Christian Sects in the Nineteenth Century

by Caroline Frances Cornwallis

LETTER VIII.
PARTICULAR BAPTISTS, SUB AND SUPRALAPSARIANS, SANDEMANIANS.

Having now given some account of the principal Calvinistic sects, I shall conclude by mentioning a few of those less numerous societies, which, whilst agreeing in the peculiar doctrines of Calvin, differ upon other points. The particular baptists, agreeing with the General Baptists on most other practices and doctrines, differ from them on this. The separation took place in the year 1616, when a controversy on the subject of infant baptism having arisen among the Baptists, one portion calling itself the “Independent Congregation” seceded, embraced the Calvinistic doctrine, and became the first Particular Baptists: others, who were in general attached to the opinions of Calvin, concerning the decrees of God and Divine Grace, were not entirely agreed concerning the manner of explaining the doctrine of the Divine decrees. The greater part believed that God only permitted the first man to fall into transgression, without particularly predetermining his fall: these were termed sublapsarians. But others again maintained that “God in order to exercise and display his justice and his free mercy, had decreed from all eternity the transgression of Adam, and so ordered the course of events, that our first parents could not possibly avoid their fall. These were termed supralapsarians.

There is a modern sect that originated in Scotland about 1728, termed Glassites, from its founder Mr. John Glass, who was expelled by the Synod from the Church of Scotland, for maintaining that “the kingdom of Christ was not of this world.” His adherents then formed themselves into churches, conformable in their institution and discipline to what they apprehended to be the plan of the first churches recorded in the New Testament. Soon after the year 1755, Mr. John Sandeman (an elder in one of these congregations in Scotland) attempted to prove that “Faith is neither more nor less than a simple assent to the Divine testimony, concerning Jesus Christ delivered for the offences of men and raised again for their justification, as recorded in the New Testament.” He also mentioned that the word Faith or Belief, is constantly used by the Apostles to signify what is denoted by it in common conversation, i.e. a persuasion of the truth of any proposition, and that there is no difference between believing any common testimony, and believing the apostolic testimony, except that which results from the testimony itself, and the Divine authority on which it rests. This led to controversy among the Calvinists and Sandemanians, concerning the nature of justifying faith; and the latter formed themselves into a separate sect. They administer the sacrament of the Lord’s supper weekly, and hold “love feasts,” of which every member is not only allowed but required to partake, and which consists of their dining together at each other’s houses, in the interval between the morning and afternoon service. They interpret literally the precept respecting the “kiss of charity,” which they use on the admission of a new member, as well as on other occasions, when they deem it necessary or proper: they make a weekly collection before the sacrament of the Lord’s supper; use mutual exhortation; abstain from blood and things strangled; wash each other’s feet; hold that every one is to consider all that he possesses to be liable to the calls of the poor and the church, and that it is unlawful to “lay up treasure upon earth,” by setting them apart for any future use. They allow of public and private diversions, so far as they are not connected with circumstances really sinful; but apprehending a lot to be sacred, they disapprove of lotteries, playing at cards, dice, &c. They maintain the necessity of a plurality of elders, pastors, or bishops in each church, and the necessity of the presence of two elders in every act of discipline, and at the administration of the Lord’s supper. Second marriages disqualify for the office of elder. The elders are ordained by prayer and fasting, imposition of hands, and giving the “right hand of fellowship.” In their discipline they are strict and severe, and in every transaction esteem unanimity to be absolutely necessary.

LETTER IX.
CALVINISTIC METHODISTS. EVANGELICAL OR SERIOUS CHRISTIANS.

I noticed the name of George Whitfield when speaking of Wesley and his followers, for during a time they acted in unison; Whitfield, however, soon embraced the Calvinistic tenets, and then the friends separated with much of unkindly feeling. Wesley held the doctrines of Calvin in abhorrence, as altogether unchristian and unfounded in Scripture. “I defy you to say so hard a thing of the Devil,” said he with characteristic earnestness, when speaking of the notion that God could arbitrarily create any for eternal reprobation. This separation between the leaders soon extended to their congregations, and from that time Calvinistic and Wesleyan Methodists became distinct sects, differing, however, but little on any other point, excepting in the greater tendency to enthusiasm among the followers of Whitfield.

“Wesley and Whitfield,” says Mr. Sidney in his life of Rowland Hill, “were men of widely different characters, both in respect to their natural dispositions as well as the discipline of their minds; and painful frailties were visible in the midst of their true greatness. An ambitious love of power was evidently the besetting weakness of John Wesley; aspiration to the honours when he had no prospect of the suffering of martyrdom, was that of Whitfield.” In his letters to Rowland Hill, it is evident how he courted and enjoyed persecution; and whenever “the fire (to use his own expression) was kindled in the country;” he was not satisfied unless “honoured” by being scorched a little in its flame. This was a wrong spirit, and did injury to his own mind, and to his followers, by encouraging a morose and morbid carriage towards the world, giving needless offence, and provoking animosity in those who might have been attracted and endeared to truth by the lovely graces of pure Christianity.”

At the time when he, and his early friends the Wesleys began their ministry, the piety of all classes was at a very low ebb. The earnestness of these men gave a new impulse to religious feeling, and after a time a considerable number of other episcopally ordained ministers of the church, together with a portion of the laity, became influenced by the same sentiments. Without seceding, they formed a party in the church, leaning to Calvinism to the extent they thought justified by the xxxix Articles; and this party soon became designated by several distinguishing terms. They called themselves Evangelical first, afterwards when that became a cant term of misapplied reproach, they took the title of Serious Christians, and by others were called Low Church, and Methodistical. Besides distinguishing themselves by an especial name, they avoided public amusements, used a peculiar phraseology, and seemed to delight in wearing their religion externally in the sight of all men, thinking perhaps to reform the thoughtless by the example of their greater strictness. But herein, in my opinion, they made a net for their own feet, for that very aspiration after greater exaltation which is implanted in us as a spur to strive after glory and immortality, is soon by mismanagement perverted into a love of earthly distinction. Hence comes ambition; but the ambition for worldly honours has in it this alleviation, that the man who toils after a title or a fortune, knows that he is, after all, seeking but a mean object; and if ever his mind is awakened at all to a sense of the world to come, the soul springs back to its true ambition, and launches into the career natural to it: but the man who seeks to be distinguished among his brethren for superior holiness, and wears it externally, that it may be seen and honoured by men, blinds his better nature, and fetters it to earth by chains forged in heaven; he sees not that he is ambitious; he is not aware that while seeking, as he imagines, to honour God in his life, he is enjoying at his heart’s core the respectful homage of men; and whilst attending to his outward deportment, and making a display even of his humility, he too frequently leaves the inner heart unchastened. Our Saviour knew the frailties of man, and his injunction that our religion should chiefly be manifested by our benevolent feelings towards our fellow creatures, while the communing with God should be carried on in silence and secrecy, is the only safe guide in these matters.

I have no doubt that there are many of the Low Church party, whose conscientiousness sets at defiance the dangers of the system they have adopted: indeed my own private friendships warrant me in saying so: but it is not well to lead others into dangerous paths where our own skill indeed may enable us to walk safely, but where the hindmost, whom we are not leading by the hand, are in continual hazard of deviating from the true course; and therefore whilst honouring individual virtues, I continue to consider the whole system erroneous: one whose tendency is to create spiritual pride, and lower the standard of Christian benevolence by restricting to a party that fellowship which should be universal. It does but substitute the excitement of the crowded church where a popular preacher charms with all the graces of rhetoric, of the committee room, of the speakers at Exeter Hall, for the ball room and the theatre; with this difference, that in the first case the instinct which makes the mind seek this excitement, is overlooked; the man believes himself performing a meritorious action, and looks with some contempt on his weaker brethren, who cannot exist without worldly amusements; on the other he knows what he is about, and if he be well-intentioned, guards against excess. It would be wiser therefore to acknowledge the instinct; not bad in itself, for God implanted it, and if it be denied a due indulgence, the mind sinks into hopeless imbecility; and not to blame those who seek other, but innocent means of gratifying it. [122a]

The extracts that I am about to give, from the writings of two men of note, in that party, distinguished also for their genuine Christian feeling, will show that they saw the dangers I have pointed out, and were anxious to guard against them. The following extracts are given in Mr. Sidney’s “Life of the Rev. Rowland Hill.” [122b]