Main currents in American thought An interpretation of American literature from the beginnings to 1920
and spoiled already, it cannot consist with the light of nature to
venture again upon such perils, especially if we can find a safer
way home.... In a word an aristocracy is a dangerous constitution
in the church of Christ.[122]
This “safer way home,” as he then proceeded to point out, lay in
following the broad path of democracy:
But to abbreviate, it seems most agreeable with the light of
nature, that if there be any of the regular forms of government
settled in the church of God, it must needs be ... a democracy.
This is the form of government which the light of nature does
highly value, and often directs to as most agreeable to the just
and natural prerogatives of human beings.... It is certainly a
great truth, namely, that man’s original liberty after it is
resigned ... ought to be cherished in all wise governments; or
otherwise a man in making himself a subject, he alters himself
from a freeman into a slave, which to do is repugnant to the law
of nature. Also the natural equality of men amongst men must be
duly favoured; in that government was never established by God or
nature, to give one man a prerogative to insult over another....
Honor all men. The end of all good government is to cultivate
humanity, and promote the happiness of all, and the good of every
man in his rights, his life, liberty, estate, honor, etc., without
injury or abuse to any.[123]
From which he concludes that--
... a democracy in church or state, is a very honorable and
regular government according to the dictates of right reason, And,
therefore ... That these churches of New England, in their ancient
constitution of church order, it being a democracy, are manifestly
justified and defended by the law and light of nature.[124]
A vigorous thinker was John Wise, with a shrewd knowledge of men and
their selfishness. He would rule himself, well or ill, and would have
others do likewise. Stewards in church and state, he would have none
of. “Brethren,” he exclaimed, “ye have been called unto liberty,
therefore Hold your hold brethren!... pull up well upon the oars, you
have a rich cargo, and I hope we shall escape shipwreck ... daylight
and good piloting will secure all.”[125] “There is strong and sharp
reasoning” in his pages, more solid meat in his two volumes than in
all Cotton Mather’s muddled effusions. Like a good Englishman and a
good Yankee he hated arbitrary power as he hated the devil. “The very
name of an arbitrary government is ready to put an Englishman’s blood
into a fermentation; but when it comes and shakes its whip over their
ears, and tells them it is their master, it makes them stark mad.”[126]
Naturally so vigorous an advocate of democracy in the church was
disliked by the gentlemen whose ambitions he thwarted. Such plebeian
views were incomprehensible to Cotton Mather. When _The Churches
Quarrel Espoused_ was reprinted in 1713, prefaced with a commendatory
letter signed by two well-known clergymen, the latter wrote to a friend:
... A furious Man, called John Wise,[127] of whom, I could wish
he had, _Cor bonum_, while we are all sensible, he wants, _Caput
bene regulatum_, has lately published a foolish Libel, against
some of us, for presbyterianizing too much in our Care to repair
some Deficiencies in our Churches. And some of our People, who are
not only tenacious of their Liberties, but also more suspicious
than they have cause to be of a Design in their pastors to make
abridgments of them; they are too much led into Temptation, by
such Invectives. But the Impression is not so great as our grand
Adversary doubtless hoped for.[128]
Two years later, when the _Vindication_ was published, the sulky
theocrat noted in his diary:
25 [May. 1717] G[ood] D[evice]. Should not I take into
Consideration what may be done for the Service of the Ministry and
Religion and the Churches, throughout the Land, that the Poison of
Wise’s cursed Libel may have an Antidote?[129]
Cotton Mather was unable to discover an antidote, and the poison of
Wise’s democratic philosophy was to prove of surprising vitality. As
late as 1772, when his two works were reprinted on subscription, no
fewer than 1133 copies were taken. That the argument of Wise was not
without influence in the struggle then developing seems reasonable; but
that it greatly influenced the thinking of the revolutionary leaders,
as Professor Tyler supposes, is scarcely probable. The argument from
natural rights was well known in 1772, and it was to Locke and not
to Wise that men like Samuel Adams turned for help. Nevertheless, in
denying to him wide influence in the later period we are neither
detracting from the honor that is rightly his as the first colonial to
justify village democracy by an appeal to political philosophy, nor
lessening the repute in which he should be held by Americans as the
early defender of local self-rule.
The instinctive sympathy of John Wise with the plain people among whom
he lived led him to stand with them in another matter that touched the
interests of the farming class. The currency question had thrust its
provocative demands into political councils, and sharply divided the
electorate. City men like Samuel Sewall were jealous to maintain the
English metallic currency, partly through custom and partly because its
scarcity augmented its value; whereas the plain people of Ipswich, like
so many country people, no doubt were impressed with the desirability
of a land-script currency. Into this mighty controversy entered John
Wise, who in the year 1721, under the pen name of _Amicus Patriae_,
is reputed to have been the author of a book entitled, _A Word of
Comfort to a Melancholy Country. Or the Bank of Credit ... fairly
defended by a Discovery of the Great Benefit, accruing by it to the
whole Province, etc. Humbly dedicated to the Merchants in Boston._ It
was “a well-managed and witty plea for paper money and ‘inflation.’”
With the economics of the problem that he was delving into, we are not
concerned; many heads have wrestled with it since; we are concerned
rather to point out that the democratic John Wise was on the same side
with the democratic Franklin, in espousing paper currency.
After all, the significant thing that emerges from the life and work
of John Wise, is the unerring directness with which he seized upon the
core of primitive Congregationalism, and the breadth and vigor with
which he defended it. After a spirited contest lasting three-quarters
of a century, theocratic Puritanism yielded to ecclesiastical
democracy. For two generations it had remained doubtful which way the
church would incline. Dominated by gentlemen, it was warped towards
Presbyterianism; but interpreted by commoners, it leaned towards
Congregationalism. The son of a plebeian. Wise inclined to sympathize
with the spirit of radical Separatism, bred of the democratic
aspirations of Jacobean underlings; and this radical Separatism he
found justified by the new political philosophy, as well as by facts
of the New England village world. The struggle for ecclesiastical
democracy was a forerunner of the struggle for political democracy
which was to be the business of the next century; and in founding his
ecclesiasticism upon the doctrine of natural rights, John Wise was an
early witness to the new order of thought.
II • Social Drifts
Great changes, whether liberal or otherwise as the future might
determine, were to come to Massachusetts from the new order with its
Charter provision establishing a property qualification for suffrage.
The venture in idealism was over and economic determinism reasserted
its sway. New England was to swing back into the broad current of
English political development. Following the Revolution of 1688 a new
theory of the political state was rising in England--the theory that
the state originated in private property and exists primarily for the
protection of property; and this conception, thrust upon New England,
was to cut sharply across the cleavages of the old order and create
new ones. It substituted the dominance of wealth for the stewardship
of righteousness; the stake-in-society principle for the Mosaic code.
It set a premium upon acquisitiveness and subordinated the Puritan to
the Yankee. It prepared the way for class alignments which must grow
sharper with the increase of wealth, and would eventually produce a
Tory group with natural longings for titles and a colonial aristocracy.
How powerful this mercantile-Tory element was to become would depend
upon the counter strength of the rising democratic group, with its
freehold tenure of land, its town meeting, its Congregational church,
and its distrust of aristocratic orders.
For the present, the world of John Wise was the real New England,
thrifty, parsimonious, intensely local, driving straight towards a
homespun democracy. The older fashioned New Englander, whatever his
social position, did not take kindly to Toryism; and when it made its
appearance in the train of the royal officials, swaggering somewhat
and a bit insolent, it seemed to the colonial both alien and wicked.
English Tory and Puritan Yankee frankly disliked each other; their
ideals were incompatible, their manners unlike. A cloud of suspicion
surrounded the English official as he walked the streets of Boston:
suspicion of the hated church which he promptly set up, though not much
given to worship; suspicion of his political motives and the overseas
authority which he represented. In a vague way the New Englanders
were convinced that he constituted a menace to their most cherished
rights and privileges; that he was secretly bent on undermining the
traditional liberties. And the English gentleman, with his casual
old-world arrogance, unwittingly aggravated the common suspicion.
How great was the chasm that separated the two worlds is sharply
revealed by an episode in the career of Joseph Dudley, son of the
emigrant, who was made royal governor in 1702. Dudley had lived much in
England, had sat in Parliament, and had imbibed prerogative notions of
government. He little relished the homely ways of New England and he
bore himself somewhat haughtily. One December day in 1705, as he was
driving along a country road with high snowdrifts on each side, he met
with two loads of wood. The chariot coming to a stop, Dudley thrust
his head out of the window and bade the carters turn aside and make
way for him; but they were inclined to argue the matter in view of the
drifts. Words were multiplied, and one of the carters cried--to quote
Sewall--“I am as good flesh and blood as you ... you may goe out of the
way.” In a rage the governor drew his sword and struck at the fellow,
who snatched the sword away and broke it. “You lie, you dog; you lie,
you devill!” cried Dudley, beside himself. “Such words don’t become a
Christian,” retorted the carter. “A Christian, you dog!” cried Dudley;
“a Christian, you devill! I was a Christian before you were born!”
and he snatched the carter’s whip and lashed him roundly. “Being in a
great passion: threatn’d to send those that affronted him to England.”
He arrested both carters and threw them into jail, whence they were
released by the help of Sewall, who took their side though connected
with Dudley through marriage. They were of good yeoman families, yet
the matter hung on for nearly a year before they were discharged from
their bonds.[130]
Village New England was becoming surprisingly independent in
spirit when plain countrymen stood upon their rights against the
Governor--“nor did they once in the Govrs ... sight pull of their
hatts,” as Dudley took pains to inform the Queen’s justices. Three
generations in America were having their effect in the creation of a