DR. MAYHEW'S "OBSERVATIONS" 1

In 1701 King William III granted a charter to a Society for the propagation of the Gospel in foreign parts." The terms of the charter were general, and the Society could act in almost any part of the British dominions where provision for a ministry fell short of what was needful to the support of an orthodox clergy. The principal grounds for instituting the Society was to combat atheism and infidelity in the plantations and colonies beyond the seas, and to discourage the labors of "divers Romish priests and jesuits" who sought to "pervert and draw over our said loving subjects to Popish superstition and idolatry." Sixty years after the Society began to fulfil its purpose, some of the orthodox in New England came to believe that the funds of the Society were being applied to support the church of England party and to undermine the congregational and presbyterian churches among them. Episcopacy was promoted in opposition to the New England churches. In 1761 thirty representatives of the Society were stationed in the more populous towns of New England, although thirty-five were in New York, New Jersey and Pennsylvania, and fourteen in the more southern colonies and the West Indies. Mayhew asserted that the Society robbed the heathen, the slaves and the heathenish colonies [of the south], who had an exclusive right, according to the charter, to the benefit of that very money which has been sunk in the episcopal gulph here, where the people actually 'had the means of religion in other protestant communions. Observations, 110. To correct this tendency, as well as to work for the conversion of the heathen,

1 Note by the Editor.

some in Massachusetts asked the General Court for a charter.1

At once a controversy arose over the conduct of the English Society. Rev. East Apthorp, fellow of Jesus College, Cambridge, and missionary of the Society in Cambridge, N. E., wrote a pamphlet Considerations on the Institution and Conduct of the London corporation, and it was printed early in 1763. Rev. Dr. Mayhew took up the challenge, and hastily prepared for publication a much larger tract Observations on the Charter and Conduct of the Society, etc. Published in April, 1763, Mayhew sent a copy to Hollis, suggesting that a reprint in London "might be of service in more respects than one." He continued: "Just as these Observations came out of the Press, we had authentic advices here, that the Archbishop of Canterbury, and the pious Society aforesaid, made great opposition to our newly incorporated Society in America receiving the royal Approbation. So that it seems that they will neither do anything considerable themselves towards civilizing and Christianizing the Indians, nor allow us to do it, if they can prevent it!"

An English edition appeared late in 1763. Of this Hollis wrote, December 6: "Among the tracts are two copies of the Observations, with East Apthorp's publication annexed to them; which have been republished here, in reality, tho' under a feigned name, by A. Millar, Printer to the Episcopal Society for propagating the Gospel in foreign parts; and it is apprehended, with tolerable exactness.

"To have republished The Observations earlier, in the Summer, when the Town was empty, would have been to little purpose, other than to have had them disregarded wholly as old in the Winter. And to have omitted Apthorp's

1 See p. 70, supra.

tract might have occasioned some persons to suspect a truth and importance in it, which it certainly has not. But now, both are seen at least, in some degree, and judged and talked of. I confess to have spoken to A. Millar about this Republication, and to have lent him the tracts for his perusal to that end. Having read them he acknowledged the warping commendam art of one writer; and the intelligent, faithful, manly fervor of the other writer, with the greatness and excellence of his Cause: But said the Observations were unlikely to meet a current sale from their size and from the times. He then proposed the giving abridgment of them; as had proposed earlier, in private conversation, a learned ingenuous friend of mine. To that I had many objections; and would not suffer for the originality, spirit, character of a very fine tract, which from its compass, warmth, might be deemed too diffused in some few respects, to be broke in upon, or altered, or endangered, in any shape.

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"At length, after various meetings, it was agreed that the Observations should be printed intire, by Millar, tho' anonimously; and that from Candor and a good Cause Apthorp's tract should be added to them: and thus they appeared at the meeting of the Parliament.

"In the whole of this affair Mr. Millar behaved handsomely. And if I went out of my usual course in it, it was purely to help on a noble cause, tho' in a small degree, and, sir, to evidence my respect to you.

That Millar should imagine that in reprinting the Observations he was doing a service to the Society is hardly possible. The appearance of the tract in London called out a reply which was almost immediately ascribed to the pen of Thomas Secker, Archbishop of Canterbury, a wellknown advocate of an American episcopacy. Hollis wrote

October 10, 1764: "That 'Answer' some pretend, 'was the Production of Dr. Burton, Rector of St. Peter's poor cornhill, Canon of Christ church, and Treasurer of the Society, though with marks of the A[rch] B[ishop's] able hand throughout it.' But I am confident it was written wholly by the A. B. himself, and contains, in fact, not so much the Societies as his own Defence, as he could make it out." Mayhew received a copy from Israel Mauduit, and reported that "People here generally suppose, whether truly or not, that the A. B. of C-t-y had at least a considerable hand in this Answer; which I think is a very plausible performance. It has lately been reprinted here; and my Remarks thereon, published this week, I send you by this Opportunity. I send also a few Copies to particular Gentlemen, of which your kind care is humbly requested: among the rest, one to a gentleman1 with whom I was desired not to put you into any sort of connexion. As this may be sent to him by you, without his knowing thro' whose hands it came, I hope I shall not, in this respect, be thought to have disregarded you direction aforesaid; which I would not by any means do. I also send you a few Copies of the Observations, undirected, to be disposed of as you may think proper.

"You will perceive by the Remarks on the London Answer to the Observations, that I have taken your hint, and made a free use of what you said about a certain important affair [New England episcopacy]; tho' not a freer one, than I supposed agreeable to your intention, if I should have Occasion. I thought I had a very fair opening given me by the Answerer himself; as I believe you will also think: And I am much obliged to you for your information on that head. Probably I might not have said anything particu

1 Mauduit, see p. 113 infra.

larly on it, had it not been for your hints, and that I was extremely desirous to do what I thought might be in some degree acceptable to you. No man living knows, or shall know, from whom those hints came; or indeed, that I had received any of that sort from any Correspondent."

An answer to Mayhew, printed without name of writer, but later known to have been written by Rev. Henry Caner, appeared in the Autumn of 1763, A Candid Examination of Dr. Mayhew's Observations, together with a “Letter to a Friend" vindicating the Society, and prepared by "one of its members." This letter has wrongfully been ascribed to Rev. Mr. Cutler of Boston, and Samuel Johnson of Connecticut, but without authority. While Mayhew omitted to notice the "most outrageous" attacks made upon his Observations, he thought Caner's tract worthy of a reply, and on November 21, the day of publication, he sent out a Defence of the Observations, etc., with an introduction on the bitterness of the assaults made upon his pamphlet and his character by his anonymous critics. This also was reprinted in London, doubtless through the agency of Hollis. "The deserved honest commendation of this Defence," Hollis wrote, April 4, 1764, "I cannot give you in better words than in those of the Rev. and Excellent Dr. [Caleb] Fleming, in a letter to me, dated Feb. 3, 1764: 'I have read the tracts sent Dr. [Nathaniel] Lardner from Dr. Mayhew, and am clearly of opinion, that the Dr. has acquitted himself as a Master of his argument. He has even proved, that what civil establishment was given the N. E. Churches, was by no means episcopal. That petition to Charles II in 1679, is conclusive. Indeed his opponents are under those prejudices of education and interest that they are incapable of seeing evidence. I am highly pleased with the Monthly Reviewers upon his Observations, in the allusion to the Dev