Memorial and biographical sketches...

Contents

Paqe

I. John Albion Andrew 1

II. James Feeeman 67

II. James Fkeemais"

JAMES FREEMAN.

One of the few remaining antiquities in the city of Boston is the church of old gray stone, known as King's Chapel. Outwardly, its aspect is one of solid strength rather than architectural pretension. Its interior, however, is very striking, and to my mind, superior in its simple elegance to that of any other church in the city. It is said to be modeled on the plan of Sir Christopher "Wren's chef d'oeuvre, St. Stephen's, Walbrook, London. It is one of the few churches which contains marble monuments of the old families of Boston. In my childhood there still remained the state-pew of the colonial governors, higher and larger than the other pews, and with a canopy above it. This building, the oldest Episcopal church in New England, became the first Unitarian church in the United States, in consequence of a change of opinion taking place in the mind of a young man who was chosen as reader and rector by this society, at the close of the American Revolution. This young man was James Freeman.

Dr. Freeman is known to the religious public as the first avowed preacher of Unitarianism in the United States ; he is remembered by the people of Boston as one, who, for fifty years, was identified with all the best interests of that community. Though never ambitious of literary distinction, his writings occupy an important place in the literature of the country, both for, justness of thought and purity of expression. But the friends of Dr. Freeman forget all these things in remembering his personal qualities. They recall him as the playfellow of children, the friend and counsellor of youth, the charming companion in social intercourse, whose happy sentences were always freighted at once with wit and wisdom, and in whose character were beautifully blended the most austere uprightness and the most generous sympathy. As, however, I cannot speak of these things without appearing to strangers to exaggerate, and to his friends to understate, his peculiar excellence, I shall rather dwell on the events of his life ; adding, at the close, some traits illustrative of his private character.

The first ancestor of Dr. Freeman who came to this country was Samuel Freeman, proprietor of the eighth part of Water town, Mass., a place settled in 1630. His son Samuel went to Eastham, on Cape Cod, with his father-in-law, Thomas Prince, Governor of Plymouth. He inherited his father-in-law's estate in Eastham, and the family remained on Cape Cod till Constant Freeman, the father of the subject of this notice, removed to Charlestown, Mass., about 1755. James Freeman was born in Charlestown, April 22, 1759. His father moved to Boston soon after, and he was sent to the public Latin School in that city, then under the care of Master Lovell, a somewhat famous teacher in his day. He entered the school in 1766, being seven years old, at that time the age fixed for admission. Among his class-' mates were the late Judge Dawes, of the Supreme Court of Massachusetts, Rev. Jonathan Homer, D. D., of Newton, Admiral Sir Isaac Coffin, of the British Navy, and Sir Bernard Morland, afterward a member of the British Parliament. When his friend, Dr. Homer, used to speak of the great men who belonged to their class in the Latin School, Dr. Freeman would sometimes add : " But, Brother Homer, you forget our classmate who was hanged." The name of this unfortunate member of the class cannot now be supplied.

James Freeman entered Harvard College in 1773, and was graduated in 1777, at the age of eighteen. Among his classmates, were Dr. Bentley and Rufus King. The American Revolution dispersed the College, and interrupted for a time his studies. But he must have laid the foundation of good scholarship there. In after years, he was an excellent Latin scholar, a good mathematician, and'read with ease the French, Italian,

Spanish, and Portuguese languages. In the latter languages, I recollect his reading for amusement, at the close of his life, the works of Father Feyjoo and Father Vieira. With the writings of Cicero, Tacitus, Lucretius, and other Latin authors, he was thoroughly acquainted. Though he always spoke lightly of his own learning, he was far more of a scholar than many men of greater pretensions.

After leaving College, Mr. Freeman went to Cape Cod to visit his relatives there ; and, as he strongly sympathized with the revolutionary movement, he engaged in disciplining a company of men who were about to join the Colonial troops. In 1780, he sailed to Quebec, in a small vessel bearing a cartel, taking with him his sister, in order to place her with her father, then in that city. On his passage, he was captured by a privateer, and was detained at Quebec after his arrival, first in a prison-ship, and afterward as a prisoner on parole. He did not leave Quebec till June, 1782, when he sailed again for Boston, arriving there about the 1st of August. Being a candidate for the ministry, he preached in several places, and was invited, in September, to officiate as Reader at the King's Chapel, in Boston, for a term of six months.

The King's Chapel was founded in 1686, and a wooden edifice for public worship was built in 1690. The present building, which is of stone, and which is still one of the finest specimens of church architecture in New England, was erected one hundred and twenty-eight years ago, — the corner-stone having been laid in 1749. Dr. Caner, the Rector of the church, had espoused the British cause, and he accompanied the British troops, when they evacuated Boston, in 1776. The few proprietors of King's Chapel, who remained in Boston, lent their building to the Old South Congregational Church, whose house of worship had been used by the British army as a riding-school. The two societies occupied the building alternately, each with its own forms and its own minister, — one in the morning and the other in the afternoon. Under these circumstances Mr. Freeman commenced his services as a Reader.

I have in my possession a file of letters which Mr. Freeman wrote to his father in Quebec, from which I will make some extracts, showing his opinions and feelings at this time. These letters have probably not been opened for sixty years.

December 24, 1782 "I suppose, long before

this reaches you, you will be made acquainted with my situation at the Chapel. The church increases every day. I trust you believe that, by entering into this line, I have imbibed no High Church notions. I have fortunately no temptations to be bigoted, for the proprietors of the Chapel are very liberal in their notions. They allow me to make several alterations in the service, which liberty I frequently use. We can scarcely be called of the Church of England, for we disclaim the authority of that country in ecclesiastical as well as in

civil matters I forgot to mention in my former

letter the sum I receive for preaching. For the first six months, I am to be paid fifty pounds sterling. This is not much, but, when I engaged, the church was small, consisting only of about forty families. It has already increased to nearly eighty. So that I imagine that at the end of the six months, when I shall enter into new terms, the salary will be increased to two hundred and fifty or three hundred pounds lawful money per annum. I wish for no more. Indeed, if at any period of life I knew what contentment was, it is at present."

In the course of the year or two following his settlement, Mr. Freeman's opinions on the subject of the Trinity were so far modified by his studies and reflections that he found it necessary to propose to his church to alter the Liturgy in the places where that doctrine appears. An English Unitarian minister, Mr. Hazlitt, was at that time residing in Boston, and his intercourse with Mr. Freeman may have contributed to this change of sentiment. But only as an occasion — for this change of view lay in the direction of the tendencies of Mr. Freeman's mind and of the tendency of thought in that community, as appears from the ease with which Unitarianism spread in Boston. Mr. Hazlitt was the father of William Hazlitt, the essayist. The latter was born in Boston, and Dr. Freeman used to speak of him as a curly-headed, bright- eyed boy.

Dr. Greenwood, in his sermon preached after the funeral of Dr. Freeman, thus speaks of the way in which this change of the Liturgy was effected. He says that Mr. Freeman first thought of leaving his Society. " He communicated his difficulties to those of his friends with whom he was most intimate. He would come into their houses and say : ' Much as I love you, I must leave you. I cannot conscientiously any longer perform the service of the church, as it now stands.' But at length it was said to him, 'Why not state your difficulties, and the grounds of them, publicly to your whole people, that they may be able to judge of the case, and determine whether it is such as to require a separation -between you and them or not ? ' The suggestion was adopted. He preached a series of sermons, in which he plainly stated his dissatisfaction with the Trinitarian portions of the Liturgy, went fully into an examination of the doctrine of the Trinity, and gave his reasons for rejecting it. He has himself assured me that when he delivered these sermons, he was under a strong impression that they were the last he should ever pronounce from this pulpit But he was heard patiently, attentively, kindly. The greater part of his hearers responded to his sentiments, and resolved to alter their Liturgy and retain their Pastor."

Alterations were accordingly made in general conformity with those of the amended Liturgy of

Dr. Samuel Clarke, and, on the 19th of June, 1785, the proprietors voted, by a majority of three fourths, to adopt those alterations. 1 In a letter to his father, dated the first of June, he says, after describing the changes which had been made in the Liturgy, " In two or three weeks, the Church will finally pass the vote whether they will adopt the alterations or not. I flatter myself the decision will be favorable ; for out of about ninety families of which the congregation consists, fifteen only are opposed to the reformation. Should the vote pass in the negative, I shall be under the necessity of resigning my living." He adds, however, that in this case, he has no fear but that he shall find employment elsewhere. " Thus," says Mr. Greenwood, " the first Episcopal Church in New England became the first Unitarian Church in the New "World. The young Reader at King's Chapel was surely placed in peculiar circumstances. It is his praise that he made a right and manly use of them ; that he did not smother his convictions and hush down his conscience, and endeavor to explain away to himself,

1 Before this vote was taken, the proprietors had taken measures to ascertain who properly belonged to the church as pewholders, and what pews had been forfeited by the absence of their former owners, according to the letter of their deeds. And, that no ground of complaint should exist, the proprietors engaged to pay for every vacated pew, though legally forfeited, the sum of sixteen pounds to its former owner. — Greenwood's History of King's Chapel.

for the sake of a little false and outward peace, the obvious sense of the prayers which he uttered before God and his people, but took that other and far better course of explicitness and honesty. By this proper use of circumstances he placed himself where he now stands in our religious history." 1

The next thing to be considered was the mode of ordination to be received by Mr. Freeman, who was as yet only a Reader. In a letter to his father, dated October 31, 1786, he describes an application made to Bishop Seabury of Connecticut, and Bishop Provost of New York, for ordination, from which the following extracts are taken, which illustrate both the opinions of the time, and the character of Mr. Freeman : —

" My visit to Bishop Seabury terminated as I expected. Before I waited upon him, he gave out that he never would ordain me ; but it was necessary to ask the question. He being in Boston last March, a committee of our Church waited upon him, and requested him to ordain me, without insisting upon any other conditions than a declaration of faith in the Holy Scriptures. He replied that, as the case was unusual, it was necessary that he should consult his presbyters — the Episcopal clergy in Connecticut. Accordingly, about the beginning of June, I rode to Stratford, where a convention was holding, carrying with me several letters of recommendation. I waited upon the Bishop's presbyters and delivered my letters.

1 Greenwood's Sermon after the funeral of Dr. Freeman, p. 11.

They professed themselves satisfied with the testimonials which they contained of my moral character, etc., but added that they could not recommend me to the Bishop for ordination upon the terms proposed by my church. For a man to subscribe the Scriptures, they said, was nothing, for it could never be determined from that what his creed was. Heretics professed to believe them not less than the orthodox, and made use of them in support of their peculiar opinions. If I could subscribe such a declaration as that I could conscientiously read the whole of the Book of Common Prayer, they would cheerfully recommend me. I answered that I could not conscientiously subscribe a declaration of that kind. ' Why not ? ' ' Because there are some parts of the Book of Common Prayer which I do not approve.' ' What parts ? ' ' The prayers to the Son and Holy Spirit.' 'You do not then believe the doctrine of the Trinity.' ' No.' ' This appears to us very strange. We can think of no texts which countenance your opinion. We should be glad to hear you mention some.' ' It would ill become me, gentlemen, to dispute with persons of your learning and abilities. But if you will give me leave, I will repeat two passages which appear to me decisive : There is one God, and one Mediator between God and man, the man Christ Jesus. There is but one God, the Father, and one Lord Jesus Christ. In both these passages Jesus Christ is plainly distinguished from God, and in the last, that God is expressly declared to be the Father.' To this they made no other reply than an ' Ah ! ' which echoed round the room. ' But are not all the attributes of the Father,' said one, ' attributed to the Son in the Scriptures ? Is not Omnipotence for instance ? ' ' It is true,' I answered,

'that our Saviour says of himself, All power is given unto me, in heaven and earth. You will please to observe here that the power is said to be given. It is a derived power. It is not self-existent and unoriginated, like that of the Father.' ' But is not the Son omniscient ? Does he not know the hearts of men ? ' ' Yes, He knows them by virtue of that intelligence which He derives from the Father. But, by a like communication, did Peter know the hearts of Ananias and Sapphira.' After some more conversation of the same kind, they told me that it could not possibly be that the Christian world should have been idolaters for seventeen hundred years, as they must be according to my opinions. In answer to this, I said that whether they had been idolaters or not I would not determine, but that it was full as probable that they should be idolaters for seventeen hundred years as that they should be Roman Catholics for twelve hundred. They then proceeded to find fault with some part of the new Liturgy. 'We observe that you have converted the absolution into a prayer. Do you mean by that to deny the power of the Priesthood to absolve the people, and that God has committed to it the power of remitting sins ? ' 'I meant neither to deny nor to affirm it.- The absolution appeared exceptionable to some persons, for which reason it was changed into a prayer, which could be exceptionable to nobody.' ' But you must be sensible, Mr. Freeman, that Christ instituted an order of Priesthood, and that to them He committed the power of absolving sins. Whosesoever sins ye remit they are remitted unto him, and whosesoever sins ye retain they are retained.' To this I made no other reply than a return of their own emphatic

Ah ! Upon the whole, finding me an incorrigible heretic, they dismissed me without granting my request. They treated me, however, with great candor and politeness, begging me to go home, to read, to alter my opinions, and then to return and receive that ordination, which they wished to procure for me from their Bishop. I left them and proceeded to New York. When there I waited on Mr. Provost, Rector of the Episcopal Church, who is elected to go to England to be consecrated a Bishop. I found him a liberal man, and that he approved of the alterations which had been made at the Chapel. Of him I hope to obtain ordination, which I am convinced he will cheerfully confer, unless prevented by the bigotry of some of his clergy. The Episcopal ministers in New York, and in the Southern States, are not such High Churchmen as those in Connecticut. The latter approach very near to Roman Catholics, or at least equal Bishop Laud and his followers. Should Provost refuse to ordain me, I shall then endeavor to effect a plan which I have long had in my head, which is, to be ordained by the Congregational ministers of the town, or to preach and administer the ordinances without any ordination whatever. The last scheme I most approve ; for I am fully convinced that he who has devoted his time to the study of divinity, and can find a congregation who are willing to hear him, is, to all intents, a minister of the Gospel ; and that, though imposition of hands, either of Bishops or Presbyters, be necessary to constitute him priest in the eye of the law, in some countries, yet that, in the eye of Heaven, he has not less of the indelible character than a Bishop or a Patriarch. Our early ancestors, who, however wrong they might be in some particulars, were in general sensible and judicious men, were of this opinion. One of the articles of the Cambridge Platform is that the call of the congregation alone constitutes a man a minister, and that imposition of hands by Bishops or Elders is a mere form, which is, by no means, essential. The same sentiments are adopted by the most rational clergy in the present day, who give up the necessity of ordination as indefensible, and ridicule the doctrine of the uninterrupted succession as a mere chimera. I am happy to find many of my hearers join with me in opinion upon this subject."

As might, perhaps, have been foreseen, it was found impossible to procure Episcopal ordination, and Mr. Freeman and his church finally determined on a method differing from both of those suggested in his letter. He was neither ordained by the Congregational ministers of Boston, nor yet did he omit all ceremony of induction, but (as Mr, Greenwood says) he fell back on first principles, and was ordained by the church itself, by a solemn service at the time of evening prayer, November 18, 1787. The Wardens entered the desk after the usual evening service, and the Senior Warden made a short address, showing the reasons of the present procedure. The first ordaining prayer was read, then the ordaining vote, to which the members gave assent by rising, by which they chose Mr. Freeman to be their " Rector, Minister, Priest, Pastor, and Ruling Elder." Other services followed, among which was the presenting a Bible to the Rector, enjoining on him " a due observance of all the precepts contained therein."

From the time that Mr. Freeman was thus set apart to his office, he sustained the various duties of the ministry till 1809, when the Rev. Samuel Cary was, at his request, associated with him as colleague ; after whose death, in 1815, he again served alone till 1824, when the Rev. F. W. P. Greenwood was inducted as colleague. In 1811, he received the degree of Doctor of Divinity from Harvard College. In 1826, his health had so far given way that he was obliged to give up to Mr. Greenwood his parochial duties and retire to a country residence near Boston. Here he lived nine years, surrounded by the affection of young and old, and, though suffering from painful disease, always cheerful, and at length expired November 14, 1835, in the seventy-seventh year of his age.

Dr. Freeman was a member of the first School Committee ever chosen by the people of Boston, which was elected in 1792, the schools before that time being under the charge of the Selectmen of the town. He was for many years on this Committee, and was one of those by whose labors the Public School System of Boston has been brought to its present excellent condition. He was one of the founders of the Massachusetts Historical Society, and, during a long period, one of its most active collaborators, contributing many valuable papers to its collections. He was also a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. His publications consist of a Thanksgiving Sermon, 1784 ; a Description of Boston, published in the Boston Magazine, 1784 ; Remarks on Morse's American Universal Geography, 1793 ; a Sermon on the Death of Rev. John Elliot, D. D., 1813 ; a volume of Sermons published in 1812, which passed through three editions ; and another volume in 1829, printed as a gift for his parish, but not published ; besides many articles in periodicals. He printed no controversial sermons, and indeed seldom preached them. His style was sententious and idiomatic, and has often been spoken of as a model of pure English. Though there is no trace of ambitious thought or expression in his writings, their tone and spirit are wise and healthy. Although Dr. Freeman was the first, who, in this country, openly preached Unitarianism, under that name, he always referred to Dr. Mayhew and others as having preached the same doctrine before.

This was no doubt true. Some form of Arianism had prevailed in New England for several years before Dr. Freeman's time ; but he was the first to avow and defend the doctrine by its distinct name. This fact necessarily brought him into relations with other advocates of these opinions, and he corresponded with Priestley and Belsham, and especially with Theophilus Lindsey, whose character he much esteemed. He also had sympathy from Chauncy, Belknap, and others older than himself, and among his contemporaries from men like Bentley, Clarke, Eliot, Kirkland. And as he loved to " keep his friendships in repair," he was surrounded in after years by multitudes of younger friends and disciples. He loved the young, and always sought to help them. I have been told of his urging new married people among his parishioners to join the smaller and struggling parish of some young minister — " Go there," he would say, " and grow up with that church, and make yourselves useful in it." He sympathized with young men in their diffident first efforts, and always encouraged and befriended them. How then could the young help loving him? He was no zealot for his own opinions, but a thoroughly liberal man, and was intimate with men of all denominations. The good Bishop Cheverus was one of his best friends. He could not tolerate intolerance, and disliked Unitarian bigotry quite as much as Orthodox bigotry. I have heard him say, " Sterne complains of the cant of criticism. I think the cant of liberality worse than that. I have a neighbor who comes and entertains me that way, abusing the Orthodox by the hour, and, all the time, boasting of his own liberality." He carried his freedom of mind into matters of taste as well as matters of opinion. Bred in the school which admired the writers of

Queen Anne's day, he loved Addison, Pope, Swift, Gay, and in Theology, such writers as the Boyle Lecturers and James Foster. But finding that many young persons were interested in Wordsworth and Coleridge, he patiently read these authors to see if he could find any good in them. I remember his reading Coleridge's " Aids to Reflection," and his " Friend," in the last years of his life, and, when he had finished them, he said, " I find some excellent ideas in him, though I do not understand all his mysteries. He is a cloudy fellow. I leave those parts to you younger folks." The leading traits in Dr. Freeman's character, which immediately impressed all who saw him, were benevolence, justice, and a Franklin-like sagacity. He could endure to see no kind of oppression, and was always ready to take sides with any whom he thought overborne. He was punctilious in keeping all engagements, and his honesty descended into the smallest particulars of life. A lady said she had seen him once under the following circumstances. " I was riding, with another lady, past Dr. Freeman's house, in the town of Newton, and we noticed a dwelling opposite, which seemed closed and unoccupied, the garden of which was full of flowers. We thought of gathering a few, and while we hesitated, we noticed an old gentleman, with long white locks hanging on his shoulders, slowly walking on the other side of the road. I asked him whether he thought that, as there was no one living in the house, we might gather some of the flowers. He looked up at us with an arch smile, and said, ' They are not my flowers, pretty ladies.' Somewhat confused, I repeated my question, to which he replied, — ' I have no right to give them to you, they are not my flowers, pretty ladies.' We rode away, not knowing till afterward who it was, but having received a lesson in regard to the rights of others which we were not likely soon to forget."

A few examples taken from his familiar conversation, though trifling in themselves, will illustrate his character and turn of mind.

A lady, who had heard of the Atheist, Abner Kneeland, giving public lectures in defense of his views, said, " What a dreadful thing it is, Dr. Freeman!" "I think it will do a great deal of good," replied he, and then mentioned a variety of facts to show that arguments in support of Infidelity had always brought out so many new defenses of Christianity as to leave religion on a higher and more impregnable basis.

He was a great lover of truth, but his regard for the feelings of others kept him from harshness. To a young friend, whom he thought in danger of carrying independence too far, he said, " It is well to be candid, but you need not say everything which is in your mind. If a person, on being introduced to me, should say, 'Dr. Freeman, what a little, old, ugly, spindle-shanked gen-

JAMES FEE E MAN. 87

tleman you are,' he would no doubt say what was in his mind, but it would not be necessary, I think, for him to say it."

Some one said to him of a book : " It is too long." " All books are too long," he replied, — " I know only one book which is not too long, and that is Robinson Crusoe, and I sometimes think that a little too long."

He related this anecdote of the famous Mather Byles. " I was once walking with Dr. John Clarke, and we met Mather Byles. He took my arm and said, ' Now we have the whole Bible here. I am the Old Testament, you, Mr. Clarke, are the New Testament, and as for Mr. Freeman, he is the Apocrypha.' "

As Dr. Freeman was talking one evening in his family, I took notes of his remarks without his being aware of it. From these I copy the following sentences : —

" Do you see human faces in the coals of fire ? The propensity I have to form the human figure is frequently annoying to me. I make men and immediately put them into a fiery furnace."

" I find I am growing very thin. Some people carry handkerchiefs to wipe away tears which they do not shed, so I wear clothes to conceal limbs which I do not possess."

• " Is that Coleridge you are reading ? Coleridge himself reads curious books, — the authors who wrote in Latin at the revival of learning. "We have better writers now. To be sure, there were Grotius and Budseus, who wei'e excellent writers, and especially Erasmus. Knox wrote well. But he was an arrogant and rash man. He condemned the French Sermon writers, and said how inferior they were to the English. As an instance, he quoted an Englishman, who had in fact copied from the French. That fellow did not find it out. In his Essays, Knox declares all mysteries and all knowledge, gives advice to young merchants and to young tailors. He was a man of bad manners. He attacked the King of Prussia bitterly. The king stood such things, however, with great fortitude. He was satisfied with possessing absolute power."