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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/9594-h.zip b/9594-h.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..f0ae5a2 --- /dev/null +++ b/9594-h.zip diff --git a/9594-h/9594-h.htm b/9594-h/9594-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..f40b1cf --- /dev/null +++ b/9594-h/9594-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,12183 @@ +<?xml version="1.0" encoding="us-ascii"?> + +<!DOCTYPE html + PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN" + "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd" > + +<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" lang="en"> + <head> + <title> + The Works of John Greenleaf Whittier, Volume VI. (of VII), by John + Greenleaf Whittier + </title> + <style type="text/css" xml:space="preserve"> + + body { margin:5%; background:#faebd7; text-align:justify} + P { text-indent: 1em; margin-top: .25em; margin-bottom: .25em; } + H1,H2,H3,H4,H5,H6 { text-align: center; margin-left: 15%; margin-right: 15%; } + hr { width: 50%; text-align: center;} + .foot { margin-left: 20%; margin-right: 20%; text-align: justify; text-indent: -3em; font-size: 90%; } + blockquote {font-size: 97%; font-style: italic; margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%;} + .mynote {background-color: #DDE; color: #000; padding: .5em; margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 95%;} + .toc { margin-left: 10%; margin-bottom: .75em;} + .toc2 { margin-left: 20%;} + div.fig { display:block; margin:0 auto; text-align:center; } + .figleft {float: left; margin-left: 0%; margin-right: 1%;} + .figright {float: right; margin-right: 0%; margin-left: 1%;} + .pagenum {display:inline; font-size: 70%; font-style:normal; + margin: 0; padding: 0; position: absolute; right: 1%; + text-align: right;} + pre { font-style: italic; font-size: 90%; margin-left: 10%;} + +</style> + </head> + <body> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + +The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Works of Whittier, Volume VI (of VII), by +John Greenleaf Whittier + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Works of Whittier, Volume VI (of VII) + Old Portraits, Modern Sketches, Personal Sketches and + Tributes, Historical Papers + +Author: John Greenleaf Whittier + +Release Date: July 10, 2009 [EBook #9594] +Last Updated: November 10, 2012 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE WORKS OF WHITTIER *** + + + + +Produced by David Widger + + + + + +</pre> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <h1> + THE WORKS OF JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER, Volume VI. (of VII) + </h1> + <h2> + OLD PORTRAITS AND MODERN SKETCHES, plus PERSONAL SKETCHES AND TRIBUTES and + HISTORICAL PAPERS + </h2> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <h2> + By John Greenleaf Whittier + </h2> + <p> + <br /> <br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /> <br /> + </p> + <blockquote> + <p class="toc"> + <big><b>CONTENTS</b></big> + </p> + <p> + <br /> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0001"> <b>OLD PORTRAITS AND MODERN SKETCHES</b> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0002"> THOMAS ELLWOOD. </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0003"> JAMES NAYLER. </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0004"> ANDREW MARVELL </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0005"> JOHN ROBERTS. </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0006"> SAMUEL HOPKINS. </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0007"> RICHARD BAXTER. </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0008"> WILLIAM LEGGETT </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0009"> NATHANIEL PEABODY ROGERS. </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0010"> ROBERT DINSMORE. </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0011"> PLACIDO, THE SLAVE POET. (1845.) </a> + </p> + <p> + <br /> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0012"> <b>PERSONAL SKETCHES AND TRIBUTES</b> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0013"> THE FUNERAL OF TORREY. </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0014"> EDWARD EVERETT. </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0015"> LEWIS TAPPAN. (1873.) </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0016"> BAYARD TAYLOR </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0017"> WILLIAM ELLERY CHANNING </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0018"> DEATH OF PRESIDENT GARFIELD. </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0019"> LYDIA MARIA CHILD. </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0020"> OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0021"> LONGFELLOW </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0022"> OLD NEWBURY. </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0023"> SCHOOLDAY REMEMBRANCES. </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0024"> EDWIN PERCY WHIPPLE. </a> + </p> + <p> + <br /> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0025"> <b>HISTORICAL PAPERS</b> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0026"> DANIEL O'CONNELL. </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0027"> ENGLAND UNDER JAMES II. </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0028"> THE BORDER WAR OF 1708. </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0029"> THE GREAT IPSWICH FRIGHT. </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0030"> POPE NIGHT. </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0031"> THE BOY CAPTIVES. AN INCIDENT OF THE INDIAN + WAR OF 1695. </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0032"> THE BLACK MEN IN THE REVOLUTION AND WAR OF + 1812. </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0033"> THE SCOTTISH REFORMERS. </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0034"> THE PILGRIMS OF PLYMOUTH. </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0035"> GOVERNOR ENDICOTT. </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0036"> JOHN WINTHROP. </a> + </p> + </blockquote> + <p> + <br /> <br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /> <br /> <a name="link2H_4_0001" id="link2H_4_0001"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h1> + OLD PORTRAITS AND MODERN SKETCHES + </h1> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + Inscribed as follows, when first collected in book-form:— + To Dr. G. BAILEY, of the National Era, Washington, D. C., these + sketches, many of which originally appeared in the columns of the + paper under his editorial supervision, are, in their present form, + offered as a token of the esteem and confidence which years of + political and literary communion have justified and confirmed, on + the part of his friend and associate, + THE AUTHOR. +</pre> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + JOHN BUNYAN. + + "Wouldst see + A man I' the clouds, and hear him speak to thee?" +</pre> + <p> + Who has not read Pilgrim's Progress? Who has not, in childhood, followed + the wandering Christian on his way to the Celestial City? Who has not laid + at night his young head on the pillow, to paint on the walls of darkness + pictures of the Wicket Gate and the Archers, the Hill of Difficulty, the + Lions and Giants, Doubting Castle and Vanity Fair, the sunny Delectable + Mountains and the Shepherds, the Black River and the wonderful glory + beyond it; and at last fallen asleep, to dream over the strange story, to + hear the sweet welcomings of the sisters at the House Beautiful, and the + song of birds from the window of that "upper chamber which opened towards + the sunrising?" And who, looking back to the green spots in his childish + experiences, does not bless the good Tinker of Elstow? + </p> + <p> + And who, that has reperused the story of the Pilgrim at a maturer age, and + felt the plummet of its truth sounding in the deep places of the soul, has + not reason to bless the author for some timely warning or grateful + encouragement? Where is the scholar, the poet, the man of taste and + feeling, who does not, with Cowper, + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "Even in transitory life's late day, + Revere the man whose Pilgrim marks the road, + And guides the Progress of the soul to God!" +</pre> + <p> + We have just been reading, with no slight degree of interest, that simple + but wonderful piece of autobiography, entitled Grace abounding to the + Chief of Sinners, from the pen of the author of Pilgrim's Progress. It is + the record of a journey more terrible than that of the ideal Pilgrim; + "truth stranger than fiction;" the painful upward struggling of a spirit + from the blackness of despair and blasphemy, into the high, pure air of + Hope and Faith. More earnest words were never written. It is the entire + unveiling of a human heart; the tearing off of the fig-leaf covering of + its sin. The voice which speaks to us from these old pages seems not so + much that of a denizen of the world in which we live, as of a soul at the + last solemn confessional. Shorn of all ornament, simple and direct as the + contrition and prayer of childhood, when for the first time the Spectre of + Sin stands by its bedside, the style is that of a man dead to + self-gratification, careless of the world's opinion, and only desirous to + convey to others, in all truthfulness and sincerity, the lesson of his + inward trials, temptations, sins, weaknesses, and dangers; and to give + glory to Him who had mercifully led him through all, and enabled him, like + his own Pilgrim, to leave behind the Valley of the Shadow of Death, the + snares of the Enchanted Ground, and the terrors of Doubting Castle, and to + reach the land of Beulah, where the air was sweet and pleasant, and the + birds sang and the flowers sprang up around him, and the Shining Ones + walked in the brightness of the not distant Heaven. In the introductory + pages he says "he could have dipped into a style higher than this in which + I have discoursed, and could have adorned all things more than here I have + seemed to do; but I dared not. God did not play in tempting me; neither + did I play when I sunk, as it were, into a bottomless pit, when the pangs + of hell took hold on me; wherefore, I may not play in relating of them, + but be plain and simple, and lay down the thing as it was." + </p> + <p> + This book, as well as Pilgrim's Progress, was written in Bedford prison, + and was designed especially for the comfort and edification of his + "children, whom God had counted him worthy to beget in faith by his + ministry." In his introduction he tells them, that, although taken from + them, and tied up, "sticking, as it were, between the teeth of the lions + of the wilderness," he once again, as before, from the top of Shemer and + Hermon, so now, from the lion's den and the mountain of leopards, would + look after then with fatherly care and desires for their everlasting + welfare. "If," said he, "you have sinned against light; if you are tempted + to blaspheme; if you are drowned in despair; if you think God fights + against you; or if Heaven is hidden from your eyes, remember it was so + with your father. But out of all the Lord delivered me." + </p> + <p> + He gives no dates; he affords scarcely a clue to his localities; of the + man, as he worked, and ate, and drank, and lodged, of his neighbors and + contemporaries, of all he saw and heard of the world about him, we have + only an occasional glimpse, here and there, in his narrative. It is the + story of his inward life only that he relates. What had time and place to + do with one who trembled always with the awful consciousness of an + immortal nature, and about whom fell alternately the shadows of hell and + the splendors of heaven? We gather, indeed, from his record, that he was + not an idle on-looker in the time of England's great struggle for freedom, + but a soldier of the Parliament, in his young years, among the praying + sworders and psalm-singing pikemen, the Greathearts and Holdfasts whom he + has immortalized in his allegory; but the only allusion which he makes to + this portion of his experience is by way of illustration of the goodness + of God in preserving him on occasions of peril. + </p> + <p> + He was born at Elstow, in Bedfordshire, in 1628; and, to use his own + words, his "father's house was of that rank which is the meanest and most + despised of all the families of the land." His father was a tinker, and + the son followed the same calling, which necessarily brought him into + association with the lowest and most depraved classes of English society. + The estimation in which the tinker and his occupation were held, in the + seventeenth century, may be learned from the quaint and humorous + description of Sir Thomas Overbury. "The tinker," saith he, "is a movable, + for he hath no abiding in one place; he seems to be devout, for his life + is a continual pilgrimage, and sometimes, in humility, goes barefoot, + therein making necessity a virtue; he is a gallant, for he carries all his + wealth upon his back; or a philosopher, for he bears all his substance + with him. He is always furnished with a song, to which his hammer, keeping + tune, proves that he was the first founder of the kettle- drum; where the + best ale is, there stands his music most upon crotchets. The companion of + his travel is some foul, sun-burnt quean, that, since the terrible + statute, has recanted gypsyism, and is turned pedlaress. So marches he all + over England, with his bag and baggage; his conversation is irreprovable, + for he is always mending. He observes truly the statutes, and therefore + had rather steal than beg. He is so strong an enemy of idleness, that in + mending one hole he would rather make three than want work; and when he + hath done, he throws the wallet of his faults behind him. His tongue is + very voluble, which, with canting, proves him a linguist. He is + entertained in every place, yet enters no farther than the door, to avoid + suspicion. To conclude, if he escape Tyburn and Banbury, he dies a + beggar." + </p> + <p> + Truly, but a poor beginning for a pious life was the youth of John Bunyan. + As might have been expected, he was a wild, reckless, swearing boy, as his + father doubtless was before him. "It was my delight," says he, "to be + taken captive by the Devil. I had few equals, both for cursing and + swearing, lying and blaspheming." Yet, in his ignorance and darkness, his + powerful imagination early lent terror to the reproaches of conscience. He + was scared, even in childhood, with dreams of hell and apparitions of + devils. Troubled with fears of eternal fire, and the malignant demons who + fed it in the regions of despair, he says that he often wished either that + there was no hell, or that he had been born a devil himself, that he might + be a tormentor rather than one of the tormented. + </p> + <p> + At an early age he appears to have married. His wife was as poor as + himself, for he tells us that they had not so much as a dish or spoon + between them; but she brought with her two books on religious subjects, + the reading of which seems to have had no slight degree of influence on + his mind. He went to church regularly, adored the priest and all things + pertaining to his office, being, as he says, "overrun with superstition." + On one occasion, a sermon was preached against the breach of the Sabbath + by sports or labor, which struck him at the moment as especially designed + for himself; but by the time he had finished his dinner he was prepared to + "shake it out of his mind, and return to his sports and gaming." + </p> + <p> + "But the same day," he continues, "as I was in the midst of a game of cat, + and having struck it one blow from the hole, just as I was about to strike + it a second time, a voice did suddenly dart from Heaven into my soul, + which said, 'Wilt thou leave thy sins and go to heaven, or have thy sins + and go to hell?' At this, I was put to an exceeding maze; wherefore, + leaving my cat upon the ground, I looked up to Heaven, and it was as if I + had, with the eyes of my understanding, seen the Lord Jesus look down upon + me, as being very hotly displeased with me, and as if He did severely + threaten me with some grievous punishment for those and other ungodly + practices. + </p> + <p> + "I had no sooner thus conceived in my mind, but suddenly this conclusion + fastened on my spirit, (for the former hint did set my sins again before + my face,) that I had been a great and grievous sinner, and that it was now + too late for me to look after Heaven; for Christ would not forgive me nor + pardon my transgressions. Then, while I was thinking of it, and fearing + lest it should be so, I felt my heart sink in despair, concluding it was + too late; and therefore I resolved in my mind to go on in sin; for, + thought I, if the case be thus, my state is surely miserable; miserable if + I leave my sins, and but miserable if I follow them; I can but be damned; + and if I must be so, I had as good be damned for many sins as be damned + for few." + </p> + <p> + The reader of Pilgrim's Progress cannot fail here to call to mind the + wicked suggestions of the Giant to Christian, in the dungeon of Doubting + Castle. + </p> + <p> + "I returned," he says, "desperately to my sport again; and I well + remember, that presently this kind of despair did so possess my soul, that + I was persuaded I could never attain to other comfort than what I should + get in sin; for Heaven was gone already, so that on that I must not think; + wherefore, I found within me great desire to take my fill of sin, that I + might taste the sweetness of it; and I made as much haste as I could to + fill my belly with its delicates, lest I should die before I had my + desires; for that I feared greatly. In these things, I protest before God, + I lie not, neither do I frame this sort of speech; these were really, + strongly, and with all my heart, my desires; the good Lord, whose mercy is + unsearchable, forgive my transgressions." + </p> + <p> + One day, while standing in the street, cursing and blaspheming, he met + with a reproof which startled him. The woman of the house in front of + which the wicked young tinker was standing, herself, as he remarks, "a + very loose, ungodly wretch," protested that his horrible profanity made + her tremble; that he was the ungodliest fellow for swearing she had ever + heard, and able to spoil all the youth of the town who came in his + company. Struck by this wholly unexpected rebuke, he at once abandoned the + practice of swearing; although previously he tells us that "he had never + known how to speak, unless he put an oath before and another behind." + </p> + <p> + The good name which he gained by this change was now a temptation to him. + "My neighbors," he says, "were amazed at my great conversion from + prodigious profaneness to something like a moral life and sober man. Now, + therefore, they began to praise, to commend, and to speak well of me, both + to my face and behind my back. Now I was, as they said, become godly; now + I was become a right honest man. But oh! when I understood those were + their words and opinions of me, it pleased me mighty well; for though as + yet I was nothing but a poor painted hypocrite, yet I loved to be talked + of as one that was truly godly. I was proud of my godliness, and, indeed, + I did all I did either to be seen of or well spoken of by men; and thus I + continued for about a twelvemonth or more." + </p> + <p> + The tyranny of his imagination at this period is seen in the following + relation of his abandonment of one of his favorite sports. + </p> + <p> + "Now, you must know, that before this I had taken much delight in ringing, + but my conscience beginning to be tender, I thought such practice was but + vain, and therefore forced myself to leave it; yet my mind hankered; + wherefore, I would go to the steeple-house and look on, though I durst not + ring; but I thought this did not become religion neither; yet I forced + myself, and would look on still. But quickly after, I began to think, 'How + if one of the bells should fall?' Then I chose to stand under a main beam, + that lay overthwart the steeple, from side to side, thinking here I might + stand sure; but then I thought again, should the bell fall with a swing, + it might first hit the wall, and then, rebounding upon me, might kill me + for all this beam. This made me stand in the steeple door; and now, + thought I, I am safe enough; for if a bell should then fall, I can slip + out behind these thick walls, and so be preserved notwithstanding. + </p> + <p> + "So after this I would yet go to see them ring, but would not go any + farther than the steeple-door. But then it came in my head, 'How if the + steeple itself should fall?' And this thought (it may, for aught I know, + when I stood and looked on) did continually so shake my mind, that I durst + not stand at the steeple-door any longer, but was forced to flee, for fear + the steeple should fall upon my head." + </p> + <p> + About this time, while wandering through Bedford in pursuit of employment, + he chanced to see three or four poor old women sitting at a door, in the + evening sun, and, drawing near them, heard them converse upon the things + of God; of His work in their hearts; of their natural depravity; of the + temptations of the Adversary; and of the joy of believing, and of the + peace of reconciliation. The words of the aged women found a response in + the soul of the listener. "He felt his heart shake," to use his own words; + he saw that he lacked the true tokens of a Christian. He now forsook the + company of the profane and licentious, and sought that of a poor man who + had the reputation of piety, but, to his grief, he found him "a devilish + ranter, given up to all manner of uncleanness; he would laugh at all + exhortations to sobriety, and deny that there was a God, an angel, or a + spirit." + </p> + <p> + "Neither," he continues, "was this man only a temptation to me, but, my + calling lying in the country, I happened to come into several people's + company, who, though strict in religion formerly, yet were also drawn away + by these ranters. These would also talk with me of their ways, and condemn + me as illegal and dark; pretending that they only had attained to + perfection, that they could do what they would, and not sin. Oh! these + temptations were suitable to my flesh, I being but a young man, and my + nature in its prime; but God, who had, as I hope, designed me for better + things, kept me in the fear of His name, and did not suffer me to accept + such cursed principles." + </p> + <p> + At this time he was sadly troubled to ascertain whether or not he had that + faith which the Scriptures spake of. Travelling one day from Elstow to + Bedford, after a recent rain, which had left pools of water in the path, + he felt a strong desire to settle the question, by commanding the pools to + become dry, and the dry places to become pools. Going under the hedge, to + pray for ability to work the miracle, he was struck with the thought that + if he failed he should know, indeed, that he was a castaway, and give + himself up to despair. He dared not attempt the experiment, and went on + his way, to use his own forcible language, "tossed up and down between the + Devil and his own ignorance." + </p> + <p> + Soon after, he had one of those visions which foreshadowed the wonderful + dream of his Pilgrim's Progress. He saw some holy people of Bedford on the + sunny side of an high mountain, refreshing themselves in the pleasant air + and sunlight, while he was shivering in cold and darkness, amidst snows + and never-melting ices, like the victims of the Scandinavian hell. A wall + compassed the mountain, separating him from the blessed, with one small + gap or doorway, through which, with great pain and effort, he was at last + enabled to work his way into the sunshine, and sit down with the saints, + in the light and warmth thereof. + </p> + <p> + But now a new trouble assailed him. Like Milton's metaphysical spirits, + who sat apart, + </p> + <p> + "And reasoned of foreknowledge, will, and fate," he grappled with one of + those great questions which have always perplexed and baffled human + inquiry, and upon which much has been written to little purpose. He was + tortured with anxiety to know whether, according to the Westminster + formula, he was elected to salvation or damnation. His old adversary vexed + his soul with evil suggestions, and even quoted Scripture to enforce them. + "It may be you are not elected," said the Tempter; and the poor tinker + thought the supposition altogether too probable. "Why, then," said Satan, + "you had as good leave off, and strive no farther; for if, indeed, you + should not be elected and chosen of God, there is no hope of your being + saved; for it is neither in him that willeth nor in him that runneth, but + in God who showeth mercy." At length, when, as he says, he was about + giving up the ghost of all his hopes, this passage fell with weight upon + his spirit: "Look at the generations of old, and see; did ever any trust + in God, and were confounded?" Comforted by these words, he opened his + Bible took note them, but the most diligent search and inquiry of his + neighbors failed to discover them. At length his eye fell upon them in the + Apocryphal book of Ecclesiasticus. This, he says, somewhat doubted him at + first, as the book was not canonical; but in the end he took courage and + comfort from the passage. "I bless God," he says, "for that word; it was + good for me. That word doth still oftentimes shine before my face." + </p> + <p> + A long and weary struggle was now before him. "I cannot," he says, + "express with what longings and breathings of my soul I cried unto Christ + to call me. Gold! could it have been gotten by gold, what would I have + given for it. Had I a whole world, it had all gone ten thousand times over + for this, that my soul might have been in a converted state. How lovely + now was every one in my eyes, that I thought to be converted men and + women. They shone, they walked like a people who carried the broad seal of + Heaven with them." + </p> + <p> + With what force and intensity of language does he portray in the following + passage the reality and earnestness of his agonizing experience:— + </p> + <p> + "While I was thus afflicted with the fears of my own damnation, there were + two things would make me wonder: the one was, when I saw old people + hunting after the things of this life, as if they should live here always; + the other was, when I found professors much distressed and cast down, when + they met with outward losses; as of husband, wife, or child. Lord, thought + I, what seeking after carnal things by some, and what grief in others for + the loss of them! If they so much labor after and shed so many tears for + the things of this present life, how am I to be bemoaned, pitied, and + prayed for! My soul is dying, my soul is damning. Were my soul but in a + good condition, and were I but sure of it, ah I how rich should I esteem + myself, though blessed but with bread and water! I should count these but + small afflictions, and should bear them as little burdens. 'A wounded + spirit who can bear!'" + </p> + <p> + He looked with envy, as he wandered through the country, upon the birds in + the trees, the hares in the preserves, and the fishes in the streams. They + were happy in their brief existence, and their death was but a sleep. He + felt himself alienated from God, a discord in the harmonies of the + universe. The very rooks which fluttered around the old church spire + seemed more worthy of the Creator's love and care than himself. A vision + of the infernal fire, like that glimpse of hell which was afforded to + Christian by the Shepherds, was continually before him, with its "rumbling + noise, and the cry of some tormented, and the scent of brimstone." + Whithersoever he went, the glare of it scorched him, and its dreadful + sound was in his ears. His vivid but disturbed imagination lent new + terrors to the awful figures by which the sacred writers conveyed the idea + of future retribution to the Oriental mind. Bunyan's World of Woe, if it + lacked the colossal architecture and solemn vastness of Milton's + Pandemonium, was more clearly defined; its agonies were within the pale of + human comprehension; its victims were men and women, with the same keen + sense of corporeal suffering which they possessed in life; and who, to use + his own terrible description, had "all the loathed variety of hell to + grapple with; fire unquenchable, a lake of choking brimstone, eternal + chains, darkness more black than night, the everlasting gnawing of the + worm, the sight of devils, and the yells and outcries of the damned." + </p> + <p> + His mind at this period was evidently shaken in some degree from its + balance. He was troubled with strange, wicked thoughts, confused by doubts + and blasphemous suggestions, for which he could only account by supposing + himself possessed of the Devil. He wanted to curse and swear, and had to + clap his hands on his mouth to prevent it. In prayer, he felt, as he + supposed, Satan behind him, pulling his clothes, and telling him to have + done, and break off; suggesting that he had better pray to him, and + calling up before his mind's eye the figures of a bull, a tree, or some + other object, instead of the awful idea of God. + </p> + <p> + He notes here, as cause of thankfulness, that, even in this dark and + clouded state, he was enabled to see the "vile and abominable things + fomented by the Quakers," to be errors. Gradually, the shadow wherein he + had so long + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "Walked beneath the day's broad glare, + A darkened man," +</pre> + <p> + passed from him, and for a season he was afforded an "evidence of his + salvation from Heaven, with many golden seals thereon hanging in his + sight." But, ere long, other temptations assailed him. A strange + suggestion haunted him, to sell or part with his Saviour. His own account + of this hallucination is too painfully vivid to awaken any other feeling + than that of sympathy and sadness. + </p> + <p> + "I could neither eat my food, stoop for a pin, chop a stick, or cast mine + eye to look on this or that, but still the temptation would come, Sell + Christ for this, or sell Christ for that; sell him, sell him. + </p> + <p> + "Sometimes it would run in my thoughts, not so little as a hundred times + together, Sell him, sell him; against which, I may say, for whole hours + together, I have been forced to stand as continually leaning and forcing + my spirit against it, lest haply, before I were aware, some wicked thought + might arise in my heart, that might consent thereto; and sometimes the + tempter would make me believe I had consented to it; but then I should be + as tortured upon a rack, for whole days together. + </p> + <p> + "This temptation did put me to such scares, lest I should at sometimes, I + say, consent thereto, and be overcome therewith, that, by the very force + of my mind, my very body would be put into action or motion, by way of + pushing or thrusting with my hands or elbows; still answering, as fast as + the destroyer said, Sell him, I will not, I will not, I will not; no, not + for thousands, thousands, thousands of worlds; thus reckoning, lest I + should set too low a value on him, even until I scarce well knew where I + was, or how to be composed again. + </p> + <p> + "But to be brief: one morning, as I did lie in my bed, I was, as at other + times, most fiercely assaulted with this temptation, to sell and part with + Christ; the wicked suggestion still running in my mind, Sell him, sell + him, sell him, sell him, sell him, as fast as a man could speak; against + which, also, in my mind, as at other times, I answered, No, no, not for + thousands, thousands, thousands, at least twenty times together; but at + last, after much striving, I felt this thought pass through my heart, Let + him go if he will; and I thought also, that I felt my heart freely consent + thereto. Oh, the diligence of Satan! Oh, the desperateness of man's heart! + </p> + <p> + "Now was the battle won, and down fell I, as a bird that is shot from the + top of a tree, into great guilt, and fearful despair. Thus getting out of + my bed, I went moping into the field; but God knows with as heavy a heart + as mortal man, I think, could bear; where, for the space of two hours, I + was like a man bereft of life; and, as now, past all recovery, and bound + over to eternal punishment. + </p> + <p> + "And withal, that Scripture did seize upon my soul: 'Or profane person, as + Esau, who, for one morsel of meat, sold his birthright; for ye know, how + that afterward, when he would have inherited the blessing, he was + rejected; for he found no place for repentance, though he sought it + carefully with tears." + </p> + <p> + For two years and a half, as he informs us, that awful scripture sounded + in his ears like the knell of a lost soul. He believed that he had + committed they unpardonable sin. His mental anguish 'was united with + bodily illness and suffering. His nervous system became fearfully + deranged; his limbs trembled; and he supposed this visible tremulousness + and agitation to be the mark of Cain. 'Troubled with pain and distressing + sensations in his chest, he began to fear that his breast- bone would + split open, and that he should perish like Judas Iscariot. He feared that + the tiles of the houses would fall upon him as he walked in the streets. + He was like his own Man in the Cage at the House of the Interpreter, shut + out from the promises, and looking forward to certain judgment. + "Methought," he says, "the very sun that shineth in heaven did grudge to + give me light." And still the dreadful words, "He found no place for + repentance, though he sought it carefully with tears," sounded in the + depths of his soul. They were, he says, like fetters of brass to his legs, + and their continual clanking followed him for months. Regarding himself + elected and predestined for damnation, he thought that all things worked + for his damage and eternal overthrow, while all things wrought for the + best and to do good to the elect and called of God unto salvation. God and + all His universe had, he thought, conspired against him; the green earth, + the bright waters, the sky itself, were written over with His irrevocable + curse. + </p> + <p> + Well was it said by Bunyan's contemporary, the excellent Cudworth, in his + eloquent sermon before the Long Parliament, that "We are nowhere commanded + to pry into the secrets of God, but the wholesome advice given us is this: + 'To make our calling and election sure.' We have no warrant from Scripture + to peep into the hidden rolls of eternity, to spell out our names among + the stars." "Must we say that God sometimes, to exercise His + uncontrollable dominion, delights rather in plunging wretched souls down + into infernal night and everlasting darkness? What, then, shall we make + the God of the whole world? Nothing but a cruel and dreadful <i>Erinnys</i>, + with curled fiery snakes about His head, and firebrands in His hand; thus + governing the world! Surely, this will make us either secretly think there + is no God in the world, if He must needs be such, or else to wish heartily + there were none." It was thus at times with Bunyan. He was tempted, in + this season of despair, to believe that there was no resurrection and no + judgment. + </p> + <p> + One day, he tells us, a sudden rushing sound, as of wind or the wings of + angels, came to him through the window, wonderfully sweet and pleasant; + and it was as if a voice spoke to him from heaven words of encouragement + and hope, which, to use his language, commanded, for the time, "a silence + in his heart to all those tumultuous thoughts that did use, like + masterless hell-hounds, to roar and bellow and make a hideous noise within + him." About this time, also, some comforting passages of Scripture were + called to mind; but he remarks, that whenever he strove to apply them to + his case, Satan would thrust the curse of Esau in his face, and wrest the + good word from him. The blessed promise "Him that cometh to me, I will in + no wise cast out" was the chief instrumentality in restoring his lost + peace. He says of it: "If ever Satan and I did strive for any word of God + in all my life, it was for this good word of Christ; he at one end, and I + at the other. Oh, what work we made! It was for this in John, I say, that + we did so tug and strive; he pulled, and I pulled, but, God be praised! I + overcame him; I got sweetness from it. Oh, many a pull hath my heart had + with Satan for this blessed sixth chapter of John!" Who does not here call + to mind the struggle between Christian and Apollyon in the valley! + </p> + <p> + That was no fancy sketch; it was the narrative of the author's own grapple + with the Spirit of Evil. Like his ideal Christian, he "conquered through + Him that loved him." Love wrought the victory the Scripture of Forgiveness + overcame that of Hatred. + </p> + <p> + He never afterwards relapsed into that state of religious melancholy from + which he so hardly escaped. He speaks of his deliverance as the waking out + of a troublesome dream. His painful experience was not lost upon him; for + it gave him, ever after, a tender sympathy for the weak, the sinful, the + ignorant, and desponding. In some measure, he had been "touched with the + feeling of their infirmities." He could feel for those in the bonds of sin + and despair, as bound with them. Hence his power as a preacher; hence the + wonderful adaptation of his great allegory to all the variety of spiritual + conditions. Like Fearing, he had lain a month in the Slough of Despond, + and had played, like him, the long melancholy bass of spiritual heaviness. + With Feeble-mind, he had fallen into the hands of Slay-good, of the nature + of Man-eaters: and had limped along his difficult way upon the crutches of + Ready-to-halt. Who better than himself could describe the condition of + Despondency, and his daughter Much-afraid, in the dungeon of Doubting + Castle? Had he not also fallen among thieves, like Little-faith? + </p> + <p> + His account of his entering upon the solemn duties of a preacher of the + Gospel is at once curious and instructive. He deals honestly with himself, + exposing all his various moods, weaknesses, doubts, and temptations. "I + preached," he says, "what I felt; for the terrors of the law and the guilt + of transgression lay heavy on my conscience. I have been as one sent to + them from the dead. I went, myself in chains, to preach to them in chains; + and carried that fire in my conscience which I persuaded them to beware + of." At times, when he stood up to preach, blasphemies and evil doubts + rushed into his mind, and he felt a strong desire to utter them aloud to + his congregation; and at other seasons, when he was about to apply to the + sinner some searching and fearful text of Scripture, he was tempted to + withhold it, on the ground that it condemned himself also; but, + withstanding the suggestion of the Tempter, to use his own simile, he + bowed himself like Samson to condemn sin wherever he found it, though he + brought guilt and condemnation upon himself thereby, choosing rather to + die with the Philistines than to deny the truth. + </p> + <p> + Foreseeing the consequences of exposing himself to the operation of the + penal laws by holding conventicles and preaching, he was deeply afflicted + at the thought of the suffering and destitution to which his wife and + children might be exposed by his death or imprisonment. Nothing can be + more touching than his simple and earnest words on this point. They show + how warm and deep were him human affections, and what a tender and loving + heart he laid as a sacrifice on the altar of duty. + </p> + <p> + "I found myself a man compassed with infirmities; the parting with my wife + and poor children hath often been to me in this place as the pulling the + flesh from the bones; and also it brought to my mind the many hardships, + miseries, and wants, that my poor family was like to meet with, should I + be taken from them, especially my poor blind child, who lay nearer my + heart than all beside. Oh, the thoughts of the hardships I thought my poor + blind one might go under would break my heart to pieces. + </p> + <p> + "Poor child! thought I, what sorrow art thou like to have for thy portion + in this world! thou must be beaten, must beg, suffer hunger, cold, + nakedness, and a thousand calamities, though I cannot now endure the wind + should blow upon thee. But yet, thought I, I must venture you all with + God, though it goeth to the quick to leave you: oh! I saw I was as a man + who was pulling down his house upon the heads of his wife and children; + yet I thought on those 'two milch kine that were to carry the ark of God + into another country, and to leave their calves behind them.' + </p> + <p> + "But that which helped me in this temptation was divers considerations: + the first was, the consideration of those two Scriptures, 'Leave thy + fatherless children, I will preserve them alive; and let thy widows trust + in me;' and again, 'The Lord said, verily it shall go well with thy + remnant; verily I will cause the enemy to entreat them well in the time of + evil.'" + </p> + <p> + He was arrested in 1660, charged with "devilishly and perniciously + abstaining from church," and of being "a common upholder of conventicles." + At the Quarter Sessions, where his trial seems to have been conducted + somewhat like that of Faithful at Vanity Fair, he was sentenced to + perpetual banishment. This sentence, however, was never executed, but he + was remanded to Bedford jail, where he lay a prisoner for twelve years. + </p> + <p> + Here, shut out from the world, with no other books than the Bible and + Fox's Martyrs, he penned that great work which has attained a wider and + more stable popularity than any other book in the English tongue. It is + alike the favorite of the nursery and the study. Many experienced + Christians hold it only second to the Bible; the infidel himself would not + willingly let it die. Men of all sects read it with delight, as in the + main a truthful representation of the 'Christian pilgrimage, without + indeed assenting to all the doctrines which the author puts in the month + of his fighting sermonizer, Great-heart, or which may be deduced from some + other portions of his allegory. A recollection of his fearful sufferings, + from misapprehension of a single text in the Scriptures, relative to the + question of election, we may suppose gave a milder tone to the theology of + his Pilgrim than was altogether consistent with the Calvinism of the + seventeenth century. "Religion," says Macaulay, "has scarcely ever worn a + form so calm and soothing as in Bunyan's allegory." In composing it, he + seems never to have altogether lost sight of the fact, that, in his + life-and-death struggle with Satan for the blessed promise recorded by the + Apostle of Love, the adversary was generally found on the Genevan side of + the argument. Little did the short-sighted persecutors of Bunyan dream, + when they closed upon him the door of Bedford jail, that God would + overrule their poor spite and envy to His own glory and the worldwide + renown of their victim. In the solitude of his prison, the ideal forms of + beauty and sublimity, which had long flitted before him vaguely, like the + vision of the Temanite, took shape and coloring; and he was endowed with + power to reduce them to order, and arrange them in harmonious groupings. + His powerful imagination, no longer self-tormenting, but under the + direction of reason and grace, expanded his narrow cell into a vast + theatre, lighted up for the display of its wonders. To this creative + faculty of his mind might have been aptly applied the language which + George Wither, a contemporary prisoner, addressed to his Muse:— + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "The dull loneness, the black shade + Which these hanging vaults have made, + The rude portals that give light + More to terror than delight; + This my chamber of neglect, + Walled about with disrespect,— + From all these, and this dull air, + A fit object for despair, + She hath taught me by her might, + To draw comfort and delight." +</pre> + <p> + That stony cell of his was to him like the rock of Padan-aram to the + wandering Patriarch. He saw angels ascending and descending. The House + Beautiful rose up before him, and its holy sisterhood welcomed him. He + looked, with his Pilgrim, from the Chamber of Peace. The Valley of + Humiliation lay stretched out beneath his eye, and he heard "the curious, + melodious note of the country birds, who sing all the day long in the + spring time, when the flowers appear, and the sun shines warm, and make + the woods and groves and solitary places glad." Side by side with the good + Christiana and the loving Mercy, he walked through the green and lowly + valley, "fruitful as any the crow flies over," through "meadows beautiful + with lilies;" the song of the poor but fresh-faced shepherd- boy, who + lived a merry life, and wore the herb heartsease in his bosom, sounded + through his cell:— + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "He that is down need fear no fall; + He that is low no pride." +</pre> + <p> + The broad and pleasant "river of the Water of Life" glided peacefully + before him, fringed "on either side with green trees, with all manner of + fruit," and leaves of healing, with "meadows beautified with lilies, and + green all the year long;" he saw the Delectable Mountains, glorious with + sunshine, overhung with gardens and orchards and vineyards; and beyond + all, the Land of Beulah, with its eternal sunshine, its song of birds, its + music of fountains, its purple clustered vines, and groves through which + walked the Shining Ones, silver-winged and beautiful. + </p> + <p> + What were bars and bolts and prison-walls to him, whose eyes were anointed + to see, and whose ears opened to hear, the glory and the rejoicing of the + City of God, when the pilgrims were conducted to its golden gates, from + the black and bitter river, with the sounding trumpeters, the transfigured + harpers with their crowns of gold, the sweet voices of angels, the + welcoming peal of bells in the holy city, and the songs of the redeemed + ones? In reading the concluding pages of the first part of Pilgrim's + Progress, we feel as if the mysterious glory of the Beatific Vision was + unveiled before us. We are dazzled with the excess of light. We are + entranced with the mighty melody; overwhelmed by the great anthem of + rejoicing spirits. It can only be adequately described in the language of + Milton in respect to the Apocalypse, as "a seven-fold chorus of + hallelujahs and harping symphonies." + </p> + <p> + Few who read Bunyan nowadays think of him as one of the brave old English + confessors, whose steady and firm endurance of persecution baffled and in + the end overcame the tyranny of the Established Church in the reign of + Charles II. What Milton and Penn and Locke wrote in defence of Liberty, + Bunyan lived out and acted. He made no concessions to worldly rank. + Dissolute lords and proud bishops he counted less than the humblest and + poorest of his disciples at Bedford. When first arrested and thrown into + prison, he supposed he should be called to suffer death for his faithful + testimony to the truth; and his great fear was, that he should not meet + his fate with the requisite firmness, and so dishonor the cause of his + Master. And when dark clouds came over him, and he sought in vain for a + sufficient evidence that in the event of his death it would be well with + him, he girded up his soul with the reflection, that, as he suffered for + the word and way of God, he was engaged not to shrink one hair's breadth + from it. "I will leap," he says, "off the ladder blindfold into eternity, + sink or swim, come heaven, come hell. Lord Jesus, if thou wilt catch me, + do; if not, I will venture in thy name!" + </p> + <p> + The English revolution of the seventeenth century, while it humbled the + false and oppressive aristocracy of rank and title, was prodigal in the + development of the real nobility of the mind and heart. Its history is + bright with the footprints of men whose very names still stir the hearts + of freemen, the world over, like a trumpet peal. Say what we may of its + fanaticism, laugh as we may at its extravagant enjoyment of newly acquired + religious and civil liberty, who shall now venture to deny that it was the + golden age of England? Who that regards freedom above slavery, will now + sympathize with the outcry and lamentation of those interested in the + continuance of the old order of things, against the prevalence of sects + and schism, but who, at the same time, as Milton shrewdly intimates, + dreaded more the rending of their pontifical sleeves than the rending of + the Church? Who shall now sneer at Puritanism, with the Defence of + Unlicensed Printing before him? Who scoff at Quakerism over the Journal of + George Fox? Who shall join with debauched lordlings and fat-witted + prelates in ridicule of Anabaptist levellers and dippers, after rising + from the perusal of Pilgrim's Progress? "There were giants in those days." + And foremost amidst that band of liberty-loving and God- fearing men, + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "The slandered Calvinists of Charles's time, + Who fought, and won it, Freedom's holy fight," +</pre> + <p> + stands the subject of our sketch, the Tinker of Elstow. Of his high merit + as an author there is no longer any question. The Edinburgh Review + expressed the common sentiment of the literary world, when it declared + that the two great creative minds of the seventeenth century were those + which produced Paradise Lost and the Pilgrim's Progress. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0002" id="link2H_4_0002"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + THOMAS ELLWOOD. + </h2> + <p> + Commend us to autobiographies! Give us the veritable notchings of Robinson + Crusoe on his stick, the indubitable records of a life long since + swallowed up in the blackness of darkness, traced by a hand the very dust + of which has become undistinguishable. The foolishest egotist who ever + chronicled his daily experiences, his hopes and fears, poor plans and vain + reachings after happiness, speaking to us out of the Past, and thereby + giving us to understand that it was quite as real as our Present, is in no + mean sort our benefactor, and commands our attention, in spite of his + folly. We are thankful for the very vanity which prompted him to bottle up + his poor records, and cast them into the great sea of Time, for future + voyagers to pick up. We note, with the deepest interest, that in him too + was enacted that miracle of a conscious existence, the reproduction of + which in ourselves awes and perplexes us. He, too, had a mother; he hated + and loved; the light from old-quenched hearths shone over him; he walked + in the sunshine over the dust of those who had gone before him, just as we + are now walking over his. These records of him remain, the footmarks of a + long-extinct life, not of mere animal organism, but of a being like + ourselves, enabling us, by studying their hieroglyphic significance, to + decipher and see clearly into the mystery of existence centuries ago. The + dead generations live again in these old self-biographies. Incidentally, + unintentionally, yet in the simplest and most natural manner, they make us + familiar with all the phenomena of life in the bygone ages. We are brought + in contact with actual flesh-and-blood men and women, not the ghostly + outline figures which pass for such, in what is called History. The horn + lantern of the biographer, by the aid of which, with painful minuteness, + he chronicled, from day to day, his own outgoings and incomings, making + visible to us his pitiful wants, labors, trials, and tribulations of the + stomach and of the conscience, sheds, at times, a strong clear light upon + contemporaneous activities; what seemed before half fabulous, rises up in + distinct and full proportions; we look at statesmen, philosophers, and + poets, with the eyes of those who lived perchance their next-door + neighbors, and sold them beer, and mutton, and household stuffs, had + access to their kitchens, and took note of the fashion of their wigs and + the color of their breeches. Without some such light, all history would be + just about as unintelligible and unreal as a dimly remembered dream. + </p> + <p> + The journals of the early Friends or Quakers are in this respect + invaluable. Little, it is true, can be said, as a general thing, of their + literary merits. Their authors were plain, earnest men and women, chiefly + intent upon the substance of things, and having withal a strong testimony + to bear against carnal wit and outside show and ornament. Yet, even the + scholar may well admire the power of certain portions of George Fox's + Journal, where a strong spirit clothes its utterance in simple, downright + Saxon words; the quiet and beautiful enthusiasm of Pennington; the torrent + energy of Edward Burrough; the serene wisdom of Penn; the logical + acuteness of Barclay; the honest truthfulness of Sewell; the wit and humor + of John Roberts, (for even Quakerism had its apostolic jokers and + drab-coated Robert Halls;) and last, not least, the simple beauty of + Woolman's Journal, the modest record of a life of good works and love. + </p> + <p> + Let us look at the Life of Thomas Ellwood. The book before us is a hardly + used Philadelphia reprint, bearing date of 1775. The original was + published some sixty years before. It is not a book to be found in + fashionable libraries, or noticed in fashionable reviews, but is none the + less deserving of attention. + </p> + <p> + Ellwood was born in 1639, in the little town of Crowell, in Oxfordshire. + Old Walter, his father, was of "gentlemanly lineage," and held a + commission of the peace under Charles I. One of his most intimate friends + was Isaac Pennington, a gentleman of estate and good reputation, whose + wife, the widow of Sir John Springette, was a lady of superior endowments. + Her only daughter, Gulielma, was the playmate and companion of Thomas. On + making this family a visit, in 1658, in company with his father, he was + surprised to find that they had united with the Quakers, a sect then + little known, and everywhere spoken against. Passing through the vista of + nearly two centuries, let us cross the threshold, and look with the eyes + of young Ellwood upon this Quaker family. It will doubtless give us a good + idea of the earnest and solemn spirit of that age of religious awakening. + </p> + <p> + "So great a change from a free, debonair, and courtly sort of behavior, + which we had formerly found there, into so strict a gravity as they now + received us with, did not a little amuse us, and disappointed our + expectations of such a pleasant visit as we had promised ourselves. + </p> + <p> + "For my part, I sought, and at length found, means to cast myself into the + company of the daughter, whom I found gathering flowers in the garden, + attended by her maid, also a Quaker. But when I addressed her after my + accustomed manner, with intention to engage her in discourse on the foot + of our former acquaintance, though she treated me with a courteous mien, + yet, as young as she was, the gravity of her looks and behavior struck + such an awe upon me, that I found myself not so much master of myself as + to pursue any further converse with her. + </p> + <p> + "We staid dinner, which was very handsome, and lacked nothing to recommend + it to me but the want of mirth and pleasant discourse, which we could + neither have with them, nor, by reason of them, with one another; the + weightiness which was upon their spirits and countenances keeping down the + lightness that would have been up in ours." + </p> + <p> + Not long after, they made a second visit to their sober friends, spending + several days, during which they attended a meeting, in a neighboring + farmhouse, where we are introduced by Ellwood to two remarkable + personages, Edward Burrough, the friend and fearless reprover of Cromwell, + and by far the most eloquent preacher of his sect and James Nayler, whose + melancholy after-history of fanaticism, cruel sufferings, and beautiful + repentance, is so well known to the readers of English history under the + Protectorate. Under the preaching of these men, and the influence of the + Pennington family, young Ellwood was brought into fellowship with the + Quakers. Of the old Justice's sorrow and indignation at this sudden + blasting of his hopes and wishes in respect to his son, and of the trials + and difficulties of the latter in his new vocation, it is now scarcely + worth while to speak. Let us step forward a few years, to 1662, + considering meantime how matters, political and spiritual, are changed in + that brief period. Cromwell, the Maccabeus of Puritanism, is no longer + among men; Charles the Second sits in his place; profane and licentious + cavaliers have thrust aside the sleek-haired, painful-faced Independents, + who used to groan approval to the Scriptural illustrations of Harrison and + Fleetwood; men easy of virtue, without sincerity, either in religion or + politics, occupying the places made honorable by the Miltons, Whitlocks, + and Vanes of the Commonwealth. Having this change in view, the light which + the farthing candle of Ellwood sheds upon one of these illustrious names + will not be unwelcome. In his intercourse with Penn, and other learned + Quakers, he had reason to lament his own deficiencies in scholarship, and + his friend Pennington undertook to put him in a way of remedying the + defect. + </p> + <p> + "He had," says Ellwood, "an intimate acquaintance with Dr. Paget, a + physician of note in London, and he with John Milton, a gentleman of great + note for learning throughout the learned world, for the accurate pieces he + had written on various subjects and occasions. + </p> + <p> + "This person, having filled a public station in the former times, lived a + private and retired life in London, and, having lost his sight, kept + always a man to read for him, which usually was the son of some gentleman + of his acquaintance, whom, in kindness, he took to improve in his + learning. + </p> + <p> + "Thus, by the mediation of my friend Isaac Pennington with Dr. Paget, and + through him with John Milton, was I admitted to come to him, not as a + servant to him, nor to be in the house with him, but only to have the + liberty of coming to his house at certain hours when I would, and read to + him what books he should appoint, which was all the favor I desired. + </p> + <p> + "He received me courteously, as well for the sake of Dr. Paget, who + introduced me, as of Isaac Pennington, who recommended me, to both of whom + he bore a good respect. And, having inquired divers things of me, with + respect to my former progression in learning, he dismissed me, to provide + myself with such accommodations as might be most suitable to my studies. + </p> + <p> + "I went, therefore, and took lodgings as near to his house (which was then + in Jewen Street) as I conveniently could, and from thenceforward went + every day in the afternoon, except on the first day of the week, and, + sitting by him in his dining-room, read to him such books in the Latin + tongue as he pleased to have me read. + </p> + <p> + "He perceiving with what earnest desire I had pursued learning, gave me + not only all the encouragement, but all the help he could. For, having a + curious ear, he understood by my tone when I understood what I read and + when I did not, and accordingly would stop me, examine me, and open the + most difficult passages to me." + </p> + <p> + Thanks, worthy Thomas, for this glimpse into John Milton's dining-room! + </p> + <p> + He had been with "Master Milton," as he calls him, only a few weeks, when, + being one "first day morning," at the Bull and Mouth meeting, Aldersgate, + the train-bands of the city, "with great noise and clamor," headed by + Major Rosewell, fell upon him and his friends. The immediate cause of this + onslaught upon quiet worshippers was the famous plot of the Fifth Monarchy + men, grim old fanatics, who (like the Millerites of the present day) had + been waiting long for the personal reign of Christ and the saints upon + earth, and in their zeal to hasten such a consummation had sallied into + London streets with drawn swords and loaded matchlocks. The government + took strong measures for suppressing dissenters' meetings or + "conventicles;" and the poor Quakers, although not at all implicated in + the disturbance, suffered more severely than any others. Let us look at + the "freedom of conscience and worship" in England under that irreverent + Defender of the Faith, Charles II. Ellwood says: "He that commanded the + party gave us first a general charge to come out of the room. But we, who + came thither at God's requiring to worship Him, (like that good man of + old, who said, we ought to obey God rather than man,) stirred not, but + kept our places. Whereupon, he sent some of his soldiers among us, with + command to drag or drive us out, which they did roughly enough." Think of + it: grave men and women, and modest maidens, sitting there with calm, + impassive countenances, motionless as death, the pikes of the soldiery + closing about them in a circle of bristling steel! Brave and true ones! + Not in vain did ye thus oppose God's silence to the Devil's uproar; + Christian endurance and calm persistence in the exercise of your rights as + Englishmen and men to the hot fury of impatient tyranny! From your day + down to this, the world has been the better for your faithfulness. + </p> + <p> + Ellwood and some thirty of his friends were marched off to prison in Old + Bridewell, which, as well as nearly all the other prisons, was already + crowded with Quaker prisoners. One of the rooms of the prison was used as + a torture chamber. "I was almost affrighted," says Ellwood, "by the + dismalness of the place; for, besides that the walls were all laid over + with black, from top to bottom, there stood in the middle a great + whipping-post. + </p> + <p> + "The manner of whipping there is, to strip the party to the skin, from the + waist upward, and, having fastened him to the whipping-post, (so that he + can neither resist nor shun the strokes,) to lash his naked body with + long, slender twigs of holly, which will bend almost like thongs around + the body; and these, having little knots upon them, tear the skin and + flesh, and give extreme pain." + </p> + <p> + To this terrible punishment aged men and delicately nurtured young females + were often subjected, during this season of hot persecution. + </p> + <p> + From the Bridewell, Ellwood was at length removed to Newgate, and thrust + in, with other "Friends," amidst the common felons. He speaks of this + prison, with its thieves, murderers, and prostitutes, its over-crowded + apartments and loathsome cells, as "a hell upon earth." In a closet, + adjoining the room where he was lodged, lay for several days the quartered + bodies of Phillips, Tongue, and Gibbs, the leaders of the Fifth Monarchy + rising, frightful and loathsome, as they came from the bloody hands of the + executioners! These ghastly remains were at length obtained by the friends + of the dead, and buried. The heads were ordered to be prepared for setting + up in different parts of the city. Read this grim passage of description:— + </p> + <p> + "I saw the heads when they were brought to be boiled. The hangman fetched + them in a dirty basket, out of some by-place, and, setting them down among + the felons, he and they made sport of them. They took them by the hair, + flouting, jeering, and laughing at them; and then giving them some ill + names, boxed them on their ears and cheeks; which done, the hangman put + them into his kettle, and parboiled them with bay-salt and cummin-seed: + that to keep them from putrefaction, and this to keep off the fowls from + seizing upon them. The whole sight, as well that of the bloody quarters + first as this of the heads afterwards, was both frightful and loathsome, + and begat an abhorrence in my nature." + </p> + <p> + At the next session of the municipal court at the Old Bailey, Ellwood + obtained his discharge. After paying a visit to "my Master Milton," he + made his way to Chalfont, the home of his friends the Penningtons, where + he was soon after engaged as a Latin teacher. Here he seems to have had + his trials and temptations. Gulielma Springette, the daughter of + Pennington's wife, his old playmate, had now grown to be "a fair woman of + marriageable age," and, as he informs us, "very desirable, whether regard + was had to her outward person, which wanted nothing to make her completely + comely, or to the endowments of her mind, which were every way + extraordinary, or to her outward fortune, which was fair." From all which, + we are not surprised to learn that "she was secretly and openly sought for + by many of almost every rank and condition." "To whom," continues Thomas, + "in their respective turns, (till he at length came for whom she was + reserved,) she carried herself with so much evenness of temper, such + courteous freedom, guarded by the strictest modesty, that as it gave + encouragement or ground of hope to none, so neither did it administer any + matter of offence or just cause of complaint to any." + </p> + <p> + Beautiful and noble maiden! How the imagination fills up this outline + limning by her friend, and, if truth must be told, admirer! Serene, + courteous, healthful; a ray of tenderest and blandest light, shining + steadily in the sober gloom of that old household! Confirmed Quaker as she + is, shrinking from none of the responsibilities and dangers of her + profession, and therefore liable at any time to the penalties of prison + and whipping-post, under that plain garb and in spite of that "certain + gravity of look and behavior,"—which, as we have seen, on one + occasion awed young Ellwood into silence,—youth, beauty, and + refinement assert their prerogatives; love knows no creed; the gay, and + titled, and wealthy crowd around her, suing in vain for her favor. + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "Followed, like the tided moon, + She moves as calmly on," +</pre> + <p> + "until he at length comes for whom she was reserved," and her name is + united with that of one worthy even of her, the world-renowned William + Penn. + </p> + <p> + Meantime, one cannot but feel a good degree of sympathy with young + Ellwood, her old schoolmate and playmate, placed, as he was, in the same + family with her, enjoying her familiar conversation and unreserved + confidence, and, as he says, the "advantageous opportunities of riding and + walking abroad with her, by night as well as by day, without any other + company than her maid; for so great, indeed, was the confidence that her + mother had in me, that she thought her daughter safe, if I was with her, + even from the plots and designs of others upon her." So near, and yet, + alas! in truth, so distant! The serene and gentle light which shone upon + him, in the sweet solitudes of Chalfont, was that of a star, itself + unapproachable. + </p> + <p> + As he himself meekly intimates, she was reserved for another. He seems to + have fully understood his own position in respect to her; although, to use + his own words, "others, measuring him by the propensity of their own + inclinations, concluded he would steal her, run away with her, and marry + her." Little did these jealous surmisers know of the true and really + heroic spirit of the young Latin master. His own apology and defence of + his conduct, under circumstances of temptation which St. Anthony himself + could have scarcely better resisted, will not be amiss. + </p> + <p> + "I was not ignorant of the various fears which filled the jealous heads of + some concerning me, neither was I so stupid nor so divested of all + humanity as not to be sensible of the real and innate worth and virtue + which adorned that excellent dame, and attracted the eyes and hearts of so + many, with the greatest importunity, to seek and solicit her; nor was I so + devoid of natural heat as not to feel some sparklings of desire, as well + as others; but the force of truth and sense of honor suppressed whatever + would have risen beyond the bounds of fair and virtuous friendship. For I + easily foresaw that, if I should have attempted any thing in a + dishonorable way, by fraud or force, upon her, I should have thereby + brought a wound upon mine own soul, a foul scandal upon my religious + profession, and an infamous stain upon mine honor, which was far more dear + unto me than my life. Wherefore, having observed how some others had + befooled themselves, by misconstruing her common kindness (expressed in an + innocent, open, free, and familiar conversation, springing from the + abundant affability, courtesy, and sweetness of her natural temper) to be + the effect of a singular regard and peculiar affection to them, I resolved + to shun the rock whereon they split; and, remembering the saying of the + poet + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + 'Felix quem faciunt aliena Pericula cantum,' +</pre> + <p> + I governed myself in a free yet respectful carriage towards her, thereby + preserving a fair reputation with my friends, and enjoying as much of her + favor and kindness, in a virtuous and firm friendship, as was fit for her + to show or for me to seek." + </p> + <p> + Well and worthily said, poor Thomas! Whatever might be said of others, + thou, at least, wast no coxcomb. Thy distant and involuntary admiration of + "the fair Guli" needs, however, no excuse. Poor human nature, guard it as + one may, with strictest discipline and painfully cramping environment, + will sometimes act out itself; and, in thy case, not even George Fox + himself, knowing thy beautiful young friend, (and doubtless admiring her + too, for he was one of the first to appreciate and honor the worth and + dignity or woman,) could have found it in his heart to censure thee! + </p> + <p> + At this period, as was indeed most natural, our young teacher solaced + himself with occasional appeals to what he calls "the Muses." There is + reason to believe, however, that the Pagan sisterhood whom he ventured to + invoke seldom graced his study with their personal attendance. In these + rhyming efforts, scattered up and down his Journal, there are occasional + sparkles of genuine wit, and passages of keen sarcasm, tersely and fitly + expressed. Others breathe a warm, devotional feeling; in the following + brief prayer, for instance, the wants of the humble Christian are + condensed in a manner worthy of Quarles or Herbert:— + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "Oh! that mine eye might closed be + To what concerns me not to see; + That deafness might possess mine ear + To what concerns me not to hear; + That Truth my tongue might always tie + From ever speaking foolishly; + That no vain thought might ever rest + Or be conceived in my breast; + That by each word and deed and thought + Glory may to my God be brought! + But what are wishes? Lord, mine eye + On Thee is fixed, to Thee I cry + Wash, Lord, and purify my heart, + And make it clean in every part; + And when 't is clean, Lord, keep it too, + For that is more than I can do." +</pre> + <p> + The thought in the following extracts from a poem written on the death of + his friend Pennington's son is trite, but not inaptly or inelegantly + expressed:— + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "What ground, alas, has any man + To set his heart on things below, + Which, when they seem most like to stand, + Fly like the arrow from the bow! + Who's now atop erelong shall feel + The circling motion of the wheel! + + "The world cannot afford a thing + Which to a well-composed mind + Can any lasting pleasure bring, + But in itself its grave will find. + All things unto their centre tend + What had beginning must have end! + + "No disappointment can befall + Us, having Him who's all in all! + What can of pleasure him prevent + Who lath the Fountain of Content?" +</pre> + <p> + In the year 1663 a severe law was enacted against the "sect called + Quakers," prohibiting their meetings, with the penalty of banishment for + the third offence! The burden of the prosecution which followed fell upon + the Quakers of the metropolis, large numbers of whom were heavily fined, + imprisoned, and sentenced to be banished from their native land. Yet, in + time, our worthy friend Ellwood came in for his own share of trouble, in + consequence of attending the funeral of one of his friends. An + evil-disposed justice of the county obtained information of the Quaker + gathering; and, while the body of the dead was "borne on Friends' + shoulders through the street, in order to be carried to the burying- + ground, which was at the town's end," says Ellwood, "he rushed out upon us + with the constables and a rabble of rude fellows whom he had gathered + together, and, having his drawn sword in his hand, struck one of the + foremost of the bearers with it, commanding them to set down the coffin. + But the Friend who was so stricken, being more concerned for the safety of + the dead body than for his own, lest it should fall, and any indecency + thereupon follow, held the coffin fast; which the justice observing, and + being enraged that his word was not forthwith obeyed, set his hand to the + coffin, and with a forcible thrust threw it off from the bearers' + shoulders, so, that it fell to the ground in the middle of the street, and + there we were forced to leave it; for the constables and rabble fell upon + us, and drew some and drove others into the inn. Of those thus taken," + continues Ellwood, "I was one. They picked out ten of us, and sent us to + Aylesbury jail. + </p> + <p> + "They caused the body to lie in the open street and cartway, so that all + travellers that passed, whether horsemen, coaches, carts, or wagons, were + fain to break out of the way to go by it, until it was almost night. And + then, having caused a grave to be made in the unconsecrated part of what + is called the Churchyard, they forcibly took the body from the widow, and + buried it there." + </p> + <p> + He remained a prisoner only about two months, during which period he + comforted himself by such verse-making as follows, reminding us of similar + enigmas in Bunyan's <i>Pilgrim's Progress</i>: + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "Lo! a Riddle for the wise, + In the which a Mystery lies. + + RIDDLE. + "Some men are free whilst they in prison lie; + Others who ne'er saw prison captives die. + + CAUTION. + "He that can receive it may, + He that cannot, let him stay, + Not be hasty, but suspend + Judgment till he sees the end. + + SOLUTION. + "He's only free, indeed, who's free from sin, + And he is fastest bound that's bound therein." +</pre> + <p> + In the mean time, where is our "Master Milton"? We, left him deprived of + his young companion and reader, sitting lonely in his small dining-room, + in Jewen Street. It is now the year 1665; is not the pestilence in London? + A sinful and godless city, with its bloated bishops fawning around the + Nell Gwyns of a licentious and profane Defender of the Faith; its + swaggering and drunken cavaliers; its ribald jesters; its obscene + ballad-singers; its loathsome prisons, crowded with Godfearing men and + women: is not the measure of its iniquity already filled up? Three years + only have passed since the terrible prayer of Vane went upward from the + scaffold on Tower Hill: "When my blood is shed upon the block, let it, O + God, have a voice afterward!" Audible to thy ear, O bosom friend of the + martyr! has that blood cried from earth; and now, how fearfully is it + answered! Like the ashes which the Seer of the Hebrews cast towards + Heaven, it has returned in boils and blains upon the proud and oppressive + city. John Milton, sitting blind in Jewen Street, has heard the toll of + the death-bells, and the nightlong rumble of the burial-carts, and the + terrible summons, "Bring out your dead!" The Angel of the Plague, in + yellow mantle, purple-spotted, walks the streets. Why should he tarry in a + doomed city, forsaken of God! Is not the command, even to him, "Arise and + flee, for thy life"? In some green nook of the quiet country, he may + finish the great work which his hands have found to do. He bethinks him of + his old friends, the Penningtons, and his young Quaker companion, the + patient and gentle Ellwood. "Wherefore," says the latter, "some little + time before I went to Aylesbury jail, I was desired by my quondam Master + Milton to take an house for him in the neighborhood where I dwelt, that he + might go out of the city for the safety of himself and his family, the + pestilence then growing hot in London. I took a pretty box for him in + Giles Chalfont, a mile from me, of which I gave him notice, and intended + to have waited on him and seen him well settled, but was prevented by that + imprisonment. But now being released and returned home, I soon made a + visit to him, to welcome him into the country. After some common discourse + had passed between us, he called for a manuscript of his, which, having + brought, he delivered to me, bidding me take it home with me and read it + at my leisure, and when I had so done return it to him, with my judgment + thereupon." + </p> + <p> + Now, what does the reader think young Ellwood carried in his gray coat + pocket across the dikes and hedges and through the green lanes of Giles + Chalfont that autumn day? Let us look farther "When I came home, and had + set myself to read it, I found it was that excellent poem which he + entitled <i>Paradise Lost</i>. After I had, with the best attention, read + it through, I made him another visit; and, returning his book with due + acknowledgment of the favor he had done me in communicating it to me, he + asked me how I liked it and what I thought of it, which I modestly but + freely told him; and, after some farther discourse about it, I pleasantly + said to him, 'Thou hast said much here of Paradise Lost; what hast thou to + say of Paradise Found?' He made me no answer, but sat some time in a muse; + then brake off that discourse, and fell upon another subject." + </p> + <p> + "I modestly but freely told him what I thought" of Paradise Lost! What he + told him remains a mystery. One would like to know more precisely what the + first critical reader of that song "of Man's first disobedience" thought + of it. Fancy the young Quaker and blind Milton sitting, some pleasant + afternoon of the autumn of that old year, in "the pretty box" at Chalfont, + the soft wind through the open window lifting the thin hair of the + glorious old Poet! Back-slidden England, plague-smitten, and accursed with + her faithless Church and libertine King, knows little of poor "Master + Milton," and takes small note of his Puritanic verse-making. Alone, with + his humble friend, he sits there, conning over that poem which, he fondly + hoped, the world, which had grown all dark and strange to the author, + "would not willingly let die." The suggestion in respect to Paradise + Found, to which, as we have seen, "he made no answer, but sat some time in + a muse," seems not to have been lost; for, "after the sickness was over," + continues Ellwood, "and the city well cleansed, and become safely + habitable again, he returned thither; and when afterwards I waited on him + there, which I seldom failed of doing whenever my occasions drew me to + London, he showed me his second poem, called Paradise Gained; and, in a + pleasant tone, said to me, 'This is owing to you, for you put it into my + head by the question you put to me at Chalfont, which before I had not + thought of.'" + </p> + <p> + Golden days were these for the young Latin reader, even if it be true, as + we suspect, that he was himself very far from appreciating the glorious + privilege which he enjoyed, of the familiar friendship and confidence of + Milton. But they could not last. His amiable host, Isaac Pennington, a + blameless and quiet country gentleman, was dragged from his house by a + military force, and lodged in Aylesbury jail; his wife and family forcibly + ejected from their pleasant home, which was seized upon by the government + as security for the fines imposed upon its owner. The plague was in the + village of Aylesbury, and in the very prison itself; but the noble-hearted + Mary Pennington followed her husband, sharing with him the dark peril. + Poor Ellwood, while attending a monthly meeting at Hedgerly, with six + others, (among them one Morgan Watkins, a poor old Welshman, who, + painfully endeavoring to utter his testimony in his own dialect, was + suspected by the Dogberry of a justice of being a Jesuit trolling over his + Latin,) was arrested, and committed to Wiccomb House of Correction. + </p> + <p> + This was a time of severe trial for the sect with which Ellwood had + connected himself. In the very midst of the pestilence, when thousands + perished weekly in London, fifty-four Quakers were marched through the + almost deserted streets, and placed on board a ship, for the purpose of + being conveyed, according to their sentence of banishment, to the West + Indies. The ship lay for a long time, with many others similarly situated, + a helpless prey to the pestilence. Through that terrible autumn, the + prisoners sat waiting for the summons of the ghastly Destroyer; and, from + their floating dungeon. + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "Heard the groan + Of agonizing ships from shore to shore; + Heard nightly plunged beneath the sullen wave + The frequent corse." +</pre> + <p> + When the vessel at length set sail, of the fifty-four who went on board, + twenty-seven only were living. A Dutch privateer captured her, when two + days out, and carried the prisoners to North Holland, where they were set + at liberty. The condition of the jails in the city, where were large + numbers of Quakers, was dreadful in the extreme. Ill ventilated, crowded, + and loathsome with the accumulated filth of centuries, they invited the + disease which daily decimated their cells. "Go on!" says Pennington, + writing to the King and bishops from his plague-infected cell in the + Aylesbury prison: "try it out with the Spirit of the Lord! Come forth with + your laws, and prisons, and spoiling of goods, and banishment, and death, + if the Lord please, and see if ye can carry it! Whom the Lord loveth He + can save at His pleasure. Hath He begun to break our bonds and deliver us, + and shall we now distrust Him? Are we in a worse condition than Israel was + when the sea was before them, the mountains on either side, and the + Egyptians behind, pursuing them?" + </p> + <p> + Brave men and faithful! It is not necessary that the present generation, + how quietly reaping the fruit of your heroic endurance, should see eye to + eye with you in respect to all your testimonies and beliefs, in order to + recognize your claim to gratitude and admiration. For, in an age of + hypocritical hollowness and mean self-seeking, when, with noble + exceptions, the very Puritans of Cromwell's Reign of the Saints were + taking profane lessons from their old enemies, and putting on an outside + show of conformity, for the sake of place or pardon, ye maintained the + austere dignity of virtue, and, with King and Church and Parliament + arrayed against you, vindicated the Rights of Conscience, at the cost of + home, fortune, and life. English liberty owes more to your unyielding + firmness than to the blows stricken for her at Worcester and Naseby. + </p> + <p> + In 1667, we find the Latin teacher in attendance at a great meeting of + Friends, in London, convened at the suggestion of George Fox, for the + purpose of settling a little difficulty which had arisen among the + Friends, even under the pressure of the severest persecution, relative to + the very important matter of "wearing the hat." George Fox, in his love of + truth and sincerity in word and action, had discountenanced the + fashionable doffing of the hat, and other flattering obeisances towards + men holding stations in Church or State, as savoring of man-worship, + giving to the creature the reverence only due to the Creator, as + undignified and wanting in due self-respect, and tending to support + unnatural and oppressive distinctions among those equal in the sight of + God. But some of his disciples evidently made much more of this "hat + testimony" than their teacher. One John Perrott, who had just returned + from an unsuccessful attempt to convert the Pope, at Rome, (where that + dignitary, after listening to his exhortations, and finding him in no + condition to be benefited by the spiritual physicians of the Inquisition, + had quietly turned him over to the temporal ones of the Insane Hospital,) + had broached the doctrine that, in public or private worship, the hat was + not to be taken off, without an immediate revelation or call to do so! + Ellwood himself seems to have been on the point of yielding to this + notion, which appears to have been the occasion of a good deal of + dissension and scandal. Under these circumstances, to save truth from + reproach, and an important testimony to the essential equality of mankind + from running into sheer fanaticism, Fox summoned his tried and faithful + friends together, from all parts of the United Kingdom, and, as it + appears, with the happiest result. Hat-revelations were discountenanced, + good order and harmony reestablished, and John Perrott's beaver and the + crazy head under it were from thenceforth powerless for evil. Let those + who are disposed to laugh at this notable "Ecumenical Council of the Hat" + consider that ecclesiastical history has brought down to us the records of + many larger and more imposing convocations, wherein grave bishops and + learned fathers took each other by the beard upon matters of far less + practical importance. + </p> + <p> + In 1669, we find Ellwood engaged in escorting his fair friend, Gulielma, + to her uncle's residence in Sussex. Passing through London, and taking the + Tunbridge road, they stopped at Seven Oak to dine. The Duke of York was on + the road, with his guards and hangers-on, and the inn was filled with a + rude company. "Hastening," says Ellwood, "from a place where we found + nothing but rudeness, the roysterers who swarmed there, besides the + damning oaths they belched out against each other, looked very sourly upon + us, as if they grudged us the horses which we rode and the clothes we + wore." They had proceeded but a little distance, when they were overtaken + by some half dozen drunken rough-riding cavaliers, of the Wildrake stamp, + in full pursuit after the beautiful Quakeress. One of them impudently + attempted to pull her upon his horse before him, but was held at bay by + Ellwood, who seems, on this occasion, to have relied somewhat upon his + "stick," in defending his fair charge. Calling up Gulielma's servant, he + bade him ride on one side of his mistress, while he guarded her on the + other. "But he," says Ellwood, "not thinking it perhaps decent to ride so + near his mistress, left room enough for another to ride between." In + dashed the drunken retainer, and Gulielma was once more in peril. It was + clearly no time for exhortations and expostulations; "so," says Ellwood, + "I chopped in upon him, by a nimble turn, and kept him at bay. I told him + I had hitherto spared him, but wished him not to provoke me further. This + I spoke in such a tone as bespoke an high resentment of the abuse put upon + us, and withal pressed him so hard with my horse that I suffered him not + to come up again to Guli." By this time, it became evident to the + companions of the ruffianly assailant that the young Quaker was in + earnest, and they hastened to interfere. "For they," says Ellwood, "seeing + the contest rise so high, and probably fearing it would rise higher, not + knowing where it might stop, came in to part us; which they did by taking + him away." + </p> + <p> + Escaping from these sons of Belial, Ellwood and his fair companion rode on + through Tunbridge Wells, "the street thronged with men, who looked very + earnestly at them, but offered them no affront," and arrived, late at + night, in a driving rain, at the mansion-house of Herbert Springette. The + fiery old gentleman was so indignant at the insult offered to his niece, + that he was with difficulty dissuaded from demanding satisfaction at the + hands of the Duke of York. + </p> + <p> + This seems to have been his last ride with Gulielma. She was soon after + married to William Penn, and took up her abode at Worminghurst, in Sussex. + How blessed and beautiful was that union may be understood from the + following paragraph of a letter, written by her husband, on the eve of his + departure for America to lay the foundations of a Christian colony:— + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "My dear wife! remember thou wast the love of my youth, and much the + joy of my life, the most beloved as well as the most worthy of all + my earthly comforts; and the reason of that love was more thy inward + than thy outward excellences, which yet were many. God knows, and + thou knowest it, I can say it was a match of Providence's making; + and God's image in us both was the first thing and the most amiable + and engaging ornament in our eyes." +</pre> + <p> + About this time our friend Thomas, seeing that his old playmate at + Chalfont was destined for another, turned his attention towards a "young + Friend, named Mary Ellis." He had been for several years acquainted with + her, but now he "found his heart secretly drawn and inclining towards + her." "At length," he tells us, "as I was sitting all alone, waiting upon + the Lord for counsel and guidance in this, in itself and to me, important + affair, I felt a word sweetly arise in me, as if I had heard a Voice which + said, Go, and prevail! and faith springing in my heart at the word, I + immediately rose and went, nothing doubting." On arriving at her + residence, he states that he "solemnly opened his mind to her, which was a + great surprisal to her, for she had taken in an apprehension, as others + had also done," that his eye had been fixed elsewhere and nearer home. "I + used not many words to her," he continues, "but I felt a Divine Power went + along with the words, and fixed the matter expressed by them so fast in + her breast, that, as she afterwards acknowledged to me, she could not shut + it out." + </p> + <p> + "I continued," he says, "my visits to my best-beloved Friend until we + married, which was on the 28th day of the eighth month, 1669. We took each + other in a select meeting of the ancient and grave Friends of that + country. A very solemn meeting it was, and in a weighty frame of spirit we + were." His wife seems to have had some estate; and Ellwood, with that nice + sense of justice which marked all his actions, immediately made his will, + securing to her, in case of his decease, all her own goods and moneys, as + well as all that he had himself acquired before marriage. "Which," he + tells, "was indeed but little, yet, by all that little, more than I had + ever given her ground to expect with me." His father, who was yet + unreconciled to the son's religious views, found fault with his marriage, + on the ground that it was unlawful and unsanctioned by priest or liturgy, + and consequently refused to render him any pecuniary assistance. Yet, in + spite of this and other trials, he seems to have preserved his serenity of + spirit. After an unpleasant interview with his father, on one occasion, he + wrote, at his lodgings in an inn, in London, what he calls <i>A Song of + Praise</i>. An extract from it will serve to show the spirit of the good + man in affliction:— + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "Unto the Glory of Thy Holy Name, + Eternal God! whom I both love and fear, + I hereby do declare, I never came + Before Thy throne, and found Thee loath to hear, + But always ready with an open ear; + And, though sometimes Thou seem'st Thy face to hide, + As one that had withdrawn his love from me, + 'T is that my faith may to the full, be tried, + And that I thereby may the better see + How weak I am when not upheld by Thee!" +</pre> + <p> + The next year, 1670, an act of Parliament, in relation to "Conventicles," + provided that any person who should be present at any meeting, under color + or pretence of any exercise of religion, in other manner than according to + the liturgy and practice of the Church of England, "should be liable to + fines of from five to ten shillings; and any person preaching at or giving + his house for the meeting, to a fine of twenty pounds: one third of the + fines being received by the informer or informers." As a natural + consequence of such a law, the vilest scoundrels in the land set up the + trade of informers and heresy-hunters. Wherever a dissenting meeting or + burial took place, there was sure to be a mercenary spy, ready to bring a + complaint against all in attendance. The Independents and Baptists ceased, + in a great measure, to hold public meetings, yet even they did not escape + prosecution. Bunyan, for instance, in these days, was dreaming, like + another Jacob, of angels ascending and descending, in Bedford prison. But + upon the poor Quakers fell, as usual, the great force of the unjust + enactment. Some of these spies or informers, men of sharp wit, close + countenances, pliant tempers, and skill in dissimulation, took the guise + of Quakers, Independents, or Baptists, as occasion required, thrusting + themselves into the meetings of the proscribed sects, ascertaining the + number who attended, their rank and condition, and then informing against + them. Ellwood, in his Journal for 1670, describes several of these + emissaries of evil. One of them came to a Friend's house, in Bucks, + professing to be a brother in the faith, but, overdoing his counterfeit + Quakerism, was detected and dismissed by his host. Betaking himself to the + inn, he appeared in his true character, drank and swore roundly, and + confessed over his cups that he had been sent forth on his mission by the + Rev. Dr. Mew, Vice- Chancellor of Oxford. Finding little success in + counterfeiting Quakerism, he turned to the Baptists, where, for a time, he + met with better success. Ellwood, at this time, rendered good service to + his friends, by exposing the true character of these wretches, and + bringing them to justice for theft, perjury, and other misdemeanors. + </p> + <p> + While this storm of persecution lasted, (a period of two or three years,) + the different dissenting sects felt, in some measure, a common sympathy, + and, while guarding themselves against their common foe, had little + leisure for controversy with each other; but, as was natural, the + abatement of their mutual suffering and danger was the signal for renewing + their suspended quarrels. The Baptists fell upon the Quakers, with + pamphlet and sermon; the latter replied in the same way. One of the most + conspicuous of the Baptist disputants was the famous Jeremy Ives, with + whom our friend Ellwood seems to have had a good deal of trouble. "His + name," says Ellwood, "was up for a topping Disputant. He was well, read in + the fallacies of logic, and was ready in framing syllogisms. His chief art + lay in tickling the humor of rude, unlearned, and injudicious hearers." + </p> + <p> + The following piece of Ellwood's, entitled "An Epitaph for Jeremy Ives," + will serve to show that wit and drollery were sometimes found even among + the proverbially sober Quakers of the seventeenth century:— + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "Beneath this stone, depressed, doth lie + The Mirror of Hypocrisy— + Ives, whose mercenary tongue + Like a Weathercock was hung, + And did this or that way play, + As Advantage led the way. + If well hired, he would dispute, + Otherwise he would be mute. + But he'd bawl for half a day, + If he knew and liked his pay. + + "For his person, let it pass; + Only note his face was brass. + His heart was like a pumice-stone, + And for Conscience he had none. + Of Earth and Air he was composed, + With Water round about enclosed. + Earth in him had greatest share, + Questionless, his life lay there; + Thence his cankered Envy sprung, + Poisoning both his heart and tongue. + + "Air made him frothy, light, and vain, + And puffed him with a proud disdain. + Into the Water oft he went, + And through the Water many sent + That was, ye know, his element! + The greatest odds that did appear + Was this, for aught that I can hear, + That he in cold did others dip, + But did himself hot water sip. + + "And his cause he'd never doubt, + If well soak'd o'er night in Stout; + But, meanwhile, he must not lack + Brandy and a draught of Sack. + One dispute would shrink a bottle + Of three pints, if not a pottle. + One would think he fetched from thence + All his dreamy eloquence. + + "Let us now bring back the Sot + To his Aqua Vita pot, + And observe, with some content, + How he framed his argument. + That his whistle he might wet, + The bottle to his mouth he set, + And, being Master of that Art, + Thence he drew the Major part, + But left the Minor still behind; + Good reason why, he wanted wind; + If his breath would have held out, + He had Conclusion drawn, no doubt." +</pre> + <p> + The residue of Ellwood's life seems to have glided on in serenity and + peace. He wrote, at intervals, many pamphlets in defence of his Society, + and in favor of Liberty of Conscience. At his hospitable residence, the + leading spirits of the sect were warmly welcomed. George Fox and William + Penn seem to have been frequent guests. We find that, in 1683, he was + arrested for seditious publications, when on the eve of hastening to his + early friend, Gulielma, who, in the absence of her husband, Governor Penn, + had fallen dangerously ill. On coming before the judge, "I told him," says + Ellwood, "that I had that morning received an express out of Sussex, that + William Penn's wife (with whom I had an intimate acquaintance and strict + friendship, <i>ab ipsis fere incunabilis</i>, at least, <i>a teneris + unguiculis</i>) lay now ill, not without great danger, and that she had + expressed her desire that I would come to her as soon as I could." The + judge said "he was very sorry for Madam Penn's illness," of whose virtues + he spoke very highly, but not more than was her due. Then he told me, + "that, for her sake, he would do what he could to further my visit to + her." Escaping from the hands of the law, he visited his friend, who was + by this time in a way of recovery, and, on his return, learned that the + prosecution had been abandoned. + </p> + <p> + At about this date his narrative ceases. We learn, from other sources, + that he continued to write and print in defence of his religious views up + to the year of his death, which took place in 1713. One of his + productions, a poetical version of the Life of David, may be still met + with, in the old Quaker libraries. On the score of poetical merit, it is + about on a level with Michael Drayton's verses on the same subject. As the + history of one of the firm confessors of the old struggle for religious + freedom, of a genial-hearted and pleasant scholar, the friend of Penn and + Milton, and the suggester of Paradise Regained, we trust our hurried + sketch has not been altogether without interest; and that, whatever may be + the religious views of our readers, they have not failed to recognize a + good and true man in Thomas Ellwood. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0003" id="link2H_4_0003"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + JAMES NAYLER. + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "You will here read the true story of that much injured, ridiculed + man, James Nayler; what dreadful sufferings, with what patience he + endured, even to the boring of the tongue with hot irons, without a + murmur; and with what strength of mind, when the delusion he had + fallen into, which they stigmatized as blasphemy, had given place to + clearer thoughts, he could renounce his error in a strain of the + beautifullest humility."—Essays of Elia. +</pre> + <p> + "Would that Carlyle could now try his hand at the English Revolution!" was + our exclamation, on laying down the last volume of his remarkable History + of the French Revolution with its brilliant and startling word- pictures + still flashing before us. To some extent this wish has been realized in + the Letters and Speeches of Oliver Cromwell. Yet we confess that the + perusal of these volumes has disappointed us. Instead of giving himself + free scope, as in his French Revolution, and transferring to his canvas + all the wild and ludicrous, the terrible and beautiful phases of that + moral phenomenon, he has here concentrated all his artistic skill upon a + single figure, whom he seems to have regarded as the embodiment and hero + of the great event. All else on his canvas is subordinated to the grim + image of the colossal Puritan. Intent upon presenting him as the fitting + object of that "hero-worship," which, in its blind admiration and + adoration of mere abstract Power, seems to us at times nothing less than + devil-worship, he dwarfs, casts into the shadow, nay, in some instances + caricatures and distorts, the figures which surround him. To excuse + Cromwell in his usurpation, Henry Vane, one of those exalted and noble + characters, upon whose features the lights held by historical friends or + foes detect no blemish, is dismissed with a sneer and an utterly unfounded + imputation of dishonesty. To reconcile, in some degree, the discrepancy + between the declarations of Cromwell, in behalf of freedom of conscience, + and that mean and cruel persecution which the Quakers suffered under the + Protectorate, the generally harmless fanaticism of a few individuals + bearing that name is gravely urged. Nay, the fact that some weak-brained + enthusiasts undertook to bring about the millennium, by associating + together, cultivating the earth, and "dibbling beans" for the New + Jerusalem market, is regarded by our author as the "germ of Quakerism;" + and furnishes an occasion for sneering at "my poor friend Dryasdust, + lamentably tearing his hair over the intolerance of that old time to + Quakerism and such like." + </p> + <p> + The readers of this (with all its faults) powerfully written Biography + cannot fail to have been impressed with the intensely graphic description + (Part I., vol. ii., pp. 184, 185) of the entry of the poor fanatic, James + Nayler, and his forlorn and draggled companions into Bristol. Sadly + ludicrous is it; affecting us like the actual sight of tragic insanity + enacting its involuntary comedy, and making us smile through our tears. + </p> + <p> + In another portion of the work, a brief account is given of the trial and + sentence of Nayler, also in the serio-comic view; and the poor man is + dismissed with the simple intimation, that after his punishment he + "repented, and confessed himself mad." It was no part of the author's + business, we are well aware, to waste time and words upon the history of + such a man as Nayler; he was of no importance to him, otherwise than as + one of the disturbing influences in the government of the Lord Protector. + But in our mind the story of James Nayler has always been one of interest; + and in the belief that it will prove so to others, who, like Charles Lamb, + can appreciate the beautiful humility of a forgiven spirit, we have taken + some pains to collect and embody the facts of it. + </p> + <p> + James Nayler was born in the parish of Ardesley, in Yorkshire, 1616. His + father was a substantial farmer, of good repute and competent estate and + be, in consequence, received a good education: At the age of twenty-two, + he married and removed to Wakefield parish, which has since been made + classic ground by the pen of Goldsmith. Here, an honest, God-fearing + farmer, he tilled his soil, and alternated between cattle-markets and + Independent conventicles. In 1641, he obeyed the summons of "my Lord + Fairfax" and the Parliament, and joined a troop of horse composed of + sturdy Independents, doing such signal service against "the man of Belial, + Charles Stuart," that he was promoted to the rank of quartermaster, in + which capacity he served under General Lambert, in his Scottish campaign. + Disabled at length by sickness, he was honorably dismissed from the + service, and returned to his family in 1649. + </p> + <p> + For three or four years, he continued to attend the meetings of the + Independents, as a zealous and devout member. But it so fell out, that in + the winter of 1651, George Fox, who had just been released from a cruel + imprisonment in Derby jail, felt a call to set his face towards Yorkshire. + "So travelling," says Fox, in his Journal, "through the countries, to + several places, preaching Repentance and the Word of Life, I came into the + parts about Wakefield, where James Navler lived." The worn and weary + soldier, covered with the scars of outward battle, received, as he + believed, in the cause of God and his people, against Antichrist and + oppression, welcomed with thankfulness the veteran of another warfare; + who, in conflict with a principalities and powers, and spiritual + wickedness in high places, had made his name a familiar one in every + English hamlet. "He and Thomas Goodyear," says Fox, "came to me, and were + both convinced, and received the truth." He soon after joined the Society + of Friends. In the spring of the next year he was in his field following + his plough, and meditating, as he was wont, on the great questions of life + and duty, when he seemed to hear a voice bidding him go out from his + kindred and his father's house, with an assurance that the Lord would be + with him, while laboring in his service. Deeply impressed, he left his + employment, and, returning to his house, made immediate preparations for a + journey. But hesitation and doubt followed; he became sick from anxiety of + mind, and his recovery, for a time, was exceedingly doubtful. On his + restoration to bodily health, he obeyed what he regarded as a clear + intimation of duty, and went forth a preacher of the doctrines he had + embraced. The Independent minister of the society to which he had formerly + belonged sent after him the story that he was the victim of sorcery; that + George Fox carried with him a bottle, out of which he made people drink; + and that the draught had the power to change a Presbyterian or Independent + into a Quaker at once; that, in short, the Arch-Quaker, Fox, was a wizard, + and could be seen at the same moment of time riding on the same black + horse, in two places widely separated. He had scarcely commenced his + exhortations, before the mob, excited by such stories, assailed him. In + the early summer of the year we hear of him in Appleby jail. On his + release, he fell in company with George Fox. At Walney Island, he was + furiously assaulted, and beaten with clubs and stones; the poor priest-led + fishermen being fully persuaded that they were dealing with a wizard. The + spirit of the man, under these circumstances, may be seen in the following + extract from a letter to his friends, dated at "Killet, in Lancashire, the + 30th of 8th Month, 1652:"— + </p> + <p> + "Dear friends! Dwell in patience, and wait upon the Lord, who will do his + own work. Look not at man who is in the work, nor at any man opposing it; + but rest in the will of the Lord, that so ye may be furnished with + patience, both to do and to suffer what ye shall be called unto, that your + end in all things may be His praise. Meet often together; take heed of + what exalteth itself above its brother; but keep low, and serve one + another in love." + </p> + <p> + Laboring thus, interrupted only by persecution, stripes, and imprisonment, + he finally came to London, and spoke with great power and eloquence in the + meetings of Friends in that city. Here he for the first time found himself + surrounded by admiring and sympathizing friends. He saw and rejoiced in + the fruits of his ministry. Profane and drunken cavaliers, intolerant + Presbyters, and blind Papists, owned the truths which he uttered, and + counted themselves his disciples. Women, too, in their deep trustfulness + and admiring reverence, sat at the feet of the eloquent stranger. Devout + believers in the doctrine of the inward light and manifestation of God in + the heart of man, these latter, at length, thought they saw such + unmistakable evidences of the true life in James Nayler, that they felt + constrained to declare that Christ was, in an especial manner, within him, + and to call upon all to recognize in reverent adoration this new + incarnation of the divine and heavenly. The wild enthusiasm of his + disciples had its effect on the teacher. Weak in body, worn with sickness, + fasting, stripes, and prison-penance, and naturally credulous and + imaginative, is it strange that in some measure he yielded to this + miserable delusion? Let those who would harshly judge him, or ascribe his + fall to the peculiar doctrines of his sect, think of Luther, engaged in + personal combat with the Devil, or conversing with him on points of + theology in his bed-chamber; or of Bunyan at actual fisticuffs with the + adversary; or of Fleetwood and Vane and Harrison millennium-mad, and + making preparations for an earthly reign of King Jesus. It was an age of + intense religious excitement. Fanaticism had become epidemic. Cromwell + swayed his Parliaments by "revelations" and Scripture phrases in the + painted chamber; stout generals and sea-captains exterminated the Irish, + and swept Dutch navies from the ocean, with old Jewish war-cries, and + hymns of Deborah and Miriam; country justices charged juries in Hebraisms, + and cited the laws of Palestine oftener than those of England. Poor Nayler + found himself in the very midst of this seething and confused moral + maelstrom. He struggled against it for a time, but human nature was weak; + he became, to use his own words, "bewildered and darkened," and the floods + went over him. + </p> + <p> + Leaving London with some of his more zealous followers, not without solemn + admonition and rebuke from Francis Howgill and Edward Burrough, who at + that period were regarded as the most eminent and gifted of the Society's + ministers, he bent his steps towards Exeter. Here, in consequence of the + extravagance of his language and that of his disciples, he was arrested + and thrown into prison. Several infatuated women surrounded the jail, + declaring that "Christ was in prison," and on being admitted to see him, + knelt down and kissed his feet, exclaiming, "Thy name shall be no more + called James Nayler, but Jesus!" Let us pity him and them. They, full of + grateful and extravagant affection for the man whose voice had called them + away from worldly vanities to what they regarded as eternal realities, + whose hand they imagined had for them swung back the pearl gates of the + celestial city, and flooded their atmosphere with light from heaven; he, + receiving their homage (not as offered to a poor, weak, sinful Yorkshire + trooper, but rather to the hidden man of the heart, the "Christ within" + him) with that self- deceiving humility which is but another name for + spiritual pride. Mournful, yet natural; such as is still in greater or + less degree manifested between the Catholic enthusiast and her confessor; + such as the careful observer may at times take note of in our Protestant + revivals and camp meetings. + </p> + <p> + How Nayler was released from Exeter jail does not appear, but the next we + hear of him is at Bristol, in the fall of the year. His entrance into that + city shows the progress which he and his followers had made in the + interval. Let us look at Carlyle's description of it: "A procession of + eight persons one, a man on horseback riding single, the others, men and + women partly riding double, partly on foot, in the muddiest highway in the + wettest weather; singing, all but the single rider, at whose bridle walk + and splash two women, 'Hosannah! Holy, holy! Lord God of Sabaoth,' and + other things, 'in a buzzing tone,' which the impartial hearer could not + make out. The single rider is a raw-boned male figure, 'with lank hair + reaching below his cheeks,' hat drawn close over his brows, 'nose rising + slightly in the middle,' of abstruse 'down look,' and large dangerous jaws + strictly closed: he sings not, sits there covered, and is sung to by the + others bare. Amid pouring deluges and mud knee-deep, 'so that the rain ran + in at their necks and vented it at their hose and breeches: 'a spectacle + to the West of England and posterity! Singing as above; answering no + question except in song. From Bedminster to Ratcliffgate, along the + streets to the High Cross of Bristol: at the High Cross they are laid hold + of by the authorities: turn out to be James Nayler and Company." + </p> + <p> + Truly, a more pitiful example of "hero-worship" is not well to be + conceived of. Instead of taking the rational view of it, however, and + mercifully shutting up the actors in a mad-house, the authorities of that + day, conceiving it to be a stupendous blasphemy, and themselves God's + avengers in the matter, sent Nayler under strong guard up to London, to be + examined before the Parliament. After long and tedious examinations and + cross-questionings, and still more tedious debates, some portion of which, + not uninstructive to the reader, may still be found in Burton's Diary, the + following horrible resolution was agreed upon:— + </p> + <p> + "That James Nayler be set in the pillory, with his head in the pillory in + the Palace Yard, Westminster, during the space of two hours on Thursday + next; and be whipped by the hangman through the streets from Westminster + to the Old Exchange, and there, likewise, be set in the pillory, with his + head in the pillory for the space of two hours, between eleven and one, on + Saturday next, in each place wearing a paper containing a description of + his crimes; and that at the Old Exchange his tongue be bored through with + a hot iron, and that he be there stigmatized on the forehead with the + letter 'B;' and that he be afterwards sent to Bristol, to be conveyed into + and through the said city on horseback with his face backward, and there, + also, publicly whipped the next market-day after he comes thither; that + from thence he be committed to prison in Bridewell, London, and there + restrained from the society of people, and there to labor hard until he + shall be released by Parliament; and during that time be debarred the use + of pen, ink, and paper, and have no relief except what he earns by his + daily labor." + </p> + <p> + Such, neither more nor less, was, in the opinion of Parliament, required + on their part to appease the divine vengeance. The sentence was pronounced + on the 17th of the twelfth month; the entire time of the Parliament for + the two months previous having been occupied with the case. The + Presbyterians in that body were ready enough to make the most of an + offence committed by one who had been an Independent; the Independents, to + escape the stigma of extenuating the crimes of one of their quondam + brethren, vied with their antagonists in shrieking over the atrocity of + Nayler's blasphemy, and in urging its severe punishment. Here and there + among both classes were men disposed to leniency, and more than one + earnest plea was made for merciful dealing with a man whose reason was + evidently unsettled, and who was, therefore, a fitting object of + compassion; whose crime, if it could indeed be called one, was evidently + the result of a clouded intellect, and not of wilful intention of evil. On + the other hand, many were in favor of putting him to death as a sort of + peace-offering to the clergy, who, as a matter of course, were greatly + scandalized by Nayler's blasphemy, and still more by the refusal of his + sect to pay tithes, or recognize their divine commission. + </p> + <p> + Nayler was called into the Parliament-house to receive his sentence. "I do + not know mine offence," he said mildly. "You shall know it," said Sir + Thomas Widrington, "by your sentence." When the sentence was read, he + attempted to speak, but was silenced. "I pray God," said Nayler, "that he + may not lay this to your charge." + </p> + <p> + The next day, the 18th of the twelfth month, he stood in the pillory two + hours, in the chill winter air, and was then stripped and scourged by the + hangman at the tail of a cart through the streets. Three hundred and ten + stripes were inflicted; his back and arms were horribly cut and mangled, + and his feet crushed and bruised by the feet of horses treading on him in + the crowd. He bore all with uncomplaining patience; but was so far + exhausted by his sufferings, that it was found necessary to postpone the + execution of the residue of the sentence for one week. The terrible + severity of his sentence, and his meek endurance of it, had in the mean + time powerfully affected many of the humane and generous of all classes in + the city; and a petition for the remission of the remaining part of the + penalty was numerously signed and presented to Parliament. A debate ensued + upon it, but its prayer was rejected. Application was then made to + Cromwell, who addressed a letter to the Speaker of the House, inquiring + into the affair, protesting an "abhorrence and detestation of giving or + occasioning the least countenance to such opinions and practices" as were + imputed to Nayler; "yet we, being intrusted in the present government on + behalf of the people of these nations, and not knowing how far such + proceeding entered into wholly without us may extend in the consequence of + it, do hereby desire the House may let us know the grounds and reasons + whereon they have proceeded." From this, it is not unlikely that the + Protector might have been disposed to clemency, and to look with a degree + of charity upon the weakness and errors of one of his old and tried + soldiers who had striven like a brave man, as he was, for the rights and + liberties of Englishmen; but the clergy here interposed, and vehemently, + in the name of God and His Church, demanded that the executioner should + finish his work. Five of the most eminent of them, names well known in the + Protectorate, Caryl, Manton, Nye, Griffith, and Reynolds, were deputed by + Parliament to visit the mangled prisoner. A reasonable request was made, + that some impartial person might be present, that justice might be done + Nayler in the report of his answers. This was refused. It was, however, + agreed that the conversation should be written down and a copy of it left + with the jailer. He was asked if he was sorry for his blasphemies. He said + he did not know to what blasphemies they alluded; that he did believe in + Jesus Christ; that He had taken up His dwelling in his own heart, and for + the testimony of Him he now suffered. "I believe," said one of the + ministers, "in a Christ who was never in any man's heart." "I know no such + Christ," rejoined the prisoner; "the Christ I witness to fills Heaven and + Earth, and dwells in the hearts of all true believers." On being asked why + he allowed the women to adore and worship him, he said he "denied bowing + to the creature; but if they beheld the power of Christ, wherever it was, + and bowed to it, he could not resist it, or say aught against it." + </p> + <p> + After some further parley, the reverend visitors grew angry, threw the + written record of the conversation in the fire, and left the prison, to + report the prisoner incorrigible. + </p> + <p> + On the 27th of the month, he was again led out of his cell and placed upon + the pillory. Thousands of citizens were gathered around, many of them + earnestly protesting against the extreme cruelty of his punishment. Robert + Rich, an influential and honorable merchant, followed him up to the + pillory with expressions of great sympathy, and held him by the hand while + the red-hot iron was pressed through his tongue and the brand was placed + on his forehead. He was next sent to Bristol, and publicly whipped through + the principal streets of that city; and again brought back to the + Bridewell prison, where he remained about two years, shut out from all + intercourse with his fellow-beings. At the expiration of this period, he + was released by order of Parliament. In the solitude of his cell, the + angel of patience had been with him. + </p> + <p> + Through the cloud which had so long rested over him, the clear light of + truth shone in upon his spirit; the weltering chaos of a disordered + intellect settled into the calm peace of a reconciliation with God and + man. His first act on leaving prison was to visit Bristol, the scene of + his melancholy fall. There he publicly confessed his errors, in the + eloquent earnestness of a contrite spirit, humbled in view of the past, + yet full of thanksgiving and praise for the great boon of forgiveness. A + writer who was present says, the "assembly was tendered, and broken into + tears; there were few dry eyes, and many were bowed in their minds." + </p> + <p> + In a paper which he published soon after, he acknowledges his lamentable + delusion. "Condemned forever," he says, "be all those false worships with + which any have idolized my person in that Night of my Temptation, when the + Power of Darkness was above rue; all that did in any way tend to dishonor + the Lord, or draw the minds of any from the measure of Christ Jesus in + themselves, to look at flesh, which is as grass, or to ascribe that to the + visible which belongs to Him. Darkness came over me through want of + watchfulness and obedience to the pure Eye of God. I was taken captive + from the true light; I was walking in the Night, as a wandering bird fit + for a prey. And if the Lord of all my mercies had not rescued me, I had + perished; for I was as one appointed to death and destruction, and there + was none to deliver me." + </p> + <p> + "It is in my heart to confess to God, and before men, my folly and offence + in that day; yet there were many things formed against me in that day, to + take away my life and bring scandal upon the truth, of which I was not + guilty at all." "The provocation of that Time of Temptation was exceeding + great against the Lord, yet He left me not; for when Darkness was above, + and the Adversary so prevailed that all things were turned and perverted + against my right seeing, hearing, or understanding, only a secret hope and + faith I had in my God, whom I had served, that He would bring me through + it and to the end of it, and that I should again see the day of my + redemption from under it all,—this quieted my soul in its greatest + tribulation." He concludes his confession with these words: "He who hath + saved my soul from death, who hath lifted my feet up out of the pit, even + to Him be glory forever; and let every troubled soul trust in Him, for his + mercy endureth forever!" + </p> + <p> + Among his papers, written soon after his release, is a remarkable prayer, + or rather thanksgiving. The limit I have prescribed to myself will only + allow me to copy an extract:— + </p> + <p> + "It is in my heart to praise Thee, O my God! Let me never forget Thee, + what Thou hast been to me in the night, by Thy presence in my hour of + trial, when I was beset in darkness, when I was cast out as a wandering + bird; when I was assaulted with strong temptations, then Thy presence, in + secret, did preserve me, and in a low state I felt Thee near me; when my + way was through the sea, when I passed under the mountains, there wast + Thou present with me; when the weight of the hills was upon me, Thou + upheldest me. Thou didst fight, on my part, when I wrestled with death; + when darkness would have shut me up, Thy light shone about me; when my + work was in the furnace, and I passed through the fire, by Thee I was not + consumed; when I beheld the dreadful visions, and was among the fiery + spirits, Thy faith staid me, else through fear I had fallen. I saw Thee, + and believed, so that the enemy could not prevail." After speaking of his + humiliation and sufferings, which Divine Mercy had overruled for his + spiritual good, he thus concludes: "Thou didst lift me out from the pit, + and set me forth in the sight of my enemies; Thou proclaimedst liberty to + the captive; Thou calledst my acquaintances near me; they to whom I had + been a wonder looked upon me; and in Thy love I obtained favor with those + who had deserted me. Then did gladness swallow up sorrow, and I forsook my + troubles; and I said, How good is it that man be proved in the night, that + he may know his folly, that every mouth may become silent, until Thou + makest man known unto himself, and has slain the boaster, and shown him + the vanity which vexeth Thy spirit." + </p> + <p> + All honor to the Quakers of that day, that, at the risk of + misrepresentation and calumny, they received back to their communion their + greatly erring, but deeply repentant, brother. His life, ever after, was + one of self-denial and jealous watchfulness over himself,— blameless + and beautiful in its humility and lowly charity. + </p> + <p> + Thomas Ellwood, in his autobiography for the year 1659, mentions Nayler, + whom he met in company with Edward Burrough at the house of Milton's + friend, Pennington. Ellwood's father held a discourse with the two Quakers + on their doctrine of free and universal grace. "James Nailer," says + Ellwood, "handled the subject with so much perspicuity and clear + demonstration, that his reasoning seemed to be irresistible. As for Edward + Burrough, he was a brisk young Man, of a ready Tongue, and might have been + for aught I then knew, a Scholar, which made me less admire his Way of + Reasoning. But what dropt from James Nailer had the greater Force upon me, + because he lookt like a simple Countryman, having the appearance of an + Husbandman or Shepherd." + </p> + <p> + In the latter part of the eighth month, 1660, he left London on foot, to + visit his wife and children in Wakefield. As he journeyed on, the sense of + a solemn change about to take place seemed with him; the shadow of the + eternal world fell over him. As he passed through Huntingdon, a friend who + saw him describes him as "in an awful and weighty frame of mind, as if he + had been redeemed from earth, and a stranger on it, seeking a better home + and inheritance." A few miles beyond the town, he was found, in the dusk + of the evening, very ill, and was taken to the house of a friend, who + lived not far distant. He died shortly after, expressing his gratitude for + the kindness of his attendants, and invoking blessings upon them. About + two hours before his death, he spoke to the friend at his bedside these + remarkable words, solemn as eternity, and beautiful as the love which + fills it:— + </p> + <p> + "There is a spirit which I feel which delights to do no evil, nor to + avenge any wrong; but delights to endure all things, in hope to enjoy its + own in the end; its hope is to outlive all wrath and contention, and to + weary out all exultation and cruelty, or whatever is of a nature contrary + to itself. It sees to the end of all temptations; as it bears no evil in + itself, so it conceives none in thought to any other: if it be betrayed, + it bears it, for its ground and spring is the mercy and forgiveness of + God. Its crown is meekness; its life is everlasting love unfeigned; it + takes its kingdom with entreaty, and not with contention, and keeps it by + lowliness of mind. In God alone it can rejoice, though none else regard + it, or can own its life. It is conceived in sorrow, and brought forth with + none to pity it; nor doth it murmur at grief and oppression. It never + rejoiceth but through sufferings, for with the world's joy it is murdered. + I found it alone, being forsaken. I have fellowship therein with them who + lived in dens and desolate places of the earth, who through death obtained + resurrection and eternal Holy Life." + </p> + <p> + So died James Nayler. He was buried in "Thomas Parnell's burying-ground, + at King's Rippon," in a green nook of rural England. Wrong and violence, + and temptation and sorrow, and evil-speaking, could reach him no more. And + in taking leave of him, let us say, with old Joseph Wyeth, where he + touches upon this case in his <i>Anguis Flagellatus</i>: "Let none insult, + but take heed lest they also, in the hour of their temptation, do fall + away." + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0004" id="link2H_4_0004"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + ANDREW MARVELL + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "They who with a good conscience and an upright heart do their civil + duties in the sight of God, and in their several places, to resist + tyranny and the violence of superstition banded both against them, + will never seek to be forgiven that which may justly be attributed + to their immortal praise."—Answer to Eikon Basilike. +</pre> + <p> + Among, the great names which adorned the Protectorate,—that period + of intense mental activity, when political and religious rights and duties + were thoroughly discussed by strong and earnest statesmen and theologians,—that + of Andrew Marvell, the friend of Milton, and Latin Secretary of Cromwell, + deserves honorable mention. The magnificent prose of Milton, long + neglected, is now perhaps as frequently read as his great epic; but the + writings of his friend and fellow secretary, devoted like his own to the + cause of freedom and the rights of the people, are scarcely known to the + present generation. It is true that Marvell's political pamphlets were + less elaborate and profound than those of the author of the glorious <i>Defence + of Unlicensed Printing</i>. He was light, playful, witty, and sarcastic; + he lacked the stern dignity, the terrible invective, the bitter scorn, the + crushing, annihilating retort, the grand and solemn eloquence, and the + devout appeals, which render immortal the controversial works of Milton. + But he, too, has left his foot-prints on his age; he, too, has written for + posterity that which they "will not willingly let die." As one of the + inflexible defenders of English liberty, sowers of the seed, the fruits of + which we are now reaping, he has a higher claim on the kind regards of + this generation than his merits as a poet, by no means inconsiderable, + would warrant. + </p> + <p> + Andrew Marvell was born in Kingston-upon-Hull, in 1620. At the age of + eighteen he entered Trinity College, whence he was enticed by the Jesuits, + then actively seeking proselytes. After remaining with them a short time, + his father found him, and brought him back to his studies. On leaving + college, he travelled on the Continent. At Rome he wrote his first satire, + a humorous critique upon Richard Flecknoe, an English Jesuit and verse + writer, whose lines on Silence Charles Lamb quotes in one of his Essays. + It is supposed that he made his first acquaintance with Milton in Italy. + </p> + <p> + At Paris he made the Abbot de Manihan the subject of another satire. The + Abbot pretended to skill in the arts of magic, and used to prognosticate + the fortunes of people from the character of their handwriting. At what + period he returned from his travels we are not aware. It is stated, by + some of his biographers, that he was sent as secretary of a Turkish + mission. In 1653, he was appointed the tutor of Cromwell's nephew; and, + four years after, doubtless through the instrumentality of his friend + Milton, he received the honorable appointment of Latin Secretary of the + Commonwealth. In 1658, he was selected by his townsmen of Hull to + represent them in Parliament. In this service he continued until 1663, + when, notwithstanding his sturdy republican principles, he was appointed + secretary to the Russian embassy. On his return, in 1665, he was again + elected to Parliament, and continued in the public service until the + prorogation of the Parliament of 1675. + </p> + <p> + The boldness, the uncompromising integrity and irreproachable consistency + of Marvell, as a statesman, have secured for him the honorable appellation + of "the British Aristides." Unlike too many of his old associates under + the Protectorate, he did not change with the times. He was a republican in + Cromwell's day, and neither threats of assassination, nor flatteries, nor + proffered bribes, could make him anything else in that of Charles II. He + advocated the rights of the people at a time when patriotism was regarded + as ridiculous folly; when a general corruption, spreading downwards from a + lewd and abominable Court, had made legislation a mere scramble for place + and emolument. English history presents no period so disgraceful as the + Restoration. To use the words of Macaulay, it was "a day of servitude + without loyalty and sensuality without love, of dwarfish talents and + gigantic vices, the paradise of cold hearts and narrow minds, the golden + age of the coward, the bigot, and the slave. The principles of liberty + were the scoff of every grinning courtier, and the Anathema Maranatha of + every fawning dean." It is the peculiar merit of Milton and Marvell, that + in such an age they held fast their integrity, standing up in glorious + contrast with clerical apostates and traitors to the cause of England's + liberty. + </p> + <p> + In the discharge of his duties as a statesman Marvell was as punctual and + conscientious as our own venerable Apostle of Freedom, John Quincy Adams. + He corresponded every post with his constituents, keeping them fully + apprised of all that transpired at Court or in Parliament. He spoke but + seldom, but his great personal influence was exerted privately upon the + members of the Commons as well as upon the Peers. His wit, accomplished + manners, and literary eminence made him a favorite at the Court itself. + The voluptuous and careless monarch laughed over the biting satire of the + republican poet, and heartily enjoyed his lively conversation. It is said + that numerous advances were made to him by the courtiers of Charles II., + but he was found to be incorruptible. The personal compliments of the + King, the encomiums of Rochester, the smiles and flatteries of the frail + but fair and high-born ladies of the Court; nay, even the golden offers of + the King's treasurer, who, climbing with difficulty to his obscure retreat + on an upper floor of a court in the Strand, laid a tempting bribe of + L1,000 before him, on the very day when he had been compelled to borrow a + guinea, were all lost upon the inflexible patriot. He stood up manfully, + in an age of persecution, for religious liberty, opposed the oppressive + excise, and demanded frequent Parliaments and a fair representation of the + people. + </p> + <p> + In 1672, Marvell engaged in a controversy with the famous High-Churchman, + Dr. Parker, who had taken the lead in urging the persecution of Non- + conformists. In one of the works of this arrogant divine, he says that "it + is absolutely necessary to the peace and government of the world that the + supreme magistrate should be vested with power to govern and conduct the + consciences of subjects in affairs of religion. Princes may with less + hazard give liberty to men's vices and debaucheries than to their + consciences." And, speaking of the various sects of Non-conformists, he + counsels princes and legislators that "tenderness and indulgence to such + men is to nourish vipers in their own bowels, and the most sottish neglect + of our quiet and security." Marvell replied to him in a severely satirical + pamphlet, which provoked a reply from the Doctor. Marvell rejoined, with a + rare combination of wit and argument. The effect of his sarcasm on the + Doctor and his supporters may be inferred from an anonymous note sent him, + in which the writer threatens by the eternal God to cut his throat, if he + uttered any more libels upon Dr. Parker. Bishop Burnet remarks that + "Marvell writ in a burlesque strain, but with so peculiar and so + entertaining a conduct 'that from the King down to the tradesman his books + were read with great pleasure, and not only humbled Parker, but his whole + party, for Marvell had all the wits on his side.'" The Bishop further + remarks that Marvell's satire "gave occasion to the only piece of modesty + with which Dr. Parker was ever charged, namely, of withdrawing from town, + and not importuning the press for some years, since even a face of brass + must grow red when it is burnt as his has been." + </p> + <p> + Dean Swift, in commenting upon the usual fate of controversial pamphlets, + which seldom live beyond their generation, says: "There is indeed an + exception, when a great genius undertakes to expose a foolish piece; so we + still read Marvell's answer to Parker with pleasure, though the book it + answers be sunk long ago." + </p> + <p> + Perhaps, in the entire compass of our language, there is not to be found a + finer piece of satirical writing than Marvell's famous parody of the + speeches of Charles II., in which the private vices and public + inconsistencies of the King, and his gross violations of his pledges on + coming to the throne, are exposed with the keenest wit and the most + laugh-provoking irony. Charles himself, although doubtless annoyed by it, + could not refrain from joining in the mirth which it excited at his + expense. + </p> + <p> + The friendship between Marvell and Milton remained firm and unbroken to + the last. The former exerted himself to save his illustrious friend from + persecution, and omitted no opportunity to defend him as a politician and + to eulogize him as a poet. In 1654 he presented to Cromwell Milton's noble + tract in <i>Defence of the People of England</i>, and, in writing to the + author, says of the work, "When I consider how equally it teems and rises + with so many figures, it seems to me a Trajan's column, in whose winding + ascent we see embossed the several monuments of your learned victories." + He was one of the first to appreciate <i>Paradise Lost</i>, and to commend + it in some admirable lines. One couplet is exceedingly beautiful, in its + reference to the author's blindness:— + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "Just Heaven, thee like Tiresias to requite, + Rewards with prophecy thy loss of sight." +</pre> + <p> + His poems, written in the "snatched leisure" of an active political life, + bear marks of haste, and are very unequal. In the midst of passages of + pastoral description worthy of Milton himself, feeble lines and hackneyed + phrases occur. His <i>Nymph lamenting the Death of her Fawn</i> is a + finished and elaborate piece, full of grace and tenderness. <i>Thoughts in + a Garden</i> will be remembered by the quotations of that exquisite + critic, Charles Lamb. How pleasant is this picture! + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "What wondrous life is this I lead! + Ripe apples drop about my head; + The luscious clusters of the vine + Upon my mouth do crush their wine; + The nectarine and curious peach + Into my hands themselves do reach; + Stumbling on melons as I pass, + Ensnared with flowers, I fall on grass. + + "Here at this fountain's sliding foot, + Or at the fruit-tree's mossy root, + Casting the body's vest aside, + My soul into the boughs does glide. + There like a bird it sits and sings, + And whets and claps its silver wings; + And, till prepared for longer flight, + Waves in its plumes the various light. + + "How well the skilful gard'ner drew + Of flowers and herbs this dial true! + Where, from above, the milder sun + Does through a fragrant zodiac run; + And, as it works, the industrious bee + Computes his time as well as we. + How could such sweet and wholesome hours + Be reckoned but with herbs and flowers!" +</pre> + <p> + One of his longer poems, <i>Appleton House</i>, contains passages of + admirable description, and many not unpleasing conceits. Witness the + following:— + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "Thus I, an easy philosopher, + Among the birds and trees confer, + And little now to make me wants, + Or of the fowl or of the plants. + Give me but wings, as they, and I + Straight floating on the air shall fly; + Or turn me but, and you shall see + I am but an inverted tree. + Already I begin to call + In their most learned original; + And, where I language want, my signs + The bird upon the bough divines. + No leaf does tremble in the wind, + Which I returning cannot find. + Out of these scattered Sibyl's leaves, + Strange prophecies my fancy weaves: + What Rome, Greece, Palestine, e'er said, + I in this light Mosaic read. + Under this antic cope I move, + Like some great prelate of the grove; + Then, languishing at ease, I toss + On pallets thick with velvet moss; + While the wind, cooling through the boughs, + Flatters with air my panting brows. + Thanks for my rest, ye mossy banks! + And unto you, cool zephyrs, thanks! + Who, as my hair, my thoughts too shed, + And winnow from the chaff my head. + How safe, methinks, and strong behind + These trees have I encamped my mind!" +</pre> + <p> + Here is a picture of a piscatorial idler and his trout stream, worthy of + the pencil of Izaak Walton:— + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "See in what wanton harmless folds + It everywhere the meadow holds: + Where all things gaze themselves, and doubt + If they be in it or without; + And for this shade, which therein shines + Narcissus-like, the sun too pines. + Oh! what a pleasure 't is to hedge + My temples here in heavy sedge; + Abandoning my lazy side, + Stretched as a bank unto the tide; + Or, to suspend my sliding foot + On the osier's undermining root, + And in its branches tough to hang, + While at my lines the fishes twang." +</pre> + <p> + A little poem of Marvell's, which he calls Eyes and Tears, has the + following passages:— + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "How wisely Nature did agree + With the same eyes to weep and see! + That having viewed the object vain, + They might be ready to complain. + And, since the self-deluding sight + In a false angle takes each height, + These tears, which better measure all, + Like watery lines and plummets fall." + + "Happy are they whom grief doth bless, + That weep the more, and see the less; + And, to preserve their sight more true, + Bathe still their eyes in their own dew; + So Magdalen, in tears more wise, + Dissolved those captivating eyes, + Whose liquid chains could, flowing, meet + To fetter her Redeemer's feet. + The sparkling glance, that shoots desire, + Drenched in those tears, does lose its fire; + Yea, oft the Thunderer pity takes, + And there his hissing lightning slakes. + The incense is to Heaven dear, + Not as a perfume, but a tear; + And stars shine lovely in the night, + But as they seem the tears of light. + Ope, then, mine eyes, your double sluice, + And practise so your noblest use; + For others, too, can see or sleep, + But only human eyes can weep." +</pre> + <p> + The Bermuda Emigrants has some happy lines, as the following:— + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "He hangs in shade the orange bright, + Like golden lamps in a green night." +</pre> + <p> + Or this, which doubtless suggested a couplet in Moore's <i>Canadian Boat + Song</i>:— + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "And all the way, to guide the chime, + With falling oars they kept the time." +</pre> + <p> + His facetious and burlesque poetry was much admired in his day; but a + great portion of it referred to persons and events no longer of general + interest. The satire on Holland is an exception. There is nothing in its + way superior to it in our language. Many of his best pieces were + originally written in Latin, and afterwards translated by himself. There + is a splendid Ode to Cromwell—a worthy companion of Milton's + glorious sonnet—which is not generally known, and which we transfer + entire to our pages. Its simple dignity and the melodious flow of its + versification commend themselves more to our feelings than its eulogy of + war. It is energetic and impassioned, and probably affords a better idea + of the author, as an actor in the stirring drama of his time, than the + "soft Lydian airs" of the poems that we have quoted. + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + AN HORATIAN ODE UPON CROMWELL'S RETURN FROM IRELAND. + + The forward youth that would appear + Must now forsake his Muses dear; + Nor in the shadows sing + His numbers languishing. + + 'T is time to leave the books in dust, + And oil the unused armor's rust; + Removing from the wall + The corslet of the hall. + + So restless Cromwell could not cease + In the inglorious arts of peace, + But through adventurous war + Urged his active star. + + And, like the three-forked lightning, first + Breaking the clouds wherein it nurst, + Did thorough his own side + His fiery way divide. + + For 't is all one to courage high, + The emulous, or enemy; + And with such to enclose + Is more than to oppose. + + Then burning through the air he went, + And palaces and temples rent; + And Caesar's head at last + Did through his laurels blast. + + 'T is madness to resist or blame + The face of angry Heaven's flame; + And, if we would speak true, + Much to the man is due, + + Who, from his private gardens, where + He lived reserved and austere, + (As if his highest plot + To plant the bergamot,) + + Could by industrious valor climb + To ruin the great work of time, + And cast the kingdoms old + Into another mould! + + Though justice against fate complain, + And plead the ancient rights in vain,— + But those do hold or break, + As men are strong or weak. + + Nature, that hateth emptiness, + Allows of penetration less, + And therefore must make room + Where greater spirits come. + + What field of all the civil war, + Where his were not the deepest scar? + And Hampton shows what part + He had of wiser art; + + Where, twining subtle fears with hope, + He wove a net of such a scope, + That Charles himself might chase + To Carisbrook's narrow case; + + That hence the royal actor borne, + The tragic scaffold might adorn, + While round the armed bands + Did clap their bloody hands. + + HE nothing common did or mean + Upon that memorable scene, + But with his keener eye + The axe's edge did try + + Nor called the gods, with vulgar spite, + To vindicate his helpless right! + But bowed his comely head, + Down, as upon a bed. + + This was that memorable hour, + Which first assured the forced power; + So when they did design + The Capitol's first line, + + A bleeding head, where they begun, + Did fright the architects to run; + And yet in that the state + Foresaw its happy fate. + + And now the Irish are ashamed + To see themselves in one year tamed; + So much one man can do, + That does best act and know. + + They can affirm his praises best, + And have, though overcome, confest + How good he is, how just, + And fit for highest trust. + + Nor yet grown stiffer by command, + But still in the Republic's hand, + How fit he is to sway + That can so well obey. + + He to the Commons' feet presents + A kingdom for his first year's rents, + And, what he may, forbears + His fame to make it theirs. + + And has his sword and spoils ungirt, + To lay them at the public's skirt; + So when the falcon high + Falls heavy from the sky, + + She, having killed, no more does search, + But on the next green bough to perch, + Where, when he first does lure, + The falconer has her sure. + + What may not, then, our isle presume, + While Victory his crest does plume? + What may not others fear, + + If thus he crowns each year? + + As Caesar, he, erelong, to Gaul; + To Italy as Hannibal, + And to all states not free + Shall climacteric be. + + The Pict no shelter now shall find + Within his parti-contoured mind; + But from his valor sad + Shrink underneath the plaid, + + Happy if in the tufted brake + The English hunter him mistake, + Nor lay his hands a near + The Caledonian deer. + + But thou, the war's and fortune's son, + March indefatigably on; + And, for the last effect, + Still keep the sword erect. + + Besides the force, it has to fright + The spirits of the shady night + The same arts that did gain + A power, must it maintain. +</pre> + <p> + Marvell was never married. The modern critic, who affirms that bachelors + have done the most to exalt women into a divinity, might have quoted his + extravagant panegyric of Maria Fairfax as an apt illustration:— + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "'T is she that to these gardens gave + The wondrous beauty which they have; + She straitness on the woods bestows, + To her the meadow sweetness owes; + Nothing could make the river be + So crystal pure but only she,— + She, yet more pure, sweet, strait, and fair, + Than gardens, woods, meals, rivers are + Therefore, what first she on them spent + They gratefully again present: + The meadow carpets where to tread, + The garden flowers to crown her head, + And for a glass the limpid brook + Where she may all her beauties look; + But, since she would not have them seen, + The wood about her draws a screen; + For she, to higher beauty raised, + Disdains to be for lesser praised; + She counts her beauty to converse + In all the languages as hers, + Nor yet in those herself employs, + But for the wisdom, not the noise, + Nor yet that wisdom could affect, + But as 't is Heaven's dialect." +</pre> + <p> + It has been the fashion of a class of shallow Church and State defenders + to ridicule the great men of the Commonwealth, the sturdy republicans of + England, as sour-featured, hard-hearted ascetics, enemies of the fine arts + and polite literature. The works of Milton and Marvell, the prose- poem of + Harrington, and the admirable discourses of Algernon Sydney are a + sufficient answer to this accusation. To none has it less application than + to the subject of our sketch. He was a genial, warmhearted man, an elegant + scholar, a finished gentleman at home, and the life of every circle which + he entered, whether that of the gay court of Charles II., amidst such men + as Rochester and L'Estrange, or that of the republican philosophers who + assembled at Miles's Coffee House, where he discussed plans of a free + representative government with the author of Oceana, and Cyriack Skinner, + that friend of Milton, whom the bard has immortalized in the sonnet which + so pathetically, yet heroically, alludes to his own blindness. Men of all + parties enjoyed his wit and graceful conversation. His personal appearance + was altogether in his favor. A clear, dark, Spanish complexion, long hair + of jetty blackness falling in graceful wreaths to his shoulders, dark + eyes, full of expression and fire, a finely chiselled chin, and a mouth + whose soft voluptuousness scarcely gave token of the steady purpose and + firm will of the inflexible statesman: these, added to the prestige of his + genius, and the respect which a lofty, self-sacrificing patriotism extorts + even from those who would fain corrupt and bribe it, gave him a ready + passport to the fashionable society of the metropolis. He was one of the + few who mingled in that society, and escaped its contamination, and who, + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "Amidst the wavering days of sin, + Kept himself icy chaste and pure." +</pre> + <p> + The tone and temper of his mind may be most fitly expressed in his own + paraphrase of Horace:— + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "Climb at Court for me that will, + Tottering Favor's pinnacle; + All I seek is to lie still! + Settled in some secret nest, + In calm leisure let me rest; + And, far off the public stage, + Pass away my silent age. + Thus, when, without noise, unknown, + I have lived out all my span, + I shall die without a groan, + An old, honest countryman. + Who, exposed to other's eyes, + Into his own heart ne'er pries, + Death's to him a strange surprise." +</pre> + <p> + He died suddenly in 1678, while in attendance at a popular meeting of his + old constituents at Hull. His health had previously been remarkably good; + and it was supposed by many that he was poisoned by some of his political + or clerical enemies. His monument, erected by his grateful constituency, + bears the following inscription:— + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "Near this place lyeth the body of Andrew Marvell, Esq., a man so + endowed by Nature, so improved by Education, Study, and Travel, so + consummated by Experience, that, joining the peculiar graces of Wit + and Learning, with a singular penetration and strength of judgment; + and exercising all these in the whole course of his life, with an + unutterable steadiness in the ways of Virtue, he became the ornament + and example of his age, beloved by good men, feared by bad, admired + by all, though imitated by few; and scarce paralleled by any. But a + Tombstone can neither contain his character, nor is Marble necessary + to transmit it to posterity; it is engraved in the minds of this + generation, and will be always legible in his inimitable writings, + nevertheless. He having served twenty years successfully in + Parliament, and that with such Wisdom, Dexterity, and Courage, as + becomes a true Patriot, the town of Kingston-upon-Hull, from whence + he was deputed to that Assembly, lamenting in his death the public + loss, have erected this Monument of their Grief and their Gratitude, + 1688." +</pre> + <p> + Thus lived and died Andrew Marvell. His memory is the inheritance of + Americans as well as Englishmen. His example commends itself in an + especial manner to the legislators of our Republic. Integrity and fidelity + to principle are as greatly needed at this time in our halls of Congress + as in the Parliaments of the Restoration; men are required who can feel, + with Milton, that "it is high honor done them from God, and a special mark + of His favor, to have been selected to stand upright and steadfast in His + cause, dignified with the defence of Truth and public liberty." + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0005" id="link2H_4_0005"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + JOHN ROBERTS. + </h2> + <p> + Thomas Carlyle, in his history of the stout and sagacious Monk of St. + Edmunds, has given us a fine picture of the actual life of Englishmen in + the middle centuries. The dim cell-lamp of the somewhat apocryphal Jocelin + of Brakelond becomes in his hands a huge Drummond-light, shining over the + Dark Ages like the naphtha-fed cressets over Pandemonium, proving, as he + says in his own quaint way, that "England in the year 1200 was no + dreamland, but a green, solid place, which grew corn and several other + things; the sun shone on it; the vicissitudes of seasons and human + fortunes were there; cloth was woven, ditches dug, fallow fields ploughed, + and houses built." And if, as the writer just quoted insists, it is a + matter of no small importance to make it credible to the present + generation that the Past is not a confused dream of thrones and battle- + fields, creeds and constitutions, but a reality, substantial as hearth and + home, harvest-field and smith-shop, merry-making and death, could make it, + we shall not wholly waste our time and that of our readers in inviting + them to look with us at the rural life of England two centuries ago, + through the eyes of John Roberts and his worthy son, Daniel, yeomen, of + Siddington, near Cirencester. + </p> + <p> + <i>The Memoirs of John Roberts, alias Haywood, by his son, Daniel Roberts</i>, + (the second edition, printed verbatim from the original one, with its + picturesque array of italics and capital letters,) is to be found only in + a few of our old Quaker libraries. It opens with some account of the + family. The father of the elder Roberts "lived reputably, on a little + estate of his own," and it is mentioned as noteworthy that he married a + sister of a gentleman in the Commission of the Peace. Coming of age about + the beginning of the civil wars, John and one of his young neighbors + enlisted in the service of Parliament. Hearing that Cirencester had been + taken by the King's forces, they obtained leave of absence to visit their + friends, for whose safety they naturally felt solicitous. The following + account of the reception they met with from the drunken and ferocious + troopers of Charles I., the "bravos of Alsatia and the pages of + Whitehall," throws a ghastly light upon the horrors of civil war:— + </p> + <p> + "As they were passing by Cirencester, they were discovered, and pursued by + two soldiers of the King's party, then in possession of the town. Seeing + themselves pursued, they quitted their horses, and took to their heels; + but, by reason of their accoutrements, could make little speed. They came + up with my father first; and, though he begged for quarter, none they + would give him, but laid on him with their swords, cutting and slashing + his hands and arms, which he held up to save his head; as the marks upon + them did long after testify. At length it pleased the Almighty to put it + into his mind to fall down on his face; which he did. Hereupon the + soldiers, being on horseback, cried to each other, <i>Alight, and cut his + throat</i>! but neither of them did; yet continued to strike and prick him + about the jaws, till they thought him dead. Then they left him, and + pursued his neighbor, whom they presently overtook and killed. Soon after + they had left my father, it was said in his heart, <i>Rise, and flee for + thy life</i>! which call he obeyed; and, starting upon his feet, his + enemies espied him in motion, and pursued him again. He ran down a steep + hill, and through a river which ran at the bottom of it; though with + exceeding difficulty, his boots filling with water, and his wounds + bleeding very much. They followed him to the top of the hill; but, seeing + he had got over, pursued him no farther." + </p> + <p> + The surgeon who attended him was a Royalist, and bluntly told his bleeding + patient that if he had met him in the street he would have killed him + himself, but now he was willing to cure him. On his recovery, young + Roberts again entered the army, and continued in it until the overthrow, + of the Monarchy. On his return, he married "Lydia Tindall, of the + denomination of Puritans." A majestic figure rises before us, on reading + the statement that Sir Matthew Hale, afterwards Lord Chief Justice of + England, the irreproachable jurist and judicial saint, was "his wife's + kinsman, and drew her marriage settlement." + </p> + <p> + No stronger testimony to the high-toned morality and austere virtue of the + Puritan yeomanry of England can be adduced than the fact that, of the + fifty thousand soldiers who were discharged on the accession of Charles + II., and left to shift for themselves, comparatively few, if any, became + chargeable to their parishes, although at that very time one out of six of + the English population were unable to support themselves. They carried + into their farm-fields and workshops the strict habits of Cromwell's + discipline; and, in toiling to repair their wasted fortunes, they + manifested the same heroic fortitude and self-denial which in war had made + them such formidable and efficient "Soldiers of the Lord." With few + exceptions, they remained steadfast in their uncompromising non- + conformity, abhorring Prelacy and Popery, and entertaining no very + orthodox notions with respect to the divine right of Kings. From them the + Quakers drew their most zealous champions; men who, in renouncing the + "carnal weapons" of their old service, found employment for habitual + combativeness in hot and wordy sectarian warfare. To this day the + vocabulary of Quakerism abounds in the military phrases and figures which + were in use in the Commonwealth's time. Their old force and significance + are now in a great measure lost; but one can well imagine that, in the + assemblies of the primitive Quakers, such stirring battle-cries and + warlike tropes, even when employed in enforcing or illustrating the + doctrines of peace, must have made many a stout heart' to beat quicker, + tinder its drab coloring, with recollections of Naseby and Preston; + transporting many a listener from the benches of his place of worship to + the ranks of Ireton and Lambert, and causing him to hear, in the place of + the solemn and nasal tones of the preacher, the blast of Rupert's bugles, + and the answering shout of Cromwell's pikemen: "Let God arise, and let his + enemies be scattered!" + </p> + <p> + Of this class was John Roberts. He threw off his knapsack, and went back + to his small homestead, contented with the privilege of supporting himself + and family by daily toil, and grumbling in concert with his old campaign + brothers at the new order of things in Church and State. To his + apprehension, the Golden Days of England ended with the parade on + Blackheath to receive the restored King. He manifested no reverence for + Bishops and Lords, for he felt none. For the Presbyterians he had no good + will; they had brought in the King, and they denied the liberty of + prophesying. John Milton has expressed the feeling of the Independents and + Anabaptists towards this latter class, in that famous line in which he + defines Presbyter as "old priest writ large." Roberts was by no means a + gloomy fanatic; he had a great deal of shrewdness and humor, loved a quiet + joke; and every gambling priest and swearing magistrate in the + neighborhood stood in fear of his sharp wit. It was quite in course for + such a man to fall in with the Quakers, and he appears to have done so at + the first opportunity. + </p> + <p> + In the year 1665, "it pleased the Lord to send two women Friends out of + the North to Cirencester," who, inquiring after such as feared God, were + directed to the house of John Roberts. He received them kindly, and, + inviting in some of his neighbors, sat down with them, whereupon "the + Friends spake a few words, which had a good effect." After the meeting was + over, he was induced to visit a "Friend" then confined in Banbury jail, + whom he found preaching through the grates of his cell to the people in + the street. On seeing Roberts he called to mind the story of Zaccheus, and + declared that the word was now to all who were seeking Christ by climbing + the tree of knowledge, "Come down, come down; for that which is to be + known of God is manifested within." Returning home, he went soon after to + the parish meeting-house, and, entering with his hat on, the priest + noticed him, and, stopping short in his discourse, declared that he could + not go on while one of the congregation wore his hat. He was thereupon led + out of the house, and a rude fellow, stealing up behind, struck him on the + back with a heavy stone. "Take that for God's sake," said the ruffian. "So + I do," answered Roberts, without looking back to see his assailant, who + the next day came and asked his forgiveness for the injury, as he could + not sleep in consequence of it. + </p> + <p> + We next find him attending the Quarter Sessions, where three "Friends" + were arraigned for entering Cirencester Church with their hats on. + Venturing to utter a word of remonstrance against the summary proceedings + of the Court, Justice Stephens demanded his name, and, on being told, + exclaimed, in the very tone and temper of Jeffreys: + </p> + <p> + "I 've heard of you. I'm glad I have you here. You deserve a stone + doublet. There's many an honester man than you hanged." + </p> + <p> + "It may be so," said Roberts, "but what becomes of such as hang honest + men?" + </p> + <p> + The Justice snatched a ball of wax and hurled it at the quiet questioner. + "I 'll send you to prison," said he; "and if any insurrection or tumult + occurs, I 'll come and cut your throat with my own sword." A warrant was + made out, and he was forthwith sent to the jail. In the evening, Justice + Sollis, his uncle, released him, on condition of his promise to appear at + the next Sessions. He returned to his home, but in the night following he + was impressed with a belief that it was his duty to visit Justice + Stephens. Early in the morning, with a heavy heart, without eating or + drinking, he mounted his horse and rode towards the residence of his + enemy. When he came in sight of the house, he felt strong misgivings that + his uncle, Justice Sollis, who had so kindly released him, and his + neighbors generally, would condemn him for voluntarily running into + danger, and drawing down trouble upon himself and family. He alighted from + his horse, and sat on the ground in great doubt and sorrow, when a voice + seemed to speak within him, "Go, and I will go with thee." The Justice met + him at the door. "I am come," said Roberts, "in the fear and dread of + Heaven, to warn thee to repent of thy wickedness with speed, lest the Lord + send thee to the pit that is bottomless!" This terrible summons awed the + Justice; he made Roberts sit down on his couch beside him, declaring that + he received the message from God, and asked forgiveness for the wrong he + had done him. + </p> + <p> + The parish vicar of Siddington at this time was George Bull, afterwards + Bishop of St. David's, whom Macaulay speaks of as the only rural parish + priest who, during the latter part of the seventeenth century, was noted + as a theologian, or Who possessed a respectable library. Roberts refused + to pay the vicar his tithes, and the vicar sent him to prison. It was the + priest's "Short Method with Dissenters." While the sturdy Non- conformist + lay in prison, he was visited by the great woman of the neighborhood, Lady + Dunch, of Down Amney. "What do you lie in jail for?" inquired the lady. + Roberts replied that it was because he could not put bread into the mouth + of a hireling priest. The lady suggested that he might let somebody else + satisfy the demands of the priest; and that she had a mind to do this + herself, as she wished to talk with him on religious subjects. To this + Roberts objected; there were poor people who needed her charities, which + would be wasted on such devourers as the priests, who, like Pharaoh's lean + kine, were eating up the fat and the goodly, without looking a whit the + better. But the lady, who seems to have been pleased and amused by the + obstinate prisoner, paid the tithe and the jail fees, and set him at + liberty, making him fix a day when he would visit her. At the time + appointed he went to Down Amney, and was overtaken on the way by the + priest of Cirencester, who had been sent for to meet the Quaker. They + found the lady ill in bed; but she had them brought to her chamber, being + determined not to lose the amusement of hearing a theological discussion, + to which she at once urged them, declaring that it would divert her and do + her good. The parson began by accusing the Quakers of holding Popish + doctrines. The Quaker retorted by telling him that if he would prove the + Quakers like the Papists in one thing, by the help of God, he would prove + him like them in ten. After a brief and sharp dispute, the priest, finding + his adversary's wit too keen for his comfort, hastily took his leave. + </p> + <p> + The next we hear of Roberts he is in Gloucester Castle, subjected to the + brutal usage of a jailer, who took a malicious satisfaction in thrusting + decent and respectable Dissenters, imprisoned for matters of conscience, + among felons and thieves. A poor vagabond tinker was hired to play at + night on his hautboy, and prevent their sleeping; but Roberts spoke to him + in such a manner that the instrument fell from his hand; and he told the + jailer that he would play no more, though he should hang him up at the + door for it. + </p> + <p> + How he was released from jail does not appear; but the narrative tells us + that some time after an apparitor came to cite him to the Bishop's Court + at Gloucester. When he was brought before the Court, Bishop Nicholson, a + kind-hearted and easy-natured prelate, asked him the number of his + children, and how many of them had been <i>bishoped</i>? + </p> + <p> + "None, that I know of," said Roberts. + </p> + <p> + "What reason," asked the Bishop, "do you give for this?" + </p> + <p> + "A very good one," said the Quaker: "most of my children were born in + Oliver's days, when Bishops were out of fashion." + </p> + <p> + The Bishop and the Court laughed at this sally, and proceeded to question + him touching his views of baptism. Roberts admitted that John had a Divine + commission to baptize with water, but that he never heard of anybody else + that had. The Bishop reminded him that Christ's disciples baptized. "What + 's that to me?" responded Roberts. "Paul says he was not sent to baptize, + but to preach the Gospel. And if he was not sent, who required it at his + hands? Perhaps he had as little thanks for his labor as thou hast for + thine; and I would willingly know who sent thee to baptize?" + </p> + <p> + The Bishop evaded this home question, and told him he was there to answer + for not coming to church. Roberts denied the charge; sometimes he went to + church, and sometimes it came to him. "I don't call that a church which + you do, which is made of wood and stone." + </p> + <p> + "What do you call it?" asked the Bishop. + </p> + <p> + "It might be properly called a mass-house," was the reply; "for it was + built for that purpose." The Bishop here told him he might go for the + present; he would take another opportunity to convince him of his errors. + </p> + <p> + The next person called was a Baptist minister, who, seeing that Roberts + refused to put off his hat, kept on his also. The Bishop sternly reminded + him that he stood before the King's Court, and the representative of the + majesty of England; and that, while some regard might be had to the + scruples of men who made a conscience of putting off the hat, such + contempt could not be tolerated on the part of one who could put it off to + every mechanic be met. The Baptist pulled off his hat, and apologized, on + the ground of illness. + </p> + <p> + We find Roberts next following George Fox on a visit to Bristol. On his + return, reaching his house late in the evening, he saw a man standing in + the moonlight at his door, and knew him to be a bailiff. + </p> + <p> + "Hast thou anything against me?" asked Roberts. + </p> + <p> + "No," said the bailiff, "I've wronged you enough, God forgive me! Those + who lie in wait for you are my Lord Bishop's bailiffs; they are merciless + rogues. Ever, my master, while you live, please a knave, for an honest man + won't hurt you." + </p> + <p> + The next morning, having, as he thought, been warned by a dream to do so, + he went to the Bishop's house at Cleave, near Gloucester. Confronting the + Bishop in his own hall, he told him that he had come to know why he was + hunting after him with his bailiffs, and why he was his adversary. "The + King is your adversary," said the Bishop; "you have broken the King's + law." Roberts ventured to deny the justice of the law. "What!" cried the + Bishop, "do such men as you find fault with the laws?" "Yes," replied the + other, stoutly; "and I tell thee plainly to thy face, it is high time + wiser men were chosen, to make better laws." + </p> + <p> + The discourse turning upon the Book of Common Prayer, Roberts asked the + Bishop if the sin of idolatry did not consist in worshipping the work of + men's hands. The Bishop admitted it, as in the case of Nebuchadnezzar's + image. + </p> + <p> + "Then," said Roberts, "whose hands made your Prayer Book? It could not + make itself." + </p> + <p> + "Do you compare our Prayer Book to Nebuchadnezzar's image?" cried the + Bishop. + </p> + <p> + "Yes," returned Roberts, "that was his image; this is thine. I no more + dare bow to thy Common-Prayer Book than the Three Children to + Nebuchadnezzar's image." + </p> + <p> + "Yours is a strange upstart religion," said the Bishop. + </p> + <p> + Roberts told him it was older than his by several hundred years. At this + claim of antiquity the prelate was greatly amused, and told Roberts that + if he would make out his case, he should speed the better for it. + </p> + <p> + "Let me ask thee," said Roberts, "where thy religion was in Oliver's days, + when thy Common-Prayer Book was as little regarded as an old almanac, and + your priests, with a few honest exceptions, turned with the tide, and if + Oliver had put mass in their mouths would have conformed to it for the + sake of their bellies." + </p> + <p> + "What would you have us do?" asked the Bishop. "Would you have had Oliver + cut our throats?" + </p> + <p> + "No," said Roberts; "but what sort of religion was that which you were + afraid to venture your throats for?" + </p> + <p> + The Bishop interrupted him to say, that in Oliver's days he had never + owned any other religion than his own, although he did not dare to openly + maintain it as he then did. + </p> + <p> + "Well," continued Roberts, "if thou didst not think thy religion worth + venturing thy throat for then, I desire thee to consider that it is not + worth the cutting of other men's throats now for not conforming to it." + </p> + <p> + "You are right," responded the frank Bishop. "I hope we shall have a care + how we cut men's throats." + </p> + <p> + The following colloquy throws some light on the condition and character of + the rural clergy at this period, and goes far to confirm the statements of + Macaulay, which many have supposed exaggerated. Baxter's early religious + teachers were more exceptionable than even the maudlin mummer whom Roberts + speaks of, one of them being "the excellentest stage- player in all the + country, and a good gamester and goodfellow, who, having received Holy + Orders, forged the like for a neighbor's son, who on the strength of that + title officiated at the desk and altar; and after him came an attorney's + clerk, who had tippled himself into so great poverty that he had no other + way to live than to preach." + </p> + <p> + J. ROBERTS. I was bred up under a Common-Prayer Priest; and a poor drunken + old Man he was. Sometimes he was so drunk he could not say his Prayers, + and at best he could but say them; though I think he was by far a better + Man than he that is Priest there now. + </p> + <p> + BISHOP. Who is your Minister now? + </p> + <p> + J. ROBERTS. My Minister is Christ Jesus, the Minister of the everlasting + Covenant; but the present Priest of the Parish is George Bull. + </p> + <p> + BISHOP. Do you say that drunken old Man was better than Mr. Bull? I tell + you, I account Mr. Bull as sound, able, and orthodox a Divine as any we + have among us. + </p> + <p> + J. ROBERT. I am sorry for that; for if he be one of the best of you, I + believe the Lord will not suffer you long; for he is a proud, ambitious, + ungodly Man: he hath often sued me at Law, and brought his Servants to + swear against me wrongfully. His Servants themselves have confessed to my + Servants, that I might have their Ears; for their Master made them drunk, + and then told them they were set down in the List as Witnesses against me, + and they must swear to it: And so they did, and brought treble Damages. + They likewise owned they took Tithes from my Servants, threshed them out, + and sold them for their Master. They have also several Times took my + Cattle out of my Grounds, drove them to Fairs and Markets, and sold them, + without giving me any Account. + </p> + <p> + BISHOP. I do assure you I will inform Mr. Bull of what you say. + </p> + <p> + J. ROBERTS. Very well. And if thou pleasest to send for me to face him, I + shall make much more appear to his Face than I'll say behind his Back. + </p> + <p> + After much more discourse, Roberts told the Bishop that if it would do him + any good to have him in jail, he would voluntarily go and deliver himself + up to the keeper of Gloucester Castle. The good-natured prelate relented + at this, and said he should not be molested or injured, and further + manifested his good will by ordering refreshments. One of the Bishop's + friends who was present was highly offended by the freedom of Roberts with + his Lordship, and undertook to rebuke him, but was so readily answered + that he flew into a rage. "If all the Quakers in England," said he, "are + not hanged in a month's time, I 'll be hanged for them." "Prithee, + friend," quoth Roberts, "remember and be as good as thy word!" + </p> + <p> + Good old Bishop Nicholson, it would seem, really liked his incorrigible + Quaker neighbor, and could enjoy heartily his wit and humor, even when + exercised at the expense of his own ecclesiastical dignity. He admired his + blunt honesty and courage. Surrounded by flatterers and self- seekers, he + found satisfaction in the company and conversation of one who, setting + aside all conventionalisms, saw only in my Lord Bishop a poor + fellow-probationer, and addressed him on terms of conscious equality. The + indulgence which he extended to him naturally enough provoked many of the + inferior clergy, who had been sorely annoyed by the sturdy Dissenter's + irreverent witticisms and unsparing ridicule. Vicar Bull, of Siddington, + and Priest Careless, of Cirencester, in particular, urged the Bishop to + deal sharply with him. The former accused him of dealing in the Black Art, + and filled the Bishop's ear with certain marvellous stories of his + preternatural sagacity and discernment in discovering cattle which were + lost. The Bishop took occasion to inquire into these stories; and was told + by Roberts that, except in a single instance, the discoveries were the + result of his acquaintance with the habits of animals and his knowledge of + the localities where they were lost. The circumstance alluded to, as an + exception, will be best related in his own words. + </p> + <p> + "I had a poor Neighbor, who had a Wife and six Children, and whom the + chief men about us permitted to keep six or seven Cows upon the Waste, + which were the principal Support of the Family, and preserved them from + becoming chargeable to the Parish. One very stormy night the Cattle were + left in the Yard as usual, but could not be found in the morning. The Man + and his Sons had sought them to no purpose; and, after they had been lost + four days, his Wife came to me, and, in a great deal of grief, cried, 'O + Lord! Master Hayward, we are undone! My Husband and I must go a begging in + our old age! We have lost all our Cows. My Husband and the Boys have been + round the country, and can hear nothing of them. I'll down on my bare + knees, if you'll stand our Friend!' I desired she would not be in such an + agony, and told her she should not down on her knees to me; but I would + gladly help them in what I could. 'I know,' said she, 'you are a good Man, + and God will hear your Prayers.' I desire thee, said I, to be still and + quiet in thy mind; perhaps thy Husband or Sons may hear of them to-day; if + not, let thy Husband get a horse, and come to me to-morrow morning as soon + as he will; and I think, if it please God, to go with him to seek then. + The Woman seemed transported with joy, crying, 'Then we shall have our + Cows again.' Her Faith being so strong, brought the greater Exercise on + me, with strong cries to the Lord, that he would be pleased to make me + instrumental in his Hand, for the help of the poor Family. In the Morning + early comes the old Man. In the Name of God, says he, which way shall we + go to seek them? I, being deeply concerned in my Mind, did not answer him + till he had thrice repeated it; and then I answered, In the Name of God, I + would go to seek them; and said (before I was well aware) we will go to + Malmsbury, and at the Horse- Fair we shall find them. When I had spoken + the Words, I was much troubled lest they should not prove true. It was + very early, and the first Man we saw, I asked him if he had seen any stray + Milch Cows thereabouts. What manner of Cattle are they? said he. And the + old Man describing their Mark and Number, he told us there were some stood + chewing their Cuds in the Horse-Fair; but thinking they belonged to some + in the Neighborhood, he did not take particular Notice of them. When we + came to the Place, the old Man found them to be his; but suffered his + Transports of Joy to rise so high, that I was ashamed of his behavior; for + he fell a hallooing, and threw up his Montier Cap in the Air several + times, till he raised the Neighbors out of their Beds to see what was the + Matter. 'O!' said he, 'I had lost my Cows four or five days ago, and + thought I should never see them again; and this honest Neighbor of mine + told me this Morning, by his own Fire's Side, nine Miles off, that here I + should find them, and here I have them!' Then up goes his Cap again. I + begged of the poor Man to be quiet, and take his Cows home, and be + thankful; as indeed I was, being reverently bowed in my Spirit before the + Lord, in that he was pleased to put the words of Truth into my mouth. And + the Man drove his Cattle home, to the great Joy of his Family." + </p> + <p> + Not long after the interview with the Bishop at his own palace, which has + been related, that dignitary, with the Lord Chancellor, in their coaches, + and about twenty clergymen on horseback, made a call at the humble + dwelling of Roberts, on their way to Tedbury, where the Bishop was to hold + a Visitation. "I could not go out of the country without seeing you," said + the prelate, as the farmer came to his coach door and pressed him to + alight. + </p> + <p> + "John," asked Priest Evans, the Bishop's kinsman, "is your house free to + entertain such men as we are?" + </p> + <p> + "Yes, George," said Roberts; "I entertain honest men, and sometimes + others." + </p> + <p> + "My Lord," said Evans, turning to the Bishop, "John's friends are the + honest men, and we are the others." + </p> + <p> + The Bishop told Roberts that they could not then alight, but would gladly + drink with him; whereupon the good wife brought out her best beer. "I + commend you, John," quoth the Bishop, as he paused from his hearty + draught; "you keep a cup of good beer in your house. I have not drank any + that has pleased me better since I left home." The cup passed next to the + Chancellor, and finally came to Priest Bull, who thrust it aside, + declaring that it was full of hops and heresy. As to hops, Roberts + replied, he could not say, but as for heresy, he bade the priest take note + that the Lord Bishop had drank of it, and had found no heresy in the cup. + </p> + <p> + The Bishop leaned over his coach door and whispered: "John, I advise you + to take care you don't offend against the higher Powers. I have heard + great complaints against you, that you are the Ringleader of the Quakers + in this Country; and that, if you are not suppressed, all will signify + nothing. Therefore, pray, John, take care, for the future, you don't + offend any more." + </p> + <p> + "I like thy Counsel very well," answered Roberts, "and intend to take it. + But thou knowest God is the higher Power; and you mortal Men, however + advanced in this World, are but the lower Power; and it is only because I + endeavor to be obedient to the will of the higher Powers, that the lower + Powers are angry with me. But I hope, with the assistance of God, to take + thy Counsel, and be subject to the higher Powers, let the lower Powers do + with me as it may please God to suffer them." + </p> + <p> + The Bishop then said he would like to talk with him further, and requested + him to meet him at Tedbury the next day. At the time appointed, Roberts + went to the inn where the Bishop lodged, and was invited to dine with him. + After dinner was over, the prelate told him that he must go to church, and + leave off holding conventicles at his house, of which great complaint was + made. This he flatly refused to do; and the Bishop, losing patience, + ordered the constable to be sent for. Roberts told him that if, after + coming to his house under the guise of friendship, he should betray him + and send him to prison, he, who had hitherto commended him for his + moderation, would put his name in print, and cause it to stink before all + sober people. It was the priests, he told him, who set him on; but, + instead of hearkening to them, he should commend them to some honest + vocation, and not suffer them to rob their honest neighbors, and feed on + the fruits of other men's toil, like caterpillars. + </p> + <p> + "Whom do you call caterpillars?" cried Priest Rich, of North Surrey. + </p> + <p> + "We farmers," said Roberts, "call those so who live on other men's fields, + and by the sweat of other men's brows; and if thou dost so, thou mayst be + one of them." + </p> + <p> + This reply so enraged the Bishop's attendants that they could only be + appeased by an order for the constable to take him to jail. In fact, there + was some ground for complaint of a lack of courtesy on the part of the + blunt farmer; and the Christian virtue of forbearance, even in Bishops, + has its limits. + </p> + <p> + The constable, obeying the summons, came to the inn, at the door of which + the landlady met him. "What do you here!" cried the good woman, "when + honest John is going to be sent to prison? Here, come along with me." The + constable, nothing loath, followed her into a private room, where she + concealed him. Word was sent to the Bishop, that the constable was not to + be found; and the prelate, telling Roberts he could send him to jail in + the afternoon, dismissed him until evening. At the hour appointed, the + latter waited upon the Bishop, and found with him only one priest and a + lay gentleman. The priest begged the Bishop to be allowed to discourse + with the prisoner; and, leave being granted, he began by telling Roberts + that the knowledge of the Scriptures had made him mad, and that it was a + great pity he had ever seen them. + </p> + <p> + "Thou art an unworthy man," said the Quaker, "and I 'll not dispute with + thee. If the knowledge of the Scriptures has made me mad, the knowledge of + the sack-pot hath almost made thee mad; and if we two madmen should + dispute about religion, we should make mad work of it." + </p> + <p> + "An 't please you, my Lord," said the scandalized priest, "he says I 'm + drunk." + </p> + <p> + The Bishop asked Roberts to repeat his words; and, instead of reprimanding + him, as the priest expected, was so much amused that he held up his hands + and laughed; whereupon the offended inferior took a hasty leave. The + Bishop, who was evidently glad to be rid of him, now turned to Roberts, + and complained that he had dealt hardly with him, in telling him, before + so many gentlemen, that he had sought to betray him by professions of + friendship, in order to send him to prison; and that, if he had not done + as he did, people would have reported him as an encourager of the Quakers. + "But now, John," said the good prelate, "I'll burn the warrant against you + before your face." "You know, Mr. Burnet," he continued, addressing his + attendant, "that a Ring of Bells may be made of excellent metal, but they + may be out of tune; so we may say of John: he is a man of as good metal as + I ever met with, but quite out of tune." + </p> + <p> + "Thou mayst well say so," quoth Roberts, "for I can't tune after thy + pipe." + </p> + <p> + The inferior clergy were by no means so lenient as the Bishop. They + regarded Roberts as the ringleader of Dissent, an impracticable, + obstinate, contumacious heretic, not only refusing to pay them tithes + himself, but encouraging others to the same course. Hence, they thought it + necessary to visit upon him the full rigor of the law. His crops were + taken from his field, and his cattle from his yard. He was often committed + to the jail, where, on one occasion, he was kept, with many others, for a + long time, through the malice of the jailer, who refused to put the names + of his prisoners in the Calendar, that they might have a hearing. But the + spirit of the old Commonwealth's man remained steadfast. When Justice + George, at the Ram in Cirencester, told him he must conform, and go to + church, or suffer the penalty of the law, he replied that he had heard + indeed that some were formerly whipped out of the Temple, but he had never + heard of any being whipped in. The Justice, pointing, through the open + window of the inn, at the church tower, asked him what that was. "Thou + mayst call it a daw-house," answered the incorrigible Quaker. "Dost thou + not see how the jackdaws flock about it?" + </p> + <p> + Sometimes it happened that the clergyman was also a magistrate, and united + in his own person the authority of the State and the zeal of the Church. + Justice Parsons, of Gloucester, was a functionary of this sort. He wielded + the sword of the Spirit on the Sabbath against Dissenters, and on week + days belabored them with the arm of flesh and the constable's staff. At + one time he had between forty and fifty of them locked up in Gloucester + Castle, among them Roberts and his sons, on the charge of attending + conventicles. But the troublesome prisoners baffled his vigilance, and + turned their prison into a meeting-house, and held their conventicles in + defiance of him. The Reverend Justice pounced upon them on one occasion, + with his attendants. An old, gray-haired man, formerly a strolling + fencing-master, was preaching when he came in. The Justice laid hold of + him by his white locks, and strove to pull him down, but the tall + fencing-raster stood firm and spoke on; he then tried to gag him, but + failed in that also. He demanded the names of the prisoners, but no one + answered him. A voice (we fancy it was that of our old friend Roberts) + called out: "The Devil must be hard put to it to have his drudgery done, + when the Priests must leave their pulpits to turn informers against poor + prisoners." The Justice obtained a list of the names of the prisoners, + made out on their commitment, and, taking it for granted that all were + still present, issued warrants for the collection of fines by levies upon + their estates. Among the names was that of a poor widow, who had been + discharged, and was living, at the time the clerical magistrate swore she + was at the meeting, twenty miles distant from the prison. + </p> + <p> + Soon after this event, our old friend fell sick. He had been discharged + from prison, but his sons were still confined. The eldest had leave, + however, to attend him in his illness, and he bears his testimony that the + Lord was pleased to favor his father with His living presence in his last + moments. In keeping with the sturdy Non-conformist's life, he was interred + at the foot of his own orchard, in Siddington, a spot he had selected for + a burial-ground long before, where neither the foot of a priest nor the + shadow of a steeple-house could rest upon his grave. + </p> + <p> + In closing our notice of this pleasant old narrative, we may remark that + the light it sheds upon the antagonistic religious parties of the time is + calculated to dissipate prejudices and correct misapprehensions, common + alike to Churchmen and Dissenters. The genial humor, sound sense, and + sterling virtues of the Quaker farmer should teach the one class that poor + James Nayler, in his craziness and folly, was not a fair representative of + his sect; while the kind nature, the hearty appreciation of goodness, and + the generosity and candor of Bishop Nicholson should convince the other + class that a prelate is not necessarily, and by virtue of his mitre, a + Laud or a Bonner. The Dissenters of the seventeenth century may well be + forgiven for the asperity of their language; men whose ears had been + cropped because they would not recognize Charles I. as a blessed martyr, + and his scandalous son as the head of the Church, could scarcely be + expected to make discriminations, or suggest palliating circumstances, + favorable to any class of their adversaries. To use the homely but apt + simile of McFingal, + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "The will's confirmed by treatment horrid, + As hides grow harder when they're curried." +</pre> + <p> + They were wronged, and they told the world of it. Unlike Shakespeare's + cardinal, they did not die without a sign. They branded, by their fierce + epithets, the foreheads of their persecutors more deeply than the + sheriff's hot iron did their own. If they lost their ears, they enjoyed + the satisfaction of making those of their oppressors tingle. Knowing their + persecutors to be in the wrong, they did not always inquire whether they + themselves had been entirely right, and had done no unrequired works of + supererogation by the way of "testimony" against their neighbors' mode cf + worship. And so from pillory and whipping-post, from prison and scaffold, + they sent forth their wail and execration, their miserere and anathema, + and the sound thereof has reached down to our day. May it never wholly die + away until, the world over, the forcing of conscience is regarded as a + crime against humanity and a usurpation of God's prerogative. But + abhorring, as we must, persecution under whatever pretext it is employed, + we are not, therefore, to conclude that all persecutors were bad and + unfeeling men. Many of their severities, upon which we now look back with + horror, were, beyond a question, the result of an intense anxiety for the + well-being of immortal souls, endangered by the poison which, in their + view, heresy was casting into the waters of life. Coleridge, in one of the + moods of a mind which traversed in imagination the vast circle of human + experience, reaches this point in his Table-Talk. "It would require," says + he, "stronger arguments than any I have seen to convince me that men in + authority have not a right, involved in an imperative duty, to deter those + under their control from teaching or countenancing doctrines which they + believe to be damnable, and even to punish with death those who violate + such prohibition." It would not be very difficult for us to imagine a + tender-hearted Inquisitor of this stamp, stifling his weak compassion for + the shrieking wretch under bodily torment by his strong pity for souls in + danger of perdition from the sufferer's heresy. We all know with what + satisfaction the gentle-spirited Melanethon heard of the burning of + Servetus, and with what zeal he defended it. The truth is, the notion that + an intellectual recognition of certain dogmas is the essential condition + of salvation lies at the bottom of all intolerance in matters of religion. + Under this impression, men are too apt to forget that the great end of + Christianity is love, and that charity is its crowning virtue; they + overlook the beautiful significance of the parable of the heretic + Samaritan and the orthodox Pharisee: and thus, by suffering their + speculative opinions of the next world to make them uncharitable and cruel + in this, they are really the worse for them, even admitting them to be + true. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0006" id="link2H_4_0006"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + SAMUEL HOPKINS. + </h2> + <p> + Three quarters of a century ago, the name of Samuel Hopkins was as + familiar as a household word throughout New England. It was a spell + wherewith to raise at once a storm of theological controversy. The + venerable minister who bore it had his thousands of ardent young + disciples, as well as defenders and followers of mature age and + acknowledged talent; a hundred pulpits propagated the dogmas which he had + engrafted on the stock of Calvinism. Nor did he lack numerous and powerful + antagonists. The sledge ecclesiastic, with more or less effect, was + unceasingly plied upon the strong-linked chain of argument which he slowly + and painfully elaborated in the seclusion of his parish. The press groaned + under large volumes of theological, metaphysical, and psychological + disquisition, the very thought of which is now "a weariness to the flesh;" + in rapid succession pamphlet encountered pamphlet, horned, beaked, and + sharp of talon, grappling with each other in mid-air, like Milton's + angels. That loud controversy, the sound whereof went over Christendom, + awakening responses from beyond the Atlantic, has now died away; its + watchwords no longer stir the blood of belligerent sermonizers; its very + terms and definitions have well-nigh become obsolete and unintelligible. + The hands which wrote and the tongues which spoke in that day are now all + cold and silent; even Emmons, the brave old intellectual athlete of + Franklin, now sleeps with his fathers,—the last of the giants. Their + fame is still in all the churches; effeminate clerical dandyism still + affects to do homage to their memories; the earnest young theologian, + exploring with awe the mountainous debris of their controversial lore, + ponders over the colossal thoughts entombed therein, as he would over the + gigantic fossils of an early creation, and endeavors in vain to recall to + the skeleton abstractions before him the warm and vigorous life wherewith + they were once clothed; but Hopkinsianism, as a distinct and living school + of philosophy, theology, and metaphysics, no longer exists. It has no + living oracles left; and its memory survives only in the doctrinal + treatises of the elder and younger Edwards, Hopkins, Bellamy, and Emmons. + </p> + <p> + It is no part of our present purpose to discuss the merits of the system + in question. Indeed, looking at the great controversy which divided New + England Calvinism in the eighteenth century, from a point of view which + secures our impartiality and freedom from prejudice, we find it + exceedingly difficult to get a precise idea of what was actually at issue. + To our poor comprehension, much of the dispute hinges upon names rather + than things; on the manner of reaching conclusions quite as much as upon + the conclusions themselves. Its origin may be traced to the great + religious awakening of the middle of the past century, when the dogmas of + the Calvinistic faith were subjected to the inquiry of acute and earnest + minds, roused up from the incurious ease and passive indifference of + nominal orthodoxy. Without intending it, it broke down some of the + barriers which separated Arminianism and Calvinism; its product, + Hopkinsianism, while it pushed the doctrine of the Genevan reformer on the + subject of the Divine decrees and agency to that extreme point where it + well-nigh loses itself in Pantheism, held at the same time that guilt + could not be hereditary; that man, being responsible for his sinful acts, + and not for his sinful nature, can only be justified by a personal + holiness, consisting not so much in legal obedience as in that + disinterested benevolence which prefers the glory of God and the welfare + of universal being above the happiness of self. It had the merit, whatever + it may be, of reducing the doctrines of the Reformation to an ingenious + and scholastic form of theology; of bringing them boldly to the test of + reason and philosophy. Its leading advocates were not mere heartless + reasoners and closet speculators. They taught that sin was selfishness, + and holiness self-denying benevolence, and they endeavored to practise + accordingly. Their lives recommended their doctrines. They were bold and + faithful in the discharge of what they regarded as duty. In the midst of + slave-holders, and in an age of comparative darkness on the subject of + human rights, Hopkins and the younger Edwards lifted up their voices for + the slave. And twelve years ago, when Abolitionism was everywhere spoken + against, and the whole land was convulsed with mobs to suppress it, the + venerable Emmons, burdened with the weight of ninety years, made a journey + to New York, to attend a meeting of the Anti- Slavery Society. Let those + who condemn the creed of these men see to it that they do not fall behind + them in practical righteousness and faithfulness to the convictions of + duty. + </p> + <p> + Samuel Hopkins, who gave his name to the religious system in question, was + born in Waterbury, Connecticut, in 1721. In his fifteenth year he was + placed under the care of a neighboring clergyman, preparatory for college, + which he entered about a year after. In 1740, the celebrated Whitefield + visited New Haven, and awakened there, as elsewhere, serious inquiry on + religious subjects. He was followed the succeeding spring by Gilbert + Tennent, the New Jersey revivalist, a stirring and powerful preacher. A + great change took place in the college. All the phenomena which President + Edwards has described in his account of the Northampton awakening were + reproduced among the students. The excellent David Brainard, then a member + of the college, visited Hopkins in his apartment, and, by a few plain and + earnest words, convinced him that he was a stranger to vital Christianity. + In his autobiographical sketch, he describes in simple and affecting + language the dark and desolate state of his mind at this period, and the + particular exercise which finally afforded him some degree of relief, and + which he afterwards appears to have regarded as his conversion from + spiritual death to life. When he first heard Tennent, regarding him as the + greatest as well as the best of men, he made up his mind to study theology + with him; but just before the commencement at which he was to take his + degree, the elder Edwards preached at New Haven. Struck by the power of + the great theologian, he at once resolved to make him his spiritual + father. In the winter following, he left his father's house on horseback, + on a journey of eighty miles to Northampton. Arriving at the house of + President Edwards, he was disappointed by hearing that he was absent on a + preaching tour. But he was kindly received by the gifted and accomplished + lady of the mansion, and encouraged to remain during the winter. Still + doubtful in respect to his own spiritual state, he was, he says, "very + gloomy, and retired most of the time in his chamber." The kind heart of + his amiable hostess was touched by his evident affliction. After some days + she came to his chamber, and, with the gentleness and delicacy of a true + woman, inquired into the cause of his unhappiness. The young student + disclosed to her, without reserve, the state of his feelings and the + extent of his fears. "She told me," says the Doctor, "that she had had + peculiar exercises respecting me since I had been in the family; that she + trusted I should receive light and comfort, and doubted not that God + intended yet to do great things by me." + </p> + <p> + After pursuing his studies for some months with the Puritan philosopher, + young Hopkins commenced preaching, and, in 1743, was ordained at + Sheffield, (now Great Barrington') in the western part of Massachusetts. + There were at the time only about thirty families in the town. He says it + was a matter of great regret to him to be obliged to settle so far from + his spiritual guide and tutor but seven years after he was relieved and + gratified by the removal of Edwards to Stockbridge, as the Indian + missionary at that station, seven miles only from his own residence; and + for several years the great metaphysician and his favorite pupil enjoyed + the privilege of familiar intercourse with each other. The removal of the + former in 1758 to Princeton, New Jersey, and his death, which soon + followed, are mentioned in the diary of Hopkins as sore trials and + afflictive dispensations. + </p> + <p> + Obtaining a dismissal from his society in Great Barrington in 1769, he was + installed at Newport the next year, as minister of the first + Congregational church in that place. Newport, at this period, was, in + size, wealth, and commercial importance, the second town in New England. + It was the great slave mart of the North. Vessels loaded with stolen men + and women and children, consigned to its merchant princes, lay at its + wharves; immortal beings were sold daily in its market, like cattle at a + fair. The soul of Hopkins was moved by the appalling spectacle. A strong + conviction of the great wrong of slavery, and of its utter incompatibility + with the Christian profession, seized upon his mind. While at Great + Barrington, he had himself owned a slave, whom he had sold on leaving the + place, without compunction or suspicion in regard to the rightfulness of + the transaction. He now saw the origin of the system in its true light; he + heard the seamen engaged in the African trade tell of the horrible scenes + of fire and blood which they had witnessed, and in which they had been + actors; he saw the half-suffocated wretches brought up from their noisome + and narrow prison, their squalid countenances and skeleton forms bearing + fearful evidence of the suffering attendant upon the transportation from + their native homes. The demoralizing effects of slaveholding everywhere + forced themselves upon his attention, for the evil had struck its roots + deeply in the community, and there were few families into which it had not + penetrated. The right to deal in slaves, and use them as articles of + property, was questioned by no one; men of all professions, clergymen and + church-members, consulted only their interest and convenience as to their + purchase or sale. The magnitude of the evil at first appalled him; he felt + it to be his duty to condemn it, but for a time even his strong spirit + faltered and turned pale in contemplation of the consequences to be + apprehended from an attack upon it. Slavery and slave-trading were at that + time the principal source of wealth to the island; his own church and + congregation were personally interested in the traffic; all were + implicated in its guilt. He stood alone, as it were, in its condemnation; + with here and there an exception, all Christendom maintained the + rightfulness of slavery. No movement had yet been made in England against + the slave-trade; the decision of Granville Sharp's Somerset case had not + yet taken place. The Quakers, even, had not at that time redeemed + themselves from the opprobrium. Under these circumstances, after a + thorough examination of the subject, he resolved, in the strength of the + Lord, to take his stand openly and decidedly on the side of humanity. He + prepared a sermon for the purpose, and for the first time from a pulpit of + New England was heard an emphatic testimony against the sin of slavery. In + contrast with the unselfish and disinterested benevolence which formed in + his mind the essential element of Christian holiness, he held up the act + of reducing human beings to the condition of brutes, to minister to the + convenience, the luxury, and lusts of the owner. He had expected bitter + complaint and opposition from his hearers, but was agreeably surprised to + find that in most cases his sermon only excited astonishment in their + minds that they themselves had never before looked at the subject in the + light in which he presented it. Steadily and faithfully pursuing the + matter, he had the satisfaction to carry with him his church, and obtain + from it, in the midst of a slaveholding and slavetrading community, a + resolution every way worthy of note in this day of cowardly compromise + with the evil on the part of our leading ecclesiastical bodies:— + </p> + <p> + "Resolved, That the slave-trade and the slavery of the Africans, as it has + existed among us, is a gross violation of the righteousness and + benevolence which are so much inculcated in the Gospel, and therefore we + will not tolerate it in this church." + </p> + <p> + There are few instances on record of moral heroism superior to that of + Samuel Hopkins, in thus rebuking slavery in the time and place of its + power. Honor to the true man ever, who takes his life in his hands, and, + at all hazards, speaks the word which is given him to utter, whether men + will hear or forbear, whether the end thereof is to be praise or censure, + gratitude or hatred. It well may be doubted whether on that Sabbath day + the angels of God, in their wide survey of His universe, looked upon a + nobler spectacle than that of the minister of Newport, rising up before + his slaveholding congregation, and demanding, in the name of the Highest, + the "deliverance of the captive, and the opening of prison doors to them + that were bound." + </p> + <p> + Dr. Hopkins did not confine his attention solely to slaveholding in his + own church and congregation. He entered into correspondence with the early + Abolitionists of Europe as well as his own country. He labored with his + brethren in the ministry to bring then to his own view of the great wrong + of holding men as slaves. In a visit to his early friend, Dr. Bellamy, at + Bethlehem, who was the owner of a slave, he pressed the subject kindly but + earnestly upon his attention. Dr. Bellamy urged the usual arguments in + favor of slavery. Dr. Hopkins refuted them in the most successful manner, + and called upon his friend to do an act of simple justice, in giving + immediate freedom to his slave. Dr. Bellamy, thus hardly pressed, said + that the slave was a most judicious and faithful fellow; that, in the + management of his farm, he could trust everything to his discretion; that + he treated him well, and he was so happy in his service that he would + refuse his freedom if it were offered him. + </p> + <p> + "Will you," said Hopkins, "consent to his liberation, if he really desires + it?" + </p> + <p> + "Yes, certainly," said Dr. Bellamy. + </p> + <p> + "Then let us try him," said his guest. + </p> + <p> + The slave was at work in an adjoining field, and at the call of his master + came promptly to receive his commands. + </p> + <p> + "Have you a good master?" inquired Hopkins. + </p> + <p> + "O yes; massa, he berry good." + </p> + <p> + "But are you happy in your present condition?" queried the Doctor. + </p> + <p> + "O yes, massa; berry happy." + </p> + <p> + Dr. Bellamy here could scarcely suppress his exultation at what he + supposed was a complete triumph over his anti-slavery brother. But the + pertinacious guest continued his queries. + </p> + <p> + "Would you not be more happy if you were free?" + </p> + <p> + "O yes, massa," exclaimed the negro, his dark face glowing with new life; + "berry much more happy!" + </p> + <p> + To the honor of Dr. Bellamy, he did not hesitate. + </p> + <p> + "You have your wish," he said to his servant. "From this moment you are + free." + </p> + <p> + Dr. Hopkins was a poor man, but one of his first acts, after becoming + convinced of the wrongfulness of slavery, was to appropriate the very sum + which, in the days of his ignorance, he had obtained as the price of his + slave to the benevolent purpose of educating some pious colored men in the + town of Newport, who were desirous of returning to their native country as + missionaries. In one instance he borrowed, on his own responsibility, the + sum requisite to secure the freedom of a slave in whom he became + interested. One of his theological pupils was Newport Gardner, who, twenty + years after the death of his kind patron, left Boston as a missionary to + Africa. He was a native African, and was held by Captain Gardner, of + Newport, who allowed him to labor for his own benefit, whenever by extra + diligence he could gain a little time for that purpose. The poor fellow + was in the habit of laying up his small earnings on these occasions, in + the faint hope of one day obtaining thereby the freedom of himself and his + family. But time passed on, and the hoard of purchase-money still looked + sadly small. He concluded to try the efficacy of praying. Having gained a + day for himself, by severe labor, and communicating his plan only to Dr. + Hopkins and two or three other Christian friends, he shut himself up in + his humble dwelling, and spent the time in prayer for freedom. Towards the + close of the day, his master sent for him. He was told that this was his + gained time, and that he was engaged for himself. "No matter," returned + the master, "I must see him." Poor Newport reluctantly abandoned his + supplications, and came at his master's bidding, when, to his + astonishment, instead of a reprimand, he received a paper, signed by his + master, declaring him and his family from thenceforth free. He justly + attributed this signal blessing to the all-wise Disposer, who turns the + hearts of men as the rivers of water are turned; but it cannot be doubted + that the labors and arguments of Dr. Hopkins with his master were the + human instrumentality in effecting it. + </p> + <p> + In the year 1773, in connection with Dr. Ezra Stiles, he issued an appeal + to the Christian community in behalf of a society which he had been + instrumental in forming, for the purpose of educating missionaries for + Africa. In the desolate and benighted condition of that unhappy continent + he had become painfully interested, by conversing with the slaves brought + into Newport. Another appeal was made on the subject in 1776. + </p> + <p> + The war of the Revolution interrupted, for a time, the philanthropic plans + of Dr. Hopkins. The beautiful island on which he lived was at an early + period exposed to the exactions and devastations of the enemy. All who + could do so left it for the mainland. Its wharves were no longer thronged + with merchandise; its principal dwellings stood empty; the very meeting + houses were in a great measure abandoned. Dr. Hopkins, who had taken the + precaution, at the commencement of hostilities, to remove his family to + Great Barrington, remained himself until the year 1776, when the British + took possession of the island. During the period of its occupation, he was + employed in preaching to destitute congregations. He spent the summer of + 1777 at Newburyport, where his memory is still cherished by the few of his + hearers who survive. In the spring of 1780, he returned to Newport. + Everything had undergone a melancholy change. The garden of New England + lay desolate. His once prosperous and wealthy church and congregation were + now poor, dispirited, and, worst of all, demoralized. His meeting-house + had been used as a barrack for soldiers; pulpit and pews had been + destroyed; the very bell had been stolen. Refusing, with his + characteristic denial of self, a call to settle in a more advantageous + position, he sat himself down once more in the midst of his reduced and + impoverished parishioners, and, with no regular salary, dependent entirely + on such free-will offerings as from time to time were made him, he + remained with them until his death. + </p> + <p> + In 1776, Dr. Hopkins published his celebrated "Dialogue concerning the + Slavery of the Africans; showing it to be the Duty and Interest of the + American States to Emancipate all their Slaves." This he dedicated to the + Continental Congress, the Signers of the Declaration of Independence. It + was republished in 1785, by the New York Abolition Society, and was widely + circulated. A few years after, on coming unexpectedly into possession of a + few hundred dollars, he devoted immediately one hundred of it to the + society for ameliorating the condition of the Africans. + </p> + <p> + He continued to preach until he had reached his eighty-third year. His + last sermon was delivered on the 16th of the tenth month, 1803, and his + death took place in the twelfth month following. He died calmly, in the + steady faith of one who had long trusted all things in the hand of God. + "The language of my heart is," said he, "let God be glorified by all + things, and the best interest of His kingdom promoted, whatever becomes of + me or my interest." To a young friend, who visited him three days before + his death, he said, "I am feeble and cannot say much. I have said all I + can say. With my last words, I tell you, religion is the one thing + needful." "And now," he continued, affectionately pressing the hand of his + friend, "I am going to die, and I am glad of it." Many years before, an + agreement had been made between Dr. Hopkins and his old and tried friend, + Dr. Hart, of Connecticut, that when either was called home, the survivor + should preach the funeral sermon of the deceased. The venerable Dr. Hart + accordingly came, true to his promise, preaching at the funeral from the + words of Elisha, "My father, my father; the chariots of Israel, and the + horsemen thereof." In the burial-ground adjoining his meeting- house lies + all that was mortal of Samuel Hopkins. + </p> + <p> + One of Dr. Hopkins's habitual hearers, and who has borne grateful + testimony to the beauty and holiness of his life and conversation, was + William Ellery Channing. Widely as he afterwards diverged from the creed + of his early teacher, it contained at least one doctrine to the influence + of which the philanthropic devotion of his own life to the welfare of man + bears witness. He says, himself, that there always seemed to him something + very noble in the doctrine of disinterested benevolence, the casting of + self aside, and doing good, irrespective of personal consequences, in this + world or another, upon which Dr. Hopkins so strongly insisted, as the + all-essential condition of holiness. + </p> + <p> + How widely apart, as mere theologians, stood Hopkins and Channing! Yet how + harmonious their lives and practice! Both could forget the poor interests + of self, in view of eternal right and universal humanity. Both could + appreciate the saving truth, that love to God and His creation is the + fulfilling of the divine law. The idea of unselfish benevolence, which + they held in common, clothed with sweetness and beauty the stern and + repulsive features of the theology of Hopkins, and infused a sublime + spirit of self-sacrifice and a glowing humanity into the indecisive and + less robust faith of Charming. What is the lesson of this but that + Christianity consists rather in the affections than in the intellect; that + it is a life rather than a creed; and that they who diverge the widest + from each other in speculation upon its doctrines may, after all, be found + working side by side on the common ground of its practice. + </p> + <p> + We have chosen to speak of Dr. Hopkins as a philanthropist rather than as + a theologian. Let those who prefer to contemplate the narrow sectarian + rather than the universal man dwell upon his controversial works, and + extol the ingenuity and logical acumen with which he defended his own + dogmas and assailed those of others. We honor him, not as the founder of a + new sect, but as the friend of all mankind,—the generous defender of + the poor and oppressed. Great as unquestionably were his powers of + argument, his learning, and skill in the use of the weapons of theologic + warfare, these by no means constitute his highest title to respect and + reverence. As the product of an honest and earnest mind, his doctrinal + dissertations have at least the merit of sincerity. They were put forth in + behalf of what he regarded as truth; and the success which they met with, + while it called into exercise his profoundest gratitude, only served to + deepen the humility and self-abasement of their author. As the utterance + of what a good man believed and felt, as a part of the history of a life + remarkable for its consecration to apprehended duty, these writings cannot + be without interest even to those who dissent from their arguments and + deny their assumptions; but in the time now, we trust, near at hand, when + distracted and divided Christendom shall unite in a new Evangelical union, + in which orthodoxy in life and practice shall be estimated above orthodoxy + in theory, he will be honored as a good man, rather than as a successful + creed-maker; as a friend of the oppressed and the fearless rebuker of + popular sin rather than as the champion of a protracted sectarian war. + Even now his writings, so popular in their day, are little known. The time + may come when no pilgrim of sectarianism shall visit his grave. But his + memory shall live in the hearts of the good and generous; the emancipated + slave shall kneel over his ashes, and bless God for the gift to humanity + of a life so devoted to its welfare. To him may be applied the language of + one who, on the spot where he labored and lay down to rest, while + rejecting the doctrinal views of the theologian, still cherishes the + philanthropic spirit of the man:— + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "He is not lost,—he hath not passed away + Clouds, earths, may pass, but stars shine calmly on; + And he who doth the will of God, for aye + Abideth, when the earth and heaven are gone. + + "Alas that such a heart is in the grave!' + Thanks for the life that now shall never end! + Weep, and rejoice, thou terror-hunted slave, + That hast both lost and found so great a friend!" +</pre> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0007" id="link2H_4_0007"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + RICHARD BAXTER. + </h2> + <p> + The picture drawn by a late English historian of the infamous Jeffreys in + his judicial robes, sitting in judgment upon the venerable Richard Baxter, + brought before him to answer to an indictment, setting; forth that the + said "Richardus Baxter, persona seditiosa et factiosa pravae mentis, + impiae, inquietae, turbulent disposition et conversation; falso illicte, + injuste nequit factiose seditiose, et irreligiose, fecit, composuit, + scripsit quendam falsum, seditiosum, libellosum, factiosum et irreligiosum + librum," is so remarkable that the attention of the most careless reader + is at once arrested. Who was that old man, wasted with disease and ghastly + with the pallor of imprisonment, upon whom the foul- mouthed buffoon in + ermine exhausted his vocabulary of abuse and ridicule? Who was Richardus + Baxter? + </p> + <p> + The author of works so elaborate and profound as to frighten by their very + titles and ponderous folios the modern ecclesiastical student from their + perusal, his hold upon the present generation is limited to a few + practical treatises, which, from their very nature, can never become + obsolete. The <i>Call to the Unconverted</i> and the <i>Saints' + Everlasting Rest</i> belong to no time or sect. They speak the universal + language of the wants and desires of the human soul. They take hold of the + awful verities of life and death, righteousness and judgment to come. + Through them the suffering and hunted minister of Kidderminster has spoken + in warning, entreaty, and rebuke, or in tones of tenderest love and pity, + to the hearts of the generations which have succeeded him. His + controversial works, his confessions of faith, his learned disputations, + and his profound doctrinal treatises are no longer read. Their author + himself, towards the close of his life, anticipated, in respect to these + favorite productions, the children of his early zeal, labor, and + suffering, the judgment of posterity. "I perceive," he says, "that most of + the doctrinal controversies among Protestants are far more about equivocal + words than matter. Experience since the year 1643 to this year 1675 hath + loudly called me to repent of my own prejudices, sidings, and censurings + of causes and persons not understood, and of all the miscarriages of my + ministry and life which have been thereby caused; and to make it my chief + work to call men that are within my bearing to more peaceable thoughts, + affections, and practices." + </p> + <p> + Richard Baxter was born at the village of Eton Constantine, in 1615. He + received from officiating curates of the little church such literary + instruction as could be given by men who had left the farmer's flail, the + tailor's thimble, and the service of strolling stage-players, to perform + church drudgery under the parish incumbent, who was old and well-nigh + blind. At the age of sixteen, he was sent to a school at Wroxeter, where + he spent three years, to little purpose, so far as a scientific education + was concerned. His teacher left him to himself mainly, and following the + bent of his mind, even at that early period, he abandoned the exact + sciences for the perusal of such controversial and metaphysical writings + of the schoolmen as his master's library afforded. The smattering of Latin + which he acquired only served in after years to deform his treatises with + barbarous, ill-adapted, and erroneous citations. "As to myself," said he, + in his letter written in old age to Anthony Wood, who had inquired whether + he was an Oxonian graduate, "my faults are no disgrace to a university, + for I was of none; I have but little but what I had out of books and + inconsiderable help of country divines. Weakness and pain helped me to + study how to die; that set me a-studying how to live; and that on studying + the doctrine from which I must fetch my motives and comforts; beginning + with necessities, I proceeded by degrees, and am now going to see that for + which I have lived and studied." + </p> + <p> + Of the first essays of the young theologian as a preacher of the + Established Church, his early sufferings from that complication of + diseases with which his whole life was tormented, of the still keener + afflictions of a mind whose entire outlook upon life and nature was + discolored and darkened by its disordered bodily medium, and of the + struggles between his Puritan temperament and his reverence for Episcopal + formulas, much might be profitably said, did the limits we have assigned + ourselves admit. Nor can we do more than briefly allude to the religious + doubts and difficulties which darkened and troubled his mind at an early + period. + </p> + <p> + He tells us at length in his Life how he struggled with these spiritual + infirmities and temptations. The future life, the immortality of the soul, + and the truth of the Scriptures were by turns questioned. "I never," says + he in a letter to Dr. More, inserted in the <i>Sadducisimus Triumphatus</i>, + "had so much ado to overcome a temptation as that to the opinion of + Averroes, that, as extinguished candles go all out in an illuminated air, + so separated souls go all into one common anima mundi, and lose their + individuation." With these and similar "temptations" Baxter struggled + long, earnestly, and in the end triumphantly. His faith, when once + established, remained unshaken to the last; and although always solemn, + reverential, and deeply serious, he was never the subject of religious + melancholy, or of that mournful depression of soul which arises from + despair of an interest in the mercy and paternal love of our common + Father. + </p> + <p> + The Great Revolution found him settled as a minister in Kidderminster, + under the sanction of a drunken vicar, who, yielding to the clamor of his + more sober parishioners, and his fear of their appeal to the Long + Parliament, then busy in its task of abating church nuisances, had agreed + to give him sixty pounds per year, in the place of a poor tippling curate, + notorious as a common railer and pothouse encumbrance. + </p> + <p> + As might have been expected, the sharp contrast which the earnest, + devotional spirit and painful strictness of Baxter presented to the + irreverent license and careless good humor of his predecessor by no means + commended him to the favor of a large class of his parishioners. Sabbath + merry-makers missed the rubicund face and maudlin jollity of their old + vicar; the ignorant and vicious disliked the new preacher's rigid + morality; the better informed revolted at his harsh doctrines, austere + life, and grave manner. Intense earnestness characterized all his efforts. + Contrasting human nature with the Infinite Purity and Holiness, he was + oppressed with the sense of the loathsomeness and deformity of sin, and + afflicted by the misery of his fellow-creatures separated from the divine + harmony. He tells us that at this period he preached the terrors of the + Law and the necessity of repentance, rather than the joys and consolations + of the Gospel, upon which he so loved to dwell in his last years. He seems + to have felt a necessity laid upon him to startle men from false hope and + security, and to call for holiness of life and conformity to the divine + will as the only ground of safety. Powerful and impressive as are the + appeals and expostulations contained in his written works, they probably + convey but a faint idea of the force and earnestness of those which he + poured forth from his pulpit. As he advanced in years, these appeals were + less frequently addressed to the fears of his auditors, for he had learned + to value a calm and consistent life of practical goodness beyond any + passionate exhibition of terrors, fervors, and transports. Having + witnessed, in an age of remarkable enthusiasm and spiritual awakening, the + ill effects of passional excitements and religious melancholy, he + endeavored to present cheerful views of Christian life and duty, and made + it a special object to repress morbid imaginations and heal diseased + consciences. Thus it came to pass that no man of his day was more often + applied to for counsel and relief by persons laboring under mental + depression than himself. He has left behind him a very curious and not + uninstructive discourse, which he entitled The Cure of Melancholy, by + Faith and Physick, in which he shows a great degree of skill in his morbid + mental anatomy. He had studied medicine to some extent for the benefit of + the poor of his parish, and knew something of the intimate relations and + sympathy of the body and mind; he therefore did not hesitate to ascribe + many of the spiritual complaints of his applicants to disordered bodily + functions, nor to prescribe pills and powders in the place of Scripture + texts. More than thirty years after the commencement of his labors at + Kidderminster he thus writes: "I was troubled this year with multitudes of + melancholy persons from several places of the land; some of high quality, + some of low, some exquisitely learned, and some unlearned. I know not how + it came to pass, but if men fell melancholy I must hear from them or see + them, more than any physician I knew." He cautions against ascribing + melancholy phantasms and passions to the Holy Spirit, warns the young + against licentious imaginations and excitements, and ends by advising all + to take heed how they make of religion a matter of "fears, tears, and + scruples." "True religion," he remarks, "doth principally consist in + obedience, love, and joy." + </p> + <p> + At this early period of his ministry, however, he had all of Whitefield's + intensity and fervor, added to reasoning powers greatly transcending those + of the revivalist of the next century. Young in years, he was even then + old in bodily infirmity and mental experience. Believing himself the + victim of a mortal disease, he lived and preached in the constant prospect + of death. His memento mori was in his bed-chamber, and sat by him at his + frugal meal. The glory of the world was stained to his vision. He was + blind to the beauty of all its "pleasant pictures." No monk of Mount Athos + or silent Chartreuse, no anchorite of Indian superstition, ever more + completely mortified the flesh, or turned his back more decidedly upon the + "good things" of this life. A solemn and funeral atmosphere surrounded + him. He walked in the shadows of the cypress, and literally "dwelt among + the tombs." Tortured by incessant pain, he wrestled against its attendant + languor and debility, as a sinful wasting of inestimable time; goaded + himself to constant toil and devotional exercise, and, to use his own + words, "stirred up his sluggish soul to speak to sinners with compassion, + as a dying man to dying men." + </p> + <p> + Such entire consecration could not long be without its effect, even upon + the "vicious rabble," as Baxter calls them. His extraordinary earnestness, + self-forgetting concern for the spiritual welfare of others, his rigid + life of denial and sacrifice, if they failed of bringing men to his feet + as penitents, could not but awaken a feeling of reverence and awe. In + Kidderminster, as in most other parishes of the kingdom, there were at + this period pious, sober, prayerful people, diligent readers of the + Scriptures, who were derided by their neighbors as Puritans, precisians, + and hypocrites. These were naturally drawn towards the new preacher, and + he as naturally recognized them as "honest seekers of the word and way of + God." Intercourse with such men, and the perusal of the writings of + certain eminent Non-conformists, had the effect to abate, in some degree, + his strong attachment to the Episcopal formula and polity. He began to + doubt the rightfulness of making the sign of the cross in baptism, and to + hesitate about administering the sacrament to profane swearers and + tipplers. + </p> + <p> + But while Baxter, in the seclusion of his parish, was painfully weighing + the arguments for and against the wearing of surplices, the use of + marriage rings, and the prescribed gestures and genuflections of his + order, tithing with more or less scruple of conscience the mint and anise + and cummin of pulpit ceremonials, the weightier matters of the law, + freedom, justice, and truth were claiming the attention of Pym and + Hampden, Brook and Vane, in the Parliament House. The controversy between + King and Commons had reached the point where it could only be decided by + the dread arbitrament of battle. The somewhat equivocal position of the + Kidderminster preacher exposed him to the suspicion of the adherents of + the King and Bishops. The rabble, at that period sympathizing with the + party of license in morals and strictness in ceremonials, insulted and + mocked him, and finally drove him from his parish. + </p> + <p> + On the memorable 23d of tenth month, 1642, he was invited to occupy a + friend's pulpit at Alcester. + </p> + <p> + While preaching, a low, dull, jarring roll, as of continuous thunder, + sounded in his ears. It was the cannon-fire of Edgehill, the prelude to + the stern battle-piece of revolution. On the morrow, Baxter hurried to the + scene of action. "I was desirous," he says, "to see the field. I found the + Earl of Essex keeping the ground, and the King's army facing them on a + hill about a mile off. There were about a thousand dead bodies in the + field between them." Turning from this ghastly survey, the preacher + mingled with the Parliamentary army, when, finding the surgeons busy with + the wounded, he very naturally sought occasion for the exercise of his own + vocation as a spiritual practitioner. He attached himself to the army. So + far as we can gather from his own memoirs and the testimony of his + contemporaries, he was not influenced to this step by any of the political + motives which actuated the Parliamentary leaders. He was no revolutionist. + He was as blind and unquestioning in his reverence for the King's person + and divine right, and as hearty in his hatred of religious toleration and + civil equality, as any of his clerical brethren who officiated in a + similar capacity in the ranks of Goring and Prince Rupert. He seems only + to have looked upon the soldiers as a new set of parishioners, whom + Providence had thrown in his way. The circumstances of his situation left + him little choice in the matter. "I had," he says, "neither money nor + friends. I knew not who would receive me in a place of safety, nor had I + anything to satisfy them for diet and entertainment." He accepted an offer + to live in the Governor's house at Coventry, and preach to the soldiers of + the garrison. Here his skill in polemics was called into requisition, in + an encounter with two New England Antinomians, and a certain Anabaptist + tailor who was making more rents in the garrison's orthodoxy than he + mended in their doublets and breeches. Coventry seems at this time to have + been the rendezvous of a large body of clergymen, who, as Baxter says, + were "for King and Parliament,"—men who, in their desire for a more + spiritual worship, most unwillingly found themselves classed with the + sentries whom they regarded as troublers and heretics, not to be + tolerated; who thought the King had fallen into the hands of the Papists, + and that Essex and Cromwell were fighting to restore him; and who followed + the Parliamentary forces to see to it that they were kept sound in faith, + and free from the heresy of which the Court News-Book accused them. Of + doing anything to overturn the order of Church and State, or of promoting + any radical change in the social and political condition of the people, + they had no intention whatever. They looked at the events of the time, and + upon their duties in respect to them, not as politicians or reformers, but + simply as ecclesiastics and spiritual teachers, responsible to God for the + religious beliefs and practices of the people, rather than for their + temporal welfare and happiness. They were not the men who struck down the + solemn and imposing prelacy of England, and vindicated the divine right of + men to freedom by tossing the head of an anointed tyrant from the scaffold + at Whitehall. It was the so-called schismatics, ranters, and levellers, + the disputatious corporals and Anabaptist musketeers, the dread and + abhorrence alike of prelate and presbyter, who, under the lead of + Cromwell, + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "Ruined the great work of time, + And cast the kingdoms old + Into another mould." +</pre> + <p> + The Commonwealth was the work of the laity, the sturdy yeomanry and God- + fearing commoners of England. + </p> + <p> + The news of the fight of Naseby reaching Coventry, Baxter, who had friends + in the Parliamentary forces, wishing, as he says, to be assured of their + safety, passed over to the stricken field, and spent a night with them. He + was afflicted and confounded by the information which they gave him, that + the victorious army was full of hot-headed schemers and levellers, who + were against King and Church, prelacy and ritual, and who were for a free + Commonwealth and freedom of religious belief and worship. He was appalled + to find that the heresies of the Antinomians, Arminians, and Anabaptists + had made sadder breaches in the ranks of Cromwell than the pikes of Jacob + Astley, or the daggers of the roysterers who followed the mad charge of + Rupert. Hastening back to Coventry, he called together his clerical + brethren, and told them "the sad news of the corruption of the army." + After much painful consideration of the matter, it was deemed best for + Baxter to enter Cromwell's army, nominally as its chaplain, but really as + the special representative of orthodoxy in politics and religion, against + the democratic weavers and prophesying tailors who troubled it. He joined + Whalley's regiment, and followed it through many a hot skirmish and siege. + Personal fear was by no means one of Baxter's characteristics, and he bore + himself through all with the coolness of an old campaigner. Intent upon + his single object, he sat unmoved under the hail of cannon-shot from the + walls of Bristol, confronted the well-plied culverins of Sherburne, + charged side by side with Harrison upon Goring's musketeers at Langford, + and heard the exulting thanksgiving of that grim enthusiast, when "with a + loud voice he broke forth in praises of God, as one in rapture;" and + marched, Bible in hand, with Cromwell himself, to the storming of + Basing-House, so desperately defended by the Marquis of Winchester. In + truth, these storms of outward conflict were to him of small moment. He + was engaged in a sterner battle with spiritual principalities and powers, + struggling with Satan himself in the guise of political levellers and + Antinomian sowers of heresy. No antagonist was too high and none too low + for him. Distrusting Cromwell, he sought to engage him in a discussion of + certain points of abstract theology, wherein his soundness seemed + questionable; but the wary chief baffled off the young disputant by + tedious, unanswerable discourses about free grace, which Baxter admits + were not unsavory to others, although the speaker himself had little + understanding of the matter. At other times, he repelled his sad-visaged + chaplain with unwelcome jests and rough, soldierly merriment; for he had + "a vivacity, hilarity, and alacrity as another man hath when he hath taken + a cup too much." Baxter says of him, complainingly, "he would not dispute + with me at all." But, in the midst of such an army, he could not lack + abundant opportunity for the exercise of his peculiar powers of + argumentation. At Amersham, he had a sort of pitched battle with the + contumacious soldiers. "When the public talking day came," says he, "I + took the reading-pew, and Pitchford's cornet and troopers took the + gallery. There did the leader of the Chesham men begin, and afterwards + Pitchford's soldiers set in; and I alone disputed with them from morning + until almost night; for I knew their trick, that if I had gone out first, + they would have prated what boasting words they listed, and made the + people believe that they had baffled me, or got the best; therefore I + stayed it out till they first rose and went away." As usual in such cases, + both parties claimed the victory. Baxter got thanks only from the King's + adherents; "Pitchford's troops and the leader of the Chesham men" retired + from their hard day's work, to enjoy the countenance and favor of + Cromwell, as men after his own heart, faithful to the Houses and the Word, + against kingcraft and prelacy. + </p> + <p> + Laughed at and held at arm's length by Cromwell, shunned by Harrison and + Berry and other chief officers, opposed on all points by shrewd, earnest + men, as ready for polemic controversy as for battle with the King's + malignants, and who set off against his theological and metaphysical + distinctions their own personal experiences and spiritual exercises, he + had little to encourage him in his arduous labors. Alone in such a + multitude, flushed with victory and glowing with religious enthusiasm, he + earnestly begged his brother ministers to come to his aid. "If the army," + said he, "had only ministers enough, who could have done such little as I + did, all their plot might have been broken, and King, Parliament, and + Religion might have been preserved." But no one volunteered to assist him, + and the "plot" of revolution went on. + </p> + <p> + After Worcester fight he returned to Coventry, to make his report to the + ministers assembled there. He told them of his labors and trials, of the + growth of heresy and levelling principles in the army, and of the evident + design of its leaders to pull down Church, King, and Ministers. He assured + them that the day was at hand when all who were true to the King, + Parliament, and Religion should come forth to oppose these leaders, and + draw away their soldiers from them. For himself, he was willing to go back + to the army, and labor there until the crisis of which he spoke had + arrived. "Whereupon," says he, "they all voted me to go yet longer." + </p> + <p> + Fortunately for the cause of civil and religious freedom, the great body + of the ministers, who disapproved of the ultraism of the victorious army, + and sympathized with the defeated King, lacked the courage and devotedness + of Baxter. Had they promptly seconded his efforts, although the + restoration of the King might have been impossible at that late period, + the horrors of civil war must have been greatly protracted. As it was, + they preferred to remain at home, and let Baxter have the benefit of their + prayers and good wishes. He returned to the army with the settled purpose, + of causing its defection from Cromwell; but, by one of those dispensations + which the latter used to call "births of Providence," he was stricken down + with severe sickness. Baxter's own comments upon this passage in his life + are not without interest. He says, God prevented his purposes in his last + and chiefest opposition to the army; that he intended to take off or + seduce from their officers the regiment with which he was connected, and + then to have tried his persuasion upon the others. He says he afterwards + found that his sickness was a mercy to himself, "for they were so strong + and active, and I had been likely to have had small success in the + attempt, and to have lost my life among them in their fury." He was right + in this last conjecture; Oliver Cromwell would have had no scruples in + making an example of a plotting priest; and "Pitchford's soldiers" might + have been called upon to silence, with their muskets, the tough disputant + who was proof against their tongues. + </p> + <p> + After a long and dubious illness, Baxter was so far restored as to be able + to go back to his old parish at Kidderminster. Here, under the + Protectorate of Cromwell, he remained in the full enjoyment of that + religious liberty which he still stoutly condemned in its application to + others. + </p> + <p> + He afterwards candidly admits, that, under the "Usurper," as he styles + Cromwell, "he had such liberty and advantage to preach the Gospel with + success, as he could not have under a King, to whom he had sworn and + performed true subjection and obedience." Yet this did not prevent him + from preaching and printing, "seasonably and moderately," against the + Protector. "I declared," said he, "Cromwell and his adherents to be guilty + of treason and rebellion, aggravated by perfidiousness and hypocrisy. But + yet I did not think it my duty to rave against him in the pulpit, or to do + this so unseasonably and imprudently as might irritate him to mischief. + And the rather, because, as he kept up his approbation of a godly life in + general, and of all that was good, except that which the interest of his + sinful cause engaged him to be against. So I perceived that it was his + design to do good in the main, and to promote the Gospel and the interests + of godliness more than any had done before him." + </p> + <p> + Cromwell, if he heard of his diatribes against him, appears to have cared + little for them. Lords Warwick and Broghill, on one occasion, brought him + to preach before the Lord Protector. He seized the occasion to preach + against the sentries, to condemn all who countenanced them, and to + advocate the unity of the Church. Soon after, he was sent for by Cromwell, + who made "a long and tedious speech" in the presence of three of his chief + men, (one of whom, General Lambert, fell asleep the while,) asserting that + God had owned his government in a signal manner. Baxter boldly replied to + him, that he and his friends regarded the ancient monarchy as a blessing, + and not an evil, and begged to know how that blessing was forfeited to + England, and to whom that forfeiture was made. Cromwell, with some heat, + made answer that it was no forfeiture, but that God had made the change. + They afterwards held a long conference with respect to freedom of + conscience, Cromwell defending his liberal policy, and Baxter opposing it. + No one can read Baxter's own account of these interviews, without being + deeply impressed with the generous and magnanimous spirit of the Lord + Protector in tolerating the utmost freedom of speech on the part of one + who openly denounced him as a traitor and usurper. Real greatness of mind + could alone have risen above personal resentment under such circumstances + of peculiar aggravation. + </p> + <p> + In the death of the Protector, the treachery of Monk, and the restoration + of the King, Baxter and his Presbyterian friends believed that they saw + the hand of a merciful Providence preparing the way for the best good of + England and the Church. Always royalists, they had acted with the party + opposed to the King from necessity rather than choice. Considering all + that followed, one can scarcely avoid smiling over the extravagant + jubilations of the Presbyterian divines, on the return of the royal + debauchee to Whitehall. They hurried up to London with congratulations of + formidable length and papers of solemn advice and counsel, to all which + the careless monarch listened, with what patience he was master of. Baxter + was one of the first to present himself at Court, and it is creditable to + his heart rather than his judgment and discrimination that he seized the + occasion to offer a long address to the King, expressive of his + expectation that his Majesty would discountenance all sin and promote + godliness, support the true exercise of Church discipline and cherish and + hold up the hands of the faithful ministers of the Church. To all which + Charles II. "made as gracious an answer as we could expect," says Baxter, + "insomuch that old Mr. Ash burst out into tears of joy." Who doubts that + the profligate King avenged himself as soon as the backs of his unwelcome + visitors were fairly turned, by coarse jests and ribaldry, directed + against a class of men whom he despised and hated, but towards whom + reasons of policy dictated a show of civility and kindness? + </p> + <p> + There is reason to believe that Charles II., had he been able to effect + his purpose, would have gone beyond Cromwell himself in the matter of + religious toleration; in other words, he would have taken, in the outset + of his reign, the very steps which cost his successor his crown, and + procured the toleration of Catholics by a declaration of universal freedom + in religion. But he was not in a situation to brave the opposition alike + of Prelacy and Presbyterianism, and foiled in a scheme to which he was + prompted by that vague, superstitious predilection for the Roman Catholic + religion which at times struggled with his habitual scepticism, his next + object was to rid himself of the importunities of sentries and the trouble + of religious controversies by reestablishing the liturgy, and bribing or + enforcing conformity to it on the part of the Presbyterians. The history + of the successful execution of this purpose is familiar to all the readers + of the plausible pages of Clarendon on the one side, or the complaining + treatises of Neal and Calamy on the other. + </p> + <p> + Charles and his advisers triumphed, not so much through their own art, + dissimulation, and bad faith as through the blind bigotry, divided + counsels, and self-seeking of the Nonconformists. Seduction on one hand + and threats on the other, the bribe of bishoprics, hatred of Independents + and Quakers, and the terror of penal laws, broke the strength of + Presbyterianism. + </p> + <p> + Baxter's whole conduct, on this occasion, bears testimony to his honesty + and sincerity, while it shows him to have been too intolerant to secure + his own religious freedom at the price of toleration for Catholics, + Quakers, and Anabaptists; and too blind in his loyalty to perceive that + pure and undefiled Christianity had nothing to hope for from a scandalous + and depraved King, surrounded by scoffing, licentious courtiers and a + haughty, revengeful prelacy. To secure his influence, the Court offered + him the bishopric of Hereford. Superior to personal considerations, he + declined the honor; but somewhat inconsistently, in his zeal for the + interests of his party, he urged the elevation of at least three of his + Presbyterian friends to the Episcopal bench, to enforce that very liturgy + which they condemned. He was the chief speaker for the Presbyterians at + the famous Savoy Conference, summoned to advise and consult upon the Book + of Common Prayer. His antagonist was Dr. Gunning, ready, fluent, and + impassioned. "They spent," as Gilbert Burnet says, "several days in + logical arguing, to the diversion of the town, who looked upon them as a + couple of fencers, engaged in a discussion which could not be brought to + an end." In themselves considered, many of the points at issue seem + altogether too trivial for the zeal with which Baxter contested them,— + the form of a surplice, the wording of a prayer, kneeling at sacrament, + the sign of the cross, etc. With him, however, they were of momentous + interest and importance, as things unlawful in the worship of God. He + struggled desperately, but unavailingly. Presbyterianism, in its eagerness + for peace and union and a due share of State support, had already made + fatal concessions, and it was too late to stand upon non- essentials. + Baxter retired from the conference baffled and defeated, amidst murmurs + and jests. "If you had only been as fat as Dr. Manton," said Clarendon to + him, "you would have done well." + </p> + <p> + The Act of Conformity, in which Charles II. and his counsellors gave the + lie to the liberal declarations of Breda and Whitehall, drove Baxter from + his sorrowing parishioners of Kidderminster, and added the evils of + poverty and persecution to the painful bodily infirmities under which he + was already bowed down. Yet his cup was not one of unalloyed bitterness, + and loving lips were prepared to drink it with him. + </p> + <p> + Among Baxter's old parishioners of Kidderminster was a widowed lady of + gentle birth, named Charlton, who, with her daughter Margaret, occupied a + house in his neighborhood. The daughter was a brilliant girl, of + "strangely vivid wit," and "in early youth," he tells us, "pride, and + romances, and company suitable thereunto, did take her up." But erelong, + Baxter, who acted in the double capacity of spiritual and temporal + physician, was sent for to visit her, on an occasion of sickness. He + ministered to her bodily and mental sufferings, and thus secured her + gratitude and confidence. On her recovery, under the influence of his + warnings and admonitions, the gay young girl became thoughtful and + serious, abandoned her light books and companions, and devoted herself to + the duties of a Christian profession. Baxter was her counsellor and + confidant. She disclosed to him all her doubts, trials, and temptations, + and he, in return, wrote her long letters of sympathy, consolation, and + encouragement. He began to feel such an unwonted interest in the moral and + spiritual growth of his young disciple, that, in his daily walks among his + parishioners, he found himself inevitably drawn towards her mother's + dwelling. In her presence, the habitual austerity of his manner was + softened; his cold, close heart warmed and expanded. He began to repay her + confidence with his own, disclosing to her all his plans of benevolence, + soliciting her services, and waiting, with deference, for her judgment + upon them. A change came over his habits of thought and his literary + tastes; the harsh, rude disputant, the tough, dry logician, found himself + addressing to his young friend epistles in verse on doctrinal points and + matters of casuistry; Westminster Catechism in rhyme; the Solemn League + and Covenant set to music. A miracle alone could have made Baxter a poet; + the cold, clear light of reason "paled the ineffectual fires" of his + imagination; all things presented themselves to his vision "with hard + outlines, colorless, and with no surrounding atmosphere." That he did, + nevertheless, write verses, so creditable as to justify a judicious modern + critic in their citation and approval, can perhaps be accounted for only + as one of the phenomena of that subtle and transforming influence to which + even his stern nature was unconsciously yielding. Baxter was in love. + </p> + <p> + Never did the blind god try his archery on a more unpromising subject. + Baxter was nearly fifty years of age, and looked still older. His life had + been one long fast and penance. Even in youth he had never known a + schoolboy's love for cousin or playmate. He had resolutely closed up his + heart against emotions which he regarded as the allurements of time and + sense. He had made a merit of celibacy, and written and published against + the entanglement of godly ministers in matrimonial engagements and family + cares. It is questionable whether he now understood his own case, or + attributed to its right cause the peculiar interest which he felt in + Margaret Charlton. Left to himself, it is more than probable that he might + never have discovered the true nature of that interest, or conjectured + that anything whatever of earthly passion or sublunary emotion had mingled + with his spiritual Platonism. Commissioned and set apart to preach + repentance to dying men, penniless and homeless, worn with bodily pain and + mental toil, and treading, as he believed, on the very margin of his + grave, what had he to do with love? What power had he to inspire that + tender sentiment, the appropriate offspring only of youth, and health, and + beauty? + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "Could any Beatrice see + A lover in such anchorite!" +</pre> + <p> + But in the mean time a reciprocal feeling was gaining strength in the + heart of Margaret. To her grateful appreciation of the condescension of a + great and good man—grave, learned, and renowned—to her youth + and weakness, and to her enthusiastic admiration of his intellectual + powers, devoted to the highest and holiest objects, succeeded naturally + enough the tenderly suggestive pity of her woman's heart, as she thought + of his lonely home, his unshared sorrows, his lack of those sympathies and + kindnesses which make tolerable the hard journey of life. Did she not owe + to him, under God, the salvation of body and mind? Was he not her truest + and most faithful friend, entering with lively interest into all her joys + and sorrows? Had she not seen the cloud of his habitual sadness broken by + gleams of sunny warmth and cheerfulness, as they conversed together? Could + she do better than devote herself to the pleasing task of making his life + happier, of comforting him in seasons of pain and weariness, encouraging + him in his vast labors, and throwing over the cold and hard austerities of + his nature the warmth and light of domestic affection? Pity, reverence, + gratitude, and womanly tenderness, her fervid imagination and the + sympathies of a deeply religious nature, combined to influence her + decision. Disparity of age and condition rendered it improbable that + Baxter would ever venture to address her in any other capacity than that + of a friend and teacher; and it was left to herself to give the first + intimation of the possibility of a more intimate relation. + </p> + <p> + It is easy to imagine with what mixed feelings of joy, surprise, and + perplexity Baxter must have received the delicate avowal. There was much + in the circumstances of the case to justify doubt, misgiving, and close + searchings of heart. He must have felt the painful contrast which that + fair girl in the bloom of her youth presented to the worn man of middle + years, whose very breath was suffering, and over whom death seemed always + impending. Keenly conscious of his infirmities of temper, he must have + feared for the happiness of a loving, gentle being, daily exposed to their + manifestations. From his well-known habit of consulting what he regarded + as the divine will in every important step of his life, there can be no + doubt that his decision was the result quite as much of a prayerful and + patient consideration of duty as of the promptings of his heart. Richard + Baxter was no impassioned Abelard; his pupil in the school of his severe + and self-denying piety was no Heloise; but what their union lacked in + romantic interest was compensated by its purity and disinterestedness, and + its sanction by all that can hallow human passion, and harmonize the love + of the created with the love and service of the Creator. + </p> + <p> + Although summoned by a power which it would have been folly to resist, the + tough theologian did not surrender at discretion. "From the first thoughts + yet many changes and stoppages intervened, and long delays," he tells us. + The terms upon which he finally capitulated are perfectly in keeping with + his character. "She consented," he says, "to three conditions of our + marriage. 1st. That I should have nothing that before our marriage was + hers; that I, who wanted no earthly supplies, might not seem to marry her + from selfishness. 2d. That she would so alter her affairs that I might be + entangled in no lawsuits. 3d. That she should expect none of my time which + my ministerial work should require." + </p> + <p> + As was natural, the wits of the Court had their jokes upon this singular + marriage; and many of his best friends regretted it, when they called to + mind what he had written in favor of ministerial celibacy, at a time when, + as he says, "he thought to live and die a bachelor." But Baxter had no + reason to regret the inconsistency of his precept and example. How much of + the happiness of the next twenty years of his life resulted from his union + with a kind and affectionate woman he has himself testified, in his simple + and touching Breviate of the Life of the late Mrs. Baxter. Her affections + were so ardent that her husband confesses his fear that he was unable to + make an adequate return, and that she must have been disappointed in him + in consequence. He extols her pleasant conversation, her active + benevolence, her disposition to aid him in all his labors, and her noble + forgetfulness of self, in ministering to his comfort, in sickness and + imprisonment. "She was the meetest helper I could have had in the world," + is his language. "If I spoke harshly or sharply, it offended her. If I + carried it (as I am apt) with too much negligence of ceremony or humble + compliment to any, she would modestly tell me of it. If my looks seemed + not pleasant, she would have me amend them (which my weak, pained state of + body indisposed me to do)." He admits she had her failings, but, taken as + a whole, the Breviate is an exalted eulogy. + </p> + <p> + His history from this time is marked by few incidents of a public + character. During that most disgraceful period in the annals of England, + the reign of the second Charles, his peculiar position exposed him to the + persecutions of prelacy and the taunts and abuse of the sentries, standing + as he did between these extremes, and pleading for a moderate Episcopacy. + He was between the upper millstone of High Church and the nether one of + Dissent. To use his own simile, he was like one who seeks to fill with his + hand a cleft in a log, and feels both sides close upon him with pain. All + parties and sects had, as they thought, grounds of complaint against him. + There was in him an almost childish simplicity of purpose, a headlong + earnestness and eagerness, which did not allow him to consider how far a + present act or opinion harmonized with what he had already done or + written. His greatest admirers admit his lack of judgment, his inaptitude + for the management of practical matters. His utter incapacity to + comprehend rightly the public men and measures of his day is abundantly + apparent; and the inconsistencies of his conduct and his writings are too + marked to need comment. He suffered persecution for not conforming to some + trifling matters of Church usage, while he advocated the doctrine of + passive obedience to the King or ruling power, and the right of that power + to enforce conformity. He wrote against conformity while himself + conforming; seceded from the Church, and yet held stated communion with + it; begged for the curacy of Kidderminster, and declined the bishopric of + Hereford. His writings were many of them directly calculated to make + Dissenters from the Establishment, but he was invariably offended to find + others practically influenced by them, and quarrelled with his own + converts to Dissent. The High Churchmen of Oxford burned his Holy + Commonwealth as seditious and revolutionary; while Harrington and the + republican club of Miles's Coffee House condemned it for its hostility to + democracy and its servile doctrine of obedience to kings. He made noble + pleas for liberty of conscience and bitterly complained of his own + suffering from Church courts, yet maintained the necessity of enforcing + conformity, and stoutly opposed the tolerant doctrines of Penn and Milton. + Never did a great and good man so entangle himself with contradictions and + inconsistencies. The witty and wicked Sir Roger L'Estrange compiled from + the irreconcilable portions of his works a laughable Dialogue between + Richard and Baxter. The Antinomians found him guilty of Socinianism; and + one noted controversialist undertook to show, not without some degree of + plausibility, that he was by turns a Quaker and a Papist! + </p> + <p> + Although able to suspend his judgment and carefully weigh evidence, upon + matters which he regarded as proper subjects of debate and scrutiny, he + possessed the power to shut out and banish at will all doubt and misgiving + in respect to whatever tended to prove, illustrate, or enforce his settled + opinions and cherished doctrines. His credulity at times seems boundless. + Hating the Quakers, and prepared to believe all manner of evil of them, he + readily came to the conclusion that their leaders were disguised Papists. + He maintained that Lauderdale was a good and pious man, in spite of + atrocities in Scotland which entitle him to a place with Claverhouse; and + indorsed the character of the infamous Dangerfield, the inventor of the + Meal-tub Plot, as a worthy convert from popish errors. To prove the + existence of devils and spirits, he collected the most absurd stories and + old-wives' fables, of soldiers scared from their posts at night by + headless bears, of a young witch pulling the hooks out of Mr. Emlen's + breeches and swallowing them, of Mr. Beacham's locomotive tobacco-pipe, + and the Rev. Mr. Munn's jumping Bible, and of a drunken man punished for + his intemperance by being lifted off his legs by an invisible hand! Cotton + Mather's marvellous account of his witch experiments in New England + delighted him. He had it republished, declaring that "he must be an + obstinate Sadducee who doubted it." + </p> + <p> + The married life of Baxter, as might be inferred from the state of the + times, was an unsettled one. He first took a house at Moorfields, then + removed to Acton, where he enjoyed the conversation of his neighbor, Sir + Matthew Hale; from thence he found refuge in Rickmansworth, and after that + in divers other places. "The women have most of this trouble," he remarks, + "but my wife easily bore it all." When unable to preach, his rapid pen was + always busy. Huge folios of controversial and doctrinal lore followed each + other in quick succession. He assailed Popery and the Establishment, + Anabaptists, ultra Calvinists, Antinomians, Fifth Monarchy men, and + Quakers. His hatred of the latter was only modified by his contempt. He + railed rather than argued against the "miserable creatures," as he styled + them. They in turn answered him in like manner. "The Quakers," he says, + "in their shops, when I go along London streets, say, 'Alas' poor man, + thou art yet in darkness.' They have oft come to the congregation, when I + had liberty to preach Christ's Gospel, and cried out against me as a + deceiver of the people. They have followed me home, crying out in the + streets, 'The day of the Lord is coming, and thou shalt perish as a + deceiver.' They have stood in the market-place, and under my window, year + after year, crying to the people, 'Take heed of your priests, they deceive + your souls;' and if any one wore a lace or neat clothing, they cried out + to me, 'These are the fruits of your ministry.'" + </p> + <p> + At Rickmansworth, he found himself a neighbor of William Penn, whom he + calls "the captain of the Quakers." Ever ready for battle, Baxter + encountered him in a public discussion, with such fierceness and + bitterness as to force from that mild and amiable civilian the remark, + that he would rather be Socrates at the final judgment than Richard + Baxter. Both lived to know each other better, and to entertain sentiments + of mutual esteem. Baxter himself admits that the Quakers, by their + perseverance in holding their religious meetings in defiance of penal + laws, took upon themselves the burden of persecution which would otherwise + have fallen upon himself and his friends; and makes special mention of the + noble and successful plea of Penn before the Recorder's Court in London, + based on the fundamental liberties of Englishmen and the rights of the + Great Charter. + </p> + <p> + The intolerance of Baxter towards the Separatists was turned against him + whenever he appealed to the King and Parliament against the proscription + of himself and his friends. "They gathered," he complains, "out of mine + and other men's books all that we had said against liberty for Popery and + Quakers railing against ministers in open congregation, and applied it as + against the toleration of ourselves." It was in vain that he explained + that he was only in favor of a gentle coercion of dissent, a moderate + enforcement of conformity. His plan for dealing with sentries reminds one + of old Isaak Walton's direction to his piscatorial readers, to impale the + frog on the hook as gently as if they loved him. + </p> + <p> + While at Acton, he was complained of by Dr. Ryves, the rector, one of the + King's chaplains in ordinary, for holding religious services in his family + with more than five strangers present. He was cast into Clerkenwell jail, + whither his faithful wife followed him. On his discharge, he sought refuge + in the hamlet of Totteridge, where he wrote and published that Paraphrase + on the New Testament which was made the ground of his prosecution and + trial before Jeffreys. + </p> + <p> + On the 14th of the sixth month, 1681, he was called to endure the greatest + affliction of his life. His wife died on that day, after a brief illness. + She who had been his faithful friend, companion, and nurse for twenty + years was called away from him in the time of his greatest need of her + ministrations. He found consolation in dwelling on her virtues and + excellences in the Breviate of her life; "a paper monument," he says, + "erected by one who is following her even at the door in some passion + indeed of love and grief." In the preface to his poetical pieces he + alludes to her in terms of touching simplicity and tenderness: "As these + pieces were mostly written in various passions, so passion hath now thrust + them out into the world. God having taken away the dear companion of the + last nineteen years of my life, as her sorrows and sufferings long ago + gave being to some of these poems, for reasons, which the world is not + concerned to know; so my grief for her removal, and the revival of the + sense of former things, have prevailed upon me to be passionate in the + sight of all." + </p> + <p> + The circumstances of his trial before the judicial monster, Jeffreys, are + too well known to justify their detail in this sketch. He was sentenced to + pay a fine of five hundred marks. Seventy years of age, and reduced to + poverty by former persecutions, he was conveyed to the King's Bench + prison. Here for two years he lay a victim to intense bodily suffering. + When, through the influence of his old antagonist, Penn, he was restored + to freedom, he was already a dying man. But he came forth from prison as + he entered it, unsubdued in spirit. + </p> + <p> + Urged to sign a declaration of thanks to James II., his soul put on the + athletic habits of youth, and he stoutly refused to commend an act of + toleration which had given freedom not to himself alone, but to Papists + and sentries. Shaking off the dust of the Court from his feet, he retired + to a dwelling in Charter-House Square, near his friend Sylvester's, and + patiently awaited his deliverance. His death was quiet and peaceful. "I + have pain," he said to his friend Mather; "there is no arguing against + sense; but I have peace. I have peace." On being asked how he did, he + answered, in memorable words, "Almost well!" + </p> + <p> + He was buried in Christ Church, where the remains of his wife and her + mother had been placed. An immense concourse attended his funeral, of all + ranks and parties. Conformist and Non-conformist forgot the bitterness of + the controversialist, and remembered only the virtues and the piety of the + man. Looking back on his life of self-denial and faithfulness to + apprehended duty, the men who had persecuted him while living wept over + his grave. During the last few years of his life, the severity of his + controversial tone had been greatly softened; he lamented his former lack + of charity, the circle of his sympathies widened, his social affections + grew stronger with age, and love for his fellow-men universally, and + irrespective of religious differences, increased within him. In his + Narrative, written in the long, cool shadows of the evening of life, he + acknowledges with extraordinary candor this change in his views and + feelings. He confesses his imperfections as a writer and public teacher. + </p> + <p> + "I wish," he says, "all over-sharp passages were expunged from my + writings, and I ask forgiveness of God and man." He tells us that mankind + appear more equal to him; the good are not so good as he once thought, nor + the bad so evil; and that in all there is more for grace to make advantage + of, and more to testify for God and holiness, than he once believed. "I + less admire," he continues, "gifts of utterance, and the bare profession + of religion, than I once did, and have now much more charity for those + who, by want of gifts, do make an obscurer profession." + </p> + <p> + He laments the effects of his constitutional irritability and impatience + upon his social intercourse and his domestic relations, and that his + bodily infirmities did not allow him a free expression of the tenderness + and love of his heart. Who does not feel the pathos and inconsolable + regret which dictated the following paragraph? + </p> + <p> + "When God forgiveth me, I cannot forgive myself, especially for my rash + words and deeds by which I have seemed injurious and less tender and kind + than I should have been to my near and dear relations, whose love + abundantly obliged me. When such are dead, though we never differed in + point of interest or any other matter, every sour or cross or provoking + word which I gave them maketh me almost irreconcilable to myself, and + tells me how repentance brought some of old to pray to the dead whom they + had wronged to forgive them, in the hurry of their passion." + </p> + <p> + His pride as a logician and skilful disputant abated in the latter and + better portion of his life he had more deference to the judgment of + others, and more distrust of his own. "You admire," said he to a + correspondent who had lauded his character, "one you do not know; + knowledge will cure your error." In his Narrative he writes: "I am much + more sensible than heretofore of the breadth and length and depth of the + radical, universal, odious sin of selfishness, and therefore have written + so much against it; and of the excellency and necessity of self-denial and + of a public mind, and of loving our neighbors as ourselves." Against many + difficulties and discouragements, both within himself and in his outward + circumstances, he strove to make his life and conversation an expression + of that Christian love whose root, as he has said with equal truth and + beauty, "is set + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + In humble self-denial, undertrod, + While flower and fruit are growing up to God." +</pre> + <p> + Of the great mass of his writings, more voluminous than those of any + author of his time, it would ill become us to speak with confidence. We + are familiar only with some of the best of his practical works, and our + estimate of the vast and appalling series of his doctrinal, metaphysical + and controversial publications would be entitled to small weight, as the + result of very cursory examination. Many of them relate to obsolete + questions and issues, monumental of controversies long dead, and of + disputatious doctors otherwise forgotten. Yet, in respect to even these, + we feel justified in assenting to the opinion of one abundantly capable of + appreciating the character of Baxter as a writer. "What works of Mr. + Baxter shall I read?" asked Boswell of Dr. Johnson. "Read any of them," + was the answer, "for they are all good." He has left upon all the impress + of his genius. Many of them contain sentiments which happily find favor + with few in our time: philosophical and psychological disquisitions, which + look oddly enough in the light of the intellectual progress of nearly two + centuries; dissertations upon evil spirits, ghosts, and witches, which + provoke smiles at the good man's credulity; but everywhere we find + unmistakable evidences of his sincerity and earnest love of truth. He + wrote under a solemn impression of duty, allowing neither pain, nor + weakness, nor the claims of friendship, nor the social enjoyments of + domestic affection, to interfere with his sleepless intensity of purpose. + He stipulated with his wife, before marriage, that she should not expect + him to relax, even for her society, the severity of his labors. He could + ill brook interruption, and disliked the importunity of visitors. "We are + afraid, sir, we break in upon your time," said some of his callers to him + upon one occasion. "To be sure you do," was his answer. His seriousness + seldom forsook him; there is scarce a gleam of gayety in all his one + hundred and sixty-eight volumes. He seems to have relished, however, the + wit of others, especially when directed against what he looked upon as + error. Marvell's inimitable reply to the High-Church pretensions of Parker + fairly overcame his habitual gravity, and he several times alludes to it + with marked satisfaction; but, for himself, he had no heart for + pleasentry. His writings, like his sermons, were the earnest + expostulations of a dying man with dying men. He tells us of no other + amusement or relaxation than the singing of psalms. "Harmony and melody," + said he, "are the pleasure and elevation of my soul. It was not the least + comfort that I had in the converse of my late dear wife, that our first + act in the morning and last in bed at night was a psalm of praise." + </p> + <p> + It has been fashionable to speak of Baxter as a champion of civil and + religious freedom. He has little claim to such a reputation. He was the + stanch advocate of monarchy, and of the right and duty of the State to + enforce conformity to what he regarded as the essentials of religious + belief and practice. No one regards the prelates who went to the Tower, + under James II., on the ground of conscientious scruples against reading + the King's declaration of toleration to Dissenters, as martyrs in the + cause of universal religious freedom. Nor can Baxter, although he wrote + much against the coercion and silencing of godly ministers, and suffered + imprisonment himself for the sake of a good conscience, be looked upon in + the light of an intelligent and consistent confessor of liberty. He did + not deny the abstract right of ecclesiastical coercion, but complained of + its exercise upon himself and his friends as unwarranted and unjust. + </p> + <p> + One of the warmest admirers and ablest commentators of Baxter designates + the leading and peculiar trait of his character as unearthliness. In our + view, this was its radical defect. He had too little of humanity, he felt + too little of the attraction of this world, and lived too exclusively in + the spiritual and the unearthly, for a full and healthful development of + his nature as a man, or of the graces, charities, and loves of the + Christian. He undervalued the common blessings and joys of life, and + closed his eyes and ears against the beauty and harmony of outward nature. + Humanity, in itself considered, seemed of small moment to him; "passing + away" was written alike on its wrongs and its rights, its pleasures and + its pains; death would soon level all distinctions; and the sorrows or the + joys, the poverty or the riches, the slavery or the liberty, of the brief + day of its probation seemed of too little consequence to engage his + attention and sympathies. Hence, while he was always ready to minister to + temporal suffering wherever it came to his notice, he made no efforts to + remove its political or social causes. In this respect he differed widely + from some of his illustrious contemporaries. Penn, while preaching up and + down the land, and writing theological folios and pamphlets, could yet + urge the political rights of Englishmen, mount the hustings for Algernon + Sydney, and plead for unlimited religious liberty; and Vane, while + dreaming of a coming millennium and reign of the saints, and busily + occupied in defending his Antinomian doctrines, could at the same time + vindicate, with tongue and pen, the cause of civil and religious freedom. + But Baxter overlooked the evils and oppressions which were around him, and + forgot the necessities and duties of the world of time and sense in his + earnest aspirations towards the world of spirits. It is by no means an + uninstructive fact, that with the lapse of years his zeal for proselytism, + doctrinal disputations, and the preaching of threats and terrors visibly + declined, while love for his fellow-men and catholic charity greatly + increased, and he was blessed with a clearer perception of the truth that + God is best served through His suffering children, and that love and + reverence for visible humanity is an indispensable condition of the + appropriate worship of the Unseen God. + </p> + <p> + But, in taking leave of Richard Baxter, our last words must not be those + of censure. Admiration and reverence become us rather. He was an honest + man. So far as we can judge, his motives were the highest and best which + can influence human action. He had faults and weaknesses, and committed + grave errors, but we are constrained to believe that the prayer with which + he closes his Saints' Rest and which we have chosen as the fitting + termination of our article, was the earnest aspiration of his life:— + </p> + <p> + "O merciful Father of Spirits! suffer not the soul of thy unworthy servant + to be a stranger to the joys which he describes to others, but keep me + while I remain on earth in daily breathing after thee, and in a believing + affectionate walking with thee! Let those who shall read these pages not + merely read the fruits of my studies, but the breathing of my active hope + and love; that if my heart were open to their view, they might there read + thy love most deeply engraven upon it with a beam from the face of the Son + of God; and not find vanity or lust or pride within where the words of + life appear without, that so these lines may not witness against me, but, + proceeding from the heart of the writer, be effectual through thy grace + upon the heart of the reader, and so be the savor of life to both." + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0008" id="link2H_4_0008"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + WILLIAM LEGGETT + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "O Freedom! thou art not, as poets dream, + A fair young girl, with light and delicate limbs, + And wavy tresses, gushing from the cap + With which the Roman master crowned his slave, + When he took off the gyves. A bearded man, + Armed to the teeth, art thou; one mailed hand + Grasps the broad shield, and one the sword; thy brow, + Glorious in beauty though it be, is scarred + With tokens of old wars; thy massive limbs + Are strong with struggling. Power at thee has launched + His bolts, and with his lightnings smitten thee; + They could not quench the life thou hast from Heaven." + BRYANT. +</pre> + <p> + WHEN the noblest woman in all France stood on the scaffold, just before + her execution, she is said to have turned towards the statue of Liberty, + —which, strangely enough, had been placed near the guillotine, as + its patron saint,—with the exclamation, "O Liberty! what crimes have + been committed in thy name!" It is with a feeling akin to that which + prompted this memorable exclamation of Madame Roland that the sincere + lover of human freedom and progress is often compelled to regard American + democracy. + </p> + <p> + For democracy, pure and impartial,—the self-government of the whole; + equal rights and privileges, irrespective of birth or complexion; the + morality of the Gospel of Christ applied to legislation; Christianity + reduced to practice, and showering the blessings of its impartial love and + equal protection upon all, like the rain and dews of heaven,—we have + the sincerest love and reverence. So far as our own government approaches + this standard—and, with all its faults, we believe it does so more + nearly than any other—it has our hearty and steadfast allegiance. We + complain of and protest against it only where, in its original framework + or actual administration, it departs from the democratic principle. + Holding, with Novalis, that the Christian religion is the root of all + democracy and the highest fact in the rights of man, we regard the New + Testament as the true political text-book; and believe that, just in + proportion as mankind receive its doctrines and precepts, not merely as + matters of faith and relating to another state of being, but as practical + rules, designed for the regulation of the present life as well as the + future, their institutions, social arrangements, and forms of government + will approximate to the democratic model. We believe in the ultimate + complete accomplishment of the mission of Him who came "to preach + deliverance to the captive, and the opening of prison doors to them that + are bound." We look forward to the universal dominion of His benign + humanity; and, turning from the strife and blood, the slavery, and social + and political wrongs of the past and present, anticipate the realization + in the distant future of that state when the song of the angels at His + advent shall be no longer a prophecy, but the jubilant expression of a + glorious reality,—"Glory to God in the highest! Peace on earth, and + good will to man!" + </p> + <p> + For the party in this country which has assumed the name of Democracy, as + a party, we have had, we confess, for some years past, very little + respect. It has advocated many salutary measures, tending to equalize the + advantages of trade and remove the evils of special legislation. But if it + has occasionally lopped some of the branches of the evil tree of + oppression, so far from striking at its root, it has suffered itself to be + made the instrument of nourishing and protecting it. It has allowed itself + to be called, by its Southern flatterers, "the natural ally of slavery." + It has spurned the petitions of the people in behalf of freedom under its + feet, in Congress and State legislatures. Nominally the advocate of + universal suffrage, it has wrested from the colored citizens of + Pennsylvania that right of citizenship which they had enjoyed under a + Constitution framed by Franklin and Rush. Perhaps the most shameful + exhibition of its spirit was made in the late Rhode Island struggle, when + the free suffrage convention, solemnly calling heaven and earth to witness + its readiness to encounter all the horrors of civil war, in defence of the + holy principle of equal and universal suffrage, deliberately excluded + colored Rhode Islanders from the privilege of voting. In the + Constitutional Conventions of Michigan and Iowa, the same party declared + all men equal, and then provided an exception to this rule in the case of + the colored inhabitants. Its course on the question of excluding slavery + from Texas is a matter of history, known and read of all. + </p> + <p> + After such exhibitions of its practice, its professions have lost their + power. The cant of democracy upon the lips of men who are living down its + principles is, to an earnest mind, well nigh insufferable. Pertinent were + the queries of Eliphaz the Temanite, "Shall a man utter vain knowledge, + and fill his belly with the east wind? Shall he reason with unprofitable + talk, or with speeches wherewith he can do no good?" Enough of wearisome + talk we have had about "progress," the rights of "the masses," the + "dignity of labor," and "extending the area of freedom"! "Clear your mind + of cant, sir," said Johnson to Boswell; and no better advice could be now + given to a class of our democratic politicians. Work out your democracy; + translate your words into deeds; away with your sentimental + generalizations, and come down to the practical details of your duty as + men and Christians. What avail your abstract theories, your hopeless + virginity of democracy, sacred from the violence of meanings? A democracy + which professes to hold, as by divine right, the doctrine of human + equality in its special keeping, and which at the same time gives its + direct countenance and support to the vilest system of oppression on which + the sun of heaven looks, has no better title to the name it disgraces than + the apostate Son of the Morning has to his old place in heaven. We are + using strong language, for we feel strongly on this subject. Let those + whose hypocrisy we condemn, and whose sins against humanity we expose, + remember that they are the publishers of their own shame, and that they + have gloried in their apostasy. There is a cutting severity in the answer + which Sophocles puts in the mouth of Electra, in justification of her + indignant rebuke of her wicked mother:— + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "'Tis you that say it, not I + You do the unholy deeds which find rue words." +</pre> + <p> + Yet in that party calling itself democratic we rejoice to recognize true, + generous, and thoroughly sincere men,—lovers of the word of + democracy, and doers of it also, honest and hearty in their worship of + liberty, who are still hoping that the antagonism which slavery presents + to democracy will be perceived by the people, in spite of the sophistry + and appeals to prejudice by which interested partisans have hitherto + succeeded in deceiving them. We believe with such that the mass of the + democratic voters of the free States are in reality friends of freedom, + and hate slavery in all its forms; and that, with a full understanding of + the matter, they could never consent to be sold to presidential aspirants, + by political speculators, in lots to suit purchasers, and warranted to be + useful in putting down free discussion, perpetuating oppression, and + strengthening the hands of modern feudalism. They are beginning already to + see that, under the process whereby men of easy virtue obtain offices from + the general government, as the reward of treachery to free principles, the + strength and vitality of the party are rapidly declining. To them, at + least, democracy means something more than collectorships, consulates, and + governmental contracts. For the sake of securing a monopoly of these to a + few selfish and heartless party managers, they are not prepared to give up + the distinctive principles of democracy, and substitute in their place the + doctrines of the Satanic school of politics. They will not much longer + consent to stand before the world as the slavery party of the United + States, especially when policy and expediency, as well as principle, unite + in recommending a position more congenial to the purposes of their + organization, the principles of the fathers of their political faith, the + spirit of the age, and the obligations of Christianity. + </p> + <p> + The death-blow of slavery in this country will be given by the very power + upon which it has hitherto relied with so much confidence. Abused and + insulted Democracy will, erelong, shake off the loathsome burden under + which it is now staggering. In the language of the late Theodore Sedgwiek, + of Massachusetts, a consistent democrat of the old school: "Slavery, in + all its forms, is anti-democratic,—an old poison left in the veins, + fostering the worst principles of aristocracy, pride, and aversion to + labor; the natural enemy of the poor man, the laboring man, the oppressed + man. The question is, whether absolute dominion over any creature in the + image of man be a wholesome power in a free country; whether this is a + school in which to train the young republican mind; whether slave blood + and free blood can course healthily together in the same body politic. + Whatever may be present appearances, and by whatever name party may choose + to call things, this question must finally be settled by the democracy of + the country." + </p> + <p> + This prediction was made eight years ago, at a time when all the facts in + the case seemed against the probability of its truth, and when only here + and there the voice of an indignant freeman protested against the exulting + claims of the slave power upon the democracy as its "natural ally." The + signs of the times now warrant the hope of its fulfilment. Over the hills + of the East, and over the broad territory of the Empire State, a new + spirit is moving. Democracy, like Balaam upon Zophim, has felt the divine + <i>afflatus</i>, and is blessing that which it was summoned to curse. + </p> + <p> + The present hopeful state of things is owing, in no slight degree, to the + self-sacrificing exertions of a few faithful and clear-sighted men, + foremost among whom was the late William Leggett; than whom no one has + labored more perseveringly, or, in the end, more successfully, to bring + the practice of American democracy into conformity with its professions. + </p> + <p> + William Leggett! Let our right hand forget its cunning, when that name + shall fail to awaken generous emotions and aspirations for a higher and + worthier manhood! True man and true democrat; faithful always to Liberty, + following wherever she led, whether the storm beat in his face or on his + back; unhesitatingly counting her enemies his own, whether in the guise of + Whig monopoly and selfish expediency, or democratic servility north of + Mason and Dixon's line towards democratic slaveholding south of it; poor, + yet incorruptible; dependent upon party favor, as a party editor, yet + risking all in condemnation of that party, when in the wrong; a man of the + people, yet never stooping to flatter the people's prejudices,—he is + the politician, of all others, whom we would hold up to the admiration and + imitation of the young men of our country. What Fletcher of Saltoun is to + Scotland, and the brave spirits of the old Commonwealth time— + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "Hands that penned + And tongues that uttered wisdom, better none + The later Sydney, Marvell, Harrington, + Young Vane, and others, who called Milton friend—" +</pre> + <p> + are to England, should Leggett be to America. His character was formed on + these sturdy democratic models. Had he lived in their day, he would have + scraped with old Andrew Marvell the bare blade-bone of poverty, or even + laid his head on the block with Vane, rather than forego his independent + thought and speech. + </p> + <p> + Of the early life of William Leggett we have no very definite knowledge. + Born in moderate circumstances; at first a woodsman in the Western + wilderness, then a midshipman in the navy, then a denizen of New York; + exposed to sore hardships and perilous temptations, he worked his way by + the force of his genius to the honorable position of associate editor of + the Evening Post, the leading democratic journal of our great commercial + metropolis. Here he became early distinguished for his ultraism in + democracy. His whole soul revolted against oppression. He was for liberty + everywhere and in all things, in thought, in speech, in vote, in religion, + in government, and in trade; he was for throwing off all restraints upon + the right of suffrage; regarding all men as brethren, he looked with + disapprobation upon attempts to exclude foreigners from the rights of + citizenship; he was for entire freedom of commerce; he denounced a + national bank; he took the lead in opposition to the monopoly of + incorporated banks; he argued in favor of direct taxation, and advocated a + free post-office, or a system by which letters should be transported, as + goods and passengers now are, by private enterprise. In all this he was + thoroughly in earnest. That he often erred through passion and prejudice + cannot be doubted; but in no instance was he found turning aside from the + path which he believed to be the true one, from merely selfish + considerations. He was honest alike to himself and the public. Every + question which was thrown up before him by the waves of political or moral + agitation he measured by his standard of right and truth, and condemned or + advocated it in utter disregard of prevailing opinions, of its effect upon + his pecuniary interest, or of his standing with his party. The vehemence + of his passions sometimes betrayed him into violence of language and + injustice to his opponents; but he had that rare and manly trait which + enables its possessor, whenever he becomes convinced of error, to make a + prompt acknowledgment of the conviction. + </p> + <p> + In the summer of 1834, a series of mobs, directed against the + Abolitionists, who had organized a national society, with the city of New + York as its central point, followed each other in rapid succession. The + houses of the leading men in the society were sacked and pillaged; + meeting-houses broken into and defaced; and the unoffending colored + inhabitants of the city treated with the grossest indignity, and + subjected, in some instances, to shameful personal outrage. It was + emphatically a "Reign of Terror." The press of both political parties and + of the leading religious sects, by appeals to prejudice and passion, and + by studied misrepresentation of the designs and measures of the + Abolitionists, fanned the flame of excitement, until the fury of demons + possessed the misguided populace. To advocate emancipation, or defend + those who did so, in New York, at that period, was like preaching + democracy in Constantinople or religious toleration in Paris on the eve of + St. Bartholomew. Law was prostrated in the dust; to be suspected of + abolitionism was to incur a liability to an indefinite degree of insult + and indignity; and the few and hunted friends of the slave who in those + nights of terror laid their heads upon the pillow did so with the prayer + of the Psalmist on their lips, "Defend me from them that rise up against + me; save me from bloody men." + </p> + <p> + At this period the New York Evening Post spoke out strongly in + condemnation of the mob. William Leggett was not then an Abolitionist; he + had known nothing of the proscribed class, save through the cruel + misrepresentations of their enemies; but, true to his democratic faith, he + maintained the right to discuss the question of slavery. The infection of + cowardly fear, which at that time sealed the lips of multitudes who + deplored the excesses of the mob and sympathized with its victims, never + reached him. Boldly, indignantly, he demanded that the mob should be put + down at once by the civil authorities. He declared the Abolitionists, even + if guilty of all that had been charged upon them, fully entitled to the + privileges and immunities of American citizens. He sternly reprimanded the + board of aldermen of the city for rejecting with contempt the memorial of + the Abolitionists to that body, explanatory of their principles and the + measures by which they had sought to disseminate them. Referring to the + determination, expressed by the memorialists in the rejected document, not + to recant or relinquish any principle which they had adopted, but to live + and die by their faith, he said: "In this, however mistaken, however mad, + we may consider their opinions in relation to the blacks, what honest, + independent mind can blame them? Where is the man so poor of soul, so + white-livered, so base, that he would do less in relation to any important + doctrine in which he religiously believed? Where is the man who would have + his tenets drubbed into him by the clubs of ruffians, or hold his + conscience at the dictation of a mob?" + </p> + <p> + In the summer of 1835, a mob of excited citizens broke open the post- + office at Charleston, South Carolina, and burnt in the street such papers + and pamphlets as they judged to be "incendiary;" in other words, such as + advocated the application of the democratic principle to the condition of + the slaves of the South. These papers were addressed, not to the slave, + but to the master. They contained nothing which had not been said and + written by Southern men themselves, the Pinkneys, Jeffersons, Henrys, and + Martins, of Maryland and Virginia. The example set at Charleston did not + lack imitators. Every petty postmaster south of Mason and Dixon's line + became ex officio a censor of the press. The Postmaster-General, writing + to his subordinate at Charleston, after stating that the post-office + department had "no legal right to exclude newspapers from the mail, or + prohibit their carriage or delivery, on account of their character or + tendency, real or supposed," declared that he would, nevertheless, give no + aid, directly or indirectly, in circulating publications of an incendiary + or inflammatory character; and assured the perjured functionary, who had + violated his oath of office, that, while he could not sanction, he would + not condemn his conduct. Against this virtual encouragement of a flagrant + infringement of a constitutional right, this licensing of thousands of + petty government officials to sit in their mail offices—to use the + figure of Milton—cross-legged, like so many envious Junos, in + judgment upon the daily offspring of the press, taking counsel of passion, + prejudice, and popular excitement as to what was "incendiary" or + "inflammatory," the Evening Post spoke in tones of manly protest. + </p> + <p> + While almost all the editors of his party throughout the country either + openly approved of the conduct of the Postmaster-General or silently + acquiesced in it, William Leggett, who, in the absence of his colleague, + was at that time sole editor of the Post, and who had everything to lose, + in a worldly point of view, by assailing a leading functionary of the + government, who was a favorite of the President and a sharer of his + popularity, did not hesitate as to the course which consistency and duty + required at his hands. He took his stand for unpopular truth, at a time + when a different course on his part could not have failed to secure him + the favor and patronage of his party. In the great struggle with the Bank + of the United States, his services had not been unappreciated by the + President and his friends. Without directly approving the course of the + administration on the question of the rights of the Abolitionists, by + remaining silent in respect to it, he might have avoided all suspicion of + mental and moral independence incompatible with party allegiance. The + impracticable honesty of Leggett, never bending from the erectness of + truth for the sake of that "thrift which follows fawning," dictated a most + severe and scorching review of the letter of the Postmaster-General. "More + monstrous, more detestable doctrines we have never heard promulgated," he + exclaimed in one of his leading editorials. "With what face, after this, + can the Postmaster-General punish a postmaster for any exercise of the + fearfully dangerous power of stopping and destroying any portion of the + mails?" "The Abolitionists do not deserve to be placed on the same footing + with a foreign enemy, nor their publications as the secret despatches of a + spy. They are American citizens, in the exercise of their undoubted right + of citizenship; and however erroneous their views, however fanatic their + conduct, while they act within the limits of the law, what official + functionary, be he merely a subordinate or the head of the post-office + department, shall dare to abridge them of their rights as citizens, and + deny them those facilities of intercourse which were instituted for the + equal accommodation of all? If the American people will submit to this, + let us expunge all written codes, and resolve society into its original + elements, where the might of the strong is better than the right of the + weak." + </p> + <p> + A few days after the publication of this manly rebuke, he wrote an + indignantly sarcastic article upon the mobs which were at this time + everywhere summoned to "put down the Abolitionists." The next day, the 4th + of the ninth month, 1835, he received a copy of the Address of the + American Anti-Slavery Society to the public, containing a full and + explicit avowal of all the principles and designs of the association. He + gave it a candid perusal, weighed its arguments, compared its doctrines + with those at the foundation of his own political faith, and rose up from + its examination an Abolitionist. He saw that he himself, misled by the + popular clamor, had done injustice to benevolent and self-sacrificing men; + and he took the earliest occasion, in an article of great power and + eloquence, to make the amplest atonement. He declared his entire + concurrence with the views of the American Anti-Slavery Society, with the + single exception of a doubt which rested, on his mind as to the abolition + of slavery in the District of Columbia. We quote from the concluding + paragraph of this article:— + </p> + <p> + "We assert without hesitation, that, if we possessed the right, we should + not scruple to exercise it for the speedy annihilation of servitude and + chains. The impression made in boyhood by the glorious exclamation of + Cato, + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "'A day, an hour, of virtuous liberty + Is worth a whole eternity of bondage!' +</pre> + <p> + has been worn deeper, not effaced, by time; and we eagerly and ardently + trust that the day will yet arrive when the clank of the bondman's fetters + will form no part of the multitudinous sounds which our country sends up + to Heaven, mingling, as it were, into a song of praise for our national + prosperity. We yearn with strong desire for the day when freedom shall no + longer wave + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "Her fustian flag in mockery over slaves.'" +</pre> + <p> + A few days after, in reply to the assaults made upon him from all + quarters, he calmly and firmly reiterated his determination to maintain + the right of free discussion of the subject of slavery. + </p> + <p> + "The course we are pursuing," said he, "is one which we entered upon after + mature deliberation, and we are not to be turned from it by a species of + opposition, the inefficacy of which we have seen displayed in so many + former instances. It is Philip Van Artevelde who says:— + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "'All my life long, + I have beheld with most respect the man + Who knew himself, and knew the ways before him; + And from among them chose considerately, + With a clear foresight, not a blindfold courage; + And, having chosen, with a steadfast mind. + Pursued his purpose.' +</pre> + <p> + "This is the sort of character we emulate. If to believe slavery a + deplorable evil and curse, in whatever light it is viewed; if to yearn for + the day which shall break the fetters of three millions of human beings, + and restore to them their birthright of equal freedom; if to be willing, + in season and out of season, to do all in our power to promote so + desirable a result, by all means not inconsistent with higher duty: if + these sentiments constitute us Abolitionists, then are we such, and glory + in the name." + </p> + <p> + "The senseless cry of 'Abolitionist' shall never deter us, nor the more + senseless attempt of puny prints to read us out of the democratic party. + The often-quoted and beautiful saying of the Latin historian, Homo sum: + humani nihil a me alienum puto, we apply to the poor slave as well as his + master, and shall endeavor to fulfil towards both the obligations of an + equal humanity." + </p> + <p> + The generation which, since the period of which we are speaking, have + risen into active life can have but a faint conception of the boldness of + this movement on the part of William Leggett. To be an Abolitionist then + was to abandon all hope of political preferment or party favor; to be + marked and branded as a social outlaw, under good society's interdict of + food and fire; to hold property, liberty, and life itself at the mercy of + lawless mobs. All this William Leggett clearly saw. He knew how rugged and + thorny was the path upon which, impelled by his love of truth and the + obligations of humanity, he was entering. From hunted and proscribed + Abolitionists and oppressed and spirit-broken colored men, the Pariahs of + American democracy, he could alone expect sympathy. The Whig journals, + with a few honorable exceptions, exulted over what they regarded as the + fall of a formidable opponent; and after painting his abolitionism in the + most hideous colors, held him up to their Southern allies as a specimen of + the radical disorganizers and democratic levellers of the North. His own + party, in consequence, made haste to proscribe him. Government advertising + was promptly withdrawn from his paper. The official journals of Washington + and Albany read him out of the pale of democracy. Father Ritchie scolded + and threatened. The democratic committee issued its bull against him from + Tammany Hall. The resolutions of that committee were laid before him when + he was sinking under a severe illness. Rallying his energies, he dictated + from his sick-bed an answer marked by all his accustomed vigor and + boldness. Its tone was calm, manly, self-relying; the language of one who, + having planted his feet hard down on the rock of principle, stood there + like Luther at Worms, because he "could not otherwise." Exhausted nature + sunk under the effort. A weary sickness of nearly a year's duration + followed. In this sore affliction, deserted as he was by most of his old + political friends, we have reason to know that he was cheered by the + gratitude of those in whose behalf he had well-nigh made a martyr's + sacrifice; and that from the humble hearths of his poor colored + fellow-citizens fervent prayers went up for his restoration. + </p> + <p> + His work was not yet done. Purified by trial, he was to stand forth once + more in vindication of the truths of freedom. As soon as his health was + sufficiently reestablished, he commenced the publication of an independent + political and literary journal, under the expressive title of The + Plaindealer. In his first number he stated, that, claiming the right of + absolute freedom of discussion, he should exercise it with no other + limitations than those of his own judgment. A poor man, he admitted that + he established the paper in the expectation of deriving from it a + livelihood, but that even for that object he could not trim its sails to + suit the varying breeze of popular prejudice. "If," said he, "a paper + which makes the Right, and not the Expedient, its cardinal object, will + not yield its conductor a support, there are honest vocations that will, + and better the humblest of them than to be seated at the head of an + influential press, if its influence is not exerted to promote the cause of + truth." He was true to his promise. The free soul of a free, strong man + spoke out in his paper. How refreshing was it, after listening to the + inanities, the dull, witless vulgarity, the wearisome commonplace of + journalists, who had no higher aim than to echo, with parrot-like + exactness, current prejudices and falsehoods, to turn to the great and + generous thoughts, the chaste and vigorous diction, of the Plaindealer! No + man ever had a clearer idea of the duties and responsibilities of a + conductor of the public press than William Leggett, and few have ever + combined so many of the qualifications for their perfect discharge: a nice + sense of justice, a warm benevolence, inflexible truth, honesty defying + temptation, a mind stored with learning, and having at command the + treasures of the best thoughts of the best authors. As was said of + Fletcher of Saltoun, he was "a gentleman steady in his principles; of nice + honor, abundance of learning; bold as a lion; a sure friend; a man who + would lose his life to serve his country, and would not do a base thing to + save it." + </p> + <p> + He had his faults: his positive convictions sometimes took the shape of a + proud and obstinate dogmatism; he who could so well appeal to the judgment + and the reason of his readers too often only roused their passions by + invective and vehement declamation. Moderate men were startled and pained + by the fierce energy of his language; and he not unfrequently made + implacable enemies of opponents whom he might have conciliated and won + over by mild expostulation and patient explanation. It must be urged in + extenuation, that, as the champion of unpopular truths, he was assailed + unfairly on all sides, and indecently misrepresented and calumniated to a + degree, as his friend Sedgwick justly remarks, unprecedented even in the + annals of the American press; and that his errors in this respect were, in + the main, errors of retaliation. + </p> + <p> + In the Plaindealer, in common with the leading moral and political + subjects of the day, that of slavery was freely discussed in all its + bearings. It is difficult, in a single extract, to convey an adequate idea + of the character of the editorial columns of a paper, where terse and + concentrated irony and sarcasm alternate with eloquent appeal and diffuse + commentary and labored argument. We can only offer at random the following + passages from a long review of a speech of John C. Calhoun, in which that + extraordinary man, whose giant intellect has been shut out of its + appropriate field of exercise by the very slavery of which he is the + champion, undertook to maintain, in reply to a Virginia senator, that + chattel slavery was not an evil, but "a great good." + </p> + <p> + "We have Mr. Calhoun's own warrant for attacking his position with all the + fervor which a high sense of duty can give, for we do hold, from the + bottom of our soul, that slavery is an evil,—a deep, detestable, + damnable evil; evil in all its aspects to the blacks, and a greater evil + to the whites; an evil moral, social, and political; an evil which shows + itself in the languishing condition of agriculture where it exists, in + paralyzed commerce, and in the prostration of the mechanic arts; an evil + which stares you in the face from uncultivated fields, and howls in your + ears through tangled swamps and morasses. Slavery is such an evil that it + withers what it touches. Where it is once securely established the land + becomes desolate, as the tree inevitably perishes which the sea-hawk + chooses for its nest; while freedom, on the contrary, flourishes like the + tannen, 'on the loftiest and least sheltered rocks,' and clothes with its + refreshing verdure what, without it, would frown in naked and incurable + sterility. + </p> + <p> + "If any one desires an illustration of the opposite influences of slavery + and freedom, let him look at the two sister States of Kentucky and Ohio. + Alike in soil and climate, and divided only by a river, whose translucent + waters reveal, through nearly the whole breadth, the sandy bottom over + which they sparkle, how different are they in all the respects over which + man has control! On the one hand the air is vocal with the mingled tumult + of a vast and prosperous population. Every hillside smiles with an + abundant harvest, every valley shelters a thriving village, the click of a + busy mill drowns the prattle of every rivulet, and all the multitudinous + sounds of business denote happy activity in every branch of social + occupation. + </p> + <p> + "This is the State which, but a few years ago, slept in the unbroken + solitude of nature. The forest spread an interminable canopy of shade over + the dark soil on which the fat and useless vegetation rotted at ease, and + through the dusky vistas of the wood only savage beasts and more savage + men prowled in quest of prey. The whole land now blossoms like a garden. + The tall and interlacing trees have unlocked their hold, and bowed before + the woodman's axe. The soil is disencumbered of the mossy trunks which had + reposed upon it for ages. The rivers flash in the sunlight, and the fields + smile with waving harvests. This is Ohio, and this is what freedom has + done for it. + </p> + <p> + "Now, let us turn to Kentucky, and note the opposite influences of + slavery. A narrow and unfrequented path through the close and sultry + canebrake conducts us to a wretched hovel. It stands in the midst of an + unweeded field, whose dilapidated enclosure scarcely protects it from the + lowing and hungry kine. Children half clad and squalid, and destitute of + the buoyancy natural to their age, lounge in the sunshine, while their + parent saunters apart, to watch his languid slaves drive the ill- + appointed team afield. This is not a fancy picture. It is a true copy of + one of the features which make up the aspect 'of the State, and of every + State where the moral leprosy of slavery covers the people with its + noisome scales; a deadening lethargy benumbs the limbs of the body + politic; a stupor settles on the arts of life; agriculture reluctantly + drags the plough and harrow to the field, only when scourged by necessity; + the axe drops from the woodman's nerveless hand the moment his fire is + scantily supplied with fuel; and the fen, undrained, sends up its noxious + exhalations, to rack with cramps and agues the frame already too much + enervated by a moral epidemic to creep beyond the sphere of the material + miasm." + </p> + <p> + The Plaindealer was uniformly conducted with eminent ability; but its + editor was too far in advance of his contemporaries to find general + acceptance, or even toleration. In addition to pecuniary embarrassments, + his health once more failed, and in the autumn of 1837 he was compelled to + suspend the publication of his paper. One of the last articles which he + wrote for it shows the extent to which he was sometimes carried by the + intensity and depth of his abhorrence of oppression, and the fervency of + his adoration of liberty. Speaking of the liability of being called upon + to aid the master in the subjection of revolted slaves, and in replacing + their cast-off fetters, he thus expresses himself: "Would we comply with + such a requisition? No! Rather would we see our right arm lopped from our + body, and the mutilated trunk itself gored with mortal wounds, than raise + a finger in opposition to men struggling in the holy cause of freedom. The + obligations of citizenship are strong, but those of justice, humanity, and + religion, stronger. We earnestly trust that the great contest of opinion + which is now going on in this country may terminate in the enfranchisement + of the slaves, without recourse to the strife of blood; but should the + oppressed bondmen, impatient of the tardy progress of truth, urged only in + discussion, attempt to burst their chains by a more violent and shorter + process, they should never encounter our arm nor hear our voice in the + ranks of their opponents. We should stand a sad spectator of the conflict; + and, whatever commiseration we might feel for the discomfiture of the + oppressors, we should pray that the battle might end in giving freedom to + the oppressed." + </p> + <p> + With the Plain dealer, his connection with the public, in a great measure, + ceased. His steady and intimate friend, personal as well as political, + Theodore Sedgwick, Jun., a gentleman who has, on many occasions, proved + himself worthy of his liberty-loving ancestry, thus speaks of him in his + private life at this period: "Amid the reverses of fortune, harassed by + pecuniary embarrassments, during the tortures of a disease which tore away + his life piecemeal, hee ever maintained the same manly and unaltered + front, the same cheerfulness of disposition, the same dignity of conduct. + No humiliating solicitation, no weak complaint, escaped him." At the + election in the fall of 1838, the noble-spirited democrat was not wholly + forgotten. A strenuous effort, which was well- nigh successful, was made + to secure his nomination as a candidate for Congress. It was at this + juncture that he wrote to a friend in the city, from his residence at New + Rochelle, one of the noblest letters ever penned by a candidate for + popular favor. The following extracts will show how a true man can meet + the temptations of political life:— + </p> + <p> + "What I am most afraid of is, that some of my friends, in their too + earnest zeal, will place me in a false position on the subject of slavery. + I am an Abolitionist. I hate slavery in all its forms, degrees, and + influences; and I deem myself bound, by the highest moral and political + obligations, not to let that sentiment of hate lie dormant and smouldering + in my own breast, but to give it free vent, and let it blaze forth, that + it may kindle equal ardor through the whole sphere of my influence. I + would not have this fact disguised or mystified for any office the people + have it in their power to give. Rather, a thousand times rather, would I + again meet the denunciations of Tammany Hall, and be stigmatized with all + the foul epithets with which the anti-abolition vocabulary abounds, than + recall or deny one tittle of my creed. Abolition is, in my sense, a + necessary and a glorious part of democracy; and I hold the right and duty + to discuss the subject of slavery, and to expose its hideous evils in all + their bearings,—moral, social, and political,—as of infinitely + higher importance than to carry fifty sub- treasury bills. That I should + discharge this duty temperately; that I should not let it come in + collision with other duties; that I should not let my hatred of slavery + transcend the express obligations of the Constitution, or violate its + clear spirit, I hope and trust you think sufficiently well of me to + believe. But what I fear is, (not from you, however,) that some of my + advocates and champions will seek to recommend me to popular support by + representing me as not an Abolitionist, which is false. All that I have + written gives the lie to it. All I shall write will give the lie to it. + </p> + <p> + "And here, let me add, (apart from any consideration already adverted to,) + that, as a matter of mere policy, I would not, if I could, have my name + disjoined from abolitionism. To be an Abolitionist now is to be an + incendiary; as, three years ago, to be an anti-monopolist was to be a + leveller and a Jack Cade. See what three short years have done in + effecting the anti-monopoly reform; and depend upon it that the next three + years, or, if not three, say three times three, if you please, will work a + greater revolution on the slavery question. The stream of public opinion + now sets against us; but it is about to turn, and the regurgitation will + be tremendous. Proud in that day may well be the man who can float in + triumph on the first refluent wave, swept onward by the deluge which he + himself, in advance of his fellows, has largely shared in occasioning. + Such be my fate; and, living or dead, it will, in some measure, be mine! I + have written my name in ineffaceable letters on the abolition record; and + whether the reward ultimately come in the shape of honors to the living + man, or a tribute to the memory of a departed one, I would not forfeit my + right to it for as many offices as has in his gift, if each of them was + greater than his own." + </p> + <p> + After mentioning that he had understood that some of his friends had + endeavored to propitiate popular prejudice by representing him as no + Abolitionist, he says:— + </p> + <p> + "Keep them, for God's sake, from committing any such fooleries for the + sake of getting me into Congress. Let others twist themselves into what + shapes they please, to gratify the present taste of the people; as for me, + I am not formed of such pliant materials, and choose to retain, + undisturbed, the image of my God! I do not wish to cheat the people of + their votes. I would not get their support, any more than their money, + under false pretences. I am what I am; and if that does not suit them, I + am content to stay at home." + </p> + <p> + God be praised for affording us, even in these latter days, the sight of + an honest man! Amidst the heartlessness, the double-dealing, the evasions, + the prevarications, the shameful treachery and falsehood, of political men + of both parties, in respect to the question of slavery, how refreshing is + it to listen to words like these! They renew our failing faith in human + nature. They reprove our weak misgivings. We rise up from their perusal + stronger and healthier. With something of the spirit which dictated them, + we renew our vows to freedom, and, with manlier energy, gird up our souls + for the stern struggle before us. + </p> + <p> + As might have been expected, and as he himself predicted, the efforts of + his friends to procure his nomination failed; but the same generous + appreciators of his rare worth were soon after more successful in their + exertions in his behalf. He received from President Van Buren the + appointment of the mission to Guatemala,—an appointment which, in + addition to honorable employment in the service of his country, promised + him the advantages of a sea voyage and a change of climate, for the + restoration of his health. The course of Martin Van Buren on the subject + of slavery in the District of Columbia forms, in the estimation of many of + his best friends, by no means the most creditable portion of his political + history; but it certainly argues well for his magnanimity and freedom from + merely personal resentment that he gave this appointment to the man who + had animadverted upon that course with the greatest freedom, and whose + rebuke of the veto pledge, severe in its truth and justice, formed the + only discord in the paean of partisan flattery which greeted his + inaugural. But, however well intended, it came too late. In the midst of + the congratulations of his friends on the brightening prospect before him, + the still hopeful and vigorous spirit of William Leggett was summoned away + by death. Universal regret was awakened. Admiration of his intellectual + power, and that generous and full appreciation of his high moral worth + which had been in too many instances withheld from the living man by party + policy and prejudice, were now freely accorded to the dead. The presses of + both political parties vied with each other in expressions of sorrow at + the loss of a great and true man. The Democracy, through all its organs, + hastened to canonize him as one of the saints of its calendar. The general + committee, in New York, expunged their resolutions of censure. The + Democratic Review, at that period the most respectable mouthpiece of the + democratic party, made him the subject of exalted eulogy. His early friend + and co-editor, William Cullen Bryant, laid upon his grave the following + tribute, alike beautiful and true:— + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "The earth may ring, from shore to shore, + With echoes of a glorious name, + But he whose loss our tears deplore + Has left behind him more than fame. + + "For when the death-frost came to lie + On Leggett's warm and mighty heart, + And quenched his bold and friendly eye, + His spirit did not all depart. + + "The words of fire that from his pen + He flung upon the lucid page + Still move, still shake the hearts of men, + Amid a cold and coward age. + + "His love of Truth, too warm, too strong, + For Hope or Fear to chain or chill, + His hate of tyranny and wrong, + Burn in the breasts they kindled still." +</pre> + <p> + So lived and died William Leggett. What a rebuke of party perfidy, of + political meanness, of the common arts and stratagems of demagogues, comes + up from his grave! How the cheek of mercenary selfishness crimsons at the + thought of his incorruptible integrity! How heartless and hollow + pretenders, who offer lip service to freedom, while they give their hands + to whatever work their slaveholding managers may assign them; who sit in + chains round the crib of governmental patronage, putting on the spaniel, + and putting off the man, and making their whole lives a miserable lie, + shrink back from a contrast with the proud and austere dignity of his + character! What a comment on their own condition is the memory of a man + who could calmly endure the loss of party favor, the reproaches of his + friends, the malignant assaults of his enemies, and the fretting evils of + poverty, in the hope of bequeathing, like the dying testator of Ford, + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "A fame by scandal untouched, + To Memory and Time's old daughter, Truth." +</pre> + <p> + The praises which such men are now constrained to bestow upon him are + their own condemnation. Every stone which they pile upon his grave is + written over with the record of their hypocrisy. + </p> + <p> + We have written rather for the living than the dead. As one of that + proscribed and hunted band of Abolitionists, whose rights were so bravely + defended by William Leggett, we should, indeed, be wanting in ordinary + gratitude not to do honor to his memory; but we have been actuated at the + present time mainly by a hope that the character, the lineaments of which + we have so imperfectly sketched, may awaken a generous emulation in the + hearts of the young democracy of our country. Democracy such as William + Leggett believed and practised, democracy in its full and all- + comprehensive significance, is destined to be the settled political faith + of this republic. Because the despotism of slavery has usurped its name, + and offered the strange incense of human tears and blood on its profaned + altars, shall we, therefore, abandon the only political faith which + coincides with the Gospel of Jesus, and meets the aspirations and wants of + humanity? No. The duty of the present generation in the United States is + to reduce this faith to practice, to make the beautiful ideal a fact. + </p> + <p> + "Every American," says Leggett, "who in any way countenances slavery is + derelict to his duty, as a Christian, a patriot, a man; and every one does + countenance and authorize it who suffers any opportunity of expressing his + deep abhorrence of its manifold abominations to pass unimproved." The + whole world has an interest in this matter. The influence of our + democratic despotism is exerted against the liberties of Europe. Political + reformers in the Old World, who have testified to their love of freedom by + serious sacrifices, hold but one language on this point. They tell us that + American slavery furnishes kings and aristocracies with their most potent + arguments; that it is a perpetual drag on the wheel of political progress. + </p> + <p> + We have before us, at this time, a letter from Seidensticker, one of the + leaders of the patriotic movement in behalf of German liberty in 1831. It + was written from the prison of Celle, where he had been confined for eight + years. The writer expresses his indignant astonishment at the speeches of + John C. Calhoun, and others in Congress, on the slavery question, and + deplores the disastrous influence of our great inconsistency upon the + cause of freedom throughout the world,—an influence which paralyzes + the hands of the patriotic reformer, while it strengthens those of his + oppressor, and deepens around the living martyrs and confessors of + European democracy the cold shadow of their prisons. + </p> + <p> + Joseph Sturge, of Birmingham, the President of the British Free Suffrage + Union, and whose philanthropy and democracy have been vouched for by the + Democratic Review in this country, has the following passage in an address + to the citizens of the United States: "Although an admirer of the + institutions of your country, and deeply lamenting the evils of my own + government, I find it difficult to reply to those who are opposed to any + extension of the political rights of Englishmen, when they point to + America, and say that where all have a control over the legislation but + those who are guilty of a dark skin, slavery and the slave trade remain, + not only unmitigated, but continue to extend; and that while there is an + onward movement in favor of its extinction, not only in England and + France, but in Cuba and Brazil, American legislators cling to this + enormous evil, without attempting to relax or mitigate its horrors." + </p> + <p> + How long shall such appeals, from such sources, be wasted upon us? Shall + our baleful example enslave the world? Shall the tree of democracy, which + our fathers intended for "the healing of the nations," be to them like the + fabled upas, blighting all around it? + </p> + <p> + The men of the North, the pioneers of the free West, and the non- + slaveholders of the South must answer these questions. It is for them to + say whether the present wellnigh intolerable evil shall continue to + increase its boundaries, and strengthen its hold upon the government, the + political parties, and the religious sects of our country. Interest and + honor, present possession and future hope, the memory of fathers, the + prospects of children, gratitude, affection, the still call of the dead, + the cry of oppressed nations looking hitherward for the result of all + their hopes, the voice of God in the soul, in revelation, and in His + providence, all appeal to them for a speedy and righteous decision. At + this moment, on the floor of Congress, Democracy and Slavery have met in a + death-grapple. The South stands firm; it allows no party division on the + slave question. One of its members has declared that "the slave States + have no traitors." Can the same be said of the free? Now, as in the time + of the fatal Missouri Compromise, there are, it is to be feared, political + peddlers among our representatives, whose souls are in the market, and + whose consciences are vendible commodities. Through their means, the slave + power may gain a temporary triumph; but may not the very baseness of the + treachery arouse the Northern heart? By driving the free States to the + wall, may it not compel them to turn and take an aggressive attitude, + clasp hands over the altar of their common freedom, and swear eternal + hostility to slavery? + </p> + <p> + Be the issue of the present contest what it may, those who are faithful to + freedom should allow no temporary reverse to shake their confidence in the + ultimate triumph of the right. The slave will be free. Democracy in + America will yet be a glorious reality; and when the topstone of that + temple of freedom which our fathers left unfinished shall be brought forth + with shoutings and cries of grace unto it, when our now drooping- Liberty + lifts up her head and prospers, happy will be he who can say, with John + Milton, "Among those who have something more than wished her welfare, I + too have my charter and freehold of rejoicing to me and my heirs." + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0009" id="link2H_4_0009"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + NATHANIEL PEABODY ROGERS. + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "And Lamb, the frolic and the gentle, + Has vanished from his kindly hearth." +</pre> + <p> + So, in one of the sweetest and most pathetic of his poems touching the + loss of his literary friends, sang Wordsworth. We well remember with what + freshness and vividness these simple lines came before us, on hearing, + last autumn, of the death of the warm-hearted and gifted friend whose name + heads this article; for there was much in his character and genius to + remind us of the gentle author of Elia. He had the latter's genial humor + and quaintness; his nice and delicate perception of the beautiful and + poetic; his happy, easy diction, not the result, as in the case of that of + the English essayist, of slow and careful elaboration, but the natural, + spontaneous language in which his conceptions at once embodied themselves, + apparently without any consciousness of effort. As Mark Antony talked, he + wrote, "right on," telling his readers often what "they themselves did + know," yet imparting to the simplest commonplaces of life interest and + significance, and throwing a golden haze of poetry over the rough and + thorny pathways of every-day duty. Like Lamb, he loved his friends without + stint or limit. The "old familiar faces" haunted him. Lamb loved the + streets and lanes of London—the places where he oftenest came in + contact with the warm, genial heart of humanity—better than the + country. Rogers loved the wild and lonely hills and valleys of New + Hampshire none the less that he was fully alive to the enjoyments of + society, and could enter with the heartiest sympathy into all the joys and + sorrows of his friends and neighbors. + </p> + <p> + In another point of view, he was not unlike Elia. He had the same love of + home, and home friends, and familiar objects; the same fondness for common + sights and sounds; the same dread of change; the same shrinking from the + unknown and the dark. Like him, he clung with a child's love to the living + present, and recoiled from a contemplation of the great change which + awaits us. Like him, he was content with the goodly green earth and human + countenances, and would fain set up his tabernacle here. He had less of + what might be termed self-indulgence in this feeling than Lamb. He had + higher views; he loved this world not only for its own sake, but for the + opportunities it afforded of doing good. Like the Persian seer, he beheld + the legions of Ormuzd and Ahriman, of Light and Darkness, contending for + mastery over the earth, as the sunshine and shadow of a gusty, half-cloudy + day struggled on the green slopes of his native mountains; and, mingled + with the bright host, he would fain have fought on until its banners waved + in eternal sunshine over the last hiding-place of darkness. He entered + into the work of reform with the enthusiasm and chivalry of a knight of + the crusades. He had faith in human progress,—in the ultimate + triumph of the good; millennial lights beaconed up all along his horizon. + In the philanthropic movements of the day; in the efforts to remove the + evils of slavery, war, intemperance, and sanguinary laws; in the humane + and generous spirit of much of our modern poetry and literature; in the + growing demand of the religious community, of all sects, for the preaching + of the gospel of love and humanity, he heard the low and tremulous prelude + of the great anthem of universal harmony. "The world," said he, in a + notice of the music of the Hutchinson family, "is out of tune now. But it + will be tuned again, and all will become harmony." In this faith he lived + and acted; working, not always, as it seemed to some of his friends, + wisely, but bravely, truthfully, earnestly, cheering on his + fellow-laborers, and imparting to the dullest and most earthward looking + of them something of his own zeal and loftiness of purpose. + </p> + <p> + "Who was he?" does the reader ask? Naturally enough, too, for his name has + never found its way into fashionable reviews; it has never been associated + with tale, or essay, or poem, to our knowledge. Our friend Griswold, who, + like another Noah, has launched some hundreds of American poets and prose + writers on the tide of immortality in his two huge arks of rhyme and + reason, has either overlooked his name, or deemed it unworthy of + preservation. Then, too, he was known mainly as the editor of a proscribed + and everywhere-spoken-against anti-slavery paper. It had few readers of + literary taste and discrimination; plain, earnest men and women, intent + only upon the thought itself, and caring little for the clothing of it, + loved the <i>Herald of Freedom</i> for its honestness and earnestness, and + its bold rebukes of the wrong, its all-surrendering homage to what its + editor believed to be right. But the literary world of authors and critics + saw and heard little or nothing of him or his writings. "I once had a bit + of scholar-craft," he says of himself on one occasion, "and had I + attempted it in some pitiful sectarian or party or literary sheet, I + should have stood a chance to get quoted into the periodicals. Now, who + dares quote from the <i>Herald of Freedom</i>?" He wrote for humanity, as + his biographer justly says, not for fame. "He wrote because he had + something to say, and true to nature, for to him nature was truth; he + spoke right on, with the artlessness and simplicity of a child." + </p> + <p> + He was born in Plymouth, New Hampshire, in the sixth month of 1794,— + a lineal descendant from John Rogers, of martyr-memory. Educated at + Dartmouth College, he studied law with Hon. Richard Fletcher, of + Salisbury, New Hampshire, now of Boston, and commenced the practice of it + in 1819, in his native village. He was diligent and successful in his + profession, although seldom known as a pleader. About the year 1833, he + became interested in the anti-slavery movement. His was one of the few + voices of encouragement and sympathy which greeted the author of this + sketch on the publication of a pamphlet in favor of immediate + emancipation. He gave us a kind word of approval, and invited us to his + mountain home, on the banks of the Pemigewasset,—an invitation + which, two years afterwards, we accepted. In the early autumn, in company + with George Thompson, (the eloquent reformer, who has since been elected a + member of the British Parliament from the Tower Hamlets,) we drove up the + beautiful valley of the White Mountain tributary of the Merrimac, and, + just as a glorious sunset was steeping river, valley, and mountain in its + hues of heaven, were welcomed to the pleasant home and family circle of + our friend Rogers. We spent two delightful evenings with him. His + cordiality, his warm-hearted sympathy in our object, his keen wit, + inimitable humor, and childlike and simple mirthfulness, his full + appreciation of the beautiful in art and nature, impressed us with the + conviction that we were the guests of no ordinary man; that we were + communing with unmistakable genius, such an one as might have added to the + wit and eloquence of Ben Jonson's famous club at the <i>Mermaid</i>, or + that which Lamb and Coleridge and Southey frequented at the <i>Salutation + and Cat</i>, of Smithfield. "The most brilliant man I have met in + America!" said George Thompson, as we left the hospitable door of our + friend. + </p> + <p> + In 1838, he gave up his law practice, left his fine outlook at Plymouth + upon the mountains of the North, Moosehillock and the Haystacks, and took + up his residence at Concord, for the purpose of editing the <i>Herald of + Freedom</i>, an anti-slavery paper which had been started some three or + four years before. John Pierpont, than whom there could not be a more + competent witness, in his brief and beautiful sketch of the life and + writings of Rogers, does not overestimate the ability with which the + Herald was conducted, when he says of its editor: "As a newspaper writer, + we think him unequalled by any living man; and in the general strength, + clearness, and quickness of his intellect, we think all who knew him well + will agree with us that he was not excelled by any editor in the country." + He was not a profound reasoner: his imagination and brilliant fancy played + the wildest tricks with his logic; yet, considering the way by which he + reached them, it is remarkable that his conclusions were so often correct. + The tendency of his mind was to extremes. A zealous Calvinistic + church-member, he became an equally zealous opponent of churches and + priests; a warm politician, he became an ultra non-resistant and + no-government man. In all this, his sincerity was manifest. If, in the + indulgence of his remarkable powers of sarcasm, in the free antics of a + humorous fancy, upon whose graceful neck he had flung loose the reins, he + sometimes did injustice to individuals, and touched, in irreverent sport, + the hem of sacred garments, it had the excuse, at least, of a generous and + honest motive. If he sometimes exaggerated, those who best, knew him can + testify that he "set down naught in malice." + </p> + <p> + We have before us a printed collection of his writings,—hasty + editorials, flung off without care or revision, the offspring of sudden + impulse frequently; always free, artless, unstudied; the language + transparent as air, exactly expressing the thought. He loved the common, + simple dialect of the people,—the "beautiful strong old Saxon,—the + talk words." He had an especial dislike of learned and "dictionary words." + He used to recommend Cobbett's Works to "every young man and woman who has + been hurt in his or her talk and writing by going to school." + </p> + <p> + Our limits will not admit of such extracts from the Collection of his + writings as would convey to our readers an adequate idea of his thought + and manner. His descriptions of natural scenery glow with life. One can + almost see the sunset light flooding the Franconia Notch, and glorifying + the peaks of Moosehillock, and hear the murmur of the west wind in the + pines, and the light, liquid voice of Pemigewasset sounding up from its + rocky channel, through its green hem of maples, while reading them. We + give a brief extract from an editorial account of an autumnal trip to + Vermont: + </p> + <p> + "We have recently journeyed through a portion of this, free State; and it + is not all imagination in us that sees, in its bold scenery, its + uninfected inland position, its mountainous but fertile and verdant + surface, the secret of the noble predisposition of its people. They are + located for freedom. Liberty's home is on their Green Mountains. Their + farmer republic nowhere touches the ocean, the highway of the world's + crimes, as well as its nations. It has no seaport for the importation of + slavery, or the exportation of its own highland republicanism. Should + slavery ever prevail over this nation, to its utter subjugation, the last + lingering footsteps of retiring Liberty will be seen, not, as Daniel + Webster said, in the proud old Commonwealth of Massachusetts, about Bunker + Hill and Faneuil Hall; but she will be found wailing, like Jephthah's + daughter, among the 'hollows' and along the sides of the Green Mountains. + </p> + <p> + "Vermont shows gloriously at this autumn season. Frost has gently laid + hands on her exuberant vegetation, tinging her rock-maple woods without + abating the deep verdure of her herbage. Everywhere along her peopled + hollows and her bold hillslopes and summits the earth is alive with green, + while her endless hard-wood forests are uniformed with all the hues of + early fall, richer than the regimentals of the kings that glittered in the + train of Napoleon on the confines of Poland, when he lingered there, on + the last outposts of summer, before plunging into the snow-drifts of the + North; more gorgeous than the array of Saladin's life- guard in the wars + of the Crusaders, or of 'Solomon in all his glory,' decked in, all colors + and hues, but still the hues of life. Vegetation touched, but not dead, + or, if killed, not bereft yet of 'signs of life.' 'Decay's effacing + fingers' had not yet 'swept the hills' 'where beauty lingers.' All looked + fresh as growing foliage. Vermont frosts don't seem to be 'killing + frosts.' They only change aspects of beauty. The mountain pastures, + verdant to the peaks, and over the peaks of the high, steep hills, were + covered with the amplest feed, and clothed with countless sheep; the + hay-fields heavy with second crop, in some partly cut and abandoned, as if + in very weariness and satiety, blooming with honeysuckle, contrasting + strangely with the colors on the woods; the fat cattle and the long-tailed + colts and close-built Morgans wallowing in it up to the eyes, or the + cattle down to rest, with full bellies, by ten in the morning. Fine but + narrow roads wound along among the hills, free almost entirely of stone, + and so smooth as to be safe for the most rapid driving, made of their + rich, dark, powder-looking soil. Beautiful villages or scattered + settlements breaking upon the delighted view, on the meandering way, + making the ride a continued scene of excitement and admiration. The air + fresh, free, and wholesome; the road almost dead level for miles and + miles, among mountains that lay over the land like the great swells of the + sea, and looking in the prospect as though there could be no passage." + </p> + <p> + To this autumnal limning, the following spring picture may be a fitting + accompaniment:— + </p> + <p> + "At last Spring is here in full flush. Winter held on tenaciously and + mercilessly, but it has let go. The great sun is high on his northern + journey, and the vegetation, and the bird-singing, and the loud frog- + chorus, the tree budding and blowing, are all upon us; and the glorious + grass—super-best of earth's garniture—with its ever-satisfying + green. The king-birds have come, and the corn-planter, the scolding + bob-o-link. 'Plant your corn, plant your corn,' says he, as he scurries + athwart the ploughed ground, hardly lifting his crank wings to a level + with his back, so self-important is he in his admonitions. The earlier + birds have gone to housekeeping, and have disappeared from the spray. + There has been brief period for them, this spring, for scarcely has the + deep snow gone, but the dark-green grass has come, and first we shall + know, the ground will be yellow with dandelions. + </p> + <p> + "I incline to thank Heaven this glorious morning of May 16th for the + pleasant home from which we can greet the Spring. Hitherto we have had to + await it amid a thicket of village houses, low down, close together, and + awfully white. For a prospect, we had the hinder part of an ugly + meeting-house, which an enterprising neighbor relieved us of by planting a + dwelling-house, right before our eyes, (on his own land, and he had a + right to,) which relieved us also of all prospect whatever. And the + revival spirit of habitation which has come over Concord is clapping up a + house between every two in the already crowded town; and the prospect is, + it will be soon all buildings. They are constructing, in quite good taste + though, small, trim, cottage-like. But I had rather be where I can breathe + air, and see beyond my own features, than be smothered among the prettiest + houses ever built. We are on the slope of a hill; it is all sand, be sure, + on all four sides of us, but the air is free, (and the sand, too, at + times,) and our water, there is danger of hard drinking to live by it. Air + and water, the two necessaries of life, and high, free play-ground for the + small ones. There is a sand precipice hard by, high enough, were it only + rock and overlooked the ocean, to be as sublime as any of the Nahant + cliffs. As it is, it is altogether a safer haunt for daring childhood, + which could hardly break its neck by a descent of some hundreds of feet. + </p> + <p> + "A low flat lies between us and the town, with its State-house, and body- + guard of well-proportioned steeples standing round. It was marshy and wet, + but is almost all redeemed by the translation into it of the high hills of + sand. It must have been a terrible place for frogs, judging from what + remains of it. Bits of water from the springs hard by lay here and there + about the low ground, which are peopled as full of singers as ever the + gallery of the old North Meeting-house was, and quite as melodious ones. + Such performers I never heard, in marsh or pool. They are not the great, + stagnant, bull-paddocks, fat and coarse-noted like Parson, but clear-water + frogs, green, lively, and sweet-voiced. I passed their orchestra going + home the other evening, with a small lad, and they were at it, all parts, + ten thousand peeps, shrill, ear-piercing, and incessant, coming up from + every quarter, accompanied by a second, from some larger swimmer with his + trombone, and broken in upon, every now and then, but not discordantly, + with the loud, quick hallo, that resembles the cry of the tree-toad. + 'There are the Hutchinsons,' cried the lad. 'The Rainers,' responded I, + glad to remember enough of my ancient Latin to know that Rana, or some + such sounding word, stood for frog. But it was a 'band of music,' as the + Miller friends say. Like other singers, (all but the Hutchinsons,) these + are apt to sing too much, all the time they are awake, constituting really + too much of a good thing. I have wondered if the little reptiles were + singing in concert, or whether every one peeped on his own hook, their + neighbor hood only making it a chorus. I incline to the opinion that they + are performing together, that they know the tune, and each carries his + part, self- selected, in free meeting, and therefore never discordant. The + hour rule of Congress might be useful, though far less needed among the + frogs than among the profane croakers of the fens at Washington." + </p> + <p> + Here is a sketch of the mountain scenery of New Hampshire, as seen from + the Holderness Mountain, or North Hill, during a visit which he made to + his native valley in the autumn of 1841:— + </p> + <p> + "The earth sphered up all around us, in every quarter of the horizon, like + the crater of a vast volcano, and the great hollow within the mountain + circle was as smoky as Vesuvius or Etna in their recess of eruption. The + little village of Plymouth lay right at our feet, with its beautiful + expanse of intervale opening on the eye like a lake among the woods and + hills, and the Pemigewasset, bordered along its crooked way with rows of + maples, meandering from upland to upland through the meadows. Our young + footsteps had wandered over these localities. Time had cast it all far + back that Pemigewasset, with its meadows and border trees; that little + village whitening in the margin of its inter vale; and that one house + which we could distinguish, where the mother that watched over and endured + our wayward childhood totters at fourscore! + </p> + <p> + "To the south stretched a broken, swelling upland country, but champaign + from the top of North Hill, patched all over with grain-fields and green + wood-lots, the roofs of the farm-houses shining in the sun. Southwest, the + Cardigan Mountain showed its bald forehead among the smokes of a thousand + fires, kindled in the woods in the long drought. Westward, Moosehillock + heaved up its long back, black as a whale; and turning the eye on + northward, glancing down the while on the Baker's River valley, dotted + over with human dwellings like shingle-bunches for size, you behold the + great Franconia Range, its Notch and its Haystacks, the Elephant Mountain + on the left, and Lafayette (Great Haystack) on the right, shooting its + peak in solemn loneliness high up into the desert sky, and overtopping all + the neighboring Alps but Mount Washington itself. The prospect of these is + most impressive and satisfactory. We don't believe the earth presents a + finer mountain display. The Haystacks stand there like the Pyramids on the + wall of mountains. One of them eminently has this Egyptian shape. It is as + accurate a pyramid to the eye as any in the old valley of the Nile, and a + good deal bigger than any of those hoary monuments of human presumption, + of the impious tyranny of monarchs and priests, and of the appalling + servility of the erecting multitude. Arthur's Seat in Edinburgh does not + more finely resemble a sleeping lion than the huge mountain on the left of + the Notch does an elephant, with his great, overgrown rump turned + uncivilly toward the gap where the people have to pass. Following round + the panorama, you come to the Ossipees and the Sandwich Mountains, peaks + innumerable and nameless, and of every variety of fantastic shape. Down + their vast sides are displayed the melancholy-looking slides, contrasting + with the fathomless woods. + </p> + <p> + "But the lakes,—you see lakes, as well as woods and mountains, from + the top of North Hill. Newfound Lake in Hebron, only eight miles distant, + you can't see; it lies too deep among the hills. Ponds show their small + blue mirrors from various quarters of the great picture. Worthen's Mill- + Pond and the Hardhack, where we used to fish for trout in truant, + barefooted days, Blair's Mill-Pond, White Oak Pond, and Long Pond, and the + Little Squam, a beautiful dark sheet of deep, blue water, about two miles + long, stretched an id the green hills and woods, with a charming little + beach at its eastern end, and without an island. And then the Great Squam, + connected with it on the east by a short, narrow stream, the very queen of + ponds, with its fleet of islands, surpassing in beauty all the foreign + waters we have seen, in Scotland or elsewhere,—the islands covered + with evergreens, which impart their hue to the mass of the lake, as it + stretches seven miles on east from its smaller sister, towards the + peerless Winnipesaukee. Great Squam is as beautiful as water and island + can be. But Winnipesaukee, it is the very 'Smile of the Great Spirit.' It + looks as if it had a thousand islands; some of them large enough for + little towns, and others not bigger than a swan or a wild duck swimming on + its surface of glass." + </p> + <p> + His wit and sarcasm were generally too good-natured to provoke even their + unfortunate objects, playing all over his editorials like the thunderless + lightnings which quiver along the horizon of a night of summer calmness; + but at times his indignation launched them like bolts from heaven. Take + the following as a specimen. He is speaking of the gag rule of Congress, + and commending Southern representatives for their skilful selection of a + proper person to do their work:— + </p> + <p> + "They have a quick eye at the South to the character, or, as they would + say, the points of a slave. They look into him shrewdly, as an old jockey + does into a horse. They will pick him out, at rifle-shot distance, among a + thousand freemen. They have a nice eye to detect shades of vassalage. They + saw in the aristocratic popinjay strut of a counterfeit Democrat an + itching aspiration to play the slaveholder. They beheld it in 'the cut of + his jib,' and his extreme Northern position made him the very tool for + their purpose. The little creature has struck at the right of petition. A + paltrier hand never struck at a noble right. The Eagle Right of Petition, + so loftily sacred in the eyes of the Constitution that Congress can't + begin to 'abridge' it, in its pride of place, is hawked at by this crested + jay-bird. A 'mousing owl' would have seen better at midnoon than to have + done it. It is an idiot blue-jay, such as you see fooling about among the + shrub oaks and dwarf pitch pines in the winter. What an ignominious death + to the lofty right, were it to die by such a hand; but it does not die. It + is impalpable to the 'malicious mockery' of such vain blows.' We are glad + it is done—done by the South—done proudly, and in slaveholding + style, by the hand of a vassal. What a man does by another he does by + himself, says the maxim. But they will disown the honor of it, and cast it + on the despised 'free nigger' North." + </p> + <p> + Or this description—not very flattering to the "Old Commonwealth"—of + the treatment of the agent of Massachusetts in South Carolina:— + </p> + <p> + "Slavery may perpetrate anything, and New England can't see it. It can + horsewhip the old Commonwealth of Massachusetts, and spit in her + governmental face, and she will not recognize it as an offence. She sent + her agent to Charleston on a State embassy. Slavery caught him, and sent + him ignominiously home. The solemn great man came back in a hurry. He + returned in a most undignified trot. He ran; he scampered,—the + stately official. The Old Bay State actually pulled foot, cleared, dug, as + they say, like any scamp with a hue and cry after him. Her grave old + Senator, who no more thought of having to break his stately walk than he + had of being flogged at school for stealing apples, came back from + Carolina upon the full run, out of breath and out of dignity. Well, what's + the result? Why, nothing. She no more thinks of showing resentment about + it than she would if lightning had struck him. He was sent back 'by the + visitation of God;' and if they had lynched him to death, and stained the + streets of Charleston with his blood, a Boston jury, if they could have + held inquest over him, would have found that he 'died by the visitation of + God.' And it would have been crowner's quest law, Slavery's crowners." + </p> + <p> + Here is a specimen of his graceful blending of irony and humor. He is + expostulating with his neighbor of the New Hampshire Patriot, assuring him + that he cannot endure the ponderous weight of his arguments, begging for a + little respite, and, as a means of obtaining it, urging the editor to + travel. He advises him to go South, to the White Sulphur Springs, and + thinks that, despite of his dark complexion, he would be safe there from + being sold for jail fees, as his pro-slavery merits would more than + counterbalance his colored liabilities, which, after all, were only prima + facie evidence against him. He suggests Texas, also, as a place where + "patriots" of a certain class "most do congregate," and continues as + follows:— + </p> + <p> + "There is Arkansas, too, all glorious in new-born liberty, fresh and + unsullied, like Venus out of the ocean,—that newly discovered star, + in the firmament banner of this Republic. Sister Arkansas, with her bowie- + knife graceful at her side, like the huntress Diana with her silver bow, + —oh it would be refreshing and recruiting to an exhausted patriot to + go and replenish his soul at her fountains. The newly evacuated lands of + the Cherokee, too, a sweet place now for a lover of his country to visit, + to renew his self-complacency by wandering among the quenched hearths of + the expatriated Indians; a land all smoking with the red man's departing + curse,—a malediction that went to the centre. Yes, and Florida,— + blossoming and leafy Florida, yet warm with the life-blood of Osceola and + his warriors, shed gloriously under flag of truce. Why should a patriot of + such a fancy for nature immure himself in the cells of the city, and + forego such an inviting and so broad a landscape? Ite viator. Go forth, + traveller, and leave this mouldy editing to less elastic fancies. We would + respectfully invite our Colonel to travel. What signifies? Journey—wander—go + forth—itinerate—exercise—perambulate—roam." + </p> + <p> + He gives the following ludicrous definition of Congress:— + </p> + <p> + "But what is Congress? It is the echo of the country at home,—the + weathercock, that denotes and answers the shifting wind,—a thing of + tail, nearly all tail, moved by the tail and by the wind, with small + heading, and that corresponding implicitly in movement with the broad + sail-like stern, which widens out behind to catch the rum-fraught breath + of 'the Brotherhood.' As that turns, it turns; when that stops, it stops; + and in calmish weather looks as steadfast and firm as though it was + riveted to the centre. The wind blows, and the little popularity-hunting + head dodges this way and that, in endless fluctuation. Such is Congress, + or a great portion of it. It will point to the northwest heavens of + Liberty, whenever the breezes bear down irresistibly upon it, from the + regions of political fair weather. It will abolish slavery at the Capitol, + when it has already been doomed to abolition and death everywhere else in + the country. 'It will be in at the death.'" + </p> + <p> + Replying to the charge that the Abolitionists of the North were "secret" + in their movements and designs, he says:— + </p> + <p> + "'In secret!' Why, our movements have been as prominent and open as the + house-tops from the beginning. We have striven from the outset to write + the whole matter cloud-high in the heavens, that the utmost South might + read it. We have cast an arc upon the horizon, like the semicircle of the + polar lights, and upon it have bent our motto, 'Immediate Emancipation,' + glorious as the rainbow. We have engraven it there, on the blue table of + the cold vault, in letters tall enough for the reading of the nations. And + why has the far South not read and believed before this? Because a steam + has gone up—a fog—from New England's pulpit and her degenerate + press, and hidden the beaming revelation from its vision. The Northern + hierarchy and aristocracy have cheated the South." + </p> + <p> + He spoke at times with severity of slaveholders, but far oftener of those + who, without the excuse of education and habit, and prompted only by a + selfish consideration of political or sectarian advantage, apologized for + the wrong, and discountenanced the anti-slavery movement. "We have nothing + to say," said he, "to the slave. He is no party to his own enslavement,—he + is none to his disenthralment. We have nothing to say to the South. The + real holder of slaves is not there. He is in the North, the free North. + The South alone has not the power to hold the slave. It is the character + of the nation that binds and holds him. It is the Republic that does it, + the efficient force of which is north of Mason and Dixon's line. By virtue + of the majority of Northern hearts and voices, slavery lives in the + South!" + </p> + <p> + In 1840, he spent a few weeks in England, Ireland, and Scotland. He has + left behind a few beautiful memorials of his tour. His Ride over the + Border, Ride into Edinburgh, Wincobank hall, Ailsa Craig, gave his paper + an interest in the eyes of many who had no sympathy with his political and + religious views. + </p> + <p> + Scattered all over his editorials, like gems, are to be found beautiful + images, sweet touches of heartfelt pathos,—thoughts which the reader + pauses over with surprise and delight. We subjoin a few specimens, taken + almost at random from the book before us:— + </p> + <p> + "A thunder-storm,—what can match it for eloquence and poetry? That + rush from heaven of the big drops, in what multitude and succession, and + how they sound as they strike! How they play on the old home roof and the + thick tree-tops! What music to go to sleep by, to the tired boy, as he + lies under the naked roof! And the great, low bass thunder, as it rolls + off over the hills, and settles down behind them to the very centre, and + you can feel the old earth jar under your feet!" + </p> + <p> + "There was no oratory in the speech of the <i>Learned Blacksmith</i>, in + the ordinary sense of that word, no grace of elocution, but mighty + thoughts radiating off from his heated mind, like sparks from the glowing + steel of his own anvil." + </p> + <p> + "The hard hands of Irish labor, with nothing in them,—they ring like + slabs of marble together, in response to the wild appeals of O'Connell, + and the British stand conquered before them, with shouldered arms. Ireland + is on her feet, with nothing in her hands, impregnable, unassailable, in + utter defencelessness,—the first time that ever a nation sprung to + its feet unarmed. The veterans of England behold them, and forbear to + fire. They see no mark. It will not do to fire upon men; it will do only + to fire upon soldiers. They are the proper mark of the murderous gun, but + men cannot be shot." + </p> + <p> + "It is coming to that (abolition of war) the world over; and when it does + come to it, oh what a long breath of relief the tired world will draw, as + it stretches itself for the first time out upon earth's greensward, and + learns the meaning of repose and peaceful sleep!" + </p> + <p> + "He who vests his labor in the faithful ground is dealing directly with + God; human fraud or weakness do not intervene between him and his + requital. No mechanic has a set of customers so trustworthy as God and the + elements. No savings bank is so sure as the old earth." + </p> + <p> + "Literature is the luxury of words. It originates nothing, it does + nothing. It talks hard words about the labor of others, and is reckoned + more meritorious for it than genius and labor for doing what learning can + only descant upon. It trades on the capital of unlettered minds. It struts + in stolen plumage, and it is mere plumage. A learned man resembles an owl + in more respects than the matter of wisdom. Like that solemn bird, he is + about all feathers." + </p> + <p> + "Our Second Advent friends contemplate a grand conflagration about the + first of April next. I should be willing there should be one, if it could + be confined to the productions of the press, with which the earth is + absolutely smothered. Humanity wants precious few books to read, but the + great living, breathing, immortal volume of Providence. Life,—real + life,—how to live, how to treat one another, and how to trust God in + matters beyond our ken and occasion,—these are the lessons to learn, + and you find little of them in libraries." + </p> + <p> + "That accursed drum and fife! How they have maddened mankind! And the deep + bass boom of the cannon, chiming in in the chorus of battle, that trumpet + and wild charging bugle,—how they set the military devil in a man, + and make him into a soldier! Think of the human family falling upon one + another at the inspiration of music! How must God feel at it, to see those + harp-strings he meant should be waked to a love bordering on divine, + strung and swept to mortal hate and butchery!" + </p> + <p> + "Leave off being Jews," (he is addressing Major Noah with regard to his + appeal to his brethren to return to Judaea,) "and turn mankind. The rocks + and sands of Palestine have been worshipped long enough. Connecticut River + or the Merrimac are as good rivers as any Jordan that ever run into a dead + or live sea, and as holy, for that matter. In Humanity, as in Christ + Jesus, as Paul says, 'there is neither Jew nor Greek.' And there ought to + be none. Let Humanity be reverenced with the tenderest devotion; + suffering, discouraged, down-trodden, hard-handed, haggard-eyed, care-worn + mankind! Let these be regarded a little. Would to God I could alleviate + all their sorrows, and leave them a chance to laugh! They are, miserable + now. They might be as happy as the blackbird on the spray, and as full of + melody." + </p> + <p> + "I am sick as death at this miserable struggle among mankind for a living. + Poor devils! were they born to run such a gauntlet after the means of + life? Look about you, and see your squirming neighbors, writhing and + twisting like so many angleworms in a fisher's bait-box, or the wriggling + animalculae seen in the vinegar drop held to the sun. How they look, how + they feel, how base it makes them all!" + </p> + <p> + "Every human being is entitled to the means of life, as the trout is to + his brook or the lark to the blue sky. Is it well to put a human 'young + one' here to die of hunger, thirst, and nakedness, or else be preserved as + a pauper? Is this fair earth but a poor-house by creation and intent? Was + it made for that?—and these other round things we see dancing in the + firmament to the music of the spheres, are they all great shining + poor-houses?" + </p> + <p> + "The divines always admit things after the age has adopted them. They are + as careful of the age as the weathercock is of the wind. You might as well + catch an old experienced weathercock, on some ancient Orthodox steeple, + standing all day with its tail east in a strong out wind, as the divines + at odds with the age." + </p> + <p> + But we must cease quoting. The admirers of Jean Paul Richter might find + much of the charm and variety of the "Flower, Fruit, and Thorn Pieces" in + this newspaper collection. They may see, perhaps, as we do, some things + which they cannot approve of, the tendency of which, however intended, is + very questionable. But, with us, they will pardon something to the spirit + of liberty, much to that of love and humanity which breathes through all. + </p> + <p> + Disgusted and heart-sick at the general indifference of Church and clergy + to the temporal condition of the people,—at their apologies for and + defences of slavery, war, and capital punishment,—Rogers turned + Protestant, in the full sense of the term. He spoke of priests and "pulpit + wizards" as freely as John Milton did two centuries ago, although with far + less bitterness and rasping satire. He could not endure to see + Christianity and Humanity divorced. He longed to see the beautiful life of + Jesus—his sweet humanities, his brotherly love, his abounding + sympathies—made the example of all men. Thoroughly democratic, in + his view all men were equal. Priests, stripped of their sacerdotal + tailoring, were in his view but men, after all. He pitied them, he said, + for they were in a wrong position,—above life's comforts and + sympathies,—"up in the unnatural cold, they had better come down + among men, and endure and enjoy with them." "Mankind," said he, "want the + healing influences of humanity. They must love one another more. + Disinterested good will make the world as it should be." + </p> + <p> + His last visit to his native valley was in the autumn of 1845. In a + familiar letter to a friend, he thus describes his farewell view of the + mountain glories of his childhood's home:— + </p> + <p> + "I went a jaunt, Thursday last, about twenty miles north of this valley, + into the mountain region, where what I beheld, if I could tell it as I saw + it, would make your outlawed sheet sought after wherever our Anglo- Saxon + tongue is spoken in the wide world. I have been many a time among those + Alps, and never without a kindling of wildest enthusiasm in my woodland + blood. But I never saw them till last Thursday. They never loomed + distinctly to my eye before, and the sun never shone on them from heaven + till then. They were so near me, I could seem to hear the voice of their + cataracts, as I could count their great slides, streaming adown their lone + and desolate sides,—old slides, some of them overgrown with young + woods, like half-healed scars on the breast of a giant. The great rains + had clothed the valleys of the upper Pemigewasset in the darkest and + deepest green. The meadows were richer and more glorious in their thick + 'fall feed' than Queen Anne's Garden, as I saw it from the windows of + Windsor Castle. And the dark hemlock and hackmatack woods were yet darker + after the wet season, as they lay, in a hundred wildernesses, in the + mighty recesses of the mountains. But the peaks,—the eternal, the + solitary, the beautiful, the glorious and dear mountain peaks, my own + Moosehillock and my native Haystacks,—these were the things on which + eye and heart gazed and lingered, and I seemed to see them for the last + time. It was on my way back that I halted and turned to look at them from + a high point on the Thornton road. It was about four in the afternoon. It + had rained among the hills about the Notch, and cleared off. The sun, + there sombred at that early hour, as towards his setting, was pouring his + most glorious light upon the naked peaks, and they casting their mighty + shadows far down among the inaccessible woods that darken the hollows that + stretch between their bases. A cloud was creeping up to perch and rest + awhile on the highest top of Great Haystack. Vulgar folks have called it + Mount Lafayette, since the visit of that brave old Frenchman in 1825 or + 1826. If they had asked his opinion, he would have told them the names of + mountains couldn't be altered, and especially names like that, so + appropriate, so descriptive, and so picturesque. A little hard white + cloud, that looked like a hundred fleeces of wool rolled into one, was + climbing rapidly along up the northwestern ridge, that ascended to the + lonely top of Great Haystack. All the others were bare. Four or five of + them,—as distinct and shapely as so many pyramids; some topped out + with naked cliff, on which the sun lay in melancholy glory; others clothed + thick all the way up with the old New Hampshire hemlock or the daring + hackmatack,—Pierpont's hackmatack. You could see their shadows + stretching many and many a mile, over Grant and Location, away beyond the + invading foot of Incorporation,—where the timber-hunter has scarcely + explored, and where the moose browses now, I suppose, as undisturbed as he + did before the settlement of the State. I wish our young friend and + genius, Harrison Eastman, had been with me, to see the sunlight as it + glared on the tops of those woods, and to see the purple of the mountains. + I looked at it myself almost with the eye of a painter. If a painter + looked with mine, though, he never could look off upon his canvas long + enough to make a picture; he would gaze forever at the original. + </p> + <p> + "But I had to leave it, and to say in my heart, Farewell! And as I + travelled on down, and the sun sunk lower and lower towards the summit of + the western ridge, the clouds came up and formed an Alpine range in the + evening heavens above it,—like other Haystacks and Moosehillocks,—so + dark and dense that fancy could easily mistake them for a higher Alps. + There were the peaks and the great passes; the Franconia Notches among the + cloudy cliffs, and the great White Mountain Gap." + </p> + <p> + His health, never robust, had been gradually failing for some time + previous to his death. He needed more repose and quiet than his duties as + an editor left him; and to this end he purchased a small and pleasant farm + in his loved Pennigewasset valley, in the hope that he might there recruit + his wasted energies. In the sixth month of the year of his death, in a + letter to us, he spoke of his prospects in language which even then + brought moisture to our eyes:— + </p> + <p> + "I am striving to get me an asylum of a farm. I have a wife and seven + children, every one of them with a whole spirit. I don't want to be + separated from any of them, only with a view to come together again. I + have a beautiful little retreat in prospect, forty odd miles north, where + I imagine I can get potatoes and repose,—a sort of haven or port. I + am among the breakers, and 'mad for land.' If I get this home,—it is + a mile or two in among the hills from the pretty domicil once visited by + yourself and glorious Thompson,—I am this moment indulging the fancy + that I may see you at it before we die. Why can't I have you come and see + me? You see, dear W., I don't want to send you anything short of a full + epistle. Let me end as I begun, with the proffer of my hand in grasp of + yours extended. My heart I do not proffer,—it was yours before,—it + shall be yours while I am N. P. ROGERS." + </p> + <p> + Alas! the haven of a deeper repose than he had dreamed of was close at + hand. He lingered until the middle of the tenth month, suffering much, yet + calm and sensible to the last. Just before his death, he desired his + children to sing at his bedside that touching song of Lover's, <i>The + Angel's Whisper</i>. Turning his eyes towards the open window, through + which the leafy glory of the season he most loved was visible, he listened + to the sweet melody. In the words of his friend Pierpont,— + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "The angel's whisper stole in song upon his closing ear; + From his own daughter's lips it came, so musical and clear, + That scarcely knew the dying man what melody was there— + The last of earth's or first of heaven's pervading all the air." +</pre> + <p> + He sleeps in the Concord burial-ground, under the shadow of oaks; the very + spot he would have chosen, for he looked upon trees with something akin to + human affection. "They are," he said, "the beautiful handiwork and + architecture of God, on which the eye never tires. Every one is a feather + in the earth's cap, a plume in her bonnet, a tress on her forehead,—a + comfort, a refreshing, and an ornament to her." Spring has hung over him + her buds, and opened beside him her violets. Summer has laid her green + oaken garland on his grave, and now the frost-blooms of autumn drop upon + it. Shall man cast a nettle on that mound? He loved humanity,—shall + it be less kind to him than Nature? Shall the bigotry of sect, and creed, + and profession, drive its condemnatory stake into his grave? God forbid. + The doubts which he sometimes unguardedly expressed had relation, we are + constrained to believe, to the glosses of commentators and creed-makers + and the inconsistency of professors, rather than to those facts and + precepts of Christianity to which he gave the constant assent of his + practice. He sought not his own. His heart yearned with pity and brotherly + affection for all the poor and suffering in the universe. Of him, the + angel of Leigh Hunt's beautiful allegory might have written, in the golden + book of remembrance, as he did of the good Abou Ben Adhem, "He loved his + fellow-men." + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0010" id="link2H_4_0010"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + ROBERT DINSMORE. + </h2> + <p> + The great charm of Scottish poetry consists in its simplicity, and + genuine, unaffected sympathy with the common joys and sorrows of daily + life. It is a home-taught, household melody. It calls to mind the pastoral + bleat on the hillsides, the kirkbells of a summer Sabbath, the song of the + lark in the sunrise, the cry of the quail in the corn-land, the low of + cattle, and the blithe carol of milkmaids "when the kye come hame" at + gloaming. Meetings at fair and market, blushing betrothments, merry + weddings, the joy of young maternity, the lights and shades of domestic + life, its bereavements and partings, its chances and changes, its holy + death-beds, and funerals solemnly beautiful in quiet kirkyards, —these + furnish the hints of the immortal melodies of Burns, the sweet ballads of + the Ettrick Shepherd and Allan Cunningham, and the rustic drama of Ramsay. + It is the poetry of home, of nature, and the affections. + </p> + <p> + All this is sadly wanting in our young literature. We have no songs; + American domestic life has never been hallowed and beautified by the sweet + and graceful and tender associations of poetry. We have no Yankee + pastorals. Our rivers and streams turn mills and float rafts, and are + otherwise as commendably useful as those of Scotland; but no quaint ballad + or simple song reminds us that men and women have loved, met, and parted + on their banks, or that beneath each roof within their valleys the tragedy + and comedy of life have been enacted. Our poetry is cold and imitative; it + seems more the product of over-strained intellects than the spontaneous + outgushing of hearts warm with love, and strongly sympathizing with human + nature as it actually exists about us, with the joys and griefs of the men + and women whom we meet daily. Unhappily, the opinion prevails that a poet + must be also a philosopher, and hence it is that much of our poetry is as + indefinable in its mysticism as an Indian Brahmin's commentary on his + sacred books, or German metaphysics subjected to homeopathic dilution. It + assumes to be prophetical, and its utterances are oracular. It tells of + strange, vague emotions and yearnings, painfully suggestive of spiritual + "groanings which cannot be uttered." If it "babbles o' green fields" and + the common sights and sounds of nature, it is only for the purpose of + finding some vague analogy between them and its internal experiences and + longings. It leaves the warm and comfortable fireside of actual knowledge + and human comprehension, and goes wailing and gibbering like a ghost about + the impassable doors of mystery:— + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "It fain would be resolved + How things are done, + And who the tailor is + That works for the man I' the sun." +</pre> + <p> + How shall we account for this marked tendency in the literature of a + shrewd, practical people? Is it that real life in New England lacks those + conditions of poetry and romance which age, reverence, and superstition + have gathered about it in the Old World? Is it that + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "Ours are not Tempe's nor Arcadia's vales," +</pre> + <p> + but are more famous for growing Indian corn and potatoes, and the + manufacture of wooden ware and pedler notions, than for romantic + associations and legendary interest? That our huge, unshapely shingle + structures, blistering in the sun and glaring with windows, were evidently + never reared by the spell of pastoral harmonies, as the walls of Thebes + rose at the sound of the lyre of Amphion? That the habits of our people + are too cool, cautious, undemonstrative, to furnish the warp and woof of + song and pastoral, and that their dialect and figures of speech, however + richly significant and expressive in the autobiography of Sam Slick, or + the satire of Hosea Biglow and Ethan Spike, form a very awkward medium of + sentiment and pathos? All this may be true. But the Yankee, after all, is + a man, and as such his history, could it be got at, must have more or less + of poetic material in it; moreover, whether conscious of it or not, he + also stands relieved against the background of Nature's beauty or + sublimity. There is a poetical side to the commonplace of his incomings + and outgoings; study him well, and you may frame an idyl of some sort from + his apparently prosaic existence. Our poets, we must needs think, are + deficient in that shiftiness, ready adaptation to circumstances, and + ability of making the most of things, for which, as a people, we are + proverbial. Can they make nothing of our Thanksgiving, that annual + gathering of long-severed friends? Do they find nothing to their purpose + in our apple-bees, buskings, berry- pickings, summer picnics, and winter + sleigh-rides? Is there nothing available in our peculiarities of climate, + scenery, customs, and political institutions? Does the Yankee leap into + life, shrewd, hard, and speculating, armed, like Pallas, for a struggle + with fortune? Are there not boys and girls, school loves and friendship, + courtings and match-makings, hope and fear, and all the varied play of + human passions, —the keen struggles of gain, the mad grasping of + ambition,—sin and remorse, tearful repentance and holy aspirations? + Who shall say that we have not all the essentials of the poetry of human + life and simple nature, of the hearth and the farm-field? Here, then, is a + mine unworked, a harvest ungathered. Who shall sink the shaft and thrust + in the sickle? + </p> + <p> + And here let us say that the mere dilettante and the amateur ruralist may + as well keep their hands off. The prize is not for them. He who would + successfully strive for it must be himself what he sings,—part and + parcel of the rural life of New England,—one who has grown strong + amidst its healthful influences, familiar with all its details, and + capable of detecting whatever of beauty, humor, or pathos pertain to it,—one + who has added to his book-lore the large experience of an active + participation in the rugged toil, the hearty amusements, the trials, and + the pleasures he describes. + </p> + <p> + We have been led to these reflections by an incident which has called up + before us the homespun figure of an old friend of our boyhood, who had the + good sense to discover that the poetic element existed in the simple home + life of a country farmer, although himself unable to give a very + creditable expression of it. He had the "vision," indeed, but the "faculty + divine" was wanting; or, if he possessed it in any degree, as Thersites + says of the wit of Ajax, "it would not out, but lay coldly in him like + fire in the flint." + </p> + <p> + While engaged this morning in looking over a large exchange list of + newspapers, a few stanzas of poetry in the Scottish dialect attracted our + attention. As we read them, like a wizard's rhyme they seemed to have the + power of bearing us back to the past. They had long ago graced the columns + of that solitary sheet which once a week diffused happiness over our + fireside circle, making us acquainted, in our lonely nook, with the + goings-on of the great world. The verses, we are now constrained to admit, + are not remarkable in themselves, truth and simple nature only; yet how + our young hearts responded to them! Twenty years ago there were fewer + verse-makers than at present; and as our whole stock of light literature + consisted of Ellwood's <i>Davideis</i> and the selections of <i>Lindley + Murray's English Reader</i>, it is not improbable that we were in a + condition to overestimate the contributions to the poet's corner of our + village newspaper. Be that as it may, we welcome them as we would the face + of an old friend, for they somehow remind us of the scent of haymows, the + breath of cattle, the fresh greenery by the brookside, the moist earth + broken by the coulter and turned up to the sun and winds of May. This + particular piece, which follows, is entitled <i>The Sparrow</i>, and was + occasioned by the crushing of a bird's-nest by the author while ploughing + among his corn. It has something of the simple tenderness of Burns. + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "Poor innocent and hapless Sparrow + Why should my mould-board gie thee sorrow! + This day thou'll chirp and mourn the morrow + Wi' anxious breast; + The plough has turned the mould'ring furrow + Deep o'er thy nest! + + "Just I' the middle o' the hill + Thy nest was placed wi' curious skill; + There I espied thy little bill + Beneath the shade. + In that sweet bower, secure frae ill, + Thine eggs were laid. + + "Five corns o' maize had there been drappit, + An' through the stalks thy head was pappit, + The drawing nowt could na be stappit + I quickly foun'; + Syne frae thy cozie nest thou happit, + Wild fluttering roun'. + + "The sklentin stane beguiled the sheer, + In vain I tried the plough to steer; + A wee bit stumpie I' the rear + Cam' 'tween my legs, + An' to the jee-side gart me veer + An' crush thine eggs. + + "Alas! alas! my bonnie birdie! + Thy faithful mate flits round to guard thee. + Connubial love!—a pattern worthy + The pious priest! + What savage heart could be sae hardy + As wound thy breast? + + "Ah me! it was nae fau't o' mine; + It gars me greet to see thee pine. + It may be serves His great design + Who governs all; + Omniscience tents wi' eyes divine + The Sparrow's fall! + + "How much like thine are human dools, + Their sweet wee bairns laid I' the mools? + The Sovereign Power who nature rules + Hath said so be it + But poor blip' mortals are sic fools + They canna see it. + + "Nae doubt that He who first did mate us + Has fixed our lot as sure as fate is, + An' when He wounds He disna hate us, + But anely this, + He'll gar the ills which here await us + Yield lastin' bliss." +</pre> + <p> + In the early part of the eighteenth century a considerable number of + Presbyterians of Scotch descent, from the north of Ireland, emigrated to + the New World. In the spring of 1719, the inhabitants of Haverhill, on the + Merrimac, saw them passing up the river in several canoes, one of which + unfortunately upset in the rapids above the village. The following + fragment of a ballad celebrating this event has been handed down to the + present time, and may serve to show the feelings even then of the old + English settlers towards the Irish emigrants:— + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "They began to scream and bawl, + As out they tumbled one and all, + And, if the Devil had spread his net, + He could have made a glorious haul!" +</pre> + <p> + The new-comers proceeded up the river, and, landing opposite to the + Uncanoonuc Hills, on the present site of Manchester, proceeded inland to + Beaver Pond. Charmed with the appearance of the country, they resolved + here to terminate their wanderings. Under a venerable oak on the margin of + the little lake, they knelt down with their minister, Jamie McGregore, and + laid, in prayer and thanksgiving, the foundation of their settlement. In a + few years they had cleared large fields, built substantial stone and frame + dwellings and a large and commodious meeting-house; wealth had accumulated + around them, and they had everywhere the reputation of a shrewd and + thriving community. They were the first in New England to cultivate the + potato, which their neighbors for a long time regarded as a pernicious + root, altogether unfit for a Christian stomach. Every lover of that + invaluable esculent has reason to remember with gratitude the settlers of + Londonderry. + </p> + <p> + Their moral acclimation in Ireland had not been without its effect upon + their character. Side by side with a Presbyterianism as austere as that of + John Knox had grown up something of the wild Milesian humor, love of + convivial excitement and merry-making. Their long prayers and fierce zeal + in behalf of orthodox tenets only served, in the eyes of their Puritan + neighbors, to make more glaring still the scandal of their marked social + irregularities. It became a common saying in the region round about that + "the Derry Presbyterians would never give up a pint of doctrine or a pint + of rum." Their second minister was an old scarred fighter, who had + signalized himself in the stout defence of Londonderry, when James II. and + his Papists were thundering at its gates. Agreeably to his death-bed + directions, his old fellow-soldiers, in their leathern doublets and + battered steel caps, bore him to his grave, firing over him the same rusty + muskets which had swept down rank after rank of the men of Amalek at the + Derry siege. + </p> + <p> + Erelong the celebrated Derry fair was established, in imitation of those + with which they had been familiar in Ireland. Thither annually came all + manner of horse-jockeys and pedlers, gentlemen and beggars, fortune- + tellers, wrestlers, dancers and fiddlers, gay young farmers and buxom + maidens. Strong drink abounded. They who had good-naturedly wrestled and + joked together in the morning not unfrequently closed the day with a + fight, until, like the revellers of Donnybrook, + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "Their hearts were soft with whiskey, + And their heads were soft with blows." +</pre> + <p> + A wild, frolicking, drinking, fiddling, courting, horse-racing, riotous + merry-making,—a sort of Protestant carnival, relaxing the grimness + of Puritanism for leagues around it. + </p> + <p> + In the midst of such a community, and partaking of all its influences, + Robert Dinsmore, the author of the poem I have quoted, was born, about the + middle of the last century. His paternal ancestor, John, younger son of a + Laird of Achenmead, who left the banks of the Tweed for the green + fertility of Northern Ireland, had emigrated to New England some forty + years before, and, after a rough experience of Indian captivity in the + wild woods of Maine, had settled down among his old neighbors in + Londonderry. Until nine years of age, Robert never saw a school. He was a + short time under the tuition of an old British soldier, who had strayed + into the settlement after the French war, "at which time," he says in a + letter to a friend, "I learned to repeat the shorter and larger + catechisms. These, with the Scripture proofs annexed to them, confirmed me + in the orthodoxy of my forefathers, and I hope I shall ever remain an + evidence of the truth of what the wise man said, 'Train up a child in the + way he should go, and when he is old he will not depart from it.'" He + afterwards took lessons with one Master McKeen, who used to spend much of + his time in hunting squirrels with his pupils. He learned to read and + write; and the old man always insisted that he should have done well at + ciphering also, had he not fallen in love with Molly Park. At the age of + eighteen he enlisted in the Revolutionary army, and was at the battle of + Saratoga. On his return he married his fair Molly, settled down as a + farmer in Windham, formerly a part of Londonderry, and before he was + thirty years of age became an elder in the church, of the creed and + observances of which he was always a zealous and resolute defender. From + occasional passages in his poems, it is evident that the instructions + which he derived from the pulpit were not unlike those which Burns + suggested as needful for the unlucky lad whom he was commending to his + friend Hamilton:— + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "Ye 'll catechise him ilka quirk, + An' shore him weel wi' hell." +</pre> + <p> + In a humorous poem, entitled Spring's Lament, he thus describes the + consternation produced in the meeting-house at sermon time by a dog, who, + in search of his mistress, rattled and scraped at the "west porch door:"— + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "The vera priest was scared himsel', + His sermon he could hardly spell; + Auld carlins fancied they could smell + The brimstone matches; + They thought he was some imp o' hell, + In quest o' wretches." +</pre> + <p> + He lived to a good old age, a home-loving, unpretending farmer, + cultivating his acres with his own horny hands, and cheering the long + rainy days and winter evenings with homely rhyme. Most of his pieces were + written in the dialect of his ancestors, which was well understood by his + neighbors and friends, the only audience upon which he could venture to + calculate. He loved all old things, old language, old customs, old + theology. In a rhyming letter to his cousin Silas, he says:— + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "Though Death our ancestors has cleekit, + An' under clods then closely steekit, + We'll mark the place their chimneys reekit, + Their native tongue we yet wad speak it, + Wi' accent glib." +</pre> + <p> + He wrote sometimes to amuse his neighbors, often to soothe their sorrow + under domestic calamity, or to give expression to his own. With little of + that delicacy of taste which results from the attrition of fastidious and + refined society, and altogether too truthful and matter-of-fact to call in + the aid of imagination, he describes in the simplest and most direct terms + the circumstances in which he found himself, and the impressions which + these circumstances had made on his own mind. He calls things by their + right names; no euphuism or transcendentalism,—the plainer and + commoner the better. He tells us of his farm life, its joys and sorrows, + its mirth and care, with no embellishment, with no concealment of + repulsive and ungraceful features. Never having seen a nightingale, he + makes no attempt to describe the fowl; but he has seen the night-hawk, at + sunset, cutting the air above him, and he tells of it. Side by side with + his waving corn-fields and orchard-blooms we have the barn-yard and + pigsty. Nothing which was necessary to the comfort and happiness of his + home and avocation was to him "common or unclean." Take, for instance, the + following, from a poem written at the close of autumn, after the death of + his wife:— + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "No more may I the Spring Brook trace, + No more with sorrow view the place + Where Mary's wash-tub stood; + No more may wander there alone, + And lean upon the mossy stone + Where once she piled her wood. + 'T was there she bleached her linen cloth, + By yonder bass-wood tree + From that sweet stream she made her broth, + Her pudding and her tea. + That stream, whose waters running, + O'er mossy root and stone, + Made ringing and singing, + Her voice could match alone." +</pre> + <p> + We envy not the man who can sneer at this simple picture. It is honest as + Nature herself. An old and lonely man looks back upon the young years of + his wedded life. Can we not look with him? The sunlight of a summer + morning is weaving itself with the leafy shadows of the bass-tree, beneath + which a fair and ruddy-checked young woman, with her full, rounded arms + bared to the elbow, bends not ungracefully to her task, pausing ever and + anon to play with the bright-eyed child beside her, and mingling her songs + with the pleasant murmurings of gliding water! Alas! as the old man looks, + he hears that voice, which perpetually sounds to us all from the past—no + more! + </p> + <p> + Let us look at him in his more genial mood. Take the opening lines of his + Thanksgiving Day. What a plain, hearty picture of substantial comfort! + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "When corn is in the garret stored, + And sauce in cellar well secured; + When good fat beef we can afford, + And things that 're dainty, + With good sweet cider on our board, + And pudding plenty; + + "When stock, well housed, may chew the cud, + And at my door a pile of wood, + A rousing fire to warm my blood, + Blest sight to see! + It puts my rustic muse in mood + To sing for thee." +</pre> + <p> + If he needs a simile, he takes the nearest at hand. In a letter to his + daughter he says:— + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "That mine is not a longer letter, + The cause is not the want of matter,— + Of that there's plenty, worse or better; + But like a mill + Whose stream beats back with surplus water, + The wheel stands still." +</pre> + <p> + Something of the humor of Burns gleams out occasionally from the sober + decorum of his verses. In an epistle to his friend Betton, high sheriff of + the county, who had sent to him for a peck of seed corn, he says:— + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "Soon plantin' time will come again, + Syne may the heavens gie us rain, + An' shining heat to bless ilk plain + An' fertile hill, + An' gar the loads o' yellow grain, + Our garrets fill. + + "As long as I has food and clothing, + An' still am hale and fier and breathing, + Ye 's get the corn—and may be aething + Ye'll do for me; + (Though God forbid)—hang me for naething + An' lose your fee." +</pre> + <p> + And on receiving a copy of some verses written by a lady, he talks in a + sad way for a Presbyterian deacon:— + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "Were she some Aborigine squaw, + Wha sings so sweet by nature's law, + I'd meet her in a hazle shaw, + Or some green loany, + And make her tawny phiz and 'a + My welcome crony." +</pre> + <p> + The practical philosophy of the stout, jovial rhymer was but little + affected by the sour-featured asceticism of the elder. He says:— + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "We'll eat and drink, and cheerful take + Our portions for the Donor's sake, + For thus the Word of Wisdom spake— + Man can't do better; + Nor can we by our labors make + The Lord our debtor!" +</pre> + <p> + A quaintly characteristic correspondence in rhyme between the Deacon and + Parson McGregore, evidently "birds o' ane feather," is still in existence. + The minister, in acknowledging the epistle of his old friend, commences + his reply as follows:— + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "Did e'er a cuif tak' up a quill, + Wha ne'er did aught that he did well, + To gar the muses rant and reel, + An' flaunt and swagger, + Nae doubt ye 'll say 't is that daft chiel + Old Dite McGregore!" +</pre> + <p> + The reply is in the same strain, and may serve to give the reader some + idea of the old gentleman as a religious controversialist:— + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "My reverend friend and kind McGregore, + Although thou ne'er was ca'd a bragger, + Thy muse I'm sure nave e'er was glegger + Thy Scottish lays + Might gar Socinians fa' or stagger, + E'en in their ways. + + "When Unitarian champions dare thee, + Goliah like, and think to scare thee, + Dear Davie, fear not, they'll ne'er waur thee; + But draw thy sling, + Weel loaded frae the Gospel quarry, + An' gie 't a fling." +</pre> + <p> + The last time I saw him, he was chaffering in the market-place of my + native village, swapping potatoes and onions and pumpkins for tea, coffee, + molasses, and, if the truth be told, New England rum. Threescore years and + ten, to use his own words, + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "Hung o'er his back, + And bent him like a muckle pack," +</pre> + <p> + yet he still stood stoutly and sturdily in his thick shoes of cowhide, + like one accustomed to tread independently the soil of his own acres,— + his broad, honest face seamed by care and darkened by exposure to "all the + airts that blow," and his white hair flowing in patriarchal glory beneath + his felt hat. A genial, jovial, large-hearted old man, simple as a child, + and betraying, neither in look nor manner, that he was accustomed to + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "Feed on thoughts which voluntary move + Harmonious numbers." +</pre> + <p> + Peace to him! A score of modern dandies and sentimentalists could ill + supply the place of this one honest man. In the ancient burial-ground of + Windham, by the side of his "beloved Molly," and in view of the old + meeting-house, there is a mound of earth, where, every spring, green + grasses tremble in the wind and the warm sunshine calls out the flowers. + There, gathered like one of his own ripe sheaves, the farmer poet sleeps + with his fathers. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0011" id="link2H_4_0011"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + PLACIDO, THE SLAVE POET. (1845.) + </h2> + <p> + I have been greatly interested in the fate of Juan Placido, the black + revolutionist of Cuba, who was executed in Havana, as the alleged + instigator and leader of an attempted revolt on the part of the slaves in + that city and its neighborhood. + </p> + <p> + Juan Placido was born a slave on the estate of Don Terribio de Castro. His + father was an African, his mother a mulatto. His mistress treated him with + great kindness, and taught him to read. When he was twelve years of age + she died, and he fell into other and less compassionate hands. At the age + of eighteen, on seeing his mother struck with a heavy whip, he for the + first time turned upon his tormentors. To use his own words, "I felt the + blow in my heart. To utter a loud cry, and from a downcast boy, with the + timidity of one weak as a lamb, to become all at office like a raging + lion, was a thing of a moment." He was, however, subdued, and the next + morning, together with his mother, a tenderly nurtured and delicate woman, + severely scourged. On seeing his mother rudely stripped and thrown down + upon the ground, he at first with tears implored the overseer to spare + her; but at the sound of the first blow, as it cut into her naked flesh, + he sprang once more upon the ruffian, who, having superior strength, beat + him until he was nearer dead than alive. + </p> + <p> + After suffering all the vicissitudes of slavery,—hunger, nakedness, + stripes; after bravely and nobly bearing up against that slow, dreadful + process which reduces the man to a thing, the image of God to a piece of + merchandise, until he had reached his thirty-eighth year, he was + unexpectedly released from his bonds. Some literary gentlemen in Havana, + into whose hands two or three pieces of his composition had fallen, struck + with the vigor, spirit, and natural grace which they manifested, sought + out the author, and raised a subscription to purchase his freedom. He came + to Havana, and maintained himself by house-painting, and such other + employments as his ingenuity and talents placed within his reach. He wrote + several poems, which have been published in Spanish at Havana, and + translated by Dr. Madden, under the title of <i>Poems by a Slave</i>. + </p> + <p> + It is not too much to say of these poems that they will bear a comparison + with most of the productions of modern Spanish literature. The style is + bold, free, energetic. Some of the pieces are sportive and graceful; such + is the address to <i>The Cucuya</i>, or Cuban firefly. This beautiful + insect is sometimes fastened in tiny nets to the light dresses of the + Cuban ladies, a custom to which the writer gallantly alludes in the + following lines:— + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "Ah!—still as one looks on such brightness and bloom, + On such beauty as hers, one might envy the doom + Of a captive Cucuya that's destined, like this, + To be touched by her hand and revived by her kiss! + In the cage which her delicate hand has prepared, + The beautiful prisoner nestles unscared, + O'er her fair forehead shining serenely and bright, + In beauty's own bondage revealing its light! + And when the light dance and the revel are done, + She bears it away to her alcove alone, + Where, fed by her hand from the cane that's most choice, + In secret it gleans at the sound of her voice! + O beautiful maiden! may Heaven accord + Thy care of the captive a fitting reward, + And never may fortune the fetters remove + Of a heart that is thine in the bondage of love!" +</pre> + <p> + In his Dream, a fragment of some length, Placido dwells in a touching + manner upon the scenes of his early years. It is addressed to his brother + Florence, who was a slave near Matanzas, while the author was in the same + condition at Havana. There is a plaintive and melancholy sweetness in + these lines, a natural pathos, which finds its way to the heart:— + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "Thou knowest, dear Florence, my sufferings of old, + The struggles maintained with oppression for years; + We shared them together, and each was consoled + With the love which was nurtured by sorrow and tears. + + "But now far apart, the sad pleasure is gone, + We mingle our sighs and our sorrows no more; + The course is a new one which each has to run, + And dreary for each is the pathway before. + + "But in slumber our spirits at least shall commune, + We will meet as of old in the visions of sleep, + In dreams which call back early days, when at noon + We stole to the shade of the palm-tree to weep! + + "For solitude pining, in anguish of late + The heights of Quintana I sought for repose; + And there, in the cool and the silence, the weight + Of my cares was forgotten, I felt not any woes. + + "Exhausted and weary, the spell of the place + Sank down on my eyelids, and soft slumber stole + So sweetly upon me, it left not a trace + Of sorrow o'ercasting the light of the soul." +</pre> + <p> + The writer then imagines himself borne lightly through the air to the + place of his birth. The valley of Matanzas lies beneath him, hallowed by + the graves of his parents. He proceeds:— + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "I gazed on that spot where together we played, + Our innocent pastimes came fresh to my mind, + Our mother's caress, and the fondness displayed + In each word and each look of a parent so kind. + + "I looked on the mountain, whose fastnesses wild + The fugitives seek from the rifle and hound; + Below were the fields where they suffered and toiled, + And there the low graves of their comrades are found. + + "The mill-house was there, and the turmoil of old; + But sick of these scenes, for too well were they known, + I looked for the stream where in childhood I strolled + When a moment of quiet and peace was my own. + + "With mingled emotions of pleasure and pain, + Dear Florence, I sighed to behold thee once more; + I sought thee, my brother, embraced thee again, + But I found thee a slave as I left thee before!" +</pre> + <p> + Some of his devotional pieces evince the fervor and true feeling of the + Christian poet. His <i>Ode to Religion</i> contains many admirable lines. + Speaking of the martyrs of the early days of Christianity, he says finely:— + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "Still in that cradle, purpled with their blood, + The infant Faith waxed stronger day by day." +</pre> + <p> + I cannot forbear quoting the last stanza of this poem:— + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "O God of mercy, throned in glory high, + On earth and all its misery look down: + Behold the wretched, hear the captive's cry, + And call Thy exiled children round Thy throne! + There would I fain in contemplation gaze + On Thy eternal beauty, and would make + Of love one lasting canticle of praise, + And every theme but Thee henceforth forsake!" +</pre> + <p> + His best and noblest production is an ode <i>To Cuba</i>, written on the + occasion of Dr. Madden's departure from the island, and presented to that + gentleman. It was never published in Cuba, as its sentiments would have + subjected the author to persecution. It breathes a lofty spirit of + patriotism, and an indignant sense of the wrongs inflicted upon his race. + Withal, it has something of the grandeur and stateliness of the old + Spanish muse. + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "Cuba!—of what avail that thou art fair, + Pearl of the Seas, the pride of the Antilles, + If thy poor sons have still to see thee share + The pangs of bondage and its thousand ills? + Of what avail the verdure of thy hills, + The purple bloom thy coffee-plain displays; + The cane's luxuriant growth, whose culture fills + More graves than famine, or the sword finds ways + To glut with victims calmly as it slays? + + "Of what avail that thy clear streams abound + With precious ore, if wealth there's, none to buy + Thy children's rights, and not one grain is found + For Learning's shrine, or for the altar nigh + Of poor, forsaken, downcast Liberty? + Of what avail the riches of thy port, + Forests of masts and ships from every sea, + If Trade alone is free, and man, the sport + And spoil of Trade, bears wrongs of every sort? + + "Cuba! O Cuba!—-when men call thee fair, + And rich, and beautiful, the Queen of Isles, + Star of the West, and Ocean's gem most rare, + Oh, say to those who mock thee with such wiles: + Take off these flowers; and view the lifeless spoils + Which wait the worm; behold their hues beneath + The pale, cold cheek; and seek for living smiles + Where Beauty lies not in the arms of Death, + And Bondage taints not with its poison breath!" +</pre> + <p> + The disastrous result of the last rising of the slaves—in Cuba is + well known. Betrayed, and driven into premature collision with their + oppressors, the insurrectionists were speedily crushed into subjection. + Placido was arrested, and after a long hearing was condemned to be + executed, and consigned to the Chapel of the Condemned. + </p> + <p> + How far he was implicated in the insurrectionary movement it is now + perhaps impossible to ascertain. The popular voice at Havana pronounced + him its leader and projector, and as such he was condemned. His own bitter + wrongs; the terrible recollections of his life of servitude; the sad + condition of his relatives and race, exposed to scorn, contumely, and the + heavy hand of violence; the impunity with which the most dreadful outrages + upon the persons of slaves were inflicted,—acting upon a mind fully + capable of appreciating the beauty and dignity of freedom,— + furnished abundant incentives to an effort for the redemption of his race + and the humiliation of his oppressors. The Heraldo, of Madrid speaks of + him as "the celebrated poet, a man of great natural genius, and beloved + and appreciated by the most respectable young men of Havana." It accuses + him of wild and ambitious projects, and states that he was intended to be + the chief of the black race after they had thrown off the yoke of bondage. + </p> + <p> + He was executed at Havana in the seventh month, 1844. According to the + custom in Cuba with condemned criminals, he was conducted from prison to + the Chapel of the Doomed. He passed thither with singular composure, + amidst a great concourse of people, gracefully saluting his numerous + acquaintances. The chapel was hung with black cloth, and dimly lighted. He + was seated beside his coffin. Priests in long black robes stood around + him, chanting in sepulchral voices the service of the dead. It is an + ordeal under which the stoutest-hearted and most resolute have been found + to sink. After enduring it for twenty-four hours he was led out to + execution. He came forth calm and undismayed; holding a crucifix in his + hand, he recited in a loud, clear voice a solemn prayer in verse, which he + had composed amidst the horrors of the Chapel. The following is an + imperfect rendering of a poem which thrilled the hearts of all who heard + it:— + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "God of unbounded love and power eternal, + To Thee I turn in darkness and despair! + Stretch forth Thine arm, and from the brow infernal + Of Calumny the veil of Justice tear; + And from the forehead of my honest fame + Pluck the world's brand of infamy and shame! + + "O King of kings!—my fathers' God!—who only + Art strong to save, by whom is all controlled, + Who givest the sea its waves, the dark and lonely + Abyss of heaven its light, the North its cold, + The air its currents, the warm sun its beams, + Life to the flowers, and motion to the streams! + + "All things obey Thee, dying or reviving + As thou commandest; all, apart from Thee, + From Thee alone their life and power deriving, + Sink and are lost in vast eternity! + Yet doth the void obey Thee; since from naught + This marvellous being by Thy hand was wrought. + + "O merciful God! I cannot shun Thy presence, + For through its veil of flesh Thy piercing eye + Looketh upon my spirit's unsoiled essence, + As through the pure transparence of the sky; + Let not the oppressor clap his bloody hands, + As o'er my prostrate innocence he stands! + + "But if, alas, it seemeth good to Thee + That I should perish as the guilty dies, + And that in death my foes should gaze on me + With hateful malice and exulting eyes, + Speak Thou the word, and bid them shed my blood, + Fully in me Thy will be done, O God!" +</pre> + <p> + On arriving at the fatal spot, he sat down as ordered, on a bench, with + his back to the soldiers. The multitude recollected that in some affecting + lines, written by the conspirator in prison, he had said that it would be + useless to seek to kill him by shooting his body,—that his heart + must be pierced ere it would cease its throbbings. At the last moment, + just as the soldiers were about to fire, he rose up and gazed for an + instant around and above him on the beautiful capital of his native land + and its sail-flecked bay, on the dense crowds about him, the blue + mountains in the distance, and the sky glorious with summer sunshine. + "Adios, mundo!" (Farewell, world!) he said calmly, and sat down. The word + was given, and five balls entered his body. Then it was that, amidst the + groans and murmurs of the horror-stricken spectators, he rose up once + more, and turned his head to the shuddering soldiers, his face wearing an + expression of superhuman courage. "Will no one pity me?" he said, laying + his hand over his heart. "Here, fire here!" While he yet spake, two balls + entered his heart, and he fell dead. + </p> + <p> + Thus perished the hero poet of Cuba. He has not fallen in vain. His genius + and his heroic death will doubtless be regarded by his race as precious + legacies. To the great names of L'Ouverture and Petion the colored man can + now add that of Juan Placido. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0012" id="link2H_4_0012"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + PERSONAL SKETCHES AND TRIBUTES + </h2> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0013" id="link2H_4_0013"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + THE FUNERAL OF TORREY. + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + Charles T. Torrey, an able young Congregational clergyman, died May + 9, 1846, in the state's prison of Maryland, for the offence of + aiding slaves to escape from bondage. His funeral in Boston, + attended by thousands, was a most impressive occasion. The + following is an extract from an article written for the <i>Essex + Transcript</i>:— +</pre> + <p> + Some seven years ago, we saw Charles T. Torrey for the first time. His + wife was leaning on his arm,—young, loving, and beautiful; the heart + that saw them blessed them. Since that time, we have known him as a most + energetic and zealous advocate of the anti-slavery cause. He had fine + talents, improved by learning and observation, a clear, intensely active + intellect, and a heart full of sympathy and genial humanity. It was with + strange and bitter feelings that we bent over his coffin and looked upon + his still face. The pity which we had felt for him in his long sufferings + gave place to indignation against his murderers. Hateful beyond the power + of expression seemed the tyranny which had murdered him with the slow + torture of the dungeon. May God forgive us, if for the moment we felt like + grasping His dread prerogative of vengeance. As we passed out of the hall, + a friend grasped our hand hard, his eye flashing through its tears, with a + stern reflection of our own emotions, while he whispered through his + pressed lips: "It is enough to turn every anti- slavery heart into steel." + Our blood boiled; we longed to see the wicked apologists of slavery—the + blasphemous defenders of it in Church and State—led up to the coffin + of our murdered brother, and there made to feel that their hands had aided + in riveting the chain upon those still limbs, and in shutting out from + those cold lips the free breath of heaven. + </p> + <p> + A long procession followed his remains to their resting-place at Mount + Auburn. A monument to his memory will be raised in that cemetery, in the + midst of the green beauty of the scenery which he loved in life, and side + by side with the honored dead of Massachusetts. Thither let the friends of + humanity go to gather fresh strength from the memory of the martyr. There + let the slaveholder stand, and as he reads the record of the enduring + marble commune with his own heart, and feel that sorrow which worketh + repentance. + </p> + <p> + The young, the beautiful, the brave!—he is safe now from the malice + of his enemies. Nothing can harm him more. His work for the poor and + helpless was well and nobly done. In the wild woods of Canada, around many + a happy fireside and holy family altar, his name is on the lips of God's + poor. He put his soul in their souls' stead; he gave his life for those + who had no claim on his love save that of human brotherhood. How poor, how + pitiful and paltry, seem our labors! How small and mean our trials and + sacrifices! May the spirit of the dead be with us, and infuse into our + hearts something of his own deep sympathy, his hatred of injustice, his + strong faith and heroic endurance. May that spirit be gladdened in its + present sphere by the increased zeal and faithfulness of the friends he + has left behind. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0014" id="link2H_4_0014"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + EDWARD EVERETT. + </h2> + <h3> + A letter to Robert C. Waterston. + </h3> + <p> + Amesbury, 27th 1st Month, 1865. + </p> + <p> + I acknowledge through thee the invitation of the standing committee of the + Massachusetts Historical Society to be present at a special meeting of the + Society for the purpose of paying a tribute to the memory of our late + illustrious associate, Edward Everett. + </p> + <p> + It is a matter of deep regret to me that the state of my health will not + permit me to be with you on an occasion of so much interest. + </p> + <p> + It is most fitting that the members of the Historical Society of + Massachusetts should add their tribute to those which have been already + offered by all sects, parties, and associations to the name and fame of + their late associate. He was himself a maker of history, and part and + parcel of all the noble charities and humanizing influences of his State + and time. + </p> + <p> + When the grave closed over him who added new lustre to the old and honored + name of Quincy, all eyes instinctively turned to Edward Everett as the + last of that venerated class of patriotic civilians who, outliving all + dissent and jealousy and party prejudice, held their reputation by the + secure tenure of the universal appreciation of its worth as a common + treasure of the republic. It is not for me to pronounce his eulogy. + Others, better qualified by their intimate acquaintance with him, have + done and will do justice to his learning, eloquence, varied culture, and + social virtues. My secluded country life has afforded me few opportunities + of personal intercourse with him, while my pronounced radicalism on the + great question which has divided popular feeling rendered our political + paths widely divergent. Both of us early saw the danger which threatened + the country. In the language of the prophet, we "saw the sword coming upon + the land," but while he believed in the possibility of averting it by + concession and compromise, I, on the contrary, as firmly believed that + such a course could only strengthen and confirm what I regarded as a + gigantic conspiracy against the rights and liberties, the union and the + life, of the nation. + </p> + <p> + Recent events have certainly not tended to change this belief on my part; + but in looking over the past, while I see little or nothing to retract in + the matter of opinion, I am saddened by the reflection that through the + very intensity of my convictions I may have done injustice to the motives + of those with whom I differed. As respects Edward Everett, it seems to me + that only within the last four years I have truly known him. + </p> + <p> + In that brief period, crowded as it is with a whole life-work of + consecration to the union, freedom, and glory of his country, he not only + commanded respect and reverence, but concentrated upon himself in a most + remarkable degree the love of all loyal and generous hearts. We have seen, + in these years of trial, very great sacrifices offered upon the altar of + patriotism,—wealth, ease, home, love, life itself. But Edward + Everett did more than this: he laid on that altar not only his time, + talents, and culture, but his pride of opinion, his long-cherished views + of policy, his personal and political predilections and prejudices, his + constitutional fastidiousness of conservatism, and the carefully + elaborated symmetry of his public reputation. With a rare and noble + magnanimity, he met, without hesitation, the demand of the great occasion. + Breaking away from all the besetments of custom and association, he forgot + the things that are behind, and, with an eye single to present duty, + pressed forward towards the mark of the high calling of Divine Providence + in the events of our time. All honor to him! If we mourn that he is now + beyond the reach of our poor human praise, let us reverently trust that he + has received that higher plaudit: "Well done, thou good and faithful + servant!" + </p> + <p> + When I last met him, as my colleague in the Electoral College of + Massachusetts, his look of health and vigor seemed to promise us many + years of his wisdom and usefulness. On greeting him I felt impelled to + express my admiration and grateful appreciation of his patriotic labors; + and I shall never forget how readily and gracefully he turned attention + from himself to the great cause in which we had a common interest, and + expressed his thankfulness that he had still a country to serve. + </p> + <p> + To keep green the memory of such a man is at once a privilege and a duty. + That stainless life of seventy years is a priceless legacy. His hands were + pure. The shadow of suspicion never fell on him. If he erred in his + opinions (and that he did so he had the Christian grace and courage to + own), no selfish interest weighed in the scale of his judgment against + truth. + </p> + <p> + As our thoughts follow him to his last resting-place, we are sadly + reminded of his own touching lines, written many years ago at Florence. + The name he has left behind is none the less "pure" that instead of being + "humble," as he then anticipated, it is on the lips of grateful millions, + and written ineffaceable on the record of his country's trial and triumph:— + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "Yet not for me when I shall fall asleep + Shall Santa Croce's lamps their vigils keep. + Beyond the main in Auburn's quiet shade, + With those I loved and love my couch be made; + Spring's pendant branches o'er the hillock wave, + And morning's dewdrops glisten on my grave, + While Heaven's great arch shall rise above my bed, + When Santa Croce's crumbles on her dead,— + Unknown to erring or to suffering fame, + So may I leave a pure though humble name." +</pre> + <p> + Congratulating the Society on the prospect of the speedy consummation of + the great objects of our associate's labors,—the peace and permanent + union of our country,— + </p> + <p> + I am very truly thy friend. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0015" id="link2H_4_0015"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + LEWIS TAPPAN. (1873.) + </h2> + <p> + One after another, those foremost in the antislavery conflict of the last + half century are rapidly passing away. The grave has just closed over all + that was mortal of Salmon P. Chase, the kingliest of men, a statesman + second to no other in our history, too great and pure for the Presidency, + yet leaving behind him a record which any incumbent of that station might + envy,—and now the telegraph brings us the tidings of the death of + Lewis Tappan, of Brooklyn, so long and so honorably identified with the + anti- slavery cause, and with every philanthropic and Christian + enterprise. He was a native of Massachusetts, born at Northampton in 1788, + of Puritan lineage,—one of a family remarkable for integrity, + decision of character, and intellectual ability. At the very outset, in + company with his brother Arthur, he devoted his time, talents, wealth, and + social position to the righteous but unpopular cause of Emancipation, and + became, in consequence, a mark for the persecution which followed such + devotion. His business was crippled, his name cast out as evil, his + dwelling sacked, and his furniture dragged into the street and burned. Yet + he never, in the darkest hour, faltered or hesitated for a moment. He knew + he was right, and that the end would justify him; one of the cheerfullest + of men, he was strong where others were weak, hopeful where others + despaired. He was wise in counsel, and prompt in action; like Tennyson's + Sir Galahad, + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "His strength was as the strength of ten, + Because his heart was pure." +</pre> + <p> + I met him for the first time forty years ago, at the convention which + formed the American Anti-Slavery Society, where I chanced to sit by him as + one of the secretaries. Myself young and inexperienced, I remember how + profoundly I was impressed by his cool self-possession, clearness of + perception, and wonderful executive ability. Had he devoted himself to + party politics with half the zeal which he manifested in behalf of those + who had no votes to give and no honors to bestow, he could have reached + the highest offices in the land. He chose his course, knowing all that he + renounced, and he chose it wisely. He never, at least, regretted it. + </p> + <p> + And now, at the ripe age of eighty-five years, the brave old man has + passed onward to the higher life, having outlived here all hatred, abuse, + and misrepresentation, having seen the great work of Emancipation + completed, and white men and black men equal before the law. I saw him for + the last time three years ago, when he was preparing his valuable + biography of his beloved brother Arthur. Age had begun to tell upon his + constitution, but his intellectual force was not abated. The old, pleasant + laugh and playful humor remained. He looked forward to the close of life + hopefully, even cheerfully, as he called to mind the dear friends who had + passed on before him, to await his coming. + </p> + <p> + Of the sixty-three signers of the Anti-Slavery Declaration at the + Philadelphia Convention in 1833, probably not more than eight or ten are + now living. + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "As clouds that rake the mountain summits, + As waves that know no guiding hand, + So swift has brother followed brother + From sunshine to the sunless land." +</pre> + <p> + Yet it is a noteworthy fact that the oldest member of that convention, + David Thurston, D. D., of Maine, lived to see the slaves emancipated, and + to mingle his voice of thanksgiving with the bells that rang in the day of + universal freedom. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0016" id="link2H_4_0016"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + BAYARD TAYLOR + </h2> + <h3> + Read at the memorial meeting in Tremont Temple, Boston, January 10, 1879. + </h3> + <p> + I am not able to attend the memorial meeting in Tremont Temple on the 10th + instant, but my heart responds to any testimonial appreciative of the + intellectual achievements and the noble and manly life of Bayard Taylor. + More than thirty years have intervened between my first meeting him in the + fresh bloom of his youth and hope and honorable ambition, and my last + parting with him under the elms of Boston Common, after our visit to + Richard H. Dana, on the occasion of the ninetieth anniversary of that + honored father of American poetry, still living to lament the death of his + younger disciple and friend. How much he has accomplished in these years! + The most industrious of men, slowly, patiently, under many disadvantages, + he built up his splendid reputation. Traveller, editor, novelist, + translator, diplomatist, and through all and above all poet, what he was + he owed wholly to himself. His native honesty was satisfied with no half + tasks. He finished as he went, and always said and did his best. + </p> + <p> + It is perhaps too early to assign him his place in American literature. + His picturesque books of travel, his Oriental lyrics, his Pennsylvanian + idyls, his Centennial ode, the pastoral beauty and Christian sweetness of + Lars, and the high argument and rhythmic marvel of Deukalion are sureties + of the permanence of his reputation. But at this moment my thoughts dwell + rather upon the man than the author. The calamity of his death, felt in + both hemispheres, is to me and to all who intimately knew and loved him a + heavy personal loss. Under the shadow of this bereavement, in the inner + circle of mourning, we sorrow most of all that we shall see his face no + more, and long for "the touch of a vanished hand, and the sound of a voice + that is still." + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0017" id="link2H_4_0017"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + WILLIAM ELLERY CHANNING + </h2> + <h3> + Read at the dedication of the Channing Memorial Church at Newport, R. I. + </h3> + <p> + DANVERS, MASS., 3d Mo., 13, 1880. + </p> + <p> + I scarcely need say that I yield to no one in love and reverence for the + great and good man whose memory, outliving all prejudices of creed, sect, + and party, is the common legacy of Christendom. As the years go on, the + value of that legacy will be more and more felt; not so much, perhaps, in + doctrine as in spirit, in those utterances of a devout soul which are + above and beyond the affirmation or negation of dogma. + </p> + <p> + His ethical severity and Christian tenderness; his hatred of wrong and + oppression, with love and pity for the wrong-doer; his noble pleas for + self-culture, temperance, peace, and purity; and above all, his precept + and example of unquestioning obedience to duty and the voice of God in his + soul, can never become obsolete. It is very fitting that his memory should + be especially cherished with that of Hopkins and Berkeley in the beautiful + island to which the common residence of those worthies has lent additional + charms and interest. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0018" id="link2H_4_0018"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + DEATH OF PRESIDENT GARFIELD. + </h2> + <h3> + A letter written to W. H. B. Currier, of Amesbury, Mass. + </h3> + <p> + DANVERS, MASS., 9th Mo., 24, 1881. + </p> + <p> + I regret that it is not in my power to join the citizens of Amesbury and + Salisbury in the memorial services on the occasion of the death of our + lamented President. But in heart and sympathy I am with you. I share the + great sorrow which overshadows the land; I fully appreciate the + irretrievable loss. But it seems to me that the occasion is one for + thankfulness as well as grief. + </p> + <p> + Through all the stages of the solemn tragedy which has just closed with + the death of our noblest and best, I have felt that the Divine Providence + was overruling the mighty affliction,—that the patient sufferer at + Washington was drawing with cords of sympathy all sections and parties + nearer to each other. And now, when South and North, Democrat and + Republican, Radical and Conservative, lift their voices in one unbroken + accord of lamentation; when I see how, in spite of the greed of gain, the + lust of office, the strifes and narrowness of party politics, the great + heart of the nation proves sound and loyal, I feel a new hope for the + republic, I have a firmer faith in its stability. It is said that no man + liveth and no man dieth to himself; and the pure and noble life of + Garfield, and his slow, long martyrdom, so bravely borne in view of all, + are, I believe, bearing for us as a people "the peaceable fruits of + righteousness." We are stronger, wiser, better, for them. + </p> + <p> + With him it is well. His mission fulfilled, he goes to his grave by the + Lakeside honored and lamented as man never was before. The whole world + mourns him. There is no speech nor language where the voice of his praise + is not heard. About his grave gather, with heads uncovered, the vast + brotherhood of man. + </p> + <p> + And with us it is well, also. We are nearer a united people than ever + before. We are at peace with all; our future is full of promise; our + industrial and financial condition is hopeful. God grant that, while our + material interests prosper, the moral and spiritual influence of the + occasion may be permanently felt; that the solemn sacrament of Sorrow, + whereof we have been made partakers, may be blest to the promotion of the + righteousness which exalteth a nation. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0019" id="link2H_4_0019"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + LYDIA MARIA CHILD. + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + In 1882 a collection of the Letters of Lydia Maria Child was + published, for which I wrote the following sketch, as an + introduction:— +</pre> + <p> + In presenting to the public this memorial volume, its compilers deemed + that a brief biographical introduction was necessary; and as a labor of + love I have not been able to refuse their request to prepare it. + </p> + <p> + Lydia Maria Francis was born in Medford, Massachusetts, February 11, 1802. + Her father, Convers Francis, was a worthy and substantial citizen of that + town. Her brother, Convers Francis, afterwards theological professor in + Harvard College, was some years older than herself, and assisted her in + her early home studies, though, with the perversity of an elder brother, + he sometimes mystified her in answering her questions. Once, when she + wished to know what was meant by Milton's "raven down of darkness," which + was made to smile when smoothed, he explained that it was only the fur of + a black cat, which sparkled when stroked! Later in life this brother wrote + of her, "She has been a dear, good sister to me would that I had been half + as good a brother to her." Her earliest teacher was an aged spinster, + known in the village as "Marm Betty," painfully shy, and with many + oddities of person and manner, the never- forgotten calamity of whose life + was that Governor Brooks once saw her drinking out of the nose of her + tea-kettle. Her school was in her bedroom, always untidy, and she was a + constant chewer of tobacco but the children were fond of her, and Maria + and her father always carried her a good Sunday dinner. Thomas W. + Higginson, in <i>Eminent Women of the Age</i>, mentions in this connection + that, according to an established custom, on the night before Thanksgiving + "all the humble friends of the Francis household—Marm Betty, the + washerwoman, wood-sawyer, and journeymen, some twenty or thirty in all—were + summoned to a preliminary entertainment. They there partook of an immense + chicken pie, pumpkin pie made in milk- pans, and heaps of doughnuts. They + feasted in the large, old-fashioned kitchen, and went away loaded with + crackers and bread and pies, not forgetting 'turnovers' for the children. + Such plain application of the doctrine that it is more blessed to give + than receive may have done more to mould the character of Lydia Maria + Child of maturer years than all the faithful labors of good Dr. Osgood, to + whom she and her brother used to repeat the Assembly's catechism once a + month." + </p> + <p> + Her education was limited to the public schools, with the exception of one + year at a private seminary in her native town. From a note by her brother, + Dr. Francis, we learn that when twelve years of age she went to + Norridgewock, Maine, where her married sister resided. At Dr. Brown's, in + Skowhegan, she first read <i>Waverley</i>. She was greatly excited, and + exclaimed, as she laid down the book, "Why cannot I write a novel?" She + remained in Norridgewock and vicinity for several years, and on her return + to Massachusetts took up her abode with her brother at Watertown. He + encouraged her literary tastes, and it was in his study that she commenced + her first story, <i>Hobomok</i>, which she published in the twenty- first + year of her age. The success it met with induced her to give to the + public, soon after, <i>The Rebels: a Tale of the Revolution</i>, which was + at once received into popular favor, and ran rapidly through several + editions. Then followed in close succession <i>The Mother's Book</i>, + running through eight American editions, twelve English, and one German, + <i>The Girl's Book</i>, the <i>History of Women</i>, and the <i>Frugal + Housewife</i>, of which thirty-five editions were published. Her <i>Juvenile + Miscellany</i> was commenced in 1826. + </p> + <p> + It is not too much to say that half a century ago she was the most popular + literary woman in the United States. She had published historical novels + of unquestioned power of description and characterization, and was widely + and favorably known as the editor of the <i>Juvenile Miscellany</i>, which + was probably the first periodical in the English tongue devoted + exclusively to children, and to which she was by far the largest + contributor. Some of the tales and poems from her pen were extensively + copied and greatly admired. It was at this period that the <i>North + American Review</i>, the highest literary authority of the country, said + of her, "We are not sure that any woman of our country could outrank Mrs. + Child. This lady has been long before the public as an author with much + success. And she well deserves it, for in all her works nothing can be + found which does not commend itself, by its tone of healthy morality and + good sense. Few female writers, if any, have done more or better things + for our literature in the lighter or graver departments." + </p> + <p> + Comparatively young, she had placed herself in the front rank of American + authorship. Her books and her magazine had a large circulation, and were + affording her a comfortable income, at a time when the rewards of + authorship were uncertain and at the best scanty. + </p> + <p> + In 1828 she married David Lee Child, Esq., a young and able lawyer, and + took up her residence in Boston. In 1831-32 both became deeply interested + in the subject of slavery, through the writings and personal influence of + William Lloyd Garrison. Her husband, a member of the Massachusetts + legislature and editor of the <i>Massachusetts Journal</i>, had, at an + earlier date, denounced the project of the dismemberment of Mexico for the + purpose of strengthening and extending American slavery. He was one of the + earliest members of the New England Anti-Slavery Society, and his + outspoken hostility to the peculiar institution greatly and unfavorably + affected his interests as a lawyer. In 1832 he addressed a series of able + letters on slavery and the slave-trade to Edward S. Abdy, a prominent + English philanthropist. In 1836 he published in Philadelphia ten strongly + written articles on the same subject. He visited England and France in + 1837, and while in Paris addressed an elaborate memoir to the Societe pour + l'Abolition d'Esclavage, and a paper on the same subject to the editor of + the <i>Eclectic Review</i>, in London. To his facts and arguments John + Quincy Adams was much indebted in the speeches which he delivered in + Congress on the Texas question. + </p> + <p> + In 1833 the American Anti-Slavery Society was formed by a convention in + Philadelphia. Its numbers were small, and it was everywhere spoken + against. It was at this time that Lydia Maria Child startled the country + by the publication of her noble <i>Appeal in Behalf of that Class of + Americans called Africans</i>. It is quite impossible for any one of the + present generation to imagine the popular surprise and indignation which + the book called forth, or how entirely its author cut herself off from the + favor and sympathy of a large number of those who had previously delighted + to do her honor. Social and literary circles, which had been proud of her + presence, closed their doors against her. The sale of her books, the + subscriptions to her magazine, fell off to a ruinous extent. She knew all + she was hazarding, and made the great sacrifice, prepared for all the + consequences which followed. In the preface to her book she says, "I am + fully aware of the unpopularity of the task I have undertaken; but though + I expect ridicule and censure, I do not fear them. A few years hence, the + opinion of the world will be a matter in which I have not even the most + transient interest; but this book will be abroad on its mission of + humanity long after the hand that wrote it is mingling with the dust. + Should it be the means of advancing, even one single hour, the inevitable + progress of truth and justice, I would not exchange the consciousness for + all Rothschild's wealth or Sir Walter's fame." + </p> + <p> + Thenceforth her life was a battle; a constant rowing hard against the + stream of popular prejudice and hatred. And through it all—pecuniary + privation, loss of friends and position, the painfulness of being suddenly + thrust from "the still air of delightful studies" into the bitterest and + sternest controversy of the age—she bore herself with patience, + fortitude, and unshaken reliance upon the justice and ultimate triumph of + the cause she had espoused. Her pen was never idle. Wherever there was a + brave word to be spoken, her voice was heard, and never without effect. It + is not exaggeration to say that no man or woman at that period rendered + more substantial service to the cause of freedom, or made such a "great + renunciation" in doing it. + </p> + <p> + A practical philanthropist, she had the courage of her convictions, and + from the first was no mere closet moralist or sentimental bewailer of the + woes of humanity. She was the Samaritan stooping over the wounded Jew. She + calmly and unflinchingly took her place by the side, of the despised slave + and free man of color, and in word and act protested against the cruel + prejudice which shut out its victims from the rights and privileges of + American citizens. Her philanthropy had no taint of fanaticism; throughout + the long struggle, in which she was a prominent actor, she kept her fine + sense of humor, good taste, and sensibility to the beautiful in art and + nature. + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + The opposition she met with from those who had shared her confidence + and friendship was of course keenly felt, but her kindly and genial + disposition remained unsoured. She rarely spoke of her personal + trials, and never posed as a martyr. The nearest approach to + anything like complaint is in the following lines, the date of which + I have not been able to ascertain:— + + THE WORLD THAT I AM PASSING THROUGH. + + Few in the days of early youth + Trusted like me in love and truth. + I've learned sad lessons from the years, + But slowly, and with many tears; + For God made me to kindly view + The world that I am passing through. + + Though kindness and forbearance long + Must meet ingratitude and wrong, + I still would bless my fellow-men, + And trust them though deceived again. + God help me still to kindly view + The world that I am passing through. + + From all that fate has brought to me + I strive to learn humility, + And trust in Him who rules above, + Whose universal law is love. + Thus only can I kindly view + The world that I am passing through. + + When I approach the setting sun, + And feel my journey well-nigh done, + May Earth be veiled in genial light, + And her last smile to me seem bright. + Help me till then to kindly view + The world that I am passing through. + + And all who tempt a trusting heart + From faith and hope to drift apart, + May they themselves be spared the pain + Of losing power to trust again. + God help us all to kindly view + The world that we are passing through. +</pre> + <p> + While faithful to the great duty which she felt was laid upon her in an + especial manner, she was by no means a reformer of one idea, but her + interest was manifested in every question affecting the welfare of + humanity. Peace, temperance, education, prison reform, and equality of + civil rights, irrespective of sex, engaged her attention. Under all the + disadvantages of her estrangement from popular favor, her charming Greek + romance of <i>Philothea</i> and her <i>Lives of Madame Roland</i> and the + <i>Baroness de Stael</i> proved that her literary ability had lost nothing + of its strength, and that the hand which penned such terrible rebukes had + still kept its delicate touch, and gracefully yielded to the inspiration + of fancy and art. While engaged with her husband in the editorial + supervision of the <i>Anti-Slavery Standard</i>, she wrote her admirable + <i>Letters from New York</i>; humorous, eloquent, and picturesque, but + still humanitarian in tone, which extorted the praise of even a + pro-slavery community. Her great work, in three octavo volumes, <i>The + Progress of Religious Ideas</i>, belongs, in part, to that period. It is + an attempt to represent in a candid, unprejudiced manner the rise and + progress of the great religions of the world, and their ethical relations + to each other. She availed herself of, and carefully studied, the + authorities at that time accessible, and the result is creditable to her + scholarship, industry, and conscientiousness. If, in her desire to do + justice to the religions of Buddha and Mohammed, in which she has been + followed by Maurice, Max Muller, and Dean Stanley, she seems at times to + dwell upon the best and overlook the darker features of those systems, her + concluding reflections should vindicate her from the charge of + undervaluing the Christian faith, or of lack of reverent appreciation of + its founder. In the closing chapter of her work, in which the large + charity and broad sympathies of her nature are manifest, she thus turns + with words of love, warm from the heart, to Him whose Sermon on the Mount + includes most that is good and true and vital in the religions and + philosophies of the world:— + </p> + <p> + "It was reserved for Him to heal the brokenhearted, to preach a gospel to + the poor, to say, 'Her sins, which are many, are forgiven, for she loved + much.' Nearly two thousand years have passed away since these words of + love and pity were uttered, yet when I read them my eyes fill with tears. + I thank Thee, O Heavenly Father, for all the messengers thou hast sent to + man; but, above all, I thank Thee for Him, thy beloved Son! Pure lily + blossom of the centuries, taking root in the lowliest depths, and + receiving the light and warmth of heaven in its golden heart! All that the + pious have felt, all that poets have said, all that artists have done, + with their manifold forms of beauty, to represent the ministry of Jesus, + are but feeble expressions of the great debt we owe Him who is even now + curing the lame, restoring sight to the blind, and raising the dead in + that spiritual sense wherein all miracle is true." + </p> + <p> + During her stay in New York, as editor of the <i>Anti-Slavery Standard</i>, + she found a pleasant home at the residence of the genial philanthropist, + Isaac T. Hopper, whose remarkable life she afterwards wrote. Her portrayal + of this extraordinary man, so brave, so humorous, so tender and faithful + to his convictions of duty, is one of the most readable pieces of + biography in English literature. Thomas Wentworth Higginson, in a + discriminating paper published in 1869, speaks of her eight years' sojourn + in New York as the most interesting and satisfactory period of her whole + life. "She was placed where her sympathetic nature found abundant outlet + and occupation. Dwelling in a house where disinterestedness and noble + labor were as daily breath, she had great opportunities. There was no mere + alms-giving; but sin and sorrow must be brought home to the fireside and + the heart; the fugitive slave, the drunkard, the outcast woman, must be + the chosen guests of the abode,— must be taken, and held, and loved + into reformation or hope." + </p> + <p> + It would be a very imperfect representation of Maria Child which regarded + her only from a literary point of view. She was wise in counsel; and men + like Charles Sumner, Henry Wilson, Salmon P. Chase, and Governor Andrew + availed themselves of her foresight and sound judgment of men and + measures. Her pen was busy with correspondence, and whenever a true man or + a good cause needed encouragement, she was prompt to give it. Her + donations for benevolent causes and beneficent reforms were constant and + liberal; and only those who knew her intimately could understand the + cheerful and unintermitted self-denial which alone enabled her to make + them. She did her work as far as possible out of sight, without noise or + pretension. Her time, talents, and money were held not as her own, but a + trust from the Eternal Father for the benefit of His suffering children. + Her plain, cheap dress was glorified by the generous motive for which she + wore it. Whether in the crowded city among the sin-sick and starving, or + among the poor and afflicted in the neighborhood of her country home, no + story of suffering and need, capable of alleviation, ever reached her + without immediate sympathy and corresponding action. Lowell, one of her + warmest admirers, in his <i>Fable for Critics</i> has beautifully + portrayed her abounding benevolence:— + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "There comes Philothea, her face all aglow: + She has just been dividing some poor creature's woe, + And can't tell which pleases her most, to relieve + His want, or his story to hear and believe. + No doubt against many deep griefs she prevails, + For her ear is the refuge of destitute tales; + She knows well that silence is sorrow's best food, + And that talking draws off from the heart its black blood." + + "The pole, science tells us, the magnet controls, + But she is a magnet to emigrant Poles, + And folks with a mission that nobody knows + Throng thickly about her as bees round a rose. + She can fill up the carets in such, make their scope + Converge to some focus of rational hope, + And, with sympathies fresh as the morning, their gall + Can transmute into honey,—but this is not all; + Not only for those she has solace; O, say, + Vice's desperate nursling adrift in Broadway, + Who clingest, with all that is left of thee human, + To the last slender spar from the wreck of the woman, + Hast thou not found one shore where those tired, drooping feet + Could reach firm mother-earth, one full heart on whose beat + The soothed head in silence reposing could hear + The chimes of far childhood throb back on the ear?" + + "Ah, there's many a beam from the fountain of day + That, to reach us unclouded, must pass, on its way, + Through the soul of a woman, and hers is wide ope + To the influence of Heaven as the blue eyes of Hope; + Yes, a great heart is hers, one that dares to go in + To the prison, the slave-hut, the alleys of sin, + And to bring into each, or to find there, some line + Of the never completely out-trampled divine; + If her heart at high floods swamps her brain now and then, + 'T is but richer for that when the tide ebbs again, + As, after old Nile has subsided, his plain + Overflows with a second broad deluge of grain; + What a wealth would it bring to the narrow and sour, + Could they be as a Child but for one little hour!" +</pre> + <p> + After leaving New York, her husband and herself took up their residence in + the rural town of Wayland, Mass. Their house, plain and unpretentious, had + a wide and pleasant outlook; a flower garden, carefully tended by her own + hands, in front, and on the side a fruit orchard and vegetable garden, + under the special care of her husband. The house was always neat, with + some appearance of unostentatious decoration, evincing at once the + artistic taste of the hostess and the conscientious economy which forbade + its indulgence to any great extent. Her home was somewhat apart from the + lines of rapid travel, and her hospitality was in a great measure confined + to old and intimate friends, while her visits to the city were brief and + infrequent. A friend of hers, who had ample opportunities for a full + knowledge of her home-life, says, "The domestic happiness of Mr. and Mrs. + Child seemed to me perfect. Their sympathies, their admiration of all + things good, and their hearty hatred of all things mean and evil were in + entire unison. Mr. Child shared his wife's enthusiasms, and was very proud + of her. Their affection, never paraded, was always manifest. After Mr. + Child's death, Mrs. Child, in speaking of the future life, said, 'I + believe it would be of small value to me if I were not united to him.'" + </p> + <p> + In this connection I cannot forbear to give an extract from some + reminiscences of her husband, which she left among her papers, which, + better than any words of mine, will convey an idea of their simple and + beautiful home-life:— + </p> + <p> + "In 1852 we made a humble home in Wayland, Mass., where we spent twenty- + two pleasant years entirely alone, without any domestic, mutually serving + each other, and dependent upon each other for intellectual companionship. + I always depended on his richly stored mind, which was able and ready to + furnish needed information on any subject. He was my walking dictionary of + many languages, my Universal Encyclopaedia. + </p> + <p> + "In his old age he was as affectionate and devoted as when the lover of my + youth; nay, he manifested even more tenderness. He was often singing,— + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "'There's nothing half so sweet in life + As Love's old dream.' +</pre> + <p> + "Very often, when he passed by me, he would lay his hand softly on my head + and murmur, 'Carum caput.' . . . But what I remember with the most tender + gratitude is his uniform patience and forbearance with my faults. . . . He + never would see anything but the bright side of my character. He always + insisted upon thinking that whatever I said was the wisest and the + wittiest, and that whatever I did was the best. The simplest little jeu + d'esprit of mine seemed to him wonderfully witty. Once, when he said, 'I + wish for your sake, dear, I were as rich as Croesus,' I answered, 'You are + Croesus, for you are king of Lydia.' How often he used to quote that! + </p> + <p> + "His mind was unclouded to the last. He had a passion for philology, and + only eight hours before he passed away he was searching out the derivation + of a word." + </p> + <p> + Her well-stored mind and fine conversational gifts made her company always + desirable. No one who listened to her can forget the earnest eloquence + with which she used to dwell upon the evidences, from history, tradition, + and experience, of the superhuman and supernatural; or with what eager + interest she detected in the mysteries of the old religions of the world + the germs of a purer faith and a holier hope. She loved to listen, as in + St. Pierre's symposium of <i>The Coffee-House of Surat</i>, to the + confessions of faith of all sects and schools of philosophy, Christian and + pagan, and gather from them the consoling truth that our Father has + nowhere left his children without some witness of Himself. She loved the + old mystics, and lingered with curious interest and sympathy over the + writings of Bohme, Swedenborg, Molinos, and Woolman. Yet this marked + speculative tendency seemed not in the slightest degree to affect her + practical activities. Her mysticism and realism ran in close parallel + lines without interfering with each other. + </p> + <p> + With strong rationalistic tendencies from education and conviction, she + found herself in spiritual accord with the pious introversion of Thomas a + Kempis and Madame Guion. She was fond of Christmas Eve stories, of + warnings, signs, and spiritual intimations, her half belief in which + sometimes seemed like credulity to her auditors. James Russell Lowell, in + his tender tribute to her, playfully alludes to this characteristic:— + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "She has such a musical taste that she 'll go + Any distance to hear one who draws a long bow. + She will swallow a wonder by mere might and main." +</pre> + <p> + In 1859 the descent of John Brown upon Harper's Ferry, and his capture, + trial, and death, startled the nation. When the news reached her that the + misguided but noble old man lay desperately wounded in prison, alone and + unfriended, she wrote him a letter, under cover of one to Governor Wise, + asking permission to go and nurse and care for him. The expected arrival + of Captain Brown's wife made her generous offer unnecessary. The prisoner + wrote her, thanking her, and asking her to help his family, a request with + which she faithfully complied. With his letter came one from Governor + Wise, in courteous reproval of her sympathy for John Brown. To this she + responded in an able and effective manner. Her reply found its way from + Virginia to the New York Tribune, and soon after Mrs. Mason, of King + George's County, wife of Senator Mason, the author of the infamous + Fugitive Slave Law, wrote her a vehement letter, commencing with threats + of future damnation, and ending with assuring her that "no Southerner, + after reading her letter to Governor Wise, ought to read a line of her + composition, or touch a magazine which bore her name in its list of + contributors." To this she wrote a calm, dignified reply, declining to + dwell on the fierce invectives of her assailant, and wishing her well here + and hereafter. She would not debate the specific merits or demerits of a + man whose body was in charge of the courts, and whose reputation was sure + to be in charge of posterity. "Men," she continues, "are of small + consequence in comparison with principles, and the principle for which + John Brown died is the question at issue between us." These letters were + soon published in pamphlet form, and had the immense circulation of + 300,000 copies. + </p> + <p> + In 1867 she published <i>A Romance of the Republic</i>, a story of the + days of slavery; powerful in its delineation of some of the saddest as + well as the most dramatic conditions of master and slave in the Southern + States. Her husband, who had been long an invalid, died in 1874. After his + death her home, in winter especially, became a lonely one, and in 1877 she + began to spend the cold months in Boston. + </p> + <p> + Her last publication was in 1878, when her <i>Aspirations of the World</i>, + a book of selections, on moral and religious subjects, from the literature + of all nations and times, was given to the public. The introduction, + occupying fifty pages, shows, at threescore and ten, her mental vigor + unabated, and is remarkable for its wise, philosophic tone and felicity of + diction. It has the broad liberality of her more elaborate work on the + same subject, and in the mellow light of life's sunset her words seem + touched with a tender pathos and beauty. "All we poor mortals," she says, + "are groping our way through paths that are dim with shadows; and we are + all striving, with steps more or less stumbling, to follow some guiding + star. As we travel on, beloved companions of our pilgrimage vanish from + our sight, we know not whither; and our bereaved hearts utter cries of + supplication for more light. We know not where Hermes Trismegistus lived, + or who he was; but his voice sounds plaintively human, coming up from the + depths of the ages, calling out, 'Thou art God! and thy man crieth these + things unto Thee!' Thus closely allied in our sorrows and limitations, in + our aspirations and hopes, surely we ought not to be separated in our + sympathies. However various the names by which we call the Heavenly + Father, if they are set to music by brotherly love, they can all be sung + together." + </p> + <p> + Her interest in the welfare of the emancipated class at the South and of + the ill-fated Indians of the West remained unabated, and she watched with + great satisfaction the experiment of the education of both classes in + General Armstrong's institution at Hampton, Va. She omitted no opportunity + of aiding the greatest social reform of the age, which aims to make the + civil and political rights of women equal to those of men. Her sympathies, + to the last, went out instinctively to the wronged and weak. She used to + excuse her vehemence in this respect by laughingly quoting lines from a + poem entitled <i>The Under Dog in the Fight</i>:— + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "I know that the world, the great big world, + Will never a moment stop + To see which dog may be in the wrong, + But will shout for the dog on top. + + "But for me, I never shall pause to ask + Which dog may be in the right; + For my heart will beat, while it beats at all, + For the under dog in the fight." +</pre> + <p> + I am indebted to a gentleman who was at one time a resident of Wayland, + and who enjoyed her confidence and warm friendship, for the following + impressions of her life in that place:— + </p> + <p> + "On one of the last beautiful Indian summer afternoons, closing the past + year, I drove through Wayland, and was anew impressed with the charm of + our friend's simple existence there. The tender beauty of the fading year + seemed a reflection of her own gracious spirit; the lovely autumn of her + life, whose golden atmosphere the frosts of sorrow and advancing age had + only clarified and brightened. + </p> + <p> + "My earliest recollection of Mrs. Child in Wayland is of a gentle face + leaning from the old stage window, smiling kindly down on the childish + figures beneath her; and from that moment her gracious motherly presence + has been closely associated with the charm of rural beauty in that + village, which until very lately has been quite apart from the line of + travel, and unspoiled by the rush and worry of our modern steam-car mode + of living. + </p> + <p> + "Mrs. Child's life in the place made, indeed, an atmosphere of its own, a + benison of peace and good-will, which was a noticeable feature to all who + were acquainted with the social feeling of the little community, refined, + as it was too, by the elevating influence of its distinguished pastor, Dr. + Sears. Many are the acts of loving kindness and maternal care which could + be chronicled of her residence there, were we permitted to do so; and + numberless are the lives that have gathered their onward impulse from her + helping hand. But it was all a confidence which she hardly betrayed to her + inmost self, and I will not recall instances which might be her grandest + eulogy. Her monument is builded in the hearts which knew her benefactions, + and it will abide with 'the power that makes for righteousness.' + </p> + <p> + "One of the pleasantest elements of her life in Wayland was the high + regard she won from the people of the village, who, proud of her literary + attainment, valued yet more the noble womanhood of the friend who dwelt so + modestly among them. The grandeur of her exalted personal character had, + in part, eclipsed for them the qualities which made her fame with the + world outside. + </p> + <p> + "The little house on the quiet by-road overlooked broad green meadows. The + pond behind it, where bloom the lilies whose spotless purity may well + symbolize her gentle spirit, is a sacred pool to her townsfolk. But + perhaps the most fitting similitude of her life in Wayland was the quiet + flow of the river, whose gentle curves make green her meadows, but whose + powerful energy, joining the floods from distant mountains, moves, with + resistless might, the busy shuttles of a hundred mills. She was too + truthful to affect to welcome unwarrantable invaders of her peace, but no + weary traveller on life's hard ways ever applied to her in vain. The + little garden plot before her door was a sacred enclosure, not to be + rudely intruded upon; but the flowers she tended with maternal care were + no selfish possession, for her own enjoyment only, and many are the lives + their sweetness has gladdened forever. So she lived among a singularly + peaceful and intelligent community as one of themselves, industrious, + wise, and happy; with a frugality whose motive of wider benevolence was in + itself a homily and a benediction." + </p> + <p> + In my last interview with her, our conversation, as had often happened + before, turned upon the great theme of the future life. She spoke, as I + remember, calmly and not uncheerfully, but with the intense earnestness + and reverent curiosity of one who felt already the shadow of the unseen + world resting upon her. + </p> + <p> + Her death was sudden and quite unexpected. For some months she had been + troubled with a rheumatic affection, but it was by no means regarded as + serious. A friend, who visited her a few days before her departure, found + her in a comfortable condition, apart from lameness. She talked of the + coming election with much interest, and of her plans for the winter. On + the morning of her death (October 20, 1880) she spoke of feeling + remarkably well. Before leaving her chamber she complained of severe pain + in the region of the heart. Help was called by her companion, but only + reached her to witness her quiet passing away. + </p> + <p> + The funeral was, as befitted one like her, plain and simple. Many of her + old friends were present, and Wendell Phillips paid an affecting and + eloquent tribute to his old friend and anti-slavery coadjutor. He referred + to the time when she accepted, with serene self-sacrifice, the obloquy + which her <i>Appeal</i> had brought upon her, and noted, as one of the + many ways in which popular hatred was manifested, the withdrawal from her + of the privileges of the Boston Athenaeum. Her pallbearers were elderly, + plain farmers in the neighborhood; and, led by the old white-haired + undertaker, the procession wound its way to the not distant burial- + ground, over the red and gold of fallen leaves, and tinder the half- + clouded October sky. A lover of all beautiful things, she was, as her + intimate friends knew, always delighted by the sight of rainbows, and used + to so arrange prismatic glasses as to throw the colors on the walls of her + room. Just after her body was consigned to the earth, a magnificent + rainbow spanned with its are of glory the eastern sky. + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + The incident at her burial is alluded to in a sonnet written by + William P. Andrews:— + + "Freedom! she knew thy summons, and obeyed + That clarion voice as yet scarce heard of men; + Gladly she joined thy red-cross service when + Honor and wealth must at thy feet be laid + Onward with faith undaunted, undismayed + By threat or scorn, she toiled with hand and brain + To make thy cause triumphant, till the chain + Lay broken, and for her the freedmen prayed. + Nor yet she faltered; in her tender care + She took us all; and wheresoe'er she went, + Blessings, and Faith, and Beauty followed there, + E'en to the end, where she lay down content; + And with the gold light of a life more fair, + Twin bows of promise o'er her grave were blest." +</pre> + <p> + The letters in this collection constitute but a small part of her large + correspondence. They have been gathered up and arranged by the hands of + dear relatives and friends as a fitting memorial of one who wrote from the + heart as well as the head, and who held her literary reputation + subordinate always to her philanthropic aim to lessen the sum of human + suffering, and to make the world better for her living. If they sometimes + show the heat and impatience of a zealous reformer, they may well be + pardoned in consideration of the circumstances under which they were + written, and of the natural indignation of a generous nature in view of + wrong and oppression. If she touched with no very reverent hand the + garment hem of dogmas, and held to the spirit of Scripture rather than its + letter, it must be remembered that she lived in a time when the Bible was + cited in defence of slavery, as it is now in Utah in support of polygamy; + and she may well be excused for some degree of impatience with those who, + in the tithing of mint and anise and cummin, neglected the weightier + matters of the law of justice and mercy. + </p> + <p> + Of the men and women directly associated with the beloved subject of this + sketch, but few are now left to recall her single-hearted devotion to + apprehended duty, her unselfish generosity, her love of all beauty and + harmony, and her trustful reverence, free from pretence and cant. It is + not unlikely that the surviving sharers of her love and friendship may + feel the inadequateness of this brief memorial, for I close it with the + consciousness of having failed to fully delineate the picture which my + memory holds of a wise and brave, but tender and loving woman, of whom it + might well have been said, in the words of the old Hebrew text, "Many, + daughters have done virtuously, but thou excellest them all." + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0020" id="link2H_4_0020"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + On the occasion of the seventy-fifth birthday of Dr. Holmes <i>The + Critic of New York</i> collected personal tributes from friends and + admirers of that author. My own contribution was as follows:— +</pre> + <p> + Poet, essayist, novelist, humorist, scientist, ripe scholar, and wise + philosopher, if Dr. Holmes does not, at the present time, hold in popular + estimation the first place in American literature, his rare versatility is + the cause. In view of the inimitable prose writer, we forget the poet; in + our admiration of his melodious verse, we lose sight of <i>Elsie Venner</i> + and <i>The Autocrat of the Breakfast Table</i>. We laugh over his wit and + humor, until, to use his own words, + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "We suspect the azure blossom that unfolds upon a shoot, + As if Wisdom's old potato could not flourish at its root;" +</pre> + <p> + and perhaps the next page melts us into tears by a pathos only equalled by + that of Sterne's sick Lieutenant. He is Montaigne and Bacon under one hat. + His varied qualities would suffice for the mental furnishing of half a + dozen literary specialists. + </p> + <p> + To those who have enjoyed the privilege of his intimate acquaintance, the + man himself is more than the author. His genial nature, entire freedom + from jealousy or envy, quick tenderness, large charity, hatred of sham, + pretence, and unreality, and his reverent sense of the eternal and + permanent have secured for him something more and dearer than literary + renown,—the love of all who know him. I might say much more: I could + not say less. May his life be long in the land. + </p> + <p> + Amesbury, Mass., 8th Month, 18, 1884. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0021" id="link2H_4_0021"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + LONGFELLOW + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + Written to the chairman of the committee of arrangements for + unveiling the bust of Longfellow at Portland, Maine, on the poet's + birthday, February 27, 1885. +</pre> + <p> + I am sorry it is not in my power to accept the invitation of the committee + to be present at the unveiling of the bust of Longfellow on the 27th + instant, or to write anything worthy of the occasion in metrical form. + </p> + <p> + The gift of the Westminster Abbey committee cannot fail to add another + strong tie of sympathy between two great English-speaking peoples. And + never was gift more fitly bestowed. The city of Portland—the poet's + birthplace, "beautiful for situation," looking from its hills on the + scenery he loved so well, Deering's Oaks, the many-islanded bay and far + inland mountains, delectable in sunset—needed this sculptured + representation of her illustrious son, and may well testify her joy and + gratitude at its reception, and repeat in so doing the words of the Hebrew + prophet: "O man, greatly beloved! thou shalt stand in thy place." + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0022" id="link2H_4_0022"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + OLD NEWBURY. + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + Letter to Samuel J. Spalding, D. D., on the occasion of the + celebration of the 250th anniversary of the settlement of Newbury. +</pre> + <p> + MY DEAR FRIEND,—I am sorry that I cannot hope to be with you on the + 250th anniversary of the settlement of old Newbury. Although I can hardly + call myself a son of the ancient town, my grandmother, Sarah Greenleaf, of + blessed memory, was its daughter, and I may therefore claim to be its + grandson. Its genial and learned historian, Joshua Coffin, was my first + school-teacher, and all my life I have lived in sight of its green hills + and in hearing of its Sabbath bells. Its wealth of natural beauty has not + been left unsung by its own poets, Hannah Gould, Mrs. Hopkins, George + Lunt, and Edward A. Washburn, while Harriet Prescott Spofford's Plum + Island Sound is as sweet and musical as Tennyson's Brook. Its history and + legends are familiar to me. I seem to have known all its old worthies, + whose descendants have helped to people a continent, and who have carried + the name and memories of their birthplace to the Mexican gulf and across + the Rocky Mountains to the shores of the Pacific. They were the best and + selectest of Puritanism, brave, honest, God-fearing men and women; and if + their creed in the lapse of time has lost something of its vigor, the + influence of their ethical righteousness still endures. The prophecy of + Samuel Sewall that Christians should be found in Newbury so long as + pigeons shall roost on its oaks and Indian corn grows in Oldtown fields + remains still true, and we trust will always remain so. Yet, as of old, + the evil personage sometimes intrudes himself into company too good for + him. It was said in the witchcraft trials of 1692 that Satan baptized his + converts at Newbury Falls, the scene, probably, of one of Hawthorne's + weird <i>Twice Told Tales</i>; and there is a tradition that, in the midst + of a heated controversy between one of Newbury's painful ministers and his + deacon, who (anticipating Garrison by a century) ventured to doubt the + propriety of clerical slaveholding, the Adversary made his appearance in + the shape of a black giant stalking through Byfield. It was never, I + believe, definitely settled whether he was drawn there by the minister's + zeal in defence of slavery or the deacon's irreverent denial of the + minister's right and duty to curse Canaan in the person of his negro. + </p> + <p> + Old Newbury has sometimes been spoken of as ultra-conservative and hostile + to new ideas and progress, but this is not warranted by its history. More + than two centuries ago, when Major Pike, just across the river, stood up + and denounced in open town meeting the law against freedom of conscience + and worship, and was in consequence fined and outlawed, some of Newbury's + best citizens stood bravely by him. The town took no part in the + witchcraft horror, and got none of its old women and town charges hanged + for witches, "Goody" Morse had the spirit rappings in her house two + hundred years earlier than the Fox girls did, and somewhat later a Newbury + minister, in wig and knee-buckles, rode, Bible in hand, over to Hampton to + lay a ghost who had materialized himself and was stamping up and down + stairs in his military boots. + </p> + <p> + Newbury's ingenious citizen, Jacob Perkins, in drawing out diseases with + his metallic tractors, was quite as successful as modern "faith and mind" + doctors. The Quakers, whipped at Hampton on one hand and at Salem on the + other, went back and forth unmolested in Newbury, for they could make no + impression on its iron-clad orthodoxy. Whitefield set the example, since + followed by the Salvation Army, of preaching in its streets, and now lies + buried under one of its churches with almost the honors of sainthood. + William Lloyd Garrison was born in Newbury. The town must be regarded as + the Alpha and Omega of anti-slavery agitation, beginning with its + abolition deacon and ending with Garrison. Puritanism, here as elsewhere, + had a flavor of radicalism; it had its humorous side, and its ministers + did not hesitate to use wit and sarcasm, like Elijah before the priests of + Baal. As, for instance, the wise and learned clergyman, Puritan of the + Puritans, beloved and reverenced by all, who has just laid down the burden + of his nearly one hundred years, startled and shamed his brother ministers + who were zealously for the enforcement of the Fugitive Slave Law, by + preparing for them a form of prayer for use while engaged in catching + runaway slaves. + </p> + <p> + I have, I fear, dwelt too long upon the story and tradition of the old + town, which will doubtless be better told by the orator of the day. The + theme is to me full of interest. Among the blessings which I would + gratefully own is the fact that my lot has been cast in the beautiful + valley of the Merrimac, within sight of Newbury steeples, Plum Island, and + Crane Neck and Pipe Stave hills. + </p> + <p> + Let me, in closing, pay something of the debt I have owed from boyhood, by + expressing a sentiment in which I trust every son of the ancient town will + unite: Joshua Coffin, historian of Newbury, teacher, scholar, and + antiquarian, and one of the earliest advocates of slave emancipation. May + his memory be kept green, to use the words of Judge Sewall, "so long as + Plum island keeps its post and a sturgeon leaps in Merrimac River." + </p> + <p> + Amesbury, 6th Month, 1885. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0023" id="link2H_4_0023"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + SCHOOLDAY REMEMBRANCES. + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + To Rev. Charles Wingate, Hon. James H. Carleton, Thomas B. Garland, + Esq., Committee of Students of Haverhill Academy: +</pre> + <p> + DEAR FRIENDS,—I was most agreeably surprised last evening by + receiving your carefully prepared and beautiful Haverhill Academy Album, + containing the photographs of a large number of my old friends and + schoolmates. I know of nothing which could have given me more pleasure. If + the faces represented are not so unlined and ruddy as those which greeted + each other at the old academy, on the pleasant summer mornings so long + ago, when life was before us, with its boundless horizon of possibilities, + yet, as I look over them, I see that, on the whole, Time has not been hard + with us, but has touched us gently. The hieroglyphics he has traced upon + us may, indeed, reveal something of the cares, trials, and sorrows + incident to humanity, but they also tell of generous endeavor, beneficent + labor, developed character, and the slow, sure victories of patience and + fortitude. I turn to them with the proud satisfaction of feeling that I + have been highly favored in my early companions, and that I have not been + disappointed in my school friendships. The two years spent at the academy + I have always reckoned among the happiest of my life, though I have + abundant reason for gratitude that, in the long, intervening years, I have + been blessed beyond my deserving. + </p> + <p> + It has been our privilege to live in an eventful period, and to witness + wonderful changes since we conned our lessons together. How little we then + dreamed of the steam car, electric telegraph, and telephone! We studied + the history and geography of a world only half explored. Our country was + an unsolved mystery. "The Great American Desert" was an awful blank on our + school maps. We have since passed through the terrible ordeal of civil + war, which has liberated enslaved millions, and made the union of the + States an established fact, and no longer a doubtful theory. If life is to + be measured not so much by years as by thoughts, emotion, knowledge, + action, and its opportunity of a free exercise of all our powers and + faculties, we may congratulate ourselves upon really outliving the + venerable patriarchs. For myself, I would not exchange a decade of my own + life for a century of the Middle Ages, or a "cycle of Cathay." + </p> + <p> + Let me, gentlemen, return my heartiest thanks to you, and to all who have + interested themselves in the preparation of the Academy Album, and assure + you of my sincere wishes for your health and happiness. + </p> + <p> + OAK KNOLL, DANVERS, 12th Month, 25, 1885. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0024" id="link2H_4_0024"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + EDWIN PERCY WHIPPLE. + </h2> + <p> + I have been pained to learn of the decease of nay friend of many years, + Edwin P. Whipple. Death, however expected, is always something of a + surprise, and in his case I was not prepared for it by knowing of any + serious failure of his health. With the possible exception of Lowell and + Matthew Arnold, he was the ablest critical essayist of his time, and the + place he has left will not be readily filled. + </p> + <p> + Scarcely inferior to Macaulay in brilliance of diction and graphic + portraiture, he was freer from prejudice and passion, and more loyal to + the truth of fact and history. He was a thoroughly honest man. He wrote + with conscience always at his elbow, and never sacrificed his real + convictions for the sake of epigram and antithesis. He instinctively took + the right side of the questions that came before him for decision, even + when by so doing he ranked himself with the unpopular minority. He had the + manliest hatred of hypocrisy and meanness; but if his language had at + times the severity of justice, it was never merciless. He "set down naught + in malice." + </p> + <p> + Never blind to faults, he had a quick and sympathetic eye for any real + excellence or evidence of reserved strength in the author under + discussion. + </p> + <p> + He was a modest man, sinking his own personality out of sight, and he + always seemed to me more interested in the success of others than in his + own. Many of his literary contemporaries have had reason to thank him not + only for his cordial recognition and generous praise, but for the firm and + yet kindly hand which pointed out deficiencies and errors of taste and + judgment. As one of those who have found pleasure and profit in his + writings in the past, I would gratefully commend them to the generation + which survives him. His <i>Literature of the Age of Elizabeth</i> is + deservedly popular, but there are none of his Essays which will not repay + a careful study. "What works of Mr. Baxter shall I read?" asked Boswell of + Dr. Johnson. "Read any of them," was the answer, "for they are all good." + </p> + <p> + He will have an honored place in the history of American literature. But I + cannot now dwell upon his authorship while thinking of him as the beloved + member of a literary circle now, alas sadly broken. I recall the wise, + genial companion and faithful friend of nearly half a century, the memory + of whose words and acts of kindness moistens my eyes as I write. + </p> + <p> + It is the inevitable sorrow of age that one's companions must drop away on + the right hand and the left with increasing frequency, until we are + compelled to ask with Wordsworth,— + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "Who next shall fall and disappear?" +</pre> + <p> + But in the case of him who has just passed from us, we have the + satisfaction of knowing that his life-work has been well and faithfully + done, and that he leaves behind him only friends. + </p> + <p> + DANVERS, 6th Month, 18, 1886. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0025" id="link2H_4_0025"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + HISTORICAL PAPERS + </h2> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0026" id="link2H_4_0026"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + DANIEL O'CONNELL. + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + In February, 1839, Henry Clay delivered a speech in the United + States Senate, which was intended to smooth away the difficulties + which his moderate opposition to the encroachments of slavery had + erected in his path to the presidency. His calumniation of + O'Connell called out the following summary of the career of the + great Irish patriot. It was published originally in the + Pennsylvania Freeman of Philadelphia, April 25, 1839. +</pre> + <p> + Perhaps the most unlucky portion of the unlucky speech of Henry Clay on + the slavery question is that in which an attempt is made to hold up to + scorn and contempt the great Liberator of Ireland. We say an attempt, for + who will say it has succeeded? Who feels contempt for O'Connell? Surely + not the slaveholder? From Henry Clay, surrounded by his slave- gang at + Ashland, to the most miserable and squalid slave-driver and small breeder + of human cattle in Virginia and Maryland who can spell the name of + O'Connell in his newspaper, these republican brokers in blood fear and + hate the eloquent Irishman. But their contempt, forsooth! Talk of the + sheep-stealer's contempt for the officer of justice who nails his ears to + the pillory, or sets the branding iron on his forehead! + </p> + <p> + After denouncing the abolitionists for gratuitously republishing the + advertisements for runaway slaves, the Kentucky orator says:— + </p> + <p> + "And like a notorious agitator upon another theatre, they would hunt down + and proscribe from the pale of civilized society the inhabitants of that + entire section. Allow me, Mr. President, to say that whilst I recognize in + the justly wounded feelings of the Minister of the United States at the + Court of St. James much to excuse the notice which he was provoked to take + of that agitator, in my humble opinion he would better have consulted the + dignity of his station and of his country in treating him with + contemptuous silence. He would exclude us from European society, he who + himself, can only obtain a contraband admission, and is received with + scornful repugnance into it! If he be no more desirous of our society than + we are of his, he may rest assured that a state of perpetual non- + intercourse will exist between us. Yes, sir, I think the American Minister + would best have pursued the dictates of true dignity by regarding the + language of the member of the British House of Commons as the malignant + ravings of the plunderer of his own country, and the libeller of a foreign + and kindred people." + </p> + <p> + The recoil of this attack "followed hard upon" the tones of congratulation + and triumph of partisan editors at the consummate skill and dexterity with + which their candidate for the presidency had absolved himself from the + suspicion of abolitionism, and by a master-stroke of policy secured the + confidence of the slaveholding section of the Union. But the late Whig + defeat in New York has put an end to these premature rejoicings. "The + speech of Mr. Clay in reference to the Irish agitator has been made use of + against us with no small success," say the New York papers. "They failed," + says the Daily Evening Star, "to convince the Irish voters that Daniel + O'Connell was the 'plunderer of his country,' or that there was an excuse + for thus denouncing him." + </p> + <p> + The defeat of the Whigs of New York and the cause of it have excited no + small degree of alarm among the adherents of the Kentucky orator. In this + city, the delicate <i>Philadelphia Gazette</i> comes magnanimously to the + aid of Henry Clay,— + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "A tom-tit twittering on an eagle's back." +</pre> + <p> + The learned editor gives it as his opinion that Daniel O'Connell is a + "political beggar," a "disorganizing apostate;" talks in its pretty way of + the man's "impudence" and "falsehoods" and "cowardice," etc.; and finally, + with a modesty and gravity which we cannot but admire, assures us that + "his weakness of mind is almost beyond calculation!" + </p> + <p> + We have heard it rumored during the past week, among some of the self- + constituted organs of the Clay party in this city, that at a late meeting + in Chestnut Street a committee was appointed to collect, collate, and + publish the correspondence between Andrew Stevenson and O'Connell, and so + much of the latter's speeches and writings as relate to American slavery, + for the purpose of convincing the countrymen of O'Connell of the justice, + propriety, and, in view of the aggravated circumstances of the case, + moderation and forbearance of Henry Clay when speaking of a man who has + had the impudence to intermeddle with the "patriarchal institutions" of + our country, and with the "domestic relations" of Kentucky and Virginia + slave-traders. + </p> + <p> + We wait impatiently for the fruits of the labors of this sagacious + committee. We should like to see those eloquent and thrilling appeals to + the sense of shame and justice and honor of America republished. We should + like to see if any Irishman, not wholly recreant to the interests and + welfare of the Green Island of his birth, will in consequence of this + publication give his vote to the slanderer of Ireland's best and noblest + champion. + </p> + <p> + But who is Daniel O'Connell? "A demagogue—a ruffian agitator!" say + the Tory journals of Great Britain, quaking meantime with awe and + apprehension before the tremendous moral and political power which he is + wielding,—a power at this instant mightier than that of any + potentate of Europe. "A blackguard"—a fellow who "obtains contraband + admission into European society"—a "malignant libeller"—a + "plunderer of his country"— a man whose "wind should be stopped," + say the American slaveholders, and their apologists, Clay, Stevenson, + Hamilton, and the Philadelphia Gazette, and the Democratic Whig + Association. + </p> + <p> + But who is Daniel O'Connell? Ireland now does justice to him, the world + will do so hereafter. No individual of the present age has done more for + human liberty. His labors to effect the peaceable deliverance of his own + oppressed countrymen, and to open to the nations of Europe a new and purer + and holier pathway to freedom unstained with blood and unmoistened by + tears, and his mighty instrumentality in the abolition of British colonial + slavery, have left their impress upon the age. They will be remembered and + felt beneficially long after the miserable slanders of Tory envy and + malignity at home, and the clamors of slaveholders abroad, detected in + their guilt, and writhing in the gaze of Christendom, shall have perished + forever,—when the Clays and Calhouns, the Peels and Wellingtons, the + opponents of reform in Great Britain and the enemies of slave emancipation + in the United States, shall be numbered with those who in all ages, to use + the words of the eloquent Lamartine, have "sinned against the Holy Ghost + in opposing the improvement of things,—in an egotistical and stupid + attempt to draw back the moral and social world which God and nature are + urging forward." + </p> + <p> + The character and services of O'Connell have never been fully appreciated + in this country. Engrossed in our own peculiar interests, and in the + plenitude of our self-esteem; believing that "we are the people, and that + wisdom will perish with us," that all patriotism and liberality of feeling + are confined to our own territory, we have not followed the untitled + Barrister of Derrynane Abbey, step by step, through the development of one + of the noblest experiments ever made for the cause of liberty and the + welfare of man. + </p> + <p> + The revolution which O'Connell has already partially effected in his + native land, and which, from the evident signs of cooperation in England + and Scotland, seems not far from its entire accomplishment, will form a + new era in the history of the civilized world. Heretofore the patriot has + relied more upon physical than moral means for the regeneration of his + country and its redemption from oppression. His revolutions, however pure + in principle, have ended in practical crime. The great truth was yet to be + learned that brute force is incompatible with a pure love of freedom, + inasmuch as it is in itself an odious species of tyranny—the relic + of an age of slavery and barbarism—the common argument of despotism—a + game + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "which, were their subjects wise, + Kings would not play at." +</pre> + <p> + But the revolution in which O'Connell is engaged, although directed + against the oppression of centuries, relies with just confidence upon the + united moral energies of the people: a moral victory of reason over + prejudice, of justice over oppression; the triumph of intellectual energy + where the brute appeal to arms had miserably failed; the vindication of + man's eternal rights, not by the sword fleshed in human hearts, but by + weapons tempered in the armory of Heaven with truth and mercy and love. + </p> + <p> + Nor is it a visionary idea, or the untried theory of an enthusiast, this + triumphant reliance upon moral and intellectual power for the reform of + political abuses, for the overthrowing of tyranny and the pulling down of + the strongholds of arbitrary power. The emancipation of the Catholic of + Great Britain from the thrall of a century, in 1829, prepared the way for + the bloodless triumph of English reform in 1832. The Catholic Association + was the germ of those political unions which compelled, by their mighty + yet peaceful influence, the King of England to yield submissively to the + supremacy of the people. + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + (The celebrated Mr. Attwood has been called the "father of political + unions." In a speech delivered by his brother, C. Attwood, Esq., at + the Sunderland Reform Meeting, September 10, 1832, I find the + following admission: "Gentlemen, the first political union was the + Roman Catholic Association of Ireland, and the true founder and + father of political unions is Daniel O'Connell.") +</pre> + <p> + Both of these remarkable events, these revolutions shaking nations to + their centre, yet polluted with no blood and sullied by no crime, were + effected by the salutary agitations of the public mind, first set in + motion by the masterspirit of O'Connell, and spreading from around him to + every portion of the British empire like the undulations from the + disturbed centre of a lake. + </p> + <p> + The Catholic question has been but imperfectly understood in this country. + Many have allowed their just disapprobation of the Catholic religion to + degenerate into a most unwarrantable prejudice against its conscientious + followers. The cruel persecutions of the dissenters from the Romish + Church, the massacre of St. Bartholomew's day, the horrors of the + Inquisition, the crusades against the Albigenses and the simple dwellers + of the Vaudois valleys, have been regarded as atrocities peculiar to the + believers in papal infallibility, and the necessary consequences of their + doctrines; and hence they have looked upon the constitutional agitation of + the Irish Catholics for relief from grieveous disabilities and unjust + distinctions as a struggle merely for supremacy or power. + </p> + <p> + Strange, that the truth to which all history so strongly testifies should + thus be overlooked,—the undeniable truth that religious bigotry and + intolerance have been confined to no single sect; that the persecuted of + one century have been the persecutors of another. In our own country, it + would be well for us to remember that at the very time when in New England + the Catholic, the Quaker, and the Baptist were banished on pain of death, + and where some even suffered that dreadful penalty, in Catholic Maryland, + under the Catholic Lord Baltimore, perfect liberty of conscience was + established, and Papist and Protestant went quietly through the same + streets to their respective altars. + </p> + <p> + At the commencement of O'Connell's labors for emancipation he found the + people of Ireland divided into three great classes,—the Protestant + or Church party, the Dissenters, and the Catholics: the Church party + constituting about one tenth of the population, yet holding in possession + the government and a great proportion of the landed property of Ireland, + controlling church and state and law and revenue, the army, navy, + magistracy, and corporations, the entire patronage of the country, holding + their property and power by the favor of England, and consequently wholly + devoted to her interest; the Dissenters, probably twice as numerous as the + Church party, mostly engaged in trade and manufactures,—sustained by + their own talents and industry, Irish in feeling, partaking in no small + degree of the oppression of their Catholic brethren, and among the first + to resist that oppression in 1782; the Catholics constituting at least two + thirds of the whole population, and almost the entire peasantry of the + country, forming a large proportion of the mercantile interest, yet nearly + excluded from the possession of landed property by the tyrannous operation + of the penal laws. Justly has a celebrated Irish patriot (Theobald Wolfe + Tone) spoken of these laws as "an execrable and infamous code, framed with + the art and malice of demons to plunder and degrade and brutalize the + Catholics of Ireland. There was no disgrace, no injustice, no + disqualification, moral, political, or religious, civil or military, which + it has not heaped upon them." + </p> + <p> + The following facts relative to the disabilities under which the Catholics + of the United Kingdom labored previous to the emancipation of 1829 will + serve to show in some measure the oppressive operation of those laws which + placed the foot of one tenth of the population of Ireland upon the necks + of the remainder. + </p> + <p> + A Catholic peer could not sit in the House of Peers, nor a Catholic + commoner in the House of Commons. A Catholic could not be Lord Chancellor, + or Keeper, or Commissioner of the Great Seal; Master or Keeper of the + Rolls; Justice of the King's Bench or of the Common Pleas; Baron of the + Exchequer; Attorney or Solicitor General; King's Sergeant at Law; Member + of the King's Council; Master in Chancery, nor Chairman of Sessions for + the County of Dublin. He could not be the Recorder of a city or town; an + advocate in the spiritual courts; Sheriff of a county, city, or town; + Sub-Sheriff; Lord Lieutenant, Lord Deputy, or other governor of Ireland; + Lord High Treasurer; Governor of a county; Privy Councillor; Postmaster + General; Chancellor of the Exchequer or Secretary of State; Vice + Treasurer, Cashier of the Exchequer; Keeper of the Privy Seal or Auditor + General; Provost or Fellow of Dublin University; nor Lord Mayor or + Alderman of a corporate city or town. He could not be a member of a parish + vestry, nor bequeath any sum of money or any lands for the maintenance of + a clergyman, or for the support of a chapel or a school; and in corporate + towns he was excluded from the grand juries. + </p> + <p> + O'Connell commenced his labors for emancipation with the strong conviction + that nothing short of the united exertions of the Irish people could + overthrow the power of the existing government, and that a union of action + could only be obtained by the establishment of something like equality + between the different religious parties. Discarding all other than + peaceful means for the accomplishment of his purpose, he placed himself + and his followers beyond the cognizance of unjust and oppressive laws. + Wherever he poured the oil of his eloquence upon the maddened spirits of + his wronged and insulted countrymen, the mercenary soldiery found no + longer an excuse for violence; and calm, firm, and united, the Catholic + Association remained secure in the moral strength of its pure and peaceful + purpose, amid the bayonets of a Tory administration. His influence was + felt in all parts of the island. Wherever an unlawful association existed, + his great legal knowledge enabled him at once to detect its character, + and, by urging its dissolution, to snatch its deluded members from the + ready fangs of their enemies. In his presence the Catholic and the + Protestant shook hands together, and the wild Irish clansman forgot his + feuds. He taught the party in power, and who trembled at the dangers + around them, that security and peace could only be obtained by justice and + kindness. He entreated his oppressed Catholic brethren to lay aside their + weapons, and with pure hearts and naked hands to stand firmly together in + the calm but determined energy of men, too humane for deeds of violence, + yet too mighty for the patient endurance of wrong. + </p> + <p> + The spirit of the olden time was awakened, of the day when Flood thundered + and Curran lightened; the light which shone for a moment in the darkness + of Ireland's century of wrong burned upwards clearly and steadily from all + its ancient altars. Shoulder to shoulder gathered around him the patriot + spirits of his nation,—men unbribed by the golden spoils of + governmental patronage Shiel with his ardent eloquence, O'Dwyer and Walsh, + and Grattan and O'Connor, and Steel, the Protestant agitator, wearing + around him the emblem of national reconciliation, of the reunion of + Catholic and Protestant,—the sash of blended orange and green, + soiled and defaced by his patriotic errands, stained with the smoke of + cabins, and the night rains and rust of weapons, and the mountain mist, + and the droppings of the wild woods of Clare. He united in one mighty and + resistless mass the broken and discordant factions, whose desultory + struggles against tyranny had hitherto only added strength to its fetters, + and infused into that mass his own lofty principles of action, until the + solemn tones of expostulation and entreaty, bursting at once from the full + heart of Ireland, were caught up by England and echoed back from Scotland, + and the language of justice and humanity was wrung from the reluctant lips + of the cold and remorseless oppressor of his native land, at once its + disgrace and glory,—the conqueror of Napoleon; and, in the words of + his own Curran, the chains of the Catholic fell from around him, and he + stood forth redeemed and disenthralled by the irresistible genius of + Universal Emancipation. + </p> + <p> + On the passage of the bill for Catholic emancipation, O'Connell took his + seat in the British Parliament. The eyes of millions were upon him. + Ireland—betrayed so often by those in whom she had placed her + confidence; brooding in sorrowful remembrance over the noble names and + brilliant reputations sullied by treachery and corruption, the long and + dark catalogue of her recreant sons, who, allured by British gold and + British patronage, had sacrificed on the altar of their ambition Irish + pride and Irish independence, and lifted their parricidal arms against + their sorrowing mother, "crownless and voiceless in her woe"—now + hung with breathless eagerness over the ordeal to which her last great + champion was subjected. + </p> + <p> + The crisis in O'Connell's destiny had come. + </p> + <p> + The glitter of the golden bribe was in his eye; the sound of titled + magnificence was in his ear; the choice was before him to sit high among + the honorable, the titled, and the powerful, or to take his humble seat in + the hall of St. Stephen's as the Irish demagogue, the agitator, the Kerry + representative. He did not hesitate in his choice. On the first occasion + that offered he told the story of Ireland's wrongs, and demanded justice + in the name of his suffering constituents. He had put his hand to the + plough of reform, and he could not relinquish his hold, for his heart was + with it. + </p> + <p> + Determined to give the Whig administration no excuse for neglecting the + redress of Irish grievances, he entered heart and soul into the great + measure of English reform, and his zeal, tact, and eloquence contributed + not a little to its success. Yet even his friends speak of his first + efforts in the House of Commons as failures. The Irish accent; the harsh + avowal of purposes smacking of rebellion; the eccentricities and flowery + luxuriance of an eloquence nursed in the fervid atmosphere of Ireland + suddenly transplanted to the cold and commonplace one of St. Stephen's; + the great and illiberal prejudices against him scarcely abated from what + they were when, as the member from Clare, he was mobbed on his way to + London, for a time opposed a barrier to the influence of his talents and + patriotism. But he triumphed at last: the mob-orator of Clare and Kerry, + the declaimer in the Dublin Rooms of the Political and Trades' Union, + became one of the most attractive and popular speakers of the British + Parliament; one whose aid has been courted and whose rebuke has been + feared by the ablest of England's representatives. Amid the sneers of + derision and the clamor of hate and prejudice he has triumphed,—on + that very arena so fatal to Irish eloquence and Irish fame, where even + Grattan failed to sustain himself, and the impetuous spirit of Flood was + stricken down. + </p> + <p> + No subject in which Ireland was not directly interested has received a + greater share of O'Connell's attention than that of the abolition of + colonial slavery. Utterly detesting tyranny of all kinds, he poured forth + his eloquent soul in stern reprobation of a system full at once of pride + and misery and oppression, and darkened with blood. His speech on the + motion of Thomas Fowell Buxton for the immediate emancipation of the + slaves gave a new tone to the discussion of the question. He entered into + no petty pecuniary details; no miserable computation of the shillings and + pence vested in beings fashioned in the image of God. He did not talk of + the expediency of continuing the evil because it had grown monstrous. To + use his own words, he considered "slavery a crime to be abolished; not + merely an evil to be palliated." He left Sir Robert Peel and the Tories to + eulogize the characters and defend the interests of the planters, in + common with those of a tithe-reaping priesthood, building their houses by + oppression and their chambers by wrong, and spoke of the negro's interest, + the negro's claim to justice; demanding sympathy for the plundered as well + as the plunderers, for the slave as well as his master. He trampled as + dust under his feet the blasphemy that obedience to the law of eternal + justice is a principle to be acknowledged in theory only, because unsafe + in practice. He would, he said, enter into no compromise with slavery. He + cared not what cast or creed or color it might assume, whether personal or + political, intellectual or spiritual; he was for its total, immediate + abolition. He was for justice,—justice in the name of humanity and + according to the righteous law of the living God. + </p> + <p> + Ardently admiring our free institutions, and constantly pointing to our + glorious political exaltation as an incentive to the perseverance of his + own countrymen in their struggle against oppression, he has yet omitted no + opportunity of rebuking our inexcusable slave system. An enthusiastic + admirer of Jefferson, he has often regretted that his practice should have + so illy accorded with his noble sentiments on the subject of slavery, + which so fully coincided with his own. In truth, wherever man has been + oppressed by his fellow-man, O'Connell's sympathy has been directed: to + Italy, chained above the very grave of her ancient liberties; to the + republics of Southern America; to Greece, dashing the foot of the indolent + Ottoman from her neck; to France and Belgium; and last, not least, to + Poland, driven from her cherished nationality, and dragged, like his own + Ireland, bleeding and violated, to the deadly embrace of her oppressor. + American slavery but shares in his common denunciation of all tyranny; its + victims but partake of his common pity for the oppressed and persecuted + and the trodden down. + </p> + <p> + In this hasty and imperfect sketch we cannot enter into the details of + that cruel disregard of Irish rights which was manifested by a Reformed + Parliament, convoked, to use the language of William IV., "to ascertain + the sense of the people." It is perhaps enough to say that O'Connell's + indignant refusal to receive as full justice the measure of reform meted + out to Ireland was fully justified by the facts of the case. The Irish + Reform Bill gave Ireland, with one third of the entire population of the + United Kingdoms, only one sixth of the Parliamentary delegation. It + diminished instead of increasing the number of voters; in the towns and + cities it created a high and aristocratic franchise; in many boroughs it + established so narrow a basis of franchise as to render them liable to + corruption and abuse as the rotten boroughs of the old system. It threw no + new power into the hands of the people; and with no little justice has + O'Connell himself termed it an act to restore to power the Orange + ascendancy in Ireland, and to enable a faction to trample with impunity on + the friends of reform and constitutional freedom. (Letters to the + Reformers of Great Britain, No. 1.) + </p> + <p> + In May, 1832, O'Connell commenced the publication of his celebrated <i>Letters + to the Reformers of Great Britain</i>. Like Tallien, before the French + convention, he "rent away the veil" which Hume and Atwood had only + partially lifted. He held up before the people of Great Britain the new + indignities which had been added to the long catalogue of Ireland's + wrongs; he appealed to their justice, their honor, their duty, for + redress, and cast down before the Whig administration the gauntlet of his + country's defiance and scorn. There is a fine burst of indignant Irish + feeling in the concluding paragraphs of his fourth letter:— + </p> + <p> + "I have demonstrated the contumelious injuries inflicted upon us by this + Reform Bill. My letters are long before the public. They have been + unrefuted, uncontradicted in any of their details. And with this case of + atrocious injustice to Ireland placed before the reformers of Great + Britain, what assistance, what sympathy, do we receive? Why, I have got + some half dozen drivelling letters from political unions and political + characters, asking me whether I advise them to petition or bestir + themselves in our behalf! + </p> + <p> + "Reformers of Great Britain! I do not ask you either to petition or be + silent. I do not ask you to petition or to do any other act in favor of + the Irish. You will consult your own feelings of justice and generosity, + unprovoked by any advice or entreaty of mine. + </p> + <p> + "For my own part, I never despaired of Ireland; I do not, I will not, I + cannot, despair of my beloved country. She has, in my view, obtained + freedom of conscience for others, as well as for herself. She has shaken + off the incubus of tithes while silly legislation was dealing out its + folly and its falsehoods. She can, and she will, obtain for herself + justice and constitutional freedom; and although she may sigh at British + neglect and ingratitude, there is no sound of despair in that sigh, nor + any want of moral energy on her part to attain her own rights by peaceable + and legal means." + </p> + <p> + The tithe system, unutterably odious and full of all injustice, had + prepared the way for this expression of feeling on the part of the people. + Ireland had never, in any period of her history, bowed her neck peaceably + to the ecclesiastical yoke. From the Canon of Cashel, prepared by English + deputies in the twelfth century, decreeing for the first time that tithes + should be paid in Ireland, down to the present moment, the Church in her + borders has relied solely upon the strong arm of the law, and literally + reaped its tithes with the sword. The decree of the Dublin Synod, under + Archbishop Comyn, in 1185, could only be enforced within the pale of the + English settlement. The attempts of Henry VIII. also failed. Without the + pale all endeavors to collect tithes were met by stern opposition. And + although from the time of William III. the tithe system has been + established in Ireland, yet at no period has it been regarded otherwise + than as a system of legalized robbery by seven eighths of the people. An + examination of this system cannot fail to excite our wonder, not that it + has been thus regarded, but that it has been so long endured by any people + on the face of the earth, least of all by Irishmen. Tithes to the amount + of L1,000,000 are annually wrung from impoverished Ireland, in support of + a clergy who can only number about one sixteenth of her population as + their hearers; and wrung, too, in an undue proportion, from the Catholic + counties. (See Dr. Doyle's Evidence before Hon. E. G. Stanley.) In the + southern and middle counties, almost entirely inhabited by the Catholic + peasantry, every thing they possess is subject to the tithe: the cow is + seized in the hovel, the potato in the barrel, the coat even on the poor + man's back. (Speech of T. Reynolds, Esq., at an anti- tithe meeting.) The + revenues of five of the dignitaries of the Irish Church Establishment are + as follows: the Primacy L140,000; Derry L120,000; Kilmore L100,000; + Clogher L100,000; Waterford L70,000. Compare these enormous sums with that + paid by Scotland for the maintenance of the Church, namely L270,000. Yet + that Church has 2,000,000 souls under its care, while that of Ireland has + not above 500,000. Nor are these princely livings expended in Ireland by + their possessors. The bishoprics of Cloyne and Meath have been long held + by absentees,—by men who know no more of their flocks than the + non-resident owner of a West India plantation did of the miserable + negroes, the fruits of whose thankless labor were annually transmitted to + him. Out of 1289 benefited clergymen in Ireland, between five and six + hundred are non-residents, spending in Bath and London, or in making the + fashionable tour of the Continent, the wealth forced from the Catholic + peasant and the Protestant dissenter by the bayonets of the military. + Scorching and terrible was the sarcasm of Grattan applied to these locusts + of the Church: "A beastly and pompous priesthood, political potentates and + Christian pastors, full of false zeal, full of worldly pride, and full of + gluttony, empty of the true religion, to their flocks oppressive, to their + inferior clergy brutal, to their king abject, and to their God impudent + and familiar,—they stand on the altar as a stepping-stone to the + throne, glorying in the ear of princes, whom they poison with crooked + principles and heated advice; a faction against their king when they are + not his slaves,—ever the dirt under his feet or a poniard to his + heart." + </p> + <p> + For the evils of absenteeism, the non-residence of the wealthy + landholders, draining from a starving country the very necessaries of + life, a remedy is sought in a repeal of the union, and the provisions of a + domestic parliament. In O'Connell's view, a restoration of such a + parliament can alone afford that adequate protection to the national + industry so loudly demanded by thousands of unemployed laborers, starving + amid the ruins of deserted manufactories. During the brief period of + partial Irish liberty which followed the pacific revolution of '82, the + manufactures of the country revived and flourished; and the smile of + contented industry was visible all over the land. In 1797 there were + 15,000 silk-weavers in the city of Dublin alone. There are now but 400. + Such is the practical effect of the Union, of that suicidal act of the + Irish Parliament which yielded up in a moment of treachery and terror the + dearest interests of the country to the legislation of an English + Parliament and the tender mercies of Castlereagh,—of that + Castlereagh who, when accused by Grattan of spending L15,000 in purchasing + votes for the Union, replied with the rare audacity of high-handed + iniquity, "We did spend L15,000, and we would have spent L15,000,000 if + necessary to carry the Union; "that Castlereagh who, when 707,000 Irishmen + petitioned against the Union and 300,000 for it, maintained that the + latter constituted the majority! Well has it been said that the deep + vengeance which Ireland owed him was inflicted by the great criminal upon + himself. The nation which he sold and plundered saw him make with his own + hand the fearful retribution. The great body of the Irish people never + assented to the Union. The following extract from a speech of Earl (then + Mr.) Grey, in 1800, upon the Union question, will show what means were + made use of to drag Ireland, while yet mourning over her slaughtered + children, to the marriage altar with England: "If the Parliament of + Ireland had been left to itself, untempted and unawed, it would without + hesitation have rejected the resolutions. Out of the 300 members, 120 + strenuously opposed the measure, 162 voted for it: of these, 116 were + placemen; some of them were English generals on the staff, without a foot + of ground in Ireland, and completely dependent on government." "Let us + reflect upon the arts made use of since the last session of the Irish + Parliament to pack a majority, for Union, in the House of Commons. All + persons holding offices under government, if they hesitated to vote as + directed, were stripped of all their employments. A bill framed for + preserving the purity of Parliament was likewise abused, and no less than + 63 seats were vacated by their holders having received nominal offices." + </p> + <p> + The signs of the times are most favorable to the success of the Irish + Liberator. The tremendous power of the English political unions is + beginning to develop itself in favor of Ireland. A deep sympathy is + evinced for her sufferings, and a general determination to espouse her + cause. Brute force cannot put down the peaceable and legal agitation of + the question of her rights and interests. The spirit of the age forbids + it. The agitation will go on, for it is spreading among men who, to use + the words of the eloquent Shiel, while looking out upon the ocean, and + gazing upon the shore, which Nature has guarded with so many of her + bulwarks, can hear the language of Repeal muttered in the dashing of the + very waves which separate them from Great Britain by a barrier of God's + own creation. Another bloodless victory, we trust, awaits O'Connell,—a + victory worthy of his heart and intellect, unstained by one drop of human + blood, unmoistened by a solitary tear. + </p> + <p> + Ireland will be redeemed and disenthralled, not perhaps by a repeal of the + Union, but by the accomplishment of such a thorough reform in the + government and policy of Great Britain as shall render a repeal + unnecessary and impolitic. + </p> + <p> + The sentiments of O'Connell in regard to the means of effecting his object + of political reform are distinctly impressed upon all his appeals to the + people. In his letter of December, 1832, to the Dublin Trades Union, he + says: "The Repealers must not have our cause stained with blood. Far + indeed from it. We can, and ought to, carry the repeal only in the total + absence of offence against the laws of man or crime in the sight of God. + The best revolution which was ever effected could not be worth one drop of + human blood." In his speech at the public dinner given him by—the + citizens of Cork, we find a yet more earnest avowal of pacific principles. + "It may be stated," said he, "to countervail our efforts, that this + struggle will involve the destruction of life and property; that it will + overturn the framework of civil society, and give an undue and fearful + influence to one rank to the ruin of all others. These are awful + considerations, truly, if risked. I am one of those who have always + believed that any political change is too dearly purchased by a single + drop of blood, and who think that any political superstructure based upon + other opinion is like the sand-supported fabric,—beautiful in the + brief hour of sunshine, but the moment one drop of rain touches the arid + basis melting away in wreck and ruin! I am an accountable being; I have a + soul and a God to answer to, in another and better world, for my thoughts + and actions in this. I disclaim here any act of mine which would sport + with the lives of my fellow-creatures, any amelioration of our social + condition which must be purchased by their blood. And here, in the face of + God and of our common country, I protest that if I did not sincerely and + firmly believe that the amelioration I desire could be effected without + violence, without any change in the relative scale of ranks in the present + social condition of Ireland, except that change which all must desire, + making each better than it was before, and cementing all in one solid + irresistible mass, I would at once give up the struggle which I have + always kept with tyranny. I would withdraw from the contest which I have + hitherto waged with those who would perpetuate our thraldom. I would not + for one moment dare to venture for that which in costing one human life + would cost infinitely too dear. But it will cost no such price. Have we + not had within my memory two great political revolutions? And had we them + not without bloodshed or violence to the social compact? Have we not + arrived at a period when physical force and military power yield to moral + and intellectual energy. Has not the time of 'Cedant arma togae' come for + us and the other nations of the earth?" + </p> + <p> + Let us trust that the prediction of O'Connell will be verified; that + reason and intellect are destined, under God, to do that for the nations + of the earth which the physical force of centuries and the red sacrifice + of a thousand battle-fields have failed to accomplish. Glorious beyond all + others will be the day when "nation shall no more rise up against nation;" + when, as a necessary consequence of the universal acknowledgment of the + rights of man, it shall no longer be in the power of an individual to drag + millions into strife, for the unholy gratification of personal prejudice + and passion. The reformed governments of Great Britain and France, + resting, as they do, upon a popular basis, are already tending to this + consummation, for the people have suffered too much from the warlike + ambition of their former masters not to have learned that the gains of + peaceful industry are better than the wages of human butchery. + </p> + <p> + Among the great names of Ireland—alike conspicuous, yet widely + dissimilar—stand Wellington and O'Connell. The one smote down the + modern Alexander upon Waterloo's field of death, but the page of his + reputation is dim with the tears of the widow and the orphan, and dark + with the stain of blood. The other, armed only with the weapons of truth + and reason, has triumphed over the oppression of centuries, and opened a + peaceful pathway to the Temple of Freedom, through which its Goddess may + be seen, no longer propitiated with human sacrifices, like some foul idol + of the East, but clothed in Christian attributes, and smiling in the + beauty of holiness upon the pure hearts and peaceful hands of its + votaries. The bloodless victories of the latter have all the sublimity + with none of the criminality which attaches itself to the triumphs of the + former. To thunder high truths in the deafened ear of nations, to rouse + the better spirit of the age, to soothe the malignant passions of. + assembled and maddened men, to throw open the temple doors of justice to + the abused, enslaved, and persecuted, to unravel the mysteries of guilt, + and hold up the workers of iniquity in the severe light of truth stripped + of their disguise and covered with the confusion of their own vileness,— + these are victories more glorious than any which have ever reddened the + earth with carnage:— + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "They ask a spirit of more exalted pitch, + And courage tempered with a holier fire." +</pre> + <p> + Of the more recent efforts of O'Connell we need not speak, for no one can + read the English periodicals and papers without perceiving that O'Connell + is, at this moment, the leading politician, the master mind of the British + empire. Attempts have been made to prejudice the American mind against him + by a republication on this side of the water of the false and foul + slanders of his Tory enemies, in reference to what is called the + "O'Connell rent," a sum placed annually in his hands by a grateful people, + and which he has devoted scrupulously to the great object of Ireland's + political redemption. He has acquired no riches by his political efforts + his heart and soul and mind and strength have been directed to his + suffering country and the cause of universal freedom. For this he has + deservedly a place in the heart and affections of every son of Ireland. + One million of ransomed slaves in the British dependencies will teach + their children to repeat the name of O'Connell with that of Wilberforce + and Clarkson. And when the stain and caste of slavery shall have passed + from our own country, he will be regarded as our friend and benefactor, + whose faithful rebukes and warnings and eloquent appeals to our pride of + character, borne to us across the Atlantic, touched the guilty + sensitiveness of the national conscience, and through shame prepared the + way for repentance. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0027" id="link2H_4_0027"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + ENGLAND UNDER JAMES II. + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + A review of the first two volumes of Macaulay's <i>History of England + from the Accession of James II</i>. +</pre> + <p> + In accordance with the labor-saving spirit of the age, we have in these + volumes an admirable example of history made easy. Had they been published + in his time, they might have found favor in the eyes of the poet Gray, who + declared that his ideal of happiness was "to lie on a sofa and read + eternal new romances." + </p> + <p> + The style is that which lends such a charm to the author's essays,— + brilliant, epigrammatic, vigorous. Indeed, herein lies the fault of the + work, when viewed as a mere detail of historical facts. Its sparkling + rhetoric is not the safest medium of truth to the simple-minded inquirer. + A discriminating and able critic has done the author no injustice in + saying that, in attempting to give effect and vividness to his thoughts + and diction, he is often overstrained and extravagant, and that his + epigrammatic style seems better fitted for the glitter of paradox than the + sober guise of truth. The intelligent and well-informed reader of the + volume before us will find himself at times compelled to reverse the + decisions of the author, and deliver some unfortunate personage, sect, or + class from the pillory of his rhetoric and the merciless pelting of his + ridicule. There is a want of the repose and quiet which we look for in a + narrative of events long passed away; we rise from the perusal of the book + pleased and excited, but with not so clear a conception of the actual + realities of which it treats as would be desirable. We cannot help feeling + that the author has been somewhat over-scrupulous in avoiding the dulness + of plain detail, and the dryness of dates, names, and statistics. The + freedom, flowing diction, and sweeping generality of the reviewer and + essayist are maintained throughout; and, with one remarkable exception, + the <i>History of England</i> might be divided into papers of magazine + length, and published, without any violence to propriety, as a + continuation of the author's labors in that department of literature in + which he confessedly stands without a rival,—historical review. + </p> + <p> + That exception is, however, no unimportant one. In our view, it is the + crowning excellence of the first volume,—its distinctive feature and + principal attraction. We refer to the third chapter of the volume, from + page 260 to page 398,—the description of the condition of England at + the period of the accession of James II. We know of nothing like it in the + entire range of historical literature. The veil is lifted up from the + England of a century and a half ago; its geographical, industrial, social, + and moral condition is revealed; and, as the panorama passes before us of + lonely heaths, fortified farm-houses, bands of robbers, rude country + squires doling out the odds and ends of their coarse fare to clerical + dependents,—rough roads, serviceable only for horseback travelling,—towns + with unlighted streets, reeking with filth and offal, —and prisons, + damp, loathsome, infected with disease, and swarming with vermin,—we + are filled with wonder at the contrast which it presents to the England of + our day. We no longer sigh for "the good old days." The most confirmed + grumbler is compelled to admit that, bad as things now are, they were far + worse a few generations back. Macaulay, in this elaborate and carefully + prepared chapter, has done a good service to humanity in disabusing + well-intentioned ignorance of the melancholy notion that the world is + growing worse, and in putting to silence the cant of blind, unreasoning + conservatism. + </p> + <p> + In 1685 the entire population of England our author estimates at from five + millions to five millions five hundred thousand. Of the eight hundred + thousand families at that period, one half had animal food twice a week. + The other half ate it not at all, or at most not oftener than once a week. + Wheaten, loaves were only seen at the tables of the comparatively wealthy. + Rye, barley, and oats were the food of the vast majority. The average + wages of workingmen was at least one half less than is paid in England for + the same service at the present day. One fifth of the people were paupers, + or recipients of parish relief. Clothing and bedding were scarce and dear. + Education was almost unknown to the vast majority. The houses and shops + were not numbered in the cities, for porters, coachmen, and errand-runners + could not read. The shopkeeper distinguished his place of business by + painted signs and graven images. Oxford and Cambridge Universities were + little better than modern grammar and Latin school in a provincial + village. The country magistrate used on the bench language too coarse, + brutal, and vulgar for a modern tap-room. Fine gentlemen in London vied + with each other in the lowest ribaldry and the grossest profanity. The + poets of the time, from Dryden to Durfey, ministered to the popular + licentiousness. The most shameless indecency polluted their pages. The + theatre and the brothel were in strict unison. The Church winked at the + vice which opposed itself to the austere morality or hypocrisy of + Puritanism. The superior clergy, with a few noble exceptions, were + self-seekers and courtiers; the inferior were idle, ignorant hangerson + upon blaspheming squires and knights of the shire. The domestic chaplain, + of all men living, held the most unenviable position. "If he was permitted + to dine with the family, he was expected to content himself with the + plainest fare. He might fill himself with the corned beef and carrots; but + as soon as the tarts and cheese-cakes made their appearance he quitted his + seat, and stood aloof till he was summoned to return thanks for the + repast, from a great part of which he had been excluded." + </p> + <p> + Beyond the Trent the country seems at this period to have been in a state + of barbarism. The parishes kept bloodhounds for the purpose of hunting + freebooters. The farm-houses were fortified and guarded. So dangerous was + the country that persons about travelling thither made their wills. Judges + and lawyers only ventured therein, escorted by a strong guard of armed + men. + </p> + <p> + The natural resources of the island were undeveloped. The tin mines of + Cornwall, which two thousand years before attracted the ships of the + merchant princes of Tyre beyond the Pillars of Hercules, were indeed + worked to a considerable extent; but the copper mines, which now yield + annually fifteen thousand tons, were entirely neglected. Rock salt was + known to exist, but was not used to any considerable extent; and only a + partial supply of salt by evaporation was obtained. The coal and iron of + England are at this time the stable foundations of her industrial and + commercial greatness. But in 1685 the great part of the iron used was + imported. Only about ten thousand tons were annually cast. Now eight + hundred thousand is the average annual production. Equally great has been + the increase in coal mining. "Coal," says Macaulay, "though very little + used in any species of manufacture, was already the ordinary fuel in some + districts which were fortunate enough to possess large beds, and in the + capital, which could easily be supplied by water carriage. It seems + reasonable to believe that at least one half of the quantity then + extracted from the pits was consumed in London. The consumption of London + seemed to the writers of that age enormous, and was often mentioned by + them as a proof of the greatness of the imperial city. They scarcely hoped + to be believed when they affirmed that two hundred and eighty thousand + chaldrons—that is to say, about three hundred and fifty thousand + tons-were, in the last year of the reign of Charles II., brought to the + Thames. At present near three millions and a half of tons are required + yearly by the metropolis; and the whole annual produce cannot, on the most + moderate computation, be estimated at less than twenty millions of tons." + </p> + <p> + After thus passing in survey the England of our ancestors five or six + generations back, the author closes his chapter with some eloquent remarks + upon the progress of society. Contrasting the hardness and coarseness of + the age of which he treats with the softer and more humane features of our + own, he says: "Nowhere could be found that sensitive and restless + compassion which has in our time extended powerful protection to the + factory child, the Hindoo widow, to the negro slave; which pries into the + stores and water-casks of every emigrant ship; which winces at every lash + laid on the back of a drunken soldier; which will not suffer the thief in + the hulks to be ill fed or overworked; and which has repeatedly endeavored + to save the life even of the murderer. The more we study the annals of the + past, the more shall we rejoice that we live in a merciful age, in an age + in which cruelty is abhorred, and in which pain, even when deserved, is + inflicted reluctantly and from a sense of duty. Every class, doubtless, + has gained largely by this great moral change; but the class which has + gained most is the poorest, the most dependent, and the most defenceless." + </p> + <p> + The history itself properly commences at the close of this chapter. + Opening with the deathscene of the dissolute Charles II., it presents a + series of brilliant pictures of the events succeeding: The miserable fate + of Oates and Dangerfield, the perjured inventors of the Popish Plot; the + trial of Baxter by the infamous Jeffreys; the ill-starred attempt of the + Duke of Monmouth; the battle of Sedgemoor, and the dreadful atrocities of + the king's soldiers, and the horrible perversion of justice by the king's + chief judge in the "Bloody Assizes;" the barbarous hunting of the Scotch + Dissenters by Claverbouse; the melancholy fate of the brave and noble Duke + of Argyle,—are described with graphic power unknown to Smollett or + Hume. Personal portraits are sketched with a bold freedom which at times + startles us. The "old familiar faces," as we have seen them through the + dust of a century and a half, start before us with lifelike distinctness + of outline and coloring. Some of them disappoint us; like the ghost of + Hamlet's father, they come in a "questionable shape." Thus, for instance, + in his sketch of William Penn, the historian takes issue with the world on + his character, and labors through many pages of disingenuous innuendoes + and distortion of facts to transform the saint of history into a pliant + courtier. + </p> + <p> + The second volume details the follies and misfortunes, the decline and + fall, of the last of the Stuarts. All the art of the author's splendid + rhetoric is employed in awakening, by turns, the indignation and contempt + of the reader in contemplating the character of the wrong-headed king. In + portraying that character, he has brought into exercise all those powers + of invective and merciless ridicule which give such a savage relish to his + delineation of Barrere. To preserve the consistency of this character, he + denies the king any credit for whatever was really beneficent and + praiseworthy in his government. He holds up the royal delinquent in only + two lights: the one representing him as a tyrant towards his people; the + other as the abject slave of foreign priests,— a man at once hateful + and ludicrous, of whom it is difficult to speak without an execration or a + sneer. + </p> + <p> + The events which preceded the revolution of 1688; the undisguised + adherence of the king to the Church of Rome; the partial toleration of the + despised Quakers and Anabaptists; the gradual relaxation of the severity + of the penal laws against Papists and Dissenters, preparing the way for + the royal proclamation of entire liberty of conscience throughout the + British realm, allowing the crop-eared Puritan and the Papist priest to + build conventicles and mass houses under the very eaves of the palaces of + Oxford and Canterbury; the mining and countermining of Jesuits and + prelates, are detailed with impartial minuteness. The secret springs of + the great movements of the time are laid bare; the mean and paltry + instrumentalities are seen at work in the under world of corruption, + prejudice, and falsehood. No one, save a blind, unreasoning partisan of + Catholicism or Episcopacy, can contemplate this chapter in English history + without a feeling of disgust. However it may have been overruled for good + by that Providence which takes the wise in their own craftiness, the + revolution of 1688, in itself considered, affords just as little cause for + self-congratulation on the part of Protestants as the substitution of the + supremacy of the crowned Bluebeard, Henry VIII., for that of the Pope, in + the English Church. It had little in common with the revolution of 1642. + The field of its action was the closet of selfish intrigue,—the + stalls of discontented prelates,—the chambers of the wanton and + adulteress,—the confessional of a weak prince, whose mind, + originally narrow, had been cramped closer still by the strait- jacket of + religious bigotry and superstition. The age of nobility and heroism had + well-nigh passed away. The pious fervor, the self-denial, and the strict + morality of the Puritanism of the days of Cromwell, and the blunt honesty + and chivalrous loyalty of the Cavaliers, had both measurably given place + to the corrupting influences of the licentious and infidel court of + Charles II.; and to the arrogance, intolerance, and shameless self-seeking + of a prelacy which, in its day of triumph and revenge, had more than + justified the terrible denunciations and scathing gibes of Milton. + </p> + <p> + Both Catholic and Protestant writers have misrepresented James II. He + deserves neither the execrations of the one nor the eulogies of the other. + The candid historian must admit that he was, after all, a better man than + his brother Charles II. He was a sincere and bigoted Catholic, and was + undoubtedly honest in the declaration, which he made in that unlucky + letter which Burnet ferreted out on the Continent, that he was prepared to + make large steps to build up the Catholic Church in England, and, if + necessary, to become a martyr in her cause. He was proud, austere, and + self-willed. In the treatment of his enemies he partook of the cruel + temper of his time. He was at once ascetic and sensual, alternating + between the hair-shirt of penance and the embraces of Catharine Sedley. + His situation was one of the most difficult and embarrassing which can be + conceived of. He was at once a bigoted Papist and a Protestant pope. He + hated the French domination to which his brother had submitted; yet his + pride as sovereign was subordinated to his allegiance to Rome and a + superstitious veneration for the wily priests with which Louis XIV. + surrounded him. As the head of Anglican heretics, he was compelled to + submit to conditions galling alike to the sovereign and the man. He found, + on his accession, the terrible penal laws against the Papists in full + force; the hangman's knife was yet warm with its ghastly butcher-work of + quartering and disembowelling suspected Jesuits and victims of the lie of + Titus Oates; the Tower of London had scarcely ceased to echo the groans of + Catholic confessors stretched on the rack by Protestant inquisitors. He + was torn by conflicting interests and spiritual and political + contradictions. The prelates of the Established Church must share the + responsibility of many of the worst acts of the early part of his reign. + Oxford sent up its lawned deputations to mingle the voice of adulation + with the groans of tortured Covenanters, and fawning ecclesiastics burned + the incense of irreverent flattery under the nostrils of the Lord's + anointed, while the blessed air of England was tainted by the carcasses of + the ill-fated followers of Monmouth, rotting on a thousand gibbets. While + Jeffreys was threatening Baxter and his Presbyterian friends with the + pillory and whipping-post; while Quakers and Baptists were only spared + from extermination as game preserves for the sport of clerical hunters; + while the prisons were thronged with the heads of some fifteen thousand + beggared families, and Dissenters of every name and degree were chased + from one hiding-place to another, like David among the cliffs of Ziph and + the rocks of the wild goats,—the thanksgivings and congratulations + of prelacy arose in an unbroken strain of laudation from all the episcopal + palaces of England. What mattered it to men, in whose hearts, to use the + language of John Milton, "the sour leaven of human traditions, mixed with + the poisonous dregs of hypocrisy, lay basking in the sunny warmth of + wealth and promotion, hatching Antichrist," that the privileges of + Englishmen and the rights secured by the great charter were violated and + trodden under foot, so long as usurpation enured to their own benefit? But + when King James issued his Declaration of Indulgence, and stretched his + prerogative on the side of tolerance and charity, the zeal of the prelates + for preserving the integrity of the British constitution and the limiting + of the royal power flamed up into rebellion. They forswore themselves + without scruple: the disciples of Laud, the asserters of kingly + infallibility and divine right, talked of usurped power and English rights + in the strain of the very schismatics whom they had persecuted to the + death. There is no reason to believe that James supposed that, in issuing + his declaration suspending the penal laws, he had transcended the rightful + prerogative of his throne. The power which he exercised had been used by + his predecessors for far less worthy purposes, and with the approbation of + many of the very men who now opposed him. His ostensible object, expressed + in language which even those who condemn his policy cannot but admire, was + a laudable and noble one. "We trust," said he, "that it will not be vain + that we have resolved to use our utmost endeavors to establish liberty of + conscience on such just and equal foundations as will render it + unalterable, and secure to all people the free exercise of their religion, + by which future ages may reap the benefit of what is so undoubtedly the + general good of the whole kingdom." Whatever may have been the motive of + this declaration,—even admitting the suspicions of his enemies to + have been true, that he advocated universal toleration as the only means + of restoring Roman Catholics to all the rights and privileges of which the + penal laws deprived them,—it would seem that there could have been + no very serious objection on the part of real friends of religious + toleration to the taking of him at his word and placing Englishmen of + every sect on an equality before the law. The Catholics were in a very + small minority, scarcely at that time as numerous as the Quakers and + Anabaptists. The army, the navy, and nine tenths of the people of England + were Protestants. Real danger, therefore, from a simple act of justice + towards their Catholic fellow- citizens, the people of England had no + ground for apprehending. But the great truth, which is even now but + imperfectly recognized throughout Christendom, that religious opinions + rest between man and his Maker, and not between man and the magistrate, + and that the domain of conscience is sacred, was almost unknown to the + statesmen and schoolmen of the seventeenth century. Milton—ultra + liberal as he was—excepted the Catholics from his plan of + toleration. Locke, yielding to the prejudices of the time, took the same + ground. The enlightened latitudinarian ministers of the Established Church—men + whose talents and Christian charity redeem in some measure the character + of that Church in the day of its greatest power and basest apostasy—stopped + short of universal toleration. The Presbyterians excluded Quakers, + Baptists, and Papists from the pale of their charity. With the single + exception of the sect of which William Penn was a conspicuous member, the + idea of complete and impartial toleration was novel and unwelcome to all + sects and classes of the English people. Hence it was that the very men + whose liberties and estates had been secured by the declaration, and who + were thereby permitted to hold their meetings in peace and quietness, used + their newly acquired freedom in denouncing the king, because the same key + which had opened their prison doors had also liberated the Papists and the + Quakers. Baxter's severe and painful spirit could not rejoice in an act + which had, indeed, restored him to personal freedom, but which had, in his + view, also offended Heaven, and strengthened the powers of Antichrist by + extending the same favor to Jesuits and Ranters. Bunyan disliked the + Quakers next to the Papists; and it greatly lessened his satisfaction at + his release from Bedford jail that it had been brought about by the + influence of the former at the court of a Catholic prince. Dissenters + forgot the wrongs and persecutions which they had experienced at the hands + of the prelacy, and joined the bishops in opposition to the declaration. + They almost magnified into Christian confessors the prelates who + remonstrated against the indulgence, and actually plotted against the king + for restoring them to liberty of person and conscience. The nightmare fear + of Popery overcame their love of religious liberty; and they meekly + offered their necks to the yoke of prelacy as the only security against + the heavier one of Papist supremacy. In a far different manner the + cleareyed and plain-spoken John Milton met the claims and demands of the + hierarchy in his time. "They entreat us," said he, "that we be not weary + of the insupportable grievances that our shoulders have hitherto cracked + under; they beseech us that we think them fit to be our justices of peace, + our lords, our highest officers of state. They pray us that it would + please us to let them still haul us and wrong us with their bandogs and + pursuivants; and that it would please the Parliament that they may yet + have the whipping, fleecing, and flaying of us in their diabolical courts, + to tear the flesh from our bones, and into our wide wounds, instead of + balm, to pour in the oil of tartar, vitriol, and mercury. Surely a right, + reasonable, innocent, and soft-hearted petition! O the relenting bowels of + the fathers!" + </p> + <p> + Considering the prominent part acted by William Penn in the reign of James + II., and his active and influential support of the obnoxious declaration + which precipitated the revolution of 1688, it could hardly have been + otherwise than that his character should suffer from the unworthy + suspicions and prejudices of his contemporaries. His views of religious + toleration were too far in advance of the age to be received with favor. + They were of necessity misunderstood and misrepresented. All his life he + had been urging them with the earnestness of one whose convictions were + the result, not so much of human reason as of what he regarded as divine + illumination. What the council of James yielded upon grounds of state + policy he defended on those of religious obligation. He had suffered in + person and estate for the exercise of his religion. He had travelled over + Holland and Germany, pleading with those in authority for universal + toleration and charity. On a sudden, on the accession of James, the friend + of himself and his family, he found himself the most influential untitled + citizen in the British realm. He had free access to the royal ear. Asking + nothing for himself or his relatives, he demanded only that the good + people of England should be no longer despoiled of liberty and estate for + their religious opinions. James, as a Catholic, had in some sort a common + interest with his dissenting subjects, and the declaration was for their + common relief. Penn, conscious of the rectitude of his own motives and + thoroughly convinced of the Christian duty of toleration, welcomed that + declaration as the precursor of the golden age of liberty and love and + good-will to men. He was not the man to distrust the motives of an act so + fully in accordance with his lifelong aspirations and prayers. He was + charitable to a fault: his faith in his fellow-men was often stronger than + a clearer insight of their characters would have justified. He saw the + errors of the king, and deplored them; he denounced Jeffreys as a butcher + who had been let loose by the priests; and pitied the king, who was, he + thought, swayed by evil counsels. He remonstrated against the interference + of the king with Magdalen College; and reproved and rebuked the hopes and + aims of the more zealous and hot-headed Catholics, advising them to be + content with simple toleration. But the constitution of his mind fitted + him rather for the commendation of the good than the denunciation of the + bad. He had little in common with the bold and austere spirit of the + Puritan reformers. He disliked their violence and harshness; while, on the + other hand, he was attracted and pleased by the gentle disposition and + mild counsels of Locke, and Tillotson, and the latitudinarians of the + English Church. He was the intimate personal and political friend of + Algernon Sydney; sympathized with his republican theories, and shared his + abhorrence of tyranny, civil and ecclesiastical. He found in him a man + after his own heart,—genial, generous, and loving; faithful to duty + and the instincts of humanity; a true Christian gentleman. His sense of + gratitude was strong, and his personal friendships sometimes clouded his + judgment. In giving his support to the measures of James in behalf of + liberty of conscience, it must be admitted that he acted in consistency + with his principles and professions. To have taken ground against them, he + must have given the lie to his declarations from his youth upward. He + could not disown and deny his own favorite doctrine because it came from + the lips of a Catholic king and his Jesuit advisers; and in thus rising + above the prejudices of his time, and appealing to the reason and humanity + of the people of England in favor of a cordial indorsement on the part of + Parliament of the principles of the declaration, he believed that he was + subserving the best interests of his beloved country and fulfilling the + solemn obligations of religious duty. The downfall of James exposed Penn + to peril and obloquy. Perjured informers endeavored to swear away his + life; and, although nothing could be proved against him beyond the fact + that he had steadily supported the great measure of toleration, he was + compelled to live secluded in his private lodgings in London for two or + three years, with a proclamation for his arrest hanging over his head. At + length, the principal informer against him having been found guilty of + perjury, the government warrant was withdrawn; and Lords Sidney, + Rochester, and Somers, and the Duke of Buckingham, publicly bore testimony + that nothing had been urged against him save by impostors, and that "they + had known him, some of them, for thirty years, and had never known him to + do an ill thing, but many good offices." It is a matter of regret that one + professing to hold the impartial pen of history should have given the + sanction of his authority to the slanderous and false imputations of such + a man as Burnet, who has never been regarded as an authentic chronicler. + The pantheon of history should not be lightly disturbed. A good man's + character is the world's common legacy; and humanity is not so rich in + models of purity and goodness as to be able to sacrifice such a reputation + as that of William Penn to the point of an antithesis or the effect of a + paradox. + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + Gilbert Burnet, in liberality as a politician and tolerance as a + Churchman, was far in advance of his order and time. It is true + that he shut out the Catholics from the pale of his charity and + barely tolerated the Dissenters. The idea of entire religious + liberty and equality shocked even his moderate degree of + sensitiveness. He met Penn at the court of the Prince of Orange, + and, after a long and fruitless effort to convince the Dissenter + that the penal laws against the Catholics should be enforced, and + allegiance to the Established Church continue the condition of + qualification for offices of trust and honor, and that he and his + friends should rest contented with simple toleration, he became + irritated by the inflexible adherence of Penn to the principle of + entire religious freedom. One of the most worthy sons of the + Episcopal Church, Thomas Clarkson, alluding to this discussion, says + "Burnet never mentioned him (Penn) afterwards but coldly or + sneeringly, or in a way to lower him in the estimation of the + reader, whenever he had occasion to speak of him in his History of + his Own Times." + + He was a man of strong prejudices; he lived in the midst of + revolutions, plots, and intrigues; he saw much of the worst side of + human nature; and he candidly admits, in the preface to his great + work, that he was inclined to think generally the worst of men and + parties, and that the reader should make allowance for this + inclination, although he had honestly tried to give the truth. Dr. + King, of Oxford, in his Anecdotes of his Own Times, p. 185, says: + "I knew Burnet: he was a furious party-man, and easily imposed upon + by any lying spirit of his faction; but he was a better pastor than + any man who is now seated on the bishops' bench." The Tory writers + —Swift, Pope, Arbuthnot, and others—have undoubtedly exaggerated + the defects of Burnet's narrative; while, on the other hand, his + Whig commentators have excused them on the ground of his avowed and + fierce partisanship. Dr. Johnson, in his blunt way, says: "I do not + believe Burnet intentionally lied; but he was so much prejudiced + that he took no pains to find out the truth." On the contrary, Sir + James Mackintosh, in the Edinburgh Review, speaks of the Bishop as + an honest writer, seldom substantially erroneous, though often + inaccurate in points of detail; and Macaulay, who has quite too + closely followed him in his history, defends him as at least quite + as accurate as his contemporary writers, and says that, "in his + moral character, as in his intellectual, great blemishes were more + than compensated by great excellences." +</pre> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0028" id="link2H_4_0028"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + THE BORDER WAR OF 1708. + </h2> + <p> + The picturesque site of the now large village of Haverhill, on the + Merrimac River, was occupied a century and a half ago by some thirty + dwellings, scattered at unequal distances along the two principal roads, + one of which, running parallel with the river, intersected the other, + which ascended the hill northwardly and lost itself in the dark woods. The + log huts of the first settlers had at that time given place to + comparatively spacious and commodious habitations, framed and covered with + sawed boards, and cloven clapboards, or shingles. They were, many of them, + two stories in front, with the roof sloping off behind to a single one; + the windows few and small, and frequently so fitted as to be opened with + difficulty, and affording but a scanty supply of light and air. Two or + three of the best constructed were occupied as garrisons, where, in + addition to the family, small companies of soldiers were quartered. On the + high grounds rising from the river stood the mansions of the well-defined + aristocracy of the little settlement,—larger and more imposing, with + projecting upper stories and carved cornices. On the front of one of + these, over the elaborately wrought entablature of the doorway, might be + seen the armorial bearings of the honored family of Saltonstall. Its + hospitable door was now closed; no guests filled its spacious hall or + partook of the rich delicacies of its ample larder. Death had been there; + its venerable and respected occupant had just been borne by his peers in + rank and station to the neighboring graveyard. Learned, affable, intrepid, + a sturdy asserter of the rights and liberties of the Province, and so far + in advance of his time as to refuse to yield to the terrible witchcraft + delusion, vacating his seat on the bench and openly expressing his + disapprobation of the violent and sanguinary proceedings of the court, + wise in council and prompt in action,—not his own townsmen alone, + but the people of the entire Province, had reason to mourn the loss of + Nathaniel Saltonstall. + </p> + <p> + Four years before the events of which we are about to speak, the Indian + allies of the French in Canada suddenly made their appearance in the + westerly part of the settlement. At the close of a midwinter day six + savages rushed into the open gate of a garrison-house owned by one + Bradley, who appears to have been absent at the time. A sentinel, + stationed in the house, discharged his musket, killing the foremost + Indian, and was himself instantly shot down. The mistress of the house, a + spirited young woman, was making soap in a large kettle over the fire. + —She seized her ladle and dashed the boiling liquid in the faces of + the assailants, scalding one of them severely, and was only captured after + such a resistance as can scarcely be conceived of by the delicately framed + and tenderly nurtured occupants of the places of our great- grandmothers. + After plundering the house, the Indians started on their long winter march + for Canada. Tradition says that some thirteen persons, probably women and + children, were killed outright at the garrison. Goodwife Bradley and four + others were spared as prisoners. The ground was covered with deep snow, + and the captives were compelled to carry heavy burdens of their plundered + household-stuffs; while for many days in succession they had no other + sustenance than bits of hide, ground-nuts, the bark of trees, and the + roots of wild onions, and lilies. In this situation, in the cold, wintry + forest, and unattended, the unhappy young woman gave birth to a child. Its + cries irritated the savages, who cruelly treated it and threatened its + life. To the entreaties of the mother they replied, that they would spare + it on the condition that it should be baptized after their fashion. She + gave the little innocent into their hands, when with mock solemnity they + made the sign of the cross upon its forehead, by gashing it with their + knives, and afterwards barbarously put it to death before the eyes of its + mother, seeming to regard the whole matter as an excellent piece of sport. + Nothing so strongly excited the risibilities of these grim barbarians as + the tears and cries of their victims, extorted by physical or mental + agony. Capricious alike in their cruelties and their kindnesses, they + treated some of their captives with forbearance and consideration and + tormented others apparently without cause. One man, on his way to Canada, + was killed because they did not like his looks, "he was so sour;" another, + because he was "old and good for nothing." One of their own number, who + was suffering greatly from the effects of the scalding soap, was derided + and mocked as a "fool who had let a squaw whip him;" while on the other + hand the energy and spirit manifested by Goodwife Bradley in her defence + was a constant theme of admiration, and gained her so much respect among + her captors as to protect her from personal injury or insult. On her + arrival in Canada she was sold to a French farmer, by whom she was kindly + treated. + </p> + <p> + In the mean time her husband made every exertion in his power to ascertain + her fate, and early in the next year learned that she was a slave in + Canada. He immediately set off through the wilderness on foot, accompanied + only by his dog, who drew a small sled, upon which he carried some + provisions for his sustenance, and a bag of snuff, which the Governor of + the Province gave him as a present to the Governor of Canada. After + encountering almost incredible hardships and dangers with a perseverance + which shows how well he appreciated the good qualities of his stolen + helpmate, he reached Montreal and betook himself to the Governor's + residence. Travel-worn, ragged, and wasted with cold and hunger, he was + ushered into the presence of M. Vaudreuil. The courtly Frenchman civilly + received the gift of the bag of snuff, listened to the poor fellow's + story, and put him in a way to redeem his wife without difficulty. The joy + of the latter on seeing her husband in the strange land of her captivity + may well be imagined. They returned by water, landing at Boston early in + the summer. + </p> + <p> + There is a tradition that this was not the goodwife's first experience of + Indian captivity. The late Dr. Abiel Abbott, in his manuscript of Judith + Whiting's <i>Recollections of the Indian Wars</i>, states that she had + previously been a prisoner, probably before her marriage. After her return + she lived quietly at the garrison-house until the summer of the next year. + One bright moonlit-night a party of Indians were seen silently and + cautiously approaching. The only occupants of the garrison at that time + were Bradley, his wife and children, and a servant. The three adults armed + themselves with muskets, and prepared to defend themselves. Goodwife + Bradley, supposing the Indians had come with the intention of again + capturing her, encouraged her husband to fight to the last, declaring that + she had rather die on her own hearth than fall into their hands. The + Indians rushed upon the garrison, and assailed the thick oaken door, which + they forced partly open, when a well-aimed shot from Goodwife Bradley laid + the foremost dead on the threshold. The loss of their leader so + disheartened them that they made a hasty retreat. + </p> + <p> + The year 1707 passed away without any attack upon the exposed frontier + settlement. A feeling of comparative security succeeded to the almost + sleepless anxiety and terror of the inhabitants; and they were beginning + to congratulate each other upon the termination of their long and bitter + trials. But the end was not yet. + </p> + <p> + Early in the spring of 1708, the principal tribes of Indians in alliance + with the French held a great council, and agreed to furnish three hundred + warriors for an expedition to the English frontier. + </p> + <p> + They were joined by one hundred French Canadians and several volunteers, + consisting of officers of the French army, and younger sons of the + nobility, adventurous and unscrupulous. The Sieur de Chaillons, and Hertel + de Rouville, distinguished as a partisan in former expeditions, cruel and + unsparing as his Indian allies, commanded the French troops; the Indians, + marshalled under their several chiefs, obeyed the general orders of La + Perriere. A Catholic priest accompanied them. De Ronville, with the French + troops and a portion of the Indians, took the route by the River St. + Francois about the middle of summer. La Perriere, with the French Mohawks, + crossed Lake Champlain. The place of rendezvous was Lake Nickisipigue. On + the way a Huron accidentally killed one of his companions; whereupon the + tribe insisted on halting and holding a council. It was gravely decided + that this accident was an evil omen, and that the expedition would prove + disastrous; and, in spite of the endeavors of the French officers, the + whole band deserted. Next the Mohawks became dissatisfied, and refused to + proceed. To the entreaties and promises of their French allies they + replied that an infectious disease had broken out among them, and that, if + they remained, it would spread through the whole army. The French + partisans were not deceived by a falsehood so transparent; but they were + in no condition to enforce obedience; and, with bitter execrations and + reproaches, they saw the Mohawks turn back on their warpath. The + diminished army pressed on to Nickisipigue, in the expectation of meeting, + agreeably to their promise, the Norridgewock and Penobscot Indians. They + found the place deserted, and, after waiting for some days, were forced to + the conclusion that the Eastern tribes had broken their pledge of + cooperation. Under these circumstances a council was held; and the + original design of the expedition, namely, the destruction of the whole + line of frontier towns, beginning with Portsmouth, was abandoned. They had + still a sufficient force for the surprise of a single settlement; and + Haverhill, on the Merrimac, was selected for conquest. + </p> + <p> + In the mean time, intelligence of the expedition, greatly exaggerated in + point of numbers and object, had reached Boston, and Governor Dudley had + despatched troops to the more exposed out posts of the Provinces of + Massachusetts and New Hampshire. Forty men, under the command of Major + Turner and Captains Price and Gardner, were stationed at Haverhill in the + different garrison-houses. At first a good degree of vigilance was + manifested; but, as days and weeks passed without any alarm, the + inhabitants relapsed into their old habits; and some even began to believe + that the rumored descent of the Indians was only a pretext for quartering + upon them two-score of lazy, rollicking soldiers, who certainly seemed + more expert in making love to their daughters, and drinking their best ale + and cider, than in patrolling the woods or putting the garrisons into a + defensible state. The grain and hay harvest ended without disturbance; the + men worked in their fields, and the women pursued their household + avocations, without any very serious apprehension of danger. + </p> + <p> + Among the inhabitants of the village was an eccentric, ne'er-do-well + fellow, named Keezar, who led a wandering, unsettled life, oscillating, + like a crazy pendulum, between Haverhill and Amesbury. He had a smattering + of a variety of trades, was a famous wrestler, and for a mug of ale would + leap over an ox-cart with the unspilled beverage in his hand. On one + occasion, when at supper, his wife complained that she had no tin dishes; + and, as there were none to be obtained nearer than Boston, he started on + foot in the evening, travelled through the woods to the city, and returned + with his ware by sunrise the next morning, passing over a distance of + between sixty and seventy miles. The tradition of his strange habits, + feats of strength, and wicked practical jokes is still common in his + native town. On the morning of the 29th of the eighth month he was engaged + in taking home his horse, which, according to his custom, he had turned + into his neighbor's rich clover field the evening previous. By the gray + light of dawn he saw a long file of men marching silently towards the + town. He hurried back to the village and gave the alarm by firing a gun. + Previous to this, however, a young man belonging to a neighboring town, + who had been spending the night with a young woman of the village, had met + the advance of the war-party, and, turning back in extreme terror and + confusion, thought only of the safety of his betrothed, and passed + silently through a considerable part of the village to her dwelling. After + he had effectually concealed her he ran out to give the alarm. But it was + too late. Keezar's gun was answered by the terrific yells, whistling, and + whooping of the Indians. House after house was assailed and captured. Men, + women, and children were massacred. The minister of the town was killed by + a shot through his door. Two of his children were saved by the courage and + sagacity of his negro slave Hagar. She carried them into the cellar and + covered them with tubs, and then crouched behind a barrel of meat just in + time to escape the vigilant eyes of the enemy, who entered the cellar and + plundered it. She saw them pass and repass the tubs under which the + children lay and take meat from the very barrel which concealed herself. + Three soldiers were quartered in the house; but they made no defence, and + were killed while begging for quarter. + </p> + <p> + The wife of Thomas Hartshorne, after her husband and three sons had + fallen, took her younger children into the cellar, leaving an infant on a + bed in the garret, fearful that its cries would betray her place of + concealment if she took it with her. The Indians entered the garret and + tossed the child out of the window upon a pile of clapboards, where it was + afterwards found stunned and insensible. It recovered, nevertheless, and + became a man of remarkable strength and stature; and it used to be a + standing joke with his friends that he had been stinted by the Indians + when they threw him out of the window. Goodwife Swan, armed with a long + spit, successfully defended her door against two Indians. While the + massacre went on, the priest who accompanied the expedition, with some of + the French officers, went into the meeting-house, the walls of which were + afterwards found written over with chalk. At sunrise, Major Turner, with a + portion of his soldiers, entered the village; and the enemy made a rapid + retreat, carrying with them seventeen, prisoners. They were pursued and + overtaken just as they were entering the woods; and a severe skirmish took + place, in which the rescue of some of the prisoners was effected. Thirty + of the enemy were left dead on the field, including the infamous Hertel de + Rouville. On the part of the villagers, Captains Ayer and Wainwright and + Lieutenant Johnson, with thirteen others, were killed. The intense heat of + the weather made it necessary to bury the dead on the same day. They were + laid side by side in a long trench in the burial- ground. The body of the + venerated and lamented minister, with those of his wife and child, sleep + in another part of the burial-ground, where may still be seen a rude + monument with its almost llegible inscription:— + </p> + <p> + "<i>Clauditur hoc tumulo corpus Reverendi pii doctique viri D. Benjamin + Rolfe, ecclesiae Christi quae est in Haverhill pastoris fidelissimi; qui + domi suae ab hostibus barbare trucidatus. A laboribus suis requievit mane + diei sacrae quietis, Aug. XXIX, anno Dom. MDCCVIII. AEtatis suae XLVI</i>." + </p> + <p> + Of the prisoners taken, some escaped during the skirmish, and two or three + were sent back by the French officers, with a message to the English + soldiers, that, if they pursued the party on their retreat to Canada, the + other prisoners should be put to death. One of them, a soldier stationed + in Captain Wainwright's garrison, on his return four years after, + published an account of his captivity. He was compelled to carry a heavy + pack, and was led by an Indian by a cord round his neck. The whole party + suffered terribly from hunger. On reaching Canada the Indians shaved one + side of his head, and greased the other, and painted his face. At a fort + nine miles from Montreal a council was held in order to decide his fate; + and he had the unenviable privilege of listening to a protracted + discussion upon the expediency of burning him. The fire was already + kindled, and the poor fellow was preparing to meet his doom with firmness, + when it was announced to him that his life was spared. This result of the + council by no means satisfied the women and boys, who had anticipated rare + sport in the roasting of a white man and a heretic. One squaw assailed him + with a knife and cut off one of his fingers; another beat him with a pole. + The Indians spent the night in dancing and singing, compelling their + prisoner to go round the ring with them. In the morning one of their + orators made a long speech to him, and formally delivered him over to an + old squaw, who took him to her wigwam and treated him kindly. Two or three + of the young women who were carried away captive married Frenchmen in + Canada and never returned. Instances of this kind were by no means rare + during the Indian wars. The simple manners, gayety, and social habits of + the French colonists among whom the captives were dispersed seem to have + been peculiarly fascinating to the daughters of the grave and severe + Puritans. + </p> + <p> + At the beginning of the present century, Judith Whiting was the solitary + survivor of all who witnessed the inroad of the French and Indians in + 1708. She was eight years of age at the time of the attack, and her memory + of it to the last was distinct and vivid. Upon her old brain, from whence + a great portion of the records of the intervening years had been + obliterated, that terrible picture, traced with fire and blood, retained + its sharp outlines and baleful colors. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0029" id="link2H_4_0029"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + THE GREAT IPSWICH FRIGHT. + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "The Frere into the dark gazed forth; + The sounds went onward towards the north + The murmur of tongues, the tramp and tread + Of a mighty army to battle led." + BALLAD OF THE CID. +</pre> + <p> + Life's tragedy and comedy are never far apart. The ludicrous and the + sublime, the grotesque and the pathetic, jostle each other on the stage; + the jester, with his cap and bells, struts alongside of the hero; the lord + mayor's pageant loses itself in the mob around Punch and Judy; the pomp + and circumstance of war become mirth-provoking in a militia muster; and + the majesty of the law is ridiculous in the mock dignity of a justice's + court. The laughing philosopher of old looked on one side of life and his + weeping contemporary on the other; but he who has an eye to both must + often experience that contrariety of feeling which Sterne compares to "the + contest in the moist eyelids of an April morning, whether to laugh or + cry." + </p> + <p> + The circumstance we are about to relate, may serve as an illustration of + the way in which the woof of comedy interweaves with the warp of tragedy. + It occurred in the early stages of the American Revolution, and is part + and parcel of its history in the northeastern section of Massachusetts. + </p> + <p> + About midway between Salem and the ancient town of Newburyport, the + traveller on the Eastern Railroad sees on the right, between him and the + sea, a tall church-spire, rising above a semicircle of brown roofs and + venerable elms; to which a long scalloping range of hills, sweeping off to + the seaside, forms a green background. This is Ipswich, the ancient + Agawam; one of those steady, conservative villages, of which a few are + still left in New England, wherein a contemporary of Cotton Mather and + Governor Endicott, were he permitted to revisit the scenes of his painful + probation, would scarcely feel himself a stranger. Law and Gospel, + embodied in an orthodox steeple and a court-house, occupy the steep, rocky + eminence in its midst; below runs the small river under its picturesque + stone bridge; and beyond is the famous female seminary, where Andover + theological students are wont to take unto themselves wives of the + daughters of the Puritans. An air of comfort and quiet broods over the + whole town. Yellow moss clings to the seaward sides of the roofs; one's + eyes are not endangered by the intense glare of painted shingles and + clapboards. The smoke of hospitable kitchens curls up through the + overshadowing elms from huge-throated chimneys, whose hearth-stones have + been worn by the feet of many generations. The tavern was once renowned + throughout New England, and it is still a creditable hostelry. During + court time it is crowded with jocose lawyers, anxious clients, sleepy + jurors, and miscellaneous hangers on; disinterested gentlemen, who have no + particular business of their own in court, but who regularly attend its + sessions, weighing evidence, deciding upon the merits of a lawyer's plea + or a judge's charge, getting up extempore trials upon the piazza or in the + bar-room of cases still involved in the glorious uncertainty of the law in + the court-house, proffering gratuitous legal advice to irascible + plaintiffs and desponding defendants, and in various other ways seeing + that the Commonwealth receives no detriment. In the autumn old sportsmen + make the tavern their headquarters while scouring the marshes for + sea-birds; and slim young gentlemen from the city return thither with + empty game-bags, as guiltless in respect to the snipes and wagtails as + Winkle was in the matter of the rooks, after his shooting excursion at + Dingle Dell. Twice, nay, three times, a year, since third parties have + been in fashion, the delegates of the political churches assemble in + Ipswich to pass patriotic resolutions, and designate the candidates whom + the good people of Essex County, with implicit faith in the wisdom of the + selection, are expected to vote for. For the rest there are pleasant walks + and drives around the picturesque village. The people are noted for their + hospitality; in summer the sea-wind blows cool over its healthy hills, + and, take it for all in all, there is not a better preserved or pleasanter + specimen of a Puritan town remaining in the ancient Commonwealth. + </p> + <p> + The 21st of April, 1775, witnessed an awful commotion in the little + village of Ipswich. Old men, and boys, (the middle-aged had marched to + Lexington some days before) and all the women in the place who were not + bedridden or sick, came rushing as with one accord to the green in front + of the meeting-house. A rumor, which no one attempted to trace or + authenticate, spread from lip to lip that the British regulars had landed + on the coast and were marching upon the town. A scene of indescribable + terror and confusion followed. Defence was out of the question, as the + young and able-bodied men of the entire region round about had marched to + Cambridge and Lexington. The news of the battle at the latter place, + exaggerated in all its details, had been just received; terrible stories + of the atrocities committed by the dreaded "regulars" had been related; + and it was believed that nothing short of a general extermination of the + patriots—men, women, and children—was contemplated by the + British commander.—Almost simultaneously the people of Beverly, a + village a few miles distant, were smitten with the same terror. How the + rumor was communicated no one could tell. It was there believed that the + enemy had fallen upon Ipswich, and massacred the inhabitants without + regard to age or sex. + </p> + <p> + It was about the middle of the afternoon of this day that the people of + Newbury, ten miles farther north, assembled in an informal meeting, at the + town-house to hear accounts from the Lexington fight, and to consider what + action was necessary in consequence of that event. Parson Carey was about + opening the meeting with prayer when hurried hoof-beats sounded up the + street, and a messenger, loose-haired and panting for breath, rushed up + the staircase. "Turn out, turn out, for God's sake," he cried, "or you + will be all killed! The regulars are marching onus; they are at Ipswich + now, cutting and slashing all before them!" Universal consternation was + the immediate result of this fearful announcement; Parson Carey's prayer + died on his lips; the congregation dispersed over the town, carrying to + every house the tidings that the regulars had come. Men on horseback went + galloping up and down the streets, shouting the alarm. Women and children + echoed it from every corner. The panic became irresistible, + uncontrollable. Cries were heard that the dreaded invaders had reached + Oldtown Bridge, a little distance from the village, and that they were + killing all whom they encountered. Flight was resolved upon. All the + horses and vehicles in the town were put in requisition; men, women, and + children hurried as for life towards the north. Some threw their silver + and pewter ware and other valuables into wells. Large numbers crossed the + Merrimac, and spent the night in the deserted houses of Salisbury, whose + inhabitants, stricken by the strange terror, had fled into New Hampshire, + to take up their lodgings in dwellings also abandoned by their owners. A + few individuals refused to fly with the multitude; some, unable to move by + reason of sickness, were left behind by their relatives. One old + gentleman, whose excessive corpulence rendered retreat on his part + impossible, made a virtue of necessity; and, seating himself in his + doorway with his loaded king's arm, upbraided his more nimble neighbors, + advising them to do as he did, and "stop and shoot the devils." Many + ludicrous instances of the intensity of the terror might be related. One + man got his family into a boat to go to Ram Island for safety. He imagined + he was pursued by the enemy through the dusk of the evening, and was + annoyed by the crying of an infant in the after part of the boat. "Do + throw that squalling brat overboard," he called to his wife, "or we shall + be all discovered and killed!" A poor woman ran four or five miles up the + river, and stopped to take breath and nurse her child, when she found to + her great horror that she had brought off the cat instead of the baby! + </p> + <p> + All through that memorable night the terror swept onward towards the north + with a speed which seems almost miraculous, producing everywhere the same + results. At midnight a horseman, clad only in shirt and breeches, dashed + by our grandfather's door, in Haverhill, twenty miles up the river. "Turn + out! Get a musket! Turn out!" he shouted; "the regulars are landing on + Plum Island!" "I'm glad of it," responded the old gentleman from his + chamber window; "I wish they were all there, and obliged to stay there." + When it is understood that Plum Island is little more than a naked + sand-ridge, the benevolence of this wish can be readily appreciated. + </p> + <p> + All the boats on the river were constantly employed for several hours in + conveying across the terrified fugitives. Through "the dead waste and + middle of the night" they fled over the border into New Hampshire. Some + feared to take the frequented roads, and wandered over wooded hills and + through swamps where the snows of the late winter had scarcely melted. + They heard the tramp and outcry of those behind them, and fancied that the + sounds were made by pursuing enemies. Fast as they fled, the terror, by + some unaccountable means, outstripped them. They found houses deserted and + streets strewn with household stuffs, abandoned in the hurry of escape. + Towards morning, however, the tide partially turned. Grown men began to + feel ashamed of their fears. The old Anglo-Saxon hardihood paused and + looked the terror in its face. Single or in small parties, armed with such + weapons as they found at hand,—among which long poles, sharpened and + charred at the end, were conspicuous,—they began to retrace their + steps. In the mean time such of the good people of Ipswich as were unable + or unwilling to leave their homes became convinced that the terrible rumor + which had nearly depopulated their settlement was unfounded. + </p> + <p> + Among those who had there awaited the onslaught of the regulars was a + young man from Exeter, New Hampshire. Becoming satisfied that the whole + matter was a delusion, he mounted his horse and followed after the + retreating multitude, undeceiving all whom he overtook. Late at night he + reached Newburyport, greatly to the relief of its sleepless inhabitants, + and hurried across the river, proclaiming as he rode the welcome tidings. + The sun rose upon haggard and jaded fugitives, worn with excitement and + fatigue, slowly returning homeward, their satisfaction at the absence of + danger somewhat moderated by an unpleasant consciousness of the ludicrous + scenes of their premature night flitting. + </p> + <p> + Any inference which might be drawn from the foregoing narrative derogatory + to the character of the people of New England at that day, on the score of + courage, would be essentially erroneous. It is true, they were not the men + to court danger or rashly throw away their lives for the mere glory of the + sacrifice. They had always a prudent and wholesome regard to their own + comfort and safety; they justly looked upon sound heads and limbs as + better than broken ones; life was to them too serious and important, and + their hard-gained property too valuable, to be lightly hazarded. They + never attempted to cheat themselves by under-estimating the difficulty to + be encountered, or shutting their eyes to its probable consequences. + Cautious, wary, schooled in the subtle strategy of Indian warfare, where + self-preservation is by no means a secondary object, they had little in + common with the reckless enthusiasm of their French allies, or the stolid + indifference of the fighting machines of the British regular army. When + danger could no longer be avoided, they met it with firmness and iron + endurance, but with a very vivid appreciation of its magnitude. Indeed, it + must be admitted by all who are familiar with the history of our fathers + that the element of fear held an important place among their + characteristics. It exaggerated all the dangers of their earthly + pilgrimage, and peopled the future with shapes of evil. Their fear of + Satan invested him with some of the attributes of Omnipotence, and almost + reached the point of reverence. The slightest shock of an earthquake + filled all hearts with terror. Stout men trembled by their hearths with + dread of some paralytic old woman supposed to be a witch. And when they + believed themselves called upon to grapple with these terrors and endure + the afflictions of their allotment, they brought to the trial a capability + of suffering undiminished by the chloroform of modern philosophy. They + were heroic in endurance. Panics like the one we have described might bow + and sway them like reeds in the wind; but they stood up like the oaks of + their own forests beneath the thunder and the hail of actual calamity. + </p> + <p> + It was certainly lucky for the good people of Essex County that no wicked + wag of a Tory undertook to immortalize in rhyme their ridiculous hegira, + as Judge Hopkinson did the famous Battle of the Kegs in Philadelphia. Like + the more recent Madawaska war in Maine, the great Chepatchet demonstration + in Rhode Island, and the "Sauk fuss" of Wisconsin, it remains to this day + "unsyllabled, unsung;" and the fast-fading memory of age alone preserves + the unwritten history of the great Ipswich fright. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0030" id="link2H_4_0030"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + POPE NIGHT. + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "Lay up the fagots neat and trim; + Pile 'em up higher; + Set 'em afire! + The Pope roasts us, and we 'll roast him!" + Old Song. +</pre> + <p> + The recent attempt of the Romish Church to reestablish its hierarchy in + Great Britain, with the new cardinal, Dr. Wiseman, at its head, seems to + have revived an old popular custom, a grim piece of Protestant sport, + which, since the days of Lord George Gordon and the "No Popery" mob, had + very generally fallen into disuse. On the 5th of the eleventh month of + this present year all England was traversed by processions and lighted up + with bonfires, in commemoration of the detection of the "gunpowder plot" + of Guy Fawkes and the Papists in 1605. Popes, bishops, and cardinals, in + straw and pasteboard, were paraded through the streets and burned amid the + shouts of the populace, a great portion of whom would have doubtless been + quite as ready to do the same pleasant little office for the Bishop of + Exeter or his Grace of Canterbury, if they could have carted about and + burned in effigy a Protestant hierarchy as safely as a Catholic one. + </p> + <p> + In this country, where every sect takes its own way, undisturbed by legal + restrictions, each ecclesiastical tub balancing itself as it best may on + its own bottom, and where bishops Catholic and bishops Episcopal, bishops + Methodist and bishops Mormon, jostle each other in our thoroughfares, it + is not to be expected that we should trouble ourselves with the matter at + issue between the rival hierarchies on the other side of the water. It is + a very pretty quarrel, however, and good must come out of it, as it cannot + fail to attract popular attention to the shallowness of the spiritual + pretensions of both parties, and lead to the conclusion that a hierarchy + of any sort has very little in common with the fishermen and tent-makers + of the New Testament. + </p> + <p> + Pope Night—the anniversary of the discovery of the Papal incendiary + Guy Fawkes, booted and spurred, ready to touch fire to his powder-train + under the Parliament House—was celebrated by the early settlers of + New England, and doubtless afforded a good deal of relief to the younger + plants of grace in the Puritan vineyard. In those solemn old days, the + recurrence of the powder-plot anniversary, with its processions, hideous + images of the Pope and Guy Fawkes, its liberal potations of strong waters, + and its blazing bonfires reddening the wild November hills, must have been + looked forward to with no slight degree of pleasure. For one night, at + least, the cramped and smothered fun and mischief of the younger + generation were permitted to revel in the wild extravagance of a Roman + saturnalia or the Christmas holidays of a slave plantation. Bigotry—frowning + upon the May-pole, with its flower wreaths and sportive revellers, and + counting the steps of the dancers as so many steps towards perdition—recognized + in the grim farce of Guy Fawkes's anniversary something of its own + lineaments, smiled complacently upon the riotous young actors, and opened + its close purse to furnish tar-barrels to roast the Pope, and strong water + to moisten the throats of his noisy judges and executioners. + </p> + <p> + Up to the time of the Revolution the powder plot was duly commemorated + throughout New England. At that period the celebration of it was + discountenanced, and in many places prohibited, on the ground that it was + insulting to our Catholic allies from France. In Coffin's History of + Newbury it is stated that, in 1774, the town authorities of Newburyport + ordered "that no effigies be carried about or exhibited only in the + daytime." The last public celebration in that town was in the following + year. Long before the close of the last century the exhibitions of Pope + Night had entirely ceased throughout the country, with, as far as we can + learn, a solitary exception. The stranger who chances to be travelling on + the road between Newburyport and Haverhill, on the night of the 5th of + November, may well fancy that an invasion is threatened from the sea, or + that an insurrection is going on inland; for from all the high hills + overlooking the river tall fires are seen blazing redly against the cold, + dark, autumnal sky, surrounded by groups of young men and boys busily + engaged in urging them with fresh fuel into intenser activity. To feed + these bonfires, everything combustible which could be begged or stolen + from the neighboring villages, farm-houses, and fences is put in + requisition. Old tar-tubs, purloined from the shipbuilders of the + river-side, and flour and lard barrels from the village-traders, are + stored away for days, and perhaps weeks, in the woods or in the rain- + gullies of the hills, in preparation for Pope Night. From the earliest + settlement of the towns of Amesbury and Salisbury, the night of the powder + plot has been thus celebrated, with unbroken regularity, down to the + present time. The event which it once commemorated is probably now unknown + to most of the juvenile actors. The symbol lives on from generation to + generation after the significance is lost; and we have seen the children + of our Catholic neighbors as busy as their Protestant playmates in + collecting, "by hook or by crook," the materials for Pope- Night bonfires. + We remember, on one occasion, walking out with a gifted and learned + Catholic friend to witness the fine effect of the illumination on the + hills, and his hearty appreciation of its picturesque and wild beauty,—the + busy groups in the strong relief of the fires, and the play and + corruscation of the changeful lights on the bare, brown hills, naked + trees, and autumn clouds. + </p> + <p> + In addition to the bonfires on the hills, there was formerly a procession + in the streets, bearing grotesque images of the Pope, his cardinals and + friars; and behind them Satan himself, a monster with huge ox-horns on his + head, and a long tail, brandishing his pitchfork and goading them onward. + The Pope was generally furnished with a movable head, which could be + turned round, thrown back, or made to bow, like that of a china- ware + mandarin. An aged inhabitant of the neighborhood has furnished us with + some fragments of the songs sung on such occasions, probably the same + which our British ancestors trolled forth around their bonfires two + centuries ago:— + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "The fifth of November, + As you well remember, + Was gunpowder treason and plot; + And where is the reason + That gunpowder treason + Should ever be forgot?" + + "When James the First the sceptre swayed, + This hellish powder plot was laid; + They placed the powder down below, + All for Old England's overthrow. + Lucky the man, and happy the day, + That caught Guy Fawkes in the middle of his play!" + + "Hark! our bell goes jink, jink, jink; + Pray, madam, pray, sir, give us something to drink; + Pray, madam, pray, sir, if you'll something give, + We'll burn the dog, and not let him live. + We'll burn the dog without his head, + And then you'll say the dog is dead." + + "Look here! from Rome The Pope has come, + That fiery serpent dire; + Here's the Pope that we have got, + The old promoter of the plot; + We'll stick a pitchfork in his back, + And throw him in the fire!" +</pre> + <p> + There is a slight savor of a Smithfield roasting about these lines, such + as regaled the senses of the Virgin Queen or Bloody Mary, which entirely + reconciles us to their disuse at the present time. + </p> + <p> + It should be the fervent prayer of all good men that the evil spirit of + religious hatred and intolerance, which on the one hand prompted the + gunpowder plot, and which on the other has ever since made it the occasion + of reproach and persecution of an entire sect of professing Christians, + may be no longer perpetuated. In the matter of exclusiveness and + intolerance, none of the older sects can safely reproach each other; and + it becomes all to hope and labor for the coming of that day when the hymns + of Cowper and the Confessions of Augustine, the humane philosophy of + Channing and the devout meditations of Thomas a Kempis, the simple essays + of Woolman and the glowing periods of Bossuet, shall be regarded as the + offspring of one spirit and one faith,—lights of a common altar, and + precious stones in the temple of the one universal Church. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0031" id="link2H_4_0031"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + THE BOY CAPTIVES. AN INCIDENT OF THE INDIAN WAR OF 1695. + </h2> + <p> + The township of Haverhill, even as late as the close of the seventeenth + century, was a frontier settlement, occupying an advanced position in the + great wilderness, which, unbroken by the clearing of a white man, extended + from the Merrimac River to the French villages on the St. Francois. A + tract of twelve miles on the river and three or four northwardly was + occupied by scattered settlers, while in the centre of the town a compact + village had grown up. In the immediate vicinity there were but few + Indians, and these generally peaceful and inoffensive. On the breaking out + of the Narragansett war, the inhabitants had erected fortifications and + taken other measures for defence; but, with the possible exception of one + man who was found slain in the woods in 1676, none of the inhabitants were + molested; and it was not until about the year 1689 that the safety of the + settlement was seriously threatened. Three persons were killed in that + year. In 1690 six garrisons were established in different parts of the + town, with a small company of soldiers attached to each. Two of these + houses are still standing. They were built of brick, two stories high, + with a single outside door, so small and narrow that but one person could + enter at a time; the windows few, and only about two and a half feet long + by eighteen inches with thick diamond glass secured with lead, and crossed + inside with bars of iron. The basement had but two rooms, and the chamber + was entered by a ladder instead of stairs; so that the inmates, if driven + thither, could cut off communication with the rooms below. Many private + houses were strengthened and fortified. We remember one familiar to our + boyhood,— a venerable old building of wood, with brick between the + weather boards and ceiling, with a massive balustrade over the door, + constructed of oak timber and plank, with holes through the latter for + firing upon assailants. The door opened upon a stone-paved hall, or entry, + leading into the huge single room of the basement, which was lighted by + two small windows, the ceiling black with the smoke of a century and a + half; a huge fireplace, calculated for eight-feet wood, occupying one + entire side; while, overhead, suspended from the timbers, or on shelves + fastened to them, were household stores, farming utensils, fishing-rods, + guns, bunches of herbs gathered perhaps a century ago, strings of dried + apples and pumpkins, links of mottled sausages, spareribs, and flitches of + bacon; the firelight of an evening dimly revealing the checked woollen + coverlet of the bed in one far-off corner, while in another "the pewter + plates on the dresser Caught and reflected the flame as shields of armies + the sunshine." + </p> + <p> + Tradition has preserved many incidents of life in the garrisons. In times + of unusual peril the settlers generally resorted at night to the fortified + houses, taking thither their flocks and herds and such household valuables + as were most likely to strike the fancy or minister to the comfort or + vanity of the heathen marauders. False alarms were frequent. The smoke of + a distant fire, the bark of a dog in the deep woods, a stump or bush + taking in the uncertain light of stars and moon the appearance of a man, + were sufficient to spread alarm through the entire settlement, and to + cause the armed men of the garrison to pass whole nights in sleepless + watching. It is said that at Haselton's garrison-house the sentinel on + duty saw, as he thought, an Indian inside of the paling which surrounded + the building, and apparently seeking to gain an entrance. He promptly + raised his musket and fired at the intruder, alarming thereby the entire + garrison. The women and children left their beds, and the men seized their + guns and commenced firing on the suspicious object; but it seemed to bear + a charmed life, and remained unharmed. As the morning dawned, however, the + mystery was solved by the discovery of a black quilted petticoat hanging + on the clothes-line, completely riddled with balls. + </p> + <p> + As a matter of course, under circumstances of perpetual alarm and frequent + peril, the duty of cultivating their fields, and gathering their harvests, + and working at their mechanical avocations was dangerous and difficult to + the settlers. One instance will serve as an illustration. At the + garrison-house of Thomas Dustin, the husband of the far-famed Mary Dustin, + (who, while a captive of the Indians, and maddened by the murder of her + infant child, killed and scalped, with the assistance of a young boy, the + entire band of her captors, ten in number,) the business of brick-making + was carried on. The pits where the clay was found were only a few rods + from the house; yet no man ventured to bring the clay to the yard within + the enclosure without the attendance of a file of soldiers. An anecdote + relating to this garrison has been handed down to the present tune. Among + its inmates were two young cousins, Joseph and Mary Whittaker; the latter + a merry, handsome girl, relieving the tedium of garrison duty with her + light-hearted mirthfulness, and + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "Making a sunshine in that shady place." +</pre> + <p> + Joseph, in the intervals of his labors in the double capacity of brick- + maker and man-at-arms, was assiduous in his attentions to his fair cousin, + who was not inclined to encourage him. Growing desperate, he threatened + one evening to throw himself into the garrison well. His threat only + called forth the laughter of his mistress; and, bidding her farewell, he + proceeded to put it in execution. On reaching the well he stumbled over a + log; whereupon, animated by a happy idea, he dropped the wood into the + water instead of himself, and, hiding behind the curb, awaited the result. + Mary, who had been listening at the door, and who had not believed her + lover capable of so rash an act, heard the sudden plunge of the wooden + Joseph. She ran to the well, and, leaning over the curb and peering down + the dark opening, cried out, in tones of anguish and remorse, "O Joseph, + if you're in the land of the living, I 'll have you!" "I'll take ye at + your word," answered Joseph, springing up from his hiding-place, and + avenging himself for her coyness and coldness by a hearty embrace. + </p> + <p> + Our own paternal ancestor, owing to religious scruples in the matter of + taking arms even for defence of life and property, refused to leave his + undefended house and enter the garrison. The Indians frequently came to + his house; and the family more than once in the night heard them + whispering under the windows, and saw them put their copper faces to the + glass to take a view of the apartments. Strange as it may seen, they never + offered any injury or insult to the inmates. + </p> + <p> + In 1695 the township was many times molested by Indians, and several + persons were killed and wounded. Early in the fall a small party made + their appearance in the northerly part of the town, where, finding two + boys at work in an open field, they managed to surprise and capture them, + and, without committing further violence, retreated through the woods to + their homes on the shore of Lake Winnipesaukee. Isaac Bradley, aged + fifteen, was a small but active and vigorous boy; his companion in + captivity, Joseph Whittaker, was only eleven, yet quite as large in size, + and heavier in his movements. After a hard and painful journey they + arrived at the lake, and were placed in an Indian family, consisting of a + man and squaw and two or three children. Here they soon acquired a + sufficient knowledge of the Indian tongue to enable them to learn from the + conversation carried on in their presence that it was designed to take + them to Canada in the spring. This discovery was a painful one. Canada, + the land of Papist priests and bloody Indians, was the especial terror of + the New England settlers, and the anathema maranatha of Puritan pulpits. + Thither the Indians usually hurried their captives, where they compelled + them to work in their villages or sold them to the French planters. Escape + from thence through a deep wilderness, and across lakes and mountains and + almost impassable rivers, without food or guide, was regarded as an + impossibility. The poor boys, terrified by the prospect of being carried + still farther from their home and friends, began to dream of escaping from + their masters before they started for Canada. It was now winter; it would + have been little short of madness to have chosen for flight that season of + bitter cold and deep snows. Owing to exposure and want of proper food and + clothing, Isaac, the eldest of the boys, was seized with a violent fever, + from which he slowly recovered in the course of the winter. His Indian + mistress was as kind to him as her circumstances permitted,—procuring + medicinal herbs and roots for her patient, and tenderly watching over him + in the long winter nights. Spring came at length; the snows melted; and + the ice was broken up on the lake. The Indians began to make preparations + for journeying to Canada; and Isaac, who had during his sickness devised a + plan of escape, saw that the time of putting it in execution had come. On + the evening before he was to make the attempt he for the first time + informed his younger companion of his design, and told him, if he intended + to accompany him, he must be awake at the time appointed. The boys lay + down as usual in the wigwam, in the midst of the family. Joseph soon fell + asleep; but Isaac, fully sensible of the danger and difficulty of the + enterprise before him, lay awake, watchful for his opportunity. About + midnight he rose, cautiously stepping over the sleeping forms of the + family, and securing, as he went, his Indian master's flint, steel, and + tinder, and a small quantity of dry moose-meat and cornbread. He then + carefully awakened his companion, who, starting up, forgetful of the cause + of his disturbance, asked aloud, "What do you want?" The savages began to + stir; and Isaac, trembling with fear of detection, lay down again and + pretended to be asleep. After waiting a while he again rose, satisfied, + from the heavy breathing of the Indians, that they were all sleeping; and + fearing to awaken Joseph a second time, lest he should again hazard all by + his thoughtlessness, he crept softly out of the wigwam. He had proceeded + but a few rods when he heard footsteps behind him; and, supposing himself + pursued, he hurried into the woods, casting a glance backward. What was + his joy to see his young companion running after him! They hastened on in + a southerly direction as nearly as they could determine, hoping to reach + their distant home. When daylight appeared they found a large hollow log, + into which they crept for concealment, wisely judging that they would be + hotly pursued by their Indian captors. + </p> + <p> + Their sagacity was by no means at fault. The Indians, missing their + prisoners in the morning, started off in pursuit with their dogs. As the + young boys lay in the log they could hear the whistle of the Indians and + the barking of dogs upon their track. It was a trying moment; and even the + stout heart of the elder boy sank within him as the dogs came up to the + log and set up a loud bark of discovery. But his presence of mind saved + him. He spoke in a low tone to the dogs, who, recognizing his familiar + voice, wagged their tails with delight and ceased barking. He then threw + to them the morsel of moose-meat he had taken from the wigwam. While the + dogs were thus diverted the Indians made their appearance. The boys heard + the light, stealthy sound of their moccasins on the leaves. They passed + close to the log; and the dogs, having devoured their moose- meat, trotted + after their masters. Through a crevice in the log the boys looked after + them and saw them disappear in the thick woods. They remained in their + covert until night, when they started again on their long journey, taking + a new route to avoid the Indians. At daybreak they again concealed + themselves, but travelled the next night and day without resting. By this + time they had consumed all the bread which they had taken, and were + fainting from hunger and weariness. Just at the close of the third day + they were providentially enabled to kill a pigeon and a small tortoise, a + part of which they ate raw, not daring to make a fire, which might attract + the watchful eyes of savages. On the sixth day they struck upon an old + Indian path, and, following it until night, came suddenly upon a camp of + the enemy. Deep in the heart of the forest, under the shelter of a ridge + of land heavily timbered, a great fire of logs and brushwood was burning; + and around it the Indians sat, eating their moose-meat and smoking their + pipes. + </p> + <p> + The poor fugitives, starving, weary, and chilled by the cold spring + blasts, gazed down upon the ample fire; and the savory meats which the + squaws were cooking by it, but felt no temptation to purchase warmth and + food by surrendering themselves to captivity. Death in the forest seemed + preferable. They turned and fled back upon their track, expecting every + moment to hear the yells of pursuers. The morning found them seated on the + bank of a small stream, their feet torn and bleeding, and their bodies + emaciated. The elder, as a last effort, made search for roots, and + fortunately discovered a few ground-nuts, (glicine apios) which served to + refresh in some degree himself and his still weaker companion. As they + stood together by the stream, hesitating and almost despairing, it + occurred to Isaac that the rivulet might lead to a larger stream of water, + and that to the sea and the white settlements near it; and he resolved to + follow it. They again began their painful march; the day passed, and the + night once more overtook them. When the eighth morning dawned, the younger + of the boys found himself unable to rise from his bed of leaves. Isaac + endeavored to encourage him, dug roots, and procured water for him; but + the poor lad was utterly exhausted. He had no longer heart or hope. The + elder boy laid him on leaves and dry grass at the foot of a tree, and with + a heavy heart bade him farewell. Alone he slowly and painfully proceeded + down the stream, now greatly increased in size by tributary rivulets. On + the top of a hill, he climbed with difficulty into a tree, and saw in the + distance what seemed to be a clearing and a newly raised frame building. + Hopeful and rejoicing, he turned back to his young companion, told him + what he had seen, and, after chafing his limbs awhile, got him upon his + feet. Sometimes supporting him, and at others carrying him on his back, + the heroic boy staggered towards the clearing. On reaching it he found it + deserted, and was obliged to continue his journey. Towards night signs of + civilization began to appear,—the heavy, continuous roar of water + was heard; and, presently emerging from the forest, he saw a great river + dashing in white foam down precipitous rocks, and on its bank the gray + walls of a huge stone building, with flankers, palisades, and moat, over + which the British flag was flying. This was the famous Saco Fort, built by + Governor Phips two years before, just below the falls of the Saco River. + The soldiers of the garrison gave the poor fellows a kindly welcome. + Joseph, who was scarcely alive, lay for a long time sick in the fort; but + Isaac soon regained his strength, and set out for his home in Haverhill, + which he had the good fortune to arrive at in safety. + </p> + <p> + Amidst the stirring excitements of the present day, when every thrill of + the electric wire conveys a new subject for thought or action to a + generation as eager as the ancient Athenians for some new thing, simple + legends of the past like that which we have transcribed have undoubtedly + lost in a great degree their interest. The lore of the fireside is + becoming obsolete, and with the octogenarian few who still linger among us + will perish the unwritten history of border life in New England. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0032" id="link2H_4_0032"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + THE BLACK MEN IN THE REVOLUTION AND WAR OF 1812. + </h2> + <p> + The return of the festival of our national independence has called our + attention to a matter which has been very carefully kept out of sight by + orators and toast-drinkers. We allude to the participation of colored men + in the great struggle for American freedom. It is not in accordance with + our taste or our principles to eulogize the shedders of blood even in a + cause of acknowledged justice; but when we see a whole nation doing honor + to the memories of one class of its defenders to the total neglect of + another class, who had the misfortune to be of darker complexion, we + cannot forego the satisfaction of inviting notice to certain historical + facts which for the last half century have been quietly elbowed aside, as + no more deserving of a place in patriotic recollection than the + descendants of the men to whom the facts in question relate have to a + place in a Fourth of July procession. + </p> + <p> + Of the services and sufferings of the colored soldiers of the Revolution + no attempt has, to our knowledge, been made to preserve a record. They + have had no historian. With here and there an exception, they have all + passed away; and only some faint tradition of their campaigns under + Washington and Greene and Lafayette, and of their cruisings under Decatur + and Barry, lingers among their, descendants. Yet enough is known to show + that the free colored men of the United States bore their full proportion + of the sacrifices and trials of the Revolutionary War. + </p> + <p> + The late Governor Eustis, of Massachusetts,—the pride and boast of + the democracy of the East, himself an active participant in the war, and + therefore a most competent witness,—Governor Morrill, of New + Hampshire, Judge Hemphill, of Pennsylvania, and other members of Congress, + in the debate on the question of admitting Missouri as a slave State into + the Union, bore emphatic testimony to the efficiency and heroism of the + black troops. Hon. Calvin Goddard, of Connecticut, states that in the + little circle of his residence he was instrumental in securing, under the + act of 1818, the pensions of nineteen colored soldiers. "I cannot," he + says, "refrain from mentioning one aged black man, Primus Babcock, who + proudly presented to me an honorable discharge from service during the + war, dated at the close of it, wholly in the handwriting of George + Washington; nor can I forget the expression of his feelings when informed, + after his discharge had been sent to the War Department, that it could not + be returned. At his request it was written for, as he seemed inclined to + spurn the pension and reclaim the discharge." There is a touching anecdote + related of Baron Stenben on the occasion of the disbandment of the + American army. A black soldier, with his wounds unhealed, utterly + destitute, stood on the wharf just as a vessel bound for his distant home + was getting under way. The poor fellow gazed at the vessel with tears in + his eyes, and gave himself up to despair. The warm-hearted foreigner + witnessed his emotion, and, inquiring into the cause of it, took his last + dollar from his purse and gave it to him, with tears of sympathy trickling + down his cheeks. Overwhelmed with gratitude, the poor wounded soldier + hailed the sloop and was received on board. As it moved out from the + wharf, he cried back to his noble friend on shore, "God Almighty bless + you, Master Baron!" + </p> + <p> + "In Rhode Island," says Governor Eustis in his able speech against slavery + in Missouri, 12th of twelfth month, 1820, "the blacks formed an entire + regiment, and they discharged their duty with zeal and fidelity. The + gallant defence of Red Bank, in which the black regiment bore a part, is + among the proofs of their valor." In this contest it will be recollected + that four hundred men met and repulsed, after a terrible and sanguinary + struggle, fifteen hundred Hessian troops, headed by Count Donop. The glory + of the defence of Red Bank, which has been pronounced one of the most + heroic actions of the war, belongs in reality to black men; yet who now + hears them spoken of in connection with it? Among the traits which + distinguished the black regiment was devotion to their officers. In the + attack made upon the American lines near Croton River on the 13th of the + fifth month, 1781, Colonel Greene, the commander of the regiment, was cut + down and mortally wounded; but the sabres of the enemy only reached him + through the bodies of his faithful guard of blacks, who hovered over him + to protect him, every one of whom was killed. The late Dr. Harris, of + Dunbarton, New Hampshire, a Revolutionary veteran, stated, in a speech at + Francistown, New Hampshire, some years ago, that on one occasion the + regiment to which he was attached was commanded to defend an important + position, which the enemy thrice assailed, and from which they were as + often repulsed. "There was," said the venerable speaker, "a regiment of + blacks in the same situation,—a regiment of negroes fighting for our + liberty and independence, not a white man among them but the officers,—in + the same dangerous and responsible position. Had they been unfaithful or + given way before the enemy, all would have been lost. Three times in + succession were they attacked with most desperate fury by well- + disciplined and veteran troops; and three times did they successfully + repel the assault, and thus preserve an army. They fought thus through the + war. They were brave and hardy troops." + </p> + <p> + In the debate in the New York Convention of 1821 for amending the + Constitution of the State, on the question of extending the right of + suffrage to the blacks, Dr. Clarke, the delegate from Delaware County, and + other members, made honorable mention of the services of the colored + troops in the Revolutionary army. + </p> + <p> + The late James Forten, of Philadelphia, well known as a colored man of + wealth, intelligence, and philanthropy, enlisted in the American navy + under Captain Decatur, of the Royal Louis, was taken prisoner during his + second cruise, and, with nineteen other colored men, confined on board the + horrible Jersey prison-ship; All the vessels in the American service at + that period were partly manned by blacks. The old citizens of Philadelphia + to this day remember the fact that, when the troops of the North marched + through the city, one or more colored companies were attached to nearly + all the regiments. + </p> + <p> + Governor Eustis, in the speech before quoted, states that the free colored + soldiers entered the ranks with the whites. The time of those who were + slaves was purchased of their masters, and they were induced to enter the + service in consequence of a law of Congress by which, on condition of + their serving in the ranks during the war, they were made freemen. This + hope of liberty inspired them with courage to oppose their breasts to the + Hessian bayonet at Red Bank, and enabled them to endure with fortitude the + cold and famine of Valley Forge. The anecdote of the slave of General + Sullivan, of New Hampshire, is well known. When his master told him that + they were on the point of starting for the army, to fight for liberty, he + shrewdly suggested that it would be a great satisfaction to know that he + was indeed going to fight for his liberty. Struck with the reasonableness + and justice of this suggestion, General Sullivan at once gave him his + freedom. + </p> + <p> + The late Tristam Burgess, of Rhode Island, in a speech in Congress, first + month, 1828, said "At the commencement of the Revolutionary War, Rhode + Island had a number of slaves. A regiment of them were enlisted into the + Continental service, and no braver men met the enemy in battle; but not + one of them was permitted to be a soldier until he had first been made a + freeman." + </p> + <p> + The celebrated Charles Pinckney, of South Carolina, in his speech on the + Missouri question, and in defence of the slave representation of the + South, made the following admissions:— + </p> + <p> + "They (the colored people) were in numerous instances the pioneers, and in + all the laborers, of our armies. To their hands were owing the greatest + part of the fortifications raised for the protection of the country. Fort + Moultrie gave, at an early period of the inexperienced and untried valor + of our citizens, immortality to the American arms; and in the Northern + States numerous bodies of them were enrolled, and fought side by side with + the whites at the battles of the Revolution." + </p> + <p> + Let us now look forward thirty or forty years, to the last war with Great + Britain, and see whether the whites enjoyed a monopoly of patriotism at + that time. + </p> + <p> + Martindale, of New York, in Congress, 22d of first month, 1828, said: + "Slaves, or negroes who had been slaves, were enlisted as soldiers in the + war of the Revolution; and I myself saw a battalion of them, as fine, + martial-looking men as I ever saw, attached to the Northern army in the + last war, on its march from Plattsburg to Sackett's Harbor." + </p> + <p> + Hon. Charles Miner, of Pennsylvania, in Congress, second month, 7th, 1828, + said: "The African race make excellent soldiers. Large numbers of them + were with Perry, and helped to gain the brilliant victory of Lake Erie. A + whole battalion of them were distinguished for their orderly appearance." + </p> + <p> + Dr. Clarke, in the convention which revised the Constitution of New York + in 1821, speaking of the colored inhabitants of the State, said:— + </p> + <p> + "In your late war they contributed largely towards some of your most + splendid victories. On Lakes Erie and Champlain, where your fleets + triumphed over a foe superior in numbers and engines of death, they were + manned in a large proportion with men of color. And in this very house, in + the fall of 1814, a bill passed, receiving the approbation of all the + branches of your government, authorizing the governor to accept the + services of a corps of two thousand free people of color. Sir, these were + times which tried men's souls. In these times it was no sporting matter to + bear arms. These were times when a man who shouldered his musket did not + know but he bared his bosom to receive a death-wound from the enemy ere he + laid it aside; and in these times these people were found as ready and as + willing to volunteer in your service as any other. They were not compelled + to go; they were not drafted. No; your pride had placed them beyond your + compulsory power. But there was no necessity for its exercise; they were + volunteers,—yes, sir, volunteers to defend that very country from + the inroads and ravages of a ruthless and vindictive foe which had treated + them with insult, degradation, and slavery." + </p> + <p> + On the capture of Washington by the British forces, it was judged + expedient to fortify, without delay, the principal towns and cities + exposed to similar attacks. The Vigilance Committee of Philadelphia waited + upon three of the principal colored citizens, namely, James Forten, Bishop + Allen, and Absalom Jones, soliciting the aid of the people of color in + erecting suitable defences for the city. Accordingly, twenty-five hundred + colored then assembled in the State-House yard, and from thence marched to + Gray's Ferry, where they labored for two days almost without intermission. + Their labors were so faithful and efficient that a vote of thanks was + tendered them by the committee. A battalion of colored troops was at the + same time organized in the city under an officer of the United States + army; and they were on the point of marching to the frontier when peace + was proclaimed. + </p> + <p> + General Jackson's proclamations to the free colored inhabitants of + Louisiana are well known. In his first, inviting them to take up arms, he + said:— + </p> + <p> + "As sons of freedom, you are now called on to defend our most inestimable + blessings. As Americans, your country looks with confidence to her adopted + children for a valorous support. As fathers, husbands, and brothers, you + are summoned to rally round the standard of the eagle, to defend all which + is dear in existence." + </p> + <p> + The second proclamation is one of the highest compliments ever paid by a + military chief to his soldiers:— + </p> + <p> + "TO THE FREE PEOPLE OF COLOR. + </p> + <p> + "Soldiers! when on the banks of the Mobile I called you to take up arms, + inviting you to partake the perils and glory of your white fellow- + citizens, I expected much from you; for I was not ignorant that you + possessed qualities most formidable to an invading enemy. I knew with what + fortitude you could endure hunger, and thirst, and all the fatigues of a + campaign. I knew well how you loved your native country, and that you, as + well as ourselves, had to defend what man holds most dear,—his + parents, wife, children, and property. You have done more than I expected. + In addition to the previous qualities I before knew you to possess, I + found among you a noble enthusiasm, which leads to the performance of + great things. + </p> + <p> + "Soldiers! the President of the United States shall hear how praiseworthy + was your conduct in the hour of danger, and the Representatives of the + American people will give you the praise your exploits entitle you to. + Your general anticipates them in applauding your noble ardor." + </p> + <p> + It will thus be seen that whatever honor belongs to the "heroes of the + Revolution" and the volunteers in "the second war for independence" is to + be divided between the white and the colored man. We have dwelt upon this + subject at length, not because it accords with our principles or feelings, + for it is scarcely necessary for us to say that we are one of those who + hold that + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "Peace hath her victories + No less renowned than war," +</pre> + <p> + and certainly far more desirable and useful; but because, in popular + estimation, the patriotism which dares and does on the battle-field takes + a higher place than the quiet exercise of the duties of peaceful + citizenship; and we are willing that colored soldiers, with their + descendants, should have the benefit, if possible, of a public sentiment + which has so extravagantly lauded their white companions in arms. If + pulpits must be desecrated by eulogies of the patriotism of bloodshed, we + see no reason why black defenders of their country in the war for liberty + should not receive honorable mention as well as white invaders of a + neighboring republic who have volunteered in a war for plunder and slavery + extension. For the latter class of "heroes" we have very little respect. + The patriotism of too many of them forcibly reminds us of Dr. Johnson's + definition of that much-abused term "Patriotism, sir! 'T is the last + refuge of a scoundrel." + </p> + <p> + "What right, I demand," said an American orator some years ago, "have the + children of Africa to a homestead in the white man's country?" The answer + will in part be found in the facts which we have presented. Their right, + like that of their white fellow-citizens, dates back to the dread + arbitrament of battle. Their bones whiten every stricken field of the + Revolution; their feet tracked with blood the snows of Jersey; their toil + built up every fortification south of the Potomac; they shared the famine + and nakedness of Valley Forge and the pestilential horrors of the old + Jersey prisonship. Have they, then, no claim to an equal participation in + the blessings which have grown out of the national independence for which + they fought? Is it just, is it magnanimous, is it safe, even, to starve + the patriotism of such a people, to cast their hearts out of the treasury + of the Republic, and to convert them, by political disfranchisement and + social oppression, into enemies? + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0033" id="link2H_4_0033"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + THE SCOTTISH REFORMERS. + </h2> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "The mills of God grind slowly, but they grind exceeding small; + Though with patience He stands waiting, with exactness grinds He + all." + FRIEDRICH VON LOGAU. +</pre> + <p> + The great impulse of the French Revolution was not confined by + geographical boundaries. Flashing hope into the dark places of the earth, + far down among the poor and long oppressed, or startling the oppressor in + his guarded chambers like that mountain of fire which fell into the sea at + the sound of the apocalyptic trumpet, it agitated the world. + </p> + <p> + The arguments of Condorcet, the battle-words of Mirabeau, the fierce zeal + of St. Just, the iron energy of Danton, the caustic wit of Camille + Desmoulins, and the sweet eloquence of Vergniaud found echoes in all + lands, and nowhere more readily than in Great Britain, the ancient foe and + rival of France. The celebrated Dr. Price, of London, and the still more + distinguished Priestley, of Birmingham, spoke out boldly in defence of the + great principles of the Revolution. A London club of reformers, reckoning + among its members such men as Sir William Jones, Earl Grey, Samuel + Whitbread, and Sir James Mackintosh, was established for the purpose of + disseminating liberal appeals and arguments throughout the United Kingdom. + </p> + <p> + In Scotland an auxiliary society was formed, under the name of Friends of + the People. Thomas Muir, young in years, yet an elder in the Scottish + kirk, a successful advocate at the bar, talented, affable, eloquent, and + distinguished for the purity of his life and his enthusiasm in the cause + of freedom, was its principal originator. In the twelfth month of 1792 a + convention of reformers was held at Edinburgh. The government became + alarmed, and a warrant was issued for the arrest of Muir. He escaped to + France; but soon after, venturing to return to his native land, was + recognized and imprisoned. He was tried upon the charge of lending books + of republican tendency, and reading an address from Theobald Wolfe Tone + and the United Irishmen before the society of which he was a member. He + defended himself in a long and eloquent address, which concluded in the + following manly strain:— + </p> + <p> + "What, then, has been my crime? Not the lending to a relation a copy of + Thomas Paine's works,—not the giving away to another a few numbers + of an innocent and constitutional publication; but my crime is, for having + dared to be, according to the measure of my feeble abilities, a strenuous + and an active advocate for an equal representation of the people in the + House of the people,—for having dared to accomplish a measure by + legal means which was to diminish the weight of their taxes and to put an + end to the profusion of their blood. Gentlemen, from my infancy to this + moment I have devoted myself to the cause of the people. It is a good + cause: it will ultimately prevail,—it will finally triumph." + </p> + <p> + He was sentenced to transportation for fourteen years, and was removed to + the Edinburgh jail, from thence to the hulks, and lastly to the + transport-ship, containing eighty-three convicts, which conveyed him to + Botany Bay. + </p> + <p> + The next victim was Palmer, a learned and highly accomplished Unitarian + minister in Dundee. He was greatly beloved and respected as a polished + gentleman and sincere friend of the people. He was charged with + circulating a republican tract, and was sentenced to seven years' + transportation. + </p> + <p> + But the Friends of the People were not quelled by this summary punishment + of two of their devoted leaders. In the tenth month, 1793, delegates were + called together from various towns in Scotland, as well as from + Birmingham, Sheffield, and other places in England. Gerrald and Margarot + were sent up by the London society. After a brief sitting, the convention + was dispersed by the public authorities. Its sessions were opened and + closed with prayer, and the speeches of its members manifested the pious + enthusiasm of the old Cameronians and Parliament-men of the times of + Cromwell. Many of the dissenting clergy were present. William Skirving, + the most determined of the band, had been educated for the ministry, and + was a sincerely religious man. Joseph Gerrald was a young man of brilliant + talents and exemplary character. When the sheriff entered the hall to + disperse the friends of liberty, Gerrald knelt in prayer. His remarkable + words were taken down by a reporter on the spot. There is nothing in + modern history to compare with this supplication, unless it be that of Sir + Henry Vane, a kindred martyr, at the foot of the scaffold, just before his + execution. It is the prayer of universal humanity, which God will yet hear + and answer. + </p> + <p> + "O thou Governor of the universe, we rejoice that, at all times and in all + circumstances, we have liberty to approach Thy throne, and that we are + assured that no sacrifice is more acceptable to Thee than that which is + made for the relief of the oppressed. In this moment of trial and + persecution we pray that Thou wouldst be our defender, our counsellor, and + our guide. Oh, be Thou a pillar of fire to us, as Thou wast to our fathers + of old, to enlighten and direct us; and to our enemies a pillar of cloud, + and darkness, and confusion. + </p> + <p> + "Thou art Thyself the great Patron of liberty. Thy service is perfect + freedom. Prosper, we beseech Thee, every endeavor which we make to promote + Thy cause; for we consider the cause of truth, or every cause which tends + to promote the happiness of Thy creatures, as Thy cause. + </p> + <p> + "O thou merciful Father of mankind, enable us, for Thy name's sake, to + endure persecution with fortitude; and may we believe that all trials and + tribulations of life which we endure shall work together for good to them + that love Thee; and grant that the greater the evil, and the longer it may + be continued, the greater good, in Thy holy and adorable providence, may + be produced therefrom. And this we beg, not for our own merits, but + through the merits of Him who is hereafter to judge the world in + righteousness and mercy." + </p> + <p> + He ceased, and the sheriff, who had been temporarily overawed by the + extraordinary scene, enforced the warrant, and the meeting was broken up. + The delegates descended to the street in silence,—Arthur's Seat and + Salisbury Crags glooming in the distance and night,—an immense and + agitated multitude waiting around, over which tossed the flaring flambeaux + of the sheriff's train. Gerrald, who was already under arrest, as he + descended, spoke aloud, "Behold the funeral torches of Liberty!" + </p> + <p> + Skirving and several others were immediately arrested. They were tried in + the first month, 1794, and sentenced, as Muir and Palmer had previously + been, to transportation. Their conduct throughout was worthy of their + great and holy cause. Gerrald's defence was that of freedom rather than + his own. Forgetting himself, he spoke out manfully and earnestly for the + poor, the oppressed, the overtaxed, and starving millions of his + countrymen. That some idea may be formed of this noble plea for liberty, I + give an extract from the concluding paragraphs:— + </p> + <p> + "True religion, like all free governments, appeals to the understanding + for its support, and not to the sword. All systems, whether civil or + moral, can only be durable in proportion as they are founded on truth and + calculated to promote the good of mankind. This will account to us why + governments suited to the great energies of man have always outlived the + perishable things which despotism has erected. Yes, this will account to + us why the stream of Time, which is continually washing away the + dissoluble fabrics of superstitions and impostures, passes without injury + by the adamant of Christianity. + </p> + <p> + "Those who are versed in the history of their country, in the history of + the human race, must know that rigorous state prosecutions have always + preceded the era of convulsion; and this era, I fear, will be accelerated + by the folly and madness of our rulers. If the people are discontented, + the proper mode of quieting their discontent is, not by instituting + rigorous and sanguinary prosecutions, but by redressing their wrongs and + conciliating their affections. Courts of justice, indeed, may be called in + to the aid of ministerial vengeance; but if once the purity of their + proceedings is suspected, they will cease to be objects of reverence to + the nation; they will degenerate into empty and expensive pageantry, and + become the partial instruments of vexatious oppression. Whatever may + become of me, my principles will last forever. Individuals may perish; but + truth is eternal. The rude blasts of tyranny may blow from every quarter; + but freedom is that hardy plant which will survive the tempest and strike + an everlasting root into the most unfavorable soil. + </p> + <p> + "Gentlemen, I am in your hands. About my life I feel not the slightest + anxiety: if it would promote the cause, I would cheerfully make the + sacrifice; for if I perish on an occasion like the present, out of my + ashes will arise a flame to consume the tyrants and oppressors of my + country." + </p> + <p> + Years have passed, and the generation which knew the persecuted reformers + has given place to another. And now, half a century after William + Skirving, as he rose to receive his sentence, declared to his judges, "You + may condemn us as felons, but your sentence shall yet be reversed by the + people," the names of these men are once more familiar to British lips. + The sentence has been reversed; the prophecy of Skirving has become + history. On the 21st of the eighth month, 1853, the corner-stone of a + monument to the memory of the Scottish martyrs—for which + subscriptions had been received from such men as Lord Holland, the Dukes + of Bedford and Norfolk; and the Earls of Essex and Leicester—was + laid with imposing ceremonies in the beautiful burial-place of Calton + Hill, Edinburgh, by the veteran reformer and tribune of the people, Joseph + Hume, M. P. After delivering an appropriate address, the aged radical + closed the impressive scene by reading the prayer of Joseph Gerrald. At + the banquet which afterwards took place, and which was presided over by + John Dunlop, Esq., addresses were made by the president and Dr. Ritchie, + and by William Skirving, of Kirkaldy, son of the martyr. The Complete + Suffrage Association of Edinburgh, to the number of five hundred, walked + in procession to Calton Hill, and in the open air proclaimed unmolested + the very principles for which the martyrs of the past century had + suffered. + </p> + <p> + The account of this tribute to the memory of departed worth cannot fail to + awaken in generous hearts emotions of gratitude towards Him who has thus + signally vindicated His truth, showing that the triumph of the oppressor + is but for a season, and that even in this world a lie cannot live + forever. Well and truly did George Fox say in his last days, + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "The truth is above all." +</pre> + <p> + Will it be said, however, that this tribute comes too late; that it cannot + solace those brave hearts which, slowly broken by the long agony of + colonial servitude, are now cold in strange graves? It is, indeed, a + striking illustration of the truth that he who would benefit his fellow- + man must "walk by faith," sowing his seed in the morning, and in the + evening withholding not his hand; knowing only this, that in God's good + time the harvest shall spring up and ripen, if not for himself, yet for + others, who, as they bind the full sheaves and gather in the heavy + clusters, may perchance remember him with gratitude and set up stones of + memorial on the fields of his toil and sacrifices. We may regret that in + this stage of the spirit's life the sincere and self-denying worker is not + always permitted to partake of the fruits of his toil or receive the + honors of a benefactor. We hear his good evil spoken of, and his noblest + sacrifices counted as naught; we see him not only assailed by the wicked, + but discountenanced and shunned by the timidly good, followed on his hot + and dusty pathway by the execrations of the hounding mob and the + contemptuous pity of the worldly wise and prudent; and when at last the + horizon of Time shuts down between him and ourselves, and the places which + have known him know him no more forever, we are almost ready to say with + the regal voluptuary of old, This also is vanity and a great evil; "for + what hath a man of all his labor and of the vexation of his heart wherein + he hath labored under the sun?" But is this the end? Has God's universe no + wider limits than the circle of the blue wall which shuts in our + nestling-place? Has life's infancy only been provided for, and beyond this + poor nursery-chamber of Time is there no playground for the soul's youth, + no broad fields for its manhood? Perchance, could we but lift the curtains + of the narrow pinfold wherein we dwell, we might see that our poor friend + and brother whose fate we have thus deplored has by no means lost the + reward of his labors, but that in new fields of duty he is cheered even by + the tardy recognition of the value of his services in the old. The + continuity of life is never broken; the river flows onward and is lost to + our sight, but under its new horizon it carries the same waters which it + gathered under ours, and its unseen valleys are made glad by the offerings + which are borne down to them from the past,—flowers, perchance, the + germs of which its own waves had planted on the banks of Time. Who shall + say that the mournful and repentant love with which the benefactors of our + race are at length regarded may not be to them, in their new condition of + being, sweet and grateful as the perfume of long- forgotten flowers, or + that our harvest-hymns of rejoicing may not reach the ears of those who in + weakness and suffering scattered the seeds of blessing? + </p> + <p> + The history of the Edinburgh reformers is no new one; it is that of all + who seek to benefit their age by rebuking its popular crimes and exposing + its cherished errors. The truths which they told were not believed, and + for that very reason were the more needed; for it is evermore the case + that the right word when first uttered is an unpopular and denied one. + Hence he who undertakes to tread the thorny pathway of reform—who, + smitten with the love of truth and justice, or indignant in view of wrong + and insolent oppression, is rashly inclined to throw himself at once into + that great conflict which the Persian seer not untruly represented as a + war between light and darkness—would do well to count the cost in + the outset. If he can live for Truth alone, and, cut off from the general + sympathy, regard her service as its "own exceeding great reward;" if he + can bear to be counted a fanatic and crazy visionary; if, in all good + nature, he is ready to receive from the very objects of his solicitude + abuse and obloquy in return for disinterested and self-sacrificing efforts + for their welfare; if, with his purest motives misunderstood and his best + actions perverted and distorted into crimes, he can still hold on his way + and patiently abide the hour when "the whirligig of Time shall bring about + its revenges;" if, on the whole, he is prepared to be looked upon as a + sort of moral outlaw or social heretic, under good society's interdict of + food and fire; and if he is well assured that he can, through all this, + preserve his cheerfulness and faith in man,—let him gird up his + loins and go forward in God's name. He is fitted for his vocation; he has + watched all night by his armor. Whatever his trial may be, he is prepared; + he may even be happily disappointed in respect to it; flowers of + unexpected refreshing may overhang the hedges of his strait and narrow + way; but it remains to be true that he who serves his contemporaries in + faithfulness and sincerity must expect no wages from their gratitude; for, + as has been well said, there is, after all, but one way of doing the world + good, and unhappily that way the world does not like; for it consists in + telling it the very thing which it does not wish to hear. + </p> + <p> + Unhappily, in the case of the reformer, his most dangerous foes are those + of his own household. True, the world's garden has become a desert and + needs renovation; but is his own little nook weedless? Sin abounds + without; but is his own heart pure? While smiting down the giants and + dragons which beset the outward world, are there no evil guests sitting by + his own hearth-stone? Ambition, envy, self-righteousness, impatience, + dogmatism, and pride of opinion stand at his door-way ready to enter + whenever he leaves it unguarded. Then, too, there is no small danger of + failing to discriminate between a rational philanthropy, with its + adaptation of means to ends, and that spiritual knight-errantry which + undertakes the championship of every novel project of reform, scouring the + world in search of distressed schemes held in durance by common sense and + vagaries happily spellbound by ridicule. He must learn that, although the + most needful truth may be unpopular, it does not follow that unpopularity + is a proof of the truth of his doctrines or the expediency of his + measures. He must have the liberality to admit that it is barely possible + for the public on some points to be right and himself wrong, and that the + blessing invoked upon those who suffer for righteousness is not available + to such as court persecution and invite contempt; for folly has its + martyrs as well as wisdom; and he who has nothing better to show of + himself than the scars and bruises which the popular foot has left upon + him is not even sure of winning the honors of martyrdom as some + compensation for the loss of dignity and self-respect involved in the + exhibition of its pains. To the reformer, in an especial manner, comes + home the truth that whoso ruleth his own spirit is greater than he who + taketh a city. Patience, hope, charity, watchfulness unto prayer,—how + needful are all these to his success! Without them he is in danger of + ingloriously giving up his contest with error and prejudice at the first + repulse; or, with that spiteful philanthropy which we sometimes witness, + taking a sick world by the nose, like a spoiled child, and endeavoring to + force down its throat the long-rejected nostrums prepared for its relief. + </p> + <p> + What then? Shall we, in view of these things, call back young, generous + spirits just entering upon the perilous pathway? God forbid! Welcome, + thrice welcome, rather. Let them go forward, not unwarned of the dangers + nor unreminded of the pleasures which belong to the service of humanity. + Great is the consciousness of right. Sweet is the answer of a good + conscience. He who pays his whole-hearted homage to truth and duty, who + swears his lifelong fealty on their altars, and rises up a Nazarite + consecrated to their holy service, is not without his solace and enjoyment + when, to the eyes of others, he seems the most lonely and miserable. He + breathes an atmosphere which the multitude know not of; "a serene heaven + which they cannot discern rests over him, glorious in its purity and + stillness." Nor is he altogether without kindly human sympathies. All + generous and earnest hearts which are brought in contact with his own beat + evenly with it. All that is good, and truthful, and lovely in man, + whenever and wherever it truly recognizes him, must sooner or later + acknowledge his claim to love and reverence. His faith overcomes all + things. The future unrolls itself before him, with its waving + harvest-fields springing up from the seed he is scattering; and he looks + forward to the close of life with the calm confidence of one who feels + that he has not lived idle and useless, but with hopeful heart and strong + arm has labored with God and Nature for the best. + </p> + <p> + And not in vain. In the economy of God, no effort, however small, put + forth for the right cause, fails of its effect. No voice, however feeble, + lifted up for truth, ever dies amidst the confused noises of time. Through + discords of sin and sorrow, pain and wrong, it rises a deathless melody, + whose notes of wailing are hereafter to be changed to those of triumph as + they blend with the great harmony of a reconciled universe. The language + of a transatlantic reformer to his friends is then as true as it is + hopeful and cheering: "Triumph is certain. We have espoused no losing + cause. In the body we may not join our shout with the victors; but in + spirit we may even now. There is but an interval of time between us and + the success at which we aim. In all other respects the links of the chain + are complete. Identifying ourselves with immortal and immutable + principles, we share both their immortality and immutability. The vow + which unites us with truth makes futurity present with us. Our being + resolves itself into an everlasting now. It is not so correct to say that + we shall be victorious as that we are so. When we will in unison with the + supreme Mind, the characteristics of His will become, in some sort, those + of ours. What He has willed is virtually done. It may take ages to unfold + itself; but the germ of its whole history is wrapped up in His + determination. When we make His will ours, which we do when we aim at + truth, that upon which we are resolved is done, decided, born. Life is in + it. It is; and the future is but the development of its being. Ours, + therefore, is a perpetual triumph. Our deeds are, all of them, component + elements of success." (Miall's Essays; Nonconformist, Vol. iv.) + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0034" id="link2H_4_0034"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + THE PILGRIMS OF PLYMOUTH. + </h2> + <p> + From a letter on the celebration of the 250th anniversary of the landing + of the Pilgrims at Plymouth, December 22, 1870. + </p> + <p> + No one can appreciate more highly than myself the noble qualities of the + men and women of the Mayflower. It is not of them that I, a descendant of + the "sect called Quakers," have reason to complain in the matter of + persecution. A generation which came after them, with less piety and more + bigotry, is especially responsible for the little unpleasantness referred + to; and the sufferers from it scarcely need any present championship. They + certainly did not wait altogether for the revenges of posterity. If they + lost their ears, it is satisfactory to remember that they made those of + their mutilators tingle with a rhetoric more sharp than polite. + </p> + <p> + A worthy New England deacon once described a brother in the church as a + very good man Godward, but rather hard man-ward. It cannot be denied that + some very satisfactory steps have been taken in the latter direction, at + least, since the days of the Pilgrims. Our age is tolerant of creed and + dogma, broader in its sympathies, more keenly sensitive to temporal need, + and, practically recognizing the brotherhood of the race, wherever a cry + of suffering is heard its response is quick and generous. It has abolished + slavery, and is lifting woman from world-old degradation to equality with + man before the law. Our criminal codes no longer embody the maxim of + barbarism, "an eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth," but have regard + not only for the safety of the community, but to the reform and well-being + of the criminal. All the more, however, for this amiable tenderness do we + need the counterpoise of a strong sense of justice. With our sympathy for + the wrong-doer we need the old Puritan and Quaker hatred of wrongdoing; + with our just tolerance of men and opinions a righteous abhorrence of sin. + All the more for the sweet humanities and Christian liberalism which, in + drawing men nearer to each other, are increasing the sum of social + influences for good or evil, we need the bracing atmosphere, healthful, if + austere, of the old moralities. Individual and social duties are quite as + imperative now as when they were minutely specified in statute-books and + enforced by penalties no longer admissible. It is well that stocks, + whipping-post, and ducking- stool are now only matters of tradition; but + the honest reprobation of vice and crime which they symbolized should by + no means perish with them. The true life of a nation is in its personal + morality, and no excellence of constitution and laws can avail much if the + people lack purity and integrity. Culture, art, refinement, care for our + own comfort and that of others, are all well, but truth, honor, reverence, + and fidelity to duty are indispensable. + </p> + <p> + The Pilgrims were right in affirming the paramount authority of the law of + God. If they erred in seeking that authoritative law, and passed over the + Sermon on the Mount for the stern Hebraisms of Moses; if they hesitated in + view of the largeness of Christian liberty; if they seemed unwilling to + accept the sweetness and light of the good tidings, let us not forget that + it was the mistake of men who feared more than they dared to hope, whose + estimate of the exceeding awfulness of sin caused them to dwell upon God's + vengeance rather than his compassion; and whose dread of evil was so great + that, in shutting their hearts against it, they sometimes shut out the + good. It is well for us if we have learned to listen to the sweet + persuasion of the Beatitudes; but there are crises in all lives which + require also the emphatic "Thou shalt not" or the Decalogue which the + founders wrote on the gate-posts of their commonwealth. + </p> + <p> + Let us then be thankful for the assurances which the last few years have + afforded us that: + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "The Pilgrim spirit is not dead, + But walks in noon's broad light." +</pre> + <p> + We have seen it in the faith and trust which no circumstances could shake, + in heroic self-sacrifice, in entire consecration to duty. The fathers have + lived in their sons. Have we not all known the Winthrops and Brewsters, + the Saltonstalls and Sewalls, of old times, in gubernatorial chairs, in + legislative halls, around winter camp-fires, in the slow martyrdoms of + prison and hospital? The great struggle through which we have passed has + taught us how much we owe to the men and women of the Plymouth Colony,—the + noblest ancestry that ever a people looked back to with love and + reverence. Honor, then, to the Pilgrims! Let their memory be green + forever! + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0035" id="link2H_4_0035"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + GOVERNOR ENDICOTT. + </h2> + <p> + I am sorry that I cannot respond in person to the invitation of the Essex + Institute to its commemorative festival on the 18th. I especially regret + it, because, though a member of the Society of Friends, and, as such, + regarding with abhorrence the severe persecution of the sect under the + administration of Governor Endicott, I am not unmindful of the otherwise + noble qualities and worthy record of the great Puritan, whose misfortune + it was to live in an age which regarded religious toleration as a crime. + He was the victim of the merciless logic of his creed. He honestly thought + that every convert to Quakerism became by virtue of that conversion a + child of perdition; and, as the head of the Commonwealth, responsible for + the spiritual as well as temporal welfare of its inhabitants, he felt it + his duty to whip, banish, and hang heretics to save his people from + perilous heresy. + </p> + <p> + The extravagance of some of the early Quakers has been grossly + exaggerated. Their conduct will compare in this respect favorably with + that of the first Anabaptists and Independents; but it must be admitted + that many of them manifested a good deal of that wild enthusiasm which has + always been the result of persecution and the denial of the rights of + conscience and worship. Their pertinacious defiance of laws enacted + against them, and their fierce denunciations of priests and magistrates, + must have been particularly aggravating to a man as proud and high + tempered as John Endicott. He had that free-tongued neighbor of his, + Edward Wharton, smartly whipped at the cart-tail about once a month, but + it may be questioned whether the governor's ears did not suffer as much + under Wharton's biting sarcasm and "free speech" as the latter's back did + from the magisterial whip. + </p> + <p> + Time has proved that the Quakers had the best of the controversy; and + their descendants can well afford to forget and forgive an error which the + Puritan governor shared with the generation in which he lived. + </p> + <p> + WEST OSSIPEE, N. H., 14th 9th Month, 1878. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0036" id="link2H_4_0036"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + JOHN WINTHROP. + </h2> + <h3> + On the anniversary of his landing at Salem. + </h3> + <p> + I see by the call of the Essex Institute that some probability is + suggested that I may furnish a poem for the occasion of its meeting at The + Willows on the 22d. I would be glad to make the implied probability a + fact, but I find it difficult to put my thoughts into metrical form, and + there will be little need of it, as I understand a lady of Essex County, + who adds to her modern culture and rare poetical gifts the best spirit of + her Puritan ancestry, has lent the interest of her verse to the occasion. + </p> + <p> + It was a happy thought of the Institute to select for its first meeting of + the season the day and the place of the landing of the great and good + governor, and permit me to say, as thy father's old friend, that its + choice for orator, of the son of him whose genius, statesmanship, and + eloquence honored the place of his birth, has been equally happy. As I + look over the list of the excellent worthies of the first emigrations, I + find no one who, in all respects, occupies a nobler place in the early + colonial history of Massachusetts than John Winthrop. Like Vane and + Milton, he was a gentleman as well as a Puritan, a cultured and + enlightened statesman as well as a God-fearing Christian. It was not under + his long and wise chief magistracy that religious bigotry and intolerance + hung and tortured their victims, and the terrible delusion of witchcraft + darkened the sun at noonday over Essex. If he had not quite reached the + point where, to use the words of Sir Thomas More, he could "hear heresies + talked and yet let the heretics alone," he was in charity and forbearance + far in advance of his generation. + </p> + <p> + I am sorry that I must miss an occasion of so much interest. I hope you + will not lack the presence of the distinguished citizen who inherits the + best qualities of his honored ancestor, and who, as a statesman, scholar, + and patriot, has added new lustre to the name of Winthrop. + </p> + <p> + DANVERS, 6th Month, 19, 1880. + </p> + <p> + <br /> <br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /> <br /> + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Works of Whittier, Volume VI (of +VII), by John Greenleaf Whittier + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE WORKS OF WHITTIER *** + +***** This file should be named 9594-h.htm or 9594-h.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/9/5/9/9594/ + +Produced by David Widger + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Works of Whittier, Volume VI (of VII) + Old Portraits, Modern Sketches, Personal Sketches and + Tributes, Historical Papers + +Author: John Greenleaf Whittier + +Release Date: December 2005 [EBook #9594] +Posting Date: July 10, 2009 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE WORKS OF WHITTIER *** + + + + +Produced by David Widger + + + + + +THE WORKS OF JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER, Volume VI. (of VII) + +OLD PORTRAITS AND MODERN SKETCHES, plus PERSONAL SKETCHES AND TRIBUTES and HISTORICAL PAPERS + + +By John Greenleaf Whittier + + + CONTENTS + + OLD PORTRAITS AND MODERN SKETCHES. + JOHN BUNYAN + THOMAS ELLWOOD + JAMES NAYLER + ANDREW MARVELL + JOHN ROBERTS + SAMUEL HOPKINS + RICHARD BAXTER + WILLIAM LEGGETT + NATHANIEL PEABODY ROGERS + ROBERT DINSMORE + PLACIDO, THE SLAVE POET + + PERSONAL SKETCHES AND TRIBUTES. + THE FUNERAL OF TORREY + EDWARD EVERETT + LEWIS TAPPAN + BAYARD TAYLOR + WILLIAM ELLERY CHANNING + DEATH OF PRESIDENT GARFIELD + LYDIA MARIA CHILD + + OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES + LONGFELLOW + OLD NEWBURY + SCHOOLDAY REMEMBRANCES + EDWIN PERCY WHIPPLE + + HISTORICAL PAPERS. + DANIEL O'CONNELL + ENGLAND UNDER JAMES II. + THE BORDER WAR OF 1708 + THE GREAT IPSWICH FRIGHT + THE BOY CAPTIVES + THE BLACK MEN IN THE REVOLUTION AND WAR OF 1812 + THE SCOTTISH REFORMERS + THE PILGRIMS OF PLYMOUTH + GOVERNOR ENDICOTT + JOHN WINTHROP + + + + + +OLD PORTRAITS AND MODERN SKETCHES + + Inscribed as follows, when first collected in book-form:-- + To Dr. G. BAILEY, of the National Era, Washington, D. C., these + sketches, many of which originally appeared in the columns of the + paper under his editorial supervision, are, in their present form, + offered as a token of the esteem and confidence which years of + political and literary communion have justified and confirmed, on + the part of his friend and associate, + THE AUTHOR. + + + + JOHN BUNYAN. + + "Wouldst see + A man I' the clouds, and hear him speak to thee?" + +Who has not read Pilgrim's Progress? Who has not, in childhood, +followed the wandering Christian on his way to the Celestial City? Who +has not laid at night his young head on the pillow, to paint on the +walls of darkness pictures of the Wicket Gate and the Archers, the Hill +of Difficulty, the Lions and Giants, Doubting Castle and Vanity Fair, +the sunny Delectable Mountains and the Shepherds, the Black River and +the wonderful glory beyond it; and at last fallen asleep, to dream over +the strange story, to hear the sweet welcomings of the sisters at the +House Beautiful, and the song of birds from the window of that "upper +chamber which opened towards the sunrising?" And who, looking back to +the green spots in his childish experiences, does not bless the good +Tinker of Elstow? + +And who, that has reperused the story of the Pilgrim at a maturer age, +and felt the plummet of its truth sounding in the deep places of the +soul, has not reason to bless the author for some timely warning or +grateful encouragement? Where is the scholar, the poet, the man of taste +and feeling, who does not, with Cowper, + + "Even in transitory life's late day, + Revere the man whose Pilgrim marks the road, + And guides the Progress of the soul to God!" + +We have just been reading, with no slight degree of interest, that simple +but wonderful piece of autobiography, entitled Grace abounding to the +Chief of Sinners, from the pen of the author of Pilgrim's Progress. It +is the record of a journey more terrible than that of the ideal Pilgrim; +"truth stranger than fiction;" the painful upward struggling of a spirit +from the blackness of despair and blasphemy, into the high, pure air of +Hope and Faith. More earnest words were never written. It is the entire +unveiling of a human heart; the tearing off of the fig-leaf covering of +its sin. The voice which speaks to us from these old pages seems not so +much that of a denizen of the world in which we live, as of a soul at the +last solemn confessional. Shorn of all ornament, simple and direct as +the contrition and prayer of childhood, when for the first time the +Spectre of Sin stands by its bedside, the style is that of a man dead to +self-gratification, careless of the world's opinion, and only desirous to +convey to others, in all truthfulness and sincerity, the lesson of his +inward trials, temptations, sins, weaknesses, and dangers; and to give +glory to Him who had mercifully led him through all, and enabled him, +like his own Pilgrim, to leave behind the Valley of the Shadow of Death, +the snares of the Enchanted Ground, and the terrors of Doubting Castle, +and to reach the land of Beulah, where the air was sweet and pleasant, +and the birds sang and the flowers sprang up around him, and the Shining +Ones walked in the brightness of the not distant Heaven. In the +introductory pages he says "he could have dipped into a style higher than +this in which I have discoursed, and could have adorned all things more +than here I have seemed to do; but I dared not. God did not play in +tempting me; neither did I play when I sunk, as it were, into a +bottomless pit, when the pangs of hell took hold on me; wherefore, I may +not play in relating of them, but be plain and simple, and lay down the +thing as it was." + +This book, as well as Pilgrim's Progress, was written in Bedford prison, +and was designed especially for the comfort and edification of his +"children, whom God had counted him worthy to beget in faith by his +ministry." In his introduction he tells them, that, although taken from +them, and tied up, "sticking, as it were, between the teeth of the lions +of the wilderness," he once again, as before, from the top of Shemer and +Hermon, so now, from the lion's den and the mountain of leopards, would +look after then with fatherly care and desires for their everlasting +welfare. "If," said he, "you have sinned against light; if you are +tempted to blaspheme; if you are drowned in despair; if you think God +fights against you; or if Heaven is hidden from your eyes, remember it +was so with your father. But out of all the Lord delivered me." + +He gives no dates; he affords scarcely a clue to his localities; of the +man, as he worked, and ate, and drank, and lodged, of his neighbors and +contemporaries, of all he saw and heard of the world about him, we have +only an occasional glimpse, here and there, in his narrative. It is the +story of his inward life only that he relates. What had time and place +to do with one who trembled always with the awful consciousness of an +immortal nature, and about whom fell alternately the shadows of hell and +the splendors of heaven? We gather, indeed, from his record, that he was +not an idle on-looker in the time of England's great struggle for +freedom, but a soldier of the Parliament, in his young years, among the +praying sworders and psalm-singing pikemen, the Greathearts and Holdfasts +whom he has immortalized in his allegory; but the only allusion which he +makes to this portion of his experience is by way of illustration of the +goodness of God in preserving him on occasions of peril. + +He was born at Elstow, in Bedfordshire, in 1628; and, to use his own +words, his "father's house was of that rank which is the meanest and most +despised of all the families of the land." His father was a tinker, and +the son followed the same calling, which necessarily brought him into +association with the lowest and most depraved classes of English society. +The estimation in which the tinker and his occupation were held, in the +seventeenth century, may be learned from the quaint and humorous +description of Sir Thomas Overbury. "The tinker," saith he, "is a +movable, for he hath no abiding in one place; he seems to be devout, for +his life is a continual pilgrimage, and sometimes, in humility, goes +barefoot, therein making necessity a virtue; he is a gallant, for he +carries all his wealth upon his back; or a philosopher, for he bears all +his substance with him. He is always furnished with a song, to which his +hammer, keeping tune, proves that he was the first founder of the kettle- +drum; where the best ale is, there stands his music most upon crotchets. +The companion of his travel is some foul, sun-burnt quean, that, since +the terrible statute, has recanted gypsyism, and is turned pedlaress. So +marches he all over England, with his bag and baggage; his conversation +is irreprovable, for he is always mending. He observes truly the +statutes, and therefore had rather steal than beg. He is so strong an +enemy of idleness, that in mending one hole he would rather make three +than want work; and when he hath done, he throws the wallet of his faults +behind him. His tongue is very voluble, which, with canting, proves him +a linguist. He is entertained in every place, yet enters no farther than +the door, to avoid suspicion. To conclude, if he escape Tyburn and +Banbury, he dies a beggar." + +Truly, but a poor beginning for a pious life was the youth of John +Bunyan. As might have been expected, he was a wild, reckless, swearing +boy, as his father doubtless was before him. "It was my delight," says +he, "to be taken captive by the Devil. I had few equals, both for +cursing and swearing, lying and blaspheming." Yet, in his ignorance and +darkness, his powerful imagination early lent terror to the reproaches of +conscience. He was scared, even in childhood, with dreams of hell and +apparitions of devils. Troubled with fears of eternal fire, and the +malignant demons who fed it in the regions of despair, he says that he +often wished either that there was no hell, or that he had been born a +devil himself, that he might be a tormentor rather than one of the +tormented. + +At an early age he appears to have married. His wife was as poor as +himself, for he tells us that they had not so much as a dish or spoon +between them; but she brought with her two books on religious subjects, +the reading of which seems to have had no slight degree of influence on +his mind. He went to church regularly, adored the priest and all things +pertaining to his office, being, as he says, "overrun with superstition." +On one occasion, a sermon was preached against the breach of the Sabbath +by sports or labor, which struck him at the moment as especially designed +for himself; but by the time he had finished his dinner he was prepared +to "shake it out of his mind, and return to his sports and gaming." + +"But the same day," he continues, "as I was in the midst of a game of +cat, and having struck it one blow from the hole, just as I was about to +strike it a second time, a voice did suddenly dart from Heaven into my +soul, which said, 'Wilt thou leave thy sins and go to heaven, or have thy +sins and go to hell?' At this, I was put to an exceeding maze; +wherefore, leaving my cat upon the ground, I looked up to Heaven, and it +was as if I had, with the eyes of my understanding, seen the Lord Jesus +look down upon me, as being very hotly displeased with me, and as if He +did severely threaten me with some grievous punishment for those and +other ungodly practices. + +"I had no sooner thus conceived in my mind, but suddenly this conclusion +fastened on my spirit, (for the former hint did set my sins again before +my face,) that I had been a great and grievous sinner, and that it was +now too late for me to look after Heaven; for Christ would not forgive me +nor pardon my transgressions. Then, while I was thinking of it, and +fearing lest it should be so, I felt my heart sink in despair, concluding +it was too late; and therefore I resolved in my mind to go on in sin; +for, thought I, if the case be thus, my state is surely miserable; +miserable if I leave my sins, and but miserable if I follow them; I can +but be damned; and if I must be so, I had as good be damned for many sins +as be damned for few." + +The reader of Pilgrim's Progress cannot fail here to call to mind the +wicked suggestions of the Giant to Christian, in the dungeon of Doubting +Castle. + +"I returned," he says, "desperately to my sport again; and I well +remember, that presently this kind of despair did so possess my soul, +that I was persuaded I could never attain to other comfort than what I +should get in sin; for Heaven was gone already, so that on that I must +not think; wherefore, I found within me great desire to take my fill of +sin, that I might taste the sweetness of it; and I made as much haste as +I could to fill my belly with its delicates, lest I should die before I +had my desires; for that I feared greatly. In these things, I protest +before God, I lie not, neither do I frame this sort of speech; these were +really, strongly, and with all my heart, my desires; the good Lord, whose +mercy is unsearchable, forgive my transgressions." + +One day, while standing in the street, cursing and blaspheming, he met +with a reproof which startled him. The woman of the house in front of +which the wicked young tinker was standing, herself, as he remarks, "a +very loose, ungodly wretch," protested that his horrible profanity made +her tremble; that he was the ungodliest fellow for swearing she had ever +heard, and able to spoil all the youth of the town who came in his +company. Struck by this wholly unexpected rebuke, he at once abandoned +the practice of swearing; although previously he tells us that "he had +never known how to speak, unless he put an oath before and another +behind." + +The good name which he gained by this change was now a temptation to him. +"My neighbors," he says, "were amazed at my great conversion from +prodigious profaneness to something like a moral life and sober man. +Now, therefore, they began to praise, to commend, and to speak well of +me, both to my face and behind my back. Now I was, as they said, become +godly; now I was become a right honest man. But oh! when I understood +those were their words and opinions of me, it pleased me mighty well; for +though as yet I was nothing but a poor painted hypocrite, yet I loved to +be talked of as one that was truly godly. I was proud of my godliness, +and, indeed, I did all I did either to be seen of or well spoken of by +men; and thus I continued for about a twelvemonth or more." + +The tyranny of his imagination at this period is seen in the following +relation of his abandonment of one of his favorite sports. + +"Now, you must know, that before this I had taken much delight in +ringing, but my conscience beginning to be tender, I thought such +practice was but vain, and therefore forced myself to leave it; yet my +mind hankered; wherefore, I would go to the steeple-house and look on, +though I durst not ring; but I thought this did not become religion +neither; yet I forced myself, and would look on still. But quickly +after, I began to think, 'How if one of the bells should fall?' Then I +chose to stand under a main beam, that lay overthwart the steeple, from +side to side, thinking here I might stand sure; but then I thought again, +should the bell fall with a swing, it might first hit the wall, and then, +rebounding upon me, might kill me for all this beam. This made me stand +in the steeple door; and now, thought I, I am safe enough; for if a bell +should then fall, I can slip out behind these thick walls, and so be +preserved notwithstanding. + +"So after this I would yet go to see them ring, but would not go any +farther than the steeple-door. But then it came in my head, 'How if the +steeple itself should fall?' And this thought (it may, for aught I know, +when I stood and looked on) did continually so shake my mind, that I +durst not stand at the steeple-door any longer, but was forced to flee, +for fear the steeple should fall upon my head." + +About this time, while wandering through Bedford in pursuit of +employment, he chanced to see three or four poor old women sitting at a +door, in the evening sun, and, drawing near them, heard them converse +upon the things of God; of His work in their hearts; of their natural +depravity; of the temptations of the Adversary; and of the joy of +believing, and of the peace of reconciliation. The words of the aged +women found a response in the soul of the listener. "He felt his heart +shake," to use his own words; he saw that he lacked the true tokens of a +Christian. He now forsook the company of the profane and licentious, and +sought that of a poor man who had the reputation of piety, but, to his +grief, he found him "a devilish ranter, given up to all manner of +uncleanness; he would laugh at all exhortations to sobriety, and deny +that there was a God, an angel, or a spirit." + +"Neither," he continues, "was this man only a temptation to me, but, my +calling lying in the country, I happened to come into several people's +company, who, though strict in religion formerly, yet were also drawn +away by these ranters. These would also talk with me of their ways, and +condemn me as illegal and dark; pretending that they only had attained to +perfection, that they could do what they would, and not sin. Oh! these +temptations were suitable to my flesh, I being but a young man, and my +nature in its prime; but God, who had, as I hope, designed me for better +things, kept me in the fear of His name, and did not suffer me to accept +such cursed principles." + +At this time he was sadly troubled to ascertain whether or not he had +that faith which the Scriptures spake of. Travelling one day from Elstow +to Bedford, after a recent rain, which had left pools of water in the +path, he felt a strong desire to settle the question, by commanding the +pools to become dry, and the dry places to become pools. Going under the +hedge, to pray for ability to work the miracle, he was struck with the +thought that if he failed he should know, indeed, that he was a castaway, +and give himself up to despair. He dared not attempt the experiment, and +went on his way, to use his own forcible language, "tossed up and down +between the Devil and his own ignorance." + +Soon after, he had one of those visions which foreshadowed the wonderful +dream of his Pilgrim's Progress. He saw some holy people of Bedford on +the sunny side of an high mountain, refreshing themselves in the pleasant +air and sunlight, while he was shivering in cold and darkness, amidst +snows and never-melting ices, like the victims of the Scandinavian hell. +A wall compassed the mountain, separating him from the blessed, with one +small gap or doorway, through which, with great pain and effort, he was +at last enabled to work his way into the sunshine, and sit down with the +saints, in the light and warmth thereof. + +But now a new trouble assailed him. Like Milton's metaphysical spirits, +who sat apart, + +"And reasoned of foreknowledge, will, and fate," he grappled with one of +those great questions which have always perplexed and baffled human +inquiry, and upon which much has been written to little purpose. He was +tortured with anxiety to know whether, according to the Westminster +formula, he was elected to salvation or damnation. His old adversary +vexed his soul with evil suggestions, and even quoted Scripture to +enforce them. "It may be you are not elected," said the Tempter; and the +poor tinker thought the supposition altogether too probable. "Why, +then," said Satan, "you had as good leave off, and strive no farther; for +if, indeed, you should not be elected and chosen of God, there is no hope +of your being saved; for it is neither in him that willeth nor in him +that runneth, but in God who showeth mercy." At length, when, as he +says, he was about giving up the ghost of all his hopes, this passage +fell with weight upon his spirit: "Look at the generations of old, and +see; did ever any trust in God, and were confounded?" Comforted by these +words, he opened his Bible took note them, but the most diligent search +and inquiry of his neighbors failed to discover them. At length his eye +fell upon them in the Apocryphal book of Ecclesiasticus. This, he says, +somewhat doubted him at first, as the book was not canonical; but in the +end he took courage and comfort from the passage. "I bless God," he +says, "for that word; it was good for me. That word doth still +oftentimes shine before my face." + +A long and weary struggle was now before him. "I cannot," he says, +"express with what longings and breathings of my soul I cried unto Christ +to call me. Gold! could it have been gotten by gold, what would I have +given for it. Had I a whole world, it had all gone ten thousand times +over for this, that my soul might have been in a converted state. How +lovely now was every one in my eyes, that I thought to be converted men +and women. They shone, they walked like a people who carried the broad +seal of Heaven with them." + +With what force and intensity of language does he portray in the +following passage the reality and earnestness of his agonizing +experience:-- + +"While I was thus afflicted with the fears of my own damnation, there +were two things would make me wonder: the one was, when I saw old people +hunting after the things of this life, as if they should live here +always; the other was, when I found professors much distressed and cast +down, when they met with outward losses; as of husband, wife, or child. +Lord, thought I, what seeking after carnal things by some, and what grief +in others for the loss of them! If they so much labor after and shed so +many tears for the things of this present life, how am I to be bemoaned, +pitied, and prayed for! My soul is dying, my soul is damning. Were my +soul but in a good condition, and were I but sure of it, ah I how rich +should I esteem myself, though blessed but with bread and water! I +should count these but small afflictions, and should bear them as little +burdens. 'A wounded spirit who can bear!'" + +He looked with envy, as he wandered through the country, upon the birds +in the trees, the hares in the preserves, and the fishes in the streams. +They were happy in their brief existence, and their death was but a +sleep. He felt himself alienated from God, a discord in the harmonies of +the universe. The very rooks which fluttered around the old church spire +seemed more worthy of the Creator's love and care than himself. A vision +of the infernal fire, like that glimpse of hell which was afforded to +Christian by the Shepherds, was continually before him, with its +"rumbling noise, and the cry of some tormented, and the scent of +brimstone." Whithersoever he went, the glare of it scorched him, and its +dreadful sound was in his ears. His vivid but disturbed imagination lent +new terrors to the awful figures by which the sacred writers conveyed the +idea of future retribution to the Oriental mind. Bunyan's World of Woe, +if it lacked the colossal architecture and solemn vastness of Milton's +Pandemonium, was more clearly defined; its agonies were within the pale +of human comprehension; its victims were men and women, with the same +keen sense of corporeal suffering which they possessed in life; and who, +to use his own terrible description, had "all the loathed variety of hell +to grapple with; fire unquenchable, a lake of choking brimstone, eternal +chains, darkness more black than night, the everlasting gnawing of the +worm, the sight of devils, and the yells and outcries of the damned." + +His mind at this period was evidently shaken in some degree from its +balance. He was troubled with strange, wicked thoughts, confused by +doubts and blasphemous suggestions, for which he could only account by +supposing himself possessed of the Devil. He wanted to curse and swear, +and had to clap his hands on his mouth to prevent it. In prayer, he +felt, as he supposed, Satan behind him, pulling his clothes, and telling +him to have done, and break off; suggesting that he had better pray to +him, and calling up before his mind's eye the figures of a bull, a tree, +or some other object, instead of the awful idea of God. + +He notes here, as cause of thankfulness, that, even in this dark and +clouded state, he was enabled to see the "vile and abominable things +fomented by the Quakers," to be errors. Gradually, the shadow wherein he +had so long + + "Walked beneath the day's broad glare, + A darkened man," + +passed from him, and for a season he was afforded an "evidence of his +salvation from Heaven, with many golden seals thereon hanging in his +sight." But, ere long, other temptations assailed him. A strange +suggestion haunted him, to sell or part with his Saviour. His own +account of this hallucination is too painfully vivid to awaken any other +feeling than that of sympathy and sadness. + +"I could neither eat my food, stoop for a pin, chop a stick, or cast mine +eye to look on this or that, but still the temptation would come, Sell +Christ for this, or sell Christ for that; sell him, sell him. + +"Sometimes it would run in my thoughts, not so little as a hundred times +together, Sell him, sell him; against which, I may say, for whole hours +together, I have been forced to stand as continually leaning and forcing +my spirit against it, lest haply, before I were aware, some wicked +thought might arise in my heart, that might consent thereto; and +sometimes the tempter would make me believe I had consented to it; but +then I should be as tortured upon a rack, for whole days together. + +"This temptation did put me to such scares, lest I should at sometimes, I +say, consent thereto, and be overcome therewith, that, by the very force +of my mind, my very body would be put into action or motion, by way of +pushing or thrusting with my hands or elbows; still answering, as fast as +the destroyer said, Sell him, I will not, I will not, I will not; no, not +for thousands, thousands, thousands of worlds; thus reckoning, lest I +should set too low a value on him, even until I scarce well knew where I +was, or how to be composed again. + +"But to be brief: one morning, as I did lie in my bed, I was, as at other +times, most fiercely assaulted with this temptation, to sell and part +with Christ; the wicked suggestion still running in my mind, Sell him, +sell him, sell him, sell him, sell him, as fast as a man could speak; +against which, also, in my mind, as at other times, I answered, No, no, +not for thousands, thousands, thousands, at least twenty times together; +but at last, after much striving, I felt this thought pass through my +heart, Let him go if he will; and I thought also, that I felt my heart +freely consent thereto. Oh, the diligence of Satan! Oh, the +desperateness of man's heart! + +"Now was the battle won, and down fell I, as a bird that is shot from the +top of a tree, into great guilt, and fearful despair. Thus getting out +of my bed, I went moping into the field; but God knows with as heavy a +heart as mortal man, I think, could bear; where, for the space of two +hours, I was like a man bereft of life; and, as now, past all recovery, +and bound over to eternal punishment. + +"And withal, that Scripture did seize upon my soul: 'Or profane person, +as Esau, who, for one morsel of meat, sold his birthright; for ye know, +how that afterward, when he would have inherited the blessing, he was +rejected; for he found no place for repentance, though he sought it +carefully with tears." + +For two years and a half, as he informs us, that awful scripture sounded +in his ears like the knell of a lost soul. He believed that he had +committed they unpardonable sin. His mental anguish 'was united with +bodily illness and suffering. His nervous system became fearfully +deranged; his limbs trembled; and he supposed this visible tremulousness +and agitation to be the mark of Cain. 'Troubled with pain and +distressing sensations in his chest, he began to fear that his breast- +bone would split open, and that he should perish like Judas Iscariot. He +feared that the tiles of the houses would fall upon him as he walked in +the streets. He was like his own Man in the Cage at the House of the +Interpreter, shut out from the promises, and looking forward to certain +judgment. "Methought," he says, "the very sun that shineth in heaven did +grudge to give me light." And still the dreadful words, "He found no +place for repentance, though he sought it carefully with tears," sounded +in the depths of his soul. They were, he says, like fetters of brass to +his legs, and their continual clanking followed him for months. +Regarding himself elected and predestined for damnation, he thought that +all things worked for his damage and eternal overthrow, while all things +wrought for the best and to do good to the elect and called of God unto +salvation. God and all His universe had, he thought, conspired against +him; the green earth, the bright waters, the sky itself, were written +over with His irrevocable curse. + +Well was it said by Bunyan's contemporary, the excellent Cudworth, in his +eloquent sermon before the Long Parliament, that "We are nowhere +commanded to pry into the secrets of God, but the wholesome advice given +us is this: 'To make our calling and election sure.' We have no warrant +from Scripture to peep into the hidden rolls of eternity, to spell out +our names among the stars." "Must we say that God sometimes, to exercise +His uncontrollable dominion, delights rather in plunging wretched souls +down into infernal night and everlasting darkness? What, then, shall we +make the God of the whole world? Nothing but a cruel and dreadful +_Erinnys_, with curled fiery snakes about His head, and firebrands in His +hand; thus governing the world! Surely, this will make us either +secretly think there is no God in the world, if He must needs be such, or +else to wish heartily there were none." It was thus at times with +Bunyan. He was tempted, in this season of despair, to believe that there +was no resurrection and no judgment. + +One day, he tells us, a sudden rushing sound, as of wind or the wings of +angels, came to him through the window, wonderfully sweet and pleasant; +and it was as if a voice spoke to him from heaven words of encouragement +and hope, which, to use his language, commanded, for the time, "a silence +in his heart to all those tumultuous thoughts that did use, like +masterless hell-hounds, to roar and bellow and make a hideous noise +within him." About this time, also, some comforting passages of +Scripture were called to mind; but he remarks, that whenever he strove to +apply them to his case, Satan would thrust the curse of Esau in his face, +and wrest the good word from him. The blessed promise "Him that cometh +to me, I will in no wise cast out" was the chief instrumentality in +restoring his lost peace. He says of it: "If ever Satan and I did strive +for any word of God in all my life, it was for this good word of Christ; +he at one end, and I at the other. Oh, what work we made! It was for +this in John, I say, that we did so tug and strive; he pulled, and I +pulled, but, God be praised! I overcame him; I got sweetness from it. +Oh, many a pull hath my heart had with Satan for this blessed sixth +chapter of John!" Who does not here call to mind the struggle between +Christian and Apollyon in the valley! + +That was no fancy sketch; it was the narrative of the author's own +grapple with the Spirit of Evil. Like his ideal Christian, he "conquered +through Him that loved him." Love wrought the victory the Scripture of +Forgiveness overcame that of Hatred. + +He never afterwards relapsed into that state of religious melancholy from +which he so hardly escaped. He speaks of his deliverance as the waking +out of a troublesome dream. His painful experience was not lost upon +him; for it gave him, ever after, a tender sympathy for the weak, the +sinful, the ignorant, and desponding. In some measure, he had been +"touched with the feeling of their infirmities." He could feel for those +in the bonds of sin and despair, as bound with them. Hence his power as +a preacher; hence the wonderful adaptation of his great allegory to all +the variety of spiritual conditions. Like Fearing, he had lain a month +in the Slough of Despond, and had played, like him, the long melancholy +bass of spiritual heaviness. With Feeble-mind, he had fallen into the +hands of Slay-good, of the nature of Man-eaters: and had limped along his +difficult way upon the crutches of Ready-to-halt. Who better than +himself could describe the condition of Despondency, and his daughter +Much-afraid, in the dungeon of Doubting Castle? Had he not also fallen +among thieves, like Little-faith? + +His account of his entering upon the solemn duties of a preacher of the +Gospel is at once curious and instructive. He deals honestly with +himself, exposing all his various moods, weaknesses, doubts, and +temptations. "I preached," he says, "what I felt; for the terrors of the +law and the guilt of transgression lay heavy on my conscience. I have +been as one sent to them from the dead. I went, myself in chains, to +preach to them in chains; and carried that fire in my conscience which I +persuaded them to beware of." At times, when he stood up to preach, +blasphemies and evil doubts rushed into his mind, and he felt a strong +desire to utter them aloud to his congregation; and at other seasons, +when he was about to apply to the sinner some searching and fearful text +of Scripture, he was tempted to withhold it, on the ground that it +condemned himself also; but, withstanding the suggestion of the Tempter, +to use his own simile, he bowed himself like Samson to condemn sin +wherever he found it, though he brought guilt and condemnation upon +himself thereby, choosing rather to die with the Philistines than to deny +the truth. + +Foreseeing the consequences of exposing himself to the operation of the +penal laws by holding conventicles and preaching, he was deeply afflicted +at the thought of the suffering and destitution to which his wife and +children might be exposed by his death or imprisonment. Nothing can be +more touching than his simple and earnest words on this point. They show +how warm and deep were him human affections, and what a tender and loving +heart he laid as a sacrifice on the altar of duty. + +"I found myself a man compassed with infirmities; the parting with my +wife and poor children hath often been to me in this place as the pulling +the flesh from the bones; and also it brought to my mind the many +hardships, miseries, and wants, that my poor family was like to meet +with, should I be taken from them, especially my poor blind child, who +lay nearer my heart than all beside. Oh, the thoughts of the hardships I +thought my poor blind one might go under would break my heart to pieces. + +"Poor child! thought I, what sorrow art thou like to have for thy portion +in this world! thou must be beaten, must beg, suffer hunger, cold, +nakedness, and a thousand calamities, though I cannot now endure the wind +should blow upon thee. But yet, thought I, I must venture you all with +God, though it goeth to the quick to leave you: oh! I saw I was as a man +who was pulling down his house upon the heads of his wife and children; +yet I thought on those 'two milch kine that were to carry the ark of God +into another country, and to leave their calves behind them.' + +"But that which helped me in this temptation was divers considerations: +the first was, the consideration of those two Scriptures, 'Leave thy +fatherless children, I will preserve them alive; and let thy widows trust +in me;' and again, 'The Lord said, verily it shall go well with thy +remnant; verily I will cause the enemy to entreat them well in the time +of evil.'" + +He was arrested in 1660, charged with "devilishly and perniciously +abstaining from church," and of being "a common upholder of +conventicles." At the Quarter Sessions, where his trial seems to have +been conducted somewhat like that of Faithful at Vanity Fair, he was +sentenced to perpetual banishment. This sentence, however, was never +executed, but he was remanded to Bedford jail, where he lay a prisoner +for twelve years. + +Here, shut out from the world, with no other books than the Bible and +Fox's Martyrs, he penned that great work which has attained a wider and +more stable popularity than any other book in the English tongue. It is +alike the favorite of the nursery and the study. Many experienced +Christians hold it only second to the Bible; the infidel himself would +not willingly let it die. Men of all sects read it with delight, as in +the main a truthful representation of the 'Christian pilgrimage, without +indeed assenting to all the doctrines which the author puts in the month +of his fighting sermonizer, Great-heart, or which may be deduced from +some other portions of his allegory. A recollection of his fearful +sufferings, from misapprehension of a single text in the Scriptures, +relative to the question of election, we may suppose gave a milder tone +to the theology of his Pilgrim than was altogether consistent with the +Calvinism of the seventeenth century. "Religion," says Macaulay, "has +scarcely ever worn a form so calm and soothing as in Bunyan's allegory." +In composing it, he seems never to have altogether lost sight of the +fact, that, in his life-and-death struggle with Satan for the blessed +promise recorded by the Apostle of Love, the adversary was generally +found on the Genevan side of the argument. Little did the short-sighted +persecutors of Bunyan dream, when they closed upon him the door of +Bedford jail, that God would overrule their poor spite and envy to His +own glory and the worldwide renown of their victim. In the solitude of +his prison, the ideal forms of beauty and sublimity, which had long +flitted before him vaguely, like the vision of the Temanite, took shape +and coloring; and he was endowed with power to reduce them to order, and +arrange them in harmonious groupings. His powerful imagination, no +longer self-tormenting, but under the direction of reason and grace, +expanded his narrow cell into a vast theatre, lighted up for the display +of its wonders. To this creative faculty of his mind might have been +aptly applied the language which George Wither, a contemporary prisoner, +addressed to his Muse:-- + + "The dull loneness, the black shade + Which these hanging vaults have made, + The rude portals that give light + More to terror than delight; + This my chamber of neglect, + Walled about with disrespect,-- + From all these, and this dull air, + A fit object for despair, + She hath taught me by her might, + To draw comfort and delight." + +That stony cell of his was to him like the rock of Padan-aram to the +wandering Patriarch. He saw angels ascending and descending. The House +Beautiful rose up before him, and its holy sisterhood welcomed him. He +looked, with his Pilgrim, from the Chamber of Peace. The Valley of +Humiliation lay stretched out beneath his eye, and he heard "the curious, +melodious note of the country birds, who sing all the day long in the +spring time, when the flowers appear, and the sun shines warm, and make +the woods and groves and solitary places glad." Side by side with the +good Christiana and the loving Mercy, he walked through the green and +lowly valley, "fruitful as any the crow flies over," through "meadows +beautiful with lilies;" the song of the poor but fresh-faced shepherd- +boy, who lived a merry life, and wore the herb heartsease in his bosom, +sounded through his cell:-- + + "He that is down need fear no fall; + He that is low no pride." + +The broad and pleasant "river of the Water of Life" glided peacefully +before him, fringed "on either side with green trees, with all manner of +fruit," and leaves of healing, with "meadows beautified with lilies, and +green all the year long;" he saw the Delectable Mountains, glorious with +sunshine, overhung with gardens and orchards and vineyards; and beyond +all, the Land of Beulah, with its eternal sunshine, its song of birds, +its music of fountains, its purple clustered vines, and groves through +which walked the Shining Ones, silver-winged and beautiful. + +What were bars and bolts and prison-walls to him, whose eyes were +anointed to see, and whose ears opened to hear, the glory and the +rejoicing of the City of God, when the pilgrims were conducted to its +golden gates, from the black and bitter river, with the sounding +trumpeters, the transfigured harpers with their crowns of gold, the sweet +voices of angels, the welcoming peal of bells in the holy city, and the +songs of the redeemed ones? In reading the concluding pages of the first +part of Pilgrim's Progress, we feel as if the mysterious glory of the +Beatific Vision was unveiled before us. We are dazzled with the excess +of light. We are entranced with the mighty melody; overwhelmed by the +great anthem of rejoicing spirits. It can only be adequately described +in the language of Milton in respect to the Apocalypse, as "a seven-fold +chorus of hallelujahs and harping symphonies." + +Few who read Bunyan nowadays think of him as one of the brave old English +confessors, whose steady and firm endurance of persecution baffled and in +the end overcame the tyranny of the Established Church in the reign of +Charles II. What Milton and Penn and Locke wrote in defence of Liberty, +Bunyan lived out and acted. He made no concessions to worldly rank. +Dissolute lords and proud bishops he counted less than the humblest and +poorest of his disciples at Bedford. When first arrested and thrown into +prison, he supposed he should be called to suffer death for his faithful +testimony to the truth; and his great fear was, that he should not meet +his fate with the requisite firmness, and so dishonor the cause of his +Master. And when dark clouds came over him, and he sought in vain for a +sufficient evidence that in the event of his death it would be well with +him, he girded up his soul with the reflection, that, as he suffered for +the word and way of God, he was engaged not to shrink one hair's breadth +from it. "I will leap," he says, "off the ladder blindfold into +eternity, sink or swim, come heaven, come hell. Lord Jesus, if thou wilt +catch me, do; if not, I will venture in thy name!" + +The English revolution of the seventeenth century, while it humbled the +false and oppressive aristocracy of rank and title, was prodigal in the +development of the real nobility of the mind and heart. Its history is +bright with the footprints of men whose very names still stir the hearts +of freemen, the world over, like a trumpet peal. Say what we may of its +fanaticism, laugh as we may at its extravagant enjoyment of newly +acquired religious and civil liberty, who shall now venture to deny that +it was the golden age of England? Who that regards freedom above +slavery, will now sympathize with the outcry and lamentation of those +interested in the continuance of the old order of things, against the +prevalence of sects and schism, but who, at the same time, as Milton +shrewdly intimates, dreaded more the rending of their pontifical sleeves +than the rending of the Church? Who shall now sneer at Puritanism, with +the Defence of Unlicensed Printing before him? Who scoff at Quakerism +over the Journal of George Fox? Who shall join with debauched lordlings +and fat-witted prelates in ridicule of Anabaptist levellers and dippers, +after rising from the perusal of Pilgrim's Progress? "There were giants +in those days." And foremost amidst that band of liberty-loving and God- +fearing men, + + "The slandered Calvinists of Charles's time, + Who fought, and won it, Freedom's holy fight," + +stands the subject of our sketch, the Tinker of Elstow. Of his high +merit as an author there is no longer any question. The Edinburgh Review +expressed the common sentiment of the literary world, when it declared +that the two great creative minds of the seventeenth century were those +which produced Paradise Lost and the Pilgrim's Progress. + + + + +THOMAS ELLWOOD. + +Commend us to autobiographies! Give us the veritable notchings of +Robinson Crusoe on his stick, the indubitable records of a life long +since swallowed up in the blackness of darkness, traced by a hand the +very dust of which has become undistinguishable. The foolishest egotist +who ever chronicled his daily experiences, his hopes and fears, poor +plans and vain reachings after happiness, speaking to us out of the Past, +and thereby giving us to understand that it was quite as real as our +Present, is in no mean sort our benefactor, and commands our attention, +in spite of his folly. We are thankful for the very vanity which +prompted him to bottle up his poor records, and cast them into the great +sea of Time, for future voyagers to pick up. We note, with the deepest +interest, that in him too was enacted that miracle of a conscious +existence, the reproduction of which in ourselves awes and perplexes us. +He, too, had a mother; he hated and loved; the light from old-quenched +hearths shone over him; he walked in the sunshine over the dust of those +who had gone before him, just as we are now walking over his. These +records of him remain, the footmarks of a long-extinct life, not of mere +animal organism, but of a being like ourselves, enabling us, by studying +their hieroglyphic significance, to decipher and see clearly into the +mystery of existence centuries ago. The dead generations live again in +these old self-biographies. Incidentally, unintentionally, yet in the +simplest and most natural manner, they make us familiar with all the +phenomena of life in the bygone ages. We are brought in contact with +actual flesh-and-blood men and women, not the ghostly outline figures +which pass for such, in what is called History. The horn lantern of the +biographer, by the aid of which, with painful minuteness, he chronicled, +from day to day, his own outgoings and incomings, making visible to us +his pitiful wants, labors, trials, and tribulations of the stomach and of +the conscience, sheds, at times, a strong clear light upon +contemporaneous activities; what seemed before half fabulous, rises up in +distinct and full proportions; we look at statesmen, philosophers, and +poets, with the eyes of those who lived perchance their next-door +neighbors, and sold them beer, and mutton, and household stuffs, had +access to their kitchens, and took note of the fashion of their wigs and +the color of their breeches. Without some such light, all history would +be just about as unintelligible and unreal as a dimly remembered dream. + +The journals of the early Friends or Quakers are in this respect +invaluable. Little, it is true, can be said, as a general thing, of +their literary merits. Their authors were plain, earnest men and women, +chiefly intent upon the substance of things, and having withal a strong +testimony to bear against carnal wit and outside show and ornament. Yet, +even the scholar may well admire the power of certain portions of George +Fox's Journal, where a strong spirit clothes its utterance in simple, +downright Saxon words; the quiet and beautiful enthusiasm of Pennington; +the torrent energy of Edward Burrough; the serene wisdom of Penn; the +logical acuteness of Barclay; the honest truthfulness of Sewell; the wit +and humor of John Roberts, (for even Quakerism had its apostolic jokers +and drab-coated Robert Halls;) and last, not least, the simple beauty of +Woolman's Journal, the modest record of a life of good works and love. + +Let us look at the Life of Thomas Ellwood. The book before us is a +hardly used Philadelphia reprint, bearing date of 1775. The original was +published some sixty years before. It is not a book to be found in +fashionable libraries, or noticed in fashionable reviews, but is none the +less deserving of attention. + +Ellwood was born in 1639, in the little town of Crowell, in Oxfordshire. +Old Walter, his father, was of "gentlemanly lineage," and held a +commission of the peace under Charles I. One of his most intimate +friends was Isaac Pennington, a gentleman of estate and good reputation, +whose wife, the widow of Sir John Springette, was a lady of superior +endowments. Her only daughter, Gulielma, was the playmate and companion +of Thomas. On making this family a visit, in 1658, in company with his +father, he was surprised to find that they had united with the Quakers, a +sect then little known, and everywhere spoken against. Passing through +the vista of nearly two centuries, let us cross the threshold, and look +with the eyes of young Ellwood upon this Quaker family. It will +doubtless give us a good idea of the earnest and solemn spirit of that +age of religious awakening. + +"So great a change from a free, debonair, and courtly sort of behavior, +which we had formerly found there, into so strict a gravity as they now +received us with, did not a little amuse us, and disappointed our +expectations of such a pleasant visit as we had promised ourselves. + +"For my part, I sought, and at length found, means to cast myself into +the company of the daughter, whom I found gathering flowers in the +garden, attended by her maid, also a Quaker. But when I addressed her +after my accustomed manner, with intention to engage her in discourse on +the foot of our former acquaintance, though she treated me with a +courteous mien, yet, as young as she was, the gravity of her looks and +behavior struck such an awe upon me, that I found myself not so much +master of myself as to pursue any further converse with her. + +"We staid dinner, which was very handsome, and lacked nothing to +recommend it to me but the want of mirth and pleasant discourse, which we +could neither have with them, nor, by reason of them, with one another; +the weightiness which was upon their spirits and countenances keeping +down the lightness that would have been up in ours." + +Not long after, they made a second visit to their sober friends, spending +several days, during which they attended a meeting, in a neighboring +farmhouse, where we are introduced by Ellwood to two remarkable +personages, Edward Burrough, the friend and fearless reprover of +Cromwell, and by far the most eloquent preacher of his sect and James +Nayler, whose melancholy after-history of fanaticism, cruel sufferings, +and beautiful repentance, is so well known to the readers of English +history under the Protectorate. Under the preaching of these men, and +the influence of the Pennington family, young Ellwood was brought into +fellowship with the Quakers. Of the old Justice's sorrow and indignation +at this sudden blasting of his hopes and wishes in respect to his son, +and of the trials and difficulties of the latter in his new vocation, it +is now scarcely worth while to speak. Let us step forward a few years, +to 1662, considering meantime how matters, political and spiritual, are +changed in that brief period. Cromwell, the Maccabeus of Puritanism, is +no longer among men; Charles the Second sits in his place; profane and +licentious cavaliers have thrust aside the sleek-haired, painful-faced +Independents, who used to groan approval to the Scriptural illustrations +of Harrison and Fleetwood; men easy of virtue, without sincerity, either +in religion or politics, occupying the places made honorable by the +Miltons, Whitlocks, and Vanes of the Commonwealth. Having this change in +view, the light which the farthing candle of Ellwood sheds upon one of +these illustrious names will not be unwelcome. In his intercourse with +Penn, and other learned Quakers, he had reason to lament his own +deficiencies in scholarship, and his friend Pennington undertook to put +him in a way of remedying the defect. + +"He had," says Ellwood, "an intimate acquaintance with Dr. Paget, a +physician of note in London, and he with John Milton, a gentleman of +great note for learning throughout the learned world, for the accurate +pieces he had written on various subjects and occasions. + +"This person, having filled a public station in the former times, lived a +private and retired life in London, and, having lost his sight, kept +always a man to read for him, which usually was the son of some gentleman +of his acquaintance, whom, in kindness, he took to improve in his +learning. + +"Thus, by the mediation of my friend Isaac Pennington with Dr. Paget, and +through him with John Milton, was I admitted to come to him, not as a +servant to him, nor to be in the house with him, but only to have the +liberty of coming to his house at certain hours when I would, and read to +him what books he should appoint, which was all the favor I desired. + +"He received me courteously, as well for the sake of Dr. Paget, who +introduced me, as of Isaac Pennington, who recommended me, to both of +whom he bore a good respect. And, having inquired divers things of me, +with respect to my former progression in learning, he dismissed me, to +provide myself with such accommodations as might be most suitable to my +studies. + +"I went, therefore, and took lodgings as near to his house (which was +then in Jewen Street) as I conveniently could, and from thenceforward +went every day in the afternoon, except on the first day of the week, +and, sitting by him in his dining-room, read to him such books in the +Latin tongue as he pleased to have me read. + +"He perceiving with what earnest desire I had pursued learning, gave me +not only all the encouragement, but all the help he could. For, having a +curious ear, he understood by my tone when I understood what I read and +when I did not, and accordingly would stop me, examine me, and open the +most difficult passages to me." + +Thanks, worthy Thomas, for this glimpse into John Milton's dining-room! + +He had been with "Master Milton," as he calls him, only a few weeks, +when, being one "first day morning," at the Bull and Mouth meeting, +Aldersgate, the train-bands of the city, "with great noise and clamor," +headed by Major Rosewell, fell upon him and his friends. The immediate +cause of this onslaught upon quiet worshippers was the famous plot of the +Fifth Monarchy men, grim old fanatics, who (like the Millerites of the +present day) had been waiting long for the personal reign of Christ and +the saints upon earth, and in their zeal to hasten such a consummation +had sallied into London streets with drawn swords and loaded matchlocks. +The government took strong measures for suppressing dissenters' meetings +or "conventicles;" and the poor Quakers, although not at all implicated +in the disturbance, suffered more severely than any others. Let us look +at the "freedom of conscience and worship" in England under that +irreverent Defender of the Faith, Charles II. Ellwood says: "He that +commanded the party gave us first a general charge to come out of the +room. But we, who came thither at God's requiring to worship Him, (like +that good man of old, who said, we ought to obey God rather than man,) +stirred not, but kept our places. Whereupon, he sent some of his +soldiers among us, with command to drag or drive us out, which they did +roughly enough." Think of it: grave men and women, and modest maidens, +sitting there with calm, impassive countenances, motionless as death, the +pikes of the soldiery closing about them in a circle of bristling steel! +Brave and true ones! Not in vain did ye thus oppose God's silence to the +Devil's uproar; Christian endurance and calm persistence in the exercise +of your rights as Englishmen and men to the hot fury of impatient +tyranny! From your day down to this, the world has been the better for +your faithfulness. + +Ellwood and some thirty of his friends were marched off to prison in Old +Bridewell, which, as well as nearly all the other prisons, was already +crowded with Quaker prisoners. One of the rooms of the prison was used +as a torture chamber. "I was almost affrighted," says Ellwood, "by the +dismalness of the place; for, besides that the walls were all laid over +with black, from top to bottom, there stood in the middle a great +whipping-post. + +"The manner of whipping there is, to strip the party to the skin, from +the waist upward, and, having fastened him to the whipping-post, (so that +he can neither resist nor shun the strokes,) to lash his naked body with +long, slender twigs of holly, which will bend almost like thongs around +the body; and these, having little knots upon them, tear the skin and +flesh, and give extreme pain." + +To this terrible punishment aged men and delicately nurtured young +females were often subjected, during this season of hot persecution. + +From the Bridewell, Ellwood was at length removed to Newgate, and thrust +in, with other "Friends," amidst the common felons. He speaks of this +prison, with its thieves, murderers, and prostitutes, its over-crowded +apartments and loathsome cells, as "a hell upon earth." In a closet, +adjoining the room where he was lodged, lay for several days the +quartered bodies of Phillips, Tongue, and Gibbs, the leaders of the Fifth +Monarchy rising, frightful and loathsome, as they came from the bloody +hands of the executioners! These ghastly remains were at length obtained +by the friends of the dead, and buried. The heads were ordered to be +prepared for setting up in different parts of the city. Read this grim +passage of description:-- + +"I saw the heads when they were brought to be boiled. The hangman +fetched them in a dirty basket, out of some by-place, and, setting them +down among the felons, he and they made sport of them. They took them by +the hair, flouting, jeering, and laughing at them; and then giving them +some ill names, boxed them on their ears and cheeks; which done, the +hangman put them into his kettle, and parboiled them with bay-salt and +cummin-seed: that to keep them from putrefaction, and this to keep off +the fowls from seizing upon them. The whole sight, as well that of the +bloody quarters first as this of the heads afterwards, was both frightful +and loathsome, and begat an abhorrence in my nature." + +At the next session of the municipal court at the Old Bailey, Ellwood +obtained his discharge. After paying a visit to "my Master Milton," he +made his way to Chalfont, the home of his friends the Penningtons, where +he was soon after engaged as a Latin teacher. Here he seems to have had +his trials and temptations. Gulielma Springette, the daughter of +Pennington's wife, his old playmate, had now grown to be "a fair woman of +marriageable age," and, as he informs us, "very desirable, whether regard +was had to her outward person, which wanted nothing to make her +completely comely, or to the endowments of her mind, which were every way +extraordinary, or to her outward fortune, which was fair." From all +which, we are not surprised to learn that "she was secretly and openly +sought for by many of almost every rank and condition." "To whom," +continues Thomas, "in their respective turns, (till he at length came for +whom she was reserved,) she carried herself with so much evenness of +temper, such courteous freedom, guarded by the strictest modesty, that as +it gave encouragement or ground of hope to none, so neither did it +administer any matter of offence or just cause of complaint to any." + +Beautiful and noble maiden! How the imagination fills up this outline +limning by her friend, and, if truth must be told, admirer! Serene, +courteous, healthful; a ray of tenderest and blandest light, shining +steadily in the sober gloom of that old household! Confirmed Quaker as +she is, shrinking from none of the responsibilities and dangers of her +profession, and therefore liable at any time to the penalties of prison +and whipping-post, under that plain garb and in spite of that "certain +gravity of look and behavior,"--which, as we have seen, on one occasion +awed young Ellwood into silence,--youth, beauty, and refinement assert +their prerogatives; love knows no creed; the gay, and titled, and wealthy +crowd around her, suing in vain for her favor. + + "Followed, like the tided moon, + She moves as calmly on," + +"until he at length comes for whom she was reserved," and her name is +united with that of one worthy even of her, the world-renowned William +Penn. + +Meantime, one cannot but feel a good degree of sympathy with young +Ellwood, her old schoolmate and playmate, placed, as he was, in the same +family with her, enjoying her familiar conversation and unreserved +confidence, and, as he says, the "advantageous opportunities of riding +and walking abroad with her, by night as well as by day, without any +other company than her maid; for so great, indeed, was the confidence +that her mother had in me, that she thought her daughter safe, if I was +with her, even from the plots and designs of others upon her." So near, +and yet, alas! in truth, so distant! The serene and gentle light which +shone upon him, in the sweet solitudes of Chalfont, was that of a star, +itself unapproachable. + +As he himself meekly intimates, she was reserved for another. He seems +to have fully understood his own position in respect to her; although, to +use his own words, "others, measuring him by the propensity of their own +inclinations, concluded he would steal her, run away with her, and marry +her." Little did these jealous surmisers know of the true and really +heroic spirit of the young Latin master. His own apology and defence of +his conduct, under circumstances of temptation which St. Anthony himself +could have scarcely better resisted, will not be amiss. + +"I was not ignorant of the various fears which filled the jealous heads +of some concerning me, neither was I so stupid nor so divested of all +humanity as not to be sensible of the real and innate worth and virtue +which adorned that excellent dame, and attracted the eyes and hearts of +so many, with the greatest importunity, to seek and solicit her; nor was +I so devoid of natural heat as not to feel some sparklings of desire, as +well as others; but the force of truth and sense of honor suppressed +whatever would have risen beyond the bounds of fair and virtuous +friendship. For I easily foresaw that, if I should have attempted any +thing in a dishonorable way, by fraud or force, upon her, I should have +thereby brought a wound upon mine own soul, a foul scandal upon my +religious profession, and an infamous stain upon mine honor, which was +far more dear unto me than my life. Wherefore, having observed how some +others had befooled themselves, by misconstruing her common kindness +(expressed in an innocent, open, free, and familiar conversation, +springing from the abundant affability, courtesy, and sweetness of her +natural temper) to be the effect of a singular regard and peculiar +affection to them, I resolved to shun the rock whereon they split; and, +remembering the saying of the poet + + 'Felix quem faciunt aliena Pericula cantum,' + +I governed myself in a free yet respectful carriage towards her, thereby +preserving a fair reputation with my friends, and enjoying as much of her +favor and kindness, in a virtuous and firm friendship, as was fit for her +to show or for me to seek." + +Well and worthily said, poor Thomas! Whatever might be said of others, +thou, at least, wast no coxcomb. Thy distant and involuntary admiration +of "the fair Guli" needs, however, no excuse. Poor human nature, guard +it as one may, with strictest discipline and painfully cramping +environment, will sometimes act out itself; and, in thy case, not even +George Fox himself, knowing thy beautiful young friend, (and doubtless +admiring her too, for he was one of the first to appreciate and honor the +worth and dignity or woman,) could have found it in his heart to censure +thee! + +At this period, as was indeed most natural, our young teacher solaced +himself with occasional appeals to what he calls "the Muses." There is +reason to believe, however, that the Pagan sisterhood whom he ventured to +invoke seldom graced his study with their personal attendance. In these +rhyming efforts, scattered up and down his Journal, there are occasional +sparkles of genuine wit, and passages of keen sarcasm, tersely and fitly +expressed. Others breathe a warm, devotional feeling; in the following +brief prayer, for instance, the wants of the humble Christian are +condensed in a manner worthy of Quarles or Herbert:-- + + "Oh! that mine eye might closed be + To what concerns me not to see; + That deafness might possess mine ear + To what concerns me not to hear; + That Truth my tongue might always tie + From ever speaking foolishly; + That no vain thought might ever rest + Or be conceived in my breast; + That by each word and deed and thought + Glory may to my God be brought! + But what are wishes? Lord, mine eye + On Thee is fixed, to Thee I cry + Wash, Lord, and purify my heart, + And make it clean in every part; + And when 't is clean, Lord, keep it too, + For that is more than I can do." + +The thought in the following extracts from a poem written on the death of +his friend Pennington's son is trite, but not inaptly or inelegantly +expressed:-- + + "What ground, alas, has any man + To set his heart on things below, + Which, when they seem most like to stand, + Fly like the arrow from the bow! + Who's now atop erelong shall feel + The circling motion of the wheel! + + "The world cannot afford a thing + Which to a well-composed mind + Can any lasting pleasure bring, + But in itself its grave will find. + All things unto their centre tend + What had beginning must have end! + + "No disappointment can befall + Us, having Him who's all in all! + What can of pleasure him prevent + Who lath the Fountain of Content?" + +In the year 1663 a severe law was enacted against the "sect called +Quakers," prohibiting their meetings, with the penalty of banishment for +the third offence! The burden of the prosecution which followed fell +upon the Quakers of the metropolis, large numbers of whom were heavily +fined, imprisoned, and sentenced to be banished from their native land. +Yet, in time, our worthy friend Ellwood came in for his own share of +trouble, in consequence of attending the funeral of one of his friends. +An evil-disposed justice of the county obtained information of the Quaker +gathering; and, while the body of the dead was "borne on Friends' +shoulders through the street, in order to be carried to the burying- +ground, which was at the town's end," says Ellwood, "he rushed out upon +us with the constables and a rabble of rude fellows whom he had gathered +together, and, having his drawn sword in his hand, struck one of the +foremost of the bearers with it, commanding them to set down the coffin. +But the Friend who was so stricken, being more concerned for the safety +of the dead body than for his own, lest it should fall, and any indecency +thereupon follow, held the coffin fast; which the justice observing, and +being enraged that his word was not forthwith obeyed, set his hand to the +coffin, and with a forcible thrust threw it off from the bearers' +shoulders, so, that it fell to the ground in the middle of the street, +and there we were forced to leave it; for the constables and rabble fell +upon us, and drew some and drove others into the inn. Of those thus +taken," continues Ellwood, "I was one. They picked out ten of us, and +sent us to Aylesbury jail. + +"They caused the body to lie in the open street and cartway, so that all +travellers that passed, whether horsemen, coaches, carts, or wagons, were +fain to break out of the way to go by it, until it was almost night. And +then, having caused a grave to be made in the unconsecrated part of what +is called the Churchyard, they forcibly took the body from the widow, and +buried it there." + +He remained a prisoner only about two months, during which period he +comforted himself by such verse-making as follows, reminding us of +similar enigmas in Bunyan's _Pilgrim's Progress_: + + "Lo! a Riddle for the wise, + In the which a Mystery lies. + + RIDDLE. + "Some men are free whilst they in prison lie; + Others who ne'er saw prison captives die. + + CAUTION. + "He that can receive it may, + He that cannot, let him stay, + Not be hasty, but suspend + Judgment till he sees the end. + + SOLUTION. + "He's only free, indeed, who's free from sin, + And he is fastest bound that's bound therein." + + +In the mean time, where is our "Master Milton"? We, left him deprived of +his young companion and reader, sitting lonely in his small dining-room, +in Jewen Street. It is now the year 1665; is not the pestilence in +London? A sinful and godless city, with its bloated bishops fawning +around the Nell Gwyns of a licentious and profane Defender of the Faith; +its swaggering and drunken cavaliers; its ribald jesters; its obscene +ballad-singers; its loathsome prisons, crowded with Godfearing men and +women: is not the measure of its iniquity already filled up? Three years +only have passed since the terrible prayer of Vane went upward from the +scaffold on Tower Hill: "When my blood is shed upon the block, let it, O +God, have a voice afterward!" Audible to thy ear, O bosom friend of the +martyr! has that blood cried from earth; and now, how fearfully is it +answered! Like the ashes which the Seer of the Hebrews cast towards +Heaven, it has returned in boils and blains upon the proud and oppressive +city. John Milton, sitting blind in Jewen Street, has heard the toll of +the death-bells, and the nightlong rumble of the burial-carts, and the +terrible summons, "Bring out your dead!" The Angel of the Plague, in +yellow mantle, purple-spotted, walks the streets. Why should he tarry in +a doomed city, forsaken of God! Is not the command, even to him, "Arise +and flee, for thy life"? In some green nook of the quiet country, he may +finish the great work which his hands have found to do. He bethinks him +of his old friends, the Penningtons, and his young Quaker companion, the +patient and gentle Ellwood. "Wherefore," says the latter, "some little +time before I went to Aylesbury jail, I was desired by my quondam Master +Milton to take an house for him in the neighborhood where I dwelt, that +he might go out of the city for the safety of himself and his family, the +pestilence then growing hot in London. I took a pretty box for him in +Giles Chalfont, a mile from me, of which I gave him notice, and intended +to have waited on him and seen him well settled, but was prevented by +that imprisonment. But now being released and returned home, I soon made +a visit to him, to welcome him into the country. After some common +discourse had passed between us, he called for a manuscript of his, +which, having brought, he delivered to me, bidding me take it home with +me and read it at my leisure, and when I had so done return it to him, +with my judgment thereupon." + +Now, what does the reader think young Ellwood carried in his gray coat +pocket across the dikes and hedges and through the green lanes of Giles +Chalfont that autumn day? Let us look farther "When I came home, and had +set myself to read it, I found it was that excellent poem which he +entitled _Paradise Lost_. After I had, with the best attention, read it +through, I made him another visit; and, returning his book with due +acknowledgment of the favor he had done me in communicating it to me, he +asked me how I liked it and what I thought of it, which I modestly but +freely told him; and, after some farther discourse about it, I pleasantly +said to him, 'Thou hast said much here of Paradise Lost; what hast thou +to say of Paradise Found?' He made me no answer, but sat some time in a +muse; then brake off that discourse, and fell upon another subject." + +"I modestly but freely told him what I thought" of Paradise Lost! What +he told him remains a mystery. One would like to know more precisely +what the first critical reader of that song "of Man's first disobedience" +thought of it. Fancy the young Quaker and blind Milton sitting, some +pleasant afternoon of the autumn of that old year, in "the pretty box" at +Chalfont, the soft wind through the open window lifting the thin hair of +the glorious old Poet! Back-slidden England, plague-smitten, and +accursed with her faithless Church and libertine King, knows little of +poor "Master Milton," and takes small note of his Puritanic verse-making. +Alone, with his humble friend, he sits there, conning over that poem +which, he fondly hoped, the world, which had grown all dark and strange +to the author, "would not willingly let die." The suggestion in respect +to Paradise Found, to which, as we have seen, "he made no answer, but sat +some time in a muse," seems not to have been lost; for, "after the +sickness was over," continues Ellwood, "and the city well cleansed, and +become safely habitable again, he returned thither; and when afterwards I +waited on him there, which I seldom failed of doing whenever my occasions +drew me to London, he showed me his second poem, called Paradise Gained; +and, in a pleasant tone, said to me, 'This is owing to you, for you put +it into my head by the question you put to me at Chalfont, which before I +had not thought of.'" + +Golden days were these for the young Latin reader, even if it be true, as +we suspect, that he was himself very far from appreciating the glorious +privilege which he enjoyed, of the familiar friendship and confidence of +Milton. But they could not last. His amiable host, Isaac Pennington, +a blameless and quiet country gentleman, was dragged from his house by a +military force, and lodged in Aylesbury jail; his wife and family +forcibly ejected from their pleasant home, which was seized upon by the +government as security for the fines imposed upon its owner. The plague +was in the village of Aylesbury, and in the very prison itself; but the +noble-hearted Mary Pennington followed her husband, sharing with him the +dark peril. Poor Ellwood, while attending a monthly meeting at Hedgerly, +with six others, (among them one Morgan Watkins, a poor old Welshman, +who, painfully endeavoring to utter his testimony in his own dialect, was +suspected by the Dogberry of a justice of being a Jesuit trolling over +his Latin,) was arrested, and committed to Wiccomb House of Correction. + +This was a time of severe trial for the sect with which Ellwood had +connected himself. In the very midst of the pestilence, when thousands +perished weekly in London, fifty-four Quakers were marched through the +almost deserted streets, and placed on board a ship, for the purpose of +being conveyed, according to their sentence of banishment, to the West +Indies. The ship lay for a long time, with many others similarly +situated, a helpless prey to the pestilence. Through that terrible +autumn, the prisoners sat waiting for the summons of the ghastly +Destroyer; and, from their floating dungeon. + + "Heard the groan + Of agonizing ships from shore to shore; + Heard nightly plunged beneath the sullen wave + The frequent corse." + +When the vessel at length set sail, of the fifty-four who went on board, +twenty-seven only were living. A Dutch privateer captured her, when two +days out, and carried the prisoners to North Holland, where they were set +at liberty. The condition of the jails in the city, where were large +numbers of Quakers, was dreadful in the extreme. Ill ventilated, +crowded, and loathsome with the accumulated filth of centuries, they +invited the disease which daily decimated their cells. "Go on!" says +Pennington, writing to the King and bishops from his plague-infected cell +in the Aylesbury prison: "try it out with the Spirit of the Lord! Come +forth with your laws, and prisons, and spoiling of goods, and banishment, +and death, if the Lord please, and see if ye can carry it! Whom the Lord +loveth He can save at His pleasure. Hath He begun to break our bonds and +deliver us, and shall we now distrust Him? Are we in a worse condition +than Israel was when the sea was before them, the mountains on either +side, and the Egyptians behind, pursuing them?" + +Brave men and faithful! It is not necessary that the present generation, +how quietly reaping the fruit of your heroic endurance, should see eye to +eye with you in respect to all your testimonies and beliefs, in order to +recognize your claim to gratitude and admiration. For, in an age of +hypocritical hollowness and mean self-seeking, when, with noble +exceptions, the very Puritans of Cromwell's Reign of the Saints were +taking profane lessons from their old enemies, and putting on an outside +show of conformity, for the sake of place or pardon, ye maintained the +austere dignity of virtue, and, with King and Church and Parliament +arrayed against you, vindicated the Rights of Conscience, at the cost of +home, fortune, and life. English liberty owes more to your unyielding +firmness than to the blows stricken for her at Worcester and Naseby. + +In 1667, we find the Latin teacher in attendance at a great meeting of +Friends, in London, convened at the suggestion of George Fox, for the +purpose of settling a little difficulty which had arisen among the +Friends, even under the pressure of the severest persecution, relative to +the very important matter of "wearing the hat." George Fox, in his love +of truth and sincerity in word and action, had discountenanced the +fashionable doffing of the hat, and other flattering obeisances towards +men holding stations in Church or State, as savoring of man-worship, +giving to the creature the reverence only due to the Creator, as +undignified and wanting in due self-respect, and tending to support +unnatural and oppressive distinctions among those equal in the sight of +God. But some of his disciples evidently made much more of this "hat +testimony" than their teacher. One John Perrott, who had just returned +from an unsuccessful attempt to convert the Pope, at Rome, (where that +dignitary, after listening to his exhortations, and finding him in no +condition to be benefited by the spiritual physicians of the Inquisition, +had quietly turned him over to the temporal ones of the Insane Hospital,) +had broached the doctrine that, in public or private worship, the hat was +not to be taken off, without an immediate revelation or call to do so! +Ellwood himself seems to have been on the point of yielding to this +notion, which appears to have been the occasion of a good deal of +dissension and scandal. Under these circumstances, to save truth from +reproach, and an important testimony to the essential equality of mankind +from running into sheer fanaticism, Fox summoned his tried and faithful +friends together, from all parts of the United Kingdom, and, as it +appears, with the happiest result. Hat-revelations were discountenanced, +good order and harmony reestablished, and John Perrott's beaver and the +crazy head under it were from thenceforth powerless for evil. Let those +who are disposed to laugh at this notable "Ecumenical Council of the Hat" +consider that ecclesiastical history has brought down to us the records +of many larger and more imposing convocations, wherein grave bishops and +learned fathers took each other by the beard upon matters of far less +practical importance. + +In 1669, we find Ellwood engaged in escorting his fair friend, Gulielma, +to her uncle's residence in Sussex. Passing through London, and taking +the Tunbridge road, they stopped at Seven Oak to dine. The Duke of York +was on the road, with his guards and hangers-on, and the inn was filled +with a rude company. "Hastening," says Ellwood, "from a place where we +found nothing but rudeness, the roysterers who swarmed there, besides the +damning oaths they belched out against each other, looked very sourly +upon us, as if they grudged us the horses which we rode and the clothes +we wore." They had proceeded but a little distance, when they were +overtaken by some half dozen drunken rough-riding cavaliers, of the +Wildrake stamp, in full pursuit after the beautiful Quakeress. One of +them impudently attempted to pull her upon his horse before him, but was +held at bay by Ellwood, who seems, on this occasion, to have relied +somewhat upon his "stick," in defending his fair charge. Calling up +Gulielma's servant, he bade him ride on one side of his mistress, while +he guarded her on the other. "But he," says Ellwood, "not thinking it +perhaps decent to ride so near his mistress, left room enough for another +to ride between." In dashed the drunken retainer, and Gulielma was once +more in peril. It was clearly no time for exhortations and +expostulations; "so," says Ellwood, "I chopped in upon him, by a nimble +turn, and kept him at bay. I told him I had hitherto spared him, but +wished him not to provoke me further. This I spoke in such a tone as +bespoke an high resentment of the abuse put upon us, and withal pressed +him so hard with my horse that I suffered him not to come up again to +Guli." By this time, it became evident to the companions of the +ruffianly assailant that the young Quaker was in earnest, and they +hastened to interfere. "For they," says Ellwood, "seeing the contest +rise so high, and probably fearing it would rise higher, not knowing +where it might stop, came in to part us; which they did by taking him +away." + +Escaping from these sons of Belial, Ellwood and his fair companion rode +on through Tunbridge Wells, "the street thronged with men, who looked +very earnestly at them, but offered them no affront," and arrived, late +at night, in a driving rain, at the mansion-house of Herbert Springette. +The fiery old gentleman was so indignant at the insult offered to his +niece, that he was with difficulty dissuaded from demanding satisfaction +at the hands of the Duke of York. + +This seems to have been his last ride with Gulielma. She was soon after +married to William Penn, and took up her abode at Worminghurst, in +Sussex. How blessed and beautiful was that union may be understood from +the following paragraph of a letter, written by her husband, on the eve +of his departure for America to lay the foundations of a Christian +colony:-- + + "My dear wife! remember thou wast the love of my youth, and much the + joy of my life, the most beloved as well as the most worthy of all + my earthly comforts; and the reason of that love was more thy inward + than thy outward excellences, which yet were many. God knows, and + thou knowest it, I can say it was a match of Providence's making; + and God's image in us both was the first thing and the most amiable + and engaging ornament in our eyes." + +About this time our friend Thomas, seeing that his old playmate at +Chalfont was destined for another, turned his attention towards a "young +Friend, named Mary Ellis." He had been for several years acquainted with +her, but now he "found his heart secretly drawn and inclining towards +her." "At length," he tells us, "as I was sitting all alone, waiting +upon the Lord for counsel and guidance in this, in itself and to me, +important affair, I felt a word sweetly arise in me, as if I had heard a +Voice which said, Go, and prevail! and faith springing in my heart at the +word, I immediately rose and went, nothing doubting." On arriving at her +residence, he states that he "solemnly opened his mind to her, which was +a great surprisal to her, for she had taken in an apprehension, as others +had also done," that his eye had been fixed elsewhere and nearer home. +"I used not many words to her," he continues, "but I felt a Divine Power +went along with the words, and fixed the matter expressed by them so fast +in her breast, that, as she afterwards acknowledged to me, she could not +shut it out." + +"I continued," he says, "my visits to my best-beloved Friend until we +married, which was on the 28th day of the eighth month, 1669. We took +each other in a select meeting of the ancient and grave Friends of that +country. A very solemn meeting it was, and in a weighty frame of spirit +we were." His wife seems to have had some estate; and Ellwood, with that +nice sense of justice which marked all his actions, immediately made his +will, securing to her, in case of his decease, all her own goods and +moneys, as well as all that he had himself acquired before marriage. +"Which," he tells, "was indeed but little, yet, by all that little, more +than I had ever given her ground to expect with me." His father, who was +yet unreconciled to the son's religious views, found fault with his +marriage, on the ground that it was unlawful and unsanctioned by priest +or liturgy, and consequently refused to render him any pecuniary +assistance. Yet, in spite of this and other trials, he seems to have +preserved his serenity of spirit. After an unpleasant interview with his +father, on one occasion, he wrote, at his lodgings in an inn, in London, +what he calls _A Song of Praise_. An extract from it will serve to show +the spirit of the good man in affliction:-- + + "Unto the Glory of Thy Holy Name, + Eternal God! whom I both love and fear, + I hereby do declare, I never came + Before Thy throne, and found Thee loath to hear, + But always ready with an open ear; + And, though sometimes Thou seem'st Thy face to hide, + As one that had withdrawn his love from me, + 'T is that my faith may to the full, be tried, + And that I thereby may the better see + How weak I am when not upheld by Thee!" + +The next year, 1670, an act of Parliament, in relation to "Conventicles," +provided that any person who should be present at any meeting, under +color or pretence of any exercise of religion, in other manner than +according to the liturgy and practice of the Church of England, "should +be liable to fines of from five to ten shillings; and any person +preaching at or giving his house for the meeting, to a fine of twenty +pounds: one third of the fines being received by the informer or +informers." As a natural consequence of such a law, the vilest +scoundrels in the land set up the trade of informers and heresy-hunters. +Wherever a dissenting meeting or burial took place, there was sure to be +a mercenary spy, ready to bring a complaint against all in attendance. +The Independents and Baptists ceased, in a great measure, to hold public +meetings, yet even they did not escape prosecution. Bunyan, for +instance, in these days, was dreaming, like another Jacob, of angels +ascending and descending, in Bedford prison. But upon the poor Quakers +fell, as usual, the great force of the unjust enactment. Some of these +spies or informers, men of sharp wit, close countenances, pliant tempers, +and skill in dissimulation, took the guise of Quakers, Independents, or +Baptists, as occasion required, thrusting themselves into the meetings of +the proscribed sects, ascertaining the number who attended, their rank +and condition, and then informing against them. Ellwood, in his Journal +for 1670, describes several of these emissaries of evil. One of them +came to a Friend's house, in Bucks, professing to be a brother in the +faith, but, overdoing his counterfeit Quakerism, was detected and +dismissed by his host. Betaking himself to the inn, he appeared in his +true character, drank and swore roundly, and confessed over his cups that +he had been sent forth on his mission by the Rev. Dr. Mew, Vice- +Chancellor of Oxford. Finding little success in counterfeiting +Quakerism, he turned to the Baptists, where, for a time, he met with +better success. Ellwood, at this time, rendered good service to his +friends, by exposing the true character of these wretches, and bringing +them to justice for theft, perjury, and other misdemeanors. + +While this storm of persecution lasted, (a period of two or three years,) +the different dissenting sects felt, in some measure, a common sympathy, +and, while guarding themselves against their common foe, had little +leisure for controversy with each other; but, as was natural, the +abatement of their mutual suffering and danger was the signal for +renewing their suspended quarrels. The Baptists fell upon the Quakers, +with pamphlet and sermon; the latter replied in the same way. One of the +most conspicuous of the Baptist disputants was the famous Jeremy Ives, +with whom our friend Ellwood seems to have had a good deal of trouble. +"His name," says Ellwood, "was up for a topping Disputant. He was well, +read in the fallacies of logic, and was ready in framing syllogisms. His +chief art lay in tickling the humor of rude, unlearned, and injudicious +hearers." + +The following piece of Ellwood's, entitled "An Epitaph for Jeremy Ives," +will serve to show that wit and drollery were sometimes found even among +the proverbially sober Quakers of the seventeenth century:-- + + "Beneath this stone, depressed, doth lie + The Mirror of Hypocrisy-- + Ives, whose mercenary tongue + Like a Weathercock was hung, + And did this or that way play, + As Advantage led the way. + If well hired, he would dispute, + Otherwise he would be mute. + But he'd bawl for half a day, + If he knew and liked his pay. + + "For his person, let it pass; + Only note his face was brass. + His heart was like a pumice-stone, + And for Conscience he had none. + Of Earth and Air he was composed, + With Water round about enclosed. + Earth in him had greatest share, + Questionless, his life lay there; + Thence his cankered Envy sprung, + Poisoning both his heart and tongue. + + "Air made him frothy, light, and vain, + And puffed him with a proud disdain. + Into the Water oft he went, + And through the Water many sent + That was, ye know, his element! + The greatest odds that did appear + Was this, for aught that I can hear, + That he in cold did others dip, + But did himself hot water sip. + + "And his cause he'd never doubt, + If well soak'd o'er night in Stout; + But, meanwhile, he must not lack + Brandy and a draught of Sack. + One dispute would shrink a bottle + Of three pints, if not a pottle. + One would think he fetched from thence + All his dreamy eloquence. + + "Let us now bring back the Sot + To his Aqua Vita pot, + And observe, with some content, + How he framed his argument. + That his whistle he might wet, + The bottle to his mouth he set, + And, being Master of that Art, + Thence he drew the Major part, + But left the Minor still behind; + Good reason why, he wanted wind; + If his breath would have held out, + He had Conclusion drawn, no doubt." + +The residue of Ellwood's life seems to have glided on in serenity and +peace. He wrote, at intervals, many pamphlets in defence of his Society, +and in favor of Liberty of Conscience. At his hospitable residence, the +leading spirits of the sect were warmly welcomed. George Fox and William +Penn seem to have been frequent guests. We find that, in 1683, he was +arrested for seditious publications, when on the eve of hastening to his +early friend, Gulielma, who, in the absence of her husband, Governor +Penn, had fallen dangerously ill. On coming before the judge, "I told +him," says Ellwood, "that I had that morning received an express out of +Sussex, that William Penn's wife (with whom I had an intimate +acquaintance and strict friendship, _ab ipsis fere incunabilis_, at +least, _a teneris unguiculis_) lay now ill, not without great danger, and +that she had expressed her desire that I would come to her as soon as I +could." The judge said "he was very sorry for Madam Penn's illness," of +whose virtues he spoke very highly, but not more than was her due. Then +he told me, "that, for her sake, he would do what he could to further my +visit to her." Escaping from the hands of the law, he visited his +friend, who was by this time in a way of recovery, and, on his return, +learned that the prosecution had been abandoned. + +At about this date his narrative ceases. We learn, from other sources, +that he continued to write and print in defence of his religious views up +to the year of his death, which took place in 1713. One of his +productions, a poetical version of the Life of David, may be still met +with, in the old Quaker libraries. On the score of poetical merit, it is +about on a level with Michael Drayton's verses on the same subject. As +the history of one of the firm confessors of the old struggle for +religious freedom, of a genial-hearted and pleasant scholar, the friend +of Penn and Milton, and the suggester of Paradise Regained, we trust our +hurried sketch has not been altogether without interest; and that, +whatever may be the religious views of our readers, they have not failed +to recognize a good and true man in Thomas Ellwood. + + + + +JAMES NAYLER. + + "You will here read the true story of that much injured, ridiculed + man, James Nayler; what dreadful sufferings, with what patience he + endured, even to the boring of the tongue with hot irons, without a + murmur; and with what strength of mind, when the delusion he had + fallen into, which they stigmatized as blasphemy, had given place to + clearer thoughts, he could renounce his error in a strain of the + beautifullest humility."--Essays of Elia. + +"Would that Carlyle could now try his hand at the English Revolution!" +was our exclamation, on laying down the last volume of his remarkable +History of the French Revolution with its brilliant and startling word- +pictures still flashing before us. To some extent this wish has been +realized in the Letters and Speeches of Oliver Cromwell. Yet we confess +that the perusal of these volumes has disappointed us. Instead of giving +himself free scope, as in his French Revolution, and transferring to his +canvas all the wild and ludicrous, the terrible and beautiful phases of +that moral phenomenon, he has here concentrated all his artistic skill +upon a single figure, whom he seems to have regarded as the embodiment +and hero of the great event. All else on his canvas is subordinated to +the grim image of the colossal Puritan. Intent upon presenting him as +the fitting object of that "hero-worship," which, in its blind admiration +and adoration of mere abstract Power, seems to us at times nothing less +than devil-worship, he dwarfs, casts into the shadow, nay, in some +instances caricatures and distorts, the figures which surround him. To +excuse Cromwell in his usurpation, Henry Vane, one of those exalted and +noble characters, upon whose features the lights held by historical +friends or foes detect no blemish, is dismissed with a sneer and an +utterly unfounded imputation of dishonesty. To reconcile, in some +degree, the discrepancy between the declarations of Cromwell, in behalf +of freedom of conscience, and that mean and cruel persecution which the +Quakers suffered under the Protectorate, the generally harmless +fanaticism of a few individuals bearing that name is gravely urged. Nay, +the fact that some weak-brained enthusiasts undertook to bring about the +millennium, by associating together, cultivating the earth, and "dibbling +beans" for the New Jerusalem market, is regarded by our author as the +"germ of Quakerism;" and furnishes an occasion for sneering at "my poor +friend Dryasdust, lamentably tearing his hair over the intolerance of +that old time to Quakerism and such like." + +The readers of this (with all its faults) powerfully written Biography +cannot fail to have been impressed with the intensely graphic description +(Part I., vol. ii., pp. 184, 185) of the entry of the poor fanatic, +James Nayler, and his forlorn and draggled companions into Bristol. +Sadly ludicrous is it; affecting us like the actual sight of tragic +insanity enacting its involuntary comedy, and making us smile through our +tears. + +In another portion of the work, a brief account is given of the trial and +sentence of Nayler, also in the serio-comic view; and the poor man is +dismissed with the simple intimation, that after his punishment he +"repented, and confessed himself mad." It was no part of the author's +business, we are well aware, to waste time and words upon the history of +such a man as Nayler; he was of no importance to him, otherwise than as +one of the disturbing influences in the government of the Lord Protector. +But in our mind the story of James Nayler has always been one of +interest; and in the belief that it will prove so to others, who, like +Charles Lamb, can appreciate the beautiful humility of a forgiven spirit, +we have taken some pains to collect and embody the facts of it. + +James Nayler was born in the parish of Ardesley, in Yorkshire, 1616. His +father was a substantial farmer, of good repute and competent estate and +be, in consequence, received a good education: At the age of twenty-two, +he married and removed to Wakefield parish, which has since been made +classic ground by the pen of Goldsmith. Here, an honest, God-fearing +farmer, he tilled his soil, and alternated between cattle-markets and +Independent conventicles. In 1641, he obeyed the summons of "my Lord +Fairfax" and the Parliament, and joined a troop of horse composed of +sturdy Independents, doing such signal service against "the man of +Belial, Charles Stuart," that he was promoted to the rank of +quartermaster, in which capacity he served under General Lambert, in his +Scottish campaign. Disabled at length by sickness, he was honorably +dismissed from the service, and returned to his family in 1649. + +For three or four years, he continued to attend the meetings of the +Independents, as a zealous and devout member. But it so fell out, that +in the winter of 1651, George Fox, who had just been released from a +cruel imprisonment in Derby jail, felt a call to set his face towards +Yorkshire. "So travelling," says Fox, in his Journal, "through the +countries, to several places, preaching Repentance and the Word of Life, +I came into the parts about Wakefield, where James Navler lived." The +worn and weary soldier, covered with the scars of outward battle, +received, as he believed, in the cause of God and his people, against +Antichrist and oppression, welcomed with thankfulness the veteran of +another warfare; who, in conflict with a principalities and powers, and +spiritual wickedness in high places, had made his name a familiar one in +every English hamlet. "He and Thomas Goodyear," says Fox, "came to me, +and were both convinced, and received the truth." He soon after joined +the Society of Friends. In the spring of the next year he was in his +field following his plough, and meditating, as he was wont, on the great +questions of life and duty, when he seemed to hear a voice bidding him go +out from his kindred and his father's house, with an assurance that the +Lord would be with him, while laboring in his service. Deeply impressed, +he left his employment, and, returning to his house, made immediate +preparations for a journey. But hesitation and doubt followed; he became +sick from anxiety of mind, and his recovery, for a time, was exceedingly +doubtful. On his restoration to bodily health, he obeyed what he +regarded as a clear intimation of duty, and went forth a preacher of the +doctrines he had embraced. The Independent minister of the society to +which he had formerly belonged sent after him the story that he was the +victim of sorcery; that George Fox carried with him a bottle, out of +which he made people drink; and that the draught had the power to change +a Presbyterian or Independent into a Quaker at once; that, in short, the +Arch-Quaker, Fox, was a wizard, and could be seen at the same moment of +time riding on the same black horse, in two places widely separated. He +had scarcely commenced his exhortations, before the mob, excited by such +stories, assailed him. In the early summer of the year we hear of him in +Appleby jail. On his release, he fell in company with George Fox. At +Walney Island, he was furiously assaulted, and beaten with clubs and +stones; the poor priest-led fishermen being fully persuaded that they +were dealing with a wizard. The spirit of the man, under these +circumstances, may be seen in the following extract from a letter to his +friends, dated at "Killet, in Lancashire, the 30th of 8th Month, 1652:"-- + +"Dear friends! Dwell in patience, and wait upon the Lord, who will do +his own work. Look not at man who is in the work, nor at any man +opposing it; but rest in the will of the Lord, that so ye may be +furnished with patience, both to do and to suffer what ye shall be called +unto, that your end in all things may be His praise. Meet often +together; take heed of what exalteth itself above its brother; but keep +low, and serve one another in love." + +Laboring thus, interrupted only by persecution, stripes, and +imprisonment, he finally came to London, and spoke with great power and +eloquence in the meetings of Friends in that city. Here he for the first +time found himself surrounded by admiring and sympathizing friends. He +saw and rejoiced in the fruits of his ministry. Profane and drunken +cavaliers, intolerant Presbyters, and blind Papists, owned the truths +which he uttered, and counted themselves his disciples. Women, too, in +their deep trustfulness and admiring reverence, sat at the feet of the +eloquent stranger. Devout believers in the doctrine of the inward light +and manifestation of God in the heart of man, these latter, at length, +thought they saw such unmistakable evidences of the true life in James +Nayler, that they felt constrained to declare that Christ was, in an +especial manner, within him, and to call upon all to recognize in +reverent adoration this new incarnation of the divine and heavenly. The +wild enthusiasm of his disciples had its effect on the teacher. Weak in +body, worn with sickness, fasting, stripes, and prison-penance, and +naturally credulous and imaginative, is it strange that in some measure +he yielded to this miserable delusion? Let those who would harshly judge +him, or ascribe his fall to the peculiar doctrines of his sect, think of +Luther, engaged in personal combat with the Devil, or conversing with him +on points of theology in his bed-chamber; or of Bunyan at actual +fisticuffs with the adversary; or of Fleetwood and Vane and Harrison +millennium-mad, and making preparations for an earthly reign of King +Jesus. It was an age of intense religious excitement. Fanaticism had +become epidemic. Cromwell swayed his Parliaments by "revelations" and +Scripture phrases in the painted chamber; stout generals and sea-captains +exterminated the Irish, and swept Dutch navies from the ocean, with old +Jewish war-cries, and hymns of Deborah and Miriam; country justices +charged juries in Hebraisms, and cited the laws of Palestine oftener than +those of England. Poor Nayler found himself in the very midst of this +seething and confused moral maelstrom. He struggled against it for a +time, but human nature was weak; he became, to use his own words, +"bewildered and darkened," and the floods went over him. + +Leaving London with some of his more zealous followers, not without +solemn admonition and rebuke from Francis Howgill and Edward Burrough, +who at that period were regarded as the most eminent and gifted of the +Society's ministers, he bent his steps towards Exeter. Here, in +consequence of the extravagance of his language and that of his +disciples, he was arrested and thrown into prison. Several infatuated +women surrounded the jail, declaring that "Christ was in prison," and on +being admitted to see him, knelt down and kissed his feet, exclaiming, +"Thy name shall be no more called James Nayler, but Jesus!" Let us pity +him and them. They, full of grateful and extravagant affection for the +man whose voice had called them away from worldly vanities to what they +regarded as eternal realities, whose hand they imagined had for them +swung back the pearl gates of the celestial city, and flooded their +atmosphere with light from heaven; he, receiving their homage (not as +offered to a poor, weak, sinful Yorkshire trooper, but rather to the +hidden man of the heart, the "Christ within" him) with that self- +deceiving humility which is but another name for spiritual pride. +Mournful, yet natural; such as is still in greater or less degree +manifested between the Catholic enthusiast and her confessor; such as the +careful observer may at times take note of in our Protestant revivals and +camp meetings. + +How Nayler was released from Exeter jail does not appear, but the next we +hear of him is at Bristol, in the fall of the year. His entrance into +that city shows the progress which he and his followers had made in the +interval. Let us look at Carlyle's description of it: "A procession of +eight persons one, a man on horseback riding single, the others, men and +women partly riding double, partly on foot, in the muddiest highway in +the wettest weather; singing, all but the single rider, at whose bridle +walk and splash two women, 'Hosannah! Holy, holy! Lord God of Sabaoth,' +and other things, 'in a buzzing tone,' which the impartial hearer could +not make out. The single rider is a raw-boned male figure, 'with lank +hair reaching below his cheeks,' hat drawn close over his brows, 'nose +rising slightly in the middle,' of abstruse 'down look,' and large +dangerous jaws strictly closed: he sings not, sits there covered, and is +sung to by the others bare. Amid pouring deluges and mud knee-deep, 'so +that the rain ran in at their necks and vented it at their hose and +breeches: 'a spectacle to the West of England and posterity! Singing as +above; answering no question except in song. From Bedminster to +Ratcliffgate, along the streets to the High Cross of Bristol: at the High +Cross they are laid hold of by the authorities: turn out to be James +Nayler and Company." + +Truly, a more pitiful example of "hero-worship" is not well to be +conceived of. Instead of taking the rational view of it, however, and +mercifully shutting up the actors in a mad-house, the authorities of that +day, conceiving it to be a stupendous blasphemy, and themselves God's +avengers in the matter, sent Nayler under strong guard up to London, to +be examined before the Parliament. After long and tedious examinations +and cross-questionings, and still more tedious debates, some portion of +which, not uninstructive to the reader, may still be found in Burton's +Diary, the following horrible resolution was agreed upon:-- + +"That James Nayler be set in the pillory, with his head in the pillory in +the Palace Yard, Westminster, during the space of two hours on Thursday +next; and be whipped by the hangman through the streets from Westminster +to the Old Exchange, and there, likewise, be set in the pillory, with his +head in the pillory for the space of two hours, between eleven and one, +on Saturday next, in each place wearing a paper containing a description +of his crimes; and that at the Old Exchange his tongue be bored through +with a hot iron, and that he be there stigmatized on the forehead with +the letter 'B;' and that he be afterwards sent to Bristol, to be conveyed +into and through the said city on horseback with his face backward, and +there, also, publicly whipped the next market-day after he comes thither; +that from thence he be committed to prison in Bridewell, London, and +there restrained from the society of people, and there to labor hard +until he shall be released by Parliament; and during that time be +debarred the use of pen, ink, and paper, and have no relief except what +he earns by his daily labor." + +Such, neither more nor less, was, in the opinion of Parliament, required +on their part to appease the divine vengeance. The sentence was +pronounced on the 17th of the twelfth month; the entire time of the +Parliament for the two months previous having been occupied with the +case. The Presbyterians in that body were ready enough to make the most +of an offence committed by one who had been an Independent; the +Independents, to escape the stigma of extenuating the crimes of one of +their quondam brethren, vied with their antagonists in shrieking over the +atrocity of Nayler's blasphemy, and in urging its severe punishment. +Here and there among both classes were men disposed to leniency, and more +than one earnest plea was made for merciful dealing with a man whose +reason was evidently unsettled, and who was, therefore, a fitting object +of compassion; whose crime, if it could indeed be called one, was +evidently the result of a clouded intellect, and not of wilful intention +of evil. On the other hand, many were in favor of putting him to death +as a sort of peace-offering to the clergy, who, as a matter of course, +were greatly scandalized by Nayler's blasphemy, and still more by the +refusal of his sect to pay tithes, or recognize their divine commission. + +Nayler was called into the Parliament-house to receive his sentence. +"I do not know mine offence," he said mildly. "You shall know it," said +Sir Thomas Widrington, "by your sentence." When the sentence was read, +he attempted to speak, but was silenced. "I pray God," said Nayler, +"that he may not lay this to your charge." + +The next day, the 18th of the twelfth month, he stood in the pillory two +hours, in the chill winter air, and was then stripped and scourged by the +hangman at the tail of a cart through the streets. Three hundred and ten +stripes were inflicted; his back and arms were horribly cut and mangled, +and his feet crushed and bruised by the feet of horses treading on him in +the crowd. He bore all with uncomplaining patience; but was so far +exhausted by his sufferings, that it was found necessary to postpone the +execution of the residue of the sentence for one week. The terrible +severity of his sentence, and his meek endurance of it, had in the mean +time powerfully affected many of the humane and generous of all classes +in the city; and a petition for the remission of the remaining part of +the penalty was numerously signed and presented to Parliament. A debate +ensued upon it, but its prayer was rejected. Application was then made +to Cromwell, who addressed a letter to the Speaker of the House, +inquiring into the affair, protesting an "abhorrence and detestation of +giving or occasioning the least countenance to such opinions and +practices" as were imputed to Nayler; "yet we, being intrusted in the +present government on behalf of the people of these nations, and not +knowing how far such proceeding entered into wholly without us may extend +in the consequence of it, do hereby desire the House may let us know the +grounds and reasons whereon they have proceeded." From this, it is not +unlikely that the Protector might have been disposed to clemency, and to +look with a degree of charity upon the weakness and errors of one of his +old and tried soldiers who had striven like a brave man, as he was, for +the rights and liberties of Englishmen; but the clergy here interposed, +and vehemently, in the name of God and His Church, demanded that the +executioner should finish his work. Five of the most eminent of them, +names well known in the Protectorate, Caryl, Manton, Nye, Griffith, and +Reynolds, were deputed by Parliament to visit the mangled prisoner. A +reasonable request was made, that some impartial person might be present, +that justice might be done Nayler in the report of his answers. This was +refused. It was, however, agreed that the conversation should be written +down and a copy of it left with the jailer. He was asked if he was sorry +for his blasphemies. He said he did not know to what blasphemies they +alluded; that he did believe in Jesus Christ; that He had taken up His +dwelling in his own heart, and for the testimony of Him he now suffered. +"I believe," said one of the ministers, "in a Christ who was never in any +man's heart." "I know no such Christ," rejoined the prisoner; "the +Christ I witness to fills Heaven and Earth, and dwells in the hearts of +all true believers." On being asked why he allowed the women to adore +and worship him, he said he "denied bowing to the creature; but if they +beheld the power of Christ, wherever it was, and bowed to it, he could +not resist it, or say aught against it." + +After some further parley, the reverend visitors grew angry, threw the +written record of the conversation in the fire, and left the prison, to +report the prisoner incorrigible. + +On the 27th of the month, he was again led out of his cell and placed +upon the pillory. Thousands of citizens were gathered around, many of +them earnestly protesting against the extreme cruelty of his punishment. +Robert Rich, an influential and honorable merchant, followed him up to +the pillory with expressions of great sympathy, and held him by the hand +while the red-hot iron was pressed through his tongue and the brand was +placed on his forehead. He was next sent to Bristol, and publicly +whipped through the principal streets of that city; and again brought +back to the Bridewell prison, where he remained about two years, shut out +from all intercourse with his fellow-beings. At the expiration of this +period, he was released by order of Parliament. In the solitude of his +cell, the angel of patience had been with him. + +Through the cloud which had so long rested over him, the clear light of +truth shone in upon his spirit; the weltering chaos of a disordered +intellect settled into the calm peace of a reconciliation with God and +man. His first act on leaving prison was to visit Bristol, the scene of +his melancholy fall. There he publicly confessed his errors, in the +eloquent earnestness of a contrite spirit, humbled in view of the past, +yet full of thanksgiving and praise for the great boon of forgiveness. A +writer who was present says, the "assembly was tendered, and broken into +tears; there were few dry eyes, and many were bowed in their minds." + +In a paper which he published soon after, he acknowledges his lamentable +delusion. "Condemned forever," he says, "be all those false worships +with which any have idolized my person in that Night of my Temptation, +when the Power of Darkness was above rue; all that did in any way tend to +dishonor the Lord, or draw the minds of any from the measure of Christ +Jesus in themselves, to look at flesh, which is as grass, or to ascribe +that to the visible which belongs to Him. Darkness came over me +through want of watchfulness and obedience to the pure Eye of God. I was +taken captive from the true light; I was walking in the Night, as a +wandering bird fit for a prey. And if the Lord of all my mercies had not +rescued me, I had perished; for I was as one appointed to death and +destruction, and there was none to deliver me." + +"It is in my heart to confess to God, and before men, my folly and +offence in that day; yet there were many things formed against me in +that day, to take away my life and bring scandal upon the truth, of +which I was not guilty at all." "The provocation of that Time of +Temptation was exceeding great against the Lord, yet He left me not; for +when Darkness was above, and the Adversary so prevailed that all things +were turned and perverted against my right seeing, hearing, or +understanding, only a secret hope and faith I had in my God, whom I had +served, that He would bring me through it and to the end of it, and that +I should again see the day of my redemption from under it all,--this +quieted my soul in its greatest tribulation." He concludes his +confession with these words: "He who hath saved my soul from death, who +hath lifted my feet up out of the pit, even to Him be glory forever; and +let every troubled soul trust in Him, for his mercy endureth forever!" + +Among his papers, written soon after his release, is a remarkable prayer, +or rather thanksgiving. The limit I have prescribed to myself will only +allow me to copy an extract:-- + +"It is in my heart to praise Thee, O my God! Let me never forget Thee, +what Thou hast been to me in the night, by Thy presence in my hour of +trial, when I was beset in darkness, when I was cast out as a wandering +bird; when I was assaulted with strong temptations, then Thy presence, in +secret, did preserve me, and in a low state I felt Thee near me; when my +way was through the sea, when I passed under the mountains, there wast +Thou present with me; when the weight of the hills was upon me, Thou +upheldest me. Thou didst fight, on my part, when I wrestled with death; +when darkness would have shut me up, Thy light shone about me; when my +work was in the furnace, and I passed through the fire, by Thee I was not +consumed; when I beheld the dreadful visions, and was among the fiery +spirits, Thy faith staid me, else through fear I had fallen. I saw Thee, +and believed, so that the enemy could not prevail." After speaking of +his humiliation and sufferings, which Divine Mercy had overruled for his +spiritual good, he thus concludes: "Thou didst lift me out from the pit, +and set me forth in the sight of my enemies; Thou proclaimedst liberty to +the captive; Thou calledst my acquaintances near me; they to whom I had +been a wonder looked upon me; and in Thy love I obtained favor with those +who had deserted me. Then did gladness swallow up sorrow, and I forsook +my troubles; and I said, How good is it that man be proved in the night, +that he may know his folly, that every mouth may become silent, until +Thou makest man known unto himself, and has slain the boaster, and shown +him the vanity which vexeth Thy spirit." + +All honor to the Quakers of that day, that, at the risk of +misrepresentation and calumny, they received back to their communion +their greatly erring, but deeply repentant, brother. His life, ever +after, was one of self-denial and jealous watchfulness over himself,-- +blameless and beautiful in its humility and lowly charity. + +Thomas Ellwood, in his autobiography for the year 1659, mentions Nayler, +whom he met in company with Edward Burrough at the house of Milton's +friend, Pennington. Ellwood's father held a discourse with the two +Quakers on their doctrine of free and universal grace. "James Nailer," +says Ellwood, "handled the subject with so much perspicuity and clear +demonstration, that his reasoning seemed to be irresistible. As for +Edward Burrough, he was a brisk young Man, of a ready Tongue, and might +have been for aught I then knew, a Scholar, which made me less admire his +Way of Reasoning. But what dropt from James Nailer had the greater Force +upon me, because he lookt like a simple Countryman, having the appearance +of an Husbandman or Shepherd." + +In the latter part of the eighth month, 1660, he left London on foot, to +visit his wife and children in Wakefield. As he journeyed on, the sense +of a solemn change about to take place seemed with him; the shadow of the +eternal world fell over him. As he passed through Huntingdon, a friend +who saw him describes him as "in an awful and weighty frame of mind, as +if he had been redeemed from earth, and a stranger on it, seeking a +better home and inheritance." A few miles beyond the town, he was found, +in the dusk of the evening, very ill, and was taken to the house of a +friend, who lived not far distant. He died shortly after, expressing his +gratitude for the kindness of his attendants, and invoking blessings upon +them. About two hours before his death, he spoke to the friend at his +bedside these remarkable words, solemn as eternity, and beautiful as the +love which fills it:-- + +"There is a spirit which I feel which delights to do no evil, nor to +avenge any wrong; but delights to endure all things, in hope to enjoy its +own in the end; its hope is to outlive all wrath and contention, and to +weary out all exultation and cruelty, or whatever is of a nature contrary +to itself. It sees to the end of all temptations; as it bears no evil in +itself, so it conceives none in thought to any other: if it be betrayed, +it bears it, for its ground and spring is the mercy and forgiveness of +God. Its crown is meekness; its life is everlasting love unfeigned; it +takes its kingdom with entreaty, and not with contention, and keeps it by +lowliness of mind. In God alone it can rejoice, though none else regard +it, or can own its life. It is conceived in sorrow, and brought forth +with none to pity it; nor doth it murmur at grief and oppression. It +never rejoiceth but through sufferings, for with the world's joy it is +murdered. I found it alone, being forsaken. I have fellowship therein +with them who lived in dens and desolate places of the earth, who through +death obtained resurrection and eternal Holy Life." + +So died James Nayler. He was buried in "Thomas Parnell's burying-ground, +at King's Rippon," in a green nook of rural England. Wrong and violence, +and temptation and sorrow, and evil-speaking, could reach him no more. +And in taking leave of him, let us say, with old Joseph Wyeth, where he +touches upon this case in his _Anguis Flagellatus_: "Let none insult, but +take heed lest they also, in the hour of their temptation, do fall away." + + + + +ANDREW MARVELL + + "They who with a good conscience and an upright heart do their civil + duties in the sight of God, and in their several places, to resist + tyranny and the violence of superstition banded both against them, + will never seek to be forgiven that which may justly be attributed + to their immortal praise."--Answer to Eikon Basilike. + +Among, the great names which adorned the Protectorate,--that period of +intense mental activity, when political and religious rights and duties +were thoroughly discussed by strong and earnest statesmen and +theologians,--that of Andrew Marvell, the friend of Milton, and Latin +Secretary of Cromwell, deserves honorable mention. The magnificent prose +of Milton, long neglected, is now perhaps as frequently read as his great +epic; but the writings of his friend and fellow secretary, devoted like +his own to the cause of freedom and the rights of the people, are +scarcely known to the present generation. It is true that Marvell's +political pamphlets were less elaborate and profound than those of the +author of the glorious _Defence of Unlicensed Printing_. He was light, +playful, witty, and sarcastic; he lacked the stern dignity, the terrible +invective, the bitter scorn, the crushing, annihilating retort, the grand +and solemn eloquence, and the devout appeals, which render immortal the +controversial works of Milton. But he, too, has left his foot-prints on +his age; he, too, has written for posterity that which they "will not +willingly let die." As one of the inflexible defenders of English +liberty, sowers of the seed, the fruits of which we are now reaping, he +has a higher claim on the kind regards of this generation than his merits +as a poet, by no means inconsiderable, would warrant. + +Andrew Marvell was born in Kingston-upon-Hull, in 1620. At the age of +eighteen he entered Trinity College, whence he was enticed by the +Jesuits, then actively seeking proselytes. After remaining with them a +short time, his father found him, and brought him back to his studies. +On leaving college, he travelled on the Continent. At Rome he wrote his +first satire, a humorous critique upon Richard Flecknoe, an English +Jesuit and verse writer, whose lines on Silence Charles Lamb quotes in +one of his Essays. It is supposed that he made his first acquaintance +with Milton in Italy. + +At Paris he made the Abbot de Manihan the subject of another satire. The +Abbot pretended to skill in the arts of magic, and used to prognosticate +the fortunes of people from the character of their handwriting. At what +period he returned from his travels we are not aware. It is stated, by +some of his biographers, that he was sent as secretary of a Turkish +mission. In 1653, he was appointed the tutor of Cromwell's nephew; and, +four years after, doubtless through the instrumentality of his friend +Milton, he received the honorable appointment of Latin Secretary of the +Commonwealth. In 1658, he was selected by his townsmen of Hull to +represent them in Parliament. In this service he continued until 1663, +when, notwithstanding his sturdy republican principles, he was appointed +secretary to the Russian embassy. On his return, in 1665, he was again +elected to Parliament, and continued in the public service until the +prorogation of the Parliament of 1675. + +The boldness, the uncompromising integrity and irreproachable consistency +of Marvell, as a statesman, have secured for him the honorable +appellation of "the British Aristides." Unlike too many of his old +associates under the Protectorate, he did not change with the times. He +was a republican in Cromwell's day, and neither threats of assassination, +nor flatteries, nor proffered bribes, could make him anything else in +that of Charles II. He advocated the rights of the people at a time when +patriotism was regarded as ridiculous folly; when a general corruption, +spreading downwards from a lewd and abominable Court, had made +legislation a mere scramble for place and emolument. English history +presents no period so disgraceful as the Restoration. To use the words +of Macaulay, it was "a day of servitude without loyalty and sensuality +without love, of dwarfish talents and gigantic vices, the paradise of +cold hearts and narrow minds, the golden age of the coward, the bigot, +and the slave. The principles of liberty were the scoff of every +grinning courtier, and the Anathema Maranatha of every fawning dean." It +is the peculiar merit of Milton and Marvell, that in such an age they +held fast their integrity, standing up in glorious contrast with clerical +apostates and traitors to the cause of England's liberty. + +In the discharge of his duties as a statesman Marvell was as punctual and +conscientious as our own venerable Apostle of Freedom, John Quincy Adams. +He corresponded every post with his constituents, keeping them fully +apprised of all that transpired at Court or in Parliament. He spoke but +seldom, but his great personal influence was exerted privately upon the +members of the Commons as well as upon the Peers. His wit, accomplished +manners, and literary eminence made him a favorite at the Court itself. +The voluptuous and careless monarch laughed over the biting satire of the +republican poet, and heartily enjoyed his lively conversation. It is +said that numerous advances were made to him by the courtiers of Charles +II., but he was found to be incorruptible. The personal compliments of +the King, the encomiums of Rochester, the smiles and flatteries of the +frail but fair and high-born ladies of the Court; nay, even the golden +offers of the King's treasurer, who, climbing with difficulty to his +obscure retreat on an upper floor of a court in the Strand, laid a +tempting bribe of L1,000 before him, on the very day when he had been +compelled to borrow a guinea, were all lost upon the inflexible patriot. +He stood up manfully, in an age of persecution, for religious liberty, +opposed the oppressive excise, and demanded frequent Parliaments and a +fair representation of the people. + +In 1672, Marvell engaged in a controversy with the famous High-Churchman, +Dr. Parker, who had taken the lead in urging the persecution of Non- +conformists. In one of the works of this arrogant divine, he says that +"it is absolutely necessary to the peace and government of the world that +the supreme magistrate should be vested with power to govern and conduct +the consciences of subjects in affairs of religion. Princes may with +less hazard give liberty to men's vices and debaucheries than to their +consciences." And, speaking of the various sects of Non-conformists, he +counsels princes and legislators that "tenderness and indulgence to such +men is to nourish vipers in their own bowels, and the most sottish +neglect of our quiet and security." Marvell replied to him in a severely +satirical pamphlet, which provoked a reply from the Doctor. Marvell +rejoined, with a rare combination of wit and argument. The effect of his +sarcasm on the Doctor and his supporters may be inferred from an +anonymous note sent him, in which the writer threatens by the eternal God +to cut his throat, if he uttered any more libels upon Dr. Parker. Bishop +Burnet remarks that "Marvell writ in a burlesque strain, but with so +peculiar and so entertaining a conduct 'that from the King down to the +tradesman his books were read with great pleasure, and not only humbled +Parker, but his whole party, for Marvell had all the wits on his side.'" +The Bishop further remarks that Marvell's satire "gave occasion to the +only piece of modesty with which Dr. Parker was ever charged, namely, of +withdrawing from town, and not importuning the press for some years, +since even a face of brass must grow red when it is burnt as his has +been." + +Dean Swift, in commenting upon the usual fate of controversial pamphlets, +which seldom live beyond their generation, says: "There is indeed an +exception, when a great genius undertakes to expose a foolish piece; so +we still read Marvell's answer to Parker with pleasure, though the book +it answers be sunk long ago." + +Perhaps, in the entire compass of our language, there is not to be found +a finer piece of satirical writing than Marvell's famous parody of the +speeches of Charles II., in which the private vices and public +inconsistencies of the King, and his gross violations of his pledges on +coming to the throne, are exposed with the keenest wit and the most +laugh-provoking irony. Charles himself, although doubtless annoyed by +it, could not refrain from joining in the mirth which it excited at his +expense. + +The friendship between Marvell and Milton remained firm and unbroken to +the last. The former exerted himself to save his illustrious friend from +persecution, and omitted no opportunity to defend him as a politician and +to eulogize him as a poet. In 1654 he presented to Cromwell Milton's +noble tract in _Defence of the People of England_, and, in writing to the +author, says of the work, "When I consider how equally it teems and rises +with so many figures, it seems to me a Trajan's column, in whose winding +ascent we see embossed the several monuments of your learned victories." +He was one of the first to appreciate _Paradise Lost_, and to commend it +in some admirable lines. One couplet is exceedingly beautiful, in its +reference to the author's blindness:-- + + "Just Heaven, thee like Tiresias to requite, + Rewards with prophecy thy loss of sight." + +His poems, written in the "snatched leisure" of an active political life, +bear marks of haste, and are very unequal. In the midst of passages of +pastoral description worthy of Milton himself, feeble lines and hackneyed +phrases occur. His _Nymph lamenting the Death of her Fawn_ is a finished +and elaborate piece, full of grace and tenderness. _Thoughts in a +Garden_ will be remembered by the quotations of that exquisite critic, +Charles Lamb. How pleasant is this picture! + + "What wondrous life is this I lead! + Ripe apples drop about my head; + The luscious clusters of the vine + Upon my mouth do crush their wine; + The nectarine and curious peach + Into my hands themselves do reach; + Stumbling on melons as I pass, + Ensnared with flowers, I fall on grass. + + "Here at this fountain's sliding foot, + Or at the fruit-tree's mossy root, + Casting the body's vest aside, + My soul into the boughs does glide. + There like a bird it sits and sings, + And whets and claps its silver wings; + And, till prepared for longer flight, + Waves in its plumes the various light. + + "How well the skilful gard'ner drew + Of flowers and herbs this dial true! + Where, from above, the milder sun + Does through a fragrant zodiac run; + And, as it works, the industrious bee + Computes his time as well as we. + How could such sweet and wholesome hours + Be reckoned but with herbs and flowers!" + + +One of his longer poems, _Appleton House_, contains passages of admirable +description, and many not unpleasing conceits. Witness the following:-- + + "Thus I, an easy philosopher, + Among the birds and trees confer, + And little now to make me wants, + Or of the fowl or of the plants. + Give me but wings, as they, and I + Straight floating on the air shall fly; + Or turn me but, and you shall see + I am but an inverted tree. + Already I begin to call + In their most learned original; + And, where I language want, my signs + The bird upon the bough divines. + No leaf does tremble in the wind, + Which I returning cannot find. + Out of these scattered Sibyl's leaves, + Strange prophecies my fancy weaves: + What Rome, Greece, Palestine, e'er said, + I in this light Mosaic read. + Under this antic cope I move, + Like some great prelate of the grove; + Then, languishing at ease, I toss + On pallets thick with velvet moss; + While the wind, cooling through the boughs, + Flatters with air my panting brows. + Thanks for my rest, ye mossy banks! + And unto you, cool zephyrs, thanks! + Who, as my hair, my thoughts too shed, + And winnow from the chaff my head. + How safe, methinks, and strong behind + These trees have I encamped my mind!" + +Here is a picture of a piscatorial idler and his trout stream, worthy of +the pencil of Izaak Walton:-- + + "See in what wanton harmless folds + It everywhere the meadow holds: + Where all things gaze themselves, and doubt + If they be in it or without; + And for this shade, which therein shines + Narcissus-like, the sun too pines. + Oh! what a pleasure 't is to hedge + My temples here in heavy sedge; + Abandoning my lazy side, + Stretched as a bank unto the tide; + Or, to suspend my sliding foot + On the osier's undermining root, + And in its branches tough to hang, + While at my lines the fishes twang." + +A little poem of Marvell's, which he calls Eyes and Tears, has the +following passages:-- + + "How wisely Nature did agree + With the same eyes to weep and see! + That having viewed the object vain, + They might be ready to complain. + And, since the self-deluding sight + In a false angle takes each height, + These tears, which better measure all, + Like watery lines and plummets fall." + + "Happy are they whom grief doth bless, + That weep the more, and see the less; + And, to preserve their sight more true, + Bathe still their eyes in their own dew; + So Magdalen, in tears more wise, + Dissolved those captivating eyes, + Whose liquid chains could, flowing, meet + To fetter her Redeemer's feet. + The sparkling glance, that shoots desire, + Drenched in those tears, does lose its fire; + Yea, oft the Thunderer pity takes, + And there his hissing lightning slakes. + The incense is to Heaven dear, + Not as a perfume, but a tear; + And stars shine lovely in the night, + But as they seem the tears of light. + Ope, then, mine eyes, your double sluice, + And practise so your noblest use; + For others, too, can see or sleep, + But only human eyes can weep." + +The Bermuda Emigrants has some happy lines, as the following:-- + + "He hangs in shade the orange bright, + Like golden lamps in a green night." + +Or this, which doubtless suggested a couplet in Moore's _Canadian Boat +Song_:-- + + "And all the way, to guide the chime, + With falling oars they kept the time." + +His facetious and burlesque poetry was much admired in his day; but a +great portion of it referred to persons and events no longer of general +interest. The satire on Holland is an exception. There is nothing in +its way superior to it in our language. Many of his best pieces were +originally written in Latin, and afterwards translated by himself. There +is a splendid Ode to Cromwell--a worthy companion of Milton's glorious +sonnet--which is not generally known, and which we transfer entire to our +pages. Its simple dignity and the melodious flow of its versification +commend themselves more to our feelings than its eulogy of war. It is +energetic and impassioned, and probably affords a better idea of the +author, as an actor in the stirring drama of his time, than the "soft +Lydian airs" of the poems that we have quoted. + + + AN HORATIAN ODE UPON CROMWELL'S RETURN FROM IRELAND. + + The forward youth that would appear + Must now forsake his Muses dear; + Nor in the shadows sing + His numbers languishing. + + 'T is time to leave the books in dust, + And oil the unused armor's rust; + Removing from the wall + The corslet of the hall. + + So restless Cromwell could not cease + In the inglorious arts of peace, + But through adventurous war + Urged his active star. + + And, like the three-forked lightning, first + Breaking the clouds wherein it nurst, + Did thorough his own side + His fiery way divide. + + For 't is all one to courage high, + The emulous, or enemy; + And with such to enclose + Is more than to oppose. + + Then burning through the air he went, + And palaces and temples rent; + And Caesar's head at last + Did through his laurels blast. + + 'T is madness to resist or blame + The face of angry Heaven's flame; + And, if we would speak true, + Much to the man is due, + + Who, from his private gardens, where + He lived reserved and austere, + (As if his highest plot + To plant the bergamot,) + + Could by industrious valor climb + To ruin the great work of time, + And cast the kingdoms old + Into another mould! + + Though justice against fate complain, + And plead the ancient rights in vain,-- + But those do hold or break, + As men are strong or weak. + + Nature, that hateth emptiness, + Allows of penetration less, + And therefore must make room + Where greater spirits come. + + What field of all the civil war, + Where his were not the deepest scar? + And Hampton shows what part + He had of wiser art; + + Where, twining subtle fears with hope, + He wove a net of such a scope, + That Charles himself might chase + To Carisbrook's narrow case; + + That hence the royal actor borne, + The tragic scaffold might adorn, + While round the armed bands + Did clap their bloody hands. + + HE nothing common did or mean + Upon that memorable scene, + But with his keener eye + The axe's edge did try + + Nor called the gods, with vulgar spite, + To vindicate his helpless right! + But bowed his comely head, + Down, as upon a bed. + + This was that memorable hour, + Which first assured the forced power; + So when they did design + The Capitol's first line, + + A bleeding head, where they begun, + Did fright the architects to run; + And yet in that the state + Foresaw its happy fate. + + And now the Irish are ashamed + To see themselves in one year tamed; + So much one man can do, + That does best act and know. + + They can affirm his praises best, + And have, though overcome, confest + How good he is, how just, + And fit for highest trust. + + Nor yet grown stiffer by command, + But still in the Republic's hand, + How fit he is to sway + That can so well obey. + + He to the Commons' feet presents + A kingdom for his first year's rents, + And, what he may, forbears + His fame to make it theirs. + + And has his sword and spoils ungirt, + To lay them at the public's skirt; + So when the falcon high + Falls heavy from the sky, + + She, having killed, no more does search, + But on the next green bough to perch, + Where, when he first does lure, + The falconer has her sure. + + What may not, then, our isle presume, + While Victory his crest does plume? + What may not others fear, + + If thus he crowns each year? + + As Caesar, he, erelong, to Gaul; + To Italy as Hannibal, + And to all states not free + Shall climacteric be. + + The Pict no shelter now shall find + Within his parti-contoured mind; + But from his valor sad + Shrink underneath the plaid, + + Happy if in the tufted brake + The English hunter him mistake, + Nor lay his hands a near + The Caledonian deer. + + But thou, the war's and fortune's son, + March indefatigably on; + And, for the last effect, + Still keep the sword erect. + + Besides the force, it has to fright + The spirits of the shady night + The same arts that did gain + A power, must it maintain. + + +Marvell was never married. The modern critic, who affirms that bachelors +have done the most to exalt women into a divinity, might have quoted his +extravagant panegyric of Maria Fairfax as an apt illustration:-- + + "'T is she that to these gardens gave + The wondrous beauty which they have; + She straitness on the woods bestows, + To her the meadow sweetness owes; + Nothing could make the river be + So crystal pure but only she,-- + She, yet more pure, sweet, strait, and fair, + Than gardens, woods, meals, rivers are + Therefore, what first she on them spent + They gratefully again present: + The meadow carpets where to tread, + The garden flowers to crown her head, + And for a glass the limpid brook + Where she may all her beauties look; + But, since she would not have them seen, + The wood about her draws a screen; + For she, to higher beauty raised, + Disdains to be for lesser praised; + She counts her beauty to converse + In all the languages as hers, + Nor yet in those herself employs, + But for the wisdom, not the noise, + Nor yet that wisdom could affect, + But as 't is Heaven's dialect." + +It has been the fashion of a class of shallow Church and State defenders +to ridicule the great men of the Commonwealth, the sturdy republicans of +England, as sour-featured, hard-hearted ascetics, enemies of the fine +arts and polite literature. The works of Milton and Marvell, the prose- +poem of Harrington, and the admirable discourses of Algernon Sydney are a +sufficient answer to this accusation. To none has it less application +than to the subject of our sketch. He was a genial, warmhearted man, an +elegant scholar, a finished gentleman at home, and the life of every +circle which he entered, whether that of the gay court of Charles II., +amidst such men as Rochester and L'Estrange, or that of the republican +philosophers who assembled at Miles's Coffee House, where he discussed +plans of a free representative government with the author of Oceana, and +Cyriack Skinner, that friend of Milton, whom the bard has immortalized in +the sonnet which so pathetically, yet heroically, alludes to his own +blindness. Men of all parties enjoyed his wit and graceful conversation. +His personal appearance was altogether in his favor. A clear, dark, +Spanish complexion, long hair of jetty blackness falling in graceful +wreaths to his shoulders, dark eyes, full of expression and fire, a +finely chiselled chin, and a mouth whose soft voluptuousness scarcely +gave token of the steady purpose and firm will of the inflexible +statesman: these, added to the prestige of his genius, and the respect +which a lofty, self-sacrificing patriotism extorts even from those who +would fain corrupt and bribe it, gave him a ready passport to the +fashionable society of the metropolis. He was one of the few who mingled +in that society, and escaped its contamination, and who, + + "Amidst the wavering days of sin, + Kept himself icy chaste and pure." + +The tone and temper of his mind may be most fitly expressed in his own +paraphrase of Horace:-- + + "Climb at Court for me that will, + Tottering Favor's pinnacle; + All I seek is to lie still! + Settled in some secret nest, + In calm leisure let me rest; + And, far off the public stage, + Pass away my silent age. + Thus, when, without noise, unknown, + I have lived out all my span, + I shall die without a groan, + An old, honest countryman. + Who, exposed to other's eyes, + Into his own heart ne'er pries, + Death's to him a strange surprise." + +He died suddenly in 1678, while in attendance at a popular meeting of his +old constituents at Hull. His health had previously been remarkably +good; and it was supposed by many that he was poisoned by some of his +political or clerical enemies. His monument, erected by his grateful +constituency, bears the following inscription:-- + + "Near this place lyeth the body of Andrew Marvell, Esq., a man so + endowed by Nature, so improved by Education, Study, and Travel, so + consummated by Experience, that, joining the peculiar graces of Wit + and Learning, with a singular penetration and strength of judgment; + and exercising all these in the whole course of his life, with an + unutterable steadiness in the ways of Virtue, he became the ornament + and example of his age, beloved by good men, feared by bad, admired + by all, though imitated by few; and scarce paralleled by any. But a + Tombstone can neither contain his character, nor is Marble necessary + to transmit it to posterity; it is engraved in the minds of this + generation, and will be always legible in his inimitable writings, + nevertheless. He having served twenty years successfully in + Parliament, and that with such Wisdom, Dexterity, and Courage, as + becomes a true Patriot, the town of Kingston-upon-Hull, from whence + he was deputed to that Assembly, lamenting in his death the public + loss, have erected this Monument of their Grief and their Gratitude, + 1688." + +Thus lived and died Andrew Marvell. His memory is the inheritance of +Americans as well as Englishmen. His example commends itself in an +especial manner to the legislators of our Republic. Integrity and +fidelity to principle are as greatly needed at this time in our halls of +Congress as in the Parliaments of the Restoration; men are required who +can feel, with Milton, that "it is high honor done them from God, and a +special mark of His favor, to have been selected to stand upright and +steadfast in His cause, dignified with the defence of Truth and public +liberty." + + + + +JOHN ROBERTS. + +Thomas Carlyle, in his history of the stout and sagacious Monk of St. +Edmunds, has given us a fine picture of the actual life of Englishmen in +the middle centuries. The dim cell-lamp of the somewhat apocryphal +Jocelin of Brakelond becomes in his hands a huge Drummond-light, shining +over the Dark Ages like the naphtha-fed cressets over Pandemonium, +proving, as he says in his own quaint way, that "England in the year 1200 +was no dreamland, but a green, solid place, which grew corn and several +other things; the sun shone on it; the vicissitudes of seasons and human +fortunes were there; cloth was woven, ditches dug, fallow fields +ploughed, and houses built." And if, as the writer just quoted insists, +it is a matter of no small importance to make it credible to the present +generation that the Past is not a confused dream of thrones and battle- +fields, creeds and constitutions, but a reality, substantial as hearth +and home, harvest-field and smith-shop, merry-making and death, could +make it, we shall not wholly waste our time and that of our readers in +inviting them to look with us at the rural life of England two centuries +ago, through the eyes of John Roberts and his worthy son, Daniel, yeomen, +of Siddington, near Cirencester. + +_The Memoirs of John Roberts, alias Haywood, by his son, Daniel Roberts_, +(the second edition, printed verbatim from the original one, with its +picturesque array of italics and capital letters,) is to be found only in +a few of our old Quaker libraries. It opens with some account of the +family. The father of the elder Roberts "lived reputably, on a little +estate of his own," and it is mentioned as noteworthy that he married a +sister of a gentleman in the Commission of the Peace. Coming of age +about the beginning of the civil wars, John and one of his young +neighbors enlisted in the service of Parliament. Hearing that +Cirencester had been taken by the King's forces, they obtained leave of +absence to visit their friends, for whose safety they naturally felt +solicitous. The following account of the reception they met with from +the drunken and ferocious troopers of Charles I., the "bravos of Alsatia +and the pages of Whitehall," throws a ghastly light upon the horrors of +civil war:-- + +"As they were passing by Cirencester, they were discovered, and pursued +by two soldiers of the King's party, then in possession of the town. +Seeing themselves pursued, they quitted their horses, and took to their +heels; but, by reason of their accoutrements, could make little speed. +They came up with my father first; and, though he begged for quarter, +none they would give him, but laid on him with their swords, cutting and +slashing his hands and arms, which he held up to save his head; as the +marks upon them did long after testify. At length it pleased the +Almighty to put it into his mind to fall down on his face; which he did. +Hereupon the soldiers, being on horseback, cried to each other, _Alight, +and cut his throat_! but neither of them did; yet continued to strike and +prick him about the jaws, till they thought him dead. Then they left +him, and pursued his neighbor, whom they presently overtook and killed. +Soon after they had left my father, it was said in his heart, _Rise, and +flee for thy life_! which call he obeyed; and, starting upon his feet, +his enemies espied him in motion, and pursued him again. He ran down a +steep hill, and through a river which ran at the bottom of it; though +with exceeding difficulty, his boots filling with water, and his wounds +bleeding very much. They followed him to the top of the hill; but, +seeing he had got over, pursued him no farther." + +The surgeon who attended him was a Royalist, and bluntly told his +bleeding patient that if he had met him in the street he would have +killed him himself, but now he was willing to cure him. On his recovery, +young Roberts again entered the army, and continued in it until the +overthrow, of the Monarchy. On his return, he married "Lydia Tindall, +of the denomination of Puritans." A majestic figure rises before us, +on reading the statement that Sir Matthew Hale, afterwards Lord Chief +Justice of England, the irreproachable jurist and judicial saint, was +"his wife's kinsman, and drew her marriage settlement." + +No stronger testimony to the high-toned morality and austere virtue of +the Puritan yeomanry of England can be adduced than the fact that, of the +fifty thousand soldiers who were discharged on the accession of Charles +II., and left to shift for themselves, comparatively few, if any, became +chargeable to their parishes, although at that very time one out of six +of the English population were unable to support themselves. They +carried into their farm-fields and workshops the strict habits of +Cromwell's discipline; and, in toiling to repair their wasted fortunes, +they manifested the same heroic fortitude and self-denial which in war +had made them such formidable and efficient "Soldiers of the Lord." With +few exceptions, they remained steadfast in their uncompromising non- +conformity, abhorring Prelacy and Popery, and entertaining no very +orthodox notions with respect to the divine right of Kings. From them +the Quakers drew their most zealous champions; men who, in renouncing the +"carnal weapons" of their old service, found employment for habitual +combativeness in hot and wordy sectarian warfare. To this day the +vocabulary of Quakerism abounds in the military phrases and figures which +were in use in the Commonwealth's time. Their old force and significance +are now in a great measure lost; but one can well imagine that, in the +assemblies of the primitive Quakers, such stirring battle-cries and +warlike tropes, even when employed in enforcing or illustrating the +doctrines of peace, must have made many a stout heart' to beat quicker, +tinder its drab coloring, with recollections of Naseby and Preston; +transporting many a listener from the benches of his place of worship to +the ranks of Ireton and Lambert, and causing him to hear, in the place of +the solemn and nasal tones of the preacher, the blast of Rupert's bugles, +and the answering shout of Cromwell's pikemen: "Let God arise, and let +his enemies be scattered!" + +Of this class was John Roberts. He threw off his knapsack, and went back +to his small homestead, contented with the privilege of supporting +himself and family by daily toil, and grumbling in concert with his old +campaign brothers at the new order of things in Church and State. To his +apprehension, the Golden Days of England ended with the parade on +Blackheath to receive the restored King. He manifested no reverence for +Bishops and Lords, for he felt none. For the Presbyterians he had no +good will; they had brought in the King, and they denied the liberty of +prophesying. John Milton has expressed the feeling of the Independents +and Anabaptists towards this latter class, in that famous line in which +he defines Presbyter as "old priest writ large." Roberts was by no means +a gloomy fanatic; he had a great deal of shrewdness and humor, loved a +quiet joke; and every gambling priest and swearing magistrate in the +neighborhood stood in fear of his sharp wit. It was quite in course for +such a man to fall in with the Quakers, and he appears to have done so at +the first opportunity. + +In the year 1665, "it pleased the Lord to send two women Friends out of +the North to Cirencester," who, inquiring after such as feared God, were +directed to the house of John Roberts. He received them kindly, and, +inviting in some of his neighbors, sat down with them, whereupon "the +Friends spake a few words, which had a good effect." After the meeting +was over, he was induced to visit a "Friend" then confined in Banbury +jail, whom he found preaching through the grates of his cell to the +people in the street. On seeing Roberts he called to mind the story of +Zaccheus, and declared that the word was now to all who were seeking +Christ by climbing the tree of knowledge, "Come down, come down; for that +which is to be known of God is manifested within." Returning home, he +went soon after to the parish meeting-house, and, entering with his hat +on, the priest noticed him, and, stopping short in his discourse, +declared that he could not go on while one of the congregation wore his +hat. He was thereupon led out of the house, and a rude fellow, stealing +up behind, struck him on the back with a heavy stone. "Take that for +God's sake," said the ruffian. "So I do," answered Roberts, without +looking back to see his assailant, who the next day came and asked his +forgiveness for the injury, as he could not sleep in consequence of it. + +We next find him attending the Quarter Sessions, where three "Friends" +were arraigned for entering Cirencester Church with their hats on. +Venturing to utter a word of remonstrance against the summary proceedings +of the Court, Justice Stephens demanded his name, and, on being told, +exclaimed, in the very tone and temper of Jeffreys: + +"I 've heard of you. I'm glad I have you here. You deserve a stone +doublet. There's many an honester man than you hanged." + +"It may be so," said Roberts, "but what becomes of such as hang honest +men?" + +The Justice snatched a ball of wax and hurled it at the quiet questioner. +"I 'll send you to prison," said he; "and if any insurrection or tumult +occurs, I 'll come and cut your throat with my own sword." A warrant was +made out, and he was forthwith sent to the jail. In the evening, Justice +Sollis, his uncle, released him, on condition of his promise to appear at +the next Sessions. He returned to his home, but in the night following +he was impressed with a belief that it was his duty to visit Justice +Stephens. Early in the morning, with a heavy heart, without eating or +drinking, he mounted his horse and rode towards the residence of his +enemy. When he came in sight of the house, he felt strong misgivings +that his uncle, Justice Sollis, who had so kindly released him, and his +neighbors generally, would condemn him for voluntarily running into +danger, and drawing down trouble upon himself and family. He alighted +from his horse, and sat on the ground in great doubt and sorrow, when a +voice seemed to speak within him, "Go, and I will go with thee." The +Justice met him at the door. "I am come," said Roberts, "in the fear +and dread of Heaven, to warn thee to repent of thy wickedness with speed, +lest the Lord send thee to the pit that is bottomless!" This terrible +summons awed the Justice; he made Roberts sit down on his couch beside +him, declaring that he received the message from God, and asked +forgiveness for the wrong he had done him. + +The parish vicar of Siddington at this time was George Bull, afterwards +Bishop of St. David's, whom Macaulay speaks of as the only rural parish +priest who, during the latter part of the seventeenth century, was noted +as a theologian, or Who possessed a respectable library. Roberts refused +to pay the vicar his tithes, and the vicar sent him to prison. It was +the priest's "Short Method with Dissenters." While the sturdy Non- +conformist lay in prison, he was visited by the great woman of the +neighborhood, Lady Dunch, of Down Amney. "What do you lie in jail for?" +inquired the lady. Roberts replied that it was because he could not put +bread into the mouth of a hireling priest. The lady suggested that he +might let somebody else satisfy the demands of the priest; and that she +had a mind to do this herself, as she wished to talk with him on +religious subjects. To this Roberts objected; there were poor people who +needed her charities, which would be wasted on such devourers as the +priests, who, like Pharaoh's lean kine, were eating up the fat and the +goodly, without looking a whit the better. But the lady, who seems to +have been pleased and amused by the obstinate prisoner, paid the tithe +and the jail fees, and set him at liberty, making him fix a day when he +would visit her. At the time appointed he went to Down Amney, and was +overtaken on the way by the priest of Cirencester, who had been sent for +to meet the Quaker. They found the lady ill in bed; but she had them +brought to her chamber, being determined not to lose the amusement of +hearing a theological discussion, to which she at once urged them, +declaring that it would divert her and do her good. The parson began by +accusing the Quakers of holding Popish doctrines. The Quaker retorted +by telling him that if he would prove the Quakers like the Papists in one +thing, by the help of God, he would prove him like them in ten. After a +brief and sharp dispute, the priest, finding his adversary's wit too keen +for his comfort, hastily took his leave. + +The next we hear of Roberts he is in Gloucester Castle, subjected to the +brutal usage of a jailer, who took a malicious satisfaction in thrusting +decent and respectable Dissenters, imprisoned for matters of conscience, +among felons and thieves. A poor vagabond tinker was hired to play at +night on his hautboy, and prevent their sleeping; but Roberts spoke to +him in such a manner that the instrument fell from his hand; and he told +the jailer that he would play no more, though he should hang him up at +the door for it. + +How he was released from jail does not appear; but the narrative tells us +that some time after an apparitor came to cite him to the Bishop's Court +at Gloucester. When he was brought before the Court, Bishop Nicholson, a +kind-hearted and easy-natured prelate, asked him the number of his +children, and how many of them had been _bishoped_? + +"None, that I know of," said Roberts. + +"What reason," asked the Bishop, "do you give for this?" + +"A very good one," said the Quaker: "most of my children were born in +Oliver's days, when Bishops were out of fashion." + +The Bishop and the Court laughed at this sally, and proceeded to question +him touching his views of baptism. Roberts admitted that John had a +Divine commission to baptize with water, but that he never heard of +anybody else that had. The Bishop reminded him that Christ's disciples +baptized. "What 's that to me?" responded Roberts. "Paul says he was +not sent to baptize, but to preach the Gospel. And if he was not sent, +who required it at his hands? Perhaps he had as little thanks for his +labor as thou hast for thine; and I would willingly know who sent thee to +baptize?" + +The Bishop evaded this home question, and told him he was there to answer +for not coming to church. Roberts denied the charge; sometimes he went +to church, and sometimes it came to him. "I don't call that a church +which you do, which is made of wood and stone." + +"What do you call it?" asked the Bishop. + +"It might be properly called a mass-house," was the reply; "for it was +built for that purpose." The Bishop here told him he might go for the +present; he would take another opportunity to convince him of his errors. + +The next person called was a Baptist minister, who, seeing that Roberts +refused to put off his hat, kept on his also. The Bishop sternly +reminded him that he stood before the King's Court, and the +representative of the majesty of England; and that, while some regard +might be had to the scruples of men who made a conscience of putting off +the hat, such contempt could not be tolerated on the part of one who +could put it off to every mechanic be met. The Baptist pulled off his +hat, and apologized, on the ground of illness. + +We find Roberts next following George Fox on a visit to Bristol. On his +return, reaching his house late in the evening, he saw a man standing in +the moonlight at his door, and knew him to be a bailiff. + +"Hast thou anything against me?" asked Roberts. + +"No," said the bailiff, "I've wronged you enough, God forgive me! Those +who lie in wait for you are my Lord Bishop's bailiffs; they are merciless +rogues. Ever, my master, while you live, please a knave, for an honest +man won't hurt you." + +The next morning, having, as he thought, been warned by a dream to do so, +he went to the Bishop's house at Cleave, near Gloucester. Confronting +the Bishop in his own hall, he told him that he had come to know why he +was hunting after him with his bailiffs, and why he was his adversary. +"The King is your adversary," said the Bishop; "you have broken the +King's law." Roberts ventured to deny the justice of the law. "What!" +cried the Bishop, "do such men as you find fault with the laws?" "Yes," +replied the other, stoutly; "and I tell thee plainly to thy face, it is +high time wiser men were chosen, to make better laws." + +The discourse turning upon the Book of Common Prayer, Roberts asked the +Bishop if the sin of idolatry did not consist in worshipping the work of +men's hands. The Bishop admitted it, as in the case of Nebuchadnezzar's +image. + +"Then," said Roberts, "whose hands made your Prayer Book? It could not +make itself." + +"Do you compare our Prayer Book to Nebuchadnezzar's image?" cried the +Bishop. + +"Yes," returned Roberts, "that was his image; this is thine. I no more +dare bow to thy Common-Prayer Book than the Three Children to +Nebuchadnezzar's image." + +"Yours is a strange upstart religion," said the Bishop. + +Roberts told him it was older than his by several hundred years. At this +claim of antiquity the prelate was greatly amused, and told Roberts that +if he would make out his case, he should speed the better for it. + +"Let me ask thee," said Roberts, "where thy religion was in Oliver's +days, when thy Common-Prayer Book was as little regarded as an old +almanac, and your priests, with a few honest exceptions, turned with the +tide, and if Oliver had put mass in their mouths would have conformed to +it for the sake of their bellies." + +"What would you have us do?" asked the Bishop. "Would you have had +Oliver cut our throats?" + +"No," said Roberts; "but what sort of religion was that which you were +afraid to venture your throats for?" + +The Bishop interrupted him to say, that in Oliver's days he had never +owned any other religion than his own, although he did not dare to openly +maintain it as he then did. + +"Well," continued Roberts, "if thou didst not think thy religion worth +venturing thy throat for then, I desire thee to consider that it is not +worth the cutting of other men's throats now for not conforming to it." + +"You are right," responded the frank Bishop. "I hope we shall have a +care how we cut men's throats." + +The following colloquy throws some light on the condition and character +of the rural clergy at this period, and goes far to confirm the +statements of Macaulay, which many have supposed exaggerated. Baxter's +early religious teachers were more exceptionable than even the maudlin +mummer whom Roberts speaks of, one of them being "the excellentest stage- +player in all the country, and a good gamester and goodfellow, who, +having received Holy Orders, forged the like for a neighbor's son, who on +the strength of that title officiated at the desk and altar; and after +him came an attorney's clerk, who had tippled himself into so great +poverty that he had no other way to live than to preach." + +J. ROBERTS. I was bred up under a Common-Prayer Priest; and a poor +drunken old Man he was. Sometimes he was so drunk he could not say his +Prayers, and at best he could but say them; though I think he was by far +a better Man than he that is Priest there now. + +BISHOP. Who is your Minister now? + +J. ROBERTS. My Minister is Christ Jesus, the Minister of the everlasting +Covenant; but the present Priest of the Parish is George Bull. + +BISHOP. Do you say that drunken old Man was better than Mr. Bull? I +tell you, I account Mr. Bull as sound, able, and orthodox a Divine as any +we have among us. + +J. ROBERT. I am sorry for that; for if he be one of the best of you, I +believe the Lord will not suffer you long; for he is a proud, ambitious, +ungodly Man: he hath often sued me at Law, and brought his Servants to +swear against me wrongfully. His Servants themselves have confessed to +my Servants, that I might have their Ears; for their Master made them +drunk, and then told them they were set down in the List as Witnesses +against me, and they must swear to it: And so they did, and brought +treble Damages. They likewise owned they took Tithes from my Servants, +threshed them out, and sold them for their Master. They have also +several Times took my Cattle out of my Grounds, drove them to Fairs and +Markets, and sold them, without giving me any Account. + +BISHOP. I do assure you I will inform Mr. Bull of what you say. + +J. ROBERTS. Very well. And if thou pleasest to send for me to face him, +I shall make much more appear to his Face than I'll say behind his Back. + +After much more discourse, Roberts told the Bishop that if it would do +him any good to have him in jail, he would voluntarily go and deliver +himself up to the keeper of Gloucester Castle. The good-natured prelate +relented at this, and said he should not be molested or injured, and +further manifested his good will by ordering refreshments. One of the +Bishop's friends who was present was highly offended by the freedom of +Roberts with his Lordship, and undertook to rebuke him, but was so +readily answered that he flew into a rage. "If all the Quakers in +England," said he, "are not hanged in a month's time, I 'll be hanged for +them." "Prithee, friend," quoth Roberts, "remember and be as good as thy +word!" + +Good old Bishop Nicholson, it would seem, really liked his incorrigible +Quaker neighbor, and could enjoy heartily his wit and humor, even when +exercised at the expense of his own ecclesiastical dignity. He admired +his blunt honesty and courage. Surrounded by flatterers and self- +seekers, he found satisfaction in the company and conversation of one +who, setting aside all conventionalisms, saw only in my Lord Bishop a +poor fellow-probationer, and addressed him on terms of conscious +equality. The indulgence which he extended to him naturally enough +provoked many of the inferior clergy, who had been sorely annoyed by the +sturdy Dissenter's irreverent witticisms and unsparing ridicule. Vicar +Bull, of Siddington, and Priest Careless, of Cirencester, in particular, +urged the Bishop to deal sharply with him. The former accused him of +dealing in the Black Art, and filled the Bishop's ear with certain +marvellous stories of his preternatural sagacity and discernment in +discovering cattle which were lost. The Bishop took occasion to inquire +into these stories; and was told by Roberts that, except in a single +instance, the discoveries were the result of his acquaintance with the +habits of animals and his knowledge of the localities where they were +lost. The circumstance alluded to, as an exception, will be best related +in his own words. + +"I had a poor Neighbor, who had a Wife and six Children, and whom the +chief men about us permitted to keep six or seven Cows upon the Waste, +which were the principal Support of the Family, and preserved them from +becoming chargeable to the Parish. One very stormy night the Cattle were +left in the Yard as usual, but could not be found in the morning. The +Man and his Sons had sought them to no purpose; and, after they had been +lost four days, his Wife came to me, and, in a great deal of grief, +cried, 'O Lord! Master Hayward, we are undone! My Husband and I must go +a begging in our old age! We have lost all our Cows. My Husband and the +Boys have been round the country, and can hear nothing of them. I'll +down on my bare knees, if you'll stand our Friend!' I desired she would +not be in such an agony, and told her she should not down on her knees to +me; but I would gladly help them in what I could. 'I know,' said she, +'you are a good Man, and God will hear your Prayers.' I desire thee, +said I, to be still and quiet in thy mind; perhaps thy Husband or Sons +may hear of them to-day; if not, let thy Husband get a horse, and come to +me to-morrow morning as soon as he will; and I think, if it please God, +to go with him to seek then. The Woman seemed transported with joy, +crying, 'Then we shall have our Cows again.' Her Faith being so strong, +brought the greater Exercise on me, with strong cries to the Lord, that +he would be pleased to make me instrumental in his Hand, for the help of +the poor Family. In the Morning early comes the old Man. In the Name of +God, says he, which way shall we go to seek them? I, being deeply +concerned in my Mind, did not answer him till he had thrice repeated it; +and then I answered, In the Name of God, I would go to seek them; and +said (before I was well aware) we will go to Malmsbury, and at the Horse- +Fair we shall find them. When I had spoken the Words, I was much +troubled lest they should not prove true. It was very early, and the +first Man we saw, I asked him if he had seen any stray Milch Cows +thereabouts. What manner of Cattle are they? said he. And the old Man +describing their Mark and Number, he told us there were some stood +chewing their Cuds in the Horse-Fair; but thinking they belonged to some +in the Neighborhood, he did not take particular Notice of them. When we +came to the Place, the old Man found them to be his; but suffered his +Transports of Joy to rise so high, that I was ashamed of his behavior; +for he fell a hallooing, and threw up his Montier Cap in the Air several +times, till he raised the Neighbors out of their Beds to see what was the +Matter. 'O!' said he, 'I had lost my Cows four or five days ago, and +thought I should never see them again; and this honest Neighbor of mine +told me this Morning, by his own Fire's Side, nine Miles off, that here +I should find them, and here I have them!' Then up goes his Cap again. +I begged of the poor Man to be quiet, and take his Cows home, and be +thankful; as indeed I was, being reverently bowed in my Spirit before the +Lord, in that he was pleased to put the words of Truth into my mouth. +And the Man drove his Cattle home, to the great Joy of his Family." + +Not long after the interview with the Bishop at his own palace, which has +been related, that dignitary, with the Lord Chancellor, in their coaches, +and about twenty clergymen on horseback, made a call at the humble +dwelling of Roberts, on their way to Tedbury, where the Bishop was to +hold a Visitation. "I could not go out of the country without seeing +you," said the prelate, as the farmer came to his coach door and pressed +him to alight. + +"John," asked Priest Evans, the Bishop's kinsman, "is your house free to +entertain such men as we are?" + +"Yes, George," said Roberts; "I entertain honest men, and sometimes +others." + +"My Lord," said Evans, turning to the Bishop, "John's friends are the +honest men, and we are the others." + +The Bishop told Roberts that they could not then alight, but would gladly +drink with him; whereupon the good wife brought out her best beer. +"I commend you, John," quoth the Bishop, as he paused from his hearty +draught; "you keep a cup of good beer in your house. I have not drank +any that has pleased me better since I left home." The cup passed next +to the Chancellor, and finally came to Priest Bull, who thrust it aside, +declaring that it was full of hops and heresy. As to hops, Roberts +replied, he could not say, but as for heresy, he bade the priest take +note that the Lord Bishop had drank of it, and had found no heresy in the +cup. + +The Bishop leaned over his coach door and whispered: "John, I advise you +to take care you don't offend against the higher Powers. I have heard +great complaints against you, that you are the Ringleader of the Quakers +in this Country; and that, if you are not suppressed, all will signify +nothing. Therefore, pray, John, take care, for the future, you don't +offend any more." + +"I like thy Counsel very well," answered Roberts, "and intend to take it. +But thou knowest God is the higher Power; and you mortal Men, however +advanced in this World, are but the lower Power; and it is only because I +endeavor to be obedient to the will of the higher Powers, that the lower +Powers are angry with me. But I hope, with the assistance of God, to +take thy Counsel, and be subject to the higher Powers, let the lower +Powers do with me as it may please God to suffer them." + +The Bishop then said he would like to talk with him further, and +requested him to meet him at Tedbury the next day. At the time +appointed, Roberts went to the inn where the Bishop lodged, and was +invited to dine with him. After dinner was over, the prelate told him +that he must go to church, and leave off holding conventicles at his +house, of which great complaint was made. This he flatly refused to do; +and the Bishop, losing patience, ordered the constable to be sent for. +Roberts told him that if, after coming to his house under the guise of +friendship, he should betray him and send him to prison, he, who had +hitherto commended him for his moderation, would put his name in print, +and cause it to stink before all sober people. It was the priests, he +told him, who set him on; but, instead of hearkening to them, he should +commend them to some honest vocation, and not suffer them to rob their +honest neighbors, and feed on the fruits of other men's toil, like +caterpillars. + +"Whom do you call caterpillars?" cried Priest Rich, of North Surrey. + +"We farmers," said Roberts, "call those so who live on other men's +fields, and by the sweat of other men's brows; and if thou dost so, thou +mayst be one of them." + +This reply so enraged the Bishop's attendants that they could only be +appeased by an order for the constable to take him to jail. In fact, +there was some ground for complaint of a lack of courtesy on the part of +the blunt farmer; and the Christian virtue of forbearance, even in +Bishops, has its limits. + +The constable, obeying the summons, came to the inn, at the door of which +the landlady met him. "What do you here!" cried the good woman, "when +honest John is going to be sent to prison? Here, come along with me." +The constable, nothing loath, followed her into a private room, where she +concealed him. Word was sent to the Bishop, that the constable was not +to be found; and the prelate, telling Roberts he could send him to jail +in the afternoon, dismissed him until evening. At the hour appointed, +the latter waited upon the Bishop, and found with him only one priest and +a lay gentleman. The priest begged the Bishop to be allowed to discourse +with the prisoner; and, leave being granted, he began by telling Roberts +that the knowledge of the Scriptures had made him mad, and that it was a +great pity he had ever seen them. + +"Thou art an unworthy man," said the Quaker, "and I 'll not dispute with +thee. If the knowledge of the Scriptures has made me mad, the knowledge +of the sack-pot hath almost made thee mad; and if we two madmen should +dispute about religion, we should make mad work of it." + +"An 't please you, my Lord," said the scandalized priest, "he says I 'm +drunk." + +The Bishop asked Roberts to repeat his words; and, instead of +reprimanding him, as the priest expected, was so much amused that he held +up his hands and laughed; whereupon the offended inferior took a hasty +leave. The Bishop, who was evidently glad to be rid of him, now turned +to Roberts, and complained that he had dealt hardly with him, in telling +him, before so many gentlemen, that he had sought to betray him by +professions of friendship, in order to send him to prison; and that, +if he had not done as he did, people would have reported him as an +encourager of the Quakers. "But now, John," said the good prelate, "I'll +burn the warrant against you before your face." "You know, Mr. Burnet," +he continued, addressing his attendant, "that a Ring of Bells may be made +of excellent metal, but they may be out of tune; so we may say of John: +he is a man of as good metal as I ever met with, but quite out of tune." + +"Thou mayst well say so," quoth Roberts, "for I can't tune after thy +pipe." + +The inferior clergy were by no means so lenient as the Bishop. They +regarded Roberts as the ringleader of Dissent, an impracticable, +obstinate, contumacious heretic, not only refusing to pay them tithes +himself, but encouraging others to the same course. Hence, they thought +it necessary to visit upon him the full rigor of the law. His crops were +taken from his field, and his cattle from his yard. He was often +committed to the jail, where, on one occasion, he was kept, with many +others, for a long time, through the malice of the jailer, who refused to +put the names of his prisoners in the Calendar, that they might have a +hearing. But the spirit of the old Commonwealth's man remained +steadfast. When Justice George, at the Ram in Cirencester, told him he +must conform, and go to church, or suffer the penalty of the law, he +replied that he had heard indeed that some were formerly whipped out of +the Temple, but he had never heard of any being whipped in. The Justice, +pointing, through the open window of the inn, at the church tower, asked +him what that was. "Thou mayst call it a daw-house," answered the +incorrigible Quaker. "Dost thou not see how the jackdaws flock about +it?" + +Sometimes it happened that the clergyman was also a magistrate, and +united in his own person the authority of the State and the zeal of the +Church. Justice Parsons, of Gloucester, was a functionary of this sort. +He wielded the sword of the Spirit on the Sabbath against Dissenters, and +on week days belabored them with the arm of flesh and the constable's +staff. At one time he had between forty and fifty of them locked up in +Gloucester Castle, among them Roberts and his sons, on the charge of +attending conventicles. But the troublesome prisoners baffled his +vigilance, and turned their prison into a meeting-house, and held their +conventicles in defiance of him. The Reverend Justice pounced upon them +on one occasion, with his attendants. An old, gray-haired man, formerly +a strolling fencing-master, was preaching when he came in. The Justice +laid hold of him by his white locks, and strove to pull him down, but the +tall fencing-raster stood firm and spoke on; he then tried to gag him, +but failed in that also. He demanded the names of the prisoners, but no +one answered him. A voice (we fancy it was that of our old friend +Roberts) called out: "The Devil must be hard put to it to have his +drudgery done, when the Priests must leave their pulpits to turn +informers against poor prisoners." The Justice obtained a list of the +names of the prisoners, made out on their commitment, and, taking it for +granted that all were still present, issued warrants for the collection +of fines by levies upon their estates. Among the names was that of a +poor widow, who had been discharged, and was living, at the time the +clerical magistrate swore she was at the meeting, twenty miles distant +from the prison. + +Soon after this event, our old friend fell sick. He had been discharged +from prison, but his sons were still confined. The eldest had leave, +however, to attend him in his illness, and he bears his testimony that +the Lord was pleased to favor his father with His living presence in his +last moments. In keeping with the sturdy Non-conformist's life, he was +interred at the foot of his own orchard, in Siddington, a spot he had +selected for a burial-ground long before, where neither the foot of a +priest nor the shadow of a steeple-house could rest upon his grave. + +In closing our notice of this pleasant old narrative, we may remark that +the light it sheds upon the antagonistic religious parties of the time is +calculated to dissipate prejudices and correct misapprehensions, common +alike to Churchmen and Dissenters. The genial humor, sound sense, and +sterling virtues of the Quaker farmer should teach the one class that +poor James Nayler, in his craziness and folly, was not a fair +representative of his sect; while the kind nature, the hearty +appreciation of goodness, and the generosity and candor of Bishop +Nicholson should convince the other class that a prelate is not +necessarily, and by virtue of his mitre, a Laud or a Bonner. The +Dissenters of the seventeenth century may well be forgiven for the +asperity of their language; men whose ears had been cropped because they +would not recognize Charles I. as a blessed martyr, and his scandalous +son as the head of the Church, could scarcely be expected to make +discriminations, or suggest palliating circumstances, favorable to any +class of their adversaries. To use the homely but apt simile of +McFingal, + + "The will's confirmed by treatment horrid, + As hides grow harder when they're curried." + +They were wronged, and they told the world of it. Unlike Shakespeare's +cardinal, they did not die without a sign. They branded, by their fierce +epithets, the foreheads of their persecutors more deeply than the +sheriff's hot iron did their own. If they lost their ears, they enjoyed +the satisfaction of making those of their oppressors tingle. Knowing +their persecutors to be in the wrong, they did not always inquire whether +they themselves had been entirely right, and had done no unrequired works +of supererogation by the way of "testimony" against their neighbors' mode +cf worship. And so from pillory and whipping-post, from prison and +scaffold, they sent forth their wail and execration, their miserere and +anathema, and the sound thereof has reached down to our day. May it +never wholly die away until, the world over, the forcing of conscience is +regarded as a crime against humanity and a usurpation of God's +prerogative. But abhorring, as we must, persecution under whatever +pretext it is employed, we are not, therefore, to conclude that all +persecutors were bad and unfeeling men. Many of their severities, upon +which we now look back with horror, were, beyond a question, the result +of an intense anxiety for the well-being of immortal souls, endangered by +the poison which, in their view, heresy was casting into the waters of +life. Coleridge, in one of the moods of a mind which traversed in +imagination the vast circle of human experience, reaches this point in +his Table-Talk. "It would require," says he, "stronger arguments than +any I have seen to convince me that men in authority have not a right, +involved in an imperative duty, to deter those under their control from +teaching or countenancing doctrines which they believe to be damnable, +and even to punish with death those who violate such prohibition." It +would not be very difficult for us to imagine a tender-hearted Inquisitor +of this stamp, stifling his weak compassion for the shrieking wretch +under bodily torment by his strong pity for souls in danger of perdition +from the sufferer's heresy. We all know with what satisfaction the +gentle-spirited Melanethon heard of the burning of Servetus, and with +what zeal he defended it. The truth is, the notion that an intellectual +recognition of certain dogmas is the essential condition of salvation +lies at the bottom of all intolerance in matters of religion. Under this +impression, men are too apt to forget that the great end of Christianity +is love, and that charity is its crowning virtue; they overlook the +beautiful significance of the parable of the heretic Samaritan and the +orthodox Pharisee: and thus, by suffering their speculative opinions of +the next world to make them uncharitable and cruel in this, they are +really the worse for them, even admitting them to be true. + + + + +SAMUEL HOPKINS. + +Three quarters of a century ago, the name of Samuel Hopkins was as +familiar as a household word throughout New England. It was a spell +wherewith to raise at once a storm of theological controversy. The +venerable minister who bore it had his thousands of ardent young +disciples, as well as defenders and followers of mature age and +acknowledged talent; a hundred pulpits propagated the dogmas which he had +engrafted on the stock of Calvinism. Nor did he lack numerous and +powerful antagonists. The sledge ecclesiastic, with more or less effect, +was unceasingly plied upon the strong-linked chain of argument which he +slowly and painfully elaborated in the seclusion of his parish. The +press groaned under large volumes of theological, metaphysical, and +psychological disquisition, the very thought of which is now "a weariness +to the flesh;" in rapid succession pamphlet encountered pamphlet, horned, +beaked, and sharp of talon, grappling with each other in mid-air, like +Milton's angels. That loud controversy, the sound whereof went over +Christendom, awakening responses from beyond the Atlantic, has now died +away; its watchwords no longer stir the blood of belligerent sermonizers; +its very terms and definitions have well-nigh become obsolete and +unintelligible. The hands which wrote and the tongues which spoke in +that day are now all cold and silent; even Emmons, the brave old +intellectual athlete of Franklin, now sleeps with his fathers,--the last +of the giants. Their fame is still in all the churches; effeminate +clerical dandyism still affects to do homage to their memories; the +earnest young theologian, exploring with awe the mountainous debris of +their controversial lore, ponders over the colossal thoughts entombed +therein, as he would over the gigantic fossils of an early creation, and +endeavors in vain to recall to the skeleton abstractions before him the +warm and vigorous life wherewith they were once clothed; but +Hopkinsianism, as a distinct and living school of philosophy, theology, +and metaphysics, no longer exists. It has no living oracles left; and +its memory survives only in the doctrinal treatises of the elder and +younger Edwards, Hopkins, Bellamy, and Emmons. + +It is no part of our present purpose to discuss the merits of the system +in question. Indeed, looking at the great controversy which divided New +England Calvinism in the eighteenth century, from a point of view which +secures our impartiality and freedom from prejudice, we find it +exceedingly difficult to get a precise idea of what was actually at +issue. To our poor comprehension, much of the dispute hinges upon names +rather than things; on the manner of reaching conclusions quite as much +as upon the conclusions themselves. Its origin may be traced to the +great religious awakening of the middle of the past century, when the +dogmas of the Calvinistic faith were subjected to the inquiry of acute +and earnest minds, roused up from the incurious ease and passive +indifference of nominal orthodoxy. Without intending it, it broke down +some of the barriers which separated Arminianism and Calvinism; its +product, Hopkinsianism, while it pushed the doctrine of the Genevan +reformer on the subject of the Divine decrees and agency to that extreme +point where it well-nigh loses itself in Pantheism, held at the same time +that guilt could not be hereditary; that man, being responsible for his +sinful acts, and not for his sinful nature, can only be justified by a +personal holiness, consisting not so much in legal obedience as in that +disinterested benevolence which prefers the glory of God and the welfare +of universal being above the happiness of self. It had the merit, +whatever it may be, of reducing the doctrines of the Reformation to an +ingenious and scholastic form of theology; of bringing them boldly to the +test of reason and philosophy. Its leading advocates were not mere +heartless reasoners and closet speculators. They taught that sin was +selfishness, and holiness self-denying benevolence, and they endeavored +to practise accordingly. Their lives recommended their doctrines. They +were bold and faithful in the discharge of what they regarded as duty. +In the midst of slave-holders, and in an age of comparative darkness on +the subject of human rights, Hopkins and the younger Edwards lifted up +their voices for the slave. And twelve years ago, when Abolitionism was +everywhere spoken against, and the whole land was convulsed with mobs to +suppress it, the venerable Emmons, burdened with the weight of ninety +years, made a journey to New York, to attend a meeting of the Anti- +Slavery Society. Let those who condemn the creed of these men see to +it that they do not fall behind them in practical righteousness and +faithfulness to the convictions of duty. + +Samuel Hopkins, who gave his name to the religious system in question, +was born in Waterbury, Connecticut, in 1721. In his fifteenth year he +was placed under the care of a neighboring clergyman, preparatory for +college, which he entered about a year after. In 1740, the celebrated +Whitefield visited New Haven, and awakened there, as elsewhere, serious +inquiry on religious subjects. He was followed the succeeding spring by +Gilbert Tennent, the New Jersey revivalist, a stirring and powerful +preacher. A great change took place in the college. All the phenomena +which President Edwards has described in his account of the Northampton +awakening were reproduced among the students. The excellent David +Brainard, then a member of the college, visited Hopkins in his apartment, +and, by a few plain and earnest words, convinced him that he was a +stranger to vital Christianity. In his autobiographical sketch, he +describes in simple and affecting language the dark and desolate state of +his mind at this period, and the particular exercise which finally +afforded him some degree of relief, and which he afterwards appears to +have regarded as his conversion from spiritual death to life. When he +first heard Tennent, regarding him as the greatest as well as the best of +men, he made up his mind to study theology with him; but just before the +commencement at which he was to take his degree, the elder Edwards +preached at New Haven. Struck by the power of the great theologian, he +at once resolved to make him his spiritual father. In the winter +following, he left his father's house on horseback, on a journey of +eighty miles to Northampton. Arriving at the house of President Edwards, +he was disappointed by hearing that he was absent on a preaching tour. +But he was kindly received by the gifted and accomplished lady of the +mansion, and encouraged to remain during the winter. Still doubtful in +respect to his own spiritual state, he was, he says, "very gloomy, and +retired most of the time in his chamber." The kind heart of his amiable +hostess was touched by his evident affliction. After some days she came +to his chamber, and, with the gentleness and delicacy of a true woman, +inquired into the cause of his unhappiness. The young student disclosed +to her, without reserve, the state of his feelings and the extent of his +fears. "She told me," says the Doctor, "that she had had peculiar +exercises respecting me since I had been in the family; that she trusted +I should receive light and comfort, and doubted not that God intended yet +to do great things by me." + +After pursuing his studies for some months with the Puritan philosopher, +young Hopkins commenced preaching, and, in 1743, was ordained at +Sheffield, (now Great Barrington') in the western part of Massachusetts. +There were at the time only about thirty families in the town. He says +it was a matter of great regret to him to be obliged to settle so far +from his spiritual guide and tutor but seven years after he was relieved +and gratified by the removal of Edwards to Stockbridge, as the Indian +missionary at that station, seven miles only from his own residence; and +for several years the great metaphysician and his favorite pupil enjoyed +the privilege of familiar intercourse with each other. The removal of +the former in 1758 to Princeton, New Jersey, and his death, which soon +followed, are mentioned in the diary of Hopkins as sore trials and +afflictive dispensations. + +Obtaining a dismissal from his society in Great Barrington in 1769, +he was installed at Newport the next year, as minister of the first +Congregational church in that place. Newport, at this period, was, in +size, wealth, and commercial importance, the second town in New England. +It was the great slave mart of the North. Vessels loaded with stolen men +and women and children, consigned to its merchant princes, lay at its +wharves; immortal beings were sold daily in its market, like cattle at a +fair. The soul of Hopkins was moved by the appalling spectacle. A +strong conviction of the great wrong of slavery, and of its utter +incompatibility with the Christian profession, seized upon his mind. +While at Great Barrington, he had himself owned a slave, whom he had sold +on leaving the place, without compunction or suspicion in regard to the +rightfulness of the transaction. He now saw the origin of the system in +its true light; he heard the seamen engaged in the African trade tell of +the horrible scenes of fire and blood which they had witnessed, and in +which they had been actors; he saw the half-suffocated wretches brought +up from their noisome and narrow prison, their squalid countenances and +skeleton forms bearing fearful evidence of the suffering attendant upon +the transportation from their native homes. The demoralizing effects of +slaveholding everywhere forced themselves upon his attention, for the +evil had struck its roots deeply in the community, and there were few +families into which it had not penetrated. The right to deal in slaves, +and use them as articles of property, was questioned by no one; men of +all professions, clergymen and church-members, consulted only their +interest and convenience as to their purchase or sale. The magnitude of +the evil at first appalled him; he felt it to be his duty to condemn it, +but for a time even his strong spirit faltered and turned pale in +contemplation of the consequences to be apprehended from an attack upon +it. Slavery and slave-trading were at that time the principal source of +wealth to the island; his own church and congregation were personally +interested in the traffic; all were implicated in its guilt. He stood +alone, as it were, in its condemnation; with here and there an exception, +all Christendom maintained the rightfulness of slavery. No movement had +yet been made in England against the slave-trade; the decision of +Granville Sharp's Somerset case had not yet taken place. The Quakers, +even, had not at that time redeemed themselves from the opprobrium. +Under these circumstances, after a thorough examination of the subject, +he resolved, in the strength of the Lord, to take his stand openly and +decidedly on the side of humanity. He prepared a sermon for the purpose, +and for the first time from a pulpit of New England was heard an emphatic +testimony against the sin of slavery. In contrast with the unselfish and +disinterested benevolence which formed in his mind the essential element +of Christian holiness, he held up the act of reducing human beings to the +condition of brutes, to minister to the convenience, the luxury, and +lusts of the owner. He had expected bitter complaint and opposition from +his hearers, but was agreeably surprised to find that in most cases his +sermon only excited astonishment in their minds that they themselves had +never before looked at the subject in the light in which he presented it. +Steadily and faithfully pursuing the matter, he had the satisfaction to +carry with him his church, and obtain from it, in the midst of a +slaveholding and slavetrading community, a resolution every way worthy of +note in this day of cowardly compromise with the evil on the part of our +leading ecclesiastical bodies:-- + +"Resolved, That the slave-trade and the slavery of the Africans, as it +has existed among us, is a gross violation of the righteousness and +benevolence which are so much inculcated in the Gospel, and therefore we +will not tolerate it in this church." + +There are few instances on record of moral heroism superior to that of +Samuel Hopkins, in thus rebuking slavery in the time and place of its +power. Honor to the true man ever, who takes his life in his hands, and, +at all hazards, speaks the word which is given him to utter, whether men +will hear or forbear, whether the end thereof is to be praise or censure, +gratitude or hatred. It well may be doubted whether on that Sabbath day +the angels of God, in their wide survey of His universe, looked upon a +nobler spectacle than that of the minister of Newport, rising up before +his slaveholding congregation, and demanding, in the name of the Highest, +the "deliverance of the captive, and the opening of prison doors to them +that were bound." + +Dr. Hopkins did not confine his attention solely to slaveholding in his +own church and congregation. He entered into correspondence with the +early Abolitionists of Europe as well as his own country. He labored +with his brethren in the ministry to bring then to his own view of the +great wrong of holding men as slaves. In a visit to his early friend, +Dr. Bellamy, at Bethlehem, who was the owner of a slave, he pressed the +subject kindly but earnestly upon his attention. Dr. Bellamy urged the +usual arguments in favor of slavery. Dr. Hopkins refuted them in the +most successful manner, and called upon his friend to do an act of simple +justice, in giving immediate freedom to his slave. Dr. Bellamy, thus +hardly pressed, said that the slave was a most judicious and faithful +fellow; that, in the management of his farm, he could trust everything to +his discretion; that he treated him well, and he was so happy in his +service that he would refuse his freedom if it were offered him. + +"Will you," said Hopkins, "consent to his liberation, if he really +desires it?" + +"Yes, certainly," said Dr. Bellamy. + +"Then let us try him," said his guest. + +The slave was at work in an adjoining field, and at the call of his +master came promptly to receive his commands. + +"Have you a good master?" inquired Hopkins. + +"O yes; massa, he berry good." + +"But are you happy in your present condition?" queried the Doctor. + +"O yes, massa; berry happy." + +Dr. Bellamy here could scarcely suppress his exultation at what he +supposed was a complete triumph over his anti-slavery brother. But the +pertinacious guest continued his queries. + +"Would you not be more happy if you were free?" + +"O yes, massa," exclaimed the negro, his dark face glowing with new life; +"berry much more happy!" + +To the honor of Dr. Bellamy, he did not hesitate. + +"You have your wish," he said to his servant. "From this moment you are +free." + +Dr. Hopkins was a poor man, but one of his first acts, after becoming +convinced of the wrongfulness of slavery, was to appropriate the very sum +which, in the days of his ignorance, he had obtained as the price of his +slave to the benevolent purpose of educating some pious colored men in +the town of Newport, who were desirous of returning to their native +country as missionaries. In one instance he borrowed, on his own +responsibility, the sum requisite to secure the freedom of a slave in +whom he became interested. One of his theological pupils was Newport +Gardner, who, twenty years after the death of his kind patron, left +Boston as a missionary to Africa. He was a native African, and was held +by Captain Gardner, of Newport, who allowed him to labor for his own +benefit, whenever by extra diligence he could gain a little time for that +purpose. The poor fellow was in the habit of laying up his small +earnings on these occasions, in the faint hope of one day obtaining +thereby the freedom of himself and his family. But time passed on, and +the hoard of purchase-money still looked sadly small. He concluded to +try the efficacy of praying. Having gained a day for himself, by severe +labor, and communicating his plan only to Dr. Hopkins and two or three +other Christian friends, he shut himself up in his humble dwelling, and +spent the time in prayer for freedom. Towards the close of the day, his +master sent for him. He was told that this was his gained time, and that +he was engaged for himself. "No matter," returned the master, "I must +see him." Poor Newport reluctantly abandoned his supplications, and came +at his master's bidding, when, to his astonishment, instead of a +reprimand, he received a paper, signed by his master, declaring him and +his family from thenceforth free. He justly attributed this signal +blessing to the all-wise Disposer, who turns the hearts of men as the +rivers of water are turned; but it cannot be doubted that the labors and +arguments of Dr. Hopkins with his master were the human instrumentality +in effecting it. + +In the year 1773, in connection with Dr. Ezra Stiles, he issued an appeal +to the Christian community in behalf of a society which he had been +instrumental in forming, for the purpose of educating missionaries for +Africa. In the desolate and benighted condition of that unhappy +continent he had become painfully interested, by conversing with the +slaves brought into Newport. Another appeal was made on the subject in +1776. + +The war of the Revolution interrupted, for a time, the philanthropic +plans of Dr. Hopkins. The beautiful island on which he lived was at an +early period exposed to the exactions and devastations of the enemy. All +who could do so left it for the mainland. Its wharves were no longer +thronged with merchandise; its principal dwellings stood empty; the very +meeting houses were in a great measure abandoned. Dr. Hopkins, who had +taken the precaution, at the commencement of hostilities, to remove his +family to Great Barrington, remained himself until the year 1776, when +the British took possession of the island. During the period of its +occupation, he was employed in preaching to destitute congregations. +He spent the summer of 1777 at Newburyport, where his memory is still +cherished by the few of his hearers who survive. In the spring of 1780, +he returned to Newport. Everything had undergone a melancholy change. +The garden of New England lay desolate. His once prosperous and wealthy +church and congregation were now poor, dispirited, and, worst of all, +demoralized. His meeting-house had been used as a barrack for soldiers; +pulpit and pews had been destroyed; the very bell had been stolen. +Refusing, with his characteristic denial of self, a call to settle in a +more advantageous position, he sat himself down once more in the midst of +his reduced and impoverished parishioners, and, with no regular salary, +dependent entirely on such free-will offerings as from time to time were +made him, he remained with them until his death. + +In 1776, Dr. Hopkins published his celebrated "Dialogue concerning the +Slavery of the Africans; showing it to be the Duty and Interest of the +American States to Emancipate all their Slaves." This he dedicated to +the Continental Congress, the Signers of the Declaration of Independence. +It was republished in 1785, by the New York Abolition Society, and was +widely circulated. A few years after, on coming unexpectedly into +possession of a few hundred dollars, he devoted immediately one hundred +of it to the society for ameliorating the condition of the Africans. + +He continued to preach until he had reached his eighty-third year. His +last sermon was delivered on the 16th of the tenth month, 1803, and his +death took place in the twelfth month following. He died calmly, in the +steady faith of one who had long trusted all things in the hand of God. +"The language of my heart is," said he, "let God be glorified by all +things, and the best interest of His kingdom promoted, whatever becomes +of me or my interest." To a young friend, who visited him three days +before his death, he said, "I am feeble and cannot say much. I have said +all I can say. With my last words, I tell you, religion is the one thing +needful." "And now," he continued, affectionately pressing the hand of +his friend, "I am going to die, and I am glad of it." Many years before, +an agreement had been made between Dr. Hopkins and his old and tried +friend, Dr. Hart, of Connecticut, that when either was called home, the +survivor should preach the funeral sermon of the deceased. The venerable +Dr. Hart accordingly came, true to his promise, preaching at the funeral +from the words of Elisha, "My father, my father; the chariots of Israel, +and the horsemen thereof." In the burial-ground adjoining his meeting- +house lies all that was mortal of Samuel Hopkins. + +One of Dr. Hopkins's habitual hearers, and who has borne grateful +testimony to the beauty and holiness of his life and conversation, was +William Ellery Channing. Widely as he afterwards diverged from the creed +of his early teacher, it contained at least one doctrine to the influence +of which the philanthropic devotion of his own life to the welfare of man +bears witness. He says, himself, that there always seemed to him +something very noble in the doctrine of disinterested benevolence, the +casting of self aside, and doing good, irrespective of personal +consequences, in this world or another, upon which Dr. Hopkins so +strongly insisted, as the all-essential condition of holiness. + +How widely apart, as mere theologians, stood Hopkins and Channing! Yet +how harmonious their lives and practice! Both could forget the poor +interests of self, in view of eternal right and universal humanity. Both +could appreciate the saving truth, that love to God and His creation is +the fulfilling of the divine law. The idea of unselfish benevolence, +which they held in common, clothed with sweetness and beauty the stern +and repulsive features of the theology of Hopkins, and infused a sublime +spirit of self-sacrifice and a glowing humanity into the indecisive and +less robust faith of Charming. What is the lesson of this but that +Christianity consists rather in the affections than in the intellect; +that it is a life rather than a creed; and that they who diverge the +widest from each other in speculation upon its doctrines may, after all, +be found working side by side on the common ground of its practice. + +We have chosen to speak of Dr. Hopkins as a philanthropist rather than as +a theologian. Let those who prefer to contemplate the narrow sectarian +rather than the universal man dwell upon his controversial works, and +extol the ingenuity and logical acumen with which he defended his own +dogmas and assailed those of others. We honor him, not as the founder of +a new sect, but as the friend of all mankind,--the generous defender of +the poor and oppressed. Great as unquestionably were his powers of +argument, his learning, and skill in the use of the weapons of theologic +warfare, these by no means constitute his highest title to respect and +reverence. As the product of an honest and earnest mind, his doctrinal +dissertations have at least the merit of sincerity. They were put forth +in behalf of what he regarded as truth; and the success which they met +with, while it called into exercise his profoundest gratitude, only +served to deepen the humility and self-abasement of their author. As the +utterance of what a good man believed and felt, as a part of the history +of a life remarkable for its consecration to apprehended duty, these +writings cannot be without interest even to those who dissent from their +arguments and deny their assumptions; but in the time now, we trust, near +at hand, when distracted and divided Christendom shall unite in a new +Evangelical union, in which orthodoxy in life and practice shall be +estimated above orthodoxy in theory, he will be honored as a good man, +rather than as a successful creed-maker; as a friend of the oppressed and +the fearless rebuker of popular sin rather than as the champion of a +protracted sectarian war. Even now his writings, so popular in their +day, are little known. The time may come when no pilgrim of sectarianism +shall visit his grave. But his memory shall live in the hearts of the +good and generous; the emancipated slave shall kneel over his ashes, and +bless God for the gift to humanity of a life so devoted to its welfare. +To him may be applied the language of one who, on the spot where he +labored and lay down to rest, while rejecting the doctrinal views of the +theologian, still cherishes the philanthropic spirit of the man:-- + + "He is not lost,--he hath not passed away + Clouds, earths, may pass, but stars shine calmly on; + And he who doth the will of God, for aye + Abideth, when the earth and heaven are gone. + + "Alas that such a heart is in the grave!' + Thanks for the life that now shall never end! + Weep, and rejoice, thou terror-hunted slave, + That hast both lost and found so great a friend!" + + + + +RICHARD BAXTER. + +The picture drawn by a late English historian of the infamous Jeffreys in +his judicial robes, sitting in judgment upon the venerable Richard +Baxter, brought before him to answer to an indictment, setting; forth +that the said "Richardus Baxter, persona seditiosa et factiosa pravae +mentis, impiae, inquietae, turbulent disposition et conversation; falso +illicte, injuste nequit factiose seditiose, et irreligiose, fecit, +composuit, scripsit quendam falsum, seditiosum, libellosum, factiosum et +irreligiosum librum," is so remarkable that the attention of the most +careless reader is at once arrested. Who was that old man, wasted with +disease and ghastly with the pallor of imprisonment, upon whom the foul- +mouthed buffoon in ermine exhausted his vocabulary of abuse and ridicule? +Who was Richardus Baxter? + +The author of works so elaborate and profound as to frighten by their +very titles and ponderous folios the modern ecclesiastical student from +their perusal, his hold upon the present generation is limited to a few +practical treatises, which, from their very nature, can never become +obsolete. The _Call to the Unconverted_ and the _Saints' Everlasting +Rest_ belong to no time or sect. They speak the universal language of +the wants and desires of the human soul. They take hold of the awful +verities of life and death, righteousness and judgment to come. Through +them the suffering and hunted minister of Kidderminster has spoken in +warning, entreaty, and rebuke, or in tones of tenderest love and pity, to +the hearts of the generations which have succeeded him. His +controversial works, his confessions of faith, his learned disputations, +and his profound doctrinal treatises are no longer read. Their author +himself, towards the close of his life, anticipated, in respect to these +favorite productions, the children of his early zeal, labor, and +suffering, the judgment of posterity. "I perceive," he says, "that most +of the doctrinal controversies among Protestants are far more about +equivocal words than matter. Experience since the year 1643 to this year +1675 hath loudly called me to repent of my own prejudices, sidings, and +censurings of causes and persons not understood, and of all the +miscarriages of my ministry and life which have been thereby caused; and +to make it my chief work to call men that are within my bearing to more +peaceable thoughts, affections, and practices." + +Richard Baxter was born at the village of Eton Constantine, in 1615. He +received from officiating curates of the little church such literary +instruction as could be given by men who had left the farmer's flail, the +tailor's thimble, and the service of strolling stage-players, to perform +church drudgery under the parish incumbent, who was old and well-nigh +blind. At the age of sixteen, he was sent to a school at Wroxeter, where +he spent three years, to little purpose, so far as a scientific education +was concerned. His teacher left him to himself mainly, and following the +bent of his mind, even at that early period, he abandoned the exact +sciences for the perusal of such controversial and metaphysical writings +of the schoolmen as his master's library afforded. The smattering of +Latin which he acquired only served in after years to deform his +treatises with barbarous, ill-adapted, and erroneous citations. "As to +myself," said he, in his letter written in old age to Anthony Wood, who +had inquired whether he was an Oxonian graduate, "my faults are no +disgrace to a university, for I was of none; I have but little but what I +had out of books and inconsiderable help of country divines. Weakness +and pain helped me to study how to die; that set me a-studying how to +live; and that on studying the doctrine from which I must fetch my +motives and comforts; beginning with necessities, I proceeded by degrees, +and am now going to see that for which I have lived and studied." + +Of the first essays of the young theologian as a preacher of the +Established Church, his early sufferings from that complication of +diseases with which his whole life was tormented, of the still keener +afflictions of a mind whose entire outlook upon life and nature was +discolored and darkened by its disordered bodily medium, and of the +struggles between his Puritan temperament and his reverence for Episcopal +formulas, much might be profitably said, did the limits we have assigned +ourselves admit. Nor can we do more than briefly allude to the religious +doubts and difficulties which darkened and troubled his mind at an early +period. + +He tells us at length in his Life how he struggled with these spiritual +infirmities and temptations. The future life, the immortality of the +soul, and the truth of the Scriptures were by turns questioned. "I +never," says he in a letter to Dr. More, inserted in the _Sadducisimus +Triumphatus_, "had so much ado to overcome a temptation as that to the +opinion of Averroes, that, as extinguished candles go all out in an +illuminated air, so separated souls go all into one common anima mundi, +and lose their individuation." With these and similar "temptations" +Baxter struggled long, earnestly, and in the end triumphantly. His +faith, when once established, remained unshaken to the last; and although +always solemn, reverential, and deeply serious, he was never the subject +of religious melancholy, or of that mournful depression of soul which +arises from despair of an interest in the mercy and paternal love of our +common Father. + +The Great Revolution found him settled as a minister in Kidderminster, +under the sanction of a drunken vicar, who, yielding to the clamor of his +more sober parishioners, and his fear of their appeal to the Long +Parliament, then busy in its task of abating church nuisances, had agreed +to give him sixty pounds per year, in the place of a poor tippling +curate, notorious as a common railer and pothouse encumbrance. + +As might have been expected, the sharp contrast which the earnest, +devotional spirit and painful strictness of Baxter presented to the +irreverent license and careless good humor of his predecessor by no means +commended him to the favor of a large class of his parishioners. Sabbath +merry-makers missed the rubicund face and maudlin jollity of their old +vicar; the ignorant and vicious disliked the new preacher's rigid +morality; the better informed revolted at his harsh doctrines, austere +life, and grave manner. Intense earnestness characterized all his +efforts. Contrasting human nature with the Infinite Purity and Holiness, +he was oppressed with the sense of the loathsomeness and deformity of +sin, and afflicted by the misery of his fellow-creatures separated from +the divine harmony. He tells us that at this period he preached the +terrors of the Law and the necessity of repentance, rather than the joys +and consolations of the Gospel, upon which he so loved to dwell in his +last years. He seems to have felt a necessity laid upon him to startle +men from false hope and security, and to call for holiness of life and +conformity to the divine will as the only ground of safety. Powerful and +impressive as are the appeals and expostulations contained in his written +works, they probably convey but a faint idea of the force and earnestness +of those which he poured forth from his pulpit. As he advanced in years, +these appeals were less frequently addressed to the fears of his +auditors, for he had learned to value a calm and consistent life of +practical goodness beyond any passionate exhibition of terrors, fervors, +and transports. Having witnessed, in an age of remarkable enthusiasm and +spiritual awakening, the ill effects of passional excitements and +religious melancholy, he endeavored to present cheerful views of +Christian life and duty, and made it a special object to repress morbid +imaginations and heal diseased consciences. Thus it came to pass that no +man of his day was more often applied to for counsel and relief by +persons laboring under mental depression than himself. He has left +behind him a very curious and not uninstructive discourse, which he +entitled The Cure of Melancholy, by Faith and Physick, in which he shows +a great degree of skill in his morbid mental anatomy. He had studied +medicine to some extent for the benefit of the poor of his parish, and +knew something of the intimate relations and sympathy of the body and +mind; he therefore did not hesitate to ascribe many of the spiritual +complaints of his applicants to disordered bodily functions, nor to +prescribe pills and powders in the place of Scripture texts. More than +thirty years after the commencement of his labors at Kidderminster he +thus writes: "I was troubled this year with multitudes of melancholy +persons from several places of the land; some of high quality, some of +low, some exquisitely learned, and some unlearned. I know not how it +came to pass, but if men fell melancholy I must hear from them or see +them, more than any physician I knew." He cautions against ascribing +melancholy phantasms and passions to the Holy Spirit, warns the young +against licentious imaginations and excitements, and ends by advising all +to take heed how they make of religion a matter of "fears, tears, and +scruples." "True religion," he remarks, "doth principally consist in +obedience, love, and joy." + +At this early period of his ministry, however, he had all of Whitefield's +intensity and fervor, added to reasoning powers greatly transcending +those of the revivalist of the next century. Young in years, he was even +then old in bodily infirmity and mental experience. Believing himself +the victim of a mortal disease, he lived and preached in the constant +prospect of death. His memento mori was in his bed-chamber, and sat by +him at his frugal meal. The glory of the world was stained to his +vision. He was blind to the beauty of all its "pleasant pictures." No +monk of Mount Athos or silent Chartreuse, no anchorite of Indian +superstition, ever more completely mortified the flesh, or turned his +back more decidedly upon the "good things" of this life. A solemn and +funeral atmosphere surrounded him. He walked in the shadows of the +cypress, and literally "dwelt among the tombs." Tortured by incessant +pain, he wrestled against its attendant languor and debility, as a sinful +wasting of inestimable time; goaded himself to constant toil and +devotional exercise, and, to use his own words, "stirred up his sluggish +soul to speak to sinners with compassion, as a dying man to dying men." + +Such entire consecration could not long be without its effect, even upon +the "vicious rabble," as Baxter calls them. His extraordinary +earnestness, self-forgetting concern for the spiritual welfare of others, +his rigid life of denial and sacrifice, if they failed of bringing men to +his feet as penitents, could not but awaken a feeling of reverence and +awe. In Kidderminster, as in most other parishes of the kingdom, there +were at this period pious, sober, prayerful people, diligent readers of +the Scriptures, who were derided by their neighbors as Puritans, +precisians, and hypocrites. These were naturally drawn towards the new +preacher, and he as naturally recognized them as "honest seekers of the +word and way of God." Intercourse with such men, and the perusal of the +writings of certain eminent Non-conformists, had the effect to abate, in +some degree, his strong attachment to the Episcopal formula and polity. +He began to doubt the rightfulness of making the sign of the cross in +baptism, and to hesitate about administering the sacrament to profane +swearers and tipplers. + +But while Baxter, in the seclusion of his parish, was painfully weighing +the arguments for and against the wearing of surplices, the use of +marriage rings, and the prescribed gestures and genuflections of his +order, tithing with more or less scruple of conscience the mint and anise +and cummin of pulpit ceremonials, the weightier matters of the law, +freedom, justice, and truth were claiming the attention of Pym and +Hampden, Brook and Vane, in the Parliament House. The controversy +between King and Commons had reached the point where it could only be +decided by the dread arbitrament of battle. The somewhat equivocal +position of the Kidderminster preacher exposed him to the suspicion of +the adherents of the King and Bishops. The rabble, at that period +sympathizing with the party of license in morals and strictness in +ceremonials, insulted and mocked him, and finally drove him from his +parish. + +On the memorable 23d of tenth month, 1642, he was invited to occupy a +friend's pulpit at Alcester. + +While preaching, a low, dull, jarring roll, as of continuous thunder, +sounded in his ears. It was the cannon-fire of Edgehill, the prelude to +the stern battle-piece of revolution. On the morrow, Baxter hurried to +the scene of action. "I was desirous," he says, "to see the field. I +found the Earl of Essex keeping the ground, and the King's army facing +them on a hill about a mile off. There were about a thousand dead bodies +in the field between them." Turning from this ghastly survey, the +preacher mingled with the Parliamentary army, when, finding the surgeons +busy with the wounded, he very naturally sought occasion for the exercise +of his own vocation as a spiritual practitioner. He attached himself to +the army. So far as we can gather from his own memoirs and the testimony +of his contemporaries, he was not influenced to this step by any of the +political motives which actuated the Parliamentary leaders. He was no +revolutionist. He was as blind and unquestioning in his reverence for +the King's person and divine right, and as hearty in his hatred of +religious toleration and civil equality, as any of his clerical brethren +who officiated in a similar capacity in the ranks of Goring and Prince +Rupert. He seems only to have looked upon the soldiers as a new set of +parishioners, whom Providence had thrown in his way. The circumstances +of his situation left him little choice in the matter. "I had," he says, +"neither money nor friends. I knew not who would receive me in a place +of safety, nor had I anything to satisfy them for diet and +entertainment." He accepted an offer to live in the Governor's house at +Coventry, and preach to the soldiers of the garrison. Here his skill in +polemics was called into requisition, in an encounter with two New +England Antinomians, and a certain Anabaptist tailor who was making more +rents in the garrison's orthodoxy than he mended in their doublets and +breeches. Coventry seems at this time to have been the rendezvous of a +large body of clergymen, who, as Baxter says, were "for King and +Parliament,"--men who, in their desire for a more spiritual worship, most +unwillingly found themselves classed with the sentries whom they regarded +as troublers and heretics, not to be tolerated; who thought the King had +fallen into the hands of the Papists, and that Essex and Cromwell were +fighting to restore him; and who followed the Parliamentary forces to see +to it that they were kept sound in faith, and free from the heresy of +which the Court News-Book accused them. Of doing anything to overturn +the order of Church and State, or of promoting any radical change in the +social and political condition of the people, they had no intention +whatever. They looked at the events of the time, and upon their duties +in respect to them, not as politicians or reformers, but simply as +ecclesiastics and spiritual teachers, responsible to God for the +religious beliefs and practices of the people, rather than for their +temporal welfare and happiness. They were not the men who struck down +the solemn and imposing prelacy of England, and vindicated the divine +right of men to freedom by tossing the head of an anointed tyrant from +the scaffold at Whitehall. It was the so-called schismatics, ranters, +and levellers, the disputatious corporals and Anabaptist musketeers, the +dread and abhorrence alike of prelate and presbyter, who, under the lead +of Cromwell, + + "Ruined the great work of time, + And cast the kingdoms old + Into another mould." + +The Commonwealth was the work of the laity, the sturdy yeomanry and God- +fearing commoners of England. + +The news of the fight of Naseby reaching Coventry, Baxter, who had +friends in the Parliamentary forces, wishing, as he says, to be assured +of their safety, passed over to the stricken field, and spent a night +with them. He was afflicted and confounded by the information which they +gave him, that the victorious army was full of hot-headed schemers and +levellers, who were against King and Church, prelacy and ritual, and who +were for a free Commonwealth and freedom of religious belief and worship. +He was appalled to find that the heresies of the Antinomians, Arminians, +and Anabaptists had made sadder breaches in the ranks of Cromwell than +the pikes of Jacob Astley, or the daggers of the roysterers who followed +the mad charge of Rupert. Hastening back to Coventry, he called together +his clerical brethren, and told them "the sad news of the corruption of +the army." After much painful consideration of the matter, it was deemed +best for Baxter to enter Cromwell's army, nominally as its chaplain, but +really as the special representative of orthodoxy in politics and +religion, against the democratic weavers and prophesying tailors who +troubled it. He joined Whalley's regiment, and followed it through many +a hot skirmish and siege. Personal fear was by no means one of Baxter's +characteristics, and he bore himself through all with the coolness of an +old campaigner. Intent upon his single object, he sat unmoved under the +hail of cannon-shot from the walls of Bristol, confronted the well-plied +culverins of Sherburne, charged side by side with Harrison upon Goring's +musketeers at Langford, and heard the exulting thanksgiving of that grim +enthusiast, when "with a loud voice he broke forth in praises of God, as +one in rapture;" and marched, Bible in hand, with Cromwell himself, to +the storming of Basing-House, so desperately defended by the Marquis of +Winchester. In truth, these storms of outward conflict were to him of +small moment. He was engaged in a sterner battle with spiritual +principalities and powers, struggling with Satan himself in the guise of +political levellers and Antinomian sowers of heresy. No antagonist was +too high and none too low for him. Distrusting Cromwell, he sought to +engage him in a discussion of certain points of abstract theology, +wherein his soundness seemed questionable; but the wary chief baffled off +the young disputant by tedious, unanswerable discourses about free grace, +which Baxter admits were not unsavory to others, although the speaker +himself had little understanding of the matter. At other times, he +repelled his sad-visaged chaplain with unwelcome jests and rough, +soldierly merriment; for he had "a vivacity, hilarity, and alacrity as +another man hath when he hath taken a cup too much." Baxter says of him, +complainingly, "he would not dispute with me at all." But, in the midst +of such an army, he could not lack abundant opportunity for the exercise +of his peculiar powers of argumentation. At Amersham, he had a sort of +pitched battle with the contumacious soldiers. "When the public talking +day came," says he, "I took the reading-pew, and Pitchford's cornet and +troopers took the gallery. There did the leader of the Chesham men +begin, and afterwards Pitchford's soldiers set in; and I alone disputed +with them from morning until almost night; for I knew their trick, that +if I had gone out first, they would have prated what boasting words they +listed, and made the people believe that they had baffled me, or got the +best; therefore I stayed it out till they first rose and went away." As +usual in such cases, both parties claimed the victory. Baxter got thanks +only from the King's adherents; "Pitchford's troops and the leader of the +Chesham men" retired from their hard day's work, to enjoy the countenance +and favor of Cromwell, as men after his own heart, faithful to the Houses +and the Word, against kingcraft and prelacy. + +Laughed at and held at arm's length by Cromwell, shunned by Harrison and +Berry and other chief officers, opposed on all points by shrewd, earnest +men, as ready for polemic controversy as for battle with the King's +malignants, and who set off against his theological and metaphysical +distinctions their own personal experiences and spiritual exercises, he +had little to encourage him in his arduous labors. Alone in such a +multitude, flushed with victory and glowing with religious enthusiasm, +he earnestly begged his brother ministers to come to his aid. "If the +army," said he, "had only ministers enough, who could have done such +little as I did, all their plot might have been broken, and King, +Parliament, and Religion might have been preserved." But no one +volunteered to assist him, and the "plot" of revolution went on. + +After Worcester fight he returned to Coventry, to make his report to the +ministers assembled there. He told them of his labors and trials, of the +growth of heresy and levelling principles in the army, and of the evident +design of its leaders to pull down Church, King, and Ministers. He +assured them that the day was at hand when all who were true to the King, +Parliament, and Religion should come forth to oppose these leaders, and +draw away their soldiers from them. For himself, he was willing to go +back to the army, and labor there until the crisis of which he spoke had +arrived. "Whereupon," says he, "they all voted me to go yet longer." + +Fortunately for the cause of civil and religious freedom, the great body +of the ministers, who disapproved of the ultraism of the victorious army, +and sympathized with the defeated King, lacked the courage and +devotedness of Baxter. Had they promptly seconded his efforts, although +the restoration of the King might have been impossible at that late +period, the horrors of civil war must have been greatly protracted. As +it was, they preferred to remain at home, and let Baxter have the benefit +of their prayers and good wishes. He returned to the army with the +settled purpose, of causing its defection from Cromwell; but, by one of +those dispensations which the latter used to call "births of Providence," +he was stricken down with severe sickness. Baxter's own comments upon +this passage in his life are not without interest. He says, God +prevented his purposes in his last and chiefest opposition to the army; +that he intended to take off or seduce from their officers the regiment +with which he was connected, and then to have tried his persuasion upon +the others. He says he afterwards found that his sickness was a mercy to +himself, "for they were so strong and active, and I had been likely to +have had small success in the attempt, and to have lost my life among +them in their fury." He was right in this last conjecture; Oliver +Cromwell would have had no scruples in making an example of a plotting +priest; and "Pitchford's soldiers" might have been called upon to +silence, with their muskets, the tough disputant who was proof against +their tongues. + +After a long and dubious illness, Baxter was so far restored as to be +able to go back to his old parish at Kidderminster. Here, under the +Protectorate of Cromwell, he remained in the full enjoyment of that +religious liberty which he still stoutly condemned in its application to +others. + +He afterwards candidly admits, that, under the "Usurper," as he styles +Cromwell, "he had such liberty and advantage to preach the Gospel with +success, as he could not have under a King, to whom he had sworn and +performed true subjection and obedience." Yet this did not prevent him +from preaching and printing, "seasonably and moderately," against the +Protector. "I declared," said he, "Cromwell and his adherents to be +guilty of treason and rebellion, aggravated by perfidiousness and +hypocrisy. But yet I did not think it my duty to rave against him in the +pulpit, or to do this so unseasonably and imprudently as might irritate +him to mischief. And the rather, because, as he kept up his approbation +of a godly life in general, and of all that was good, except that which +the interest of his sinful cause engaged him to be against. So I +perceived that it was his design to do good in the main, and to promote +the Gospel and the interests of godliness more than any had done before +him." + +Cromwell, if he heard of his diatribes against him, appears to have cared +little for them. Lords Warwick and Broghill, on one occasion, brought +him to preach before the Lord Protector. He seized the occasion to +preach against the sentries, to condemn all who countenanced them, and to +advocate the unity of the Church. Soon after, he was sent for by +Cromwell, who made "a long and tedious speech" in the presence of three +of his chief men, (one of whom, General Lambert, fell asleep the while,) +asserting that God had owned his government in a signal manner. Baxter +boldly replied to him, that he and his friends regarded the ancient +monarchy as a blessing, and not an evil, and begged to know how that +blessing was forfeited to England, and to whom that forfeiture was made. +Cromwell, with some heat, made answer that it was no forfeiture, but that +God had made the change. They afterwards held a long conference with +respect to freedom of conscience, Cromwell defending his liberal policy, +and Baxter opposing it. No one can read Baxter's own account of these +interviews, without being deeply impressed with the generous and +magnanimous spirit of the Lord Protector in tolerating the utmost freedom +of speech on the part of one who openly denounced him as a traitor and +usurper. Real greatness of mind could alone have risen above personal +resentment under such circumstances of peculiar aggravation. + +In the death of the Protector, the treachery of Monk, and the restoration +of the King, Baxter and his Presbyterian friends believed that they saw +the hand of a merciful Providence preparing the way for the best good of +England and the Church. Always royalists, they had acted with the party +opposed to the King from necessity rather than choice. Considering all +that followed, one can scarcely avoid smiling over the extravagant +jubilations of the Presbyterian divines, on the return of the royal +debauchee to Whitehall. They hurried up to London with congratulations +of formidable length and papers of solemn advice and counsel, to all +which the careless monarch listened, with what patience he was master of. +Baxter was one of the first to present himself at Court, and it is +creditable to his heart rather than his judgment and discrimination that +he seized the occasion to offer a long address to the King, expressive of +his expectation that his Majesty would discountenance all sin and promote +godliness, support the true exercise of Church discipline and cherish and +hold up the hands of the faithful ministers of the Church. To all which +Charles II. "made as gracious an answer as we could expect," says Baxter, +"insomuch that old Mr. Ash burst out into tears of joy." Who doubts that +the profligate King avenged himself as soon as the backs of his unwelcome +visitors were fairly turned, by coarse jests and ribaldry, directed +against a class of men whom he despised and hated, but towards whom +reasons of policy dictated a show of civility and kindness? + +There is reason to believe that Charles II., had he been able to effect +his purpose, would have gone beyond Cromwell himself in the matter of +religious toleration; in other words, he would have taken, in the outset +of his reign, the very steps which cost his successor his crown, and +procured the toleration of Catholics by a declaration of universal +freedom in religion. But he was not in a situation to brave the +opposition alike of Prelacy and Presbyterianism, and foiled in a scheme +to which he was prompted by that vague, superstitious predilection for +the Roman Catholic religion which at times struggled with his habitual +scepticism, his next object was to rid himself of the importunities of +sentries and the trouble of religious controversies by reestablishing the +liturgy, and bribing or enforcing conformity to it on the part of the +Presbyterians. The history of the successful execution of this purpose +is familiar to all the readers of the plausible pages of Clarendon on the +one side, or the complaining treatises of Neal and Calamy on the other. + +Charles and his advisers triumphed, not so much through their own art, +dissimulation, and bad faith as through the blind bigotry, divided +counsels, and self-seeking of the Nonconformists. Seduction on one hand +and threats on the other, the bribe of bishoprics, hatred of Independents +and Quakers, and the terror of penal laws, broke the strength of +Presbyterianism. + +Baxter's whole conduct, on this occasion, bears testimony to his honesty +and sincerity, while it shows him to have been too intolerant to secure +his own religious freedom at the price of toleration for Catholics, +Quakers, and Anabaptists; and too blind in his loyalty to perceive that +pure and undefiled Christianity had nothing to hope for from a scandalous +and depraved King, surrounded by scoffing, licentious courtiers and a +haughty, revengeful prelacy. To secure his influence, the Court offered +him the bishopric of Hereford. Superior to personal considerations, he +declined the honor; but somewhat inconsistently, in his zeal for the +interests of his party, he urged the elevation of at least three of his +Presbyterian friends to the Episcopal bench, to enforce that very liturgy +which they condemned. He was the chief speaker for the Presbyterians at +the famous Savoy Conference, summoned to advise and consult upon the Book +of Common Prayer. His antagonist was Dr. Gunning, ready, fluent, and +impassioned. "They spent," as Gilbert Burnet says, "several days in +logical arguing, to the diversion of the town, who looked upon them as a +couple of fencers, engaged in a discussion which could not be brought to +an end." In themselves considered, many of the points at issue seem +altogether too trivial for the zeal with which Baxter contested them,-- +the form of a surplice, the wording of a prayer, kneeling at sacrament, +the sign of the cross, etc. With him, however, they were of momentous +interest and importance, as things unlawful in the worship of God. He +struggled desperately, but unavailingly. Presbyterianism, in its +eagerness for peace and union and a due share of State support, had +already made fatal concessions, and it was too late to stand upon non- +essentials. Baxter retired from the conference baffled and defeated, +amidst murmurs and jests. "If you had only been as fat as Dr. Manton," +said Clarendon to him, "you would have done well." + +The Act of Conformity, in which Charles II. and his counsellors gave the +lie to the liberal declarations of Breda and Whitehall, drove Baxter from +his sorrowing parishioners of Kidderminster, and added the evils of +poverty and persecution to the painful bodily infirmities under which he +was already bowed down. Yet his cup was not one of unalloyed bitterness, +and loving lips were prepared to drink it with him. + +Among Baxter's old parishioners of Kidderminster was a widowed lady of +gentle birth, named Charlton, who, with her daughter Margaret, occupied a +house in his neighborhood. The daughter was a brilliant girl, of +"strangely vivid wit," and "in early youth," he tells us, "pride, and +romances, and company suitable thereunto, did take her up." But erelong, +Baxter, who acted in the double capacity of spiritual and temporal +physician, was sent for to visit her, on an occasion of sickness. He +ministered to her bodily and mental sufferings, and thus secured her +gratitude and confidence. On her recovery, under the influence of his +warnings and admonitions, the gay young girl became thoughtful and +serious, abandoned her light books and companions, and devoted herself to +the duties of a Christian profession. Baxter was her counsellor and +confidant. She disclosed to him all her doubts, trials, and temptations, +and he, in return, wrote her long letters of sympathy, consolation, and +encouragement. He began to feel such an unwonted interest in the moral +and spiritual growth of his young disciple, that, in his daily walks +among his parishioners, he found himself inevitably drawn towards her +mother's dwelling. In her presence, the habitual austerity of his manner +was softened; his cold, close heart warmed and expanded. He began to +repay her confidence with his own, disclosing to her all his plans of +benevolence, soliciting her services, and waiting, with deference, for +her judgment upon them. A change came over his habits of thought and his +literary tastes; the harsh, rude disputant, the tough, dry logician, +found himself addressing to his young friend epistles in verse on +doctrinal points and matters of casuistry; Westminster Catechism in +rhyme; the Solemn League and Covenant set to music. A miracle alone +could have made Baxter a poet; the cold, clear light of reason "paled the +ineffectual fires" of his imagination; all things presented themselves to +his vision "with hard outlines, colorless, and with no surrounding +atmosphere." That he did, nevertheless, write verses, so creditable as +to justify a judicious modern critic in their citation and approval, can +perhaps be accounted for only as one of the phenomena of that subtle and +transforming influence to which even his stern nature was unconsciously +yielding. Baxter was in love. + +Never did the blind god try his archery on a more unpromising subject. +Baxter was nearly fifty years of age, and looked still older. His life +had been one long fast and penance. Even in youth he had never known a +schoolboy's love for cousin or playmate. He had resolutely closed up his +heart against emotions which he regarded as the allurements of time and +sense. He had made a merit of celibacy, and written and published +against the entanglement of godly ministers in matrimonial engagements +and family cares. It is questionable whether he now understood his own +case, or attributed to its right cause the peculiar interest which he +felt in Margaret Charlton. Left to himself, it is more than probable +that he might never have discovered the true nature of that interest, or +conjectured that anything whatever of earthly passion or sublunary +emotion had mingled with his spiritual Platonism. Commissioned and set +apart to preach repentance to dying men, penniless and homeless, worn +with bodily pain and mental toil, and treading, as he believed, on the +very margin of his grave, what had he to do with love? What power had he +to inspire that tender sentiment, the appropriate offspring only of +youth, and health, and beauty? + + "Could any Beatrice see + A lover in such anchorite!" + +But in the mean time a reciprocal feeling was gaining strength in the +heart of Margaret. To her grateful appreciation of the condescension of +a great and good man--grave, learned, and renowned--to her youth and +weakness, and to her enthusiastic admiration of his intellectual powers, +devoted to the highest and holiest objects, succeeded naturally enough +the tenderly suggestive pity of her woman's heart, as she thought of his +lonely home, his unshared sorrows, his lack of those sympathies and +kindnesses which make tolerable the hard journey of life. Did she not +owe to him, under God, the salvation of body and mind? Was he not her +truest and most faithful friend, entering with lively interest into all +her joys and sorrows? Had she not seen the cloud of his habitual sadness +broken by gleams of sunny warmth and cheerfulness, as they conversed +together? Could she do better than devote herself to the pleasing task +of making his life happier, of comforting him in seasons of pain and +weariness, encouraging him in his vast labors, and throwing over the cold +and hard austerities of his nature the warmth and light of domestic +affection? Pity, reverence, gratitude, and womanly tenderness, her +fervid imagination and the sympathies of a deeply religious nature, +combined to influence her decision. Disparity of age and condition +rendered it improbable that Baxter would ever venture to address her in +any other capacity than that of a friend and teacher; and it was left to +herself to give the first intimation of the possibility of a more +intimate relation. + +It is easy to imagine with what mixed feelings of joy, surprise, and +perplexity Baxter must have received the delicate avowal. There was much +in the circumstances of the case to justify doubt, misgiving, and close +searchings of heart. He must have felt the painful contrast which that +fair girl in the bloom of her youth presented to the worn man of middle +years, whose very breath was suffering, and over whom death seemed always +impending. Keenly conscious of his infirmities of temper, he must have +feared for the happiness of a loving, gentle being, daily exposed to +their manifestations. From his well-known habit of consulting what he +regarded as the divine will in every important step of his life, there +can be no doubt that his decision was the result quite as much of a +prayerful and patient consideration of duty as of the promptings of his +heart. Richard Baxter was no impassioned Abelard; his pupil in the +school of his severe and self-denying piety was no Heloise; but what +their union lacked in romantic interest was compensated by its purity and +disinterestedness, and its sanction by all that can hallow human passion, +and harmonize the love of the created with the love and service of the +Creator. + +Although summoned by a power which it would have been folly to resist, +the tough theologian did not surrender at discretion. "From the first +thoughts yet many changes and stoppages intervened, and long delays," he +tells us. The terms upon which he finally capitulated are perfectly in +keeping with his character. "She consented," he says, "to three +conditions of our marriage. 1st. That I should have nothing that before +our marriage was hers; that I, who wanted no earthly supplies, might not +seem to marry her from selfishness. 2d. That she would so alter her +affairs that I might be entangled in no lawsuits. 3d. That she should +expect none of my time which my ministerial work should require." + +As was natural, the wits of the Court had their jokes upon this singular +marriage; and many of his best friends regretted it, when they called to +mind what he had written in favor of ministerial celibacy, at a time +when, as he says, "he thought to live and die a bachelor." But Baxter +had no reason to regret the inconsistency of his precept and example. +How much of the happiness of the next twenty years of his life resulted +from his union with a kind and affectionate woman he has himself +testified, in his simple and touching Breviate of the Life of the late +Mrs. Baxter. Her affections were so ardent that her husband confesses +his fear that he was unable to make an adequate return, and that she must +have been disappointed in him in consequence. He extols her pleasant +conversation, her active benevolence, her disposition to aid him in all +his labors, and her noble forgetfulness of self, in ministering to his +comfort, in sickness and imprisonment. "She was the meetest helper I +could have had in the world," is his language. "If I spoke harshly or +sharply, it offended her. If I carried it (as I am apt) with too much +negligence of ceremony or humble compliment to any, she would modestly +tell me of it. If my looks seemed not pleasant, she would have me amend +them (which my weak, pained state of body indisposed me to do)." He +admits she had her failings, but, taken as a whole, the Breviate is an +exalted eulogy. + +His history from this time is marked by few incidents of a public +character. During that most disgraceful period in the annals of England, +the reign of the second Charles, his peculiar position exposed him to the +persecutions of prelacy and the taunts and abuse of the sentries, +standing as he did between these extremes, and pleading for a moderate +Episcopacy. He was between the upper millstone of High Church and the +nether one of Dissent. To use his own simile, he was like one who seeks +to fill with his hand a cleft in a log, and feels both sides close upon +him with pain. All parties and sects had, as they thought, grounds of +complaint against him. There was in him an almost childish simplicity of +purpose, a headlong earnestness and eagerness, which did not allow him to +consider how far a present act or opinion harmonized with what he had +already done or written. His greatest admirers admit his lack of +judgment, his inaptitude for the management of practical matters. His +utter incapacity to comprehend rightly the public men and measures of his +day is abundantly apparent; and the inconsistencies of his conduct and +his writings are too marked to need comment. He suffered persecution for +not conforming to some trifling matters of Church usage, while he +advocated the doctrine of passive obedience to the King or ruling power, +and the right of that power to enforce conformity. He wrote against +conformity while himself conforming; seceded from the Church, and yet +held stated communion with it; begged for the curacy of Kidderminster, +and declined the bishopric of Hereford. His writings were many of them +directly calculated to make Dissenters from the Establishment, but he was +invariably offended to find others practically influenced by them, and +quarrelled with his own converts to Dissent. The High Churchmen of +Oxford burned his Holy Commonwealth as seditious and revolutionary; while +Harrington and the republican club of Miles's Coffee House condemned it +for its hostility to democracy and its servile doctrine of obedience to +kings. He made noble pleas for liberty of conscience and bitterly +complained of his own suffering from Church courts, yet maintained the +necessity of enforcing conformity, and stoutly opposed the tolerant +doctrines of Penn and Milton. Never did a great and good man so entangle +himself with contradictions and inconsistencies. The witty and wicked +Sir Roger L'Estrange compiled from the irreconcilable portions of his +works a laughable Dialogue between Richard and Baxter. The Antinomians +found him guilty of Socinianism; and one noted controversialist undertook +to show, not without some degree of plausibility, that he was by turns a +Quaker and a Papist! + +Although able to suspend his judgment and carefully weigh evidence, upon +matters which he regarded as proper subjects of debate and scrutiny, he +possessed the power to shut out and banish at will all doubt and +misgiving in respect to whatever tended to prove, illustrate, or enforce +his settled opinions and cherished doctrines. His credulity at times +seems boundless. Hating the Quakers, and prepared to believe all manner +of evil of them, he readily came to the conclusion that their leaders +were disguised Papists. He maintained that Lauderdale was a good and +pious man, in spite of atrocities in Scotland which entitle him to a +place with Claverhouse; and indorsed the character of the infamous +Dangerfield, the inventor of the Meal-tub Plot, as a worthy convert from +popish errors. To prove the existence of devils and spirits, he +collected the most absurd stories and old-wives' fables, of soldiers +scared from their posts at night by headless bears, of a young witch +pulling the hooks out of Mr. Emlen's breeches and swallowing them, of Mr. +Beacham's locomotive tobacco-pipe, and the Rev. Mr. Munn's jumping Bible, +and of a drunken man punished for his intemperance by being lifted off +his legs by an invisible hand! Cotton Mather's marvellous account of his +witch experiments in New England delighted him. He had it republished, +declaring that "he must be an obstinate Sadducee who doubted it." + +The married life of Baxter, as might be inferred from the state of the +times, was an unsettled one. He first took a house at Moorfields, then +removed to Acton, where he enjoyed the conversation of his neighbor, Sir +Matthew Hale; from thence he found refuge in Rickmansworth, and after +that in divers other places. "The women have most of this trouble," he +remarks, "but my wife easily bore it all." When unable to preach, his +rapid pen was always busy. Huge folios of controversial and doctrinal +lore followed each other in quick succession. He assailed Popery and the +Establishment, Anabaptists, ultra Calvinists, Antinomians, Fifth Monarchy +men, and Quakers. His hatred of the latter was only modified by his +contempt. He railed rather than argued against the "miserable +creatures," as he styled them. They in turn answered him in like manner. +"The Quakers," he says, "in their shops, when I go along London streets, +say, 'Alas' poor man, thou art yet in darkness.' They have oft come to +the congregation, when I had liberty to preach Christ's Gospel, and cried +out against me as a deceiver of the people. They have followed me home, +crying out in the streets, 'The day of the Lord is coming, and thou shalt +perish as a deceiver.' They have stood in the market-place, and under my +window, year after year, crying to the people, 'Take heed of your +priests, they deceive your souls;' and if any one wore a lace or neat +clothing, they cried out to me, 'These are the fruits of your ministry.'" + +At Rickmansworth, he found himself a neighbor of William Penn, whom he +calls "the captain of the Quakers." Ever ready for battle, Baxter +encountered him in a public discussion, with such fierceness and +bitterness as to force from that mild and amiable civilian the remark, +that he would rather be Socrates at the final judgment than Richard +Baxter. Both lived to know each other better, and to entertain +sentiments of mutual esteem. Baxter himself admits that the Quakers, by +their perseverance in holding their religious meetings in defiance of +penal laws, took upon themselves the burden of persecution which would +otherwise have fallen upon himself and his friends; and makes special +mention of the noble and successful plea of Penn before the Recorder's +Court in London, based on the fundamental liberties of Englishmen and the +rights of the Great Charter. + +The intolerance of Baxter towards the Separatists was turned against him +whenever he appealed to the King and Parliament against the proscription +of himself and his friends. "They gathered," he complains, "out of mine +and other men's books all that we had said against liberty for Popery and +Quakers railing against ministers in open congregation, and applied it as +against the toleration of ourselves." It was in vain that he explained +that he was only in favor of a gentle coercion of dissent, a moderate +enforcement of conformity. His plan for dealing with sentries reminds +one of old Isaak Walton's direction to his piscatorial readers, to impale +the frog on the hook as gently as if they loved him. + +While at Acton, he was complained of by Dr. Ryves, the rector, one of the +King's chaplains in ordinary, for holding religious services in his +family with more than five strangers present. He was cast into +Clerkenwell jail, whither his faithful wife followed him. On his +discharge, he sought refuge in the hamlet of Totteridge, where he wrote +and published that Paraphrase on the New Testament which was made the +ground of his prosecution and trial before Jeffreys. + +On the 14th of the sixth month, 1681, he was called to endure the +greatest affliction of his life. His wife died on that day, after a +brief illness. She who had been his faithful friend, companion, and +nurse for twenty years was called away from him in the time of his +greatest need of her ministrations. He found consolation in dwelling on +her virtues and excellences in the Breviate of her life; "a paper +monument," he says, "erected by one who is following her even at the door +in some passion indeed of love and grief." In the preface to his +poetical pieces he alludes to her in terms of touching simplicity and +tenderness: "As these pieces were mostly written in various passions, so +passion hath now thrust them out into the world. God having taken away +the dear companion of the last nineteen years of my life, as her sorrows +and sufferings long ago gave being to some of these poems, for reasons, +which the world is not concerned to know; so my grief for her removal, +and the revival of the sense of former things, have prevailed upon me to +be passionate in the sight of all." + +The circumstances of his trial before the judicial monster, Jeffreys, are +too well known to justify their detail in this sketch. He was sentenced +to pay a fine of five hundred marks. Seventy years of age, and reduced +to poverty by former persecutions, he was conveyed to the King's Bench +prison. Here for two years he lay a victim to intense bodily suffering. +When, through the influence of his old antagonist, Penn, he was restored +to freedom, he was already a dying man. But he came forth from prison as +he entered it, unsubdued in spirit. + +Urged to sign a declaration of thanks to James II., his soul put on the +athletic habits of youth, and he stoutly refused to commend an act of +toleration which had given freedom not to himself alone, but to Papists +and sentries. Shaking off the dust of the Court from his feet, he +retired to a dwelling in Charter-House Square, near his friend +Sylvester's, and patiently awaited his deliverance. His death was quiet +and peaceful. "I have pain," he said to his friend Mather; "there is no +arguing against sense; but I have peace. I have peace." On being asked +how he did, he answered, in memorable words, "Almost well!" + +He was buried in Christ Church, where the remains of his wife and her +mother had been placed. An immense concourse attended his funeral, of +all ranks and parties. Conformist and Non-conformist forgot the +bitterness of the controversialist, and remembered only the virtues and +the piety of the man. Looking back on his life of self-denial and +faithfulness to apprehended duty, the men who had persecuted him while +living wept over his grave. During the last few years of his life, the +severity of his controversial tone had been greatly softened; he lamented +his former lack of charity, the circle of his sympathies widened, his +social affections grew stronger with age, and love for his fellow-men +universally, and irrespective of religious differences, increased within +him. In his Narrative, written in the long, cool shadows of the evening +of life, he acknowledges with extraordinary candor this change in his +views and feelings. He confesses his imperfections as a writer and +public teacher. + +"I wish," he says, "all over-sharp passages were expunged from my +writings, and I ask forgiveness of God and man." He tells us that +mankind appear more equal to him; the good are not so good as he once +thought, nor the bad so evil; and that in all there is more for grace to +make advantage of, and more to testify for God and holiness, than he once +believed. "I less admire," he continues, "gifts of utterance, and the +bare profession of religion, than I once did, and have now much more +charity for those who, by want of gifts, do make an obscurer profession." + +He laments the effects of his constitutional irritability and impatience +upon his social intercourse and his domestic relations, and that his +bodily infirmities did not allow him a free expression of the tenderness +and love of his heart. Who does not feel the pathos and inconsolable +regret which dictated the following paragraph? + +"When God forgiveth me, I cannot forgive myself, especially for my rash +words and deeds by which I have seemed injurious and less tender and kind +than I should have been to my near and dear relations, whose love +abundantly obliged me. When such are dead, though we never differed in +point of interest or any other matter, every sour or cross or provoking +word which I gave them maketh me almost irreconcilable to myself, and +tells me how repentance brought some of old to pray to the dead whom they +had wronged to forgive them, in the hurry of their passion." + +His pride as a logician and skilful disputant abated in the latter and +better portion of his life he had more deference to the judgment of +others, and more distrust of his own. "You admire," said he to a +correspondent who had lauded his character, "one you do not know; +knowledge will cure your error." In his Narrative he writes: "I am much +more sensible than heretofore of the breadth and length and depth of the +radical, universal, odious sin of selfishness, and therefore have written +so much against it; and of the excellency and necessity of self-denial +and of a public mind, and of loving our neighbors as ourselves." Against +many difficulties and discouragements, both within himself and in his +outward circumstances, he strove to make his life and conversation an +expression of that Christian love whose root, as he has said with equal +truth and beauty, "is set + + In humble self-denial, undertrod, + While flower and fruit are growing up to God." + +Of the great mass of his writings, more voluminous than those of any +author of his time, it would ill become us to speak with confidence. We +are familiar only with some of the best of his practical works, and our +estimate of the vast and appalling series of his doctrinal, metaphysical +and controversial publications would be entitled to small weight, as the +result of very cursory examination. Many of them relate to obsolete +questions and issues, monumental of controversies long dead, and of +disputatious doctors otherwise forgotten. Yet, in respect to even these, +we feel justified in assenting to the opinion of one abundantly capable +of appreciating the character of Baxter as a writer. "What works of Mr. +Baxter shall I read?" asked Boswell of Dr. Johnson. "Read any of them," +was the answer, "for they are all good." He has left upon all the +impress of his genius. Many of them contain sentiments which happily +find favor with few in our time: philosophical and psychological +disquisitions, which look oddly enough in the light of the intellectual +progress of nearly two centuries; dissertations upon evil spirits, +ghosts, and witches, which provoke smiles at the good man's credulity; +but everywhere we find unmistakable evidences of his sincerity and +earnest love of truth. He wrote under a solemn impression of duty, +allowing neither pain, nor weakness, nor the claims of friendship, nor +the social enjoyments of domestic affection, to interfere with his +sleepless intensity of purpose. He stipulated with his wife, before +marriage, that she should not expect him to relax, even for her society, +the severity of his labors. He could ill brook interruption, and +disliked the importunity of visitors. "We are afraid, sir, we break in +upon your time," said some of his callers to him upon one occasion. "To +be sure you do," was his answer. His seriousness seldom forsook him; +there is scarce a gleam of gayety in all his one hundred and sixty-eight +volumes. He seems to have relished, however, the wit of others, +especially when directed against what he looked upon as error. Marvell's +inimitable reply to the High-Church pretensions of Parker fairly overcame +his habitual gravity, and he several times alludes to it with marked +satisfaction; but, for himself, he had no heart for pleasentry. His +writings, like his sermons, were the earnest expostulations of a dying +man with dying men. He tells us of no other amusement or relaxation than +the singing of psalms. "Harmony and melody," said he, "are the pleasure +and elevation of my soul. It was not the least comfort that I had in the +converse of my late dear wife, that our first act in the morning and last +in bed at night was a psalm of praise." + +It has been fashionable to speak of Baxter as a champion of civil and +religious freedom. He has little claim to such a reputation. He was the +stanch advocate of monarchy, and of the right and duty of the State to +enforce conformity to what he regarded as the essentials of religious +belief and practice. No one regards the prelates who went to the Tower, +under James II., on the ground of conscientious scruples against reading +the King's declaration of toleration to Dissenters, as martyrs in the +cause of universal religious freedom. Nor can Baxter, although he wrote +much against the coercion and silencing of godly ministers, and suffered +imprisonment himself for the sake of a good conscience, be looked upon in +the light of an intelligent and consistent confessor of liberty. He did +not deny the abstract right of ecclesiastical coercion, but complained of +its exercise upon himself and his friends as unwarranted and unjust. + +One of the warmest admirers and ablest commentators of Baxter designates +the leading and peculiar trait of his character as unearthliness. In our +view, this was its radical defect. He had too little of humanity, he +felt too little of the attraction of this world, and lived too +exclusively in the spiritual and the unearthly, for a full and healthful +development of his nature as a man, or of the graces, charities, and +loves of the Christian. He undervalued the common blessings and joys of +life, and closed his eyes and ears against the beauty and harmony of +outward nature. Humanity, in itself considered, seemed of small moment +to him; "passing away" was written alike on its wrongs and its rights, +its pleasures and its pains; death would soon level all distinctions; and +the sorrows or the joys, the poverty or the riches, the slavery or the +liberty, of the brief day of its probation seemed of too little +consequence to engage his attention and sympathies. Hence, while he was +always ready to minister to temporal suffering wherever it came to his +notice, he made no efforts to remove its political or social causes. +In this respect he differed widely from some of his illustrious +contemporaries. Penn, while preaching up and down the land, and writing +theological folios and pamphlets, could yet urge the political rights of +Englishmen, mount the hustings for Algernon Sydney, and plead for +unlimited religious liberty; and Vane, while dreaming of a coming +millennium and reign of the saints, and busily occupied in defending his +Antinomian doctrines, could at the same time vindicate, with tongue and +pen, the cause of civil and religious freedom. But Baxter overlooked the +evils and oppressions which were around him, and forgot the necessities +and duties of the world of time and sense in his earnest aspirations +towards the world of spirits. It is by no means an uninstructive fact, +that with the lapse of years his zeal for proselytism, doctrinal +disputations, and the preaching of threats and terrors visibly declined, +while love for his fellow-men and catholic charity greatly increased, and +he was blessed with a clearer perception of the truth that God is best +served through His suffering children, and that love and reverence for +visible humanity is an indispensable condition of the appropriate worship +of the Unseen God. + +But, in taking leave of Richard Baxter, our last words must not be those +of censure. Admiration and reverence become us rather. He was an honest +man. So far as we can judge, his motives were the highest and best which +can influence human action. He had faults and weaknesses, and committed +grave errors, but we are constrained to believe that the prayer with +which he closes his Saints' Rest and which we have chosen as the fitting +termination of our article, was the earnest aspiration of his life:-- + +"O merciful Father of Spirits! suffer not the soul of thy unworthy +servant to be a stranger to the joys which he describes to others, but +keep me while I remain on earth in daily breathing after thee, and in a +believing affectionate walking with thee! Let those who shall read these +pages not merely read the fruits of my studies, but the breathing of my +active hope and love; that if my heart were open to their view, they +might there read thy love most deeply engraven upon it with a beam from +the face of the Son of God; and not find vanity or lust or pride within +where the words of life appear without, that so these lines may not +witness against me, but, proceeding from the heart of the writer, be +effectual through thy grace upon the heart of the reader, and so be the +savor of life to both." + + + + +WILLIAM LEGGETT + + "O Freedom! thou art not, as poets dream, + A fair young girl, with light and delicate limbs, + And wavy tresses, gushing from the cap + With which the Roman master crowned his slave, + When he took off the gyves. A bearded man, + Armed to the teeth, art thou; one mailed hand + Grasps the broad shield, and one the sword; thy brow, + Glorious in beauty though it be, is scarred + With tokens of old wars; thy massive limbs + Are strong with struggling. Power at thee has launched + His bolts, and with his lightnings smitten thee; + They could not quench the life thou hast from Heaven." + BRYANT. + +WHEN the noblest woman in all France stood on the scaffold, just before +her execution, she is said to have turned towards the statue of Liberty, +--which, strangely enough, had been placed near the guillotine, as its +patron saint,--with the exclamation, "O Liberty! what crimes have been +committed in thy name!" It is with a feeling akin to that which prompted +this memorable exclamation of Madame Roland that the sincere lover of +human freedom and progress is often compelled to regard American +democracy. + +For democracy, pure and impartial,--the self-government of the whole; +equal rights and privileges, irrespective of birth or complexion; the +morality of the Gospel of Christ applied to legislation; Christianity +reduced to practice, and showering the blessings of its impartial love +and equal protection upon all, like the rain and dews of heaven,--we have +the sincerest love and reverence. So far as our own government +approaches this standard--and, with all its faults, we believe it does so +more nearly than any other--it has our hearty and steadfast allegiance. +We complain of and protest against it only where, in its original +framework or actual administration, it departs from the democratic +principle. Holding, with Novalis, that the Christian religion is the +root of all democracy and the highest fact in the rights of man, we +regard the New Testament as the true political text-book; and believe +that, just in proportion as mankind receive its doctrines and precepts, +not merely as matters of faith and relating to another state of being, +but as practical rules, designed for the regulation of the present life +as well as the future, their institutions, social arrangements, and forms +of government will approximate to the democratic model. We believe in +the ultimate complete accomplishment of the mission of Him who came "to +preach deliverance to the captive, and the opening of prison doors to +them that are bound." We look forward to the universal dominion of His +benign humanity; and, turning from the strife and blood, the slavery, and +social and political wrongs of the past and present, anticipate the +realization in the distant future of that state when the song of the +angels at His advent shall be no longer a prophecy, but the jubilant +expression of a glorious reality,--"Glory to God in the highest! Peace +on earth, and good will to man!" + +For the party in this country which has assumed the name of Democracy, as +a party, we have had, we confess, for some years past, very little +respect. It has advocated many salutary measures, tending to equalize the +advantages of trade and remove the evils of special legislation. But if +it has occasionally lopped some of the branches of the evil tree of +oppression, so far from striking at its root, it has suffered itself to +be made the instrument of nourishing and protecting it. It has allowed +itself to be called, by its Southern flatterers, "the natural ally of +slavery." It has spurned the petitions of the people in behalf of +freedom under its feet, in Congress and State legislatures. Nominally +the advocate of universal suffrage, it has wrested from the colored +citizens of Pennsylvania that right of citizenship which they had enjoyed +under a Constitution framed by Franklin and Rush. Perhaps the most +shameful exhibition of its spirit was made in the late Rhode Island +struggle, when the free suffrage convention, solemnly calling heaven and +earth to witness its readiness to encounter all the horrors of civil war, +in defence of the holy principle of equal and universal suffrage, +deliberately excluded colored Rhode Islanders from the privilege of +voting. In the Constitutional Conventions of Michigan and Iowa, the same +party declared all men equal, and then provided an exception to this rule +in the case of the colored inhabitants. Its course on the question of +excluding slavery from Texas is a matter of history, known and read of +all. + +After such exhibitions of its practice, its professions have lost their +power. The cant of democracy upon the lips of men who are living down +its principles is, to an earnest mind, well nigh insufferable. Pertinent +were the queries of Eliphaz the Temanite, "Shall a man utter vain +knowledge, and fill his belly with the east wind? Shall he reason with +unprofitable talk, or with speeches wherewith he can do no good?" Enough +of wearisome talk we have had about "progress," the rights of "the +masses," the "dignity of labor," and "extending the area of freedom"! +"Clear your mind of cant, sir," said Johnson to Boswell; and no better +advice could be now given to a class of our democratic politicians. Work +out your democracy; translate your words into deeds; away with your +sentimental generalizations, and come down to the practical details of +your duty as men and Christians. What avail your abstract theories, your +hopeless virginity of democracy, sacred from the violence of meanings? +A democracy which professes to hold, as by divine right, the doctrine of +human equality in its special keeping, and which at the same time gives +its direct countenance and support to the vilest system of oppression on +which the sun of heaven looks, has no better title to the name it +disgraces than the apostate Son of the Morning has to his old place in +heaven. We are using strong language, for we feel strongly on this +subject. Let those whose hypocrisy we condemn, and whose sins against +humanity we expose, remember that they are the publishers of their own +shame, and that they have gloried in their apostasy. There is a cutting +severity in the answer which Sophocles puts in the mouth of Electra, in +justification of her indignant rebuke of her wicked mother:-- + + "'Tis you that say it, not I + You do the unholy deeds which find rue words." + +Yet in that party calling itself democratic we rejoice to recognize true, +generous, and thoroughly sincere men,--lovers of the word of democracy, +and doers of it also, honest and hearty in their worship of liberty, who +are still hoping that the antagonism which slavery presents to democracy +will be perceived by the people, in spite of the sophistry and appeals to +prejudice by which interested partisans have hitherto succeeded in +deceiving them. We believe with such that the mass of the democratic +voters of the free States are in reality friends of freedom, and hate +slavery in all its forms; and that, with a full understanding of the +matter, they could never consent to be sold to presidential aspirants, by +political speculators, in lots to suit purchasers, and warranted to be +useful in putting down free discussion, perpetuating oppression, and +strengthening the hands of modern feudalism. They are beginning already +to see that, under the process whereby men of easy virtue obtain offices +from the general government, as the reward of treachery to free +principles, the strength and vitality of the party are rapidly declining. +To them, at least, democracy means something more than collectorships, +consulates, and governmental contracts. For the sake of securing a +monopoly of these to a few selfish and heartless party managers, they are +not prepared to give up the distinctive principles of democracy, and +substitute in their place the doctrines of the Satanic school of +politics. They will not much longer consent to stand before the world as +the slavery party of the United States, especially when policy and +expediency, as well as principle, unite in recommending a position more +congenial to the purposes of their organization, the principles of the +fathers of their political faith, the spirit of the age, and the +obligations of Christianity. + +The death-blow of slavery in this country will be given by the very power +upon which it has hitherto relied with so much confidence. Abused and +insulted Democracy will, erelong, shake off the loathsome burden under +which it is now staggering. In the language of the late Theodore +Sedgwiek, of Massachusetts, a consistent democrat of the old school: +"Slavery, in all its forms, is anti-democratic,--an old poison left in +the veins, fostering the worst principles of aristocracy, pride, and +aversion to labor; the natural enemy of the poor man, the laboring man, +the oppressed man. The question is, whether absolute dominion over any +creature in the image of man be a wholesome power in a free country; +whether this is a school in which to train the young republican mind; +whether slave blood and free blood can course healthily together in the +same body politic. Whatever may be present appearances, and by whatever +name party may choose to call things, this question must finally be +settled by the democracy of the country." + +This prediction was made eight years ago, at a time when all the facts in +the case seemed against the probability of its truth, and when only here +and there the voice of an indignant freeman protested against the +exulting claims of the slave power upon the democracy as its "natural +ally." The signs of the times now warrant the hope of its fulfilment. +Over the hills of the East, and over the broad territory of the Empire +State, a new spirit is moving. Democracy, like Balaam upon Zophim, has +felt the divine _afflatus_, and is blessing that which it was summoned to +curse. + +The present hopeful state of things is owing, in no slight degree, to the +self-sacrificing exertions of a few faithful and clear-sighted men, +foremost among whom was the late William Leggett; than whom no one has +labored more perseveringly, or, in the end, more successfully, to bring +the practice of American democracy into conformity with its professions. + +William Leggett! Let our right hand forget its cunning, when that name +shall fail to awaken generous emotions and aspirations for a higher and +worthier manhood! True man and true democrat; faithful always to +Liberty, following wherever she led, whether the storm beat in his face +or on his back; unhesitatingly counting her enemies his own, whether in +the guise of Whig monopoly and selfish expediency, or democratic +servility north of Mason and Dixon's line towards democratic slaveholding +south of it; poor, yet incorruptible; dependent upon party favor, as a +party editor, yet risking all in condemnation of that party, when in the +wrong; a man of the people, yet never stooping to flatter the people's +prejudices,--he is the politician, of all others, whom we would hold up +to the admiration and imitation of the young men of our country. What +Fletcher of Saltoun is to Scotland, and the brave spirits of the old +Commonwealth time-- + + "Hands that penned + And tongues that uttered wisdom, better none + The later Sydney, Marvell, Harrington, + Young Vane, and others, who called Milton friend--" + +are to England, should Leggett be to America. His character was formed +on these sturdy democratic models. Had he lived in their day, he would +have scraped with old Andrew Marvell the bare blade-bone of poverty, or +even laid his head on the block with Vane, rather than forego his +independent thought and speech. + +Of the early life of William Leggett we have no very definite knowledge. +Born in moderate circumstances; at first a woodsman in the Western +wilderness, then a midshipman in the navy, then a denizen of New York; +exposed to sore hardships and perilous temptations, he worked his way by +the force of his genius to the honorable position of associate editor of +the Evening Post, the leading democratic journal of our great commercial +metropolis. Here he became early distinguished for his ultraism in +democracy. His whole soul revolted against oppression. He was for +liberty everywhere and in all things, in thought, in speech, in vote, in +religion, in government, and in trade; he was for throwing off all +restraints upon the right of suffrage; regarding all men as brethren, he +looked with disapprobation upon attempts to exclude foreigners from the +rights of citizenship; he was for entire freedom of commerce; he +denounced a national bank; he took the lead in opposition to the monopoly +of incorporated banks; he argued in favor of direct taxation, and +advocated a free post-office, or a system by which letters should be +transported, as goods and passengers now are, by private enterprise. In +all this he was thoroughly in earnest. That he often erred through +passion and prejudice cannot be doubted; but in no instance was he found +turning aside from the path which he believed to be the true one, from +merely selfish considerations. He was honest alike to himself and the +public. Every question which was thrown up before him by the waves of +political or moral agitation he measured by his standard of right and +truth, and condemned or advocated it in utter disregard of prevailing +opinions, of its effect upon his pecuniary interest, or of his standing +with his party. The vehemence of his passions sometimes betrayed him +into violence of language and injustice to his opponents; but he had that +rare and manly trait which enables its possessor, whenever he becomes +convinced of error, to make a prompt acknowledgment of the conviction. + +In the summer of 1834, a series of mobs, directed against the +Abolitionists, who had organized a national society, with the city of New +York as its central point, followed each other in rapid succession. The +houses of the leading men in the society were sacked and pillaged; +meeting-houses broken into and defaced; and the unoffending colored +inhabitants of the city treated with the grossest indignity, and +subjected, in some instances, to shameful personal outrage. It was +emphatically a "Reign of Terror." The press of both political parties +and of the leading religious sects, by appeals to prejudice and passion, +and by studied misrepresentation of the designs and measures of the +Abolitionists, fanned the flame of excitement, until the fury of demons +possessed the misguided populace. To advocate emancipation, or defend +those who did so, in New York, at that period, was like preaching +democracy in Constantinople or religious toleration in Paris on the eve +of St. Bartholomew. Law was prostrated in the dust; to be suspected of +abolitionism was to incur a liability to an indefinite degree of insult +and indignity; and the few and hunted friends of the slave who in those +nights of terror laid their heads upon the pillow did so with the prayer +of the Psalmist on their lips, "Defend me from them that rise up against +me; save me from bloody men." + +At this period the New York Evening Post spoke out strongly in +condemnation of the mob. William Leggett was not then an Abolitionist; +he had known nothing of the proscribed class, save through the cruel +misrepresentations of their enemies; but, true to his democratic faith, +he maintained the right to discuss the question of slavery. The +infection of cowardly fear, which at that time sealed the lips of +multitudes who deplored the excesses of the mob and sympathized with its +victims, never reached him. Boldly, indignantly, he demanded that the +mob should be put down at once by the civil authorities. He declared the +Abolitionists, even if guilty of all that had been charged upon them, +fully entitled to the privileges and immunities of American citizens. He +sternly reprimanded the board of aldermen of the city for rejecting with +contempt the memorial of the Abolitionists to that body, explanatory of +their principles and the measures by which they had sought to disseminate +them. Referring to the determination, expressed by the memorialists in +the rejected document, not to recant or relinquish any principle which +they had adopted, but to live and die by their faith, he said: "In this, +however mistaken, however mad, we may consider their opinions in relation +to the blacks, what honest, independent mind can blame them? Where is +the man so poor of soul, so white-livered, so base, that he would do less +in relation to any important doctrine in which he religiously believed? +Where is the man who would have his tenets drubbed into him by the clubs +of ruffians, or hold his conscience at the dictation of a mob?" + +In the summer of 1835, a mob of excited citizens broke open the post- +office at Charleston, South Carolina, and burnt in the street such papers +and pamphlets as they judged to be "incendiary;" in other words, such as +advocated the application of the democratic principle to the condition of +the slaves of the South. These papers were addressed, not to the slave, +but to the master. They contained nothing which had not been said and +written by Southern men themselves, the Pinkneys, Jeffersons, Henrys, and +Martins, of Maryland and Virginia. The example set at Charleston did not +lack imitators. Every petty postmaster south of Mason and Dixon's line +became ex officio a censor of the press. The Postmaster-General, writing +to his subordinate at Charleston, after stating that the post-office +department had "no legal right to exclude newspapers from the mail, or +prohibit their carriage or delivery, on account of their character or +tendency, real or supposed," declared that he would, nevertheless, give +no aid, directly or indirectly, in circulating publications of an +incendiary or inflammatory character; and assured the perjured +functionary, who had violated his oath of office, that, while he could +not sanction, he would not condemn his conduct. Against this virtual +encouragement of a flagrant infringement of a constitutional right, this +licensing of thousands of petty government officials to sit in their mail +offices--to use the figure of Milton--cross-legged, like so many envious +Junos, in judgment upon the daily offspring of the press, taking counsel +of passion, prejudice, and popular excitement as to what was "incendiary" +or "inflammatory," the Evening Post spoke in tones of manly protest. + +While almost all the editors of his party throughout the country either +openly approved of the conduct of the Postmaster-General or silently +acquiesced in it, William Leggett, who, in the absence of his colleague, +was at that time sole editor of the Post, and who had everything to lose, +in a worldly point of view, by assailing a leading functionary of the +government, who was a favorite of the President and a sharer of his +popularity, did not hesitate as to the course which consistency and duty +required at his hands. He took his stand for unpopular truth, at a time +when a different course on his part could not have failed to secure him +the favor and patronage of his party. In the great struggle with the +Bank of the United States, his services had not been unappreciated by the +President and his friends. Without directly approving the course of the +administration on the question of the rights of the Abolitionists, by +remaining silent in respect to it, he might have avoided all suspicion of +mental and moral independence incompatible with party allegiance. The +impracticable honesty of Leggett, never bending from the erectness of +truth for the sake of that "thrift which follows fawning," dictated a +most severe and scorching review of the letter of the Postmaster-General. +"More monstrous, more detestable doctrines we have never heard +promulgated," he exclaimed in one of his leading editorials. "With what +face, after this, can the Postmaster-General punish a postmaster for any +exercise of the fearfully dangerous power of stopping and destroying any +portion of the mails?" "The Abolitionists do not deserve to be placed on +the same footing with a foreign enemy, nor their publications as the +secret despatches of a spy. They are American citizens, in the exercise +of their undoubted right of citizenship; and however erroneous their +views, however fanatic their conduct, while they act within the limits of +the law, what official functionary, be he merely a subordinate or the +head of the post-office department, shall dare to abridge them of their +rights as citizens, and deny them those facilities of intercourse which +were instituted for the equal accommodation of all? If the American +people will submit to this, let us expunge all written codes, and resolve +society into its original elements, where the might of the strong is +better than the right of the weak." + +A few days after the publication of this manly rebuke, he wrote an +indignantly sarcastic article upon the mobs which were at this time +everywhere summoned to "put down the Abolitionists." The next day, the +4th of the ninth month, 1835, he received a copy of the Address of the +American Anti-Slavery Society to the public, containing a full and +explicit avowal of all the principles and designs of the association. He +gave it a candid perusal, weighed its arguments, compared its doctrines +with those at the foundation of his own political faith, and rose up from +its examination an Abolitionist. He saw that he himself, misled by the +popular clamor, had done injustice to benevolent and self-sacrificing +men; and he took the earliest occasion, in an article of great power and +eloquence, to make the amplest atonement. He declared his entire +concurrence with the views of the American Anti-Slavery Society, with the +single exception of a doubt which rested, on his mind as to the abolition +of slavery in the District of Columbia. We quote from the concluding +paragraph of this article:-- + +"We assert without hesitation, that, if we possessed the right, we should +not scruple to exercise it for the speedy annihilation of servitude and +chains. The impression made in boyhood by the glorious exclamation of +Cato, + + "'A day, an hour, of virtuous liberty + Is worth a whole eternity of bondage!' + +has been worn deeper, not effaced, by time; and we eagerly and ardently +trust that the day will yet arrive when the clank of the bondman's +fetters will form no part of the multitudinous sounds which our country +sends up to Heaven, mingling, as it were, into a song of praise for our +national prosperity. We yearn with strong desire for the day when +freedom shall no longer wave + + "Her fustian flag in mockery over slaves.'" + +A few days after, in reply to the assaults made upon him from all +quarters, he calmly and firmly reiterated his determination to maintain +the right of free discussion of the subject of slavery. + +"The course we are pursuing," said he, "is one which we entered upon after +mature deliberation, and we are not to be turned from it by a species of +opposition, the inefficacy of which we have seen displayed in so many +former instances. It is Philip Van Artevelde who says:-- + + "'All my life long, + I have beheld with most respect the man + Who knew himself, and knew the ways before him; + And from among them chose considerately, + With a clear foresight, not a blindfold courage; + And, having chosen, with a steadfast mind. + Pursued his purpose.' + +"This is the sort of character we emulate. If to believe slavery a +deplorable evil and curse, in whatever light it is viewed; if to yearn +for the day which shall break the fetters of three millions of human +beings, and restore to them their birthright of equal freedom; if to be +willing, in season and out of season, to do all in our power to promote +so desirable a result, by all means not inconsistent with higher duty: if +these sentiments constitute us Abolitionists, then are we such, and glory +in the name." + +"The senseless cry of 'Abolitionist' shall never deter us, nor the more +senseless attempt of puny prints to read us out of the democratic party. +The often-quoted and beautiful saying of the Latin historian, Homo sum: +humani nihil a me alienum puto, we apply to the poor slave as well as his +master, and shall endeavor to fulfil towards both the obligations of an +equal humanity." + +The generation which, since the period of which we are speaking, have +risen into active life can have but a faint conception of the boldness of +this movement on the part of William Leggett. To be an Abolitionist then +was to abandon all hope of political preferment or party favor; to be +marked and branded as a social outlaw, under good society's interdict of +food and fire; to hold property, liberty, and life itself at the mercy of +lawless mobs. All this William Leggett clearly saw. He knew how rugged +and thorny was the path upon which, impelled by his love of truth and the +obligations of humanity, he was entering. From hunted and proscribed +Abolitionists and oppressed and spirit-broken colored men, the Pariahs of +American democracy, he could alone expect sympathy. The Whig journals, +with a few honorable exceptions, exulted over what they regarded as the +fall of a formidable opponent; and after painting his abolitionism in the +most hideous colors, held him up to their Southern allies as a specimen +of the radical disorganizers and democratic levellers of the North. His +own party, in consequence, made haste to proscribe him. Government +advertising was promptly withdrawn from his paper. The official journals +of Washington and Albany read him out of the pale of democracy. Father +Ritchie scolded and threatened. The democratic committee issued its bull +against him from Tammany Hall. The resolutions of that committee were +laid before him when he was sinking under a severe illness. Rallying his +energies, he dictated from his sick-bed an answer marked by all his +accustomed vigor and boldness. Its tone was calm, manly, self-relying; +the language of one who, having planted his feet hard down on the rock of +principle, stood there like Luther at Worms, because he "could not +otherwise." Exhausted nature sunk under the effort. A weary sickness of +nearly a year's duration followed. In this sore affliction, deserted as +he was by most of his old political friends, we have reason to know that +he was cheered by the gratitude of those in whose behalf he had well-nigh +made a martyr's sacrifice; and that from the humble hearths of his poor +colored fellow-citizens fervent prayers went up for his restoration. + +His work was not yet done. Purified by trial, he was to stand forth once +more in vindication of the truths of freedom. As soon as his health was +sufficiently reestablished, he commenced the publication of an +independent political and literary journal, under the expressive title of +The Plaindealer. In his first number he stated, that, claiming the right +of absolute freedom of discussion, he should exercise it with no other +limitations than those of his own judgment. A poor man, he admitted that +he established the paper in the expectation of deriving from it a +livelihood, but that even for that object he could not trim its sails to +suit the varying breeze of popular prejudice. "If," said he, "a paper +which makes the Right, and not the Expedient, its cardinal object, will +not yield its conductor a support, there are honest vocations that will, +and better the humblest of them than to be seated at the head of an +influential press, if its influence is not exerted to promote the cause +of truth." He was true to his promise. The free soul of a free, strong +man spoke out in his paper. How refreshing was it, after listening to +the inanities, the dull, witless vulgarity, the wearisome commonplace of +journalists, who had no higher aim than to echo, with parrot-like +exactness, current prejudices and falsehoods, to turn to the great and +generous thoughts, the chaste and vigorous diction, of the Plaindealer! +No man ever had a clearer idea of the duties and responsibilities of a +conductor of the public press than William Leggett, and few have ever +combined so many of the qualifications for their perfect discharge: a +nice sense of justice, a warm benevolence, inflexible truth, honesty +defying temptation, a mind stored with learning, and having at command +the treasures of the best thoughts of the best authors. As was said of +Fletcher of Saltoun, he was "a gentleman steady in his principles; of +nice honor, abundance of learning; bold as a lion; a sure friend; a man +who would lose his life to serve his country, and would not do a base +thing to save it." + +He had his faults: his positive convictions sometimes took the shape +of a proud and obstinate dogmatism; he who could so well appeal to the +judgment and the reason of his readers too often only roused their +passions by invective and vehement declamation. Moderate men were +startled and pained by the fierce energy of his language; and he not +unfrequently made implacable enemies of opponents whom he might have +conciliated and won over by mild expostulation and patient explanation. +It must be urged in extenuation, that, as the champion of unpopular +truths, he was assailed unfairly on all sides, and indecently +misrepresented and calumniated to a degree, as his friend Sedgwick justly +remarks, unprecedented even in the annals of the American press; and that +his errors in this respect were, in the main, errors of retaliation. + +In the Plaindealer, in common with the leading moral and political +subjects of the day, that of slavery was freely discussed in all its +bearings. It is difficult, in a single extract, to convey an adequate +idea of the character of the editorial columns of a paper, where terse +and concentrated irony and sarcasm alternate with eloquent appeal and +diffuse commentary and labored argument. We can only offer at random the +following passages from a long review of a speech of John C. Calhoun, in +which that extraordinary man, whose giant intellect has been shut out of +its appropriate field of exercise by the very slavery of which he is the +champion, undertook to maintain, in reply to a Virginia senator, that +chattel slavery was not an evil, but "a great good." + +"We have Mr. Calhoun's own warrant for attacking his position with all +the fervor which a high sense of duty can give, for we do hold, from the +bottom of our soul, that slavery is an evil,--a deep, detestable, +damnable evil; evil in all its aspects to the blacks, and a greater evil +to the whites; an evil moral, social, and political; an evil which shows +itself in the languishing condition of agriculture where it exists, in +paralyzed commerce, and in the prostration of the mechanic arts; an evil +which stares you in the face from uncultivated fields, and howls in your +ears through tangled swamps and morasses. Slavery is such an evil that +it withers what it touches. Where it is once securely established the +land becomes desolate, as the tree inevitably perishes which the sea-hawk +chooses for its nest; while freedom, on the contrary, flourishes like the +tannen, 'on the loftiest and least sheltered rocks,' and clothes with its +refreshing verdure what, without it, would frown in naked and incurable +sterility. + +"If any one desires an illustration of the opposite influences of slavery +and freedom, let him look at the two sister States of Kentucky and Ohio. +Alike in soil and climate, and divided only by a river, whose translucent +waters reveal, through nearly the whole breadth, the sandy bottom over +which they sparkle, how different are they in all the respects over which +man has control! On the one hand the air is vocal with the mingled +tumult of a vast and prosperous population. Every hillside smiles with +an abundant harvest, every valley shelters a thriving village, the click +of a busy mill drowns the prattle of every rivulet, and all the +multitudinous sounds of business denote happy activity in every branch +of social occupation. + +"This is the State which, but a few years ago, slept in the unbroken +solitude of nature. The forest spread an interminable canopy of shade +over the dark soil on which the fat and useless vegetation rotted at +ease, and through the dusky vistas of the wood only savage beasts and +more savage men prowled in quest of prey. The whole land now blossoms +like a garden. The tall and interlacing trees have unlocked their hold, +and bowed before the woodman's axe. The soil is disencumbered of the +mossy trunks which had reposed upon it for ages. The rivers flash in the +sunlight, and the fields smile with waving harvests. This is Ohio, and +this is what freedom has done for it. + +"Now, let us turn to Kentucky, and note the opposite influences of +slavery. A narrow and unfrequented path through the close and sultry +canebrake conducts us to a wretched hovel. It stands in the midst of an +unweeded field, whose dilapidated enclosure scarcely protects it from the +lowing and hungry kine. Children half clad and squalid, and destitute of +the buoyancy natural to their age, lounge in the sunshine, while their +parent saunters apart, to watch his languid slaves drive the ill- +appointed team afield. This is not a fancy picture. It is a true copy +of one of the features which make up the aspect 'of the State, and of +every State where the moral leprosy of slavery covers the people with its +noisome scales; a deadening lethargy benumbs the limbs of the body +politic; a stupor settles on the arts of life; agriculture reluctantly +drags the plough and harrow to the field, only when scourged by +necessity; the axe drops from the woodman's nerveless hand the moment his +fire is scantily supplied with fuel; and the fen, undrained, sends up its +noxious exhalations, to rack with cramps and agues the frame already too +much enervated by a moral epidemic to creep beyond the sphere of the +material miasm." + +The Plaindealer was uniformly conducted with eminent ability; but its +editor was too far in advance of his contemporaries to find general +acceptance, or even toleration. In addition to pecuniary embarrassments, +his health once more failed, and in the autumn of 1837 he was compelled +to suspend the publication of his paper. One of the last articles which +he wrote for it shows the extent to which he was sometimes carried by the +intensity and depth of his abhorrence of oppression, and the fervency of +his adoration of liberty. Speaking of the liability of being called upon +to aid the master in the subjection of revolted slaves, and in replacing +their cast-off fetters, he thus expresses himself: "Would we comply with +such a requisition? No! Rather would we see our right arm lopped from +our body, and the mutilated trunk itself gored with mortal wounds, than +raise a finger in opposition to men struggling in the holy cause of +freedom. The obligations of citizenship are strong, but those of +justice, humanity, and religion, stronger. We earnestly trust that the +great contest of opinion which is now going on in this country may +terminate in the enfranchisement of the slaves, without recourse to the +strife of blood; but should the oppressed bondmen, impatient of the tardy +progress of truth, urged only in discussion, attempt to burst their +chains by a more violent and shorter process, they should never encounter +our arm nor hear our voice in the ranks of their opponents. We should +stand a sad spectator of the conflict; and, whatever commiseration we +might feel for the discomfiture of the oppressors, we should pray that +the battle might end in giving freedom to the oppressed." + +With the Plain dealer, his connection with the public, in a great +measure, ceased. His steady and intimate friend, personal as well as +political, Theodore Sedgwick, Jun., a gentleman who has, on many +occasions, proved himself worthy of his liberty-loving ancestry, thus +speaks of him in his private life at this period: "Amid the reverses of +fortune, harassed by pecuniary embarrassments, during the tortures of a +disease which tore away his life piecemeal, hee ever maintained the same +manly and unaltered front, the same cheerfulness of disposition, the same +dignity of conduct. No humiliating solicitation, no weak complaint, +escaped him." At the election in the fall of 1838, the noble-spirited +democrat was not wholly forgotten. A strenuous effort, which was well- +nigh successful, was made to secure his nomination as a candidate for +Congress. It was at this juncture that he wrote to a friend in the city, +from his residence at New Rochelle, one of the noblest letters ever +penned by a candidate for popular favor. The following extracts will +show how a true man can meet the temptations of political life:-- + +"What I am most afraid of is, that some of my friends, in their too +earnest zeal, will place me in a false position on the subject of +slavery. I am an Abolitionist. I hate slavery in all its forms, +degrees, and influences; and I deem myself bound, by the highest moral +and political obligations, not to let that sentiment of hate lie dormant +and smouldering in my own breast, but to give it free vent, and let it +blaze forth, that it may kindle equal ardor through the whole sphere of +my influence. I would not have this fact disguised or mystified for any +office the people have it in their power to give. Rather, a thousand +times rather, would I again meet the denunciations of Tammany Hall, and +be stigmatized with all the foul epithets with which the anti-abolition +vocabulary abounds, than recall or deny one tittle of my creed. +Abolition is, in my sense, a necessary and a glorious part of democracy; +and I hold the right and duty to discuss the subject of slavery, and to +expose its hideous evils in all their bearings,--moral, social, and +political,--as of infinitely higher importance than to carry fifty sub- +treasury bills. That I should discharge this duty temperately; that I +should not let it come in collision with other duties; that I should not +let my hatred of slavery transcend the express obligations of the +Constitution, or violate its clear spirit, I hope and trust you think +sufficiently well of me to believe. But what I fear is, (not from you, +however,) that some of my advocates and champions will seek to recommend +me to popular support by representing me as not an Abolitionist, which is +false. All that I have written gives the lie to it. All I shall write +will give the lie to it. + +"And here, let me add, (apart from any consideration already adverted +to,) that, as a matter of mere policy, I would not, if I could, have my +name disjoined from abolitionism. To be an Abolitionist now is to be an +incendiary; as, three years ago, to be an anti-monopolist was to be a +leveller and a Jack Cade. See what three short years have done in +effecting the anti-monopoly reform; and depend upon it that the next +three years, or, if not three, say three times three, if you please, will +work a greater revolution on the slavery question. The stream of public +opinion now sets against us; but it is about to turn, and the +regurgitation will be tremendous. Proud in that day may well be the man +who can float in triumph on the first refluent wave, swept onward by the +deluge which he himself, in advance of his fellows, has largely shared in +occasioning. Such be my fate; and, living or dead, it will, in some +measure, be mine! I have written my name in ineffaceable letters on the +abolition record; and whether the reward ultimately come in the shape of +honors to the living man, or a tribute to the memory of a departed one, I +would not forfeit my right to it for as many offices as has in his gift, +if each of them was greater than his own." + +After mentioning that he had understood that some of his friends had +endeavored to propitiate popular prejudice by representing him as no +Abolitionist, he says:-- + +"Keep them, for God's sake, from committing any such fooleries for the +sake of getting me into Congress. Let others twist themselves into what +shapes they please, to gratify the present taste of the people; as for +me, I am not formed of such pliant materials, and choose to retain, +undisturbed, the image of my God! I do not wish to cheat the people of +their votes. I would not get their support, any more than their money, +under false pretences. I am what I am; and if that does not suit them, +I am content to stay at home." + +God be praised for affording us, even in these latter days, the sight of +an honest man! Amidst the heartlessness, the double-dealing, the +evasions, the prevarications, the shameful treachery and falsehood, of +political men of both parties, in respect to the question of slavery, how +refreshing is it to listen to words like these! They renew our failing +faith in human nature. They reprove our weak misgivings. We rise up +from their perusal stronger and healthier. With something of the spirit +which dictated them, we renew our vows to freedom, and, with manlier +energy, gird up our souls for the stern struggle before us. + +As might have been expected, and as he himself predicted, the efforts of +his friends to procure his nomination failed; but the same generous +appreciators of his rare worth were soon after more successful in their +exertions in his behalf. He received from President Van Buren the +appointment of the mission to Guatemala,--an appointment which, in +addition to honorable employment in the service of his country, promised +him the advantages of a sea voyage and a change of climate, for the +restoration of his health. The course of Martin Van Buren on the subject +of slavery in the District of Columbia forms, in the estimation of many +of his best friends, by no means the most creditable portion of his +political history; but it certainly argues well for his magnanimity and +freedom from merely personal resentment that he gave this appointment to +the man who had animadverted upon that course with the greatest freedom, +and whose rebuke of the veto pledge, severe in its truth and justice, +formed the only discord in the paean of partisan flattery which greeted +his inaugural. But, however well intended, it came too late. In the +midst of the congratulations of his friends on the brightening prospect +before him, the still hopeful and vigorous spirit of William Leggett was +summoned away by death. Universal regret was awakened. Admiration of +his intellectual power, and that generous and full appreciation of his +high moral worth which had been in too many instances withheld from the +living man by party policy and prejudice, were now freely accorded to the +dead. The presses of both political parties vied with each other in +expressions of sorrow at the loss of a great and true man. The +Democracy, through all its organs, hastened to canonize him as one of the +saints of its calendar. The general committee, in New York, expunged +their resolutions of censure. The Democratic Review, at that period the +most respectable mouthpiece of the democratic party, made him the subject +of exalted eulogy. His early friend and co-editor, William Cullen +Bryant, laid upon his grave the following tribute, alike beautiful and +true:-- + + "The earth may ring, from shore to shore, + With echoes of a glorious name, + But he whose loss our tears deplore + Has left behind him more than fame. + + "For when the death-frost came to lie + On Leggett's warm and mighty heart, + And quenched his bold and friendly eye, + His spirit did not all depart. + + "The words of fire that from his pen + He flung upon the lucid page + Still move, still shake the hearts of men, + Amid a cold and coward age. + + "His love of Truth, too warm, too strong, + For Hope or Fear to chain or chill, + His hate of tyranny and wrong, + Burn in the breasts they kindled still." + +So lived and died William Leggett. What a rebuke of party perfidy, of +political meanness, of the common arts and stratagems of demagogues, +comes up from his grave! How the cheek of mercenary selfishness crimsons +at the thought of his incorruptible integrity! How heartless and hollow +pretenders, who offer lip service to freedom, while they give their hands +to whatever work their slaveholding managers may assign them; who sit in +chains round the crib of governmental patronage, putting on the spaniel, +and putting off the man, and making their whole lives a miserable lie, +shrink back from a contrast with the proud and austere dignity of his +character! What a comment on their own condition is the memory of a man +who could calmly endure the loss of party favor, the reproaches of his +friends, the malignant assaults of his enemies, and the fretting evils of +poverty, in the hope of bequeathing, like the dying testator of Ford, + + "A fame by scandal untouched, + To Memory and Time's old daughter, Truth." + +The praises which such men are now constrained to bestow upon him are +their own condemnation. Every stone which they pile upon his grave is +written over with the record of their hypocrisy. + +We have written rather for the living than the dead. As one of that +proscribed and hunted band of Abolitionists, whose rights were so bravely +defended by William Leggett, we should, indeed, be wanting in ordinary +gratitude not to do honor to his memory; but we have been actuated at the +present time mainly by a hope that the character, the lineaments of which +we have so imperfectly sketched, may awaken a generous emulation in the +hearts of the young democracy of our country. Democracy such as William +Leggett believed and practised, democracy in its full and all- +comprehensive significance, is destined to be the settled political faith +of this republic. Because the despotism of slavery has usurped its name, +and offered the strange incense of human tears and blood on its profaned +altars, shall we, therefore, abandon the only political faith which +coincides with the Gospel of Jesus, and meets the aspirations and wants +of humanity? No. The duty of the present generation in the United +States is to reduce this faith to practice, to make the beautiful ideal a +fact. + +"Every American," says Leggett, "who in any way countenances slavery is +derelict to his duty, as a Christian, a patriot, a man; and every one +does countenance and authorize it who suffers any opportunity of +expressing his deep abhorrence of its manifold abominations to pass +unimproved." The whole world has an interest in this matter. The +influence of our democratic despotism is exerted against the liberties of +Europe. Political reformers in the Old World, who have testified to +their love of freedom by serious sacrifices, hold but one language on +this point. They tell us that American slavery furnishes kings and +aristocracies with their most potent arguments; that it is a perpetual +drag on the wheel of political progress. + +We have before us, at this time, a letter from Seidensticker, one of the +leaders of the patriotic movement in behalf of German liberty in 1831. +It was written from the prison of Celle, where he had been confined for +eight years. The writer expresses his indignant astonishment at the +speeches of John C. Calhoun, and others in Congress, on the slavery +question, and deplores the disastrous influence of our great +inconsistency upon the cause of freedom throughout the world,--an +influence which paralyzes the hands of the patriotic reformer, while it +strengthens those of his oppressor, and deepens around the living martyrs +and confessors of European democracy the cold shadow of their prisons. + +Joseph Sturge, of Birmingham, the President of the British Free Suffrage +Union, and whose philanthropy and democracy have been vouched for by the +Democratic Review in this country, has the following passage in an +address to the citizens of the United States: "Although an admirer of the +institutions of your country, and deeply lamenting the evils of my own +government, I find it difficult to reply to those who are opposed to any +extension of the political rights of Englishmen, when they point to +America, and say that where all have a control over the legislation but +those who are guilty of a dark skin, slavery and the slave trade remain, +not only unmitigated, but continue to extend; and that while there is an +onward movement in favor of its extinction, not only in England and +France, but in Cuba and Brazil, American legislators cling to this +enormous evil, without attempting to relax or mitigate its horrors." + +How long shall such appeals, from such sources, be wasted upon us? Shall +our baleful example enslave the world? Shall the tree of democracy, +which our fathers intended for "the healing of the nations," be to them +like the fabled upas, blighting all around it? + +The men of the North, the pioneers of the free West, and the non- +slaveholders of the South must answer these questions. It is for them to +say whether the present wellnigh intolerable evil shall continue to +increase its boundaries, and strengthen its hold upon the government, the +political parties, and the religious sects of our country. Interest and +honor, present possession and future hope, the memory of fathers, the +prospects of children, gratitude, affection, the still call of the dead, +the cry of oppressed nations looking hitherward for the result of all +their hopes, the voice of God in the soul, in revelation, and in His +providence, all appeal to them for a speedy and righteous decision. At +this moment, on the floor of Congress, Democracy and Slavery have met in +a death-grapple. The South stands firm; it allows no party division on +the slave question. One of its members has declared that "the slave +States have no traitors." Can the same be said of the free? Now, as in +the time of the fatal Missouri Compromise, there are, it is to be feared, +political peddlers among our representatives, whose souls are in the +market, and whose consciences are vendible commodities. Through their +means, the slave power may gain a temporary triumph; but may not the very +baseness of the treachery arouse the Northern heart? By driving the free +States to the wall, may it not compel them to turn and take an aggressive +attitude, clasp hands over the altar of their common freedom, and swear +eternal hostility to slavery? + +Be the issue of the present contest what it may, those who are faithful +to freedom should allow no temporary reverse to shake their confidence in +the ultimate triumph of the right. The slave will be free. Democracy in +America will yet be a glorious reality; and when the topstone of that +temple of freedom which our fathers left unfinished shall be brought +forth with shoutings and cries of grace unto it, when our now drooping- +Liberty lifts up her head and prospers, happy will be he who can say, +with John Milton, "Among those who have something more than wished her +welfare, I too have my charter and freehold of rejoicing to me and my +heirs." + + + + +NATHANIEL PEABODY ROGERS. + + "And Lamb, the frolic and the gentle, + Has vanished from his kindly hearth." + +So, in one of the sweetest and most pathetic of his poems touching the +loss of his literary friends, sang Wordsworth. We well remember with +what freshness and vividness these simple lines came before us, on +hearing, last autumn, of the death of the warm-hearted and gifted friend +whose name heads this article; for there was much in his character and +genius to remind us of the gentle author of Elia. He had the latter's +genial humor and quaintness; his nice and delicate perception of the +beautiful and poetic; his happy, easy diction, not the result, as in the +case of that of the English essayist, of slow and careful elaboration, +but the natural, spontaneous language in which his conceptions at once +embodied themselves, apparently without any consciousness of effort. As +Mark Antony talked, he wrote, "right on," telling his readers often what +"they themselves did know," yet imparting to the simplest commonplaces of +life interest and significance, and throwing a golden haze of poetry over +the rough and thorny pathways of every-day duty. Like Lamb, he loved his +friends without stint or limit. The "old familiar faces" haunted him. +Lamb loved the streets and lanes of London--the places where he oftenest +came in contact with the warm, genial heart of humanity--better than the +country. Rogers loved the wild and lonely hills and valleys of New +Hampshire none the less that he was fully alive to the enjoyments of +society, and could enter with the heartiest sympathy into all the joys +and sorrows of his friends and neighbors. + +In another point of view, he was not unlike Elia. He had the same love +of home, and home friends, and familiar objects; the same fondness for +common sights and sounds; the same dread of change; the same shrinking +from the unknown and the dark. Like him, he clung with a child's love to +the living present, and recoiled from a contemplation of the great change +which awaits us. Like him, he was content with the goodly green earth +and human countenances, and would fain set up his tabernacle here. He +had less of what might be termed self-indulgence in this feeling than +Lamb. He had higher views; he loved this world not only for its own +sake, but for the opportunities it afforded of doing good. Like the +Persian seer, he beheld the legions of Ormuzd and Ahriman, of Light and +Darkness, contending for mastery over the earth, as the sunshine and +shadow of a gusty, half-cloudy day struggled on the green slopes of his +native mountains; and, mingled with the bright host, he would fain have +fought on until its banners waved in eternal sunshine over the last +hiding-place of darkness. He entered into the work of reform with the +enthusiasm and chivalry of a knight of the crusades. He had faith in +human progress,--in the ultimate triumph of the good; millennial lights +beaconed up all along his horizon. In the philanthropic movements of the +day; in the efforts to remove the evils of slavery, war, intemperance, +and sanguinary laws; in the humane and generous spirit of much of our +modern poetry and literature; in the growing demand of the religious +community, of all sects, for the preaching of the gospel of love and +humanity, he heard the low and tremulous prelude of the great anthem of +universal harmony. "The world," said he, in a notice of the music of the +Hutchinson family, "is out of tune now. But it will be tuned again, and +all will become harmony." In this faith he lived and acted; working, not +always, as it seemed to some of his friends, wisely, but bravely, +truthfully, earnestly, cheering on his fellow-laborers, and imparting to +the dullest and most earthward looking of them something of his own zeal +and loftiness of purpose. + +"Who was he?" does the reader ask? Naturally enough, too, for his name +has never found its way into fashionable reviews; it has never been +associated with tale, or essay, or poem, to our knowledge. Our friend +Griswold, who, like another Noah, has launched some hundreds of American +poets and prose writers on the tide of immortality in his two huge arks +of rhyme and reason, has either overlooked his name, or deemed it +unworthy of preservation. Then, too, he was known mainly as the editor +of a proscribed and everywhere-spoken-against anti-slavery paper. It had +few readers of literary taste and discrimination; plain, earnest men and +women, intent only upon the thought itself, and caring little for the +clothing of it, loved the _Herald of Freedom_ for its honestness and +earnestness, and its bold rebukes of the wrong, its all-surrendering +homage to what its editor believed to be right. But the literary world +of authors and critics saw and heard little or nothing of him or his +writings. "I once had a bit of scholar-craft," he says of himself on one +occasion, "and had I attempted it in some pitiful sectarian or party or +literary sheet, I should have stood a chance to get quoted into the +periodicals. Now, who dares quote from the _Herald of Freedom_?" He +wrote for humanity, as his biographer justly says, not for fame. "He +wrote because he had something to say, and true to nature, for to him +nature was truth; he spoke right on, with the artlessness and simplicity +of a child." + +He was born in Plymouth, New Hampshire, in the sixth month of 1794,-- +a lineal descendant from John Rogers, of martyr-memory. Educated at +Dartmouth College, he studied law with Hon. Richard Fletcher, of +Salisbury, New Hampshire, now of Boston, and commenced the practice of it +in 1819, in his native village. He was diligent and successful in his +profession, although seldom known as a pleader. About the year 1833, he +became interested in the anti-slavery movement. His was one of the few +voices of encouragement and sympathy which greeted the author of this +sketch on the publication of a pamphlet in favor of immediate +emancipation. He gave us a kind word of approval, and invited us to his +mountain home, on the banks of the Pemigewasset,--an invitation which, +two years afterwards, we accepted. In the early autumn, in company with +George Thompson, (the eloquent reformer, who has since been elected a +member of the British Parliament from the Tower Hamlets,) we drove up the +beautiful valley of the White Mountain tributary of the Merrimac, and, +just as a glorious sunset was steeping river, valley, and mountain in its +hues of heaven, were welcomed to the pleasant home and family circle of +our friend Rogers. We spent two delightful evenings with him. His +cordiality, his warm-hearted sympathy in our object, his keen wit, +inimitable humor, and childlike and simple mirthfulness, his full +appreciation of the beautiful in art and nature, impressed us with the +conviction that we were the guests of no ordinary man; that we were +communing with unmistakable genius, such an one as might have added to +the wit and eloquence of Ben Jonson's famous club at the _Mermaid_, or +that which Lamb and Coleridge and Southey frequented at the _Salutation +and Cat_, of Smithfield. "The most brilliant man I have met in America!" +said George Thompson, as we left the hospitable door of our friend. + +In 1838, he gave up his law practice, left his fine outlook at Plymouth +upon the mountains of the North, Moosehillock and the Haystacks, and took +up his residence at Concord, for the purpose of editing the _Herald of +Freedom_, an anti-slavery paper which had been started some three or four +years before. John Pierpont, than whom there could not be a more +competent witness, in his brief and beautiful sketch of the life and +writings of Rogers, does not overestimate the ability with which the +Herald was conducted, when he says of its editor: "As a newspaper writer, +we think him unequalled by any living man; and in the general strength, +clearness, and quickness of his intellect, we think all who knew him well +will agree with us that he was not excelled by any editor in the +country." He was not a profound reasoner: his imagination and brilliant +fancy played the wildest tricks with his logic; yet, considering the way +by which he reached them, it is remarkable that his conclusions were so +often correct. The tendency of his mind was to extremes. A zealous +Calvinistic church-member, he became an equally zealous opponent of +churches and priests; a warm politician, he became an ultra non-resistant +and no-government man. In all this, his sincerity was manifest. If, in +the indulgence of his remarkable powers of sarcasm, in the free antics of +a humorous fancy, upon whose graceful neck he had flung loose the reins, +he sometimes did injustice to individuals, and touched, in irreverent +sport, the hem of sacred garments, it had the excuse, at least, of a +generous and honest motive. If he sometimes exaggerated, those who best, +knew him can testify that he "set down naught in malice." + +We have before us a printed collection of his writings,--hasty +editorials, flung off without care or revision, the offspring of sudden +impulse frequently; always free, artless, unstudied; the language +transparent as air, exactly expressing the thought. He loved the common, +simple dialect of the people,--the "beautiful strong old Saxon,--the talk +words." He had an especial dislike of learned and "dictionary words." +He used to recommend Cobbett's Works to "every young man and woman who +has been hurt in his or her talk and writing by going to school." + +Our limits will not admit of such extracts from the Collection of his +writings as would convey to our readers an adequate idea of his thought +and manner. His descriptions of natural scenery glow with life. One can +almost see the sunset light flooding the Franconia Notch, and glorifying +the peaks of Moosehillock, and hear the murmur of the west wind in the +pines, and the light, liquid voice of Pemigewasset sounding up from its +rocky channel, through its green hem of maples, while reading them. We +give a brief extract from an editorial account of an autumnal trip to +Vermont: + +"We have recently journeyed through a portion of this, free State; and it +is not all imagination in us that sees, in its bold scenery, its +uninfected inland position, its mountainous but fertile and verdant +surface, the secret of the noble predisposition of its people. They are +located for freedom. Liberty's home is on their Green Mountains. Their +farmer republic nowhere touches the ocean, the highway of the world's +crimes, as well as its nations. It has no seaport for the importation of +slavery, or the exportation of its own highland republicanism. Should +slavery ever prevail over this nation, to its utter subjugation, the last +lingering footsteps of retiring Liberty will be seen, not, as Daniel +Webster said, in the proud old Commonwealth of Massachusetts, about +Bunker Hill and Faneuil Hall; but she will be found wailing, like +Jephthah's daughter, among the 'hollows' and along the sides of the Green +Mountains. + +"Vermont shows gloriously at this autumn season. Frost has gently laid +hands on her exuberant vegetation, tinging her rock-maple woods without +abating the deep verdure of her herbage. Everywhere along her peopled +hollows and her bold hillslopes and summits the earth is alive with +green, while her endless hard-wood forests are uniformed with all the +hues of early fall, richer than the regimentals of the kings that +glittered in the train of Napoleon on the confines of Poland, when he +lingered there, on the last outposts of summer, before plunging into the +snow-drifts of the North; more gorgeous than the array of Saladin's life- +guard in the wars of the Crusaders, or of 'Solomon in all his glory,' +decked in, all colors and hues, but still the hues of life. Vegetation +touched, but not dead, or, if killed, not bereft yet of 'signs of life.' +'Decay's effacing fingers' had not yet 'swept the hills' 'where beauty +lingers.' All looked fresh as growing foliage. Vermont frosts don't seem +to be 'killing frosts.' They only change aspects of beauty. The mountain +pastures, verdant to the peaks, and over the peaks of the high, steep +hills, were covered with the amplest feed, and clothed with countless +sheep; the hay-fields heavy with second crop, in some partly cut and +abandoned, as if in very weariness and satiety, blooming with +honeysuckle, contrasting strangely with the colors on the woods; the fat +cattle and the long-tailed colts and close-built Morgans wallowing in it +up to the eyes, or the cattle down to rest, with full bellies, by ten in +the morning. Fine but narrow roads wound along among the hills, free +almost entirely of stone, and so smooth as to be safe for the most rapid +driving, made of their rich, dark, powder-looking soil. Beautiful +villages or scattered settlements breaking upon the delighted view, on +the meandering way, making the ride a continued scene of excitement and +admiration. The air fresh, free, and wholesome; the road almost dead +level for miles and miles, among mountains that lay over the land like +the great swells of the sea, and looking in the prospect as though there +could be no passage." + +To this autumnal limning, the following spring picture may be a fitting +accompaniment:-- + +"At last Spring is here in full flush. Winter held on tenaciously and +mercilessly, but it has let go. The great sun is high on his northern +journey, and the vegetation, and the bird-singing, and the loud frog- +chorus, the tree budding and blowing, are all upon us; and the glorious +grass--super-best of earth's garniture--with its ever-satisfying green. +The king-birds have come, and the corn-planter, the scolding bob-o-link. +'Plant your corn, plant your corn,' says he, as he scurries athwart the +ploughed ground, hardly lifting his crank wings to a level with his back, +so self-important is he in his admonitions. The earlier birds have gone +to housekeeping, and have disappeared from the spray. There has been +brief period for them, this spring, for scarcely has the deep snow gone, +but the dark-green grass has come, and first we shall know, the ground +will be yellow with dandelions. + +"I incline to thank Heaven this glorious morning of May 16th for the +pleasant home from which we can greet the Spring. Hitherto we have had +to await it amid a thicket of village houses, low down, close together, +and awfully white. For a prospect, we had the hinder part of an ugly +meeting-house, which an enterprising neighbor relieved us of by planting +a dwelling-house, right before our eyes, (on his own land, and he had a +right to,) which relieved us also of all prospect whatever. And the +revival spirit of habitation which has come over Concord is clapping up a +house between every two in the already crowded town; and the prospect is, +it will be soon all buildings. They are constructing, in quite good +taste though, small, trim, cottage-like. But I had rather be where I can +breathe air, and see beyond my own features, than be smothered among the +prettiest houses ever built. We are on the slope of a hill; it is all +sand, be sure, on all four sides of us, but the air is free, (and the +sand, too, at times,) and our water, there is danger of hard drinking to +live by it. Air and water, the two necessaries of life, and high, free +play-ground for the small ones. There is a sand precipice hard by, high +enough, were it only rock and overlooked the ocean, to be as sublime as +any of the Nahant cliffs. As it is, it is altogether a safer haunt for +daring childhood, which could hardly break its neck by a descent of some +hundreds of feet. + +"A low flat lies between us and the town, with its State-house, and body- +guard of well-proportioned steeples standing round. It was marshy and +wet, but is almost all redeemed by the translation into it of the high +hills of sand. It must have been a terrible place for frogs, judging +from what remains of it. Bits of water from the springs hard by lay here +and there about the low ground, which are peopled as full of singers as +ever the gallery of the old North Meeting-house was, and quite as +melodious ones. Such performers I never heard, in marsh or pool. They +are not the great, stagnant, bull-paddocks, fat and coarse-noted like +Parson, but clear-water frogs, green, lively, and sweet-voiced. I +passed their orchestra going home the other evening, with a small lad, +and they were at it, all parts, ten thousand peeps, shrill, ear-piercing, +and incessant, coming up from every quarter, accompanied by a second, +from some larger swimmer with his trombone, and broken in upon, every now +and then, but not discordantly, with the loud, quick hallo, that +resembles the cry of the tree-toad. 'There are the Hutchinsons,' cried +the lad. 'The Rainers,' responded I, glad to remember enough of my +ancient Latin to know that Rana, or some such sounding word, stood for +frog. But it was a 'band of music,' as the Miller friends say. Like +other singers, (all but the Hutchinsons,) these are apt to sing too much, +all the time they are awake, constituting really too much of a good +thing. I have wondered if the little reptiles were singing in concert, +or whether every one peeped on his own hook, their neighbor hood only +making it a chorus. I incline to the opinion that they are performing +together, that they know the tune, and each carries his part, self- +selected, in free meeting, and therefore never discordant. The hour rule +of Congress might be useful, though far less needed among the frogs than +among the profane croakers of the fens at Washington." + +Here is a sketch of the mountain scenery of New Hampshire, as seen from +the Holderness Mountain, or North Hill, during a visit which he made to +his native valley in the autumn of 1841:-- + +"The earth sphered up all around us, in every quarter of the horizon, +like the crater of a vast volcano, and the great hollow within the +mountain circle was as smoky as Vesuvius or Etna in their recess of +eruption. The little village of Plymouth lay right at our feet, with its +beautiful expanse of intervale opening on the eye like a lake among the +woods and hills, and the Pemigewasset, bordered along its crooked way +with rows of maples, meandering from upland to upland through the +meadows. Our young footsteps had wandered over these localities. Time +had cast it all far back that Pemigewasset, with its meadows and border +trees; that little village whitening in the margin of its inter vale; and +that one house which we could distinguish, where the mother that watched +over and endured our wayward childhood totters at fourscore! + +"To the south stretched a broken, swelling upland country, but champaign +from the top of North Hill, patched all over with grain-fields and green +wood-lots, the roofs of the farm-houses shining in the sun. Southwest, +the Cardigan Mountain showed its bald forehead among the smokes of a +thousand fires, kindled in the woods in the long drought. Westward, +Moosehillock heaved up its long back, black as a whale; and turning the +eye on northward, glancing down the while on the Baker's River valley, +dotted over with human dwellings like shingle-bunches for size, you +behold the great Franconia Range, its Notch and its Haystacks, the +Elephant Mountain on the left, and Lafayette (Great Haystack) on the +right, shooting its peak in solemn loneliness high up into the desert +sky, and overtopping all the neighboring Alps but Mount Washington +itself. The prospect of these is most impressive and satisfactory. We +don't believe the earth presents a finer mountain display. The Haystacks +stand there like the Pyramids on the wall of mountains. One of them +eminently has this Egyptian shape. It is as accurate a pyramid to the +eye as any in the old valley of the Nile, and a good deal bigger than any +of those hoary monuments of human presumption, of the impious tyranny of +monarchs and priests, and of the appalling servility of the erecting +multitude. Arthur's Seat in Edinburgh does not more finely resemble a +sleeping lion than the huge mountain on the left of the Notch does an +elephant, with his great, overgrown rump turned uncivilly toward the gap +where the people have to pass. Following round the panorama, you come to +the Ossipees and the Sandwich Mountains, peaks innumerable and nameless, +and of every variety of fantastic shape. Down their vast sides are +displayed the melancholy-looking slides, contrasting with the fathomless +woods. + +"But the lakes,--you see lakes, as well as woods and mountains, from the +top of North Hill. Newfound Lake in Hebron, only eight miles distant, +you can't see; it lies too deep among the hills. Ponds show their small +blue mirrors from various quarters of the great picture. Worthen's Mill- +Pond and the Hardhack, where we used to fish for trout in truant, +barefooted days, Blair's Mill-Pond, White Oak Pond, and Long Pond, and +the Little Squam, a beautiful dark sheet of deep, blue water, about two +miles long, stretched an id the green hills and woods, with a charming +little beach at its eastern end, and without an island. And then the +Great Squam, connected with it on the east by a short, narrow stream, the +very queen of ponds, with its fleet of islands, surpassing in beauty all +the foreign waters we have seen, in Scotland or elsewhere,--the islands +covered with evergreens, which impart their hue to the mass of the lake, +as it stretches seven miles on east from its smaller sister, towards the +peerless Winnipesaukee. Great Squam is as beautiful as water and island +can be. But Winnipesaukee, it is the very 'Smile of the Great Spirit.' +It looks as if it had a thousand islands; some of them large enough for +little towns, and others not bigger than a swan or a wild duck swimming +on its surface of glass." + +His wit and sarcasm were generally too good-natured to provoke even their +unfortunate objects, playing all over his editorials like the thunderless +lightnings which quiver along the horizon of a night of summer calmness; +but at times his indignation launched them like bolts from heaven. Take +the following as a specimen. He is speaking of the gag rule of Congress, +and commending Southern representatives for their skilful selection of a +proper person to do their work:-- + +"They have a quick eye at the South to the character, or, as they would +say, the points of a slave. They look into him shrewdly, as an old +jockey does into a horse. They will pick him out, at rifle-shot +distance, among a thousand freemen. They have a nice eye to detect +shades of vassalage. They saw in the aristocratic popinjay strut of a +counterfeit Democrat an itching aspiration to play the slaveholder. They +beheld it in 'the cut of his jib,' and his extreme Northern position made +him the very tool for their purpose. The little creature has struck at +the right of petition. A paltrier hand never struck at a noble right. +The Eagle Right of Petition, so loftily sacred in the eyes of the +Constitution that Congress can't begin to 'abridge' it, in its pride of +place, is hawked at by this crested jay-bird. A 'mousing owl' would have +seen better at midnoon than to have done it. It is an idiot blue-jay, +such as you see fooling about among the shrub oaks and dwarf pitch pines +in the winter. What an ignominious death to the lofty right, were it to +die by such a hand; but it does not die. It is impalpable to the +'malicious mockery' of such vain blows.' We are glad it is done--done by +the South--done proudly, and in slaveholding style, by the hand of a +vassal. What a man does by another he does by himself, says the maxim. +But they will disown the honor of it, and cast it on the despised 'free +nigger' North." + +Or this description--not very flattering to the "Old Commonwealth"--of +the treatment of the agent of Massachusetts in South Carolina:-- + +"Slavery may perpetrate anything, and New England can't see it. It can +horsewhip the old Commonwealth of Massachusetts, and spit in her +governmental face, and she will not recognize it as an offence. She sent +her agent to Charleston on a State embassy. Slavery caught him, and sent +him ignominiously home. The solemn great man came back in a hurry. He +returned in a most undignified trot. He ran; he scampered,--the stately +official. The Old Bay State actually pulled foot, cleared, dug, as they +say, like any scamp with a hue and cry after him. Her grave old Senator, +who no more thought of having to break his stately walk than he had of +being flogged at school for stealing apples, came back from Carolina upon +the full run, out of breath and out of dignity. Well, what's the result? +Why, nothing. She no more thinks of showing resentment about it than she +would if lightning had struck him. He was sent back 'by the visitation +of God;' and if they had lynched him to death, and stained the streets of +Charleston with his blood, a Boston jury, if they could have held inquest +over him, would have found that he 'died by the visitation of God.' And +it would have been crowner's quest law, Slavery's crowners." + +Here is a specimen of his graceful blending of irony and humor. He is +expostulating with his neighbor of the New Hampshire Patriot, assuring +him that he cannot endure the ponderous weight of his arguments, begging +for a little respite, and, as a means of obtaining it, urging the editor +to travel. He advises him to go South, to the White Sulphur Springs, and +thinks that, despite of his dark complexion, he would be safe there from +being sold for jail fees, as his pro-slavery merits would more than +counterbalance his colored liabilities, which, after all, were only prima +facie evidence against him. He suggests Texas, also, as a place where +"patriots" of a certain class "most do congregate," and continues as +follows:-- + +"There is Arkansas, too, all glorious in new-born liberty, fresh and +unsullied, like Venus out of the ocean,--that newly discovered star, in +the firmament banner of this Republic. Sister Arkansas, with her bowie- +knife graceful at her side, like the huntress Diana with her silver bow, +--oh it would be refreshing and recruiting to an exhausted patriot to go +and replenish his soul at her fountains. The newly evacuated lands of +the Cherokee, too, a sweet place now for a lover of his country to visit, +to renew his self-complacency by wandering among the quenched hearths of +the expatriated Indians; a land all smoking with the red man's departing +curse,--a malediction that went to the centre. Yes, and Florida,-- +blossoming and leafy Florida, yet warm with the life-blood of Osceola and +his warriors, shed gloriously under flag of truce. Why should a patriot +of such a fancy for nature immure himself in the cells of the city, and +forego such an inviting and so broad a landscape? Ite viator. Go forth, +traveller, and leave this mouldy editing to less elastic fancies. We +would respectfully invite our Colonel to travel. What signifies? +Journey--wander--go forth--itinerate--exercise--perambulate--roam." + +He gives the following ludicrous definition of Congress:-- + +"But what is Congress? It is the echo of the country at home,--the +weathercock, that denotes and answers the shifting wind,--a thing of +tail, nearly all tail, moved by the tail and by the wind, with small +heading, and that corresponding implicitly in movement with the broad +sail-like stern, which widens out behind to catch the rum-fraught breath +of 'the Brotherhood.' As that turns, it turns; when that stops, it stops; +and in calmish weather looks as steadfast and firm as though it was +riveted to the centre. The wind blows, and the little popularity-hunting +head dodges this way and that, in endless fluctuation. Such is Congress, +or a great portion of it. It will point to the northwest heavens of +Liberty, whenever the breezes bear down irresistibly upon it, from the +regions of political fair weather. It will abolish slavery at the +Capitol, when it has already been doomed to abolition and death +everywhere else in the country. 'It will be in at the death.'" + +Replying to the charge that the Abolitionists of the North were "secret" +in their movements and designs, he says:-- + +"'In secret!' Why, our movements have been as prominent and open as the +house-tops from the beginning. We have striven from the outset to write +the whole matter cloud-high in the heavens, that the utmost South might +read it. We have cast an arc upon the horizon, like the semicircle of +the polar lights, and upon it have bent our motto, 'Immediate +Emancipation,' glorious as the rainbow. We have engraven it there, on +the blue table of the cold vault, in letters tall enough for the reading +of the nations. And why has the far South not read and believed before +this? Because a steam has gone up--a fog--from New England's pulpit and +her degenerate press, and hidden the beaming revelation from its vision. +The Northern hierarchy and aristocracy have cheated the South." + +He spoke at times with severity of slaveholders, but far oftener of those +who, without the excuse of education and habit, and prompted only by a +selfish consideration of political or sectarian advantage, apologized for +the wrong, and discountenanced the anti-slavery movement. "We have +nothing to say," said he, "to the slave. He is no party to his own +enslavement,--he is none to his disenthralment. We have nothing to say +to the South. The real holder of slaves is not there. He is in the +North, the free North. The South alone has not the power to hold the +slave. It is the character of the nation that binds and holds him. It +is the Republic that does it, the efficient force of which is north of +Mason and Dixon's line. By virtue of the majority of Northern hearts and +voices, slavery lives in the South!" + +In 1840, he spent a few weeks in England, Ireland, and Scotland. He has +left behind a few beautiful memorials of his tour. His Ride over the +Border, Ride into Edinburgh, Wincobank hall, Ailsa Craig, gave his paper +an interest in the eyes of many who had no sympathy with his political +and religious views. + +Scattered all over his editorials, like gems, are to be found beautiful +images, sweet touches of heartfelt pathos,--thoughts which the reader +pauses over with surprise and delight. We subjoin a few specimens, taken +almost at random from the book before us:-- + +"A thunder-storm,--what can match it for eloquence and poetry? That rush +from heaven of the big drops, in what multitude and succession, and how +they sound as they strike! How they play on the old home roof and the +thick tree-tops! What music to go to sleep by, to the tired boy, as he +lies under the naked roof! And the great, low bass thunder, as it rolls +off over the hills, and settles down behind them to the very centre, and +you can feel the old earth jar under your feet!" + +"There was no oratory in the speech of the _Learned Blacksmith_, in the +ordinary sense of that word, no grace of elocution, but mighty thoughts +radiating off from his heated mind, like sparks from the glowing steel of +his own anvil." + +"The hard hands of Irish labor, with nothing in them,--they ring like +slabs of marble together, in response to the wild appeals of O'Connell, +and the British stand conquered before them, with shouldered arms. +Ireland is on her feet, with nothing in her hands, impregnable, +unassailable, in utter defencelessness,--the first time that ever a +nation sprung to its feet unarmed. The veterans of England behold them, +and forbear to fire. They see no mark. It will not do to fire upon men; +it will do only to fire upon soldiers. They are the proper mark of the +murderous gun, but men cannot be shot." + +"It is coming to that (abolition of war) the world over; and when it does +come to it, oh what a long breath of relief the tired world will draw, as +it stretches itself for the first time out upon earth's greensward, and +learns the meaning of repose and peaceful sleep!" + +"He who vests his labor in the faithful ground is dealing directly with +God; human fraud or weakness do not intervene between him and his +requital. No mechanic has a set of customers so trustworthy as God and +the elements. No savings bank is so sure as the old earth." + +"Literature is the luxury of words. It originates nothing, it does +nothing. It talks hard words about the labor of others, and is reckoned +more meritorious for it than genius and labor for doing what learning can +only descant upon. It trades on the capital of unlettered minds. It +struts in stolen plumage, and it is mere plumage. A learned man +resembles an owl in more respects than the matter of wisdom. Like that +solemn bird, he is about all feathers." + +"Our Second Advent friends contemplate a grand conflagration about the +first of April next. I should be willing there should be one, if it +could be confined to the productions of the press, with which the earth +is absolutely smothered. Humanity wants precious few books to read, but +the great living, breathing, immortal volume of Providence. Life,--real +life,--how to live, how to treat one another, and how to trust God in +matters beyond our ken and occasion,--these are the lessons to learn, and +you find little of them in libraries." + +"That accursed drum and fife! How they have maddened mankind! And the +deep bass boom of the cannon, chiming in in the chorus of battle, that +trumpet and wild charging bugle,--how they set the military devil in a +man, and make him into a soldier! Think of the human family falling upon +one another at the inspiration of music! How must God feel at it, to see +those harp-strings he meant should be waked to a love bordering on +divine, strung and swept to mortal hate and butchery!" + +"Leave off being Jews," (he is addressing Major Noah with regard to his +appeal to his brethren to return to Judaea,) "and turn mankind. The +rocks and sands of Palestine have been worshipped long enough. +Connecticut River or the Merrimac are as good rivers as any Jordan that +ever run into a dead or live sea, and as holy, for that matter. In +Humanity, as in Christ Jesus, as Paul says, 'there is neither Jew nor +Greek.' And there ought to be none. Let Humanity be reverenced with the +tenderest devotion; suffering, discouraged, down-trodden, hard-handed, +haggard-eyed, care-worn mankind! Let these be regarded a little. Would +to God I could alleviate all their sorrows, and leave them a chance to +laugh! They are, miserable now. They might be as happy as the blackbird +on the spray, and as full of melody." + +"I am sick as death at this miserable struggle among mankind for a +living. Poor devils! were they born to run such a gauntlet after the +means of life? Look about you, and see your squirming neighbors, +writhing and twisting like so many angleworms in a fisher's bait-box, or +the wriggling animalculae seen in the vinegar drop held to the sun. How +they look, how they feel, how base it makes them all!" + +"Every human being is entitled to the means of life, as the trout is to +his brook or the lark to the blue sky. Is it well to put a human 'young +one' here to die of hunger, thirst, and nakedness, or else be preserved +as a pauper? Is this fair earth but a poor-house by creation and intent? +Was it made for that?--and these other round things we see dancing in +the firmament to the music of the spheres, are they all great shining +poor-houses?" + +"The divines always admit things after the age has adopted them. They +are as careful of the age as the weathercock is of the wind. You might +as well catch an old experienced weathercock, on some ancient Orthodox +steeple, standing all day with its tail east in a strong out wind, as the +divines at odds with the age." + +But we must cease quoting. The admirers of Jean Paul Richter might find +much of the charm and variety of the "Flower, Fruit, and Thorn Pieces" in +this newspaper collection. They may see, perhaps, as we do, some things +which they cannot approve of, the tendency of which, however intended, is +very questionable. But, with us, they will pardon something to the +spirit of liberty, much to that of love and humanity which breathes +through all. + +Disgusted and heart-sick at the general indifference of Church and clergy +to the temporal condition of the people,--at their apologies for and +defences of slavery, war, and capital punishment,--Rogers turned +Protestant, in the full sense of the term. He spoke of priests and +"pulpit wizards" as freely as John Milton did two centuries ago, +although with far less bitterness and rasping satire. He could not +endure to see Christianity and Humanity divorced. He longed to see the +beautiful life of Jesus--his sweet humanities, his brotherly love, his +abounding sympathies--made the example of all men. Thoroughly +democratic, in his view all men were equal. Priests, stripped of their +sacerdotal tailoring, were in his view but men, after all. He pitied +them, he said, for they were in a wrong position,--above life's comforts +and sympathies,--"up in the unnatural cold, they had better come down +among men, and endure and enjoy with them." "Mankind," said he, "want +the healing influences of humanity. They must love one another more. +Disinterested good will make the world as it should be." + +His last visit to his native valley was in the autumn of 1845. In a +familiar letter to a friend, he thus describes his farewell view of the +mountain glories of his childhood's home:-- + +"I went a jaunt, Thursday last, about twenty miles north of this valley, +into the mountain region, where what I beheld, if I could tell it as I +saw it, would make your outlawed sheet sought after wherever our Anglo- +Saxon tongue is spoken in the wide world. I have been many a time among +those Alps, and never without a kindling of wildest enthusiasm in my +woodland blood. But I never saw them till last Thursday. They never +loomed distinctly to my eye before, and the sun never shone on them from +heaven till then. They were so near me, I could seem to hear the voice +of their cataracts, as I could count their great slides, streaming adown +their lone and desolate sides,--old slides, some of them overgrown with +young woods, like half-healed scars on the breast of a giant. The great +rains had clothed the valleys of the upper Pemigewasset in the darkest +and deepest green. The meadows were richer and more glorious in their +thick 'fall feed' than Queen Anne's Garden, as I saw it from the windows +of Windsor Castle. And the dark hemlock and hackmatack woods were yet +darker after the wet season, as they lay, in a hundred wildernesses, in +the mighty recesses of the mountains. But the peaks,--the eternal, the +solitary, the beautiful, the glorious and dear mountain peaks, my own +Moosehillock and my native Haystacks,--these were the things on which eye +and heart gazed and lingered, and I seemed to see them for the last time. +It was on my way back that I halted and turned to look at them from a +high point on the Thornton road. It was about four in the afternoon. It +had rained among the hills about the Notch, and cleared off. The sun, +there sombred at that early hour, as towards his setting, was pouring his +most glorious light upon the naked peaks, and they casting their mighty +shadows far down among the inaccessible woods that darken the hollows +that stretch between their bases. A cloud was creeping up to perch and +rest awhile on the highest top of Great Haystack. Vulgar folks have +called it Mount Lafayette, since the visit of that brave old Frenchman in +1825 or 1826. If they had asked his opinion, he would have told them the +names of mountains couldn't be altered, and especially names like that, +so appropriate, so descriptive, and so picturesque. A little hard white +cloud, that looked like a hundred fleeces of wool rolled into one, was +climbing rapidly along up the northwestern ridge, that ascended to the +lonely top of Great Haystack. All the others were bare. Four or five of +them,--as distinct and shapely as so many pyramids; some topped out with +naked cliff, on which the sun lay in melancholy glory; others clothed +thick all the way up with the old New Hampshire hemlock or the daring +hackmatack,--Pierpont's hackmatack. You could see their shadows +stretching many and many a mile, over Grant and Location, away beyond the +invading foot of Incorporation,--where the timber-hunter has scarcely +explored, and where the moose browses now, I suppose, as undisturbed as +he did before the settlement of the State. I wish our young friend and +genius, Harrison Eastman, had been with me, to see the sunlight as it +glared on the tops of those woods, and to see the purple of the +mountains. I looked at it myself almost with the eye of a painter. If a +painter looked with mine, though, he never could look off upon his canvas +long enough to make a picture; he would gaze forever at the original. + +"But I had to leave it, and to say in my heart, Farewell! And as I +travelled on down, and the sun sunk lower and lower towards the summit of +the western ridge, the clouds came up and formed an Alpine range in the +evening heavens above it,--like other Haystacks and Moosehillocks,--so +dark and dense that fancy could easily mistake them for a higher Alps. +There were the peaks and the great passes; the Franconia Notches among +the cloudy cliffs, and the great White Mountain Gap." + +His health, never robust, had been gradually failing for some time +previous to his death. He needed more repose and quiet than his duties +as an editor left him; and to this end he purchased a small and pleasant +farm in his loved Pennigewasset valley, in the hope that he might there +recruit his wasted energies. In the sixth month of the year of his +death, in a letter to us, he spoke of his prospects in language which +even then brought moisture to our eyes:-- + +"I am striving to get me an asylum of a farm. I have a wife and seven +children, every one of them with a whole spirit. I don't want to be +separated from any of them, only with a view to come together again. I +have a beautiful little retreat in prospect, forty odd miles north, where +I imagine I can get potatoes and repose,--a sort of haven or port. I am +among the breakers, and 'mad for land.' If I get this home,--it is a mile +or two in among the hills from the pretty domicil once visited by +yourself and glorious Thompson,--I am this moment indulging the fancy +that I may see you at it before we die. Why can't I have you come and +see me? You see, dear W., I don't want to send you anything short of a +full epistle. Let me end as I begun, with the proffer of my hand in +grasp of yours extended. My heart I do not proffer,--it was yours +before,--it shall be yours while I am N. P. ROGERS." + +Alas! the haven of a deeper repose than he had dreamed of was close at +hand. He lingered until the middle of the tenth month, suffering much, +yet calm and sensible to the last. Just before his death, he desired his +children to sing at his bedside that touching song of Lover's, _The +Angel's Whisper_. Turning his eyes towards the open window, through +which the leafy glory of the season he most loved was visible, he +listened to the sweet melody. In the words of his friend Pierpont,-- + + "The angel's whisper stole in song upon his closing ear; + From his own daughter's lips it came, so musical and clear, + That scarcely knew the dying man what melody was there-- + The last of earth's or first of heaven's pervading all the air." + +He sleeps in the Concord burial-ground, under the shadow of oaks; the +very spot he would have chosen, for he looked upon trees with something +akin to human affection. "They are," he said, "the beautiful handiwork +and architecture of God, on which the eye never tires. Every one is +a feather in the earth's cap, a plume in her bonnet, a tress on her +forehead,--a comfort, a refreshing, and an ornament to her." Spring has +hung over him her buds, and opened beside him her violets. Summer has +laid her green oaken garland on his grave, and now the frost-blooms of +autumn drop upon it. Shall man cast a nettle on that mound? He loved +humanity,--shall it be less kind to him than Nature? Shall the bigotry +of sect, and creed, and profession, drive its condemnatory stake into his +grave? God forbid. The doubts which he sometimes unguardedly expressed +had relation, we are constrained to believe, to the glosses of +commentators and creed-makers and the inconsistency of professors, rather +than to those facts and precepts of Christianity to which he gave the +constant assent of his practice. He sought not his own. His heart +yearned with pity and brotherly affection for all the poor and suffering +in the universe. Of him, the angel of Leigh Hunt's beautiful allegory +might have written, in the golden book of remembrance, as he did of the +good Abou Ben Adhem, "He loved his fellow-men." + + + + +ROBERT DINSMORE. + +The great charm of Scottish poetry consists in its simplicity, and +genuine, unaffected sympathy with the common joys and sorrows of daily +life. It is a home-taught, household melody. It calls to mind the +pastoral bleat on the hillsides, the kirkbells of a summer Sabbath, the +song of the lark in the sunrise, the cry of the quail in the corn-land, +the low of cattle, and the blithe carol of milkmaids "when the kye come +hame" at gloaming. Meetings at fair and market, blushing betrothments, +merry weddings, the joy of young maternity, the lights and shades of +domestic life, its bereavements and partings, its chances and changes, +its holy death-beds, and funerals solemnly beautiful in quiet kirkyards, +--these furnish the hints of the immortal melodies of Burns, the sweet +ballads of the Ettrick Shepherd and Allan Cunningham, and the rustic +drama of Ramsay. It is the poetry of home, of nature, and the +affections. + +All this is sadly wanting in our young literature. We have no songs; +American domestic life has never been hallowed and beautified by the +sweet and graceful and tender associations of poetry. We have no Yankee +pastorals. Our rivers and streams turn mills and float rafts, and are +otherwise as commendably useful as those of Scotland; but no quaint +ballad or simple song reminds us that men and women have loved, met, and +parted on their banks, or that beneath each roof within their valleys the +tragedy and comedy of life have been enacted. Our poetry is cold and +imitative; it seems more the product of over-strained intellects than the +spontaneous outgushing of hearts warm with love, and strongly +sympathizing with human nature as it actually exists about us, with the +joys and griefs of the men and women whom we meet daily. Unhappily, the +opinion prevails that a poet must be also a philosopher, and hence it is +that much of our poetry is as indefinable in its mysticism as an Indian +Brahmin's commentary on his sacred books, or German metaphysics subjected +to homeopathic dilution. It assumes to be prophetical, and its +utterances are oracular. It tells of strange, vague emotions and +yearnings, painfully suggestive of spiritual "groanings which cannot be +uttered." If it "babbles o' green fields" and the common sights and +sounds of nature, it is only for the purpose of finding some vague +analogy between them and its internal experiences and longings. It +leaves the warm and comfortable fireside of actual knowledge and human +comprehension, and goes wailing and gibbering like a ghost about the +impassable doors of mystery:-- + + "It fain would be resolved + How things are done, + And who the tailor is + That works for the man I' the sun." + +How shall we account for this marked tendency in the literature of a +shrewd, practical people? Is it that real life in New England lacks +those conditions of poetry and romance which age, reverence, and +superstition have gathered about it in the Old World? Is it that + + "Ours are not Tempe's nor Arcadia's vales," + +but are more famous for growing Indian corn and potatoes, and the +manufacture of wooden ware and pedler notions, than for romantic +associations and legendary interest? That our huge, unshapely shingle +structures, blistering in the sun and glaring with windows, were +evidently never reared by the spell of pastoral harmonies, as the walls +of Thebes rose at the sound of the lyre of Amphion? That the habits of +our people are too cool, cautious, undemonstrative, to furnish the warp +and woof of song and pastoral, and that their dialect and figures of +speech, however richly significant and expressive in the autobiography of +Sam Slick, or the satire of Hosea Biglow and Ethan Spike, form a very +awkward medium of sentiment and pathos? All this may be true. But the +Yankee, after all, is a man, and as such his history, could it be got at, +must have more or less of poetic material in it; moreover, whether +conscious of it or not, he also stands relieved against the background of +Nature's beauty or sublimity. There is a poetical side to the +commonplace of his incomings and outgoings; study him well, and you may +frame an idyl of some sort from his apparently prosaic existence. Our +poets, we must needs think, are deficient in that shiftiness, ready +adaptation to circumstances, and ability of making the most of things, +for which, as a people, we are proverbial. Can they make nothing of our +Thanksgiving, that annual gathering of long-severed friends? Do they +find nothing to their purpose in our apple-bees, buskings, berry- +pickings, summer picnics, and winter sleigh-rides? Is there nothing +available in our peculiarities of climate, scenery, customs, and +political institutions? Does the Yankee leap into life, shrewd, hard, +and speculating, armed, like Pallas, for a struggle with fortune? Are +there not boys and girls, school loves and friendship, courtings and +match-makings, hope and fear, and all the varied play of human passions, +--the keen struggles of gain, the mad grasping of ambition,--sin and +remorse, tearful repentance and holy aspirations? Who shall say that we +have not all the essentials of the poetry of human life and simple +nature, of the hearth and the farm-field? Here, then, is a mine +unworked, a harvest ungathered. Who shall sink the shaft and thrust in +the sickle? + +And here let us say that the mere dilettante and the amateur ruralist may +as well keep their hands off. The prize is not for them. He who would +successfully strive for it must be himself what he sings,--part and +parcel of the rural life of New England,--one who has grown strong amidst +its healthful influences, familiar with all its details, and capable of +detecting whatever of beauty, humor, or pathos pertain to it,--one who +has added to his book-lore the large experience of an active +participation in the rugged toil, the hearty amusements, the trials, and +the pleasures he describes. + +We have been led to these reflections by an incident which has called up +before us the homespun figure of an old friend of our boyhood, who had +the good sense to discover that the poetic element existed in the simple +home life of a country farmer, although himself unable to give a very +creditable expression of it. He had the "vision," indeed, but the +"faculty divine" was wanting; or, if he possessed it in any degree, as +Thersites says of the wit of Ajax, "it would not out, but lay coldly in +him like fire in the flint." + +While engaged this morning in looking over a large exchange list of +newspapers, a few stanzas of poetry in the Scottish dialect attracted our +attention. As we read them, like a wizard's rhyme they seemed to have +the power of bearing us back to the past. They had long ago graced the +columns of that solitary sheet which once a week diffused happiness over +our fireside circle, making us acquainted, in our lonely nook, with the +goings-on of the great world. The verses, we are now constrained to +admit, are not remarkable in themselves, truth and simple nature only; +yet how our young hearts responded to them! Twenty years ago there were +fewer verse-makers than at present; and as our whole stock of light +literature consisted of Ellwood's _Davideis_ and the selections of +_Lindley Murray's English Reader_, it is not improbable that we were in a +condition to overestimate the contributions to the poet's corner of our +village newspaper. Be that as it may, we welcome them as we would the +face of an old friend, for they somehow remind us of the scent of +haymows, the breath of cattle, the fresh greenery by the brookside, the +moist earth broken by the coulter and turned up to the sun and winds of +May. This particular piece, which follows, is entitled _The Sparrow_, +and was occasioned by the crushing of a bird's-nest by the author while +ploughing among his corn. It has something of the simple tenderness of +Burns. + + "Poor innocent and hapless Sparrow + Why should my mould-board gie thee sorrow! + This day thou'll chirp and mourn the morrow + Wi' anxious breast; + The plough has turned the mould'ring furrow + Deep o'er thy nest! + + "Just I' the middle o' the hill + Thy nest was placed wi' curious skill; + There I espied thy little bill + Beneath the shade. + In that sweet bower, secure frae ill, + Thine eggs were laid. + + "Five corns o' maize had there been drappit, + An' through the stalks thy head was pappit, + The drawing nowt could na be stappit + I quickly foun'; + Syne frae thy cozie nest thou happit, + Wild fluttering roun'. + + "The sklentin stane beguiled the sheer, + In vain I tried the plough to steer; + A wee bit stumpie I' the rear + Cam' 'tween my legs, + An' to the jee-side gart me veer + An' crush thine eggs. + + "Alas! alas! my bonnie birdie! + Thy faithful mate flits round to guard thee. + Connubial love!--a pattern worthy + The pious priest! + What savage heart could be sae hardy + As wound thy breast? + + "Ah me! it was nae fau't o' mine; + It gars me greet to see thee pine. + It may be serves His great design + Who governs all; + Omniscience tents wi' eyes divine + The Sparrow's fall! + + "How much like thine are human dools, + Their sweet wee bairns laid I' the mools? + The Sovereign Power who nature rules + Hath said so be it + But poor blip' mortals are sic fools + They canna see it. + + "Nae doubt that He who first did mate us + Has fixed our lot as sure as fate is, + An' when He wounds He disna hate us, + But anely this, + He'll gar the ills which here await us + Yield lastin' bliss." + +In the early part of the eighteenth century a considerable number of +Presbyterians of Scotch descent, from the north of Ireland, emigrated to +the New World. In the spring of 1719, the inhabitants of Haverhill, on +the Merrimac, saw them passing up the river in several canoes, one of +which unfortunately upset in the rapids above the village. The following +fragment of a ballad celebrating this event has been handed down to the +present time, and may serve to show the feelings even then of the old +English settlers towards the Irish emigrants:-- + + "They began to scream and bawl, + As out they tumbled one and all, + And, if the Devil had spread his net, + He could have made a glorious haul!" + +The new-comers proceeded up the river, and, landing opposite to the +Uncanoonuc Hills, on the present site of Manchester, proceeded inland to +Beaver Pond. Charmed with the appearance of the country, they resolved +here to terminate their wanderings. Under a venerable oak on the margin +of the little lake, they knelt down with their minister, Jamie McGregore, +and laid, in prayer and thanksgiving, the foundation of their settlement. +In a few years they had cleared large fields, built substantial stone and +frame dwellings and a large and commodious meeting-house; wealth had +accumulated around them, and they had everywhere the reputation of a +shrewd and thriving community. They were the first in New England to +cultivate the potato, which their neighbors for a long time regarded as a +pernicious root, altogether unfit for a Christian stomach. Every lover +of that invaluable esculent has reason to remember with gratitude the +settlers of Londonderry. + +Their moral acclimation in Ireland had not been without its effect upon +their character. Side by side with a Presbyterianism as austere as that +of John Knox had grown up something of the wild Milesian humor, love of +convivial excitement and merry-making. Their long prayers and fierce +zeal in behalf of orthodox tenets only served, in the eyes of their +Puritan neighbors, to make more glaring still the scandal of their marked +social irregularities. It became a common saying in the region round +about that "the Derry Presbyterians would never give up a pint of +doctrine or a pint of rum." Their second minister was an old scarred +fighter, who had signalized himself in the stout defence of Londonderry, +when James II. and his Papists were thundering at its gates. Agreeably +to his death-bed directions, his old fellow-soldiers, in their leathern +doublets and battered steel caps, bore him to his grave, firing over him +the same rusty muskets which had swept down rank after rank of the men of +Amalek at the Derry siege. + +Erelong the celebrated Derry fair was established, in imitation of those +with which they had been familiar in Ireland. Thither annually came all +manner of horse-jockeys and pedlers, gentlemen and beggars, fortune- +tellers, wrestlers, dancers and fiddlers, gay young farmers and buxom +maidens. Strong drink abounded. They who had good-naturedly wrestled +and joked together in the morning not unfrequently closed the day with a +fight, until, like the revellers of Donnybrook, + + "Their hearts were soft with whiskey, + And their heads were soft with blows." + +A wild, frolicking, drinking, fiddling, courting, horse-racing, riotous +merry-making,--a sort of Protestant carnival, relaxing the grimness of +Puritanism for leagues around it. + +In the midst of such a community, and partaking of all its influences, +Robert Dinsmore, the author of the poem I have quoted, was born, about +the middle of the last century. His paternal ancestor, John, younger son +of a Laird of Achenmead, who left the banks of the Tweed for the green +fertility of Northern Ireland, had emigrated to New England some forty +years before, and, after a rough experience of Indian captivity in the +wild woods of Maine, had settled down among his old neighbors in +Londonderry. Until nine years of age, Robert never saw a school. He was +a short time under the tuition of an old British soldier, who had strayed +into the settlement after the French war, "at which time," he says in a +letter to a friend, "I learned to repeat the shorter and larger +catechisms. These, with the Scripture proofs annexed to them, confirmed +me in the orthodoxy of my forefathers, and I hope I shall ever remain an +evidence of the truth of what the wise man said, 'Train up a child in the +way he should go, and when he is old he will not depart from it.'" He +afterwards took lessons with one Master McKeen, who used to spend much of +his time in hunting squirrels with his pupils. He learned to read and +write; and the old man always insisted that he should have done well at +ciphering also, had he not fallen in love with Molly Park. At the age of +eighteen he enlisted in the Revolutionary army, and was at the battle of +Saratoga. On his return he married his fair Molly, settled down as a +farmer in Windham, formerly a part of Londonderry, and before he was +thirty years of age became an elder in the church, of the creed and +observances of which he was always a zealous and resolute defender. From +occasional passages in his poems, it is evident that the instructions +which he derived from the pulpit were not unlike those which Burns +suggested as needful for the unlucky lad whom he was commending to his +friend Hamilton:-- + + "Ye 'll catechise him ilka quirk, + An' shore him weel wi' hell." + +In a humorous poem, entitled Spring's Lament, he thus describes the +consternation produced in the meeting-house at sermon time by a dog, who, +in search of his mistress, rattled and scraped at the "west porch +door:"-- + + "The vera priest was scared himsel', + His sermon he could hardly spell; + Auld carlins fancied they could smell + The brimstone matches; + They thought he was some imp o' hell, + In quest o' wretches." + +He lived to a good old age, a home-loving, unpretending farmer, +cultivating his acres with his own horny hands, and cheering the long +rainy days and winter evenings with homely rhyme. Most of his pieces +were written in the dialect of his ancestors, which was well understood +by his neighbors and friends, the only audience upon which he could +venture to calculate. He loved all old things, old language, old +customs, old theology. In a rhyming letter to his cousin Silas, +he says:-- + + "Though Death our ancestors has cleekit, + An' under clods then closely steekit, + We'll mark the place their chimneys reekit, + Their native tongue we yet wad speak it, + Wi' accent glib." + +He wrote sometimes to amuse his neighbors, often to soothe their sorrow +under domestic calamity, or to give expression to his own. With little +of that delicacy of taste which results from the attrition of fastidious +and refined society, and altogether too truthful and matter-of-fact to +call in the aid of imagination, he describes in the simplest and most +direct terms the circumstances in which he found himself, and the +impressions which these circumstances had made on his own mind. He calls +things by their right names; no euphuism or transcendentalism,--the +plainer and commoner the better. He tells us of his farm life, its +joys and sorrows, its mirth and care, with no embellishment, with no +concealment of repulsive and ungraceful features. Never having seen a +nightingale, he makes no attempt to describe the fowl; but he has seen +the night-hawk, at sunset, cutting the air above him, and he tells of it. +Side by side with his waving corn-fields and orchard-blooms we have the +barn-yard and pigsty. Nothing which was necessary to the comfort and +happiness of his home and avocation was to him "common or unclean." +Take, for instance, the following, from a poem written at the close of +autumn, after the death of his wife:-- + + "No more may I the Spring Brook trace, + No more with sorrow view the place + Where Mary's wash-tub stood; + No more may wander there alone, + And lean upon the mossy stone + Where once she piled her wood. + 'T was there she bleached her linen cloth, + By yonder bass-wood tree + From that sweet stream she made her broth, + Her pudding and her tea. + That stream, whose waters running, + O'er mossy root and stone, + Made ringing and singing, + Her voice could match alone." + +We envy not the man who can sneer at this simple picture. It is honest +as Nature herself. An old and lonely man looks back upon the young years +of his wedded life. Can we not look with him? The sunlight of a summer +morning is weaving itself with the leafy shadows of the bass-tree, +beneath which a fair and ruddy-checked young woman, with her full, +rounded arms bared to the elbow, bends not ungracefully to her task, +pausing ever and anon to play with the bright-eyed child beside her, and +mingling her songs with the pleasant murmurings of gliding water! Alas! +as the old man looks, he hears that voice, which perpetually sounds to us +all from the past--no more! + +Let us look at him in his more genial mood. Take the opening lines of +his Thanksgiving Day. What a plain, hearty picture of substantial +comfort! + + "When corn is in the garret stored, + And sauce in cellar well secured; + When good fat beef we can afford, + And things that 're dainty, + With good sweet cider on our board, + And pudding plenty; + + "When stock, well housed, may chew the cud, + And at my door a pile of wood, + A rousing fire to warm my blood, + Blest sight to see! + It puts my rustic muse in mood + To sing for thee." + +If he needs a simile, he takes the nearest at hand. In a letter to his +daughter he says:-- + + "That mine is not a longer letter, + The cause is not the want of matter,-- + Of that there's plenty, worse or better; + But like a mill + Whose stream beats back with surplus water, + The wheel stands still." + +Something of the humor of Burns gleams out occasionally from the sober +decorum of his verses. In an epistle to his friend Betton, high sheriff +of the county, who had sent to him for a peck of seed corn, he says:-- + + "Soon plantin' time will come again, + Syne may the heavens gie us rain, + An' shining heat to bless ilk plain + An' fertile hill, + An' gar the loads o' yellow grain, + Our garrets fill. + + "As long as I has food and clothing, + An' still am hale and fier and breathing, + Ye 's get the corn--and may be aething + Ye'll do for me; + (Though God forbid)--hang me for naething + An' lose your fee." + +And on receiving a copy of some verses written by a lady, he talks in a +sad way for a Presbyterian deacon:-- + + "Were she some Aborigine squaw, + Wha sings so sweet by nature's law, + I'd meet her in a hazle shaw, + Or some green loany, + And make her tawny phiz and 'a + My welcome crony." + +The practical philosophy of the stout, jovial rhymer was but little +affected by the sour-featured asceticism of the elder. He says:-- + + "We'll eat and drink, and cheerful take + Our portions for the Donor's sake, + For thus the Word of Wisdom spake-- + Man can't do better; + Nor can we by our labors make + The Lord our debtor!" + +A quaintly characteristic correspondence in rhyme between the Deacon and +Parson McGregore, evidently "birds o' ane feather," is still in +existence. The minister, in acknowledging the epistle of his old friend, +commences his reply as follows:-- + + "Did e'er a cuif tak' up a quill, + Wha ne'er did aught that he did well, + To gar the muses rant and reel, + An' flaunt and swagger, + Nae doubt ye 'll say 't is that daft chiel + Old Dite McGregore!" + +The reply is in the same strain, and may serve to give the reader some +idea of the old gentleman as a religious controversialist:-- + + "My reverend friend and kind McGregore, + Although thou ne'er was ca'd a bragger, + Thy muse I'm sure nave e'er was glegger + Thy Scottish lays + Might gar Socinians fa' or stagger, + E'en in their ways. + + "When Unitarian champions dare thee, + Goliah like, and think to scare thee, + Dear Davie, fear not, they'll ne'er waur thee; + But draw thy sling, + Weel loaded frae the Gospel quarry, + An' gie 't a fling." + +The last time I saw him, he was chaffering in the market-place of my +native village, swapping potatoes and onions and pumpkins for tea, +coffee, molasses, and, if the truth be told, New England rum. Threescore +years and ten, to use his own words, + + "Hung o'er his back, + And bent him like a muckle pack," + +yet he still stood stoutly and sturdily in his thick shoes of cowhide, +like one accustomed to tread independently the soil of his own acres,-- +his broad, honest face seamed by care and darkened by exposure to "all +the airts that blow," and his white hair flowing in patriarchal glory +beneath his felt hat. A genial, jovial, large-hearted old man, simple as +a child, and betraying, neither in look nor manner, that he was +accustomed to + + "Feed on thoughts which voluntary move + Harmonious numbers." + +Peace to him! A score of modern dandies and sentimentalists could ill +supply the place of this one honest man. In the ancient burial-ground of +Windham, by the side of his "beloved Molly," and in view of the old +meeting-house, there is a mound of earth, where, every spring, green +grasses tremble in the wind and the warm sunshine calls out the flowers. +There, gathered like one of his own ripe sheaves, the farmer poet sleeps +with his fathers. + + + + +PLACIDO, THE SLAVE POET. (1845.) + +I have been greatly interested in the fate of Juan Placido, the black +revolutionist of Cuba, who was executed in Havana, as the alleged +instigator and leader of an attempted revolt on the part of the slaves in +that city and its neighborhood. + +Juan Placido was born a slave on the estate of Don Terribio de Castro. +His father was an African, his mother a mulatto. His mistress treated +him with great kindness, and taught him to read. When he was twelve +years of age she died, and he fell into other and less compassionate +hands. At the age of eighteen, on seeing his mother struck with a heavy +whip, he for the first time turned upon his tormentors. To use his own +words, "I felt the blow in my heart. To utter a loud cry, and from a +downcast boy, with the timidity of one weak as a lamb, to become all at +office like a raging lion, was a thing of a moment." He was, however, +subdued, and the next morning, together with his mother, a tenderly +nurtured and delicate woman, severely scourged. On seeing his mother +rudely stripped and thrown down upon the ground, he at first with tears +implored the overseer to spare her; but at the sound of the first blow, +as it cut into her naked flesh, he sprang once more upon the ruffian, +who, having superior strength, beat him until he was nearer dead than +alive. + +After suffering all the vicissitudes of slavery,--hunger, nakedness, +stripes; after bravely and nobly bearing up against that slow, dreadful +process which reduces the man to a thing, the image of God to a piece of +merchandise, until he had reached his thirty-eighth year, he was +unexpectedly released from his bonds. Some literary gentlemen in Havana, +into whose hands two or three pieces of his composition had fallen, +struck with the vigor, spirit, and natural grace which they manifested, +sought out the author, and raised a subscription to purchase his freedom. +He came to Havana, and maintained himself by house-painting, and such +other employments as his ingenuity and talents placed within his reach. +He wrote several poems, which have been published in Spanish at Havana, +and translated by Dr. Madden, under the title of _Poems by a Slave_. + +It is not too much to say of these poems that they will bear a comparison +with most of the productions of modern Spanish literature. The style is +bold, free, energetic. Some of the pieces are sportive and graceful; +such is the address to _The Cucuya_, or Cuban firefly. This beautiful +insect is sometimes fastened in tiny nets to the light dresses of the +Cuban ladies, a custom to which the writer gallantly alludes in the +following lines:-- + + "Ah!--still as one looks on such brightness and bloom, + On such beauty as hers, one might envy the doom + Of a captive Cucuya that's destined, like this, + To be touched by her hand and revived by her kiss! + In the cage which her delicate hand has prepared, + The beautiful prisoner nestles unscared, + O'er her fair forehead shining serenely and bright, + In beauty's own bondage revealing its light! + And when the light dance and the revel are done, + She bears it away to her alcove alone, + Where, fed by her hand from the cane that's most choice, + In secret it gleans at the sound of her voice! + O beautiful maiden! may Heaven accord + Thy care of the captive a fitting reward, + And never may fortune the fetters remove + Of a heart that is thine in the bondage of love!" + +In his Dream, a fragment of some length, Placido dwells in a touching +manner upon the scenes of his early years. It is addressed to his +brother Florence, who was a slave near Matanzas, while the author was in +the same condition at Havana. There is a plaintive and melancholy +sweetness in these lines, a natural pathos, which finds its way to the +heart:-- + + "Thou knowest, dear Florence, my sufferings of old, + The struggles maintained with oppression for years; + We shared them together, and each was consoled + With the love which was nurtured by sorrow and tears. + + "But now far apart, the sad pleasure is gone, + We mingle our sighs and our sorrows no more; + The course is a new one which each has to run, + And dreary for each is the pathway before. + + "But in slumber our spirits at least shall commune, + We will meet as of old in the visions of sleep, + In dreams which call back early days, when at noon + We stole to the shade of the palm-tree to weep! + + "For solitude pining, in anguish of late + The heights of Quintana I sought for repose; + And there, in the cool and the silence, the weight + Of my cares was forgotten, I felt not any woes. + + "Exhausted and weary, the spell of the place + Sank down on my eyelids, and soft slumber stole + So sweetly upon me, it left not a trace + Of sorrow o'ercasting the light of the soul." + + +The writer then imagines himself borne lightly through the air to the +place of his birth. The valley of Matanzas lies beneath him, hallowed by +the graves of his parents. He proceeds:-- + + "I gazed on that spot where together we played, + Our innocent pastimes came fresh to my mind, + Our mother's caress, and the fondness displayed + In each word and each look of a parent so kind. + + "I looked on the mountain, whose fastnesses wild + The fugitives seek from the rifle and hound; + Below were the fields where they suffered and toiled, + And there the low graves of their comrades are found. + + "The mill-house was there, and the turmoil of old; + But sick of these scenes, for too well were they known, + I looked for the stream where in childhood I strolled + When a moment of quiet and peace was my own. + + "With mingled emotions of pleasure and pain, + Dear Florence, I sighed to behold thee once more; + I sought thee, my brother, embraced thee again, + But I found thee a slave as I left thee before!" + +Some of his devotional pieces evince the fervor and true feeling of the +Christian poet. His _Ode to Religion_ contains many admirable lines. +Speaking of the martyrs of the early days of Christianity, he says +finely:-- + + "Still in that cradle, purpled with their blood, + The infant Faith waxed stronger day by day." + +I cannot forbear quoting the last stanza of this poem:-- + + "O God of mercy, throned in glory high, + On earth and all its misery look down: + Behold the wretched, hear the captive's cry, + And call Thy exiled children round Thy throne! + There would I fain in contemplation gaze + On Thy eternal beauty, and would make + Of love one lasting canticle of praise, + And every theme but Thee henceforth forsake!" + +His best and noblest production is an ode _To Cuba_, written on the +occasion of Dr. Madden's departure from the island, and presented to that +gentleman. It was never published in Cuba, as its sentiments would have +subjected the author to persecution. It breathes a lofty spirit of +patriotism, and an indignant sense of the wrongs inflicted upon his race. +Withal, it has something of the grandeur and stateliness of the old +Spanish muse. + + "Cuba!--of what avail that thou art fair, + Pearl of the Seas, the pride of the Antilles, + If thy poor sons have still to see thee share + The pangs of bondage and its thousand ills? + Of what avail the verdure of thy hills, + The purple bloom thy coffee-plain displays; + The cane's luxuriant growth, whose culture fills + More graves than famine, or the sword finds ways + To glut with victims calmly as it slays? + + "Of what avail that thy clear streams abound + With precious ore, if wealth there's, none to buy + Thy children's rights, and not one grain is found + For Learning's shrine, or for the altar nigh + Of poor, forsaken, downcast Liberty? + Of what avail the riches of thy port, + Forests of masts and ships from every sea, + If Trade alone is free, and man, the sport + And spoil of Trade, bears wrongs of every sort? + + "Cuba! O Cuba!---when men call thee fair, + And rich, and beautiful, the Queen of Isles, + Star of the West, and Ocean's gem most rare, + Oh, say to those who mock thee with such wiles: + Take off these flowers; and view the lifeless spoils + Which wait the worm; behold their hues beneath + The pale, cold cheek; and seek for living smiles + Where Beauty lies not in the arms of Death, + And Bondage taints not with its poison breath!" + +The disastrous result of the last rising of the slaves--in Cuba is well +known. Betrayed, and driven into premature collision with their +oppressors, the insurrectionists were speedily crushed into subjection. +Placido was arrested, and after a long hearing was condemned to be +executed, and consigned to the Chapel of the Condemned. + +How far he was implicated in the insurrectionary movement it is now +perhaps impossible to ascertain. The popular voice at Havana pronounced +him its leader and projector, and as such he was condemned. His own +bitter wrongs; the terrible recollections of his life of servitude; the +sad condition of his relatives and race, exposed to scorn, contumely, and +the heavy hand of violence; the impunity with which the most dreadful +outrages upon the persons of slaves were inflicted,--acting upon a mind +fully capable of appreciating the beauty and dignity of freedom,-- +furnished abundant incentives to an effort for the redemption of his race +and the humiliation of his oppressors. The Heraldo, of Madrid speaks of +him as "the celebrated poet, a man of great natural genius, and beloved +and appreciated by the most respectable young men of Havana." It accuses +him of wild and ambitious projects, and states that he was intended to be +the chief of the black race after they had thrown off the yoke of +bondage. + +He was executed at Havana in the seventh month, 1844. According to the +custom in Cuba with condemned criminals, he was conducted from prison to +the Chapel of the Doomed. He passed thither with singular composure, +amidst a great concourse of people, gracefully saluting his numerous +acquaintances. The chapel was hung with black cloth, and dimly lighted. +He was seated beside his coffin. Priests in long black robes stood +around him, chanting in sepulchral voices the service of the dead. It is +an ordeal under which the stoutest-hearted and most resolute have been +found to sink. After enduring it for twenty-four hours he was led out to +execution. He came forth calm and undismayed; holding a crucifix in his +hand, he recited in a loud, clear voice a solemn prayer in verse, which +he had composed amidst the horrors of the Chapel. The following is an +imperfect rendering of a poem which thrilled the hearts of all who heard +it:-- + + "God of unbounded love and power eternal, + To Thee I turn in darkness and despair! + Stretch forth Thine arm, and from the brow infernal + Of Calumny the veil of Justice tear; + And from the forehead of my honest fame + Pluck the world's brand of infamy and shame! + + "O King of kings!--my fathers' God!--who only + Art strong to save, by whom is all controlled, + Who givest the sea its waves, the dark and lonely + Abyss of heaven its light, the North its cold, + The air its currents, the warm sun its beams, + Life to the flowers, and motion to the streams! + + "All things obey Thee, dying or reviving + As thou commandest; all, apart from Thee, + From Thee alone their life and power deriving, + Sink and are lost in vast eternity! + Yet doth the void obey Thee; since from naught + This marvellous being by Thy hand was wrought. + + "O merciful God! I cannot shun Thy presence, + For through its veil of flesh Thy piercing eye + Looketh upon my spirit's unsoiled essence, + As through the pure transparence of the sky; + Let not the oppressor clap his bloody hands, + As o'er my prostrate innocence he stands! + + "But if, alas, it seemeth good to Thee + That I should perish as the guilty dies, + And that in death my foes should gaze on me + With hateful malice and exulting eyes, + Speak Thou the word, and bid them shed my blood, + Fully in me Thy will be done, O God!" + +On arriving at the fatal spot, he sat down as ordered, on a bench, with +his back to the soldiers. The multitude recollected that in some +affecting lines, written by the conspirator in prison, he had said that +it would be useless to seek to kill him by shooting his body,--that his +heart must be pierced ere it would cease its throbbings. At the last +moment, just as the soldiers were about to fire, he rose up and gazed for +an instant around and above him on the beautiful capital of his native +land and its sail-flecked bay, on the dense crowds about him, the blue +mountains in the distance, and the sky glorious with summer sunshine. +"Adios, mundo!" (Farewell, world!) he said calmly, and sat down. The +word was given, and five balls entered his body. Then it was that, +amidst the groans and murmurs of the horror-stricken spectators, he rose +up once more, and turned his head to the shuddering soldiers, his face +wearing an expression of superhuman courage. "Will no one pity me?" he +said, laying his hand over his heart. "Here, fire here!" While he yet +spake, two balls entered his heart, and he fell dead. + +Thus perished the hero poet of Cuba. He has not fallen in vain. His +genius and his heroic death will doubtless be regarded by his race as +precious legacies. To the great names of L'Ouverture and Petion the +colored man can now add that of Juan Placido. + + + + + +PERSONAL SKETCHES AND TRIBUTES + + + + +THE FUNERAL OF TORREY. + + Charles T. Torrey, an able young Congregational clergyman, died May + 9, 1846, in the state's prison of Maryland, for the offence of + aiding slaves to escape from bondage. His funeral in Boston, + attended by thousands, was a most impressive occasion. The + following is an extract from an article written for the _Essex + Transcript_:-- + +Some seven years ago, we saw Charles T. Torrey for the first time. His +wife was leaning on his arm,--young, loving, and beautiful; the heart +that saw them blessed them. Since that time, we have known him as a most +energetic and zealous advocate of the anti-slavery cause. He had fine +talents, improved by learning and observation, a clear, intensely active +intellect, and a heart full of sympathy and genial humanity. It was with +strange and bitter feelings that we bent over his coffin and looked upon +his still face. The pity which we had felt for him in his long +sufferings gave place to indignation against his murderers. Hateful +beyond the power of expression seemed the tyranny which had murdered him +with the slow torture of the dungeon. May God forgive us, if for the +moment we felt like grasping His dread prerogative of vengeance. As we +passed out of the hall, a friend grasped our hand hard, his eye flashing +through its tears, with a stern reflection of our own emotions, while he +whispered through his pressed lips: "It is enough to turn every anti- +slavery heart into steel." Our blood boiled; we longed to see the wicked +apologists of slavery--the blasphemous defenders of it in Church and +State--led up to the coffin of our murdered brother, and there made to +feel that their hands had aided in riveting the chain upon those still +limbs, and in shutting out from those cold lips the free breath of +heaven. + +A long procession followed his remains to their resting-place at Mount +Auburn. A monument to his memory will be raised in that cemetery, in the +midst of the green beauty of the scenery which he loved in life, and side +by side with the honored dead of Massachusetts. Thither let the friends +of humanity go to gather fresh strength from the memory of the martyr. +There let the slaveholder stand, and as he reads the record of the +enduring marble commune with his own heart, and feel that sorrow which +worketh repentance. + +The young, the beautiful, the brave!--he is safe now from the malice of +his enemies. Nothing can harm him more. His work for the poor and +helpless was well and nobly done. In the wild woods of Canada, around +many a happy fireside and holy family altar, his name is on the lips of +God's poor. He put his soul in their souls' stead; he gave his life for +those who had no claim on his love save that of human brotherhood. How +poor, how pitiful and paltry, seem our labors! How small and mean our +trials and sacrifices! May the spirit of the dead be with us, and infuse +into our hearts something of his own deep sympathy, his hatred of +injustice, his strong faith and heroic endurance. May that spirit be +gladdened in its present sphere by the increased zeal and faithfulness of +the friends he has left behind. + + + + +EDWARD EVERETT. + +A letter to Robert C. Waterston. + +Amesbury, 27th 1st Month, 1865. + +I acknowledge through thee the invitation of the standing committee of +the Massachusetts Historical Society to be present at a special meeting +of the Society for the purpose of paying a tribute to the memory of our +late illustrious associate, Edward Everett. + +It is a matter of deep regret to me that the state of my health will not +permit me to be with you on an occasion of so much interest. + +It is most fitting that the members of the Historical Society of +Massachusetts should add their tribute to those which have been already +offered by all sects, parties, and associations to the name and fame of +their late associate. He was himself a maker of history, and part and +parcel of all the noble charities and humanizing influences of his State +and time. + +When the grave closed over him who added new lustre to the old and +honored name of Quincy, all eyes instinctively turned to Edward Everett +as the last of that venerated class of patriotic civilians who, outliving +all dissent and jealousy and party prejudice, held their reputation by +the secure tenure of the universal appreciation of its worth as a common +treasure of the republic. It is not for me to pronounce his eulogy. +Others, better qualified by their intimate acquaintance with him, have +done and will do justice to his learning, eloquence, varied culture, and +social virtues. My secluded country life has afforded me few +opportunities of personal intercourse with him, while my pronounced +radicalism on the great question which has divided popular feeling +rendered our political paths widely divergent. Both of us early saw the +danger which threatened the country. In the language of the prophet, we +"saw the sword coming upon the land," but while he believed in the +possibility of averting it by concession and compromise, I, on the +contrary, as firmly believed that such a course could only strengthen and +confirm what I regarded as a gigantic conspiracy against the rights and +liberties, the union and the life, of the nation. + +Recent events have certainly not tended to change this belief on my part; +but in looking over the past, while I see little or nothing to retract in +the matter of opinion, I am saddened by the reflection that through the +very intensity of my convictions I may have done injustice to the motives +of those with whom I differed. As respects Edward Everett, it seems to +me that only within the last four years I have truly known him. + +In that brief period, crowded as it is with a whole life-work of +consecration to the union, freedom, and glory of his country, he not only +commanded respect and reverence, but concentrated upon himself in a most +remarkable degree the love of all loyal and generous hearts. We have +seen, in these years of trial, very great sacrifices offered upon the +altar of patriotism,--wealth, ease, home, love, life itself. But Edward +Everett did more than this: he laid on that altar not only his time, +talents, and culture, but his pride of opinion, his long-cherished views +of policy, his personal and political predilections and prejudices, his +constitutional fastidiousness of conservatism, and the carefully +elaborated symmetry of his public reputation. With a rare and noble +magnanimity, he met, without hesitation, the demand of the great +occasion. Breaking away from all the besetments of custom and +association, he forgot the things that are behind, and, with an eye +single to present duty, pressed forward towards the mark of the high +calling of Divine Providence in the events of our time. All honor to +him! If we mourn that he is now beyond the reach of our poor human +praise, let us reverently trust that he has received that higher plaudit: +"Well done, thou good and faithful servant!" + +When I last met him, as my colleague in the Electoral College of +Massachusetts, his look of health and vigor seemed to promise us many +years of his wisdom and usefulness. On greeting him I felt impelled to +express my admiration and grateful appreciation of his patriotic labors; +and I shall never forget how readily and gracefully he turned attention +from himself to the great cause in which we had a common interest, and +expressed his thankfulness that he had still a country to serve. + +To keep green the memory of such a man is at once a privilege and a duty. +That stainless life of seventy years is a priceless legacy. His hands +were pure. The shadow of suspicion never fell on him. If he erred in +his opinions (and that he did so he had the Christian grace and courage +to own), no selfish interest weighed in the scale of his judgment against +truth. + +As our thoughts follow him to his last resting-place, we are sadly +reminded of his own touching lines, written many years ago at Florence. +The name he has left behind is none the less "pure" that instead of being +"humble," as he then anticipated, it is on the lips of grateful millions, +and written ineffaceable on the record of his country's trial and +triumph:-- + + "Yet not for me when I shall fall asleep + Shall Santa Croce's lamps their vigils keep. + Beyond the main in Auburn's quiet shade, + With those I loved and love my couch be made; + Spring's pendant branches o'er the hillock wave, + And morning's dewdrops glisten on my grave, + While Heaven's great arch shall rise above my bed, + When Santa Croce's crumbles on her dead,-- + Unknown to erring or to suffering fame, + So may I leave a pure though humble name." + +Congratulating the Society on the prospect of the speedy consummation of +the great objects of our associate's labors,--the peace and permanent +union of our country,-- + +I am very truly thy friend. + + + + +LEWIS TAPPAN. (1873.) + +One after another, those foremost in the antislavery conflict of the last +half century are rapidly passing away. The grave has just closed over +all that was mortal of Salmon P. Chase, the kingliest of men, a statesman +second to no other in our history, too great and pure for the Presidency, +yet leaving behind him a record which any incumbent of that station might +envy,--and now the telegraph brings us the tidings of the death of Lewis +Tappan, of Brooklyn, so long and so honorably identified with the anti- +slavery cause, and with every philanthropic and Christian enterprise. He +was a native of Massachusetts, born at Northampton in 1788, of Puritan +lineage,--one of a family remarkable for integrity, decision of +character, and intellectual ability. At the very outset, in company with +his brother Arthur, he devoted his time, talents, wealth, and social +position to the righteous but unpopular cause of Emancipation, and +became, in consequence, a mark for the persecution which followed such +devotion. His business was crippled, his name cast out as evil, his +dwelling sacked, and his furniture dragged into the street and burned. +Yet he never, in the darkest hour, faltered or hesitated for a moment. +He knew he was right, and that the end would justify him; one of the +cheerfullest of men, he was strong where others were weak, hopeful where +others despaired. He was wise in counsel, and prompt in action; like +Tennyson's Sir Galahad, + + "His strength was as the strength of ten, + Because his heart was pure." + +I met him for the first time forty years ago, at the convention which +formed the American Anti-Slavery Society, where I chanced to sit by him +as one of the secretaries. Myself young and inexperienced, I remember +how profoundly I was impressed by his cool self-possession, clearness of +perception, and wonderful executive ability. Had he devoted himself to +party politics with half the zeal which he manifested in behalf of those +who had no votes to give and no honors to bestow, he could have reached +the highest offices in the land. He chose his course, knowing all that +he renounced, and he chose it wisely. He never, at least, regretted it. + +And now, at the ripe age of eighty-five years, the brave old man has +passed onward to the higher life, having outlived here all hatred, abuse, +and misrepresentation, having seen the great work of Emancipation +completed, and white men and black men equal before the law. I saw him +for the last time three years ago, when he was preparing his valuable +biography of his beloved brother Arthur. Age had begun to tell upon his +constitution, but his intellectual force was not abated. The old, +pleasant laugh and playful humor remained. He looked forward to the +close of life hopefully, even cheerfully, as he called to mind the dear +friends who had passed on before him, to await his coming. + +Of the sixty-three signers of the Anti-Slavery Declaration at the +Philadelphia Convention in 1833, probably not more than eight or ten are +now living. + + "As clouds that rake the mountain summits, + As waves that know no guiding hand, + So swift has brother followed brother + From sunshine to the sunless land." + +Yet it is a noteworthy fact that the oldest member of that convention, +David Thurston, D. D., of Maine, lived to see the slaves emancipated, and +to mingle his voice of thanksgiving with the bells that rang in the day +of universal freedom. + + + + +BAYARD TAYLOR + +Read at the memorial meeting in Tremont Temple, Boston, January 10, 1879. + +I am not able to attend the memorial meeting in Tremont Temple on the +10th instant, but my heart responds to any testimonial appreciative of +the intellectual achievements and the noble and manly life of Bayard +Taylor. More than thirty years have intervened between my first meeting +him in the fresh bloom of his youth and hope and honorable ambition, and +my last parting with him under the elms of Boston Common, after our visit +to Richard H. Dana, on the occasion of the ninetieth anniversary of that +honored father of American poetry, still living to lament the death of +his younger disciple and friend. How much he has accomplished in these +years! The most industrious of men, slowly, patiently, under many +disadvantages, he built up his splendid reputation. Traveller, editor, +novelist, translator, diplomatist, and through all and above all poet, +what he was he owed wholly to himself. His native honesty was satisfied +with no half tasks. He finished as he went, and always said and did his +best. + +It is perhaps too early to assign him his place in American literature. +His picturesque books of travel, his Oriental lyrics, his Pennsylvanian +idyls, his Centennial ode, the pastoral beauty and Christian sweetness of +Lars, and the high argument and rhythmic marvel of Deukalion are sureties +of the permanence of his reputation. But at this moment my thoughts +dwell rather upon the man than the author. The calamity of his death, +felt in both hemispheres, is to me and to all who intimately knew and +loved him a heavy personal loss. Under the shadow of this bereavement, +in the inner circle of mourning, we sorrow most of all that we shall see +his face no more, and long for "the touch of a vanished hand, and the +sound of a voice that is still." + + + + +WILLIAM ELLERY CHANNING + +Read at the dedication of the Channing Memorial Church at Newport, R. I. + +DANVERS, MASS., 3d Mo., 13, 1880. + +I scarcely need say that I yield to no one in love and reverence for the +great and good man whose memory, outliving all prejudices of creed, sect, +and party, is the common legacy of Christendom. As the years go on, the +value of that legacy will be more and more felt; not so much, perhaps, in +doctrine as in spirit, in those utterances of a devout soul which are +above and beyond the affirmation or negation of dogma. + +His ethical severity and Christian tenderness; his hatred of wrong and +oppression, with love and pity for the wrong-doer; his noble pleas for +self-culture, temperance, peace, and purity; and above all, his precept +and example of unquestioning obedience to duty and the voice of God in +his soul, can never become obsolete. It is very fitting that his memory +should be especially cherished with that of Hopkins and Berkeley in the +beautiful island to which the common residence of those worthies has lent +additional charms and interest. + + + + +DEATH OF PRESIDENT GARFIELD. + +A letter written to W. H. B. Currier, of Amesbury, Mass. + +DANVERS, MASS., 9th Mo., 24, 1881. + +I regret that it is not in my power to join the citizens of Amesbury and +Salisbury in the memorial services on the occasion of the death of our +lamented President. But in heart and sympathy I am with you. I share +the great sorrow which overshadows the land; I fully appreciate the +irretrievable loss. But it seems to me that the occasion is one for +thankfulness as well as grief. + +Through all the stages of the solemn tragedy which has just closed with +the death of our noblest and best, I have felt that the Divine Providence +was overruling the mighty affliction,--that the patient sufferer at +Washington was drawing with cords of sympathy all sections and parties +nearer to each other. And now, when South and North, Democrat and +Republican, Radical and Conservative, lift their voices in one unbroken +accord of lamentation; when I see how, in spite of the greed of gain, the +lust of office, the strifes and narrowness of party politics, the great +heart of the nation proves sound and loyal, I feel a new hope for the +republic, I have a firmer faith in its stability. It is said that no man +liveth and no man dieth to himself; and the pure and noble life of +Garfield, and his slow, long martyrdom, so bravely borne in view of all, +are, I believe, bearing for us as a people "the peaceable fruits of +righteousness." We are stronger, wiser, better, for them. + +With him it is well. His mission fulfilled, he goes to his grave by the +Lakeside honored and lamented as man never was before. The whole world +mourns him. There is no speech nor language where the voice of his +praise is not heard. About his grave gather, with heads uncovered, the +vast brotherhood of man. + +And with us it is well, also. We are nearer a united people than ever +before. We are at peace with all; our future is full of promise; our +industrial and financial condition is hopeful. God grant that, while our +material interests prosper, the moral and spiritual influence of the +occasion may be permanently felt; that the solemn sacrament of Sorrow, +whereof we have been made partakers, may be blest to the promotion of the +righteousness which exalteth a nation. + + + + +LYDIA MARIA CHILD. + + In 1882 a collection of the Letters of Lydia Maria Child was + published, for which I wrote the following sketch, as an + introduction:-- + +In presenting to the public this memorial volume, its compilers deemed +that a brief biographical introduction was necessary; and as a labor of +love I have not been able to refuse their request to prepare it. + +Lydia Maria Francis was born in Medford, Massachusetts, February 11, +1802. Her father, Convers Francis, was a worthy and substantial citizen +of that town. Her brother, Convers Francis, afterwards theological +professor in Harvard College, was some years older than herself, and +assisted her in her early home studies, though, with the perversity of an +elder brother, he sometimes mystified her in answering her questions. +Once, when she wished to know what was meant by Milton's "raven down of +darkness," which was made to smile when smoothed, he explained that it +was only the fur of a black cat, which sparkled when stroked! Later in +life this brother wrote of her, "She has been a dear, good sister to me +would that I had been half as good a brother to her." Her earliest +teacher was an aged spinster, known in the village as "Marm Betty," +painfully shy, and with many oddities of person and manner, the never- +forgotten calamity of whose life was that Governor Brooks once saw her +drinking out of the nose of her tea-kettle. Her school was in her +bedroom, always untidy, and she was a constant chewer of tobacco but the +children were fond of her, and Maria and her father always carried her a +good Sunday dinner. Thomas W. Higginson, in _Eminent Women of the Age_, +mentions in this connection that, according to an established custom, on +the night before Thanksgiving "all the humble friends of the Francis +household--Marm Betty, the washerwoman, wood-sawyer, and journeymen, some +twenty or thirty in all--were summoned to a preliminary entertainment. +They there partook of an immense chicken pie, pumpkin pie made in milk- +pans, and heaps of doughnuts. They feasted in the large, old-fashioned +kitchen, and went away loaded with crackers and bread and pies, not +forgetting 'turnovers' for the children. Such plain application of the +doctrine that it is more blessed to give than receive may have done more +to mould the character of Lydia Maria Child of maturer years than all the +faithful labors of good Dr. Osgood, to whom she and her brother used to +repeat the Assembly's catechism once a month." + +Her education was limited to the public schools, with the exception of +one year at a private seminary in her native town. From a note by her +brother, Dr. Francis, we learn that when twelve years of age she went to +Norridgewock, Maine, where her married sister resided. At Dr. Brown's, +in Skowhegan, she first read _Waverley_. She was greatly excited, and +exclaimed, as she laid down the book, "Why cannot I write a novel?" +She remained in Norridgewock and vicinity for several years, and on her +return to Massachusetts took up her abode with her brother at Watertown. +He encouraged her literary tastes, and it was in his study that she +commenced her first story, _Hobomok_, which she published in the twenty- +first year of her age. The success it met with induced her to give to +the public, soon after, _The Rebels: a Tale of the Revolution_, which was +at once received into popular favor, and ran rapidly through several +editions. Then followed in close succession _The Mother's Book_, running +through eight American editions, twelve English, and one German, _The +Girl's Book_, the _History of Women_, and the _Frugal Housewife_, of +which thirty-five editions were published. Her _Juvenile Miscellany_ was +commenced in 1826. + +It is not too much to say that half a century ago she was the most +popular literary woman in the United States. She had published +historical novels of unquestioned power of description and +characterization, and was widely and favorably known as the editor of the +_Juvenile Miscellany_, which was probably the first periodical in the +English tongue devoted exclusively to children, and to which she was by +far the largest contributor. Some of the tales and poems from her pen +were extensively copied and greatly admired. It was at this period that +the _North American Review_, the highest literary authority of the +country, said of her, "We are not sure that any woman of our country +could outrank Mrs. Child. This lady has been long before the public as +an author with much success. And she well deserves it, for in all her +works nothing can be found which does not commend itself, by its tone of +healthy morality and good sense. Few female writers, if any, have done +more or better things for our literature in the lighter or graver +departments." + +Comparatively young, she had placed herself in the front rank of American +authorship. Her books and her magazine had a large circulation, and were +affording her a comfortable income, at a time when the rewards of +authorship were uncertain and at the best scanty. + +In 1828 she married David Lee Child, Esq., a young and able lawyer, and +took up her residence in Boston. In 1831-32 both became deeply +interested in the subject of slavery, through the writings and personal +influence of William Lloyd Garrison. Her husband, a member of the +Massachusetts legislature and editor of the _Massachusetts Journal_, had, +at an earlier date, denounced the project of the dismemberment of Mexico +for the purpose of strengthening and extending American slavery. He was +one of the earliest members of the New England Anti-Slavery Society, and +his outspoken hostility to the peculiar institution greatly and +unfavorably affected his interests as a lawyer. In 1832 he addressed a +series of able letters on slavery and the slave-trade to Edward S. Abdy, +a prominent English philanthropist. In 1836 he published in Philadelphia +ten strongly written articles on the same subject. He visited England +and France in 1837, and while in Paris addressed an elaborate memoir to +the Societe pour l'Abolition d'Esclavage, and a paper on the same subject +to the editor of the _Eclectic Review_, in London. To his facts and +arguments John Quincy Adams was much indebted in the speeches which he +delivered in Congress on the Texas question. + +In 1833 the American Anti-Slavery Society was formed by a convention in +Philadelphia. Its numbers were small, and it was everywhere spoken +against. It was at this time that Lydia Maria Child startled the country +by the publication of her noble _Appeal in Behalf of that Class of +Americans called Africans_. It is quite impossible for any one of the +present generation to imagine the popular surprise and indignation which +the book called forth, or how entirely its author cut herself off from +the favor and sympathy of a large number of those who had previously +delighted to do her honor. Social and literary circles, which had been +proud of her presence, closed their doors against her. The sale of her +books, the subscriptions to her magazine, fell off to a ruinous extent. +She knew all she was hazarding, and made the great sacrifice, prepared +for all the consequences which followed. In the preface to her book she +says, "I am fully aware of the unpopularity of the task I have +undertaken; but though I expect ridicule and censure, I do not fear them. +A few years hence, the opinion of the world will be a matter in which I +have not even the most transient interest; but this book will be abroad +on its mission of humanity long after the hand that wrote it is mingling +with the dust. Should it be the means of advancing, even one single +hour, the inevitable progress of truth and justice, I would not exchange +the consciousness for all Rothschild's wealth or Sir Walter's fame." + +Thenceforth her life was a battle; a constant rowing hard against the +stream of popular prejudice and hatred. And through it all--pecuniary +privation, loss of friends and position, the painfulness of being +suddenly thrust from "the still air of delightful studies" into the +bitterest and sternest controversy of the age--she bore herself with +patience, fortitude, and unshaken reliance upon the justice and ultimate +triumph of the cause she had espoused. Her pen was never idle. Wherever +there was a brave word to be spoken, her voice was heard, and never +without effect. It is not exaggeration to say that no man or woman at +that period rendered more substantial service to the cause of freedom, or +made such a "great renunciation" in doing it. + +A practical philanthropist, she had the courage of her convictions, and +from the first was no mere closet moralist or sentimental bewailer of the +woes of humanity. She was the Samaritan stooping over the wounded Jew. +She calmly and unflinchingly took her place by the side, of the despised +slave and free man of color, and in word and act protested against the +cruel prejudice which shut out its victims from the rights and privileges +of American citizens. Her philanthropy had no taint of fanaticism; +throughout the long struggle, in which she was a prominent actor, she +kept her fine sense of humor, good taste, and sensibility to the +beautiful in art and nature. + + The opposition she met with from those who had shared her confidence + and friendship was of course keenly felt, but her kindly and genial + disposition remained unsoured. She rarely spoke of her personal + trials, and never posed as a martyr. The nearest approach to + anything like complaint is in the following lines, the date of which + I have not been able to ascertain:-- + + THE WORLD THAT I AM PASSING THROUGH. + + Few in the days of early youth + Trusted like me in love and truth. + I've learned sad lessons from the years, + But slowly, and with many tears; + For God made me to kindly view + The world that I am passing through. + + Though kindness and forbearance long + Must meet ingratitude and wrong, + I still would bless my fellow-men, + And trust them though deceived again. + God help me still to kindly view + The world that I am passing through. + + From all that fate has brought to me + I strive to learn humility, + And trust in Him who rules above, + Whose universal law is love. + Thus only can I kindly view + The world that I am passing through. + + When I approach the setting sun, + And feel my journey well-nigh done, + May Earth be veiled in genial light, + And her last smile to me seem bright. + Help me till then to kindly view + The world that I am passing through. + + And all who tempt a trusting heart + From faith and hope to drift apart, + May they themselves be spared the pain + Of losing power to trust again. + God help us all to kindly view + The world that we are passing through. + +While faithful to the great duty which she felt was laid upon her in an +especial manner, she was by no means a reformer of one idea, but her +interest was manifested in every question affecting the welfare of +humanity. Peace, temperance, education, prison reform, and equality of +civil rights, irrespective of sex, engaged her attention. Under all the +disadvantages of her estrangement from popular favor, her charming Greek +romance of _Philothea_ and her _Lives of Madame Roland_ and the _Baroness +de Stael_ proved that her literary ability had lost nothing of its +strength, and that the hand which penned such terrible rebukes had still +kept its delicate touch, and gracefully yielded to the inspiration of +fancy and art. While engaged with her husband in the editorial +supervision of the _Anti-Slavery Standard_, she wrote her admirable +_Letters from New York_; humorous, eloquent, and picturesque, but still +humanitarian in tone, which extorted the praise of even a pro-slavery +community. Her great work, in three octavo volumes, _The Progress of +Religious Ideas_, belongs, in part, to that period. It is an attempt to +represent in a candid, unprejudiced manner the rise and progress of the +great religions of the world, and their ethical relations to each other. +She availed herself of, and carefully studied, the authorities at that +time accessible, and the result is creditable to her scholarship, +industry, and conscientiousness. If, in her desire to do justice to the +religions of Buddha and Mohammed, in which she has been followed by +Maurice, Max Muller, and Dean Stanley, she seems at times to dwell upon +the best and overlook the darker features of those systems, her +concluding reflections should vindicate her from the charge of +undervaluing the Christian faith, or of lack of reverent appreciation of +its founder. In the closing chapter of her work, in which the large +charity and broad sympathies of her nature are manifest, she thus turns +with words of love, warm from the heart, to Him whose Sermon on the Mount +includes most that is good and true and vital in the religions and +philosophies of the world:-- + +"It was reserved for Him to heal the brokenhearted, to preach a gospel to +the poor, to say, 'Her sins, which are many, are forgiven, for she loved +much.' Nearly two thousand years have passed away since these words of +love and pity were uttered, yet when I read them my eyes fill with tears. +I thank Thee, O Heavenly Father, for all the messengers thou hast sent to +man; but, above all, I thank Thee for Him, thy beloved Son! Pure lily +blossom of the centuries, taking root in the lowliest depths, and +receiving the light and warmth of heaven in its golden heart! All that +the pious have felt, all that poets have said, all that artists have +done, with their manifold forms of beauty, to represent the ministry of +Jesus, are but feeble expressions of the great debt we owe Him who is +even now curing the lame, restoring sight to the blind, and raising the +dead in that spiritual sense wherein all miracle is true." + +During her stay in New York, as editor of the _Anti-Slavery Standard_, +she found a pleasant home at the residence of the genial philanthropist, +Isaac T. Hopper, whose remarkable life she afterwards wrote. Her +portrayal of this extraordinary man, so brave, so humorous, so tender and +faithful to his convictions of duty, is one of the most readable pieces +of biography in English literature. Thomas Wentworth Higginson, in a +discriminating paper published in 1869, speaks of her eight years' +sojourn in New York as the most interesting and satisfactory period of +her whole life. "She was placed where her sympathetic nature found +abundant outlet and occupation. Dwelling in a house where +disinterestedness and noble labor were as daily breath, she had great +opportunities. There was no mere alms-giving; but sin and sorrow must +be brought home to the fireside and the heart; the fugitive slave, the +drunkard, the outcast woman, must be the chosen guests of the abode,-- +must be taken, and held, and loved into reformation or hope." + +It would be a very imperfect representation of Maria Child which regarded +her only from a literary point of view. She was wise in counsel; and men +like Charles Sumner, Henry Wilson, Salmon P. Chase, and Governor Andrew +availed themselves of her foresight and sound judgment of men and +measures. Her pen was busy with correspondence, and whenever a true man +or a good cause needed encouragement, she was prompt to give it. Her +donations for benevolent causes and beneficent reforms were constant and +liberal; and only those who knew her intimately could understand the +cheerful and unintermitted self-denial which alone enabled her to make +them. She did her work as far as possible out of sight, without noise or +pretension. Her time, talents, and money were held not as her own, but a +trust from the Eternal Father for the benefit of His suffering children. +Her plain, cheap dress was glorified by the generous motive for which she +wore it. Whether in the crowded city among the sin-sick and starving, or +among the poor and afflicted in the neighborhood of her country home, no +story of suffering and need, capable of alleviation, ever reached her +without immediate sympathy and corresponding action. Lowell, one of her +warmest admirers, in his _Fable for Critics_ has beautifully portrayed +her abounding benevolence:-- + + "There comes Philothea, her face all aglow: + She has just been dividing some poor creature's woe, + And can't tell which pleases her most, to relieve + His want, or his story to hear and believe. + No doubt against many deep griefs she prevails, + For her ear is the refuge of destitute tales; + She knows well that silence is sorrow's best food, + And that talking draws off from the heart its black blood." + + "The pole, science tells us, the magnet controls, + But she is a magnet to emigrant Poles, + And folks with a mission that nobody knows + Throng thickly about her as bees round a rose. + She can fill up the carets in such, make their scope + Converge to some focus of rational hope, + And, with sympathies fresh as the morning, their gall + Can transmute into honey,--but this is not all; + Not only for those she has solace; O, say, + Vice's desperate nursling adrift in Broadway, + Who clingest, with all that is left of thee human, + To the last slender spar from the wreck of the woman, + Hast thou not found one shore where those tired, drooping feet + Could reach firm mother-earth, one full heart on whose beat + The soothed head in silence reposing could hear + The chimes of far childhood throb back on the ear?" + + "Ah, there's many a beam from the fountain of day + That, to reach us unclouded, must pass, on its way, + Through the soul of a woman, and hers is wide ope + To the influence of Heaven as the blue eyes of Hope; + Yes, a great heart is hers, one that dares to go in + To the prison, the slave-hut, the alleys of sin, + And to bring into each, or to find there, some line + Of the never completely out-trampled divine; + If her heart at high floods swamps her brain now and then, + 'T is but richer for that when the tide ebbs again, + As, after old Nile has subsided, his plain + Overflows with a second broad deluge of grain; + What a wealth would it bring to the narrow and sour, + Could they be as a Child but for one little hour!" + +After leaving New York, her husband and herself took up their residence +in the rural town of Wayland, Mass. Their house, plain and +unpretentious, had a wide and pleasant outlook; a flower garden, +carefully tended by her own hands, in front, and on the side a fruit +orchard and vegetable garden, under the special care of her husband. The +house was always neat, with some appearance of unostentatious decoration, +evincing at once the artistic taste of the hostess and the conscientious +economy which forbade its indulgence to any great extent. Her home was +somewhat apart from the lines of rapid travel, and her hospitality was in +a great measure confined to old and intimate friends, while her visits to +the city were brief and infrequent. A friend of hers, who had ample +opportunities for a full knowledge of her home-life, says, "The domestic +happiness of Mr. and Mrs. Child seemed to me perfect. Their sympathies, +their admiration of all things good, and their hearty hatred of all +things mean and evil were in entire unison. Mr. Child shared his wife's +enthusiasms, and was very proud of her. Their affection, never paraded, +was always manifest. After Mr. Child's death, Mrs. Child, in speaking of +the future life, said, 'I believe it would be of small value to me if I +were not united to him.'" + +In this connection I cannot forbear to give an extract from some +reminiscences of her husband, which she left among her papers, which, +better than any words of mine, will convey an idea of their simple and +beautiful home-life:-- + +"In 1852 we made a humble home in Wayland, Mass., where we spent twenty- +two pleasant years entirely alone, without any domestic, mutually serving +each other, and dependent upon each other for intellectual companionship. +I always depended on his richly stored mind, which was able and ready to +furnish needed information on any subject. He was my walking dictionary +of many languages, my Universal Encyclopaedia. + +"In his old age he was as affectionate and devoted as when the lover of +my youth; nay, he manifested even more tenderness. He was often +singing,-- + + "'There's nothing half so sweet in life + As Love's old dream.' + +"Very often, when he passed by me, he would lay his hand softly on my +head and murmur, 'Carum caput.' . . . But what I remember with the +most tender gratitude is his uniform patience and forbearance with my +faults. . . . He never would see anything but the bright side of my +character. He always insisted upon thinking that whatever I said was the +wisest and the wittiest, and that whatever I did was the best. The +simplest little jeu d'esprit of mine seemed to him wonderfully witty. +Once, when he said, 'I wish for your sake, dear, I were as rich as +Croesus,' I answered, 'You are Croesus, for you are king of Lydia.' How +often he used to quote that! + +"His mind was unclouded to the last. He had a passion for philology, and +only eight hours before he passed away he was searching out the +derivation of a word." + +Her well-stored mind and fine conversational gifts made her company +always desirable. No one who listened to her can forget the earnest +eloquence with which she used to dwell upon the evidences, from history, +tradition, and experience, of the superhuman and supernatural; or with +what eager interest she detected in the mysteries of the old religions of +the world the germs of a purer faith and a holier hope. She loved to +listen, as in St. Pierre's symposium of _The Coffee-House of Surat_, +to the confessions of faith of all sects and schools of philosophy, +Christian and pagan, and gather from them the consoling truth that our +Father has nowhere left his children without some witness of Himself. +She loved the old mystics, and lingered with curious interest and +sympathy over the writings of Bohme, Swedenborg, Molinos, and Woolman. +Yet this marked speculative tendency seemed not in the slightest degree +to affect her practical activities. Her mysticism and realism ran in +close parallel lines without interfering with each other. + +With strong rationalistic tendencies from education and conviction, she +found herself in spiritual accord with the pious introversion of Thomas +a Kempis and Madame Guion. She was fond of Christmas Eve stories, of +warnings, signs, and spiritual intimations, her half belief in which +sometimes seemed like credulity to her auditors. James Russell Lowell, +in his tender tribute to her, playfully alludes to this characteristic:-- + + "She has such a musical taste that she 'll go + Any distance to hear one who draws a long bow. + She will swallow a wonder by mere might and main." + +In 1859 the descent of John Brown upon Harper's Ferry, and his capture, +trial, and death, startled the nation. When the news reached her that +the misguided but noble old man lay desperately wounded in prison, alone +and unfriended, she wrote him a letter, under cover of one to Governor +Wise, asking permission to go and nurse and care for him. The expected +arrival of Captain Brown's wife made her generous offer unnecessary. The +prisoner wrote her, thanking her, and asking her to help his family, a +request with which she faithfully complied. With his letter came one +from Governor Wise, in courteous reproval of her sympathy for John Brown. +To this she responded in an able and effective manner. Her reply found +its way from Virginia to the New York Tribune, and soon after Mrs. Mason, +of King George's County, wife of Senator Mason, the author of the +infamous Fugitive Slave Law, wrote her a vehement letter, commencing with +threats of future damnation, and ending with assuring her that "no +Southerner, after reading her letter to Governor Wise, ought to read a +line of her composition, or touch a magazine which bore her name in its +list of contributors." To this she wrote a calm, dignified reply, +declining to dwell on the fierce invectives of her assailant, and wishing +her well here and hereafter. She would not debate the specific merits or +demerits of a man whose body was in charge of the courts, and whose +reputation was sure to be in charge of posterity. "Men," she continues, +"are of small consequence in comparison with principles, and the +principle for which John Brown died is the question at issue between us." +These letters were soon published in pamphlet form, and had the immense +circulation of 300,000 copies. + +In 1867 she published _A Romance of the Republic_, a story of the days of +slavery; powerful in its delineation of some of the saddest as well as +the most dramatic conditions of master and slave in the Southern States. +Her husband, who had been long an invalid, died in 1874. After his death +her home, in winter especially, became a lonely one, and in 1877 she +began to spend the cold months in Boston. + +Her last publication was in 1878, when her _Aspirations of the World_, a +book of selections, on moral and religious subjects, from the literature +of all nations and times, was given to the public. The introduction, +occupying fifty pages, shows, at threescore and ten, her mental vigor +unabated, and is remarkable for its wise, philosophic tone and felicity +of diction. It has the broad liberality of her more elaborate work on +the same subject, and in the mellow light of life's sunset her words seem +touched with a tender pathos and beauty. "All we poor mortals," she +says, "are groping our way through paths that are dim with shadows; and +we are all striving, with steps more or less stumbling, to follow some +guiding star. As we travel on, beloved companions of our pilgrimage +vanish from our sight, we know not whither; and our bereaved hearts utter +cries of supplication for more light. We know not where Hermes +Trismegistus lived, or who he was; but his voice sounds plaintively +human, coming up from the depths of the ages, calling out, 'Thou art God! +and thy man crieth these things unto Thee!' Thus closely allied in our +sorrows and limitations, in our aspirations and hopes, surely we ought +not to be separated in our sympathies. However various the names by +which we call the Heavenly Father, if they are set to music by brotherly +love, they can all be sung together." + +Her interest in the welfare of the emancipated class at the South and of +the ill-fated Indians of the West remained unabated, and she watched with +great satisfaction the experiment of the education of both classes in +General Armstrong's institution at Hampton, Va. She omitted no +opportunity of aiding the greatest social reform of the age, which aims +to make the civil and political rights of women equal to those of men. +Her sympathies, to the last, went out instinctively to the wronged and +weak. She used to excuse her vehemence in this respect by laughingly +quoting lines from a poem entitled _The Under Dog in the Fight_:-- + + "I know that the world, the great big world, + Will never a moment stop + To see which dog may be in the wrong, + But will shout for the dog on top. + + "But for me, I never shall pause to ask + Which dog may be in the right; + For my heart will beat, while it beats at all, + For the under dog in the fight." + +I am indebted to a gentleman who was at one time a resident of Wayland, +and who enjoyed her confidence and warm friendship, for the following +impressions of her life in that place:-- + +"On one of the last beautiful Indian summer afternoons, closing the past +year, I drove through Wayland, and was anew impressed with the charm of +our friend's simple existence there. The tender beauty of the fading +year seemed a reflection of her own gracious spirit; the lovely autumn of +her life, whose golden atmosphere the frosts of sorrow and advancing age +had only clarified and brightened. + +"My earliest recollection of Mrs. Child in Wayland is of a gentle face +leaning from the old stage window, smiling kindly down on the childish +figures beneath her; and from that moment her gracious motherly presence +has been closely associated with the charm of rural beauty in that +village, which until very lately has been quite apart from the line of +travel, and unspoiled by the rush and worry of our modern steam-car mode +of living. + +"Mrs. Child's life in the place made, indeed, an atmosphere of its own, a +benison of peace and good-will, which was a noticeable feature to all who +were acquainted with the social feeling of the little community, refined, +as it was too, by the elevating influence of its distinguished pastor, +Dr. Sears. Many are the acts of loving kindness and maternal care which +could be chronicled of her residence there, were we permitted to do so; +and numberless are the lives that have gathered their onward impulse from +her helping hand. But it was all a confidence which she hardly betrayed +to her inmost self, and I will not recall instances which might be her +grandest eulogy. Her monument is builded in the hearts which knew her +benefactions, and it will abide with 'the power that makes for +righteousness.' + +"One of the pleasantest elements of her life in Wayland was the high +regard she won from the people of the village, who, proud of her literary +attainment, valued yet more the noble womanhood of the friend who dwelt +so modestly among them. The grandeur of her exalted personal character +had, in part, eclipsed for them the qualities which made her fame with +the world outside. + +"The little house on the quiet by-road overlooked broad green meadows. +The pond behind it, where bloom the lilies whose spotless purity may well +symbolize her gentle spirit, is a sacred pool to her townsfolk. But +perhaps the most fitting similitude of her life in Wayland was the quiet +flow of the river, whose gentle curves make green her meadows, but whose +powerful energy, joining the floods from distant mountains, moves, with +resistless might, the busy shuttles of a hundred mills. She was too +truthful to affect to welcome unwarrantable invaders of her peace, but no +weary traveller on life's hard ways ever applied to her in vain. The +little garden plot before her door was a sacred enclosure, not to be +rudely intruded upon; but the flowers she tended with maternal care were +no selfish possession, for her own enjoyment only, and many are the lives +their sweetness has gladdened forever. So she lived among a singularly +peaceful and intelligent community as one of themselves, industrious, +wise, and happy; with a frugality whose motive of wider benevolence was +in itself a homily and a benediction." + +In my last interview with her, our conversation, as had often happened +before, turned upon the great theme of the future life. She spoke, as I +remember, calmly and not uncheerfully, but with the intense earnestness +and reverent curiosity of one who felt already the shadow of the unseen +world resting upon her. + +Her death was sudden and quite unexpected. For some months she had been +troubled with a rheumatic affection, but it was by no means regarded as +serious. A friend, who visited her a few days before her departure, +found her in a comfortable condition, apart from lameness. She talked of +the coming election with much interest, and of her plans for the winter. +On the morning of her death (October 20, 1880) she spoke of feeling +remarkably well. Before leaving her chamber she complained of severe +pain in the region of the heart. Help was called by her companion, but +only reached her to witness her quiet passing away. + +The funeral was, as befitted one like her, plain and simple. Many of her +old friends were present, and Wendell Phillips paid an affecting and +eloquent tribute to his old friend and anti-slavery coadjutor. He +referred to the time when she accepted, with serene self-sacrifice, the +obloquy which her _Appeal_ had brought upon her, and noted, as one of the +many ways in which popular hatred was manifested, the withdrawal from her +of the privileges of the Boston Athenaeum. Her pallbearers were elderly, +plain farmers in the neighborhood; and, led by the old white-haired +undertaker, the procession wound its way to the not distant burial- +ground, over the red and gold of fallen leaves, and tinder the half- +clouded October sky. A lover of all beautiful things, she was, as her +intimate friends knew, always delighted by the sight of rainbows, and +used to so arrange prismatic glasses as to throw the colors on the walls +of her room. Just after her body was consigned to the earth, a +magnificent rainbow spanned with its are of glory the eastern sky. + + The incident at her burial is alluded to in a sonnet written by + William P. Andrews:-- + + "Freedom! she knew thy summons, and obeyed + That clarion voice as yet scarce heard of men; + Gladly she joined thy red-cross service when + Honor and wealth must at thy feet be laid + Onward with faith undaunted, undismayed + By threat or scorn, she toiled with hand and brain + To make thy cause triumphant, till the chain + Lay broken, and for her the freedmen prayed. + Nor yet she faltered; in her tender care + She took us all; and wheresoe'er she went, + Blessings, and Faith, and Beauty followed there, + E'en to the end, where she lay down content; + And with the gold light of a life more fair, + Twin bows of promise o'er her grave were blest." + +The letters in this collection constitute but a small part of her large +correspondence. They have been gathered up and arranged by the hands of +dear relatives and friends as a fitting memorial of one who wrote from +the heart as well as the head, and who held her literary reputation +subordinate always to her philanthropic aim to lessen the sum of human +suffering, and to make the world better for her living. If they +sometimes show the heat and impatience of a zealous reformer, they may +well be pardoned in consideration of the circumstances under which they +were written, and of the natural indignation of a generous nature in view +of wrong and oppression. If she touched with no very reverent hand the +garment hem of dogmas, and held to the spirit of Scripture rather than +its letter, it must be remembered that she lived in a time when the Bible +was cited in defence of slavery, as it is now in Utah in support of +polygamy; and she may well be excused for some degree of impatience with +those who, in the tithing of mint and anise and cummin, neglected the +weightier matters of the law of justice and mercy. + +Of the men and women directly associated with the beloved subject of this +sketch, but few are now left to recall her single-hearted devotion to +apprehended duty, her unselfish generosity, her love of all beauty and +harmony, and her trustful reverence, free from pretence and cant. It is +not unlikely that the surviving sharers of her love and friendship may +feel the inadequateness of this brief memorial, for I close it with the +consciousness of having failed to fully delineate the picture which my +memory holds of a wise and brave, but tender and loving woman, of whom it +might well have been said, in the words of the old Hebrew text, "Many, +daughters have done virtuously, but thou excellest them all." + + + + +OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES + + On the occasion of the seventy-fifth birthday of Dr. Holmes _The + Critic of New York_ collected personal tributes from friends and + admirers of that author. My own contribution was as follows:-- + +Poet, essayist, novelist, humorist, scientist, ripe scholar, and wise +philosopher, if Dr. Holmes does not, at the present time, hold in popular +estimation the first place in American literature, his rare versatility +is the cause. In view of the inimitable prose writer, we forget the +poet; in our admiration of his melodious verse, we lose sight of _Elsie +Venner_ and _The Autocrat of the Breakfast Table_. We laugh over his wit +and humor, until, to use his own words, + + "We suspect the azure blossom that unfolds upon a shoot, + As if Wisdom's old potato could not flourish at its root;" + +and perhaps the next page melts us into tears by a pathos only equalled +by that of Sterne's sick Lieutenant. He is Montaigne and Bacon under one +hat. His varied qualities would suffice for the mental furnishing of +half a dozen literary specialists. + +To those who have enjoyed the privilege of his intimate acquaintance, the +man himself is more than the author. His genial nature, entire freedom +from jealousy or envy, quick tenderness, large charity, hatred of sham, +pretence, and unreality, and his reverent sense of the eternal and +permanent have secured for him something more and dearer than literary +renown,--the love of all who know him. I might say much more: I could +not say less. May his life be long in the land. + +Amesbury, Mass., 8th Month, 18, 1884. + + + + +LONGFELLOW + + Written to the chairman of the committee of arrangements for + unveiling the bust of Longfellow at Portland, Maine, on the poet's + birthday, February 27, 1885. + +I am sorry it is not in my power to accept the invitation of the +committee to be present at the unveiling of the bust of Longfellow on the +27th instant, or to write anything worthy of the occasion in metrical +form. + +The gift of the Westminster Abbey committee cannot fail to add another +strong tie of sympathy between two great English-speaking peoples. And +never was gift more fitly bestowed. The city of Portland--the poet's +birthplace, "beautiful for situation," looking from its hills on the +scenery he loved so well, Deering's Oaks, the many-islanded bay and far +inland mountains, delectable in sunset--needed this sculptured +representation of her illustrious son, and may well testify her joy and +gratitude at its reception, and repeat in so doing the words of the +Hebrew prophet: "O man, greatly beloved! thou shalt stand in thy place." + + + + +OLD NEWBURY. + + Letter to Samuel J. Spalding, D. D., on the occasion of the + celebration of the 250th anniversary of the settlement of Newbury. + +MY DEAR FRIEND,--I am sorry that I cannot hope to be with you on the +250th anniversary of the settlement of old Newbury. Although I can +hardly call myself a son of the ancient town, my grandmother, Sarah +Greenleaf, of blessed memory, was its daughter, and I may therefore claim +to be its grandson. Its genial and learned historian, Joshua Coffin, was +my first school-teacher, and all my life I have lived in sight of its +green hills and in hearing of its Sabbath bells. Its wealth of natural +beauty has not been left unsung by its own poets, Hannah Gould, Mrs. +Hopkins, George Lunt, and Edward A. Washburn, while Harriet Prescott +Spofford's Plum Island Sound is as sweet and musical as Tennyson's Brook. +Its history and legends are familiar to me. I seem to have known all its +old worthies, whose descendants have helped to people a continent, and +who have carried the name and memories of their birthplace to the Mexican +gulf and across the Rocky Mountains to the shores of the Pacific. They +were the best and selectest of Puritanism, brave, honest, God-fearing men +and women; and if their creed in the lapse of time has lost something of +its vigor, the influence of their ethical righteousness still endures. +The prophecy of Samuel Sewall that Christians should be found in Newbury +so long as pigeons shall roost on its oaks and Indian corn grows in +Oldtown fields remains still true, and we trust will always remain so. +Yet, as of old, the evil personage sometimes intrudes himself into +company too good for him. It was said in the witchcraft trials of 1692 +that Satan baptized his converts at Newbury Falls, the scene, probably, +of one of Hawthorne's weird _Twice Told Tales_; and there is a tradition +that, in the midst of a heated controversy between one of Newbury's +painful ministers and his deacon, who (anticipating Garrison by a +century) ventured to doubt the propriety of clerical slaveholding, the +Adversary made his appearance in the shape of a black giant stalking +through Byfield. It was never, I believe, definitely settled whether he +was drawn there by the minister's zeal in defence of slavery or the +deacon's irreverent denial of the minister's right and duty to curse +Canaan in the person of his negro. + +Old Newbury has sometimes been spoken of as ultra-conservative and +hostile to new ideas and progress, but this is not warranted by its +history. More than two centuries ago, when Major Pike, just across the +river, stood up and denounced in open town meeting the law against +freedom of conscience and worship, and was in consequence fined and +outlawed, some of Newbury's best citizens stood bravely by him. The town +took no part in the witchcraft horror, and got none of its old women and +town charges hanged for witches, "Goody" Morse had the spirit rappings in +her house two hundred years earlier than the Fox girls did, and somewhat +later a Newbury minister, in wig and knee-buckles, rode, Bible in hand, +over to Hampton to lay a ghost who had materialized himself and was +stamping up and down stairs in his military boots. + +Newbury's ingenious citizen, Jacob Perkins, in drawing out diseases with +his metallic tractors, was quite as successful as modern "faith and mind" +doctors. The Quakers, whipped at Hampton on one hand and at Salem on the +other, went back and forth unmolested in Newbury, for they could make no +impression on its iron-clad orthodoxy. Whitefield set the example, since +followed by the Salvation Army, of preaching in its streets, and now lies +buried under one of its churches with almost the honors of sainthood. +William Lloyd Garrison was born in Newbury. The town must be regarded as +the Alpha and Omega of anti-slavery agitation, beginning with its +abolition deacon and ending with Garrison. Puritanism, here as +elsewhere, had a flavor of radicalism; it had its humorous side, and its +ministers did not hesitate to use wit and sarcasm, like Elijah before the +priests of Baal. As, for instance, the wise and learned clergyman, +Puritan of the Puritans, beloved and reverenced by all, who has just laid +down the burden of his nearly one hundred years, startled and shamed his +brother ministers who were zealously for the enforcement of the Fugitive +Slave Law, by preparing for them a form of prayer for use while engaged +in catching runaway slaves. + +I have, I fear, dwelt too long upon the story and tradition of the old +town, which will doubtless be better told by the orator of the day. The +theme is to me full of interest. Among the blessings which I would +gratefully own is the fact that my lot has been cast in the beautiful +valley of the Merrimac, within sight of Newbury steeples, Plum Island, +and Crane Neck and Pipe Stave hills. + +Let me, in closing, pay something of the debt I have owed from boyhood, +by expressing a sentiment in which I trust every son of the ancient town +will unite: Joshua Coffin, historian of Newbury, teacher, scholar, and +antiquarian, and one of the earliest advocates of slave emancipation. May +his memory be kept green, to use the words of Judge Sewall, "so long as +Plum island keeps its post and a sturgeon leaps in Merrimac River." + +Amesbury, 6th Month, 1885. + + + + +SCHOOLDAY REMEMBRANCES. + + To Rev. Charles Wingate, Hon. James H. Carleton, Thomas B. Garland, + Esq., Committee of Students of Haverhill Academy: + +DEAR FRIENDS,--I was most agreeably surprised last evening by receiving +your carefully prepared and beautiful Haverhill Academy Album, containing +the photographs of a large number of my old friends and schoolmates. I +know of nothing which could have given me more pleasure. If the faces +represented are not so unlined and ruddy as those which greeted each +other at the old academy, on the pleasant summer mornings so long ago, +when life was before us, with its boundless horizon of possibilities, +yet, as I look over them, I see that, on the whole, Time has not been +hard with us, but has touched us gently. The hieroglyphics he has traced +upon us may, indeed, reveal something of the cares, trials, and sorrows +incident to humanity, but they also tell of generous endeavor, beneficent +labor, developed character, and the slow, sure victories of patience and +fortitude. I turn to them with the proud satisfaction of feeling that I +have been highly favored in my early companions, and that I have not been +disappointed in my school friendships. The two years spent at the +academy I have always reckoned among the happiest of my life, though I +have abundant reason for gratitude that, in the long, intervening years, +I have been blessed beyond my deserving. + +It has been our privilege to live in an eventful period, and to witness +wonderful changes since we conned our lessons together. How little we +then dreamed of the steam car, electric telegraph, and telephone! We +studied the history and geography of a world only half explored. Our +country was an unsolved mystery. "The Great American Desert" was an +awful blank on our school maps. We have since passed through the +terrible ordeal of civil war, which has liberated enslaved millions, and +made the union of the States an established fact, and no longer a +doubtful theory. If life is to be measured not so much by years as by +thoughts, emotion, knowledge, action, and its opportunity of a free +exercise of all our powers and faculties, we may congratulate ourselves +upon really outliving the venerable patriarchs. For myself, I would not +exchange a decade of my own life for a century of the Middle Ages, or a +"cycle of Cathay." + +Let me, gentlemen, return my heartiest thanks to you, and to all who have +interested themselves in the preparation of the Academy Album, and assure +you of my sincere wishes for your health and happiness. + +OAK KNOLL, DANVERS, 12th Month, 25, 1885. + + + + +EDWIN PERCY WHIPPLE. + +I have been pained to learn of the decease of nay friend of many years, +Edwin P. Whipple. Death, however expected, is always something of a +surprise, and in his case I was not prepared for it by knowing of any +serious failure of his health. With the possible exception of Lowell and +Matthew Arnold, he was the ablest critical essayist of his time, and the +place he has left will not be readily filled. + +Scarcely inferior to Macaulay in brilliance of diction and graphic +portraiture, he was freer from prejudice and passion, and more loyal to +the truth of fact and history. He was a thoroughly honest man. He wrote +with conscience always at his elbow, and never sacrificed his real +convictions for the sake of epigram and antithesis. He instinctively +took the right side of the questions that came before him for decision, +even when by so doing he ranked himself with the unpopular minority. He +had the manliest hatred of hypocrisy and meanness; but if his language +had at times the severity of justice, it was never merciless. He "set +down naught in malice." + +Never blind to faults, he had a quick and sympathetic eye for any real +excellence or evidence of reserved strength in the author under +discussion. + +He was a modest man, sinking his own personality out of sight, and he +always seemed to me more interested in the success of others than in his +own. Many of his literary contemporaries have had reason to thank him +not only for his cordial recognition and generous praise, but for the +firm and yet kindly hand which pointed out deficiencies and errors of +taste and judgment. As one of those who have found pleasure and profit +in his writings in the past, I would gratefully commend them to the +generation which survives him. His _Literature of the Age of Elizabeth_ +is deservedly popular, but there are none of his Essays which will not +repay a careful study. "What works of Mr. Baxter shall I read?" asked +Boswell of Dr. Johnson. "Read any of them," was the answer, "for they +are all good." + +He will have an honored place in the history of American literature. But +I cannot now dwell upon his authorship while thinking of him as the +beloved member of a literary circle now, alas sadly broken. I recall the +wise, genial companion and faithful friend of nearly half a century, the +memory of whose words and acts of kindness moistens my eyes as I write. + +It is the inevitable sorrow of age that one's companions must drop away +on the right hand and the left with increasing frequency, until we are +compelled to ask with Wordsworth,-- + + "Who next shall fall and disappear?" + +But in the case of him who has just passed from us, we have the +satisfaction of knowing that his life-work has been well and faithfully +done, and that he leaves behind him only friends. + +DANVERS, 6th Month, 18, 1886. + + + + + +HISTORICAL PAPERS + + + + +DANIEL O'CONNELL. + + In February, 1839, Henry Clay delivered a speech in the United + States Senate, which was intended to smooth away the difficulties + which his moderate opposition to the encroachments of slavery had + erected in his path to the presidency. His calumniation of + O'Connell called out the following summary of the career of the + great Irish patriot. It was published originally in the + Pennsylvania Freeman of Philadelphia, April 25, 1839. + +Perhaps the most unlucky portion of the unlucky speech of Henry Clay on +the slavery question is that in which an attempt is made to hold up to +scorn and contempt the great Liberator of Ireland. We say an attempt, +for who will say it has succeeded? Who feels contempt for O'Connell? +Surely not the slaveholder? From Henry Clay, surrounded by his slave- +gang at Ashland, to the most miserable and squalid slave-driver and small +breeder of human cattle in Virginia and Maryland who can spell the name +of O'Connell in his newspaper, these republican brokers in blood fear and +hate the eloquent Irishman. But their contempt, forsooth! Talk of the +sheep-stealer's contempt for the officer of justice who nails his ears to +the pillory, or sets the branding iron on his forehead! + +After denouncing the abolitionists for gratuitously republishing the +advertisements for runaway slaves, the Kentucky orator says:-- + +"And like a notorious agitator upon another theatre, they would hunt down +and proscribe from the pale of civilized society the inhabitants of that +entire section. Allow me, Mr. President, to say that whilst I recognize +in the justly wounded feelings of the Minister of the United States at +the Court of St. James much to excuse the notice which he was provoked to +take of that agitator, in my humble opinion he would better have +consulted the dignity of his station and of his country in treating him +with contemptuous silence. He would exclude us from European society, he +who himself, can only obtain a contraband admission, and is received with +scornful repugnance into it! If he be no more desirous of our society +than we are of his, he may rest assured that a state of perpetual non- +intercourse will exist between us. Yes, sir, I think the American +Minister would best have pursued the dictates of true dignity by +regarding the language of the member of the British House of Commons as +the malignant ravings of the plunderer of his own country, and the +libeller of a foreign and kindred people." + +The recoil of this attack "followed hard upon" the tones of +congratulation and triumph of partisan editors at the consummate skill +and dexterity with which their candidate for the presidency had absolved +himself from the suspicion of abolitionism, and by a master-stroke of +policy secured the confidence of the slaveholding section of the +Union. But the late Whig defeat in New York has put an end to these +premature rejoicings. "The speech of Mr. Clay in reference to the Irish +agitator has been made use of against us with no small success," say the +New York papers. "They failed," says the Daily Evening Star, "to +convince the Irish voters that Daniel O'Connell was the 'plunderer of his +country,' or that there was an excuse for thus denouncing him." + +The defeat of the Whigs of New York and the cause of it have excited no +small degree of alarm among the adherents of the Kentucky orator. In +this city, the delicate _Philadelphia Gazette_ comes magnanimously to the +aid of Henry Clay,-- + + "A tom-tit twittering on an eagle's back." + +The learned editor gives it as his opinion that Daniel O'Connell is a +"political beggar," a "disorganizing apostate;" talks in its pretty way +of the man's "impudence" and "falsehoods" and "cowardice," etc.; and +finally, with a modesty and gravity which we cannot but admire, assures +us that "his weakness of mind is almost beyond calculation!" + +We have heard it rumored during the past week, among some of the self- +constituted organs of the Clay party in this city, that at a late meeting +in Chestnut Street a committee was appointed to collect, collate, and +publish the correspondence between Andrew Stevenson and O'Connell, and so +much of the latter's speeches and writings as relate to American slavery, +for the purpose of convincing the countrymen of O'Connell of the justice, +propriety, and, in view of the aggravated circumstances of the case, +moderation and forbearance of Henry Clay when speaking of a man who has +had the impudence to intermeddle with the "patriarchal institutions" of +our country, and with the "domestic relations" of Kentucky and Virginia +slave-traders. + +We wait impatiently for the fruits of the labors of this sagacious +committee. We should like to see those eloquent and thrilling appeals to +the sense of shame and justice and honor of America republished. We +should like to see if any Irishman, not wholly recreant to the interests +and welfare of the Green Island of his birth, will in consequence of this +publication give his vote to the slanderer of Ireland's best and noblest +champion. + +But who is Daniel O'Connell? "A demagogue--a ruffian agitator!" say the +Tory journals of Great Britain, quaking meantime with awe and +apprehension before the tremendous moral and political power which he is +wielding,--a power at this instant mightier than that of any potentate of +Europe. "A blackguard"--a fellow who "obtains contraband admission into +European society"--a "malignant libeller"--a "plunderer of his country"-- +a man whose "wind should be stopped," say the American slaveholders, and +their apologists, Clay, Stevenson, Hamilton, and the Philadelphia +Gazette, and the Democratic Whig Association. + +But who is Daniel O'Connell? Ireland now does justice to him, the world +will do so hereafter. No individual of the present age has done more for +human liberty. His labors to effect the peaceable deliverance of his own +oppressed countrymen, and to open to the nations of Europe a new and +purer and holier pathway to freedom unstained with blood and unmoistened +by tears, and his mighty instrumentality in the abolition of British +colonial slavery, have left their impress upon the age. They will be +remembered and felt beneficially long after the miserable slanders of +Tory envy and malignity at home, and the clamors of slaveholders abroad, +detected in their guilt, and writhing in the gaze of Christendom, shall +have perished forever,--when the Clays and Calhouns, the Peels and +Wellingtons, the opponents of reform in Great Britain and the enemies of +slave emancipation in the United States, shall be numbered with those who +in all ages, to use the words of the eloquent Lamartine, have "sinned +against the Holy Ghost in opposing the improvement of things,--in an +egotistical and stupid attempt to draw back the moral and social world +which God and nature are urging forward." + +The character and services of O'Connell have never been fully appreciated +in this country. Engrossed in our own peculiar interests, and in the +plenitude of our self-esteem; believing that "we are the people, and that +wisdom will perish with us," that all patriotism and liberality of +feeling are confined to our own territory, we have not followed the +untitled Barrister of Derrynane Abbey, step by step, through the +development of one of the noblest experiments ever made for the cause +of liberty and the welfare of man. + +The revolution which O'Connell has already partially effected in his +native land, and which, from the evident signs of cooperation in England +and Scotland, seems not far from its entire accomplishment, will form a +new era in the history of the civilized world. Heretofore the patriot +has relied more upon physical than moral means for the regeneration of +his country and its redemption from oppression. His revolutions, however +pure in principle, have ended in practical crime. The great truth was +yet to be learned that brute force is incompatible with a pure love of +freedom, inasmuch as it is in itself an odious species of tyranny--the +relic of an age of slavery and barbarism--the common argument of +despotism--a game + + "which, were their subjects wise, + Kings would not play at." + +But the revolution in which O'Connell is engaged, although directed +against the oppression of centuries, relies with just confidence upon the +united moral energies of the people: a moral victory of reason over +prejudice, of justice over oppression; the triumph of intellectual energy +where the brute appeal to arms had miserably failed; the vindication of +man's eternal rights, not by the sword fleshed in human hearts, but by +weapons tempered in the armory of Heaven with truth and mercy and love. + +Nor is it a visionary idea, or the untried theory of an enthusiast, this +triumphant reliance upon moral and intellectual power for the reform of +political abuses, for the overthrowing of tyranny and the pulling down of +the strongholds of arbitrary power. The emancipation of the Catholic of +Great Britain from the thrall of a century, in 1829, prepared the way for +the bloodless triumph of English reform in 1832. The Catholic +Association was the germ of those political unions which compelled, by +their mighty yet peaceful influence, the King of England to yield +submissively to the supremacy of the people. + + (The celebrated Mr. Attwood has been called the "father of political + unions." In a speech delivered by his brother, C. Attwood, Esq., at + the Sunderland Reform Meeting, September 10, 1832, I find the + following admission: "Gentlemen, the first political union was the + Roman Catholic Association of Ireland, and the true founder and + father of political unions is Daniel O'Connell.") + +Both of these remarkable events, these revolutions shaking nations to +their centre, yet polluted with no blood and sullied by no crime, were +effected by the salutary agitations of the public mind, first set in +motion by the masterspirit of O'Connell, and spreading from around him to +every portion of the British empire like the undulations from the +disturbed centre of a lake. + +The Catholic question has been but imperfectly understood in this +country. Many have allowed their just disapprobation of the Catholic +religion to degenerate into a most unwarrantable prejudice against its +conscientious followers. The cruel persecutions of the dissenters from +the Romish Church, the massacre of St. Bartholomew's day, the horrors of +the Inquisition, the crusades against the Albigenses and the simple +dwellers of the Vaudois valleys, have been regarded as atrocities +peculiar to the believers in papal infallibility, and the necessary +consequences of their doctrines; and hence they have looked upon the +constitutional agitation of the Irish Catholics for relief from grieveous +disabilities and unjust distinctions as a struggle merely for supremacy +or power. + +Strange, that the truth to which all history so strongly testifies should +thus be overlooked,--the undeniable truth that religious bigotry and +intolerance have been confined to no single sect; that the persecuted of +one century have been the persecutors of another. In our own country, +it would be well for us to remember that at the very time when in New +England the Catholic, the Quaker, and the Baptist were banished on pain +of death, and where some even suffered that dreadful penalty, in Catholic +Maryland, under the Catholic Lord Baltimore, perfect liberty of +conscience was established, and Papist and Protestant went quietly +through the same streets to their respective altars. + +At the commencement of O'Connell's labors for emancipation he found the +people of Ireland divided into three great classes,--the Protestant or +Church party, the Dissenters, and the Catholics: the Church party +constituting about one tenth of the population, yet holding in possession +the government and a great proportion of the landed property of Ireland, +controlling church and state and law and revenue, the army, navy, +magistracy, and corporations, the entire patronage of the country, +holding their property and power by the favor of England, and +consequently wholly devoted to her interest; the Dissenters, probably +twice as numerous as the Church party, mostly engaged in trade and +manufactures,--sustained by their own talents and industry, Irish in +feeling, partaking in no small degree of the oppression of their Catholic +brethren, and among the first to resist that oppression in 1782; the +Catholics constituting at least two thirds of the whole population, and +almost the entire peasantry of the country, forming a large proportion +of the mercantile interest, yet nearly excluded from the possession of +landed property by the tyrannous operation of the penal laws. Justly has +a celebrated Irish patriot (Theobald Wolfe Tone) spoken of these laws as +"an execrable and infamous code, framed with the art and malice of demons +to plunder and degrade and brutalize the Catholics of Ireland. There was +no disgrace, no injustice, no disqualification, moral, political, or +religious, civil or military, which it has not heaped upon them." + +The following facts relative to the disabilities under which the +Catholics of the United Kingdom labored previous to the emancipation of +1829 will serve to show in some measure the oppressive operation of those +laws which placed the foot of one tenth of the population of Ireland upon +the necks of the remainder. + +A Catholic peer could not sit in the House of Peers, nor a Catholic +commoner in the House of Commons. A Catholic could not be Lord +Chancellor, or Keeper, or Commissioner of the Great Seal; Master or +Keeper of the Rolls; Justice of the King's Bench or of the Common Pleas; +Baron of the Exchequer; Attorney or Solicitor General; King's Sergeant at +Law; Member of the King's Council; Master in Chancery, nor Chairman of +Sessions for the County of Dublin. He could not be the Recorder of a +city or town; an advocate in the spiritual courts; Sheriff of a county, +city, or town; Sub-Sheriff; Lord Lieutenant, Lord Deputy, or other +governor of Ireland; Lord High Treasurer; Governor of a county; Privy +Councillor; Postmaster General; Chancellor of the Exchequer or Secretary +of State; Vice Treasurer, Cashier of the Exchequer; Keeper of the Privy +Seal or Auditor General; Provost or Fellow of Dublin University; nor Lord +Mayor or Alderman of a corporate city or town. He could not be a member +of a parish vestry, nor bequeath any sum of money or any lands for the +maintenance of a clergyman, or for the support of a chapel or a school; +and in corporate towns he was excluded from the grand juries. + +O'Connell commenced his labors for emancipation with the strong +conviction that nothing short of the united exertions of the Irish people +could overthrow the power of the existing government, and that a union of +action could only be obtained by the establishment of something like +equality between the different religious parties. Discarding all other +than peaceful means for the accomplishment of his purpose, he placed +himself and his followers beyond the cognizance of unjust and oppressive +laws. Wherever he poured the oil of his eloquence upon the maddened +spirits of his wronged and insulted countrymen, the mercenary soldiery +found no longer an excuse for violence; and calm, firm, and united, the +Catholic Association remained secure in the moral strength of its pure +and peaceful purpose, amid the bayonets of a Tory administration. His +influence was felt in all parts of the island. Wherever an unlawful +association existed, his great legal knowledge enabled him at once to +detect its character, and, by urging its dissolution, to snatch its +deluded members from the ready fangs of their enemies. In his presence +the Catholic and the Protestant shook hands together, and the wild Irish +clansman forgot his feuds. He taught the party in power, and who +trembled at the dangers around them, that security and peace could only +be obtained by justice and kindness. He entreated his oppressed Catholic +brethren to lay aside their weapons, and with pure hearts and naked hands +to stand firmly together in the calm but determined energy of men, too +humane for deeds of violence, yet too mighty for the patient endurance of +wrong. + +The spirit of the olden time was awakened, of the day when Flood +thundered and Curran lightened; the light which shone for a moment in the +darkness of Ireland's century of wrong burned upwards clearly and +steadily from all its ancient altars. Shoulder to shoulder gathered +around him the patriot spirits of his nation,--men unbribed by the golden +spoils of governmental patronage Shiel with his ardent eloquence, O'Dwyer +and Walsh, and Grattan and O'Connor, and Steel, the Protestant agitator, +wearing around him the emblem of national reconciliation, of the reunion +of Catholic and Protestant,--the sash of blended orange and green, soiled +and defaced by his patriotic errands, stained with the smoke of cabins, +and the night rains and rust of weapons, and the mountain mist, and the +droppings of the wild woods of Clare. He united in one mighty and +resistless mass the broken and discordant factions, whose desultory +struggles against tyranny had hitherto only added strength to its +fetters, and infused into that mass his own lofty principles of action, +until the solemn tones of expostulation and entreaty, bursting at once +from the full heart of Ireland, were caught up by England and echoed back +from Scotland, and the language of justice and humanity was wrung from +the reluctant lips of the cold and remorseless oppressor of his native +land, at once its disgrace and glory,--the conqueror of Napoleon; and, in +the words of his own Curran, the chains of the Catholic fell from around +him, and he stood forth redeemed and disenthralled by the irresistible +genius of Universal Emancipation. + +On the passage of the bill for Catholic emancipation, O'Connell took his +seat in the British Parliament. The eyes of millions were upon him. +Ireland--betrayed so often by those in whom she had placed her +confidence; brooding in sorrowful remembrance over the noble names and +brilliant reputations sullied by treachery and corruption, the long and +dark catalogue of her recreant sons, who, allured by British gold and +British patronage, had sacrificed on the altar of their ambition Irish +pride and Irish independence, and lifted their parricidal arms against +their sorrowing mother, "crownless and voiceless in her woe"--now hung +with breathless eagerness over the ordeal to which her last great +champion was subjected. + +The crisis in O'Connell's destiny had come. + +The glitter of the golden bribe was in his eye; the sound of titled +magnificence was in his ear; the choice was before him to sit high among +the honorable, the titled, and the powerful, or to take his humble seat +in the hall of St. Stephen's as the Irish demagogue, the agitator, the +Kerry representative. He did not hesitate in his choice. On the first +occasion that offered he told the story of Ireland's wrongs, and demanded +justice in the name of his suffering constituents. He had put his hand +to the plough of reform, and he could not relinquish his hold, for his +heart was with it. + +Determined to give the Whig administration no excuse for neglecting the +redress of Irish grievances, he entered heart and soul into the great +measure of English reform, and his zeal, tact, and eloquence contributed +not a little to its success. Yet even his friends speak of his first +efforts in the House of Commons as failures. The Irish accent; the harsh +avowal of purposes smacking of rebellion; the eccentricities and flowery +luxuriance of an eloquence nursed in the fervid atmosphere of Ireland +suddenly transplanted to the cold and commonplace one of St. Stephen's; +the great and illiberal prejudices against him scarcely abated from what +they were when, as the member from Clare, he was mobbed on his way to +London, for a time opposed a barrier to the influence of his talents and +patriotism. But he triumphed at last: the mob-orator of Clare and Kerry, +the declaimer in the Dublin Rooms of the Political and Trades' Union, +became one of the most attractive and popular speakers of the British +Parliament; one whose aid has been courted and whose rebuke has been +feared by the ablest of England's representatives. Amid the sneers of +derision and the clamor of hate and prejudice he has triumphed,--on that +very arena so fatal to Irish eloquence and Irish fame, where even Grattan +failed to sustain himself, and the impetuous spirit of Flood was stricken +down. + +No subject in which Ireland was not directly interested has received a +greater share of O'Connell's attention than that of the abolition of +colonial slavery. Utterly detesting tyranny of all kinds, he poured +forth his eloquent soul in stern reprobation of a system full at once of +pride and misery and oppression, and darkened with blood. His speech on +the motion of Thomas Fowell Buxton for the immediate emancipation of the +slaves gave a new tone to the discussion of the question. He entered +into no petty pecuniary details; no miserable computation of the +shillings and pence vested in beings fashioned in the image of God. He +did not talk of the expediency of continuing the evil because it had +grown monstrous. To use his own words, he considered "slavery a crime to +be abolished; not merely an evil to be palliated." He left Sir Robert +Peel and the Tories to eulogize the characters and defend the interests +of the planters, in common with those of a tithe-reaping priesthood, +building their houses by oppression and their chambers by wrong, and +spoke of the negro's interest, the negro's claim to justice; demanding +sympathy for the plundered as well as the plunderers, for the slave as +well as his master. He trampled as dust under his feet the blasphemy +that obedience to the law of eternal justice is a principle to be +acknowledged in theory only, because unsafe in practice. He would, +he said, enter into no compromise with slavery. He cared not what cast +or creed or color it might assume, whether personal or political, +intellectual or spiritual; he was for its total, immediate abolition. He +was for justice,--justice in the name of humanity and according to the +righteous law of the living God. + +Ardently admiring our free institutions, and constantly pointing to our +glorious political exaltation as an incentive to the perseverance of his +own countrymen in their struggle against oppression, he has yet omitted +no opportunity of rebuking our inexcusable slave system. An enthusiastic +admirer of Jefferson, he has often regretted that his practice should +have so illy accorded with his noble sentiments on the subject of +slavery, which so fully coincided with his own. In truth, wherever man +has been oppressed by his fellow-man, O'Connell's sympathy has been +directed: to Italy, chained above the very grave of her ancient +liberties; to the republics of Southern America; to Greece, dashing the +foot of the indolent Ottoman from her neck; to France and Belgium; and +last, not least, to Poland, driven from her cherished nationality, and +dragged, like his own Ireland, bleeding and violated, to the deadly +embrace of her oppressor. American slavery but shares in his common +denunciation of all tyranny; its victims but partake of his common pity +for the oppressed and persecuted and the trodden down. + +In this hasty and imperfect sketch we cannot enter into the details of +that cruel disregard of Irish rights which was manifested by a Reformed +Parliament, convoked, to use the language of William IV., "to ascertain +the sense of the people." It is perhaps enough to say that O'Connell's +indignant refusal to receive as full justice the measure of reform meted +out to Ireland was fully justified by the facts of the case. The Irish +Reform Bill gave Ireland, with one third of the entire population of the +United Kingdoms, only one sixth of the Parliamentary delegation. It +diminished instead of increasing the number of voters; in the towns and +cities it created a high and aristocratic franchise; in many boroughs it +established so narrow a basis of franchise as to render them liable to +corruption and abuse as the rotten boroughs of the old system. It threw +no new power into the hands of the people; and with no little justice has +O'Connell himself termed it an act to restore to power the Orange +ascendancy in Ireland, and to enable a faction to trample with impunity +on the friends of reform and constitutional freedom. (Letters to the +Reformers of Great Britain, No. 1.) + +In May, 1832, O'Connell commenced the publication of his celebrated +_Letters to the Reformers of Great Britain_. Like Tallien, before the +French convention, he "rent away the veil" which Hume and Atwood had only +partially lifted. He held up before the people of Great Britain the new +indignities which had been added to the long catalogue of Ireland's +wrongs; he appealed to their justice, their honor, their duty, for +redress, and cast down before the Whig administration the gauntlet of his +country's defiance and scorn. There is a fine burst of indignant Irish +feeling in the concluding paragraphs of his fourth letter:-- + +"I have demonstrated the contumelious injuries inflicted upon us by this +Reform Bill. My letters are long before the public. They have been +unrefuted, uncontradicted in any of their details. And with this case of +atrocious injustice to Ireland placed before the reformers of Great +Britain, what assistance, what sympathy, do we receive? Why, I have got +some half dozen drivelling letters from political unions and political +characters, asking me whether I advise them to petition or bestir +themselves in our behalf! + +"Reformers of Great Britain! I do not ask you either to petition or be +silent. I do not ask you to petition or to do any other act in favor of +the Irish. You will consult your own feelings of justice and generosity, +unprovoked by any advice or entreaty of mine. + +"For my own part, I never despaired of Ireland; I do not, I will not, +I cannot, despair of my beloved country. She has, in my view, obtained +freedom of conscience for others, as well as for herself. She has shaken +off the incubus of tithes while silly legislation was dealing out its +folly and its falsehoods. She can, and she will, obtain for herself +justice and constitutional freedom; and although she may sigh at British +neglect and ingratitude, there is no sound of despair in that sigh, nor +any want of moral energy on her part to attain her own rights by +peaceable and legal means." + +The tithe system, unutterably odious and full of all injustice, had +prepared the way for this expression of feeling on the part of the +people. Ireland had never, in any period of her history, bowed her neck +peaceably to the ecclesiastical yoke. From the Canon of Cashel, prepared +by English deputies in the twelfth century, decreeing for the first time +that tithes should be paid in Ireland, down to the present moment, the +Church in her borders has relied solely upon the strong arm of the law, +and literally reaped its tithes with the sword. The decree of the Dublin +Synod, under Archbishop Comyn, in 1185, could only be enforced within the +pale of the English settlement. The attempts of Henry VIII. also failed. +Without the pale all endeavors to collect tithes were met by stern +opposition. And although from the time of William III. the tithe system +has been established in Ireland, yet at no period has it been regarded +otherwise than as a system of legalized robbery by seven eighths of the +people. An examination of this system cannot fail to excite our wonder, +not that it has been thus regarded, but that it has been so long endured +by any people on the face of the earth, least of all by Irishmen. Tithes +to the amount of L1,000,000 are annually wrung from impoverished Ireland, +in support of a clergy who can only number about one sixteenth of her +population as their hearers; and wrung, too, in an undue proportion, from +the Catholic counties. (See Dr. Doyle's Evidence before Hon. E. G. +Stanley.) In the southern and middle counties, almost entirely inhabited +by the Catholic peasantry, every thing they possess is subject to the +tithe: the cow is seized in the hovel, the potato in the barrel, the coat +even on the poor man's back. (Speech of T. Reynolds, Esq., at an anti- +tithe meeting.) The revenues of five of the dignitaries of the Irish +Church Establishment are as follows: the Primacy L140,000; Derry +L120,000; Kilmore L100,000; Clogher L100,000; Waterford L70,000. Compare +these enormous sums with that paid by Scotland for the maintenance of the +Church, namely L270,000. Yet that Church has 2,000,000 souls under its +care, while that of Ireland has not above 500,000. Nor are these +princely livings expended in Ireland by their possessors. The bishoprics +of Cloyne and Meath have been long held by absentees,--by men who know no +more of their flocks than the non-resident owner of a West India +plantation did of the miserable negroes, the fruits of whose thankless +labor were annually transmitted to him. Out of 1289 benefited clergymen +in Ireland, between five and six hundred are non-residents, spending in +Bath and London, or in making the fashionable tour of the Continent, the +wealth forced from the Catholic peasant and the Protestant dissenter by +the bayonets of the military. Scorching and terrible was the sarcasm of +Grattan applied to these locusts of the Church: "A beastly and pompous +priesthood, political potentates and Christian pastors, full of false +zeal, full of worldly pride, and full of gluttony, empty of the true +religion, to their flocks oppressive, to their inferior clergy brutal, to +their king abject, and to their God impudent and familiar,--they stand on +the altar as a stepping-stone to the throne, glorying in the ear of +princes, whom they poison with crooked principles and heated advice; a +faction against their king when they are not his slaves,--ever the dirt +under his feet or a poniard to his heart." + +For the evils of absenteeism, the non-residence of the wealthy +landholders, draining from a starving country the very necessaries of +life, a remedy is sought in a repeal of the union, and the provisions of +a domestic parliament. In O'Connell's view, a restoration of such a +parliament can alone afford that adequate protection to the national +industry so loudly demanded by thousands of unemployed laborers, starving +amid the ruins of deserted manufactories. During the brief period of +partial Irish liberty which followed the pacific revolution of '82, the +manufactures of the country revived and flourished; and the smile of +contented industry was visible all over the land. In 1797 there were +15,000 silk-weavers in the city of Dublin alone. There are now but 400. +Such is the practical effect of the Union, of that suicidal act of the +Irish Parliament which yielded up in a moment of treachery and terror the +dearest interests of the country to the legislation of an English +Parliament and the tender mercies of Castlereagh,--of that Castlereagh +who, when accused by Grattan of spending L15,000 in purchasing votes for +the Union, replied with the rare audacity of high-handed iniquity, "We +did spend L15,000, and we would have spent L15,000,000 if necessary to +carry the Union; "that Castlereagh who, when 707,000 Irishmen petitioned +against the Union and 300,000 for it, maintained that the latter +constituted the majority! Well has it been said that the deep vengeance +which Ireland owed him was inflicted by the great criminal upon himself. +The nation which he sold and plundered saw him make with his own hand the +fearful retribution. The great body of the Irish people never assented +to the Union. The following extract from a speech of Earl (then Mr.) +Grey, in 1800, upon the Union question, will show what means were made +use of to drag Ireland, while yet mourning over her slaughtered children, +to the marriage altar with England: "If the Parliament of Ireland had +been left to itself, untempted and unawed, it would without hesitation +have rejected the resolutions. Out of the 300 members, 120 strenuously +opposed the measure, 162 voted for it: of these, 116 were placemen; some +of them were English generals on the staff, without a foot of ground in +Ireland, and completely dependent on government." "Let us reflect upon +the arts made use of since the last session of the Irish Parliament to +pack a majority, for Union, in the House of Commons. All persons holding +offices under government, if they hesitated to vote as directed, were +stripped of all their employments. A bill framed for preserving the +purity of Parliament was likewise abused, and no less than 63 seats were +vacated by their holders having received nominal offices." + +The signs of the times are most favorable to the success of the Irish +Liberator. The tremendous power of the English political unions is +beginning to develop itself in favor of Ireland. A deep sympathy is +evinced for her sufferings, and a general determination to espouse her +cause. Brute force cannot put down the peaceable and legal agitation of +the question of her rights and interests. The spirit of the age forbids +it. The agitation will go on, for it is spreading among men who, to use +the words of the eloquent Shiel, while looking out upon the ocean, and +gazing upon the shore, which Nature has guarded with so many of her +bulwarks, can hear the language of Repeal muttered in the dashing of the +very waves which separate them from Great Britain by a barrier of God's +own creation. Another bloodless victory, we trust, awaits O'Connell,--a +victory worthy of his heart and intellect, unstained by one drop of human +blood, unmoistened by a solitary tear. + +Ireland will be redeemed and disenthralled, not perhaps by a repeal of +the Union, but by the accomplishment of such a thorough reform in the +government and policy of Great Britain as shall render a repeal +unnecessary and impolitic. + +The sentiments of O'Connell in regard to the means of effecting his +object of political reform are distinctly impressed upon all his appeals +to the people. In his letter of December, 1832, to the Dublin Trades +Union, he says: "The Repealers must not have our cause stained with +blood. Far indeed from it. We can, and ought to, carry the repeal only +in the total absence of offence against the laws of man or crime in the +sight of God. The best revolution which was ever effected could not be +worth one drop of human blood." In his speech at the public dinner given +him by--the citizens of Cork, we find a yet more earnest avowal of +pacific principles. "It may be stated," said he, "to countervail our +efforts, that this struggle will involve the destruction of life and +property; that it will overturn the framework of civil society, and give +an undue and fearful influence to one rank to the ruin of all others. +These are awful considerations, truly, if risked. I am one of those who +have always believed that any political change is too dearly purchased by +a single drop of blood, and who think that any political superstructure +based upon other opinion is like the sand-supported fabric,--beautiful in +the brief hour of sunshine, but the moment one drop of rain touches the +arid basis melting away in wreck and ruin! I am an accountable being; I +have a soul and a God to answer to, in another and better world, for my +thoughts and actions in this. I disclaim here any act of mine which +would sport with the lives of my fellow-creatures, any amelioration of +our social condition which must be purchased by their blood. And here, +in the face of God and of our common country, I protest that if I did not +sincerely and firmly believe that the amelioration I desire could be +effected without violence, without any change in the relative scale of +ranks in the present social condition of Ireland, except that change +which all must desire, making each better than it was before, and +cementing all in one solid irresistible mass, I would at once give up the +struggle which I have always kept with tyranny. I would withdraw from +the contest which I have hitherto waged with those who would perpetuate +our thraldom. I would not for one moment dare to venture for that which +in costing one human life would cost infinitely too dear. But it will +cost no such price. Have we not had within my memory two great political +revolutions? And had we them not without bloodshed or violence to the +social compact? Have we not arrived at a period when physical force and +military power yield to moral and intellectual energy. Has not the time +of 'Cedant arma togae' come for us and the other nations of the earth?" + +Let us trust that the prediction of O'Connell will be verified; that +reason and intellect are destined, under God, to do that for the nations +of the earth which the physical force of centuries and the red sacrifice +of a thousand battle-fields have failed to accomplish. Glorious beyond +all others will be the day when "nation shall no more rise up against +nation;" when, as a necessary consequence of the universal acknowledgment +of the rights of man, it shall no longer be in the power of an individual +to drag millions into strife, for the unholy gratification of personal +prejudice and passion. The reformed governments of Great Britain and +France, resting, as they do, upon a popular basis, are already tending to +this consummation, for the people have suffered too much from the warlike +ambition of their former masters not to have learned that the gains of +peaceful industry are better than the wages of human butchery. + +Among the great names of Ireland--alike conspicuous, yet widely +dissimilar--stand Wellington and O'Connell. The one smote down the +modern Alexander upon Waterloo's field of death, but the page of his +reputation is dim with the tears of the widow and the orphan, and dark +with the stain of blood. The other, armed only with the weapons of truth +and reason, has triumphed over the oppression of centuries, and opened a +peaceful pathway to the Temple of Freedom, through which its Goddess may +be seen, no longer propitiated with human sacrifices, like some foul idol +of the East, but clothed in Christian attributes, and smiling in the +beauty of holiness upon the pure hearts and peaceful hands of its +votaries. The bloodless victories of the latter have all the sublimity +with none of the criminality which attaches itself to the triumphs of the +former. To thunder high truths in the deafened ear of nations, to rouse +the better spirit of the age, to soothe the malignant passions of. +assembled and maddened men, to throw open the temple doors of justice to +the abused, enslaved, and persecuted, to unravel the mysteries of guilt, +and hold up the workers of iniquity in the severe light of truth stripped +of their disguise and covered with the confusion of their own vileness,-- +these are victories more glorious than any which have ever reddened the +earth with carnage:-- + + "They ask a spirit of more exalted pitch, + And courage tempered with a holier fire." + +Of the more recent efforts of O'Connell we need not speak, for no one can +read the English periodicals and papers without perceiving that O'Connell +is, at this moment, the leading politician, the master mind of the +British empire. Attempts have been made to prejudice the American mind +against him by a republication on this side of the water of the false and +foul slanders of his Tory enemies, in reference to what is called the +"O'Connell rent," a sum placed annually in his hands by a grateful +people, and which he has devoted scrupulously to the great object of +Ireland's political redemption. He has acquired no riches by his +political efforts his heart and soul and mind and strength have been +directed to his suffering country and the cause of universal freedom. +For this he has deservedly a place in the heart and affections of every +son of Ireland. One million of ransomed slaves in the British +dependencies will teach their children to repeat the name of O'Connell +with that of Wilberforce and Clarkson. And when the stain and caste of +slavery shall have passed from our own country, he will be regarded as +our friend and benefactor, whose faithful rebukes and warnings and +eloquent appeals to our pride of character, borne to us across the +Atlantic, touched the guilty sensitiveness of the national conscience, +and through shame prepared the way for repentance. + + + + +ENGLAND UNDER JAMES II. + + A review of the first two volumes of Macaulay's _History of England + from the Accession of James II_. + +In accordance with the labor-saving spirit of the age, we have in these +volumes an admirable example of history made easy. Had they been +published in his time, they might have found favor in the eyes of the +poet Gray, who declared that his ideal of happiness was "to lie on a sofa +and read eternal new romances." + +The style is that which lends such a charm to the author's essays,-- +brilliant, epigrammatic, vigorous. Indeed, herein lies the fault of the +work, when viewed as a mere detail of historical facts. Its sparkling +rhetoric is not the safest medium of truth to the simple-minded inquirer. +A discriminating and able critic has done the author no injustice in +saying that, in attempting to give effect and vividness to his thoughts +and diction, he is often overstrained and extravagant, and that his +epigrammatic style seems better fitted for the glitter of paradox than +the sober guise of truth. The intelligent and well-informed reader of +the volume before us will find himself at times compelled to reverse the +decisions of the author, and deliver some unfortunate personage, sect, or +class from the pillory of his rhetoric and the merciless pelting of his +ridicule. There is a want of the repose and quiet which we look for in +a narrative of events long passed away; we rise from the perusal of the +book pleased and excited, but with not so clear a conception of the +actual realities of which it treats as would be desirable. We cannot +help feeling that the author has been somewhat over-scrupulous in +avoiding the dulness of plain detail, and the dryness of dates, names, +and statistics. The freedom, flowing diction, and sweeping generality of +the reviewer and essayist are maintained throughout; and, with one +remarkable exception, the _History of England_ might be divided into +papers of magazine length, and published, without any violence to +propriety, as a continuation of the author's labors in that department of +literature in which he confessedly stands without a rival,--historical +review. + +That exception is, however, no unimportant one. In our view, it is the +crowning excellence of the first volume,--its distinctive feature and +principal attraction. We refer to the third chapter of the volume, from +page 260 to page 398,--the description of the condition of England at the +period of the accession of James II. We know of nothing like it in the +entire range of historical literature. The veil is lifted up from the +England of a century and a half ago; its geographical, industrial, +social, and moral condition is revealed; and, as the panorama passes +before us of lonely heaths, fortified farm-houses, bands of robbers, +rude country squires doling out the odds and ends of their coarse fare +to clerical dependents,--rough roads, serviceable only for horseback +travelling,--towns with unlighted streets, reeking with filth and offal, +--and prisons, damp, loathsome, infected with disease, and swarming with +vermin,--we are filled with wonder at the contrast which it presents to +the England of our day. We no longer sigh for "the good old days." The +most confirmed grumbler is compelled to admit that, bad as things now +are, they were far worse a few generations back. Macaulay, in this +elaborate and carefully prepared chapter, has done a good service to +humanity in disabusing well-intentioned ignorance of the melancholy +notion that the world is growing worse, and in putting to silence the +cant of blind, unreasoning conservatism. + +In 1685 the entire population of England our author estimates at from +five millions to five millions five hundred thousand. Of the eight +hundred thousand families at that period, one half had animal food twice +a week. The other half ate it not at all, or at most not oftener than +once a week. Wheaten, loaves were only seen at the tables of the +comparatively wealthy. Rye, barley, and oats were the food of the vast +majority. The average wages of workingmen was at least one half less +than is paid in England for the same service at the present day. One +fifth of the people were paupers, or recipients of parish relief. +Clothing and bedding were scarce and dear. Education was almost unknown +to the vast majority. The houses and shops were not numbered in the +cities, for porters, coachmen, and errand-runners could not read. The +shopkeeper distinguished his place of business by painted signs and +graven images. Oxford and Cambridge Universities were little better than +modern grammar and Latin school in a provincial village. The country +magistrate used on the bench language too coarse, brutal, and vulgar for +a modern tap-room. Fine gentlemen in London vied with each other in the +lowest ribaldry and the grossest profanity. The poets of the time, from +Dryden to Durfey, ministered to the popular licentiousness. The most +shameless indecency polluted their pages. The theatre and the brothel +were in strict unison. The Church winked at the vice which opposed +itself to the austere morality or hypocrisy of Puritanism. The superior +clergy, with a few noble exceptions, were self-seekers and courtiers; the +inferior were idle, ignorant hangerson upon blaspheming squires and +knights of the shire. The domestic chaplain, of all men living, held the +most unenviable position. "If he was permitted to dine with the family, +he was expected to content himself with the plainest fare. He might fill +himself with the corned beef and carrots; but as soon as the tarts and +cheese-cakes made their appearance he quitted his seat, and stood aloof +till he was summoned to return thanks for the repast, from a great part +of which he had been excluded." + +Beyond the Trent the country seems at this period to have been in a state +of barbarism. The parishes kept bloodhounds for the purpose of hunting +freebooters. The farm-houses were fortified and guarded. So dangerous +was the country that persons about travelling thither made their wills. +Judges and lawyers only ventured therein, escorted by a strong guard of +armed men. + +The natural resources of the island were undeveloped. The tin mines of +Cornwall, which two thousand years before attracted the ships of the +merchant princes of Tyre beyond the Pillars of Hercules, were indeed +worked to a considerable extent; but the copper mines, which now yield +annually fifteen thousand tons, were entirely neglected. Rock salt was +known to exist, but was not used to any considerable extent; and only a +partial supply of salt by evaporation was obtained. The coal and iron of +England are at this time the stable foundations of her industrial and +commercial greatness. But in 1685 the great part of the iron used was +imported. Only about ten thousand tons were annually cast. Now eight +hundred thousand is the average annual production. Equally great has +been the increase in coal mining. "Coal," says Macaulay, "though very +little used in any species of manufacture, was already the ordinary fuel +in some districts which were fortunate enough to possess large beds, and +in the capital, which could easily be supplied by water carriage. It +seems reasonable to believe that at least one half of the quantity then +extracted from the pits was consumed in London. The consumption of +London seemed to the writers of that age enormous, and was often +mentioned by them as a proof of the greatness of the imperial city. They +scarcely hoped to be believed when they affirmed that two hundred and +eighty thousand chaldrons--that is to say, about three hundred and fifty +thousand tons-were, in the last year of the reign of Charles II., brought +to the Thames. At present near three millions and a half of tons are +required yearly by the metropolis; and the whole annual produce cannot, +on the most moderate computation, be estimated at less than twenty +millions of tons." + +After thus passing in survey the England of our ancestors five or six +generations back, the author closes his chapter with some eloquent +remarks upon the progress of society. Contrasting the hardness and +coarseness of the age of which he treats with the softer and more humane +features of our own, he says: "Nowhere could be found that sensitive and +restless compassion which has in our time extended powerful protection to +the factory child, the Hindoo widow, to the negro slave; which pries into +the stores and water-casks of every emigrant ship; which winces at every +lash laid on the back of a drunken soldier; which will not suffer the +thief in the hulks to be ill fed or overworked; and which has repeatedly +endeavored to save the life even of the murderer. The more we study the +annals of the past, the more shall we rejoice that we live in a merciful +age, in an age in which cruelty is abhorred, and in which pain, even when +deserved, is inflicted reluctantly and from a sense of duty. Every +class, doubtless, has gained largely by this great moral change; but the +class which has gained most is the poorest, the most dependent, and the +most defenceless." + +The history itself properly commences at the close of this chapter. +Opening with the deathscene of the dissolute Charles II., it presents a +series of brilliant pictures of the events succeeding: The miserable fate +of Oates and Dangerfield, the perjured inventors of the Popish Plot; the +trial of Baxter by the infamous Jeffreys; the ill-starred attempt of the +Duke of Monmouth; the battle of Sedgemoor, and the dreadful atrocities of +the king's soldiers, and the horrible perversion of justice by the king's +chief judge in the "Bloody Assizes;" the barbarous hunting of the Scotch +Dissenters by Claverbouse; the melancholy fate of the brave and noble +Duke of Argyle,--are described with graphic power unknown to Smollett or +Hume. Personal portraits are sketched with a bold freedom which at times +startles us. The "old familiar faces," as we have seen them through the +dust of a century and a half, start before us with lifelike distinctness +of outline and coloring. Some of them disappoint us; like the ghost of +Hamlet's father, they come in a "questionable shape." Thus, for +instance, in his sketch of William Penn, the historian takes issue with +the world on his character, and labors through many pages of disingenuous +innuendoes and distortion of facts to transform the saint of history into +a pliant courtier. + +The second volume details the follies and misfortunes, the decline and +fall, of the last of the Stuarts. All the art of the author's splendid +rhetoric is employed in awakening, by turns, the indignation and contempt +of the reader in contemplating the character of the wrong-headed king. +In portraying that character, he has brought into exercise all those +powers of invective and merciless ridicule which give such a savage +relish to his delineation of Barrere. To preserve the consistency of +this character, he denies the king any credit for whatever was really +beneficent and praiseworthy in his government. He holds up the royal +delinquent in only two lights: the one representing him as a tyrant +towards his people; the other as the abject slave of foreign priests,-- +a man at once hateful and ludicrous, of whom it is difficult to speak +without an execration or a sneer. + +The events which preceded the revolution of 1688; the undisguised +adherence of the king to the Church of Rome; the partial toleration of +the despised Quakers and Anabaptists; the gradual relaxation of the +severity of the penal laws against Papists and Dissenters, preparing the +way for the royal proclamation of entire liberty of conscience throughout +the British realm, allowing the crop-eared Puritan and the Papist priest +to build conventicles and mass houses under the very eaves of the palaces +of Oxford and Canterbury; the mining and countermining of Jesuits and +prelates, are detailed with impartial minuteness. The secret springs of +the great movements of the time are laid bare; the mean and paltry +instrumentalities are seen at work in the under world of corruption, +prejudice, and falsehood. No one, save a blind, unreasoning partisan of +Catholicism or Episcopacy, can contemplate this chapter in English +history without a feeling of disgust. However it may have been overruled +for good by that Providence which takes the wise in their own craftiness, +the revolution of 1688, in itself considered, affords just as little +cause for self-congratulation on the part of Protestants as the +substitution of the supremacy of the crowned Bluebeard, Henry VIII., for +that of the Pope, in the English Church. It had little in common with +the revolution of 1642. The field of its action was the closet of +selfish intrigue,--the stalls of discontented prelates,--the chambers of +the wanton and adulteress,--the confessional of a weak prince, whose +mind, originally narrow, had been cramped closer still by the strait- +jacket of religious bigotry and superstition. The age of nobility and +heroism had well-nigh passed away. The pious fervor, the self-denial, +and the strict morality of the Puritanism of the days of Cromwell, and +the blunt honesty and chivalrous loyalty of the Cavaliers, had both +measurably given place to the corrupting influences of the licentious and +infidel court of Charles II.; and to the arrogance, intolerance, and +shameless self-seeking of a prelacy which, in its day of triumph and +revenge, had more than justified the terrible denunciations and scathing +gibes of Milton. + +Both Catholic and Protestant writers have misrepresented James II. He +deserves neither the execrations of the one nor the eulogies of the +other. The candid historian must admit that he was, after all, a better +man than his brother Charles II. He was a sincere and bigoted Catholic, +and was undoubtedly honest in the declaration, which he made in that +unlucky letter which Burnet ferreted out on the Continent, that he was +prepared to make large steps to build up the Catholic Church in England, +and, if necessary, to become a martyr in her cause. He was proud, +austere, and self-willed. In the treatment of his enemies he partook of +the cruel temper of his time. He was at once ascetic and sensual, +alternating between the hair-shirt of penance and the embraces of +Catharine Sedley. His situation was one of the most difficult and +embarrassing which can be conceived of. He was at once a bigoted Papist +and a Protestant pope. He hated the French domination to which his +brother had submitted; yet his pride as sovereign was subordinated to his +allegiance to Rome and a superstitious veneration for the wily priests +with which Louis XIV. surrounded him. As the head of Anglican heretics, +he was compelled to submit to conditions galling alike to the sovereign +and the man. He found, on his accession, the terrible penal laws against +the Papists in full force; the hangman's knife was yet warm with its +ghastly butcher-work of quartering and disembowelling suspected Jesuits +and victims of the lie of Titus Oates; the Tower of London had scarcely +ceased to echo the groans of Catholic confessors stretched on the rack by +Protestant inquisitors. He was torn by conflicting interests and +spiritual and political contradictions. The prelates of the Established +Church must share the responsibility of many of the worst acts of the +early part of his reign. Oxford sent up its lawned deputations to mingle +the voice of adulation with the groans of tortured Covenanters, and +fawning ecclesiastics burned the incense of irreverent flattery under the +nostrils of the Lord's anointed, while the blessed air of England was +tainted by the carcasses of the ill-fated followers of Monmouth, rotting +on a thousand gibbets. While Jeffreys was threatening Baxter and his +Presbyterian friends with the pillory and whipping-post; while Quakers +and Baptists were only spared from extermination as game preserves for +the sport of clerical hunters; while the prisons were thronged with the +heads of some fifteen thousand beggared families, and Dissenters of every +name and degree were chased from one hiding-place to another, like David +among the cliffs of Ziph and the rocks of the wild goats,--the +thanksgivings and congratulations of prelacy arose in an unbroken strain +of laudation from all the episcopal palaces of England. What mattered it +to men, in whose hearts, to use the language of John Milton, "the sour +leaven of human traditions, mixed with the poisonous dregs of hypocrisy, +lay basking in the sunny warmth of wealth and promotion, hatching +Antichrist," that the privileges of Englishmen and the rights secured by +the great charter were violated and trodden under foot, so long as +usurpation enured to their own benefit? But when King James issued his +Declaration of Indulgence, and stretched his prerogative on the side of +tolerance and charity, the zeal of the prelates for preserving the +integrity of the British constitution and the limiting of the royal power +flamed up into rebellion. They forswore themselves without scruple: the +disciples of Laud, the asserters of kingly infallibility and divine +right, talked of usurped power and English rights in the strain of the +very schismatics whom they had persecuted to the death. There is no +reason to believe that James supposed that, in issuing his declaration +suspending the penal laws, he had transcended the rightful prerogative of +his throne. The power which he exercised had been used by his +predecessors for far less worthy purposes, and with the approbation of +many of the very men who now opposed him. His ostensible object, +expressed in language which even those who condemn his policy cannot but +admire, was a laudable and noble one. "We trust," said he, "that it will +not be vain that we have resolved to use our utmost endeavors to +establish liberty of conscience on such just and equal foundations as +will render it unalterable, and secure to all people the free exercise of +their religion, by which future ages may reap the benefit of what is so +undoubtedly the general good of the whole kingdom." Whatever may have +been the motive of this declaration,--even admitting the suspicions of +his enemies to have been true, that he advocated universal toleration as +the only means of restoring Roman Catholics to all the rights and +privileges of which the penal laws deprived them,--it would seem that +there could have been no very serious objection on the part of real +friends of religious toleration to the taking of him at his word and +placing Englishmen of every sect on an equality before the law. The +Catholics were in a very small minority, scarcely at that time as +numerous as the Quakers and Anabaptists. The army, the navy, and nine +tenths of the people of England were Protestants. Real danger, +therefore, from a simple act of justice towards their Catholic fellow- +citizens, the people of England had no ground for apprehending. But the +great truth, which is even now but imperfectly recognized throughout +Christendom, that religious opinions rest between man and his Maker, and +not between man and the magistrate, and that the domain of conscience is +sacred, was almost unknown to the statesmen and schoolmen of the +seventeenth century. Milton--ultra liberal as he was--excepted the +Catholics from his plan of toleration. Locke, yielding to the prejudices +of the time, took the same ground. The enlightened latitudinarian +ministers of the Established Church--men whose talents and Christian +charity redeem in some measure the character of that Church in the day of +its greatest power and basest apostasy--stopped short of universal +toleration. The Presbyterians excluded Quakers, Baptists, and Papists +from the pale of their charity. With the single exception of the sect of +which William Penn was a conspicuous member, the idea of complete and +impartial toleration was novel and unwelcome to all sects and classes of +the English people. Hence it was that the very men whose liberties and +estates had been secured by the declaration, and who were thereby +permitted to hold their meetings in peace and quietness, used their newly +acquired freedom in denouncing the king, because the same key which had +opened their prison doors had also liberated the Papists and the Quakers. +Baxter's severe and painful spirit could not rejoice in an act which had, +indeed, restored him to personal freedom, but which had, in his view, +also offended Heaven, and strengthened the powers of Antichrist by +extending the same favor to Jesuits and Ranters. Bunyan disliked the +Quakers next to the Papists; and it greatly lessened his satisfaction at +his release from Bedford jail that it had been brought about by the +influence of the former at the court of a Catholic prince. Dissenters +forgot the wrongs and persecutions which they had experienced at the +hands of the prelacy, and joined the bishops in opposition to the +declaration. They almost magnified into Christian confessors the +prelates who remonstrated against the indulgence, and actually plotted +against the king for restoring them to liberty of person and conscience. +The nightmare fear of Popery overcame their love of religious liberty; +and they meekly offered their necks to the yoke of prelacy as the only +security against the heavier one of Papist supremacy. In a far different +manner the cleareyed and plain-spoken John Milton met the claims and +demands of the hierarchy in his time. "They entreat us," said he, "that +we be not weary of the insupportable grievances that our shoulders have +hitherto cracked under; they beseech us that we think them fit to be our +justices of peace, our lords, our highest officers of state. They pray +us that it would please us to let them still haul us and wrong us with +their bandogs and pursuivants; and that it would please the Parliament +that they may yet have the whipping, fleecing, and flaying of us in their +diabolical courts, to tear the flesh from our bones, and into our wide +wounds, instead of balm, to pour in the oil of tartar, vitriol, and +mercury. Surely a right, reasonable, innocent, and soft-hearted +petition! O the relenting bowels of the fathers!" + +Considering the prominent part acted by William Penn in the reign of +James II., and his active and influential support of the obnoxious +declaration which precipitated the revolution of 1688, it could hardly +have been otherwise than that his character should suffer from the +unworthy suspicions and prejudices of his contemporaries. His views of +religious toleration were too far in advance of the age to be received +with favor. They were of necessity misunderstood and misrepresented. +All his life he had been urging them with the earnestness of one whose +convictions were the result, not so much of human reason as of what he +regarded as divine illumination. What the council of James yielded upon +grounds of state policy he defended on those of religious obligation. +He had suffered in person and estate for the exercise of his religion. +He had travelled over Holland and Germany, pleading with those in +authority for universal toleration and charity. On a sudden, on the +accession of James, the friend of himself and his family, he found +himself the most influential untitled citizen in the British realm. +He had free access to the royal ear. Asking nothing for himself or his +relatives, he demanded only that the good people of England should be no +longer despoiled of liberty and estate for their religious opinions. +James, as a Catholic, had in some sort a common interest with his +dissenting subjects, and the declaration was for their common relief. +Penn, conscious of the rectitude of his own motives and thoroughly +convinced of the Christian duty of toleration, welcomed that declaration +as the precursor of the golden age of liberty and love and good-will to +men. He was not the man to distrust the motives of an act so fully in +accordance with his lifelong aspirations and prayers. He was charitable +to a fault: his faith in his fellow-men was often stronger than a clearer +insight of their characters would have justified. He saw the errors of +the king, and deplored them; he denounced Jeffreys as a butcher who had +been let loose by the priests; and pitied the king, who was, he thought, +swayed by evil counsels. He remonstrated against the interference of the +king with Magdalen College; and reproved and rebuked the hopes and aims +of the more zealous and hot-headed Catholics, advising them to be content +with simple toleration. But the constitution of his mind fitted him +rather for the commendation of the good than the denunciation of the bad. +He had little in common with the bold and austere spirit of the Puritan +reformers. He disliked their violence and harshness; while, on the other +hand, he was attracted and pleased by the gentle disposition and mild +counsels of Locke, and Tillotson, and the latitudinarians of the English +Church. He was the intimate personal and political friend of Algernon +Sydney; sympathized with his republican theories, and shared his +abhorrence of tyranny, civil and ecclesiastical. He found in him a man +after his own heart,--genial, generous, and loving; faithful to duty and +the instincts of humanity; a true Christian gentleman. His sense of +gratitude was strong, and his personal friendships sometimes clouded his +judgment. In giving his support to the measures of James in behalf of +liberty of conscience, it must be admitted that he acted in consistency +with his principles and professions. To have taken ground against them, +he must have given the lie to his declarations from his youth upward. He +could not disown and deny his own favorite doctrine because it came from +the lips of a Catholic king and his Jesuit advisers; and in thus rising +above the prejudices of his time, and appealing to the reason and +humanity of the people of England in favor of a cordial indorsement on +the part of Parliament of the principles of the declaration, he believed +that he was subserving the best interests of his beloved country and +fulfilling the solemn obligations of religious duty. The downfall of +James exposed Penn to peril and obloquy. Perjured informers endeavored +to swear away his life; and, although nothing could be proved against him +beyond the fact that he had steadily supported the great measure of +toleration, he was compelled to live secluded in his private lodgings in +London for two or three years, with a proclamation for his arrest hanging +over his head. At length, the principal informer against him having been +found guilty of perjury, the government warrant was withdrawn; and Lords +Sidney, Rochester, and Somers, and the Duke of Buckingham, publicly bore +testimony that nothing had been urged against him save by impostors, and +that "they had known him, some of them, for thirty years, and had never +known him to do an ill thing, but many good offices." It is a matter of +regret that one professing to hold the impartial pen of history should +have given the sanction of his authority to the slanderous and false +imputations of such a man as Burnet, who has never been regarded as an +authentic chronicler. The pantheon of history should not be lightly +disturbed. A good man's character is the world's common legacy; and +humanity is not so rich in models of purity and goodness as to be able to +sacrifice such a reputation as that of William Penn to the point of an +antithesis or the effect of a paradox. + + Gilbert Burnet, in liberality as a politician and tolerance as a + Churchman, was far in advance of his order and time. It is true + that he shut out the Catholics from the pale of his charity and + barely tolerated the Dissenters. The idea of entire religious + liberty and equality shocked even his moderate degree of + sensitiveness. He met Penn at the court of the Prince of Orange, + and, after a long and fruitless effort to convince the Dissenter + that the penal laws against the Catholics should be enforced, and + allegiance to the Established Church continue the condition of + qualification for offices of trust and honor, and that he and his + friends should rest contented with simple toleration, he became + irritated by the inflexible adherence of Penn to the principle of + entire religious freedom. One of the most worthy sons of the + Episcopal Church, Thomas Clarkson, alluding to this discussion, says + "Burnet never mentioned him (Penn) afterwards but coldly or + sneeringly, or in a way to lower him in the estimation of the + reader, whenever he had occasion to speak of him in his History of + his Own Times." + + He was a man of strong prejudices; he lived in the midst of + revolutions, plots, and intrigues; he saw much of the worst side of + human nature; and he candidly admits, in the preface to his great + work, that he was inclined to think generally the worst of men and + parties, and that the reader should make allowance for this + inclination, although he had honestly tried to give the truth. Dr. + King, of Oxford, in his Anecdotes of his Own Times, p. 185, says: + "I knew Burnet: he was a furious party-man, and easily imposed upon + by any lying spirit of his faction; but he was a better pastor than + any man who is now seated on the bishops' bench." The Tory writers + --Swift, Pope, Arbuthnot, and others--have undoubtedly exaggerated + the defects of Burnet's narrative; while, on the other hand, his + Whig commentators have excused them on the ground of his avowed and + fierce partisanship. Dr. Johnson, in his blunt way, says: "I do not + believe Burnet intentionally lied; but he was so much prejudiced + that he took no pains to find out the truth." On the contrary, Sir + James Mackintosh, in the Edinburgh Review, speaks of the Bishop as + an honest writer, seldom substantially erroneous, though often + inaccurate in points of detail; and Macaulay, who has quite too + closely followed him in his history, defends him as at least quite + as accurate as his contemporary writers, and says that, "in his + moral character, as in his intellectual, great blemishes were more + than compensated by great excellences." + + + + +THE BORDER WAR OF 1708. + +The picturesque site of the now large village of Haverhill, on the +Merrimac River, was occupied a century and a half ago by some thirty +dwellings, scattered at unequal distances along the two principal roads, +one of which, running parallel with the river, intersected the other, +which ascended the hill northwardly and lost itself in the dark woods. +The log huts of the first settlers had at that time given place to +comparatively spacious and commodious habitations, framed and covered +with sawed boards, and cloven clapboards, or shingles. They were, many +of them, two stories in front, with the roof sloping off behind to a +single one; the windows few and small, and frequently so fitted as to be +opened with difficulty, and affording but a scanty supply of light and +air. Two or three of the best constructed were occupied as garrisons, +where, in addition to the family, small companies of soldiers were +quartered. On the high grounds rising from the river stood the mansions +of the well-defined aristocracy of the little settlement,--larger and +more imposing, with projecting upper stories and carved cornices. On the +front of one of these, over the elaborately wrought entablature of the +doorway, might be seen the armorial bearings of the honored family of +Saltonstall. Its hospitable door was now closed; no guests filled its +spacious hall or partook of the rich delicacies of its ample larder. +Death had been there; its venerable and respected occupant had just been +borne by his peers in rank and station to the neighboring graveyard. +Learned, affable, intrepid, a sturdy asserter of the rights and liberties +of the Province, and so far in advance of his time as to refuse to yield +to the terrible witchcraft delusion, vacating his seat on the bench and +openly expressing his disapprobation of the violent and sanguinary +proceedings of the court, wise in council and prompt in action,--not his +own townsmen alone, but the people of the entire Province, had reason to +mourn the loss of Nathaniel Saltonstall. + +Four years before the events of which we are about to speak, the Indian +allies of the French in Canada suddenly made their appearance in the +westerly part of the settlement. At the close of a midwinter day six +savages rushed into the open gate of a garrison-house owned by one +Bradley, who appears to have been absent at the time. A sentinel, +stationed in the house, discharged his musket, killing the foremost +Indian, and was himself instantly shot down. The mistress of the house, +a spirited young woman, was making soap in a large kettle over the fire. +--She seized her ladle and dashed the boiling liquid in the faces of the +assailants, scalding one of them severely, and was only captured after +such a resistance as can scarcely be conceived of by the delicately +framed and tenderly nurtured occupants of the places of our great- +grandmothers. After plundering the house, the Indians started on their +long winter march for Canada. Tradition says that some thirteen persons, +probably women and children, were killed outright at the garrison. +Goodwife Bradley and four others were spared as prisoners. The ground +was covered with deep snow, and the captives were compelled to carry +heavy burdens of their plundered household-stuffs; while for many days in +succession they had no other sustenance than bits of hide, ground-nuts, +the bark of trees, and the roots of wild onions, and lilies. In this +situation, in the cold, wintry forest, and unattended, the unhappy young +woman gave birth to a child. Its cries irritated the savages, who +cruelly treated it and threatened its life. To the entreaties of the +mother they replied, that they would spare it on the condition that it +should be baptized after their fashion. She gave the little innocent +into their hands, when with mock solemnity they made the sign of the +cross upon its forehead, by gashing it with their knives, and afterwards +barbarously put it to death before the eyes of its mother, seeming to +regard the whole matter as an excellent piece of sport. Nothing so +strongly excited the risibilities of these grim barbarians as the tears +and cries of their victims, extorted by physical or mental agony. +Capricious alike in their cruelties and their kindnesses, they treated +some of their captives with forbearance and consideration and tormented +others apparently without cause. One man, on his way to Canada, was +killed because they did not like his looks, "he was so sour;" another, +because he was "old and good for nothing." One of their own number, who +was suffering greatly from the effects of the scalding soap, was derided +and mocked as a "fool who had let a squaw whip him;" while on the other +hand the energy and spirit manifested by Goodwife Bradley in her defence +was a constant theme of admiration, and gained her so much respect among +her captors as to protect her from personal injury or insult. On her +arrival in Canada she was sold to a French farmer, by whom she was kindly +treated. + +In the mean time her husband made every exertion in his power to +ascertain her fate, and early in the next year learned that she was a +slave in Canada. He immediately set off through the wilderness on foot, +accompanied only by his dog, who drew a small sled, upon which he carried +some provisions for his sustenance, and a bag of snuff, which the +Governor of the Province gave him as a present to the Governor of Canada. +After encountering almost incredible hardships and dangers with a +perseverance which shows how well he appreciated the good qualities of +his stolen helpmate, he reached Montreal and betook himself to the +Governor's residence. Travel-worn, ragged, and wasted with cold and +hunger, he was ushered into the presence of M. Vaudreuil. The courtly +Frenchman civilly received the gift of the bag of snuff, listened to the +poor fellow's story, and put him in a way to redeem his wife without +difficulty. The joy of the latter on seeing her husband in the strange +land of her captivity may well be imagined. They returned by water, +landing at Boston early in the summer. + +There is a tradition that this was not the goodwife's first experience of +Indian captivity. The late Dr. Abiel Abbott, in his manuscript of Judith +Whiting's _Recollections of the Indian Wars_, states that she had +previously been a prisoner, probably before her marriage. After her +return she lived quietly at the garrison-house until the summer of the +next year. One bright moonlit-night a party of Indians were seen +silently and cautiously approaching. The only occupants of the garrison +at that time were Bradley, his wife and children, and a servant. The +three adults armed themselves with muskets, and prepared to defend +themselves. Goodwife Bradley, supposing the Indians had come with the +intention of again capturing her, encouraged her husband to fight to the +last, declaring that she had rather die on her own hearth than fall into +their hands. The Indians rushed upon the garrison, and assailed the +thick oaken door, which they forced partly open, when a well-aimed shot +from Goodwife Bradley laid the foremost dead on the threshold. The loss +of their leader so disheartened them that they made a hasty retreat. + +The year 1707 passed away without any attack upon the exposed frontier +settlement. A feeling of comparative security succeeded to the almost +sleepless anxiety and terror of the inhabitants; and they were beginning +to congratulate each other upon the termination of their long and bitter +trials. But the end was not yet. + +Early in the spring of 1708, the principal tribes of Indians in alliance +with the French held a great council, and agreed to furnish three hundred +warriors for an expedition to the English frontier. + +They were joined by one hundred French Canadians and several volunteers, +consisting of officers of the French army, and younger sons of the +nobility, adventurous and unscrupulous. The Sieur de Chaillons, and +Hertel de Rouville, distinguished as a partisan in former expeditions, +cruel and unsparing as his Indian allies, commanded the French troops; +the Indians, marshalled under their several chiefs, obeyed the general +orders of La Perriere. A Catholic priest accompanied them. De Ronville, +with the French troops and a portion of the Indians, took the route by +the River St. Francois about the middle of summer. La Perriere, with the +French Mohawks, crossed Lake Champlain. The place of rendezvous was Lake +Nickisipigue. On the way a Huron accidentally killed one of his +companions; whereupon the tribe insisted on halting and holding a +council. It was gravely decided that this accident was an evil omen, and +that the expedition would prove disastrous; and, in spite of the +endeavors of the French officers, the whole band deserted. Next the +Mohawks became dissatisfied, and refused to proceed. To the entreaties +and promises of their French allies they replied that an infectious +disease had broken out among them, and that, if they remained, it would +spread through the whole army. The French partisans were not deceived by +a falsehood so transparent; but they were in no condition to enforce +obedience; and, with bitter execrations and reproaches, they saw the +Mohawks turn back on their warpath. The diminished army pressed on to +Nickisipigue, in the expectation of meeting, agreeably to their promise, +the Norridgewock and Penobscot Indians. They found the place deserted, +and, after waiting for some days, were forced to the conclusion that the +Eastern tribes had broken their pledge of cooperation. Under these +circumstances a council was held; and the original design of the +expedition, namely, the destruction of the whole line of frontier towns, +beginning with Portsmouth, was abandoned. They had still a sufficient +force for the surprise of a single settlement; and Haverhill, on the +Merrimac, was selected for conquest. + +In the mean time, intelligence of the expedition, greatly exaggerated in +point of numbers and object, had reached Boston, and Governor Dudley had +despatched troops to the more exposed out posts of the Provinces of +Massachusetts and New Hampshire. Forty men, under the command of Major +Turner and Captains Price and Gardner, were stationed at Haverhill in the +different garrison-houses. At first a good degree of vigilance was +manifested; but, as days and weeks passed without any alarm, the +inhabitants relapsed into their old habits; and some even began to +believe that the rumored descent of the Indians was only a pretext for +quartering upon them two-score of lazy, rollicking soldiers, who +certainly seemed more expert in making love to their daughters, and +drinking their best ale and cider, than in patrolling the woods or +putting the garrisons into a defensible state. The grain and hay harvest +ended without disturbance; the men worked in their fields, and the women +pursued their household avocations, without any very serious apprehension +of danger. + +Among the inhabitants of the village was an eccentric, ne'er-do-well +fellow, named Keezar, who led a wandering, unsettled life, oscillating, +like a crazy pendulum, between Haverhill and Amesbury. He had a +smattering of a variety of trades, was a famous wrestler, and for a mug +of ale would leap over an ox-cart with the unspilled beverage in his +hand. On one occasion, when at supper, his wife complained that she had +no tin dishes; and, as there were none to be obtained nearer than Boston, +he started on foot in the evening, travelled through the woods to the +city, and returned with his ware by sunrise the next morning, passing +over a distance of between sixty and seventy miles. The tradition of his +strange habits, feats of strength, and wicked practical jokes is still +common in his native town. On the morning of the 29th of the eighth +month he was engaged in taking home his horse, which, according to his +custom, he had turned into his neighbor's rich clover field the evening +previous. By the gray light of dawn he saw a long file of men marching +silently towards the town. He hurried back to the village and gave the +alarm by firing a gun. Previous to this, however, a young man belonging +to a neighboring town, who had been spending the night with a young woman +of the village, had met the advance of the war-party, and, turning back +in extreme terror and confusion, thought only of the safety of his +betrothed, and passed silently through a considerable part of the village +to her dwelling. After he had effectually concealed her he ran out to +give the alarm. But it was too late. Keezar's gun was answered by the +terrific yells, whistling, and whooping of the Indians. House after +house was assailed and captured. Men, women, and children were +massacred. The minister of the town was killed by a shot through his +door. Two of his children were saved by the courage and sagacity of his +negro slave Hagar. She carried them into the cellar and covered them +with tubs, and then crouched behind a barrel of meat just in time to +escape the vigilant eyes of the enemy, who entered the cellar and +plundered it. She saw them pass and repass the tubs under which the +children lay and take meat from the very barrel which concealed herself. +Three soldiers were quartered in the house; but they made no defence, and +were killed while begging for quarter. + +The wife of Thomas Hartshorne, after her husband and three sons had +fallen, took her younger children into the cellar, leaving an infant on a +bed in the garret, fearful that its cries would betray her place of +concealment if she took it with her. The Indians entered the garret and +tossed the child out of the window upon a pile of clapboards, where it +was afterwards found stunned and insensible. It recovered, nevertheless, +and became a man of remarkable strength and stature; and it used to be a +standing joke with his friends that he had been stinted by the Indians +when they threw him out of the window. Goodwife Swan, armed with a long +spit, successfully defended her door against two Indians. While the +massacre went on, the priest who accompanied the expedition, with some of +the French officers, went into the meeting-house, the walls of which were +afterwards found written over with chalk. At sunrise, Major Turner, with +a portion of his soldiers, entered the village; and the enemy made a +rapid retreat, carrying with them seventeen, prisoners. They were +pursued and overtaken just as they were entering the woods; and a severe +skirmish took place, in which the rescue of some of the prisoners was +effected. Thirty of the enemy were left dead on the field, including the +infamous Hertel de Rouville. On the part of the villagers, Captains Ayer +and Wainwright and Lieutenant Johnson, with thirteen others, were killed. +The intense heat of the weather made it necessary to bury the dead on the +same day. They were laid side by side in a long trench in the burial- +ground. The body of the venerated and lamented minister, with those of +his wife and child, sleep in another part of the burial-ground, where may +still be seen a rude monument with its almost llegible inscription:-- + +"_Clauditur hoc tumulo corpus Reverendi pii doctique viri D. Benjamin +Rolfe, ecclesiae Christi quae est in Haverhill pastoris fidelissimi; qui +domi suae ab hostibus barbare trucidatus. A laboribus suis requievit +mane diei sacrae quietis, Aug. XXIX, anno Dom. MDCCVIII. AEtatis suae +XLVI_." + +Of the prisoners taken, some escaped during the skirmish, and two or +three were sent back by the French officers, with a message to the +English soldiers, that, if they pursued the party on their retreat to +Canada, the other prisoners should be put to death. One of them, a +soldier stationed in Captain Wainwright's garrison, on his return four +years after, published an account of his captivity. He was compelled to +carry a heavy pack, and was led by an Indian by a cord round his neck. +The whole party suffered terribly from hunger. On reaching Canada the +Indians shaved one side of his head, and greased the other, and painted +his face. At a fort nine miles from Montreal a council was held in order +to decide his fate; and he had the unenviable privilege of listening to a +protracted discussion upon the expediency of burning him. The fire was +already kindled, and the poor fellow was preparing to meet his doom with +firmness, when it was announced to him that his life was spared. This +result of the council by no means satisfied the women and boys, who had +anticipated rare sport in the roasting of a white man and a heretic. One +squaw assailed him with a knife and cut off one of his fingers; another +beat him with a pole. The Indians spent the night in dancing and +singing, compelling their prisoner to go round the ring with them. In +the morning one of their orators made a long speech to him, and formally +delivered him over to an old squaw, who took him to her wigwam and +treated him kindly. Two or three of the young women who were carried +away captive married Frenchmen in Canada and never returned. Instances +of this kind were by no means rare during the Indian wars. The simple +manners, gayety, and social habits of the French colonists among whom the +captives were dispersed seem to have been peculiarly fascinating to the +daughters of the grave and severe Puritans. + +At the beginning of the present century, Judith Whiting was the solitary +survivor of all who witnessed the inroad of the French and Indians in +1708. She was eight years of age at the time of the attack, and her +memory of it to the last was distinct and vivid. Upon her old brain, +from whence a great portion of the records of the intervening years had +been obliterated, that terrible picture, traced with fire and blood, +retained its sharp outlines and baleful colors. + + + + +THE GREAT IPSWICH FRIGHT. + + "The Frere into the dark gazed forth; + The sounds went onward towards the north + The murmur of tongues, the tramp and tread + Of a mighty army to battle led." + BALLAD OF THE CID. + + +Life's tragedy and comedy are never far apart. The ludicrous and the +sublime, the grotesque and the pathetic, jostle each other on the stage; +the jester, with his cap and bells, struts alongside of the hero; the +lord mayor's pageant loses itself in the mob around Punch and Judy; the +pomp and circumstance of war become mirth-provoking in a militia muster; +and the majesty of the law is ridiculous in the mock dignity of a +justice's court. The laughing philosopher of old looked on one side of +life and his weeping contemporary on the other; but he who has an eye to +both must often experience that contrariety of feeling which Sterne +compares to "the contest in the moist eyelids of an April morning, +whether to laugh or cry." + +The circumstance we are about to relate, may serve as an illustration of +the way in which the woof of comedy interweaves with the warp of tragedy. +It occurred in the early stages of the American Revolution, and is part +and parcel of its history in the northeastern section of Massachusetts. + +About midway between Salem and the ancient town of Newburyport, the +traveller on the Eastern Railroad sees on the right, between him and the +sea, a tall church-spire, rising above a semicircle of brown roofs and +venerable elms; to which a long scalloping range of hills, sweeping off +to the seaside, forms a green background. This is Ipswich, the ancient +Agawam; one of those steady, conservative villages, of which a few are +still left in New England, wherein a contemporary of Cotton Mather and +Governor Endicott, were he permitted to revisit the scenes of his painful +probation, would scarcely feel himself a stranger. Law and Gospel, +embodied in an orthodox steeple and a court-house, occupy the steep, +rocky eminence in its midst; below runs the small river under its +picturesque stone bridge; and beyond is the famous female seminary, where +Andover theological students are wont to take unto themselves wives of +the daughters of the Puritans. An air of comfort and quiet broods over +the whole town. Yellow moss clings to the seaward sides of the roofs; +one's eyes are not endangered by the intense glare of painted shingles +and clapboards. The smoke of hospitable kitchens curls up through the +overshadowing elms from huge-throated chimneys, whose hearth-stones have +been worn by the feet of many generations. The tavern was once renowned +throughout New England, and it is still a creditable hostelry. During +court time it is crowded with jocose lawyers, anxious clients, sleepy +jurors, and miscellaneous hangers on; disinterested gentlemen, who have +no particular business of their own in court, but who regularly attend +its sessions, weighing evidence, deciding upon the merits of a lawyer's +plea or a judge's charge, getting up extempore trials upon the piazza or +in the bar-room of cases still involved in the glorious uncertainty of +the law in the court-house, proffering gratuitous legal advice to +irascible plaintiffs and desponding defendants, and in various other ways +seeing that the Commonwealth receives no detriment. In the autumn old +sportsmen make the tavern their headquarters while scouring the marshes +for sea-birds; and slim young gentlemen from the city return thither with +empty game-bags, as guiltless in respect to the snipes and wagtails as +Winkle was in the matter of the rooks, after his shooting excursion at +Dingle Dell. Twice, nay, three times, a year, since third parties have +been in fashion, the delegates of the political churches assemble in +Ipswich to pass patriotic resolutions, and designate the candidates whom +the good people of Essex County, with implicit faith in the wisdom of the +selection, are expected to vote for. For the rest there are pleasant +walks and drives around the picturesque village. The people are noted +for their hospitality; in summer the sea-wind blows cool over its healthy +hills, and, take it for all in all, there is not a better preserved or +pleasanter specimen of a Puritan town remaining in the ancient +Commonwealth. + +The 21st of April, 1775, witnessed an awful commotion in the little +village of Ipswich. Old men, and boys, (the middle-aged had marched to +Lexington some days before) and all the women in the place who were not +bedridden or sick, came rushing as with one accord to the green in front +of the meeting-house. A rumor, which no one attempted to trace or +authenticate, spread from lip to lip that the British regulars had landed +on the coast and were marching upon the town. A scene of indescribable +terror and confusion followed. Defence was out of the question, as the +young and able-bodied men of the entire region round about had marched to +Cambridge and Lexington. The news of the battle at the latter place, +exaggerated in all its details, had been just received; terrible stories +of the atrocities committed by the dreaded "regulars" had been related; +and it was believed that nothing short of a general extermination of the +patriots--men, women, and children--was contemplated by the British +commander.--Almost simultaneously the people of Beverly, a village a few +miles distant, were smitten with the same terror. How the rumor was +communicated no one could tell. It was there believed that the enemy had +fallen upon Ipswich, and massacred the inhabitants without regard to age +or sex. + +It was about the middle of the afternoon of this day that the people of +Newbury, ten miles farther north, assembled in an informal meeting, at +the town-house to hear accounts from the Lexington fight, and to consider +what action was necessary in consequence of that event. Parson Carey was +about opening the meeting with prayer when hurried hoof-beats sounded up +the street, and a messenger, loose-haired and panting for breath, rushed +up the staircase. "Turn out, turn out, for God's sake," he cried, "or +you will be all killed! The regulars are marching onus; they are at +Ipswich now, cutting and slashing all before them!" Universal +consternation was the immediate result of this fearful announcement; +Parson Carey's prayer died on his lips; the congregation dispersed over +the town, carrying to every house the tidings that the regulars had come. +Men on horseback went galloping up and down the streets, shouting the +alarm. Women and children echoed it from every corner. The panic became +irresistible, uncontrollable. Cries were heard that the dreaded invaders +had reached Oldtown Bridge, a little distance from the village, and that +they were killing all whom they encountered. Flight was resolved upon. +All the horses and vehicles in the town were put in requisition; men, +women, and children hurried as for life towards the north. Some threw +their silver and pewter ware and other valuables into wells. Large +numbers crossed the Merrimac, and spent the night in the deserted houses +of Salisbury, whose inhabitants, stricken by the strange terror, had fled +into New Hampshire, to take up their lodgings in dwellings also abandoned +by their owners. A few individuals refused to fly with the multitude; +some, unable to move by reason of sickness, were left behind by their +relatives. One old gentleman, whose excessive corpulence rendered +retreat on his part impossible, made a virtue of necessity; and, seating +himself in his doorway with his loaded king's arm, upbraided his more +nimble neighbors, advising them to do as he did, and "stop and shoot the +devils." Many ludicrous instances of the intensity of the terror might +be related. One man got his family into a boat to go to Ram Island for +safety. He imagined he was pursued by the enemy through the dusk of the +evening, and was annoyed by the crying of an infant in the after part of +the boat. "Do throw that squalling brat overboard," he called to his +wife, "or we shall be all discovered and killed!" A poor woman ran four +or five miles up the river, and stopped to take breath and nurse her +child, when she found to her great horror that she had brought off the +cat instead of the baby! + +All through that memorable night the terror swept onward towards the +north with a speed which seems almost miraculous, producing everywhere +the same results. At midnight a horseman, clad only in shirt and +breeches, dashed by our grandfather's door, in Haverhill, twenty miles up +the river. "Turn out! Get a musket! Turn out!" he shouted; "the +regulars are landing on Plum Island!" "I'm glad of it," responded the +old gentleman from his chamber window; "I wish they were all there, and +obliged to stay there." When it is understood that Plum Island is little +more than a naked sand-ridge, the benevolence of this wish can be readily +appreciated. + +All the boats on the river were constantly employed for several hours in +conveying across the terrified fugitives. Through "the dead waste and +middle of the night" they fled over the border into New Hampshire. Some +feared to take the frequented roads, and wandered over wooded hills and +through swamps where the snows of the late winter had scarcely melted. +They heard the tramp and outcry of those behind them, and fancied that +the sounds were made by pursuing enemies. Fast as they fled, the terror, +by some unaccountable means, outstripped them. They found houses +deserted and streets strewn with household stuffs, abandoned in the hurry +of escape. Towards morning, however, the tide partially turned. Grown +men began to feel ashamed of their fears. The old Anglo-Saxon hardihood +paused and looked the terror in its face. Single or in small parties, +armed with such weapons as they found at hand,--among which long poles, +sharpened and charred at the end, were conspicuous,--they began to +retrace their steps. In the mean time such of the good people of Ipswich +as were unable or unwilling to leave their homes became convinced that +the terrible rumor which had nearly depopulated their settlement was +unfounded. + +Among those who had there awaited the onslaught of the regulars was a +young man from Exeter, New Hampshire. Becoming satisfied that the whole +matter was a delusion, he mounted his horse and followed after the +retreating multitude, undeceiving all whom he overtook. Late at night +he reached Newburyport, greatly to the relief of its sleepless +inhabitants, and hurried across the river, proclaiming as he rode the +welcome tidings. The sun rose upon haggard and jaded fugitives, worn +with excitement and fatigue, slowly returning homeward, their +satisfaction at the absence of danger somewhat moderated by an unpleasant +consciousness of the ludicrous scenes of their premature night flitting. + +Any inference which might be drawn from the foregoing narrative +derogatory to the character of the people of New England at that day, on +the score of courage, would be essentially erroneous. It is true, they +were not the men to court danger or rashly throw away their lives for the +mere glory of the sacrifice. They had always a prudent and wholesome +regard to their own comfort and safety; they justly looked upon sound +heads and limbs as better than broken ones; life was to them too serious +and important, and their hard-gained property too valuable, to be lightly +hazarded. They never attempted to cheat themselves by under-estimating +the difficulty to be encountered, or shutting their eyes to its probable +consequences. Cautious, wary, schooled in the subtle strategy of Indian +warfare, where self-preservation is by no means a secondary object, they +had little in common with the reckless enthusiasm of their French allies, +or the stolid indifference of the fighting machines of the British +regular army. When danger could no longer be avoided, they met it with +firmness and iron endurance, but with a very vivid appreciation of its +magnitude. Indeed, it must be admitted by all who are familiar with the +history of our fathers that the element of fear held an important place +among their characteristics. It exaggerated all the dangers of their +earthly pilgrimage, and peopled the future with shapes of evil. Their +fear of Satan invested him with some of the attributes of Omnipotence, +and almost reached the point of reverence. The slightest shock of an +earthquake filled all hearts with terror. Stout men trembled by their +hearths with dread of some paralytic old woman supposed to be a witch. +And when they believed themselves called upon to grapple with these +terrors and endure the afflictions of their allotment, they brought to +the trial a capability of suffering undiminished by the chloroform of +modern philosophy. They were heroic in endurance. Panics like the one +we have described might bow and sway them like reeds in the wind; but +they stood up like the oaks of their own forests beneath the thunder and +the hail of actual calamity. + +It was certainly lucky for the good people of Essex County that no wicked +wag of a Tory undertook to immortalize in rhyme their ridiculous hegira, +as Judge Hopkinson did the famous Battle of the Kegs in Philadelphia. +Like the more recent Madawaska war in Maine, the great Chepatchet +demonstration in Rhode Island, and the "Sauk fuss" of Wisconsin, it +remains to this day "unsyllabled, unsung;" and the fast-fading memory of +age alone preserves the unwritten history of the great Ipswich fright. + + + + +POPE NIGHT. + + "Lay up the fagots neat and trim; + Pile 'em up higher; + Set 'em afire! + The Pope roasts us, and we 'll roast him!" + Old Song. + +The recent attempt of the Romish Church to reestablish its hierarchy in +Great Britain, with the new cardinal, Dr. Wiseman, at its head, seems to +have revived an old popular custom, a grim piece of Protestant sport, +which, since the days of Lord George Gordon and the "No Popery" mob, had +very generally fallen into disuse. On the 5th of the eleventh month of +this present year all England was traversed by processions and lighted up +with bonfires, in commemoration of the detection of the "gunpowder plot" +of Guy Fawkes and the Papists in 1605. Popes, bishops, and cardinals, in +straw and pasteboard, were paraded through the streets and burned amid +the shouts of the populace, a great portion of whom would have doubtless +been quite as ready to do the same pleasant little office for the Bishop +of Exeter or his Grace of Canterbury, if they could have carted about and +burned in effigy a Protestant hierarchy as safely as a Catholic one. + +In this country, where every sect takes its own way, undisturbed by legal +restrictions, each ecclesiastical tub balancing itself as it best may on +its own bottom, and where bishops Catholic and bishops Episcopal, bishops +Methodist and bishops Mormon, jostle each other in our thoroughfares, it +is not to be expected that we should trouble ourselves with the matter at +issue between the rival hierarchies on the other side of the water. It +is a very pretty quarrel, however, and good must come out of it, as it +cannot fail to attract popular attention to the shallowness of the +spiritual pretensions of both parties, and lead to the conclusion that a +hierarchy of any sort has very little in common with the fishermen and +tent-makers of the New Testament. + +Pope Night--the anniversary of the discovery of the Papal incendiary Guy +Fawkes, booted and spurred, ready to touch fire to his powder-train under +the Parliament House--was celebrated by the early settlers of New +England, and doubtless afforded a good deal of relief to the younger +plants of grace in the Puritan vineyard. In those solemn old days, the +recurrence of the powder-plot anniversary, with its processions, hideous +images of the Pope and Guy Fawkes, its liberal potations of strong +waters, and its blazing bonfires reddening the wild November hills, must +have been looked forward to with no slight degree of pleasure. For one +night, at least, the cramped and smothered fun and mischief of the +younger generation were permitted to revel in the wild extravagance +of a Roman saturnalia or the Christmas holidays of a slave plantation. +Bigotry--frowning upon the May-pole, with its flower wreaths and sportive +revellers, and counting the steps of the dancers as so many steps towards +perdition--recognized in the grim farce of Guy Fawkes's anniversary +something of its own lineaments, smiled complacently upon the riotous +young actors, and opened its close purse to furnish tar-barrels to roast +the Pope, and strong water to moisten the throats of his noisy judges and +executioners. + +Up to the time of the Revolution the powder plot was duly commemorated +throughout New England. At that period the celebration of it was +discountenanced, and in many places prohibited, on the ground that it was +insulting to our Catholic allies from France. In Coffin's History of +Newbury it is stated that, in 1774, the town authorities of Newburyport +ordered "that no effigies be carried about or exhibited only in the +daytime." The last public celebration in that town was in the following +year. Long before the close of the last century the exhibitions of Pope +Night had entirely ceased throughout the country, with, as far as we can +learn, a solitary exception. The stranger who chances to be travelling +on the road between Newburyport and Haverhill, on the night of the 5th of +November, may well fancy that an invasion is threatened from the sea, or +that an insurrection is going on inland; for from all the high hills +overlooking the river tall fires are seen blazing redly against the cold, +dark, autumnal sky, surrounded by groups of young men and boys busily +engaged in urging them with fresh fuel into intenser activity. To feed +these bonfires, everything combustible which could be begged or stolen +from the neighboring villages, farm-houses, and fences is put in +requisition. Old tar-tubs, purloined from the shipbuilders of the +river-side, and flour and lard barrels from the village-traders, are +stored away for days, and perhaps weeks, in the woods or in the rain- +gullies of the hills, in preparation for Pope Night. From the earliest +settlement of the towns of Amesbury and Salisbury, the night of the +powder plot has been thus celebrated, with unbroken regularity, down to +the present time. The event which it once commemorated is probably now +unknown to most of the juvenile actors. The symbol lives on from +generation to generation after the significance is lost; and we have seen +the children of our Catholic neighbors as busy as their Protestant +playmates in collecting, "by hook or by crook," the materials for Pope- +Night bonfires. We remember, on one occasion, walking out with a gifted +and learned Catholic friend to witness the fine effect of the +illumination on the hills, and his hearty appreciation of its picturesque +and wild beauty,--the busy groups in the strong relief of the fires, and +the play and corruscation of the changeful lights on the bare, brown +hills, naked trees, and autumn clouds. + +In addition to the bonfires on the hills, there was formerly a procession +in the streets, bearing grotesque images of the Pope, his cardinals and +friars; and behind them Satan himself, a monster with huge ox-horns on +his head, and a long tail, brandishing his pitchfork and goading them +onward. The Pope was generally furnished with a movable head, which +could be turned round, thrown back, or made to bow, like that of a china- +ware mandarin. An aged inhabitant of the neighborhood has furnished us +with some fragments of the songs sung on such occasions, probably the +same which our British ancestors trolled forth around their bonfires two +centuries ago:-- + + "The fifth of November, + As you well remember, + Was gunpowder treason and plot; + And where is the reason + That gunpowder treason + Should ever be forgot?" + + "When James the First the sceptre swayed, + This hellish powder plot was laid; + They placed the powder down below, + All for Old England's overthrow. + Lucky the man, and happy the day, + That caught Guy Fawkes in the middle of his play!" + + "Hark! our bell goes jink, jink, jink; + Pray, madam, pray, sir, give us something to drink; + Pray, madam, pray, sir, if you'll something give, + We'll burn the dog, and not let him live. + We'll burn the dog without his head, + And then you'll say the dog is dead." + + "Look here! from Rome The Pope has come, + That fiery serpent dire; + Here's the Pope that we have got, + The old promoter of the plot; + We'll stick a pitchfork in his back, + And throw him in the fire!" + +There is a slight savor of a Smithfield roasting about these lines, such +as regaled the senses of the Virgin Queen or Bloody Mary, which entirely +reconciles us to their disuse at the present time. + +It should be the fervent prayer of all good men that the evil spirit of +religious hatred and intolerance, which on the one hand prompted the +gunpowder plot, and which on the other has ever since made it the +occasion of reproach and persecution of an entire sect of professing +Christians, may be no longer perpetuated. In the matter of exclusiveness +and intolerance, none of the older sects can safely reproach each other; +and it becomes all to hope and labor for the coming of that day when the +hymns of Cowper and the Confessions of Augustine, the humane philosophy +of Channing and the devout meditations of Thomas a Kempis, the simple +essays of Woolman and the glowing periods of Bossuet, shall be regarded +as the offspring of one spirit and one faith,--lights of a common altar, +and precious stones in the temple of the one universal Church. + + + + +THE BOY CAPTIVES. AN INCIDENT OF THE INDIAN WAR OF 1695. + +The township of Haverhill, even as late as the close of the seventeenth +century, was a frontier settlement, occupying an advanced position in the +great wilderness, which, unbroken by the clearing of a white man, +extended from the Merrimac River to the French villages on the St. +Francois. A tract of twelve miles on the river and three or four +northwardly was occupied by scattered settlers, while in the centre of +the town a compact village had grown up. In the immediate vicinity there +were but few Indians, and these generally peaceful and inoffensive. On +the breaking out of the Narragansett war, the inhabitants had erected +fortifications and taken other measures for defence; but, with the +possible exception of one man who was found slain in the woods in 1676, +none of the inhabitants were molested; and it was not until about the +year 1689 that the safety of the settlement was seriously threatened. +Three persons were killed in that year. In 1690 six garrisons were +established in different parts of the town, with a small company of +soldiers attached to each. Two of these houses are still standing. They +were built of brick, two stories high, with a single outside door, so +small and narrow that but one person could enter at a time; the windows +few, and only about two and a half feet long by eighteen inches with +thick diamond glass secured with lead, and crossed inside with bars of +iron. The basement had but two rooms, and the chamber was entered by a +ladder instead of stairs; so that the inmates, if driven thither, could +cut off communication with the rooms below. Many private houses were +strengthened and fortified. We remember one familiar to our boyhood,-- +a venerable old building of wood, with brick between the weather boards +and ceiling, with a massive balustrade over the door, constructed of oak +timber and plank, with holes through the latter for firing upon +assailants. The door opened upon a stone-paved hall, or entry, leading +into the huge single room of the basement, which was lighted by two small +windows, the ceiling black with the smoke of a century and a half; a huge +fireplace, calculated for eight-feet wood, occupying one entire side; +while, overhead, suspended from the timbers, or on shelves fastened to +them, were household stores, farming utensils, fishing-rods, guns, +bunches of herbs gathered perhaps a century ago, strings of dried apples +and pumpkins, links of mottled sausages, spareribs, and flitches of +bacon; the firelight of an evening dimly revealing the checked woollen +coverlet of the bed in one far-off corner, while in another "the pewter +plates on the dresser Caught and reflected the flame as shields of armies +the sunshine." + +Tradition has preserved many incidents of life in the garrisons. In +times of unusual peril the settlers generally resorted at night to the +fortified houses, taking thither their flocks and herds and such +household valuables as were most likely to strike the fancy or minister +to the comfort or vanity of the heathen marauders. False alarms were +frequent. The smoke of a distant fire, the bark of a dog in the deep +woods, a stump or bush taking in the uncertain light of stars and moon +the appearance of a man, were sufficient to spread alarm through the +entire settlement, and to cause the armed men of the garrison to pass +whole nights in sleepless watching. It is said that at Haselton's +garrison-house the sentinel on duty saw, as he thought, an Indian inside +of the paling which surrounded the building, and apparently seeking to +gain an entrance. He promptly raised his musket and fired at the +intruder, alarming thereby the entire garrison. The women and children +left their beds, and the men seized their guns and commenced firing on +the suspicious object; but it seemed to bear a charmed life, and remained +unharmed. As the morning dawned, however, the mystery was solved by the +discovery of a black quilted petticoat hanging on the clothes-line, +completely riddled with balls. + +As a matter of course, under circumstances of perpetual alarm and +frequent peril, the duty of cultivating their fields, and gathering their +harvests, and working at their mechanical avocations was dangerous and +difficult to the settlers. One instance will serve as an illustration. +At the garrison-house of Thomas Dustin, the husband of the far-famed Mary +Dustin, (who, while a captive of the Indians, and maddened by the murder +of her infant child, killed and scalped, with the assistance of a young +boy, the entire band of her captors, ten in number,) the business of +brick-making was carried on. The pits where the clay was found were only +a few rods from the house; yet no man ventured to bring the clay to the +yard within the enclosure without the attendance of a file of soldiers. +An anecdote relating to this garrison has been handed down to the present +tune. Among its inmates were two young cousins, Joseph and Mary +Whittaker; the latter a merry, handsome girl, relieving the tedium of +garrison duty with her light-hearted mirthfulness, and + + "Making a sunshine in that shady place." + +Joseph, in the intervals of his labors in the double capacity of brick- +maker and man-at-arms, was assiduous in his attentions to his fair +cousin, who was not inclined to encourage him. Growing desperate, he +threatened one evening to throw himself into the garrison well. His +threat only called forth the laughter of his mistress; and, bidding her +farewell, he proceeded to put it in execution. On reaching the well he +stumbled over a log; whereupon, animated by a happy idea, he dropped the +wood into the water instead of himself, and, hiding behind the curb, +awaited the result. Mary, who had been listening at the door, and who +had not believed her lover capable of so rash an act, heard the sudden +plunge of the wooden Joseph. She ran to the well, and, leaning over the +curb and peering down the dark opening, cried out, in tones of anguish +and remorse, "O Joseph, if you're in the land of the living, I 'll have +you!" "I'll take ye at your word," answered Joseph, springing up from +his hiding-place, and avenging himself for her coyness and coldness by a +hearty embrace. + +Our own paternal ancestor, owing to religious scruples in the matter of +taking arms even for defence of life and property, refused to leave his +undefended house and enter the garrison. The Indians frequently came to +his house; and the family more than once in the night heard them +whispering under the windows, and saw them put their copper faces to the +glass to take a view of the apartments. Strange as it may seen, they +never offered any injury or insult to the inmates. + +In 1695 the township was many times molested by Indians, and several +persons were killed and wounded. Early in the fall a small party made +their appearance in the northerly part of the town, where, finding two +boys at work in an open field, they managed to surprise and capture them, +and, without committing further violence, retreated through the woods to +their homes on the shore of Lake Winnipesaukee. Isaac Bradley, aged +fifteen, was a small but active and vigorous boy; his companion in +captivity, Joseph Whittaker, was only eleven, yet quite as large in size, +and heavier in his movements. After a hard and painful journey they +arrived at the lake, and were placed in an Indian family, consisting of a +man and squaw and two or three children. Here they soon acquired a +sufficient knowledge of the Indian tongue to enable them to learn from +the conversation carried on in their presence that it was designed to +take them to Canada in the spring. This discovery was a painful one. +Canada, the land of Papist priests and bloody Indians, was the especial +terror of the New England settlers, and the anathema maranatha of Puritan +pulpits. Thither the Indians usually hurried their captives, where they +compelled them to work in their villages or sold them to the French +planters. Escape from thence through a deep wilderness, and across lakes +and mountains and almost impassable rivers, without food or guide, was +regarded as an impossibility. The poor boys, terrified by the prospect +of being carried still farther from their home and friends, began to +dream of escaping from their masters before they started for Canada. It +was now winter; it would have been little short of madness to have chosen +for flight that season of bitter cold and deep snows. Owing to exposure +and want of proper food and clothing, Isaac, the eldest of the boys, was +seized with a violent fever, from which he slowly recovered in the course +of the winter. His Indian mistress was as kind to him as her +circumstances permitted,--procuring medicinal herbs and roots for her +patient, and tenderly watching over him in the long winter nights. +Spring came at length; the snows melted; and the ice was broken up on the +lake. The Indians began to make preparations for journeying to Canada; +and Isaac, who had during his sickness devised a plan of escape, saw that +the time of putting it in execution had come. On the evening before he +was to make the attempt he for the first time informed his younger +companion of his design, and told him, if he intended to accompany him, +he must be awake at the time appointed. The boys lay down as usual in +the wigwam, in the midst of the family. Joseph soon fell asleep; but +Isaac, fully sensible of the danger and difficulty of the enterprise +before him, lay awake, watchful for his opportunity. About midnight he +rose, cautiously stepping over the sleeping forms of the family, and +securing, as he went, his Indian master's flint, steel, and tinder, and a +small quantity of dry moose-meat and cornbread. He then carefully +awakened his companion, who, starting up, forgetful of the cause of his +disturbance, asked aloud, "What do you want?" The savages began to stir; +and Isaac, trembling with fear of detection, lay down again and pretended +to be asleep. After waiting a while he again rose, satisfied, from the +heavy breathing of the Indians, that they were all sleeping; and fearing +to awaken Joseph a second time, lest he should again hazard all by his +thoughtlessness, he crept softly out of the wigwam. He had proceeded but +a few rods when he heard footsteps behind him; and, supposing himself +pursued, he hurried into the woods, casting a glance backward. What was +his joy to see his young companion running after him! They hastened on +in a southerly direction as nearly as they could determine, hoping to +reach their distant home. When daylight appeared they found a large +hollow log, into which they crept for concealment, wisely judging that +they would be hotly pursued by their Indian captors. + +Their sagacity was by no means at fault. The Indians, missing their +prisoners in the morning, started off in pursuit with their dogs. As the +young boys lay in the log they could hear the whistle of the Indians and +the barking of dogs upon their track. It was a trying moment; and even +the stout heart of the elder boy sank within him as the dogs came up to +the log and set up a loud bark of discovery. But his presence of mind +saved him. He spoke in a low tone to the dogs, who, recognizing his +familiar voice, wagged their tails with delight and ceased barking. He +then threw to them the morsel of moose-meat he had taken from the wigwam. +While the dogs were thus diverted the Indians made their appearance. The +boys heard the light, stealthy sound of their moccasins on the leaves. +They passed close to the log; and the dogs, having devoured their moose- +meat, trotted after their masters. Through a crevice in the log the boys +looked after them and saw them disappear in the thick woods. They +remained in their covert until night, when they started again on their +long journey, taking a new route to avoid the Indians. At daybreak they +again concealed themselves, but travelled the next night and day without +resting. By this time they had consumed all the bread which they had +taken, and were fainting from hunger and weariness. Just at the close of +the third day they were providentially enabled to kill a pigeon and a +small tortoise, a part of which they ate raw, not daring to make a fire, +which might attract the watchful eyes of savages. On the sixth day they +struck upon an old Indian path, and, following it until night, came +suddenly upon a camp of the enemy. Deep in the heart of the forest, +under the shelter of a ridge of land heavily timbered, a great fire of +logs and brushwood was burning; and around it the Indians sat, eating +their moose-meat and smoking their pipes. + +The poor fugitives, starving, weary, and chilled by the cold spring +blasts, gazed down upon the ample fire; and the savory meats which the +squaws were cooking by it, but felt no temptation to purchase warmth and +food by surrendering themselves to captivity. Death in the forest seemed +preferable. They turned and fled back upon their track, expecting every +moment to hear the yells of pursuers. The morning found them seated on +the bank of a small stream, their feet torn and bleeding, and their +bodies emaciated. The elder, as a last effort, made search for roots, +and fortunately discovered a few ground-nuts, (glicine apios) which +served to refresh in some degree himself and his still weaker companion. +As they stood together by the stream, hesitating and almost despairing, +it occurred to Isaac that the rivulet might lead to a larger stream of +water, and that to the sea and the white settlements near it; and he +resolved to follow it. They again began their painful march; the day +passed, and the night once more overtook them. When the eighth morning +dawned, the younger of the boys found himself unable to rise from his bed +of leaves. Isaac endeavored to encourage him, dug roots, and procured +water for him; but the poor lad was utterly exhausted. He had no longer +heart or hope. The elder boy laid him on leaves and dry grass at the +foot of a tree, and with a heavy heart bade him farewell. Alone he +slowly and painfully proceeded down the stream, now greatly increased in +size by tributary rivulets. On the top of a hill, he climbed with +difficulty into a tree, and saw in the distance what seemed to be a +clearing and a newly raised frame building. Hopeful and rejoicing, he +turned back to his young companion, told him what he had seen, and, after +chafing his limbs awhile, got him upon his feet. Sometimes supporting +him, and at others carrying him on his back, the heroic boy staggered +towards the clearing. On reaching it he found it deserted, and was +obliged to continue his journey. Towards night signs of civilization +began to appear,--the heavy, continuous roar of water was heard; and, +presently emerging from the forest, he saw a great river dashing in white +foam down precipitous rocks, and on its bank the gray walls of a huge +stone building, with flankers, palisades, and moat, over which the +British flag was flying. This was the famous Saco Fort, built by +Governor Phips two years before, just below the falls of the Saco River. +The soldiers of the garrison gave the poor fellows a kindly welcome. +Joseph, who was scarcely alive, lay for a long time sick in the fort; but +Isaac soon regained his strength, and set out for his home in Haverhill, +which he had the good fortune to arrive at in safety. + +Amidst the stirring excitements of the present day, when every thrill of +the electric wire conveys a new subject for thought or action to a +generation as eager as the ancient Athenians for some new thing, simple +legends of the past like that which we have transcribed have undoubtedly +lost in a great degree their interest. The lore of the fireside is +becoming obsolete, and with the octogenarian few who still linger among +us will perish the unwritten history of border life in New England. + + + + +THE BLACK MEN IN THE REVOLUTION AND WAR OF 1812. + +The return of the festival of our national independence has called our +attention to a matter which has been very carefully kept out of sight by +orators and toast-drinkers. We allude to the participation of colored +men in the great struggle for American freedom. It is not in accordance +with our taste or our principles to eulogize the shedders of blood even +in a cause of acknowledged justice; but when we see a whole nation doing +honor to the memories of one class of its defenders to the total neglect +of another class, who had the misfortune to be of darker complexion, we +cannot forego the satisfaction of inviting notice to certain historical +facts which for the last half century have been quietly elbowed aside, +as no more deserving of a place in patriotic recollection than the +descendants of the men to whom the facts in question relate have to a +place in a Fourth of July procession. + +Of the services and sufferings of the colored soldiers of the Revolution +no attempt has, to our knowledge, been made to preserve a record. They +have had no historian. With here and there an exception, they have all +passed away; and only some faint tradition of their campaigns under +Washington and Greene and Lafayette, and of their cruisings under Decatur +and Barry, lingers among their, descendants. Yet enough is known to show +that the free colored men of the United States bore their full proportion +of the sacrifices and trials of the Revolutionary War. + +The late Governor Eustis, of Massachusetts,--the pride and boast of the +democracy of the East, himself an active participant in the war, and +therefore a most competent witness,--Governor Morrill, of New Hampshire, +Judge Hemphill, of Pennsylvania, and other members of Congress, in the +debate on the question of admitting Missouri as a slave State into the +Union, bore emphatic testimony to the efficiency and heroism of the black +troops. Hon. Calvin Goddard, of Connecticut, states that in the little +circle of his residence he was instrumental in securing, under the act of +1818, the pensions of nineteen colored soldiers. "I cannot," he says, +"refrain from mentioning one aged black man, Primus Babcock, who proudly +presented to me an honorable discharge from service during the war, dated +at the close of it, wholly in the handwriting of George Washington; nor +can I forget the expression of his feelings when informed, after his +discharge had been sent to the War Department, that it could not be +returned. At his request it was written for, as he seemed inclined to +spurn the pension and reclaim the discharge." There is a touching +anecdote related of Baron Stenben on the occasion of the disbandment of +the American army. A black soldier, with his wounds unhealed, utterly +destitute, stood on the wharf just as a vessel bound for his distant home +was getting under way. The poor fellow gazed at the vessel with tears in +his eyes, and gave himself up to despair. The warm-hearted foreigner +witnessed his emotion, and, inquiring into the cause of it, took his last +dollar from his purse and gave it to him, with tears of sympathy +trickling down his cheeks. Overwhelmed with gratitude, the poor wounded +soldier hailed the sloop and was received on board. As it moved out from +the wharf, he cried back to his noble friend on shore, "God Almighty +bless you, Master Baron!" + +"In Rhode Island," says Governor Eustis in his able speech against +slavery in Missouri, 12th of twelfth month, 1820, "the blacks formed an +entire regiment, and they discharged their duty with zeal and fidelity. +The gallant defence of Red Bank, in which the black regiment bore a part, +is among the proofs of their valor." In this contest it will be +recollected that four hundred men met and repulsed, after a terrible and +sanguinary struggle, fifteen hundred Hessian troops, headed by Count +Donop. The glory of the defence of Red Bank, which has been pronounced +one of the most heroic actions of the war, belongs in reality to black +men; yet who now hears them spoken of in connection with it? Among the +traits which distinguished the black regiment was devotion to their +officers. In the attack made upon the American lines near Croton River +on the 13th of the fifth month, 1781, Colonel Greene, the commander of +the regiment, was cut down and mortally wounded; but the sabres of the +enemy only reached him through the bodies of his faithful guard of +blacks, who hovered over him to protect him, every one of whom was +killed. The late Dr. Harris, of Dunbarton, New Hampshire, a +Revolutionary veteran, stated, in a speech at Francistown, New Hampshire, +some years ago, that on one occasion the regiment to which he was +attached was commanded to defend an important position, which the enemy +thrice assailed, and from which they were as often repulsed. "There +was," said the venerable speaker, "a regiment of blacks in the same +situation,--a regiment of negroes fighting for our liberty and +independence, not a white man among them but the officers,--in the same +dangerous and responsible position. Had they been unfaithful or given +way before the enemy, all would have been lost. Three times in +succession were they attacked with most desperate fury by well- +disciplined and veteran troops; and three times did they successfully +repel the assault, and thus preserve an army. They fought thus through +the war. They were brave and hardy troops." + +In the debate in the New York Convention of 1821 for amending the +Constitution of the State, on the question of extending the right of +suffrage to the blacks, Dr. Clarke, the delegate from Delaware County, +and other members, made honorable mention of the services of the colored +troops in the Revolutionary army. + +The late James Forten, of Philadelphia, well known as a colored man of +wealth, intelligence, and philanthropy, enlisted in the American navy +under Captain Decatur, of the Royal Louis, was taken prisoner during his +second cruise, and, with nineteen other colored men, confined on board +the horrible Jersey prison-ship; All the vessels in the American service +at that period were partly manned by blacks. The old citizens of +Philadelphia to this day remember the fact that, when the troops of the +North marched through the city, one or more colored companies were +attached to nearly all the regiments. + +Governor Eustis, in the speech before quoted, states that the free +colored soldiers entered the ranks with the whites. The time of those +who were slaves was purchased of their masters, and they were induced to +enter the service in consequence of a law of Congress by which, on +condition of their serving in the ranks during the war, they were made +freemen. This hope of liberty inspired them with courage to oppose their +breasts to the Hessian bayonet at Red Bank, and enabled them to endure +with fortitude the cold and famine of Valley Forge. The anecdote of the +slave of General Sullivan, of New Hampshire, is well known. When his +master told him that they were on the point of starting for the army, to +fight for liberty, he shrewdly suggested that it would be a great +satisfaction to know that he was indeed going to fight for his liberty. +Struck with the reasonableness and justice of this suggestion, General +Sullivan at once gave him his freedom. + +The late Tristam Burgess, of Rhode Island, in a speech in Congress, first +month, 1828, said "At the commencement of the Revolutionary War, Rhode +Island had a number of slaves. A regiment of them were enlisted into the +Continental service, and no braver men met the enemy in battle; but not +one of them was permitted to be a soldier until he had first been made a +freeman." + +The celebrated Charles Pinckney, of South Carolina, in his speech on the +Missouri question, and in defence of the slave representation of the +South, made the following admissions:-- + +"They (the colored people) were in numerous instances the pioneers, and +in all the laborers, of our armies. To their hands were owing the +greatest part of the fortifications raised for the protection of the +country. Fort Moultrie gave, at an early period of the inexperienced and +untried valor of our citizens, immortality to the American arms; and in +the Northern States numerous bodies of them were enrolled, and fought +side by side with the whites at the battles of the Revolution." + +Let us now look forward thirty or forty years, to the last war with Great +Britain, and see whether the whites enjoyed a monopoly of patriotism at +that time. + +Martindale, of New York, in Congress, 22d of first month, 1828, said: +"Slaves, or negroes who had been slaves, were enlisted as soldiers in the +war of the Revolution; and I myself saw a battalion of them, as fine, +martial-looking men as I ever saw, attached to the Northern army in the +last war, on its march from Plattsburg to Sackett's Harbor." + +Hon. Charles Miner, of Pennsylvania, in Congress, second month, 7th, +1828, said: "The African race make excellent soldiers. Large numbers of +them were with Perry, and helped to gain the brilliant victory of Lake +Erie. A whole battalion of them were distinguished for their orderly +appearance." + +Dr. Clarke, in the convention which revised the Constitution of New York +in 1821, speaking of the colored inhabitants of the State, said:-- + +"In your late war they contributed largely towards some of your most +splendid victories. On Lakes Erie and Champlain, where your fleets +triumphed over a foe superior in numbers and engines of death, they were +manned in a large proportion with men of color. And in this very house, +in the fall of 1814, a bill passed, receiving the approbation of all the +branches of your government, authorizing the governor to accept the +services of a corps of two thousand free people of color. Sir, these +were times which tried men's souls. In these times it was no sporting +matter to bear arms. These were times when a man who shouldered his +musket did not know but he bared his bosom to receive a death-wound from +the enemy ere he laid it aside; and in these times these people were +found as ready and as willing to volunteer in your service as any other. +They were not compelled to go; they were not drafted. No; your pride had +placed them beyond your compulsory power. But there was no necessity for +its exercise; they were volunteers,--yes, sir, volunteers to defend that +very country from the inroads and ravages of a ruthless and vindictive +foe which had treated them with insult, degradation, and slavery." + +On the capture of Washington by the British forces, it was judged +expedient to fortify, without delay, the principal towns and cities +exposed to similar attacks. The Vigilance Committee of Philadelphia +waited upon three of the principal colored citizens, namely, James +Forten, Bishop Allen, and Absalom Jones, soliciting the aid of the people +of color in erecting suitable defences for the city. Accordingly, +twenty-five hundred colored then assembled in the State-House yard, and +from thence marched to Gray's Ferry, where they labored for two days +almost without intermission. Their labors were so faithful and efficient +that a vote of thanks was tendered them by the committee. A battalion of +colored troops was at the same time organized in the city under an +officer of the United States army; and they were on the point of marching +to the frontier when peace was proclaimed. + +General Jackson's proclamations to the free colored inhabitants of +Louisiana are well known. In his first, inviting them to take up arms, +he said:-- + +"As sons of freedom, you are now called on to defend our most inestimable +blessings. As Americans, your country looks with confidence to her +adopted children for a valorous support. As fathers, husbands, and +brothers, you are summoned to rally round the standard of the eagle, to +defend all which is dear in existence." + +The second proclamation is one of the highest compliments ever paid by a +military chief to his soldiers:-- + +"TO THE FREE PEOPLE OF COLOR. + +"Soldiers! when on the banks of the Mobile I called you to take up arms, +inviting you to partake the perils and glory of your white fellow- +citizens, I expected much from you; for I was not ignorant that you +possessed qualities most formidable to an invading enemy. I knew with +what fortitude you could endure hunger, and thirst, and all the fatigues +of a campaign. I knew well how you loved your native country, and that +you, as well as ourselves, had to defend what man holds most dear,--his +parents, wife, children, and property. You have done more than I +expected. In addition to the previous qualities I before knew you to +possess, I found among you a noble enthusiasm, which leads to the +performance of great things. + +"Soldiers! the President of the United States shall hear how praiseworthy +was your conduct in the hour of danger, and the Representatives of the +American people will give you the praise your exploits entitle you to. +Your general anticipates them in applauding your noble ardor." + +It will thus be seen that whatever honor belongs to the "heroes of the +Revolution" and the volunteers in "the second war for independence" is to +be divided between the white and the colored man. We have dwelt upon +this subject at length, not because it accords with our principles or +feelings, for it is scarcely necessary for us to say that we are one of +those who hold that + + "Peace hath her victories + No less renowned than war," + +and certainly far more desirable and useful; but because, in popular +estimation, the patriotism which dares and does on the battle-field takes +a higher place than the quiet exercise of the duties of peaceful +citizenship; and we are willing that colored soldiers, with their +descendants, should have the benefit, if possible, of a public sentiment +which has so extravagantly lauded their white companions in arms. If +pulpits must be desecrated by eulogies of the patriotism of bloodshed, we +see no reason why black defenders of their country in the war for liberty +should not receive honorable mention as well as white invaders of a +neighboring republic who have volunteered in a war for plunder and +slavery extension. For the latter class of "heroes" we have very little +respect. The patriotism of too many of them forcibly reminds us of Dr. +Johnson's definition of that much-abused term "Patriotism, sir! 'T is +the last refuge of a scoundrel." + +"What right, I demand," said an American orator some years ago, "have the +children of Africa to a homestead in the white man's country?" The +answer will in part be found in the facts which we have presented. Their +right, like that of their white fellow-citizens, dates back to the dread +arbitrament of battle. Their bones whiten every stricken field of the +Revolution; their feet tracked with blood the snows of Jersey; their toil +built up every fortification south of the Potomac; they shared the famine +and nakedness of Valley Forge and the pestilential horrors of the old +Jersey prisonship. Have they, then, no claim to an equal participation +in the blessings which have grown out of the national independence for +which they fought? Is it just, is it magnanimous, is it safe, even, to +starve the patriotism of such a people, to cast their hearts out of the +treasury of the Republic, and to convert them, by political +disfranchisement and social oppression, into enemies? + + + + +THE SCOTTISH REFORMERS. + + "The mills of God grind slowly, but they grind exceeding small; + Though with patience He stands waiting, with exactness grinds He + all." + FRIEDRICH VON LOGAU. + +The great impulse of the French Revolution was not confined by +geographical boundaries. Flashing hope into the dark places of the +earth, far down among the poor and long oppressed, or startling the +oppressor in his guarded chambers like that mountain of fire which fell +into the sea at the sound of the apocalyptic trumpet, it agitated the +world. + +The arguments of Condorcet, the battle-words of Mirabeau, the fierce zeal +of St. Just, the iron energy of Danton, the caustic wit of Camille +Desmoulins, and the sweet eloquence of Vergniaud found echoes in all +lands, and nowhere more readily than in Great Britain, the ancient foe +and rival of France. The celebrated Dr. Price, of London, and the still +more distinguished Priestley, of Birmingham, spoke out boldly in defence +of the great principles of the Revolution. A London club of reformers, +reckoning among its members such men as Sir William Jones, Earl Grey, +Samuel Whitbread, and Sir James Mackintosh, was established for the +purpose of disseminating liberal appeals and arguments throughout the +United Kingdom. + +In Scotland an auxiliary society was formed, under the name of Friends of +the People. Thomas Muir, young in years, yet an elder in the Scottish +kirk, a successful advocate at the bar, talented, affable, eloquent, and +distinguished for the purity of his life and his enthusiasm in the cause +of freedom, was its principal originator. In the twelfth month of 1792 a +convention of reformers was held at Edinburgh. The government became +alarmed, and a warrant was issued for the arrest of Muir. He escaped to +France; but soon after, venturing to return to his native land, was +recognized and imprisoned. He was tried upon the charge of lending books +of republican tendency, and reading an address from Theobald Wolfe Tone +and the United Irishmen before the society of which he was a member. He +defended himself in a long and eloquent address, which concluded in the +following manly strain:-- + +"What, then, has been my crime? Not the lending to a relation a copy of +Thomas Paine's works,--not the giving away to another a few numbers of an +innocent and constitutional publication; but my crime is, for having +dared to be, according to the measure of my feeble abilities, a strenuous +and an active advocate for an equal representation of the people in the +House of the people,--for having dared to accomplish a measure by legal +means which was to diminish the weight of their taxes and to put an end +to the profusion of their blood. Gentlemen, from my infancy to this +moment I have devoted myself to the cause of the people. It is a good +cause: it will ultimately prevail,--it will finally triumph." + +He was sentenced to transportation for fourteen years, and was removed to +the Edinburgh jail, from thence to the hulks, and lastly to the +transport-ship, containing eighty-three convicts, which conveyed him to +Botany Bay. + +The next victim was Palmer, a learned and highly accomplished Unitarian +minister in Dundee. He was greatly beloved and respected as a polished +gentleman and sincere friend of the people. He was charged with +circulating a republican tract, and was sentenced to seven years' +transportation. + +But the Friends of the People were not quelled by this summary punishment +of two of their devoted leaders. In the tenth month, 1793, delegates +were called together from various towns in Scotland, as well as from +Birmingham, Sheffield, and other places in England. Gerrald and Margarot +were sent up by the London society. After a brief sitting, the +convention was dispersed by the public authorities. Its sessions were +opened and closed with prayer, and the speeches of its members manifested +the pious enthusiasm of the old Cameronians and Parliament-men of the +times of Cromwell. Many of the dissenting clergy were present. William +Skirving, the most determined of the band, had been educated for the +ministry, and was a sincerely religious man. Joseph Gerrald was a young +man of brilliant talents and exemplary character. When the sheriff +entered the hall to disperse the friends of liberty, Gerrald knelt in +prayer. His remarkable words were taken down by a reporter on the spot. +There is nothing in modern history to compare with this supplication, +unless it be that of Sir Henry Vane, a kindred martyr, at the foot of the +scaffold, just before his execution. It is the prayer of universal +humanity, which God will yet hear and answer. + +"O thou Governor of the universe, we rejoice that, at all times and in +all circumstances, we have liberty to approach Thy throne, and that we +are assured that no sacrifice is more acceptable to Thee than that which +is made for the relief of the oppressed. In this moment of trial and +persecution we pray that Thou wouldst be our defender, our counsellor, +and our guide. Oh, be Thou a pillar of fire to us, as Thou wast to our +fathers of old, to enlighten and direct us; and to our enemies a pillar +of cloud, and darkness, and confusion. + +"Thou art Thyself the great Patron of liberty. Thy service is perfect +freedom. Prosper, we beseech Thee, every endeavor which we make to +promote Thy cause; for we consider the cause of truth, or every cause +which tends to promote the happiness of Thy creatures, as Thy cause. + +"O thou merciful Father of mankind, enable us, for Thy name's sake, to +endure persecution with fortitude; and may we believe that all trials and +tribulations of life which we endure shall work together for good to them +that love Thee; and grant that the greater the evil, and the longer it +may be continued, the greater good, in Thy holy and adorable providence, +may be produced therefrom. And this we beg, not for our own merits, but +through the merits of Him who is hereafter to judge the world in +righteousness and mercy." + +He ceased, and the sheriff, who had been temporarily overawed by the +extraordinary scene, enforced the warrant, and the meeting was broken up. +The delegates descended to the street in silence,--Arthur's Seat and +Salisbury Crags glooming in the distance and night,--an immense and +agitated multitude waiting around, over which tossed the flaring +flambeaux of the sheriff's train. Gerrald, who was already under arrest, +as he descended, spoke aloud, "Behold the funeral torches of Liberty!" + +Skirving and several others were immediately arrested. They were tried +in the first month, 1794, and sentenced, as Muir and Palmer had +previously been, to transportation. Their conduct throughout was worthy +of their great and holy cause. Gerrald's defence was that of freedom +rather than his own. Forgetting himself, he spoke out manfully and +earnestly for the poor, the oppressed, the overtaxed, and starving +millions of his countrymen. That some idea may be formed of this noble +plea for liberty, I give an extract from the concluding paragraphs:-- + +"True religion, like all free governments, appeals to the understanding +for its support, and not to the sword. All systems, whether civil or +moral, can only be durable in proportion as they are founded on truth and +calculated to promote the good of mankind. This will account to us why +governments suited to the great energies of man have always outlived the +perishable things which despotism has erected. Yes, this will account to +us why the stream of Time, which is continually washing away the +dissoluble fabrics of superstitions and impostures, passes without injury +by the adamant of Christianity. + +"Those who are versed in the history of their country, in the history of +the human race, must know that rigorous state prosecutions have always +preceded the era of convulsion; and this era, I fear, will be accelerated +by the folly and madness of our rulers. If the people are discontented, +the proper mode of quieting their discontent is, not by instituting +rigorous and sanguinary prosecutions, but by redressing their wrongs and +conciliating their affections. Courts of justice, indeed, may be called +in to the aid of ministerial vengeance; but if once the purity of their +proceedings is suspected, they will cease to be objects of reverence to +the nation; they will degenerate into empty and expensive pageantry, and +become the partial instruments of vexatious oppression. Whatever may +become of me, my principles will last forever. Individuals may perish; +but truth is eternal. The rude blasts of tyranny may blow from every +quarter; but freedom is that hardy plant which will survive the tempest +and strike an everlasting root into the most unfavorable soil. + +"Gentlemen, I am in your hands. About my life I feel not the slightest +anxiety: if it would promote the cause, I would cheerfully make the +sacrifice; for if I perish on an occasion like the present, out of my +ashes will arise a flame to consume the tyrants and oppressors of my +country." + +Years have passed, and the generation which knew the persecuted reformers +has given place to another. And now, half a century after William +Skirving, as he rose to receive his sentence, declared to his judges, +"You may condemn us as felons, but your sentence shall yet be reversed by +the people," the names of these men are once more familiar to British +lips. The sentence has been reversed; the prophecy of Skirving has +become history. On the 21st of the eighth month, 1853, the corner-stone +of a monument to the memory of the Scottish martyrs--for which +subscriptions had been received from such men as Lord Holland, the Dukes +of Bedford and Norfolk; and the Earls of Essex and Leicester--was laid +with imposing ceremonies in the beautiful burial-place of Calton Hill, +Edinburgh, by the veteran reformer and tribune of the people, Joseph +Hume, M. P. After delivering an appropriate address, the aged radical +closed the impressive scene by reading the prayer of Joseph Gerrald. At +the banquet which afterwards took place, and which was presided over by +John Dunlop, Esq., addresses were made by the president and Dr. Ritchie, +and by William Skirving, of Kirkaldy, son of the martyr. The Complete +Suffrage Association of Edinburgh, to the number of five hundred, walked +in procession to Calton Hill, and in the open air proclaimed unmolested +the very principles for which the martyrs of the past century had +suffered. + +The account of this tribute to the memory of departed worth cannot fail +to awaken in generous hearts emotions of gratitude towards Him who has +thus signally vindicated His truth, showing that the triumph of the +oppressor is but for a season, and that even in this world a lie cannot +live forever. Well and truly did George Fox say in his last days, + + "The truth is above all." + +Will it be said, however, that this tribute comes too late; that it +cannot solace those brave hearts which, slowly broken by the long agony +of colonial servitude, are now cold in strange graves? It is, indeed, a +striking illustration of the truth that he who would benefit his fellow- +man must "walk by faith," sowing his seed in the morning, and in the +evening withholding not his hand; knowing only this, that in God's good +time the harvest shall spring up and ripen, if not for himself, yet for +others, who, as they bind the full sheaves and gather in the heavy +clusters, may perchance remember him with gratitude and set up stones of +memorial on the fields of his toil and sacrifices. We may regret that in +this stage of the spirit's life the sincere and self-denying worker is +not always permitted to partake of the fruits of his toil or receive the +honors of a benefactor. We hear his good evil spoken of, and his noblest +sacrifices counted as naught; we see him not only assailed by the wicked, +but discountenanced and shunned by the timidly good, followed on his hot +and dusty pathway by the execrations of the hounding mob and the +contemptuous pity of the worldly wise and prudent; and when at last the +horizon of Time shuts down between him and ourselves, and the places +which have known him know him no more forever, we are almost ready to say +with the regal voluptuary of old, This also is vanity and a great evil; +"for what hath a man of all his labor and of the vexation of his heart +wherein he hath labored under the sun?" But is this the end? Has God's +universe no wider limits than the circle of the blue wall which shuts in +our nestling-place? Has life's infancy only been provided for, and +beyond this poor nursery-chamber of Time is there no playground for the +soul's youth, no broad fields for its manhood? Perchance, could we but +lift the curtains of the narrow pinfold wherein we dwell, we might see +that our poor friend and brother whose fate we have thus deplored has by +no means lost the reward of his labors, but that in new fields of duty he +is cheered even by the tardy recognition of the value of his services in +the old. The continuity of life is never broken; the river flows onward +and is lost to our sight, but under its new horizon it carries the same +waters which it gathered under ours, and its unseen valleys are made glad +by the offerings which are borne down to them from the past,--flowers, +perchance, the germs of which its own waves had planted on the banks of +Time. Who shall say that the mournful and repentant love with which the +benefactors of our race are at length regarded may not be to them, in +their new condition of being, sweet and grateful as the perfume of long- +forgotten flowers, or that our harvest-hymns of rejoicing may not reach +the ears of those who in weakness and suffering scattered the seeds of +blessing? + +The history of the Edinburgh reformers is no new one; it is that of all +who seek to benefit their age by rebuking its popular crimes and exposing +its cherished errors. The truths which they told were not believed, and +for that very reason were the more needed; for it is evermore the case +that the right word when first uttered is an unpopular and denied one. +Hence he who undertakes to tread the thorny pathway of reform--who, +smitten with the love of truth and justice, or indignant in view of wrong +and insolent oppression, is rashly inclined to throw himself at once into +that great conflict which the Persian seer not untruly represented as a +war between light and darkness--would do well to count the cost in the +outset. If he can live for Truth alone, and, cut off from the general +sympathy, regard her service as its "own exceeding great reward;" if he +can bear to be counted a fanatic and crazy visionary; if, in all good +nature, he is ready to receive from the very objects of his solicitude +abuse and obloquy in return for disinterested and self-sacrificing +efforts for their welfare; if, with his purest motives misunderstood and +his best actions perverted and distorted into crimes, he can still hold +on his way and patiently abide the hour when "the whirligig of Time shall +bring about its revenges;" if, on the whole, he is prepared to be looked +upon as a sort of moral outlaw or social heretic, under good society's +interdict of food and fire; and if he is well assured that he can, +through all this, preserve his cheerfulness and faith in man,--let him +gird up his loins and go forward in God's name. He is fitted for his +vocation; he has watched all night by his armor. Whatever his trial may +be, he is prepared; he may even be happily disappointed in respect to it; +flowers of unexpected refreshing may overhang the hedges of his strait +and narrow way; but it remains to be true that he who serves his +contemporaries in faithfulness and sincerity must expect no wages from +their gratitude; for, as has been well said, there is, after all, but one +way of doing the world good, and unhappily that way the world does not +like; for it consists in telling it the very thing which it does not wish +to hear. + +Unhappily, in the case of the reformer, his most dangerous foes are those +of his own household. True, the world's garden has become a desert and +needs renovation; but is his own little nook weedless? Sin abounds +without; but is his own heart pure? While smiting down the giants and +dragons which beset the outward world, are there no evil guests sitting +by his own hearth-stone? Ambition, envy, self-righteousness, impatience, +dogmatism, and pride of opinion stand at his door-way ready to enter +whenever he leaves it unguarded. Then, too, there is no small danger of +failing to discriminate between a rational philanthropy, with its +adaptation of means to ends, and that spiritual knight-errantry which +undertakes the championship of every novel project of reform, scouring +the world in search of distressed schemes held in durance by common sense +and vagaries happily spellbound by ridicule. He must learn that, +although the most needful truth may be unpopular, it does not follow that +unpopularity is a proof of the truth of his doctrines or the expediency +of his measures. He must have the liberality to admit that it is barely +possible for the public on some points to be right and himself wrong, and +that the blessing invoked upon those who suffer for righteousness is not +available to such as court persecution and invite contempt; for folly has +its martyrs as well as wisdom; and he who has nothing better to show of +himself than the scars and bruises which the popular foot has left upon +him is not even sure of winning the honors of martyrdom as some +compensation for the loss of dignity and self-respect involved in the +exhibition of its pains. To the reformer, in an especial manner, comes +home the truth that whoso ruleth his own spirit is greater than he who +taketh a city. Patience, hope, charity, watchfulness unto prayer,--how +needful are all these to his success! Without them he is in danger of +ingloriously giving up his contest with error and prejudice at the first +repulse; or, with that spiteful philanthropy which we sometimes witness, +taking a sick world by the nose, like a spoiled child, and endeavoring to +force down its throat the long-rejected nostrums prepared for its relief. + +What then? Shall we, in view of these things, call back young, generous +spirits just entering upon the perilous pathway? God forbid! Welcome, +thrice welcome, rather. Let them go forward, not unwarned of the dangers +nor unreminded of the pleasures which belong to the service of humanity. +Great is the consciousness of right. Sweet is the answer of a good +conscience. He who pays his whole-hearted homage to truth and duty, who +swears his lifelong fealty on their altars, and rises up a Nazarite +consecrated to their holy service, is not without his solace and +enjoyment when, to the eyes of others, he seems the most lonely and +miserable. He breathes an atmosphere which the multitude know not of; +"a serene heaven which they cannot discern rests over him, glorious in +its purity and stillness." Nor is he altogether without kindly human +sympathies. All generous and earnest hearts which are brought in contact +with his own beat evenly with it. All that is good, and truthful, and +lovely in man, whenever and wherever it truly recognizes him, must sooner +or later acknowledge his claim to love and reverence. His faith +overcomes all things. The future unrolls itself before him, with its +waving harvest-fields springing up from the seed he is scattering; and he +looks forward to the close of life with the calm confidence of one who +feels that he has not lived idle and useless, but with hopeful heart and +strong arm has labored with God and Nature for the best. + +And not in vain. In the economy of God, no effort, however small, put +forth for the right cause, fails of its effect. No voice, however +feeble, lifted up for truth, ever dies amidst the confused noises of +time. Through discords of sin and sorrow, pain and wrong, it rises a +deathless melody, whose notes of wailing are hereafter to be changed to +those of triumph as they blend with the great harmony of a reconciled +universe. The language of a transatlantic reformer to his friends is +then as true as it is hopeful and cheering: "Triumph is certain. We have +espoused no losing cause. In the body we may not join our shout with the +victors; but in spirit we may even now. There is but an interval of time +between us and the success at which we aim. In all other respects the +links of the chain are complete. Identifying ourselves with immortal and +immutable principles, we share both their immortality and immutability. +The vow which unites us with truth makes futurity present with us. Our +being resolves itself into an everlasting now. It is not so correct to +say that we shall be victorious as that we are so. When we will in +unison with the supreme Mind, the characteristics of His will become, in +some sort, those of ours. What He has willed is virtually done. It may +take ages to unfold itself; but the germ of its whole history is wrapped +up in His determination. When we make His will ours, which we do when we +aim at truth, that upon which we are resolved is done, decided, born. +Life is in it. It is; and the future is but the development of its +being. Ours, therefore, is a perpetual triumph. Our deeds are, all of +them, component elements of success." (Miall's Essays; Nonconformist, +Vol. iv.) + + + + +THE PILGRIMS OF PLYMOUTH. + +From a letter on the celebration of the 250th anniversary of the landing +of the Pilgrims at Plymouth, December 22, 1870. + +No one can appreciate more highly than myself the noble qualities of the +men and women of the Mayflower. It is not of them that I, a descendant +of the "sect called Quakers," have reason to complain in the matter of +persecution. A generation which came after them, with less piety and +more bigotry, is especially responsible for the little unpleasantness +referred to; and the sufferers from it scarcely need any present +championship. They certainly did not wait altogether for the revenges of +posterity. If they lost their ears, it is satisfactory to remember that +they made those of their mutilators tingle with a rhetoric more sharp +than polite. + +A worthy New England deacon once described a brother in the church as a +very good man Godward, but rather hard man-ward. It cannot be denied +that some very satisfactory steps have been taken in the latter +direction, at least, since the days of the Pilgrims. Our age is tolerant +of creed and dogma, broader in its sympathies, more keenly sensitive to +temporal need, and, practically recognizing the brotherhood of the race, +wherever a cry of suffering is heard its response is quick and generous. +It has abolished slavery, and is lifting woman from world-old degradation +to equality with man before the law. Our criminal codes no longer embody +the maxim of barbarism, "an eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth," but +have regard not only for the safety of the community, but to the reform +and well-being of the criminal. All the more, however, for this amiable +tenderness do we need the counterpoise of a strong sense of justice. +With our sympathy for the wrong-doer we need the old Puritan and Quaker +hatred of wrongdoing; with our just tolerance of men and opinions a +righteous abhorrence of sin. All the more for the sweet humanities and +Christian liberalism which, in drawing men nearer to each other, are +increasing the sum of social influences for good or evil, we need the +bracing atmosphere, healthful, if austere, of the old moralities. +Individual and social duties are quite as imperative now as when they +were minutely specified in statute-books and enforced by penalties no +longer admissible. It is well that stocks, whipping-post, and ducking- +stool are now only matters of tradition; but the honest reprobation of +vice and crime which they symbolized should by no means perish with them. +The true life of a nation is in its personal morality, and no excellence +of constitution and laws can avail much if the people lack purity and +integrity. Culture, art, refinement, care for our own comfort and that +of others, are all well, but truth, honor, reverence, and fidelity to +duty are indispensable. + +The Pilgrims were right in affirming the paramount authority of the law +of God. If they erred in seeking that authoritative law, and passed over +the Sermon on the Mount for the stern Hebraisms of Moses; if they +hesitated in view of the largeness of Christian liberty; if they seemed +unwilling to accept the sweetness and light of the good tidings, let us +not forget that it was the mistake of men who feared more than they dared +to hope, whose estimate of the exceeding awfulness of sin caused them to +dwell upon God's vengeance rather than his compassion; and whose dread of +evil was so great that, in shutting their hearts against it, they +sometimes shut out the good. It is well for us if we have learned to +listen to the sweet persuasion of the Beatitudes; but there are crises in +all lives which require also the emphatic "Thou shalt not" or the +Decalogue which the founders wrote on the gate-posts of their +commonwealth. + +Let us then be thankful for the assurances which the last few years have +afforded us that: + + "The Pilgrim spirit is not dead, + But walks in noon's broad light." + +We have seen it in the faith and trust which no circumstances could +shake, in heroic self-sacrifice, in entire consecration to duty. The +fathers have lived in their sons. Have we not all known the Winthrops +and Brewsters, the Saltonstalls and Sewalls, of old times, in +gubernatorial chairs, in legislative halls, around winter camp-fires, in +the slow martyrdoms of prison and hospital? The great struggle through +which we have passed has taught us how much we owe to the men and women +of the Plymouth Colony,--the noblest ancestry that ever a people looked +back to with love and reverence. Honor, then, to the Pilgrims! Let their +memory be green forever! + + + + +GOVERNOR ENDICOTT. + +I am sorry that I cannot respond in person to the invitation of the Essex +Institute to its commemorative festival on the 18th. I especially regret +it, because, though a member of the Society of Friends, and, as such, +regarding with abhorrence the severe persecution of the sect under the +administration of Governor Endicott, I am not unmindful of the otherwise +noble qualities and worthy record of the great Puritan, whose misfortune +it was to live in an age which regarded religious toleration as a crime. +He was the victim of the merciless logic of his creed. He honestly +thought that every convert to Quakerism became by virtue of that +conversion a child of perdition; and, as the head of the Commonwealth, +responsible for the spiritual as well as temporal welfare of its +inhabitants, he felt it his duty to whip, banish, and hang heretics to +save his people from perilous heresy. + +The extravagance of some of the early Quakers has been grossly +exaggerated. Their conduct will compare in this respect favorably with +that of the first Anabaptists and Independents; but it must be admitted +that many of them manifested a good deal of that wild enthusiasm which +has always been the result of persecution and the denial of the rights of +conscience and worship. Their pertinacious defiance of laws enacted +against them, and their fierce denunciations of priests and magistrates, +must have been particularly aggravating to a man as proud and high +tempered as John Endicott. He had that free-tongued neighbor of his, +Edward Wharton, smartly whipped at the cart-tail about once a month, but +it may be questioned whether the governor's ears did not suffer as much +under Wharton's biting sarcasm and "free speech" as the latter's back did +from the magisterial whip. + +Time has proved that the Quakers had the best of the controversy; and +their descendants can well afford to forget and forgive an error which +the Puritan governor shared with the generation in which he lived. + +WEST OSSIPEE, N. H., 14th 9th Month, 1878. + + + + +JOHN WINTHROP. + +On the anniversary of his landing at Salem. + +I see by the call of the Essex Institute that some probability is +suggested that I may furnish a poem for the occasion of its meeting at +The Willows on the 22d. I would be glad to make the implied probability +a fact, but I find it difficult to put my thoughts into metrical form, +and there will be little need of it, as I understand a lady of Essex +County, who adds to her modern culture and rare poetical gifts the best +spirit of her Puritan ancestry, has lent the interest of her verse to the +occasion. + +It was a happy thought of the Institute to select for its first meeting +of the season the day and the place of the landing of the great and good +governor, and permit me to say, as thy father's old friend, that its +choice for orator, of the son of him whose genius, statesmanship, and +eloquence honored the place of his birth, has been equally happy. As I +look over the list of the excellent worthies of the first emigrations, I +find no one who, in all respects, occupies a nobler place in the early +colonial history of Massachusetts than John Winthrop. Like Vane and +Milton, he was a gentleman as well as a Puritan, a cultured and +enlightened statesman as well as a God-fearing Christian. It was not +under his long and wise chief magistracy that religious bigotry and +intolerance hung and tortured their victims, and the terrible delusion of +witchcraft darkened the sun at noonday over Essex. If he had not quite +reached the point where, to use the words of Sir Thomas More, he could +"hear heresies talked and yet let the heretics alone," he was in charity +and forbearance far in advance of his generation. + +I am sorry that I must miss an occasion of so much interest. I hope you +will not lack the presence of the distinguished citizen who inherits the +best qualities of his honored ancestor, and who, as a statesman, scholar, +and patriot, has added new lustre to the name of Winthrop. + +DANVERS, 6th Month, 19, 1880. + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Works of Whittier, Volume VI (of +VII), by John Greenleaf Whittier + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE WORKS OF WHITTIER *** + +***** This file should be named 9594.txt or 9594.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/9/5/9/9594/ + +Produced by David Widger + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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BAILEY, of the National Era, Washington, D. C., these + sketches, many of which originally appeared in the columns of the + paper under his editorial supervision, are, in their present form, + offered as a token of the esteem and confidence which years of + political and literary communion have justified and confirmed, on + the part of his friend and associate, + THE AUTHOR. + + + + JOHN BUNYAN. + + "Wouldst see + A man I' the clouds, and hear him speak to thee?" + +Who has not read Pilgrim's Progress? Who has not, in childhood, +followed the wandering Christian on his way to the Celestial City? Who +has not laid at night his young head on the pillow, to paint on the +walls of darkness pictures of the Wicket Gate and the Archers, the Hill +of Difficulty, the Lions and Giants, Doubting Castle and Vanity Fair, +the sunny Delectable Mountains and the Shepherds, the Black River and +the wonderful glory beyond it; and at last fallen asleep, to dream over +the strange story, to hear the sweet welcomings of the sisters at the +House Beautiful, and the song of birds from the window of that "upper +chamber which opened towards the sunrising?" And who, looking back to +the green spots in his childish experiences, does not bless the good +Tinker of Elstow? + +And who, that has reperused the story of the Pilgrim at a maturer age, +and felt the plummet of its truth sounding in the deep places of the +soul, has not reason to bless the author for some timely warning or +grateful encouragement? Where is the scholar, the poet, the man of taste +and feeling, who does not, with Cowper, + + "Even in transitory life's late day, + Revere the man whose Pilgrim marks the road, + And guides the Progress of the soul to God!" + +We have just been reading, with no slight degree of interest, that simple +but wonderful piece of autobiography, entitled Grace abounding to the +Chief of Sinners, from the pen of the author of Pilgrim's Progress. It +is the record of a journey more terrible than that of the ideal Pilgrim; +"truth stranger than fiction;" the painful upward struggling of a spirit +from the blackness of despair and blasphemy, into the high, pure air of +Hope and Faith. More earnest words were never written. It is the entire +unveiling of a human heart; the tearing off of the fig-leaf covering of +its sin. The voice which speaks to us from these old pages seems not so +much that of a denizen of the world in which we live, as of a soul at the +last solemn confessional. Shorn of all ornament, simple and direct as +the contrition and prayer of childhood, when for the first time the +Spectre of Sin stands by its bedside, the style is that of a man dead to +self-gratification, careless of the world's opinion, and only desirous to +convey to others, in all truthfulness and sincerity, the lesson of his +inward trials, temptations, sins, weaknesses, and dangers; and to give +glory to Him who had mercifully led him through all, and enabled him, +like his own Pilgrim, to leave behind the Valley of the Shadow of Death, +the snares of the Enchanted Ground, and the terrors of Doubting Castle, +and to reach the land of Beulah, where the air was sweet and pleasant, +and the birds sang and the flowers sprang up around him, and the Shining +Ones walked in the brightness of the not distant Heaven. In the +introductory pages he says "he could have dipped into a style higher than +this in which I have discoursed, and could have adorned all things more +than here I have seemed to do; but I dared not. God did not play in +tempting me; neither did I play when I sunk, as it were, into a +bottomless pit, when the pangs of hell took hold on me; wherefore, I may +not play in relating of them, but be plain and simple, and lay down the +thing as it was." + +This book, as well as Pilgrim's Progress, was written in Bedford prison, +and was designed especially for the comfort and edification of his +"children, whom God had counted him worthy to beget in faith by his +ministry." In his introduction he tells them, that, although taken from +them, and tied up, "sticking, as it were, between the teeth of the lions +of the wilderness," he once again, as before, from the top of Shemer and +Hermon, so now, from the lion's den and the mountain of leopards, would +look after then with fatherly care and desires for their everlasting +welfare. "If," said he, "you have sinned against light; if you are +tempted to blaspheme; if you are drowned in despair; if you think God +fights against you; or if Heaven is hidden from your eyes, remember it +was so with your father. But out of all the Lord delivered me." + +He gives no dates; he affords scarcely a clue to his localities; of the +man, as he worked, and ate, and drank, and lodged, of his neighbors and +contemporaries, of all he saw and heard of the world about him, we have +only an occasional glimpse, here and there, in his narrative. It is the +story of his inward life only that he relates. What had time and place +to do with one who trembled always with the awful consciousness of an +immortal nature, and about whom fell alternately the shadows of hell and +the splendors of heaven? We gather, indeed, from his record, that he was +not an idle on-looker in the time of England's great struggle for +freedom, but a soldier of the Parliament, in his young years, among the +praying sworders and psalm-singing pikemen, the Greathearts and Holdfasts +whom he has immortalized in his allegory; but the only allusion which he +makes to this portion of his experience is by way of illustration of the +goodness of God in preserving him on occasions of peril. + +He was born at Elstow, in Bedfordshire, in 1628; and, to use his own +words, his "father's house was of that rank which is the meanest and most +despised of all the families of the land." His father was a tinker, and +the son followed the same calling, which necessarily brought him into +association with the lowest and most depraved classes of English society. +The estimation in which the tinker and his occupation were held, in the +seventeenth century, may be learned from the quaint and humorous +description of Sir Thomas Overbury. "The tinker," saith he, "is a +movable, for he hath no abiding in one place; he seems to be devout, for +his life is a continual pilgrimage, and sometimes, in humility, goes +barefoot, therein making necessity a virtue; he is a gallant, for he +carries all his wealth upon his back; or a philosopher, for he bears all +his substance with him. He is always furnished with a song, to which his +hammer, keeping tune, proves that he was the first founder of the kettle- +drum; where the best ale is, there stands his music most upon crotchets. +The companion of his travel is some foul, sun-burnt quean, that, since +the terrible statute, has recanted gypsyism, and is turned pedlaress. So +marches he all over England, with his bag and baggage; his conversation +is irreprovable, for he is always mending. He observes truly the +statutes, and therefore had rather steal than beg. He is so strong an +enemy of idleness, that in mending one hole he would rather make three +than want work; and when he hath done, he throws the wallet of his faults +behind him. His tongue is very voluble, which, with canting, proves him +a linguist. He is entertained in every place, yet enters no farther than +the door, to avoid suspicion. To conclude, if he escape Tyburn and +Banbury, he dies a beggar." + +Truly, but a poor beginning for a pious life was the youth of John +Bunyan. As might have been expected, he was a wild, reckless, swearing +boy, as his father doubtless was before him. "It was my delight," says +he, "to be taken captive by the Devil. I had few equals, both for +cursing and swearing, lying and blaspheming." Yet, in his ignorance and +darkness, his powerful imagination early lent terror to the reproaches of +conscience. He was scared, even in childhood, with dreams of hell and +apparitions of devils. Troubled with fears of eternal fire, and the +malignant demons who fed it in the regions of despair, he says that he +often wished either that there was no hell, or that he had been born a +devil himself, that he might be a tormentor rather than one of the +tormented. + +At an early age he appears to have married. His wife was as poor as +himself, for he tells us that they had not so much as a dish or spoon +between them; but she brought with her two books on religious subjects, +the reading of which seems to have had no slight degree of influence on +his mind. He went to church regularly, adored the priest and all things +pertaining to his office, being, as he says, "overrun with superstition." +On one occasion, a sermon was preached against the breach of the Sabbath +by sports or labor, which struck him at the moment as especially designed +for himself; but by the time he had finished his dinner he was prepared +to "shake it out of his mind, and return to his sports and gaming." + +"But the same day," he continues, "as I was in the midst of a game of +cat, and having struck it one blow from the hole, just as I was about to +strike it a second time, a voice did suddenly dart from Heaven into my +soul, which said, 'Wilt thou leave thy sins and go to heaven, or have thy +sins and go to hell?' At this, I was put to an exceeding maze; +wherefore, leaving my cat upon the ground, I looked up to Heaven, and it +was as if I had, with the eyes of my understanding, seen the Lord Jesus +look down upon me, as being very hotly displeased with me, and as if He +did severely threaten me with some grievous punishment for those and +other ungodly practices. + +"I had no sooner thus conceived in my mind, but suddenly this conclusion +fastened on my spirit, (for the former hint did set my sins again before +my face,) that I had been a great and grievous sinner, and that it was +now too late for me to look after Heaven; for Christ would not forgive me +nor pardon my transgressions. Then, while I was thinking of it, and +fearing lest it should be so, I felt my heart sink in despair, concluding +it was too late; and therefore I resolved in my mind to go on in sin; +for, thought I, if the case be thus, my state is surely miserable; +miserable if I leave my sins, and but miserable if I follow them; I can +but be damned; and if I must be so, I had as good be damned for many sins +as be damned for few." + +The reader of Pilgrim's Progress cannot fail here to call to mind the +wicked suggestions of the Giant to Christian, in the dungeon of Doubting +Castle. + +"I returned," he says, "desperately to my sport again; and I well +remember, that presently this kind of despair did so possess my soul, +that I was persuaded I could never attain to other comfort than what I +should get in sin; for Heaven was gone already, so that on that I must +not think; wherefore, I found within me great desire to take my fill of +sin, that I might taste the sweetness of it; and I made as much haste as +I could to fill my belly with its delicates, lest I should die before I +had my desires; for that I feared greatly. In these things, I protest +before God, I lie not, neither do I frame this sort of speech; these were +really, strongly, and with all my heart, my desires; the good Lord, whose +mercy is unsearchable, forgive my transgressions." + +One day, while standing in the street, cursing and blaspheming, he met +with a reproof which startled him. The woman of the house in front of +which the wicked young tinker was standing, herself, as he remarks, "a +very loose, ungodly wretch," protested that his horrible profanity made +her tremble; that he was the ungodliest fellow for swearing she had ever +heard, and able to spoil all the youth of the town who came in his +company. Struck by this wholly unexpected rebuke, he at once abandoned +the practice of swearing; although previously he tells us that "he had +never known how to speak, unless he put an oath before and another +behind." + +The good name which he gained by this change was now a temptation to him. +"My neighbors," he says, "were amazed at my great conversion from +prodigious profaneness to something like a moral life and sober man. +Now, therefore, they began to praise, to commend, and to speak well of +me, both to my face and behind my back. Now I was, as they said, become +godly; now I was become a right honest man. But oh! when I understood +those were their words and opinions of me, it pleased me mighty well; for +though as yet I was nothing but a poor painted hypocrite, yet I loved to +be talked of as one that was truly godly. I was proud of my godliness, +and, indeed, I did all I did either to be seen of or well spoken of by +men; and thus I continued for about a twelvemonth or more." + +The tyranny of his imagination at this period is seen in the following +relation of his abandonment of one of his favorite sports. + +"Now, you must know, that before this I had taken much delight in +ringing, but my conscience beginning to be tender, I thought such +practice was but vain, and therefore forced myself to leave it; yet my +mind hankered; wherefore, I would go to the steeple-house and look on, +though I durst not ring; but I thought this did not become religion +neither; yet I forced myself, and would look on still. But quickly +after, I began to think, 'How if one of the bells should fall?' Then I +chose to stand under a main beam, that lay overthwart the steeple, from +side to side, thinking here I might stand sure; but then I thought again, +should the bell fall with a swing, it might first hit the wall, and then, +rebounding upon me, might kill me for all this beam. This made me stand +in the steeple door; and now, thought I, I am safe enough; for if a bell +should then fall, I can slip out behind these thick walls, and so be +preserved notwithstanding. + +"So after this I would yet go to see them ring, but would not go any +farther than the steeple-door. But then it came in my head, 'How if the +steeple itself should fall?' And this thought (it may, for aught I know, +when I stood and looked on) did continually so shake my mind, that I +durst not stand at the steeple-door any longer, but was forced to flee, +for fear the steeple should fall upon my head." + +About this time, while wandering through Bedford in pursuit of +employment, he chanced to see three or four poor old women sitting at a +door, in the evening sun, and, drawing near them, heard them converse +upon the things of God; of His work in their hearts; of their natural +depravity; of the temptations of the Adversary; and of the joy of +believing, and of the peace of reconciliation. The words of the aged +women found a response in the soul of the listener. "He felt his heart +shake," to use his own words; he saw that he lacked the true tokens of a +Christian. He now forsook the company of the profane and licentious, and +sought that of a poor man who had the reputation of piety, but, to his +grief, he found him "a devilish ranter, given up to all manner of +uncleanness; he would laugh at all exhortations to sobriety, and deny +that there was a God, an angel, or a spirit." + +"Neither," he continues, "was this man only a temptation to me, but, my +calling lying in the country, I happened to come into several people's +company, who, though strict in religion formerly, yet were also drawn +away by these ranters. These would also talk with me of their ways, and +condemn me as illegal and dark; pretending that they only had attained to +perfection, that they could do what they would, and not sin. Oh! these +temptations were suitable to my flesh, I being but a young man, and my +nature in its prime; but God, who had, as I hope, designed me for better +things, kept me in the fear of His name, and did not suffer me to accept +such cursed principles." + +At this time he was sadly troubled to ascertain whether or not he had +that faith which the Scriptures spake of. Travelling one day from Elstow +to Bedford, after a recent rain, which had left pools of water in the +path, he felt a strong desire to settle the question, by commanding the +pools to become dry, and the dry places to become pools. Going under the +hedge, to pray for ability to work the miracle, he was struck with the +thought that if he failed he should know, indeed, that he was a castaway, +and give himself up to despair. He dared not attempt the experiment, and +went on his way, to use his own forcible language, "tossed up and down +between the Devil and his own ignorance." + +Soon after, he had one of those visions which foreshadowed the wonderful +dream of his Pilgrim's Progress. He saw some holy people of Bedford on +the sunny side of an high mountain, refreshing themselves in the pleasant +air and sunlight, while he was shivering in cold and darkness, amidst +snows and never-melting ices, like the victims of the Scandinavian hell. +A wall compassed the mountain, separating him from the blessed, with one +small gap or doorway, through which, with great pain and effort, he was +at last enabled to work his way into the sunshine, and sit down with the +saints, in the light and warmth thereof. + +But now a new trouble assailed him. Like Milton's metaphysical spirits, +who sat apart, + +"And reasoned of foreknowledge, will, and fate," he grappled with one of +those great questions which have always perplexed and baffled human +inquiry, and upon which much has been written to little purpose. He was +tortured with anxiety to know whether, according to the Westminster +formula, he was elected to salvation or damnation. His old adversary +vexed his soul with evil suggestions, and even quoted Scripture to +enforce them. "It may be you are not elected," said the Tempter; and the +poor tinker thought the supposition altogether too probable. "Why, +then," said Satan, "you had as good leave off, and strive no farther; for +if, indeed, you should not be elected and chosen of God, there is no hope +of your being saved; for it is neither in him that willeth nor in him +that runneth, but in God who showeth mercy." At length, when, as he +says, he was about giving up the ghost of all his hopes, this passage +fell with weight upon his spirit: "Look at the generations of old, and +see; did ever any trust in God, and were confounded?" Comforted by these +words, he opened his Bible took note them, but the most diligent search +and inquiry of his neighbors failed to discover them. At length his eye +fell upon them in the Apocryphal book of Ecclesiasticus. This, he says, +somewhat doubted him at first, as the book was not canonical; but in the +end he took courage and comfort from the passage. "I bless God," he +says, "for that word; it was good for me. That word doth still +oftentimes shine before my face." + +A long and weary struggle was now before him. "I cannot," he says, +"express with what longings and breathings of my soul I cried unto Christ +to call me. Gold! could it have been gotten by gold, what would I have +given for it. Had I a whole world, it had all gone ten thousand times +over for this, that my soul might have been in a converted state. How +lovely now was every one in my eyes, that I thought to be converted men +and women. They shone, they walked like a people who carried the broad +seal of Heaven with them." + +With what force and intensity of language does he portray in the +following passage the reality and earnestness of his agonizing +experience:-- + +"While I was thus afflicted with the fears of my own damnation, there +were two things would make me wonder: the one was, when I saw old people +hunting after the things of this life, as if they should live here +always; the other was, when I found professors much distressed and cast +down, when they met with outward losses; as of husband, wife, or child. +Lord, thought I, what seeking after carnal things by some, and what grief +in others for the loss of them! If they so much labor after and shed so +many tears for the things of this present life, how am I to be bemoaned, +pitied, and prayed for! My soul is dying, my soul is damning. Were my +soul but in a good condition, and were I but sure of it, ah I how rich +should I esteem myself, though blessed but with bread and water! I +should count these but small afflictions, and should bear them as little +burdens. 'A wounded spirit who can bear!'" + +He looked with envy, as he wandered through the country, upon the birds +in the trees, the hares in the preserves, and the fishes in the streams. +They were happy in their brief existence, and their death was but a +sleep. He felt himself alienated from God, a discord in the harmonies of +the universe. The very rooks which fluttered around the old church spire +seemed more worthy of the Creator's love and care than himself. A vision +of the infernal fire, like that glimpse of hell which was afforded to +Christian by the Shepherds, was continually before him, with its +"rumbling noise, and the cry of some tormented, and the scent of +brimstone." Whithersoever he went, the glare of it scorched him, and its +dreadful sound was in his ears. His vivid but disturbed imagination lent +new terrors to the awful figures by which the sacred writers conveyed the +idea of future retribution to the Oriental mind. Bunyan's World of Woe, +if it lacked the colossal architecture and solemn vastness of Milton's +Pandemonium, was more clearly defined; its agonies were within the pale +of human comprehension; its victims were men and women, with the same +keen sense of corporeal suffering which they possessed in life; and who, +to use his own terrible description, had "all the loathed variety of hell +to grapple with; fire unquenchable, a lake of choking brimstone, eternal +chains, darkness more black than night, the everlasting gnawing of the +worm, the sight of devils, and the yells and outcries of the damned." + +His mind at this period was evidently shaken in some degree from its +balance. He was troubled with strange, wicked thoughts, confused by +doubts and blasphemous suggestions, for which he could only account by +supposing himself possessed of the Devil. He wanted to curse and swear, +and had to clap his hands on his mouth to prevent it. In prayer, he +felt, as he supposed, Satan behind him, pulling his clothes, and telling +him to have done, and break off; suggesting that he had better pray to +him, and calling up before his mind's eye the figures of a bull, a tree, +or some other object, instead of the awful idea of God. + +He notes here, as cause of thankfulness, that, even in this dark and +clouded state, he was enabled to see the "vile and abominable things +fomented by the Quakers," to be errors. Gradually, the shadow wherein he +had so long + + "Walked beneath the day's broad glare, + A darkened man," + +passed from him, and for a season he was afforded an "evidence of his +salvation from Heaven, with many golden seals thereon hanging in his +sight." But, ere long, other temptations assailed him. A strange +suggestion haunted him, to sell or part with his Saviour. His own +account of this hallucination is too painfully vivid to awaken any other +feeling than that of sympathy and sadness. + +"I could neither eat my food, stoop for a pin, chop a stick, or cast mine +eye to look on this or that, but still the temptation would come, Sell +Christ for this, or sell Christ for that; sell him, sell him. + +"Sometimes it would run in my thoughts, not so little as a hundred times +together, Sell him, sell him; against which, I may say, for whole hours +together, I have been forced to stand as continually leaning and forcing +my spirit against it, lest haply, before I were aware, some wicked +thought might arise in my heart, that might consent thereto; and +sometimes the tempter would make me believe I had consented to it; but +then I should be as tortured upon a rack, for whole days together. + +"This temptation did put me to such scares, lest I should at sometimes, I +say, consent thereto, and be overcome therewith, that, by the very force +of my mind, my very body would be put into action or motion, by way of +pushing or thrusting with my hands or elbows; still answering, as fast as +the destroyer said, Sell him, I will not, I will not, I will not; no, not +for thousands, thousands, thousands of worlds; thus reckoning, lest I +should set too low a value on him, even until I scarce well knew where I +was, or how to be composed again. + +"But to be brief: one morning, as I did lie in my bed, I was, as at other +times, most fiercely assaulted with this temptation, to sell and part +with Christ; the wicked suggestion still running in my mind, Sell him, +sell him, sell him, sell him, sell him, as fast as a man could speak; +against which, also, in my mind, as at other times, I answered, No, no, +not for thousands, thousands, thousands, at least twenty times together; +but at last, after much striving, I felt this thought pass through my +heart, Let him go if he will; and I thought also, that I felt my heart +freely consent thereto. Oh, the diligence of Satan! Oh, the +desperateness of man's heart! + +"Now was the battle won, and down fell I, as a bird that is shot from the +top of a tree, into great guilt, and fearful despair. Thus getting out +of my bed, I went moping into the field; but God knows with as heavy a +heart as mortal man, I think, could bear; where, for the space of two +hours, I was like a man bereft of life; and, as now, past all recovery, +and bound over to eternal punishment. + +"And withal, that Scripture did seize upon my soul: 'Or profane person, +as Esau, who, for one morsel of meat, sold his birthright; for ye know, +how that afterward, when he would have inherited the blessing, he was +rejected; for he found no place for repentance, though he sought it +carefully with tears." + +For two years and a half, as he informs us, that awful scripture sounded +in his ears like the knell of a lost soul. He believed that he had +committed they unpardonable sin. His mental anguish 'was united with +bodily illness and suffering. His nervous system became fearfully +deranged; his limbs trembled; and he supposed this visible tremulousness +and agitation to be the mark of Cain. 'Troubled with pain and +distressing sensations in his chest, he began to fear that his breast- +bone would split open, and that he should perish like Judas Iscariot. He +feared that the tiles of the houses would fall upon him as he walked in +the streets. He was like his own Man in the Cage at the House of the +Interpreter, shut out from the promises, and looking forward to certain +judgment. "Methought," he says, "the very sun that shineth in heaven did +grudge to give me light." And still the dreadful words, "He found no +place for repentance, though he sought it carefully with tears," sounded +in the depths of his soul. They were, he says, like fetters of brass to +his legs, and their continual clanking followed him for months. +Regarding himself elected and predestined for damnation, he thought that +all things worked for his damage and eternal overthrow, while all things +wrought for the best and to do good to the elect and called of God unto +salvation. God and all His universe had, he thought, conspired against +him; the green earth, the bright waters, the sky itself, were written +over with His irrevocable curse. + +Well was it said by Bunyan's contemporary, the excellent Cudworth, in his +eloquent sermon before the Long Parliament, that "We are nowhere +commanded to pry into the secrets of God, but the wholesome advice given +us is this: 'To make our calling and election sure.' We have no warrant +from Scripture to peep into the hidden rolls of eternity, to spell out +our names among the stars." "Must we say that God sometimes, to exercise +His uncontrollable dominion, delights rather in plunging wretched souls +down into infernal night and everlasting darkness? What, then, shall we +make the God of the whole world? Nothing but a cruel and dreadful +_Erinnys_, with curled fiery snakes about His head, and firebrands in His +hand; thus governing the world! Surely, this will make us either +secretly think there is no God in the world, if He must needs be such, or +else to wish heartily there were none." It was thus at times with +Bunyan. He was tempted, in this season of despair, to believe that there +was no resurrection and no judgment. + +One day, he tells us, a sudden rushing sound, as of wind or the wings of +angels, came to him through the window, wonderfully sweet and pleasant; +and it was as if a voice spoke to him from heaven words of encouragement +and hope, which, to use his language, commanded, for the time, "a silence +in his heart to all those tumultuous thoughts that did use, like +masterless hell-hounds, to roar and bellow and make a hideous noise +within him." About this time, also, some comforting passages of +Scripture were called to mind; but he remarks, that whenever he strove to +apply them to his case, Satan would thrust the curse of Esau in his face, +and wrest the good word from him. The blessed promise "Him that cometh +to me, I will in no wise cast out" was the chief instrumentality in +restoring his lost peace. He says of it: "If ever Satan and I did strive +for any word of God in all my life, it was for this good word of Christ; +he at one end, and I at the other. Oh, what work we made! It was for +this in John, I say, that we did so tug and strive; he pulled, and I +pulled, but, God be praised! I overcame him; I got sweetness from it. +Oh, many a pull hath my heart had with Satan for this blessed sixth +chapter of John!" Who does not here call to mind the struggle between +Christian and Apollyon in the valley! + +That was no fancy sketch; it was the narrative of the author's own +grapple with the Spirit of Evil. Like his ideal Christian, he "conquered +through Him that loved him." Love wrought the victory the Scripture of +Forgiveness overcame that of Hatred. + +He never afterwards relapsed into that state of religious melancholy from +which he so hardly escaped. He speaks of his deliverance as the waking +out of a troublesome dream. His painful experience was not lost upon +him; for it gave him, ever after, a tender sympathy for the weak, the +sinful, the ignorant, and desponding. In some measure, he had been +"touched with the feeling of their infirmities." He could feel for those +in the bonds of sin and despair, as bound with them. Hence his power as +a preacher; hence the wonderful adaptation of his great allegory to all +the variety of spiritual conditions. Like Fearing, he had lain a month +in the Slough of Despond, and had played, like him, the long melancholy +bass of spiritual heaviness. With Feeble-mind, he had fallen into the +hands of Slay-good, of the nature of Man-eaters: and had limped along his +difficult way upon the crutches of Ready-to-halt. Who better than +himself could describe the condition of Despondency, and his daughter +Much-afraid, in the dungeon of Doubting Castle? Had he not also fallen +among thieves, like Little-faith? + +His account of his entering upon the solemn duties of a preacher of the +Gospel is at once curious and instructive. He deals honestly with +himself, exposing all his various moods, weaknesses, doubts, and +temptations. "I preached," he says, "what I felt; for the terrors of the +law and the guilt of transgression lay heavy on my conscience. I have +been as one sent to them from the dead. I went, myself in chains, to +preach to them in chains; and carried that fire in my conscience which I +persuaded them to beware of." At times, when he stood up to preach, +blasphemies and evil doubts rushed into his mind, and he felt a strong +desire to utter them aloud to his congregation; and at other seasons, +when he was about to apply to the sinner some searching and fearful text +of Scripture, he was tempted to withhold it, on the ground that it +condemned himself also; but, withstanding the suggestion of the Tempter, +to use his own simile, he bowed himself like Samson to condemn sin +wherever he found it, though he brought guilt and condemnation upon +himself thereby, choosing rather to die with the Philistines than to deny +the truth. + +Foreseeing the consequences of exposing himself to the operation of the +penal laws by holding conventicles and preaching, he was deeply afflicted +at the thought of the suffering and destitution to which his wife and +children might be exposed by his death or imprisonment. Nothing can be +more touching than his simple and earnest words on this point. They show +how warm and deep were him human affections, and what a tender and loving +heart he laid as a sacrifice on the altar of duty. + +"I found myself a man compassed with infirmities; the parting with my +wife and poor children hath often been to me in this place as the pulling +the flesh from the bones; and also it brought to my mind the many +hardships, miseries, and wants, that my poor family was like to meet +with, should I be taken from them, especially my poor blind child, who +lay nearer my heart than all beside. Oh, the thoughts of the hardships I +thought my poor blind one might go under would break my heart to pieces. + +"Poor child! thought I, what sorrow art thou like to have for thy portion +in this world! thou must be beaten, must beg, suffer hunger, cold, +nakedness, and a thousand calamities, though I cannot now endure the wind +should blow upon thee. But yet, thought I, I must venture you all with +God, though it goeth to the quick to leave you: oh! I saw I was as a man +who was pulling down his house upon the heads of his wife and children; +yet I thought on those 'two milch kine that were to carry the ark of God +into another country, and to leave their calves behind them.' + +"But that which helped me in this temptation was divers considerations: +the first was, the consideration of those two Scriptures, 'Leave thy +fatherless children, I will preserve them alive; and let thy widows trust +in me;' and again, 'The Lord said, verily it shall go well with thy +remnant; verily I will cause the enemy to entreat them well in the time +of evil.'" + +He was arrested in 1660, charged with "devilishly and perniciously +abstaining from church," and of being "a common upholder of +conventicles." At the Quarter Sessions, where his trial seems to have +been conducted somewhat like that of Faithful at Vanity Fair, he was +sentenced to perpetual banishment. This sentence, however, was never +executed, but he was remanded to Bedford jail, where he lay a prisoner +for twelve years. + +Here, shut out from the world, with no other books than the Bible and +Fox's Martyrs, he penned that great work which has attained a wider and +more stable popularity than any other book in the English tongue. It is +alike the favorite of the nursery and the study. Many experienced +Christians hold it only second to the Bible; the infidel himself would +not willingly let it die. Men of all sects read it with delight, as in +the main a truthful representation of the 'Christian pilgrimage, without +indeed assenting to all the doctrines which the author puts in the month +of his fighting sermonizer, Great-heart, or which may be deduced from +some other portions of his allegory. A recollection of his fearful +sufferings, from misapprehension of a single text in the Scriptures, +relative to the question of election, we may suppose gave a milder tone +to the theology of his Pilgrim than was altogether consistent with the +Calvinism of the seventeenth century. "Religion," says Macaulay, "has +scarcely ever worn a form so calm and soothing as in Bunyan's allegory." +In composing it, he seems never to have altogether lost sight of the +fact, that, in his life-and-death struggle with Satan for the blessed +promise recorded by the Apostle of Love, the adversary was generally +found on the Genevan side of the argument. Little did the short-sighted +persecutors of Bunyan dream, when they closed upon him the door of +Bedford jail, that God would overrule their poor spite and envy to His +own glory and the worldwide renown of their victim. In the solitude of +his prison, the ideal forms of beauty and sublimity, which had long +flitted before him vaguely, like the vision of the Temanite, took shape +and coloring; and he was endowed with power to reduce them to order, and +arrange them in harmonious groupings. His powerful imagination, no +longer self-tormenting, but under the direction of reason and grace, +expanded his narrow cell into a vast theatre, lighted up for the display +of its wonders. To this creative faculty of his mind might have been +aptly applied the language which George Wither, a contemporary prisoner, +addressed to his Muse:-- + + "The dull loneness, the black shade + Which these hanging vaults have made, + The rude portals that give light + More to terror than delight; + This my chamber of neglect, + Walled about with disrespect,-- + From all these, and this dull air, + A fit object for despair, + She hath taught me by her might, + To draw comfort and delight." + +That stony cell of his was to him like the rock of Padan-aram to the +wandering Patriarch. He saw angels ascending and descending. The House +Beautiful rose up before him, and its holy sisterhood welcomed him. He +looked, with his Pilgrim, from the Chamber of Peace. The Valley of +Humiliation lay stretched out beneath his eye, and he heard "the curious, +melodious note of the country birds, who sing all the day long in the +spring time, when the flowers appear, and the sun shines warm, and make +the woods and groves and solitary places glad." Side by side with the +good Christiana and the loving Mercy, he walked through the green and +lowly valley, "fruitful as any the crow flies over," through "meadows +beautiful with lilies;" the song of the poor but fresh-faced shepherd- +boy, who lived a merry life, and wore the herb heartsease in his bosom, +sounded through his cell:-- + + "He that is down need fear no fall; + He that is low no pride." + +The broad and pleasant "river of the Water of Life" glided peacefully +before him, fringed "on either side with green trees, with all manner of +fruit," and leaves of healing, with "meadows beautified with lilies, and +green all the year long;" he saw the Delectable Mountains, glorious with +sunshine, overhung with gardens and orchards and vineyards; and beyond +all, the Land of Beulah, with its eternal sunshine, its song of birds, +its music of fountains, its purple clustered vines, and groves through +which walked the Shining Ones, silver-winged and beautiful. + +What were bars and bolts and prison-walls to him, whose eyes were +anointed to see, and whose ears opened to hear, the glory and the +rejoicing of the City of God, when the pilgrims were conducted to its +golden gates, from the black and bitter river, with the sounding +trumpeters, the transfigured harpers with their crowns of gold, the sweet +voices of angels, the welcoming peal of bells in the holy city, and the +songs of the redeemed ones? In reading the concluding pages of the first +part of Pilgrim's Progress, we feel as if the mysterious glory of the +Beatific Vision was unveiled before us. We are dazzled with the excess +of light. We are entranced with the mighty melody; overwhelmed by the +great anthem of rejoicing spirits. It can only be adequately described +in the language of Milton in respect to the Apocalypse, as "a seven-fold +chorus of hallelujahs and harping symphonies." + +Few who read Bunyan nowadays think of him as one of the brave old English +confessors, whose steady and firm endurance of persecution baffled and in +the end overcame the tyranny of the Established Church in the reign of +Charles II. What Milton and Penn and Locke wrote in defence of Liberty, +Bunyan lived out and acted. He made no concessions to worldly rank. +Dissolute lords and proud bishops he counted less than the humblest and +poorest of his disciples at Bedford. When first arrested and thrown into +prison, he supposed he should be called to suffer death for his faithful +testimony to the truth; and his great fear was, that he should not meet +his fate with the requisite firmness, and so dishonor the cause of his +Master. And when dark clouds came over him, and he sought in vain for a +sufficient evidence that in the event of his death it would be well with +him, he girded up his soul with the reflection, that, as he suffered for +the word and way of God, he was engaged not to shrink one hair's breadth +from it. "I will leap," he says, "off the ladder blindfold into +eternity, sink or swim, come heaven, come hell. Lord Jesus, if thou wilt +catch me, do; if not, I will venture in thy name!" + +The English revolution of the seventeenth century, while it humbled the +false and oppressive aristocracy of rank and title, was prodigal in the +development of the real nobility of the mind and heart. Its history is +bright with the footprints of men whose very names still stir the hearts +of freemen, the world over, like a trumpet peal. Say what we may of its +fanaticism, laugh as we may at its extravagant enjoyment of newly +acquired religious and civil liberty, who shall now venture to deny that +it was the golden age of England? Who that regards freedom above +slavery, will now sympathize with the outcry and lamentation of those +interested in the continuance of the old order of things, against the +prevalence of sects and schism, but who, at the same time, as Milton +shrewdly intimates, dreaded more the rending of their pontifical sleeves +than the rending of the Church? Who shall now sneer at Puritanism, with +the Defence of Unlicensed Printing before him? Who scoff at Quakerism +over the Journal of George Fox? Who shall join with debauched lordlings +and fat-witted prelates in ridicule of Anabaptist levellers and dippers, +after rising from the perusal of Pilgrim's Progress? "There were giants +in those days." And foremost amidst that band of liberty-loving and God- +fearing men, + + "The slandered Calvinists of Charles's time, + Who fought, and won it, Freedom's holy fight," + +stands the subject of our sketch, the Tinker of Elstow. Of his high +merit as an author there is no longer any question. The Edinburgh Review +expressed the common sentiment of the literary world, when it declared +that the two great creative minds of the seventeenth century were those +which produced Paradise Lost and the Pilgrim's Progress. + + + + + + + THOMAS ELLWOOD. + +Commend us to autobiographies! Give us the veritable notchings of +Robinson Crusoe on his stick, the indubitable records of a life long +since swallowed up in the blackness of darkness, traced by a hand the +very dust of which has become undistinguishable. The foolishest egotist +who ever chronicled his daily experiences, his hopes and fears, poor +plans and vain reachings after happiness, speaking to us out of the Past, +and thereby giving us to understand that it was quite as real as our +Present, is in no mean sort our benefactor, and commands our attention, +in spite of his folly. We are thankful for the very vanity which +prompted him to bottle up his poor records, and cast them into the great +sea of Time, for future voyagers to pick up. We note, with the deepest +interest, that in him too was enacted that miracle of a conscious +existence, the reproduction of which in ourselves awes and perplexes us. +He, too, had a mother; he hated and loved; the light from old-quenched +hearths shone over him; he walked in the sunshine over the dust of those +who had gone before him, just as we are now walking over his. These +records of him remain, the footmarks of a long-extinct life, not of mere +animal organism, but of a being like ourselves, enabling us, by studying +their hieroglyphic significance, to decipher and see clearly into the +mystery of existence centuries ago. The dead generations live again in +these old self-biographies. Incidentally, unintentionally, yet in the +simplest and most natural manner, they make us familiar with all the +phenomena of life in the bygone ages. We are brought in contact with +actual flesh-and-blood men and women, not the ghostly outline figures +which pass for such, in what is called History. The horn lantern of the +biographer, by the aid of which, with painful minuteness, he chronicled, +from day to day, his own outgoings and incomings, making visible to us +his pitiful wants, labors, trials, and tribulations of the stomach and of +the conscience, sheds, at times, a strong clear light upon +contemporaneous activities; what seemed before half fabulous, rises up in +distinct and full proportions; we look at statesmen, philosophers, and +poets, with the eyes of those who lived perchance their next-door +neighbors, and sold them beer, and mutton, and household stuffs, had +access to their kitchens, and took note of the fashion of their wigs and +the color of their breeches. Without some such light, all history would +be just about as unintelligible and unreal as a dimly remembered dream. + +The journals of the early Friends or Quakers are in this respect +invaluable. Little, it is true, can be said, as a general thing, of +their literary merits. Their authors were plain, earnest men and women, +chiefly intent upon the substance of things, and having withal a strong +testimony to bear against carnal wit and outside show and ornament. Yet, +even the scholar may well admire the power of certain portions of George +Fox's Journal, where a strong spirit clothes its utterance in simple, +downright Saxon words; the quiet and beautiful enthusiasm of Pennington; +the torrent energy of Edward Burrough; the serene wisdom of Penn; the +logical acuteness of Barclay; the honest truthfulness of Sewell; the wit +and humor of John Roberts, (for even Quakerism had its apostolic jokers +and drab-coated Robert Halls;) and last, not least, the simple beauty of +Woolman's Journal, the modest record of a life of good works and love. + +Let us look at the Life of Thomas Ellwood. The book before us is a +hardly used Philadelphia reprint, bearing date of 1775. The original was +published some sixty years before. It is not a book to be found in +fashionable libraries, or noticed in fashionable reviews, but is none the +less deserving of attention. + +Ellwood was born in 1639, in the little town of Crowell, in Oxfordshire. +Old Walter, his father, was of "gentlemanly lineage," and held a +commission of the peace under Charles I. One of his most intimate +friends was Isaac Pennington, a gentleman of estate and good reputation, +whose wife, the widow of Sir John Springette, was a lady of superior +endowments. Her only daughter, Gulielma, was the playmate and companion +of Thomas. On making this family a visit, in 1658, in company with his +father, he was surprised to find that they had united with the Quakers, a +sect then little known, and everywhere spoken against. Passing through +the vista of nearly two centuries, let us cross the threshold, and look +with the eyes of young Ellwood upon this Quaker family. It will +doubtless give us a good idea of the earnest and solemn spirit of that +age of religious awakening. + +"So great a change from a free, debonair, and courtly sort of behavior, +which we had formerly found there, into so strict a gravity as they now +received us with, did not a little amuse us, and disappointed our +expectations of such a pleasant visit as we had promised ourselves. + +"For my part, I sought, and at length found, means to cast myself into +the company of the daughter, whom I found gathering flowers in the +garden, attended by her maid, also a Quaker. But when I addressed her +after my accustomed manner, with intention to engage her in discourse on +the foot of our former acquaintance, though she treated me with a +courteous mien, yet, as young as she was, the gravity of her looks and +behavior struck such an awe upon me, that I found myself not so much +master of myself as to pursue any further converse with her. + +"We staid dinner, which was very handsome, and lacked nothing to +recommend it to me but the want of mirth and pleasant discourse, which we +could neither have with them, nor, by reason of them, with one another; +the weightiness which was upon their spirits and countenances keeping +down the lightness that would have been up in ours." + +Not long after, they made a second visit to their sober friends, spending +several days, during which they attended a meeting, in a neighboring +farmhouse, where we are introduced by Ellwood to two remarkable +personages, Edward Burrough, the friend and fearless reprover of +Cromwell, and by far the most eloquent preacher of his sect and James +Nayler, whose melancholy after-history of fanaticism, cruel sufferings, +and beautiful repentance, is so well known to the readers of English +history under the Protectorate. Under the preaching of these men, and +the influence of the Pennington family, young Ellwood was brought into +fellowship with the Quakers. Of the old Justice's sorrow and indignation +at this sudden blasting of his hopes and wishes in respect to his son, +and of the trials and difficulties of the latter in his new vocation, it +is now scarcely worth while to speak. Let us step forward a few years, +to 1662, considering meantime how matters, political and spiritual, are +changed in that brief period. Cromwell, the Maccabeus of Puritanism, is +no longer among men; Charles the Second sits in his place; profane and +licentious cavaliers have thrust aside the sleek-haired, painful-faced +Independents, who used to groan approval to the Scriptural illustrations +of Harrison and Fleetwood; men easy of virtue, without sincerity, either +in religion or politics, occupying the places made honorable by the +Miltons, Whitlocks, and Vanes of the Commonwealth. Having this change in +view, the light which the farthing candle of Ellwood sheds upon one of +these illustrious names will not be unwelcome. In his intercourse with +Penn, and other learned Quakers, he had reason to lament his own +deficiencies in scholarship, and his friend Pennington undertook to put +him in a way of remedying the defect. + +"He had," says Ellwood, "an intimate acquaintance with Dr. Paget, a +physician of note in London, and he with John Milton, a gentleman of +great note for learning throughout the learned world, for the accurate +pieces he had written on various subjects and occasions. + +"This person, having filled a public station in the former times, lived a +private and retired life in London, and, having lost his sight, kept +always a man to read for him, which usually was the son of some gentleman +of his acquaintance, whom, in kindness, he took to improve in his +learning. + +"Thus, by the mediation of my friend Isaac Pennington with Dr. Paget, and +through him with John Milton, was I admitted to come to him, not as a +servant to him, nor to be in the house with him, but only to have the +liberty of coming to his house at certain hours when I would, and read to +him what books he should appoint, which was all the favor I desired. + +"He received me courteously, as well for the sake of Dr. Paget, who +introduced me, as of Isaac Pennington, who recommended me, to both of +whom he bore a good respect. And, having inquired divers things of me, +with respect to my former progression in learning, he dismissed me, to +provide myself with such accommodations as might be most suitable to my +studies. + +"I went, therefore, and took lodgings as near to his house (which was +then in Jewen Street) as I conveniently could, and from thenceforward +went every day in the afternoon, except on the first day of the week, +and, sitting by him in his dining-room, read to him such books in the +Latin tongue as he pleased to have me read. + +"He perceiving with what earnest desire I had pursued learning, gave me +not only all the encouragement, but all the help he could. For, having a +curious ear, he understood by my tone when I understood what I read and +when I did not, and accordingly would stop me, examine me, and open the +most difficult passages to me." + +Thanks, worthy Thomas, for this glimpse into John Milton's dining-room! + +He had been with "Master Milton," as he calls him, only a few weeks, +when, being one "first day morning," at the Bull and Mouth meeting, +Aldersgate, the train-bands of the city, "with great noise and clamor," +headed by Major Rosewell, fell upon him and his friends. The immediate +cause of this onslaught upon quiet worshippers was the famous plot of the +Fifth Monarchy men, grim old fanatics, who (like the Millerites of the +present day) had been waiting long for the personal reign of Christ and +the saints upon earth, and in their zeal to hasten such a consummation +had sallied into London streets with drawn swords and loaded matchlocks. +The government took strong measures for suppressing dissenters' meetings +or "conventicles;" and the poor Quakers, although not at all implicated +in the disturbance, suffered more severely than any others. Let us look +at the "freedom of conscience and worship" in England under that +irreverent Defender of the Faith, Charles II. Ellwood says: "He that +commanded the party gave us first a general charge to come out of the +room. But we, who came thither at God's requiring to worship Him, (like +that good man of old, who said, we ought to obey God rather than man,) +stirred not, but kept our places. Whereupon, he sent some of his +soldiers among us, with command to drag or drive us out, which they did +roughly enough." Think of it: grave men and women, and modest maidens, +sitting there with calm, impassive countenances, motionless as death, the +pikes of the soldiery closing about them in a circle of bristling steel! +Brave and true ones! Not in vain did ye thus oppose God's silence to the +Devil's uproar; Christian endurance and calm persistence in the exercise +of your rights as Englishmen and men to the hot fury of impatient +tyranny! From your day down to this, the world has been the better for +your faithfulness. + +Ellwood and some thirty of his friends were marched off to prison in Old +Bridewell, which, as well as nearly all the other prisons, was already +crowded with Quaker prisoners. One of the rooms of the prison was used +as a torture chamber. "I was almost affrighted," says Ellwood, "by the +dismalness of the place; for, besides that the walls were all laid over +with black, from top to bottom, there stood in the middle a great +whipping-post. + +"The manner of whipping there is, to strip the party to the skin, from +the waist upward, and, having fastened him to the whipping-post, (so that +he can neither resist nor shun the strokes,) to lash his naked body with +long, slender twigs of holly, which will bend almost like thongs around +the body; and these, having little knots upon them, tear the skin and +flesh, and give extreme pain." + +To this terrible punishment aged men and delicately nurtured young +females were often subjected, during this season of hot persecution. + +From the Bridewell, Ellwood was at length removed to Newgate, and thrust +in, with other "Friends," amidst the common felons. He speaks of this +prison, with its thieves, murderers, and prostitutes, its over-crowded +apartments and loathsome cells, as "a hell upon earth." In a closet, +adjoining the room where he was lodged, lay for several days the +quartered bodies of Phillips, Tongue, and Gibbs, the leaders of the Fifth +Monarchy rising, frightful and loathsome, as they came from the bloody +hands of the executioners! These ghastly remains were at length obtained +by the friends of the dead, and buried. The heads were ordered to be +prepared for setting up in different parts of the city. Read this grim +passage of description:-- + +"I saw the heads when they were brought to be boiled. The hangman +fetched them in a dirty basket, out of some by-place, and, setting them +down among the felons, he and they made sport of them. They took them by +the hair, flouting, jeering, and laughing at them; and then giving them +some ill names, boxed them on their ears and cheeks; which done, the +hangman put them into his kettle, and parboiled them with bay-salt and +cummin-seed: that to keep them from putrefaction, and this to keep off +the fowls from seizing upon them. The whole sight, as well that of the +bloody quarters first as this of the heads afterwards, was both frightful +and loathsome, and begat an abhorrence in my nature." + +At the next session of the municipal court at the Old Bailey, Ellwood +obtained his discharge. After paying a visit to "my Master Milton," he +made his way to Chalfont, the home of his friends the Penningtons, where +he was soon after engaged as a Latin teacher. Here he seems to have had +his trials and temptations. Gulielma Springette, the daughter of +Pennington's wife, his old playmate, had now grown to be "a fair woman of +marriageable age," and, as he informs us, "very desirable, whether regard +was had to her outward person, which wanted nothing to make her +completely comely, or to the endowments of her mind, which were every way +extraordinary, or to her outward fortune, which was fair." From all +which, we are not surprised to learn that "she was secretly and openly +sought for by many of almost every rank and condition." "To whom," +continues Thomas, "in their respective turns, (till he at length came for +whom she was reserved,) she carried herself with so much evenness of +temper, such courteous freedom, guarded by the strictest modesty, that as +it gave encouragement or ground of hope to none, so neither did it +administer any matter of offence or just cause of complaint to any." + +Beautiful and noble maiden! How the imagination fills up this outline +limning by her friend, and, if truth must be told, admirer! Serene, +courteous, healthful; a ray of tenderest and blandest light, shining +steadily in the sober gloom of that old household! Confirmed Quaker as +she is, shrinking from none of the responsibilities and dangers of her +profession, and therefore liable at any time to the penalties of prison +and whipping-post, under that plain garb and in spite of that "certain +gravity of look and behavior,"--which, as we have seen, on one occasion +awed young Ellwood into silence,--youth, beauty, and refinement assert +their prerogatives; love knows no creed; the gay, and titled, and wealthy +crowd around her, suing in vain for her favor. + + "Followed, like the tided moon, + She moves as calmly on," + +"until he at length comes for whom she was reserved," and her name is +united with that of one worthy even of her, the world-renowned William +Penn. + +Meantime, one cannot but feel a good degree of sympathy with young +Ellwood, her old schoolmate and playmate, placed, as he was, in the same +family with her, enjoying her familiar conversation and unreserved +confidence, and, as he says, the "advantageous opportunities of riding +and walking abroad with her, by night as well as by day, without any +other company than her maid; for so great, indeed, was the confidence +that her mother had in me, that she thought her daughter safe, if I was +with her, even from the plots and designs of others upon her." So near, +and yet, alas! in truth, so distant! The serene and gentle light which +shone upon him, in the sweet solitudes of Chalfont, was that of a star, +itself unapproachable. + +As he himself meekly intimates, she was reserved for another. He seems +to have fully understood his own position in respect to her; although, to +use his own words, "others, measuring him by the propensity of their own +inclinations, concluded he would steal her, run away with her, and marry +her." Little did these jealous surmisers know of the true and really +heroic spirit of the young Latin master. His own apology and defence of +his conduct, under circumstances of temptation which St. Anthony himself +could have scarcely better resisted, will not be amiss. + +"I was not ignorant of the various fears which filled the jealous heads +of some concerning me, neither was I so stupid nor so divested of all +humanity as not to be sensible of the real and innate worth and virtue +which adorned that excellent dame, and attracted the eyes and hearts of +so many, with the greatest importunity, to seek and solicit her; nor was +I so devoid of natural heat as not to feel some sparklings of desire, as +well as others; but the force of truth and sense of honor suppressed +whatever would have risen beyond the bounds of fair and virtuous +friendship. For I easily foresaw that, if I should have attempted any +thing in a dishonorable way, by fraud or force, upon her, I should have +thereby brought a wound upon mine own soul, a foul scandal upon my +religious profession, and an infamous stain upon mine honor, which was +far more dear unto me than my life. Wherefore, having observed how some +others had befooled themselves, by misconstruing her common kindness +(expressed in an innocent, open, free, and familiar conversation, +springing from the abundant affability, courtesy, and sweetness of her +natural temper) to be the effect of a singular regard and peculiar +affection to them, I resolved to shun the rock whereon they split; and, +remembering the saying of the poet + + 'Felix quem faciunt aliena Pericula cantum,' + +I governed myself in a free yet respectful carriage towards her, thereby +preserving a fair reputation with my friends, and enjoying as much of her +favor and kindness, in a virtuous and firm friendship, as was fit for her +to show or for me to seek." + +Well and worthily said, poor Thomas! Whatever might be said of others, +thou, at least, wast no coxcomb. Thy distant and involuntary admiration +of "the fair Guli" needs, however, no excuse. Poor human nature, guard +it as one may, with strictest discipline and painfully cramping +environment, will sometimes act out itself; and, in thy case, not even +George Fox himself, knowing thy beautiful young friend, (and doubtless +admiring her too, for he was one of the first to appreciate and honor the +worth and dignity or woman,) could have found it in his heart to censure +thee! + +At this period, as was indeed most natural, our young teacher solaced +himself with occasional appeals to what he calls "the Muses." There is +reason to believe, however, that the Pagan sisterhood whom he ventured to +invoke seldom graced his study with their personal attendance. In these +rhyming efforts, scattered up and down his Journal, there are occasional +sparkles of genuine wit, and passages of keen sarcasm, tersely and fitly +expressed. Others breathe a warm, devotional feeling; in the following +brief prayer, for instance, the wants of the humble Christian are +condensed in a manner worthy of Quarles or Herbert:-- + + "Oh! that mine eye might closed be + To what concerns me not to see; + That deafness might possess mine ear + To what concerns me not to hear; + That Truth my tongue might always tie + From ever speaking foolishly; + That no vain thought might ever rest + Or be conceived in my breast; + That by each word and deed and thought + Glory may to my God be brought! + But what are wishes? Lord, mine eye + On Thee is fixed, to Thee I cry + Wash, Lord, and purify my heart, + And make it clean in every part; + And when 't is clean, Lord, keep it too, + For that is more than I can do." + +The thought in the following extracts from a poem written on the death of +his friend Pennington's son is trite, but not inaptly or inelegantly +expressed:-- + + "What ground, alas, has any man + To set his heart on things below, + Which, when they seem most like to stand, + Fly like the arrow from the bow! + Who's now atop erelong shall feel + The circling motion of the wheel! + + "The world cannot afford a thing + Which to a well-composed mind + Can any lasting pleasure bring, + But in itself its grave will find. + All things unto their centre tend + What had beginning must have end! + + "No disappointment can befall + Us, having Him who's all in all! + What can of pleasure him prevent + Who lath the Fountain of Content?" + +In the year 1663 a severe law was enacted against the "sect called +Quakers," prohibiting their meetings, with the penalty of banishment for +the third offence! The burden of the prosecution which followed fell +upon the Quakers of the metropolis, large numbers of whom were heavily +fined, imprisoned, and sentenced to be banished from their native land. +Yet, in time, our worthy friend Ellwood came in for his own share of +trouble, in consequence of attending the funeral of one of his friends. +An evil-disposed justice of the county obtained information of the Quaker +gathering; and, while the body of the dead was "borne on Friends' +shoulders through the street, in order to be carried to the burying- +ground, which was at the town's end," says Ellwood, "he rushed out upon +us with the constables and a rabble of rude fellows whom he had gathered +together, and, having his drawn sword in his hand, struck one of the +foremost of the bearers with it, commanding them to set down the coffin. +But the Friend who was so stricken, being more concerned for the safety +of the dead body than for his own, lest it should fall, and any indecency +thereupon follow, held the coffin fast; which the justice observing, and +being enraged that his word was not forthwith obeyed, set his hand to the +coffin, and with a forcible thrust threw it off from the bearers' +shoulders, so, that it fell to the ground in the middle of the street, +and there we were forced to leave it; for the constables and rabble fell +upon us, and drew some and drove others into the inn. Of those thus +taken," continues Ellwood, "I was one. They picked out ten of us, and +sent us to Aylesbury jail. + +"They caused the body to lie in the open street and cartway, so that all +travellers that passed, whether horsemen, coaches, carts, or wagons, were +fain to break out of the way to go by it, until it was almost night. And +then, having caused a grave to be made in the unconsecrated part of what +is called the Churchyard, they forcibly took the body from the widow, and +buried it there." + +He remained a prisoner only about two months, during which period he +comforted himself by such verse-making as follows, reminding us of +similar enigmas in Bunyan's _Pilgrim's Progress_: + + "Lo! a Riddle for the wise, + In the which a Mystery lies. + + RIDDLE. + "Some men are free whilst they in prison lie; + Others who ne'er saw prison captives die. + + CAUTION. + "He that can receive it may, + He that cannot, let him stay, + Not be hasty, but suspend + Judgment till he sees the end. + + SOLUTION. + "He's only free, indeed, who's free from sin, + And he is fastest bound that's bound therein." + + +In the mean time, where is our "Master Milton"? We, left him deprived of +his young companion and reader, sitting lonely in his small dining-room, +in Jewen Street. It is now the year 1665; is not the pestilence in +London? A sinful and godless city, with its bloated bishops fawning +around the Nell Gwyns of a licentious and profane Defender of the Faith; +its swaggering and drunken cavaliers; its ribald jesters; its obscene +ballad-singers; its loathsome prisons, crowded with Godfearing men and +women: is not the measure of its iniquity already filled up? Three years +only have passed since the terrible prayer of Vane went upward from the +scaffold on Tower Hill: "When my blood is shed upon the block, let it, O +God, have a voice afterward!" Audible to thy ear, O bosom friend of the +martyr! has that blood cried from earth; and now, how fearfully is it +answered! Like the ashes which the Seer of the Hebrews cast towards +Heaven, it has returned in boils and blains upon the proud and oppressive +city. John Milton, sitting blind in Jewen Street, has heard the toll of +the death-bells, and the nightlong rumble of the burial-carts, and the +terrible summons, "Bring out your dead!" The Angel of the Plague, in +yellow mantle, purple-spotted, walks the streets. Why should he tarry in +a doomed city, forsaken of God! Is not the command, even to him, "Arise +and flee, for thy life"? In some green nook of the quiet country, he may +finish the great work which his hands have found to do. He bethinks him +of his old friends, the Penningtons, and his young Quaker companion, the +patient and gentle Ellwood. "Wherefore," says the latter, "some little +time before I went to Aylesbury jail, I was desired by my quondam Master +Milton to take an house for him in the neighborhood where I dwelt, that +he might go out of the city for the safety of himself and his family, the +pestilence then growing hot in London. I took a pretty box for him in +Giles Chalfont, a mile from me, of which I gave him notice, and intended +to have waited on him and seen him well settled, but was prevented by +that imprisonment. But now being released and returned home, I soon made +a visit to him, to welcome him into the country. After some common +discourse had passed between us, he called for a manuscript of his, +which, having brought, he delivered to me, bidding me take it home with +me and read it at my leisure, and when I had so done return it to him, +with my judgment thereupon." + +Now, what does the reader think young Ellwood carried in his gray coat +pocket across the dikes and hedges and through the green lanes of Giles +Chalfont that autumn day? Let us look farther "When I came home, and had +set myself to read it, I found it was that excellent poem which he +entitled _Paradise Lost_. After I had, with the best attention, read it +through, I made him another visit; and, returning his book with due +acknowledgment of the favor he had done me in communicating it to me, he +asked me how I liked it and what I thought of it, which I modestly but +freely told him; and, after some farther discourse about it, I pleasantly +said to him, 'Thou hast said much here of Paradise Lost; what hast thou +to say of Paradise Found?' He made me no answer, but sat some time in a +muse; then brake off that discourse, and fell upon another subject." + +"I modestly but freely told him what I thought" of Paradise Lost! What +he told him remains a mystery. One would like to know more precisely +what the first critical reader of that song "of Man's first disobedience" +thought of it. Fancy the young Quaker and blind Milton sitting, some +pleasant afternoon of the autumn of that old year, in "the pretty box" at +Chalfont, the soft wind through the open window lifting the thin hair of +the glorious old Poet! Back-slidden England, plague-smitten, and +accursed with her faithless Church and libertine King, knows little of +poor "Master Milton," and takes small note of his Puritanic verse-making. +Alone, with his humble friend, he sits there, conning over that poem +which, he fondly hoped, the world, which had grown all dark and strange +to the author, "would not willingly let die." The suggestion in respect +to Paradise Found, to which, as we have seen, "he made no answer, but sat +some time in a muse," seems not to have been lost; for, "after the +sickness was over," continues Ellwood, "and the city well cleansed, and +become safely habitable again, he returned thither; and when afterwards I +waited on him there, which I seldom failed of doing whenever my occasions +drew me to London, he showed me his second poem, called Paradise Gained; +and, in a pleasant tone, said to me, 'This is owing to you, for you put +it into my head by the question you put to me at Chalfont, which before I +had not thought of.'" + +Golden days were these for the young Latin reader, even if it be true, as +we suspect, that he was himself very far from appreciating the glorious +privilege which he enjoyed, of the familiar friendship and confidence of +Milton. But they could not last. His amiable host, Isaac Pennington, +a blameless and quiet country gentleman, was dragged from his house by a +military force, and lodged in Aylesbury jail; his wife and family +forcibly ejected from their pleasant home, which was seized upon by the +government as security for the fines imposed upon its owner. The plague +was in the village of Aylesbury, and in the very prison itself; but the +noble-hearted Mary Pennington followed her husband, sharing with him the +dark peril. Poor Ellwood, while attending a monthly meeting at Hedgerly, +with six others, (among them one Morgan Watkins, a poor old Welshman, +who, painfully endeavoring to utter his testimony in his own dialect, was +suspected by the Dogberry of a justice of being a Jesuit trolling over +his Latin,) was arrested, and committed to Wiccomb House of Correction. + +This was a time of severe trial for the sect with which Ellwood had +connected himself. In the very midst of the pestilence, when thousands +perished weekly in London, fifty-four Quakers were marched through the +almost deserted streets, and placed on board a ship, for the purpose of +being conveyed, according to their sentence of banishment, to the West +Indies. The ship lay for a long time, with many others similarly +situated, a helpless prey to the pestilence. Through that terrible +autumn, the prisoners sat waiting for the summons of the ghastly +Destroyer; and, from their floating dungeon. + + "Heard the groan + Of agonizing ships from shore to shore; + Heard nightly plunged beneath the sullen wave + The frequent corse." + +When the vessel at length set sail, of the fifty-four who went on board, +twenty-seven only were living. A Dutch privateer captured her, when two +days out, and carried the prisoners to North Holland, where they were set +at liberty. The condition of the jails in the city, where were large +numbers of Quakers, was dreadful in the extreme. Ill ventilated, +crowded, and loathsome with the accumulated filth of centuries, they +invited the disease which daily decimated their cells. "Go on!" says +Pennington, writing to the King and bishops from his plague-infected cell +in the Aylesbury prison: "try it out with the Spirit of the Lord! Come +forth with your laws, and prisons, and spoiling of goods, and banishment, +and death, if the Lord please, and see if ye can carry it! Whom the Lord +loveth He can save at His pleasure. Hath He begun to break our bonds and +deliver us, and shall we now distrust Him? Are we in a worse condition +than Israel was when the sea was before them, the mountains on either +side, and the Egyptians behind, pursuing them?" + +Brave men and faithful! It is not necessary that the present generation, +how quietly reaping the fruit of your heroic endurance, should see eye to +eye with you in respect to all your testimonies and beliefs, in order to +recognize your claim to gratitude and admiration. For, in an age of +hypocritical hollowness and mean self-seeking, when, with noble +exceptions, the very Puritans of Cromwell's Reign of the Saints were +taking profane lessons from their old enemies, and putting on an outside +show of conformity, for the sake of place or pardon, ye maintained the +austere dignity of virtue, and, with King and Church and Parliament +arrayed against you, vindicated the Rights of Conscience, at the cost of +home, fortune, and life. English liberty owes more to your unyielding +firmness than to the blows stricken for her at Worcester and Naseby. + +In 1667, we find the Latin teacher in attendance at a great meeting of +Friends, in London, convened at the suggestion of George Fox, for the +purpose of settling a little difficulty which had arisen among the +Friends, even under the pressure of the severest persecution, relative to +the very important matter of "wearing the hat." George Fox, in his love +of truth and sincerity in word and action, had discountenanced the +fashionable doffing of the hat, and other flattering obeisances towards +men holding stations in Church or State, as savoring of man-worship, +giving to the creature the reverence only due to the Creator, as +undignified and wanting in due self-respect, and tending to support +unnatural and oppressive distinctions among those equal in the sight of +God. But some of his disciples evidently made much more of this "hat +testimony" than their teacher. One John Perrott, who had just returned +from an unsuccessful attempt to convert the Pope, at Rome, (where that +dignitary, after listening to his exhortations, and finding him in no +condition to be benefited by the spiritual physicians of the Inquisition, +had quietly turned him over to the temporal ones of the Insane Hospital,) +had broached the doctrine that, in public or private worship, the hat was +not to be taken off, without an immediate revelation or call to do so! +Ellwood himself seems to have been on the point of yielding to this +notion, which appears to have been the occasion of a good deal of +dissension and scandal. Under these circumstances, to save truth from +reproach, and an important testimony to the essential equality of mankind +from running into sheer fanaticism, Fox summoned his tried and faithful +friends together, from all parts of the United Kingdom, and, as it +appears, with the happiest result. Hat-revelations were discountenanced, +good order and harmony reestablished, and John Perrott's beaver and the +crazy head under it were from thenceforth powerless for evil. Let those +who are disposed to laugh at this notable "Ecumenical Council of the Hat" +consider that ecclesiastical history has brought down to us the records +of many larger and more imposing convocations, wherein grave bishops and +learned fathers took each other by the beard upon matters of far less +practical importance. + +In 1669, we find Ellwood engaged in escorting his fair friend, Gulielma, +to her uncle's residence in Sussex. Passing through London, and taking +the Tunbridge road, they stopped at Seven Oak to dine. The Duke of York +was on the road, with his guards and hangers-on, and the inn was filled +with a rude company. "Hastening," says Ellwood, "from a place where we +found nothing but rudeness, the roysterers who swarmed there, besides the +damning oaths they belched out against each other, looked very sourly +upon us, as if they grudged us the horses which we rode and the clothes +we wore." They had proceeded but a little distance, when they were +overtaken by some half dozen drunken rough-riding cavaliers, of the +Wildrake stamp, in full pursuit after the beautiful Quakeress. One of +them impudently attempted to pull her upon his horse before him, but was +held at bay by Ellwood, who seems, on this occasion, to have relied +somewhat upon his "stick," in defending his fair charge. Calling up +Gulielma's servant, he bade him ride on one side of his mistress, while +he guarded her on the other. "But he," says Ellwood, "not thinking it +perhaps decent to ride so near his mistress, left room enough for another +to ride between." In dashed the drunken retainer, and Gulielma was once +more in peril. It was clearly no time for exhortations and +expostulations; "so," says Ellwood, "I chopped in upon him, by a nimble +turn, and kept him at bay. I told him I had hitherto spared him, but +wished him not to provoke me further. This I spoke in such a tone as +bespoke an high resentment of the abuse put upon us, and withal pressed +him so hard with my horse that I suffered him not to come up again to +Guli." By this time, it became evident to the companions of the +ruffianly assailant that the young Quaker was in earnest, and they +hastened to interfere. "For they," says Ellwood, "seeing the contest +rise so high, and probably fearing it would rise higher, not knowing +where it might stop, came in to part us; which they did by taking him +away." + +Escaping from these sons of Belial, Ellwood and his fair companion rode +on through Tunbridge Wells, "the street thronged with men, who looked +very earnestly at them, but offered them no affront," and arrived, late +at night, in a driving rain, at the mansion-house of Herbert Springette. +The fiery old gentleman was so indignant at the insult offered to his +niece, that he was with difficulty dissuaded from demanding satisfaction +at the hands of the Duke of York. + +This seems to have been his last ride with Gulielma. She was soon after +married to William Penn, and took up her abode at Worminghurst, in +Sussex. How blessed and beautiful was that union may be understood from +the following paragraph of a letter, written by her husband, on the eve +of his departure for America to lay the foundations of a Christian +colony:-- + + "My dear wife! remember thou wast the love of my youth, and much the + joy of my life, the most beloved as well as the most worthy of all + my earthly comforts; and the reason of that love was more thy inward + than thy outward excellences, which yet were many. God knows, and + thou knowest it, I can say it was a match of Providence's making; + and God's image in us both was the first thing and the most amiable + and engaging ornament in our eyes." + +About this time our friend Thomas, seeing that his old playmate at +Chalfont was destined for another, turned his attention towards a "young +Friend, named Mary Ellis." He had been for several years acquainted with +her, but now he "found his heart secretly drawn and inclining towards +her." "At length," he tells us, "as I was sitting all alone, waiting +upon the Lord for counsel and guidance in this, in itself and to me, +important affair, I felt a word sweetly arise in me, as if I had heard a +Voice which said, Go, and prevail! and faith springing in my heart at the +word, I immediately rose and went, nothing doubting." On arriving at her +residence, he states that he "solemnly opened his mind to her, which was +a great surprisal to her, for she had taken in an apprehension, as others +had also done," that his eye had been fixed elsewhere and nearer home. +"I used not many words to her," he continues, "but I felt a Divine Power +went along with the words, and fixed the matter expressed by them so fast +in her breast, that, as she afterwards acknowledged to me, she could not +shut it out." + +"I continued," he says, "my visits to my best-beloved Friend until we +married, which was on the 28th day of the eighth month, 1669. We took +each other in a select meeting of the ancient and grave Friends of that +country. A very solemn meeting it was, and in a weighty frame of spirit +we were." His wife seems to have had some estate; and Ellwood, with that +nice sense of justice which marked all his actions, immediately made his +will, securing to her, in case of his decease, all her own goods and +moneys, as well as all that he had himself acquired before marriage. +"Which," he tells, "was indeed but little, yet, by all that little, more +than I had ever given her ground to expect with me." His father, who was +yet unreconciled to the son's religious views, found fault with his +marriage, on the ground that it was unlawful and unsanctioned by priest +or liturgy, and consequently refused to render him any pecuniary +assistance. Yet, in spite of this and other trials, he seems to have +preserved his serenity of spirit. After an unpleasant interview with his +father, on one occasion, he wrote, at his lodgings in an inn, in London, +what he calls _A Song of Praise_. An extract from it will serve to show +the spirit of the good man in affliction:-- + + "Unto the Glory of Thy Holy Name, + Eternal God! whom I both love and fear, + I hereby do declare, I never came + Before Thy throne, and found Thee loath to hear, + But always ready with an open ear; + And, though sometimes Thou seem'st Thy face to hide, + As one that had withdrawn his love from me, + 'T is that my faith may to the full, be tried, + And that I thereby may the better see + How weak I am when not upheld by Thee!" + +The next year, 1670, an act of Parliament, in relation to "Conventicles," +provided that any person who should be present at any meeting, under +color or pretence of any exercise of religion, in other manner than +according to the liturgy and practice of the Church of England, "should +be liable to fines of from five to ten shillings; and any person +preaching at or giving his house for the meeting, to a fine of twenty +pounds: one third of the fines being received by the informer or +informers." As a natural consequence of such a law, the vilest +scoundrels in the land set up the trade of informers and heresy-hunters. +Wherever a dissenting meeting or burial took place, there was sure to be +a mercenary spy, ready to bring a complaint against all in attendance. +The Independents and Baptists ceased, in a great measure, to hold public +meetings, yet even they did not escape prosecution. Bunyan, for +instance, in these days, was dreaming, like another Jacob, of angels +ascending and descending, in Bedford prison. But upon the poor Quakers +fell, as usual, the great force of the unjust enactment. Some of these +spies or informers, men of sharp wit, close countenances, pliant tempers, +and skill in dissimulation, took the guise of Quakers, Independents, or +Baptists, as occasion required, thrusting themselves into the meetings of +the proscribed sects, ascertaining the number who attended, their rank +and condition, and then informing against them. Ellwood, in his Journal +for 1670, describes several of these emissaries of evil. One of them +came to a Friend's house, in Bucks, professing to be a brother in the +faith, but, overdoing his counterfeit Quakerism, was detected and +dismissed by his host. Betaking himself to the inn, he appeared in his +true character, drank and swore roundly, and confessed over his cups that +he had been sent forth on his mission by the Rev. Dr. Mew, Vice- +Chancellor of Oxford. Finding little success in counterfeiting +Quakerism, he turned to the Baptists, where, for a time, he met with +better success. Ellwood, at this time, rendered good service to his +friends, by exposing the true character of these wretches, and bringing +them to justice for theft, perjury, and other misdemeanors. + +While this storm of persecution lasted, (a period of two or three years,) +the different dissenting sects felt, in some measure, a common sympathy, +and, while guarding themselves against their common foe, had little +leisure for controversy with each other; but, as was natural, the +abatement of their mutual suffering and danger was the signal for +renewing their suspended quarrels. The Baptists fell upon the Quakers, +with pamphlet and sermon; the latter replied in the same way. One of the +most conspicuous of the Baptist disputants was the famous Jeremy Ives, +with whom our friend Ellwood seems to have had a good deal of trouble. +"His name," says Ellwood, "was up for a topping Disputant. He was well, +read in the fallacies of logic, and was ready in framing syllogisms. His +chief art lay in tickling the humor of rude, unlearned, and injudicious +hearers." + +The following piece of Ellwood's, entitled "An Epitaph for Jeremy Ives," +will serve to show that wit and drollery were sometimes found even among +the proverbially sober Quakers of the seventeenth century:-- + + "Beneath this stone, depressed, doth lie + The Mirror of Hypocrisy-- + Ives, whose mercenary tongue + Like a Weathercock was hung, + And did this or that way play, + As Advantage led the way. + If well hired, he would dispute, + Otherwise he would be mute. + But he'd bawl for half a day, + If he knew and liked his pay. + + "For his person, let it pass; + Only note his face was brass. + His heart was like a pumice-stone, + And for Conscience he had none. + Of Earth and Air he was composed, + With Water round about enclosed. + Earth in him had greatest share, + Questionless, his life lay there; + Thence his cankered Envy sprung, + Poisoning both his heart and tongue. + + "Air made him frothy, light, and vain, + And puffed him with a proud disdain. + Into the Water oft he went, + And through the Water many sent + That was, ye know, his element! + The greatest odds that did appear + Was this, for aught that I can hear, + That he in cold did others dip, + But did himself hot water sip. + + "And his cause he'd never doubt, + If well soak'd o'er night in Stout; + But, meanwhile, he must not lack + Brandy and a draught of Sack. + One dispute would shrink a bottle + Of three pints, if not a pottle. + One would think he fetched from thence + All his dreamy eloquence. + + "Let us now bring back the Sot + To his Aqua Vita pot, + And observe, with some content, + How he framed his argument. + That his whistle he might wet, + The bottle to his mouth he set, + And, being Master of that Art, + Thence he drew the Major part, + But left the Minor still behind; + Good reason why, he wanted wind; + If his breath would have held out, + He had Conclusion drawn, no doubt." + +The residue of Ellwood's life seems to have glided on in serenity and +peace. He wrote, at intervals, many pamphlets in defence of his Society, +and in favor of Liberty of Conscience. At his hospitable residence, the +leading spirits of the sect were warmly welcomed. George Fox and William +Penn seem to have been frequent guests. We find that, in 1683, he was +arrested for seditious publications, when on the eve of hastening to his +early friend, Gulielma, who, in the absence of her husband, Governor +Penn, had fallen dangerously ill. On coming before the judge, "I told +him," says Ellwood, "that I had that morning received an express out of +Sussex, that William Penn's wife (with whom I had an intimate +acquaintance and strict friendship, _ab ipsis fere incunabilis_, at +least, _a teneris unguiculis_) lay now ill, not without great danger, and +that she had expressed her desire that I would come to her as soon as I +could." The judge said "he was very sorry for Madam Penn's illness," of +whose virtues he spoke very highly, but not more than was her due. Then +he told me, "that, for her sake, he would do what he could to further my +visit to her." Escaping from the hands of the law, he visited his +friend, who was by this time in a way of recovery, and, on his return, +learned that the prosecution had been abandoned. + +At about this date his narrative ceases. We learn, from other sources, +that he continued to write and print in defence of his religious views up +to the year of his death, which took place in 1713. One of his +productions, a poetical version of the Life of David, may be still met +with, in the old Quaker libraries. On the score of poetical merit, it is +about on a level with Michael Drayton's verses on the same subject. As +the history of one of the firm confessors of the old struggle for +religious freedom, of a genial-hearted and pleasant scholar, the friend +of Penn and Milton, and the suggester of Paradise Regained, we trust our +hurried sketch has not been altogether without interest; and that, +whatever may be the religious views of our readers, they have not failed +to recognize a good and true man in Thomas Ellwood. + + + + + + + JAMES NAYLER. + + "You will here read the true story of that much injured, ridiculed + man, James Nayler; what dreadful sufferings, with what patience he + endured, even to the boring of the tongue with hot irons, without a + murmur; and with what strength of mind, when the delusion he had + fallen into, which they stigmatized as blasphemy, had given place to + clearer thoughts, he could renounce his error in a strain of the + beautifullest humility."--Essays of Elia. + +"Would that Carlyle could now try his hand at the English Revolution!" +was our exclamation, on laying down the last volume of his remarkable +History of the French Revolution with its brilliant and startling word- +pictures still flashing before us. To some extent this wish has been +realized in the Letters and Speeches of Oliver Cromwell. Yet we confess +that the perusal of these volumes has disappointed us. Instead of giving +himself free scope, as in his French Revolution, and transferring to his +canvas all the wild and ludicrous, the terrible and beautiful phases of +that moral phenomenon, he has here concentrated all his artistic skill +upon a single figure, whom he seems to have regarded as the embodiment +and hero of the great event. All else on his canvas is subordinated to +the grim image of the colossal Puritan. Intent upon presenting him as +the fitting object of that "hero-worship," which, in its blind admiration +and adoration of mere abstract Power, seems to us at times nothing less +than devil-worship, he dwarfs, casts into the shadow, nay, in some +instances caricatures and distorts, the figures which surround him. To +excuse Cromwell in his usurpation, Henry Vane, one of those exalted and +noble characters, upon whose features the lights held by historical +friends or foes detect no blemish, is dismissed with a sneer and an +utterly unfounded imputation of dishonesty. To reconcile, in some +degree, the discrepancy between the declarations of Cromwell, in behalf +of freedom of conscience, and that mean and cruel persecution which the +Quakers suffered under the Protectorate, the generally harmless +fanaticism of a few individuals bearing that name is gravely urged. Nay, +the fact that some weak-brained enthusiasts undertook to bring about the +millennium, by associating together, cultivating the earth, and "dibbling +beans" for the New Jerusalem market, is regarded by our author as the +"germ of Quakerism;" and furnishes an occasion for sneering at "my poor +friend Dryasdust, lamentably tearing his hair over the intolerance of +that old time to Quakerism and such like." + +The readers of this (with all its faults) powerfully written Biography +cannot fail to have been impressed with the intensely graphic description +(Part I., vol. ii., pp. 184, 185) of the entry of the poor fanatic, +James Nayler, and his forlorn and draggled companions into Bristol. +Sadly ludicrous is it; affecting us like the actual sight of tragic +insanity enacting its involuntary comedy, and making us smile through our +tears. + +In another portion of the work, a brief account is given of the trial and +sentence of Nayler, also in the serio-comic view; and the poor man is +dismissed with the simple intimation, that after his punishment he +"repented, and confessed himself mad." It was no part of the author's +business, we are well aware, to waste time and words upon the history of +such a man as Nayler; he was of no importance to him, otherwise than as +one of the disturbing influences in the government of the Lord Protector. +But in our mind the story of James Nayler has always been one of +interest; and in the belief that it will prove so to others, who, like +Charles Lamb, can appreciate the beautiful humility of a forgiven spirit, +we have taken some pains to collect and embody the facts of it. + +James Nayler was born in the parish of Ardesley, in Yorkshire, 1616. His +father was a substantial farmer, of good repute and competent estate and +be, in consequence, received a good education: At the age of twenty-two, +he married and removed to Wakefield parish, which has since been made +classic ground by the pen of Goldsmith. Here, an honest, God-fearing +farmer, he tilled his soil, and alternated between cattle-markets and +Independent conventicles. In 1641, he obeyed the summons of "my Lord +Fairfax" and the Parliament, and joined a troop of horse composed of +sturdy Independents, doing such signal service against "the man of +Belial, Charles Stuart," that he was promoted to the rank of +quartermaster, in which capacity he served under General Lambert, in his +Scottish campaign. Disabled at length by sickness, he was honorably +dismissed from the service, and returned to his family in 1649. + +For three or four years, he continued to attend the meetings of the +Independents, as a zealous and devout member. But it so fell out, that +in the winter of 1651, George Fox, who had just been released from a +cruel imprisonment in Derby jail, felt a call to set his face towards +Yorkshire. "So travelling," says Fox, in his Journal, "through the +countries, to several places, preaching Repentance and the Word of Life, +I came into the parts about Wakefield, where James Navler lived." The +worn and weary soldier, covered with the scars of outward battle, +received, as he believed, in the cause of God and his people, against +Antichrist and oppression, welcomed with thankfulness the veteran of +another warfare; who, in conflict with a principalities and powers, and +spiritual wickedness in high places, had made his name a familiar one in +every English hamlet. "He and Thomas Goodyear," says Fox, "came to me, +and were both convinced, and received the truth." He soon after joined +the Society of Friends. In the spring of the next year he was in his +field following his plough, and meditating, as he was wont, on the great +questions of life and duty, when he seemed to hear a voice bidding him go +out from his kindred and his father's house, with an assurance that the +Lord would be with him, while laboring in his service. Deeply impressed, +he left his employment, and, returning to his house, made immediate +preparations for a journey. But hesitation and doubt followed; he became +sick from anxiety of mind, and his recovery, for a time, was exceedingly +doubtful. On his restoration to bodily health, he obeyed what he +regarded as a clear intimation of duty, and went forth a preacher of the +doctrines he had embraced. The Independent minister of the society to +which he had formerly belonged sent after him the story that he was the +victim of sorcery; that George Fox carried with him a bottle, out of +which he made people drink; and that the draught had the power to change +a Presbyterian or Independent into a Quaker at once; that, in short, the +Arch-Quaker, Fox, was a wizard, and could be seen at the same moment of +time riding on the same black horse, in two places widely separated. He +had scarcely commenced his exhortations, before the mob, excited by such +stories, assailed him. In the early summer of the year we hear of him in +Appleby jail. On his release, he fell in company with George Fox. At +Walney Island, he was furiously assaulted, and beaten with clubs and +stones; the poor priest-led fishermen being fully persuaded that they +were dealing with a wizard. The spirit of the man, under these +circumstances, may be seen in the following extract from a letter to his +friends, dated at "Killet, in Lancashire, the 30th of 8th Month, 1652:"-- + +"Dear friends! Dwell in patience, and wait upon the Lord, who will do +his own work. Look not at man who is in the work, nor at any man +opposing it; but rest in the will of the Lord, that so ye may be +furnished with patience, both to do and to suffer what ye shall be called +unto, that your end in all things may be His praise. Meet often +together; take heed of what exalteth itself above its brother; but keep +low, and serve one another in love." + +Laboring thus, interrupted only by persecution, stripes, and +imprisonment, he finally came to London, and spoke with great power and +eloquence in the meetings of Friends in that city. Here he for the first +time found himself surrounded by admiring and sympathizing friends. He +saw and rejoiced in the fruits of his ministry. Profane and drunken +cavaliers, intolerant Presbyters, and blind Papists, owned the truths +which he uttered, and counted themselves his disciples. Women, too, in +their deep trustfulness and admiring reverence, sat at the feet of the +eloquent stranger. Devout believers in the doctrine of the inward light +and manifestation of God in the heart of man, these latter, at length, +thought they saw such unmistakable evidences of the true life in James +Nayler, that they felt constrained to declare that Christ was, in an +especial manner, within him, and to call upon all to recognize in +reverent adoration this new incarnation of the divine and heavenly. The +wild enthusiasm of his disciples had its effect on the teacher. Weak in +body, worn with sickness, fasting, stripes, and prison-penance, and +naturally credulous and imaginative, is it strange that in some measure +he yielded to this miserable delusion? Let those who would harshly judge +him, or ascribe his fall to the peculiar doctrines of his sect, think of +Luther, engaged in personal combat with the Devil, or conversing with him +on points of theology in his bed-chamber; or of Bunyan at actual +fisticuffs with the adversary; or of Fleetwood and Vane and Harrison +millennium-mad, and making preparations for an earthly reign of King +Jesus. It was an age of intense religious excitement. Fanaticism had +become epidemic. Cromwell swayed his Parliaments by "revelations" and +Scripture phrases in the painted chamber; stout generals and sea-captains +exterminated the Irish, and swept Dutch navies from the ocean, with old +Jewish war-cries, and hymns of Deborah and Miriam; country justices +charged juries in Hebraisms, and cited the laws of Palestine oftener than +those of England. Poor Nayler found himself in the very midst of this +seething and confused moral maelstrom. He struggled against it for a +time, but human nature was weak; he became, to use his own words, +"bewildered and darkened," and the floods went over him. + +Leaving London with some of his more zealous followers, not without +solemn admonition and rebuke from Francis Howgill and Edward Burrough, +who at that period were regarded as the most eminent and gifted of the +Society's ministers, he bent his steps towards Exeter. Here, in +consequence of the extravagance of his language and that of his +disciples, he was arrested and thrown into prison. Several infatuated +women surrounded the jail, declaring that "Christ was in prison," and on +being admitted to see him, knelt down and kissed his feet, exclaiming, +"Thy name shall be no more called James Nayler, but Jesus!" Let us pity +him and them. They, full of grateful and extravagant affection for the +man whose voice had called them away from worldly vanities to what they +regarded as eternal realities, whose hand they imagined had for them +swung back the pearl gates of the celestial city, and flooded their +atmosphere with light from heaven; he, receiving their homage (not as +offered to a poor, weak, sinful Yorkshire trooper, but rather to the +hidden man of the heart, the "Christ within" him) with that self- +deceiving humility which is but another name for spiritual pride. +Mournful, yet natural; such as is still in greater or less degree +manifested between the Catholic enthusiast and her confessor; such as the +careful observer may at times take note of in our Protestant revivals and +camp meetings. + +How Nayler was released from Exeter jail does not appear, but the next we +hear of him is at Bristol, in the fall of the year. His entrance into +that city shows the progress which he and his followers had made in the +interval. Let us look at Carlyle's description of it: "A procession of +eight persons one, a man on horseback riding single, the others, men and +women partly riding double, partly on foot, in the muddiest highway in +the wettest weather; singing, all but the single rider, at whose bridle +walk and splash two women, 'Hosannah! Holy, holy! Lord God of Sabaoth,' +and other things, 'in a buzzing tone,' which the impartial hearer could +not make out. The single rider is a raw-boned male figure, 'with lank +hair reaching below his cheeks,' hat drawn close over his brows, 'nose +rising slightly in the middle,' of abstruse 'down look,' and large +dangerous jaws strictly closed: he sings not, sits there covered, and is +sung to by the others bare. Amid pouring deluges and mud knee-deep, 'so +that the rain ran in at their necks and vented it at their hose and +breeches: 'a spectacle to the West of England and posterity! Singing as +above; answering no question except in song. From Bedminster to +Ratcliffgate, along the streets to the High Cross of Bristol: at the High +Cross they are laid hold of by the authorities: turn out to be James +Nayler and Company." + +Truly, a more pitiful example of "hero-worship" is not well to be +conceived of. Instead of taking the rational view of it, however, and +mercifully shutting up the actors in a mad-house, the authorities of that +day, conceiving it to be a stupendous blasphemy, and themselves God's +avengers in the matter, sent Nayler under strong guard up to London, to +be examined before the Parliament. After long and tedious examinations +and cross-questionings, and still more tedious debates, some portion of +which, not uninstructive to the reader, may still be found in Burton's +Diary, the following horrible resolution was agreed upon:-- + +"That James Nayler be set in the pillory, with his head in the pillory in +the Palace Yard, Westminster, during the space of two hours on Thursday +next; and be whipped by the hangman through the streets from Westminster +to the Old Exchange, and there, likewise, be set in the pillory, with his +head in the pillory for the space of two hours, between eleven and one, +on Saturday next, in each place wearing a paper containing a description +of his crimes; and that at the Old Exchange his tongue be bored through +with a hot iron, and that he be there stigmatized on the forehead with +the letter 'B;' and that he be afterwards sent to Bristol, to be conveyed +into and through the said city on horseback with his face backward, and +there, also, publicly whipped the next market-day after he comes thither; +that from thence he be committed to prison in Bridewell, London, and +there restrained from the society of people, and there to labor hard +until he shall be released by Parliament; and during that time be +debarred the use of pen, ink, and paper, and have no relief except what +he earns by his daily labor." + +Such, neither more nor less, was, in the opinion of Parliament, required +on their part to appease the divine vengeance. The sentence was +pronounced on the 17th of the twelfth month; the entire time of the +Parliament for the two months previous having been occupied with the +case. The Presbyterians in that body were ready enough to make the most +of an offence committed by one who had been an Independent; the +Independents, to escape the stigma of extenuating the crimes of one of +their quondam brethren, vied with their antagonists in shrieking over the +atrocity of Nayler's blasphemy, and in urging its severe punishment. +Here and there among both classes were men disposed to leniency, and more +than one earnest plea was made for merciful dealing with a man whose +reason was evidently unsettled, and who was, therefore, a fitting object +of compassion; whose crime, if it could indeed be called one, was +evidently the result of a clouded intellect, and not of wilful intention +of evil. On the other hand, many were in favor of putting him to death +as a sort of peace-offering to the clergy, who, as a matter of course, +were greatly scandalized by Nayler's blasphemy, and still more by the +refusal of his sect to pay tithes, or recognize their divine commission. + +Nayler was called into the Parliament-house to receive his sentence. +"I do not know mine offence," he said mildly. "You shall know it," said +Sir Thomas Widrington, "by your sentence." When the sentence was read, +he attempted to speak, but was silenced. "I pray God," said Nayler, +"that he may not lay this to your charge." + +The next day, the 18th of the twelfth month, he stood in the pillory two +hours, in the chill winter air, and was then stripped and scourged by the +hangman at the tail of a cart through the streets. Three hundred and ten +stripes were inflicted; his back and arms were horribly cut and mangled, +and his feet crushed and bruised by the feet of horses treading on him in +the crowd. He bore all with uncomplaining patience; but was so far +exhausted by his sufferings, that it was found necessary to postpone the +execution of the residue of the sentence for one week. The terrible +severity of his sentence, and his meek endurance of it, had in the mean +time powerfully affected many of the humane and generous of all classes +in the city; and a petition for the remission of the remaining part of +the penalty was numerously signed and presented to Parliament. A debate +ensued upon it, but its prayer was rejected. Application was then made +to Cromwell, who addressed a letter to the Speaker of the House, +inquiring into the affair, protesting an "abhorrence and detestation of +giving or occasioning the least countenance to such opinions and +practices" as were imputed to Nayler; "yet we, being intrusted in the +present government on behalf of the people of these nations, and not +knowing how far such proceeding entered into wholly without us may extend +in the consequence of it, do hereby desire the House may let us know the +grounds and reasons whereon they have proceeded." From this, it is not +unlikely that the Protector might have been disposed to clemency, and to +look with a degree of charity upon the weakness and errors of one of his +old and tried soldiers who had striven like a brave man, as he was, for +the rights and liberties of Englishmen; but the clergy here interposed, +and vehemently, in the name of God and His Church, demanded that the +executioner should finish his work. Five of the most eminent of them, +names well known in the Protectorate, Caryl, Manton, Nye, Griffith, and +Reynolds, were deputed by Parliament to visit the mangled prisoner. A +reasonable request was made, that some impartial person might be present, +that justice might be done Nayler in the report of his answers. This was +refused. It was, however, agreed that the conversation should be written +down and a copy of it left with the jailer. He was asked if he was sorry +for his blasphemies. He said he did not know to what blasphemies they +alluded; that he did believe in Jesus Christ; that He had taken up His +dwelling in his own heart, and for the testimony of Him he now suffered. +"I believe," said one of the ministers, "in a Christ who was never in any +man's heart." "I know no such Christ," rejoined the prisoner; "the +Christ I witness to fills Heaven and Earth, and dwells in the hearts of +all true believers." On being asked why he allowed the women to adore +and worship him, he said he "denied bowing to the creature; but if they +beheld the power of Christ, wherever it was, and bowed to it, he could +not resist it, or say aught against it." + +After some further parley, the reverend visitors grew angry, threw the +written record of the conversation in the fire, and left the prison, to +report the prisoner incorrigible. + +On the 27th of the month, he was again led out of his cell and placed +upon the pillory. Thousands of citizens were gathered around, many of +them earnestly protesting against the extreme cruelty of his punishment. +Robert Rich, an influential and honorable merchant, followed him up to +the pillory with expressions of great sympathy, and held him by the hand +while the red-hot iron was pressed through his tongue and the brand was +placed on his forehead. He was next sent to Bristol, and publicly +whipped through the principal streets of that city; and again brought +back to the Bridewell prison, where he remained about two years, shut out +from all intercourse with his fellow-beings. At the expiration of this +period, he was released by order of Parliament. In the solitude of his +cell, the angel of patience had been with him. + +Through the cloud which had so long rested over him, the clear light of +truth shone in upon his spirit; the weltering chaos of a disordered +intellect settled into the calm peace of a reconciliation with God and +man. His first act on leaving prison was to visit Bristol, the scene of +his melancholy fall. There he publicly confessed his errors, in the +eloquent earnestness of a contrite spirit, humbled in view of the past, +yet full of thanksgiving and praise for the great boon of forgiveness. A +writer who was present says, the "assembly was tendered, and broken into +tears; there were few dry eyes, and many were bowed in their minds." + +In a paper which he published soon after, he acknowledges his lamentable +delusion. "Condemned forever," he says, "be all those false worships +with which any have idolized my person in that Night of my Temptation, +when the Power of Darkness was above rue; all that did in any way tend to +dishonor the Lord, or draw the minds of any from the measure of Christ +Jesus in themselves, to look at flesh, which is as grass, or to ascribe +that to the visible which belongs to Him. Darkness came over me +through want of watchfulness and obedience to the pure Eye of God. I was +taken captive from the true light; I was walking in the Night, as a +wandering bird fit for a prey. And if the Lord of all my mercies had not +rescued me, I had perished; for I was as one appointed to death and +destruction, and there was none to deliver me." + +"It is in my heart to confess to God, and before men, my folly and +offence in that day; yet there were many things formed against me in +that day, to take away my life and bring scandal upon the truth, of +which I was not guilty at all." "The provocation of that Time of +Temptation was exceeding great against the Lord, yet He left me not; for +when Darkness was above, and the Adversary so prevailed that all things +were turned and perverted against my right seeing, hearing, or +understanding, only a secret hope and faith I had in my God, whom I had +served, that He would bring me through it and to the end of it, and that +I should again see the day of my redemption from under it all,--this +quieted my soul in its greatest tribulation." He concludes his +confession with these words: "He who hath saved my soul from death, who +hath lifted my feet up out of the pit, even to Him be glory forever; and +let every troubled soul trust in Him, for his mercy endureth forever!" + +Among his papers, written soon after his release, is a remarkable prayer, +or rather thanksgiving. The limit I have prescribed to myself will only +allow me to copy an extract:-- + +"It is in my heart to praise Thee, O my God! Let me never forget Thee, +what Thou hast been to me in the night, by Thy presence in my hour of +trial, when I was beset in darkness, when I was cast out as a wandering +bird; when I was assaulted with strong temptations, then Thy presence, in +secret, did preserve me, and in a low state I felt Thee near me; when my +way was through the sea, when I passed under the mountains, there wast +Thou present with me; when the weight of the hills was upon me, Thou +upheldest me. Thou didst fight, on my part, when I wrestled with death; +when darkness would have shut me up, Thy light shone about me; when my +work was in the furnace, and I passed through the fire, by Thee I was not +consumed; when I beheld the dreadful visions, and was among the fiery +spirits, Thy faith staid me, else through fear I had fallen. I saw Thee, +and believed, so that the enemy could not prevail." After speaking of +his humiliation and sufferings, which Divine Mercy had overruled for his +spiritual good, he thus concludes: "Thou didst lift me out from the pit, +and set me forth in the sight of my enemies; Thou proclaimedst liberty to +the captive; Thou calledst my acquaintances near me; they to whom I had +been a wonder looked upon me; and in Thy love I obtained favor with those +who had deserted me. Then did gladness swallow up sorrow, and I forsook +my troubles; and I said, How good is it that man be proved in the night, +that he may know his folly, that every mouth may become silent, until +Thou makest man known unto himself, and has slain the boaster, and shown +him the vanity which vexeth Thy spirit." + +All honor to the Quakers of that day, that, at the risk of +misrepresentation and calumny, they received back to their communion +their greatly erring, but deeply repentant, brother. His life, ever +after, was one of self-denial and jealous watchfulness over himself,-- +blameless and beautiful in its humility and lowly charity. + +Thomas Ellwood, in his autobiography for the year 1659, mentions Nayler, +whom he met in company with Edward Burrough at the house of Milton's +friend, Pennington. Ellwood's father held a discourse with the two +Quakers on their doctrine of free and universal grace. "James Nailer," +says Ellwood, "handled the subject with so much perspicuity and clear +demonstration, that his reasoning seemed to be irresistible. As for +Edward Burrough, he was a brisk young Man, of a ready Tongue, and might +have been for aught I then knew, a Scholar, which made me less admire his +Way of Reasoning. But what dropt from James Nailer had the greater Force +upon me, because he lookt like a simple Countryman, having the appearance +of an Husbandman or Shepherd." + +In the latter part of the eighth month, 1660, he left London on foot, to +visit his wife and children in Wakefield. As he journeyed on, the sense +of a solemn change about to take place seemed with him; the shadow of the +eternal world fell over him. As he passed through Huntingdon, a friend +who saw him describes him as "in an awful and weighty frame of mind, as +if he had been redeemed from earth, and a stranger on it, seeking a +better home and inheritance." A few miles beyond the town, he was found, +in the dusk of the evening, very ill, and was taken to the house of a +friend, who lived not far distant. He died shortly after, expressing his +gratitude for the kindness of his attendants, and invoking blessings upon +them. About two hours before his death, he spoke to the friend at his +bedside these remarkable words, solemn as eternity, and beautiful as the +love which fills it:-- + +"There is a spirit which I feel which delights to do no evil, nor to +avenge any wrong; but delights to endure all things, in hope to enjoy its +own in the end; its hope is to outlive all wrath and contention, and to +weary out all exultation and cruelty, or whatever is of a nature contrary +to itself. It sees to the end of all temptations; as it bears no evil in +itself, so it conceives none in thought to any other: if it be betrayed, +it bears it, for its ground and spring is the mercy and forgiveness of +God. Its crown is meekness; its life is everlasting love unfeigned; it +takes its kingdom with entreaty, and not with contention, and keeps it by +lowliness of mind. In God alone it can rejoice, though none else regard +it, or can own its life. It is conceived in sorrow, and brought forth +with none to pity it; nor doth it murmur at grief and oppression. It +never rejoiceth but through sufferings, for with the world's joy it is +murdered. I found it alone, being forsaken. I have fellowship therein +with them who lived in dens and desolate places of the earth, who through +death obtained resurrection and eternal Holy Life." + +So died James Nayler. He was buried in "Thomas Parnell's burying-ground, +at King's Rippon," in a green nook of rural England. Wrong and violence, +and temptation and sorrow, and evil-speaking, could reach him no more. +And in taking leave of him, let us say, with old Joseph Wyeth, where he +touches upon this case in his _Anguis Flagellatus_: "Let none insult, but +take heed lest they also, in the hour of their temptation, do fall away." + + + + + + + ANDREW MARVELL + + "They who with a good conscience and an upright heart do their civil + duties in the sight of God, and in their several places, to resist + tyranny and the violence of superstition banded both against them, + will never seek to be forgiven that which may justly be attributed + to their immortal praise."--Answer to Eikon Basilike. + +Among, the great names which adorned the Protectorate,--that period of +intense mental activity, when political and religious rights and duties +were thoroughly discussed by strong and earnest statesmen and +theologians,--that of Andrew Marvell, the friend of Milton, and Latin +Secretary of Cromwell, deserves honorable mention. The magnificent prose +of Milton, long neglected, is now perhaps as frequently read as his great +epic; but the writings of his friend and fellow secretary, devoted like +his own to the cause of freedom and the rights of the people, are +scarcely known to the present generation. It is true that Marvell's +political pamphlets were less elaborate and profound than those of the +author of the glorious _Defence of Unlicensed Printing_. He was light, +playful, witty, and sarcastic; he lacked the stern dignity, the terrible +invective, the bitter scorn, the crushing, annihilating retort, the grand +and solemn eloquence, and the devout appeals, which render immortal the +controversial works of Milton. But he, too, has left his foot-prints on +his age; he, too, has written for posterity that which they "will not +willingly let die." As one of the inflexible defenders of English +liberty, sowers of the seed, the fruits of which we are now reaping, he +has a higher claim on the kind regards of this generation than his merits +as a poet, by no means inconsiderable, would warrant. + +Andrew Marvell was born in Kingston-upon-Hull, in 1620. At the age of +eighteen he entered Trinity College, whence he was enticed by the +Jesuits, then actively seeking proselytes. After remaining with them a +short time, his father found him, and brought him back to his studies. +On leaving college, he travelled on the Continent. At Rome he wrote his +first satire, a humorous critique upon Richard Flecknoe, an English +Jesuit and verse writer, whose lines on Silence Charles Lamb quotes in +one of his Essays. It is supposed that he made his first acquaintance +with Milton in Italy. + +At Paris he made the Abbot de Manihan the subject of another satire. The +Abbot pretended to skill in the arts of magic, and used to prognosticate +the fortunes of people from the character of their handwriting. At what +period he returned from his travels we are not aware. It is stated, by +some of his biographers, that he was sent as secretary of a Turkish +mission. In 1653, he was appointed the tutor of Cromwell's nephew; and, +four years after, doubtless through the instrumentality of his friend +Milton, he received the honorable appointment of Latin Secretary of the +Commonwealth. In 1658, he was selected by his townsmen of Hull to +represent them in Parliament. In this service he continued until 1663, +when, notwithstanding his sturdy republican principles, he was appointed +secretary to the Russian embassy. On his return, in 1665, he was again +elected to Parliament, and continued in the public service until the +prorogation of the Parliament of 1675. + +The boldness, the uncompromising integrity and irreproachable consistency +of Marvell, as a statesman, have secured for him the honorable +appellation of "the British Aristides." Unlike too many of his old +associates under the Protectorate, he did not change with the times. He +was a republican in Cromwell's day, and neither threats of assassination, +nor flatteries, nor proffered bribes, could make him anything else in +that of Charles II. He advocated the rights of the people at a time when +patriotism was regarded as ridiculous folly; when a general corruption, +spreading downwards from a lewd and abominable Court, had made +legislation a mere scramble for place and emolument. English history +presents no period so disgraceful as the Restoration. To use the words +of Macaulay, it was "a day of servitude without loyalty and sensuality +without love, of dwarfish talents and gigantic vices, the paradise of +cold hearts and narrow minds, the golden age of the coward, the bigot, +and the slave. The principles of liberty were the scoff of every +grinning courtier, and the Anathema Maranatha of every fawning dean." It +is the peculiar merit of Milton and Marvell, that in such an age they +held fast their integrity, standing up in glorious contrast with clerical +apostates and traitors to the cause of England's liberty. + +In the discharge of his duties as a statesman Marvell was as punctual and +conscientious as our own venerable Apostle of Freedom, John Quincy Adams. +He corresponded every post with his constituents, keeping them fully +apprised of all that transpired at Court or in Parliament. He spoke but +seldom, but his great personal influence was exerted privately upon the +members of the Commons as well as upon the Peers. His wit, accomplished +manners, and literary eminence made him a favorite at the Court itself. +The voluptuous and careless monarch laughed over the biting satire of the +republican poet, and heartily enjoyed his lively conversation. It is +said that numerous advances were made to him by the courtiers of Charles +II., but he was found to be incorruptible. The personal compliments of +the King, the encomiums of Rochester, the smiles and flatteries of the +frail but fair and high-born ladies of the Court; nay, even the golden +offers of the King's treasurer, who, climbing with difficulty to his +obscure retreat on an upper floor of a court in the Strand, laid a +tempting bribe of L1,000 before him, on the very day when he had been +compelled to borrow a guinea, were all lost upon the inflexible patriot. +He stood up manfully, in an age of persecution, for religious liberty, +opposed the oppressive excise, and demanded frequent Parliaments and a +fair representation of the people. + +In 1672, Marvell engaged in a controversy with the famous High-Churchman, +Dr. Parker, who had taken the lead in urging the persecution of Non- +conformists. In one of the works of this arrogant divine, he says that +"it is absolutely necessary to the peace and government of the world that +the supreme magistrate should be vested with power to govern and conduct +the consciences of subjects in affairs of religion. Princes may with +less hazard give liberty to men's vices and debaucheries than to their +consciences." And, speaking of the various sects of Non-conformists, he +counsels princes and legislators that "tenderness and indulgence to such +men is to nourish vipers in their own bowels, and the most sottish +neglect of our quiet and security." Marvell replied to him in a severely +satirical pamphlet, which provoked a reply from the Doctor. Marvell +rejoined, with a rare combination of wit and argument. The effect of his +sarcasm on the Doctor and his supporters may be inferred from an +anonymous note sent him, in which the writer threatens by the eternal God +to cut his throat, if he uttered any more libels upon Dr. Parker. Bishop +Burnet remarks that "Marvell writ in a burlesque strain, but with so +peculiar and so entertaining a conduct 'that from the King down to the +tradesman his books were read with great pleasure, and not only humbled +Parker, but his whole party, for Marvell had all the wits on his side.'" +The Bishop further remarks that Marvell's satire "gave occasion to the +only piece of modesty with which Dr. Parker was ever charged, namely, of +withdrawing from town, and not importuning the press for some years, +since even a face of brass must grow red when it is burnt as his has +been." + +Dean Swift, in commenting upon the usual fate of controversial pamphlets, +which seldom live beyond their generation, says: "There is indeed an +exception, when a great genius undertakes to expose a foolish piece; so +we still read Marvell's answer to Parker with pleasure, though the book +it answers be sunk long ago." + +Perhaps, in the entire compass of our language, there is not to be found +a finer piece of satirical writing than Marvell's famous parody of the +speeches of Charles II., in which the private vices and public +inconsistencies of the King, and his gross violations of his pledges on +coming to the throne, are exposed with the keenest wit and the most +laugh-provoking irony. Charles himself, although doubtless annoyed by +it, could not refrain from joining in the mirth which it excited at his +expense. + +The friendship between Marvell and Milton remained firm and unbroken to +the last. The former exerted himself to save his illustrious friend from +persecution, and omitted no opportunity to defend him as a politician and +to eulogize him as a poet. In 1654 he presented to Cromwell Milton's +noble tract in _Defence of the People of England_, and, in writing to the +author, says of the work, "When I consider how equally it teems and rises +with so many figures, it seems to me a Trajan's column, in whose winding +ascent we see embossed the several monuments of your learned victories." +He was one of the first to appreciate _Paradise Lost_, and to commend it +in some admirable lines. One couplet is exceedingly beautiful, in its +reference to the author's blindness:-- + + "Just Heaven, thee like Tiresias to requite, + Rewards with prophecy thy loss of sight." + +His poems, written in the "snatched leisure" of an active political life, +bear marks of haste, and are very unequal. In the midst of passages of +pastoral description worthy of Milton himself, feeble lines and hackneyed +phrases occur. His _Nymph lamenting the Death of her Fawn_ is a finished +and elaborate piece, full of grace and tenderness. _Thoughts in a +Garden_ will be remembered by the quotations of that exquisite critic, +Charles Lamb. How pleasant is this picture! + + "What wondrous life is this I lead! + Ripe apples drop about my head; + The luscious clusters of the vine + Upon my mouth do crush their wine; + The nectarine and curious peach + Into my hands themselves do reach; + Stumbling on melons as I pass, + Ensnared with flowers, I fall on grass. + + "Here at this fountain's sliding foot, + Or at the fruit-tree's mossy root, + Casting the body's vest aside, + My soul into the boughs does glide. + There like a bird it sits and sings, + And whets and claps its silver wings; + And, till prepared for longer flight, + Waves in its plumes the various light. + + "How well the skilful gard'ner drew + Of flowers and herbs this dial true! + Where, from above, the milder sun + Does through a fragrant zodiac run; + And, as it works, the industrious bee + Computes his time as well as we. + How could such sweet and wholesome hours + Be reckoned but with herbs and flowers!" + + +One of his longer poems, _Appleton House_, contains passages of admirable +description, and many not unpleasing conceits. Witness the following:-- + + "Thus I, an easy philosopher, + Among the birds and trees confer, + And little now to make me wants, + Or of the fowl or of the plants. + Give me but wings, as they, and I + Straight floating on the air shall fly; + Or turn me but, and you shall see + I am but an inverted tree. + Already I begin to call + In their most learned original; + And, where I language want, my signs + The bird upon the bough divines. + No leaf does tremble in the wind, + Which I returning cannot find. + Out of these scattered Sibyl's leaves, + Strange prophecies my fancy weaves: + What Rome, Greece, Palestine, e'er said, + I in this light Mosaic read. + Under this antic cope I move, + Like some great prelate of the grove; + Then, languishing at ease, I toss + On pallets thick with velvet moss; + While the wind, cooling through the boughs, + Flatters with air my panting brows. + Thanks for my rest, ye mossy banks! + And unto you, cool zephyrs, thanks! + Who, as my hair, my thoughts too shed, + And winnow from the chaff my head. + How safe, methinks, and strong behind + These trees have I encamped my mind!" + +Here is a picture of a piscatorial idler and his trout stream, worthy of +the pencil of Izaak Walton:-- + + "See in what wanton harmless folds + It everywhere the meadow holds: + Where all things gaze themselves, and doubt + If they be in it or without; + And for this shade, which therein shines + Narcissus-like, the sun too pines. + Oh! what a pleasure 't is to hedge + My temples here in heavy sedge; + Abandoning my lazy side, + Stretched as a bank unto the tide; + Or, to suspend my sliding foot + On the osier's undermining root, + And in its branches tough to hang, + While at my lines the fishes twang." + +A little poem of Marvell's, which he calls Eyes and Tears, has the +following passages:-- + + "How wisely Nature did agree + With the same eyes to weep and see! + That having viewed the object vain, + They might be ready to complain. + And, since the self-deluding sight + In a false angle takes each height, + These tears, which better measure all, + Like watery lines and plummets fall." + + "Happy are they whom grief doth bless, + That weep the more, and see the less; + And, to preserve their sight more true, + Bathe still their eyes in their own dew; + So Magdalen, in tears more wise, + Dissolved those captivating eyes, + Whose liquid chains could, flowing, meet + To fetter her Redeemer's feet. + The sparkling glance, that shoots desire, + Drenched in those tears, does lose its fire; + Yea, oft the Thunderer pity takes, + And there his hissing lightning slakes. + The incense is to Heaven dear, + Not as a perfume, but a tear; + And stars shine lovely in the night, + But as they seem the tears of light. + Ope, then, mine eyes, your double sluice, + And practise so your noblest use; + For others, too, can see or sleep, + But only human eyes can weep." + +The Bermuda Emigrants has some happy lines, as the following:-- + + "He hangs in shade the orange bright, + Like golden lamps in a green night." + +Or this, which doubtless suggested a couplet in Moore's _Canadian Boat +Song_:-- + + "And all the way, to guide the chime, + With falling oars they kept the time." + +His facetious and burlesque poetry was much admired in his day; but a +great portion of it referred to persons and events no longer of general +interest. The satire on Holland is an exception. There is nothing in +its way superior to it in our language. Many of his best pieces were +originally written in Latin, and afterwards translated by himself. There +is a splendid Ode to Cromwell--a worthy companion of Milton's glorious +sonnet--which is not generally known, and which we transfer entire to our +pages. Its simple dignity and the melodious flow of its versification +commend themselves more to our feelings than its eulogy of war. It is +energetic and impassioned, and probably affords a better idea of the +author, as an actor in the stirring drama of his time, than the "soft +Lydian airs" of the poems that we have quoted. + + + AN HORATIAN ODE UPON CROMWELL'S RETURN FROM IRELAND. + + The forward youth that would appear + Must now forsake his Muses dear; + Nor in the shadows sing + His numbers languishing. + + 'T is time to leave the books in dust, + And oil the unused armor's rust; + Removing from the wall + The corslet of the hall. + + So restless Cromwell could not cease + In the inglorious arts of peace, + But through adventurous war + Urged his active star. + + And, like the three-forked lightning, first + Breaking the clouds wherein it nurst, + Did thorough his own side + His fiery way divide. + + For 't is all one to courage high, + The emulous, or enemy; + And with such to enclose + Is more than to oppose. + + Then burning through the air he went, + And palaces and temples rent; + And Caesar's head at last + Did through his laurels blast. + + 'T is madness to resist or blame + The face of angry Heaven's flame; + And, if we would speak true, + Much to the man is due, + + Who, from his private gardens, where + He lived reserved and austere, + (As if his highest plot + To plant the bergamot,) + + Could by industrious valor climb + To ruin the great work of time, + And cast the kingdoms old + Into another mould! + + Though justice against fate complain, + And plead the ancient rights in vain,-- + But those do hold or break, + As men are strong or weak. + + Nature, that hateth emptiness, + Allows of penetration less, + And therefore must make room + Where greater spirits come. + + What field of all the civil war, + Where his were not the deepest scar? + And Hampton shows what part + He had of wiser art; + + Where, twining subtle fears with hope, + He wove a net of such a scope, + That Charles himself might chase + To Carisbrook's narrow case; + + That hence the royal actor borne, + The tragic scaffold might adorn, + While round the armed bands + Did clap their bloody hands. + + HE nothing common did or mean + Upon that memorable scene, + But with his keener eye + The axe's edge did try + + Nor called the gods, with vulgar spite, + To vindicate his helpless right! + But bowed his comely head, + Down, as upon a bed. + + This was that memorable hour, + Which first assured the forced power; + So when they did design + The Capitol's first line, + + A bleeding head, where they begun, + Did fright the architects to run; + And yet in that the state + Foresaw its happy fate. + + And now the Irish are ashamed + To see themselves in one year tamed; + So much one man can do, + That does best act and know. + + They can affirm his praises best, + And have, though overcome, confest + How good he is, how just, + And fit for highest trust. + + Nor yet grown stiffer by command, + But still in the Republic's hand, + How fit he is to sway + That can so well obey. + + He to the Commons' feet presents + A kingdom for his first year's rents, + And, what he may, forbears + His fame to make it theirs. + + And has his sword and spoils ungirt, + To lay them at the public's skirt; + So when the falcon high + Falls heavy from the sky, + + She, having killed, no more does search, + But on the next green bough to perch, + Where, when he first does lure, + The falconer has her sure. + + What may not, then, our isle presume, + While Victory his crest does plume? + What may not others fear, + + If thus he crowns each year? + + As Caesar, he, erelong, to Gaul; + To Italy as Hannibal, + And to all states not free + Shall climacteric be. + + The Pict no shelter now shall find + Within his parti-contoured mind; + But from his valor sad + Shrink underneath the plaid, + + Happy if in the tufted brake + The English hunter him mistake, + Nor lay his hands a near + The Caledonian deer. + + But thou, the war's and fortune's son, + March indefatigably on; + And, for the last effect, + Still keep the sword erect. + + Besides the force, it has to fright + The spirits of the shady night + The same arts that did gain + A power, must it maintain. + + +Marvell was never married. The modern critic, who affirms that bachelors +have done the most to exalt women into a divinity, might have quoted his +extravagant panegyric of Maria Fairfax as an apt illustration:-- + + "'T is she that to these gardens gave + The wondrous beauty which they have; + She straitness on the woods bestows, + To her the meadow sweetness owes; + Nothing could make the river be + So crystal pure but only she,-- + She, yet more pure, sweet, strait, and fair, + Than gardens, woods, meals, rivers are + Therefore, what first she on them spent + They gratefully again present: + The meadow carpets where to tread, + The garden flowers to crown her head, + And for a glass the limpid brook + Where she may all her beauties look; + But, since she would not have them seen, + The wood about her draws a screen; + For she, to higher beauty raised, + Disdains to be for lesser praised; + She counts her beauty to converse + In all the languages as hers, + Nor yet in those herself employs, + But for the wisdom, not the noise, + Nor yet that wisdom could affect, + But as 't is Heaven's dialect." + +It has been the fashion of a class of shallow Church and State defenders +to ridicule the great men of the Commonwealth, the sturdy republicans of +England, as sour-featured, hard-hearted ascetics, enemies of the fine +arts and polite literature. The works of Milton and Marvell, the prose- +poem of Harrington, and the admirable discourses of Algernon Sydney are a +sufficient answer to this accusation. To none has it less application +than to the subject of our sketch. He was a genial, warmhearted man, an +elegant scholar, a finished gentleman at home, and the life of every +circle which he entered, whether that of the gay court of Charles II., +amidst such men as Rochester and L'Estrange, or that of the republican +philosophers who assembled at Miles's Coffee House, where he discussed +plans of a free representative government with the author of Oceana, and +Cyriack Skinner, that friend of Milton, whom the bard has immortalized in +the sonnet which so pathetically, yet heroically, alludes to his own +blindness. Men of all parties enjoyed his wit and graceful conversation. +His personal appearance was altogether in his favor. A clear, dark, +Spanish complexion, long hair of jetty blackness falling in graceful +wreaths to his shoulders, dark eyes, full of expression and fire, a +finely chiselled chin, and a mouth whose soft voluptuousness scarcely +gave token of the steady purpose and firm will of the inflexible +statesman: these, added to the prestige of his genius, and the respect +which a lofty, self-sacrificing patriotism extorts even from those who +would fain corrupt and bribe it, gave him a ready passport to the +fashionable society of the metropolis. He was one of the few who mingled +in that society, and escaped its contamination, and who, + + "Amidst the wavering days of sin, + Kept himself icy chaste and pure." + +The tone and temper of his mind may be most fitly expressed in his own +paraphrase of Horace:-- + + "Climb at Court for me that will, + Tottering Favor's pinnacle; + All I seek is to lie still! + Settled in some secret nest, + In calm leisure let me rest; + And, far off the public stage, + Pass away my silent age. + Thus, when, without noise, unknown, + I have lived out all my span, + I shall die without a groan, + An old, honest countryman. + Who, exposed to other's eyes, + Into his own heart ne'er pries, + Death's to him a strange surprise." + +He died suddenly in 1678, while in attendance at a popular meeting of his +old constituents at Hull. His health had previously been remarkably +good; and it was supposed by many that he was poisoned by some of his +political or clerical enemies. His monument, erected by his grateful +constituency, bears the following inscription:-- + + "Near this place lyeth the body of Andrew Marvell, Esq., a man so + endowed by Nature, so improved by Education, Study, and Travel, so + consummated by Experience, that, joining the peculiar graces of Wit + and Learning, with a singular penetration and strength of judgment; + and exercising all these in the whole course of his life, with an + unutterable steadiness in the ways of Virtue, he became the ornament + and example of his age, beloved by good men, feared by bad, admired + by all, though imitated by few; and scarce paralleled by any. But a + Tombstone can neither contain his character, nor is Marble necessary + to transmit it to posterity; it is engraved in the minds of this + generation, and will be always legible in his inimitable writings, + nevertheless. He having served twenty years successfully in + Parliament, and that with such Wisdom, Dexterity, and Courage, as + becomes a true Patriot, the town of Kingston-upon-Hull, from whence + he was deputed to that Assembly, lamenting in his death the public + loss, have erected this Monument of their Grief and their Gratitude, + 1688." + +Thus lived and died Andrew Marvell. His memory is the inheritance of +Americans as well as Englishmen. His example commends itself in an +especial manner to the legislators of our Republic. Integrity and +fidelity to principle are as greatly needed at this time in our halls of +Congress as in the Parliaments of the Restoration; men are required who +can feel, with Milton, that "it is high honor done them from God, and a +special mark of His favor, to have been selected to stand upright and +steadfast in His cause, dignified with the defence of Truth and public +liberty." + + + + + + JOHN ROBERTS. + +Thomas Carlyle, in his history of the stout and sagacious Monk of St. +Edmunds, has given us a fine picture of the actual life of Englishmen in +the middle centuries. The dim cell-lamp of the somewhat apocryphal +Jocelin of Brakelond becomes in his hands a huge Drummond-light, shining +over the Dark Ages like the naphtha-fed cressets over Pandemonium, +proving, as he says in his own quaint way, that "England in the year 1200 +was no dreamland, but a green, solid place, which grew corn and several +other things; the sun shone on it; the vicissitudes of seasons and human +fortunes were there; cloth was woven, ditches dug, fallow fields +ploughed, and houses built." And if, as the writer just quoted insists, +it is a matter of no small importance to make it credible to the present +generation that the Past is not a confused dream of thrones and battle- +fields, creeds and constitutions, but a reality, substantial as hearth +and home, harvest-field and smith-shop, merry-making and death, could +make it, we shall not wholly waste our time and that of our readers in +inviting them to look with us at the rural life of England two centuries +ago, through the eyes of John Roberts and his worthy son, Daniel, yeomen, +of Siddington, near Cirencester. + +_The Memoirs of John Roberts, alias Haywood, by his son, Daniel Roberts_, +(the second edition, printed verbatim from the original one, with its +picturesque array of italics and capital letters,) is to be found only in +a few of our old Quaker libraries. It opens with some account of the +family. The father of the elder Roberts "lived reputably, on a little +estate of his own," and it is mentioned as noteworthy that he married a +sister of a gentleman in the Commission of the Peace. Coming of age +about the beginning of the civil wars, John and one of his young +neighbors enlisted in the service of Parliament. Hearing that +Cirencester had been taken by the King's forces, they obtained leave of +absence to visit their friends, for whose safety they naturally felt +solicitous. The following account of the reception they met with from +the drunken and ferocious troopers of Charles I., the "bravos of Alsatia +and the pages of Whitehall," throws a ghastly light upon the horrors of +civil war:-- + +"As they were passing by Cirencester, they were discovered, and pursued +by two soldiers of the King's party, then in possession of the town. +Seeing themselves pursued, they quitted their horses, and took to their +heels; but, by reason of their accoutrements, could make little speed. +They came up with my father first; and, though he begged for quarter, +none they would give him, but laid on him with their swords, cutting and +slashing his hands and arms, which he held up to save his head; as the +marks upon them did long after testify. At length it pleased the +Almighty to put it into his mind to fall down on his face; which he did. +Hereupon the soldiers, being on horseback, cried to each other, _Alight, +and cut his throat_! but neither of them did; yet continued to strike and +prick him about the jaws, till they thought him dead. Then they left +him, and pursued his neighbor, whom they presently overtook and killed. +Soon after they had left my father, it was said in his heart, _Rise, and +flee for thy life_! which call he obeyed; and, starting upon his feet, +his enemies espied him in motion, and pursued him again. He ran down a +steep hill, and through a river which ran at the bottom of it; though +with exceeding difficulty, his boots filling with water, and his wounds +bleeding very much. They followed him to the top of the hill; but, +seeing he had got over, pursued him no farther." + +The surgeon who attended him was a Royalist, and bluntly told his +bleeding patient that if he had met him in the street he would have +killed him himself, but now he was willing to cure him. On his recovery, +young Roberts again entered the army, and continued in it until the +overthrow, of the Monarchy. On his return, he married "Lydia Tindall, +of the denomination of Puritans." A majestic figure rises before us, +on reading the statement that Sir Matthew Hale, afterwards Lord Chief +Justice of England, the irreproachable jurist and judicial saint, was +"his wife's kinsman, and drew her marriage settlement." + +No stronger testimony to the high-toned morality and austere virtue of +the Puritan yeomanry of England can be adduced than the fact that, of the +fifty thousand soldiers who were discharged on the accession of Charles +II., and left to shift for themselves, comparatively few, if any, became +chargeable to their parishes, although at that very time one out of six +of the English population were unable to support themselves. They +carried into their farm-fields and workshops the strict habits of +Cromwell's discipline; and, in toiling to repair their wasted fortunes, +they manifested the same heroic fortitude and self-denial which in war +had made them such formidable and efficient "Soldiers of the Lord." With +few exceptions, they remained steadfast in their uncompromising non- +conformity, abhorring Prelacy and Popery, and entertaining no very +orthodox notions with respect to the divine right of Kings. From them +the Quakers drew their most zealous champions; men who, in renouncing the +"carnal weapons" of their old service, found employment for habitual +combativeness in hot and wordy sectarian warfare. To this day the +vocabulary of Quakerism abounds in the military phrases and figures which +were in use in the Commonwealth's time. Their old force and significance +are now in a great measure lost; but one can well imagine that, in the +assemblies of the primitive Quakers, such stirring battle-cries and +warlike tropes, even when employed in enforcing or illustrating the +doctrines of peace, must have made many a stout heart' to beat quicker, +tinder its drab coloring, with recollections of Naseby and Preston; +transporting many a listener from the benches of his place of worship to +the ranks of Ireton and Lambert, and causing him to hear, in the place of +the solemn and nasal tones of the preacher, the blast of Rupert's bugles, +and the answering shout of Cromwell's pikemen: "Let God arise, and let +his enemies be scattered!" + +Of this class was John Roberts. He threw off his knapsack, and went back +to his small homestead, contented with the privilege of supporting +himself and family by daily toil, and grumbling in concert with his old +campaign brothers at the new order of things in Church and State. To his +apprehension, the Golden Days of England ended with the parade on +Blackheath to receive the restored King. He manifested no reverence for +Bishops and Lords, for he felt none. For the Presbyterians he had no +good will; they had brought in the King, and they denied the liberty of +prophesying. John Milton has expressed the feeling of the Independents +and Anabaptists towards this latter class, in that famous line in which +he defines Presbyter as "old priest writ large." Roberts was by no means +a gloomy fanatic; he had a great deal of shrewdness and humor, loved a +quiet joke; and every gambling priest and swearing magistrate in the +neighborhood stood in fear of his sharp wit. It was quite in course for +such a man to fall in with the Quakers, and he appears to have done so at +the first opportunity. + +In the year 1665, "it pleased the Lord to send two women Friends out of +the North to Cirencester," who, inquiring after such as feared God, were +directed to the house of John Roberts. He received them kindly, and, +inviting in some of his neighbors, sat down with them, whereupon "the +Friends spake a few words, which had a good effect." After the meeting +was over, he was induced to visit a "Friend" then confined in Banbury +jail, whom he found preaching through the grates of his cell to the +people in the street. On seeing Roberts he called to mind the story of +Zaccheus, and declared that the word was now to all who were seeking +Christ by climbing the tree of knowledge, "Come down, come down; for that +which is to be known of God is manifested within." Returning home, he +went soon after to the parish meeting-house, and, entering with his hat +on, the priest noticed him, and, stopping short in his discourse, +declared that he could not go on while one of the congregation wore his +hat. He was thereupon led out of the house, and a rude fellow, stealing +up behind, struck him on the back with a heavy stone. "Take that for +God's sake," said the ruffian. "So I do," answered Roberts, without +looking back to see his assailant, who the next day came and asked his +forgiveness for the injury, as he could not sleep in consequence of it. + +We next find him attending the Quarter Sessions, where three "Friends" +were arraigned for entering Cirencester Church with their hats on. +Venturing to utter a word of remonstrance against the summary proceedings +of the Court, Justice Stephens demanded his name, and, on being told, +exclaimed, in the very tone and temper of Jeffreys: + +I 've heard of you. I'm glad I have you here. You deserve a stone +doublet. There's many an honester man than you hanged." + +"It may be so," said Roberts, "but what becomes of such as hang honest +men?" + +The Justice snatched a ball of wax and hurled it at the quiet questioner. +"I 'll send you to prison," said he; "and if any insurrection or tumult +occurs, I 'll come and cut your throat with my own sword." A warrant was +made out, and he was forthwith sent to the jail. In the evening, Justice +Sollis, his uncle, released him, on condition of his promise to appear at +the next Sessions. He returned to his home, but in the night following +he was impressed with a belief that it was his duty to visit Justice +Stephens. Early in the morning, with a heavy heart, without eating or +drinking, he mounted his horse and rode towards the residence of his +enemy. When he came in sight of the house, he felt strong misgivings +that his uncle, Justice Sollis, who had so kindly released him, and his +neighbors generally, would condemn him for voluntarily running into +danger, and drawing down trouble upon himself and family. He alighted +from his horse, and sat on the ground in great doubt and sorrow, when a +voice seemed to speak within him, "Go, and I will go with thee." The +Justice met him at the door. "I am come," said Roberts, "in the fear +and dread of Heaven, to warn thee to repent of thy wickedness with speed, +lest the Lord send thee to the pit that is bottomless!" This terrible +summons awed the Justice; he made Roberts sit down on his couch beside +him, declaring that he received the message from God, and asked +forgiveness for the wrong he had done him. + +The parish vicar of Siddington at this time was George Bull, afterwards +Bishop of St. David's, whom Macaulay speaks of as the only rural parish +priest who, during the latter part of the seventeenth century, was noted +as a theologian, or Who possessed a respectable library. Roberts refused +to pay the vicar his tithes, and the vicar sent him to prison. It was +the priest's "Short Method with Dissenters." While the sturdy Non- +conformist lay in prison, he was visited by the great woman of the +neighborhood, Lady Dunch, of Down Amney. "What do you lie in jail for?" +inquired the lady. Roberts replied that it was because he could not put +bread into the mouth of a hireling priest. The lady suggested that he +might let somebody else satisfy the demands of the priest; and that she +had a mind to do this herself, as she wished to talk with him on +religious subjects. To this Roberts objected; there were poor people who +needed her charities, which would be wasted on such devourers as the +priests, who, like Pharaoh's lean kine, were eating up the fat and the +goodly, without looking a whit the better. But the lady, who seems to +have been pleased and amused by the obstinate prisoner, paid the tithe +and the jail fees, and set him at liberty, making him fix a day when he +would visit her. At the time appointed he went to Down Amney, and was +overtaken on the way by the priest of Cirencester, who had been sent for +to meet the Quaker. They found the lady ill in bed; but she had them +brought to her chamber, being determined not to lose the amusement of +hearing a theological discussion, to which she at once urged them, +declaring that it would divert her and do her good. The parson began by +accusing the Quakers of holding Popish doctrines. The Quaker retorted +by telling him that if he would prove the Quakers like the Papists in one +thing, by the help of God, he would prove him like them in ten. After a +brief and sharp dispute, the priest, finding his adversary's wit too keen +for his comfort, hastily took his leave. + +The next we hear of Roberts he is in Gloucester Castle, subjected to the +brutal usage of a jailer, who took a malicious satisfaction in thrusting +decent and respectable Dissenters, imprisoned for matters of conscience, +among felons and thieves. A poor vagabond tinker was hired to play at +night on his hautboy, and prevent their sleeping; but Roberts spoke to +him in such a manner that the instrument fell from his hand; and he told +the jailer that he would play no more, though he should hang him up at +the door for it. + +How he was released from jail does not appear; but the narrative tells us +that some time after an apparitor came to cite him to the Bishop's Court +at Gloucester. When he was brought before the Court, Bishop Nicholson, a +kind-hearted and easy-natured prelate, asked him the number of his +children, and how many of them had been _bishoped_? + +"None, that I know of," said Roberts. + +"What reason," asked the Bishop, "do you give for this?" + +"A very good one," said the Quaker: "most of my children were born in +Oliver's days, when Bishops were out of fashion." + +The Bishop and the Court laughed at this sally, and proceeded to question +him touching his views of baptism. Roberts admitted that John had a +Divine commission to baptize with water, but that he never heard of +anybody else that had. The Bishop reminded him that Christ's disciples +baptized. "What 's that to me?" responded Roberts. "Paul says he was +not sent to baptize, but to preach the Gospel. And if he was not sent, +who required it at his hands? Perhaps he had as little thanks for his +labor as thou hast for thine; and I would willingly know who sent thee to +baptize?" + +The Bishop evaded this home question, and told him he was there to answer +for not coming to church. Roberts denied the charge; sometimes he went +to church, and sometimes it came to him. "I don't call that a church +which you do, which is made of wood and stone." + +"What do you call it?" asked the Bishop. + +"It might be properly called a mass-house," was the reply; "for it was +built for that purpose." The Bishop here told him he might go for the +present; he would take another opportunity to convince him of his errors. + +The next person called was a Baptist minister, who, seeing that Roberts +refused to put off his hat, kept on his also. The Bishop sternly +reminded him that he stood before the King's Court, and the +representative of the majesty of England; and that, while some regard +might be had to the scruples of men who made a conscience of putting off +the hat, such contempt could not be tolerated on the part of one who +could put it off to every mechanic be met. The Baptist pulled off his +hat, and apologized, on the ground of illness. + +We find Roberts next following George Fox on a visit to Bristol. On his +return, reaching his house late in the evening, he saw a man standing in +the moonlight at his door, and knew him to be a bailiff. + +"Hast thou anything against me?" asked Roberts. + +"No," said the bailiff, "I've wronged you enough, God forgive me! Those +who lie in wait for you are my Lord Bishop's bailiffs; they are merciless +rogues. Ever, my master, while you live, please a knave, for an honest +man won't hurt you." + +The next morning, having, as he thought, been warned by a dream to do so, +he went to the Bishop's house at Cleave, near Gloucester. Confronting +the Bishop in his own hall, he told him that he had come to know why he +was hunting after him with his bailiffs, and why he was his adversary. +"The King is your adversary," said the Bishop; "you have broken the +King's law." Roberts ventured to deny the justice of the law. "What!" +cried the Bishop, "do such men as you find fault with the laws?" "Yes," +replied the other, stoutly; "and I tell thee plainly to thy face, it is +high time wiser men were chosen, to make better laws." + +The discourse turning upon the Book of Common Prayer, Roberts asked the +Bishop if the sin of idolatry did not consist in worshipping the work of +men's hands. The Bishop admitted it, as in the case of Nebuchadnezzar's +image. + +"Then," said Roberts, "whose hands made your Prayer Book? It could not +make itself." + +"Do you compare our Prayer Book to Nebuchadnezzar's image?" cried the +Bishop. + +"Yes," returned Roberts, "that was his image; this is thine. I no more +dare bow to thy Common-Prayer Book than the Three Children to +Nebuchadnezzar's image." + +"Yours is a strange upstart religion," said the Bishop. + +Roberts told him it was older than his by several hundred years. At this +claim of antiquity the prelate was greatly amused, and told Roberts that +if he would make out his case, he should speed the better for it. + +"Let me ask thee," said Roberts, "where thy religion was in Oliver's +days, when thy Common-Prayer Book was as little regarded as an old +almanac, and your priests, with a few honest exceptions, turned with the +tide, and if Oliver had put mass in their mouths would have conformed to +it for the sake of their bellies." + +"What would you have us do?" asked the Bishop. "Would you have had +Oliver cut our throats?" + +"No," said Roberts; "but what sort of religion was that which you were +afraid to venture your throats for?" + +The Bishop interrupted him to say, that in Oliver's days he had never +owned any other religion than his own, although he did not dare to openly +maintain it as he then did. + +"Well," continued Roberts, "if thou didst not think thy religion worth +venturing thy throat for then, I desire thee to consider that it is not +worth the cutting of other men's throats now for not conforming to it." + +"You are right," responded the frank Bishop. "I hope we shall have a +care how we cut men's throats." + +The following colloquy throws some light on the condition and character +of the rural clergy at this period, and goes far to confirm the +statements of Macaulay, which many have supposed exaggerated. Baxter's +early religious teachers were more exceptionable than even the maudlin +mummer whom Roberts speaks of, one of them being "the excellentest stage- +player in all the country, and a good gamester and goodfellow, who, +having received Holy Orders, forged the like for a neighbor's son, who on +the strength of that title officiated at the desk and altar; and after +him came an attorney's clerk, who had tippled himself into so great +poverty that he had no other way to live than to preach." + +J. ROBERTS. I was bred up under a Common-Prayer Priest; and a poor +drunken old Man he was. Sometimes he was so drunk he could not say his +Prayers, and at best he could but say them; though I think he was by far +a better Man than he that is Priest there now. + +BISHOP. Who is your Minister now? + +J. ROBERTS. My Minister is Christ Jesus, the Minister of the everlasting +Covenant; but the present Priest of the Parish is George Bull. + +BISHOP. Do you say that drunken old Man was better than Mr. Bull? I +tell you, I account Mr. Bull as sound, able, and orthodox a Divine as any +we have among us. + +J. ROBERT. I am sorry for that; for if he be one of the best of you, I +believe the Lord will not suffer you long; for he is a proud, ambitious, +ungodly Man: he hath often sued me at Law, and brought his Servants to +swear against me wrongfully. His Servants themselves have confessed to +my Servants, that I might have their Ears; for their Master made them +drunk, and then told them they were set down in the List as Witnesses +against me, and they must swear to it: And so they did, and brought +treble Damages. They likewise owned they took Tithes from my Servants, +threshed them out, and sold them for their Master. They have also +several Times took my Cattle out of my Grounds, drove them to Fairs and +Markets, and sold them, without giving me any Account. + +BISHOP. I do assure you I will inform Mr. Bull of what you say. + +J. ROBERTS. Very well. And if thou pleasest to send for me to face him, +I shall make much more appear to his Face than I'll say behind his Back. + +After much more discourse, Roberts told the Bishop that if it would do +him any good to have him in jail, he would voluntarily go and deliver +himself up to the keeper of Gloucester Castle. The good-natured prelate +relented at this, and said he should not be molested or injured, and +further manifested his good will by ordering refreshments. One of the +Bishop's friends who was present was highly offended by the freedom of +Roberts with his Lordship, and undertook to rebuke him, but was so +readily answered that he flew into a rage. "If all the Quakers in +England," said he, "are not hanged in a month's time, I 'll be hanged for +them." "Prithee, friend," quoth Roberts, "remember and be as good as thy +word!" + +Good old Bishop Nicholson, it would seem, really liked his incorrigible +Quaker neighbor, and could enjoy heartily his wit and humor, even when +exercised at the expense of his own ecclesiastical dignity. He admired +his blunt honesty and courage. Surrounded by flatterers and self- +seekers, he found satisfaction in the company and conversation of one +who, setting aside all conventionalisms, saw only in my Lord Bishop a +poor fellow-probationer, and addressed him on terms of conscious +equality. The indulgence which he extended to him naturally enough +provoked many of the inferior clergy, who had been sorely annoyed by the +sturdy Dissenter's irreverent witticisms and unsparing ridicule. Vicar +Bull, of Siddington, and Priest Careless, of Cirencester, in particular, +urged the Bishop to deal sharply with him. The former accused him of +dealing in the Black Art, and filled the Bishop's ear with certain +marvellous stories of his preternatural sagacity and discernment in +discovering cattle which were lost. The Bishop took occasion to inquire +into these stories; and was told by Roberts that, except in a single +instance, the discoveries were the result of his acquaintance with the +habits of animals and his knowledge of the localities where they were +lost. The circumstance alluded to, as an exception, will be best related +in his own words. + +"I had a poor Neighbor, who had a Wife and six Children, and whom the +chief men about us permitted to keep six or seven Cows upon the Waste, +which were the principal Support of the Family, and preserved them from +becoming chargeable to the Parish. One very stormy night the Cattle were +left in the Yard as usual, but could not be found in the morning. The +Man and his Sons had sought them to no purpose; and, after they had been +lost four days, his Wife came to me, and, in a great deal of grief, +cried, 'O Lord! Master Hayward, we are undone! My Husband and I must go +a begging in our old age! We have lost all our Cows. My Husband and the +Boys have been round the country, and can hear nothing of them. I'll +down on my bare knees, if you'll stand our Friend!' I desired she would +not be in such an agony, and told her she should not down on her knees to +me; but I would gladly help them in what I could. 'I know,' said she, +'you are a good Man, and God will hear your Prayers.' I desire thee, +said I, to be still and quiet in thy mind; perhaps thy Husband or Sons +may hear of them to-day; if not, let thy Husband get a horse, and come to +me to-morrow morning as soon as he will; and I think, if it please God, +to go with him to seek then. The Woman seemed transported with joy, +crying, 'Then we shall have our Cows again.' Her Faith being so strong, +brought the greater Exercise on me, with strong cries to the Lord, that +he would be pleased to make me instrumental in his Hand, for the help of +the poor Family. In the Morning early comes the old Man. In the Name of +God, says he, which way shall we go to seek them? I, being deeply +concerned in my Mind, did not answer him till he had thrice repeated it; +and then I answered, In the Name of God, I would go to seek them; and +said (before I was well aware) we will go to Malmsbury, and at the Horse- +Fair we shall find them. When I had spoken the Words, I was much +troubled lest they should not prove true. It was very early, and the +first Man we saw, I asked him if he had seen any stray Milch Cows +thereabouts. What manner of Cattle are they? said he. And the old Man +describing their Mark and Number, he told us there were some stood +chewing their Cuds in the Horse-Fair; but thinking they belonged to some +in the Neighborhood, he did not take particular Notice of them. When we +came to the Place, the old Man found them to be his; but suffered his +Transports of Joy to rise so high, that I was ashamed of his behavior; +for he fell a hallooing, and threw up his Montier Cap in the Air several +times, till he raised the Neighbors out of their Beds to see what was the +Matter. 'O!' said he, 'I had lost my Cows four or five days ago, and +thought I should never see them again; and this honest Neighbor of mine +told me this Morning, by his own Fire's Side, nine Miles off, that here +I should find them, and here I have them!' Then up goes his Cap again. +I begged of the poor Man to be quiet, and take his Cows home, and be +thankful; as indeed I was, being reverently bowed in my Spirit before the +Lord, in that he was pleased to put the words of Truth into my mouth. +And the Man drove his Cattle home, to the great Joy of his Family." + +Not long after the interview with the Bishop at his own palace, which has +been related, that dignitary, with the Lord Chancellor, in their coaches, +and about twenty clergymen on horseback, made a call at the humble +dwelling of Roberts, on their way to Tedbury, where the Bishop was to +hold a Visitation. "I could not go out of the country without seeing +you," said the prelate, as the farmer came to his coach door and pressed +him to alight. + +"John," asked Priest Evans, the Bishop's kinsman, "is your house free to +entertain such men as we are?" + +"Yes, George," said Roberts; "I entertain honest men, and sometimes +others." + +"My Lord," said Evans, turning to the Bishop, "John's friends are the +honest men, and we are the others." + +The Bishop told Roberts that they could not then alight, but would gladly +drink with him; whereupon the good wife brought out her best beer. +"I commend you, John," quoth the Bishop, as he paused from his hearty +draught; "you keep a cup of good beer in your house. I have not drank +any that has pleased me better since I left home." The cup passed next +to the Chancellor, and finally came to Priest Bull, who thrust it aside, +declaring that it was full of hops and heresy. As to hops, Roberts +replied, he could not say, but as for heresy, he bade the priest take +note that the Lord Bishop had drank of it, and had found no heresy in the +cup. + +The Bishop leaned over his coach door and whispered: "John, I advise you +to take care you don't offend against the higher Powers. I have heard +great complaints against you, that you are the Ringleader of the Quakers +in this Country; and that, if you are not suppressed, all will signify +nothing. Therefore, pray, John, take care, for the future, you don't +offend any more." + +"I like thy Counsel very well," answered Roberts, "and intend to take it. +But thou knowest God is the higher Power; and you mortal Men, however +advanced in this World, are but the lower Power; and it is only because I +endeavor to be obedient to the will of the higher Powers, that the lower +Powers are angry with me. But I hope, with the assistance of God, to +take thy Counsel, and be subject to the higher Powers, let the lower +Powers do with me as it may please God to suffer them." + +The Bishop then said he would like to talk with him further, and +requested him to meet him at Tedbury the next day. At the time +appointed, Roberts went to the inn where the Bishop lodged, and was +invited to dine with him. After dinner was over, the prelate told him +that he must go to church, and leave off holding conventicles at his +house, of which great complaint was made. This he flatly refused to do; +and the Bishop, losing patience, ordered the constable to be sent for. +Roberts told him that if, after coming to his house under the guise of +friendship, he should betray him and send him to prison, he, who had +hitherto commended him for his moderation, would put his name in print, +and cause it to stink before all sober people. It was the priests, he +told him, who set him on; but, instead of hearkening to them, he should +commend them to some honest vocation, and not suffer them to rob their +honest neighbors, and feed on the fruits of other men's toil, like +caterpillars. + +"Whom do you call caterpillars?" cried Priest Rich, of North Surrey. + +"We farmers," said Roberts, "call those so who live on other men's +fields, and by the sweat of other men's brows; and if thou dost so, thou +mayst be one of them." + +This reply so enraged the Bishop's attendants that they could only be +appeased by an order for the constable to take him to jail. In fact, +there was some ground for complaint of a lack of courtesy on the part of +the blunt farmer; and the Christian virtue of forbearance, even in +Bishops, has its limits. + +The constable, obeying the summons, came to the inn, at the door of which +the landlady met him. "What do you here!" cried the good woman, "when +honest John is going to be sent to prison? Here, come along with me." +The constable, nothing loath, followed her into a private room, where she +concealed him. Word was sent to the Bishop, that the constable was not +to be found; and the prelate, telling Roberts he could send him to jail +in the afternoon, dismissed him until evening. At the hour appointed, +the latter waited upon the Bishop, and found with him only one priest and +a lay gentleman. The priest begged the Bishop to be allowed to discourse +with the prisoner; and, leave being granted, he began by telling Roberts +that the knowledge of the Scriptures had made him mad, and that it was a +great pity he had ever seen them. + +"Thou art an unworthy man," said the Quaker, "and I 'll not dispute with +thee. If the knowledge of the Scriptures has made me mad, the knowledge +of the sack-pot hath almost made thee mad; and if we two madmen should +dispute about religion, we should make mad work of it." + +"An 't please you, my Lord," said the scandalized priest, "he says I 'm +drunk." + +The Bishop asked Roberts to repeat his words; and, instead of +reprimanding him, as the priest expected, was so much amused that he held +up his hands and laughed; whereupon the offended inferior took a hasty +leave. The Bishop, who was evidently glad to be rid of him, now turned +to Roberts, and complained that he had dealt hardly with him, in telling +him, before so many gentlemen, that he had sought to betray him by +professions of friendship, in order to send him to prison; and that, +if he had not done as he did, people would have reported him as an +encourager of the Quakers. "But now, John," said the good prelate, "I'll +burn the warrant against you before your face." "You know, Mr. Burnet," +he continued, addressing his attendant, "that a Ring of Bells may be made +of excellent metal, but they may be out of tune; so we may say of John: +he is a man of as good metal as I ever met with, but quite out of tune." + +"Thou mayst well say so," quoth Roberts, "for I can't tune after thy +pipe." + +The inferior clergy were by no means so lenient as the Bishop. They +regarded Roberts as the ringleader of Dissent, an impracticable, +obstinate, contumacious heretic, not only refusing to pay them tithes +himself, but encouraging others to the same course. Hence, they thought +it necessary to visit upon him the full rigor of the law. His crops were +taken from his field, and his cattle from his yard. He was often +committed to the jail, where, on one occasion, he was kept, with many +others, for a long time, through the malice of the jailer, who refused to +put the names of his prisoners in the Calendar, that they might have a +hearing. But the spirit of the old Commonwealth's man remained +steadfast. When Justice George, at the Ram in Cirencester, told him he +must conform, and go to church, or suffer the penalty of the law, he +replied that he had heard indeed that some were formerly whipped out of +the Temple, but he had never heard of any being whipped in. The Justice, +pointing, through the open window of the inn, at the church tower, asked +him what that was. "Thou mayst call it a daw-house," answered the +incorrigible Quaker. "Dost thou not see how the jackdaws flock about +it?" + +Sometimes it happened that the clergyman was also a magistrate, and +united in his own person the authority of the State and the zeal of the +Church. Justice Parsons, of Gloucester, was a functionary of this sort. +He wielded the sword of the Spirit on the Sabbath against Dissenters, and +on week days belabored them with the arm of flesh and the constable's +staff. At one time he had between forty and fifty of them locked up in +Gloucester Castle, among them Roberts and his sons, on the charge of +attending conventicles. But the troublesome prisoners baffled his +vigilance, and turned their prison into a meeting-house, and held their +conventicles in defiance of him. The Reverend Justice pounced upon them +on one occasion, with his attendants. An old, gray-haired man, formerly +a strolling fencing-master, was preaching when he came in. The Justice +laid hold of him by his white locks, and strove to pull him down, but the +tall fencing-raster stood firm and spoke on; he then tried to gag him, +but failed in that also. He demanded the names of the prisoners, but no +one answered him. A voice (we fancy it was that of our old friend +Roberts) called out: "The Devil must be hard put to it to have his +drudgery done, when the Priests must leave their pulpits to turn +informers against poor prisoners." The Justice obtained a list of the +names of the prisoners, made out on their commitment, and, taking it for +granted that all were still present, issued warrants for the collection +of fines by levies upon their estates. Among the names was that of a +poor widow, who had been discharged, and was living, at the time the +clerical magistrate swore she was at the meeting, twenty miles distant +from the prison. + +Soon after this event, our old friend fell sick. He had been discharged +from prison, but his sons were still confined. The eldest had leave, +however, to attend him in his illness, and he bears his testimony that +the Lord was pleased to favor his father with His living presence in his +last moments. In keeping with the sturdy Non-conformist's life, he was +interred at the foot of his own orchard, in Siddington, a spot he had +selected for a burial-ground long before, where neither the foot of a +priest nor the shadow of a steeple-house could rest upon his grave. + +In closing our notice of this pleasant old narrative, we may remark that +the light it sheds upon the antagonistic religious parties of the time is +calculated to dissipate prejudices and correct misapprehensions, common +alike to Churchmen and Dissenters. The genial humor, sound sense, and +sterling virtues of the Quaker farmer should teach the one class that +poor James Nayler, in his craziness and folly, was not a fair +representative of his sect; while the kind nature, the hearty +appreciation of goodness, and the generosity and candor of Bishop +Nicholson should convince the other class that a prelate is not +necessarily, and by virtue of his mitre, a Laud or a Bonner. The +Dissenters of the seventeenth century may well be forgiven for the +asperity of their language; men whose ears had been cropped because they +would not recognize Charles I. as a blessed martyr, and his scandalous +son as the head of the Church, could scarcely be expected to make +discriminations, or suggest palliating circumstances, favorable to any +class of their adversaries. To use the homely but apt simile of +McFingal, + + "The will's confirmed by treatment horrid, + As hides grow harder when they're curried." + +They were wronged, and they told the world of it. Unlike Shakespeare's +cardinal, they did not die without a sign. They branded, by their fierce +epithets, the foreheads of their persecutors more deeply than the +sheriff's hot iron did their own. If they lost their ears, they enjoyed +the satisfaction of making those of their oppressors tingle. Knowing +their persecutors to be in the wrong, they did not always inquire whether +they themselves had been entirely right, and had done no unrequired works +of supererogation by the way of "testimony" against their neighbors' mode +cf worship. And so from pillory and whipping-post, from prison and +scaffold, they sent forth their wail and execration, their miserere and +anathema, and the sound thereof has reached down to our day. May it +never wholly die away until, the world over, the forcing of conscience is +regarded as a crime against humanity and a usurpation of God's +prerogative. But abhorring, as we must, persecution under whatever +pretext it is employed, we are not, therefore, to conclude that all +persecutors were bad and unfeeling men. Many of their severities, upon +which we now look back with horror, were, beyond a question, the result +of an intense anxiety for the well-being of immortal souls, endangered by +the poison which, in their view, heresy was casting into the waters of +life. Coleridge, in one of the moods of a mind which traversed in +imagination the vast circle of human experience, reaches this point in +his Table-Talk. "It would require," says he, "stronger arguments than +any I have seen to convince me that men in authority have not a right, +involved in an imperative duty, to deter those under their control from +teaching or countenancing doctrines which they believe to be damnable, +and even to punish with death those who violate such prohibition." It +would not be very difficult for us to imagine a tender-hearted Inquisitor +of this stamp, stifling his weak compassion for the shrieking wretch +under bodily torment by his strong pity for souls in danger of perdition +from the sufferer's heresy. We all know with what satisfaction the +gentle-spirited Melanethon heard of the burning of Servetus, and with +what zeal he defended it. The truth is, the notion that an intellectual +recognition of certain dogmas is the essential condition of salvation +lies at the bottom of all intolerance in matters of religion. Under this +impression, men are too apt to forget that the great end of Christianity +is love, and that charity is its crowning virtue; they overlook the +beautiful significance of the parable of the heretic Samaritan and the +orthodox Pharisee: and thus, by suffering their speculative opinions of +the next world to make them uncharitable and cruel in this, they are +really the worse for them, even admitting them to be true. + + + + + + + SAMUEL HOPKINS. + +Three quarters of a century ago, the name of Samuel Hopkins was as +familiar as a household word throughout New England. It was a spell +wherewith to raise at once a storm of theological controversy. The +venerable minister who bore it had his thousands of ardent young +disciples, as well as defenders and followers of mature age and +acknowledged talent; a hundred pulpits propagated the dogmas which he had +engrafted on the stock of Calvinism. Nor did he lack numerous and +powerful antagonists. The sledge ecclesiastic, with more or less effect, +was unceasingly plied upon the strong-linked chain of argument which he +slowly and painfully elaborated in the seclusion of his parish. The +press groaned under large volumes of theological, metaphysical, and +psychological disquisition, the very thought of which is now "a weariness +to the flesh;" in rapid succession pamphlet encountered pamphlet, horned, +beaked, and sharp of talon, grappling with each other in mid-air, like +Milton's angels. That loud controversy, the sound whereof went over +Christendom, awakening responses from beyond the Atlantic, has now died +away; its watchwords no longer stir the blood of belligerent sermonizers; +its very terms and definitions have well-nigh become obsolete and +unintelligible. The hands which wrote and the tongues which spoke in +that day are now all cold and silent; even Emmons, the brave old +intellectual athlete of Franklin, now sleeps with his fathers,--the last +of the giants. Their fame is still in all the churches; effeminate +clerical dandyism still affects to do homage to their memories; the +earnest young theologian, exploring with awe the mountainous debris of +their controversial lore, ponders over the colossal thoughts entombed +therein, as he would over the gigantic fossils of an early creation, and +endeavors in vain to recall to the skeleton abstractions before him the +warm and vigorous life wherewith they were once clothed; but +Hopkinsianism, as a distinct and living school of philosophy, theology, +and metaphysics, no longer exists. It has no living oracles left; and +its memory survives only in the doctrinal treatises of the elder and +younger Edwards, Hopkins, Bellamy, and Emmons. + +It is no part of our present purpose to discuss the merits of the system +in question. Indeed, looking at the great controversy which divided New +England Calvinism in the eighteenth century, from a point of view which +secures our impartiality and freedom from prejudice, we find it +exceedingly difficult to get a precise idea of what was actually at +issue. To our poor comprehension, much of the dispute hinges upon names +rather than things; on the manner of reaching conclusions quite as much +as upon the conclusions themselves. Its origin may be traced to the +great religious awakening of the middle of the past century, when the +dogmas of the Calvinistic faith were subjected to the inquiry of acute +and earnest minds, roused up from the incurious ease and passive +indifference of nominal orthodoxy. Without intending it, it broke down +some of the barriers which separated Arminianism and Calvinism; its +product, Hopkinsianism, while it pushed the doctrine of the Genevan +reformer on the subject of the Divine decrees and agency to that extreme +point where it well-nigh loses itself in Pantheism, held at the same time +that guilt could not be hereditary; that man, being responsible for his +sinful acts, and not for his sinful nature, can only be justified by a +personal holiness, consisting not so much in legal obedience as in that +disinterested benevolence which prefers the glory of God and the welfare +of universal being above the happiness of self. It had the merit, +whatever it may be, of reducing the doctrines of the Reformation to an +ingenious and scholastic form of theology; of bringing them boldly to the +test of reason and philosophy. Its leading advocates were not mere +heartless reasoners and closet speculators. They taught that sin was +selfishness, and holiness self-denying benevolence, and they endeavored +to practise accordingly. Their lives recommended their doctrines. They +were bold and faithful in the discharge of what they regarded as duty. +In the midst of slave-holders, and in an age of comparative darkness on +the subject of human rights, Hopkins and the younger Edwards lifted up +their voices for the slave. And twelve years ago, when Abolitionism was +everywhere spoken against, and the whole land was convulsed with mobs to +suppress it, the venerable Emmons, burdened with the weight of ninety +years, made a journey to New York, to attend a meeting of the Anti- +Slavery Society. Let those who condemn the creed of these men see to +it that they do not fall behind them in practical righteousness and +faithfulness to the convictions of duty. + +Samuel Hopkins, who gave his name to the religious system in question, +was born in Waterbury, Connecticut, in 1721. In his fifteenth year he +was placed under the care of a neighboring clergyman, preparatory for +college, which he entered about a year after. In 1740, the celebrated +Whitefield visited New Haven, and awakened there, as elsewhere, serious +inquiry on religious subjects. He was followed the succeeding spring by +Gilbert Tennent, the New Jersey revivalist, a stirring and powerful +preacher. A great change took place in the college. All the phenomena +which President Edwards has described in his account of the Northampton +awakening were reproduced among the students. The excellent David +Brainard, then a member of the college, visited Hopkins in his apartment, +and, by a few plain and earnest words, convinced him that he was a +stranger to vital Christianity. In his autobiographical sketch, he +describes in simple and affecting language the dark and desolate state of +his mind at this period, and the particular exercise which finally +afforded him some degree of relief, and which he afterwards appears to +have regarded as his conversion from spiritual death to life. When he +first heard Tennent, regarding him as the greatest as well as the best of +men, he made up his mind to study theology with him; but just before the +commencement at which he was to take his degree, the elder Edwards +preached at New Haven. Struck by the power of the great theologian, he +at once resolved to make him his spiritual father. In the winter +following, he left his father's house on horseback, on a journey of +eighty miles to Northampton. Arriving at the house of President Edwards, +he was disappointed by hearing that he was absent on a preaching tour. +But he was kindly received by the gifted and accomplished lady of the +mansion, and encouraged to remain during the winter. Still doubtful in +respect to his own spiritual state, he was, he says, "very gloomy, and +retired most of the time in his chamber." The kind heart of his amiable +hostess was touched by his evident affliction. After some days she came +to his chamber, and, with the gentleness and delicacy of a true woman, +inquired into the cause of his unhappiness. The young student disclosed +to her, without reserve, the state of his feelings and the extent of his +fears. "She told me," says the Doctor, "that she had had peculiar +exercises respecting me since I had been in the family; that she trusted +I should receive light and comfort, and doubted not that God intended yet +to do great things by me." + +After pursuing his studies for some months with the Puritan philosopher, +young Hopkins commenced preaching, and, in 1743, was ordained at +Sheffield, (now Great Barrington') in the western part of Massachusetts. +There were at the time only about thirty families in the town. He says +it was a matter of great regret to him to be obliged to settle so far +from his spiritual guide and tutor but seven years after he was relieved +and gratified by the removal of Edwards to Stockbridge, as the Indian +missionary at that station, seven miles only from his own residence; and +for several years the great metaphysician and his favorite pupil enjoyed +the privilege of familiar intercourse with each other. The removal of +the former in 1758 to Princeton, New Jersey, and his death, which soon +followed, are mentioned in the diary of Hopkins as sore trials and +afflictive dispensations. + +Obtaining a dismissal from his society in Great Barrington in 1769, +he was installed at Newport the next year, as minister of the first +Congregational church in that place. Newport, at this period, was, in +size, wealth, and commercial importance, the second town in New England. +It was the great slave mart of the North. Vessels loaded with stolen men +and women and children, consigned to its merchant princes, lay at its +wharves; immortal beings were sold daily in its market, like cattle at a +fair. The soul of Hopkins was moved by the appalling spectacle. A +strong conviction of the great wrong of slavery, and of its utter +incompatibility with the Christian profession, seized upon his mind. +While at Great Barrington, he had himself owned a slave, whom he had sold +on leaving the place, without compunction or suspicion in regard to the +rightfulness of the transaction. He now saw the origin of the system in +its true light; he heard the seamen engaged in the African trade tell of +the horrible scenes of fire and blood which they had witnessed, and in +which they had been actors; he saw the half-suffocated wretches brought +up from their noisome and narrow prison, their squalid countenances and +skeleton forms bearing fearful evidence of the suffering attendant upon +the transportation from their native homes. The demoralizing effects of +slaveholding everywhere forced themselves upon his attention, for the +evil had struck its roots deeply in the community, and there were few +families into which it had not penetrated. The right to deal in slaves, +and use them as articles of property, was questioned by no one; men of +all professions, clergymen and church-members, consulted only their +interest and convenience as to their purchase or sale. The magnitude of +the evil at first appalled him; he felt it to be his duty to condemn it, +but for a time even his strong spirit faltered and turned pale in +contemplation of the consequences to be apprehended from an attack upon +it. Slavery and slave-trading were at that time the principal source of +wealth to the island; his own church and congregation were personally +interested in the traffic; all were implicated in its guilt. He stood +alone, as it were, in its condemnation; with here and there an exception, +all Christendom maintained the rightfulness of slavery. No movement had +yet been made in England against the slave-trade; the decision of +Granville Sharp's Somerset case had not yet taken place. The Quakers, +even, had not at that time redeemed themselves from the opprobrium. +Under these circumstances, after a thorough examination of the subject, +he resolved, in the strength of the Lord, to take his stand openly and +decidedly on the side of humanity. He prepared a sermon for the purpose, +and for the first time from a pulpit of New England was heard an emphatic +testimony against the sin of slavery. In contrast with the unselfish and +disinterested benevolence which formed in his mind the essential element +of Christian holiness, he held up the act of reducing human beings to the +condition of brutes, to minister to the convenience, the luxury, and +lusts of the owner. He had expected bitter complaint and opposition from +his hearers, but was agreeably surprised to find that in most cases his +sermon only excited astonishment in their minds that they themselves had +never before looked at the subject in the light in which he presented it. +Steadily and faithfully pursuing the matter, he had the satisfaction to +carry with him his church, and obtain from it, in the midst of a +slaveholding and slavetrading community, a resolution every way worthy of +note in this day of cowardly compromise with the evil on the part of our +leading ecclesiastical bodies:-- + +"Resolved, That the slave-trade and the slavery of the Africans, as it +has existed among us, is a gross violation of the righteousness and +benevolence which are so much inculcated in the Gospel, and therefore we +will not tolerate it in this church." + +There are few instances on record of moral heroism superior to that of +Samuel Hopkins, in thus rebuking slavery in the time and place of its +power. Honor to the true man ever, who takes his life in his hands, and, +at all hazards, speaks the word which is given him to utter, whether men +will hear or forbear, whether the end thereof is to be praise or censure, +gratitude or hatred. It well may be doubted whether on that Sabbath day +the angels of God, in their wide survey of His universe, looked upon a +nobler spectacle than that of the minister of Newport, rising up before +his slaveholding congregation, and demanding, in the name of the Highest, +the "deliverance of the captive, and the opening of prison doors to them +that were bound." + +Dr. Hopkins did not confine his attention solely to slaveholding in his +own church and congregation. He entered into correspondence with the +early Abolitionists of Europe as well as his own country. He labored +with his brethren in the ministry to bring then to his own view of the +great wrong of holding men as slaves. In a visit to his early friend, +Dr. Bellamy, at Bethlehem, who was the owner of a slave, he pressed the +subject kindly but earnestly upon his attention. Dr. Bellamy urged the +usual arguments in favor of slavery. Dr. Hopkins refuted them in the +most successful manner, and called upon his friend to do an act of simple +justice, in giving immediate freedom to his slave. Dr. Bellamy, thus +hardly pressed, said that the slave was a most judicious and faithful +fellow; that, in the management of his farm, he could trust everything to +his discretion; that he treated him well, and he was so happy in his +service that he would refuse his freedom if it were offered him. + +"Will you," said Hopkins, "consent to his liberation, if he really +desires it?" + +"Yes, certainly," said Dr. Bellamy. + +"Then let us try him," said his guest. + +The slave was at work in an adjoining field, and at the call of his +master came promptly to receive his commands. + +"Have you a good master?" inquired Hopkins. + +"O yes; massa, he berry good." + +"But are you happy in your present condition?" queried the Doctor. + +"O yes, massa; berry happy." + +Dr. Bellamy here could scarcely suppress his exultation at what he +supposed was a complete triumph over his anti-slavery brother. But the +pertinacious guest continued his queries. + +"Would you not be more happy if you were free?" + +"O yes, massa," exclaimed the negro, his dark face glowing with new life; +"berry much more happy!" + +To the honor of Dr. Bellamy, he did not hesitate. + +"You have your wish," he said to his servant. "From this moment you are +free." + +Dr. Hopkins was a poor man, but one of his first acts, after becoming +convinced of the wrongfulness of slavery, was to appropriate the very sum +which, in the days of his ignorance, he had obtained as the price of his +slave to the benevolent purpose of educating some pious colored men in +the town of Newport, who were desirous of returning to their native +country as missionaries. In one instance he borrowed, on his own +responsibility, the sum requisite to secure the freedom of a slave in +whom he became interested. One of his theological pupils was Newport +Gardner, who, twenty years after the death of his kind patron, left +Boston as a missionary to Africa. He was a native African, and was held +by Captain Gardner, of Newport, who allowed him to labor for his own +benefit, whenever by extra diligence he could gain a little time for that +purpose. The poor fellow was in the habit of laying up his small +earnings on these occasions, in the faint hope of one day obtaining +thereby the freedom of himself and his family. But time passed on, and +the hoard of purchase-money still looked sadly small. He concluded to +try the efficacy of praying. Having gained a day for himself, by severe +labor, and communicating his plan only to Dr. Hopkins and two or three +other Christian friends, he shut himself up in his humble dwelling, and +spent the time in prayer for freedom. Towards the close of the day, his +master sent for him. He was told that this was his gained time, and that +he was engaged for himself. "No matter," returned the master, "I must +see him." Poor Newport reluctantly abandoned his supplications, and came +at his master's bidding, when, to his astonishment, instead of a +reprimand, he received a paper, signed by his master, declaring him and +his family from thenceforth free. He justly attributed this signal +blessing to the all-wise Disposer, who turns the hearts of men as the +rivers of water are turned; but it cannot be doubted that the labors and +arguments of Dr. Hopkins with his master were the human instrumentality +in effecting it. + +In the year 1773, in connection with Dr. Ezra Stiles, he issued an appeal +to the Christian community in behalf of a society which he had been +instrumental in forming, for the purpose of educating missionaries for +Africa. In the desolate and benighted condition of that unhappy +continent he had become painfully interested, by conversing with the +slaves brought into Newport. Another appeal was made on the subject in +1776. + +The war of the Revolution interrupted, for a time, the philanthropic +plans of Dr. Hopkins. The beautiful island on which he lived was at an +early period exposed to the exactions and devastations of the enemy. All +who could do so left it for the mainland. Its wharves were no longer +thronged with merchandise; its principal dwellings stood empty; the very +meeting houses were in a great measure abandoned. Dr. Hopkins, who had +taken the precaution, at the commencement of hostilities, to remove his +family to Great Barrington, remained himself until the year 1776, when +the British took possession of the island. During the period of its +occupation, he was employed in preaching to destitute congregations. +He spent the summer of 1777 at Newburyport, where his memory is still +cherished by the few of his hearers who survive. In the spring of 1780, +he returned to Newport. Everything had undergone a melancholy change. +The garden of New England lay desolate. His once prosperous and wealthy +church and congregation were now poor, dispirited, and, worst of all, +demoralized. His meeting-house had been used as a barrack for soldiers; +pulpit and pews had been destroyed; the very bell had been stolen. +Refusing, with his characteristic denial of self, a call to settle in a +more advantageous position, he sat himself down once more in the midst of +his reduced and impoverished parishioners, and, with no regular salary, +dependent entirely on such free-will offerings as from time to time were +made him, he remained with them until his death. + +In 1776, Dr. Hopkins published his celebrated "Dialogue concerning the +Slavery of the Africans; showing it to be the Duty and Interest of the +American States to Emancipate all their Slaves." This he dedicated to +the Continental Congress, the Signers of the Declaration of Independence. +It was republished in 1785, by the New York Abolition Society, and was +widely circulated. A few years after, on coming unexpectedly into +possession of a few hundred dollars, he devoted immediately one hundred +of it to the society for ameliorating the condition of the Africans. + +He continued to preach until he had reached his eighty-third year. His +last sermon was delivered on the 16th of the tenth month, 1803, and his +death took place in the twelfth month following. He died calmly, in the +steady faith of one who had long trusted all things in the hand of God. +"The language of my heart is," said he, "let God be glorified by all +things, and the best interest of His kingdom promoted, whatever becomes +of me or my interest." To a young friend, who visited him three days +before his death, he said, "I am feeble and cannot say much. I have said +all I can say. With my last words, I tell you, religion is the one thing +needful." "And now," he continued, affectionately pressing the hand of +his friend, "I am going to die, and I am glad of it." Many years before, +an agreement had been made between Dr. Hopkins and his old and tried +friend, Dr. Hart, of Connecticut, that when either was called home, the +survivor should preach the funeral sermon of the deceased. The venerable +Dr. Hart accordingly came, true to his promise, preaching at the funeral +from the words of Elisha, "My father, my father; the chariots of Israel, +and the horsemen thereof." In the burial-ground adjoining his meeting- +house lies all that was mortal of Samuel Hopkins. + +One of Dr. Hopkins's habitual hearers, and who has borne grateful +testimony to the beauty and holiness of his life and conversation, was +William Ellery Channing. Widely as he afterwards diverged from the creed +of his early teacher, it contained at least one doctrine to the influence +of which the philanthropic devotion of his own life to the welfare of man +bears witness. He says, himself, that there always seemed to him +something very noble in the doctrine of disinterested benevolence, the +casting of self aside, and doing good, irrespective of personal +consequences, in this world or another, upon which Dr. Hopkins so +strongly insisted, as the all-essential condition of holiness. + +How widely apart, as mere theologians, stood Hopkins and Channing! Yet +how harmonious their lives and practice! Both could forget the poor +interests of self, in view of eternal right and universal humanity. Both +could appreciate the saving truth, that love to God and His creation is +the fulfilling of the divine law. The idea of unselfish benevolence, +which they held in common, clothed with sweetness and beauty the stern +and repulsive features of the theology of Hopkins, and infused a sublime +spirit of self-sacrifice and a glowing humanity into the indecisive and +less robust faith of Charming. What is the lesson of this but that +Christianity consists rather in the affections than in the intellect; +that it is a life rather than a creed; and that they who diverge the +widest from each other in speculation upon its doctrines may, after all, +be found working side by side on the common ground of its practice. + +We have chosen to speak of Dr. Hopkins as a philanthropist rather than as +a theologian. Let those who prefer to contemplate the narrow sectarian +rather than the universal man dwell upon his controversial works, and +extol the ingenuity and logical acumen with which he defended his own +dogmas and assailed those of others. We honor him, not as the founder of +a new sect, but as the friend of all mankind,--the generous defender of +the poor and oppressed. Great as unquestionably were his powers of +argument, his learning, and skill in the use of the weapons of theologic +warfare, these by no means constitute his highest title to respect and +reverence. As the product of an honest and earnest mind, his doctrinal +dissertations have at least the merit of sincerity. They were put forth +in behalf of what he regarded as truth; and the success which they met +with, while it called into exercise his profoundest gratitude, only +served to deepen the humility and self-abasement of their author. As the +utterance of what a good man believed and felt, as a part of the history +of a life remarkable for its consecration to apprehended duty, these +writings cannot be without interest even to those who dissent from their +arguments and deny their assumptions; but in the time now, we trust, near +at hand, when distracted and divided Christendom shall unite in a new +Evangelical union, in which orthodoxy in life and practice shall be +estimated above orthodoxy in theory, he will be honored as a good man, +rather than as a successful creed-maker; as a friend of the oppressed and +the fearless rebuker of popular sin rather than as the champion of a +protracted sectarian war. Even now his writings, so popular in their +day, are little known. The time may come when no pilgrim of sectarianism +shall visit his grave. But his memory shall live in the hearts of the +good and generous; the emancipated slave shall kneel over his ashes, and +bless God for the gift to humanity of a life so devoted to its welfare. +To him may be applied the language of one who, on the spot where he +labored and lay down to rest, while rejecting the doctrinal views of the +theologian, still cherishes the philanthropic spirit of the man:-- + + "He is not lost,--he hath not passed away + Clouds, earths, may pass, but stars shine calmly on; + And he who doth the will of God, for aye + Abideth, when the earth and heaven are gone. + + "Alas that such a heart is in the grave!' + Thanks for the life that now shall never end! + Weep, and rejoice, thou terror-hunted slave, + That hast both lost and found so great a friend!" + + + + + + + RICHARD BAXTER. + +The picture drawn by a late English historian of the infamous Jeffreys in +his judicial robes, sitting in judgment upon the venerable Richard +Baxter, brought before him to answer to an indictment, setting; forth +that the said "Richardus Baxter, persona seditiosa et factiosa pravae +mentis, impiae, inquietae, turbulent disposition et conversation; falso +illicte, injuste nequit factiose seditiose, et irreligiose, fecit, +composuit, scripsit quendam falsum, seditiosum, libellosum, factiosum et +irreligiosum librum," is so remarkable that the attention of the most +careless reader is at once arrested. Who was that old man, wasted with +disease and ghastly with the pallor of imprisonment, upon whom the foul- +mouthed buffoon in ermine exhausted his vocabulary of abuse and ridicule? +Who was Richardus Baxter? + +The author of works so elaborate and profound as to frighten by their +very titles and ponderous folios the modern ecclesiastical student from +their perusal, his hold upon the present generation is limited to a few +practical treatises, which, from their very nature, can never become +obsolete. The _Call to the Unconverted_ and the _Saints' Everlasting +Rest_ belong to no time or sect. They speak the universal language of +the wants and desires of the human soul. They take hold of the awful +verities of life and death, righteousness and judgment to come. Through +them the suffering and hunted minister of Kidderminster has spoken in +warning, entreaty, and rebuke, or in tones of tenderest love and pity, to +the hearts of the generations which have succeeded him. His +controversial works, his confessions of faith, his learned disputations, +and his profound doctrinal treatises are no longer read. Their author +himself, towards the close of his life, anticipated, in respect to these +favorite productions, the children of his early zeal, labor, and +suffering, the judgment of posterity. "I perceive," he says, "that most +of the doctrinal controversies among Protestants are far more about +equivocal words than matter. Experience since the year 1643 to this year +1675 hath loudly called me to repent of my own prejudices, sidings, and +censurings of causes and persons not understood, and of all the +miscarriages of my ministry and life which have been thereby caused; and +to make it my chief work to call men that are within my bearing to more +peaceable thoughts, affections, and practices." + +Richard Baxter was born at the village of Eton Constantine, in 1615. He +received from officiating curates of the little church such literary +instruction as could be given by men who had left the farmer's flail, the +tailor's thimble, and the service of strolling stage-players, to perform +church drudgery under the parish incumbent, who was old and well-nigh +blind. At the age of sixteen, he was sent to a school at Wroxeter, where +he spent three years, to little purpose, so far as a scientific education +was concerned. His teacher left him to himself mainly, and following the +bent of his mind, even at that early period, he abandoned the exact +sciences for the perusal of such controversial and metaphysical writings +of the schoolmen as his master's library afforded. The smattering of +Latin which he acquired only served in after years to deform his +treatises with barbarous, ill-adapted, and erroneous citations. "As to +myself," said he, in his letter written in old age to Anthony Wood, who +had inquired whether he was an Oxonian graduate, "my faults are no +disgrace to a university, for I was of none; I have but little but what I +had out of books and inconsiderable help of country divines. Weakness +and pain helped me to study how to die; that set me a-studying how to +live; and that on studying the doctrine from which I must fetch my +motives and comforts; beginning with necessities, I proceeded by degrees, +and am now going to see that for which I have lived and studied." + +Of the first essays of the young theologian as a preacher of the +Established Church, his early sufferings from that complication of +diseases with which his whole life was tormented, of the still keener +afflictions of a mind whose entire outlook upon life and nature was +discolored and darkened by its disordered bodily medium, and of the +struggles between his Puritan temperament and his reverence for Episcopal +formulas, much might be profitably said, did the limits we have assigned +ourselves admit. Nor can we do more than briefly allude to the religious +doubts and difficulties which darkened and troubled his mind at an early +period. + +He tells us at length in his Life how he struggled with these spiritual +infirmities and temptations. The future life, the immortality of the +soul, and the truth of the Scriptures were by turns questioned. "I +never," says he in a letter to Dr. More, inserted in the _Sadducisimus +Triumphatus_, "had so much ado to overcome a temptation as that to the +opinion of Averroes, that, as extinguished candles go all out in an +illuminated air, so separated souls go all into one common anima mundi, +and lose their individuation." With these and similar "temptations" +Baxter struggled long, earnestly, and in the end triumphantly. His +faith, when once established, remained unshaken to the last; and although +always solemn, reverential, and deeply serious, he was never the subject +of religious melancholy, or of that mournful depression of soul which +arises from despair of an interest in the mercy and paternal love of our +common Father. + +The Great Revolution found him settled as a minister in Kidderminster, +under the sanction of a drunken vicar, who, yielding to the clamor of his +more sober parishioners, and his fear of their appeal to the Long +Parliament, then busy in its task of abating church nuisances, had agreed +to give him sixty pounds per year, in the place of a poor tippling +curate, notorious as a common railer and pothouse encumbrance. + +As might have been expected, the sharp contrast which the earnest, +devotional spirit and painful strictness of Baxter presented to the +irreverent license and careless good humor of his predecessor by no means +commended him to the favor of a large class of his parishioners. Sabbath +merry-makers missed the rubicund face and maudlin jollity of their old +vicar; the ignorant and vicious disliked the new preacher's rigid +morality; the better informed revolted at his harsh doctrines, austere +life, and grave manner. Intense earnestness characterized all his +efforts. Contrasting human nature with the Infinite Purity and Holiness, +he was oppressed with the sense of the loathsomeness and deformity of +sin, and afflicted by the misery of his fellow-creatures separated from +the divine harmony. He tells us that at this period he preached the +terrors of the Law and the necessity of repentance, rather than the joys +and consolations of the Gospel, upon which he so loved to dwell in his +last years. He seems to have felt a necessity laid upon him to startle +men from false hope and security, and to call for holiness of life and +conformity to the divine will as the only ground of safety. Powerful and +impressive as are the appeals and expostulations contained in his written +works, they probably convey but a faint idea of the force and earnestness +of those which he poured forth from his pulpit. As he advanced in years, +these appeals were less frequently addressed to the fears of his +auditors, for he had learned to value a calm and consistent life of +practical goodness beyond any passionate exhibition of terrors, fervors, +and transports. Having witnessed, in an age of remarkable enthusiasm and +spiritual awakening, the ill effects of passional excitements and +religious melancholy, he endeavored to present cheerful views of +Christian life and duty, and made it a special object to repress morbid +imaginations and heal diseased consciences. Thus it came to pass that no +man of his day was more often applied to for counsel and relief by +persons laboring under mental depression than himself. He has left +behind him a very curious and not uninstructive discourse, which he +entitled The Cure of Melancholy, by Faith and Physick, in which he shows +a great degree of skill in his morbid mental anatomy. He had studied +medicine to some extent for the benefit of the poor of his parish, and +knew something of the intimate relations and sympathy of the body and +mind; he therefore did not hesitate to ascribe many of the spiritual +complaints of his applicants to disordered bodily functions, nor to +prescribe pills and powders in the place of Scripture texts. More than +thirty years after the commencement of his labors at Kidderminster he +thus writes: "I was troubled this year with multitudes of melancholy +persons from several places of the land; some of high quality, some of +low, some exquisitely learned, and some unlearned. I know not how it +came to pass, but if men fell melancholy I must hear from them or see +them, more than any physician I knew." He cautions against ascribing +melancholy phantasms and passions to the Holy Spirit, warns the young +against licentious imaginations and excitements, and ends by advising all +to take heed how they make of religion a matter of "fears, tears, and +scruples." "True religion," he remarks, "doth principally consist in +obedience, love, and joy." + +At this early period of his ministry, however, he had all of Whitefield's +intensity and fervor, added to reasoning powers greatly transcending +those of the revivalist of the next century. Young in years, he was even +then old in bodily infirmity and mental experience. Believing himself +the victim of a mortal disease, he lived and preached in the constant +prospect of death. His memento mori was in his bed-chamber, and sat by +him at his frugal meal. The glory of the world was stained to his +vision. He was blind to the beauty of all its "pleasant pictures." No +monk of Mount Athos or silent Chartreuse, no anchorite of Indian +superstition, ever more completely mortified the flesh, or turned his +back more decidedly upon the "good things" of this life. A solemn and +funeral atmosphere surrounded him. He walked in the shadows of the +cypress, and literally "dwelt among the tombs." Tortured by incessant +pain, he wrestled against its attendant languor and debility, as a sinful +wasting of inestimable time; goaded himself to constant toil and +devotional exercise, and, to use his own words, "stirred up his sluggish +soul to speak to sinners with compassion, as a dying man to dying men." + +Such entire consecration could not long be without its effect, even upon +the "vicious rabble," as Baxter calls them. His extraordinary +earnestness, self-forgetting concern for the spiritual welfare of others, +his rigid life of denial and sacrifice, if they failed of bringing men to +his feet as penitents, could not but awaken a feeling of reverence and +awe. In Kidderminster, as in most other parishes of the kingdom, there +were at this period pious, sober, prayerful people, diligent readers of +the Scriptures, who were derided by their neighbors as Puritans, +precisians, and hypocrites. These were naturally drawn towards the new +preacher, and he as naturally recognized them as "honest seekers of the +word and way of God." Intercourse with such men, and the perusal of the +writings of certain eminent Non-conformists, had the effect to abate, in +some degree, his strong attachment to the Episcopal formula and polity. +He began to doubt the rightfulness of making the sign of the cross in +baptism, and to hesitate about administering the sacrament to profane +swearers and tipplers. + +But while Baxter, in the seclusion of his parish, was painfully weighing +the arguments for and against the wearing of surplices, the use of +marriage rings, and the prescribed gestures and genuflections of his +order, tithing with more or less scruple of conscience the mint and anise +and cummin of pulpit ceremonials, the weightier matters of the law, +freedom, justice, and truth were claiming the attention of Pym and +Hampden, Brook and Vane, in the Parliament House. The controversy +between King and Commons had reached the point where it could only be +decided by the dread arbitrament of battle. The somewhat equivocal +position of the Kidderminster preacher exposed him to the suspicion of +the adherents of the King and Bishops. The rabble, at that period +sympathizing with the party of license in morals and strictness in +ceremonials, insulted and mocked him, and finally drove him from his +parish. + +On the memorable 23d of tenth month, 1642, he was invited to occupy a +friend's pulpit at Alcester. + +While preaching, a low, dull, jarring roll, as of continuous thunder, +sounded in his ears. It was the cannon-fire of Edgehill, the prelude to +the stern battle-piece of revolution. On the morrow, Baxter hurried to +the scene of action. "I was desirous," he says, "to see the field. I +found the Earl of Essex keeping the ground, and the King's army facing +them on a hill about a mile off. There were about a thousand dead bodies +in the field between them." Turning from this ghastly survey, the +preacher mingled with the Parliamentary army, when, finding the surgeons +busy with the wounded, he very naturally sought occasion for the exercise +of his own vocation as a spiritual practitioner. He attached himself to +the army. So far as we can gather from his own memoirs and the testimony +of his contemporaries, he was not influenced to this step by any of the +political motives which actuated the Parliamentary leaders. He was no +revolutionist. He was as blind and unquestioning in his reverence for +the King's person and divine right, and as hearty in his hatred of +religious toleration and civil equality, as any of his clerical brethren +who officiated in a similar capacity in the ranks of Goring and Prince +Rupert. He seems only to have looked upon the soldiers as a new set of +parishioners, whom Providence had thrown in his way. The circumstances +of his situation left him little choice in the matter. "I had," he says, +"neither money nor friends. I knew not who would receive me in a place +of safety, nor had I anything to satisfy them for diet and +entertainment." He accepted an offer to live in the Governor's house at +Coventry, and preach to the soldiers of the garrison. Here his skill in +polemics was called into requisition, in an encounter with two New +England Antinomians, and a certain Anabaptist tailor who was making more +rents in the garrison's orthodoxy than he mended in their doublets and +breeches. Coventry seems at this time to have been the rendezvous of a +large body of clergymen, who, as Baxter says, were "for King and +Parliament,"--men who, in their desire for a more spiritual worship, most +unwillingly found themselves classed with the sentries whom they regarded +as troublers and heretics, not to be tolerated; who thought the King had +fallen into the hands of the Papists, and that Essex and Cromwell were +fighting to restore him; and who followed the Parliamentary forces to see +to it that they were kept sound in faith, and free from the heresy of +which the Court News-Book accused them. Of doing anything to overturn +the order of Church and State, or of promoting any radical change in the +social and political condition of the people, they had no intention +whatever. They looked at the events of the time, and upon their duties +in respect to them, not as politicians or reformers, but simply as +ecclesiastics and spiritual teachers, responsible to God for the +religious beliefs and practices of the people, rather than for their +temporal welfare and happiness. They were not the men who struck down +the solemn and imposing prelacy of England, and vindicated the divine +right of men to freedom by tossing the head of an anointed tyrant from +the scaffold at Whitehall. It was the so-called schismatics, ranters, +and levellers, the disputatious corporals and Anabaptist musketeers, the +dread and abhorrence alike of prelate and presbyter, who, under the lead +of Cromwell, + + "Ruined the great work of time, + And cast the kingdoms old + Into another mould." + +The Commonwealth was the work of the laity, the sturdy yeomanry and God- +fearing commoners of England. + +The news of the fight of Naseby reaching Coventry, Baxter, who had +friends in the Parliamentary forces, wishing, as he says, to be assured +of their safety, passed over to the stricken field, and spent a night +with them. He was afflicted and confounded by the information which they +gave him, that the victorious army was full of hot-headed schemers and +levellers, who were against King and Church, prelacy and ritual, and who +were for a free Commonwealth and freedom of religious belief and worship. +He was appalled to find that the heresies of the Antinomians, Arminians, +and Anabaptists had made sadder breaches in the ranks of Cromwell than +the pikes of Jacob Astley, or the daggers of the roysterers who followed +the mad charge of Rupert. Hastening back to Coventry, he called together +his clerical brethren, and told them "the sad news of the corruption of +the army." After much painful consideration of the matter, it was deemed +best for Baxter to enter Cromwell's army, nominally as its chaplain, but +really as the special representative of orthodoxy in politics and +religion, against the democratic weavers and prophesying tailors who +troubled it. He joined Whalley's regiment, and followed it through many +a hot skirmish and siege. Personal fear was by no means one of Baxter's +characteristics, and he bore himself through all with the coolness of an +old campaigner. Intent upon his single object, he sat unmoved under the +hail of cannon-shot from the walls of Bristol, confronted the well-plied +culverins of Sherburne, charged side by side with Harrison upon Goring's +musketeers at Langford, and heard the exulting thanksgiving of that grim +enthusiast, when "with a loud voice he broke forth in praises of God, as +one in rapture;" and marched, Bible in hand, with Cromwell himself, to +the storming of Basing-House, so desperately defended by the Marquis of +Winchester. In truth, these storms of outward conflict were to him of +small moment. He was engaged in a sterner battle with spiritual +principalities and powers, struggling with Satan himself in the guise of +political levellers and Antinomian sowers of heresy. No antagonist was +too high and none too low for him. Distrusting Cromwell, he sought to +engage him in a discussion of certain points of abstract theology, +wherein his soundness seemed questionable; but the wary chief baffled off +the young disputant by tedious, unanswerable discourses about free grace, +which Baxter admits were not unsavory to others, although the speaker +himself had little understanding of the matter. At other times, he +repelled his sad-visaged chaplain with unwelcome jests and rough, +soldierly merriment; for he had "a vivacity, hilarity, and alacrity as +another man hath when he hath taken a cup too much." Baxter says of him, +complainingly, "he would not dispute with me at all." But, in the midst +of such an army, he could not lack abundant opportunity for the exercise +of his peculiar powers of argumentation. At Amersham, he had a sort of +pitched battle with the contumacious soldiers. "When the public talking +day came," says he, "I took the reading-pew, and Pitchford's cornet and +troopers took the gallery. There did the leader of the Chesham men +begin, and afterwards Pitchford's soldiers set in; and I alone disputed +with them from morning until almost night; for I knew their trick, that +if I had gone out first, they would have prated what boasting words they +listed, and made the people believe that they had baffled me, or got the +best; therefore I stayed it out till they first rose and went away." As +usual in such cases, both parties claimed the victory. Baxter got thanks +only from the King's adherents; "Pitchford's troops and the leader of the +Chesham men" retired from their hard day's work, to enjoy the countenance +and favor of Cromwell, as men after his own heart, faithful to the Houses +and the Word, against kingcraft and prelacy. + +Laughed at and held at arm's length by Cromwell, shunned by Harrison and +Berry and other chief officers, opposed on all points by shrewd, earnest +men, as ready for polemic controversy as for battle with the King's +malignants, and who set off against his theological and metaphysical +distinctions their own personal experiences and spiritual exercises, he +had little to encourage him in his arduous labors. Alone in such a +multitude, flushed with victory and glowing with religious enthusiasm, +he earnestly begged his brother ministers to come to his aid. "If the +army," said he, "had only ministers enough, who could have done such +little as I did, all their plot might have been broken, and King, +Parliament, and Religion might have been preserved." But no one +volunteered to assist him, and the "plot" of revolution went on. + +After Worcester fight he returned to Coventry, to make his report to the +ministers assembled there. He told them of his labors and trials, of the +growth of heresy and levelling principles in the army, and of the evident +design of its leaders to pull down Church, King, and Ministers. He +assured them that the day was at hand when all who were true to the King, +Parliament, and Religion should come forth to oppose these leaders, and +draw away their soldiers from them. For himself, he was willing to go +back to the army, and labor there until the crisis of which he spoke had +arrived. "Whereupon," says he, "they all voted me to go yet longer." + +Fortunately for the cause of civil and religious freedom, the great body +of the ministers, who disapproved of the ultraism of the victorious army, +and sympathized with the defeated King, lacked the courage and +devotedness of Baxter. Had they promptly seconded his efforts, although +the restoration of the King might have been impossible at that late +period, the horrors of civil war must have been greatly protracted. As +it was, they preferred to remain at home, and let Baxter have the benefit +of their prayers and good wishes. He returned to the army with the +settled purpose, of causing its defection from Cromwell; but, by one of +those dispensations which the latter used to call "births of Providence," +he was stricken down with severe sickness. Baxter's own comments upon +this passage in his life are not without interest. He says, God +prevented his purposes in his last and chiefest opposition to the army; +that he intended to take off or seduce from their officers the regiment +with which he was connected, and then to have tried his persuasion upon +the others. He says he afterwards found that his sickness was a mercy to +himself, "for they were so strong and active, and I had been likely to +have had small success in the attempt, and to have lost my life among +them in their fury." He was right in this last conjecture; Oliver +Cromwell would have had no scruples in making an example of a plotting +priest; and "Pitchford's soldiers" might have been called upon to +silence, with their muskets, the tough disputant who was proof against +their tongues. + +After a long and dubious illness, Baxter was so far restored as to be +able to go back to his old parish at Kidderminster. Here, under the +Protectorate of Cromwell, he remained in the full enjoyment of that +religious liberty which he still stoutly condemned in its application to +others. + +He afterwards candidly admits, that, under the "Usurper," as he styles +Cromwell, "he had such liberty and advantage to preach the Gospel with +success, as he could not have under a King, to whom he had sworn and +performed true subjection and obedience." Yet this did not prevent him +from preaching and printing, "seasonably and moderately," against the +Protector. "I declared," said he, "Cromwell and his adherents to be +guilty of treason and rebellion, aggravated by perfidiousness and +hypocrisy. But yet I did not think it my duty to rave against him in the +pulpit, or to do this so unseasonably and imprudently as might irritate +him to mischief. And the rather, because, as he kept up his approbation +of a godly life in general, and of all that was good, except that which +the interest of his sinful cause engaged him to be against. So I +perceived that it was his design to do good in the main, and to promote +the Gospel and the interests of godliness more than any had done before +him." + +Cromwell, if he heard of his diatribes against him, appears to have cared +little for them. Lords Warwick and Broghill, on one occasion, brought +him to preach before the Lord Protector. He seized the occasion to +preach against the sentries, to condemn all who countenanced them, and to +advocate the unity of the Church. Soon after, he was sent for by +Cromwell, who made "a long and tedious speech" in the presence of three +of his chief men, (one of whom, General Lambert, fell asleep the while,) +asserting that God had owned his government in a signal manner. Baxter +boldly replied to him, that he and his friends regarded the ancient +monarchy as a blessing, and not an evil, and begged to know how that +blessing was forfeited to England, and to whom that forfeiture was made. +Cromwell, with some heat, made answer that it was no forfeiture, but that +God had made the change. They afterwards held a long conference with +respect to freedom of conscience, Cromwell defending his liberal policy, +and Baxter opposing it. No one can read Baxter's own account of these +interviews, without being deeply impressed with the generous and +magnanimous spirit of the Lord Protector in tolerating the utmost freedom +of speech on the part of one who openly denounced him as a traitor and +usurper. Real greatness of mind could alone have risen above personal +resentment under such circumstances of peculiar aggravation. + +In the death of the Protector, the treachery of Monk, and the restoration +of the King, Baxter and his Presbyterian friends believed that they saw +the hand of a merciful Providence preparing the way for the best good of +England and the Church. Always royalists, they had acted with the party +opposed to the King from necessity rather than choice. Considering all +that followed, one can scarcely avoid smiling over the extravagant +jubilations of the Presbyterian divines, on the return of the royal +debauchee to Whitehall. They hurried up to London with congratulations +of formidable length and papers of solemn advice and counsel, to all +which the careless monarch listened, with what patience he was master of. +Baxter was one of the first to present himself at Court, and it is +creditable to his heart rather than his judgment and discrimination that +he seized the occasion to offer a long address to the King, expressive of +his expectation that his Majesty would discountenance all sin and promote +godliness, support the true exercise of Church discipline and cherish and +hold up the hands of the faithful ministers of the Church. To all which +Charles II. "made as gracious an answer as we could expect," says Baxter, +"insomuch that old Mr. Ash burst out into tears of joy." Who doubts that +the profligate King avenged himself as soon as the backs of his unwelcome +visitors were fairly turned, by coarse jests and ribaldry, directed +against a class of men whom he despised and hated, but towards whom +reasons of policy dictated a show of civility and kindness? + +There is reason to believe that Charles II., had he been able to effect +his purpose, would have gone beyond Cromwell himself in the matter of +religious toleration; in other words, he would have taken, in the outset +of his reign, the very steps which cost his successor his crown, and +procured the toleration of Catholics by a declaration of universal +freedom in religion. But he was not in a situation to brave the +opposition alike of Prelacy and Presbyterianism, and foiled in a scheme +to which he was prompted by that vague, superstitious predilection for +the Roman Catholic religion which at times struggled with his habitual +scepticism, his next object was to rid himself of the importunities of +sentries and the trouble of religious controversies by reestablishing the +liturgy, and bribing or enforcing conformity to it on the part of the +Presbyterians. The history of the successful execution of this purpose +is familiar to all the readers of the plausible pages of Clarendon on the +one side, or the complaining treatises of Neal and Calamy on the other. + +Charles and his advisers triumphed, not so much through their own art, +dissimulation, and bad faith as through the blind bigotry, divided +counsels, and self-seeking of the Nonconformists. Seduction on one hand +and threats on the other, the bribe of bishoprics, hatred of Independents +and Quakers, and the terror of penal laws, broke the strength of +Presbyterianism. + +Baxter's whole conduct, on this occasion, bears testimony to his honesty +and sincerity, while it shows him to have been too intolerant to secure +his own religious freedom at the price of toleration for Catholics, +Quakers, and Anabaptists; and too blind in his loyalty to perceive that +pure and undefiled Christianity had nothing to hope for from a scandalous +and depraved King, surrounded by scoffing, licentious courtiers and a +haughty, revengeful prelacy. To secure his influence, the Court offered +him the bishopric of Hereford. Superior to personal considerations, he +declined the honor; but somewhat inconsistently, in his zeal for the +interests of his party, he urged the elevation of at least three of his +Presbyterian friends to the Episcopal bench, to enforce that very liturgy +which they condemned. He was the chief speaker for the Presbyterians at +the famous Savoy Conference, summoned to advise and consult upon the Book +of Common Prayer. His antagonist was Dr. Gunning, ready, fluent, and +impassioned. "They spent," as Gilbert Burnet says, "several days in +logical arguing, to the diversion of the town, who looked upon them as a +couple of fencers, engaged in a discussion which could not be brought to +an end." In themselves considered, many of the points at issue seem +altogether too trivial for the zeal with which Baxter contested them,-- +the form of a surplice, the wording of a prayer, kneeling at sacrament, +the sign of the cross, etc. With him, however, they were of momentous +interest and importance, as things unlawful in the worship of God. He +struggled desperately, but unavailingly. Presbyterianism, in its +eagerness for peace and union and a due share of State support, had +already made fatal concessions, and it was too late to stand upon non- +essentials. Baxter retired from the conference baffled and defeated, +amidst murmurs and jests. "If you had only been as fat as Dr. Manton," +said Clarendon to him, "you would have done well." + +The Act of Conformity, in which Charles II. and his counsellors gave the +lie to the liberal declarations of Breda and Whitehall, drove Baxter from +his sorrowing parishioners of Kidderminster, and added the evils of +poverty and persecution to the painful bodily infirmities under which he +was already bowed down. Yet his cup was not one of unalloyed bitterness, +and loving lips were prepared to drink it with him. + +Among Baxter's old parishioners of Kidderminster was a widowed lady of +gentle birth, named Charlton, who, with her daughter Margaret, occupied a +house in his neighborhood. The daughter was a brilliant girl, of +"strangely vivid wit," and "in early youth," he tells us, "pride, and +romances, and company suitable thereunto, did take her up." But erelong, +Baxter, who acted in the double capacity of spiritual and temporal +physician, was sent for to visit her, on an occasion of sickness. He +ministered to her bodily and mental sufferings, and thus secured her +gratitude and confidence. On her recovery, under the influence of his +warnings and admonitions, the gay young girl became thoughtful and +serious, abandoned her light books and companions, and devoted herself to +the duties of a Christian profession. Baxter was her counsellor and +confidant. She disclosed to him all her doubts, trials, and temptations, +and he, in return, wrote her long letters of sympathy, consolation, and +encouragement. He began to feel such an unwonted interest in the moral +and spiritual growth of his young disciple, that, in his daily walks +among his parishioners, he found himself inevitably drawn towards her +mother's dwelling. In her presence, the habitual austerity of his manner +was softened; his cold, close heart warmed and expanded. He began to +repay her confidence with his own, disclosing to her all his plans of +benevolence, soliciting her services, and waiting, with deference, for +her judgment upon them. A change came over his habits of thought and his +literary tastes; the harsh, rude disputant, the tough, dry logician, +found himself addressing to his young friend epistles in verse on +doctrinal points and matters of casuistry; Westminster Catechism in +rhyme; the Solemn League and Covenant set to music. A miracle alone +could have made Baxter a poet; the cold, clear light of reason "paled the +ineffectual fires" of his imagination; all things presented themselves to +his vision "with hard outlines, colorless, and with no surrounding +atmosphere." That he did, nevertheless, write verses, so creditable as +to justify a judicious modern critic in their citation and approval, can +perhaps be accounted for only as one of the phenomena of that subtle and +transforming influence to which even his stern nature was unconsciously +yielding. Baxter was in love. + +Never did the blind god try his archery on a more unpromising subject. +Baxter was nearly fifty years of age, and looked still older. His life +had been one long fast and penance. Even in youth he had never known a +schoolboy's love for cousin or playmate. He had resolutely closed up his +heart against emotions which he regarded as the allurements of time and +sense. He had made a merit of celibacy, and written and published +against the entanglement of godly ministers in matrimonial engagements +and family cares. It is questionable whether he now understood his own +case, or attributed to its right cause the peculiar interest which he +felt in Margaret Charlton. Left to himself, it is more than probable +that he might never have discovered the true nature of that interest, or +conjectured that anything whatever of earthly passion or sublunary +emotion had mingled with his spiritual Platonism. Commissioned and set +apart to preach repentance to dying men, penniless and homeless, worn +with bodily pain and mental toil, and treading, as he believed, on the +very margin of his grave, what had he to do with love? What power had he +to inspire that tender sentiment, the appropriate offspring only of +youth, and health, and beauty? + + "Could any Beatrice see + A lover in such anchorite!" + +But in the mean time a reciprocal feeling was gaining strength in the +heart of Margaret. To her grateful appreciation of the condescension of +a great and good man--grave, learned, and renowned--to her youth and +weakness, and to her enthusiastic admiration of his intellectual powers, +devoted to the highest and holiest objects, succeeded naturally enough +the tenderly suggestive pity of her woman's heart, as she thought of his +lonely home, his unshared sorrows, his lack of those sympathies and +kindnesses which make tolerable the hard journey of life. Did she not +owe to him, under God, the salvation of body and mind? Was he not her +truest and most faithful friend, entering with lively interest into all +her joys and sorrows? Had she not seen the cloud of his habitual sadness +broken by gleams of sunny warmth and cheerfulness, as they conversed +together? Could she do better than devote herself to the pleasing task +of making his life happier, of comforting him in seasons of pain and +weariness, encouraging him in his vast labors, and throwing over the cold +and hard austerities of his nature the warmth and light of domestic +affection? Pity, reverence, gratitude, and womanly tenderness, her +fervid imagination and the sympathies of a deeply religious nature, +combined to influence her decision. Disparity of age and condition +rendered it improbable that Baxter would ever venture to address her in +any other capacity than that of a friend and teacher; and it was left to +herself to give the first intimation of the possibility of a more +intimate relation. + +It is easy to imagine with what mixed feelings of joy, surprise, and +perplexity Baxter must have received the delicate avowal. There was much +in the circumstances of the case to justify doubt, misgiving, and close +searchings of heart. He must have felt the painful contrast which that +fair girl in the bloom of her youth presented to the worn man of middle +years, whose very breath was suffering, and over whom death seemed always +impending. Keenly conscious of his infirmities of temper, he must have +feared for the happiness of a loving, gentle being, daily exposed to +their manifestations. From his well-known habit of consulting what he +regarded as the divine will in every important step of his life, there +can be no doubt that his decision was the result quite as much of a +prayerful and patient consideration of duty as of the promptings of his +heart. Richard Baxter was no impassioned Abelard; his pupil in the +school of his severe and self-denying piety was no Heloise; but what +their union lacked in romantic interest was compensated by its purity and +disinterestedness, and its sanction by all that can hallow human passion, +and harmonize the love of the created with the love and service of the +Creator. + +Although summoned by a power which it would have been folly to resist, +the tough theologian did not surrender at discretion. "From the first +thoughts yet many changes and stoppages intervened, and long delays," he +tells us. The terms upon which he finally capitulated are perfectly in +keeping with his character. "She consented," he says, "to three +conditions of our marriage. 1st. That I should have nothing that before +our marriage was hers; that I, who wanted no earthly supplies, might not +seem to marry her from selfishness. 2d. That she would so alter her +affairs that I might be entangled in no lawsuits. 3d. That she should +expect none of my time which my ministerial work should require." + +As was natural, the wits of the Court had their jokes upon this singular +marriage; and many of his best friends regretted it, when they called to +mind what he had written in favor of ministerial celibacy, at a time +when, as he says, "he thought to live and die a bachelor." But Baxter +had no reason to regret the inconsistency of his precept and example. +How much of the happiness of the next twenty years of his life resulted +from his union with a kind and affectionate woman he has himself +testified, in his simple and touching Breviate of the Life of the late +Mrs. Baxter. Her affections were so ardent that her husband confesses +his fear that he was unable to make an adequate return, and that she must +have been disappointed in him in consequence. He extols her pleasant +conversation, her active benevolence, her disposition to aid him in all +his labors, and her noble forgetfulness of self, in ministering to his +comfort, in sickness and imprisonment. "She was the meetest helper I +could have had in the world," is his language. "If I spoke harshly or +sharply, it offended her. If I carried it (as I am apt) with too much +negligence of ceremony or humble compliment to any, she would modestly +tell me of it. If my looks seemed not pleasant, she would have me amend +them (which my weak, pained state of body indisposed me to do)." He +admits she had her failings, but, taken as a whole, the Breviate is an +exalted eulogy. + +His history from this time is marked by few incidents of a public +character. During that most disgraceful period in the annals of England, +the reign of the second Charles, his peculiar position exposed him to the +persecutions of prelacy and the taunts and abuse of the sentries, +standing as he did between these extremes, and pleading for a moderate +Episcopacy. He was between the upper millstone of High Church and the +nether one of Dissent. To use his own simile, he was like one who seeks +to fill with his hand a cleft in a log, and feels both sides close upon +him with pain. All parties and sects had, as they thought, grounds of +complaint against him. There was in him an almost childish simplicity of +purpose, a headlong earnestness and eagerness, which did not allow him to +consider how far a present act or opinion harmonized with what he had +already done or written. His greatest admirers admit his lack of +judgment, his inaptitude for the management of practical matters. His +utter incapacity to comprehend rightly the public men and measures of his +day is abundantly apparent; and the inconsistencies of his conduct and +his writings are too marked to need comment. He suffered persecution for +not conforming to some trifling matters of Church usage, while he +advocated the doctrine of passive obedience to the King or ruling power, +and the right of that power to enforce conformity. He wrote against +conformity while himself conforming; seceded from the Church, and yet +held stated communion with it; begged for the curacy of Kidderminster, +and declined the bishopric of Hereford. His writings were many of them +directly calculated to make Dissenters from the Establishment, but he was +invariably offended to find others practically influenced by them, and +quarrelled with his own converts to Dissent. The High Churchmen of +Oxford burned his Holy Commonwealth as seditious and revolutionary; while +Harrington and the republican club of Miles's Coffee House condemned it +for its hostility to democracy and its servile doctrine of obedience to +kings. He made noble pleas for liberty of conscience and bitterly +complained of his own suffering from Church courts, yet maintained the +necessity of enforcing conformity, and stoutly opposed the tolerant +doctrines of Penn and Milton. Never did a great and good man so entangle +himself with contradictions and inconsistencies. The witty and wicked +Sir Roger L'Estrange compiled from the irreconcilable portions of his +works a laughable Dialogue between Richard and Baxter. The Antinomians +found him guilty of Socinianism; and one noted controversialist undertook +to show, not without some degree of plausibility, that he was by turns a +Quaker and a Papist! + +Although able to suspend his judgment and carefully weigh evidence, upon +matters which he regarded as proper subjects of debate and scrutiny, he +possessed the power to shut out and banish at will all doubt and +misgiving in respect to whatever tended to prove, illustrate, or enforce +his settled opinions and cherished doctrines. His credulity at times +seems boundless. Hating the Quakers, and prepared to believe all manner +of evil of them, he readily came to the conclusion that their leaders +were disguised Papists. He maintained that Lauderdale was a good and +pious man, in spite of atrocities in Scotland which entitle him to a +place with Claverhouse; and indorsed the character of the infamous +Dangerfield, the inventor of the Meal-tub Plot, as a worthy convert from +popish errors. To prove the existence of devils and spirits, he +collected the most absurd stories and old-wives' fables, of soldiers +scared from their posts at night by headless bears, of a young witch +pulling the hooks out of Mr. Emlen's breeches and swallowing them, of Mr. +Beacham's locomotive tobacco-pipe, and the Rev. Mr. Munn's jumping Bible, +and of a drunken man punished for his intemperance by being lifted off +his legs by an invisible hand! Cotton Mather's marvellous account of his +witch experiments in New England delighted him. He had it republished, +declaring that "he must be an obstinate Sadducee who doubted it." + +The married life of Baxter, as might be inferred from the state of the +times, was an unsettled one. He first took a house at Moorfields, then +removed to Acton, where he enjoyed the conversation of his neighbor, Sir +Matthew Hale; from thence he found refuge in Rickmansworth, and after +that in divers other places. "The women have most of this trouble," he +remarks, "but my wife easily bore it all." When unable to preach, his +rapid pen was always busy. Huge folios of controversial and doctrinal +lore followed each other in quick succession. He assailed Popery and the +Establishment, Anabaptists, ultra Calvinists, Antinomians, Fifth Monarchy +men, and Quakers. His hatred of the latter was only modified by his +contempt. He railed rather than argued against the "miserable +creatures," as he styled them. They in turn answered him in like manner. +"The Quakers," he says, "in their shops, when I go along London streets, +say, 'Alas' poor man, thou art yet in darkness.' They have oft come to +the congregation, when I had liberty to preach Christ's Gospel, and cried +out against me as a deceiver of the people. They have followed me home, +crying out in the streets, 'The day of the Lord is coming, and thou shalt +perish as a deceiver.' They have stood in the market-place, and under my +window, year after year, crying to the people, 'Take heed of your +priests, they deceive your souls;' and if any one wore a lace or neat +clothing, they cried out to me, 'These are the fruits of your ministry.'" + +At Rickmansworth, he found himself a neighbor of William Penn, whom he +calls "the captain of the Quakers." Ever ready for battle, Baxter +encountered him in a public discussion, with such fierceness and +bitterness as to force from that mild and amiable civilian the remark, +that he would rather be Socrates at the final judgment than Richard +Baxter. Both lived to know each other better, and to entertain +sentiments of mutual esteem. Baxter himself admits that the Quakers, by +their perseverance in holding their religious meetings in defiance of +penal laws, took upon themselves the burden of persecution which would +otherwise have fallen upon himself and his friends; and makes special +mention of the noble and successful plea of Penn before the Recorder's +Court in London, based on the fundamental liberties of Englishmen and the +rights of the Great Charter. + +The intolerance of Baxter towards the Separatists was turned against him +whenever he appealed to the King and Parliament against the proscription +of himself and his friends. "They gathered," he complains, "out of mine +and other men's books all that we had said against liberty for Popery and +Quakers railing against ministers in open congregation, and applied it as +against the toleration of ourselves." It was in vain that he explained +that he was only in favor of a gentle coercion of dissent, a moderate +enforcement of conformity. His plan for dealing with sentries reminds +one of old Isaak Walton's direction to his piscatorial readers, to impale +the frog on the hook as gently as if they loved him. + +While at Acton, he was complained of by Dr. Ryves, the rector, one of the +King's chaplains in ordinary, for holding religious services in his +family with more than five strangers present. He was cast into +Clerkenwell jail, whither his faithful wife followed him. On his +discharge, he sought refuge in the hamlet of Totteridge, where he wrote +and published that Paraphrase on the New Testament which was made the +ground of his prosecution and trial before Jeffreys. + +On the 14th of the sixth month, 1681, he was called to endure the +greatest affliction of his life. His wife died on that day, after a +brief illness. She who had been his faithful friend, companion, and +nurse for twenty years was called away from him in the time of his +greatest need of her ministrations. He found consolation in dwelling on +her virtues and excellences in the Breviate of her life; "a paper +monument," he says, "erected by one who is following her even at the door +in some passion indeed of love and grief." In the preface to his +poetical pieces he alludes to her in terms of touching simplicity and +tenderness: "As these pieces were mostly written in various passions, so +passion hath now thrust them out into the world. God having taken away +the dear companion of the last nineteen years of my life, as her sorrows +and sufferings long ago gave being to some of these poems, for reasons, +which the world is not concerned to know; so my grief for her removal, +and the revival of the sense of former things, have prevailed upon me to +be passionate in the sight of all." + +The circumstances of his trial before the judicial monster, Jeffreys, are +too well known to justify their detail in this sketch. He was sentenced +to pay a fine of five hundred marks. Seventy years of age, and reduced +to poverty by former persecutions, he was conveyed to the King's Bench +prison. Here for two years he lay a victim to intense bodily suffering. +When, through the influence of his old antagonist, Penn, he was restored +to freedom, he was already a dying man. But he came forth from prison as +he entered it, unsubdued in spirit. + +Urged to sign a declaration of thanks to James II., his soul put on the +athletic habits of youth, and he stoutly refused to commend an act of +toleration which had given freedom not to himself alone, but to Papists +and sentries. Shaking off the dust of the Court from his feet, he +retired to a dwelling in Charter-House Square, near his friend +Sylvester's, and patiently awaited his deliverance. His death was quiet +and peaceful. "I have pain," he said to his friend Mather; "there is no +arguing against sense; but I have peace. I have peace." On being asked +how he did, he answered, in memorable words, "Almost well!" + +He was buried in Christ Church, where the remains of his wife and her +mother had been placed. An immense concourse attended his funeral, of +all ranks and parties. Conformist and Non-conformist forgot the +bitterness of the controversialist, and remembered only the virtues and +the piety of the man. Looking back on his life of self-denial and +faithfulness to apprehended duty, the men who had persecuted him while +living wept over his grave. During the last few years of his life, the +severity of his controversial tone had been greatly softened; he lamented +his former lack of charity, the circle of his sympathies widened, his +social affections grew stronger with age, and love for his fellow-men +universally, and irrespective of religious differences, increased within +him. In his Narrative, written in the long, cool shadows of the evening +of life, he acknowledges with extraordinary candor this change in his +views and feelings. He confesses his imperfections as a writer and +public teacher. + +"I wish," he says, "all over-sharp passages were expunged from my +writings, and I ask forgiveness of God and man." He tells us that +mankind appear more equal to him; the good are not so good as he once +thought, nor the bad so evil; and that in all there is more for grace to +make advantage of, and more to testify for God and holiness, than he once +believed. "I less admire," he continues, "gifts of utterance, and the +bare profession of religion, than I once did, and have now much more +charity for those who, by want of gifts, do make an obscurer profession." + +He laments the effects of his constitutional irritability and impatience +upon his social intercourse and his domestic relations, and that his +bodily infirmities did not allow him a free expression of the tenderness +and love of his heart. Who does not feel the pathos and inconsolable +regret which dictated the following paragraph? + +"When God forgiveth me, I cannot forgive myself, especially for my rash +words and deeds by which I have seemed injurious and less tender and kind +than I should have been to my near and dear relations, whose love +abundantly obliged me. When such are dead, though we never differed in +point of interest or any other matter, every sour or cross or provoking +word which I gave them maketh me almost irreconcilable to myself, and +tells me how repentance brought some of old to pray to the dead whom they +had wronged to forgive them, in the hurry of their passion." + +His pride as a logician and skilful disputant abated in the latter and +better portion of his life he had more deference to the judgment of +others, and more distrust of his own. "You admire," said he to a +correspondent who had lauded his character, "one you do not know; +knowledge will cure your error." In his Narrative he writes: "I am much +more sensible than heretofore of the breadth and length and depth of the +radical, universal, odious sin of selfishness, and therefore have written +so much against it; and of the excellency and necessity of self-denial +and of a public mind, and of loving our neighbors as ourselves." Against +many difficulties and discouragements, both within himself and in his +outward circumstances, he strove to make his life and conversation an +expression of that Christian love whose root, as he has said with equal +truth and beauty, "is set + + In humble self-denial, undertrod, + While flower and fruit are growing up to God." + +Of the great mass of his writings, more voluminous than those of any +author of his time, it would ill become us to speak with confidence. We +are familiar only with some of the best of his practical works, and our +estimate of the vast and appalling series of his doctrinal, metaphysical +and controversial publications would be entitled to small weight, as the +result of very cursory examination. Many of them relate to obsolete +questions and issues, monumental of controversies long dead, and of +disputatious doctors otherwise forgotten. Yet, in respect to even these, +we feel justified in assenting to the opinion of one abundantly capable +of appreciating the character of Baxter as a writer. "What works of Mr. +Baxter shall I read?" asked Boswell of Dr. Johnson. "Read any of them," +was the answer, "for they are all good." He has left upon all the +impress of his genius. Many of them contain sentiments which happily +find favor with few in our time: philosophical and psychological +disquisitions, which look oddly enough in the light of the intellectual +progress of nearly two centuries; dissertations upon evil spirits, +ghosts, and witches, which provoke smiles at the good man's credulity; +but everywhere we find unmistakable evidences of his sincerity and +earnest love of truth. He wrote under a solemn impression of duty, +allowing neither pain, nor weakness, nor the claims of friendship, nor +the social enjoyments of domestic affection, to interfere with his +sleepless intensity of purpose. He stipulated with his wife, before +marriage, that she should not expect him to relax, even for her society, +the severity of his labors. He could ill brook interruption, and +disliked the importunity of visitors. "We are afraid, sir, we break in +upon your time," said some of his callers to him upon one occasion. "To +be sure you do," was his answer. His seriousness seldom forsook him; +there is scarce a gleam of gayety in all his one hundred and sixty-eight +volumes. He seems to have relished, however, the wit of others, +especially when directed against what he looked upon as error. Marvell's +inimitable reply to the High-Church pretensions of Parker fairly overcame +his habitual gravity, and he several times alludes to it with marked +satisfaction; but, for himself, he had no heart for pleasentry. His +writings, like his sermons, were the earnest expostulations of a dying +man with dying men. He tells us of no other amusement or relaxation than +the singing of psalms. "Harmony and melody," said he, "are the pleasure +and elevation of my soul. It was not the least comfort that I had in the +converse of my late dear wife, that our first act in the morning and last +in bed at night was a psalm of praise." + +It has been fashionable to speak of Baxter as a champion of civil and +religious freedom. He has little claim to such a reputation. He was the +stanch advocate of monarchy, and of the right and duty of the State to +enforce conformity to what he regarded as the essentials of religious +belief and practice. No one regards the prelates who went to the Tower, +under James II., on the ground of conscientious scruples against reading +the King's declaration of toleration to Dissenters, as martyrs in the +cause of universal religious freedom. Nor can Baxter, although he wrote +much against the coercion and silencing of godly ministers, and suffered +imprisonment himself for the sake of a good conscience, be looked upon in +the light of an intelligent and consistent confessor of liberty. He did +not deny the abstract right of ecclesiastical coercion, but complained of +its exercise upon himself and his friends as unwarranted and unjust. + +One of the warmest admirers and ablest commentators of Baxter designates +the leading and peculiar trait of his character as unearthliness. In our +view, this was its radical defect. He had too little of humanity, he +felt too little of the attraction of this world, and lived too +exclusively in the spiritual and the unearthly, for a full and healthful +development of his nature as a man, or of the graces, charities, and +loves of the Christian. He undervalued the common blessings and joys of +life, and closed his eyes and ears against the beauty and harmony of +outward nature. Humanity, in itself considered, seemed of small moment +to him; "passing away" was written alike on its wrongs and its rights, +its pleasures and its pains; death would soon level all distinctions; and +the sorrows or the joys, the poverty or the riches, the slavery or the +liberty, of the brief day of its probation seemed of too little +consequence to engage his attention and sympathies. Hence, while he was +always ready to minister to temporal suffering wherever it came to his +notice, he made no efforts to remove its political or social causes. +In this respect he differed widely from some of his illustrious +contemporaries. Penn, while preaching up and down the land, and writing +theological folios and pamphlets, could yet urge the political rights of +Englishmen, mount the hustings for Algernon Sydney, and plead for +unlimited religious liberty; and Vane, while dreaming of a coming +millennium and reign of the saints, and busily occupied in defending his +Antinomian doctrines, could at the same time vindicate, with tongue and +pen, the cause of civil and religious freedom. But Baxter overlooked the +evils and oppressions which were around him, and forgot the necessities +and duties of the world of time and sense in his earnest aspirations +towards the world of spirits. It is by no means an uninstructive fact, +that with the lapse of years his zeal for proselytism, doctrinal +disputations, and the preaching of threats and terrors visibly declined, +while love for his fellow-men and catholic charity greatly increased, and +he was blessed with a clearer perception of the truth that God is best +served through His suffering children, and that love and reverence for +visible humanity is an indispensable condition of the appropriate worship +of the Unseen God. + +But, in taking leave of Richard Baxter, our last words must not be those +of censure. Admiration and reverence become us rather. He was an honest +man. So far as we can judge, his motives were the highest and best which +can influence human action. He had faults and weaknesses, and committed +grave errors, but we are constrained to believe that the prayer with +which he closes his Saints' Rest and which we have chosen as the fitting +termination of our article, was the earnest aspiration of his life:-- + +"O merciful Father of Spirits! suffer not the soul of thy unworthy +servant to be a stranger to the joys which he describes to others, but +keep me while I remain on earth in daily breathing after thee, and in a +believing affectionate walking with thee! Let those who shall read these +pages not merely read the fruits of my studies, but the breathing of my +active hope and love; that if my heart were open to their view, they +might there read thy love most deeply engraven upon it with a beam from +the face of the Son of God; and not find vanity or lust or pride within +where the words of life appear without, that so these lines may not +witness against me, but, proceeding from the heart of the writer, be +effectual through thy grace upon the heart of the reader, and so be the +savor of life to both." + + + + + + + WILLIAM LEGGETT + + "O Freedom! thou art not, as poets dream, + A fair young girl, with light and delicate limbs, + And wavy tresses, gushing from the cap + With which the Roman master crowned his slave, + When he took off the gyves. A bearded man, + Armed to the teeth, art thou; one mailed hand + Grasps the broad shield, and one the sword; thy brow, + Glorious in beauty though it be, is scarred + With tokens of old wars; thy massive limbs + Are strong with struggling. Power at thee has launched + His bolts, and with his lightnings smitten thee; + They could not quench the life thou hast from Heaven." + BRYANT. + +WHEN the noblest woman in all France stood on the scaffold, just before +her execution, she is said to have turned towards the statue of Liberty, +--which, strangely enough, had been placed near the guillotine, as its +patron saint,--with the exclamation, "O Liberty! what crimes have been +committed in thy name!" It is with a feeling akin to that which prompted +this memorable exclamation of Madame Roland that the sincere lover of +human freedom and progress is often compelled to regard American +democracy. + +For democracy, pure and impartial,--the self-government of the whole; +equal rights and privileges, irrespective of birth or complexion; the +morality of the Gospel of Christ applied to legislation; Christianity +reduced to practice, and showering the blessings of its impartial love +and equal protection upon all, like the rain and dews of heaven,--we have +the sincerest love and reverence. So far as our own government +approaches this standard--and, with all its faults, we believe it does so +more nearly than any other--it has our hearty and steadfast allegiance. +We complain of and protest against it only where, in its original +framework or actual administration, it departs from the democratic +principle. Holding, with Novalis, that the Christian religion is the +root of all democracy and the highest fact in the rights of man, we +regard the New Testament as the true political text-book; and believe +that, just in proportion as mankind receive its doctrines and precepts, +not merely as matters of faith and relating to another state of being, +but as practical rules, designed for the regulation of the present life +as well as the future, their institutions, social arrangements, and forms +of government will approximate to the democratic model. We believe in +the ultimate complete accomplishment of the mission of Him who came "to +preach deliverance to the captive, and the opening of prison doors to +them that are bound." We look forward to the universal dominion of His +benign humanity; and, turning from the strife and blood, the slavery, and +social and political wrongs of the past and present, anticipate the +realization in the distant future of that state when the song of the +angels at His advent shall be no longer a prophecy, but the jubilant +expression of a glorious reality,--"Glory to God in the highest! Peace +on earth, and good will to man!" + +For the party in this country which has assumed the name of Democracy, as +a party, we have had, we confess, for some years past, very little +respect. It has advocated many salutary measures, tending to equalize the +advantages of trade and remove the evils of special legislation. But if +it has occasionally lopped some of the branches of the evil tree of +oppression, so far from striking at its root, it has suffered itself to +be made the instrument of nourishing and protecting it. It has allowed +itself to be called, by its Southern flatterers, "the natural ally of +slavery." It has spurned the petitions of the people in behalf of +freedom under its feet, in Congress and State legislatures. Nominally +the advocate of universal suffrage, it has wrested from the colored +citizens of Pennsylvania that right of citizenship which they had enjoyed +under a Constitution framed by Franklin and Rush. Perhaps the most +shameful exhibition of its spirit was made in the late Rhode Island +struggle, when the free suffrage convention, solemnly calling heaven and +earth to witness its readiness to encounter all the horrors of civil war, +in defence of the holy principle of equal and universal suffrage, +deliberately excluded colored Rhode Islanders from the privilege of +voting. In the Constitutional Conventions of Michigan and Iowa, the same +party declared all men equal, and then provided an exception to this rule +in the case of the colored inhabitants. Its course on the question of +excluding slavery from Texas is a matter of history, known and read of +all. + +After such exhibitions of its practice, its professions have lost their +power. The cant of democracy upon the lips of men who are living down +its principles is, to an earnest mind, well nigh insufferable. Pertinent +were the queries of Eliphaz the Temanite, "Shall a man utter vain +knowledge, and fill his belly with the east wind? Shall he reason with +unprofitable talk, or with speeches wherewith he can do no good?" Enough +of wearisome talk we have had about "progress," the rights of "the +masses," the "dignity of labor," and "extending the area of freedom"! +"Clear your mind of cant, sir," said Johnson to Boswell; and no better +advice could be now given to a class of our democratic politicians. Work +out your democracy; translate your words into deeds; away with your +sentimental generalizations, and come down to the practical details of +your duty as men and Christians. What avail your abstract theories, your +hopeless virginity of democracy, sacred from the violence of meanings? +A democracy which professes to hold, as by divine right, the doctrine of +human equality in its special keeping, and which at the same time gives +its direct countenance and support to the vilest system of oppression on +which the sun of heaven looks, has no better title to the name it +disgraces than the apostate Son of the Morning has to his old place in +heaven. We are using strong language, for we feel strongly on this +subject. Let those whose hypocrisy we condemn, and whose sins against +humanity we expose, remember that they are the publishers of their own +shame, and that they have gloried in their apostasy. There is a cutting +severity in the answer which Sophocles puts in the mouth of Electra, in +justification of her indignant rebuke of her wicked mother:-- + + "'Tis you that say it, not I + You do the unholy deeds which find rue words." + +Yet in that party calling itself democratic we rejoice to recognize true, +generous, and thoroughly sincere men,--lovers of the word of democracy, +and doers of it also, honest and hearty in their worship of liberty, who +are still hoping that the antagonism which slavery presents to democracy +will be perceived by the people, in spite of the sophistry and appeals to +prejudice by which interested partisans have hitherto succeeded in +deceiving them. We believe with such that the mass of the democratic +voters of the free States are in reality friends of freedom, and hate +slavery in all its forms; and that, with a full understanding of the +matter, they could never consent to be sold to presidential aspirants, by +political speculators, in lots to suit purchasers, and warranted to be +useful in putting down free discussion, perpetuating oppression, and +strengthening the hands of modern feudalism. They are beginning already +to see that, under the process whereby men of easy virtue obtain offices +from the general government, as the reward of treachery to free +principles, the strength and vitality of the party are rapidly declining. +To them, at least, democracy means something more than collectorships, +consulates, and governmental contracts. For the sake of securing a +monopoly of these to a few selfish and heartless party managers, they are +not prepared to give up the distinctive principles of democracy, and +substitute in their place the doctrines of the Satanic school of +politics. They will not much longer consent to stand before the world as +the slavery party of the United States, especially when policy and +expediency, as well as principle, unite in recommending a position more +congenial to the purposes of their organization, the principles of the +fathers of their political faith, the spirit of the age, and the +obligations of Christianity. + +The death-blow of slavery in this country will be given by the very power +upon which it has hitherto relied with so much confidence. Abused and +insulted Democracy will, erelong, shake off the loathsome burden under +which it is now staggering. In the language of the late Theodore +Sedgwiek, of Massachusetts, a consistent democrat of the old school: +"Slavery, in all its forms, is anti-democratic,--an old poison left in +the veins, fostering the worst principles of aristocracy, pride, and +aversion to labor; the natural enemy of the poor man, the laboring man, +the oppressed man. The question is, whether absolute dominion over any +creature in the image of man be a wholesome power in a free country; +whether this is a school in which to train the young republican mind; +whether slave blood and free blood can course healthily together in the +same body politic. Whatever may be present appearances, and by whatever +name party may choose to call things, this question must finally be +settled by the democracy of the country." + +This prediction was made eight years ago, at a time when all the facts in +the case seemed against the probability of its truth, and when only here +and there the voice of an indignant freeman protested against the +exulting claims of the slave power upon the democracy as its "natural +ally." The signs of the times now warrant the hope of its fulfilment. +Over the hills of the East, and over the broad territory of the Empire +State, a new spirit is moving. Democracy, like Balaam upon Zophim, has +felt the divine _afflatus_, and is blessing that which it was summoned to +curse. + +The present hopeful state of things is owing, in no slight degree, to the +self-sacrificing exertions of a few faithful and clear-sighted men, +foremost among whom was the late William Leggett; than whom no one has +labored more perseveringly, or, in the end, more successfully, to bring +the practice of American democracy into conformity with its professions. + +William Leggett! Let our right hand forget its cunning, when that name +shall fail to awaken generous emotions and aspirations for a higher and +worthier manhood! True man and true democrat; faithful always to +Liberty, following wherever she led, whether the storm beat in his face +or on his back; unhesitatingly counting her enemies his own, whether in +the guise of Whig monopoly and selfish expediency, or democratic +servility north of Mason and Dixon's line towards democratic slaveholding +south of it; poor, yet incorruptible; dependent upon party favor, as a +party editor, yet risking all in condemnation of that party, when in the +wrong; a man of the people, yet never stooping to flatter the people's +prejudices,--he is the politician, of all others, whom we would hold up +to the admiration and imitation of the young men of our country. What +Fletcher of Saltoun is to Scotland, and the brave spirits of the old +Commonwealth time-- + + "Hands that penned + And tongues that uttered wisdom, better none + The later Sydney, Marvell, Harrington, + Young Vane, and others, who called Milton friend--" + +are to England, should Leggett be to America. His character was formed +on these sturdy democratic models. Had he lived in their day, he would +have scraped with old Andrew Marvell the bare blade-bone of poverty, or +even laid his head on the block with Vane, rather than forego his +independent thought and speech. + +Of the early life of William Leggett we have no very definite knowledge. +Born in moderate circumstances; at first a woodsman in the Western +wilderness, then a midshipman in the navy, then a denizen of New York; +exposed to sore hardships and perilous temptations, he worked his way by +the force of his genius to the honorable position of associate editor of +the Evening Post, the leading democratic journal of our great commercial +metropolis. Here he became early distinguished for his ultraism in +democracy. His whole soul revolted against oppression. He was for +liberty everywhere and in all things, in thought, in speech, in vote, in +religion, in government, and in trade; he was for throwing off all +restraints upon the right of suffrage; regarding all men as brethren, he +looked with disapprobation upon attempts to exclude foreigners from the +rights of citizenship; he was for entire freedom of commerce; he +denounced a national bank; he took the lead in opposition to the monopoly +of incorporated banks; he argued in favor of direct taxation, and +advocated a free post-office, or a system by which letters should be +transported, as goods and passengers now are, by private enterprise. In +all this he was thoroughly in earnest. That he often erred through +passion and prejudice cannot be doubted; but in no instance was he found +turning aside from the path which he believed to be the true one, from +merely selfish considerations. He was honest alike to himself and the +public. Every question which was thrown up before him by the waves of +political or moral agitation he measured by his standard of right and +truth, and condemned or advocated it in utter disregard of prevailing +opinions, of its effect upon his pecuniary interest, or of his standing +with his party. The vehemence of his passions sometimes betrayed him +into violence of language and injustice to his opponents; but he had that +rare and manly trait which enables its possessor, whenever he becomes +convinced of error, to make a prompt acknowledgment of the conviction. + +In the summer of 1834, a series of mobs, directed against the +Abolitionists, who had organized a national society, with the city of New +York as its central point, followed each other in rapid succession. The +houses of the leading men in the society were sacked and pillaged; +meeting-houses broken into and defaced; and the unoffending colored +inhabitants of the city treated with the grossest indignity, and +subjected, in some instances, to shameful personal outrage. It was +emphatically a "Reign of Terror." The press of both political parties +and of the leading religious sects, by appeals to prejudice and passion, +and by studied misrepresentation of the designs and measures of the +Abolitionists, fanned the flame of excitement, until the fury of demons +possessed the misguided populace. To advocate emancipation, or defend +those who did so, in New York, at that period, was like preaching +democracy in Constantinople or religious toleration in Paris on the eve +of St. Bartholomew. Law was prostrated in the dust; to be suspected of +abolitionism was to incur a liability to an indefinite degree of insult +and indignity; and the few and hunted friends of the slave who in those +nights of terror laid their heads upon the pillow did so with the prayer +of the Psalmist on their lips, "Defend me from them that rise up against +me; save me from bloody men." + +At this period the New York Evening Post spoke out strongly in +condemnation of the mob. William Leggett was not then an Abolitionist; +he had known nothing of the proscribed class, save through the cruel +misrepresentations of their enemies; but, true to his democratic faith, +he maintained the right to discuss the question of slavery. The +infection of cowardly fear, which at that time sealed the lips of +multitudes who deplored the excesses of the mob and sympathized with its +victims, never reached him. Boldly, indignantly, he demanded that the +mob should be put down at once by the civil authorities. He declared the +Abolitionists, even if guilty of all that had been charged upon them, +fully entitled to the privileges and immunities of American citizens. He +sternly reprimanded the board of aldermen of the city for rejecting with +contempt the memorial of the Abolitionists to that body, explanatory of +their principles and the measures by which they had sought to disseminate +them. Referring to the determination, expressed by the memorialists in +the rejected document, not to recant or relinquish any principle which +they had adopted, but to live and die by their faith, he said: "In this, +however mistaken, however mad, we may consider their opinions in relation +to the blacks, what honest, independent mind can blame them? Where is +the man so poor of soul, so white-livered, so base, that he would do less +in relation to any important doctrine in which he religiously believed? +Where is the man who would have his tenets drubbed into him by the clubs +of ruffians, or hold his conscience at the dictation of a mob?" + +In the summer of 1835, a mob of excited citizens broke open the post- +office at Charleston, South Carolina, and burnt in the street such papers +and pamphlets as they judged to be "incendiary;" in other words, such as +advocated the application of the democratic principle to the condition of +the slaves of the South. These papers were addressed, not to the slave, +but to the master. They contained nothing which had not been said and +written by Southern men themselves, the Pinkneys, Jeffersons, Henrys, and +Martins, of Maryland and Virginia. The example set at Charleston did not +lack imitators. Every petty postmaster south of Mason and Dixon's line +became ex officio a censor of the press. The Postmaster-General, writing +to his subordinate at Charleston, after stating that the post-office +department had "no legal right to exclude newspapers from the mail, or +prohibit their carriage or delivery, on account of their character or +tendency, real or supposed," declared that he would, nevertheless, give +no aid, directly or indirectly, in circulating publications of an +incendiary or inflammatory character; and assured the perjured +functionary, who had violated his oath of office, that, while he could +not sanction, he would not condemn his conduct. Against this virtual +encouragement of a flagrant infringement of a constitutional right, this +licensing of thousands of petty government officials to sit in their mail +offices--to use the figure of Milton--cross-legged, like so many envious +Junos, in judgment upon the daily offspring of the press, taking counsel +of passion, prejudice, and popular excitement as to what was "incendiary" +or "inflammatory," the Evening Post spoke in tones of manly protest. + +While almost all the editors of his party throughout the country either +openly approved of the conduct of the Postmaster-General or silently +acquiesced in it, William Leggett, who, in the absence of his colleague, +was at that time sole editor of the Post, and who had everything to lose, +in a worldly point of view, by assailing a leading functionary of the +government, who was a favorite of the President and a sharer of his +popularity, did not hesitate as to the course which consistency and duty +required at his hands. He took his stand for unpopular truth, at a time +when a different course on his part could not have failed to secure him +the favor and patronage of his party. In the great struggle with the +Bank of the United States, his services had not been unappreciated by the +President and his friends. Without directly approving the course of the +administration on the question of the rights of the Abolitionists, by +remaining silent in respect to it, he might have avoided all suspicion of +mental and moral independence incompatible with party allegiance. The +impracticable honesty of Leggett, never bending from the erectness of +truth for the sake of that "thrift which follows fawning," dictated a +most severe and scorching review of the letter of the Postmaster-General. +"More monstrous, more detestable doctrines we have never heard +promulgated," he exclaimed in one of his leading editorials. "With what +face, after this, can the Postmaster-General punish a postmaster for any +exercise of the fearfully dangerous power of stopping and destroying any +portion of the mails?" "The Abolitionists do not deserve to be placed on +the same footing with a foreign enemy, nor their publications as the +secret despatches of a spy. They are American citizens, in the exercise +of their undoubted right of citizenship; and however erroneous their +views, however fanatic their conduct, while they act within the limits of +the law, what official functionary, be he merely a subordinate or the +head of the post-office department, shall dare to abridge them of their +rights as citizens, and deny them those facilities of intercourse which +were instituted for the equal accommodation of all? If the American +people will submit to this, let us expunge all written codes, and resolve +society into its original elements, where the might of the strong is +better than the right of the weak." + +A few days after the publication of this manly rebuke, he wrote an +indignantly sarcastic article upon the mobs which were at this time +everywhere summoned to "put down the Abolitionists." The next day, the +4th of the ninth month, 1835, he received a copy of the Address of the +American Anti-Slavery Society to the public, containing a full and +explicit avowal of all the principles and designs of the association. He +gave it a candid perusal, weighed its arguments, compared its doctrines +with those at the foundation of his own political faith, and rose up from +its examination an Abolitionist. He saw that he himself, misled by the +popular clamor, had done injustice to benevolent and self-sacrificing +men; and he took the earliest occasion, in an article of great power and +eloquence, to make the amplest atonement. He declared his entire +concurrence with the views of the American Anti-Slavery Society, with the +single exception of a doubt which rested, on his mind as to the abolition +of slavery in the District of Columbia. We quote from the concluding +paragraph of this article:-- + +"We assert without hesitation, that, if we possessed the right, we should +not scruple to exercise it for the speedy annihilation of servitude and +chains. The impression made in boyhood by the glorious exclamation of +Cato, + + "'A day, an hour, of virtuous liberty + Is worth a whole eternity of bondage!' + +has been worn deeper, not effaced, by time; and we eagerly and ardently +trust that the day will yet arrive when the clank of the bondman's +fetters will form no part of the multitudinous sounds which our country +sends up to Heaven, mingling, as it were, into a song of praise for our +national prosperity. We yearn with strong desire for the day when +freedom shall no longer wave + + "Her fustian flag in mockery over slaves.'" + +A few days after, in reply to the assaults made upon him from all +quarters, he calmly and firmly reiterated his determination to maintain +the right of free discussion of the subject of slavery. + +"The course we are pursuing," said he, "is one which we entered upon after +mature deliberation, and we are not to be turned from it by a species of +opposition, the inefficacy of which we have seen displayed in so many +former instances. It is Philip Van Artevelde who says:-- + + "'All my life long, + I have beheld with most respect the man + Who knew himself, and knew the ways before him; + And from among them chose considerately, + With a clear foresight, not a blindfold courage; + And, having chosen, with a steadfast mind. + Pursued his purpose.' + +"This is the sort of character we emulate. If to believe slavery a +deplorable evil and curse, in whatever light it is viewed; if to yearn +for the day which shall break the fetters of three millions of human +beings, and restore to them their birthright of equal freedom; if to be +willing, in season and out of season, to do all in our power to promote +so desirable a result, by all means not inconsistent with higher duty: if +these sentiments constitute us Abolitionists, then are we such, and glory +in the name." + +"The senseless cry of 'Abolitionist' shall never deter us, nor the more +senseless attempt of puny prints to read us out of the democratic party. +The often-quoted and beautiful saying of the Latin historian, Homo sum: +humani nihil a me alienum puto, we apply to the poor slave as well as his +master, and shall endeavor to fulfil towards both the obligations of an +equal humanity." + +The generation which, since the period of which we are speaking, have +risen into active life can have but a faint conception of the boldness of +this movement on the part of William Leggett. To be an Abolitionist then +was to abandon all hope of political preferment or party favor; to be +marked and branded as a social outlaw, under good society's interdict of +food and fire; to hold property, liberty, and life itself at the mercy of +lawless mobs. All this William Leggett clearly saw. He knew how rugged +and thorny was the path upon which, impelled by his love of truth and the +obligations of humanity, he was entering. From hunted and proscribed +Abolitionists and oppressed and spirit-broken colored men, the Pariahs of +American democracy, he could alone expect sympathy. The Whig journals, +with a few honorable exceptions, exulted over what they regarded as the +fall of a formidable opponent; and after painting his abolitionism in the +most hideous colors, held him up to their Southern allies as a specimen +of the radical disorganizers and democratic levellers of the North. His +own party, in consequence, made haste to proscribe him. Government +advertising was promptly withdrawn from his paper. The official journals +of Washington and Albany read him out of the pale of democracy. Father +Ritchie scolded and threatened. The democratic committee issued its bull +against him from Tammany Hall. The resolutions of that committee were +laid before him when he was sinking under a severe illness. Rallying his +energies, he dictated from his sick-bed an answer marked by all his +accustomed vigor and boldness. Its tone was calm, manly, self-relying; +the language of one who, having planted his feet hard down on the rock of +principle, stood there like Luther at Worms, because he "could not +otherwise." Exhausted nature sunk under the effort. A weary sickness of +nearly a year's duration followed. In this sore affliction, deserted as +he was by most of his old political friends, we have reason to know that +he was cheered by the gratitude of those in whose behalf he had well-nigh +made a martyr's sacrifice; and that from the humble hearths of his poor +colored fellow-citizens fervent prayers went up for his restoration. + +His work was not yet done. Purified by trial, he was to stand forth once +more in vindication of the truths of freedom. As soon as his health was +sufficiently reestablished, he commenced the publication of an +independent political and literary journal, under the expressive title of +The Plaindealer. In his first number he stated, that, claiming the right +of absolute freedom of discussion, he should exercise it with no other +limitations than those of his own judgment. A poor man, he admitted that +he established the paper in the expectation of deriving from it a +livelihood, but that even for that object he could not trim its sails to +suit the varying breeze of popular prejudice. "If," said he, "a paper +which makes the Right, and not the Expedient, its cardinal object, will +not yield its conductor a support, there are honest vocations that will, +and better the humblest of them than to be seated at the head of an +influential press, if its influence is not exerted to promote the cause +of truth." He was true to his promise. The free soul of a free, strong +man spoke out in his paper. How refreshing was it, after listening to +the inanities, the dull, witless vulgarity, the wearisome commonplace of +journalists, who had no higher aim than to echo, with parrot-like +exactness, current prejudices and falsehoods, to turn to the great and +generous thoughts, the chaste and vigorous diction, of the Plaindealer! +No man ever had a clearer idea of the duties and responsibilities of a +conductor of the public press than William Leggett, and few have ever +combined so many of the qualifications for their perfect discharge: a +nice sense of justice, a warm benevolence, inflexible truth, honesty +defying temptation, a mind stored with learning, and having at command +the treasures of the best thoughts of the best authors. As was said of +Fletcher of Saltoun, he was "a gentleman steady in his principles; of +nice honor, abundance of learning; bold as a lion; a sure friend; a man +who would lose his life to serve his country, and would not do a base +thing to save it." + +He had his faults: his positive convictions sometimes took the shape +of a proud and obstinate dogmatism; he who could so well appeal to the +judgment and the reason of his readers too often only roused their +passions by invective and vehement declamation. Moderate men were +startled and pained by the fierce energy of his language; and he not +unfrequently made implacable enemies of opponents whom he might have +conciliated and won over by mild expostulation and patient explanation. +It must be urged in extenuation, that, as the champion of unpopular +truths, he was assailed unfairly on all sides, and indecently +misrepresented and calumniated to a degree, as his friend Sedgwick justly +remarks, unprecedented even in the annals of the American press; and that +his errors in this respect were, in the main, errors of retaliation. + +In the Plaindealer, in common with the leading moral and political +subjects of the day, that of slavery was freely discussed in all its +bearings. It is difficult, in a single extract, to convey an adequate +idea of the character of the editorial columns of a paper, where terse +and concentrated irony and sarcasm alternate with eloquent appeal and +diffuse commentary and labored argument. We can only offer at random the +following passages from a long review of a speech of John C. Calhoun, in +which that extraordinary man, whose giant intellect has been shut out of +its appropriate field of exercise by the very slavery of which he is the +champion, undertook to maintain, in reply to a Virginia senator, that +chattel slavery was not an evil, but "a great good." + +"We have Mr. Calhoun's own warrant for attacking his position with all +the fervor which a high sense of duty can give, for we do hold, from the +bottom of our soul, that slavery is an evil,--a deep, detestable, +damnable evil; evil in all its aspects to the blacks, and a greater evil +to the whites; an evil moral, social, and political; an evil which shows +itself in the languishing condition of agriculture where it exists, in +paralyzed commerce, and in the prostration of the mechanic arts; an evil +which stares you in the face from uncultivated fields, and howls in your +ears through tangled swamps and morasses. Slavery is such an evil that +it withers what it touches. Where it is once securely established the +land becomes desolate, as the tree inevitably perishes which the sea-hawk +chooses for its nest; while freedom, on the contrary, flourishes like the +tannen, 'on the loftiest and least sheltered rocks,' and clothes with its +refreshing verdure what, without it, would frown in naked and incurable +sterility. + +"If any one desires an illustration of the opposite influences of slavery +and freedom, let him look at the two sister States of Kentucky and Ohio. +Alike in soil and climate, and divided only by a river, whose translucent +waters reveal, through nearly the whole breadth, the sandy bottom over +which they sparkle, how different are they in all the respects over which +man has control! On the one hand the air is vocal with the mingled +tumult of a vast and prosperous population. Every hillside smiles with +an abundant harvest, every valley shelters a thriving village, the click +of a busy mill drowns the prattle of every rivulet, and all the +multitudinous sounds of business denote happy activity in every branch +of social occupation. + +"This is the State which, but a few years ago, slept in the unbroken +solitude of nature. The forest spread an interminable canopy of shade +over the dark soil on which the fat and useless vegetation rotted at +ease, and through the dusky vistas of the wood only savage beasts and +more savage men prowled in quest of prey. The whole land now blossoms +like a garden. The tall and interlacing trees have unlocked their hold, +and bowed before the woodman's axe. The soil is disencumbered of the +mossy trunks which had reposed upon it for ages. The rivers flash in the +sunlight, and the fields smile with waving harvests. This is Ohio, and +this is what freedom has done for it. + +"Now, let us turn to Kentucky, and note the opposite influences of +slavery. A narrow and unfrequented path through the close and sultry +canebrake conducts us to a wretched hovel. It stands in the midst of an +unweeded field, whose dilapidated enclosure scarcely protects it from the +lowing and hungry kine. Children half clad and squalid, and destitute of +the buoyancy natural to their age, lounge in the sunshine, while their +parent saunters apart, to watch his languid slaves drive the ill- +appointed team afield. This is not a fancy picture. It is a true copy +of one of the features which make up the aspect 'of the State, and of +every State where the moral leprosy of slavery covers the people with its +noisome scales; a deadening lethargy benumbs the limbs of the body +politic; a stupor settles on the arts of life; agriculture reluctantly +drags the plough and harrow to the field, only when scourged by +necessity; the axe drops from the woodman's nerveless hand the moment his +fire is scantily supplied with fuel; and the fen, undrained, sends up its +noxious exhalations, to rack with cramps and agues the frame already too +much enervated by a moral epidemic to creep beyond the sphere of the +material miasm." + +The Plaindealer was uniformly conducted with eminent ability; but its +editor was too far in advance of his contemporaries to find general +acceptance, or even toleration. In addition to pecuniary embarrassments, +his health once more failed, and in the autumn of 1837 he was compelled +to suspend the publication of his paper. One of the last articles which +he wrote for it shows the extent to which he was sometimes carried by the +intensity and depth of his abhorrence of oppression, and the fervency of +his adoration of liberty. Speaking of the liability of being called upon +to aid the master in the subjection of revolted slaves, and in replacing +their cast-off fetters, he thus expresses himself: "Would we comply with +such a requisition? No! Rather would we see our right arm lopped from +our body, and the mutilated trunk itself gored with mortal wounds, than +raise a finger in opposition to men struggling in the holy cause of +freedom. The obligations of citizenship are strong, but those of +justice, humanity, and religion, stronger. We earnestly trust that the +great contest of opinion which is now going on in this country may +terminate in the enfranchisement of the slaves, without recourse to the +strife of blood; but should the oppressed bondmen, impatient of the tardy +progress of truth, urged only in discussion, attempt to burst their +chains by a more violent and shorter process, they should never encounter +our arm nor hear our voice in the ranks of their opponents. We should +stand a sad spectator of the conflict; and, whatever commiseration we +might feel for the discomfiture of the oppressors, we should pray that +the battle might end in giving freedom to the oppressed." + +With the Plain dealer, his connection with the public, in a great +measure, ceased. His steady and intimate friend, personal as well as +political, Theodore Sedgwick, Jun., a gentleman who has, on many +occasions, proved himself worthy of his liberty-loving ancestry, thus +speaks of him in his private life at this period: "Amid the reverses of +fortune, harassed by pecuniary embarrassments, during the tortures of a +disease which tore away his life piecemeal, hee ever maintained the same +manly and unaltered front, the same cheerfulness of disposition, the same +dignity of conduct. No humiliating solicitation, no weak complaint, +escaped him." At the election in the fall of 1838, the noble-spirited +democrat was not wholly forgotten. A strenuous effort, which was well- +nigh successful, was made to secure his nomination as a candidate for +Congress. It was at this juncture that he wrote to a friend in the city, +from his residence at New Rochelle, one of the noblest letters ever +penned by a candidate for popular favor. The following extracts will +show how a true man can meet the temptations of political life:-- + +"What I am most afraid of is, that some of my friends, in their too +earnest zeal, will place me in a false position on the subject of +slavery. I am an Abolitionist. I hate slavery in all its forms, +degrees, and influences; and I deem myself bound, by the highest moral +and political obligations, not to let that sentiment of hate lie dormant +and smouldering in my own breast, but to give it free vent, and let it +blaze forth, that it may kindle equal ardor through the whole sphere of +my influence. I would not have this fact disguised or mystified for any +office the people have it in their power to give. Rather, a thousand +times rather, would I again meet the denunciations of Tammany Hall, and +be stigmatized with all the foul epithets with which the anti-abolition +vocabulary abounds, than recall or deny one tittle of my creed. +Abolition is, in my sense, a necessary and a glorious part of democracy; +and I hold the right and duty to discuss the subject of slavery, and to +expose its hideous evils in all their bearings,--moral, social, and +political,--as of infinitely higher importance than to carry fifty sub- +treasury bills. That I should discharge this duty temperately; that I +should not let it come in collision with other duties; that I should not +let my hatred of slavery transcend the express obligations of the +Constitution, or violate its clear spirit, I hope and trust you think +sufficiently well of me to believe. But what I fear is, (not from you, +however,) that some of my advocates and champions will seek to recommend +me to popular support by representing me as not an Abolitionist, which is +false. All that I have written gives the lie to it. All I shall write +will give the lie to it. + +"And here, let me add, (apart from any consideration already adverted +to,) that, as a matter of mere policy, I would not, if I could, have my +name disjoined from abolitionism. To be an Abolitionist now is to be an +incendiary; as, three years ago, to be an anti-monopolist was to be a +leveller and a Jack Cade. See what three short years have done in +effecting the anti-monopoly reform; and depend upon it that the next +three years, or, if not three, say three times three, if you please, will +work a greater revolution on the slavery question. The stream of public +opinion now sets against us; but it is about to turn, and the +regurgitation will be tremendous. Proud in that day may well be the man +who can float in triumph on the first refluent wave, swept onward by the +deluge which he himself, in advance of his fellows, has largely shared in +occasioning. Such be my fate; and, living or dead, it will, in some +measure, be mine! I have written my name in ineffaceable letters on the +abolition record; and whether the reward ultimately come in the shape of +honors to the living man, or a tribute to the memory of a departed one, I +would not forfeit my right to it for as many offices as has in his gift, +if each of them was greater than his own." + +After mentioning that he had understood that some of his friends had +endeavored to propitiate popular prejudice by representing him as no +Abolitionist, he says:-- + +"Keep them, for God's sake, from committing any such fooleries for the +sake of getting me into Congress. Let others twist themselves into what +shapes they please, to gratify the present taste of the people; as for +me, I am not formed of such pliant materials, and choose to retain, +undisturbed, the image of my God! I do not wish to cheat the people of +their votes. I would not get their support, any more than their money, +under false pretences. I am what I am; and if that does not suit them, +I am content to stay at home." + +God be praised for affording us, even in these latter days, the sight of +an honest man! Amidst the heartlessness, the double-dealing, the +evasions, the prevarications, the shameful treachery and falsehood, of +political men of both parties, in respect to the question of slavery, how +refreshing is it to listen to words like these! They renew our failing +faith in human nature. They reprove our weak misgivings. We rise up +from their perusal stronger and healthier. With something of the spirit +which dictated them, we renew our vows to freedom, and, with manlier +energy, gird up our souls for the stern struggle before us. + +As might have been expected, and as he himself predicted, the efforts of +his friends to procure his nomination failed; but the same generous +appreciators of his rare worth were soon after more successful in their +exertions in his behalf. He received from President Van Buren the +appointment of the mission to Guatemala,--an appointment which, in +addition to honorable employment in the service of his country, promised +him the advantages of a sea voyage and a change of climate, for the +restoration of his health. The course of Martin Van Buren on the subject +of slavery in the District of Columbia forms, in the estimation of many +of his best friends, by no means the most creditable portion of his +political history; but it certainly argues well for his magnanimity and +freedom from merely personal resentment that he gave this appointment to +the man who had animadverted upon that course with the greatest freedom, +and whose rebuke of the veto pledge, severe in its truth and justice, +formed the only discord in the paean of partisan flattery which greeted +his inaugural. But, however well intended, it came too late. In the +midst of the congratulations of his friends on the brightening prospect +before him, the still hopeful and vigorous spirit of William Leggett was +summoned away by death. Universal regret was awakened. Admiration of +his intellectual power, and that generous and full appreciation of his +high moral worth which had been in too many instances withheld from the +living man by party policy and prejudice, were now freely accorded to the +dead. The presses of both political parties vied with each other in +expressions of sorrow at the loss of a great and true man. The +Democracy, through all its organs, hastened to canonize him as one of the +saints of its calendar. The general committee, in New York, expunged +their resolutions of censure. The Democratic Review, at that period the +most respectable mouthpiece of the democratic party, made him the subject +of exalted eulogy. His early friend and co-editor, William Cullen +Bryant, laid upon his grave the following tribute, alike beautiful and +true:-- + + "The earth may ring, from shore to shore, + With echoes of a glorious name, + But he whose loss our tears deplore + Has left behind him more than fame. + + "For when the death-frost came to lie + On Leggett's warm and mighty heart, + And quenched his bold and friendly eye, + His spirit did not all depart. + + "The words of fire that from his pen + He flung upon the lucid page + Still move, still shake the hearts of men, + Amid a cold and coward age. + + "His love of Truth, too warm, too strong, + For Hope or Fear to chain or chill, + His hate of tyranny and wrong, + Burn in the breasts they kindled still." + +So lived and died William Leggett. What a rebuke of party perfidy, of +political meanness, of the common arts and stratagems of demagogues, +comes up from his grave! How the cheek of mercenary selfishness crimsons +at the thought of his incorruptible integrity! How heartless and hollow +pretenders, who offer lip service to freedom, while they give their hands +to whatever work their slaveholding managers may assign them; who sit in +chains round the crib of governmental patronage, putting on the spaniel, +and putting off the man, and making their whole lives a miserable lie, +shrink back from a contrast with the proud and austere dignity of his +character! What a comment on their own condition is the memory of a man +who could calmly endure the loss of party favor, the reproaches of his +friends, the malignant assaults of his enemies, and the fretting evils of +poverty, in the hope of bequeathing, like the dying testator of Ford, + + "A fame by scandal untouched, + To Memory and Time's old daughter, Truth." + +The praises which such men are now constrained to bestow upon him are +their own condemnation. Every stone which they pile upon his grave is +written over with the record of their hypocrisy. + +We have written rather for the living than the dead. As one of that +proscribed and hunted band of Abolitionists, whose rights were so bravely +defended by William Leggett, we should, indeed, be wanting in ordinary +gratitude not to do honor to his memory; but we have been actuated at the +present time mainly by a hope that the character, the lineaments of which +we have so imperfectly sketched, may awaken a generous emulation in the +hearts of the young democracy of our country. Democracy such as William +Leggett believed and practised, democracy in its full and all- +comprehensive significance, is destined to be the settled political faith +of this republic. Because the despotism of slavery has usurped its name, +and offered the strange incense of human tears and blood on its profaned +altars, shall we, therefore, abandon the only political faith which +coincides with the Gospel of Jesus, and meets the aspirations and wants +of humanity? No. The duty of the present generation in the United +States is to reduce this faith to practice, to make the beautiful ideal a +fact. + +"Every American," says Leggett, "who in any way countenances slavery is +derelict to his duty, as a Christian, a patriot, a man; and every one +does countenance and authorize it who suffers any opportunity of +expressing his deep abhorrence of its manifold abominations to pass +unimproved." The whole world has an interest in this matter. The +influence of our democratic despotism is exerted against the liberties of +Europe. Political reformers in the Old World, who have testified to +their love of freedom by serious sacrifices, hold but one language on +this point. They tell us that American slavery furnishes kings and +aristocracies with their most potent arguments; that it is a perpetual +drag on the wheel of political progress. + +We have before us, at this time, a letter from Seidensticker, one of the +leaders of the patriotic movement in behalf of German liberty in 1831. +It was written from the prison of Celle, where he had been confined for +eight years. The writer expresses his indignant astonishment at the +speeches of John C. Calhoun, and others in Congress, on the slavery +question, and deplores the disastrous influence of our great +inconsistency upon the cause of freedom throughout the world,--an +influence which paralyzes the hands of the patriotic reformer, while it +strengthens those of his oppressor, and deepens around the living martyrs +and confessors of European democracy the cold shadow of their prisons. + +Joseph Sturge, of Birmingham, the President of the British Free Suffrage +Union, and whose philanthropy and democracy have been vouched for by the +Democratic Review in this country, has the following passage in an +address to the citizens of the United States: "Although an admirer of the +institutions of your country, and deeply lamenting the evils of my own +government, I find it difficult to reply to those who are opposed to any +extension of the political rights of Englishmen, when they point to +America, and say that where all have a control over the legislation but +those who are guilty of a dark skin, slavery and the slave trade remain, +not only unmitigated, but continue to extend; and that while there is an +onward movement in favor of its extinction, not only in England and +France, but in Cuba and Brazil, American legislators cling to this +enormous evil, without attempting to relax or mitigate its horrors." + +How long shall such appeals, from such sources, be wasted upon us? Shall +our baleful example enslave the world? Shall the tree of democracy, +which our fathers intended for "the healing of the nations," be to them +like the fabled upas, blighting all around it? + +The men of the North, the pioneers of the free West, and the non- +slaveholders of the South must answer these questions. It is for them to +say whether the present wellnigh intolerable evil shall continue to +increase its boundaries, and strengthen its hold upon the government, the +political parties, and the religious sects of our country. Interest and +honor, present possession and future hope, the memory of fathers, the +prospects of children, gratitude, affection, the still call of the dead, +the cry of oppressed nations looking hitherward for the result of all +their hopes, the voice of God in the soul, in revelation, and in His +providence, all appeal to them for a speedy and righteous decision. At +this moment, on the floor of Congress, Democracy and Slavery have met in +a death-grapple. The South stands firm; it allows no party division on +the slave question. One of its members has declared that "the slave +States have no traitors." Can the same be said of the free? Now, as in +the time of the fatal Missouri Compromise, there are, it is to be feared, +political peddlers among our representatives, whose souls are in the +market, and whose consciences are vendible commodities. Through their +means, the slave power may gain a temporary triumph; but may not the very +baseness of the treachery arouse the Northern heart? By driving the free +States to the wall, may it not compel them to turn and take an aggressive +attitude, clasp hands over the altar of their common freedom, and swear +eternal hostility to slavery? + +Be the issue of the present contest what it may, those who are faithful +to freedom should allow no temporary reverse to shake their confidence in +the ultimate triumph of the right. The slave will be free. Democracy in +America will yet be a glorious reality; and when the topstone of that +temple of freedom which our fathers left unfinished shall be brought +forth with shoutings and cries of grace unto it, when our now drooping- +Liberty lifts up her head and prospers, happy will be he who can say, +with John Milton, "Among those who have something more than wished her +welfare, I too have my charter and freehold of rejoicing to me and my +heirs." + + + + + + +NATHANIEL PEABODY ROGERS. + +"And Lamb, the frolic and the gentle, +Has vanished from his kindly hearth." + +So, in one of the sweetest and most pathetic of his poems touching the +loss of his literary friends, sang Wordsworth. We well remember with +what freshness and vividness these simple lines came before us, on +hearing, last autumn, of the death of the warm-hearted and gifted friend +whose name heads this article; for there was much in his character and +genius to remind us of the gentle author of Elia. He had the latter's +genial humor and quaintness; his nice and delicate perception of the +beautiful and poetic; his happy, easy diction, not the result, as in the +case of that of the English essayist, of slow and careful elaboration, +but the natural, spontaneous language in which his conceptions at once +embodied themselves, apparently without any consciousness of effort. As +Mark Antony talked, he wrote, "right on," telling his readers often what +"they themselves did know," yet imparting to the simplest commonplaces of +life interest and significance, and throwing a golden haze of poetry over +the rough and thorny pathways of every-day duty. Like Lamb, he loved his +friends without stint or limit. The "old familiar faces" haunted him. +Lamb loved the streets and lanes of London--the places where he oftenest +came in contact with the warm, genial heart of humanity--better than the +country. Rogers loved the wild and lonely hills and valleys of New +Hampshire none the less that he was fully alive to the enjoyments of +society, and could enter with the heartiest sympathy into all the joys +and sorrows of his friends and neighbors. + +In another point of view, he was not unlike Elia. He had the same love +of home, and home friends, and familiar objects; the same fondness for +common sights and sounds; the same dread of change; the same shrinking +from the unknown and the dark. Like him, he clung with a child's love to +the living present, and recoiled from a contemplation of the great change +which awaits us. Like him, he was content with the goodly green earth +and human countenances, and would fain set up his tabernacle here. He +had less of what might be termed self-indulgence in this feeling than +Lamb. He had higher views; he loved this world not only for its own +sake, but for the opportunities it afforded of doing good. Like the +Persian seer, he beheld the legions of Ormuzd and Ahriman, of Light and +Darkness, contending for mastery over the earth, as the sunshine and +shadow of a gusty, half-cloudy day struggled on the green slopes of his +native mountains; and, mingled with the bright host, he would fain have +fought on until its banners waved in eternal sunshine over the last +hiding-place of darkness. He entered into the work of reform with the +enthusiasm and chivalry of a knight of the crusades. He had faith in +human progress,--in the ultimate triumph of the good; millennial lights +beaconed up all along his horizon. In the philanthropic movements of the +day; in the efforts to remove the evils of slavery, war, intemperance, +and sanguinary laws; in the humane and generous spirit of much of our +modern poetry and literature; in the growing demand of the religious +community, of all sects, for the preaching of the gospel of love and +humanity, he heard the low and tremulous prelude of the great anthem of +universal harmony. "The world," said he, in a notice of the music of the +Hutchinson family, "is out of tune now. But it will be tuned again, and +all will become harmony." In this faith he lived and acted; working, not +always, as it seemed to some of his friends, wisely, but bravely, +truthfully, earnestly, cheering on his fellow-laborers, and imparting to +the dullest and most earthward looking of them something of his own zeal +and loftiness of purpose. + +"Who was he?" does the reader ask? Naturally enough, too, for his name +has never found its way into fashionable reviews; it has never been +associated with tale, or essay, or poem, to our knowledge. Our friend +Griswold, who, like another Noah, has launched some hundreds of American +poets and prose writers on the tide of immortality in his two huge arks +of rhyme and reason, has either overlooked his name, or deemed it +unworthy of preservation. Then, too, he was known mainly as the editor +of a proscribed and everywhere-spoken-against anti-slavery paper. It had +few readers of literary taste and discrimination; plain, earnest men and +women, intent only upon the thought itself, and caring little for the +clothing of it, loved the _Herald of Freedom_ for its honestness and +earnestness, and its bold rebukes of the wrong, its all-surrendering +homage to what its editor believed to be right. But the literary world +of authors and critics saw and heard little or nothing of him or his +writings. "I once had a bit of scholar-craft," he says of himself on one +occasion, "and had I attempted it in some pitiful sectarian or party or +literary sheet, I should have stood a chance to get quoted into the +periodicals. Now, who dares quote from the _Herald of Freedom_?" He +wrote for humanity, as his biographer justly says, not for fame. "He +wrote because he had something to say, and true to nature, for to him +nature was truth; he spoke right on, with the artlessness and simplicity +of a child." + +He was born in Plymouth, New Hampshire, in the sixth month of 1794,-- +a lineal descendant from John Rogers, of martyr-memory. Educated at +Dartmouth College, he studied law with Hon. Richard Fletcher, of +Salisbury, New Hampshire, now of Boston, and commenced the practice of it +in 1819, in his native village. He was diligent and successful in his +profession, although seldom known as a pleader. About the year 1833, he +became interested in the anti-slavery movement. His was one of the few +voices of encouragement and sympathy which greeted the author of this +sketch on the publication of a pamphlet in favor of immediate +emancipation. He gave us a kind word of approval, and invited us to his +mountain home, on the banks of the Pemigewasset,--an invitation which, +two years afterwards, we accepted. In the early autumn, in company with +George Thompson, (the eloquent reformer, who has since been elected a +member of the British Parliament from the Tower Hamlets,) we drove up the +beautiful valley of the White Mountain tributary of the Merrimac, and, +just as a glorious sunset was steeping river, valley, and mountain in its +hues of heaven, were welcomed to the pleasant home and family circle of +our friend Rogers. We spent two delightful evenings with him. His +cordiality, his warm-hearted sympathy in our object, his keen wit, +inimitable humor, and childlike and simple mirthfulness, his full +appreciation of the beautiful in art and nature, impressed us with the +conviction that we were the guests of no ordinary man; that we were +communing with unmistakable genius, such an one as might have added to +the wit and eloquence of Ben Jonson's famous club at the _Mermaid_, or +that which Lamb and Coleridge and Southey frequented at the _Salutation +and Cat_, of Smithfield. "The most brilliant man I have met in America!" +said George Thompson, as we left the hospitable door of our friend. + +In 1838, he gave up his law practice, left his fine outlook at Plymouth +upon the mountains of the North, Moosehillock and the Haystacks, and took +up his residence at Concord, for the purpose of editing the _Herald of +Freedom_, an anti-slavery paper which had been started some three or four +years before. John Pierpont, than whom there could not be a more +competent witness, in his brief and beautiful sketch of the life and +writings of Rogers, does not overestimate the ability with which the +Herald was conducted, when he says of its editor: "As a newspaper writer, +we think him unequalled by any living man; and in the general strength, +clearness, and quickness of his intellect, we think all who knew him well +will agree with us that he was not excelled by any editor in the +country." He was not a profound reasoner: his imagination and brilliant +fancy played the wildest tricks with his logic; yet, considering the way +by which he reached them, it is remarkable that his conclusions were so +often correct. The tendency of his mind was to extremes. A zealous +Calvinistic church-member, he became an equally zealous opponent of +churches and priests; a warm politician, he became an ultra non-resistant +and no-government man. In all this, his sincerity was manifest. If, in +the indulgence of his remarkable powers of sarcasm, in the free antics of +a humorous fancy, upon whose graceful neck he had flung loose the reins, +he sometimes did injustice to individuals, and touched, in irreverent +sport, the hem of sacred garments, it had the excuse, at least, of a +generous and honest motive. If he sometimes exaggerated, those who best, +knew him can testify that he "set down naught in malice." + +We have before us a printed collection of his writings,--hasty +editorials, flung off without care or revision, the offspring of sudden +impulse frequently; always free, artless, unstudied; the language +transparent as air, exactly expressing the thought. He loved the common, +simple dialect of the people,--the "beautiful strong old Saxon,--the talk +words." He had an especial dislike of learned and "dictionary words." +He used to recommend Cobbett's Works to "every young man and woman who +has been hurt in his or her talk and writing by going to school." + +Our limits will not admit of such extracts from the Collection of his +writings as would convey to our readers an adequate idea of his thought +and manner. His descriptions of natural scenery glow with life. One can +almost see the sunset light flooding the Franconia Notch, and glorifying +the peaks of Moosehillock, and hear the murmur of the west wind in the +pines, and the light, liquid voice of Pemigewasset sounding up from its +rocky channel, through its green hem of maples, while reading them. We +give a brief extract from an editorial account of an autumnal trip to +Vermont: + +"We have recently journeyed through a portion of this, free State; and it +is not all imagination in us that sees, in its bold scenery, its +uninfected inland position, its mountainous but fertile and verdant +surface, the secret of the noble predisposition of its people. They are +located for freedom. Liberty's home is on their Green Mountains. Their +farmer republic nowhere touches the ocean, the highway of the world's +crimes, as well as its nations. It has no seaport for the importation of +slavery, or the exportation of its own highland republicanism. Should +slavery ever prevail over this nation, to its utter subjugation, the last +lingering footsteps of retiring Liberty will be seen, not, as Daniel +Webster said, in the proud old Commonwealth of Massachusetts, about +Bunker Hill and Faneuil Hall; but she will be found wailing, like +Jephthah's daughter, among the 'hollows' and along the sides of the Green +Mountains. + +"Vermont shows gloriously at this autumn season. Frost has gently laid +hands on her exuberant vegetation, tinging her rock-maple woods without +abating the deep verdure of her herbage. Everywhere along her peopled +hollows and her bold hillslopes and summits the earth is alive with +green, while her endless hard-wood forests are uniformed with all the +hues of early fall, richer than the regimentals of the kings that +glittered in the train of Napoleon on the confines of Poland, when he +lingered there, on the last outposts of summer, before plunging into the +snow-drifts of the North; more gorgeous than the array of Saladin's life- +guard in the wars of the Crusaders, or of 'Solomon in all his glory,' +decked in, all colors and hues, but still the hues of life. Vegetation +touched, but not dead, or, if killed, not bereft yet of 'signs of life.' +'Decay's effacing fingers' had not yet 'swept the hills' 'where beauty +lingers.' All looked fresh as growing foliage. Vermont frosts don't seem +to be 'killing frosts.' They only change aspects of beauty. The mountain +pastures, verdant to the peaks, and over the peaks of the high, steep +hills, were covered with the amplest feed, and clothed with countless +sheep; the hay-fields heavy with second crop, in some partly cut and +abandoned, as if in very weariness and satiety, blooming with +honeysuckle, contrasting strangely with the colors on the woods; the fat +cattle and the long-tailed colts and close-built Morgans wallowing in it +up to the eyes, or the cattle down to rest, with full bellies, by ten in +the morning. Fine but narrow roads wound along among the hills, free +almost entirely of stone, and so smooth as to be safe for the most rapid +driving, made of their rich, dark, powder-looking soil. Beautiful +villages or scattered settlements breaking upon the delighted view, on +the meandering way, making the ride a continued scene of excitement and +admiration. The air fresh, free, and wholesome; the road almost dead +level for miles and miles, among mountains that lay over the land like +the great swells of the sea, and looking in the prospect as though there +could be no passage." + +To this autumnal limning, the following spring picture may be a fitting +accompaniment:-- + +"At last Spring is here in full flush. Winter held on tenaciously and +mercilessly, but it has let go. The great sun is high on his northern +journey, and the vegetation, and the bird-singing, and the loud frog- +chorus, the tree budding and blowing, are all upon us; and the glorious +grass--super-best of earth's garniture--with its ever-satisfying green. +The king-birds have come, and the corn-planter, the scolding bob-o-link. +'Plant your corn, plant your corn,' says he, as he scurries athwart the +ploughed ground, hardly lifting his crank wings to a level with his back, +so self-important is he in his admonitions. The earlier birds have gone +to housekeeping, and have disappeared from the spray. There has been +brief period for them, this spring, for scarcely has the deep snow gone, +but the dark-green grass has come, and first we shall know, the ground +will be yellow with dandelions. + +"I incline to thank Heaven this glorious morning of May 16th for the +pleasant home from which we can greet the Spring. Hitherto we have had +to await it amid a thicket of village houses, low down, close together, +and awfully white. For a prospect, we had the hinder part of an ugly +meeting-house, which an enterprising neighbor relieved us of by planting +a dwelling-house, right before our eyes, (on his own land, and he had a +right to,) which relieved us also of all prospect whatever. And the +revival spirit of habitation which has come over Concord is clapping up a +house between every two in the already crowded town; and the prospect is, +it will be soon all buildings. They are constructing, in quite good +taste though, small, trim, cottage-like. But I had rather be where I can +breathe air, and see beyond my own features, than be smothered among the +prettiest houses ever built. We are on the slope of a hill; it is all +sand, be sure, on all four sides of us, but the air is free, (and the +sand, too, at times,) and our water, there is danger of hard drinking to +live by it. Air and water, the two necessaries of life, and high, free +play-ground for the small ones. There is a sand precipice hard by, high +enough, were it only rock and overlooked the ocean, to be as sublime as +any of the Nahant cliffs. As it is, it is altogether a safer haunt for +daring childhood, which could hardly break its neck by a descent of some +hundreds of feet. + +"A low flat lies between us and the town, with its State-house, and body- +guard of well-proportioned steeples standing round. It was marshy and +wet, but is almost all redeemed by the translation into it of the high +hills of sand. It must have been a terrible place for frogs, judging +from what remains of it. Bits of water from the springs hard by lay here +and there about the low ground, which are peopled as full of singers as +ever the gallery of the old North Meeting-house was, and quite as +melodious ones. Such performers I never heard, in marsh or pool. They +are not the great, stagnant, bull-paddocks, fat and coarse-noted like +Parson, but clear-water frogs, green, lively, and sweet-voiced. I +passed their orchestra going home the other evening, with a small lad, +and they were at it, all parts, ten thousand peeps, shrill, ear-piercing, +and incessant, coming up from every quarter, accompanied by a second, +from some larger swimmer with his trombone, and broken in upon, every now +and then, but not discordantly, with the loud, quick hallo, that +resembles the cry of the tree-toad. 'There are the Hutchinsons,' cried +the lad. 'The Rainers,' responded I, glad to remember enough of my +ancient Latin to know that Rana, or some such sounding word, stood for +frog. But it was a 'band of music,' as the Miller friends say. Like +other singers, (all but the Hutchinsons,) these are apt to sing too much, +all the time they are awake, constituting really too much of a good +thing. I have wondered if the little reptiles were singing in concert, +or whether every one peeped on his own hook, their neighbor hood only +making it a chorus. I incline to the opinion that they are performing +together, that they know the tune, and each carries his part, self- +selected, in free meeting, and therefore never discordant. The hour rule +of Congress might be useful, though far less needed among the frogs than +among the profane croakers of the fens at Washington." + +Here is a sketch of the mountain scenery of New Hampshire, as seen from +the Holderness Mountain, or North Hill, during a visit which he made to +his native valley in the autumn of 1841:-- + +"The earth sphered up all around us, in every quarter of the horizon, +like the crater of a vast volcano, and the great hollow within the +mountain circle was as smoky as Vesuvius or Etna in their recess of +eruption. The little village of Plymouth lay right at our feet, with its +beautiful expanse of intervale opening on the eye like a lake among the +woods and hills, and the Pemigewasset, bordered along its crooked way +with rows of maples, meandering from upland to upland through the +meadows. Our young footsteps had wandered over these localities. Time +had cast it all far back that Pemigewasset, with its meadows and border +trees; that little village whitening in the margin of its inter vale; and +that one house which we could distinguish, where the mother that watched +over and endured our wayward childhood totters at fourscore! + +"To the south stretched a broken, swelling upland country, but champaign +from the top of North Hill, patched all over with grain-fields and green +wood-lots, the roofs of the farm-houses shining in the sun. Southwest, +the Cardigan Mountain showed its bald forehead among the smokes of a +thousand fires, kindled in the woods in the long drought. Westward, +Moosehillock heaved up its long back, black as a whale; and turning the +eye on northward, glancing down the while on the Baker's River valley, +dotted over with human dwellings like shingle-bunches for size, you +behold the great Franconia Range, its Notch and its Haystacks, the +Elephant Mountain on the left, and Lafayette (Great Haystack) on the +right, shooting its peak in solemn loneliness high up into the desert +sky, and overtopping all the neighboring Alps but Mount Washington +itself. The prospect of these is most impressive and satisfactory. We +don't believe the earth presents a finer mountain display. The Haystacks +stand there like the Pyramids on the wall of mountains. One of them +eminently has this Egyptian shape. It is as accurate a pyramid to the +eye as any in the old valley of the Nile, and a good deal bigger than any +of those hoary monuments of human presumption, of the impious tyranny of +monarchs and priests, and of the appalling servility of the erecting +multitude. Arthur's Seat in Edinburgh does not more finely resemble a +sleeping lion than the huge mountain on the left of the Notch does an +elephant, with his great, overgrown rump turned uncivilly toward the gap +where the people have to pass. Following round the panorama, you come to +the Ossipees and the Sandwich Mountains, peaks innumerable and nameless, +and of every variety of fantastic shape. Down their vast sides are +displayed the melancholy-looking slides, contrasting with the fathomless +woods. + +"But the lakes,--you see lakes, as well as woods and mountains, from the +top of North Hill. Newfound Lake in Hebron, only eight miles distant, +you can't see; it lies too deep among the hills. Ponds show their small +blue mirrors from various quarters of the great picture. Worthen's Mill- +Pond and the Hardhack, where we used to fish for trout in truant, +barefooted days, Blair's Mill-Pond, White Oak Pond, and Long Pond, and +the Little Squam, a beautiful dark sheet of deep, blue water, about two +miles long, stretched an id the green hills and woods, with a charming +little beach at its eastern end, and without an island. And then the +Great Squam, connected with it on the east by a short, narrow stream, the +very queen of ponds, with its fleet of islands, surpassing in beauty all +the foreign waters we have seen, in Scotland or elsewhere,--the islands +covered with evergreens, which impart their hue to the mass of the lake, +as it stretches seven miles on east from its smaller sister, towards the +peerless Winnipesaukee. Great Squam is as beautiful as water and island +can be. But Winnipesaukee, it is the very 'Smile of the Great Spirit.' +It looks as if it had a thousand islands; some of them large enough for +little towns, and others not bigger than a swan or a wild duck swimming +on its surface of glass." + +His wit and sarcasm were generally too good-natured to provoke even their +unfortunate objects, playing all over his editorials like the thunderless +lightnings which quiver along the horizon of a night of summer calmness; +but at times his indignation launched them like bolts from heaven. Take +the following as a specimen. He is speaking of the gag rule of Congress, +and commending Southern representatives for their skilful selection of a +proper person to do their work:-- + +"They have a quick eye at the South to the character, or, as they would +say, the points of a slave. They look into him shrewdly, as an old +jockey does into a horse. They will pick him out, at rifle-shot +distance, among a thousand freemen. They have a nice eye to detect +shades of vassalage. They saw in the aristocratic popinjay strut of a +counterfeit Democrat an itching aspiration to play the slaveholder. They +beheld it in 'the cut of his jib,' and his extreme Northern position made +him the very tool for their purpose. The little creature has struck at +the right of petition. A paltrier hand never struck at a noble right. +The Eagle Right of Petition, so loftily sacred in the eyes of the +Constitution that Congress can't begin to 'abridge' it, in its pride of +place, is hawked at by this crested jay-bird. A 'mousing owl' would have +seen better at midnoon than to have done it. It is an idiot blue-jay, +such as you see fooling about among the shrub oaks and dwarf pitch pines +in the winter. What an ignominious death to the lofty right, were it to +die by such a hand; but it does not die. It is impalpable to the +'malicious mockery' of such vain blows.' We are glad it is done--done by +the South--done proudly, and in slaveholding style, by the hand of a +vassal. What a man does by another he does by himself, says the maxim. +But they will disown the honor of it, and cast it on the despised 'free +nigger' North." + +Or this description--not very flattering to the "Old Commonwealth"--of +the treatment of the agent of Massachusetts in South Carolina:-- + +"Slavery may perpetrate anything, and New England can't see it. It can +horsewhip the old Commonwealth of Massachusetts, and spit in her +governmental face, and she will not recognize it as an offence. She sent +her agent to Charleston on a State embassy. Slavery caught him, and sent +him ignominiously home. The solemn great man came back in a hurry. He +returned in a most undignified trot. He ran; he scampered,--the stately +official. The Old Bay State actually pulled foot, cleared, dug, as they +say, like any scamp with a hue and cry after him. Her grave old Senator, +who no more thought of having to break his stately walk than he had of +being flogged at school for stealing apples, came back from Carolina upon +the full run, out of breath and out of dignity. Well, what's the result? +Why, nothing. She no more thinks of showing resentment about it than she +would if lightning had struck him. He was sent back 'by the visitation +of God;' and if they had lynched him to death, and stained the streets of +Charleston with his blood, a Boston jury, if they could have held inquest +over him, would have found that he 'died by the visitation of God.' And +it would have been crowner's quest law, Slavery's crowners." + +Here is a specimen of his graceful blending of irony and humor. He is +expostulating with his neighbor of the New Hampshire Patriot, assuring +him that he cannot endure the ponderous weight of his arguments, begging +for a little respite, and, as a means of obtaining it, urging the editor +to travel. He advises him to go South, to the White Sulphur Springs, and +thinks that, despite of his dark complexion, he would be safe there from +being sold for jail fees, as his pro-slavery merits would more than +counterbalance his colored liabilities, which, after all, were only prima +facie evidence against him. He suggests Texas, also, as a place where +"patriots" of a certain class "most do congregate," and continues as +follows:-- + +"There is Arkansas, too, all glorious in new-born liberty, fresh and +unsullied, like Venus out of the ocean,--that newly discovered star, in +the firmament banner of this Republic. Sister Arkansas, with her bowie- +knife graceful at her side, like the huntress Diana with her silver bow, +--oh it would be refreshing and recruiting to an exhausted patriot to go +and replenish his soul at her fountains. The newly evacuated lands of +the Cherokee, too, a sweet place now for a lover of his country to visit, +to renew his self-complacency by wandering among the quenched hearths of +the expatriated Indians; a land all smoking with the red man's departing +curse,--a malediction that went to the centre. Yes, and Florida,-- +blossoming and leafy Florida, yet warm with the life-blood of Osceola and +his warriors, shed gloriously under flag of truce. Why should a patriot +of such a fancy for nature immure himself in the cells of the city, and +forego such an inviting and so broad a landscape? Ite viator. Go forth, +traveller, and leave this mouldy editing to less elastic fancies. We +would respectfully invite our Colonel to travel. What signifies? +Journey--wander--go forth--itinerate--exercise--perambulate--roam." + +He gives the following ludicrous definition of Congress:-- + +"But what is Congress? It is the echo of the country at home,--the +weathercock, that denotes and answers the shifting wind,--a thing of +tail, nearly all tail, moved by the tail and by the wind, with small +heading, and that corresponding implicitly in movement with the broad +sail-like stern, which widens out behind to catch the rum-fraught breath +of 'the Brotherhood.' As that turns, it turns; when that stops, it stops; +and in calmish weather looks as steadfast and firm as though it was +riveted to the centre. The wind blows, and the little popularity-hunting +head dodges this way and that, in endless fluctuation. Such is Congress, +or a great portion of it. It will point to the northwest heavens of +Liberty, whenever the breezes bear down irresistibly upon it, from the +regions of political fair weather. It will abolish slavery at the +Capitol, when it has already been doomed to abolition and death +everywhere else in the country. 'It will be in at the death.'" + +Replying to the charge that the Abolitionists of the North were "secret" +in their movements and designs, he says:-- + +"'In secret!' Why, our movements have been as prominent and open as the +house-tops from the beginning. We have striven from the outset to write +the whole matter cloud-high in the heavens, that the utmost South might +read it. We have cast an arc upon the horizon, like the semicircle of +the polar lights, and upon it have bent our motto, 'Immediate +Emancipation,' glorious as the rainbow. We have engraven it there, on +the blue table of the cold vault, in letters tall enough for the reading +of the nations. And why has the far South not read and believed before +this? Because a steam has gone up--a fog--from New England's pulpit and +her degenerate press, and hidden the beaming revelation from its vision. +The Northern hierarchy and aristocracy have cheated the South." + +He spoke at times with severity of slaveholders, but far oftener of those +who, without the excuse of education and habit, and prompted only by a +selfish consideration of political or sectarian advantage, apologized for +the wrong, and discountenanced the anti-slavery movement. "We have +nothing to say," said he, "to the slave. He is no party to his own +enslavement,--he is none to his disenthralment. We have nothing to say +to the South. The real holder of slaves is not there. He is in the +North, the free North. The South alone has not the power to hold the +slave. It is the character of the nation that binds and holds him. It +is the Republic that does it, the efficient force of which is north of +Mason and Dixon's line. By virtue of the majority of Northern hearts and +voices, slavery lives in the South!" + +In 1840, he spent a few weeks in England, Ireland, and Scotland. He has +left behind a few beautiful memorials of his tour. His Ride over the +Border, Ride into Edinburgh, Wincobank hall, Ailsa Craig, gave his paper +an interest in the eyes of many who had no sympathy with his political +and religious views. + +Scattered all over his editorials, like gems, are to be found beautiful +images, sweet touches of heartfelt pathos,--thoughts which the reader +pauses over with surprise and delight. We subjoin a few specimens, taken +almost at random from the book before us:-- + +"A thunder-storm,--what can match it for eloquence and poetry? That rush +from heaven of the big drops, in what multitude and succession, and how +they sound as they strike! How they play on the old home roof and the +thick tree-tops! What music to go to sleep by, to the tired boy, as he +lies under the naked roof! And the great, low bass thunder, as it rolls +off over the hills, and settles down behind them to the very centre, and +you can feel the old earth jar under your feet!" + +"There was no oratory in the speech of the _Learned Blacksmith_, in the +ordinary sense of that word, no grace of elocution, but mighty thoughts +radiating off from his heated mind, like sparks from the glowing steel of +his own anvil." + +"The hard hands of Irish labor, with nothing in them,--they ring like +slabs of marble together, in response to the wild appeals of O'Connell, +and the British stand conquered before them, with shouldered arms. +Ireland is on her feet, with nothing in her hands, impregnable, +unassailable, in utter defencelessness,--the first time that ever a +nation sprung to its feet unarmed. The veterans of England behold them, +and forbear to fire. They see no mark. It will not do to fire upon men; +it will do only to fire upon soldiers. They are the proper mark of the +murderous gun, but men cannot be shot." + +"It is coming to that [abolition of war] the world over; and when it does +come to it, oh what a long breath of relief the tired world will draw, as +it stretches itself for the first time out upon earth's greensward, and +learns the meaning of repose and peaceful sleep!" + +"He who vests his labor in the faithful ground is dealing directly with +God; human fraud or weakness do not intervene between him and his +requital. No mechanic has a set of customers so trustworthy as God and +the elements. No savings bank is so sure as the old earth." + +"Literature is the luxury of words. It originates nothing, it does +nothing. It talks hard words about the labor of others, and is reckoned +more meritorious for it than genius and labor for doing what learning can +only descant upon. It trades on the capital of unlettered minds. It +struts in stolen plumage, and it is mere plumage. A learned man +resembles an owl in more respects than the matter of wisdom. Like that +solemn bird, he is about all feathers." + +"Our Second Advent friends contemplate a grand conflagration about the +first of April next. I should be willing there should be one, if it +could be confined to the productions of the press, with which the earth +is absolutely smothered. Humanity wants precious few books to read, but +the great living, breathing, immortal volume of Providence. Life,--real +life,--how to live, how to treat one another, and how to trust God in +matters beyond our ken and occasion,--these are the lessons to learn, and +you find little of them in libraries." + +"That accursed drum and fife! How they have maddened mankind! And the +deep bass boom of the cannon, chiming in in the chorus of battle, that +trumpet and wild charging bugle,--how they set the military devil in a +man, and make him into a soldier! Think of the human family falling upon +one another at the inspiration of music! How must God feel at it, to see +those harp-strings he meant should be waked to a love bordering on +divine, strung and swept to mortal hate and butchery!" + +"Leave off being Jews," (he is addressing Major Noah with regard to his +appeal to his brethren to return to Judaea,) "and turn mankind. The +rocks and sands of Palestine have been worshipped long enough. +Connecticut River or the Merrimac are as good rivers as any Jordan that +ever run into a dead or live sea, and as holy, for that matter. In +Humanity, as in Christ Jesus, as Paul says, 'there is neither Jew nor +Greek.' And there ought to be none. Let Humanity be reverenced with the +tenderest devotion; suffering, discouraged, down-trodden, hard-handed, +haggard-eyed, care-worn mankind! Let these be regarded a little. Would +to God I could alleviate all their sorrows, and leave them a chance to +laugh! They are, miserable now. They might be as happy as the blackbird +on the spray, and as full of melody." + +"I am sick as death at this miserable struggle among mankind for a +living. Poor devils! were they born to run such a gauntlet after the +means of life? Look about you, and see your squirming neighbors, +writhing and twisting like so many angleworms in a fisher's bait-box, or +the wriggling animalculae seen in the vinegar drop held to the sun. How +they look, how they feel, how base it makes them all!" + +"Every human being is entitled to the means of life, as the trout is to +his brook or the lark to the blue sky. Is it well to put a human 'young +one' here to die of hunger, thirst, and nakedness, or else be preserved +as a pauper? Is this fair earth but a poor-house by creation and intent? +Was it made for that?--and these other round things we see dancing in +the firmament to the music of the spheres, are they all great shining +poor-houses?" + +"The divines always admit things after the age has adopted them. They +are as careful of the age as the weathercock is of the wind. You might +as well catch an old experienced weathercock, on some ancient Orthodox +steeple, standing all day with its tail east in a strong out wind, as the +divines at odds with the age." + +But we must cease quoting. The admirers of Jean Paul Richter might find +much of the charm and variety of the "Flower, Fruit, and Thorn Pieces" in +this newspaper collection. They may see, perhaps, as we do, some things +which they cannot approve of, the tendency of which, however intended, is +very questionable. But, with us, they will pardon something to the +spirit of liberty, much to that of love and humanity which breathes +through all. + +Disgusted and heart-sick at the general indifference of Church and clergy +to the temporal condition of the people,--at their apologies for and +defences of slavery, war, and capital punishment,--Rogers turned +Protestant, in the full sense of the term. He spoke of priests and +"pulpit wizards" as freely as John Milton did two centuries ago, +although with far less bitterness and rasping satire. He could not +endure to see Christianity and Humanity divorced. He longed to see the +beautiful life of Jesus--his sweet humanities, his brotherly love, his +abounding sympathies--made the example of all men. Thoroughly +democratic, in his view all men were equal. Priests, stripped of their +sacerdotal tailoring, were in his view but men, after all. He pitied +them, he said, for they were in a wrong position,--above life's comforts +and sympathies,--"up in the unnatural cold, they had better come down +among men, and endure and enjoy with them." "Mankind," said he, "want +the healing influences of humanity. They must love one another more. +Disinterested good will make the world as it should be." + +His last visit to his native valley was in the autumn of 1845. In a +familiar letter to a friend, he thus describes his farewell view of the +mountain glories of his childhood's home:-- + +"I went a jaunt, Thursday last, about twenty miles north of this valley, +into the mountain region, where what I beheld, if I could tell it as I +saw it, would make your outlawed sheet sought after wherever our Anglo- +Saxon tongue is spoken in the wide world. I have been many a time among +those Alps, and never without a kindling of wildest enthusiasm in my +woodland blood. But I never saw them till last Thursday. They never +loomed distinctly to my eye before, and the sun never shone on them from +heaven till then. They were so near me, I could seem to hear the voice +of their cataracts, as I could count their great slides, streaming adown +their lone and desolate sides,--old slides, some of them overgrown with +young woods, like half-healed scars on the breast of a giant. The great +rains had clothed the valleys of the upper Pemigewasset in the darkest +and deepest green. The meadows were richer and more glorious in their +thick 'fall feed' than Queen Anne's Garden, as I saw it from the windows +of Windsor Castle. And the dark hemlock and hackmatack woods were yet +darker after the wet season, as they lay, in a hundred wildernesses, in +the mighty recesses of the mountains. But the peaks,--the eternal, the +solitary, the beautiful, the glorious and dear mountain peaks, my own +Moosehillock and my native Haystacks,--these were the things on which eye +and heart gazed and lingered, and I seemed to see them for the last time. +It was on my way back that I halted and turned to look at them from a +high point on the Thornton road. It was about four in the afternoon. It +had rained among the hills about the Notch, and cleared off. The sun, +there sombred at that early hour, as towards his setting, was pouring his +most glorious light upon the naked peaks, and they casting their mighty +shadows far down among the inaccessible woods that darken the hollows +that stretch between their bases. A cloud was creeping up to perch and +rest awhile on the highest top of Great Haystack. Vulgar folks have +called it Mount Lafayette, since the visit of that brave old Frenchman in +1825 or 1826. If they had asked his opinion, he would have told them the +names of mountains couldn't be altered, and especially names like that, +so appropriate, so descriptive, and so picturesque. A little hard white +cloud, that looked like a hundred fleeces of wool rolled into one, was +climbing rapidly along up the northwestern ridge, that ascended to the +lonely top of Great Haystack. All the others were bare. Four or five of +them,--as distinct and shapely as so many pyramids; some topped out with +naked cliff, on which the sun lay in melancholy glory; others clothed +thick all the way up with the old New Hampshire hemlock or the daring +hackmatack,--Pierpont's hackmatack. You could see their shadows +stretching many and many a mile, over Grant and Location, away beyond the +invading foot of Incorporation,--where the timber-hunter has scarcely +explored, and where the moose browses now, I suppose, as undisturbed as +he did before the settlement of the State. I wish our young friend and +genius, Harrison Eastman, had been with me, to see the sunlight as it +glared on the tops of those woods, and to see the purple of the +mountains. I looked at it myself almost with the eye of a painter. If a +painter looked with mine, though, he never could look off upon his canvas +long enough to make a picture; he would gaze forever at the original. + +"But I had to leave it, and to say in my heart, Farewell! And as I +travelled on down, and the sun sunk lower and lower towards the summit of +the western ridge, the clouds came up and formed an Alpine range in the +evening heavens above it,--like other Haystacks and Moosehillocks,--so +dark and dense that fancy could easily mistake them for a higher Alps. +There were the peaks and the great passes; the Franconia Notches among +the cloudy cliffs, and the great White Mountain Gap." + +His health, never robust, had been gradually failing for some time +previous to his death. He needed more repose and quiet than his duties +as an editor left him; and to this end he purchased a small and pleasant +farm in his loved Pennigewasset valley, in the hope that he might there +recruit his wasted energies. In the sixth month of the year of his +death, in a letter to us, he spoke of his prospects in language which +even then brought moisture to our eyes:-- + +"I am striving to get me an asylum of a farm. I have a wife and seven +children, every one of them with a whole spirit. I don't want to be +separated from any of them, only with a view to come together again. I +have a beautiful little retreat in prospect, forty odd miles north, where +I imagine I can get potatoes and repose,--a sort of haven or port. I am +among the breakers, and 'mad for land.' If I get this home,--it is a mile +or two in among the hills from the pretty domicil once visited by +yourself and glorious Thompson,--I am this moment indulging the fancy +that I may see you at it before we die. Why can't I have you come and +see me? You see, dear W., I don't want to send you anything short of a +full epistle. Let me end as I begun, with the proffer of my hand in +grasp of yours extended. My heart I do not proffer,--it was yours +before,--it shall be yours while I am N. P. ROGERS." + +Alas! the haven of a deeper repose than he had dreamed of was close at +hand. He lingered until the middle of the tenth month, suffering much, +yet calm and sensible to the last. Just before his death, he desired his +children to sing at his bedside that touching song of Lover's, _The +Angel's Whisper_. Turning his eyes towards the open window, through +which the leafy glory of the season he most loved was visible, he +listened to the sweet melody. In the words of his friend Pierpont,-- + + "The angel's whisper stole in song upon his closing ear; + From his own daughter's lips it came, so musical and clear, + That scarcely knew the dying man what melody was there-- + The last of earth's or first of heaven's pervading all the air." + +He sleeps in the Concord burial-ground, under the shadow of oaks; the +very spot he would have chosen, for he looked upon trees with something +akin to human affection. "They are," he said, "the beautiful handiwork +and architecture of God, on which the eye never tires. Every one is +a feather in the earth's cap, a plume in her bonnet, a tress on her +forehead,--a comfort, a refreshing, and an ornament to her." Spring has +hung over him her buds, and opened beside him her violets. Summer has +laid her green oaken garland on his grave, and now the frost-blooms of +autumn drop upon it. Shall man cast a nettle on that mound? He loved +humanity,--shall it be less kind to him than Nature? Shall the bigotry +of sect, and creed, and profession, drive its condemnatory stake into his +grave? God forbid. The doubts which he sometimes unguardedly expressed +had relation, we are constrained to believe, to the glosses of +commentators and creed-makers and the inconsistency of professors, rather +than to those facts and precepts of Christianity to which he gave the +constant assent of his practice. He sought not his own. His heart +yearned with pity and brotherly affection for all the poor and suffering +in the universe. Of him, the angel of Leigh Hunt's beautiful allegory +might have written, in the golden book of remembrance, as he did of the +good Abou Ben Adhem, "He loved his fellow-men." + + + + + + +ROBERT DINSMORE. + +The great charm of Scottish poetry consists in its simplicity, and +genuine, unaffected sympathy with the common joys and sorrows of daily +life. It is a home-taught, household melody. It calls to mind the +pastoral bleat on the hillsides, the kirkbells of a summer Sabbath, the +song of the lark in the sunrise, the cry of the quail in the corn-land, +the low of cattle, and the blithe carol of milkmaids "when the kye come +hame" at gloaming. Meetings at fair and market, blushing betrothments, +merry weddings, the joy of young maternity, the lights and shades of +domestic life, its bereavements and partings, its chances and changes, +its holy death-beds, and funerals solemnly beautiful in quiet kirkyards, +--these furnish the hints of the immortal melodies of Burns, the sweet +ballads of the Ettrick Shepherd and Allan Cunningham, and the rustic +drama of Ramsay. It is the poetry of home, of nature, and the +affections. + +All this is sadly wanting in our young literature. We have no songs; +American domestic life has never been hallowed and beautified by the +sweet and graceful and tender associations of poetry. We have no Yankee +pastorals. Our rivers and streams turn mills and float rafts, and are +otherwise as commendably useful as those of Scotland; but no quaint +ballad or simple song reminds us that men and women have loved, met, and +parted on their banks, or that beneath each roof within their valleys the +tragedy and comedy of life have been enacted. Our poetry is cold and +imitative; it seems more the product of over-strained intellects than the +spontaneous outgushing of hearts warm with love, and strongly +sympathizing with human nature as it actually exists about us, with the +joys and griefs of the men and women whom we meet daily. Unhappily, the +opinion prevails that a poet must be also a philosopher, and hence it is +that much of our poetry is as indefinable in its mysticism as an Indian +Brahmin's commentary on his sacred books, or German metaphysics subjected +to homeopathic dilution. It assumes to be prophetical, and its +utterances are oracular. It tells of strange, vague emotions and +yearnings, painfully suggestive of spiritual "groanings which cannot be +uttered." If it "babbles o' green fields" and the common sights and +sounds of nature, it is only for the purpose of finding some vague +analogy between them and its internal experiences and longings. It +leaves the warm and comfortable fireside of actual knowledge and human +comprehension, and goes wailing and gibbering like a ghost about the +impassable doors of mystery:-- + + "It fain would be resolved + How things are done, + And who the tailor is + That works for the man I' the sun." + +How shall we account for this marked tendency in the literature of a +shrewd, practical people? Is it that real life in New England lacks +those conditions of poetry and romance which age, reverence, and +superstition have gathered about it in the Old World? Is it that + + "Ours are not Tempe's nor Arcadia's vales," + +but are more famous for growing Indian corn and potatoes, and the +manufacture of wooden ware and pedler notions, than for romantic +associations and legendary interest? That our huge, unshapely shingle +structures, blistering in the sun and glaring with windows, were +evidently never reared by the spell of pastoral harmonies, as the walls +of Thebes rose at the sound of the lyre of Amphion? That the habits of +our people are too cool, cautious, undemonstrative, to furnish the warp +and woof of song and pastoral, and that their dialect and figures of +speech, however richly significant and expressive in the autobiography of +Sam Slick, or the satire of Hosea Biglow and Ethan Spike, form a very +awkward medium of sentiment and pathos? All this may be true. But the +Yankee, after all, is a man, and as such his history, could it be got at, +must have more or less of poetic material in it; moreover, whether +conscious of it or not, he also stands relieved against the background of +Nature's beauty or sublimity. There is a poetical side to the +commonplace of his incomings and outgoings; study him well, and you may +frame an idyl of some sort from his apparently prosaic existence. Our +poets, we must needs think, are deficient in that shiftiness, ready +adaptation to circumstances, and ability of making the most of things, +for which, as a people, we are proverbial. Can they make nothing of our +Thanksgiving, that annual gathering of long-severed friends? Do they +find nothing to their purpose in our apple-bees, buskings, berry- +pickings, summer picnics, and winter sleigh-rides? Is there nothing +available in our peculiarities of climate, scenery, customs, and +political institutions? Does the Yankee leap into life, shrewd, hard, +and speculating, armed, like Pallas, for a struggle with fortune? Are +there not boys and girls, school loves and friendship, courtings and +match-makings, hope and fear, and all the varied play of human passions, +--the keen struggles of gain, the mad grasping of ambition,--sin and +remorse, tearful repentance and holy aspirations? Who shall say that we +have not all the essentials of the poetry of human life and simple +nature, of the hearth and the farm-field? Here, then, is a mine +unworked, a harvest ungathered. Who shall sink the shaft and thrust in +the sickle? + +And here let us say that the mere dilettante and the amateur ruralist may +as well keep their hands off. The prize is not for them. He who would +successfully strive for it must be himself what he sings,--part and +parcel of the rural life of New England,--one who has grown strong amidst +its healthful influences, familiar with all its details, and capable of +detecting whatever of beauty, humor, or pathos pertain to it,--one who +has added to his book-lore the large experience of an active +participation in the rugged toil, the hearty amusements, the trials, and +the pleasures he describes. + +We have been led to these reflections by an incident which has called up +before us the homespun figure of an old friend of our boyhood, who had +the good sense to discover that the poetic element existed in the simple +home life of a country farmer, although himself unable to give a very +creditable expression of it. He had the "vision," indeed, but the +"faculty divine" was wanting; or, if he possessed it in any degree, as +Thersites says of the wit of Ajax, "it would not out, but lay coldly in +him like fire in the flint." + +While engaged this morning in looking over a large exchange list of +newspapers, a few stanzas of poetry in the Scottish dialect attracted our +attention. As we read them, like a wizard's rhyme they seemed to have +the power of bearing us back to the past. They had long ago graced the +columns of that solitary sheet which once a week diffused happiness over +our fireside circle, making us acquainted, in our lonely nook, with the +goings-on of the great world. The verses, we are now constrained to +admit, are not remarkable in themselves, truth and simple nature only; +yet how our young hearts responded to them! Twenty years ago there were +fewer verse-makers than at present; and as our whole stock of light +literature consisted of Ellwood's _Davideis_ and the selections of +_Lindley Murray's English Reader_, it is not improbable that we were in a +condition to overestimate the contributions to the poet's corner of our +village newspaper. Be that as it may, we welcome them as we would the +face of an old friend, for they somehow remind us of the scent of +haymows, the breath of cattle, the fresh greenery by the brookside, the +moist earth broken by the coulter and turned up to the sun and winds of +May. This particular piece, which follows, is entitled _The Sparrow_, +and was occasioned by the crushing of a bird's-nest by the author while +ploughing among his corn. It has something of the simple tenderness of +Burns. + + "Poor innocent and hapless Sparrow + Why should my mould-board gie thee sorrow! + This day thou'll chirp and mourn the morrow + Wi' anxious breast; + The plough has turned the mould'ring furrow + Deep o'er thy nest! + + "Just I' the middle o' the hill + Thy nest was placed wi' curious skill; + There I espied thy little bill + Beneath the shade. + In that sweet bower, secure frae ill, + Thine eggs were laid. + + "Five corns o' maize had there been drappit, + An' through the stalks thy head was pappit, + The drawing nowt could na be stappit + I quickly foun'; + Syne frae thy cozie nest thou happit, + Wild fluttering roun'. + + "The sklentin stane beguiled the sheer, + In vain I tried the plough to steer; + A wee bit stumpie I' the rear + Cam' 'tween my legs, + An' to the jee-side gart me veer + An' crush thine eggs. + + "Alas! alas! my bonnie birdie! + Thy faithful mate flits round to guard thee. + Connubial love!--a pattern worthy + The pious priest! + What savage heart could be sae hardy + As wound thy breast? + + "Ah me! it was nae fau't o' mine; + It gars me greet to see thee pine. + It may be serves His great design + Who governs all; + Omniscience tents wi' eyes divine + The Sparrow's fall! + + "How much like thine are human dools, + Their sweet wee bairns laid I' the mools? + The Sovereign Power who nature rules + Hath said so be it + But poor blip' mortals are sic fools + They canna see it. + + "Nae doubt that He who first did mate us + Has fixed our lot as sure as fate is, + An' when He wounds He disna hate us, + But anely this, + He'll gar the ills which here await us + Yield lastin' bliss." + +In the early part of the eighteenth century a considerable number of +Presbyterians of Scotch descent, from the north of Ireland, emigrated to +the New World. In the spring of 1719, the inhabitants of Haverhill, on +the Merrimac, saw them passing up the river in several canoes, one of +which unfortunately upset in the rapids above the village. The following +fragment of a ballad celebrating this event has been handed down to the +present time, and may serve to show the feelings even then of the old +English settlers towards the Irish emigrants:-- + + "They began to scream and bawl, + As out they tumbled one and all, + And, if the Devil had spread his net, + He could have made a glorious haul!" + +The new-comers proceeded up the river, and, landing opposite to the +Uncanoonuc Hills, on the present site of Manchester, proceeded inland to +Beaver Pond. Charmed with the appearance of the country, they resolved +here to terminate their wanderings. Under a venerable oak on the margin +of the little lake, they knelt down with their minister, Jamie McGregore, +and laid, in prayer and thanksgiving, the foundation of their settlement. +In a few years they had cleared large fields, built substantial stone and +frame dwellings and a large and commodious meeting-house; wealth had +accumulated around them, and they had everywhere the reputation of a +shrewd and thriving community. They were the first in New England to +cultivate the potato, which their neighbors for a long time regarded as a +pernicious root, altogether unfit for a Christian stomach. Every lover +of that invaluable esculent has reason to remember with gratitude the +settlers of Londonderry. + +Their moral acclimation in Ireland had not been without its effect upon +their character. Side by side with a Presbyterianism as austere as that +of John Knox had grown up something of the wild Milesian humor, love of +convivial excitement and merry-making. Their long prayers and fierce +zeal in behalf of orthodox tenets only served, in the eyes of their +Puritan neighbors, to make more glaring still the scandal of their marked +social irregularities. It became a common saying in the region round +about that "the Derry Presbyterians would never give up a pint of +doctrine or a pint of rum." Their second minister was an old scarred +fighter, who had signalized himself in the stout defence of Londonderry, +when James II. and his Papists were thundering at its gates. Agreeably +to his death-bed directions, his old fellow-soldiers, in their leathern +doublets and battered steel caps, bore him to his grave, firing over him +the same rusty muskets which had swept down rank after rank of the men of +Amalek at the Derry siege. + +Erelong the celebrated Derry fair was established, in imitation of those +with which they had been familiar in Ireland. Thither annually came all +manner of horse-jockeys and pedlers, gentlemen and beggars, fortune- +tellers, wrestlers, dancers and fiddlers, gay young farmers and buxom +maidens. Strong drink abounded. They who had good-naturedly wrestled +and joked together in the morning not unfrequently closed the day with a +fight, until, like the revellers of Donnybrook, + + "Their hearts were soft with whiskey, + And their heads were soft with blows." + +A wild, frolicking, drinking, fiddling, courting, horse-racing, riotous +merry-making,--a sort of Protestant carnival, relaxing the grimness of +Puritanism for leagues around it. + +In the midst of such a community, and partaking of all its influences, +Robert Dinsmore, the author of the poem I have quoted, was born, about +the middle of the last century. His paternal ancestor, John, younger son +of a Laird of Achenmead, who left the banks of the Tweed for the green +fertility of Northern Ireland, had emigrated to New England some forty +years before, and, after a rough experience of Indian captivity in the +wild woods of Maine, had settled down among his old neighbors in +Londonderry. Until nine years of age, Robert never saw a school. He was +a short time under the tuition of an old British soldier, who had strayed +into the settlement after the French war, "at which time," he says in a +letter to a friend, "I learned to repeat the shorter and larger +catechisms. These, with the Scripture proofs annexed to them, confirmed +me in the orthodoxy of my forefathers, and I hope I shall ever remain an +evidence of the truth of what the wise man said, 'Train up a child in the +way he should go, and when he is old he will not depart from it.'" He +afterwards took lessons with one Master McKeen, who used to spend much of +his time in hunting squirrels with his pupils. He learned to read and +write; and the old man always insisted that he should have done well at +ciphering also, had he not fallen in love with Molly Park. At the age of +eighteen he enlisted in the Revolutionary army, and was at the battle of +Saratoga. On his return he married his fair Molly, settled down as a +farmer in Windham, formerly a part of Londonderry, and before he was +thirty years of age became an elder in the church, of the creed and +observances of which he was always a zealous and resolute defender. From +occasional passages in his poems, it is evident that the instructions +which he derived from the pulpit were not unlike those which Burns +suggested as needful for the unlucky lad whom he was commending to his +friend Hamilton:-- + + "Ye 'll catechise him ilka quirk, + An' shore him weel wi' hell." + +In a humorous poem, entitled Spring's Lament, he thus describes the +consternation produced in the meeting-house at sermon time by a dog, who, +in search of his mistress, rattled and scraped at the "west porch +door:"-- + + "The vera priest was scared himsel', + His sermon he could hardly spell; + Auld carlins fancied they could smell + The brimstone matches; + They thought he was some imp o' hell, + In quest o' wretches." + +He lived to a good old age, a home-loving, unpretending farmer, +cultivating his acres with his own horny hands, and cheering the long +rainy days and winter evenings with homely rhyme. Most of his pieces +were written in the dialect of his ancestors, which was well understood +by his neighbors and friends, the only audience upon which he could +venture to calculate. He loved all old things, old language, old +customs, old theology. In a rhyming letter to his cousin Silas, +he says:-- + + "Though Death our ancestors has cleekit, + An' under clods then closely steekit, + We'll mark the place their chimneys reekit, + Their native tongue we yet wad speak it, + Wi' accent glib." + +He wrote sometimes to amuse his neighbors, often to soothe their sorrow +under domestic calamity, or to give expression to his own. With little +of that delicacy of taste which results from the attrition of fastidious +and refined society, and altogether too truthful and matter-of-fact to +call in the aid of imagination, he describes in the simplest and most +direct terms the circumstances in which he found himself, and the +impressions which these circumstances had made on his own mind. He calls +things by their right names; no euphuism or transcendentalism,--the +plainer and commoner the better. He tells us of his farm life, its +joys and sorrows, its mirth and care, with no embellishment, with no +concealment of repulsive and ungraceful features. Never having seen a +nightingale, he makes no attempt to describe the fowl; but he has seen +the night-hawk, at sunset, cutting the air above him, and he tells of it. +Side by side with his waving corn-fields and orchard-blooms we have the +barn-yard and pigsty. Nothing which was necessary to the comfort and +happiness of his home and avocation was to him "common or unclean." +Take, for instance, the following, from a poem written at the close of +autumn, after the death of his wife:-- + + "No more may I the Spring Brook trace, + No more with sorrow view the place + Where Mary's wash-tub stood; + No more may wander there alone, + And lean upon the mossy stone + Where once she piled her wood. + 'T was there she bleached her linen cloth, + By yonder bass-wood tree + From that sweet stream she made her broth, + Her pudding and her tea. + That stream, whose waters running, + O'er mossy root and stone, + Made ringing and singing, + Her voice could match alone." + +We envy not the man who can sneer at this simple picture. It is honest +as Nature herself. An old and lonely man looks back upon the young years +of his wedded life. Can we not look with him? The sunlight of a summer +morning is weaving itself with the leafy shadows of the bass-tree, +beneath which a fair and ruddy-checked young woman, with her full, +rounded arms bared to the elbow, bends not ungracefully to her task, +pausing ever and anon to play with the bright-eyed child beside her, and +mingling her songs with the pleasant murmurings of gliding water! Alas! +as the old man looks, he hears that voice, which perpetually sounds to us +all from the past--no more! + +Let us look at him in his more genial mood. Take the opening lines of +his Thanksgiving Day. What a plain, hearty picture of substantial +comfort! + + "When corn is in the garret stored, + And sauce in cellar well secured; + When good fat beef we can afford, + And things that 're dainty, + With good sweet cider on our board, + And pudding plenty; + + "When stock, well housed, may chew the cud, + And at my door a pile of wood, + A rousing fire to warm my blood, + Blest sight to see! + It puts my rustic muse in mood + To sing for thee." + +If he needs a simile, he takes the nearest at hand. In a letter to his +daughter he says:-- + + "That mine is not a longer letter, + The cause is not the want of matter,-- + Of that there's plenty, worse or better; + But like a mill + Whose stream beats back with surplus water, + The wheel stands still." + +Something of the humor of Burns gleams out occasionally from the sober +decorum of his verses. In an epistle to his friend Betton, high sheriff +of the county, who had sent to him for a peck of seed corn, he says:-- + + "Soon plantin' time will come again, + Syne may the heavens gie us rain, + An' shining heat to bless ilk plain + An' fertile hill, + An' gar the loads o' yellow grain, + Our garrets fill. + + "As long as I has food and clothing, + An' still am hale and fier and breathing, + Ye 's get the corn--and may be aething + Ye'll do for me; + (Though God forbid)--hang me for naething + An' lose your fee." + +And on receiving a copy of some verses written by a lady, he talks in a +sad way for a Presbyterian deacon:-- + + "Were she some Aborigine squaw, + Wha sings so sweet by nature's law, + I'd meet her in a hazle shaw, + Or some green loany, + And make her tawny phiz and 'a + My welcome crony." + +The practical philosophy of the stout, jovial rhymer was but little +affected by the sour-featured asceticism of the elder. He says:-- + + "We'll eat and drink, and cheerful take + Our portions for the Donor's sake, + For thus the Word of Wisdom spake-- + Man can't do better; + Nor can we by our labors make + The Lord our debtor!" + +A quaintly characteristic correspondence in rhyme between the Deacon and +Parson McGregore, evidently "birds o' ane feather," is still in +existence. The minister, in acknowledging the epistle of his old friend, +commences his reply as follows:-- + + "Did e'er a cuif tak' up a quill, + Wha ne'er did aught that he did well, + To gar the muses rant and reel, + An' flaunt and swagger, + Nae doubt ye 'll say 't is that daft chiel + Old Dite McGregore!" + +The reply is in the same strain, and may serve to give the reader some +idea of the old gentleman as a religious controversialist:-- + + "My reverend friend and kind McGregore, + Although thou ne'er was ca'd a bragger, + Thy muse I'm sure nave e'er was glegger + Thy Scottish lays + Might gar Socinians fa' or stagger, + E'en in their ways. + + "When Unitarian champions dare thee, + Goliah like, and think to scare thee, + Dear Davie, fear not, they'll ne'er waur thee; + But draw thy sling, + Weel loaded frae the Gospel quarry, + An' gie 't a fling." + +The last time I saw him, he was chaffering in the market-place of my +native village, swapping potatoes and onions and pumpkins for tea, +coffee, molasses, and, if the truth be told, New England rum. Threescore +years and ten, to use his own words, + + "Hung o'er his back, + And bent him like a muckle pack," + +yet he still stood stoutly and sturdily in his thick shoes of cowhide, +like one accustomed to tread independently the soil of his own acres,-- +his broad, honest face seamed by care and darkened by exposure to "all +the airts that blow," and his white hair flowing in patriarchal glory +beneath his felt hat. A genial, jovial, large-hearted old man, simple as +a child, and betraying, neither in look nor manner, that he was +accustomed to + + "Feed on thoughts which voluntary move + Harmonious numbers." + +Peace to him! A score of modern dandies and sentimentalists could ill +supply the place of this one honest man. In the ancient burial-ground of +Windham, by the side of his "beloved Molly," and in view of the old +meeting-house, there is a mound of earth, where, every spring, green +grasses tremble in the wind and the warm sunshine calls out the flowers. +There, gathered like one of his own ripe sheaves, the farmer poet sleeps +with his fathers. + + + + + + +PLACIDO, THE SLAVE POET. + +[1845.] + +I have been greatly interested in the fate of Juan Placido, the black +revolutionist of Cuba, who was executed in Havana, as the alleged +instigator and leader of an attempted revolt on the part of the slaves in +that city and its neighborhood. + +Juan Placido was born a slave on the estate of Don Terribio de Castro. +His father was an African, his mother a mulatto. His mistress treated +him with great kindness, and taught him to read. When he was twelve +years of age she died, and he fell into other and less compassionate +hands. At the age of eighteen, on seeing his mother struck with a heavy +whip, he for the first time turned upon his tormentors. To use his own +words, "I felt the blow in my heart. To utter a loud cry, and from a +downcast boy, with the timidity of one weak as a lamb, to become all at +office like a raging lion, was a thing of a moment." He was, however, +subdued, and the next morning, together with his mother, a tenderly +nurtured and delicate woman, severely scourged. On seeing his mother +rudely stripped and thrown down upon the ground, he at first with tears +implored the overseer to spare her; but at the sound of the first blow, +as it cut into her naked flesh, he sprang once more upon the ruffian, +who, having superior strength, beat him until he was nearer dead than +alive. + +After suffering all the vicissitudes of slavery,--hunger, nakedness, +stripes; after bravely and nobly bearing up against that slow, dreadful +process which reduces the man to a thing, the image of God to a piece of +merchandise, until he had reached his thirty-eighth year, he was +unexpectedly released from his bonds. Some literary gentlemen in Havana, +into whose hands two or three pieces of his composition had fallen, +struck with the vigor, spirit, and natural grace which they manifested, +sought out the author, and raised a subscription to purchase his freedom. +He came to Havana, and maintained himself by house-painting, and such +other employments as his ingenuity and talents placed within his reach. +He wrote several poems, which have been published in Spanish at Havana, +and translated by Dr. Madden, under the title of _Poems by a Slave_. + +It is not too much to say of these poems that they will bear a comparison +with most of the productions of modern Spanish literature. The style is +bold, free, energetic. Some of the pieces are sportive and graceful; +such is the address to _The Cucuya_, or Cuban firefly. This beautiful +insect is sometimes fastened in tiny nets to the light dresses of the +Cuban ladies, a custom to which the writer gallantly alludes in the +following lines:-- + + "Ah!--still as one looks on such brightness and bloom, + On such beauty as hers, one might envy the doom + Of a captive Cucuya that's destined, like this, + To be touched by her hand and revived by her kiss! + In the cage which her delicate hand has prepared, + The beautiful prisoner nestles unscared, + O'er her fair forehead shining serenely and bright, + In beauty's own bondage revealing its light! + And when the light dance and the revel are done, + She bears it away to her alcove alone, + Where, fed by her hand from the cane that's most choice, + In secret it gleans at the sound of her voice! + O beautiful maiden! may Heaven accord + Thy care of the captive a fitting reward, + And never may fortune the fetters remove + Of a heart that is thine in the bondage of love!" + +In his Dream, a fragment of some length, Placido dwells in a touching +manner upon the scenes of his early years. It is addressed to his +brother Florence, who was a slave near Matanzas, while the author was in +the same condition at Havana. There is a plaintive and melancholy +sweetness in these lines, a natural pathos, which finds its way to the +heart:-- + + "Thou knowest, dear Florence, my sufferings of old, + The struggles maintained with oppression for years; + We shared them together, and each was consoled + With the love which was nurtured by sorrow and tears. + + "But now far apart, the sad pleasure is gone, + We mingle our sighs and our sorrows no more; + The course is a new one which each has to run, + And dreary for each is the pathway before. + + "But in slumber our spirits at least shall commune, + We will meet as of old in the visions of sleep, + In dreams which call back early days, when at noon + We stole to the shade of the palm-tree to weep! + + "For solitude pining, in anguish of late + The heights of Quintana I sought for repose; + And there, in the cool and the silence, the weight + Of my cares was forgotten, I felt not any woes. + + "Exhausted and weary, the spell of the place + Sank down on my eyelids, and soft slumber stole + So sweetly upon me, it left not a trace + Of sorrow o'ercasting the light of the soul." + + +The writer then imagines himself borne lightly through the air to the +place of his birth. The valley of Matanzas lies beneath him, hallowed by +the graves of his parents. He proceeds:-- + + "I gazed on that spot where together we played, + Our innocent pastimes came fresh to my mind, + Our mother's caress, and the fondness displayed + In each word and each look of a parent so kind. + + "I looked on the mountain, whose fastnesses wild + The fugitives seek from the rifle and hound; + Below were the fields where they suffered and toiled, + And there the low graves of their comrades are found. + + "The mill-house was there, and the turmoil of old; + But sick of these scenes, for too well were they known, + I looked for the stream where in childhood I strolled + When a moment of quiet and peace was my own. + + "With mingled emotions of pleasure and pain, + Dear Florence, I sighed to behold thee once more; + I sought thee, my brother, embraced thee again, + But I found thee a slave as I left thee before!" + +Some of his devotional pieces evince the fervor and true feeling of the +Christian poet. His _Ode to Religion_ contains many admirable lines. +Speaking of the martyrs of the early days of Christianity, he says +finely:-- + + "Still in that cradle, purpled with their blood, + The infant Faith waxed stronger day by day." + +I cannot forbear quoting the last stanza of this poem:-- + + "O God of mercy, throned in glory high, + On earth and all its misery look down: + Behold the wretched, hear the captive's cry, + And call Thy exiled children round Thy throne! + There would I fain in contemplation gaze + On Thy eternal beauty, and would make + Of love one lasting canticle of praise, + And every theme but Thee henceforth forsake!" + +His best and noblest production is an ode _To Cuba_, written on the +occasion of Dr. Madden's departure from the island, and presented to that +gentleman. It was never published in Cuba, as its sentiments would have +subjected the author to persecution. It breathes a lofty spirit of +patriotism, and an indignant sense of the wrongs inflicted upon his race. +Withal, it has something of the grandeur and stateliness of the old +Spanish muse. + + "Cuba!--of what avail that thou art fair, + Pearl of the Seas, the pride of the Antilles, + If thy poor sons have still to see thee share + The pangs of bondage and its thousand ills? + Of what avail the verdure of thy hills, + The purple bloom thy coffee-plain displays; + The cane's luxuriant growth, whose culture fills + More graves than famine, or the sword finds ways + To glut with victims calmly as it slays? + + "Of what avail that thy clear streams abound + With precious ore, if wealth there's, none to buy + Thy children's rights, and not one grain is found + For Learning's shrine, or for the altar nigh + Of poor, forsaken, downcast Liberty? + Of what avail the riches of thy port, + Forests of masts and ships from every sea, + If Trade alone is free, and man, the sport + And spoil of Trade, bears wrongs of every sort? + + "Cuba! O Cuba!---when men call thee fair, + And rich, and beautiful, the Queen of Isles, + Star of the West, and Ocean's gem most rare, + Oh, say to those who mock thee with such wiles: + Take off these flowers; and view the lifeless spoils + Which wait the worm; behold their hues beneath + The pale, cold cheek; and seek for living smiles + Where Beauty lies not in the arms of Death, + And Bondage taints not with its poison breath!" + +The disastrous result of the last rising of the slaves--in Cuba is well +known. Betrayed, and driven into premature collision with their +oppressors, the insurrectionists were speedily crushed into subjection. +Placido was arrested, and after a long hearing was condemned to be +executed, and consigned to the Chapel of the Condemned. + +How far he was implicated in the insurrectionary movement it is now +perhaps impossible to ascertain. The popular voice at Havana pronounced +him its leader and projector, and as such he was condemned. His own +bitter wrongs; the terrible recollections of his life of servitude; the +sad condition of his relatives and race, exposed to scorn, contumely, and +the heavy hand of violence; the impunity with which the most dreadful +outrages upon the persons of slaves were inflicted,--acting upon a mind +fully capable of appreciating the beauty and dignity of freedom,-- +furnished abundant incentives to an effort for the redemption of his race +and the humiliation of his oppressors. The Heraldo, of Madrid speaks of +him as "the celebrated poet, a man of great natural genius, and beloved +and appreciated by the most respectable young men of Havana." It accuses +him of wild and ambitious projects, and states that he was intended to be +the chief of the black race after they had thrown off the yoke of +bondage. + +He was executed at Havana in the seventh month, 1844. According to the +custom in Cuba with condemned criminals, he was conducted from prison to +the Chapel of the Doomed. He passed thither with singular composure, +amidst a great concourse of people, gracefully saluting his numerous +acquaintances. The chapel was hung with black cloth, and dimly lighted. +He was seated beside his coffin. Priests in long black robes stood +around him, chanting in sepulchral voices the service of the dead. It is +an ordeal under which the stoutest-hearted and most resolute have been +found to sink. After enduring it for twenty-four hours he was led out to +execution. He came forth calm and undismayed; holding a crucifix in his +hand, he recited in a loud, clear voice a solemn prayer in verse, which +he had composed amidst the horrors of the Chapel. The following is an +imperfect rendering of a poem which thrilled the hearts of all who heard +it:-- + + "God of unbounded love and power eternal, + To Thee I turn in darkness and despair! + Stretch forth Thine arm, and from the brow infernal + Of Calumny the veil of Justice tear; + And from the forehead of my honest fame + Pluck the world's brand of infamy and shame! + + "O King of kings!--my fathers' God!--who only + Art strong to save, by whom is all controlled, + Who givest the sea its waves, the dark and lonely + Abyss of heaven its light, the North its cold, + The air its currents, the warm sun its beams, + Life to the flowers, and motion to the streams! + + "All things obey Thee, dying or reviving + As thou commandest; all, apart from Thee, + From Thee alone their life and power deriving, + Sink and are lost in vast eternity! + Yet doth the void obey Thee; since from naught + This marvellous being by Thy hand was wrought. + + "O merciful God! I cannot shun Thy presence, + For through its veil of flesh Thy piercing eye + Looketh upon my spirit's unsoiled essence, + As through the pure transparence of the sky; + Let not the oppressor clap his bloody hands, + As o'er my prostrate innocence he stands! + + "But if, alas, it seemeth good to Thee + That I should perish as the guilty dies, + And that in death my foes should gaze on me + With hateful malice and exulting eyes, + Speak Thou the word, and bid them shed my blood, + Fully in me Thy will be done, O God!" + +On arriving at the fatal spot, he sat down as ordered, on a bench, with +his back to the soldiers. The multitude recollected that in some +affecting lines, written by the conspirator in prison, he had said that +it would be useless to seek to kill him by shooting his body,--that his +heart must be pierced ere it would cease its throbbings. At the last +moment, just as the soldiers were about to fire, he rose up and gazed for +an instant around and above him on the beautiful capital of his native +land and its sail-flecked bay, on the dense crowds about him, the blue +mountains in the distance, and the sky glorious with summer sunshine. +"Adios, mundo!" (Farewell, world!) he said calmly, and sat down. The +word was given, and five balls entered his body. Then it was that, +amidst the groans and murmurs of the horror-stricken spectators, he rose +up once more, and turned his head to the shuddering soldiers, his face +wearing an expression of superhuman courage. "Will no one pity me?" he +said, laying his hand over his heart. "Here, fire here!" While he yet +spake, two balls entered his heart, and he fell dead. + +Thus perished the hero poet of Cuba. He has not fallen in vain. His +genius and his heroic death will doubtless be regarded by his race as +precious legacies. To the great names of L'Ouverture and Petion the +colored man can now add that of Juan Placido. + + + + + + + + PERSONAL SKETCHES AND TRIBUTES + + +THE FUNERAL OF TORREY. + + Charles T. Torrey, an able young Congregational clergyman, died May + 9, 1846, in the state's prison of Maryland, for the offence of + aiding slaves to escape from bondage. His funeral in Boston, + attended by thousands, was a most impressive occasion. The + following is an extract from an article written for the _Essex + Transcript_:-- + +Some seven years ago, we saw Charles T. Torrey for the first time. His +wife was leaning on his arm,--young, loving, and beautiful; the heart +that saw them blessed them. Since that time, we have known him as a most +energetic and zealous advocate of the anti-slavery cause. He had fine +talents, improved by learning and observation, a clear, intensely active +intellect, and a heart full of sympathy and genial humanity. It was with +strange and bitter feelings that we bent over his coffin and looked upon +his still face. The pity which we had felt for him in his long +sufferings gave place to indignation against his murderers. Hateful +beyond the power of expression seemed the tyranny which had murdered him +with the slow torture of the dungeon. May God forgive us, if for the +moment we felt like grasping His dread prerogative of vengeance. As we +passed out of the hall, a friend grasped our hand hard, his eye flashing +through its tears, with a stern reflection of our own emotions, while he +whispered through his pressed lips: "It is enough to turn every anti- +slavery heart into steel." Our blood boiled; we longed to see the wicked +apologists of slavery--the blasphemous defenders of it in Church and +State--led up to the coffin of our murdered brother, and there made to +feel that their hands had aided in riveting the chain upon those still +limbs, and in shutting out from those cold lips the free breath of +heaven. + +A long procession followed his remains to their resting-place at Mount +Auburn. A monument to his memory will be raised in that cemetery, in the +midst of the green beauty of the scenery which he loved in life, and side +by side with the honored dead of Massachusetts. Thither let the friends +of humanity go to gather fresh strength from the memory of the martyr. +There let the slaveholder stand, and as he reads the record of the +enduring marble commune with his own heart, and feel that sorrow which +worketh repentance. + +The young, the beautiful, the brave!--he is safe now from the malice of +his enemies. Nothing can harm him more. His work for the poor and +helpless was well and nobly done. In the wild woods of Canada, around +many a happy fireside and holy family altar, his name is on the lips of +God's poor. He put his soul in their souls' stead; he gave his life for +those who had no claim on his love save that of human brotherhood. How +poor, how pitiful and paltry, seem our labors! How small and mean our +trials and sacrifices! May the spirit of the dead be with us, and infuse +into our hearts something of his own deep sympathy, his hatred of +injustice, his strong faith and heroic endurance. May that spirit be +gladdened in its present sphere by the increased zeal and faithfulness of +the friends he has left behind. + + + + +EDWARD EVERETT. + +A letter to Robert C. Waterston. + +Amesbury, 27th 1st Month, 1865. + +I acknowledge through thee the invitation of the standing committee of +the Massachusetts Historical Society to be present at a special meeting +of the Society for the purpose of paying a tribute to the memory of our +late illustrious associate, Edward Everett. + +It is a matter of deep regret to me that the state of my health will not +permit me to be with you on an occasion of so much interest. + +It is most fitting that the members of the Historical Society of +Massachusetts should add their tribute to those which have been already +offered by all sects, parties, and associations to the name and fame of +their late associate. He was himself a maker of history, and part and +parcel of all the noble charities and humanizing influences of his State +and time. + +When the grave closed over him who added new lustre to the old and +honored name of Quincy, all eyes instinctively turned to Edward Everett +as the last of that venerated class of patriotic civilians who, outliving +all dissent and jealousy and party prejudice, held their reputation by +the secure tenure of the universal appreciation of its worth as a common +treasure of the republic. It is not for me to pronounce his eulogy. +Others, better qualified by their intimate acquaintance with him, have +done and will do justice to his learning, eloquence, varied culture, and +social virtues. My secluded country life has afforded me few +opportunities of personal intercourse with him, while my pronounced +radicalism on the great question which has divided popular feeling +rendered our political paths widely divergent. Both of us early saw the +danger which threatened the country. In the language of the prophet, we +"saw the sword coming upon the land," but while he believed in the +possibility of averting it by concession and compromise, I, on the +contrary, as firmly believed that such a course could only strengthen and +confirm what I regarded as a gigantic conspiracy against the rights and +liberties, the union and the life, of the nation. + +Recent events have certainly not tended to change this belief on my part; +but in looking over the past, while I see little or nothing to retract in +the matter of opinion, I am saddened by the reflection that through the +very intensity of my convictions I may have done injustice to the motives +of those with whom I differed. As respects Edward Everett, it seems to +me that only within the last four years I have truly known him. + +In that brief period, crowded as it is with a whole life-work of +consecration to the union, freedom, and glory of his country, he not only +commanded respect and reverence, but concentrated upon himself in a most +remarkable degree the love of all loyal and generous hearts. We have +seen, in these years of trial, very great sacrifices offered upon the +altar of patriotism,--wealth, ease, home, love, life itself. But Edward +Everett did more than this: he laid on that altar not only his time, +talents, and culture, but his pride of opinion, his long-cherished views +of policy, his personal and political predilections and prejudices, his +constitutional fastidiousness of conservatism, and the carefully +elaborated symmetry of his public reputation. With a rare and noble +magnanimity, he met, without hesitation, the demand of the great +occasion. Breaking away from all the besetments of custom and +association, he forgot the things that are behind, and, with an eye +single to present duty, pressed forward towards the mark of the high +calling of Divine Providence in the events of our time. All honor to +him! If we mourn that he is now beyond the reach of our poor human +praise, let us reverently trust that he has received that higher plaudit: +"Well done, thou good and faithful servant!" + +When I last met him, as my colleague in the Electoral College of +Massachusetts, his look of health and vigor seemed to promise us many +years of his wisdom and usefulness. On greeting him I felt impelled to +express my admiration and grateful appreciation of his patriotic labors; +and I shall never forget how readily and gracefully he turned attention +from himself to the great cause in which we had a common interest, and +expressed his thankfulness that he had still a country to serve. + +To keep green the memory of such a man is at once a privilege and a duty. +That stainless life of seventy years is a priceless legacy. His hands +were pure. The shadow of suspicion never fell on him. If he erred in +his opinions (and that he did so he had the Christian grace and courage +to own), no selfish interest weighed in the scale of his judgment against +truth. + +As our thoughts follow him to his last resting-place, we are sadly +reminded of his own touching lines, written many years ago at Florence. +The name he has left behind is none the less "pure" that instead of being +"humble," as he then anticipated, it is on the lips of grateful millions, +and written ineffaceable on the record of his country's trial and +triumph:-- + + "Yet not for me when I shall fall asleep + Shall Santa Croce's lamps their vigils keep. + Beyond the main in Auburn's quiet shade, + With those I loved and love my couch be made; + Spring's pendant branches o'er the hillock wave, + And morning's dewdrops glisten on my grave, + While Heaven's great arch shall rise above my bed, + When Santa Croce's crumbles on her dead,-- + Unknown to erring or to suffering fame, + So may I leave a pure though humble name." + +Congratulating the Society on the prospect of the speedy consummation of +the great objects of our associate's labors,--the peace and permanent +union of our country,-- + +I am very truly thy friend. + + + + +LEWIS TAPPAN. + +[1873.] + +One after another, those foremost in the antislavery conflict of the last +half century are rapidly passing away. The grave has just closed over +all that was mortal of Salmon P. Chase, the kingliest of men, a statesman +second to no other in our history, too great and pure for the Presidency, +yet leaving behind him a record which any incumbent of that station might +envy,--and now the telegraph brings us the tidings of the death of Lewis +Tappan, of Brooklyn, so long and so honorably identified with the anti- +slavery cause, and with every philanthropic and Christian enterprise. He +was a native of Massachusetts, born at Northampton in 1788, of Puritan +lineage,--one of a family remarkable for integrity, decision of +character, and intellectual ability. At the very outset, in company with +his brother Arthur, he devoted his time, talents, wealth, and social +position to the righteous but unpopular cause of Emancipation, and +became, in consequence, a mark for the persecution which followed such +devotion. His business was crippled, his name cast out as evil, his +dwelling sacked, and his furniture dragged into the street and burned. +Yet he never, in the darkest hour, faltered or hesitated for a moment. +He knew he was right, and that the end would justify him; one of the +cheerfullest of men, he was strong where others were weak, hopeful where +others despaired. He was wise in counsel, and prompt in action; like +Tennyson's Sir Galahad, + + "His strength was as the strength of ten, + Because his heart was pure." + +I met him for the first time forty years ago, at the convention which +formed the American Anti-Slavery Society, where I chanced to sit by him +as one of the secretaries. Myself young and inexperienced, I remember +how profoundly I was impressed by his cool self-possession, clearness of +perception, and wonderful executive ability. Had he devoted himself to +party politics with half the zeal which he manifested in behalf of those +who had no votes to give and no honors to bestow, he could have reached +the highest offices in the land. He chose his course, knowing all that +he renounced, and he chose it wisely. He never, at least, regretted it. + +And now, at the ripe age of eighty-five years, the brave old man has +passed onward to the higher life, having outlived here all hatred, abuse, +and misrepresentation, having seen the great work of Emancipation +completed, and white men and black men equal before the law. I saw him +for the last time three years ago, when he was preparing his valuable +biography of his beloved brother Arthur. Age had begun to tell upon his +constitution, but his intellectual force was not abated. The old, +pleasant laugh and playful humor remained. He looked forward to the +close of life hopefully, even cheerfully, as he called to mind the dear +friends who had passed on before him, to await his coming. + +Of the sixty-three signers of the Anti-Slavery Declaration at the +Philadelphia Convention in 1833, probably not more than eight or ten are +now living. + + "As clouds that rake the mountain summits, + As waves that know no guiding hand, + So swift has brother followed brother + From sunshine to the sunless land." + +Yet it is a noteworthy fact that the oldest member of that convention, +David Thurston, D. D., of Maine, lived to see the slaves emancipated, and +to mingle his voice of thanksgiving with the bells that rang in the day +of universal freedom. + + + + +BAYARD TAYLOR + +Read at the memorial meeting in Tremont Temple, Boston, January 10, 1879. + +I am not able to attend the memorial meeting in Tremont Temple on the +10th instant, but my heart responds to any testimonial appreciative of +the intellectual achievements and the noble and manly life of Bayard +Taylor. More than thirty years have intervened between my first meeting +him in the fresh bloom of his youth and hope and honorable ambition, and +my last parting with him under the elms of Boston Common, after our visit +to Richard H. Dana, on the occasion of the ninetieth anniversary of that +honored father of American poetry, still living to lament the death of +his younger disciple and friend. How much he has accomplished in these +years! The most industrious of men, slowly, patiently, under many +disadvantages, he built up his splendid reputation. Traveller, editor, +novelist, translator, diplomatist, and through all and above all poet, +what he was he owed wholly to himself. His native honesty was satisfied +with no half tasks. He finished as he went, and always said and did his +best. + +It is perhaps too early to assign him his place in American literature. +His picturesque books of travel, his Oriental lyrics, his Pennsylvanian +idyls, his Centennial ode, the pastoral beauty and Christian sweetness of +Lars, and the high argument and rhythmic marvel of Deukalion are sureties +of the permanence of his reputation. But at this moment my thoughts +dwell rather upon the man than the author. The calamity of his death, +felt in both hemispheres, is to me and to all who intimately knew and +loved him a heavy personal loss. Under the shadow of this bereavement, +in the inner circle of mourning, we sorrow most of all that we shall see +his face no more, and long for "the touch of a vanished hand, and the +sound of a voice that is still." + + + + +WILLIAM ELLERY CHANNING + +Read at the dedication of the Channing Memorial Church at Newport, R. I. + +DANVERS, MASS., 3d Mo., 13, 1880. + +I scarcely need say that I yield to no one in love and reverence for the +great and good man whose memory, outliving all prejudices of creed, sect, +and party, is the common legacy of Christendom. As the years go on, the +value of that legacy will be more and more felt; not so much, perhaps, in +doctrine as in spirit, in those utterances of a devout soul which are +above and beyond the affirmation or negation of dogma. + +His ethical severity and Christian tenderness; his hatred of wrong and +oppression, with love and pity for the wrong-doer; his noble pleas for +self-culture, temperance, peace, and purity; and above all, his precept +and example of unquestioning obedience to duty and the voice of God in +his soul, can never become obsolete. It is very fitting that his memory +should be especially cherished with that of Hopkins and Berkeley in the +beautiful island to which the common residence of those worthies has lent +additional charms and interest. + + + + + +DEATH OF PRESIDENT GARFIELD. + +A letter written to W. H. B. Currier, of Amesbury, Mass. + +DANVERS, MASS., 9th Mo., 24, 1881. + +I regret that it is not in my power to join the citizens of Amesbury and +Salisbury in the memorial services on the occasion of the death of our +lamented President. But in heart and sympathy I am with you. I share +the great sorrow which overshadows the land; I fully appreciate the +irretrievable loss. But it seems to me that the occasion is one for +thankfulness as well as grief. + +Through all the stages of the solemn tragedy which has just closed with +the death of our noblest and best, I have felt that the Divine Providence +was overruling the mighty affliction,--that the patient sufferer at +Washington was drawing with cords of sympathy all sections and parties +nearer to each other. And now, when South and North, Democrat and +Republican, Radical and Conservative, lift their voices in one unbroken +accord of lamentation; when I see how, in spite of the greed of gain, the +lust of office, the strifes and narrowness of party politics, the great +heart of the nation proves sound and loyal, I feel a new hope for the +republic, I have a firmer faith in its stability. It is said that no man +liveth and no man dieth to himself; and the pure and noble life of +Garfield, and his slow, long martyrdom, so bravely borne in view of all, +are, I believe, bearing for us as a people "the peaceable fruits of +righteousness." We are stronger, wiser, better, for them. + +With him it is well. His mission fulfilled, he goes to his grave by the +Lakeside honored and lamented as man never was before. The whole world +mourns him. There is no speech nor language where the voice of his +praise is not heard. About his grave gather, with heads uncovered, the +vast brotherhood of man. + +And with us it is well, also. We are nearer a united people than ever +before. We are at peace with all; our future is full of promise; our +industrial and financial condition is hopeful. God grant that, while our +material interests prosper, the moral and spiritual influence of the +occasion may be permanently felt; that the solemn sacrament of Sorrow, +whereof we have been made partakers, may be blest to the promotion of the +righteousness which exalteth a nation. + + + + +LYDIA MARIA CHILD. + + In 1882 a collection of the Letters of Lydia Maria Child was + published, for which I wrote the following sketch, as an + introduction:-- + +In presenting to the public this memorial volume, its compilers deemed +that a brief biographical introduction was necessary; and as a labor of +love I have not been able to refuse their request to prepare it. + +Lydia Maria Francis was born in Medford, Massachusetts, February 11, +1802. Her father, Convers Francis, was a worthy and substantial citizen +of that town. Her brother, Convers Francis, afterwards theological +professor in Harvard College, was some years older than herself, and +assisted her in her early home studies, though, with the perversity of an +elder brother, he sometimes mystified her in answering her questions. +Once, when she wished to know what was meant by Milton's "raven down of +darkness," which was made to smile when smoothed, he explained that it +was only the fur of a black cat, which sparkled when stroked! Later in +life this brother wrote of her, "She has been a dear, good sister to me +would that I had been half as good a brother to her." Her earliest +teacher was an aged spinster, known in the village as "Marm Betty," +painfully shy, and with many oddities of person and manner, the never- +forgotten calamity of whose life was that Governor Brooks once saw her +drinking out of the nose of her tea-kettle. Her school was in her +bedroom, always untidy, and she was a constant chewer of tobacco but the +children were fond of her, and Maria and her father always carried her a +good Sunday dinner. Thomas W. Higginson, in _Eminent Women of the Age_, +mentions in this connection that, according to an established custom, on +the night before Thanksgiving "all the humble friends of the Francis +household--Marm Betty, the washerwoman, wood-sawyer, and journeymen, some +twenty or thirty in all--were summoned to a preliminary entertainment. +They there partook of an immense chicken pie, pumpkin pie made in milk- +pans, and heaps of doughnuts. They feasted in the large, old-fashioned +kitchen, and went away loaded with crackers and bread and pies, not +forgetting 'turnovers' for the children. Such plain application of the +doctrine that it is more blessed to give than receive may have done more +to mould the character of Lydia Maria Child of maturer years than all the +faithful labors of good Dr. Osgood, to whom she and her brother used to +repeat the Assembly's catechism once a month." + +Her education was limited to the public schools, with the exception of +one year at a private seminary in her native town. From a note by her +brother, Dr. Francis, we learn that when twelve years of age she went to +Norridgewock, Maine, where her married sister resided. At Dr. Brown's, +in Skowhegan, she first read _Waverley_. She was greatly excited, and +exclaimed, as she laid down the book, "Why cannot I write a novel?" +She remained in Norridgewock and vicinity for several years, and on her +return to Massachusetts took up her abode with her brother at Watertown. +He encouraged her literary tastes, and it was in his study that she +commenced her first story, _Hobomok_, which she published in the twenty- +first year of her age. The success it met with induced her to give to +the public, soon after, _The Rebels: a Tale of the Revolution_, which was +at once received into popular favor, and ran rapidly through several +editions. Then followed in close succession _The Mother's Book_, running +through eight American editions, twelve English, and one German, _The +Girl's Book_, the _History of Women_, and the _Frugal Housewife_, of +which thirty-five editions were published. Her _Juvenile Miscellany_ was +commenced in 1826. + +It is not too much to say that half a century ago she was the most +popular literary woman in the United States. She had published +historical novels of unquestioned power of description and +characterization, and was widely and favorably known as the editor of the +_Juvenile Miscellany_, which was probably the first periodical in the +English tongue devoted exclusively to children, and to which she was by +far the largest contributor. Some of the tales and poems from her pen +were extensively copied and greatly admired. It was at this period that +the _North American Review_, the highest literary authority of the +country, said of her, "We are not sure that any woman of our country +could outrank Mrs. Child. This lady has been long before the public as +an author with much success. And she well deserves it, for in all her +works nothing can be found which does not commend itself, by its tone of +healthy morality and good sense. Few female writers, if any, have done +more or better things for our literature in the lighter or graver +departments." + +Comparatively young, she had placed herself in the front rank of American +authorship. Her books and her magazine had a large circulation, and were +affording her a comfortable income, at a time when the rewards of +authorship were uncertain and at the best scanty. + +In 1828 she married David Lee Child, Esq., a young and able lawyer, and +took up her residence in Boston. In 1831-32 both became deeply +interested in the subject of slavery, through the writings and personal +influence of William Lloyd Garrison. Her husband, a member of the +Massachusetts legislature and editor of the _Massachusetts Journal_, had, +at an earlier date, denounced the project of the dismemberment of Mexico +for the purpose of strengthening and extending American slavery. He was +one of the earliest members of the New England Anti-Slavery Society, and +his outspoken hostility to the peculiar institution greatly and +unfavorably affected his interests as a lawyer. In 1832 he addressed a +series of able letters on slavery and the slave-trade to Edward S. Abdy, +a prominent English philanthropist. In 1836 he published in Philadelphia +ten strongly written articles on the same subject. He visited England +and France in 1837, and while in Paris addressed an elaborate memoir to +the Societe pour l'Abolition d'Esclavage, and a paper on the same subject +to the editor of the _Eclectic Review_, in London. To his facts and +arguments John Quincy Adams was much indebted in the speeches which he +delivered in Congress on the Texas question. + +In 1833 the American Anti-Slavery Society was formed by a convention in +Philadelphia. Its numbers were small, and it was everywhere spoken +against. It was at this time that Lydia Maria Child startled the country +by the publication of her noble _Appeal in Behalf of that Class of +Americans called Africans_. It is quite impossible for any one of the +present generation to imagine the popular surprise and indignation which +the book called forth, or how entirely its author cut herself off from +the favor and sympathy of a large number of those who had previously +delighted to do her honor. Social and literary circles, which had been +proud of her presence, closed their doors against her. The sale of her +books, the subscriptions to her magazine, fell off to a ruinous extent. +She knew all she was hazarding, and made the great sacrifice, prepared +for all the consequences which followed. In the preface to her book she +says, "I am fully aware of the unpopularity of the task I have +undertaken; but though I expect ridicule and censure, I do not fear them. +A few years hence, the opinion of the world will be a matter in which I +have not even the most transient interest; but this book will be abroad +on its mission of humanity long after the hand that wrote it is mingling +with the dust. Should it be the means of advancing, even one single +hour, the inevitable progress of truth and justice, I would not exchange +the consciousness for all Rothschild's wealth or Sir Walter's fame." + +Thenceforth her life was a battle; a constant rowing hard against the +stream of popular prejudice and hatred. And through it all--pecuniary +privation, loss of friends and position, the painfulness of being +suddenly thrust from "the still air of delightful studies" into the +bitterest and sternest controversy of the age--she bore herself with +patience, fortitude, and unshaken reliance upon the justice and ultimate +triumph of the cause she had espoused. Her pen was never idle. Wherever +there was a brave word to be spoken, her voice was heard, and never +without effect. It is not exaggeration to say that no man or woman at +that period rendered more substantial service to the cause of freedom, or +made such a "great renunciation" in doing it. + +A practical philanthropist, she had the courage of her convictions, and +from the first was no mere closet moralist or sentimental bewailer of the +woes of humanity. She was the Samaritan stooping over the wounded Jew. +She calmly and unflinchingly took her place by the side, of the despised +slave and free man of color, and in word and act protested against the +cruel prejudice which shut out its victims from the rights and privileges +of American citizens. Her philanthropy had no taint of fanaticism; +throughout the long struggle, in which she was a prominent actor, she +kept her fine sense of humor, good taste, and sensibility to the +beautiful in art and nature. + + The opposition she met with from those who had shared her confidence + and friendship was of course keenly felt, but her kindly and genial + disposition remained unsoured. She rarely spoke of her personal + trials, and never posed as a martyr. The nearest approach to + anything like complaint is in the following lines, the date of which + I have not been able to ascertain:-- + + THE WORLD THAT I AM PASSING THROUGH. + + Few in the days of early youth + Trusted like me in love and truth. + I've learned sad lessons from the years, + But slowly, and with many tears; + For God made me to kindly view + The world that I am passing through. + + Though kindness and forbearance long + Must meet ingratitude and wrong, + I still would bless my fellow-men, + And trust them though deceived again. + God help me still to kindly view + The world that I am passing through. + + From all that fate has brought to me + I strive to learn humility, + And trust in Him who rules above, + Whose universal law is love. + Thus only can I kindly view + The world that I am passing through. + + When I approach the setting sun, + And feel my journey well-nigh done, + May Earth be veiled in genial light, + And her last smile to me seem bright. + Help me till then to kindly view + The world that I am passing through. + + And all who tempt a trusting heart + From faith and hope to drift apart, + May they themselves be spared the pain + Of losing power to trust again. + God help us all to kindly view + The world that we are passing through. + +While faithful to the great duty which she felt was laid upon her in an +especial manner, she was by no means a reformer of one idea, but her +interest was manifested in every question affecting the welfare of +humanity. Peace, temperance, education, prison reform, and equality of +civil rights, irrespective of sex, engaged her attention. Under all the +disadvantages of her estrangement from popular favor, her charming Greek +romance of _Philothea_ and her _Lives of Madame Roland_ and the _Baroness +de Stael_ proved that her literary ability had lost nothing of its +strength, and that the hand which penned such terrible rebukes had still +kept its delicate touch, and gracefully yielded to the inspiration of +fancy and art. While engaged with her husband in the editorial +supervision of the _Anti-Slavery Standard_, she wrote her admirable +_Letters from New York_; humorous, eloquent, and picturesque, but still +humanitarian in tone, which extorted the praise of even a pro-slavery +community. Her great work, in three octavo volumes, _The Progress of +Religious Ideas_, belongs, in part, to that period. It is an attempt to +represent in a candid, unprejudiced manner the rise and progress of the +great religions of the world, and their ethical relations to each other. +She availed herself of, and carefully studied, the authorities at that +time accessible, and the result is creditable to her scholarship, +industry, and conscientiousness. If, in her desire to do justice to the +religions of Buddha and Mohammed, in which she has been followed by +Maurice, Max Muller, and Dean Stanley, she seems at times to dwell upon +the best and overlook the darker features of those systems, her +concluding reflections should vindicate her from the charge of +undervaluing the Christian faith, or of lack of reverent appreciation of +its founder. In the closing chapter of her work, in which the large +charity and broad sympathies of her nature are manifest, she thus turns +with words of love, warm from the heart, to Him whose Sermon on the Mount +includes most that is good and true and vital in the religions and +philosophies of the world:-- + +"It was reserved for Him to heal the brokenhearted, to preach a gospel to +the poor, to say, 'Her sins, which are many, are forgiven, for she loved +much.' Nearly two thousand years have passed away since these words of +love and pity were uttered, yet when I read them my eyes fill with tears. +I thank Thee, O Heavenly Father, for all the messengers thou hast sent to +man; but, above all, I thank Thee for Him, thy beloved Son! Pure lily +blossom of the centuries, taking root in the lowliest depths, and +receiving the light and warmth of heaven in its golden heart! All that +the pious have felt, all that poets have said, all that artists have +done, with their manifold forms of beauty, to represent the ministry of +Jesus, are but feeble expressions of the great debt we owe Him who is +even now curing the lame, restoring sight to the blind, and raising the +dead in that spiritual sense wherein all miracle is true." + +During her stay in New York, as editor of the _Anti-Slavery Standard_, +she found a pleasant home at the residence of the genial philanthropist, +Isaac T. Hopper, whose remarkable life she afterwards wrote. Her +portrayal of this extraordinary man, so brave, so humorous, so tender and +faithful to his convictions of duty, is one of the most readable pieces +of biography in English literature. Thomas Wentworth Higginson, in a +discriminating paper published in 1869, speaks of her eight years' +sojourn in New York as the most interesting and satisfactory period of +her whole life. "She was placed where her sympathetic nature found +abundant outlet and occupation. Dwelling in a house where +disinterestedness and noble labor were as daily breath, she had great +opportunities. There was no mere alms-giving; but sin and sorrow must +be brought home to the fireside and the heart; the fugitive slave, the +drunkard, the outcast woman, must be the chosen guests of the abode,-- +must be taken, and held, and loved into reformation or hope." + +It would be a very imperfect representation of Maria Child which regarded +her only from a literary point of view. She was wise in counsel; and men +like Charles Sumner, Henry Wilson, Salmon P. Chase, and Governor Andrew +availed themselves of her foresight and sound judgment of men and +measures. Her pen was busy with correspondence, and whenever a true man +or a good cause needed encouragement, she was prompt to give it. Her +donations for benevolent causes and beneficent reforms were constant and +liberal; and only those who knew her intimately could understand the +cheerful and unintermitted self-denial which alone enabled her to make +them. She did her work as far as possible out of sight, without noise or +pretension. Her time, talents, and money were held not as her own, but a +trust from the Eternal Father for the benefit of His suffering children. +Her plain, cheap dress was glorified by the generous motive for which she +wore it. Whether in the crowded city among the sin-sick and starving, or +among the poor and afflicted in the neighborhood of her country home, no +story of suffering and need, capable of alleviation, ever reached her +without immediate sympathy and corresponding action. Lowell, one of her +warmest admirers, in his _Fable for Critics_ has beautifully portrayed +her abounding benevolence:-- + + "There comes Philothea, her face all aglow: + She has just been dividing some poor creature's woe, + And can't tell which pleases her most, to relieve + His want, or his story to hear and believe. + No doubt against many deep griefs she prevails, + For her ear is the refuge of destitute tales; + She knows well that silence is sorrow's best food, + And that talking draws off from the heart its black blood." + + "The pole, science tells us, the magnet controls, + But she is a magnet to emigrant Poles, + And folks with a mission that nobody knows + Throng thickly about her as bees round a rose. + She can fill up the carets in such, make their scope + Converge to some focus of rational hope, + And, with sympathies fresh as the morning, their gall + Can transmute into honey,--but this is not all; + Not only for those she has solace; O, say, + Vice's desperate nursling adrift in Broadway, + Who clingest, with all that is left of thee human, + To the last slender spar from the wreck of the woman, + Hast thou not found one shore where those tired, drooping feet + Could reach firm mother-earth, one full heart on whose beat + The soothed head in silence reposing could hear + The chimes of far childhood throb back on the ear?" + + "Ah, there's many a beam from the fountain of day + That, to reach us unclouded, must pass, on its way, + Through the soul of a woman, and hers is wide ope + To the influence of Heaven as the blue eyes of Hope; + Yes, a great heart is hers, one that dares to go in + To the prison, the slave-hut, the alleys of sin, + And to bring into each, or to find there, some line + Of the never completely out-trampled divine; + If her heart at high floods swamps her brain now and then, + 'T is but richer for that when the tide ebbs again, + As, after old Nile has subsided, his plain + Overflows with a second broad deluge of grain; + What a wealth would it bring to the narrow and sour, + Could they be as a Child but for one little hour!" + +After leaving New York, her husband and herself took up their residence +in the rural town of Wayland, Mass. Their house, plain and +unpretentious, had a wide and pleasant outlook; a flower garden, +carefully tended by her own hands, in front, and on the side a fruit +orchard and vegetable garden, under the special care of her husband. The +house was always neat, with some appearance of unostentatious decoration, +evincing at once the artistic taste of the hostess and the conscientious +economy which forbade its indulgence to any great extent. Her home was +somewhat apart from the lines of rapid travel, and her hospitality was in +a great measure confined to old and intimate friends, while her visits to +the city were brief and infrequent. A friend of hers, who had ample +opportunities for a full knowledge of her home-life, says, "The domestic +happiness of Mr. and Mrs. Child seemed to me perfect. Their sympathies, +their admiration of all things good, and their hearty hatred of all +things mean and evil were in entire unison. Mr. Child shared his wife's +enthusiasms, and was very proud of her. Their affection, never paraded, +was always manifest. After Mr. Child's death, Mrs. Child, in speaking of +the future life, said, 'I believe it would be of small value to me if I +were not united to him.'" + +In this connection I cannot forbear to give an extract from some +reminiscences of her husband, which she left among her papers, which, +better than any words of mine, will convey an idea of their simple and +beautiful home-life:-- + +"In 1852 we made a humble home in Wayland, Mass., where we spent twenty- +two pleasant years entirely alone, without any domestic, mutually serving +each other, and dependent upon each other for intellectual companionship. +I always depended on his richly stored mind, which was able and ready to +furnish needed information on any subject. He was my walking dictionary +of many languages, my Universal Encyclopaedia. + +"In his old age he was as affectionate and devoted as when the lover of +my youth; nay, he manifested even more tenderness. He was often +singing,-- + + "'There's nothing half so sweet in life + As Love's old dream.' + +"Very often, when he passed by me, he would lay his hand softly on my +head and murmur, 'Carum caput.' . . . But what I remember with the +most tender gratitude is his uniform patience and forbearance with my +faults. . . . He never would see anything but the bright side of my +character. He always insisted upon thinking that whatever I said was the +wisest and the wittiest, and that whatever I did was the best. The +simplest little jeu d'esprit of mine seemed to him wonderfully witty. +Once, when he said, 'I wish for your sake, dear, I were as rich as +Croesus,' I answered, 'You are Croesus, for you are king of Lydia.' How +often he used to quote that! + +"His mind was unclouded to the last. He had a passion for philology, and +only eight hours before he passed away he was searching out the +derivation of a word." + +Her well-stored mind and fine conversational gifts made her company +always desirable. No one who listened to her can forget the earnest +eloquence with which she used to dwell upon the evidences, from history, +tradition, and experience, of the superhuman and supernatural; or with +what eager interest she detected in the mysteries of the old religions of +the world the germs of a purer faith and a holier hope. She loved to +listen, as in St. Pierre's symposium of _The Coffee-House of Surat_, +to the confessions of faith of all sects and schools of philosophy, +Christian and pagan, and gather from them the consoling truth that our +Father has nowhere left his children without some witness of Himself. +She loved the old mystics, and lingered with curious interest and +sympathy over the writings of Bohme, Swedenborg, Molinos, and Woolman. +Yet this marked speculative tendency seemed not in the slightest degree +to affect her practical activities. Her mysticism and realism ran in +close parallel lines without interfering with each other. + +With strong rationalistic tendencies from education and conviction, she +found herself in spiritual accord with the pious introversion of Thomas +a Kempis and Madame Guion. She was fond of Christmas Eve stories, of +warnings, signs, and spiritual intimations, her half belief in which +sometimes seemed like credulity to her auditors. James Russell Lowell, +in his tender tribute to her, playfully alludes to this characteristic:-- + + "She has such a musical taste that she 'll go + Any distance to hear one who draws a long bow. + She will swallow a wonder by mere might and main." + +In 1859 the descent of John Brown upon Harper's Ferry, and his capture, +trial, and death, startled the nation. When the news reached her that +the misguided but noble old man lay desperately wounded in prison, alone +and unfriended, she wrote him a letter, under cover of one to Governor +Wise, asking permission to go and nurse and care for him. The expected +arrival of Captain Brown's wife made her generous offer unnecessary. The +prisoner wrote her, thanking her, and asking her to help his family, a +request with which she faithfully complied. With his letter came one +from Governor Wise, in courteous reproval of her sympathy for John Brown. +To this she responded in an able and effective manner. Her reply found +its way from Virginia to the New York Tribune, and soon after Mrs. Mason, +of King George's County, wife of Senator Mason, the author of the +infamous Fugitive Slave Law, wrote her a vehement letter, commencing with +threats of future damnation, and ending with assuring her that "no +Southerner, after reading her letter to Governor Wise, ought to read a +line of her composition, or touch a magazine which bore her name in its +list of contributors." To this she wrote a calm, dignified reply, +declining to dwell on the fierce invectives of her assailant, and wishing +her well here and hereafter. She would not debate the specific merits or +demerits of a man whose body was in charge of the courts, and whose +reputation was sure to be in charge of posterity. "Men," she continues, +"are of small consequence in comparison with principles, and the +principle for which John Brown died is the question at issue between us." +These letters were soon published in pamphlet form, and had the immense +circulation of 300,000 copies. + +In 1867 she published _A Romance of the Republic_, a story of the days of +slavery; powerful in its delineation of some of the saddest as well as +the most dramatic conditions of master and slave in the Southern States. +Her husband, who had been long an invalid, died in 1874. After his death +her home, in winter especially, became a lonely one, and in 1877 she +began to spend the cold months in Boston. + +Her last publication was in 1878, when her _Aspirations of the World_, a +book of selections, on moral and religious subjects, from the literature +of all nations and times, was given to the public. The introduction, +occupying fifty pages, shows, at threescore and ten, her mental vigor +unabated, and is remarkable for its wise, philosophic tone and felicity +of diction. It has the broad liberality of her more elaborate work on +the same subject, and in the mellow light of life's sunset her words seem +touched with a tender pathos and beauty. "All we poor mortals," she +says, "are groping our way through paths that are dim with shadows; and +we are all striving, with steps more or less stumbling, to follow some +guiding star. As we travel on, beloved companions of our pilgrimage +vanish from our sight, we know not whither; and our bereaved hearts utter +cries of supplication for more light. We know not where Hermes +Trismegistus lived, or who he was; but his voice sounds plaintively +human, coming up from the depths of the ages, calling out, 'Thou art God! +and thy man crieth these things unto Thee!' Thus closely allied in our +sorrows and limitations, in our aspirations and hopes, surely we ought +not to be separated in our sympathies. However various the names by +which we call the Heavenly Father, if they are set to music by brotherly +love, they can all be sung together." + +Her interest in the welfare of the emancipated class at the South and of +the ill-fated Indians of the West remained unabated, and she watched with +great satisfaction the experiment of the education of both classes in +General Armstrong's institution at Hampton, Va. She omitted no +opportunity of aiding the greatest social reform of the age, which aims +to make the civil and political rights of women equal to those of men. +Her sympathies, to the last, went out instinctively to the wronged and +weak. She used to excuse her vehemence in this respect by laughingly +quoting lines from a poem entitled _The Under Dog in the Fight_:-- + + "I know that the world, the great big world, + Will never a moment stop + To see which dog may be in the wrong, + But will shout for the dog on top. + + "But for me, I never shall pause to ask + Which dog may be in the right; + For my heart will beat, while it beats at all, + For the under dog in the fight." + +I am indebted to a gentleman who was at one time a resident of Wayland, +and who enjoyed her confidence and warm friendship, for the following +impressions of her life in that place:-- + +"On one of the last beautiful Indian summer afternoons, closing the past +year, I drove through Wayland, and was anew impressed with the charm of +our friend's simple existence there. The tender beauty of the fading +year seemed a reflection of her own gracious spirit; the lovely autumn of +her life, whose golden atmosphere the frosts of sorrow and advancing age +had only clarified and brightened. + +"My earliest recollection of Mrs. Child in Wayland is of a gentle face +leaning from the old stage window, smiling kindly down on the childish +figures beneath her; and from that moment her gracious motherly presence +has been closely associated with the charm of rural beauty in that +village, which until very lately has been quite apart from the line of +travel, and unspoiled by the rush and worry of our modern steam-car mode +of living. + +"Mrs. Child's life in the place made, indeed, an atmosphere of its own, a +benison of peace and good-will, which was a noticeable feature to all who +were acquainted with the social feeling of the little community, refined, +as it was too, by the elevating influence of its distinguished pastor, +Dr. Sears. Many are the acts of loving kindness and maternal care which +could be chronicled of her residence there, were we permitted to do so; +and numberless are the lives that have gathered their onward impulse from +her helping hand. But it was all a confidence which she hardly betrayed +to her inmost self, and I will not recall instances which might be her +grandest eulogy. Her monument is builded in the hearts which knew her +benefactions, and it will abide with 'the power that makes for +righteousness.' + +"One of the pleasantest elements of her life in Wayland was the high +regard she won from the people of the village, who, proud of her literary +attainment, valued yet more the noble womanhood of the friend who dwelt +so modestly among them. The grandeur of her exalted personal character +had, in part, eclipsed for them the qualities which made her fame with +the world outside. + +"The little house on the quiet by-road overlooked broad green meadows. +The pond behind it, where bloom the lilies whose spotless purity may well +symbolize her gentle spirit, is a sacred pool to her townsfolk. But +perhaps the most fitting similitude of her life in Wayland was the quiet +flow of the river, whose gentle curves make green her meadows, but whose +powerful energy, joining the floods from distant mountains, moves, with +resistless might, the busy shuttles of a hundred mills. She was too +truthful to affect to welcome unwarrantable invaders of her peace, but no +weary traveller on life's hard ways ever applied to her in vain. The +little garden plot before her door was a sacred enclosure, not to be +rudely intruded upon; but the flowers she tended with maternal care were +no selfish possession, for her own enjoyment only, and many are the lives +their sweetness has gladdened forever. So she lived among a singularly +peaceful and intelligent community as one of themselves, industrious, +wise, and happy; with a frugality whose motive of wider benevolence was +in itself a homily and a benediction." + +In my last interview with her, our conversation, as had often happened +before, turned upon the great theme of the future life. She spoke, as I +remember, calmly and not uncheerfully, but with the intense earnestness +and reverent curiosity of one who felt already the shadow of the unseen +world resting upon her. + +Her death was sudden and quite unexpected. For some months she had been +troubled with a rheumatic affection, but it was by no means regarded as +serious. A friend, who visited her a few days before her departure, +found her in a comfortable condition, apart from lameness. She talked of +the coming election with much interest, and of her plans for the winter. +On the morning of her death (October 20, 1880) she spoke of feeling +remarkably well. Before leaving her chamber she complained of severe +pain in the region of the heart. Help was called by her companion, but +only reached her to witness her quiet passing away. + +The funeral was, as befitted one like her, plain and simple. Many of her +old friends were present, and Wendell Phillips paid an affecting and +eloquent tribute to his old friend and anti-slavery coadjutor. He +referred to the time when she accepted, with serene self-sacrifice, the +obloquy which her _Appeal_ had brought upon her, and noted, as one of the +many ways in which popular hatred was manifested, the withdrawal from her +of the privileges of the Boston Athenaeum. Her pallbearers were elderly, +plain farmers in the neighborhood; and, led by the old white-haired +undertaker, the procession wound its way to the not distant burial- +ground, over the red and gold of fallen leaves, and tinder the half- +clouded October sky. A lover of all beautiful things, she was, as her +intimate friends knew, always delighted by the sight of rainbows, and +used to so arrange prismatic glasses as to throw the colors on the walls +of her room. Just after her body was consigned to the earth, a +magnificent rainbow spanned with its are of glory the eastern sky. + + The incident at her burial is alluded to in a sonnet written by + William P. Andrews:-- + + "Freedom! she knew thy summons, and obeyed + That clarion voice as yet scarce heard of men; + Gladly she joined thy red-cross service when + Honor and wealth must at thy feet be laid + Onward with faith undaunted, undismayed + By threat or scorn, she toiled with hand and brain + To make thy cause triumphant, till the chain + Lay broken, and for her the freedmen prayed. + Nor yet she faltered; in her tender care + She took us all; and wheresoe'er she went, + Blessings, and Faith, and Beauty followed there, + E'en to the end, where she lay down content; + And with the gold light of a life more fair, + Twin bows of promise o'er her grave were blest." + +The letters in this collection constitute but a small part of her large +correspondence. They have been gathered up and arranged by the hands of +dear relatives and friends as a fitting memorial of one who wrote from +the heart as well as the head, and who held her literary reputation +subordinate always to her philanthropic aim to lessen the sum of human +suffering, and to make the world better for her living. If they +sometimes show the heat and impatience of a zealous reformer, they may +well be pardoned in consideration of the circumstances under which they +were written, and of the natural indignation of a generous nature in view +of wrong and oppression. If she touched with no very reverent hand the +garment hem of dogmas, and held to the spirit of Scripture rather than +its letter, it must be remembered that she lived in a time when the Bible +was cited in defence of slavery, as it is now in Utah in support of +polygamy; and she may well be excused for some degree of impatience with +those who, in the tithing of mint and anise and cummin, neglected the +weightier matters of the law of justice and mercy. + +Of the men and women directly associated with the beloved subject of this +sketch, but few are now left to recall her single-hearted devotion to +apprehended duty, her unselfish generosity, her love of all beauty and +harmony, and her trustful reverence, free from pretence and cant. It is +not unlikely that the surviving sharers of her love and friendship may +feel the inadequateness of this brief memorial, for I close it with the +consciousness of having failed to fully delineate the picture which my +memory holds of a wise and brave, but tender and loving woman, of whom it +might well have been said, in the words of the old Hebrew text, "Many, +daughters have done virtuously, but thou excellest them all." + + + + +OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES + + On the occasion of the seventy-fifth birthday of Dr. Holmes _The + Critic of New York_ collected personal tributes from friends and + admirers of that author. My own contribution was as follows:-- + +Poet, essayist, novelist, humorist, scientist, ripe scholar, and wise +philosopher, if Dr. Holmes does not, at the present time, hold in popular +estimation the first place in American literature, his rare versatility +is the cause. In view of the inimitable prose writer, we forget the +poet; in our admiration of his melodious verse, we lose sight of _Elsie +Venner_ and _The Autocrat of the Breakfast Table_. We laugh over his wit +and humor, until, to use his own words, + + "We suspect the azure blossom that unfolds upon a shoot, + As if Wisdom's old potato could not flourish at its root;" + +and perhaps the next page melts us into tears by a pathos only equalled +by that of Sterne's sick Lieutenant. He is Montaigne and Bacon under one +hat. His varied qualities would suffice for the mental furnishing of +half a dozen literary specialists. + +To those who have enjoyed the privilege of his intimate acquaintance, the +man himself is more than the author. His genial nature, entire freedom +from jealousy or envy, quick tenderness, large charity, hatred of sham, +pretence, and unreality, and his reverent sense of the eternal and +permanent have secured for him something more and dearer than literary +renown,--the love of all who know him. I might say much more: I could +not say less. May his life be long in the land. + +Amesbury, Mass., 8th Month, 18, 1884. + + + + +LONGFELLOW + + Written to the chairman of the committee of arrangements for + unveiling the bust of Longfellow at Portland, Maine, on the poet's + birthday, February 27, 1885. + +I am sorry it is not in my power to accept the invitation of the +committee to be present at the unveiling of the bust of Longfellow on the +27th instant, or to write anything worthy of the occasion in metrical +form. + +The gift of the Westminster Abbey committee cannot fail to add another +strong tie of sympathy between two great English-speaking peoples. And +never was gift more fitly bestowed. The city of Portland--the poet's +birthplace, "beautiful for situation," looking from its hills on the +scenery he loved so well, Deering's Oaks, the many-islanded bay and far +inland mountains, delectable in sunset--needed this sculptured +representation of her illustrious son, and may well testify her joy and +gratitude at its reception, and repeat in so doing the words of the +Hebrew prophet: "O man, greatly beloved! thou shalt stand in thy place." + + + + +OLD NEWBURY. + + Letter to Samuel J. Spalding, D. D., on the occasion of the + celebration of the 250th anniversary of the settlement of Newbury. + +MY DEAR FRIEND,--I am sorry that I cannot hope to be with you on the +250th anniversary of the settlement of old Newbury. Although I can +hardly call myself a son of the ancient town, my grandmother, Sarah +Greenleaf, of blessed memory, was its daughter, and I may therefore claim +to be its grandson. Its genial and learned historian, Joshua Coffin, was +my first school-teacher, and all my life I have lived in sight of its +green hills and in hearing of its Sabbath bells. Its wealth of natural +beauty has not been left unsung by its own poets, Hannah Gould, Mrs. +Hopkins, George Lunt, and Edward A. Washburn, while Harriet Prescott +Spofford's Plum Island Sound is as sweet and musical as Tennyson's Brook. +Its history and legends are familiar to me. I seem to have known all its +old worthies, whose descendants have helped to people a continent, and +who have carried the name and memories of their birthplace to the Mexican +gulf and across the Rocky Mountains to the shores of the Pacific. They +were the best and selectest of Puritanism, brave, honest, God-fearing men +and women; and if their creed in the lapse of time has lost something of +its vigor, the influence of their ethical righteousness still endures. +The prophecy of Samuel Sewall that Christians should be found in Newbury +so long as pigeons shall roost on its oaks and Indian corn grows in +Oldtown fields remains still true, and we trust will always remain so. +Yet, as of old, the evil personage sometimes intrudes himself into +company too good for him. It was said in the witchcraft trials of 1692 +that Satan baptized his converts at Newbury Falls, the scene, probably, +of one of Hawthorne's weird _Twice Told Tales_; and there is a tradition +that, in the midst of a heated controversy between one of Newbury's +painful ministers and his deacon, who (anticipating Garrison by a +century) ventured to doubt the propriety of clerical slaveholding, the +Adversary made his appearance in the shape of a black giant stalking +through Byfield. It was never, I believe, definitely settled whether he +was drawn there by the minister's zeal in defence of slavery or the +deacon's irreverent denial of the minister's right and duty to curse +Canaan in the person of his negro. + +Old Newbury has sometimes been spoken of as ultra-conservative and +hostile to new ideas and progress, but this is not warranted by its +history. More than two centuries ago, when Major Pike, just across the +river, stood up and denounced in open town meeting the law against +freedom of conscience and worship, and was in consequence fined and +outlawed, some of Newbury's best citizens stood bravely by him. The town +took no part in the witchcraft horror, and got none of its old women and +town charges hanged for witches, "Goody" Morse had the spirit rappings in +her house two hundred years earlier than the Fox girls did, and somewhat +later a Newbury minister, in wig and knee-buckles, rode, Bible in hand, +over to Hampton to lay a ghost who had materialized himself and was +stamping up and down stairs in his military boots. + +Newbury's ingenious citizen, Jacob Perkins, in drawing out diseases with +his metallic tractors, was quite as successful as modern "faith and mind" +doctors. The Quakers, whipped at Hampton on one hand and at Salem on the +other, went back and forth unmolested in Newbury, for they could make no +impression on its iron-clad orthodoxy. Whitefield set the example, since +followed by the Salvation Army, of preaching in its streets, and now lies +buried under one of its churches with almost the honors of sainthood. +William Lloyd Garrison was born in Newbury. The town must be regarded as +the Alpha and Omega of anti-slavery agitation, beginning with its +abolition deacon and ending with Garrison. Puritanism, here as +elsewhere, had a flavor of radicalism; it had its humorous side, and its +ministers did not hesitate to use wit and sarcasm, like Elijah before the +priests of Baal. As, for instance, the wise and learned clergyman, +Puritan of the Puritans, beloved and reverenced by all, who has just laid +down the burden of his nearly one hundred years, startled and shamed his +brother ministers who were zealously for the enforcement of the Fugitive +Slave Law, by preparing for them a form of prayer for use while engaged +in catching runaway slaves. + +I have, I fear, dwelt too long upon the story and tradition of the old +town, which will doubtless be better told by the orator of the day. The +theme is to me full of interest. Among the blessings which I would +gratefully own is the fact that my lot has been cast in the beautiful +valley of the Merrimac, within sight of Newbury steeples, Plum Island, +and Crane Neck and Pipe Stave hills. + +Let me, in closing, pay something of the debt I have owed from boyhood, +by expressing a sentiment in which I trust every son of the ancient town +will unite: Joshua Coffin, historian of Newbury, teacher, scholar, and +antiquarian, and one of the earliest advocates of slave emancipation. May +his memory be kept green, to use the words of Judge Sewall, "so long as +Plum island keeps its post and a sturgeon leaps in Merrimac River." + +Amesbury, 6th Month, 1885. + + + + +SCHOOLDAY REMEMBRANCES. + + To Rev. Charles Wingate, Hon. James H. Carleton, Thomas B. Garland, + Esq., Committee of Students of Haverhill Academy: + +DEAR FRIENDS,--I was most agreeably surprised last evening by receiving +your carefully prepared and beautiful Haverhill Academy Album, containing +the photographs of a large number of my old friends and schoolmates. I +know of nothing which could have given me more pleasure. If the faces +represented are not so unlined and ruddy as those which greeted each +other at the old academy, on the pleasant summer mornings so long ago, +when life was before us, with its boundless horizon of possibilities, +yet, as I look over them, I see that, on the whole, Time has not been +hard with us, but has touched us gently. The hieroglyphics he has traced +upon us may, indeed, reveal something of the cares, trials, and sorrows +incident to humanity, but they also tell of generous endeavor, beneficent +labor, developed character, and the slow, sure victories of patience and +fortitude. I turn to them with the proud satisfaction of feeling that I +have been highly favored in my early companions, and that I have not been +disappointed in my school friendships. The two years spent at the +academy I have always reckoned among the happiest of my life, though I +have abundant reason for gratitude that, in the long, intervening years, +I have been blessed beyond my deserving. + +It has been our privilege to live in an eventful period, and to witness +wonderful changes since we conned our lessons together. How little we +then dreamed of the steam car, electric telegraph, and telephone! We +studied the history and geography of a world only half explored. Our +country was an unsolved mystery. "The Great American Desert" was an +awful blank on our school maps. We have since passed through the +terrible ordeal of civil war, which has liberated enslaved millions, and +made the union of the States an established fact, and no longer a +doubtful theory. If life is to be measured not so much by years as by +thoughts, emotion, knowledge, action, and its opportunity of a free +exercise of all our powers and faculties, we may congratulate ourselves +upon really outliving the venerable patriarchs. For myself, I would not +exchange a decade of my own life for a century of the Middle Ages, or a +"cycle of Cathay." + +Let me, gentlemen, return my heartiest thanks to you, and to all who have +interested themselves in the preparation of the Academy Album, and assure +you of my sincere wishes for your health and happiness. + +OAK KNOLL, DANVERS, 12th Month, 25, 1885. + + + + +EDWIN PERCY WHIPPLE. + +I have been pained to learn of the decease of nay friend of many years, +Edwin P. Whipple. Death, however expected, is always something of a +surprise, and in his case I was not prepared for it by knowing of any +serious failure of his health. With the possible exception of Lowell and +Matthew Arnold, he was the ablest critical essayist of his time, and the +place he has left will not be readily filled. + +Scarcely inferior to Macaulay in brilliance of diction and graphic +portraiture, he was freer from prejudice and passion, and more loyal to +the truth of fact and history. He was a thoroughly honest man. He wrote +with conscience always at his elbow, and never sacrificed his real +convictions for the sake of epigram and antithesis. He instinctively +took the right side of the questions that came before him for decision, +even when by so doing he ranked himself with the unpopular minority. He +had the manliest hatred of hypocrisy and meanness; but if his language +had at times the severity of justice, it was never merciless. He "set +down naught in malice." + +Never blind to faults, he had a quick and sympathetic eye for any real +excellence or evidence of reserved strength in the author under +discussion. + +He was a modest man, sinking his own personality out of sight, and he +always seemed to me more interested in the success of others than in his +own. Many of his literary contemporaries have had reason to thank him +not only for his cordial recognition and generous praise, but for the +firm and yet kindly hand which pointed out deficiencies and errors of +taste and judgment. As one of those who have found pleasure and profit +in his writings in the past, I would gratefully commend them to the +generation which survives him. His _Literature of the Age of Elizabeth_ +is deservedly popular, but there are none of his Essays which will not +repay a careful study. "What works of Mr. Baxter shall I read?" asked +Boswell of Dr. Johnson. "Read any of them," was the answer, "for they +are all good." + +He will have an honored place in the history of American literature. But +I cannot now dwell upon his authorship while thinking of him as the +beloved member of a literary circle now, alas sadly broken. I recall the +wise, genial companion and faithful friend of nearly half a century, the +memory of whose words and acts of kindness moistens my eyes as I write. + +It is the inevitable sorrow of age that one's companions must drop away +on the right hand and the left with increasing frequency, until we are +compelled to ask with Wordsworth,-- + + "Who next shall fall and disappear?" + +But in the case of him who has just passed from us, we have the +satisfaction of knowing that his life-work has been well and faithfully +done, and that he leaves behind him only friends. + +DANVERS, 6th Month, 18, 1886. + + + + + + + + HISTORICAL PAPERS + + +DANIEL O'CONNELL. + + In February, 1839, Henry Clay delivered a speech in the United + States Senate, which was intended to smooth away the difficulties + which his moderate opposition to the encroachments of slavery had + erected in his path to the presidency. His calumniation of + O'Connell called out the following summary of the career of the + great Irish patriot. It was published originally in the + Pennsylvania Freeman of Philadelphia, April 25, 1839. + +Perhaps the most unlucky portion of the unlucky speech of Henry Clay on +the slavery question is that in which an attempt is made to hold up to +scorn and contempt the great Liberator of Ireland. We say an attempt, +for who will say it has succeeded? Who feels contempt for O'Connell? +Surely not the slaveholder? From Henry Clay, surrounded by his slave- +gang at Ashland, to the most miserable and squalid slave-driver and small +breeder of human cattle in Virginia and Maryland who can spell the name +of O'Connell in his newspaper, these republican brokers in blood fear and +hate the eloquent Irishman. But their contempt, forsooth! Talk of the +sheep-stealer's contempt for the officer of justice who nails his ears to +the pillory, or sets the branding iron on his forehead! + +After denouncing the abolitionists for gratuitously republishing the +advertisements for runaway slaves, the Kentucky orator says:-- + +"And like a notorious agitator upon another theatre, they would hunt down +and proscribe from the pale of civilized society the inhabitants of that +entire section. Allow me, Mr. President, to say that whilst I recognize +in the justly wounded feelings of the Minister of the United States at +the Court of St. James much to excuse the notice which he was provoked to +take of that agitator, in my humble opinion he would better have +consulted the dignity of his station and of his country in treating him +with contemptuous silence. He would exclude us from European society, he +who himself, can only obtain a contraband admission, and is received with +scornful repugnance into it! If he be no more desirous of our society +than we are of his, he may rest assured that a state of perpetual non- +intercourse will exist between us. Yes, sir, I think the American +Minister would best have pursued the dictates of true dignity by +regarding the language of the member of the British House of Commons as +the malignant ravings of the plunderer of his own country, and the +libeller of a foreign and kindred people." + +The recoil of this attack "followed hard upon" the tones of +congratulation and triumph of partisan editors at the consummate skill +and dexterity with which their candidate for the presidency had absolved +himself from the suspicion of abolitionism, and by a master-stroke of +policy secured the confidence of the slaveholding section of the +Union. But the late Whig defeat in New York has put an end to these +premature rejoicings. "The speech of Mr. Clay in reference to the Irish +agitator has been made use of against us with no small success," say the +New York papers. "They failed," says the Daily Evening Star, "to +convince the Irish voters that Daniel O'Connell was the 'plunderer of his +country,' or that there was an excuse for thus denouncing him." + +The defeat of the Whigs of New York and the cause of it have excited no +small degree of alarm among the adherents of the Kentucky orator. In +this city, the delicate _Philadelphia Gazette_ comes magnanimously to the +aid of Henry Clay,-- + + "A tom-tit twittering on an eagle's back." + +The learned editor gives it as his opinion that Daniel O'Connell is a +"political beggar," a "disorganizing apostate;" talks in its pretty way +of the man's "impudence" and "falsehoods" and "cowardice," etc.; and +finally, with a modesty and gravity which we cannot but admire, assures +us that "his weakness of mind is almost beyond calculation!" + +We have heard it rumored during the past week, among some of the self- +constituted organs of the Clay party in this city, that at a late meeting +in Chestnut Street a committee was appointed to collect, collate, and +publish the correspondence between Andrew Stevenson and O'Connell, and so +much of the latter's speeches and writings as relate to American slavery, +for the purpose of convincing the countrymen of O'Connell of the justice, +propriety, and, in view of the aggravated circumstances of the case, +moderation and forbearance of Henry Clay when speaking of a man who has +had the impudence to intermeddle with the "patriarchal institutions" of +our country, and with the "domestic relations" of Kentucky and Virginia +slave-traders. + +We wait impatiently for the fruits of the labors of this sagacious +committee. We should like to see those eloquent and thrilling appeals to +the sense of shame and justice and honor of America republished. We +should like to see if any Irishman, not wholly recreant to the interests +and welfare of the Green Island of his birth, will in consequence of this +publication give his vote to the slanderer of Ireland's best and noblest +champion. + +But who is Daniel O'Connell? "A demagogue--a ruffian agitator!" say the +Tory journals of Great Britain, quaking meantime with awe and +apprehension before the tremendous moral and political power which he is +wielding,--a power at this instant mightier than that of any potentate of +Europe. "A blackguard"--a fellow who "obtains contraband admission into +European society"--a "malignant libeller"--a "plunderer of his country"-- +a man whose "wind should be stopped," say the American slaveholders, and +their apologists, Clay, Stevenson, Hamilton, and the Philadelphia +Gazette, and the Democratic Whig Association. + +But who is Daniel O'Connell? Ireland now does justice to him, the world +will do so hereafter. No individual of the present age has done more for +human liberty. His labors to effect the peaceable deliverance of his own +oppressed countrymen, and to open to the nations of Europe a new and +purer and holier pathway to freedom unstained with blood and unmoistened +by tears, and his mighty instrumentality in the abolition of British +colonial slavery, have left their impress upon the age. They will be +remembered and felt beneficially long after the miserable slanders of +Tory envy and malignity at home, and the clamors of slaveholders abroad, +detected in their guilt, and writhing in the gaze of Christendom, shall +have perished forever,--when the Clays and Calhouns, the Peels and +Wellingtons, the opponents of reform in Great Britain and the enemies of +slave emancipation in the United States, shall be numbered with those who +in all ages, to use the words of the eloquent Lamartine, have "sinned +against the Holy Ghost in opposing the improvement of things,--in an +egotistical and stupid attempt to draw back the moral and social world +which God and nature are urging forward." + +The character and services of O'Connell have never been fully appreciated +in this country. Engrossed in our own peculiar interests, and in the +plenitude of our self-esteem; believing that "we are the people, and that +wisdom will perish with us," that all patriotism and liberality of +feeling are confined to our own territory, we have not followed the +untitled Barrister of Derrynane Abbey, step by step, through the +development of one of the noblest experiments ever made for the cause +of liberty and the welfare of man. + +The revolution which O'Connell has already partially effected in his +native land, and which, from the evident signs of cooperation in England +and Scotland, seems not far from its entire accomplishment, will form a +new era in the history of the civilized world. Heretofore the patriot +has relied more upon physical than moral means for the regeneration of +his country and its redemption from oppression. His revolutions, however +pure in principle, have ended in practical crime. The great truth was +yet to be learned that brute force is incompatible with a pure love of +freedom, inasmuch as it is in itself an odious species of tyranny--the +relic of an age of slavery and barbarism--the common argument of +despotism--a game + + "which, were their subjects wise, + Kings would not play at." + +But the revolution in which O'Connell is engaged, although directed +against the oppression of centuries, relies with just confidence upon the +united moral energies of the people: a moral victory of reason over +prejudice, of justice over oppression; the triumph of intellectual energy +where the brute appeal to arms had miserably failed; the vindication of +man's eternal rights, not by the sword fleshed in human hearts, but by +weapons tempered in the armory of Heaven with truth and mercy and love. + +Nor is it a visionary idea, or the untried theory of an enthusiast, this +triumphant reliance upon moral and intellectual power for the reform of +political abuses, for the overthrowing of tyranny and the pulling down of +the strongholds of arbitrary power. The emancipation of the Catholic of +Great Britain from the thrall of a century, in 1829, prepared the way for +the bloodless triumph of English reform in 1832. The Catholic +Association was the germ of those political unions which compelled, by +their mighty yet peaceful influence, the King of England to yield +submissively to the supremacy of the people. + + [The celebrated Mr. Attwood has been called the "father of political + unions." In a speech delivered by his brother, C. Attwood, Esq., at + the Sunderland Reform Meeting, September 10, 1832, I find the + following admission: "Gentlemen, the first political union was the + Roman Catholic Association of Ireland, and the true founder and + father of political unions is Daniel O'Connell."] + +Both of these remarkable events, these revolutions shaking nations to +their centre, yet polluted with no blood and sullied by no crime, were +effected by the salutary agitations of the public mind, first set in +motion by the masterspirit of O'Connell, and spreading from around him to +every portion of the British empire like the undulations from the +disturbed centre of a lake. + +The Catholic question has been but imperfectly understood in this +country. Many have allowed their just disapprobation of the Catholic +religion to degenerate into a most unwarrantable prejudice against its +conscientious followers. The cruel persecutions of the dissenters from +the Romish Church, the massacre of St. Bartholomew's day, the horrors of +the Inquisition, the crusades against the Albigenses and the simple +dwellers of the Vaudois valleys, have been regarded as atrocities +peculiar to the believers in papal infallibility, and the necessary +consequences of their doctrines; and hence they have looked upon the +constitutional agitation of the Irish Catholics for relief from grieveous +disabilities and unjust distinctions as a struggle merely for supremacy +or power. + +Strange, that the truth to which all history so strongly testifies should +thus be overlooked,--the undeniable truth that religious bigotry and +intolerance have been confined to no single sect; that the persecuted of +one century have been the persecutors of another. In our own country, +it would be well for us to remember that at the very time when in New +England the Catholic, the Quaker, and the Baptist were banished on pain +of death, and where some even suffered that dreadful penalty, in Catholic +Maryland, under the Catholic Lord Baltimore, perfect liberty of +conscience was established, and Papist and Protestant went quietly +through the same streets to their respective altars. + +At the commencement of O'Connell's labors for emancipation he found the +people of Ireland divided into three great classes,--the Protestant or +Church party, the Dissenters, and the Catholics: the Church party +constituting about one tenth of the population, yet holding in possession +the government and a great proportion of the landed property of Ireland, +controlling church and state and law and revenue, the army, navy, +magistracy, and corporations, the entire patronage of the country, +holding their property and power by the favor of England, and +consequently wholly devoted to her interest; the Dissenters, probably +twice as numerous as the Church party, mostly engaged in trade and +manufactures,--sustained by their own talents and industry, Irish in +feeling, partaking in no small degree of the oppression of their Catholic +brethren, and among the first to resist that oppression in 1782; the +Catholics constituting at least two thirds of the whole population, and +almost the entire peasantry of the country, forming a large proportion +of the mercantile interest, yet nearly excluded from the possession of +landed property by the tyrannous operation of the penal laws. Justly has +a celebrated Irish patriot (Theobald Wolfe Tone) spoken of these laws as +"an execrable and infamous code, framed with the art and malice of demons +to plunder and degrade and brutalize the Catholics of Ireland. There was +no disgrace, no injustice, no disqualification, moral, political, or +religious, civil or military, which it has not heaped upon them." + +The following facts relative to the disabilities under which the +Catholics of the United Kingdom labored previous to the emancipation of +1829 will serve to show in some measure the oppressive operation of those +laws which placed the foot of one tenth of the population of Ireland upon +the necks of the remainder. + +A Catholic peer could not sit in the House of Peers, nor a Catholic +commoner in the House of Commons. A Catholic could not be Lord +Chancellor, or Keeper, or Commissioner of the Great Seal; Master or +Keeper of the Rolls; Justice of the King's Bench or of the Common Pleas; +Baron of the Exchequer; Attorney or Solicitor General; King's Sergeant at +Law; Member of the King's Council; Master in Chancery, nor Chairman of +Sessions for the County of Dublin. He could not be the Recorder of a +city or town; an advocate in the spiritual courts; Sheriff of a county, +city, or town; Sub-Sheriff; Lord Lieutenant, Lord Deputy, or other +governor of Ireland; Lord High Treasurer; Governor of a county; Privy +Councillor; Postmaster General; Chancellor of the Exchequer or Secretary +of State; Vice Treasurer, Cashier of the Exchequer; Keeper of the Privy +Seal or Auditor General; Provost or Fellow of Dublin University; nor Lord +Mayor or Alderman of a corporate city or town. He could not be a member +of a parish vestry, nor bequeath any sum of money or any lands for the +maintenance of a clergyman, or for the support of a chapel or a school; +and in corporate towns he was excluded from the grand juries. + +O'Connell commenced his labors for emancipation with the strong +conviction that nothing short of the united exertions of the Irish people +could overthrow the power of the existing government, and that a union of +action could only be obtained by the establishment of something like +equality between the different religious parties. Discarding all other +than peaceful means for the accomplishment of his purpose, he placed +himself and his followers beyond the cognizance of unjust and oppressive +laws. Wherever he poured the oil of his eloquence upon the maddened +spirits of his wronged and insulted countrymen, the mercenary soldiery +found no longer an excuse for violence; and calm, firm, and united, the +Catholic Association remained secure in the moral strength of its pure +and peaceful purpose, amid the bayonets of a Tory administration. His +influence was felt in all parts of the island. Wherever an unlawful +association existed, his great legal knowledge enabled him at once to +detect its character, and, by urging its dissolution, to snatch its +deluded members from the ready fangs of their enemies. In his presence +the Catholic and the Protestant shook hands together, and the wild Irish +clansman forgot his feuds. He taught the party in power, and who +trembled at the dangers around them, that security and peace could only +be obtained by justice and kindness. He entreated his oppressed Catholic +brethren to lay aside their weapons, and with pure hearts and naked hands +to stand firmly together in the calm but determined energy of men, too +humane for deeds of violence, yet too mighty for the patient endurance of +wrong. + +The spirit of the olden time was awakened, of the day when Flood +thundered and Curran lightened; the light which shone for a moment in the +darkness of Ireland's century of wrong burned upwards clearly and +steadily from all its ancient altars. Shoulder to shoulder gathered +around him the patriot spirits of his nation,--men unbribed by the golden +spoils of governmental patronage Shiel with his ardent eloquence, O'Dwyer +and Walsh, and Grattan and O'Connor, and Steel, the Protestant agitator, +wearing around him the emblem of national reconciliation, of the reunion +of Catholic and Protestant,--the sash of blended orange and green, soiled +and defaced by his patriotic errands, stained with the smoke of cabins, +and the night rains and rust of weapons, and the mountain mist, and the +droppings of the wild woods of Clare. He united in one mighty and +resistless mass the broken and discordant factions, whose desultory +struggles against tyranny had hitherto only added strength to its +fetters, and infused into that mass his own lofty principles of action, +until the solemn tones of expostulation and entreaty, bursting at once +from the full heart of Ireland, were caught up by England and echoed back +from Scotland, and the language of justice and humanity was wrung from +the reluctant lips of the cold and remorseless oppressor of his native +land, at once its disgrace and glory,--the conqueror of Napoleon; and, in +the words of his own Curran, the chains of the Catholic fell from around +him, and he stood forth redeemed and disenthralled by the irresistible +genius of Universal Emancipation. + +On the passage of the bill for Catholic emancipation, O'Connell took his +seat in the British Parliament. The eyes of millions were upon him. +Ireland--betrayed so often by those in whom she had placed her +confidence; brooding in sorrowful remembrance over the noble names and +brilliant reputations sullied by treachery and corruption, the long and +dark catalogue of her recreant sons, who, allured by British gold and +British patronage, had sacrificed on the altar of their ambition Irish +pride and Irish independence, and lifted their parricidal arms against +their sorrowing mother, "crownless and voiceless in her woe"--now hung +with breathless eagerness over the ordeal to which her last great +champion was subjected. + +The crisis in O'Connell's destiny had come. + +The glitter of the golden bribe was in his eye; the sound of titled +magnificence was in his ear; the choice was before him to sit high among +the honorable, the titled, and the powerful, or to take his humble seat +in the hall of St. Stephen's as the Irish demagogue, the agitator, the +Kerry representative. He did not hesitate in his choice. On the first +occasion that offered he told the story of Ireland's wrongs, and demanded +justice in the name of his suffering constituents. He had put his hand +to the plough of reform, and he could not relinquish his hold, for his +heart was with it. + +Determined to give the Whig administration no excuse for neglecting the +redress of Irish grievances, he entered heart and soul into the great +measure of English reform, and his zeal, tact, and eloquence contributed +not a little to its success. Yet even his friends speak of his first +efforts in the House of Commons as failures. The Irish accent; the harsh +avowal of purposes smacking of rebellion; the eccentricities and flowery +luxuriance of an eloquence nursed in the fervid atmosphere of Ireland +suddenly transplanted to the cold and commonplace one of St. Stephen's; +the great and illiberal prejudices against him scarcely abated from what +they were when, as the member from Clare, he was mobbed on his way to +London, for a time opposed a barrier to the influence of his talents and +patriotism. But he triumphed at last: the mob-orator of Clare and Kerry, +the declaimer in the Dublin Rooms of the Political and Trades' Union, +became one of the most attractive and popular speakers of the British +Parliament; one whose aid has been courted and whose rebuke has been +feared by the ablest of England's representatives. Amid the sneers of +derision and the clamor of hate and prejudice he has triumphed,--on that +very arena so fatal to Irish eloquence and Irish fame, where even Grattan +failed to sustain himself, and the impetuous spirit of Flood was stricken +down. + +No subject in which Ireland was not directly interested has received a +greater share of O'Connell's attention than that of the abolition of +colonial slavery. Utterly detesting tyranny of all kinds, he poured +forth his eloquent soul in stern reprobation of a system full at once of +pride and misery and oppression, and darkened with blood. His speech on +the motion of Thomas Fowell Buxton for the immediate emancipation of the +slaves gave a new tone to the discussion of the question. He entered +into no petty pecuniary details; no miserable computation of the +shillings and pence vested in beings fashioned in the image of God. He +did not talk of the expediency of continuing the evil because it had +grown monstrous. To use his own words, he considered "slavery a crime to +be abolished; not merely an evil to be palliated." He left Sir Robert +Peel and the Tories to eulogize the characters and defend the interests +of the planters, in common with those of a tithe-reaping priesthood, +building their houses by oppression and their chambers by wrong, and +spoke of the negro's interest, the negro's claim to justice; demanding +sympathy for the plundered as well as the plunderers, for the slave as +well as his master. He trampled as dust under his feet the blasphemy +that obedience to the law of eternal justice is a principle to be +acknowledged in theory only, because unsafe in practice. He would, +he said, enter into no compromise with slavery. He cared not what cast +or creed or color it might assume, whether personal or political, +intellectual or spiritual; he was for its total, immediate abolition. He +was for justice,--justice in the name of humanity and according to the +righteous law of the living God. + +Ardently admiring our free institutions, and constantly pointing to our +glorious political exaltation as an incentive to the perseverance of his +own countrymen in their struggle against oppression, he has yet omitted +no opportunity of rebuking our inexcusable slave system. An enthusiastic +admirer of Jefferson, he has often regretted that his practice should +have so illy accorded with his noble sentiments on the subject of +slavery, which so fully coincided with his own. In truth, wherever man +has been oppressed by his fellow-man, O'Connell's sympathy has been +directed: to Italy, chained above the very grave of her ancient +liberties; to the republics of Southern America; to Greece, dashing the +foot of the indolent Ottoman from her neck; to France and Belgium; and +last, not least, to Poland, driven from her cherished nationality, and +dragged, like his own Ireland, bleeding and violated, to the deadly +embrace of her oppressor. American slavery but shares in his common +denunciation of all tyranny; its victims but partake of his common pity +for the oppressed and persecuted and the trodden down. + +In this hasty and imperfect sketch we cannot enter into the details of +that cruel disregard of Irish rights which was manifested by a Reformed +Parliament, convoked, to use the language of William IV., "to ascertain +the sense of the people." It is perhaps enough to say that O'Connell's +indignant refusal to receive as full justice the measure of reform meted +out to Ireland was fully justified by the facts of the case. The Irish +Reform Bill gave Ireland, with one third of the entire population of the +United Kingdoms, only one sixth of the Parliamentary delegation. It +diminished instead of increasing the number of voters; in the towns and +cities it created a high and aristocratic franchise; in many boroughs it +established so narrow a basis of franchise as to render them liable to +corruption and abuse as the rotten boroughs of the old system. It threw +no new power into the hands of the people; and with no little justice has +O'Connell himself termed it an act to restore to power the Orange +ascendancy in Ireland, and to enable a faction to trample with impunity +on the friends of reform and constitutional freedom. [Letters to the +Reformers of Great Britain, No. 1.] + +In May, 1832, O'Connell commenced the publication of his celebrated +_Letters to the Reformers of Great Britain_. Like Tallien, before the +French convention, he "rent away the veil" which Hume and Atwood had only +partially lifted. He held up before the people of Great Britain the new +indignities which had been added to the long catalogue of Ireland's +wrongs; he appealed to their justice, their honor, their duty, for +redress, and cast down before the Whig administration the gauntlet of his +country's defiance and scorn. There is a fine burst of indignant Irish +feeling in the concluding paragraphs of his fourth letter:-- + +"I have demonstrated the contumelious injuries inflicted upon us by this +Reform Bill. My letters are long before the public. They have been +unrefuted, uncontradicted in any of their details. And with this case of +atrocious injustice to Ireland placed before the reformers of Great +Britain, what assistance, what sympathy, do we receive? Why, I have got +some half dozen drivelling letters from political unions and political +characters, asking me whether I advise them to petition or bestir +themselves in our behalf! + +"Reformers of Great Britain! I do not ask you either to petition or be +silent. I do not ask you to petition or to do any other act in favor of +the Irish. You will consult your own feelings of justice and generosity, +unprovoked by any advice or entreaty of mine. + +"For my own part, I never despaired of Ireland; I do not, I will not, +I cannot, despair of my beloved country. She has, in my view, obtained +freedom of conscience for others, as well as for herself. She has shaken +off the incubus of tithes while silly legislation was dealing out its +folly and its falsehoods. She can, and she will, obtain for herself +justice and constitutional freedom; and although she may sigh at British +neglect and ingratitude, there is no sound of despair in that sigh, nor +any want of moral energy on her part to attain her own rights by +peaceable and legal means." + +The tithe system, unutterably odious and full of all injustice, had +prepared the way for this expression of feeling on the part of the +people. Ireland had never, in any period of her history, bowed her neck +peaceably to the ecclesiastical yoke. From the Canon of Cashel, prepared +by English deputies in the twelfth century, decreeing for the first time +that tithes should be paid in Ireland, down to the present moment, the +Church in her borders has relied solely upon the strong arm of the law, +and literally reaped its tithes with the sword. The decree of the Dublin +Synod, under Archbishop Comyn, in 1185, could only be enforced within the +pale of the English settlement. The attempts of Henry VIII. also failed. +Without the pale all endeavors to collect tithes were met by stern +opposition. And although from the time of William III. the tithe system +has been established in Ireland, yet at no period has it been regarded +otherwise than as a system of legalized robbery by seven eighths of the +people. An examination of this system cannot fail to excite our wonder, +not that it has been thus regarded, but that it has been so long endured +by any people on the face of the earth, least of all by Irishmen. Tithes +to the amount of L1,000,000 are annually wrung from impoverished Ireland, +in support of a clergy who can only number about one sixteenth of her +population as their hearers; and wrung, too, in an undue proportion, from +the Catholic counties. [See Dr. Doyle's Evidence before Hon. E. G. +Stanley.] In the southern and middle counties, almost entirely inhabited +by the Catholic peasantry, every thing they possess is subject to the +tithe: the cow is seized in the hovel, the potato in the barrel, the coat +even on the poor man's back. [Speech of T. Reynolds, Esq., at an anti- +tithe meeting.] The revenues of five of the dignitaries of the Irish +Church Establishment are as follows: the Primacy L140,000; Derry +L120,000; Kilmore L100,000; Clogher L100,000; Waterford L70,000. Compare +these enormous sums with that paid by Scotland for the maintenance of the +Church, namely L270,000. Yet that Church has 2,000,000 souls under its +care, while that of Ireland has not above 500,000. Nor are these +princely livings expended in Ireland by their possessors. The bishoprics +of Cloyne and Meath have been long held by absentees,--by men who know no +more of their flocks than the non-resident owner of a West India +plantation did of the miserable negroes, the fruits of whose thankless +labor were annually transmitted to him. Out of 1289 benefited clergymen +in Ireland, between five and six hundred are non-residents, spending in +Bath and London, or in making the fashionable tour of the Continent, the +wealth forced from the Catholic peasant and the Protestant dissenter by +the bayonets of the military. Scorching and terrible was the sarcasm of +Grattan applied to these locusts of the Church: "A beastly and pompous +priesthood, political potentates and Christian pastors, full of false +zeal, full of worldly pride, and full of gluttony, empty of the true +religion, to their flocks oppressive, to their inferior clergy brutal, to +their king abject, and to their God impudent and familiar,--they stand on +the altar as a stepping-stone to the throne, glorying in the ear of +princes, whom they poison with crooked principles and heated advice; a +faction against their king when they are not his slaves,--ever the dirt +under his feet or a poniard to his heart." + +For the evils of absenteeism, the non-residence of the wealthy +landholders, draining from a starving country the very necessaries of +life, a remedy is sought in a repeal of the union, and the provisions of +a domestic parliament. In O'Connell's view, a restoration of such a +parliament can alone afford that adequate protection to the national +industry so loudly demanded by thousands of unemployed laborers, starving +amid the ruins of deserted manufactories. During the brief period of +partial Irish liberty which followed the pacific revolution of '82, the +manufactures of the country revived and flourished; and the smile of +contented industry was visible all over the land. In 1797 there were +15,000 silk-weavers in the city of Dublin alone. There are now but 400. +Such is the practical effect of the Union, of that suicidal act of the +Irish Parliament which yielded up in a moment of treachery and terror the +dearest interests of the country to the legislation of an English +Parliament and the tender mercies of Castlereagh,--of that Castlereagh +who, when accused by Grattan of spending L15,000 in purchasing votes for +the Union, replied with the rare audacity of high-handed iniquity, "We +did spend L15,000, and we would have spent L15,000,000 if necessary to +carry the Union; "that Castlereagh who, when 707,000 Irishmen petitioned +against the Union and 300,000 for it, maintained that the latter +constituted the majority! Well has it been said that the deep vengeance +which Ireland owed him was inflicted by the great criminal upon himself. +The nation which he sold and plundered saw him make with his own hand the +fearful retribution. The great body of the Irish people never assented +to the Union. The following extract from a speech of Earl (then Mr.) +Grey, in 1800, upon the Union question, will show what means were made +use of to drag Ireland, while yet mourning over her slaughtered children, +to the marriage altar with England: "If the Parliament of Ireland had +been left to itself, untempted and unawed, it would without hesitation +have rejected the resolutions. Out of the 300 members, 120 strenuously +opposed the measure, 162 voted for it: of these, 116 were placemen; some +of them were English generals on the staff, without a foot of ground in +Ireland, and completely dependent on government." "Let us reflect upon +the arts made use of since the last session of the Irish Parliament to +pack a majority, for Union, in the House of Commons. All persons holding +offices under government, if they hesitated to vote as directed, were +stripped of all their employments. A bill framed for preserving the +purity of Parliament was likewise abused, and no less than 63 seats were +vacated by their holders having received nominal offices." + +The signs of the times are most favorable to the success of the Irish +Liberator. The tremendous power of the English political unions is +beginning to develop itself in favor of Ireland. A deep sympathy is +evinced for her sufferings, and a general determination to espouse her +cause. Brute force cannot put down the peaceable and legal agitation of +the question of her rights and interests. The spirit of the age forbids +it. The agitation will go on, for it is spreading among men who, to use +the words of the eloquent Shiel, while looking out upon the ocean, and +gazing upon the shore, which Nature has guarded with so many of her +bulwarks, can hear the language of Repeal muttered in the dashing of the +very waves which separate them from Great Britain by a barrier of God's +own creation. Another bloodless victory, we trust, awaits O'Connell,--a +victory worthy of his heart and intellect, unstained by one drop of human +blood, unmoistened by a solitary tear. + +Ireland will be redeemed and disenthralled, not perhaps by a repeal of +the Union, but by the accomplishment of such a thorough reform in the +government and policy of Great Britain as shall render a repeal +unnecessary and impolitic. + +The sentiments of O'Connell in regard to the means of effecting his +object of political reform are distinctly impressed upon all his appeals +to the people. In his letter of December, 1832, to the Dublin Trades +Union, he says: "The Repealers must not have our cause stained with +blood. Far indeed from it. We can, and ought to, carry the repeal only +in the total absence of offence against the laws of man or crime in the +sight of God. The best revolution which was ever effected could not be +worth one drop of human blood." In his speech at the public dinner given +him by--the citizens of Cork, we find a yet more earnest avowal of +pacific principles. "It may be stated," said he, "to countervail our +efforts, that this struggle will involve the destruction of life and +property; that it will overturn the framework of civil society, and give +an undue and fearful influence to one rank to the ruin of all others. +These are awful considerations, truly, if risked. I am one of those who +have always believed that any political change is too dearly purchased by +a single drop of blood, and who think that any political superstructure +based upon other opinion is like the sand-supported fabric,--beautiful in +the brief hour of sunshine, but the moment one drop of rain touches the +arid basis melting away in wreck and ruin! I am an accountable being; I +have a soul and a God to answer to, in another and better world, for my +thoughts and actions in this. I disclaim here any act of mine which +would sport with the lives of my fellow-creatures, any amelioration of +our social condition which must be purchased by their blood. And here, +in the face of God and of our common country, I protest that if I did not +sincerely and firmly believe that the amelioration I desire could be +effected without violence, without any change in the relative scale of +ranks in the present social condition of Ireland, except that change +which all must desire, making each better than it was before, and +cementing all in one solid irresistible mass, I would at once give up the +struggle which I have always kept with tyranny. I would withdraw from +the contest which I have hitherto waged with those who would perpetuate +our thraldom. I would not for one moment dare to venture for that which +in costing one human life would cost infinitely too dear. But it will +cost no such price. Have we not had within my memory two great political +revolutions? And had we them not without bloodshed or violence to the +social compact? Have we not arrived at a period when physical force and +military power yield to moral and intellectual energy. Has not the time +of 'Cedant arma togae' come for us and the other nations of the earth?" + +Let us trust that the prediction of O'Connell will be verified; that +reason and intellect are destined, under God, to do that for the nations +of the earth which the physical force of centuries and the red sacrifice +of a thousand battle-fields have failed to accomplish. Glorious beyond +all others will be the day when "nation shall no more rise up against +nation;" when, as a necessary consequence of the universal acknowledgment +of the rights of man, it shall no longer be in the power of an individual +to drag millions into strife, for the unholy gratification of personal +prejudice and passion. The reformed governments of Great Britain and +France, resting, as they do, upon a popular basis, are already tending to +this consummation, for the people have suffered too much from the warlike +ambition of their former masters not to have learned that the gains of +peaceful industry are better than the wages of human butchery. + +Among the great names of Ireland--alike conspicuous, yet widely +dissimilar--stand Wellington and O'Connell. The one smote down the +modern Alexander upon Waterloo's field of death, but the page of his +reputation is dim with the tears of the widow and the orphan, and dark +with the stain of blood. The other, armed only with the weapons of truth +and reason, has triumphed over the oppression of centuries, and opened a +peaceful pathway to the Temple of Freedom, through which its Goddess may +be seen, no longer propitiated with human sacrifices, like some foul idol +of the East, but clothed in Christian attributes, and smiling in the +beauty of holiness upon the pure hearts and peaceful hands of its +votaries. The bloodless victories of the latter have all the sublimity +with none of the criminality which attaches itself to the triumphs of the +former. To thunder high truths in the deafened ear of nations, to rouse +the better spirit of the age, to soothe the malignant passions of. +assembled and maddened men, to throw open the temple doors of justice to +the abused, enslaved, and persecuted, to unravel the mysteries of guilt, +and hold up the workers of iniquity in the severe light of truth stripped +of their disguise and covered with the confusion of their own vileness,-- +these are victories more glorious than any which have ever reddened the +earth with carnage:-- + + "They ask a spirit of more exalted pitch, + And courage tempered with a holier fire." + +Of the more recent efforts of O'Connell we need not speak, for no one can +read the English periodicals and papers without perceiving that O'Connell +is, at this moment, the leading politician, the master mind of the +British empire. Attempts have been made to prejudice the American mind +against him by a republication on this side of the water of the false and +foul slanders of his Tory enemies, in reference to what is called the +"O'Connell rent," a sum placed annually in his hands by a grateful +people, and which he has devoted scrupulously to the great object of +Ireland's political redemption. He has acquired no riches by his +political efforts his heart and soul and mind and strength have been +directed to his suffering country and the cause of universal freedom. +For this he has deservedly a place in the heart and affections of every +son of Ireland. One million of ransomed slaves in the British +dependencies will teach their children to repeat the name of O'Connell +with that of Wilberforce and Clarkson. And when the stain and caste of +slavery shall have passed from our own country, he will be regarded as +our friend and benefactor, whose faithful rebukes and warnings and +eloquent appeals to our pride of character, borne to us across the +Atlantic, touched the guilty sensitiveness of the national conscience, +and through shame prepared the way for repentance. + + + + + + + +ENGLAND UNDER JAMES II. + + A review of the first two volumes of Macaulay's _History of England + from the Accession of James II_. + +In accordance with the labor-saving spirit of the age, we have in these +volumes an admirable example of history made easy. Had they been +published in his time, they might have found favor in the eyes of the +poet Gray, who declared that his ideal of happiness was "to lie on a sofa +and read eternal new romances." + +The style is that which lends such a charm to the author's essays,-- +brilliant, epigrammatic, vigorous. Indeed, herein lies the fault of the +work, when viewed as a mere detail of historical facts. Its sparkling +rhetoric is not the safest medium of truth to the simple-minded inquirer. +A discriminating and able critic has done the author no injustice in +saying that, in attempting to give effect and vividness to his thoughts +and diction, he is often overstrained and extravagant, and that his +epigrammatic style seems better fitted for the glitter of paradox than +the sober guise of truth. The intelligent and well-informed reader of +the volume before us will find himself at times compelled to reverse the +decisions of the author, and deliver some unfortunate personage, sect, or +class from the pillory of his rhetoric and the merciless pelting of his +ridicule. There is a want of the repose and quiet which we look for in +a narrative of events long passed away; we rise from the perusal of the +book pleased and excited, but with not so clear a conception of the +actual realities of which it treats as would be desirable. We cannot +help feeling that the author has been somewhat over-scrupulous in +avoiding the dulness of plain detail, and the dryness of dates, names, +and statistics. The freedom, flowing diction, and sweeping generality of +the reviewer and essayist are maintained throughout; and, with one +remarkable exception, the _History of England_ might be divided into +papers of magazine length, and published, without any violence to +propriety, as a continuation of the author's labors in that department of +literature in which he confessedly stands without a rival,--historical +review. + +That exception is, however, no unimportant one. In our view, it is the +crowning excellence of the first volume,--its distinctive feature and +principal attraction. We refer to the third chapter of the volume, from +page 260 to page 398,--the description of the condition of England at the +period of the accession of James II. We know of nothing like it in the +entire range of historical literature. The veil is lifted up from the +England of a century and a half ago; its geographical, industrial, +social, and moral condition is revealed; and, as the panorama passes +before us of lonely heaths, fortified farm-houses, bands of robbers, +rude country squires doling out the odds and ends of their coarse fare +to clerical dependents,--rough roads, serviceable only for horseback +travelling,--towns with unlighted streets, reeking with filth and offal, +--and prisons, damp, loathsome, infected with disease, and swarming with +vermin,--we are filled with wonder at the contrast which it presents to +the England of our day. We no longer sigh for "the good old days." The +most confirmed grumbler is compelled to admit that, bad as things now +are, they were far worse a few generations back. Macaulay, in this +elaborate and carefully prepared chapter, has done a good service to +humanity in disabusing well-intentioned ignorance of the melancholy +notion that the world is growing worse, and in putting to silence the +cant of blind, unreasoning conservatism. + +In 1685 the entire population of England our author estimates at from +five millions to five millions five hundred thousand. Of the eight +hundred thousand families at that period, one half had animal food twice +a week. The other half ate it not at all, or at most not oftener than +once a week. Wheaten, loaves were only seen at the tables of the +comparatively wealthy. Rye, barley, and oats were the food of the vast +majority. The average wages of workingmen was at least one half less +than is paid in England for the same service at the present day. One +fifth of the people were paupers, or recipients of parish relief. +Clothing and bedding were scarce and dear. Education was almost unknown +to the vast majority. The houses and shops were not numbered in the +cities, for porters, coachmen, and errand-runners could not read. The +shopkeeper distinguished his place of business by painted signs and +graven images. Oxford and Cambridge Universities were little better than +modern grammar and Latin school in a provincial village. The country +magistrate used on the bench language too coarse, brutal, and vulgar for +a modern tap-room. Fine gentlemen in London vied with each other in the +lowest ribaldry and the grossest profanity. The poets of the time, from +Dryden to Durfey, ministered to the popular licentiousness. The most +shameless indecency polluted their pages. The theatre and the brothel +were in strict unison. The Church winked at the vice which opposed +itself to the austere morality or hypocrisy of Puritanism. The superior +clergy, with a few noble exceptions, were self-seekers and courtiers; the +inferior were idle, ignorant hangerson upon blaspheming squires and +knights of the shire. The domestic chaplain, of all men living, held the +most unenviable position. "If he was permitted to dine with the family, +he was expected to content himself with the plainest fare. He might fill +himself with the corned beef and carrots; but as soon as the tarts and +cheese-cakes made their appearance he quitted his seat, and stood aloof +till he was summoned to return thanks for the repast, from a great part +of which he had been excluded." + +Beyond the Trent the country seems at this period to have been in a state +of barbarism. The parishes kept bloodhounds for the purpose of hunting +freebooters. The farm-houses were fortified and guarded. So dangerous +was the country that persons about travelling thither made their wills. +Judges and lawyers only ventured therein, escorted by a strong guard of +armed men. + +The natural resources of the island were undeveloped. The tin mines of +Cornwall, which two thousand years before attracted the ships of the +merchant princes of Tyre beyond the Pillars of Hercules, were indeed +worked to a considerable extent; but the copper mines, which now yield +annually fifteen thousand tons, were entirely neglected. Rock salt was +known to exist, but was not used to any considerable extent; and only a +partial supply of salt by evaporation was obtained. The coal and iron of +England are at this time the stable foundations of her industrial and +commercial greatness. But in 1685 the great part of the iron used was +imported. Only about ten thousand tons were annually cast. Now eight +hundred thousand is the average annual production. Equally great has +been the increase in coal mining. "Coal," says Macaulay, "though very +little used in any species of manufacture, was already the ordinary fuel +in some districts which were fortunate enough to possess large beds, and +in the capital, which could easily be supplied by water carriage. It +seems reasonable to believe that at least one half of the quantity then +extracted from the pits was consumed in London. The consumption of +London seemed to the writers of that age enormous, and was often +mentioned by them as a proof of the greatness of the imperial city. They +scarcely hoped to be believed when they affirmed that two hundred and +eighty thousand chaldrons--that is to say, about three hundred and fifty +thousand tons-were, in the last year of the reign of Charles II., brought +to the Thames. At present near three millions and a half of tons are +required yearly by the metropolis; and the whole annual produce cannot, +on the most moderate computation, be estimated at less than twenty +millions of tons." + +After thus passing in survey the England of our ancestors five or six +generations back, the author closes his chapter with some eloquent +remarks upon the progress of society. Contrasting the hardness and +coarseness of the age of which he treats with the softer and more humane +features of our own, he says: "Nowhere could be found that sensitive and +restless compassion which has in our time extended powerful protection to +the factory child, the Hindoo widow, to the negro slave; which pries into +the stores and water-casks of every emigrant ship; which winces at every +lash laid on the back of a drunken soldier; which will not suffer the +thief in the hulks to be ill fed or overworked; and which has repeatedly +endeavored to save the life even of the murderer. The more we study the +annals of the past, the more shall we rejoice that we live in a merciful +age, in an age in which cruelty is abhorred, and in which pain, even when +deserved, is inflicted reluctantly and from a sense of duty. Every +class, doubtless, has gained largely by this great moral change; but the +class which has gained most is the poorest, the most dependent, and the +most defenceless." + +The history itself properly commences at the close of this chapter. +Opening with the deathscene of the dissolute Charles II., it presents a +series of brilliant pictures of the events succeeding: The miserable fate +of Oates and Dangerfield, the perjured inventors of the Popish Plot; the +trial of Baxter by the infamous Jeffreys; the ill-starred attempt of the +Duke of Monmouth; the battle of Sedgemoor, and the dreadful atrocities of +the king's soldiers, and the horrible perversion of justice by the king's +chief judge in the "Bloody Assizes;" the barbarous hunting of the Scotch +Dissenters by Claverbouse; the melancholy fate of the brave and noble +Duke of Argyle,--are described with graphic power unknown to Smollett or +Hume. Personal portraits are sketched with a bold freedom which at times +startles us. The "old familiar faces," as we have seen them through the +dust of a century and a half, start before us with lifelike distinctness +of outline and coloring. Some of them disappoint us; like the ghost of +Hamlet's father, they come in a "questionable shape." Thus, for +instance, in his sketch of William Penn, the historian takes issue with +the world on his character, and labors through many pages of disingenuous +innuendoes and distortion of facts to transform the saint of history into +a pliant courtier. + +The second volume details the follies and misfortunes, the decline and +fall, of the last of the Stuarts. All the art of the author's splendid +rhetoric is employed in awakening, by turns, the indignation and contempt +of the reader in contemplating the character of the wrong-headed king. +In portraying that character, he has brought into exercise all those +powers of invective and merciless ridicule which give such a savage +relish to his delineation of Barrere. To preserve the consistency of +this character, he denies the king any credit for whatever was really +beneficent and praiseworthy in his government. He holds up the royal +delinquent in only two lights: the one representing him as a tyrant +towards his people; the other as the abject slave of foreign priests,-- +a man at once hateful and ludicrous, of whom it is difficult to speak +without an execration or a sneer. + +The events which preceded the revolution of 1688; the undisguised +adherence of the king to the Church of Rome; the partial toleration of +the despised Quakers and Anabaptists; the gradual relaxation of the +severity of the penal laws against Papists and Dissenters, preparing the +way for the royal proclamation of entire liberty of conscience throughout +the British realm, allowing the crop-eared Puritan and the Papist priest +to build conventicles and mass houses under the very eaves of the palaces +of Oxford and Canterbury; the mining and countermining of Jesuits and +prelates, are detailed with impartial minuteness. The secret springs of +the great movements of the time are laid bare; the mean and paltry +instrumentalities are seen at work in the under world of corruption, +prejudice, and falsehood. No one, save a blind, unreasoning partisan of +Catholicism or Episcopacy, can contemplate this chapter in English +history without a feeling of disgust. However it may have been overruled +for good by that Providence which takes the wise in their own craftiness, +the revolution of 1688, in itself considered, affords just as little +cause for self-congratulation on the part of Protestants as the +substitution of the supremacy of the crowned Bluebeard, Henry VIII., for +that of the Pope, in the English Church. It had little in common with +the revolution of 1642. The field of its action was the closet of +selfish intrigue,--the stalls of discontented prelates,--the chambers of +the wanton and adulteress,--the confessional of a weak prince, whose +mind, originally narrow, had been cramped closer still by the strait- +jacket of religious bigotry and superstition. The age of nobility and +heroism had well-nigh passed away. The pious fervor, the self-denial, +and the strict morality of the Puritanism of the days of Cromwell, and +the blunt honesty and chivalrous loyalty of the Cavaliers, had both +measurably given place to the corrupting influences of the licentious and +infidel court of Charles II.; and to the arrogance, intolerance, and +shameless self-seeking of a prelacy which, in its day of triumph and +revenge, had more than justified the terrible denunciations and scathing +gibes of Milton. + +Both Catholic and Protestant writers have misrepresented James II. He +deserves neither the execrations of the one nor the eulogies of the +other. The candid historian must admit that he was, after all, a better +man than his brother Charles II. He was a sincere and bigoted Catholic, +and was undoubtedly honest in the declaration, which he made in that +unlucky letter which Burnet ferreted out on the Continent, that he was +prepared to make large steps to build up the Catholic Church in England, +and, if necessary, to become a martyr in her cause. He was proud, +austere, and self-willed. In the treatment of his enemies he partook of +the cruel temper of his time. He was at once ascetic and sensual, +alternating between the hair-shirt of penance and the embraces of +Catharine Sedley. His situation was one of the most difficult and +embarrassing which can be conceived of. He was at once a bigoted Papist +and a Protestant pope. He hated the French domination to which his +brother had submitted; yet his pride as sovereign was subordinated to his +allegiance to Rome and a superstitious veneration for the wily priests +with which Louis XIV. surrounded him. As the head of Anglican heretics, +he was compelled to submit to conditions galling alike to the sovereign +and the man. He found, on his accession, the terrible penal laws against +the Papists in full force; the hangman's knife was yet warm with its +ghastly butcher-work of quartering and disembowelling suspected Jesuits +and victims of the lie of Titus Oates; the Tower of London had scarcely +ceased to echo the groans of Catholic confessors stretched on the rack by +Protestant inquisitors. He was torn by conflicting interests and +spiritual and political contradictions. The prelates of the Established +Church must share the responsibility of many of the worst acts of the +early part of his reign. Oxford sent up its lawned deputations to mingle +the voice of adulation with the groans of tortured Covenanters, and +fawning ecclesiastics burned the incense of irreverent flattery under the +nostrils of the Lord's anointed, while the blessed air of England was +tainted by the carcasses of the ill-fated followers of Monmouth, rotting +on a thousand gibbets. While Jeffreys was threatening Baxter and his +Presbyterian friends with the pillory and whipping-post; while Quakers +and Baptists were only spared from extermination as game preserves for +the sport of clerical hunters; while the prisons were thronged with the +heads of some fifteen thousand beggared families, and Dissenters of every +name and degree were chased from one hiding-place to another, like David +among the cliffs of Ziph and the rocks of the wild goats,--the +thanksgivings and congratulations of prelacy arose in an unbroken strain +of laudation from all the episcopal palaces of England. What mattered it +to men, in whose hearts, to use the language of John Milton, "the sour +leaven of human traditions, mixed with the poisonous dregs of hypocrisy, +lay basking in the sunny warmth of wealth and promotion, hatching +Antichrist," that the privileges of Englishmen and the rights secured by +the great charter were violated and trodden under foot, so long as +usurpation enured to their own benefit? But when King James issued his +Declaration of Indulgence, and stretched his prerogative on the side of +tolerance and charity, the zeal of the prelates for preserving the +integrity of the British constitution and the limiting of the royal power +flamed up into rebellion. They forswore themselves without scruple: the +disciples of Laud, the asserters of kingly infallibility and divine +right, talked of usurped power and English rights in the strain of the +very schismatics whom they had persecuted to the death. There is no +reason to believe that James supposed that, in issuing his declaration +suspending the penal laws, he had transcended the rightful prerogative of +his throne. The power which he exercised had been used by his +predecessors for far less worthy purposes, and with the approbation of +many of the very men who now opposed him. His ostensible object, +expressed in language which even those who condemn his policy cannot but +admire, was a laudable and noble one. "We trust," said he, "that it will +not be vain that we have resolved to use our utmost endeavors to +establish liberty of conscience on such just and equal foundations as +will render it unalterable, and secure to all people the free exercise of +their religion, by which future ages may reap the benefit of what is so +undoubtedly the general good of the whole kingdom." Whatever may have +been the motive of this declaration,--even admitting the suspicions of +his enemies to have been true, that he advocated universal toleration as +the only means of restoring Roman Catholics to all the rights and +privileges of which the penal laws deprived them,--it would seem that +there could have been no very serious objection on the part of real +friends of religious toleration to the taking of him at his word and +placing Englishmen of every sect on an equality before the law. The +Catholics were in a very small minority, scarcely at that time as +numerous as the Quakers and Anabaptists. The army, the navy, and nine +tenths of the people of England were Protestants. Real danger, +therefore, from a simple act of justice towards their Catholic fellow- +citizens, the people of England had no ground for apprehending. But the +great truth, which is even now but imperfectly recognized throughout +Christendom, that religious opinions rest between man and his Maker, and +not between man and the magistrate, and that the domain of conscience is +sacred, was almost unknown to the statesmen and schoolmen of the +seventeenth century. Milton--ultra liberal as he was--excepted the +Catholics from his plan of toleration. Locke, yielding to the prejudices +of the time, took the same ground. The enlightened latitudinarian +ministers of the Established Church--men whose talents and Christian +charity redeem in some measure the character of that Church in the day of +its greatest power and basest apostasy--stopped short of universal +toleration. The Presbyterians excluded Quakers, Baptists, and Papists +from the pale of their charity. With the single exception of the sect of +which William Penn was a conspicuous member, the idea of complete and +impartial toleration was novel and unwelcome to all sects and classes of +the English people. Hence it was that the very men whose liberties and +estates had been secured by the declaration, and who were thereby +permitted to hold their meetings in peace and quietness, used their newly +acquired freedom in denouncing the king, because the same key which had +opened their prison doors had also liberated the Papists and the Quakers. +Baxter's severe and painful spirit could not rejoice in an act which had, +indeed, restored him to personal freedom, but which had, in his view, +also offended Heaven, and strengthened the powers of Antichrist by +extending the same favor to Jesuits and Ranters. Bunyan disliked the +Quakers next to the Papists; and it greatly lessened his satisfaction at +his release from Bedford jail that it had been brought about by the +influence of the former at the court of a Catholic prince. Dissenters +forgot the wrongs and persecutions which they had experienced at the +hands of the prelacy, and joined the bishops in opposition to the +declaration. They almost magnified into Christian confessors the +prelates who remonstrated against the indulgence, and actually plotted +against the king for restoring them to liberty of person and conscience. +The nightmare fear of Popery overcame their love of religious liberty; +and they meekly offered their necks to the yoke of prelacy as the only +security against the heavier one of Papist supremacy. In a far different +manner the cleareyed and plain-spoken John Milton met the claims and +demands of the hierarchy in his time. "They entreat us," said he, "that +we be not weary of the insupportable grievances that our shoulders have +hitherto cracked under; they beseech us that we think them fit to be our +justices of peace, our lords, our highest officers of state. They pray +us that it would please us to let them still haul us and wrong us with +their bandogs and pursuivants; and that it would please the Parliament +that they may yet have the whipping, fleecing, and flaying of us in their +diabolical courts, to tear the flesh from our bones, and into our wide +wounds, instead of balm, to pour in the oil of tartar, vitriol, and +mercury. Surely a right, reasonable, innocent, and soft-hearted +petition! O the relenting bowels of the fathers!" + +Considering the prominent part acted by William Penn in the reign of +James II., and his active and influential support of the obnoxious +declaration which precipitated the revolution of 1688, it could hardly +have been otherwise than that his character should suffer from the +unworthy suspicions and prejudices of his contemporaries. His views of +religious toleration were too far in advance of the age to be received +with favor. They were of necessity misunderstood and misrepresented. +All his life he had been urging them with the earnestness of one whose +convictions were the result, not so much of human reason as of what he +regarded as divine illumination. What the council of James yielded upon +grounds of state policy he defended on those of religious obligation. +He had suffered in person and estate for the exercise of his religion. +He had travelled over Holland and Germany, pleading with those in +authority for universal toleration and charity. On a sudden, on the +accession of James, the friend of himself and his family, he found +himself the most influential untitled citizen in the British realm. +He had free access to the royal ear. Asking nothing for himself or his +relatives, he demanded only that the good people of England should be no +longer despoiled of liberty and estate for their religious opinions. +James, as a Catholic, had in some sort a common interest with his +dissenting subjects, and the declaration was for their common relief. +Penn, conscious of the rectitude of his own motives and thoroughly +convinced of the Christian duty of toleration, welcomed that declaration +as the precursor of the golden age of liberty and love and good-will to +men. He was not the man to distrust the motives of an act so fully in +accordance with his lifelong aspirations and prayers. He was charitable +to a fault: his faith in his fellow-men was often stronger than a clearer +insight of their characters would have justified. He saw the errors of +the king, and deplored them; he denounced Jeffreys as a butcher who had +been let loose by the priests; and pitied the king, who was, he thought, +swayed by evil counsels. He remonstrated against the interference of the +king with Magdalen College; and reproved and rebuked the hopes and aims +of the more zealous and hot-headed Catholics, advising them to be content +with simple toleration. But the constitution of his mind fitted him +rather for the commendation of the good than the denunciation of the bad. +He had little in common with the bold and austere spirit of the Puritan +reformers. He disliked their violence and harshness; while, on the other +hand, he was attracted and pleased by the gentle disposition and mild +counsels of Locke, and Tillotson, and the latitudinarians of the English +Church. He was the intimate personal and political friend of Algernon +Sydney; sympathized with his republican theories, and shared his +abhorrence of tyranny, civil and ecclesiastical. He found in him a man +after his own heart,--genial, generous, and loving; faithful to duty and +the instincts of humanity; a true Christian gentleman. His sense of +gratitude was strong, and his personal friendships sometimes clouded his +judgment. In giving his support to the measures of James in behalf of +liberty of conscience, it must be admitted that he acted in consistency +with his principles and professions. To have taken ground against them, +he must have given the lie to his declarations from his youth upward. He +could not disown and deny his own favorite doctrine because it came from +the lips of a Catholic king and his Jesuit advisers; and in thus rising +above the prejudices of his time, and appealing to the reason and +humanity of the people of England in favor of a cordial indorsement on +the part of Parliament of the principles of the declaration, he believed +that he was subserving the best interests of his beloved country and +fulfilling the solemn obligations of religious duty. The downfall of +James exposed Penn to peril and obloquy. Perjured informers endeavored +to swear away his life; and, although nothing could be proved against him +beyond the fact that he had steadily supported the great measure of +toleration, he was compelled to live secluded in his private lodgings in +London for two or three years, with a proclamation for his arrest hanging +over his head. At length, the principal informer against him having been +found guilty of perjury, the government warrant was withdrawn; and Lords +Sidney, Rochester, and Somers, and the Duke of Buckingham, publicly bore +testimony that nothing had been urged against him save by impostors, and +that "they had known him, some of them, for thirty years, and had never +known him to do an ill thing, but many good offices." It is a matter of +regret that one professing to hold the impartial pen of history should +have given the sanction of his authority to the slanderous and false +imputations of such a man as Burnet, who has never been regarded as an +authentic chronicler. The pantheon of history should not be lightly +disturbed. A good man's character is the world's common legacy; and +humanity is not so rich in models of purity and goodness as to be able to +sacrifice such a reputation as that of William Penn to the point of an +antithesis or the effect of a paradox. + + Gilbert Burnet, in liberality as a politician and tolerance as a + Churchman, was far in advance of his order and time. It is true + that he shut out the Catholics from the pale of his charity and + barely tolerated the Dissenters. The idea of entire religious + liberty and equality shocked even his moderate degree of + sensitiveness. He met Penn at the court of the Prince of Orange, + and, after a long and fruitless effort to convince the Dissenter + that the penal laws against the Catholics should be enforced, and + allegiance to the Established Church continue the condition of + qualification for offices of trust and honor, and that he and his + friends should rest contented with simple toleration, he became + irritated by the inflexible adherence of Penn to the principle of + entire religious freedom. One of the most worthy sons of the + Episcopal Church, Thomas Clarkson, alluding to this discussion, says + "Burnet never mentioned him (Penn) afterwards but coldly or + sneeringly, or in a way to lower him in the estimation of the + reader, whenever he had occasion to speak of him in his History of + his Own Times." + + He was a man of strong prejudices; he lived in the midst of + revolutions, plots, and intrigues; he saw much of the worst side of + human nature; and he candidly admits, in the preface to his great + work, that he was inclined to think generally the worst of men and + parties, and that the reader should make allowance for this + inclination, although he had honestly tried to give the truth. Dr. + King, of Oxford, in his Anecdotes of his Own Times, p. 185, says: + "I knew Burnet: he was a furious party-man, and easily imposed upon + by any lying spirit of his faction; but he was a better pastor than + any man who is now seated on the bishops' bench." The Tory writers + --Swift, Pope, Arbuthnot, and others--have undoubtedly exaggerated + the defects of Burnet's narrative; while, on the other hand, his + Whig commentators have excused them on the ground of his avowed and + fierce partisanship. Dr. Johnson, in his blunt way, says: "I do not + believe Burnet intentionally lied; but he was so much prejudiced + that he took no pains to find out the truth." On the contrary, Sir + James Mackintosh, in the Edinburgh Review, speaks of the Bishop as + an honest writer, seldom substantially erroneous, though often + inaccurate in points of detail; and Macaulay, who has quite too + closely followed him in his history, defends him as at least quite + as accurate as his contemporary writers, and says that, "in his + moral character, as in his intellectual, great blemishes were more + than compensated by great excellences." + + + + + + +THE BORDER WAR OF 1708. + +The picturesque site of the now large village of Haverhill, on the +Merrimac River, was occupied a century and a half ago by some thirty +dwellings, scattered at unequal distances along the two principal roads, +one of which, running parallel with the river, intersected the other, +which ascended the hill northwardly and lost itself in the dark woods. +The log huts of the first settlers had at that time given place to +comparatively spacious and commodious habitations, framed and covered +with sawed boards, and cloven clapboards, or shingles. They were, many +of them, two stories in front, with the roof sloping off behind to a +single one; the windows few and small, and frequently so fitted as to be +opened with difficulty, and affording but a scanty supply of light and +air. Two or three of the best constructed were occupied as garrisons, +where, in addition to the family, small companies of soldiers were +quartered. On the high grounds rising from the river stood the mansions +of the well-defined aristocracy of the little settlement,--larger and +more imposing, with projecting upper stories and carved cornices. On the +front of one of these, over the elaborately wrought entablature of the +doorway, might be seen the armorial bearings of the honored family of +Saltonstall. Its hospitable door was now closed; no guests filled its +spacious hall or partook of the rich delicacies of its ample larder. +Death had been there; its venerable and respected occupant had just been +borne by his peers in rank and station to the neighboring graveyard. +Learned, affable, intrepid, a sturdy asserter of the rights and liberties +of the Province, and so far in advance of his time as to refuse to yield +to the terrible witchcraft delusion, vacating his seat on the bench and +openly expressing his disapprobation of the violent and sanguinary +proceedings of the court, wise in council and prompt in action,--not his +own townsmen alone, but the people of the entire Province, had reason to +mourn the loss of Nathaniel Saltonstall. + +Four years before the events of which we are about to speak, the Indian +allies of the French in Canada suddenly made their appearance in the +westerly part of the settlement. At the close of a midwinter day six +savages rushed into the open gate of a garrison-house owned by one +Bradley, who appears to have been absent at the time. A sentinel, +stationed in the house, discharged his musket, killing the foremost +Indian, and was himself instantly shot down. The mistress of the house, +a spirited young woman, was making soap in a large kettle over the fire. +--She seized her ladle and dashed the boiling liquid in the faces of the +assailants, scalding one of them severely, and was only captured after +such a resistance as can scarcely be conceived of by the delicately +framed and tenderly nurtured occupants of the places of our great- +grandmothers. After plundering the house, the Indians started on their +long winter march for Canada. Tradition says that some thirteen persons, +probably women and children, were killed outright at the garrison. +Goodwife Bradley and four others were spared as prisoners. The ground +was covered with deep snow, and the captives were compelled to carry +heavy burdens of their plundered household-stuffs; while for many days in +succession they had no other sustenance than bits of hide, ground-nuts, +the bark of trees, and the roots of wild onions, and lilies. In this +situation, in the cold, wintry forest, and unattended, the unhappy young +woman gave birth to a child. Its cries irritated the savages, who +cruelly treated it and threatened its life. To the entreaties of the +mother they replied, that they would spare it on the condition that it +should be baptized after their fashion. She gave the little innocent +into their hands, when with mock solemnity they made the sign of the +cross upon its forehead, by gashing it with their knives, and afterwards +barbarously put it to death before the eyes of its mother, seeming to +regard the whole matter as an excellent piece of sport. Nothing so +strongly excited the risibilities of these grim barbarians as the tears +and cries of their victims, extorted by physical or mental agony. +Capricious alike in their cruelties and their kindnesses, they treated +some of their captives with forbearance and consideration and tormented +others apparently without cause. One man, on his way to Canada, was +killed because they did not like his looks, "he was so sour;" another, +because he was "old and good for nothing." One of their own number, who +was suffering greatly from the effects of the scalding soap, was derided +and mocked as a "fool who had let a squaw whip him;" while on the other +hand the energy and spirit manifested by Goodwife Bradley in her defence +was a constant theme of admiration, and gained her so much respect among +her captors as to protect her from personal injury or insult. On her +arrival in Canada she was sold to a French farmer, by whom she was kindly +treated. + +In the mean time her husband made every exertion in his power to +ascertain her fate, and early in the next year learned that she was a +slave in Canada. He immediately set off through the wilderness on foot, +accompanied only by his dog, who drew a small sled, upon which he carried +some provisions for his sustenance, and a bag of snuff, which the +Governor of the Province gave him as a present to the Governor of Canada. +After encountering almost incredible hardships and dangers with a +perseverance which shows how well he appreciated the good qualities of +his stolen helpmate, he reached Montreal and betook himself to the +Governor's residence. Travel-worn, ragged, and wasted with cold and +hunger, he was ushered into the presence of M. Vaudreuil. The courtly +Frenchman civilly received the gift of the bag of snuff, listened to the +poor fellow's story, and put him in a way to redeem his wife without +difficulty. The joy of the latter on seeing her husband in the strange +land of her captivity may well be imagined. They returned by water, +landing at Boston early in the summer. + +There is a tradition that this was not the goodwife's first experience of +Indian captivity. The late Dr. Abiel Abbott, in his manuscript of Judith +Whiting's _Recollections of the Indian Wars_, states that she had +previously been a prisoner, probably before her marriage. After her +return she lived quietly at the garrison-house until the summer of the +next year. One bright moonlit-night a party of Indians were seen +silently and cautiously approaching. The only occupants of the garrison +at that time were Bradley, his wife and children, and a servant. The +three adults armed themselves with muskets, and prepared to defend +themselves. Goodwife Bradley, supposing the Indians had come with the +intention of again capturing her, encouraged her husband to fight to the +last, declaring that she had rather die on her own hearth than fall into +their hands. The Indians rushed upon the garrison, and assailed the +thick oaken door, which they forced partly open, when a well-aimed shot +from Goodwife Bradley laid the foremost dead on the threshold. The loss +of their leader so disheartened them that they made a hasty retreat. + +The year 1707 passed away without any attack upon the exposed frontier +settlement. A feeling of comparative security succeeded to the almost +sleepless anxiety and terror of the inhabitants; and they were beginning +to congratulate each other upon the termination of their long and bitter +trials. But the end was not yet. + +Early in the spring of 1708, the principal tribes of Indians in alliance +with the French held a great council, and agreed to furnish three hundred +warriors for an expedition to the English frontier. + +They were joined by one hundred French Canadians and several volunteers, +consisting of officers of the French army, and younger sons of the +nobility, adventurous and unscrupulous. The Sieur de Chaillons, and +Hertel de Rouville, distinguished as a partisan in former expeditions, +cruel and unsparing as his Indian allies, commanded the French troops; +the Indians, marshalled under their several chiefs, obeyed the general +orders of La Perriere. A Catholic priest accompanied them. De Ronville, +with the French troops and a portion of the Indians, took the route by +the River St. Francois about the middle of summer. La Perriere, with the +French Mohawks, crossed Lake Champlain. The place of rendezvous was Lake +Nickisipigue. On the way a Huron accidentally killed one of his +companions; whereupon the tribe insisted on halting and holding a +council. It was gravely decided that this accident was an evil omen, and +that the expedition would prove disastrous; and, in spite of the +endeavors of the French officers, the whole band deserted. Next the +Mohawks became dissatisfied, and refused to proceed. To the entreaties +and promises of their French allies they replied that an infectious +disease had broken out among them, and that, if they remained, it would +spread through the whole army. The French partisans were not deceived by +a falsehood so transparent; but they were in no condition to enforce +obedience; and, with bitter execrations and reproaches, they saw the +Mohawks turn back on their warpath. The diminished army pressed on to +Nickisipigue, in the expectation of meeting, agreeably to their promise, +the Norridgewock and Penobscot Indians. They found the place deserted, +and, after waiting for some days, were forced to the conclusion that the +Eastern tribes had broken their pledge of cooperation. Under these +circumstances a council was held; and the original design of the +expedition, namely, the destruction of the whole line of frontier towns, +beginning with Portsmouth, was abandoned. They had still a sufficient +force for the surprise of a single settlement; and Haverhill, on the +Merrimac, was selected for conquest. + +In the mean time, intelligence of the expedition, greatly exaggerated in +point of numbers and object, had reached Boston, and Governor Dudley had +despatched troops to the more exposed out posts of the Provinces of +Massachusetts and New Hampshire. Forty men, under the command of Major +Turner and Captains Price and Gardner, were stationed at Haverhill in the +different garrison-houses. At first a good degree of vigilance was +manifested; but, as days and weeks passed without any alarm, the +inhabitants relapsed into their old habits; and some even began to +believe that the rumored descent of the Indians was only a pretext for +quartering upon them two-score of lazy, rollicking soldiers, who +certainly seemed more expert in making love to their daughters, and +drinking their best ale and cider, than in patrolling the woods or +putting the garrisons into a defensible state. The grain and hay harvest +ended without disturbance; the men worked in their fields, and the women +pursued their household avocations, without any very serious apprehension +of danger. + +Among the inhabitants of the village was an eccentric, ne'er-do-well +fellow, named Keezar, who led a wandering, unsettled life, oscillating, +like a crazy pendulum, between Haverhill and Amesbury. He had a +smattering of a variety of trades, was a famous wrestler, and for a mug +of ale would leap over an ox-cart with the unspilled beverage in his +hand. On one occasion, when at supper, his wife complained that she had +no tin dishes; and, as there were none to be obtained nearer than Boston, +he started on foot in the evening, travelled through the woods to the +city, and returned with his ware by sunrise the next morning, passing +over a distance of between sixty and seventy miles. The tradition of his +strange habits, feats of strength, and wicked practical jokes is still +common in his native town. On the morning of the 29th of the eighth +month he was engaged in taking home his horse, which, according to his +custom, he had turned into his neighbor's rich clover field the evening +previous. By the gray light of dawn he saw a long file of men marching +silently towards the town. He hurried back to the village and gave the +alarm by firing a gun. Previous to this, however, a young man belonging +to a neighboring town, who had been spending the night with a young woman +of the village, had met the advance of the war-party, and, turning back +in extreme terror and confusion, thought only of the safety of his +betrothed, and passed silently through a considerable part of the village +to her dwelling. After he had effectually concealed her he ran out to +give the alarm. But it was too late. Keezar's gun was answered by the +terrific yells, whistling, and whooping of the Indians. House after +house was assailed and captured. Men, women, and children were +massacred. The minister of the town was killed by a shot through his +door. Two of his children were saved by the courage and sagacity of his +negro slave Hagar. She carried them into the cellar and covered them +with tubs, and then crouched behind a barrel of meat just in time to +escape the vigilant eyes of the enemy, who entered the cellar and +plundered it. She saw them pass and repass the tubs under which the +children lay and take meat from the very barrel which concealed herself. +Three soldiers were quartered in the house; but they made no defence, and +were killed while begging for quarter. + +The wife of Thomas Hartshorne, after her husband and three sons had +fallen, took her younger children into the cellar, leaving an infant on a +bed in the garret, fearful that its cries would betray her place of +concealment if she took it with her. The Indians entered the garret and +tossed the child out of the window upon a pile of clapboards, where it +was afterwards found stunned and insensible. It recovered, nevertheless, +and became a man of remarkable strength and stature; and it used to be a +standing joke with his friends that he had been stinted by the Indians +when they threw him out of the window. Goodwife Swan, armed with a long +spit, successfully defended her door against two Indians. While the +massacre went on, the priest who accompanied the expedition, with some of +the French officers, went into the meeting-house, the walls of which were +afterwards found written over with chalk. At sunrise, Major Turner, with +a portion of his soldiers, entered the village; and the enemy made a +rapid retreat, carrying with them seventeen, prisoners. They were +pursued and overtaken just as they were entering the woods; and a severe +skirmish took place, in which the rescue of some of the prisoners was +effected. Thirty of the enemy were left dead on the field, including the +infamous Hertel de Rouville. On the part of the villagers, Captains Ayer +and Wainwright and Lieutenant Johnson, with thirteen others, were killed. +The intense heat of the weather made it necessary to bury the dead on the +same day. They were laid side by side in a long trench in the burial- +ground. The body of the venerated and lamented minister, with those of +his wife and child, sleep in another part of the burial-ground, where may +still be seen a rude monument with its almost llegible inscription:-- + +"_Clauditur hoc tumulo corpus Reverendi pii doctique viri D. Benjamin +Rolfe, ecclesiae Christi quae est in Haverhill pastoris fidelissimi; qui +domi suae ab hostibus barbare trucidatus. A laboribus suis requievit +mane diei sacrae quietis, Aug. XXIX, anno Dom. MDCCVIII. AEtatis suae +XLVI_." + +Of the prisoners taken, some escaped during the skirmish, and two or +three were sent back by the French officers, with a message to the +English soldiers, that, if they pursued the party on their retreat to +Canada, the other prisoners should be put to death. One of them, a +soldier stationed in Captain Wainwright's garrison, on his return four +years after, published an account of his captivity. He was compelled to +carry a heavy pack, and was led by an Indian by a cord round his neck. +The whole party suffered terribly from hunger. On reaching Canada the +Indians shaved one side of his head, and greased the other, and painted +his face. At a fort nine miles from Montreal a council was held in order +to decide his fate; and he had the unenviable privilege of listening to a +protracted discussion upon the expediency of burning him. The fire was +already kindled, and the poor fellow was preparing to meet his doom with +firmness, when it was announced to him that his life was spared. This +result of the council by no means satisfied the women and boys, who had +anticipated rare sport in the roasting of a white man and a heretic. One +squaw assailed him with a knife and cut off one of his fingers; another +beat him with a pole. The Indians spent the night in dancing and +singing, compelling their prisoner to go round the ring with them. In +the morning one of their orators made a long speech to him, and formally +delivered him over to an old squaw, who took him to her wigwam and +treated him kindly. Two or three of the young women who were carried +away captive married Frenchmen in Canada and never returned. Instances +of this kind were by no means rare during the Indian wars. The simple +manners, gayety, and social habits of the French colonists among whom the +captives were dispersed seem to have been peculiarly fascinating to the +daughters of the grave and severe Puritans. + +At the beginning of the present century, Judith Whiting was the solitary +survivor of all who witnessed the inroad of the French and Indians in +1708. She was eight years of age at the time of the attack, and her +memory of it to the last was distinct and vivid. Upon her old brain, +from whence a great portion of the records of the intervening years had +been obliterated, that terrible picture, traced with fire and blood, +retained its sharp outlines and baleful colors. + + + + + +THE GREAT IPSWICH FRIGHT. + + "The Frere into the dark gazed forth; + The sounds went onward towards the north + The murmur of tongues, the tramp and tread + Of a mighty army to battle led." + BALLAD OF THE CID. + + + +Life's tragedy and comedy are never far apart. The ludicrous and the +sublime, the grotesque and the pathetic, jostle each other on the stage; +the jester, with his cap and bells, struts alongside of the hero; the +lord mayor's pageant loses itself in the mob around Punch and Judy; the +pomp and circumstance of war become mirth-provoking in a militia muster; +and the majesty of the law is ridiculous in the mock dignity of a +justice's court. The laughing philosopher of old looked on one side of +life and his weeping contemporary on the other; but he who has an eye to +both must often experience that contrariety of feeling which Sterne +compares to "the contest in the moist eyelids of an April morning, +whether to laugh or cry." + +The circumstance we are about to relate, may serve as an illustration of +the way in which the woof of comedy interweaves with the warp of tragedy. +It occurred in the early stages of the American Revolution, and is part +and parcel of its history in the northeastern section of Massachusetts. + +About midway between Salem and the ancient town of Newburyport, the +traveller on the Eastern Railroad sees on the right, between him and the +sea, a tall church-spire, rising above a semicircle of brown roofs and +venerable elms; to which a long scalloping range of hills, sweeping off +to the seaside, forms a green background. This is Ipswich, the ancient +Agawam; one of those steady, conservative villages, of which a few are +still left in New England, wherein a contemporary of Cotton Mather and +Governor Endicott, were he permitted to revisit the scenes of his painful +probation, would scarcely feel himself a stranger. Law and Gospel, +embodied in an orthodox steeple and a court-house, occupy the steep, +rocky eminence in its midst; below runs the small river under its +picturesque stone bridge; and beyond is the famous female seminary, where +Andover theological students are wont to take unto themselves wives of +the daughters of the Puritans. An air of comfort and quiet broods over +the whole town. Yellow moss clings to the seaward sides of the roofs; +one's eyes are not endangered by the intense glare of painted shingles +and clapboards. The smoke of hospitable kitchens curls up through the +overshadowing elms from huge-throated chimneys, whose hearth-stones have +been worn by the feet of many generations. The tavern was once renowned +throughout New England, and it is still a creditable hostelry. During +court time it is crowded with jocose lawyers, anxious clients, sleepy +jurors, and miscellaneous hangers on; disinterested gentlemen, who have +no particular business of their own in court, but who regularly attend +its sessions, weighing evidence, deciding upon the merits of a lawyer's +plea or a judge's charge, getting up extempore trials upon the piazza or +in the bar-room of cases still involved in the glorious uncertainty of +the law in the court-house, proffering gratuitous legal advice to +irascible plaintiffs and desponding defendants, and in various other ways +seeing that the Commonwealth receives no detriment. In the autumn old +sportsmen make the tavern their headquarters while scouring the marshes +for sea-birds; and slim young gentlemen from the city return thither with +empty game-bags, as guiltless in respect to the snipes and wagtails as +Winkle was in the matter of the rooks, after his shooting excursion at +Dingle Dell. Twice, nay, three times, a year, since third parties have +been in fashion, the delegates of the political churches assemble in +Ipswich to pass patriotic resolutions, and designate the candidates whom +the good people of Essex County, with implicit faith in the wisdom of the +selection, are expected to vote for. For the rest there are pleasant +walks and drives around the picturesque village. The people are noted +for their hospitality; in summer the sea-wind blows cool over its healthy +hills, and, take it for all in all, there is not a better preserved or +pleasanter specimen of a Puritan town remaining in the ancient +Commonwealth. + +The 21st of April, 1775, witnessed an awful commotion in the little +village of Ipswich. Old men, and boys, (the middle-aged had marched to +Lexington some days before) and all the women in the place who were not +bedridden or sick, came rushing as with one accord to the green in front +of the meeting-house. A rumor, which no one attempted to trace or +authenticate, spread from lip to lip that the British regulars had landed +on the coast and were marching upon the town. A scene of indescribable +terror and confusion followed. Defence was out of the question, as the +young and able-bodied men of the entire region round about had marched to +Cambridge and Lexington. The news of the battle at the latter place, +exaggerated in all its details, had been just received; terrible stories +of the atrocities committed by the dreaded "regulars" had been related; +and it was believed that nothing short of a general extermination of the +patriots--men, women, and children--was contemplated by the British +commander.--Almost simultaneously the people of Beverly, a village a few +miles distant, were smitten with the same terror. How the rumor was +communicated no one could tell. It was there believed that the enemy had +fallen upon Ipswich, and massacred the inhabitants without regard to age +or sex. + +It was about the middle of the afternoon of this day that the people of +Newbury, ten miles farther north, assembled in an informal meeting, at +the town-house to hear accounts from the Lexington fight, and to consider +what action was necessary in consequence of that event. Parson Carey was +about opening the meeting with prayer when hurried hoof-beats sounded up +the street, and a messenger, loose-haired and panting for breath, rushed +up the staircase. "Turn out, turn out, for God's sake," he cried, "or +you will be all killed! The regulars are marching onus; they are at +Ipswich now, cutting and slashing all before them!" Universal +consternation was the immediate result of this fearful announcement; +Parson Carey's prayer died on his lips; the congregation dispersed over +the town, carrying to every house the tidings that the regulars had come. +Men on horseback went galloping up and down the streets, shouting the +alarm. Women and children echoed it from every corner. The panic became +irresistible, uncontrollable. Cries were heard that the dreaded invaders +had reached Oldtown Bridge, a little distance from the village, and that +they were killing all whom they encountered. Flight was resolved upon. +All the horses and vehicles in the town were put in requisition; men, +women, and children hurried as for life towards the north. Some threw +their silver and pewter ware and other valuables into wells. Large +numbers crossed the Merrimac, and spent the night in the deserted houses +of Salisbury, whose inhabitants, stricken by the strange terror, had fled +into New Hampshire, to take up their lodgings in dwellings also abandoned +by their owners. A few individuals refused to fly with the multitude; +some, unable to move by reason of sickness, were left behind by their +relatives. One old gentleman, whose excessive corpulence rendered +retreat on his part impossible, made a virtue of necessity; and, seating +himself in his doorway with his loaded king's arm, upbraided his more +nimble neighbors, advising them to do as he did, and "stop and shoot the +devils." Many ludicrous instances of the intensity of the terror might +be related. One man got his family into a boat to go to Ram Island for +safety. He imagined he was pursued by the enemy through the dusk of the +evening, and was annoyed by the crying of an infant in the after part of +the boat. "Do throw that squalling brat overboard," he called to his +wife, "or we shall be all discovered and killed!" A poor woman ran four +or five miles up the river, and stopped to take breath and nurse her +child, when she found to her great horror that she had brought off the +cat instead of the baby! + +All through that memorable night the terror swept onward towards the +north with a speed which seems almost miraculous, producing everywhere +the same results. At midnight a horseman, clad only in shirt and +breeches, dashed by our grandfather's door, in Haverhill, twenty miles up +the river. "Turn out! Get a musket! Turn out!" he shouted; "the +regulars are landing on Plum Island!" "I'm glad of it," responded the +old gentleman from his chamber window; "I wish they were all there, and +obliged to stay there." When it is understood that Plum Island is little +more than a naked sand-ridge, the benevolence of this wish can be readily +appreciated. + +All the boats on the river were constantly employed for several hours in +conveying across the terrified fugitives. Through "the dead waste and +middle of the night" they fled over the border into New Hampshire. Some +feared to take the frequented roads, and wandered over wooded hills and +through swamps where the snows of the late winter had scarcely melted. +They heard the tramp and outcry of those behind them, and fancied that +the sounds were made by pursuing enemies. Fast as they fled, the terror, +by some unaccountable means, outstripped them. They found houses +deserted and streets strewn with household stuffs, abandoned in the hurry +of escape. Towards morning, however, the tide partially turned. Grown +men began to feel ashamed of their fears. The old Anglo-Saxon hardihood +paused and looked the terror in its face. Single or in small parties, +armed with such weapons as they found at hand,--among which long poles, +sharpened and charred at the end, were conspicuous,--they began to +retrace their steps. In the mean time such of the good people of Ipswich +as were unable or unwilling to leave their homes became convinced that +the terrible rumor which had nearly depopulated their settlement was +unfounded. + +Among those who had there awaited the onslaught of the regulars was a +young man from Exeter, New Hampshire. Becoming satisfied that the whole +matter was a delusion, he mounted his horse and followed after the +retreating multitude, undeceiving all whom he overtook. Late at night +he reached Newburyport, greatly to the relief of its sleepless +inhabitants, and hurried across the river, proclaiming as he rode the +welcome tidings. The sun rose upon haggard and jaded fugitives, worn +with excitement and fatigue, slowly returning homeward, their +satisfaction at the absence of danger somewhat moderated by an unpleasant +consciousness of the ludicrous scenes of their premature night flitting. + +Any inference which might be drawn from the foregoing narrative +derogatory to the character of the people of New England at that day, on +the score of courage, would be essentially erroneous. It is true, they +were not the men to court danger or rashly throw away their lives for the +mere glory of the sacrifice. They had always a prudent and wholesome +regard to their own comfort and safety; they justly looked upon sound +heads and limbs as better than broken ones; life was to them too serious +and important, and their hard-gained property too valuable, to be lightly +hazarded. They never attempted to cheat themselves by under-estimating +the difficulty to be encountered, or shutting their eyes to its probable +consequences. Cautious, wary, schooled in the subtle strategy of Indian +warfare, where self-preservation is by no means a secondary object, they +had little in common with the reckless enthusiasm of their French allies, +or the stolid indifference of the fighting machines of the British +regular army. When danger could no longer be avoided, they met it with +firmness and iron endurance, but with a very vivid appreciation of its +magnitude. Indeed, it must be admitted by all who are familiar with the +history of our fathers that the element of fear held an important place +among their characteristics. It exaggerated all the dangers of their +earthly pilgrimage, and peopled the future with shapes of evil. Their +fear of Satan invested him with some of the attributes of Omnipotence, +and almost reached the point of reverence. The slightest shock of an +earthquake filled all hearts with terror. Stout men trembled by their +hearths with dread of some paralytic old woman supposed to be a witch. +And when they believed themselves called upon to grapple with these +terrors and endure the afflictions of their allotment, they brought to +the trial a capability of suffering undiminished by the chloroform of +modern philosophy. They were heroic in endurance. Panics like the one +we have described might bow and sway them like reeds in the wind; but +they stood up like the oaks of their own forests beneath the thunder and +the hail of actual calamity. + +It was certainly lucky for the good people of Essex County that no wicked +wag of a Tory undertook to immortalize in rhyme their ridiculous hegira, +as Judge Hopkinson did the famous Battle of the Kegs in Philadelphia. +Like the more recent Madawaska war in Maine, the great Chepatchet +demonstration in Rhode Island, and the "Sauk fuss" of Wisconsin, it +remains to this day "unsyllabled, unsung;" and the fast-fading memory of +age alone preserves the unwritten history of the great Ipswich fright. + + + + + +POPE NIGHT. + + "Lay up the fagots neat and trim; + Pile 'em up higher; + Set 'em afire! + The Pope roasts us, and we 'll roast him!" + Old Song. + +The recent attempt of the Romish Church to reestablish its hierarchy in +Great Britain, with the new cardinal, Dr. Wiseman, at its head, seems to +have revived an old popular custom, a grim piece of Protestant sport, +which, since the days of Lord George Gordon and the "No Popery" mob, had +very generally fallen into disuse. On the 5th of the eleventh month of +this present year all England was traversed by processions and lighted up +with bonfires, in commemoration of the detection of the "gunpowder plot" +of Guy Fawkes and the Papists in 1605. Popes, bishops, and cardinals, in +straw and pasteboard, were paraded through the streets and burned amid +the shouts of the populace, a great portion of whom would have doubtless +been quite as ready to do the same pleasant little office for the Bishop +of Exeter or his Grace of Canterbury, if they could have carted about and +burned in effigy a Protestant hierarchy as safely as a Catholic one. + +In this country, where every sect takes its own way, undisturbed by legal +restrictions, each ecclesiastical tub balancing itself as it best may on +its own bottom, and where bishops Catholic and bishops Episcopal, bishops +Methodist and bishops Mormon, jostle each other in our thoroughfares, it +is not to be expected that we should trouble ourselves with the matter at +issue between the rival hierarchies on the other side of the water. It +is a very pretty quarrel, however, and good must come out of it, as it +cannot fail to attract popular attention to the shallowness of the +spiritual pretensions of both parties, and lead to the conclusion that a +hierarchy of any sort has very little in common with the fishermen and +tent-makers of the New Testament. + +Pope Night--the anniversary of the discovery of the Papal incendiary Guy +Fawkes, booted and spurred, ready to touch fire to his powder-train under +the Parliament House--was celebrated by the early settlers of New +England, and doubtless afforded a good deal of relief to the younger +plants of grace in the Puritan vineyard. In those solemn old days, the +recurrence of the powder-plot anniversary, with its processions, hideous +images of the Pope and Guy Fawkes, its liberal potations of strong +waters, and its blazing bonfires reddening the wild November hills, must +have been looked forward to with no slight degree of pleasure. For one +night, at least, the cramped and smothered fun and mischief of the +younger generation were permitted to revel in the wild extravagance +of a Roman saturnalia or the Christmas holidays of a slave plantation. +Bigotry--frowning upon the May-pole, with its flower wreaths and sportive +revellers, and counting the steps of the dancers as so many steps towards +perdition--recognized in the grim farce of Guy Fawkes's anniversary +something of its own lineaments, smiled complacently upon the riotous +young actors, and opened its close purse to furnish tar-barrels to roast +the Pope, and strong water to moisten the throats of his noisy judges and +executioners. + +Up to the time of the Revolution the powder plot was duly commemorated +throughout New England. At that period the celebration of it was +discountenanced, and in many places prohibited, on the ground that it was +insulting to our Catholic allies from France. In Coffin's History of +Newbury it is stated that, in 1774, the town authorities of Newburyport +ordered "that no effigies be carried about or exhibited only in the +daytime." The last public celebration in that town was in the following +year. Long before the close of the last century the exhibitions of Pope +Night had entirely ceased throughout the country, with, as far as we can +learn, a solitary exception. The stranger who chances to be travelling +on the road between Newburyport and Haverhill, on the night of the 5th of +November, may well fancy that an invasion is threatened from the sea, or +that an insurrection is going on inland; for from all the high hills +overlooking the river tall fires are seen blazing redly against the cold, +dark, autumnal sky, surrounded by groups of young men and boys busily +engaged in urging them with fresh fuel into intenser activity. To feed +these bonfires, everything combustible which could be begged or stolen +from the neighboring villages, farm-houses, and fences is put in +requisition. Old tar-tubs, purloined from the shipbuilders of the +river-side, and flour and lard barrels from the village-traders, are +stored away for days, and perhaps weeks, in the woods or in the rain- +gullies of the hills, in preparation for Pope Night. From the earliest +settlement of the towns of Amesbury and Salisbury, the night of the +powder plot has been thus celebrated, with unbroken regularity, down to +the present time. The event which it once commemorated is probably now +unknown to most of the juvenile actors. The symbol lives on from +generation to generation after the significance is lost; and we have seen +the children of our Catholic neighbors as busy as their Protestant +playmates in collecting, "by hook or by crook," the materials for Pope- +Night bonfires. We remember, on one occasion, walking out with a gifted +and learned Catholic friend to witness the fine effect of the +illumination on the hills, and his hearty appreciation of its picturesque +and wild beauty,--the busy groups in the strong relief of the fires, and +the play and corruscation of the changeful lights on the bare, brown +hills, naked trees, and autumn clouds. + +In addition to the bonfires on the hills, there was formerly a procession +in the streets, bearing grotesque images of the Pope, his cardinals and +friars; and behind them Satan himself, a monster with huge ox-horns on +his head, and a long tail, brandishing his pitchfork and goading them +onward. The Pope was generally furnished with a movable head, which +could be turned round, thrown back, or made to bow, like that of a china- +ware mandarin. An aged inhabitant of the neighborhood has furnished us +with some fragments of the songs sung on such occasions, probably the +same which our British ancestors trolled forth around their bonfires two +centuries ago:-- + + "The fifth of November, + As you well remember, + Was gunpowder treason and plot; + And where is the reason + That gunpowder treason + Should ever be forgot?" + + "When James the First the sceptre swayed, + This hellish powder plot was laid; + They placed the powder down below, + All for Old England's overthrow. + Lucky the man, and happy the day, + That caught Guy Fawkes in the middle of his play!" + + "Hark! our bell goes jink, jink, jink; + Pray, madam, pray, sir, give us something to drink; + Pray, madam, pray, sir, if you'll something give, + We'll burn the dog, and not let him live. + We'll burn the dog without his head, + And then you'll say the dog is dead." + + "Look here! from Rome The Pope has come, + That fiery serpent dire; + Here's the Pope that we have got, + The old promoter of the plot; + We'll stick a pitchfork in his back, + And throw him in the fire!" + +There is a slight savor of a Smithfield roasting about these lines, such +as regaled the senses of the Virgin Queen or Bloody Mary, which entirely +reconciles us to their disuse at the present time. + +It should be the fervent prayer of all good men that the evil spirit of +religious hatred and intolerance, which on the one hand prompted the +gunpowder plot, and which on the other has ever since made it the +occasion of reproach and persecution of an entire sect of professing +Christians, may be no longer perpetuated. In the matter of exclusiveness +and intolerance, none of the older sects can safely reproach each other; +and it becomes all to hope and labor for the coming of that day when the +hymns of Cowper and the Confessions of Augustine, the humane philosophy +of Channing and the devout meditations of Thomas a Kempis, the simple +essays of Woolman and the glowing periods of Bossuet, shall be regarded +as the offspring of one spirit and one faith,--lights of a common altar, +and precious stones in the temple of the one universal Church. + + + + + +THE BOY CAPTIVES. + +AN INCIDENT OF THE INDIAN WAR OF 1695. + +The township of Haverhill, even as late as the close of the seventeenth +century, was a frontier settlement, occupying an advanced position in the +great wilderness, which, unbroken by the clearing of a white man, +extended from the Merrimac River to the French villages on the St. +Francois. A tract of twelve miles on the river and three or four +northwardly was occupied by scattered settlers, while in the centre of +the town a compact village had grown up. In the immediate vicinity there +were but few Indians, and these generally peaceful and inoffensive. On +the breaking out of the Narragansett war, the inhabitants had erected +fortifications and taken other measures for defence; but, with the +possible exception of one man who was found slain in the woods in 1676, +none of the inhabitants were molested; and it was not until about the +year 1689 that the safety of the settlement was seriously threatened. +Three persons were killed in that year. In 1690 six garrisons were +established in different parts of the town, with a small company of +soldiers attached to each. Two of these houses are still standing. They +were built of brick, two stories high, with a single outside door, so +small and narrow that but one person could enter at a time; the windows +few, and only about two and a half feet long by eighteen inches with +thick diamond glass secured with lead, and crossed inside with bars of +iron. The basement had but two rooms, and the chamber was entered by a +ladder instead of stairs; so that the inmates, if driven thither, could +cut off communication with the rooms below. Many private houses were +strengthened and fortified. We remember one familiar to our boyhood,-- +a venerable old building of wood, with brick between the weather boards +and ceiling, with a massive balustrade over the door, constructed of oak +timber and plank, with holes through the latter for firing upon +assailants. The door opened upon a stone-paved hall, or entry, leading +into the huge single room of the basement, which was lighted by two small +windows, the ceiling black with the smoke of a century and a half; a huge +fireplace, calculated for eight-feet wood, occupying one entire side; +while, overhead, suspended from the timbers, or on shelves fastened to +them, were household stores, farming utensils, fishing-rods, guns, +bunches of herbs gathered perhaps a century ago, strings of dried apples +and pumpkins, links of mottled sausages, spareribs, and flitches of +bacon; the firelight of an evening dimly revealing the checked woollen +coverlet of the bed in one far-off corner, while in another "the pewter +plates on the dresser Caught and reflected the flame as shields of armies +the sunshine." + +Tradition has preserved many incidents of life in the garrisons. In +times of unusual peril the settlers generally resorted at night to the +fortified houses, taking thither their flocks and herds and such +household valuables as were most likely to strike the fancy or minister +to the comfort or vanity of the heathen marauders. False alarms were +frequent. The smoke of a distant fire, the bark of a dog in the deep +woods, a stump or bush taking in the uncertain light of stars and moon +the appearance of a man, were sufficient to spread alarm through the +entire settlement, and to cause the armed men of the garrison to pass +whole nights in sleepless watching. It is said that at Haselton's +garrison-house the sentinel on duty saw, as he thought, an Indian inside +of the paling which surrounded the building, and apparently seeking to +gain an entrance. He promptly raised his musket and fired at the +intruder, alarming thereby the entire garrison. The women and children +left their beds, and the men seized their guns and commenced firing on +the suspicious object; but it seemed to bear a charmed life, and remained +unharmed. As the morning dawned, however, the mystery was solved by the +discovery of a black quilted petticoat hanging on the clothes-line, +completely riddled with balls. + +As a matter of course, under circumstances of perpetual alarm and +frequent peril, the duty of cultivating their fields, and gathering their +harvests, and working at their mechanical avocations was dangerous and +difficult to the settlers. One instance will serve as an illustration. +At the garrison-house of Thomas Dustin, the husband of the far-famed Mary +Dustin, (who, while a captive of the Indians, and maddened by the murder +of her infant child, killed and scalped, with the assistance of a young +boy, the entire band of her captors, ten in number,) the business of +brick-making was carried on. The pits where the clay was found were only +a few rods from the house; yet no man ventured to bring the clay to the +yard within the enclosure without the attendance of a file of soldiers. +An anecdote relating to this garrison has been handed down to the present +tune. Among its inmates were two young cousins, Joseph and Mary +Whittaker; the latter a merry, handsome girl, relieving the tedium of +garrison duty with her light-hearted mirthfulness, and + + "Making a sunshine in that shady place." + +Joseph, in the intervals of his labors in the double capacity of brick- +maker and man-at-arms, was assiduous in his attentions to his fair +cousin, who was not inclined to encourage him. Growing desperate, he +threatened one evening to throw himself into the garrison well. His +threat only called forth the laughter of his mistress; and, bidding her +farewell, he proceeded to put it in execution. On reaching the well he +stumbled over a log; whereupon, animated by a happy idea, he dropped the +wood into the water instead of himself, and, hiding behind the curb, +awaited the result. Mary, who had been listening at the door, and who +had not believed her lover capable of so rash an act, heard the sudden +plunge of the wooden Joseph. She ran to the well, and, leaning over the +curb and peering down the dark opening, cried out, in tones of anguish +and remorse, "O Joseph, if you're in the land of the living, I 'll have +you!" "I'll take ye at your word," answered Joseph, springing up from +his hiding-place, and avenging himself for her coyness and coldness by a +hearty embrace. + +Our own paternal ancestor, owing to religious scruples in the matter of +taking arms even for defence of life and property, refused to leave his +undefended house and enter the garrison. The Indians frequently came to +his house; and the family more than once in the night heard them +whispering under the windows, and saw them put their copper faces to the +glass to take a view of the apartments. Strange as it may seen, they +never offered any injury or insult to the inmates. + +In 1695 the township was many times molested by Indians, and several +persons were killed and wounded. Early in the fall a small party made +their appearance in the northerly part of the town, where, finding two +boys at work in an open field, they managed to surprise and capture them, +and, without committing further violence, retreated through the woods to +their homes on the shore of Lake Winnipesaukee. Isaac Bradley, aged +fifteen, was a small but active and vigorous boy; his companion in +captivity, Joseph Whittaker, was only eleven, yet quite as large in size, +and heavier in his movements. After a hard and painful journey they +arrived at the lake, and were placed in an Indian family, consisting of a +man and squaw and two or three children. Here they soon acquired a +sufficient knowledge of the Indian tongue to enable them to learn from +the conversation carried on in their presence that it was designed to +take them to Canada in the spring. This discovery was a painful one. +Canada, the land of Papist priests and bloody Indians, was the especial +terror of the New England settlers, and the anathema maranatha of Puritan +pulpits. Thither the Indians usually hurried their captives, where they +compelled them to work in their villages or sold them to the French +planters. Escape from thence through a deep wilderness, and across lakes +and mountains and almost impassable rivers, without food or guide, was +regarded as an impossibility. The poor boys, terrified by the prospect +of being carried still farther from their home and friends, began to +dream of escaping from their masters before they started for Canada. It +was now winter; it would have been little short of madness to have chosen +for flight that season of bitter cold and deep snows. Owing to exposure +and want of proper food and clothing, Isaac, the eldest of the boys, was +seized with a violent fever, from which he slowly recovered in the course +of the winter. His Indian mistress was as kind to him as her +circumstances permitted,--procuring medicinal herbs and roots for her +patient, and tenderly watching over him in the long winter nights. +Spring came at length; the snows melted; and the ice was broken up on the +lake. The Indians began to make preparations for journeying to Canada; +and Isaac, who had during his sickness devised a plan of escape, saw that +the time of putting it in execution had come. On the evening before he +was to make the attempt he for the first time informed his younger +companion of his design, and told him, if he intended to accompany him, +he must be awake at the time appointed. The boys lay down as usual in +the wigwam, in the midst of the family. Joseph soon fell asleep; but +Isaac, fully sensible of the danger and difficulty of the enterprise +before him, lay awake, watchful for his opportunity. About midnight he +rose, cautiously stepping over the sleeping forms of the family, and +securing, as he went, his Indian master's flint, steel, and tinder, and a +small quantity of dry moose-meat and cornbread. He then carefully +awakened his companion, who, starting up, forgetful of the cause of his +disturbance, asked aloud, "What do you want?" The savages began to stir; +and Isaac, trembling with fear of detection, lay down again and pretended +to be asleep. After waiting a while he again rose, satisfied, from the +heavy breathing of the Indians, that they were all sleeping; and fearing +to awaken Joseph a second time, lest he should again hazard all by his +thoughtlessness, he crept softly out of the wigwam. He had proceeded but +a few rods when he heard footsteps behind him; and, supposing himself +pursued, he hurried into the woods, casting a glance backward. What was +his joy to see his young companion running after him! They hastened on +in a southerly direction as nearly as they could determine, hoping to +reach their distant home. When daylight appeared they found a large +hollow log, into which they crept for concealment, wisely judging that +they would be hotly pursued by their Indian captors. + +Their sagacity was by no means at fault. The Indians, missing their +prisoners in the morning, started off in pursuit with their dogs. As the +young boys lay in the log they could hear the whistle of the Indians and +the barking of dogs upon their track. It was a trying moment; and even +the stout heart of the elder boy sank within him as the dogs came up to +the log and set up a loud bark of discovery. But his presence of mind +saved him. He spoke in a low tone to the dogs, who, recognizing his +familiar voice, wagged their tails with delight and ceased barking. He +then threw to them the morsel of moose-meat he had taken from the wigwam. +While the dogs were thus diverted the Indians made their appearance. The +boys heard the light, stealthy sound of their moccasins on the leaves. +They passed close to the log; and the dogs, having devoured their moose- +meat, trotted after their masters. Through a crevice in the log the boys +looked after them and saw them disappear in the thick woods. They +remained in their covert until night, when they started again on their +long journey, taking a new route to avoid the Indians. At daybreak they +again concealed themselves, but travelled the next night and day without +resting. By this time they had consumed all the bread which they had +taken, and were fainting from hunger and weariness. Just at the close of +the third day they were providentially enabled to kill a pigeon and a +small tortoise, a part of which they ate raw, not daring to make a fire, +which might attract the watchful eyes of savages. On the sixth day they +struck upon an old Indian path, and, following it until night, came +suddenly upon a camp of the enemy. Deep in the heart of the forest, +under the shelter of a ridge of land heavily timbered, a great fire of +logs and brushwood was burning; and around it the Indians sat, eating +their moose-meat and smoking their pipes. + +The poor fugitives, starving, weary, and chilled by the cold spring +blasts, gazed down upon the ample fire; and the savory meats which the +squaws were cooking by it, but felt no temptation to purchase warmth and +food by surrendering themselves to captivity. Death in the forest seemed +preferable. They turned and fled back upon their track, expecting every +moment to hear the yells of pursuers. The morning found them seated on +the bank of a small stream, their feet torn and bleeding, and their +bodies emaciated. The elder, as a last effort, made search for roots, +and fortunately discovered a few ground-nuts, (glicine apios) which +served to refresh in some degree himself and his still weaker companion. +As they stood together by the stream, hesitating and almost despairing, +it occurred to Isaac that the rivulet might lead to a larger stream of +water, and that to the sea and the white settlements near it; and he +resolved to follow it. They again began their painful march; the day +passed, and the night once more overtook them. When the eighth morning +dawned, the younger of the boys found himself unable to rise from his bed +of leaves. Isaac endeavored to encourage him, dug roots, and procured +water for him; but the poor lad was utterly exhausted. He had no longer +heart or hope. The elder boy laid him on leaves and dry grass at the +foot of a tree, and with a heavy heart bade him farewell. Alone he +slowly and painfully proceeded down the stream, now greatly increased in +size by tributary rivulets. On the top of a hill, he climbed with +difficulty into a tree, and saw in the distance what seemed to be a +clearing and a newly raised frame building. Hopeful and rejoicing, he +turned back to his young companion, told him what he had seen, and, after +chafing his limbs awhile, got him upon his feet. Sometimes supporting +him, and at others carrying him on his back, the heroic boy staggered +towards the clearing. On reaching it he found it deserted, and was +obliged to continue his journey. Towards night signs of civilization +began to appear,--the heavy, continuous roar of water was heard; and, +presently emerging from the forest, he saw a great river dashing in white +foam down precipitous rocks, and on its bank the gray walls of a huge +stone building, with flankers, palisades, and moat, over which the +British flag was flying. This was the famous Saco Fort, built by +Governor Phips two years before, just below the falls of the Saco River. +The soldiers of the garrison gave the poor fellows a kindly welcome. +Joseph, who was scarcely alive, lay for a long time sick in the fort; but +Isaac soon regained his strength, and set out for his home in Haverhill, +which he had the good fortune to arrive at in safety. + +Amidst the stirring excitements of the present day, when every thrill of +the electric wire conveys a new subject for thought or action to a +generation as eager as the ancient Athenians for some new thing, simple +legends of the past like that which we have transcribed have undoubtedly +lost in a great degree their interest. The lore of the fireside is +becoming obsolete, and with the octogenarian few who still linger among +us will perish the unwritten history of border life in New England. + + + + + + +THE BLACK MEN IN THE REVOLUTION AND WAR OF 1812. + +The return of the festival of our national independence has called our +attention to a matter which has been very carefully kept out of sight by +orators and toast-drinkers. We allude to the participation of colored +men in the great struggle for American freedom. It is not in accordance +with our taste or our principles to eulogize the shedders of blood even +in a cause of acknowledged justice; but when we see a whole nation doing +honor to the memories of one class of its defenders to the total neglect +of another class, who had the misfortune to be of darker complexion, we +cannot forego the satisfaction of inviting notice to certain historical +facts which for the last half century have been quietly elbowed aside, +as no more deserving of a place in patriotic recollection than the +descendants of the men to whom the facts in question relate have to a +place in a Fourth of July procession. + +Of the services and sufferings of the colored soldiers of the Revolution +no attempt has, to our knowledge, been made to preserve a record. They +have had no historian. With here and there an exception, they have all +passed away; and only some faint tradition of their campaigns under +Washington and Greene and Lafayette, and of their cruisings under Decatur +and Barry, lingers among their, descendants. Yet enough is known to show +that the free colored men of the United States bore their full proportion +of the sacrifices and trials of the Revolutionary War. + +The late Governor Eustis, of Massachusetts,--the pride and boast of the +democracy of the East, himself an active participant in the war, and +therefore a most competent witness,--Governor Morrill, of New Hampshire, +Judge Hemphill, of Pennsylvania, and other members of Congress, in the +debate on the question of admitting Missouri as a slave State into the +Union, bore emphatic testimony to the efficiency and heroism of the black +troops. Hon. Calvin Goddard, of Connecticut, states that in the little +circle of his residence he was instrumental in securing, under the act of +1818, the pensions of nineteen colored soldiers. "I cannot," he says, +"refrain from mentioning one aged black man, Primus Babcock, who proudly +presented to me an honorable discharge from service during the war, dated +at the close of it, wholly in the handwriting of George Washington; nor +can I forget the expression of his feelings when informed, after his +discharge had been sent to the War Department, that it could not be +returned. At his request it was written for, as he seemed inclined to +spurn the pension and reclaim the discharge." There is a touching +anecdote related of Baron Stenben on the occasion of the disbandment of +the American army. A black soldier, with his wounds unhealed, utterly +destitute, stood on the wharf just as a vessel bound for his distant home +was getting under way. The poor fellow gazed at the vessel with tears in +his eyes, and gave himself up to despair. The warm-hearted foreigner +witnessed his emotion, and, inquiring into the cause of it, took his last +dollar from his purse and gave it to him, with tears of sympathy +trickling down his cheeks. Overwhelmed with gratitude, the poor wounded +soldier hailed the sloop and was received on board. As it moved out from +the wharf, he cried back to his noble friend on shore, "God Almighty +bless you, Master Baron!" + +"In Rhode Island," says Governor Eustis in his able speech against +slavery in Missouri, 12th of twelfth month, 1820, "the blacks formed an +entire regiment, and they discharged their duty with zeal and fidelity. +The gallant defence of Red Bank, in which the black regiment bore a part, +is among the proofs of their valor." In this contest it will be +recollected that four hundred men met and repulsed, after a terrible and +sanguinary struggle, fifteen hundred Hessian troops, headed by Count +Donop. The glory of the defence of Red Bank, which has been pronounced +one of the most heroic actions of the war, belongs in reality to black +men; yet who now hears them spoken of in connection with it? Among the +traits which distinguished the black regiment was devotion to their +officers. In the attack made upon the American lines near Croton River +on the 13th of the fifth month, 1781, Colonel Greene, the commander of +the regiment, was cut down and mortally wounded; but the sabres of the +enemy only reached him through the bodies of his faithful guard of +blacks, who hovered over him to protect him, every one of whom was +killed. The late Dr. Harris, of Dunbarton, New Hampshire, a +Revolutionary veteran, stated, in a speech at Francistown, New Hampshire, +some years ago, that on one occasion the regiment to which he was +attached was commanded to defend an important position, which the enemy +thrice assailed, and from which they were as often repulsed. "There +was," said the venerable speaker, "a regiment of blacks in the same +situation,--a regiment of negroes fighting for our liberty and +independence, not a white man among them but the officers,--in the same +dangerous and responsible position. Had they been unfaithful or given +way before the enemy, all would have been lost. Three times in +succession were they attacked with most desperate fury by well- +disciplined and veteran troops; and three times did they successfully +repel the assault, and thus preserve an army. They fought thus through +the war. They were brave and hardy troops." + +In the debate in the New York Convention of 1821 for amending the +Constitution of the State, on the question of extending the right of +suffrage to the blacks, Dr. Clarke, the delegate from Delaware County, +and other members, made honorable mention of the services of the colored +troops in the Revolutionary army. + +The late James Forten, of Philadelphia, well known as a colored man of +wealth, intelligence, and philanthropy, enlisted in the American navy +under Captain Decatur, of the Royal Louis, was taken prisoner during his +second cruise, and, with nineteen other colored men, confined on board +the horrible Jersey prison-ship; All the vessels in the American service +at that period were partly manned by blacks. The old citizens of +Philadelphia to this day remember the fact that, when the troops of the +North marched through the city, one or more colored companies were +attached to nearly all the regiments. + +Governor Eustis, in the speech before quoted, states that the free +colored soldiers entered the ranks with the whites. The time of those +who were slaves was purchased of their masters, and they were induced to +enter the service in consequence of a law of Congress by which, on +condition of their serving in the ranks during the war, they were made +freemen. This hope of liberty inspired them with courage to oppose their +breasts to the Hessian bayonet at Red Bank, and enabled them to endure +with fortitude the cold and famine of Valley Forge. The anecdote of the +slave of General Sullivan, of New Hampshire, is well known. When his +master told him that they were on the point of starting for the army, to +fight for liberty, he shrewdly suggested that it would be a great +satisfaction to know that he was indeed going to fight for his liberty. +Struck with the reasonableness and justice of this suggestion, General +Sullivan at once gave him his freedom. + +The late Tristam Burgess, of Rhode Island, in a speech in Congress, first +month, 1828, said "At the commencement of the Revolutionary War, Rhode +Island had a number of slaves. A regiment of them were enlisted into the +Continental service, and no braver men met the enemy in battle; but not +one of them was permitted to be a soldier until he had first been made a +freeman." + +The celebrated Charles Pinckney, of South Carolina, in his speech on the +Missouri question, and in defence of the slave representation of the +South, made the following admissions:-- + +"They (the colored people) were in numerous instances the pioneers, and +in all the laborers, of our armies. To their hands were owing the +greatest part of the fortifications raised for the protection of the +country. Fort Moultrie gave, at an early period of the inexperienced and +untried valor of our citizens, immortality to the American arms; and in +the Northern States numerous bodies of them were enrolled, and fought +side by side with the whites at the battles of the Revolution." + +Let us now look forward thirty or forty years, to the last war with Great +Britain, and see whether the whites enjoyed a monopoly of patriotism at +that time. + +Martindale, of New York, in Congress, 22d of first month, 1828, said: +"Slaves, or negroes who had been slaves, were enlisted as soldiers in the +war of the Revolution; and I myself saw a battalion of them, as fine, +martial-looking men as I ever saw, attached to the Northern army in the +last war, on its march from Plattsburg to Sackett's Harbor." + +Hon. Charles Miner, of Pennsylvania, in Congress, second month, 7th, +1828, said: "The African race make excellent soldiers. Large numbers of +them were with Perry, and helped to gain the brilliant victory of Lake +Erie. A whole battalion of them were distinguished for their orderly +appearance." + +Dr. Clarke, in the convention which revised the Constitution of New York +in 1821, speaking of the colored inhabitants of the State, said:-- + +"In your late war they contributed largely towards some of your most +splendid victories. On Lakes Erie and Champlain, where your fleets +triumphed over a foe superior in numbers and engines of death, they were +manned in a large proportion with men of color. And in this very house, +in the fall of 1814, a bill passed, receiving the approbation of all the +branches of your government, authorizing the governor to accept the +services of a corps of two thousand free people of color. Sir, these +were times which tried men's souls. In these times it was no sporting +matter to bear arms. These were times when a man who shouldered his +musket did not know but he bared his bosom to receive a death-wound from +the enemy ere he laid it aside; and in these times these people were +found as ready and as willing to volunteer in your service as any other. +They were not compelled to go; they were not drafted. No; your pride had +placed them beyond your compulsory power. But there was no necessity for +its exercise; they were volunteers,--yes, sir, volunteers to defend that +very country from the inroads and ravages of a ruthless and vindictive +foe which had treated them with insult, degradation, and slavery." + +On the capture of Washington by the British forces, it was judged +expedient to fortify, without delay, the principal towns and cities +exposed to similar attacks. The Vigilance Committee of Philadelphia +waited upon three of the principal colored citizens, namely, James +Forten, Bishop Allen, and Absalom Jones, soliciting the aid of the people +of color in erecting suitable defences for the city. Accordingly, +twenty-five hundred colored then assembled in the State-House yard, and +from thence marched to Gray's Ferry, where they labored for two days +almost without intermission. Their labors were so faithful and efficient +that a vote of thanks was tendered them by the committee. A battalion of +colored troops was at the same time organized in the city under an +officer of the United States army; and they were on the point of marching +to the frontier when peace was proclaimed. + +General Jackson's proclamations to the free colored inhabitants of +Louisiana are well known. In his first, inviting them to take up arms, +he said:-- + +"As sons of freedom, you are now called on to defend our most inestimable +blessings. As Americans, your country looks with confidence to her +adopted children for a valorous support. As fathers, husbands, and +brothers, you are summoned to rally round the standard of the eagle, to +defend all which is dear in existence." + +The second proclamation is one of the highest compliments ever paid by a +military chief to his soldiers:-- + +"TO THE FREE PEOPLE OF COLOR. + +"Soldiers! when on the banks of the Mobile I called you to take up arms, +inviting you to partake the perils and glory of your white fellow- +citizens, I expected much from you; for I was not ignorant that you +possessed qualities most formidable to an invading enemy. I knew with +what fortitude you could endure hunger, and thirst, and all the fatigues +of a campaign. I knew well how you loved your native country, and that +you, as well as ourselves, had to defend what man holds most dear,--his +parents, wife, children, and property. You have done more than I +expected. In addition to the previous qualities I before knew you to +possess, I found among you a noble enthusiasm, which leads to the +performance of great things. + +"Soldiers! the President of the United States shall hear how praiseworthy +was your conduct in the hour of danger, and the Representatives of the +American people will give you the praise your exploits entitle you to. +Your general anticipates them in applauding your noble ardor." + +It will thus be seen that whatever honor belongs to the "heroes of the +Revolution" and the volunteers in "the second war for independence" is to +be divided between the white and the colored man. We have dwelt upon +this subject at length, not because it accords with our principles or +feelings, for it is scarcely necessary for us to say that we are one of +those who hold that + + "Peace hath her victories + No less renowned than war," + +and certainly far more desirable and useful; but because, in popular +estimation, the patriotism which dares and does on the battle-field takes +a higher place than the quiet exercise of the duties of peaceful +citizenship; and we are willing that colored soldiers, with their +descendants, should have the benefit, if possible, of a public sentiment +which has so extravagantly lauded their white companions in arms. If +pulpits must be desecrated by eulogies of the patriotism of bloodshed, we +see no reason why black defenders of their country in the war for liberty +should not receive honorable mention as well as white invaders of a +neighboring republic who have volunteered in a war for plunder and +slavery extension. For the latter class of "heroes" we have very little +respect. The patriotism of too many of them forcibly reminds us of Dr. +Johnson's definition of that much-abused term "Patriotism, sir! 'T is +the last refuge of a scoundrel." + +"What right, I demand," said an American orator some years ago, "have the +children of Africa to a homestead in the white man's country?" The +answer will in part be found in the facts which we have presented. Their +right, like that of their white fellow-citizens, dates back to the dread +arbitrament of battle. Their bones whiten every stricken field of the +Revolution; their feet tracked with blood the snows of Jersey; their toil +built up every fortification south of the Potomac; they shared the famine +and nakedness of Valley Forge and the pestilential horrors of the old +Jersey prisonship. Have they, then, no claim to an equal participation +in the blessings which have grown out of the national independence for +which they fought? Is it just, is it magnanimous, is it safe, even, to +starve the patriotism of such a people, to cast their hearts out of the +treasury of the Republic, and to convert them, by political +disfranchisement and social oppression, into enemies? + + + + + +THE SCOTTISH REFORMERS. + + "The mills of God grind slowly, but they grind exceeding small; + Though with patience He stands waiting, with exactness grinds He + all." + FRIEDRICH VON LOGAU. + +The great impulse of the French Revolution was not confined by +geographical boundaries. Flashing hope into the dark places of the +earth, far down among the poor and long oppressed, or startling the +oppressor in his guarded chambers like that mountain of fire which fell +into the sea at the sound of the apocalyptic trumpet, it agitated the +world. + +The arguments of Condorcet, the battle-words of Mirabeau, the fierce zeal +of St. Just, the iron energy of Danton, the caustic wit of Camille +Desmoulins, and the sweet eloquence of Vergniaud found echoes in all +lands, and nowhere more readily than in Great Britain, the ancient foe +and rival of France. The celebrated Dr. Price, of London, and the still +more distinguished Priestley, of Birmingham, spoke out boldly in defence +of the great principles of the Revolution. A London club of reformers, +reckoning among its members such men as Sir William Jones, Earl Grey, +Samuel Whitbread, and Sir James Mackintosh, was established for the +purpose of disseminating liberal appeals and arguments throughout the +United Kingdom. + +In Scotland an auxiliary society was formed, under the name of Friends of +the People. Thomas Muir, young in years, yet an elder in the Scottish +kirk, a successful advocate at the bar, talented, affable, eloquent, and +distinguished for the purity of his life and his enthusiasm in the cause +of freedom, was its principal originator. In the twelfth month of 1792 a +convention of reformers was held at Edinburgh. The government became +alarmed, and a warrant was issued for the arrest of Muir. He escaped to +France; but soon after, venturing to return to his native land, was +recognized and imprisoned. He was tried upon the charge of lending books +of republican tendency, and reading an address from Theobald Wolfe Tone +and the United Irishmen before the society of which he was a member. He +defended himself in a long and eloquent address, which concluded in the +following manly strain:-- + +"What, then, has been my crime? Not the lending to a relation a copy of +Thomas Paine's works,--not the giving away to another a few numbers of an +innocent and constitutional publication; but my crime is, for having +dared to be, according to the measure of my feeble abilities, a strenuous +and an active advocate for an equal representation of the people in the +House of the people,--for having dared to accomplish a measure by legal +means which was to diminish the weight of their taxes and to put an end +to the profusion of their blood. Gentlemen, from my infancy to this +moment I have devoted myself to the cause of the people. It is a good +cause: it will ultimately prevail,--it will finally triumph." + +He was sentenced to transportation for fourteen years, and was removed to +the Edinburgh jail, from thence to the hulks, and lastly to the +transport-ship, containing eighty-three convicts, which conveyed him to +Botany Bay. + +The next victim was Palmer, a learned and highly accomplished Unitarian +minister in Dundee. He was greatly beloved and respected as a polished +gentleman and sincere friend of the people. He was charged with +circulating a republican tract, and was sentenced to seven years' +transportation. + +But the Friends of the People were not quelled by this summary punishment +of two of their devoted leaders. In the tenth month, 1793, delegates +were called together from various towns in Scotland, as well as from +Birmingham, Sheffield, and other places in England. Gerrald and Margarot +were sent up by the London society. After a brief sitting, the +convention was dispersed by the public authorities. Its sessions were +opened and closed with prayer, and the speeches of its members manifested +the pious enthusiasm of the old Cameronians and Parliament-men of the +times of Cromwell. Many of the dissenting clergy were present. William +Skirving, the most determined of the band, had been educated for the +ministry, and was a sincerely religious man. Joseph Gerrald was a young +man of brilliant talents and exemplary character. When the sheriff +entered the hall to disperse the friends of liberty, Gerrald knelt in +prayer. His remarkable words were taken down by a reporter on the spot. +There is nothing in modern history to compare with this supplication, +unless it be that of Sir Henry Vane, a kindred martyr, at the foot of the +scaffold, just before his execution. It is the prayer of universal +humanity, which God will yet hear and answer. + +"O thou Governor of the universe, we rejoice that, at all times and in +all circumstances, we have liberty to approach Thy throne, and that we +are assured that no sacrifice is more acceptable to Thee than that which +is made for the relief of the oppressed. In this moment of trial and +persecution we pray that Thou wouldst be our defender, our counsellor, +and our guide. Oh, be Thou a pillar of fire to us, as Thou wast to our +fathers of old, to enlighten and direct us; and to our enemies a pillar +of cloud, and darkness, and confusion. + +"Thou art Thyself the great Patron of liberty. Thy service is perfect +freedom. Prosper, we beseech Thee, every endeavor which we make to +promote Thy cause; for we consider the cause of truth, or every cause +which tends to promote the happiness of Thy creatures, as Thy cause. + +"O thou merciful Father of mankind, enable us, for Thy name's sake, to +endure persecution with fortitude; and may we believe that all trials and +tribulations of life which we endure shall work together for good to them +that love Thee; and grant that the greater the evil, and the longer it +may be continued, the greater good, in Thy holy and adorable providence, +may be produced therefrom. And this we beg, not for our own merits, but +through the merits of Him who is hereafter to judge the world in +righteousness and mercy." + +He ceased, and the sheriff, who had been temporarily overawed by the +extraordinary scene, enforced the warrant, and the meeting was broken up. +The delegates descended to the street in silence,--Arthur's Seat and +Salisbury Crags glooming in the distance and night,--an immense and +agitated multitude waiting around, over which tossed the flaring +flambeaux of the sheriff's train. Gerrald, who was already under arrest, +as he descended, spoke aloud, "Behold the funeral torches of Liberty!" + +Skirving and several others were immediately arrested. They were tried +in the first month, 1794, and sentenced, as Muir and Palmer had +previously been, to transportation. Their conduct throughout was worthy +of their great and holy cause. Gerrald's defence was that of freedom +rather than his own. Forgetting himself, he spoke out manfully and +earnestly for the poor, the oppressed, the overtaxed, and starving +millions of his countrymen. That some idea may be formed of this noble +plea for liberty, I give an extract from the concluding paragraphs:-- + +"True religion, like all free governments, appeals to the understanding +for its support, and not to the sword. All systems, whether civil or +moral, can only be durable in proportion as they are founded on truth and +calculated to promote the good of mankind. This will account to us why +governments suited to the great energies of man have always outlived the +perishable things which despotism has erected. Yes, this will account to +us why the stream of Time, which is continually washing away the +dissoluble fabrics of superstitions and impostures, passes without injury +by the adamant of Christianity. + +"Those who are versed in the history of their country, in the history of +the human race, must know that rigorous state prosecutions have always +preceded the era of convulsion; and this era, I fear, will be accelerated +by the folly and madness of our rulers. If the people are discontented, +the proper mode of quieting their discontent is, not by instituting +rigorous and sanguinary prosecutions, but by redressing their wrongs and +conciliating their affections. Courts of justice, indeed, may be called +in to the aid of ministerial vengeance; but if once the purity of their +proceedings is suspected, they will cease to be objects of reverence to +the nation; they will degenerate into empty and expensive pageantry, and +become the partial instruments of vexatious oppression. Whatever may +become of me, my principles will last forever. Individuals may perish; +but truth is eternal. The rude blasts of tyranny may blow from every +quarter; but freedom is that hardy plant which will survive the tempest +and strike an everlasting root into the most unfavorable soil. + +"Gentlemen, I am in your hands. About my life I feel not the slightest +anxiety: if it would promote the cause, I would cheerfully make the +sacrifice; for if I perish on an occasion like the present, out of my +ashes will arise a flame to consume the tyrants and oppressors of my +country." + +Years have passed, and the generation which knew the persecuted reformers +has given place to another. And now, half a century after William +Skirving, as he rose to receive his sentence, declared to his judges, +"You may condemn us as felons, but your sentence shall yet be reversed by +the people," the names of these men are once more familiar to British +lips. The sentence has been reversed; the prophecy of Skirving has +become history. On the 21st of the eighth month, 1853, the corner-stone +of a monument to the memory of the Scottish martyrs--for which +subscriptions had been received from such men as Lord Holland, the Dukes +of Bedford and Norfolk; and the Earls of Essex and Leicester--was laid +with imposing ceremonies in the beautiful burial-place of Calton Hill, +Edinburgh, by the veteran reformer and tribune of the people, Joseph +Hume, M. P. After delivering an appropriate address, the aged radical +closed the impressive scene by reading the prayer of Joseph Gerrald. At +the banquet which afterwards took place, and which was presided over by +John Dunlop, Esq., addresses were made by the president and Dr. Ritchie, +and by William Skirving, of Kirkaldy, son of the martyr. The Complete +Suffrage Association of Edinburgh, to the number of five hundred, walked +in procession to Calton Hill, and in the open air proclaimed unmolested +the very principles for which the martyrs of the past century had +suffered. + +The account of this tribute to the memory of departed worth cannot fail +to awaken in generous hearts emotions of gratitude towards Him who has +thus signally vindicated His truth, showing that the triumph of the +oppressor is but for a season, and that even in this world a lie cannot +live forever. Well and truly did George Fox say in his last days, + + "The truth is above all." + +Will it be said, however, that this tribute comes too late; that it +cannot solace those brave hearts which, slowly broken by the long agony +of colonial servitude, are now cold in strange graves? It is, indeed, a +striking illustration of the truth that he who would benefit his fellow- +man must "walk by faith," sowing his seed in the morning, and in the +evening withholding not his hand; knowing only this, that in God's good +time the harvest shall spring up and ripen, if not for himself, yet for +others, who, as they bind the full sheaves and gather in the heavy +clusters, may perchance remember him with gratitude and set up stones of +memorial on the fields of his toil and sacrifices. We may regret that in +this stage of the spirit's life the sincere and self-denying worker is +not always permitted to partake of the fruits of his toil or receive the +honors of a benefactor. We hear his good evil spoken of, and his noblest +sacrifices counted as naught; we see him not only assailed by the wicked, +but discountenanced and shunned by the timidly good, followed on his hot +and dusty pathway by the execrations of the hounding mob and the +contemptuous pity of the worldly wise and prudent; and when at last the +horizon of Time shuts down between him and ourselves, and the places +which have known him know him no more forever, we are almost ready to say +with the regal voluptuary of old, This also is vanity and a great evil; +"for what hath a man of all his labor and of the vexation of his heart +wherein he hath labored under the sun?" But is this the end? Has God's +universe no wider limits than the circle of the blue wall which shuts in +our nestling-place? Has life's infancy only been provided for, and +beyond this poor nursery-chamber of Time is there no playground for the +soul's youth, no broad fields for its manhood? Perchance, could we but +lift the curtains of the narrow pinfold wherein we dwell, we might see +that our poor friend and brother whose fate we have thus deplored has by +no means lost the reward of his labors, but that in new fields of duty he +is cheered even by the tardy recognition of the value of his services in +the old. The continuity of life is never broken; the river flows onward +and is lost to our sight, but under its new horizon it carries the same +waters which it gathered under ours, and its unseen valleys are made glad +by the offerings which are borne down to them from the past,--flowers, +perchance, the germs of which its own waves had planted on the banks of +Time. Who shall say that the mournful and repentant love with which the +benefactors of our race are at length regarded may not be to them, in +their new condition of being, sweet and grateful as the perfume of long- +forgotten flowers, or that our harvest-hymns of rejoicing may not reach +the ears of those who in weakness and suffering scattered the seeds of +blessing? + +The history of the Edinburgh reformers is no new one; it is that of all +who seek to benefit their age by rebuking its popular crimes and exposing +its cherished errors. The truths which they told were not believed, and +for that very reason were the more needed; for it is evermore the case +that the right word when first uttered is an unpopular and denied one. +Hence he who undertakes to tread the thorny pathway of reform--who, +smitten with the love of truth and justice, or indignant in view of wrong +and insolent oppression, is rashly inclined to throw himself at once into +that great conflict which the Persian seer not untruly represented as a +war between light and darkness--would do well to count the cost in the +outset. If he can live for Truth alone, and, cut off from the general +sympathy, regard her service as its "own exceeding great reward;" if he +can bear to be counted a fanatic and crazy visionary; if, in all good +nature, he is ready to receive from the very objects of his solicitude +abuse and obloquy in return for disinterested and self-sacrificing +efforts for their welfare; if, with his purest motives misunderstood and +his best actions perverted and distorted into crimes, he can still hold +on his way and patiently abide the hour when "the whirligig of Time shall +bring about its revenges;" if, on the whole, he is prepared to be looked +upon as a sort of moral outlaw or social heretic, under good society's +interdict of food and fire; and if he is well assured that he can, +through all this, preserve his cheerfulness and faith in man,--let him +gird up his loins and go forward in God's name. He is fitted for his +vocation; he has watched all night by his armor. Whatever his trial may +be, he is prepared; he may even be happily disappointed in respect to it; +flowers of unexpected refreshing may overhang the hedges of his strait +and narrow way; but it remains to be true that he who serves his +contemporaries in faithfulness and sincerity must expect no wages from +their gratitude; for, as has been well said, there is, after all, but one +way of doing the world good, and unhappily that way the world does not +like; for it consists in telling it the very thing which it does not wish +to hear. + +Unhappily, in the case of the reformer, his most dangerous foes are those +of his own household. True, the world's garden has become a desert and +needs renovation; but is his own little nook weedless? Sin abounds +without; but is his own heart pure? While smiting down the giants and +dragons which beset the outward world, are there no evil guests sitting +by his own hearth-stone? Ambition, envy, self-righteousness, impatience, +dogmatism, and pride of opinion stand at his door-way ready to enter +whenever he leaves it unguarded. Then, too, there is no small danger of +failing to discriminate between a rational philanthropy, with its +adaptation of means to ends, and that spiritual knight-errantry which +undertakes the championship of every novel project of reform, scouring +the world in search of distressed schemes held in durance by common sense +and vagaries happily spellbound by ridicule. He must learn that, +although the most needful truth may be unpopular, it does not follow that +unpopularity is a proof of the truth of his doctrines or the expediency +of his measures. He must have the liberality to admit that it is barely +possible for the public on some points to be right and himself wrong, and +that the blessing invoked upon those who suffer for righteousness is not +available to such as court persecution and invite contempt; for folly has +its martyrs as well as wisdom; and he who has nothing better to show of +himself than the scars and bruises which the popular foot has left upon +him is not even sure of winning the honors of martyrdom as some +compensation for the loss of dignity and self-respect involved in the +exhibition of its pains. To the reformer, in an especial manner, comes +home the truth that whoso ruleth his own spirit is greater than he who +taketh a city. Patience, hope, charity, watchfulness unto prayer,--how +needful are all these to his success! Without them he is in danger of +ingloriously giving up his contest with error and prejudice at the first +repulse; or, with that spiteful philanthropy which we sometimes witness, +taking a sick world by the nose, like a spoiled child, and endeavoring to +force down its throat the long-rejected nostrums prepared for its relief. + +What then? Shall we, in view of these things, call back young, generous +spirits just entering upon the perilous pathway? God forbid! Welcome, +thrice welcome, rather. Let them go forward, not unwarned of the dangers +nor unreminded of the pleasures which belong to the service of humanity. +Great is the consciousness of right. Sweet is the answer of a good +conscience. He who pays his whole-hearted homage to truth and duty, who +swears his lifelong fealty on their altars, and rises up a Nazarite +consecrated to their holy service, is not without his solace and +enjoyment when, to the eyes of others, he seems the most lonely and +miserable. He breathes an atmosphere which the multitude know not of; +"a serene heaven which they cannot discern rests over him, glorious in +its purity and stillness." Nor is he altogether without kindly human +sympathies. All generous and earnest hearts which are brought in contact +with his own beat evenly with it. All that is good, and truthful, and +lovely in man, whenever and wherever it truly recognizes him, must sooner +or later acknowledge his claim to love and reverence. His faith +overcomes all things. The future unrolls itself before him, with its +waving harvest-fields springing up from the seed he is scattering; and he +looks forward to the close of life with the calm confidence of one who +feels that he has not lived idle and useless, but with hopeful heart and +strong arm has labored with God and Nature for the best. + +And not in vain. In the economy of God, no effort, however small, put +forth for the right cause, fails of its effect. No voice, however +feeble, lifted up for truth, ever dies amidst the confused noises of +time. Through discords of sin and sorrow, pain and wrong, it rises a +deathless melody, whose notes of wailing are hereafter to be changed to +those of triumph as they blend with the great harmony of a reconciled +universe. The language of a transatlantic reformer to his friends is +then as true as it is hopeful and cheering: "Triumph is certain. We have +espoused no losing cause. In the body we may not join our shout with the +victors; but in spirit we may even now. There is but an interval of time +between us and the success at which we aim. In all other respects the +links of the chain are complete. Identifying ourselves with immortal and +immutable principles, we share both their immortality and immutability. +The vow which unites us with truth makes futurity present with us. Our +being resolves itself into an everlasting now. It is not so correct to +say that we shall be victorious as that we are so. When we will in +unison with the supreme Mind, the characteristics of His will become, in +some sort, those of ours. What He has willed is virtually done. It may +take ages to unfold itself; but the germ of its whole history is wrapped +up in His determination. When we make His will ours, which we do when we +aim at truth, that upon which we are resolved is done, decided, born. +Life is in it. It is; and the future is but the development of its +being. Ours, therefore, is a perpetual triumph. Our deeds are, all of +them, component elements of success." [Miall's Essays; Nonconformist, +Vol. iv.] + + + + + +THE PILGRIMS OF PLYMOUTH. + +From a letter on the celebration of the 250th anniversary of the landing +of the Pilgrims at Plymouth, December 22, 1870. + +No one can appreciate more highly than myself the noble qualities of the +men and women of the Mayflower. It is not of them that I, a descendant +of the "sect called Quakers," have reason to complain in the matter of +persecution. A generation which came after them, with less piety and +more bigotry, is especially responsible for the little unpleasantness +referred to; and the sufferers from it scarcely need any present +championship. They certainly did not wait altogether for the revenges of +posterity. If they lost their ears, it is satisfactory to remember that +they made those of their mutilators tingle with a rhetoric more sharp +than polite. + +A worthy New England deacon once described a brother in the church as a +very good man Godward, but rather hard man-ward. It cannot be denied +that some very satisfactory steps have been taken in the latter +direction, at least, since the days of the Pilgrims. Our age is tolerant +of creed and dogma, broader in its sympathies, more keenly sensitive to +temporal need, and, practically recognizing the brotherhood of the race, +wherever a cry of suffering is heard its response is quick and generous. +It has abolished slavery, and is lifting woman from world-old degradation +to equality with man before the law. Our criminal codes no longer embody +the maxim of barbarism, "an eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth," but +have regard not only for the safety of the community, but to the reform +and well-being of the criminal. All the more, however, for this amiable +tenderness do we need the counterpoise of a strong sense of justice. +With our sympathy for the wrong-doer we need the old Puritan and Quaker +hatred of wrongdoing; with our just tolerance of men and opinions a +righteous abhorrence of sin. All the more for the sweet humanities and +Christian liberalism which, in drawing men nearer to each other, are +increasing the sum of social influences for good or evil, we need the +bracing atmosphere, healthful, if austere, of the old moralities. +Individual and social duties are quite as imperative now as when they +were minutely specified in statute-books and enforced by penalties no +longer admissible. It is well that stocks, whipping-post, and ducking- +stool are now only matters of tradition; but the honest reprobation of +vice and crime which they symbolized should by no means perish with them. +The true life of a nation is in its personal morality, and no excellence +of constitution and laws can avail much if the people lack purity and +integrity. Culture, art, refinement, care for our own comfort and that +of others, are all well, but truth, honor, reverence, and fidelity to +duty are indispensable. + +The Pilgrims were right in affirming the paramount authority of the law +of God. If they erred in seeking that authoritative law, and passed over +the Sermon on the Mount for the stern Hebraisms of Moses; if they +hesitated in view of the largeness of Christian liberty; if they seemed +unwilling to accept the sweetness and light of the good tidings, let us +not forget that it was the mistake of men who feared more than they dared +to hope, whose estimate of the exceeding awfulness of sin caused them to +dwell upon God's vengeance rather than his compassion; and whose dread of +evil was so great that, in shutting their hearts against it, they +sometimes shut out the good. It is well for us if we have learned to +listen to the sweet persuasion of the Beatitudes; but there are crises in +all lives which require also the emphatic "Thou shalt not" or the +Decalogue which the founders wrote on the gate-posts of their +commonwealth. + +Let us then be thankful for the assurances which the last few years have +afforded us that: + + "The Pilgrim spirit is not dead, + But walks in noon's broad light." + +We have seen it in the faith and trust which no circumstances could +shake, in heroic self-sacrifice, in entire consecration to duty. The +fathers have lived in their sons. Have we not all known the Winthrops +and Brewsters, the Saltonstalls and Sewalls, of old times, in +gubernatorial chairs, in legislative halls, around winter camp-fires, in +the slow martyrdoms of prison and hospital? The great struggle through +which we have passed has taught us how much we owe to the men and women +of the Plymouth Colony,--the noblest ancestry that ever a people looked +back to with love and reverence. Honor, then, to the Pilgrims! Let their +memory be green forever! + + + + + +GOVERNOR ENDICOTT. + +I am sorry that I cannot respond in person to the invitation of the Essex +Institute to its commemorative festival on the 18th. I especially regret +it, because, though a member of the Society of Friends, and, as such, +regarding with abhorrence the severe persecution of the sect under the +administration of Governor Endicott, I am not unmindful of the otherwise +noble qualities and worthy record of the great Puritan, whose misfortune +it was to live in an age which regarded religious toleration as a crime. +He was the victim of the merciless logic of his creed. He honestly +thought that every convert to Quakerism became by virtue of that +conversion a child of perdition; and, as the head of the Commonwealth, +responsible for the spiritual as well as temporal welfare of its +inhabitants, he felt it his duty to whip, banish, and hang heretics to +save his people from perilous heresy. + +The extravagance of some of the early Quakers has been grossly +exaggerated. Their conduct will compare in this respect favorably with +that of the first Anabaptists and Independents; but it must be admitted +that many of them manifested a good deal of that wild enthusiasm which +has always been the result of persecution and the denial of the rights of +conscience and worship. Their pertinacious defiance of laws enacted +against them, and their fierce denunciations of priests and magistrates, +must have been particularly aggravating to a man as proud and high +tempered as John Endicott. He had that free-tongued neighbor of his, +Edward Wharton, smartly whipped at the cart-tail about once a month, but +it may be questioned whether the governor's ears did not suffer as much +under Wharton's biting sarcasm and "free speech" as the latter's back did +from the magisterial whip. + +Time has proved that the Quakers had the best of the controversy; and +their descendants can well afford to forget and forgive an error which +the Puritan governor shared with the generation in which he lived. + +WEST OSSIPEE, N. H., 14th 9th Month, 1878. + + + + + +JOHN WINTHROP. + +On the anniversary of his landing at Salem. + +I see by the call of the Essex Institute that some probability is +suggested that I may furnish a poem for the occasion of its meeting at +The Willows on the 22d. I would be glad to make the implied probability +a fact, but I find it difficult to put my thoughts into metrical form, +and there will be little need of it, as I understand a lady of Essex +County, who adds to her modern culture and rare poetical gifts the best +spirit of her Puritan ancestry, has lent the interest of her verse to the +occasion. + +It was a happy thought of the Institute to select for its first meeting +of the season the day and the place of the landing of the great and good +governor, and permit me to say, as thy father's old friend, that its +choice for orator, of the son of him whose genius, statesmanship, and +eloquence honored the place of his birth, has been equally happy. As I +look over the list of the excellent worthies of the first emigrations, I +find no one who, in all respects, occupies a nobler place in the early +colonial history of Massachusetts than John Winthrop. Like Vane and +Milton, he was a gentleman as well as a Puritan, a cultured and +enlightened statesman as well as a God-fearing Christian. It was not +under his long and wise chief magistracy that religious bigotry and +intolerance hung and tortured their victims, and the terrible delusion of +witchcraft darkened the sun at noonday over Essex. If he had not quite +reached the point where, to use the words of Sir Thomas More, he could +"hear heresies talked and yet let the heretics alone," he was in charity +and forbearance far in advance of his generation. + +I am sorry that I must miss an occasion of so much interest. I hope you +will not lack the presence of the distinguished citizen who inherits the +best qualities of his honored ancestor, and who, as a statesman, scholar, +and patriot, has added new lustre to the name of Winthrop. + +DANVERS, 6th Month, 19, 1880. + + + + + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK, VOLUME VI., COMPLETE *** +By John Greenleaf Whittier + +****** This file should be named wit3510.txt or wit3510.zip ***** + +Corrected EDITIONS of our etexts get a new NUMBER, wit3511.txt +VERSIONS based on separate sources get new LETTER, wit3510a.txt + +This eBook was produced by David Widger + +Project Gutenberg eBooks are often created from several printed +editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the US +unless a copyright notice is included. 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