CHAPTER VII.—Diamond Cut Diamond.
The purpose of the easy going settler of Virginia in coming to America was not to find religious freedom, but to better his financial condition. He parted from old England with regret; found the same church in Virginia he had left at home; lived under the same laws and in many ways under the same conditions. He venerated the laws of England and contributed without grumbling towards the support of the Established Church under a general taxation system for that purpose; but appeals by his clergy to curtail privileges granted by acts of toleration aroused no such zeal as was exhibited by his New England non-conformist brother in his attitude towards Baptist and Quaker.
America was fallow soil for new thought; and the first seed sown was that which led to the first constitutional amendment. Sowers of new thought, argued: “You cannot by law control men in their attitude of mind and heart toward God. Religious freedom must come. It is an inalienable right and cannot be denied. It is useless for the state to disturb itself by enacting rules of regulation.” Finally they threatened: “To obtain this right you will force us to support the new issue of local self-government; and if the two, religious freedom and self-government for the colony join forces, it means war.”
So the dissenters, and particularly the Presbyterians, in the first instance, contending for religious freedom only, were forced into the newer controversy to procure the old; and to such an extent were the issues assimilated, [pg 130] that the English correctly attributed the Revolution to the Presbyterians. Walpole, addressing parliament made the statement: “Cousin America has run away with a Presbyterian parson.”
The first act of toleration was passed in 1699. The Act of 1705 provided that if a person denied the existence of God or the Trinity or the divine authority of the scriptures or asserted there are more gods than one; upon conviction of the first offense was deprived of the right to hold an office of trust or emolument; upon the second conviction he was denied the right to sue or to inherit property or to act as trustee for any person or estate and was subject to a sentence of three years’ imprisonment; his own children could be taken from him and placed in more orthodox hands; upon the third conviction he was put to death, though this statute was never invoked.
Before 1750 the spirit of the clergy of the English Church had subsided into moderation; and the dissenter or non-conformist preacher had grown more aggressive; though the laws against him were still oppressive.
Rev. Francis MaKemie established the first Presbyterian churches in the Virginia colony. He was forced repeatedly to appear before the magistrates and once before the Governor; and is accredited with having obtained the first act of toleration in 1699; though Samuel Davies is looked upon as the founder of the Presbyterian Church in Virginia; and to him and Thomas Jefferson, more than to any other men, thanks are due for services in behalf of religious liberty.
From 1732, dissenters, in the main Presbyterians, began to settle the great Valley of Virginia. Within ten years from the establishment of the first Presbyterian [pg 131] church there were Presbyterian churches in nine of the then few counties; they had also obtained promises from the authorities not to disturb them in their worship; though this was a protection guaranteed by the Act of Toleration then in force.
The Presbyterian Synod meeting in Philadelphia in 1738, petitioned the Governor of Virginia that Presbyterians of the valley might have “the free enjoyment of their civil and religious liberties.” They received a favorable reply; which stimulated the emigration of Presbyterians into the valley not only from the less liberal colonies but from the Old Country.
Samuel Davies, protected by compliance with the Act of Tolerance, came to Virginia when but twenty-three years of age and immediately went to work establishing churches. He appeared before the Virginia committee which under a show of compliance with the law, licensed as few non-conformist ministers as was possible; and from that body procured licenses for several ministers and permits to establish several churches in new territory. In the General Court of Virginia, where he was forced to appear; he argued that not only inherently but by the Act of Toleration, applicants for the ministry must be granted the power and place to preach. In this he was opposed by Peyton Randolph, then attorney general for the colony, and though he lost the case was said to have had the better of the argument. He procured from the attorney general of the Mother Country an opinion to the effect that the English law of Toleration, somewhat broader than the colonial, was applicable to, and the law of, the colony. Eventually his fight procured for Presbyterians a liberal interpretation of the Act.
He was always careful to declare that his opposition was not to the Church of England but the clergy, expressing [pg 132] himself “as not against the peculiar rights and ceremonies of the English Church, much less against their excellent articles; but against the general strain of the doctrine delivered from the pulpit, in which their articles were opposed or not mentioned.”
His was a fight, not only for religious liberty, but for the supremacy of Christ in the church, the authenticity of the Bible, equal rights under the law for all denominations and individual right to freedom of conscience.
Because of his work, peace would have prevailed between all confessors of the Trinity and laws curtailing religious freedom would have been annulled; had not the Tidewater clergy bestirred themselves and fanned to flame the last expiring embers of intolerance in Virginia.
He died in 1761; at the time head of what is now Princeton University, having succeeded Jonathan Edwards as president.
After Davies’ efforts ended, other influences at work ultimately brought about the result.
The non-conformists through immigration, natural causes and religious teachings, grew rapidly in strength and influence and became aggressive.
Presbyterian ministers no longer thought of applying in person at the capital, Williamsburg, for license and location as required under the Act, but preached the word of God “wherever duty and conscience inspired them.” This was particularly true in the remoter settlements west of the Blue Ridge.
The French-Indian war was highly favorable to the growth of religious liberty. The non-conformist frontier settlements stood as a barrier to Indian invasion and bore the brunt of the struggle. Tidewater, Virginia, felt grateful towards the Presbyterians and for that reason was inclined to give a liberal construction to the Act.
[pg 133] In 1755, just when the colony was feeling most heavily the burden incident to this war, the clergy of the English Church, who were paid from the public treasury, made demand for increased salaries. Though backed by the King, the demand was unpopular and the colonists were slow in complying; whereupon the clergy instituted a test Suit, known as the Parsons’ case, to recover damages.
Patrick Henry was employed to represent certain citizens in opposition to the parsons. At the time he was an unknown, ungainly and somewhat dissipated young lawyer. It was his first big case. In the beginning he was almost too embarrassed to speak, but as he talked he gained confidence, until with great eloquence and passion he assailed the clergy and finally the King; declaring that the Burgesses of Virginia were “the only authority which could give force to the laws for the government of the colony;” one of the first public utterances declaring for self-government for the colony.
When the case was submitted the jury was peremptorily instructed to find for the plaintiff; and they did so by awarding damages in the sum of one penny. It was a great victory for Henry; the beginning of his greatness and popularity.
The clergy, incensed by the verdict, instituted proceedings for violations of the Act of Toleration. Under these persecutions and counter attacks instituted by the non-conformists charging the conformist clergy with habits of dissipation, Toryism and of laying upon them increased burdens of taxation, the colony was greatly disturbed.
Conformist attacks were chiefly against the Baptists; the Presbyterians had grown too strong. They charged the Baptists with being followers of the German Anabaptists; and predicted horrors similar to those of Munster.
[pg 134] Three Baptist preachers, James Chiles, John Waller and Lewis Craig, were arrested; but were offered their release if they would discontinue preaching. They declined. As they were being carried to prison through the streets of Fredericksburg they sang: “Broad is the way that leads to death;” and while confined, preached to the people who congregated beneath the windows of the jail.
They were arraigned for “preaching the gospel contrary to law.” Patrick Henry, when he heard the charge arose and said: “What do I hear read? Did I hear an expression that these men whom Your Worships are about to try for misdemeanor are charged with preaching the Gospel of the Son of God?”
The result of these persecutions made the conformist clergy yet more unpopular; more of the people became non-conformists, until they numerically exceeded the conformists. Then the non-conformists assumed the role of aggressor; objected to the term dissenter, demanded the repeal of all acts of toleration, religious freedom for all and that the clergy of no sect be paid by general taxation.
Tory influence dominated the conformist clergy; the non-conformist preachers, advocating religious liberty, quite naturally became the first advocates of civil liberty and freedom for the colonies. Thus in the issue that brought about the Revolution, one side of the religious controversialists favored the colony, the other the king; and by the end of the struggle the conformist or English Church was practically non-existent.
Rev. Donald McDonald, going to Williamsburg in the spring of 1772 to lobby against the Bill, “To Regulate His Majesty’s Protestant Subjects,” was forced to remain indefinitely. Of necessity he gave up his church in [pg 135] the valley; and in order to make a living, accepted the call of a small church in Williamsburg.
Here he made the acquaintance of and was vastly aided in his fight for religious freedom by Patrick Henry, Thomas Jefferson, George Mason, Richard Henry Lee and Edmund Pendleton; three of whom were members and vestrymen of the English Church. Each being members of the Upper House of Assembly bore the title of Esquire, which, though now used indiscriminately, was then a title of great respect.
In the old Bruton Church of Williamsburg, a commemorative tablet is inscribed: “To the glory of God and in memory of the members of the committee which drafted the law establishing religious freedom in Virginia; Thomas Jefferson, vestryman of St. Ann’s Parish; Edmund Pendleton, vestryman of Drysdale Parish; George Wyth, vestryman of Bruton Parish; George Mason, vestryman of Truro Parish; Thomas Ludwell Lee, vestryman of Overwharton Parish; being all members of the committee.”
It was George Mason of Gunston Hall, vestryman of Truro Parish, who wrote the Virginia Bill of Rights; and it was copied by Jefferson in preparing the Declaration of Independence.
In the Virginia Bill of Rights it is declared: “That religion is the duty which we owe to our Creator and the manner of discharging it can be directed only by reason and conviction, nor by force or violence; and therefore that all men should enjoy the fullest toleration in the exercise of religion according to the dictates of conscience, unpunished and unrestrained by the magistrate.”
Jefferson has come down as “The father of modern democracy and religious toleration.” It was his bill establishing [pg 136] religious freedom, beginning: “Well aware that Almighty God hath created the mind free; that all attempts to influence it by temporal punishment or burdens or by civil incapacitations, tend only to beget habits of hypocrisy and meanness * * *” that Virginia in territory, then an empire, established perfect religious freedom.
The Bill of the Virginia General Assembly, of December 17, 1785, slightly modified and pushed through by James Madison and Patrick Henry, became the First Amendment to the Constitution of the United States.
[pg 137]