USA > Massachusetts > Middlesex County > Wakefield > Wakefield Congregational church; a commemorative sketch. 1644-1877 > Part 1
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Gc 974.402 W13b 1847503
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REYNOLDS HISTORICAL GENEALOGY COLLECTION
5.
ALLEN COUNTY PUBLIC LIBRARY 3 1833 01105 4324
WAKEFIELD
CONGREGATIONALCHURCH
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A COMMEMORATIVE SKETCH.
1644-1877.
BY .
REV. CHARLES R. BLISS, Pastor of the Church.
Wthese are the Fathers.
THE NEWBERRY LIBRARY CHICAGO
WAKEFIELD : W. H. TWOMBLY, PRINTER, WAKEFIELD'S BLOCK. 1877.
1847503
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WAKEFIELD, December 16, 1876.
DEAR SIR :
At an informal meeting of the congregation, held on Thanks- giving Day, November 30th, 1876, immediately after the religious services in the Congregational Church, there was an earnest expression of desire that the sermon then just listened to, respecting the Old Pastors of the First Parish, as also a former historical discourse preached by you last June, might be preserved in printed form. for more general circulation and usefulness ; and we were appointed a committee to carry such desire into effect, if we might with your favor and consent.
Pursuant to such commission and authority, and in accordance with our own sincere wishes, we respectfully solicit the use of your manuscripts of the historical discourses referred to, for publication, knowing them to be the fruit of much labor, thought and research-containing matter of great value and local interest-and believing this progressive generation may well pause a moment in its swift career, and gain new lessons in Courage, Faith and Duty, from the solemn Voices of the Past.
Trusting for your co-operation, and with feelings of high respect and warm personal regard, we are
Very Truly Yours, LUCIUS BEEBE. GEORGE R. MORRISON. JOHN G. ABORN. THOMAS WINSHIP. GEORGE W. ABORN. CHESTER W. EATON.
REV. CHARLES R. BLISS.
WAKEFIELD, Dec. 21, IS76.
DEAR BRETHREN :
I have received your communication relative to the historical discourses lately preached in our Church, and sincerely thank you for the kind terms in which you have addressed me.
We honor ourselves in paying due respect to the memory and the work of the worthy men whose places we occupy; and, since the interest I have felt in reviewing the long and successful career of the Church is so generally shared, I cheerfully accede to your request.
Reciprocating your sentiments of regard, I am
Yours Truly, CHARLES R. BLISS.
Messrs. LUCIUS BEEBE, GEORGE R. MORRISON, JOHN G. ABORN, THOMAS WINSHIP, GEORGE W. ABORN, CHESTER W. EATON.
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https://archive.org/details/wakefieldcongreg 1644blis
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INTRODUCTORY NOTE.
He who would understand the chief characteristics of the early life of New England, must study the history of her churches. The highest acts of men give to the world the best ground for an estimate concerning them: and the churches, absorbing as they did anxious thought, patient toil and unselfish endeavor, are mirrors in which we may see clearly reflected the characters of our fathers. Unhappily, they who make history do not always write it ; and we there- fore lack desirable facilities for tracing the church life of the Puritans. The records of the first church in Wakefield, though nearly continuous are not full, and are wholly silent upon various matters about which the church was with sister churches deeply interested. Yet they disclose a sufficient number of leading facts to give very clear impressions of the progress of the church, the character of the ministry. the questions which at various times agitated it, and the tone of belief and feeling by which it has been characterized.
This volume had its origin in the quickened historical spirit of the centennial year. A discourse upon the history of the church was prepared and preached, when it was found that the material at hand demanded another sermon. A Com- memorative Gathering, to which the colonies of the church in adjoining towns, and the churches of this place, were invited to send representatives, was held, and speeches and letters
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made the occasion memorable. It was, as previous corres- pondence indicates, thought best to preserve what had been rescued, and, as any change of form in the material prepared would be attended with some sacrifice, the discourses, some- what extended, are printed as they were preached. A brief account of the gathering follows. Mindful of the pleasure which the discovery of an exact picture of the church as it was in 1676, or 1776, would have given us, we have attempt- ed to give a picture of its condition in 1876 for the pleasure of our successors, to whom we send herewith our cordial salutations.
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CONTENTS.
1 .- A SKETCH OF THE CHURCH.
2 .- BRIEF NOTICES OF EIGHT PASTORS - REV. HENRY GREEN, REV. RICHARD BROWN, REV. SAMUEL HAUGH, REV. WILLIAM HOBBY, REV. JOHN BROCK, REV. CALEB PRENTICE, REV. JONATHAN PIERPONT, REV. REUBEN EMERSON.
3 .- AN ACCOUNT OF À COMMEMORATIVE GATHERING. · 4 .- FACTS REGARDING THE PRESENT CONDITION OF THE CHURCH.
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CONCERNING THE CHURCH.
JOHN 4, 38-Other men labored, and ye are entered into their labors.
This day is this scripture fulfilled in your cars. Look around you. Let your eye glance up and down these pleas- ant streets, upon these public buildings and private dwellings, and over these cultivated gardens and outlying farms ; and then go back two hundred and thirty-two years, and look again about you. Rocks and tangled thickets fill the courses of these smoothly-gravelled highways. The public common with its graceful elms, the fields now leveled and fruitful. and the very sites of these comely houses, are wild with cedars and hemlocks; while marshes stretch hither and thither between these lakes, and the Indian and the wild beast dispute with each other the right to possess that which neither can hold. What a contrast is this ! It is as wide as that between civilization and barbarism. Do we ask who were its authors? . We are compelled to answer that we are not. Other men labored, and we have entered into their labors. What those labors were, in all their variety and dif- ficulty and completeness, it were impossible to comprehend. Every generation performed its allotted share. The felling of the forests, and the organization and growth of the munici- pality, the school, and the church. proceeded simultaneously, and when one generation rested from its toil, its successor, with motives equally pure, and courage equally strong, step- ped into its place.
Bearing in mind the variety of the labors of those first generations, you will not expect me to speak of all depart- ments of their work. The accomplished historian of the town has produced an invaluable volume, in which municipal
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and social affairs are presented with great fidelity ; but it did not fall within the scope of that work to trace the church life of your fathers. This, I propose, to some extent, to do. Should any one say that this is but the centennial year, an'l hardly justifies one in going back more than twice one hun- dred years, I reply-the value of the centennial year con- sists, chiefly, in the fact that it revives the historic spirit : and when one goes back as far as to the grand period of the Revolution, he can hardly fail to go back to the grander pe- riod signalized by the first consecration of this land to civil and religious freedom.
Not far from the year 1642, a small company of people. some of whom had just arrived from England, and others of whom had been a brief time in the country, left the shelter of friendly homes in Lynn, and planted themselves on this spot. Too few in number to form, at once, a church, they waited till the Autumn of 1644," or that of 1645. when fresh accessions enabled them to fulfil their purpose. I will read to you from the ancient record. as traced by a hand that more than two hundred years ago "forgot its cunning." the names of those brethren :
Francis Smith.
Lieut. Marshall and his wife.
Mrs. Green.
Eliz. Wiley.
Will. Cowdrey and his wife.
Eliz. Hart.
John Pierson and his wife.
Lidia Lakin.
Bro. Dunton.
Eliza Hooper.
George Davis.
Zach. Fitch and his wife.
Thos. Kendall and his wife.
Will. Eaton and his wife.
Thos. Parker and his wife.
John Batchelder and his wife.
William Hooper.
Will. Martin.
Mary Swain.
Thos. Bancroft.
Joan Marshall.
Jonas Eaton and his wife.
Thos. Marshall.
Judith Pool.
Sister Martin.
Abigail Damion.
Thos. Hartshorn and his wife. Lieut Smith and his wife. Edward Taylor and his wife.
* The exact date of the founding of the church is in doubt. In favor of placing it in the year 1614. there Is authority as follows :- (a) Tradition in the church. Rev. Richard Brown . writing in 1720, mentions that year. The Bi-centennial celebration of the church was ob- served in 1844. (b) Johnson, the author of The Wonder Working Providence, published In
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It would give us great satisfaction to know the precise spot where, with prayer and psalm and solemn covenant. they dedicated themselves to God and to each other. It was probably on the street now called Albion, not far from its eastern end. But to the genuine New Englander truth is more important than any dress it may wear, and covenants are more sacred than any places in which they may have been taken; and although we know not the precise spot where the founders of this church pledged themselves to each other and to Christ, we do possess the exact words in which they did so. Inasmuch as few of you have ever heard the articles which for more than a hundred years serv- ed this church as both creed and covenant, I will quote a por- tion of them :
"We give up ourselves to the Lord Jesus Christ, to be ruled and guided by him in the matter of his worship and in our whole conversa- tion, acknowledging him not only our alone Saviour, but also our King to reign and rule over us, and our Prophet and Teacher, by his word and spirit. Forsaking all other teachers and doctrines which he has not commanded, we wholly disclaim our own righteousness in point of jus- tification, and do cleave unto him for righteousness and life, grace and glory.
We do farther promise, by the help of Christ, to walk with our breth- ren and sisters of the congregation in the spirit of brotherly love, watch- ing over them and caring for them, avoiding all jealousies, suspicions, backbitings, censurings, quarrelings, and secret risings of the heart against them, forgiving and forbearing, and yet seasonably admonishing and restoring them by a spirit of meekness, and set them in joint again that have been, through infirmity, overtaken in any fault among us.
We resolve, in the same strength, to approve ourselves in our partic-
1654, gives 1644 as the date. As he was an inhabitant of the neighboring town of Woburn, he would be likely to know the fact. (c) The early authorities of the Colony were opposed to the incorporation of a town till a church had been formed; and the town was certainly incorporated iu 1644. In favor of 1645, the chief authority is Gov. Win- tinop. He gives in his history Nov. 3, 1645, as the date. He is followed by Hubbard and Spotford. But he also gives the date of the incorporation of the town as 1645. Since the reconl of the General Court proves this to have been an error, it is fair to infer that he was cynally astray respecting the date at which the church was gathered. From some source not easily ascertained, a mistake has been formerly made regarding the number of churches that were formed in the Colony before this one. Johnson, mentioned above, says that this was the twenty-fourth. The order was as follows :-- Salem, Charlestown, Dorchester, Bos- lon. Roxbury, Lynn, Watertown, Cambridge, Ipswich, Newbury, Cambridge 2d, Concord, Hingham, Dedham, Weymouth, Rowley, Hampton, Salisbury, Sudbury, Braintree, Glonees- ter, Dover, Woburn, Reading.
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ular callings, shunning idleness, not slothful in business, knowing that idleness is the bane of any society. Neither will we deal hardly or oppressingly with any wherein we are the Lord's stewards; promising to the best of our abilities to teach our children the good knowledge of the Lord, that they also may learn to fear him and serve him with us, that it may go well with them and with us forever."
With such vows and promises, they might well anticipate what we behold in the fulfilment of the passage-"The wil- derness and the solitary place shall be glad for them, and the desert shall rejoice and blossont as the rose." The for- tunes of the infant church were, on the whole, prosperous. Its numbers increased, though its pastorate was, during the first eighteen years, twice interrupted by death. Though the early records are brief. they attest very plainly two facts. The discipline of the church was very careful ; and its members were fully alive to questions in which all the churches of the colony were interested.
Every generation has its own peculiar and vexing difficul- ties with which to deal ; and the first and second generations in the New England churches had their full share of them. The chief of these grew out of the unsettled mutual relations of civil to religious affairs. To explain this difficulty it is necessary to revert to a certain underlying idea which moved our fathers to come to these shores. Their ambition was to found a Christian state ; and the best method of doing it awakened inquiries upon which the leading minds among them expended long and anxious thought. Their conclusions at length took shape in the principle which, in 1631, the Gen- eral Court framed into a law that-the right of voting should be confined to members of churches. Mistaken as we now see the conclusion to have been, we have no right to impeach the motives of those who reached and adopted it. In the nature of the case, however, it could not stand. The require- ments for entering the churches were rigid. There were worthy and conscientious people who could not enter them. and, what was still more portentous in the fears of the first members, many of their own children did not incline to en- ter them. Deep solicitude was at length awakened, not only .
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in Massachusetts, but also in Connecticut ; and a synod was convened in Boston in 1657, to examine the whole subject, and advise the churches upon it. The conclusions of that synod were unfortunate. Not seeing the wisdom of wholly separating church and state, they attempted to meet the dif- ficulty by devising a modified kind of church membership- one to which Scripture gave no sanction, and one the work- ing of which proved most disastrous. They decided that the baptized children of church members might, by a simple declaration of their belief in the Bible and the religion of Christ, without any experimental knowledge of religion, be accounted members of the church in so far as to entitle them to have their children baptized, which would also invest them with the right to act in public affairs.
This decision, involving as it did a wide departure from grounds previously occupied, encountered powerful opposi- tion from the churches, and especially from the laity. An- other synod was called five years later, embracing among its members the pastor of this church-Rev. Samuel Haugh- and the decision was re-affirmed. Soon, as we learn from our records, it was brought before this church for their judg- ment-for it was never the custom of the churches to accept any decrees of synods or councils till they had themselves examined them.
The propositions and the result of the action of this church are recorded as follows :
" The minds of the brethren being tried as to the practice of the children's duty to own the covenant in order to their children's baptism, themselves not in full communion-(1) It was propounded in a church meeting whether confederate visible believers in particular churches, and their infant seed whose next parents one or both are in covenant, are acknowledged according to Scripture to be the approved members of the visible church. (2) Whether the infant seed of the church, be- ing members of the same church with their parents, are, when they are adult or grown up. personally under the watch, discipline and govern- ment of that church. (3) Whether such persons not admitted to full communion, being without such further qualifications as the word of God requireth thereunto, Fet nevertheless, they understanding the doc- trines of faith, and publicly professing their assent thereunto, not scan- dalous in life, and solemnly owaing the covenant before the church,
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wherein they give up themselves and their children to the Lord, and subject themselves to the government of Christ in the church, -their children are to be baptized. '
The propositions were voted and passed on the affirmative part. The brethren consented thereto by their silence, and afterwards by their usual sign, nemine contradicente."
At first sight, the concluding portion of the third of these articles would seem to be sufficiently stringent to exclude all from the church, save such as professed conversion; but it was not so interpreted. The condition to full communion was a narrative of personal experience, describing the special reasons the candidate could present for believing himself a Christian. A. formal act of owning the covenant, and ac- knowledging God, and submitting to the government of the church, was held to be consistent with the denial that one was an actual disciple of Christ, in the New Testament sense. Hence, a person could be a member of the church, while neither he nor others believed he was a Christian. In adopt- ing this plan, those usually far-sighted men did not see that, in the process of time, many would be introduced into the churches who would have no sympathy with the doctrines preached ; nor did they forecast the time, which actually came, when a wide-spread defection from the old standards would take place. Resorting to a human contrivance to strengthen the churches, they made them weak. With all they had learned, they did not yet understand that the fewer connections the gospel has with anything that appeals to the ambition or self-interest of men, the more vigorous will be its life, and the steadier will be its advance. But they were striking out a new path, and having the benefit neither of the experience nor the mistakes of others, their failure but shows that they were men.
Descend now one full century from that time. You reach the year 1765-ten years before the opening of the Revolu- tion. Great changes have occurred. All the first settlers are gone, and the third generation till their places. The for- ests have disappeared ; comfortable dwellings have been erected ; and roads have been built. The first small meeting
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house has given place to one of more pretending aspect, standing a little to the north and west of this spot-a build- ing already ancient and dilapidated, and destined in three years from that time to yield its place to the structure within whose well-kept frame we are to-day sitting. It is the 2nd day of September-a week day ; but the church is open, and the saddled horses standing about the door indicate that some meeting is in progress. We enter, and find ourselves in a business meeting of the old church. The chairman is Dea. Benjamin Brown, senior, whose son, also a deacon, is des- tined ten years later to be a member of the first provincial Congress, a Colonel, and afterward a General in the army. The secretary is Dea. Brown Emerson-the grandfather of your old pastor, Rev. Reuben Emerson. There are Ban- crofts and Temples and Nichollses present. We learn from their remarks that Parson Hobby had two months before de- parted this life, and that they had just observed a day of sol- emu fasting and prayer. They have now assembled to dis- cuss a grave matter of church administration. From other sources we know that great uncertainty of religious opinions was prevailing. The seed planted one hundred years before was bringing forth its fruit. And this meeting was held to determine the proper answer to be given to two questions. One was-whether it would be safe for them to receive new members while without a pastor. And the other was- whether it would not be wise to guard the door of the church by a stringent doctrinal creed. I cannot repeat the speeches that were made upon that occasion, but I can state to you the result reached. As to the first point, they voted to receive members, but directed the Deacons to examine them and "receive satisfaction" from them ; and decided that when such candidates were to be received, an ordained minister should be invited to administer to them the covenant. The second question they answered by voting that Ebenezer Nich- ols, Esq., Dea. Samuel Bancroft and Lieut. John Temple. should be a committee to confer with Rev. Peter Clark of Danvers, and Rov. Eliab Stone of No. Reading, and draw up, with their assistance, a Confession of Faith. Four weeks
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later that committee reported to the church ; and the creed then constructed and adopted is the creed of this church- unaltered save in two or three lines-now in use." What- ever may be our general views about the usefulness of creeds. it cannot but heighten our impressions of the fidelity to their convictions of those men, that, without promptings from clerical sources, they attempted to stem the tide that was, as they thought, threatening the safety of their church. They took the responsibility that belonged to them; and in the times of discussion, and rupture of old ties that not long af- ter came to many churches, this was unmoved and immova- ble.
It may properly be admitted that the zeal for sound doc- trines which at that time was becoming very strong in the hearts of many ministers as well as laymen, sometimes car- ried them to rather absurd lengths. An entry in the records, made two years before Mr. Hobby died, in his hand-writing, reads as follows --.. Received letters missive from Marble- head, desiring assistance at the installation of Mr. Witherell. but being a stranger to the gentleman, his experiences and · his principles, voted not to send." The next year this entry oceurs-"Received letters missive from the 3rd church in Salem, desiring assistance in setting apart Mr. Huntington to the work of the ministry; but, being unacquainted with the gentleman, his principles, morals and experience, voted not to send." Mr. Hobby was well known throughout the province as a disciple and defender of Whitefield, and hav-
* It has become so common among churches to recast their creeds, that it may see.n strange that any church, professing to be abreast with the age, should content itself with a confession dating back 112 years. In reply it may be said-(1) The pastors and members of this church have never thought that their creed should be discarded, either because its lan- gnage was becoming antiquated, or because some of its implications did not quite agree with modern theological notions. (2) The flavor of age about it pleases them. (3) The wise laymen under whose administration it was introduced were too wise to think that a technical creed ought ever to be used on the admission of members. For that purpose. they believed the covenant suficient. The church has never pursnel any other method. Each can lidate receives a copy of the creed when be is examined, and, according to a standing rule, if he expresses'no dissout before the time for his public reception, he is held to have given it his general endorsement. The church has never believed that an intellectual as- sent to dogmas should be mingled with a profession of allegiance to Christ. Hence, it has never felt itself fored, by the incongruities which others feel, to change its creed. Nor has it ever been admonished by the creeping in of heresies, that its method was unsafe.
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ing suffered some persecution on that account, it was not strange that he should be on his guard against endorsing in- fit men as ministers ; but lack of personal acquaintance with them seems a poor reason why he should not sit upon coun- cils called to judge of their qualifications. During the inter- val between the pastorates of Mr. Hobby and Mr. Prentice, the church, on one occasion, went so far in its solicitude as to fail of its object. Having heard Rev. John Lathrop, they liked him ; but, fearing the leaven of heterodoxy, they pass- ed the following vote-"That the church doth make choice of Mr. John Lathrop, provided his principles of religion, and methods of church government, agree with this church. Voted-that the Deacons, with Col. Nichols and Mr. John Temple and Mr. Nathaniel Emerson. be a committee to join with Rev. Mr. Joseph Emerson of Malden, the Rev. Mr. Robie of Lynn, and the Rev. Mr. Stone of No. Reading, to examine Mr. John Lathrop." The result was favorable to his orthodoxy, but not to their desires ; for when, after subjecting him to such an examination, they gave him a call. he declined it. It is, however, far better that men should so prize great privileges as to go too far in defending them. than that they should lose them by prizing them too little.
It is quite impossible for Christians living in times like our own, when denominational lines have been drawn-after, rather than before, theological battles-to appreciate the i- easiness of those living just before such division. Conscious of increasing differences of opinion. and not knowing whith- er views thought to be errors. and yet vigorously defended by good men, would lead .- such persons would naturally become very wary, and at length grow so cager in the de- fence of important doctrines as to create, rather than heal. divisions. After the death of Mr. Hobby, who seems to have adhered to the position of JJonathan Edwards, that only converted persons have a right to partake of the communion. -- a position then widely denied-a division arose in this church, in consequence of which the celebration of the ordi- nance was for a time suspended. A brief record informs. us of the fact ; but records are sometimes the more significant
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