To give the sense and understanding of it being read by the Scripture itself.
3. To collect a few and profitable points of doctrine out of the naturall sense.
4. To applie (if he have the gift) the doctrines rightly collected to the manners of men in a simple and plain speech.
This form is understood to embody the circumstances, collations, and analogies of faith previously mentioned.15 The format of Text, Doctrine, and Application remained typical of sermons, especially on such formal occasions as the political sermons reproduced here, and in the hands of the most accomplished preachers (such as Jonathan Edwards the Elder) the old form could be effective for “sustaining rigorous analysis and dramatizing the essential relationships among the Word, human intelligence, and conduct.”16 It is no surprise that a mastery of classical rhetoric is displayed in the sermons of the eighteenth century, since this was the “golden age of the classics” in America.17
Of the several vehicles for expounding political theology available to American ministers, the most venerable were the election sermons preached for 256 years in Massachusetts and 156 years in Connecticut. The practice began in Vermont in 1778 and in New Hampshire in 1784 in the sermon by Samuel McClintock (no. 26, herein). These were sermons preached annually to the governor and legislature after the election of officers. To be chosen for the task was an honor, and the sermons were published and distributed to each official with an extra copy or two for the ministers of the official’s home district. It is at least arguable that a published sermon is a mark of its excellence to begin with, whatever the occasion of its utterance. (In the screening of several thousand items, the intention has been that only leading clergymen putting their best foot forward on important political matters are here represented.) One index of quality is suggested by the fact that very few of the sermons preached ever were published; thus Samuel Dunbar, an Old Light minister from Stoughton, Massachusetts, wrote out some eight thousand sermons during his long career but published only nine of them (see no. 7).
Besides the election sermon, the artillery sermon was also an annual affair in Massachusetts and dealt with civic and military matters. The Thursday or Fifth-day Lecture was begun by the Reverend John Cotton in Boston in 1633 and was practiced for 200 years; it was a popular event and was combined with Market Day for gathering and discussing matters of social and political interest. Election sermons were sometimes then repeated for a different audience. The Lecture was no Boston or Congregationalist monopoly, as can be seen from Abraham Keteltas’s sermon preached during the evening Lecture in the First Presbyterian Church at Newburyport in 1777 (no. 19, herein). Convention sermons also were political in nature and grew out of election-day ceremonies.
There were many other opportunities for political discourse, such as the annual observation of January 30 as the execution day of the king-turned-tyrant, Charles I. Century sermons were preached to mark the Glorious Revolution’s centenary, on November 5, 1788, the anniversary of William III’s landing in England to secure it from popery and tyranny and to preserve traditional British liberties. The century sermon of Elhanan Winchester is included here (no. 33). Days of prayer, fasting, and thanksgiving were proclaimed for particular occasions throughout the eighteenth century and even earlier. Such times were nationally proclaimed (“recommended”) at least sixteen times by the Continental Congress during the Revolutionary War; and the entire American community repaired to their various churches on such days of fasting, prayer, and humiliation to repent of sins, seek forgiveness, and implore God to lift the affliction of their suffering from them—the jeremiad form so central to American consciousness.18 Days of thanksgiving were likewise proclaimed when divine favor was experienced. The end of the war brought a great outpouring of praise and gratitude, and four sermons, nos. 24 through 27, reflect these sentiments. Such proclamations became rarer under the Constitution but did not disappear during Washington’s or Adams’s administrations, and their suspension during Jefferson’s administration was followed by a reinstatement under James Madison. The Fourth of July regularly occasioned political sermons as well as orations. The death of Washington evoked a universal grief and countless sermons extolling the character of the American Joseph; an example is that of Henry Holcombe, a Baptist, who preached in Savannah, Georgia (no. 49). The Boston Massacre sermons and orations commemorated the events of March 5, 1770, and the “Patriots’ Day” observances, as they are now called, marked the battles of Lexington and Concord in New England each year on April 19. Not only was such preaching widely attended, repeated, and published as tracts, but it was often reprinted in the newspapers as well.
This rhetorical form expressed the philosophical mean that free government is based on liberty, and liberty is founded in truth and justice as framed by eternal laws. Republicanism and virtue were far from split apart by James Madison and his colleagues at the Federal Convention, as the clergy understood our constitutional system. For these preachers and their flocks, the two remained essentially bound together. The political culture of this country was not only all the things it is most frequently said to be (I think of Bernard Bailyn’s five items), but was deeply rooted in the core religious consciousness articulated above all by the preachers; theirs were the pulpits of a new nation with a privileged, providential role in world history. What America’s religious consciousness consisted of in the tumultuous and triumphant years of founding is what this book will disclose.
| October 1990 | Ellis Sandoz* |
Thanks are due, for permission to reprint materials in their collections, to the Doheny Library of the University of Southern California, Los Angeles, for one item (no. 17); to the Massachusetts Historical Society of Boston for one item (no. 19); to the American Antiquarian Society of Worcester, Massachusetts, for five items (nos. 3, 11, 12, 49, and 55); and to the Henry E. Huntington Library of San Marino, California, for the remaining forty-eight items in the book. Personal thanks go to Marcus A. McCorison, director, to John Hench, and to Keith Arbour at the American Antiquarian Society for their generous assistance. Because of two extended stays and a number of shorter visits at the Huntington Library, I owe many more debts of gratitude than I can repay here. But special thanks go to Robert Middlekauff (then director) and his wife Beverly for good counsel, assistance, and warm hospitality; also my gratitude is extended to Martin Ridge, who is director of research, and to Mary Wright, who supervises the Rare Book Reading Room. Among all the other helpful members of the Huntington staff, I especially thank Alan Jutzi, curator of rare books, and Tom Langen, who saw to the copying of over 4,000 pages of material from the rare book collection and who prepared the title-page photographs reproduced herein, except for those to nos. 3 and 11, which Marcus McCorison at the American Antiquarian Society provided. There can hardly be finer places to work than the Huntington Library and the American Antiquarian Society. Dean Charles R. Ritcheson, director of the Doheny Library, and his staff were helpful on more than one occasion with my work on this book. So also were the staffs of the New York Public Library, the Library of Congress, the Centenary College Library of Shreveport, Louisiana, and the Middleton Library and the Hill Memorial Library of Louisiana State University—and I am grateful.
I wish also to thank several institutions for financial support of my work on this book: Louisiana State University by a sabbatical leave; the Huntington Library by a Visiting Fellow’s appointment; and, by research grants, the Earhart Foundation, the John M. Olin Foundation, the Armstrong Foundation, and the Wilbur Foundation.
Liberty Fund is thanked for having the courage to undertake this large publication project and to see it through to completion. Individuals too numerous to be named here deserve thanks for rendering help great and small, but I must mention Dr. Gregory T. Russell, my graduate assistant during much of the preparation period for the work and later my colleague, who was of great assistance with the details. A similar word of thanks also is due my current graduate assistant, Manuel Brieske. Not least of all I
