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sermon. Some vicinities also had a Thursday lecture, which was a third sermon. Prayer meetings, conference meetings, class meetings, and love feasts were frequently added. By 1830 the Bible School was making its way throughout the country. It was not the place of ease it now is, however, for the children were expected to learn weekly and recite not less than ten verses of Scripture. All were encouraged in feats of Biblical memory.

A. B. Hart, in commenting on this period, said:

"In this day of many interests and few enthusiasms it is hard to realize the immense force of religion and religious organizations upon the minds of the people. 'Hell' and 'brimstone' preaching was still common. Revivalists like Finney and Nettleton preached the tortures of damned souls until people shrieked and dropped fainting in their pews.'' *7

Whether because of this type of preaching or for some other reason, all the churches seemed touched, nevertheless, with a new feeling of responsibility to humanity, and sincere efforts were made to make religion effective, to apply it to all moral questions, and to make individuals and community correspond to the principles of Christianity. This passionate desire to "rescue the perishing" and to elevate community standards led directly to reform legislation, such as the movement against the excessive use of intoxicating liquors, begun in 1817, widened by the Washington organizations in

"Slavery and Abolition, 18.

1830, and still later developed into state prohibition.

88

Although the movement dealt with in this book, like the Unitarian and Universalist movements, was a revolt against the narrow exclusiveness of certain religious views, the people in the older states and in the rapidly growing young states were not noted for their tolerance. Indeed, intolerance may be mentioned as a striking characteristic of the period. Timothy Flint pointed out the prevailing narrowness of spirit among believers." Harriet Martineau commented on the same thing:

"A religious young Christian legislator was pitied, blamed, and traduced in Boston, last year, by clergymen, lawyers, and professors of a college, for endeavoring to obtain a repeal of the law under which the testimony of speculative atheists is rejected in courts of justice: Quakers (calling themselves Friends) excommunicate each other: Presbyterian clergymen preach hatred to Catholics: a convent is burnt and the nuns are banished from the neighborhood: and Episcopalian clergymen claim credit for admitting Unitarians to sit in committees for public objects.'' 40

Newspapers frequently referred to this illiberality. Thus one editor wrote:

"Summary Process. In looking over a religious newspaper published in Philadelphia, which accidentally came into our possession-we thought that it was a very efficient way to dispose of political or religious opponents, by consigning them all to the 'devil,' or his 'friends,' in the plenitude

88 Hart, A. B. Slavery and Abolition, 12-15.
89 Recollections of the Last Ten Years, 114.
40 Society in America, III., 227.

of one's own power! To be sure it is not very modest, or kind, or liberal, or charitable but what else is there for a devil if infallible man may not command his services?'' “

An editorial in the same paper, three years later, read in part as follows:

"Religious Newspapers and Controversies. We have 'fallen upon evil times.' Indeed it would almost seem that a return to the 'days of fire and faggot' might be speedily looked for-if the secular power could be rendered subservient to the propagation and 'glorious progress' of some of the leading Christian sects. Concerning such quarrels (which then existed as now though with a better excuse than at present), Franklin about sixty years ago, said in a private letter to a friend:

""When theologians or religious people quarrel about religion, each party abuses the other; the profane and the infidel believe both sides and enjoy the fray; the reputation of religion in general suffers and its enemies are ready to say, not what was said in primitive times, behold how these Christians love one another, but mark how these Christians hate one another.'

"And when we refer to certain newspapers in which 'the drum ecclesiastic' is most loudly and wickedly beaten-with rub-a-dub here, and rub-a-dub there-it may well be said— 'mark how these Christians hate one another.'

"There have been regular settos between wrangling priests whose zeal was manifestly greater 'to floor their antagonists, and, by cart-loads of Latin and Greek and Hebrew,' 'with' or 'without points,' send each other into the safe and fast keeping of 'the prince of devils,' and gather laurels for themselves—outrageously and indecently inconsistent with the sublime principles of that religion which teaches meekness and forbearance and 'peace and good will to all men.'

41 Niles Register, August 14, 1830.

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But we have been disgusted in too many of the religious newspapers, and would enter an humble, but earnest protest against them all, saying, 'Let there be peace between you.''

In spite of these statements on the prevailing intolerance, however, breaches had begun to appear in the stern religious views with the opening of the new century. The struggle of the narrow element was hard, and complete victory for the liberals was long postponed, yet, nevertheless, Henry Adams has well written:

"The spread of great popular sects like the Universalists and Campbellites, founded on assumptions such as no Orthodox theology could tolerate, showed a growing tendency to relaxation of thought in that direction. The struggle for existence was already mitigated, and the first effect of the change was seen in the increasing cheerfulness of religion.'' 43

The growth of churches during the period under consideration is of interest. Apparently for the year 1810, Timothy Dwight estimated the number of churches in Massachusetts as 531, in Maine 221, in New Hampshire 160, in Connecticut 355, and in Vermont as at least 154. Of this number, over half or 843 out of 1421 were Presbyterian or Congregational. Of the total number, 385 were Baptist and forty-five Methodist. Only one of the latter was reported in New Hampshire and one in Vermont, while not a single church of that denomination was located in Connecticut. The Presbyterian

43 Niles Register, August 3, 1833.

48 History of the United States, IX., 239.

churches were good, but the buildings of the Baptists, with a few exceptions, and those of the Methodists, were not. The congregations of the latter, like their buildings, were generally small, and their ministers, according to Dwight, were usually uneducated." In 1817, however, the number of Methodists in the United States was estimated at 224,853, while the number of Baptists was 183,245."

Six years later there were seven hundred Congregational churches in New England alone, and over 1400 Presbyterian churches in the United States with some 100,000 communicants. The Episcopalians then had about seven hundred churches, the Baptists over 2300, and the Methodists more than 2500, while the Universalists possessed about two hundred separate societies and the Catholics one hundred. In all, there were, in 1823, about 8000 places of worship, 5000 ministers, and a dozen theological seminaries." Eight years later, the number of churches was over 12,000. The Baptists and Methodists had 4484 between them, the Presbyterians 1472, the Congregationalists 1381, the Episcopalians 922, and the Roman Catholics 784."

A few years afterwards, Harriet Martineau declared that in 1835 there were 15,477 churches with only 12,130 ministers. The leading sects were ranked by her as follows: Episcopalian Methodists,

Travels in New England and New York, 443-447.

45 Niles Register, August 28, 1817.

48 Ibid., November 22, 1823.

47 Ibid., September 8, 1831.

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