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Even Unto the Death CHAPTER XIV Even unto the Death It is not safe for the colonies to sleep, since they will prob- ably always have some wakeful enemies in Britain; & if they should be such children as to do so, I hope there are at least some persons too much of men, & friends to them, to rock the cradle, or sing lullabie to them. Jonathan Mayhew, 17661 JONATHAN MAYHEW was forty-five years of age when the Stamp Act was repealed. The gray hair beneath his clerical wig and the knowledge that he was now passing what his century called "middle age" brought moments of reflection on the course of his life. At times he found himself "almost sick of this World" which contains "so little sense & integrity, so much folly & villainy." But if he was in a reflective mood on April 26, 1766, he had reason to think of how far he had traveled since that summer day in 1747 when the Boston clergy boycotted his ordination. Evidence of his altered status had arrived in a letter from Samuel Checkly of the New South Church. Checkly had joined in Mayhew's ostracism, but now he wrote to invite the West Church and its pastor to attend the ordination of an associate minister at the New South. This was Checkly's second letter concerning the ordination. He had heard that the first letter was not fully understood, and he was anxious that there should be no misunderstanding. Mayhew was unaccustomed to such solicitous attention from the Boston clergy. Of all his colleagues, only Chauncy had been consistently friendly and sympathetic. Elizabeth May- hew complained that even those who were not known enemies to her husband's principles did not "speak in the softest terms" 2i8 CALLED UNTO LIBERTY of him. She understood more than anyone else the mixture of tragedy and irony in his dying at the time when his inter- national reputation was beginning to demand that old clerical antagonists treat him openly at least with respect and civility.2 Outside Boston, Mayhew had enjoyed fellowship with far more of the clergy, some of whom wrote to him requesting advice and favors. His struggle against Episcopacy made him especially popular in those communities that had an "Anglican problem" of their own. The Congregational Church in Rut- land (later Barre), Massachusetts seems to have been at- tracted by his prestige when it invited the West Church to send its pastor and one lay messenger to serve on an ecclesi- astical council it was calling in June 1766 to hear charges against its minister, Thomas Frink. Massachusetts Congrega- tionalists had avoided ecclesiastical organization and pre- served the authority of the local congregation. In cases where a church could not settle its own differences, it had become customary to summon a council of five neighboring churches to give advice on the matter at hand. Such advice was not obligatory, but in practice it was usually accepted as such. The scene of the coming council was nearly sixty miles from Boston, but Mayhew accepted the invitation. He and Captain Andrew Cragie prepared to set out on Monday, June 9.3 The Sunday before, Mayhew awakened at dawn. As his mind wandered over the prospects of the week ahead and then to the Stamp Act crisis so recently passed, he saw a con- nection between these two lines of thought. If we can have a council or "communion of churches," why not also a "com- munion of Colonies"? The idea struck him so forcibly that he got out of bed and wrote a letter to James Otis. "Would it not be very proper & decorous," he asked, "for our assembly to send circular congratulatory Letters to all the rest without exception, on the repeal, and the present favorable aspect of Things?" These letters could be "conceived at once in terms EVEN UNTO THE DEATH 21Q of warm friendship & regard to them, of Loyalty to the king, of filial affection towards the mother country; and intimating a desire to cement & perpetuate union among ourselves, by all practicable & laudable methods." It is important to main- tain and increase the spirit of unity that has brought the repeal of the Stamp Act. Such unity may be the only means of saving American liberties, "for what may be hereafter we cannot tell, how favorable soever the present appearances may be."4 There is no evidence that this letter to Otis produced any results.5 Its importance lies instead in the revelation that less than one month after New England celebrated the repeal of the Stamp Act, Mayhew had recovered from the shock of his first encounter with mob violence and was again on guard against new infringements of American liberties. Written at the very moment the Massachusetts Whigs were taking ad- vantage of the "retreat" of the imperial government to isolate Bernard and Hutchinson in the provincial government, the letter indicates where Mayhew's sympathies lay. Spiritually and intellectually, if not more directly, he was taking his place in the small group of New England men who were resolved not to let the easy victory in the Stamp Act crisis lull the colonies into a sense of security while their enemies in Brit- ain continued to plot. The letter also reveals that recent events had left their mark on him. He cautioned Otis that it was not the time for "asperity in language," but for "firmness in adher- ing to our rights, in opposition to all encroachments." The council at Rutland convened on Tuesday, June 10, and for six days heard complaints against the arbitrary conduct of Mr. Frink. Mayhew served as scribe, recording the charges against the pastor and the judgment of the council on each count. On June 18 the visiting clergy and laymen handed down a decision in which they unanimously recommended that Frink's relation with the Rutland church be terminated. 220 CALLED UNTO LIBERTY "This advice we give," the record read, "as we trust, in Sim- plicity and the Fear of God, to whom we Expect to give an Account." The scribe who wrote these lines was to give his account much sooner than he anticipated as he began the trip back to Boston.® Mayhew returned home fatigued and weak. The difficult journey in addition to the arduous proceedings of the council had been too much for his poor health. He tried to ignore the severe headaches he suffered soon after his return, but within four days he was seized with a "violent nervous Disorder" (apparently a stroke or cerebral hemorrhage) that paralyzed his right side and left him in a stupor. During the next two weeks he had only occasional moments of lucidity. By July 3 recovery seemed impossible. The prospect of death was noth- ing new to one who had enjoyed few periods of health during his entire lifetime. Two years before he had told his congre- gation, "Merely to die once, is a small matter to those who are to die no more." 7 Some of the town's clergy could not conceal their curiosity to see how such a notorious heretic would face his Creator. Was it true, as some of the orthodox maintained, that Armin- ians always repented on their death beds and chose to die Calvinists? Three years earlier, Mayhew had boasted, "I am certain, that in that great day, I shall not be condemned by him for any wilful perversion of his gospel, ... in this respect at least, I am innocent; clear from the blood of you and all men, whether old or young." A story that cannot be traced to a contemporary source relates that Samuel Cooper asked the minister in his dying hours if he still held fast to the religious tenets he had maintained during his life. The answer was, "My integrity I hold fast, and will not let it go." On July 8 the clergy resigned him "to the Father and Redeemer of Spirits," and the following morning, Wednesday, July 9, EVEN UNTO THE DEATH 221 he breathed his last between five and six o'clock, exactly three months before his forty-sixth birthday.8 On a very hot Friday the people of the West Church and a multitude of Boston citizenry gathered in the late afternoon to pay their last respects. Retaining some of the Puritan ab- horrence of elaborate Anglican funerals and Roman Catholic prayers for the dead, Congregationalists customarily held no religious service over the deceased; but on this occasion Charles Chauncy prayed before the corpse was carried from the West Church. The procession to the grave was one of the longest Boston had ever seen. One hundred and fourteen men of the parish walked ahead of the casket, borne by six minis- terial pallbearers, who were followed by the family, mourn- ers, and women of the West Church. Then came the clergy and gentlemen of the town in their carriages and coaches, fifty-seven vehicles in all.9 The following Sunday the West Church gathered to hear Chauncy eulogize their departed pastor as "a friend to liberty both civil and religious." Although he was Mayhew's closest friend among the local clergy, Chauncy had often been abashed at the forthrightness of his colleague's sermons and polemical writing, a feeling which he did not attempt to hide in this eulogy: "And if his zeal, at any time, betrayed him into too great a severity of expression, it was against the at- tempts of those who would make slaves either of men's souls or bodies."10 Professor John Winthrop's obituary notice in the Boston newspapers contained the same apologetic note: If at any Time thro' the Warmth of his Imagination, his earnest- ness in the Cause of Religion and Truth, and his fixed aversion to Establishments of Men in the Church of Christ, he may, in some few Instances have been hurried beyond the Bounds of Modera- tion, his many Virtues, and great Services towards establishing Christianity on the most enlarged Foundation abundantly atone 222 CALLED UNTO LIBERTY for such Foibles: Indeed the natural Keenness and Poignancy of his Wit, whetted often by cruel and unchristian Usage, must pali- ate his severest Strokes of Satire.
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