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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 21 September 2009
Any one who has glanced at the venerable document known as the “Saybrook Platform,” which served as the legal basis of Connecticut Congregationalism during the eighteenth century, has noticed that there are prefaced to the fifteen famous Articles which form the Platform itself, not only the elaborate Confession of Faith adopted at the Savoy palace in 1658 and re-enacted at Boston in 1680, but certain “Heads of Agreement Assented to by the United Ministers formerly called Presbyterian and Congregational,” as their title runs. And if one's curiosity has been sufficiently aroused to read the words of introduction in which the Saybrook divines describe their work, one finds them uniting in the declaration that these Heads of Agreement shall “be observed by the Churches throughout this Colony” of Connecticut. The question at once presents itself how it came about that a document which purports to be a compromise between Congregationalists and Presbyterians, should be accepted as one of the pillars of the legally established ecclesiastical constitution of a colony where declared Presbyterianism had as yet no foothold; and be received as so authoritative an exposition of eighteenth-century Connecticut Congregationalism as to form the liberal half of the two fold result of the Saybrook Synod, and at least a co-ordinate actor in the Platform, without the adoption of which the Synod would never have arrived at unanimity. What it was, and how it came so to be used, is the object of our present inquiry.
1 Saybrook Platform, ed. 1760, p. 96.Google Scholar
2 Till 1641. True Hist. Councils, p. 90Google Scholar, quoted by Rev DrDexter, H. M., Congregationalism as Seen in its Literature, p. 651.Google Scholar
3 Speech, in Harrison, , O. Cromwell, p. 60.Google Scholar
4 Printed in London. Other associations existed in Worcestershire, Devonshire, Essex, Dorset, Wiltshire and Hampshire. See Briggs, , American Presbyterianism, pp. 77, 78.Google Scholar
5 Agreement, etc., p. 3.Google Scholar
6 Ibid., p. 16.
7 Ibid., pp. 17, 18.
8 Ibid, p. 18.
9 Ibid., pp. 19–21.
10 Sept. 29–Oct. 12, 1658.
11 Hist, of the Union between Presb. and Cong. Ministers, etc., 2d ed. London, 1698, p. 1Google Scholar. This lively and anonymous tract is clearly the work of a Congregationalist.
12 History of the Union, etc., ed. 1698, p. 2.Google Scholar
13 Compare Stoughton, , Hist. Religion in England, v., 310, 311.Google Scholar
14 Compare Mather, C., Blessed Unions (1692), p. iii.Google Scholar; Magnalia, ed. 1853, ii., 272Google Scholar; Parentator, pp. 147, 148Google Scholar. The latter thus records the activity of the three men: “Dr. Annestey and Mr. Vincent and others, often Declared.That this Union would never have been Effected, if Mr. Mather had not been among them. … He had Thanks from the Country as well as the City on that Account: And among the rest, a General Assembly of Ministers in Devon, sent up to London this Instrument. ‘Junii 23. 1691. Agreed, That the Reverend Mr. John Flavel, Moderator of this Assembly, send unto the Reverend Mr. Matthew Mead, Mr. John How, and Mr. Increase Mather, and give Them, and such Others as have been Eminently Instrumental in Promoting the Union, the Thanks of this Assembly, for the great Pains they have taken therein.’”
15 Extracts from the documents and the names of the Trustees will be found in Briggs, American Presbyterianism, Appendix, pp. lvi–li.Google Scholar
16 Hist, of the Union, etc., p. 5Google Scholar. Preface to Heads of Agreement, p. [vi.]Google Scholar
17 Ibid., pp. v., I, etc.; Two Sticks, p. [ii.], etc.Google Scholar
18 Two Sticks Made One: or. The Excellency of Unity, etc., London, 1691Google Scholar. This discourse, which gives the date of the union, is an illustration of how completely a preacher, on an historic occasion, may divorce himself from history. The sermon is full of exhortation, but throws no light on the means by which the union had been brought about.
19 Palmer's abridgment of Calamy, Nonconformists' Memorial, ed. London, 1775, i. 355Google Scholar. See p. 40, note 14 of this paper.
20 Stoughton, , Hist. Religion in England, v., 294, 295.Google Scholar
21 London, 1691, pp. vi., 16.
22 Hist, of the Union, etc., p. 3.Google Scholar
23 Contr. Eccles. Hist. Conn., p. 36.Google Scholar
24 Compare Ibid.
25 Heads of Agreement, § vi.Google Scholar
26 Ibid., § i., 6.
27 Ibid., § i., 4.
28 Ibid., § i., 6
29 Ibid., § i., 7; iii., 3.
30 Ibid., § iv., 2.
31 Ibid., § ii.
32 Ibid., § ii., 7.
33 Magnalia, ed. 1853, ii., 272.Google Scholar
34 Blessed Unions, etc., Boston, 1692.Google Scholar
35 Conn. Records, v., 51.Google Scholar
36 Conn. Records, v., 87.Google Scholar
37 DrBacon, L. in Contr. Eccles. Hist, Conn., p. 62.Google Scholar
38 History of the Union between the Presbyterian and Congregational Ministers in and about London, and the Causes of the Breach of it, already cited. The second edition was printed at London in 1698. I have never met the first edition.
39 Ibid., p. 3.
40 Ibid., p. 5.
41 Ibid.
42 Ibid.
43 Ibid., p. 6.
44 Heads of Agreement, Preface, p. [vi].Google Scholar
45 History of the Union, etc., p. 6.Google Scholar
46 A few general remarks regarding the Crispian controversy may be found in Stoughton, , Hist. Religion in England, v., 296–300Google Scholar. The contemporary controversial literature is voluminous.
47 I have not seen this book, but I suppose it to be Christ Made Sin, London, 1691.Google Scholar
48 In Gospel Truth Stated and Vindicated, London, 1692.Google Scholar
49 Hist, of the Union, p. 7.Google Scholar
50 Ibid., p. 3.
51 This paper may be found in Chauncy's Neomianism Unmask'd, etc., London, 1692–1693, part iii., pp. 96, 97Google Scholar. The exceptions are wholly doctrinal.
52 Hist, of the Union, etc., pp. 7, 8.Google Scholar
53 Ibid., p. 12.
54 Ibid., p. 13.
55 Ibid., p. 16.
56 See Briggs, , American Presbyterianism, Appendix, p. lviiiGoogle Scholar. The last joint meeting recorded was June 26, 1693; the first separate meeting of the Presbyterians was Feb. 5, 1695.
57 Hist, of the Union, etc., pp. 23–25.Google Scholar