VOL. VII.

No. 2.

WHEN we remember the excesses of sects in Europe whose views resembled Mrs. Hutchinson's, we are inclined to judge charitably the conservatism of the dominant party in Boston and to sympathize in a degree with their dread of the influence of persons who taught a moral and political freedom so broad that it seemed to lead to license and the abrogation of all law. Theories of "soul liberty" sown broadcast in Europe in the sixteenth century had often borne dead sea fruits as evil as those of the French Revolution; and there was no American Republic of the nineteenth century, proclaiming liberty to all and allowing equal ity to take care of itself, to present the peaceable fruits of righteousness as a result of "following the principles of the reformation" with logical precision to all their conseqences, as was the aim and pride

To

of the friends of Mrs. Hutchinson. this new party whose theories in regard to religious and political liberty were certainly far in advance of the views held by their neighbors, the men whom they found in power in Massachusetts were "priestridden magistrates," and the clergy they regarded as "the ushers of persecution," "popish factors," and "under a covenant of works," sometimes going so far as to call them Pharisees and hypocrites, and accusing them of setting up a court of high commission similar to the ecclesiastical court which had driven them across the Atlantic. They sympathized with the feeling of the Episcopal minister, Mr. Blackstone, an emigrant not of the Antinomian party, who when urged by the Massachusetts people, by whom he was highly esteemed, to unite with the Congregational church, replied: "I "I came

from England because I did not like the Lord Bishops; but I can't join with you because I would not be under the Lord Brethren." Mrs. Hutchinson's party detested despotism in every form or degree. Carried to their logical results, their theories would have made each man literally a law unto himself.

But fanatics trained in a Christian community are usually restrained by education and public sentiment. Their morality is of a better quality than their intellectual theories, and they do not follow the latter to their legitimate consequences. With one or two exceptions, the false doctrine of the party did not result in evil conduct. One of the party, it is true, Captain Underhill, the famous leader in the Pequod war, was banished, as the opponents of the Antinomians delighted to record, for gross immorality. Underhill had the effrontery to tell the reverent and pure-hearted Winthrop that "the spirit had sent into him the witness of free grace while he was in the moderate enjoyment of the good creature called tobacco," that is, while smoking his pipe, "since which he had never doubted his good estate, and neither should, though he should fall into sin." Probably Mrs. Hutchinson and the majority of her friends would have declared that they did not belong to the party which was called by her name. Any one who has read in the diaries and letters of the noble Winthrop the record of his abhorrence of evil and bitter repentance for the smallest fault, of his awful reverence for God and all holy things, can imagine the horror and disgust with which he listened to Underhill, whom he doubtless regarded as a fair representative of his

party. His logical mind well versed in metaphysics and theology could conceive of no result but immoral practice from what he regarded as an immoral creed.

Mr. Coggeshall's friendship for Mr. Wheelwright and Mrs. Hutchinson, but still more his sense of justice and disapproval of "the stringency of regulation and lack of latitude even in non-essentials," produced by the desire for uni. formity in creed and ceremonial prevailing among civil and religious leaders, brought him into conflict with ministers and magistrates. The party to which he belonged were at first called opinionatists, but soon from the 'disregard to the law both as an evidence and a means of grace" with which they were charged, were called Antinomians. Callender says that they were "Puritans of the highest form," high church Calvinists. Such questions as the nature of the soul, resurrection of the body, the believer's union with the Holy Spirit, and the most difficult and abstruse Calvinistic doctrines, which were differently interpreted by the two parties, were discussed at every fireside and wherever men and women met, and the controversy pursued with all "the exquisite rancor of theological hatred." Many of their distinctions and explanations were mere logomachy, and Cotton Mather says, "'tis believed that multitudes of persons who took in with both parties did never to their dying hour understand what their difference was." Often both parties were really "of one mind, the one speaking of the abstract, the other speaking of the concrete," as had also been said in regard to the ancient Nestorian controversy. Writing of his grand

father whom he thought, and we are inclined to agree with him, resembled the amiable and peace-loving Melancthon in character, he says: "Nor indeed am I without vehement suspicion that Mr. Cotton was really one with his antagonists, whatever seeming difference there was between them." He could easily believe that, though “interest, prejudice and faction put them into such quarrelsome heretications one against an other," "these good men might misunderstand each other." If he had judged all the Antinomians as charitably, he would have foreborne to call them hypocrites and liars because they sometimes said to their opponents: “Nay, don't mistake me, for I mean the same that you do; we differ only in words."t Boileau, describing the victims of the controversy about the words Hoomonsion and Homoionsion, calls them " martyrs for a diphthong," and the phrase might be figuratively applied to the Antinomians, so slightly did their theological system differ from the Calvinism of the orthodox party.

One who has witnessed the strug gles, the animosities, the unfair theological debates, the social ostracism of party by

“In the height and heat of all the difference, when some ships were going from hence to England,

Mr. Cotton in the whole congregation advised the passengers to tell our countrymen at home 'That all the strife here was about magnifying the grace of God; the one person seeking to advance the grace of God within us to sanctification; and another person seeking to advance the grace of God towards us to justification,' and Mr. Wilson stood up after him declaring on the other side that he knew none that did not endeavor to advance the grace of God in both.'"-Magnalia.

+ But such charity he would have agreed with a fanatical Presbyterian of that age in describing as "a cursed intolerable toleration."

party in a village where two small churches of different denominations, there being room for but one, are fighting for a foothold, can imagine the bitterness and all uncharitableness that filled many hearts in Boston at this time. Political strife was added to theological controversy. Friends and even families were divided in opinion and sometimes becane open enemies.

The Hutchinsonians "frequenting the lectures of other ministers did make much disturbance by public questions and objections to their doctrines." The other side railed at Mrs. Hutchinson, "the prime seducer of the whole faction," de. nounced "her scandalous, dangerous and enchanting extravagances," her promises of peace and comfort and spiritual perfection to those who adopted her views, and compared her to the pythoness out of whom St. Paul cast the spirit of divination. And Cotton Mather tried to persuade himself that his grandfather Cotton never accepted her doctrines. He associated with her simply from the desire to do for the New England prophetess what St. Paul did for the ancient soothsayer. Even the good qualities of the Antinomians were misrepresented. "They appeared wondrous holy, humble, self-denying and spiritual, and full of the most charming expressions imaginable," but these virtues were assumed for the sake of winning disciples! These cunning sectaries "acquainted themselves with as many as possibly they could, and carried their acquaintance with all the courtesies and kindness they could contrive to ingratiate themselves in the hearts of others, especially the new-comers into the place." This charge of a sort of religious dema