ADDITIONAL STATEMENTS, &c.

A. Page 19. Of the Question of American Episcopacy, as agitated in the Colonies.

THERE were two periods which were especially productive of pamphlets and newspaper essays on this subject. The first of these periods was about the time of the civil controversy, which arose on the occasion of the stamp act. The question of American Episcopacy was brought forward in a pamphlet by the Rev. East Apthorp, missionary at Cambridge, Massachusetts, a native of that province, but afterward possessed of several considerable preferments in England. His production was answered by Dr. Mayhew, a congregational minister of Boston. Several others engaged in the dispute; among whom was Archbishop Secker, although his name was not prefixed to his pamphlet, which has been since printed in his works.

The other period was a few years before the revolutionary war, when the Rev. Dr. Chandler, of Elizabeth-Town, NewJersey, made an appeal to the public, in favour of the object of obtaining an American Episcopate. There were various answers to the pamphlet and defences of it, in other pamphlets published by the Doctor and others. In addition to these, the newspapers abounded with periodical and other productions. The author of the present performance was at that time a youth; but from what he then heard and observed, he believes it was impossible to have obtained the concurrence of a respectable number of laymen in any measure for the obtaining of an American bishop. What could have been the reason of this, when there was scarcely a member of the Episcopal Church who would not have been ready to avow his preference of Episcopacy to Presbytery; and of a form of prayer, to that which is extem

porary? It is believed to have been owing to an existing jealousy, that American Episcopacy would have been made an instrument of enforcing the new plan of civil government, which had been adopted in Great-Britain; in contrariety to original compact and future security for freedom: a regard to which was as prevalent among Episcopalians, as among any description of their fellow-citizens.

Perhaps these sentiments may be supposed to be contradicted by the circumstance, that during the revolutionary war, a considerable number of the American people became inclined to the British cause; and, that of them, a great proportion were Episcopalians. But this is not inconsistent with the sentiments expressed. On the subject of parliamentary taxation, it would probably have been impossible to have found in any city, town, or vicinity of the colonies, such a number of persons not vehemently opposed to it, as would have been sufficient to form a congregation. Out of the sphere of governmental influence, there was scarcely a man of that description. When the controversy became ripened into war, some fell off from the cause, from danger to their persons and their properties; others, from the sentiment that the public evil hazarded might prove worse than that intended to be avoided; and others perhaps, although very few, from scruples of conscience. They who were influenced by these, had stopped short at the taking of arms; for which, the passion was general. To find freedom in this step, and yet to withdraw while the cause of so important a measure existed, may have been the dictate of prudence, but could not have been that of conscience. All the aforesaid circumstances operated with increased vigour, when the question of independence was forced on the reluctant public. Had the British arms succecded, and thus the right of parliamentary taxation been established-for there was no offer of relinquishment of it, until after the alliance with France-a membership of the Episcopal Church would have been little more than a political mark, to distinguish those who should advocate claims hostile to American interests.

To persons who may give their attention to the colonial history, the question may occur-Why did not the British government so far consult its own interests, as to authorize the consecrating of bishops for America? This question shall be considered, on the ground of views taken of past incidents. Any ministry, who should have ventured en the measure, would have raised up against themselves

the whole of the dissenting interest in England, and the weight of that interest was more important to them in their estimation than the making of a party for the mother country in the colonies The matter is resolvable into the ignorance of government of the real state of the people, whom they expected to govern so easily, at so great a distance. Again, this ignorance is resolvable into their depending on information received from persons whose judg ments, or whose honesty, they ought, the most of all, to have distrusted: an error, which hung heavily on all their proceedings, until the period when it ceased to be of consequence.

Lest it should be thought, that the dissenting interest in England has been magnified, it ought to be known, that the forces of the different denominations of dissenters-with the exception of the people called Quakers-was concentrated in a committee in London. The author was acquainted with a member of that committee in England, in 1771 and 1772, and knew that he had free access to the ministry. The impression then received, was its being an object of government to avoid any thing of a religious nature, which might set the dissenters in a political opposition. They had great influence in elections to parliament.

As to the laity's uniting in an application for the Episcopacy, it is natural to suppose that this, if to be found any where, would have been found in Virginia, a province settled by members of the Church of England, who were still the great mass of its inhabitants. How far they were from favouring the endeavour, may be learned from the following

statement.

In the year 1771, a convention of twelve clergymen, there being about a hundred in the province, and, after a larger convention had rejected the measure now adopted, drew up a petition to the crown for the appointment of an American bishop. Four of the clergy protested, and, because of their protest, received the thanks of the House of Burgesses. When it is considered, that a great majority of that house must have been of the establishment; that there never had been any attempt among them to throw off any property of its distinctive character; that they must have felt the want of ecclesiastical discipline over immoral clergymen, and the burden of sending to England for ordination; there seems no way of accounting for their conduct, but the danger resulting from the newly introduced system of colonial government. This is warranted by the absurdity of the reasons

on which the protest of the four clergymen was bottomed among which, perhaps the most absurd, was professed respect for the diocesan authority of the bishops of London; it being notorious, that the then bishop and his immediate predecessors had manifested zeal for the appointment now opposed. In consequence of the proceeding of the House of Burgesses, a convention of the clergy of New-York and New-Jersey published an address to the Episcopalians in Virginia, drawn up by Dr. Chandler. It must be evident on reading the address, that the reasoning of it was unanswerable; and that, as the address expresses, there were, on the other side "only unreasonable jealousies and groundless suspicions:" unreasonable and groundless, so far as they were declared, and referring to titles to civil offices, and the like; while there was a sentiment silently operating, to the effect above stated. Whether the address of the twelve clergy crossed the Atlantic is not here known. This was to depend on its being signed by a majority of the clergy of the province; which was probably prevented by the public sentiment. It is remarkable, that of the two gentlemen appointed by the House of Burgesses to deliver their thanks to the four protesters, the first named of them -Richard Henry Lee, fifteen years after, and then president of Congress, did not hesitate to furnish to the two bishops who went for consecration, a certificate, that the business on which they went was consistent with the civil institutions of the American republic.*

Certain it is, that no endeavours for a lay petition for Episcopacy were made. Some accounted for this, on the principle, that as the wished for bishop would have a relation to the clergy only, the matter concerned them and none others. But what sort of a bishop would he have been, who should have had no relation to the laity, except through the medium of the clergy? The well informed advocates for Episcopacy must doubtless have known the imperfection of such a scheme: but they who suggested the proviso must have considered it as a prudential expedient.

For the correctness of the opinion expressed of the utter inability of the British administrations for the government of the colonies, there may be here a reference to Bissett's History of the Reign of George III. This author wrote in opposition to Belsham, and may, therefore, be supposed, on the whole, favourable to government. But he points out, with candour, the contrariety between the views of ministers and the consequences of their acts-evidently bottomed on false information, and their relying on the persons whom they ought the most to have distrusted.

Had bishops been consecrated for America on the plan proposed by Archbishop Secker; the civil government no further interfering than in the grant of the royal permission; it is difficult to perceive, how hinderance could have been attempted by any description of persons, without an avowal of intolerance; and without a disposition to unprovoked insurrection, beyond what can be supposed from any thing that passed of a political description. That good prelate's scheme is unfolded in his letter to Mr. Walpole, printed among the prelate's works. From the circumstance, that, since the revolution, an act of Parliament was held necessary to permit the giving of a beginning to the American succession, it may be thought, that the archbishop was mistaken in his opinion of the sufficiency of the license of the king. But this would not be a correct inference. The case became altered by the event of American independence and although there was legislative interference in regard to the Church in the United States, there have been bishops consecrated for Nova-Scotia and Canada, on royal authority only; agreeably to the opinion which had been expressed by Archbishop Secker. On the ground of the practicability of giving bishops to America, without invoking the aid of Parliament; it was the opinion of the author, at the time of the controversy here noticed, that no disturbance would have happened, however threatened by some who were indeed very violent on the subject.

But he is not backward to acknowledge, that he thought he foresaw difficulties to the Episcopal Church, from the other source here hinted. It was not unlikely, that the British government, had they sanctioned an Episcopacy in the colonies, would have endeavoured to render it subservient to the support of a party, on the plan of the newly projected domination. In this case, the effects would have been hostile to the estimation of Episcopacy in the minds of the people; the great mass of whom, including the best informed, and those who had the property of the country in their hands, had set themselves in a determined, and, as the author thinks, a justifiable opposition to the new system. It is well known, that religious opinion has been often made, by circumstances, the test and the instrument of a political party; when the views of the party had not any more natural connexion with the opinion, than with its opposite. Thus, in England, Arminianism was conceived of as allied to absolute monarchy, and Calvinism to popular privilege; at the same time that, in the United Netherlands,