USA > Connecticut > The history of the Episcopal Church in Connecticut, Vol. II > Part 23
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Frequent changes in the presidency are always to be avoided, because always injurious to the prosperity 1 Charge, 1836, pp. 22, 23.
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of a college. Care should be taken to select for that office men who are well fitted to its responsibilities and duties by experience and attainment, and then none but the best reasons should be allowed to pro- duce a dissolution of the connection. The Trustees resolved at length to fill the vacancy, occasioned by the resignation of Dr. Wheaton, with one who, though he had gained no celebrity in the Church, had yet proved himself eminently successful in one depart- ment of collegiate instruction. Thus they chose their own Professor of Mathematics and Natural Phil- osophy, the Rev. Silas Totten, D. D.
The constitution of the Episcopal Academy of Con- necticut, at the instance of the Board of Trustees, was carefully revised by the Convention of 1836, and among the changes introduced, was one giving to the corporation the power of choosing the Principal, - a power hitherto held by the Convention of the Dio- cese. Other features, better suited to the object of a preparatory school of the highest order, were incor- porated into the several articles, and as much of the old letter retained as comported with the design of the new organization. At a meeting of the Trustees in May, the Rev. Allen C. Morgan, Rector of St. John's Church, Waterbury, was appointed provisional Principal, but he did not accept the appointment until it had been renewed with great unanimity by the Convention of 1836, when he immediately prepared to enter upon its duties. Success attended his efforts to revive the Academy, and restore it to the measure of its ancient prosperity, but, at the end of two years, his sudden death, while on a journey to New York, again created a vacancy, which was filled by electing
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as Principal the author of this work, at that time the youthful Rector of St. Peter's Church in Cheshire.
The Convention of 1836 revised, also, the Consti- tution of the Church in the Diocese, in accordance with amendments proposed the previous year, and put back, to its old historic place in June, the time of the annual meeting.
St. James's Church, Westville, in the town of New Haven, St. Mark's Church, New Britain, and Christ Church, Westport, were new parishes, added, the first named in 1835, the other two in 1836, to the list of those in union with the Convention. Houses of wor- ship were erected at once for each of these parishes, and, in several of the older ones, steps were taken which indicated the advancement of the Church. A chapel was built and consecrated in the autumn of 1835, at Bethel, in Danbury, out of which has since sprung a thrifty parochial organization. A spacious church of gray stone, not architecturally imposing or attractive, was built by St. John's parish, Bridge- port, and a smaller one, of like material and better design, by the parish in Guilford, and both were con- secrated in 1838. Within the period embraced in this chapter, new churches were consecrated at North Haven, Bethlehem, Southport, Bristol, Oxford, Milton, Bridgewater, New Milford, Glastenbury, Brookfield, Trumbull, and Cheshire. Those at North Haven, Glastenbury, Bethlehem, and Cheshire, were con- structed of brick, the rest of wood.
In his address to the Annual Convention of 1837, Bishop Brownell referred to the fact, that he had been able to visit all the parishes of the Diocese, with few exceptions, each year since his "withdrawal from
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the charge of Washington College." But, he went on to say, "it becomes a question of considerable moment, whether such frequent visitations are really useful to the parishes ? I certainly deem it useful annually to become acquainted with the condition of each particular parish ; and it affords me, personally, much gratification annually to meet each of my brethren of the clergy in his own domestic circle, to see the faces of my brethren of the laity, and to enjoy the hospitality and kindness which, on such occasions, I never fail to experience. Yet it may reasonably be questioned, whether such frequent visitations do not diminish the interest which would otherwise be attached to them? I would especially call the attention of the clergy and of the Conven- tion to this question, in reference to the holy rite of Confirmation. When that rite is administered annually, there will be, of course, but a small number to receive it. Does not the smallness of the number sometimes detract from the interest which the clergy- man and the congregation would otherwise attach to the administration of it ? When it is felt, too, that the rite may be received the very next season, does not this consideration sometimes lead to a postpone- ment of the preparation for it to another, and another, and another year ? And do not such frequent visita- tions sometimes become rather opportunities for the gratification of private friendship, than the occasions for the performance of official duties ? The question here presented is one on which my own mind is not yet definitely settled. I leave it with my brethren for their future consideration and ultimate counsel."
And his brethren, in taking up the subject the
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next year, referred it to a committee, who suggested an alteration in the time and manner of making his visitations. "The number of congregations in the Diocese," said they, "is such, that if the Bishop visits them all every year, in those seasons which are favor- able for an attendance on public worship, his stay in each parish must, necessarily, be very short. This circumstance, alone, may account for the occasional negligence which exists on the part of the clergy to accompany the Bishop in his visitations, and the con- sequent transient effects produced by them. Could the clergy be excited to take a deep interest in them, and accompany the Bishop in sufficient numbers to show the laity that they consider them important, and to enable the rector of the parish visited to have such additional services as the situation of his parish might require, this evil might be remedied."
Hence resolutions were adopted, to the effect, that it be not expected of the Bishop to visit each parish every year, - the canon then, as now, required an Episcopal visitation once in three years,- but that it be recommended to him, so to arrange his visitations as to allow more time to each parish, and that the clergy accompany him on such visitations as far as their respective duties would permit.
Great sensibility to the concerns of religion was evinced in Connecticut, soon after Bishop Brownell put forth his suggestions. A revival prevailed in some parts of the State, and symptoms of renewed vitality were seen in many parishes, that called for special visitations. As a consequence of this, he reported, in 1838, a larger number of persons con- firmed than he had reported in any one year during
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the preceding five. The number of parishes visited was not much diminished in the next two years, and from 1829, when he summed up his confirmations, to 1840, he had added to the list four thousand eight hundred and seventy-two, making in all, to that date, since his consecration to the Episcopate, including those confirmed during his first two visits to the southwest, eight thousand two hundred and forty-six. The communicants, in 1840, as reported in fifty-eight parishes, were five thousand four hundred and sixty- eight, but as no returns were received from full a score of the smaller parishes, the whole number in the Diocese must have been, at least, six thousand. The aggregate of new communicants since 1819 ex- ceeded this number.
The " Episcopal Watchman," a weekly paper de- voted to the interests of the Church in Connecticut, was published in Hartford for seven years, and then, in the beginning of 1834, it was discontinued, and the list of subscribers was transferred to a New York publication. But the churchmen of the Diocese, who had been so long accustomed to a periodical of their own, were not content to be thus served, and a lay- man1 was encouraged in a scheme of issuing another
1 Alonzo B. Chapin, Esq., the son of a Congregational minister, and edu- cated for the legal profession. He read himself into the Episcopal Church, and, becoming a candidate for Holy Orders, was ordained a deacon in 1838. He was a student of remarkable industry, and stored his mind with a fund of varied knowledge, some of which he put forth in the shape of pamphlets, reviews, and books, that gained for him a wide reputation among churchmen. He was too rapid a writer to be always accurate, and more care and scholarship would have added to the value of his historical publications. The work by which he is best known, is A view of the Organization and Order of the Primitive Church. He was honored with the degree of D. D. by the Norwich University, of Vermont, and died at Hartford, after much bodily suffering, in 1858, at the age of 50.
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weekly paper, to be called the "Chronicle of the Church." It was an inauspicious time to begin an enterprise of this sort, for the embarrassments in the commercial world were great, and there was much derangement in the currency of the country. But, with liberal promises in the outset, and a partial indorsement of the object by the Convention of the Diocese, the paper, the first number of which was issued at . New Haven, Epiphany, 1837, soon ob- tained a fair circulation, and was continued under the charge of its original editor for eight years, when it was removed to Hartford, and merged in “The Calendar." 1
The number of candidates for Holy Orders con- tinued to increase in Connecticut, without really adding many to the list of the parochial clergy. Age and infirmity gradually removed the names which had stood the longest on this list, and the Rev. Reuben Ives went to his rest in October, 1836, hav- ing several years before retired from the active duties of the ministry. But Ashbel Baldwin, Daniel Bur- hans, and Truman Marsh, each without any charge, still lingered, the only survivors of those belong- ing to Connecticut who were ordained by its first Bishop.
As fast as the new candidates were admitted to the priesthood, they seemed to be wanted in other Dioceses;
1 This was a weekly paper published, under different editors, until 1866, when it took the name of the Connecticut Churchman, and the next year it assumed a broader title, The Churchman. No official sanction by the Convention, of what has become a strictly private enterprise, has been sought or given for nearly thirty years. It has long been the uni- versal feeling that Church periodicals of all kinds, in this country, must depend for support upon their intrinsic merits.
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and there were those among them who could not well decline the invitations to rectorships elsewhere, that promised a liberal support and a wide field of useful- ness. In 1840, Bishop Brownell stated, in his address to the Annual Convention, that he had granted, dur- ing the previous year, letters dimissory to thirteen clergymen, - ten of them being natives of Connecti- cut. The parishes were constantly gaining strength, and the weaker ones were beginning to ask for more frequent services, and all for " clergymen who were supposed to possess higher qualifications of learning or talents." But there was an evil, in the power of the laity to remedy, which lay at the bottom of much of this uncertainty in the pastoral relations. While many of the necessaries of life had become more expensive, - some of them having doubled in value, - and while the wages of common laborers and of mechanics had been increased in the same proportion, there was not a corresponding improvement in the provision made for the maintenance of the clergy. Their salaries in Connecticut stood, substantially, where they had stood for twenty years, and, as tax- ing had ceased, and the support of religion was wholly voluntary, large parishes in the agricultural towns appeared to think they were doing liberally, if they each paid an annual salary of five hundred dollars. Even this, in some cases, was doled out in a way quite unsatisfactory and embarrassing to the receivers.
Bishop Brownell, therefore, very properly called the attention of the laity to the subject, in 1839, and urged them to inquire whether justice was extended to the labors of the clergy. He spoke of the con-
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stant demands for " higher qualifications in classical education," and then said : -
" The money now required to carry a young man through the Academy, the College, and the Theologi- cal Seminary, would purchase a considerable farm, or constitute a moderate capital for the young manu- facturer, mechanic, or merchant. And yet how dif- ferent are the worldly prospects of these classes ? The industrious farmer may secure a competence for his family, or even rise to affluence. The mechanic, the manufacturer, and the merchant may become rich, through the many avenues of enterprise. But the clergyman, whose intelligence might find such scope in the pursuits of ambition, must be content with the mere necessaries of life. And if he leaves a family behind him, when he is called from his labors, they must be consigned to the charities of the world, or to the care of more fortunate relatives or friends.
" It is true that the clergyman has higher ends and aims than the acquisition of wealth. It is also true, that the cares of riches might tend to withdraw his thoughts from his more sacred duties. But it must be remembered that poverty has also its cares. And, though I would not wish to see a wealthy clergy, I would desire to see every clergyman's mind freed from corroding anxieties in regard to the immediate support of his family ; and I think it not too much to desire, also, that he should be able to lay aside some little provision for the support of his old age, or to secure a bereaved family from absolute want.
" In this Diocese, I know of no clergyman with a family, who receives greater compensation for his VOL. II. 21
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services than is necessary for his immediate and mod- erate support. I know of many who are scarcely able to maintain their families, with the most rigid economy, and who have a hard struggle to keep free from the humiliation of unpaid demands for the com- mon necessaries of life. The condition of the unmar- ried clergy is but little better, for, in most cases, any modicum they may be able to save from their neces- sary expenses must be expended in books, or applied to the payment of debts incurred during their prep- aration for the ministry.
" Brethren of the laity, these things ought not so to be. They are repugnant to justice, to humanity, and to Scripture. 'The laborer is worthy of his hire.' .
" I say not these things at the instance of the clergy, for they are as uncomplaining as they are self-denying. But, as Providence has placed me in a station to witness their privations, as well as their devoted labors, and knowing, as I do, the discourage- ments which those privations throw in the way of those who are looking forward to the sacred office, I should be unfaithful to my duty, and unjust to my feelings, if I failed to inculcate upon the several parishes of this Diocese the immediate necessity of a more adequate provision for the support of their clergy."
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CHAPTER XXIII.
EDUCATION IN THE CHURCH; OXFORD TRACTS; FOURTH CHARGE OF BISHOP BROWNELL; AND NEW PARISHES.
A. D. 1840 - 1843.
THE public schools of Connecticut offered so many advantages for a preliminary course of instruction, that churchmen committed their children to them, regardless of the evils by which they were attended. The munificent fund provided by the State for the purposes of primary education, continued to operate as a check upon the establishment of parochial schools or private seminaries. But the question was sometimes raised, whether efforts ought not to be encouraged for bringing a larger number of the children of Episcopalians under the constant influ- ence of the teachings of the Church ? It was felt to be unwise to subject to sectarian influences those youth, especially, who must be sent from home to finish their education, or who, having passed beyond the common schools, needed the higher instruction of the academy to prepare them for college, or for the counting-room. The Diocesan institution at Cheshire, though prosperous and doing its work well, could not provide for all of this class.
The fashion of family boarding-schools for each sex, separately, was now extending, and, from time to time, a few clergymen of the Diocese, with insuffi-
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cient salaries from their parishes, or with a taste for teaching, were induced to advertise for scholars, and to make arrangements for their reception in the best manner they could. With limited accommodations, the number in each case was usually, at first, small, but out of these and similar efforts have grown pri- vate educational institutions, which, receiving pupils from different sections of the country, have had a long season of prosperity, and benefited the Church at the same time that they have rewarded, in a measure, the toil of their projectors. During the period from childhood to youth, external influences are the most potent in their operation, and for this reason, teachers who command the respect and affec- tion of their pupils, will naturally impress upon them, even though they use none of the arts of proselytism, their own views of important questions concerning morals and religion. It is an inaccurate assumption, that if there be given to a child certain general principles, he will, of himself, erect upon them the proper superstructure. As the natural tendency of the human mind is not to right doctrines, so no Christian parent, living in the faith of our Church, can consent to leave it to the individual judgment of his son to fix what course he will pursue, and what creed he shall adopt.
The Convention of 1840, acting upon that part of Bishop Brownell's address which related to the sub- ject of education, adopted the report of a committee, which contained these words : -
"Let churchmen patronize their own institutions. All similar institutions are now, by tacit and common consent, under the influence of particular denomina-
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tions. If we send our children where their religious faith is in danger of being perverted, we have no one to blame for it but ourselves. Let the clergy exert themselves, by persuasion and remonstrance, to induce the laity, in their respective cures, not to sacrifice to convenience or to fancied intellectual ad- vantages, the spiritual welfare of their children."
Appended to the whole report were several resolu- lutions, and among them one : -
"That it is the duty of every member of the Church in this Diocese to unite in establishing, or improving, if already established, Episcopal acade- mies or other schools for the higher instruction of youth, and not to expose the children of the Church to be perverted by sectarian influences."
All this was recommended in reference to institu- tions for males, and the College at Hartford, about which there was dissatisfaction in some quarters, be- cause it did not attract a larger number of students, was presented to the Convention, not only as deser- ving a place in the hearts of Connecticut churchmen, but as entitled to the confidence and support of those who belonged to other dioceses. The education of females, quite as important in many of its aspects as that of males, was not touched directly in the report, and it has never been made a subject of legislation or public counsel by the Church in Connecticut. But seminaries for this purpose were established in some of the principal towns of the State by Christian women, upon their own responsibility, and under the patronage of leading clergymen and laymen ; and many parishes in remote parts of the land, as well as nearer home, have felt the influence of the good
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training of those who, from school-girls, have become mistresses of households, and zealous promoters of the interests of the Episcopal Church.
A theological movement in England, under the management of a few distinguished divines of Oxford, assumed a character which was beginning to create uneasiness and alarm. The growth of latitudinarian sentiments, and the ignorance which prevailed con- cerning the spiritual claims of the Church, were evils in the mother country, which the writers of the " Tracts for the Times " at first professed to be desir- ous of reaching and remedying. But, in their zeal to revive neglected usages and excite a veneration for Catholic antiquity, they seemed to be carried beyond their original purpose, as announced, and they were led to make statements in their writings which conflicted with the principles of the English Reformation, and rendered them liable to the charge of Romanizing tendencies. Feelings of strong parti- sanship were indulged in the controversy which fol- lowed the publication of the Tracts, and while the Oxford divines embraced every opportunity to clear themselves from the imputation of Popery, and de- nied that Church principles could ever become the path to superstition and idolatry, their opponents, on the other hand, persistently charged them with look- ing in the direction of Rome, and forsaking and con- demning the spirit and doctrines of the English Re- formers.
With the appearance of the Tracts in this country came much of the evil of the foreign controversy, and party spirit, for a time, ran high in the Church. As a consequence, the publications were both de-
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fended and denounced by those who had never read them ; and the judgment of the clergy, and of intel- ligent laymen, interested in theological science, was, in a measure, forestalled by the discussions and state- ments about them in the popular periodicals of the day. Connecticut was not a good field in which to carry on a controversy of this kind, and, perhaps, no Diocese in the land manifested less concern in the progress of the whole movement. Bishop Brownell referred to the subject in his address to the Annual Convention of 1840, and he was so well convinced of the truth and propriety of the sentiments which he then expressed, that he repeated them in his ad- dress the next year without changing a word. After stating his repugnance to innovation, and his desire to see his brethren pursuing a course "equally free from the errors of the Romish superstition, on the one hand, and from the novelties and devices of sectarian dissent, on the other," he added some words about the controversies which had sprung from the Oxford Tracts, and said : -
" If the learned authors have sometimes manifested an undue veneration for the writings of the early Fathers of the Church, and an undue admiration for some ceremonies dropped at the Reformation, there can be little danger from their enthusiasm on these subjects, in a country of free discussion ; and a nearer approximation to the truth will be the probable result in England of the present controversy. I cannot help thinking, however, that in that country much of the heat of this controversy, and much of the interest which it has excited, have been occasioned by its con- nection with those party politics, and sectarian preju-
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dices, which prevail there. In our own country, the first of these causes can have no influence, and the lat- ter must be much less strongly felt ; and we should be unable to account for the sensation which the discus- sion has excited among us, were it not for the influ- ence of those sympathies and antipathies which, in the present state of intercourse, are so easily propa- gated across the Atlantic.
" The circumstances under which our Church has grown up in this country, have led us to regard it in its true character, not as a State establishment, but as a divine institution. As a minor denomination of Christians, too, we have been constantly compelled to act on the defensive, and have been more gen- erally accustomed, than our English brethren, to refer its constitution to the appropriate Scriptural author- ity, and its usages to those early Christian writings, by which they can be successfully defended.
" Though I do not imagine that the Tracts referred to, or the discussions which have grown out of them, will lead to any material change of sentiment in regard to the doctrines, discipline, or usages of the Church, as they are now received and practiced by us, yet the writers will not fail to command our respect for their learning, their talents, and their piety. And if the controversies which they have aroused, both in England and in this country, are attended with some violations of Christian charity, it is to be hoped that the evil will be counterbalanced, in the ultimate elucidation and establishment of truth.
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