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The plain, everyday people, then, were not only irritated by social distinctions and wounded in the sensitive pocket nerve by burdensome church taxes, but they were shocked and disgusted by clerical immorality. Nor was this all. They saw their fellows and neighbors arrested and thrust like common malefactors into the county jails for the alleged crime of preaching the Gospel of peace, free to all men without tithe and without trammel of priestly contrivance. Looking at it in this way, they did well to be angry.

These illustrations of the Baptist propaganda and persecution and of their consequences have been thus fully set forth in order to show the passionate feeling of the Baptists themselves and the sympathy for them in the community at large in the latter part of 1774. This state of the public feeling led up to the resolution reached by the Baptists to make a direct attack on the Establishment as soon as possible. In 1773 an attempt to overthrow the Established Church would have been foolish and futile; in 1774 petitions to that end were subscribed to, Semple tells us, by "vast numbers readily and indeed eagerly."

It is well at this point, by way of review, to state briefly the relations of the Baptists and the legislature up to the middle of the year 1774. There do not appear to have been any petitions during 1771. Early in 1772, on Feb

that the work has been of God, and not of man ” (Writings, 105, and note, ibid.). Rev. R. B. C. Howell, in " Early Baptists in Virginia," an address delivered in 1856, nearly fifty years after Semple wrote, and nearly seventy years after Leland's "Virginia Chronicle," flatly contradicts the testimony of both these notable men as to this matter. What his authority is for so doing I know not; he gives none. See Publications of American Baptist Historical Society, 1857, p. 105 ff. Benedict says of these preachers: A portion of the men under consideration possessed in a high degree the powers of imagination and invention to which many modern preachers of literary training can make but small pretensions. . . . Figures and metaphors were their favorite themes, and, by some means or others, they would make all things about them plain. As for parables, they would never leave one till they had made it go on all-fours."

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Benedict, Fifty Years, 96.

ruary 12, the Journal of the Burgesses shows that " A petition of several persons of the county of Lunenburg, whose names are thereunto subscribed, was presented to the House and read; setting forth, that the petitioners, being of the society of Christians called Baptists, find themselves restricted in the exercise of their religion, their teachers imprisoned under various pretences, and the benefits of the Toleration Act denied them, although they are willing to conform to the true spirit of that act, and are loyal and quiet subjects; and therefore, praying that they may be treated with the same kind indulgence, in religious matters, as Quakers, Presbyterians, and other Protestant dissenters enjoy."

72

Identical petitions are presented from Mecklenburg county on February 22, and from Sussex on February 24; and on this same day (Feb. 24) a like petition from Amelia county adds that "If the Act of Toleration does not extend to this colony, they are exposed to severe persecution; and if it does extend hither, and the power of granting licenses to teachers be lodged, as is supposed, in the General Court alone, the petitioners must suffer considerable inconveniences, not only because that Court sits not oftener than twice in the year, and then at a place far remote, but because the said Court will admit a single meeting-house, and no more, in one county, and that the petitioners are loyal and quiet subjects, whose tenets in no wise affect the state; and therefore praying a redress of their grievances, and that Liberty of Conscience may be secured to them." "

On February 25, the Committee for Religion reported that those petitions were reasonable and was ordered to bring in a bill in accordance therewith. On the 27th of

72 Journal, House of Burgesses, Feb. 12, 1772.

78 Journal of Ho. of Burgesses, Fristoe, 73, says: "I knew the General Court to refuse a license for a Baptist meeting-house in the county of Richmond, because there was a Presbyterian meeting-house already in the county, although the act of Toleration considered them distinct societies."

February this bill was reported, read a second time, and committed to the Committee for Religion."

Another similar petition was presented from Caroline county on March 14, and was laid on the table.

99 75

On March 17, "Mr. Treasurer reported from Committee for Religion, to whom the bill for extending the benefit of the several Acts of Toleration to His Majesty's Protestant subjects in this Colony, dissenting from the Church of England, was committed." The bill was ordered to be engrossed and to be "read the third time upon the first day of July next." But the House was prorogued on April 11, "to the 25th day of June next." The Journal shows no further entries until March 4, 1773. The house was prorogued again, March 13, by Lord Dunmore, and did not meet until May 5, 1774.

This Toleration Bill, proposed in February, 1772, was opposed by Baptists and by other dissenters as the next petition shows.

The year 1774 was a year of committees and correspondence, of petitions and expectation. The Virginia Committee of Correspondence was busily at work. The Virginia Burgesses had recommended the annual Congress of the Colonies, and its first meeting took place in September of this year in Philadelphia. Men's minds were excited in anticipation of coming change. Events were moving rapidly. The Baptists begun their general forward movement in the spring. At first it was defensive as before; it soon became offensive. It began with a petition for the improvement of their condition.

On May 12, 1774, "A petition of sundry persons of the community of Christians called Baptists, and other Protestant dissenters, whose names are thereunto subscribed, was presented to the House and read, setting forth that the toleration proposed by the bill, ordered at the last session of the General Assembly to be printed and published, not

7 Cf. Journal of Burgesses.

75 Ibid.

admitting public worship, except in the daytime, is inconsistent with the laws of England, as well as the practice and usage of the primitive churches, and even of the English Church itself; that the night season may sometimes be better spared by the petitioners from the necessary duties of their callings; and that they wish for no indulgences which may disturb the peace of Government; and therefore praying the House to take their case into consideration, and to grant them suitable redress." "

The House does not seem to have taken any action on the matter beyond referring it to the Committee for Religion. The petitioners, it is seen, were men busy at work during the daytime. This petition appears to be the joint work of individuals, Baptists and others. Perhaps it was shrewdly intended to accompany or precede the next petition noticed by the Assembly.

Four days later, on May 16, 1774, the House of Burgesses

"Ordered, that the Committee of Propositions and Grievances be discharged from proceeding upon the petition of sundry Baptist ministers, from different parts of this country, convened together in Loudon county at their Annual Association, which came certified to this Assembly, praying that an Act of Toleration may be made, giving the Petitioners and other Protestant dissenting Ministers, Liberty to preach in all proper Places, and at all Seasons, without Restraint. Ordered, that said Petition be referred to the consideration of the Committee for Religion; and that they do examine the Matter thereof, and report the same, with their Opinion thereon, to the House.""

This is an official petition from the Baptist representative body. It may have come from the Ketocton Association of the Regular Baptists held at Brent Town in 1774, although Brent Town was in Fauquier. The Separate

76

439.

Journal of House of Burgesses, May 12, 1774; also Meade, ii, 'Journal of Burgesses, May 16, 1774.

77

78

Association for the Northern District was not held until the fourth Saturday in May, 1774, at Picket's MeetingHouse in Fauquier county. The Separate Association for the Southern District " met on the second Saturday in May, as we have already seen," and passed a resolution appointing fast days; but nothing is said of any petition to the Assembly.

It is a noteworthy conjunction of circumstances that on this same day, May 16, the Burgesses "Ordered, that Mr. Washington, Mr. Gray, Mr. Munford and Mr. Syme be added to the Committee for Religion." On the next day, May 17, Mr. Andrew Lewis, Mr. Macdowell and Mr. James Taylor were added to the same Committee. Jefferson had been added on May 9.

The Assembly was dissolved by Dunmore on May 26, and no legislative action was taken during the rest of the year.

With the advent of 1775, the political current began to run so strongly that all other interests were swept along with it. The Baptists, both from principle and from interest, were thorough republicans and ardent supporters of the revolutionary party. Speaking of it from the religious point of view, Semple says: "This was a very favorable season for the Baptists. Having been much ground under the British laws, or at least by the interpretation of them in Virginia, they were to a man favourable to any revolution by which they could obtain freedom of religion." And Armitage, looking back across a hundred years at the situation, says: ... the Baptists demanded both (civil and religious liberty), and this accounts for the

78

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Semple does not note any petition from either of these associations to the General Assembly, nor do I find any note either of this petition or of the meeting of the Ketocton Association in Fristoe. Cf. Semple, 298, 301. Dr. C. F. James thinks this petition of the Ketocton Association may date back to 1771. Cf. Religious Herald, Jan. 12, 1899.

79 See p. 16.

80 Semple, 62.

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