USA > Massachusetts > History of the Diocese of Massachusetts, 1810-1872 > Part 15
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With the masses of population, vacillating and youthful, flowing in upon us like the waves of the ocean, bearing with them the ignorance and prejudices respecting our Church, wherein they have been educated-upon this por- tion of our population, youthful as they are-powerful and lasting impres- sions are readily made. They are constantly arriving here and returning to their homes, carrying with them the truths and errors they have here im- bibed. If they should be thoroughly indoctrinated into the principles and doctrines of the Church, they would carry and diffuse those doctrines into every town, hundreds of miles around us. Could they become practically acquainted with the simplicity, purity, and truth of our worship, they would return to their friends, and the firesides of their homes, zealous, faithful, efficient missionaries of our cause.75
73. JM, 1846, p. 41.
74. JM, 1846, p. 42. The report was signed by Luke Whitney and Ira Spauld- ing, wardens of St. Luke's, and dated
Lowell, 1 Oct. 1846.
75. JM, 1846, pp. 40-41. This quotation was among 'extracts' from a document re- ceived by the Church Extension Commit-
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The Rev. Theodore Edson, St. Anne's, Lowell, reported to the diocese, as secretary for the extension committee, that the property of St. Luke's had, by sale, 'become entirely alienated from the use of the Episcopal Church'.76 He then added that,
The extent of this calamity is not to be measured by the amount of property lost. The indifference thus manifested towards an object so widely con- nected with the best interests of religion and the welfare of a Church con- tinually taunted for the wealth of its members, reacts with fearful effect upon the community, and demonstrates the importance of an efficient or- ganization not to suppress all action, but to set on foot vigorous and active measures for raising funds whereby to aid the worthy enterprise of building up the Church. . . . 77
This statement of Edson's revealed yet once more the parochial aspect of the Church in Massachusetts. Lowell with one Episcopal society had no better claim to diocesan funds than any other in- dustrial center of comparable size. With the promise of a large and self-maintaining parish as the offspring of St. Anne's, however, Edson suffered under the apparent indifference of Bishop East- burn. Admittedly the support, guidance, and direction of the af- fairs of the diocese resided in the various committees acting by authority of the annual convention. These committees, including the standing committee, were made up of lay and clerical members who, for the most part, belonged to individual parishes. The bish- op on the other hand belonged primarily to the diocese. As a leader in diocesan concerns, he had the opportunity for, if not the responsibility of, channeling the resources of the diocese and of directing the work of the committees for the over-all good of the diocese and of the Church at large. In the case of St. Luke's, the bishop did not appear as an advocate for 'vigorous and active measures' for aiding the parish. The Church extension committee itself, though, had taken 'no direct measures for raising funds', as
tee of the diocese, dated Lowell, 29 July 1846, and signed by John F. Rodgers and Luke Whitney, a committee of St. Luke's vestry. The argument had the familiar ring of 'Give us a child for its first seven years, etc.'
76. JM, 1846, p. 44.
77. JM, 1846, pp. 44-45. Edson's view- point was somewhat biased, as he had had to struggle to keep St. Anne's going in the face of opposition imposed by some of the mill owners.
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the Board of Missions had helped to support small or new parishes for ten years.78 The Board of Missions, which had supported the Rev. Amos D. McCoy as missionary at St. Luke's for at least three years, accepted no diocesan responsibility for the extinction of the parish. The secretary of the board, the Rev. M. A. DeWolfe Howe, used the failure of this parish to read a lesson on New England thrift at the parochial level. 'Nothing is more discouraging to the liberality of the Church', reported Howe, 'than the failure of mis- sionary enterprises on which large sums have been expended. Great care should be taken by infant parishes, not to incur diffi- culties which may thus not only cripple themselves, but result in depriving others of the sympathy and aid which otherwise might be obtained.'79
The "others' referred to by Howe meant parishes in the western part of the diocese, or in industrial areas in the eastern portion of the diocese, where there was but one Episcopal society. The bud- get of the Board of Missions for 1845-46 was about $11,700; of this amount one third went to 'Foreign Missions', one third for 'Gen- eral Domestic Missions', and one third for 'Missions within this Diocese'.80 The missionary resources of the diocese resided not in diocesan boards and committees but rather in individuals and small groups of the Episcopal Church. William Appleton, as noted above, gave money to build and furnish St. Stephen's Chapel. Two years later in 1848, he gave $5000, which was used to erect in China, by the American Board of Missions, the first Episcopal mis- sionary chapel. This gift was not inspired by an heartfelt interest on Appleton's part in missions, but he regretted the small attend- ance at St. Paul's, Boston, when a missionary gave the sermon.81 Personalities raised more missionary funds than reports of com- mittees. When the Rev. William Jones Boone, the Episcopal
78. JM, 1846, pp. 45, 56.
79. JM, 1846, pp. 61-62. As rector of St. James', Roxbury, Mr. Howe had ex- perienced the situation of having his par- ish on 'the verge of immediate dissolution'. JM, 1844, p. 25.
80. JM, 1846, pp. 56-63.
81. . .. I could well spare more', wrote Appleton but missions did not 'produce the strongest Interest' in him. At St. Paul's he noted that it was very strange there should be so little interest in missions'. Appleton, Diaries, p. 129.
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Church's first missionary bishop in China, preached at St. Paul's, Brookline, and subsequently stayed the night at the Appleton's house, William Appleton gave him $500 for the 'China Mission'. 82
Within the diocese, individual help probably exceeded diocesan aid to missions and weak parishes. Individual givers did not, how- ever, confine their aid to needy parishes alone; they gave naturally enough to parishes they favored or to which they belonged. Re- garded by the Board of Missions 'as one of the most important stations in the Diocese', All Saints, Worcester, at long last com- menced its great career without important diocesan help. Funds for the critical years of 1844 to 1846 came one-half from within the parish itself and one-half from 'the liberality of the churchmen of Boston'. To Bishop Eastburn's leadership, of course, belonged a portion of the successful effort made in both Worcester and Lynn. 83
As during the episcopate of Bishop Griswold, water power still was tied in closely with some new Episcopal societies, but more for business than for personal motives. Methuen in the Merrimack River valley had not been without occasional church services from 1833.84 Before 1845, the Merrimack east, or tidewater side, of Low- ell had been known as a source of power; the stretch of the river at the falls between Andover and Methuen revealed a drop of about fifty feet. 85 The capital for utilizing the power was available in 1845, and the Essex Corporation, a group of Boston investors, did for Lawrence what the earlier Locks and Canal Company had done for Lowell.86 The rector of this new parish for thirty years was the Rev. George Packard, who came to Grace Church with letters dim- issory from the Diocese of Virginia.87 Outside of substantial help
82. Appleton, Diaries, pp. 216-217, en- try for 26 June 1859.
83. JM, 1845, pp. 77-78; 1846, p. 57; 1847, p. 91.
84. Rev. A. H. Amory, Anniversary Ser- mon Preached in Grace Church Chapel, Oc- tober 11, 1896 (Cambridge, 1896), p. 4. Maurice B. Dorgan, History of Lawrence, Massachusetts, etc. (pub. by the author, n.p., 1924), pp. 126-127.
85. J. F. C. Hayes, History of the City of Lawrence (Lawrence, Mass., 1868), p. 9.
86. The Essex Corp. was incorporated 20 March 1845; Samuel Lawrence, the youngest brother of Amos and Abbott Lawrence, was one of the incorporators. The first directors were Abbott Lawrence, Nathan Appleton, Ignatus Sargent, Wil- liam Sturgis, and Charles S. Storrow. Hayes, Lawrence, pp. 11-17.
87. JM, 1844, p. 21. He died in Law- rence 30 Nov. 1876. Packard was a gradu- ate of Bowdoin in 1821, and took his M.D. there in 1825. His brother Joseph Packard
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in building its first two churches, Grace Church parish survived and grew by the strength of sheer numbers, as in the case of St. Anne's in Lowell. 88 Its third rector, Mr. A. H. Amory, justly noted that "The names of Boston's prominent merchants and manufac- turers are found on each subscription list to day [1896] and fifty years ago. Men who put their capital here are interested in the moral welfare of the people. Corporations have souls and hearts. The church . .. was built and improved by friends of the city and parish, whose capital is in these mills, but who have rarely, if ever, been within its walls. This generosity and act of benevolence should be given its true value.'89
Bishop Eastburn saw no great opportunities for the Church in Lawrence without help from 'those, whose talent and resources are engaged in the work of building up this new settlement . . . '. The bishop also pointed out that the founders of the Essex Corporation at Lawrence 'have from the beginning felt, that, without establish- ing the Gospel of Christ there .. . , they could expect no blessing from on high'.90 Like St. Stephen's, Lynn, Grace Church, Law- rence, was 'always to be poor', yet always a strong parish and good training ground for priests and bishops.91 The Roman Church early saw the rising city of Lawrence 'as a field for religious teach- ing', and thence they sent 'as pioneer workers for the church, men of large capacity and untiring energy .. . '. The Roman Catholic population exceeded any other Christian society from the begin- ning, and in 1848 about thirty-five per cent of the population be- longed to the Roman Church. 92
Although both the Roman and the Episcopal societies had the benefit of able pastors, the Roman group developed among a popu- lation more than one-third of which 'was naturally [Roman] Cath- olic in religious tendency', while the Episcopal group grew up sup-
was also an Episcopal minister, and profes- sor at Virginia Theological Seminary. Gen- eral Catalog Bowdoin College (1950), p. 52.
88. The rector after Packard's death was William Lawrence, later Bishop of Massa- chusetts. Grace Church was the only par- ish Bishop Lawrence ever held .
Amory, Sermon, pp. 7-10. 89. Amory, Sermon, p. 7.
90. JM, 1847, p. 17.
91. Amory, Sermon, p. 7.
92. A Roman church was built and Masses held from mid-1846. Dorgan, Law- rence, pp. 126-127.
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ported in part by individuals living away from Lawrence. From the time of the building of the Roman church in 1846, its children had the benefit of 'quite a large school'.93 The number of Episcopalians, however, was small; Grace Church Sunday school numbered only 104, ten years after the society started.94 In his annual diocesan addresses Bishop Eastburn paid his tribute to the maintenance, in great part, of Grace Church, Lawrence, and St. Stephen's, Lynn, by a few laymen centered in or near Boston. He did not suggest, however, that the parishes themselves could be self-supporting. In Eastburn's early episcopate, it was yet a day of small things for the diocese, and the bishop was primarily concerned with the kind of theology his different parishes preached and professed, and was only secondarily occupied with the extension of the Church into new areas. 95
93. Dorgan, Lawrence, p. 126.
94. Lawrence's population in 1856 was 16,800; in this same year Grace Church reported 103 members. Dorgan, Lawrence, p. 174; JM, 1856, p. 67.
95. JM, 1844, p. 31. Eastburn set him- self squarely against any doctrine or prac- tice in the Church which could be con- nected with the Oxford Movement. What the Oxford Movement meant to a New York state layman of the Episcopal Church (and a brother-in-law of Bishop DeLan- cey), James Fenimore Cooper, appeared in 1847. Cooper wrote, 'Here we have the
Anglo-American church, just as it has fin- ished a blast of trumpets, through the me- dium of numberless periodicals and a thou- sand letters from its confiding if not con- fident clergy, in honor of its quiet and har- mony, and superior polity, suspended on the very brink of the precipice of separa- tion, if not of schism, and all because it has pleased certain ultra-sublimated divines in the other hemisphere to write a parcel of tracts that nobody understands, them- selves included.' The Crater, or Vulcan's Peak (Mohawk Ed., New York and Lon- don), p. 7.
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N his first diocesan address, Bishop Eastburn had mentioned theological training. Specifically he had referred to General Theological Seminary, where he had been a student and later a trustee. In 1842 he could 'speak with confidence in its favor', and he could hope that the clergy in his diocese 'so far as they may have any influence over the minds of young persons looking for- ward to ordination . . . [would] secure their attendance upon that distinguished seat of theological acquirement'.1 Three years' resi- dence in New England had, however, shown Eastburn that the people in New England revealed a preference 'towards institutions for education established among themselves'.2 His opinion, like Bishop Griswold's, was that a diocesan seminary would hold in the Church candidates for the ministry who were also Episcopalians. Without a theological school in the diocese, these candidates could, and did, take advantage of the ‘greater facilities for theo- logical education offered by other religious bodies .. . '.3 Also, in 1846, Bishop Eastburn had felt unsure of the training at General Theological Seminary, and warned that a young candidate's going there was 'a matter at present of doubtful expediency'. 4
Bishop Eastburn had discussed the establishing of a school of theology with William Appleton and others prior to the diocesan convention of June 1845.5 William Appleton had definite feelings on the subject. To provide for . .. the education of ministers and workers for Christ, I feel ... is a true test of a man's religion',
1. JM, 1843, pp. 31-32.
2. JM, 1846, p. 29.
3. Ibid.
4. This doubt about General Theologi- cal Seminary came, of course, from Bishop Eastburn's distrust of the influence of the
Oxford Movement on the school. JGC, 1844, pp. 230-231.
5. James Arthur Muller, The Episcopal Theological School, 1867-1943 (Cambridge, 1943), p. 7.
[155 ]
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wrote Appleton in 1842, before the diocese had the full-time serv- ices of a bishop.6 When, in the diocesan convention of 1845, Ed- ward S. Rand, Jr., brought up the question of theological educa- tion, Bishop Eastburn appointed a committee, of which he himself was named chairman, to report to the next annual convention. Other members of the committee were the Rev. Edward Ballard, the Rev. Charles Mason, William Appleton, William F. Otis, and E. S. Rand, Jr.7
The idea of a diocesan seminary had been latent in the mind of Appleton at least as early as 1842. In April of that year, he, with his rector at St. Paul's, Mr. Vinton, met Simon Greenleaf, a layman of Christ Church, Cambridge, and Professor of the Harvard Law School.8 Greenleaf was, like Appleton, interested in organizing a diocesan seminary, but realized that the efforts and the results of the diocesan convention of 1836 indicated a conservative approach in this field.9 Like Appleton, again, Greenleaf was a great admirer of Alonzo Potter, who had been on an important committee for a projected diocesan seminary in 1831. Greenleaf wrote Potter in 1839, and expressed his belief that by purchasing 'one of the ample mansions' on Mt. Auburn Street in Cambridge, and by having Potter live there and be at once the sole teacher of the seminary and the rector of Christ Church, Cambridge, some $15,000 might be raised, the plan might work. Potter tactfully declined any invita- tion again to serve in the diocese.10 When Appleton and Vinton
6. Appleton, Diaries (1 May 1842), p. 93.
7. JM, 1845, pp. 41-42. Bishop East- burn was, of course, the president or pre- siding officer of the convention; in the journal he is referred to as 'the Chair'. The Chair appointed the committee named above.
8. Simon Greenleaf (1783-1853), born in Newburyport, Mass., removed to Maine as a young man where he attained promi- nence as a lawyer. He was named Royall Professor of Law at Harvard Law School in 1833, where he taught until 1848. He died in Cambridge in 1853. He had a son, the
Rev. Patrick Henry Greenleaf (1807-69), an Episcopal minister, and two daughters. Each of these daughters married men who were Episcopal ministers, the Rev. Samuel Fuller, and the Rev. Andrew Croswell. Memorial Biographies of New England His- toric Genealogical Society, 1853-1855 (Bos- ton, 1881), II, 106-107. The notice of Si- mon Greenleaf in the Proceedings of the Massachusetts Historical Society, 1835-1855, II, 563-568, is unclear in its statement about his children on page 567.
9. JM, 1836, pp. 50-52; 1837, p. 41. 10. Muller, ETS, p. 6.
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met Greenleaf in 1842, Appleton noted in his diary, ‘ ... much talk as to Theological Seminary: I said, "Now is the time to begin; if you Gentl will put things as they should be, I will purchase the House opposite the Craigie place, if it is to be had for ten thousand dollars." '11
Following the death of Bishop Griswold, the plans for a seminary were in abeyance until the years 1845 and 1846. In 1845, Bishop Eastburn's committee 'to promote the cause of Theological Educa- tion in the Diocese' was organized. In 1846, at the diocesan con- vention, the Rev. A. H. Vinton reported for the Committee on Theological Education that in line with his wish to found a 'Divin- ity School', William Appleton had ... actually contributed for that purpose, the sum of twenty-five thousand dollars, upon the conditions set forth in a certain Indenture, exhibited to this Con- vention'.12 The conditions were not met; the diocese was to be without a school for more than a score of years.
Appleton's 1846 plan was both conservative and largely a family affair. He wrote in 1842 that his son Amory 'fully agrees with me in the course I propose' to educate ministers for the diocese.13 Amory died in 1843, but in 1846 William Appleton still had two sons and two sons-in-law, all interested in the Episcopal Church. Here was a ready-made committee who had obvious reasons for
11. Appleton, Diaries (30 Apr. 1842), p· 93.
12. JM, 1845, p. 41. The indenture men- tioned was an agreement made between William Appleton and four trustees, J. S. C. Greene, A. A. Lawrence, F. H. Apple- ton, J. W. Appleton, all sons or sons-in- law of Mr. Appleton. The agreement was dated 9 May 1846; it provided that the trustees should hold in trust 200 shares of the Bank of Commerce, and 100 shares of the Bank of America, New York City, which Mr. Appleton had given to the trus- tees. This stock was described as 'exceed- ing in value the sum of twenty-five thou- sand dollars .. . '. If the trustees secured a further sum of $25,000 or more, within two years, they were to sell the bank stocks, and pay to Mr. Appleton any amount, in-
cluding dividends, over $25,000. Then the trustees were to create an endowment fund of $50,000 (or more, if the original amount were exceeded) for the projected 'Protes- tant Episcopal Divinity School of Massa- chusetts'. The indenture stated that the bishop of the diocese 'for the time being, shall, ex-officio, always be a member of the said Board of Trustees [of the School], and shall, when present, preside at their meet- ings ... '. Were the original gift of Apple- ton not matched within two years, the trustees were to 'refund and repay . . . on request' whatever sums had been contrib- uted, including the bank stocks of Mr. Appleton. JM, 1846, pp. 47-53, 69-70.
13. Appleton, Diaries (2 May 1842), p. 93.
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working together. After the convention of June 1846, Appleton wrote that 'my proposition for a Divinity School ... will be carried into effect is doubtful in my mind. I think much good would be de- rived by the Institution, but God will devise all for good.'14
William Appleton's grandson, Bishop William Lawrence, re- marked some seventy years later that ' "From our present point of view 'God devised for good,' in causing the plan to fall through," for had this, or any of the previous efforts, been successful, the School would have been a local institution under diocesan con- trol.'15
Both Bishop Lawrence's comment and William Appleton's "doubtful mind' revealed the latent tensions always present in the annual conventions of the diocese. Historically these tensions arose from the congregational and parochial viewpoint to which the diocesan conventions were always subject. These tensions, also, developed from an incomplete understanding of the Book of Common Prayer by far too many clergy and laymen, who were drawn to the Church by their preference for the prayer book forms of Morning Prayer and Evening Prayer, but who, at the same time, were apparently indifferent to the Ordinal with its forthright pref- ace. 16
William Appleton's 'Indenture' sought at the outset to avoid tensions by keeping the projected plan for a seminary in the hands of his immediate family. On the diocesan level, owing in part to the relatively small numbers of churchmen in the diocese and to their concentration near Boston, family, social, and even business co- hesiveness helped to surmount the tensions. This cohesiveness showed itself in at least two ways. Firstly, clergy and laymen served the Church, as was pointed out above, in both parish and diocese,
14. Appleton, Diaries (3 June 1846), p. 120.
15. Muller, ETS, p. 7.
16. In the preface to the Ordinal it is clearly stated that .... from the Apostles' time there have been these Orders of Min- isters in Christ's Church,-Bishops, Priests, and Deacons'. The authority for these orders is self-evident to all men . . .
diligently reading Holy Scripture and an- cient Authors . . . '. The prayer book terms the morning and evening services . . . Daily Morning Prayer', and 'Daily Eve- ning Prayer', not confining the services to Sundays, saints' days, or holy days, hence providing a form of service to be used on every day of the week.
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for long periods of time. Secondly, the relationships, on several different levels, of many individuals numbered as Episcopalians, had a firmer foundation than was at first sight apparent. A very little closer reading of the seemingly dull and repetitious annual reports of the diocese, for example, reveals the social or family unitedness of the Church. An instance of this coherence appeared in the report for 1848.
In his annual diocesan address of that year, Bishop Eastburn noted that at Trinity Church, Boston, on 2 February 1848, he had ordained to the priesthood the Rev. Andrew Croswell. 17 The Rev. Patrick H. Greenleaf preached the sermon, and the Rev. Thomas M. Clark assisted Eastburn 'in the laying on of hands'.18 From this summary recording of a routine episcopal act the following facts emerge. Clark, just appointed assistant minister at Trinity Church on the Greene Foundation, had been a fellow student of Greenleaf's under Bishop Griswold. Griswold had ordained them within four months of one another in 1836. Both Clark and Greenleaf were converts to the Episcopal Church in the sense that their immediate families, both residing in Newburyport, were not members of the Church there. Greenleaf's father, Simon, was (as stated above) a close friend and adviser of William Appleton in diocesan affairs, while Clark's father, Thomas, Sr., was connected with Appleton in the group of persons who had been permitted to subscribe to stock in the Pawtucket Canal Co. Andrew Croswell, the central figure in this ordination scene, was married to Caroline Augusta Greenleaf, who was at once the daughter of Simon and the sister of Patrick H. Greenleaf, who preached the sermon.19 Bishop Eastburn alone ap- peared to be the only figure outside of this quasi-family circle. 20
By his marriage to Mary Jane Head, granddaughter of Joseph
17. Eastburn gave this address in Trin- ity Church, Boston, at the annual conven- tion on 14 June 1848. JM, 1848, p. 3.
18. JM, 1848, p. 17.
19. Trinity Church, p. 201; Cleaveland and Packard, History of Bowdoin College (Boston, 1882), pp. 301-302; Rt. Rev. George Burgess, List of ... Order of Dea- cons, etc. (Boston, 1875), nos. 1110 and
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