Though religion, rightly understood and generally practiced, is productive of the most salutary and beneficial consequences to society, yet nothing has a more pernicious influence than mistaken notions of it. Of all kinds of delusion, religious enthusiasm is the most deplorable, and has often been attended with the most melancholy and dismal effects. By abusing the best things, they may be made the innocent occasion of the worst. Many calamities have happened in the world, even on account of religion, yet the fatal consequences ought not to be charged to that divine institution which naturally breathes benevolence, gentleness and peace, but to the ignorance and corruption of human nature, which pervert and abuse it. Enthusiasts generally agree in two articles: they disclaim the power and authority of the civil magistrate, and mistake their own wild fancies, the fruits of a distempered brain, for the impulses of the Divine Spirit, both of which are big with the most fatal consequences to society. The desperate fanatic Venner, in the reign of Charles the second, was not more transported with religious phrenzy and madness, than an unfortunate family in Carolina at this time happened to be. For the credit of the province, it were to be wished that such an incident lay buried in eternal oblivion; but history claims the privilege of exhibiting examples of different kinds for public instruction. If good examples serve as a spur to stimulate men to virtue and religion, bad ones, on the contrary, may also serve, like beacons upon a rock, to warn men of danger and delusion.
[Sidenote] The enthusiasm of the family of Dutartre.
"The family of Dutartres consisting of four sons and four daughters, were descendents of French refugees, who came into Carolina after the revocation of the edict of Nantz. They lived in Orange-quarter and though in low circumstances, always maintained an honest character, and were esteemed by their neighbours persons of blameless and irreproachable lives. But at this time a strolling Moravian preacher happening to come to that quarter where they lived, insinuated himself into their family, and partly by conversation, and partly by the writings of Jacob Behman, which he put into their hands, filled their heads with wild and fantastic ideas. Unhappily for the poor family those strange notions gained ground on them, insomuch that in one year they began to withdraw themselves from the ordinances of public worship, and all conversation with the world around them, and strongly to imagine they were the only family upon earth who had the knowledge of the true God, and whom he vouchsafed to instruct, either by the immediate impulses of his Spirit, or by signs and tokens from heaven. At length it came to open visions and revelations. God raised up a prophet among them, like unto Moses, to whom he taught them to hearken. This prophet was Peter Rombert, who had married the eldest daughter of the family when a widow. To this man the Author and Governor of the world deigned to reveal, in the plainest manner, that the wickedness of man was again so great in the world, that as in the days of Noah he was determined to destroy all men from off the face of it, except one family whom he would save for raising up a godly seed upon earth. This revelation Peter Rombert was sure of, and felt it as plain as the wind blowing on his body, and the rest of the family, with equal confidence and presumption, firmly believed it.
"A few days after this, God was pleased to reveal himself a second time to the prophet, saying, Put away the woman whom thou hast for thy wife, and when I have destroyed this wicked generation, I will raise up her first husband from the dead, and they shall be man and wife as before, and go thou and take to wife her youngest sister, who is a virgin, so shall the chosen family be restored entire, and the holy seed preserved pure and undefiled in it. At first the father, when he heard of this revelation, was staggered at so extraordinary a command from heaven; but the prophet assured him that God would give him a sign, which accordingly happened; upon which the old man took his youngest daughter by the hand, and gave her to the wise prophet immediately for his wife, who without further ceremony took the damsel and deflowered her. Thus for some time they continued in acts of incest and adultery, until that period which made the fatal discovery, and introduced the bloody scene of blind fanaticism and madness.
"Those deluded wretches were so far possessed with the false conceit of their own righteousness and holiness, and of the horrid wickedness of all others, that they refused obedience to the civil magistrate, and all laws and ordinances of men. Upon pretence that God commanded them to bear no arms, they not only refused to comply with the militia law, but also the law for repairing the high-ways. After long forbearance, Mr. Simmons, a worthy magistrate, and the officer of the militia in that quarter, found it necessary to issue his warrants for levying the penalty of the laws upon them. But by this time Judith Dutartre, the wife the prophet obtained by revelation, proving with child, another warrant was issued for bringing her before the Justice to be examined, and bound over to the general sessions, in consequence of a law of the province, framed for preventing bastardy. The constable having received his warrants, and being jealous of meeting with no good usage in the execution of his office, prevailed on two or three of his neighbours to go along with him. The family observing the constable coming, and being apprized of his errand, consulted their prophet, who soon told them that God commanded them to arm and defend themselves against persecution, and their substance against the robberies of ungodly men; assuring them at the same time that no weapon formed against them should prosper. Accordingly they did so, and laying hold of their arms, fired on the constable and his followers, and drove them out of their plantation. Such behaviour was not to be tolerated, and therefore Captain Simmons gathered a party of militia, and went to protect the constable in the execution of his office. When the deluded family saw the Justice and his party approaching, they shut themselves up in their house, and firing from it like furies, shot Captain Simmons dead on the spot, and wounded several of his party. The militia returned the fire, killed one woman within the house, and afterwards forcibly entering it, took the rest prisoners, six in number, and brought them to Charlestown.
[Sidenote] Their trial and condemnation.
"At the Court of general sessions, held in September 1724, three of them were brought to trial, found guilty and condemned. Alas! miserable creatures, what amazing infatuation possessed them! They pretended they had the Spirit of God leading them to all truth, they knew it and felt it: but this spirit, instead of influencing them to obedience, purity and peace, commanded them to commit rebellion, incest, and murder. What is still more astonishing, the principal persons among them, I mean the prophet, the father of the family, and Michel Boneau, never were convinced of their delusion, but persisted in it until their last breath. During their trial they appeared altogether unconcerned and secure, affirming that God was on their side, and therefore they feared not what man could do unto them. They freely told the incestuous story in open court in all its circumstances and aggravations, with a good countenance, and very readily confessed the facts respecting their rebellion and murder, with which they stood charged, but pled their authority from God in vindication of themselves, and insisted they had done nothing in either case but by his express command.
"As it is commonly the duty of clergymen to visit persons under sentence of death, both to convince them of their error and danger, and prepare them for death by bringing them to a penitent disposition; Alexander Garden, the episcopal minister of Charlestown, to whom we are indebted for this account, attended those condemned persons with great diligence and concern. What they had affirmed in the court of justice, they repeated and confessed to him in like manner in the prison. When he began to reason with them and to explain the heinous nature of their crimes, they treated him with disdain. Their motto was, Answer him not a word; who is he that should presume to teach them, who had the Spirit of God speaking inwardly to their souls. In all they had done, they said they had obeyed the voice of God, and were now about to suffer martyrdom for his religion. But God had assured them, that he would either work a deliverance for them, or raise them up from the dead on the third day. These things the three men continued confidently to believe, and notwithstanding all the means used to convince them of their mistake, persisted in the same belief until the moment they expired. At their execution they told the spectators with seeming triumph, they should soon see them again, for they were certain they should rise from the dead on the third day. With respect to the other three, the daughter Judith being with child, was not tried, and the two sons, David and John Dutartre, about eighteen and twenty years of age, having been also tried and condemned, continued sullen and reserved, in hopes of seeing those that were executed rise from the dead, but being disappointed, they became, or at least seemed to become, sensible of their error, and were both pardoned. Yet not long afterwards one of them relapsed into the same snare, and murdered an innocent person, without either provocation or previous quarrel, and for no other reason, as he confessed, but that God had commanded him so to do. Being a second time brought to trial, he was found guilty of murder and condemned. Mr. Garden attended him again under the second sentence, and acknowledged, with great appearance of success. No man could appear more deeply sensible of his error and delusion, or could die a more sincere and hearty penitent on account of his horrid crimes. With great attention he listened to Mr. Garden, while he explained to him the terms of pardon and salvation proposed in the Gospel, and seemed to die in the humble hopes of mercy, through the all-sufficient merits of a Redeemer."
Thus ended that tragical scene of fanaticism, in which seven persons lost their lives, one was killed, two were murdered, and four executed for the murders. A signal and melancholy instance of the weakness and frailty of human nature, and to what giddy heights of extravagance and madness, an inflamed imagination will carry unfortunate mortals. It is hard for the wisdom of men to conceive a remedy for a distemper such as religious infatuation. Severity and persecution commonly add strength to the contagion, and render it more furious. Indulgence and lenity might perhaps prove more efficacious, as the swellings of phrenzy would in time subside, in proportion as they exceed the bounds of nature. Had they given this unhappy family time for cool thought and reflection, it is not improbable that those clouds of delusion which overspread their minds might have dispersed, and they might have returned to a sense of their frailty and error. But it belongs to the civil power to prohibit wild enthusiasts and mad visionaries from spreading doctrines among vulgar people, destructive of civil order and public peace. The majority of mankind every where are ignorant and credulous, and therefore are objects of compassion, and ought to be protected against the baleful influence of such men as seduce them from their duty and subjection to legal authority, by poisoning their minds with notions hurtful to themselves and others.
[Sidenote] Progress of the colony.