NOTE 28, page 72.

MR. SYMMES.

FROM the "Gleanings" by Mr. Savage, in his late visit to England, we derive the following record of the baptism of children born to Mr. Symmes, while he was rector of Dunstable, which was from September, 1625 to 1633.

The following baptisms are recorded upon our church books:

This is exactly the number of the children of Mr. Symmes, when Johnson wrote the following eulogy on his wife.

66

Among all the godly women that came through the perilous seas to war their warfare, the wife of this zealous teacher, Mrs. Sarah Symmes, shall not be omitted, nor any other, but to avoid tediousness; the virtuous woman, endued by Christ, with graces fit for a wilderness condition-her courage exceeding her stature-with much cheerfulness did undergo all the difficulties of these times of straits, her God through faith in Christ, supplying all wants with great industry, nurturing up her young children in the fear of the Lord-their number being ten, both sons and daughters, a certain sign of the Lord's intent to people this vast wilderness. God grant that they may be valiant in faith against sin, Satan, and all the enemies of Christ's kingdom, following the example of their father and grandfather, who have both suffered for the same, in remembrance of whom these following lines are placed :

"Come, Zachary, thou must re-edify

Christ's churches in this desert land of his,
With Moses' zeal, stamp'd unto dust, defy

All crooked ways that Christ's true worship miss.

With Spirit's sword, and armor girt about,

Thou layest on load proud Prelate's crown to crack,
And wilt not suffer wolves thy flock to rout,

Tho' close they creep, with sheep skins on their back.

Thy father's spirit doubled is upon

Thee, Symmes-then war, thy father fighting died;
In prayer, then, prove thou like champion,

Hold out till death, and Christ will crown provide."

Mather says that his epitaph "mentions his having lived forty-nine years seven months with his virtuous consort, by whom he had thirteen children, five sons and eight daughters."

He also preserves the following "passage, written by Mr. William Symmes, the father of our Zechariah, in a book which was made by a

godly preacher, that was hid in the house of Mr. William Symmes, the father of William, from the rage of the Marian persecution."

666

6

"I note it as a special mercy of God,' (he writes in a leaf of that book,) that both my father and mother were favorers of the gospel, and hated idolatry under Queen Mary's persecution. I came to this book by this means: going to Sandwich in Kent, to preach, the first or second year after I was ordained a minister, Anno 1587 or 88, and preaching in St. Mary's, where Mr. Pawson, an ancient godly preacher, was minister, who knew my parents well, and me too, at school; he, after I had finished my sermons, came and brought me this book for a present, acquainting me with the above-mentioned circumstances;' and then he adds, I charge my sons Zechariah and William, before Him that shall judge the quick and the dead, that you never defile yourselves with any idolatry or superstition whatsoever, but learn your religion out of God's holy word, and worship God, as he himself hath prescribed, and not after the devices and traditions of men. Scripsi, December 6, 1602.'"

Of the children of Mr. Symmes, Mary was married to Capt. Thomas Savage, 15th 7mo. 1652. Elizabeth married Hezekiah Usher, and another daughter married Samuel Hough.

Zechariah graduated at Harvard College, 1657, and married Susanna Graves, of this town, November 18, 1669, and the birth and baptism of their daughter Katharine, is recorded March 29, and April 2, 1676. He was ordained December 27, 1682, the first minister of Bradford, where he had previously preached fourteen years. He died there 1708, aged seventy-one.

His son, Rev. Thomas Symmes, was born February 1, 1678, graduated at Harvard College, 1698, and was ordained in 1702, the first minister of Boxford. But being dismissed in 1708, he was installed the same year in Bradford, successor to his father, and died October 6, 1725, aged forty-eight. From an interesting and valuable memoir of him, by Rev. John Brown, of Haverhill, published in 1726, we learn that he was distinguished for his eloquence as a preacher, his piety as a Christian, and faithfulness as a pastor. He received his preparatory education in the grammar-school, at Charlestown, under the instruction of the famous master Emerson, who was afterwards school-master at Salem, where he died. He was sustained at college by the help of benefactors, and distinguished himself by his scholarship and real piety. He was married three times. His first wife was Elizabeth Blowers, of Cambridge; his second, Hannah, daughter of Rev. John Pike, of Dover; and his third, Mrs. Eleanor, widow of Eliezer Moody, of Dedham, and daughter of Dr. Benjamin Thompson, of Braintree, who survived him. He left eight children, the eldest of whom, Thomas, resided in Charlestown, and became a deacon in the church. I have been quite desirous to make some extracts from his memoir, especially from the farewell advice he composed and left for his children, and in which he alludes very feelingly to the baptismal covenant, in which he had given them to God. But I must refer to the "plain memorative account" of him, annexed to the sermon preached on occasion of his death.1

1 See also Gage's Hist. of Rowley.

NOTE 29, page 72.

DANIEL RUSSELL.

AN elegy, composed on the death of this gentleman, is now in possession of the Rev. Charles Lowell, D. D., of Boston. Some further notices respecting him, and the distinguished family to which he belonged, will be given in note 57.

NOTE 30, page 72.

SEATING THE MEETING-HOUSE.

"FEBRUARY 1, 1675. Agreed with John Fosdick and Nathaniel Frothingham, to provide all timber, and build three galleries, one in the front, and one on each side in the meeting-house, and to make two seats, one before the other, in the galleries, and to make a pair of stairs to each gallery, and to alter the lower stairs going up to the men's galleries, so as may be most convenient for an outlet; the side galleries to run from the front gallery home to the opposite wall; the town to find boards and nails, and to pay for the said work, when completely finished, £46 in town pay; and if it shall appear a hard bargain, twenty shillings Attest, L. HAMMOND, Recorder.”

more.

The business of assigning seats to the people, belonged formerly to the selectmen of the town. Frequent orders may be met with on the town books for seating individuals. The men and women appear to have sat on different sides of the house. The boys had one of the galleries assigned to them, and constituted a part of the congregation which the fathers of the town found it difficult to manage. The following extract exhibits one of the expedients they devised.

"At a meeting of the selectmen, March 23, 1674. The persons hereinafter mentioned, are appointed to look after the boys, and keep them in order in the meeting-house, upon the Sabbath and lecture days, for the year ensuing, twenty-four persons being ordered to sit two for each month; viz.,

"To the respective persons above written:

“GENTLEMEN—The sense of the necessity of the inspection and government of youth, at times of public worshipping of God in our meeting-house, and finding that the way taken to that end the last year, through the care and diligence of the persons attending that work, did very much reach our end propounded, we are encouraged to proceed the same way this year also, and accordingly request you respectively to take your turns in attending the said work, according to the method hereafter propounded, in which we do desire you to do your utmost, that all children and youth that are under age, may be as much within your inspection as the convenience of seats will admit of; not permitting them to scatter up and down in obscure places, where they may be from under a due observance, wherein, if need be, you shall have the assistance of the constable. Your faithful attendance hereunto will doubtless be a service acceptable to God and your brethren, remembering that to be a door-keeper in the house of God, was of high esteem with holy David. We further desire your care to prevent the disorderly running out of youth in time of public worship. "By order of selectmen,

"LAWR. HAMMOND, Recorder."

This practice was continued until 1682, when Luke Perkins was appointed to attend to this business, for which he was to receive £3 per annum. The experience, however, of both ancient and modern times, has shown that children ought not to be separated from their parents, but that families ought to sit together in the house of God.

NOTE 31, page 73.

TOLERATION.

IT has been very common to reproach our fathers as having exhibited the spirit of intolerance and persecution in the worst forms. They have been represented as narrow-minded bigots in their attachment to their own sentiments, and fierce persecutors in their indiscriminate hatred to all who differed in any measure from them. No candid person, acquainted with the character of the Puritans and with the times in which they lived, will hesitate to pronounce this representation false and slanderous. They were the pioneer reformers of the age in which they lived; and if they failed to carry out their principles consistently, they only fell, in these respects, into the opinions that reigned universally around them. Those who came after them, and took their principles for granted, were able, in the light of their experience, to see clearly the results to which those principles led. The fathers of New England effected a wider separation between the church and the state than had ever existed before-erected a wider platform of religious freedom than the laws of any other people allowed; and if they did not go to the full extent of what we now regard as just and expedient, we convict ourselves of bigotry, if we severely censure them.

When we consider the state of christendom at that time, and reflect at what cost they had planted themselves here to establish their own principles of church order, and how dangerous opposition and dissent were to their institutions in their feeble beginnings, we may well wonder that they practiced as much toleration as they did. The Rev. Mr. Albro, in his eloquent and ingenious "Discourse on the Fathers of New England," delivered December 22d, 1844, maintains that no instance of persecution, properly so called, can be justly imputed to them. Whether we are prepared to admit this or not, we shall be persuaded, upon investigation, that justice has not been done to either the principles or the conduct of our fathers in respect of toleration. We do not believe that they are justly chargeable with a persecuting, intolerant spirit; and we do not claim for them on the other hand, the merit of having discovered and carried out consistently, the principle of religious toleration. No one body of men are entitled to this praise; but we believe that among those who have contributed to this great result, no class of men bore a more honorable and efficient part than our fathers.

The following extracts from several election sermons, will exhibit the light in which this doctrine was held by the fathers. The first is from Mr. Shepard's sermon, from which I have made extracts in the Lecture; the second is from Rev. John Higginson's election sermon of 1663; and the last from Rev. W. Stoughton's, of 1668.

"Let the magistrate's coercive power in matters of religion be still asserted, seeing he is one who is bound to God, more than any other men, to cherish his true religion; and as the good kings of Judah, commended for it in Scripture, Asa, Jehosaphat, Hezekiah, Josiah, &c., therefore are they to be principal instruments in furthering the reformation aforesaid; and I would leave it with any godly, sober Christian to consider and answer, whether the interest of religion hath not as good a title and plea for the magistrate's protection, as [not any irreligion which self-conceit and humor hath wedded any unto, but] any worldly interest whatsoever? and how woful would the state of things soon be among us, if men might have liberty without control, to profess, or preach, or print, or publish what they list, tending to the seduction of others! and though the enemy soweth tares, which cannot be many times plucked up without danger to the wheat, and are therefore let alone, yet would I hope none of the Lord's husbandmen will be so foolish as to sow tares, or plead for the sowing of them; I mean in the way of the toleration aforesaid, when as it may be prevented, the light of nature and right reason would cry out against such a thing.

1

"The cause of God and his people among us is not a toleration of all religions, or of the heresies and idolatries of the age we live in. I say, not a toleration of these so far as we have liberty and power for to help it. How inconsistent would such a toleration be with the love of the one true religion revealed in the word of God? would not such a state be guilty of having other gods, where such a toleration is? is not

1 Shepard's Election Sermon, p. 38.