Vernon Stauffer

[1] Reverend Jedediah Morse, born at Woodstock, Connecticut, August23, 1761, died at New Haven, June9, 1826, was a man of note. He was the author of the first American geography and gazetteer. His connection with the leading public men of his times, particularly with those of the Federalist party, was both extensive and intimate. His travels and correspondence in the interests of his numerous geographical compositions in part promoted this acquaintance; but his outspoken and unflinching support of the measures of government during the Federalist regime did even more to enhance his influence. Morse was graduated from Yale College in 1783 and settled at Charlestown as minister of the Congregational church in that place in 1789. His wife was Elizabeth Ann Breese, granddaughter of Samuel Finley, president of the College of New Jersey. Quite apart from all other claims to public recognition, the following inscription, to be found to this day on a tablet attached to the front of the house in Charlestown wherein his distinguished son was born, would have rendered the name of Jedediah Morse worthy of regard:

“Here was born 27th of April, 1791,
Samuel Finley Breese Morse.
Inventor of the Electric Telegraph.”

W. B. Sprague’s Annals of the American Pulpit, vol.ii, pp. 247–256, contains interesting data concerning Morse’s activities and personality. Sprague also wrote The Life of Jedidiah Morse, D. D., New York, 1874. (Morse’s surname appears in the sources both as “Jedediah” and “Jedidiah”). Sawyer’s Old Charlestown, etc., p.299, has an engaging account of Morse’s loyalty to the muse of Federalism, and of the painful, though not serious physical consequences, in which in at least one instance this involved him. Cf. also Memorabilia in the Life of Jedediah Morse, D. D., by his son, Sidney E. Morse. A bibliography of thirty-two titles by Morse is appended to the sketch in F. B. Dexter, Biographical Sketches of the Graduates of Yale College, vol.iv, pp.295–304.

[2] A Sermon, Delivered at the New North Church in Boston, in the morning, and in the afternoon at Charlestown, May9th, 1798, being the day recommended by John Adams, President of the United States of America, for solemn humiliation, fasting and prayer. By Jedidiah Morse, D. D., Minister of the Congregational Church in Charlestown, Boston, 1798, p.25.

[3] Robison, Proofs of a Conspiracy against all the Religions and Governments of Europe, carried on in the Secret Meetings of the Free Masons, Illuminati, and Reading Societies, Edinburgh, 1797.

[4] An early and yet typical example of this unfavorable view of the moral and religious life of the people after the first generation of the Puritans was gone, may be found in The Result of 1679,—a document prepared by the Synod in response to directions from the Massachusetts General Court, calling for answers to the following questions: “What are the euills that haue provoked the Lord to bring his judgments on New England? What is to be donn that so those euills may be reformed?”. The following brief excerpt from The Result supplies the point of View: “Our Fathers neither sought for, nor thought of great things for themselves, but did seek first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness, and all these things were added to them. They came not into the wilderness to see a man cloathed in soft raiment. But that we have in too many respects, been forgetting the Errand upon which the Lord sent us hither; all the world is witness: And therefore we may not wonder that God hath changed the tenour of his Dispensations towards us, turning to doe us hurt, and consuming us after that he hath done us good. If we had continued to be as once we were, the Lord would have continued to doe for us, as once he did.” The entire document, together with much valuable explanatory comment, may be found in Walker, Creeds and Platforms of Congregationalism, pp.421–437. Backus, History of New England, vol i, pp.457–461, contains a group of similar laments.

[5] Snow, A History of Boston, p.333.

[6] Weeden, Economic and Social History of New England, vol.ii, p.696.

[7] Acts and Resolves, Public and Private, of the Province of Massachusetts Bay, vol.iii, pp.500 et seq. The Preamble of this Act is highly interesting: “For preventing and avoiding the many and great mischiefs which arise from publick stage-plays, interludes and other theatrical entertainments, which not only occasion great and unnecessary expenses, and discourage industry and frugality, but likewise tend generally to increase immorality, impiety and a contempt for religion,—Be it enacted”, etc.

[8] Seilhamer, History of the American Theatre, vol.ii, pp.51 et seq.; Winsor, The Memorial History of Boston, vol.iv, ch. v: “The Drama in Boston,” by William W. Clapp, pp.358 et seq.

[9] Seilhamer, op. cit., vol.iii, p.13; Dunlap, History of the American Theatre, vol.i, p.244; Snow, History of Boston, pp.333 et seq.

[10] Acts and Laws of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, 1792–3, pp. 686 et seq.

[11] The public discussion and legislative phase of the situation, together with the disorders occasioned by the determination of the supporters of the theatre to serve their enterprise at any cost, are well covered by Clapp in the chapter already cited in Winsor’s Memorial History of Boston. Cf. also Seilhamer, vol.iii, pp.14 et seq.; Dunlap, vol.i, pp. 242 et seq.; Willard, Memories of Youth and Manhood, vol.i, pp. 324, 325; Bentley, Diary, vol.i. pp 340, 379, 380, 414, 415, 418, etc.

[12] The Speech of John Gardiner, Esquire, Delivered in the House of Representatives. On Thursday, the 26th of January, 1792, Boston, 1792, p. 18. Another publication of the same year, The Rights of the Drama: or, An Inquiry into the Origin, Principles, and Consequences of Theatrical Entertainments. By Philo Dramatis (pseud.), discussed the subject in different vein, but with the same object in view. In the final chapter on “The Outlines of a Theatre, it’s Necessary Appendages, a Plan of Regulation, Calculation of Expenses, Profits, &c.”, doubtless by way of turning the balance of public judgment in favor of the establishment of a local theatre, the author suggests that the following ends may be served: the development of native genius, and thus the elevation of America to a high rank in the republic of letters; the reservation of a certain portion of the revenues of the theatre by the Commonwealth, for the care of the poor of Boston, or of the state, and for the support of the University at Cambridge (Harvard), thus easing the burden of taxation. The closing words of this pamphlet, stripped of their bombast, are not unworthy to stand with Gardiner’s: “Whenever I consider this subject, and contemplate the formation of a Theatre, I cannot help feeling a kind of enthusiasm … I anticipate the time when the Garricks and Siddons of America shall adorn the Stage, and melt the soul to pity. But here let me pause.—Let the most rigid Stoic, or the greatest fanatic in religion, or the most notorious dupe to prejudice, once hearken to the tale of the tragic muse, whose office it is to soften, and to subdue the violent passions of the mind, by painting the real misfortunes and distresses, which accompany our journey through life; or attend to the laughable follies, and vain inconsistencies, which daily mark the character of the human species—the deformity of vice—the excellence of virtue—, and, from the representation of the lively Comedy, ‘catch the manners living as they rise,’ and then say, if he can, that lessons of instruction are unknown to the Drama. If these have no effect, let him listen, with mute attention, to the occasional symphonies, which burst from a thousand strings, and accompany, and give life and animation to the Comic scene—and then, if sunk below the brute creation, let him be fortified against the impressions of sensibility. The stoicism of man must surpass our comprehension, if the dramatic scene can be contemplated without emotion; more especially when the representation of life and manners is intended to correct and to enlarge the heart….”

[13] Cf. (Boston) Independent Chronicle and Universal Advertiser, Thursday, March28, 1793.

[14] Pseud.: Effects of the Stage on the Manners of a People: and the Propriety of Encouraging and Establishing a Virtuous Theatre. By a Bostonian, Boston, 1792. The author is insipid enough; none the less the pamphlet is by no means void of a certain practical-mindedness and good sense as the author argues for the frank acceptance of the theatre as an institution in the city’s life. The following constitute his chief contentions: The theatre, in some form or other, is bound to come, because of the fact that the people generally are interested in the subject of amusement; the tastes and appetites of the people already give painful evidence of serious debasement and corruption; the acceptance of a “Virtuous Theatre” is the only possible expedient if the people are to be saved from worse debauchment.

The view taken by the Reverend William Bentley, Salem’s well-known minister, was less specious, though tinged with a mildly pessimistic view of popular tastes. Under date of July31, 1792, he wrote: “So much talk has been in the Country about Theatrical entertainments that they have become the pride even of the smallest children in our schools. The fact puts in mind of the effect from the Rope flyers, who visited N. England, after whose feats the children of seven were sliding down the fences & wounding themselves in every quarter.” Diary, vol. i, p.384. Later, he wrote: “The Theatre opened for the first time [in Salem] is now the subject. The enlightened who have not determined upon its utter abolition have yet generally agreed that it is too early introduced into our country.” Ibid., vol.ii, p.81. Cf. ibid., pp.258, et seq., 299, 322. It is clear that Bentley was apprehensive.

[15] Weeden, Economic and Social History of New England, vol.i, pp. 188, 195; Bishop, History of American Manufactures, vol.i, pp. 245 et seq.

[16] Ibid., p.250; vol.ii, pp.501, 502. See also Clark, History of Manufactures in the United States, p.480.

[17] Ibid. Bishop notes the fact that in 1721 a small village of forty houses, near Boston, made 3000 barrels of cider.

[18] Ibid., p.269; Weeden, op. cit., vol.i, pp.144, 148 et seq.

[19] The impression that this decline toward a general state of drunkenness set in early will appear from the following excerpt taken from the Synod’s report on “The Necessity of Reformation”, presented to the General Court of Massachusetts in 1679: “VIII. There is much Intemperance. The heathenish and Idolatrous practice of Health-drinking is become too general a Provocation. Dayes of Training, and other publick Solemnityes, have been abused in this respect: and not only English but Indians have been debauched, by those that call themselves Christians, who have put their bottles to them, and made them drunk also. This is a crying Sin, and the more aggravated in that the first Planters of this Colony did (as in the Patent expressed) come into this Land with a design to Convert the Heathen unto Christ…. There are more Temptations and occasions unto That Sin, publickly allowed of, than any necessity doth require; the proper end of Taverns, &c. being to that end only, a far less number would suffice: But it is a common practice for Town dwellers, yea and Church-members, to frequent publick Houses, and there to misspend precious Time, unto the dishonour of the Gospel, and the scandalizing of others, who are by such examples induced to sin against God.” Cf. Walker, Creeds and Platforms of Congregationalism, p.430.

[20] Hatch, The Administration of the American Revolutionary Army, pp. 89 et seq. The supplies of beer, cider, and rum furnished the armies were not always held to be adequate. After the battle of Brandywine, Congress ordered thirty hogsheads of rum distributed among the soldiers as a tribute to their gallant conduct in that battle. Cf. One Hundred Years of Temperance, New York, 1886, article by Daniel Dorchester on “The Inception of the Temperance Reformation”, p. 113, for comments on the effects of the return of drunken soldiers to the ranks of citizenship.

[21] Weeden, op. cit., vol.ii, p.883, supplies the following concerning the character of the coasting and river trade, which the exigencies of the war greatly stimulated: “A cargo from Boston to Great Barrington and Williamstown contained 11 hdds. and 6 tierces of rum, 3 bbls. of wine, 2 do. of brandy, 1/2 bale of cotton, and 1 small cask of indigo. The proportion of ‘wet goods’ to the small quantity of cotton and indigo is significant, and indicates the prevailing appetites”.

[22] In 1783 Massachusetts had no fewer than sixty-three distilleries. In 1783 this state distilled 1,475,509 gallons of spirits from foreign, and 11,490 gallons from domestic materials. From 1790 to 1800 in the United States, 23,148,404 gallons of spirits were distilled from molasses; of this 6,322,640 gallons were exported, leaving a quantity for home consumption so large as to supply its own comment. Low grain prices, together with the difficulty of gaining access to the molasses markets, hastened a transition to grain distilling near the end of the eighteenth century, with the result that in 1810 Mr. Gallatin, Secretary of the Treasury, reported not less than 9,000,000 gallons of spirits as having been distilled from grain and fruit in 1801. Bishop, History of American Manufactures, vol.ii, pp.30, 65, 83, 152; Clark, History of Manufactures in the United States, p.230.

[23] Collections of the Massachusetts Historical Society, 6th ser., vol.iv, Belknap Papers, pt. iii, p.440.

[24] Ibid., p.508.

[25] Diary of William Bentley, vol.ii, p.92: May31, 1794: “The observation of holydays at Election is an abuse in this part of the Country. Not only at our return yesterday, did we observe crowds around the new Tavern at the entrance of the Town, but even at this day, we saw at Perkins’ on the neck, persons of all descriptions, dancing to a fiddle, drinking, playing with pennies, &c. It is proper such excesses should be checked.” Cf. also ibid., pp.58, 363, 410, 444 et seq. Cf. also Earle, Alice Morse, Stage-coach and Tavern Days, New York, 1900.

[26] Collections of the Massachusetts Historical Society, 6th Series, vol. iv, Belknap Papers, pt. iii, p.456. Jeremiah Libbey writes of the situation at Portsmouth, [N. H.?]: “The common allowance of rum to labourers here is half a pint per day, which has been the rule or custom as long as I can remember. There are several persons in this town that are endeavouring to abolish the custom by giving them more wages in lieu of the allowance, as it is call’d; but the custom is so rooted that it is very difficult to break it. The attachment is so great, that in general if you were to offer double the price of the allowance in money it would not be satisfactory to the labourers, and altho’ that is the case & it is the ruin of them and familys in many instances … untill a substitute of beer or some other drink is introduced in general, it will be difficult to get over it”.

[27] Diary of William Bentley, vol.i, pp.167, 175, 217, 218, 244, 247, 248, 255, 256, 281 et seq.

[28] Autobiography and Correspondence of Lyman Beecher, vol.i, p.30.

[29] Ibid., p.24. The description of the meeting of the Consociation, pp. 214 et seq., is unusually vivid: “ … the preparation for our creature comforts in the sitting-room of Mr. Heart’s house, besides food, was a broad sideboard, covered with decanters and bottles, and sugar, and pitchers of water. There we found all the various kinds of liquors then in vogue. The drinking was apparently universal. This preparation was made by the society as a matter of course. When the Consociation arrived, they always took something to drink round; also before public services, and always on their return. As they could not all drink at once, they were obliged to stand and wait, as people do when they go to mill. There was a decanter of spirits also on the dinnertable, to help digestion, and gentlemen partook of it through the afternoon and evening as they felt the need, some more and some less; and the sideboard, with the spillings of water, and sugar, and liquor, looked and smelled like the bar of a very active grog-shop. None of the Consociation were drunk; but that there was not, at times, a considerable amount of exhilaration, I can not affirm.” It was Beecher’s judgment that “the tide was swelling in the drinking habits of society.” Ibid., p.215.

[30] Ibid., vol.i, pp.133, 138, 163, 255, 256, 371; vol.ii. pp.294, 328 et seq.

[31] A Discourse on Some Events of the Last Century, delivered in the Brick Church in New Haven, on Wednesday, January7, 1801. By Timothy Dwight, President of Yale College, New Haven, 1801. Cf. this author’s Travels in New England and New York, vol.iv, pp. 353 et seq.

[32] Dwight’s Century Sermon, p.18.

[33] Ibid., pp.18 et seq.

[34] The testimony of a European traveller should prove as edifying as that of an intimate participant in the country’s life. In 1788, Brissot de Warville visited America. He remarked the change which had come over the people of New England, of Boston in particular. The old “Presbyterian austerity, which interdicted all pleasures, even that of walking; which forbade travelling on Sunday, which persecuted men whose opinions were different from their own” was no longer to be encountered. Yet no evidence of the corruption of morals presented itself to the distinguished traveller. On the contrary, he remarked the general wholesomeness and soundness of domestic life, and the general poise and temperance of a people which, “since the ancient puritan austerity has disappeared”, was able to play cards without yielding to the gambling instinct and to enjoy its clubs and parties without offending the spirit of courtesy and good-breeding. The glow upon the soul of Brissot as he contemplates the prosperity and unaffected simplicity of the people of Boston is evident as he writes: “With what pleasure did I contemplate this town, which first shook off the English yoke! which, for a long time, resisted all the seductions, all the menaces, all the horrors of a civil war! How I delighted to wander up and down that long street, whose simple houses of wood border the magnificent channel of Boston, and whose full stores offer me all the productions of the continent which I had quitted! How I enjoyed the activity of the merchants, the artizans, and the sailors! It was not the noisy vortex of Paris; it was not the unquiet, eager mien of my countrymen; it was the simple, dignified air of men, who are conscious of liberty, and who see in all men their brothers and their equals. Everything in this street bears the marks of a town still in its infancy, but which, even in its infancy, enjoys a great prosperity…. Boston is just rising from the devastations of war, and its commerce is flourishing; its manufactures, productions, arts, and sciences, offer a number of curious and interesting observations.” (Brissot De Warville, New Travels in the United States of America, pp.70–82.) Equally laudatory comment respecting the state of society in Connecticut is made by Brissot (pp. 108, 109).

John Bernard, the English comedian, who was in this country at the close of the eighteenth century, found the state of society very much like that which he had left in his own country. “They wore the same clothes, spoke the same language, and seemed to glow with the same affable and hospitable feelings. In walking along the mall I could scarcely believe I had not been whisked over to St. James’s Park; and in their houses the last modes of London were observable in nearly every article of ornament or utility. Other parts of the state were, however, very different.” (Bernard, Retrospections of America, 1797–1811, p.29.) Bernard found in New England abundant evidences of progress such as he had not been accustomed to in England, and splendid stamina of character (p. 30). Nothing, apparently, suggested to him that the people were not virile and sound.

[35] Bentley, Diary, vol.i, pp.253 et seq., discusses at length “the Puerile Sports usual in these parts of New England”. Weeden, Economic and Social History of New England, vol.ii, p.696, comments on the dearth of public amusement. Cf. also ibid., p.864. The changed attitude of the public toward dancing, as reported by Weeden, pp.696 and 864, doubtless finds its explanation in the growing consciousness that the resources in the way of entertainment deserve to be increased. At the close of the century, however, dancing was still frowned upon. Bentley, Diary, vol.ii, pp.17, 232, 233, 296, 322, 363.

[36] Brissot, New Travels in the United States of America, p.72: “Music, which their teachers formerly prescribed as a diabolic art, begins to make part of their education. In some houses you hear the forte-piano. This art, it is true, is still in its infancy; but the young novices who exercise it, are so gentle, so complaisant, and so modest, that the proud perfection of art gives no pleasure equal to what they afford.” Cf. also Bentley, Diary, vol.ii, pp.247 et seq., 292.

[37] Brissot, New Travels in the United States of America, pp.86 et seq. Brissot generously explains this fact upon the ground that in a country so new, whose immediate concerns were so compelling, and where, also, wealth is not centered in a few hands, the cultivation of the arts and sciences is not to be expected. On the side of invention the situation was far from being as bad as a reading of Brissot might seem to imply. Weeden, Economic and Social History of New England, vol.ii, pp.847–858.

[38] Goddard, Studies in New England Transcendentalism, p.18. While the passage cited deals with an earlier situation, the general observation made concerning the well-poised character of the New England type of mind is as valid for the close of the eighteenth century as for the corresponding period of the preceding century; and the failure of New England to take a “plunge … from the moral heights of Puritanism” is all the more impressive in the later period in view of the variety and character of the new incitements and impulses which the people of New England generally felt in the period following the Revolution.

[39] Conspicuous in this group was the new merchant class. In the wake of the Revolution came an industrial and commercial revival which profoundly affected the life of New England. While the period of the Confederation, on account of its political disorganization and the chaotic state of public finance and the currency, was characterized by extreme economic depression, on the other hand, the adoption of the Constitution communicated to the centers of industry and commerce a feeling of optimism. The sense that a federal government had been formed, equal to the task of guaranteeing to its citizens the rights and privileges of trade, gave early evidence that the economic impulses of the country had been quickened notably. Such evidence is too abundant and too well known either to permit or to require full statement here, but the following is suggestive: The fisheries of New England, which had been nearly destroyed during the Revolution, had so far revived by 1789 that a total of 480 vessels, representing a tonnage of 27,000, were employed in the industry. At least 32,000 tons of shipping were built in the United States, a very large part of this in New England, in 1791. Before the war the largest amount built in any one year was 26,544 tons. But the record of 1791 was modest. From 1789 to 1810, American shipping increased from 202,000 to 1,425,000 tons. Because of the federal government’s proclamation of strict neutrality with regard to the wars abroad, the carrying trade of the world came largely into the hands of shipowners and seamen of the United States, with the result that the dockyards and wharves of New England fairly hummed with activity. The exports of 1793 amounted to $33,026,233. By 1799 they had mounted to $78,665,522, of which $33,142,522 was the growth, produce, or manufacture of the Union. Within a very few years after the adoption of the Constitution, American merchants had become the warehousers and distributors of merchandise to all parts of the world. The wharves of New England were covered with goods from Europe, the Orient, the West Indies, and from the looms, shops, and distilleries of the nation. Directed by resourceful and far-sighted men who had the instinct for commercial expansion, ships sailed from New England ports for Batavia, Canton, Calcutta, St. Petersburg, Port Louis. They carried with them coffee, fish, flour, provisions, tobacco, rum, iron, cattle, horses; they brought back molasses, sugar, wine, indigo, pepper, salt, muslins, calicoes, silks, hemp, duck. The situation is dealt with in detail by Bishop, History of American Manufactures, vol. ii, pp.13–82; Clark, History of Manufactures in the United States, pp. 227 et seq.; Weeden, Economic and Social History of New England, vol. ii, pp.816–857.

[40] Winsor, The Memorial History of Boston, vol.iii, pp.191, 203; Morse, The Federalist Party in Massachusetts, pp.37, 38; Harvard Theological Review, January, 1916, p.104.

[41] Weeden, Early Life in Rhode Island, pp.357 et seq., calls attention to the spacious and elegant houses which were built at Providence about 1790, and to the new group of merchants which the expansion of trans-oceanic commerce called into existence there. Weeden, Economic and Social History of New England, pp.821 et seq., deals with the situation in a larger way.

[42] Parker, History of the Second Church of Christ in Hartford, p. 172. The passage contains a vivid picture of the state of polite society in an important Connecticut center. Love, The Colonial History of Hartford, pp.244 et seq., deals with the transformation of social life with particular reference to the disintegration of Puritanism.

[43] An outcry against the excesses of fashion began to make itself heard. “An Old Farmer,” writing to the Massachusetts Spy, March27, 1799, complains on account of the consequent drain upon the purses of husbands and fathers: “I am a plain farmer, and therefore beg leave to trouble you with a little plain language. By the dint of industry, and application to agricultural concerns, I have, till lately, made out to keep square with the world. But the late scarcity of money, together with the extravagance of fashions have nearly ruined me…. I am by no means tenacious of the old way, or of old fashions. I know that my family must dress different from what I used to when I was young; yet as I have the interest of husbands and fathers at heart, I wish there might be some reformation in the present mode of female dress…. In better times, six or seven yards of Calico would serve to make a gown; but now fourteen yards are scarcely sufficient. I do not perceive that women grow any larger now than formerly…. A few years since, my daughters were not too proud to wear good calfskin shoes; two pair of which would last them a year: But now none will suit them but morroco, and these must be of the slenderest kind…. Young ladies used to be contented with wearing nothing on their heads but what Nature gave them…. But now they dare not appear in company, unless they have half a bushel of gauze, and other stuff, stuck on their heads”. The letter closes with a humorous account of the writer’s embarrassing experience with the trains of the ladies’ dresses on the occasion of a recent visit to church.

[44] Swift, Lindsay, The Massachusetts Election Sermons (Publications of the Colonial Society of Massachusetts, vol.i, Transactions, 1892–1894), pp.428 et seq.

[45] Weeden, Economic and Social History of New England, vol.ii, pp. 864 et seq.

[46] Scudder, Recollections of Samuel Breck, with Passages from His Note-Books, pp.178 et seq. Breck visited New England about 1791. He was impressed with the looseness of life and gross lawlessness which he saw. A fairer judgment appears on page 182: “The severe, gloomy puritanical spirit that had governed New England since the days of the Pilgrim forefathers was gradually giving way in the principal towns”, etc.

[47] Lauer, Church and State in New England (Johns Hopkins University Studies in History and Political Science. Tenth Series), pp. 95 et seq.

[48] The term “Standing Order” was generally employed in the speech and literature of the period, and had reference to the alliance between the party of the Establishment and the party of the government.

[49] The scope of inquiry prescribed by the special object of this dissertation renders both unnecessary and unprofitable the tracing of this struggle in detail. Valuable special studies in this field are available. Among these the following are to be commended as of exceptional usefulness: Burrage, A History of the Baptists in New England; Greene, The Development of Religious Liberty in Connecticut; Reed, Church and State in Massachusetts, 1691–1740; Cobb, The Rise of Religious Liberty in America; Ford, New England’s Struggle for Religious Liberty. Lauer’s excellent treatise has already been cited. Of contemporaneous treatments, Backus, A History of New England, with Particular Reference to the Denomination of Christians called Baptists, though deficient in literary merit, is doubtless the most trustworthy and replete. The citations made from the latter work refer, unless otherwise indicated, to the edition of 1871 (2vols.).

[50] The Charter Granted by Their Majesties King William and Queen Mary, to the Inhabitants of the Massachusetts-Bay in New-England, Boston in New England, 1726, p.9. The principle of church membership as a qualification for voting was set aside for a property qualification.

[51] Backus, History of New England, vol.i, pp.446 et seq. Cf. Reed, Church and State in Massachusetts, 1691–1740, pp.23 et seq.

[52] Backus, History of New England, vol.i, p.448.

[53] Charters and “Acts and Laws” of the Province of Massachusetts-Bay, With Appended Acts and Laws, Boston, 1726–1735, p.383. The law provided that “all persons who profess themselves to be of the Church of England”, and who were so situated that “there is a Person in Orders according to the Rules of the Church of England setled [sic], and abiding among them and performing Divine Service within Five Miles of the Habitation, or usual Residence of any Person professing himself as aforesaid of the Church of England”, might have his rate-money reserved for the support of the Episcopal church.

[54] Charters and “Acts and Laws” of the Province of Mass., etc., p. 423. The five-mile limitation formed a part of this legislation, also.

[55] Burrage, History of the Baptists in New England, p.105.

[56] Palfrey, A Compendious History of New England, vol.iv, pp. 94, 95.

[57] Acts and Resolves, Public and Private, etc., vol.iii, p.645.

[58] Ibid.

[59] Backus, History of New England, vol.ii, p.140.

[60] Ibid.

[61] Ibid.

[62] Separatists or Separates were the names by which those were commonly designated who withdrew from the orthodox churches on account of the controversies occasioned by the Great Awakening. See Blake, S. Leroy, The Separates or Strict Congregationalists of New England, Boston, 1902, pp.17 et seq.

[63] Hovey, A Memoir of the Life and Times of the Rev. Isaac Backus, p. 171.

[64] Backus, History of New England, vol.ii, pp.96 et seq. Backus himself suffered imprisonment under this act. See ibid., p.109.

[65] Greene, The Development of Religious Liberty in Connecticut, pp. 235 et seq. The process of absorption referred to had much to do with the breaking up of the Separatist movement. Few of these congregations continued to exist until the struggle for religious freedom was fully won. Other contributory causes in the breaking up of the movement were the poverty of the members of these congregations, the difficulties they experienced in securing pastoral care, and the dissensions that arose among them in the exercise of their boasted rights of private judgment, public exhortation, and the interpretation of the Scriptures.

[66] Backus, History of New England, vol.ii, pp.140 et seq.

[67] Backus, op. cit., p.141.

[68] Ibid.

[69] Cf. Minutes of the Warren Association for 1769, quoted by Burrage, History of the Baptists in New England, pp.108 et seq. Cf. the following, taken from a statement and appeal to Baptists, in the Boston Evening Post, Aug.20, 1770: “To the Baptists in the Province of Massachusetts Bay, who are, or have been, oppressed in any way on a religious account. It would be needless to tell you that you have long felt the effects of the laws by which the religion of the government in which you live is established. Your purses have felt the burden of ministerial rates; and when these would not satisfy your enemies, your property hath been taken from you and sold for less than half its value…. You will therefore readily hear and attend when you are desired to collect your cases of suffering, and have them well attested; such as, the taxes you have paid to build meeting-houses, to settle ministers and support them, with all the time, money and labor you have lost in waiting on courts, feeing lawyers, &c.; and bring or send such cases to the Baptist Association to be held at Bellingham; when measures will be resolutely adopted for obtaining redress from another quarter than that to which repeated application hath been made unsuccessfully. Nay, complaints, however just and grievous, hath been treated with indifference, and scarcely, if at all credited”. (Quoted by Backus, History of New England, vol.ii, p.155.)

[70] Backus, History of New England, vol.ii, pp.156 et seq.

[71] This standing committee of the Warren Association is itself a token of the strengthened purpose of the Baptists.

[72] The address is given in full in Hovey, A Memoir of the Life and Times of Isaac Backus, pp.218–221. It drew a kindly response from the Provincial Congress, signed by John Hancock as president, pleading the inability of the Congress to give redress and advising the aggrieved parties to submit their case to the General Court of Massachusetts at its next session. This step was taken in September, 1775; but beyond the fact that a bill, drawn to give redress, was once read in the sessions of the Assembly, nothing came at the matter. “Such”, remarks Backus, “is the disposition of mankind”. (Cf. Backus, History of New England, vol.ii, pp.202 et seq. Cf. Burrage, History of the Baptists in New England, pp.113 et seq.)

[73] The Laws of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, Passed from the Year 1780, to the End of the Year 1800, vol.i, pp.19, 20.

[74] Ibid.

[75] Backus, History of New England, vol.ii, pp.228 et seq., for cases of persecution under the operation of the bill of rights.

[76] The contribution made by the newspapers must not be overlooked in this connection. From about 1770 on there may be traced a growing disposition on the part of dissenters to air their grievances in the public journals. Supporters of the Establishment were not slow to respond.

[77] In addition to the two specifically referred to, Backus published the following: Policy, as well as Honesty, Forbids the Use of Secular Force in Religious Affairs, Boston, 1779; Truth is Great, and Will Prevail, Boston, 1781; A Door Opened for Equal Christian Liberty, etc., Boston, 1783.

[78] Backus, op. cit., p.13.

[79] Quoted from Backus, History of New England, vol.ii, p.223.

[80] Walker, History of the Congregational Churches in the United States, pp.206–209.

[81] Cf. A Vindication of the Government of the New-England Churches, etc., Boston, 1772. The first edition of 500 copies was quickly subscribed for, and a second was published the same year.

[82] An edition of Wise’s tracts was published as late as 1860, by the Congregational Board of Publication. From that edition the citations are drawn. The following from the “Introductory Notice” is of interest: “ … some of the most glittering sentences of the immortal Declaration of Independence are almost literal quotations from this essay of John Wise [i. e., Vindication of the Government of New-England Churches]. And it is a significant fact, that in 1772, only four years before the declaration was made, a large edition of both those tracts was published by subscription in one duodecimo volume. The presumption which this fact alone suggests, that it was used as a political text-book in the great struggle for freedom then opening, is fully confirmed by the list of subscribers’ names printed at the end, with the number of copies annexed.” Page xx et seq.

[83] Ibid., pp.48–50, 54, 56.

[84] Wise, op. cit., p.56.

[85] Backus, History of New England, vol.ii, pp.391–401, furnishes the following table of Baptist strength in New England in the year 1795: Churches, 325; ministers, 232; members, 20,902. Methodism had emerged in New England within the last quarter of the century, and Methodist ministers were indefatigable in their labors. By the close of the century as generous-minded a Congregational minister as Bentley could not altogether cover over his chagrin on account of the growth and influence of the “sects”. Cf. Diary of William Bentley, vol. ii, pp.127, 409, 419.

[86] Backus, History of New England, vol.ii, p.235. Cf. Burrage, History of the Baptist in New England, pp.121 et seq.

[87] Cobb, The Rise of Religious Liberty in America, pp.509–511.

[88] Backus, History of New England, vol.ii, p.341.

[89] Ibid., pp.351 et seq., 379.

[90] Backus, op. cit., pp.353 et seq.

[91] Ibid., p.379.

[92] Actual disestablishment did not come in Massachusetts until 1833.

[93] Since the particular purpose of this chapter is to explain the bitter spirit existing between the orthodox party and dissenters in New England near the close of the eighteenth century, rather than to re-write the history of the struggle for full religious toleration, much that occurred in the long process of severing the bond between church and state may be passed over. Attention will be focused upon the character rather than the chronology of the struggle.

[94] Cobb, The Rise of Religious Liberty in America, p.238; Fiske, The Beginnings of New England, pp.123 et seq.

[95] Greene, The Development of Religious Liberty in Connecticut, p. 121; Cobb, The Rise of Religious Liberty in America, p.243.

[96] Cobb, op. cit., pp.244, 246.

[97] Ibid., pp.240 et seq.; Greene, The Development of Religious Liberty in Connecticut, pp.62 et seq., 68.

[98] It was the judgment of Isaac Backus that “oppression was greater in Connecticut, than in other governments in New England”. (History of New England, vol.ii, p.404.)

[99] Cobb, The Rise of Religious Liberty in America, p.244. Cobb’s statement concerning the lack of harshness and ungentleness which characterized the attitude of the supporters of the state church toward dissent is extreme. The controlling spirit of the Standing Order was doubtless a positive concern for the welfare of the Establishment rather than a desire to weed out dissent; but the clash of interests became so sharp and bitter that motives did not remain unmixed, and in many an instance dissent in Connecticut was compelled to reckon with a spirit of actual persecution.

[100] The Public Records of the Colony of Connecticut, vol.i, p.21.

[101] Cobb, The Rise of Religious Liberty in America, pp.246 et seq.

[102] The Public Records of the Colony of Connecticut, vol.i, p.311.

[103] Ibid., pp.356, 362; vol.ii, pp.99, 240; vol.iii, pp.78, 82 et seq.

[104] Ibid., vol.iii, pp.13, 18, 101, 216 et seq.

[105] Ibid., vol.iv, pp.67, 127, 136 et seq.

[106] Ibid., vol.vii, p.554.

[107] Ibid., pp.334, 335.

[108] Ibid., vol.iii, p.183.

[109] Ibid., vol.i, pp.437 et seq.

[110] Ibid., vol.iii, p.104.

[111] Cobb, The Rise of Religious Liberty in America, p.247.

[112] Walker, The Creeds and Platforms of Congregationalism, pp.465 et seq.

[113] Walker, A History of the Congregational Churches in the United States, pp.202 et seq.; Greene, The Development of Religious Liberty in Connecticut, pp.133 et seq.

[114] Walker, The Creeds and Platforms of Congregationalism, pp. 491–494.

[115] The Public Records of the Colony of Connecticut, vol.v, pp. 51 et seq.

[116] Ibid.

[117] Ibid.

[118] Walker, The Creeds and Platforms of Congregationalism, pp. 502–506, where “The Saybrook Meeting and Articles” are printed in full. For expositions, see Backus, History of New England, vol.i, pp. 470 et seq.; Palfrey, A History of New England, vol.iii, p.342; Dexter, The Congregationalism of the last Three Hundred Years, pp. 489, 490.

[119] The Public Records of the Colony of Connecticut, vol.v, p.87.

[120] Greene, The Development of Religious Liberty in Connecticut, p 151.

[121] Cf. supra, p. 53.

[122] The Public Records of the Colony of Connecticut, vol.v, p.50. It seems clear that either through neglect or evasion a considerable number of congregations failed to qualify under the law. In any event the legislature deemed itself warranted in passing an act, May, 1721, imposing a fine of five shillings on persons convicted of not having attended “the publick worship of God on the Lord’s day in some congregation by law allowed.” (See ibid., vol.vi, p.248.) Churches which for doctrinal or other reasons withdrew from the Establishment suffered serious embarrassments on account of this law respecting the licensing of congregations.

[123] Ibid., vol.v, p.50. Any infraction of this law was to be punished by a heavy fine. Failure to pay the fine involved heavy bail or imprisonment.

[124] Greene, The Development of Religious Liberty in Connecticut, pp. 191 et seq.

[125] The Public Records of the Colony of Connecticut, vol.vi, p.106.

[126] The Pub. Records of the Colony of Conn., vol.vi, pp.237, 257. Unlike the Massachusetts exemption laws passed on behalf of these two bodies, these were perpetual.

[127] Collections of the Connecticut Historical Society: Talcott Papers, vol. v, pp.9–13; Backus, History of New England, vol.ii, pp.98 et seq.

[128] Parker, History of the Second Church of Christ in Hartford, pp. 117, 119; Papers of the New Haven Colony Historical Society, vol. iv: The Bradford Annals, pp.318 et seq.; Backus, History of New England, vol.ii, pp.57 et seq., 79 et seq. For the account of the difficulties of a particular Separatist congregation, see Dutton, The History of the North Church in New Haven, pp.25–28. Cf. The Public Records of the Colony of Connecticut, vol.xi, pp.323 et seq.; also Beardsley, The History of the Episcopal Church in Connecticut, vol.i, p.140.

[129] The bigoted and unfeeling spirit which controlled the authorities is well expressed in the act of May, 1743. Proceeding on the assumption that the Separatists, taking advantage of the act of May, 1708, were responsible for the disruptive tactics and measures of the times, by means of which “some of the parishes established by the laws of this Colony … have been greatly damnified, and by indirect means divided and parted,” the General Court repealed the act in question, and put in its place the following: “And be it further enacted, that, for the future, if any of His Majesty’s good subjects, being protestants, inhabitants of this Colony, that shall soberly dissent from the way of worship and ministry established by the laws of this Colony, that such persons may apply themselves to this Assembly for relief, where they shall be heard. And such persons as have any distinguishing character, by which they may be known from the presbyterians or congregationalists, and from the consociated churches established by the laws of this Colony, may expect the indulgence of this Assembly [Italics mine.—V. S.], having first before this Assembly taken the oaths and subscribed the declaration provided in the act of Parliament in cases of like nature.” (The Public Records of the Colony of Connecticut, vol.viii, p.522. Cf. Backus, History of New England, vol.ii, p.58.)

[130] The Public Records of the Colony of Connecticut, vol.viii, p.454.

[131] Ibid., p.456.

[132] The Pub. Records of the Colony of Conn., vol.viii, p.456.

[133] Ibid., p.457.

[134] Backus, History of New England, vol.ii, p.57.

[135] Cobb, The Rise of Religious Liberty in America, pp.274 et seq. Greene, The Development of Religious Liberty in Connecticut, pp. 244 et seq.

[136] Cf. supra, Footnote 129.

[137] Backus, History of New England, vol.ii, pp.59 et seq., 62, 65 et seq., 77 et seq., 81 et seq.

[138] Greene, The Development of Religious Liberty in Connecticut, pp. 248–262. The difficulties experienced by three congregations in New Haven, Canterbury, and Enfield, are dealt with in detail.

[139] A revision of Connecticut laws took place in 1750. The unjust legislation of 1742–43 and of the following years was quietly left out.

[140] Papers of the New Haven Colony Historical Society, vol.iii, pp. 398 et seq.

[141] Acts and Laws of the State of Connecticut, in America, p.21.

[142] Acts and Laws of the State of Connecticut, in America, p.21.

[143] Parker, History of the Second Church of Hartford, pp.170, 171. Cf. Beecher, Autobiography, Correspondence, etc., vol.i, p.302. The latter’s account of the situation is much softened by his sympathies with the dominant party.

[144] By this time dissenters and Anti-Federalists had largely consolidated their interests. The political program of the latter drew upon the former all the suspicions and antagonisms which the Standing Order entertained toward the foes of Federalism. The acrimonious discussion which arose at this time over the disposition of the Western Reserve and the funds thus derived, admirably illustrates the cross-currents of religious and political agitation in the last decade of the century. Cf. Greene, The Development of Religious Liberty in Connecticut, pp. 380–392.

[145] This is readily explicable in view of the fact that most of the magistrates were adherents of the Establishment. The comment of Backus touches the pith of the matter, as dissenters saw it: “Thus the civil authority in the uppermost religious party in their State, was to judge the consciences of all men who dissented from their worship.” (History of New England, vol.ii, p.345.)

[146] Acts and Laws of the State of Connecticut, p.418.

[147] In September, 1818, by the adoption of the new state constitution, the long wearisome struggle was brought to an end, and State and Church in Connecticut were separated completely.

[148] This point of view was tersely set forth in the election sermon preached by the Rev. Mr. Payson, at Boston, May27, 1778: “Let the restraints of religion once be broken down, as they infallibly would be by leaving the subject of public worship to the humours of the multitude, and we might well defy all human wisdom and power to support and preserve order and government in the state.”—Quoted by Backus, Church History of New England, from 1620 to 1804 (ed. of 1844, Philadelphia), pp.204 et seq.

[149] The state of feelings shared by the supporters of the Establishment at the time when the blow fell severing the bond between the church and state in Connecticut, is vividly expressed by Beecher: “It was a time of great depression…. It was as dark a day as ever I saw. The injury done to the cause of Christ, as we then supposed, was irreparable. For several days I suffered what no tongue can tell for the best thing that ever happened to the State of Connecticut.” (Autobiography, Correspondence, etc., vol.i, p.304.)

[150] This was the view propounded by President Ezra Stiles, of Yale, in his election sermon of May3, 1783: “Through the liberty enjoyed here, all religious sects will grow up into large and respectable bodies. But the Congregational and Presbyterian denominations, however hitherto despised, will, by the blessing of Heaven continue to hold the greatest figure in America, and, notwithstanding all the fruitless labors and exertions to proselyte us to other communions, become more numerous than the whole collective body of our fellow protestants in Europe.” (Quoted by Backus, History of New England, vol.ii, p.312.)

To this exposition and bold forecast Backus took decided objections, on the grounds (1) that persecution and not tolerance had promoted the growth of sects in America, and (2) that the numerical increase of the Congregationalists and Presbyterians in this country did not justify any such prediction. Cf. ibid., pp.403–407.

[151] Perhaps no man more boldly stated this interpretation of the motives that inspired the Standing Order than Abraham Bishop, leader of the forces of Republicanism in Connecticut and arch-enemy of “ecclesiastical aristocrats.” “The religion of the country is made a stalking horse for political jockies … Thanksgiving and fasts have been often improved for political purposes and the miserable gleanings from half a year’s ignorance of the true interests of our country have been palmed on the people, by the political clergy, as a pious compliance with the governor’s very pious proclamations…. The union of Church and State … [is] the grand fortress of the ‘friends of order and good government.’” (Oration delivered at Wallingford, New Haven, 1801, pp. 46, 83.) That “the church is in danger” has for some time past been one of the most frequent and frantic of all the absurd cries heard in the land, and that New England through her clannishness has produced “patriarchs in opinion” who assume the prerogative of dictating the opinions of the people on all subjects, are further trenchant comments of the same orator. (Ibid., pp.13, 17.) Bishop’s observations respecting the alleged specious and insincere character of those public utterances by which “the friends of order and good government” sought to preserve the status quo, are equally pointed. “The sailor nailed the needle of his compass to the cardinal point and swore that it should not be always traversing. So does the New England friend of order: but he cautiously conceals the oppression and imposture, which sustains these habits…. This cry of steady habits has a talismanic effect on the minds of our people; but nothing can be more hollow, vain and deceitful. Recollect for a moment that everything valuable in our world has been at one time innovation, illuminatism, modern philosophy, atheism…. Our steady habits have calmly assumed domination over the rights of conscience and suffrage. Certainly the trinitarian doctrine is established by law and the denial of it is placed in the rank follies. Though we have ceased to transport from town to town, quakers, new lights, and baptists; yet the dissenters from our prevailing denomination are, even at this moment, praying for the repeal of those laws which abridge the rights of conscience.” (Ibid., pp.14, 16.)

[152] Quoted by Walker, in his History of the Congregational Churches in the United States, p.216.

[153] Green, Life, pp.224, 225.

[154] Cf. supra, pp. 36 and 37 et seq.

[155] See Walker, Creeds and Platforms of Congregationalism, p.287.

[156] The lowest point of religious decline in the history of New England was reached in the first quarter of the eighteenth century. The absence of vital piety was generally remarked. The prevailing type of religious experience was unemotional and formal. The adoption of the Half-Way Covenant in the third quarter of the previous century helped to precipitate a state of things wherein the ordinary distinctions between the converted and the unconverted were largely obscured. Emphasis came to be laid heavily upon the cultivation of morality as a means of promoting spiritual life. Prayer, the reading of the Bible, and church attendance were other “means”. In other words, man’s part in the acquisition of religious experience came prominently into view. The promoters of the revival attacked these notions, asserting that repentance and faith were still fundamentally necessary and that the experience of conversion, i. e., the conscious sense of a change in one’s relation to God, was the prime test of one’s hope of salvation. Charles Chauncy, minister of the First Church, Boston, in his Seasonable Thoughts on the State of Religion in New England (1743), championed the former position; the great Edwards came to the defence of the latter.

[157] Channing, Memoirs, vol.i. pp.287–290, 387. Cf. also Goddard, Studies in New England Transcendentalism, pp.13 et seq.

[158] Riley, American Philosophy, p.192. Note: It is not here maintained that radical religious ideas in New England had their earliest roots, or found their sole stimulus, in the controversy which the theological formulations incident to the Great Awakening provoked. Incipient religious liberalism is distinguishable as far back as the publication of Cotton Mather’s Reasonable Religion, in 1713. In his erudite essay on “The Beginnings of Arminianism in New England,” F. A. Christie adopts the position that prior to the Great Awakening there were rumor and alarm over the mere arrival of Arminian doctrines in this country; but that after 1742 the heresy spread rapidly, chiefly due to the growth of the Episcopal church, with its marked leanings to the Arminian theology. Cf. Papers of the American Society of Church History, Second Series, vol.iii, pp.168 et seq. But however that may be, the cause of Arminianism during the eighteenth century was promoted by men in New England who drew at least a part of their inspiration from the writings of leaders of thought in the mother country whose theological positions inclined strongly toward rationalism. Cf. Cooke, Unitarianism in America, pp.39, 44 et seq., 79. Harvard College, from the close of the seventeenth century on, was increasingly recognized as a center of liberalizing tendencies, although none will dispute that the kernel of intellectual independence was found, all too frequently, well hidden within the tough shell of traditional conceits. Cf. Quincy, The History of Harvard University, vol. i, pp.44–57, 199 et seq. Independent impulses were largely responsible for the following events which mark the definite emergence of Unitarianism in America: the organization of the first New England Unitarian congregation at Gloucester, Mass., in 1779; the publication in this country, five years later, of the London edition of Dr. Charles Chauncy’s Salvation for All Men; and the defection from Trinitarian standards of King’s Chapel, Boston, in 1785–87. Still it must be maintained that the controversies which raged around the doctrines of the New Calvinism beyond all other factors stiffened the inclinations and tendencies of the century toward liberal thinking. Such terms as “Arminianism”, “Pelagianism”, “Socinianism”, “Arianism”, etc., which occur with ever-increasing frequency from the fourth decade of the century on, are in themselves suggestive of the divergencies in religious opinion which the doctrinal discussion incident to the Great Awakening provoked. Cf. Fiske, A Century of Science and Other Essays: “The Origins of Liberal Thought in America”, pp.148 et seq.

[159] As a typical illustration the comment of Lyman Beecher may be cited: “The Deistic controversy was an existing thing, and the battle was hot, the crisis exciting.” (Autobiography, Correspondence, etc. vol. i, p.52.) The date is about 1798. In the same connection President Dwight of Yale is referred to as “the great stirrer-up of that [i. e., the deistic] controversy on this side the Atlantic.” (Ibid.) It is certain that Dwight had some acquaintance with the works of the leading English deists, and that he opposed their views. Cf. Travels in New England and New York, vol.iv, p.362; but his main target was infidelity of the French school. Beecher fails to distinguish between the two.

[160] One discovers no convincing evidence that the deistical views of Benjamin Franklin produced any direct effect upon the thought of New England. As respects Thomas Jefferson the case was different. But New England Federalists were so successful in keeping public attention fixed on Jefferson’s fondness for French political and religious philosophy, that his alleged “French infidelity” rather than his opinions concerning natural religion became and continued to be the bone of contention. That he was regarded as a deist is, however, not to be questioned. Bentley, Diary, vol.iii, p.20.

[161] Allen’s book of some 477 pages bore the following pretentious and rambling title: Reason the only Oracle of Man, or a Compendius System of Natural Religion. Alternately Adorned with Confutations of a Variety of Doctrines incompatible to it; Deduced from the Most Exalted Ideas which we are able to form of the Divine and Human Characters, and from the Universe in General. By Ethan Allen, Esq. Bennington, State of Vermont. The Preface is dated July2, 1782. Evans records the fact that the entire edition, except about thirty copies, was destroyed by fire, said to have been caused by lightning, an event which the orthodox construed as a judgment from heaven on account of the nature of the book. Cf. American Bibliography, vol. vi, p.266. The author’s aim has been interpreted as an effort “to build up a system of natural religion on the basis of a deity expressed in the external universe, as interpreted by the reason of man, in which the author includes the moral consciousness.” (Moncure D. Conway in Open Court [magazine], January28, 1892, article: “Ethan Allen’s Oracles of Reason,” p.3119.)

[162] The Literary Diary of Ezra Stiles, vol.iii, p.345. The comment of Yale’s president is fairly representative: “And the 13th Inst died in Vermont the profane & impious Deist Gen Ethan Allen, Author of the Oracles of Reason, a Book replete with scurrilous Reflexions on Revelation. ‘And in Hell he lift up his Eyes being in Torments.’” (Ibid.) In 1787, at Litchfield, Connecticut, where Allen’s home had once been, there was published an anonymous sermon, from the text: “And he would fain have filled his belly with the husks which the swine did eat.” (Luke 15: 16.) The sermon was planned to counteract the effect produced by the “prophane, prayerless, graceless infidel,” Allen, through the publication of the book in question. The author, “Common Sense” (apparently Josiah Sherman), adopts for his sermon the caption, “A Sermon to Swine,” and explains in the Advertisement the temper of his mood: “By way of apology, I hope Gen. Allen will pardon any reproach that may be supposable, in comparing him to the Prodigal Son, sent by the Citizen into his fields to feed Swine with husks, when he considers, what an infinitely greater reproach he casts upon the holy oracles of God, and upon his Prophets, Apostles and Ministers, and upon the Lord of life and glory himself; at whose tribunal we must all shortly appear; when he represents Him as an impostor and cheat, and all the blessed doctrines of the gospel as falsehood and lies.” (A Sermon to Swine: From Luke xv: 16 … Containing a concise, but sufficient answer to General Allen’s Oracles of Reason. By Common Sense, A. M., Litchfield, 1787.)

An amusing albeit suggestive episode is recorded by William Bentley in his Diary, in connection with certain reflections on the dangers involved in the loaning of books: “Allen’s oracles of reason … was lent to Col. C. under solemn promise of secrecy, but by him sent to a Mr. Grafton, who was reported to have died a Confirmed Infidel…. The book was found at his death in his chamber, examined with horror by his female relations. By them conveyed to a Mr. Williams … & there examined—reported to be mine from the initials W. B., viewed as an awful curiosity by hundreds, connected with a report that I encouraged infidelity in Grafton by my prayers with him in his dying hour, & upon the whole a terrible opposition to me fixed in the minds of the devout & ignorant multitude.” (Ibid., vol.i, p.82.)

The following extract from Timothy Dwight’s poem on The Triumph of Infidelity supplies another interesting contemporaneous estimate of Allen’s assault upon revelation:

“In vain thro realms of nonsense ran

The great Clodhopping oracle of man.

Yet faithful were his toils: What could he more?

In Satan’s cause he bustled, bruised and swore;

And what the due reward, from me shall know,

For gentlemen of equal worth below.”

A foot-note explains the point in the last two lines: “In A——n’s Journal, the writer observes, he presumes he shall be treated in the future world as well as other gentlemen of equal merit are treated: A sentiment in which all his countrymen will join.” (The Triumph of Infidelity: A Poem. [Anonymous], 1788, pp.23 et seq. The copy referred to is dedicated by the author “To Mons. de Voltaire.”)

[163] The Age of Reason: Part I, appeared in America in 1794. Cf. The Age of Reason by Thomas Paine, edited by Moncure Daniel Conway, New York, 1901, p.vii; also advertisements of its offer for sale, Massachusetts Spy (Worcester), Nov.19, 1794. The Connecticut Courant (Hartford), Jan.19, and Feb.9, 1795, contains examples of pained newspaper comment. Walcott Papers, vol.viii, 7.

[164] At least fifteen thousand copies of the second part of the book arrived in America in the spring of 1796, despatched from Paris by Paine, consigned to his Philadelphia friend, Mr. Franklin Bache, Republican printer, editor, and ardent servant of radicalism generally. It was clearly Paine’s purpose to influence as many minds in America as possible. Cf. Conway, The Writings of Thomas Paine, vol.iv, p.15; Paine’s letter to Col. Fellows, in New York, explaining the forwarding of the books. This effort to obtain a general circulation of the Age of Reason did not escape the attention of men who were disturbed over the prevailing evidences of irreligion. In a fast day sermon, delivered in April, 1799, the Reverend Daniel Dana, of Newburyport, Massachusetts, called attention to the matter in the following fashion: “ … let me mention a fact which ought to excite universal alarm and horror. The well-known and detestable pamphlet of Thomas Paine, written with a professed design to revile the Christian religion, and to diffuse the poison of infidelity, was composed in France, was there printed in English, and an edition containing many thousand of copies, conveyed at a single time into our country, in order to be sold at a cheap rate, or given away, as might best ensure its circulation. What baneful success has attended this vile and insidious effort, you need not be told. That infidelity has had, for several years past, a rapid increase among us, seems a truth generally acknowledged.” (Two Sermons, delivered April25, 1799: the day recommended by the President of the United States for National Humiliation, Fasting and Prayer. By Daniel Dana, A. M., pastor of a church in Newburyport, 1799, p.45). Cf. also ibid., p.20.

[165] The Age of Reason was written from the standpoint of a man who believed that the disassociation of religion from political institutions, and the elimination from it of fiction and fable, would bring in the true religion of humanity. The following excerpt sets out the author’s approach and aim: “Soon after I had published the pamphlet, ‘Common Sense’, in America I saw the exceeding probability that a revolution in the system of government would be followed by a revolution in the system of religion. The adulterous connection of church and state, wherever it had taken place, whether Jewish, Christian, or Turkish, had so effectually prohibited by pains and penalties every discussion upon established creeds, and upon first principles of religion, that until the system of government should be changed those subjects could not be brought fairly and openly before the world; but that whenever this should be done a revolution in the system of religion would follow. Human inventions and priestcraft would be detected; and man would return to the pure, unmixed, and unadulterated belief of one God and no more.” (The Writings of Thomas Paine, vol.ii, pp. 22 et seq.) Paine’s exposition of the tenets of natural religion was far from scholarly, and as soon as the public became aware of the eccentric and uneven character of the book, the storm of criticism speedily blew itself out. The recoil of Paine’s ugly attack upon Washington, in the same year in which the Age of Reason was extensively circulated in this country, materially helped to discredit the book.

[166] A partial list of the books and pamphlets, separate discourses not included, which were published in this country immediately following the appearance of the Age of Reason will serve to emphasize the depth of the impression which Paine’s book made: (1)Priestley, Joseph, An Answer to Mr. Paine’s Age of Reason; being a Continuation of Letters to the Philosophers and Politicians of France, on the Subject of Religion; and of the Letters of a Philosophical Unbeliever. Second Edition. Northumberlandtown, America, 1794; (2)Williams, Thomas, The Age of Infidelity: an Answer to Thomas Paine’s Age of Reason. By a Layman (pseud.). Third Edition, Worcester, Mass., 1794; (3) Stilwell, Samuel, A Guide to Reason, or an Examination of Thomas Paine’s Age of Reason, and Investigation of the True and Fabulous Theology, New York, 1794; (4)Winchester, Elhanan, Ten Letters Addressed to Mr. Paine, in Answer to His Pamphlet, entitled The Age of Reason, Second Edition, New York, 1795; (5)Ogden, Uzal, Antidote to Deism. The Deist Unmasked; or an Ample Refutation of all the Objections of Thomas Paine, Against the Christian Religion; as Contained in a Pamphlet, intitled (sic), The Age of Reason, etc., Two volumes, Newark, 1795; (6)Broaddus, Andrew, The Age of Reason and Revelation; or Animadversions on Mr. Thomas Paine’s late piece, intitled “The Age of Reason”, etc. … Richmond, 1795; (7)Muir, James, An Examination of the Principles Contained in the Age of Reason. In Ten Discourses, Baltimore, 1795; (8)Belknap, Jeremy, Dissertations on the Character, Death & Resurrection of Jesus Christ … with remarks on some sentiments advanced in a book intitled “The Age of Reason,” Boston, 1795; (9)Humphreys, Daniel, The Bible Needs no Apology; or Watson’s System of Religion Refuted; and the Advocate Proved an Unreliable One, by the Bible Itself: of which a short view is given, and which itself gives a short answer to Paine: in Four Letters, on Watson’s Apology for the Bible, and Paine’s Age of Reason, Part the Second, Portsmouth, 1796; (10)Tytler, James, Paine’s Second Part of the Age of Reason Answered, Salem, 1796; (11)Fowler, James, The Truth of the Bible Fairly Put to the Test, by Confronting the Evidences of Its Own Facts, Alexandria, 1797; (12)Levy, David, A Defence of the Old Testament, in a Series of Letters, addressed to Thomas Paine, Author of a Book entitled, The Age of Reason, Part Second, etc. … New York, 1797; (13)Williams, Thomas, Christianity Vindicated in the admirable speech of the Hon. Theo. Erskine, in the Trial of J. Williams, for Publishing Paine’s Age of Reason, Philadelphia, 1797; (14)Snyder, G., The Age of Reason Unreasonable; or the Folly of Rejecting Revealed Religion, Philadelphia, 1798; (15)Nelson, D., An Investigation of that False, Fabulous and Blasphemous Misrepresentation of Truth, set forth by Thomas Paine, in his two volumes, entitled The Age of Reason, etc. (This volume appears to have been published pseudonymously. Advertised in Lancaster, Pa., Intelligencer and Advertiser, October, 1800); (16)Boudinot, Elias, The Age of Revelation, Or, The Age of Reason shewn to be an Age of Infidelity, Philadelphia, 1801.

[167] Cf. Morse, The Federalist Party in Massachusetts, Appendix I, pp. 217 et seq., for a detailed and fairly satisfactory statement of the character and extent of the discussion which Paine’s book precipitated in New England.

[168] Channing, Memoirs, vol.i, pp.60, 61. On the latter page it is asserted that in order to counteract such fatal principles as those expressed in the Age of Reason, the patrons and governors of Harvard College had Watson’s Apology for the Bible published and furnished to the students at the expense of the corporation. This was in 1796. Beecher’s Autobiography, Correspondence, etc., vol.i, pp. 30, 35, 52, touches upon the situation at Yale. Cf. Dwight, Theology: Explained and Defended, vol.i, pp.xxv, xxvi. The extensive prevalence of infidelity among Yale students is commented upon and the statement made that a considerable proportion of the class which President Dwight first taught (1795–96) “had assumed the names of principal English and French Infidels; and were more familiarly known by them than by their own.” (Ibid.) Cf. Dorchester, Christianity in the United States, p.319.

[169] The impression lingered on after the stir caused by the appearance of the Age of Reason. In 1803 Paine was in southern New England. His presence was disturbing, as the following comment of William Bentley will show: “Reports are circulated that Thomas Paine intends to visit New England. The name is enough. Every person has ideas of him. Some respect his genius and dread the man. Some reverence his political, while they hate his religious, opinions. Some love the man, but not his private manners. Indeed he has done nothing which has not extremes in it. He never appears but we love and hate him. He is as great a paradox as ever appeared in human nature.” (Diary, vol.iii. p.37. Cf. ibid., vol.ii. pp.102, 107, 145.)

[170] Hazen, Contemporary American Opinion of the French Revolution, pp. 141 et seq.

[171] Ibid., p.143.

[172] Dwight, Travels, vol.iv, p.361.

[173] Writings of Thomas Jefferson, vol.v, pp.154, 274; Massachusetts Historical Collections, Sixth Series, vol.iv, Belknap Papers, p.503.

[174] The entire episode is treated with great fullness and equal vividness by Hazen, Contemporary American Opinion of the French Revolution, pp. 164–188.

[175] Writings of Thomas Jefferson, vol.vi, pp.153 et seq.

[176] From the first, devotion to the French cause had not been quite unanimous. Here and there, scattered through the country, a man might be found who from the beginning of the Revolution had cherished misgivings as to the essential soundness of the principles of the French in the conflict they were waging with despotism. Occasionally a man had ventured to speak out, voicing apprehension and doubt, although usually preferring to adopt the device of pseudonymity. Conspicuous in this by no means large group were the elder and the younger Adams, the former declaring himself in his “Discourses on Davila” (Cf. The Life and Works of John Adams, vol.vi, pp.223–403), and the latter in the “Publicola” letters, written in 1791, in response to Paine’s treatise on “The Rights of Man”. Morse, John Quincy Adams, p.18. But events, much more than political treatises, were to break the spell which the Revolution in its earlier stages cast over the people of America.

[177] No better testimony concerning the unfavorable impression created by the execution of the French king could be had than that supplied by the comment of Salem’s republican minister, the Reverend William Bentley. Under date of March25, 1793, he wrote: “The melancholy news of the beheading of the Roi de France is confirmed in the public opinion, & the event is regretted most sincerely by all thinking people. The french lose much of their influence upon the hearts of the Americans by this event.” (Diary, vol.ii, p.13. Cf. Hazen, Contemporary American Opinion of the French Revolution, pp.254 et seq.) This thrill of public horror also found expression in the following lines taken from a broadside of the day:

“When Mobs triumphant seize the rheins,

And guide the Car of State,

Monarchs will feel the galling chains,

And meet the worst of fate:

For instance, view the Gallic shore,

A nation, once polite

See what confusion hovers o’er,

A Star, that shone so bright.

Then from the scene recoil with dread,

For LOUIS is no more,

The barb’rous Mob cut off his head,

And drank the spouting gore.

Shall we, the Sons of FREEDOM dare

Against so vile a Race?

Unless we mean ourselves to bare (sic)

The palm of their disgrace.

No! God forbid, the man who feels

The force of pity’s call,

To join those Brutes, whose sentence seals,

Whose hearts are made of gall.”

(The Tragedy of Louis Capet, and Printed next the venerable Stump of Liberty Tree, for J. Plumer, Jun., Trader, of Newbury-port.) (In vol.21 of Broadsides, Library of Congress.)

[178] Webster, The Revolution in France considered in Respect to its Progress and Effects, New York, 1794. Webster’s discriminating pamphlet is one of the most suggestive of all American contemporaneous documents. Cf. Hazen, Contemporary American Opinion of the French Revolution, p.259.

[179] For characteristic outbursts of this nature, cf. Adams, Life and Works, vol.ii, p.160; Gibbs, Memoirs of the Administrations of Washington and John Adams, vol.i, p.90. Typical newspaper comment similar in vein may be found in the Western Star (Stockbridge, Mass.), March11, 1794, and the Gazette of the United States (Philadelphia), April13, 1793.

[180] As early as 1790 John Adams had spoken of the French nation as a “republic of atheists.” (Works, vol.ix, p.563.) Other leaders responded to similar sentiments. (Hazen, Contemporary American Opinion of the French Revolution, p.266.) Familiarity with French philosophical and religious opinions before the French Revolution had supplied a basis for this concern.

[181] Aulard, Le culte de la Raison et de l’Être suprÊme, pp.17 et seq. Cf. Sloane, The French Revolution and Religious Reform, pp.53, 79, 97. The effort to dechristianize the institutions of religion in France is admitted by both writers, but the superficial occasion of this hostile effort is made clear.

[182] Cf. infra, pp.103 et seq.

[183] The practice of looking to the religious situation in France for ammunition to serve the artillery of political parties in America, is well illustrated in the following instances: The Western Star of March25, 1794, dwelt at length upon the depravity of French irreligion, and asserted that the lack of public alarm in this country must be accepted as convincing evidence that the American public has already yielded itself to the seductive influence and power of atheistical opinions. On the other hand, the Independent Chronicle, issues of March6 and July24, 1794, pounces upon Robespierre’s scheme for the rehabilitation of religion under the guise of the cult of the Supreme Being, and with great gusto asserts that here is the positive and sufficient proof that the charge of atheism which has been lodged against the Revolutionists is as baseless as it is wicked. An examination of the newspaper comment of the day supplies abundant warrant that this crying up and crying down of the charge of French infidelity went far in the direction of investing the political situation in New England with those characteristics of bitter and extravagant crimination and recrimination with which all political discussion in that section, as in fact throughout the entire country, near the close of the eighteenth century, was so deeply marked.

[184] By the adoption of this measure the Catholic clergy in France were turned into state officials. The relation of the Pope to the French clergy became that of a spiritual guide and counsellor only. The principle of territorial limitation on the part of ecclesiastics was also abolished. Cf. Sloane, The French Revolution and Religious Reform, pp. 121 et seq.

[185] Aulard, The French Revolution, vol.iii, pp.152–191, gives an excellent rÉsumÉ of the dechristianizing movement.

[186] The conservative press of America saw to it that this information did not escape the attention of its readers. Cf. Hazen, Contemporary American Opinion of the French Revolution, pp.267 et seq. Cf. Morse, The Federalist Party in Massachusetts, pp.80–87, 98 et seq.

[187] Hazen, Contemporary American Opinion of the French Revolution, pp. 269 et seq.

[188] Dwight, Travels, vol.iv, p.362.

[189] Beecher, Autobiography, Correspondence, etc., vol.i, p.30.

[190] Baldwin, Annals of Yale College … From its Foundation to the Year 1831, New Haven, 1831, p.146.

[191] Field, Brief Memoirs of the Members of the Class Graduated at Yale College in September, 1802. (Printed for private distribution), p. 9.

[192] Beecher, Autobiography, Correspondence, etc., vol.i, p.30.

[193] Sprague, Annals of the American Pulpit, vol.ii, pp.164, 165. Cf. Sketches of Yale College, with Numerous Anecdotes … New York, 1843, p.136.

[194] Memoir of William Ellery Channing, vol.i, p.60.

[195] Ibid. Sidney Willard, in his Memories of Youth and Manhood, vol. ii, p.101, tones down the picture appreciably.

[196] Morse, The Federalist Party in Massachusetts, pp.88 et seq.

[197] A Sermon Delivered to the First Congregation in Cambridge, and the Religious Society in Charlestown, April11, 1793. By David Tappan, A. M., Professor of Divinity in Harvard College, Boston, 1793.

[198] Ibid., p.16.

[199] David Osgood (1747–1822) was one of the best known New England clergymen of his day. Possessing a fondness for unusual public occasions, such as state and church festivals, he acquired the habit of turning them to account by way of airing his political and religious ideas, a custom which drew to him the cordial support of the Federal school to which he belonged, and the no less cordial contempt of the Republicans. Cf. Sprague, Annals of the American Pulpit, vol.ii, pp. 75, 76.

[200] The predilection of the New England clergy for political preaching requires a word. The clergy emerged from the period of the American Revolution with their reputation considerably enhanced. The cause of the struggling colonists they had supported with resolution and ability and their moral force had shown itself remarkably effective. It is also to be noted that from the settlement of the country, the clergy had been extraordinarily influential in the direction of public affairs. They were the intimates and advisers of public officials as well as the trusted counsellors of the people. After the setting up of the government most of the questions which agitated the public mind had definite moral and religious aspects. The New England clergy would have regarded themselves as seriously remiss and therefore culpable had they not spoken out upon the burning questions of the day. With the intrusion of foreign affairs into the sphere of American politics the impulse in the direction of political preaching was decidedly strengthened. Definite issues regarding morality and religion were thus raised, and the passions of patriotism and religious devotion became inextricably woven together. Love, The Fast and Thanksgiving Days of New England, p.363; Swift, The Massachusetts Election Sermons: Publications of the Colonial Society of Massachusetts, vol.i: Transactions, 1892–1894, pp.422 et seq.

[201] The Democratic Societies (or Clubs), to which fuller attention is given on pp.104 et seq., instantly assumed a position of first importance in the minds of many clergyman of New England. Coupled as their emergence was with the amazing performances of Genet, they had the effect of suggesting to the clerical mind the fatal thrust at religion which might, and probably would result, on account of their subterranean operations. This idea of a secret combination against the institutions of religion in America, which proved to have a powerful attraction for many clerical minds, was definitely related to the spasm of anxiety and fear which swept the country when the presence of these secret clubs became generally known.

[202] Cf. [Osgood, David], The Wonderful Works of God are to be Remembered. A Sermon delivered on the day of the Annual Thanksgiving, November20, 1794, Boston, 1794, pp.21 et seq.

[203] On account of the virulence of party feeling, it was not to be expected that Osgood would succeed in stating the case in a manner acceptable to all. Popular opinion respecting the wisdom and fairness of Osgood’s performance was far from unanimous. An opposition, inspired by political interests, quickly developed, to which Republican newspapers willingly enough gave voice. The Independent Chronicle of Dec.11, 1794, contains typical expressions of adverse comment. An exceptionally forceful counter-attack was made in the guise of an anonymous “sermon”, entitled: “The Altar of Baal Thrown Down: or, The French Nation Defended, Against the Pulpit Slander of David Osgood, A. M., Pastor of the Church in Medford. Par Citoyen de Novion.” The author of this pamphlet, who, as time demonstrated, was none other than James Sullivan, later governor of Massachusetts, right valiantly took up the cudgel in defence of the French. The French, he argues, are to be regarded as a mighty nation by whom our own nation has been preserved from destruction. Their excesses are most charitably and fairly explained in the light of the frightful oppressions which they had long suffered. Their attitude toward religion should not be regarded as hostile. The French strike only at a clergy who have linked their power with that of the nobility, and who together have made the people’s lot intolerable. Cf. ibid., pp.12 et seq. The entire sermon abounds in caustic criticism of Osgood for having stepped “out of … line to gratify a party.”

[204] Christian Thankfulness Explained and Enforced. A Sermon, delivered at Charlestown, in the afternoon of February19, 1795. The day of general thanksgiving through the United States. By David Tappan, D. D., Hollisian Professor of Divinity in Harvard College, Boston, 1795.

[205] The Nature and Manner of Giving Thanks to God, Illustrated. A sermon, delivered on the day of the national thanksgiving, February19, 1795. By Ebenezer Bradford, A. M., pastor of the First Church in Rowley, Boston, 1795.

[206] The so-called “Whiskey Rebellion” came in for a considerable amount of hostile comment on the part of the Federalist clergy at this time. Generally speaking, the New England clergy felt sure of their ground respecting the alleged causal relation between the Democratic Clubs and the Pennsylvania uprising. Hence it happened that the tone of clerical condemnation with respect to everything which had the semblance of a secret propaganda was appreciably heightened. The moralizing tendencies of the clergy with respect to the secret combinations which were believed to be back of the “Whiskey Rebellion” is well illustrated in the following: A Sermon, delivered February19, 1795, being a day of general thanksgiving throughout the United States of America. By Joseph Dana, A. M., pastor of the South Church in Ipswich. Newburyport, 1795. Cf. also, Wolcott Papers, vol.viii, 7.

[207] Tappan’s Sermon, p.36.

[208] A Discourse, delivered February19, 1795. The day set apart by the President for a general thanksgiving throughout the United States. By David Osgood, A. M., pastor of the church in Medford, Boston, 1795, p.18.

[209] Ibid., pp.18, 19.

[210] A Sermon, delivered before the Convention of the Clergy of Massachusetts, in Boston, May26, 1796. By Jeremy Belknap, minister of the church in Federal-Street, Boston. Boston, 1796, pp.15 et seq. A similar note was struck by Tappan in the convention of the following year. Cf. Sermon, delivered before the Annual Convention of the Congregational Ministers of Massachusetts, in Boston, June1, 1797, Boston, 1797, p.26.

[211] A Sermon, delivered on the 9th of May, 1798. Being the day of a National Fast, Recommended by the President of the United States. By John Thornton Kirkland, minister of the New South Church, Boston. Boston, 1798, pp.18 et seq.

[212] Complaints of the nature indicated, and justifications of ministerial conduct in continuing the practice of “political preaching” increase in number from about 1796 on. The following examples are picked almost at random: The sermon preached by John Eliot at the ordination of Joseph M’Kean, Milton, Mass., November1, 1797, Boston, 1797, p.33; James Abercrombie’s Fast Day Sermon, May9, 1798, Philadelphia, Philadelphia, (n. d.); Eliphalet Porter’s Fast Day Sermon of the same date, at Roxbury, Boston, 1798, p.22; Samuel Miller’s Fast Day Sermon, also of the same date, at New York, New York, 1798.

[213] God’s Challenge to Infidels to Defend Their Cause, Illustrated and Applied in a Sermon, delivered in West Springfield, May4, 1797, being the day of the General Fast. By Joseph Lathrop, minister … Second Ed., Cambridge, 1803.

[214] Ibid., p.4.

[215] A Sermon, preached on the State Fast, April6th, 1798. … By Nathan Strong, pastor of the North Presbyterian Church in Hartford. Hartford, 1798, pp.14 et seq.

[216] Some Facts evincive of the Atheistical, Anarchical, and in other respects, Immoral Principles of the French Republicans, Stated in a sermon delivered on the 9th of May, 1798. … By David Osgood … Boston, 1798.

[217] One of the curious results of the reflection of the American clergy on the significance of the French Revolution was a marked disposition to treat the Roman Catholic Church with unwonted sympathy and respect. Osgood’s implied apology not infrequently received an unblushingly frank statement. Cf. for example, Nathan Strong’s Connecticut Fast Day Sermon, cited above.

[218] This estimate of the case appealed to Osgood’s mind and satisfied his fancy. A year later he was heard on the following subject: The Devil Let Loose; or The Wo occasioned to the Inhabitants of the Earth by His Wrathful Appearance among Them. For lurid rhetoric Osgood outdid himself on this occasion. “Not in France only, but in various other countries, is the devil let loose; iniquity abounds; unclean spirits, like frogs in the houses and kneading-troughs of the Egyptians, have gone forth to the kings and rulers of the earth, … the armies of Gog and Magog are gathered together in open hostility against all unrighteousness, truth and goodness.” (The Devil Let Loose, etc. Illustrated in a Discourse, delivered on the Day of the National Fast, April25, 1799, Boston, 1799, pp.13 et seq.)

[219] Some Facts Evincive, etc., pp.13, 16 et seq.

[220] Acts and Proceedings of the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church in the United States of America, May17, 1798, pp.11 et seq.

[221] Ibid.

[222] The Massachusetts Mercury (Boston), June19, 1798, contains the address in full.

[223] This address may be found in the Independent Chronicle of July4, 1799, and the Newburyport Herald of June28, 1799. A further comment, of more than average significance, on the unparalleled degeneracy of the times may be found in the sermon preached by the Reverend William Harris, of Marblehead, Massachusetts, before the annual convention of the Protestant Episcopal Church, held in Boston, May28, 1799. Cf. A Sermon delivered at Trinity Church, in Boston. … By William Harris, rector of St. Michael’s Church, Marblehead, Boston, 1799. A decade and a half later Lyman Beecher preached his famous sermon on “Building Waste Places.” The impression which lingered in his mind concerning the period under survey is worthy of consideration. After having discussed the unhappy condition of religious life in the churches of New England during the first half of the eighteenth century, he said: “A later cause of decline and desolation has been the insidious influence of infidel philosophy. The mystery of iniquity had in Europe been operating for a long time. The unclean spirits had commenced their mission to the kings of the earth to gather them together to the battle of the great day of God Almighty. But when that mighty convulsion [Foot-note: The French Revolution] took place, that a second-time burst open the bottomless pit, and spread darkness and dismay over Europe, every gale brought to our shores contagion and death. Thousands at once breathed the tainted air and felt the fever kindle in the brain. A paroxysm of moral madness and terrific innovation ensued. In the frenzy of perverted vision every foe appeared a friend, and every friend a foe. No maxims were deemed too wise to be abandoned, none too horrid to be adopted; no foundations too deep laid to be torn up, and no superstructure too venerable to be torn down, that another, such as in Europe they were building with bones and blood, might be built…. The polluted page of infidelity everywhere met the eye while its sneers and blasphemies assailed the ear…. The result was a brood of infidels, heretics, and profligates—a generation prepared to be carried about, as they have been, by every wind of doctrine, and to assail, as they have done, our most sacred institutions.” Cf. Beecher, Autobiography, Correspondence, etc., vol.i, pp.239, 240.

[224] Robinson, Jeffersonian Democracy in New England, p.i; Channing, History of the United States, vol.iv, p.150.

[225] The term “Anti-Federalist” was born out of the struggle which developed over the adoption of the national constitution. The term “Republican” was one of the by-products of the discussion which arose in this country, from 1792 on, over French revolutionary ideals. Cf. Johnston, American Political History, pt.i, p.207.

[226] American State Papers: Foreign Relations, vol.i, p.140.

[227] The issues of the Columbian Centinel for 1793 abound in addresses of this character.

[228] Cf. for example, the issues of the Connecticut Courant for July 29, Aug.5 and 26, 1793, and of the Independent Chronicle for May7, 16 and 23, 1793. Cf. Channing, History of the United States, vol.iv, p.128.

[229] The Connecticut Courant of May13, 1793, contains the first announcements of Genet’s arrival which that paper made. Subsequent issues are fairly well occupied with accounts of Genet’s arrival in Philadelphia, the unconfirmed expressions of cordiality and heated enthusiasm which he encountered there, the congratulatory address which the citizens of that place presented him, Genet’s response, etc. In the issue of August12 mention is made of the Frenchman’s arrival in New York. Thus far not the slightest trace of a suspecting attitude of mind is discoverable.

[230] The issues of the Connecticut Courant for August19 and 26, and November11, 1793, contain articles that admirably illustrate the rising temper of the New England Federalists as they contemplated Genet’s absurdities and improprieties.

[231] Luetscher, in his Early Political Machinery in the United States, p. 33, asserts that not more than twenty-four separate organizations of this character were formed within the two years which followed their first appearance. These were fairly well distributed throughout the Union. One was in Maine, one in Massachusetts (Boston), three in Vermont, two in New York, one in New Jersey, five in Pennsylvania, one in Delaware, one in Maryland, two in Virginia, one in North Carolina, four in South Carolina, and two in Kentucky.

[232] McMaster, A History of the People of the United States, vol. ii, pp.175 et seq.

[233] Hazen, Contemporary American Opinion of the French Revolution, pp. 189 et seq.

[234] Robinson, Jeffersonian Democracy in New England, p.10, for significant comments upon the effect of the establishment of the Democratic Societies on general political interest. The vote was appreciably increased and elections were more hotly contested on account of the emergence of the Clubs. Cf. also New England Magazine, January, 1890, p.488.

[235] Morse, The Federalist Party in Massachusetts, p.75; Wolcott Papers, vol.vii, 5, letter of Jedediah Morse to Oliver Wolcott. The Independent Chronicle of Jan.16, 1794, contains the Rules and Regulations and the Declaration of this Society.

[236] Massachusetts Mercury, Nov.29, 1793. Cf. Works of Fisher Ames, vol.ii, pp.146 et seq.

[237] Jedediah Morse did not fail to observe the appearance of the Boston organization nor to divine its character and general scope of action. In a letter to Oliver Wolcott, Secretary of the Treasury, and Morse’s intimate friend, a letter written close to the date of the organization of the Constitutional Club, Morse wrote optimistically but seriously of the situation:

“Charlestown, Dec.16th, 1793

… The body of the people repose great confidence in the Wisdom of the President—of Congress, & of the heads of Departments. May they have Wisdom to direct them! The President’s speech meets with much approbation—It is worthy of himself—We have some grumbletonians among us—who, when the French are victorious, speak loud & saucy—but when they meet with a check—sing small.—They form a sort of political Thermometer, by whh we can pretty accurately determine, what is, in their opinion, the state of French politics.—The French cause has no enemies here,—their conduct has many.—There are some who undistinguishly [sic] & unboundedly approve both—& most bitterly denounce, as Aristocrats, all who do not think as they do.—This party, whh is not numerous—nor as respectable as it is numerous—are about forming a Democratic Club—whh I think they call “the Massts. Constitutional Society”—I don’t know their design, but suppose they consider themselves as guardians of the Rights of Man—& overseers of the President, Congress, & you gentlemen in the several principal departments of State—to see that you don’t infringe upon the Constitution.—They don’t like, nor see through your borrowing so much money of Holland—They are very suspicious about all money matters….

Your friend,

Jed^h Morse.”

Wolcott Papers, vol.viii, 5.

[238] Annals of Congress, vol.iv, p.787.

[239] The President’s address was printed in full in leading New England journals. Cf. for example, Columbian Centinel, Nov.29, 1794; Independent Chronicle, Dec.1, 1794; Connecticut Courant, Dec.1, 1794.

[240] Columbian Centinel, Dec.6, 10, 1794; Connecticut Courant, Dec.8, 24, 1794.

[241] Columbian Centinel, Dec.13, 1794.

[242] Ibid., Dec.20, 1794.

[243] Independent Chronicle, Sept.18, 1794. Cf. also issues of this paper for Sept.1, 4, 8, and 15, Dec.4, 8, and 15, 1794.

[244] Ibid., Aug.25, 1794.

[245] Ibid., Dec.8, 1794.

[246] Independent Chronicle, Dec.11, 1794.

[247] Ibid., Nov.27, 1794.

[248] Cf. supra, pp. 89 et seq.

[249] Cf. Independent Chronicle, Dec.22, 25, and 29, 1794; Jan.8 and 15, 1795.

[250] Ibid., Jan.12, 1795.

[251] Ibid., Jan.15, 1795.

[252] A more detached and better balanced judgment of the importance of the part played by the clergy in the suppression of the Democratic Societies is that recorded by William Bentley: “When I consider the rash zeal with which the clergy have embarked in the controversy respecting Constitution & Clubs, I could not help thinking of a place in this Town, called Curtis’ folly. The good man attempting to descend a steep place, thought it best to take off one pair of his oxen & tackle them behind. But while the other cattle drove down hill, they drew the others down hill backwards & broke their necks. Had the French clergy continued with the people & meliorated their tempers they would have served them & the nobility.” (Diary, vol.ii, p.130.)

[253] That a certain depth of impression was made upon the mind of Jedediah Morse by the agitation that developed over these secret organizations will appear from the following letter which he wrote to Oliver Wolcott, late in 1794. It is quite true that the letter shows no trace of apprehension as respects the future; but the man’s interest had been keenly solicited and the future was to have suggestions and appeals of its own.

Wolcott Papers, vol.viii, 9. The explicit proof that the mind of this man, whose personality is of large importance for the purpose in hand, received permanent impressions from the activities of the Democratic Societies, on account of which he found it not difficult to conceive of like secret combinations a few years later, is found in his references to the political clubs in his Fast Day sermon of May9, 1798, p.24. Cf. also “Note F,” p.67, of his Thanksgiving Sermon of Nov.29, 1798.

[254] An interesting coincidence appears in this connection. The treaty was actually concluded on the very day that President Washington made his address dealing with the uprising in western Pennsylvania (November19, 1794). It was not submitted to the Senate, however, until June8 of the following year. On June24, 1795, it was recommended by that body for ratification, with a special reservation as to the twelfth article. Cf. Macdonald, Documentary Source Book of American History, p.244. The promulgation of the treaty came later, as will appear. For comment on the popular resentment which the public announcement of the provisions of the treaty stirred up, cf. McMaster, A History of the People of the United States, vol.ii, pp.212 et seq. For contemporary newspaper reports of the situation, cf. the Independent Chronicle, July9, 13, 16, 23 and 27, 1795. For pertinent observations by Jedediah Morse regarding the apprehensions which the vehement popular disapproval of the treaty awakened in his mind, cf. Wolcott Papers, vol.viii, 11.

[255] William Bentley, whose Democratic leanings must not be overlooked, delivered himself in characteristic fashion: “The public indignation is roused, & the papers begin to talk of lost liberties…. The Secrecy under which this business has been covered has served to exasperate the public mind, upon the discovery…. The bells tolled on the 4 of July instead of ringing, & a mournful silence prevailed through the City. In this Town the men who hold securities under the government are sufficiently influential against the disquiets & angry expressions of more dependent people.” (Diary, vol.ii, p.146.)

[256] Independent Chronicle, July16, 1795.

[257] Cf. reprint of the handbill circulated at Portsmouth, New Hampshire, in the Independent Chronicle of July20, 1795.

[258] Cf. extracts from the speech of Fisher Ames in the House of Representatives, April28, 1796. Quoted by Channing, History of the United States, vol.iv, pp.145 et seq.

[259] As a matter of fact, as far as Congress was concerned, the discussion over the treaty was continued for some time to come, because of the measures that were necessary to be taken to put the treaty into effect. Cf. Bassett, The Federalist System, p.134. The country, however, showed a disposition to accept the treaty as inevitable when the President’s signature was finally affixed.

[260] McMaster, A History of the People of the United States, vol.ii, pp. 248 et seq. Cf. Works of Fisher Ames, vol.i, p.161.

[261] Morse, The Federalist Party in Massachusetts, pp.153 et seq.

[262] Travelers from abroad who were in the country at this time remarked the extreme virulence of public and private discussion. De La Rochefoucault-Liancourt, Travels through the United States of North America, vol.ii, pp.231 et seq. Cf. ibid., pp. 75 et seq., 256, 359, 381; vol.iii, pp.23, 33 et seq., 74 et seq., 156, 163 et seq., 250, 274, 366 et seq. Cf. Weld, Travels through the States of North America … during the years 1795, 1796, and 1797, p.62. Writing specifically of the excited state of the public mind in February, 1796, the latter observer of our national life said: “It is scarcely possible for a dozen Americans to sit together without quarrelling about politics, and the British treaty, which had just been ratified, now gave rise to a long and acrimonious debate. The farmers were of one opinion, and gabbled away for a long time; the lawyers and the judge were of another, and in turns they rose to answer their opponents with all the power of rhetoric they possessed. Neither party could say anything to change the sentiments of the other one; the noisy contest lasted till late at night, when getting heartily tired they withdrew, not to their respective chambers, but to the general one that held five or six beds, and in which they laid down in pairs. Here the conversation was again revived, and pursued with as much noise as below, till at last sleep closed their eyes, and happily their mouths at the same time….” (Ibid., pp. 58 et seq.) Such unfavorable reflections are not to be dismissed as representing prejudiced views of the case. A habit of intolerance toward political opponents and of all men who shared contrary opinions, had become one of the characteristics of the times. The agitation over the treaty went far toward fixing this habit. The Alien and Sedition Acts, which came a little later, were the result of an unrestrained freedom of discussion scarcely more perceptible when they were passed in 1798 than at the time of the heat produced by the treaty.

[263] Gibbs, Memoirs of the Administrations of Washington and John Adams, vol.i, p.226, Oliver Ellsworth’s letter to Oliver Wolcott. Ellsworth reports that the “argument and explanation [of the treaty], that ‘’tis a damned thing made to plague the French,’ has by repetition, lost its power.” This could have been true only in a local sense.

[264] Cf. McMaster, A History of the People of the United States, vol. ii, pp.227 et seq., for an ample discussion of this view of the situation.

[265] That this fierce indictment of “British faction” and appeal to republican sentiment was by no means without practical effect, is shown in the result of the general election of 1796. The outcome of that election gave ground for great encouragement to the Democrats; for while their hero and idol, Thomas Jefferson, was not summoned to the presidency, none the less, to the deep chagrin of the Federalists, his opponent, John Adams, received his commission to succeed Washington on the basis of a majority in the electoral college of only three votes. There could be no question that a spirit of confident and undaunted republicanism was abroad in the land, and the good ship Federalism was destined to encounter foul weather. The state contest held in Massachusetts that same year was even more ominous. After a campaign marked by great vigor on the part of the Federalists, in an effort to rally popular support to their candidate, Increase Sumner, it developed that Samuel Adams, whose enemies had stressed the charge that he desired to enjoy a life tenure of the gubernatorial office, was reelected by a handsome Democratic majority of 5,000 votes. Cf. Morse, The Federalist Party in Massachusetts, p.161. Jedediah Morse showed himself to be a fairly astute prognosticator in connection with this election. He is found writing Wolcott, in October, 1795, to the effect that he is conscious of the fact that a severe storm is brewing. It is his conviction that the storm has been gathering for some time and is now about to burst forth. “Disorganizers” have been behind the opposition to the treaty. They have worked subterraneanly, trying to keep opposition alive. Cf. Wolcott Papers, vol.viii, 14.

[266] Cf. supra, p. 93.

[267] As early as the winter of 1795 William Bentley made the disgusted comment: “The Clergy are now the Tools of the Federalists.” Diary, vol.ii, p.129. Commencing with the participation of the clergy in the discussion over the treaty, Democrat newspapers like the Independent Chronicle began to administer mild rebukes to the clergy for the unwisdom of their conduct in favoring the British. Cf. the issue of the Chronicle for July20, 1795, for one of the earliest utterances of this sort. The spirit of resentment grew apace. Three years later this spirit of moderation had been fully discarded, and the clergy were being lashed unmercifully for their folly. For typical outbursts of this character, cf. the Independent Chronicle of Dec.3, 1798. Jedediah Morse paid tribute to the political concern and service of the clergy in a letter to Wolcott, written Dec.23, 1796: “Very few of ye Clergy of my acquaintance seem disposed to pray for the success of the French, since they have so insidiously and wickedly interferred in the management of our political affairs, & I apprehend the complexion of the thanksgiving sermons throughout N Engd. this year, are different from those of the last, in respect to this particular. I can speak of more than one with authority.” (Wolcott Papers, vol.viii, 20.)

[268] Morse, The Federalist Party in Massachusetts, p.121.

[269] Pamphleteers and newspaper writers were much more explicit. The Pretensions of Thomas Jefferson to the Presidency Examined: and the Charges against John Adams Refuted, was one of the well known political pamphlets of the day. According to Gibbs, in his Memoirs of the Administrations of Washington and John Adams, vol. i, p.379, it was prepared by Oliver Wolcott and William Smith, the latter of South Carolina. It marshalled the reasons why Jefferson should not be elected to the presidency. Among these “reasons” the charge of a close alliance between Jefferson and the men of the country who were notoriously interested in the cause of irreligion was boldly affirmed. Cf. page 36 et seq. This pamphlet was published in 1796. Later the charge of impiety was lodged against Jefferson with great frequency. Typical utterances of this nature may be found in the Library of American Literature, vol.iv, pp.249–251: “The Imported French Philosophy” (from “The Lay Preacher” of Joseph Dennie). This disquisition was much quoted in the newspapers of the day. From the position that the leaders of the Democrats were irreligious, it was easy for the Federalists to glide over to the position that the spirit of infidelity, believed to be spreading far and wide through the country, was consciously and deliberately backed by the restless and unscrupulous elements which, in the view of the Federalists, formed the opposition. The Connecticut Courant of January19, 1795, reflects this attitude. “The French”, it is asserted, “are mad in their pursuit of every phantom which disordered intellects can image. Having set themselves free from all human control, they would gladly scale the ramparts of heaven, and dethrone ALMIGHTY JEHOVAH. Our own Democrats would do just so, if they dare.” Cf. also the issue of the Courant for January5, the same year, for a characterization of the program of the Democrats as “a crazy system of Anti-Christian politics.” The offence given to the Democrats by such accusations was great. No man, perhaps, stated the stinging resentment which they felt better than Benjamin Franklin Bache in his Aurora of August15, 1798: “No part of the perfidy of the faction, the insidious monarchical faction, which dishonors our country, and endangers our future peace, is so bare faced as their perpetual railing about a party acting in concert with France—a party of democrats and Jacobins—a party of disorganizers and atheists—a party inimical to our independence! What is the plain intent of these impudent and ignorant railings? It is to impose upon the ignorant, to collect and concentre in our focus all the vice, pride, superstition, avarice, and ambition in the United States, in order to weigh down by the union of such a phalanx of iniquity, all that is virtuous and free in the nation.” Abraham Bishop, whose repudiation of the Federalist charge that Jefferson was to be the High Priest of Infidelity was particularly vehement, saw in this cry that an alliance had been made between the forces of democracy and the forces of infidelity, the evidences of a shameless hypocrisy that stripped its makers of all right to be styled Christians. The cry that infidelity abounded meant nothing more nor less than that new electioneering methods were being employed. Oration Delivered in Wallingford on the 11th of March, 1801 … by Abraham Bishop, pp.36, 37.

[270] The Writings of Thomas Jefferson, vol.vii, pp.93 et seq. In similar strain, Jefferson wrote Adams a day later, offering his best wishes for his administration, but with the thought of the impending “storm” still well fixed in his mind. Cf. ibid., pp. 95 et seq. Cf. Jefferson’s letter to Dr. Benjamin Rush, ibid., pp.113 et seq.

[271] The following clause in the treaty seemed to afford ample protection to the rights of France: “Nothing in this treaty contained shall, however, be construed or operate contrary to former and existing public treaties with other sovereigns or states.” (United States Statutes at Large, vol.viii, p.128: Article XXV of the treaty.) But France was unable to blind her eyes to the practical consideration that her European enemy, Great Britain, and an American government, suspicious of if not positively antagonistic to French influence, were to be the interpreters of the treaty.

[272] Annals of Congress, vol.vii, p.103.

[273] Gibbs, Memoirs of the Administrations of Washington and John Adams, vol.i, p.416, letter of Uriah Tracy to Oliver Wolcott.

[274] Works of Fisher Ames, vol.i. pp.232 et seq., Ames’ letter to Timothy Pickering.

[275]Cf. The Writings of Thomas Jefferson, vol. vii, pp.127 et seq., letter of Jefferson to Thomas Pinckney. Even Jefferson’s steadfast faith and loyalty to France was momentarily put to rout.

[276] Cf. Morison, The Life and Letters of Harrison Gray Otis, vol.i, p. 69, letter of Otis to Gen. William Heath. This letter was published in full in the Massachusetts Mercury of April17, 1798.

[277] Morison, The Life and Letters of Harrison Gray Otis, vol.i, p. 69.

[278] The Works of John Adams, vol.viii, pp.615, 620. President Adams was fully persuaded that French notions of domination “comprehended all America, both north and south”. (Ibid.) Cf. also Annals of Congress, vol.vii, p.1147, speech of Otis on Foreign Intercourse; American Historical Association Report for 1896, p.807, Higginson’s letter to Pickering.

[279] One of the pamphlets of the day, frequently referred to, much quoted in the newspapers, and evidently much read, bore the horrific title: The Cannibals’ Progress; or the Dreadful Horrors of French Invasion, as displayed by the Republican Officers and Soldiers, in their Perfidy, rapacity, ferociousness & brutality, exercised towards the Innocent inhabitants of Germany. Translated from the German, by Anthony Aufrer(e), Esq. … The Connecticut Courant, in announcing a new edition of this work as just off the press, offered the following description of its character: “This work contains a circumstantial account of the excesses committed by the French Army in Suabia. At the present moment, when our country is in danger of being overrun by the same nation, our people ought to be prepared for those things, which they must expect, in case such an event should happen. The pamphlet should be owned by every man, and read in every family. They will there find, from an authentic source, that the consequences of being conquered by France, or even subjected to their government, are more dreadful than the heart of man can conceive. Murder, robbery, burning of towns, and the violation of female chastity, in forms too dreadful to relate, in instances too numerous to be counted, are among them. Five thousand copies of this work were sold in Philadelphia in a few days, and another edition of ten thousand is now in the press in that city.” Cf. the issue of the Courant for July2, 1798. Another book of horrors which deserves mention in this connection, although it came to public attention in America a little later, was the following: The History of the Destruction of the Helvetic Union and Liberty. By J. Mallet DuPan. This work was first printed in England in 1798, and the following March was reprinted in Boston. A sentence or two taken from the author’s preface will convey a fair notion of its nature: “In the Helvetic History, every Government may read its own destiny, and learn its duty. If there be yet one that flatters itself that its existence is reconcilable with that of the French Republic, let it study this dreadful monument of their friendship. Here every man may see how much weight treaties, alliances, benefactions, rights of neutrality, and even submission itself, retain in the scales of that Directory, who hunt justice from the earth, and whose sanguinary rapacity seeks plunder and spreads ruin alike on the Nile as on the Rhine, in Republican Congresses as well as in the heart of Monarchies.” Like The Cannibals’ Progress, this work was much quoted in the newspapers and caught the sympathetic eye of many clergyman, Jedediah Morse among the number. July29, 1799, Chauncey Goodrich, of Hartford, Connecticut, wrote Oliver Wolcott to the effect that “the facts … in Du Pan, Robinson, Barruel, have got into every farm house; they wont go out, till the stories of the indian tomahawk & war dances around their prisoners do.” (Wolcott Papers, vol.v, 77.) Nathaniel Ames did not think highly of the veracity of The Cannibals’ Progress, yet he paid tribute to its influence in the following fashion: “July31, 1798. Judge Metcalf with his cockade on came down to see Gen. Washington expecting to get a Commission to fight the French & infatuated at the slanders of the Progress of the Cannibals that the French skin Americans, to make boots for their Army, &c.” (Dedham Historical Register, vol.ix: Diary of Ames, p.24.)

[280] Channing, History of the United States, vol.iv, pp.176 et seq., gives a brief but entertaining account of the political jockeying on the part of our government which lay back of Monroe’s recall and the despatch of Pinckney to France.

[281] Gibbs, Memoirs of the Administrations of Washington and John Adams, vol.ii, pp.15 et seq. Cf. McMaster, History of the People of the United States, vol.ii, pp.368 et seq.

[282] Cf. Works of Fisher Ames, vol.i, p.225, letter of Ames to H. G. Otis. Ames’ comment on the discomfiture of the Democrats was characteristically vigorous: “The late communications [i. e., the X. Y. Z. despatches] have only smothered their rage; it is now a coal-pit, lately it was an open fire. Thacher would say, the effect of the despatches is only like a sermon in hell to awaken conscience in those whose day of probation is over, to sharpen pangs which cannot be soothed by hope.”

[283] The Writings of Thomas Jefferson, vol.vii, p.228, Jefferson’s letter to Edmund Pendleton.

[284] The elation of Jedediah Morse over the turn affairs seemed to be taking was great. Under date of May21, 1798, he wrote Wolcott, dilating on “the wonderful and happy change in the public mind. Opposition is shrinking into its proper insignificance, stripped of the support of its deluded honest friends. I now feel it is an honour to be an American.” (Wolcott Papers, vol.viii, 23.)

[285] Jedediah Morse was far from comfortable over the unwillingness of the President to proceed with vigor in handling affairs with France. An ill-concealed vein of impatience is discoverable in the following letter which he wrote to Wolcott, under date of July13, 1798: “He [Washington] will unite all honest men among us. It gladdens the hearts of some at least, to my knowledge, of our deluded, warm democrats. They say, ‘Washington is a good man—an American, & we will rally round his standard!’ … The rising & unexpected spread of the American spirit has dispelled all gloom from my mind, respecting our country. I rejoyce at the crisis, because I believe, the issue will be, the extinction of French influence among us, & if this can be effected, treasure & even blood, will not be spilt in vain.—The government is strengthening every day, by the confidence and assertions of the people.—We are waiting with almost impatience to have war declared agt. France, that we may distinguish more decidedly between friends & foes among ourselves. I believe there is energy enough in government to silence, & if necessary exterminate its obstinate & dangerous enemies.” (Wolcott Papers, vol.viii, 27.) Eleven months later Morse expressed to Wolcott his grave fears on account of the disposition of the national government to reciprocate the “pacific overtures of the French govt.” (Wolcott Papers, vol.viii, 24.) It is not French arms, but their “principles” which he holds in dread. (Cf. ibid.) Back of the fire-eating spirit of this New England clergyman was a genuine moral and religious concern.

[286] The texts of these various acts may be found in United States Statutes at Large, vol.i, pp.566–569, 570–572, 577–578, 596–597. The Naturalization Act extended from five to nineteen years the period of residence necessary for aliens who wished to become naturalized; that is to say, fourteen years of residence, to be followed by an additional five years of residence after the declaration of intention to become a citizen had been filed. It is obvious that this measure was intended to defeat the process by which the Democrats had been absorbing the foreign vote. The Act Concerning Aliens empowered the President “to order all such aliens as he should judge dangerous to the peace and safety of the United States, or should have reasonable grounds to suspect were concerned in any treasonable or secret machinations against the government thereof, to depart out of the territory of the United States within such a time as should be expressed in such order.” Penalties in the form of heavy imprisonment and the withdrawal of the opportunity to become citizens were attached. The Act Respecting Alien Enemies gave the president power when the country was in a state of war to cause the subjects of the nation at war with the United States “to be apprehended, restrained, secured, and removed as alien enemies.” The Sedition Act, not only in point of time but in sinister significance as well, stood at the apex of this body of legislation. It provided that fines and imprisonments were to be imposed upon men who were found guilty of unlawfully combining or conspiring for opposition to measures of government, or for impeding the operation of any law in the United States, or for intimidating an officer in the performance of his duty. The penalty was to be a fine not exceeding five thousand dollars, and imprisonment not exceeding five years. Penalties were also provided for publishing false, scandalous, and malicious writings against the government.

[287] At the time the country numbered among its population a very large number of aliens. French refugees from the West Indies, to the number of perhaps 25,000, were here. Cf. Report of the American Historical Association for 1912: “The Enforcement of the Alien and Sedition Laws,” by F. M. Anderson, p.116. England, also, had her quota of citizens here, not a few of whom were fugitives from justice, and some of whom, like William Cobbett and J. Thomson Callender (cf. McMaster, History of the People of the United States, vol.ii, p.338), either drew the fire of the advocates of French principles or busied themselves in the affairs of government on this side of the ocean. The amount of scurrilous abuse, aimed at the heads of government, which issued from the public press had become appalling. No innuendoes were too indelicate, no personalities too coarse, no slanders too malicious, no epithets too vile to be of service in the general campaign of villification. The prostitution of the public press in America has never been more abject than it was at the close of the eighteenth and the beginning of the nineteenth centuries. (Duniway, The Development of Freedom of the Press in Massachusetts, pp.143, 144.) Unfortunately, Federalists compromised their position and scandalized their cause by writing as scurrilous and libelous articles as their enemies; but the agencies of administration were in their hands, and, as the Democrats charged, their offences were not noticed.

[288] Morison, The Life and Letters of Harrison Cray Otis, vol.i, pp. 106 et seq. Morison’s treatment of this tempestuous period is characterized by keen discrimination and fine balance. It is one of the most satisfying as well as one of the most vivid accounts of the situation to be found.

[289] Connecticut Courant, July8, 1799.

[290] Independent Chronicle, Dec.3, 1798.

[291] Report of the American Historical Association for 1912: “The Enforcement of the Alien and Sedition Laws,” by F. M. Anderson, pp. 115 et seq. Cf. The Writings of Thomas Jefferson, vol.vii, pp.256 et seq., 262, letters of Monroe to Jefferson.

[292] Anderson, who appears to have made a painstaking examination of the available records, states his conclusions thus: “I have made a special effort to discover every possible instance and to avoid confusing Federal and State cases. There appears to have been about 24 or 25 persons arrested. At least 15, and probably several more, were indicted. Only 10, or possibly 11, cases came to trial. In 10 the accused were pronounced guilty. The eleventh case may have been an acquittal, but the report of it is entirely unconfirmed.” (Report of the American Historical Association for 1912, p.120. Cf. Bassett, The Federalist System, p.264.) An important phase of the judicial aspects of the situation, as respects the forming of public opinion, was the widespread publication in the newspapers of the charges made to grand juries by Federal judges who exerted themselves to defend the alien and sedition laws, and whose utterances received caustic criticism at the hands of Democrat writers.

[293] Duniway, The Development of Freedom of the Press in Massachusetts, pp. 145, 146.

[294] The Writings of Thomas Jefferson, vol.vii, pp.331 et seq., Jefferson’s letter to Elbridge Gerry.

[295] The report of this episode may be found in the Connecticut Courant of May14, 1798. Cf. The Writings of Thomas Jefferson, vol.vii, pp. 252 et seq., Jefferson’s letter to Madison.

[296] Ibid.

[297] An Answer to Alexander Hamilton’s Letter, Concerning the Public Conduct and Character of John Adams, Esq., President of the United States, New York, 1800, p.3. In this connection it may be noted that as ardent and hopeful a Democrat as Nathaniel Ames seriously contemplated the outbreak of civil war in the United States as the result of the tense party situation near the end of 1798. Cf. Dedham Historical Register, Diary of Ames, vol.ix, p.63.

[298] The Works of Alexander Hamilton, vol.vii, pp.374–377: Fragment on the French Revolution. The Fragment is undated. It could not have been written later than 1804, of course. There are some slight traces that it was compiled at the time the excitement over the Illuminati was prevalent in America.

[299] Forestier, Les IlluminÉs de BaviÈre et la Franc-MaÇonnerie allemande, p.103. This author, upon whose recent painstaking researches much reliance is placed in this chapter, relates that one traveler who was in Bavaria at this time, found 28,000 churches and chapels, with pious foundations representing a total value of 60,000,000 florins. Munich, a city of 40,000 inhabitants, had no less than 17 convents. When a papal bull, issued in 1798, authorized the elector to dispose of the seventh part of the goods of the clergy, the Bavarian government, in executing the pope’s directions, deducted 25,000,000 florins, and it was remarked that this amount did not equal the sum which had been agreed upon. Cf. ibid., pp.103 et seq.

[300] Forestier, op. cit., p.108: “Dans aucun pays du monde, si l’on excepte le Paraguay, les fils de Loyola n’avaient obtenu une victoire plus complÈte, ni conquis une autoritÉ plus grande.” Cf. Mounier, De l’influence attribuÉe aux Philosophes aux franc-maÇons et aux illuminÉs sur la rÉvolution de France, p.189.

[301] Ibid., pp.109, 100. Duhr, B., Geschichte der Jesuiten in den LÄndern deutscher Zunge im 16. Jahrhundert, Freiburg, 1907, discusses the earlier development. The work of F. J. Lipowsky, Geschichte der Jesuiten in Baiern, MÜnchen, 1816, 2vols., is antiquated and is little more than a chronicle.

[302] Engel, Geschichte des Illuminaten-Ordens, p.29.

[303] The suppression of the Jesuits by Pope Clement XIV, in 1773, did not greatly diminish the influence and power of the order in Bavaria. Refusing to accept defeat, the new intrigues to which they gave themselves inspired in their enemies a new sense of their cohesion, with the result that they appeared even more formidable than before their suppression.

[304] Forestier, op. cit., pp.105 et seq.

[305] Forestier, op. cit., p.19.

[306] Ibid., p.18. Cf. Engel, op. cit., pp.19, 28, 29.

[307] In the person of Maximilian Joseph, Bavaria found an elector whose earlier devotion to liberal policies gave promise of fundamental reforms. Agriculture and manufactures were encouraged; judicial reforms were undertaken; the despotism of the clergy was resisted. The founding of the Academy of Science at Munich, in 1759, represented a definite response to the spirit of the AufklÄrung. However, the elector was not at all minded to break with the Catholic faith. All efforts to introduce Protestant ideas into the country were vigorously opposed by the government. In the end the elector’s program of reform miscarried. At the time of his death, in 1777 (the date given by Forestier, p. 106, is incorrect; cf. Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie, vol.xxi. p. 30; also Brockhaus, Konversations-Lexikon, vol.xi. p.683.), the absolute power of the clergy remained unshattered.

[308] Forestier, op. cit., p.107.

[309] As a result of this effort, George Weishaupt, father of Adam, came to the University of Ingolstadt as professor of imperial institutions and criminal law.

[310] Engel, op. cit., pp.19 et seq.

[311] Forestier, op. cit., pp.19 et seq. Cf. Engel, op. cit., pp.20 et seq.

[312] Ibid., pp.22 et seq.

[313] Forestier, op. cit., pp.16 et seq.

[314] Forestier, op. cit., p.18.

[315] Ibid.

[316] Ickstatt withdrew from direct participation in the affairs of the University of Ingolstadt in 1765, but he continued to exercise a controlling influence over the policies of the institution for some time to come. The son of one of his former pupils, Lori, a man of liberal notions, was later chosen co-director of the institution, and with him Weishaupt made common cause in his campaign against the Jesuits.

[317] Forestier, op. cit., p.21. Cf. Engel, op. cit., p.33.

[318] No clearer illustration of Weishaupt’s lack of nobility is needed than his treatment of his protector and patron, Ickstatt. Owing to a marriage which he had contracted in 1773, against the wishes of Ickstatt, a decided chill came over the relations between the two men. All considerations of gratitude were carelessly tossed aside by Weishaupt. Later, in utter disregard of the anticlericalism of his benefactor, Weishaupt entered into an intrigue with the Jesuit professor Stadler, to obtain a coveted ecclesiastical position for the latter. Ickstatt, hearing of this, renounced Weishaupt as an ingrate. Forestier, op. cit., pp.22 et seq.

[319] Engel, op. cit., p.31.

[320] Forestier, op. cit., p.21.

[321] Ibid. Cf. Engel, op. cit., p.32.

[322] Ibid., p.22.

[323] Ibid., p.25.

[324] Ibid.

[325] The motives which led Weishaupt to consider the formation of a secret organization of the general character indicated were not all of a kind. In part they were creditable, in part discreditable. That he had a genuine interest in the cause of liberalism and progress, born largely of the personal discomfort and injury he had experienced at the hands of intolerance and bigotry, there can be no honest doubt. But a thirst for power was also a fundamental element in his nature. The despotic character of the order which he attempted to build up is in itself a sufficient proof of this. Besides, the cast of his personal affairs at the time the organization was launched smacks loudly of the mans over-weening vanity and yearning for personal conquest. His break with Ickstatt had been followed by a breach between him and Lori on account of the constant recriminations in which Weishaupt engaged against his enemies in the university. The secret alliance he had formed with the Jesuit Stadler likewise soon dissolved. His complaints because of alleged infringements of his freedom of speech as a teacher were vehement. His interference in university affairs outside the proper sphere of his authority was frequent and involved him in numerous acrimonious verbal battles. (Engel seeks to relieve Weishaupt of part of the odium of these charges by shifting somewhat of the burden to other shoulders. (Cf. Geschichte des Illuminaten-Ordens, pp. 29–54.) His partiality is, however, sufficiently accounted for by the fact that at the time his work was published, he was the head of the revived Order of the Illuminati. Cf. op. cit., p.467; cf. Religion in Geschichte und Gegenwart, vol.iii: article, “Illuminaten”). Yet none of these experiences brought home to the mind of Weishaupt that he was to blame. As to the matter of motive, Forestier’s comment is much to the point: “Ainsi le hardi confesseur de la vÉritÉ se trouvait seul À lutter visiÈre levÉe contre la tourbe des bigots. Une volontÉ moins bien trempÉe aurait laissÉ sombrer dans une rÉsignation inerte ou dans la manie de la persÉcution ce modeste professeur d’une UniversitÉ sans prestige, perdu dans un coin de la BaviÈre, mal payÉ, mal vu de la majoritÉ de ses collÈgues, mal notÉ par le Curateur, surveillÉ, soupÇonnÉ par tous ceux que scandalisait le radicalisme de ses opinions. Mais l’Âme de Weishaupt disposait de deux puissants ressorts: la soif du prosÉlytisme et la volontÉ de puissance.” (Op. cit., pp. 25 et seq.) The view adopted by Kluckhohn is not essentially different: “Rachsucht, Ehrgeiz, Herrschbegier mischten sich in ihm mit dem Drange, grosses zu wirken und ein WoltÄter der Menschheit zu werden.” (Herzog-Plitt, Real-EncyklopÄdie fÜr protestantische Theologie und Kirche, 2. Aufl., vol.vi, Leipzig, 1880: article, “Illuminaten,” p. 699.)

[326] Forestier, op. cit., p.28. Weishaupt readily detected the disparate character of current Freemasonry, and for a brief time he was enthusiastic over the project of developing a rarified type of Masonry to which only men of superior talents should be admitted. For the reasons given, the idea was abandoned.

[327] Ibid., p.29.

[328] Forestier, op. cit., p.75. The teaching function of the order is well set out by Forestier in the following: “Faire de l’homme actuel, restÉ sauvage et fÉrocement ÉgoÏste sous le vernis d’une civilisation apparante, un Être vÉritablement sociable, c’est-À-dire respectueux des droits de ses semblables et amÈne dans ses rapports avec eux, enseigner À ses membres ‘l’art de rÉaliser le bien sans trouver d’opposition, de corriger leurs dÉfauts, d’ecarter les obstacles, d’attaquer le mal À la racine, de faire en un mot ce que jusqu’À prÉsent l’Éducation, l’enseignement de la morale, les lois civiles et la religion mÊme ont ÉtÉ incapables d’accomplir,’ leur apprendre ‘À soumettre leurs dÉsirs au contrÔle de la raison,’ tel est donc en derniÈre analyse ce que L’Ordre considÈre comme sa fin suprÊme. SociÉtÉ d’enseignement par les occupations qu’il impose À ses adeptes, il est essentiellement, par le but qu’il se propose, un institut d’Éducation sociale.” (Op. cit., p.78.)

[329] It was Weishaupt’s original purpose to style the new order the “Perfectibilists”, but this he later renounced as too bizarre and lacking in the element of mystery.

[330] Forestier, op. cit., p.46: “Au moment oÙ Weishaupt avait fondÉ son Ordre, l’organisation de tout le SystÈme Était À peine ÉbauchÉe dans son esprit. Quand il s’Était subitement dÉcidÉ À jeter les bases de son Édifice, il avait hÂtivement rÉdigÉ des Statuts provisoires, se promettant de les remanier et d’arrÊter dÉfinitivement dans le silence du cabinet le plan gÉnÉral.” Cf. Engel, op. cit., p.90: “Die ersten Ordensstatuten, welche einen Einblick geben Über das, was Weishaupt wollte, bestanden nur kurze Zeit; sie waren recht dÜrftig und unklar.” It was not until Baron Knigge came to his assistance, four years later, that Weishaupt was able to rescue the organization of the society from the mire of puerility into which his impractical nature had plunged it.

[331] Engel, op. cit., pp.56 et seq. The recruiting of women, Jews, pagans, monks, and members of other secret organizations was forbidden. Weishaupt preferred the enrollment of men who were between the ages of 18 and 30.

[332] Cf. Einige Originalschriften des Illuminaten Ordens, pp.49, 50, 56.

[333] Ibid., p.26.

[334] Einige Originalschriften des Illuminaten Ordens, pp.61–65.

[335] Ibid., p.63. From time to time the Novice was required to submit to his superiors notations he had made upon interesting portions of books which he had read, in order that his instruction might be properly directed. Cf. ibid., pp.62, 65. In the pursuit of the art or science that he had chosen as his principal occupation, he was expected to keep in close touch with his enroller.

[336] Ibid., p.31.

[337] Forestier, op. cit., p.61.

[338] Ibid., pp.61–64.

[339] Forestier, op. cit., p.64.

[340] Ibid., p.65.

[341] Ibid.

[342] Ibid., p.66. It was in the mind of Weishaupt to make a sort of free university out of this grade. He himself declared: “In der nÄchsten Klasse [i. e., Minervals], dÄchte ich also eine Art von gelehrter Academie zu errichten: in solcher wird gearbeitet, an Karakteren, historischen, und lebenden, Studium der Alten, Beobachtungsgeist, Abhandlungen, Preisfragen, und in specie mache ich darinnen jeden zum Spion des andern und aller. Darauf werden die FÄhigen zu den Mysterien herausgenommen, die in dieser Klasse etliche GrundsÄtze und Grunderfordernisse zum menschlichen glÜckseligen Leben sind.” (Quoted by Engel from Weishaupt’s correspondence with Zwack, p. 76.) The grade Minerval is therefore to be regarded as designed to supply the opportunity par excellence for imparting the revolutionary ideas of which the founder of the order boasted. Under the direction of their superiors the Minervals were to continue the study of the humanities which they began as Novices; they were to study the works of the ancients, to prepare dissertations upon subjects in those fields to which their special talents were suited, etc.,—in a word, to show themselves worthy of membership in an academy of savants. Cf. Einige Originalschriften des Illuminaten Ordens, p.216. Cf. Forestier, op. cit., p. 74. Weishaupt entertained extremely ambitious notions of a system of special libraries under the control of the order, and in which the literary and scientific productions of the order should be assembled and preserved. Cf. Der Ächte Illuminat, p.46.

[343] Forestier, op. cit., p.66.

[344] The fantastic element in Weishaupt’s mind is well illustrated at this point. In view of the fact that he particularly sought the recruitment of youths between the ages of 15 and 20 years (cf. Einige Originalschriften des Illuminaten Ordens, p.261), it is difficult to see the possibility of sustained satisfaction in such associations. We shall see later that Baron Knigge substantially modified the character of the organization in this particular. Weishaupt did not scruple to employ outright deception with reference to the reputed age and power of the order to enhance in the minds of the members the sense of the value of these secret associations. Forestier, op. cit., p.82.

[345] Ibid., p.66.

[346] Der Ächte Illuminat, p.94. The notion that the supreme heads of the order, whose identity of course was concealed from the members, were individuals of exceptional purity, was kept before the minds of the “illuminated” Minervals as an added incentive.

[347] From two to four Minervals were given to each Illuminated Minerval, to receive his instructions in the principles and objects of the order. The selection of these pupils in a given instance was supposed to be based upon their openness to the influence of their particular instructor. Cf. Forestier, op. cit., p.70 et seq.

[348] Ibid., p.71. The principle of espionage was an important element in the administration of the order. Weishaupt acknowledged his indebtedness to the ideal of organization which the Society of Jesus had set before him (Cf. Endliche ErklÄrungen, pp.60 et seq. Cf. Forestier, pp.97–99), and the principle of one member spying upon another was apparently borrowed from that source. It was Weishaupt’s theory that dissimulation and hypocrisy could best be eradicated by proving to the members of the organization the inutility of such courses of life in view of the incessant surveillance under which all the members lived. (Cf. Der Ächte Illuminat, p.102.) Accordingly the Novice was left to surmise just how many eyes of unknown superiors might be upon him. The duty imposed upon the Illuminated Minerval of informing upon his disciples has been noted above. Weishaupt seems never to have surmised that this policy of espionage would tend to kill mutual confidence and fraternal regard at the roots.

[349] Forestier, op. cit., p.71.

[350] Weishaupt’s conception of the content of these terms left room for a recognition of the benefits to be derived from society, but denied the value of the state. Man had moved forward, not backward, from his primitive condition. The satisfaction of his needs had supplied the motive force to his progress. In the state of nature, it is quite true, man enjoyed the two sovereign goods, equality and liberty. However, his disposition and desires were such that a continuance in the state of nature was impossible. The condition of misery into which he came resulted from his failure to acquire the art of controlling his faculties and curbing his passions, and from the injustice which he suffered the state to impose upon him. With the erection of the state had come the notions of the subjection of some men to the power and authority of others, the consequent loss of the unity of the race, and the replacement of the love of humanity with nationalism, or patriotism. But political revolutions were not needed to accomplish the emancipation of the race; such revolutions had always proved sterile because they touched nothing deeper than the constitutions of states. Man’s nature needed to be reconstituted. To bring life under the control of reason would enable men again to possess themselves of equality and liberty. A return to man’s primitive state is both impossible and undesirable. Social life is a blessing. Only let men learn to govern themselves by the light of reason, and civil authority, having been found utterly useless, will quickly disappear. Forestier, op. cit., pp. 311–316.

[351] Der Ächte Illuminat, pp.110, 123.

[352] Forestier, op. cit., p.78.

[353] Forestier, op. cit., p.80.

[354] In view of the connections which the enemies of the order later made between the Illuminati and the French Revolution, it is worthy of particular emphasis that Weishaupt eschewed the principle of effecting reform by political revolution, and definitely committed himself to the ideal of moral and intellectual reformation. The slow process of ameliorating the unhappy condition of humanity through the leavening influence of the ideas propagated in the order, i. e., by reshaping private and public opinion, was the pathway which Weishaupt chose. Der Ächte Illuminat, pp.10, 205. Such, at least, was the theory in the case. In practise the order abandoned the policy of non-intervention and sought to influence government by putting its members in important civil positions. Forestier, op. cit., pp.329 et seq.

[355] Einige Originalschriften des Illuminaten Ordens, p.339.

[356] Ibid., p.279.

[357] Forestier, op. cit., p.88. The anticlerical spirit of the order did not receive an official emphasis commensurate with its importance and weight, doubtless because of Weishaupt’s desire to work under cover against his enemies as completely as possible. Forestier’s comment seems thoroughly just: “Il ne faut pas oublier que Weishaupt en fondant sa SocietÉ n’avait pas songÉ seulement À faire le bonheur de l’humanitÉ, mais qu’il avait cherchÉ aussi À trouver des alliÉs dans la lutte qu’il soutenait À Ingolstadt contre le parti des ex-JÉsuites. A cÔtÉ du but officiellement proclamÉ, l’Ordre avait un autre but, auquel on pensait d’autant plus qu’on en parlait moins.” (Op. cit., 87. Cf. ibid., pp.92, 110.)

[358] Ibid., p.90.

[359] Einige Originalschriften des Illuminaten Ordens, p.216. The order was to be used in the circulation of anticlerical and antireligious books and pamphlets, and the work of the priests and the monks was to be held in mind as constituting the chief obstacle to intellectual and moral progress. Forestier, op. cit., pp.91, 92.

[360] Ibid., p.317.

[361] Ibid., p.318.

[362] Forestier, op. cit., p.318. This was treated as the esoteric doctrine of Christ, coming to the surface here and there in His teachings and acts, and revealed in the disciplina arcani of the early church. It is only when this secret teaching is grasped that the coherence of Jesus’ utterances and the significance of the true doctrines of man’s fall and his resurrection can be understood. It was because man abandoned the state of nature that he lost his dignity and his liberty. In other words, he fell because he ceased to fight against his sensual desires, surrendering himself to the rule of his passions. His work of redemption will be accomplished when he learns to moderate his passions and to limit his desires. The kingdom of grace is therefore a kingdom wherein men live in reason’s light.

[363] “Par ses divers caractÈres avouÉs ou secrets, l’Ordre des IlluminÉs Était l’expression d’une Époque et d’un milieu. Le SystÈme nÉ dans le cerveau de Weishaupt avait trouvÉ des adeptes en BaviÈre parce qu’il rÉpondait aux aspirations et satisfaisait les haines de la classe cultivÉe dans ce pays.” (Ibid., p.99.)

[364] These new centers were Munich, Regensburg, Freising, and EichstÄtt. For data concerning the early enrollment of recruits, cf. ibid., pp. 30 et seq.

[365] Ibid., p.45.

[366] The term Areopagite was applied to the men who shared with Weishaupt the supreme direction of the order. Each was assigned a pseudonym. With one exception, Xavier Zwack (Danaus), they seem to have been men of very ordinary ability. Forestier, op. cit., p.232.

[367] Ibid., pp.231 et seq., 112 et seq.

[368] Weishaupt’s original plan had been to leave the matter of financial support to the discretion of the members. Einige Originalschriften des Illuminaten Ordens, p.16. Time, however, proved the imprudence of this arrangement, and hence fixed dues, very modest in their character, were imposed. Forestier, pp.130 et seq.

[369] Ibid., pp.132 et seq.

[370] Engel gives the date of the admission of Knigge as July, 1780. Cf. Geschichte des Illuminaten-Ordens, p.114. Forestier is less specific. Les IlluminÉs de BaviÈre, &c., p.217.

[371] Baron Knigge (born near Hannover, October16, 1752; died at Bremen, May6, 1796) was a man of considerable distinction in his day. He had studied law at GÖttingen, and later had been attached to the courts of Hesse-Cassel and Weimar. Retiring subsequently to private life, he made his home successively at Frankfort-on-the-Main, Heidelberg, Hannover, and Bremen. He was an author of note, a writer of romance, popular philosophy, and dramatic poetry. His best known work, Ueber den Umgang mit Menschen (Hannover, 1788), a volume filled with a discussion of practical principles and maxims of life and characterized by a narrow and egoistical outlook, enjoyed a considerable notoriety in its time. (Knigge’s complete works were assembled and published in twelve volumes at Hannover, 1804–1806). He had a decided bias for secret societies, and at the earliest moment that his age permitted had joined a lodge of the Strict Observance, one of the Masonic branches of the period. The Strict Observance was particularly devoted to the reform of Masonry, with special reference to the elimination of the occult sciences which at the time were widely practised in the lodges, and the establishment of cohesion and homogeneity in Masonry through the enforcement of strict discipline, the regulation of functions, etc. (Later, the leaders of the Strict Observance found themselves compelled to yield to the popular clamor for the occult sciences which were all but universal in European Freemasonry, and adopted them. Their presence and practice had been influential in attracting Knigge to the Masonic system. Cf. Forestier, op. cit., p.207.) Knigge’s Masonic career proved to be of such a nature as to leave him restless and unsatisfied. Because he was not permitted to enjoy the advancement in the order of the Strict Observance that he coveted, he temporarily lost his interest in Masonry only to have it revived a little later by being chosen to assist in the establishment of a new Masonic lodge at Hanau. Meantime his interest in the subjects of theosophy, magic, and particularly alchemy, grew apace. On this account he was led to make an effort to affiliate himself with the Rosicrucians, a branch of Freemasonry notorious for the absurdity of its pretensions and its shameless pandering to the popular desire for occultism. Knigge’s advance did not happen to be received with favor; and the result was that, finding himself compelled for the moment to be content with his membership in the Strict Observance, he renounced his interest in alchemy and devoted his reflections to the development of a form of Masonry which should teach men rules of life by the observance of which they might gradually regain that perfection from which their original parents fell. It was at the moment when Knigge’s mind was occupied with this project that his membership in the Order of the Illuminati was solicited. Cf. Forestier, pp. 214 et seq. As to the personality of the man, the following estimate by Forestier is excellent: “ … gentilhomme democrate, dilettante par temperament, homme de lettres par necessitÉ, ecrivain abondant et mediocre, publiciste, moraliste, romancier sentimental et satirique, … un personnage interessant moins encore en lui-meme que comme representant d’une caste en dissolution.” (Op. cit., p.202.)

[372] Weishaupt himself, overcoming his earlier antipathy to Freemasonry, had joined the Masons at Munich, in 1777, influenced particularly by his desire to find suggestions for the working out of the higher grades of his order. Out of this connection, and under the persuasion of Zwack, the plan of forming an alliance between the Illuminati and Freemasonry had occurred to Weishaupt’s mind before Knigge joined the order. One Masonic lodge, that of Theodore of Good Counsel, located at Munich, had, by the middle of 1779, come so completely under the influence of members of the Illuminati that it had come to be regarded as a part of the order. Cf. Forestier, p.200. But here again the situation waited upon the energetic leadership of Knigge.

[373] Ibid., pp.133 et seq. Cf. Engel, op. cit., pp.114 et seq. Soon after Knigge was admitted to the order, Weishaupt found himself driven to make to the former a most humiliating confession. Knigge hesitated for some time before becoming a member, and to bring him to a decision Weishaupt painted the objects and character of the order before him in flaming colors. The Illuminati represented the greatest advancements in science, the most marvelous speculative philosophy, and a truly wonderful system to carry its purposes into effect. Having joined the order, Knigge’s suspicions were aroused on account of the feeble and trifling character of its organization; and Weishaupt, upon being repeatedly pressed for an explanation concerning the nature of the so-called higher grades, had finally to confess to Knigge that they did not exist. Cf. Forestier, pp.218–226. Knigge’s resolution was staggered, but his courage was finally rallied because of the confidence which Weishaupt and the other leaders reposed in him. Cf. ibid., pp. 228 et seq.

[374] Nachtrag von weiteren Originalschriften, vol.i, p.108. Cf. Forestier, op. cit., p.250; Engel, op. cit., p.117.

[375] The ligament to bind the Illuminati and Freemasonry together was supplied by Knigge in the grades of the second class. Cf. Engel, op. cit., p.115.

[376] Apparently these grades were never worked out. See Forestier, p. 250.

[377] Forestier devotes more than forty well-packed pages to a discussion of this phase of the subject. Ibid., pp.251–294.

[378] Der Ächte Illuminat, p.14. Pages 17–37, ibid., contains the description of this grade as revised by Knigge.

[379] Ibid., pp.39–78.

[380] Ibid., pp.82–138.

[381] Knigge had, of course, to provide a new ritual and code for these grades. These have not been preserved. They were doubtless similar to those of other Masonic systems, in their Blue Lodge features. “La Franc-MaÇonnerie bleue Étant le sol commun oÙ poussaient les vÉgÉtations luxuriantes et diverses des hauts grades et le terrain oÙ tous les Franc-MaÇons pouvaient se rencontrer, les diffÉrents SystÈmes, prÉoccupÉs d’Établir leur authenticitÉ et aussi pour ne pas dÉrouter les transfuges des autres sectes, avaient soin de respecter les formes et les usages traditionnels. La Franc-MaÇonnerie IlluminÉe obÉit vraisemblablement aux mÊmes considÉrations.” (Forestier, op. cit., p.262.)

[382] Forestier, op. cit., p.272. Der Ächte Illuminat, pp.139–212, contains the ritual and statutes of this grade.

[383] The initiatory rites of this grade were followed by a banquet, which in turn was concluded by a ceremony fashioned after the pattern of the Christian Eucharist. Bread and wine were given to the members, and an effort was made to throw an atmosphere of great solemnity about the observance. Cf. Forestier, pp.278 et seq. Christian enemies of the order took special umbrage at this ceremony.

[384] The Chapter was placed under obligation to see that Blue Lodges, not to exceed thirty all told, were established in all the important centers of its district. They had also to see that the Order of the Illuminati secretly obtained a preponderating influence in the lodges of other systems, to reform them if possible, or, failing in this, to ruin them. A Prefect, or Local Superior, who furnished regular reports to his superiors, presided over the Chapter. Cf. Forestier, pp. 279–281.

[385] The members of this class were usually referred to as Epopts, and their immediate superiors as Hierophants. These superiors were technically known as Deans. Ibid., pp.287, 281.

[386] Their admission to the rank was further conditioned upon their advancement in Masonry and the effectiveness of their service in the lower grades of the Illuminati. Cf. ibid., p.281.

[387] The rites of initiation into this grade expressed a growing tendency in the direction of sacerdotal pomp. Cf. ibid., pp.283–286.

[388] “Comme toutes les demandes de renseignements leur Étaient transmises, ils devaient s’efforcer de satisfaire leurs gens et d’Établir des thÉories solidement construites en faisant Étudier et Élucider par leurs subordonnÉs les points restÉs obscurs.” (Ibid., p.288.) Free entrÉe to all the assemblies of the inferior grades of the order was accorded the Priests, but only in the ceremony of reception into the grade of Scottish Knight did they appear in costume. On other occasions they were not obliged to make their official character known.

[389] The prefectures were grouped together into provinces, of which there seem to have been twelve, to each of which, as to the prefectures and their capitals, pseudonymous names were given. For the geographical divisions of the Illuminati system, cf. Forestier, pp.295 et seq.

[390] The title of Regent was also used in this connection.

[391] Provincials, as the term suggests, had control over the various provinces.

[392] An important modification in the government of the order was made by Knigge with respect to its general form. Knigge found the order a despotism, and this he regarded as a fundamental weakness and error. The Areopagites, who chafed excessively under Weishaupt’s immoderate zeal to command, and between whom and their leader constant and perilous divisions arose, eagerly sided with Knigge in his efforts to distribute authority. At the latter’s suggestion a congress was called at Munich, in October, 1780, at which the position and authority of the Areopagites were definitively settled. The territory, present and prospective, of the order was divided into twelve provinces, each of which was to be governed by a Provincial. The posts of Provincials were thereupon distributed among the Areopagites. Each Provincial was to be left free to administer his province without direct interference on the part of Weishaupt, who remained the supreme head. Cf. Forestier, pp.231–234; cf. ibid., p.244. Knigge was thus permitted to take pride in the fact that whereas he found the order a monarchy, he left it under “une espÈce de gouvernement rÉpublicain.” (Cf. ibid., p.305.)

[393] To illustrate: The teaching function of the order was fully worked out and made effective by centering its direction in the grade of Priests. Forestier also notes Knigge’s retention of the founder’s insistence upon the knowledge of man as “la science par excellence.” The principle of espionage was likewise retained. Cf. Forestier, pp. 298–304.

[394] The remodeling of the order in order to graft it on to the stem of Freemasonry has already been indicated. No practical result of Knigge’s work exceeded this.

[395] Certainly at this point Knigge’s feet were planted more solidly upon the earth than those of his fanciful predecessor. Cf. Forestier, pp. 240 et seq.

[396] The practical considerations which impelled Knigge to adopt this position were dictated by diplomatic rather than by conscientious reasons, although the latter were not wholly wanting. Knigge was well aware of the conditions in Catholic countries like Bavaria which gave rise to the violent anticlerical sentiments that the leaders of the Illuminati echoed. Nor was he out of sympathy with the men of his time who protested against religious intolerance and bigotry. But a spirit of anticlericalism readily enough becomes transmuted into a spirit essentially anti-religious, and Knigge saw that any manifestation of this sort would seriously embarrass the propaganda of the order in Protestant as well as in Catholic lands. Knigge’s personal religious views appear to have been liberal rather than ultra radical. For a full and lucid discussion of the whole topic, cf. Forestier, pp.238 et seq.

[397] Knigge’s proposed modifications of the organization and principles of the order were adopted by the Areopagites, July9, 1781. Cf. Forestier, p.240. This action amounted to a virtual defeat for Weishaupt and a corresponding triumph for Knigge. In other words, a new epoch had begun. Engel’s observations on the significance of the new policies and the respective services rendered by the two men is characteristically biased: “Weishaupt war tatsÄchlich der einzige im Orden, der streng darauf achtete, sein System der Notwendigkeit unterzuordnen, wohl wissend, dass dadurch allein der Bestand des Ordens gesichert wÜrde. Phantastische Grade entwerfen, ohne eine Spur der Notwendigkeit, dass durch diese der Zweck der Vereinigung sicherer erreicht werde, dann die Mitglieder in die Aeusserlichkeit dieser Form einpressen und einschnÜren, ist leider ein vielfach noch jetzt angewandtes, unbrauchbares Rezept, dem auch Knigge huldigte. Letzterem war es ebenso wie vielen Areopagiten nur darum zu tun, viele Mitglieder zu haben, um dadurch Eindruck zu erzielen, die geistige QualitÄt stand in zweiter Linie.” (Geschichte des Illuminaten-Ordens, pp. 123 et seq.) Knigge brought more than organizing skill to the languishing order. His accomplishments as a winner of recruits materially helped to fan the smouldering fires of enthusiasm among the earlier leaders. As early as November, 1780, he had begun to enroll adepts (the term commonly applied to members of the order, new and old), and some of these turned out to be most effective propagandists. Cf. Forestier, pp.343 et seq.

[398] Forestier is disposed to explain the power of appeal which the new system had for the members of rival Masonic systems on the following grounds: (1)it at least pretended to take more seriously the doctrines of equality and liberty; (2)it emphasized the period of adolescence as the best of all ages for the winning of recruits; (3)it made appreciably less of financial considerations; and (4)it tended to turn attention away from such chimeras as the philosopher’s stone, magic, and knight-templar chivalry, which filled with weak heads and visionary spirits the high grades of most of the other systems. Cf. ibid., p.340. German Freemasonry was far from being in a wholesome and promising condition when the order of the Illuminati emerged. From its introduction into that country sometime within the second quarter of the eighteenth century, it had developed two general types; viz., English Freemasonry and the French high grades. The former was generally disposed to be content with simple organizations. Its lodges were little more than secret clubs whose members had their signs of recognition and their simple rituals, and whose ideals were represented by the terms fraternity and cooperation. The latter developed an excess of ceremonies and “mysteries”, and thus opened the door for the introduction of impostures of every sort. Visionaries and charlatans flocked to the French lodges, and alchemy and thaumaturgy found in their secret quarters a veritable hot-house for their culture. It is Forestier’s opinion that this activity and influence of dreamers and mountebanks within the Masonic lodges is to be regarded as a reaction from the dreariness and sterility of current rationalism. Cf. ibid., p.146. However that may be, in the third quarter of the eighteenth century German Freemasonry generally was catering to a popular thirst for mystery, and the Order of the Illuminati was able to draw advantage from that fact. Certainly the very novelty of the new system had much to do with its attractiveness.

[399] Forestier, op. cit., p.344.

[400] Engel’s treatment of the situation would seem to be inadequate and lacking in accuracy. Cf. Engel, op. cit., p.352. Forestier submits ample proofs of the expansion of the order to include Austria and Switzerland, notably the former. Cf. Forestier, op. cit., pp.346 et seq., 398 et seq.

[401] Ibid., pp.349 et seq.

[402] Engel identifies Dalberg as the last elector of Mainz, and, in the time of Napoleon I, grand duke of Frankfort. See ibid., p.354. Forestier extends the list of civil notables to include Count Metternich, imperial ambassador at Coblenz; Count Brigido, governor of Galicia; Count Leopold Kolowrat, chancellor of Bohemia; Baron Kressel, vice-chancellor of Bohemia; Count Poelffy, chancellor of Hungary; Count Banffy, governor of Transylvania; Count Stadion, ambassador at London; and Baron Van Swieten, minister of public instruction. (The last seven were members of the lodge established at Vienna.) Cf. ibid., pp.400 et seq.

[403] Goethe’s connection with the order is fully established by both Engel (cf. ibid., pp.355 et seq.) and Forestier (cf. ibid., pp.396 et seq.). The question whether Schiller belonged to the Illuminati is answered in the negative by Engel. Cf. ibid., p.356.

[404] “Un pÉdagogue cÉlÈbre, Pestalozzi, figurait parmi les membres de l’Église Minervale de Lautern.” (Forestier, p.349.)

[405] Ibid., p.399.

[406] In its efforts to obtain a decisive triumph over rival systems of Freemasonry, substantial progress had been made. At Munich, the Secret Chapter of the dominant Masonic fraternity in that city capitulated to the new system. At Vienna, Masons eagerly enrolled as Illuminati with a view to blocking the attempt of the Rosicrucians to extend the hegemony of that branch. The important general congress of Freemasons, held at Wilhelmsbad, in July, 1782, for the purpose of arriving at some conclusion concerning the claims of rival systems, yielded to the Illuminati a double advantage: the pretensions of the Order of the Strict Observance, its most dangerous rival, were disallowed and the opportunity which the congress offered in the form of a field for winning new recruits was adroitly seized by representatives of the Illuminati, with the result that its emissaries retired from the congress completely satisfied. Further, the Order of the Illuminati had apparently put itself on the high road to a complete victory in the Masonic world by securing the enlistment of the two most important personages in German Freemasonry, Duke Ferdinand of Brunswick and Prince Carl of Hesse. The full extent of the order’s conquests among the various branches of Masonry is impossible of full and accurate statement, for the principal reason which Engel gives: “Nur wenige Dokumente existieren als Nachweis, denn es ist natÜrlich, dass solche in der Verfolgungszeit in Bayern vernichtet wurden, um nicht verdÄchtigt zu werden und Äussere Verbindungen ziemlich schroff abgebrochen wurden, als sich die Skandalsucht erhob und dem Orden und deren Leiter all erdenlichen Schlechtigkeiten andichtete. Im Laufe der Zeit sind dann die betreffenden Schriften von den Logen als minderwertig missachtet und beseitigt worden, so dass eine AufklÄrung heute ungemein erschwert ist.” (Op. cit., pp.349 et seq.) Still, Forestier, in his chapter on “L’Action sur les Loges Allemandes” (pp. 343–388), from which the foregoing isolated facts are drawn, gathers together a very considerable body of evidence, all tending to show that Illuminated Freemasonry was permitted to enjoy a very gratifying, though brief, period of prosperity.

[407] Writing of the condition of the order at the hour of its apogee, in 1784, Forestier says: “La situation de l’Ordre À cette Époque paraÎt donc des plus prospÈres. Solidement Établi en BaviÈre, il s’Étend sur toute l’Europe Centrale, du Rhin À la Vistule et des Alpes À la mer du Nord et À la Baltique. Il compte au nombre de ses membres des jeunes gens qui appliqueront plus tard les principes qu’il leur a inculquÉs, des fonctionnaires de tout ordre qui mettent leur influence À son service, des membres du clergÉ auxquels il enseigne la tolÉrance, des princes dont il peut invoquer la protection et qu’il espÈre diriger. Il semble que le Grand Architecte de l’Univers ait spÉcialement veillÉ sur lui….” (Op. cit., p.401.)

[408] The term was no longer in official use, but the men remained. In other words, Weishaupt’s Areopagites were Knigge’s Provincials.

[409] Forestier, op. cit., pp.411–413.

[410] Engel asserts that the chief apple of discord was the grade of Priest. Weishaupt believed that Knigge had injected into the ritual of the order at that point expressions of radical religious sentiment which, if once discovered to the public, would be found extremely injurious to the order. Cf. ibid., pp.133 et seq. Cf. Forestier op. cit., p.415. But this was only one of many bones of contention. At bottom the two men were inordinately jealous, both as to their positions in the order and the systems which they had worked out.

[411] Knigge withdrew from the order April20, 1784. In July of the same year he put his name to an agreement, pledging himself to restore such papers of the order as he possessed and to maintain silence concerning what he knew of the order’s affairs. Cf. Forestier, p.428. Freed from his responsibilities to the order, Knigge resumed his work as a writer, by which he managed to maintain himself very indifferently in funds. He was finally accorded a government post, as inspector of schools, at Bremen, where he died. Cf. ibid., pp.549–551.

[412] Carl Theodore, successor to Maximilian Joseph, as Elector Palatinate had been ruler of the provinces of the Rhine since 1742. When he became duke of Upper and Lower Bavaria in 1777, he had established a reputation as a liberal-minded sovereign. The first two years of his rule in Bavaria gave promise of a tolerant reign; but reactionaries, in the persons of his confessor, the ex-Jesuit Frank, a certain Baron Lippert, who was devoted to the cause of ultramontanism, and the duchess dowager of Bavaria and sister of the duke, Maria Anna, worked upon his spirit and easily persuaded the well-meaning but weak-willed monarch to reverse his former policy and come to the defence of the cause of clericalism. See the comments of Professor August Kluckhohn, quoted by Engel, p.4.

[413] Cf. Engel, op. cit., p.161, where the edict in full may be found. Cf. Forestier, p.453. The Bavarian monarch’s bold and, at first blush, precipitate action is explained by the following facts: Flushed with a sense of their growing influence and power, the Bavarian Illuminati for some time past had been guilty of extremely imprudent utterances which had excited the public mind. To certain of their critics, notably the priest Frank and the canon Dantzer, director of the schools of Bavaria, they had not deigned to make a specific reply. (Dantzer, not wholly unfairly, charged the members of the order with interference in the affairs of the public school system of the country). A lofty tone of assumed indifference characterized the leaders; but a spirit of boasting which led the members to profess the exercise of a controlling influence in civil affairs, together with less guarded expressions respecting the extreme religious and political ideals of the order, served to arouse public suspicion. To this extent the Bavarian Illuminati had themselves to blame for the ruin of the order. Cf. Forestier, pp.430–438. On the part of the government, the situation in its main outlines developed somewhat as follows: Early in October, 1783, the duchess dowager, Maria Anna, was made the recipient of a document that contained detailed accusations against the Illuminati of Bavaria, charging them with holding such vicious moral and religious sentiments as that life should be controlled by passion rather than reason, that suicide is justifiable, that one may poison one’s enemies, and that religion should be regarded as nonsense and patriotism as puerility. Finally, and much more seriously from the particular point of view of the duchess, the Bavarian Illuminati were accused of being in the service of the government of Austria, whose efforts at the time to extend its hegemony over Bavaria had created considerable tension in the latter country. For a copy in full of the famous letter, cf. Engel, pp.183–187. Cf. Forestier, pp.440 et seq. The author, or at least the inspirer of the document seems to have been one Joseph Utzschneider (Engel disallows this; see op. cit., pp.187 et seq.) who, discontented on account of his slow advancement and enraged by exactions imposed upon him to prove his loyalty, had withdrawn from the Order of the Illuminati, in August, 1783. Later, Utzschneider persuaded several other members, among them GrÜnberger and Cosandey, fellow professors with him in the Academy of Santa Maria, to follow him in the course he had taken. Obtaining from his associates the ritual of the higher grades of the order, he prepared and despatched his presentment to the duchess. Cf. Forestier, pp.444 et seq. The latter, greatly alarmed by the document, carried the accusations, particularly the charge of intrigues in the interests of Austria, to the duke, who thus far had manifested an attitude of indifference to the suspicions that had been engendered concerning the order. His fear being awakened by the considerations of danger to his person and throne that were urged, the duke resolved to bring matters to an immediate crisis. Cf. ibid., p.452.

[414] Engel, op. cit., p.161. The leaders of the order in Bavaria exerted themselves to disarm the suspicions of the government with reference to any lack of loyal submission to the interdict. Circular letters containing copies of the edict and commanding the lodges to suspend their labors were addressed to the brethren. A lack of sincerity showed itself, however, in the efforts of the leaders to convey the impression to their subordinates that the sudden tempest would soon pass and that care therefore must be observed to preserve the cohesion of the order. In one important particular this effort to allay suspicion over-reached itself. In July, 1784, certain members of the order inserted an article in a Bavarian journal, the Realzeitung of Erlangen, of the nature of a counter-attack upon the Jesuits, and claiming that the latter, in defiance of the government, were continuing their secret associations. To this a recriminating answer was promptly made, and a war of newspaper articles and pamphlets was soon on. All of this tended, of course, to lend color to the suspicion that the operations of the order continued unabated. Cf. Forestier, pp.454 et seq. Cf. Engel, pp.240 et seq. The duchess, Maria Anna, moreover, continued her efforts to strengthen the purpose of the duke. Cf. Forestier, p.467.

[415] The precise occasion, if any existed, for the launching of the second edict remains wholly in doubt. In a final effort to clear the order from the suspicions and calumniations raised against it, an appeal was made to Carl Theodore, in February, 1785, to permit representatives of the order to appear before him and furnish proofs of its innocence. This last desperate device failed. Cf. Engel, pp.283–290, for a copy of this letter. Cf. Forestier, pp.465 et seq.

[416] Engel, as in the former instance, copies the second edict in full. Cf. op. cit., pp.161–164. Cf. Forestier, pp.468, 469. The terms of the second interdict provided that, in view of the alleged degenerate character of the Order of the Illuminati, as well as of the disorders it had occasioned, all its financial resources should be confiscated, half to be given to the poor and half to the informer against the order, “wenn er gleich selbst ein Mitglied wÄre … und solcher keineswegs geoffenbart, sondern in Geheim gehalten werden solle.” (Engel, p.164.)

[417] Forestier’s comment is trenchant: “Par une ironie du sort, le gouvernement, si indifferent ou si tolerant jusqu’alors, ne commenÇa À servir que lorsque le danger Était passÉ et, aprÈs avoir respectÉ si longtemps l’organisme vivant, il s’acharna sur le cadavre.” (Op. cit., p.469.)

[418] Cosandey and Renner (the latter also a professor associated with Cosandey on the faculty of the Academy of Santa Maria) were two of the men who supplied important information in this manner. Engel, pp. 291–304, prints their declarations. In this way, also, lists of names of members of the order came into possession of the government. Cf. Engel, pp.303 et seq.

[419] A considerable amount of the most valuable papers of the order were either carefully concealed or devoted to the flames immediately after the launching of the second edict. Cf. Forestier, p.469. Later, the government obtained important assistance in its campaign by coming into possession of a considerable portion of those that were spared. Cf. Engel, pp.259 et seq., 276 et seq.

[420] Cf. Forestier, p.475. Weishaupt was well out of harm’s way when the inquiry began in his home city. He brought lasting discredit upon himself by resorting to precipitate flight two weeks before the proclamation of the second ban. It is evident that he saw the storm gathering, and was resolved to put himself beyond personal danger, whatever might happen to his associates. The excuse he seems to have trumped up to justify his early flight had reference to a difficulty that arose between him and the librarian of the University of Ingolstadt over the latter’s failure to purchase two books which Weishaupt held he needed for his classes. He fled across the border to Regensburg, and finally settled at Gotha.

[421] Cf. Engel, op. cit., p.305, for a copy of the order. This measure seemed to be rendered necessary by the fact that the lists of Illuminati which Cosandey and Renner furnished the government contained the names of several officers and other military personages. A later decree called upon ex-members of the order in the army to furnish information concerning the teachings and membership of the order, and to present such papers and insignia as might be at hand. Cf. Forestier, p.481.

[422] Those who made a frank acknowledgment of their membership in the order were to be pardoned, while those who hesitated or showed themselves contumacious were not only to lose their positions but to suffer other penalties. Cf. Forestier, p.478.

[423] Ibid.

[424] Ibid.

[425] Ibid., p.475.

[426] Forestier gives the title of nine such productions that came from Weishaupt’s pen within the space of a few months. Cf. op. cit., p.484. The most notable of these were: Apologie der Illuminaten, Frankfort and Leipzig, 1786, and VollstÄndige Geschichte der Verfolgung der Illuminaten in Bayern, Frankfort and Leipzig, 1786. The latter was planned to consist of two volumes, but only one appeared.

[427] Zwack’s name had been on the list of members which Renner had put into the hands of the government. He was at the time a councillor of state. A short time before his house was invaded by the police and his papers seized, he had been deposed from his position on account of his relations with the Illuminati. At the time of the seizure he was living at Landshut in circumstances of disgrace and suspicion. Cf. Engel, p.303; Forestier, pp.480, 498.

[428] These documents were published by the Bavarian government, under the title: Einige Originalschriften des Illuminaten Ordens, Munich, 1787. Engel, pp.259–262, publishes the list compiled by the government.

[429] Among these papers were found two smaller packets which gave a foundation for the most inveterate hostility to the order. These contained intimations of the order’s right to exercise the law of life and death over its members, a brief dissertation entitled, Gedanken Über den Selbstmord, wherein Zwack, its author, had recorded his defence of suicide (cf. Engel, p.262), a eulogy of atheism, a proposal to establish a branch of the order for women, the description of an infernal machine for safeguarding secret papers, and receipts for procuring abortion, counterfeiting seals, making poisonous perfumes, secret ink, etc. (Cf. Forestier, pp.499 et seq.) The receipts for procuring abortion were destined to have a very ugly personal association in the public mind. Weishaupt, while still a resident of Ingolstadt, had stained his private life because of a liaison with his sister-in-law. On the 8 of February, 1780, his first wife had died. Her sister, who was his house-keeper at the time, continued in the household, and during the time that Weishaupt was waiting for a papal dispensation, permitting his marriage with her, she was found to be with child. Thrown into a panic on account of the failure of the dispensation to arrive (as a matter of fact it did not reach Ingolstadt until three years after it was first applied for), Weishaupt contemplated recourse to the method of procuring an abortion, in order to extricate himself from his painfully embarrassed position. In August, 1783, he wrote Hertel, one of the prominent members of the order, admitting the facts just stated. This letter fell into the hands of the authorities and was published by them in the volume entitled, Nachtrag von weiteren Originalschriften, Munich, 1787, vol.i, p.14. The stigma of a new disgrace was thus attached to the order. Weishaupt made a pitifully weak effort to suggest extenuating circumstances for his conduct, in his volume, Kurze Rechtfertigung meiner Absichten, 1787, pp.13 et seq. Taken in connection with the objectionable papers referred to above, this private scandal of the head of the order made the accusation of gross immorality on the part of the Illuminati difficult to evade. A spirit of intense revulsion penetrated the public mind.

[430] Other secret documents of the order were seized by the police in a search of the quarters of Baron Bassus, whose membership in the order on account of his close friendship with Zwack, brought him under the government’s suspicion. The police visitation referred to yielded no very important result, apart from establishing more solidly the government’s claim that the order had not obeyed the first edict. The papers seized in this instance were published by the government under the title, Nachtrag von weiteren Originalschriften … Zwei Abtheilungen, Munich, 1787.

[431] Forestier, pp.504 et seq.

[432] MÄndl, in the most cowardly fashion, charged the order with unmentionable practices. He seems to have been the Judas in the order’s inner circle. Cf. Forestier, pp.505 et seq. Cf. Engel, pp.331 et seq.

[433] Massenhausen was Ajax in the order. The papers seized by the police identified him as one of Weishaupt’s intimates.

[434] The “revelations” of MÄndl appear to have been immediately responsible for the edict. Cf. Forestier, p.507.

[435] Engel, op. cit., p.280.

[436] “Unter der nemlichen confiscations—und relegations Straf werden die illuminaten Logen, sie mÖgen gleich auf diesen oder anderen Namen umgetauft seyn, ebenfalls verbothen, worauf man auch allenthalben gute Spehr’ [SpÄher] bestellen, und die Gesellschaften, welche entweder in Wirth—oder PrivathÄusern mit versperrten ThÜren oder sonst auf verdÄchtige Weise gehalten werden, als wahre Logen behandeln lassen, und die so leer als gewÖhnliche Ausrede, das es nur ehrliche Compagnien von guten Freunden sind, zumal von jenen, welche sich des Illuminatismi und der Freygeisterei vorhin schon suspect gemacht haben, nicht annehmen wird….” Quoted by Engel, p.280.

[437] Forestier, op. cit., p.509.

[438] Forestier, op. cit., pp.511 et seq. Cf. Engel, op. cit., pp.378 et seq.

[439] Ibid., p.369. Cf. Forestier, pp.511 et seq.

[440] Ibid., p.512.

[441] Ibid., pp.512 et seq. An effort to secure the extradition of Weishaupt was defeated by an appeal to Duke Ernst. Cf. Engel, pp. 231 et seq.

[442] The most significant of these were the following: Einleitung zu meiner Apologie, 1787; Bemerkungen Über einige Originalschriften, published soon after the former; Das verbesserte System der Illuminaten mit allen seinen Graden Einrichtungen, also soon after the first mentioned work; Kurze Rechtfertigung meiner Absichten, 1787; Nachtrag zur Rechtfertigung meiner Absichten, 1787.

[443] A sympathetic and moving account of the last years of Weishaupt’s life appears in Engel, op. cit., pp.380–402.

[444] Forestier, op. cit., pp.543 et seq.

[445] “Es muss die Furcht vor dem verschrieenen Illuminatismus geradezu wie ein Druck in der Luft gehangen haben, denn der Orden selbst existierte in seiner festeren Organisation schon lange nicht mehr, als sich die Gespensterfurcht vor ihm in so allgemeiner Weise breit machte.” (Engel, op. cit., p.425.)

[446] Forestier, op. cit., p.613.

[447] Ibid., pp.613 et seq.

[448] As late as November15, 1790, incited thereto by the priest Frank, the duke of Bavaria proclaimed a new interdict against the order. The threat of death as a punishment for membership in the order or activity on its behalf was again imposed. Cf. Engel, p.371; Forestier, pp. 614 et seq. The following year the police of the city of Munich compiled a list of ninety-one names (Forestier gives the number as ninety-two, cf. ibid., p.615), of members of the order who were supposed to be still active, and proceeded to apply the policy of banishing those who were held to be most dangerous. A number suffered in this way. Cf. Engel, pp.371 et seq. Cf. Forestier, pp.615 et seq. A spirit of reckless denunciation ruled in Munich, because of which no suspected man’s person was safe. Not until the death of Carl Theodore, in 1799, did this period of hostility to the order on the part of the Bavarian government finally come to an end.

[449] A reorganization of the Rosicrucian system had taken place in 1767, which stressed the antiquity, sanctity, and superior character of the order in its relations to the rest of the Masonic fraternity. According to their claims, the Rosicrucians alone were able to explain the hieroglyphics, symbols, and allegories of Freemasonry. The structure of the order was greatly elaborated at the time indicated, and thus supplementing its traditional appeal to the thirst for alchemy and magic, the order grew rapidly. Cf. Forestier, pp.187–191. Cf. Engel, p. 240.

[450] Vehse, in his Geschichte des Preussischen Hofes, vol.ii, p.35, puts the matter thus: “In den LÄndern nun, wo sie aufgehoben waren, brauchten die Exjesuiten das Mittel in den geheimen Gesellschaften Aufnahme zu suchen. Sie bildeten hier eine schleichende und deshalb um so sichere Opposition gegen alle AufklÄrungstendenzen. In dem Freimaurerorden stifteten sie die sogenannten ‘inneren Systeme.’ Hier waren sie als Proselytenmacher ganz in der Stille tÄtig und arbeiteten mit Macht darauf hin, das obscurante Pfaffentum und die despotische Hierarchie in beiden Konfessionen, im Protestantismus sowohl als Katholizismus wieder herzustellen.” (Quoted by Engel, pp.241 et seq.)

[451] Forestier, op. cit., p.191. Engel, op. cit., p.242.

[452] Ibid., p.242.

[453] Ibid., pp.247 et seq. Forestier brings into connection with this effort of the king of Prussia to check the supposed operations of the Illuminati, a further reproach which came upon the order on account of the course pursued by the Rosicrucians in spreading the report in the Masonic world that the Eclectic Alliance, an ill-fated effort to unite and dominate German Freemasonry, launched in 1783, was a survival of the Order of the Illuminati. The unpopularity and suspicion which the Eclectic Alliance incurred were due in part to its attempts to eliminate the high grades of Masonry, but more especially to the charges made against it by representatives of rival Masonic systems that it had at heart the undermining of the Christian religion. Cf. ibid., pp.617 et seq., 383–388. The Illuminati had had affiliations with the Eclectic Alliance, and hence a certain justification had been given for the accusations which were transferred from the former to the latter.

[454] The loose use of the term “Illuminati” involved in these statements is only partially illustrated in the following comment of Mounier: “On a donnÉ par dÉrision la qualitÉ d’IlluminÉs À tous les charlatans mystiques de ce siÈcle, À tous ceux qui s’occupent d’alchimie, de magie et de cabale, de revenans, de relations avec des esprits intermÉdiaires, tels que les Saint-Germain, les Cagliostro, les Swedenborg, les Rose-croix et les Martinistes: mais il a existÉ une autre espÈce d’illuminÉs en Allemagne” (i. e., Weishaupt’s system). (De l’influence attribuÉe aux philosophes, aux franc-maÇons et aux illuminÉs, sur la rÉvolution de France, p.169.) Not these systems alone, but the representatives of the diffused forces of the Enlightenment were appointed to share the mantle of the ambiguous term.

[455] Baron Knigge. In responding to Bahrdt’s appeal to assist him in working out the system of the German Union, Knigge violated the pledge he had made to the Bavarian government not to concern himself again with secret organizations. For his indiscretion he paid the penalty of an unpleasant notoriety. Cf. Forestier, p.629.

[456] Bahrdt’s career was objectionable from almost every point of view. He had been first a pastor, and later a professor of sacred philology at the University of Leipzig. Here, as at Erfurt, the place of his next professional labors, his dissolute conduct involved him in public scandals which lost him his post. In 1771 he went to Giessen as preacher and professor of theology. Later, after numerous changes of location and in the character of his educational activity, he took refuge at Halle, where he conducted courses in rhetoric, eloquence, declamation, and ethics. A man of low tastes, his life was without dignity and solid convictions. Cf. Forestier, pp.624 et seq.; Mounier, pp.201 et seq.; P. Tschackert, in Herzog-Hauck, RealencyklopÄdie, 3. Aufl., ii, (1897), pp. 357–359.

[457] These associations were to be divided into six grades: Adolescent, Man, Elder, Mesopolite, Diocesan, and Superior. A ritual was provided and the low initiation fee of one thaler imposed. The system, never fully developed, conveys the impression of crudeness and absurdity.

[458] Mounier, pp.201 et seq. Forestier makes the added suggestion that Bahrdt saw in the formation of the Union a chance to further his own literary ambitions and pecuniary interests. Cf. Forestier, p.627.

[459] Ibid., pp.629, 630.

[460] Ibid.

[461] Mounier, p.186.

[462] “Die merkwÜrdigste, aber auch gleichzeitig groteskeste Beschuldigung, die jemals dem Illuminatenorden nachgesagt worden ist, war die, dass er die franzÖsische Revolution zur Explosion gebracht habe. Es gehÖrte recht viel KombinationsvermÖgen und Taschenspielerei in der Logik dazu, um den Beweis fÜr diese wundersame Behauptung zusammenzuleimen, aber in jener Zeit wurde tatsÄchlich alles geglaubt, sobald es sich darum handelte, dem Illuminatismus eine neue Schurkerei aufzuhalsen.” (Engel, pp.402, 404. Cf. Mounier, pp.124, 215 et seq.)

[463] Published anonymously at Munich, in 1794.

[464] Title in full: Illuminatus Dirigens oder Schottischer Ritter. Ein Pendant zu der nicht unwichtigen Schrift: Die neuesten Arbeiten, etc., Munich, 1794.

[465] The grades of Priest and Regent were reproduced in the first of these two works. The most objectionable principles of the order were reserved to these two grades.

[466] Forestier brings into connection with the publication of these pamphlets the appearance of certain brochures of Knigge’s, wherein he espoused with great ardor the cause of the French Revolutionists. The special import of this requires no comment. Cf. ibid., pp.636 et seq.

[467] Hoffman had himself been a member of the Illuminati, at Vienna. Cf. Forestier, op. cit., p.646.

[468] The date was early in 1792 (!). Cf. ibid., p.646.

[469] Forestier, whose treatment at this point is characteristically thorough, gives the titles, or otherwise refers to not less than fourteen pamphlets or brochures, in addition to numerous magazine articles. Cf. ibid., pp. 649–658.

[470] Forestier, op. cit., pp.649–658.

[471] Johann Joachim Christoph Bode (1730–1793), by no means a distinguished representative of the German literati of his period, occupied a fairly important rÔle in the history of the Order of the Illuminati. After Weishaupt’s flight to Ingolstadt he was the most active leader in the ranks of the persecuted order. Cf. Forestier, pp.543 et seq. He was profoundly interested in Masonry. In 1790 he projected a plan for the union of all the German lodges of Masonry. The effort proved futile.

[472] The PhilalÈthes were conspicuous among French Freemasons for their unequalled devotion to alchemy and theurgy. The order was founded about 1773.

[473] Staack, in his Der Triumph der Philosophie im 18. Jahrhundert (1803), vol.ii, p.276, represents von dem Busche as a military official in the service of the Dutch government, and as a member of Weishaupt’s order. Mounier (p. 212) refers to him as a major in the service of the landgrave of Hesse-Darmstadt. His figure is of no historical importance apart from its chance connection with the Illuminati legend.

[474] This bizarre and preposterous explanation of the genesis of the French Revolution was a favorite with contemporary German and French writers of the special-pleader type. It was used, as we shall see later, by both Robison and Barruel in their discussions of the rÔle played by the Illuminati in the great French political and social debacle. Its classic statement was made a few years later by Staack, in his Der Triumph der Philosophie im 18. Jahrhundert, vol.ii, pp.348 et seq.

A more silly exposition of the relation of the Illuminati to the French Revolution is that found in the fabulous tale related by the notorious Sicilian impostor, Giuseppe Balsamo (“Count” Alessandro Cagliostro), who, in 1790, having been arrested at Rome and interrogated by officials respecting his revolutionary principles, attempted to divert suspicion by recounting experiences he claimed to have had with two chiefs of the Illuminati, at Mitau, near Frankfort, Germany. Revelations had been made to him at that time (1780), he alleged, to the effect that the Order of the Illuminati was able to number 20,000 lodges, scattered through Europe and America; that its agents were industriously operating in all European courts, particularly, being lavishly financed with funds drawn from the immense treasures of the order; and that the next great blow of the order was to be delivered against the government of France. Cf. Sierke, SchwÄrmer und Schwindler zu Ende des 18. Jahrhunderts, pp.407 et seq. Both Engel (pp. 420 et seq.) and Forestier (pp. 658 et seq.) devote an unnecessary amount of space to Cagliostro’s foolish “revelations”. It is sufficient for our purpose to remark in passing that, in any case, Cagliostro was not discussing the affairs of Weishaupt’s order, but the affairs of the Strict Observance whose growing credulity and occultism caused the term “Illuminati” sometimes to be applied to them.

[475] “Ses principes Étaient directement contraires À ceux des illuminÉs; il n’Était pas homme À placer ses espÉrances dans un intervalle de mille ans. Il n’a jamais pensÉ qu’un peuple pÛt devenir assez vertueux pour se passer de lois et de magistrats. Il a soutenu la vraie thÉorie de la balance des pouvoirs, et combattu le despotisme populaire, toutes les fois que l’amour de la cÉlÉbritÉ et l’intÉrÊt de son ambition ne le faisaient pas agir contre sa propre doctrine, et les illuminÉs n’auraient ÉtÉ capables, ni d’ajouter À ses lumiÈres, ni de changer sa thÉorie, ni de corriger ses vices.” (Mounier, pp.216 et seq.) This judgment of a sensible and impartial critic of the French Revolution, first submitted to the public in 1801, is as valid now as then.

[476] Without citing his authority, Forestier makes the statement that von dem Busche’s interest in the reform of the debased order of the PhilalÈthes led him not only to accompany Bode but to offer to pay his expenses. Cf. Forestier, p.666.

[477] The theories and sÉances of the empiric, Mesmer, were greatly agitating Paris at the time and attracting attention throughout Europe.

[478] Mounier, pp.212 et seq. Cf. Forestier, pp.664 et seq. While Bode was in Paris he kept in close correspondence with his German friend, Frau Hess, of Hirschberg. Engel, who made an examination of this correspondence in the Royal Library at Dresden, was unable to discover the slightest intimation that Bode’s mind, while he was in Paris, was occupied with anything more revolutionary than the turning of the PhilalÈthes away from their craze for alchemy, cabala, theosophy, and theurgy, or in Mesmer’s theories. Cf. Engel, pp.409–415. When Bode returned to Germany it is undeniable that he carried with him an unfavorable opinion of French Masonry. Cf. Forestier, p. 668.

[479] In addition to the two elaborated upon in the remainder of this chapter, the following are most worthy of note: Staack, Der Triumph der Philosophie im 18. Jahrhundert, vols. i, ii, 1803 (already noted); Proyard, Louis XVI et ses vertus aux prises avec la perversitÉ du siÈcle, Paris, 1808 (4vols.); De Malet, Recherches politiques et historiques qui prouvent l’existence d’une secte rÉvolutionnaire, son antique origine, ses moyens, ainsi que son but, et dÉvoilent entiÈrement l’unique cause de la RÉvolution FranÇaise, Paris, 1817; De Langres, Des SociÉtÉs SecrÈtes en Allemagne et dans d’autres contrÉes, de la Secte des IlluminÉs, du Tribunal Secret, de l’assassinat de Kotzebue, 1819; Le Couteulx, Les Sectes et SociÉtÉs politiques et religieuses, Paris, 1863; Deschamps, Les SociÉtÉs SecrÈtes et la SociÉtÉ, vols. i, ii, iii, Avignon, 1874–1876. As late as 1906, in an article in the Edinburgh Review of July of that year, Una Birch traversed much of the ground covered thus far in this and the preceding chapter and, on the theory that an event as spontaneous (?) as the French Revolution must have originated in a definite coÖrdination of ideas and doctrines, reaffirmed the general notion that the Masonic lodges of France, having been inoculated with the doctrines of the Illuminati, became the principal points of associative agitation for, and thus the direct cause of, the French Revolution. This essay may also be found in the volume of essays entitled, Secret Societies and the French Revolution (London and New York, 1911), by the same author.

[480] Later editions of this work, which in their number and geographical extent strongly suggest the degree of interest the subject had for the reading public, appeared as follows: second edition, London, 1797; third edition, London, 1798; fourth edition, London and New York, 1798; a French translation, London, 1798–99 (2vols.); a German translation, KÖnigslutter and Hamburg, 1800; a Dutch translation, Dordrecht (n. d.). See Wolfstieg, Bibliographie der Freimaurerischen Literatur, vol.i, pp.192, 193.

[481] Robison was a mathematician, scientific writer, and lecturer in the field of natural philosophy, of considerable ability and distinction. The son of a Glasgow merchant, he was born in Scotland in 1739. He received the benefits of a thorough education, graduating from Glasgow University in 1756. The connections he enjoyed throughout his life were of the best. Subsequent to his graduation he became tutor to the son of Sir Charles Knowles, the English admiral, and later was appointed by the government to service in the testing out at sea of the newly completed chronometer of John Harrison, the horologist. Still later he went to Russia as private secretary to Sir Charles. While in Russia he was called to the chair of mathematics established in connection with the imperial sea-cadet corps of nobles. Abandoning this post, he returned to Scotland, and in 1773 became professor of natural philosophy in Edinburgh University, lecturing on such subjects as hydro-dynamics, astronomy, optics, electricity, and magnetism. His distinction in this general field seems clearly demonstrated by the fact that he was called upon to contribute to the third edition of the Encyclopaedia Britannica articles on seamanship, the telescope, optics, waterworks, resistance to fluids, electricity, magnetism, music, etc., as well as by the fact that when the Royal Society of Edinburgh was organized under royal charter in 1783, Robison was elected general secretary of that distinguished organization, an office he continued to hold until within a few years of his death. The versatility of the man is further evidenced by the fact that he was deeply interested in music, attaining the mastery of several instruments, and in the writing of verse. His reputation was not confined to Great Britain. In 1790 the College of New Jersey (Princeton University) conferred upon him the degree of LL.D. (Cf. General Catalogue of the College of New Jersey, 1746–1896, p.177. The Dictionary of National Biography, vol. xlix, p.58, incorrectly gives the date for the bestowal of this degree as 1798.) Later, his alma mater, Glasgow University, bestowed upon him a like honor.

In addition to his encyclopaedia articles and his book on the Illuminati, Robison edited and published the lectures of Dr. Black, the chemist, and the following scientific works, the product of his own intellectual activity: Outlines of a Course of Lectures on Mechanical Philosophy, Edinburgh, 1797, and Elements of Mechanical Philosophy, Edinburgh, 1804. The latter was intended to be the initial volume of a series, but its successors were not forthcoming. A posthumous work of four volumes entitled, A System of Mechanical Philosophy, with Notes by David Brewster, LL.D., was published at Edinburgh in 1822. The death of Robison occurred in 1805. (For the material incorporated in the foregoing the writer is chiefly indebted to the Dictionary of National Biography, vol.xlix, pp.57, 58, and to casual references in the Transactions of the Royal Society of Edinburgh, vols. i–v.)

[482] “Die Neuesten Religionsbegebenheiten mit unpartheyischen Anmerkungen mit BeihÜlfe mehrerer von H. M. G. KÖster, Professor in Giessen, herausgegeben Jg. 1–20 Giessen, 1778–97 verfolgten gleichfalls den Zweck, von den wichtigsten VorfÄllen aus der Religionsgeschichte der Gegenwart eine deutliche, grÜndliche und nÜtzliche Beschreibung zu liefern, doch beschrÄnkten sie sich dabei vornehmlich auf Deutschland und richteten sich in erster Linie an Laien und Nichttheologen” (Herzog-Hauck, RealencyklopÄdie, 3rd ed., vol.xxiv, Leipzig, 1913, p. 673).

[483] Though a Mason, Robison was by no means an ardent supporter of Freemasonry. The English Masonic lodges with which he was acquainted impressed him as having no higher function than that of supplying “a pretext for passing an hour or two in a sort of decent conviviality, not altogether void of some rational occupation.” He found the lodges on the continent, however, “matters of serious concern and debate.” Cf. Proofs of a Conspiracy, etc., pp.1 et seq. (The edition of Robison’s book here as elsewhere referred to is the third [London] edition of 1798.) Robison professed to have visited lodges at LiÈge, Valenciennes, Brussels, Aix-la-Chapelle, Berlin, KÖnigsberg, and St. Petersburg. Everywhere he found an elaboration of ritual, joined with a spirit of grave interest in the affairs of Freemasonry, which filled him with astonishment and seemed to call for explanation. Cf. ibid., pp.2 et seq.

[484] Robison, op. cit., p.7. Robison also made use of several of the works which the disturbances occasioned by the Bavarian Illuminati called forth on the continent. Conspicuous among these were the documents of the order published by the Bavarian government. Cf. ibid., pp.133, 185, 186, 205, etc. He also made use of Hoffman’s violently hostile sheet, the Wiener Zeitschrift. Cf. ibid., pp.358, 393. Robison’s knowledge of the German language was, however, far from perfect, as he himself freely admitted (Cf. ibid., pp.14, 499), so that his handling of his sources must be viewed as neither capable nor complete. The meagerness of his resources is perhaps best illustrated in his treatment of the conspiracy which he assumed underlay the French Revolution. Such “proofs” as he made use of in this connection amounted to little more than the political manifestoes of certain secret lodges and clubs, fugitive revolutionary documents which chanced to blow across his path, current historical conjecture and gossip, etc. The whole was pieced together in the spirit of one who ventured to hope that his “scattered facts” might be of some service to his generation. (Cf. ibid., pp.493–496.)

[485] Robison, op. cit., pp.10, 11, 15.

[486] An illustration of the carelessness with which Robison handled his dates is found on pages 15 and 133 (cf. p.103) of the Proofs of a Conspiracy, etc., in the matter of the date of the founding of the Order of the Illuminati. Far more serious in its reflection on the author’s lack of accuracy and insight is such looseness and general unsoundness of treatment as permitted him to represent the Jesuits as frequenters of English and French Masonic lodges, while at the same time indicting the latter as fully committed to a free-thinking propaganda which sought nothing less than the eradication of religion, not to speak of its institutions. Cf. ibid., pp.22 et seq. Robison’s superficial explanation of the anticlericalism of Weishaupt might be cited as another illustration of the blundering method pursued in the book. Cf. ibid., pp.101, 103 et seq. His weak and practically pointless digression in order to find opportunity to comment on the educational projects of Basedow will serve to illustrate the discursive quality in his work. Cf. ibid., 85 et seq.

[487] Robison’s exposition of the elements of uncontrolled curiosity and conjecture as elements in his purpose in writing the book is not without significance: “I must entreat that it be remembered that these sheets are not the work of an author determined to write a book. They were for the most part notes, which I took from books I had borrowed, that I might occasionally have recourse to them when occupied with Free Masonry, the first object of my curiosity. My curiosity was diverted to many other things as I went along, and when the Illuminati came in my way, I regretted the time I had thrown away on Free Masonry. (But, observing their connection, I thought that I perceived the progress of one and the same design. This made me eager to find out any remains of Weishaupt’s Association. I was not surprised when I saw marks of its interference in the French Revolution.) In hunting for clearer proofs I found out the German Union—and, in fine, the whole appeared to be one great and wicked project, fermenting and working over all Europe.” (Ibid., pp. 493 et seq.) Encouraged by his friends, Robison “set about collecting my [his] scattered facts.” (Ibid., p.494.)

[488] Ibid., pp.28 et seq.

[489] Robison does not wholly miss the true point in his survey of the backgrounds of the French Revolution. He points out numerous “cooperating causes” which served to make the Revolution inevitable. “Perhaps there never was a nation where all these cooperating causes had acquired greater strength than in France. Oppressions of all kinds were at a height. The luxuries of life were enjoyed exclusively by the upper classes, and this in the highest degree of refinement; so that the desires of the rest were whetted to the utmost. Even religion appeared in an unwelcome form, and seemed chiefly calculated for procuring establishments for the younger sons of insolent and useless nobility. For numbers of men of letters were excluded, by their birth, from all hopes of advancement to the higher stations in the church. These men frequently vented their discontents by secretly joining the laics in their bitter satires on such in the higher orders of the clergy, as had scandalously departed from the purity and simplicity of manners which Christianity enjoins. Such examples were not unfrequent, and none was spared in those bitter invectives…. The faith of the nation was shaken; and when, in a few instances, a worthy CurÉ uttered the small still voice of true religion, it was not heard amidst the general noise of satire and reproach. The misconduct of administration, and the abuse of the public treasures, were every day growing more impudent and glaring, and exposed the government to continual criticism.” (Robison, pp.60 et seq. Cf. ibid., pp.362 et seq.) These “cooperating causes” receive little emphasis, however, in Robison’s zealous effort to trace the revolutionary spirit to its lair in the Masonic lodges of France.

[490] Ibid., pp.40 et seq.

[491] Robison, op. cit., pp.43 et seq.

[492] Ibid., p.51. Robison’s account of this phase of the situation has little to commend it. Upon his own unsupported assertions many of the Revolutionary leaders, as, for example, Mirabeau, SieyÈs, Despremenil, Bailly, Fauchet, Maury, Mounier, and Talleyrand, are brought into direct connection with one or another of the French Masonic systems. Cf. Robison, pp.49 et seq. Similarly, it is maintained, it was among Masonic lodges that the ideas contained in such books as Robinet’s La Nature, ou l’Homme moral et physique, Condorcet’s Le ProgrÈs de l’Esprit humain, Lequinio’s Les prÉjugÉs vaincus par la raison, and the book Des Erreurs et de la VÉritÉ, were first disseminated. Indeed, some of these books are said to have sprung out of the very bosom of the lodges. Cf. ibid., pp.43 et seq.

[493] Ibid., pp.67 et seq. Comparison with Forestier, pp.141 et seq., will make clear the paucity of the data upon which Robison drew in attempting to write the earlier chapters of the history of German Freemasonry.

[494] Robison, op. cit., p.64.

[495] Robison’s language is absurdly strong. “In half a year Free Masonry underwent a complete revolution all over Germany.” (Ibid., p. 70.)

[496] The sheer puerility of the treatment is indicated by the following: “A Mr. Rosa, a French commissary, brought from Paris a complete wagon-load of Masonic ornaments, which were all distributed before it had reached Berlin, and he was obliged to order another, to furnish the Lodges of that city. It became for a while the most profitable business to many French officers and commissaries dispersed over Germany, having little else to do.” (Robison, op. cit., pp.69 et seq.)

[497] Ibid., p.73.

[498] Ibid., pp.65 et seq.

[499] Ibid., pp.78, 79. Robison read into this situation a deliberate effort on the part of the leaders of French Freemasonry to extend the hegemony of the latter. He surmised that political uses and benefits were thus aimed at. Cf. ibid.

[500] Robison’s term for the representatives of the AufklÄrung. Cf. Robison, p.81.

[501] Ibid., p.80. This declension of faith and morals Robison, more wisely than he was aware, traced in part to the clash between the Roman Catholic and Protestant systems in Germany and the spirit of free inquiry which was thus promoted. See Robison, pp.80 et seqq.

[502] It is in this connection that Basedow is brought into relations with Robison’s devious exposition. Cf. ibid., pp.85 et seq.

[503] Ibid., pp.82 et seq.

[504] Robison, op. cit., pp.92 et seq. “ … Germany has experienced the same gradual progress, from Religion to Atheism, from decency to dissoluteness, and from loyalty to rebellion, which has had its course in France. And I must now add, that this progress has been effected in the same manner, and by the same means; and that one of the chief means of seduction has been the Lodges of the Free Masons. The French, along with their numerous chevaleries [sic], and stars, and ribands, had brought in the custom of haranguing in the Lodges, and as human nature has a considerable uniformity everywhere, the same topics became favorite subjects of declamation that had tickled the ear in France; there were the same corruptions of sentiments and manners among the luxurious or profligate, and the same incitements to the utterance of these sentiments, wherever it could be done with safety; and I may say, that the zealots in all these tracts of free-thinking were more serious, more grave, and fanatical. These are assertions a priori. I can produce proofs.” (Ibid., pp.91 et seq.) The “proofs” here referred to concern the Masonic career of Baron Knigge, whose antagonism to orthodox Christianity Robison distorts both as to its temper and its effect.

[505] Ibid., pp.126 et seq.

[506] Ibid., pp.100 et seq.

[507] Ibid., pp.101 et seq. These connections Robison almost wholly misconceived. Cf. supra, pp. 150, 163 et seq.

[508] Robison, op. cit., p.103.

[509] Ibid., p.105. The ulterior object of the order is later stated by Robison in the following manner: “Their first and immediate aim is to get possession of riches, power, and influence, without industry; and, to accomplish this, they want to abolish Christianity; and then dissolute manners and universal profligacy will procure them the adherence of all the wicked, and enable them to overturn all the civil governments of Europe; after which they will think of further conquests, and extend their operations to the other quarters of the globe, till they have reduced mankind to a state of one indistinguishable chaotic mass.” Robison, pp.209 et seq.

[510] Ibid., p.126.

[511] Ibid., p.212.

[512] Robison omitted nothing in his effort to fasten the stigma of moral obliquity upon the order. The published papers of the order were appealed to show that crimes of bribery, theft, and libertinism were not uncommon on the part of the leaders. See Robison, pp.144 et seq. The unsavory documents of the order referred to on page 181 of this dissertation likewise received Robison’s zealous attention. Cf. ibid., pp. 138 et seq. Weishaupt’s personal immorality in his relations with his sister-in-law is made to do full duty as “a brilliant specimen of the ethics which illuminated” the leaders. Cf. ibid., pp.164 et seq. (If a particular illustration of Robison’s bungling way of handling his German sources were needed, that might be found in the fact that our author identified the victim of Weishaupt’s lust as the sister-in-law of Zwack. Cf. ibid., p.167.)

[513] To Robison’s mind this constituted the crowning infamy of the order. “There is nothing in the whole constitution of the Illuminati that strikes me with more horror than the proposals of Hercules and Minos to enlist women in this shocking warfare with all that ‘is good, and pure, and lovely, and of good report’…. Are not the accursed fruits of Illumination to be seen in the present humiliating condition of women in France? … In their present state of national moderation (as they call it) and security, see Madame Tallien come into the public theatre, accompanied by other beautiful women, (I was about to have misnamed them Ladies), laying aside all modesty, and presenting themselves to the public view, with bared limbs, À la Sauvage, as the alluring objects of desire…. Was not their abominable farce in the church of Notre Dame a bait of the same kind, in the true spirit of Weishaupt’s Eroterion?” (Robison, pp.243, 251, 252.)

[514] Robison, op. cit., pp.110–200.

[515] Ibid., pp.201 et seq.

[516] Ibid. Although offered to the public with every show of confidence, Robison’s list was largely chimerical. He had depended upon isolated references in the papers of the order, many of which he must have misread. Doubtless in numerous cases he took the hopes of the ambitious leaders of the order as sober statements of fact. The importance of the reference to America will, of course, appear later.

[517] Ibid., p.272.

[518] Ibid., p.286.

[519] Ibid., p.290.

[520] Robison, op. cit., pp.315 et seq.

[521] Ibid., p.322.

[522] Ibid., p.321.

[523] Ibid., p.317. “All the Archives that were found were the plans and lists of the members, and a parcel of letters of correspondence. The correspondence and other business was managed by an old man in some inferior office or judicatory, who lived at bed and board in Bahrdt’s house for about six shillings a week, having a chest of papers and a writing-desk in the corner of the common room of the house.” (Ibid.)

[524] Ibid., pp.291, 296, 297.

[525] Ibid., p.299. Bahrdt’s fantastical program called for the division of these societies into Provinces or Dioceses, each directed by its Diocesan, and subordinate to a central organization. Cf. ibid., p.292

[526] Ibid., p.294.

[527] Robison, op, cit., p.297.

[528] Ibid., pp.322 et seq. “ … although I cannot consider the German Union as a formal revival of the Order under another name, I must hold those United, and the members of those Reading Societies, as Illuminati and Minervals. I must even consider the Union as a part of Spartacus’s work.” (Ibid.)

[529] Ibid., pp.355 et seq. “Thus I think it clearly appears, that the suppression of the Illuminati in Bavaria and of the Union in Brandenburgh were insufficient…. The habit of plotting had formed itself into a regular system. Societies now acted everywhere in secret, in correspondence with similar societies in distant places. And thus a mode of cooperation was furnished to the discontented, the restless, and the unprincipled in all places, without even the trouble of formal initiations, and without any external appearances by which the existence and occupations of the members could be distinguished.” (Ibid.)

[530] Ibid., p.355. Cf. ibid., p.286.

[531] Ibid., p.358.

[532] Robison, op. cit., p.371.

[533] Ibid., pp.393 et seq.

[534] Ibid., pp.397 et seq.

[535] Ibid., p.374.

[536] Ibid., p.398.

[537] The Grand Orient, according to Robison, represented the association of all the improved Masonic lodges of France. Its Grand Master was the Duke of OrlÉans. Cf. ibid., p.381.

[538] Ibid., pp.400 et seq.

[539] Ibid., p.376.

[540] Ibid., pp.376 et seq.

[541] Robison, op. cit., p.405.

[542] Ibid., p.402. Robison regarded the famous Jacobin Club in Paris as “just one of those Lodges.” (Robison, p.406. Cf. ibid., p. 402.) He allowed his statement to stand, however, without making any effort to substantiate it. Further, he held that the political committees in these “illuminated” lodges of France were in correspondence with similar committees in Germany, Holland, Austria, and Switzerland. Cf. ibid., pp.406 et seq., 414 et seq., 420. The contradictory character of his “evidence” is perhaps best illustrated by the fact that he treats the Masonic lodges of Paris as trying to seduce the lodges of German Freemasons. Cf. Ibid., p.418.

[543] Ibid., p.402.

[544] Ibid., p.405.

[545] The London edition of 1797–8 (4vols.) was reprinted in five volumes at Hamburg, Augsburg and Braunschweig; and a new edition, revised and corrected by the author, was issued at Lyons in 1818. Barruel himself put forth an English translation at London in 1798; and this was reprinted at Hartford, Conn., New York, and Elizabeth-town, N. J., the following year. Continental allies of the ex-Jesuit must have been responsible for translations into Polish, Dutch and Portuguese, which enjoyed but one printing apiece, as well as for the three editions of the Spanish translation, and for two of the three Italian editions. During the anti-Masonic campaign of the swindler Leo Taxil (1887), the Italian translation was reprinted at Rome by the Tipografia de Propaganda Fide.

Abridgements and excerpts were also circulated in several languages, including English. In this connection the following titles may also be noted: Application of Barruel’s Memoirs of Jacobinism to the Secret Societies of Ireland and Great Britain, London, 1798; The Anti-Christian and Antisocial Conspiracy. An extract from the French of Barruel, to which is prefixed “Jachin and Boaz,” Lancaster, (U. S.), 1812.

Cf. Sommervogel, C., BibliothÈque de la Compagnie de JÉsus, i, Bruxelles, 1890, coll. 938–941; also Wolfstieg, Bibliographie der Freimaurerischen Literatur, vol.i, pp.324, 325.

[546] Augustin Barruel (1741–1820) was a French controversialist and publicist, whose zeal was aroused in the defence of traditional ecclesiastical institutions and doctrines, in opposition to rationalistic tendencies manifest in the eighteenth century. Barruel entered the Society of Jesus in 1756 and was later driven from France when that order was suppressed by the French government in 1773. Permitted the next year to terminate his exile, he gave himself to literary pursuits. As might be expected, the turbulent condition of public affairs in France drew him into the currents of political discussion. His loyalty to the interests of the church would brook no silence. The civil oath demanded of ecclesiastics and the promulgation of the civil constitution in the earlier period of the Revolution specially roused his spirit, and led to the publication of a number of pamphlets from his pen. His ecclesiastical loyalties and political antagonisms were such that when the full fury of the revolutionary storm broke, Barruel became an emigrÉ and sought asylum in England. There he continued his literary employments, and published in 1794 his well-known Histoire du clergÉ de France, pendant la rÉvolution franÇaise. In that same year he brought out an English translation at London. This work Barruel dedicated to the English people in grateful recognition of the hospitable treatment which they accorded the persecuted ecclesiastics of his own land. Later, and while still in England, he wrote his Memoirs of Jacobinism. The number of editions through which this work passed is in itself a gauge of its claim upon popular interest. After the fall of the Directory, and after he had given his pledge of fidelity to the new government, Barruel again was permitted to return to France. With a view to healing the schism in the French church which the Revolution had produced, he championed the cause of the government in a work entitled, Du Pape et ses droits religieux, 1803. As the Napoleonic regime drew towards its close, Barruel came to be regarded as an emigrÉ priest, and suffered arrest at the hands of the government. In August, 1816, Barruel was allowed to make his profession in the Society of Jesus. Shortly before this he wrote to its General: “Je m’Étais toujours regardÉ comme liÉ par mes voeux, sans cesser d’Être vraiment JÉsuite, ce qui heureusement a fait pour moi une douce illusion dans laquelle je remercie Dieu de m’avoir laissÉ vivre jusqu’ au moment oÙ vous vous prÊtez avec tant de bontÉ À la demande que j’ai faite pour ma profession.” (La Compagnie de JÉsus en France, Histoire d’un siÈcle, 1814–1914, Par Joseph Burnichon, S.J., Tome 1^er, Paris, 1914, pp. 74 et seq.) The last years of Barruel’s life were spent in retirement. A list of his writings may be found in QuÉrard’s La France LittÉraire, Tome Premier, pp.196, 197, and a more elaborate one, in Sommervogel, op. cit. i, coll. 930–945.

[547] Barruel, op. cit., pp.i, vi.

[548] Ibid., pp.xiii et seq.

[549] Barruel’s term was Sophistes.

[550] Barruel, op. cit., pp.xiv, xv.

[551] Ibid., p.2.

[552] Ibid., p.1.

[553] Barruel’s main reliance is the correspondence of Voltaire, as published in the edition of Kehl.

[554] Barruel, op. cit., vol.i, pp.25 et seq.

[555] Ibid., pp.26, 27, 33.

[556] Ibid., pp.54 et seq. Barruel represents the Encyclopedists as arguing that force could not be employed until there had first been a revolution in all religious ideas; hence L’EncyclopÉdie, with all its insinuating doubts, its artful cross-references, its veiled impiety, was planned to give the first great impulse in that direction. Thus the old forms of thought would perish “as it were, by inanition;” later, the laying of the axe to the altar would not be hazardous.

[557] Ibid., pp.75 et seq.

[558] Ibid., pp.127 et seq.

[559] Ibid., pp.163 et seq. According to Barruel, the conspirators numbered among their adepts the following: Joseph II of Germany, Catherine II of Russia, Christian VII of Denmark, Gustave III of Sweden, Poniatowski, king of Poland, and the landgrave Frederick of Hesse-Cassel.

[560] Ibid., p.154.

[561] Barruel, op. cit., p.157.

[562] Ibid., pp.321 et seq.

[563] Ibid., vol.ii, pp.9, 10, 13 et seq., 21.

[564] Ibid., pp.52 et seq., 66, 76. Barruel labors hard to save himself from the cruel necessity of including Montesquieu in the list of conspirators. He finds it “painful to apply such a reproach to this celebrated writer.” (Ibid., p.76.) With some cleverness he remarks: “He [Montesquieu] did not conspire by setting up his systems, but his systems formed conspirators.” (Ibid., p.98.)

[565] Ibid., p.101.

[566] Barruel, op. cit., pp.130, 131, 157 et seq.

[567] Ibid., pp.159 et seq.

[568] Barruel contended that the popular uprisings of the period in Geneva, Bohemia, Transylvania, and even among the negroes of St. Domingo, were all directly due to the conspiracy. Cf. Barruel, pp.205 et seq., 255 et seq., 260 et seq., 271.

[569] Barruel’s estimate of Freemasonry was appreciably lower than that of Robison. Its mysteries were to be traced to Manes, and to the introduction of Manichaeism into Europe in the period of Frederich II (1221–1250). Condorcet was appealed to for proof in this connection. Cf. Barruel, pp.399 et seq. The general idea that the Freemasons were responsible for the campaign against monarchy and the Catholic religion which, many believed, characterized the greater part of the eighteenth century, had already been made familiar to the French by the ecclesiastics Larudan and Lefranc. Cf. Forestier, pp.684 et seq.

[570] By the occult lodges Barruel meant those whose members had received the higher mysteries and degrees. Cf. Barruel, vol.ii, p.293.

[571] Ibid., pp.276, 277, 278, 279.

[572] Ibid., pp.436 et seq.

[573] Ibid., p.436.

[574] Ibid., p.438.

[575] Ibid., pp.444 et seq.

[576] Ibid., pp.455 et seq.

[577] Ibid., pp.471 et seq. Cf. ibid., p.437.

[578] “Under the name of ILLUMINES a band of Conspirators had coalesced with the Encyclopedists and Masons, far more dangerous in their tenets, more artful in their plots, and more extensive in their plans of devastation. They more silently prepared the explosions of the Revolutionary volcano, not merely swearing hatred to the Altar of Christ and the Throne of Kings, but swearing at once hatred to every God, to every Law, to every Government, to all society and social compact; and in order to destroy every plea and every foundation of social contract, they proscribed the terms MINE and THINE, acknowledging neither Equality nor Liberty but in the entire, absolute and universal overthrow of all PROPERTY whatever.” (Barruel, op. cit., p. 478. Cf. vol.iii, pp.17, 22 et seq.)

[579] Barruel attributed little or no success to the efforts which Weishaupt’s associates made to strip him of much of his despotic power. Cf. Barruel, ch. xviii.

[580] The discussion of the character of the order fills the entire third volume of the Memoirs. It is not too much to say that Barruel’s analysis of the organization is characterized by no little soundness of judgment as well as by literary skill. The documents upon which he draws are not only those published by the Bavarian government, but also the apologetic writings of Weishaupt and Knigge, as well as a considerable part of the polemical literature which developed after the suppression of the order. Yet it need scarcely be said, the author’s bias is nowhere obscured. On page after page he conveys the impression that he is dealing with the sum of all villainies. His judgment of Weishaupt was, of course, severe: “An odious phenomenon in nature, an Atheist void of remorse, a profound hypocrite, destitute of those superior talents which lead to the vindication of truth, he is possessed of all that energy and ardor in vice which generates conspirators for impiety and anarchy. Shunning, like the ill-boding owl, the genial rays of the sun, he wraps around him the mantle of darkness; and history shall record of him, as of the evil spirit, only the black deeds which he planned or executed…. Scarcely have the magistrates cast their eyes upon him when they find him at the head of a conspiracy which, when compared with those of the clubs of Voltaire and D’Alembert, or with the secret committees of D’OrlÉans [sic], make these latter appear like the faint imitations of puerility, and show the Sophister and the Brigand as mere novices in the arts of revolution.” (Barruel, op. cit., pp.2, 3, 7.)

[581] Ibid., p.293. Cf. ibid., p.413: “Will not hell vomit forth its legions to applaud this last Spartacus, to contemplate in amazement this work of the Illuminizing Code? Will not Satan exclaim, ‘Here then are men as I wished them’”.

[582] Ibid., vol.iv, p.379. Cf. ibid., p.387: “ … in this den of conspirators … we find every thing in perfect union with the Occult Lodges, to which it only succeeds. Adepts, object, principles, all are the same; whether we turn our eyes towards the adepts of impiety, of rebellion, or of anarchy, they are now but one conspiring Sect, under the disastrous name of Jacobin. We have hitherto denominated some by the name of Sophisters, others by that of Occult Masons, and, lastly, we have described those men styled IlluminÉes. Their very names will now disappear; they will in future all be duly described by the name of Jacobin.”

[583] Barruel, op. cit., ch. ix.

[584] Ibid., ch. x.

[585] Ibid., p.326.

[586] Ibid., ch. xi.

[587] Ibid., p.370.

[588] Ibid., pp.370 et seq.

[589] Ibid., pp.375 et seq.

[590] Ibid., p.376.

[591] Ibid., p.377.

[592] Ibid., p.379.

[593] Barruel, op. cit., passim.

[594] Ibid., pp.468 et seq.

[595] Ibid., pp.472 et seq.

[596] Ibid., pp.476 et seq.

[597] Ibid., pp.482 et seq.

[598] Ibid., pp.493–551. Barruel found no difficulty in making the conspiracy broad enough in Prussia to take in Immanuel Kant. Cf. ibid., pp.523 et seq. The Professor of KÖnigsberg and the Professor of Ingolstadt developed systems which ultimately lead to the same end (!). Cf. ibid., p.526.

[599] Ibid., pp.493 et seq.

[600] The reference is to the United Irishmen, an organization whose affairs got somewhat mixed with the discussion of the Illuminati in America. Cf. infra, pp.271 et seq.

[601] A foot-note connects the French minister, Adet, with the Illuminati campaign in North America. Cf. ibid., p.494.

[602] Robison, op. cit., p.535.

[603] Ibid., p.537.

[604] Ibid., p.538.

[605] Barruel, op. cit., vol.iii, p.xiv.

[606] Barruel, op. cit., vol.iii, p.xiv.

[607] Ibid., p.xv.

[608] Ibid., pp.xv, xvi.

[609] Ibid., p.xviii.

[610] The Works of John Adams, vol.ix, pp.169 et seq.

[611] Cf. supra, p. 10.

[612] A Sermon, Delivered at the New North Church in Boston, in the morning, and in the afternoon at Charlestown, May9th, 1798, being the day recommended by John Adams, President of the United States of America, for solemn humiliation, fasting and prayer. By Jedidiah Morse, D. D., minister of the congregation in Charlestown, Boston, 1798, pp.5–12.

[613] Ibid., p.13.

[614] Morse was one of those New England clergymen whose earlier enthusiasm for the French Revolution had been pronounced. In a sermon preached on the occasion of the national thanksgiving of 1795, he confessed his profound interest in the French cause, on account of what that people had accomplished in breaking the chains of civil and ecclesiastical tyranny. At the same time he voiced his concern because a spirit of vandalism had lately arisen in France, by which all the salutary results of the Revolution were gravely imperiled. Still, his hopes for the recovery of the nation’s self-control were strong. Cf. The Present Situation of Other Nations of the World, Contrasted with our Own. A Sermon, delivered at Charlestown, in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, February19, 1795; being the day recommended by George Washington, President of the United States of America, for Publick Thanksgiving and Prayer. By Jedidiah Morse, D. D., minister of the congregation in Charlestown, Boston, 1795, pp.10–16. Cf. also the Preface to Morse’s Fast Day Sermon of April25, 1799.

[615] Morse, Sermon on the National Fast, May9, 1798, p.13.

[616] The X. Y. Z. despatches.

[617] Morse, Sermon on the National Fast, May9, 1798, pp.14 et seq.

[618] Morse, op. cit., p.17.

[619] Ibid., p.19.

[620] Ibid., p.20.

[621] Morse, op. cit., p.20.

[622] Morse’s first acquaintance with Robison’s volume is thus explained by him: “The first copies which were sent to America, arrived at Philadelphia and New York, at both which places the re-printing of it was immediately undertaken, and the Philadelphia edition was completed ready for sale in the short space of 3 weeks. This was about the middle of April. Happening at this time to be in Philadelphia, and hearing the work spoken of in terms of the highest respect by men of judgment, one of them went so far as to pronounce it the most interesting work that the present century had produced; I was induced to procure a copy, which I brought home with me….” (Independent Chronicle, June14, 1798.) In Sprague’s Life of Jedediah Morse, pp.233 et seq., it is affirmed that Dr. Erskine, one of Morse’s Scottish correspondents, wrote Morse in January, 1797, informing him of the alarm which had sprung up in Europe with respect to the “conspiracy”, and calling attention to Robison’s volume which was then being prepared for the press.

[623] Morse, Sermon on the National Fast, May9, 1798, p.21.

[624] Ibid.

[625] Ibid., pp.22 et seq.

[626] Ibid., p.23.

[627] Ibid.

[628] Ibid., p.24.

[629] Robison’s reference to the “several” societies established in America previous to 1786 (cf. supra, p. 210) is specifically referred to. Cf. Sermon on the National Fast, May9, 1798, p.23.

[630] Ibid., p.24.

[631] Morse, op. cit., p.24.

[632] Morse had been at pains in his sermon to recommend Robison’s volume as throwing a flood of light upon “the causes which have brought the world into its present disorganized state.” (Ibid., pp. 24 et seq.) Later it must have occurred to him that the silence he had maintained in the pulpit respecting Masonry’s part in the conspiracy was bound to be noticed by all who upon his recommendation read Robison’s volume.

[633] Ibid., p.21.

[634] Morse, op. cit., p.21.

[635] Ibid., p.22.

[636] Ibid., pp.21, 22. For the time being Morse was content to follow the example of Robison. The latter, in his discussion of English Freemasonry, made a fairly sharp distinction between the English system and the Masonic systems of the continent. That distinction, on the whole, was decidedly favorable to English Freemasonry. By every consideration of precedent and prudence Morse must have felt strongly impelled to pursue the same course.

[637] Ibid., p.22.

[638] Morse, op. cit., p.25.

[639] Ibid., pp.25 et seq.

[640] Cf. supra, ch. i, 2.

[641] Cf. supra, pp. 125 et seq.

[642] The editor of as loyal and resourceful a Federalist sheet as the Columbian Centinel, for example, insisted upon treating as a whole the performances of the clergy on the occasion of the national fast, and refused to make discriminations with respect to the special import or merit of any particular minister’s performance: “Wednesday last was observed throughout the United States as a day of Fasting and Prayer. (Within the sphere of our information we can say, that on no occasion were there ever exhibited more moral patriotism, and more ardent devotion.) The Clergy on this occasion came forward with a zeal which added greatly to the high character they have long enjoyed, as Patriots. We could instance numerous traits of Federalism, which would do them honour; but when all of them are entitled to praise, it would be invidious to make distinctions.” (Columbian Centinel, May12, 1798.)

[643] Wolcott Papers, viii, 23.

[644] A Discourse, Delivered at the Roman Catholic Church in Boston on the 9th of May, 1798. … By the Reverend John Thayer, Catholic Missioner, Boston, 1798.

[645] Ibid., p.23.

[646] Op. cit.

[647] Independent Chronicle, May31, 1798.

[648] Ibid. The “observations” referred to really threw no new light upon the situation. They amounted to nothing more than proof of the fact that the editor of the New York Spectator had accepted the idea of the Illuminati conspiracy. This being the case he was anxious to warn his readers that if they would escape from the designs of the French government they must make their choice, and that speedily, between “INDEPENDENCE and SUBMISSION.”

[649] Independent Chronicle, June14, 1798.

[650] The extracts in question boldly championed Robison’s cause, and while admitting that all the tenets and secret manoeuvers of the Illuminati could not be said to have been fully brought to light, Morse did not hesitate to draw the following summary conclusion: “There is however sufficient known to call forth the indignation of every person who professes to be a friend to religion or virtue, and to put every one on their guard who knows and respects the rights of private property, and of good government.” (Ibid.)

[651] Ibid.

[652] A Discourse delivered in the Chapel of Harvard College, June19, 1798, Occasioned by the Approaching Departure of the Senior Class from the University. By David Tappan, D. D., Hollis Professor of Divinity in said College, Boston, 1798.

[653] Ibid., pp.4–13.

[654] As far as the present writer has been able to discover, President Dwight did not deal publicly with the Illuminati charge until a little later. Tappan’s reference must therefore be to general discussions of infidelity, a favorite topic with Yale’s president, as we have seen.

[655] The reference is to Robison. Whether or not Tappan had personally read Robison’s volume at this time is not altogether clear. The general impression created by his sermon is that he had.

[656] Cf. Tappan’s Sermon, p.19.

[657] Ibid., pp.15 et seq. (foot note).

[658] Cf. Tappan’s Sermon, pp.15 et seq. (foot note).

[659] THE DUTY OF AMERICANS IN THE PRESENT CRISIS. Illustrated in a Discourse, Preached on the Fourth of July, 1798; by the Reverend Timothy Dwight, D. D., President of Yale-College; at the request of the citizens of New-Haven. New-Haven, 1798.

[660] Ibid., p.8.

[661] The elaboration of this point necessarily led to some emphasis upon the spirit of irreligion and savage persecution that had thus manifested itself, and this in turn necessitated an effort to find a way out of the embarrassment of seeming to approve this persecution. The following ingenious foot note appended to the text of the published sermon admirably illustrates the inventive resourcefulness of many a New England clergyman of the day who found it necessary to rescue himself from such an impasse as Dwight’s method of exegesis produced: “In the mention of all these evils brought on the Romish Hierarchy, I beg it may be remembered, that I am far from justifying the iniquitous conduct of their persecutors. I know not that any person holds it, and all other persecutions, more in abhorrence. Neither have I a doubt of the integrity and piety of multitudes of the unhappy sufferers. In my view they claim, and I trust will receive, the commiseration, and, as occasion offers, the kind offices of all men possessed even of common humanity.” (Ibid., p.9.) The truth is that in some cases Protestant clergymen in New England, out of their concern for Christianity in general, went so far as to deprecate the persecutions which Roman Catholicism suffered.

[662] Dwight offered as his sources of authority Robison’s Proofs and an article on Barruel’s Memoirs of Jacobinism which he had discovered in the British Critic.

[663] Cf. Dwight’s Sermon, p.11.

[664] Ibid.

[665] Ibid.

[666] Cf. Dwight’s Sermon, pp.11, 12.

[667] Ibid., p.12.

[668] Ibid., p.13.

[669] Cf. Dwight’s Sermon, p.15.

[670] Cf. Dwight’s Sermon, pp.20, 21.

[671] Ibid., p.22.

[672] The commanding position that Dwight occupied in the Standing Order, as well as the unenviable distinction which in the eyes of the opposition belonged to him, is certified to by the fact that he was commonly referred to as “Pope Dwight.” Cf. Beecher, Autobiography, Correspondence, etc., vol.i, p.289. Cf. Stiles, Diary, vol.ii, p.531.

[673] The Connecticut Journal of July11, 1798, comments as follows upon New Haven’s celebration of the previous Fourth: “The exercises of the day at the Meeting-house were a Sermon by President Dwight, from the 16thchapter of Revelations, 15thverse, accompanied with prayers. An Oration by Noah Webster, jun., Esq., and sundry pieces of excellent music. We forbare [sic] to remark particularly on the Sermon and Oration, as the public eye will be speedily gratified in perusing them…. We shall only say that an enlightened audience, composed of the citizens of New-Haven, the members of our university, and many clergymen, civilians, and other respectable inhabitants from the adjacent towns, listened with profound attention while Doct. Dwight and Mr. Webster exposed to their view, in a feeling manner, those principles of modern philosophy which desolate Europe, and threaten the universe with mighty evils.”

[674] An Oration, pronounced at Sharon, on the Anniversary of American Independence, 4th of July, 1798. By John C. Smith, Litchfield, (n. d.), pp.6 et seq. Cf. ibid., pp.7 et seq.

[675] Theodore Dwight: An Oration spoken at Hartford, in the State of Connecticut, on the Anniversary of American Independence, July4th, 1798. Hartford, 1798, p.23.

[676] Ibid. On a later page, in commenting upon Robison’s reference in his Proofs of a Conspiracy to the lodges of the Illuminati which had been established in America, Dwight said: “I know not who belonged to that society in this country; but if I were about to make proselytes to illuminatism in the United States, I should in the first place apply to Thomas Jefferson, Albert Gallatin, and their political associates.” (Ibid., p.30.) This early use of the outcry against the Illuminati for political purposes was prophetic.

[677] An Oration on Party Spirit, Pronounced before the Connecticut Society of Cincinnati, convened at Hartford, for the celebration of American Independence, on the 4th of July, 1798. By Thomas Day, (n. d.), p.15.

[678] Ibid.

[679] That “Censor’s” tone of moderation was assumed and not genuine is further evinced by his assertion of contempt for Robison’s absurd supposition that the Illuminati had kindled the French Revolution and for his “unjustifiable attacks upon certain worthy characters.” If the Illuminati had never existed the Revolution would have occurred on account of the arbitrary and excessive despotism of the old French government, the insupportable weight of taxation, the luxury and dissipation of the nobility and clergy, the prohibition of free religious and political discussion, and the dissemination of liberal sentiments during the previous fifty years. That Robison, without sufficient warrant, should have attacked such characters as “the worthy La Fayette,” “the venerable Duke de Rochefoucault,” Dr. Priestley, et al., caused his book to appear as one born of “incorrigible prejudices, acting upon an inflamed imagination.” As for the author of the fast day sermon, he may judge for himself whether he was too hasty in recommending such a book to the public. The times may be full of peril, but surely this does not justify those who terrify their fellow citizens by means of groundless alarms. One’s fellow citizens also need to be put on their guard against the danger of becoming “the dupes of every foolish tale which the prejudices or ignorance of Europeans may fabricate.” Such were further comments by “Censor.” Cf. Day, op. cit.

[680] These articles began in the issue of the Mercury for August3, and were continued through the issues of August10, 14, 17, 21, 28, and 31. Because of an effort which the Reverend Josiah Bartlett made to absolve the Masons of this country of the suspicion that had been cast upon them, they found a certain continuation in the issues of the Mercury for September7, 14, 18, 21; but these are reserved for the special treatment of the Masonic aspects of the case. Cf. infra, pp. 330 et seq.

[681] Massachusetts Mercury, Aug.3, 1798.

[682] Ibid.

[683] Massachusetts Mercury, Aug.3, 1798.

[684] Ibid., Aug.10.

[685] Ibid. In this connection Morse seeks to extract comfort from the fact that the editors of the British Critic, having compared Robison’s Proofs and Barruel’s Memoirs of Jacobinism, have recorded their verdict that the two works are highly confirmatory of each other, “barring certain unimportant particulars.” He likewise observes that the marks of precipitation and certain faults of style and expression which some of the impartial English reviewers have been able to point out, have yet not been allowed to alter their judgment that the book as a whole is a credit to its author, and contains much valuable information. The clamor that has arisen against the book, Morse insists, is to be traced to the hostility of men who have been incensed because their secrets have been exposed. At this point it may be said in passing that Morse allowed himself to be drawn into the expression of a sentiment, gratuitous in its nature, which served to precipitate the very thing he had been anxious to avoid, viz., a break with the Masons. Irritated by his critics, he wrote: “The Free Masons can not be angry with him [Robison]…. If therefore any are really angry here, it must be because he has touched and exposed their secret friends.”

[686] The reference is to Professor Tappan’s sermon before the senior class of Harvard. Cf. supra, pp. 244 et seq.

[687] In this instance the reference is not to President Dwight’s Fourth of July sermon: that sermon had not yet been seen by Morse; but to an allusion made by Dwight to Robison’s book in a note appended to the following pamphlet: The Nature and Danger of Infidel Philosophy. Two Discourses, to the Candidates for the Baccalaureate, in Yale College, September9, 1797…. New-Haven, 1798. Cf. Massachusetts Mercury, Aug.17, 1798.

[688] Theodore Dwight’s Fourth of July oration is referred to. Cf. supra, pp. 246 et seq.

[689] Massachusetts Mercury, Aug.17, 1798.

[690] Ibid., Aug.21, 1798.

[691] Massachusetts Mercury, Aug.21, 1798. Morse’s article in this issue of the Mercury, perhaps more discursive and less convincing than anything he had previously written on the general subject, at various points descends to the level of abuse, in which Robison’s hostile English reviewers, the Reverend William Bentley (for reasons that will appear later), and “Censor” are made to share.

[692] Massachusetts Mercury, Aug.28, 1798. In explanation of the delicacy and difficulty of such a task as Robison’s, Morse offered to his readers the following: “The schemes and views of Conspirators are often veiled in language and signs intelligible only to themselves; they correspond under fictitious names; their papers are sparingly multiplied, artfully detached, and most cautiously concealed.” (Ibid.) The apologetic motive is evident.

[693] Ibid. With a “summary account” of the documents upon which Robison had relied in the composition of his book and of which Morse had no first-hand knowledge, and with an examination of the alleged differences between the accounts of the “conspiracy” by Robison and Barruel (cf. ibid., Aug.31, 1798), Morse’s prolix discussion of the subject came to a close. During the time that his articles were in process of publication, “Censor” contributed a fresh article to the Mercury, admitting that his faith in the existence of the European Illuminati was growing, but still protesting that Robison was to be regarded as extremely blameworthy on account of the false and calumnious attacks that he had made on worthy private characters in his Proofs. Cf. the Massachusetts Mercury of August28 for this article by “Censor.” What degree of unmixed comfort this may have afforded Morse, we may guess.

[694] As yet Barruel’s Memoirs of Jacobinism was known to Americans only in the literature of English reviews.

[695] Massachusetts Mercury, Nov.3, 1798: article by “A Customer.”

[696] Massachusetts Mercury, Nov.13, 1798.

[697] Ibid.

[698] Ibid., Nov.16, 1798. Extracts from Barruel’s Memoirs, garnered from English reviews, were offered in evidence by this writer. The charge of contradiction was hotly commanded by him to give place to the darker charge of designed perversion on the part of Robison’s enemies.

[699] Ibid., Nov.30, 1798.

[700] Massachusetts Mercury, Nov.30, 1798.

[701] Massachusetts Mercury, Oct.26, 1798.

[702] Ibid.

[703] A Sermon, Preached at Charlestown, November29, 1798, on the Anniversary Thanksgiving in Massachusetts. With an Appendix, designed to illustrate some parts of the Discourse; exhibiting proofs of the early existence, progress, and deleterious effects of French intrigue and influence in the United States. By Jedediah Morse, D. D., pastor of the church in Charlestown…. Boston, December, 1798. Two reprints of the sermon were issued early in the next year.

[704] Morse, op. cit., p.9.

[705] Ibid., pp.10–14.

[706] Morse, op. cit., p.15.

[707] Ibid.

[708] Ibid.

[709] Ibid., p.16.

[710] Ibid., p.18.

[711] The sermon was preached in two parts, morning and afternoon, and concerning Morse’s discussion of the Christian religion this explanatory mote appears in the printed report: “The last article, respecting the Christian Religion, which constituted the whole of the forenoon sermon, being a common, though always interesting subject, has been considerably abridged.” (Ibid., p.4.) This is only one of many marks of the great care Morse took to get the printed report of the sermon before the public in the most impressive form possible. He was fully conscious of the fact that he had an allegation to defend as well as a demurrer to oppose.

[712] Morse, op. cit., pp.20–22.

[713] Morse’s Anniversary Thanksgiving Sermon, pp.22 et seq. The sermon of Lathrop referred to bears the following title: A Sermon, on the Dangers of the Times, from Infidelity and Immorality; and especially from a lately discovered Conspiracy against Religion and Government, delivered at West-Springfield and afterward at Springfield. By Joseph Lathrop, D. D., Springfield, September, 1798. The statement that Morse quotes appears on page 14 of Lathrop’s sermon. Cf. Cunningham, Abner, Practical Infidelity Portrayed and the Judgments of God Made Manifest, (3rd. edition), New York, 1836, pp.42–46, where a somewhat similar situation in Orange County, New York, is referred to, and with suggestions of secret revolutionary designs not unlike those made by Lathrop. The situation referred to by Cunningham is also dealt with by F. M. Ruttenber, in his History of the County of Orange, with a History of the Town and City of Newburgh …. Newburgh, N. Y., 1875, pp.164 et seq. Woodbridge Riley’s article on Early Free-Thinking Societies in America (Harvard Theological Review, July, 1918, pp.247–284) came to the attention of the author of this study when the entire dissertation was in page proof.

[714] Some of these dated as far back as 1782, and none of them need have been disturbing to a calm mind.

[715] The following letter, written by Morse to Timothy Pickering, throws considerable light upon the sources from which the most of these documents were derived and the manner and spirit in which they were compiled.

[716] Morse’s Thanksgiving Sermon, “Note F,” pp.67 et seq.

[717] Morse’s Thanksgiving Sermon, p.67. The reference is, of course, to the Democratic Clubs.

[718] Morse’s Thanksgiving Sermon, pp.68 et seq.

[719] Ibid., p.67.

[720] Ibid. This secret organization referred to by Morse was founded in Ireland about 1791. It was in part the outgrowth of republican sentiments which the French Revolution inspired in the Irish people, in part of similar sentiments earlier received. Cf. Madden, The United Irishmen, vol.i, pp.3–44. The object of the organization was to obtain complete emancipation for both Catholics and Dissenters, and to reform the Irish parliament. The group manifested a bold revolutionary spirit. When the English government resorted to strong repressive measures, many of its members came to America. The Irish Rebellion of 1798 sent other Irish political exiles here; with the result that by many in this country the situation was adjudged to be alarming. William Cobbett (“Peter Porcupine”) was one of the most aggressive opponents of the movement in America. The Proceedings of the Society of the United Irishmen of Dublin was published at Philadelphia in 1795. The same year Cobbett published A Bone to Gnaw, for the Democrats; or Observations on a Pamphlet entitled “The Political Progress of Britain.” Part ii of Cobbett’s pamphlet was devoted to the Proceedings just mentioned. Cobbett’s paper, Porcupine’s Gazette, to a considerable extent was devoted to the raising of an alarm against the United Irishmen. Cobbett urged that the United Irishmen represented a conspiracy on the part of France to ruin the United States. See Porcupine’s Gazette, May8, 10, 1798. Since Cobbett was one of the men in America deeply interested in Robison’s Proofs of a Conspiracy (cf. particularly Porcupine’s Gazette for May18, July14, and Aug.13, 1798), and since Cobbett printed in his paper much that Morse published on the subject of the Illuminati (see, for example, Porcupine’s Gazette for Aug.9 and 13, 1798; Feb.25, 26, and June3, 1799), it is at least believable that Morse took from Cobbett the suggestion about the identification of the Illuminati with the United Irishmen. The Commercial Advertiser of New York was another newspaper that gave attention to the subject of the United Irishmen. The issue of that paper for Nov.1, 1798, carried an extended article copied from the Gazette of the United States, calling upon the citizens of this country to be on their guard against the United Irishmen. The author of this article identified the United Irishmen and the French party in the United States as one. Cf. also the Commercial Advertiser for Nov.5, 1798. Thus Morse had abundant warrant in precedent if not in fact for the suggestion he made at this point in the Appendix to his thanksgiving sermon.

[721] One may be sure that the following caustic comment of the editor of the Independent Chronicle is to be set down to instinctive repugnance and hostility, and is thus representative only of rabid partisanship: “Actions speak louder than words. If the parish observe the Minister busy about many things; if they find him more anxious about the geographical description of the City of Washington or the Georgia Lands, than the New-Jerusalem or the Land of Canaan; if they find him neglect his parish on a Sunday and employ himself during the week, to collect ridiculous fables to swell an appendix to a political publication. If he will do these things, he must expect that his Flock will not increase, and that at the year’s end, while he is exploring the territory of the United States, and hunting up Robinson’s [sic] straggling Illuminati, he must not be surprised if some of his own sheep have strayed across the river, and become the care of a more attentive shepherd.” (Ibid., Jan.7, 1799.)

[722] A Memorial of Divine Benefits. In a Sermon, delivered at Exeter, on the 15th, and at Haverhill, on the 29th of November, 1798, days of Public Thanksgiving, in New-Hampshire and Massachusetts. By Abiel Abbot, pastor of the First Church in Haverhill. Haverhill, Massachusetts, 1798, pp.18 et seq.

[723] A Sermon, delivered on the day of Public Thanksgiving, at Deerfield; Nov.29, ’98. By John Taylor. A. M., pastor of the church at Deerfield. Greenfield (n. d.), p.13.

[724] Taylor’s Thanksgiving Sermon, p.13.

[725] A Sermon, delivered on the Anniversary Thanksgiving, November29, 1798, with some additions in the historical part. By Jonathan French, A. M., pastor of the South Church in Andover. Andover, 1799. p.23.

[726] Ibid., pp.23 et seq.

[727] Ibid.

[728] A Discourse, delivered on the Public Thanksgiving Day, November29, 1798. By Joseph Eckley, D. D., minister of the Old South Church, Boston. Boston, 1798, pp.9, 15, 18.

[729] Connecticut kept a state thanksgiving at the same time as Massachusetts.

[730] Political Instruction from the Prophecies of God’s Word,—a Sermon, preached on the State Thanksgiving, Nov.29, 1798. By Nathan Strong, pastor of the North Presbyterian Church in Hartford, Connecticut. Hartford, 1798. This sermon is characterized by an ingenious effort to remove the stigma “mother of harlots” from the Catholic hierarchy and attach it to the Revolutionary leaders in France. “It is the Talleyrands and their associates,” said Strong, “whom I conceive to be the most properly designated by the mother of harlots, in the present period of the great apostacy.” (Ibid., p.17.)

[731] A Sermon preached at Billerica, November29, 1798, being the day of the Anniversary Thanksgiving throughout the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. By Henry Cumings, A. M., pastor of the church in said town. Boston. 1798, p.22.

[732] Ibid.

[733] The following excerpt from a letter of Jedediah Morse to Timothy Pickering, under date of Feb.11, 1799, is significant in this connection: “An editn. of 450 of my Sermon and Appendix is nearly gone—& a second of 800 is in the press. A number of gentlemen in Boston have thought it might be useful to send a copy to every clergyman in the commonwealth, & have agreed with the printer to furnish them, & they will be distributed when the members of the Legislature return home.” (Pickering Papers, vol.xxiv, 71.)

[734] The full title of this journal was The Columbian Centinel and Massachusetts Federalist. Here was an instance in which Masonic affiliations quite overrode ardent Federalist loyalty. To this the following letter of editor Benjamin Russell to William Bentley testifies:

[735] Columbian Centinel, Sept.8, 1798.

[736] Ibid., Sept.12, 1798.

[737] Ibid., Jan.5, 1799.

[738] Ibid.

[739] Columbian Centinel, Jan.5, 1799. This communication including the BÖttiger letter, was promptly copied by the Massachusetts Mercury, and thus given a wider publicity. Cf. the Mercury of Jan.11, 1799.

[740] Op. Cit.

[741] Somewhat later the Mercury offered to its readers relevant passages from Lathrop’s sermon of the preceding September and from French’s thanksgiving sermon. Cf. the Mercury for Jan.11 and Feb.26, 1799.

[742] The attention of Thomas and Abijah Adams, editors of the Independent Chronicle, during the fall and winter of 1798–99 was mostly occupied with very pressing personal considerations. In October, 1798, Thomas Adams was arrested under the Sedition Act. While his trial was in progress objectionable comments on the state and federal governments continued to appear in the Chronicle, with the result that his clerk and acting editor, Abijah Adams, was likewise arrested and put on trial. Thomas Adams died before his case was concluded; but Abijah Adams was later convicted and had the sentence of the court imposed upon him. Duniway, The Development of Freedom of the Press in Massachusetts, pp.144 et seq. These facts supply a new angle from which to view the relative silence of the Independent Chronicle with regard to the Illuminati controversy.

[743] Independent Chronicle, April15, 1799. Cf. ibid., Jan.7, 1799.

[744] Outside of Boston the newspapers of Massachusetts appear to have been generally content to furnish their readers an occasional article bearing on the controversy, copied in most cases from the columns of Boston or Hartford journals, or from papers which entered New England from without, particularly from New York and Philadelphia. Some of these Massachusetts newspapers are to be noticed later in connection with the effort that the Masons made to clear themselves of guilt.

[745] American Mercury, Aug.16, 1798.

[746] The following quotation bears upon the topic, and does full justice to the abilities of the rhymster, although offering only slight suggestion respecting the variety of subjects which the poem, after the manner of its kind, touched upon:

Cf. American Mercury, Jan.3, 1799: “Ode on Ends; or, The Boy’s Address, who carries the American Mercury.”

[747] Babcock’s adverse attitude is dealt with on pp.313 et seq. of this dissertation.

[748] Cf. issues of the Courant for July2, 30, Aug.6, 13, Sept.17, 1798; and for May27, June10, 17, 24, July1, 8, 15, 22, 29, Aug.5, 12, 19, 26, Sept.2, 9, 16, 23, Oct.7, Dec.16, 1799.

[749] Ibid., Aug.6, 1798.

[750] Ibid., Aug.13, 1798.

[751] Ibid., Sept.3, 1798. This view that the Courant sought to turn the agitation over the Illuminati to political account is confirmed by the following extract from “Guillotina,” the new year’s poem that the editors of the Courant presented to their patrons early in 1799.

Connecticut Courant, Jan.7, 1799: “Guillotina, for the year 1799, addressed to the Reader’s of the Connecticut Courant.”

[752] Porcupine’s Gazette, April12, 13, 1798.

[753] Ibid., July14, 1798.

[754] Porcupine’s Gazette, July14, 1798. An illustration of the dearth of vital data bearing on the existence of the Illuminati, as well as of the absurd way in which those who sought to prove their existence grasped at straws, is to be found in this issue of Porcupine’s Gazette. Cobbett published a letter which he had recently received from a certain William Smith, of Norwalk, Connecticut, who claimed that the chaplain of the ship of a French Admiral had made statements in his presence that corroborated Robison’s contentions. This letter speedily found its way into several New England newspapers, and passed for evidence in the case. Cf. for example, the Salem Gazette, Aug.7, 1798.

[755] Ibid., Aug.13, 23, 24, 30, 1798.

[756] Porcupine’s Gazette, Feb.25, 1799.

[757] Porcupine’s Gazette, Feb.25, 1799.

[758] Ibid., Feb.26, 1799.

[759] By this abbreviated title Bache’s paper was generally referred to.

[760] Aurora, Aug.3, 1798.

[761] Aurora, Aug.3, 1798.

[762] Ibid., Aug.10, 1798. Bache’s death occurred in September.

[763] The Life and Works of John Adams, vol.ix, p.172.

[764] Ibid., pp.172 et seq.

[765] Reverend Ashbel Green, who was chaplain of Congress at the time, accounts for the presence of this quality in the proclamation in the following manner. The President requested Green to assist him by preparing a draft of such a proclamation as the latter deemed suitable for the purpose. Aware of the complaints that had been made respecting previous proclamations, on the ground that while they called the people to the religious duties of thanksgiving and fasting, they were yet somewhat lacking in the manifestation of “a decidedly Christian spirit,” Green resolved to prepare for the President’s benefit a proclamation of such a thoroughgoing evangelical character that no such objection could possibly be lodged against it. This he endeavored to do. The President adopted Greens draft and published it, “with only the alteration of two or three words out of all affecting the religious character of my [his] production.” (The Life of Ashbel Green, pp.260 et seq.) The “decidedly Christian spirit” of the proclamation did not make the instrument immune from criticism. “An Old Ecclesiastic” contributed a highly censorious article to the Aurora, sharply rebuking the President for proclaiming the fast, objecting also to his “very improper and impolitic … language … when speaking of the French nation,” and questioning his right to direct the people as to what they should pray for. Cf. Aurora, April4, 1799. This article was copied by the Independent Chronicle for the benefit of New England readers, and drew from “A Real Ecclesiastic” a valiant defence of the President’s action and language. In the eyes of this writer, “the observations … by an Old Ecclesiastic … are so artfully fitted to excite groundless suspicions and prejudices against that GREAT AND GOOD MAN [President Adams], and especially to prepossess unwary readers against the approaching Fast recommended by him, that it seems important to defeat the writer’s manifest intention by a few seasonable remarks.” The nation was a Christian nation, and therefore the President had a right to recommend the observance of a day of Christian humiliation and prayer. Cf. Massachusetts Mercury, April16, 1799.

[766] A Sermon, Exhibiting the Present Dangers, and Consequent Duties of the Citizens of the United States of America. Delivered at Charlestown, April25, 1799, the day of the National Fast. By Jedediah Morse, D. D., pastor of the church in Charlestown. Charlestown, 1799.

[767] Morse, op. cit., p.5.

[768] Morse, op. cit.

[769] Ibid., p.9.

[770] Ibid., p.7.

[771] Ibid., p.9.

[772] Ibid., p.12.

[773] Morse, op. cit., pp.13 et seq. Morse gave as his authority in this instance Robert Goodloe Harper’s “Sketch of the Principal Acts of Congress during the session which closed the 3d. of March”. See Note A, p. 33, of Morse’s Sermon. Reference to Benton’s Abridgement of the Debates of Congress, vol.ii, pp.339, 343, discloses the fact that sentiments embodying this apprehension were expressed in the Third Congress. The struggle which France and England waged for the control of the island of St. Domingo, a struggle that had as its principal development the insurrection of the blacks of the island under the leadership of Toussaint l’Ouverture, properly enough was full of deep interest for Americans. Cf. Hildreth, The History of the United States of America, vol.v, pp.269 et seq. For a recent discussion of American policy with respect to St. Domingo and the state of affairs within the island, see Treudley, Mary, The United States and Santo Domingo, 1789–1866 (doctoral dissertation, Clark University), pp.125–138.

[774] Cf. Morse’s Sermon, pp.12–14.

[775] Cf. Morse’s Sermon, p.15.

[776] Cf. Morse’s Sermon, pp.15–17. The allusion to a hostile attitude towards the clergy, with which the extract closes, led Morse to dwell at length upon the anticlerical spirit of the whole French system. Cf. ibid., pp. 17 et seq. Wherever that system operates, there, Morse asserts, the clergy are the first to feel its power and to become the victims of its sanguinary revolutionizing spirit. Here in the United States this same malignant spirit is visibly at work. And all that the clergy have done to provoke this deadly hostility may be summed up in the phrase, “they have preached politics.” (Ibid., p.18). They are now “censured and abused, and represented as an expense, useless, nay even, noxious body of men” for doing what “only twenty years ago they were called upon to perform as a duty.” (Ibid., p.19). No clergyman of the Standing Order could possibly have felt keener resentment on account of the growing antagonism to that group of men than Jedediah Morse. His state of mind is a bit more clearly revealed by the contents of the following note by which the printed sermon was accompanied. This note, it should first be explained, was called out by the fact that a bill had been presented in a recent session of the Massachusetts legislature, providing for the suspension of the obligation to support the clergy of the Standing Order in all cases where it was possible for individuals to produce certificates, showing that they were otherwise contributing to the support of public worship. “Had this Bill passed into a law, it is easy to see that it would have justified and protected (as was no doubt the intention of the Bill, though by no means of all who may have voted for it) the disaffected, the irreligious, and the despisers of public worship and of the Christian Sabbath, in every town and parish, in withdrawing that support of the Christian ministry which the laws now oblige them to give.” (Note D, p.49 of the Fast Sermon).

[777] The concluding sections of the sermon were devoted to (a)a depiction of the awful calamities which would come upon America if ever French armies were permitted to work their remorseless ravages here, and (b)an analysis of the duties which arose out of the dangers that had been presented. The duties named required one (1)to stand by one’s post of duty, despite the gloomy but not utterly hopeless aspect of affairs; (2)to avoid all political connections with those nations which seem devoted by Providence to destruction, and to make a zealous effort “to watch their movements, and detect and expose the machinations of their numerous emissaries among us; to reject, as we would the most deadly poison, their atheistical and destructive principles in whatever way or shape they may be insinuated among us;” and, especially, (3)to promote the election to offices of trust of only such men as have “good principles and morals, who respect religion and love their country, who will be a terror to evil doers, and will encourage such as do well.”

[778] Ibid., p. 34. For the benefit of his readers, Morse supplied the following translation:

“At the East of the Lodge of Portsmouth in Virginia, the 17th of the 5th month, in the year of (V? L?) True Light 5798/:

The (R? L? Pte? Fse?) respectable French Provincial Lodge, regularly appointed under the distinctive title of WISDOM, No. 2660 by the GRAND ORIENT OF FRANCE.

To

The (T? R? L?) very respectable French Lodge, The Union, No. 14, constituted by the Grand Orient of New-York.

S? F? V?
TT? CC? and RR? FF?

The plate or opening (la planche) with which you have favoured us in date of the 16th of the 2nd month of the current year (Mque?) Masonic, came to us but a few days since. It was laid before our (R? L?) respectable Lodge, at its extraordinary session on the 14th inst.

We congratulate you TT? CC? FF? upon the new Constitutions or Regulations which you have obtained from the Grand Orient of New York. We will therefore make it our pleasure and duty to maintain the most fraternal or intimate Correspondence with your (R? L?) respectable Lodge; as also with all the regular Lodges who are willing to favour us with theirs.

It is on this ground (a ce titre) that we think it our duty to inform you of the establishment of two new Masonic workshops (attellieres) regularly constituted and installed according to the French ritual, by our Provincial (R? L?) respectable Lodge; one, more than a year since, under the title of Friendship in the East side of Petersburg in Virginia; the other more recent, under the title of PERFECT EQUALITY, in the East of Port de Paix in the Island of St. Domingo.

We herewith transmit to you some copies of our List (Tableau) for this year, which our Lodge prays you to accept in return for those which it hath received from your Lodge with thankfulness.

May the Grand Architect of the Universe bless your labours, and crown them with all manner of success. With these sentiments we have the favour to be,

P? L? N? M? Q? V? S? C?
TT? CC? and TT? RR? FF?
Your very affectionate FF?
By order of the very respectable
Provincial Lodge of Wisdom,

Guieu,

Secretary.”

Morse’s Sermon, p.35.

[779] These documents may be found on pp.36–45 of Morse’s Sermon. For the motto Morse supplied the following translation: “Men believe their eyes farther than their ears. The way by precept is long, but short and efficaceous by example.” (Ibid., pp.46 et seq.)

[780] Ibid., pp.46 et seq.

[781] Ibid., p.46.

[782] Morse’s Sermon, p.46.

[783] Ibid.

[784] Ibid.

[785] Ibid.

[786] Morse’s Sermon, p.46.

[787] Ibid., pp.46 et seq.

[788] Ibid., p.47.

[789] Ibid.

[790] Ibid.

[791] Naturally, Morse had not failed to make use of his European authorities in preparing his sermon for the eyes of the general public. There was, of course, no new evidence to be derived from this source.

[792] Morse’s Sermon, p.48. The immediate source from which Morse obtained the documents of which he made such large and confident use in this sermon, constitutes an interesting subject of inquiry. Happily that source is fully disclosed in the following extract from a letter which Morse addressed to Wolcott, Dec.6, 1799:

The canniness of Oliver Wolcott’s Federalism is quite as much illuminated by this letter as is Jedediah Morse’s caution and generosity in assuming responsibility for the publication of the documents referred to. That Wolcott had been instrumental in furnishing Morse’s quiver with the arrows which Morse discharged from his bow on the occasion of the 1799 fast, was soon suspected in Democratic circles. Cf. Aurora, Feb.14, 1800. (In this connection it may be remarked that Wolcott was not the only New England Federalist who came into possession of portions of the correspondence of Wisdom Lodge. The Pickering MSS., vol.xlii, 37, presents a copy of another letter which in this instance was sent by the Portsmouth lodge to the lodge Verity and Union, in Philadelphia. The letter bears date of April12, 1798. Its value for the purposes of this investigation is nil. How it came to be in Pickering’s possession is not known. The implication is strong that the Federalists were eager to exploit the documents to the utmost.)

[793] As far as the records show, no other minister in New England may be said to have spoken emphatically upon the subject on the occasion of the fast. It was Morse alone who galvanized the issue into new life. The general tenor of the utterances of the clergy on the day of the fast may be judged from the following typical examples. At Concord, the Reverend Hezekiah Packard, who made it known that he had read Dr. Morse’s thanksgiving sermon and its appendix, descanted on the dangers to be apprehended from the existence of foreign intrigue among the citizens of this country. His language was general, though certainly expressive of profound concern. Cf. Federal Republicanism, Displayed in Two Discourses, preached on the day of the State Fast at Chelmsford, and on the day of the National Fast at Concord, in April, 1799. By Hezekiah Packard, pastor of the church in Chelmsford. Boston, 1799. At Franklin, Mass., the Reverend Nathaniel Emmons discoursed in similar vein. The French were pointed out as a nation which had corrupted every people whom they had subjugated. Further, Emmons asserted that things were happening in the United States which made it certain “some men [were] behind the curtain … pushing on the populace to open sedition and rebellion.” No direct reference to the Illuminati was made, however. Cf. A Discourse, delivered on the National Fast, April25, 1799. By Nathaniel Emmons, D. D., pastor of the church in Franklin. Wrentham, Mass., 1799, p.23. The pastor of the church in Braintree had also been reading Morse’s thanksgiving sermon. However, he had no definite word to speak on the subject of the Illuminati. France, he said, had her secret friends here, and the real truth of her designs were hidden from the American people. Cf. A Discourse, delivered April25, 1799; being the day of Fasting and Prayer throughout the United States of America. By Ezra Weld, A. M., pastor of the church in Braintree. Boston, 1799. At Newburyport, the Reverend Daniel Dana saw an exceedingly dark and ominous situation confronting him and his hearers. He spoke of a “deep-laid infernal scheme to hunt Christianity from the globe.” It was his firm belief that all the foundations of religion and morality were frightfully imperiled. But he gave no clear intimation that he was thinking of the Illuminati. Two Sermons, delivered April25, 1799; the day recommended by the President of the United States for National Humiliation, Fasting and Prayer. By Daniel Dana, A. M., pastor of a church in Newburyport. Newburyport, 1799, p.45. In addition to Morse there was at least one other exception to the general reticence. A congregation at Sullivan, N. H.(?), heard a sermon full of wild and hysterical utterances, containing frequent references to the Illuminati, to Robison and Barruel, with much stress laid upon the lugubrious idea that the church in America was about to drink a cup of persecution exceedingly bitter. This sermon, however, was much too irrational to be of special significance. The Present Times Perilous. A Sermon, preached at Sullivan, on the National Fast, April25, 1799. By Abraham Cummings, A. M., (n. d.). It would not be altogether incorrect to observe that the New England clergy, on the occasion of the national fast of 1799, took their cue direct from the President’s proclamation rather than from the literature which had previously been published on the subject of Illuminism.

[794] This is certainly a reasonable inference from the fact that the interest of the public in Morse’s sermon made necessary four different issues of it during the year in which it appeared. One of these was printed at Charlestown, another at Boston, a third at Hartford, and a fourth at New York.

[795] Here it may be noted that when Morse’s sermon appeared in print, it was accompanied by a note setting forth the author’s account of the progress of his thought regarding the Illuminati. In part the note ran as follows: “In my Discourse on the National Fast, May9th., 1798, after giving some account of Robison’s Proofs of a Conspiracy, etc., a work which had just arrived in America, I said, ‘There are too many evidences that this order [the Illuminati] has had its branches established, in some form or other, and its emissaries secretly at work in this country, for several years past.’

“Being often publicly called upon for evidence to support this insinuation, I engaged, when my health and leisure would permit, to lay it before the public. This engagement was in part fulfilled, in the Appendix to my Thanksgiving Sermon of Nov.29, 1798, Note (F), p. 73, to which I refer the reader.

“Since this I have received a letter from President Dwight, confirming the fact which he had asserted in a note to his Discourse of the 4th of July, 1798, viz, that ‘Illuminatism exists in this country; and the impious mockery of the Sacramental Supper described by Mr. Robison has been enacted here.’ …

“But if all this evidence, added to that which arises prima facie from the existing state of things; from the wonderful and alarming change which has been suddenly and imperceptibly produced too generally in the principles and morals of the American people, be insufficient to convince and satisfy candid minds of the actual existence, and secret and extensive operation, of Illuminatism in this country, the following documents which were received through a most respectable channel, and for the authenticity of which I pledge myself, must, I conceive, remove every doubt remaining in the minds of reasonable men. If any branches of this Society are established in this part of the United States, the members no doubt will feel irritated at this disclosure, and will use all their secret arts, and open endeavours, to diminish the importance of these documents and the reputation of him who makes them public.” (Note B, pp.33 et seq.) The note concludes with a solemn statement by its author to the effect that he stands prepared to sacrifice all, even his life if necessary, for the cause of religion and his country. See also the preface of the sermon.

[796] Wolcott Papers, vol.viii, 26.

[797] Wolcott Papers, vol.viii, 26.

[798] On the very day of the national fast the editor of the Chronicle busied himself at his familiar task of rebuking the clergy on account of their practice of indulging in “political preaching”. The latter were again admonished to confine their attention to the divine book of Revelation and to abandon their interest in the reveries of Robison. This, however, was only such a jibe as had intermittently issued from this source.

[799] Independent Chronicle, May9, 1799.

[800] Ibid.

[801] Independent Chronicle, May30, 1799.

[802] Ibid.

[803] Ibid.

[804] Ibid., June10, 1799.

[805] Cf. especially the Independent Chronicle of May9, 13, 16, 20, 27, 30, and June3, 6, 10, 13, 1799.

[806] Ibid., May13, 1799.

[807] Independent Chronicle, May20, 1799.

[808] Cf. supra, pp. 281 et seq.

[809] The ship Ocean was a vessel of the United States concerning which, in the spring of 1799, the statement got into circulation that it had been captured by the French and every soul on board foully murdered. No such massacre actually took place. Morse, however, heard the story, believed it, and made reference to it in his fast sermon of April25, 1799. Later, and not unnaturally, he became disturbed over the part he had played in giving publicity to the story. His integrity, he believed, was involved; likewise the faith of the public in other pronouncements he had made, e. g. with regard to the Illuminati. See Wolcott Papers, vol.viii, 27. And this was the view of the case that his enemies took. Cf. for instance, the Aurora, June6, 1799.

[810] American Mercury, June6, 1799.

[811] Printed at Walpole, N. H.

[812] American Mercury, Aug.29, 1799. Cf. also The Bee (New Haven), Aug.21, 1799.

[813] Cf. issue of May7, 1799.

[814] Cf. issue of May10, 1799.

[815] Connecticut Courant, May27, 1799.

[816] An Oration delivered at Ridgefield on the Fourth of July, 1799, before a large concourse of people, assembled to commemorate their National Independence. By David Edmond. Danbury…MDCCXCIX, p. 10.

[817] An Oration, on the Apparent and the Real Political Situation of the United States, pronounced before the Connecticut Society of the Cincinnati, assembled at New-Haven … July4th, 1799. By Zechariah Lewis, … New-Haven, 1799, p.16.

[818] An Oration spoken at Hartford … on the Anniversary of American Independence, July4th, A. D., 1799. By William Brown. Hartford … 1799, pp.6 et seqq.

[819] An Oration, pronounced July4th, 1799, at the request of the Inhabitants of the Town of Boston, in Commemoration of the Anniversary of American Independence. By John Lowell, Junior. Boston, 1799, p.21.

[820] An Oration, delivered before the citizens of Portland … on the Fourth of July, 1799 … By A. Stoddard. Portland, 1799, pp.10, 11, 13, 29 et seq.

[821] An Oration delivered at Byfield, July4, 1799. By Rev. Elijah Parish, A. M. Newburyport (n. d.).

[822] An Oration, delivered at Roxbury, July4, 1799. In Commemoration of American Independence. By Thomas BeedÉ. Boston, 1799.

[823] The Connecticut Courant of June10, 1799, carried to its readers the announcement that “the IIIrd volume of the History of Jacobinism” had just been received by Messrs. Hudson & Goodwin, the editors, and, along with volumes i and ii, was on sale.

[824] Jedediah Morse was certainly one of those who hoped for much from the appearance of Barruel’s work in America. On October3, 1799, he wrote to the American publishers of the Memoirs of Jacobinism, expressing his gratification over the receipt of six copies of volumes i and ii (bound in one) of the same, and arranging to have the remaining volumes forwarded to him at the earliest possible date. Cf. Morse’s letter to Messrs. Hudson & Goodwin, in the Ford Collection, New York Public Library. Morse’s urgency in the case is partly explained by the fact that at this time he was being drawn deeply into the Ebeling-Huntington-Babcock-Bentley-Morse controversy, to be noticed below.

[825] Wolcott Papers, vol.v, 77. Cf. Salem Gazette, Aug.13, 1799.

[826] Cf. the issues of the Courant for June24, July1, 8, 15, 29, Aug.5, 12, 19, 26, Sept.2, 9, 16, 23, 30, Oct.7, 1799. The partisan object in view in making and publishing this abridgment of Barruel is thinly veiled in the following statement of the editors: “We have not, indeed, much to apprehend from external invasion, but our greatest dangers arise from a disorganizing party among ourselves, who will recognize no government, except in bacchanalian curses, and the sanguinary notions of a blind, seditious, and corrupted crowd—who will be guided by no laws except what are conceived in the womb of crime, the weakness and absurdity of which will be calculated to establish the reign of licentiousness, and consolidate the empire of sedition and conspiracy.” (Connecticut Courant, July8, 1798.)

[827] Cf. the issues of the Mercury for July30, Aug.9, 13, 16, 20, 27, Sept.3, 6, 17, 24, Oct.1, 8, 22, 29, 1799. Other papers, the Columbian Centinel, for example, began the publication of the Abridgement, but discontinued the series before the end was reached.

[828] The entire indifference to the Abridgement which many New England editors manifested was the occasion of no little disappointment and chagrin on the part of those who had hoped for material assistance and comfort from this source. Cf. Connecticut Courant, July22, 1799. With regard to the general impression which the Memoirs of Jacobinism made in this country, the comments of Thomas Jefferson are of interest. Though based upon an imperfect acquaintance with Barruel’s work, considerable sound criticism is expressed. “I have lately by accident got sight of a single volume (the 3d.) of the AbbÉ Barruel’s ‘Antisocial Conspiracy’, which gives me the first idea I have ever had of what is meant by the Illuminatism against which ‘Illuminate Morse’, as he is now called, and his ecclesiastical and monarchical associates have been making such a hue and cry. Barruel’s own parts of the book are perfectly the ravings of a Bedlamite. But he quotes largely from Wishaupt [sic] whom he considers the founder of what he calls the order … Wishaupt seems to be an enthusiastic philanthropist. He is among those (as you know the excellent Price and Priestley also are) who believe in the infinite perfectibility of man. He thinks he may in time be rendered so perfect that he will be able to govern himself in every circumstance, so as to injure none, to do all the good he can, to leave government no occasion to exercise their powers over him, and, of course, to render political government useless. This, you know, is Godwin’s doctrine, and this is what Robison, Barruel, and Morse have called a conspiracy against all government. … The means he proposes to effect this improvement of human nature are ‘to enlighten men, to correct their morals and inspire them with benevolence’. As Wishaupt lived under the tyranny of a despot and priests, he knew that caution was necessary even in spreading information, and the principles of pure morality. He proposed, therefore, to lead the Free Masons to adopt this object. … This has given an air of mystery to his views, was the foundation of his banishment, the subversion of the Masonic Order, and is the color for the ravings against him of Robison, Barruel, and Morse, whose real fears are that the craft would be endangered by the spreading of information, reason, and natural morality among men. … I believe you will think with me that if Wishaupt had written here, where no secrecy is necessary in our endeavours to render men wise and virtuous, he would not have thought of any secret machinery for that purpose … ”. (The Writings of Thomas Jefferson, vol.vii, p.419: Letter to Bishop James Madison.)

[829] Christopher D. Ebeling (1741–1817) was a German geographer and historian who was greatly interested in everything relating to America. In 1794 he was elected a corresponding member of the Massachusetts Historical Society. He was in correspondence with such public characters in America as Morse, Dr. Jeremy Belknap, President Stiles, and Thomas Jefferson. After his death, Ebeling’s large and valuable library became the property of Harvard University.

[830] Cf. op. cit.

[831] Ibid.

[832] American Mercury, Sept.26, 1799. The entire article was well calculated to nettle the feelings of Morse. He was referred to therein as “a celebrated calumniator of Masonry” and “an eagle-eyed detector of Illuminatism.” The concluding statement was peculiarly humiliating and irritating: “Many people wonder why the Rev. Granny, who has officiated at the birth of so many mice (when Mountains have travailed), had not published the letter he has lately received from Professor Ebeling: many others suppose he will publish it as an Appendix to his next Fast-Day Sermon.” In addition to the American Mercury, the Bee and the Aurora both published this account of the Ebeling-Morse letter. Cf. the edition of the former for Oct.9, 1799, and of the latter for Nov.25, Dec.6, 9, 1799. Thus wide publicity was given to the matter, on account of which Morse was justly aroused.

[833] American Mercury, Nov.7, 1799 Cf. Columbian Centinel, Nov.23, 1799.

[834] Morse’s letter to Babcock, editor of the American Mercury, bore date of October4, 1799. It drew no further response from Babcock than a private epistle, calling upon Morse to refute the statements which had appeared in the Mercury, and promising that then the editor’s “man” would be produced. Cf. American Mercury, Nov.7, 1799.

[835] American Mercury, Nov.14, 1799. Cf. Columbian Centinel, Nov.23, 1799.

[836] American Mercury, Nov.14, 1799. The affidavits of Tappan and Pearson were actually offered in evidence later. Cf. Connecticut Courant, May19, 1800; Massachusetts Mercury, May23, 1800.

[837] Cf. the issue of this paper for Sept.30, 1799.

[838] Ibid., Nov.4, 1799.

[839] Cf. article by “Candidus” in the issue of this paper for Nov.23, 1799.

[840] Cf. the issue of this paper for Dec.27, 1799.

[841] Cf. Bee, Nov.20, 1799.

[842] Ibid.

[843] Ibid., Nov.20, 27, 1799.

[844] Ibid., Nov.20, 1799.

[845] Cf. Aurora, Nov.16, 25, Dec.6, 9, 1799.

[846] Ibid., Nov.16, 1799.

[847] Ibid.

[848] Ibid.

[849] This fact was acknowledged by Ebeling. Cf. Ebeling MSS.: Ebeling’s letters to Bentley, July28, 1800; July1, 1801.

[850] From 1798 on, Bentley’s Diary is replete with ill-tempered and abusive references to Morse. Cf. for example, vol.ii, pp.278, 291, 296, 302, 329, 334, 384, 391; vol.iii. pp.9, 32, 141, 149, 217, 218, 342, 357 et seq., 431; vol.iv, pp.209, 241. Bentley’s enthusiastic devotion to Freemasonry and his rancorous republicanism were largely responsible for his personal feeling towards Morse; but there also appears to have been a disagreeable and petty personal element in the situation. Bentley was peevish and spiteful towards Morse because he believed that the latter had stirred up one of the creditors of the elder Bentley to attempt to collect a debt from the son. Cf. Bentley, Diary, vol.iv, pp. 241 et seq. Even before the Illuminati agitation broke out in New England, Bentley found it impossible to repress his low opinion of Morse as a geographer and as a man. Cf. ibid., vol.ii, pp.64, 70.

[851] Cf. Ebeling MSS.: Ebeling’s letter to Bentley, March13, 1799.

[852] Ibid.: Ebeling’s letter to Bentley, March23, 1799.

[853] Ibid.

[854] In view of the fact that Ebeling had instructed Bentley that his letter was not to be given to the public, and that if by any chance it should find its way into print, it was to be expurgated and presented to the public only in part, he felt aggrieved at Bentley for paying attention to none of his instructions. Ebeling’s great fear seems to have been that his mention of living personages in European politics would be likely to create serious embarrassments. Nevertheless, he assured Bentley that he was not disposed to be deeply hurt over the appearance of the letter in the American press. Cf. ibid.: Ebeling’s letters to Bentley, July28, 1800, July1, 1801.

[855] Morse had ample justification for thinking himself thoroughly ill-used in this situation. The embarrassment that he experienced over the appearance of the letter in the Aurora and the Bee was enhanced by the fact that the account of the Ebeling-Morse letter published in the American Mercury, which tallied with the Aurora-Bee letter, was due to a confidence that Morse had given to a man whom he supposed to be friendly to his cause. A certain Samuel Huntington had visited him, to whom Morse read the letter he had received from Ebeling. Trusting to his memory, Huntington afterwards sent a communication to the American Mercury, purporting to contain a true account of the epistle that Morse had read to him. Cf. Bentley Correspondence, vol. i, 40: J. Eliot’s letter to Bentley, July26, 1802. Cf. The Mercury and New-England Palladium [successor to the Massachusetts Mercury], April28, 1801.

[856] The agitation against Morse became highly abusive and threatening. He was made the recipient of scurrilous and intimidating epistles, which did not stop short of promising physical chastisement. Cf. Wolcott Papers, vol.viii, 32, for a specimen of such documents. Cf. ibid., 30: Morse’s letter to Wolcott, Dec.6, 1799.

[857] Wolcott Papers, 31. Cf. National Magazine, or a Political, Historical, Biographical, and Literary Repository, vol.ii, pp.26 et seq.: article by Philalethes. Parker’s observations are fully corroborated by this pseudonymous writer. That Wisdom Lodge was a regular Masonic lodge, organized under the Grand Orient of France, is further testified to by Mackey, The History of Free Masonry, vol, v, p.1420. Treudley, The United States and Santa Domingo, 1789–1866, pp.111–125, adequately presents the essential facts bearing on the presence of the French refugees in the United States.

[858] Wolcott Papers, vol.viii, 31.

[859] Payson (1753–1820) was a Harvard graduate, who located at Rindge in 1782, and continued in the pastorate at that place until death removed him, forty-eight years later.

[860] Proofs of the Real Existence, and Dangerous Tendency, of Illuminism. Containing an abstract of the most interesting parts of what Dr. Robison and the Abbe Barruel have published on this subject; with collateral proofs and general observations. By Seth Payson, A. M., Charlestown, 1802.

[861] Ibid., pp.iii, 217 et seq., 245 et seq.

[862] Mackey, Lexicon and History of Freemasonry, pp.183 et seq. One of the most active and influential New England Masons of the period was the Reverend William Bentley. The following references in his Diary throw light upon this phase of the situation: vol.ii, pp.6–8, 11, 12. Cf. also Myer’s History of Free Masonry and Its Progress in the United States, p.15.

[863] Cf. for example, a small volume entitled, Eulogium and Vindication of Masonry. Selected (and Improved) from Various Writers, Philadelphia, 1792. The following excerpt is fairly typical: “There are brethren who, careless of their own reputation, disregard the instinctive lessons of our noble science, and by yielding to vice and intemperance, not only disgrace themselves, but reflect dishonor upon Masonry in general. It is this unfortunate circumstance which has given rise to those severe and unjust reflections, which the prejudiced part of mankind have so illiberally bestowed upon us.” (Ibid., p.11. Cf. ibid., p.19.) This representation of the case is fully confirmed by The Freemason’s Monitor; or Illustrations of Masonry: in Two Parts. By a Royal Arch Mason … Albany, 1797, pp.18 et seq.. The following sermon, delivered by a non-Mason, is also suggestive in this connection: A Discourse delivered in the New Presbyterian Church, New York: Before the Grand Lodge of the State of New York … June24th, 1795. By Samuel Miller, one of the Ministers of the United Presbyterian Churches in the City of New York, 1795. Miller dwelt at length upon the suspicion and prejudice that existed against the Masons, due, as he argued, to (1)the order’s veil of secrecy, (2)the number of men who have been admitted to membership who were known to be the open enemies of religion and morality and a disgrace to human nature itself, and (3)the “scenes of vanity and folly” and “the froth of nonsense” by which too many Masonic gatherings were characterized. Cf. ibid., pp. 25 et seq. Despite the fact that the sermon was full of frankest criticism, Miller’s composition was ordered printed by the Grand Lodge, doubtless for the principal reason that he had been at pains to distinguish between genuine and spurious Masons. Thaddeus Harris, a prominent Massachusetts Mason, in a sermon preached at the consecration at a lodge at Groton, Mass., Aug.9, 1797, took account of the same criticism of the order. Cf. also, Bentley’s Diary, vol.i, p.379. Reference to such Masonic compilations as The Vocal Companion and Masonic Register, Boston, 1802, and The Maryland Ahiman Rezon of Free and Accepted Masons … Baltimore, 1797, will not leave the reader in doubt that a good deal of the poetry and music employed in the lodges was excessively hilarious and coarse.

[864] In addition to the sermons of Miller and Harris cited in the foregoing note, cf. A Discourse on the Origin, Progress and Design of Free Masonry. Delivered at the Meeting-House in Charlestown, in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, on the Anniversary of St. John the Baptist, June24, A. D. 1793. By Josiah Bartlett, M. B., Boston, 1793. p. 17. The Rev. Ashbel Baldwin, chaplain of the grand lodge of Connecticut, in 1797, came to the defence of Masonry against the same charge. Cf. The Records of Free Masonry in the State of Connecticut, etc. By E. G. Storer, Grand Secretary, New Haven, 1859, vol.i, pp. 97 et seq.

[865] Jedediah Morse’s efforts, in his fast sermon at May9, 1798, to avoid giving mortal offence to the Masons of New England, have already been noted. See supra, pp. 235 et seq. As Robison had sought to exculpate the Masons of England, so Morse sought to exculpate the Masons of “the Eastern States.” We shall see plenty of evidence, however, that New England Masons were not deceived. From the first they recognized with more or less clearness that Masonry itself was involved. The good name and integrity of their entire institution were at stake.

[866] General Joseph Warren, the Revolutionary patriot and hero, who fell at Bunker Hill, one of the most honored leaders of American Freemasonry.

[867] Cf. Columbian Centinel, June30, 1798; also Massachusetts Mercury, Aug.21, 1798, for the address of the Grand Lodge in full, together with the President’s cordial response.

[868] Harris was Past Grand Chaplain of the Grand Lodge and Chaplain of the Grand Royal Arch Chapter of Massachusetts.

[869] A Charge delivered before the Morning Star Lodge, in Worcester, Massachusetts, upon the festival of Saint John the Baptist, June25, A. L. 5798. By the Rev. Brother William Bentley, of Salem, Massachusetts. Worcester, June, A. L. 5798. (The initials A. L. in the foregoing title stand for Anno Lucis, and represent a common Masonic usage). This charge not only found independent publication, but got into the New England newspapers generally, and did much to distinguish its author as a bold defender of the craft.

[870] Ibid., p.9.

[871] Bentley, op. cit., p.16.

[872] Ibid., pp.22 et seq.

[873] Ibid., p.31. Bentley rarely, if ever, made as generous a reference to Morse from this time on. His resentment toward the chief calumniator of Masonry, as Morse came to be regarded, grew apace.

[874] Discourses, delivered on Public Occasions, Illustrating the Principles, Displaying the Tendency, and Vindicating the Design of Freemasonry. By Thaddeus Mason Harris…. Charlestown, Anno Lucis, 1801.

[875] Harris, op. cit., pp.51 et seq.

[876] Ibid., Discourses ii, vii, viii, and x, particularly.

[877] This became one of the terms by which Bentley was alluded to.

[878] A Sermon delivered before the Grand Lodge of Free and Accepted Masons of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, at a Public Installation of Officers of Corinthian Lodge, at Concord, … June25, 1798. By Jedediah Morse, D. D., minister of the congregation in Charlestown (n. d.).

[879] An Oration, delivered before the Right Worshipful Master and Brethren of St. Peter’s Lodge, at the Episcopal Church in Newburyport, Massachusetts, on the festival of St. John the Baptist; celebrated June25, 5798. By Worshipful Brother Charles Jackson, p.M., Newburyport, March, A. L. 5799.

[880] Ibid., p.18.

[881] Ibid., p.17.

[882] Ibid., pp.19 et seq.

[883] Ibid., p.23.

[884] Cf. supra, pp. 254 et seq.

[885] Massachusetts Mercury, Aug.7, 1798. Bartlett was Grand Master of the Grand Lodge of Massachusetts.

[886] Ibid.

[887] In his address before the Worcester Lodge, June25, Bentley had gone so far as to designate Morse “a madman” for accepting Robison’s book at its face value. This led to a retort in kind on the part of Morse. Bentley, according to Morse, was incapable of making himself understood; one must always have a commentator in reading him. Massachusetts Mercury, Aug.3, 1798.

[888] Ibid., Aug.10, 1798.

[889] Ibid., Sept.7, 1798.

[890] Massachusetts Mercury, Sept.18, 1798.

[891] Ibid.

[892] The Masons appear to have paid little if any attention to the thanksgiving sermon of November29, 1798. There was little reason why they should.

[893] See Salem Gazette, Dec.25, 1798.

[894] Salem Gazette, Dec.25, 1798.

[895] Ibid.

[896] Salem Gazette, Dec.25, 1798.

[897] Hayden, Washington and His Masonic Compeers, p.176.

[898] Ibid., pp.176 et seq.

[899] The address of the Maryland Grand Lodge was presented early in June, 1798. The President’s response followed in due course. Both documents were freely copied in the newspapers of the day, the New England papers not excepted. Cf. for example, the Salem Gazette, Aug.10, 1798.

[900] An Address, delivered in Essex Lodge, Massachusetts, Dec.27, 5798 (1798), on the festival of St. John the Evangelist, at the induction of officers. By William Bentley. Essex Lodge was located at Salem, Bentley’s home. The address may be found in the Freemason’s Magazine, February, 1812, pp.333 et seq. Bentley’s further reflections upon President Adams’s unsatisfactory response to the Vermont Grand Lodge led him to make even more pointed observations. Under date of Feb.4, 1799, he wrote in his diary: “My address to Essex Lodge out of press. Pres. A. talks like a boy about the danger of the institution. Men of sense who ridicule or oppose the Institution are surprised at his simplicity. If he affects to be afraid, he loosens by the pretence because indifferent persons consider it as a weakness & his judgment suffers, so that he gets neither aid nor confidence.” (Diary, vol. ii, p.296.)

[901] An Oration, delivered in the Meeting house of the First Parish in Portland, Monday, June24th, 5799 … in celebration of the anniversary festival of St. John the Baptist. By Brother Amos Stoddard … Portland, 1799.

[902] Ibid., p.9.

[903] Ibid., p.10.

[904] Ibid.

[905] Ibid.

[906] A Sermon delivered before Mount Moriah Lodge: at Reading in the County of Middlesex; at the celebration of St. John: June24th, A. D. 1799. By Caleb Prentiss, A. M., pastor of the First Parish in said town … Leominster (Mass.) … Anno Lucis, 5799.

[907] Prentiss, op. cit., pp.12, 13.

[908] A Sermon, at the Consecration of the Social Lodge in Ashby, and the Installation of its Officers, June24, A. D. 1799. By Seth Payson, A. M., pastor of the church in Rindge, Amherst, N. H. 1800.

[909] Cf. supra, p. 321.

[910] Payson’s Sermon, p.8.

[911] Payson’s Sermon, p.9.

[912] Ibid.

[913] Bentley, op. cit., vol.ii, p.316.

[914] Ibid.

[915] The Secrets of Masonry Illustrated and Explained; in a Discourse, preached at South-Kingston, before the Grand Lodge of the State of Rhode-Island, etc., September3d, A. L. 5799. By Abraham L. Clark, A. M., rector of St. John’s Church, Providence. Providence, 1799. p.13.

[916] An Address, delivered December18, 1799. Before the Brethren of Montgomery Lodge; at their Masonic Hall in Franklin…. By Brother James Mann, P. M. Wrentham, 1800, p.16.

[917] Masonry in Its Glory: or Solomon’s Temple Illuminated. By David Austin, Jun.: Citizen of the World. East-Windsor, Connecticut, 1800, p.32. Cf. An Oration, pronounced at Walpole, Newhampshire [sic] before the Jerusalem, Golden Rule and Olive Branch Lodges of Free and Accepted Masons, at their celebration of the festival of St. John the Baptist, June24th, A. L. 5800. By Brother Martin Field, A. B. Putney, October, 1800.

[918] An Oration pronounced before the Right Worshipful Master & Brethren of St. Peter’s Lodge, at the Episcopal Church in Newburyport, on the festival of St. John the Baptist, June24th, 5802. By Brother Michael Hodge, Jun. p.M. Newburyport, … 5802, p.12.

[919] An Address, delivered before the Grand Lodge of Massachusetts, on the festival of St. John the Evangelist, Dec.27th, A. L. 5805…. By Henry Maurice Lisle, P. M. R. A. C. and Master of Union Lodge, Dorchester. Boston, 1805, pp.14 et seq.

[920] Bentley, Diary, vol.iii, p.228.

[921] An Address, delivered at the Grand Convention of the Free Masons of the State of Maryland; held on the 10th May, 1802,—in which the observance of secrecy is vindicated, and the principal objections of Professor Robison against the institution, are candidly considered. By John Crawford, M. D., Grand Master. Baltimore, 1802, pp. 5, 8, 9, 30.—In this connection, the following table showing the numerical increase of certain Massachusetts lodges during the period 1794–1802, compiled from the records of these lodges as contained in their published histories, will be of interest. In three instances, viz., St. John’s, Corinthian and Columbian, both those who received membership and those who took degrees are included.

* Only one new member admitted after May.
† Only one new member admitted after Sept.3.
‡ Incomplete.

[922] A Masonic Oration, pronounced on the festival of St. John the Evangelist, December26, 1799…. In Middletown. By Alexander Collins, Esq. Middletown, 1800.

[923] Ibid., p.5.

[924] Ibid., p.15. An interesting episode in Washington’s Masonic career may here be alluded to. In the summer of 1798, the Reverend G. W. Snyder, a Lutheran clergyman of Frederickstown, Md., wrote Washington, expressing his fear that Illuminism might possibly gain an entrance into the American lodges and appealing to Washington to exert himself to prevent such an unhappy consummation. Snyder accompanied his letter with a copy of Robison’s Proofs of a Conspiracy. Washington replied to Snyder’s letter to the effect that he had heard much about “the nefarious and dangerous plan and doctrines of the Illuminati,” but that he did not believe the lodges of this country had become contaminated thereby. Later Snyder again addressed Washington on the subject, expressing surprise that the latter was doubtful concerning the spread of the doctrines of Illuminism in this country. To this Washington made answer that he had not intended to impart the impression by his former letter “that the doctrines of the Illuminati and the principles of Jacobinism had not spread in the United States.” On the contrary, he professed himself fully satisfied on that point. But what he had meant to say formerly was this: he “did not believe that the lodges of freemasons in this country had, as societies, endeavoured to propagate the diabolical tenets of the former, or pernicious principles of the latter.” (Cf. Sparks, The Writings of Washington, vol.xi, pp.314 et seq., 377. Cf. Hayden, Washington and His Masonic Compeers, pp.177–189.) A recent study of this correspondence has appeared. Cf. Sachse, Washington’s Masonic Correspondence, Philadelphia, 1915, pp.117–139. The author manifests undue eagerness to acquit Washington of serious interest in the controversy over the Illuminati. His unnecessary emphasis upon Snyder’s private character, his remark that “Brother Washington evidently surmised that this letter from Snyder was nothing more or less than a scheme to entrap him” (Ibid., p.124), and his characterization of Washington’s second letter to Snyder as “sharp,” all strongly imply that Sachse failed to view the episode in its true setting. That Washington had a genuine interest in the controversy over the Illuminati the following letter gives added proof:

“Mount Vernon, 28th Feb^y, 1799.

Rev. Sir,

The letter with which you were pleased to favor me, dated the first instant, accompanying your thanksgiving sermon, came duly to hand.

For the latter I pray you to accept my thanks.—I have read it, and the Appendix with pleasure, and wish the latter, at least, could meet a more general circulation than it probably will have, for it contains important information, as little known, out of a small circle as the dissemination of it would be useful, if spread through the community.

With great respect,

I am,—Revd. Sir,

Your most Obdt. Servant,

G^o. Washington.”

The Rev^d. M^r. Morse

Washington Collection, New York Public Library.

Washington’s copy of Morse’s sermon may be found in the Athenaeum, Boston.

[925] The Fraternal Tribute of Respect Paid to the Masonic Character of Washington, in the Union League, in Dorchester, January7th., A. L. 5800. Charlestown, 1800, p.11. (The address appeared anonymously.)

[926] Charlestown Masons went so far as to hold out the olive branch of peace and good-will to Morse, in connection with the Masonic mourning which followed Washington’s death. It is recorded that the lodge in Charlestown presented to Morse the cloth which for a time hung under the portrait of its “beloved Brother, George Washington.” The gift was gratefully accepted by Morse and was made into a coat which he afterwards wore. Cf. By-Laws of King Solomon’s Lodge, Charlestown, etc. Boston, 1885, p.83.

[927] Robison, Jeffersonian Democracy in New England, pp.26 et seq. Cf. Bentley, Diary, vol.ii, pp.289, 346, 421, 429, 458.

[928] The situation is well covered by McMaster, History of the People of the United States, vol.ii, pp.441 et seq.

[929] On account of the supposed place of concealment of the imaginary papers, this was commonly referred to as the “tub plot.”

[930] The public report of this story by Morse has already been noted. Cf. supra, p.306.

[931] Independent Chronicle, April18, 1798. Cf. Constitutional Telegraph (Boston), Oct.2, 1799.

[932] To the Freemen of Rhode-Island, etc., p.4. This pamphlet was issued anonymously and without date. Its author was Jonathan Russell, and the date of its publication fell within the period of the Adams-Jefferson contest for the presidency, i. e., 1800–1801. The passage from which the quotation is taken is marked by not a little dignity and comprehension. “The people have been continually agitated by false alarms, and without even the apparition of a foe. They have been made to believe that their government and their religion were upon the eve of annihilation. The ridiculous fabrications of plots, which have been crushed out of being by the weight of their own absurdity; and the perpetration of massacres which never existed, but in the distempered malevolence which preached them, have been artfully employed to excite an indignation which might be played off for the purposes of party. Tubs have arrived at Charlestown. The crews of the Ocean and Pickering have been murdered…. No falsehood which depravity could invent, has passed unpropagated by credulity; and no innocence which virtue could render respectable and amiable has escaped unassailed by federal malignity. Bigotry has cried down toleration, and royalism everything Republican.” (Ibid.)

[933] Aurora, June5, 1799.

[934] The pamphlet’s full title follows: A View of the New England Illuminati: who are indefatigably engaged in Destroying the Religion and Government of the United States; under a feigned regard for their safety—and under an impious abuse of true religion. The pamphlet passed through at least two editions. The citations of this study are from the second.

[935] Ogden (1740–1800) was rector of St. John’s Church (formerly Queen’s Chapel), Portsmouth, N. H., from 1786 to 1793. He was a well-meaning but an exceedingly erratic man. Perry, The History of the American Episcopal Church, 1587–1883, vol.ii, p.79. He is said to have been the first Episcopal clergyman to be ordained in the city of Boston. Cf. ibid., p.488. His death occurred at Chestertown, Md.

[936] A View of the New England Illuminati, pp.2, 3.

[937] Ibid., p.3.

[938] Ibid.

[939] Ibid., p.5. Ogden’s observations in this connection are caustic enough. “The people generally attended the public exercises in the meeting-houses, but had no share in the deliberations of the ministers. Dinners were prepared, by private donations, of the most delicious food of the season, which could be procured by the parishioners; and a day of conviviality was thus observed once a month by the clergy, to their gratification and the increase of their association.” (Ibid.)

[940] Ibid., pp.4 et seq.

[941] Ogden, op. cit., p.5. Ogden made a delicate thrust at this point. He professed to see an explanation of the prevalence of sceptical and deistical notions in New England in the discussions of the dark and obscure questions that consumed the attention of the clergy in their monthly meetings, before they became interested in the affairs of the French Revolution. Cf. ibid.

[942] Ibid., pp.5 et seq.

[943] Ibid., p.6.

[944] Ibid., p.7.

[945] Ogden, op. cit., p.7.

[946] Ibid., p.8.

[947] Ibid., pp.8, 18.

[948] Ibid., p.18.

[949] Ibid., p.9.

[950] Ibid.

[951] Ogden, op. cit., pp.9 et seq.

[952] Ibid.

[953] Ibid., pp.11, 16.

[954] Ibid., p.11. President Dwight is dubbed by Ogden “the head of the Illuminati.” (Ibid.) “In his sermon preached on the fourth of July, 1798, in New-Haven, he has given us a perfect picture of the Illuminati of Connecticut, under his control, in the representation he has made of the Illuminati of Europe…. Birth, education, elevation, and connections have placed Doctor Dwight at the head of the Edwardean sect and Illuminati…. Science he forsakes, and her institutions he prostrates, to promote party, bigotry, and error.” (Ibid.)

[955] Ibid., pp.11 et seq.

[956] Ibid., p.14.

[957] Ogden, op. cit., p.19.

[958] Ibid., p.12.

[959] Ibid., p.19.

[960] Ibid., p.15.

[961] Ibid., p.20.

[962] Ogden, op. cit., pp.10, 11.

[963] Ogden’s pamphlet was in high favor with the Democrats from the first. The Aurora of Feb.14, 1800, has the following reference to it: “This book, within a few months, has attained a very rapid and extensive circulation, in all parts of the union. It is the ‘clue’ to the tyrannies at the northward, which have assumed the control of our affairs, under the sanction of federalism, or an union of church and state, & which has associated in one focus, federalism, religion, war, aristocracy, monarchy, and prelacy.” Ogden was responsible for two other pamphlets, somewhat similar in tone, but less striking. One of these bore the title: Friendly Remarks to the People of Connecticut, upon their College and Schools. It was published anonymously, and without indication of date or place of publication. The other bore the following title and imprint: A Short History of Late Ecclesiastical Oppressions in New-England and Vermont. By a Citizen. In which is exhibited a Statement of the Violation of Religious Liberties which are ratified by the Constitution of the United States. Richmond, … 1799. Neither of these is worthy of special notice.

[964] In the order of their composition and appearance these were: (1)Connecticut Republicanism. An Oration on the Extent and Power of Political Delusion, delivered in New-Haven, on the evening preceding the public commencement, September, 1800. By Abraham Bishop. Philadelphia, 1800; (2)Oration delivered at Wallingford, on the 11th of March, 1801, before the Republicans of the State of Connecticut, and their general thanksgiving for the election of Thomas Jefferson to the Presidency and of Aaron Burr to the Vice Presidency of the United States of America. By Abraham Bishop. New-Haven, 1801; (3)Proofs of a Conspiracy, against Christianity, and the Government of the United States; exhibited in several views of the union of church and state in New-England. By Abraham Bishop. Hartford, 1802.

[965] Oration delivered at Wallingford, on the 11th of March, 1801, p. 101.

[966] Plenty of bad political blood was back of the whole episode. Bishop’s father, who was charged with holding no less than five political offices simultaneously under Jefferson, had recently had his responsibilities extended by being appointed Collector of Customs for the Port of New Haven. The indignation of the Federalists was unutterable. A wrathy protest was sent to Jefferson, among whose specifications was the claim that on account of Bishop Senior’s advanced age (he was in his seventy-eighth year), the work would fall to his son who was a foe to commerce and an enemy to order. Cf. McMaster, History of the United States, vol.ii, pp.585 et seq. In these circumstances Abraham Bishop seems to have found an adequate casus belli.

[967] Connecticut Courant, Sept.15, 1800.

[968] Connecticut Republicanism. An Oration, etc., p.39.

[969] Ibid., p.43.

[970] The reception of Bishop’s oration by the Federalists gave strong impulse in that direction. The pamphleteers and newspaper scribblers of that political persuasion promptly attacked him. Noah Webster replied to Bishop in A Rod for the Fool’s Back. “Connecticutensis” wrote and published Three Letters to Abraham Bishop. Cf. Oration delivered at Wallingford, on the 11th of March, 1801, pp.103 et seq.

[971] Ibid., passim.

[972] Ibid., p.18.

[973] Ibid., pp.22, 44.

[974] Ibid., pp.26 et seq.

[975] Bishop, op. cit., pp.47 et seq.

[976] Ibid., pp.50, 51.

[977] Ibid., p.68.

[978] Ibid., p.87.

[979] Ibid., p.92.

[980] Proofs of a Conspiracy against Christianity and the Government of the United States, preface.

[981] Ibid., pp.15, 16.

[982] Ibid., p.54.

[983] Ibid., pp.60 et seq.

[984] Ibid., p.64.

[985] Ibid., p.59.

[986] Ibid., p.64.

[987] Bishop, op. cit., preface.

[988] The practice was not confined to New England. In New York, for example, the political enemies of the Clinton family employed the term “Illuminati” to embarrass the adherents of that faction. A Full Exposition of the Clintonian Faction, and the Society of the Columbian Illuminati; with an account of the writer of the narrative, and the characters of his certificate men, as also Remarks on Warren’s Pamphlet. By J[ohn] W[ood]. Newark, 1802.