, while, for eleven or twelve years, he had been secretly of the Episcopal persua- sion, and only waited for a suitable opportunity to avow his faith. Hollis, writing from London, in 1723, to Benjamin Colman in Boston, makes a like state- ment, which he professes to have obtained from him, and which he gives in these words: "I never was in judgment heartily with the Dissenters, but bore it patiently until a favorable opportunity offered. This has opened at Boston, and I now declare publicly what I before believed privately." But there is not a particle of evidence coming directly from Cutler to support the charge, and what thus comes from other sources is based chiefly on rumor; so that if at any time he dropped a word which was construed in this way, he probably intended no more by it than that there had long been a struggle between his religious convictions and his temporal prospects.
Passing over the harsh epithets applied to these gentlemen and to the Church of England, as no better than Popery, by the ministers intemperately zealous for the prosperity of the prevailing order, we come to the results of the theological dispute in the Col- lege Library. If both sides claimed the victory, it cannot he said that both sides went away equally
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satisfied. The abrupt termination of the debate was soon enough, as we have seen, to save to Congrega- tionalism three of the signers of the declaration, Eliot, Hart, and Whittelsey ; but the rest, with clearer and more decided convictions, were quite prepared to fol- low on in the severe path which they had already entered. They distinctly declared their belief that the Church of England was a true branch of the Church of Christ, and that it became their duty to enter and serve in her communion. The Trustees took no official action, or rather passed no resolves, at the annual Commencement in reference to the Rector or the Tutor, - though the latter had sent in his resignation,-preferring without doubt to ascertain the popular will as well as to wait the result of the efforts to restore them in full affection to the estab- lished religion. But when the controversy had been closed, and while the General Assembly was still in session, they met and voted to " excuse the Rev. Mr. Cutler from all further service as rector of Yale Col- lege, and to accept of the resignation which Mr. Brown had made as tutor." They voted too, "that all such persons as shall hereafter be elected to the office of rector or tutor in this college, shall, before they are accepted therein, before the trustees declare their assent to the confession of faith owned and con- sented to by the elders and messengers of the churches in the Colony of Connecticut, assembled by delega- tion at Saybrook, September 9, 1708; and confirmed by act of the general assembly ; and shall particularly give satisfaction to them of the soundness of their faith, in opposition to Arminian or prelatical corrup- tions, or any other of dangerous consequence to the
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purity and peace of the churches." Still further they voted, "that upon just grounds of suspicion of the rector's or a tutor's inclination to Arminian or prelat- ical principles, a meeting of the trustees shall be called to examine into the case."
All this was done to guard the established religion of the land, and to maintain in their integrity the faith and ecclesiastical organization of the Puritans. The displacement of Rector Cutler from his office was a natural step, which few will be bold enough, even at this late day, to censure, under the circumstances, but it is difficult to reconcile it with the cherished theory that the settlement of New England was "purely to propagate civil and religious liberty." The resolves of the Trustees were passed October 27, and a week later, Cutler, Johnson, and Brown were on their way to Boston, where they embarked Novem- ber 5th, and sailed for England. They had prepared their friends for this termination of their inquiries by putting books into their hands which they per- suaded them to read, and Johnson, in resigning his pastoral charge, told his people in affectionate terms that he would return to them, if they would receive him as an Episcopal clergyman; but with such a prop- osition they were unable to comply, notwithstanding their esteem for him personally, and their admiration of his preaching and his prayers, both of which, he now informed them to their great surprise, had all along been drawn from the Church of England. When he had laid together and balanced all the considera- tions which affected his religious feelings, and come to a resolution to brave the consequences of renounc- ing the faith in which he had been educated, he wrote
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in his private journal these final words: "It seems to be my duty to venture myself in the arms of Almighty Providence, and cross the ocean for the sake of that excellent church, the Church of England, and God preserve me ; and if I err, God forgive me."
After a stormy passage they reached the shores of the mother-country, and landing at Ramsgate De- cember 15th, they proceeded immediately to Canter- bury, where they were obliged to tarry three days for a stage-coach to take them to London.
This brief suspension of their journey afforded them an opportunity to see and hear what they had never seen and heard before. On the morning after their arrival, they visited the Cathedral Church and joined in the celebration of divine service. They must have been bowed to reverence by the deep solemnity of the place and the worship. The magnificence of the structure, its lofty arches and shadowy aisles, the air of devotion, the "dim religious light," the surpliced priests, the beauty, the order of the whole service, - the notes of the pealing organ, growing more and more dense and powerful, filling the vast pile and seeming to cause the very walls to tremble, the rich voices of the choir breaking out, at intervals, into sweet gushes of melody, -gushes that rose and re- verberated through every part of the sacred edifice, -how grandly impressive, yet how surprising, all these things must have been to men who had just emerged from the bald worship of the Puritans, and known only their plain sanctuaries here in the wilds of New England. Surely feelings of reverential grat- itude must have overflowed their hearts at finding themselves in that venerable cathedral, " observing
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the ordinances and sharing the devotions of a church, which in spite of the misrepresentations and taunts of her adversaries they had learned to vindicate and to honor." They had no letters of introduction to any one in Canterbury, but, relying upon the strength of their mission to favor them, they ventured, through their landlord, to present themselves to the Dean, - the excellent and learned Dr. Stanhope, whose name is familiar to all students in English theology. On reaching the Deanery, he instructed the servant to say " that they were some gentlemen from America, come over for Holy Orders, who were desirous of pay- ing their duty to the Dean." He came at once to the door, took them cordially by the hand, and to their surprise said, " Come in, gentlemen ; you are very welcome ; I know you well, for we have just been reading your declaration for the Church."
The declaration, with their names appended, had found its way into the London papers, and the Dean and a company of Prebendaries who dined with him were engaged in reading it, at the moment when their arrival was announced. Every feeling of em- barrassment that they were in a land of strangers was dispelled by this hearty welcome. Here in Can- terbury, as elsewhere, friends rose up and followed them with their favors and remembrances ; and one kind gentleman, chaplain to the Earl of Thanet, meet- ing them some months afterwards in London, invited them to his lodgings, and "counted out to each of them ten guineas," which were a present from his noble patron for the purchase of books. Their recep- tion by the Bishop of London, (Dr. Robinson,) under whose jurisdiction the Colonial Church in New Eng-
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land was placed, and by the principal members of the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel, was equally cordial and gratifying. They found sympathy wher- ever they went, and from men of cultivated minds who honored them for their independence and sacri- fices. They bore with them, among other testimoni- als, a letter from the Rev. James Orem, -one of the Society's missionaries in Rhode Island, - in which he said : "I can scarce express the hardships they have undergone, and the indignities that have been put upon them, by the worst sort of dissenters who bear sway here, and several honest gentlemen who declared for the church with them; who, by reason of the unhappy circumstances of their families, can't go to England, but lie now under all the hardships and pressures that the malice and rage of the implacable enemies of our excellent church and constitution can subject them to; but I hope their suffering condition will be taken into consideration at home." Some lay- men in the same province, Church-wardens and Ves- trymen, testified to their high character and disinter- ested motives, by saying, "It is plain these gentlemen have, in this important affair, acted like Christians and men of virtue and honor, without any sordid private views of interest and advancement." The bishops and clergy of the Church of England, there- fore, could do no less than regard them with the love and confidence of brothers ; and, satisfied of their emi- nent fitness for the ministry into which they desired to enter, arrangements were soon made for their ordi- nation and future duties. It was decided that to Cutler should be committed the new church (Christ) about to be opened in Boston ; that Brown should have
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the charge of the vacant Mission at Bristol, in Rhode Island, and that Johnson should be appointed to Strat- ford, in the neighborhood of his former associations ; while Mr. Pigot, who had lingered now, at the earnest request of the Society, for more than a year in Con- necticut, should proceed to Providence, the first desig- nated field of his labor.
But these plans, so well laid by the wisdom of man, were destined to be frustrated, in a measure, by the inscrutable and higher wisdom of God. Before they had quite completed their preparations for receiving Holy Orders, the small-pox, a disease which was long the dread of both Europe and America, fell with great severity upon Cutler, the eldest of the three, and threatened to terminate in his death. But the Divine goodness was pleased to spare him, and upon his re- covery, towards the end of March 1723, he and his two friends were ordained by the Bishop of Norwich, (Dr. Green,) in St. Martin's Church, first Deacons, and afterwards Priests. The Bishop of London, (Dr. Rob- inson,) to whom the duty belonged, was so near his grave that he was obliged to delegate the office with Letters dimissory to his brother in the Episcopate. The high object for which they had suffered and sur- rendered so much, for which they had encountered many of St. Paul's perils, been "in weariness and painfulness," and crossed the ocean, was at last at- tained, and they were clothed with authority to exe- cute the office of Priests in the Church of God. But, alas ! another and a more painful trial was at hand. Scarcely had they arranged for brief visits to Oxford and other places, prior to their return to America, before the same dreadful malady which had pros-
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trated for a time the eldest, reappeared with greater malignity, and struck down to the dust the youngest of their number. Within a week after their ordina- tion, Brown, who had preached the day before, was seized with the small-pox and died on Easter eve, - a mysterious loss to the Church; mourned by all who knew him, but by none so much as by his dear friend and classmate, the companion of his travels, and the sharer of his personal fears and solicitudes. He was not laid to his rest in his native land and among the graves of his immediate kindred; but if he must be cut off in the bright morning of his youth, and while yet he had but once lifted up his voice as a minister in the Church which he had so earnestly hoped and prayed to serve, doubtless it was some consolation to his mind, that he was among those who recognized and regarded him as a brother, and in a land towards which his thoughts, for many months, had been affec- tionately drawn. If God vouchsafed him the con- sciousness of death in the last hour, he might have felt, as a poet of our Church has expressed the sen- timent, -
" And I can yet my dust lay down Beneath old England's sward ; For, lulled by her, 't were sweet to wait The coming of the Lord."
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CHAPTER IV.
THE RETURN OF CUTLER AND JOHNSON TO AMERICA, AND THE INCREASE OF THE CHURCH OF ENGLAND IN CONNECTICUT.
A. D. 1723-1727.
WHEN the first shock of sorrow for their painful bereavement had passed away, the surviving friends of Brown began to prepare for their departure to this country. They improved the brief remainder of their sojourn in England by visiting the Universities of Oxford and Cambridge, where they were treated with every mark of affectionate and respectful regard, and honored in a way which must have been specially gratifying to their personal pride and laudable ambi- tion. Oxford conferred upon Cutler the degree of Doctor of Divinity, and upon Johnson that of Master of Arts, giving them both diplomas; and Cambridge, shortly afterwards, repeated to them the same distin- guished honors. By this time James Wetmore, who had boldly delivered his testimony for Episcopacy in presence of the authorities of the College and of Con- necticut, and whom they had left behind to make suitable arrangements for his voyage, had resigned his pastoral charge at North Haven, and now came to be their companion in the ranks of the Church of England, as well as in their visits to Cambridge, Wind- sor, Hampton Court, and other remarkable places. Dr. Robinson, the Bishop of London, had descended to VOL. I. 4
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his grave, and Bishop Gibson, an excellent and learned prelate, had been translated from the See of Lincoln to be his successor. From him they received their letters of license, and, at the universities not more than in London, they availed themselves of every opportunity to enter into a full description of the state of the Colonial Church, and to show the vast injury it was suffering for the want of an Episcopate. While they had encountered the perils of the ocean to obtain what their consciences told them was a valid ordination, and while they were at that moment fresh in their grief over the loss of a beloved asso- ciate who had fallen a victim to the distemper of the country, they certainly had a good right to speak with earnestness and warmth on this subject, and to represent the discouraging effect which their experi- ence must have upon those Congregational ministers in New England who were waiting to be settled in the faith of the Church. In Bishop Gibson they found not only an attentive listener, but one who proved himself a noble Christian prelate, by his anxi- ety to correct the evils of which they complained, and who, on his first coming to the See of London, set forth in a large memorial the advantages of placing and maintaining one or more bishops in the American colonies. Mr. Pigot, writing to the Society soon after his arrival at Stratford, pleaded for the same manifest right ; and referring to the hardships of compelling the new converts from Presbyterianism to go to England for Episcopal ordination, added, " The Honorable So- ciety will perceive by this, that many sound reasons are not wanting to inspirit them to procure the mis- sion of a Bishop into these Western parts ; for, besides
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the deficiency of a governor in the Church, to inspect the regular lives of the clergy, to ordain, confirm consecrate churches, and the like, amongst those that already conform, there is, also, a sensible want of this superior order, as a sure bulwark against the many heresies that are already brooding in this part of the world."
Dr. Cutler and Mr. Johnson - having completed their designs in visiting the mother-country, and established bonds of friendship which united the hearts of zealous churchmen on both sides of the Atlantic - embarked for a New-England port July 26, 1723, and immediately upon their arrival hast- ened, the one to his church in Boston, the other to his mission at Stratford. The day after reaching his charge, (Nov. 5th,) Johnson made another entry in his private journal, thus : "God having in his merciful Providence spared me another year through so many dangers as I have been exposed unto on my late voy- age, and returned me safe to my father's house, and here to my charge, I adore his singular and marvel- lous goodness, which I the rather admire, because I, who am a sinful unworthy creature, am spared when my friend far worthier than I (Mr. Brown) is cut off, for which dispensation of God, I desire to be deeply humbled. He was one of the most amiable persons in the world, a finely accomplished scholar, and a brave Christian. But such is thy pleasure, O good God, such thy kindness, that I am yet alive, though unworthy to live! What can I do less than devote my life thus preserved by Thee to thy service, to do all the good I can for thy glory and the souls of men! And as I am now (for which I adore thy goodness)
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perfectly well satisfied as to the lawfulness and regu- larities of my mission, (being Episcopally initiated, con- firmed, and ordained,) so I purpose by thy grace both to adorn my profession by a holy life, as a Christian, and faithfully to fulfil my ministry as a clergyman, by doing all the service I can to the souls committed to my charge."
Mr. Wetmore was sent to New York, and subse- quently stationed at Rye, in that State, and after a faithful and most successful ministry of nearly thirty- seven years, he died of the small-pox in 1760, in the sixty-fifth year of his age. Dr. Cutler followed him to his reward five years later, having done good ser- vice for the Church in Boston, and seen his own con- gregation, within three years from the time of his settlement among them, increase from four hundred to seven or eight hundred persons. If it was proper to trace here any part of the early history of Episco- pacy in Massachusetts, much might be said in com- mendation of his unwearied and efficient ministra- tions. But Connecticut is our theme, and henceforth to the history within her borders attention will be most strictly confined.
When Mr. Johnson arrived at Stratford, he found the church, which had been for some time in the progress of building, not yet completed. It was the first edifice for the Church of England erected in the colony, and after many hindrances was opened for divine service on Christmas day 1724. Its erec- tion belongs to the influence and ministry of his pred- ecessor, who, in one of his letters to the Society, as a reason for its slow progress, said, the people "are too closely fleeced by the adverse party to carry it on
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with dispatch." It was described at the time as "a neat, small wooden building, forty-five feet and a half long, thirty and a half wide, and twenty-two between joints, or up to the roof"; and was built partly at the expense of the members of the Church of England, in Stratford, and "partly by the liberal contributions of several pious and generous gentlemen of the neigh- boring provinces, and sometimes of travellers who occasionally passed through the town." Mr. Pigot's record of his ministrations shows him to have been a man full of zealous and self-sacrificing labors. He opened a Parochial Register in a good round hand, which was used by his successors for many years afterwards, and is still carefully preserved ; and to me personally it is an interesting fact, that the first and only entry made by him under one of the heads in this register, was the marriage of a kinsman of mine to a descendant of William Jeanes, a warden of the Church; and the first entry under another head, by Mr. Johnson, was the baptism of a child, the fruit of that marriage.
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