V

In proportion as the population began worship was at one time required under to spread along the large and beautiful severe penalties; nay, even the sacramentstreams that flow from the Alleghany al services of the Church were rendered Mountains into the Chesapeake Bay, more obligatory by law. Dissenters, Quakers, parishes were legally constituted, so that and Roman Catholics were prohibited in 1722 there were fifty-four, some very from settling in the province. People of large, others of moderate extent, in the every name entering the colony, without twenty-nine counties of the colony. Their having been Christians in the countries size depended much on the number of they came from, were condemned to slatitheable inhabitants within a certain dis-very. Shocking barbarity! the reader will trict. Each parish had a convenient church built of stone, brick, or wood, and many of the larger ones had also chapels of ease, so that the places of public worship were not less than seventy in all. To each parish church there was a parsonage attached, and likewise, in almost all cases, a glebe of 250 acres and a small stock of cattle. But not more than about half, probably, of these established churches were provided with ministers; in the rest the services were conducted by lay readers, or occasionally by neighbouring clergymen. When the war of the Revolution commenced there were ninety-five parishes, and at least a hundred clergymen of the Established Church.

justly exclaim; yet these very laws prove how deep and strong, though turbid and dark, ran the tide of religious feeling among the people. As has been justly remarked, "If they were not wise Christians, they were at least strenuous religionists."

I have said enough to show that, in the colonization of Virginia, religion was far from being considered as a matter of no importance; its influence, on the contrary, was deemed essential to national as well as individual prosperity and happiress.

66

Maryland, we have seen, though originally a part of Virginia, was planted by Lord Baltimore, as a refuge for persecuted Roman Catholics. When the first of its colonists landed in 1634, under the gui-We shall yet have occasion to speak of dance of Leonard Calvert, son of that nothe Church establishment in Virginia, and bleman, on an island in the Potomac, they its influence upon the interests of reli- took possession of the province for their gion, as well as of the character of the Saviour," as well as for "their lord the clergy there during the colonial period. I king." They planted their colony on the cannot, however, forbear saying, that al- broad basis of toleration for all Christian though the greater number of the estab-sects, and in this noble spirit the governlished ministers seem, at that epoch, to ment was conducted for fifty years. Think have been very poorly qualified for their what we may of their creed, and very dif-great work, others were an ornament to ferent as was this policy from what Rotheir calling. I may mention as belong-manism elsewhere might have led us to ing to early times the names of the Rev.expect, we cannot refuse to Lord BaltiRobert Hunt and the Rev. Alexander Whit-more's colony the praise of having estabaker. The former of these accompanied lished the first government in modern the first settlers, preached the first Eng times, in which entire toleration was lish sermon ever heard on the American' granted to all denominations of Chriscontinent, and by his calm and judicious tians; this too, at a time when the Newcounsels, his exemplary conduct, and his England Puritans could hardly bear with faithful ministrations, rendered most im- one another, much less with "papists ;" portant services to the infant colony. The when the zealots of Virginia held both latter was justly styled "the Apostle of "papists" and "Dissenters" in nearly equal Virginia." At a later period, we find, abhorrence; and when, in fact, toleration among other worthies, the Rev. James was not considered in any part of the ProtBlair, whose indefatigable exertions in the estant world to be due to Roman Catholics. cause of religion and education rank him After being thus avowed at the outset, tolamong the greatest benefactors of Ameri-eration was renewed in 1649, when, by the ca. Nor were there laymen wanting death of Charles I., the government in among those who had the cause of God at. England was about to pass into the handsheart. Morgan Morgan, in particular, was of the extreme opponents of the Roman greatly blessed in his endeavours to sustain the spirit of piety, by founding churches and otherwise, more especially in the northern part of the Great Valley. In later times Virginia has produced many illustrious men, not only in the Episcopal, but in almost every other denomination of Christians.

In point of intolerance, the Legislature of Virginia equalled, if it did not exceed, that of Massachusetts. Attendance at parish

Catholics. "And whereas the enforcing
of the conscience in matters of religion,"
such is the language of their statute,
"hath frequently fallen out to be of dan-
gerous consequence in those common-
wealths where it has been practised, and
for the more quiet and peaceable govern-
ment of this province, and the better to
preserve mutual love and amity among the
inhabitants, no person within this province
professing to believe in Jesus Christ shall

Many

be any way troubled, molested, or discoun-, New-York, as well as with emigrants tenanced for his or her religion, or in the from England. The Earl of Shaftesbury, free exercise thereof." Meanwhile, Prot- when committed to the Tower in 1681, estant sects increased so much, that the begged for leave to exile himself to Carpolitical power of the state passed, at olina. length, entirely out of the hands of its Nor were they Churchmen only who founders, and before the war of the Rev-emigrated thither from England. olution, many churches had been planted Dissenters, disgusted with the unfavourain it by Episcopalians, Presbyterians, and ble state of things in that country, went Baptists. out also, carrying with them intelligence, industry, and sobriety. Joseph Blake, in particular, brother of the gallant admiral of that name, having inherited his brother's fortune, devoted it to transporting his persecuted brethren to America, and conducted thither a company of them from Somersetshire.. Thus the booty taken from New Spain helped to people South Carolina.* A colony from Ireland, also, went over, and were soon merged among the other colonists.

North Carolina was first colonized by stragglers from Virginia settling on the rivers that flow into Albemarle Sound, and among these were a good many Quakers, driven out of Virginia by the intolerance of its laws. This was about the middle of the seventeenth century. Puritans from New-England, and emigrants from Barbadoes, followed in succession; but the Dissenters from Virginia predominated. Religion for a long while seems to have received but little attention. William Edmunson and George Fox visited their Quaker friends among the pine groves of Albemarle in 1672, and found a "tender people." A Quarterly Meeting was established, and thenceforward that religious body may be said to have organized a spiritual government in the colony. But it was long before any other made much progress. No Episcopal minister was settled in it until 1703, and no church built until 1705.

Such was the character of what might be called the substratum of the population in South Carolina. The colonists were of various origin, but many of them had carried thither the love of true religion, and the number of such soon increased.

Το

Georgia, of all the original thirteen colonies, ranks latest in point of date. The good Oglethorpe, one of the finest speciinens of a Christian gentleman of the Cavalier school, one who loved his king and The Proprietaries, it is true, who obtain- his Church, led over a mixed people to ed North as well as South Carolina from settle on the banks of the Savannah. Poor Charles II., professed to be actuated by a debtors, taken from the prisons of England, "laudable and pious zeal for the propaga- formed a strange medley with godly Motion of the Gospel;" but they did nothing ravians from Herrnhut in Germany, and to vindicate their claim to such praise. In brave Highlanders from Scotland. their "Constitutions" they maintained, that Georgia, also, were directed the youthful religion and the profession of it were in- steps of those two wonderful men, John dispensable to the well-being of the state and Charles Wesley, and the still more eland privileges of citizenship; vain words, oquent Whitefield, who made the pine foras long as no measures were taken to pro- ests that stretch from the Savannah to the mote what they thus lauded. But we shall Altamaha resound with the tones of their yet see that, little as true religion owed in fervid piety. In Georgia, too, was built. North Carolina to the first settlers, or to the "Orphan House," for the erection of the Proprietaries, that state eventually ob- which so much eloquence was poured tained a large population of a truly reli- forth, both in England and in the Atlantic gious character, partly from the emigra- cities of her American colonies, by the tion of Christians from France and Scot-last-named herald of the Gospel, but which land, partly from the increase of Puritans was not destined to fulfil the expectations from New-England. of its good and great founder.

South Carolina began to be colonized in Thus we find that religion was not the 1670 by settlers shipped to the province by predominating motive that led to the colthe Proprietaries, and from that time for-onization of the Southern States, as was ward it received a considerable accession the case with New-England; and yet it of emigrants almost every year. Its cli- cannot be said to have been altogether mate was represented as being the finest wanting. It is remarkable, that in every in the world: under its almost tropical charter granted to the Southern colonies, sun flowers were said to blossom every "the propagation of the Gospel" is menmonth of the year: orange groves were tioned as one of the reasons for the plantto supplant those of cedar, silk-worms ing of them being undertaken. And we were to be fed on mulberry-trees intro- shall see that that essential element of a duced from the south of France, and the people's prosperity ultimately received a choicest wines were to be produced. * Bancroft's "History of the United States," vol. Ships arrived with Dutch settlers from ii., p. 172, 173.

vast accession of strength from the emi- | grants whom God was preparing to send from the Old World to those parts of the New.

CHAPTER VI.

RELIGIOUS CHARACTER OF THE EARLY COLO-
NISTS.-FOUNDERS OF NEW-YORK.

first a mere station for traders, gradually bore the appearance of a regular plantation; and New Amsterdam, on Manhattan Island, began to look like some thriving town, with its little fleet of Dutch ships almost continually lying at its wharves. Settlements were also made at the west end of Long Island, on Staten Island, along the North River up to Albany, and even beyond that, as well as at Bergen, at various points on the Hackensack, and on the Raritan, in what was afterward New-Jersey.

We now proceed to give some account of the intermediate states between NewHarmony at this time subsisted between England and those in the South, compri- the Dutch and their Puritan neighbours, notsing New-York, New-Jersey, Delaware, withstanding the dispute about their respecand Pennsylvania. We begin with New- tive boundaries. In 1627, we find the GovYork, which, as we have seen, was first ernor of New Netherlands, or New Belgium, colonized by the Dutch. as the country was sometimes called, pay"The spirit of the age," says an eloquenting a visit of courtesy and friendship to the author,* to whom we have often referred, Plymouth colony, by which he was receivwas present when the foundations of New-ed with "the noise of trumpets." A treaty York were laid. Every great European of friendship and commerce was proposed. event affected the fortunes of America. Did" Our children after us," said the Pilgrims, a state prosper, it sought an increase of wealth by plantations in the West: Was a sect persecuted, it escaped to the New World. The Reformation, followed by collisions between English Dissenters and the Anglican hierarchy, colonized New-England. The Reformation, emancipating the United Provinces, led to European settlements on the Hudson. The Netherlands divide with England the glory of having planted the first colonies in the United States: they also divide the glory of having set the example of public freedom. If England gave our fathers the idea of a popular representation, Holland originated for them the principle of federal union."

It was the Dutch, we remarked, who first discovered the Rivers Hudson and Connecticut, and probably the Delaware also. In 1614, five years after Henry Hudson had sailed up the first of those streams, and to which he gave his name, they erected a few huts upon Manhattan Island, where now stands the city of New-York,

The first attempts to establish trading stations, for they hardly could be called settlements, were made by the merchants of Amsterdam. But when the Dutch West India Company was formed, in 1621, it ob- | tained a monopoly of the trade with all parts of the Atlantic coast claimed by Holland in North America. Colonization on the Hudson River does not appear to have been the main object of that Company. The territory of New Netherlands was not even named in the charter, nor did the States-General guaranty its possession and protection. Trade with the natives in skins and furs was, in fact, the primary and almost exclusive object.

But in a few years, as the families of the Company's factors increased, what was at proft's "History of the United States,"

"shall never forget the good and courteous entreaty which we found in your country, and shall desire your prosperity forever."

The colony, as it extended, gradually penetrated into the interior of East Jersey, and along the shores of the Delaware. Still, receiving neither protection nor encouragement from the fatherland, and abandoned to the tender mercies of a low-minded commercial corporation, its progress was not what might have been expected. It had not always wise governors. The infamous Kieft, neglecting to conciliate the Indians, allowed the settlers on Staten Island to be destroyed by the savages of NewJersey; and having, in a most wanton attack upon a tribe of the friendly Algonquins, massacred many of them in cold blood, the colony lay for two whole years (1643-1645) exposed to attack at all points, and was threatened with absolute ruin. From the banks of the Raritan to the borders of the Connecticut, not a "bowery" (farm) was safe. "Mine eyes," says an eyewitness, saw the flames of their towns, and the flights and hurries of men, women, and children, the present removal of all that could to Holland!" In this war the celebrated Anne Hutchinson, one of the most extraordinary women of her age, was murdered by the Indians, together with all her family, with but one exception.

66

Next to this disastrous war, the colony was most retarded by the want of a popular form of government, and by the determination of the West India Company not to concede one.

The first founders of New Netherlands were men of a bold and enterprising turn, whose chief motive in leaving Holland was, no doubt, the acquisition of wealth. But educated in the National Dutch Church, they brought with them a strong attach

ment to its doctrines, worship, and govern-, Among others who thus came by way of ment; and however deeply interested in Holland to America was Robert Livingtheir secular pursuits, they unquestionably ston, ancestor of the numerous and distintook early measures to have the Gospel guished family of that name to be found in preached purely among them, and to have various parts of America, but particularly the religious institutions of their fatherland in the State of New-York, and son of that planted and maintained in their adopted pious and celebrated minister, the Rev. country. A church was organized at New | John Livingston, of Scotland, who, after Amsterdam, now New-York, not later, being eminently blessed in his labours in probably, than 161o; and there was one at his native country, was, in 1663, driven by Albany as early, not earlier. The first persecution into Holland, where he spent minister of the spel settled at New- the remainder of his life as minister of the York was the Rev. Everardus Bogardus. Scotch Church at Rotterdam.

Several causes retarded the progress of religion among the Dutch colonists in America. One was the unsettled state of the country, caused by actual or dreaded

the churches being long unnecessarily dependant for their pastors on the classis, or presbytery, of Amsterdam; a body which, however well disposed, was at too remote a distance to exercise a proper judgment in selecting such ministers as the circumstances of the country and the people required; a third is to be found in the lateness of the introduction of the English tongue into the public services of the churches; it ought to have occurred at least fifty years sooner.

The Dutch language was exclusively used in the Dutch churches until 1764, being exactly a century after the colony had fallen into the hands of the English. As soon as that event took place, the new gov-hostilities with the Indians; another lay in ernor made great efforts to introduce the language of his own country, by opening schools in which it was taught. This, together with the introduction of the English Episcopal Church, and the encouragement it received from Governor Fletcher, in 1693, made the new language come rapidly into use. The younger colonists began to urge that, for a part of the day at least, English should be used in the churches; or that new churches should be built for those who commonly spoke that tongue. At length, after much opposition from some who Notwithstanding these hinderances, the dreaded lest, together with the language of blessed Gospel was widely and successtheir fathers, their good old doctrines, lit-fully preached and maintained in the colourgy, catechisms, and all should disappear, ny, both when under the government of the Rev. Dr. Laidlie, a distinguished Scotch Holland and afterward. Its beneficial inminister who had been settled in an Eng- fluence was seen in the strict and wholelish Presbyterian church at Flushing, in some morals that characterized the comHolland, connected with the Reformed munity, and in the progress of education Dutch Church, was invited to New-York, among all classes, especially after the in order to commence Divine service there adoption of a more popular form of governin English. Having accepted this call, he ment. Many faithful pastors were either was, in 1764, transferred to that city, and sent over from Holland, or raised up at in his new charge his labours were long later periods in the colony, and sent over and greatly blessed. From that time the to Holland for instruction in theology. Dutch language gradually disappeared, so Among the former I may mention the that hardly a vestige of it now remains. Rev. T. J. Frelinghuysen, who came from Holland in 1720, and settled on the Raritan. As an able, evangelical, and eminently successful preacher, he proved a great blessing to the Reformed Dutch Church in America. He left five sons, all ministers, and two daughters, who were married to ministers.* In confirmation of this statement, we may add the testimony of the

The population of New Netherlands, when it fell into the hands of the English, is supposed to have been about ten thousand, or half as many as that of NewEngland at the same date. There has been a slight emigration to it from Holland ever since, too small, however, to be regarded as of any importance. But all the emigrants from Dutch ports to America were not Hollanders. The Reformation had made the Dutch an independent nation, and the long and bitter experience they had had of oppression led them to offer an asylum to the persecuted Protestants of England, Scotland, France, Italy, and Germany.*

This has often been made an occasion of reproach and ridicule by men of more wit than grace

or sense.

Beaumont and Fletcher, in their "Maid of the Inn," introduce one of their characters as saying,

"I am a schoolmaster, sir, and would fain E

Confer with you about erecting four
New sects of religion at Amsterdam."

And Andrew Marvell, in his "Character of Holland," writes:

"Sure, when religion did itself embark,

And from the East would westward steer its bark,
It struck; and splitting on this unknown ground,
Each one thence pillaged the first piece he found.
Hence Amsterdam, Turk, Christian, Pagan, Jew,
Staple of sects, and mint of schism, grew;
That bank of conscience, where not one so strange
Opinion, but finds credit and exchange.
In vain for Catholics ourselves we bear;
The Universal Church is only there."

* Christian Magazine, quoted in Dr. Gunn's Memoirs of Dr. Livingston, p. 87.