USA > Massachusetts > Berkshire County > Pittsfield > The history of Pittsfield (Berkshire County), Massachusetts, from the year 1800 to the year 1876 > Part 12
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Your discourses generally from February, 1806, to the time of your going to Boston in May, were constantly interlarded with politics. Your sermon on the Sabbath next after the last New Year's day was most pointedly irritating and insulting, and has caused very general uneasiness in the town. Your conduct on the 4th of March current, and the toast you then gave and repeated-" No compromise with fed- eralists, no concurrence with neuters,"-we consider as drawing the sword against us and throwing away the scabbard. Your sermon on the Sabbath after, we view as a pointed declaration that your future conduct should comport with that sentiment ; for you then knew of our complaints against you, and our uneasiness ou that account, yet you asserted that, for forty-three years past, you had preached nothing but
1 Mr. Little stated at this time, that "he had always been the friend of Mr. Allen and his family ;" but Hon. Ezekiel Bacon, a competent witness, wrote to Hon. H. C. Van Schaack as follows : " Mr Little was a lawyer by profes- sion, I believe of quite respectable standing, and I think king's attorney for the county when the revolution came on. Ilis town and county were mostly very zealous whigs, particularly the clergyman of the parish, Rev. Thomas Allen, who then, and also in the federal and democratic times, pursued Mr. Little, as he and his friends, at least, thought, pretty warmly and inexorably. Ilowever that might be, there was no love lost between them."
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Christ and Him crucified, or truths and doctrines therewith connected ; and that you should pursue the same line or manner of preaching in future, notwithstanding the menaces of your opposers : which clearly imports, either that you had been menaced on account of preaching such doctrines, or that you consider all your political preaching as con- sonant therewith ; neither of which is admitted." * * * " It gives us no little uneasiness that, while our feelings are thus harassed np and lacerated by your public discourses-while many of your own political adherents are dissatisfied with such sermons, and some of them have told you so-while too many of the uncandid and injudicious are indecently grinning their smiles of approbation, to the disturbance of. public worship, and while it is not an unusual thing to hear them, leav- ing the house, declare that 'the parson has given the federalists a proper dressing to-day,'-you are declaring that you do not preach on political subjects, yet at other times with a strange inconsistency, you have boldly declared that you considered republicanism, or democracy, as exhibited in the administration of Mr. Jefferson, to be the very essence of the gospel of Jesus Christ. We complain of your publica- tions in the Sun, and more particularly that ' on the death of Hamilton,' and also that 'on the execution of Wheeler.' 1
" We complain of your giving public notice in the meeting-house, on the Sabbath day, that the 4th of March would be celebrated in this town as a day of thanksgiving and praise, etc., and of your intro- duction at a conference-meeting on the evening of the 3d of March, of the political song which was to be sung by your party on the day fol- lowing." 2
This extract will give a vivid idea of the temper of the times,
1 The article upon the death of Hamilton was exceedingly severe in its criticism of that greatest leader and idol of the federal party, and represented his death to have been a divine judgment. The article upon the execution of Wheeler, who was hanged for rape committed upon his own daughter, bit- terly censured the federal governor of Massachusetts for not commuting his sentence to imprisonment for life. Rev. Wm Allen does not expressly deny his father's authorship of these articles ; but he states that of six articles in the Sun, including these, which were attributed by the federalists to him, three, at least, were not written by him. He maintains, however, his father's right to have written them, and explains with regard to the Wiceler article, that he was, with thousands of others, strongly opposed to the punishment of death except for murder. In regard to the amelioration of the laws, the Pitts- field minister was, from the first to the last, an earnest reformer.
2 This charge was reduced by Rev. Wm. Allen to the fact that his father gave permission to rehearse the piece in the school house, where the meeting was held, after the congregation had been dismissed, and that he invited those who wished to remain and listen.
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as well as of the complaints made against Mr. Allen. He replied in the following letter :
PITTSFIELD, March 31, 1807.
To Woodbridge Little and Ashbel Strong, Esquires, Mr. Joseph Fair- field and Mr. Eli Maynard, committee from the aggrieved part of my flock :
GENTLEMEN : Woodbridge Little has drawn up, with the assist- ance of Mr. Williams and others, a paper containing false and malevo- lent charges against your pastor, which you have signed as being true.
Two things I request of you.
1. That you would lay said paper of charges before your constitu- ents whom you represent, and that they do not condemn me as guilty of them, unheard ; nor scourge a man that is an American, uncondemned.
2. You say in your paper, that you shall be ready to accept of me adequate and reasonable satisfaction, corresponding with the nature and equity of the case ; but have left me wholly in the dark as to what you shall be pleased to deem adequate and reasonable satisfaction. If I do not know what my people want of me, how shall I be able to gratify their wishes ? You will, therefore, be pleased to tell me what satisfaction will be agreeable to you .. Do you desire any pecuniary sat- isfaction ? If so, how much will satisfy you ? Or do you desire a con- fession from me? You will dictate one for me and send it to me. Otherwise I shall not be able to ascertain what will satisfy you. Or do you want a promise in respect to my future preaching ? You must express to me the nature and extent of such promise-for you may call anything and everything political.
You will, therefore, expressly and clearly define the restraints you design to put me under in my preaching, and substitute your con- ยท sciences and mandates in the room of mine. Be pleased to satisfy my mind on these topics in order to enable me to give you that adequate and reasonable satisfaction, for my manifold offenses, which you demand.
I can do nothing on that subject 'till I hear from you again.
I am, gentlemen, with due respect, your sincere friend and affec- tionate pastor, THOMAS ALLEN.
A full meeting of " the dissatisfied " voted this reply " unsatis- factory," and appointed Mr. Little with four others to request Mr. Allen to call a church-meeting, and, if they could agree, unite with him in calling a mutual council to hear and advise the conflicting parties; otherwise to take the proper measures for calling an ex parte council.
Mr. Allen declined to unite in calling a council "the way not
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being properly prepared for it,"1 and the dissatisfied, through a committee of which Mr. Little was again chairman, asked the advice of the Berkshire Association of Congregational ministers, which met at Lenox on the third Tuesday of June. This body made the following response :
" GENTLEMEN : This association feel it a very delicate matter to give advice in the case you have stated to us, because the official character of the pastor of the church in Pittsfield is concerned in it ; but, reflect- ing on the present unhappy and threatening state of the church, we have been influenced to converse together on the subject, and now com- municate to you the result of our deliberations.
" We are of opinion that for any members of the church to unite together, or with any others, in measures which implicate the character of your pastor, either as unchristian or imprudent, is an unjustifiable step. If any of the brethren have done this we recommend it to them to embrace the earliest opportunity to acknowledge to the pastor their fault. If, however, difficulties threatening the peace of the church and the town should still subsist, it is our opinion that the brethren should act agreeably to the rule prescribed by the Head of the Church in the eighteenth chapter of Matthew, and take the private steps of discipline with their pastor. If these steps should not produce the desired effect in bringing about a reconciliation, we advise the aggrieved brethren to take no other steps in a matter of so much importance, without having the counsel of able and wise men.
ALBERT SAMUEL SHEPARD, Scribe. DAVID PERRY, Moderator. Lenox, June 17, 1807.
Mr. Allen's friends took exception to this paper on the ground that it was so expressed as " to lead the seceding members of his church to think that he was worthy of discipline," thus in fact condemning one of their ministerial brethren unheard, and with- out even a statement in writing of the things laid to his charge. On this latter ground, indeed, Rev. Mr. Perry of Richmond, although a federalist, and although he signed the proceedings as moderator, protested against them. The complainants, on the contrary, maintained that their irregularity in failing to take the preliminary gospel-steps of discipline was merely technical, and that they had been led into it by Mr. Allen's own request that the committee should make their communications to him in writing.
1 This phrase alludes to a technical difficulty, which will appear in the prog- ress of the controversy.
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To this again it might well have been replied, that the mode of procedure enjoined in the gospel, according to St. Matthew, con- templated as the essential first step, the private action of an individual, and that the very existence of a committee pre-sup- posed a violation of covenant obligations in forming a union for combined action ; thus destroying the privacy which the Head of the Church had ordained, in order to prevent the obstacles which the publicity of a quarrel inevitably interposes to reconciliation. Mr. Allen and his son laid great stress upon this irregularity of procedure, and the former based his refusal to submit the mat- ters in controversy to a church-meeting, on the ground that their introduction was barred by a by-law requiring that there should be first filed a certificate that the prescribed gospel-steps had been taken without effect.
Mr. Little had always considered it improper to deal with the pastor of a church, in a case of alleged misconduct, as with a private member, and "after careful deliberation had formed the opinion that it was regular and expedient to confer with Mr. Allen through a committee; " a view which seems also to have obtained with a minority of the Berkshire Association, repugnant as it is to the genius of Congregationalism.
The expediency of such a course seemed, however, much more apparent than its regularity ; and whatever rightfulness per- tained to it arose from the circumstances of this particular case, rather than from any distinction recognized in Congregational usage between pastor and people. Variation from the ordinary method of procedure was justified, if at all, by these facts : First, that the original affront was given to a party, and not spe- cially to any individual, however much resentment for it might have rankled in individual breasts. Secondly, the offense was publicly given, and the anger which it aroused was immediately as publicly manifested; and thus, while the combined action of those aggrieved was natural, the privacy enjoined in the first of the " gospel-steps " was in the nature of the case impracticable. It was only an obstacle to the amicable adjustment, which all professed to desire, that one party sought to enforce, and the other pretended to comply with, precepts which, if they had ever, in some remote stage of the controversy, been applicable, had long ceased to furnish a guide in the pursuit of peace ; pre- cepts which, whatever may have been the letter of the law, could
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no longer be enforced or obeyed. The very attempt to hold com- munication under the fraternal forms and affectionate phraseology of Christian brotherhood, seems a mockery, if not a profanation, when the whole substance of the correspondence proves that- however honestly the parties may have persuaded themselves to the contrary-the relations of pastor and parishioner, of Christian with Christian, had long been lost and absorbed in those of dem- ocrat and federalist.
The awkward attempt of Mr. Little to put himself right on the record, in accordance with the advice of the Berkshire Asso- ciation will illustrate the absurdity of the position. He thus relates the manner of his confession to his pastor :
" In my conversation with Mr. Allen I intimated no regret that I had engaged in the affair [the withdrawal from attendance on his preach- ing] but informed him that it proceeded from pure and honest motives, from regard to the peace and unity of the town, and to prevent a divi- sion ; not from any malice or ill-will towards him. That I had always been friendly to him and his family. But I finally told him that, if the particular mode of proceeding which was pursued gave him offense, I was sorry for it and asked his pardon ; that it might be erroneous-not that I was convinced of it-but did not pretend to be infallible. Indeed I meant to convey the idea, that a party might be honest in his pur- poses, and yet take erroneous measures to obtain them. If I had done so, I was sorry."
In this statement, while Mr. Little lays down some very sound general truths, it is clear that he does not consider himself to have been at all in the wrong. Mr. Allen was quite right in regarding his acknowledgments, guarded as they were with qualifications from beginning to end, as in no sense a confession of injury done his pastor. Yet it was all that he could truth- fully and conscientiously have said. Here, as throughout the prolonged controversy, it is apparent that the parties had removed themselves to such widely-separated stand-points, in the all- absorbing questions of politics, that unity, even in the church, was simply impossible.
While this diplomatic correspondence was passing, rumors and suspicions, taking the form of assertion, and' even malicious stories, the product of pure invention, found their way into the town-newspapers, were gravely believed by the partisan-readers on each side, and sadly increased the malignancy of the strife.
15
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One of the grosser and more unfounded of these calumnies will serve to illustrate their character. In July, 1808, Governor Gore, making the tour of the state, with much pomp and circum- stance, reached Berkshire, and visited its principal towns ; Pitts- field twice. On his second visit he was honored with a salute of seventeen guns ; the buildings on Park square were illuminated, and the leading gentlemen of both political parties paid their respects to him personally. But, during the night, some demo- crats of the baser sort prepared effigies representing him, which were burned on the square. This "wretched transaction," as it was rightly termed by Rev. Wm. Allen, was severely and sin- cerely reprobated by his father; but the next number of the Reporter declared that, "after strict enquiry" it had "found that three persons were the instigators and managers of this infamous riot," and that, of these, Rev. Thomas Allen was one. Descending to particulars, the Reporter said : " It is presumable that one of the effigies was furnished by Parson Allen; it is certain and we uver it as an undeniable fact that two of his- boots were burned upon one of them. The parson was unfortunate in one circumstance. He ordered his son to take an old pair of boots, which he said ' would do;' but the son, in haste to execute the commands of his reverend father, took, in the dark, one of an old, and one of a new, pair, and they were burned."
Rev. Wm. Allen, whose word is unimpeachable, declares that there was not one particle of truth in the whole story. His father went to bed that night at his usual hour, and knew noth- ing of the affair until the next day. No article for an effigy was taken from his house. One of Mr. Allen's sons demanded from the editor of the Reporter the name of his informant, but it was refused. Mr. Allen, himself then wrote to him, requiring a retraction of the whole story; but this too, the editor, after con- sulting his friends, refused, and declined to print the letter, on the pretense, that it contained a charge that the paper had, from its establishment, followed the writer with personal abuse, slan- der and falsehood.
Many of the newspaper-attacks upon Mr. Allen were, like the above, pure fabrications. Others were perversions and exaggera- tions of things actually said and done by him.
Mr. Allen being now sixty-six years old and in broken health, believed that the enemies which he had made in his more vigor-
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ous days were taking advantage of his age and infirmities to avenge their old griefs ; a supposition in which he was strength- ened by the fact that the leaders of the opposition were many of them men, or the sons of men, whose " handling" as tories he had approved, or perhaps incited; and that writers in the Reporter went back to the time of the revolution to find cause of com- plaint against him. Under these provocations, and the " dissatis- fied " having already left his ministry and set up a separate place of worship, Mr. Allen addressed the following letter to Wood- bridge Little, shortly after the latter's " confession :"
PITTSFIELD, July, 1807.
Sir-To reclaim a brother who is in fault, to promote the cause of religion, and support the honor of God, is the end of church-govern- ment. In a late conversation we had together, you made known to me your disapprobation of the part you had acted in forming a combina- tion in town to forsake my ministry and set up a separate worship, and so to perpetuate a division among us. I enquire whether the honor of religion and the nature of the case do not require that your sense of this matter should be made known to the public ; for it is a matter that has not been done in a corner, but has long since been before the pub- lic. It is not your degradation that I seek-it is the glory of man to retrace a wrong step he has taken and recover himself from every wrong way. I hope you will not be disposed to justify, or unreason- ably to extenuate the part you have acted by persuasion, and under the influence of Doctor James and Mr. Pomeroy over you, to the wonder of all your friends who are new-comers into town, and warm political partisans. Whatever declarations are extorted from men which do not flow from conviction and a temper of mind corresponding with them can do them no good, nor the cause of religion. I wish you, sir, to take a full view of the case before you, and seriously consider what of duty is lying on you to perform towards me whom you have greatly injured and grievously wounded ; and above all, for the wound you have given to religion in this place, which may not be soon, if ever, healed. The following statement, which I deem just, I wish you seriously to reflect on, and answer a well-informed and impartial conscience on it :
1. You have drawn up and set on foot for circulation through this town, by subscription, a paper illiberal and very much wanting in can- dor, and which I consider as false and libelous.
2. You have drawn up a second paper containing criminations against your pastor, which are false, seditious and very malevolent. You was not under the influence of love to me, but of hatred and enmity, when you drew that paper. For which I demand of you personal Christian satisfaction.
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3. You have attended the meetings of the inimical part of my flock and been an active partisan at them, taking counsel with them against your pastor as their head and leader.
4. You have acted as the head of their committee, and chief-manager of their evil designs against me, and the whole body has been swayed by your example and counsel.
5. You have been the life and soul of this confederacy against your pastor : giving countenance to it by your pen, your name, property, example and advice, by which many honest people have been induced to unite in it.
6. You acted as their committee-man, delegated to the association of ministers, while I was absent on a journey, improving that oppor- tunity in hopes of prevailing against me in your malevolent designs.
7. By your charge against me of introducing the Jefferson song at a prayer-meeting, you gave authority to a false and very malevolent publication, in the Reporter of April 25th last, and which was, no doubt, the cause of it, and some of your party were the authors of it, and various other libelous publications in that paper. Every step you have taken as a leader in this whole business, appears to me to be the fruit of deep-rooted malice, flowing from political motives and enmity to my person, usefulness and family, and design at my extermination. You drew up those false charges against me, not in the spirit of love, not from those pure motives you suggest, but from hatred and enmity and with a view to scandalize me and run me down in my character . and usefulness. And lastly, in respect to myself, your greatest offense is your present buoying up your conscience with vain pretensions of friendship to me, and of being influenced by the purest motives in this whole malevolent career. The dimmest eye will readily discern the futility of such a pretext; all your works in this whole matter stand in full proof against any such suggestions.
But, what is unspeakably worse than any personal injury you have sought to do unto me, is, the dishonor you have done to God, and the irreparable wound you have given to religion in this town by setting up such a separate worship, and so perpetuating a division in this church and town. You have signed your name to withdraw from my ministry, and consequently from all communion with this church, and to set up a separate worship, and to call in and to withdraw from my ministry and consequently from the communion with this church and to set up a separate worship, and to call in another minister, for you could hear me no longer : such a minister of whatever order as the majority of the malcontents should appoint. You have raised money for that end and appointed your treasurer ; and all this before you had taken one gospel-step for conciliation, which might easily in the first stage of the business have prevented your after-conduct, so disgraceful
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and injurious to religion and so fatal to the peace and unity of this church and town.
In fine, I am under a great mistake if you have not gone in the way of Cain, who hated his brother, and in the gainsayings of Korah who excited and fomented a combination against Moses and Aaron. Divers members of this church have been fully persuaded that the times will fully justify them in letting all these matters rest till the irritation of the public mind, on political subjects, should subside ; which is now the case, and nothing occasions any further delay in order to a final settlement of them, in the church, but my ill state of health.
I thought it needful to make the above statement for your reflection, and that you may fully know my expectations from you; and that whatever you may see fit to do may be the result of conviction and sober judgment and not of restraint. It is now the evening of life with both, and it cannot be long before we shall meet each other at the judgment seat of Christ. I am fully persuaded your plea of friend- ship and brotherly love to me in this your conduct and your benevolent motives to prevent evil, not foment it, will never stand the test of that impartial tribunal. Wishing you every blessing,
I am, sir, your humble servant,
THOMAS ALLEN.
The following curt note from Mr. Little closed the correspond- ence :
REV. SIR :
I have received your angry, unfounded and abusive letter.
Yours, etc., WOODBRIDGE LITTLE.
P. S .- Matthew, VII, 1-5.
We must now go back a few months in our story to the first definite steps towards a division of the parish. In consequence of the sermon preached on the next Sunday after New Year's, 1807 (January fourth), a paper was drawn up on the second of the following month and signed by a large number of persons, who agreed to pay the sums subscribed by them to Ashbel Strong, Esq., for the support of such a minister as the majority might choose. In accordance with the terms of this agreement an Episcopalian clergyman was engaged and preached once or twice a month in the town-house-which stood where the present Episcopal church does-where regular services were held every Sunday, either with or without a clergyman. From the early
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