psalm 90,
13-
From the old metrical paraphrase, sung at the Consecration of Bishop Seabury in Aberdeen, n November 1784, and at the centennial commem- oration of the Consecration, 1884, in Aberdeen and in Connecticut.
OLORD, the Saviour and defence Of us Thy chosen race, From age to age Thou still hast been Our sure abiding-place.
To satisfy and cheer our souls
Thy early mercy send; That we may all our days to come
In joy and comfort spend.
Let happy times, with large amends,
Dry up our former tears, Or equal at the least the term
Of our afflicted years.
To all Thy servants, Lord, let this Thy wondrous work be known;
And to our offspring yet unborn Thy glorious power be shown.
Let Thy bright rays upon us shine,
Give Thou our work success; The glorious work we have in hand
Do Thou vouchsafe to bless.
To Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, The God whom we adore,
Be glory; as it was, is now, And shall be evermore. Amen.
r
MARIA SEABURY
At Newton Highlands, Mass., March 18, 1916, in her eighty-third year, died MARIA SEABURY, daughter of Charles Saltonstall and Ruth Haw- kins (Mount) Seabury, late of Stony Brook, L. I., about three miles from Caroline Church, Se- tauket, in the grave yard of which she was laid to rest on the 21st of the same month. Her mother was a sister of William and of Shepard Mount, artists of distinction in their day, and among the earliest of the members of the National Academy of Design in New York. Her father was the second son of Rev. Charles Seabury, the only son of Bishop Seabury who left issue, and who succeeded his father as rector of St. James', New London, and for the last thirty years of his life was rector of Caroline Church. Her Churchman- ship was of the type of those men, and her faith- ful devotion to all the duties of her life was a beautiful exemplification of the principles which by tradition from them she had received to hold. Of deep and tenacious affections, strong char- acter, luminous intelligence, and, in spite of her very active habits, of no small literary cultiva- tion, she afforded a remarkable instance of large achievement, with very slender resources, and in the face of constantly recurring adversities al- ways mastered by her cheery forcefulness. In the cares and labors of her life she may well be said to have done a man's part, without the least abatement of the grace and charm which emi- nently belonged to her as a woman ; and to all who were permitted to know her, either of her own or later generations, the memory of her ex- ample will always be as of the light that shineth in darkness. W. J. S.
DIED
SEABURY — Died in Boston, March 27th, CATHARINE REGIXA SEABURY, of Mendon, Mass., daughter of the late Rev. Samuel Seabury, D.D., of the General Theological Seminary, and of Mary Ann Schuyler Jones Seabury, his wife, and great grand-daugner of the Rt. Rev. Samuel Seabury, D.D., first Bishop of the American Church.
"Grant unto her, O Lord, eternal rest, And let light perpetual shine upon her."
MEMORIAL
EXCERPT FROM THE MINUTES OF THE FACULTY OF THE GENERAL THEOLOGICAL SEMINARY
Upon motion of Professor Edmunds the fol- lowing resolution was unanimously adopted by a rising vote :
"The faculty of the General Theological Semi- nary desire to put on record, at the first meeting of the academic year, their sense of the loss which has come to them and to the seminary in the death of the Rev. WILLIAM JONES SEABURY, D.D. He has gone to his rest after a long life ^x faithful service to his Master and to the Church. Of his seventy-nine years fifty were spent in the ministry, and forty-four as instructor and professor in this institution. Six of the present faculty were undergraduate students under him. The member next in seniority is his academic junior by thirty years. To many of our alumni he has been the single representative of former days, while to his colleagues he has been able to recall precedents and happenings in the past which have shed light on the problems of the present.
"He has been known in the Church — as be- came the bearer of his illustrious name — as the staunch upholder of its principles and order. He has placed on record from the authentic and abundant sources open to him the stories of events connected with the beginnings of the American episcopate. He has been the wise coun- sellor of perplexed bishops and priests. He has occupied places of honor and usefulness on the governing boards of many institutions. Every- where he has been held in esteem and regard. But to his colleagues of the faculty have been given a closer contact and a privileged intimacy. They know in a special degree the vigor and clearness of thought, seen in these later years when they might have been lessened by age ; the humor, always kindly, which banished dulness and sometimes perhaps prevented differences of judgment from becoming too sharp ; the firm con- victions combined in a wonderful way with a readiness to recognize new viewpoints and to accept changed methods ; the consistent courtesy as of a Christian gentleman ; the unfailing sym- pathy and good will in all personal relations ; the genuine humility, the perfect sincerity, the true devoutiaess, which marked his character. They will miss him greatly as counsellor and as friend, and his name will be carved deep, not only on the stone tablet near the altar where he delighted to officiate but also on their hearts. May he rest in peace."
Attest :
CHARLES N. SHEPARD, Secretary.
September 27, 1916.
SAMUEL SEABURY, the noted jurist counsel for the Hofstader committee inves- tigating the New York City administration, as he appears spending a week-end of rest at his home in East Hampton, L. I.
WiH. World nhoto
SAMUEL SEABURY BELL
BRONXVILLE, N. Y. — At the age of 75, Samuel Seabury Bell, retired banker and cousin of the Hofstadter Legislative In- vestigating counsel, died October 15th at the home of his niece, Miss Gertrude Slade, with whom he had resided for the past ten years. He had been retired for several years.
Mr. Bell, who was a son of the late Samuel Peters Bell, was born in New York. He was a great-great-grandson of the Rt. Rev. Samuel Seabury, the first Anglican Bishop of the United States.
While his two brothers, Charles and Frank Bell, joined the surveying part of the Canadian Pacific Railroad when the line was extended to the West Coast and later became active in the development of British Columbia, Samuel remained in New York and engaged in banking.
Surviving him, besides his brothers, is a sister, Miss Lydia Bell of Bronxville.
LIFE AND CORRESPONDENCE
OF
THE RT. REV. SAMUEL SEABURY, D.D.
WORKS BY THE SAME AUTHOR.
History of the Episcopal Church in Connecticut.
From 1635 to 1865. Two volumes, 8vo .... $6.00.
Life and Correspondence of Samuel Johnson, D. D.
Missionary of the Church of England in Connecticut, and First President of King's College, New York.
One volume, 8vo .... $3.00.
Life and Times of William Samuel Johnson, LL. D.
First Senator in Congress from Connecticut, and President of 'Columbia College, New York.
One volume, 8vo .... $2.50.
LIFE AND CORRESPONDENCE
OF
THE RIGHT REVEREND
SAMUEL SEABURY, D.D
FIRST BISHOP OF CONNECTICUT, AND OF THE EPISCOPAL CHURCH IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA.
E. EDWARDS ^EARDSLEY, D.D., LL.D.
RECTOR OF ST. THOMAS'S CHURCH, NEW HAVEN.
BOSTON: HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN AND COMPANY.
C&e Ktoermfce Press,
1881.
COPYRIGHT, 1880, Br E. EDWARDS BEARDSLEY.
RIVERSIDE, CAMBRIDGE:
STEREOTYPED AND FEINTED H. 0. HOUQHTON AND COMPANY.
To
THE MOST REVEREND ROBERT EDEN, D. D.,
PRIMUS, BISHOP OF MORAY, ROSS, AND CAITHNESS,
IN GRATEFUL RECOGNITION OF THE BENEFITS WHICH HAVE FLOWED FROM THB ACT OF HIS PREDECESSOR IN CONSECRATING THE
FIRST BISHOP EOR THE EPISCOPAL CHURCH
IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA;
AND IN TESTIMONY OF THE BOND OF INTEREST AND FELLOWSHIP WHICH SHOULD EVER BIND TOGETHER CHURCHES OF THE ONE FAITH,
jts Mum*
IS RESPECTFULLY AND CORDIALLY DEDICATED BY
THE AUTHOR.
M181331
PBEFAOE.
To very many persons it has been a matter of wonder that so distinguished a prelate as Seabury, who bore a most important part in the organization and establishment of the Church in this country, should be left so long without an extended biogra- phy. It is not necessary to inquire into the causes of this neglect. A brief and imperfect outline of his character has been given in various publications ; but this is the first attempt to bring together the leading events of his earlier and his later life, and to trace him, as he may be seen in his works and correspond- ence, from colonial times to the end of his episcopate.
The lapse of a century has carried away some of the materials for such a biography, and one may therefore regret that it had not been commenced be- fore all the great actors, with whom he was inti- mately associated, had descended to the grave. I have no doubt that the Bishop himself, like other public men, destroyed many papers which he did not believe essential to the history of the period in which he lived, or which he did not care to have -fall into other hands. Those that have been preserved and
PREFACE.
gathered by me are much more abundant and satis- factory than was anticipated when the preparation of this volume was projected. While the first part of his journal as Bishop, ending with May, 1791, is miss- ing, there are contemporary documents to supply, in a sufficient measure, the details of his Episcopal acts and complete the view of his character and services.
He began life as an enthusiastic royalist, and as- serted his political opinions with a sturdiness and ability which, in the heats of the Revolution, put him in great peril and distress. As a fair historian, I have allowed him to tell the story of his own suffer- ings at the outbreak of the war which led to the in- dependence of the colonies ; and the candid reader will observe that no effort has been made to conceal in the least degree this portion of his history, or to distort the plain meaning of his words or his acts. The time has long since gone by when there need be any^ timidity or hesitation in speaking freely of those upon whom obloquy was once heaped for conscien- tiously espousing the cause of the crown.
The name of Bishop Seabury is identified with the Church in Connecticut. It was in making researches and collecting materials for the two volumes of his- tory, which have already been published, that I first conceived the idea of writing his life. I found valu- able letters and documents which could not well be used in the historic narrative, and it seemed to me that it was due to his cherished memory to give them the greater prominence of a distinct consideration and
PREFACE. ix
a separate work. Full justice cannot be done to the character of an illustrious individual without pre- senting, as far as possible, a complete picture of what he thought and how he acted ; what he was in him- self, in his principles, in his purposes, and in the deeper sanctities of his inner life.
Not only is Bishop Seabury identified with the Church in Connecticut : he belongs to the whole Protestant Episcopal Church in the United States of America, and the interest, therefore, in his biography should be general, not local. No one who wishes to understand thoroughly the character of the men who, in our early ecclesiastical councils, held fast to great principles, and worked steadily and prayerfully for the union and consolidation of what appeared for a time to be opposing parties, will fail to appreciate this effort to bring out the influence of the first Bishop of Connecticut, and to present the main facts of his history in unbroken chronological order.
I am indebted to several gentlemen for kindly an- swering letters of inquiry and furnishing me with in- teresting incidents. My thanks are especially due to the Rev. William J. Seabury, D. D., a great grandson of the Bishop, for the loan of the MS. Letter-book, and for information which has been of much service to me ; to the Rt. Rev. Dr. William Stevens Perry, Bishop of Iowa, for the use of the MS. volume of the Society's letters, New York, now in his possession as historiographer of the Church ; and to the Rev. Samuel Hart, M. A., Professor in Trinity College,
X PREFACE.
Hartford, for valuable pamphlets and free access to the archives of the diocese. The Kev. Dr. Thomas W. Coit, Professor of Ecclesiastical History in the Berkeley Divinity School, Middletown ; Rev. William Walker, of Monymusk, Scotland, and Mr. George Grub, LL. D., of Aberdeen, should be included in my acknowledgments, as they have favored me with facts and papers which add t interest and value to the work. Due credit has been given in the foot-notes for all the matter drawn from " The Historical Notes and Documents " which constitute the third volume of Perry's " Half Century of the Legislation of the American Church," or "Journals of General Conven- tions."
The frontispiece was made expressly for this work. The original portrait, now in the Library of Trinity College, was engraved in 1786 by the celebrated English engraver, William Sharp, and the plate af- fectionately inscribed to Benjamin West, Esq., by Duche*, his grateful friend and pupil. Copies of this print have become exceedingly rare, and the engrav- ing which forms the frontispiece of the present vol- ume will supply, what many have long wished to obtain, a good likeness of Bishop Seabury.
NEW HAVEN, November, 1880.
CONTENTS.
CHAPTER I.
BIRTH AND PARENTAGE; EDUCATION OF HIS FATHER, AND CON- FORMITY TO EPISCOPACY ; MISSIONARY AT NEW LONDON, AND REMOVAL TO HEMPSTEAD; THE SON GRADUATES AT YALE COLLEGE, AND IS APPOINTED A CATECHIST; GOES ABROAD AND IS ORDAINED FOR NEW BRUNSWICK; PROMOTION TO THE LIVING OF JAMAICA, AND MARRIAGE; RELIGIOUS CONDITION OF HIS CURE, AND WHITEFIELD'S ITINERANCY
A. D. 1729--1764.
CHAPTER II.
DEATH OF HIS FATHER, AND SCARCITY OF CLERGYMEN; PLEAS FOR AN AMERICAN EPISCOPATE, AND DR. CHANDLER'S PUBLI- CATIONS; REMOVAL TO WESTCHKSTER, AND INSTITUTION INTO
THE RECTORSHIP OF ST. PETER'S CHURCH; MISSIONARY WORK, AND STATE OF HIS PARISH; POLITICAL TROUBLES, AND CON- TINENTAL CONGRESSES ; DEFENSE OF THE CROWN, AND ANONY- MOUS PAMPHLETS; CLERICAL FRIENDS AND THEIR INTIMACY 17
A. D. 1764-1775.
CHAPTER IH.
LETTER TO THE SECRETARY; FIRMNESS OF ALLEGIANCE; AR- REST AND IMPRISONMENT; MEMORIAL TO THE GENERAL AS- SEMBLY OF CONNECTICUT; RELEASE AND RETURN TO HIS
FAMILY ; FRESH TROUBLES, AND DECLARATION OF INDEPEN- DENCE; CLOSE OF HIS CHURCH, AND ACCOUNT OF HIS PERSE- CUTIONS 33
A. D. 1775-1776.
Xii CONTENTS.
CHAPTER IV.
ESCAPE TO LONG ISLAND, AND DESECRATION OF HIS CHURCH; LETTER TO THE SOCIETY, AND DEATH OF MISSIONARIES; RES- IDENCE IN NEW YORK CITY, AND MISSIONARY AT STATEN ISLAND; APPOINTED CHAPLAIN, AND BURNING OF TRINITY CHURCH; SUFFERINGS AND LOSSES OF THE CLERGY . . 48
A. D. 1776-1780.
CHAPTER V.
CONTINUED RESISTANCE OF THE COLONIES; TREACHERY OF AR- NOLD, AND HIS PLOT TO DESTROY THE AMERICAN CAUSE; EXPEDITION AGAINST NEW LONDON, AND MASSACRE OF THE GARRISON IN FORT GRISWOLD; SIEGE OF YORKTOWN, AND SURRENDER OF LORD CORNWALLIS; TREATY OF PEACE, AND INDEPENDENCE OF THE COLONIES ; LOYALISTS AND THEIR TREATMENT ; THE CLERGY AND THE CHURCH . . V . 62
A. D. 1780-1783.
CHAPTER VI.
CLERGY IN CONNECTICUT BEFORE THE WAR, AND AT ITS CLOSE; CONVENTION IN WOODBURY, AND APPOINTMENT OF A BISHOP; TESTIMONIALS FROM REV. MR. JARVIS AND THE CLERGY OF NEW YORK IN FAVOR OF DR. SEABURYJ LETTERS TO THE ARCHBISHOP OF CANTERBURY, AND DEPARTURE OF DR. SEA- BURY FOR ENGLAND . . .... . . .76
A. D. 1783.
CHAPTER VII.
SCHEME OF THE REV. MR. WHITE, AND OPPOSITION OF THE CLERGY OF CONNECTICUT ; CONVENTION IN WOODBURY AND NUMBER PRESENT; SYMPATHY IN MASSACHUSETTS, AND LET- TERS OF REV. MR. FOGG; ARRIVAL OF DR. SEABURY IN LON- DON, AND IMPEDIMENTS TO HIS CONSECRATION; CORRESPOND- ENCE WITH THE CLERGY, AND CONVENTION IN WALLINGFORD 97
A. D. 1783-1784.
CONTENTS. xiii
CHAPTER VIII.
SETTLEMENT OP HIS FAMILY IN NEW LONDON, AND LETTERS TO THE CLERGY OF CONNECTICUT ; SCOTTISH EPISCOPACY, AND DR. BERKELEY'S CORRESPONDENCE WITH BISHOP SKINNER; WAITING FOR AN ACT OF PARLIAMENT, AND NOTHING ACCOM- PLISHED FOR HIS AID; THE DANISH SUCCESSION, AND CART- WRIGHT OF SHREWSBURY; APPLICATION TO THE SCOTTISH BISHOPS ....... . . . . . . 117
A. D. 1784.
CHAPTER IX.
BISHOP KILGOUR'S LETTER, AND DR. SEABURY'S REPLY; ARRIVAL IN ABERDEEN, AND OPPOSITION OF DR. SMITH; CONSECRA- TION, AND SYNOD OF BISHOPS; CONCORDATS, AND ADDRESS TO THE CLERGY OF CONNECTICUT J PREACHES IN ABERDEEN, AND BISHOP JOLLY'S PRAYER ; RETURN TO LONDON, AND LETTER TO MR. BOUCHER 140
A. D. 1784-1785.
CHAPTER X.
ARRIVAL IN LONDON, AND NEW PERPLEXITIES J OPPOSITION OF GRANVILLE SHARPE AND OTHERS; LETTER TO THE CLERGY OF CONNECTICUT, AND FRIENDSHIP OF AMERICAN LOYALISTS; PECUNIARY SUPPORT, AND LETTER TO THE VENERABLE SOCI- ETY; BISHOP SKINNER'S INTEREST, AND LETTERS OF DR.
CHANDLER 163
A. D. 1 785.
CHAPTER XL
CONSECRATION SERMON, AND OBJECTIONS TO IT; LETTERS OF BISHOPS LOWTH AND SKINNER; CHARLES WESLEY, AND HIS OPINION OF BISHOP SEABURY; MEETINGS TO ORGANIZE THE CHURCH IN MARYLAND AND PENNSYLVANIA ; CONVENTIONS AT NEW BRUNSWICK AND NEW YORK; TITLE OF THE CHURCH, AND DR. WHITE'S INFLUENCE 182
A. D. 1784-1785.
CONTENTS.
CHAPTER XII.
LETTER OF BISHOP SKINNER TO MR. BOUCHER, AND HIS ANSWER; ARRIVAL OP BISHOP SEABURY AT NEWPORT, AND LANDING AT NEW LONDON; CONVENTION AT MIDDLETOWN, AND HIS RECOGNITION BY THE CLERGY; ORDINATION, AND SERMON OF MR. LEAMING; CONVOCATION, AND THE CLERGY OF MASSA- CHUSETTS; COMMITTEE ON ALTERATIONS IN THE LITURGY, AND BISHOP'S CHARGE .. . . . - . . . . 201
A. D. 1785-1786.
CHAPTER XIII.
COURTESIES TO THE SOUTHERN CLERGY, AND PROPOSALS TO CHANGE THE LITURGY I BISHOP SEABURY'S LETTER TO DR. SMITH, AND REASONS FOR NOT ATTENDING CONVENTION IN
PHILADELPHIA; CONVOCATION IN NEW HAVEN, AND RELUC- TANCE TO ALTER THE LITURGY; ORDINATION OF SEVEN CAN- DIDATES, AND LETTER TO THE SCOTTISH BISHOPS J BISHOP SEABURY AND HIS CLERGY DENOUNCED AS NON-JURORS AND JACOBITES, AND MR. LEAMING'S DEFENSE. . . . . 226
A. D. 1785.
CHAPTER XIV.
CONVENTION IN PHILADELPHIA, AND ADOPTION OF AN ECCLESI- ASTICAL CONSTITUTION; APPLICATION FOR BISHOPS IN THE
ENGLISH LINE, AND " THE PROPOSED BOOK; " LETTER OF MR. PROVOOST, AND HOSTILITY TO BISHOP SEABURY; FEARS OF FRIENDS, AND REPLY OF THE BISHOPS ; ANOTHER CONVENTION IN PHILADELPHIA, AND ITS PROCEEDINGS 244
A. D. 1785-1786.
CHAPTER XV.
BISHOP SEABURY'S COMMUNION OFFICE, AND CONVOCATION AT DERBY; LITURGICAL CHANGES, AND LETTER TO GOVERNOR HUNTINGTCN; SECOND CHARGE, AND EPISCOPAL RESIDENCE; POVERTY OF THE CLERGY AND PEOPLE, AND SUPPORT OF THE
BISHOP . ... . . . . . . .263
A. D. 1786-1787.
CONTENTS. xv
CHAPTER XVI.
CONVENTION AT WILMINGTON, AND DOCUMENTS FROM ENGLAND; BISHOPS ELECT, AND THEIR DEPARTURE FROM AMERICA; DR. GRIFFITH, AND LETTER OF BENJAMIN MOORE; DRS. WHITE AND PROVOOST CONSECRATED, AND CONVOCATION IN WAL-
LINGFORD; CORRESPONDENCE WITH BISHOPS SKINNER, PRO- VOOST, AND WHITE 287
A. D. 1786-1787.
CHAPTER XVII.
CONVOCATION AT STAMFORD, AND ITS RESULTS; LETTER OF LEAMING, AND EFFORTS TO CONCILIATE; OBSTACLES TO UNION, AND BISHOP FOR MASSACHUSETTS PROPOSED; WORK OF SEA- BURY, AND CONVOCATION AND CONSECRATION AT NEW LON- DON; THE MITRE AND WHEN IT WAS WORN .... 304
A. D. 1787.
CHAPTER XVIII.
CORRESPONDENCE WITH MR. PARKER, AND VISIT TO BOSTON; CHARITY SERMON, AND ORDINATIONS ; STAY IN THE CITY, AND CALL UPON DR. BYLES; LETTER OF LEAMING, AND CON- VOCATION AT NORTH HAVEN 320
A. D. 1788.
CHAPTER XIX.
VALIDITY OF CONSECRATION, AND LETTER TO BISHOP DRUM- MOND; DEATH OF CHARLES EDWARD, AND RELIEF FOR THE SCOTTISH EPISCOPAL CHURCH; ATTACHMENT OF HIS CLERGY, AND LETTERS TO TILLOTSON BRONSON J CONVENTION TO MEET IN PHILADELPHIA, AND CORRESPONDENCE WITH BISHOP WHITE 335
A. D. 1788-1789.
CHAPTER XX.
CONVENTION IN PHILADELPHIA, AND APPLICATION FOR THE CONSECRATION OF REV. EDWARD BASS; DEATH OF DR. GRIF- FITH, AND HIS FUNERAL; RESULTS OF THE CONVENTION, AND
xvi CONTENTS.
ADJOURNMENT; LETTER OF DR. SMITH, AND PERSISTENCE OF BISHOP PROVOOST; BISHOP SEABURY AND THE EASTERN CHURCHES IN PHILADELPHIA, AND LETTER OF LEAMING . 357
A. D. 1789.
CHAPTER XXI.
PROCEEDINGS OF THE CONVENTION, AND REVISION OF THE LIT- URGY ; HOUSE OF BISHOPS, AND REJECTION OF THE ATHANA-
SIAN CREED; MISUNDERSTANDING BETWEEN THE TWO HOUSES, AND PRAYER FOR THE PRESIDENT AND ALL IN AUTHORITY; CHANGES IN THE COMMUNION OFFICE, AND BISHOP SEABURY'S INFLUENCE J CONVOCATION AT LITCHFIELD, AND DR. LEAM- ING'S RETIREMENT . . . . .- '-,...- . . 373
A. D. 1789-1790.
CHAPTER XXII.
CONVOCATION IN NEWTOWN, AND RATIFICATION OF THE PRAYER BOOK; PROTEST OF REV. JAMES SAYRE, AND USE OF THE NICENE CREED; DR. SEABURY DECLARED BISHOP IN RHODE ISL- AND, AND LETTERS TO LAYMEN,' DR. COKE AND HIS PROPO- SITION; OFFICIAL VISITATION, AND JOURNEY TO PORTSMOUTH; PUBLICATION OF SERMONS, AND CONVOCATION AT WATERTOWN ; PARISH IN STRATFORD, AND LETTER TO DR. DIBBLEE . . 389
A. D. 1790-1792.
CHAPTER XXIH.
CONTENTION IN STRATFORD, AND EFFORTS OF MR. BOWDEN TO CONCILIATE THE PEOPLE ; INFLUENCE OF MR. SAYRE, AND TROUBLES IN WOODBURY ; CONVENTION IN NEW HAVEN, AND LAITY FIRST INTRODUCED ; SUPPORT OF THE BISHOP, AND EPISCOPAL VISITATION J SERMON BEFORE GENERAL CONVEN- TION, AND CONSECRATION OF DR. CLAGGETT ; CONVOCATION AT HUNTINGTON AND PARISH INDEPENDENCE; CONVENTION AT M1DDLETOWN, AND ORDINATION 411
A. D. 1792-1793.
CHAPTER XXIV.
OFFICE FOR BURIAL OF INFANTS, AND POINTED PSALTER; VISIT- ATION TO RHODE ISLAND, AND DISORDER IN NARRAGANSETT J
CONTENTS. xvii
CONSECRATION OF CHURCHES, AND CONVOCATION IX NEW MIL- FORD ; LETTER TO WILLIAM STEVENS, AND CONVENTION IN NEW HAVEN; EPISCOPAL ACADEMY, CONVOCATION IN CHESH- IRE, AND CONSECRATION AT WATERTOWN ; ANNUAL CONVEN- TION, AND ESTABLISHMENT OF THE ACADEMY .... 430
A. D. 1793-1795.
CHAPTER XXV.
VISITATION, AND CONVENTION IN RHODE ISLAND; GENERAL CON- VENTION IN PHILADELPHIA, AND NO DEPUTIES FROM NEW ENGLAND; OFFENSIVE PAMPHLET, AND COURSE OF ITS AU- THOR; CONSECRATION OF CHURCHES, AND LAST VISITATION; DEATH AND FUNERAL; REMOVAL AND RE-INTERMENT OF HIS REMAINS; CHARACTER AND CONCLUSION 447
A. D. 1795-1796. APPENDIX A.
ADDRESS OF CONVENTION OF CLERGYMEN IN NEW YORK TO
THE VENERABLE SOCIETY ........ 463
APPENDIX B.
MONUMENTS TO BISHOP SEABURY 405
APPENDIX C.
BISHOP WHITE'S MS. NOTE ON THE CHURCH IN AMERICA, AND LIST OF THE CONSECRATION OF SCOTTISH BISHOPS . . . 469
APPENDIX D. BISHOP SEABURY'S COMMUNION OFFICE 474
APPENDIX E.
OFFICE FOR THE BURIAL OF INFANTS .- 488
b
LIFE AND OOEEESPONDENOE
OF
SAMUEL SEABURY.
CHAPTER I.
BIKTH AND PARENTAGE ; EDUCATION OF HIS FATHER, AND CON- FORMITY TO EPISCOPACY ; MISSIONARY AT NEW LONDON, AND REMOVAL TO HEMPSTEAD ; THE SON GRADUATES AT YALE COL- LEGE, AND IS APPOINTED A CATECHISTJ GOES ABROAD AND IS OR- DAINED FOR NEW BRUNSWICK ; PROMOTION TO THE LIVING OF JAMAICA, AND MARRIAGE ; RELIGIOUS CONDITION OF HIS CURE, AND WHITEFIELD'S ITINERANCY.
A. D. 1729-1764.
THE name of Samuel Seabury occupies an impor- tant place in the early history of our American Church, and it will be the object of the following pages to bring together the memorials of his life, and present them in their due sequence and order.
He was born in Groton, Conn., November 30, 1729, and was the second son of Samuel Seabury, by his wife Abigail, daughter of Mr. Thomas Mumford. Groton was also the native place of his father, a son of John Seabury who removed from Duxbury, Mass., about the year 1700, and first settled at Stonington; but in 1704 he exchanged his plantation in that place for one in Groton, opposite New London. Congrega-
2 LIFE AND CORRESPONDENCE
tionalism was then the only form of religion in the colony, and John Seabury, being its earnest supporter and holding the office of deacon in the society at Groton, taught his family the doctrines which he him- self accepted, and, with a view to educating him for the ministry, sent his fourth son, Samuel, to college.
It has been stated that he first entered Yale, and was a member of that institution when Rector Cutler and others announced their withdrawal from the Con- gregational order, and their conformity to Episcopacy. Much excitement and controversy ensued, and dur- ing the disturbance, several students left, and among them young Seabury, who is enrolled with the gradu- ating class of Harvard College, in 1724, being at that time eighteen years of age.1 It is proper to men- tion, however, that while this statement may be en- tirely correct, nothing has been found to verify it upon the records of either institution. Dr. Johnson, of Stratford, in recommending him to the "Honor- able Board," spoke of him as having " been educated and graduated in the colleges in this country," and Seabury himself, afterwards, in a letter introducing Ebenezer Punderson, who took his bachelor's degree in 1726, said, " He hath been educated at Yale Col- lege, Connecticut, where I had a particular acquaint- ance with him, and where he always had the charac- ter of a sober person."
In 1726, he became the first preacher to " the Second Ecclesiastical Society," organized by permis- sion of the General Assembly of Connecticut, in that part of the town called North Groton. About this time he married and was brought in contact and as-
1 Hallam's Annals of St. James's Church, New London, p. 31.
OF SAMUEL SEABURY. 3
sociation with members of the Church of England. His father-in-law, Thomas Mumford, came originally from Narragansett, R. I., and was the uncle by mar- riage of Dr. McSparran, the celebrated missionary of the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in that region. When the New London parish was formed under the auspices of this missionary, who was the nearest and most accessible clergyman of the English Church, Mr. Mumford as one of the founders figured conspicuously, and subsequently, in the appointment of officers, he was chosen the first warden. The re- ligious predilections of his wife's family, or the public agitation of the subject, perhaps both, led Mr. Sea- bury to examine the claims of Episcopacy, and early in the spring of 1730, he had ceased to officiate for the Congregationalists in North Groton, and declared his intention of crossing the ocean to obtain Holy Orders. He appeared before the Honorable Society on the 21st of August, 1730, was ordained deacon and priest by the Bishop of London, and returned to Connecticut with the appointment of a missionary to New London, on a salary of .£50 per annum,1 the churchmen of that place, Groton, and other parts ad- jacent having built a church and petitioned for his services as a gentleman born and bred in the colony, whom they well knew and in whom they had great confidence.
His son, the future bishop, was born while he was ministering to the Congregationalists at North Gro- ton, and was but an infant in the arms of his mother when the father embarked for England. He was baptized December 14, 1729, by Rev. John Owen,
1 Hawkins's Missions of the Church of England, p. 294.
4 LIFE AND CORRESPONDENCE
Congregational minister at Groton ; but his nurture was wholly in the Episcopal Church, and his boyhood was passed amid scenes of extraordinary religious ex- citement. The followers of Whitefield, ignorant and fanatical, seduced many of the inhabitants of New London and its vicinity into the wildest extrava- gances, and on one occasion, in the midst of their re- ligious delirium, they assembled in a public street on a Sunday, and burnt rich apparel and a large num- ber of theological books, among which was included Bishop Beveridge's " Private Thoughts on Religion."
The mission at Hempstead, on Long Island, be- came vacant in 1742 by the removal of Dr. Jenney to Philadelphia, and the elder Seabury, who had done good service at New London, was transferred to this important sphere of duty, where he was called to en- counter a spirit of religious frenzy and intolerance not unlike that which he had witnessed in Connecti- cut. He passed the remainder of his days in Hemp- stead, and as grammar schools had not then been es- tablished in every important town, he did what many of the clergy of the time were constrained to do : he added to his pastoral work the duties of a teacher.
His son Samuel was admitted a member of the freshman class in Yale College in 1744, and, soon after he took his degree, the father informed the So- ciety for the Propagation of the Gospel, that a num- ber of people at Huntington, a town about eighteen miles from his mission, had conformed to Episcopacy, and built an edifice for the worship of Almighty God according to the Liturgy of the Church of England. He had frequently officiated in that place, and at the desire of the people, his son had read prayers and
OF SAMUEL SEABURY. 5
sermons there under his direction. The following extract from a letter to the secretary, dated Septem- ber 30, 1748, shows that he had already dedicated him to the work of the ministry, and was giving him the best advantages in his power for becoming useful in that vocation.
My son is now studying Physic, and before he be of age to present himself to the Society in person, I intend, God willing, that he shall spend one or two years at Edinburgh in the study of Physic. I have been led into this manner of educating him, from an hint taken from one of the Hon- orable Society's Abstracts concerning their designed economy of their College at Barbadoes. I shall therefore esteem it a great favor if the Society will be pleased to approve this method, and give him a place on their books, and grant what may be recommended in his favor by our Revd< Com- missary in regard to Huntington.
My son is not yet nineteen years of age, and as I believe he may be employed at Huntington in reading prayers and sermons, and in catechising to good purpose, before he will be of age for Holy Orders, I presume to hope the Society will employ him at Huntington with some small allowance.1
He served in the capacity of a catechist nearly four years, and was allowed a salary of £10 per annum. His relinquishment of the position is thus noted by his father in a letter dated at Hempstead, October 13, 1752 : "Agreeable to the Honorable Society's in- structions to him, my son laid down his place of cate- chist in July last, and embarked from New York for Edinburgh in August, in order to spend one year there in the study of physic and anatomy ; after that intending to present himself to the Honorable Society in order to make a tender of his future life to the
1 MSS. Society for the Propagation of the Gospel.
6 LIFE AND CORRESPONDENCE
service of his great Master, under their direction. With this intent he left me, and I hope he may be found worthy of their notice and regard. The church has gained in Huntington by his assistance." l It was not a very uncommon thing for clergymen in America at that period to acquire a certain degree of medical science as a means of accomplishing good, and the regular practitioners then, as now, had a right to be displeased with this encroachment upon the business of their profession. In an anonymous letter to the Bishop of London, 1763, complaint was made that some of the missionaries in the country parishes acted as physicians and surgeons, to the det- riment of the Church.
No evidence has been discovered in the records of the University of Edinburgh that Seabury even en- rolled, and he is not in the list of those who have graduated in medicine from that institution. " As re- gards enrollment or matriculation, the absence of his name is not so decisive ; for the records of the uni- versity at that time were not so sufficient as evidence of at least occasional attendance by a student as they would be now." 2 A little more light is shed upon his connection with the institution in the Society's Ab- stracts, where mention is made of his appointment as a missionary to New Brunswick " out of regard to the request of the inhabitants, and to the united testi- mony of the Episcopal clergy of New York in his fa- vor, as a youth of good .genius, unblemished morals, sound principles in religion, and one that had made as good proficiency in literature while in America, as the
1 MSS. Society for the Propagation of the Gospel.
2 MS. Letter, Prof. A. C. Fraser, March, 1879.
OF SAMUEL SEABURY. 7
present state of learning there would admit of ; and he was gone for further improvement to the Univer- sity of Edinburgh ; and Mr. Seabury, being of full age for Holy Orders, presented himself to the Society in the latter end of last summer from the Univer- sity of Edinburgh, and upon examination being found worthy, he was ordained deacon and priest, and soon after set out for New Brunswick, where the Society hopes he will follow the example of his worthy father, and prove a very diligent and useful missionary in his station." l It seems quite evident that while at Edinburgh he first became acquainted with the Epis- copal Church in Scotland, with whose College of Bishops he was afterwards so closely identified.2
He had attained the age of twenty-four years when he applied for admission to Holy Orders. Dr. Sher- lock, then occupying the metropolitan see, was bend- ing under the weight of age and bodily infirmities, and incapable of performing the functions of his office, though his mind was still unclouded, and he retained his powerful faculties and discriminative judgment. Dr. John Thomas, Bishop of Lincoln,
1 Abstract of Proceedings from February, 1753, to February, 1754, p. 57.
2 The story has often been told that, on the Sunday after his arrival, he inquired of his host where he might find an Episcopal service. The penal laws were then in force which prohibited the Episcopal clergy in Scotland from officiating except in private houses for four persons only, besides the family; or, if in an uninhabited building, for a number not exceeding four. His host replied, "I will show you; take your hat and follow me, but keep barely in my sight, for we are watched with jealousy by the Presbyterians." He led him through winding, narrow lanes and unfrequented streets, and finally disappeared suddenly into an old build- ing several stories high, followed by Seabury, to an upper room where a little band had gathered to worship God in the forms of the Liturgy ac- cording to the dictates of their conscience.
8 LIFE AND CORRESPONDENCE
therefore, acting in his behalf, ordained Mr. Seabury a deacon on St. Thomas's day, 1753, and two days after (Sunday, December 23d), he was advanced to the priesthood by Dr. Richard Osbaldiston, Bishop of Carlisle, acting also for the Bishop of London.
The Rev. J. Wetmore, of Rye, N. Y., who had sent a testimonial to the venerable Society in his favor, recommended him for the cure of New Brunswick, in New Jersey, vacant by the removal of Rev. Mr. Wood to Nova Scotia, and the Bishop of London, under date of December 23, 1753, licensed and authorized him to perform the office of a priest in that province ; and the Society accordingly gave him the appoint- ment to New Brunswick with a salary of ,£50 per annum. He returned to America and arrived at his mission on the 25th of May, 1754, where he found a stone church " nearly finished," and a congregation that greeted him with a hearty welcome.
His ministry in this place was too short to be pro- ductive of much good or to be marked by many events. Having been promoted to the living of Ja- maica, L. I., he was duly inducted into that parish on the 12th of January, 1757, by Sir Charles Hardy, at that time the provincial governor of New York. This change brought him back to the neighborhood of his youthful associations and "nearer to a most excellent father, whom he dearly loved and whose conversation he highly valued." It must have been acceptable to him on other accounts, for he had as- sumed new responsibilities and entered into the do- mestic relations. On the 12th of October, 1756, just three months prior to his induction into the living of Jamaica, he married Mary, daughter of Mr. Ed- ward Hicks, of New York.
OF SAMUEL SEABURY. 9
He found enough to do in the sphere to which he had been transferred, and evils to contend with that taxed his best energies and abilities. The circuit of his ministerial labors reached out beyond his imme- diate cure, and Flushing, in the same county, was one of the stations where he was frequently called to officiate. He gave a sad picture of its religious con- dition in his report to the Society in 1759. " Flush- ing," said he, " in the last generation the grand seat of Quakerism, is in this the seat of infidelity, — a transition how natural ! Bred up in an entire neglect of all religious principles, in hatred to the clergy and in contempt of the sacraments, how hard is their con- version, especially as they disown the necessity of any redemption ! At Jamaica, open infidelity has not made so great a progress ; a general remissness in at- tending divine service, however, prevails, though I know not from what particular cause."
This indifference to Christian truth and Christian ordinances was a source of grief to him in his minis- trations. No measure of fidelity on his part seemed at first to awaken any direct interest in his work, or to turn aside the broad current that was carrying everybody along towards the awful vortex of unbe- lief. Six months after he made the report referred to above, he wrote again to the Society in the same melancholy and discouraging strain : " Such is the effect of deism and infidelity (for the spreading of which Quakerism has paved the way), which have here been propagated with the greatest zeal and the most astonishing success, that a general indifference towards all religion has taken place ; and the too com- mon opinion seems to be that they shall be saved
10 LIFE AND CORRESPONDENCE
without either of the Christian sacraments, without any external worship of God, — in short, without the mediation of Christ, as well as with ; and even among those who profess themselves members of the Church of England, a very great backwardness in attending her service prevails, and particularly with regard to the holy sacrament of- the Lord's Supper ; so great is their aversion to it, or neglect of it, that I fear the number of communicants at present scarce exceeds twenty."
It is easy to see that a young and zealous clergy- man, who had the prosperity of the Church so much in his heart, could not fail to be deeply affected by the gloomy prospects of his mission. A new country in a forming state needed, in a marked degree, all the supports of a right faith and a right practice, and hence he felt that any doctrine or set of princi- ples which led people to look with indifference upon religious rites was deleterious in its influence, and corrupting in its nature. He saw no good in the absence of liturgical worship, — at least, in his view, there was no good in a negative system of faith which referred everything to the inward light, and rejected alike the voice of the Church and all ex- ternal revelation. His patient and steady ministra- tions, however, after a time began to tell upon the inhabitants, and at a later date, he was enabled to make a better report of the spiritual condition of his cure. " Things are considerably mended," he wrote, " especially at Flushing, which has ever been the seat of Quakerism and infidelity. Many young people of both sexes have steadily attended divine service the past summer (whose parents are either Quakers or deists), and behaved with great decency."
OF SAMUEL SEABURY. 11
Mr. Seabury was acquiring experience in his min- isterial work, and fitting himself more and more to grapple with the evils by which he was surrounded. While he could not discern all the fruits which under God he had hoped would come from his labors, he saw improvement in many things, and in 1762 informed the Society that the church was gradually gaining in strength, and that a more serious turn of mind ?egan to manifest itself, — particularly in Flushing, where the white congregation had increased from twenty to eighty. At Jamaica, his principal charge, there were one hundred and twenty families connected with the church, from which came twenty-nine communicants, — more than one sixth of the whole number of fami- lies resident in the place. The missionaries of the Society were required by its rules to transmit a state- ment of the number of their families, baptisms, and communicants, together with such general informa- tion in regard to the sects as might show their rela- tive strength ; and thus the history of each mission, as it was presented from time to time, was before the authority at home, and carefully considered. This rendered them exceedingly vigilant and observing, and their details became something more than dry statistics.
Whatever may now be thought of Seabury's opin- ion of the tendency of Quakerism, it was deliberately formed and honestly entertained. But a new source of disquietude arose in 1764. In that year, White- field, who for the sixth time had lately arrived in America from England, visited his mission, and pro- duced the usual excitement which everywhere at- tended his ministrations. The populace followed him
12 LIFE AND CORRESPONDENCE
and hung with enthusiasm upon his extraordinary eloquence. Large congregations continually gathered to hear him, and Whitefield himself, in a letter to a friend, speaking of this visit, said, " My late excur- sions upon Long Island I trust have been blessed. It would surprise you to see above one hundred car- riages at every sermon in the New World." l
There was no turning, for the time, the current of popular feeling which set in the direction of White- field's ministrations. Some from sympathy with his doctrines, some from admiration of his earnestness and power, and more from curiosity to hear the won- derful man and join with the crowds, were drawn to his sermons and helped to stimulate and extend the public sensation. He was under no restraint, and though episcopally ordained, such had been his er- ratic course that the clergy of the Church of England in the American colonies had opposed his policy and refused to admit him to their pulpits. He was in no way connected with the Society for the Propa- gation of the Gospel, and was only mentioned in its proceedings as his letters and conduct reflected upon the character of its missionaries, and interfered with their work. He left a legacy of discord and confu- sion behind him wherever he went. No measure of zeal and earnestness as a preacher, and no pretense of spiritual illumination, could justify his neglect of the solemn obligations assumed at his ordination, and his disregard of the ritual and usages of the Book of Common Prayer. His extravagances, great as they were, excited the displeasure of those in England who had befriended and aided him, and his censori-
1 Memoirs of Whitefield t p. 181.
OF SAMUEL SEABURY. 13
ousness and want of charity, added to his irregulari- ties, alienated him from their confidence and affec- tions. It was in reply to charges which he sent home to the Society against its missionaries in this country, that Seeker, then Bishop of Oxford, wrote him in 1741 : " You must permit me to say, and I do it with sincere good will to you, that I am per- suaded you are much too severe in what you have printed concerning your brethren of the clergy in this nation, and therefore you may have been too severe in what you have written concerning those abroad, especially as I find that many accounts differ- ent from yours are sent to the Society, concerning their missionaries, by persons in all appearance well deserving of credit."
Whitefield had lost his reverence for the teaching and authority of the Church, and, like all enthusiasts, he could discover defects in the theology of others from which he fancied himself to be free. He as- sailed the works of Tillotson, and " The Whole Duty of Man," — affirming that the archbishop " knew no more of Christianity than Mahomet," and he im- pugned the authority of writings which had been a guide and solace to thousands of Christians of un- doubted intelligence and piety. His followers im- proved oftentimes upon his illiberality and enthu- siasm, and the Presbyterians, or Congregationalists, especially in New England, who at first favored his evangelism, became divided in opinion, and, while some adhered to him firmly, others rejected him as interfering with the customs of the churches and the peace and usefulness of the settled pastors. The op- position to him among them was as violent as among
14 LIFE AND CORRESPONDENCE
the clergy and members of the Church of England. The General Association of Connecticut, which met in June, 1745, expecting that he would make a tour through the colony during the summer, passed a reso- lution, declaring him to be "the faulty occasion of many errors in doctrine and disorders in practice," and " that if the said Mr. Whitefield should make his progress through this government, it would by no means be advisable for any of our ministry to admit him into their pulpits, or for any of our people to at- tend his administrations." l The Old and New Lights were parties which grew out of his itinerancy.
The feeling towards Whitefield at the time he vis- ited Long Island appears to have changed with some of the southern clergy of the Church of England. He had either become less denunciatory of those wrho differed from him in regard to the system of itiner- ancy and certain points of doctrine, or a score of years had accustomed people to the effects of his ex- travagances and worn away the edge of their resist- ance. The Kev. Hugh Neill, a missionary at Oxford, Pa., writing to the secretary of the Society, October 17, 1763, and speaking of the unity in his parish, said : " How long it will continue so, God only knows. 'For Mr. Whitefield arriving lately among us, and meeting with a most cordial reception from the Epis- copal clergy of Philadelphia, has thrown the clergy and laity in the country into a very great conster- nation. The unanimity among the Church clergy, both in city and country, for this three and twenty years past in opposing him prevented his hurting the Church (a few individuals excepted). The divisions
1 TrumbulPs History, vol. ii., p. 190.
OF SAMUEL SEABURY. 15
that he created among the dissenters in this province, and all over America, were examples sufficient to warn us from splitting upon the same rock. But such has been the fatality of our city brethren that they have received him with open arms and still continue to fol- low him from the church to the meeting-houses, and from thence to the church again, with a greater de- gree of veneration (I really believe) than if his Grace of Canterbury was to condescend to pay them a visit." l
Seabury, like his northern brethren, was in entire sympathy with the views of the writer of this letter. His early education and love of order, to say nothing about his abhorrence of canonical and rubrical irregu- larities, led him to disapprove of Whitefield's course, and to dread the effects of his preaching within the limits of his parish. He knew too much of that " continual succession of strolling preachers " among the other religious bodies who had adopted his senti- ments and method of instruction, and who misrep- resented the Church as popish, to believe that no mischief would come to the cause of truth by the introduction of the great revivalist. He reported, however, that none of his own people were finally led astray, while many of them appear to have been more seriously impressed by his earnest, yet concilia- tory manner of presenting and defending the doc- trines of the Church. A letter addressed to the secretary, and dated October 6, 1764, very well ex- presses his fears, and the actual result of this visit of Whitefield: —
Since my last letter to the Honorable Society, we have 1 Hist. Collections, Penn., p. 354.
16 LIFE AND CORRESPONDENCE
had a long visit from Mr. Whitefield in this colony, where he has preached frequently, especially in the city of New York, and in this island, and I am sorry to say he has had more influence than formerly, and I fear has done a great deal of mischief ; his tenets and method of preaching have been adopted by many of the dissenting teachers, and this town in particular has a continual, I had almost said a daily, suc- cession of strolling preachers and exhorters ; and the poor Church of England is on every occasion misrepresented as popish, and as teaching her members to expect salvation on account of their own works and deservings. I have in the most moderate manner endeavored to set these things in their true light, and I think not without success : none of my people have been led away by them, though I have not been without apprehensions on their account, and I hope that friendly disposition and mutual intercourse of good of- fices which have always subsisted between the Church peo- ple and dissenters since I have been settled here, and which I have constantly endeavored to promote, will meet with but little interruption.
An acquaintance of more than six years with the people of his parish had led Mr. Seabury to look with alternate hope and fear to its future condition. His own support was not as liberal as he had anticipated, and promises made when lie first entered upon his ministry in the place were still unfulfilled. The in- fluence of the Quakers had corrupted the principle of Christian generosity, for they " considered it as a mark of an avaricious and venal spirit for a minister to receive anything of his people by way of support." Men in all periods of Christendom have, for the most part, shown themselves too ready to take advantage of the least encouragement, to withhold from the Lord the offerings which, in some shape, are justly his due.
OF SAMUEL SEABURY. . 17
CHAPTEK II.
DEATH OF HIS FATHER AND SCARCITY OF CLERGYMEN; PLEAS FOR AN AMERICAN EPISCOPATE AND DR. CHANDLER'S PUBLICATIONS; RE- MOVAL TO WESTCHESTER AND INSTITUTION INTO THE RECTORSHIP OF ST. PETER'S CHURCH; MISSIONARY WORK AND STATE OF HIS PAR- ISH; POLITICAL TROUBLES AND CONTINENTAL CONGRESSES; DEFENSE OF THE CROWN AND ANONYMOUS PAMPHLETS; CLERICAL FRIENDS AND THEIR INTIMACY.
A. D. 1764-1775.
THE death of his father, on the 15th of June, 1764, was an event which not only filled him with per- sonal sorrow, but deprived the neighboring parish at Hempstead of its faithful missionary. More than twenty years he had filled that post, and during seven of them the son had been favored with the opportu- nity of taking his immediate counsel and guidance in troublesome matters. The following letter, written by the bereaved widow to her brother-in-law in Rhode Island, sheds some light upon the family history, and the condition in which the children were left.
HEMPSTEAD, July 15, 1764.
DEAR, BROTHER, — As you are to me in a double capacity, both in regard to the relation between us, and in regard to our unhappy condition, for I heard by report that my sister is dead, but I have not had a line from you, at which I am somewhat surprised. As to my own deplorable state, my dear husband left me and his family, the 19th of June, to go 2
18 LIFE AND CORRESPONDENCE
to England, from whence he returned the 7th of June, a sick, and I may say, a dying man, for he lived one painful week, and then resigned his soul into the arms of his dear Saviour.
Dear Sir : Your own heart will better suggest to you what I feel than any words I can make use of. I can only say, I have lost one of the best husbands, and am left with six children ; the eldest son and daughter married ; the youngest son with a merchant in New York, and the other three with me, — one of which is a daughter of nineteen, one a son of seventeen, and the other a daughter of six years.
Dear Sir: I am both a widow and a stranger. My husband did not lay up treasures on earth ; though, I have reason to think, he did in Heaven, where no rust doth corrupt ; and my whole trust is in Him who hath said, " He is the Father of the fatherless," and the widow's God.
Sir, as there is in your hands a legacy left me by my mother, I should be glad to know of you what I may expect from it, for I shall be in want of it by next May.
If you write to me, please direct to the care of Mr. Henry Remsen, Jr., Hanover Square, New York, the gentleman with whom my son lives, and he will forward the letter.
I have no more to say, sir, but to commend you and your children to God Almighty, and, begging your prayers for me and mine,
I am, sir, your affectionate sister and humble servant,
ELIZABETH SEABUBY.1 To JAMES HELME, ESQ., SOUTH KINGSTOWN.
The vacancy at Hempstead very naturally imposed upon Mr. Seabury the duty of looking out for a suit- able minister to supply the place. For twelve years he had been acquainted with Leonard Cutting, — ed- ucated at Eton and Cambridge, and for a long time a tutor in King's (now Columbia) College, but then
1 Updike's History Narragansett Church, pp. 134, 135.
OF SAMUEL SEABURY. 19
serving as a missionary in his former cure at New Brunswick, N. J. In the summer of 1765, he in- closed to the Society a petition from the church wardens and vestrymen of the parish of Hempstead, asking that Mr. Cutting might be transferred to that place. The people much desired him for their minis- ter, and Seabury supported the petition with a state- ment that he was well qualified to supply the parish, and would do " real service therein to the cause of virtue and religion in general, and to the interest of the Church in particular." Accordingly the change was authorized, and Mr. Cutting continued in charge at Hempstead till 1784.
The want of clergymen of the Church of England in the American colonies became more urgent as death made inroads into their ranks. The necessity of going home for Holy Orders deterred many from entering the ministry, and of those who ventured on the voyage so large a proportion fell by the way that it was disheartening to think of the sacrifice. Sea- bury did not hesitate to speak out his mind on this subject, and, like other missionaries, to plead, as occa- sion offered, for an American Episcopate. He was present at the meeting of a voluntary association of the Episcopal clergy of New York and New Jersey, when the matter was fully discussed and the unani- mous opinion reached, that " fairly to explain the plan on which American bishops had been requested, to lay before the public the reasons of this request, to answer the objections that had been made, and to obviate those that might be otherwise conceived against it, was not only proper and expedient, but a matter of necessity and duty."
20 LIFE AND CORRESPONDENCE
The Kev. Dr. Johnson, of Stratford, had previously suggested to Dr. Chandler, the rector at Elizabeth- town, the preparation of an appeal to the public in behalf of the Church of England in America, and this action of the clergy ripened the suggestion and led him to write and publish the works which appeared successively in 1767 and 1771, and provoked so much opposition from the enemies of Episcopacy in this country. " The Appeal to the Public," " The Appeal Defended," and "The Appeal farther Defended" were issued at a period when the minds of men were agitated in the colonies with contests and jealousies about political rights and privileges. Those who wrote against the object of the Appeal endeavored to take advantage of the existing troubles, and repre- sented that the taxation of the colonies and the pro- posal of sending bishops to America were parts of one general system, and unfriendly to political and relig- ious liberty.
It was before the controversy which sprung up on the appearance of Dr. Chandler's publications, that Seabury addressed a letter to the secretary of the Society, dated April 17, 1766, from which the follow- ing extract is made : —
We have lately had a most affecting account of the loss of Messrs. Giles and Wilson, the Society's missionaries, the ship they were in being wrecked near the entrance of Dela- ware Bay, and only four persons saved out of twenty-eight ; their death is a great loss in the present want of clergymen in these colonies, and indeed, I believe one great reason why so few from this continent offer themselves for Holy Orders is because it is evident from experience that not more than four out of five who have gone from the northern colonies have returned. This is an unaccountable argument for the
OF SAMUEL SEABURY. 21
necessity of bishops in the colonies. The poor Church of England in America is the only instance that ever happened of an Episcopal Church without a bishop, and in which no orders could be obtained without crossing an ocean of three thousand miles in extent ; without bishops the Church can- not flourish in America, and unless the Church be well sup- ported and prevail, this whole continent will be overrun with infidelity and deism, Methodism, and New Light, with every species and every degree of skepticism and enthusiasm ; and without a bishop upon the spot, I fear it will be impossible to keep the Church herself pure and undefiled.
The clergy did their utmost to preserve the true faith and convince the authorities at home of the un- wisdom of leaving the colonies in such a deplorable condition. Those in New York, with some of their brethren from Connecticut and New Jersey, adopted the plan of " holding voluntary and annual conven- tions " for the purpose of considering the best meth- ods of promoting the welfare of the Church of Eng- land and thwarting the schemes of her adversaries.1
The decease of the elder Seabury sundered one strong tie that bound the son to Jamaica. Besides this, the living was insufficient to meet the demands of his growing family. The people had not redeemed the pledge which they gave him on coming among them, to provide a suitable parsonage, and there was no prospect of any immediate effort in this direction. He received, therefore, with favor, the overtures made to him by the wardens and vestrymen of St. Peter's Church, at Westchester, and intimated to the Society his wish to accept the offer of that mission. The proposition was readily acceded to, and he re- moved to Westchester, and on the 3d of December,
1 Appendix A.
22 LIFE AND CORRESPONDENCE
1766, was in due form "admitted, instituted, and in- ducted " into the rectorship of the parish under the authority of Sir Henry Moore, then captain-general and governor-in-chief in and over the province of New York and territories depending thereon. Here he had an average congregation of about two hun- dred, and adopted, as one means of imparting relig- ious instruction, the practice of preaching at funerals in the more remote districts, when people assembled who never came together at other times.
His settlement at Westchester did not separate him from association with his clerical friends, for ac- cess to those who dwelt in New York and New Jer- sey was as convenient as before, and with greater care than in these days, the clergy, then few in num- ber, visited each other to interchange hopes and fears and confer together in a private way on the best in- terests of the church. After he had been in this mission nearly a year he wrote to the Society to give information of its state, and the following extract from his letter has its bright and its dark sides : —
The congregation at Westchester is very unsteady in their attendance ; sometimes there are more than the church, which is a small, old, wooden building, can contain, at other times very few, generally near two hundred. The communi- cants are few, the most I have had has been twenty-two ; two new ones have been added since I have been here. At Eastchester, which is four miles distant, the congregation is generally larger than in Westchester. The old church in which they meet as yet is very small and cold. They have erected, and just completed the roof of a large, well-built stone church, in which they have expended, they say, seven hundred pounds currency ; but their ability seems to be ex- hausted, and I fear I shall never see it finished. I applied
OF SAMUEL SEABURY. 23
last winter to his excellency Sir Henry Moore, for a brief in their favor, but the petition was rejected. Since I came into this parish I have preached every other Sunday at West- chester in the morning, and have, after prayers in the after- noon, catechised the children and explained the Catechism to them. I was the more inclined to do this, as they have never been used to any evening service at all, and as there seemed to be but little sober sense of religion amongst the lower sort of people, I was in hopes by this means to lay some foundation of religious knowledge in the younger part of the congregation. I cannot yet boast of the number of my catechumens, which is but ten, but most of them repeat the Catechism extremely well. There are also a considera- ble number of young people who attend to hear, and are very attentive. I should be very much obliged to the So- ciety for a number of Lewis's Catechisms, and some small Prayer Books, and such other tracts as they think proper ; these things presented to the children and younger people by their minister, I have found by my own experience, give them impressions in his favor, and dispose them to come to church and to make their responses.
At Westchester I have baptized six white children, and one mulatto adult ; at Eastchester eight white, and at New Rochelle seven white and two negro children. Before I left Jamaica, I baptized there four adults and three infants. I have made two visits there since, and baptized one adult, two white children, and three black ones ; and I must do the peo- ple at Newtown the justice to inform the Society, that since my removal they sent me £20 currency. With regard to the income of this parish, the salary, by an act of assembly, is £50 currency — the exchange from New York to London being generally from £70 to £80 for £100 sterling. Burial fees there are here none; but the more wealthy families sometimes give the minister a linen scarf on these occasions. Marriage fees from one to four Spanish dollars ; but far the greater number go to an Independent teacher in the parish of Rye, because his ceremony is short and they have nothing
24 LIFE AND CORRESPONDENCE
to say. Possibly these fees may amount to .£5 or <£ 6 a year. The parsonage house is so much out of repair that it will cost ,£100 currency to make it comfortable, and the glebe has cost me near £20 to repair the fences ; when it is put in good order, it would, I believe, rent for <£25 per annum. Some of the principal people have been endeavoring to prevail on the congregation to make up the deduction from the Society's salary by subscription, but have not succeeded, owing to the great expense they have been and must be at here in buying and repairing their parsonage house, for which they are yet in debt £100, and to the necessity they will shortly be under of rebuilding their church ; and the Eastchester people are exhausted by the church they have undertaken to build. I must defer writing concerning that part of the parish which is under Mr. Munroe's care till my information is more correct. The professed dissenters in this parish are not numerous; some Calvinistic or Presbyterian French at New Rochelle, a few Presbyterians at Eastchester, and some Quakers ; at Westchester a good many Quakers. But there are many families, especially among the lower classes, who do not even pretend to be of any religion at all.
The missionaries, by the instructions of the Society, were required to encourage the setting up of schools for the teaching of children, and an important advan- tage was gained where these were successfully estab- lished. The Society appointed schoolmasters in some places, and appropriated annually small stipends to- wards their support. A brother of the rector, Na- thaniel Seabury, held such a position in Westchester and retired in 1768, when another gentleman was ap- pointed, who continued his services in that capacity for several years. The rector subsequently reported this school to be in a prosperous condition and the children to be advancing in knowledge.
The impolitic measures of the British government
OF SAMUEL SEABURY. 25
were beginning to agitate the colonies and to fore- shadow the troubles of the Revolution. The Stamp Act had been passed and a Congress had been held in New York, composed of delegates from nine of the thirteen colonies, who considered the grievances of the people and sent petitions to the king and Parlia- ment for its immediate repeal. A year elapsed from the time of its enactment before the odious measure was rescinded, and then the repeal was accompanied by a declaratory act, asserting the right of Parlia- ment to bind the colonies in all cases whatsoever, and, as a consequence, the public irritation was by no means allayed. Liberty was a word upon which many changes were rung, and political questions were discussed with excited feelings and widely opposing views. Americans, for the most part,, claimed the rights of British subjects and denied the power or authority of Parliament to tax the colonies without their consent. This was the real foundation of the whole dispute which resulted in independence.
Seabury did not sympathize with the vehement advocates for liberty. He knew that "unbounded licentiousness in manners and insecurity to private property " must be the unavoidable consequence of extreme measures. So early as March, 1770, he wrote the secretary of the Society : "The violent party heats which prevail in this colony as well as in the others engross at present the attention of the people. But I think that even the disturbances will be attended with some advantage to the interests of the Church. The usefulness and truth of her doctrines, with re- gard to civil government, appear more evident from those disorders which other principles have led the
26 LIFE AND CORRESPONDENCE
people into. This is particularly remarked and pub- licly mentioned by the more candid and reasonable people, who seem heartily tired with the great clam- ors for liberty." And he added in the same letter : " I hope the time is not far off when these matters will be settled upon a firm and permanent founda- tion ; but however that may be, I am confident the behavior of the Church people, considered as a body, has been such as has done her honor, and will be re- membered many years in this country with approba- tion."
An uneasy state of public feeling continued, though appearances indicated that the colonies had been brought into subjection and would not attempt im- mediately any armed resistance to the British govern- ment. Lord North was prime minister at the time, and had popular tumults at home to look after, as well as dissensions on this side of the Atlantic. He believed in the omnipotence of the king and Parlia- ment, and failed to see that coercion, if successful at first, might end in uniting the colonies in a steady and unyielding defense of their civil rights.
The missionary at Westchester in January, 1771, reported the condition of his charge to be much the same as at the date of his last letter. It was difficult to draw the attention of the people to the subject of religion or to persuade them that it was of any real importance. The political animosities and disturb- ances occupied their thoughts, and they seemed to be more anxious about the future of the colonies than about the interests of their souls and the advance- ment of the Church. He endeavored to perform his duty, hoping for better results from his labors, and
OF SAMUEL SEABURY. 27
according to the abstracts of the Society, the number of his baptisms in 1774 was forty-nine and of admis- sions to the holy communion three.
New York was the most quiet and loyal of all the colonies, — at least, it had more friends of the Brit- ish government in the beginning than any which fa- vored the proceedings of the Continental Congress. Her Assembly declined to take into consideration the acts of that body at its first meeting in Philadel- phia, September, 1774, and refused to choose dele- gates to the second Congress, which was to convene in the same city the following May. The policy of the province was conservative ; and Seabury, from the impulses of his nature and the convictions of his conscience, took the side of the crown and resolutely defended its measures, and used his influence in Westchester County to quiet the people and prevent them from joining the Sons of Liberty. He was one of a number of persons who assembled at White Plains in April, 1775, and his name is the third on the list of three hundred and twelve signatures affixed to an emphatic protest which the meeting adopted as follows : " We, the subscribers, freeholders, and inhabitants of the county of Westchester, having assembled at the White Plains in consequence of cer- tain advertisements, do now declare that we met here to declare our honest abhorrence of all unlawful Con- gresses and committees, and that we are determined, at the hazard of our lives and properties, to support the King and Constitution ; and that we acknowledge no representatives but the General Assembly, to whose wisdom and integrity we submit the guardian- ship of our rights, liberties, and privileges."
28 LIFE AND CORRESPONDENCE
The protest and the proceedings of the meeting were published in " Kivington's Gazette/' a newspaper printed in the city of New York, which warmly es- poused the royal cause, and had a great influence on the public mind. Rivington was an Englishman by birth, who had an extensive foreign correspondence and a large acquaintance in Europe and America, and he published, as he claimed, what was conformable to his ideas of true liberty ; but he became obnoxious to the patriots and was denounced, and finally " his press was destroyed by a mob from Connecticut, who carried off a part of his types, converted them into Whig bullets, and compelled him to suspend the pub- lication of his paper."1
Prior to this, the colonial interests had been dis- cussed in two pamphlets printed without the name of the author or publisher, and one of them, entitled " Free Thoughts on the Proceedings of the Conti- nental Congress," was signed " A. W. Farmer,"2 and attributed at the time and since to Isaac Wilkins, then an influential member of the loyal Provincial Assembly of New York, and an intimate friend of the rector of the church in Westchester. He was a fearless leader on the ministerial side in that body, and when it was proposed to appoint delegates to the second Continental Congress, he made a speech against the proposition which was greatly admired by his friends for its eloquence, clearness, and preci- sion. A bitter feeling was excited towards the un- known author of these pamphlets, which were exten- sively and gratuitously circulated among the people
1 Sabine's Loyalists of the American Revolution, vol. ii., p. 216.
2 A Westchester farmer.
OF SAMUEL SEABURY. 29
of New York and other provinces. Vengeance was denounced upon him, and failing to find him, copies of the pamphlets were gathered and burnt, and in some instances they were tarred, feathered, and nailed to the whipping-post, as an indication of the treatment which their author would receive if he were detected. A month had scarcely passed away before an anon- ymous answer to the "Farmer" appeared, written with prudence and skill, and vindicating the measures of the Congress from the calumnies and misrepre- sentations of their enemies. Almost simultaneously with this answer was issued another pamphlet entitled 66 An Examination into the Conduct of the Delegates at their Grand Convention," and addressed to the merchants of New York; and the " Farmer," who wrote it, announced in an Appendix that he should be pleased to defend his former publication and this in the same reply, and he would therefore wait ten days for his antagonist's remarks, which he supposed would be ample time for so accomplished a writer. The date of its publication — Christmas Eve, 1774 — shows that he was ready with his reply at the ap- pointed moment, and it came from the press of Riv- ington, and excited anew the curiosity of the public to discover the authorship of the anonymous pam- phlets. The controversy thickened, and a rejoinder on the side of the colonies was eagerly anticipated, and it soon appeared ; and to the surprise of some and the delight of others, this too was issued from the notorious press of James Rivington. The credit of thus defending the colonies was given in the public estimation to such men as John Jay, of Westchester County, and his father-in-law, William Livingston;
30 LIFE AND CORRESPONDENCE
but neither of these gentlemen held the polemic pen in the dispute with the "Farmer." It was Alexander Hamilton, so celebrated in American history, but at that time a gifted youth, not yet nineteen years old, born, like Isaac Wilkins, in the West Indies, and just completing a course of academical instruction at King's College under the presidency of that ardent loyalist, Dr. Myles Cooper.
But who was the spirited writer that signed him- self " A. W. Farmer " ? Seabury, at an earlier day, had entered into a compact with his clerical friends, Dr. Chandler, of New Jersey, and Dr. Inglis, rector of Trinity Church, New York, to watch and confute all publications in pamphlets or newspapers that threat- ened mischief to the Church of England and the British government in America. Out of this com- pact undoubtedly sprung " Free Thoughts on the Pro- ceedings of the Congress at Philadelphia," which was from his pen, as were the other publications that im- mediately followed on the same side of the question. His object, as stated by himself, was " to point out, in a way accommodated to the comprehension of the farmers and landowners, the destructive influence which the measures of the Congress, if acted upon, would have on them and the laboring part of the community," and he endeavored to persuade the New York Assembly that "if they acceded to them, as other assemblies had done, they would betray the rights and liberties of their Constitution, set up a new sovereign power in the province, and plunge it into all the horrors of rebellion and civil war." l
The struggle for independence had actually begun,
1 Shea's Life and' Epoch of Hamilton, p. 299.
OF SAMUEL SEABURY. 31
and the battle of Lexington, on the 19th of April, 1775, thrilled through the land, and the people in different places were preparing for united resistance to the king's troops. The suspicion which had fallen upon Seabury as the author of the obnoxious publica- tions grew in strength, and his known intimacy with leading loyalists brought him under the surveillance of his enemies, and a body of troops, stationed at Rye, a neighboring town, was sent to arrest him at his residence, together with Isaac Wilkins, then a member of the Provincial Assembly from Westches- ter. They both escaped, having been advised of the attempt upon their personal liberty, and kept them- selves for a time in concealment.1 Wilkins fled from his home and embarked for England, issuing to his countrymen at the moment of his departure, May 3, 1775, an address in which, among other things, he said : " I leave America, and every endearing con- nection, because I will not raise my hand against my sovereign, nor will I draw my sword against my coun- try ; when I can conscientiously draw it in her favor, my life shall be cheerfully devoted to her service." His wife and children were left behind. The follow- ing letter from Seabury, dated the 30th of the same month, is a brief but graphic description of his own condition and of the feeling in the vicinity of New York : —
1 " In the old Wilkins mansion on Castle Hill Neck, Westchester, is still shown the place where Drs. Cooper, Chandler, and Seabury man- aged to secrete themselves for some time, notwithstanding the most minute and persevering search was made for them ; so ingeniously con- trived was the place of their concealment in and about the old-fashioned chimney. Food was conveyed to them through a trap-door in the floor." Bolton's History of the Church in Westchester County, p. 86, ed. 1855.
32 LIFE AND CORRESPONDENCE
MY EVER DEAR WILKINS, — I hope you are safe in Lon- don; may every blessing attend you. Mrs. Wilkins was well last evening. Isabella has had a rash, but is better. Everything here quiet. Reported that two thousand men are ready in Connecticut for any operation for which they may be wanted in this province. The Asia is arrived — re- ported that she has demanded a supply of provisions for Bos- ton and it is agreed that they shall be furnished. The as- sociations went on very heavily at W. C. ; very few signed. The Provincial Congress have agreed to raise money upon the province, as the representatives of the people. Mr. L. Morris has published his remarks upon the Protest, etc., — poor me — you are safe — I think I am too. If I knew any- thing worth writing, I would write it. I think the present scene will not last long. Drs. Cooper and Chandler sailed last week. Tell Dr. Cooper I received his letter, and I will write to him. When I can collect anything worthy your notice you shall have it. God bless you, says your ever affectionate SEABURY.
As often happens in perilous political revolutions, families became divided on the question between Great Britain and her colonies, parents being arrayed against their children, and children against their par- ents. Wilkins married a sister of Lewis Morris, a signer of the Declaration of Independence, and of Gouverneur Morris, a distinguished patriot also, but the mother espoused tbe royal cause, and remained within the British lines during the continuance of hostilities. Her correspondence at this period with her sons excited suspicion and occasioned them some difficulty, notwithstanding their labors and sacrifices in behalf of the colonies.1
1 Loyalists of the American Revolution, vol. ii., p. 433.
OF SAMUEL SEABURY. 33
CHAPTER m.
LETTER TO THE SECRETARY; FIRMNESS OF ALLEGIANCE; ARREST AND IMPRISONMENT ; MEMORIAL TO THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY OF CONNECTICUT; RELEASE AND RETURN TO HIS FAMILY; FRESH TROUBLES AND DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE ; CLOSE OF HIS
CHURCH AND ACCOUNT OF HIS PERSECUTIONS.
A. D. 1775-1776.
THE same day on which Seabury wrote to his friend Wilkins he addressed a letter to the secretary of the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel, and expressed his fears about being able to perform his duties in his parish. "We are here," he said, "in a very alarming situation. Dr. Cooper 1 and Dr. Chand- ler have been obliged to quit this community, and sailed for England last week. I have been obliged to retire a few days from the threatened vengeance of the New England people who lately broke into this province. But I hope I shall be able to keep my
1 The Rev. Dr. Myles Cooper, President of King's College, was threat- ened with personal violence by a mob which went to his residence to seize him; but the collegians had no sympathy with the attempt, and Hamilton, one of them, spoke to the crowd from the steps of the porch and remonstrated against such disgraceful conduct. It has been said that at first Dr. Cooper supposed that he was inciting the turbulent peo- ple, and cried out from an upper window: " Don't listen to him, gentle- men; he is crazy." While Hamilton detained the crowd with his address, the president escaped by the rear of the building to the river, and was rowed to the Asia, — a British vessel of war, riding at anchor in the harbor. Vide Shea's Life and Epoch of Hamilton, p. 354. 3
34 LIFE AND CORRESPONDENCE
station. The charge against the clergy is a very ex- traordinary one, — that they have, in conjunction with the Society and the British ministry, laid a plan for enslaving America. I do not believe that those peo- ple who raised this calumny believe one syllable of it, but they intend it as an engine to turn the popu- lar fury upon the Church, which, should the violent schemes of some of our Eastern neighbors succeed, will probably fall a sacrifice to the persecuting spirit of independency."
The influence of New England, especially of Massa- chusetts, and its defensive measures was extending, and some men, who at first were lukewarm and in- clined only to plans for reconciliation, began to assume a bolder front, and to say that the dispute with Great Britain must end in the separation of the colonies, and the acknowledgment of their independence. The course of Seabury as a citizen and a minister of the Church was dignified and determined. If others wa- vered or changed, he was firm, and, like his clerical brethren, felt it to be his duty to pray for the king and his government, in obedience to the oath which he had taken at his ordination.
It is true, his language in his political pamphlets was more in the style of a violent partisan than of a discreet and godly clergyman ; but he was writing in the disguise of a farmer, and addressed himself to the plain yeomanry of the land in a way which would be sure to arrest their attention and work upon their honest convictions. Speaking in his first pamphlet of the recommendation to appoint committees in the sev- eral colonies to inspect the conduct of the inhabitants and see whether they violated the agreement of the
OF SAMUEL SEABURY. 35
"grand Continental Congress/' he said: "Will you be instrumental in bringing the most abject slavery on yourselves? Will you choose such committees? Will you submit to them, should they be chosen by the weak, foolish, turbulent part of the country people ? Do as you please ; but by Him that made me, I will not ! No, if I must be enslaved, let it be to a king at least, and not by a parcel of upstart, lawless commit- tee-men. If I must be devoured, let it be by the jaws of a lion, and not gnawed to death by rats and
vermin." 1
This was the strong language which the disturb- ances of the times evoked, and the bitterness of the controversy between the crown and the people seemed to justify its use. The worst treatment fell upon the clergy of the Church of England, and though no greater opponents to the war for independence than many of their sectarian brethren, they were marked for closer restraint and subjected to sharper trials and persecutions. The fears which Seabury had expressed in his letter to the secretary were soon realized. He had been serving, as best he could, his two dimin- ished congregations, and working in another way to obtain a partial support for his family, when an armed force from Connecticut invaded the territory of New York, seized him at his school-room, and carried him to New Haven. The particulars of his arrest and the recital of his wrongs and of the cruelties inflicted upon him are so well stated in his petition to the General Assembly, asking for relief, that no apol- ogy is necessary for printing it here in full. It is headed, —
1 Free Thoughts, etc., p. 18.
36 LIFE AND CORRESPONDENCE
To the General Assembly of the Governor and Company of the Colony of Connecticut, now sitting in New Haven, in said Colony, by special Order of his Honor, the Governor.
The memorial of Samuel Seabury, Clerk, A. M., Rector of the Parish of West Chester, in the County of West Chester and Province of New York, humbly showeth : —
That on Wednesday, the 22d day of November last, your memorialist was seized at a house in West Chester where he taught a grammar school, by a company of armed men, to the number, as he supposes, of about forty ; that after being carried to his own house and being allowed time to send for his horse, he was forced away on the road to Kingsbridge, but soon meeting another company of armed men, they joined and proceeded to East Chester.
That a person styled Captain Lothrop ordered your memo- rialist to be seized. That after the two companies joined, the command appeared to your memorialist to be in Captain Isaac Sears, and the whole number of men to be about one hundred. That from East Chester your memorialist, in com- pany with Jonathan Fowler, Esq., of East Chester, and Nathl. Underbill, Esq., of West Chester, was sent under a guard of about twenty armed men to Horseneck, and on the Mon- day following was brought to this town and carried in tri- umph through a great part of it, accompanied by a large number of men on horseback and in carriages, chiefly armed. That the whole company arranged themselves before the house of Captain Sears. That after firing two cannon and huzzaing, your memorialist was sent under a guard of four or five men to the house of Mrs. Lyman, where he has ever since been kept under guard. That during this time your memorialist hath been prevented from enjoying a free inter- course with his friends ; forbidden to visit some of them, though in company with his guard ; prohibited from reading prayers in the church, and in performing any part of divine service, though invited by the Rev. Mr. Hubbard so to do ; interdicted the use of pen, ink, and paper, except for the pur-
OF SAMUEL SEABURY. 37
pose of writing to his family, and then it was required that his letters should be examined and licensed before they were sent off ; though on Friday last, Captain Sears condescended that your memorialist should be indulged in writing a memo- rial to this Hon. Assembly. That your memorialist hath re- ceived but one letter from his family since he has been under confinement, and that was delivered to him open, though brought by the post.
Your memorialist begs leave further to represent, that he hath heard a verbal account that one of his daughters was abused and insulted by some of the people when at his house on the 22d of November. That a bayonet was thrust through her cap, and her cap thereby tore from [her] head. That the handkerchief about her neck was pierced by a bayonet, both before and behind. That a quilt in the frame on which the daughters of your memorialist were at work was so cut and pierced with bayonets as to be rendered useless. That while your memorialist was waiting for his horse, on the said 22d day of November, the people obliged the wife of your memo- rialist to open his desk, where they examined his papers, part of the time in presence of your memorialist. That he had in a drawer in the desk three or four dollars and a few pieces of small silver. That he hath heard that only an English shilling and three or four coppers were found in the drawers after he was brought away. That your memorialist thinks this not improbable, as Jonathan Fowler, Esq., informed him that a new beaver hat, a silver mounted horsewhip, and two silver spoons were carried off from his house on said day. Mr. Meloy, also, of this town, informed your memorialist, that he, the said Meloy, had been accused by some people of pointing a bayonet at the breast of a daughter of your memo- rialist, desiring your memorialist to exculpate him from the charge, to which request your memorialist replied that he was not at his house but at his school-house, when the affair was said to have happened ; but that a daughter of your memori- alist met him as he was brought from the school-house, and told him that one of the men had pushed a bayonet against
38 LIFE AND CORRESPONDENCE
her breast and otherwise insulted her ; and your memorialist remembers that when he left his house in the morning his daughter had a cap on, but when she met him near the school-house, she had none on, and her hair was hanging over her shoulders.
Your memorialist, also, begs leave further to represent that after he had been eight or ten days at New Haven, he was carried by Mr. Jonathan Mix, to whose care he was com- mitted, to the house of Mr. Beers, innkeeper, in said town, where were Captain Sears, Captain Lothrop, Mr. Brown, and some others, whose names he did not know, or does not recollect. That several questions were asked him, to some of which he gave the most explicit answers, but perceiving some insidious design against him by some of the questions, he refused to answer any more. That Captain Sears then observed to him, if he understood him right, that they did not intend to release him, nor to make such a compromise with him as had been made with Judge Fowler and Mr. Underbill, but to keep him a prisoner till the unhappy dis- putes between Great Britain and America were settled. That whatever your memorialist might think, what they had done they would take upon themselves and support. That your memorialist then asked an explicit declaration of the charges against him, and was told that the charges against him were : —
That he, your memorialist, had entered into a combination with six or seven others to seize Captain Sears as he was passing through the county of West Chester, and convey him on board a man-of-war.
That your memorialist had signed a protest at the White Plains, in the county of West Chester, against the proceed- ings of the Continental Congress.
That your memorialist had neglected to open his church on the day of the Continental Fast.
And that he had written pamphlets and newspapers against the liberties of America.
To the first and last of these charges your memorialist
OF SAMUEL SEABURY. 39
pleads not guilty, and will be ready to vindicate his inno- cence, as soon as he shall be restored to his liberty in that province to which only he conceives himself to be amenable. He considers it a high infringement of the liberty for which the virtuous sons of America are now nobly struggling, to be carried by force out of one colony into another, for the sake either of trial or imprisonment. Must he be judged by the laws of Connecticut, to which as an inhabitant of New York he owed no obedience ? or by the laws of that colony in which he has been near twenty years a resident ? or, if the regulations of Congress be attended to, must he be dragged from the committee of his own county, and from the Congress of his own province, cut off from the inter- course of his friends, deprived of the benefit of those evi- dences which may be necessary for the vindication of his in- nocence, and judged by strangers to him, to his character, and to the circumstances of his general conduct in life ?
One great grievance justly complained of by the people of America, and which they are now struggling against, is the Act of Parliament directing persons to be carried from America to England for ,a trial. And your memorialist is confident that the supreme legislative authority in this col- ony will not permit him to be treated in a manner so de- structive to that liberty for which they are now contending. If your memorialist is to be dealt with according to law, he conceives that the laws of Connecticut, as well as of New York, forbid the imprisonment of his person any otherwise than according to law. If he is to be judged according to the regulations of the Congress, they have ordained the Provincial Congress of New York, or the committee of the county of West Chester, to be his judges. Neither the laws of either colony nor the regulations of the Congress give any countenance to the mode of treatment which he has met with. But considered in either light, he conceives it must appear unjust, cruel, arbitrary, and tyrannical.
With regard to the second charge, viz. : That your memo- rialist signed a protest against the proceedings of the Con-
40 LIFE AND CORRESPONDENCE
gress, he begs leave to state the fact as it really is. The General Assembly of the province of New York, in their sessions last winter, determined to send a petition to the king, a memorial, to the House of Lords, and a remon- strance to the House of Commons, upon the subject of American grievances; and the members of the house, at least many of them, as your memorialist was informed, rec- ommended it to their constituents to be quiet till the issue of those applications should be known. Sometime in the beginning of April, as your memorialist thinks, the people were invited to meet at the White Plains to choose dele- gates for a Provincial Congress. Many people there assem- bled were averse from the measure. They, however, gave no other opposition to the choice of delegates than signing a protest. This protest your memorialist signed in company with two members of the assembly, and above three hun- dred other people. Your memorialist had not a thought of acting against the liberties of America. He did not con- ceive it to be a crime to support the measures of the repre- sentatives of the people, measures which he then hoped, and expected, would have had a good effect by inducing a change of conduct in regard to America. More than eight months have now passed since your memorialist signed the protest. If his crime was of so atrocious a kind, why was he suffered to remain so long unpunished ? or why should he be now singled out from more than three hundred, to endure the un- exampled punishment of captivity and unlimited confine- ment ?
The other crime alleged against your memorialist is, that he neglected to open his church on the day of the Conti- nental Fast. To this he begs leave to answer : That he had no notice of the day appointed but from common report. That he received no order relative to said day either from any Congress or committee. That he cannot think himself guilty of neglecting or disobeying an order of Congress, which order was never signified to him in any way. That a complaint was exhibited against your memorialist to the
OF SAMUEL SEABURY. 41
Provincial Congress of New York, by Captain Sears, soon after the neglect with which he is charged, and that after the matter was fully debated, the complaint was dismissed. That he conceives it to be cruel, abitrary, and in the high- est degree unjust, after his supposed offense has been ex- amined before the proper tribunal, to be dragged like a felon seventy miles from home, and again impeached of the same crime. At this rate of proceeding, should he be ac- quitted at New Haven, he may be forced seventy miles far- ther, and so on without end.
Further your memorialist begs leave to represent : That he has a wife and six children, to whom he owes, both from duty and affection, protection, support, and instruction. That his family in a great measure depend, under the provi- dence of God, upon his daily care for their daily bread. That there are several families at West Chester who depend on his advice as a physician, to which profession he was bred. That as a clergyman he has the care of the towns of East and West Chester. That there is not now a clergyman of any denomination nearer than nine miles from the place of his residence, and but one within that distance without crossing the Sound ; so that in his absence there is- none to officiate to the people in any religious service, to visit the sick, or bury the dead.
Your memorialist also begs leave to observe : That in or- der to discharge some debts which the necessity of his affairs formerly obliged him to contract, he, about a year ago, opened a grammar school, and succeeded so far as to make it worth one hundred pounds, York money, for the year past. That he was in a fair way of satisfying his creditors and freeing himself from a heavy incumbrance. That he had five young gentlemen from the Island of Jamaica, one from Mont- real, four children of gentlemen now in England, committed to his care, among others from New York and the country. That he apprehends his school to be broken up, and his Scholars dispersed, probably some of them placed at other schools, and that it may be difficult, if not impracticable,
42 LIFE AND CORRESPONDENCE
again to recover them. That if there should be no other im- pediment, yet if the people of West Chester are to be liable to such treatment as your memorialist hath lately endured, no person will be willing to trust his children there. That in this case, your memorialist must lie entirely at the mercy of his creditors to secure him from a jail, or must part with everything he has to satisfy their just demands.
Your memorialist, thinking it his duty to use all lawful and honorable means to free himself from his present con- finement, mentioned his case to the judges of the superior court, lately sitting in this town. Those honorable gentle- men thought it a case not proper for them to interfere in ; he has, therefore, no remedy, but in the interposition of the Honorable House of Assembly.
To them he looks for relief from the heavy hand of op- pression and tyranny. He hopes and expects that they will dismiss him from his confinement, and grant him their pro- tection, while he passes peaceably through the colony. He is indeed accused of breaking the rules of the Continental Congress. He thinks he can give a good account of his con- duct, such as would satisfy reasonable and candid men. He is certain that nothing can be laid to his charge so repugnant to the regulations of the Congress, as the conduct of those people who in an arbitrary and hostile manner forced him from his house, and have kept him now four weeks a prisoner without any means or prospect of relief. He has a higher opinion of the candor, justice, and equity of the Honorable House of Assembly, and shall they incline to inquire more minutely into the affair, he would be glad to appear at the bar of their house, and answer for himself ; or to be per- mitted to have counsel to answer for him ; or, in such way as they in their wisdom shall think best, to grant him relief. And your memorialist, as in duty bound, shall ever pray.
SAMUEL SEABURY.
DATED IN NEW HAVEN THE 20TH DAY OF DECEMBER, 1775.
•
A letter from the President of the Provincial Con-
OF SAMUEL SEABURY. 43
gress of New York to the Governor of Connecticut, demanding his " immediate discharge/' and dated the 12th of December, was read before the Lower House of the Assembly, and six of its members, with Dr. Wm. Samuel Johnson, of the Upper House, were appointed to take it into consideration and' report how it should be answered. The memorial of Mr. Seabury was subsequently referred to the same com- mittee, and, after due deliberation, they recommended as expedient and proper that all parties concerned in the matter of it " be heard by themselves or counsel before both Houses of Assembly," and the question being put in the Lower House on accepting the re- port, it was decided in the negative.
The memorialist, however, was speedily released from his confinement, and he returned to his family after Christmas, arriving in Westchester on the 2d of January. His absence had occasioned much anx- iety and perplexity, and his private affairs were in a distracted condition. He seems to have had lit- tle hope that he could retain his place without fur- ther molestation ; but he determined to perform his ministerial duties at any sacrifice until he was driven away. His papers were in a confused state, so that he could make no formal report to the Society, but he wrote to the secretary eleven days after his re- turn to Westchester, and briefly mentioned, as it was his duty to do, the hardships which had befallen him and the personal inconveniencies to which he had been subjected.
" Since my last letter," said he, " I have been seized by a company of disaffected people in arms from Connecticut, in number about one hundred, and
44 LIFE AND CORRESPONDENCE
carried to New Haven. This happened on the 22d of November, and I was kept under a military guard till the 23d of December. The particulars of this affair I will send you when I find a safe opportunity. On the 2d of this month I returned to my family. How long I shall be able to continue here is very uncertain ; but I am determined to stay as long as I am permitted to discharge the duties of my mission, whatever personal inconvenience it may subject me to. My private affairs have suffered much on this occasion. I was compelled to bear my expenses, and that has not been less than <£10 sterling. My papers were all examined, and are thrown into such confusion that I can find none of my memoranda relating to my mission or correspondence with the Society."
The critical state of the times made him exceed- ingly cautious, and he did not write again to the So- ciety until the close of the year. The quiet of a few weeks after his return to his mission was succeeded by fresh insults, and a perpetual watch was kept on his movements to find new causes for treating him with severity. His ecclesiastical character, though venerated by many on the side of the colonies, did not save him from persecution, and he was filled with gloomy forebodings for himself and his brethren. " God's providence," said he, " will, I hope, protect his Church and clergy in this country, the disorder and confusion of which are beyond description. But it is his property to bring order out of confusion, good out of evil; and may his will be done."
The Declaration of Independence on the 4th of July, 1776, left no longer any room for the Provin- cial Assembly of New York to hesitate about with-
OF SAMUEL SEABURY. 45
drawing from the support of the crown, and falling in with the measures of the General Congress. The popular voice was setting in the strong current of united resistance to the invasion of the British troops, and steps were taken to maintain, at any cost, the war which had been for some time in progress. An edict was proclaimed by the Provincial Assembly for- bidding persons to contribute in any way to the sup- port or comfort of the king and his forces under penalty of death. This added to the terror of the times, and compelled Seabury to discontinue his pub- lic services, — at least it was construed as prohibiting him from the use of the full Liturgy of the Church of England. His conscience would not allow him to mu- tilate it; and he therefore absented himself from the sanctuary, and directed the sexton to notify the peo- ple who might come to worship of his determination not to officiate until he was at liberty to pray for the king. His own account of his trials and sufferings at this period, contained in the letter already referred to, dated December 29, 1776, is so complete, that at the risk of repeating some things, it is introduced to close this chapter.
Since my last letter I have undergone more uneasiness than I can describe ; more, I believe, than I could well sup- port again.
When the present unnatural rebellion was first beginning, I foresaw evidently what was coming on the country, and I exerted myself to stem the torrent of popular clamor, to recall people to the use of their reason, and to retain them in their loyalty and allegiance. Several pamphlets ap- peared in favor of government, among others, some written under the character of a Farmer, which gave great offense to the Sons of Liberty, as the rebels then styled themselves.
46 LIFE AND CORRESPONDENCE
These were attributed to me, and were the principal reason of my being carried into Connecticut the last year. If I would have disavowed these publications I should have been set at liberty in a few days ; but as I refused to declare whether I were, or were not, the author, they kept me till they sent to New York and New London, and wherever they could hear of a journeyman printer who had wrought for Mr. Rivington at the time when those pamphlets were published, and had them examined ; but, finding no suffi- cient proof, upon my putting in a memorial to the General Assembly at Connecticut, the gang who took me prisoner thought proper to withdraw their guard and let me return. I continued tolerably quiet at home for a few weeks, till after the king's troops evacuated Boston, when, the rebel army passing from thence to New York, bodies of them, con- sisting of twenty or thirty men, would, every day or two, sometimes two or three times a day, come through West Chester, though five miles out of their way, and never failed to stop at my house, I believe only for the malicious pleas- ure of insulting me by reviling the king, the Parliament, Lord North, the Church, the bishops, the clergy, and the Society, and, above all, that vilest of all miscreants, A. W. Farmer. One would give one hundred dollars to know who he was, that he might plunge his bayonet into his heart; another would crawl fifty miles to see him roasted ; but, happily for the farmer, it was not in the power of any per- son in America to expose him. This continued about a month. Matters then became pretty quiet, till they got intelligence that General Howe was coming to New York. Independency was then declared by the grand Congress at Philadelphia; and the petty Congress at New York pub- lished an edict, making it death to aid, abet, support, assist, or comfort the king, or any of his forces, servants, or friends. Till this time I had kept the church open. About fifty armed men were now sent into my neighborhood.
I was now in a critical situation. If I prayed for the king the least I could expect was to be sent into New Eng-
OF SAMUEL SEABUKY. 47
land ; probably something worse, as no clergyman on the continent was so obnoxious to them. If I went to church and omitted praying for the king, it would not only be a breach of my duty, but in some degree countenancing their rebellion, and supporting that independency which they had declared. As the least culpable course, I determined not to go to church, and ordered the sexton, on Sunday morning, to tell any person who should inquire, that till I could pray for the king, and do my duty according to the rubric and canons, there would be neither prayers nor sermon. About half a dozen of my parishioners and a dozen rebel soldiers came to the church. The rest of the people, in a general way, declared that they would not go to church till their minister was at liberty to pray for the king.
Soon after this, the British fleet and army arrived at Staten Island. The rebels then became very alert in ap- prehending the friends of government. Many had retired to West Chester from New York. These were first sought after; some escaped; many were seized. My situation be- came daily more critical, as they began to take up the inhab- itants of the country. At length two ships of war came into the Sound and took their station within sight of my house. Immediately the whole coast was guarded that no one might go to them. Within a few days the troops landed on Long Island, and the rebels were defeated. A body of them then took post at the heights near Kingsbridge, in my parish, and began to throw up works. Another body fixed themselves within two miles of my house.
For some time before I had kept a good deal out of sight, lodging abroad, and never being at home for more than an hour or two at a time, and having a number of people whom I could depend upon engaged, who punctually informed me of every circumstance that was necessary for me to know.
48 LIFE AND CORRESPONDENCE
CHAPTER IV.
ESCAPE TO LONG ISLAND, AND DESECRATION OF HIS CHURCH ; LETTER TO THE SOCIETY, AND DEATH OF MISSIONARIES; RESI- DENCE IN NEW YORK CITY, AND MISSIONARY AT STATEN ISLAND J APPOINTED CHAPLAIN, AND BURNING OF TRINITY CHURCH ; SUF- FERINGS AND LOSSES OF THE CLERGY.
A. D. 1776-1780.
AFTER the British troops had effected a landing on Long Island and defeated the American forces, Seabury contrived to escape from Westchester, and sought protection within the lines of the king's army. He could not have prevented the lawlessness and ravages had he remained ; but it was a sad day for his church and family when he withdrew. A com- pany of cavalry, having been quartered at his resi- dence, consumed all the produce of his glebe, and the colonial troops, after burning the pews in his church and injuring it in other ways, converted it into a hospital. The school, which had been moderately prosperous under his charge, was completely broken up, and he and his family were deprived of all visible means of support. Great as his privations and dis- tresses were, he did not abate an atom of his loyalty to the home government ; but continued to uphold its designs and to hope for deliverance and the return of peace and better days.
When the royal army passed over from Long Isl-
OF SAMUEL SEABURY. 49
and into Westchester County, his familiarity with the roads and rivers of the region enabled him to furnish maps and plans which were of essential service to the commanding general. He knew the sentiments of the bulk of his people, and believed that he was right in doing everything to encourage their loyalty and to deter them from embarking in a revolution that was surrounded by so many terrors.
" I must observe/' wrote he at this time, " that but few of my congregation are engaged in the re- bellion. The New England rebels used frequently to observe, as an argument against me, that the nearer they came to West Chester the fewer friends they found to American liberty, — that is, to rebellion ; and, in justice to the rebels of East and West Ches- ter, 1 must say, that none of them ever offered me any insult or attempted to do me any injury that I know of. It must give the Society great sat- isfaction to know that all their missionaries have conducted themselves with great propriety, and, on many occasions, with a firmness and steadiness that have done them honor. This may, indeed, be said of all the clergy on this side the Delaware, and, I am persuaded, of many on the other. But the conduct of the Philadelphia clergy has been the very reverse. They not only rushed headlong into the rebellion themselves, but perverted the judgment and soured the tempers and inflamed the passions of the people by sermons and orations, both from the pulpit and the press. Their behavior hath been of great disad- vantage to the loyal clergy."
It was impossible for Seabury to resume his clerical duties or be safe in Westchester unless under military
50 LIFE AND CORRESPONDENCE
protection ; and, accordingly, when the king's troops departed from the neighborhood, he gathered what little he could carry and retired with his family to New York. His retirement was not a day too soon, for scarcely had he reached the city when niany persons in his parish and its vicinity were seized and carried away, and the whole region for thirty miles around was pillaged and laid waste by the marches and depredations, sometimes of one army and some- times of the other.
His next letter to the secretary of the Society was dated at New York, March 29, 1777, and opened with an apology for not giving in the previous one infor- mation of the death of the neighboring missionary at Eye, the Kev. Mr. Avery. He detailed the sad cir- cumstances as he had received them, and placed the cause of his death, whether justly or not is uncertain, among the barbarities of civil war.
When the king's army was about to leave the county of West Chester, the latter end of October last, our brigade, un- der the command of General Agnew, pushed forward about two miles beyond Rye, in hopes of bringing a large detach- ment of the rebel army, which lay there, to an engagement ; but not being able to come up with them, they returned on a Sunday afternoon to join the royal army near the White Plains. That evening the rebels returned to Rye, and as Mr. Avery and many of the loyalists had shown particular marks of joy when the king's troops came there, they be- came very obnoxious to the rebels, who showed their resent- ment by plundering their houses, driving off their cattle, taking away their grain, and imprisoning some of them. Among the rest, Mr. Avery was a sufferer, and lost his cat- tle, horses, etc. On Tuesday morning he desired a maid- servant to give the children their breakfast, and went out.
OF SAMUEL SEABURY. 51
Some time after, he was found, some say, under a fence or in an out-house, with his throat cut, either dead or just ex- piring. Many people are very confident that he was mur- dered by the rebels ; others suppose that his late repeated losses and disappointments, the insults and threats of the rebels, and the absence of his best friends, drove him into a state of desperation, too severe for his strength of mind. He had, last spring, a stroke of the palsy, which deprived him of the use of one hand, and affected his reason a good deal. He also, about the same time, lost his wife, — a pru- dent and cheerful woman, which affected him so much, that when I attended at her funeral I did not think it right to leave him suddenly, but tarried with him several days till he was more composed. I visited him again a fortnight after and found him much better, and would have repeated my visits ; but the times became too critical to admit of it. He has left five or six helpless orphans, I fear, in great dis- tress ; indeed, I know not what is to become of them. I have only heard that the rebels had humanity enough to permit them to be carried to Mr. Avery's friends at Norwalk, in Connecticut.
In the same letter he reported the death of another missionary, the Rev. Luke Babcock, who for six years had been stationed at the manor of Philipsburg (now Yonkers), and, like himself, was a sincere and active loyalist. From his allegiance to the king sprung the calamities which hurried him to the grave. " The latter end of October," wrote Seabury, "he was seized by the rebels at his house and carried off to the Provincial Congress at Fishkill. His papers and sermons were also seized and examined, but as noth- ing appeared on which they could ground any pre- tense for detaining him, he was asked whether he supposed himself bound by his oath of allegiance to the king : upon his answering in the affirmative, he
52 LIFE AND CORRESPONDENCE
was deemed an enemy to the liberties of America, and ordered to be kept in custody. About the mid- dle of February he was taken sick, and as his confine- ment had produced no change in his sentiments, he was dismissed with a written order to remove within ten days within the lines of the king's army, being adjudged a person too dangerous to be permitted to continue where his influence might be exerted in favor of legal government. He got home with diffi- culty in a raging fever, and delirious. In this state he continued about a week (the greatest part of the time delirious), and then died, extremely regretted. Indeed, I knew not a more excellent man, and I fear his loss, particularly in that mission, will scarcely be made up."
As for himself and his people, it has already been seen that the bitter fruits of civil war were reaped by them in abundance. His description of the treatment of women and children is too painful to be repeated. This treatment must be ascribed to that spirit of law- lessness which unhappily in times of great excitement and disorder is somewhat beyond the control of mag- istrates and military commanders. New York was their place of refuge, where they found protection, if not support. " Many families of my parishioners," said he, " are now in this town, who used to live decently, suffering for common necessaries. I daily meet them, and it is melancholy to observe the dejec- tion strongly marked on their faces, which seem to implore that assistance which I am unable to give. To pity and pray for them is all I can do. I shall say nothing more of my own situation at present, than that I have hitherto supported myself and
OF SAMUEL SEABURY. 53
family with decency, and will not distrust the good- ness of God which has hitherto preserved me, nor render myself unworthy of it by repining and discon- tent."
On the 12th of November, 1777, he wrote again to the secretary and mentioned that about a month before, he had visited Westchester, and thought of spending the winter there, but was compelled to re- linquish his purpose and return to New York. He requested that he might be allowed to remove to Staten Island, if he found it safer than Westchester, and the Society, " sensible of his great worth," read- ily consented to his request and promised a contin- uance of his salary of £50 per annum until the existing disturbances should cease. In December of the same year he officiated on Staten Island, admin- istered the sacrament of baptism, and preached to a devout congregation of nearly three hundred people ; but his removal thither was felt to be unsafe, and he continued to reside in New York, and applied him- self, for the support of his family, to the practice of medicine, as he had done to a limited extent in West- Chester.'
His eye, however, was still on his work as a minis- ter of the gospel, and he watched every opportunity to resume his duties and serve the Church. It was some compensation for being deprived of access to his parish that Dr. Seabury,1 on the 14th of Feb- ruary, 1778, was appointed, by Sir Henry Clinton, chaplain to the king's American regiment, raised and commanded by Col. Edmund Fanning, and while act-
1 The degree of Doctor of Divinity was conferred upon him by the University of Oxford, December 15, 1777.
54 LIFE AND CORRESPONDENCE
ing in that capacity, he preached a sermon in camp from the text, "Fear God, honor the king," which was printed by request of Gov. William Tryon. His belief in the success of the British arms was strong, but he admitted the f ormidableness of the opposition, as appears from the following letter to the secretary, dated
NEW YORK, November 22, 1778.
REVEREND SIR, — I am obliged still to continue at New York, it being impracticable for me to return to West Ches- ter or reside with safety on Staten Island ; and though I am strong in hope that the commotions in this country will soon subside, yet I confess the present appearances seem to indi- cate a fixed resolution in the Congress to support their inde- pendency, as long as they possibly can. I am, however, con- fident it could not be supported against the vigorous efforts of Great Britain for one campaign, as the resources of this country must be nearly exhausted.
The unhappy war went on four years longer, and although the chances for American independence often trembled in the balance, there were no signs of a disposition to lay down arms and submit to the demands of the British ministry. Shut up in New York, Dr. Seabury knew but little of what was trans- piring outside, and having no intelligence to commu- nicate concerning any missionary labors, he wrote no letters to the Society, and he could send none to his brethren over the lines. It was only by reports, not always to be relied upon, that any information could be obtained of the condition of the clergy and Church of England in the other colonies. Dr. Inglis sent home a detailed account of the calamities which befell both as far as he had been able to learn them, and described the great conflagration that destroyed
OF SAMUEL SEABURY. 55
one fourth part of the city of New York, about a thousand houses, including Trinity Church, its rectory and charity school, large and expensive buildings, together with two hundred dwellings that stood on church ground. The origin of the conflagration was attributed to evil-minded patriots who, upon the oc- cupancy of the city by the king's forces, secreted themselves in the houses ; and on Saturday, the 21st of September, 1776, a little after midnight, when the weather was dry and the wind blowing fresh, they kindled fires in several places at the same time, and but for the providence of God, and the vigorous ef- forts of the officers and men belonging to the army and navy, the whole city would have been destroyed. Trinity Church was not rebuilt until 1788 ; but the corporation had two chapels, St. Paul's and St. George's, which had escaped destruction, and these were opened again for regular services, which had been suspended for nearly three months, while Gen- eral Washington was holding the city. The death of Dr. Auchmuty, the rector, which was thought to have been hastened by the persecutions and hardships he underwent from the patriots, occurred about this time,1 and Dr. Inglis, the senior assistant, was elected his successor March 20, 1777. He was duly admitted and instituted into his office according to the forms and custom of those days, and as there was no edifice for him to enter, he was conducted to Trinity Church and the ceremony made valid " by placing his hand on the wall of the said church, the same being then
a ruin."2
1 March 4, 1777.
2 Berrien's History of Trinity Church, p. 152.
56 LIFE AND CORRESPONDENCE
The friendship between Dr. Inglis and Dr. Seabury was cemented by a participation in common trials, and their political transgressions were so much alike that they were equally hated and persecuted. Both had used their pens vigorously in defense of the measures and authority of the British government, and in opposition to publications which they regarded as virulent, artful, and pernicious. Dr. Inglis wrote an answer to the famous pamphlet of Thomas Paine, entitled " Common Sense," which advocated an inde- pendent republic, and was perhaps more widely cir- culated than any political publication in America up to that time. The first edition of the answer was seized and committed to the flames, but a copy was sent to Philadelphia and another edition issued, which put the author in so great peril that he attributed his deliverance and safety to the hand of an overruling Providence.
It has been seen how Dr. Seabury wrote against the schemes of the Continental Congress and brought on himself the hostility and persecution of the promoters of American independence. His loyalty was founded on the deepest convictions of duty, and he adhered to it at the expense of his peace and comfort. What he did to eke out his living by the practice of med- icine in New York while the city was in possession of the king's troops was a matter of necessity, and enabled him to support his family with that degree of decency of which he had spoken in one of his letters to the venerable Society. But nowhere in America during those troublous times was there any luxury to be enjoyed by the clergy and members of the Church of England. The clergy especially were
OF SAMUEL SEABURY. 57
thrown into great embarrassment and distress, and the sympathy of their brethren at home was so much excited that a subscription was set on foot and money contributed and sent over to be distributed among a certain number for the relief of their immediate necessities.
" At the breaking out of the war," says Hawkins, " the Society was contributing towards the mainte- nance of nearly eighty missionaries, at an average little exceeding £40 a year for each. But in pro- portion as the violence of party feeling increased, the clergy, against whom it was more especially directed, and who, with hardly an exception, remained un- shaken in their allegiance to the king, were either driven from their parishes by actual force, or induced for the safety of their families to retire."
New York was the stronghold to which those who had no other refuge fled for security, and in that ex- pensive city many of them tarried, hoping that the gloomy clouds of war would soon disappear and al- low them to return to their families and their flocks, and resume the duties of their sacred calling. Their hearts sickened at the prospect as months and years passed on without bringing the deliverance hoped for, or any mitigation of their sufferings and sorrows. The Eev. Thomas Barton, a missionary of the Soci- ety in Delaware, was forced to surrender his loyalty or find protection within the British lines ; and in a letter to the secretary dated New York, January 8, 1779, he said : " The clergy of America, the mission- aries in particular, have suffered beyond example, and indeed beyond the records of any history in this day
1 Missions of the Church of England, p. 343.
58 LIFE AND CORRESPONDENCE
of trial. Most of them have lost their all, many of them are now in a state of melancholy pilgrimage and poverty ; and some of them have lately (from grief and despondency, it is said) paid the last debt
of nature We may exclaim, Quis furor, O
cives ! What have we done to deserve this treat- ment from our former friends and fellow-citizens? We have not intermeddled with any matters incon- sistent with our callings and functions. We have studied to be quiet and to give no offense to the present rulers. We have obeyed the laws and gov- ernment now in being, as far as our consciences and prior obligations would permit. We know no crime that can be alleged against us, except an honest avowal of our principles can be deemed such, and for these have we suffered a persecution as cruel as the bed of Procrustes." l
It was in midsummer, 1779, that a fleet of vessels of war under Sir George Collier, and transports with troops under General Tryon, left New York, and, arriving off New Haven, soon took possession of the town, and scenes of bloodshed, plunder, and destruc- tion followed. The same expedition, two days later, July 7th, sailed away from New Haven, and the next morning the troops disembarked at Fairfield, plun- dered the houses of the inhabitants and then burnt them, together with the two churches and all the principal buildings of the place. The Rev. John Say re, who had been the missionary of the Society at Fair- field for five years, endeavored to use his influence with General Tryon and prevent an indiscriminate conflagration ; but his efforts wer.e unsuccessful, and
1 Historical Collections, Delaware, pp. 131, 132.
OF SAMUEL SEABURY. 59
with his church and dwelling in ashes, his library, furniture, and other valuables entirely destroyed, and no food and no means of support for his wife and eight children, he was obliged to avail himself of the military protection offered, and retire with them to New York, where he obtained subsistence in part by the practice of medicine.
The end of this cruel expedition had not yet been accomplished ; for, after crossing the Sound to Hunt- ington Bay, and remaining over Sunday, it returned to Norwalk on the llth of July, and again applied the torch of the invader, burning a larger number of houses, barns, and shops than at Fairfield, together with the meeting-house and the Episcopal church. The Kev. Jeremiah Learning, the worthy missionary at this place, was the victim of sufferings from both friends and foes. Everything he possessed, except the clothes on his back, was lost. " My loss on that fatal day," said he in a letter to the Society, dated New York, the 29th of the same month, "was not less than £1,200 or £1,300 sterling. Although in great danger, my life has been preserved, and I hope I shall never forget the kind providence of God in that trying hour. In this situation I was brought by His Majesty's troops to this city, at which I shall, with the greatest pleasure, obey the Society's com- mands."
These clergymen, thus driven to a place of com- mon refuge, must have often conferred together and interchanged thoughts about the probable issue of the struggle for independence. Every day it was prolonged made them more uneasy; but Seabury, with the practice of medicine and his duties as chap-
60 LIFE AND CORRESPONDENCE
lain, had better opportunities than his brethren of rising above the depths of despondency. He had little or nothing to communicate to the Society, of general interest, and his correspondence, like that of other missionaries at this time, was confined to a simple report of himself and of the unchanged condi- tion of public affairs.
" Think not, good sir," said he in one of his letters to the secretary, " that I repent of my loyalty to my king, or of my attachment to the Church of England or to the British government. Under the same cir- cumstances I would again act as I have done, even were I sure the consequences would be worse." Not- withstanding the general treatment of the clergy had been unkind and often severe without provocation, they were distressed at the public calamities, and could not but pity the sorrowful condition of their countrymen who took the other side in the contest, and were patiently waiting for peace and independ- ence. It was a terrible time for all. " The judg- ments of God," said Isaac Brown, one of the refugee clergymen, " fall very heavy on the inhabitants of this land in general, and seem to be yet increasing daily. Even the brute creation groans and travails in pain ; for all manner of cruelties are practiced upon the beasts of the field, as well as their own- ers, in this day of common calamity, and no pros- pect of redress that I can see, either from heaven or men ; for the inhabitants have not yet learned right- eousness, and consequently remain very proper in- struments to execute the divine vengeance on one another."
Such a fearful state of things is hardly conceivable
OF SAMUEL SEABURY. 61
by those who have never known from experience the evils of civil war. The generation has passed away that could tell the thrilling tales of the Revolution, and stir up with painful memories the feelings of children gathered around the old domestic firesides.
62 LIFE AND CORRESPONDENCE
CHAPTER Y.
CONTINUED RESISTANCE OF THE COLONIES; TREACHERY OF AR- NOLD, AND HIS PLOT TO DESTROY THE AMERICAN CAUSE; EXPE- DITION AGAINST NEW LONDON, AND MASSACRE OF THE GARRI- SON IN FORT GRISWOLD; SIEGE OF YORKTOWN, AND SURRENDER OF LORD CORNWALLIS; TREATY OF PEACE, AND INDEPENDENCE OF THE COLONIES; LOYALISTS AND THEIR TREATMENT; THE
CLERGY AND THE CHURCH.
A. D. 1780-1783.
IT is impossible to forecast the varying events and fortunes of war. The strength of armies is often strangely broken, and victory is not always given to the side which has the best troops and the heaviest artillery. " The rebellion," wrote Dr. Inglis to the Society, May 20, 1780, " declines daily, and is near its last gasp;" but there was more inherent life in it than he was willing to acknowledge, or had any means of ascertaining. Earlier than this, Jacob Du- che, a clergyman of the Church of England, in Phil- adelphia, who made the first prayer in the Conti- nental Congress and read the Psalter for the seventh day, so remarkably appropriate, addressed a letter to General Washington, in which he pictured in gloomy colors the utter hopelessness of resistance, and be- sought him to cease his desperate and destructive efforts. The letter was sent to Congress, and the author was obliged to flee the country, and his estate was confiscated.
OF SAMUEL SEABURY. 63
As time went on, the colonies became more firm and determined, and submission to the king and his ministry was further than ever from the mind of the congressional government. Too much had been done and too many sacrifices made to think of taking any backward steps, and the advantages gained now and then by the American troops were full of encourage- ment, and enlivened their hopes.
In the autumn of 1780, the military posts along the Hudson River above New York, as far as West Point, presented a scene of unparalleled and surpris- ing movements. The treachery of Benedict Arnold and his artfully contrived plan to make it easy for Sir Henry Clinton to capture the fortress and army under his command were startling facts, developed just in time to save the American cause and inspire its promoters with new vigilance and energy. Had West Point and the forces within and around it fallen into the hands of the British general through the treason of Arnold, the hopes of the colonies would have been blighted, and the vision of their independ- ence, for years at least, must have disappeared. The unfortunate Major Andre — not more beloved by his friends than lamented by his enemies — would have indeed escaped the ignominious death of the gallows, and all the region where Seabury had ministered and was well known would have had a somewhat differ- ent history and been consecrated to other memories.
But Providence was in the way of these results. The conspiracy to surrender West Point was not des- tined to succeed or to have any place in our Ameri- can annals, except one as dishonorable to the head and heart of the projector as to the commander who
64 LIFE AND CORRESPONDENCE
should be willing to accept the laurels of victory won by such atrocious treachery. Sir Henry Clin- ton ought not to be held responsible for the violation of the flag of truce, or for the course imposed upon Major Andre*, without alternative, when Arnold sent him back to New York by a circuitous route with a pass under a fictitious name. He refused, however, to save his adjutant-general at the price of surrender- ing the traitor, and perhaps he was bound by honor and every military principle to protect an officer who had deserted from the enemy and openly espoused the cause of the king. All the bravery which Ar- nold had before shown and all the service he had rendered to the American cause were at once forgot- ten, and contempt and disgust were the only emo- tions excited by his treason. With a folly equal to his wickedness, he warned General Washington not to execute the sentence of death upon the victim of the complot. " If this warning," said he in his inso- lent letter, " should be disregarded and he suffer, I call heaven and earth to witness that your excellency will be answerable for the torrent of blood that may be spilt in consequence."
The threat thus uttered was, in a measure, exe- cuted, when, a year later, Arnold was put in com- mand of an expedition fitted out at New York, — the headquarters of Sir Henry Clinton and the Brit- ish army, — and sent to New London, Conn., four- teen miles below Norwich, the place of the traitor's birth and the scene of his boyhood. The town, by his order, was burnt, Whigs and Tories suffering alike from the conflagration, and the little garrison in Fort Griswold, on the opposite side of the Thames, which
OF SAMUEL SEABURY. 65
stood heroically to its guns and kept the enemy for a time at bay, was finally forced to surrender, and the indiscriminate massacre which followed forms one of the bloodiest and most horrible chapters in the whole history of the war.
Almost simultaneously with the movements of this expedition, were commenced the investment and siege of Yorktown by the combined French and American armies under the command of General Washington. For twenty days the siege was continued, and the in- vestment was so complete and the batteries on the colonial side so strong that nothing was left Lord Cornwallis, the British commander, but to capitulate, and then to surrender his whole force, consisting of nearly eight thousand men, with all the munitions of war. This happened on the 19th of October, and virtually decided the struggle for independence in favor of the colonies. The capture of so large a part of the British army in America occasioned great re- joicings throughout the land, and at home it made the people more clamorous for the end of a war which was destroying commerce and bringing no glory to the realm of England. " It is all over," said Lord North, with a fainting heart, when he heard of the catastrophe.
The ministry hesitated about attempting to raise troops to replace the army surrendered by Lord Cornwallis, and early in 1782, a motion was made in Parliament that an address be presented to His Maj- esty praying that the war with the colonies should terminate and measures be taken to restore tran- quillity and effect a reconciliation. An earnest and animated debate was entered into on both sides, but
5
C6 LIFE AND CORRESPONDENCE
the motion was finally lost by a majority of only one in favor of the ministry and for the prosecution of the war. Such a vote was indicative of the public sentiment of the English nation. It w;is the signal for an immediate dissolution of the cabinet, and the resignation of Lord North was followed by a total change of ministry and measures. Gleams of peace began to be seen in the near future, and the Con- gress of the colonies appointed commissioners to ne- gotiate a treaty whenever the temper of the crown should be ready for such an event.
Early in May of this year, Sir Guy Carleton arrived at New York to relieve General Clinton as command- er-in-chief of the British forces in America, and the pacific tone of his first letter to Washington showed, if nothing more, a change in the views of Parliament respecting the principles on which the war for seven years had been conducted and the policy of its con- tinuance. The clergy of the Church of England in the city do not appear to have been at once apprised of this change. Dr. Inglis wrote to the secretary of the Society under date of May 6, 1782 : " Our new commander-in-chief, Sir Guy Carleton, is arrived and indicates a disposition to act with vigor ; and this with a little judgment and common sense will soon change the face of affairs here."
He had said before, in the same letter : " Our pros- pects in Europe and America are rather gloomy at present ; but they are not such as should make us despond, nor do I by any means think our affairs are irretrievable. It may be some satisfaction to you to hear that the Church of England, notwith- standing the persecutions it suffers, gains ground in
OF SAMUEL SEABURY. 67
some places, particularly in Connecticut. This I can assure you of as an indubitable fact. The steady, uniform conduct of the Society's missionaries and of a few clergymen who are not in their service, in that province, their adherence to the dictates of conscience by persevering in loyalty and preaching the gospel unadulterated with politics, raised the esteem and respect even of their enemies, whilst the pulpits of dissenters resounded with scarcely anything else than the furious politics of the times, which occasioned dis- gust in the more serious and thinking. The conse- quence is that many serious dissenters have actually joined the Church of England. The increase in some places has been surprisingly great."
So far as the Church in New York was concerned, there was little to report. The refugee clergy con- tinued to keep up good hopes and to encourage their people with the prospect of better days. It was about this time that a room was secured in the City Hall, to accommodate those who could not obtain pews in the churches, and the refugee clergy officiated in turn to large and respectable audiences. It must have been in view of the religious and not of the military and political condition of the colonies that Seabury wrote to the Society on the 24th of June, 1782 : " The situation of affairs in this country has, for the last year, continued so much the same, that I have nothing new of which to inform the Society. Both West Chester and Staten Island remain in the same ruined state, as much exposed to the incursions of the rebels as ever, though these incursions have not lately been so frequent as formerly.
" By what we can learn of the Society's mission-
68 LIFE AND CORRESPONDENCE
aries they seem to be in a more quiet state at pres- ent, and suffer no personal abuse unless perhaps from some disorderly individuals."
This, however, was not for them the quiet that precedes the storm, but rather the forerunner of un- expected and surprising events. In the beginning of August, General Washington received a communica- tion from Sir Guy Carle ton, informing him that nego- tiations for a general peace had been entered upon at Paris, and though from that time preparations for war ceased, and no further acts of hostility were committed by either party, yet the American army was not disbanded nor the posture of defense relin- quished. So long as the result of the negotiations was in suspense, it was necessary to maintain the same caution and vigilance as before.
It was this intelligence which alarmed the loyalists in New York, especially the clergy of the Church of England. "It is impossible," wrote the Rev. John Sayre, to the Society, August 14, 1782, " for words to describe the universal consternation which was pro- duced here by the communication of a letter from His Majesty's Commissioner to General Washington, in consequence of directions from England informing him of the king's command to his minister plenipo- tentiary at Paris, to propose the independency of the thirteen provinces in the first instance, instead of making it the subject of a general treaty. As there can be little doubt of the acceptance of this proposal, it is obvious that it must greatly affect the affairs of the Church as well as those of the state." Others expressed themselves in similar terms, and not only looked to the venerable Society for advice and in-
OF SAMUEL SEABURY. 69
struction, but some of them, utterly hopeless of find- ing any provision for their families in this country, began to think of removing to England.
The rights and the tranquillity of France, Spain, and Holland were involved in the settlement of the many questions between the two great belligerents, and before the fundamental articles of a definitive treaty were agreed upon and a time for signing fixed, the summer and autumn had passed. Dr. Franklin, John Adams, John Jay, and Henry Lau- rens were the commissioners to act for the colonies, and they resisted the attempt of the British envoys to obtain compensation for the loyalists whose prop- erty had been confiscated, and many of whom had been driven out of the country. Franklin claimed that Congress had no power in the case, as the prop- erty of the loyalists had been confiscated by the States, and the remedy, if any, was to be sought from the States. The utmost which was finally ac- complished was simply to get an article inserted in the treaty by which it was made the duty of Con- gress to recommend to the States an indemnification of the loyalists ; but the recommendation was of no force, and it was declared at the time that there was not the least probability that the States would be governed by it or offer any restitution.
After all the preliminaries and articles had been settled, the treaty of peace was signed at Paris by both parties in due form on the 30th of November, 1782. It was approved and ratified by Congress, and hailed with demonstrations of gratitude and joy by the weary colonies. An official proclamation that peace had been secured was made to the American
70 LIFE AND CORRESPONDENCE
army on the 19th of April, 1783, precisely eight years from the day of the memorable battle of Lex- ington, when the first blood of the Revolution was shed. "The treaty," says Bancroft,1 "was not a compromise, ' nor a compact imposed by force, but a free and perfect solution and perpetual settlement of all that had been called in question. By doing an act of justice to her former colonies, England rescued her own liberties at home from imminent danger, and opened the way for their slow and certain develop- ment. The narrowly selfish colonial policy which had led to the cruel and unnatural war was cast aside and forever by Great Britain, which was hence- forward, as the great colonizing power, to sow all the oceans with the seed of republics."
The supreme question for the clergy of the old Church of England and their friends to consider was, what to do in the changed position of civil affairs. No notice had been taken of their religious rights in the final treaty, but they were given over wholly to the tender mercies of those who had been their en- emies, and who, at this time, seem to have had no generous sympathy for them in their ruined circum- stances. "At the peace," says Sabine, "a majority of the Whigs of several States committed a great crime. Instead of repealing the proscription and banishment acts, as justice and good policy required, they mani- fested a disposition to place the humbled and un- happy loyalists beyond the pale of human sympa- thy." 2 He cites Massachusetts, Virginia, and New York, as " adopting measures of inexorable severity."
1 History of the United States, vol. x., p. 591.
2 Loyalists of the American Revolution, vol. i., p. 88.
OF SAMUEL SEABURY. 71
Such was the violence threatened in New York that Sir Guy Carle ton, before evacuating the city, wrote to the President of Congress that the loyalists " conceived the safety of their lives depended on his removing them," and the crown, by way of doing what could not be accomplished in the negotiations for peace, offered them inducements to emigrate to Nova Scotia and other British territory, where they might begin settlements and found cities. Upwards of twelve thousand men, women, and children are said to have embarked from New York for Nova Scotia and the Bahamas, before Sir Guy Carleton withdrew his forces. Many of the clergy followed their people and were appointed to new missions by the venerable Society, with increased salaries, besides receiving grants of land.
Dr. Inglis, whose private fortune through his wife was ample, was included in the confiscation act of New York, and, being compelled to abandon his church and rectory, accompanied some loyalists of his congregation to Annapolis in Nova Scotia. The in- strument by which he relinquished his rights, sealed and delivered in the presence of credible witnesses, ran thus: "For certain just and lawful causes, me and my mind hereunto specially moving, without compul- sion, fear, fraud, or deceit, [I] do purely, simply, and absolutely resign and give up the said rectory of the parish of Trinity Church and my office of rector in the said corporation."1 And " agreeable to the de- sire of the Whig Episcopalians," the Rev. Samuel Provoost was subsequently called and inducted into the office which he had in this manner vacated.
1 Berrien's History of Trinity Church, p. 161.
72 LIFE AND CORRESPONDENCE
It was the 25th of November, 1*783, before Sir Guy Carleton was ready to evacuate New York and de- liver it into the charge of General Washington. He had been delayed in this purpose by his care for the loyalists and for the large amount of goods, stores, and military supplies which had accumulated in the city. The number that desired to be sent to Nova Scotia was so great that their removal could not be accomplished in a shorter time with the transports at his command."
Dr. Seabury, whatever may have been his course hitherto, had no disposition to flee from his country ; but his parish at Westchester was so broken and ruined that he could not return to it and resume his ministry, and Staten Island was in a condition scarcely better. He remained with his family in New York, doing what he could for their support and not yet knowing what work, in the providence of God, he might be called to undertake.
Among the refugee clergy with whom he had been in frequent association were Jeremiah Learning and Richard Mansfield, both having been driven from their missions in Connecticut, and both deeply interested in the revival of the Church in that State. It has been seen from the reports to the Society that it was less depressed and deranged here than elsewhere, though all the clergy, with the exception of John Beach, of Newtown, had been compelled to disregard the oaths assumed at their ordination, and to omit, in using the Liturgy, the prayers for the king and royal family. By nothing, however, which they did and suffered, was their opinion of the Church and its organization changed. They were all men who had crossed the
OF SAMUEL SEABURY. 73
ocean to obtain Holy Orders, and they believed the first step to be taken at this crisis was to secure the apostolic office. They might think that the old opposition of Presbyterians and Congregationalists to the plan of an American Episcopate, so effectual with the authorities at home before the Revolution, would be renewed ; but they could not be restrained from attempting to supply the Church in Connecticut with a head, more necessary now than ever, before pro- ceeding to revise the Book of Common Prayer, and adapt it to the new civil circumstances.
No such establishment as existed in England was expected or desired in this country. It was said by Dr. Chauncy, before the revolt of the colonies, that the Episcopalians " had in view nothing short of a complete Church hierarchy after the pattern of that at home, with like officers in all their various degrees of dignity, with a like large revenue for their sup- port, and with the allowance of no other privilege to dissenters but that of a bare toleration." It was the fear of such an imaginary hierarchy that kept the adversaries of the Church perpetually on the watch to prevent its consummation. In vain was it denied to be any part of the plan. " The bishops proposed," said Dr. Chandler, " were to have no temporal power, and consequently to hold no courts for the exercise of it ; they were to have no jurisdiction at all over any of the dissenters, but to govern the Episcopal clergy only ; they were to have no maintenance from the colonies in any form ; they were not to interfere in any matters of civil government, but to be confined to the exercise of their spiritual functions only."
1 Chandler's Appeal farther Defended, p. 233.
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England finally lost her most valuable possessions in America, notwithstanding her efforts by a subtle state policy to retain them. The British cabinet might acknowledge that an American Episcopate was a measure right in itself, but the representations of dissenters that sending bishops to this country would be offensive to the people and incline them to independence were strong enough to keep the simple question in abeyance. There appeared to be no sep- aration of Church from state in the diplomatic mind of that day, and men on this side detected a foe un- der the mitre and the Episcopal robes. " If Parlia- ment," said John Adams, " could tax us, they could establish the Church of England, with all its creeds, articles, tests, ceremonies, and tithes, and prohibit all other churches as conventicles and schism-shops." *
Undoubtedly the clergy in New York, after the dismemberment of the colonies, came together in a casual way and consulted about the course to be pur- sued. Nothing was publicly or formally done, but suggestions how to bring order out of confusion must have been made, and thoughts interchanged on the propriety of renewing the effort to obtain from Eng- lish bishops the consecration of some suitable Amer- ican clergyman to the apostolic office. Mansfield re- turned to his church and family in Derby, Conn., before the cessation of hostilities ; but Learning and John Sayre had only waste fields to re-occupy, and they were deterred from going back to these and be- ginning anew their self-sacrificing work. Graves, of New London, another refugee, whose church was also laid in ashes at the burning of the town by Arnold,
1 Works, vol. x., p. 287.
OF SAMUEL SEABURY. 75
had died in Ne'w York during the war ; and Peters, of Hebron, who fled to England at the outbreak of the Revolution to escape popular violence, remained there, and published, in 1781, a " General History of Connecticut," which is more of a curiosity for its fabulous descriptions than a reliable authority for its statements.
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CHAPTER VI.
CLERGY IN CONNECTICUT BEFORE THE WAR, AND AT ITS CLOSE ; CONVENTION IN WOODBURY, AND APPOINTMENT OF A BISHOP J TESTIMONIALS FROM REV. MR. JARVIS AND THE CLERGY OF NEW YORK IN FAVOR OF DR. SEABURY ; LETTERS TO THE ARCHBISHOP OF CANTERBURY, AND DEPARTURE OF DR. SEABURY FOR ENGLAND.
A. D. 1783.
THERE were twenty clergymen of the Church of England in Connecticut, with twice that number of parishes or missions, when the war began. Besides those mentioned in the previous chapter, we find Samuel Andrews of Wallingford, Richard S. Clark of New Milford, Ebenezer Dibblee of Stamford, Daniel Fogg of Brooklyn, Bela Hubbard of New Haven, Abraham Jarvis of Middletown, Ebenezer Kneeland of Stratford, John Rutgers Marshall of Woodbury, Chris- topher Newton of Ripton, now Huntington, James Nichols of Plymouth, James Scovill of Waterbury, John Tyler of Norwich, Roger Viets of Simsbury, and to these must be added Gideon Bostwick of Great Barrington, Mass., who always acted and was reck- oned with the Connecticut clergy. Of these, Knee- land died a prisoner to the patriots in his own house on the 17th of April, 1777; and the venerable Beach, of Newtown, who had never ceased to pray for the king, lived till March 19, 1782, when he went to his welcome rest in the grave. Mr. Mansfield, of
OF SAMUEL SEABURY.
77
Derby, preached the sermon at his funeral, which was printed, — the text being the significant one : " I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith," -words in which the heroic and saintly servant of God triumphed a few hours before his death.
Fourteen clergymen were to be found in Connecti- cut at the close of the war. They were ministering in some way to their feeble and impoverished flocks, and in the last week of March, 1783, ten of this number met in the quiet village of Woodbury, at the house
House in which Dr. Seabury was chosen Bishop.
then occupied by the Rev. John Rutgers Marshall, a missionary of the venerable Society and rector of St. Paul's Church in that place. The house is still standing, an interesting relic and reminder of an im-
78 LIFE AND CORRESPONDENCE
portant event which was the head of a great epoch in American ecclesiastical history.
No laymen were admitted to the gathering, and it was so secret as to be known only to the clergy. Who of the fourteen in the State were absent can- not now be ascertained, for though Mr. Jarvis was the secretary, no minutes were kept to be made pub- lic, and consequently the names were not preserved. The fear of opposition, and perhaps the fear of not having the hearty concurrence of their lay brethren, led to the secrecy of the movement. " Ten clergy- men met," says Daniel Fogg, one of this number, in a brief note to the Rev. Mr. Parker, of Boston, dated July 2, 1783. " The Connecticut clergy have done already everything in their power, in the matter you were anxious about: would write you the particulars, if I knew of any safe opportunity of sending this let- ter, but as I do not, must defer it till I do."
They met in the lower front room of the house, on the left side of the main entrance, and on the 25th of March, without a formal election, selected two persons, the Rev. JEREMIAH LEAMING and the Rev. SAMUEL SEABURY, as suitable, either of them, to go to England and obtain, if possible, Episcopal conse- cration. Their secretary was commissioned and sent to New York to consult the clergy in that city and submit the letters which had been prepared and adopted for their examination, and, if approved, to request their concurrence and aid in the proposed applications.
The two candidates were in New York, and . Mr. Learning, to whom the appointment was first offered, shrank at his time of life and with his infirmities from
OF SAMUEL SEABURY. 79
undertaking responsibilities and burdens so great. There was good reason for giving him the oppor- tunity to decline the high and sacred office. For twenty-one years he had been the faithful mission- ary at Norwalk and had used his pen vigorously in defending the Church against the bitter attacks of her enemies. He was well known to the Connecticut clergy and a long intercourse with him had won their entire respect and confidence. As one of them said at the time, " He is indeed a tried servant of the Church and carries about him in a degree the marks of a confessor." Though he had suffered much for his loyalty, both, in person and in estate, he was as little prepared to accept a comfortable home and sup- port in the British provinces as to return to the scene of his former ministrations, now laid waste, or to take up the burden of an office which he believed to be as necessary to the Church as the head to the body.
On the other hand, Dr. Seabury, though born and educated in Connecticut, had exercised no part of his ministry in that colony. He was twelve years younger than Learning, without bodily infirmity, and had all his boldness and*%eal and all his unflinching adherence to primitive truth and apostolic order. It was wisely ordered in the providence of God that he should be the man to go on a voyage to England for Episcopal consecration. He was every way qualified to meet the emergencies of the time and to overcome the obstacles that were to be thrown in his path ; and if he failed in England, his original instructions au- thorized him to apply to the non-juring bishops of the Episcopal Church in Scotland, with which he be- came acquainted many years before, while pursuing his studies at the University of Edinburgh.
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The following documents, addressed to the Arch- bishop of York, state very clearly the object of the clergy of Connecticut, and give forcible reasons for the success of their application : —
NEW YORK, April 21, 1783.
MY LORD, — The Clergy of Connecticut, deeply impressed with anxious apprehension of what may be the fate of the Church in America, under the present changes of empire and policy, beg leave to embrace the earliest moment in their power to address your Grace on that important sub- ject.
This part of America is at length dismembered from the British Empire ; but, notwithstanding the dissolution of our civil connection with the parent state, we still hope to retain the religious polity, the primitive and evangelical doctrine and discipline, which, at the Reformation, were restored and established in the Church of England. To render that pol- ity complete, and to provide for its perpetuity in this coun- try, by the establishment of an American Episcopate, has long been an object of anxious concern to us, and to many of our brethren in other parts of this continent. The at- tainment of this object appears to have been hitherto ob- structed by considerations of a political nature, which we conceive were founded in groundless jealousies and misap- prehensions that can no longer be supposed to exist ; and therefore, whatever may be the effect of independency on this country, in other respects, we presume it will be allowed to open a door for renewing an application to the spiritual governors of the Church on this head ; an application which we consider as not only seasonable, but more than ever nec- essary at this time ; because if it be now any longer neg- lected, there is reason to apprehend that a plan of a very extraordinary nature, lately formed and published in Phil- adelphia, may be carried into execution. This plan is, in brief, to constitute a nominal Episcopate by the united suf- frages of presbyters and laymen. The peculiar situation of
OF SAMUEL SEABURY. 81
the Episcopal Churches in America, and the necessity of adopting some speedy remedy for the want of a regular Episcopate, are offered, in the publication here alluded to, as reasons fully sufficient to justify the scheme. Whatever influence this project may have on the minds of the igno- rant or unprincipled part of the laity, or however it may, possibly, be countenanced by some of the clergy in other parts of the country, we think it our duty to reject such a spurious substitute for Episcopacy, and, as far as may be in our power, to prevent its taking effect.
To lay the foundation, therefore, for a valid and regular Episcopate in America, we earnestly entreat your Grace, that, in your Archiepiscopal character, you will espouse the cause of our sinking Church ; and, at this important cri- sis, afford her that relief on which her very existence de- pends, by consecrating a Bishop for Connecticut. The per- son whom we have prevailed upon to offer himself to your Grace for that purpose is the Reverend Doctor Samuel Sea- lury, who has been the Society's worthy missionary for many years. He was born and educated in Connecticut — he is personally known to us — and we believe him to be every way qualified for the Episcopal Office, and for the discharge of those duties peculiar to it, in the present trying and dangerous times.
All the weighty considerations which concur to enforce our request are well known to your Grace : we therefore forbear to enlarge, lest we should seem to distrust your Grace's zeal in a cause of such acknowledged importance to the interests of religion. Suffer us then to rest in humble confidence that your Grace will hear and grant our petition, and give us the consolation of receiving, through a clear and uninterrupted channel, an overseer in this part of the house- hold of God.
That God may continue your life and health, make you in his Providence an eminent instrument of great and exten- sive usefulness to mankind in general, a lasting blessing to the Church over which you preside in particular ; and that 6
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the present and future sons of the Church in America may have cause to record and perpetuate your name as their friend and spiritual father, — and, when your sacred work is ended, that you may find it gloriously rewarded, is and shall be the devout prayer of the Clergy of Connecticut, by whose order (in convention assembled) and in whose behalf this letter is addressed to your Grace by your Grace's most obedient, humble servant,
ABRAHAM JARVIS,
Minister of the Episcopal Church in Middletown, and Sec- retary to the Convention.
TESTIMONIAL.
WHEREAS our well beloved in Christ, Samuel Seabury, Doctor of Divinity, and missionary of Staten Island in this Province, is about to embark for England, at the earnest re- quest of the Episcopal Clergy of Connecticut, and for the purpose of presenting himself a candidate for the sacred of- fice of a Bishop ; and that when consecrated and admitted to the said office, he may return to Connecticut, and there exercise the spiritual powers, and discharge the duties which are peculiar to the Episcopal character, among the members of the Church of England, by superintending the Clergy, ordaining candidates for Holy Orders, and confirming such of the Laity as may choose to be confirmed. We the sub- scribers, desirous to testify our hearty concurrence in this measure, and promote its success ; as well as to declare the high opinion we justly entertain of Doctor Seabury's learn- ing, abilities, prudence, and zeal for religion, do hereby cer- tify, that we have been personally and intimately acquainted with the said Doctor Seabury for many years past — that we believe him to be every way qualified for the sacred office of a Bishop ; the several duties of which office, we are firmly persuaded, he will discharge with honor, dignity, and fidelity, and consequently with advantage to the Church of God.
And we cannot forbear to express our most earnest wish
OF SAMUEL SEABURY. 83
that Doctor Seabury may succeed in this application, as it will be the means of preserving the Church of England in America from ruin, and of preventing many irregularities which we see approaching, and which, if once introduced, no after care may be able to remove.
Given under our hands, at New York, this twenty-first day of April, in the year of our Lord one thousand seven hun- dred and eighty -three.
JEREMIAH LEAMING, D. D. ; CHARLES INGLIS, D. D., Rector of Trinity Church, New York;
BENJAMIN MOORE, D. D., Assistant Minister of Trinity Church, New York ; and others.
NEW YORK, May 24, 1783.
MY LORD, — The Reverend Doctor Samuel Seabury will have the honor of presenting this letter to your Grace. He goes to England, at the request of the Episcopal Clergy of Connecticut, on business highly interesting and important. They have written on the subject to your Grace, and also to the Archbishop of Canterbury, and the Bishop of London. But, as they were pleased to consult us on the occasion, and to submit what they had written to our inspection, request- ing our concurrence in their application, their letters are dated at New York, and signed only by the Rev. Mr. Jarvis, the secretary to their convention, whom they commissioned and sent here for that purpose.
The measure proposed, on this occasion, by our brethren of Connecticut, could not fail to have our hearty concur- rence. For we are decidedly of opinion, that no other means can be devised to preserve the existence of the Epis- copal Church in this country. We have therefore joined with Mr. Jarvis in giving Doctor Seabury a testimonial, in which we have briefly, but sincerely, expressed our sense of his merit, and our earnest wishes for the success of his un- dertaking.
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Should he succeed and be consecrated, he means (with the approbation of the Society) to return in the character, and perform the duties of a missionary, at New London, in Connecticut; and on his arrival in that country, to make application to the Governor, in hope of being cheerfully per- mitted to exercise the spiritual powers of his Episcopal office there ; in which, we are persuaded, he will meet with little, if any opposition. For many persons of character in Con- necticut, and elsewhere, who are not members of the Epis- copal Church, have lately declared they have no longer any objection to an American Episcopate, now that the inde- pendency of this country, acknowledged by Great Britain, has removed their apprehensions of the Bishops being in- vested with a share of temporal power by the British gov- ernment.
We flatter ourselves that any impediments to the conse- cration of a -Bishop for America, arising from the peculiar constitution of the Church of England, may be removed by the King's royal permission ; and we cannot entertain a doubt of his Majesty's readiness to grant it.
In humble confidence that your Grace will consider the object of this application as a measure worthy of your zeal- ous patronage, we beg leave to remind your Grace, that sev- eral legacies have been, at different times, bequeathed for the support of Bishops in America, and to express our hopes that some part of those legacies, or of the interest arising from them, may be appropriated to the maintenance of Doc- tor Seabury, in case he is consecrated, and settles in Amer- ica. We conceive that the separation of this country from the parent state can be no reasonable bar to such appropria- tion, nor invalidate the title of American Bishops, who de- rive their consecration from the Church of England, to the benefit of those legacies. And perhaps this charitable as- sistance is now more necessary than it would have been, had not the empire been dismembered.
We take this opportunity to inform your Grace, that we have consulted his excellency Sir Guy Carleton on the sub-
OF SAMUEL SEABURY. 85
ject of procuring the appointment of a Bishop for the prov- ince of Nova Scotia, on which he has expressed to us his en- tire approbation, and has written to administration, warmly recommending the measure. We took the liberty, at the same time, of mentioning our worthy brother, the Rev. Doc- tor Thomas B. Chandler, to his excellency, as a person every way qualified to discharge the duties of the Episcopal office in that province, with dignity and honor. And we hope for your Grace's approbation of what we have done in that mat- ter, and for the concurrence of your influence with Sir Guy Carleton's recommendation in promoting the design.
We should have given this information sooner to your Grace, but that we waited for Doctor Seabury's departure for England, which we considered as affording the best and most proper conveyance.
If Doctor Chandler and Doctor Seabury should both suc- ceed, as we pray God they may, we trust that, with the blessing of Heaven, the Episcopal Church will yet flourish in this western hemisphere.
With the warmest sentiments of respect and esteem, we have the honor to be, my Lord, your Grace's most dutiful sons, and obedient humble servants,
JEREMIAH LEAMING, D. D. ; CHARLES INGLIS, D. D., Rector of Trinity Church, New York ;
BENJAMIN MOORE, D. D., Assistant Minister of Trinity Church,
New York ; and others. His GRACE THE ARCHBISHOP OF YORK.
The letters written by the Rev. Mr. Jar vis and the clergy of New York, to the Archbishop of Canter- bury, were longer and more detailed in their state- ments than those addressed to the Archbishop of York. They were the same in spirit and yet so dif- ferent in the text as to make it desirable to give them a place in this chapter. Mr. Jarvis, who was
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particularly skillful in the preparation of ecclesiasti- cal documents, drew up, as the.ir secretary, the let- ters for the clergy of Connecticut, and the original draught of the one to the Archbishop of Canterbury contained a few passages which were erased when it came to be submitted to the inspection of the friends in New York. This was an omitted passage, refer- ring to the war of the Ke volution : " During the ar- duous struggle, the Church in this country was passed over without notice, and we grieve to find that in the conclusion she was not thought worth regarding. In the severest season of the conflict, none of her faith- ful members conceived of this as possible, much less did they dream of it as probable. But we mean not here to dwell on unavailing complaint."
MAY IT PLEASE YOUR GRACE, — In this day of anxiety for the Church in America, the clergy of Connecticut, deeply impressed with apprehensions of what will be her fate under the present changes of empire and policy, beg leave to em- brace the earliest moment in their power to address your Grace with all the unaffected freedom which may become the ministers of Christ when pleading the cause of that Church; a cause wherein not only her interest is greatly concerned, but on which her very existence depends.
America is now severed from the British empire ; by that separation we cease to be a part of the national Church. But although political changes affect and dissolve our exter- nal connection, and cut us off from the powers of the state, yet we hope a door still remains open for access to the gov- ernors of the Church ; and what they might not do for us without the permission of government, while we were bound as subjects to ask favors and receive them under its auspices and sanction : they may, in right of their inherent spiritual powers, grant and exercise in favor of a Church planted and nurtured by their hand, and now subjected to other
OF SAMUEL SEABURY. 87
powers. As it is our only refuge, we are persuaded no just exceptions can lie against the attempt to avail ourselves of it ; and the uniform benevolent part the Bishops have taken in order to transfer the Episcopal authority into America fills us with the greater confidence of success in the applica- tion.
To secure to our Church a valid and undoubted Episco- pate, and that the several vacant churches may be furnished with ministers as soon as possible, are what we have much at heart.
A further reason, we beg leave to observe, that induces us to take this early and only measure we can devise for this purpose, is effectually to prevent the carrying into execution a plan of a very extraordinary nature, lately come to our knowledge, formed and published in Philadelphia, and, as we suppose, circulating in the Southern States, with design to have it adopted. The plan is, in brief, to constitute a nomi- nal ideal Episcopate, by the united suffrages of presbyters and laymen. The singular and peculiar situation of the American Church, the exigence of the case, and the neces- sity of adopting some speedy and specious remedy, corre- sponding with the state of affairs in the country, are some of the pleas which are adduced as adequate to give full sanc- tion to this scheme. To what degree such a plan may oper- ate upon the minds of the uninformed, unstable, or unprinci- pled part of the Church, we can at present form no opinion ; equally unable are we to conjecture what may be the lengths to which the rage for popular right, as the fountain of all in- stitutions, civil and ecclesiastical, will run ; sufficient for us it is, that while we conscientiously reject such a spurious sub- stitute for episcopacy, we also think it our duty to take every step within our power to frustrate its pernicious effects. Thus are we afloat, torn from our anchor, and surrounded with shelves and rocks, on which we are in danger of being dashed to pieces, and have but one port into which we can look, and from whence expect relief.
The distinguished light in which we have been always
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taught to view your Grace as an able and zealous patron of the American Church, decidedly points out to whom, in this crisis, we are instantly to make our request. Accordingly, to your Grace we have recourse, and humbly present our petition, that in your archiepiscopal character you will es- pouse the cause of our sinking Church, and afford her re- lief by consecrating the person for our bishop whom we have prevailed upon to offer himself to your Grace for that purpose.
The gentleman we beg leave to present to your Grace is the Reverend Doctor Samuel Seabury, who has been the Society's worthy missionary for many years. He was born and educated in Connecticut ; he is personally known to us, and we believe him to be every way qualified for the Epis- copal office, and for the discharge of those duties peculiar to it in the present trying and dangerous times.
Permit us to suggest, with all deference, our firm persua- sion that a sense of the sacred deposit committed by the great Head of the Church to her bishops, is so awfully im- pressed on your Grace's mind, as not to leave a moment's doubt in us of your being heartily disposed to rescue the American Church from the distress and danger, which now more than ever threatens her for want of an Episcopate. We rely on your Grace's indulgence for the liberty we take to assert that it is a real act of charity, while we humbly trust, the blessing of her that is ready to perish will come upon those that befriend her in this necessity. Well known unto your Grace are all those irrefutable arguments that have been so clearly stated, and strongly urged by the illus- trious prelates who have, as our fathers in God, advocated for us.
Wherefore as the whole of our case, and all the weighty considerations which concur to enforce it, are present with you, we forbear to enlarge, lest the multitude of our words should imply a diffidence of success in the thing we ask. Suffer us then to rest in humble confidence, that this our so- licitude for a matter in itself so important to the Church of
OF SAMUEL SEABURY. 89
God, will meet with your fullest approbation, and that your Grace will feel affectionately for us, and from a pious zeal to advance real religion, and propagate the true Church of Christ, will judge it clearly your duty, in the exercise of your high and holy office, to hear and grant our petition, and give us the consolation of receiving, through a clear and uninterrupted channel transmitted to us by your Grace's hands, an overseer in this part of the household of God.
That God may continue your life and health, make you, in his providence, an eminent instrument of great and exten- sive usefulness to mankind in general, a lasting blessing to the church over which you preside in particular, and that the present and future sons of the Church in America may have cause to record and perpetuate your name as their friend and spiritual father, and when your sacred work is ended that you may find it gloriously rewarded, is and shall be the devout prayer of the clergy of Connecticut, by whoso order and in whose behalf this letter is signed by your Grace's most obedient, humble servant,
ABRAHAM JAEVIS,
Minister of the Episcopal Church in Middletown, and Sec- retary to the Convention.
NEW YORK, May 24, 1783.
MY LORD, — The Reverend Doctor Samuel Seabury will have the honor of presenting this letter to your Grace. At the request of the Episcopal clergy of Connecticut, he goes to England on business highly interesting and important, namely : to be consecrated by your Grace, and admitted to the sacred office of a bishop ; after which, he purposes to return to Connecticut, and there exercise the spiritual pow- ers which belong to the Episcopal character.
Although the letter which Doctor Seabury carries from the clergy of Connecticut to your Grace, and the testimonial with which he is furnished, set forth his design, and point out the necessity of carrying it into execution ; yet we con- ceived it to be our duty, in a matter of such moment, to give every support in our power to Doctor Seabury, by writing
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to your Grace (as we have also done to his lordship of Lon- don, and his Grace of York), and laying our sentiments on the subject before you, especially as the clergy of Connecti- cut chose to consult us on the occasion, and submit their letter to our inspection, that we might act in concert with them ; and this is the reason why their letter to your Grace is dated at New York, and is only signed by the Reverend Mr. Jarvis, the secretary to their convention, whom they commissioned and sent here for the purpose.
Thex separation of these colonies from the parent state leaves the Church of England here in a most deplorable situation. For as the event was unexpected, no provision was made to guard against its consequences. Whilst the colonies were dependent on England, they were thence sup- plied with clergymen. The supply indeed was scanty, and inadequate to the wants of the colonists ; yet the Church was preserved in existence, and, through the blessing of Providence, increased in many places. To remove the hard- ships under which the Church labored, particularly in the affair of ordination, and to procure a more ample supply of clergymen, which would greatly promote the growth of the Church, the clergy of several provinces repeatedly applied that one or more bishops might be appointed to reside in America. Their applications, though approved and warmly supported by many illustrious dignitaries of our Church, and others ; yet, either through inattention in government or mistaken maxims of policy, were disregarded. Hereby the Church in America is now utterly helpless, and unable to preserve itself. As the colonies are become independent, no ordination in the usual way can, as we presume, be procured from England. A few years must carry off such of the present clergy as can remain in the United States, and with them the Church of which they are members will be extinct.
This melancholy event is inevitable if some remedy is not applied ; and the only expedient that could be devised to prevent it is the one now proposed. Should Doctor Seabury succeed, and be consecrated, he means to return in the char-
OF SAMUEL SEABURY. 91
acter and perform the duties of a missionary at New Lon- don, in Connecticut. This, we apprehend, will secure to him at least a safe reception there, and prepare the way gradually for exercising the spiritual powers of a bishop, by superintending the clergy, ordaining candidates for Holy Orders, and administering confirmation to such of the laity as shall choose to be confirmed. To which, we are per- suaded, the minds of people will be reconciled by the time his Episcopal character is generally known. For, consist- ently with our original plan for an American Episcopate, he will have no temporal power or authority whatever. If a bishop is once established in Connecticut, we are confident that bishops will soon be admitted into the other colonies ; so that the fate of all the churches in the united colonies is virtually involved in the success of this application.
Such, my lord, is our state, and such are our views. It remains now with your Grace to afford that relief to the Church of God here, which it stands so much in need of, and save it from utterly perishing in the United States of America, by consecrating Doctor Seabury, and thereby con- veying to us a valid and regular Episcopate. We have the fullest persuasion of your Grace's zeal in whatever concerns the cause of religion, as well as reliance on your firmness to support that cause against groundless objections or inter- vening difficulties. We consider the political impediments, which formally obstructed the appointment of bishops in America, as now entirely removed, — they no longer exist. England can have no apprehensions from the disgust that may be given to dissenters by this measure. Whatever risk shall attend it can only be incurred by Doctor Seabury and the other members of the Church here ; and however hazard- ous the attempt, they are willing to embark in it rather than by their lukewarmness to become accessory to the ruin of the Church of God. Indeed, it is but justice to mention that many eminent dissenters in Connecticut and other provinces have lately declared that they have no objections to bishops here now, when the independency of America is acknowl-
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edged by Great Britain. It is not from such, but from men of an illiberal turn, in whom prejudice gets the better of a sense of justice and right, that danger is to be apprehended ; and of this latter sort there are too many in all places.
We flatter ourselves that the impediments to the consecra- tion of a bishop, who is to remove out of the British domin- ions, will be got over, when the necessity of the case and the peculiarity of our situation are considered. Regulations which are merely local, and designed to preserve order in a particular state, should certainly be observed with regard to bishops who are to reside in that state. But we humbly conceive they do not apply to extraordinary emergencies like the present; nor ought they to interfere with the general interests of Christianity, especially when no inconvenience can ensue. On this principle the practice of the Christian Church, for many ages, seems to have been founded. For the light of the gospel has been diffused and the Christian Church planted and established in most nations of Christen- dom, by bishops and other missionaries from such as had no temporal jurisdiction in those nations. But should it be thought that peculiar difficulties, in the present instance, must arise from the constitution of the Church of England, we doubt not but the king, as supreme head of that church, is competent to remove them. His royal permission would fully authorize your Grace to consecrate Doctor Seabury. And when we reflect on his majesty's undeviating regard, as well to the practice as to whatever may tend to promote the influence of true religion, we cannot hesitate to believe that his permission for the purpose may be obtained. Give us leave to add, that such an indulgence, in a matter so ear- nestly desired by people, whose attachment to his royal per- son and government has involved them in many and great difficulties, would be worthy of his princely disposition and paternal goodness.
It may be proper to inform your Grace that the late con- fusions have been fatal to great numbers of the American clergy. Many have died ; others have been banished ; so
OF SAMUEL SEABURY. 93
that several parishes are now destitute of incumbents. In the four colonies of Connecticut, New York, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania, we know at this time of no less than seventy vacant churches, to say nothing of many large tracts of country, where several congregations might immediately be formed and churches built were there clergymen to offi- ciate. We believe the case of other colonies, in this respect, to be nearly similar, and it would be very difficult, perhaps impossible, to procure such a number of clergymen from England as are wanted, even supposing the former inter- course were restored ; yet we are of opinion that all those vacancies would soon be filled were bishops here to confer Holy Orders. The demand for clergymen will be further increased by the general disposition that prevails among dis- senters at present, to join the Church of England. This is most remarkable in Connecticut, where numbers are daily added to the Church, and from the best information we are assured that a similar disposition appears in other colonies.
We cannot omit another circumstance which is of great moment. Some alterations in the Liturgy must be made in consequence of independency ; particularly in the collects for the king and royal family. The offices for November 5th, January 30th, May 29th, and October 25th must be omitted. A revision of the canons will be expedient, be- cause many of them, as they now stand, are wholly inappli- cable to the state of things here. But it must be the wish of every sound churchman that no alteration may take place, except where it is indispensably necessary, and that an en- tire uniformity be preserved among all the churches in the several colonies. How these desirable objects can be ob- tained without bishops, we are unable to see. It would be improper for presbyters to make those alterations, suppos- ing they were perfectly unanimous. But divisions will be unavoidable where all are equal, and there is no superior to control. The common bond which united the clergy being now dissolved, some will think themselves at liberty to use only such parts of the Liturgy, and adopt such rules as they
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choose ; and hence the several congregations may become so many independent churches, each varying from the other, as the fancy of the clergyman may direct. We are sorry to inform your Grace that some symptoms of this kind have already appeared, though it is only in a few individuals. The superintending authority of a bishop will guard against those evils ; it will secure unanimity and submission, prevent dangerous innovations and all unnecessary departure from the established articles, rules, and forms of our excellent Church.
But we shall not protract this letter by inserting more par- ticulars relative to the state of the clergy and Churches here, of which Dr. Seabury will be able to give you any informa- tion your Grace may desire. We shall only beg leave to re- mind your Grace that several legacies have been successively bequeathed for the support of bishops in America ; and to express our hopes that some part of those legacies, or of the interest arising from them, may be appropriated to the main- tenance of Dr. Seabury, in case he is consecrated, and re- turns to Connecticut. We do not conceive that the separa- tion of these colonies from the parent state can be a bar to this appropriation, or invalidate the title of bishops of the Church of England to the benefit of those legacies. And perhaps this charitable assistance is more necessary now, than formerly ; since American bishops must have more dif- ficulties to struggle with, in consequence of the separation ; and no other mode of support can be provided for them, until our confusions subside, and the government of this country assumes a more settled form.
Having thus with all plainness and sincerity represented our case, we shall urge no further arguments for a compli- ance with our request, as it would imply a doubt of your Grace's readiness to promote a measure, in which the inter- ests of Christianity in general, and of the Episcopal Church in particular, are so much concerned. A miscarriage on this occasion would preclude all hope of succeeding hereafter in England, where duty and inclination lead us to apply
OF SAMUEL SEABURY. 95
for an episcopate, and many bad consequences would un- avoidably follow. It would forward the pernicious scheme alluded to by the clergy of Connecticut in their letter to your Grace ; it might probably give rise to applications for an episcopate to foreign states, which must be attended with many inconveniences ; or possibly the issue might be a total extinction of the Episcopal Church in the United States of America.
We shall only add, that we have consulted his excellency, Sir Guy Carleton, the commander-in-chief, on this subject, anc} on the appointment of a bishop to Nova Scotia ; both of which have his entire approbation. As Nova Scotia is to re- main a part of the British dominions, it was necessary that application should be made to government before the ap- pointment there could take place ; and the commander-in- chief has, at our request, written very pressingly to admin- istration, and warmly recommended the measure. We took the liberty at the same time to recommend our worthy brother, the Rev. Dr. Thomas B. Chandler, as a person well qualified to discharge the duties of the Episcopal office in that province with dignity and honor. And we hope for your Grace's approbation of what we did in this matter, and for your kind assistance in promoting the design ; of which we should have given information to your Grace sooner, had we not waited for Dr. Seabury's departure for England, and we judged that the safest and best conveyance. If both these appointments should succeed, we trust that, with the blessing of Heaven, the Church of England will yet flourish in this western hemisphere.
With sincerest wishes for your Grace's health and happi- ness, that you may long continue an ornament and blessing to the Church over which you preside, and with the most perfect respect and esteem, we have the honor to be your Grace's most dutiful sons and obedient, humble servants.
The foregoing letter was printed without signature in " The Churchman's Magazine" for February, 1807.
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It bears internal and unmistakable evidence of hav- ing proceeded from the same clergymen who signed the letter to the Archbishop of York, of even date. A letter was also written by the clergy of Connecticut in convention assembled, imploring the venerable So- ciety to continue the stipends to its missionaries, and urging this support as necessary in the present emer- gency, but with how little success will be seen here- after. Taking these letters and others that might be of service to him, Dr. Seabury departed for England in the flag-ship of Admiral Digby, and many prayers went up to the " Eternal God who alone spreadeth out the heavens and ruleth the raging of the sea," that He would keep him under his protection, and conduct him in safety to the end of his journey.
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CHAPTER VII.
SCHEME OF THE REV. MR. WHITE AND OPPOSITION OP THE CLERGY OF CONNECTICUT ; CONVENTION IN WOODBURY AND NUMBER PRES- ENT ; SYMPATHY IN MASSACHUSETTS, AND LETTERS OF REV. MR. FOGG'; ARRIVAL OF DR. SEABURY IN LONDON, AND IMPEDIMENTS TO HIS CONSECRATION J CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE CLERGY, AND CONVENTION IN WALLINGFORD.
A. D. 1783-1784.
ONE of the motives which influenced the clergy of Connecticut in moving so early after the acknowl- edgment of independence to secure a bishop in this country was the publication of a pamphlet in Phila- delphia which recommended a plan of a very extraor- dinary nature. It was written by the Rev. William White, afterwards the Bishop of Pennsylvania, and issued from the press without his name, in the sum- mer of 1782. It does not appear to have reached the Northern States until peace had been declared, but it was circulated in the region which gave it birth and where the Episcopal atmosphere was less impregnated with high views of the Christian minis- try. According to the interpretation of the author, the pamphlet " proposed the combining of the clergy and of representatives of the congregations, in con- venient districts, with a representative body of the whole, nearly on the plan subsequently adopted. This ecclesiastical representative was to make a declara-
7
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tion approving of Episcopacy, and professing a deter- mination to possess the succession when it could be obtained ; but they were to carry the plan into imme- diate act." l
To this scheme, as they had a right to understand it, the Connecticut clergy were decidedly opposed. The argument from necessity did not, in their opin- ion, exist. For more than half a century candidates from the colony had been sent three thousand miles to obtain Holy Orders, and it would have been a re- versal of all their history, and all their teaching and belief in regard to the Church of Christ, to consent for one moment to the main proposition of the pam- phlet. At the meeting, therefore, in Woodbury, the following document, addressed to Mr. White, was pre- pared and adopted as an expression of their views and as a reason for the steps they had taken to se- cure a bishop.
REVEREND SIR, — We, the clergy of Connecticut, met at Woodbury in voluntary convention, beg leave to acquaint you that a small pamphlet, printed in Philadelphia, has been transmitted to us, of which you are said to be the author. This pamphlet proposes a new form of government in the Episcopal Church, and points at the method of erecting it. As the thirteen States have now risen to independent sover- eignty, we agree with you, sir, that the chain which con- nected this with the mother Church is broken ; that the American Church is now left to stand in its own strength, and that some change in its regulations must in due time take place. But we think it premature and of dangerous consequence, to enter upon so capital a business, till we have resident bishops (if they can be obtained) to assist in the performance of it, and to form a new union in the Ameri- 1 Memoirs of P. E. Church, p. 91.
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can Church, under proper superiors, since its union is now broken with such superiors in the British Church. We shall only advert to such things in the pamphlet as we es- teem of dangerous consequence. You say the conduct you mean to recommend is to include in the proposed frame of government a general approbation of Episcopacy, and a declaration of an intention to procure the succession as soon as conveniently may be ; but in the mean time to carry the plan into effect, without waiting for the succession. But why do you include a general approbation of Episcopacy in your proposed new frame of government ? not because you think bishops a constituent part of an Episcopal Church, unless you conceive they derive their office and existence from the king's authority ; for though you acknowledge we cannot at present have bishops here, and propose to set up without them, yet you say no constitutional principle of our Church is changed by the Revolution, but what was founded on the authority of the king. Your motives for the above general approbation seem, indeed, to be purely political. One is, that the general opinion of Episcopalians is in favor of bishops, and therefore (if we understand your reasoning) it would be impolitic not to flatter them with the hopes of it. Another reason is, that too wide a deviation from the British Church might induce future emigrants from thence to set up independent churches here. But could you have proposed to set up the ministry, without waiting for the succession, had you believed the Episcopal superiority to be an ordinance of Christ, with the exclusive authority of or- dination and government, and that it has ever been so es- teemed in the purest ages of the Church ? and yet we con- ceive this to be the sense of Episcopalians in general, and warranted by the constant practice of the Christian Church. Really, sir, we think an Episcopal Church without Episco- pacy, if it be not a contradiction in terms, would, however, be a new thing under the sun ; and yet the Episcopal Church, by the pamphlet proposed to be erected, must be in this predicament till the succession be obtained. You plead
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necessity, however, and argue that the best writers in the Church admit of Presbyterian ordination where Episcopal cannot be had. To prove this, you quote concessions from the venerable Hooker, and Dr. Chandler, which their ex- uberant charity to the reformed churches abroad led them to make. But the very words you quote from the last mentioned gentleman prove his opinion to be, that bishops were as truly an ordinance of Christ, and as essential to his Church, as the sacraments ; for, say you, he insists upon it (meaning the Episcopal superiority) as of divine right; asserts that the laws relating to it bind as strongly as the laws which relate to baptism and the holy Eucharist, and that if the succession be once broken, not all the men on earth, not all the angels in heaven, without an immediate commission from Christ, can restore it ; but you say he does not, however, hold this succession to be necessary, only where it can be had. Neither does he or the Christian Church hold the sacraments to be necessary, where they cannot be had agreeable to the appointment of the Great Head of the Church. Why should particular acts of authority be thought more necessary than the authority itself ? Why should the sacraments be more essential than that authority Christ has ordained to administer them ? It is true that Christ has appointed the sacraments, and it is as true that He hath appointed officers to administer them, and has expressly forbid any to do it but those who are authorized by his ap- pointment, or called of God, as was Aaron. And yet these gentlemen (without any inconsistency with their declared sentiments) have, and all good men will express their char- itable hopes, that God, in compassion to a well-meant zeal, will add the same blessings to those who, through unavoida- ble mistake, act beside his commission as if they really had it. As far as we can find, it has been the constant opinion of our Church in England and here, that the Episcopal superi- ority is an ordinance of Christ, and we think that the uni- form practice of the whole American Church, for near a cen- tury, sending their candidates three thousand miles for Holy
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Orders, is more than a presumptive proof that the Church here are, and ever have been, of this opinion. The sectaries, soon after the Reformation, declared that the book of conse- cration, etc., was superstitious and contrary to God's word, and the moderation you mention in the articles and canons consists in affirming that this declaration was entirely false ; and would you wish to be more severe ? The instances you adduce, wherein Presbyterian ordination has been tolerated in the Church, have, by its best writers, been set in such a point of view as to give no countenance to your scheme, and the authorities you quote have been answered again and again. If you will not allow this superiority to have an higher origin than the apostles ; yet since they were divinely inspired, we see not why their practice is not equal to a divine warrant ; and as they have given no liberty to devi- ate from their practice in any exigence of the church, we know not what authority we have to take such liberties in any case. However, we think nothing can be more clear, than that our Church has ever believed bishops to have the sole right of ordination and government, and that this regi- men was appointed of Christ himself, and it is now, to use your own words, humbly submitted to consideration, whether such Episcopalians. as consent even to a temporary departure, and set aside this ordinance of Christ for conveniency, can scarcely deserve the name of Christians. But would neces- sity warrant a deviation from the law of Christ, and the im- memorial practice of the Church, yet what necessity have we to plead ? Can we plead necessity with any propriety, till we have tried to obtain an Episcopate, and have been rejected? We conceive the present to be a more favorable opportunity for the introduction of bishops than this coun- try has before seen. However dangerous bishops formerly might have been thought to the civil rights of these States, this danger has now vanished, for such superiors will have no civil authority. They will be purely ecclesiastics. The States have now risen to sovereign authority, and bishops will be equally under the control of civil law with other
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clergymen ; no danger, then, can now be feared from bishops, but such as may be feared from presbyters. This being the case, have we not the highest reason to hope, that the whole civil authority upon the continent (should their assistance be needed) will unite their influence with the Church, to procure an office so essential to it, and to render complete a profession, which contains so considerable a proportion of its inhabitants ? And on the other hand, is there any reason to believe that all the bishops in England, and in all the other reformed Churches in Europe, are so totally lost to a sense of their duty, and to the real wants of their brethren in the Episcopal Church here, as to refuse to ordain bishops to preside over us, when a proper application shall be made to them for it ? If this cannot be, why is not the present a favorable opportunity for such an application ? Nothing is further from the design of this letter than to begin a dis- pute with you ; but in a frank and brotherly way to express our opinion of the mistaken and dangerous tendency of the pamphlet. We fear, should the scheme of it be carried into execution in the Southern States, it will create divisions in the Church at a time when its whole strength depends upon its unity ; for we know it is totally abhorrent from the principles of the Church in the Northern States, and are fully convinced they will never submit to it. And indeed should we consent to a temporary departure from Episco- pacy, there would be very little propriety in asking for it afterwards, and as little reason ever to expect it in America. Let us all then unite as one man to improve this favorable opportunity, to procure an object so desirable and so essen- tial to the Church.
We are, dear sir, your affectionate brethren, the clergy of Connecticut.
Signed by order of the Convention,
ABRAHAM JARVIS, Secretary.
WOODBURY, March 25, 1783.
An answer to this communication was duly re-
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turned, but when it was received in July, 1783, such had been the change of circumstances since the pam- phlet was published, that Mr. White no longer de- fended his proposed scheme.1 He asked for the in- dulgence of his Connecticut brethren on the ground of a supposed necessity, which, he now admitted, had ceased to exist. He affirmed that he had been misunderstood, but " no personal animosity," said he, " became the result of this misapprehension, and other events have manifested consent in all matters essential to ecclesiastical discipline." Some twenty- five years later the use made of statements in the pamphlet by a writer controverting Episcopacy in a secular newspaper2 led the author to write two or three letters to that publication for the purpose of counteracting the mischievous effects which an incor- rect citation was likely to produce.
Other clergymen in New England besides those from Connecticut were interested in the proceedings at Woodbury. The Kev. Samuel Parker, of Boston (afterwards Bishop of Massachusetts, who died before performing a single Episcopal act), appears to have put himself in communication with the Rev. Daniel Fogg, one of the ten clergymen who composed the voluntary convention, and the brief letters which passed between them, especially those of Mr. Fogg, shed some light upon that important gathering. The following was the second of these letters, the first having given no particulars : —
POMFRET, July 14, 1783.
DEAR SIR, — I wrote you a few lines the 2d instant by an uncertain conveyance, in which I mentioned that the
i Memoirs of P. E. Church, pp. 282-286. 2 Albany Centinel.
104 LIFE AND CORRESPONDENCE
Connecticut clergy had done all in their power respecting the matter you were anxious about ; but they keep it a pro- found secret, even from their most intimate friends of the laity.
The matter is this : After consulting the clergy in New York how to keep up the succession, they unanimously agreed to send a person to England to be consecrated Bishop for America, and pitched upon Dr. Seabury as the most proper person for this purpose, who sailed for England the beginning of last month, highly recommended by all the clergy in New York and Connecticut, etc. If he succeeds, he is to come out as missionary for New London or some other vacant mission, and if they will not receive him in Connecticut, or any other of the States of America, he is to go to Nova Scotia. Sir Guy highly approves of the plan, and has used all his influence in favor of it.
The clergy have even gone so far as to instruct Dr. Sea- bury, if none of the regular bishops of the Church of Eng- land will ordain him, to go down to Scotland and receive ordination from a nonjuring bishop. Please to let me know by Mr. Grosvenor how you approve of the plan, and whether you have received any late accounts from England.
From your affectionate brother, D. FOGG.1
Mr. Parker accepted, in general, the action of the clergy of Connecticut, and only raised one or two objections, which had been thought of and met. He was a prominent and influential presbyter in Massa- chusetts, and deeply solicitous for the proper organi- zation and establishment of the Church in this coun- try. It was natural for him to turn to Connecticut, one of the New England States, where the battle for Episcopacy had been early and well fought, and where men understood and were prepared to assert its claims. Another letter from Mr. Fogg gave ex-
1 Church Documents, Connecticut, pp. 212, 213.
OF SAMUEL SEABURY. 105
planatory reasons in support of the action at Wood- bury, and indicated to Mr. Parker that he and his brethren would not be compelled to come under the jurisdiction of Dr. Seabury, if he succeeded in ob- taining Episcopal consecration. This appears to have closed the correspondence on the subject.
DEAR SIK, — I am very glad that the conduct of the Con- necticut clergy meets with your approbation in the main. Dr. Seabury's being a refugee was an objection which I made, but was answered, they could not fix upon any other person who they thought was so likely to succeed as he was, and should he succeed and not be permitted to reside in any of the United States, it would be an easy matter for any other