USA > Vermont > Bennington County > Bennington > Memorials of a century. Embracing a record of individuals and events, chiefly in the early history of Bennington, Vt., and its First church > Part 28
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1 Vol. III., p. 80.
2 History Baptists in New England, 1602-1804, by Isaac Backus, Vol. I., p. 133. 33
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would say to him, 'I think, Mr. Williams, I must now confess to you that the most wise God hath provided and cut out this part of the world as a refuge and receptacle for all sorts of consciences.' There never existed a persecuting spirit in Connecticut." Ban- croft quotes Douglas, in a foot-note, as saying, "I never heard of any persecuting spirit in Connecticut. In this they are egregiously aspersed."1 He adds, further on : "During the intervening cen- tury (Connecticut's first century) we shall rarely have occasion to recur to Connecticut. Its institutions were perfected. For more than a century peace was within its borders; and with transient interruptions its democratic institutions were unharmed. For a century, with short exceptions, its history is the picture of colo- nial happiness. To describe its condition is but to enumerate the blessings of self-government, as exercised by a community of farm- ers, who have leisure to reflect, who cherish education, and who have neither a nobility nor a populace." 2
While the third article of the bill of rights of the new constitu- tion (1780) of Massachusetts was not generally interpreted until an enabling statute (in 1811)3 to give to every religious congrega- tion, whether incorporated or not, their own taxes for the support of religion, Connecticut passed an unequivocal act to this effect in 1784. And whereas this third article of the bill of rights was not abolished in Massachusetts until 1833, Connecticut adopted a con- stitution, in 1818, which in principle left every one free to adopt some religion, or no religion, as they should be pleased to do; and pay a tax for public worship, only upon voluntary connection with some religious society, - thus obtaining complete religious free- dom, the ground which the Separates took, and for which chiefly they separated from the Standing Order as far back as 1730. The constitution of Massachusetts was revised in 1820, and an attempt was made at that time to have the third article of the bill of rights abolished, by which Massachusetts would have been put on the same footing with Connecticut, but it failed. The attempt was again made in 1833, and was successful.4 -
2 Ibid., pp. 60, 61.
1 Vol. II., pp. 56, 57.
3 Buck's Mass. Ecc. Law, pp. 43, 45.
4 " So unanimous had the dissatisfaction become, that, in 1834, an amendment of the third article of the bill of rights was adopted, by which the ancient ' policy of the Commonwealth, derived from the mother country, steadily main- tained for two hundred years, was entirely abandoned."-Buck's Mass. Ecc. Law, p. 64.
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PURITANS OF MASSACHUSETTS BAY.
V. JUSTICE TO THE PURITANS OF MASSACHUSETTS BAY. - In what has been said in this volume respecting the laws of Connect- icut and Massachusetts, in their bearing upon the Separates, the case has been stated strongly against them; not, however, with the least feeling of prejudice against the fathers of New England, but simply to account for the course of the Separates, to whom, as a class, so many of the early settlers of Bennington belonged.
With regard to the spiritual degeneracy of the churches, in con- nection with the culmination of the halfway covenant folly, the writer has no apology to offer for them. Such backslidings, how- ever, have, from time to time, disgraced professed Christianity in all ages of its history; and the sad story of such degeneracies should be pondered by us, so as to impress the admonition of Scripture, " Wherefore let him that thinketh he standeth take heed lest he fall." But with respect to the principle of the en- forcement of religious conformity, particularly in the matter of public worship, some words of explanation should be added, in justice to the Puritans; though they were but men, and, as such, to be seen in the light of their imperfections as well as their virtues.
The Puritans did not believe, did not profess to believe, in free- dom of religious worship. They did not profess to be Separatists as to the Church of England. There were instances, indeed, in the mother country, of their standing in an attitude of severe antag- onism toward the Separatists. (The Pilgrims who came in the Mayflower, and settled in Plymouth, were Separatists, of that day, and believed in entire freedom of conscience as to religious worship, and remained so while they lived, though the influence of the Plymouth colony was gradually overborne by that of the more powerful colony of Massachusetts Bay, and of the con- federation, afterward, of the colonies of Plymouth, Massachusetts, Connecticut, and New Haven.)
Moreover, take them as they were, how far in advance were they of their times ? Let such imperfections as there were in their knowledge and attainments be viewed in contrast with the greater imperfections and far deeper ignorance of the times at large, and of their own early education. Their faults were not so much faults of the men as of the times. Let it be remembered that the daylight of freedom of public worship, as to compulsory taxation, has not yet come in England, - only a faint twilight betokening, now at
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length the approach of day; and it may be the better understood how deep was the darkness a century and a half ago.
The purpose of the Puritan fathers, to maintain, as a parish, public worship, at all hazards, as a foremost duty and interest of the community, is to be charged with much of their proceedings toward the minority who refused to assist in supporting the public worship of God with the majority of the town. This principle has run through all the ecclesiastical legislation of Massachusetts, dominating every opposing principle and interest, until its power was felt, most seriously of all, by those who came to be in the minority, as against the Unitarians, and were themselves refused, in the courts, any of the property of the old society. This subject is fully set forth by Buck in his "Massachusetts Ecclesiastical Law." Our Puritan fathers believed it was necessary to com- pel unwilling ones to assist the willing; and they were slow to believe that a parish had become sufficiently large to maintain more than one meeting; and they felt no security that that meeting would be maintained unless severe measures of coercion were employed upon such as otherwise would refuse to co-operate with them.
"The confederate commissioners of the New England colony from 1643 to 1667, maintained a careful supervision of the religious condition of each colony. They distributed Bibles, they conducted missions to the Indians on a scale unknown before their time, be- side settling the very difficult questions of public law relating to war, boundary, and jurisdiction, on high Christian principles, without precedents to guide them." 1
"The General Court, as early as 1654, held it to be their ' great duty to provide that all places and people within their gates should be supplied with an able and faithful minister of God's holy word.'" "Presidents of county courts and grand juries were to present all abuses and neglects, and to attend to the orders of the General Court concerning the maintenance of the ministry, and the purging of their towns from such ministry and public preach- ers as should be found vicious in their lives, and perniciously het- erodox in their doctrine. 'So strictly were these matters attended to, that we have, in 1800, the exact penalties which towns should pay for neglecting to supply good preaching to the people. If the neglect lasted for three months out of six, the penalty was
1 Mass. Ecc. Law, p. 23.
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from thirty to sixty dollars ; if repeated, the penalty was from sixty to one hundred dollars."1 The General Court also had a care over the attendance upon public worship. " At common law, it was an offence to be absent from public worship; and by statutes, I Elizabeth, ch. 2, absentees, without excuse, were liable to the censures of the church, and a fine of twelve pence." A fine might be imposed for delinquency until 1835.2
Some traces of this feeling of misgiving lest public worship could not be maintained without some assistance of the civil power is seen even in the first constitution and early legislation of Vermont.
It is even now claimed, by some authors for the infant colony of Massachusetts,3 that the excluding of heterogeneous sects was a measure of necessity, on the principle that self-preservation is the first law of nature. Undoubtedly thus reasoned the fathers of the Massachusetts colony. The early history of Connecticut colony, and, indeed, of infant communities in the new States, in our own time, would seem, however, to disprove such reasoning.
Besides, if they degenerated, out of their own loins, from among their own churches and communities, came forth those who saw the truth, and led up the others and mankind to a higher plape.
The instances of exceedingly severe treatment - such as if in- flicted now would be considered outrageous and diabolical in every sense - were sporadic cases, - effects of sudden and overpower- ing excitement in the community. They were not the normal and abiding results of the spirit of the people and the community as a whole.
In the "Massachusetts Ecclesiastical Law," p. 36, the author justły says, in a note, " It would seem that the harsh moods of our ancestors, in the case of the Quakers and witches, hardly lasted two years. We might look in vain for a swifter return to common sense, after a national excitement."
Another + has said of Massachusetts, " The wild excesses of the people in preventing witchcraft, in 1692, destroyed nearly every trace of belief in ghosts and such things."
Of the law of 1742, in the General Assembly of Connecticut, " For regulating abuses and correcting disorders in ecclesiastical
1 Mass. Ecc. Law, pp. 26, 27. 2 Mass. Ecc. Law, p. 27.
3 See l'alfrey's remarks on this point in his History of New England.
4 Goodrich Hist. United States.
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affairs," and which imposed penalties on itinerant preachers and exhorters, it has been well declared, " It was a high-handed in- fringement of the rights of conscience, and in a few years fell and buried the party which enacted it in ruins."1 The reaction against this persecuting course was as violent as the adoption of the course itself. It intensified the spirit of Separatism, and an accelerated progress of religious liberty ensued.
The constant tendency of human nature is to degenerate, while the church of God in the world, with all its reactions and back- slidings, still brings forth from within itself those who lead man- kind up to successively higher planes of civilization, goodness, intelligence, and happiness. "Even so every good tree bringeth forth good fruit; but a corrupt tree bringeth forth evil fruit." See the Pilgrims landing on Plymouth Rock, in 1620, and the Puritans settling in Salem and Boston, in 1630, and consider what New England is to-day, and what its influence in the world has already been.
In tracing, therefore, the course of legislation in the States named, with regard to freedom of religious worship, the object of the writer has been simply historical information upon an inter- esting, important, and little understood subject, and justice to all, while he still retains the most profound respect for our Pil- grim and Puritan forefathers.
1 Great Awakening, p. 238.
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APPENDIX.
A.
THE CHARTER OF BENNINGTON.
THE following is a copy of the original instrument in the town clerk's office. Upon the back of the charter are the names of the grantees, including the min- ister as one, and the school as another, and the name of Governor Wentworth occurs twice. Accompanying the charter is a plan of the township, in sixty- four squares, to designate the rights, with the name of its proprietor on each square, as the rights were severally drawn by lot " by the agents, for the pro- prietors in Portsmouth, Jan. 10, 1749; and were entered by the secretary of said province upon this plan ; each man taking his chance whose name stands in the schedule annexed to the grant of said township."]
Province of New Hampshire. S
George the Second, by the Grace of God, of Great Britain, France, and Ireland, King, Defender of the Faith, &c.
To all persons to whom these presents shall come, coscascos Seal. Greeting. Know ye, That We, of our especial grace, certain knowledge, and mere motion, for the due en- couragement of settling a new plantation within our said province, by and with the advice of our trusty and well-beloved Benning Wentworth, Esquire, our Governour and Commander-in-Chief of our said province of New Hampshire, in America, and of our Council of the said province, have, upon the conditions and reservations hereinafter made, given and granted, and by these presents for us, our heirs and successors, do give and grant in equal shares unto our loving subjects, inhabitants of our said province of New Hampshire, and his Majesty's other governments, and to their
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heirs and assigns forever, whose names are entered in this grant, to be divided to and amongst them, into sixty-four equal shares. All that tract or parcel of land, situate, lying, and being within our said province of New Hampshire, containing, by admeasure- ment, twenty-three thousand and forty acres, which tract is to contain six miles square and no more, out of which an allowance is to be made for highways and unimprovable lands, by rocks, mountains, ponds, and rivers, one thousand and forty acres, free according to a plan and survey thereof, made by our said Govern- our's order, by Matthew Clesson, surveyor, returned into the Sec- retary's office and hereunto annexed, butted and bounded, as fol- lows, viz. : Beginning at a crotched hemlock tree marked W. W., six miles due north of a white oak tree, standing in the northern bound- ary line of the province of the Massachusetts Bay, twenty-four miles east of Hudson's river, marked M. C. I. T., and from said hem- lock tree west ten degrees, north four miles to a stake and stones, which is the south-west corner, and from said stake and stones north ten degrees east, six miles to a stake and stones, which is the north-west corner, and from said stake and stones east ten degrees south, six miles to a stake and stones, which is in the north-east corner, and from thence southi ten degrees west, six miles to a stake and stones, which is the south-east corner, and from thence west ten degrees north, two miles to the crotched hemlock first mentioned; and that the same be and hereby is incorporated into a township by the name of Bennington; and the inhabitants that do, or shall hereafter inhabit the said township, are hereby declared to be enfranchised with, and entituled to, all and every the privileges and immunities that other towns within our province by law exercise and enjoy. And further, that the said town, as soon as there shall be fifty families resident and settled thereon, shall have the liberty of holding two fairs, one of which shall be held on the first Monday in the month of March, and the other on the first Mon- day in the month of September, annually, which fairs are not to con- tinue and be held longer than the respective Saturdays following the said Mondays; and that, as soon as the said town shall consist of fifty families, a market shall be opened and kept one or more days in each week, as may be thought most advantageous to the inhab- itants. Also, that the first meeting for the choice of town officers, agreeable to the laws of our said province, shall be held on the last Wednesday of March next, which said meeting shall be noti-
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THE BENNINGTON CHARTER.
fied by Colonel William Williams, who is hereby also appointed moderator of the said first meeting, which he is to notify and govern agreeably to the law and custom of our said province. And that the annual meeting forever hereafter for the choice of such officers, for the said town, shall be on the last Wednesday of March annually.
To have and to hold the said tract of land as above expressed, together with all privileges and appurtenances, to them, and their respective heirs and assigns forever, upon the following condi- , tions, viz. : -
Imprimis. That every grantee, his heirs or assigns, shall plant and cultivate five acres of land within the term of five years for every fifty acres contained in his or their share or pro- portion of land in said township, and continue to improve and settle the same by additional cultivation, on penalty of the forfeit- ure of his grant or share in the said township, and of its reverting to his majesty, his heirs and successors, to be by him or them re- granted to such of his subjects as shall effectually settle and cul- tivate the same.
Secundo. That all white and other pine trees within the said township, fit for masting our royal navy, be carefully preserved for that use, and none to be cut or felled without his majesty's especial license for so doing, first had and obtained on the penalty of the forfeiture of the right of such grantee, his heirs, or assigns, to us, our heirs or successors, as well as being subject to the penalty of any act or acts of Parliament that now are or here- after shall be enacted.
Tertio. That before any division of the said land be made to and among the grantees, a tract of land, as near the centre of said township as the land will admit of, shall be re- served and marked out for town lots, one of which shall be allotted to each grantee of the contents of one acre.
Quarto. Yielding and paying therefor to us, our heirs and suc- cessors, for the space of ten years, to de computed from the date hereof, the rent of one ear of Indian corn only, on the twenty-fifth day of December, annually, if lawfully demanded, the first payment to be made on the twenty-fifthi day of December next ensuing the date hereof.
Every proprietor, or settler, or inhabitant, shall yield and pay unto us, our heirs and successors, yearly and Quinto.
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every year forever, from and after the expiration of ten years from the date hereof, namely, on the twenty-fifth day of December, which will be in the year of our Lord 1760, one shilling proclama- tion money, for every hundred acres he so owns, settles, or pos- sesses, and so in proportion for a greater or lesser tract of the said land, which money shall be paid by the respective persons above said, their heirs, or assigns, in our council chamber in Portsmouth, or to such officer or officers as shall be appointed to receive the same, and this to be in lieu of all other rents and ser- vices whatsoever.
In testimony whereof we have caused the seal of our said prov- ince to be hereunto affixed. Witness, BENNING WENTWORTH, Esq., our Governor, and Commander-in-Chief of our said provinces, the third day of January, in the year of our Lord Christ one thou- sand seven hundred and forty-nine, and in the twenty-third year of our reign. B. WENTWORTH.
By his Excellency's command, with advice of the Council.
THEODORE ATKINSON, Esq.
STATE OF VERMONT, SURVEYOR-GENERAL'S OFFICE, SUNDERLAND, December 13th, 1785.
Recorded in the first book for charters of the New Hampshire grants, pp. 193, 194, 195. I. ALLEN, Secretary-General.
B. ALLEN AND WARNER.
By successful acts of adventurous heroism, - foremost among which was the taking of Ticonderoga, with his small handful of men, "in the name of the Great Jehovah and the Continental Con- gress, "- Ethan Allen has gained a conspicuous place in the an- nals of Vermont. He is fairly entitled to the admiration he has received, on account of the remarkable warmth of his nature, the irresistible popular force, for a time, of his writing and speak- ing, and his distinguished activity, daring, and enterprise in the public service. Two or three characteristic anecdotes are here introduced.
He was once sued upon a promissory note for sixty pounds, and as it was not convenient for him to meet a judgment, he em- ployed a lawyer to procure a continuance. As the readiest means
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ETHAN ALLEN.
for this, the lawyer determined to deny the signature. The at- testing witness would then be necessary, and as he lived in Boston, and could not be procured in season, a continuance would be inevitable. When the case was called, Allen happened to be present, and, to his astonishment, he heard his lawyer gravely deny the signature of the note. With long strides he made his way through the crowd, and, confronting the amazed attorney, rebuked him in a voice of thunder: " Mr. - , I did not hire you to come here and lie. That is a true note; I signed it, I'll swear to it, and I'll pay it. I want no shuffling, but I want time. What I employed you for was to get this business put over to the next Court, not to come here and lie and juggle about it." It is needless to say he got the continuance.1
Two little girls, seven and four years of age, had wandered into the woods. Not returning, and night about setting in, the parents, fearing they had fallen a prey to the wild beasts then infesting the forests, with the aid of a few neighbors commenced a search, which was continued through the night, and the next day, joined by large numbers from that and adjacent towns, and was prosecuted until mid-afternoon of the third day, when, worn out by fatigue, and despairing of finding the lost wanderers alive, the men had collected together with the view of returning to their home; but among them was Ethan Allen. He mounted a stump, and, in a manner peculiar to himself, pointed first to the father and then to the mother of the lost children, now petrified witlı grief, and admonished each individual present - and especially those who were parents-to make the case of these parents his own, and then say whether they could go contentedly to their homes without making one further effort to save these dear little ones who were probably now alive, but perishing with hunger, and spending their last strength in crying to father and mother to give them food. As he spoke his giant frame was agitated, and tears rolled down his cheeks; and in the assembly of several hundred men but few eyes were dry; whereupon all manifested a willingness to return. The search being renewed, before night of the same day the lost children were found, and restored in safety to the arms of distracted parents.2
When Col. Allen was captured at Montreal, by the British, with his party of Canadians, order was given that thirteen of these
1 Vermont Record. 2 Vermont Hist. Mag. Article, Sunderland.
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APPENDIX.
Canadians should be thrust through with bayonets. "It cut me to the heart," he says, " to see the Canadians in so hard a case, in consequence of their having been true to me; they were wringing their hands, saying their prayers (as I concluded), and expected immediate death. I therefore stepped between the executioners and the Canadians, opened my clothes, and told General Prescott to thrust his bayonet into my breast, for I was the sole cause of the Canadians' taking up arms; the guard in the mean time roll- ing their eyeballs from the General to me, as though impatiently waiting his dread commands to sheathe their bayonets in my breast. I could, however, plainly discern that he was in a sus- pense and quandary about the matter. This gave me additional hopes of succeeding; for my design was not to die, but to save the Canadians by a finesse." 1
In the progress of the New York controversy, several pamphlets were written by Allen, as well as letters of official correspondence with the opposing party, exhibiting, in a manner peculiar to him- self, and well suited to the state of public feeling, the injustice of the New York claims. These pamphlets were extensively circu- lated, and contributed much to inform the minds, arouse the zeal, and unite the efforts of the settlers.2
When Col. Allen had been released from his long captivity, in exchange for Colonel Campbell, Allen paid a visit to the American camps at Valley Forge, where he had much to tell of his various vicissitudes and hardships. Washington, in a letter to the Presi- dent of Congress suggesting that something should be done for Allen, observes : "His fortitude and firmness seem to have placed him out of the reach of misfortune. There is an original something about him that commands admiration, and his long captivity and sufferings have only served to increase, if possible, his enthusiastic zeal. He appears very desirous of rendering his 'services to the States, and of being employed." 3
Seth Warner, Allen's comrade in so many adventures, and in so much public service, without attempting, perhaps incapable of, rhetorical effects by his tongue and pen, possessed more breadth of character, more prudence and judgment, and yet no less deter- mination and courage, than Allen. When the peculiar occasions for adventurous daring had passed by, Warner rose to a higher
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