THE ATLANTIC MONTHLY.

THE PURITAN MINISTER.

It is nine o'clock upon a summer Sunday morning, in the year sixteen hundred and something. The sun looks down brightly on a little forest settlement, around whose expanding fields the great American wilderness recedes each day, withdrawing its bears and wolves and Indians into an ever remoter distance,—not yet so far but that a stout wooden gate at each end of the village street indicates that there is something outside which must stay outside, if possible. It would look very busy and thriving in this little place, to-day, but for the Sabbath stillness which broods over everything with almost an excess of calm. Even the smoke ascends more faintly than usual from the chimneys of these abundant log-huts and scanty framed houses, and since three o'clock yesterday afternoon not a stroke of this world's work has been done. Last night a preparatory lecture was held, and now comes the consummation of the whole week's life, in the solemn act of worship. In which settlement of the Massachusetts Colony is the great observance to pass before our eyes? If it be Cambridge village, the warning drum is beating its peaceful summons to the congregation. If it be Salem village, a bell is sounding its more ecclesiastic peal, and a red flag is simultaneously hung forth from the meeting-house, like the auction-flag of later periods, but offering in this case goods without money and beyond price. But if it be Haverhill village, then Abraham Tyler has been blowing his horn assiduously for half an hour, a service for which Abraham, each year, receives a half-pound of pork from every family in town.

Be it drum, bell, or horn, which gives the summons, we will draw near to this important building, the centre of the village, the one public edifice,—meeting-house, town-house, school-house, watch-house, all in one. So important is it, that no one can legally dwell more than a half-mile from it. And yet the people ride to meeting, short though the distance be, for at yonder oaken block a wife dismounts from behind her husband;—and has it not, moreover, been found needful to impose a fine of forty shillings on fast trotting to and fro? All sins [pg 266] are not modern ones, young gentlemen.

We approach nearer still, and come among the civic institutions. This is the pillory, yonder the stocks, and there is a large wooden cage, a terror to evil-doers, but let us hope empty now. Round the meeting-house is a high wooden paling, to which the law permits citizens to tie their horses, provided it be not done too near the passage-way. For at that opening stands a sentry, clothed in a suit of armor which is painted black, and cost the town twenty-four shillings by the bill. He bears also a heavy matchlock musket; his rest, or iron fork, is stuck in the ground, ready to support the weapon; and he is girded with his bandoleer, or broad leather belt, which sustains a sword and a dozen tin cartridge-boxes.

The meeting-house is the second to which the town has treated itself, the first having been "a timber fort, both strong and comely, with flat roof and battlements,"—a cannon on top, and the cannonade of the gospel down below. But this one cost the town sixty-three pounds, hard-earned pounds, and carefully expended. It is built of brick, smeared outside with clay, and finished with clay-boards, larger than our clapboards, outside of all. It is about twenty-five feet square, with a chimney half the width of the building, and projecting four feet above the thatched roof. The steeple is in the centre, and the bell-rope, if they have one, hangs in the middle of the broad aisle. There are six windows, two on each of the two sides, and two more at the end, part being covered with oiled paper only, part glazed in numerous small panes. And between the windows, on the outside, hang the heads of all the wolves that have been killed in the township within the year. But the Quakers think that the wolves have cheated the parish and got inside, in sheep's clothing.

The people are assembling. The Governor has passed by, with his four vergers bearing halberds before him. The French Popish ambassadors, who have just arrived from Canada, are told the customs of the place, and left to stay quietly in the Governor's house, with sweetmeats, wines, and the liberty of a private walk in the garden. The sexton has just called for the minister, as is his duty twice every Sunday, and, removing his cocked hat, he walks before his superior officer. The minister enters and passes up the aisle, dressed in Geneva cloak, black skull-cap, and black gloves open at thumb and finger, for the better handling of his manuscript. He looks round upon his congregation, a few hundred, recently seated anew for the year, arranged according to rank and age. There are the old men in the pews beneath the pulpit. There are the young men in the gallery, or near the door, with ruffs, showy belts, gold and silver buttons, "points" at the knees, and great boots. There are the young women, with "silk or tiffany hoods or scarfs," "embroidered or needle-worked caps," "immoderate great sleeves," "cut works,"—a mystery,—"slash apparel,"—another mystery,—"immoderate great vayles, long wings," etc.,—mystery on mystery, but all recorded in the statutes, which forbid these splendors to persons of mean estate. There are the wives of the magistrates in prominent seats, and the grammar-school master's wife next them; and in each pew, close to the mother's elbow, is the little wooden cage for the youngest child, still too young to sit alone. All boys are held too young to sit alone also; for, though the emigrants left in Holland the aged deaconess who there presided, birch in hand, to control the rising generation in Sunday meetings, yet the urchins are now herded on the pulpit- and gallery-stairs, with four constables to guard them from the allurements of sin. And there sits Sin itself embodied in the shrinking form of some humiliated man or woman, placed on a high stool in the principal aisle, bearing the name of some dark crime written on paper and pinned to the garments, or perhaps a Scarlet Letter on the breast.

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Oh, the silence of this place of worship, after the solemn service sets in! "People do not sneeze or cough here in public assemblies," says one writer, triumphantly, "so much as in England." The warning caution, "Be short," which the minister has inscribed above his study-door, claims no authority over his pulpit. He may pray his hour, unpausing, and no one thinks it long; for, indeed, at prayer-meetings four persons will sometimes pray an hour each,—one with confession, one with private petitions, a third with petitions for church and kingdom, and a fourth with thanksgiving,—neither part of the quartette being for an instant confused with the other. Then he may preach his hour, and, turning his hour-glass, may say,—but that he will not anticipate the levity to be born in a later century with Mather Byles,—"Now, my hearers, we will take another glass."

In short, this is the pomp and circumstance of glorious preaching. Woe to any one who shall disturb its proprieties! It is written in the statute, "If any one interrupt or oppose a preacher in season of worship, they shall be reproved by the magistrate, and on repetition shall pay £5, or stand two hours on a block four feet high, with this inscription in capitals, 'A Wanton Gospeller.'" Nor this alone, but the law stands by the minister's doctrine even out of the meeting-house. It is but a few days since Nathaniel Hadlock was sentenced to be