Nor was this the persistence of a self-seeking and ambitious man, bent on attaining something for himself. It occurred to him, not unnaturally, that possibly if the State of Connecticut were to be asked to give permission for a bishop to reside within its borders, it might be easier to secure such permission for another than for one who had been imprisoned in New Haven for his loyalty. Accordingly he wrote to his friends here: "I beg that no clergyman in Connecticut will hesitate a moment on my account; the point is to get the Episcopal authority into that country"; and then he went on to say that, if another is designated, "he shall have every assistance in my power." These are not the words of a self- seeking man—a man of low ambitions. But they are the words of a man filled with a great purpose, inspired with a great thought, ready to do and to bear and to wait, so the purpose can be accomplished and the thought take shape. All is summed up by him in a single sentence: "Believe me, there is nothing that is not base that I would not do, nor any risk that I would not run, nor any inconvenience to myself that I would not encounter, to carry this business into effect." [Footnote: While these negotiations in England were in progress, an application was made, without Seabury's knowledge, to Cartwright of Shrewsbury, an irregular non-juring bishop. As, however, this was subsequent to the opening of negotiations with Scotland, nothing, fortunately, came of it. It has been said that an application was made to, or an offer received from, the Danish government, looking to a consecration by Danish bishops. This, however, is a mistake. No application was ever made for consecration in Denmark; while the offer of the Danish government, made through Mr. Adams, our then Minister to England, related only to the ordination of candidates for the diaconate and priesthood. The passage of the Act of Parliament, mentioned above, prevented the necessity of acting on the offer; and fortunately so, for the Danish Episcopate is only titular.]
Nearly fourteen months had now elapsed since Seabury arrived in London. It was clear that consecration must, if obtained at all, be obtained elsewhere than in England, and naturally his thoughts reverted to Scotland. So careful, however, was he to consult in all things those who had elected him, that he would take no decisive step—notwithstanding the instructions given from Woodbury in March, 1783—till they had been communicated with, and their views obtained; so that it was not till August 31, 1784, that he wrote to Dr. Myles Cooper. The letter is creditable alike to his head and his heart. No word of personal disappointment and vexation, no line of reproach finds place in it is the letter of a manly man, too strong in faith and purpose to waste time in complaints and repinings. He applies through his friend to the bishops of Scotland, and adds: "I hope I shall not apply in vain. If they consent to impart the Episcopal succession to the Church of Connecticut, they will, I think, do a good work, and the blessing of thousands will attend them. And perhaps for this cause, among others, God's providence has supported them and continued their succession under various and great difficulties; that a free, valid, and purely ecclesiastical Episcopacy may from them pass into the Western world."
Let me pause, just here, to remind you that this was the third time that men's minds were turned to the Scottish bishops in connection with an American Episcopate.
When, in 1703, the Venerable Society had it in mind to send out to
America a Suffragan to the Bishop of London, it was thought that
consecration could be most readily obtained from the bishops of
Scotland.
In the autumn of 1782, one year after the surrender of Lord Cornwallis at Yorktown—an event which practically settled the question of the independence of the thirteen colonies—the Rev. Dr. George Berkeley, a son of that great prelate who sang of the "westward course of empire," addressed a letter to Bishop Skinner, coadjutor to the Primus of the Scottish Church, suggesting that the bishops of Scotland should consecrate a bishop for America, and saying, "had my honored father's scheme for planting an Episcopal College, whereof he was to have been president, in the Summer Islands, not been sacrificed by the worst minister that Britain ever saw, probably under a mild monarch (who loves the Church of England as much as I believe his grandfather hated it) Episcopacy would have been established in America by a succession from the English Church, unattended by any invidious temporal rank or power."
No doubt the question thus proposed to the Scottish bishops was carefully considered, but the result was unfavorable to Dr. Berkeley's wishes. Bishop Skinner wrote: "Nothing can be done in the affair with safety on our side, till the independence of America be fully and irrevocably recognized by the government of Britain; and even then the enemies of our Church might make a handle of our correspondence with the colonies as a proof that we always wished to fish in troubled waters, and we have little need to give any ground for an imputation of this kind,"
No one who recalls the frightful provisions of the penal acts of Parliament passed in 1746 and 1748, which were plainly intended to annihilate the Scottish Church, and were unrepeated when Bishop Skinner wrote the words just quoted, can wonder at the hesitation of the Scottish bishops. For in executing these laws in days not long passed, "so vigilantly were the Scottish Episcopal clergy watched…that it was with the utmost difficulty they could celebrate any of the services of religion. There are instances of individual clergymen performing public worship no less than sixteen times in one day…..The service was often performed in farm-houses, or in the out-houses of the farmhouse, if these were conveniently constructed. In either case the clergyman, the family, and four persons were in the apartment, and dozens or hundreds of others stationed themselves in as favorable positions as they could, to listen to the prayers of the Church. Sometimes divine service was celebrated under a shed, in which was the number allowed by law, while the people stood at a small distance in the open air. At times, again, when there was no apparent danger; pastor and people met in the recesses of woods, in secluded glens, and on the sides of sequestered mountains, where the vault of heaven was their covering, the moss turfs their humble altar, and perhaps a solitary seat their pulpit." [Footnote: John Parker Lawson's History of the Scottish Episcopal Church, pp. 300-302. See also the Rev. W. Walker's most interesting Life of John Skinner of Linshirt, chap. iii. To make the general statements in the text plainer, I add, in a foot-note, some details which time forbade me to introduce into the sermon. By the Act of 1746, "every person exercising the function of a pastor or minister in any Episcopal meeting in Scotland, without registering his letters of orders, and taking all the oaths prescribed by law, and praying for his Majesty King George and the royal family by name" was "for the first offence to suffer six months' imprisonment; and for the second, or any subsequent offence, was to be transported to some of his Majesty's plantations in America for life; and in case of his return to Great Britain, to suffer imprisonment for life." All chapels were to be closed; and even in a private house only four persons besides the family were allowed to be present at any service. In 1748, no letters of orders, not given by some bishop of England or Ireland, were allowed in Scotland; and no persons were allowed to officiate as chaplains in private families, or to preach or perform any divine services in houses of which they were not the masters, unless they belonged to the Presbyterian establishment. These atrocious acts were, undoubtedly, intended to destroy "root and branch" the Scottish Church. Happily some laws are so stringent that their very stringency prevents their thorough execution. It should never be forgotten that the English Episcopate unanimously opposed the Act of 1748 in the House of Lords.] In very truth, so far as the worship of God was concerned, "they wandered"—these churchmen of Scotland—"in deserts and in mountains and in dens and caves of the earth."
We may not sympathize with the political scruples of the non- jurors of Scotland. But any men who so possess the courage of their convictions as not to shrink from loss of goods and danger of life, and who accept the trials of martyrdom without posing as martyrs in personal comfort and security, deserve and will receive the veneration of all true-hearted and right-minded men. And in this matter, "let all history declare whether in any age or in any cause, as followers of Knox or of Montrose, as Cameronians or as Jacobites, the men—aye and the women—of Scotland have quailed from any degree of sacrifice or suffering." [Footnote: Lord Stanhope, History of England, in. 210.]
To return:—The correspondence between Bishop Skinner and Dr. Berkeley was continued through the winter of 1782-1783, but without any actual result. [Footnote: Scottish Church Review, i. 36-43.] In the autumn of 1783—some four months after Seabury's arrival in England—a letter was sent to the Scottish Primus by Mr. Elphinstone, a man of literary reputation, the son of a Scottish clergyman, in which the following question was put: "Can consecration be obtained in Scotland for an already dignified and well vouched American clergyman, now in London, for the purpose of perpetuating the Episcopal reformed Church in America, particularly in Connecticut?" [Footnote: Wilberforce, American Church, p. 205.] At the same time Dr. Berkeley renewed his correspondence with Bishop Skinner in these words: "I have this day [Nov. 24] heard (I need not add with the sincerest pleasure) that a respectable Presbyter, well recommended from America, hath arrived in London, seeking what it seems in the present state of affairs he cannot expect to receive in our Church. Surely, dear sir, the Scotch prelates, who are not shackled by any Erastian connexion, will not send this suppliant empty away. …. I scruple not to give it as my decided opinion that the king, some of his cabinet counsellors, all our bishops (except, peradventure, the Bishop of St. Asaph [Footnote: Dr. Jonathan Shipley.]), all the learned and respectable clergy of our Church, will at least secretly rejoice if a Protestant bishop be sent from Scotland to America—more especially if Connecticut is to be the scene of his ministry." [Footnote: Scottish Church Review, i. 106; where the rest of the correspondence is also given.]
The question now brought before the Scottish bishops, was, as will be readily seen, a different one from that proposed nearly two years before. Then they were asked to originate action and to send out a bishop, selected by themselves, to take his chances of being received by the clergy and church-people in America. Now the proposition was to complete action already begun, and to invest with the Episcopal character a person selected in America and sent out to obtain consecration. Wisely did the Scottish prelates decline to take the former course, which could only have increased the difficulties of the situation. As wisely, and with a noble recognition of the importance of what they clearly regarded as the great responsibility and solemn duty laid upon them, did they decide to adopt the latter. Said one of them: "Considering the great Depositum committed to us, I do not see how we can account to our great Lord and Master, if we neglect such an opportunity of promoting His truth and enlarging the borders of His Church. "These words have in them the ring of a firm conviction of duty, and a thorough understanding of the true character and position of Christ's kingdom upon earth.