USA > Connecticut > The history of the Episcopal Church in Connecticut, Vol. I > Part 8
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A spirit of inquiry into the points of Scriptural dif- ference between Congregationalism and the Church of England was well extended as early as 1730, through- out the Colony of Connecticut. The construction put upon the law which had been adopted for the relief of Episcopalians, forced them to redouble their exer- tions and renew their appeals to the Society for resi- dent missionaries. And Providence opened a way to satisfy the more urgent of these appeals. Sundry "in- habitants of New London, Groton, and places adjacent, who had petitioned once and again" to no purpose, renewed their requests in the spring of this year, stat- ing that the church which they had erected at much expense "continues shut up, to the derision of its enemies, but to our great grief and discomfort, with
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this only abatement, that it stands a monument and witness for us how earnestly we desire the blessing" of a pastor. The Rev. James McSparran, the Missionary in the Narragansett country, visited them occasionally, and officiated in the church before its completion. He was the nearest Episcopal clergyman, and appears to have been instrumental in laying its foundation; but when, in his work entitled " America Dissected," he speaks of the inhabitants of Connecticut and says, "I myself began our Church by occasional visits among them at a place called New London, and that has given rise to others, so that the Society maintain at this day, and in this colony, eight Episcopal Missionaries," he claims rather more than properly belongs to his efforts or his influence. The Church was not introduced into Connecticut from Rhode Island, but from the Prov- ince of New York, as it has been shown in a former chapter. Pigot and Johnson, while Missionaries at Stratford, both visited New London and preached, and baptized there each a child, the one a son and the other a daughter, from the same family, and that, too, prior to 1725, the year in which the first movement towards the erection of a church was made.1 Mr. Johnson, in a communication to the Society in that same year, speaks of having obtained "considerable subscriptions " to build a church in New London, " and a piece of land to set it on," -- the custom pre- vailing in those days, as it does in these, to solicit
1 April 25th, 1723, Mr. Pigot preached in New London, and baptized JOHN, infant son of William and Mary Norton. October 25, 1724, Mr. Johnson baptized in the same town SARAH, infant daughter of William and Mary Norton. Mr. Johnson, in recording the baptism in his Parish Register, makes this " N. B. - Mr. Talbot baptized LAUZERNE, son of Richard and Elizabeth Wilson, at New London, Oct. 15, 1724."
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Christian charity from the strong and rich in behalf of the weak and destitute.
Mr. Samuel Seabury, the father of Bishop Seabury, a graduate of Harvard University in 1724, to which institution he transferred himself from Yale, after the disturbance about Rector Cutler, was born in Groton, and was the first preacher to "the Second Ecclesi- astical Society," organized by permission of the Gen- eral Assembly in the north part of that town. This was in 1726. But after a few weeks, the Congrega- tional licentiate, who had come within the light of Episcopacy, gave up his charge as stated supply in North Groton, and finally, with letters dated in the spring of 1730, recommending him to the notice of Bishop Gibson, he crossed the ocean for valid ordi- nation, and appeared before the Society on the 21st of August in the same year.1 The New London peti- tioners spoke of him as " a gentleman - born and bred in this country," and "therefore sure of a welcome reception in whatsoever vacancy he is sent to fill in New England ;" and so they begged with all earnest- ness that their " destitute condition might come into remembrance at the Board, when he applied for a mission." Their prayer was supported by the clergy here, and granted by the Society. He returned to New London, arriving there December 9th, 1730, and began his services in the yet unfinished church to about one hundred persons, of whom fourteen only were communicants. He is recorded as having met with his parishioners April 10th, 1732, when the first Church-wardens and Vestrymen were chosen; and thus the third Episcopal parish, with a house of worship and
1 Hawkins, p. 294.
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a resident minister, was fully established in the Colony of Connecticut.
Though the number of those who had actually con- formed to the Church of England was small at this period, still there was a large number that ventured to look kindly on her services, and the grosser attacks of her enemies did not check the disposition to hear or read what was spoken or published in her defence. Johnson, writing to the Society in the autumn of 1730, after referring to the increase of "a good temper toward the Church," added: "One thing I have par- ticularly to rejoice in, and that is, that I have a very considerable influence in the college in my neigh- borhood ; and that a love to the Church gains ground greatly in it. Several young men that are graduates, and some young ministers, I have prevailed with to read and consider the matter so far, that they are very uneasy out of the communion of the Church, and some seem much disposed to come into her service ; and those that are best affected to the Church are the brightest and most studious of any that are educated in the country."
John Pierson and Isaac Brown-brother of that promising young man who accompanied Cutler and Johnson to England for ordination, but died of the small-pox before his return-graduated at Yale Col- lege in 1729; and Pierson is entered in the Parish Register of Stratford as making his first communion on Christmas day, 1732. In due time these young men went over for Holy Orders, but were returned to fields of missionary labor in other provinces than Connecticut,1 and the name of Isaac Brown appeared
1 Pierson was at Salem, N. J., where he died in 1747.
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in the list of the Society for a full half century. It was considered a great hardship that the candidates were thus subjected to the peril and expense of a voyage to England to obtain what the Church had a right to demand should be given them here. The want of a resident Bishop was one mighty obstacle which stood in the way of a more rapid growth. It afforded occasion for the opposers of the Church to
deride her members or charge them with inconsist- ency in vindicating a threefold ministry and Apos- tolic order, while they were practically without Epis- copal supervision. It embarrassed the clergy in a portion of their work; so much so that the senior Missionary in the colony, in the summer of 1731, ad- dressed the Bishop of London, and "humbly pre- sumed to beg his Lordship's directions" relative to the exhortation, after baptism, to the sponsors, re- quiring them to bring the child to the Bishop to be confirmed. "Some," he added, "wholly omit this ex- hortation, because it is impracticable; others insert the words, ('if there be opportunity,') because our ad- versaries object to it as a mere jest, to order the god- fathers to bring the child to the Bishop, when there is none within a thousand leagues of us, which is a reproach that we cannot answer." There was no dis- position to vary from what was wisely established at home, except in things confessedly indifferent and cir- cumstantial in their own nature, and this, for the good of the cause, that the Missionaries might have less occasion to employ themselves in pleading among the people about "the ceremonies and constitutions of the Church," and more time to devote in " advanc- ing the great essentials and vitals of religion."
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Early in 1732 that "popular and insinuating young man," whose settlement by the Independents at New- town, eight years before, had been so acceptable tc all classes, publicly informed his people of a change in his views, and declared his readiness to receive orders in the Church of England. Mr. Johnson bap- tized his infant son in February, and he himself is entered as a communicant in the Parish Register at Stratford, his native place, under date of April 9th in the same year, which was Easter day. A sagacious Puritan mother of that time illustrated the ten- dency of candid inquiry, when she predicted this re- sult in her own mind, and told her son, after it was accomplished, that she "knew Mr. Beach would turn churchman, for she never heard of any one that kept reading Church-books, but what always did." He was a graduate of Yale in 1721, and cherished a high re- spect for Rector Cutler, by whom, when a boy at Stratford, his desire for a classical education was spe- cially encouraged. He studied the great controversy of the times with the best helps which he could ob- tain before his settlement; but he reopened it with Mr. Johnson, once his college Tutor, on the occasion of that gentleman's periodical visits to Newtown, and made "the various points of difference hitherto sup- posed to exist between them " the "constant subjects of inquiry, reflection, and prayer." Though much esteemed for his scholarship, piety, and zeal, his decla- ration for Episcopacy "was followed by the display of greater bitterness and violence among his Congre- gationalist neighbors than had been witnessed in any of the former instances of defection from their ranks." We shall reserve for another chapter a notice of some
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of the pamphlets published at that period, rudely and maliciously attacking the Church in Connecticut.
No one went over from this country recommended to the Bishop of London for Holy Orders with better testimonials than John Beach. Johnson spoke of him, from a long acquaintance, as "a very ingenuous and studious person, and a truly serious and conscientious Christian." Besides these testimonials, he bore with him a petition from Lemuel Morehouse and others, "members of the Church of England in Redding and Newtown," renewing their request for a share in the charities of the Honorable Society, and particularly that Mr. Beach might be appointed a Missionary in the town and vicinity where he was so well known and respected and beloved. The petition was granted, and the usual allowance for salary appropriated ; but upon his return from England, in September 1732, he found the affections of his old parishioners alienated from him, and himself and his plans for the Church op- posed with increased rancor. A tribe of Indians, three miles distant from Newtown, to whom he was charged by the Society to extend his ministrations, had been stirred up to resist him and treat him with indignity and violence, under the ridiculous plea that he was about to rob them of their lands and draw from them money for his support. But none of these things moved him away from his godly work. Because there was no suitable place for assembling, he invited the few professors of the Church of England to meet in his own house, where for a considerable time he conducted the public services. "He pressed on with resolute and cheerful spirit; conciliating many of the Indians, and gathering around him large congrega-
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tions of his own countrymen." In his first report to the Society, made six months after his arrival at his mission, he says: "I have now forty-four commu- nicants, and their number increases every time I administer the Communion." And of his flock he remarks: "The people here have a high esteem of the Church, and are now greatly rejoiced that they have an opportunity of worshipping God in that way, and have begun to build two small churches, the one at Newtown, and the other at Redding." It is said that the frame of the building in Newtown, twenty- eight feet long and twenty-four wide, was raised on Saturday, the roof-boards put on the same evening, and the next day the handful of churchmen assembled for divine service under its imperfect protection, sit- ting upon the timbers and kneeling upon the ground.
Thus we have reached, in and through the year 1734, the organization of the fourth and fifth Episco- pal parishes in Connecticut, with church edifices and settled ministers. By this time, the light was again streaming up from North Groton, in the eastern part of the State; for Ebenezer Punderson, the successor of Samuel Seabury in the Congregational ministry there, had declared for Episcopacy, and he was already on his way to England for Holy Orders, and with a petition to be returned to the scene of his former labors. This change in the sentiments of their pastor occurring for a second time, was a great discourage- ment to the North Society; and in a memorial to the General Assembly, May, 1734, asking that body to interpose and enact something for their relief, men- tion is made of their happiness under Mr. Punderson for about two years and a half, when "it pleased God
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in His Providence to leave him to believe and hold some things they thought erroneous," and notwith- standing " many private conferences, associations and counsels of reverend ministers," in the neighborhood, " together with fasting and prayers for his recovery," Mr. Punderson still persisted in his views, and “ten or twelve of the people of the parish and heads of families signed his paper and contributed money to him to bear his expenses to England" for ordination. Relieved of a portion of his cares by the appointment of Mr. Beach to the mission at Newtown, Mr. John- son directed his attention to other quarters, and in the autumn of this same year he ascended the valley of the Naugatuck as far as Waterbury, and baptized an infant son of Nathaniel Gunn. This was undoubt- edly the first instance in that town of the dedication of a child to God "by our office and ministry," and the first occasion on which the forms of the Liturgy were used there by a clergyman of the Church of England.
Johnson at Stratford, Caner at Fairfield, the elder Seabury at New London, Beach at Newtown and Redding,-four missionaries, with five houses of wor- ship,-constituted the working clerical force of the Church in Connecticut down to the end of the year 1734. The gain within the last lustrum had been the greatest in new localities or stations. The rooted tree was shooting upward and spreading out its salubrious branches, and many were finding beneath them a kind shelter for the refreshment of their weary souls. As often as we look back to this day of small things, and contrast it, in no spirit of vain boasting, with the fuller prosperity of the Church in these times, we dis-
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cern the footprints of the divine mercy marking a perilous path, and recognize also the overruling Prov- idence of God in ordering and governing the affairs of that "kingdom " which "is not of this world." If we have evils now to contend with of a nature to cause us sleepless solicitude, and if the Church, be- cause she holds the truths of the Bible in their integ- rity, is to be maintained as a bulwark against the modern forms of popular error and unbelief, let us not forget the lessons of the past, nor the battles which were fought in this colony, when our mustered watchmen on the walls were fewer than the fingers upon the right hand. When Gregory Nazianzen, Bishop of Constantinople, bade adieu to his people in the great church of St. Sophia, before an immense auditory, his last words were : "My dear children, pre- serve the Depositum of Faith, and remember the stones which have been thrown at me, because I planted it in your hearts." If we turn from "the stones which were thrown at them," let us never forget the reso- lute men who planted and watered the Protestant Episcopal Church in Connecticut, looking in sure faith to God for the increase.
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CHAPTER VII.
RELIGIOUS CONTROVERSY; AND THE GROWTH OF THE PARISHES.
A. D. 1734-1738.
RELIGIOUS controversy has too often revealed the bad passions of human nature. Conducted in a spirit which by no means comports with the work of our Divine Saviour, it has been a fruitful source among Christian denominations of alienation and bitterness, of invective and reproach. He always gains an ad- vantage over his opponent in every dispute, who, con- scious of the justness of his cause and the strength of his argument, preserves an equanimity of temper, and avoids the use of harsh language and opprobrious un- christian epithets.
It became necessary at an early period to defend the Church of England in Connecticut against the public attacks of her enemies, as well as to be vigilant in regard to their secret stratagems. A worthy pa- rishioner of Johnson, at Stratford, had been stoutly as- sailed, in 1725, by Jonathan Dickinson, of New Jersey, on the subject of Episcopacy; and not venturing to measure lances with such an adversary, he made ap- plication to his pastor for the draught of an argument to meet this particular assault; which was furnished, and which the parishioner sent in his own name. It brought forth a reply, and a rejoinder soon followed. At a later date, Mr. Dickinson was pleased to amplify
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and put in print his own statements, and this of course involved the necessity of publishing what had been written on the other side. At this stage of the con- troversy a new champion stepped into the arena,- Mr. Foxcroft of Boston, - and took up the cause against the Church, writing more largely and artfully than the zealous New-Jersey divine. But a single pamphlet in reply from the pen of Johnson appears to have driven him entirely from the field. Fresh antag- onists, however, frequently compelled that sturdy de- fender of Episcopacy to reoccupy the original grounds of controversy so thoroughly explored by him be- fore he determined to withdraw from his Congre- gational brethren and seek for Holy Orders in the Church of England. In 1732, provoked, no doubt, by the recent declaration of Mr. Beach at Newtown, John Graham, a Congregational minister in the south part of Woodbury, now Southbury, published a most scur- rilous and abusive ballad, misrepresenting and ridi- culing the Church, her practices and her members, and closing with these words, - words too indicative of the unhappy spirit which reigned at that period, -
" They that do thus and won't reform these evils,
Are these Christ's Church, pray, or be n't they the Devil's ?"
William Beach of Stratford, a wealthy gentleman, and brother of the Rev. John Beach, had been charged with the heinous sin of covenant-breaking, because he left the Congregationalists and entered into the com- munion of the Church; and not willing to allow such a charge to go unnoticed, he persuaded Mr. Johnson, both for his own defence and as an antidote to the malicious ballad of Graham, to draw up and publish
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a tract, containing "Plain Reasons for Conforming to the Church." Replies and rejoinders followed, and the controversy reached down to the year 1736, when it was closed by Johnson; and Mr. Graham withdrew from a contest in which he had won no honors for himself and no advantage to his cause. The more the subject of Episcopacy was publicly discussed and the grosser the attacks upon it, the greater was the increase in the number of its adherents. Popular at- tention was drawn to the Church of England by the animated controversies in which her missionaries were involved, and the examination of her doctrines and worship softened or removed in many instances the prejudices of early education. A member of the little flock of Mr. Beach at Newtown, returning one day from service, accidentally dropped her Prayer Book, which was picked up, and pronounced by the person into whose hands it fell to be a Mass. Manual, contain- ing very wicked things. Curiosity was excited among his neighbors to see the heretical and extraordinary book, and several who looked over its pages were so far from agreeing in opinion with him that they found it contained a large portion of the Scriptures, besides several of the excellent prayers which Mr. Beach had been in the habit of using while serving them accept- ably as a Congregational or Independent minister. The Society in England for the Propagation of the Gospel had furnished its Missionary in this place, as elsewhere, with a number of copies of the Book of Common Prayer for gratuitous distribution, and these were now put in circulation, and the result was, that, in the course of twelve months, eight families were added to the Church; and as the increased congrega-
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tion rendered a private dwelling inconvenient to meet in, an edifice for public worship was called for and speedily erected, as shown in the previous chapter.
In 1736 the communicants included in the mission of Mr. Beach were 105, but he was not permitted long to enjoy in quietness this measure of prosperity. The Rev. Jonathan Dickinson of New Jersey, the Pres- byterian divine who had before appeared as a sharp as- sailant of Episcopacy, again took up his pen to attack the Church, and published in this same year a sermon entitled, " The Vanity of Human Institutions in the Worship of God." It was in the spirit and style of sim- ilar publications of that day, and evidenced that the author not only misunderstood or purposely misrepre- sented the nature and object of the Liturgy, but that he fixed the sin of schism, the guilt of rending the body of Christ, upon all who, from any motive, were led to conform to the Church of England. Copies were freely distributed in Newtown among all classes of people, and churchmen found them in their houses without knowing the source to which they were in- debted for the singular gratuity. Mr. Beach was therefore compelled, in self-defence, to enter the field of controversy, and wrote a little pamphlet called "A Vindication of the Worship of the Church of Eng- land," in which he met all the bold statements of the sermon, and maintained the utility of forms of prayer and their Scriptural sanction, without considering them as of special divine appointment. One hundred pages in reply followed from Mr. Dickinson, reiterating his former charges, and adding some new "misrepre- sentations and slanders," with a zeal which would have done credit to the heart of a Puritan in the times of VOL. I.
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Oliver Cromwell. But scarcely had the printed sheets become dry before the Missionary was ready with an Appeal to the "Unprejudiced," in the course of which he made this personal allusion, by way of justifying his own withdrawal from Independency: "I have evened the scale of my judgment as much as possibly I could; and, to the best of my knowledge, I have not allowed one grain of worldly motive on either side. I have supposed myself on the brink of eter- nity, just going into the other world, to give up my account to my great Judge; and must I be branded for an antichrist or heretic and apostate, because my judgment determines that the Church of England is most agreeable to the word of God? I can speak in the presence of God, who knows my heart better than you do, that I would willingly turn dissenter again, if you or any man living would show me reason for it. But then it must be reason, (whereby I exclude not the word of God, the highest reason,) and not sophistry and calumny, as you have hitherto used, that will convince a lover of truth and right."
The immediate effect of this prolonged controversy was to double the number of churchmen in Newtown; and in New Jersey, also, some thanks were due to Mr. Dickinson for the indirect benefit which he contrib- uted to the very cause that he attempted to destroy.
The Church of England, in all this time, was stead- ily gaining strength in other parts of the Colony of Connecticut. The truly Christian deportment of the clergy recommended her doctrines to the people, and many of them would hear and read, notwithstanding the repeated warnings of the Congregational minis- ters to avoid the public services, the instructions and
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the books of churchmen. Mr. Beach often officiated and administered the sacraments at Ridgefield, dis- tant from his residence about eighteen miles, where, in 1735, there were nearly twenty "families of very serious and religious people, who had a just esteem of the Church of England, and desired to have the opportunity of worshipping God in that way." At New London the usual attendance upon the stated services of Seabury had greatly increased, in spite of losses by death and other causes; and he had officiated many times in Norwich, more frequently during the absence of Mr. Punderson in England to obtain Holy Orders, and once, in mid-summer of 1735, he held a public service in the town of Windham. Here a con- gregation of eighty people assembled, some of whom lingered for hours after the service was closed, seek- ing information in regard to the Church; and having obtained it, they confessed that her doctrines had been sadly misrepresented, and that henceforth they should have a more favorable opinion of their char- acter and tendency. In August of the next year he reported to the Society his remarkable success at Hebron, an inland town, which he had visited by the importunity of the people six times, two of which occasions had been on Sundays. More than twenty families, there and in the neighboring places, already conformed to the Church, and he had administered the sacrament of the Lord's Supper to fourteen commu- nicants. He was allowed afterwards ten pounds a year for such ministrations, which became stated. The secret of this success was, that a parish had been formed at Hebron as early as 1734, when the first minister of the town, the Rev. John Bliss, having been
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