[Our primary focus in the coming months is on the influences and events that led to and shaped the birth of the United States as an independent nation in 1776. In previous blogs we listed some colonial sermons from the 1730s to 1750s that shaped the thinking of the Founders. We continue today with more from that period.]
In the 1730s the colonies continued to develop ways, thinking and policies that are important to know before focusing on the era of the American Revolution. Freedom of speech and the press was solidified with the trial of Peter Zenger in 1735. The first hospital in America was started by the Quakers in Philadelphia around 1740. The number of blacks in the South began to significantly increase. By the start of the Revolution in 1775 they grew 3-fold to almost 410,000 (about 40% of entire population in the South). Conflicts with Britain emerged on matters of self-governance, but we will address them more later.
New Immigrants and Religion
Religious developments is our focus in today’s blog. First, a review of previous periods of immigration. The first period was in Massachusetts and New England being mostly shaped by the Exodus of English Puritans between 1629-1641. The second period was in Virginia and to some degree the Carolinas and Georgia begin shaped mostly by the “Distressed” Cavaliers and Indentured Servants between 1642 and 1675. Third was in Eastern Pennsylvania, Delaware and western New Jersey being mostly shaped by the Quaker and German Pietist migration between 1675 and 1725. Lutherans also emerged with Henry Muhlenberg as the founder in 1742.
But the fourth migration period began around 1717 and lasted to the eve of the Revolution and was mostly shaped by immigrants from north Britain (Scotland, northern Ireland, northern counties of England). These settled mostly in the backcountry of Pennsylvania, Maryland, Virginia and North Carolina and eventually had a significant religious impact. They tended to be Presbyterians and Anglicans but what was unique from previous settlers is that both were inclined toward “new light” Christianity.
These new settlers were accustomed back in Britain to gather at times in field meetings and prayer societies, and they shared a hostility toward the established church and a belief in “free grace.” In America this led to interdenominational tendencies, open-air camp meetings and more emotional displays. It was the main characteristic of what became known as the Great Awakening.
The First Great Awakening in America
The Great Awakening began in early 1730s. It found expression among every major religious group: Congregationalists, Baptists, Presbyterians and Anglicans/Methodists. We listed some of the sermons of this period that shaped America in a previous post and noted the famous Congregationalist pastor Jonathan Edwards.
Harry Stout in his book The New England Soul describes how awakening began in New England: “Increasingly ministers called upon each other to concentrate on laying a foundation of personal faith and spirituality through a return to the simple gospel message of the ‘New Birth.’” Where previously their sermons were more focused on the head than the heart, it was apparent that now polished, literary discourses were less desired than more emotional styles found in the spreading frontier congregations.
1734 brought the first rumblings of revival in Northampton, Massachusetts where Jonathan Edwards’ sermons brought in over 300 new converts. In 1738 the visiting itinerant Anglican evangelist George Whitefield impacted the middle and southern colonies, but brought major awakening again to New England in 1740 and 1741 with his constant emphasis on ‘New Birth’. New converts flocked into the churches, especially the youth. The Journal of David Brainard in 1745 expressed the passion of that generation.
Gilbert Tennent continued the itinerant work in Pennsylvania with harvests at least equal to Whitefield’s and many new graduates of Harvard and Yale began itinerating as well. Tennent’s sermon on The Danger of an Unconverted Ministry sparked huge backlash led by Charles Chauncey and faculties of Harvard and Yale (see Harvard pamphlet in 1744) and many traditional clergy who felt threatened. Chauncey emphasized “reason” while Jonathan Edwards defended the revival in his 1746 book: Treatise on the Religious Affections. The major shift in New England was the rise of the common person to take responsibility for their own soul and for the health of their congregations. Stout wrote that the laity “…discovered the power they possessed when united against authority.” In this case it was their pastors, but later it would be focused on the civil government.
Both camps were needed. The two styles of “rational” and “evangelical” ministry grew to respect each other. The Anglican and ‘Arminian’ Congregational clergy such as Chauncey, who emphasized morality and natural theology, employed their pens and Election day and artillery sermons (especially during the war against the French and Indians) most effectively to lay the foundation for later resistance to British tyranny and the cause of civil liberty. A sermon in 1747, Civil Magistrates Must be Just, Ruling in the Fear of God, by Charles Chauncy is a great example. It included other clergy such as Jonathan Mayhew (his sermon on the principle of limited submission to authority is in the section for paid subscribers.)
Continuing Awakening from 1750 to the Revolution
But while the evangelical awakening waned after 1745 among the Congregationalists of New England, it continued among dissenter congregations; Separate Baptists, Presbyterians. And even if perhaps fervor cooled in urban areas, it spread slowly into the frontier communities and in isolated regions. Sometimes historians say the revival was over by about 1750, but in fact the Presbyterians were impacted in rural areas as late as 1760. And the Baptists, Anglicans and Methodists in the south and backcountry regions did not even start being impacted by the Awakening until the 1760s. (Baptists enjoyed it up 1777, Anglicans and Methodists up 1783. And in Virginia there was a culminating multi-denominational phase between 1784 to 1789.)
One of its leaders in Virginia was Presbyterian Samuel Davies whose sermons in the 1750s were featured in a previous blog. Also important was the founding of new universities by the leaders of the Awakening, among them Princeton in 1746 (It’s first president was Presbyterian Rev. Jonathan Dickinson). The Founding Father generation began to attend these new universities and shaped their spiritual life and worldview for the eventual era of independence. Another development was new outlets for spreading news and mass communication. All of this helped build unity among the 13 separate colonies that led to the emergence on one nation.
Sermons Shaping the Colonial Mind
In an earlier post we listed some sermons of the period. Revival brought not just passion and fervor but principles of freedom. One example was a sermon by Rev. Elisha Williams of Boston who previously helped turn Yale College away from Enlightenment to more Biblical foundations. But his 1744 sermon called The Essential Rights and Liberties of Protestants was a great expression of the colonial mind. We give some excerpts below.
1744, The Essential Rights and Liberties of Protestants
1. Scripture as the Sole Rule of Faith
Williams emphasizes that every Protestant must recognize the Bible alone as the guide for belief and practice. He argues that civil authorities should never legislate religious doctrine:
“That the sacred scriptures are the alone rule of faith and practice to a Christian … and must therefore inviolably maintain, that every Christian has a right of judging for himself what he is to believe and practice in religion according to that rule.”
He warns that civil interference in spiritual matters undermines true Christian liberty and charity:
“If our Purses be Caesar's, our Consciences are GOD’S:—and if Caesar's Commands interfere with GOD'S, we must obey GOD rather than Men.”
2. Right of Private Judgment and Liberty of Conscience
He asserts that individuals inherently own the right to interpret Scripture and follow their conscience:
“Every man has an equal right to follow the dictates of his own conscience in the affairs of religion … he has an unalienable right to judge of the sense and meaning [of scripture], and to follow his judgment wherever it leads him; even an equal right with any rulers be they civil or ecclesiastical.”
Williams upholds this freedom even if it conflicts with popular or legal expectation:
“Should a government … make it penal to examine and search [the scriptures]; it would be a manifest usurpation upon the common rights of mankind … men would be bound by a higher authority to read them, notwithstanding any humane prohibition.”
3. Limits of Civil Authority in Religion
Drawing on Lockean principles, Williams draws a clear boundary:
“The civil authority hath no power to make or ordain articles of faith, creeds, forms of worship or church government.”
He strongly rejects any government enforcement of religious uniformity:
“The civil authority have no power to establish any religion … much less … with penalties whatsoever.”
He insists government’s rightful role is to uphold religious freedom:
“Civil authority should protect all their subjects in the enjoyment of this right of private judgment … and the liberty of worshipping GOD according to their consciences.”
4. Natural Rights & the Right to Property
Williams connects the right to religious liberty with basic human rights rooted in nature and labor:
“Reason teaches us that all Men are naturally equal … every man having a property in his own person, the labor of his body and the work of his hands are properly his own … And if every man has the right to his Person and Property; he has also a Right to defend them … and so has a Right of punishing all Insults upon his Person and Property.”
He draws analogies between defending property and defending conscience:
“A man can no more part with [private judgment] than he can his power of thinking … to attempt to strip himself of the power of reasoning … is equally reasonable as to vest another with this right.”
5. Vigilance, Charity, and the Preciousness of Religious Liberty
Williams reminds Protestants that safeguarding freedom of conscience is an ongoing duty:
“Religious liberty was so precious a jewel that it is always to be watched with a careful eye: for no people are likely to enjoy liberty long, that are not zealous to preserve it.”
He emphasizes that recognizing one’s own rights fosters compassion toward others of different beliefs:
“The more firmly this is established in our minds; the more firm shall we be against all attempts upon our Christian liberty, and better practice that Christian charity towards such as are of different sentiments from us.”
The Great Awakening shaped a generation of leaders throughout the American colonies that shared an evangelical fervor, sincere godly character and involvement in their church communities, and a common worldview about liberty, law and governance. Williams’ sermon is an exhibit of a synthesis of evangelical theology and Locke’s worldview. And another New England minister, Jonathan Mayhew, six years later articulated the principles of resistance to tyranny. It was not focused on resisting Britain but provided the theological basis for the Revolution about fifteen years later. [Rev. Jonathan Mayhew’s sermon excerpts are below in the paid subscriber section.]
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