History of Worcester County, Massachusetts : with biographical sketches of many of its pioneers and prominent men, Vol. II, Part 134

Author: Hurd, D. Hamilton (Duane Hamilton)
Publication date: 1889
Publisher: Philadelphia : J.W. Lewis & Co.
Number of Pages: 1464

USA > Massachusetts > Worcester County > History of Worcester County, Massachusetts : with biographical sketches of many of its pioneers and prominent men, Vol. II > Part 134

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Adherence to these principles and continuance of present intellectual and economic conditions assure Worcester's future.

A more apt embodiment of one of the most im- portant phases of Worcester's history and life can hardly be found than in the following extract, from that admirable inaugural of Mayor Bacon, so often referred to :

The fact that absenteeism, the bane of cities, as it is of States, is

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here almost wholly unknown, a very minute and quite inconsiderable proportion only of the property of Worcester being owned by non-resi- dents, the capital here, particularly that devoted to and invested in manufactures, in trade, in mechanic arts being almost entirely owned, eupervised and managed not hy the agent of some distant capitalist, but by the resident proprietor, whose personal supervision of his own af- fairs and his owu capital insures thrift and profit in his own business, and whose personal residence amongst us is a sure guarantee of bis sympathy and generons co-operation in every enterprise calculated to benefit the city of his residence ; the circumstance . . . that our capi- tal, manufacturing and mechanical, is quite minutely subdivided and owned in moderate and comparatively inconsiderable amounts, by a great number of thrifty and independent proprietors, the fortunate pe- culiarity in our industrial organization, that the prosperity of our city is not dependent, as is the case not unfrequently elsewhere upon the prosperity of any one particularly dominant and controlling mechanical or manufacturing interest, which now flourishing, and now depressed, exhibits the place of its location, now a town or city, full of life and activity, and now embarrassed in its business and the abode of idleness and a place of stagnation and distress ; the stability of our prosperity, on the contrary, reposing upon the great number and variety of inter- ests and trades, manufacturing, mechanical and commercial, carried on bere, where, though one branch or interest may be at any given time depressed. the greater number will be found prosperons and produc- tive ; these, and all these, have condnced to our prosperity, and now let me ask which of these causes has exhausted itself, or which is likely to cease its operation ? Not one ; in my opinion not one.

As true to-day as in 1851, and of all the causes which have contributed to Worcester's honor and her prosperity, not one has exhausted itself.

CHAPTER CLXXXI.

WORCESTER-(Continued.) ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY.

BY CHARLES EMERY STEVENS.

A HISTORY of any New England town without an ecclesiastical chapter would surely be like the play of Hamlet with the part of Hamlet left out. For a city of eighty thousand inhabitants, with fifty churches and fifteen denominations, and a history covering two centuries, such a chapter ought of right to occupy a large space. But this the plan of the present work altogether forbids. Only a very con- densed outline of what might well fill a volume can here be given. It must needs be a somewhat bald narration. Outline sketches admit of neither shad- ing nor color. Under such limitations this writing must proceed.

At the outset two methods of treatment presented themselves. One was the chronological method ; the other was the topical. By the latter method all that is to be said of one denomination would be pre- sented by itself; the topic would be exhausted be- fore another was touched. Beginning with the Trinitarian Congregationalists, for example, we should treat of all the churches of that order before pro- ceeding with the next. And although the other method may have its advantages, and, indeed, has been adopted by some writers, this, on the whole, seemed to be the preferable method. It has this im-

portant advantage, that the origin and growth of each denomination can be viewed consecutively and apart from others. Accordingly, this method will be pursued in the present history. Without further preface, I begin with the

TRINITARIAN CONGREGATIONALISTS-First or Old South Church .- The first permanent settlement in Worcester began on the 21st of October, 1713. Nearly fifty years before, steps had been taken towards this end and temporary settlements had been begun ; but before foot was set npon the soil a provision was made "that a good minister of God's word be placed there." This provision was first realized in the year 1719, when the Rev. Andrew Gardner was ordained as the first minister of the Gospel settled in Worces- ter. Before this, however, the people had been wont to assemble regularly for public worship in their dwelling-houses, and notably in that of Gershom Rice, who was the first to open his house for the pur- pose. Soon the dwelling-house became too strait, and in 1717 a small meeting-house of logs was built. It stood at the corner of Franklin and Green Streets, just southeast of the Common. This served its pur- pose until 1719, when a more spacious. edifice was erected on the site thenceforward occupied by the Old South for one hundred and sixty-eight years. Meanwhile a church had been constituted-perhaps self-constituted-with Daniel Heywood and Nathan- iel Moore for its first deacons. This occurred soon after the permanent settlement. The precise date of this important beginning is not known, but Whitney (" History of Worcester County ") thinks that all probabilities point to the year 1719. This, then, seems to have been the year when the church was organized, the meeting-house built and the first min- ister settled.

The ministry of Mr. Gardner was not a happy one. He was addicted to deer-hunting and practical jokes, and, naturally, was accused of remissness in the dis- charge of his duties. His people on their part ne- glected to pay his small stipend of perhaps £40, and also the "gratuity " of £60, which they had voted to give him. Dissatisfaction increased ; some left his preaching. The General Court having been appealed to in vain, an ecclesiastical council was at length convened, in September, 1721, to take the matter in hand. After long delay by the council, on the 31st of October, 1722, Mr. Gardner was dismissed from his charge. It is said his errors were more of the head than of the heart. He was generous, some- times withont regard to consequences. This instance has been preserved: "A poor parishioner having solicited aid in circumstances of distress, Mr. Gard- ner gave away his only pair of shoes for his relief; and, as this was done on Saturday, appeared the next day in his stockings at the desk to perform the morn- ing service, and in the evening officiated in borrowed slippers a world too wide for his slender members." Mr. Gardner was a native of Brookline and a gradn-

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HISTORY OF WORCESTER COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.

ate of Harvard in the class of 1712. It was thought worthy of mention that, in conformity with the cus- tom of the time, his name was placed last in the roll of his class, as indicating the relative social position of his parents. For the same reason Abraham Lin- coln's name would have stood at the foot of his class had he been college bred. The subsequent history of Mr. Gardner did not improve his reputation. In- stalled as the first minister of Lunenburg in 1728, and dismissed in 1731 " because he was unworthy,", he retired to a town in the Conuecticut Valley, and there died at an advanced age. After a period of preaching without settlement by the Rev. Shearjashub Bourne, the Rev. Thomas White and others, on the 10th of February, 1725, a call was given to the Rev. Isaac Burr, and on the 13th of October following he was ordained as the second minister. A long and quiet ministry followed. His relations with the peo- ple were cordial, and the latter were forward and gen- erous in his support. When the paper money of the period became depreciated they took care that his salary should not suffer. During his ministry a memorable event was the arrival in Worcester, Octo- ber 14, 1740, of George Whitefield, accompanied by Gov. Belcher. On the next day the famous evan- gelist "preached on the Common to some thousands," as he wrote in his diary. Nothing appears to show that this visit was otherwise than welcome to Mr. Burr. And yet, the forces then set in motion had their ultimate issue in his dismission. It seems the Rev. David Hall, of Sutton, " a follower of White- field," found Mr. Burr too backward in the new Whitefield movement. Though he preached re- peatedly "in private houses " in Worcester with Mr. Burr's consent, yet he was moved to write down in his diary that the latter " seemed not well pleased." At length Mr. Burr refused his consent to further preaching by his Sutton brother, whereupon the lat- ter was led to express the fear that the Worcester minister was " too much a stranger to the power of godliness." In truth, a Whitefield party had been formed in Worcester, and Mr. Burr was found not to be of the number. Alienation naturally arose, and the growing trouble impaired his health. So, in about four years after Whitefield's advent, a mutual council was convened, and under its advice Mr. Burr was dismissed in March, 1745. Lincoln (" History of Worcester," p. 146) says that he was the son of the Hon. Peter Burr, the father of President Burr, of Princeton College, and consequently grandfather of Aaron Burr, Vice-President of the United States. But this is an error. It appears from evidence in the probate office at Hartford, Conn., that he was the son of Thomas Burr, of that city, and therefore not of the Aaron Burr lineage. He was born in 1698, and graduated at Yale in 1717. His death occurred at Windsor, abont 1751. No portraiture of his person or mind survives; no characteristic anecdote is of record, and nothing testifies of his ministry save its

continuance for a fifth of a century in a generally peaceful way. The town next made choice of Na- thaniel Gardner, a graduate of Harvard in 1739; he, however, declined the call. Nearly two years elapsed before the settlement of the next minister. In this interval a covenant1 was adopted and subscribed by fifty members of the church. Doubtless there was a covenant of some sort when the church was first or- ganized, but what it was, and how it compared with this new one, we have no means of knowing. If it was a "half-way covenant" after the fashion of that day, it must have differed materially from this one of 1746.

After Mr. Gardner many candidates were heard ; but at last the choice lay between the Rev. Thaddeus Maccarty, of Boston, and the Rev. Jonathan May- hew, of Martha's Vineyard. Each was to preach four Sabbaths in succession, and on the Sabbath be- fore the day of election both were to preach. After this competitive trial the choice by a very large ma- jority fell on Mr. Maccarty, and Worcester missed the chance of having the famous divine of the Revolu- tion among the number of its ministers. Mr. Mac- carty was installed on the 10th of June, 1747. The sermon on the occasion was preached by himself, for which unusual step he offered ingenious reasons in the introduction. Besides the pecuniary provision for his support, a house with abont two acres of land on the Common southeast from the meeting- honse was purchased for a parsonage. In 1765 this property was conveyed in fee to Mr. Maccarty by the town. Nearly fifty years after, in a suit hy the Rev. Samuel Austin, D.D., in behalf of the parish, the property was recovered back from the tenant claim- ing under a conveyance by the executors of the de- ceased minister. The estate, however, was afterwards relinquished by the parish. The ministry of Mr. Maccarty was of nearly forty years' duration. In the course of it occurred the Revolutionary War, bring- ing severe trials ; and at the close protracted sickness kept him out of the pulpit. He lived greatly re- spected and died deeply lamented on the 20th of July, 1784, at the age of sixty-three years. His min- istry was the longest of all which the First Church enjoyed during the first one hundred and seventy years. Mr. Maccarty was tall, slender and thin, with a black, penetrating eye, which added to his effective- ness in speaking.2

1 To be found in Lincoln'e " Ilistory of Worcester."

2 A faint likeness of him survives on a poorly-painted canvas in the possession of Mrs. Mary P. Duun, one of his lineal descendants. IIis remains were buried in the cemetery then en the Common, at a spot just south of and very near the Soldiers' Monument. In 1848 all the gravestones in the cemetery were laid flat, each over ite respective grave, and buried beneath the turf, and Mr. Maccarty's among the rest. A description of the emblems on his headstone, together with ite inscriptions, is given in Barton's " Epitaphs." The inscriptions were copied upen a mural tablet erected in the Oldl'South by Dwight Foster (brother of Mrs. Dunn), late a justice of the Supreme Court of Massa- clinsette. The tablet will have an appropriate place upon the wall of the New Old South.

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" As a preacher he was solemn, loud, searching and rousing," said a contemporary clerical brother. Pres- ident John Adams, in his early years a resident of Worcester, wrote to Dr. Bancroft that " Mr. Mac- carty, though a Calvinist, was no bigot." In the course of his ministry, Mr. Maccarty published eight occasional sermons ; several others may be found in Doctor Smalley's " Worcester Pulpit." From these pos- terity may judge something of his doctrine, which was sound, and something of his style, which was not classical. During his sickness and after his de- cease a young man appeared in his pulpit whose preaching was destined to be the occasion, if not the cause, of a lasting division in the First Parish. Of this an account will be given under another head. During the controversy which arose, no minister was called ; then, in 1786, the Rev. Daniel Story was called, accepted the call and went on preaching, without being ordained, for about two years, when the call was re-called. It had been discovered, that he, too, entertained Arminian sentiments. Having thus received his conge in Worcester, Mr. Story went into Ohio as chaplain of the company which founded Marietta, the centennial of which was celebrated in 1888, a distinguished citizen of Worcester (Senator Hoar) having a leading part therein. Mr. Story was an uncle of Joseph Story, the eminent justice of the Supreme Court of the United States. He was born in Boston on the 29th of July, 1756, was a graduate of Dartmouth in the class of 1780 and died at Mari- etta in 1804.

The settlement of the next minister, Dr. Austin, in the last decade of the century, was the beginning of a new order of things. Before proceeding with its history let us look at the way of public worship in the First Church during the period then closing. As elsewhere, the principal parts of the service were praying and preaching; singing and reading the Scripture lesson were subordinate; and, indeed, this last did not become a part of the service until near the middle of the century. Under date of Septem- ber 3, 1749, the church record recites that the " laud- able custom was very unanimously come into by the church at one of their meetings some time before." In this matter the Worcester church was not behind others, since the custom "was not introduced into New England " until that period. Singing had been a part of the service from the beginning. At first it was congregational, primitive and rude. The minis- ter read the first line of a psalm and the congrega- tion sang it. Then the eldest deacon "lined " the rest, and " singing and reading went on alternately." There was neither chorister nor choir nor set tune, but each one sang to please himself. This was the "usual way," so-called. In 1726 an attempt was made to substitute the "ruleable way." A vote of the town was passed to that effect, but the deacons resisted, and the "usual way " still prevailed. The unmelodious custom was too strongly entrenched.

Forty-three years went by and a generation had died off before another attempt to change it was made. Then, in May, 1769, came a modest propo- sition to invite "a qualified individual" to lead. A bolder stroke followed in March, 1770, when three men were designated by name "to sit in the elders' seat and lead," and by a unanimous vote a fourth was chosen to "assist." Here was our modern quar- tette, so far as the old-time sense of propriety would allow. The next step was taken in 1773 by providing seats exclusively for the singers. Six years after, on the 5th of August, 1779, the town struck the final blow by adopting these votes : That the singers sit in the front seats of the front gallery ; that they he requested to take said seats and carry on the sing- ing ; and that the psalm be not "lined." Neverthe- less, on the next Sabbath the venerable eldest deacon rose and began to "line" the psalm. The singers, from their new " coign of vantage," began to sing; the deacon raised his voice, the singers raised theirs ; it was an unequal strife, and the deacon "retired from the meeting-house in tears." This was the end of the " usual way " of singing in Worcester. From that time onward the ruleable way prevailed without op- position.

The first book in use was the " Bay Psalm Book," 1 as improved by President Dunster, of Harvard Col- lege. This held the ground until 1761, and was then displaced by the version of Tate and Brady, "with an Appendix of Scriptural Hymns by Dr. Watts." The exact date when this book came into use was on the 29th of November in that year. It continued in use until the settlement of Dr. Austin, and then, on the 20th of January, 1790, gave way to "Watts' Psalms and Hymns and Spiritual Songs." The ver- sion of Sternhold and Hopkins was never used in the church in this town," says Lincoln.2 This version was the one in use under royal authority by the Church of England, and was hound up with its " Book of Common Prayer." Perhaps it was be- cause of this that the New England churches chose to have a" Psalm Book" of their own-a book free from all complicity with an established church.

1 This most famous and rarest of books was the first one ever printed in America. Its true, whole and only title was " The whole booke of psalmes faithfully translated into English Metre, Wherennto is prefixed a discourse declaring oot only the lawfulnee, but also the necessity of the heavenly Ordinances of sioging Scripture Psalme in the Churches of God. Imprinted 1640." In 1636 there were, saye Dr. Thomas Prince, " near thirty ministers " in New England who had been educated in the English universities. These divines selected out of their number "the Rev. Mr. Richard Mather, the Rev. Mr. Thomas Weld and the Rev. Mr. John Eliot," to prepare a new version of the Psalmns for the use of the New England churches. The printing of the work was hegun in 1639 and completed in 1640. This was the " Bay Psalm-Book." A single copy, bearing the imprint of the last-named year, is treasured in the iron safe of the American Antiquarian Society, i Worcester It is sometimes said of a very rare book that it is worth its weight in gold. In 1876 a copy of this hook belonging to the estate of the late Dr. Nathaniel B. Shurtleff, was sold by auction in Boston for about one thousand and fifty dollars. The Worcester copy weighs nine ounces. The price paid for the Boston copy, therefore, was more than six times its weight in gold. 2 MS. Notes in Lib. of Antiq. Soc.

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To illustrate the several versions and furnish a means of comparison the first verse of the first psalm from each is subjoined.

FROM THE BAY PSALM-BOOK OF 1640.

O Blessed man that in th' advice of wicked doth not walk : nor stand in sinners way, nor sit in chayre of scornfull folk.

FROM DUNSTER'S IMPROVED BAY PSALM-BOOK OF 1650.

O Blessed man that walks notin th' advice of wicked men, Nor standeth in the sinners way nor scorners seat sits in.

FROM TATE AND BRADY, ORIGINAL EDITION, ANNO 1700.

Happy the Man whom ill Advice From Virtue ne'er withdrew, Who ne'er with Sinners stood nor sat Amongst the scoffing Crew.

FROM TATE AND BRADY, WITH APPENDIX BY WATTS, ANNO 1751.

How hlest is he who ne'er consents by ill Advice to walk Nor stands in Sinners Ways; nor sits where Men profanely talk !

FROM STERNHOLD AND HOFKINS, LONDON, 1648.

The man is blest that hath not bent to wicked read his eare : Nor led his life as sinners do, nor sate in scorners chaire.

After six years of waiting the First Parish at length secured the most distinguished among all its minis- ters. On the 29th of September, 1790, the Rev. Samnel Anstin, D.D., of New Haven, was duly in- stalled in the vacant pulpit. His first considerable step was to clear up and reinvigorate the doctrinal basis of the church. A new creed and covenant were adopted, whereby its orthodoxy was conformed to the strictest type. All the subsequent activities of Dr. Austin had this type for their basis. He devoted himself to the investigation of theological questions. He prepared and published the first complete edition of the works of the elder Jonathan Edwards. He was one of the founders of the General Association of Massachusetts, and also of the Massachusetts Home Missionary Society. He was often called to sit in councils on difficult cases. He was a man of strong convictions and plain speech. On public affairs he preached with great freedom. His fast-day sermons were notable. Several were published. The one preached on the 23d of July, 1812, during the war, caused much agitation. He therefore published it, with this upon its title-page : "Published from the press by the desire of some who heard it and liked it ; by the desire of some who heard it and did not like it; and by the desire of others who did not hear it, but imagine they should not have liked it if they had."

presidency in 1821, he became pastor of a small church in Newport, R. I., once the charge of the famous divine, Dr. Samuel Hopkins. This, too, he resigned in 1825, and then returned to Worcester, preaching occasionally in Millbury. By and by the death of an adopted son, physical disease and pecu- niary losses brought on mental disturbance. Like the poet Cowper, he became a religious monomaniac. The darkness of despair settled down upon him. For some four years he remained in this state of gloom. Near the end, light at intervals broke through the cloud. He died on the 4th of December, 1830, in the seventy-first year of his age. He was a man of com- manding stature, of dignified carriage, austere yet affable on near approach, and "with a smile like a sunbeam breaking through the clouds." As a preacher he was remarkable for power and pathos, and of eminent gifts in devotional exercises. The impress of his character was deep and abiding. Of his publications, Lincoln ("History ") gives a list of thirty-three, with their titles.

The successor of Dr. Anstin was the Rev. Charles A. Goodrich. He was ordained as colleague pastor on the 9th of October, 1816, and became sole pastor by the formal dismission of Dr. Austin in 1818. His ministry was short but fruitful of a spiritual harvest, about eighty new confessors, being added to the church in one year. But it was a ministry full of trouble also. Beginning as a young man of twenty-six years, he found himself confronted at the outset with the opposition of a leading person both in the parish and in the town. Though this person was not himself of the church, yet some of his family were; and the com- bined influence of all caused the diaffection to spread. Attempts at reconciliation were made and failed. It became evident that either the minister or the disaf- fected must leave. The former was too strongly in- trenched to be ousted, and the latter perforce ac- cepted the alternative. For a time they resorted to other communions while retaining connection with their own church. Presently, they sought release from this bond. Some asked for dismission and re- commendation. Several were dismissed but not re- commended. Councils were resorted to and counter- councils were held, with the usual results of ex parte proceedings. Each party in turn was sustained. At last a council constituted the disaffected, with others, into a new church, the history of which, under the name of the Calvinist or Central Church, will be given in its proper place. A war of pamphlets followed, able and exhaustive on both sides; and to them the reader must be remitted for further and fuller details of the unhappy controversy. This church quarrel was the most serious that ever afflicted any church of any communion in the town. Ill health compelled Mr. Goodrich to lay down his charge on the 14th of November, 1820, and the same canse prevented him from resuming the pastoral office. For the rest of

At the end of twenty-five years he became presi- dent of the University of Vermont, but, because of the suit already mentioned, remained nominal pastor of the First Parish till 1818. Resigning the college i his life he devoted himself to literary pursuits. He

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History of Worcester County, Massachusetts : with biographical sketches of many of its pioneers and prominent men, Vol. II, Part 134

Author: Hurd, D. Hamilton (Duane Hamilton) Publication date: 1889 Publisher: Philadelphia : J.W. Lewis & Co. Number of Pages: 1464

Author: Hurd, D. Hamilton (Duane Hamilton)
Publication date: 1889
Publisher: Philadelphia : J.W. Lewis & Co.
Number of Pages: 1464