There is good reason, however, to suggest that Clark's contrast between two opposing Anglican visions is much too heavily drawn. As much recent scholarship has demonstrated, 18th century Anglicanism was defined much more by 'unity and accord' than by High v. Low conflict. William Gibson, for example, states that, amidst much "fluidity", "ecclesiological labels" became "meaningless" in the 18th century. Likewise, John K. Nelson's study of the Church of England in colonial Virginia presents a quite conventional picture of Anglican piety and practice. Added to this, Clark's insistence of a sharp contrast between the character of Anglicanism in the northern and southern colonies is not seen reflected in the post-1783 Protestant Episcopal Church. To give one particular example, when the 1786 PECUSA General Convention - dominated by delegates from northern states - considered the inclusion of the Athanasian Creed in the proposed American Prayer Book, the overwhelming majority of delegates (17 of 20) voted against.
Prior to 1775, however, Washington and Inglis were on opposing sides on the call for an American episcopate. Inglis was, with Thomas Bradbury Chandler and Samuel Seabury, a leading advocate of a bishop for the colonies. Washington - with the majority - opposed the proposal in the Virginia House of Burgesses in 1772. Rather than viewing this as the low church Washington opposing the high church Inglis, it is more the case that this was a disagreement between two contrasting Anglican experiences in the colonies. Inglis, Chandler, and Seabury represented the Church of England in the northern colonies in which it was not established. Maintaining the Church of England's order and identity in these colonies required a bishop. By contrast, in Virginia (as in other southern colonies) the Church of England was established. Here the Church of England's order and identity was secured by law. As a result, Virginia's clergy did not support the campaign for a colonial bishop. When the Bishop of London's commissary in Virginia called a convention of its clergy in 1771 in order to issue a statement of support for a colonial bishop, only 12 of 100 clergy appeared. As one of the clerical opponents, Thomas Gwatkin, declared, the appointment of a colonial bishop would overturn the constitutional settlement of the Church in Virginia.
This, then, was not a High v. Low controversy: it was a clash between the settled, established, ordered Anglicanism of Virginia and the very different and less settled context experienced by the clergy of the Church of England in the northern colonies. The differences between Washington and Inglis on the matter of a colonial episcopate were less about ideology and more about practicalities and communal norms.
As for the political controversies that were intensifying in the years leading to 1775, here too it is difficult to see ideological differences between Inglis and Washington. For example, in Inglis' famous response to Common Sense, his The True Interest of America Impartially Stated (1776), there is an explicit rejection of a right by Parliament to tax the colonies:
I think America should insist, that the claim of parliamentary taxation be either explicitly relinquished; or else, such security given as the cafe will admit, and maybe equivalent to a formal relinquishment, that this claim shall not be exerted.
Likewise, Inglis is deeply critical of the action by the forces of the Crown which led to the initial confrontation at Lexington and Concord:
That the expedition to Lexington was rash and ill-judged-that it was risking the peace of the continent, and wantonly involving fellow subjects in blood, for a most inconsiderable object - I shall most readily allow.
Limited monarchy is the form of government which is most favourable to liberty - which is best adapted to the genius and temper of Britons; although here and there among us a crack-brained zealot for democracy or absolute monarchy, may be sometimes found ... I plead for that constitution which has been formed by the wisdom of ages - is the admiration of mankind - is best adapted to the genius of Britons, and is most friendly to liberty.
In support of this, he invokes a leading Enlightenment thinker:
the testimony of one of the best judges in subjects of this fort, and the greatest masters of jurisprudence, that any age has produced, in favour of the English constitution, I mean the celebrated MONTESQUIEU.
And it is in the same tone of 'Enlightened liberty' that he celebrates the Glorious Revolution:
The constitution of England, as it now stands, was fixed at the Revolution, in 1688 - an era ever memorable in the fair annals of Liberty. It was then that the limits of royal prerogative on the one hand, and the liberties and privileges of the subject, on the other; were ascertained with precision ... The lamp of science never shone brighter in any country than in Britain, nor did patriots of greater fame ever adorn the cause of freedom, than those who stood forth to assert her liberties, at that distinguished period ... I am none of your passive obedience and non-resistance men. The principles on which the glorious Revolution in 1688 was brought about, constitute the articles of my political creed.
We might, then, point to Inglis as an example of how Enlightened thought had taken root amongst the clergy of the Church of England during the 18th century. To state the glaringly obvious, Inglis was no spokesman for reactionary clerical anti-Enlightenment thought. As Rohrer notes in his study of Inglis' friend and clerical colleague Thomas Bradbury Chandler, the latter had learnt from Samuel Johnson, one of the 'Yale Apostates', to embrace "'New Learning' - Samuel Johnson's term for the Enlightenment". The same Enlightened thought, therefore, which shaped the intellectual world of George Washington also shaped that of Charles Inglis. For Inglis, as for Washington, Enlightened thought and Enlightened liberty were not remotely imagined as being at all incompatible with Anglicanism.
Also related to this is the fact that Inglis, like the Anglican statesman Burke, did not regard monarchy as either a political or theological essential. In the Reflections, Burke would state:
The old prerogative enthusiasts, it is true, did speculate foolishly, and perhaps impiously too, as if monarchy had more of a divine sanction than any other mode of government ...
Inglis gave an earlier expression to this understanding in a 1780 sermon:
It may be proper to observe further, that this Duty [of submission to governing authority] is not confined to those who live under any one particular Form of Government: It extends to the Subjects of all regular States, lawfully established. That some Forms of Government are preferable to others, cannot be doubted; yet neither our Saviour, nor his Apostles have decided where that Preference is due. This was foreign to their Design. They interfered not with the Civil Rights of Individuals, nor with the Political Constitution of States; but laid down the general Duty of Subjects, who are to render to Caesar the Things that are Caesar's, be subject to the higher Powers, and honour those who are vested with supreme Authority; whether that Authority be lodged in One, in a Few, or in Many.
It would not be remotely convincing to attempt to portray the Loyalist Inglis as an advocate of a Throne and Altar ancien regime. This was not how 18th century Anglicanism understood the British constitutional order; rather than invoking Throne and Altar against Enlightened liberty, it regarded the Church of England as allied to such liberty against absolutism in church and state.
In a sermon Inglis preached in 1774 at the funeral of his friend and colleague John Oligvie - who ministered alongside Inglis in Trinity Church, New York - we also see how Inglis and Washington shared the same moral vision, the same account of virtue, characteristic of 18th century Anglicanism:
His Temper was even, unclouded, and such as scarcely any Accident could ruffle. His Heart was humane, tender and benevolent - burning with Zeal for the Good of others. Piety to God is the Source of every other Virtue, and His was lively and active. It was a sacred Flame, kindled from above, which ever glowed with a pure, regular, and unabating Warmth, It was fervent, tho’ not violent - gentle, tho’ not languid.
It is difficult not to think of how Washington could have sat in the pews and approved of this funeral sermon, recognising in it the same understanding of piety and virtue which he knew. As for what mourners should contemplate, here again Washington would have been familiar with the content and language of the exhortation:
To mark the Dispensations of Providence with a careful Eye - to apply and improve them so that we may advance in the Christian Life is our indispensible Duty. Whilst therefore we contemplate this dark Dispensation with reverential Awe and Submission, whilst our Hearts bleed under this affecting Loss - for you have lost in him a faithful Guide and Instructor, I have lost a sincere Friend: Let us endeavour to draw some Thing beneficial from it. We have here an awakening Instance of our Mortality, of the Uncertainty of human Life.
Outside of references to the War, therefore, Inglis' sermons would have been recognised by Washington as 'Church of England preaching', reflecting the same moral vision he heard from Church of England pulpits in Virginia. This was also the case with the conception of the Deity set forth in Inglis' sermons. As he declared in the above-mentioned sermon from 1780:
To fear God, is one of the first and greatest Duties of his rational Creatures. This Fear arises from a just Conception of His Being, Attributes, Perfections and Presence ... It is the Beginning of Wisdom; and when habitually fixed in the Soul, is the Foundation of true Religion, the Parent of every Virtue.
There is, however, one aspect of Enlightened influence on Washington that it might be thought to be alien to Inglis - that is, Washington being a Freemason.
In his study The Religious Beliefs of America's Founders: Reason, Revelation, and Revolution (2012), Frazer provocatively says of Washington's theological beliefs "corresponded closely with the anti-Christian teaching of Freemasonry". Leaving aside the fact that this rather hysterical and conspiratorial view does not seek in anyway to account for those Christians - whether in the 18th or 21st centuries - who regard membership of the Freemasons as compatible with Christianity, it also brings us to consider a sermon preached by Inglis to Freemasons in New York in 1783. (A reminder, by the way, that Loyalists were just as likely to be Freemasons as Patriots.)
The sermon opens with Inglis praising the Freemason ethos of "brotherly love":
At a time when discord has rent asunder the bands of Society, and filled the hearts of fellow subjects, neighbours, and even the nearest relatives, with bitter animosity; it is peculiarly incumbent on the Ministers of Jesus Christ, the Prince of Peace, to inculcate the doctrine of benevolence, which is the chief source of human happiness, and by the practice of which, we most resemble the supreme Being. Nor can any subject be more suitable for discussion before a Society which is cemented by brotherly love, and whose professed object is the discharge of those several duties which flow from benevolence.
This, Inglis declares, coheres with the Christian understanding:
The doctrines of Christianity must ever be cherished, and held in high estimation by such a Society; for those doctrines breathe the tenderest benevolence and love, and direct us to do good unto all men - they are streams that issue from the great fountain of light and love - their aim is to remove from mankind all malevolence and wrath, and unite them to God and to each other in the bonds of affection, peace, purity, and mutual good-will.
It will be noticed that the sermon's opening referred to "the supreme Being". As seen in yesterday's post, Frazer's interpretation of such language as indicating 'theistic rationalism' entirely overlooks how such Enlightened discourse was normative in 18th century Anglicanism. We see this again in Inglis' sermon:
The Supreme Being, considered as self-existing from all eternity, must be possessed of every possible perfection, and in an infinite degree. By creative power, those perfections were displayed; for whilst the deity was retired, as it were, in the awful solitude of his own perfections, and creation existed not; those perfections could be objects of contemplation to himself only. It was love and goodness which moved him to call other beings into existence, that he might communicate happiness to them; that they might share, in some degree, in his perfections; partake of his felicity, and serve and own him as the author of their existence, and of that portion of happiness which they enjoyed.
While Inglis himself was not a Freemason, his esteem for the institution is obvious throughout the sermon, and particularly in the conclusion:
I trust it will be your constant endeavour, as it is my sincere wish - that brotherly love, and every other virtue which adorns or dignifies human life, may distinguish your Society and its several Members - that you may comprise in the circle of your love, all that are objects of love to that God, whose mercies are over all his works - that the law of Christ may be your rule, and your actions squared by the precepts he has delivered - that divine wisdom may be your guide, which was present with the Almighty, when he "prepared the Heavens, and set a compass upon the face of the depth".
Again, if Washington had been sitting amongst his Masonic brethren in the pews, Inglis' sermon would have been well received. Here was a particularly striking expression of the theological and moral vision shared by Washington the Patriot and Inglis the Loyalist, one a gentleman of the Church of England, the other a clergyman of the Church of England, both products of Anglo-American Enlightened thought and liberty, both shaped by the account of virtue and the Deity upheld by 18th century Anglican piety and divinity. For both, the Enlightened sensibility of Freemasonry was a means of giving expression to this.
Comments
Post a Comment