STRATFORD, July 21, 1741. [Footnote: Life of Dr. Samuel Johnson, p. 111.]
And so by an obvious sequence of cause and effect it came to pass that the clergy were early ripe for rebellion, and only awaited their opportunity. Nor could it have been otherwise. An autocratic priesthood had seen their order stripped of its privileges one by one, until nothing remained but their moral empire over their parishioners, and then at last not only did an association of rival ecclesiastics send over emissaries to steal away their people, but they proposed to establish a bishop in the land. The thought was wormwood. He would be rich, he would live in a palace, he would be supported by the patronage and pomp of the royal governors; the imposing ceremonial would become fashionable; and in imagination they already saw themselves reduced to the humble position of dissenters in their own kingdom. Jonathan Mayhew was called a heretic by his more conservative brethren, but he was one of the ablest and the most acrid of the Boston ministers. He took little pains to disguise his feelings, and so early as 1750 he preached a sermon, which was once famous, wherein he told his hearers that it was their duty to oppose the encroachment of the British prelates, if necessary, by force.
“Suppose, then, it was allowed, in general, that the clergy were a useful order of men; that they ought to be esteemed very highly in love for their work’s sake, and to be decently supported by those they serve, ‘the laborer being worthy of his reward.’ Suppose, further, that a number of reverend and right reverend drones, who worked not; who preached, perhaps, but once a year, and then not the gospel of Jesus Christ, but the divine right of tithes, the dignity of their office as ambassadors of Christ, ... suppose such men as these, spending their lives in effeminacy, luxury, and idleness; ... suppose this should be the case, ... would not everybody be astonished at such insolence, injustice, and impiety?” [Footnote: “Discourse concerning Unlimited Submission,” Jonathan Mayhew. Thornton’s American Pulpit, pp. 71, 72.] “Civil tyranny is usually small in its beginning, like ‘the drop of a bucket,’ till at length, like a mighty torrent... it bears down all before it.... Thus it is as to ecclesiastical tyranny also—the most cruel, intolerable, and impious of any. From small beginnings, ‘it exalts itself above all that is called God and that is worshipped.’ People have no security against being unmercifully priest-ridden but by keeping all imperious bishops, and other clergymen who love to ‘lord it over God’s heritage,’ from getting their foot into the stirrup at all.... For which reason it becomes every friend to truth and human kind, every lover of God and the Christian religion, to bear a part in opposing this hateful monster.” [Footnote: Preface to “A Discourse concerning Unlimited Submission,” Jonathan Mayhew. Thornton’s Amer. Pulpit, pp. 50, 51.]
Between these envenomed priests peace was impossible; each year brought with it some new aggression which added fuel to the flame. In 1763, Mr. Apthorp, missionary at Cambridge, published a pamphlet, in answer, as he explained, to “some anonymous libels which appeared in our newspapers ... grossly reflecting on the society & their missionaries, & in particular on the mission at Cambridge.” [Footnote: East Apthorp to the Secretary, June 25, 1763. Perry’s Coll. iii. 500.]
By this time the passions of the Congregationalist divines had reached a point when words seemed hardly adequate to give them expression. The Rev. Ezra Stiles wrote to Dr. Mayhew in these terms:—
“Shall we be hushed into silence, by those whose tender mercies are cruelty; and who, notwithstanding their pretence of moderation, wish the subversion of our churches, and are combined, in united, steady and vigorous effort, by all the arts of subtlety and intreague, for our ruin?” [Footnote: Dr. Ezra Stiles to Dr. Mayhew, 1763. Life of Mayhew, p. 246.]
Mr. Stiles need have felt no anxiety, for, according to Mr. Apthorp, “this occasion was greedily seized, ... by a dissenting minister of Boston, a man of a singular character, of good abilities, but of a turbulent & contentious disposition, at variance, not only with the Church of England, but in the essential doctrines of religion, with most of his own party.” [Footnote: East Apthorp to the Secretary. Perry’s Coll. iii. 500.] He alluded to a tract written by Dr. Mayhew in answer to his pamphlet, in which he reproduced the charge made by Mr. Stiles: “The society have long had a formal design to dissolve and root out all our New-England churches; or, in other words, to reduce them all to the Episcopal form.” [Footnote: Observations on the Charter, etc. of the Society, p. 107.] And withal he clothed his thoughts in language which angered Mr. Caner:—
“A few days after, Mr. Apthorpe published the enclosed pamphlet, in vindication of the institution and conduct of the society, which occasioned the ungenteel reflections which your grace will find in Dr. Mayhew’s pamphlet, in which, not content with the personal abuse of Mr. Apthorpe, he has insulted the missions in general, the society, the Church of England, in short, the whole rational establishment, in so dirty a manner, that it seems to be below the character of a gentleman to enter into controversy with him. In most of his sermons, of which he published a great number, he introduces some malicious invectives against the society or the Church of England, and if at any time the most candid and gentle remarks are made upon such abuse, he breaks forth into such bitter and scurrilous personal reflections, that in truth no one cares to have anything to do with him. His doctrinal principles, which seem chiefly copied from Lord Shaftsbury, Bolingbroke, &c., are so offensive to the generalty of the dissenting ministers, that they refuse to admit him a member of their association, yet they appear to be pleased with his abusing the Church of England.” [Footnote: Rev. Mr. Caner to the Archbishop of Canterbury, June 8, 1763. Perry’s Coll. iii. 497, 498.]
The Archbishop of Canterbury himself now interfered, and tried to calm the tumult by a candid and dignified reply to Dr. Mayhew, in which he labored to show the harmlessness of the proposed bishopric.