[28]This circular was signed by the sub-committee, Rev. J. G. Adams and Rev. E. H. Chapin.
[28]This circular was signed by the sub-committee, Rev. J. G. Adams and Rev. E. H. Chapin.
"What concord hath Christ with Belial."—2Cor.vi. 15.
THE New England Anti-Slavery Society was one of the most vigorous and persistent bodies that ever appeared on these western shores as a reformatory institution. Its chief leader was the indomitable Garrison, who had vowed that on the vexed question of American slavery "he would be heard," and whose "Liberator" was making its journeys from a Boston press throughout the land; hailed and patronized by a goodly company in the North, denounced as incendiary at the South, where a large sum was offered for the head of its editor. He had sympathetic companions of a persistency equal to his own: Wendell Phillips, Edmund Quincy, Samuel E. Sewell, N. P. Rogers, Stephen C. Foster, John Pierpont, Theodore Parker, Parker Pillsbury, Frederick Douglass, and C. L. Remond, among the men of New England, and the Tappans of New York, and representatives at the annual gatherings from Philadelphia, Baltimore, and Washington. Lucretia Mott and Abby Kelley (afterwards Mrs. Foster) were among the women expounders of this gospel of freedom, and "Anniversary Week" in Boston was made especiallynotable by their gatherings at Marlboro Chapel and Faneuil Hall. No matter what other meetings on that week were dull, there was always an exuberance of liveliness at the Anti-Slavery Convention. "Eloquence is dog-cheap at Marlboro Chapel," said Ralph Waldo Emerson; and it was. No better could be heard on the continent. The hardest and boldest resolutions were usually up for consideration, denouncing slaveholders and all their abettors, political, ecclesiastical, of whatever standing or profession. Church and state alike were subjects of their maledictions. Their defiance of all opposition had a clarion ring in it. Nothing pleased them more than to have their positions questioned or assailed. The adventurous wight who was willing to appear as a condemner of their doctrines was the very one for whom they were looking, and for whose presence and opposition they were profoundly thankful. Their meetings were electrifying. Such debates and orations, such questionings and rejoinders! Such hymns and spiritual songs, too, sung often by the Hutchinsons to the old tunes of "Amherst," "Lenox," and "New Jerusalem!" We hear them now; they brought the shouts and tears.
We remember a scene in Marlboro Chapel one afternoon during Anniversary Week. There came up for debate the question: "Does the Constitution of the United States justify slavery?" Rev. John Pierpont took the negative, and very logically maintained it for more than an hour. He appeared in the greatness of his strength, and at the close of his argument proposed to those of his auditors who wished, to question his statements. And never was seen a hungrier company of interrogators than then and there came upon him.But he was unmoved as a sea-rock in the midst of the breakers. His side of the question was not popular with most of the speakers and their sympathizers there, and he was subjected to a most searching cross-questioning. But he came out triumphantly (as it seemed) through it all. When three or four would speak at once, he would say: "One at a time, friends; the miller's rule holds,—first come, first served. I desire to hear you all." The afternoon sunshine suddenly blazing in from one of the windows upon his face, he aptly remarked: "Some subjects are involved in impenetrable darkness; but here we seem to have a super-abundance of light!" When the last inquirer had been answered, the speaker asked: "Are you all through?" And no other one questioning, he said: "And now, after the fashion of the good old divines, I come to the 'Improvement';" under which head he carefully and briefly reviewed the substance of the debate. It was a masterly plea.
But the end was not yet. There was an evening meeting. Again the hall was filled, to listen to a reply to Mr. Pierpont by Wendell Phillips. The orator was in his best mood, and his silvery speech kept the audience spell-bound. It was a complete refutation of the arguments adduced in the afternoon. A clergyman sitting near to Mr. Pierpont said to him: "How can his arguments be answered?" to which the latter replied: "I should like to see the man who could tell me!" So Greek met Greek in those stirring and stormy days.
It was an up-hill movement, this anti-slavery agitation. It called out spirits of more colors than those mentioned in "Macbeth." The opposition was intense.Garrison's life was in peril in the streets of Boston in 1835, and a little company of his sympathizers, including the poet Whittier and George Thompson, the English philanthropist, were closely followed in the streets of Concord, N. H., one evening, that they might be seized by certain mobocratic ones, and subjected to an immersion in some liquid coloring of transient, if not indelible, black; but the hounded ones escaped, preserving white men's complexions. They were not to be put down by mobs nor frightened by any human opposition. They had the spirit of Luther as he went to the Diet at Worms. Though the pro-slavery "devils were thick as the tiles on the houses," they proposed to fight them in the name of God and humanity.
Politicians could do nothing with them, and the churches generally discarded them. There was no love lost, however, between them and the churches. The churches did not give them credit for the good they were seeking to do, and they had no words of approval for the humanity of the churches. Even the National Constitution was denounced as "a covenant with death and an agreement with hell," and the churches were accused as upholders of this covenant. So they reasoned, not always, however, in that charity which the New Testament commends. There were those in the churches as strongly opposed to slavery as themselves,—but they were slow to recognize action against it outside of their own organizations,—who could say, as did Dr. Gannett of the Unitarian Church:—
"In principle I am with you. But there are those with whom you are connected, persons who seem to me so to distrust the goodness of all others who differ from them, and to look down upon all such with so great a consciousness ofmoral superiority, that I feel myself when in their presence to be in a situation not unlike that of a criminal before his accuser and judge."[29]
At one time they held an Anti-Sabbath Convention for a few days, in Boston, during which they said many hard things against the sanctity of this seventh-day worship-time, evidently because they could thus castigate the churches for refusing to discuss freely on this day the crying sin of American slavery. It seemed a pity to hear such harsh denunciations by the speakers who were advocating a righteous cause, against an institution that had done so much towards the world's true civilization. But this was one of their methods of carrying on the reform.
A leading spirit in this movement in the "Granite State" was Nathaniel P. Rogers, for a few years the editor of the "Herald of Freedom," issued at Concord, N. H. He was a lawyer of Plymouth, Grafton County, and a member of the Orthodox Church in that town, and was a descendant of him who was burned at Smithfield, and had the martyr spirit of his noted ancestor. He was a scholarly, witty, and affable man, and wielded as facile a pen as any editor in New England. In many of his descriptive sketches he gave to the scenery of New Hampshire a fascination equal to that with which Sir Walter Scott invests the lochs and hills of Scotland. His plea with Mr. Webster, the great Senator from Massachusetts, to let "his lion voice in one Numidian roar" be heard from his place in Congress on the abomination of American slavery and the claims of American freedom, once read, could never be forgotten. When his "Herald ofFreedom" was first issued, some of the stage-drivers from Concord refused to carry it out to the subscribers; but this hostility, through the personal influence of the editor, soon ceased. Its columns were opened to all sorts of radical sayings against the churches because of their presumed hostility to human freedom; but as the columns of the paper were free, there were sometimes sound and strong answers to them. Mr. Rogers, worn out with mental toiling and anxiety, was called from the earthly life in the midst of his years.
And so this work of the anti-slavery reformers went steadily forward with increasing momentum, till a more general awakening took place all over the land. The churches were becoming more and more alive to it, and the politicians could in no wise evade it. The seed of "Free-Soilism" sown, "Know-nothingism" sprang up, and one of the two leading political parties became the party of Freedom—of "free soil, free speech, free men." The passage and attempted enforcement of the Fugitive Slave Act, and the repeal of the Missouri Compromise, had served to bring about this result. Hence the election of Mr. Lincoln to the Presidency, secession, war, the downfall of slavery. These first agitators lived to see the end they had striven for attained. They hadbeen heard, and a stronger than they had heard, and had answered them, and an imploring and struggling nation, "in the day of his power!" Now could one of the first of our poets sing:—
"Ring and swingBells of joy! On morning's wingSend the song of praise abroad!With a sound of broken chainsTell the nations that he reignsWho alone is Lord and God!"
"Ring and swingBells of joy! On morning's wingSend the song of praise abroad!With a sound of broken chainsTell the nations that he reignsWho alone is Lord and God!"
"Ring and swing
Bells of joy! On morning's wing
Send the song of praise abroad!
With a sound of broken chains
Tell the nations that he reigns
Who alone is Lord and God!"
Of course the Universalist churches could not evade this controversy between freedom and slavery. Their very faith invited and encouraged it. The Fatherhood of God and the Brotherhood of Man are doctrines which forever stand in opposition to the presumption that man can own property in his fellow man. Of all the Christian sects, Universalists were the last who could countenance in the light of their beneficent faith the abomination of American slavery. If other theologies gave cause for the aspersion that "God was the greatest slaveholder in the universe," because it was his intention to keep in spiritual bondage and sufferings great numbers of his offspring world without end, Universalism affirmed that this whole human creation now groaning and travailing in pain shall be delivered from its bondage of corruption into the glorious liberty of the children of God.[30]Could this church, bearing its own significant name, be silent, then, when the test time came? Nay, it was a golden opportunity for her to speak and act. She uttered her voice, firmly, freely, faithfully. True, there were conservatives at first in this church as in others, who dreaded the consequences of the agitation of this subject, who deemed it a political question rather than a religious one, and feared not only discord and division in the churches because of it, but a disruption of the national union. This timidity wore off in due time, and this manifesto went forth from the Universalists of Massachusetts and other States in 1845. It is a "protest against American slavery," and is signed by three hundred and four Universalist clergymen. The reasons stated as the basis of the protest are these:—
"1. Because slavery denies the eternal distinction between a man and property, ranking a human being with a material thing. 2. Because it does not award to the laborer the fruits of his toil in any higher sense than to the cattle. 3. Because it trammels the intellectual powers and prevents their expansion. 4. Because it checks the development of the moral nature of the slave; denies him rights and therefore responsibility. 5. Because it involves a practical denial of the religious nature of the slave. 6. Because it presents an insurmountable barrier to the propagation of the great truth of the Universal Brotherhood and thereby most effectually prevents the progress of true Christianity. 7. Because the essential nature of slavery cannot be altered by any kindness, how great so ever, practised toward the slave. 8. Because the long continuance of a system of wrong cannot palliate it, but on the other hand augments the demand for its abolition. 9. Because we would in all charity remember that peculiarities of situation may affect the judgment and moral sense; still, we must not forget that no peculiarity of situation can excuse a perpetual denial of universal principles and obligations."
[29]Memoir of Dr. Gannett, by his son, p. 294.[30]Heb. viii. 21, 22.
[29]Memoir of Dr. Gannett, by his son, p. 294.
[30]Heb. viii. 21, 22.
"The crooked shall be made straight, and the rough places plain."—Isaiah, xl. 4.
THE half-century just passed has been notable for the progress of thought in reference to the significant reforms now claiming public attention. Foremost among these is that of
In no other period of the past has its work been so marked and cheering. In Great Britain and America its manifestations were almost simultaneous. Intemperance was seen to be a monstrous national vice, and societies were formed for the suppression of it. Abstinence from distilled liquors was at first the pledge taken; but subsequent discussion of the subject induced the next and safer step forward, of total abstinence from all intoxicants. From 1834 to 1838 nearly the whole of the original societies through England and Scotland extended their principles on the new and broader declaration, and worked with renewed enthusiasm.[31]The same course was taken in our own country, and similar effects followed. The new pledge was consistent, because it struck at the root of the evil.
The Temperance reform enlisted the sympathies of Universalists in the beginning. It was a vindication of the Gospel of enlightened and pure manhood, maintaining its supremacy over the sinful inclinations and indulgences "that war against the soul." Indeed, one of the first avowed advocates of the practice of total abstinence, as early as 1778, was the well-known and honored Dr. Benjamin Rush, one of the signers of the Declaration of Independence, and a firm believer in Christian Universalism. He not only advocated this practice himself, but was especially interested in commending it to the attention of two religious bodies in Pennsylvania, the Episcopalians and Presbyterians, at their annual meetings. When in later days the attention of the Christian churches was called to the consideration of this reform, no more zealous friends of it were found than those among Universalists. The Universalist ministry was well represented, and its services welcomed by others. An instance is remembered of a deserved tribute, given in his peculiar quaintness of speech, by the elder Dr. (Lyman) Beecher, to Rev. Edwin Thompson, at an annual meeting of the Massachusetts Temperance Society. Mr. Thompson was State agent for the Society, and had been very active in its work during the year; so that a speaker alluded to him as having been in that time "the main spoke in the wheel." "Indeed," said Dr. Beecher, "it seems to me that he has been the hub, and all the spokes, and a considerable part of the rim!"
The reform in our country was quickened by the "Washingtonian" movement, which involved the reformation of the inebriate, and his work to redeem others from the destroyer. Although there were backslidersin this, as in all reformatory movements, yet the number of the saved justified a thousand times the interest taken in the great work itself. It was an indication of what might be done everywhere and in all time by Divine aid, and human will at work relying upon it. It seemed also to emphasize the truth that men, however far overcome by wrong habit, are not to be given over as irreclaimable. It was in accord with the grand idea that there are no lost ones so far astray as to be beyond the mercy which sent Him into the world, who said, "I came not to call the righteous but sinners to repentance. They that are whole need not a physician, but they that are sick."
Legislation took higher and stronger ground in reference to the evil of intemperance. The subject went into politics more than ever. The doctrine of prohibition gained advocates. A law favoring it was passed in Massachusetts, and afterwards in Maine. Prosecutions and law-suits followed, and appeals went up to the highest courts to test the constitutionality of the law. This was affirmed by them, just as the framers of the law knew that it would be. Despite all sophisms and evasions, the common sense of every man will settle down into the conviction that the people of a nation, if they would be really strong and free, must employ every safeguard against this giant evil, that has so constantly outraged and cursed our world.
The rising of the women of the West, in 1873, to suppress the demoralizing work of the liquor-saloons, was an outspoken, providential protest against these scourges of our civilization. Jeered by the thoughtless, and insulted and cursed by the dealers in the death-poison, it was an indication that made the traffickers instrong drink thoughtful, the friends of woman to take new note of her righteous demands and of her reformatory power, and every true soldier in the temperance army to put on new courage in view of the many instrumentalities which God is able to raise up in aid of His redeeming work with His children. One result of the Woman's Crusade has been the formation of the Woman's Christian Temperance Unions in all parts of our land.
The signs of progress in this reform are more significant than ever. The popularity of the Prohibitory Law in Maine; the Prohibitory clause just put into the Kansas and Iowa Constitutions, and proposed in other States; the numerous Reform Leagues; the proposal to institute in our Congress a thorough investigation in reference to the bearing of this question of liquor-making and vending on the industrial, social, and political welfare of our nation; the continued discussion of the effects of the use of intoxicants by leading statesmen, scientists, and medical professors of our age, and the bringing out of new facts, all showing the vital importance of the Temperance reform; and, also, the evident tendency of these movements, as apprehended by the devotees of the liquor interests themselves, moving them, as at a recent convention of brewers in Washington, to avow their determination to defeat, if possible, by all practicable means, the legal, moral, and especially the religious endeavors put forth against the evil by which they are enriched at the expense of the prosperity, happiness, and peace of so many millions of our land,—these facts are unmistakable indications of still greater achievements in the days and years to come.
Like most reforms, this one must work a long way on to its completion. The evil against which it contends is deep-seated and far-reaching. Appetite, avarice, and the drinking usages of society are its strongholds. But all these are not impervious to the inroads of the right upon them. The public conscience is awake to the demands of this reform as it never was before. When that is more truthfully and generally educated, moral suasion will have freer course, and restrictive laws will find a stronger support everywhere.
The history of our race is one of warfare. "Wars and fightings" have been realized among men from the beginning, and the world has not outgrown the sanguinary strife. Even during the time of which we are speaking in these pages, when so much has been done for the mental and moral enlightenment of mankind, these murderous human contentions have been going on in the Old World and the New. Our own nation has passed through one of the darkest passages of its history. The war of the Rebellion came of a war that existed previous to the withdrawal of the Southern States of our Union, the war of slavery,—for slavery itself is war always, an outrage on the rights of human beings, perpetrated by members of a common brotherhood. And thus one war opened the way to another. They who were warring upon others could no longer bear to have their wrong-doings questioned, but claimed the right to multiply and perpetuate them. So came secession, so came the fratricidal contest. The majority of the nation did not seek war, did not desire it. But the Unionists of the nation deemed themselvesjustified in resisting the efforts of the secessionists to dismember the nation, and so through a defensive warfare sought to preserve the Union. It was a terrible ordeal, and although the abomination of slavery was swept away, it was at the cost of tens of thousands of lives, of a vast amount of treasure, of suffering as yet unrevealed, and of a lamentable demoralization. The Almighty brought out of it a new order of things with our nation, by abolishing human bondage and placing freedom in the ascendancy. The new order, however, is not yet fully effected. It will take time, wisdom, patience, mutual forbearance, sympathy, and fraternal help to secure this result.
But one reform aids another. A higher view of the claims of human freedom will tend to effect a clearer perception of the great claims of the human brotherhood. If man is too good to be enslaved by his fellow-man, he is too good to be destroyed by him. If human freedom is sacred, so is human life. And we are sure that this grand conception has been very clearly realized, and as clearly affirmed, during the middle of the present century.
In the midst of the world's conflicts during this time, the advocates of peace principles, on both sides of the Atlantic, have not been inactive. They have had a hearing, if a limited one, in Christendom. Peace associations have been more operative than before, and the pulpit and press have made new appeals to the public for the promotion of peace principles. Excellent publications in essay, sermon, or oration have been issued from the press. We hear of one Sunday, in 1845, when one hundred and twenty peace sermons were preached in the city of London. Our philanthropic countryman,Elihu Burritt, has done much for this cause. One of the ablest and most admirable of appeals in behalf of "peace on earth and good will to men" was given in 1845, in Boston, by Charles Sumner,—who may be justly reckoned as one of the brightest lights among philanthropists and statesmen of the present century,—on "The True Grandeur of Nations." Moved by the threatening aspect of affairs between the United States and Mexico, the orator denounced the war system as the ordeal by battle still unwisely continued by international law as the arbiter of justice between nations, and insisted that this system ought to give way to peaceful arbitration for the settlement of international questions, as the private ordeal of battle had given way to such substitutes in the administration of justice between individuals. "The oration attracted unusual attention, led to much controversy, and was widely circulated both in America and Europe. It was pronounced by Richard Cobden to be 'the most noble contribution made by any modern writer to the cause of peace.'"[32]
The delusion that wars must always be expected more or less with mankind is a vagary of barbarism, and not a true Christian thought. Rather is the poet right, when he says:—
"War is a game, which, were their subjects wise,Kings would not play at."
"War is a game, which, were their subjects wise,Kings would not play at."
"War is a game, which, were their subjects wise,
Kings would not play at."
Wars may be lessened, may be outgrown in human society. There are better ways of settling human disputes than by an appeal to arms. Facts in the history of our own nation prove it. Here are a few of them:—
In 1794, the question of the Northeastern boundary between the United States and the dependencies of Great Britain was settled by arbitration.
In 1822, the question of restitution or compensation for slaves found on board of British vessels during the war of 1812. The matter was referred to the Emperor of Russia, and his award accepted by both nations.
In 1858, a difficulty between the United States and the government of Chili and Peru, was referred to the arbitration of the King of the Belgians, and settled by his award.
In 1869, the claims of the United States and Great Britain to landed property in and about Puget Sound were adjusted by peaceable reference.
In 1871, the well-known Alabama claim, which caused so much ill feeling between the United States and England, and threatened to involve the two countries in a terrible war. President Grant, referring to the settlement of this claim, said in his message of Dec. 3, 1871:—
"This year has witnessed two great nations, having one language and lineage, settling by peaceful arbitration disputes of long standing, which were liable at any time to bring nations to a bloody conflict. The example thus set, if successful in its final issue, will be followed by other civilized nations, and finally be the means of restoring to pursuits of industry millions of men now maintained to settle the disputes of nations by the sword."
Is this good possible? Assuredly, if good is able to prevail over evil, right over wrong, love over hatred. And what does the Christian Gospel signify but this: "Peace on earth and good will toward men"? This "good will" shall come, if Christians will do their dutyby insisting on the practicability of it. The undercurrent of a better feeling is gaining force as the great truth of the Brotherhood of Man is more deeply and extensively realized. If the present toiling-time is dark, there is light beyond it, the unerring prophecy of the time when "nations shall learn war no more."
As said Victor Hugo, at the Congress of Peace in Paris, in 1849:—
"A day will come when the only battle-field shall be the market open to commerce and the mind opening to new ideas; when a cannon shall be exhibited in public museums just as an instrument of torture is now, and people shall be astonished how such a thing could have been. A day shall come when those two immense groups, the United States of America and the United States of Europe, shall be seen placed in presence of each other, extending the hand of fellowship across the ocean, exchanging their produce, their commerce, their industry, their arts, their genius, clearing the earth, peopling the deserts, meliorating creation under the eyes of the Creator, and uniting, for the good of all, these two irresistible and infinite powers,—the fraternity of men and the power of God."
In agreement with the foregoing statements in reference to the reform movements of our time, we may note more briefly certain other indications of the increase of that spirit which would lessen the afflictions and wrongs and promote the well-being of society.
has been a subject of much thought and discussion during the generation just passed. It has been, and still is, an open question among the more thoughtful, whether the subject of the proper treatment of criminalshas been regarded aright. We may justly plead for benevolent sympathy without being the apologist of crime. Conscience must be remembered as well as the cry of pitying tenderness, and punishment must have a meaning, or the distinctions of right and wrong are lost. "It will be a sad day," as one has truly said, "when those who violate our laws are more pitied than blamed." Christians are bound by their religion to labor for the prevention of crime, and for the strict application of all righteous laws to the criminal; to impress as they can the awfulness of sin on their own and on other's consciences, and to recall the fallen back to virtue, shamed by his sin, and resolute and strong in the working of a regenerated will, thus vindicating and imitating "the goodness and severity of God." The treatment of convicts in our prisons at the present time is generally more in accordance with these considerations than in the past, when severity was deemed more needful as applied to criminals who were subjects of total depravity, than a proportionate mercy, which regarded them not only as lost ones, but as capable of a possible restoration to their rightful Owner and Almighty Friend. The reform schools in our different States are working in this Christian direction. The subject of
has elicited much attention during the time of which we are speaking. It has been discussed in newspapers, pamphlets, legislatures, pulpits, and lyceum halls. Some of our States have abolished the gallows, others are agitating this subject in their legislatures. The present governor (Long) of Massachusetts, in his annual messagesof the last two years, has recommended the abolition of the death penalty. A large number of ministers of the Universalist Church have constantly affirmed their opposition to it. Rev. Charles Spear published a sensible work on the subject, and Rev. Hosea Ballou, D. D., thirty years since, gave the whole question a very thorough investigation, in reply to Rev. Dr. Cheever of New York, and others.[33]Michigan was the first State in the Union to abolish the death penalty, and a late Report makes the statement that, with a population of 1,500,000, no man has been executed in the State during the last thirty-five years, and that a less number of murders have been perpetrated during the last ten years, in ratio to the population, than during the same decade in any other State where public or even private executions have prevailed.[34]Capital punishment has also been abolished in Maine.
has also been a subject of deep and widespread interest. Christianity has ever given to woman a place denied her by all other religions. As Christian thought has had freer course, and Christian theology and practical work new and brighter development, the relations of woman to the welfare and progress of human society have been more clearly understood and appreciated. Her rights in law are now more plainly and justly defined, and the importance of her equal education with the other sex admitted and emphasized. She is prominent and indispensable as a teacher, all over the land;she is a graduate of the college and a professor there; she is a successful practitioner in the legal and medical professions; she is an ordained minister of the Gospel; she is a merchant, a book-keeper and accountant, an editor, an artist, a mechanic, a farmer, and has more than average success in all these departments of activity. Her right to the ballot is slowly but surely coming to a settlement, which it will take time and thought on her part (for whensheasks for the ballot it will be hers), and enlightened legislation to effect. Where she has exercised this right, none but favorable results have been witnessed.[35]Our State legislatures are called upon to give attention to the subject, and a committee of our national Congress have just decided to report a proposed amendment to the Constitution, declaring that "the right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of sex, and giving Congress the power, by appropriate legislation, to enforce the provisions of this article." If Congress will agree to propose this amendment, and three fourths of the States will ratify it, woman suffrage will be legalized.
The philanthropic and successful efforts in behalf of the blind, the deaf and dumb, and feeble minded, of fallen women, and orphan children, are becoming more and more apparent every year, all in cheering accord with that restorative mercy and power evinced in Him whose mission was to relieve the sorrows and removethe afflictive evils that beset mankind. And no more unmistakable evidence of the decline of that horrible doctrine of endless suffering for the wicked can be realized, than the instituting and maintaining societies for the suppression of cruelty to animals. Surely, the Father of our spirits will not be less merciful towards any of his children, than these children are justly called upon to be to the inferior creatures of his forming hand! These are some of the signs of Christian progress during the last half-century.Laus Deo!
[31]Chambers' Miscellany.[32]New Amer. Enc.[33]Universalist Quarterly, Vol. VI. No. 4, October, 1849.[34]"Gospel Banner," Augusta, Me., June 10, 1882.[35]The Governor of Wyoming affirms that woman suffrage is an unqualified success in the Territory.
[31]Chambers' Miscellany.
[32]New Amer. Enc.
[33]Universalist Quarterly, Vol. VI. No. 4, October, 1849.
[34]"Gospel Banner," Augusta, Me., June 10, 1882.
[35]The Governor of Wyoming affirms that woman suffrage is an unqualified success in the Territory.
"Help those women which labored with me in the churches."—Paul, Phil. iv. 3.
THE Universalist Church is much indebted to its faithful women. Taking into consideration its comparative numbers, no other church in America has been more signally favored in the genial and healthful influence of its writers who have borne the honorable name of Woman. They have been instrumental in spreading the doctrines of the primitive Gospel and the moral bearings of their religion before the world in most attractive and impressive forms, and have disabused the public in its wrong estimate of the character and ability of the advocates of Universalism and the tendency and influence of its principles.
Among those worthy to be remembered in this goodly company, who have passed from the present life during the last half-century, we may mention the gifted sister poets, Alice and Phœbe Cary, Mrs. Sarah Broughton, Mrs. Julia H. Scott, Mrs. Sarah C. E. Mayo, Mrs. Charlotte A. Jerauld, Mrs. Henrietta A. Bingham, Mrs. Elmina R. B. Waldo, Mrs. Luella J. B. Case, and Mrs. E. H. Cobb.
Among the living we may note the names of Mrs. Catharine M. Sawyer, whose contributions to our church journals are so well known; Mrs. Mary A. Livermore,who in her past connection with our church work and literature has gained such a high reputation with her voice and pen, as well as in her deeds of benevolence and mercy during the war of the rebellion; Mrs. Julia A. Carney, whose hymns and instruction books have made her name so familiar in our Sunday-schools and homes; Mrs. Caroline A. Soule, whose consecrated words and works have secured her a name which the church of her love will hold in righteous estimation; Mrs. Nancy T. Munroe, Mrs. Lathrop (formerly Mrs. Bacon), Mrs. E. M. Bruce, Mrs. J. L. Patterson, Mrs. S. M. Perkins, Mrs. P. A. Hanaford, Miss Carnahan, Miss Remick, Miss Minnie S. Davis,—but it is difficult to know where to draw the line in this counting. Others might be named, would space permit, who have made their contributions to the literature of the church. The older and well known retain "their wonted fires," and the new and younger are coming to succeed and honor them. Some of our women are speaking our best and most practical words in our churches, prayer and conference and missionary meetings; in our Sunday-schools, conventions, and associations; in our pulpits, as evangelists and pastors; in our educational institutions. If the Universalist Church has not at this hour as brilliant a presentation of Christian literature from the pen of its women as it had thirty years since, there never was more of the practical and available talent of woman in it than at the present time; never so much organized effort on their part as now.
This effort seems to have taken new form and life since the Centenary Year of the church came round,—1870. Previous to that date, the history of many a new movement, many a new parish or church, had been thehistory of woman's fidelity in the inception, progress, and success of the enterprise. It was but natural, then, that in the inspiration awakened by the approach of this centennial year, the women of the church should be aroused to new and still greater effort. And thus it was that the "Woman's Centenary Aid Association" was organized at Buffalo, N. Y., in September, 1869. The organization was effected, and the main work under it was to aid in the raising of the proposed "Murray Fund," of $200,000. The total amount raised by that Association for this object, in all the States and elsewhere, deducting comparatively moderate expenses, and placed in the treasury of the United States Convention for the Murray Fund, was $35,000. Nearly 13,000 women thus became members of the Association. The fact was a new and cheering manifestation. The "Christian Leader," a Universalist journal of New York city, thus alluded to it:—
"If our women need no eulogy, we need the satisfaction of making a warm, explicit confession of our admiration of their attempt, and our gratitude for what they have done. They can well afford to dispense with the acknowledgment, but we cannot afford not to make it. It becomes us here to raise no question as to woman's fitness for certain employments and political prerogatives, hitherto the prerogatives of the rougher sex. But should we reach what some call 'extreme views' on the several points, and should our zeal bring us onto the platform as a champion thereof, the sledgehammer we should wield is,the work of the Universalist women in their Centenary Year. God bless and make us grateful for our women!"
Since that time the Association has taken the title of the "Womans' Centenary Association" (droppingthe word "Aid" used in the beginning in reference to its work in connection with the United States Convention). It has much other work of its own now. Its tract publishing and circulation, its Scotland Mission, its endowment of women professorships in one of our colleges, its special gifts for the aid of theological students, the helping of needy and worthy parish organizations, establishing Sunday-schools in waste places, and assisting to sustain them and other beneficent works, are included in its ministries. Every year's report of its doings has spoken to the public of the utility and effectiveness of its work.
In May, 1875, Mrs. Caroline A. Soule, the first President of the Association, sailed from New York city for Scotland, on a mission of observation, as a company of believers there had for some time received aid and encouragement from the Association. She passed several months in Scotland, preaching in Dunfermline, Glasgow, Larbert, Dundee, and other places, and organized the "Scottish Universalist Convention." She also assisted at the dedication of a little church in Stenhousemuir, the only Universalist Church edifice in Great Britain. Three years afterwards she went, by approval of the Association, as a preacher and missionary. After preaching awhile in Dundee and Glasgow, in 1879 she organized, in the last-named place, the "St. Paul Universalist Church," and established a Sunday-school and church library. Great numbers of tracts and many books (twenty barrels of closely-packed matter) were circulated as helps in her work. The rite of ordination was conferred upon her by the Scottish Convention. During her work in Scotland she has proved, by her fidelity, self-sacrifice, and persistence in her work duringmany and severe discouragements, her qualifications for a Christian missionary worthy to be recorded among the most devoted of any in the other churches who have been strengthened and honored by the accomplishment of devoted women in their missionary fields. Her work is a noble beginning of that which may continue to be done by the Universalist Church, if it shall possess a zeal commensurate with the magnitude of that pre-eminent Gospel to be "preached to every creature," which it is called of God to maintain. Christian Universalism and woman, "what God hath joined together, let not man put asunder."[36]
[36]For a more ample view of the position and work of the women of the Universalist Church, we refer the reader to the volume recently given to the public by Mrs. E. R. Hanson, entitled "Our Women Workers." Chicago, 1882.
[36]For a more ample view of the position and work of the women of the Universalist Church, we refer the reader to the volume recently given to the public by Mrs. E. R. Hanson, entitled "Our Women Workers." Chicago, 1882.
"Insignificant as the denomination of Universalists may now appear in the eyes of the world, it is not to be doubted that the time is coming when it will occupy in this country, and throughout all Christendom, a much more commanding position, and men will ask for the beginning of what they shall then see, and love to read the story of our present struggles and victories."—Rev. T. J. Sawyer, D. D.
IT is within the first century of our national republic, just passed, that this great faith in the universality of God's love and of the work of Christian salvation with man, has gained a prominence in the churches which it had not known since the earlier times of Christianity. It is of the last half century, in connection with the history of this faith, however, that I would more particularly speak, as it is within this period that the work of its promulgation in our own country has been especially realized, its public advocates multiplied, and their ministries extended in many of the States of our Union. Its publications and other educational forces have increased, and, as we have seen, it has identified itself with some of the most significant reforms of the age. Many of its friends and representatives have been among the worthy and excellent of the times in which they have lived, and not a few of its public advocates deserve to be honorably and thankfully remembered in the present and the future for the contributions theyhave made to the progress of the church in the knowledge of Christian truth and the realization and enjoyment of the Christian life. It is one of the enjoyments connected with the preparation of these pages, that the writer may call them up in memory and speak of them as they appear to him, and note some of their characteristics, and pay them that tribute of respect and honor which they so justly merit.
Though others may appear as their successors in the same high calling, they can scarcely be more faithful or effective in their labors than have these earnest defenders of the Abrahamic faith who have been foremost in its promulgation during the past generation. If many of them now rest from their labors, their works surely follow them, and their names deserve tender and thankful remembrance by their survivors in the church for whose prosperity and honor they so hopefully, bravely, and faithfully taught and wrought.
It should be understood that, in the succeeding sketches of ministers, it is not the intent of the writer to present anything like a full record of all who have faithfully served in this capacity in our country during the time of our church history comprehended in these pages. A complete biographical encyclopædia cannot be compassed in so limited a space. It is from his own particular standpoint of observation and recollection that the writer presents his testimony. Furthermore, it is mainly to those now departed that these references are made.
TheBalloushave been conspicuous in this conflict of religious opinions during the present century. Foremost among the family of preachers, most of whom have departed, stands acknowledged Hosea the elder, one ofthe strongest theologians of the past or present in New England. He lived through half the present century, being nearly thirty years old when he entered it, and was vigorous to the last at the age of eighty-one. The statement of his life-history is not a new one now. The four ample volumes containing it, by Dr. Whittemore, have been extensively read, and will be for years to come. But having known and revered him, it is an unspeakable pleasure to the writer to state his impressions of the man and the preacher.
Hosea Ballou(a native of Richmond, N. H.), came from the home of a worthy Baptist clergyman, whose means of living and supporting a large family were small. He had but meagre opportunities for education, but employed what he had to the best advantage, and became a school-teacher in early manhood. He joined the Baptist Church when quite young, but afterwards grew out of its theology, and became convinced of the truth of Universalism. Discouraged in his first attempts as a public speaker, he grew more confident, and soon attracted much attention, wherever he appeared, as an advocate of his faith. His pastorates were in Barnard, Vt., Portsmouth, N. H., Salem and Boston, Mass. He died in the last-named city, June 7, 1852, after a pastorate of more than thirty years. His two sons, Hosea F., of Vermont, and Massena B., of Stoughton, Mass., have served in the ministry many years.
Mr. Ballou was gifted with great logical clearness, aptness, and force. His preaching was plain, scriptural, and often fervent, and no one could bring home to the hearer the great themes of the Divine Fatherhood and Human Brotherhood more effectively than he. Wakefulindeed must be the theological opponent who could evade the force of his logic. He employed the Socratic method, by drawing the objector out, so that his own statements would confound or confute him. Many valiant ones of the opposite faith were there who could readily assail and denounce his doctrines, where his replies could not reach them, but who would be very sure to keep at a respectful distance from that "sword of the Spirit" which he wielded with such consummate skill.
Of the published works of Mr. Ballou, none have evinced more mental clearness and vigor than his volume on "Atonement," issued in 1805.[37]Its plainness and adaptedness to the common reader, its sharp logic, and above all its apt and convincing appeals to the Scriptures, render it a timely helper everywhere and always, in the discussion of the theologies which have assumed the Christian name, and which are now being so closely scrutinized. Every reader and student of theology understands something of the old theory of Atonement so long dominant in the Christian Church, so exceedingly perplexing to honest and independent inquirers, so hard to be vindicated by its ablest advocates, and so surely sowing the seeds of scepticism and infidelity in many minds. Volume after volume has appeared in defence and attempted illustration of it. Sin an infinite evil, being a violation of infinite law, and therefore the law requiring an infinite sacrifice, shortof which no atonement could be made; the transgression of Adam bringing the whole human race into the same situation of sin and misery, and subjecting them all to the infinite penalty of an infinite law, which they had violated in their parent before they individually existed. In view of this penalty, which was endless suffering, God himself, to placate his own wrath against the delinquents, assumed a body of flesh and blood, and suffered the penalty of the law by death,—not that God himself actually died, but the human body in which he came,—this is deemed the infinite sacrifice by which it is possible for a part of mankind to be saved. "Divines of the greatest ability," writes Mr. Ballou, "and of the first rank among theliterati, have drained the last faculty of invention in plodding through the dark region of metaphysics to bring up a Samuel to explain the solecism ofsatisfying an infinite dissatisfaction."
Now let us note how the author of "Atonement" quietly sets forth this absurdity. It is all comprehended in a single page of the volume:—
"We will state it as it is often stated by those who believe it, which is by the likeness of debt and credit. The sinner owed a debt to Divine Justice, which he was unable to discharge; the Divine Being cannot, consistently with his honor, dispense with the pay, but says, 'I must have what is my just due;' but as the debtor has not ability to pay the smallest fraction, Divine Wisdom lays a deep, concerted, mysterious plan for the debt to be discharged. And how was it? Why, for God to pay it himself!
"Our neighbor owes us a hundred pounds; time of payment comes, and we make a demand for our dues. Says our neighbor, 'My misfortunes have been such that I am not the possessor of the smallest fraction of property in the world;and as much as I owe you I am worse than nothing.' I declare to him positively that I will not lose so much as a fraction of the interest, and leave him. A friend calls, and asks me how I succeeded in obtaining my dues of my neighbor. I reply, 'My neighbor is not, nor will he ever be, able to pay me any part of my demand.' My friend says he is sorry that I should lose my debt. I answer, 'I shall not lose it. I have very fortunately, in my meditations on the subject, thought of a method by which I can avail myself of the whole, to my full satisfaction; and I think it is a method which no person in the world but myself could ever have discovered.' My friend is curious and impatient to know the secret, never before found out. The reader may guess his confusion on my telling him, 'that as I have that sum already by me, I am now going to pay up the obligation before the interest is any larger!' This has been called the Gospel plan, which contains the depths of infinite wisdom."
What could be plainer, and how could the justness of this representation be questioned? Questioned it was, of course, not by any attempt at elaborate examination and refutation, but by a sermon now and then given out from some Orthodox pulpit, by some honest minister, entrenched behind the prejudices of his hearers, and altogether disinclined to meet the whole question in the broadest daylight of investigation. Out of this plain exposition, and others like it, since made, have come the examinations, and statements, and restatements, and amendments, and improvements of the orthodox doctrine of Atonement, which are keeping astir at this hour the pulpits and schools of theology all over the land and across the seas.
Many are the anecdotes of Mr. Ballou given in the biographies already before the public. Were we toattempt a selection, we should be at a loss where to begin. We have one in mind, given us by Rev. Moses Ballou, which we have never seen in our religious journals. A Mr. Buckman, a relative of Mr. Ballou, had taken it upon him as a matter of conscience, with very little mental preparation, to be a preacher. He had a good deal of self-assurance, and, withal, strong love of approbation. Being in company with Mr. Ballou, at one time, he was anxious to get an approving word from him, and said, "Brother Ballou, I am awfully tried with myself." "Ah!" said Mr. Ballou, "Why so? What is the trouble?" "Why," said Mr. Buckman, "it is this: to think that I should ever try to preach, and know so little. Now, what do you think about it?" "Why," said Mr. Ballou, hesitating a little, "if you really want to know my mind, I think—that—if you knew a little more, you would never try again!"
How welcome was he at the great meetings of the church,—conferences, associations, conventions. He was usually called upon to give the discourse at the close of the meeting. And it was often a feast to hear him, as he would dwell upon the excellency of the divine attributes, the "exceeding great and precious promises," and the plain and reasonable precepts of the gospel. A prophetic word of good cheer would be spoken by him at such times. He would see, and make others see, the clouds receding, and the clear day opening in the blue and golden sky beyond. However acceptably others had preached before him, the expectation was that somehow his discoursing would give finish and sanction to them all. And it was so. At Barre, Vt., where the General Convention met in 1831, excellent discourses were delivered by able ministers present, andso rich and varied were the topics dwelt upon, that the query was somewhat humorously proposed, "What will Father Ballou have to say after all this?" Judge of our interest and delight when the modest man arose, and in the most quiet way proposed for his text the words of Elihu, in Job, xxxvi. 2: "Suffer me a little, and I will show thee that I have yet to speak on God's behalf." And such a vindication of the character of the gracious Father of all in face of the aspersions cast upon it by his weak and erring children! It was simply electrifying.
The late Rev. Theodore Clapp, D. D., of New Orleans, and a minister in the Unitarian Church, once related that, being present in a gathering of Unitarian clergymen in Boston, the conversation turned on the changes which had been effected in the theology of New England, and the question who, of all her great divines, had wrought the most and greatest changes. Of course Channing had the most advocates; but there were some who named Edwards, Emmons, Hopkins, and other doctors of the Orthodox Schools. At last Dr. Clapp, who had remained silent, was appealed to. "Gentlemen," said he, "you have not yet named the man!" "What!" replied all in astonishment, "not named him!" "No, gentlemen, you have not yet named him." "Why, who can it be? We have named every preacher of eminence in New England." "And yet, gentlemen, you have not namedtheman." "Well, who do you say he is?" With great impressiveness, Mr. Clapp uttered the name. "Hosea Ballou has effected more and greater changes in the theological opinions of the people of New England, than any man dead orliving." There was silence for a time, and the discussion was not renewed.[38]
Mr. Ballou was a vigorous writer. His "Treatise on the Atonement," "Notes on the Parables," and volumes of sermons, are among his best offerings to the public. The first-named book ought to be read throughout Christendom. He was through his professional life a welcome contributor to the periodicals of the church. He has stood and will continue to stand high. His imposing statue at Mount Auburn will look out upon generations mentally and spiritually blest through his truthful ministries.
The eldest son of Mr. Ballou, Rev.Hosea Faxon Ballou, was born in Dana, Mass., April 4, 1799, and died in Wilmington, Vt., May 20, 1881. At the age of thirty he became desirous of entering the ministry, but hesitated from anxiety as to the support of his growing family. He began the study of theology, however, and in 1832, after a few months with Rev. Benjamin Whittemore, preached with success three times in the vicinity of Boston, and was called to Whitingham, Vt. He was ordained at Boston, June 30, 1833. After a pastorate of nearly twenty-five years at Whitingham he went to Wilmington, where he was pastor until, in 1872, the infirmities of age led him to abandon the pulpit, after a ministry of forty years without the loss of a single Sunday. In person Mr. Ballou was tall, erect, and strong, bearing a marked resemblance to his distinguished father in face and form as well as in mental characteristics. His sermons evinced a high order of intellect and cultivation. During the last seventeen years of his residence in Whitingham,he held the office of town clerk, and in Wilmington was twice elected to the Constitutional Convention and once to the State Legislature. He was President of the Wilmington Savings Bank for seven years before his death, and occupied many other positions of honor and trust. He reared a large family of children, and it has been said of him, in truth we may believe, that during the past fifty years no man in Southern Vermont exerted so wide an influence over religious opinions.
Another son of Mr. Ballou,Massena B. Ballou, was pastor of the Universalist Church in Stoughton, Mass., for twenty-five years, and now resides in that town, at an advanced age.
An elder brother of Hosea was Rev.David Ballou, of Munroe, Mass., a man of remarkable acuteness as a reasoner, and quite as sound a theologian as the more distinguished one just noticed, but whose success as a preacher was much less, because of the want of that ease and fluency in the delivery of his discourses which his brother possessed. But those who knew him well have borne witness to the excellence of his character and his great ability as an expounder of the Word of the Gospel.
His son, Rev.Moses Ballou, held a prominent place in our church as one of its talented ministers, and as a writer of more than ordinary ability. He was born in Munroe, Mass., March 24, 1811. Educated at the academy at Brattleboro, Vt., he began preaching at the age of twenty-two. One of his earliest charges was at Bath, N. H. He was subsequently settled at Portsmouth, where he had pastorates twice. He had chargeof the churches at Bridgeport, Hartford, and New Haven, Conn., and in later years removed to New York city, where he was pastor of the Bleecker Street Church. He then came to Philadelphia, and took charge of the Church of the Restoration. Failing in health, he gave up his work in that city, and removed to Atco, N. J. His friends there erected for him a small church edifice, where he held service when able so to do. He died in Philadelphia, May 19, 1879.
He was the author of two books,—one the "Memorial of Rev. Merritt Sanford;" the other, "The Divine Character Vindicated," a review of Rev. Edward Beecher's work, entitled "The Conflict of Ages." This last-named volume indicates the masterly mental strength of the man. Dr. Beecher himself, we are informed, acknowledged it to have been the ablest of any reply made to his work. It has never yet been read by Universalists as it deserves to be. Mr. Ballou was not only a strong and logical writer, but an earnest and eloquent preacher. Dr. T. B. Thayer writes of him:—
"In his best days, when in the vigor of his manhood, physically and mentally, few men could hold a thoughtful and intellectual audience to closer attention than he; and even those who differed from him theologically acknowledged the ability with which he maintained his positions, and were little disposed to enter the lists of controversial argument against them. And at times when the great truths of the Gospel seemed, in the midst of his speaking, to dawn upon him in new and larger revelation, he would break into speech that thrilled his hearers, and lifted them for a space into the fellowship of the angels.
"He knew for a good while that the end was approaching, and he was ready. Death was to him only the door thatopened into the new immortal life, which was almost as presently real to him as the life he was living here. And when, at the last, his life-long friend, Rev. James Shrigley, said good-bye to him, he exclaimed, 'Why say good-bye, when we shall meet again to-morrow?'"