"The Cause of Liberty, United With That of Truth & Righteousness, is the Cause of God"

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Happy Independence Day to all from Log College Press! Today marks the 248th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence, as well as seventh anniversary of the founding of Log College Press in 2017.

In the past we have highlighted various aspects of Presbyterian contributions to and appreciations of the great event commemorated on this day in history.

Arise, O God, plead thine own cause (Ps. 74:22).

I lay down this maxim of divinity: Tyranny being a work of Satan, is not from God, because sin, either habitual or actual, is not from God: the power that is, must be from God; the magistrate, as magistrate, is good in nature of office, and the intrinsic end of his office, (Rom. xiii. 4) for he is the minister of God for thy good; and, therefore, a power ethical, politic, or moral, to oppress, is not from God, and is not a power, but a licentious deviation of a power; and is no more from God, but from sinful nature and the old serpent, than a license to sin. — Samuel Rutherford, Lex Rex (1644)

Today we highlight a patriotic sermon by Abraham Keteltas, delivered on October 5, 1777, titled God Arising and Pleading His People’s Cause; or, The American War in Favor of Liberty, Against the Measures and Arms of Great Britain, Shewn to Be the Cause of God.

Keteltas (1732-1798) was born in New York City of Dutch descent and, raised by pious Protestants, lived among the French Huguenots in New York and New Rochelle. He studied theology at Yale University, graduating in 1752, and obtained a license to preach in 1756. He preached in Dutch, French and English at various places in the north Mid-Atlantic and New England, including Jamaica and Long Island, New York; Connecticut; and Massachusetts. He was deeply interested in the political and social welfare of those around him, as reflected in several sermons dealing with the military, and political matters; and in his role as a delegate to the New York Provincial Congress.

In his most famous 1777 sermon, Keteltas defined the cause of God of which he spoke as primarily the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ:

All the doctrines contained in the old and new Testament, from that system of truth, of which we are speaking, amongst these doctrines, those most essential to man, are his fall in Adam, and redemption by the Lord Jesus Christ, the necessity of being regenerated and sanctified by the spirit of God, and being justified by the righteousness of his son imputed to them, and received by faith, the necessity of holiness in order to happiness, and of conformity in heart and life to the nature and will of God: These, and all the other doctrines of his word, are the cause of God.

He went on to elaborate that “By the cause of God, we are to understand, the cause of universal righteousness.” This encompasses a care and concern for the welfare of all men, but especially those of the household of faith. Liberty, in opposition to slavery and bondage, is one of the chiefs concerns that we should thus seek to promote for all mankind, and especially fellow believers.

Liberty is the grand fountain, under God, of every temporal blessing, and what is infinitely more important, it is favorable to the propagation of unadulterated Christianity. Liberty is the parent of truth, justice, virtue, patriotism, benevolence, and every generous and noble purpose of the soul. Under the influence of liberty, the arts and sciences, trade, commerce, and husbandry flourish, and the wilderness blossoms like the rose.

The opposite of liberty, conversely, is tyranny, which is something that God detests.

But if liberty is thus friendly to the happiness of mankind, and is the cause of the kind parent of the universe; certainly tyranny & oppression are the cause of the devil, the cause which God’s souls hates.

After giving examples of just causes from both Biblical and world history (Dutch and Swiss independence), Keteltas turns his attention to the conflict between Great Britain and the American colonies, highlighting the righteousness of the American cause in the face of British tyranny, and British refusals to hear many appeals to justice, even from members of Parliament. A nation that had warmly espoused the cause of liberty in the past (Great Britain) had itself become tyrannical, and it was the duty of America now to stand for that cause, which was in fact the cause of God.

From the preceding discourse, I think we have reason to conclude, that the cause of this American Continent, against the measures of a cruel, bloody, and vindictive ministry, is the cause of God. We are contending for the rights of mankind, for the welfare of millions now living, and for the happiness of millions yet unborn. If it is the indisputed duty of mankind, to do good to all as they have opportunity, especially to those who are of the household of faith, if they are bound by the commandments of the supreme lawgiver, to love their neighbor as themselves, and do to others as they would that others should do unto them; then the war carried on against us, is unjust and unwarrantable, and our cause is not only righteous, but most important: It is God’s own cause: It is the grand cause of the whole human race, and what can be more interesting and glorious. If the principles on which the present civil war is carried on by the American colonies, against the British arms, were universally adopted and practiced upon by mankind, they would turn a vale of tears, into a paradise of God: whereas opposite principles, and a conduct, founded upon them, has filled the world with blood and stupor, with rapine and violence, with cruelty and injustice, with wretchedness, poverty, horror, desolation, and despair; We cannot therefore doubt, that the cause of liberty, united with that of truth & righteousness, is the cause of God.

As Keteltas goes on to say, if Great Britain herself (when resisting the tyranny of Charles I or James II) had once been on the right side of the cause of liberty, America should not be censured for taking up the standard which had fallen. In looking back to the past as we do in celebrating American Independence, it is or ought to be for the purpose of keeping in sight of a landmark that is faithful and true lest we be shipwrecked. It has been said (not by Alexis De Tocqueville - see Ralph Keyes, The Quote Verifier [2006]) that “America is great because she is good, and if America ever ceases to be good, she will cease to be great.” If the cause of liberty was just in 1776, it is certainly just in 2024, but whether America is on the side of that cause in 2024 may rightly be questioned, but must certainly be prayed for.

American Presbyterians and Sunday Mail

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In recent news, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in favor of a mail carrier for the U.S. Postal Service who was forced to resign over his refusal to work (deliver mail) on the Lord’s Day and, subsequently, filed suit against the agency for its denial of an accommodation of his religious belief in keeping the Lord’s Day holy, and thereby violating his civil rights. Gerald Groff, the postal employee in question, had worked at the Post Office since 2012, but a 2013 arrangement between the U.S. Post Office and Amazon led to a requirement that mail be delivered on the Lord’s Day, a duty which Mr. Groff was initially able to avoid until the issue was pressed upon him, leading to his resignation for conscience’ sake. The Supreme Court’s ruling was welcomed by many who have been concerned about the encroachment of business on the Christian Sabbath, especially non-essential labor that is mandated by the federal government of its employees.

It should be noted, though, that the 2013 Post Office-Amazon arrangement which led to Mr. Groff’s trial of conscience is not the first time this particular issue has been confronted in American history. This very issue, in fact, was of immense concern to 19th century Presbyterians.

As far back as 1808, Postmaster General Gideon Granger directed that post offices be opened on the Lord’s Day for the sorting of mail. One particular local postmaster in Washington, Pennsylvania, Hugh Wylie — who was also a ruling elder in the Presbyterian Church — began to open his post office on the Lord’s Day not only for sorting of mail, but also for the distribution of mail. Eventually, the distribution of the mail began encroached upon the time of worship services, and complaints were made about the propriety of this sort of work occurring on this day of the week. Although the Post Office supported Wylie in his efforts to maintain the flow of mail, the Synod of Pittsburgh condemned Wylie and barred him from communion, and suspended him from the eldership. He appealed unsuccessfully to the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church in the United States of America.

Meanwhile, in 1810, the U.S. Congress passed a law requiring postmasters to open their offices on the Lord’s Day. In the context of the approaching War of 1812, the argument of necessity held sway in the public mind given that need for expedited communication during wartime carried plausible weight. But the opposing argument that the nation itself was involved in a sinful course of action by diverting federal employees and citizens from the duties of the Sabbath by maintaining a regular course of business on that day also began to carry weight in the minds of Christian citizens. Petitions were sent from the PCUSA General Assembly in 1812 and 1815 to Congress urging repeal of the 1810 legislation. Although these and other petitions went unheeded by Congress, the 1819 PCUSA General Assembly ruled concerning its members that engaging in business or commerce — in particular, in relation to Sabbath mail delivery — on the Lord’s Day was a bar to communion (Baird’s Digest [1856], p. 33).

In the mid-1820s and early 1830s, a renewed effort was made by Christians of various denominations to pressure Congress to repeal its legalization of mail delivery on the Lord’s Day. Lyman Beecher helped to found the General Union for the Promotion of the Christian Sabbath in 1828, and his 1829 sermon on the Pre-Eminent Importance of the Christian Sabbath zeroed in the Sabbath desecration caused by thousands of federal employees being pulled away from public worship to transport and deliver the mail, arguing at one point: “the petitions are, not that Congress will do any thing for religion, but, simply, that by legislation they will do nothing against religion - simply that they will not, with the people's money, hire their twenty-six thousand Mail-carriers, Post-masters and assistants, to unite with the wicked in prostrating the holy Sabbath! We ask for no union of church and state: but, simply, that the moral influence of the Sabbath may not be thus bartered away for secular gain.”

In 1829, Senator Richard M. Johnson, chairman of the Senate Committee on the Post Office and Post Roads and a devout Baptist, issued a report which shot down the petitions sitting before Congress to repeal the 1810 law, stating that “The transportation of the mails on the first day of the week, it is believed, does not interfere with rights of conscience” (Richard C. Wylie, Sabbath Laws in the United States [1905], p. 181). Stuart Robinson notes that “Colonel Johnson was by education and prejudice a Seventh Day Baptist, and the opinion gained general currency that his report was inspired, if not prepared, by a Seventh-Day Baptist preacher” (Sabbath Laws in the United States [1879]).

The controversy was not limited to the halls of Congress or the ecclesiastical courts, but spilled over into the press. Charles Hodge addressed the matter in The Biblical Repertory and Theological Review with his article The American Quarterly Review on Sunday Mails (1831). He objected to the manner in which this respectable journal portrayed the ongoing debate, and used the opportunity to articulate a clear understanding of the obligations of the Sabbath day for all Christians, and further argued that necessity was not at stake in the question of the propriety of mail delivery.

In his controversial 1832 discourse, Prince Messiah's Claims to Dominion Over All Governments; and the Disregard of His Authority by the United States, in the Federal Constitution, Reformed Presbyterian minister James R. Willson continued the argument against Sabbath mail delivery: “The Sabbath is very grossly and scandalously violated in all parts of the United States. It is true, the federal and state legislatures, and the courts of justice, do yet adjourn, on the Lord's holy day. But how do the officers of government spend their Sabbaths? Which of them reads the Holy Scriptures, ‘spending the whole time in the public and private exercises of religion?’ — The transportation of the mails — the opening of the post-offices, and the diffusion of political and other secular intelligence, profane the Sabbath, and corrupt the public mind.”

Stonewall Jackson is known to have been very particular about doing anything that would contribute to the delivery of mail on the Sabbath. Robert L. Dabney had this to say about it: “His convictions of the sin committed by the Government of the United States, in the unnecessary transmission of mails, and the consequent imposition of secular labor on the Sabbath day, upon a multitude of persons, were singularly strong. His position was, that if no one would avail himself of these Sunday mails, save in cases of true and unavoidable necessity, the letters carried would be so few that the sinful custom would speedily be arrested, and the guilt and mischief prevented. Hence, he argued, that as every man is bound to do whatever is practicable and lawful for him to do, to prevent the commission of sin, he who posted or received letters on the Sabbath day, or even sent a letter which would occupy that day in travelling, was responsible for a part of the guilt. It was of no avail to reply to him, that this self-denial on the part of one Christian would not close a single post-office, nor arrest a single mail-coach in the whole country. His answer was, that unless some Christians would begin singly to practise their exact duty, and thus set the proper example, the reform would never be begun; that his responsibility was to see to it that he, at least, was not particeps criminis; and that whether others would co-operate, was their concern, not his” (Life and Campaigns of Lieut.-Gen. Thomas J. Jackson (Stonewall Jackson) [1866], p. 88).

As late as 1889, Thomas P. Stevenson testified on behalf of the National Reform Association before the U.S. Senate in favor of a Sunday Rest Bill, submitting on that occasion a report on The National Mail Service and the Sabbath. Towards the end of his report he made this striking claim: “The action of the Government in this matter involves the whole nation in guilt and exposes the whole people to the righteous judgments of God. No man can say, ‘I never used the mails on the Sabbath; I am therefore not responsible.’ When irreligion and vice unsettle the foundations of social welfare, no man can assure himself that his personal or domestic interests will not be imperiled. When Israel went into captivity ‘that this land might enjoy her Sabbaths,’ the whole people suffered. A nation is justly held responsible for the action of its Government, because the nation is greater than the Government, and can reform it at pleasure. The violation of the Sabbath by the mail service involves in guilt not merely the officials in charge of the Post-Office Department, but the American people. The people have direct, legitimate, and, in some sense, authoritative access to the Government. Those who desire or would insist on the continuance of the Sabbath mail service, in the face of such considerations as we have urged, are a small minority of the population. It is only necessary for the people to speak; the Government will obey their voice.”

Eventually, in 1912, Congress finally acted to bar mail delivery on the Lord’s Day. It was to the great relief and acclaim of many Christians, but the greatest impetus for this change of heart on the part of the federal government was not the petitions of Sabbath-keepers, but the arguments of organized labor who emphasized the need of workers for a day of temporal and secular rest. Thus matters stood until the 2013 Amazon deal, and now in 2023, the highest court in the land has taken the part of a federal worker with a conscience about keeping the Lord’s Day holy. America’s controversy with the Lord, however, is far from resolved. The obligation upon all to uphold the Christian Sabbath, as stated in the Fourth Commandment, endures. Those who seek to witness to this truth rejoice with Gerald Groff, having won his day in court, and yet, as has been said in another context, “The principle for which we contend is bound to reassert itself, though it may be at another time and in another form.”

For further reading on this topic, with additional details, see this 2020 article by Barry Waugh, “Mail Carrying on Sunday.”

America's Debt to Calvinism

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"He that will not honor the memory, and respect the influence of Calvin, knows but little of the origin of American liberty." — George Bancroft, Literary and Historical Miscellanies (1855), p. 406

The central thesis of this book — that John Calvin and his Genevan followers had a profound influence on the American founding — runs counter to widespread assumptions and rationale of the American experiment in government. — David W. Hall, The Genevan Reformation and the American Founding (2003), p. vii

On the Fourth of July, which is not only the date celebrated as the birth of the United States in 1776, but also the date on which Log College Press was founded in 2017, we pause to remember how God has dealt graciously with this nation in large part through the influence of the doctrines of grace and the principles of civil liberty which are associated with Calvinism.

American history has many streams running through it, including the Native American population, Spanish exploration, African-American slaves, and much more, but it cannot be denied that in the colonial era and in the early part of the republic, American principles and character were largely fashioned by the Protestant European settlers who came to this country and, looking to Scripture as their foundation, enacted laws, promoted education and even fought for freedom, on the basis of ideas taught in John Calvin’s Geneva.

To demonstrate this premise — which historically was unquestioned, but has been increasingly challenged in recent years — we will extract from the writings of some authors on Log College Press, and others, to show that many of America’s founding principles can be traced to the Calvinism that brought French Huguenots to Florida and South Carolina in 1562; English Anglicans and Presbyterians to Jamestown, Virginia in 1607; Pilgrims and Puritans to Massachusetts beginning in 1620; the Dutch Reformed to New Netherland (New York) in the 1620s; the Scotch-Irish, such as Francis Makemie in the 1680s, to Virginia and Pennsylvania; and the German Reformed settlers who, as did John Phillip Boehm in 1720, arrived in Pennsylvania and other ports of entry. Although painting a picture with broad strokes, and not at all unmindful of the secular character of this nation today under principles enshrined in the U.S. Constitution and Bill of Rights, it is worthwhile to consider how Geneva influenced the founding of America more than any other source. It has been well said by some that “knowledge of the past is the key to the future.”

Jean Leon Gerome Ferris, The Mayflower Compact, 1620

Egbert W. Smith writes, in a chapter titled “America’s Debt to Calvinism,” that:

If the average American citizen were asked, who was the founder of America, the true author of our giant Republic, might be puzzled to answer. We can imagine his amazement at hearing the answer given to this question by the famous German historian, [Leopold von] Ranke, one of the profoundest scholars of modern times. Says Ranke, ‘John Calvin was the virtual founder of America.’” — E.W. Smith, The Creed of Presbyterians (1901), p. 119

In a lecture given by Philip Schaff in 1854, he stated:

The religious character of North America, viewed as a whole, is predominantly of the Reformed or Calvinistic stamp…To obtain a clear view of the enormous influence which Calvin's personality, moral earnestness, and legislative genius, have exerted on history, you must go to Scotland and to the United States. — Philip Schaff, America: A Sketch of the Political, Social, and Religious Character of the United States of North America (1855), pp. 111-112

Nathaniel S. McFetridge devotes a chapter in his most famous book, Calvinism in History, to the influence of Calvinism as a political force in American history, and argues thus:

My proposition is this — a proposition which the history clearly demonstrates: That this great American nation, which stretches her vast and varied territory from sea to sea, and from the bleak hills of the North to the sunny plains of the South, was the purchase chiefly of the Calvinists, and the inheritance which they bequeathed to all liberty-loving people.

If would be almost impossible to give the merest outline of the influence of the Calvinists on the civil and religious liberties of this continent without seeming to be a mere Calvinistic eulogist; for the contestants in the great Revolutionary conflict were, so far as religious opinions prevailed, so generally Calvinistic on the one side and Arminian on the other as to leave the glory of the result almost entirely with the Calvinists. They who are best acquainted with the history will agree most readily with the historian, Merle D’Aubigne, when he says: ‘Calvin was the founder of the greatest of republics. The Pilgrims who left their country in the reign of James I., and, landing on the barren soil of New England, founded populous and mighty colonies, were his sons, his direct and legitimate sons; and that American nation which we have seen growing so rapidly boasts as its father the humble Reformer on the shores of Lake Leman [Lake Geneva].’” — N.S. McFetridge, Calvinism in History (1882), pp. 59-60

W. Melancthon Glasgow, referencing the great American historian George Bancroft, says:

"Mr. Bancroft says: 'The first public voice in America for dissolving all connection with Great Britain came not from the Puritans of New England, the Dutch of New York, nor the Planters of Virginia, but from the Scotch-Irish Presbyterians of the Carolinas.' He evidently refers to the influence of Rev. Alexander Craighead and the Mecklenburg Declaration: and this influence was due to the meeting of the Covenanters of Octorara, where in 1743, they denounced in a public manner the policy of George the Second, renewed the Covenants, swore with uplifted swords that they would defend their lives and their property against all attack and confiscation, and their consciences should be kept free from the tyrannical burden of Episcopacy....It is now difficult to tell whether Donald Cargill, Hezekiah Balch or Thomas Jefferson wrote the National Declaration of American Independence, for in sentiment it is the same as the "Queensferry Paper" and the Mecklenburg Declaration." — W. Melancthon Glasgow, History of the Reformed Presbyterian Church in America (1888), pp. 65-67

William H. Roberts, in a chapter on “Calvinism in America,” wrote:

Politically, Calvinism is the chief source of modern republican government. That Calvinism and republicanism are related to each other as cause and effect is acknowledged by authorities who are not Presbyterians or Reformed…The Westminster Standards are the common doctrinal standards of all the Calvinists of Great Britain and Ireland, the countries which have given to the United States its language and to a considerable degree its laws. The English Calvinists, commonly known as Puritans, early found a home on American shores, and the Scotch, Dutch, Scotch-Irish, French and German settlers, who were of the Protestant faith, were their natural allies. It is important to a clear understanding of the influence of Westminster in American Colonial history to know that the majority of the early settlers of this country from Massachusetts to New Jersey inclusive, and also in parts of Maryland, Virginia, and the Carolinas, were Calvinists.” — William H. Roberts in Philip Vollmer, John Calvin: Theologian, Preacher, Educator, Statesman (1909), pp. 202-203

Speaking of the Scotch-Irish, Charles L. Thompson wrote:

Did they abandon homes that were dear to them in Scotland first and then in Ireland? It was done at the call of God. They wanted homes for themselves and their children; but it was only that in them there might be a free development of the faith for which their fathers and they had suffered. Nor was their religion a thing of either forms or sentiment. It was grounded in Scripture. The family Bible was the charter of their liberties. To seek its deepest meanings was their delight. They, therefore, brought to to their various settlements in the new world a knowledge of the Calvinism which they had found in their Bibles, and a devotion to the forms in which it found expression giving definite doctrinal character to all their communities — character by which their various migrations may be easily traced. Whether in Nova Scotia, in Pennsylvania, in Kentucky and Tennessee, or wherever their pioneer footsteps led them, the stamp of their convictions, from which no ‘wind of doctrine’ and no ‘cunning craftiness’ could draw them, is seen in all their social life and on all their institutions. Almost universally they were Presbyterians and they are the dominant element in the Presbyterian Church today.

Alike among the Puritans, the Dutch and the Scotch-Irish, it was Calvinism which was the prevailing doctrine. Its relation to the life of our republic has often been recognized. — Charles L. Thompson, The Religious Foundations of America (1917), pp. 242-243

Loraine Boettner, in a section on Calvinism in America, quotes George Bancroft in regards to the American War of Independence:

With this background we shall not be surprised to find that the Presbyterians took a very prominent part in American Revolution. Our own historian Bancroft says: “The Revolution of 1776, so far as it was affected by religion, was a Presbyterian measure. It was the natural outgrowth of the principles which the Presbyterianism of the Old World planted in her sons, the English Puritans, the Scotch Covenanters, the French Huguenots, the Dutch Calvinists, and the Presbyterians of Ulster.” So intense, universal, and aggressive were the Presbyterians in their zeal for liberty that the war was spoken of in England as “The Presbyterian Rebellion.” An ardent colonial supporter of King George III wrote home: “I fix all the blame for these extraordinary proceedings upon the Presbyterians. They have been the chief and principal instruments in all these flaming measures. They always do and ever will act against government from that restless and turbulent anti-monarchial spirit which has always distinguished them everywhere.” When the news of “these extraordinary proceedings” reached England, Prime Minister Horace Walpole said in Parliament, “Cousin America has run off with a Presbyterian parson.” — Loraine Boettner, The Reformed Doctrine of Predestination (1932), p. 383

Speaking of Calvinism’s influence on America, H. Gordon Harold wrote:

Now back of every great movement lie its proponents. Who were the people that fostered rebellion and revolution in the New World? Who spoke openly against the tyrannies and indignities they experienced? Who stepped forward with ready hearts, willing to die in resistance to the injustices meted out to them in the wilderness of this remote continent? They were mostly as follows: Huguenots from France; men of the Reformed faith, presbyterians of the Continent, who had come from the Palatinate, Switzerland, and the Low Countries; Lutherans who had fled the agonies of the Thirty Years’ War; German Baptists who had endured persecution; and Presbyterians and Seceders (ultra-Presbyterians) from Scotland and Ulster; also the Puritan Congregationalists from England. Practically all of these were Calvinists, or neo-Calvinists, and a large number of them were Ulster-Scotch Presbyterians. — H. Gordon Harold in Gaius J. Slosser, ed., They Seek a Country: The American Presbyterians (1955), pp. 151-152

Douglas F. Kelly had this to say about the “Presbyterian Rebellion” of 1776:

The gibe of some in the British Parliament that the American revolution was “a Presbyterian Rebellion” did not miss the mark. We may include in “Presbyterian” other Calvinists such as New England Congregationalists, many of the Baptists, and others. The long-standing New England tradition of “election day sermons” continued to play a major part in shaping public opinion toward rebellion toward England on grounds of transcendent law. Presbyterian preaching by Samuel Davies and others had a similar effect in preparing the climate of religious public opinion for resistance to royal or parliamentary tyranny in the name of divine law, expressed in legal covenants. Davies directly inspired Patrick Henry, a young Anglican, whose Presbyterian mother frequently took him to hear Davies.” — Douglas F. Kelly, The Emergence of Liberty in the Modern World: The Influence of Calvin on Five Governments From the 16th to the 18th Centuries (1992), pp. 131-132

At Log College Press, in appreciation of this great Calvinistic heritage which was bequeathed to 21st century Americans by Geneva and those who were inspired by her to come to these shores, we wish you and yours a very happy Fourth of July! And if we have not already “taxed” our readers’ patience without their consent (this blog post is admittedly longer than most), in the spirit of the day, we offer more to read from the following blog posts from the past. Blessings to you and yours!

John Witherspoon Was Born 300 Years Ago

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One of the great leaders of the early American Presbyterian church, John Witherspoon, was born 300 years ago, on February 5, 1723. We remember him as a minister, a President of the College of New Jersey (Princeton), a Founding Father of the United States of America, and as moderator of the first General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church in the United States of America (PCUSA).

Witherspoon was born in the village of Gifford, Scotland, where John Knox was also born two centuries before. He went on to attend the Haddington Grammar School, and later graduated from the University of Edinburgh with a Master of Arts in 1739, where he continued his studies in theology. He received an honorary doctoral degree in divinity from the University of St. Andrews in 1764. He ministered in Beith, Ayrshire (1745–1758), where he married Elizabeth Montgomery (they had ten children, with five surviving to adulthood), and at the Laigh Kirk, Paisley (1758-1768).

After declining the first invitation in 1766, Witherspoon accepted the second invitation to serve as President of the College of New Jersey in 1768. Already well-respected as a theologian and author on this side of the pond, Witherspoon became an important voice in American ecclesiastical affairs, and in the political realm as well.

He taught moral philosophy and other subjects at Princeton. He helped to organize the Nassau Presbyterian Church there, and he served in the Continental Congress as a delegate from New Jersey, and as chaplain, and signed both the Declaration of Independence and the Articles of Confederation. He preached a famous fast-day sermon called The Dominion of Providence Over the Passions of Men (1776), which includes these memorable words:

If your cause is just, you may look with confidence to the Lord, and intreat him to plead it as his own. You are all my witnesses, that this is the first time of my introducing any political subject into the pulpit. At this season, however, it is not only lawful but necessary, and I willingly embrace the opportunity of declaring my opinion without any hesitation, that the cause in which America is now in arms, is the cause of justice, of liberty, and of human nature. So far as we have hitherto proceeded, I am satisfied that the confederacy of the colonies has not been the effect of pride, resentment, or sedition, but of a deep and general conviction that our civil and religious liberties, and consequently in a great measure the temporal and eternal happiness of us and our posterity, depended on the issue. The knowledge of God and his truths have from the beginning of the world been chiefly, if not entirely confined to those parts of the earth where some degree of liberty and political justice were to be seen, and great were the difficulties with which they had to struggle, from the imperfection of human society, and the unjust decisions of unsurped authority. There is not a single instance in history, in which civil liberty was lost, and religious liberty preserved entire. If therefore we yield up our temporal property, we at the same time deliver the conscience into bondage.

In his later years, Witherspoon married for a second time and had two more children. He was elected as the moderator of the PCUSA General Assembly in 1789. He wrote the preface to the 1791 Isaac Collins Bible, the first family Bible published in America. He died at his farm Tusculum, just outside Princeton, in 1794, and was laid to rest at Princeton Cemetery.

Statues have been sculpted in his honor on both sides of the Atlantic and may be found in Washington, D.C., at Princeton University, at the University of the West of Scotland in Paisley, and at the Presbyterian Historical Society in Philadelphia. Witherspoon is remembered today as a man whose ideals included personal piety, ecclesiastical purity, and civil liberty, and who left his mark on the course of American and Presbyterian history. We honor him today as a man who contributed much to the shaping of the Presbyterian church, and whose legacy has left its mark on the whole world for good.

Happy Thanksgiving From Log College Press!

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The history of Thanksgiving is always a fascinating (and sometimes, controversial) topic. The site of the first Protestant Thanksgiving in America is usually associated with the Pilgrims of Plymouth, Massachusetts in 1621, but Virginia also puts forth a claim to an earlier observance of Thanksgiving at Jamestown in 1610, and even prior to that, Thanksgiving, including the singing of a psalm, was observed by the French Huguenots at Fort Caroline, near modern-day Jacksonville, Florida in 1564.

Moving forward to the colonial and early American eras, magistrates began to follow these earlier examples of gathering to give thanks at appointed occasions and they issued Thanksgiving proclamations. Two notable Presbyterians who had a hand in this were John Witherspoon and Elias Boudinot IV.

Witherspoon served on a committee which drafted the Thanksgiving proclamations by the Confederation Congress for 1781 and 1782. Boudinot, who served as President of the Confederation Congress, and later, as a representative of New Jersey in the U.S. House of Representatives, signed the Congressional Thanksgiving Proclamation for 1783, and also proposed the resolution calling upon President George Washington to issue a Thanksgiving proclamation in 1789.

Witherspoon’s 1781 Thanksgiving proclamation called upon Americans to:

assemble on that day, with grateful hearts, to celebrate the praises of our gracious benefactor; to confess our manifold sins; to offer up our most fervent supplications to the God of all grace, that it may please Him to pardon our offences, and incline our hearts for the future to keep all his laws; to comfort and relieve all our brethren who are in distress or captivity; to prosper our husbandmen, and give success to all engaged in lawful commerce; to impart wisdom and integrity to our counsellors, judgment and fortitude to our officers and soldiers; to protect and prosper our illustrious ally, and favor our united exertions for the speedy establishment of a safe, honorable and lasting peace; to bless all seminaries of learning; and cause the knowledge of God to cover the earth, as the waters cover the seas.

Boudinot’s 1789 Thanksgiving resolution called upon President Washington to

recommend to the people of the United States a day of public thanksgiving and prayer, to be observed by acknowledging, with grateful hearts, the many signal favors of Almighty God, especially by affording them an opportunity peaceably a Constitution of government for their safety and happiness.

Corporate giving of thanks to God as Creator and Governor of the Nations, through Christ, King of the Church and the Nations, has been the practice of Christian families, churches and nations for centuries, but as the holiday of Thanksgiving is a peculiarly American institution, it is helpful to reflect on its early history in colonial times leading up to the foundation of our republic.

Theodore L. Cuyler once wrote:

Thanksgiving Day is a fitting time to inventory your mercies and blessings. Set all your family to the pitch of the one hundred and third Psalm; and hang on the wall over your Thanksgiving dinner these mottoes -- 'A merry heart is a good medicine' -- and 'He that is of a cheerful heart hath a continual feast' ["'A Merry Heart Doeth Good': A Talk For Thanksgiving Day" (1897)].

We at Log College Press are thankful for our readers and their support, and we wish each of you a very joyful and Happy Thanksgiving. May God bless you and yours richly!

What's New at Log College Press? - November 15, 2022

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As the year winds down, Log College Press remains in high gear as we continue to expand the site and make accessible more and more literature from early American Presbyterians.

Last month, in October 2022, we added 494 new works to the site. There are currently over 16,000 free works available at LCP. Today we are highlighting some of the new free PDFs available as found on our Recent Additions and Early Access pages, two features provided to members of the Dead Presbyterians Society.

Some highlights at the Early Access page:

Some highlights at the Recent Addtiions page:

  • Philip Schaff edited both The American Church History series and A Select Library of the Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers of the Christian Church (first and second series). All of the above has now been added to Log College Press (approximately 23,000 pages of material);

  • Working for the Presbyterian Board of Publication, William M. Engles edited the 12-volume British Reformers series, which has now been added to his page;

  • The full run of The Penn Monthly Magazine under Robert E. Thompson’s editorship (13 volumes);

  • Dozens of works by Theodore L. Cuyler, Benjamin M. Palmer and Thomas DeWitt Talmage;

  • Joshua L. Wilson’s 1845 first sermon on witchcraft; and much more.

Also, be sure also to check out the quotes we have been adding at our blog for DPS members: Though Dead They Still Speak, including George Howe on the importance of a well-educated spiritual ministry; E.S. Ely on the duty of civic rulers to "kiss the Son"; Alexander Proudfit on the Biblical qualifications for public office; and Robert D. Wilson’s life plan to defend the Old Testament.

We appreciate hearing from our readers if they find matters needing correction, or if they have questions about authors or works on the site, or if they have suggestions for additions to the site. Your feedback helps the experience of other readers as well.

Meanwhile, please feel free to browse the many resources available to our readers in print and in digital format. There is a lot to explore, and many Presbyterian voices from the past to hear. Thank you, as always, for your interest and support, dear friends.

Davidson's Desiderata

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Early on in its history, in May 1853, a discourse was delivered at the Presbyterian Historical Society in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania by Robert B. Davidson: Presbyterianism: Its True Place and Value in History (1854). After an overview of the history of Presbyterianism in Scotland and in early America, Davidson left his hearers with a list of things things desired or wanted in connection with the goal of preserving the history of Presbyterianism - a desiderata. This list was an inspired effort to steer the work of the Presbyterian Historical Society as it began to put into practice the vision of its founder, Cortlandt Van Rensselaer.

  1. Collections of pamphlets, tractates, controversial and other essays, bearing on the history of the Presbyterian church in this country, especially touching the Schism of 1741. These should be bound in volumes, and arranged in chronological order, handy for reference. No time should be lost in this work, for pamphlets are very perishable commodities, and speedily vanish out of sight. A copy of Gilbert Tennent’s Remarks on the Protest cannot now be obtained. One was understood by Dr. Hodge, when he wrote his History, to be in the Antiquarian Library, in Worcester, Mass., but the work is reported by the librarian as missing. This shows us that we should hoard old pamphlets and papers with Mohammedan scrupulosity, especially when there are no duplicates.

  2. Collections, like Gillies’, of accounts of Revivals, and other memoranda of the progress of vital religion. Such collections would be supplementary to Gillies’ great work, which does not embrace the wonderful events of the present century in America.

  3. Collections of memoirs of particular congregations, of which quite a number have been at various times printed, and which ought to be brought together and preserved.

  4. Collections of occasional Sermons, both of deceased and living divines. As old productions are of interest to us, so such as are of recent publication may interest posterity. Such collections would furnish good specimens of the Presbyterian pulpit, and might be either chronologically or alphabetically arranged.

  5. Collections of discourses delivered about and after the era of the Revolution. They would exhibit in a striking and favorable light the patriotic sympathies of the clergy at that period, as also the popular sentiment on the independence of the States, and their subsequent union under the present constitution.

  6. A similar collection of Discourses preached on the day of Thanksgiving in the year 1851, would be very interesting; exhibiting the various views held on the Higher Law, and the preservation of the Union, and also the value of the Pulpit in pouring oil on the strong passions of mankind.

  7. Biographical sketches of leading Presbyterian divines and eminent laymen. It is understood that one of our most esteemed writers is engaged in the preparation of a work of this sort, embracing the different Christian denominations. Whatever emanates from his elegant pen will be sure to possess a standard value; but it is thought, from the very structure of his projected work, such a one as is now recommended will not interfere with it, nor its necessity be superseded. Mark the stirring catalogue that might be produced, names which, though they that bare them have been gathered to their fathers, still powerfully affect us by the recollection of what they once did, or said, or wrote, and by a multitude of interesting associations that rush into the memory: Makemie, the Tennents, Dickinson, Davies, Burr, Blair, the Finleys, Beattie, Brainerd, Witherspoon, Rodgers, Nisbet, Ewing, Sproat, the Caldwells, S. Stanhope Smith, John Blair Smith, McWhorter, Griffin, Green, Blythe, J.P. Campbell, Boudinot, J.P. Wilson, Joshua L. Wilson, Hoge, Speece, Graham, Mason, Alexander, Miller, John Holt Rice, John Breckinridge, Nevins, Wirt. Here is an array of names which we need not blush to see adorning a Biographia Presbyterianiana. And the materials for most of the sketches are prepared to our hand, and only require the touch of a skilful compiler.

  8. Lives of the Moderators. There have been sixty-four Moderators of the General Assembly; and as it is usual to call to the Chair of that venerable body men who enjoy some consideration among their brethren, it is fair to infer that a neat volume might be produced. Many were men of mark; and where this was not the case, materials could be gathered from the times in which they lived, or the doings of the Assembly over which they presided.

  9. A connected account or gazetteer of Presbyterian Missions, both Foreign and Domestic, with sketches of prominent missionaries, and topographical notices of the stations. Dr. Green prepared something of this sort, but it is meagre, and might be greatly enlarged and enriched.

  10. Reprints of scarce and valuable works. It may be objected that we have already a Board of Publication, who have this duty in charge; but it is not intended to do anything that would look like interference with that useful organ. The Board are expected to publish works of general utility, and likely to be popular, and so reimburse the outlay; this society would only undertake what would not fall strictly within the Board’s appropriate province, or would interest not the public generally, but the clerical profession.

  11. A continuation of the Constitutional History of the Presbyterian Church to the present time. The valuable work of Dr. Hodge is unfinished; and whether his engrossing professional duties will ever allow him sufficient leisure to complete it is, to say the least, doubtful.

  12. Should that not be done, then it will be desirable to have prepared an authentic narrative of the late Schism of 1838; or materials should be collected to facilitate its preparation hereafter, when it can be done more impartially than at present. Dr. Robert J. Breckinridge did a good service in this way, by publishing a series of Memoirs to serve for a future history, in the Baltimore Religious and Literary Magazine.

  13. It might be well to compile a cheap and portable manual for the use of the laity, containing a compact history of the Presbyterian Church in America.

Other proposals on Davidson’s list include a history of the rise and decline of English Presbyterianism; a history of the French Huguenots; and a history of the Reformation in Scotland as well as biographical sketches of Scottish divines.

It is a useful exercise for those who share Davidson’s interest in church history to pause and reflect on the extent to which the goals that he proposed have been met. The Presbyterian Historical Society itself — located in Philadelphia — has certainly done tremendous legwork in this regard as a repository of valuable historical materials which has allowed scholars the opportunity to study and learn from the past. We are extremely grateful for the efforts of the Presbyterian Historical Society. Samuel Mills Tenney’s similar vision led to the creation of the Historical Foundation of the Presbyterian and Reformed Churches in Montreat, North Carolina. The PCA Historical Center in St. Louis, Missouri is another such agency that has done great service to the church at large as a repository of Reformed literature and memorabilia.

We do have access today to Gilbert Tennent’s Remarks Upon a Protestation Presented to the Synod of Philadelphia, June 1, 1741. By 1861, we know that a copy was located and deposited, in fact, at Presbyterian Historical Society. Though not yet available in PDF form at Log College Press, it is available for all to read online in html through the Evans Early American Imprint Collection here.

The biographical sketches then in progress that Davidson referenced in point #7 were carried through to publication by William B. Sprague. His Annals of the American Pulpit remain to this day a tremendous resource for students of history, yet, as Davidson wisely noted, though many writers have followed in Sprague’s footsteps on a much more limited basis, there is always room for more to be done towards the creation of a Biographia Presbyterianiana.

Regarding the Lives of Moderators (point #8), we are grateful for the labors of Barry Waugh of Presbyterians of the Past to highlight the men that Davidson had in mind. The lists and biographical sketches that he has generated are a very useful starting point towards achieving the goal articulated by Davidson, and help to bring to mind the contributions of Moderators to the work of the church.

There are a number of organizations that have taken pains to reprint older Presbyterian works of interest. Too many to list here, the contributions of all those who share this vision to make literature from the past accessible to present-day readers is to be applauded, including the efforts of Internet Archive, Google Books and others who digitize such works. We at Log College Press also strive to do this both with respect to reprints and our library of primary sources. For us, the past is not dead, primary sources are not inaccessible, and the writings of 18th-19th century Presbyterians are not irrelevant. It is worth noting that there are topical pages with growing resources available on Log College Press that highlight material on biographies, church history, the 1837 Old School / New School division, sermons and much more.

Much more could be said in regards to the extent to which organizations, historians and others have carried forward the goals articulated by Davidson. But for now we leave it to our readers to consider Davidson’s Desiderata, articulated over 150 years ago, and its connection to our shared interest in preserving the history and literature of early American Presbyterianism.

Fourth of July Celebration at Log College Press

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If your cause is just — you may look with confidence to the Lord and intreat him to plead it as his own. You are all my witnesses, that this is the first time of my introducing any political subject into the pulpit. At this season however, it is not only lawful but necessary, and I willingly embrace the opportunity of declaring my opinion without any hesitation, that the cause in which America is now in arms, is the cause of justice, of liberty, and of human nature. — John Witherspoon, The Dominion of Providence Over the Passions of Men: A Sermon, Preached at Princeton, on the 17th of May, 1776. Being the General Fast Appointed by the Congress Through the United Colonies (1777)

It was five years ago today that Log College Press was founded on July 4, 2017. (See what this site looked like early on [as of January 19, 2018] via the Wayback Machine here.) Thanks to the support and encouragement of our dear readers, we have come a long way since then.

We have now published 7 books, and 10 booklets. Log College Press now has over 15,000 works by over 1,900 authors available to read on the site.

On this date in past years we have highlighted men who served the cause of civil and religious liberty, as well as books by our authors which celebrate the cause.

This year we take note of our authors which share a birthday with Log College Press and the United States of America:

At Log College Press we have much cause to celebrate, and we give thanks to God for the labors of godly men and women who have gone before in service to the cause of Christ and freedom. We also recognize how far this country has fallen from its ideal as epitomized in John Winthrop’s “City on a Hill” (1630).

Our national sins are great. It was in 1778 that Jacob Green famously said: “Can it be believed that a people contending for liberty should, at the same time, be promoting and supporting slavery?” And it was in 1832 that James R. Willson pointed out our great need as a nation to acknowledge our dependence upon and submission to God, and to kiss Son specifically, alluding to Ps. 2:12 and quoting Ps. 9:17, when took note of the great omission by our Constitutional Founding Fathers who chose not to honor God in our national charter: “Was it a mere omission? Did the convention that framed the constitution forget to name the living God? Was this an omission in some moment of national phrenzy, when the nation forgot God? That, indeed, were a great sin. God says, ‘the nations that forget God, shall be turned into hell’” (Prince Messiah).

Though far from where we as a nation ought to be, yet there is cause for remembrance of and thanksgiving for the blessings of the past as well as the mercies of today. As William B. Sprague once said, “LET THE DAY BE OBSERVED, BUT LET IT BE OBSERVED RELIGIOUSLY” (Religious Celebration of Independence: A Discourse Delivered at Northampton, on the Fourth of July, 1827 (1827)). That is to say, with respect to this civil holiday (as distinct from a religious holy day), we ought to celebrate its noblest ideals, exemplified in America’s fight for freedom and independence, with proper solemnities, in an appropriate Christian manner, but in humble acknowledgment of how far we as a people have still to go, by the grace of God, to arrive at those ideals.

To understand civil and religious freedom aright, we believe it is important to study God’s Word first, but not to neglect the study of history as well. Primary sources from the past are a valuable tool in promoting reformation and revival in the present. Our topical page on Church and State is one particular relevant resource. We thank our readers for their interest in and support of this project by Log College Press to make accessible what Presbyterians who have gone before had to say on this and other important matters. To God be the glory, as we we celebrate another Independence Day, and a birthday besides.

Justice Harlan and a Place for Dissent

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Yesterday, in the midst of a Senate confirmation hearing for Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson, who has been nominated to serve on the U.S. Supreme Court, the question was posed: “What do you think is the purpose of a dissent?” In her response, Judge Jackson made reference to a famous dissenting opinion by a noted Presbyterian jurist whom we have written about previously on Log College Press. She said,

There are actually many justices in history who have used the dissent mechanism to discuss the law in ways that others find, over time, to be more persuasive,” Jackson said. “I’m thinking of the first Justice Harlan, who dissented famously in Plessy v. Ferguson [1896]. He dissented alone. All of the other justices agreed with the proposition of ‘separate but equal,’ and he said ‘no’ in a dissent. And his dissent generations later became … the blueprint for Justice Marshall to make arguments that led to Brown v. Board [of Education of Topeka, 1954].

When Justice Harlan dissented from the Plessy “separate but equal” doctrine, he wrote:

But in view of the constitution, in the eye of the law, there is in this country no superior, dominant, ruling class of citizens. There is no caste here. Our constitution is color-blind, and neither knows nor tolerates classes among citizens. In respect of civil rights, all citizens are equal before the law. The humblest is the peer of the most powerful. The law regards man as man, and takes no account of his surroundings or of his color when his civil rights as guaranteed by the supreme law of the land are involved. It is, therefore, to be regretted that this high tribunal, the final expositor of the fundamental law of the land, has reached the conclusion that it is competent for a State to regulate the enjoyment by citizens of their civil rights solely upon the basis of race. In my opinion, the judgment this day rendered will, in time, prove to be quite as pernicious as the decision made by this tribunal in the Dred Scott case.

Fifty-eight years later, in Brown v. Board of Education, the U.S. Supreme Court repudiated Plessy in favor of the principle that racial segregation, even regarding otherwise equal facilities, is unjust, and finally affirmed the dissenting opinion of Justice Harlan, giving encouragement to those who, taking the long view, and trusting in God, believe that justice and truth will ultimately prevail.

James R. Willson Warns of Political Danger

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In 2009, Crown & Covenant Publications published a volume edited by RPCNA minister Gordon J. Keddie titled Political Danger, containing sermons, essays, letters and more by RPCNA minister James Renwick Willson. It is a valuable compendium of Willson’s works. Most of the material in that volume — and much more — is now available to read online at Log College Press, including the 1825 fast sermon Political Danger.

Based on three Scriptural passages (Ps. 12:8; Prov. 28:15; and Prov. 29:2), this sermon — originally titled Political Danger: A Sermon Preached on January 6, 1825, on the Occasion of a Fast Observed by Several Churches in Newburgh, N.Y., and Its Vicinity and originally published in The Evangelical Witness — warns of the danger to society when wicked men are exalted to high places in civil government (Ps. 12:8). Vice is defended, promoted and eventually imitated by citizens when wicked rulers shape wicked policies and call evil good. Willson goes on to explain how this principle is true in all times and places, and how the nation that embraces such wicked rulers incurs the wrath of God. After recounting the national sins of his day, Willson implored his hearers to humble themselves before God and seek His mercy. At this annual fast, he called upon Christians to “in prayer call upon Jehovah, invoking His blessing upon us during the present year and for all time to come.”

One wonders what Rev. Willson would think of the condition of the United States almost 200 years later. We do well to heed his admonition to humble ourselves before the Lord both in the church and in civil society. Take up this sermon and hear Willson’s voice preaching to us today with prayerful consideration.

Charles H. Parkhurst: An Advocate for Social Justice

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Although the term “Social Justice Warrior” was not in vogue (or in disrepute) at the time, the Rev. Charles H. Parkhurst might well have identified with the label. Parkhurst served as pastor of the Madison Square Presbyterian Church in New York City from 1880 to 1918, during which time he not only preached the gospel from the pulpit but also, beginning in 1892, famously took on municipal corruption in the form of Tammany Hall.

Vice and crime, as well as unjust law enforcement, had long been a concern of Christians in New York. The Rev. Howard Crosby preached a November 1883 Thanksgiving Sermon at the Fourth Avenue Presbyterian Church titled The City’s Disease and Remedy. After Crosby’s death in 1891, it was Parkhurst who succeeded him as President of the Society for the Prevention of Crime.

In surveying the situation around him, Parkhurst began to realize that so much of the corruption he and his parishioners encountered was not only protected but supported and encouraged by the very officials charged with upholding and enforcing the law. This led to a remarkable sermon preached on February 14, 1892 based on the text “Ye are the salt of the earth” (Matt. 5:13) which he was later to refer to as “The First Gun of the Campaign” against Tammany Hall. His direct assault on city leaders ignited a firestorm of criticism and media attention. In fact, city leaders convened a grand jury to force him to either substantiate his accusations of corruption from the pulpit or else face possible charges himself for perjury.

Madison Square Park c. 1908

Madison Square Park c. 1908

Within one week he was indeed subpoenaed to appear before a grand jury and was not able to offer any substantive evidence to support his claims apart from “uncontradicted newspaper reports,” and thus a week later the grand jury issued a report completely rebuking him and apparently vindicating city leaders. Parkhurst looked upon this development not as a defeat, however, but as an encouragement to go out and investigate the matter himself (he did hire private detectives to assist) and to gather the direct evidence needed to show the link between criminal operations and police involvement. Meanwhile, he continued to preach denunciations of “municipal misrule” from the pulpit. On March 13, 1892, Parkhurst again proclaimed that it was his Christian duty to oppose the corruption that he saw around him.

I do not speak as a Republican or a Democrat, as a Protestant or a Catholic, as an advocate of prohibition, or as an advocate of license. I am moved, so help me Almighty God, by the respect which I have for the Ten Commandments, and by my anxiety as a preacher of Jesus Christ, to have the law of God regnant in individual and social life; so that I antagonize our existing municipal administration, because I believe, with all the individual exceptions frankly conceded four weeks ago, that administration to be essentially corrupt, interiorly rotten, and in all its combined tendency and effect to stand in diametric resistance to all that Christ and a loyally Christian pulpit represent in the world.

After Parkhurst presented evidence to a grand jury in March 1892, that grand jury issued a report which condemned the role of the New York Police Department in fostering and protecting vice and crime in the city. Newspapers took note of how the tables were turned. Public pressure continued to mount upon the Police Department and the Tammany Hall leaders, culminating in the Lexow Committee’s investigation of police corruption, including bribery and organized crime, which did much to expose the connections unearthed by Parkhurst and the City Vigilance League, of which he also served as President.

The boss of Tammany Hall, Richard Croker, was forced to leave the country and reside in Europe for three years following the work of the Lexow Committee. A new mayor was elected in New York City in 1894 who did much to reign in the abuses of Tammany Hall. Municipal reform achieved a great victory in these various ways, and much of that victory is attributable to the perseverance and unflinching determination of Rev. Charles H. Parkhurst in the face of great opposition from those who ran city hall.

He addressed an audience on May 14, 1894 at Union Theological Seminary on the topic of the place of the pulpit in the area of social reform.

I am to speak of the relation of the minister to good government. In order to avoid all misapprehension, let us start out by saying that nothing should be allowed to interfere with the pulpit's prime obligation to convert men, women, and children to Christ in their individual character. No one can have attended carefully to Christ's method of working in the world without appreciating the emphasis which he laid upon the individual, and without feeling the volume of meaning there is in the fact that so many of his finest words and deepest lessons were delivered in the presence of but a single auditor. There are no associate results which do not hide all their roots in the separate individualities that combine to compose such association.

At the same time, what God thinks most of is not a man in his individual character, but men in their mutual and organized relations. That is the idea that the Bible leaves off upon, and in that way throws upon the idea the superb emphasis of finality, culminating, as Scripture does, not in the roll-call of a mob of sanctified individualities, but in the apocalyptic forecast of a holy city come down from God out of heaven; not men, therefore, taken as so many separate integers, but men conceived of as wrought up into the structure of a corporate whole social, municipal, civic.

Men require to be sanctified, but the relations which subsist between them require to be sanctified also. Philemon was a Christian and Onesimus was a Christian; but Onesimus was still Philemon's slave. Philemon had been converted, and Onesimus had been converted, but the relation between them had not been converted. A good part of every man is involved in his relations, and heaven is not arithmetic but organic.

Wherever men rub against one another, therefore, the pulpit has something to say, or ought to have something to say.

Read the story of his reform efforts in his own words in Our Fight With Tammany (1895) and My Forty Years in New York (1923).

American Independence and Presbyterians

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Log College Press began officially on July 4, 2017. We identify this date not only with the origin of LCP, but of course also with the founding of the United States of America, when the Declaration of Independence was promulgated in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania on July 4, 1776.

In 2018, we wished our readers a Happy Independence Day; in 2019, we spoke of “Freedom’s Cost’; in 2020, the theme was “Presbyterians and the Revolution”; and today we highlight Fourth of July orations and sermons by some noted Presbyterians.

It was customary for many Presbyterians to commemorate American Independence with speeches and sermons. Here we bring to your attention a representative sample of some specimens of Presbyterian Independence oratory.

  • Samuel Clark Aiken (1827) - Speaking to the Sunday School Societies in Utica, New York, on the 51st anniversary of American Independence, Rev. Aiken of the need for nations who have been greatly blessed to maintain religion in its public and private spheres, and of the role that Sunday Schools play in this.

  • Diarca Howe Allen (1861) - Rev. Allen’s discourse, published in 1862, focused on the centennial of Lebanon, New Hampshire in the context of a celebration of national independence.

  • Nathan Sidney Smith Beman (1841) - Rev. Beman’s discourse was titled The Western Continent. Looking both the past and the future, he spoke of national blessings which should continue to expand westward.

  • Elias Boudinot IV (1793) - Speaking to the Society of the Cincinnati of the State of New Jersey on the 17th anniversary of American Independence, Rev. Boudinot called upon his hearers, with a direct preceding message to President George Washington, to strive to maintain the ideals for which American patriots had fought: “The obligations of mankind to these worthy characters increase in proportion to the importance of the blessings purchased by their labors.” He also advocated for increased rights for women.

  • Frederick Thomas Brown (1865) - Speaking on the first Fourth of July following the War Between the States, Rev. Brown argued that this was an important moment for the country in which he prayed that our nation would become stronger and more unified.

  • Hooper Cumming (1817, 1821, 1824) - Rev. Cumming, in his short life, delivered a number of Fourth of July orations, some of which are found on his page. In each, he stirs up his hearers to appreciate our national blessings, and to strive to maintain godly ideals.

  • Daniel Dana (1814) - Delivered in the midst of the War of 1812, Rev. Dana reminded his audience that God is concerned with national affairs. He highlighted God’s providence not only with respect to America but also with respect to the affairs of Europe.

  • Ezra Stiles Ely (1827) - Rev. Ely preached a Fourth of July sermon (published in 1828) — based on the concluding verses of Psalm 2 — on The Duty of Christian Freemen to Elect Christian Rulers. According to Ely, the Lord Jesus Christ is the rightful sovereign of all lands.

  • Timothy Flint (1815) - Speaking on the first Fourth of July after the War of 1812 ended, Rev. Flint called to mind the troubles that the nation had endured, but with thankfulness for the mercies of God in seeing the country through.

  • Ralph Randolph Gurley (1825) - Rev. Gurley spoke in Washington, D.C. of a religious celebration of national blessings; yet, he also addressed the fact that slavery continued to be a stain on our national honor, and of efforts to colonize Western Africa with freed slaves.

  • Symmes Cleves Henry (1824) - In this oration delivered before the Society of Cincinnati of the State of New Jersey, Rev. Henry spoke of the ideals represented by the historical events commemorated on the 48th anniversary of American Independence.

  • William Linn (1791) - Rev. Linn’s sermon, preached in New York, was based on Ps. 16:6: “The lines are fallen unto me in pleasant places; yea, I have a goodly heritage.” He recounted many of the blessings that God’s favor had granted to a young nation.

  • John McKnight (1794) - Rev. McKnight’s Fourth of July sermon, preached in New York City, was titled God the Author of Promotion and based on Ps. 75:6-9. In the context of celebrating the birth of the American nation, he reminds his hearers that it is God who raises up and casts down.

  • Samuel Miller (1793, 1795) - Among the earliest published sermons of Rev. Miller were two Fourth of July messages preached in New York City. The first was titled Christianity the Grand Source and Surest Basis for Political Liberty.

  • Eliphalet Nott (1801) - On the 25th anniversary of American Independence, Rev. Nott spoke of The Providence of God towards American Israel.

  • George Potts (1826) - It was on the same day that both John Adams and Thomas Jefferson died that Rev. Potts, speaking in Philadelphia, commemorated the 50th anniversary of American Independence.

  • Horace Southworth Pratt (1828) - Preaching in Fryeburg, Maine Rev. Pratt spoke of the nature of freedom and liberty Biblically understood.

  • Nathaniel Scudder Prime (1825) - Rev. Prime’s sermon highlighted a critical defect in our national freedom from tyranny: The Year of Jubilee; But Not to Africans: A Discourse, Delivered July 4th, 1825, Being the 49th Anniversary of American Independence.

  • David Ramsay (1778) - Speaking to an audience in Charleston, South Carolina on the 2nd anniversary of American Independence, Dr. Ramsay encouraged his hearers to consider the advantages of liberty in the midst of a war that was far from over. He would go on to record the history of the American War of Independence.

  • Henry Ruffner (1856) - Addressing his fellow Virginians in 1856 (before West Virginia seceded), Rev. Ruffner spoke of the necessity of maintaining the Federal Union: “United we stand, divided we fall.”

  • William McKendree Scott (1851) - In time-honored fashion, Rev. Scott spoke to his fellow citizens at a “barbacue” held in Danville, Kentucky to commemorate our national independence.

  • Isaac Nathan Shannon (1852) - Rev. Shannon, preaching in New Brunswick, New Jersey, highlighted the providence of God in the history of the American nation.

  • William Buell Sprague (1827, 1830) - Rev. Sprague preached on the 51st and 54th anniversaries of American Independence, calling for religious celebration of this momentous event in our history, and reminding his congregation that “Happy is the people whose God is the Lord” (Ps. 144:15).

  • Joseph Sweetman (1810) - Rev. Sweetman preached on religion as the foundation for national prosperity at Charlton, New York.

  • Joseph Farrand Tuttle (1876) - Speaking on the centennial of American Independence, Rev. Tuttle recalled the efforts and sacrifices of the revolutionary forefathers of Morris County, New Jersey.

  • William Spotswood White (1840) - Rev. White preached on 4th of July Reminiscences and Reflections: A Sermon in Charlottesville, Virginia, also on Ps. 144:15. Acknowledging the political agitations that were convulsing the land at the time, he spoke of the providential guidance and blessing that America has received and for which we should give thanks.

It is worth taking time to brush off the dust, so to speak, on these historical orations and sermons and consider what our American Presbyterian forefathers had to say about independence, liberty, national blessings, and the need for further reformation, and freedom for all.

Happy Independence Day to our readers from Log College Press!

Justice Harlan's Dissent: "Our Constitution is color-blind."

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On May 18, 1896, the U.S. Supreme Court handed down a decision in Plessy v. Ferguson which affirmed the doctrine of “separate but equal” in favor of the state of Louisiana’s right to maintain racially segregated public transportation systems. The vote was 7-1 and the lone dissenter was Associate Justice John Marshall Harlan.

Justice Harlan was also a ruling elder and a Sunday School teacher at the New York Avenue Presbyterian Church in Washington, D.C. Wallace Radcliffe presided over the justice’s funeral when he passed away in 1911. Harlan’s dissent (recently added to Log College Press) contains some memorable words that reflect his conviction that disparate treatment of citizens by the government based on race was unjust.

But in view of the constitution, in the eye of the law, there is in this country no superior, dominant, ruling class of citizens. There is no caste here. Our constitution is color-blind, and neither knows nor tolerates classes among citizens. In respect of civil rights, all citizens are equal before the law. The humblest is the peer of the most powerful. The law regards man as man, and takes no account of his surroundings or of his color when his civil rights as guaranteed by the supreme law of the land are involved. It is, therefore, to be regretted that this high tribunal, the final expositor of the fundamental law of the land, has reached the conclusion that it is competent for a State to regulate the enjoyment by citizens of their civil rights solely upon the basis of race. In my opinion, the judgment this day rendered will, in time, prove to be quite as pernicious as the decision made by this tribunal in the Dred Scott case.

Lady Justice and her blindfold.

Lady Justice and her blindfold.

Although he failed to persuade his colleagues in 1896, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in Brown v. Board of Education (1954) that “separate but equal” public education was unconstitutional, thus essentially rendering Plessy v. Ferguson a dead letter.

The principle that he stood for was an outworking of his religious beliefs. James W. Gordon wrote in “Religion and the First Justice Harlan: A Case Study in Late Nineteenth-Century Presbyterian Constitutionalism” Marquette Law Review Vol. 85, No. 2 (2001):

The first Justice John Marshall Harlan was a deeply religious man. As a devout and life-long "Old School" Presbyterian, Harlan's religious convictions shaped his style as a judge. They also provided him with a concrete standard against which to measure the "rightness" or "wrongness" of the world he saw around him, a standard he often consciously or unconsciously applied in his public life.

Justice Harlan also opposed tolerating polygamy in U.S. territories, siding with the majority in Reynolds v. United States (1879) and in Davis v. Beason (1890), and again opposed racial segregation as the lone dissenter in Berea College v. Kentucky (1908).

Certainly it is the case that the U.S. Constitution has deficiencies which not only include a failure to acknowledge God or Jesus Christ as the fountain of its authority, but also its original acceptance of slavery and the Three-Fifths Compromise in which slaves were reckoned as less than a person for census purposes. But Justice Harlan was a man of principle regarding Christian civil ethics, particularly with respect to the idea that race should not be a factor in how the government treats one citizen in contrast to another. “Our Constitution is color-blind,” said Justice Harlan.

An American Presbyterian remembers the Edict of Nantes

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It was on April 13, 1598 that the Edict of Nantes was signed by Henry IV of France granting a measure of religious liberty to French Huguenots after decades of armed conflict with the Roman Catholic majority. This event is a major landmark in the history of Western civilization as well as Protestant church history. The civil and religious freedom granted to suffering Huguenots in 1598 was gradually undermined and finally revoked by Louis XIX in October 1685, leading to the world-wide French Huguenot Diaspora. But freedom, in God’s Providence, always find a path to victory over tyranny.

The signing of the Edict of Nantes by Henry IV on April 13, 1598.

The signing of the Edict of Nantes by Henry IV on April 13, 1598.

For reflections on the importance of the Edict of Nantes, we turn today to the writings of an American Presbyterian who specialized in the history of the French Huguenots, Henry Martyn Baird, who called it “one of the most illustrious of laws ever enacted in behalf of religious liberty” (The Huguenots and Henry of Navarre, Vol. 2 (1886), p. 414.

For both Henry M. Baird and his brother Charles, the Edict and its Revocation were among the most important miles in the history of the French Huguenots and indeed in world history.

It was on the 200th anniversary of the Revocation that Henry addressed the Huguenot Society of America on The Edict of Nantes and Its Recall (1886) and it was on the 300th anniversary of the Edict itself that Henry addressed that same body on The Strength and Weakness of the Edict of Nantes (1898). The combined historical studies by Henry and Charles of the rise and diaspora of the French Huguenots, and Henry of Navarre (Henry IV), all highlight the Edict as the highwater mark of civil and religious liberty in this period, and its Revocation as a terrible blow to freedom (which God nevertheless used for much good in spreading his people across the globe), and thus it is worth recalling to mind this chapter of church history. It is never inapropos, and indeed always timely, to study the history and principles of freedom under God.

The Almond Tree in Blossom: A Tribute to the Godly Father of T. De Witt Talmage

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Thomas De Witt Talmage — “the American Spurgeon,” one of the most famous preachers in American history — was the youngest son of David T. and Catherine “Catey” Van Nest Talmage. Born in New Jersey, where his father would serve in the state legislature, the son was raised in the Reformed Church (David served as a deacon in the First Church of Raritan), and that is where Thomas began his ministry before being called to serve in the Presbyterian Church.

Engraving of the 1833 Leonid Meteor Shower by Adolf Vollmy (1889), based on the painting by Karl Jauslin.

Engraving of the 1833 Leonid Meteor Shower by Adolf Vollmy (1889), based on the painting by Karl Jauslin.

Thomas once gave an account of his father’s experience traveling between work and home of an event that astronomers still talk about today. The horse that David Talmage was riding was named “Star.”

My father was on the turnpike road between Trenton and Bound Brook, coming through the night from Trenton, where he was serving the State, to his home, where there was sickness. I have often heard him tell about it. It was the night of the 12th and the morning of the 13th of November, 1833. The sky was cloudless and the air clear. Suddenly the heavens became a scene never to be forgotten. From the constellation Leo meteors began to shoot out in all directions. For the two hours between four and six in the morning it was estimated that a thousand meteors a minute flashed and expired. It grew lighter than noon-day. Through the upper air shot arrows of fire! Balls of fire! Trails of fire! Showers of fire! Some the appearances were larger than the full moon. All around the heavens explosion followed explosion. Sounds as well as sights! The air filled with an uproar. All the luminaries of the sky seemed to have received marching orders. The ether was ribbed and interlaced and garlanded with meteoric display. From horizon to horizon everything was in combustion and conflagration. The spectacle ceased not until the rising sun of the November morning eclipsed it, and the whole American nation sat down exhausted with the agitations of a night to be memorable until the earth itself shall become a falling star. The Bible closes with such a scene of falling lights — not only fidgety meteors, but grave old stars. St. John saw it in prospect and wrote: ‘The stars of heaven fell unto the earth even as a fig tree casteth her untimely figs when she is shaken of a mighty wind.’ What a time there will be when worlds drop! Rain of planets! Gravitation letting loose her grip on worlds! Constellations falling apart and galaxies dissolved!

David Talmage also served as sheriff, and worked to promote education in New Jersey. He lived a long and fruitful life (1783-1865). When he died, Thomas delivered a commemorative sermon titled “The Beauty of Old Age,” based on Ecclesiastes 12:5: “The almond tree shall flourish.”

An almond tree in blossom.

An almond tree in blossom.

Thomas spoke of how his father shined so brightly even in old age. Even as the almond tree blossoming is a picture of the same.

Finally, I notice that in my father’s old age was to be seen the beauty of Christian activity.

He had not retired from the field. He had been busy so long, you could not expect him idle now. The faith I have described was not an idle expectation that sits with its hands in its pocket idly waiting, but a feeling which gather up all the resources of the soul, and hurls them upon one grand design. He was among the first who toiled in Sabbath-schools and never failed to speak praise of these institutions. No storm or darkness ever kept him away from prayer-meeting. In the neighbourhood where he lived, for years he held a devotional meeting. Oftentimes the only praying-man present before a handful of attendants, he would give out the hymn, read the lines, conduct the music, and pray. Then read the Scriptures and pray again. Then lead forth in the Doxology with an enthusiasm as if there were a thousand people present, and all the Church members had been doing their duty. He went forth visiting the sick, burying the dead, collecting alms for the poor, inviting the ministers of religion to his household, in which there was, as in the house of Shunem, a little room over the wall, with bed and candlestick for any passing Elisha. He never shuddered at the sight of a subscription-paper, and not a single great cause of benevolence has arisen within the last half-century which he did not bless with his beneficence. Oh! this was not a barren almond-tree that blossomed. His charity was not like the bursting of the bud of a famous tree in the South, that fills the whole forest with its racket, nor was it a clumsy thing, like the fruit in some tropical clime, that crashes down, almost knocking the life out of those who gather it, for in his case the right hand knew not what the left hand did. The churches of God, in whose service he toiled, have arisen as one man to declare his faithfulness and to mourn their loss. He stood in the front of the holy war, and the courage which never trembled or winced in the presence of temporal danger induced him to dare all things for God. In church matters he was not afraid to be shot at. Ordained, not by the laying on of human hands, but by the imposition of a Saviour’s love, he preached by his life, in official position, and legislative hall, and commercial circles, a practical Christianity. He showed that there was a such a thing as honesty in politics. He slandered no party, stuffed no ballot-box, forged no naturalization papers, intoxicated no voters, told no lies, surrendered no principle, countenanced no demagogueism. He called things by their rightful names; and what others styled prevarication, exaggeration, misstatement, or hyperbole, he called a lie. Though he was far from being undecided in his views, and never professed neutrality, or had any consort with those miserable men who boast how well they can walk on both sides of a dividing-line and be on neither, yet even in the excitements of election canvass, when his name was hotly discussed in public journals, I do not think his integrity was ever assaulted. Started every morning with a chapter of the Bible, and his whole family around him on their knees, he forgot not, in the excitement of the world, that he had a God to serve and a heaven to win. The morning prayer came up on one side of the day, and the evening prayer on the other side, and joined each other in an arch above his head, under the shadow of which he walked all the day. The Sabbath worship extended into Monday’s conversation, and Tuesday’s bargain, and Wednesday’s mirthfulness, and Thursday’s controversy, and Friday’s sociality, and Saturday’s calculation.

Through how many thrilling scenes he had passed! He stood, at Morristown, in the choir that chanted when George Washington was buried; talked with young men whose grandfathers he had held on his knee; watched the progress of John Adam’s administration; denounced, at the time, Aaron Burr’s infamy; heard the guns that celebrated the New Orlean’s victory; voted against Jackson, but lived long enough to wish we had one just like him; remembered when the first steamer struck the North River with its wheel buckets; flushed with excitement in the time of National Banks and Sub-Treasury; was startled at the birth of telegraphy; saw the United States grow from a speck on the world’s map, till all nations dip their flag at our passing merchantmen, and our “national airs” have been heard on the steeps of the Himalayas; was born while the revolutionary cannon were coming home from Yorktown, and lived to hear the tramp of troops returning from the war of the great Rebellion; lived to speak the names of eighty children, grandchildren, and great grandchildren. Nearly all his contemporaries gone! Aged Wilberforce said that sailors drink to “friends astern” until half way over sea, and then drink to “friends ahead.” With him it had for a long time been “friends ahead.” So also with my father. Long and varied pilgrimage! Nothing but sovereign grace could have kept him true, earnest, useful and Christian through so many exciting scenes.

He worked unweariedly from the sunrise of youth to the sunset of old age, and then in the sweet nightfall of death, lighted by the starry promises, went home, taking his sheaves with him. Mounting from earthly to heavenly service, I doubt not there were a great multitude that thronged heaven’s gate to hail him into the skies — those whose sorrows he has appeased, whose burdens he had lifted, whose guilty souls he had pointed to a pardoning God, whose dying moments he had cheered, whose ascending spirits he had helped up on the wings of sacred music. I should like to have heard that long, loud, triumphant shout, of heaven’s welcome. I think that the harps throbbed with another thrill, and the hills quaked with a mightier hallelujah. Hall, ransomed soul! thy race run — thy toil ended. Hail to the coronation!

Like an almond tree in blossom — which does so in winter, as Thomas notes (see “The Almond-Tree in Blossom” in his 1872 Sermons) — David Talmage served God well in old age, and the tribute that his son left for him is an encouragement to others, young and old, that one can hold on the starry promises, and shine all the brighter, not only in the noon-day of life, but also towards the end our days, even in the darkest of nights.

Princeton Presbyterian and Translator of Kuyper: J. Hendrik De Vries

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John Hendrik De Vries (1859-1939) was a Dutch-born Presbyterian minister who served as pastor of the Second Presbyterian Church in Princeton, New Jersey and elsewhere. His contribution to the church was significant in making available in English works by Dutch pastors such as Abraham Kuyper and Herman Bavinck.

We have recently added some of his translations and other works to Log College Press. Take note of these translation works by De Vries:

  • Pantheism’s Destruction of Boundaries (1893) - by Abraham Kuyper

  • Calvinism: The Origin and Safeguard of Our Constitutional Liberties (1895) - by Abraham Kuyper

  • Encyclopedia of Sacred Theology: Its Principles (1898) - by Abraham Kuyper with an introduction by B.B. Warfield

  • Abraham Kuyper’s Stone Lectures on Calvinism (1898) - This edition includes B.B. Warfield’s handwritten notes about the translation process. J. Hendrik De Vries translated lectures one and five (Calvinism in History, and Calvinism and Art), and Geerardhus Vos translated the final lecture (Calvinism and the Future).

  • The Work of the Holy Spirit (1900) — by Abraham Kuyper

  • Creation or Development (1901) — by Herman Bavinck

  • The Biblical Criticism of the Present Day (1904) — by Abraham Kuyper

  • To Be Near Unto God (1918) — by Abraham Kuyper

De Vries translated other works by Kuyper, which we hope to add to Log College Press in the future, but for now be sure to check out his page for the works that we have currently. The ties between Princeton and Kuyper were strong, and De Vries was an important link in the chain.

Political Dissent by Early American Covenanters

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“John Ploughman says, Of two evils choose neither. Don't choose the least, but let all evils alone.” — Charles Spurgeon, The Salt-Cellars: Being a Collection of Proverbs, Together with Homely Notes Thereon (1889), p. 297

“...instead of being fixed by their favourite poster, 'of two evils choose the least,' I say,... when you give me the choice of two moral evils, I can choose neither of them. If I have the choice of two physical evils, I will choose the least. If I am asked whether I would choose to lose a toe or a leg, I would choose to part with a toe; but if I am asked whether I would desecrate the Sabbath by steam or by horse power, I say I would do neither. There is a dangerous and deadly fallacy lurking beneath this common maxim, against which I would warn all; for of two moral evils we must choose neither — we are not at liberty to do evil that good may come.” — William Symington, Speech of the Rev. Dr. Symington at the great meeting, for protesting against the desecration of the Sabbath by the running of trains on the Edinburgh and Glasgow railway on the Lord's day, held in the City Hall, Glasgow, February 26, 1842

“There is one political maxim that comforts me: ‘The Lord reigns.’” — John Newton, Letter III to Mrs. P., August 1775

When the Testimony of the Reformed Presbyterian Church in America (RPCNA) was adopted in 1806 (published in 1807 under the title Reformation Principles Exhibited), a full chapter was included on the subject, in addition to the one on civil government, concerning “the right of Dissent from a Constitution of Civil Government.” Because American Covenanters view the scope of Christ’s dominion as King to include all things — nations as well as the church — they historically considered it sinful to omit (as the U.S. Constitution does) allegiance to him as King (Ps. 2:10-12). And further, oaths such as that required of elected officials (and often voters) by the same Constitution were consequently considered unlawful.

William Gibson, one of the early Covenanter ministers in America, who was involved in the preparation of Reformation Principles Exhibited, had in fact fled Ireland because of his refusal to swear an oath of allegiance to the government during the Irish Rebellion of 1797. Alexander McLeod, author of Messiah, Governor of the Nations of the Earth — a classic statement of Covenanter doctrine concerning the Mediatorial Kingship of Christ over all things — wrote about political dissent in the historical section of the RP Testimony. These men, as well as James Renwick Willson, Samuel B. Wylie and others, were confronted early on with issues of what it meant to be a loyal, patriotic civic-minded American citizen in the newly-formed republic of the United States of America.

For many Covenanters — and abolitionists in general, such as William L. Garrison, who described the U.S. Constitution as “a covenant with death and an agreement with hell” — the founding charter of this country, rather than manifesting Biblically-required submission to the laws of Christ, mandated sinful involvement by all who voted or swore oaths of allegiance to a document that exalted “We, the people” at the expense of Christ’s honor, and positively required endorsement of, a system that upheld the wicked practice of enslaving human beings. Thus, early American Covenanters declined to vote, or serve on juries, or to participate in any political activity that required them to sanction the political process as it then existed.

Even after the War Between the States — or, the “Late Rebellion” as it was termed by some — political dissent was viewed as a crucial aspect of Covenanter testimony to the claims of the Lord Jesus Christ upon America. It was not until the 1960’s that the doctrine of political dissent was dropped as a term of communion within the RPCNA. The current RP Testimony allows for voting in American civil elections if candidates meet certain criteria involving fidelity to Christian moral and doctrinal standards. However, a consistent application of the even current standard teaching of the RPCNA would prohibit a Covenanter from voting for most (all?) candidates standing for the 2020 election, if principle rather than pragmatism holds sway.

At the heart of this historic dissent from political activity in America is not an Anabaptistic rejection of all involvement in civil affairs. Covenanters confess (see the Westminster Confession of Faith chap. 23) that civil government is a good and needful ordinance of God. Their political activity in American history with regard to opposition to slavery (and other current forms of legal but immoral conduct such as Sabbath-breaking and abortion), is well-documented (see Joseph S. Moore, Founding Sins: How a Group of Antislavery Radicals Fought to Put Christ into the Constitution). The concern of Covenanters for godly civil government has always been at the forefront of their core convictions; so much so that their unpopular stand regarding political dissent has led them to suffer persecution for their unwillingness to embrace American political ideals. James R. Willson was once burned in effigy after he published Prince Messiah's Claims to Dominion Over All Governments; and the Disregard of His Authority by the United States, in the Federal Constitution (1832). Covenanters have historically considered it a noble and worthy sacrifice to decline to avail themselves of the political privilege of voting as long as the oath of allegiance to the U.S. Constitution is a part of the process of the elective franchise. But these were the same body of people who — beginning with Alexander Craighead, who was the first Presbyterian in America to publicly justify armed rebellion against Great Britain in 1743, and whose principles inspired the 1775 Mecklenburg Declaration of Independence — were front and center in the fight for American Independence, and in the fight for freedom for American slaves. Their desire for reformation encompassed both church and state.

Much more could be said about the Covenanter principle of political dissent, but to read them in their own words, it is helpful to consult the following:

  • Thomas Houston Acheson, Why Covenanters Do Not Vote (1912) - In this brief two-part article, Acheson gives six reasons that are NOT the reason why Covenanters do not vote; his six-fold reason why Covenanters do not vote; and the response to twelve objections to the Covenanter position.

  • George Alexander Edgar, The Reformed Presbyterian Catechism (1912) - In this catechism of RP principles (a reprise of Roberts’ 1853 catechism cited below), it is taught that nations and their constitutions are morally accountable before God, and that Christians therefore have a duty to dissent from immoral constitutions.

  • Finley Milligan Foster, What Voting Under an Unchristian Constitution Involves (n.d.) - This tract sketches the basic arguments of Covenanters that the U.S. Constitution is immoral, the act of voting involves acceptance of an immoral constitution, and that such is a sin against the King of the nations.

  • James Mitchell Foster, Shall We Condemn the Aggravated Guilt of This Nation in Vitiating the Consciences of its Christian Citizens by Requiring Them to Swear Allegiance to the Secular Constitution of the U.S. as the Condition of Exercising Their Political Privileges in the Governing Body? (1909) — No summary is needed after reading the title.

  • William Melancthon Glasgow, History of the Reformed Presbyterian Church in America - Political dissent is a recurring theme throughout Glasgow’s standard history of the denomination.

  • Nathan Robinson Johnston, “Political Dissent” (1892) - This is a letter to the editor of the Christian Instructor, reprinted in Political Dissenter, which responds to an article critiquing the Covenanter position on political dissent. Johnston responds to several points made by the author of that article in defense of political dissent.

  • James Calvin McFeeters, The Covenanters in America: The Voice of Their Testimony on Present Moral Issues (1892) - This testimony by McFeeters includes a chapter on “The Covenanters and Political Dissent.”

  • Alexander McLeod, Reformation Principles Exhibited (1807) - As mentioned above, this first Testimony of the RPCNA contains an historical section as well as a doctrinal outline, both of which articulate a position of political dissent from constitutions which omit and oppose allegiance to Christ.

  • John Wagner Pritchard, Soldiers of the Church: The Story of What the Reformed Presbyterians (Covenanters) of North America, Canada, and the British Isles, Did to Win the World War of 1914-1918 (1919) - This volume, of which we have written before, examines the contributions of RP members to the war effort in World War I in light of the issue of the usual requirements of soldiers to swear an oath of allegiance to their government. He writes: "People who do not understand, marvel that a Covenanter will give his life for his country but withholds his vote at election time. A Covenanter will give his life because of his loyalty to his country, and withholds his vote at election time because of his loyalty to Christ. To become a soldier he is required to swear loyalty to his country, and that he is always eager to do; but to vote at an election he is required to swear to a Constitution of Civil Government that does not recognize the existence of God, the authority of Christ over the nation, nor any obligation to obey His moral law; and that his conception of loyalty to Christ will not permit him to do."

  • William Louis Roberts, The Reformed Presbyterian Catechism (1853) — In this catechism of RP principles, “The right and duty of dissent from an immoral constitution of civil government” is identified as one of the twelve distinctive teachings of the RPCNA.

  • James McLeod Willson, Bible Magistracy; or, Christ's Dominion Over the Nations (1842) - After sketching fundamental principles of civil government and Christ’s Kingship over the nations, Willson applies those principles to the situation in the United States and affirms the need for political dissent.

  • James Renwick Willson, Prince Messiah's Claims to Dominion Over All Governments; and the Disregard of His Authority by the United States, in the Federal Constitution (1832) - This is perhaps the most detailed critique of the U.S. Constitution and its flaws from the Covenanter perspective.

  • Richard Cameron Wylie, Dissent From Unscriptural Political Systems (1896) - An address delivered at the First International Convention of Reformed Presbyterian Churches, held in Scotland, outlines reasons why Covenanters held to the doctrine of political dissent.

Although the doctrine of political dissent from immoral constitutions is not widely understood or accepted today among Christians and even among some Reformed Presbyterians, it is helpful to consider what early Covenanters believed in this country concerning involvement in civil affairs. There are some today who may abstain from voting because of indifference or apathy; those Covenanters did so out of a deep abiding conviction that Christ must be honored in the halls of government and at the ballot box. In this election year, it is worth pondering those convictions in the light of Scripture, and seeking to understand whether these principles remain relevant. There are many avenues to reformation, but the means as well as the end must be able to stand in the light of God’s word in order for a nation to be blessed. As A.A. Hodge (not a Covenanter, but a vice-president of the National Reform Association) said:

In the name of your own interests I plead with you; in the name of your treasure-houses and barns, of your rich farms and cities, of your accumulations in the past and your hopes in the future, — I charge you, you never will be secure if you do not faithfully maintain all the crown-rights of Jesus the King of men. In the name of your children and their inheritance of the precious Christian civilization you in turn have received from your sires; in the name of the Christian Church, — I charge you that its sacred franchise, religious liberty, cannot be retained by men who in civil matters deny their allegiance to the King. In the name of your own soul and its salvation; in the name of the adorable Victim of that bloody and agonizing sacrifice whence you draw all your hopes of salvation; by Gethsemane and Calvary, — I charge you, citizens of the United States, afloat on your wide wild sea of politics, There is Another King, One Jesus: The Safety Of The State Can Be Secured Only In The Way Of Humble And Whole-souled Loyalty To His Person and of Obedience His Law (Popular Lectures on Theological Themes, p. 287).

A Century-Old Message to China From the RPCNA

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On April 27, 1913, a national day of prayer, called for by the government of the Republic of China, was observed by Christian churches then in existence in that nation. Its purpose was to seek divine assistance for the problems besetting the new republic (following the Revolution of 1911), including its efforts at codifying a constitutional framework of government.

The Synod of the Reformed Presbyterian Church of America (RPCNA), which had been active in missionary efforts in China since at least the late 19th century, determined to offer its counsel to the government, particularly with respect to the duty of nations to honor the “King of kings, and Lord of lords” (Rev. 19:16), Jesus Christ.

A 55-page pamphlet was authored on behalf of the RPCNA by Rev. William John McKnight, and delivered to the government of China by Rev. John Knox Robb. An account of its delivery is given in the Christian Nation for April 8, 1914 by John W. Pritchard. Recently, McKnight’s rare work was uploaded to Log College Press.

McKnight, William John, A Message to China Title Page 3.jpg

The pamphlet begins by sending greetings and the warmest wishes for the success of the new government. It also assures its intended Chinese recipients that the RPCNA has petitioned the U.S. Congress for the repeal of the Chinese Exclusion Act, and desires to see any wrongs done to China by the U.S. properly remedied.

Sun Yat-sen had briefly served as President of the Republic of China in 1912 (McKnight quotes the words of Sun in the pamphlet); Yuan Shikai was the President in 1913-1914, when the RPCNA’s “Message to China” was authored and delivered. The unsettled status of draft versions of a Chinese constitution, among related matters, led to the call to Christian churches for a day of prayer, and to the RPCNA’s determination to reach out to China in this matter.

McKnight discusses at great length the flaws of the American constitution in omitting any homage to Jesus Christ. The RPCNA has long testified that it is the duty of nations to publicly and explicitly acknowledge the true God and to seek his assistance and blessing in accordance with the words of Ps. 2:10-12: “Be wise now therefore, O ye kings: be instructed, ye judges of the earth. Serve the LORD with fear, and rejoice with trembling. Kiss the Son, lest he be angry, and ye perish from the way, when his wrath is kindled but a little. Blessed are all they that put their trust in him.” McKnight tells the story of Alexander Hamilton who once quipped when asked why there was no mention of God in the U.S. Constitution, “We forgot.” He also quotes, among many other noted Americans theologians, Chauncey Lee, who said, “Let it, then, be received, as an axiom in politics; let it be engraven upon our hearts, as with the point of a diamond; that Religion is the only sure foundation of a free and happy government.”

McKnight, William John, A Message to China Title Page.jpg

The principles of free, just and pious civil government, and the RPCNA’s earnest desire to see them implemented in the newly-formed Republic of China, and to avoid the pitfalls of an atheistic government such as America adopted in 1789, constitute the heart of McKnight’s “Message to China.” The pamphlet both begins and ends with prayers and good wishes for the well-being of China, and an earnest desire for the new republic’s success and prosperity.

From the report by Robb published by Pritchard, we learn that a box containing hundreds of copies of the Message intended for each member of the legislature to read mysteriously disappeared (thousands more, we know from the 1913 RP Synod minutes, were intended to be delivered to RP missionaries in China). Yet, the Message was delivered to the government. However, history tells us that the Republic of China, although it was remarkable enough that it sought divine assistance through of day of prayer, did not ever promulgate a constitution that did as the Covenanters hoped — acknowledging submission to King Jesus. China’s 20th century history is overall a tremendously sad chapter, but the RPCNA and other denominations have never stopped praying for reformation in that great land. The 1913 RP “Message to China” stands as an enduring, if not well-known, testimony to lessons that should be applied by all nations on earth, as well as 21st century China. Read the full pamphlet here, and be encouraged for pray for China today, as well as our own nation.

No God in the Constitution

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The wicked shall be turned into hell, and all the nations that forget God (Ps. 9:17).

A concern of many 19th century Presbyterians regarding the American Constitution is that it omits any reverent acknowledgement of God Almighty. The failure to honor the God of nations in our national charter was noted in a previous post highlighting the remarks of George Duffield IV and George Junkin. Today’s post highlights a remark attributed to Vice-President Alexander Hamilton. The omission of God in the U.S. Constitution was noticed by Presbyterians even outside of the Covenanter Church (which from the beginning of America’s founding as a nation until the 1960’s held to the position of political dissent) very early in American history as we shall see.

Appended to Thomas Smyth’s 1860 sermon The Sin and the Curse are comments regarding this defect of the U.S. Constitution.

No God in the Constitution

“The name of God does not occur in the Constitution which they framed, nor any recognition of Divine Providence.”

As a fitting accompaniment to an article in last week’s Observer, of which the closing period forms an appropriate title to still another item of history, connected with the same subject, some of your readers wil be, perhaps, interested in an extract or two from one of the many Congratulatory Addresses presented to President Washington on his election as First President under the new Constitution, with his reply.

“The First Presbytery of the Eastward,” in their “Address to George Washington, President of the United States, after many pious congratulations, &c., proceed thus:

“Whatever any have supposed wanting in the original plan” [of the Constitution], “we are happy to see so wisely provided in its amendments; and it is with peculiar satisfaction that we behold how easily the entire confidence of the people, in the man who sits at the helm of government, has eradicated every remaing objection to its form.

“Among these we never considered the want of a religious test, that grand engine of persecution in every tyrant’s hand: but we should not have been alone in rejoicing, to have some explicit acknowledgment of the only true God and Jesus Christ whom He hath sent, inserted somewhere in the Magna Charta of our country, &c., &c.

“October 28, 1789.”
…
The venerable Dr. [John] Rodgers once met Alexander Hamilton, soon after the adoption of the Constitution of the United States and said to him, “Mr. Hamilton, I am grieved to see that you have neglected to acknowledge God in the Constitution.” Hamilton replied, “My dear sir, we forgot to do it.”

George Duffield V also took note of the reported conversation between John Rodgers and Alexander Hamilton in The God of Our Fathers: An Historical Sermon (1861).

Hamilton said to Dr. Rodgers, “Indeed, Dr., we forgot it!”

In the same sermon Duffield quotes the words of John Mitchell Mason:

“That no notice whatever should be taken of that God who planteth a nation, and plucketh it up at his pleasure, is an omission which no pretext whatever can palliate. Had such a momentous business been transacted by Mohammedans, they would have begun, “In the name of God.” Even the savages, whom we despise, setting a better example, would have paid some homage to the Great Spirit. But from the Constitution of the United States, it is impossible to ascertain what God we worship; or whether we own a God at all. * * Should the citizens of America be as irreligious as her Constitution, we will have reason to tremble, lest the Governor of the Universe, who will not be treated with indignity by a people, any more than by individuals, overturn, from its foundation, the fabric we have been rearing, and crush us to atoms in the wreck.” — Works of J.M. Mason, D.D., Vol. i., p. 50.

Hamilton’s biographer Ron Chernow, when speaking of the story of Hamilton’s quip about forgetting God, says: “One is tempted to reply that Alexander Hamilton never forgot anything important” (Alexander Hamilton, p. 235). James Renwick Willson would concur.

There is no acknowledgment of Almighty God, nor any, even the most remote, token of national subjection to Jehovah, the Creator. It is believed, that there never existed, previous to this constitution, any national deed like this, since the creation of the world. A nation having no God! In vain shall we search the annals of pagan Greece and Rome, of modern Asia, Africa, pagan America, and the isles of the sea — they have all worshipped some God. The United States have none — But here let us pause over this astounding fact. Was it a mere omission? Did the convention that framed the constitution forget to name the living God? Was this an omission in some moment of national phrenzy, when the nation forgot God? That, indeed, were a great sin. God says, “the nations that forget God, shall be turned into hell.” It was not, however, a thoughtless act, an undesigned omission. It was a deliberate deed, whereby God was rejected; and in the true atheistical spirit of the whole instrument, and of course, done with intent to declare national independence of the Lord of hosts (Prince Messiah's Claims to Dominion Over All Governments; and the Disregard of His Authority by the United States, in the Federal Constitution (1832), p. 25).