The Beginners of a Nation / A History of the Source and Rise of the Earliest English Settlements in America, with Special Reference to the Life and Character of the People

by Edward Eggleston

XVI.

Mrs. Hutchinson's doctrines. In these meetings she emphasized Cotton's favorite doctrine of "a covenant of grace." Her sensitive woman's nature no doubt had beat its wings against the bars of legalism. Compare Whelewright's Sermon in Proc. Mass. Hist. Soc., 1866, 265. Cotton's Sermon on the Churches Resurrection, 1642. She was not a philosopher, but nothing could be more truly in accord with the philosophy of character than her desire to give to conduct a greater spontaneity. Cotton himself preached in the same vein. In addition to the Reformation, of which Puritans made so much, he looked for something more which he called, in the phrase of the Apocalypse, "the first resurrection." Mrs. Hutchinson, who was less prudent and more virile than Cotton, did not hesitate to describe most of the ministers in the colony as halting under a "covenant of works." Her doctrine was, at bottom, an insurrection against the vexatious legalism of Puritanism. She carried her rebellion so far that she would not even admit that good works were a necessary evidence of conversion. It was the particular imbecility of the age that thought of almost every sort must spin a cocoon of theological phrases for itself. Spontaneity of religious and moral action represented itself to Mrs. Hutchinson and her followers as an indwelling of the Holy Ghost in the believer and as a personal union with Christ whom they identified with the "new creature" of Paul. Such a hardening of metaphor into dogma is one of the commonest phenomena of religious thought.

XVII.

Vane's arrival, 1635. Sir Henry Vane the younger, who had become an ardent Puritan in spite of his father, landed in Boston in October, 1635. He had already shown those gifts which enabled him afterward to play a considerable part in English history. His election as governor, 1636. His high connections made him an interesting figure, and though only about twenty-six years of age he was chosen governor in May, 1636. Ardent by nature, and yet in his youth when he "forsook the honors and preferments of the court to enjoy the ordinances of Christ in their purity," nothing was more natural than that he should be captivated by the seraphic Cotton and that he should easily adopt the transcendental views of Mrs. Hutchinson. Winthrop, the natural leader of the colony, having given place in 1635 to Haynes, perhaps in order that Hooker's party might be conciliated and the Connecticut emigration avoided, was a second time thrust aside that a high-born youth might be honored. Winthrop was utterly opposed to Mrs. Hutchinson, in whose teachings his apprehensive spirit saw full-fledged Antinomianism, and, by inference, potential anabaptism, blasphemy, and sedition. The Hutchinsonians were partisans of Vane, who adhered to their doctrine. The ministers other than Cotton and Whelewright, stung by the imputation that they were under "a covenant of works," rallied about Winthrop. Political cleavage and religious division unfortunately coincided.

XVIII.

Arrogance of the Hutchinson party. Supported by the prestige of the young governor and of some conspicuous citizens and inspired by Cotton's metaphorical and mystical preaching, which was interpreted with latitude, the enthusiasm of the Hutchinsonians tended to become fanaticism. We have to depend mainly on the prejudiced account of their enemies, but there is little reason to doubt that the advocates of "a covenant of grace" assumed the airs of superiority usually seen in those who have discovered a short cut to perfection. The human spirit knows few greater consolations than well-disguised self-righteousness. The followers of Mrs. Hutchinson, if we may believe the witnesses, sometimes showed their sanctity by walking out of meeting when a preacher not under "a covenant of grace" entered the pulpit. They even interrupted the services with controversial questions addressed to the minister. Wilson, pastor of the Boston church, was condemned by them as being under "a covenant of works," and also incidentally criticised for his "thick utterance." Nor can one find that Cotton interposed his authority to protect his less gifted colleague. It is quite conceivable that he looked with some satisfaction on the progress of affairs in Boston. 1636. The heavenly minded young governor who had chosen to suffer reproach with the people of God was his disciple. The brilliant woman who was easily the leader of the town was the very apostle of his doctrine. The superiority of his opinions on a union with Christ that preceded active faith as compared with those of Hooker and the lesser divines was enthusiastically asserted by the great majority of the Boston church, led by Mrs. Hutchinson. Seeing so much zeal and sound doctrine he may have felt that the first or spiritual resurrection of which he was wont to prophesy from the Apocalypse, had already begun in his own congregation, and that among these enthusiasts were those who had learned to "buy so as though they bought not"—those who had been lifted into a crystalline sphere where they had "the Moone under their feet. Cotton's Churches Resurrection, p. 27. And if we have the Moone under our feete, then wee are not eclipsed when the Moone is Eclipsed." Thus did Cotton's imagination revel in cosmical imagery.

XIX.

Bitterness of the debate. The arrogance of the elect is hard to bear, and it is not wonderful that the debate waxed hot. The concentrated religiousness of a town that sought to shut out unbelieving residents made the dispute dangerous. In the rising tempest a ballast of ungodly people might have been serviceable. But in Boston there were few even of the indifferent to be buffers in the religious collision. While the covenant-of-grace people made themselves offensive, their opponents,—Winthrop, the slighted ex-governor, Wilson, the unpopular pastor, and the ministers accused of being under a covenant of works—resorted to the favorite weapons of polemics. They hatched a brood of inferences from the opinions Mrs. Hutchinson held, or was thought to hold, and then made her responsible for the ugly bantlings. They pretended to believe, and no doubt did believe, that Mrs. Hutchinson's esoteric teaching was worse than what she gave out. They borrowed the names of ancient heresies, long damned by common consent, to give odium to her doctrine. That the new party should be called Antinomian was plausible; the road they had chosen for escape from Puritan legalism certainly lay in that direction. But Antinomianism had suffered from an imputation of immorality, and no such tendency was apparent, unless by logical deduction, in the doctrines taught in Boston. The hearers of Mrs. Hutchinson were also accused of having accepted the doctrines of the so-called Family of Love which had of old been accused of many detestable things, and was a common bugaboo of theology at the time. The whole town of Boston and the whole colony of Massachusetts was set in commotion by the rude theological brawl. Overthrow of Vane, 1637. Such was the state of combustion in Boston that it was thought necessary by the opponents of Vane and Mrs. Hutchinson to hold the court of elections at the former capital, Newtown. The excitement at this court was so great that the church members, who only could vote, were on the point of laying violent hands on one another in a contest growing out of a question relating to the indwelling of the Holy Ghost. Vane was defeated, and Winthrop again made governor.

XX.

The Synod of 1637. A great synod of elders from all the New England churches was assembled. All the way from Ipswich and Newbury on the east and from the Connecticut on the west the "teaching elders" made their way by water or by land, at public expense, that they might help the magistrates of Massachusetts to decide on what they should compel the churches to believe. Short Story of the Rise, Reign, etc., passim. For more than three weeks the synod at Cambridge wrestled with the most abstruse points of doctrine. Winthrop's Journal, i, 284, and following. The governor frequently had to interpose to keep the peace; sometimes he adjourned the assembly, to give time for heats to cool. Cotton's Way of the Churches Cleared, passim. A long list of errors, most of which were not held by anybody in particular, were condemned. A nearly unanimous conclusion on certain fine-spun doctrines was reached at length by means of affirmations couched in language vague or ambiguous. Cotton, who had been forced after debate to recant one opinion and modify others, assented to the inconclusive conclusions, but with characteristic non-committalism he qualified his assent and withheld his signature.