USA > New Hampshire > History of New Hampshire, Volume II > Part 27
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2 See articles in the Granite Monthly of 1904, pp. 207-228, and 267-287, by Frank B. Sanborn.
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The successor of Dr. Samuel Langdon at Portsmouth was the Rev. Ezra Stiles, D. D., who was soon called to be president of Yale College and was one of the most eminent scholars and educators of his time. Indeed New Hampshire was quite a hunting ground for college presidents, for Bowdoin College chose for its first president the Rev. Joseph McKeen, D. D., who was born at Derry, October 15, 1757, graduated at Dart- mouth in 1774, taught in Phillips Andover Academy and was called to Bowdoin from his pastorate at Beverly, Mass. The second president of Bowdoin was also a New Hampshire man, the Rev. Jesse Appleton, D. D., born at New Ipswich, Novem- ber 17, 1772. He graduated at Dartmouth and preached for a while at Hampton.
The coming of the eminent evangelist, George Whitefield, to New Hampshire made the usual stir that his preaching pro- duced. Though a Calvinist in theory he was a Methodist in fervor and methods, having learned how to evangelize in the school of John Wesley, who, though not so gifted with eloquence, greatly excelled Whitefield in powerful effect upon his audi- ences. Indeed Whitefield at first spoke against the effect of Wesley's preaching, which occasioned some to lose physical strength and fall prostrate on the ground. Wesley invited him to preach in Moorfield common, London, and to the surprise of the speaker similar results attended his own proclamation of the Gospel. He could no longer object and interpreted such relig- ious phenomena as special manifestations of the power of the Holy Spirit on the souls of men. Powerful emotional experi- ences became the test of conversion, the evidence of salvation. Because such experiences were rare or unheard of in New Eng- land, Whitefield drew the unwarrantable conclusion that many of the ministers had no acquaintance with saving grace, failing to distinguish between the intellectual, emotional, and practical types of Christian experience. This failure has always made some honest men unduly censorious. Whitefield first preached at Portsmouth in 1745 and recorded in his diary, that he "preached to a polite auditory, but so very unconcerned, that I began to question whether I had been speaking to rational or brute creatures." He moved on to York and a few days later preached again at Portsmouth. The congregation was larger and the
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effect seemed better. "Instead of preaching to dead stocks, I now had reason to believe I was preaching to living men. People began to melt soon after I began to pray; and the power increased more and more during the whole sermon." Curiosity had worn off; Whitefield himself was probably in a better state of health and frame of mind; and the hearers were consequently more receptive of truth, having learned of revivals elsewhere and so prepared to feel what they believed ; for subjective emotional experience usually corresponds to intellectual beliefs and ex- pectations. When he returned to Portsmouth in 1754 a large cavalcade came out to meet him, which overwhelmed him with humility and joy.
Mr. Whitefield first came to Exeter in 1745. Some of the parishioners of the Rev. John Odlin, who was nearly half a century minister of the church at Exeter and was succeeded by his son, the Rev. Woodbridge Odlin, had heard Mr. Whitefield at Portsmouth and Hampton and leaped too quickly to the conclusion that the Odlins were unconverted men. Hence there was a split in his parish and a new church was built and society gathered under the leadership of the Rev. Daniel Rogers. About one-third of the Exeter people joined the new movement which rent the church asunder for half a century. Many of the lead- ing ministers of New Hampshire had no more sympathy with the preaching of Whitefield than equally good ministers have now with that of Billy Sunday. But sinners were soundly con- verted in both cases, and nothing is so convincing as success. One young man went to Exeter with a stone in his pocket, wherewith to break Mr. Whitefield's head, but he listened and confessed that he himself had a broken heart. On Whitefield's last visit to Exeter, in 1770, he preached two hours in the open to a vast assembly that no church could contain. It was but a few days before his death at Newburyport, and he contrasted the earthly with the heavenly life. It is a question whether dissen- tions in the churches did not more than counterbalance any revival spirit awakened by the preaching of Whitefield. Emo- tional religion quickly subsides; the revival that improves char- acter and consequent conduct has abiding value.
To show that revivals are not dependent upon professional evangelists let us turn to the religious history of the church at
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Dunbarton, where the Rev. Walter Harris was minister for over forty years. Revival after revial attended his faithful labors. "Very soon after his ordination, in 1789, he commenced in a systematic way, the important work of stating, defining, illus- trating and defending the great doctrines of the gospel. Several years were spent in this great work, during which Mr. Harris brought into vigorous exercise all the powers of his acute and discriminating mind, a mind well trained, both in the school of science and in the school of theology, a mind naturally capacious and discerning, capable of grasping and digesting great truths, at the same time that it was fired with a peculiar ardor and energy, from the inspiration of a heart touched with the mys- terious power of divine grace and blessed in an uncommon measure with an unction from the Holy One. In this manner he labored; not shunning to declare the whole counsel of God, preaching the truth with an earnestness and affection, and with a fidelity and a pungency, peculiarly adapted to take effect. Two whole years passed away under these faithful labors, and no signs were witnessed of God's reviving influences. The third year also had half finished its course, and no cloud of mercy had yet made its appearance over this hill of Zion. But now had arrived the hour of God's merciful visitation. A stillness, like that of death, now pervaded the congregation on the Sab- bath, save when the stillness was broken by the involuntary sighs and half suppressed sobs of those who had felt the Spirit's power upon their hearts and were weeping over their sins. With such convincing energy did the Holy Ghost descend, that the entire people were moved; the whole town was shaken as with a moral earthquake, and none were so hardened as not to be interested in the inquiry, 'What shall I do to be saved?' Now were Zion's walls indeed called salvation and her gates praise. This was one of the most signal and glorious works of grace ever witnessed in New England. It introduced to this then infant church about eighty new members."
This is the language of sixty years ago and shows the religious philosophy then current. The "set time to favor Zion had come," as the writer thought, but we now believe that God's time to bless honest and wise effort is all the time and that genuine revivals follow compliance with established law in
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the spiritual world. The truth well expressed and lived will always be reinforced by the power of the eternal Spirt of Truth. Tides of religious emotion ebb and flow, as they did at Dun- barton. This revival was in 1792, and the next one was in 1816 and the next in 1826. Had God forgotten Dunbarton meanwhile? In the nature of the case the dragnet can not be filled with fish every year in a small town. Even the Almighty must wait for people to be born and grow.
Here is another illustration of an old-time revival. At Tamworth, in the year 1800, there was "a remarkable outpouring of the Holy Spirit, it may be unparalleled in the annals of church history, if the number of the inhabitants is taken into the account. The revival had its origin in a prayer meeting. It soon spread through the town. Prayer meetings were held every evening in the week. The principle business for months was religious conversation and prayer. Whole nights were spent in prayer and singing. The pastor had no help from abroad. For four months he preached almost every day. The work extended to Conway, Moultonborough, Eaton, Ossipee and Sandwich." There were three hundred converts, of whom about two hun- dred united with the church at Tamworth. This was a Union Congregational church, made up of persons of different denom- inations and shades of belief. The minister was the Rev. Samuel Hidden, and he was ordained on a large boulder, on which fifty men might stand. It is fifteen feet high, and the almost level top measures twenty feet by thirty. The writer hereof once visited it, situated in the midst of wild scenery.3
But there were many other churches where no intermittent revivals occurred, but where in the course of fifty or one hundred years as many persons were gathered into the fold as were enrolled in the revival churches during the same time. There was less excitement, and the result was deeper and purer moral character, for all enthusiasatic revivals have been followed by relapses and backslidings.
Presbyterianism has never flourished on the soil of New England. Even the emigrants of that persuasion from Scotland and North Ireland have, in their offspring, gradually melted into
3 The New Hampshire Churches, by the Rev. Robert F. Lawrence, pp. 377, 593.
1
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Congregationalism. Somehow the independence of the local church has been more in harmony with the democratic spirit of New England. The Presbyterians of Londonderry spread out into Bedford and neighboring towns but began to wane ere the close of the century. Twelve Presbyterian churches in the upper valley of the Connecticut, in Vermont and New Hamp- shire, constituted the Grafton Presbytery, organized through the influence of President Wheelock of Dartmouth College, to which the college church belonged. Their government and practices differed somewhat from the Presbyterianism of Scot- land and long ago these churches became Congregational.
The Boston Presbytery was organized in Londonderry, April 10, 1745, and at one time at least nine churches in New Hampshire belonged to this. In some towns, like Chester and Pembroke, there was an endeavor to combine the Presbyterians and Congregationalists into a Consociate church. In other towns the two churches worked side by side, sometimes in harmony and sometimes at variance. Neither was strong enough to absorb the other, and neither was broad and catholic enough to allow itself to be absorbed. They could not see that the Kingdom of God was bigger and of more import- ance than all the denominations, and that religion is more than theology. The eighteenth and nineteenth centuries fostered divisions; let us hope that the twentieth century will be marked by the reunion of all the good, of "all who love our Lord Jesus Christ in sincerity." There are said to be only four Presbyterian churches in New Hampshire today. In the year 1800 there were one hundred and thirty-eight Congregational and Presbyterian churches in the State.
Mention has been made in previous pages of the Episcopal church at Portsmouth, under the leadership of the Rev. Arthur Brown, and of the efforts of the Governors Wentworth to spread Episcopalianism throughout New Hampshire and Vermont. The Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign Parts endeavored to foster such a movement, but without much suc- cess. Prior to the year 1800 only four Episcopal churches had been gathered, at Portsmouth, Holderness, Cornish and Clare- mont. The last was organized in 1771 by the Rev. Samuel Peters, missionary of the above named society. He visited towns
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on both sides of the Connecticut river and reported "several thousand souls, who live without the means of grace, destitute of knowledge, laden down with ignorance and covered with poverty." This sounds like pleas made now by the agents of different denominations in behalf of settlers on the western frontier. Poor benighted souls! Each one should have a church and minister of his own peculiar preference, or there is little hope for him in either world! The Episcopalians and the Con- gregationalists built a Union Church in Claremont, and called a Congregational minister, on condition that he be episcopally ordained, and he had good sense and breadth enough to agree to the terms. Anything to keep the peace among Christian brethren and to work together in harmony. The second ordina- tion did him no harm, and it comforted others.
Colonel John Peters wrote to his brother, the Rev. Samuel Peters, in London, June 20, 1778, as follows. It throws new light on the condition of the loyalists during the Revolution :
Rev. Dr. Wheelock, President of the Dartmouth College, in New Hamp- shire, in conjunction with Deacon Bayley, Mr. Morey, and Mr. Hurd, all justices of the peace, put an end to the Church of England in this State, so early as 1775. They seized me, Capt. Peters, and all the judges of Cumber- land and Gloucester, the Rev. Mr. Cossit and Mr. Cole, and all the Church people for 200 miles up the river (Connecticut), and confined us all in close gaols, after beating and drawing us through water and mud. Here we lay some time and were to continue in prison until we abjured the king and signed the league and covenant. Many died; one of which was Capt. Peters' son. We were removed from the gaol and confined in private houses at our own expense. Capt. Peters and myself were guarded by twelve rebel soldiers, while sick in bed, and we paid dearly for this honor; and others fared in like manner. I soon recovered from my indisposition, and took the first opportunity and fled for Canada, leaving Cossit, Cole, Peters, Willis, Porter, Sumner, Papin, etc., in close confinement, where they had misery, insults, and sickness enough. My flight was in 1776, since which my family arrived at Montreal and informed me that many prisoners died; that Capt. Peters had been tried by court-martial and ordered to be shot for refusing. to lead his company against the King's troops. He was afterwards re- prieved, but still in gaol, and that he was ruined both in health and in property ; that Cossit and Cole were alive when they came away, but were under confinement, and had more insults than any of the loyalists, because they had been servants of the Society, which under pretense (as rebels say) of propagating religion, had propagated loyalty, in opposition to the liberties of America.
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This statement is probably somewhat exaggerated. The Rev. Mr. Cossit was confined in Claremont for four years, but he continued his church services and administered the Lord's Supper the first Sunday of every month, so that his confinement could not have been very close. He says that the number of his parishioners increased during this time. He left Claremont in 1785 and went to Sidney, in the island of Cape Breton, where he died in 1815.4
The Episcopal Church at Cornish was organized in 1793, in consequence of the conversion of Philander Chase, a student in Dartmouth College, through the devout reading of the Book of Common Prayer. The diocese including this church was formed May 25, 1802. The Episcopal Church at Holderness was greatly indebted to the Livermore family. The church edifice was built upon land belonging to Judge Samuel Livermore, in 1797, though services had long been held in a large, unfurnished room. Robert Fowle, ordained in 1789, was styled Priest Fowle and held office as rector for fifty-eight years.
Mrs. Rachel (Thurber) Scammon of Stratham has the honor of being the first Baptist known in New Hampshire. She had embraced the principles of that denomination before settling in Stratham in 1720. During fifty years by private conversations and distribution of literature she obtained only one convert, a woman, who repaired to Boston and was there immersed. The Baptist church was not erected in Stratham until after the death of Mrs. Scammon, when a revival occured, and among the converts was Dr. Samuel Shepherd, a young physician, who was led to embrace the Baptist belief by reading Norcott on Bapt- ism. He became an influential missionary and organizer of Baptist churches. The first organized church of the Baptists of New Hampshire was at Newton in 1750 or 1755, the authorities differing as to date. By the end of the century they had gathered forty-one churches, thirty ministers and 2562 communi- cants, and their State Association was formed in 1785. The revival led by Whitefield fostered the Baptist movement. Their theology was the same, and the same earnestness of spirit characterized them. Laymen took part in evangelization. So rigid was the Calvinism of the early Baptists that they became
4 Hist. of Claremont, by Otis F. R. Waite, pp. 97-99.
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known as "Hard Shells." They had a definite religious experi- ence, and immersion and close communion separated them from other Christian societies. The English Baptists have long practiced open communion with all acknowledged followers of Christ, but the American Baptists, until recently, have been quite strict in excluding all who have not been regularly baptized, that is, immersed. Such strictness is now fast disappearing.5
"We must bear in mind," says a Baptist historian, "that all were set down as Arminians who did not come up to the highest point of Hyper-Calvinism." This he accounts one of the three great evils among the Baptists of that time and remarks upon the change that took place during the first half of the nineteenth century. Calvinism and Arminianism were the words applied to the teachings of those who followed in general the doctrines of John Calvin or of James Arminius, wherein unconditional election was opposed to free grace and a universal call unto salvation. The Calvinists were accused of being Antinomians, who made void the moral law. Some went so far as to oppose morality to religion and hold up the moralist as the subtlest kind of a sinner. This nonsense has not yet ceased entirely.
It is noticeable that religious denominations have arisen and flourished by laying emphasis upon one special feature of Christianity. The whole truth is too vast to be grasped by one person or group. One phase of truth seems to be adapted to some souls; another phase to others. Free grace is the shib- boleth of one sect; divine sovereignty, of another; the inner light, of another, the witness of the Spirit, of another; and so there have arisen bands of zealous and devoted enthusiasts to propagate their intense convictions and tell their experiences. No denomination seems to have been broad enough to allow and encourage its members to think and believe as they must, to welcome truth from every source, to cultivate the type of piety that each preferred, and to insist only that all should be lovers and imitators of the Highest Ideal. Emphasis too often has been laid upon non-essentials as vital to piety, and an outward ceremony has been esteemed a necessary condition of salvation. The means have been mistaken for the end, and the goal desired by all good men has been obscured by controversy.
5 Hist. of Baptist Denomination, by David Benedict, 1813, pp. 315-332.
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The Baptists of New Hampshire split off from the Congre- gationalists, denying the validity of infant baptism and insisting on immersion of adults as alone valid. Soon some of their own number began to be dissatisfied with Calvinistic doctrines, while agreeing as to water baptism. They laid stress upon the freedom of the human will to decide individual destiny, and hence were called Freewill Baptists. In more recent times they have pre- ferred the name, Free Baptists. The founder of this denomina- tion was Benjamin Randall, born at Newcastle, February 7, 1749. He listened to the preaching of George Whitefield, when he came to Portsmouth in 1770, and was strongly impressed. The death of Whitefield soon after produced pungent convictions, and after some time spent in self-inspection, study of the Bible and prayer he united with the Congregational church. His heart prompted him to exhortation and he spoke, as opportunity offered, with great pathos and power.
Further study convinced Randall that immersion was the only biblical form of baptism, and such authority was binding upon his conscience. Therefore he got himself immersed and joined a Baptist church. This made him happier than ever before, as every step in obedience to conscience must, whether the conscience follows an enlightened reason or not. He began to preach but could not declare the doctrines of election, as taught by the Baptists. For this he was called to account, and some disowned fellowship with him and called him a heretic, word of omnious meaning. Randall's reply was, "It makes no odds with me who disowns me, so long as I know that the Lord owns me." He had already settled in New Durham and here was his home for the remainder of his life. In 1780 he was ordained as an evangelist, though he had been preaching gratuitously for several years. He never had any stated salary .or compensation for evangelization. His whole life was a labor of love for the spiritual welfare of others. Traveling throughout New Hampshire and Maine he had revivals and organized churches, especially in neglected regions and where thoughtful people were tired of the extreme doctrines of Calvinism. Asso- ciated with him in the organization of the Freewill Baptist Church were the Rev. Tozier Lord of Barrington and later of Acton, a Baptist minister who sympathized with Randall's
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beliefs and aims, yet never united with the new denomination. The Rev. Edward Lock, who had gathered churches in Loudon and Canterbury, was disowned by his Calvinistic brethern of the Baptist church and was ordained by Mr. Lord and a layman, to preach a more liberal gospel. John Shepherd of Gilmanton identified himself with the new movement and thought that he had a divine revelation of the plan of polity adopted by the Freewill Baptists. He was a Ruling Elder for sixty-four years. Another Baptist minister was the Rev. Pelatiah Tingley of Sanford, Maine, who rejected the doctrine of unconditional election and gave his sympathy and aid to Randall and his associates. The Rev. Samuel Weeks of Gilmanton was another sympathizer, who was forced by the oppositions of his church to remove to East Parsonsfield, Maine. The Rev. Daniel Hib- bard of Maine also left the Baptists to lend his aid to the advocates of free will and free grace. Thus seven Baptists, four of whom had been ordained ministers, were the real founders of the Freewill Baptist denomination. At the end of ten years the new denomination had twenty churches and eight ministers, who rendered much service as itinerant evangelists. In the year 1800 there were six Quarterly Meetings, fifty-one churches, many of them in Maine, twenty-eight ordained min- isters, and twenty-two unordained. The estimated number of church members was then about two thousand.
Benjamin Randall died at his home in New Durham, October 22, 1808, aged fifty-nine years. Fifty years later the Free Baptist churches erected a suitable monument at his grave. It is of Italian marble on a block of granite, symbols of purity and enduring strength. He has been described as "a man of medium size, or a little below, erect and gentlemanly in his appearance. His features were sharp, his eyes of a hazel color, and the general expression of his countenance was grave and dignified. His deep piety and fervent spirit gave a characteristic sweetness to the tones of his voice, and he usually wept as he preached. His gestures were few, and, as a speaker, he was calm, argumentative and very impressive. His perception was great and his memory strong. He was somewhat nervous in temperament, quite sanguine in his opinions, very conscientious in what he thought was right, and his reproofs were often
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administered with cutting severity. He had little patience with the fashions of the world and a spirit of avarice he could not endure. There were other men of more extensive reading, but few of keener observation, or greater reflection. He studied the works of men and the creations of God, the books of men and the word of God, the ways of men and the providences of God."6
At least two of the Freewill Baptist churches were soon turned aside to become followers of the system of faith and practice, of which Ann Lee is the acknowledged head. They were first known in England as Shaking Quakers, and then as Shakers. The com- munities at Enfield and Canterbury have flourished for over a century. The latter was founded in 1782. Elder Henry Clough and Benjamin Whitcher were leaders in the movement. The latter donated to the society a farm of one hundred acres, on which the Shaker village at Canterbury is built.
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