The life of Ashbel Green, V.D.M.

Front matter

Joseph Earl and Genevieve Thornton

Arrington

Collection of 19th Century Americana

Preface

A BIOGRAPHY of Dr. Green, which would fully exhibit his character and usefulness in the American Presbyterian Church, must comprehend the greater part of her annals. Such a work as this, however important and desirable, the writer has neither the time nor capacity to undertake. The manuscript containing his own account of himself, was committed to us for publication by the author’s written request, found among his papers after his decease. Such a token of affection and confidence, seemed to impose a filial obligation not to decline a service which, we are fully sensible, belongs legitimately to a more competent pen. The plan at first proposed, was to prepare a somewhat extended memoir, using the posthumous papers only as furnishing facts to be written and arranged by ourselves. But the instructions which accompany the manuscript have satisfied the surviving relatives, that they preclude the exercise of much discretionary power in preparing it for the press. To them it appears beyond a doubt, to have been the wish of the writer that his autobiography should be published substantially as it was left, without modification or abridgment. Whether the work thus issued will be more useful, or better fulfil the public expectation, than if contracted in some of its details, and enlarged by materials that are abundant and accessible, is not regarded by them an open question.

As we deemed it to be the dictate of both delicacy and duty, to submit the manuscript for revision to those who are presumed to have been best acquainted with the intention of the author, it is now presented to the public as it was returned to the editor from them. Although the reader v/ill discover that in several parts

PREFACE.

of the narrative the events are not recorded in exact chronological order, yet we have not presumed to displace them, nor make any other arrangement than that adopted by the writer. It is due, however, to those intelligent friends of the deceased, to whose opinions we have deferred, to say, that they are influenced not only by a desire to obey what they deem the injunction of their venerated relative, but by a confident persuasion that the memoir will make a better moral impression by exhibiting his character as it is reflected from the miscellaneous and motley pages of his own diary, than after any omissions which would wholly conceal its imperfections. The sketch of a friend and admirer might present a more attractive picture, but the difference would be like that between the product of a skilful artist and the original.

The trivial things which the fastidious reader would pass over as jejune and tedious, may be very significant as indicative of character; and if a man’s record of his closet exercises exhibits one of its features, his account of a “ lost cow, or the purchase of oysters and cantelopes,” may bring to view another.*

That so large a space should be occupied by reminiscences relating to the absorbing topics of the times, during his youth and early manhood, will surprise no one who has just conceptions of their religious, as well as political importance. For awhile, himself a soldier, participating in the anxieties and perils of the struggle, and then in the joys of its issue : acquainted with many of the leading actors in it, and a personal friend of some of the most illustrious, it was scarcely possible that in writing the memoirs of himself, he could separate his own history from those great national events with which both he and they had been so closely conversant. The times and scenes, moreover, to which they relate, will be reviewed with increasing interest, the farther they recede ; while there is so much of the narrator’s personal character mingled with his subjects, as they are handled in his familiar epistolary manner,

PREFACE.

that they will be found less digressive and episodic than many would anticipate. But in giving this work of Dr. Green to the public so little abridged, it is not presumed that its details of social visits, calls of friends, and occurrences of only personal and ephemeral importance will be read with equal interest by every one, or read at all by some. But in those parts that will least engage the attention of the general reader, there will be found the names of many both living and dead, and the mention of here and there occurrences, which, though of little intrinsic value, will suggest to many readers affecting and useful reminiscences. Even the dry record of a monotonous routine of college labours, uninteresting as it will probably be to most, wdll be read by many an alumnus with delight. He will not be more surprised than gratified to discover some trifling incident in his academical life, so gravely chronicled with his name, and which may cause perhaps a tear of contrition over the follies that gave his venerable teacher so much poignant distress. With respect to the somew^hat prolix and circumstantial account of the scenes of turbulence and disorder in the College, the editor feels it due to himself to state, that they did not appear to him of so much general importance to the public, nor so closely blended with the life of Dr. Green, as to be worthy of occupying the room they take in the journal. But from certain marginal notes indicative of his wdshes on the subject, it was obviously his desire, that if his life were published, it should contain all on this subject which he had transcribed from his private memoranda. He was fully aware of the various reports, misrepresentations, and inferences injurious to himself, to which these riotous proceedings and the consequent action of the faculty, under his administration, had given occasion. With a view then, at once to disabuse the public mind of any remaining error, and vindicate the government of the College, he prepared the somewhat copious narrative, w^hich, in our circumstances, we have not felt at liberty to withhold, or even abridge. Trivial, moreover, as are many of the items of his diur-

PREFACE, nal record, yet none can form an adequate conception of his industry and the amount of his labours, without such a report of them, much less of the trials of his temper, faith and patience.

It is unnecessary to add, that the important work of preparing the following memoir for the press, was not sought, nor was it undertaken without many serious misgivings, and an oppressive sense of responsibility. The circumstances that attended the request of Dr. Green, appeared to give it the imperative force of a claim. We have not indulged so much as the hope that our duty would be discharged to the satisfaction of all. We were so well aw^are of the diversity of sentiment in relation to his character and usefulness, especially in some of the most important doings of his life, that w^e have not presumed upon success in any endeavour to make the many discordant opinions harmonize wuth one another, nor with our own. The issuing of the work without alteration or notes, has somewhat lightened our toil, but the reader can easily imagine that the humble service that remained, has given us not a little solicitude as well as labour. We have been greatly aided by the cheerful and prompt co-operation of those who have sent us valuable papers in relation to their honoured friend, by w^hich our pages will be greatly enriched.

May the grace of which he was so largely a partaker, be imparted to the readers of this memoir, and many be incited to higher attainments in piety by the influence of his Godly example.

Table Of Contents

Apology for writing his own life. Birth and parentage. Account of his father, mother, and grandfather. Piety of his parents ; method of spending the Sabbath. Origin of Bible classes. Follies and immoralities of his youth. Preparation for College. Juvenile poetry. Smattering of medical knowledge. Dr. Rush.

Glad to avail himself of what he had heretofore written. Reminiscences — when written — their general character — to whom addressed — where published. Introduction. Must keep in mind his clerical character ; says no more of himself than is necessary; his son’s descent connected with our free institutions ; who principally concerned in originating the American Revolution ; impatience of the writer at hearing our revolution compared with that of France; difference of the two illustrated in a number of particulars ; his father a decided whig ; argument between his father and an English tory ; the tory makes confession of guilt before his father’s congregation, but never believed that Burgoyne surrendered to the American forces. ........ 25 — 36

Simplicity and plainness of manners and habits of living before our Revolution ; exceedingly different from w'hat w^e now witness ; illustrations ; slavery ; taverns ; conveyances. Before revolution but seven colleges authorized to confer degrees in the arts ; discoveries in science since his memory. The Bank of North America— for some time the only bank. Change for the worse in morality. Dr. Rittenhouse ; Georgium Sidus ; Dr. R.’s funeral; address; member of his congregation. Printing; its use in the Revolution. Holt’s and Rivington’s antagonistic newspapers in New York; devices of Holt’s paper; on the evacuation of New York Rivington remained; spy of Washington; the writer’s dealings with him, Hamilton’s first public display. Paine’s Common Sense ; its popularity ; sickness and death of Paine. ....... 37 — 47

Contents

them to the British; his residence but twelve miles off British lines ; his father member of Provincial congress ; chairman of committee to draft the original constitution of New Jersey; his flight; instructions to writer if British should come. The whole of New Jersey militia called out; old men and boys left at home ; the writer at fifteen stands guard and makes an arrest. . . . 48 — 59

His father’s views in regard to ministers engaging in the active duties of the Revolution. Mr. Caldwell. Dr. Witherspoon. Governor Franklin before the Provincial congress of New Jersey; Witherspoon’s reply to his speech. Witherspoon in continental congress ; his first speech. Comparison of desire for office now and in the time of the Revolution. Speech of Jay. Able men in first congress; their sources of subsistence. Paper currency. Errors of the congress, of the states, and of the people. Issuing of bills of credit by congress; complaints of a man who was ruined ; continuance of war unexpected by the people. His father’s views on the subject of the currency. Essays of “ Eumenes.” Plan of congress. The British assist in depreciating the bills. Devices on the continental bills. ........ 60 — 74

Treatment of American prisoners captured by the British; Captain Huddy; Captain Asgill. Retaliation threatened. Ramsey’s History. British humanity. Release of prisoners by the British ; their wretchedness; twelve of them laid down at his father’s door; account of two who remained. Fever. Search for tory property. The prison ship, “ The Jersey.” Inoculation and vaccination ; smallpox in the army; General Washington determines to inoculate the whole army. His plan. Complaints. Account of those who were inoculated in his father’s family. The officers ; their conduct. Cards. Ramsey’s History. Smallpox among the people. ....... 75 — 94

Appendix

Extract from President Quincy’s History of Cambridge University. Quotation from the Address of Hon. S. L. Southard. Sentiment of Dr. Miller at the Centennial

Celebration of the College of New Jersey. Letter of the Rev. Dr. Magie. 611

Epitaph by Dr. Green on the death of his first wife. . . . 612

Account of Dr. Green’s first sermon. ..... 613

Sketch of Rev. Abram Pierson, his maternal grandfather. . . 613

Address of the Philadelphia Clergy to President Washington, and his reply. 614

A sketch of Dr. Sproat. ....... 615

Response to Dr. Miller by Dr. Green when inaugurated President of the College of New Jersey. ........ 618

Account of the revival in the College in 1815. .... 618

Proclamation of a day of fasting and prayer — prepared for President Adams. 622

Prayer offered at the time of the national grief on account of the death of Washington. ......... 623

Questions and counsels given to the subjects of the revival in the College. 624

List of Publications.

THE LIFE

OF THE

REV. ASHBEL GREEN, D.D. LL.D.

Chapter I

Hackneyed as is the excuse for authorship, that it was undertaken on the advice of friends, it is nevertheless true, that my life would never have been written by myself, if those w^hose opinions I thought I ought to regard, had not urged me to it ; nay, if they had not laid it upon me as a duty which I owed to them and to the Christian community. They remarked, that I had been active in the concerns of the church to which I belong, and had witnessed important occurrences both in the church and in the state, and that if a statement of these were connected, wdth a more particular account of my religious exercises than I had ever given, as far as they knew, they thought that the narration would be interesting, and very useful. The consideration of usefulness, I can truly say, prevailed with me to yield to the representation made; not indeed without considerable reluctance, both because the labour assumed w^ould, at my time of life, be onerous, and because it is difficult for a man to write his own life properly. It ought to avoid extreme minuteness on the one hand, and undiscriminating generality on the other; to be like the features of the face, indicative of a common nature, and yet characteristic of an individual ; containing nothing that is false rather than all that is true : for there are some things that a prudent and conscientious man should not reveal to any mortal ; and there are others, which a regard to the feelings of living individuals forbids to be published.

May a gracious God direct both my thoughts and my pen, that I say all that I ought, and nothing that would be better concealed !

My birth was on the sixth day of July, 1762, at Hanover, in the county of Morris, and state of New Jersey. My father was the Rev. Jacob Green, who was a native of the town of Malden, in the state of Massachusetts. He w^as a graduate of the College or University of Cambridge, near Boston, in New England; and was engaged by the celebrated evangelist, the Rev. George Whitefield, to be a teacher of his Orphan House Academy, in the state of Georgia. He accompanied Mr. Whitefield in his journey to the South as far as Elizabethtown in New Jersey. There Mr. Whitefield heard such discouraging accounts in regard to his Orphan House, that he told my father that he feared he should not be able to fulfil his engagements to him relative to salary ; and he put it at the option of my father, either to take the risk of the success of the Orphan House enterprise, or to receive an indemnity for his expenses and losses till that time.

KjJV. ASHBEL GREEN.

and to stop where he then was. After consulting with Mr. Dickenson and Mr. Burr, (both of whom were afterwards presidents of the College of New Jersey,) who strongly advised him to abandon his Georgia expedition, and to study divinity, and be licensed to preach the gospel, my father chose the latter alternative proposed by Mr. Whitefield; studied divinity under the direction of Mr. Burr; was soon called to settle in the Presbyterian congregation of Hanover; was the pastor of that congregation for forty-five years ; and died and was buried there in the month of May, 1790.

My father was twice married ; by his first wife he had three children, by his second six. My mother, my father’s second wife, whose Christian name was Elizabeth, was the daughter of the Rev. John Pierson, for a long time the pastor of the congregation of Woodbridge in New Jersey, where, I believe, my mother was born. Mr. Pierson, my maternal grandfather, and whom I well remember, died at my father’s house, in the eighty-first year of his age, in the month of August or September, in the year 1770. It is stated on his tombstone that he was a minister of the gospel fiftyseven years.

Both my parents were eminently pious ; my mother always praying with the family, when my father was from home. In no other family have I ever known the Lord’s day to be observed with equal strictness and solemnity, as in that, in which, under the paternal roof, it was my happy lot to pass a number of my juvenile years. My father, after preaching to the people of his pastoral charge twice on each Sabbath in the summer and once in winter, and after resting for a short time, had his whole family collected together for instruction and devotion. It is at least seventy years ago, and yet in my mind’s eye, I see him sitting in his arm chair, and without book, and commonly with his eyes shut, asking in regular order every question in the Westminster Shorter Catechism, helping or correcting those who could not repeat it perfectly ; and sometimes making remarks on particular answers, or on the whole catechism after it had been repeated. When this part of the exercise was finished, the children of the family, of whom there were five or six, were questioned on five chapters previously prescribed, the questioner still neither using nor needing a book. To this succeeded an inquiry in regard to the text or texts he had preached on ; and what we could recollect of the sermons we had heard. This was followed by asking the elder children what other books they had read besides the Bible, and by the repetition of short sentences of devotional poetry which any of us could remember. The whole was concluded sometimes with a short address from my father, and always by an impressive prayer. No secular business, nor conversation on secular subjects, was allowed in the family, except that which related to milking the cows, and relieving the necessities of the other brute animals, of which my father had a considerable number.

When I was tutor in college, at the time when Dr. Witherspoon was on his mission to Britain, to solicit benefactions for the College of which he was the president, the whole instruction of the college devolved upon Dr. Smith and myself. The doctor took the two higher classes of the college for private instruction in

REV. ASHBEL GREEN.

religion on the Lord’s day; and he requested me to take charge of the Sophomore and Freshman classes, and to give them such religious instruction as I should think most suitable; and I thought I could not do better than adopt that part of my father’s plan, which consisted of prescribing five chapters in the Bible, to be examined on as a Sabbath day’s exercise. The Rev. Robert Finley, who was afterwards settled at Baskenridge, was then a member of the Freshman class; and he was the first clergyman, except myself, that I ever heard of, as instituting a Bible class in his congregation. When I became the president of the College in 1812, all the students were formed into a Bible class, and I not long after heard of what I have stated in regard to Doctor Finley. Perhaps this valuable instruction of Bible classes may be traced into my father’s family. Great good is often done beyond the views of those w^ho give it origin.*

My early religious education preserved me, during the time I lived with my pious parents, from open and profligate vice, or, at least, from that which the world would so denominate. And yet I have to lament that I grieved them by some acts of disobedience, and by the youthful follies and irregularities in which I indulged. My native corruptions, I think, were peculiarly strong; and but for providential restraints, and a kind of constitutional timidity, might have carried me to any excess. I was not habitually profane in my conversation;- and yet, among my companions, I did not always scruple an oath. But secret sins, known only to God and myself, are those which, on a review

* Appendix, A.

of my youthful days, I have cause chiefly to mourn, and most deeply to deplore.

The instruction which I received in preparing for the standing which I took at entering college, was chiefly derived from my father. It was not, however, his original intention to give me a liberal education. He had four sons; of vrhom the eldest and the youngest he intended for scholars ; but the intermediate two, of whom I was one, were to be farmers or mechanics. Indeed, he had such an opinion of the importance of knowing how to manage a farm, that he engaged a pious and distinguished farmer of his congregation, to take charge of my elder brother and myself, and instruct us, by putting us to labour with the other individuals he employed, in all kinds of agricultural work In consequence of this, I became acquainted wdth every species of farming business; from which, as it has turned out, I have derived very little other advantage, than being able, during the ten years I presided over the college at Princeton, to cultivate a large garden with skill and success. My father taught a number of pupils, of age sufficient to understand their own interest; for whose accommodation he erected a school house on the opposite side of the street to that on which his own dwelling stood. He took these pupils on the condition, that he should direct their studies, and in ordinary circumstances hear them recite once every day ; but that he would have no inspection of them but at the times of recitation ; and that he would discharge them, if they were idle, or failed to make progress, according to their capacities. As for myself, though not intending me for a professed scholar, he wished me to be acquainted with

REV. ASHBEL GREEN.

the rules of grammar, and at a very early age — I think in my seventh year — made me learn a part of “Cheever’s Accidence,” and afterward, the Latin grammar of a Mr. Ross, a clergyman of New England. But from the time I was able to read, I showed a fondness for books, and as I grew older, determined, if possible, to obtain a college education. My father saw my inclination, and my mother favoured it. The result was, that though my father made no hesitation to take me off from my studies, whenever he needed my assistance, I still kept in the first class of his pupils; and afterwards, when in accordance with his advice, I taught first an English, and at length a grammar school, my leisure hours were devoted to my own improvement.

Among other vanities, I thirsted for the fame of a poet, and wasted a good deal of time in writing verses. My mother was a little proud of one of these compositions; but my father gave me the wise counsel to aim at a good prose style, and to let poetry alone. Yet on a certain occasion, when he was solicited to furnish an epitaph for a man of note, who died in his congregation, he gave me the thoughts he wished to be expressed, and told me to try my hand at putting them into verse. I did so; and he thought so well of my production, as to cause it to be engraved on the tomb-stone of the defunct, where I have recently seen it, when on a visit to the place of my nativity. In a few months after I had entered college, the rival societies commenced a paper war, and I wrote a song in ridicule of an individual, which I afterwards had great cause to regret; for a copy had been preserved among the students, and when the subject of ridicule became a tutor, he was annoyed by hearing this song sung by the rogues of the college, whom he had offended ; I was at the time a professor in the institution. I certainly have no just claim, and never had, to poetic talent; and though some of my doggerel verses have appeared in print, I sincerely hope, that not a line of them will ever be republished. My epitaph on the tomb-stone of my first wife, is amonor the best things in verse that I have ever written.^

I have mentioned above that my father took me off from my studies whenever he needed my assistance. He was a physician, as well as a clergyman ; and besides -going on his errands, he called on me to prepare medicines, sent me to let blood, to innoculate for the small-pox, and to extract teeth, so that I obtained the common appellation of doctor before 1 had ever seen a college. My smattering of medical knowledge has been useful to myself and to my family, and occasionally in my pastoral visitation. The late Dr. Rush sometimes sent a melancholic patient to me for advice, and he once became my patient himself, as I had before been one of his.

* Appendix, B.

REV. ASHBEL GREEN.

Chapter II

My narrative of the early part of my life, and of the family of which I was a member, has now reached a point, at which I may avail myself of what I have heretofore written ; a circumstance which affords me a seasonable help. In the summer of 1840, while residing with my nephew, the Rev. Jacob Green, at Bedford, in the state of New York, I began to write my reminiscences in letters addressed to my youngest son. They were continued at intervals, till the autumn of 1842; and they mingle my biography from my seventeenth to my twenty-fifth year, with an account of the condition of our country previously to our revolutionary war, and a statement of public affairs, both political and religious, till the happy termination of that war, and for a considerable period afterwards. The letters to my son were published without my name; but they were of such a character as, in a short time, to reveal the author ; nor was I solicitous for concealment. The publication of these reminiscences was made in a daily newspaper in Philadelphia. I now introduce them, with some additional information, in notes, and with a few curtailments.

My dear a. — As the garrulity of age is proverbial, and you have often importuned me to write my reminiscences, perhaps it is more surprising that I have forborne to do it hitherto, than that, in the closing month of my seventy-eighth year, I have determined to comply with your request.

Old men, you are aware, remember the occurrences of their early years, with greater accuracy than those which happen when they have reached a more advanced age. But as I have kept a diary for the last half century, I think I am pretty well furnished with materials for my undertaking, in which I mean to take notice of the state of society at the commencement and during the progress of the American Revolution, as w'ell as of many events that have since transpired. As I had, moreover, the privilege of knowing personally some fifteen or sixteen of the signers of the declaration of our national independence, and can boast of having had a degree of intimacy with some of them, I shall have it in my power to bring into view a number of things, which do not find a place in a formal or professed history of our country.

It is my wish, in every thing I write, to keep in mind my clerical character. I shall, therefore, not overlook the state of religion, during the period to which my memory extends. In doing this, however, you need not fear that I shall write either homilies or polemical discussions; but I shall not withhold the statement of facts, and some brief and cursory remarks of a religious character.

It is not my intention to say more of myself than shall seem necessary to the accomplishment of my general purpose; but all that may, in my judgment, contribute to that end, I shall speak of as freely as on

REV. ASHBEL GREEN.

any other topic. You perceive that I have already begun to egotize; nor do I see how this could be avoided, without the use of a clumsy periphrasis, more objectionable, in epistolary writing, than egotism in extreme.

Your descent, my son, is, on my side of the house, from the Puritans of Old and New England ; and on your mother’s side, it is from the Scotch Covenanters, and their descendants in Ireland, and in the United States. The infidel and tory historian Plume, admits that English liberty is indebted for its preservation chiefly to the Puritans; and notwithstanding the ludicrous attitude in which Sir Walter Scott has seen meet to portray some of the Covenanters, their unyielding attachment both to civil and religious liberty, was undeniably of the most noble and heroic kind. You have, therefore, as I think, no cause to be ashamed of your ancestry ; but I should not have mentioned this, if our whole country were not, in my apprehension, indebted to the two races of men I have named for the free institutions which we now so richly enjoy. Whence originated the spirit w’hich begun our conflict with the mother country, produced the declaration of our national independence, and bore us triumphantly through the war of the Revolution ? I well remember that the tories of that day, both in Britain and in our own country, attributed it — and they justly attributed it — to the leaders of the Yankees in New England, and to those of the Scotch and Irish inhabitants of the middle and southern provinces. They erred egregiously in one thing; that is, in saying or believing that the rebel leaders (such was their language,) aimed at independence the first. None of those leaders, I am confident, thought of independence ; but most earnestly wished for reconciliation with the parent State, till blood was shed at Lexington and Bunker Hill; nor by many, till a good while after those events. I am not sure whether it was by a communication from Mr. Samuel Adams himself, with whom I breakfasted in Boston in 1791, or from credible testimony otherwise obtained, I was informed that he was of the opinion, some time before he could get others to think with him, that we ought to have done with petitioning and remonstrating with Britain, and at once to set up for ourselves. Yet this, I believe, was not till after the conflicts I have just mentioned.