USA > Connecticut > The history of the Episcopal Church in Connecticut, Vol. II > Part 16
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The controversy upon the subject of the ministry was not yet closed, when another attack was made upon the Church, different from all former ones, and encouraged by men of the highest standing and re- sponsibility in the Congregational ranks. A pamphlet of twenty-four pages entitled, " A Serious Call to those who are without the Pale of the Episcopal Church. By a Consistent Churchman," was printed and freely circulated in Connecticut, where it was designed to produce its sinister effect. It was not one of the doctrinal tracts referred to in the beginning of this chapter ; but it was read to the "associate gentlemen," who relished it highly and advised its publication. No imprint was given, and the hypoc- risy of the title-page was in keeping with the mis- representation and irony of the whole pamphlet. The author professed to be a " Consistent Church- man," though he was a rigid Congregationalist,1 and penned his work with the deliberate intention of mis- leading his readers. He addressed it to Presbyteri- ans, Congregationalists, Baptists, Methodists, Quakers, and all of every denomination who do not belong to
1 Rev. Bennet Tyler, then the Congregational minister at South Britain, in Southbury, and afterwards the first President of the Theological Insti- tute of Connecticut, located at East Windsor Hill.
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the Episcopal Church ; and he began in this startling manner : -
" Fellow travellers to eternity : I come to you on a momentous errand ; and I beg your patient and candid attention to my message. You may, perhaps, wish to know who I am, and what claims I have to your re- gard ; but this is not the time to gratify an idle curi- osity. If I were passing your dwellings in the dead of night, and saw them in flames, while you were quietly reposing in sleep, I should not stop to tell you my name or place of abode, till I saw you safe from your danger. This is but a faint emblem of the danger from which I am now to exhort you to flee. Let it suffice, then, to say (and here let your curiosity cease), that I am a member of the EPISCOPAL CHURCH, the only Church on earth ; and my message is, to inform you, that you must become members of the same, or be lost for ever. You may be startled at such a suggestion ; but count me not your enemy because I tell you the truth. The most unwelcome is sometimes the most
friendly message ; and if what I say shall cause pain, it is the pain inflicted by a faithful surgeon, who
wounds only to heal. If you are all in the broad road to destruction, it is certainly high time that you knew it; and he who sounds a timely alarm in your ears, acts the part of the most unfeigned friendship. If it be a fact, that while you remain out of the Church you are aliens from the commonwealth of Israel and strangers from the covenants of promise, having no hope, and without God in the world ; surely, no means should be left untried to effect your conversion."
The author professed to derive support for his
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premises from two sources - the Word of God; and the writings of Bishop Hobart, Rev. Thomas Y. How, D. D., and Rev. Menzies Rayner. When he had made all his citations and been liberal in pathetic appeals, he was not content until he added an appendix, con- taining animadversions upon the conduct of incon- sistent churchmen. The conclusion of the pamphlet accords with the spirit of the introduction.
" Let the syren song of charity, then, be sung no longer. Let all the ministers of our Church assume a tone of consistency. Let them no longer crouch to their adversaries, nor tremble at the epithet of bigot. Let them not be afraid or ashamed to proclaim upon the house-top, that out of the Episcopal Church, there is no salvation. Let the pulpit thunder and the press groan, ' EPISCOPACY OR PERDITION.' Let the sound ring from house to house, from neighborhood to neighborhood, from town to town. Let it be wafted upon every breeze, and echo from every hill. Let it be pro- claimed in the highways and hedges, in the street and at the market, in the tavern and the grog shop, 'EPIS- COPACY OR PERDITION ; ' and no doubt the poor Presby- terians and Baptists and Methodists will be frightened out of their wits, and rush into the Church by scores and by hundreds. The Saybrook Platform will be cast to the moles and the bats, no man will dare have a Bible without a Prayer-Book by its side, and at no distant period, as Dr. How predicts, Episcopalians will be the predominant sect in Connecticut."
The vein of irony, running through the whole pro- duction, was so well concealed, that a careless reader, dipping into its pages here and there and not examin- ing the authorities cited, might be led to think the VOL. II. 14
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" Consistent Churchman " was in sober earnest. Some persons1 were undoubtedly deceived in this way until the scheme was exposed.
By a chain of providential circumstances the Rector of Trinity Church, New Haven (Rev. Mr. Croswell), became acquainted with the fact that the proof sheets had been revised and corrected by his neighbor, the Pastor of the First Ecclesiastical Society, and that the publisher was a Congregational deacon, who sustained intimate relations to this pastor. Scarcely had the work come from the press before he was ready with an answer in the shape of " A Sober Appeal to the Christian Public." Called out on this occasion by a sense of duty to the interests of religion, he spoke with severity of the obvious design of the pamphlet, which was " to slander and defame the ministers and members of the Protestant Episcopal Church - to misrepresent its principles and doctrines - and to rid- icule and disparage its ordinances." He vindicated the reputation of Bishop Hobart both as a divine and a man, and pronounced the extracts from his publica- tions to be " garbled, distorted, or disjointed," and not warranting the inferences drawn by a writer who " opened the first page of his work with an egregious falsehood." He characterized the following paragraph relating to baptism as " a vulgar profanity - a cold- blooded mockery in its style and manner, which none but the worst of infidels have ever equalled." And surely it is something beyond mere burlesque.
" No doubt hell is paved with the skulls of infants, for
1 The story is told of a poor post-rider - a zealous churchman - who thinking the Serious Call was meant to be serious, filled his saddle-bags with the pamphlets and scattered them along on his route into the country, in the full belief that he was doing the Church good service.
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no other reason but because they were never sprinkled by an Episcopal Priest !! Oh! it is enough to chill one's blood in his veins, and to make every tender hearted mother run crazy, to think how many poor in- fants must be eternally miserable when they might have been so easily saved. O ye parents, how can you suffer your children to remain unregenerate! Fly with them to the Church. Have them baptized with- out delay. Then, they will be children of God and in- heritors of the kingdom of heaven." 1
Mr. Croswell referred to the rules of the Congrega- tional order, prohibiting the baptism of infants, except in certain cases, but in his opinion, they did not jus- tify the ridiculing of those, " who, acting as ministers of Christ, conceive themselves bound by his command to baptize all who are presented for that purpose, agreeably to the rules of the Gospel."
He might have turned back to a period when there was a diversity of opinion among Congregationalists about the proper subjects of baptism. One hundred years before, the " half-way covenant system," as it was called, had occasioned strife and contention in the colony, and even towards the end of the eighteenth century, some ministers of the Standing Order, with their churches, fell under the censure of their brethren for adhering to it and inclining to the merciful side of the question. But the views of those who favored admitting only " professors of piety " to the commu- nion, and only the children of such persons to baptism, were now beginning to triumph, and soon the "half- way covenant,"2 which had caused so much trouble
1 Serious Call, p. 16.
2 This provided that baptized persons of good moral character, solemnly
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in various churches, was generally abandoned in Con- necticut and throughout New England.
The pious fraud, if it could be thus described, was so well answered that it is not known whether " A Consistent Churchman " made any further public dem- onstration. Mr. Croswell concluded his " Appeal " with an allegory intended to match the startling para- graph already cited from the first page of the " Serious Call." "If I were to awaken in the dead of night, and find my dwelling in flames, and should discover a person skulking away in some dark corner, muffled
owning or renewing the covenant before the Church and publicly profess- ing their assent to the doctrines of faith, yet without furnishing credible evidence of any Christian experience, might not only have the privilege of presenting their children for baptism, but " be admitted and accounted members of the Church, and under the care and discipline thereof as other members," the communion excepted. Fitness for this ordinance was to be determined by future trial and examination.
So late as 1795, when Dr. Dwight was a candidate for the Presidency of Yale College, the system had its advocates ; for objections growing out of the " half-way covenant " were raised against him, and in a letter to the Hon. Jonathan Ingersoll, who favored his election, a passage occurs which should be quoted in this place for the history it contains.
" The admission of children to baptism on what is commonly called the half-way plan, has never appeared to me a sufficient reason to refuse com- muning with a church ; nor, indeed, do I consider it as having anything to do with the subject of communing. I have repeatedly administered the Lord's Supper to the Church at Stamford, in which that practice has always existed. You will make the necessary conclusion.
" It appears to me poorly worth the while for any man to employ himself in circulating such reports with reference to the appointment proposed ; and (shall I say) almost equally so for my friends to employ themselves in obvi- ating them when spread. I thank my friends, however, and heartily ; and you, in particular, for this instance of your good will.
" But I do not court the appointment. Let those who do, take it. I am already happily settled, and in a station little exposed to envy or obloquy. To build up a ruined college is a difficult task. It is a pity the man who wishes for it should not be gratified. I am not that man." - MS. Letter, June 24, 1795.
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up in a clumsy disguise, with a torch in his hand, and a dagger concealed under his jacket, and withal refus- ing to disclose his name, - I should certainly be justi- fied in considering him (whatever might be his pro- fessions) as a thief and incendiary ; as an assassin and plunderer ; and, as such, should think it my duty to hand him over to public justice. I leave it to a can- did public, and, indeed, to the ingenious author him- self, to determine which of these similitudes best suits his case. Let justice be done and I shall be con- tent."
The "Sober Appeal," like its predecessor, had a wide circulation, and produced not a little sensation in the community where it was published. While the original assailant lay concealed, two pamphlets ap- peared, addressed to the Rev. Mr. Croswell, and evi- dently designed to provoke personal controversy. The authorship of one of these was "imputed at the time to an ambitious shoemaker, who laid claim to extraordinary piety, and who, subsequently, in a great revival season, gained considerable celebrity as a lay- preacher. He unfortunately lived long enough, as his brethren asserted, to fall from grace." 1
The other was from the pen of an officer of Yale College (Prof. Goodrich), and was in the form of a letter which began thus : -
" REV. SIR: As a member of the Church of Christ, and a citizen of this town, I have witnessed with deep concern the asperity of feeling created of late by a pamphlet signed ' A Consistent Churchman.' From the first I have regretted its publication. The irony is in some instances unwarrantably severe ; and how-
1 Annals of Trinity Parish, MS.
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ever legitimate its deductions may be, the citizens of this town will, I fear, consider even the most decisive proofs of rashness and weakness in the reasonings of Dr. Hobart and Mr. Rayner as a poor compensation for the pain inflicted on a large and respectable class of the community. Mingled as we are by our inter- ests and our relations in social life, it is deeply to be lamented that jealousy and discord should be kindled up between different denominations of Christians."
This was a soothing and courteous introduction. But in the heat of his zeal to defend the pastor of the First Ecclesiastical Society, in New Haven (Rev. N. W. Taylor), and to deny that he was the author of the pamphlet in question or had any "share in its composition," personalities and syllogisms and special pleadings were resorted to, which ill became so accom- plished a mind and so graceful a pen.
No rejoinder was made by the author of the " Sober Appeal," and the controversy ended, but the effects of it did not readily pass away. Its natural tendency was to provoke further inquiry; and books, setting forth the claims of Episcopacy, were eagerly sought after and read ; so that prominent instances of subse- quent change of opinion and of conformity to the Church were easily traced back to circumstances con- nected with this incident. The case of Hector Hum- phreys,1 the son of Congregational parents, and early imbued with all the sectarian prejudices, so prevalent
1 He graduated at Yale College in 1818, with the highest distinction, and had but just entered on his theological studies when these pamphlets made their appearance and fell into his hands. They seem to have awakened in him an apprehension that if men of learning and piety, whom he had always been taught to hold in the greatest veneration, could resort to such " base expedients to build up their cause, there must be something radically
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at that day, throughout New England, may be se- lected as a type or representation of those brought under the indirectly converting influences of " A Con- sistent Churchman."
defective in their system. Be this as it may, he could no longer conscien- tiously pursue his theological studies under a system so apparently marked with deformity ; nor did he at that time even dream that he could ever bring his mind into conformity with the conflicting system of the Church. He began therefore, to turn his attention to the study of the law. But in the meantime he made an earnest and thorough investigation of the whole subject in dispute between the Church and the sects. And the result of this investigation was precisely what might have been expected. He was not long in coming to a full conviction of the soundness of the claims of Epis- copacy, and this conviction was followed up by his embracing, openly and unreservedly, the doctrines and worship of the Church." - Annuls of Trinity Parish, MS.
The Rev. Dr. Humphreys died on the 25th of January, 1857, having been President of St. John's College, Annapolis, Maryland, for twenty-five years. He preserved to the last the " Serious Call " and "Sober Appeal," which were the instruments of his conversion to Episcopacy, and used to say that there were no volumes in his library which he valued more highly.
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CHAPTER XVI.
SPECIAL CONVENTION; CONSECRATION OF DR. BROWNELL; GEN- ERAL THEOLOGICAL SEMINARY; AND REVIVAL OF THE CHURCH- MAN'S MAGAZINE.
A. D. 1819-1821.
THE Standing Committee, in compliance with a resolution of the last Annual Convention, summoned the presbyters, deacons, and lay deputies from the several parishes to meet in Trinity Church, New Haven, on the 26th of October, for the transaction of ordinary business; and "on the following day to receive and recognize the Bishop of the Diocese, who was then to be consecrated." Forty-two clergymen, including eight from other dioceses, and forty lay delegates were present, together with a large number of churchmen, drawn to New Haven by the interest of the occasion.
The first day was chiefly occupied with the affairs of the Episcopal Academy. A special committee, ap- pointed at the previous Annual Convention to investi- gate the state of the funds, and all the facts connected with the interest and prosperity of the institution, made their report, accompanied by a fuller statement from the Principal, concerning the "course of studies." He gave sixty as the average number of students in each term, during the last thirteen years, and said : " Of those educated at the Academy since its institu-
.
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tion, twenty-eight have taken Holy Orders, three are now candidates, and about ninety have been qualified to enter the various colleges. The number of those who have been qualified for the professions of law and medicine is considerable, but cannot be correctly ascertained."
The Convention met on the second day of the ses- sion in the old Court-house, and after the transaction of some routine business, and the election of dele- gates to represent the Diocese in the next General Convention, an adjournment took place to attend the consecration. The presbyters, deacons, and lay dele- gates, with the visiting clergymen, then formed a pro- cession from the house of Lieutenant Governor Inger- soll to Trinity Church, accompanied by the Bishop elect and Bishops White, Hobart, and Griswold. The clergy, in those days, were accustomed to appear in the black gown on such occasions. Morning Prayer was read by the Rev. Reuben Ives, and Bishop White, who acted as the consecrator, preached the sermon. Towards the conclusion of it, he addressed himself particularly to his reverend brethren of the Diocese, and referred to his long intercourse with those who had filled the Episcopate among them.
"With your first Bishop, he [the preacher] was con- nected in preparing and establishing the Book of Com- mon Prayer. The Bishops of our Church were then three in number, and one of them, owing to indisposi- tion, was absent from our counsels ; so that the busi- ness was gone over in familiar conversation between your Bishop and him who now addresses you; who has ever since retained a pleasing recollection of the interviews of that period, and of the good sense and
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the Christian temper of the person with whom he was associated.
" After his decease, it was in this city, about twenty- two years ago, when the present speaker was the principal agent in the consecrating of a successor. Many have been the subsequent occasions, when we took sweet counsel together, and walked in the house of God as friends. His memory will be pre- cious to his surviving brother, until he shall follow to the rest that remains to the people of God, when the labors of life shall be over ; if, through divine mercy, he shall attain to such a termination of his pilgrim- age.
" With your Bishop, who has sustained a provisional charge of the Episcopacy among you, the intercourse of your preacher has been longer and more intimate, in consequence of a knowledge of him from his in- fancy ; and while the sense of his active usefulness among you is cherished throughout this Diocese, it is here associated with many recollections which give a personal interest to the issue." 1
The closing duties of the Convention involved a formal relinquishment by Bishop Hobart of his provi- sional charge, and a recognition of the new relation in which the services of that day had placed the Diocese. In the few farewell words which he ad- dressed to his brethren of the clergy and laity, he bore witness to their love and zeal for the pure and primitive doctrines of the Church, and to numerous acts of attention, kindness, and hospitality which could never be forgotten.
" A connection thus consecrated and endeared," said 1 Sermon, pp. 20, 21.
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he, " I cannot consider as now dissolved, without emo- tion. But I should be selfish indeed, if I did not check the feelings of regret, by those of congratula- tion at the auspicious event which this day places over you a Bishop, who, in the fidelity and the talents that have distinguished him in the stations which he has hitherto filled, has inspired our sanguine expecta- tions of his great usefulness in the important relation which he will now sustain to you."
The Convention was not ungrateful to him for his eminent services in the Diocese, and the words used by the committee appointed to draft an address of thanks, show well enough that he and his work would long be remembered. Speaking of his sacrifice and labors in adding the care of the Church in this State to the arduous duties of his own Episcopate, they said : -
" When we consider that this sacrifice was made, and these labors undertaken, without any view to pecuniary interest, and when we call to mind the eminent services which you have rendered ; the new impulse which your visitations have given to our zeal ; and the general success which has attended the exer- cise of your Episcopal functions, we feel bound to offer to the great Head of the Church and Supreme Disposer of all things, our sincere and heartfelt ac- knowledgment of the distinguished blessings which he has been pleased to confer upon us through the me- dium of your services."
But the Rev. Dr. Bronson, president of the Standing Committee, presented, in behalf of the Convention, a longer address to Bishop Brownell, recognizing him as their Diocesan, and anticipating an increase of zeal
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and unanimity in promoting the interests of religion, and in drawing men "by gentle persuasives to be reconciled to the Divine Saviour of the world, and to walk in love and peace together." Their memories lingered around the struggles of the past, and they could not refrain from alluding to them on an occasion when their hearts were filled with so much joy.
" Looking back to the time when that venerable man, Bishop Seabury, the first Protestant Bishop in America, took charge of this Diocese, and reflecting on what we this day have witnessed, we see abundance of reason for thanksgiving and praise to the Great Head of the Church. Under his prudent, yet ener- getic administration, and that of his dignified succes- sor, we have increased greatly in numbers ; we have become a consolidated and uniform body; as far as is consistent with fallen human nature we are united in doctrine, in discipline, and the service we render to Almighty God. By the liberality of our civil rulers, and the joint contributions of the Church at large, we are now able, we hope, to disencumber the Episcopal office of parochial services, that it may be wholly dedicated to its peculiar duties. For the accomplish- ment of this so desirable an object, much has been due to the exertions and unremitting recommenda- tions of those two eminent characters in our Church"
And in replying to this part of the address, Bishop Brownell said : "In the performance of my duties, it shall be my endeavor to imitate that prudence and zeal which characterized the earliest Bishop of this Diocese and of this country, and to cultivate those virtues which distinguished his immediate successor. These venerable men have gone to their reward, and
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we now enjoy the fruit of their labors. While we cherish their services and their worth in grateful remembrance, we cannot be unmindful of the zealous and disinterested services of a bishop now present, who has, for two years past, performed the Episcopal duties of this Diocese, under the XXth Canon of the General Convention. Having lived under his Episco- pal jurisdiction ever since the Church has enjoyed the benefit of his labors in this present station, and having been for the year past associated with him in the inti- mate relation of assistant in his parochial labors, I should do violence to my feelings if I neglected, on the present occasion, to acknowledge my obligations to his personal friendship, or to express my sense of his ser- vices in this Diocese, and to the Church at large."
These addresses of welcome and congratulation closed the solemnities of the day, and all returned to their respective homes with new hopes and raised ex- pectations. Bishop Brownell removed his family to Hartford, and he was chosen to the temporary charge of Christ Church in that city, which the Rev. Mr. Wainwright resigned to accept the station of assistant minister of Trinity Church, New York, made vacant by his own elevation to the Episcopate of Connecticut. He began his official duties with an ordination to the Diaconate at Middletown, on the 17th of Novem- ber ; and, a week afterwards, he consecrated the new church in Sharon, built of brick, and the church in Kent. He also administered the rite of con- firmation in both these churches the same week, in the former to forty-six persons and in the latter to thirty-five. Between the date of his consecration and the meeting of the Annual Convention in June of the
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