CHAPTER IV.

1814.

The early history of the Church in Virginia. Election of Dr. Griffith as Bishop, in 1786. Bishop Madison, the first Bishop of Virginia, consecrated in 1790. Deep depression of the Church, and its causes. Apostolic character and labours of the Rev. Devereux Jarratt. Dr. Bracken's election in 1812. New era in the Church under the auspices of a few young Clergymen. Erection of the Monumental Church in Richmondand efforts made to obtain Dr. Moore for its first Rector with a view to his election as Bishop. Correspondence on the subject-including letters from Judge Washington, Bishop Hobart, and others. Propriety and delicacy of Dr. Moore's course in respect to it. His election by the Convention and circumstances connected with his consecration in 1814. His removal to Richmond. Previous condition of the Episcopal community there. His great popularity and success. Fidelity in the pulpit and in pastoral visitation. Presentation to him of a splendid copy of the New Testament by his fellow citizens of all denominations. Summary view of his character and labours as Rector of the Monumental Church.

It will not be an inappropriate introduction to our account of the elevation of the subject of this memoir to the Episcopate of Virginia, to take a brief glance at the preceding history of the Church in that Diocese. The establishment of the Church and the propagation of the Gospel among the native tribes of the new world seem to have occupied a prominent place in the views of government and the designs of those who were instrumental in the founding of the first English colony in America. "As far back as 1588, when Sir Walter Raleigh made an assignment of his patent to Thomas Smith and others, he accompanied it with a donation of one hundred pounds for the propagation of the Christian religion in Virginia.' It was also en

joined by the King's instruction that the presidents, councils and the ministers, should provide that the true word and service of God be preached, planted, and used, not only in the said Colonies, but also as much as might be among the savages bordering upon them, according to the rites and doctrines of the Church of England.' And the first charter assigns as one of the reasons for the grant, that the contemplated undertaking was a work which may, by the providence of Almighty God, hereafter tend to the glory of his divine majesty in propagating the Christian religion to such people as yet live in darkness and miserable ignorance of the true knowledge and worship of God."*

In conformity with these pious designs, the Church was planted with the Colony, at Jamestown, in 1606, and the remains of the old Church tower is almost the only relic which indicates to the traveller the site of the original settlement. In a few years the Rev. Robert Hurst, pastor of Jamestown, was joined by the Rev. Alexander Whitaker, who established the Church at Henrico. By this gentleman, Pocahontas, the Indian princess, was baptized; and in consequence of his faithful evangelical labours he received the honourable title of "Apostle of Virginia." In the year 1619, by the first legislative assembly ever convened in the province, the Church of England was made the established religion of Virginia, and fixed provision was made by law for the decent support of the clergy. By the appropriating of glebes, the imposition of taxes, and the providing of funds for the establishment of schools and a university-liberal provision was made not only for sustaining the services of religion among the Colonists, but also for the extension of its benefits to the benighted Indian tribes

Burk's History of Virginia, Charter, Hazard's State papers, cited by Dr. Hawks.

by which they were surrounded. From this time the number of ministers and parishes increased as rapidly as could be expected in the infant Colony; and notwithstanding the neglect of the provincial government, the fierce assaults of sectaries, and the prevalence of irreligion and vice, incident to newly settled communities of adventurers, the Church continued to exist, though attended with various fortune until the war of the Revolution. That momentous struggle, deprived it of many of its clergy, and some of its warmest friends among the laity, who left the country from attachment to the royal cause, and the measures which resulted in the political independence of the Colonies, left the Church in a state of great feebleness and prostration. In Maryland and Virginia, where the Church, as the established religion, was sustained by a system of taxation, its hold upon the affections of the people was weaker, and it was more thoroughly crippled by the revolution, than it was in the other provinces, where its existence imposed no involuntary burdens upon the people. As the established religion of an oppressive government, it shared deeply in the odium attached to the royal power by which it had been imposed. Moreover, the character of the clergy who were brought into frequent collision with the provincial officers, and with their flocks, in the enforcement of their legal claims to support, became more secularized, and was less virtuous and exemplary than that of the clergy in the other provinces; who, as missionaries, were responsible for their good behaviour to the societies in whose service they laboured, and who depended for their support upon the Christian bounty of the mother country.

There was presented in the American Colonies the anomaly of an Episcopal Church, comprising hundreds of ministers and congregations, without a resident Bishop on

the continent, and for the space of more than one hundred and fifty years subject to no Episcopal supervision or control that could be at all effective. It is true that the Bishop of London had nominal jurisdiction over the Churches in the provinces, and occasionally imposed some restraints and exerted some salutary influence through the medium of his commissaries. But in the absence of all proper discipline, many of the clergy not only became negligent in the performance of the spiritual duties of their office, but brought discredit upon their profession by indulging in the vices and dissipations of the world.

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Notwithstanding the very depressed state of the Church in Virginia, arising chiefly from the causes which have been adverted to, it was organized into an ecclesiastical body by the calling of a convention, soon after the close of the revolutionary war; and an early attempt was made to complete its organization and secure episcopal services, by the election, in 1786, of the Rev. David Griffith, of Fairfax parish, to the office of Bishop. But we have melancholy proof of the slender attachment of the people to the Church and its divine institutions, in the fact, that the convention did not furnish the means necessary to defray the expenses of the Bishop-elect in proceeding to England to procure consecration; and as his own resources were too limited to enable him to bear the expense himself, Dr. Griffith was not consecrated; and in 1789 he resigned the honourable appointment to which the suffrages of the Convention had called him. It was not until one hundred and eighty-four years after it was first planted at Jamestown, that the Church in Virginia received its first Bishop, in the person of the Right Rev. James Madison, D. D., who was elected by the convention in 1790, and consecrated at Lambeth, in September of the same year.

Bishop Madison seems to have entered upon the duties of his office with a sincere desire to elevate the character of the Church, and to employ a commendable zeal in the prosecution of such measures as would be likely to promote its prosperity. In his addresses to the convention he exhorted the clergy to fidelity, activity, and energy in the performance of the various duties of their sacred function, enforced upon the laity the duty of contributing to the support of the ministry and other institutions of religion, recommended the catechising of children, the distribution of religious tracts, and other efforts which seemed well adapted to advance the interests of truth and piety in the diocese. But however wise and judicious were his schemes, and however serious his purpose to have them carried into execution, it is certain that the result was in no wise answerable to his anticipations and desires. The deep-rooted prejudices against the Church grew and strengthened. The minds of men, animated by the spirit of revolution-and too often mistaking licentiousness for liberty-burned with hatred towards every thing connected with the government whose yoke they had cast off, and seemed disposed to break loose from all restraints, those of religion and virtue not excepted. The mad demon of blaspheming infidelity, which had rode upon the whirlwind of the French Revolution, was welcomed as an angel of light and freedom by the leading civilians of Virginia. And it was no difficult matter to persuade the vulgar to treat with abuse and violence the sacred things which their superiors and leaders contemptuously despised. The sectaries had long viewed the Church with jealousy, suspicion and hatred, and were willing to combine with the enemies of all religion to strip her of her inheritance and lay her dignity in the dust. This alliance of sectarianism and infidelity in the prosecu