USA > Massachusetts > Suffolk County > Boston > History of King's Chapel, in Boston : the first Episcopal church in New England : comprising notices of the introduction of Episcopacy into the northern colonies > Part 2
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* The commissioners were Col. Richard Nichols, George Cartwright, Sir Robert Carr, and Samuel Maverick. The two former arrived at Boston, the two latter at Piscataqua, about the same time.
1 Both the Mavericks are mentioned in Eliot's Biog. Dict.
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INTRODUCTION.
ed." It sounds strange to hear Charles II. read- ing a lesson on religious freedom to the pilgrims ; but it was a good lesson, though delivered in an arrogant style, and by a profligate tyrant.
It was with some difficulty that the general court were brought to answer at all to an authority not recognised in their charter, but at length they did so to eacli instruction, more or less explicitly. With regard to the king's letter they say, that they had endeavored formerly to satisfy his ex- pectations, and now further say that touching the oath of allegiance, they had ordered it to be taken, in that form prescribed by the colony law, by all freemen and other householders ; and that touching civil liberties, they observed the qualifi- cations mentioned in his majesty's letter ; " and as to ecclesiastical privileges they had commended to the ministry and people here the word of the Lord for their rule."* This last answer was plainly evasive, or rather it was an absolute refusal to be dictated to in religious matters. Our fathers could dictate very well, but they could not so well endure dictation.
In reply, the commissioners say, " The end of the first planters coming hither was, as the court expressed in their address, 1660, the enjoyment of
* Hutch. Hist. 1. 243.
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INTRODUCTION.
the liberty of your own consciences ; we therefore admire that you should deny the liberty of con- science to any, especially where the king requires it; and that upon a vain conceit of your own, that it will disturb your enjoyments, which the king often hath said it shall not. Though you commend to the ministers and people the word of the Lord for their rule, yet you did it with a pro- viso, that they have the approbation of the court ; and we have great reason both to think and say, that the king and his council and the church of England understand and follow the rules in God's word as much as this corporation." Finally they advise them, for fear of consequences, to " an inge- nious and free consent to what the king desired."*
But " an ingenious and free consent," it was not the purpose of the Massachusetts corporation . to give. The commissioners were foiled and re- turned to their master. Charles had so many affairs to attend to at home, that the colony re- mained untroubled for some years, or not seriously troubled;+ but in 1683 he sent Edward Randolpht
* Mass. Hist. Col. 2d S. vol. viii. p. 76.
t The subject of the common prayer, &c, continued, how- ever, to be pressed from time to time. See Hutch. Col. Pa. p. 520.
# Randolph first came to Boston in 1676. " After a tedious passage of 10 weeks, arrived at Boston on 10th June."- His letter to the king. Hutch. Col. Pa. p. 503. In 1678
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INTRODUCTION.
with a quo warranto against their charter, which the following year was taken away. In 1685, Feb. 6, Charles died. His successor, James II. was proclaimed in Boston, in April of the same year. On the 15th of May, 1686, the Rose fri- gate arrived from England with a commission to Mr Joseph Dudley as president of Massachusetts and the colonies north of it, and to other gentle- men to constitute his council; and in the same frigate came Mr Robert Ratcliffe, the first Epis-
Randolph came over again, having been to England in the interim. He was in England again in 1679, and returned the latter part of the same year. He went home again the next winter, and returned in 1681, bringing with him his com- mission from the crown constituting him collector and sur- veyor and searcher of the customs in New England. Hutch. Hist. 1. 330. We find Randolph in England again, Feb. 1681. Ib. 335. He arrived with the quo warranto, in Oct. 1633 ; having come, however, to Boston, and gone back to England between these two years. Ib. 336.
Since writing the above, I have seen a MS. of four pages, lately presented to the Mass. Hist. Soc. being Randolph's own account of his voyages to and from England. The re- cital is brief, consisting of little else beside dates ; but a fact or two like the following, which he records, inark the kind of people he had to deal with.
" 17 December, 1681. I arrived againe att Boston in New England, with his Majesty's Commission, appointing me Collector, &ca. But that commission is opposed, being looked upon as an encroachment on their Charter. A Law revived by the assembly to trye me for my life, for acting by his Majesty's Commission before it was allowed of by them.
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INTRODUCTION.
copal minister of Boston, and indeed of New England.
I find that I have completed the limits of a discourse, without coming even to the building of the wooden church which the Episcopalians first erected on this spot. The early history of our church is, however, the history of the introduction of episcopacy among those who fled from it and hated it. As such it possesses a peculiar interest and value. There is another light in which it is more interesting still, which is its connexion with the great history of religious liberty. The
thoughtful observer will mark the strange pro- cesses by which the human mind is often forced to the most simple and excellent conclusions. He will see arbitrary power from the mother country, contending against arbitrary power here, and the result of these conflicting and angry au- thorities to be toleration, liberty and peace.
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FORMATION OF THE FIRST EPISCOPAL SOCIETY. - ROBERT RATCLIFFE, THE FIRST RECTOR,
BUT THE FOUNDATION OF THE TEMPLE OF THE LORD WAS NOT YET LAID .- Ezra iii. 6.
THE " Rose frigate " must have seemed to the greater part of the Bostonians, or Bostoneers, as Randolph called them, freighted heavily with wo, bearing as it did the Rev. Robert Ratcliffe, of the church of England, with his surplice, and his book of Common Prayer ; to say nothing of the commission which appointed a president over them, by the king's sole authority. It was as new to them, and as disagreeable, to have in their midst a settled clergyman of that church, as it was to see at their head a ruler not of their own choosing. "There had been very few in- stances of even occasional assemblies for religious worship according to the rites and ceremonies of the church of England for more than fifty years.
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When the commissioners from King Charles were at Boston in 1665, they had a chaplain with them, but there was no house for public worship. Most of the inhabitants who were upon the stage in 1686, had never seen a church of England assem- bly."* The time was now come for the strange sight to be exhibited, and for the members of the episcopal communion to rally under the counte- nance and influence of the royal government. It should be stated, too, that the general court had declared in 1677, that no persons should be hin- dered from performing divine service according to the church of England.t The way therefore appeared to lay smooth and open for the Episco- palians to introduce their forms of worship and government.
As Randolph had the chief hand in overturning the old charter of the colony, so was he most active and efficient in establishing an Episcopalian church here, and procuring the services of a cler- gyman from England. For the former purpose he had acted as a constant spy upon the colonists, and had been backwards and forwards between the two countries ten or eleven times in as many years. He was indeed, as Hutchinson says, " incessant." For the latter purpose, the build- ing up of episcopacy, he was diligently employed in moving the ecclesiastical dignitaries at home,
* Hutch. Hist. 1. 353 t Ibid.
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as will appear by his letters preserved in Hutch- inson's Collection of Papers. In a letter to the Bishop of London, dated, Boston, July 14th, 1682,* he urges both of these objects. "Nothing will so effectually settle this government on a firm dependence upon the crown," he says, "as bringing a quo warranto against their charter, which will wholly disenable many, now great sticklers and promoters of the faction among us, from acting further in a public station." With regard to the church he says, " We have advice by Capt. Barrett, now arrived from London, that your lordship hath remembered us, and sent over a minister with Mr Cranfield; the very report hath given great satisfaction to many hundreds whose children are not baptized, and to as many who never, since they came out of England, re- ceived the sacrament." And again ; " If we are misinformed concerning your lordship's sending over a minister, be pleased to commiserate our condition and send us over a sober discreet gen- tleman. Your lordship hath now good security, as long as their agents t are in England, for his civil treatment by the contrary party ; he will be received by all honest men with hearty christian respects and kindness, and if his majesty's laws
* Hutch. Col. Pa. p. 538. 2 t Dudley and Richards. :
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(as none but fanatics question) be of force with us, we could raise a sufficient maintenance for divers ministers out of the estates of those whose treasons have forfeited them to his majesty."
In a previous letter to the bishop, dated May 29th of the same year, Randolph had given sim- ilar assurances of the safety of any clergyman who might be sent over. " Your lordship hath a great pledge for such ministers as your lordship shall think convenient to send over, for their civil treatment, and I think no person fitter than Major Dudley,* their agent, to accompany them, who will be very careful to have them settled as or- dered in England." He had also spoken of the feasible means of maintaining such clergymen.
* Dudley's character is well hit off by Randolph in this same letter. " Major Dudley is a great opposer of the fac- tion heere, against which I have now articled to his majesty, who, if he finds things resolutely maniged, will cringe and bow to anything. He hath his fortune to make in the world, and if his majesty, upon alteration of the government, make
· him captain of the castle of Boston and the forts in the collo- ney, his majesty will gain a popular man, and obleidge the better party." Of Richards, the other agent, he writes, " As. for Capt. Richards, he is one of the faction, a man of mean extraction, coming over a poore servant, as most of the faction were at their first planting heere, but by extraordinary feats and coussinadge have gott them great estates in land, espe- cially Danford, so that if his majesty doe fine them suffi- ciently, and well if they escape soe, they can goe to worke for more." Randolph likens the two agents to the two consuls of Rome, Cæsar and Bibulus.
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PERIOD FIRST.
" In my attendance on your lordship, I often expressed that some able ministers might be appointed to perform the offices of the church with us. The main obstacle was how they should 'be maintained. I did formerly, and do now pro- pose, that a part of that money sent over hither, and pretended to be expended among the Indians, may be ordered to go towards that charge." And again he says, "My Lord, your goodness and readiness to serve his majesty in the settle- ment of this great plantation, invites me, upon all occasions, to interpose your lordship's more weighty affairs, but since we are here immediately under your lordship's care, I with more freedom press for able and sober ministers, and we will contribute largely to their maintenance ; but one thing will mainly help, when no marriages here- after shall be allowed lawful but such as are made by the ministers of the church of England."
The length and number of the above extracts will be pardoned, on account of the strong light which they throw on the movements of the party who were now arraying themselves so boldly against the old puritanical influence of the colony ; and particularly on the views and character of Edward Randolph, who may be called the head of that party. We see what lofty ideas of the royal prerogative he entertained, in his proposing
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PERIOD FIRST.
to destroy the ancient civil rights of the colony by taking away their charter, and setting over them a governor appointed by the crown. And we see that his notions of the English Church were no less lofty, in his suggestions that not one clergyman only of the church, but several might be maintained, by the high-handed methods of diverting the funds of the " Society for propagating the Gospel among the Indians" to their support, and of applying confiscated estates and all mar- riage fees to the same use. But in the whole of this arbitrary course I can easily conceive that he was actuated by a sense of duty towards his sove- reign, who was also the sovereign of these colo- nies, and who, Randolph might well imagine, was not treated here with the deference and obedience which were his due. He considered that the Bostonians were stiff-necked, refractory and re- bellious, and that he ought to curb and turn their spirit. They, on the other hand, looked upon him as the myrmidon of a tyrant and a hateful spy, and said that " he went up and down seek- ing to devour them."* He despised their prim and exclusive congregationalism, and they abom- inated his stately and formal episcopacy. He was arbitrary after his fashion, and they were so
* Hutch. Hist. 1. 319.
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PERIOD FIRST.
after theirs. If he had not been excited by their inveterate opposition to what he deemed alone true and venerable, he probably would not have troubled them as much as he did. If they had not been too weak at that time to resist the royal power, they would not have borne his arro- gant interference for a day.
We have seen that Randolph carried his two great ends, the destruction of the original Massa- chusetts charter, and the importation and intro- duction of an Episcopal clergyman.
On the 15th of May, 1686, as I have before stated, arrived the Rose frigate, commanded by Captain George. On the 25th, Dudley entered on the duties of his temporary presidency .* On the 26th, Mr Ratcliffe waited on the council, and Mr Mason and Randolph proposed that he should have one of the three congregational meet- ing-houses to preach in. This was denied, but he was granted the use of the library room in the east end of the town house, which then stood where the Old State House, or, as its present name is, the City Hall, now stands.
But the formation of the First Episcopal Soci- ety is to be dated from the 15th of June, same year, on which day the records of the church
* See Hutch. Hist. 1. 343. and extracts from Sewall's MS. Diary, in Wisner's History of the Old South, note 27.
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commence. The first page of this valuable man- uscript * I shall now quote entire, as it comes in order in the narrative, and gives an account of the original steps taken by the society, as briefly as they could well be stated, besides informing us who the founders of the church were.
" Boston in N. England. June 15th, 1686.
" At a meeteing, wherein were present the Gent. following - vizt. Mr Ratcliffe, our minister. Edward Randolph, Esq. one of his majestie's councell. . Captaine Lydgett. Mr Luscomb. Mr White. Mr Maccartie. Mr Ravenscroft. Doctor Clerke. Mr Turfery. Mr Bankes. Doctor Bullivant.
" Agreed. That every Sabbath day after evening sermon, shall be made a publique collec- tion by the churchwardens for the time being for
* It is a folio volume, bound in parchment, and bears the following as its title page ; " Boston in New England, Anno Domini, 1686. An entry booke, of all such meetings, agree- ments, and other matters, proper to be recognized, had, and done from time, to time ; by the members of the church of England, as by law established, under the gracious influen- ces of the most illustrious Prince our Sovereign Lord, James the 2d. By the Grace of God, of England, Scotland, France, and Ireland king, defendour of the faith &c. - Anno Dom- ini, 1686, and in the 2d yeare of his said Majestie's Reign, at Doston within his said Majestie's territory, and Dominion of New England in America."
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the servise of the church, and to be continued untill some publique and settled provision be made for the same .*
" Agreed. That Doctor Benjamin Bullivant, and Mr Richard Bankes, are elected churchwar- dens, and to continue untill Easter next.
" Agreed. That Edward Randolph, Esq. Capt. Lydgett, Mr Luscomb and Dr Bullivant, with our minister, should wayte on the President and Councell to treate about our church affaires.
" Agreed. That an humble addresse be made to his Majestie, and to be signed by the gentlemen as above-named, to implore his Majestie's favour to our church, and it is consented that all other true sons of the church of England, may join with us in the same.
" Agreed. That in the same method, a letter be sent to the Right Reverend father in God, the Lord Archbishop of Canterbury, and one other to the Reverend father in God, the Lord Bishop of London, to implore those prelates favour towards our church.
* The first recorded collection is on June 20, 1686, amount- ing to £3 11s. Od. and the account is regularly kept from this time forwards. On the 22d of October, same year, the bal- ance of the collections made up to that time, remaining from necessary expenses, is ordered to be paid to Mr Ratcliffe. The whole amount of collections was £48 88. 4d. Expenses £19 14s. 6d. Paid Mr Ratcliffe £28 13s. 10d. Mr Ratcliffe's receipts for this sum in two several payments are given.
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" Agreed. That Mr Smith the Joyner do make 12 formes, for the servise of the church, for each of which he shall be paid 4s. 8d.
" Agreed. With the said Mr Smith the Joy- ner, that this church will pay and allow unto him 20s. quarterlie, and every quarter, for and in con- sideration of his cleaneing, placeing, and remove- ing the Pulpit, formes, table &c, and dooing all other things which shall be convenient and necessary in our place of publique Assembling."
The accommodations provided for and referred to in the two last votes, were intended to furnish the library room in the town house in a decent manner for the performance of divine service. . This was truly an humble beginning for those who made such high pretensions as did these zealous royalists and churchmen. As they as- sembled in the east end of the town house, and looked round on their twelve forms and their movable pulpit, they must have felt the contrast between such a tabernacle and the solemn old cathedrals at home ; and have felt too that they were among a people, who, though of the same blood with themselves, were strangers to their mode of faith and worship, despising what they esteemed most sacred, and setting at nought the power which they deemed unquestionable. It is hardly to be supposed that these feelings were
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calculated to conciliate them toward the congre- gationalists, or that the condition in which they found themselves was favorable at the time to their growth in christian humility or charity ; for truths taught by experience are learned slowly. That they even had the town house for their worship, is, however, a proof that the colonists were to a very considerable degree overawed and restrained, by the attitude which the mother coun- try assumed towards them.
The second recorded meeting of the church- men took place on the 4th of July, still the same year .* At this meeting it was agreed to pay Mr Ratcliffe fifty pounds per annum salary, beside what the council might think fit to settle on him ; and that if Mr Buckley, the chaplain of the Rose, should please to assist Mr Ratcliffe, he should " receive for his paynes 20s. a weeke." It was also agreed that "a sober and fitt person be sought after for a clarke," and that there should be a Sacrament on the second Sabbath of the month. But the most important vote was the fol- lowing ; " Agreed. That the councell be addressed unto, to give us libertie and authority by a briefe, to passe through the whole territory of his majes-
* Beside those persons who attended the first meeting, there were present at this, Mr Proctour, Mr Steph. Wissen- dunke, Mr Thomas Brindley, and Mr Mallett.
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tie in New England, and therein to collect and receive all such voluntary donations as all persons whatsoever shall be disposed to give us, for and towards the building of a church in Boston, to be erected for the servise of God, and for the use of the church of England as per law established." The liberty and authority applied for according to this vote, were probably granted, as a list is given in the records of a num- ber of persons who furnished donations, which I shall more particularly notice presently. We find by the succeeding and last vote at this second meeting, that worship was still performed in the town house, not only on the Sabbath, but on Wednesdays and Fridays. " Agreed. That the prayers of the church be said every Wednesday and Friday in the yeare, (for the present, in the Library chamber in the town-house in Boston,) and in the Summer Season to beginne at 7 of the clock in the morning, and in the winter season, at 9 of the clock in the forenoon."
Of Mr Ratcliffe, and his service in the town house, there is a brief notice in the journal of John Dunton, a bookseller of London, a singular character, who came to Boston in the year 1686, in order to secure a debt for books, as also to dis- pose of a cargo of the same article, and who arrived here in March, after a passage of more
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PERIOD FIRST.
than four months .* He says, " About this time arrived the Rose frigot from England with a new charter, procured by one Randal, which gave major Dudley the title of president, and the ma- gistrates were now changed into counsellors. Parson Ratcliffe came over with the charter, and on Lord's days read the Common Prayer in his surplice, and preached in the Town house. Mr Ratcliffe was an eminent preacher, and his ser- mons were useful and well dressed ; I was once or twice to hear him, and it was noised about that Dr Annesly's son-in-law [himself ] was turned apostate. But I could easily forgive 'em, in re- gard the common prayer and the surplice were religious novelties in New England."
This account of Mr Ratcliffe as a preacher, short as it is, is the only one which I have yet been able to discover. Randolph, in a letter to the Archbishop of Canterbury, of the date 1686,+ mentions the services in the town house, and speaks of having transferred the place of assem- bling to the " exchange." This letter is a great curiosity, as indeed are all which are preserved of
* See Mass. Hist. Col. 2d S. vol. 2d, p. 97. It is worthy of notice that when Dunton arrived, some time in March, the harbor was frozen over.
t No other date is given to this letter. Hutch. Col. Pa. p. 549.
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his. They not only let us far into the spirit of the times, and the men of the times, but show the perfect calmness and conscientiousness of his own tyranny in a way, which, however exasper- ating that tyranny was to our fathers, is to us, at this distance of time, only amusing. He begins his letter thus ; " May it please your Grace, - I have forborne writing to your grace till I had been some time upon the place, to see how the poor people here would demean themselves under the new government." After noticing the refrac- tory disposition of these poor people, he thus goes on to speak of his ecclesiastical efforts. "I take leave humbly to remind, that when your grace was present at a committee of the Lords, and was therein pleased to move, that one of their meeting-houses in Boston should be ordered to be set apart for the exercise of the religion according to the church of England, it was then answered by some of those noble Lords who dis- coursed in their favour, provided they might have liberty of conscience in matters of religion, they would voluntarily submit to have one of their three meeting housen * to be disposed of by the president and council for that use. Since my arrival with Mr Ratcliffe,t a sober man, recom-
* Housen, so spelt.
+ There must have been a royal company in the Rose.
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mended by my lord of London to be our minister ; who besides his lordship's fair testimonials, brought with him a letter from the right honorable the Lords of the committee for trade and foreign plan- tations to the president and council, for their coun- tenance and encouragement in the discharge of his office ; yet 'twas a long time before they took the least notice of him or his business. At last, though strongly opposed, I got a little room in their town-house, for such as were of the church of England to assemble in, but found it so strait that we are forced now to make use of the ex- change for that purpose ; where, to humour the . people, our minister preaches twice a day and baptises all that come to him, some infants, some adult persons. We are now come to have prayers every Wednesday and Friday mornings on their exchange, and resolve not to be baffled by the great affronts ; some calling our minister Baal's priest, and some of their ministers, from the pulpit, calling our prayers leeks, garlic and trash." He then recurs to the subject of mainte- nance, saying, " We have often moved for an honorable maintenance for our minister ; but they tell us those that hire him must maintain him, as they maintain their own ministers, by contribu- tion." He humbly represents to his grace " that the three meeting-houses in Boston might pay
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