AND THEOLOGICAL REVIEW. NO. XV. SEPTEMBER, 1837. ART. I. THE FATHERS OF NEW ENGLAND. By REV. DANIEL DANA, D. D., Newburyport, Mass. It will scarcely be denied that New England is one of the fairest spots upon earth; the abode of liberty, of good government, of art, of science, of pure religion; the seat of all that adorns, and dignifies, and blesses humanity. If the question be asked, To whom does she owe these distinctions?the answer must be, She owes them, under God, to the wisdom and piety of her early Fathers. That they were men, with the frailties and imperfections of men, is undeniable. But, after every fair deduction, will there not still remain a large amount of solid, real, undisputed worth? And may it not in sober truth be asserted, that while their errours were the errours of their age, their excellencies, great, original, and extraordinary as they were, were purely their own? It is the design of this article to give, not a full and finished portrait, but a few imperfect sketches of these emi nent men. As to intellectual superiority, it is well known, they advanced no confident and high-sounding pretensions. With them, neither talents, nor acquisitions in science, were objects of idolatry. But to assign them, in these regards, an ordinary rank, would be a gross mistake. Not a few of the early Fathers of New England were educated in the universities of Cambridge and Oxford; were richly imbued with the learning of the times, and lived on terms, not only of intimacy, but of acknowledged equality, with the first British scholars. And be it remembered, there were giants in the earth in those days. It was a period of marked intellectual superiVOL. IV. 40 ority. Never was theology, the first of sciences, more profoundly and extensively cultivated. The great Dr. Owen, himself a host, a living library of theological knowledge, sympathized in the views and plans of the New England Fathers. And we have it on the authority of Neal, that he was determined on a removal to these shores; but was prevented by an order from the British Council. 66 Vulgar minds," says Junius, "make no distinction between the highly difficult, and the impossible." In accordance with this maxim, Sir Philip Francis has remarked, that "to distinguish and resolve, in a question of instant life and death, between extreme difficulty and positive impossibility, is the surest indication of a superiour mind." Let this test of genius be applied to the early emigrants to New England; and shall we find them little men, or great men? The project of exploring a home in the American wilderness a home, too, for the delicacy of woman, and the feebleness of infancy-was no every-day project. feeble minds it would naturally appear as visionary as an expedition to the moon. And to minds of ordinary strength it would seem little less daring than the voyage of the great Discoverer himself. But to the noble men of whom we speak, it presented an object congenial with the brawny strength of their intellectual powers; congenial too, with their lofty aspirations and wishes. And what they wished, they attempted, and what they attempted, they accomplished. To Another proof of the mental superiority of the New England Fathers, is found in their wonderfully lucid, and correct ideas of liberty. They loved liberty. It was dearer to their hearts than friends, or home, or country; dearer than the air they breathed; dearer than every thing, but their God and Saviour. But what was the liberty they loved? Was it a mere abstraction of the mind? Was it the offspring of a showy, imposing, but impracticable equality? Was it a wretched something, pretendedly based on the perfectibility of man, but really emanating from his basest depravity, and powerfully pampering every brutal indulgence? Was it a liberty spurning every restraint, and bidding defiance to every law of earth and heaven? Far otherwise. It was a liberty, intelligible, practicable, safe, salutary; a liberty whose first principle is wholesome restraint; whose origin, and nutriment, and protection, and permanence are found in equal and energetic laws. This is the liberty which those venerable men loved. They breathed its spirit into their children; and they again into theirs; until it has come down to posterity, as a precious birth-right; an inestimable inheritance. This liberty we still possess; at least in our conceptions and theories. It is embodied, too, in our constitutions, commentaries and laws. On this subject, if on no other, the new world has instructed the old. And if the flame of genuine liberty is to burn on the altars of the old world, it will be enkindled by sparks wafted across the Atlantic. Do we need another proof of the intellectual ardour and superiority of these men? We may receive it in their early and liberal provision for schools, and other literary institutions. It is with genuine learning as with genuine goodness. Its possessors, and they alone, are its cordial, efficient friends and supporters. Such were the Puritan Fathers of New England. And they made large and effectual provision for the universal instruction of the young. "To the end that learning may not be buried in the graves of our forefathers"-such was their own simple and touching language-it was ordered, "that every township, after the Lord hath increased them to the number of fifty householders, shall teach all children to write and read; and where any town shall increase to the number of one hundred families, they shall set up a grammar school, the master thereof being able to instruct youth, so far as they may be fitted for the university." This was an original conception, and as grand as it was original. To elicit and cultivate the intellect of the whole community at the public expense; and thus convert that intellect into a kind of common property; a fund, immense in its value, and interminable in its existence-if this was a great thought, it stamps with greatness the minds that gave it birth. To the vast importance of this object, the parent country seems at length awaking. We see her putting forth some corresponding exertions. We rejoice at it. And we are bound to adore the Almighty Inspirer and Patron of every great and good design, if our own example has administered admonition on the subject, to the British community. If there, as has been recently said, the schoolmaster is abroad; we may say, and without boasting, that in New England the schoolmaster has been abroad, from her infant days. |