USA > Massachusetts > Hampden County > West Springfield > Historical discourse delivered at West Springfield : December 2, 1824, the day of the annual thanksgiving > Part 3
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" See Appendix, O.
+ Notwithstanding he was advanced to the age of 84 years, he, frequently, during this period, went out in the evening, to attend a religious service.
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pledge of the spiritual prosperity of his people, after he should be gathered to the congregation of the dead.
In March 1818, Doctor Lathrop, in consequence of the great imperfection of his sight, requested the parish to provide him a colleague. At that time, he delivered a kind of valedictory sermon,* in which he gave his people many important directions, and very tenderly commended them to the care and guidance of the great Head of the church. But though, from that period, he rarely took part in the publick service of the sanctuary, his usefulness continued, perhaps I may say, without abatement, till the close of life. For it was impossible for such a man, unless his faculties had suffered a complete wreck, to live in vain. We never approached him, without feeling ourselves in the presence of a friend and counsellor ; and even here, in the place of our solemnities, it was a cheering reflection, that we could behold his venerable forni, and know that his heart was lifted up in devout petitions for our prosperity and salvation. Hie closed his life, on the 31st of December 1820, in the 90th year of his age, and 65th of his ministry. He died as he had lived, full of peace and hope ; and when we committed his remains to the dust, we heard a
* The text was John xvi. 19.
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voice, as it had been from the third heavens, saying, " Blessed are the dead that die in the Lord."*
And here, if I were to obey the dictates of feeling, I should pause to pay a tribute to the memory of our departed father ; but having already borne testimony to his excellence in the presence of his remains,t I shall not now resume the topic, however grateful, not doubting that for all that relates to his character, I may safely trust to your own tender and faithful recollection.
On the last sabbath of April 1819, I commenced my labours among you as a candidate, and on the 28th of July, was called to settle with you in the ministry. On the 25th of August following, it being the 63d anniversary of Doctor Lathrop's ministry, I was constituted your junior pastor. # In the service of that occasion, you all remember that my Reverend father had a part ; and how earnestly he prayed, that the union, which was then to be formed, might be the
* See Appendix, P.
t See the sermon preached at his funeral.
# The exercises, on that occasion, were as follows :- Reverend Doctor Lathrop offered the introductory prayer ; Reverend Doctor Flint of Hartford, Connecticut, preached the sermon from Luke i. 15; Reverend Mr. Storrs of Long-Meadow offered the consecrating prayer ; Reverend Doctor Bassett of Hebron, Connecticut, gave the charge ; Reverend Mr. Bastow of Keene, N. II. gave the Right-hand of fellowship ; and Reverend Mr. Andrews of Putney, Vermont, offered the con- cluding prayer.
The sermon, charge and Right-hand of fellowship were printed.
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source of lasting and mutual blessings to us, after he should be in the grave. It was my happiness to enjoy his company and counsels for more than a year ; a blessing, which I desire always to remember with gratitude both to God and to him ; and when he went to his rest, it seemed to me, as when an armour-bearer faileth.
During the little period of my residence with you, we have mingled with each other, both in mercies and afflictions. There have 68 persons died within the limits of this parish, since my ordination, 36 of whom were heads of families. There have been admitted to the Lord's table 127, including such as have transferred their relation to this from other churches. The last year, especially, has been marked by unusual tokens of divine favour. It has witnessed a larger accession to our church, than any preceding year since its estab- lishment ; and a considerable proportion of them are persons in the morning of life, who, we may reasonably hope, will live to be extensively useful. The present number of our communicants is 263. And I must not forget to remark, as another token of divine goodness, that no root of bitterness has hitherto sprung up to trouble us. For all the indulgence and kindness, which you have manifested towards me, during this period, whether in prosperity or adversity, I desire
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ever to be sincerely grateful; and in return, I hope never to covet any higher pleasure, than to spend and be spent in your service.
In this church, there have been 12 deacons, 9 of whom have deceased. Of these, all had arrived to the age of 70; 6 to the age of 80 ; and 3 had passed their 90th year. Of those now living, 2 have already reached a period, much beyond the ordinary age of man. A similar instance of longevity, it is presumed, is scarcely to be found .*
This church, so far as is known, retains, substan- tially, the same confession of faith and covenant, upon which it was originally established ; no other alteration having been made, than the omission, or change of some obsolete phrases.t Its ministers too, have all held the same general system of faith ; and those, who are gone, have exhibited its purifying influence in life, and we doubt not, have felt its sustaining influence in death. God grant that the mantle of its departed ministers may rest upon those, who come after them : that while they hold fast the pure doctrine of Christ, they may speak the truth in love.
From the commencement, the peace of this church and society has never been materially interrupted. Of this, there is a happy illustration in the fact, that there
* See Appendix, Q.
+ See Appendix, R.
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has never been an ecclesiastical council here, for any other purpose than ordination. Every important measure, which this society has adopted, has been marked with a good degree of unanimity ; and I know not that our records are disgraced by a single disorderly act. From each one of our hearts, let there now rise a devout petition, that the same peaceable spirit, which has hitherto prevailed, may continue to reign among us, as long as the sun and the moon shall endure.
Such, my brethren and friends, is an outline of the history of this church and society. And now, on a review, I am persuaded, that none of you will doubt that the subject has been altogether in unison with the solemnities of the day ; that there is enough in our history, to awaken and keep alive a spirit of thanksgiving. Let this hour, then, be sacred to a devout remembrance of those interpositions, by which the lives of our fathers were marked ; of the protection, which they experienced in the midst of savages ; of that spirit of intelligence and piety, which distinguished them, and which has, in a good degree, been trans- mitted to us, in our civil and religious institutions. Let us recollect with gratitude, the favour of heaven towards this church, in providing for it a succession of ministers, who have served God and their generation faithfully, and who, though they have entered into
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rest, have left the savour of their faith and piety behind them. Let our preservation from discord, the continuance of our christian privileges, and above all, the influences of the Holy Spirit, conspire to engage all the powers of our souls in the service of thanks- giving. And let us testify our gratitude, by faithfully imitating the piety of our fathers ; by carefully watching over those institutions, which it was their first concern to establish ; and by making such use of our religious privileges, that they shall be the means, under God, of accomplishing our own salvation, and be transmitted, unimpaired, to posterity.
But, while the subject presents so many arguments for thanksgiving, there is much in it also to render us serious ; for we surely cannot fail to remember, that our concern, this morning, has been with the genera- tions that are dead. Our fathers, where are they ? Where are they, who were active in the formation of this society, or who constituted it, more than half a century after its establishment ? Where are they, who dispensed to our fathers the word of life, and baptized their children ? And where too, are many, who were once your fellow-worshippers ; who came with you to the house of God, and listened with you to the messages of grace? Gone-gone to the land of silence ; to the world of retribution. We walk over their
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unconscious dust, and say to ourselves, 'there they will sleep for ages ;' but do we heed the voice that seems to speak to us from among their graves, and remind us, that we too shall soon inhabit that region of desolation ? Hearers, time is on the wing. You meet here, this morning, to offer your thanksgivings to God ; but before the return of this anniversary, your friends may have wept around your graves. Ere long, these seats will be filled with other occu- pants ; these walls will echo to other voices. This temple of the Lord, if not blasted by the elements, will fall under the hand of time; and we trust that another and another will arise, till all, who are destined to worship in temples made with hands, shall have joined the service of the upper sanctuary. But though we shall soon be beyond the reach of christian privileges, we shall not be beyond their influence. God grant that we may remember them in eternity with joy ; and that all the successive generations of worshippers, who shall assemble here, may be gathered at last in the congregation of the saved, and keep an everlasting thanksgiving to redeeming grace.
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APPENDIX.
A.
THERE is considerable obscurity resting over the history of the first settlement of the town. There is a tradition, that the first house, which was built, was on the west side of the river ; and that it was the intention of our fathers to have prosecuted the original settlement here, but that they abandoned it, on the suggestion of the Indians, that the place was subject to inundations. The fact seems to liave been, that some of them were here in 1635, and probably commenced building a house, on the west side of the river, and actu- ally built one, on the east side ; that they went away, and returned the next year, and began the permanent settlement.
B.
In the summer of 1630, there arrived in this country, from England, ten, or eleven ships, filled with passengers and live cattle. Among the passengers, were Governor Winthrop, deputy Governor Dudley, William Pynchon, Esq. the Reverend Messrs. Wilson and Warliam, and many other persons of distinction. Mr. Pynchon, the father of the town of Springfield, as appears by a note written by himself, came in the ship Jewel, which arrived at Salem, June 15, 1630, having sailed from the Isle of Wight, on the 8th of the preced- ing April.
Hubbard, in his history of New-England, states, that as early as 1635, " the inhabitants of the Massachusetts were overpressed with multitudes of new families, that daily resorted thither, so as like an hive of bees overstocked, there was a necessity that some should swarm out."-p. 305.
C.
By the records of the general court of Massachusetts, it appears that Mr. Pynchon published a work, in which he was considered as having advanced some erroneous views of the doctrine of atonement.
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The court ordered the book to be burned, May 1652, and summoned him to attend. They proposed to write to England, signifying their disapprobation of the sentiments advanced ; and Sir Henry Vane, the friend of Mr. Pynchon, who had been king Charles' secretary of state, and was then president of the council of state, in a letter dated Whitehall, April 15, 1652, urged the governour and magistrates " to deal with him tenderly and in a brotherly way, and to encourage him in the improvement of his excellent abilities, for the further service of the churches." The court, however, suspended him from his office at Springfield, and appointed Mr. Henry Smith to be his successor. They also directed the Reverend Mr. Norton of Ipswich, to prepare a refutation of the heretical opinions advanced in his book. Mr. Pynchon afterwards made a recantation of his former sentiments, and declared, that in consequence of further light, which it had pleased God to give him, he had been brought to admit the commonly received doctrine of redemption. Mather alludes to this affair in the following manner :-
" A gentleman of New-England had written a book, entitled, ' the meritorious price of man's redemption,' wherein he pretends to prove, that Christ suffered not for ns those unutterable torments of God's wrath, which are commonly called hell torments, to redeem our souls from them, and that Christ bore not our sins by God's imputation, and therefore, also, did not bear the curse of the law for them. The general court of the colony, concerned that the glorious truthis of the gospel might be rescued from the confusions whereinto the essay of this gentleman had thrown them, and afraid lest the church of God abroad should suspect that New-England allowed of such exorbitant aberrations, appointed Mr. Norton to draw up an answer to that erroneous treatise. This work he performed, with a most elaborate and judicious pen, in a book afterwards published, under the title of A discussion of that great point in divinity, the sufferings of Christ ; and the questions about his active and passive righteousness and the imputation thereof." Magnalia, Book III, pp. 265, 6.
Notwithstanding the recantation of Mr. Pynchon to the general court, it appears that he wrote a long reply to Mr. Norton, after
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he returned to England, which was published, at his own expense, in 1662.
Beside the difficulty in which Mr. Pynchon was involved, in con- sequence of his book, he was, at an earlier period, brought into an unhappy collision with the people of Connecticut. In the year 1637, when provisions were unusually scarce, the general court at Hartford contracted with Mr. Pynchon to furnish the country with 500 bushels of Indian corn. This contract he failed to fulfil ; and the court severely censured hin, charging him with violating his oath, and abusing the trust, which had been reposed in him as a magistrate. He was also censured by the church in Windsor ; and though he wrote his defence, and desired a reconsideration of the case, they saw fit to abide by their original determination. It does not appear, on what ground he was amenable to the church in Windsor, as there was, at that time, a church in Springfield, and the churches were strictly independant. Whether it was on the ground, that the offended brother lived at Windsor, or that Mr. Pynchon, from the circumstance of his having a warehouse* there, was, in some way, connected with that church, or for some other reason, I have not been able to ascertain. He, however, afterwards wrote to the Reverend Mr. Eliot, and the church at Roxbury, of which he had been a member, in consequence of which, they went into a particu- lar investigation of the affair ; and though they gave notice to his accusers and judges, who were then at Charlestown, they did not make their appearance. The result of the Roxbury court was a complete acquittal of Mr. Pynchon, and a publick testimony in his favour.
It does not appear that Mr. Pynchon left the country, with a determination not to return ; and the contrary may be rather inferred, from the fact that he left his family behind him. He settled down at Wraisbury, a small place on the Thames, in Buckinghamshire county, where he seems to have spent the rest of his days. Hle died there October 1662, aged 72 years.
It appears that Mr. Pynchon was married, and brought his wife with him, when he came to New-England, and that she died at
" Hence that part of Windsor is called Warehouse-point.
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Charlestown, probably, before he came to Roxbury ; but neither her name, or family is known to any of the descendants now living. As it appears from some of his letters, that he had a wife at Spring- field, between 1636 and 1640, he must have been married a second time ; but nothing more is known, in respect to the connexion, than the fact that it existed. By the town records, it appears that he had four children with him at Springfield ; viz : John, who was married at Hartford, October 30, 1645, to Miss Amy Wyllis ; Anna, the wife of Mr. Henry Smith ; Mary, who married Mr. Elizur Holyoke, November 20, 1640 ; and Margaret, who was " contracted at Springfield, to Mr. William Davies, and was married in the Bay, December 6, 1664, by Mr." (doubtless, Deputy Governor) " Dudley." It seems also, from some of Mr. Pynchon's letters, that he had a son, who resided at Barbadoes, who was probably left in England in 1630, and came thence afterwards. Ilis son John (afterwards Colonel) Pynchon was a magistrate in the town, more than fifty years, and died January 17, 1703, aged 77 years. Mrs. Holyoke died October 26, 1657. The inscription on her tomb stone is as follows :---
" flere lyeth the body of Mari the wife of Elizur Holyoke „who died October 26, 1657. Shee that lyes here was while shee stoode, A very glory of womanhoode ; Even here was sowne most pretious dust, Which surely shall rise with the just."
The brick house, built by Colonel Jolin Pynchon, probably before 1660, and the lot belonging to it, have never been alienated from the family, or name of Pynchon. The land was included in the grant, originally made to William Pynchon. At the time the house was erected, Colonel Pynchon transplanted from his lands, on the west side of the river, the two noted elm trees, which stood in front of his house. In 1807, one of them was felled. The circumference of its roots, two feet above the level of the ground, was 112 feet. The circumference of the trunk, five and a half feet above level, was 223 feet. The circumference of the trunk of the other was 25 feet, 8 inches.
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D.
The town purchased Mr. Moxon's estate for 70 pounds. Though. it seems to have been their original purpose to appropriate it for the benefit of the ministry, it does not appear that this was expressly done, till 1655. At the time of Mr. Glover's settlement, the town voted that he should have the use of the house and land belonging to it, while he continued with them in the ministry, on condition that he should leave it in as good a state as he found it. But in 1665, they voted to give the aforesaid estate to Mr. Glover, provided that he should continue to be their teacher, during his life, or that he should remove by mutual consent ; and in case of his thus removing, or in case that, after his death, his wife and children should choose to leave the place, the town should then have the refusal of the property. In 1677, shortly after the destruction of the town, by the Indians, in which the house occupied by Mr. Glover was burnt, they voted to rebuild it ; but having determined that they had no right to transfer to him the property, which had once been appro- priated for the use of the ministry forever, they also voted that the building, with the lands connected with it, should be improved, according to the original appropriation, being no longer considered as private property : but inasmuch as they had once been given to . Mr. Glover, in order to recompense him, the town agreed to allow him 100 pounds in addition to his stated salary, provided he should continue their minister during life. In 1681, there was an agree- ment between Mr. Glover and the town, to refer to the general court the question, " whether the donation, which the town had made to him, of the house and land purchased for the ministry, were legal and consistent with right." The general court decided, that the town had no right to dispose of the property, after the original appropriation, but that they were nevertheless bound to make up the loss to Mr. Glover, in some other way. In 1682, they endeav- oured to bargain with him by exchange of property ; but the controversy was never finally settled, till after his death. In 1692, there was an agreement between the town and Mr. l'elatialı Glover, son of the deceased clergyman, to refer the matter to arbitrators ; and their decision was, that the town should pay to Mr. Glover the
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sum of 350 pounds, and the land, on that condition, should revert to its original use. This decision terminated the controversy.
About the time that the second parish was incorporated, in 1696, the general court ordered, that there should be a division of the land, and that the inhabitants on the west side of the river should have 100 acres. There seems, however, to have been no definite settlement, in respect to it, for a number of years ; as we find, so late as 1706, the second parish petitioning for their part of the land. It seems, afterwards, to have been settled by an agreement between the ministers of the two parishes.
Until about 1684, there was a large tract of land belonging to the town, called the outward commons, situated in what are now the towns of West Springfield, Wilbraham and Ludlow, which had never been appropriated. At that time, it was divided into five parts, three on the east side of the river, and two on the west ; and cachi individual was to have his proportion of the land, according to a given rate. In 1699, they drew, and decided the order in which the lots should lie ; but the lands were not all surveyed and appropriated, till after the year 1740. The north division, on the west side of the river, was surveyed in 1734 ; the south division, in 1746. In each of the divisions, there was a lot appropriated for schools, and for the ministry. At the time Ludlow and Wilbrahamt were incorporated, a portion of these lands were given to them. The last of the ministry land, belonging to the first parish in Springfield, was sold in 1806; that belonging to the first parish in West Springfield, in 1821. The avails go to constitute a permanent fund, for the support of the ministry. There is also a lot of ministry land in Long Meadow, but I am not able to gain any particular infor- mation, in respect to the manner in which it was acquired.
E.
Whether there were any dwelling houses saved, when the town was burnt, beside the two or three which were garrisoned, it is not now easy to ascertain. One of these, which was then owned by Major John Pynchon, is standing at this day. There is a manu- script letter in existence, from Major Pynchon to his son Joseph,
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then in England, in which he particularly describes the calamity. He states that, although his own dwelling house was spared, his mills, barns and out houses were all consumed, so that he had nothing left for food, for man, or beast.
The following entry, in reference to the same calamitous event, is made on the cover of one of the town record books :- " On the 5th day of October, in the year 1675, a day to be kept in memory by posterity, when the barbarous heathen made an assault on this poor town, killed two men and a woman, and wounded several, one of which died soon after ; burned down 29 dwelling houses and barns, much corn and hay ; but God did wonderfully preserve us, or we had been a prey to their teeth. God, in his good providence, so ordered it, that an Indian gave intelligence of the enemies' designs to fall on this town, whereby we escaped with our lives, for which we should give God the glory.
Jonathan Burt, being an eye witness of the same."
F.
The town " voted to give Mr. Brewer 80 pounds per annum, and the use of the ministry house and land ; also to give him 100 pounds, within the term of six or seven years, over and above his yearly salary, to enable him for further settlement, as he might see. cause." In 1717, they voted him 85 pounds, being an addition of 5 pounds to his original salary, for three years ; and in 1718, they made another addition of 15 pounds for that year. Mr. Brewer's answer to their call was, that, " provided the town were unanimous, he was inclinable to compliance with the towns' proffer, and that, in order to a continuance with them, if he should further find God leading him so to do."
The town then appointed a committee " to declare to Mr. Daniel Brewer, in the name of the town, the towns' good resentment of Mr. Daniel Brewer his answer to the towns' invitation, and to give him thanks for the same."
The Reverend Mr. Brewer was a native of Roxbury, and was the son of Daniel Brewer, who is said to have been born in England. He was graduated at Harvard College in 1687. He married Miss
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Katherine Chauncy of Northampton, August 23, 1699. He had eight children, six of whom survived him, and most of them settled in this vicinity. Mr. Brewer died November 5, 1733, in the 66th year of his age, and the 40th of his ministry. Ilis widow died May 15, 1754, in her 79th year. The only publication of his, which I have ever seen, or heard of, is a sermon entitled, " God's help to be sought in time of war, with a due sense of the vanity of what help man can afford : shewed at Springfield, March 26, 1724." It is a respectable performance, and indicates a spirit of ardent piety.
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