USA > Rhode Island > Providence County > Providence > Discourses comprising a history of the First Congregational Church in Providence; delivered June 19, 1836, after the close of a century from the formation of the church > Part 2
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Mr. Snow is believed to have been a perfectly upright and pious man, of a benevolent disposition and some strong traits of character. His ardent temperament, and the excitements of the day, operating upon an uneducated and undisciplined mind, produced in him a zeal, which was "not according to knowledge." He continued to labor assiduously, and we trust successfully, in the cause he had so vehemently espoused, for nearly fifty years .; But the close of his ministry, like the beginning, was troubled. His infirmities requiring an assist- ant, and one having been obtained, difficulties arose, with which we have no concern, except to say that they led, in 1793, to another separation, when Mr. Snow again seceded with a minority of his church, and formed what is now the Richmond-street Congregational Church. Mr. Wilson, who had been engaged first as assistant to Mr. Snow, and continued in that relation two years, received, at the time of the separation, a call to settle over those of the church and society who re- mained, and was ordained in October, 1793, as Pastor of the
* The division was nearly equal, but clearly in favor of those who re- mained. Appendix, Note G.
+ Appendix, Note H.
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Beneficent Congregational Church. He has filled the office faithfully from that time to the present, and still lives in a good old age, the second minister of a church that separated from this more than ninety years ago ! Thus have both the Congregational churches on the west side, or "Presbyterian churches," as they also are commonly but wrongly called, sprung from this church ; and from them a third has been re- cently and amicably formed.
I have dwelt perhaps too long on these first features and early struggles of your church, my friends. But they seem to me more important both in their character and their conse- quences, than almost any that followed them. They un- doubtedly did much to determine the present complexion of this church, as a wholly independent and liberal church .- And in that view, we can see, that good has been brought out of seeming evil. We do not pretend, no one can suppose, that all the blame belonged to one party in these conflicts and changes. There may have been much fault, it would be marvellous if there were not some fault, on both sides. But I «can find no manner of justification for the conduct of those who first removed, in the way they did. And I do think, the conduct of those who remained, as the first church, if it is represented truly, is worthy of all praise for its forbearance; and not its forbearance only, but its unusual generosity. For it is a fact too rare to remain unknown, if it be so, that this church allowed to those who had thus left and thus branded them, the continued use of land for burial, to which they had forfeited all legal claim by their separation ; and moreover permitted them to share the advantages of a subsequent ex- change of lands, dividing with them the profits from the sale of the old, and even giving their Pastor, Mr. Snow, a choice
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of the new lots ; thus securing to them, as to you, the eligible ground, where both still bury their dead.
And there have both been constrained, and we trust willing, to bury all, if aught remained, that was wrong or unkind in the feelings which had severed them. This fellowship of the grave, unbroken through all their differences and still contin- uing, is a beautiful moral. In life they could not remain to- gether, but in death they again form literally ONE CONGREGA- TION. It is an instructive fact. It is a monument of solemn warning. Let it not be unheeded. Go, ye disciples of two sects, and now four churches, formed from one-go, stand on that eminence, reserved for the dead and sacred to the living. See there your Pastors and people reposing quietly in the same resting-place, side by side, their conflicts all over, their common dust mingling with the common earth, their spirits having gone to render their account to the God who gave them. Pause there, and see the utter vanity of human pride and prejudice. Amid those mute but eloquent mounds, learn your frailty and folly. Know your present and your future selves. Let the living listen to the dead. And when you are tempted to strife and uncharitableness, to evil-speaking or any evil-doing, look forward but a few years, and see your own bodies laid low there, and your souls humbled and trem- bling before the universal Father who hath called us all to be brethren, and the pure and gracious Saviour who died to rec- oncile us to one another and to God.
The unhappy division which we have now noticed, as im- partially as we were able, left this church in so broken and feeble a state, that the support of Mr. Cotton became difficult and his situation uncomfortable. He continued however to bear up under the discouragements and struggle with the dif-
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ficulties for some time, retaining the confidence of his people, and endeavoring faithfully to subserve their spiritual, though they were unable to advance his temporal interests. In July, 1747, he resigned his charge, believing it best for himself and the people, and received an honorable dismission ; thus clos- ing a laborious ministry of nineteen years, the first and the most eventful that this church has known.
I regret that I can find no account of Mr. Cotton's previous or subsequent life,* and that so little is said of him personally in the records. We must be content to rest in the fact, that all we do know of him is favorable. His fidelity to the church and his attachment to the ministry are well attested. He seems to have been very mild, but decided and firm. He had a full share of obloquy and trial, even for those days, but there is no evidence that he resisted evil with any but christian weapons. That he was rational and charitable, appears from the very fact and manner of the separation. His memory should be cherished by the descendants of those whose church he founded, and whose fathers he led and animated in circum- stances so unlike those with which we are favored. It was a day of small things. It was a season of anxious fear and pe- culiar trial. But the providence of God was over it, and the life of his church, though feeble and often flickering, was not suffered to expire. Let His goodness be praised, and the servi- ces of his faithful minister and persevering people be ever held in grateful remembrance.
* Farmer, in his register of the Cotton family, gives this line :- " Rev. Josiah, of Providence, Woburn, and Sandown, N. H." He makes him to have been the son of Roland, who was grandson of the first and famous John Cotton.
DISCOURSE II.
DISCOURSE II.
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JOB VIII. 7. Though thy beginning was small, yet thy latter end should greatly increase.
For five years after Mr. Cotton's departure, this Society had no stated minister or regular ordinances. Indeed the record says, " the sacraments of the New Testament were not stated- ly administered for about sixteen years." But they were not without preaching and occasional administration of the ordi- nances, during any large portion of this time. Early in 1752, they succeeded in procuring the services of JOHN BASS, who became the second minister of the church. There is no rec- ord of his formal installation. As he had been previously or- dained in Connecticut, they probably thought it unnecessary in their feeble state, to incur the expense and trouble of a spe- cial service. His ministry was short, and is summed up in this scanty record.
" In the spring of the year 1752, Mr. John Bass, before of Ashford, in the colony of Connecticut, moved into the town, who supplied them with preaching till about the year 1758, when by reason of an ill state of health, and the small en- couragement he met with, as to support and number of hear- ers, he gave up the business, and entered upon the practice of Physic. In which time the number of hearers did not often-
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times exceed twenty. And the church was so scattered and divided, that it was scarcely known whether there were any of them left."
This is discouraging indeed. And it could have been only strong principle and a high value of privileges, that car- ried them on. Mr. Bass graduated at Harvard College in 1737, and after closing his ministry of six years, lived as a Physician in Providence until 1762. In the Providence Ga- zette of that year, a friend has found for us a brief notice of his death and character. He is there spoken of as "a gen- tleman, who in his public performances, was evangelical, learned, rational and accurate ; and in private life was amia- ble, beneficent, compassionate, instructive and exemplary."*
In 1761, this people made a vigorous effort to rise from their depression. For direction and encouragement, they convened an Ecclesiastical Council, from the three churches in Bristol, Medfield and Rehoboth. In all humility, they asked them first to determine, "whether they would consider the remain- ing members as the Congregational Church in Providence; and proceed to add to them." This was decided in the affir- mative, and after prayers and other services, a covenant was submitted and subscribed by eleven males and ten females, of whom several were then members of other churches. This covenant is different from the first, resembling more nearly that now in use.
Being thus confirmed, the church obtained more reg- ular supplies, and in the next year, 1762, invited DAVID SHERMAN ROWLAND, of Plainfield, to become their Pas- tor. He accepted the invitation, but there is no record of the exact time of his ordination. He brought his family here
* Appendix, Note I.
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in the Fall of 1762, and from that time devoted himself to the service of his people, with no little self-sacrifice and with encouraging success.
The congregation now increased and accessions were made to the church. Still their resources were very limited, and their embarrassments at times so great, that they were com- pelled to send messengers repeatedly to other and distant pla- ces to solicit aid. They commissioned even their Pastor to go out for this purpose. In one of the minute-books of the So- ciety, we find a resolution passed in the year 1771, commend- ing the unwearied care and labor of Mr. Rowland, wishing to retain his services, but lamenting their inabilaty to support him unless they can have immediate relief from abroad, and therefore requesting him " to proceed to such place or places, on this continent, as he shall think proper, for and in behalf of this Society, to solicit and to receive the charity of such per- son or persons, whom God hath blest with affluence and lib- erality, &c." We find several instances of members of the Society who were travelling on their own account, being charged with the same commission. These facts show us how great and protracted were the difficulties with which they had to struggle. They show us also how many are the obligations under which we are laid to render aid to others, now that from a beginning so small we have greatly increas- ed. Is it for us, in the plenitude of those means and the inde- pendence of that strength, which have been drawn, in part at leust, from the benefactions of strangers, to turn away from the calls of destitute societies, pressed down by the hard ne- cessities, or torn and racked by the divisions, under which our own church once groaned ? While we thank and serve that God who hath prospered us, let us resolve, " as we have op- portunity, to do good unto all men, especially to those who are of the household of faith."
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And here I may notice, both in commendation and exhorta- tion, the origin of that peculiar name, by which this Society is sometimes called-" the Benevolent Congregational Society." It is a mistake to give this name to the Church, or the religious Society, as such. It belongs to a distinct body, formed with corporate powers about this period, consisting neither of wor- shippers nor pew-holders exclusively, but of those in either re- lation who voluntarily associate, "for the purpose of raising a fund for the permanent support of the institutions of religion, and for such charitable purposes as the Society shall think proper, after the other object shall be accomplished." This association was incorporated in 1770, by the name of The Be- nevolent Congregational Society in the Town of Providence. It continues still a separate body, holding the funds by which the ministry is supported here, and directing all the financial concerns. And though it must be regarded as somewhat an anomaly in the external character of our churches, it has un- doubtedly rendered important services to religion, and may continue to do so, as it is formed for " charitable purposes," be- side the direct support of public worship. It is to be hoped, at least, that we shall vindicate our title to the character of Be- nevolent, in other and better features than that of a name. Our obligations multiply by the force of example. One of the churches to which we have given birth, be it remembered, is called Beneficent, and another Pacific. It were an offence in- deed, should either of these distinguished Societies leave it to be inferred from any of their deeds, that there is not only a peculiar taste in names, but also an incongruity between names and things.
In 1774, Mr. Rowland, finding new difficulties in the way of his continuance with the Society, asked and received a dis- mission after an arduous ministry of twelve years. " Thus was the third minister removed, not by death, but from the feeble-
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ness of the Society, and the divisions and difficulties of the times. There are intimations here of an uneasiness in the church, and tares that were sown; but there is no explana- tion, and we are left to infer that it was a part of the same dif- ficulties that occasioned the loss of Mr. Rowland, of whom we would now speak more particularly.
Mr. Rowland was not an ordinary man. He has left evi- dences, not only of diligence and acceptableness in the pasto- ral relation, but likewise of more than common study and learning. I have seen but one of his publications, but that, though a sermon, would make no contemptible volume ; enough, at least, to alarm those modern hearers, who grow uneasy the moment a preacher trespasses beyond a half-hour. The discourse before me was delivered by Mr. Rowland, in 1772, at the Congregational Convention assembled at Bristol. Its title is Catholicism, or Christian Charity, and it extends to seventy-five full octavo pages. It shows a well-furnished and vigorous mind, an easy writer, and a christian of discriminat- ing and liberal views. Its doctrine, so far as it presents doc- trine, would be called orthodox, but it is orthodoxy of a very safe kind. It was not every minister of that day, nor is it of this day, who would have the disposition and the courage, to quote with commendation that noble passage of DR. WATTS, which Mr. Rowland gives entire, and which shows what was his own spirit.
"It is a very uncharitable practice, to think that a man can never journey safely to heaven, unless his hat and his shoes be of the same color with ours, unless he treads in the very track of our feet, and his footsteps too be of the same size. It is a curious and perverse fancy to pronounce a man no Chris- tian, because every thought of his soul, and all the atoms of his brain, are not just ranged in the same posture as mine .- How ridiculously unreasonable is it, for a man of brown hair
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to shut his brother out from the rank and species of men, and call him an ox or a lion, because his locks are black or yellow ? I am persuaded there is a breadth in the narrow road to heaven, and persons may travel more than seven abreast in it. And though they do not trace precisely the same track, yet all look to the same Saviour, Jesus, and all arrive at the same common salvation. And though their names be crossed out of the records of a particular church on earth, where charity fails, yet they will be found written in the Lamb's book of life, which is a record of eternal love, and shall be forever joined to the fel- lowship of the catholic church in heaven."*
Whatever have been or may be the peculiar doctrines of this church, so long as it breathes or recommends this spirit, it is liberal enough. We are prepared to hear Mr. Rowland, as he does in the conclusion of his discourse, exhort his brethren in the ministry-" to receive into their affection and commun- ion, sober regular Christians, whether they are called by the name of Lutherans, Episcopalians, Presbyterians, Congrega- tionalists, Independents, or Baptists, that there may be no schism or rent in the visible body of Christ."t
It would seem, that as regards theological attainments and pulpit powers, this church has at no time been more favored or honored than in the gifts of Rowland. And to his standing with his brethren, the associated pastors of the colony gave their public testimonial, after he left, commending him, as " a brother, whose praise is in all the churches, a brother deserv- edly beloved."
In the following year, Dr. John Lathrop, pastor of the Sec- ond Church in Boston, came here to reside. It was the year 1775, when the British had possession of Boston, and he, with most of the inhabitants, being compelled to leave, this Society
" Convention Sermon, 1772, page 64.
t Ibid, page 74.
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invited him to take up his residence with them, as their minis- ter, until he could return. To this he consented, and preach- ed to them nearly a year to great acceptance. Short as this connexion was, and though not solemnized as the pastoral re- lation, it is gratifying to associate with any period of your his- tory, so honored a name as that of Lathrop. He returned to Boston and remained in the ministry there until 1816, when he died at the age of seventy-six.
During the four next years, the Society was broken and scattered by the effects of the war. They had occasional preachers, of whom Mr. Grosvenor is the only one mentioned. In the Fall of the year 1780, "they began," says the record, " to collect in from their dispersion in the country, and felt encouraged to keep a steady supply. They applied to the REV. ENOS HITCHCOCK, of Beverly, Mass. who came in De- cember, and after tarrying three Sabbaths, received the unan- imous invitation of the Society to remove his family to this place, and to tarry at least one year." This was soon follow- ed by an unanimous invitation to become the permanent pas- tor. He accepted the invitation in a letter expressive of the deepest humility and devotion to the cause of Christ. His Installation took place, October 1st, 1783, six churches com- posing the council, and Dr. Cooper, of Boston, preaching the sermon .* The services were performed " in the Baptist meet- ing-house, which had been kindly offered by that Society for the better accommodation of hearers." Thus after an inter- val of ten years, this church enjoyed again a pastor devoted to its interests ; and after a broken and troubled existence of six- ty years, manifested a stability and strength which have been steadily advancing.
The first recorded act of Mr. Hitchcock's ministry, reflects
* Appendix, Note K.
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upon him and his church a lustre, which, we fear, the records of very few churches can show, in this age of uncharitableness. I take it as I find it in the oldest record, where it is simply en- tered as an act of the church, without a word of comment, or any intimation that they regarded it as any thing more than a christian duty. It is a free and most cordial restoration of Mr. Snow and the other Seceders, "to the full charity and communion and fellowship of this Church," all censure being taken off, and the kindest feelings expressed. The exact votes by which this was done, are given in another place, and particular attention is called to them .*
Let all the circumstances of this case be kept in mind, let it be remembered in what way, in what temper, with what lan- guage, these same individuals withdrew from this church, let it be considered that they are not known to have asked, per- haps would have disdained to ask, this offer of conciliation and fellowship, then let the strong and generous terms of those votes be noted-and where are we to seek, would that we could find, many instances of equal charity, christian forgive- ness and magnanimity. I know not how the offer was re- ceived or answered, if answered at all, by the church to whom it was made. In a recent "Annual Report of the Beneficent Congregational church," presented in 1832, with an outline of the history of that church, these votes, which we have cit- ed, are quoted, probably from our records, not in terms of com- mendation or acknowledgment of any favor conferred by this church, but rather, it would seem, in testimony of the admit- ted fair character of that church and its former pastor. I men- tion it, not in censure or complaint, but only as illustrative of the men of whom we speak, and their times.
It is matter of regret, that our records contain nothing more
* Appendix, Note L.
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relative to the proceedings of the church or the state of the society under Dr. Hitchcock, except baptisms, admissions to the church, and invitations to assist at ordinations. These last indicate a much more liberal interchange of ministerial offices and christian fellowship, than has since prevailed. Let- ters missive, for instance, were received, and cordially ac- cepted, from the church in Newport to ordain Rev. Wm. Pat- tern, in 1786, and the church in Providence to ordain Rev. James Wilson, in 1793 .*
Under the faithful services and exemplary character of Dr. Hitchcock, the society increased until it became necessary to provide a more commodious house of worship. Their first house, in which they still worshipped, they had enlarged more than once, and had now used it more than seventy years .- Accordingly a new house was begun on the same site with this, in which we are now worshipping, and completed in 1795, the service of Dedication being performed on the 16th of Au- gust of that year, in the presence, and with the aid, of clergy- men of different denominations. On taking possession of the new house, many additions were made to the society, and their hopes and prospects brightened.
Their enjoyment of the house itself, however, was destined to be of short continuance; and we may anticipate a few years, to tell its brief story. It is said to have been a beautiful house, and for that period and this region, must have been un- usual for the style of its architecture, and its commanding po- sition.t On the morning of the 4th of June, 1814, just twen- · ty years from the laying of its foundations, the whole edifice was in a few hours made level with those foundations by a de- vouring fire. The sensations with which that dread confla- gration was witnessed by many who now hear me, must be
* Appendix, Note M.
tAppendix, Note N.
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still too vivid to ask the aid of description. Sorrowful indeed must have been the feelings, yet strong the trust, with which you listened, on the following Sabbath, to the impressive dis- course of my predecessor, from those apt and affecting words : "Our holy and our beautiful house, where our fathers praised thee, is burnt up with fire; and all our pleasant things are laid waste."t And full must have been your gratitude to that Being, who prompted and enabled you to take measures, the very next day, for the erection of a new and superior house, and also to the generous friends, near and distant, of your own and other names, who gave proof of their kind sympathy .- Gratitude was indeed due to that Society especially, to whom we have been compelled to refer in a different way, the Bene- ficent Congregational church, for their truly liberal and unu- sual offer, at that time, of their own house of worship, half of every Sabbath " during your pleasure," the pastors of the two churches to share the pulpit and other services. It is among the most gracious alleviations of sorrow, that it so often brings us unwonted pledges of the kind feeling and generous aid of those around us.
It is in place here to remark, that while it was neither ne- cessary nor convenient for this Society to avail itself of the generous offer just mentioned, the relations between the church that made the offer and this church, were for many years- through the whole of Dr. Hitchcock's ministry, and a large portion of his successor's-the relations of almost sister church- es. And although this has changed with change of times, and ministerial fellowship has for some years been withheld, we cheerfully acknowledge many proofs of friendly feeling
t Dr. Edes preached from this text, (Isaiah LXIV. 11,) on that occasion, in the Town House, where the Society worshipped for two years until a new house was erected-this being, as we have said, their old and firs' meeting-house, sold to the town after they left it in 1795.
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and christian kindness, given us by that pastor and people. May it long continue. 'May it increase, as the distance wid- ens which throws the causes of variance farther and farther into the forgotten past. And may the time come, if not on earth, yet in heaven, when those churches which have sprung from the loins of this, shall look back upon it with the counte- nance, and pray for it with the voice, not of aliens, but of chil- dren !
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