Writings of Shaker Apostates and Anti-Shakers, 1782–1850, Volume 1: 1782–1811 [1 ed.] 9781138766877, 9781848933873, 9781138664296

Table of contents :
Contents
Acknowledgements
Preface
General Introduction
Bibliography
Valentine Rathbun, A Brief Account of a Religious Scheme (1782)
Amos Taylor, A Narrative of the Strange Principles, Conduct and Character of the People Known by the Name of Shakers (1782)
P. A., Three Curious Pieces (1782)
Benjamin West, Scriptural Cautions (1783)
Benjamin West, Scriptural Cautions (1783)
Daniel Rathbun, A Letter, fr om Daniel Rathbun, of Richmond, in the County of Berkshire to James Whittacor, Chief Elder of the Church, called Shakers (1785)
‘Spectator’, ‘The People Called Shakers’, Massachusetts Spy: or, Worcester Gazette (1786)
William Scales, ‘Mystery of the People Called Shakers’, Boston Gazette, and the Country Journal (1789)
[Anon.], ‘For the Western Star’, Western Star (1796)
Caleb Rathbun, ‘Caleb Rathbun Aged Nearly Seventeen Years’, Western Star (1796)
Amos Taylor, Letter, Western Star (1796)
Valentine Rathbun, ‘For the Western Star’, Western Star (1797)
Reuben Rathbone, Reasons Offered for Leaving the Shakers (1800)
James Smith, ‘An Attempt to Develope Shakerism’, Supporter (1810)
James Smith, Remarkable Occurrences, Lately Discovered Among the People Called Shakers (1810)
[Anon.], ‘Who Are the Shakers?’, American Commercial Daily Advertiser (1810)
[Anon.] [‘Mobbing the Shakers at Union Village, Ohio’], Supporter (1810)
[Anon.], ‘Expedition Against the Shakers’, Democratic Press (1810)
James Smith, Shakerism Detected (1810)
John Bailey, Fanaticism Exposed (1811)
Silent Corrections
Editorial Notes

Citation preview

WRITINGS OF SHAKER APOSTATES AND ANTI-SHAKERS, 1782–1850

American Communal Societies

Series Editors: Christian Goodwillie Peter Hoehnle

Forthcoming Titles in this Series Shaker Autobiographies, Biographies and Testimonies, 1806–1907 Christian Goodwillie, Glendyne R. Wegland and Margaret Gower (eds)

Contents of the Edition

Volume 1 General Introduction 1782–1811 Volume 2 1812–1826 Volume 3 1831– c. 1852 Index

WRITINGS OF SHAKER APOSTATES AND ANTI-SHAKERS, 1782–1850

Edited by Christian Goodwillie Volume 1 1782–1811

First published 2013 by Pickering & Chatto (Publishers) Limited Published 2016 by Routledge 2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN 711 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017, USA Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business Copyright © Taylor & Francis 2013 Copyright © General Introduction Christian Goodwillie 2013 Copyright © Editorial material Christian Goodwillie 2013 To the best of the Publisher’s knowledge every effort has been made to contact relevant copyright holders and to clear any relevant copyright issues.  Any omissions that come to their attention will be remedied in future editions. All rights reserved, including those of translation into foreign languages. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers. Notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and explanation without intent to infringe.

british library cataloguing in publication data Writings of Shaker apostates and anti-Shakers, 1782–1850. – (American communal societies) 1. Shakers – United States – History – 18th century – Sources. 2. Shakers – United States – History – 19th century – Sources. 3. Shakers – United States – Public opinion – History – 18th century – Sources. 4. Shakers – United States – Public opinion – History – 19th century – Sources. I. Series II. Goodwillie, Christian. 289.8’0973-dc23

ISBN-13: 978-1-84893-387-3 (set) Typeset by Pickering & Chatto (Publishers) Limited

CONTENTS

Acknowledgements Preface General Introduction Bibliography Valentine Rathbun, A Brief Account of a Religious Scheme (1782) Amos Taylor, A Narrative of the Strange Principles, Conduct and Character of the People Known by the Name of Shakers (1782) P. A., Three Curious Pieces (1782) Benjamin West, Scriptural Cautions (1783) Daniel Rathbun, A Letter, from Daniel Rathbun, of Richmond, in the County of Berkshire to James Whittacor, Chief Elder of the Church, called Shakers (1785) ‘Spectator’, ‘The People Called Shakers’, Massachusetts Spy: or, Worcester Gazette (1786) William Scales, ‘Mystery of the People Called Shakers’, Boston Gazette, and the Country Journal (1789) [Anon.], ‘For the Western Star’, Western Star (1796) Caleb Rathbun, ‘Caleb Rathbun Aged Nearly Seventeen Years’, Western Star (1796) Amos Taylor, Letter, Western Star (1796) Valentine Rathbun, ‘For the Western Star’, Western Star (1797) Reuben Rathbone, Reasons Offered for Leaving the Shakers (1800) James Smith, ‘An Attempt to Develope Shakerism’, Supporter (1810) James Smith, Remarkable Occurrences, Lately Discovered Among the People Called Shakers (1810) [Anon.], ‘Who Are the Shakers?’, American Commercial Daily Advertiser (1810) [Anon.] [‘Mobbing the Shakers at Union Village, Ohio’], Supporter (1810) [Anon.], ‘Expedition Against the Shakers’, Democratic Press (1810)

ix xiii xvii xxxv 1 29 41 45

55 113 119 131 137 143 147 151 179 187 201 207 211

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James Smith, Shakerism Detected (1810) John Bailey, Fanaticism Exposed (1811)

213 243

Silent Corrections Editorial Notes

267 269

For Elizabeth A. De Wolfe, Scott De Wolfe and David D. Newell. Friends, colleagues and mentors in the study of Shaker Literature.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

This collection could not have been assembled without the generous help of a whole host of individuals who are passionate about studying the Shakers. I received prompt answers to many questions from the Shaker studies listserv community. I would particularly like to thank the following individuals for their help in tracking down information about Shakers, anti-Shakers, Shaker apostates and even non-Shakers mentioned in this text: Tina Agren, Lenny Brooks, Sylvia Jeanne Bugbee, Philippe Chavance, Janice Clowes, Jane Crosthwaite, Larrie Curry, Sierra Dixon, Rob Emlen, Renee Fox, Jerry Grant, Mary Ann Haagen, Brother Arnold Hadd, Ann-Marie Harris, Lesley Herzberg, Tommy Hines, Peter Hoehnle, Magda Gabor-Hotchkiss, Rosemary Krill, Gayle Lynch, Julie Lyon, E. Richard McKinstry, Carol Medlicott, Stephen J. Paterwic, Charles E. Rand, Marc Rhorer, James Smart, Jeanne Solensky, Sandra Soule, Sharon Thayer, Mike Volmar, Glendyne Wergland and Ilyon Woo. I would like to thank the outstanding and highly professional staff at Pickering & Chatto: Daire Carr, Stephina Clarke, Eleanor Hooker and Ruth Ireland. It’s been a pleasure to work with you. Mark Tillson, my colleague in the Special Collections Department at Hamilton College, deserves special thanks. He was a tremendous help during the course of this project. Randy and Mary Anne Ericson of the Richard W. Couper Press have worked tirelessly to provide a forum for new research in Shaker studies. Some of the research presented herein first saw the light of day in the American Communal Societies Quarterly. The Ericsons deserve thanks from not just me, but the field in general. Three individuals have been key in the development of my passion for Shaker literature, and one even provided the opportunity for me to undertake this project. This collection is dedicated to these three people: Elizabeth A. De Wolfe, who single-handedly founded the field of Shaker apostate studies. Her many books and articles have laid a foundation for the rest of us to build on. She graciously passed this project along to me, for which I am extremely thankful. Her husband, antiquarian bookseller Scott De Wolfe has been a great friend, whose deep knowledge of Shakers, as well as books, has been an inspiration to me. Finally, David D. Newell has truly been my mentor in this field. David shares my passion for old books, paper, Shakers and cultural byways in general. He has

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been a close friend, and has shared a wealth of information with me on eighteenth-century Shakerism; Valentine Rathbun and William Scales in particular. Most of all, I owe the biggest debt of gratitude to my wife Erika. She was practically a single parent to our two young children Douglas and Sabine while this set was in preparation. Her dedication to motherhood, and loving patience in caring for the children is a source of wonder to me. Mary Dyer and Eunice Chapman would be proud!

PREFACE

‘From a Spirit of Detraction and Slander’: Attacking the Shakers in Print This collection of writings by Shaker apostates and anti-Shaker individuals brings together thirty-nine texts spanning 1782–c. 1852, comprising the bulk of the corpus of the genre. Texts were selected for inclusion in these volumes based on their relative rarity in institutional and electronic repositories, as well as the lack of a readily available critical or reprinted edition. Scholars of Shakerism will note the absence of Thomas Brown’s Account of the People Called Shakers (1812); Mary Marshall Dyer’s Brief Statement (1818), Portraiture of Shakerism (1822), and Rise and Progress (1847); William Haskett’s Shakerism Unmasked (1828); David R. Lamson’s Two Years’ Experience Among the Shakers (1848); and Hervey Elkins’s Fifteen Years in the Senior Order of the Shakers (1853). These important accounts have been omitted from this collection because either they have been reprinted in the recent past, are widely available on the internet or have been presented in critical editions by scholars such as Elizabeth A. De Wolfe and Peter Hoehnle. The goal in the present collection is to offer printed sources that survive in very few copies (in three cases only one) and are therefore largely inaccessible to the public. Each account is prefaced with a headnote that explains its geographical and social context, provides biographical information about the author (where known), delineates key themes or accusations and examines the popular impact of its publication, as well as the particular impact on the Shakers in general, or on a specific Shaker community. Editorial annotations appear throughout the original source texts. These notes provide specific information on individuals, events, or larger concepts in Shakerism. Admirers of the United Society of Believers in Christ’s Second Appearing, more commonly known as Shakers, might object to the collection of this critical mass of information originally intended to discredit and damage the sect. The purpose of this collection is not to perpetuate malice and misinformation, but instead to present these accounts for their undoubted value as windows on – xiii –

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times, places and people long since passed. These accounts often capture and express the intense emotions of anger and heartbreak surrounding the partial conversion of a family to the celibate faith of Shakerism – where mothers, fathers and children were separated to live as brothers and sisters. If only part of a family joined, the non-believing family members left behind in ‘the World’ (a Shaker term for the non-Shaker realm beyond their communities) were often intensely bitter. In Shaking the Faith: Women, Family, and Mary Marshall Dyer’s Anti-Shaker Campaign, 1815–1867, scholar Elizabeth A. De Wolfe traced the sad career of Dyer, who fought a fifty-two-year battle in print against the sect in an effort to regain her children. Dyer’s predecessor Eunice Chapman waged a similar battle that brought her into contact with the highest echelons of Shaker leadership, as well as the leaders of New York state government. Literary historian Ilyon Woo has wonderfully retold Chapman’s story in her book The Great Divorce. Lesser-known accounts such as those of French and Indian War veteran, former Indian captive and revolutionary soldier Colonel James Smith – who was ultimately devastated by the conversion of his son and namesake to Shakerism, deserve exposure to a wider audience. Not all of the accounts contained in this book are so personal. Alongside accounts by Shaker apostates – those who had converted to Shakerism and ultimately rejected the faith – are the writings of anti-Shaker individuals. These fall broadly into two categories, those objecting to Shakerism on theological grounds and those seeking to present a sensationalized picture of life within Shaker communities. Scholars have largely ignored the densely theological accounts. This is almost certainly due to the fact that Shaker theology itself has been woefully understudied by non-Shakers. Until a well-developed academic presentation of Shaker theology is available it would be most difficult to examine the criticism levelled at it by anti-Shaker clergymen. The sensational anti-Shaker accounts date primarily from the 1840s, a period of internal spiritual revival within Shaker communities known to scholars as the ‘Era of Manifestations’ or ‘Mother’s Work’. The late 1830s and 1840s saw novel spiritual ‘gifts’ of songs, dances, testimonies, revealed scripture, art and ritual communal activity. The more extreme aspects of these phenomena fascinated and shocked worldly observers. Shaker apostate David R. Lamson wrote the fullest account of these times in his Two Years’ Experience Among the Shakers. Scholar Peter Hoehnle published a critical edition of this important text, which is key to understanding the extent of the spirit manifestations and the accompanying usurpation of authority within Shaker communities. While Lamson’s account and its graphic illustrations Shaker worship are well-known, equally fascinating accounts such as A Return of Departed Spirits or Extract from an Unpublished Manuscript on Shaker History contain startling descriptions of the embodiment of ethnic spirits from all over the world by Shaker mediums, as well as the appearance to the

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Shakers of a who’s-who of biblical and historical personages, all of whom had converted to Shakerism in heaven. These accounts shed light on some of the most interesting episodes in Shaker history.

Editorial Note Forward slashes (/) have been used to mark original page breaks. And as ellipses appear originally in square brackets in some of the main texts, braces have been used to mark editorial omissions ({...}).

GENERAL INTRODUCTION

You have been here among the Shakers, for which you are sensured by some of your respectable neighbours, who are unacquainted with the people, and in order to wipe off the Stigma, it becomes necessary that an excuse should be sought for, and nothing better than to charge the people with being lier’s, drunkerds, whores, whore masters, thieves and robers. Henry Miller, Shaker Elder, 1824

Throughout their nearly 240-year history in North America, those seeking to destroy Shaker communities and faith have repeatedly attacked the Shakers in print. The Shakers preached a revolutionary message that the Christ-spirit had returned to earth through the agency of a woman, their founder Ann Lee, and that salvation was possible here and now through confession of sins, renunciation of sexual intercourse and community of goods. Shakers worshipped God through dancing, and manifested the divine spirit in ecstatic shaking and trembling. People who embarked on the Shaker path considered themselves to be partakers of the Christian millennium, an event triggered by Ann Lee’s gospel witness. The Shakers believed the millennium would start on a small scale and progress onwards until all God’s ends were accomplished.1 The existence and principles of this joyous, dancing, celibate community constituted a mortal threat to many. The Shakers, consistent with the practices of the early Christians, shared their testimony and beliefs with potential converts face to face through personal witness. Their strange religion was a fearful mystery to the people of revolutionary New England, and, beginning in 1805, the Ohio River Valley.

From ‘the High Region of Spiritual Sensation’ to ‘the Arcanum of the Killing Letter’: Shaker Apostate Writing in the Eighteenth Century Former Presbyterian minister and Shaker convert Richard McNemar used those words to describe his reluctance to degrade the realm of spirituality through the deadening medium of print. In fact, Shaker founder Ann Lee was illiterate. The only surviving physical mark of her intellect is the ‘X’ she made on the marriage registry of the Manchester Cathedral. However, ‘Ann the Word’ as she was – xvii –

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known, was to her followers a living embodiment of the logos, or Christ spirit. Ann Lee embarked from her native England with eight followers aboard the ship Mariah in May 1774. They arrived in New York City on 6 August. By September 1776 she was settled near Albany in the swampy wilderness of Niskeyuna, New York.2 The Shakers opened their gospel to the world in the spring of 1780. Ann Lee passed her teachings to her followers orally, just as Jesus Christ did to the apostles. Curious, religiously-minded individuals from Columbia County, New York, and Berkshire County, Massachusetts, learned about Shaker beliefs through intense personal meetings with Mother Ann and the Elders. The Shakers had no published creed or constitution, and the only prior mention of them in the American press was a newspaper article published in the Virginia Gazette in 1769.3 As the American public slowly became aware of the Shakers and Ann Lee, who was known as ‘the Elect Lady’, they desired information about the incredible events surrounding the sect. It was not Shakers who penned the first printed words about their movement and leader, but rather those who wished to discredit and destroy the nascent faith. Reverend Joseph Huntington in his 1780 anti-sectarian work Letters of Friendship cited Ann Lee as an extreme example of where excesses of religious enthusiasm and congregational strife could lead. He advised quarrelsome church members to visit ‘the neighbourhood of Stockbridge, and see the ravings of the Elect Lady, and those of her apostles, and hear what they say of the mighty power of God, impelling them to all manner of wantonness; hear their prayers for the dead; and attend to all the frenzy and distraction among them, and their doctrine of spiritual marriage in particular’.4 From the very beginning the Shakers ceded the power of the press to nonShakers, and throughout the 1780s they left erroneous and libellous reports unchallenged in the public arena. Huntington’s accusation that the Shakers practised a form of spiritual marriage is false. However, its vagueness and innuendo left the Shakers open to charges of immorality. Conversely, the Shakers did believe in the conversion of the dead to Shakerism, though they did not practise rituals to affect it, but instead relied on the spirits of the dead to convert of their own free will. The outward expansion of Shaker missionaries from their base in Niskeyuna, New York, following the ‘Dark Day’ of 19 May 1780, brought the unprecedented sights and sounds of Shaker worship to central Massachusetts. Mother Ann Lee herself travelled through northern Connecticut and into Upton and Grafton, Massachusetts, during June 1781.5 Apparently, Shaker converts had already come to the attention of the civil/religious authorities in Northampton, Massachusetts, as the following article from Boston’s Independent Chronicle, dated 4 May 1781, demonstrates: Worcester, May 4. From several parts of the country, we are informed of the extraordinary behaviour of a number of people, who appear to be actuated by a kind of religious frenzy, they are commonly called SHAKERS – We are told that at the Supe-

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rior Court holden at Northampton last week, two persons of this sect were indicted for Adultery, to which they both pleaded guilty; they are to sit on the gallows; receive a number of stripes each, and to wear the letter A on their outer-garments. It is said the woman, conceiving her husband to be an UNHOLY man, thought she ought not to cohabit with him, or suffer him to partake of those conjugal pleasures which were his right only to enjoy; but threw herself into the arms and embraces of one of the Brotherhood, who was, as she supposed, more righteous, and ’tis said is pregnant by him. It is hoped these disturbers of the peace will all be properly taken care of.6

The first major printed work against the Shakers appeared in early 1781. Pittsfield, Massachusetts-based Baptist Valentine Rathbun briefly converted to Shakerism during 1780. Unfortunately, he had convinced the majority of his friends and family to do the same. Disillusioned with the sect, he apostatized within three months. Bereft of friends and family, he launched the first Shaker apostate campaign in the public press. His Account of the Matter, Form, and Manner of a New and Strange Religion, Taught and Propagated by a Number of Europeans, Living in a Place Called Nisqueunia, in the State of New-York and (variously titled) Some Brief Hints of a Religious Scheme went through ten different printings in New York, New England, and even Nova Scotia, during the 1780s. His publication, which also served as an apologia to his fellow clergymen for having been temporarily deceived by the Shakers, was designed to highlight the deviant practices of the new sect. Rathbun related that ‘At one of their meetings, they hung a woman by the neck, but took her down before she was dead, to shew as a sign, how they were to be persecuted’.7 He called the Shakers teachings the ‘doctrines of devils’ that would be taught by the ‘seducing spirits’ in the ‘latter times’ spoken of in 1 Timothy 4. A 1782 edition of his work was published at Worcester with an appendix purporting to be a dialogue between King George III and his ministers plotting to send the pacifist Shakers to New England to dupe the people and pave the way for British reconquest. Writings like this one, and parallel stories in the newspapers, did much to damage the reputation of Shakers among people that lived far from centres of Shaker activity. On Valentine Rathbun’s heels two other individuals published pamphlets attacking the Shakers. Amos Taylor’s Narrative of the Strange Principles, Conduct and Character of the People Known by the Name of Shakers appeared in 1782. Taylor offered a seventeen-point explication of Shaker beliefs – the first thing of its kind printed. Benjamin West, who was perhaps the son and namesake of the famous Brown University mathematician, published Scriptural Cautions Against Embracing a Religious Scheme, Taught by a Number of Europeans in 1783. West’s account refutes Shakerism more on theological grounds, in comparison with the personal accounts of Rathbun and Taylor. He was also the first to trace the sect’s history back to the French Prophets of the early eighteenth century.

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In 1784 prominent Baptist preacher Isaac Backus published the second volume of his Church History of New-England. Noting the Shakers with disgust, he wrote of visiting them in June 1782, in company with Valentine Rathbun. Backus was horrified that they earnestly inculcate that doctrine of devils of forbidding to marry, and require so much bodily exercise, in singing and dancing, &c. as has destroyed the health and even the lives of some; a cruel cross indeed! while their chief leaders delight themselves much in feasting and drinking spirituous liquor.

To these charges Backus added that of dancing naked, an accusation that would follow the Shakers well into the nineteenth century. Backus also purported to give seven tenets of the Shaker faith which were completely scurrilous.8 On 26 January 1786, an article by one ‘Spectator’9 published a nineteen-point ‘Articles’ of faith that he claimed had been agreed to by a meeting of Shaker leaders. This was likely not the case, as some points are not consistent with anything subsequently published by the Shakers regarding their beliefs. However, some of ‘Spectators’s’ reported Shaker tenets do accord with known Shaker beliefs. His account may very well be the earliest printed explication of Shaker beliefs written by a non-Shaker. Only apostate Amos Taylor’s seventeen points of Shaker doctrine (published in his 1782 Narrative), and Backus’s slanderous writing, pre-date it. Valentine Rathbun’s younger brother Daniel published the longest Shaker apostate work of the eighteenth century. His 1785 Letter, from Daniel Rathbun to James Whittacor, Chief Elder of the Church, Called Shakers is an incredibly rich account of the early Shaker movement in America. A lengthy personal narrative, it also employs scriptural refutation, and examines Shaker parallels with the French Prophets and the Roman Catholic Church. Rathbun goes further than any of the earlier apostates in charging Mother Ann with alcohol abuse, and her followers in general with shockingly immoral behaviour. In one of the more memorable lines of the canon of Shaker apostate literature, Rathbun wrote of the Shakers: ‘they will many of them drink hard, sing and dance all night, strip naked and spank one anothers arses’. Daniel Rathbun’s Letter was attacked by William Scales, a Harvard-educated minister and Shaker convert who considered himself a theological defender of Shakerism. Scales intended to publish his own defence of the Shakers in 1787. However, by 1789 he too had apostatized and published a lengthy newspaper article exposing the sect, and proposing to ‘effect the utter extermination of your ministration from off the face of the earth’. Scales haunted the Shaker villages for years seeking compensation for his financial losses while a Shaker. Continuing a strong family tradition, the last two Shaker apostate narratives of the eighteenth century were also written by Rathbuns. Caleb Rathbun, Valentine’s grandson, escaped the New Lebanon, New York, Shaker community in 1795.

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He published a narrative of the appalling physical abuse he suffered at their hands. Caleb’s account appeared as part of the climax of hostilities in a newspaper war carried on in the Western Star newspaper of Stockbridge, Massachusetts, in early 1796. These articles were published by an anti-Shaker using the pseudonym ‘Calvin’ and answered by a defender of the Shakers who styled himself ‘A Lover of Truth’.10 The extremely graphic content of Caleb Rathbun’s deposition, and its incendiary charges of maltreatment, was aimed at inciting popular anger towards the Shakers. Reuben Rathbone, Valentine’s son, had been a Shaker for just shy of twenty years by the time he apostatized in 1799. He had achieved the position of Church Family Elder at the Hancock, Massachusetts, community – a responsibility second only to that of the Ministry. He had also condemned his father in a letter that excoriated him for rejecting the Shaker faith. In the end, for reasons that are in dispute, he left the community at Hancock and published a self-justification, Reasons Offered for Leaving the Shakers, in 1800. Rathbone’s is the only eighteenth-century apostate account that gives insight into the day-today life in a formally organized Shaker community. It is a valuable source in this regard due to the relative scarcity of Shaker manuscript records for the period. Shaker apostate narratives of the eighteenth century served a number of purposes. For their authors they were a way to apologize to their families and former friends for having embraced the faith in the first place. Apostate authors generally plead that despite their best intentions they were deceived by the supernaturally evil powers of the Shakers. Themes common to nearly all of these works are: drunkenness and sexual immorality on the part of the Shaker leadership, the abuse of children, the abuse of parents by their children, encouragement of suicidal tendencies among converts, the practice of witchcraft and sorcery by Shaker leaders, destroying people’s health through excessive exercise and malnutrition, defrauding converts of their wealth and dancing naked. Some of these accusations would be carried forward by nineteenth-century apostates and anti-Shaker writers. The totality of the Shakers’ response to these attacks in print during the nineteenth century amounted to two editions of their Concise Statement of the Principles of the Only True Church, According to the Gospel of the Present Appearance of Christ (a [1785] edition of eight pages, and 1790 edition of twenty-four pages), and a brief newspaper article refuting the monetary claims of apostate William Dodge.11 Thus far the Shakers had completely ceded control of their public image to their enemies.

‘A Poisonous Worm Gnawing at the Root of the Tree of Liberty’ Shaker Benjamin Seth Youngs was one of three brethren dispatched from the New Lebanon, New York, Shaker community at three o’clock on the frozen morning of 1 January 1805. Over the next three months these missionaries tra-

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versed more than 1,000 miles – nearly the whole way on foot – to carry the Shaker gospel to religious revivalists in Kentucky and Ohio. They arrived in March and through much travail converted many during 1805, gathering in souls throughout central Kentucky and south-western Ohio. The missionaries may have hoped that the malicious writings of their enemies had not spread to this far frontier. However, much to their chagrin the void of information about Shakerism was readily filled with vicious writings – most written twenty to thirty years prior. After 1,000 miles on foot the missionaries found that they could not outpace the explosive printed accusations of their most committed enemies: apostates from the faith and anti-Shaker individuals dedicated to defeating the sect on theological or social grounds. Within three months of their arrival Youngs’s fellow missionary John Meacham reported to his spiritual superiors at New Lebanon that ‘some Books are found to be in circulation that prove hurtful to the mind of many’.12 One of these was probably Reuben Rathbone’s Reasons Offered for Leaving the Shakers, as the missionaries requested that a copy of Rathbone’s letter to his father Valentine (wherein he defended Shakerism) be forwarded for use in refuting attacks. On 6 August 1806, the missionaries wrote to the Ministry at New Lebanon with worrying news: Many of the accusations that were Spread in the First opening of the gospel have been brought to this country – & they are surculated in adition to a very numerous multitude of fresh ones that have been raised against the worck of God here, one of the rathbun books has also been Brought – & they have made great use of it, carying it & Reading it from place to place.13

A familiar scene began to play out yet again, and the Shakers were faced with physical violence incited by the printed words of their foes. Benjamin Seth Youngs, the aforementioned missionary, as well as theologian, judged that these works were written ‘from a spirit of detraction and slander’. In 1808 at Lebanon, Ohio, the Shakers published The Testimony of Christ’s Second Appearing, a work authored primarily by Youngs. In the preface he complained that ‘Many have undertaken to write and publish concerning the principles and practice of a people, who, in derision, are called SHAKERS, and either through ignorance or prejudice have misrepresented both’. He further charged that The greatest part that hath been published abroad in the world [was by] writers either unacquainted with the people, or actuated by a spirit of prejudice … nor hath any thing, hitherto, been published that meets our approbation … stating facts in an imperfect light [and also] adding the most groundless falsities.14

In authoring the 600-page Testimony Youngs hoped to provide the world with a proper understanding of the Shakers and their beliefs. Instead, he provided them with ammunition to attack the United Society during its westward expansion.

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In his preface to the Testimony Youngs made specific reference to an anonymous publication printed in Danville (Kentucky) 1805, said to be taken – From the Theological Magazine. A specimen of this garbling writer is – that ‘The first founder of this wild sect was one Jane Lees: she lived in the town of Manchester, in England; was of low parentage and procured her living at the expense of her chastity. She sustained the character of a woman of ill fame in England, which character she supported in America until her death.’15

Until recently this item – the first anti-Shaker imprint published west of the Appalachians – was a bibliographic ghost. The account as printed in the Theological Magazine in 1795 has long been available to scholars.16 In 1805 the text of this same article was republished as a curious appendage to a series of evangelical vignettes written for theatrical performance entitled The Village Dialogues by English preacher and missionary Rowland Hill (misspelled Roland on the title page of this edition). The Village Dialogues was reprinted numerous times in both England and America, however only the Danville edition contains the appended text of the account of the Shakers. This item is the earliest known imprint from Danville, Kentucky. Unfortunately the title page of the sole surviving copy has been trimmed right above where a date of imprint presumably appeared. However, from the Shakers’ reference to the work it can be safely dated to 1805. Remarkably, it was printed in the same year that saw the arrival of Shaker missionaries. Unfortunately, the sole surviving copy of the 1805 imprint contains only pages [1] and 2, so any additional text that may have been added contemporary to the arrival of the Shaker missionaries is not present. Despite its fragmentary nature, this humble imprint holds great importance as being the first of many hundreds of items printed by and about the Shakers following their 1805 mission to the west. Colonel James Smith, who fought both the French and Indian War and the Revolutionary War, and was also held captive by the Indians, was no stranger to conflict and strife. Settled in his son and namesake’s home at Cane Ridge, Kentucky, he looked forward to a secure old age that he would improve through missionary work for the Presbyterian Church. When the climatic events of the Kentucky Revival unfolded virtually on his doorstep he and his family were enthusiastic participants. He could not foresee the arrival of a people such as the Shakers, who brought a plan for salvation far more radical than anything Smith could have ever imagined. Under their influence his son abandoned both his wife and father and joined the Shakers at Turtle Creek (Union Village), Ohio. Smith found himself once again at the centre of conflict, and he was not going to give up his family without a fight. In July 1810 Smith launched the largest print battle to date between an anti-Shaker and the Shakers. He published a lengthy newspaper article, ‘An Attempt to Develope Shakerism’, that was reprinted throughout

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the United States. He followed up with his first pamphlet, colloquially known as Shakerism Developed, which was printed in Kentucky, Virginia, and Tennessee. In this work Smith offered an eleven-point encapsulation of Shaker faith. The main theme was the maltreatment of his daughter-in-law Polly and her children. To frame this he added allegations of child abuse, licentious sex and alcohol abuse. As a patriot and veteran of the revolution Smith introduced a new theme into antiShaker literature: the supposed Shaker plot to subvert the American Republic. He warned: ‘Let Shakerism predominate, and it will extirpate Christianity, destroy marriage and also our present free government, and finally depopulate America. According to their scheme civil and ecclesiastical government are blendid together, theirs is a despotic monarchy.’17 Echoing similar accusations from the early 1780s he warned that the Shakers were secret Tories just waiting for their chance to aid in the British reconquest of the frontier along the Ohio and Wabash rivers. For the first time the Shakers had a member who was willing to take up his pen in defence of the sect. Richard McNemar, a former Presbyterian minister and leading light during the Kentucky Revival, had joined the Shakers in 1805. He was an enthusiastic and prolific writer, and immediately refuted Smith’s work in local newspapers. Unfortunately, due to the negligible rate of survival for Ohio newspapers of this period, some portions of the Smith–McNemar newspaper war are missing; as is all but one part and a fragment of a four-part anti-Shaker series called ‘A Retrospective View of Shakerism’, by a Thomas Freeman. The outcome of all of this anti-Shaker agitation in the public press was a mob action at Union Village, Ohio, on 27 August 1810. Less than three months later Smith issued his second pamphlet, Shakerism Detected. This work was partly in reply to McNemar’s newspaper rejoinder to Smith, published as ‘The Developer of Shakerism Developed’.18 McNemar attacked Smith for his role in a controversial proto-revolutionary incident that occurred in 1765 (see the headnote for Shakerism Detected, pp. 213–16, below). This struck a raw nerve with Smith. In his lengthy work Smith defended his past and amplified his charges against the Shakers. To do so he introduced a new technique for attacking the Shakers that would be employed by many apostates to come – the affidavit. Smith travelled the frontier collecting testimony from ten eyewitnesses as to the perfidy of the Shakers. Unfortunately most of these eyewitnesses were his relatives, but no matter. Smith furthered his allegations of treasonous intentions on the part of the Shakers, calling into question their relations with the Shawnee Indians. He called Ohio Shaker leader David Darrow ‘pope’ – a loaded term to a still predominantly anti-Catholic public. After briefly recapitulating his military service, Smith closed by asking: ‘can I bear to see my grand-children raised up traitors to the free government that protects them, to be pests of society and slaves to pope David?’ McNemar deftly countered Smith’s claims in the first Shaker publication issued solely to refute an anti-Shaker or apostate: ‘Shakerism Detected &.’

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Examined & Refuted, in Five Propositions. The McNemar–Smith conflict ended in a draw. Smith returned to the military life he loved, serving briefly in the War of 1812 before his death. James Smith Jr remained among the Shakers. In Kentucky 1811 and 1812 saw the publication of two scripturally based attacks on Shakerism. Benjamin Seth Youngs’s words in the Testimony were turned against the Shakers, and contrasted with the Bible, by Baptist John Bailey and physician Christopher Clark. Bailey’s Fanaticism Exposed is not very compelling. He objects to Shaker theology and echoes the concerns of Smith about the citizens of a free country being used as slaves by the despotic Shakers. Clark’s Shock to Shakerism is excessively long. To him a Shaker convert was an ‘enthusiastic dupe, or a spiritually blinded wretch’. He compares Shakers with slaves, writing ‘it is easier to gain white Negroes in America, to work, and dance all their days, than obtain money to purchase black ones’. Apart from a few humorous digressions, its dense comparison of Youngs Testimony with the Bible drag it down. Neither work was much noticed at the time, and had nowhere near the impact on the Shakers as the works of James Smith. Back east, 1812 was a landmark year for Shaker apostate writing. Thomas Brown published his Account of the People Called Shakers: Their Faith, Doctrines, and Practice. While this text is not included in the present set, it is one of the major works by a Shaker apostate. Brown’s Account drew on the writings of the Rathbun family, and he even travelled to Milton, New York, to interview Daniel Rathbun Jr, who had been a Shaker follower along with his father in the early 1780s. The scope of Brown’s Account was larger than any prior apostate publication, it was 372 pages in length, and boasted a large list of subscribers. The authoritative and largely calm style of Brown’s presentation lent it an air of credibility that is lacking in some of the more hyperbolic anti-Shaker works. In an amusing incident from 1816 a witness for later apostate Eunice Chapman cited Brown’s Account in front of the New York Legislature. Deric Veeder, a former Shaker from Watervliet, New York, told his questioners – in the presence of Shaker Elders – that ‘He knew T. Brown’s history of the Shaker, was true.’ According to Chapman, ‘This testimony so alarmed Elders Wells & Hodgson, that they arose from their seats, faced Mr. Veeder, and attempted to dispute him.’19 Brown’s work was cited by many subsequent anti-Shaker writers and is a cornerstone of the genre. Many years later, around 1900, Shaker Alonzo Giles Hollister printed a letter written by Seth Youngs Wells to Yale Professor Benjamin Silliman in 1823 that dismissed Brown’s work in its entirety. It was titled Thomas Brown and his Pretended History of Shakers.20

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‘Give Me My Children – I Ask No More’ Shaker apostate literature of the late 1810s and early 1820s is dominated by two names: Eunice Chapman and Mary Marshall Dyer. Eunice Chapman’s husband James joined the Shakers and took the couple’s children with him, as was his legal right. Mary Dyer joined the Shakers with her husband, but decided to leave – only to find she could not take her children with her. Chapman began her public campaign to regain her children before the New York State Legislature at Albany in 1815. In 1817 she published her tale of woe An Account of the Conduct of the People Called Shakers in the Case of Eunice Chapman and her Children, since her Husband became Acquainted with that People, and Joined their Society. Some among the public doubted that a woman could have produced the work. However, Eunice was no shrinking violet. She acted the helpless victim before the powerful men in New York politics, but her letter to Shaker leader Mother Lucy Wright (reprinted in Volume 2, p. 85) reveals a woman of clear and threatening purpose, determined to get custody her children at any costs. Ilyon Woo has published the definitive account of Chapman’s struggles in her book The Great Divorce. In northern New England another embittered young woman paid careful attention to Eunice’s struggle, following her in the public press. Mary Dyer left the Enfield, New Hampshire, Shaker community in 1815. She left behind her believing husband Joseph and their five children. Dyer began a correspondence with Chapman, seeking advice on her own efforts to reclaim her children. At Union Village, Ohio, a similar drama had enveloped the Davis family. Abram Van Vleet, the anti-Shaker editor of Lebanon Ohio’s Western Star newspaper judged the spirit of the times and republished and expanded edition of Chapman’s Account. This new edition, first issued at Albany in 1818, was supplemented with a new writing by Thomas Brown, Mary Dyer’s letters to Chapman, and also a full slate of local affidavits concerning the Davis clan. Father David Darrow, the First Elder of the Union Village, Ohio, Ministry lamented to Richard Spier of the New Lebanon, New York, community: They are now printing and publishing all the Slander and false reports they can get hold of gathering all the apostates and every one that will swear any thing against us. and sending out their Depositions in the publick papers through the world in order to stir up the envy of man kind against us.21

Richard McNemar once again took up his pen to answer the apostates’ accusations in his lengthy rebuttal The Other Side of the Question, issued in 1819. Mary Marshall Dyer’s anti-Shaker odyssey was just beginning. In 1818, no doubt inspired by Chapman, she published A Brief Statement of the Sufferings of Mary Dyer. Taking a cue from Colonel James Smith, she collected numerous affidavits in support of her story. However, the Shakers had finally overcome their

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reticence to answer such works in kind. Dyer’s Brief Statement was answered the same year by former husband Joseph Dyer’s Compendious Narrative.22 In May 1818, in an episode worthy of the silver screen, Dyer and Chapman teamed up to lead a mob against the Shakers at Enfield, New Hampshire.23 In 1822 Dyer issued her magnum opus: A Portraiture of Shakerism, a vast collection of damning statements about the Shakers that spanned the entire history of the sect. Dyer followed Thomas Brown’s lead in considering the full historical scope of Shakerism, compiling a veritable treasury of wrongdoing on the part of the Shakers. Historian Elizabeth A. De Wolfe has documented Mary Dyer’s fifty-two-year long anti-Shaker crusade in her masterful Shaking the Faith: Women, Family, and Mary Marshall Dyer’s Anti-Shaker Campaign, 1815–1867. Tempers in Ohio had not cooled much following the publication of McNemar’s Other Side of the Question. In a digression from attacking his main enemies, McNemar used a few pages of Other Side to respond to a paragraph of less-thanflattering commentary about the Shakers published by the pretentiously-named ‘Rational Brethren of the West’. One of these Rational Brethren was Daniel Doty, an original settler of south-western Ohio and former friend of McNemar’s from the time of the Kentucky Revival. Doty took umbrage at McNemar’s coolly intellectual criticism of the Rational Brethren and their beliefs and went on the offensive. In 1820 he partnered with William Ludlow to publish An Address to the People at Union Village, and a Solemn Warning to the Whole Human Family Against Shakerism and Delusion. He used Abram Van Vleet as his publisher. Doty’s work tackles the ominous mathematics of Shaker celibacy. What would happen, he wonders, if Shakerism took hold? Why, the earth would be depopulated within one hundred years – in direct defiance of God’s command. The feud between Doty and McNemar seems to have ended with a whimper, rather than a bang, as no further publications issued from either side. However, anti-Shaker publishing west of the Appalachians was just heating up.

‘If Jesus Christ was Here in Person, the Shakers would Shoot Him’ Five substantial and informative apostate and anti-Shaker works were published in Ohio, Kentucky, and Indiana, between 1824 and 1834. Absolem Blackburn’s 1824 Brief Account was published as a mea culpa by one who had joined the Shakers not once, but twice. Alongside his apologetic Blackburn provides the richest contemporary account of the lost Shaker village at West Union, Indiana, to be found in a non-manuscript source. While Blackburn was finishing his work for the press in Kentucky, a new group of spiritual seekers in south-western Ohio sought out the Shakers. The opening of the Shaker gospel to the people of the White Water River country in 1823 provoked a strong backlash from embarrassed local Methodist clergymen. Samuel Brown’s Countercheck to Shakerism

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and Peter Youmans’s Appeal to Scripture and Common Sense, or, A Death Blow to Shakerism lamented the loss of good Methodists to the heretical doctrines of the Shakers. Countercheck is needlessly verbose, along the lines of Christopher Clark’s 1812 Shock to Shakerism. In attempting to make a theologically-sound refutation of Shakerism Brown succeeds only in explaining Methodism. Youmans, on the other hand, is more successful in hammering home his objections to Shakerism. In only twelve pages of tightly packed prose he achieves what Brown failed to do in seventy-six. His most devastating device is a table giving an eight-point side-by-side comparison of Jesus Christ and Ann Lee. Youmans called the Shakers ‘filthy dreamers’. Their worship was a solemn mockery … They dance seemingly with all their might; at times they jump, and clap their hands, and stomp with their feet; they scream, shout, and holloo, like Indians. No person of common sense would call that worshipping God; but rather worshipping the Devil, their master. 24

1826 was a banner year for western Shaker apostates. Two major works of deep substance were published. John Woods lived as a Shaker for seventeen years. Like James Smith Jr and James Chapman, he abandoned his wife and children to take up the cross. In his apostate narrative Shakerism Unmasked Woods shares his inner conflict (viewed in hindsight) when faced with the awful choice of leaving his wife and youngest son to fend for themselves. Nonetheless, he followed Father David Darrow’s advice and forsook all for the cross, moving to the Shaker community at Union Village, Ohio. For the next seventeen years Woods held one of the toughest jobs in a Shaker community –schoolteacher and Deacon of the Boys’ Order. As the old saying goes, no good deed goes unpunished. Woods butted heads repeatedly with Malcolm Worley, the first convert to Shakerism west of the Appalachians and a leading light of the Union Village community. Worley had a very different, and probably impractical, approach to educating and disciplining children. Circumstances dictated that Woods eventually left Union Village without permission from his Elders and sought refuge at Pleasant Hill, Kentucky. When his case was judged by the Ministry he was essentially exiled to the disease-ridden West Union, Indiana, community. Luckily, he got sick but didn’t die, and was sent to Pleasant Hill to convalesce. At that point he took this opportunity to leave the Shakers. Woods finally rejected what he viewed as the despotism and favouritism of the Shaker hierarchy. One of the strongest lines in his work is something he claims to have overheard a brother at Pleasant Hill say: ‘If Jesus Christ was here in person, the Shakers would shoot him.’25 John Whitbey was an entirely different, and more threatening, case. Whitbey followed his brother Richardson to the Pleasant Hill, Kentucky, community. Highly intelligent, and of a naturally inquisitive and disputatious turn of mind, Whitbey quickly came into conflict with his Elders. Shakerism as a revealed reli-

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gion relies on the acquiescence of each order to its superior, or ‘lead’. Whitbey asked too many questions that cast the divinely inspired leadership of the Elders in doubt. His Beauties of Priestcraft is a generally positive account of the Shakers, among whom he saw a degree of love and union ‘exceeded by no society on earth’.26 Whiteby’s rational approach to life, religion and social equality attracted him to the ideas of Welsh-born social reformer Robert Owen. Whitbey read Owen’s New View of Society and spread its ideas among his colleagues at the Novitiate, or Gathering Order, at Pleasant Hill. This met with stern disapproval from the Elders, who included the theologian John Dunlavy. According to his own account, Whitbey finally decided to leave the community in part due to a public shaming at Dunlavy’s hands. So, he journeyed on to New Harmony and published his thoughtful – and unwelcome – critique of Shakerism. Whitbey matches Thomas Brown for his degree of cool detachment from the subject at hand, despite his participation. These types of narratives were very effective despite, or possibly because of, the fact that they did not devolve into the hysterical accusations of criminal abuse so common to anti-Shaker writings. Once again McNemar answered the objections of Whitbey and his allies in Investigator; or A Defence of the Order, Government & Economy of the United Society Called Shakers, Against Sundry Charges & Legislative Proceedings. McNemar also dealt with the apostasy of the poet Aquila Massie Bolton, who had once authored a lengthy poem promoting Shakerism. Followings Bolton’s apostasy from the Union Village, Ohio, community, McNemar eviscerated him with a pamphlet entitled A Series of Lectures on Orthodoxy and Heterodoxy, in Allusion to the Testimony of Christ’s Second Appearing. Introduced by a Rpely [sic] to Sundry Defamatory Letters written by A. M. Bolton, late, a Catechuman in the United Society at Union Village. Bolton’s remarkable saga has been detailed by independent scholar Sandra Soule in her book Independency of the Mind: Aquila Massie Bolton, Poetry, Shakerism, and Controversy. The final work of western Shaker apostasy from this period is in some ways the most mysterious. John McBride joined the Shakers at South Union, Kentucky, in 1809. He was sent to Pleasant Hill where he lived as a member until sometime in the early 1830s. His argument is presented in a series of numbered points on different aspects of Shaker life and doctrine. McBride objected strongly to the confession of sins to Shaker Elders, comparing it to Roman Catholic practices – as did so many other apostates. Despite his objection to this, and to dancing, he lived happily as a Shaker for ten years before doubt crept in; then he still managed another five; and another five beyond that, despite struggling with some sort of sexual affliction, which he confessed to the Elders. Their advice to him was ‘some have found benefit by running’. McBride dared to get out of bed at night and pray to God for help, a practice forbidden by Shakers. His roommate tattled on him to the Elders, and McBride, like Whitbey, was publicly humiliated. He left the Shakers shortly thereafter and related his story in his

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Account, published at Cincinnati in 1834. However, McBride’s story is unique among Shaker apostates in that he finally returned to Pleasant Hill, and died there in 1844. McBride’s Account was the last western Shaker apostate narrative published before 1850.

‘A Gold Watch, and Golden Pump, to Pump the Power of God With’ The remainder of the anti-Shaker and Shaker apostate works published before 1850 came from the north-eastern heartland of Shakerism. Two rather mild works mark the beginning of the era. Englishman Benjamin Green’s True Believers Vademecum details his seven-year stay at the Enfield, New Hampshire, Shaker community. Green presents himself as a serious-minded religious seeker. The worst that he alleges of the Shakers is that his Deacon called him a ‘fool’ or ‘saphead’, and that he might have been the object of unwelcome advances by an Eldress in his family. His account is fairly short on the details of everyday life, and eventually morphs into a singular and bizarre personal religious manifesto that has nothing to do with the Shakers. In contrast, Charles C. Hodgdon’s Life and Manner of Living Among the Shakers is a genuinely sincere and heartbreaking account of an earnest young man determined to find out the truth about the Shakers. Hodgdon was open-minded enough to reject Mary Dyer’s slanderous allegations about the Shakers and seek out the truth for himself. His account of daily life at the Canterbury, New Hampshire, community in the early 1820s is wonderful. In the end, Hodgdon fell in love with a young sister in the community. After a period of travail they were able to leave the Shakers and begin their lives together in nearby Concord, New Hampshire. His wife (unnamed in his work) had two children before tragically dying of a bowel ailment. Hodgdon was left alone as a single father of two, aged just twenty-one. His publication is expressly intended to render a fair statement about his life with the Shakers, and to provide the public with an alternative to the poisonous writings of such as Mary Dyer. Hodgdon concluded his pamphlet with an original poem entitled ‘To Mary Dyer as a Slanderer’. Hodgdon’s work was published in 1838, and in a way it marked the end of an era. From this point forward no written account of life among the Shakers could be published outside of the context of the events the ‘Era of Manifestations’ or ‘Mother’s Work’. This period of internal spiritual revival brought Shaker communities of the late 1830s and 1840s into contact with their deceased founders, as well historical and biblical personages, and more broadly the spirits of the dead from all nations throughout time. ‘Visionists’ or ‘instruments’ – we might call them mediums – conveyed testimonies, songs, dances and even works of art, from the spirits to the Shakers. No one who lived among the Shakers from 1837 through to the mid-1850s could have escaped the omnipresence of these activi-

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ties within the communities. As such, the apostate narratives of the period draw heavily on the bizarre novelties and religious innovations observed during the period. The first such work was A Return of Departed Spirits published in 1843. Probably written by Louis Thomas, who lived at the Watervliet, New York, community for a brief time from 1842 to 1843, it describes the colourful cast of spirits who manifested themselves to proclaim their glad acceptance of Shakerism in the spirit world. Among the notables are George Washington, Alexander the Great, the Prophet Mohammed and Pope Pius (which one isn’t specified). Along with these grandees came the nameless deceased of all nation and times, including Laplanders, Greenlanders, Hottentots, Arabs, Jews, etc. Read objectively it is quite hilarious, but when compared to Shaker manuscript records of the period its authenticity holds up quite well. In this respect it is like David R. Lamson’s Two Years’ Experience Among the Shakers, which describes the same time period among the Hancock, Massachusetts, Shaker community. As scholar Peter Hoehnle has shown, Lamson’s version of events jibes overwhelmingly with the Shakers’ own records.27 The anonymous Extract of an Unpublished Manuscript on Shaker History is broadly similar, except for the fact that its author had a longer tenure with the Shakers. The author was a young woman who lived with her son at the South Family, or Gathering Order, of the Harvard, Massachusetts, Shaker community. She describes fantastic scenes in her narrative, including the presentation of a golden pump and spiritual spectacles to a Shirley, Massachusetts, Shaker Elder by none other than Jesus Christ. Her account of the funeral of Abijah Worster, who had been a follower of Shadrach Ireland’s pre-Shaker religious community in the 1770s, demonstrates how the new spiritual ‘gifts’ of the Era of Manifestations permeated every aspect of Shaker life. The Extract takes a rather dark turn into descriptions of child abuse towards the end. Some issues, particularly the welfare of children among the Shakers, would never cease to be a cause of public curiosity or concern. The other anti-Shaker accounts from this period centre on family issues. Horatio Stone could not bear the fact that his brother Henry and sister Julia had joined the Shakers. His objections centred primarily on the Shaker covenant, which deprived a seceding member of full compensation for property consecrated to, or work performed for, the community. He quotes extensively from the Shakers’ Brief Exposition – his refutations of quoted passages are given in footnotes or brief interjections. Owing to this technique his work lacks rhetorical strength. However, a section where he describes Shaker Philemon Stewart’s location of the New Lebanon, New York, community’s feast ground with angelic assistance is quite remarkable. Stone was also only the second anti-Shaker writer to use an illustration of any kind. Whereas David Lamson had illustrated the Hancock Shakers’ ‘fountain stone’ (erected as a centre of worship) surrounded by dancing Shakers, Stone used it as a stark, tombstone-like image to underscore

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the title of his work Lo Here and Lo There!, or, The Grave of the Heart (reprinted in Volume 3, pp. 111–64). William H. Pillow’s anti-Shaker case was like Eunice Chapman or Mary Dyer’s, only in reverse. Pillow’s wife joined the Shakers, and in a foolish moment he indentured his children to them. When he decided Shaker life was not for him he had no recourse, his wife wanted to stay, and his children were legally beyond his control. Faced with this nightmare scenario Pillow attempted to reclaim his wife and children through the courts. His situation excited the sympathies of Methodist clergyman Luther Lee, who published on Pillow’s case in his magazine the True Wesleyan. Pillow battled the Shakers in court from 1847 to 1852. Despite the legality of the indentures, Pillow eventually succeeded in reclaiming his children. His wife also left the Shakers in time. His case was the last Shaker child-custody case that resulted in substantial printed evidence in the newspapers and private press. Beginning in the mid-1840s troupes of apostate Shakers travelled throughout the north-eastern and Midwestern United States. Capitalizing on popular curiosity regarding the extreme spiritual manifestations occurring at the Shaker communities, they presented programmes of Shaker dance and song to paying spectators. The history of the various troupes has yet to be written. One such was the Hammons family, who had left the Alfred, Maine, Shaker community. Another troupe featured former Canterbury, New Hampshire, physician Dr William Tripure lecturing on the beliefs and customs of the Shakers. All of these groups performed in Shaker costume and executed spectacular dances such as the ‘whirling gift’, wherein a Shaker female spun round hundreds of times. The Shaker apostate troupes satisfied the public in a way that the real Shakers could not – since they had closed their meetings to the public due to the very types of spirit manifestations now sold to the public as entertainment. The broadside notices for their performances featured evocative new woodcut illustrations of quaintly costumed Shaker brothers and sisters engaged in the dance. The design and presentation of these broadsides, which are similar to circus broadsides of the period, put the sacred worship of the real Shaker communities on equal footing with the most vulgar public entertainment. The first half of the nineteenth century closed with a blast from the antiShaker past. Mary Marshall Dyer, who had left the Shakers in 1815, issued two works around this time. The first The Rise and Progress of the Serpent from the Garden of Eden, to the Present Day: With a Disclosure of Shakerism appeared in 1847. The second, Shakerism Exposed, was published without a date. Historian Elizabeth A. De Wolfe has dated the work to circa 1852 based on Dyer’s use of her married name Mary Dyer, which she had retaken in that year. For much of her publishing career Dyer emphasized her maiden name Marshall over her detested married name. The work serves as a fair summary of anti-Shaker and Shaker apostate writing from the eighteenth century to 1850. It quotes

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extensively from Reuben Rathbone’s Reasons Offered for Leaving the Shakers, published in 1800. However, it also reprints affidavits from as recently as 1847. By this time Dyer could draw on seventy years’ worth of anti-Shaker writing to suit her purpose. She herself had been a key player since 1818, or thirty-four years prior to the suspected publication date of Shakerism Exposed. Dyer’s antiShaker quest would not end until her death in 1867. When Mary Dyer died a whole school of anti-Shaker writing died with her. Although there are Shaker apostate writings from the mid and late nineteenth century, they are a far cry from the shocking and violent works produced in the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. Hervey Elkins’s Fifteen Years in the Senior Order of Shakers, published in 1853, is a largely positive work. In fact, Elkins remained lifelong friends with many Shakers. The majority of other narratives technically by apostates in the second half of the nineteenth century tend to be fond reminiscences of Shaker life, rather than sweeping indictments of the people and their faith. Mary Ann Haagen’s survey of the writings of prominent Shaker – and prominent Shaker apostate – Henry Cumings of Enfield, New Hampshire, reveals a man once committed to his faith, but ultimately opting for a life outside of the Shaker Church.28 As the nineteenth century waned the Shakers were no longer seen as a fundamental affront to God’s will, or a threat to the survival of the human race, or the stability of the American Republic. When fear of the Shakers subsided, the writing of, and market for, anti-Shaker works also began to dwindle. In closing, I invoke the words of Shaker Isaac Newton Youngs who closed his own survey of Shaker apostates by remarking: ‘Of the numerous apostates that have been, but few traces have been left on record. Some, being more conspicuous than the rest, may serve as specimens.’29 May the specimens presented in this volume – taken with a grain of salt – preserve the outsider’s perspective, thereby enriching the study of Shakerism. Notes 1. 2. 3.

4.

5.

6.

B. S. Youngs, The Testimony of Christ’s Second Appearing (Lebanon, OH: From the Press of John M’Clean, 1808), p. 8. Ibid., pp. 24–6. Virginia Gazette (Williamsburg, Virginia), 9 November 1769, p. 1. For the full text of this article see C. Goodwillie, ‘The Shakers in Eighteenth-Century Newspapers, Part One: “From a Spirit of Detraction and Slander”’, American Communal Societies Quarterly, 4:3 ( July 2012), pp. 161–84, on p. 162. J. Huntington, Letters of Friendship to Those Clergymen who have Lately Renounced Communion with the Ministers and Churches of Christ in General (Hartford, CT: Printed and Sold by Hudson and Godwin, [1780]), pp. 130–1. R. Bishop and S. Y. Wells, Testimonies of the Life, Character, Revelations and Doctrines, of Our Ever Blessed Mother Ann Lee (Hancock, MA: Printed by J. Tallcott & J. Deming, Junrs., 1816), pp. 84–5. Independent Chronicle and the Universal Advertiser (Boston, Massachusetts), 10 May 1781, [p. 2].

xxxiv 7. 8. 9. 10.

11. 12.

13. 14. 15. 16.

17. 18. 19.

20. 21. 22.

23. 24. 25. 26. 27. 28. 29.

Writings of Shaker Apostates and Anti-Shakers, 1782–1850: Volume 1

Rathbun, Brief Account, p. 15. Reproduced in this collection, Volume 1, p. 14. I. Backus, A Church History of New-England, Vol. II (Providence: Printed by John Carter, 1784) pp. 409–10. ‘Spectator’, Massachusetts Spy: or, Worcester Gazette (Worcester, Massachusetts), 26 January 1786, [p. 2]. For the full story of this newspaper war, see Goodwillie, ‘The Shakers in EighteenthCentury Newspapers, Part Three: “Calvin” versus “A Lover of Truth,” Abusing Caleb Rathbun, the Death of Joseph Meacham and the Tale of His Sister’, American Communal Societies Quarterly, 6:1 ( January 2012), pp. 39–63. Western Star (Stockbridge, Massachusetts), 22 March 1796, [p. 1]. John Meacham, Issachar Bates and Benjamin Seth Youngs to Ministry, New Lebanon, New York, 1 June 1805. Edward Deming Andrews Memorial Shaker Collection, ASC 1048, De-Wint M. [Anon.] to Ministry, New Lebanon, New York, 13 August 1806. Edward Deming Andrews Memorial Shaker Collection, ASC 1048, De-Wint M. Youngs, The Testimony, [p. 5]. Ibid. ‘A Short Account of the People Known by the Name of Shakers, or Shaking Quakers’, Theological Magazine, 1:2 (September/October 1795), pp. [81]–7. The 1805 Danville printing of the text of the ‘short account of the … Shakers’ is nearly identical to the original 1795 imprint. The only minor differences are in the spelling of words or the lack of definite and indefinite articles. J. Smith, ‘An Attempt to Develope Shakerism’, Supporter (Chillicothe, OH), 10 July 1810, [p. 2]. Reproduced in this collection, Volume 1, p. 184. R. McNemar, “Shakerism! The Developer of Shakerism Developed,” Liberty Hall (Cincinnati, OH), 25 July 1810, [p. 5]. E. Chapman, An Account of the Conduct of the Shakers, in the Case of Eunice Chapman & her Children, Written by Herself (Lebanon, OH: Printed by Van Vleet & Camron, 1818), p. 34. Reproduced in this collection, Volume 2, p. 108. [S. Y. Wells], Thomas Brown and his Pretended History of Shakers ([Mt. Lebanon, c. 1900]). David Darrow to Richard Spier, 20 October 1817. Edward Deming Andrews Memorial Shaker Collection, ASC 1048, De-Wint M. These two works have been reprinted with an introductory essay and commentary by E. A. De Wolfe, Domestic Broils: Shakers, Antebellum Marriage, and the Narratives of Mary and Joseph Dyer (Amherst, MA: University of Massachusetts Press, 2010). For a full account of this colourful incident see E. A. De Wolfe, ‘The Mob at Enfield’, American Communal Societies Quarterly, 4:2 (April 2010), pp. 80–91. P. Youmans, Appeal to Scripture (1826), p. 9. Reproduced in this collection, Volume 2, p. 311. J. Woods, Shakerism Unmasked (Paris, KY: Printed at the Office of the Western Observer, 1826), p. 73. Reproduced in this collection, Volume 2, p. 367. J. Whitbey, Beauties of Priestcraft (New Harmony, IN: Printed for the Author, at the Office of the New-Harmony Gazette, 1826). A Bruised Idealist: David Lamson, Hopedale, and the Shakers (Clinton, NY: Richard W. Couper Press), 2010. M. Haagen (ed.), The Collected Writings of Henry Cumings (1834–1913): Shaker Elder and Citizen of Enfield, New Hampshire (Clinton, NY: Richard W. Couper Press), 2012. I. N. Youngs, ‘A Concise View’, ASC 861b, p. 496.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

† indicates the work is included in this set. * indicates the work is anti-Shaker, or was written by a Shaker apostate.

Primary Sources Manuscripts [Anon.], ‘A Short Account of the People Known by the Name of Shakers, or Shaking Quakers’, Theological Magazine, 1:2 (September/October 1795), pp. 81–7. [Anon.] to Ministry, New Lebanon, New York, 13 August 1806. Edward Deming Andrews Memorial Shaker Collection, ASC 1048, De-Wint M. Bishop, R., ‘A Daily Journal of Passing Events’, 1839–50, New Lebanon, New York, Shaker Manuscript Collection, Item 2, NN. †* Chapman, E. to L. Wright, 4 December 1817. Shaker Collection, Item 113, Manuscript Division, Library of Congress. ‘Church Journal, 1843–1860’, Shirley, Massachusetts. FM-6.2, Fruitlands Museum. ‘Daily Journal of Current Events’, 1816–30, Union Village, Ohio, Shaker Collection, V:B236, OClWHi. ‘Daily Record of Events of the Church Family’, 1805–61, Union Village, Ohio, Shaker Collection, V:B-230, OClWHi. Darrow, D. to R. Spier, 20 October 1817. Edward Deming Andrews Memorial Shaker Collection, ASC 1048, De-Wint M. [Discharge of William Scales], Edward Deming Andrews Memorial Shaker Collection, ASC 736, De-Wint M. ‘Domestic Journal of Important Occurrences’, New Lebanon, New York (1780–1841), Shaker Collection, V:B-60, OClWHi. Goodrich, D., ‘Rise and Progress of the Church’, Ms. 6140a, Hancock Shaker Village, Inc. [ Journal of Membership and Dedication of Property, 1789–1820], Ms. 10,804, Shaker Museum and Library. [Legal Discharge in Rathbun vs. Slosson], Edward Deming Andrews Memorial Shaker Collection, ASC 736, De-Wint. M. – xxxv –

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Writings of Shaker Apostates and Anti-Shakers, 1782–1850: Volume 1

Meacham, J., ‘Way-Marks’, Shaker Collection, VII: B-59, OClWHi. Meacham, J., I. Bates and B. S. Youngs to Ministry, New Lebanon, New York, 1 June 1805. Edward Deming Andrews Memorial Shaker Collection, ASC 1048, De-Wint M. Rathbone, R. to V. Rathbun, Sr (date unknown), Shaker Collection, IV:A-30, OClWHi. Youngs, B. S., ‘A journey to the Indians, Miami near Lebanon, Ohio, 3d month. 1807’, Edward Deming Andrews Memorial Shaker Collection, ASC 860, De-Wint M. Youngs, I. N., & J. M. Brown, ‘Domestic Journal’, New Lebanon, New York (1856– 69), Shaker Collection, V:B-71, OClWHi. Youngs, I. N., ‘A Concise View Of the Church of God and of Christ, On Earth Having its foundation In the faith of Christ’s first and Second Appearing. New Lebanon, 1856’, Edward Deming Andrews Memorial Shaker Collection, ASC 861b, De-Wint M. —, ‘Elders First Order. Names and Ages of those who have been gathered into the Church; With the place of their Birth, and time of coming; ... Departures, Death, etc. Written by Isaac N. Youngs’, New Lebanon, New York, 1856. Ms. 326, Hancock Shaker Village, Inc.

Printed Sources Untitled works Independent Chronicle and the Universal Advertiser (Boston, MA), 10 May 1781, p. 2. Massachusetts Spy: or, American Oracle of Liberty (Worcester, MA), 26 April 1782. New Hampshire Mercury and the General Advertiser (Portsmouth, NH), 1 February 1786, p. 3. Supporter (Chillicothe, OH), 8 September 1810. Reporter (Lexington, KY), 12 September 1812. Reporter (Lexington, KY), 8 May 1813. Rising Sun (Keene, NH), 21 June 1796. Virginia Gazette (Williamsburg, VA), 9 November 1769. Vermont Journal and the Universal Advertiser (Windsor, VT), 8 November 1785. Vermont Journal and the Universal Advertiser (Windsor, VT), 24 March 1790. †* Western Star (Stockbridge, MA), 26 January 1796. Western Star (Stockbridge, MA), 22 March 1796. Western Star (Stockbridge, MA), 10 April 1797. †* [Anon.], ‘Expedition Against the Shakers’, Democratic Press (Philadelphia, PA), 1 October 1810. †* [Anon.], ‘The Shaker Concert’, Norfolk Democrat (Dedham, MA), 5 February 1847. †* [Anon.], ‘Who Are the Shakers?’, American Commercial Daily Advertiser (Baltimore, MD), 15 August 1810. Arnold, J. N., Vital Records of Rehoboth, 1642–1896 (Providence, RI: Narragansett Historical Publishing Company, 1897). Backus, A Church History of New-England, Vol. II (Providence, RI: Printed by John Carter, 1784).

Bibliography

xxxvii

Backus, I., A History of New England with Particular Reference to the Denomination of Christians Called Baptists (Newton, MA: Backus Historical Society, 1871). †* Bailey, J., Fanaticism Exposed or the Scheme of Shakerism Compared with Scripture, Reason, and Religion and Found to be Contrary to Them All … (Lexington, KY: Printed at the Reporter Office, 1811). Bishop, R., and S. Y. Wells, Testimonies of the Life, Character, Revelations and Doctrines, of Our Ever Blessed Mother Ann Lee (Hancock, MA: Printed by J. Tallcott & J. Deming, Junrs., 1816). * Belief of the Rational Brethren of the West (Cincinnati, OH: Printed for the Society, 1819). Blinn, H. C., The Manifestation of Spiritualism Among the Shakers, 1837–1847 (East Canterbury, NH: 1899). †* Blackburn, A. H., A Brief Account of the Rise, Progress, Doctrines, and Practices of the People Usually Denominated Shakers (Flemingsburg, KY: Printed by A. Crookshanks, 1824). †* Brown, S., A Countercheck to Shakerism (Cincinnati, OH: Looker & Reynolds, 1824). * Brown, T., An Account of the People Called Shakers: their Faith, Doctrines, and Practice (Troy, NY: Printed by Parker and Bliss, 1812). Brown Genealogy of Many of the Descendants of Thomas, John, and Eleazer Brown: Sons of Thomas and Mary (Newhall) Brown, of Lynn, Mass., 1628–1907, Volume 1 (Salem, MA: Higginson Book Co., 1994). * Carr, B. W., Gleanings of Religion, or, A Compilation containing the Natural History of Man – a True Account of the Different Sects in the Religious World; Together with Much Useful and Instructive Information on Various Subjects (Lexington, KY: Joseph G, Norwood, 1829). * Chapman, E., An Account of the Conduct of the People Called Shakers: In the Case of Eunice Chapman and Her Children, Since Her Husband Became Acquainted with that People, and Joined Their Society. Written by Herself (Albany, NY: Printed for the Authoress, at 95 State-street, 1817). * —, No. 2, Being an Additional Account of the Conduct of the Shakers in the Case of Eunice Chapman and Her Children with Their Religious Creed. Written by Herself. Also, a Refutation of the Shakers Remonstrance to the Proceedings of the Legislature of 1817. By Thomas Brown. Also, the Deposition of Mary Dyer, Who Petitioned the Legislature of the State of New-Hampshire for Relief in a Similar Case. Also, Affidavits from Different Persons Who Have Been Members of the Shaker Society. Also, Communications from the State of Ohio, Respecting the Shakers in that State and Others. Also, the Proceedings of the Legislature of the State of New-York, in this Case for Three Years (Albany, NY: Printed by I. W. Clark for the Authoress, 1818). Chapman, J., The Memorial of James Chapman, to the Respectable Legislature of the State of New York, Now in Session (Albany, NY, 1817). †* Clark, C., A Shock to Shakerism: or, a Serious Refutation of the Idolatrous Divinity of Ann Lee of Manchester (Eng.) (Richmond, KY: Printed for T. W. Ruble, 1812). * —, A Shock to Shakerism: or, A Serious Refutation of the Idolatrous Divinity of Ann Lee of Manchester (England) (Russellville, KY: Robert Paisley, 1816).

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Writings of Shaker Apostates and Anti-Shakers, 1782–1850: Volume 1

Currier, J. J., ‘Ould Newbury’: Historical and Biographical Sketches (Boston, MA: Damrell and Upham, 1896). De Wolfe, E. A., Domestic Broils: Shakers, Antebellum Marriage, and the Narratives of Mary and Joseph Dyer (Amherst, MA: University of Massachusetts Press, 2010). Dunlavy, J., The Manifesto, or, A Declaration of the Doctrines and Practice of the Church of Christ (Pleasant Hill, KY: P. Bertrand, Printer, 1818). Dyer, J., A Compendious Narrative Elucidating the Character, Disposition, and Conduct of Mary Dyer, from the Time of Her Marriage, in 1799, till She Left the Society Called Shakers, in 1815: with a few Remarks Upon Certain Charges which She has Since Published Against that Society: Together with Sundry Depositions by her Husband, Joseph Dyer; to which is Annexed, a Remonstrance Against the Testimony and Application of the said Mary, for Legislative Interference (Concord, NH: Printed by Isaac Hill, for the Author, 1818). —, A Compendious Narrative, Elucidating the Character, Disposition and Conduct of Mary Dyer, from the Time of her Marriage, in 1799, till she Left the Society called Shakers, in 1815 (Concord, NH: Printed by Isaac Hill for the Author, 1819). —, A Compendious Narrative, Elucidating the Character, Disposition and Conduct of Mary Dyer, from the Time of her Marriage, in 1799, till she Left the Society Called Shakers, in 1815 …, 2nd edn (Pittsfield, MA: Printed by J. M. Beckwith, at the Office of the Berkshire American, 1826). * Dyer, M. M., A Brief Statement of the Sufferings of Mary Dyer: Occasioned by the Society Called Shakers. Written by Herself. To which is Added, Affidavits and Certificates. Also, a Declaration from Their Own Publication (Concord, NH: Joseph C. Spear, 1818). * —, A Brief Statement of the Sufferings of Mary Dyer, Occasioned by the Society Called Shakers. Written by Herself ... (Boston, MA: Published by William S. Spear, 1818). * —, A Portraiture of Shakerism, Exhibiting a General View of Their Character and Conduct, from the First Appearance of Ann Lee in New-England, Down to the Present Time. And Certified by Many Respectable Authorities. Drawn up by Mary M. Dyer ... The Author has Endeavored, while Exposing to the World the Dark Side of the Picture, to Give it No Deeper Shade Than the Light of Truth Will Warrant … (Haverhill, NH: Printed for the Auth or [by Sylvester T. Goss], 1822). * —, Reply to the Shakers’ Statements, Called a “Review of the Portraiture of Shakerism,” with an Account of the Sickness and Death of Betsy Dyer; a Sketch of the Journey of the Author: and Testimonies from Several Persons ... (Concord, NH: Printed for the Author, 1824). * —, To the Elders and Principals of the Shaker Societies (1825). * —, To the Public (New Lebanon, NY, 1826). * —, The Rise and Progress of the Serpent from the Garden of Eden, to the Present Day: with a Disclosure of Shakerism, Exhibiting a General View of Their Real Character and Conduct from the Appearance of Ann Lee. Also, the Life and Sufferings of the Author, Who was Mary M. Dyer, but is now Mary Marshall. (Concord, NH: Printed for the Author, 1847). †* —, Shakerism Exposed: By Mary M. Dyer (Hanover, NH: Dartmouth Press, YEAR). * Elkins, H., Fifteen Years in the Senior Order of Shakers: A Narration of Facts, Concerning that Singular People (Hanover, NH: Dartmouth Press, 1853). Ellis, F., History of Columbia County, New York (Philadelphia, PA: Everts & Ensign, 1878).

Bibliography

xxxix

†* Extract from an Unpublished Manuscript on Shaker History (by an Eye witness), Giving an Accurate Description of Their Songs, Dances, Marches, Visions, Visits to the Spirit Land, &c. (Boston, MA: Printed and Published by E. K. Allen, 1850). Evans, N. W., and E. B. Stivers History of Adams County Ohio (West Union, OH: Published by E. B. Stivers, 1900). Farnham, J., To the Public. Having Lately Seen a Scandalous Handbill in Circulation, Published by Mary Dyer, Containing, Among Other Malicious Falsehoods, a Slanderous Charge Against Me (1825). Field, D. D., A History of the County of Berkshire, Massachusetts (Pittsfield, MA: Printed by Samuel W. Bush, 1829) —, A History of the Town of Pittsfield, in Berkshire County, Mass. (Hartford, CT: Press of Case, Tiffany and Burnham, 1844). *Freeman, T., ‘Retrospective View of Shakerism’ (fragmentary), Western Star (Lebanon, OH), 29 September, 1810. * —, ‘Retrospective View of Shakerism. No. V’, Western Star (Lebanon, OH), 13 October 1810. †* ‘GREAT MORAL CURIOSITY! SHAKER CONCERT!!’, Maine Cultivator and Hallowell Gazette (Hallowell, ME), 27 March 1847. †* Green, B., The True Believer’s Vademecum, or Shakerism Exposed: Together with an Account of the Life of the Author, from His Birth, to the Period of His Joining and Leaving that Society of People Called Shakers, who have Excited the Astonishment and Wonder of the Enquiring Part of the Community of this Vastly Extended Empire. Also, a Fair Exhibition of the Way in which Real Unmingled Happiness May Be Obtained, Without Being Exposed to the Shackles of Superstition (Concord, NH: Printed for the Author, 1831). *—, Biographical Account of the Life of Benjamin Green, in Which Are Set Forth His Pretensions to the Throne. Written by Himself (Concord, NH: Published by the Author, 1848). Green, C., and S. Y. Wells, A Summary View of the Millennial Church (Albany, NY: Printed by Packard & Van Benthuysen, 1823). [Green, C., and S. Y. Wells], A Brief Exposition of the Established Principles and Regulations of the United Society Called Shakers (Albany, NY: Printed by Hoffman and White, 1834). Haagen, M. (ed.), The Collected Writings of Henry Cumings (1834–1913): Shaker Elder and Citizen of Enfield, New Hampshire (Clinton, NY: Richard W. Couper Press, 2012). Harding, L. A., History of Decatur County, Indiana: Its People, Industries and Institutions (Indianapolis, IN: B. F. Bowen & Co., 1915). *Haskett, William J., Shakerism Unmasked, or The History of the Shakers; Including a Form Politic of Their Government as Councils, Orders, Gifts, with an Exposition of the Five Orders of Shakerism, and Ann Lee’s Grand Foundation Vision, in Sealed Pages. With Some Extracts from their Private Hymns which have Never Appeared before the Public (Pittsfield, MA: Published by the Author, L. H. Walkley, Printer, 1828). History and Biographical Encyclopaedia of Butler County, Ohio, with Illustrations and Sketches of its Representative Men and Pioneers (Cincinnati, OH: Western Biographical Publishing Co., 1882).

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Writings of Shaker Apostates and Anti-Shakers, 1782–1850: Volume 1

†*Hodgdon, C. C., Just Published, Hodgdon’s Life and Manner of Living among the Shakers: Founded on Truth (Concord, NH: Published by the author, 1838). Hoehnle, P., A Bruised Idealist: David Lamson, Hopedale, and the Shakers (Clinton, NY: Richard W. Couper Press), 2010. ‘Humbug’, Maine Cultivator and Hallowell Gazette (Hallowell, ME), 3 April 1847, p. 2. History of the War Between the United States and Great-Britain … (Hartford, CT: Published by William S. Marsh, 1815). * Huntington, J., Letters of Friendship to Those Clergymen who have Lately Renounced Communion with the Ministers and Churches of Christ in General (Hartford, CT: Printed and Sold by Hudson and Godwin, 1780). * Huntington, Z., The Exile of Connecticut; Composed by Himself in the Decline of Life. Being a Concise Narrative of the Life of Zebulon Huntington, Till Almost Four Score Years of Age (c. 1845). In Supreme Court. Edward Fowler vs. Jacob R. Hollenbeck and William H. Pillow (Albany, NY, 1850). †* Indoctum Parliamentum. A Farce in One Act and a Beautiful Variety of Scenes (1818). * Lamson, D. R., Two Years’ Experience Among the Shakers: Being a Description of the Manners and Customs of that People, the Nature and Policy of their Government, their Marvellous Intercourse with the Spiritual World, the Object and Uses of Confession, their Inquisition, in Short, a Condensed View of Shakerism as it is (West Boylston, MA: Published by the author, 1848). Littell, J., Family Records or Genealogies of the First Settlers of Passaic Valley (and Vicinity) Above Chatham (New Jersey) (Feltville, NJ: Stationers’ Hall Press, 1851-1852). †* McBride, J., An Account of the Doctrines, Government, Manners and Customs of the Shakers. By John McBride, a Member for Twenty Years. With Remarks on Confession to Catholic Priests and Shaker Elders (Cincinnati, OH, 1834). McNemar, R., The Kentucky Revival (Cincinnati, OH: From the Press of John W. Browne, 1807). —, ‘Diary’, Shaker Collection, Item 254, DLC-MSS —, “Shakerism! The Developer of Shakerism Developed,” Liberty Hall (Cincinnati, OH), 25 July 1810, [p. 5]. —, ‘Shakerism Detected &c.’ Examined & Refuted, in Five Propositions (Lexington, KY: Printed by Thomas Smith, 1811). —, McNemar, The Other Side of the Question: In Three Parts … Comprising a General Vindication of the Character of Mother and the Elders against the Atacks of Public Slander, the Edicts of a Prejudiced Party, and the Misguided Zeal of Lawless Mobs (Cincinnati, OH: Looker, Reynolds & Co., printers, 1819). — (comp.), Investigator; or A Defence of the Order, Government & Economy of the United Society Called Shakers, Against Sundry Charges & Legislative Proceedings. Addressed to the Political World. By the Society of Believers at Pleasant Hill, Ky. … (Lexington, KY: Printed by Smith & Palmer, 1828). —, A Record Relating to the Cogar Mob and Boon Suit. By Perigrinus (1831).

Bibliography

xli

—, Review. Of American Policy. July 1819. ‘I am not thine ASS on which Thou hast Ridden, ever since I was Thine.’ Numb. 22, 30 (Union Village, OH). —, A Series of Lectures on Orthodoxy and Heterodoxy, in Allusion to the Testimony of Christ’s Second Appearing. Introduced by a Rpely [sic] to Sundry Defamatory Letters written by A. M. Bolton, late, a Catechuman in the United Society at Union Village. Designed for the Edification of Young Believers. By E. W. (Dayton, OH, 1832). —, Shakerism Detected [a pamphlet published by Col. James Smith, of Kentucky] Examined and Refuted in Five Propositions; Published at Lebanon (O) and Lexington (K) in 1811, by Richard M’Namer (Reprinted by Request) (Watervliet, OH, 8 May 1833). —, The Shaker Society Advs Gass, Banta, &c. upon an Appeal from a Decree of the Lincoln Circuit Court (1834?). — (comp.), Investigator, or A Defence of the Order, Government and Economy of the United Society called Shakers, Against Sundry Charges and Legislative Proceedings. Addressed to the Political World. By the Society of Believers, at Pleasant Hill, KY. Printed at Lexington, Ky.: 1828. (Reprinted New York: Egbert, Hovey & King, Printers, 1846). Meacham, J., A Concise Statement of the Principles of the Only True Church, According to the Gospel of the Present Appearence of Christ … (Bennington, VT: Haswell & Russell, 1790). Minutes of the Annual Conferences of the Methodist Episcopal Church, for the Years 1773–1828, Vol. 1 (New York: Published by T. Mason and G. Lane, 1840). ‘Museum’, Sun (Baltimore, MD), 7 December 1846, p. 2. †* P., A., Three Curious Pieces. Being A Ready Way to Unpopularity: or, Truth a General Enemy (Boston, MA: Printed and sold by E. Russell, in Essex-Street, near Liberty-Stump, 1782). Owen, R., New View of Society: or, Essays on the Principle of the Formation of the Human Character, and the Application of the Principle to Practice (London: Printed for Cadell and Davies, 1813). Pelham, R., ‘A Sketch of the Life and Experiences of Richard W. Pelham, Part II’, Shaker Quarterly, ed. T. Johnson, 9:2 (Summer 1969), pp. 53–64. †* Rathbone, R., Reasons Offered for Leaving the Shakers (Pittsfield, MA: Printed by Chester Smith, 1800). †* Rathbun, C., ‘Caleb Rathbun … maketh oath …’, Western Star (Stockbridge, MA), 5 April 1796. †* Rathbun, D., A Letter from Daniel Rathbun, of Richmond in the County of Berkshire, to James Whittacor, Chief Elder of the Church, Called Shakers (Springfield, MA:Printed at the Printing-Office near the Great Ferry, 1785). * —, A Letter from Daniel Rathbun, of Richmond in the County of Berkshire, to James Whittacor, Chief Elder of the Church, called Shakers (United States, [c. 1785]). * Rathbun, V., An Account of the Matter, Form, and Manner of a New and Strange Religion, Taught and Propagated by a Number of Europeans, Living in a Place called Nisqueunia, in the State of New-York. Written by Valentine Rathbun, Minister of the Gospel (Providence, RI: Printed and Sold by Bennett Wheeler, 1781). * —, An Account of the Matter, Form, and Manner of a New and Strange Religion … (Halifax: Reprinted and Sold by Anthony Henry, 1781).

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Writings of Shaker Apostates and Anti-Shakers, 1782–1850: Volume 1

* —, Some Brief Hints of a Religious Scheme, Taught and Propagated by a Number of Europeans, Living in a Place Called Nisqueunia, in the State of New York … Hartford Printed (Boston, MA: Reprinted by Benjamin Edes & Sons, 1781). * —, Some Brief Hints of a Religious Scheme, Taught and Propagated by a Number of Europeans, Living in a Place Called Nisqueunia, in the State of New York …Hartford Printed (Norwich, CT: Printed by John Trumbull, 1781). * —, Some Brief Hints of a Religious Scheme, Taught and Propagated by a Number of Europeans, Living in a Place Called Nisqueunia, in the State of New York … Hartford Printed (Hartford, CT: Printed and Sold in the Year, 1781). †* —, A Brief Account of a Religious Scheme Taught and Propagated by a Number of Europeans, who Lately Lived in a Place called Nisqueunia,in the State of New-York, but now Residing in Harvard, Commonwealth of Massachusetts, Commonly Called Shaking Quakers. To which is added A Dialogue between George the Third of Great-Britain, and his Ministers; Giving an Account of the Late London Mob, in the Original of the Sect Called Shakers. The Whole Being a Discovery of the Wicked Machinations of the Principal Enemies of America (Worcester, MA: 1782). * —, Some Brief Hints of a Religious Scheme, Taught and Propagated by a Number of Europeans, Living in a Place Called Nisqueunia, in the State of New York …Hartford Printed (Boston, MA: Reprinted and Sold by Benjamin Edes and Sons, 1782). * —, Some Brief Hints of a Religious Scheme, Taught and Propagated by a Number of Europeans, Living in a Place Called Nisqueunia, in the State of New York … Hartford Printed (Salem, MA: Reprinted and Sold by S. Hall, 1782). * —, Some Brief Hints of a Religious Scheme, Taught and Propagated by a Number of Europeans, Living in a Place Called Nisqueunia, in the State of New York …Hartford Printed (New York: Printed in the Year 1783). †* —, Western Star (Stockbridge, MA), 10 April 1797. * Religions-Register, oder kurze Beschreibung der Glaubenslehre und gottesdienstliche Verrichtungen der sogennanten Schaeking-Quaekers in dem Staat Ohio (Neumarket, VA: Gedruckt und zu haben bey Ambrosius Henkel, 1809). A Remonstrance Against the Testimony and Application of Mary Dyer, Requesting Legislative Interference Against the United Society Commonly Called Shakers. Together with some Affidavits and Certificates, Showing the Falsity of her Statements (Concord, NH: Printed by Isaac Hill, 1818). Report of the Committee on the Judiciary on the Petitions of John Black and William H. Pillow, for a Divorce of the Marriage Contract, and on Bills Referred to them on the Same Subject (Albany, NY, 1849). * Report of the Examination of the Shakers of Canterbury and Enfield, before the New-Hampshire Legislature, at the November Session, 1848, Including the Testimony at Length; Several Extracts from Shaker Publications; The Bill which Passed the House of Representatives; The Proceedings in the Pillow Case, Together with the Letter of James W. Spinney. From Notes Taken at the Examination (Concord, NH: Printed by Ervin B. Tripp, 1849). A Review of Mary Dyer’s Publication, Entitled ‘A Portraiture of Shakerism’; Together with Sundry Affidavits, Disproving the Truth of her Assertions (Concord, NH: Printed by J. B. Moore, For the Society, 1824).

Bibliography

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Sanborn, V. C., Genealogy of the Family of Samborne or Sanborn (Privately Printed for the Author, 1899). Scales, W., Priestcraft Exposed from its Foundation or, Religious Freedom Defended, in Nine Chapters (Danvers, MA: Printed and Sold by E. Russell, 1781). —, The Confusion of Babel Discovered; or, An Answer to Jeremy Belknap’s Discourse upon the Lawfulness of War; or Military Duty (America: Printed, for the information of the publick, 1780). — [Polublepos] (pseud.), Cumberland Gazette (Portland, ME), 15 December 1786, p. 2. —, ‘PROPOSALS’, New Hampshire Gazette, and General Advertiser (Portsmouth, NH), 17 February 1787, p. 3. †* —, ‘Mystery of the People called SHAKERS laid open, and their Ministration exploded, for its Falsities and Impositions’, Boston Gazette and Country Journal, 15 June 1789, p. 1. * ‘SHAKER VOCALISTS’, Salem Register (Salem, MA), 14 May 1846. * Shakerism Unveiled, A Truthful Sketch of Their History, Belief, Manner of Life, Cruel and Inhuman Treatment of Their Subjects, and Especially the Women and Children, from 1688 down to the Present Time. With Extracts from the Holy Roll, or Shaker Bible and Mrs. Mary Dyer’s Work, Who was 18 Years Among Them (Published for the Author, 1869). Shakers (New Lebanon, NY, [c. 1848]). Simms, H., Middletown in Black and White (Middletown, OH: Journal Printing Co., 1908). Smith, J., An Account of the Remarkable Occurrences in the Life and Travels of Col. James Smith (Lexington, KY: Printed by John Bradford, 1799). †* —, ‘An Attempt to Develope Shakerism’, Supporter (Chillicothe, OH), 10 July 1810. * —, ‘To Richard M’Nemar’, Liberty Hall (Cincinnati, OH), 26 September 1810, [p. 4]. * —, Remarkable Occurrences, Lately Discovered Among the People called Shakers: of a Treasonous and Barbarous Nature, or Shakerism Developed (Carthage, TN: Printed by William Moore, 1810). †* —, Remarkable Occurrences, Lately Discovered among the People Called Shakers: of a Treasonous and Barbarous Nature, or Shakerism Developed (Paris, KY: Joel R. Lyle, 1810). * —, Remarkable Occurrences, Lately Discovered Among the People Called Shakers: of a Treasonous and Barbarous Nature, or Shakerism Developed (Abington, VA: Printed by John G. Ustick, 1811). * —, Remarkable Occurrences, Lately Discovered Among the People Called Shakers: of a Treasonous and Barbarous Nature, or Shakerism Developed (Lynchburg, VA: Printed by Jacob Haas, 1811). †* —, Shakerism Detected: their Erroneous and Treasonous Proceedings, and False Publications Contained in Different News-papers, Exposed to Public View by the Depositions of Ten Different Persons Living in Various Parts of the States of Kentucky and Ohio: Accompanied with Remarks (Paris, KY: Joel R. Lyle, 1810). Smith, J., and J. Darlinton (eds), An Account of the Remarkable Occurrences in the Life and Travels of Col. James Smith (Cincinnati, OH: Robert Clarke & Co., 1870). Smith, J. E. A., The History of Pittsfield, (Berkshire County,) Massachusetts, From the Year 1734 to the Year 1800, 2 vols (Boston, MA: Published by Lee and Shephard, 1869).

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Writings of Shaker Apostates and Anti-Shakers, 1782–1850: Volume 1

Spencer, J. H., A History of Kentucky Baptists, From 1769 to 1885, Vol. 1 (Cincinnati, OH: Printed for the Author, 1886). †* ‘Spectator’, Massachusetts Spy: or, Worcester Gazette (Worcester, MA), 26 January 1786, p. 2. Stewart, P., A Holy, Sacred and Divine Roll and Book; From the Lord God of Heaven, to the Inhabitants of Earth: Revealed in the United Society at New Lebanon … (Canterbury, NH: Printed in the United Society, 1843). Stone, H. M., and J. A. Stone, To the Public (New Lebanon, NY?: [c. 1847]). †* Stone, H., Lo Here and Lo There!, or, The Grave of the Heart (New York: Printed for the Author, 1846). Stubbs, R., Browne’s Western Calendar, or, The Cincinnati Almanac for the Year of our Lord, Eighteen Hundred & Seven (Cincinnati, OH, Printed at the press of John W. Browne, 1806?). —, Browne’s Western calendar, or, The Cincinnati Almanac for the Year of our Lord 1808 (Cincinnati, OH: Printed at the press of John W. Browne, [c. 1807]). †* Taylor, A., A Narrative of the Strange Principles, Conduct and Character of the People Known by the Name of Shakers: Whose Errors have Spread in Several Parts of North-America, but are Beginning to Diminish, and Ought to Be Guarded Against. In Two Numbers. By Amos Taylor. Late of their Number and Acquainted with them in Five Different Governments for Ten Months. Number I. Wherein their Whole Constitution is Laid Open, more Particularly the Method Used by that People in Making their Proselytes (Worcester, MA): Printed for the Author [by Isaiah Thomas], 1782). †* — (untitled), Western Star, 2 August 1796. —, The Bookseller’s Legacy (Bennington, VT: Printed by Anthony Haswell, 1803). †* [Thomas, L. G.], A Return of Departed Spirits of the Highest Characters of Distinction, as Well as the Indiscriminate of All Nations, into the Bodies of the “Shakers,” or “United Society of Believers in the Second Advent of the Messiah.” By an Associate of Said Society … (Philadelphia, PA: Published by J. R. Conlon, 1843). * —, A Revelation of the Extraordinary Visitation of Departed Spirits of Distinguished Men and Women of All Nations, and Their Manifestations through the Living Bodies of the ‘Shakers.’ By a Guest of the ‘community’ near Watervliet, N.Y. (Philadelphia, PA: Published by L. G. Thomas, 1869). To the Respectable Legislature of the State of New-York (Albany, NY, 1816) (Signed: ‘In behalf of the Society, Richard Spier, Morrell Baker, Peter Dodge, Calvin Green, Seth Y. Wells, Watervliet, 13 February 1816’). To the Legislature of the State of New-York (Signed: ‘In behalf of the Society, Peter Dodge, Seth Y. Wells, Joseph Hodgson, Watervliet, March 20th, 1817’). Trial of the Shakers, for an Attempt to Restrain the Wife and Three Children of William H. Pillow, an Exposure of their Deceptions, and her Final Release, by a Writ of Habeas Corpus (Lowell, [MA], 1847). †* Van Vleet, A. (comp.), An Account of the Conduct of the Shakers, in the Case of Eunice Chapman & Her Children, Written by Herself. Also, a Refutation of the Shakers’ Remonstrance to the Proceedings of the Legislature of New-York, in 1817, by Thomas Brown. To which

Bibliography

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are Added, the Deposition of Mary Dyer, Who Petitioned the Legislature of the State of New-Hampshire, for Relief in a Similar Case. Also, Depositions of Others Who have been Members of the Shaker Society. Also, the Proceedings of the Legislature of the State of NewYork in the Case of Eunice Chapman (Lebanon, OH: Printed by Van Vleet & Camron, 1818). * Village Dialogues: Between Farmer Littleworth and Thomas Newman, Rev. Mr. Lovegood, Parson Dolittle and others by Roland Hill; to which is Added by Another Hand, an Account of the People Known by the Name of Shaking Quakers (Danville, KY, [c. 1805]). [Wells, S. Y.] (comp.), Millennial Praises (Hancock, MA: Printed by Josiah Tallcott Jr, 1813.). [Wells, S. Y.], Thomas Brown and his Pretended History of Shakers (Mt. Lebanon, [NY],[c. 1900]). †* West, B., Scriptural Cautions Against Embracing a Religious Scheme, Taught by a Number of Europeans, who Came from England to America, in the Year 1776, and Stile Themselves the Church, &c. &c. By Benjamin West, who had been Deluded by Them, to the Great Injury of Himself and Family (Hartford, CT: Printed and sold by Bavil Webster, 1783). White Jr., R. ‘Lo here! and Lo there! and the Shakers: An Expostulatory Epistle, with an Invitation’, Knickerbocker, or, New-York Monthly Magazine, 29:2 (February 1847), pp. 180–1. †* Whitbey, J., Beauties of Priestcraft; or, A Short Account of Shakerism (New Harmony, IN: Printed for the Author, at the Office of the New Harmony Gazette, 1826). White, A., and L. S. Taylor, Shakerism: Its Meaning and Message (Columbus, OH: Press of Fred J. Heer, 1905). †* Woods, J., Shakerism Unmasked, or, A Narrative Shewing the Entrance of the Shakers into the Western Country, their Stratagems and Devices, Discipline and Economy; Together with what May Seem Necessary to Exhibit the True State of that People. By John Woods: Who Lived with them Seventeen Years (Paris, KY: Printed at the Office of the Western Observer, 1826). †* Youmans, P., An Appeal to Scripture and Common Sense, or, A Death Blow to Shakerism (1826).

Secondary Sources Ancestry.com., Connecticut Town Birth Records, pre-1870 (Barbour Collection) (database on-line). Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations Inc., 2006. [Stonington Vital Records, pp. 326–7.] Andrews, E. D., ‘The Shaker Mission to the Shawnee Indians’, Winterthur Portfolio, 7 (1972). Blake, N., ‘Eunice Against the Shakers’, New York History, 41 (October 1960), pp. 359–78. Clark, T. D., and F. G. Ham, Pleasant Hill and Its Shakers (Harrodsburg, KY: Pleasant Hill Press, 1996). Cook, H. E., Shaker Music: A Manifestation of American Folk Culture (Lewisburg, PA: Bucknell University Press, 1973). Crosthwaite, J. F., ‘“The Mighty Hand of Overruling Providence”: The Shaker Claim to America’, American Communal Societies Quarterly 6:2 (April 2012), pp. 93–111.

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D’Armand, R. C., DeArmond Families of America (Knoxville, TN: Family Record Society, 1954). De Wolfe, E. A. (ed.), Absolem H. Blackburn’s a Brief Account of the People Usually Denominated Shakers, 1824 (Ashfield, MA: Huntstown Press, 1996). —, ‘“Erroneous Principles, Base Deceptions, and Pious Frauds”: Anti-Shaker Writing, Mary Marshall Dyer, and the Public Theater of Apostasy’ (PhD dissertation, Boston University, 1996) UMI Dissertation Services, 1998. —, ‘“So Much have they Got for Their Folly”: Shaker Apostates and the Tale of Woe’, Communal Societies, 18 (1998), pp. 21–35. —, ‘Mary Marshall Dyer, Gender, and A Portraiture of Shakerism’, Religion and American Culture, 8 (Summer 1998), pp. 237–64. —, ‘“A Very Deep Design at the Bottom”: The Shaker Threat, 1780–1860’, in N. L. Schultz (ed.), Fear Itself: Enemies Real & Imagined in American Culture (West Lafayette, IN: Purdue University Press, 1999), pp. 105–18. —, Shaking the Faith: Women, Family, and Mary Marshall Dyer’s anti-Shaker Campaign, 1815–1867 (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2002). —, ‘The Mob at Enfield: Community, Gender, and Violence Against the Shakers’, in S. L. Brown (ed.), Intentional Community: An Anthropological Perspective (Albany, NY: State University of New York Press, 2002). —, ‘Murder by Inches: Shakers, Family, and the Death of Elder Caleb Dyer’, in R. Asher, L. B. Goodheart and A. Rogers (eds), Murder on Trial: 1620–2002 (Albany, NY: State University of New York Press, 2005), pp. 185–206 —, ‘The Mob at Enfield’, American Communal Societies Quarterly, 4:2 (April 2010), pp. 80–91. Emlen, Robert P., ‘The Hard Choices of Brother John Cummings’, Historical New Hampshire, 34 (Spring 1979), pp. 54–65. —, ‘Black Shaker Minstrels and the Comic Performance of Shaker Worship’, American Communal Societies Quarterly, 4:4 (October 2010), pp. 191–217. —, Picturing the Shakers: The Visual Evidence of Shaker Life in the Illustrated Press of Nineteenth-Century America (forthcoming). Frantz, John. B., and W. Pencak (eds), Beyond Philadelphia: The American Revolution in the Pennsylvania Hinterland (University Park, PA: Pennsylvania State University Press, 1998). Goitein, P. L., ‘Strangers Along the Trail: Peoria’s Shaker Apostates Enter the World’, American Communal Societies Quarterly, 4:1 ( January 2010), pp. 3–19. Goodwillie, C., ‘The Shakers in Eighteenth-Century Newspapers, Part One: “From a Spirit of Detraction and Slander”’, American Communal Societies Quarterly, 4:3 ( July 2010), pp. 161–82. —, ‘The Shakers in Eighteenth-Century Newspapers, Part Two: Voyages of the Shaker Ship and Other adventures, both Legal and Social’, American Communal Societies Quarterly 5:1 ( January 2011), pp. 27–51. —, ‘The Shakers in Eighteenth-Century Newspapers, Part Three: ‘Calvin’ versus ‘A Lover of Truth’, Abusing Caleb Rathbun, the Death of Joseph Meacham and the Tale of His Sister’, American Communal Societies Quarterly, 6:1 ( January 2012), pp. 39–63.

Bibliography

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Hamilton, J. D., Material Culture of the American Freemasons (Lexington, MA: Museum of Our National Heritage, 1994). Humez, J., ‘“A Woman Mighty to Pull You Down”: Married Women’s Rights and Female Anger in the Anti-Shaker Narratives of Eunice Chapman and Mary Marshall Dyer’, Journal of Women’s History, 6 (Summer 1994), pp. 90–110. Jones, W. H., ‘Welsh Settlements in Ohio’, Cambrian: A Welsh-American Monthly Magazine, 27:7 ( July 1907), pp. 311–17. Kanon, T., ‘Seduced, Bewildered and Lost: Anti-Shakerism on the Early Nineteenth-Century Frontier’, Ohio Valley History, 7:2 (Summer 2007), pp. 1–30. MacLean, J. P., Shakers of Ohio (Columbus, OH: F. J. Heer Printing Co., 1907). McCorison, M. A., Amos Taylor, a Sketch and Bibliography (Worcester, MA: American Antiquarian Society, 1959). Medlicott, C., ‘Conflict and Tribulation on the Frontier: The West Union Shakers and their Retreat’, American Communal Societies Quarterly, 3:3 ( July 2009), pp. 111–37. —, Issachar Bates: A Shaker’s Journey (Lebanon, NH: University Press of New England, 2013). Newell, D. D., ‘ “William Scales” 1789 “Mystery of the People Called Shakers”’, American Communal Societies Quarterly, preview issue (September 2006),pp. 6–20. —, ‘“Late Recruits for Britain”: Anti-Shaker Propaganda During the American Revolution’, American Communal Societies Quarterly, 2:3 ( July 2008), pp. 103–21. Opdahl, V. W., ‘William Pillow: His Life Among the Shakers’, Yorker, 15 (November– December 1956), pp. 23–7. Paterwic, S. J., Historical Dictionary of the Shakers (Lanham, MD: Scarecrow Press, 2008). Rathbun-Rathbone-Rathburn Family Historian, 8:1 ( January 1988). Revolutionary Soldiers Resident or Dying in Onondaga County, N.Y. (Syracuse, NY: Onondaga Historical Association, 1913). Soule, S., Robert White Jr.: Spreading the Light of the Gospel (Clinton, NY: Richard W. Couper Press), 2009. —, Independency of the Mind: Aquila Massie Bolton, Poetry, Shakerism, and Controversy (Clinton, NY: Richard W. Couper Press), 2010. Stein, S., Letters from a Young Shaker (Lexington, KY: University of Kentucky Press, 1985). —, ‘Inspiration, Revelation, and Scripture: The Story of a Shaker Bible’, Proceedings of the American Antiquarian Society 105, pt. 2 (1996), pp. 347–76. —, ‘The “Not-So-Faithful” Believers: Conversion, Deconversion, and Reconversion Among the Shakers’, American Studies, 38:3 (Fall 1997), pp. 5–20. Wergland, G., One Shaker Life: Isaac Newton Youngs, 1793–1865 (Amherst, MA: University of Massachusetts Press, 2006). Woo, I., ‘Rational Renegades: Antebellum Anti-Shakers, Shaker Apostates, and the Literary Imagination’ (PhD dissertation, Columbia University, 2004). —, ‘From “Sensual Attraction” to “A Malady of the Mind”: How Hervey Elkins Loved and Left the Shakers’, Communal Societies, 24 (2004), pp. 65–94. —, The Great Divorce (New York: Atlantic Monthly Press, 2010).

RATHBUN, A BRIEF ACCOUNT OF A RELIGIOUS SCHEME

Valentine Rathbun, A Brief Account of a Religious Scheme: Taught and Propagated by a Number of Europeans, who Lately Lived in a Place Called Nisqueunia, in the State of New-York, but Now Residing in Harvard, Commonwealth of Massachusetts, commonly called Shaking Quakers; to which is added a Dialogue between George the Third of Great-Britain and his Ministers, giving an Account of the Late London mob, and the Original of the Sect Called Shakers, the whole being a Discovery of the Wicked Machinations of the Principal Enemies of America (Worcester, MA, 1782).

The Shakers faced no more ardent detractor during the eighteenth century than Valentine Rathbun. Born to Joshua Rathbun in Stonington, Connecticut, on 23 December 1724, Rathbun was part of a large extended clan, many of whom eventually moved to Berkshire County in western Massachusetts. Rathbun was married to Tabitha Brown on 1 August 1744 by Congregational Minister Reverend Joseph Fish of the North Stonington Church.1 The three Congregational churches in the greater Stonington area were split during the great awakening, and a Baptist church was formed in 1743, along with an ardently Calvinist Strict Congregationalist church.2 At an unknown date Rathbun united with the Baptists. He immigrated to Pittsfield, Berkshire County, Massachusetts in around 1768 along with a number of his family, and Stonington neighbours.3 Rathbun was a clothier by trade. By 1769 he was operating a clothier’s works (probably a fulling mill) on a small pond adjacent to Richmond Pond on the Pittsfield/ Richmond/Hancock town border. According to an early history of Pittsfield, Rathbun began to hold Baptist meetings in his house, and in 1772 organized an official Baptist church of which he was head.4 Rathbun was very active in dissenting politics as well as religion. An ardent patriot, he was a leader of the so-called ‘Berkshire Constitutionalists’ who in 1775 rejected alliance with the rebel state government at Boston and instead sought a greater degree of liberty through a separate constitutional process. Historian Joseph E. A. Smith characterized Rathbun as an ideal revolutionary firebrand due to his ‘extremely radical principles, and passion for ultra, not –1–

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Writings of Shaker Apostates and Anti-Shakers, 1782–1850: Volume 1

to say violent, measures’. Smith noted that Rathbun’s popularity peaked when ‘the blood of the people was heated even beyond a revolutionary fervor, as it often was when Valentine Rathbun was a successful candidate’.5 The people of Berkshire sent Rathbun as a representative to the Massachusetts General Court (Legislature) in the crucial years of 1776 and 1777.6 In 1779 a revival began in New Lebanon, New York, that spread through the Presbyterian and Baptist congregations to the south and east into Hancock and Pittsfield, Massachusetts. Rathbun’s Baptist congregation was strongly wrought upon by ideas ‘that the day was at hand when Christ was to appear on earth; wars and fightings should cease; [and] the Kingdom of Heaven was to be established among men’.7 By coincidence Tallmadge Bishop of New Lebanon, who had been a subject of the revival, came upon the Shaker settlement at Niskeyuna, New York, in April 1780. He brought news of Mother Ann Lee and her teachings back to his community. Valentine Rathbun, according to his own account, first visited Mother Ann on 26 May 1780. Significantly, this was only a week after the famed ‘Dark Day’ of 19 May, when the sun was blotted out at midday over much of New England and New York. This ominous portent, combined with the climate of revivalism, caused anxiety among the population. Rathbun’s ‘mind was turned wholly upside-down’ by Mother Ann’s singing – ‘with a mystical voice, in a mixture of words, known and unknown, which seemed to be a perfect charm’ – and the preaching of her colleagues. He became convinced that he ‘had been all [his] life in a dream about religion’. Rathbun was an enthusiastic apostle for Shakerism among his Baptist congregation (which included many of his own family and relatives) and they converted en masse. Within three months Rathbun regretted his conversion and concluded that ‘the spirit of witchcraft’ fuelled Shakerism (p. 18, below). However, it was too late to reclaim many members of his own family, including some of his children, convinced as they were of Mother Ann’s path to salvation. From late 1780 onwards Valentine Rathbun was a committed enemy of the Shakers. During the close of the year he penned a lengthy anti-Shaker writing wherein he laid out his personal experiences with the sect, theological arguments against their beliefs and damning allegations. His writing was first published in Hartford, Connecticut in February 1781. It was entitled Some Brief Hints of a Religious Scheme, Taught and Propagated by a Number of Europeans, Living in a Place Called Nisqueunia, in the State of New York. Between 1781 and 1783 the contents of this pamphlet were reprinted ten times throughout New England, New York, and even in Nova Scotia. The details of these various issues are given in the bibliography for this set. Rathbun’s pamphlet is important as it presents one of the few contemporary eyewitness accounts of Mother Ann and the early Shakers. Subsequent to its publication, in August 1783, Rathbun personally led a mob against the Shakers when they were assembled at Daniel Goodrich’s house

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on the Pittsfield and Hancock, Massachusetts, borderline. It was there that his son and namesake Valentine Jr, who had converted to Shakerism, confronted him. Valentine Sr ‘mounted some steps, and taking an advantagous position, with a large hickory staff, he levelled several stroke’s at his son’s head, with such violence, that his scull was laid bare nearly three inches in length’.8 Reprinted herein is the lengthiest edition of Rathbun’s work printed at Worcester, Massachusetts in 1782. Only this edition contains an additional text of unknown authorship that implies Shakerism itself was a scheme concocted at the highest levels of the British government to aid in the conquest of New England by British forces during the Revolutionary War. Shakerism is presented as a plot to destabilize the nascent American government in a way similar to the anti-Catholic, anti-war rioters loyal to Lord George Gordon who plagued London in 1780.9 The text claims that King George III and his ministers fiendishly planned to ‘use these Shaking Quakers … to good advantage – I look upon them at least late recruits for Britain’ (p. 26, below). In 1782 the Shakers were very active at Harvard, Massachusetts, which is nearby Worcester. The publication of this Dialogue appended to Rathbun’s pamphlet was probably intended to incite the local population to physical violence against the pacifist Shakers, who were after all led by English people. The Shakers did in fact suffer attacks in central Massachusetts, and a stone monument where Father James Whittaker was tied up and whipped still stands on South Shaker Road in Harvard. Valentine Rathbun’s brother Daniel, son Reuben and grandson Caleb would each publish their own anti-Shaker works between 1785 and 1800, all of which are included in this volume. Valentine Rathbun’s last printed attack on the sect was published in the Western Star newspaper of Stockbridge, Massachusetts.10 It is also reproduced in this collection on pp. 147–50, below. Valentine Rathbun eventually moved to central New York where he died at Marcellus in February 1814. Notes 1.

2. 3.

4.

Ancestry.com. Connecticut Town Birth Records, pre-1870 (Barbour Collection) [database online]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations Inc., 2006. Stonington Vital Records, pp. 326–7. I. Backus, A History of New England with Particular Reference to the Denomination of Christians Called Baptists (Newton, MA: Backus Historical Society, 1871), p. 518. D. D. Field, A History of the Town of Pittsfield, in Berkshire County, Mass. (Hartford, MA: Press of Case, Tiffany & Burnham, 1844), p. 47. See D. D. Field, A History of the County of Berkshire, Massachusetts (Pittsfield: Printed by Samuel W. Bush, 1829), p. 325, for a list of immigrants from southeastern Connecticut to Richmond, Massachusetts during the years 1763–75. J. E. A. Smith, The History of Pittsfield, (Berkshire County,) Massachusetts, from the Year 1734 to the Year 1800, 2 vols (Boston, MA: Published by Lee & Shephard, 1869), vol. 2, pp. 26, 452; and p. 37, for the reference to Rathbun’s fulling mill.

4 5. 6. 7.

Writings of Shaker Apostates and Anti-Shakers, 1782–1850: Volume 1

Ibid., vol. 1, p. 178. Field, A History of the County of Berkshire, Massachusetts, p. 374. A. White and L. S. Taylor, Shakerism: Its Meaning and Message (Columbus, OH: Press of Fred J. Heer, 1905), pp. 35–6. 8. R. Bishop and S. Y. Wells, Testimonies of the Life, Character, Revelations and Doctrines, of Our Ever Blessed Mother Ann Lee (Hancock, MA: Printed by J. Tallcott & J. Deming, Junrs, 1816), p. 162. 9. For a full account of how the Gordon riots relate to the Dialogue appended to Rathbun’s Brief Account see D. D. Newell, ‘”Late Recruits for Britain”: Anti-Shaker Propaganda During the American Revolution’, American Communal Societies Quarterly, 2:3 ( July 2008), pp. 103–21. 10. Western Star (Stockbridge, MA), 10 April 1797, [p. 1].

Valentine Rathbun, A Brief Account of a Religious Scheme: Taught and Propagated by a Number of Europeans, who Lately Lived in a Place Called Nisqueunia, in the State of New-York, but Now Residing in Harvard, Commonwealth of Massachusetts, Commonly Called Shaking Quakers; to which is added a Dialogue between George the Third of GreatBritain and his Ministers, giving an Account of the Late London mob, and the Original of the Sect Called Shakers, the whole being a Discovery of the Wicked Machinations of the Principal Enemies of America (Worcester, MA, 1782).

A BRIEF ACCOUNT, &c. AT the earnest request of many enquiring minds, I have undertaken to present to the publick, the matter form and manner of a new and strange religion, that has lately taken place among many people in the States of Massachusetts and of New-York; and in pursuing my purpose, I shall take the following method. In the first place, I will present to view, the leaders and teachers of this new and strange religion. II. I will shew their manner of address. III. I will shew their doctrine, with the scripture evidence they bring to prove it. IV. I will shew their manner of worship. V. I shall shew the directions which they give to those that come to them, to be instructed. VI. I will shew the power and effect of their instructions on their adherents. –5–

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Writings of Shaker Apostates and Anti-Shakers, 1782–1850: Volume 1

VII. I shall shew what this new religion is, as pointed out by scripture testimony. VIII. I shall give some reasons for my knowledge in this new religion, not by mere speculation, but by sorrowful experience. IX. I shall close the whole by a word of advice to ministers and people. To return therefore according to my promise, in the first place to present to publick view, the leaders and teachers of this new and strange religion. The whole number consists of five males and seven females; three of the males, and two females, profess to be perfect, or to have attained a state of perfection; the other / seven not perfect yet, but very far advanced. This people are Europeans, a part of which came from England to New-York in the year 1774,1 and lived at New-York and Albany, and places adjacent, two years – and in the year 1776, the rest came to Philadelphia, and travelled through Pennsylvania to New-York, where the whole twelve came together, and directly went and made a purchase of land, in a place called Nisqueunia,2 about nine or ten miles north-west from Albany, where they immediately settled, and went to clearing their land, and following their occupations of blacksmithing, weaving and shoe-making and were unknown and unnoticed, unless by a few of their neighbours, until the 17th day of April 1780; at which time one Talmage Bishop brought tidings into NewLebanon of a number of strange and wonderful Christians; the people, like the Athenians of old, were filled with desire to see new things, and ran to see them. This brings me to shew, II. Their manner of address. When any person goes to see them, they all meet him with many smiles, and seeming great gladness; they bid him welcome, and directly tell him they knew of his coming yesterday. This sets the person to wondering at their knowledge, and presently they get the person some victuals; then they sit down and have a spell of singing; they sing odd tunes, and British marches, sometimes without words, and sometimes with a mixture of words known and unknown. After singing they fall to shaking their heads in a very extraordinary manner, with their eyes shut and face up; then a woman about forty years old sits and makes a sort of a prayer, chiefly in an unknown tongue (if I may so call it) then one of the men comes to the person, and pretends to interpret the woman’s prayer; after which they tell the person he has come to the right place to be instructed; they enquire the person’s name, and ever after call him by his Christian name: They use no compliments, but their language is, yea and nay. If the person have long hair, or a club, they bring the bible, and read to him I Cor. xi. chap. and 14th verse, then telling him if he intends to be instructed, he must first have his hair cut short; telling of him that he wears the mark of the beast. / If he consents to have his

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hair cut, after it is done, they come round him, and touch him with their fingers here and there, and give him a sly cross, and in a very loving way, put their hands on his head, and then begin to preach their doctrine to him. But this leads me to enter on the third thing proposed, viz. III. To shew their doctrine, with the scripture evidence they bring to prove it. They introduce their doctrine with a multitude of good words; saying, we must hate sin, love God, take up our cross, &c. Then proceed to say, in the first place, that there is a new dispensation taking place, in which the saints shall reign a thousand years with Christ, and that in that state the saints shall be perfect, and that they have entered into it, and that they are the only church in the world; telling the person or hearer, that they have all the Apostolic gifts that were ever given; they tell the person that he has come to the right place for instruction, for they only are able to teach; then they pause a while to see how the person receives it, if they find he listens, and seems to be coming, they proceed and say, all the churches now in the world are antichrist, and false churches, and that there is not one person born again among them all, and that there has not one gone to Heaven for these twelve hundred years, no, not since the Apostolick age. If the person makes any objections, they tell him he must not dispute, his business is to hear and receive instruction, and all hands will fall to confirming the truth of what is declared: This puts the person to silence, and then they proceed, with a great laugh, and tell him they have many things to say to him, which he is not yet able to bear; this is to engage the person to hear. Then, secondly, they proceed to say, that all external ordinances, especially baptism and the Lord’s supper, ceased in the Apostolick age; and that God had never sent one man to preach, since the Apostles days, until they entered into the new dispensation, and were sent by God, from Great-Britain, to call in God’s elect; and to confirm the truth of what the teacher has said, he (the teacher) falls a trembling, and will say he feels the blood of Christ now running down his thigh and leg. Then they / tell the person he cannot bear any more now, but he must come again very soon and they will tell him more; and thus they with many fawning embraces, part with him for that time. 3. When he comes again they meet him with great joy, clasp him in their arms, and tell him they have the great love of God; and after things are a little settled, they begin with him again, telling him that he must confess his sins to them, from his childhood, that they may take his case and travail for him, that he may be born again. If he be a professor of godliness, and pleads that he hopes his sins are forgiven, and washed away by the blood of Christ; they tell him nay, they are not forgiven. They tell him whatsoever is done in secret must be revealed on the house-top; and they being the church, are the house-top. Then one takes him alone, and if he confesses his sins to him, then he tells it to the rest: But if it be suspected he keeps back part of his sin, he must confess the whole all being present.

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4. They tell him they see angels, and converse with them, and hear them sing, and sing with them; and the spirits of just men made perfect, they also freely converse with. They further tell him, the song that they sing, is the song of the hundred and forty and four thousand, which no man can learn, but only those that are redeemed from the earth. Then tell him, they have got a mother pointing to a woman, one of their company: And that she speaks seventy-two tongues, and that when she speaks in unknown tongues, the living people cannot understand her; yet the dead understand her, for she talks to them.3 5. They proceed and say, the judgment is set, the books are opened, and dead are now rising, and coming to judgment, and they are set to judge the world: Quoting I Cor. vi. chap. 2 verse. They tell the person, that the great tribunal is that church, and that the dead are coming before them every day, to be judged. They go on to say, all that have died in an imperfect state, have gone to hell, or to a prison state; and there to pay the debt to divine justice by suffering; and that there are degrees of / punishment, which they are to pass through; great sins, a great degree of hell, small sins, a small hell: And after passing through the several degrees of punishment, and paying the whole debt, out they come, and stand before us (say they) and are acquitted, and go home to Heaven; they quote for proof, Psal. xvi 10. Psal. lxviii. 18. Ezekiel xvi. 44–61. I Peter iii. 18, 19, 20. I Peter iv. 6. They comment on those texts thus: Did Christ go to hell? Yes. When? Why when he was crucified. What did he go there for? Why to preach to the spirits in prison. What did he preach to them? Why the gospel. Why did he preach the gospel to the old world, or to the dead? Why that they might be judged, as unconverted sinners, but finally live, according to God, in the spirit, after they have paid the debt in suffering. 6. They say, that the forecited woman, about forty years of age, is the woman spoken of in the xiith chapter of the Revelations of John, who was cloathed with the sun, having the moon under her feet, and on her head a crown of twelve stars; and that she has travailed and brought forth the man child. Further, that she is the mother of all the elect; and that she travails for the whole world; and that no blessing can come to any person, but only by and through her; and that in the way of her being possessed of their sins, by their confessing of them, and repenting of the same, one by one, according to her direction. 7. They hold themselves so far immortal, that they shall never die, but shall be changed in the twinkling of an eye, and go from this to the upper regions; and that now they are above all temptations and sufferings, and can neither be lifted up or cast down; only as they suffer in travail for the elect. I might still proceed much further on this head; but as it will necessarily fall into their instructions to their adherents, I pass by it for the present, and shall proceed.

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IV. To shew their manner of worship (if it may be so called.) The manner and form of their worship is entirely new / and different from all others: It differs but little on the Sabath, from any other day: They begin by sitting down and shaking their heads in a violent manner, turning their heads half round, so that their face looks over each shoulder, their eyes being shut; while they are thus shaking, one will begin to sing some odd tune, without words or rule; after a while another will strike in; and then another; and after a while they all fall in, and make a strange charm: – Some singing without words, and some with an unknown tongue, or mutter, and some with a mixture of English: The mother, so called minds to strike such notes as makes a concord, and so form the charm.4 When they leave off singing, they drop off, one by one, as oddly as they come on; in the best part of their worship, every one acts for himself, and almost every one different from the other; one will stand with his arms extended, acting over odd postures, which they call signs; another will be dancing, and sometimes hopping on one leg about the floor; another will fall to turning round, so swift, that if it be a woman, her cloaths will be so filled with the wind as though they were kept out by a hoop; another will be prostrate on the floor; another will be talking with somebody; and some sitting by smoaking their pipes; some groaning most dismally; some trembling extremely; others acting as though all their nerves were convulsed; others swinging their arms, with all vigour, as though they were turning a wheel, &c. Then all break off and have a spell of smoaking, and sometimes great fits of laughter. – They have several such exercises in a day, especially on the Sabbath. When they go to eat, they sit down, and have a spell of singing and shaking the head at the table, before they eat, some times they kneel down, shake their heads and groan, say nothing, and then fall to eating, and will be very merry and airy. If one has done eating before the rest, he kneels down, shakes his head a spell, and off he goes and leaves the rest eating; so each one dismisses the table for himself: But it is impossible to point out any exact form; for they vary and differ, and seldom act the same form exactly over again. They chuse so to do, to be singular / lest as they say, they should be connected with Babylon. Every day their worship is similar to what has been observed. They have no publick prayer, no preaching, and but little reading. Their actions in worship is according to the dictates of the sprit that governs them; then they profess saying, they are in a spiritual dispensation. Having thus shewn as far as may be, their manner of worship, I proceed fifthly, to shew the directions which they give to those that come to them to be instructed. V. When any person goes to them to be instructed, they enquire of him, whether he has given his vote and money for the defence of the country, and presently tell him, it is contrary to the Gospel to bear arms, saying Christ’s kingdom is not of this world; they labour to convince him that it is a great error to have any thing

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to do with war and fighting: They directly tell him, he is not born again, and that he must observe their instruction, in order that he may attain to the new birth. – Then they tell him, he must confess his sin to them; for if he hides his sin they can do nothing for him: They further tell him, if he refuses, they can tell him all his sin that he ever committed; and pretend that he can keep nothing hid from them; and when they have frightened him to a confession, then they further tell him, he must renounce and abstain from all the works of the flesh; telling him, that the first fall of our first parents, was carnal copulation, and that this ruined the world; and that every one that has any thing to do with man or woman, in the work of generation, is acting Adam and Eve’s sin over again: They tell the man to obstain from his wife, the woman from her husband, and that if the wife doth not agree to it, the husband must put her away; and if the husband will not agree to it, the wife must leave her husband; and for an example, the mother, so called, will tell how she left her husband, in New-York,5 and one of the men, how he left his wife in England. They tell young men and young women, if they marry, and have any thing to do with the works of lusts of the flesh, they can never be born again: They / shew the necessity of receiving this instruction by quoting Rev. iii 3, 4, 5. They dwell more on this part of their instructions than all the rest. They tell their adherents, if they conform to their instructions in this point, there is no fear of their being born again; but if they disobey, they certainly will be damned. While they are thus instructing their adherents, they sometimes use great severity, and sometimes great flattery, to frighten on the one hand and allure on the other; and while they are thus at work with a person, they come round him, touch him with their fingers in different places, cross him here and there, get their hands on his head, and prophecy, that great blessings are laid up for him: They presently make him believe them, and as soon as they see the spirit begin to operate on him, then they tell him, that now he has received the Holy Ghost, and now if he disobeys, it is a gone case with him: They tell him, if he had never come to see them, and had died in his ignorance without receiving the Holy Ghost, he would have gone to hell or a prison state, and suffered a while, and then come out and gone to Heaven; but now, if he turns back, there is no forgiveness, neither in this world, nor that which is to come: They quote for proof, Matt. xii. 32. This is to terrify the person, and bring him into an absolute dependence on them: Then they tell him, he must come often to them to be instructed, or he will be in danger of being taken by evil spirits and led wrong; and that he must not think he can understand the Bible, or know in any respect how to act, but only as he receives instruction from them: They tell him they have many things for him, which he is not yet able to bear; but as fast as he is able to receive it, they will instruct him: Thus the person is kept in constant expectation of something new. If the person seems to be sober, then one takes him by the hand, and round the floor with him, and make him run skip about, and

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laugh heartily at him, and will tell him he must not be melancholy; and when they get him merry with them then let him go: Then they tell the person for his admiration, that since he has been / present they have had many of the dead come before them to be judged; and make him believe they know his thoughts, and know future events, and nothing can be hid from them; telling how people are together, and talking about them, and what they say, &c. Then they tell the person that they shall never die, and also all those that obey them, and get to be perfect, shall never die, but be changed in a moment, and go home body and soul: But all the bodies of those that die in their sin, shall never rise. – They further tell him, that the hundred and forty and four thousand, which were sealed; twelve thousand out of each tribe, is a work yet to be done; and that they are of the tribe of Benjamin, though the youngest tribe, and last in the account, yet first in the order, of being sealed; and that they are the first fruits of that tribe; and that all that are to be brought in, in America, will belong to that tribe: And thus, the last is to be first, and the first last. I might still proceed, on this head; but it would be endless to repeat all their instruction to their adherents, as they are ever studying new things to keep up the dependence and admiration of their disciples. I shall therefore pass on. VI. To shew the power and effect of their instructions, on their adherents. There is a very extraordinary and uncommon power attends their instruction; in the first place, a total blindness, as to all their former views of religion and the Bible, on the instructed, takes place; and then a strange infatuation of the mind, to believe all their teachers say. Presently a strange power begins to come on, and takes place in the body, or human frame; which sets the person to gaping and stretching; and soon sets him to twitching as though his nerves were all in a convulsion. I can compare it to nothing nearer in its feelings, than the operations of an electerising machine; the person believes it is the power of God, and therefore dare not resist, but wholly gives way to it. – Thus the power comes on, more and more; and as the power increases, so their faith increases / in their teachers. If any body opposes them, it brings on the power, quick, strong and violent; and they cry out, on the opposer, that he will be damn’d, for opposing the power of God; and fall to twitching and trembling as though they had an extreme fit of the ague. This power as it increases, it brings on, many times, extreme weakness of body; so that their limbs fail them, and they fall to the floor, or on the ground, and lie helpless: At other times, it brings on great shakings – and shrugging of the shoulders – and tramping about with the feet – dismal groans and out-cries – and perhaps, may issue, for that time, in great laugher and lightness. And at the time of intervals, they grow very dumb, and say but little; and as the power has its fits on them, so it grows more powerful, until it leads on to what they call signs. The power will take their hand, stretch it up;

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pull the other down, they interpret it – the hand up, is a sign of mercy, the hand down of judgment: Sometimes their hand is stretched out forward, then away they run after it; if it leads to some person, they lay their hand on his head – then cross their arms, one across the other – then say he must take up his cross, and renounce the works of the flesh – then they strength both hands behind them, and say he must leave the world behind him: Sometimes their hands will be cramped up, one singer stretched out strait, another down into their hand, and their hand all out of common shape: Sometimes their hand will stretch out, and after it they run, – through woods – cross lots – over fences, swamps, or whatever, until they come to a house; perhaps they will be stopt several times in their course, and their head turn them round, as though they had lost their way; then take a new set off, and run again; perhaps, when they get to the house, they will he down on the ground – make a round ring with their finger among the dirt – puther about in it – then start up – double their fist at it – run away from it – come at it again – show the looks of vengeance at it – threaten it with postures – then run and jump into it, and stamp it all to pieces – This sign they interpret to be the old Heavens, / which are to pass away with a great noise. – When he goes into the house, he flutters round with his hands flying, and hissing as if he intended to drive all the flies out of the room – But this, he says, is to haunt the evil spirits out, which the house is full of. After he has done his errand, he follows his hand off, without asking how they do, or bidding them farewell. – When they meet together for their worship, they fall to groaning and trembling, and every one acts alone for himself; one will fall prostrate on the floor, another on his knees, and his head in his hands, on the floor; another will be muttering over articulate sounds, which neither they or any body else understand. Some will be singing, each one his own tune; some without words, in an Indian tone, some sing jig tunes, some tunes of their own making in an unknown mutter, which they call new tongues; some will be dancing, and others stand laughing heartily and loudly; others will be drumming on the floor with their feet, as though a pair of drum-sticks were beating a ruff on a drumhead; others will be agonizing, as though they were in great pain; others jumping up and down; others fluttering over some body, and talking to them; others will be shooing and hissing evil spirits out of the house, until the different tunes, groaning, jumping, dancing, drumming, laughing, talking and fluttering, shooing and hissing makes a perfect Bedlam; this they call the worship or God. They speak highly of their teachers, and say those men at Nisqeunia are the angels of God, sent forth to gather in God’s elect. Some of them say, that the woman called the mother, has the fullness of the God-Head, bodily dwelling in her, and that she is the queen of Heaven, Christ’s wife; and that all God’s elect must be born through her; yea, that Christ through her is born the second time. They say, that that church (as they call it) has power to shut Heaven, that it rain

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not, and to bring on all manner of plagues, as often as they will. They prophecy that this gospel (as they call it) must be preached to all the world, and all those that do not fall in with it will be damned. If / any body opposes them, they get round him, threaten him with damnation, storm and stamp at him, stare open their eyes, pucker up their mouths, and cry oh! oh! at him, and act all postures of vengeance, which is enough to frighten a Hercules out of his wits. Every one, as soon as they fall in with this new religion, immediately throw down their arms, and cry out against the means of defence made use of against the common enemy, and appear the most obstinate against all the proceedings of the country. I have heard some of them say, that all our authority, civil and military, is from hell, and would go there again. The effect of this scheme is such, that men and their wives have parted, children run away from their parents, and society entirely broke up in neighbourhoods; it makes children deny and disown their parents, and say they are full of devils. They are continually throwing out their curses on all that do not fall in with them; prophesying the destruction of the country; declaring they belong to the kingdom of God, and at the same time, if they are asked whether they are born again they will say nay. If any person goes to reason with them, they immediately put their fingers in their ears, or run off out of hearing, or else drown him with clamour, noise and curses: And as their teachers advise and order children to run away from parents, and men to shut their doors against their own brethren, by blood, and refuse them any admission into their house; all their orders are punctually obeyed. They make great dependence on their signs, and say it is the power of God, and God has taken that way to preach by them: One of them had a sign, that a certain man had committed murder, and charged him with it, which the man denied; he again had a sign, that a certain man intended to kill two children and their mother, on a certain night; then he had a sign for two of his associates to go and lie all night behind the house, and watch for him, and when they heard the children cry, to rush in, take the man and bind him, and bring the man to him; the two men obeyed / his orders, believing in his sign: About break of day he had a sign, that they catched the man and bound him; however, in the morning, the two men returned having not seen the man. Thus their signs in general prove false; however they get out this way, that the sign is true, but that they made a false interpretation. I knew another, who under the operation of the spirit prophesied, that at the end of two weeks, New-London would be destroyed, and at the end of four weeks, Albany would be burnt, and the next day the world would be at an end; all which proved false. Another had a sign, that a certain man, on such a day, would kill him, and on the third day he should rise again into life and action; which likewise proved false. One of their postures which increase among them, is turning round; very swift for an hour, and some-

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times for two hours at a time, until then are all wet with sweat; this they say is to shew the great power of God. They meet together in the night, and have been heard two miles by the people, in the dead of the night; sometimes a company of them will run away to some house, get into it, raise a bedlam, wake up all in the house, and the neighbours round about for a mile: They run about in the woods and elsewhere, hooting and tooting like owls; some of them have stripped naked in the woods, and thought they were angels, and invisible, and could go about among men and not be seen, and have lost their clothes, and never found them again. Sometimes while eating at the table, they say their dead parents and brethren come on the table and set on a pye, and they see them, &c. At one of their meetings they hung a woman by the neck, but took her down before she was dead, to shew as a sign, how they were to be persecuted; and now while I am writing I am informed by good authority, that two men in the scheme have murdered themselves, one cut his throat, the other stabbed himself, after he had tried twice to kill his wife, &c. I might proceed much further, but it is as impossible to / fully set forth the power and effect of this new religion, as to trace the airy road of the meteor; I therefore proceed, VII. To shew what this new religion is, as pointed out by scripture testimony. In opening this proposition it will be necessary to observe, on the great purposes of God, which will terminate in two grand events; first, the deliverance of his people, and fulfilling his promises to them: Secondly, the destruction of the man of sin. These events will conclude and finish the reign of Antichrist: And the work of God in general, has a special respect, both in his providence and grace, to the grand conclusion. Every age of the church have had their trials and combats, with the great enemy of God and his people; and as God’s work and designs have advanced forward, so the power of the enemy has increased; and it is very evident, that the last struggles of the enemy will be the most powerful and dangerous; this God saw, and in his great goodness has advertised his people of the delusions and errors that would take place in the last days; knowing that the crafty serpent would act over again, his subtil wiles, in the highest pretensions of the greatest good. We are informed by our Lord, in Matt. xxiv. 24. that false Christs and false prophets shall arise, and shall shew great signs and wonders in so much that is it were possible, they should deceive the very elect. This matter is more fully opened and illustrated by the great apostle Paul in his epistle to the Thessalonians, ii., – 12. he gives advice, not to be deceived; for the day of Christ shall not come, before there come first a falling away; and that the man of sin be revealed, whom he calls the son of perdition, who opposeth

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and exalteth himself above all that is called God, or that is worshipped: So that he as God sitteth in the temple of God, shewing, that he is God; – he shews in the 7th verse, that it is the great mystery of iniquity, whore coming shall be after the working of satan, with all power, and signs and lying wonders, with all deceivableness of unrighteousness, &c. As this great delusion / is to take place in the last days, before the coming of Christ, we are charged by our Lord to watch, we are therefore to watch the signs of his coming, and to watch the motions of the mystery of iniquity, which if well attended to, it will appear most evident, that this is the day in which we may expect to see satan, in the highest, and most delusive machinations, having great wrath, knowing that he hath but a short time. Rev. xii. 12. And while men are looking for the great revolution, or change of times to take place, when Christ shall reign in and with his church a thousand years; – satan finds the most fit season to present a counterfeit, drest in the highest colours of sanctity and holiness; and as many expect to see new things take place in the Millenium state; so satan improves his advantage on such, by presenting new religion, new laws, new modes and forms, new churches, new preaching, new doctrine, new views, new discoveries, new spirit, new bibles, or seen in a new light, new Heaven and new glory. – And that all old things are to pass away, no more old religion, no more old modes and forms, old churches, old preaching and doctrine are to cease; old views, old experiences, and old conversion to be rejected; old friendship, old relations, and old love to be known no more. And while the pleasing picture by the arch enemy is presented to view, it finds many admirers. It is very evident, that this is the very day in which this work of Satan is on the wheel: And notwithstanding, it may appear unaccountable to every rational mind, that any of the human specie should fall in with so diabolical a scheme; yet when we consider its fine dress of perfection, and the spirit of infatuation and witchcraft, that attends it, it may form our minds into a belief, that it can be and really is so. It is further evident that Antichrist cannot appear in any other light or path, but only that which Christ and his Apostles has marked out for it. – I will therefore compare the works and character of Antichrist with this new and strange religion, as it is delineated and set forth. / The Apostle Paul, in his second epistle to Timothy, iii. 1–9, points out this very people, in this new religion, and shews they were to appear in the last day, bearing the character of God’s enemies. Again, in i Tim. iv. 1, 2, 3. The Holy Ghost points out the doctrines of this new religion, and calls them the doctrines of devils, which are taught them by seducing spirits. Again, 2 Peter, ii. 1, 2, 3. Their heresies are spoken of, and of their denying the Lord that bought them. Nothing is more evident than that the Apostle points out this very people, for they throw away their conversion and begin to repent of their sin which they

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committed in their childhood; and thus to attone and make satisfaction, and step up the ladder of their own works, into a state of perfection; but if death should overtake them before they get to be perfect, then down to hell they must go, to pay the remainder in suffering, and when they have paid the debt and are born again in hell, then to come out and go to Heaven; will they thank Christ, as the great mediator, and adore him, for his attoning blood and righteousness? No, not at all; Oh, dreadful scheme, that stands opposed to the glorious plan of redemption by Christ! Well might Peter and Jude say of them, wells without water, clouds without rain, twice dead, pluckt up by the roots, wandering stars; for whom is reserved the blackness of darkness for ever. Again, I find this new religion differs from the true religion of the gospel, respecting faith. I find gospel religion says, being justified by faith, Rom. v. i. but this new religion says by works. – To decide this matter, I shall attend to the Apostle, in Rom. iv. 4, 5. where he says, To him that worketh, is the reward not reckoned of grace, but of debt; – but to him that worketh not, but believeth on him that justifieth the ungodly, his faith is counted for righteousness. The true Christian sees by faith, lives by faith, walks by faith, fights the good fight of faith, and gets the victory by faith: But the people in this new religion, do not so much as talk about faith in Christ, but they place their whole knowledge in their religion, on their pretended visions, prophesies and / signs – Another thing which proves this new religion to be false, is what follows. – The Apostle James, in his epistle i. 5, says, If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God who giveth liberally. But this people go to Nisqueunia, to ask of a number of Europeans, what they shall do who tell them, agreeable to what I find 2 Peter, ii. 18, 19. They speak great swelling words of vanity, and allure through their much wantonness, those that were clean escaped, from them who live in error; and while they promised them liberty, they themselves are the servants of corruption. – And further, instead of attending to the worthy instructions of our Godly teachers, they are burning all the books of divinity, and learning, they come at. – In this new religion is the whole magazine of error, treasured up in the great mystery of iniquity, in which is found all the power of delusive witchcraft, to blindfold souls, and lead them to hell. I might cite a multitude of scripture in proof of this point, but shall only say, the whole canon of God’s word is levelled against this new religion, and doth and will eternally condemn it, and all its propagators shall not be able to stand the trial; with which I close this head and proceed, VIII. To give some reasons for my knowledge in this new religion, not by mere speculation, but sorrowful experience. On the 13th day of May last, I. received a request from a church at Stillwa6 ter, above Albany, to attend an a conference, the 25th day of the same month; and being disposed to go, two of my brethren offered to bear me company, pro-

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vided I would return back by the way of Nisqueunia with them, to see a new and strange people living there. I consented to their proposition, in consequence of their company in my journey, and on the 26th day of May last we arrived at Nisqueunia: The Europeans, though strangers, received us very kindly, and presently told us they knew of our coming the day before; this set me to wondering at their knowledge. After they had got us some victuals, one of them came and sat down by me / and began to speak many good words, saying, I must hate sin, love God, and take up my cross, &c. then went on to tell about a new dispensation, and that they had got into it; his words seemed so well placed, that I heard them with attention: Mean while a man, one of their company, stands up before me, and began to stretch and bend, and extend his arms up and down, and to act all manner of postures, and turn his eyes almost inside out; I had never seen or heard of such actions before, and it set me a wondering what he meant. By this time my mind was much engaged, attending to one that spoke good words, and to the other that acted so oddly. Mean while he that spoke drew near to me, and every little while would touch me with his finger; but I thought it was that I might mind well what he said; he likewise would give me a sly cross, and put his hand on my head or about me, which I took not much notice of. The mother, so called, looked very smiling, came and sat down, and began to sing a strange tune, with a mystical voice, in a mixture of words, known and unknown, which seemed to be a perfect charm. After they had been the object of attention for some time, I turned my thoughts on my former views of religion, and sound, to my admiration, my mind was turned wholly up-side down; and began to think I had been all my life in a dream about religion. – After a further discovery of their worship, I felt greatly shocked and confounded; yet a secret belief kept prevailing, that they were the people of God. I tarried all night, but sat up, hearing and seeing those strange things until the break of day, in which time they gave me a hint of their purgatory scheme, which greatly shocked my mind: In this tumult of thought I left them in the morning, about eight o’clock, and returned home. In a very short time I found a power come on me, different from what I had ever felt before, and made me feel very weak and maugre, and in a little time it so affected my nerves that they gave a twich, as sudden as a flash of lightning; at first I thought what can that be? But immediately / the answer was ready; It is the power of God: This made me give way to it, daring not to resist it, and immediately it gave me another twitch; it had this effect on me, to make me attend to the power, and in so doing I thought I attended on God: It never brought me to what they call signs, and to so great shaking as some have; however, I fully believed it was the work of God, and yet I found great difficulties to get along; to give up my old experience, appeared a great thing, and to hold them was contrary to the scheme. However, I reconciled my difficulties as well as I could, by

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concluding, that in the new dispensation, new things would appear; and greater light would shine, and whatever was wanting in my old experiency would now appear; yet so far as they went they might be good; yet many told me, I would ever be weak in the new, until I threw away all the old. I went again to Nusqueunia and received further instructions from the Europeans, and seemed to be more confirmed. Having given them a relation of my life, they made me many large promises of very great blessings and still I remained under the operation of the spirit. – But in a little time the effect of this new work in many, appeared so wild that it troubled me much, and I thought it my duty to sever between the precious and the vile; which when I began to do, they rose upon me with a dismal hiss, and had a sign to stop me; however, I went through against their signs; and as the work went on, more inconsistencies and falsehoods appeared, which made me repeat a rejection of such things, and made mention of some imperfections I have seen in their teachers; this made them rise in such a clamour, hiss and uproar, as though the infernal den had broke loose: This gave me such a shock, that I could go no further until I had examined the scheme over again. For this purpose I attended to my Bible more carefully, and my eyes began to be opened, and the power on me began to decrease; but had great threatenings sent to me from the teachers and others; telling me if I turned back, damnation was my portion. – Their prophesies / and their signs appeared more and false false, which still opened my eyes, and gave me great jealousy, that this new religion was led by a false spirit, and in a little time the operation wholly left me; my eyes were wide open, and I was as though I had come out of a dark cellar, into the brightest beams of the noon day sun. I am very sensible, that the spirit which leads on this new scheme, is the spirit of witchcraft, and is the most powerful of any delusion I ever heard or read of except what I find in Acts viii. 9, 10, 11. If I have been in any measure a means of leading any person7 into this wicked and dreadful delusion, I am very sorry, and as I heartily repent of my folly, I ask the forgiveness of all, especially those, that like myself, have been attending to creatures instead of looking to God. Having thus given a short, but true relation, of this new religion, in its several parts, together with my real and absolute knowledge of the same, by sorrowful experience, I pass on to the 9th, and last proposition, viz. To close the whole by a word of advice to ministers and people.

To the Ministers of the Gospel. Reverend Sirs, AS God has called you to the great and arduous work of the ministry, to teach the way of life, and watch over souls; it becomes my duty to advertise you of the growing evils and dangerous errors that are prevailing in our land, that by

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a timely information you may be able to guard against those damnable heresies, abominable impieties, and horrible blasphemies, pointed out in this piece. When I consider the distresses of my bleeding country, the burthen of war, and want of religion, it may justly serve, as a strong motive, to engage every true lover of God and his country, to use his utmost endeavours to promote the union, peace and tranquility of the people in the civil state, and to quicken all into action, in the great and momentous concerns of eternity – While the internal designs of an unwearied enemy are ripening into action, in leading souls to destruction, by delusive charms, it becomes / your duty to use your utmost exertions to prevent their calamitous shipwreck, by the overflowing deluge of an infinite brood of evils. The great and glorious doctrines of the gospel are intended as a sacred barrier against bewitching error: O then endeavour to inculcate in the minds of your hearers, the great mediatorship of Christ – the necessity of regenerating grace, and a divine faith in God through the blood and righteousness of the Lord Jesus Christ; and to maintain practical Godliness, by carefully and closely attending and adhering to every divine requirement. Dear Sirs, There never was a day that more loudly called for faithful watchmen, than the present time; while we see Satan transforming himself into an angel of light, and bringing forward his deep laid scheme, to undermine the glorious plan of Redemption by Christ: And as he at first deceived the woman, and made use of her to delude the man; so he is playing his prank over again, sending one woman from the State of New-York, and another from the State of Rhode-Island,8 who vie with each other, and are as dangerous to the heedless passenger as Scilla and Charibdes are to the unskillful mariner. O then! what need is there of skilful pilots and experienced helmsmen, to steer the ship of Zion, and keep her in the true channel of faith and love to God. The battle is now begun, Michael and his angels, and the dragon and his angels are now formed one against the other, for the grand decision. Now, we may expect the whole artillery of the infernal den, charged with error, delusion and blasphemy, attending with all the power of hellish fury, in the last struggle of the enemy. Now therefore, you are to fight against all the powers of darkness, and withstand Satan not only in his malignant rage and envy, but also in his deceitful flatteries and counterfeit friendship. For the old enemy of God and his people, like a grand politician, will try every method, by power, fraud and lies, to carry his diabolical designs / into execution. – You need therefore the whole armour of God, that you may be able to withstand, and having done all to stand; but there is no fear to them that put their trust Christ, who will again come up from the fields of Edom, glorious in his apparel, travelling in the greatness of his strength, and will trample his enemies in his fury, and sprinkle his garments with

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the blood of his enemies. You know your leader and where your strength lies; it is your duty to attend closely to his directions, that you may be powerful in your warfare, to pull down the strong holds of sin and Satan, and in so doing save yourselves and them who hear you, and at last receive a crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous judge, will give at that day. Dear Fathers in Christ, I close my address to you, by wishing you the blessing of God in your pious labours to promote religion and virtue, and the advancement of the Redeemer’s kingdom. I commend you to God, and the power of his grace, who is able to make you successful in building up your churches in the most holy faith, and at last to give you all an inheritance among them that are sanctified. I now turn myself to the people in general. My dear countrymen, I am deeply affected at the fearful omens of impending destruction that so loudly threaten our bleeding land. Surely God is angry, and the tokens of his displeasure are plainly discovered. It is a day that calls for lamentation and mourning, repentance and reformation; it is for our sin that God has permitted the sword to be unsheathed upon us; and tyranny to clank its chains and threaten us with slavery. Notwithstanding it was our duty to look to God for help, and in an humble dependence on him to stand forth in our defence, against a cruel enemy; yet how has our armies degenerated into nurseries of impiety, and the contagious distemper that we have been opposing, spread itself in our land? Vice and immorality abounds; stupidity and profanness prevails; ambition and discord has been a growing evil; and how / many of our countrymen, lost to the tender feelings of the human heart, been found more cruel than the Ostrich. How many traitorous plans have been formed for our blood and treasure, by a banditti of infernal miscreants? And notwithstanding God has prevented, and his good providence blasted the designs of those Cains and Judases that have combined against us, yet how have we forgot the danger, without being found in suitable returns to God. The great enemy of God that has filled the world with uproar, war and death, has ever envied the recovery of man, by a glorious mediator; and has ever been trying to circumvent the merciful designs of God, through Christ, for the salvation of souls. And in addition to all his subtile wiles, he takes the advantage of the great decay of religion and virtue, and makes it his opportunity to play his magic games, attended with the doctrine of purgatory, the worship of the creature instead of the creator, and an earthly and creature tribunal, to being the whole creation of men to trial. The scheme is so naked and balled,9 with all its splendid shew of perfection, that every rational mind would recoil at the thought of falling in with such a diabolical plan, was it not for a bewitching power that attends it, which turns every thing upside down, and puts darkness for light, error for truth, bitter for sweet, and hell for Heaven. Multitudes have fallen in with this dreadful scheme, and are so infatuated in their senses, that they are deprived of their reason, and past recovery, unless God

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interpose for them. While the leaders of this dreadful catastrophe, like the bowels of Ætna, are ever vomiting up their sulphur; like wild-fire it flies, and catches at a distance, and spreads like a plague. For such a delusion to take place in the land, loudly proclaims the judgment of God. For a people to be carried away with the power of errors, bespeaks their great darkness and ignorance of the truth. Men, Brethren, and Fathers suffer me to address you with a word of advice. One great end and design of this piece is to timely advise you of the growing evils that / are prevailing in our land, especially the fatal delusion set forth in this narrative. Consider the great and noble end of your creation. You were not made to be the meer play-things of time, nor to furnish Satan with materials to carry on his dark designs and horrid intrigues against the Most High, but to honour and glorify God. Therefore, for this great end and purpose break off from sin of every kind, encourage religion and virtue in each other; carefully attend to the doctrine and advice of your godly teachers; lift up your hearts in your desires to God, for his holy spirit to enlighten and lead you into the truth; closely attend to the word of God; make it the man of your counsel. Let all your conduct speak forth your belief of the Deity, and judgment to come; and by becoming holy we shall be a happy people, and shall see the return of God’s blessings, Satan disappointed and blasted, and the glorious kingdom of Christ advancing. I close my address to you, by heartily recommending to your serious consideration the great duty of guarding against those dangerous errors, and destructive delusions, which lead the misguided soul into the endless mazes and winding labyrinths of trouble and sorrow. And may God preserve you and lead you to himself, through faith in Jesus Christ, with which I close, and subscribe myself the publick’s real friend, and humble servant, VALENTINE RATHBUN, (Minister of the Gospel. Pittsfield, December 5, 1780. /

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A DIALOGUE, BETWEEN

GEORGE the THIRD of Great-Britain, and his MINISTERS; giving an Account of the Late MOB in LONDON, And the original of the Sect called

SHAKERS. Who lately went from ENGLAND to NORTH-AMERICA. LONDON, Printed: WORCESTER, Re-printed, 1782. /

A DIALOGUE, &C. London, 1781. When the people on this Island began some time ago to enter into Associations, in order to defeat the schemes of wicked and corrupt rulers, the King and his Ministers were much alarmed. A Cabinet Council was held at Whitehall in consequence thereof. There were present among others his Majesty, Lord Bute (under the rose) Lord North, Lord Germaine, Lord Mansfield, and a well know toryistical Bishop. After the debates on this important business were over; the following conversation or Dialogue took place, which laid that scene of disturbance and confusion,10 which lately took place in this Metropolis, and by which so many innocent persons unfortunately lost their lives: By this conference we are also led to the discovery of a low and contemptible scheme for raising commotions and disturbing the peace of our brethren in America, by introducing a new, strange and foolish religion, which, unaccountable as it may seem, it is said has already created much mischief in that quarter. The conversation was began by his Majesty, and was neaily as follows, viz. His Majesty.11 These Associations and Committees of / Correspondence,12 now forming with such rapid progress in England, appear to be similar to those by which the Americans first dared openly to oppose our government. Lord Mansfield.13 Very true, may it please your Majesty, and you cannot be too sensible of the great danger of such unlawful combinations.

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Lord Bute.14 Indeed, may it please your Majesty, I look upon their measures to be worthy of our most serious attention. Lord North.15 May it please your Majesty to allow me to express my sentiments relative to the alarming opposition now making in this realm to the measures we have adopted for the security of your Majesty’s government – For the people in a cool and determined manner to associate and enter into covenants, and chuse men of property and influence to preside over and direct them in the means of opposition to government, appears to me to be big with the most fatal consequences. Lord Germaine.16 These are the very measures which were taken by the Americans in the beginning of their rebellion. Your Majesty may recollect their regular advances in this way. Ten thousand mobs could not have done half so much injury to this Kingdom. Lord Mansfield. It is a just maxim, That desperate diseases require desperate remedies. Mobs, may it please your Majesty, often produce the best effects; they tend to strengthen government, and in their consequences to weaken the opposition of the people, as they introduce anarchy and confusion, whereby the more serious and sensible part of the community are plundered and ill-treated, which will make them rather submit to some small infringement of their liberties, than to be harrassed by a mob raised out of the lowest and most abandoned of the people; and even acknowledge that absolute government is better than none. Lord Germaine. We must then take the hint, and raise a mob that will effectually answer our purpose at this day. His Majesty. My Lords, I look to you for advice in this / important matter – if you think it worthy of attention you will please to point out the means of redress. Lord Bute. May it please your Majesty, your faithful servants now present have devised ways and means to counteract those dangerous measure adopted by the people; we only want your royal approbation. His Majesty. Please to make them known to me. Lord North. May it please your Majesty, we really think it expedient to raise a mob chiefly out of the lower sort of the people, to be headed by a person of some consequence. This riotous assembly when raised may easily be led to commit such outrages as well alarm all the sober and more sensible part of the nation, who will then wish for and request the interposition of government. Let military power be exerted in a proper moment – a few of the most worthless be taken and after trial executed, and at the same time extend mercy to a few who are the least atrocious. The riot will then subside – a new face will appear upon our political affairs – the different passions of the people will be wrought upon – the moderate men will have more influence upon those in opposition – the dignity of government will acquire new luster – those in opposition will loose ground –

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and finally all their pleasing expectations from Associations, &c. will vanish like the dew upon the rising of the morning sun. His Majesty. Your scheme appears something plausible – But how can the matter be properly conducted? For it appears to me to be an exceeding delicate affair. Lord North. May it please your Majesty, some trusty person or person must be employed who are favourites of the people; – your Majesty’s faithful ministers have already had a conference with Lord Gordon – he has the petition of the protestant association in trust, to present to your Majesty and Parliament against the bill of Toleration, &c. His character answer to a hair. – He has agreed if your Majesty approves the measure, to issue an advertisement, inviting the people to attend him in presenting the petition; and we have agreed with a number of / cunning, artful fellows to influence the mob so assembled to burn a few buildings, &c. at which time we can set on our dogs of war, &c. Lord Bute. And one thing more must be done, the leading magistrates in the city must be brought into the secret, otherwise they will blow up our whole scheme by raising the posse comitatas17 on the first appearance of Lord Gordon’s advertisement. His Majesty. That’s right, a better plan could not be devised. – I thank you my good friends. As for Lord Gordon I will make him shine in due time; he is young and may live to enjoy his earning. Lord Mansfield. We have assured Lord Gordon that his popularity will be equal to his most sanguine expectations – and he appears to be well satisfied with the idea of being the darling of the people. Something, however, must be done to bring him off from that punishment, which in the eye of the law he will justly merit. It will be proper that he undergo confinement, and stand a trial for his life; but matters being properly managed, there will be no danger of his suffering a greater evil than a confinement for a short time, and we make no doubt but he will receive full compensation for that inconvenience by your Majesty’s royal bounty. His Majesty. He may relay on my assistance – and I think the sooner this plan is put in execution the better. Lord Germaine. It is now an excellent time, as we have caused such a clamour to be raised against popery. His Majesty. I could wish we had as good a plan to settle our affairs in America. Lord Germaine. The people in Great-Britain are pleased with the notion of our having a right to tax America; they think it will help to relieve them of their burthens; besides an English chimney-sweeper plumes himself on his English blood, and thinks he has a right to govern and makes laws for America. Lord Bute. I fear, may it please your Majesty that all our money blood and treasure expended there is lost, and / America also. The money we have expended in bribery seems to have had but little good effect, but few of those we have retained appear to act conformable to our wishes; they seem to have but little courage to stand forth in the defence of our interest.

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Lord North. We must make some allowance for that, our affairs are so ruinous there, that they see they stand a great chance to be hanged or be obliged to leave their country forever, and self-preservation is one of the first laws of nature we all know: But we must make use of every stratagem; we find they answer when nothing else will, My Lord Germaine has lately had intelligence from some agents we have lately sent to America, to work upon the superstition of the people there. They have had tolerable success. My Lord will inform your Majesty concerning them. His Majesty. My Lord Germaine I am all attention. Lord Germaine. May it please your Majesty, our accounts from the persons who were sent to propagate a new religions scheme in America are very flattering. They make converts daily, and it is merry to hear of the weakness and folly of their tenets, and how aptly adapted to work on the foolish and superstitious passions of the most ignorant of the Americans. You must note, Sir, they have ever been taught to believe in miracles and supernatural operations. Their leaders, our agents,18 who stile themselves elders, profess to have all these powers, viz. To heal the sick, lame, wounded, &c. to have the gift of prophesy, divine revelations, and of conversing in unknown tongues, &c. and to be perfect and infallible; the spirit, as they term it, works upon and agitates their whole bodies; they have holy dances, turnings, shakings of the head and limbs, fall down and have terrible agitations; and many excel so much in these things, especially their converts, that they appear meagre, pale, and their visages ghastly; they are taught that they must confess their sins to their elders, and at such times are inquired of, Whether they have been guilty of taking up arms, which / is represented as the greatest sin; whether they have been guilty of carnal knowledge with brutes; whether they have been guilty of whoredom, and with how many women; whether they have had carnal knowledge of a woman in her pregnancy, &c. and at the confession of each sin kneel and put up ejaculations to Heaven for pardon: The wretched converts to this religion, flock after their teachers, and at certain places are entertained on free cost, and are led to believe that the means of their support is furnished in a miraculous manner: This religion, contemptible as it may appear, is calculated to infatuate weak minds; and those who are but little acquainted with the construction of the human body, really think the teachers of this scheme have power from Heaven to work miracles, and never consider that the violent agitations of their bodies in the exercise of their absurd shakings, will in particular cases give a fresh spring to the blood, and cause a circulation in parts which were before obstructed; and by means of which people who were before lame, may chance by the violent frenzy they have worked themselves into, cause a circulation to take place in a lame limb, and and thereby recover the use of it; this is held up as a real miracle, and does not fail to bring over fresh converts, particularly of those whose nerves are weak. They are taught to believe that the time draws near when the whole of the saints shall be sealed,

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and when the remaining wicked, among whom are those who have taken arms against us, shall be destroyed, to make room for the saints to reign with Christ a thousand years. They are great adepts in the use of the scriptures, and never fail to interpret it directly to their purpose. These people, if properly increased, might be worked up to any thing, and to any purpose by their leaders, on whom they solely depend for direction, only let them have a divine revelation to take arms and destroy rebels to God, and rebels to man; but I fear we are almost too late in this affair – we should have began sooner – but it may be that we may yet use these Shaking / Quakers, as they are called, to good advantage – I look upon them at least late recruits for Britain. Bishop.19 I have often been told that the people in some of the colonies were great bigots in their religion; especially the dissenters – I am somewhat surprised that these Shaking Quakers should have any influence on them, especially as they are reputed to be foremost in the rebellion, and great opposers to any religious scheme that bears any resemblance to popery. – Now, if I am rightly informed, this new scheme bears a strong resemblance in many particulars to the catholick church – for instance, their profession of being perfect, infallible, confessions of sin, bodily agitations, out-side shews, &c. this answers directly to the mother papal church, together with their power of working miracles, &c. However, if we can but get this scheme to go down, it will have, I believe, a good tendency to cut the sinews of their rebellion, as the numerous converts will refuse to bear arms against the forces sent to subdue the Americans by your Majesty. His Majesty. I could wish the plan might succeed – but I must confess I am not without my doubts. Lord Germaine. May it please your Majesty, our agents, the teachers of this strange religion, are very cunning, and cover their designs thick with art. Lord North. It is certain from the intelligence we have received – that these people have made great progress in carrying on their plan – And it is well known that when a people are deluded by an appearance of supernatural power, that great things have and may still be done towards bringing them under a proper subjection to government, when the force of arms have failed. Bishop. All governments that are worth any thing are supported by the influence of the clergy – no Bishops, no King, is the old true maxim. Lord Bute. I am a great friend to the clergy, and am sensible of their importance in the pillars of our state, no gentlemen have so unanimously supported our measures / for the recovery of America, as the Lords Spiritual. Lord North. May it please your Majesty, we may see by the easy manner in which the Americans are taken and duped by those shakers, that the bulk of the people there were never sited by wisdom and virtue for freemen; such ignorant and stupid wretches ought never to be free – they never acted from any principle of knowledge, founded in their understandings, in their rebellion and opposi-

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tion to our government; they were dictated by only a few speculative men who foresaw the evil of our claims of making laws for them in all cases whatsoever. Lord Germaine. But, Sir, you must acknowledge that some of our laws; by which their charters were almost annihilated, and they subjected to be brought to England for trial, &c. might be seen through by weak minds. Lord North. That’s true, Sir, and were intended to be seen by the commonality, you know, Sir, we had our aims by drawing them into rebellion, but consequences have turned out contrary to our expectations. His Majesty. True, gentlemen – I have been waiting for the joyful news of the conquest of the rebels in America, and expecting it as a consequence of your councils and measures, but have been continually disappointed; it is assurance, gentlemen, that I want, that the work will be soon compleated, and for the want of such assurance, my soul is almost starved. Shall it be said, that in the reign of George the Third, a native born King of Britain, that America was torn from his Crown! Forbid it Heaven! Forbid it Earth, and all the power of darkness; Rather than such an event should take place, I would wish that the whole continent of America might be sunk into the bottom of the ocean, or consumed like Sodom with fire and brimstone, and every cursed rebel in it. Bishop. Amen, may it please your Majesty. Lord Bute. Amen. Lord Germaine. Amen. / Lord North. Amen. Lord Mansfield. Amen. Bishop. And let all the people say Amen, and God bless and prosper your Majesty.

FINIS

TAYLOR, A NARRATIVE OF THE STRANGE PRINCIPLES, CONDUCT AND CHARACTER OF THE PEOPLE KNOWN BY THE NAME OF SHAKERS

Amos Taylor, A Narrative of the Strange Principles, Conduct and Character of the People Known by the Name of Shakers (Worcester, MA, 1782).

Amos Taylor is a mercurial figure in early American literature. He flits on and off the stage through a series of intermittently published works on a broad variety of topics. Noted bibliographer Marcus McCorison gathered a critical mass of information on Taylor, to which a few newly discovered facts can be added.1 McCorison’s concise assessment of Taylor cries out for quotation: ‘The warp and woof of society in any age is made up of non-entities. However, some nonentities are warped sufficiently to be interesting to later generations.’2 Taylor was born in Groton, Massachusetts, on 7 September 1748. In his autobiographical publication The Bookseller’s Legacy Taylor claimed to have read the Bible by the age of seven. Despite this early piety, Taylor became convinced that he was not among the elect (in a Calvinistic sense) and gave himself up to ‘looseness, to vanity and profaneness’.3 On 14 April 1769, Taylor was reprimanded by a friend for swearing. This brought him to his senses and triggered his rebirth into Christianity.4 A reasonably good student, he attended Dartmouth College for a year beginning in 1770. In April 1775 he marched to Cambridge with a contingent of troops from Groton to serve with colonial forces at the siege of Boston. Over the next two years he alternated between military service and teaching school in New Hampshire. When he was finally discharged on 1 September 1777, his officer noted Taylor as a ‘great impostor’. The following spring Taylor married Dorothy Hutchins on 19 February 1778. He reapplied to Dartmouth early in 1779 but apparently was not admitted.5 The Shakers arrived at Harvard, Massachusetts (immediately south of Taylor’s hometown of Groton) in June 1781.6 It was probably at this time that he associated with Mother Ann Lee and her followers. Taylor claimed he lived with the – 29 –

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Shakers for ten months. However, no mention of him is found in Shaker sources. A ten-month residence seems plausible though, since Taylor’s anti-Shaker narrative was first advertised in Worcester on 26 April 1782.7 His Narrative of the Strange Principles, Conduct and Character of the People Called Shakers acknowledges Valentine Rathbun’s prior work and proposes to bring the history of the Shakers forward with a particular emphasis on their institutions, orders and discipline. Taylor’s seventeen-point explication of Shaker beliefs is the first printed statement of its kind. Crucially, he identifies key Shaker doctrines, such as: salvation through free-will faith and the confession of sins; the reconciliation of the true Church to mankind through Shakerism, which coincides with the advent of the Christian millennium; and finally, that the second appearance of Christ is in and through the Shaker Church. Although his account is very critical overall, he does acknowledge that the Shakers had the dubious power to convert ‘lyars, swearers, drunkards, extortioners … to confess, and absolutely for a time to leave their ordinary and common vices for the sake of uniting into one general spirit of downright idolatry, crying out with one voice … great is the Elect Mother of the Shakers!’ (p. 37, below). Although Taylor promised another instalment of his anti-Shaker work, apparently it was never published. By the mid-1780s Taylor had reunited with his wife and was living in Reading, Vermont, and he had been imprisoned for debt. He broke out of jail at Windsor, and the Sheriff promised a five-dollar reward for his capture, publishing this description of him on 26 October 1785: ‘about five feet nine inches high, and about forty years of age, light brown hair, and considerably bald; pretends to be a schoolmaster, and very religious where he is not acquainted’.8 Another advertisement from 1790 shows Taylor still resident in Reading, and delinquent in paying his property taxes.9 On 19 May 1794 his wife Dorothy died following the birth of a third child. Taylor remarried a woman named Hannah, but things quickly soured.10 In June 1796 he published an advertisement throughout Vermont and New Hampshire warning citizens not to incur expenses on his account for his estranged wife Hannah and her daughter. Oddly, in the same ad he also promotes his Whitingham, Vermont, bookstore and some of his own upcoming publications.11 In July 1796, fourteen years after the fact, he wrote a letter to the Western Star of Stockbridge, Massachusetts (a vehicle for much controversial writing on the Shakers during the 1790s) retracting the statements he had published in his Narrative of 1782, reprinted in full below. Readers curious about the remainder of Taylor’s life and his various printed works of poetry and prose should consult McCorison’s excellent and highly entertaining article. Taylor’s last work was printed at Utica, New York, in 1813. It seems that like many struggling New England men of his generation he tried to make a new life in the burgeoning settlements of central and western New York. Taylor’s

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Narrative is extremely important for students of the Shakers as it is one of only three pamphlets published about the sect during the life of Mother Ann Lee. Notes 1.

M. A. McCorison, Amos Taylor, a Sketch and Bibliography (Worcester, MA: American Antiquarian Society, 1959), pp. [37]–42. 2. Ibid., [p. 37]. 3. A. Taylor, The Bookseller’s Legacy (Bennington, VT: Printed by Anthony Haswell, 1803), p. 11. 4. Ibid., pp. 10–19. 5. McCorison, Amos Taylor, pp. 38–9. 6. R. Bishop and S. Y. Wells, Testimonies of the Life, Character, Revelations and Doctrines, of Our Ever Blessed Mother Ann Lee (Hancock, MA: Printed by J. Tallcott & J. Deming, Junrs, 1816), pp. 84–5. 7. The Massachusetts Spy: or, American Oracle of Liberty (Worcester, MA), 26 April 1782, [p. 2]. 8. Vermont Journal and the Universal Advertiser (Windsor, VT), 8 November 1785, [p. 5]. 9. Vermont Journal and the Universal Advertiser (Windsor, VT), 24 March 1790, [p. 3]. 10. McCorison, Amos Taylor, pp. 41–2. Taylor’s first child, a daughter named Nancy, was born on 19 December 1786. A second child was born prior to 1793. 11. Rising Sun (Keene, NH), 21 June 1796, [p. 4].

Amos Taylor, A Narrative of the Strange Principles, Conduct and Character of the People Known by the Name of Shakers (Worcester, MA, 1782).

a NARRATIVE of the Strange Principles, Conduct and Character of the SHAKERS. WHEN we consider the infant state of civil power in America, since the revolution began, every infringement on the natural rights of humanity, every effort to undermine our original constitution, either in civil or ecclesiastical order saps the foundation of Independency. To see a body of more than two thousand people, having no will of their own, but governed by a few Europeans1 conquering their adherents into the most unreserved subjection, argues some infatuating power; some deep, very deep design at bottom. To describe what this power is will be the design of the following Narrative, and by what means this people are supported in their delusion. / There are few people in this land no doubt but what have heard of the contents of Valentine Rathbun’s Narrative, in which some gross absurdities in point of doctrine and worship are pointed out. But since this people have increased in numbers, they have established such orders and founded such institutions among themselves as renders it very easy to trace them in their discipline to the seat and foundation of their power. For this purpose the writer thinks proper to lay open to the learned world, more particularly, the whole body of their discipline, that the publick may be able to judge for themselves what this power is, and from what it proceeds. The predominant principle in the heart of man is the love of dominion and preeminency. Pride is the root of all sin. From this principle the whole fabrick of – 33 –

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that religion is founded. These people are artful, designing men, especially their leaders. The common people who are imposed upon are many of them very sincere. If any person opens his mind2 to them, as the confession of sin is termed, they commonly gain their point. The reason of their success may be attributed on the one hand to a very extraordinary skill which these people have acquired in hearing confessions; and on the other to a likeness of principle and motive which creates a peculiar sympathy and union. They are universally of one spirit in belief of, obedience to, and raised expectations from their church. Their discipline is founded on the supposed perfection of their leaders: The Mother,3 it is / said, obeys God through Christ; European elders obey her; American labourers obey them: The common people obey them while confession is made of every secret in nature, from the oldest to the youngest. The perpetual labours of which gives their teachers experience and skill. By this means the people are made to believe themselves to be seen through and through in the gospel glass of perfection by their teachers, as they express themselves, for hundred of miles in an instant, and that they are arrived to that state of glory by which they behold not only the estate of the living, but of the dead, with innumerable worlds of spirits good and bad. When the extraordinary appearance of strange exercise in their way of worship causes a doubt in the minds of any spectator, they frequently inculcate the innocency of laying open the secrets of life, provided a confession is kept concealed, intimating the benefit of the experience of their leaders in particular cases of conscience, as being privileged thereby with especial opportunities to judge for themselves concerning the truth of their profession. Such like arguments to a mind that begins to be open to their insinuations, especially where there has been the weight of some burden on the conscience beforetime, will by the allurement of these people, introduce a person partly from curiosity, or some impression from these instructions, to use a familiarity of laying open the whole of his life, upon which the greatest condescension is paid to the intended proselyte. / His principles and practice in life are all laid open – predominant vices exposed – habit of mind and thoughts of his heart are drawn from him. The person thus exposed receives instruction applicable to secret cases of conscience; is told that there is no delusion but only in sin. That is it which they warn him against. And these people have a faculty to draw the attention of new proselytes into a belief of extraordinary perfection in resolving the difficulties laid before them, studiously disengaging their attachment to common vice into a spirit of idolatry in respect to them and their instructions, effectually to secure their dominion over the conscience. The adherent finds some consistency of moral instruction and skill in determining cases of conscience; an easy conquest over former vices; suddenly grows perfect in his own imagination; sees on the one hand great conformity in their society, alike in sentiment, each one forgoing his

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old habitual course, cemented together in opposition to a world of persecution, having one will to govern them though of the female sex. Which sympathy, love, power and union in this delusion they believe to be of God. On the other hand observing some spirit of intemperance among those who are not acquainted with this splendid scheme of new religion, he is thereby confirmed in his error. Sometimes they endeavour to frighten those whom they cannot allure, by throwing out a censorious spirit; by judging all who fall not in with their way; which has the desired effect, more especially with persons of a timorous make and constitution, which is but a slavish / scheme in their delusion. Subservient to their purposes, are strict injunctions laid on every adherent, not to weaken one another by scruples of conscience, trials and darkness, such cases being reserved to their elders and teachers; besides all records and general orders4 are kept concealed, excepting from the individuals who are particularly concerned. The doctrines which are more clearly come to light since the first rise of their religion, are as follows, viz. First. That God, through Jesus Christ in the Church, is reconciled with man. Second. That sins confessed to God’s witnesses5 are forgiven in the Church as soon as forsaken. Third. That Christ is come a light into human nature, to enlighten every man that cometh into the world without distinction. Fourth. That no man is born of God until by faith he is assimulated into the character of Jesus Christ in his Church.6 Fifth. That in obedience to that Church a man’s faith will increase until he comes to be one with Christ in the millenium Church state. Sixth. That every man is a free agent to walk in true light, and so to choose or reject the truth of God within him. / Seventh. Of consequence that it is in every man’s power to be obedient to the faith without which he shall suffer so much loss. Eighth. That this is the gospel of the first resurrection which is now preached in that Church. Ninth. That all who are born of God (as they explain the new birth) shall never taste of the second death. Tenth. That those who are said to have been regenerated among Christians are only regenerated in part, therefore are not assimulated into the character of Christ in his Church while here in the body, of consequence not tasting the happiness of the first resurrection, cannot escape in part the second death. Eleventh. They hold that the word everlasting when applied to the punishment of the wicked, refers only to a limited space of time, excepting in the case of those who fall from their Church.

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Twelfth. That the second death having power over such rise not into the character of Christ in the first resurrection, will in due time fill up the measure of his sufferings beyond the grave. Thirteenth. That the righteousness and sufferings of Christ in his members are both one; that every man suffers personally for himself, with inexpressible woe and misery for sins not repented / of notwithstanding this union, until final redemption. Fourteenth. They believe Christ will never make any publick appearance as a single person, but only in his saints: That the judgment day is now began in that Church. Fifteenth. They believe no salvation out of obedience to the sovereignty of their dominion: That all sin which is committed against God, is done against them, and must be pardoned for Christ’s sake through them, for which confession must be made to them. Sixteenth. They believe that their Church is come out of the order of natural generation,7 to be as Christ was; that those who have wives are as though they had none; that by these means Heaven begins upon earth, and they thereby loose their sensual or earthly relation to Adam the first, and come to be transparent in their ideas in the bright and heavenly visions of God. Seventeenth. They hold to a travel and labour for the redemption of departed spirits. There are other articles less important which they occasionally advance, which for brevity’s sake must be omitted but the above are a summary of their principles. The writer will now proceed in order to trace them to that seat of power which produces those / strange operations that are frequent among them. By the same caution they use in the first introduction of their proselytes, they carefully lead them by several degrees into the belief of their tenets, and to consequence into the several exercises of their worship. They firstly inculcate a principle of passive obedience, as introductory to some future knowledge of divine mysteries to which they will attain by a strict adherence to Church precepts. They are exhorted not to despise (by strict order) the things they understand not. And being supposed to have some resolution of warfare against their sins by personal labour, they are bid to judge of the safety of communion with that society by the victory they obtain against predominant vice, not to inquire into principles any faster than as they shall come into vision by leaving their sin. And since the human frame and construction of man is such, that great effects may be produced merely by, as it were, a mechanical operation on the nerves, they improve them to excite the attention of mankind, as it it were the strange work spoken of in Scripture, which should be brought to pass in the latter days. They therefore exhort their adherents with great solemnity in their address, to cherish such kind of motions upon themselves as are frequently observed on the

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human body of others, telling them the operations of God’s spirit are in scripture said to be diverse. And that as they become more acquainted with them, although they carry some outward appearance of gross absurdities in the eyes of the world / yet will they assuredly find an inward spirit of piety and holiness running through the whole of their exercises: Tell them that God therefore owns them, and his holy spirit moves them to such extraordinary extasies of mind and motions of the body. Thus are their proselytes duped into the belief of something more than common, and are led to judge of every whimsical passion of animal nature, separate from grace to be a part of their religion, while they at the same time, through a misled judgment, condemn the grace of God in the hearts of those who make not so much of human passion. It has been observed that persons who newly open their minds to this society, leave immediately the company of their old neighbours and acquaintances, some of their old vicious habits, and all their old religion, and experiences, and are cemented into the union of deep delusion, resigning their former wills to this new mother, to be governed by her, through her elders, tutors and labourers, which of consequence, produce likeness of sentiment and raised elevation of mind. However mysterious it may seem, numberless instances can be produced where lyars, swearers, drunkards, extortioners, unclean, unjust, covetous persons, proud, self-willed, heady, high minded, &c. at least many of these characters have all been brought down to confess, and absolutely for a time to leave their ordinary and common vices for the sake of uniting into one general spirit of downright idolatry, crying out with one voice as in Acts xix. 34, great is Diana of the Ephesians;8 or, great is the Elect Mother9 of the Shakers! These people gain advantage to rise in authority by judging in matters of conscience; giving / out their precepts; receiving perpetually confession from their converts; elevating their minds in their several exercises; reforming them from the common delusion of ordinary vice for this grand delusion, still more notoriously absurd, of worshiping the creature, instead of the Creator, who is God blessed forevermore. Some have been ready to query if these operations can be performed without the assistance of some supernatural power. The delicacy of an answer to which requires moderation in determining a matter of universal enquiry. It will be granted however, by what has been already written, that great appearances of more than common power may proceed from the union and fellowship of such a deluded body of people, whose affections and animal spirits are cemented into a likeness of passion and transport, being bewitched, as it were, or enchanted with the splendid shew of perfection: Should this be the most favourable circumstance in regard to that people, and they be ignorant of any absolute league, but only among themselves; it is most worthy of being truly distinguished from pure and vital religion, and ought to be abhorred and utterly detested by all, even as an infringement on the common rights of humanity. For there is a perpetual scene of trembling, quivering, shaking, sigh-

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ing, crying, groaning, screaming, jumping, singing, dancing and turning, which strikes the animal part, operating on the nerves of the greatest opposers, in following which the adherent finds an easy transition from favour with them to go into their several exercises, to mourn and rejoice with them, to kneel, to leap, and dance, to turn and shake, and sometimes to utter / forth their unknown mutter, so gibberish that a person not deluded would imagine they were a company of madmen, by whom their passions in different colours are artfully displayed; this they call the gift of new tongues, by which their opposers oftentimes find themselves severely scolded at, sometimes mocked, entreated or flattered, according to the operation of their several humours, frequently gathering round some one of their own company who is not quite obedient enough for them, like spiteful birds in fighting, and peck upon him in their unknown mutter, as if they would pick his flesh from him. If this will not do in such a case of discipline, the common people are informed of his secret sins, long before confessed to the elders, and gone before hand to judgement who now begin to hold their disobedient rebel in open derision, shewing the anger of God towards him, as they term it. They tell him that God has revealed to them that he has been guilty of such and such sins, that he has never repented of them; for if he had, these sins would never have come up again to judgement; that he is in danger of falling away; that it is impossible for their church to lay any thing upon him which is contrary to the will of God. All hands fall to, and justify some injunction he complains of as a matter of grievance. If his mind is perplexed, and he seeks to know the reason of particular orders, they entangle him in his difficulty to make him comply with his duty, warning him at his peril not to dispute the authority of the church, not suffering him to enjoy any peace until bewitched with the effect of their discipline, he finally gives up his reason, sense, judgement, / will and affection, being overcome with their apparent harmony among themselves, and excessive severity towards him. He then receives double congratulations from their whole society, in full rejoicing over him as a sinner that is brought to repentance. By which time this conquered one is prepared for new battles, in order to help subdue the next rebellious wretch who dare dispute the mighty canons of that august assembly. A particular account of the writer’s experience in five different governments is now sitting for the press: In which every useful matter of intelligence concerning the rise of that people, and their several advances in this new system will soon be published in the Second Number.10 Some of the principal heads of this people are said to be born in the town of Manchester, in the west of England, and members of West’s separate church11 there. – The names of those who have resided in Harvard, Commonwealth of Massachusetts, from May 1781, to February 1782, are Anna Leese, the Mother, William Leese, her natural brother, John Parkinton,12 formerly a Baptist preacher in England, James Whittiker, chief speaker in the Assemblies, James Shepherd

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said to have been a merchant in England, besides two women of that church, seven in all: The rest of the European Shakers have still resided in Nisqueunia,13 above Albany, since their first settlement there, among whom Elder Ocknell,14 as he is called by that people, is chief. / The above Mother and four Elders have had the lead of government at Harvard,15 over all their adherents for hundreds of miles round them, who have kept up a store of provision, sufficient for eighty or an hundred people at a time; and on their settlement first at Harvard, their meeting was kept up by day and night, chiefly in singing, until after they had got some footing, when it was immediately turned into heavy dancing, generally about forty or fifty men together, and as many women separate by themselves in different rooms. Their meetings consisted of a constant variety of some newly come, and others just ready to leave them; – some would stay two, some six, some ten, and some twenty days on a visit; – some would come twice, some thrice, some five, and some ten times a piece; – some would come twenty, some fifty, some an hundred, and some two hundred miles:16 Besides they have had labourers constantly going and coming, making new proselytes, and confirming their old ones further and further in this millennium state of their church as they profess; the whole of which is manifestly done to introduce popery and ecclesiastical power. – Their meetings generally continued every night until about two o’clock after midnight, and very frequently until the break of day; no distinction on the sabbath, excepting on the account of hard labour. These people are generally instructed to be very industrious especially at their own dwelling places of abode, to bring in their ability to keep up their meeting. Multitudes spend their whole time this way, and are supported by others; they / generally come, and always go, by order. They vary in their exercises – their heavy dancing, as it is called, is performed by a perpetual springing from the house floor, about four inches up and down, both in the men’s and women’s apartment, moving about as thick as they can crowd, with extraordinary transport, singing sometimes one at a time, and sometimes more than one, making a perfect charm. This elevation draws upon the nerves so as that they have intervals of shuddering as if they were in a strong fit of the ague. – They sometimes clap hands and leap so as to strike the joyce17 above their heads. They throw off their outside garments in these exercises, and spend their strength very cheerfully this way; their chief speaker oftentimes calls for their attention, when they all stop and here some harangue, and then fall to dancing again. Sometimes when they stop and hear some harangue, and then fall to dancing again. Sometimes when they are weary of this heavy exercise of body, they stop and fall on their knees and make a sound like the roaring of many waters, in groans and cries to God, as they say, for the wicked world who persecute them.

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There might be written a volume if it were necessary to settle their character that way; but the writing will be brief, therefore shall conclude this first number by requesting those who are masters of language to excuse his manner of style, as not being reviewed by any man of learning, but wrote chiefly at first hand, and committed to the press, promising to accept of the best assistance in the next number – Warning all men to guard against / these destructive errors; desiring to give publick praise to God for his own escape from that delusion. It is to be hoped from all people knowing to any part of their character, that necessary matters of intelligence will be minuted down and communicated for the press, so that any evidence of witchcraft, or unchaste behaviour more particularly may be produced from good authority, if any such things there be, which the writer shall cheerfully give notice of in his next publication.18 That God may preserve the United States of America from publick innovations is the desire of the writer, and that this people may brought to see their mistake will be the unfeigned wish of every considerate person, as it is of AMOS TAYLOR / {The remainder of Taylor’s Narrative is a proposal to promote the manufacture of rag paper in the United States, a copyright notice on the text of the Narrative, and also for a number of additional publications, including a request that:} Useful intelligence concerning the people called Shakers, is earnestly desired to be forwarded by the Massachusetts Representatives to Boston State-House, and from thence to the author hereof; with any copies for the press, on subjects likely to promote publick virtue and the paper-manufacture withall. Among the general copies expected to be published by the advertiser, there will be the first and second / Numbers of the Narrative concerning a certain people known by the name of Shakers; wherein the life of that people, and the several advances they have made in their errors, since the common Narrative of Valentine Rathbun was published, are laid open. {More proposed publications are listed here.} AMOS TAYLOR. Harvard, April 15, 1782

P. A., THREE CURIOUS PIECES

P. A., Three Curious Pieces. Being A Ready Way to Unpopularity: or, Truth a General Enemy (Boston, MA: Printed and sold by E. Russell, in Essex-Street, near LibertyStump, 1782), pp. 7–8.

Three Curious Pieces is a satirical anti-social pamphlet that attacks in turn: Calvinists, Arminians, Episcopalians, Catholics, Shakers, Quakers, Atheists, Deists, Universalists, the rich, merchants, doctors, duelists and many other members of society. The premise is that an old man tells a young gentleman ‘it is impossible to be honest and yet be popular’.1 The earnest young man is deeply disturbed to hear that in order to be popular he must sacrifice his honesty. He returns home and falls into a troubled sleep. In a dream he implores the older man to explain himself. The old man responds, ‘It is but to know mankind, to suspect them.’2 Then, through the device of an extended dream-sequence, the old man boldly speaks harsh truth to the above named groups and individuals. His bold honesty leads to his unpopularity and alienation from society. Thus his point is proven –the truth has been spoken. The fact that the Shakers had garnered enough popular attention to be included in this pamphlet is quite remarkable. Mother Ann Lee had only opened her gospel two years prior in April 1780, and that was in New York and the border regions of western Massachusetts, far from Boston. However, by 1781 the Shakers were active in Worcester County, Massachusetts, and accounts of them were published in many New England newspapers.3 The Shaker-themed content of Three Curious Pieces is satirical, but mirrors serious aspects of Valentine Rathbun’s publications, particularly the accusation that Mother Ann Lee was a ‘political tool sent from Europe to propagate the doctrine of non-resistance and passive-obedience’ (p. 43, below). This seems to be taken right from the Dialogue appended to the 1782 Worcester printing of Valentine Rathbun’s Brief Account (reproduced in this volume, pp. 1–27). One especially curious part of Three Curious Pieces is the reference to a Shaker ‘running after his own finger’ (p. 43, below). Valentine Rathbun mentioned this activity in his narrative, as did his brother Daniel Rathbun in his Letter to James Whittacor.4 A newspaper

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account published at Stockbridge, Massachusetts, in 1796 offers a description of the same kind of religious enthusiasm among the Shakers at New Lebanon in the early 1780s: ‘Who of the old inhabitants of [the Shakers’] neighbourhood but can recollect the wild vagaries of their first setting out … the spirit … led them from their work by the guidance of the extended hand, in rough paths’.5 From these various accounts, published many years apart, it appears that such fantastic behaviour was a part of the unregulated nature of early Shaker worship. Notes 1.

2. 3.

4. 5.

P. A., Three Curious Pieces. Being a Ready Way to Unpopularity: or, Truth a General Enemy (Boston, MA: Printed and sold by E. Russell, in Essex-Street, near Liberty-Stump, 1782), p. 2 (not reproduced here). Ibid., p. 3 (not reproduced here). For information on newspaper coverage of the Shakers during the 1780s see C. Goodwillie, ‘The Shakers in Eighteenth-Century Newspapers, Part One: “From a Spirit of Detraction and Slander”’, American Communal Societies Quarterly, 4:3 ( July 2010), pp. 161–82. Rathbun, Brief Account, p. 12; and Rathbun, A Letter, p. 85. Western Star (Stockbridge, MA), 26 January 1796, [p. 1].

P. A., Three Curious Pieces. Being A Ready Way to Unpopularity: or, Truth a General Enemy (Boston, MA: Printed and sold by E. Russell, in Essex-Street, near Liberty-Stump, 1782), pp. 7–8.

“If you are so fortunate as to meet with a Shaker, when he is not running after his own finger, I advise you to reason with him first, and if that should fail, remind him of the idolatrous Israelites in the days of Elijah, who leaped upon the altar, cried aloud and cut themselves with knives: but however this devotion (or distraction) was not addressed to the God of universal nature, but to Baal a god of their own making: Then carry him to mount Horeb, where the Lord passed by before Elijah, when a strong wind rent the rocks, after the wind an earthquake, and after an earthquake a fire, but the Lord was not in either of the three; after the fire a still small voice which was the voice of God to Elijah; and as a further illustration tell him that religion is first pure, then peaceable, not clammorous. St. Paul advises to let your moderation be known to all men; tell him that their prohibition of marriage,* &c. is not the doctrine of truth but of satan, which is emphatically expressed by Paul to Timothy, Now the / spirit speaketh expressly, that in the latter times some shall depart from the faith, giving heed to seducing spirits and doctrines of devils, speaking lies in hypocrisy, forbidding to marry, &c. Tell him that the Elect Lady is a political tool sent from Europe to propagate the doctrine of non-resistance and passive-obedience, urging the people to withhold their taxes, to effect the destruction of civil government, and if the Americans were not very lenitive they would either execute or transport her for a sower of sedition; but whatever may be her pretensions she does not intend to leave her bones in this country, but after she has fleeced her proselites as the Israelites did the Egyptians, viz. collected all the jewels of gold and silver they are possessed of, she will find the

*

I advise you to serve him as I do the Reader, viz. take him aside and tell him that you don’t believe they live up to this particular tenet, but rather allow themselves to copulate promiscuously; and this suggestion will serve for a double-headed shot, for he will be as angry in the margin as he is in the body of the work. – 43 –

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way across the atlantic, and then set down and laugh at all the fools she has left in America: As long as he is inclined to Shakerism he will resent it.

WEST, SCRIPTURAL CAUTIONS

Benjamin West, Scriptural Cautions Against Embracing a Religious Scheme Taught by a Number of Europeans, who came from England to America, in the Year 1776,1 and Stile themselves the Church … by Benjamin West, who has been Deluded by Them to the Great Injury of Himself and Family (Hartford, CT: Bavil Webster, 1783).

The context of Benjamin West’s account is quite obscure. In Scriptural Cautions West offers virtually no information about his life before or during his contact with the Shakers. Owing to the prominence of the painter Benjamin West, and the famous mathematician Benjamin West (1730–1813), it is difficult to find any firm information on the Benjamin West who authored the text reproduced below. It is possible that he was a son, or grandson, of the mathematician, who was born at Rehoboth, Massachusetts. Intriguingly, the mathematician Benjamin West published a number of Almanacs under the psuedonym ‘Bickerstaff ’ with Bavil Webster of Hartford – also the printer of Scriptural Cautions. Rehoboth was the scene of intense Shaker missionary activity during September 1782 when Mother Ann Lee and the Elders stayed ten days at the house of sea captain Morrell Baker.2 Rehoboth was later the site of the construction of the Shakers’ ship Union, which was captained by Baker and cruised the east coast of the United States and the Caribbean islands on a trading mission in 1786–7.3 At Rehoboth on 11 January 1788, a Benjamin West was married to Elizabeth Miller by Elder Jacob Hix.4 Hix was a Baptist Elder, a denomination that yielded many converts to Shakerism, and to which someone such as West who had flirted with Shakerism could have belonged. If indeed this is the correct Benjamin West he is listed as resident in Rehoboth in the 1790 Federal census with a male under the age of sixteen years and two females, one of which was presumably his wife Elizabeth. Men named Benjamin West appear in the census of Rehoboth throughout the nineteenth century, so it is unclear exactly when the writer of Scriptural Cautions died. West’s work is grounded in theology, and offers less of a first-hand account of the Shakers in comparison with the writings of Valentine Rathbun and Amos Taylor. West is truly threatened by the social upheaval that Shakerism foments.

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He laments: ‘Wives disown all natural affection for their husbands and children. Thus women become monsters, and men worse than infidels in this new and strange religion’ (p. 50, below). He also claims that Shakerism puts its adherents ‘under strong temptations to murder themselves’ (p. 52, below). This is a novel accusation that West was the first to level at the sect. He continues in the vein of Rathbun and Taylor in charging those who follow the Shakers of ‘[seeking] to witches, wizards, charmers, and those that have familar spirits’ (p. 57, below). West also charged the Shakers with adultery. Scriptural Cautions is notable for being the first work about the Shakers (pro or con) to connect them with the French Prophets, or Camisards. These Protestant rebels waged a guerrilla war against the royal Catholic army in the Cevennes region of southern France from 1702 to 1715. They were led by inspired prophets, some of whom travelled to England. In the Testimony of Christ’s Second Appearing, published twenty-five years later, the Shakers claimed them as an early influence.5 Ultimately, as Elizabeth De Wolfe has noted, West’s account was less successful as a narrative than Valentine Rathbun’s and was rarely cited by later anti-Shaker writers.6 Notes 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6.

The Shakers, Mother Ann Lee and eight followers, actually arrived at New York City on August 6, 1774 (Bishop and Wells, Testimonies, p. 8). Bishop and Wells, Testimonies, p. 127. For more information on the voyage of the Union see Goodwillie, The Shakers in Eighteenth Century Newspapers, Part Two, pp. 28–31. J. N. Arnold, Vital Records of Rehoboth, 1642–1896 (Providence, RI: Narragansett Historical Publishing Company, 1897), p. 258. Youngs, Testimony, pp. 407–8. De Wolfe, ‘Erroneous Principles’, p. 51.

Benjamin West, Scriptural Cautions Against Embracing a Religious Scheme Taught by a Number of Europeans, who came from England to America, in the Year 1776, and Stile themselves the Church … by Benjamin West, who has been Deluded by Them to the Great Injury of Himself and Family. (Hartford, CT: Bavil Webster, 1783).

Let no man deceive you by any means, for that day shall not come, except there be a falling away first, and that Man of sin be revealed; the son of perdition; who opposeth and exalteth himself, above all that is called GOD, or that is worshiped. II. Thess. ii. 3, 4.

{...}

Scriptural Cautions, &c. AT the earnest request of many serious minded persons, I have undertaken to present to public view the necessity of their receiving and maintaining evidences of a saving interest in Christ, by faith and love; accompanied with practical Godliness. And, From a discovery of the deplorable state of the inhabitants of our land, appearing awfully sunk down and involved in sin and disobedience against God, and the strong delusions pointed out in the scriptures, spreading amongst the people; and from sorrowful experience of the baneful effects of my own family’s being infatuated with this new, false and strange religion; which is attended with all deceivableness. In deep humiliation I would advertise all people, that are desirous of the knowledge of the truth, that they may be saved from these impending delusions; with scriptural cautions, against giving their attention to false Christs and false Prophets; therefore attend to the words of wisdom, from the wife king of Israel, against giving attention to, or following after the strange Woman,1 or her Prosolites: who flatter with their lips, Proverbs vii. 5, and at times is loud and

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stubborn; her feet abideth not in her house; therefore let not your hearts incline to her ways: Go not astray in her paths for she hath cast down many, wounded, yea her house is the way to hell, going down to the chambers of death, Proverbs vii. 11, 25, 26, 27. She having separated from, and left her own husband,2 as I am informed, contrary to divine authority, Matt. xix. 5, 6. I. Cor. vii. 2, 3, 4, 5. She and her adherents teach others to do the same, through which means instead / of being a crown, to their husbands, they become as rottenness in his bones; Proverbs xii. 4. She selleth families through her witchcrafts. Nah. iii. 4.3 for they become tributary to her, as well as involved in Satan’s snare. – It may be observed that this scheme is carried on and supported with all deceivableness. II. Thess. ii. 10. She is subtil of heart and their ways are movable, they may at first appear with many good words and fair speeches to deceive the hearts of the simple, repeating those miracles they have power to do. Rev. xii. 14. And there was unclean spirits to come out of the mouth of the false prophet working miracles. Rev. xvi. 13, 14. They often change from this scheme of flattery and appear in a very great fury calling it the anger of God, against sin, telling persons they are going right to hell, except they come into relation with that body of Europeans they stile the Church,4 and subjected in perfect obedience to them; – hence they wear the rough garment to deceive, as in Zach. xii. 4. If it be one that is persuaded of a saving interest in God’s salvation, through faith in the blood and righteousness of Christ; they will very artfully labour to draw a vail between him and all his former views of redemption by the virtue of Christ’s blood; and tell them it will all avail them nothing, but he is the farther lost from God for what he has heretofore experienced of light, comfort and consolation; therefore there is no way to escape hell, but to lay open all the secret sins of his past life to them for they say God cannot be found any where else but in that body they belong to; therefore it appears that it is a strange God they worship, as well as a strange Woman they follow; I am persuaded it is not the God of the whole universe for he fills heaven and earth, therefore in him we live move and have our being; since therefore they give their adorations to such a strange Deity, and adore a poor old Woman as the head and source of their influences; we may observe they have strange laws, which run counter to the laws and / commands of the true God of Israel; they urge that for men and their own wives to dwell together according to knowledge in the use of means for multiplication according to God’s appointment, is a damning sin; therefore the man and his wife must part asunder in that respect and not so much as lodge in one bed together; – but the God that made them at the beginning made them male and female, and tempered them together; commanding them to be fruitful and multiply, annexing his blessing to them, Gen. i. 28; God saw fit to make the woman, a help meat for the man, being bone of his bone and flesh of his flesh, Gen. ii. 23. Again, we may observe God established his covenant with Noah; after he came out of the ark, when the old world

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was drowned, and commanded them to be fruitful and multiply, and bring forth abundantly in the earth, and multiply therein, Gen. ix. 7, 8. Moreover the superstitious Pharisees came to our Saviour tempting him with this question; whether or no it was lawful for a man to put away his wife for every cause; observe the answer of that divine person by whom we were at first formed and who spake us into being; he answered the superstitious Pharisees & said unto them; have ye not read that he which made them at the beginning made them male and female, and said for this cause shall a man leave father and mother and shall cleave to his wife, and they twain shall be one flesh; wherefore they are no more twain but one flesh; what therefore God has joined together let no man put asunder; – and tells them, some for the hardness of their hearts were suffered to put away their wives, but it was not so from the beginning, and he plainly tells them the consequences of such proceedings is to become adulterers, Matt. ix. 3–10, therefore Paul willeth that the young women marry, bear children, guide their house, and give no occasion to their adversary to speak reproachfully; hence it is that marriage is honorable in all, and the bed undefiled; but whore mongers and adulterers God will judge. / I. Tim. v. 14. Heb. xiii. 4. Therefore it plainly appears from divine authority that the laws and rules coming forth from the strange Woman and her prosolites, does not correspond with, but runs counter to the laws and institutions of the God of the true Israel, under both law and gospel: To blind peoples eyes they urge they must not indulge any of the works of the flesh; now the apostle tells us the works of the flesh are manifest, which are these adultry, fornication, idolatry, witchcraft, &c. with many other wicked practices. But in the catalogue of the works of the flesh; he does not once call in question; men’s and women’s labouring with their hands in a lawful way, for the things needful to their bodies nor partaking of those things for their nourishment and comfort, if it be received with thanks giving to the author of their benefits. Neither does the inspired apostle once mention men and their own wives dwelling together according to knowledge, or lodging in one bed together, to be the works of the flesh; but the apostle describes the works of the flesh, Gal. v. 19, 20. Furthermore in this strange religion is found the generations that Solomon speaks of in Prov. xxx. 11. 12, that curses their father and does not bless their mother,5 and are pure in their own eyes, and never have been washed from their filthiness; if any should deny this assertion, it is too obvious from their own conduct to be denied, which may be proved by good authority; what heavier curses can a child denounce against his parents than to call them devils and tell them they will wake in hell? Yet these poor deluded creatures boast of their holiness, as though none could convince them of sin; it further appears they are not washed from their filthiness, from their own testimony, disowning any being born again but those Europeans, which they call the church; yet they will impose upon the public, pretending to teach them the way to heaven, and the things of

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the kingdom. And yet our Saviour testified to Nicodemus, except a man be born again he / cannot see the kingdom of God; consequently they are strangers to the things of that kingdom, for if they are not born of God, they are of their father the devil. John, viii. 44. Therefore we may not think it strange if they clash in the face of God’s authority, even to cursing father and mother, and parting asunder husband and wife; for Christ tells them the works of their father they will do, for he was a murderer from the beginning and abode not in the truth; they also countenance and indulge husbands leaving their own wives, and children, and depriving them of his interest or labour for their maintenance or support, unless they will imbrace with them this strange religion that is attended with so many glaring absurdities. Wives disown all natural affections to their husbands and children. Thus women become monsters, and men worse than infidels in this new and strange religion: but when we consider from whence these new laws and rules originate, and who stands at the head of their discipline, the wonder may abate in some degree, for God placed the man next to himself in the creation, between the woman and himself, and enjoined the woman obedience to the man, and said the man should rule over her, Gen. iii. 16. And Paul being inspired by the same spirit, saith, let the women learn in silence with all submission; but suffer not a woman to teach, nor to usurp authority over the man, but to be in silence, for Adam was first formed, then Eve. I. Tim. ii. 11, 12, 13. But in this new religion, the men hold themselves in intire subjection to the woman, and she has the rule over the men to that degree, that it appears to be the common opinion of her adherents and their foremost leaders, the oldest of which stands in more awe and fear of her than children do of their parents. Under the lead and influence of this government, some being operated upon with strange persuations, that it is the works of God, acknowledge themselves filled with blasphemous thoughts against the God of heaven; and at times are under temptations to murder / themselves, and yet are hurried to go forth with the rest of their company, in their dance as though they were all filled with frolicking devils. Sometimes they will appear with a strange rising shuddering, and trembling, as though the hatchways of the bottomless pit were bursted open, and the internal spirits had broke in among them; therefore they have many kinds of charms to affright, or to allure. From these circumstances it may not be thought strange, if one should conclude their was sorcery and witch craft in the cause, since they obey not the truth, Gal. iii. 1. They boast much of their signs and wonders, but I have not found them exalted above what we read of them in the II. Thess. ii. 3–10. And we may see it is above all that is called God, and with all powers and signs, and lying wonders. Now the spirit speaketh expressly, that in the latter times some shall depart from the faith, giving heed to seducing spirits and doctring6 of devils, speaking lies in hypocrisy, having their consciences

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seared with a hot iron, forbiding to marry, and commanding to abstain from meats7 which God has created to be received with thanking. I. Tim. iv. 1, 2, 3. Furthermore, They urge that a new dispensation has taken place, and that Christ has come the second time, which they pretend to prove by counting the mistical numbers specified in the prophesies of Daniel, as well as by their signs and wonders. But our Lord Jesus Christ advertises us these great signs and wonders taking place before his coming; which if it were possible would deceive the very elect. Matt. xxiv. 24. These things indicate that the time draws nigh and is even at the doors; but it has pleased God in his wisdom to reserve the foresight and knowledge of that time to himself, and not reveal it to men nor angels beforehand; but it shall come sudden, to the great surprise of Christ’s rejecters and gospel dispisers; for it shall come like a thief in the night, on a sudden as the lightening breaketh forth out of the east and shineth unto the west, for the Lord shall descend from / heaven with a shout, &c. Matt. xxiv. 27, 43; I. Thess. iv. 16 &c. Therefore let all persons that are infatuated with apprehensions of its being a new dispensation, and so conclude it may admit of new laws or a new gospel, be alarmed from the following considerations. When God had given forth the divine law under the legal dispensation, he forbid adding thereto or diminishing therefrom. Deut. xii 32. And at the close of the divine records, the Lord tells us, that he that shall add to the things of the prophesies of the book, God shall add to him all the plagues that are written in the book; and if any man shall take away from the words of this prophecy, God shall take away his part out of the book of life. Rev. xxii. 18, 19. Therefore saith Paul. Though we, or an angel from heaven preach any other gospel unto you, then that we have preached unto you, let him be accursed Gal. i. 8. O then let us all turn our attention from the voice of false prophets and the influence of seducing spirits, and carefully attend to God’s word, by which we are to try the Spirits. – If there arise among you a prophet or a dreamer of dreams, and giveth thee a sign or a wonder, and the sign comes to pass, whereof he spake unto thee, saying, Let us go after other Gods, which thou hast not known, and let us serve them; thou shalt not harken to the words of that prophet or that dreamer of dreams; for the Lord your God proveth you, to know whether you love the Lord your God with your heart and with all your soul; ye shall walk after the Lord your God, and fear him and keep his commandments, and obey his voice, and ye shall serve him and cleave unto him, and that prophet or that dreamer of dreams shall be put to death, because he hath spoken to turn you away from the Lord your God, Deut. xiii. 1–5. Now let it excite every one that has named the name of Christ, to prayer and watchfulness, and that they depart from all iniquity; while we look into this melancholly / scene of some departing from the faith, and forgetting they were purged from their old sins, and have become puffed up and vain in their imaginations, having their understandings darkened, being alienated from the life of God

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through the ignorance that is in them, because of the blindness of their hearts. Eph. iv. 18. And being destitute of the principles and powers of spiritual life and void natural affectations.8 What must be the consequence of seeking to witches, wizards, charmers and those that have familiar spirits, and for children to curse their parents, husbands and wives to part asunder and become adulterers, leaving their poor children destitute of any support, and renouncing all natural affections for each other and their offspring, and speaking blasphemies against God, and sometimes are under strong temptations to murder themselves, and yet seem to be fully persuaded they are in the work of God. And now in order to be deterred from, and guarded against those horrid absurdities, let us all be allarmed from mount Ebal, & consider the cannons of God’s word are loaded with heavy curses that are pointed against such wicked conduct, and will be discharged like so many blazeing thunder-bolts from the artillery of heaven, in one eternal storm against all such miserable offenders, unless timely repentance through the tender mercy and long forbearance of God, through the blood and righteousness of Christ interpose for their relief; for it will not avail for any to plead that those things were but the effects of their strong zeal; it was a very great zeal no doubt in them that caused their children to pass through the fire to Moloch; They built the high places of Baal, to burn their sons with fire for burnt offerings unto Baal, which the Lord says I commanded not, nor spake it, neither came it into my mind. Jer. xix. 5. From hence we learn the necessity of keeping close to the sacred word of God as the man of our counsel, / for it is not only flesh and blood that we have to contend with in the cause, but principalities and powers and spiritual wickedness in high places; wherefore we need to take the whole armour of God, that we may be able to withstand temptations in this evil day; let us stand therefore having on the breastplate of righteousness, above all, taking the shield of faith, wherewith we may quench all the fiery darts of the wicked; and take the helmet of salvation and sword of the spirit which is the word of God, praying with all prayer and supplication in the spirit, and watching thereunto with all perseverance. Eph. vi. 11–18. Therefore let every soul be careful to lay aside all carnal weapons in this case, and use none but them that are mighty through God to the pulling down the strong hold of sin either in ourselves or others, and casting down imaginations and every thing that exalteth itself against God, and let every thought be brought into captivity to the obedience of Christ, and let us ever look to the Captain of our salvation by faith and prayer, lest while we are watching the motions of the enemy on one hand, we are caught in his snare on the other, and it being but fleeing from the bear for the lion to meet us. With sorrow and grief I must confess I have been much captivated with, and deeply involved in this new and strange scheme, to the admiration of many of my former acquaintances, and was extremely zealous, being persuaded, it was the

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only way to perfection out of all sin; but alas, the great deception is this, to be ever going on in a way that never comes to the knowledge of the truth. For the consideration of inquiring minds, I shall mention a few things which were conductive to my falling in with this deceiving scheme; the consideration of which is to be lamented. Not only seeing the encouragible, impenitent, and open profane, eagerly pursuing every method by which they might / express their absolute contempt both of the authority and goodness of God, (which should have led them to repentance) as though the flood-gates of sin and abomination were hoisted, and each one was striving to be formost in the horrid stream leading down to the black regions of the burning main. And the professing people of our land, who stile themselves Christians, who ought to have kept the feast with the unlevened bread of sincerity, or rather been mourning for the abominations of our land in deep humiliation before God. But the dark aspects that appear from their common conduct, seem to denote a woful declension from gospel simplicity, and true faith is scarcely to be found on earth amongst all its professors, who appear with the mark of infidelity, covetousness, pride and wantonness abounding, at a very enormous height, through which means civil religion appears to be stiffled, and almost fetched its last gasps in our professing land. The consideration of these things gave me much exercise, for the want of charity; when there was any subjected to the cross, or had vital union with Christ, or walked humbly with God. And my mind not being fruitful in the consideration, that at such a juncture the man of sin or son of perdition would exalt himself and ascend his reign with the mistry of inquity, spreading itself with all deceivableness. I therefore having the opportunity of an interview with those people, who perfuaded me, that a new dispensation had taken place; and they appearing with their fine-spun dress of perfection – with the appearance of things supernatural, and with many good words, drew my attention to their inchanting influence, by which means I soon because prejudiced in their favour, and subjected to their lead and government, / expecting to find them people they profess to be. But alas, I found myself awfully deceived, being landed upon a papist system attended with its own spirit, and pregnant with its corrupt principles, vending itself with the attempts of tyranny: as the young asp may act out all the postures of the old one, before it has power to bite. Furthermore, When I came to hear false testimonies, to my certain knowledge, come forth from those that call themselves perfect, as well as from their prosolites; under these operations and influences deceived by them, which has not only been productive to break the most tenderest ties of nature between a man and his wife, but the horrid sin of adultery is carried on amongst those superstitious perfectioners, that pretend, that it is a damning sin for a man and his own wife to dwell together according to knowledge in the natural use of each other.

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But since their scheme is carried on, and with all deceivableness, the circumstances of deception are manifold. Respecting their dancing, the general representation they give of it, is that it is the token of great joy and happiness of the new Jerusalem state, and denotes the victory over sin; a great deception lies in these pretentions; for ask those dancers, whether they are born again, and they will say no. Besides this, the orders from their church, are to labour in their dance to mortify the lusts of the flesh. Hence they use these expression in their dance: Labour, labour, mortification before redemption! Thus it evidently appears, that in order to be born again, they must ware out their constitutions, and reduce their natures so low, as not to have any of the common feelings of mankind, and by this they are to judge of their being born again; O miserable Jerusalem state / About two years ago, they held up to view, and was often heard to say, if they preserved in their dispensation, they should never die a natural death; but after they began to die and numbers had died among them, they grew ashamed of their doctrine of immortality, and began to deny that they ever held to any such thing; thus are known to shift and change to say and unsay, to carry and end their scheme. As to their doctrine, it is well known to all who are acquainted with the several branches of it, and are also acquainted with the doctrine of the church of Rome, that there is no essential difference; their doctrine of perfections, celibacy or abstainance, the doctrine of purgatory or prison state, the doctrine of church oracles, the doctrine of church power to open and shut heaven, to acquit and damn souls, is all Romish doctrine; thus it is very easy to see who these people are, and to what body or church they belong; and if it was written of the church of Rome, Mistery, Babylon the great, the mother of harlots and abominations of the earth; so may it be written of this people, Mistery, Rome the mother of witchcrafts, &c. It may also be observed that the exact resemblance of this people appeared in England in the year 1706 and 1707, brought in by two or three French prophets9 (so called,) who went on with their prophesies, shakings, unknown tongues, &c. which prevailed for a time, and took in many into the delusive scheme, but finally worked itself out and died in shame and contempt. Since therefore we are all exposed and liable to be taken in the snares of Satan, let it exite one all to sanctify the Lord God in their hearts, and let him be our fear and our dread, since the fear of the Lord is a fountain of life to depart from the snares of death. For he spake thus to me with a strong hand, and instructed / me that I should not walk in the way of this people. Saying, Say ye not a confederacy to all them to whom this people shall say a confederacy; neither fear ye their fear, nor be afraid; sanctify the Lord of hosts himself, and let him be your fear, and let him be your dread. And when they shall say unto you, seek unto them that have familiar spirits, and unto wizards that peep, and mutter: should not a people seek unto their God: for the living, to the dead? To the law and to the testimony: if they speak not according to this word, it is because there is no light in them. Isaiah, viii. 11–13, 19, 20.

DANIEL RATHBUN, A LETTER

Daniel Rathbun, A Letter, from Daniel Rathbun, of Richmond, in the County of Berkshire to James Whittacor, Chief Elder of the Church, Called Shakers (Springfield, MA, 1785).

Daniel Rathbun was a younger brother of Shaker apostate Valentine Rathbun. He was born at Stonington, Connecticut, on 16 February 1730/1.1 He married Sarah Higbee at Middletown, Connecticut, on 4 May 1758. Like his brother Valentine, he was a Baptist, and immigrated to Berkshire County in western Massachusetts, settling in Richmond sometime between 1763 and 1775.2 He was probably a member of Valentine Rathbun’s Baptist congregation. He visited the Shakers at Niskeyuna, New York, in early 1780, probably in company with his brother (who first visited them on 26 May). He remained a follower of Mother Ann Lee’s for four-and-a-half years, finally leaving the sect in late 1784 or early 1785.3 Rathbun wrote his lengthy attack on the Shakers in 1785. Two editions were printed, one with an imprint of Springfield, Massachusetts, and the other lacking a publication location. The Springfield edition is advertised in the 27 April 1786 edition of Worcester’s Massachusetts Spy newspaper as ‘just published’, suggesting that despite the 1785 date on the title page of the Springfield edition, the printing may not have been completed until 1786. The contents of the two editions are identical. Daniel Rathbun availed himself of the services of his older brother Valentine for a preface to the work. Valentine’s Brief Account (reproduced in this volume on pp. 1–27) had achieved great success and inspired other disgruntled former Shakers to lift their pens in opposition to the sect. In his preface, Valentine affirms the veracity of Daniel’s work and asserts that he has ‘ever found [Daniel] remarkably free from prejudice against the Shakers’ (p. 60, below). Perhaps that is the case, but through the course of his Letter Daniel accuses the Shakers of a stunning array of unwholesome deeds. The motivating factor for his Letter is his underlying conflict with James Whittaker, Mother Ann Lee’s successor as leader of the Shakers following her death on 8 September 1784. Acting as his brother’s apologist, Valentine justified Daniel printing his complaints against the Shakers by the fact that – 55 –

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Whittaker would not speak to him personally. Thus, ‘not being allowed to state his objections, and tell him his faults face to face, the author [Daniel] therefore tho’t it his duty … in writing to him in particular, that said Whittacor might take it to himself, and have fair opportunity to make answer in his own vindication; or to confess his faults and make satisfaction’ (p. 61, below). The alleged alcoholism of Mother Ann Lee and the majority of the Shakers is a leitmotif of the Letter. Rathbun also accuses Whittaker of regular drunkenness, and states that at a public meeting Whittaker ‘fumbled in his speech and acted very oddly’. Rathbun claimed to have seen Mother Ann and her brother William Lee drunk so often that he suffered ‘many crying spells … about their hard drinking’. At Niskeyuna he claimed that ‘for several days together I believe the mother was the most of the time amiss with liquor; that she would act I thought ridiculously odd’ (p. 64, below). Rathbun alleged that this constant use of alcohol led to even more excesses, saying of the Shakers, ‘they will many of them drink hard, sing and dance all night, strip naked and spank one anothers arses … and to those that are opposed to them, they will judge and condemn, and sentence to hell with the most dreadful oaths & curses; calling them boogers, devils and Sodomites; besides pushing, hunching, pulling hair, striking, biting, and spitting in their faces’ (p. 73, below). Rathbun’s most shocking allegations of physical abuse mirror larger social concerns about the Shakers’ doctrine of celibacy and the separation of nuclear families. He claimed, I saw a young man … order his father to strip in the midst of a large room full of people both men and women, then seizing him by his private members, hauling him this way and that by them, chastizing him aloud … and then … setting him upon his head and shoulders, heels upwards, then by force wrenching his naked thighs apart and taking him again by his members, and handling them in the view of all present, every way exposing his father to the utmost shame. (p. 70, below)

In the 1780s and 1790s the Shakers did practise extreme mortification of their bodies through constant dancing and limited diet. This was an effort to ‘crucify the flesh’ and curb natural desires. Practices as excessive as the aforementioned may have occurred at the height of Shaker enthusiasm in the early 1780s, but the only evidence to be found is in the works of Shaker apostates. Apart from its earthiness, Rathbun’s Letter is also heavily reliant on scripture in its attack on Shakerism. In this sense it is by far the most densely theological of any of the anti-Shaker works published in the eighteenth century. Additionally, Rathbun utilized published works on the French Prophets and Antonio Gavin’s anti-Catholic book The Great Red Dragon, or The Master-Key to Popery to frame the Shakers in a historical context. Firstly, to show that their supposed visions, signs and wonders were analogous to those foisted on the people of London by

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the much maligned French Prophets in the early eighteenth century. Secondly, Rathbun skilfully compares the hierarchical and authoritarian leadership structure of Shakerism to the Catholic Church, which was still a byword for evil and oppression among the Protestant, culturally-English settlers of New England. James Whittaker died on 20 July 1787. As far as is known he never replied to Rathbun’s letter, his time being employed in gathering in the scattered converts to Shakerism. The publication of his Letter did not stop Rathbun from trying to get satisfaction from the Shakers. A New Lebanon journal records that on 5 August 1790, ‘Old and young Daniel Rathbun here to have something allowed them for their past contributions to the Church.’4 Whether they succeeded in their purpose or not is unknown. Daniel Rathbun moved to Saratoga County, New York, around 1800, and resided in either Milton or Ballston. He was a member of the Masonic Lodge (his elegantly engraved silver Mark Medal still survives), and died on 17 January 1823.5 Notes 1. 2. 3. 4. 5.

Ancestry.com. Connecticut Town Birth Records, pre-1870 (Stonington Vital Records, p. 326–7). Field, A History of the County of Berkshire, p. 325. See Rathbun, A Letter, p. 96, below, where he states ‘the whole four years and half that I was with you’. ‘Domestic Journal of Important Occurrences’ (1780–1841), Shaker Collection, V:B-60, p. 10, Western Reserve Historical Society. For an image of Rathbun’s Mark Medal see J. D. Hamilton, Material Culture of the American Freemasons (Lexington, MA: Museum of Our National Heritage, 1994), pp. 143–4.

Daniel Rathbun, A Letter, from Daniel Rathbun, of Richmond, in the County of Berkshire to James Whittacor, Chief Elder of the Church, Called Shakers (Springfield, MA, 1785).

PREFACE. Courteous Reader, The following sheets by the author will inform you, that in these last ages of the world, the mystery of iniquity has advanced near to its perfection. It may be a question with some, whether the following piece is a true relation of those facts declared, and therefore it may loose its weight and authority in such minds. Under this view of the matter, I think it my duty to endeavour to enforce the truth of said piece, by shewing first my acquaintance with the several matters inserted. 2dly. By acquainting the reader with the character of the author through the general course of his life. 3dly. By shewing the motives that induced the author to write the following piece, letterwise to James Whittacor.1 4thly. To alarm, awaken, and quicken all to watchfulness in this day of dangers. First then – Respecting my knowledge and acquaintance with the several matters inserted in the author’s piece. Ever since the first appearance of the European scheme,2 I have had a careful and watchful eye on it; and conclude I have kept pace with it in my observations, / and am fully sensible of the truth of said piece in a general view; tho’ there may be some particular things in said piece which I have not seen with my eyes and heard with my cars; yet I have no doubt of the truth of them, if I may judge of the product from the principle. I fully know their doctrines in general – particularly as to their doctrine of perfection; the doctrine of one supreme earthly head; the doctrine of an earthly tribunal, to judge the whole world; the doctrine of the resurrection day being now come; the doctrine of the dead daily rising by thousands; the doctrine of making satisfaction for sin committed by suffering here or in hell, and after payment is made, then to receive redemption and go to heaven; the doctrine of celibacy; the doctrine of a new dispensation, in which they are beyond the bible; the doctrine of miracles done among them, and many other doctrines, too tedious to mention – 59 –

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in a preface. I am fully sensible, that their doctrines in general exactly agree with the doctrines of the church of Rome, having not only been acquainted with the Romish religion by history; but having been in the Romish dominions,3 and seen and heard for myself; but I really think that in the church of Rome, the mistery of iniquity never arose to so high a key as it has in these people called / Shakers; and if it be possible in those Shakers, the devil has outdone himself. As to the practice and conduct of those people called Shakers, I really think the author of the following piece instead of exaggerating, and carrying things beyond the truth, has fell almost infinitely short of what might be said with truth. I think it not necessary in this short information to enter the list of particulars in their conduct; for it would be as impossible to present the whole to view, as to sound the ocean where there is no bottom, or to count all the stars in the heavens. 2dly. I come to acquaint the reader with the character of the author to the following piece. As to his general character through the world, I am under peculiar advantages to know it – he being brought up with me, and for a series of about fifty years, my connection and acquaintance has been continued, and I must own; acknowledge and declare, that I never knew of any blot, blemish, or scandal ever cleaving to him, or his character, any more than what is common in the best of men, who are all subject to the common infirmities of human nature. I ever found him a strictly honest man in all his dealings; and for many years he has been a professor of religion, and a member of a church. And as I was conversant with him often, while he was writing the / following piece, I ever found him exceeding careful in his writing not to go beyond his knowledge in things, and to use as soft terms as possibly would do, to give any idea of the matter. And I have ever found him remarkably free from prejudice against the Shakers, which is a thing rarely to be found among those that have suffered less than he has by them. It is therefore my opinion, that the publick may freely receive his piece as the real truth. There is one thing that may perhaps stumble some minds, which is, that such a man should be taken in by so diabolical a scheme; but in answer to this, it may be remembered what we read in the prophet Daniel, 11 chap.–35 verse, and some of them of understanding shall fall to try them, and to purge, and to make them white, even to the time of the end; and again, when we consider the power of Anti-Christ, that if it were possible the elect should be deceived by it, while it appears in the deceivable dress of high sanctity and holiness in this day of declension, in which many errors abound. The consideration of which may remove those doubts and open the way for charity to be exercised. But if any are still disposed to wonder, then there is a greater wonder, then why the author of the following piece was taken in by the Shakers, which is, how our father Adam came to / fall into sin, who was perfect, and without any sinful propensities in his nature, as he came out of the hands of God? When this question is answered,

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the other may be resolved more easily. The author’s hope was of greater good in which he fell, and so was Adam’s, for which he fell. I now proceed to the third thing proposed, by shewing the motives that induced the author to write letterwise to James Whittacor. First. As James Whittacor is the chief Elder, and has the whole controul of his church and all its disciples, the author has therefore wrote to him, and laid in his objections against him and his scheme, in order thereby to convince him if possible of his ill policy and wicked craft in his grand deception imposed on mankind – and that it might check his wild career for the future.–2dly. Another motive that induced the author to write letterwise was, that the disciples of said Whittacor might be convicted by it, especially respecting them, as well as their leaders, that so they might be recovered from the snares of death before it be too late, and brought to the knowledge of the truth as it is in Jesus Christ. 3dly. A third motive that induced the author to write letterwise was, that as his greatest difficulty was with said Whittacor, and not being allowed to state his objections, and tell him his / faults face to face, the author therefore tho’t it his duty to keep as near the rule of the gospel as might be in writing to him in particular, that said Whittacor might take it to himself, and have fair opportunity to make answer in his own vindication; or to confess his faults and make satisfaction. Or finally at last, to be left without excuse in the day of trial. 4thly. A fourth motive that induced the author to write letterwise was this, The author was not insensible that in every subject that belongs to the system of truth, the most eligible method would be to divide the subject into as many propositions as naturally arise, and consider each one in its several parts – all which will coincide one with another. But in the subject he has undertaken to present to publick view there is nothing but confusion, inconsistency, and opposition, even to itself. He has therefore chosen such a method as would give him the largest latitude to follow it in all its cramp corners – skulking holes, and winding paths, where it hides itself from the vulgar eye – for in the way of letter writing there is full liberty to catch the several parts where they may be found; to reach forward to that which is before, and bring up that which is behind – make references and inferences at every turn. These are some of the reasons no doubt which moved the author to write letterwise, &c. / I now proceed 4thly to the alarming consideration of what we find contained in the following piece; together with other frauds that lead to destruction, that it might awaken and quicken all to a careful watchfulness, in this day of dangers. When I confider the privileges both civil & sacred that we as a people are indulged with, and what might justly be expected by God from us as a people in general in humble thankfulness, and a wise improvement of all his mercies – I say the blessings of God, both in his providence and grace, lays us under the strongest obligations to be a reformed, religious, holy people; ever being found in suitable returns to GOD for all his benefits. But instead of this, or such a

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line of conduct, how sad is the state of religion, and how much more deplorable is the state of the world in general. A great part of the people irreligious and profane. Many others that do not so much as make a profession of religion, and still many others that make a profession are under the power and dominion of Anti-Christ, and counterfeit religion – passing for true coin, and none or very few laying of it to heart. Now many, lo here, and lo there, are sounding in our world, and many powerful instruments sent out by the arch enemy, to seduce and lead mankind astray, and the natural product is errour, heresy, idolatry, / novelty, and abominable impieties, which are introduced for religion. But a few out of the great whole of the people in our land that are true fearers of God, and stand cloathed with his word. The deceivers and deceived have formed and maintained a perfect religious bedlam in our world, while deism and atheism in consequence prevail. This indeed is a day of dangers if I now advert to the corrupt scheme discovered by the following, piece.– There we may find many hundreds of poor deluded people carried captive, who are made perfect slaves to their leaders. Many have gone down to the grave thro’ labour and hard fatigue, under the orders of their teachers. Many others have broke and destroyed their constitutions. Many in a decaying and dying state, and yet drove on with severity and rigour by their hard hearted Pharoah-like masters, while their leaders live on the spoils of their disciples, and wallow in wealth and ease, and regale themselves in rioting and drunkenness, in chambering and wantonness. These things are truly alarming, and ought to wake us up to attention and watchfulness; especially while we confider, that while we are escaping one snare, another is ready to take us. It is evidently the last days of the world, in which every method is taken by the arch enemy to seduce mankind and destroy their souls. Every thing is drawing to a close, and ripening / for the final event. The state of mankind by the fall is such, they are opposed to nothing so much as to their own salvation, in the way God has proposed, by his Son in the Gospel; and therefore every false system of religion is more readily embraced by a blind and ignorant world. What awful surprise will all false professors meet with in the final conclusion, when it is too late to recover themselves. Under this view of the matter, let us all watch and pray, lest we enter into temptations: and let him that thinketh he standeth take heed lest he fall. From the publick’s humble servant.

V. R.4 / {...}

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A LETTER, &C. to elder james whittacor, After so long a connection with you, it appears to me but just and reasonable, that I should let you know the cause and reasons of my declension from you – some of which I have made known to you in the course of our travels together; but never having my mind answered, and that you might have no just cause of offence, I have now undertook to state my objections in writing, and support them by the best authority I can, or lay myself open to be refuted. It is true I set out with you in the simplicity of my soul, not knowing who you was or whether bound; but you said Mount Zion – and I was for that; and so we went on, and the first thing that ever really stumbled me was, what I saw in the mother5 at Elijah Wile’s,6 she / look’d very red, and acted to my acceptation, as tho’ she had drink’d too hard.7 This indeed bro’t great distress and trouble upon me, and how could it be otherwise, when I had put myself into her hands as an infallible guide, trusting she was perfect; and if so, I thought she could not have any licentious appetites. This gave me some confusion, but after much trouble and reasoning about it, I evdeavoured to put it out of my mind, and hope the best; but ‘ere long I was troubled again with seeing the same thing in her, and in others of the lead; and about the same time, many of the brethren being troubled on the same account, were chastised by the church for false judging; and reports of this sort were current about in the world. This indeed gave me some doubt of your infallibility; and especially as I knew these things were not meerly accidental, but common, or at least in time grew very common. Yet I did not mean to separate from you without sufficient light and strength in my own soul, to come off without danger and loss. It was therefore that I did not, but endured with great trouble and anguish of soul what I cannot express, for above two years since I first began to complain and open my troubles to you on this account as I had opportunity; but not being convinced that my complaints were causeless, nor yet that the things I complained off were warrantable, / and seeing no reformation; but rather an increase, I felt a gradual decline from you, and it could not be otherwise, except I could be made sensible that vice was no sin; and if so in one thing, why not in all? And though to the pure all things are pure, as you often would plead; yet it is in the temperate use of them; for temperance is one of the fruits of the spirit, see Gal. 5 chap. 23 verse; therefore, whosoever goes into excessive drinking, is not pure; for nothing more incapacitates or renders them more incapable to serve either God or man. And if all things were pure to

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you, why should such liberties be taken in some things even to excess and some abstinence in others even to distress. I think God has given me some understanding of what is right and what is wrong; therefore if I should see any person that you or I could name intoxicated with liquor repeatedly and from time to time, so that they would stumble in their walk and fumble in their speech with an inflamed countenance, and irregular behaviour, and you should tell me that such an one was the only lead of God set up in the world, to whom all souls must come, and by whom all must be saved that are saved, or made perfect of Adam’s race, first and last, I could not believe it. I say I could not believe it; it would be violence upon myself to attempt to believe it; nor do I think any can believe / it but only such as must consequently believe that the commands of God are annulled, the bible out of date, and a new ministration never before heard of taking place; where all things is inserted, vice is become virtue, and virtue vice. But more particularly at a certain time I went with the church from Harwood to Wooburn8 and when we arrived at Nathan Kindale’s9 in that place, the mother and elder William10 took a private chamber and I suppose lay down to sleep, for they were there I believe some hours before I could see them; and at length I went into the chamber and elder William was got up, but he appeared to me as if he had been drinking very hard, both by his words and actions. I think the Mother was not got up. But the whole seene was such as gave me great trouble, and I had afterwards to confess my jealousy. I know that my troubles were very great on this account at that time. At another time I saw you so much amiss with liquor at William Mories in the town of Norton,11 you fumbled in your speech and acted very oddly, so that I was exceedingly afraid it would be observed by the spectators that were present. Afterward when the church came to Ashfield,12 I think you cannot but remember how many crying spells I had about their hard drinking; and how many times I have been chastised on this account for my false-juding the church as they / called it. At another time I having heard that the mother was drunk at landlord Willcox’s in New-Windsor, on their way from Enfield13 to New-Providence,14 my troubles were so hard upon me that I roar’d and cry’d great part of one whole day together, that I was almost down sick; but afterwards, when the church came through the town of Richmond,15 on their way to Nisqueunia,16 they made some stay among us, at which time I saw more of it, and that very apparently at Sam. Fitch’s,17 and the widow Goodrich’s;18 but more abundantly after they went over into New-Lebanon: especially on the day that the mother was carried by authority before Esq. Grant,19 there I saw such a flagrant proof of what I had in part seen and so long suspected, that I was now satisfied as to this matter. But still some how or other I did not leave you till I had seen much more of it. At Nisqueunia one time for several days together I believe the mother was the most of the time amiss with liquor; that she would act I thought ridiculously odd, and one time when I was there at Nisqueunia the

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mother went over to John Partington’s,20 and she was well for what I knew when she went off ; but I heard directly that she was under great sufferings there; and when she returned I thought she was quite drunk, and I had a fair observation of her. Now elder James, I appeal to your own conscience – deny it / if you can, and face God in it. And now to close this point, I refer you to certain passages of scriptures, I. Cor. 5–11, but now I have written to you not to keep company if any man that is called a brother be a fornicator, an idolater, a railer, or a drunkard, &c, with such an one no not to eat. Again, I. Cor. 6–10, nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, &c, shall inherit the kingdom of God. And again, Romans 13–13 let us walk honestly as in the day time; not in rioting and drunkenness, in chambering and wantonness, &c. and after this the command of God to me by the Apostle Paul, II. Thess. 3 chap. and 6 verse, now we command you brethren in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that you withdraw yourselves from every brother that walketh disorderly, and not after the tradition which ye received of us, verse 7, for yourselves know how ye ought to follow us, &c. Thus having made my first objection against your intemperance, which practice is inconsistent with both reason and scripture, and consequently with the happiness of man both here and hereafter, which is one great and grand cause of my separating from you. I come now to make my second objection, which is against your new dispensation and new ministration, at the head of which the mother is exalted, and preferred above Christ, and her apostles above the apostles of Christ; / in which you go contrary to the ministration of Christ and his Apostles; and in effect renounce the bible, if I can see the consistency of things. For I believe you will not deny but that the mother did go by her immediate gifts of visions, revelations, and prophesy, as you call them, without any regard to the bible, which I think does produce a ministration quite different from either that of Moses or Christ, as appears by some shocking instances, particularly children that were of your community, cursing their parents that were unbelievers,21 calling them wolves and devils, &c. Again children chastising their parents in very opprobrious language that were believers. Again men and women, parents and children, dancing stark naked together;22 as also, men an women, parents and children going into the creek and swimming together; and again the mother’s pounding and beating the private parts of both men and women in her discipline – these things have I seen and many others that will come in, in their proper places. Now were these and such like things are ministred, and are essential and necessary parts of the ministration, I and every body else that sees and hears such things, must agree that it is sure enough a new ministration, and whether you would own it or not, it is so, because I find no such things ministred or commanded in the bible. And now I shall instance a few / of your doctrinal points which you make use of in support of your new dispensation, new apostles and ministry.

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First – It has been often urged among you that the present day is seven times greater than that of Christ’s first appearance, and consequently the present ministration is seven times greater than that of the apostles. It was in this view, as I suppose, that Samuel Fitch said in my hearing, if I understood him right, that the mother was seven times greater than Christ. And again, he said if I remember right, that Christ had been and gather’d his company, and now mother was gathering her company; and that when Christ should hereafter appear with his company, mother would also appear with her company, making the mother the head of this dispensation, as Christ was of that, with the addition of seven times greater. Elder Partington also said in my hearing at the time when the people returned from the mother’s funeral23 to the house that either the mother was, or he believed she was gone to prepare a place for them, and that he believed she was then present and heard every word that was said. I will also transcribe a certain clause in William Scale’s24 letter to me in his own words, wherein he says, “two of the leading persons have sealed their testimony with their blood, whereby it is of force.” These are his own words. Now elder James was ever any thing / more absurd. At another time Joseph Meechem25 told me in answer to my question, that you (viz.) mother and elders were got beyond all that was written; if he denies this article as he seemed to do when I was at church last, it would destroy all my charity for him. I think the same has apparently transpired in your general doctrine in such like expressions as these, the scriptures were good in their day, but nothing to us in this new dispensation; and would often chastise me for believing and holding to what was written in the bible – calling it letter, and old heavens, and a back dispensation. Now to speak plain, I think for you who preach such doctrine and yet often read and expound, and apply scripture, is an inconsistent imposition upon yourselves and others; for what have you to do with letter and old heavens, and a back dispensation, who are in the new? Now observe, where ever you are inconsistent you must be also ignorant and ought to be willing to be taught; for where there is ignorance and inconsistency there is no safety. If you make any use of the scriptures, and they are any thing to your purpose, how have you got beyond them? And if you are included by them, how is it a new ministration? For the very gifts you pretend to, as visions, revelations, tongues and prophesy, you quote from scripture to prove your mission and ministry by. Pray how then are / you in a new one beyond it? Why will you be here and there both, or somebody no where? Either own the bible and go according to it, or prove its invalidity, and have nothing to do with it; for how can you be in a new seven-fold greater day with the same old apostolick gifts in a seven fold lesser degree. Elder James pray look, for I must think that if you are consistent, I am not a rational creature. But to return, I shall first prove by scripture, whether it be any thing to you or not, that there is two, and but two days of dispensation, which is that of Moses and Christ, the law and the gospel which include the two

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states of man, (viz.) law and grace, the first Adam and the second, Adam states, and that these are to be continued to the end of the world, and all mankind are and will be included in the old covenant and the new to the end of time, which two covenants were in the two testimonies or ministrations of Moses and Christ; and there is no other, nor ever will be, as I will shew you by scripture, if that proves any thing, – First with respect to the perpetuity, if not the eternity of the law, see Mal. 4–4, remember ye the law of Moses my servant which I commanded him in Horeb for all Israel, with the statutes and judgments – and Christ in reference to this same law says, Matt. 5–18, for verily I say unto you, till heaven and earth pass one jot or one tittle, shall in no wise pass / from the law till all be fulfilled. And St. Paul having treated particularly of justification by faith without the deeds of the law, finally concludes, Rom. 3. 31, do we then make void the law by faith? God forbid, yea we establish the law. By what I have already quoted it appears that the prophet Malachi, confirms the law, at least throughout the Jewish œconomy, and Paul confirms it throughout the apostolick day; and Christ confirms it till the heavens and earth be no more. And now with respect to the gospel, according to the testimony already given by Christ and his apostles: as to its duration and continuance, Christ says, Matt. 24–14 and this (not another) gospel of the kingdom shall be preached for a witness unto all nations, and then shall the end come. Again, Matt. 28–20 teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you (mark I have commanded you) and lo I am with you always, even unto the end of the world, Amen. And Paul I think allows of no other ministration but the law and gospel to the end of time. See Rom. 2–16, in the day when God shall judge the secrets of men by Jesus Christ, according to my gospel. Read a few verses foregoing in this passage last quoted, wherein you may see that the law as well as gospel is that by which men will be judged in the great day. And also with respect to the continuance of / the apostolick ministration, you may see I: Peter 1–25, but the word of the Lord endureth forever; and this is the word which by the gospel is preached unto you. And that you may also see that there is no allowance for any other ministration but that of the apostolick according to their testimony in that day, see Gal. 1–8, but though we or an angel from heaven preach any other gospel unto you than which we have preached unto you let him be accurs’d. And in the 9th verse he says, if any man preach any other gospel, &c. I think what I have already laid down is sufficient to prove that there is but two testimonies, and two ministrations, that of Moses and Christ, which are the two witnesses, or the two testators, who have dedicated their testimony with blood, as you may find in the 9th of Hebrews, and indeed in that whole epistle at large. What then could William Scales mean when he said that two of the leading persons had sealed their testimony with their blood,26 whereby it is of force? which if it be so, yours must be a third testament and ministration, and consequently a third covenant, which annuls the second or

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new covenant spoken of in 8th of Hebrew. Now elder James, dare you or any of you say, that there is or ever will be more than these two covenants? But if you have got a testament or a ministration that is not contained in that new covenant ministration / spoken of in the 8th chap. of Hebrews. It must be another, whatever it be, then what will you call it, and where will you place it? and it is evident that you do think you are in a new day and dispensation; because you call all that is written a back dispensation and old heavens; and even if it were as you suppose that you were in the new heavens, that also is contained in what you call a back dispensation, see Isaiah 65–17 and on, compared with Revelation 21st chap. &c, wherein the particular state and circumstance of the new heavens and earth, with those that dwell in them is ministred and given by the prophet Isaiah and John the revelator both, for it is what they testified and yet is contained in what you call a back dispensation and old heavens; but if you should say that you have entered into what they said should take place, it would at once destroy the very idea of your new dispensation and ministry, where the mother is the head gathering her company according to Samuel Fitch’s doctrine, as recited above and you the apostles; and on the other hand, if it be as elder Partington said, that the mother was gone to prepare a place for them, that also as effectually destroys the very idea of Christ’s mission and ministry for that end according to what is written in the bible; especially with respect to us in this day, then surely we have done with the bible, and must depend wholly / upon the mother, whose ministration does produce what is not contained in the bible. Now I desire you to observe that if it be as you say, that this is a new day and dispensation, of which the mother is the first born, and consequently the head or lead; then she stands in this day and dispensation to us, just as Christ did in that day and dispensation of the gospel, according to what is written, where Christ was the first born, among many brethren, and consequently the head and lead to them, and as he was Christ and a Saviour to them, so is the Mother Christ, and a Saviour to us,27 for Sam. Fitch told me that he had no Christ to look to but the mother, and as Christ had a new testament and died for them in that day, so the mother has a new testament, and died for us in this day – for this is what you pretend, and as Christ sealed his testimony with his blood whereby it is of force, so has the mother sealed her testimony with her blood, whereby it is of force, according to William Scale’s. And as Christ’s death and sufferings was meritorious for their salvation in that day, so is the mother’s death and sufferings meritorious for our salvation in this day; and as they in that day were to obey Christ’s ministry, so we must obey the mother’s ministry in this day; and as it is said in Zachariah 12th chap. they shall look upon Christ whom they have pierced and mourn, and be in bitterness, &c. / even so we in this day shall look upon the mother whom we have pierced and mourn, and be in bitterness; as I once heard Samuel Fitch hold forth in his doctrine; and as it was expedient for Christ to go away – and he was gone to

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prepare a place for his followers, even so it was expedient for the mother to go away, and she was gone to prepare a place for her followers, according to what elder Partington said; and as Christ was present with his followers by his spirit in that day, so is the mother present with her followers by her spirit in this day, ministring gifts to them. Now elder James is not this another Christ in imitation of that we read of; and is not what she ministers quite another gospel – if you call it gospel? and does not this entirely set aside the bible as a thing out of date? and put your testimony in its place? and does not this set Christ aside, and put the mother in his place, with the appellation of seven fold greater? and do you not take great pains to erase every idea of God and Christ out of the minds of your people, but only what dwells in the mother and the elders? and to deface and erase the very remembrance of that old letter, called scripture, saying you have got the spirit. And are you not therefore inconsistent to meddle at all with the bible, except you could prove by it, its own invalidity and dissolution? for elder James you must know, it would be absurd / to suppose, that a new day and dispensation could take place but at the end and expiration of the former; therefore if you do really believe that you are entered into a new day and dispensation, as you say you have, you must know of consequence that whatever improvements you have made from the bible was a grand imposition; and if you make any use of scripture you bring it into force, and will overthrow the mother, especially if her ministry and that of her apostles differ from that of Christ’s and his apostle – which is the next thing to be attended to. First the testimony of Christ’s gospel says, I. Timothy, 2–12, but I suffer not a woman to teach nor to usurp authority over the man; but to be in silence: but the mother’s testimony says the contrary, and takes unlimited authority upon herself; even to ordering, dictating, stripping and whipping both men and women. Now can any creature suppose that God will be with and own any one in the breach of his commands? What have you elder James to vindicate this point but the disannuling of the commandment? and that cannot be done without breaking with the whole book, and the author of it too. This proves your new dispensation: but if the commands of God stand, it will overthrow your whole system, and you with it. I think it is entirely needless to undertake to prove, that the woman / spoken of in the 12th chap. of Rev. and also that in Jeremiah 31–22, and that again in the 45th Psalm, from the 10th verse and on. May none of them be applied to the mother, as you pretend, because she is at the head of the great and last dispensation, far enough beyond all them, they being in the former, and this pretence saves me the labour, and proves she is not. And besides that in the Rev. and in the Psalms was undoubtedly a figurative description of the church, and that in Jeremiah, a prophesy of Christ’s nativity, with a hint at the manner of it. But to proceed to another particular, Christ’s Gospel says, Matthew 15–4, for God commanded saying, honor thy father and mother; and he that curseth

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father or mother, let him die the death – these are Christ’s own words, and every awakened and enlightened conscience must know and feel that there is a moral rectitude in them and his obligations to obey them as the command of God, both in his law and gospel too; but it is certain that under the mother’s ministry I have heard children curse their parents – and it was appointed in the church, and I take it to be a criterion in your system to cut off all natural affection by the highest provocation; and also under the mother’s ministry, children do dishonor their parents I know, for I saw a young man of your company order his father to strip in the midst of / a large room full of people both men and women, then seizing him by his private members, hauling him this way and that by them, chastizing him aloud for his old heavens and lust, and then taking him up and setting him upon his head and shoulders, heels upwards, then by force wrenching his naked thighs apart and taking him again by his members, and handling them in the view of all present, every way exposing his father to the utmost shame. Was not this dishonoring his parent, elder James, and breaking the command of God? the mother being present and the mover of it: when Christ expressly says, Matt. 5–19, whosoever therefore shall break one of these least commands, and teach men so, shall be called least in the kingdom of heaven. But whosoever shall do, and teach them, shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven. Is not here a material difference in the two ministrations, and the one tending directly to the destruction of the other? but you will say that Christ is come in the mother, and it is he that does it; but will Christ contradict or counteract his own word? or will he tell the mother to do what he forbids? for when God commanded children to honour their father and mother, would Christ in the mother set this young man to dishonor his father, as related above? Does not such a doctrine tend to the abolishing of the scriptures, and opening / an uninterrupted way to the mother’s ministry? but here observe, that although Christ says, Matt. 10–35, for I am come to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-inlaw, &c. and this being the necessary consequence or effect of the gospel, to set at variance and separate them that believe from them that believe not; yet so far is the believer from cursing his father or mother, or any body else, that he will bless and curse not: yea he will bless them that curse him, and do good to them that hate him, and pray for them that despitefully use him, and persecute him according to the commands of Christ, see Matt. 5–44: and so far is he from dishonouring his parents by any abusive language or behaviour, that he honours and obeys them, according to gospel commanded. In Col. 3–20, children obey your parents in all things, for this is well pleasing to the Lord; but wherever the son dishonours the father the character is bad, as you may see, Micah 7–6 and wherever children disobey their parents, their character is bad, as you may see, Rom. 1–30, and II. Tim. 3–2, this is what we read in the scriptures; but under

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the mother’s ministry I have seen and known the greatest of what men would call abusive treatment of children to their parents, I think that ever I heard of, and all under a pretence of religion / and freeing their souls. Dishonouring and disobeying parents is a plain and open breach of the commands of God, according to what is written; and if your ministry leads into these things it must be ANTE, or against, let the pretence be what it will; except it be as you say a new dispensation, where there is no God, nor Christ, nor bible, but what is in the mother, that can do us any good; then I say you have no business with the bible, and ought not to impose upon people with it, nor do I think you would if they were able to bear it; but where as I am in full belief of the scriptures – thanks to God for it. I mean to contend earnestly for the faith which was once delivered to the saints. Again we read I. Cor. 6–10, nor revilers shall inherit the kingdom of God. Again I. Cor. 5–11, nor a railer with such an one no not to eat. And again James 4–11 speak not evil one of another brethren, for he that speaketh evil of his brother, and judgeth his brother, speaketh evil of the law, and judgeth the law, &c. I could quote many texts of scripture, from the old and new testament to the same effect, whereby it appears that railing, reviling, and evil speaking is contrary to the nature and spirit of the gospel of Christ, which testifies that such shall not inherit the kingdom of God. Therefore, whoever allows themselves in these things, pretend what they will, they are disowned / of God; and what can tend more to destroy people’s morals; and is it not the reverse of a meek and quiet spirit; and does it not belong to another kingdom? For Christ when he was reviled, he reviled not again; when he was persecuted, he threatened not, but committed himself to him that judgeth right. And Paul says, being reviled we bless; being defamed we entreat; being persecuted we suffer it: but it is not to be marveled at if another ministration produces other things for such as is the tree, such the fruit will be. And James says, out of the same mouth proceedeth blessing and cursing, (and so it is with you) my brethren these things ought not to be so. Again, Paul to Timothy says, the servant of the Lord must not strive, but be gentle towards all men? apt to teach, patient, in meekness instructing them that oppose themselves &c. but you do strive. Again, Paul to the Ephesians says, let all bitterness, and wrath, and anger, and clamour, and evil speaking be put away from you, with all malice, and be kind one to another – tender hearted, forgiving one another even as God for Christ’s sake hath forgiven you. Now Elder James this seems to be the nature and spirit of the gospel; – therefore I am bold to say, that there can be no drunkard, no curser of parents, no dishonorer of parents, no disobedient to parents, and such like can be found in Christ’s gospel; and / if you have any such in yours, then it must be another. Elder James I honestly tell you, that I have spared you in relation to railing, fearing you was not able to bear a true declaration of facts without offence: I have kept back the words and suppressed the ideas that offered themselves to give it its own complection, and least

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I should be a railer too. But if an honest recital of facts should offend you, I should think that you was not good; or that the things acted were not good, and you were ashamed of them, and ought to confess and suppress them; for if you knew how some of your people treats my character, if you had any sense of humanity, you would be ashamed of them, and if you had any sense of christianity you would be sorry for them, and take unwearied pains to teach them better; which I think you must do, except you as well as they are so lost from God as to act that out, that may in time convince every body, and prove the absurdity of your new ministry. I speak this not that it annoys me; but that by plain facts and fair reason and scripture, you might be convicted; and besides this, to my own master I stand or fall: or even allowing that I was in fault, I think you ought to have taken the gospel rule, Gal. 6–1, brethren if a man be overtaken in a fault, ye which are spiritual, restore such an one in the spirit of meekness, considering yourself lest you also / be tempted. But your people seem to have a different mode of discipline. I am sensible, that it is a received opinion among you, that to come out with great wrath and anger in testimony against what you call sin is right; but is not wrath, and anger, and clamour, and evil speaking sin itself ? else why is it forbidden? see Eph. 4–31 – again, Titus 3–2 to speak evil of no man; to be no brawlers, but gentle, shewing all meekness unto all men: then to rail and exclaim, and falsely accuse & that in anger too, is against the commands of God and therefore sin; from which I see no escape but by repentance and faith in Christ, except by taking refuge in a new dispensation would do. I know that part of Paul’s charge to Timothy and Titus, was to reprove and rebuke; but that was by preaching the word, which carries reproof and rebuke in it to those that sin; but I am far from believing that either of them, in obeying Paul’s charge, ever conducted as many of you do, for it must be done in meekness, without bitterness, anger, wrath, clamour, or evil speaking, &c. Is going into sin the way out of it? Another point to be examined is, whether your mother’s character agrees with that given by St. Paul, Titus 1st chap. wherein he says, if any man be blameless, the husband of one wife, having faithful children, not accused of riot, or unruly. For a bishop must be / blameless as the steward of God, not self-willed, not soon angry, not given to wine, no striker, not given to filthy lucre, &c. Mark, he says, if any be blameless, which he could not be if he were found in the breach of any one rule given in this character – the husband of one wife; but your mother was no husband nor did she allow of any husband, or wife at all, and them that were such she would part them forever, if they would be of her community; and certainly they were accused of riot, and of being very unruly, for they will many of them drink hard, sing and dance all night, strip naked and spank one anothers arses, and make as much noise as they can among themselves, and to those that are opposed to them, they will judge and condemn, and sen-

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tence to hell with the most dreadful oaths & curses; calling them boogers, devils and Sodomites; besides pushing, hunching, pulling hair, striking, biting, and spitting in their faces – fee the widow Goodrich in particular, and the others almost as bad, in the most angry, venemous manner I think that ever I fee any where in any cafe. Mark I don’t mean that this is the case at all times; for there is at sometimes the greatest appearance of love and meekness. And as to the mother’s being self-willed, I would mention one instance, and let that suffice for the present: as you will likely remember when the church28 as you / call them was at Elijah Sloson’s,29 a great number of people being gathered, you began your doctrine and the people being inquisitive and desirous to ask some questions, you would not allow of it, but said to them that when you & your brethren, viz. the speakers had done, they should have their opportunity and be fairly heard and answered; at which they gave audience and kept good order ’till you had all got through. Then your mother slipped into the house (for this was out of doors) and sent a messenger immediately to call you in, but you lingering a little, she sent another express for you and the rest of the elders, at which you went in; then she took you up stairs into a chamber and chastised you for disobedience – I being present and an eye and ear witness to the whole. The people were offended at their disappointment, and William Baker, a young man partly believing in that way fell off for this thing. In this she would have her way, and force you to break your agreement. Again, she was very often very angry, and much given to wine and strong drink, and certainly she was a striker, both of me and many others. And as to her being given to, or greedy of filthy lucre, let her pretence be what it would, this is certain, she did require that we should resign up all we had to her disposal. Now elder James I leave to you judge, whether your mother’s character agrees with / that given by St. Paul. But perhaps you will say, that your mother was not a bishop, but the first and great apostle of a new dispensation, and you the bishop. Well, will that help the matter as to character. Will a drunkard, a railer, a self-willed angry striker, and one that demands all I have, and will ever prepare war against us, if their be any hesitation abut it? I say, will such an one do, being a woman too, for the great apostle or bishop, or the Christ of your new dispensation? for you do say, or at least you have said, that there is no God, nor Christ but what was in your mother, and you her elders; nor no salvation but by her; and this pretence of a new day and dispensation is a handsome covering for all, and well accounts for the many unaccountable things produced by her ministry, and for the mother’s appearing in so different a character from that given by St. Paul. Now elder James if you would but rationally attend to what has been already said, you must be convinced that you have not the characters of christians according to any thing we find in scripture. – Therefore, if you make a pretence of being the people of God, you had better tell every one honestly, as you do the strong believers among you, that you are got clear beyond all that is

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written in the bible, and let people know who and what you be before you take them and put out their eyes, and set them a / grinding in your mill, for then the poor creatures do not know how to get away, nor w[h]ere to go; for though you have renounced the scripture, or rather have got beyond it; yet you will craftily make use of it, to catch and hold as many as you can, saying in the words of Christ, that he came, that they that see not, might see, and that they that see, might be made blind – endeavouring to make them as blind as possible to all they ever did see, and to believe that all the religion since the apostle’s time was only anti-christian; and that all that they ever thought to be good was only bad; and great part of what they used to think was bad, to be good, saying to the pure, all things are pure, and that what goeth into a man, does not defile him; and in such crafty ways introducing the greatest vices and suppressing the virtues of all your followers; and thus puting out their eyes to that which is good, opening them in belief of what is bad; calling evil good and good evil; not suffering them to read the scriptures, nor receive any thing but what you teach them; and the more anger and rage they could manifest or feel against every thing that was not in your line, the more they were caress’d and applauded by you; and they are made to believe it to be one of the greatest virtues, and an essential point of obedience upon which their doctrine depends, to feel the greatest hatred and anger / against their opposers: calling it the anger of God; you craftily leading on in it, by quoting such scriptures as these, viz. Christ looked about upon them with anger, &c. Again, he took a scourge of small cords, and drove out the buyers and sellers. And again, he fays, ye serpents, ye generation of vipers, &c. And Paul to Elimos, O full of subtilty and mischief, thou enemy of all righteousness; thou child of the devil, &c. forgetting that these words were and are yet spoken to those that oppose and go contrary to Christ and his apostle’s doctrine and ministry which therefore you have no right to make use of, except you will own them and subject to their gospel, and not make it a cloak of maliciousness; for the wrath of man worketh not the righteousness of God, see James 1st chap. 20 verse. Elder James I speak what I know of your crafty ways to drive the people into those miscarriages, even to that degree that I hear that one of your pupils struck at one of her opposers with an axe, and threatened his life. To be sure she does much at striking with sticks, and biting, and spitting in the face I believe, for I have seen the wounds that was said she gave: and is she not therefore according to your own doctrine the seed of Cain that killed his brother with a stick? Besides many others I could name, that by the accounts are not much if any thing behind her in acts of outrage / and violence; and yet I have no doubt but the poor creatures verily think they do God service. O! how much blood has been shed by this religious anger since the foundation of the world; and this is certainly the effect of your new ministration; and besides all this Elder James, I have been many times burdened at your hypocrisy and deceit, denying at one time

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what you said at another: particularly once at Elias Brown’s, in Preston,30 when we left Stonington31 on our way to Windham,32 they questioned you of things that I knew was among you, and you would not own it. I thought then if I remember right, they would likely soon be certified of the matter, and report, that you had lied about it. I have many times observed such things in you that has given me great trouble. Also your mother said one time in my hearing, that Amos Rathbun33 had never brought any thing and given to the church, when I knew the contrary. At another time when some of those you call the world seemed to suspect and accuse her of taking money of her people,34 she plumply denied it, when I absolutely knew that she had taken of me both silver and gold, and I knew that she knew it, for she would speak of it at other times in commendation of me, I supposed for an example to others. At another time at Ashfield, in the case between Isaac Chancy35 and Talmage Bishop,36 and some / others that were entangled in the same affair, it came before her for decision, and after she had been some time upon the matter, she came out with reproofs against them, and then made an appeal to me, meaning as I supposed, that I should join with her, and come out sharp against them also; I knowing her mind and my own ignorance of the matter, was straightened in myself what to do, at length come out in such terms as I thought I might with a good conscience; but it not answering her mind she came right upon me with chastisement. I thought because I would not tell a lie. And many times in her appeals to me – in her discipline upon others, I have been so afraid, I think I may say, that I should bring her upon me like a lion, if I did not even wrong my conscience in joining with her, as would bring me to great streights in my mind; and this I suppose from my observation of others, that they think it to be perfectly agreeable to God’s will to say as you do at a venture, you being their God or guide, if they can please you they feel well enough; but I was afraid to trust it, for I did believe, and do still that there was another God beyond you that I was answerable to. One time elder John Partington chastised me, thumping upon me because when the world,37 as you call them, told me of your mother’s getting drunk, I did not deny it, and came out against them with a sharp sword for / falsely accusing the people of God. Elder William has also chastised me for the same thing, saying I lost my faith and confidence for not being more bold and zealous to defend the people of God, when indeed I knew that what they said, and much more was true, and I could not deny it without lying against my own conscience. Elder William has often forced me, and others to say I will or I will not do this and that, when I fear’d to do it lest I should not be able to perform. Now elder James was not this making us liars; and great pains has been taken also, to make us railers. Children often called up to tell the worst things they could about their parents and friends in open assemblies, and to berate them to the last degree, rendering them as ridiculous and odious as devils, even calling them such; and those that signalized

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themselves most in this manner, were highest esteemed in the church. I myself have been reproved, and I thought despised for not doing more in this line than my conscience would allow of. Many have gone so far in raillery as falsely to accuse, and when convicted of their mistake, they would twist out, saying, it was in a sinful nature to do all these things, and therefore guilty of the nature if not the actions. I have also seen such a lead given to excessive drinking, that I could not go with it without sacrificing or violating my conscience; and / therefore it was that I complained to you so much about it. I think it is very evident that your people in general are become great drinkers – and that from your examples; for if you did not do it yourselves, they would not dare to do it. I have certainly seen and, heard complaints from others, of your often-being beside yourselves; especially when you rode abroad. One time you and elder William, and George Darrow,38 came in to John Spires,39 I being there, and George smelt and acted as if he was full of rum up to his gullet, and the rest of you not much behind him. I remember this same George was chastised sharply at Ashfield for covetousness by the church when they were there; but afterwards becoming very liberal and free with liquor to your mother and the elders, and partaking of it with you himself, he soon became a great favorite of the church, while I sunk into contempt for my uneasiness and complaints against such practises. You may likely remember a certain time when you and elder William came to my house from Barrington, in Court time,40 elder William fumbled in his speech and tumbled about, and spewed on the floor and was hurried away to bed under a pretence of great sufferings. I did not see this at this time, being from home; but was informed of it by my wife,41 who says she saw it. I saw Knap’s wife42 come to the church in a sleigh, I being / there, that she could scarce get into the house, being apparently to my exception almost drunk; and elder William received her with great joy, comforting and strengthening her, without the least reproof that I know of, either then or afterwards for it. She appeared to me to be then as full of what you call the power of God, as ever, and would keep for some time hallowing out aloud, as her usual manner was, and elder Williams laughing and rejoicing, as it seem’d, to see her keep so alive in religion, as I supposed, he would have us all think, when I knew and could not but think that every one that saw her must know that she had more rum religion than any other at that time, except such as had a great share of the same themselves. Now elder James these and such like things were certainly the cause and reason of my separating from you, according to the command of God in II. Cor. 6–17, wherefore, come out from among them, and be ye separate saith the Lord, and touch not the unclean thing, and I will receive you. And it is evident to me that your lead was unclean, and out from all bible rules and commands, into such a diversity of enormities which I have seen and heard, and know to be among you; and I solemnly declare that I do believe according to my observations of things amongst you, that those that are

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the deepest in those what I call vices and abominations as / related above are the highest in the esteem and favour of you and your church. I have more to say, but shall close these objections by a reference to the 28th of Isaiah, at the beginning, woe to the crown of pride, to the drunkards of Ephraim, whose glorious beauty is a fading flower, which are on the head of the fat vallies of them that are overcome with wine. Behold the Lord hath a mighty and strong one, which as a tempest of hail and a destroying storm, as a flood of mighty waters overflowing shall cast down to the earth with the hand, the crown of pride, the drunkards of Ephraim shall be troden under feet. Wherefore I advise you to tell your poor infatuated company, that you have been deceiving them; and while you have been promising them liberty, you yourself have been a servant of corruption least this woe be upon you, all which inconsistencies and absurdities seems to be the real and necessary production of your new dispensation and ministry. Now elder James, omitting many things that might justly come under consideration for a further demonstration of the falsehood of your pretences, I proceed to make a comparison, between you and the Papist. First, they hold that the Pope is the supreme head of the church, and you hold that the mother was, while living, and now you are supreme head of your church, for you say / Christ came in you, and Christ and his people are one; and this is the idea you give us, that when you speak to us Christ speaks to us, for their is no other Christ. Again, you are as absolute and despotick as the Pope, and are as arbitrary in your discipline, and hold yourself as infallible as he. Herein you agree only being two different communions; one or both is mistaken in asserting, that no body can be saved out of your communion. He says this of his, and you of yours. However I think this to be very ridiculous for either, except your characters were better. The Papists hold to Purgatory, and so do you, and in the same manner, both with respect to their going in and coming out; and for what end? they worship their dead saint, and so do you, and pray to them, sing verses, serenade, and celebrate your mother and father William as you call them. This I have seen and heard, among such as were of your communion, and you yourself bid me confess to your mother, after she was dead, the last time I visited you at Nisqueuniah. Now is not praying and confessing to the dead an unscriptural as well as an irrational thing? and what warrant have we for it but your bold assertions? except it be that scripture in the 8th of Isaiah, 19th verse, and when they shall say unto you, seek unto them that have familiar spirits, and unto wizards that peep and that mutter, should not / a people seek unto their God? for the living to the dead; to which I shall speak more particularly in its proper place. Now the Papists pretend to prove the doctrine of purgatory by their apparitions and revelations, so do you. The Papists make confession of their sins to the Pope and a great number of father confessors under him, and so do you in your order;43 and the Pope and father confessors pretend a power to absolve or forgive sins,

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and so do you; they make the penitents kneed in confession before the fathers, and so do you; they administer corporal punishment in their discipline, and enjoy repentance, and so do you; the penitent after confession, kisses the fathers hand, or sleeve if there is favor, and so it is among you. They have their convents and nunneries for men and women, who are exempted from marriage, and so it is among you, only not in so popular a manner for want of ability. They have their inquisition, and so have you in every idea of it, I think so far as you can go, without the civil authority; and against those that dissent from them, their excommunications, curses, invectives, and imprecations are the same of yours, for what I can see, and their hatred and aversion against all but their own sect, is the same of yours; they pretend to the gifts of healing and casting out devils: of apparitions, revelations and prophesy – if the accounts be / true, in a greater degree perhaps than ever yet you pretended. The Papist will send a father confessor into a family to take the lead and government of it, who becomes absolute master of the house, and the controul of the whole family, both parents and children and the ordering and disposition of them, as we are informed by the author of the book entitled the master key to Popery,44 and I think the same is in practice among you. See Aaron Williams at Nathan Kindal’s, in Woobon, Rufus Cogswell45 at Joshua Burtch’s46 in Stonington, Benjamin Ellis47 at Joseph Bennets48 at New-Providence, &c. Besides the many father confessors that make it their business to travel about from house to house to take the confessions and give their instructions and orders to families: Such as Ebenezer Cooley,49 Israel Chancey,50 Joseph Meechem, Joshua Cogswell,51 and many others, for all which services the Papists make great demands upon their people; but I think you go clear beyond them, for you require all that they have, even their whole estates, and their persons and families too, to be entirely at your disposal, telling them that short of this, they will leave their souls and so terrifying the poor infatuates to a compliance rather than go to hell. The Papists and you too as I understand hold, that every soul has to suffer either here or hereafter for all their sin, and yet you have power / to remit them. How inconsistent that is: but of this more hereafter. It is said that among the Papists many of the priests of pure lives assert, that they have seen the little boy Jesus in the consecrated host, just, as I have heard Amos Rathbun assert, that he has seen Jesus Christ like a little boy in James Whittacor. I understand by vision or apparition, both they and you pretend to the power of miracles; but very few if any are manifest, or believed; but among yourselves, which if it were true, is no more than what we read of the beast and false prophet in three passages of scripture in the Revelations. I read of one among the Papists that asserted she had several times seen Jesus Christ, and that he had talked with her. At another time she saw the Holy Trinity. And Joseph Meechem among you told me that John Partington, one of your elders, had often seen Jesus Christ, and also the prophet Daniel, and I think talked with them.

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Another article is, that the Papists have their secondary mediators, such as the virgin. Mary, St. Peter, St. Paul, and a great number of their eminent saints besides, who are dead, whom they worship and pray to, desiring them to pray and intercede with Christ for them; and this is a known professed principle among you. Even Joseph Meechem told me, and I have often heard it talkt among you, that God would not hear us but by secondary mediators / under Christ; and that we could not be saved, but by the mother’s intercession. And indeed I have heard her pray’d to many times since she was dead: this is therefore another Popish tenet. Again both their and your punishing the particular part that sin’d in your discipline, &c. Again, the Pope and Priests among the Papists do not allow the common people the liberty of reading the bible; and hold forth that the people ought to obey them blindly in every thing without hesitation; and I know this to be the case among you, for great efforts have been made to beat me and others off from reading the bible. I remember Samuel Fitch one time came forth with this doctrine, that we ought to believe and obey whatever came from the mother, if we did not see the reason and propriety of it; and that we had no right to question or doubt of the truth of what the mother said or did – this is as nearly his words as I can repeat them, and exactly the sense as I receive it: to which I then took an exception, and ventured to say to Joseph Meechem, that Fitch’s doctrine deprived me of seeing and knowing for myself. The news of my objection was soon carried, and soon followed with chastisement for my gainsaying Samuel Fitch. Now elder James from this comparison of things, I think you have no reason to blame me or any others for believing and calling you Papists, which I / really do, and as such denounce you, and declare myself a Protestant. Protesting against your Romish idolatry and superstition, as Luther did in his time, expecting the Popish bull full of invectives, which however, I have as little faith in, as I have in your unscriptural doctrine and discipline. But once more by way of comparison: it is evident from scripture testimony, that the man of sin, or mystery of iniquity before its destruction, shall arise, full in the character given of it by St. Paul, II. Thess. 2 chap. and it has been gradually increasing ever since the first degeneracy of the Christian religion and the rise of Popery; and the many accounts that have been given by the writers of almost every age since, even down to this day, shew us, that according to Christ’s words, Matt. 24–24, for there shall arise false Christs, and false prophets, and shall shew great signs and wonders, insomuch that if it were possible, they shall deceive the very elect, has been abundantly verified by the impostures of these times, whose pretensions to perfection and the power of miracles, such as casting out devils, unknown tongues, visions, revelations and prophesy; and even to be Christ himself, have turned out to be a meer cheat, and themselves persons of the most immoral and debauched lives, of all whom it would be endless to write particularly; yet I think it necessary to quote a few / passages from a book called the

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French prophets,52 written in the year 1707–8. First, John Lacy, Esq.53 in his preface to that book, gives this account of his operations in that day like yours in this, page 4th. They began by a preternatural course of breathing, then my head come to be shaken violently and forcibly, and with a very quick motion horizontally, or from side to side; then my stomach had twitches, not much unlike an hyccup; afterwards my hands and arms were violently shaken, and sometimes a catching or twitches all over my body. After which he says, he had the gift of tongues and prophesy, and to denounce the judgment of God immediately coming down on the city of London, and kingdom of England. And to make it as publick as possible that men might have timely warning concerning which, as I understand, Sir Edmund Calamy,54 in his remark upon it says, page 34: “’Tis well known to many that it was prophetically declared by one of them, and afterwards reported by many, that a dismal judgment would fall on this city, in three weeks time; but blessed be God, tho’ many weeks have since passed or elapsed this noble city, the ruin of which would be the greatest joy to hell and Rome that could be, continues safe.” This John Lacy goes on prophesying for several days together, now and then making a stop or pause and whistling / a spell, see page 71 and 72; “he whistles, he whistles, he whistles.” In his prophetical declaration he says, page 78, “with many plagues will I strike them,” he striking on his knee at the same time, giving the sign, page 80, “hear he rolled about on his seat, working with his body, and moving his head and hands like a man sick at heart, page 95, he shakes much his hand, and seems to threaten; here he strikes several times, pointing his fingers ends to his heart, crying out, O! rottenness, rottenness, I see it, I see it.” Goes on to say, “have you not read, out of his belly shall flow a spring of living water: what was the meaning of that to him, who believe in Christ? and if you do not believe in my Christ, now, now, taking possession of his throne, your cistern shall be empty of that little knowledge you have soon.” Now elder James here is the same craft that you have used with us to terrify us along, pretending that Christ was come in you, and that if we did not believe Christ in you, viz. believe you, we should soon be left destitute of the knowledge of God. See your picture in these deceivers and read the fact. The following words were written by one who believed in the French Prophets, in a letter to his friend, wherein he says, page 9, “but that which fully determined me in this point was their predicting things miraculous to be wrought / within a determined time by them, and that time very short, and declaring to the world, that if the power of God does not before the 29th of April next attest to the work, they will own themselves deluded.” Here I would observe, that this man was gain’d to the belief of them by their bold assertions, who was undoubtedly convinced after the 29th of April; except they could make as good a shift, as I quoted by Edmund Calamy, in one of his remarks, page 34: “in a warning which is said to have been dictated by the spirit, on the 26th of July last, are these words: the tower gun, will roar in a

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few days, by this day sen’ night; but a week and a fortnight passed, and no man could hear the sound of them; by that time it should seem their spirit was convinced it might be charged with a falsity: upon Aug 12th, therefore, that is 17 days after the prediction out came a salvo; and ’tis declared that the tower guns were the guns from the tower of heaven, with which this city was to be battered, and that the key of time was not yet given, by which to explain the seven night expressed; but that a few months should produce the key. Is not this a meer bantering the world, under a pretence of revelation.” Now elder James is not this just like some of your shifts among you: first to declare that the mother and elders would never die, and some would say not a natural death; and when they / did die, they either denied that they ever said so, or they would say that they were not dead. I have been credibly informed, that the mother delivered it as prophesy, that she herself, and elder William and you, and John Partington and several more of the elders would die by persecution; and when Thaddius Noble, since the mother and elder William’s death,55 told this prediction to John Partington, he said “why I will tell thee brother William suffered to death, he bleed out of every hole in his body – I think these were the very words. Now why was he not honest enough to own the mistake; but because that would be to give up your perfection and infallibility, and convince the people. I could mention many other things that are now on my mind; but would only ask you whether you think that the cause of God is upheld by falsehood and fraud? But to return, in page 24 we have an account that the French Prophets of that time declared, that a new dispensation had taken place; and the millennium was just then commencing, and that the new dispensation shall be published in all parts, in three years time; and the great work which should be effected was compleat restoration; the whole creation appear in its primitive beauty, and man regain the perfection of Adam, and his immediate communion with God: and the wicked cut off by the judgments of God from the / earth, and so say you within your time limited. This was what they so confidently asserted, and yet an absolute falsehood in every part of it, altho’ attended with what they themselves, and likely thousands of others, verily thought was a miraculous power, or the power of God – see Sir Richard Buckley’s56 remark, page 35th; “among much more than a thousand extacies that I have seen, I have seen many so very much agitated and moved, that no part of their body could be said to be in repose, as if they had been stomach sick, heart sick, fainting, rack’d with cholicks, stone and gout;” and I have seen the same among you, even to spilling blood. See another passage quoted from this same author, page 89, “and those evidences do arise from the operations and effects wrought by it, which are either of the graces of the holy spirit wrought powerfully in the hearts of those whom he has called into this dispensation, or of his gifts, to wit. Those that follow the gift of prayer and supplication – the gift of exhortation – of prediction – of language – of discerning

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the secrets of the heart – the gift of ministration – of the same spirit to others, by laying on of hands, and the gift of healing, of every one of which I shall give clear and manifest instances.” All these I know you pretend to. Much more I could quote from this author in favor of those pretenders (he being one of / their proselytes) to the new dispensation, Christ’s second coming – the millennium began, and the gifts attending, and the great work of restitution of all things to be accomplished in three years time. This is exactly what you pretend, only yours is to be eleven years; of which they are so bold and confident, that Sir Edmund Calamy says in treatise page 38, “they talk much of their humility, but do but question their being inspired and you will see disdain in their looks: this is certainly true concerning you. Again he says, they openly and scurrilously traduce the office of the ministry, and villify all that are in it without distinction, in most opprobrious language: I believe there is hundreds, if not thousands that can say they have heard the same from you. Again, he says page 39, “they that set up for prophets, freely pour out their curses on all that oppose them, and seem to delight in nothing more than in threatening viols of wrath and fire from heaven on all such as refuse to own them the peculiar heritage of the Lord, and his special messengers; and so do you it is well known, and for which you have had some trouble. Judgments on opposers is their common theme, on which they are warmest and freest, and they are required not to pity those that fall under those judgments: nay, upon the supposition of their near approach, they often scornfully / insult,” and so again I say do you. Now elder James this is a picture to the life in every instance, and was I a shaker I should know it to be mine. First, they then said Christ was come, and the millennium begun, and in three years time the great and grand revolution was to be accomplished, &c. and they had all the gifts and operations by the accounts that you pretend to, to evince the truth of their declaration; and they were as bold and confident as you, and after all they got defeated in Bunnilfieds57 at the grave of Doctor Ames,58 and thence became a blot in the annals of England, and will remain so to all future posterity no doubt. Notwithstanding all which, a little number of you, a woman at the head, who I have no doubt were Papists, have rallied again with a raft of Popish tenets, and have made another sally, declaring that Christ is come in you, for the same end and purpose that the others pretended, fixing the time at eleven years from the beginning of your ministry at Nisqueuniah for the accomplishment of the consummation of all things, at which time also your millennium began, or in others words usurpation began – five of which years are already passed. But again, see F. C’s remark, page 38, “and so when they whistle and hiss, and drum, and trumpet in their extacies, and take these things with many other childish and fantastick motions for evident marks of / a gracious visitation, and when the spirit employs them to beat and thump, and cuff, and trample upon one another, and to play tricks like merry Andrews59 upon a stage. Can this be the spirit of

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God,” – these are exactly his words of what was among them, and certainly the same is among you; except the words drum and trumpet. Again this author says concerning the church of Rome, page 42, “the histories of the lives of their saints are full of visions, extraordinary revelations and extacies.” And again he says, page 43, “the Romish church has he-saints and she-saints, famous for visions and revelations, from one age to another.” Here I would observe, that the church of Rome, that mother of harlots, and abominations of the earth, have had those what you call gifts of visions, revelations, and prophesy for many ages; the French prophets the same, and you the same – all pretending perfection, and yet are known to have lived at the same time in the most scandalous vices, both they and you. I have read of the malicious zeal of the Papists, besides the bloody inquisition, that thought it a virtue, and have committed many murders upon those of a different persuasion; and also among the French prophets and their adherents in England, of whom I have been treating. We have this account page 51, “another of them that has been charged with killing several / persons in cold blood, from which charged be has never yet cleared himself as I can hear of, has declared in the hearing of many, that he would murder his own father if he was commanded to do it by inspiration,” And from what I have seen of the violences committed among you, I have many times feared that murder would be done, even among yourselves in your discipline; besides the rage and threatnings of some of your people against their opposers, and all as they pretend in the gifts of God. But once more, with which I shall conclude this head: see Edmund Calamy’s treatise, page 47, “the late story of Mr. Mason, in Buckinghamshire, ought not to be forgotten, he firmly expected the appearance of Christ in a little village in that county, called Water-Stratford, to conduct his people from thence to Jerusalem, and begin the miliennium. But about the very time that was fixed for Christ’s appearance, Mr. Mason died and left a company of poor deluded people behind him, who continued together praying and dancing and singing night and day in hopes of Christ’s sudden appearance among them. But after long waiting to no purpose they at last despaired.” Now elder James it is evident by the events that all these referred to, and many others that might be mentioned were deceived, and their poor deluded followers sadly disappointed, whose credentials I / think were exactly the same of yours; and what greater likelihood is there of your succeeding than they. Perhaps you will say that you have taken up a greater cross than they, in refraining or forbidding marriage, and that you mortify the flesh with more bodily exercise than any of them ever did. Well that is true, which yet gives me but greater doubt of your success. In the next place I shall proceed to consider some passage of scripture in relation to some of your doctrines and character. First then: You say, as I understand, that the first sin, that our first parents committed in the garden of Eden, was the act of copulation, that being the

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forbidden fruit, which I desire you to reconcile with the command of God to them: to be fruitful and multiply, and replenish the earth, Gen. 1–28. You say, If I understand you, that Eve was the forbidden tree, that Adam was forbid to touch on pain of death, which however aggrees not with scripture, for the tree of knowledge of good and evil was in the garden before the woman existed, and Adam forbid to eat of it, see Gen. 2–9 and 17 verse. Now observe, the act of copulation could not be the forbidden fruit, because that could not be pertaken but together and at once; but Eve pertook of it separately from her husband, as you may see Gen. 3–6, as also I. Tim. 2–14, therefore / what ever else it might be, the woman was not the tree, nor the act of copulation the fruit here spoken of; consequently these passages of scripture must be wrong, if you be right. – Observe again, Adam was forbid to touch the forbidden tree, Gen. 3–3; but concerning his wife it is said, Gen. 2–24, therefore shall a man leave his father and mother and shall cleave unto his wife, and they shall be one flesh, which could not be but by a touch of copulation, which was it that made them one flesh. This destroys the idea of the woman’s being the tree that Adam was forbid to touch. This therefore proves your hypothesis to be false, which is the grand fundamental pillar of your whole system, which must go headlong for want of a better foundation. Again, you say, that all marriages were and are of the devil, first and last. Here again you are too fast, for marriage was instituted and performed in the garden before the fall, as appears Gen. 2d chap. 22d 23d 24th verses, and the rib which the Lord God had taken from man made he a woman, and brought her unto the man, and Adam said, this is now bone of my bone and flesh of my flesh: she shall be called woman because she was taken out of man: therefore shall a man leave his father and mother, and shall cleave unto his wife, and they shall be one flesh. This is marriage in every sense of it: for its proper definition is agreeing / and joining together. Is it not therefore presumptuous to contradict scripture? And call this of the devil? Again Gen. 24th chap. wherein you may see the godliness, the solemnity and inspiration of Isaac and Rebeckah’s marriage, of the angels attending, verse 7, the blessing and prediction of Rebecka’s being the mother of thousands and millions, and that her seed should possess the gate of those that hate them, as in verse 60, and preceeding this in the 50th verse, then Laban and Bethuel answered and said, the thing proceedeth from Lord – but you say from the devil. Therefore I desire you to consider whether you be able to dispute this point with God. Again, see Matt. 19–4–5–6, and he answered and said unto them, have ye not read that he which made them at the beginning made them male and female, and said for this cause shall a man leave father and mother and shall cleave to his wife, and they twain shall be one flesh. And what follows in the 6th verse is the addition of Christ’s own words: wherefore they are no more twain, but one flesh: what therefore God has joined together let no man put asunder. Here observe, Christ acknowledges that God joined them together, and

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forbids man to put them asunder; but you say the devil joined them together, and go about to put them asunder, in which you both contradict Christ and break his command. And again / Paul in his gospel says, Eph. 5–22 wives submit yourselves unto your own husband as unto the Lord: verse 23, for the husband is the head of the wife, even as Christ is the head of the church, &c. therefore as the church is subject unto Christ, so let the wives be to their own husbands in every thing: verse 25, husbands love your wives, even as Christ also loved the church, &c. verse 28, so ought men to love their wives as their own bodies: he that loveth his wife loveth himself: verse 29, for no man ever yet hated his own flesh, but nourisheth and cherisheth it, even as the Lord the church. Then in reference to the sacred institution of marriage, in the same words before quoted says, verse 31, for this cause shall a man leave his father and mother, and shall be joined unto his wife, and they two shall be one flesh. Mark, several thing may be noted from this passage of scripture: first, that the Apostle makes use of the marriage state and union between the husband & wife to represent the marriage state and union between Christ and the church; by which he acknowledgeth the marriage that you disown, and gives special rules for them to go by. Secondly, that these rules and commands were given to husbands and wives as such, who were at the same time also married to Christ, see Rom. 7, hence learn, that being married to a woman doth not hinder us from being married / to Christ, which you deny. Thirdly, the very terms of husband and wife, supposes marriage. Fourthly, if marriage were all of the devil, I wonder the Apostle should make use of that for a comparison of the spiritual state and union between Christ and his church. Again, St. Paul says, Heb. 13–4, marriage is honorable in all, and the bed undefiled; but whore-mongers and adulterers God will judge – which being given out in positive terms, in the new covenant ministration, I think is sufficient to decide all controversies, and still the clamours that may arise on this head. But to return, with reference to the forbidden fruit, you say as I said before that it was the act of copulation between Adam and Eve, and is still forbidden fruit to every man and his wife, therefore it is incumbent on you to shew where it is forbidden and by whom, that I & others may believe it upon better authority than your bare assertion. I desire you would answer this question if you are able, or own that I was right in saying you had renounced or at least did not go by the bible, for if you cannot prove that act to be forbidden by God, then certainly you are mistaken in calling that the forbidden fruit, which was not nor is not forbidden. I know that for me to copulate with another man’s wife, or to steal another man’s goods would be forbidden fruit, because God hath commanded saying, thou shalt not / commit adultery – thou shalt not steal; but I am far from believing that Adam’s copulating with his wife, when he was implicity bid to do it, was the occasion of his fall, for it was certainly and inseparably connected with multiplying, and his sin consisted only in breaking the command of God: for where

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no law is, there is no transgression, Rom. 4, 15. Again, sin is not imputed when there is no law, Rom. 5–13. And again, nay I had not known sin, but by the law, for I had not known lust, except the law had said, thou shalt not covet, Rom. 7–7, therefore except you can produce the law of God that forbids copulation between man and wife, you cannot make it a sin, and consequently that could not be the cause of Adam’s fall. And again, except you can produce the law of God that forbids marriage, you cannot make it a sin, and therefore not of the devil, as you pretend. And St. Paul says, I. Cor. 7–28, but and if thou marry, thou hast not sinned, and if a virgin marry she hath not sinned. Now elder James by what has been said it is evident, that you deny and contradict the scripture, both of the old and new testament, and thereby have departed from the faith of those holy men, that wrote the scriptures, and consequently must fall into that character given by St. Paul, I. Tim. 4th chap. Which I shall attend to in the next place. / I. Tim. 4–1, Now the spirit speaketh expressly, that in the latter times some shall depart from the faith, giving heed to seducing spirits and doctrines of devils, verse 2 speaking lies in hypocrisy, having their conscience seared with a hot iron, verse 3, forbidding to marry, &c. Here elder James is one of the blackest characters I think that we can find in the bible, which is given of a people that should arise in the latter times, which particularly belongs to those that are found in this character, let them be who or where they will. First, The Apostle says, that in the latter times some shall depart from the faith, viz. the Apostle’s faith and gospel, then certainly those that renounce it, calling all that is written in the bible letter, old heavens, and a back dispensation, and that Christ therein testified of that we believe in, and depend on for salvation, to be anti-christ, the devil, old belzebub, high king of hell, which are Samuel Fitch’s words and terms for it, and to which you also agree. I say I think such have to all intents departed from the faith, in the sense of the text, giving heed to seducing spirits and doctrines of devils, as if he should say, giving heed to them spirits that deceive, mislead, and debauch people: see the definition agreeable with that Rev. 2–20, notwithstanding I have a few things against thee, because thou sufferest that woman Jezebel,60 which calleth herself a prophetess, / to teach and seduce, to wit, deceive, mislead, and debauch my servants, tho’ God has expressly said, I. Tim. 2–12, but I suffer not a woman to teach, nor to usurp authority over the man; but to be in silence; as in I. Cor. 14–34, let your women keep silence in the churches, for it is not permitted unto them to speak, but they are commanded to be under obedience, as also saith the law; but Jezebel never would obey God, but will be seducing, viz. deceiving, misleading, and debauching the people. Here observe, there was Jezebel in the days of Elijah the prophet, a seducer and a Jezebel in the days of John the revelator, a seducer and a Jezebel still; therefore if the mother or any other woman call herself a prophetess and set up for a teacher and leader, usurping authority over men, and deceive, mislead,

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and debauch people, she comes full into the character of Jezebel, and is a seseducer. Tho’ all fraud it is true originates from the devil, first and last, he being the old seducer, that deceived the deceivers, and set themselves to deceive others, as you and the mother deceived me, for it is certain that you deceived me when I came first among you, by insinuating and pretending that you was perfect and had attained to compleat redemption from sin, and that if we would obey your doctrine, we should be soon there too, which I found to be nothing but a cheat, for the further / I went with you, the further I had to go and the more I did the more I had to do, and instead of freedom and millennium glory, as I expected, I found the greatest bondage and slavery, and to give thee all we had besides, & at last go to purgatory for what I could see. Thus was I deceived by you, and so I believe are all the rest; and as to your perfection, that may be seen by the accounts in this letter: and again, as to our being misled by you, I think it was wholly a forsaking God and Christ, and depending upon you for salvation, which will fail every one that trusts to it, if the bible be true; for that says cursed is man, that trusteth in man, and maketh flesh his arm; and again, it is certain your people are debauched, by having their civility, and humanity, and I think their morality also destroyed; and becoming the most profane, desultory, foul-mouth’d people, I believe that ever made any pretensions to Goodness; and not only in words but also in behaviour, as may be seen in the former part of this letter. All which proves you to be seducers; having been yourselves seduced, whose doctrine as such, must be doctrines of devils. Verse 2d. Speaking lies in hypocrisy, having their conscience sear’d with a hot iron. I have already spoken something in particular, in relation to this; and therefore I shall only add, that from my general observations, I do really think, that I / never saw such a false people as you. I think none but such whose conscience is sear’d with a hot iron, could so wholly give themselves up to false prophesy, false accusations, and false reports as you do; I mean you all as a sect, and for the truth of this, I appeal to all that are well acquainted with you. Verse 3d. forbidding to marry, and commanding to abstain from meats, which God hath created to be received with thanksgiving, of them which believe and know the truth. Verse 4th. For every creature to God is good, and nothing to be refused, if it be received with thanksgiving: verse 5th. For it is sanctified by the word of God and prayer. Here it is plain, the Apostle speaks of forbidding to marry, as a grant material article in the doctrines of devils, which is given as a distinguishing mark of those deceivers here spoken of. And now that you might see, that you have departed from the Apostles gospel, and consequently from the faith; I refer you to I Tim. 3d chap. where the same Apostle gives the character of Bishops and Deacons, each having a wife and children, and yet chief officers in the church of Christ: that it might be seen and known, in those latter times spoken of by the spirit, that there was no such thing, as forbidding to marry, in the church of Christ: and that thereby those deceivers spoken

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of in the latter times, that should arise, forbidding to marry, might be / more easily known and detected. Now elder James, by this you ought to be convinced of your error, in forbidding to marry: and that you do forbid to marry, is certainly true, I have often heard you deny it, and as often heard you forbid it, at least implicitly, I can instance particulars, wherein you have forbid, and even prevented marriages, to wit. Hannah Kindale61 has often told in publick that she was just going to be married to the man she loved before the fell in with you. Jonathan Slosson62 was going to be married to Hannah Goodrich;63 Job Bishop64 was going to have Desier Sanford;65 William Miles and Mary Clerk as I have heard – many more I could mention that are now on my mind, that were likely agreed to marry, but were broken off and terrified out of it by you: nor do you allow any in your community, but such as wholly renounce marriage: and those that were married before, you part them forever or disown them; and for a further conformation of this I can say I was present with the mother66 one time at Ashfield, when she undertook to break the marriage of Pitman Cook67 and his wife, and I assisted therein, and dar’d not do otherwise, for fear of falling under her displeasure. The manner was this, she having professed the minds of her people, that the herself was that battle-ax and weapon of war, spoken of in Jeremiah 51–20 that was to / break in pieces the nations and destroy kingdoms: she was to break in pieces the horse and his rider: the chariot and his rider: she was to break in pieces man and woman, old and young: the young man and the maid, &c. she said it was their lust brought them together, and that he that married them was not a man of God, and therefore what he did was not of God, but of the devil, and therefore void, not regarding what is spoken by Malachi; 2d chap: 14–15–16 verse, the whole paragraph to which I refer you, and desire you to read: and I suppose they hold their marriage to be void, and themselves acquit from each other ever since, for they call their marriage covenant a covenant of death and hell, and so do many if not all the rest: At another time at Harwood,68 I being present, Samuel Fitch, I suppose by the mother’s direction brought in his wife and son; and I think daughter too, that being all his family; ordered them to kneel down, then kneeled down with them himself, in the midst of an assembly of their own sort of people, then in the audience of the whole, in a solemn manner, renounced his wife and children; as being his wife and children ever any more, and forbid his wife ever esteeming him her husband again, declaring she was no more his wife, nor he her husband – this I saw and heard, which was designed as I supposed to give a lead to / others. Besides the severe chastisements and many methods taken by you to set men and women, husbands and wives at the greatest distance in affection from each other. Now elder James are not these things forbidding to marry in the highest sense? and does not this with what else has been said, which I defy you to deny, bring you full into the character here given by St. Paul of those that depart from the faith, giving heed to seducing

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spirits and doctrines of devils, speaking lies in hypocrisy having their conscience seared with a hot iron, forbidding to marry &c. what follows in the 4th and 5th verse being a declaration, of Gods approbation to the marriage rights; I shall pass to another observation in the same chap. Verse 7th. But refuse prophane and old wife’s fables; and exercise thyself rather unto Godliness: verse 8th for bodily exercise profiteth little, &c. verse 9th; this is a faithful saying, and worthy of all acceptation. Here observe it is evident to me at least, that the mother was a very profane old wife, and that her doctrines were meer fables, being I think altogether unscriptural, and her religion consisted much in bodily exercise, and therefore of little profit: this is another characteristick given by the Apostle in the same chapter with the above, and then concludes emphatically in the following words, this is a faithful saying and worthy of all acceptation, which is a clear / manifestation of the Apostle’s disapprobation of what you make so much account of: you laying the whole stress of our salvation upon our faith in and obedience to an old wife’s fables and great bodily exercise, which the Apostle sets nothing at all by. Herein therefore appears a great difference between you and the Apostles, which you account for by the introduction of a new dispensation which however I think brings you into a most doleful character according to scripture prediction: Now elder James by what has been said it is evident, that however wrong all others may be, you cannot be right, if the scriptures be true: and tho you may pretend to be beyond them, and hence take liberty to go contrary to them, I desire you to read this advertisement of a runaway, departed from the faith: take warning and return, lest you be taken up by it and punished according to the rule which the scriptures gives in such cases. Again, II. Thess. 2–4, who opposeth and exalteth himself above all that is called God, or that is worshiped, so that he as God sitteth in the temple of God shewing himself that he is God. This is a description of the man of sin, the son of perdition, that should be revealed before the coming of Christ, as appears in the proceeding verses and in the 7th verse says, for the mystery of iniquity doth already work, only he who now letteth will let, until / he be taken out of the way; as if he should say, that which is mysterious and out of sight, and yet iniquitous doth already work, counterfeiting Christ and the true religion, and that by a mist of darkness and the power of deception, it would let or hinder the man of sin as such being discovered or revealed, even until the time of Christ’s coming, at which time the mystery of iniquity, which is a deception, a cheat and fraud shall be taken out of the way; verse 8th, and then shall that wicked be revealed, whom the Lord shall consume with the spirit of his mouth, and shall destroy with the brightness of his coming, viz. then the man of sin which is it that opposeth every thing both good and bad that stands, in the way of its own exaltation and honour, wanting the pre-eminence and exalting itself above God, should be destroyed, to wit, Anti-Christ, counterfeit Christ, and counterfeit religion,

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mixed with pride, self and vain glory; and this is that abomination of desolation, spoken of by Daniel the prophet, standing in the holy place, and referred to by our saviour, Matt. 24–15, which when we see we should flee from it, and which the coming of Christ will be the destruction of not only in a political and general sense, at his final and last coming, but also in every individual elect soul, in whom he comes by his spirit through all ages down to that day, and it cannot be otherwise, for where ever and / whenever Christ comes, the man of sin is overthrown; therefore where the man of sin is, Christ is not come, either in a general or individual sense – but more especially in the later days, according to the sense of the apostle, when the mystery of iniquity shall rise to the heighth, and the man of sin exalt himself above all that is called God in the religious system: the appearing of Christ shall consume and destroy with the brightness of his coming; verse 9, even him whose coming is after the working of Satan, with all power and signs and lying wonders, by which it is evident, that just before the coming of Christ there should a people arise, in whom Satan would work with all power of delusion, deception, and signs and lying wonders, which undoubtedly are the same that Christ speaks of Matt. 24–24, for there shall arise false Christs, and false prophets, and shall shew great signs and wonders insomuch, that if it were possible, they shall deceive the very elect; and bids us, neither believe nor follow them. Again, Rev. 13–13, and he doeth great wonders, so that he maketh fire come down from heaven on the earth in the sight of men; verse 14, and deceiveth them that dwell on the earth, by means of these miracles which he had power to do in the sight of the beast. And again, Rev. 16–13, and I saw three unclean spirits like frogs come out of the mouth of the dragon, / and out of the mouth of the beast, and out of the mouth of the false prophet; verse 14th, for they are the spirits of devils working miracles, &c. then in the 15th verse, Christ says, behold I come as a thief. Here observe, in this passage in the Rev. Christ comes as a thief, after the going forth of these miraculous deceivers, which just agrees with what St. Paul has just been saying, that Christ’s coming is after, or not until after the working of Satan, with all power, and signs, and lying wonders; from whence we learn that in these latter days, there should arise false Christ’s false prophets and deceivers, with all power, even the power of miracles, and signs, and lying wonders. And indeed herein lies the power of deception; all which great and wonderful things, is yet no evidence of their being the people of God; But the contrary; especially if they oppose and exalt themselves, pretending to be Christ, and at the same time, having base morals; working as in verse 10th with all deceivableness of unrighteousness &c. which just completes the character of those deceivers here spoken of, verse 11th, and for this cause God shall send them strong delusions, that they should believe a lie; verse 12, that they all might be damned who believed not the truth, but had pleasure in unrighteousness. Now elder James

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I having made some observations / in reference to a few passages of scripture under this head: shall in the next place proceed to make a comparison of what I have found among you, with what is here written. First then, It is certain that you oppose every thing that does not acknowledge your mission and ministry, which being contrary to the bible, you oppose that, and consequently the divine author of it too and even venture to go contrary to his commands, according to what is written, as a thing invalid and out of date; and it is as certain, that you do oppose all mankind, of all ranks and degrees sects and denominations of men under heaven, condemning them altogether, and declaring they will all go to hell, that do not acknowledge you to be the only lead of God in the world, and subject themselves to your ministry; you oppose every argument that can be raised, and every text of scripture, that can be produced in support of any other religion but your own. This I think is opposing and at the same time exalting yourself, for just as much as you run down others, you exalt yourself; and not only so, but you plainly say, there is no God that can save souls, but what is in you, the elders and the mother, and there has been great pains taken to bring me and others into this belief, for indeed I never could believe it: and I hear that some of your people begin to declare openly, that James / Whittacor is the saviour of the world, and you suffer and even order your people to kneel down to you: when the angel would not suffer John the Revelator to fall down to him; nor would the apostle Peter suffer Cornelius to do the like to him; and God has also commanded saying, thou shalt have no other Gods before me: thou shalt not bow down thyself to them, nor serve them, Exod. 20–5; but you presume upon it, and require that acknowledgement paid to you: Is not this opposing and exalting yourself above all that is called God? according to the character given of such; and is not this implicitly calling yourself God, and robbing him of his glory; bending the people’s whole attention to you as God, and you terrifying them to it, taking the whole government and controul of them, and their interest too, wholly depriving them of the liberty of seeing and believing for themselves, or knowing any thing but what you tell them concerning their souls – and this just comes to what Samuel Fitch said, as I told you before, that he had no other Christ to look to but the mother; and since she was dead, you take the throne and are become supreme judge of quick and dead – this you pretend absolutely, if I understand you. I say is not this exalting yourself above all that is called God? it astonishes me to think, that any mortal should have their conscience so seared, as to / make such pretensions; you certainly know that you are not God: then how dare you allow your people, to deify and make a God of you, who are but a poor frail mortal, as the mother and elder William was, who pretended the same things, and are dead. I wonder you are not afraid of being smitten of god, and eaten of worms as Herod was for the same thing. But the scriptures must be fulfilled: there must be some that oppose and exalt themselves

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above all that is called God, or that is worshiped – so that they as God set in the temple of God, or the church, or the religious system, there shewing themselves to be God, which is the man of sin, the son of perdition. But secondly, with respect to the mystery of iniquity among you, I can say that I have been confounded many times, not knowing how to account for such inconsistencies, or reconcile such high appearances of religion and sincerity, with such wickedness and abominations at the same time, in the same persons; nothing was more common among you, than to use the most prophane language, especially when chastising others – yet in the highest zeal of religion; and to use equivocations and deceit under a pretence of defending the cause of God, and even when in liquor much more resolute for God against sin than at other times. Your persuading of us that liquor operated right the contrary in you that were / perfect to what it did in them that were not: that whereas it influenced them to serve the devil; it animated you to serve God: and even in the times of your intoxications, there would be an appearance of the mighty power and gifts of God in you, as you call it: I also have took notice that by the greatest fits of anger, rage and execrations against somebody or other, you would find the greatest releasement, as if your souls were solaced in heaven. One thing a man told me that he saw of a quarrel between the mother and elder William, that was very sharp and bloody,69 with many hard blows, and dreadful cursing and outrage, till they were both maul’d and bruised by each other, and directly after the people were chastized for false judging, and this salvo put upon it, that Paul and Barnabas contended and parted: and Paul withstood Peter to the face, keeping up a shew of religion in it; and when any of you come out against others, in the greatest railleries and accusations, many of which I have no doubt were false, you would turn it into a pretence of love and faithfulness to them; and so you find ways to turn every vice into a virtue, giving way to your passions, foul language, equivocations to say no worse of it, and hard drinking, which are all condemned by the scriptures, and yet all in common practice among you in the highest pretensions of religion, and attended with the / mighty power and gifts of God to all appearance. This looks I think like a mystery of iniquity, where the greatest abominations are committed: children abusing their parents in the most shocking manner that ever was heard of, being set on by the mother and you, and ruling over their parents: and wives ruling over their husbands, all which is against the laws of God and nature: yet all under the highest appearance of divine approbation, being attended at the same time with an increase of those supernatural gifts. This I say looks like the mystery of iniquity spoken of, and agrees with that Rev. 17–5, and upon her forehead was a name written mystery – Babylon the great – the mother of harlots – and abominations of the earth. But again, thirdly, it is said that the coming Christ is after the working of Satan, with all power and signs & lying wonders: and this is the case with you, for you assume the prerogative of all power under

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heaven, and without distinction or reserve, villify and condemn it, as what must fall before you, and acknowledge your ministration first and last: and besides you pretend to the power of miracles, which if it were so, is no more than what the false prophet and unclean spirits could do, as before quoted: to be sure you have power to scare and terrify your own people especially, and make them believe just what you please: and indeed so / far as I myself believe you to be those deceivers here spoken of, I believe you to have the power of false miracles, for I have seen one that was of you, cause fire to come down from heaven, as I then thought, he being in a great rage, gave a violent screech and stamp with his foot, at which instant I saw a flash of fire or lightning all at one and the same instant. Another person told me that he saw the same thing at another time. One time when I was at the church, as elder William came out of his room, he said he heard a clap of thunder among the dead, and saw the lightning. Here observe, we read that these things shall be done by the beast, which includes the false prophet and unclean spirits; but not a word of any such thing is ever said shall be seen or done among the people of God. I would just further say, you have the power of deception, to shift and turn yourselves into every shape to deceive. 4thly, Signs and lying wonders every body that knows you, knows that you are full of signs: signs with the hand, poking, pointing, reaching, swinging, touching, stroking, striking shaking, and the like: as also on the floor falling down, rolling tumbling, wallowing, kicking, thumping, pitching over, roaring, crying, screaming, hollowing &c. as also being led about by signs, following the hand this way and that: moreover hissing, mouthing, lolling out the tongue, grinning, biting, glaring, / with many strange postures of the body and limbs: besides great trembling, shaking, turning, twitching, stamping with a started voice, now and then hollowing out sharp and sudden. Now whether you call these signs good or bad, they are among you, and exactly agree with this prediction, and where do you see it else? 5thly, Lying wonders and signs without meaning or signification, are the same thing: yet there are other things that may more properly be considered as what is meant by lying wonders, to wit. visions, which are very frequent and wonderful, yet little or no truth in them, and nothing to be known by them as I can see. Even the mother’s visions were no better, for I have often heard of a vision that she had of you, in which she saw you in the very act of copulation with a woman; which you must own was a lying wonder, or betray your guilt; either of which dethrones you. Again Eleazer Goodrich’s70 revelation at Amos Rathbun’s, where he charged a man with murdering a person in times past, and of having a design then of murdering a woman, and her two children, and to prevent which, sent two men privately to watch the house the night it was to be done, which turned out be a lying wonder. I did not see this myself; but often heard the story and I believed it, even altho’ I was then in that faith; / but I saw him a day or two after a Ezekiel Goodrich’s, where as though he was Christ, took the judgment

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seat, cut off a number of souls, and sentenced them to hell; baptized several persons in the name of the Trinity; and saying he that betrayed him was at hand: then putting one hand to his forehead, pushing it back and with the other hand, with his forefinger, would saw across his throat, repeating the sign several timer over, and saying again, that he that betrayed him was at hand; and that in three days, he should be perfected; at which I, and I believe all the rest present, thought that the man, whom he had accused of murder at Amos Rathbun’s, had a design against his life; for I found by his expressions, that it was he that should betray him; I tarried till late at night before I went home, and afterward enquired, and found that nobody came neither then, nor afterward to give him any disturbance; which though attended with such a mighty power, and signs, as would scare people into the belief of it; yet was but a lying wonder. I could mention the names of a considerable number of persons that have been cut off, and received the sentence of damnation from those that have assumed the judgment seat, one of which was confirmed by the mother; who has since been restored, and is now in good standing among you: and I was knowing that his sentence / was everlasting woe; and never to find repentance: I have been often scared and terrified almost out of my wits by such things, till I found that great part if not all, was but lying wonders: I have had to run to the relief of your people in Tyringham,71 with all speed while I was in that way, who were in the utmost confusion, almost in distraction and despair, by the havock which William Allen and his wife, and some others made in that place, by their lying wonders; yea one of them that was a believer in your way told me, that in one of his wives high religious turns, he never saw any creature so full of lying wonder as she was. I saw the mother one time, in a great rage with one of Elijah Wiles’s sisters, for something she had said about the church, she cut her off, and gave her wholly to the devil as I took it, and said, that within a fortnight she would hang herself, as there was a God. These I think were exactly her words, which terrified me very much, believing then as I had been taught, that not one of her words could fail; but no such thing happened, for I have long since seen the girl alive and well. At another time, I heard the mother tell a vision to Nathan Goodrich,72 how she saw the great angel of God going forth, blowing his trumpet, and his brother Ezekiel73 that was dead was with him, and that she had a particular command from them, or / from God, to come to his house, and warn him of approaching death; and admonish him to set his house in order. This is now above a year and half ago, and the man is, yet alive and well I believe, for I live not far from him. There was also a prophesy uttered by one of the brethren, that Albany should be destroyed within one year from that time, which is I think about three years ago; but I heard but lately it stands safe yet; and all with the greatest assurances, and yet absolutely lying wonders; and what makes them such, is because they are not true, for the events prove it; and yet you have the confidence to threaten people with the judgments

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of God, damnation and the bottomless pit, if they do not believe, and subject to your lead and government; by which many are terrified into it; others being won by flatteries are taken in and led away by it. But 6thly, deceivableness of unrighteousness, making use of scripture, such as suits your turn, to catch and entangle them that hear you, when at the same time it is a declared principle among those of you that are strong, that you are in a new day and dispensation, beyond the bible and do not mean to go by it, nor make any rule of it; at the same time you will hold forth certain perfect rules in scripture, to convict people of their imperfection and short coming, and thereby destroy all the faith, in what they had / received, and by telling them that you are perfect draw them away after you: is not this deceivableness of unrighteousness, first to make use of scripture to decoy and catch others, which you will not own nor go by yourselves? secondly, to destroy all their former faith by the scripture, and build them up in another without the scripture, often quoting your visions, revelations, unknown tongues and prophesy, as the infallible evidence of your being the only people of God in the world: which however I think, upon a proper discussion of matters, is no more nor less then what is given in this and the like character, as the distinguishing marks, of the greatest deceivers spoken of in the whole bible, I have been much burdened latterly, with almost all your expositions of scripture believing that you corrupted the word, and perverted the people; whether ignorantly or designedly I leave; but you would certainly read wrong, and put a wrong construction upon it; which whether it were ignorance or craft in you, it certainly disqualifies you for the high station you assume, and proves there is no such thing as perfection and infallibility in you, as you pretend. I shall give but only one instance, Rom. 11, 22. Behold therefore; the goodness and severity of God, on them which fell, severity; which was speaking of the fall of the Jews through unbelief. But you would read it thus, on / them which feel severity, persuading the people from the words, that it was the goodness of God to them for to feel severity, and take the liberty to be more severe, and cruel to them as I thought. This you would often mention, and whether you know better yet, or not, I cannot tell; for I was so kept under I dared not tell you of it. Now elder James, upon the whole, if you should deny this character here given by St. Paul to be yours, I beg you would tell me whose it is, and make out the comparison to demonstration as I have done in reference to you, by comparing what I have found amongst you in fact; with those particular passages of scripture herein referred to. For nothing is certainly known to be right or wrong, but by the sacred record of truth, which is given as a rule to try the spirits by; which is the next thing to be considered. I John 4, 1, Beloved, believe not every spirit, but try the spirits whether they are of God: Because many false prophets are gone out into the world. As if he had said prove them, compare and try them, by the rules that I give you, and by the written word of God, But elder James, you will not allow of it; But you say,

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we must believe and obey what you say at a venture, or go to hell: herein therefore is a trial of the spirits at once, verse 2; hereby know ye the spirit of God; every spirit that confesseth that Jesus Christ is / come in the flesh is of God: here is an infallible rule given, to try the spirits by; and no man can say, that Jesus is the Lord; but by the Holy Ghost; neither can any man confess that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh, but they that have received him; viz. his spirit, his words and gospel; neither can any man confess Christ, that does not know Christ; and he that saith he knows him, and keepeth not his commands is a liar, and the truth is not in him. I John 2, 4, But again, it was a thing well understood in the days of the Apostles, that Christ was come in the flesh, for the destruction of the flesh; therefore to confess Christ come in the flesh, is to confess the body of sin destroyed, to wit; the carnal mind which is a fleshly mind, vicious habits, appetites and inclinations of the flesh destroyed; as appears Colos. 2, 11, in whom also you are circumcised with the circumcision made without hands, in putting off the body of the sins of the flesh, by the circumcision of Christ; as if he should say, in whom also ye are cut off, with the cutting off made without hands, in the putting of the body of the sins of the flesh, by the cutting off of Christ; mark, circumcision under the law, was a figure of the cutting off of Christ, or the body of the sins of the flesh, which body of sins, Christ takes upon himself, in behalf of all his elect in a special manner, and was cut off for them. Therefore / as it is said, that Christ our passover was slain for us, even so Christ our body of sins was cut off for us; in whom we have redemption through his blood; even the forgiveness of sins: again, I Peter 4, 1, forasmuch then, as Christ hath suffered for us in the flesh, arm yourselves with the same mind; for he that hath suffered in the flesh, hath ceased from sin. Rom. 6, 6, knowing this, that our old man is crucified with him, that the body of sin might be destroyed, that henceforth we should not serve sin; verse 7th for he that is dead, is freed from sin, as if he had said, by Christ’s dying for us, we are dead to sin: verse 8th now if we be dead with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with him; which death to sin, and life in Christ Jesus, we obtain or come into possession of, through faith in him; and not for any thing that we have done, or can do. Therefore whosoever confesseth, that Jesus a Christ is come in the flesh in a gospel sense, is of God, and feels his soul delivered from the flesh, by Christ’s coming in the flesh, and if he cannot express it experimentally for himself, it is no confession at all; he is antichrist or of antichrist. Now elder James, I do not remember of ever hearing any such things as these among you, the whole four years and half that I was with you, nor have I the least idea, that you have any expectation of salvation by him that died on calvary, according to the / ministration given by him and his apostles in that day. But it was mothers ministry, and mothers sufferings while she lived, and now it is yours.

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But I desire your further attention, Rom.8–8, so then they that are in the flesh cannot please God, to wit, they that are not delivered from the body of the sins of the flesh through faith in Christ cannot please God, for such are in the flesh in the sense of the text, and may be known by their fruit, as we find Gal. 5–19, now the works of the flesh are manifest, which are these, adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lasciviousness: verse 20, idolatry, witchcraft, hatred, variance, emulations, wrath, strifes, seditions, heresies: verse 21, envying, murders, drukenness, reveling, and such like, of the which I tell you before, as I have also told you in time past, that they that do such things shall not inherit the kingdom of God. Now elder James, first, I cannot say that you in particular are guilty of adultery or fornication in a natural sense, tho’ you may be in the highest degree, in a scriptural sense; but it is evident there is many that are of you, who are guilty in the natural way. 2dly, I suppose that filthy dreams74 defiles the flesh, and is uncleanness, Jude 8 verse, of which there is more among you I believe, than any where else, as I am greatly knowing, having been a father confessor among you. 3dly, And I suppose / that for you to order men and women to strip naked and dance, and go swim together, is laciviousness. 4thly, And I suppose there was never more abominable idolatry commited than there is among you, by their making a God of you, and you of yourself. 5thly, And I suppose that all seducers are witches and wizzards, and all false doctrines heresies, and delusions are witchcraft. The Galatians were bewitched in that way, which is no doubt the apostles meaning here. 6thly, And hatred here spoken of evidently abounds among you, especially against those that are in opposition. It is a common thing to hear one and another of you express your hatred against such and such ones when you are commanded to hate no man, and to love your enemies. 7thly, Again, variance, I have seen and heard much of even among you that call yourselves the church, and elsewhere among you. 8thly, Emulation is envy and disdain, striving to go beyond others. And do you not set yourselves up above all others, and even envy and disdain them; but more especially those that are not of you. I have heard elder John Partington tell a man that was a believer among you, that he felt as if his soul disdained the other man’s soul. 9thly, Again, wrath is so apparent, their needs no particular inferences given: you call it the wrath of God, which I doubt of; but if it were so, where is any gospel / rule for you to act it out in the manner you do? It is put into this catalogue as the works of flesh. 10thly, And again, strife is among you it in a high degree, far beyond what I ever saw it in any other people, professor or prophane I think. 11th, Also sedition, breaking up families, setting some against the others and bringing the greatest confusion, trouble and distress upon them, if they would not all come into your way. It would be too tedious to mention the number of families that are broken by what I suppose to be sedition, one set against another: and where there is any of your sort of people in a family, they must have the rules, if it be but a child, or

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quit the family, tho’ against the parents will and commands. 12th, Again, Heresies, I suppose, that all that is held to or preached up contrary to the bible, is heresy; at least I take that to be the apostle’s sense of it: and I do not see wherein you go by it, or according to it at all. 13th, And again envyings, I leave it to you elder James whether you do not envy me, if not, see if there is none else of you that do, for I suspect them. 14th, Again, murders. I do not think that you have designedly murdered any body; but I believe you have been the cause of many deaths by driving people beyond their strength: I would only give my opinion in this and leave it to God. 15th, Again, drunkenness, this is also among you, / and is what I so often complained of, as you will likely remember, and what first began to open my eyes to see other misdemeanours. Lastly, revelings, are high carousing dances, this or something very much like it I think is also among you in the highest degree, all which the apostle says are the works of the flesh: and as he had told them before, he tells them again, that they that do such things shall not inherit the kingdom of God. Now then I would make this inference, that whoever does these works of the flesh, has not the body of sin destroyed in him, and therefore Christ is not come in him, pretend what he will: nor does he, nor can he confess that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh, and therefore not of God: he is anti-christ, as saith the apostle. But once more verse 6th, we are of God: he that knoweth God heareth us: he that is not of God, heareth not us, hereby know we the spirit of truth, and the spirit of error. Here the apostle peremptorily declares, that they in that day were of God, and they that know God would hear them; But you say you know God, and yet will not hear them, nor go by them. Here you contradict the apostle, and fleeing again to the horns of your old alter for refuge, by pretending that you are in a new dispensation beyond them, which is a covering for every variation from them. What right then have you to take this passage of scripture from them / as you do, and apply it to yourselves? and now call upon others in their words to come to your terms, saying; they that know God heareth you, and they that are not of God heareth not you. Is not this imposing upon people with craft and deception? But the apostle has determined it, that if you or any other will not hear them, you are not of God: and tells us that hereby we shall know the spirit of truth, and the spirit of error. But now having tried the spirit by the help of God thus far, I shall close this head in the words of St. Paul, Eph. 4–14, that we henceforth be no more children, tossed to and fro, and carried about with every wind of doctrine, by the flight of men and cunning craftiness whereby they lie in weight to deceive. But again for a further trial of the spirits by the word, in a more general sense, in which I pray God give me an impartial mind, and understanding; Isaiah 8, 19. And when they shall say unto you, seek unto them that have familiar spirits, and unto wizards that peep, and that mutter; should not a people seek unto their God? For the living to the dead? It is certain elder James, that you have a number of persons out abroad in

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the world, great part of the time, if not all, who are persuading people to seek unto you, and it is as certain, that spirits do attend you, and speak to you and you to them: I do not say you are wizards; but I think I may say that / you are constantly peeping in every dark hole and corner, to spy out something amiss in people. And the definition of muttering, is speaking confusedly; and it appears to me, that you did all make a God of the mother; and though she is dead, you seek to her for the living that is, them that are alive. I do now really think, I have not strained any one point; but have given a short and true account of things as they be. Here the prophet as much as says, when any shall say unto you, to seek to such a people as this, then he says verse 20th, To the law and to the testimony; if they speak not according to this word, it is because there is no light in them: which he refers to, as a rule to try them by; which appears to me, as an infallible proof against you; seeing you have renounced the law and testimony. And where, or whenever, we find a people whose marks and character exactly agree with this prediction, let it be in what day or age of the world it will, they are the people intended; and it may be expected, that when men leave the scriptures, and follow their own feelings and conceptions, they are not only in danger of being imposed upon; but often run into the highest enthusiasm therefore to the law and testimony. Now I leave you to make what reflections you please upon it: while I proceed to another passage of scripture. Jude 3d verse. Beloved, when I gave all diligence / to write unto you, of the common salvations it was needful for me to write unto you, and exhort you, that you should earnestly contend for the faith, that was once delivered to the Saints, to wit, the same faith that the Apostles had in the atoning blood and righteousness of Jesus Christ, according to their doctrine and testimony, which agrees with the prophet Isaiah, as recited above; to the law and to the testimony &c. And therefore there is no other law nor testimony, nor faith, nor ever will be that God will own; till the final, and last appearing of our Lord Jesus Christ; as you may see, II [iThess. 1, 10, When he shall come, to be glorified in his Saints, and to be admired in all them that believe; Because our testimony among you, was believed in that day. Again, Jude 4th verse, But there are certain men crept in unawares, who were before of old ordained unto this condemnation, ungodly men, turning the grace of God into lasciviousness, and denying the only Lord God, and our Lord Jesus Christ. This agrees with II Peter 2, 1, Wherein they are called false teachers, who should privily bring in damnable heresies, even denying the Lord that bought them, and bring upon themselves swift destruction. I believe, that turning the grace of God into lasciviousness, is turning religion into baudy and balderdash language and behaviour, which I have seen / and heard to an excessive degree among you, enough to abash and dash the countenances, of all modest people. Here observe, the Apostle says, it was those false teachers, that turned the grace of God into lasciviousness; and you set up for teachers, and are found in these things. He says

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those ungodly men crept in unawares, and it is true we were not aware of such things among you, when we first joined you, nor had we then any idea, of such doctrines as you now hold forth, nor of such discipline, nor of such practices and behaviour so inconsistent with reason and scripture. And Peter says, those false teachers, should privily bring in damnable heresies, to wit, doctrines contrary to scripture, even denying the Lord that bought them. And I think, I have abundantly shewn already, wherein you deny both God and Christ; but what is in you, as head or chief since the mother’s death; why now elder James, I cannot see, but that you fall into this character, which if it be so, you are in danger of swift destruction. For he that is able to characterise from ancient times, was able to tell the fate. Jude 8 verse, Likewise also these filthy dreamers defile the flesh, despise dominion, and speak evil of dignities; now whoever does these things, are the persons or people intended: and by your forbidding to marry, your people are become filthy dreamers, I certainly know, by my own / experience, and by the frequent confessions of others, for when nature is every other way restrained, it takes its course that way, and becomes habitual. And again, it is natural for those that set themselves up above all others, in power and dignity, to despise and speak evil of them: which is beyond what Michael the Archangel, dared to do to the devil; verse 10. But these speak evil of those things which they know not; but what they know naturally as brute beasts; in those things they corrupt themselves. Peter says, and shall utterly perish in their own corruption; verse 11th. He pronounces a woe against them, and compares them with Cain, and Balaam and Core. Now elder James, I desire not to magnify, not to misapply things, but certainly, Cain was a murderer, Balaam was after a reward, and Core was a gainsayer: here the apostle Jude was pointing out a people, that are like them; but first I would observe, that love and hatred, are the greatest marks of distinction between the children of God, and the children of the devil, as you may see I. John 3–15, whosoever hateth his brother is a murderer, and ye know that no murderer hath eternal life abiding in him; but on the other hand I. John, 4–7, beloved let us love one another, for love is of God: and every one that loveth, is born of God, and knoweth God. Now to / take you as a people you are full of violent expressions of hatred against all others, but your own sect; and all such I think are of Cain’s denomination; for there is no such thing as hating a brother or fellow creature in the kingdom of Christ: and he that hates feels like a murderer, and is such, and therefore of Cain. But again, when you first began to call upon us to give up our estates to you,75 it was with this pretence, that the poor and the rich should all fare alike; but instead of that, the poor are neglected and much poorer than they were before, and you are living away upon what the rich bring in, and building a large vessel with it,76 and likely intend to carry off what you can get, and leave the poor to shurk for themselves. This I take to be running greedily after the error of Balaam for reward – concern-

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ing whom we read, II. Peter, 2–14, an heart they have, exercised with covetous practices, cursed children, verse 15, which have forsaken the right way, and are gone astray, following the way of Balaam, the son of Boser, who loved the wages of unrighteousness. But again, with respect to the gainsaying of Core, he rose up with his company, and said the congregation of the Lord was all holy; and it seems did not incline to obey Moses and Aaron, but gainsayed them. And now you are risen up with a company, saying the congregation of the Lord / are all holy – meaning your own company, and are gainsaying Moses and Aaron, yea Christ and his apostles too, and will not obey them, not follow their lead; but are set out for yourselves another way. Again, verse 17, these are wells without water – clouds that are carried with a tempest, to whom the mist of darkness is reserved forever: compared with Jude 13th verse, raging waves of the sea foaming out their own shame: wandering stars, to whom is reserved the blackness of darkness forever. I think these wells without water, may be aptly applied to teachers without knowledge: and clouds carried with a tempest, to people driven on with the rapid spirit of enthusiasm: and raging waves of the sea foaming out their own shame, to those whose religion consists much in anger and violence, and shameful indecensies: and wandering stars to those who have departed from the law and testimony of God – all which so exactly resembles what may abundantly be seen among you, that I can make no distinction: verse 14th, and Enoch also, the seventh from Adam, prophesied of these, &c. Again verse 16th, these are murmurers, complainers, walking after their own lusts, and their mouth speaketh great swelling words, having mens persons in admiration because of advantage. First then, I suppose that finding a great deal of fault and being often displeased, is to murmur and complain: / and to eat and drink to excess, if that were all, is waking after their own lust: and great swelling words are bold, confident, presumptuous expressions: and to shew more respect to the rich and honorable than to the poor and despised, is an evidence of having their persons in admiration for some advantage thereby. Now elder James, I leave it to you whether you do not show more respect and take more pains to keep Esq. Joseph Bennet,77 David Meechem,78 Joseph Merkum,79 Jeremiah Williard, David Hammon, and such like persons, than you have done to David Mudge, Thadius Hoburt, Ebenezer Davis, and Moses Crane – but you have lost these people, and they are gone off – this is as you say, beyond the bible, II. Tim. 3–1, this know also, that in the last days perilous times shall come, that is, times of great danger – of people’s being led away by designing men, under a pretence of religion, into what is exprest, verse 2d, for men shall be lovers of their ownselves, covetous, boasters, proud blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy. Now elder James, there is indeed a great appearance of love among yourselves, and of as much hatred to all others: and as to covetousness God will be your judge, but this is certain, that you do take away men’s estates, and do not give to the poor

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neither; but consume it among yourselves. And as to your being / proud, I really think there is the greatest appearance of pride, haughtiness, scornfulness, and disdain, both in words and behaviour among you, that I ever saw in any professing people: and I think you are great boasters of your extraordinary gifts, of your pure and senseless lives, of your denial and cross, in all which you go not beyond others, as I can see, except it be in refraining women, which is but an error: in all other things, I think you take more liberty than people generally do, and in this view of yourselves, you look down upon others with anger and disdain, because they do not do as you do, and be as good as you be. He next mentions blasphemers, and I think for you to set up the mother above Christ, as you really did, and since she is dead, for you and your people, to set yourself up above Christ, as I take it you do, is blasphemy: and I think for you or any of you, to call every other God, and Christ, but what is in you the devil, old Belzebub, which you do, is also blasphemy: and I think for you to curse the God that I worshipped, in plain and bold terms, as you have done, was also blasphemy. Then he says, disobedient to parents: in your order the children of believing parents, must obey their parents so long as they can keep before them; but if the child out travels his parents, in your Judgment of the matter, the child takes the lead and government / of his parents, and that with great severity; But the children of unbelieving parents, must win them over to the faith, or quit them, though they be under age, and against their parents will and commands, and ever after, treat them very villainously in words especially: and it may be observed and known, that such children, are very unthankful to their parents, for any thing they ever received from them, and such I believe to be unholy as is said above. But again, verse 3d: Without natural affection, truce brakers, false accusers, Inconsistent, fierce, despisers of those that are good. First, it is an essential article in your system of religion, to wholly destroy and root out all natural affection: nor are they proper members of your community, till they are without natural affection; and then they become implacable, unmerciful, as you may see in the same words: Rom. 1, 31. Secondly, truce breakers, this is called Rom. 1, 21, covenant breakers, and it is true you do break the most solemn covenants, between husbands and wives, which is apparent: and without doubt many between young men and maids, that lies hid, and it is a wonder, if many covenants have not been broken by you, that Souls has made to serve God, in a different way from this: and I think you do all in your power, to break the covenant of grace, and set people to work, a one side of both law and / gospel: and to depend upon you for salvation. Thirdly, false accusers, this is a general complaint against you, and what has so universally incencsed people against you, and when any of you would get buffeted for it, you would call it persecution; when perhaps it was only for your faults. 4thly, Inconsistent, this is lusting, and take you as a people, I believe there is a constant raging, of lust among you, being prohibited all access to women. And 5thly, fierce despisers, of

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those that are good, now I think you cannot deny, but that you effect to be fierce, and if you discover any among you, that are languid and low, you fall upon them and bounce them about, till you wake them up, and make them as fierce, as so many red hot heaters; till you habituate them to it, and in this frame they become such fierce despisers of all others that are not of them, and like them; nor will you suffer them to come short of this: and this you call your testimony against the wicked and sin. But again 4th verse, Traitors, heady, high minded, lovers of pleasure, more than lovers of God. First then I remember, that when we come first among you, some were scrupulous of confessing their sins, for fear it would be known, you told them they need not fear for that, for you kept all close, and never let the world know any thing of such matters; but since that you betray all those secrets in general, / if not the particular persons: and it is very common for one brother or sister to betray another to the church, and get them severely chastised, and they are encouraged in it, yea children are scrutinized by the church, and made to betray every thing they know against their parents, which I have seen, and it looks to me like treachery. Again, 2dly, heady, high minded, viz. will have your way, being above, and knowing better than all others, and this is true: for if you found out at any time, that any of us only thought by way of question, in our own minds, whether you was right or not, in such or such a case, you would be upon us like so many lions, with chastisement: and this looks to me like being heady, and high minded. And again 3dly. Lovers of pleasure more than lovers of God: agree all with this is that, Rom 1, 32, Who knowing the judgments of God, that they that commit such things, are worthy of death, not only do the same, but have pleasure in them that do them. From which it appears, that they took pleasure in those things, and in them that did them; and loved that more than they did God. Therefore, whoever does these things themselves that are here spoken of by the apostle, and takes pleasure in others that do the same, they are the persons intended, verse 5, having a form of godliness, but denying the power / thereof – from such also turn away, as if he should say, having an appearance of godliness transformed into the ministers of Christ, pretending godliness, and at the same time denying the power and efficacy of Christ’s gospel for our salvation: or that there is any power that can save souls, but what is in themselves, from such turn away: verse 6th, for of this sort are they that creep into houses and lead captive silly women, laden with sins, and led away with divers lusts. Such women as these are easily convicted of their dangerous situation, and are liable to be taken captive, and led away by those that pretend to be perfect, able to bare their burdens and unlaid them of their sins; and this is the craft of deceivers, to creep into houses, working first with the women, to get the man, and then the whole house or family; as the Philistines first wrought with Delilah to get Sampson: and so Titus 1–11, subvert whole houses, teaching things which they ought not for

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filthy lucres sake, or for their estates: verse 7th, ever learning and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth. This is the case with your poor people, continually going for instruction, and growing more ignorant, which differs entirely from what St. Paul tells us shall be in the new covenant state: Hebrews 8–11, and they shall not teach every man his neighbour, and every man his brother, saying, know the / Lord, for all shall know me, from the least to the greatest. Again, I. John, 2–27, but the anointing which ye have received of him abideth in you, and ye need not that any man teach you, but as the same anointing teacheth you of all things and is truth, and is no lie, and even as it (mind as it) hath taught you, ye shall abide in him. Again, Christ says, John 16–13, how be it, when the spirit of truth is come, he will guide you into all truth – not you elder James. But to proceed, verse 8th, now as Jannes and Jambres withstood Moses, so do these also resist the truth, men of corrupt minds, reprobate concerning the faith. Observe here, the apostle says, that as they withstood Moses, so does these resist the truth, which truth is what the prophets and apostles have wrote, and when the spirit of truth comes in any one, it leads into all truth, that is into the volume of the scriptures, and gives him to see and feel, the truth and reality of them, for when Christ comes, he comes according to scriptures, not to destroy the law and prophets, and when he comes again, either by his spirit to gather his elect, or personally to judgment, he will not destroy his own gospel or ministration already given – and this you say is what we cannot be saved by it, neither yet by Christ, in a once crucified Christ; but you say we must be saved by faith in a Christ that is come in the mother, Hereby / I suppose you resist the truth, for why could we not be saved by a Christ come in any body else as well? these, the apostle says are men of corrupt minds, reprobate concerning the faith, which faith is that the apostle had, in a once crucified Christ. But to conclude: – with respect to Christ being come in you, there is nothing appears to make it evident; but to the contrary: and indeed there is no such thing as Christ’s coming in the manner you pretend, so long as there is any exalting themselves above God in his temple, for his coming will be their destruction, as the rising sun dispels darkness. Another reason I would offer, and that is what the apostle Peter speaking of Christ says, Acts 3–21, whom the heavens must receive, until the times of restitution of all things. Again, I. Cor. 15–28, and when all things shall be subdued unto him, then shall the Son also himself be subject unto him that put all things under him, that God may be all in all. First, we see not yet the restitution of all things to their primitive rectitude, until which time the heaven is to retain him. Again 2dly, all things are not yet subdued unto him, seeing there are so many usurpers yet extant.

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Christian Friends, AFTER having concluded my letter to James Whittacor, I think myself under / obligations to tell you how I came to fall in with the people called Shakers, and how I was led out from them. First. I having been a professor in the baptist order,80 for a number of years: at length, hearing of a strange people at Nisqueuniah, about nine miles north west from Albany, and being previously possessed of an opinion from certain passages of scripture, that about this time, Christ was to make his second appearance some where or other, and hoping it might be among them, I went to see them, and found a very sensible, religious people to appearance. They received and treated me very kindly, and after a while began some conversation, intimating they had attained the great and wonderful things, even the apostolic gifts. They sang together after shaking awhile, and then the mother spake in her unknown tongue: afterward came together and began to question on me, whether I thought I was born again or not? I said that I had a hope: they asked me if I did not commit sin – I did not deny it, then they took the bible and turned to that in John, he that is born of God, doth not commit sin: he that sinneth is of the devil: he that sineth hath not seen him, neither knows him, &c. and all with such a grace and solemnity, and I being ignorant, brought me to a pause: they pretended they were perfect, and stood with Christ in full redemption: and that / Christ had made his second appearance in them: and that they had the word of God, for all such as would believe in his second appearing: had much talk this evening: the next day I took a kind leave of them, and returned home full of thoughts, and wondering at the strange things that I had heard and seen. Soon after I made them another visit, when they taught me the necessity of confession of sins, shewing scripture warrant for it, and urged it upon me, as what they had all come into, in order to obtain repentance and salvation from sin – insinuating that if I would obey the word of God through them, I might soon attain to the same great and glorious things. This being for what I knew what I was looking for, I complied, thinking it would do me no hurt if it did me no good, at the same time many others ran to see as I did, & fell in, they pretended as I said, to have the fame apostolic gifts, and there was so much of a resemblance, I knew not but that it might be so, and there was the most extraordinary appearance of love and union among them, that I ever saw. I began to think I had found the people I was looking for, and the millennium was begun. We had now set out for perfection, and began to forget our old religion, and attend to the new lead: we had confessed our sins, and began to think ourselves better then others: felt very joyfull, inviting / everybody to come and go with us to Mount Zion. They strictly enjoined it upon us to search our hearts, and make full confession of all former sins, and to practice confession to them of all future sins, of thought, word, and deed: and after a while, they began to teach us the necessity of forsaking all for

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Christ, and to refrain from our wives, saying, if ye live after the flesh, ye shall die; but if ye through the spirit do mortify the deeds of the body, ye shall live. They said moreover, that the act of copulation was the forbidden fruit in the garden, which being taken, procured our fall and loss: this we also complied with, still thinking that as we did more we grew better. All was yet calm and mild. After a while a again, they taught us the necessity of laying all at the apostle’s feet – shewing scripture for it, and give up all to their disposal for the relief of the poor, saying, let the brother of low degree rejoice in that he is exalted; and let the brother of high degree rejoice in that he is made low, refering to scripture, which we could more easily do, having given up our wives, we cared not much what became of all the rest. By and by they began to dance: this shocked me very much; but they read, Jeremiah 31–13, then shall the virgin rejoice in the dance, both young men and old together: faying, this was that day. In a little time they carried those dances into great fatigue / and labour, for the mortification of the flesh. I began now to think I must obey every command of God, in order to obtain perfection; but they taught me to look wholly to them, who were the only lead of God for my soul, as Moses was to the children of Israel: they were for a time for what I could see, strict in their morals, severe in their discipline, and constant in their devotions. This looked to me to be right: I began to think we were the only people of God, and that the whole world lay in wickedness: we thought we obeyed God, and therefore could not fail of finding acceptance with him: and that all others that did not do as we did, would certainly be lost. We were taught to believe in the mother, and be obedient to our instruction, and thereby we should believe in Christ, and obey him in his second appearing; they often quoting these words, that Christ was the author of eternal salvation to all them that obey him, which was to obey the Mother, Christ being come in her, and by whom he speaks to us, as the children of Israel obeyed. God in obeying Moses, by whom God speaks to them, and her ministration being attended with visions, revelations, unknown tongues, and prophesy to all appearance as we accepted, we dared not but believe what they said, and that they were what they pretended to be: they often threatnining of us with damnation, and the loss of / our souls, if we disbelieved and disobeyed them. This drew our attention to them in neglect of the bible, or any other God or Christ but what was in them, which was what they often said, and would insist upon it, that there was no saviour but what was in them: thus was I caught and carried away, believing it must be right, and yet some how or other at length found it all gendered to bondage, and knew not how, for I had done my utmost, and meant to do it still in obeying God; yet such trouble and distress would often come upon me, I knew not how, nor for what; but it felt like the bands of death: it would first set me a groaning, and as my distress increased to hollowing, like a man void of reason; and after long enduring such things, I have gone to the church and told the mother how it was

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with me. She would speak comfortably to me, and send me into the dance, and hurry us round, and make us as jovial as possible, and labour it off, and then resume great cheerfulness again – and this became a general practice to get rid of our burdens. I might not follow any teachings of God in my own soul a one side of the mother’s instructions, and I was taught by the elders, that God would not hear me no more than he would a devil: I must go to the mother and elders, and they must pray for me, and teach me; this had a tendency to cut me off from seeking any where / else but to them. I began now to be in great trouble at times, fearing all was not right; but I had got in, and could not get out: felt desolate and lost, and all I had now to build any hopes of salvation upon, was my obedience to their instructions and orders; and the further I went the more I felt involved. Oh! what a bondman I have been in Egypt, and shut up in Babylon, and could not get out: I began now to suspect I had missed my way to mount Zion, and come to Sinai, for I could hear little else but thunder and tempest: the sound of a trumpet in the nature of it, and the voice of words: a fiery law and dreadful curses: old Pharoah saying ye are idle, or in their own words, ye are slothful, ye are slothful, and if you are not a thousand times more faithful then ever you have been, you will loose your souls: the whole tale of brick required, and no straw given: perfection required without grace: and we were beaten by severe chastisement, and my soul groaned under cruel bondage, and these dreadful thunderings from the church, and chastisements within it they said was God’s roaring out of Zion, and I think uttering his voice from Jerusalem; and I did not know but that it was so, till about two years after I first joined them, when things that had lain hid began to rise and come to view, which I knew could not be good, and that gave me great doubts and / fears concerning the whole of that religion, and then my troubles increased: I was afraid to go forward or backward, for I had lost possession of every thing I dared trust to, yea I was afraid to read the bible, or believe any thing of it. To follow a corrupt lead would be fatal, and to join with any sect, looked to me like going back into Sodom. Here I stopped, like Israel at the red sea, and cried to God, nor could I help it then: yea my soul cried to God day and night: many times in the utmost confusion, almost in distraction & despair, and dared not stir one step, this way or that, by any detriment of mind, tho’ I went several times after this to the church, which would but increase my trouble, for seeing and hearing such things as I could not join with; I had been in great honour and respect among them, but was now fallen into contempt, my children ruled over me, and was set on by the mother to chastise me: one especially was made use of to reprove and chastise me openly and publickly for my coveteousness, in not giving up all I had to the church, and submitting, myself to their disposition. Elder John Partington was so hard upon me once in this matter, in a publick assembly, that he really scared and terrified me, with such great and terrible words and threatenings; and several others I supposed were set on by the

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mother to keep flouting and galling of me, if possible, / to force me to a compliance. This indeed brought great trials upon me: I dared not go and sell what I had and give it to them, except what came in victuals and cloathing, in which I suppose I was not behind any. They were also as hard upon me to make me renounce all other religion but theirs, and every idea of any God or Christ, but what was in them; and also to renounce all that ever I experienced, as something in the old heavens. They disapproved of my reading the bible, driving things to a great extremity with great words and dreadful threatnings, which would make me like Job, almost, if not quite long for death. After such trials I have gone out into the woods and fell on my knees and on my face, roaring and crying and telling God they were trying to force me to renounce him and deny Christ, which I dared not do, tho’ I should die for it. They told me abundantly, that God would not hear my cries and prayers no more than he would a devil: to their terms I must come, or go to hell. Here I was held a long time in Babylon at the red sea, and under Sinai’s dreadful thunders, in the mystery all at once, and felt myself under Job’s affliction: my friends that came to see me and labour with me being of this profession, who no doubt felt friendly to me, would read me off and condemn me, as Job’s friends did him, and try to terrify and / persuade me to renounce my old religion, ideas and notions of any other God or Christ than what was in the church; but my soul held its integrity, and often cried out in the language of Job, though he slay me yet will I trust in him. My breath, to wit, my words was strange to my wife; my children were all as it were dead to me, being all in that religion and against me: my worldly substance all gone from me as to any satisfaction in it, or enjoyment of it as heretofore, & tho’ I had seen many things erroneous and absurd among them, yet I dared not leave them in a profligate manner, nor resent any of their conduct; for I knew, be it as it might with others, it was God’s hand upon me, every despiteful word, and all the hard treatment I received from any, was God’s hand upon me, and correction from God by them, he suffering them so to do, and all this was just upon me: for I like the Galatians had left the faith of the gospel, and was seeking justification by the works of the law. But this I did not then yet see, but was determined to wait upon God, and die in Babylon or at the red sea, in the situation I was then in, for I could go no further till God delivered me, which I had a measure of faith to believe he would, in his own time and way: but after having through fear refrained reading the bible some time, and my troubles increasing, one day being in my house, and looking towards / the bible, thought with myself, O! how I used to love that book; but now I am afraid of it, and afraid of every thing, all is lost, and I am lost, and know not where to go; but thought again, I will go and take the bible and read, let come of it what will: and as God would have it, when I come to open the book and read, I found it spake to me, and into me, describing the state of my foul, and speaking the language of

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my heart, my soul had fellowship with it, and I knew that I was in the same travel that they had been in that wrote; I sensibly felt virtue and life from their words: now I again knew the bible was true; and my foul felt such a deliverance, that I could not read for crying, with love and joy and thankfulness to God, for his mercy to such a poor lost soul. I could scarce read any where, but it seemed to be new to me, and life in it; and I could scarce read a sentence, before I should burst out a crying again, with joy and thankfulness and love to God: it would speak so right into my soul, and my soul in the word, becoming one with it as Christ says, I in you, and you in me, that is his word abiding in us, and we abiding in his word, having fellowship with him, in and by his word. Here I found joy and peace in believing: I began now to try to recover my family again, to an adherance to the bible, which at length succeeded – who all came off with me, except my eldest daughter,81 who was sent away at a great / distance from the church, perhaps to keep her out of the way. Now I saw the necessity and importance of believing and obeying the scriptures: particularly the words of Christ, concerning false Christs, and false prophets, that should arise and shew great signs and wonders, and if it were possible, deceive the very elect: and also of those that should cry lo here is Christ, and lo there: he says believe them not: go not after them; but thro’ inconsideration and disobedience to the command of Christ, I went after them, and believed them, that Christ was come in them, and that the kingdom of God was come in them, when I ought to have looked for it, and found it in my own heart. Here I believe God gave me sorrow and repentance for departing from God, and putting confidence in creatures that could neither save themselves, nor them that trusted in them. Here God was pleased to divide the red sea of Christ’s blood; and open a way of redemption for my soul through faith in his blood, giving me to see the line of grace in distinction from the line of works, that I had been led along in under the old covenant and a broken law, where there was no possible salvation, till we were slain by it: Rom. 7–11, and become dead to it: Gal. 2–19, and wholly divorced from it: Rom. 7–3, and made alive through faith, in that all atoning blood and righteousness of Jesus Christ, who became the end of the law for righteousness to all them that believe: nor is the best doings / that ever man did or can do, since the gospel day, in order thereby to attain life and justification before God, any better, than if he had cut off a dog’s neck, or offered swines blood: Isaiah 66–3, and it is an infallible evidence, that he that is at work for life, has not got it, nor can he obtain it in that way, for this wholly sets Christ aside, and invalidates the gospel: and this was the cafe: Rom. 9–31, but Israel which followed after the law of righteousness hath not attained to the law of righteousness. Verse 32d. Wherefore? because they sought it not by faith, but as it were by the works of the law, for they stumbled at that stumbling stone. Again, Rom. 10–3, for they being ignorant of God’s righteousness, and going about to establish their own righteousness have not

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submitted themselves to the righteousness of God, which righteousness of God is Christ’s righteousness, which is become ours by imputation, through our faith in him, and this is certainly the case of these people called Shakers: they are endeavouring to establish their own righteousness by their own works, and yet come so short of it, as to fall into great abominations. Their whole dependance is upon their own doings for salvation: not so much as one word said about what Christ has done and suffered for us, among them; but it is what they themselves do, and the mother and elders suffer for them: and since her death, they expect / to suffer for their own sins, till they have paid the last mite: and the more they suffer here, the less they shall suffer in hell or purgatory, before they come out again: and if any attain to perfection here in this life, it must be by so much greater degrees of sufferings, and in this belief, they put themselves to all the hardships, fatigues and sufferings, they are possibly able to endure – and all this in order to obtain salvation, not expecting of it in any other way: and this is their new heaven’s state, which is wholly under the law of works, and entirely excludes Christ and the gospel, see Gal. 5–4, Christ is become of no effect unto you, whosoever of you are justified by the law, ye are fallen from grace. Again, Gal. 2–16, knowing that a man is not justified by the works of the law, but by the faith of Jesus Christ: even we have believed in Jesus Christ, that we may be justified by the faith of Christ, and not by the works of the law, for by the works of the law shall no flesh be justified. Again, for as many as are of the works of the law, are under the curse. Here I say God shewed me the legal line, where there was no salvation; for the law made nothing perfect, Heb. 7, 19. Again, Gal. 3, 21, for if there had been a law given, that could have been by the law. Again, Gal, 2, 21, for if righteousness came by the law, then Christ is dead in vain. By all which / it is evident, that all they that are at work, in what way or manner soever, expecting salvation by it, are under the law, and under the curse. Here I saw therefore there was no righteousness or perfection to be attained by the law, or by our own works; and all that I had done since I joined these people, or could possibly do, was no better then dross and dung, and that if ever any soul was sav’d, it would be by free grace, and not for works of righteousness that we have done; but of his own mercy he saved us, by the washing of regeneration, and renewing of the Holy Ghost – being justified freely by his grace, through the redemption that is in Jesus Christ. The old covenant was a covenant of works, which all mankind are under by nature, and condemned to death; but the new covenant was a covenant of grace – grace is the joyful sound to every new condemned criminal, and blessed are the people that know it. Grace is the essence of the gospel, its nature is to ransom and redeem, breaks every yoke and sets the prisoners free – it bestows freely wine and milk, without money and without price – & it is by grace we are saved through faith, and that not of ourselves, it is gift of God – not of works, least any man

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should boast, Eph. 2–8–9. Grace is free mercy and love of God to a lost world, in giving his only begotten son, that whosoever believeth in him, should not perish, but have everlasting life. Grace procures / a perfect and compleat righteousness, wrought out by Jesus Christ, in offering up himself a sacrifice to God for us, adequate, and that is every way answerable to the demands of the law, for all them that believe, and one discovery of this by faith, does more towards breaking my heart in godly sorrow and repentance, and exalting the Lord alone, and filling my soul with humiliation and love, and giving me more freedom of soul, than all that the legal system can afford. Grace makes us feel our dependence, and to value Christs blood; grace is the whole theme of them that art saved; by grace, in all their thank offerings and praises, they bring forth Christ the head stone with shouting, crying grace, grace unto it, Zach. 4, 7, not that the new covenant doctrines of grace and faith, destroys the necessity of obedience to the commands of God, for Christ says, I come not to destroy the law and the prophets, but to fulfill; and St. Paul says, do we then make void the law through faith, God forbid, ye we establish the law; but here is the defect among all the unregenerate, they do not love God, and therefore do not obey him, all that they do in the outward form of obedience, is from self and to self, and not to God, and what he he does is that he might find favour and acceptance of God by it; and to obtain life; but the renewed soul obeys from the heart, because he loves God, and loves his commands; / for no more does any one love God, then he loves his commands; hence David says, O! how love I thy law; and St. Paul says, I delight in the law of God after the inward man; and this they do, because they have obtained life; and from life, and the nature of God in them; which only is obedience, in the sense of the commands; again, here is another blunder men make, they think because God commands, they must obey; and so they must or be lost, except Christ obeys for them, and when they think they have obeyed, they think they shall be excepted; But alas! they have broke the law already, and the sentence is past against them, and die they must do what they can now, except through faith in Christ’s dying for them, they be acquitted: for this is true, he died for all, and has fulfilled and answered the demands of the law, both in it’s preceptive, and penal part, by his active and passive obedience, for all his elect: and they are thereby acquitted; nor has the law any demands upon them for they are dead to it; agreeable to Rom. 7, 4, Therefore my brethren ye are become dead to the law by the body of Christ. This was a wonderful deliverance to my soul, when God was pleased to open it unto me, and make it mine; I saw and felt too, that I was become dead to the law, by that crucified body of Christ; that it had its whole demand of him for me, that he had kept it for me, and suffered the penalty due to me, and I had nothing to do, but to believe and trust in him, / and love and obey him forever. Again, Rom. 5, 10, for if when we were enemies, we were reconciled to God, by the death of his son, much more being reconciled, we shall be saved

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by his life; here I saw, that it was the death of Christ, that reconciled us to God, and nothing of our own doings; and that our whole salvation depends upon the life of Christ; and because he lives we shall live also; John 4, 19, here I can say blessed be God, I knew what it was to eat the flesh of the Son of Man, and drink his blood by faith, as really and sensibly, as ever my body fed on temporal food, and found strength and nourishment thereby: his flesh was to eat indeed, and his blood was drink indeed, which any soul fed on by faith: for this flesh and blood of Christ was the sacrifice of atonement that made peace, and reconciled God and man again, and is the bread of life to the soul of the believer, as appears John 6–51, I am the living bread, which came down from heaven: if any man eat of this bread, he shall live forever: and the bread that I will give is my flesh, which I will give for the life of the world. Here is therefore full and free redemption, and whosoever does really believe these things does feel his soul saved. As Christ says, he that believes shall be saved. Thus when God was pleased to recover me again to the faith of the gospel, I felt my soul enter into rest, and ceased from its own works, as we read Heb. 4, 3, For we which have believed, do enter into rest: as he said &c. Again, verse 10th. For he that is entered into his rest, he also hath ceased from his own works, as God did from his. And this was the coming of Christ the kingdom of God, and the millennium began in my soul, which I had been trying to find; but could not by observation, or the works of the law. And now to conclude, in the words of King Jesus, Rev. 2, 2, I know thy works and thy labour, and thy patience, and how thou canst not bear them which are evil, and thou has tried them, which say they are Apostles and are not, and has found them liars.– FINIS.

‘SPECTATOR’, ‘THE PEOPLE CALLED SHAKERS’

‘Spectator’, ‘The People Called Shakers’, Massachusetts Spy: or, Worcester Gazette (Worcester, MA), 26 January 1786.

Despite continued negative publicity, Shakers finally received relatively balanced treatment in an anonymous article by a ‘Spectator’, published in the Massachusetts Spy on 26 January 1786. The venue of publication for this article is intriguing, in that the pages of the Spy had carried some of the most salacious stories circulating at the time about the Shakers, including the lurid tale of the axe-murderer James Yates.1 ‘Spectator’ claimed to present ‘Articles’ of the Shakers’ faith as agreed upon at a meeting of Shaker leaders. This seems highly unlikely, given that some of the supposed ‘Articles’ are not consistent with anything subsequently published by the Shakers regarding their beliefs. However, some of the tenets of Shakerism reported by ‘Spectator’ do accord with known Shaker beliefs. This account may very well be the earliest printed explication of Shaker beliefs written by a non-Shaker. Only Amos Taylor’s seventeen points of Shaker doctrine published in his 1782 Narrative (reprinted in this volume, pp. 29–40) pre-dates the list reproduced below, which comprises nineteen points.2 I have found no record of a conference of the Shaker leadership during 1784 or 1785 where such ‘Articles’ would have been agreed upon. However, this was a time of great tumult within the Shaker Church, when a leadership crisis created by the deaths of Mother Ann and Father William was being resolved. It is quite possible that such a meeting was held and that no other record of it survives. If this is the case then this report is all the more crucial to our understanding of the early Shakers. Bookseller and researcher David D. Newell is in the process of unravelling the history of the first printed work issued by the Shakers, the Concise Statement of the Principles of the Only True Church, which was published at Bennington, Vermont, in 1790. His research has persuaded him of the likelihood that an undated edition of the Concise Statement may have been published as early as 1785. Nevertheless, the contents of the following article and the Shakers’ Concise Statement are very different, indicating that it is unlikely that ‘Spectator’ had

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access to that publication. This account emphasizes Shaker doctrines such as the new dispensation available through Mother Ann, the confession of sins, spiritual resurrection (the Shakers’ belief that the resurrection was one of the spirit rather than the body), and the conversion of the dead. All of these beliefs were professed by Shakers well into the nineteenth century, and some are reflected in the Concise Statement. However, ‘Spectator’ errs when he states that the Shakers considered the last dispensation to have begun in 1776. The Concise Statement declares that it began in 1747.3 Additionally, alleged practices such as the whipping, or biting, of infants and others to drive out devils were surely never part of any written Shaker statement of beliefs. Actions such as whipping to drive out devils likely did occur during the most frenzied scenes of Shaker worship in the 1780s, but such actions were never codified as forms of Shaker worship. Consequently, it is unlikely that ‘Spectator’ knew of the Concise Statement. The author’s negative closing aside, stating that the Shakers ‘call Rum the Spirit of God!!’, precedes one of the earliest printings of the allegation that Mother Ann Lee was a habitual drunkard – a charge that was oft-repeated by apostate and anti-Shaker writers. Notes 1. 2. 3.

For the details of the Yates case see Goodwillie, ‘The Shakers in Eighteenth Century Newspapers, Part One’, pp. 161–82. Taylor, A Narrative of the Strange Principles, pp. 7–9. Meacham, A Concise Statement, p. 13.

‘Spectator’, ‘The People Called Shakers’, Massachusetts Spy: or, Worcester Gazette (Worcester, MA), 26 January 1786.

The people called SHAKERS have made so much noise in some parts of this Country, that many have been at the pains of long journies on purpose to find out their Scheme from their own mouths; it might perhaps save that trouble to others, as well as afford some satisfaction to all; if you should think proper to hand to the publick, through the channel of your useful paper, the following ARTICLES; which, having been avowedly maintained by themselves, in a Conference publickly held at one of their Meetings, were taken down, read, and discussed before them, by paragraphs, and affirmed by sundry of their Leaders, in the presence of a number of their disciples. 1. There is but one person in the Godhead. The word Christ does not mean any divine person; nor any thing but the attributes of wisdom and power. And the word Jesus does not signify any thing human; he was a man, indeed, when he suffered: but not since. 2. The word Holy Ghost signifies no divine person; but only a power or influence on the hearts of men which makes them believers; and that comes only from the word of the Mother.1 3. The Mother is the Spouse spoken of in the Canticles – the elect Lady in John’s Epistle – and the woman clothed with the Sun in the 11th of Revelations. She is holy – omniscient – and every where present as God himself is: – and as much to be revered, believed and obeyed, as he. She is the Lamb’s wife, and the mother of the Church; no blessing ever came down from heaven – nor shall any man ever ascend to that blessed state and world, but through her. Hence 4. None had ever gone to heaven before the year of our Lord 1776. That year was the Fulness of time, mentioned in the Scripture; for, then the old, literal dispensation of the gospel under Jesus ceased; to make room for the new Spiritual dispensation under the Mother: just as that of Moses withdrew when Jesus appeared. – 115 –

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5. The Scriptures are true, and given by divine inspiration; but they are all fulfilled already; except what is now completing in the Shakers. 6. These are the only true church, these are the 144,000 on Mount Zion with the Lamb: – In them Christ is come to the last judgment of the quick and dead. 7. For carrying on this great work, God was pleased to transfer his power, and all his gifts to the mother: and for the same purpose, she has commissioned seven fathers; who are perfect and holy as herself: by her concurrence with their labours, the number of the disciples already amounts to 14000; and this number will soon be enlarged so as to destroy all that will not receive their gospel, and then to fill all the world. 8. By this body, that gospel is to be preached to all the living and to all the dead; and whoever, of either class, believes – confesses – and forsakes all sin, shall certainly be saved – but all others eternally damned. 9. The gift of tongues – of miracles – and of discerning of Spirits is now imparted, through the mother, to this church; and the dead are daily coming before them to receive their final doom from their mouths. 10. In order to salvation it is necessary to confess all our sins to the Mother, or her elders – utterly to renounce marriage and all use of it – and never commit any sin for the future: but yield ourselves, and all that we have, up to the disposal of the church; and, be in all things, obedient to its directions. 11. Upon this confession, these leaders take all the sins of the proselyte on themselves – and set the new convert free; – and from that time he has no need to pay any regard to Sabbath – to baptism – to the supper – or any external ordinance – all these being already fulfilled for him: it is, however, incumbent on him to labour himself up to the perfection of God. 12. This they may do by any bodily work – none such being, in truth, an act of worship, more than another: But, yet, these labours must depend, for their kind and continuance, on the gift conferred at the time, this sometimes determines to one sort of labour, and sometimes to another, as laughing, singing, dancing, turning round, weeping, &c. &c. all which are appointed as means for mortifying the body and waking up the soul. 13. The church is now in the state of the resurrection, and equal to the angels; serving God perfectly every moment, and never commits one sin.

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14. But, if they should cease to labour, and be seduced by the devil to intermit the dance, they may fall away and die; and, in case they should they shall never have their bodies raised again: there being no resurrection but that in which they now stand. 15. To prevent this fall, they are ever fighting against devils, and expelling them from themselves and others; but all this combat is maintained in a bodily manner, the devils being visible to their bodily eyes; as the good angels also are. 16. They carry on very frequent dialogues with both angels, devils and departed souls – a party of them being employed now in preaching to the Indians and negroes who have died since the beginning of time, in the respective languages of those nations; – others are engaged in like benevolent employ with the dead of other nations; and among other instances of their success, several divines of eminence, in those days, have lately returned – confessed their sins – received their gospel – joined their head – and entered into their redemption, among whom are the late Rev. Whitefield and Watts.2 17. The devils which will not depart from the possessed, when commanded – especially in the case of infants, are to be expelled by whipping, or even by biting the unhappy subjects. 18. All touching or shaking of hands between different sexes, is lustful, and an abomination: but they are allowed to blow mother’s love into one another, by breathing in their faces, which always fills them with transports of joy. 19. It is not lawful to make war, in any case. N. B. The various works of obscenity – intemperance, and madness charged on these people, by some who have lately deserted them, are not here noticed; as themselves denied them; – but it is notorious that they call Rum the Spirit of God!! and account it a piece of devotion to be filled therewith – this, it is said, was forcibly inculcated by the mother, both by precept and example: and continues to be so still; as she is said to be more frequently with them in the dance, since her death, than ever before. Spectator

SCALES, ‘MYSTERY OF THE PEOPLE CALLED SHAKERS’

William Scales, ‘Mystery of the People Called Shakers’, Boston Gazette, and the Country Journal (15 June 1789), p. 1. There was a William Scales, a man of bright tallents, who for a season seemed interested in the faith: but being of an aspiring turn, he exalted himself above the Lead, & not being able to gain the ascendancy, he turned against, & became a bitter persecutor, raving, bawling, & venting his rage in the street & on the Churches premises – & finally became a wretched vagabond, destitute of the necessaries of life.1 Brother Isaac Newton Youngs

William Scales was born in Georgetown, Maine, in 1741. He attended Harvard College, graduating fifty-fifth in a class of fifty-six scholars in 1771. As David D. Newell has noted in his biographical article on Scales,2 he was one of only two college-educated men who converted to Shakerism. Following his graduation from Harvard, Scales preached at various locations in the District of Maine. He was a firm believer in New Light principles and actively sought the ‘gift of the Holy Spirit’, as he explained in his writings.3 By 1780 Scales had associated with the Quakers and issued his first publication The Confusion of Babel Discovered (1780), a Christian pacifist response to Jeremy Belknap’s defence of the American Revolution. His second publication, Priestcraft Exposed (1781), was an attack on the orthodox clergy in New England. Shortly after its publication he began to follow Shaker founder Mother Ann Lee and the Elders with her. Scales was an ardent defender of Shakerism. Shaker apostate writer Thomas Brown stated in his 1812 Account of the People Called Shakers that it was actually Scales, not Joseph Meacham, who authored the Shakers’ first publication A Concise Statement, which was probably first issued in 1785, and then again in 1790. Additionally, Brown claimed that Scales authored James Whittaker’s blistering letter to his parents in England, which was appended to A Concise Statement.4 Shaker apostate Daniel Rathbun refers multiple times in his 1785 Letter (reproduced in this volume on pp. 55–112) to correspondence with Scales, who was – 119 –

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defending the Shakers from Rathbun’s attacks. In December 1786 Scales issued an open challenge in the Cumberland Gazette of Portland, Maine, to anyone sympathetic to Rathbun’s Letter. He signed himself with an ersatz classical Greek pseudonym likely meaning ‘farsighted’. ‘Whosoever have a mind to hear an Answer to Daniel Rathbun’s Letter to James Whittacor, may hear it at any time by applying to William Scales, or in open street, or in any house they shall appoint. Polublepos.’5 Early in 1787 Scales made an attempt to get a pro-Shaker work published. Under a section of the New Hampshire Gazette newspaper headlined ‘PROPOSALS’, Scales sought subscribers ‘For Printing a Pamphlet, entitled, the Mystery of the people called Shakers unfolded, and every objection against it answered. – The price of each Pamphlet will not exceed six pence. – Those who wish to gratify themselves in perusing the Pamphlet, will please to give in their names to the Printer hereof. Feb 17.’6 This work was probably never issued, and Scales shortly turned against the Shakers. His pro-Shaker manuscript is unknown to scholars, and was probably destroyed given his change of allegiance. Sometime between February and July 1787 William Scales fell out with the Shaker leadership. The Shakers claimed that Scales contended with Whittaker for primacy in the sect, citing a particularly evocative incident where the two had an all-night theological battle: At one time, [ James Whittaker] and Br. David Meacham spent the whole night in labors with him, in which Scales strove, with all his faculties, to exalt himself above Father James, by assuming to himself superior authority, and a greater degree of Divine light. After struggling in vain, till the rising of the sun, F. James called him to an east window, and said ‘William, blow out the light of the yonder sun.’ ‘I can’t,’ said William. ‘You can as easily do it, (said F. James) as you can put out the light of God which is in my soul.’ These words came with such Divine power, that Scales turned short about, and went out, and hid himself under the roof of the log meeting-house, where he lay for some time, brooding over his defeat. F. James, at length, sent for him to come forth. Scales replied, ‘I am a dead dog.’7

Scales left the Shakers before Father James Whittaker’s decease on 20 July 1787. He became an active opponent of the Shakers, and sought financial compensation from them for his past labour. On 28 May 1789, Scales signed a release acknowledging the receipt of £20 from the Shakers, and releasing them from further financial claims, stating he was ‘fulley satisfied with and paid and Do believe and Acknowledg it to be a Just and Equel Balance’.8 Less than a month later he published his scathing ‘Mystery of the People called SHAKERS laid open, and their Ministration exploded, for its Falsities and Impositions’ in the

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Boston Gazette for 15 June 1789. At the head of his account is a Latin phrase that translates to ‘All men heed, and witness this insane spectacle.’ Like many Shaker apostates Scales tried to justify his earnest involvement with the sect, claiming that he had infiltrated Shakerism to expose it. He taunted the Shakers, saying that despite their claims of omniscience, they failed to see his ‘manifold duplicities … I say this consideration of your ministration does forever explode it for an imposture, and a ministration of vain glory’. Scales’s description of the physicality of early Shaker worship is among the richest given in eighteenth-century sources, with only Daniel Rathbun’s matching it for metaphorical creativity. He reiterates the omnipresent claim in eighteenth-century apostate and anti-Shaker writings that Shakers turned parents against children and children against parents. Scales echoes Amos Taylor’s account in claiming that due to the Shakers ‘many have been tempted to put an end to their existence in this life’. Additionally, Scales asserted that the Shakers’ ministry had produced ‘whoredoms, adultery and illegitimate births’. Consequently Scales intended ‘to effect the utter extermination of your ministration from off the face of the earth’ (p. 129, below). Scales next turned to the law for satisfaction, instituting a suit against the Shakers. New Lebanon Shaker Isaac Newton Youngs recorded what happened next: ‘There was a tedious law suit instituted, or set on foot by William Scales, an Apostate; he swore the peace against some of the brethren. The case was tried in Albany, Octr 6 (1789.) William appeared in Court, and was immediately confined in jail.’9 Nevertheless, on 27 October 1789, he was back at New Lebanon, ‘hallowing about our buildings’. He returned again on Sunday, 5 December. The Shakers took pity on him and lodged him overnight, but left two men with him ‘to see that he did no mischief ’. Scales remained at New Lebanon all that week, ‘hallowing’ around the village. On Wednesday, 8 December, he renewed his demand for financial compensation of Deacon Jonathan Walker for past services rendered. He was again watched through the night by two men. The following Saturday Scales was back begging for mittens and shoes, which the Shakers gave him. Again, on Tuesday, 21 December, he ‘forcibly came into the house, staid several hours & made great disturbance’. Scales reappeared briefly in February 1791.10 Scales’s later life was a slow mental unravelling, which the Shakers recorded in their 1816 publication of Testimonies of Mother Ann Lee: He became a wandering vagabond, and, for many years, wandered from one part of the United States to another, begging his bread from place to place, and venting out his malicious venom against all who displeased him, without regard to rank or character. In his rambles he visited most, if not all the Churches, from Watervliet to the District of Maine, often begging his bread at their doors. He was, at length,

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During the sad twilight of his life Scales preached in the Harvard College yard, where he was known as ‘Scales the Shaker’. He died at his sisters’ house in Dresden, Maine, in the summer of 1807.12 Notes 1. 2.

I. N. Youngs, ‘A Concise View’, ASC 861b, p. 489. For the most extensive biographical investigation yet published on Scales see D. D. Newell, ‘William Scales’ 1789 “Mystery of the People Called Shakers”’, American Communal Societies Quarterly, preview issue (September 2006), pp. 6-20. I have relied on Newell’s work for much of the biographical information on Scales contained in this essay. 3. W. Scales, Priestcraft Exposed from its Foundation or, Religious Freedom Defended, in Nine Chapters (Danvers, MA: Printed and Sold by E. Russell, [1781]), p. 16. 4. See T. Brown, An Account of the People Called Shakers: Their Faith, Doctrines, and Practice (Troy, NY: Printed by Parker and Bliss, 1812), p. 298. 5. W. Scales [Polublepos], Cumberland Gazette (Portland, ME), 15 December 1786, [p. 2]. 6. New-Hampshire Gazette, and General Advertiser (Portsmouth, NH), 17 February 1787, [p. 3]. 7. Bishop and Wells, Testimonies, p. 393. 8. [Discharge of William Scales], Edward Deming Andrews Memorial Shaker Collection, ASC 736, De-Wint. M. 9. I. N. Youngs, ‘A Concise View’, ASC 861b, p. 416. 10. ‘Domestic Journal’, V:B-60. 11. Bishop and Wells, Testimonies, p. 395. 12. Newell, ‘William Scales 1789’, p. 12.

William Scales, ‘Mystery of the People Called Shakers’, Boston Gazette, and the Country Journal (15 June 1789), p. 1.

The Mystery of the People called SHAKERS, laid open, and their Ministration exploded, for its Falsities and Impositions. By William Scales.

ATTENDITE HOMINES, ET SPECTACULUM IN SANUM VIDETE.1 THIS piece is design’d for the conviction of the people called SHAKERS, and for the good of all generations; therefore I shall pretty much omit every thing else, and proceed directly to my great design, which I shall effect by a dialogue between the Elder of that people and myself the Author, and A will stand for Author, and E for Elder. E. What emboldens you to appear in public? A. A very great sense of duty. E. What is your education? A. I received a liberal education at Harvard College, and was graduated in the year ’71. E. But that society hath no good repute for its piety. A. But I have a certificate signed by the rulers of that society of my diligence and honesty. – 123 –

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E. But the wicked will approbate the wicked. A. It is, perhaps, too much for you to say that the rulers of that society are wicked; besides, my principle being very contrary to theirs, they would not have testified my diligence and honesty without good evidence; and I went to College by the advice of ministers and the approbation of their Churches. E. But vice, since it, hath destroyed your reputation. A. I know not what you say, for I have ever since done my utmost to do justice, to love mercy, and to walk humbly; and to confirm this, I was soon after graduation, approbated and licenced to preach the gospel by ordained ministers. E. What, of that? Is ordination any thing? A. An uninterrupted succession of the ministerial office from the first Apostles is of infinite importance for the support of true faith and government in the Church. E. I think nothing of that; but were it admitted, what is that to you, since the Dissenters and Protestants have it not? The Papist only have that. A. That is not admitted; for it is evident enough that the Elders and Ministers of the separation from the Papal Church were ordain’d by that class of men that stood in the lineal succession. E. The Episcopal Church deny a proper lineal succession in the independent and Presbyterian Elders and Ministers. A. That doth not disturb us: There are many besides the Papists that are so drowned in pride, avarice, and things of dominion, that they would fain be Gods, while others must be content to be trampled underfoot; I believe if the truth were known, that the Presbyterians, Independents, Quakers, and every other religious denomination are as beloved of God and as much own’d in their piety, discipline, office and ordination, as the Papal or Episcopal Church. E. What, do you hold that the Quakers are the Church of Christ? A. Verily I do; yea Shakers and every other sect in Christendom; and I doubt not but they are all upon a level before God. I disdain that contracted spirit that dooms all others to Paganism, Anti-Christianism and to hell. The different sects in Christendom verily are but so many different parts of the Church of Christ, differently enlightened, and formed into different bodies, to support their different light or testimony.

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E. Truly, you rake together a hedious company for the Church of Christ, but I guess you will find it to be a synagogue of Satan before you have done with it. A. I expect to find a great many corruptions in it, and that which is evil is sure enough of the devil, and God will purge it away in due time. E. Where then is the Anti-Christian Church? A. The Anti-Christian Church is all that heap of corruption, pride and avarice, that have dominion in Christendom, whereof the Episcopal and Papal Church hath a great share. And to sum up the whole matter with you, kind Friend, as I am Catholic2 in my principle, so I am full of love and tender mercy to all my fellow creatures. Therefore, knowing they cannot be own’d of God in their prevailing pride, avarice and thirst of dominion, I purpose to do my part to put away these abominations from among them; and, since necessity requires my appearing in public, I will, in modesty, hand my credentials to the public also. Besides what I have already deliver’d, I have a number under my hand, signed by the people, in St. Georges, eastward, in Georgetown, in Vassalborough, in Kittery,3 and where I have sojourned for a time, which, in spite of all the rage of my enemies, ascertain my innocency, honesty and ingenuous dealing with them, I dwelt and dealt with them: And in Vassalborough there is recorded on Town book, by vote of the inhabitants, words vouching my ingenuous dealing with them in all respects.4 E. You have been sadly persecuted then, in your reputation. A. Ah verily so I have, and that perhaps beyond any man on earth: There is nothing that can be invented in an evil imagination but hath been said of me, and you Shakers have done the same and much more abundantly, while at the same time I walked before you in all the innocency I was capable of, labouring hard, and subjecting myself to the feet of every one of you. E. But you opposed our ministration very much. A. So I did, and finally prov’d it an imposture, and it is for that very reason you counted me the worst of all men, and dubb’d me with names without number, too infamous to be sounded in public. E. But do you justify yourself, and condemn us and others altogether? A. I am not going any more to take that upon me I am not guilty of, as I have done to an infinite degree in times past. E. An infinite degree? how you express yourself !

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A. Verily, the iniquities I opposed were infinite, and the whole force thereof came down upon me in all manner of calumny and evil speaking to which I was obliged to yield and condemn myself. But now knowing my innocency, I purpose to shake it all off, and prove my innocency, which I can abundantly do. E. But you made sad work of confessing of sins while you was among us, which made it appear that you exceeded them all for wickedness. A. I thank your ministration for all that; For it taught me that every act of sin I had committed in all my life, is considered before God as one continued act of abomination through the whole of my life, and that since the heart is infinitely deceitful, I was infinitely worse in every act of sin than I could imagine. Therefore I was resolved to make thorough work and cut off my name from among men; to this purpose I took hold of every the least failing of my life, and by the most superlative expressions, and by hyperbolical descriptions, made it look both as if it was of itself an enormity equal to Sodomy, and as if it had been the common practice of my life. E. Was you not then very unwise? A. I was very simple in it in one sense, and very crafty in it in another. E. How was you simple in it? A. Because I really believed as I was told that I was infinitely bad in all my failings. E. How was you crafty in it? A. In that I did it mightily to strengthen myself against your ministration if I should at last find it to be an imposture. E. How could this strengthen you against our ministration. A. Very exceedingly; but since it lays so deep, and out of the sight of the populace, I may not shew it: What I aim’d at while I was with you, was effectually to try your ministration, and to search it out in all its windings and complicated deviations. E. But was you not then guilty of manifold duplicities? A. Verily I was: but they are as innocent as to become a Jew when among Jews, to become as without law when among those that are without law, &c. which the great Apostle Paul said he did. Therefore, since your ministration, which declares itself to be full of eyes before and behind, and by its omnipotent intui-

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tion, sees the secrets of all men, and eternity, I say, since your ministration did not at all see my manifold duplicities, but only as I laid them out in a more complicated way of subtlity, and that innocent too, owning me largely to be a man of God and minister in its gospel: I say this consideration of your ministration does forever explode it for an imposture, and a ministration of vain glory. E. But if the case was so with you, are you wise to publish it? A. I think it not altogether foolish, since it was innocent, and I expect I have done with the sort forever: For I intend to be one upright man in time to come. E. But why will you publish our extravagances since you practiced them yourself and that much more abundantly? A. You practiced them under the pretence of serving God; but I practiced them to try your ministration; and in that I serv’d God too, but in a different way. E. If then we served God in holding and commanding, and you in trying them, why may we not shake hands upon equal footing? A. So I will, if you will renounce your ministration, and cleanse yourselves from the abominations of false prophecies, and all other evils. E. What false prophecies? A. Infinite are the numbers, as it were; but when the day of trial comes between you and me, which I shall hasten as fast as convenient, I will endeavour to bring them forth. E. What evils have you against me? A. I have none against you properly, but against your ministration I have infinite loads of evils. E. What are the principal? A. I can comprehend them all, as many as they be, in sentences, very comprehensive: Infinite confusions of variegated exertions, positions, agitations, extensions, amplifications and distortions of the body and its members, in ways exceeding imagination. Infinite hissings like serpents, snarlings and barkings like dogs, rattling like hogs, crowing like dunghill cocks, peeping like chickens, and innumerable confused sounds and responses, strange howlings, shoutings, exclamations and vociferations of infinite confusion. Whirlings of amazing velocity, signs by the head and all the members of the body, in such various ways, that were the most fruitful imagination to speak, it cannot mistake; extreme wal-

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lowing on the floor and walking about with extended arms, extreme labours of dancing, leaping and jumping and otherways, to which the people are driven, as the Israelites in Egypt, to their sore bondage by their cruel task masters, with infinite encouragements and promises of immediate redemption one hour, and infinite discouragements and menaces of eternal damnation the next; all which are so extreme and dreadful, that all have been or are perplexed beyond measure; many have been undone under the most awful apprehensions of eternal damnation; many have been and are thrown into consumptions, several have lost their lives, and others are in danger of losing them. Infinite confusions of doctrines, harangues of infinite inconsistencies, jargons of discourses of infinite impertinence, a gibberish of languages, that Seraphs can find no meaning in, perpetual denunciation of vengeance and damnation, accompanied with fury and rage equal to the madness of a raving man possessed with legions of devils, which was called the anger of God times without number, and at all times. Dissolving the authority of parents over their children, and setting children in authority over their parents whence hath proceeded infinite confusion, rage and insult against the aged. Dissolving wedlock, and separating the marriage bed, which hath been the source of adultery, or of men’s going to women that are not their wives, and having children by them, and some have left their first wives and married other women, and some have taken young women into private apartments under the pretence of labouring with them for their soul’s good, but have given them the venereal embrace, and some bastards have been begotten this way – and this dissolution of wedlock hath a sanction: For all marriage is declared by the Elders to be the covenant of death and hell, and the officers who ratify them the emissaries of Satan. Whereas all marriages is declared the covenant of hell, and they who ratify them the emissaries of Satan, young people are terrified at the thought of marriage, and abhor the ratifiers thereof with infinite hatred. All which, together with dissolving wedlock already ratified, have been the means of cutting off thousands of possible lives of human intelligences, and if suffered, thousands and millions more of the lives of such intelligences will it cut off. By the reason of your awful sentences, many have run almost distracted, and are bleeding away the life of their souls and bodies without a just cause. Hence it is that many have been tempted to put an end to their existence in this life, and one Joseph Sanburn,5 of New-Enfield, in the State of New-Hampshire, really hath done it. By the reason of the terrors of your false prophecies and menaces, many have ruined their fortunes, others have very much damaged them, and all have been and are hindred from getting interests, increasing and multiplying from subduing the earth and replenishing it, and from all the comforts of society and friendship; and they have no reward from you for all this loss: For you say you hate them with a perfect hatred, and hate exceedingly to be in their company; – Therefore I impeach your ministration of murder, of dissolving the most sacred

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covenants, civil & religious, whence have proceeded whoredoms, adultery and illegitimate births; I also impeach your ministration of murder of thousands and millions of possible lives of human intelligences, and I impeach it of the ruin of men’s fortunes, and declare it to be a public nuisance, not fit to be tolerated any longer in the land. E. But what will you effect by this? A. I intend to effect the utter extermination of your ministration from off the face of the earth. E. But you cannot except you prove your charges. A. That I can do, by innumerable living witnesses, and to this end, I petition, and earnestly desire, that all people who are acquainted with the mischievousness of your ministration, would prepare themselves against the day of trial. E. But do you intend to destroy me? A. By no means, but to treat you with the greatest charity and tender mercy; but your ministration I intend to exterminate from the face of the earth or that shall me. WILLIAM SCALES. June 9, 1789.

[ANON.], ‘FOR THE WESTERN STAR’

[Anon.], ‘For the Western Star’, Western Star, 26 January 1796, [p. 1].

This article, published on 26 January 1796, in the Western Star newspaper, Stockbridge, Massachusetts, presents a rare and remarkably detailed account of life at New Lebanon’s Shaker community immediately prior to the death of Father Joseph Meacham. The Shakers gathered their followers at New Lebanon in early September 1787.1 During the next ten years the logistics of communal living and working were being developed at New Lebanon under the direction of Father Joseph and Mother Lucy Wright. The following account is partly a reminiscence of Shakers (as perceived by an unkindly disposed neighbour), and partly a report on Shakerism at that moment. It contains the usual scurrilous accusations common to eighteenth-century reports, but it also offers a wealth of good information – some of which should be taken with a grain of salt. Most particularly it conveys the perspective of an unsympathetic outsider confidently awaiting the collapse of the sect. This account triggered the first full-scale newspaper war between an anti-Shaker, ‘Calvin’, and an advocate for the Shakers who styled himself ‘A Lover of Truth’.2 Notes 1. 2.

White and Taylor, Shakerism, p. 73. For the full story of that memorable engagement see Goodwillie, ‘The Shakers in Eighteenth-Century Newspapers, Part Three: “Calvin” versus “A Lover of Truth,” Abusing Caleb Rathbun, the Death of Joseph Meacham and the Tale of His Sister’, American Communal Societies Quarterly, 6:1 ( January 2012), pp. 39–63.

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[Anon.], ‘For the Western Star’, Western Star, 26 January 1796, [p. 1].

The Shakers in the neighbourhood of New-Lebanon1 Spring and Hancock2 are of late in a great fermentation, which seems to indicate an approaching revolution among them, especially at New-Lebanon, their principal seat, and the residence of their Chief Elder,3 or Pontiff, and mother, or Chief Matron.4 Their young people, on whose industry depends principally the prosecution of their lucrative manufactories, are deserting them one after another, and recovering wages for their past services of them – which, weakening their number of hands, and impairing their stock, seems to shock their rulers, as an event unlooked for. This hath however been expected by many of their neighbours, who considered how little inducement their young manufacturers and labourers have to remain with them, after arriving to mature years. When placed, by accident, or by their parents or guardians, under the Shakers, they were mostly too young to have any rational choice of their own; nor does it appear that they were ever wrought into that religious enthusiasm which cemented the elder ones into a mass, and which is now so far cooled that very little precept or example of their religion is exhibited even by the Elders. On the contrary, the common rank of their church are steadily at work on week-days, and are allowed no religious books on Sunday, nor may they of late years, go to their Meeting-house. But in order to stimulate them to industry, they are taught to excel the world’s people in their works as much as in their faith, for (say they) faith without works is dead – which faith is understood to be a confidence in their Chief, and by these works they are to understand their manual labor. They are almost every way restricted by the mandate of those in whose appointment they have no voice; for the high priest appoints those in office under him, and names his successor. These young labourers have hardly any opportunity of learning; they have been deprived many years of almost or quite every print, but the Almanack; the bible was prohibited, psalters and service books burned, &c. they are allowed no property at their disposal; they may not converse freely with other people, and are much restricted in their conversation with each other, as their Pontiff pretends to know not only their most private – 133 –

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words and actions, but even the thoughts of their hearts. Their liberty of walking is limited to a small bit of land; excursions for wholesome recreation are constrained, and diversion and pleasantry, sometimes so essential to health, is forbidden. They are therefore pale, dispirited and sickly, and deaths are frequent among that people. They are all day inspected by their rulers, and at night a stated watch keeps centry at their doors; while even the dear, consolatory impulses of natural affection are interdicted as criminal, as well among relatives, as between those of the different sexes. Thus situated, and living on the public road where young people of the different sexes are seen riding together for their innocent pleasure, in rosy health, how can it be expected but that Mother nature will whisper to them that they are also her free children, and stimulate them to throw off their irksome and barbarizing bondage, as they now frequently do. But it is painful to recollect with what eagerness we have seen them (in the attempt) pursued along the highway, and from house to house, and the stripes and other assaults, the very mention of which decency forbids, which hath been the portion of some brought back again, and of such as are unwilling to abide in their ways; sometimes followed by handcuffing and imprisonment in a dungeon, &c. many of these abuses the neighbours can testify, and the worst of them were lately proved by lawful evidence. Such of them as make good their escape, are disagreeably situated; from their great change, and sudden emancipation, they can, many of them, be scarcely expected to know how to use their liberty without abusing it. They are children in the science of social life, and have every thing to learn at once. If they have any sensibility, they find themselves singular and solitary even among a crowd of wellwishers, in whose presence they are dissident; and thus desponding, they are not unfrequently seduced by their old task-masters to return to their former bondage. The SHAKERS are deservedly commended for the excellency of their manufactures; but it is a disagreeable consideration that the liberty of so many must be sacrificed to the business. They have also of late years been esteemed by many an inoffensive sect, for their quiet neighbourhood, and for the fairness and punctuality of their external demeanour. This may however have flowed from the dictates of policy as far as relates to their artful rulers, but it is very little doubted but the bulk of that people are well meaning and virtuous. Artful as their rulers are, their policy has its visible imperfections; their institutions clash with the immutable laws of nature, and with the principles of reason and social order, and would evidently, if extended, and adhered to exterminate the human race. And as they are deficient in authority to controul any but the ignorant; and as nothing but the frantic enthusiasm which actuated them to stem the current of nature and reason, they might have foreseen that as soon as this blind zeal had spent its force (which was too intense to be durable)

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their former zealots would begin to warp off as seems now to be coming the case, thro’ a natural chain of events, which may be thus briefly traced. Who of the old inhabitants of their neighbourhood but can recollect the wild vagaries of their first setting out, the drunkenness of their old first mother5 and foundress, whom they held to be immortal: her known lasciviousness; their once crowding and kneeling round her, when she was drunk, to kiss the hem of her garment, in presence of most of the neighbours, at Esq. Grant’s,6 in NewLebanon. The Bachanalian dances she instituted, of naked fathers, mothers, brothers and sisters, through each other in the same room; men running after their hands, which were extended and guided by the Spirit, through quags, briers, hedges and over mountains; their agonizing groans, twitchings, whirling round, talking in unknown tongues, prophesying, working miracles, &c. while excessive drinking was countenanced among them, and industry quite discarded. The artful refugees from Europe, who formed and led them, with the mother at their head, perceiving that by the mode of procedure sustenance would soon be lacking, ordained now the collection of their persons and estates under a Spiritual head. This done, they taught the body of them industry, economy, sobriety, obedience, dependence, and implicit devotion to the Chief, who, with a few favorites, seems thence forward to have secretly monopolized the various excesses which their institution favoured, to which they were addicted, and which hath probably precipitated the sudden death of so many of them, and given the remainder their florid appearance and trembling nerves. The first order,7 now secluded from the common people’s inspection, (who may not speak to them without being first addressed by them) established regularly their pretended theocracy, and ruled by their Oracles, divesting themselves of the care and management of the common property, which they vested in the second order, depending solely on them for the sanction of their authority, consisting of a few of their most knowing and artful, who soon learned interested pursuits, and cooled down into a fair, plausible, hoarding combination; while the common labouring many, by natural consequence, sank into blind, abject torpitude. Their signs, miracles, prophecies and tongues failed; the spirit no more twitched, cramped and twirled them round, nor led them from their work by the guidance of the extended hand, in rough paths; and their worship dwindled into a mere assembling now and then to hear a few, perhaps 50, words of very little meaning; to hum in concert an inarticulate, melancholy tone, and then, forming in the shape of a corn-harrow, dance a short jig, horn-pipe, or the like, while the Deacons, singing the black Joke,8 the tune of Peggy and Molly, or the like, filled the apex of the angle. This worship wasted very little of their strength, which was prudently husbanded for more productive service. Still the different sexes are kept asunder among all but the first order; matrimonial bands were broken and interdicted, and natural love, with all its dictates

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and enjoyments, forbidden, as abominably carnal and sinful, and the cloathes of the two sexes could not even be seen hanging on the same line to dry. The consequences of this were, as might have been expected; the subordinate orders, devoted as they were, could but observe with murmuring the partial license of the Head Elders, who lived a recluse life in chambers of which they kept the keys, and where also dwelt an equal number of the most beautiful and accomplished women among the sect. To remove this impression, and to exhibit a shadow of equality, the women and men among all the different orders are now permitted to live near each other, and to eat and drink together; but still all affectionate intercourse and intimacy are as before prohibited, and the families being numerous, they are checks and spies to restrain each other. This partial indulgence hath however humanized them again in a degree, giving a new spring to the softer propensities of the heart, and kindling a relish for social enjoyments, which, uneffaced as at first, by a daily and free intercourse with their chief, or by the fanatic zeal thereby inspired, is daily bursting the brittle bands of their unnatural constraint. When, through their growing independence of thought, any of their more knowing or influential are become disaffected, and appear to be about withdrawing, the Elders conciliate them to stay by preferments and indulgencies. But when it shall be generally known among them that disaffection and revolt are the road to preferment and indulgence, more and more will follow the same track; and this temporizing expedient will defeat its own object.

RATHBUN, ‘CALEB RATHBUN AGED NEARLY SEVENTEEN YEARS’

Caleb Rathbun, ‘Caleb Rathbun Aged Nearly Seventeen Years, the Son of Valentine Rathbun, Jun. Maketh Oath’, Western Star (Stockbridge, MA), 5 April 1796, [p. 4].

The grandson of Baptist Minister Valentine Rathbun Sr followed in the footsteps of his grandfather and great uncle Daniel Rathbun in publishing some of the most sensational charges alleged against the Shakers at that time. Born in 1780, Caleb was brought among the Shakers as an infant following the conversion of his parents in or around the year of his birth. Caleb’s father Valentine Jr was a member of the New Lebanon community, and apparently Caleb had been allowed to remain with him as a boy and possibly into his adolescence. According to his deposition, Caleb was eventually removed from his father’s care and assigned to a succession of Shaker Deacons who were in charge of young males and supervised their work. His deposition also levels the charge that young Shakers were denied the opportunity for education. It is impossible to prove or disprove the allegations of violent abuse made by Caleb Rathbun, but they would have resonated powerfully with disgruntled, anti-Shaker individuals throughout Berkshire County, Massachusetts and Columbia County, New York. Caleb’s mother Sylvia Lusk Rathbun died a Shaker at Hancock, Massachusetts, in 1784. Perhaps her father (Caleb’s grandfather) Major Thomas Lusk was one of the local anti-Shaker contingent, as Caleb apparently sought refuge with him after finally escaping the Shakers. Unfortunately, manuscript records detailing the daily events at Hancock in the 1790s are not extant, so Caleb’s escape attempts cannot be documented beyond this deposition. Caleb Rathbun’s deposition was published as part of the climax of hostilities in a newspaper war carried on in the Western Star newspaper of Stockbridge, Massachusetts, in early 1796. These articles were published by an anti-Shaker using the pseudonym ‘Calvin’ and answered by a defender of the Shakers who styled himself ‘A Lover of Truth’.1 The extremely graphic content of Caleb Rathbun’s deposition, and its incendiary charges of maltreatment, was aimed at inciting popular anger towards the Shakers. Following his escape from the – 137 –

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Shakers in September 1795, Caleb resided with his mother’s family the Lusks in Richmond and West Stockbridge, Massachusetts. On 27 June 1797, he filed a lawsuit against the Society, and David Slosson in particular, for maltreatment and loss of wages. This suit was settled on 7 May 1798 when the Society/Slosson paid Rathbun $25.00 for a ‘full Discharge to the Said David And the Community Jointly and Severally and to Save Harmless from any further Charge or Demand from Said Caleb’.2 Caleb eventually followed the same course as many of his relatives and moved to the newly opened lands of western New York’s Genesee country. In 1815 he is recorded as living at Gorham, New York, in a list of subscribers for a book about the War of 1812, in which he may have served.3 In 1820 he was living at Stafford, New York, where he resided with a wife, son and two daughters. His fate after that is unknown.4 Notes 1. 2. 3. 4.

For the full story of this newspaper war see Goodwillie, ‘The Shakers in EighteenthCentury Newspapers, Part Three’, pp. 39–63. [Legal Discharge in Rathbun vs. Slosson], ASC 736, SA 874.76, Edward Deming Andrews Memorial Shaker Collection, DeWint-M. The History of the War between the United States and Great-Britain … (Hartford, CT: Published by William S. Marsh, 1815), p. 470. For information on Caleb Rathbun, his possible military service and his listing in the 1820 Census, see the Rathbun-Rathbone-Rathburn Family Historian, 8:1 ( January 1988), p. 10.

Caleb Rathbun, ‘Caleb Rathbun Aged Nearly Seventeen Years, the Son of Valentine Rathbun, Jun. Maketh Oath’, Western Star (Stockbridge, MA), 5 April 1796, [p. 4].

Caleb Rathbun, aged nearly seventeen years, the son of Valentine Rathbun, jun.1 maketh oath: That his mother being dead, and his father being one of the people called Shakers, and working at the Clothier’s business among that people in New-Lebanon, took the deponent when in the ninth year of his age, to work with him at the business. About four months after Job Bishop,2 Eleazar Rand,3 and one Walker,4 Deacons, or in authority among the Shakers, constrained the deponent, entirely against his will, to leave his father, who likewise seemed fond of having him with him; they placed the deponent under the command of David Slason,5 with more than twenty other boys, to work at farming and other business, who were all constrained to very hard labour by very great severity. That the deponent believes he received, during about four years that he remained there, more than fifty severe whippings: the first correction he remembers of receiving there was inflicted on him and several of his mates in the meeting-house, under the pretence of their being carnal minded: this correction lasted nearly half a day, and was inflicted by Job Bishop, Eleazar Rand, Henry Cluff,6 and Elizur Goodrich,7 in the presence of the Chief Elder, Joseph Mechum,8 David Mechum,9 Lucy Goodrich, the mother,10 and Hannah Goodrich.11 They were jirked each by one leg and one arm, from side to side, across the floor, and violently jammed against the wall, they were next stripped quite naked, and tied with their hands above their heads, and there slapped with a stick, like a pudding stick, for near half an hour; and finally they were loosened in this naked situation, and set to jumping about, the Elders in the mean time running round among them and pushing them over. The said Slason once to punish the deponent for taking an apple contrary to orders when it lay in his way, tied him up with his shirt over his head and eyes, and brushed his whole body with a sharp new broom, till his skin was streaked with red, and blood shot. That at another time he, for the like offence, was, by – 139 –

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the said Slason stripped quite naked, part of his hair jirked off his head, and thrown into the fire, and then whipped with a stirrup leather, or crupper, till he was bloody from his neck to his heels. That said Slason, at another time, broke a press-board by a blow of it across the deponent’s head; and in order to mortify him and his fellow sufferers, they were many of them compelled to drink urine, a pint at a draught, very frequently, by spells. That whipping and other cruelties were frequently repeated during his whole stay; and no opportunity or privilege allowed him to speak freely to his father during the whole time, or to complain to any one else; nor was any opportunity afforded them to learn to read or to write. That nearly four years had thus passed, when, despairing of better usage, he attempted an escape by flight; but being soon met and brought back by one of those in authority among them, he was thereupon removed to the Shaker village in Hancock;12 and put under the command of Comstock Betts,13 the ruler there, or Elder Brother, as they call him, with whom most of the time he wrought at nail making, and boarded with several youths nearly of his age, who wrought at different employments, all under command of said Betts; they were steadily kept to hard service, and frequently and cruelly corrected. That said Betts, among other cruel inventions to mortify them, would rouse them at night, in their sleep, push and punch them round the room, pull their ears and hair, this he would repeat several times in the dead of night, sometimes twice or more in a week. That he once whipped him for the slight offence of laughing after they went to bed, with an ox-goad of beach, till it was worn to a stump. That he hath seen one of his mates, named Ezekiel Goodrich,14 aged about 19 or 20 years, stripped quite naked, and buffeted round the room by an equal numbers of women and men, under pretence that he was carnal, this they severely and repeatedly did for several months, guarding him day and night, that he might not complain or escape. That he, the deponent, and his mates, were taught that the world’s people would be cruel to them, or kill them, if they should flee to them, which greatly terrified them. – Notwithstanding which, the cruelties of said Betts, and their confinements were so insufferable, that the deponent again attempted an escape by flight, and thro terror made no stay till he arrived at Westfield,15 where the Shakers overtook him and brought him back, and cruelly whipped him. This whipping was by Jonathan Southwick.16 That on a certain Sunday evening, about two years since the deponent, for falling asleep contrary to his orders, was taken up into a loft by David Southwick17 and Eliphalet Comstock,18 where he was, by order of said Betts, stripped naked, jirked on his knees round the room by one of them, and severely struck by the other with a ferrule, made somewhat like a large pudding stick, so that the skin turned blue, and till the skin and flesh on the tops of his feet and on his knees were so worn and torn by the floor, that one of his knees is openly sore to the present time. That neither he nor his mates had here any opportunity of schooling. That during his stay he could neither write nor cypher, and could

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scarce read easy reading, and most of this he had learned before he was put at the Shaker Church; and that part of his mates had still less learning than himself. That last September he determined on another effort to escape so cruel a bondage; at unawares he again took a sudden flight, and through fear scarcely halted till near the City of Hudson;19 as he never had information while in Hancock of his grandfather, Major Thomas Lusk, who lived not far from the Shakers, and hath since been the guardian and defender of the deponent. his Caleb X Rathbun mark Canaan, March 14th, 1796 Sworn before me, SAMUEL JONES, Justice of the Peace. A true Copy.

TAYLOR, LETTER

Amos Taylor, Letter, Western Star, 26 July 1796.

The Western Star newspaper of Stockbridge, Massachusetts, continued to be a venue for the communications of apostates, although the 26 July 1796 issue carried a surprising statement from one of the most prominent anti-Shakers of the eighteenth century. Amos Taylor, the author of the 1782 publication A Narrative of the Strange Principles, Conduct and Character of the People Known by the Name of Shakers, completely recanted the damaging accusations he had made against the sect. Taylor, at various times a Dartmouth student, revolutionary soldier and Christian convert, came to the Shirley, Massachusetts, Shakers in 1780 or 1781. He lived among the Shakers there and at Harvard for about ten months. Upon his departure the dissatisfied Taylor undertook to damage the Shakers by publishing only the second (after Valentine Rathbun) anti-Shaker pamphlet then in circulation. It is a mystery why – sixteen years later – Taylor undertook to rescind his attacks against the Shakers and write about them in very positive terms. In 1796 he was living in Whitingham, Vermont, where he was employed as a schoolteacher and bookstore owner. His words were published as an advertisement in the Star. For more information about Taylor see the headnote to his Narrative in this volume, pp. 29–31.

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Amos Taylor, Letter, Western Star, 26 July 1796.

The subscriber having some time since published a book in Worcester, insinuating as if the people called Shakers worshipped the creature instead of the creator, and as if their reformation from ordinary vice arose from no other motive than to fit up power and dominion among their Elders, to the exclusion of any regard for the law and gospel, as revealed to us in holy scriptures – this is to certify, that from a careful inspection of my own motives, in writing said book, as well as from the most advantagious opportunity for observing their general deportment, and being unconnected with and uninfluenced by them (the author being a regular member of a congregational church in Vermont,) I now in this way retract my error in writing or speaking in any manner and at any time without judgment, proof or evidence concerning said people, as their deportment and profession actually carries a living and daily witness to the eyes of all rational spectators that they are a peaceable, honest and industrious people – and further that their profession and practice does not in the least give any man occasion to scruple but what they really worship God in spirit and in truth, according to the best of their judgment, through the mediation of Jesus Christ, by the assistance of God’s spirit. Their idea of perfection in the members of their church appears to arise from no other quarter than an expectation of the aid and assistance of divine grace, as the consequence and procurement of which was purchased by the death and sufferings of Christ. AMOS TAYLOR Whitingham, (Vermont) July, 1796

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VALENTINE RATHBUN, ‘FOR THE WESTERN STAR’

Valentine Rathbun Letter, ‘For the Western Star’, Western Star, 10 April 1797, [p. 1].

The letter reproduced below was Valentine Rathbun’s last known attack on his long-term enemies the Shakers, published by the Western Star on 10 April 1797.1 Although the Rathbun family’s enmity against the Shakers would continue with the publication of Reuben Rathbone’s Reasons Offered for Leaving the Shakers in 1800, the letter below would be Valentine’s parting shot before he moved to the central New York town of Marcellus, where he died in 1814. Rathbun’s text offers information on the missionary activities of Morrel Baker (the Captain of the Shakers’ ship Union) and Rufus Cogswell – including a particularly courageous visit that the duo made to Rathbun’s house. It also offers one of the earliest statements about the precipitous decline of Shakerism, launching a tradition that continues in the press to this day. Notes 1.

V. Rathbun, Western Star (Stockbridge, MA), 10 April 1797, [p. 1]. Rathbun’s letter was also printed as ‘About the Shakers’, in the New Star; A Republican Miscellaneous, Literary Paper, 6 (16 May 1797), p. 45.

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Valentine Rathbun, ‘For the Western Star’, Western Star, 10 April 1797, [p. 1].

Messrs. Rosseter & Willard, Please to give the following piece a place in your useful paper for the benefit of the public, and you will oblige a friend to the religious interest.

The Shakers in New-Lebanon and Hancock being on the decline, their old people being dead and dying, and their young people leaving them, they are brought to their last trial to maintain their ground, as such they have taken the following method, viz. – They have appointed two of their servants, Morral Baker1 and Rufus Cogswell2 by name, their missionaries to go forth and preach for the conversion and bringing in new disciples to their religion. Accordingly said Baker and Cogswell went forth, and when they had performed a certain tour, returned and called at my house, in order to have some conversation with me; and soon after they came in, Morral Baker asked me whether I had any faith in their religion, I answered none at all; he asked the reason why I had no faith in them, on which I began to open the corruption of their system which made them both very uneasy, and rising up to go, I begged of them to tarry a little longer; that I might further open the falsehood of their scheme; but they were so nettled with disgust, they immediately departed; a few days after this, there came a man to my house, by the name of Carpenter, who lived not far from the Shakers in New-Lebanon, and desired to have some conversation with me about the Shakers, and went on and told me that Morral Baker had tried him and his wife a long time to confess their sins to him and join the Shakers, telling them that thousands were now coming in, and in order for greater influence, said Baker told them he had been to Elder Rathbun’s, (meaning my house) and conversed with me, and that I stood exceeding tenders towards them, and that I confessed they had the great power of God, and that it was the work of God, and that I cried like a child, and further said it would not be many days before I would come in and join the people; in all which there is not the least color of truth, & I know not what it can be called, short of wilful lying; and I understand by people that have come from the towns where they have been in their tours – 149 –

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since, that they make the same report, that I own them to be the people of God, and that I am coming in soon to join them – thus they are making me a stalking horse to increase their influence among their hearers – which conduct must be the most shockingly wicked. When I consider therefore the awful effects of that diabolical scheme in parting men and their wives, in breaking up families, in monopolizing wealth to themselves in the most fraudulent way, &c. I believe it to be my duty to caution and warn people against such lying impostors, lest the ignorant and simple by them are led astray. What I have here asserted I am able to prove by moral testimony. VALENTINE RATHBUN. Pittsfield,3 January 7, 1797

RATHBONE, REASONS OFFERED FOR LEAVING THE SHAKERS

Reuben Rathbone, Reasons Offered for Leaving the Shakers (Pittsfield, MA: Printed by Chester Smith, 1800).

The last Shaker apostate account published in the eighteenth century was probably the one that personally hurt the Shakers the most, even if it received little public attention. Reuben Rathbone was the son of Valentine Rathbun, whose 1781 Brief Account was the opening salvo of the print war on the Shakers. Valentine struggled for years against the Shakers, probably due to the shame he felt in having been instrumental in the conversion of so many of his family and friends to the faith he considered a false abomination. Particularly galling to Valentine was the permanent loss of his son and namesake Valentine and daughter Sylvia to the Shakers. His son Reuben appeared to be irrevocably lost, until his stunning apostasy from the Hancock Shaker community in 1800. Reuben Rathbone was born on 18 May 1760, in Stonington, Connecticut. He moved to Berkshire County, Massachusetts with his family around 1768.1 During the Revolutionary War he was in a company that marched from Pittsfield, Massachusetts, to Kinderhook, New York, in May 1777; then in Captain John Strong’s company that marched from Pittsfield to Fort Ann, New York during June and July 1777.2 He was twenty-years old when his father Valentine became convinced of the truth of Mother Ann Lee’s teachings. Despite his father’s apostasy and campaign of publications in opposition to the sect Reuben remained with the Shakers. His consecration of property to the Hancock community on 10 April 1789 consisted of ‘a Span of horses and wagon’.3 When the community at Hancock was formally gathered in to gospel order in 1791 he was appointed Elder of the Church Family by the collective decision of his fellow Shakers. At an unknown date he composed a lengthy letter to his father repudiating Valentine’s attacks on the Shakers, and in essence bolstering the case commonly made by apostates that Shakerism encouraged children to become the enemies of their parents.4 Devout Hancock Shaker Daniel Goodrich Sr later wrote, – 151 –

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Writings of Shaker Apostates and Anti-Shakers, 1782–1850: Volume 1 Reuben was a Man of good Faccultyes of Mind; and had been a belever from the first opening of the gospel to us – and very Zealous – but not wise – the want of wisdom In his Labors had caused greate tribulation to the Elders and Expence to the brethren.5

Following the death of Father Calvin Harlow, the first male minister (or ‘parent’) of the Hancock community on 20 December 1795, Nathaniel Deming was installed in his place. The Shakers later identified this moment as the beginning of Reuben Rathbone’s disaffection, claiming that he wanted this promotion to a position of spiritual leadership.6 He left the Shakers on 24 July 1799. Elisabeth Deming, the sister of Minister Nathaniel Deming, accompanied him. The two were married before the publication of his Reasons in February 1800, although the exact date is not known.7 Rathbone’s incendiary pamphlet Reasons Offered for Leaving the Shakers was in print seven months after he left Hancock. It makes for compelling – and shocking – reading. Rathbone explained that the Shakers endured extreme physical worship, termed ‘labor’, in order ‘to destroy the very nature of the flesh so as to become an Eunuch for the kingdom of heaven’s sake. This I understood to be a total destruction of the nature of generation, both as to the inclination of the spirit and the natural faculties of the body’ (p. 158, below). Shaker Isaac Newton Youngs’s own account of that time supports Rathbone’s assertions, ‘Many were so zealous that they sought mortification thro’ excessive bodily hardships; taking excentric means to shun all indulgence by extreme effort in hand labor, exercising long & violently in the worship, going without needful sleep, eating but little.’8 Rathbone recounted still more gruesome events of this period later in Reasons, writing the faithful labored into that degree of mortification that the natural functions of the body were so impaired, and the power of retention so relaxed that they were not able to keep themselves from involuntary evacuations, almost continuously, which made some almost despair of ever being saved, as the natural seed of copulation was looked upon as the most unclean and hateful of any thing in the natural creation. (p. 166, below)

Rathbone’s account of the transition of the Shaker Church from what he terms ‘fleshly relation’ to ‘church relation’ in 1788 is very interesting, and one of the few first-hand accounts of that process, which began the institutionalization of communalism among the sect. The Shakers were deeply embittered by Rathbone’s defection and publication. They used his own letter to his father to discredit his apostate narrative. They also accused him of having lived in adultery with Elisabeth Deming while a Shaker at Hancock, and of being homosexual.9 Rathbone eventually moved to New York State, like his father Valentine, and his uncle Daniel. He was killed by the fall of a tree at Marcellus, New York, in 1807.10 In very un-Shakerlike fashion the Shakers recorded his fate with delight in their 1816 record of Ann Lee’s teachings, which had a special section at the end detailing the fate of Shaker apostates:

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Having been frustrated in all his designs to overthrow the work of God, he at length removed to a new settlement, in the western part of New-York. Being, one day, employed in clearing and burning a lot of new land, and being left alone for a short time, his lifeless body was, soon after, found under the top of a tree, which, in consequence of its having been burnt nearly off from the trunk, suddenly fell upon him and crushed him to death. Thus died the man, who, after having been exalted above his own order among God’s people, aspired, like Lucifer, to exalt himself above the order of God; but fell in the attempt; and after spending a number of years in malicious opposition to the work of God, he was thus arrested by the hand of Providence, and finished his wicked career in judgment.11

Notes 1.

Field, A History of the Town of Pittsfield, p. 47; and Field, A History of the County of Berkshire, p. 325. 2. Revolutionary Soldiers Resident or Dying in Onondaga County, N.Y. (Syracuse, NY: Onondaga Historical Association, 1913), p. 122. 3. [ Journal of Membership and Dedication of Property, 1789–1820], MS. 10,804, Shaker Museum and Library. 4. Reuben Rathbone to Valentine Rathbun, Sr, (date unknown), Shaker Collection, IV:A30, OClWHi. 5. D. Goodrich, ‘Rise and Progress of the Church’, MS. 6140a, Hancock Shaker Village, Inc. 6. Bishop and Wells, Testimonies, p. 391. 7. See Rathbone, Reasons Offered for Leaving the Shakers, below, where he refers to ‘my wife’. 8. I. N.Youngs, ‘A Concise View Of the Church of God and of Christ, On Earth Having its foundation In the faith of Christ’s first and Second Appearing. New Lebanon, 1856’, pp. 21–2. Edward Deming Andrews Memorial Shaker Collection, ASC 861b, De-Wint M. 9. Ibid., pp. 26–7. 10. Brown Genealogy of Many of the Descendants of Thomas, John, and Eleazer Brown: Sons of Thomas and Mary (Newhall) Brown, of Lynn, Mass., 1628-1907, Volume 1 (Salem, MA: Higginson Book Co., 1994), p. 527. 11. Bishop and Wells, Testimonies, pp. 391–2.

Reuben Rathbone, Reasons Offered for Leaving the Shakers (Pittsfield, MA: Printed by Chester Smith, 1800).

REASONS, &c. WHEREAS I have been a professor among the People called Shakers, and have zealously labored, both in public and private, (whereof many hundreds are witnesses) to promote and build up the profession; but have of late separated myself from that people,1 it seemed to me not unreasonable and no more than what might be justly expected, that I should shew some reason or cause for so doing. In order for this I shall endeavor to give a short account of my life and experiences, from my youth up to this time, including my manner of faith before I heard of this people, the manner of my entering in among them, and the faith I received in hearing their testimony, and my perseverance in it. Together with my trials and tribulations which I have had of late, which has effected my separation. Avoiding, if possible, everything that may create or increase a spirit of hatred or envy against this people, for it is to be lamented there is a great deal too much already. But as it is my purpose and intention only simply to state my reasons, and submit the matter to God the judge of all, I hope it may give no offence, neither to Jew nor Gentile, nor to the Church of God. To give a particular account of my life, and the exercises of my mind from the days of my infancy, would be a labor too tedious for me to endure at this time, as my health is much impaired by a continued series of afflictions But I shall only say, that from the time I began to know between good and evil, till I was about eighteen years of age, a great part of the time my mind was exercised with fearful and awful apprehensions of a future judgment; sometimes to that degree, that I could wish myself a toad or a snake or any thing that had no soul to exist in futurity. At length I was brought to experience a change of sensation, the particulars of which may not be necessary to relate now, but I was made to love God for what he was in himself: I had such a sense of love of God, through the Lord Jesus Christ, for the salvation and happiness of his creatures, that I was no more afraid what he would do with me; but was determined to serve and – 155 –

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obey God to the end of my days. Here I must observe one thing (as I mean to be an honest man) which I have made use of in support of one principle of faith, which I afterwards received among this people called Shakers – the thing I mean is this, I had observed in the course of my life that one of the greatest things that operated upon the minds of young people, was a connection / between male and female, the mode or manner in which it was carried, (which is needless for me to relate) made it appear to me like an earthly sensual pleasure, so that when my heart was full of love of God, and was resolved to forsake all carnal enjoyments, for the service of the Lord Jesus Christ, I though I could never get a wife without laying aside my religion. This I observed to some of my friends at the time: But although I felt this sensation for myself, yet I did not doubt but what it might be right for men and women to marry and propagate their species; but whether I was overmuch righteous or not, is a matter I choose to leave for the present, and proceed farther, as to the change of sensation which I received. Doubtless it was thought by professed Christians in general, to be the new birth, or real conversion by which the soul is entitled to the kingdom of Heaven: But as for my own part I never pretended to say whether it was or was not; but my hope of everlasting life was in loving the Lord Jesus Christ, and obeying his gospel – believing that what was contained in the scriptures was a sufficient rule to walk by, and by which I should be judged at the last day. However, after some time, forgetting the commandments of the Lord Jesus Christ, to watch and pray always, or at least, not attending to it, I became carnally minded, and lost in a great measure, my confidence towards God, and that life and comfort which I had before enjoyed. At length, in the spring of the year 1780 I heard a rumour of a strange people at Niskauna,2 that was possessed of remarkable gifts and power, and held to strange doctrines, such as I had never heard before, one thing particular, which drew my attention was the cross3 against the flesh (as it is called) or denying all matrimonial connection between male and female, &c. This brought to my mind what I had felt before in myself; and I rather believed it must be of God, although I had never searched the scripture to see if it was agreeable to the sacred record: But as numbers of my friends and acquaintance soon went to see them, and brought back very wonderful reports which increased my faith so that I was resolved to go and see them for myself; not doubting but what they were the people of God – at length, some time in July 1780, I went with a number of others to see them, at Niskauna, to hear and see for myself, and having an opportunity then, and from time to time, after I received the following principles of faith: viz. But first. I desire to be understood, what I am going to relate as the principles of my faith, is not what I suggested in myself but what I really heard preached, either from the first ministers or from others that were authorized by them to preach: that is, That the great and last day had began – that the Lord Jesus Christ had made his second appearance in that

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person which / was called the mother4 – that she was redeemed from all sin, and stood without fault before the throne of God – that the fulness of the Godhead dwelt in her bodily, as really as it did in the Lord Jesus Christ in his first appearance, and as much greater as his second appearance was to be greater than the first. I understood and believed that she was the woman spoken of in the 12th chapter of Rev. and in Jeremiah 31st chap. 22d verse, that as the Lord Jesus Christ was the second Adam, so she was the second Eve – that as the first Eve was first in the transgression which effect the fall of the human race, so she, as the second Eve, had the first gift & revelation of God, to effect completely the restoration from the fall, which was to be redeemed and delivered wholly from the power, spirit, and nature, that produced natural generation, which was said to be the forbidden fruit that was in the midst of the garden, that our first patents were forbidden to touch upon pain of death I believed that regeneration signified the resurrection from the dead, that Christ spoke of in Luke, 20th chapter, 35th and 36th verses, where he says, “But they which shall be accounted worthy to obtain that world and resurrection from the dead, neither marry nor are given in marriage, neither can they die any more, for they are equal unto the angels, and are the children of God, being the children of the resurrection.” I believed that the mother with some others which were with her, stood completely in the resurrection, and were equal unto the angels, and were conversant and familiar with invisible beings in a spiritual would, and that they were not subject to any natural disorders or infirmities which were incident to the rest of mankind – I believed that God had given them the spirit and power of judgement, to judge the world both quick and dead, and that their power and testimony would increase till it should gather all Nations, and set them on the right hand or on the left, according to what is written in Mathew, 25th chapter and 31st verse: and soon I believed the day and time had commenced which was prophesied of, in Isaiah, 2d chapter and 2d verse, &c. and in Daniel 2d chapter and 44th verse; and 7th chapter, 9th and 10th verses; and in Isaiah 65th chapter, 17th verse, and so on; and in Revelations, 20th and 21st chapters. Many more places might be mentioned which purport the same thing, but perhaps it is not necessary. All this I say I believed without the least doubt, and my labor and concern was to come into possession of that which I had faith in. In order for this I was taught, I must confess all my sins: this I did willingly and honesty; believing myself to be before the bar of eternal justice, where the thoughts and intents of my heart were fully and clearly seen and known. I was also taught, that I must take up my cross against all sin; / but in a special manner against the lust of the flesh, which included not only all manner of uncleanness, contrary to the order of nature, and all natural feelings and actions between male and female; but comprehended all natural union between natural relations, as being the product and fruits of the flesh: and also to labor for the power of God to destroy the very

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nature of the flesh so as to become an Eunuch for the kingdom of heaven’s sake. This I understood to be a total destruction of the nature of generation, both as to the inclination of the spirit and the natural faculties of the body. Although this is not held so now among the people; yet I am sure it was so communicated by the first Ministers, and so received and understood by all the people. It was held that the seed spoken of by the Apostle John in his first epistle, 3d chapter and 9th verse, was the natural seed of copulation: it was held that the marriage in Cana of Gallilee spoken of in the 2d chapter of John, was nothing else but the union of Christ and his disciples: it was also abundantly taught, that what was contained in the scriptures was of no use to us, as it respected our travail, being all in a back dispensation: but that which was the present gift of the Church must be received as the infallible word of God. All these things which I have mentioned, I had no more doubt of than I had of the being of an eternal God; but labored accordingly, in full faith and hope of obtaining a full and complete redemption from the nature and root of all sin, which I believed to be the lust of the flesh, as I have before observed, my faith was so firm that I do not remember ever at one time reading or searching the scriptures, for my own confirmation but only for the purpose of having wherewith to prove the truth of my profession, and to convince gainsayers. At length, being found faithful and obedient, I received an order to labor, with others, and receive confessions; which I went forth in, according as I was taught, and received the approbation and blessing of the Church, and the work seemed to flourish and prosper, to my great encouragement, till some time in the summer of the year 1783, when an unhappy disunion appeared in the Church, and as the matter could not be, or was not kept private, but did and has got abroad among the world, it may not be amiss for me to give a sketch of it; although it is far from my purpose to be a slanderer, or to set up myself as a judge, to justify or condemn; but to state simple facts, as far as may be expedient, and leave the matter to him who is the judge of all. It may be remembered that I before observed, it was under stood and believed that not only the mother, but a number of others had found complete redemption from all sin; among these were William Leas,5 her natural brother, and James / Whittaker,6 an Englishman. It was understood by all, from our first acquaintance with them, that William Leas stood next to the mother, and James Whittaker next to him. However in the summer of the year 1783, a strife arose (or at least it did not appear before to my knowledge) between them. Which should be first – the mother interfered to settle the controversy, and the contention was very unhappy, and proved the means, I believe, of separating a number that appeared to be strong believers; but it had no effect to shake my faith at all; although I was an eye witness to that, which would be really shocking to humanity. My faith was so strong in the mother, believing she had the sole government

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of all souls, both quick and dead, and was actuated wholly by the power of the invisible God, that if I had seen her smite a man dead I don’t know as I should have dared to give myself liberty to think it was wrong. But finally the dispute terminated in the death of William Leas, in July, 1784. And by the death of the mother in September following, the ministration and government of the Church revolved on James Whittaker; this to be sure was a very trying time to believers; it being so contrary from what was first expected; but elder James soon gathered the greatest part of the people to a comfortable faith in his ministration, signifying it was necessary for the mother to go away in order for a further increase of the gospel – he prophesied abundantly of a great increase and spread of the gospel, which was soon to take place. He finally ordered the people to sell their possessions and give to the poor, and to go forth and preach the gospel, in obedience to the gift: some actually sold their possessions, others were preparing to do it; for my part I had nothing to sell, but went to the Church to know what the gift was for me & spoke to Elder James, his words to me were these, “Go forth and circumcise as many as you can.” In obedience to his order, I went forth and took a journey down into Connection, where for my testimony I was taken up, and put into New-London Goal, where I was kept a prisoner four months.7 However the order that was given for the people to sell their possessions was taken off – they were told the time had not come but that it was a gift to try their faith – so that they which had sold, had to buy again, and so the matter rested. As for me, after I got released from prison, and by the help of some of my friends, settled all my expences; I turned again to Elder James where I had the privilege of going several journies with him, and as I had a peculiar faculty in singing, my gift was chiefly to labor in Songs.8 But the last journey I went with him, which was in the year 1787, the latter part of the winter – on returning home he was taken sick so that he could get no farther than Enfield, (in / Connecticut,) where he remained till July following and departed this life. This was a very trying scene with me, as well as many others, for I think I can truly say I loved him as I did my own life. Notwithstanding, I was not at all shaken in my faith, but believed that God would carry on his own work – and as there was several men who seemed to be blessed with great abilities, which had labored in the ministry with Elder James, we were not left without hope; but that the gospel would yet increase according to what had been spoken. At this time there was a very strong labor among three men,9 who were the principle ministers that were left, to know which of them should have the first gift. At length the lot fell upon Elder Joseph Meachem,10 a man greatly beloved and respected by all the people His labor seemed to be to gather the sensation of the people to a farther increase, signifying the departure of Elder James was necessary for the further increase of the gospel, and that it was impossible to take place while

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he continued in the body. The manner of the increase here spoken of, I shall endeavor to describe in as few words as I can, so as to comprehend the substance. It was signified that the believers as a body were all in fleshly relation, and that the time had come for a number to be gathered out of that relation into church relation, to be purged and purified from the flesh, and be prepared to minister the gospel to others. The first gathering took place at New-Lebanon in 1788,11 where there was a great number gathered, both male and female; numbers of which were selected from all the different parts among believes; some on account of their peculiar ingenuity and faculties in temporal things, to be helps in the temporal order of the Church; others (it was signified) were gathered for the more special purpose of being helps to other souls, in spiritual things; others were gathered merely for their own protections and salvation; and others on account of their temporal property. These were all under a daily ministration, for Elder Joseph and some others, who were assistants to him in the ministry; but the labors and exercises both of body and spirit, which this people were exercised in under the daily ministration, is not easily conceived by any one who was not a witness of what I shall not undertake to be particular: but believe it will be sufficient to say, that their chief labor was to destroy the whole order of nature, expecting to obtain the power of God, so as to wholly actuate and move the human frame, independent of any natural strength. How much propriety there was in the under taking, time has sufficiently shewn; upon which I shall observe hereafter. However to proceed in relation to the increase of the people, which were gathered, as has been observed, were called / the Church or Church relation, the rest were all called fleshly relation; but the fire or furnace in Zion, as it was called, was not wholly confined in the Church. Ministers were sent from the Church to other parts to kindle the same fire, and in a particular manner to Hancock,12 the then place of my residence, where the flame burnt so exceedingly that it seemed as though nothing would remain but just faith; but that seemed to be as unshaken as ever. At length, after two or three years of unremitting labors and tribulation, the time came for the people, in Hancock, to be gathered into Church relation; Elder Calvin Harlow,13 a very desirable young man, and one who had the love and esteem of all the people, was appointed as a Bishop, for to gather the Church in Hancock, which took place in the first part of the year 1791. This seemed to be a time comfort and satisfaction, hoping we should now have a privilege to travail out of the flesh, for we had understood that they which had a privilege in Church relation, could travail farther out of the flesh in one week than they which were in fleshly relation could in a year: and as it was the most essential principle of our faith, to find redemption from the flesh our hopes of salvation now increased.

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But to proceed farther respecting the increase about or before this time, there was a further gift in the Church, at Lebanon which was called and is still, the Mother Church;14 the gift was this, they were taught that they had got to find their order of relation to God, in the life of Church order; that is, they had got to find who their Parents15 were, and who their Ministers16 were, and who their Elders17 was, and also, their order of relation one to another, as brethren and sisters; that is, to know who was 1st, 2d, 3d, &c. – as to their parents it was doubtless without any difficulty they acknowledged Elder Joseph to be their father in the Gospel; but as to a mother, it was such a new thing18 and so unexpected that there was something of a labor before the matter was finished: as to the rest, as it does not respect my present purpose, I shall omit saying any thing about it: but as the same line of order was preached to us in Hancock, and the persons appointed and set before us, we had no difficulty in acknowledging them to be our Parents and received what they spoke to us as the oracle of God. Some time after we were called upon to labor, to know who our Elders were and find our relation to them – myself and one more male and two females were appointed, and called upon to labor for the lot of Eldership. We labored accordingly, believing what we were taught to be the infallible word of God. Now perhaps it may be enquired what was the work or business of these Elders, what was the purpose of their gift. It was this, they were to stand between their parents19 and the rest of the family with whom they lived – they were to receive / the word and counsel of God from their parents, and communicate the same to the rest of the family – the family were to look to the Elders, and to them only, for every gift of God they received; and likewise, the Elders to the parents: however it frequently happened that the parents spoke to individuals, and some times to all, as occasion required. Now after we had labored some time, according to our first appointment, being called Elder brethren and Elder sisters, not knowing which was first or which was last; we were all told by our parents that there was but the Elder brother and one Elder sister; there was one which was the oldest, and but one, and the family were all required to labor and manifest their faith who that one was, They accordingly labored, and all signified their faith to be in me as their Elder brother, and that one who was a partner with me to be their Elder sister.20 This being ratified and confirmed by our parents as the gift of God, they all looked to me their Elder, by which and through which they were to receive every gift of God that came to them. This brought me to a very solemn and weighty concern, to discharge my duty in relation to my brethren and sisters, so that they might receive comfort and consolation, and I be accepted of God: but as I had full faith in my parents, and had liberty to ask their counsel upon every needful occasion, we seemed to enjoy in some measure, a comfortable travail, hoping yet to see the increase of the gospel as had been prophecied. At length Elder Calvin, whom we esteemed as our father in the gos-

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pel was taken very sick, so that he was not expected to continue in the body; his sickness, however, (which rendered him unable, a great part of the time, to give much counsel or instruction in relation to the Church) did not immediately take him away; but he continued for more than a year, and departed this life the 21st of December, 1795. This was a time of much affliction and sorrow; but yet my faith was unshaken, and being encouraged by her whom we called and esteemed to be our mother, that there would be an increase of the gospel in a short time, therefore we labored to take courage and hope in God. About this time I understood it was believed in the Church, at Lebanon, that the time was just at hand for the gospel to be opened to the world, and about this time the gift of laboring for mortification21 came about to an end; it was found that we lost our natural strength faster than we obtained the power of God to replace it, so that by this means a great many had gone into eternity, and a great many were very weak: by this time Elder Joseph, the first Bishop, who was believed in the Church to be the descendent of David that was to destroy Gog and Magog, became very much reduced and impaired in his health, though he seemed to labor very strong for a further opening of the gospel among / the world: yet he was obliged to submit to the decrees of God, and bid adieu to time, which took place the 16th of August, 1796. This however, did not seem to be a matter of discouragement; but the forerunner of a farther increase, as it was supposed he had finished his work that he had to do in this world, and that the gift for the farther opening of the gospel was reserved for Henry Clough,22 a young man who had labored in the ministry as an assistant to Elder Joseph, though he was not first in the ministry, but was subject unto her whom he called his mother,23 which was the partner of Elder Joseph; yet he was esteemed to be a very wise man, and depended on as one who had a great work to do in relation to the farther opening and spread of the gospel. Soon after Elder Joseph’s decease, she that was called our mother,24 in Hancock was taken sick, and continued a few weeks, and departed this life, which was on the 19th of September, 1796 Here began a scene of tribulation which exceeded all my former experience; although before this things sometimes appeared very dark and unaccountable, having our expectations so cut off from time to time; but while I had a privilege to be told what to do by them that I believed had the knowledge of God, it was easy for me to be obedient without giving myself much trouble about the propriety or impropriety of matters: but now being left to labor myself and the rest of the people, whose eyes were upon me as their leader I was filled with great concern and labor to know the will of God in relation to myself and the rest of my brethren and sisters. However, having been taught by our parents the order of our relation to God, and of some things that would be the gift after their decease, which was not only spoke to me, but also to numbers of the rest. I was determined to labor according to the

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teaching we had received, hoping that God would open the way for our protection and for the farther increase of the gospel. About this time or not long after some things took place in relation to us, by the counsel or order of the Church at Lebanon, which was a matter of some trial, not to me only, but to the whole of the Church, as it appeared contradictory to what had been taught by our parents; but after giving myself an opportunity of being informed, if seemed to be made to appear that the matter was not inconsistent or contradictory to any thing which we had before received, but altogether necessary for our increase. About this time there seemed to be a gift in the Church, at Lebanon, that the time had come for the gospel to be opened to the world – ministers were appointed and sent forth under the direction of Henry Clough, or Elder Henry, as he was called; the gift was for them to go forth and preach the gospel to the world, and have them confess their sins, &c. and / remain where they were and not come to the Church. They went forth accordingly, time and again, and a great sound there seemed to be, of abundance, of rain, as it were, which seemed to be a matter of great rejoicing: however, as there was not much brought to pass, it was believed that they had not got the right gifts, but that it was necessary to have another gift, which was this, they were to go forth and preach the gospel and invite all to come to the Church: but this did not seem to have the desired effect. Finally, it was thought that the lack was in the ministers; they were suspeuded and others sent forth; but all to little or no purpose. In the mean time Elder Henry, who was admired for his wisdom and abilities, and depended on as one whom God had raised up for the defence and increase of the gospel, was taken sick and in a short time left this world, which I think was about the first of March, 1798. These things gave me much exercise of mind, it seemed as though God would destroy the hope of man sure enough: yet I dared not give way to unbelief or to be discourage; but labored to put as favorable construction on every thing as I was able; but I was ready to say sometimes to myself, “Merciful God, what is the matter, is all things right:” but would check myself, and shut it out, and labor to take courage: however, there were other things that increased my tribulation – one of which was this, there was some who was appointed by the mother Church, as ministers to reside at the meeting-house, in Hancock, and labor in relation to the people in that order, & to receive counsel from the Church at Lebanon, & minister the same to the people in their own order – with these I had labored to support union and peace, according to the best of my knowledge, which succeeded in a good degree. But, at length, in the increase, as it was called, there seemed to be that faith required of me, in relation to them, that I was not able to obtain, without further understanding, it appeared to me, as well as to a number of others that in order to believe and receive, what they told me I must reject, what we had been taught by our parents, and count them as deceivers and imposters. This brought me under a great trial, and as I was

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not able to open my mind to my satisfaction, so as to find any help, I thought I would try one way more, and with the advice of some of my brethren, I set down and wrote a pretty lengthy letter,25 wherein I stated my grievances and trials in as humble and Godly manner as I was able, desiring to have some help in my mind if there was any for me in the Church. This letter I delivered to one of the ministers, and desired it might be carried to them who had the first gift in the Church, at Lebanon, where it was soon carried; but to my surprize, it was treated with the utmost contempt – not even allowed to be read, but committed to the fire and burnt up. / The minister I delivered it to, I suppose, read it and communicated something of the contents, for which, at his return, I received a pretty severe admonition, being upbraided for some things which I had mentioned in my letter, and told me that there was none ever known to prosper, that undertook to write to their Elders, or to that import: so that instead of receiving any help in my faith, or understanding by the means of opening my mind fully, I received only an addition of trouble, which was so great it was impossible to keep it undiscovered by the family, who were so effected in seeing my tears and hearing my cries to God, that some of them were almost ready to flee away and leave the place; but as I had so much faith that I dare not act any thing against that which was the gift in the mother Church, I humbled myself with submission and labored to be reconciled and to reconcile the rest to that which was the gift in them, which we held to be before us according to our profession. However I thought within myself, if I had been deceived, I should be more watchful so as not to be deceived again, if I had been deceived by them whom I believed to be as righteous souls, and more Godly in their example than those who were in the present ministry, it was hard to know what might be depended on; but I meant to labor to receive every gift that came, and reconcile the rest to it, as far as I was able whether I believed it to be the very gift of God or not, if I could not see as there was any sin in it; I believed it was better for peace sake to condescend as far as I could, and not wrong my conscience, than to have any strife or contention; but my gift and calling in relation to the rest, made it sometimes very difficult, for I was required to receive every order that came as the very gift of God for our salvation, and preach it as such to the rest, and sometimes there was that given as order, which was impossible for me to believe that God had any hand in it, for I had learnt by this time that they who stood in the highest authority, in the mother Church, were liable to be deceived sometimes, believing they had a very extraordinary gift of God, and afterwards it was found by certain evidence to be a deception: therefore as my faith was shaken in the foundation, or in them which we looked to as the foundation of our help, I found myself under necessity to cry to the Infinite God, the author of my existence, for some manifestation of light, and was led to take a view, in some measure, of our travail from the first of our faith, wherein I found so many things that were believed and received as

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the revelation of God, which were found by experience to be false and absurd; so many things that were done and undone and all under the name of an increase, that I was doubtful whether we were not deceived in the very foundations principles of our faith, which was this, That the last and glorious day / of the second appearance of the Lord Jesus Christ had taken place, and that more than fifty years ago; and that we who had embraced that faith and travailed in the increase were the only people that are justified upon the face of the whole Earth. I say I was in doubt whether we were not deceived in this foundation point of our faith, and if this was the case I was sure that our building would all be in vain: therefore I was exercised in my mind with exceeding strong labour to ascertain the matter; and having an opportunity with one who professed to be a minister and whom I looked to as my Elder,26 I asked many questions in a very familiar manner, taking care not to discover myself fully, but mentioned the feelings of some others in the family which indeed felt the same that I did; but by all that I could gather from him I found he was as dark as I was, and manifested that he himself was under trials, and said he had a desire sometimes to ask his mother some questions respecting the same matter; but was afraid of being accused of laboring out of his order, and be admonished for it, &c. Here I found there was no light to be had, though he did not signify that he felt any unbelief respecting his profession; but manifested darkness and ignorance. Now seemed as though there was but one alternative for me to take, which I resolved upon, which was this, to cry incessantly to God my creator for his grace and mercy to help me, that I might be able to take a retrospective view of my faith and profession from the first, and compare it with the prophecies which are recorded in the Scriptures of truth. Before this time we had found by certain experience to a demonstration, that one essential principle of our faith was no less than a gross absurdity, which I shall endeavor to shew – the principle of our faith was this, we heard and believed that by confessing and forsaking our sins, we should be able by the power of God to labor completely out of the nature of the flesh, that is to say, to wholly destroy that nature and faculty which is created in men and women for the purpose of propagating their specie. This seemed to be the greatest and most arduous work there was to be done; but receiving such great encouragement, understanding and believing that there was a number which had already attained to it, we undertook the work cheerfully, and labored all manner of ways that we could conceive would have any tendency to mortify the flesh; but still the flesh lived, though some were so violent in their labors, and brought their bodies under so much weakness that there was not much power of erection in the parts of generation; but the solids being so relaxed and the retentive faculty so weakened, that they were more subject to involuntary evacuations than they were before.

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However as there was abundance / of means used to encourage us in the work, we persevered with unremitting labors till the Church was gathered in Lebanon. Then it seemed as though the flesh would be destroyed at once – the testimony against the flesh increased – the labors and exercises of body were increased with great zeal and violence, so that in a short time they who were the most zealous and faithful labored into that degree of mortification that the natural functions of the body were so impaired, and the power of retention so relaxed that they were not able to keep themselves from involuntary evacuations, almost continually, which made some almost despair of ever being saved, as the natural seed of copulation was looked upon as the most unclean and hateful of any thing in the natural creation. However numbers labored out of the flesh, that is to say, the blood ceased to circulate in the veins – the lungs ceased to do their office – the soul took its departure out of the fleshly tabernacle. But the work was carried on with unremitting zeal, till a great number left the body and went into eternity who, I have not the least doubt but that they as really put an end to their own existence in this world as though they had taken a dose of poison or a raizor and cut their throats; but it was said they gave up their lives for Christ’s sake: let that be as it may, I have no doubt they believed so. At length, after a while the gift seemed to abate about labouring for mortification, till finally it came quite to an end. Physicians were appointed and set to labour to help the sick and those that were weak, to build up that which they had been destroying, though it had not been taught plainly to my knowledge that the idea was wholly given up, of totally destroying that nature in this world; yet what took place made it appear so. All these things I had observed and understood, and as I had the care of a considerable number that frequently opened their feelings and trials to me, and their unbelief in finding a total end to the flesh in this world; I labored into the matter thoroughly, till I was fully satisfied for my self: I was informed, and that from good authority, that the first mother,27 whom we believed to be equal with the Angels, was subject to the same natural infirmities28 which were incident to other women, which, if true, as I had some understanding in the theory of the human machine, I was persuaded she was not delivered from the nature of generation, it being necessary for that purpose, and that only. Having understood all these things, and much more also, which I could mention were it necessary; I was fully persuaded that it was as possible to stop the blood and juices from flowing into an arm or a leg, or to dry up the marrow in the bones, as to accomplish what we had undertaken. Being fully satisfied I did not scruple to speak my faith among my / brethren, not for their discouragement but, for their encouargement that they might not be cast down and discouraged if they felt the flesh ever so strong; knowing we had got it to fight to the end of our days: however I was exceedingly tried, as well as the rest, to find we had been so deceived, not know-

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ing but what we might be deceived in a great many other things as well as that; but being desirous to know how the matter was held by them who were before us. I took an opportunity with the minister whom I looked to for counsel, and opened some of the brethren’s feelings to him in relation to the matter. He at first seemed to intimate as though there was an evil spirit to work with them; but when I come to tell him frankly what my faith was in relation to the matter he gave the matter up, and joined with me, telling a number of circumstances to confirm it. But to return to the first principles of our faith, viz. The second appearance of Christ in that woman which we called the mother. I have before observed, that she was said to be the woman spoken of in the 12th chap. of Rev. it was held that the man child she brought forth was James Whittaker, and her going into the wilderness was her coming into America. Now when I came to read the scriptures for myself; and remembered what I was taught and what I believed, I was astonished with myself that ever I imbibed such absurd ideas; but the reason was, I never searched the scriptures to see if these things were so, but believed and received every thing I heard, without giving myself liberty to doubt the truth of it; but when I came to look and read for myself, the matter looks so plain and obvious that it seems as though I should be guilty of impertinence to make any comment upon it, but shall leave every one to read and judge for themselves. Now I shall leave this matter and observe some things which took place in the Church which gave me much affliction. We had some years before entered into covenant to maintain and support a joint interest one with another, and agreed not to bring one another into debt for any services or interest we should bestow to the joint interest of the Church. This was entered into in writing,29 with our names subscribed to it: but the meaning or intention of this thing as we understood it, was this, there had been a number that had left the people and come with great demands for wages,30 &c. – Some of which appeared to be very unjust, and brought distress upon the Church. This covenant therefore was intended to cut them off from making any demand, so that the Church might be able to do that which was just and equal in relation to them, without being brought into distress, and so the matter was conducted for a number of years. When any one went away, the Deacons and Overseers31 came to a settlement with them – paid them a / certain sum and took a final discharge: whether they did justice or not, I do not pretend to say; but I had heard it intimated some time past, that the time would come when those who went away from the Church would not be allowed any thing at all: however, I did not believe that ever I should see that time come; it looked to me like such barefaced injustice, that I could not think it would ever be presumed upon. However it was not a great while before the gift come sure enough, and as it got among the Deacons before I had knowledge of it, it was divulged

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amongst the family, which made no small stir among them; and as they opened their trials to me in the matter, I labored to pacify them, telling them I did not believe it: however. I was determined to know the truth of it, and as I had an opportunity with the Minister, I opened what trials there was among the brethren, and desired to know the truth of the matter. He was very free and open to disclose the whole matter, and opened his faith freely – he said he believed that those who went away and left the Church had no more right to receive any temporal property out of the Church as a compensation for any labor or any interest they had bro’t in, no more than Judas had a right to an inheritance with the Apostles after he had betrayed Christ. It was alledged that the interest or service that was given, was given to God, and to take away that which was given to God would be committing sacrilege. This indeed was pretty strong meat for me, however, I thought I would not say any thing to bring myself into trouble: but being asked the question what my faith was in relation to the matter, I dared not be otherwise than an honest man, so I opened my faith honestly. I told him I believed that if any one who had lived with us, and labored faithfully, and spent their strength with us for a number of years, and finally, for some cause or other they chose to go away and leave us, it was a righteous thing for us to give them something as a compensation for their labour I told him if one who lived there with us that had a piece of land which he had given in to the joint interest, and afterwards saw fit to take himself away, I could not in conscience feel any heart to improve that land, unless it was purchased of him, and he received the value of it. As to its being sacrilege I could not conceive the matter to be so that what was given for sacred Use and consecrated to God for that purpose, to take it away might be called sacrelege; But this seemed to me to be a difficult thing: When we came together we brought what we had, and put it into the common stock, for the general benefit of all, not for others any more than for ourselves, to be used equally, according to our daily needs, such as eating, drinking, &c. so that I could not see the propriety of saying it was all given up for Sacred use any more than our daily eating and / drinking, or any others temporal duty is sacred. It was signified to me that the wicked did not deserve any thing but judgment, which included all that were not of that profession, It was told me they who went away from the Church to the world had what they went after; they had the flesh and that was enough for them. In answer to what was said of the wicked’s not deserving any thing, I said, if a wicked man does me a day’s work, it is as just and right for me to pay him, as though he had been a righteous man: also, I told them I did not know but the time might come when the people of God would have power to execute judgment, but I did not believe that the time had come yet, therefore, I queried thus; here is one of the brethren (mentioning his name) who has been here these 8 or 9 years, and has laboured faithfully – he has been a very strong laborious young

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man and has done a great deal of good – by and by he gets discouraged, loses his faith, or for some other cause, he chooses to go away and leaves us. Well, we say, he has gone to the unclean and left the only means of his salvation and will have to suffer the judgment of God. Now, is not that enough for him to bear – do not we ought to feel sorry for him, and pity him, or shall we try to make him as wretched and miserable as we possibly can in this world, by depriving him of all the fruit of his labor which is necessary for his subsistance in this world? Can this be right, or can any one who has a Christian spirit have a heart to do it? To repeat all the conversation we had upon this subject would be very lengthy and needless; but it cost me a great deal of affliction before I got through with it. I shall only further observe, that we compromised the matter as well as we could. I admitted they that went away had no right to make any demand according to the covenant, and the matter seemed to be dropped as to its being sin to give them any thing, and so we labored for union again. However, numbers not long after went away and left the Church, I suppose, chiefly on that account; but they were settled with, and something given to them for peace sake, so as to get a final discharge from them, that would secure the Church from any controversy in the law. This was a reserve that was made that it might be right to sacrifice something, for peace sake, rather than to enter into a controversy that might bring the Church into trouble. Not far from this time (as I was continually exercised in tribulation which I was unable to keep undiscovered, although the cause I labored to keep to myself; but doubtless it was observed that I did not preach up faith so strong as I had done in times past, but labored to maintain union and reconciliation to the present gift and order that was for us,) being in company / with the Ministers one evening, I was questioned respecting my faith. I was asked whether I had a living witness in me, that this was the second coming of Christ? I said nay, I have not. My answer seemed to be very surprising and unexpected: however, they undertook to labor with me – I shewed my reasons in part; but the more they labored with me, the less faith I felt, till I did not see but I should loose all I had got. The labor continued a day or two, till my tribulation was unutterable. I did not see but what I must give up my place as an Elder, for I always had a mortal aversion to hypocrites, and I did not see but what I had got to be one myself in some degree, although I was conscious to myself that I had never done any intended wrong, nor willfully acted any thing that I knew was sin, since the first of my profession; but as I had not faith, without doubt, I was not able to preach faith to others; however, viewing the consequences that would naturally follow, I desired to labour further, and accordingly went to the Ministers and humbled myself, and begged their patience with me till I had labored for a further increase of faith. They seemed to be thankful for my resolution and labored to encourage me in it.

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But to return again to the labor I was in, to wit, in searching the scriptures to ascertain whether the day and time had come, according to the testimony, of the second appearing of Christ. I have already shewn that in some of the most essential points of our faith we were grossly deceived, and there were many other things which I found to my satisfaction, were equally absurd. One thing I heard asserted not long since (by one who professed to be my teacher) in the most positive terms that the Church was now in the new Jerusalem state. This appeared to me to be a deception, for in that state it is plainly said that God will wipe away all tears from their eyes, and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain, for the former things are passed away. The present state of the Church seemed to me to be quite the reverse from this, for there is both sorrow, pain and death, and that to a greater degree than what there is among many other people; but this is called suffering with Christ: however it appears to me without all doubt that the sole cause for the greatest part of the sufferings and deaths that have been among this people is intemperance. What propriety there is in saying that the Lord Jesus Christ has come in his glory with all the holy Angels with him, to reign as king upon Earth, and yet his Church be in a state of sufferings I do not pretend to say, but shall leave it for every one to judge for themselves: but as I shall not have time to be particular in shewing my ideas on every passage of scripture which I have quoted, and have perused to my satisfaction, I shall only observe upon a / few things which were spoken by the Lord Jesus Christ, which I believe will be acknowledged to be the most sure word of prophecy. In the 24th chapter of Matthew Christ gives a very particular account of what should take place before his coming, and the manner of his coming; and in the 25th chapter he tells what should be after his coming – he signifies that before his coming there would be a great many sounds and voices about religion; false prophets and false Christs should arise and shew great signs and wonders &c. Observe this was to be before his coming, not afterwards, “for (he says) as the light’ning cometh out of the East and shineth even unto the West, so shall the coming of the son of man be;” there will be such light and evidence manifested as will put the matter beyond all controversy, both with the just and unjust, for he says, “all the tribes of the Earth shall see him, & shall mourn at his appearing.” Now it is held by some that the light’ning here spoken of does not mean the electrical fire that cometh out of the clouds, but the sun that riseth in the East, & progressively increases till it enlightens the whole Earth. Admitting this to be the case, it is no less evident that the second coming of Christ will be with such incontestable evidence, that all men will have to submit to his government; for as the sun rises, the day appears, the darkness passes away, and every object that scarcely discernable in the night now appears clearly to be what it is; and as it is impossible for the sun to rise and not bring the day along with it, so it appears to be impossible, according to what is written, for the sun

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of righteousness to arise, and be arising more than fifty years, and almost all the inhabitants of the Earth be entirely ignorant of it: but perhaps it may be said it is possible for men to sleep in the day, when the sun does shine, and not know whether it be day or night; but Christ says, he shall send his Angels with a great sound of a trumpet. This no doubt, will awaken every creature, for “all the tribes of the Earth shall mourn, and they shall see the son of man coming in the clouds of heaven with power and great glory.” Perhaps it is needless for me to say that there never was more sects and denominations of religion – and lo here! and lo there! than there is at this present time. This is a sign that the day of Christ is at hand; but not that it has already come, and been come these fifty years. Now after Christ had spoken a considerable time in relation to his coming, and the manner of it, he tells us how it should be after he had come; beginning at Matthew, 25th chapter and 31st verse, where he says, “when the son of man shall come in his glory, and all the holy Angels with him, then shall he set upon the throne of his glory, and before him shall be gathered all nations, and he shall separate them one from another, as a shepherd divideth his sheep from the goats, and he shall set / sheep on the right, but the goats on the left; then shall the king say to them on his right hand, come ye blessed of my father inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world, for I was an hungred and ye gave me meat, &c.” This paragraph, or passage of scripture, came into my mind some days before I left the people in Hancock. I was under exceeding tribulation in my mind with respect to these things that I had been laboring in. I walked out into the garden to amuse my mind some, with the natural creation; while I was walking in the garden it seemed to break forth into my mind, as though it was sent by the invisible power of him that spoke it first; the reason that was assigned for pronouncing the blessing was the matter that operated more essentially in my mind, “for I was an hungred and ye gave me meat;” it was not because they were Shakers, or Quakers, or any one particular sect or denomination; it was not because they gave alms and sounded a trumpet so as to have the praise of men; it was not because they attended to a great many orders and ceremonies, for fear of punishment, expecting thereby to make them selves a righteousness Nay it was not all this. But what was it? It was because they had received the spirit of the Lord Jesus, which made them love to do good to their fellow creatures; it was because they loved righteousness, for righteousness sake; it was because they loved those that hated them, and blessed those that cursed them; and when they had done all, they could feel themselves unprofitable servants, as it seems was the tenor of their language. They were ready to cry out, Lord where did we do such and such things? They felt as if they had done nothing that was sufficient to make them worthy of any favor; but what they had done they did out of love to God, and therefore had made no account of it.

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These meditations and contemplations seemed to carry me quite beyond the limits of my order. I forgot all my trouble, and almost forgot I was a Shaker; however, recollecting where and what I was, my trouble soon come on again; and as there was some things about that time that come forth as order, which I had not much faith in, so that I could not speak it to the rest as a matter of my own faith, which I was required to do, without wronging my conscience. I came to a resolution to resign my office, and not be a hypocrite any longer, let the event be as it would, though I was not determined to come away till I was further satisfied: I accordingly carried my my resolution into effect and gave up my place as the Elder Brother, June 30th,32 and desired no one to look to me for any help or any counsel as they had done, but to labor for myself only, and be esteemed as one of the least of all. This I spoke to the family, and told them I felt myself quite come to / an end and unable to be any further help to them; but did not tell the cause, in particular, for I was not allowed by any means to open my weakness or unbelief to the rest, respecting the foundation of our profession. But the circumstance of my resigning my place seemed to be very shocking, and caused great agitations and anxiety of mind throughout the Church. My tribulation also was not at all lessened; viewing things as they had been in relation to me, and comparing them with my present state; it seemed as though it was more than I should be able to endure, and continue in the body: but as I had but one life to lose, and one soul to save, I was determined once for all, to be an honest man, and abide the event. However, as there was one appointed to supply the place which I had left, there was immediately great labor and pains taken to seperate the feelings of the Church from me, both by the Ministers and Elders; and as this could not easily be done without finding something against me, whereby it might be made to appear that I had been wicked, and gone contrary to the order of the Church. There was no pains spared in laboring and searching to find some iniquity, both by examining me and many others, till finally it was thought they had found some thing worthy of admonition. I was labored with and severely admonished, even for that which they themselves would have justified. A few months before I was told I had got to come to such and such thing or go to the world, &c. I received the communication without making much reply, and told them I should consider of it I but notwithstanding, I had felt many times as though I could go away and leave them with as much peace of conscience as ever I lay down to sleep as to any faith I had that bound me there; yet, when I come to bring the matter near and realize it, to forsake the people which I so loved, and had so long maintained such a near relation and intimate union with, and with whom I had a comfortable subsistance, with respect to temporal things, and seek me a place among strangers, it seemed as though I had rather give up my life and go into eternity; for my natural relations were as much strangers to me as the rest of mankind, for from the first of my faith, there was no one to my knowledge

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that labored more effectually to reject and shut out their natural relations33 than myself; and having been very bold and presumptuous to testify many things to them, which I had good reason to believe were dictated by the spirit of error, and that which I should have to acknowledge was false and absurd; and also in treating them with such unnatural contempt, that I felt as though I should never have confidence to ask of them any favor. In consideration of these things and feeling my heart and affections so bound up in the family where I lived, that I / chose to submit it to any thing that was required of me, as far as I was able and not sin against my own conscience, not seeing any thing but what I must soon leave this world, for my appetite to food was all gone, so that I was able to take very but little for my nourishment; and there was such a pain in my heart, almost continually, that it seemed some times as though it would burst asunder; and all the remedy I could find was weeping and crying to God – and this was so troublesome to the Ministers and Elders (it having such an effect upon those that had tender feelings) that I was disallowed weeping before the family, or indeed, any where else; however I was not able to refrain all the time; but when my heart was in such pain that I could endure it no longer, I would take myself alone and weep and pray to God till I was in some measure refreshed; but my tribulation still continued as constant as my breath. Though the family was exceeding kind and tender to me, and were willing to help me to every thing I needed as to temporal support, and would often try to comfort me in my spirit, but it was all in vain – also the Ministers and Elders frequently labored with me, to help my faith; but that was equally in vain; for the more they labored with me, the more I was satisfied we were all upon a wrong foundation, and should at last be found false witnesses before God. It appeared evident to me that my feelings to the people and family where I lived was partial, and that which was acquired by a long habit of intimacy, more than by the true love of God, which is universal to all that believe in Christ. Viewing things to be so I was unwilling to stay there and die, for death appeared to me not far distant, as my body was reduced almost to a skeleton, and my natural strength almost exhausted; therefore I believed it was my duty to change my condition by coming away and leaving them, and renouncing that which I believed was error: but the cross I had to take up for that purpose I believe was seven fold greater than it was to forsake my father’s house34 and join that people at first – however I gathered up as much resolution as I could, and accomplished my purpose the 24th of July, 1799, by bidding them farewell, and leaving the place. As to my feelings since that time, I shall only observe, that notwithstanding I was at a loss for some time whether I should live or die, my health was so impaired. I have not seen one moment that I was sorry I came away, let it be to my honor or dishonor; but I am fully persuaded that I have been under the power of deception and was led by the spirit of error, as to the main principles of faith that I set out upon: but my

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present feeling and determination is to turn to the good and the right way, which is the new and living way, pointed out by Christ and his Apostles, and make it the rule of my life and conduct. / Now I desire to address myself in a few words, to those who have or may hereafter come away from the people called Shakers. There has been numbers who have left that people, whose conduct, I am sorry to say, has been more wicked & prophane than the rest of mankind in general. This is made use of by the Shakers (as some of you well know) as an evidence that they are the only people of God; applying that scripture in Matthew 12th, 43d, &c. where it speaks of the unclean spirit going out of a man, and afterwards he takes seven other spirits more wicked than himself, &c. This is applied to all that leave them. They suppose that they are going to be seven times more wicked than ever they were before; or, at least, all that leave them and deny any faith in them: but for my part I do not feel under any obligation to be wicked, because they think it must be so: neither do I feel any lack of the protection of God from the power of evil any more than ever I did; but I feel as fully determined, by the help of God, to do justice, love mercy, and walk humbly with God, as ever I did in any part of my life – and as there are numbers of you that have lived with me, and have heard me speak a great deal against the flesh, &c. and likely would be glad to hear from me now in relation to the matter, I would just let you know that I feel as much against the works of the flesh, which is forbidden in the scriptures, as ever I did: but the ordinance and covenant of marriage, between male and female, which was ordained of God, in the garden of Eden before the fall; I believe it is the gift of God now as really as ever it was; but as I have not time to be particular in this matter, I would refer you to a book, written by my ingenious friend, Daniel Rathbone,35 which was published some years ago, where the matter is fairly and ingeniously laid open. But there is another thing which I desire to be a little particular in, respecting some that have left the Shakers, and have dishonored themselves by bad behaviour. Although wickedness is inexcusable whenever it is found, yet sometimes by knowing what the cause is, we may be able to make some allowance for the effect. Now in the beginning of our faith there was a great many young children among the believers, which lived chiefly with their parents for a number of years, and the chief part of the teaching they had was to sing and dance and labor for mortification. Finally there was a great number gathered to the Church, where they were put under the care of a Minister, appointed for that purpose.36 They were disallowed to have any books that was proper to instruct the mind into the principles of humanity. Their teaching was such as might be expected from those who rejected the scriptures, reason, and common sense, as being repugnant to the Gospel. They were, doubtless, some of them very vicious in their natures, and ungovernable, therefore / it seemed necessary to use violent means to subject them to obedience. This appeared barbarous and cruel, and only aggravated

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their feelings to greater opposition. Finally they broke out of their bondage, and went off to the world one after another.37 Now being taught from their infancy that their was no other people that served God but the Shakers, and not having any opportunity to learn any thing to the contrary, they did not know but it was so; and not being able to endure the discipline in the Church, they renounced that religion; together with all the rest upon Earth, determining to take their own way, without fearing God or regarding man. Being bred up so entirely ignorant of all the principles of morality, they become easy victims to all manner of evil. – Others there are, who had arrived to the years of understanding before they joined the Shakers, and have since left them, and made a sad figure in the world. Those I apprehend are such as never had any principles of righteousness in them, but joined the people out of some selfish motives; and not finding their purpose answered, return back to their old course with an increase of evil. Now, my friends, as we have made a very extraordinary profession, and exalted ourselves above the rest of mankind, and have found ourselves deceived; do not let us be discouraged of trying to serve God at all; but let us remember that the day will come when we shall all receive a reward according to our works. Now a few words to those whom I have called my brethren and sisters, to wit, the Church in Hancock, called Shakers; although I do not expect you will be allowed by your ministers to read what I have here written, yet it may be possible that some of you may chance to see it, which if you do, you will find the real cause of my coming away from you; for as I was not allowed to open my mind to any one but those who labord with me, it was impossible for you to know the cause of my affliction fully or the reason of my leaving you: but thanks be to God, I am now where I have liberty to open my mind without fearing the displeasure of mortals; but as I understand the common proceeding among you in relation to those that come away from you, I shall not be disappointed to find myself exceedingly hated by some of you, who, no doubt, believe it your duty to hate me and execrate me as much as you are able, lest you should lose your union with your Ministers and Elders; I sap in this I shall not be disappointed, but shall consider it to be just in relation to me to have the same meat measured to me that I have measured to others, though I cannot say that I have ever felt or allowed myself to feel such a spirit of revenge as I have observed among some of you. A few days before I came away from you, I heard a man say, (one that professed to be very forward among you) speaking of one / that had lately come off, that he wished a tree might fall upon him before he got to the place where he was agoing:38 and there is some whom you esteem to be some of the foremost among you, who have uttered such sentiments as these when their cattle got into their neighbor’s grain: they thought it was as well for their cattle to eat it as it was for the world to have it, because their neighbor, who was the owner of it, was not a Shaker, but of the world. Many more such like things might be mentioned were

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it necessary; but I shall only observe, that through a long course of experience, I have found, that there hath existed and still doth exist a spirit among you which would put all the race of Adam into the most exquisite torture, had they power sufficient, that would not subject to your faith and profession. Now these things I speak not to reproach you; but my desire is that you might see the spirit of error by which you are led and renounce it, and embrace the simple doctrines which were taught by Christ and the Apostles. But there is one thing which hath come to my ears that I understand came from some of you, to which, it appears to me, I cannot do justice to myself without making some reply. I have understood it has been intimated that while I lived in the Church and professed to be strong in faith, that I lived in unlawful connexion with a certain woman, which is since my wife.39 Now this appears to me to be mean and ill usage, and beneath the Church of Christ, even if it was true. You may remember, doubtless, some of you, what I spoke to you a few days before I come away – I told you if any of you had any things against me, or knew any wickedness of me to tell me of it before I came away, so that I might confess it and leave it with you, and not serve me as you did the rest, as soon as they were gone, then to try to rake up every thing you could against them. Now why was you not so kind, if you knew these things, as to tell me of it while I was there, for I presume you knew as much about it then as you do now. However I will tell you the simple truth, as I expect to answer it to God my creator. From the time that I first professed Christianity (which was a year or two before I heard of the people called Shakers) to this day, I never have had any unlawful connexion with any woman, nor never in the course of my life did I ever defile myself with strange flesh; and from the time I first knew the Shakers to this time, I never defiled myself with what is called among you effeminacy;40 neither did I ever know by any certain knowledge, while I lived with you that there was any females in the Church or any where else, except it was at the time when there was such a gift for men and women to strip naked and go into the water together, &c. I was some times a spectator, and perhaps might observe the difference; but as to the woman which is now my wife, I / never knew whether she was male or female till after I was legally married to her; and as to my making any agreement with her to come away from the Church, I never did, first nor last, for I never spoke a single word to her about one thing or another, after I was determined to come away, till a few minutes before I came away; then I spoke with her and gave her the offer of my friendship and protection, if God spared my life, if it was her choice to follow me. Now there are some things which I have hinted that many of you are ignorant of, which I feel it my duty to open more plainly. It is well known to you that the foundation of our hope was built upon our faith in the first Mother, William Leas and James Whittaker, believing that they were redeemed from all sin and were equal unto the Angels of God. I have hinted something about the conten-

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tion there was among them; now I will tell you what I saw with my own eyes, I was at Niskauna with the Mother and the Elders. At length there was a contention broke out, which seemed chiefly to be between the Mother and William Leas; it kept increasing till there was nothing but clamor and confusion. Finally the Mother fell to beating William Leas41 – smiting of him in the face – he tried to defend off her blows, threatening to smite her if she did not let him alone. There was a number of people present, who, most of them, seemed to join with the Mother, and labored to keep William Leas from hurting her, for there was awful threatning on both sides; however the mother would not let him alone, but notwithstanding his activity in defending himself would very often get a blow at him, till his face was in a gore of blood: at length, as he could endure it no longer, he smote her with his fist, and being a very strong man I understood that he hurt her very much, but she did not fall quite to the floor, if I remember right, the people being so thick held her up. I stood the chief part of time not more than five or six feet from them, and saw the whole of what I have described, and I think I have not exaggerated it one morsal, but have rather come short; for as I have had considerable opportunity in the course of my life both in the army among soldiers42 and elsewhere, I never saw any contention that appeared more contrary to the Gospel: notwithstanding, at that time, my faith and imagination was such, that I dared not judge there was any thing in the Mother that was wrong: but since I have found by incontestable evidence that I have been deceived, and have given myself liberty to exercise the rational faculties that God has created in me, it appears to me that the Mother, at that time, was very much overcome with strong liquor, and was under the influence and power of Satan; and there is some among you now, or at least was the last I heard from them, that can say, if they would be honest, that I have / spoke but a little part of what they see and heard from time to time, as they had more opportunity than I. There is one among you, or was when I came away, that told me a few months ago that he was there at the time I was and lived there some time after: he signified they were in contention almost continually; sometimes between the Mother and William Leas, and sometime between the Mother and James Whittaker – he told as to their language, there never was a sailor stepped on board a ship that exceeded them – he told me the Mother charged Whittaker with committing whoredom with a certain woman; Whittaker declared his innocence, &c – This man that told me this I suppose is now among you and means to stay, for aught that I know; but you yourselves, some of you, believe, or at least have believed, that there is some among you who are in Authority, that are no more Shakers in heart and principle than the rest of the world, but stay among you out of selfish motives. There is many things I should be glad to say to you, but as I expect it is unlikely many of you will ever see what I have wrote so long as you remain in your bond-

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age, I shall close my matter by just observing, that my experience among the Shakers appears to like a man that has been following an ignis fatuus,43 which is something which he supposes to be light, and sets out to go to it, but never gets any nearer to it, but follows it till he is led into a dismal wilderness of darkness, and then it disappears; so it seems has been the case with me. It appears to me that I turned my eyes off from that light which God had appointed for souls to look to, and thought I see a light some where else, but in following after it I found it was always out yonder, till finally it led me into a dismal swamp, and then disappeared, where I had to get out as well as I could; but I am thankful to God that I have so far got out that I hope I am able, in some measure, to discover things as they be; and may God grant that you all may receive the same help and grace of God to bring you out of your darkness into the true light of the glorious Gospel of the Son of God, so that you may be happy in this world and that which is to come, which is the sincere desire of REUBEN RATHBONE.

FINIS.

SMITH, ‘A N ATTEMPT TO DEVELOPE SHAKERISM’

James Smith, ‘An Attempt to Develope Shakerism’, Supporter (Chillicothe, OH), 10 July 1810, [p. 2].

Colonel James Smith was born in Franklin County, Pennsylvania in 1737. In 1755 he was taken captive by a mixed band of Indians near Bedford, Pennsylvania. He remained in captivity until 1759, and in 1799 published a narrative of his experience.1 In 1765, five years before the birth of his future Shaker arch-nemesis Richard McNemar, Smith led a group of white settlers called the ‘Black Boys’ in the destruction of a pack train carrying trade goods, liquor and weapons to the Indians. The government of Pennsylvania responded by capturing and imprisoning seven Black Boys, which led to Smith and a group of 300 men investing Fort Loudon in what was arguably the first act of armed rebellion carried out against the British army in North America. Over the late spring of 1765, Smith and his men harassed Lieutenant Charles Grant, the commander of Fort Loudon, surrounding the fort two more times and disrupting further Indian trade. Smith was branded a rebel by Grant. In early June, Governor John Penn decided that the Black Boys were justified in their actions, and charges against Smith were dropped. In return, Smith ceased his depredations on the Indian pack trains.2 At the outbreak of the Revolutionary War Smith was chosen to represent Westmoreland County Pennsylvania in the 1776 General Assembly in Philadelphia. In 1777 he saw action in New Jersey at Rocky Hill. For the duration of the war Smith defended the western Pennsylvania frontier against Indian attacks. Smith moved to Cane Ridge, Kentucky, with his family in 1788.3 His presence loomed large over the settlement of Cane Ridge, and Bourbon County in general. That same year he was appointed to represent the settlers at Danville where the separation of the state of Kentucky from Virginia was being negotiated. Smith remained a representative for Bourbon County in the Kentucky state legislature throughout 1799.4 In that year he also published his autobiography An Account of the Remarkable Occurrences in the Life and Travels of Col. – 179 –

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James Smith. Smith and his son James Smith Jr were members of Barton Stone’s Presbyterian congregation, and were participants in the epochal camp meetings centred at Cane Ridge in August 1801. As he relates in his publications, Smith was then living with his son and namesake. James Smith Jr eventually converted to Shakerism and relocated his unwilling family to Turtle Creek, Ohio, to live with the Shakers. James Smith launched an anti-Shaker campaign in the public press throughout the Ohio River Valley. Smith’s first writing, ‘An Attempt to Develope Shakerism’, offers a thumbnail sketch of the devastating impact of Shakerism on his family. He touches on themes he would go on to explore more fully in his first pamphlet Remarkable Occurrences (also included in this volume on pp. 187–99). Comparisons of the Shakers with the Roman Catholic Church, accusations of licentious sex among the Shakers – and that Shaker leader David Darrow hosted bacchanals with groups of women, as well as accusations of child abuse, made for a dense and shocking indictment of the Shakers in the public press. A recurring theme in Smith’s writing – and one that Shaker Richard McNemar would later twist to attack Smith – was Smith’s service to the colonies in the French and Indian War and the American Revolution. Smith writes as an authentic and battle-hardened protector of American civil and religious liberties. For him, Shakerism represented a hierarchical, authoritarian system very similar to that of the English government he had fought to eliminate. Of the Shakers he wrote, the principles of servile subjection are so ingrafted in them, that they may be wretched dupes, tories, and pests to society. And under the pretence of worshiping God, the root of civil and religious liberty is deeply wounded … It has been said, if those under the Shakers are in bondage, they are voluntary slaves … when I see a snake in the grass, or a poisonous worm gnawing at the root of the TREE OF LIBERTY, shall I not at least cry out ‘TAKE CARE.’ (p. 185, below)

Notes 1. 2.

3. 4.

J. Smith and J. Darlinton (eds), An Account of the Remarkable Occurrences in the Life and Travels of Col. James Smith (Cincinnati: Robert Clarke & Co., 1870), [p. v]. J. B. Frantz and W. Pencak (eds), Beyond Philadelphia: The American Revolution in the Pennsylvania Hinterland (University Park, PA: Pennsylvania State University Press, 1998), pp. 112–13. Smith and Darlinton, An Account, p. viii. Ibid., pp. 131–8.

James Smith, ‘An Attempt to Develope Shakerism’, Supporter (Chillicothe, OH), 10 July 1810, [p. 2].

An Attempt to Develope Shakerism. About five years ago, three Shakers, viz. Issachar Baits,1 John Mitcham2 and Benjamin Young,3 came to Kentucky, where I then resided, but was abroad in the state of Tennessee. On my return to my son James Smith’s4 in Kentucky, where I had my home, I found he had joined the Shakers, I knew very little about them, but soon after they having collected a party on Turtle-creek,5 in the state of Ohio, I asked the above mentioned Baits, if I might go and live with them for some time, to see what sort of people they were – to which he agreed; I accordingly went, and from that time to the present, I have diligently endeavored to find them out, (which is truly difficult) and I think I have succeeded in a good degree. They artfully and insidiously conceal their real views and principles from those whom they wish to proselyte to their scheme. The main thing necessary to stop the progress of Shakerism, is for mankind to know what it is. I shall, therefore endeavor plainly, to relate what I have discovered. and as I intend principally to confine myself to matters of fact, I hold myself in readiness to prove the truth of what I shall assert, if required. The Shakers hold that their chief Elder, David Durrow,6 is inspired and infallible, that the council and people under him must implicitly believe what he teaches, and obey his commands, which they call believing and obeying God. For the satisfaction of my readers, I shall here insert some information which I received from persons who had been a considerable time with the Shakers, and have left them, which may afford some light concerning the Shaker’s practices. As the persons appeared to be ashamed of having been Shakers, I shall not insert their names. On March 13th, 1810, I called on one who had been three years with the Shakers. He said he had formerly been a member of the Methodist society, and was then happy in the enjoyment of vital religion; but was not so while with the Shakers; moreover, that the arbitrary authority and hard usage exercised over the – 181 –

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working hands was intolerable. He also added that it was easy joining the Shakers, but hard to get free from them – The same evening I had an interview with three others,7 who were altogether; one of whom had been eighteen months, another near two years, the other three years with the Shakers. Those men say that in general their education of children is chiefly a pretence, that their principal leaders only are well educated. They do not approve of those of a lower rank reading any books; they are taken from school as soon as they are fit for other business. Elder David has overseers appointed over the different societies, called families, throughout the states of Ohio, Kentucky, and the Indiana Territory. The overseers provide for the laborer’s common diet, and apparel, and what they earn more than is sufficient for that purpose, is given to Elder David, to be disposed of among his council or as he sees fit, this they call giving up the money to God. They whip their laborers or underlings severely, and also their children or young people, if they refuse to kneel or dance, or confess their sins, or otherwise transgress. Besides they have various modes of inflicting punishment. My informers say they saw them punish a little boy for taking a piece of cake without leave, in the manner following: They made a circle on the floor about a foot in diamiter and compelled the boy to stand within the circle with his face upwards, from twelve o’clock till dark. The Shakers quarrel and fight among themselves, though they endeavor to conceal it from others. Even when in their dance which they esteem devotional, my informers say they have seen them strike each other with their elbows, and one man strike another with his fist so that the blood ran from his mouth and nose. They further state, that that Shakers told them, if they bore the cross, and abstained from women for some time, they would become so holly8 that it would be no sin to have carnal knowledge of their own holy women, but that it would be wrong for them to have children, as it would be a bad example to the world, and might prevent them from living in celibacy so as to become holy. One of the men above mentioned, who had left them, told me he believed that Elder David stored up liquor for their own use, which was as far as possible concealed from the common people. He said that he saw Elder David’s Steward at one time buy several barrels of rum and wine, which were taken to his lodging; he also said that he spied a considerable number of Women in Elder David’s place drinking wine very freely; and when he beheld that their leaders were living in luxury on his hard labor he left them. The substance of the foregoing account I took in writing from those men, which being read to them, they said it was fairly stated, the truth whereof they were willing to declare upon oath. Further, to shew the practice of the Shakers, I shall mention some circumstances relative to my son James Smith. After joining the Shakers, he appeared

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to be divested of natural affection towards his wife Polly, and other connextions; and appeared determined to sell his plantation in Kentucky, and remove to the Shakers on Turtle-creek, which at length he did, contrary to his wife’s consent. Before he removed (which was in October last)9 he promised to Polly, if she would go with him, he would not take her among the Shakers, but would buy a place three miles from them. Notwithstanding he had left her bed a long time before this, and slept in a separate one from his wife; she bore this; and upon these terms consented to go, rather than to be separated from her children. Notwithstanding this, he took her directly among the Shakers, urging her to confess her sins to them, and telling her if she would not do so, and receive their testimony, she would surely go to hell and be damned. About the first of March last,10 they drove Polly from the house she had lived in while among them, and took her children from her. The fifth day of march last, my step-son William Irwin, and I went with Polly to Shaker-town. She asked of James the privilege of seeing her children. He told her where they were, and said she might go and see them, but refused to go with her. William Irwin, and I went with her to the house where the children were, and asked to see them – we were told by John Woods11 and Malcolm Worly,12 that he had committed the children to their care, and she should not see them. We used entreaties, and finally threatened Woods and Worley with the civil law, but all in vain. That night we retired into the country, the tender mother in deep distress, bereft of her children, not knowing if she should ever see them again. Wednesday, March 6th. We returned to Shaker-town to try again, if by any means Polly could be admitted to see her children. A short interview was granted, on condition that she must not converse with her children, except in the presence of the Shakers. – When she was about to take leave of her children, her eldest son laid hold on his dear mamma, and wept bitterly – O! mournful scene! I then beheld the tender child forcibly wrested by the iron hands of a despotic Shaker from the affectionate arms of a weeping mother – The feelings of my heart, I cannot describe. My son before he received the shaker’s testimony, was kind to me and affectionate to his wife, he received me into his house, and gave every reason to expect his succour in my declining age. To see him not only seduced from Christianity, but divested of the feelings of humanity, to see my kind my kind daughter treated with savage barbarity, her heart rending sorrow made a subject of mock and exultation my dear grand children forced into despotic bondage, which tends to the ruin of both soul and body, was too much for human nature to bear. This is the fruits of Shakerism! James was naturally friendly; a dutiful son, a kind husband, and tender father: He is now a dupe to those deceivers. Before he left Kentucky, he frequently told me their chief Elder David, was infallibly inspired, and could do nothing wrong, and that he must implicitly believe and obey him: This he called believing and obeying God.

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I rejoice in the freedom of our American constitutions, that all men are priviledged to worship God according to the dictates of their conscience; yet I clearly see that this class of people under the protection of a free government are endeavoring to sap its foundation. They condemn all religion except their own as anti-christian: They also condemn all government, both civil and ecclesiastical, except their own. Let Shakerism predominate, and it will extirpate Christianity, destroy marriage, and also our present free government, and finally depopulate America. According to their scheme, civil and ecclesiastical government are blended together, and this is despotic monarchy. The Pope David, has the treasury in his own hands. Money creates influence. Theirs is a money-making scheme. It may be thought the enlightened state of America is a sufficient security: but from the progress of Shakerism for a few years past, I think it is time for the friends of liberty and of mankind to bestir themselves. Popery or Popish despotic bondage had its beginning. The assumed infallibility of the Pope was the source of his power and influence, which was exercised over all that believed in him; which is precisely the case with David Durrow. The supremacy of the Pope prevailed until ten kings and their people became subject to him. If American freemen are enlightened to know their rights and the value of their privileges; tories have also increased in subtilty and artifice. I believe if all the despots on earth and all the infernal spirits were united to invent a plan to destroy Christianity and enslave mankind, Shakerism could not have been exceeded. Satan is transformed into an angel of light, and his ministers into ministers of righteousness. Holiness is their theme, whilst they bind fetters on poor deceived souls, disturb the peace of families and society; violate marriage, which is an institution of God; the nearest, the happiest relation in social life, and the main pillar of any state or kingdom. Who would have thought that Shakerism (big with every kind of political evil) could have succeeded as it has already done in our western country? Soon after the arrival of the three first Shakers, who came hither, some men of learning, talents and apparent piety, joined them, it may be they were traitors in heart, before, and the more readily acceded to their treasonous scheme. All who joined them of this description, take the place of recruiting officers, who are actively employed in their master’s service. They compass sea and land to make one proselyte, and he is tenfold more a slave to Pope David, than they are, for they partake of David’s benefice, and the proselyte becomes his slave. – They have a large party on Turtle-creek, where they have two elegant houses of worship, one fifty feet long and forty feet wide, the other not altogether so large; another party on Eagle creek,13 both in the state of Ohio. Also a considerable

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number in Kentucky,14 and on the Wabash river;15 it is said that they have gained two thousand proselytes, in five years, in our Western states! But admitting there is no general danger, as to our government – Shall not the innocent be protected? Shall the children be torn from the mother’s beast and subjected to servile bondage, and she left without redress. The Shakers teach their disciplines, that it is a virtue to be without natural affection. If then, under the influence of this doctrine, men become monsters, and abandon their wives; shall we suffer the mother to be robbed of her tender offspring, by a father professedly destitute of parental affection, and by him consigned to bondage! Here is a species of involuntary servitude. And the rights of conscience are also violated, children under the terror of the lash, must kneel and dance to the Shaker Idol, Anna Lee. Thus the principles of servile subjection are so ingrafted in them, that they may be wretched dupes, tories, and pests to society. And under the pretence of worshiping God, the root of civil and religious liberty is deeply wounded. It has been said, if those under the Shakers are in bondage, they are voluntary slaves. They are just such voluntary slaves as the ten kings and their subjects were under the Pope, they were artfully led into it; and what has been done may be accomplished again. I do not conceive that the Shakers, in general, who have come to mature age, are voluntary slaves, they have been artfully decoyed into it by the promise of greater liberty; they are objects of pity, seduced, bewildered and lost; under strong delusion, kept in bondage, by the fear of hell or the terror of the whip. It may be enquired, can the legislature constitutionally interfere? I leave this question with politicians of the present day to answer. But I ask again if a law passed to prevent black and mulatto persons from residing in the state of Ohio, except they be given bond with sufficient security, because they have been degraded, and unmanned by slavery – can we not touch a treasonous nest which is hatching and breeding among us? I am an old man – I was a volunteer in Braddock’s campaign: – my time of service in the world is near an end: – I have fought for liberty in the American revolution – I have, in my weak manner, been an advocate for it in conventions and legislative assemblies: – and now, when I see a snake in the grass, or a poisonous worm gnawing at the root of the TREE OF LIBERTY, shall I not at least cry out “TAKE CARE.” I have nothing to do here with the Shaker’s faith, mode of worship, or the injury that it has done, or may do to religion. This I leave to the preachers of the gospel: I only speak of it as a political evil, under the pretence of worshipping God. I intend, soon to publish a pamphlet, wherein Shakerism will be more fully stated. JAMES SMITH

SMITH, REMARKABLE OCCURRENCES

James Smith, Remarkable Occurrences, Lately Discovered Among the People Called Shakers: Of a Treasonous and Barbarous Nature, or Shakerism Developed (Paris, KY: Joel R. Lyle, 1810).

At the end of his ‘An Attempt to Develope Shakerism’ James Smith stated ‘I intend, soon to publish a pamphlet, wherein Shakerism will be more fully stated’ (see p. 185, above). Remarkable Occurences was the fulfilment of Smith’s intentions. It was published in 1810 at Paris, Kentucky; and Carthage, Tennessee; and in 1811 at Abington and Lynchburg, Virginia. Smith’s anti-Shaker ire had turned into a region-wide publicity nightmare for the burgeoning Shaker movement. His status as a former Indian captive, Indian fighter, Revolutionary patriot and frontiersman made him a formidable enemy for the Shakers. Remarkable Occurrences begins with a scurrilous eleven-point explication of the Shakers’ faith. Smith reiterated the same allegations of physical violence, child abuse, licentious sex, alcohol abuse and servile obedience levelled at the Shakers in the ‘Attempt’ article. Added to these is a greatly expanded account of his attempt to recover his grandchildren from the Shakers. His son and namesake, James Smith Jr, had joined the Shakers, sold his property in Cane Ridge, Kentucky, and moved to the Shaker settlement at Turtle Creek (Union Village), Ohio. Smith Jr brought his children with him, leaving their mother (his abandoned wife) Polly Smith bereft. To stoke the flames of public outrage regarding the Shakers’ treatment of families and children Smith accused them of abortion and infanticide, saying that if the Shakers ‘beget children, they put them out of the way’ (p. 198, below). Amplifying claims he first made in the ‘Attempt’, Smith accused the Shakers of being enemies of Christianity, the United States government and the Constitution: ‘Let Shakerism predominate, and it will extirpate Christianity, destroy marriage and also our present free government, and finally depopulate America. According to their scheme civil and ecclesiastical government are blendid together, theirs is a despotic monarchy’ (p. 195, below). Echoing the 1782 Dialogue appended to Shaker apostate Valentine Rathbun’s Brief Account (reprinted

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in this volume on pp. 1–27) Smith claimed that Shakerism is just a moneymaking scheme, and that the Shakers planned ‘to collect a fund in order to raise and pay an army of Tories whenever an opportunity offers’ (p. 198, below). In a frontier society threatened on its western border by hostile Indians supported by the British Empire this was no light accusation. In summation, Smith declared Shakerism to be ‘a political evil, under the pretext of divine worship’ (p. 198, below). His Remarkable Occurrences would spark a mob action at Union Village, Ohio, on 17 August 1810; as well as a bitter newspaper war between himself and Shaker leader Richard McNemar, the details of which are given in the preliminary notes to the subsequent texts in this edition.

James Smith, Remarkable Occurrences, Lately Discovered Among the People Called Shakers: Of a Treasonous and Barbarous Nature, or Shakerism Developed (Paris, KY: Joel R. Lyle, 1810).

AN ATTEMPT, TO DEVELOP SHAKERISM. ABOUT five years ago, three Shakers viz. Issacher Baits,1 John Mitcham,2 & Benjamin Young,3 came to Kentucky, where I then resided, but was abroad in the state of Tennessee. On my return to my son James Smith’s4 in Kentucky, where I had my home. I found he had joined the Shakers I knew very little about them, but soon after they having collected a party on Turtle-creek,5 in the state of Ohio I asked the abovementioned Baits, if I might go and live with them for some time, to see what sort of people they were – to which he agreed. I accordingly went; and from that time to the present, I have diligently endeavoured to find them out, (which is truly difficult,) and I think I have succeeded in a good degree. They artfully and insiduously conceal their real views and principles, from those whom they wish to proselyte to their scheme. The main thing necessary to stop the progress of Shakerism, is for mankind to know what it is. I shall therefore endeavour plainly to relate what I have discovered, and as I intend principally to confine myself to matters of fact, I hold myself in readiness to prove the truth of what I shall assert, if required. I shall first give some account of the Shakers’ faith, and secondly, of their practice. /

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SHAKERISM. DOCTRINE OF SHAKERS. 1st. That our mother EVE is what is meant by the forbidden fruit, the woman being prohibited from all animals, save Adam only, and she contrary to the command, had carnal knowledge of the serpent: That this first sin followed the whole human race; and that mankind can never be restored to their primitive holiness and happiness, without a life of celibacy, and abstinence, from copulation between the sexes. This they call taking up the full cross. 2d. That all who do not confess their sins to them, and receive the testimony of God, from them, will certainly be damned, and go to hell. 3d. The Shakers deny the personality of Christ, saying that the man Christ Jesus had no more to do with our salvasion than any other man who had received the unction, only as he was a patron for a life of celibacy. 4th. That the man who was crucified was not Christ, but the unction or spirit in him only was Christ, and that this unction or spirit has come in a more powerful manner into a woman called Anna Lee,6 who is Christ’s second coming without sin unto salvation. They esteem Anna Lee, much superior to Jesus. 5th. They deny the resurrection of the Body of Jesus, and also of our Bodies.7 6th. They hold that Elder David Durrow8 is inspired / and infallible, that the priests and people undo him must implicitly believe what he teaches and obey his commands, which they call believing and obeying God. 7th. That all who have died, even those who have been martyrs for christianity, have gone to hell. 8th. That all who come to them and confess their sins, shall be delivered out of hell, except such as have in this life received their testimony and afterwards left them, and spread abroad what they had seen and heard while among them. 9th. That the scriptures of the old and new testament, are true, and foretold of them, yet they are not the word of God, nor a rule to them. That they are in a new dispensation, and have received a new revelation, being immediately inspired by the spirit of God, above what the Apostles ever were; & that none can understand the scriptures of the old and new testament aright, but such as receive their explanation from them. 10th.That the day of judgement is come, that they with thousands of saints and angels are now judging the world, and that they can see angels and spirits which to others are invisible. 11th. That the general conflagration has now taken place, the fire is now kindled which will burn the world, viz a life of celibacy, the human race not being propagated, there will not one be left on the face of the earth. Then the earth will be burnt / up, but not by material fire. For the satisfaction of my readers, I shall here insert some information, which I received from persons who have been a

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considerable time with the Shakers, and have left them which may afford farther light respecting the Shakers’ faith; and also give some idea of their practice, which is the second thing I proposed. As the persons appear to be ashamed of having been Shakers, I shall not insert their names. On March 13th 1810, I called on one who had been three years with the Shakers. He said he had formerly been a member of the Methodist society, and was then happy in the enjoyment of vital religion; but was not so while with the Shakers; moreover that the arbitrary authority and hard usage exercised over the working hands, was intolerable. He also added that it is easy joining the Shakers, but hard to get free from them. – The same evening I had an interview with three others,9 who were altogether; one of whom had been eighteen months, another near two years, the other three years with the Shakers. They say the only use the Shakers make of the Bible is to gain Proselytes. That as to themselves, they view it in the same light as an old Almanac: That what is spoken or dictated by Elder David must be received by them as the word of God: And (as he is esteemed infallible) implicit faith and obedience must be given to all his precepts. This they call believing and obeying God. – These / men say that in general their education of children is chiefly a pretence, that their principle leaders only are well educated. They do not approve of those of a lower rank reading any books; they are taken from school as soon as they are fit for other business. Elder David has overseers appointed over the different societies, called families,10 throughout the state of Ohio, Kentucky, and the Indiana Territory. The overseers provide for the labourers common diet, and apparel and what they earn more than is sufficient for that purpose, is given up to Elder David to be disposed of among his council or as he sees fit, this they call giving up the money to God. They whip their labourers or underlings severely and also their children or young people if they refuse to kneel or dance, or confess their sins, or otherwise transgress. Besides they have various modes of inflicting punishment. My informers say they saw them punish a little boy for taking a piece of a cake without leave, in the manner following: – They made a circle on the floor about a foot in diameter, and compelled the boy to stand within the circle with his face upwards, from twelve o’clock till dark. The Shakers quarrel and fight among themselves, though they endeavour to conceal it from others. Even when in their dance which they esteem devotional, my informers say they have seen them strike each other with their elbows, and one man / strike another with his fist so that the blood ran from his mouth and nose. Elder David has taught the Shakers that when assaulted by the men of the world they may borrow their own spirit and beat them. They further state, that the Shakers told them, if they bore the cross, and abstained from women for some time, they would become so holy that it would be no sin for them to have carnal knowledge of their own holy women. But that

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it would be wrong for them to have children, as it would be a bad example to the world and might prevent them from living in celibacy so as to become holy. The Shakers charged these men, when about to leave them, that they should not tell what they had seen or heard while they were with them, stating that they would certainly go to hell for leaving the faith; but if they told as above, they would never get out, but must sink forever to the lowest hell. They also say they believe many of the lower class feel sensibly their bondage and are tired of Shakerism, but are so infatuated, they are afraid of going to hell if they disbelieve or disobey. They dare not converse privately with any one who is not a Shaker, or even with each other. It is easy to put on the grievous yoke, but hard to get clear of it. The substance of the foregoing account, I took in writing from those men, which being read to them, they all said it was fairly stated, the truth whereof they were willing to declare upon oath. / I shall here insert another circumstance respecting the man, first mentioned, which may serve to show something of the spirit and practice of the Shakers. When he left them he brought all his family with him except one daughter who was concealed from him. Sometime after, his son attended an assembly of the Shakers;11 and seeing his sister, (who was a minor) he took her by the hand to lead her away. The Shakers attempted to take her from him by violence, some spectators came to aid in bringing away the girl, when a violent struggle insued between the two parties. They collared each other, tore each others’ shirts, &c. The Shakers being most numerous prevailed; and afterwards prosecuted the other party at the civil law for a riot; in which they failed being the first aggressors. Farther, to shew the practice of the Shakers, I shall mention some circumstances relative to my son James Smith. After joining the Shakers, he appeared to be divested of natural affection towards his wife Polly, and other connections; and appeared determined to sell his plantation in Kentucky, & remove to the Shakers on Turtle creek, which at length he did contrary to his wife’s consent. Before he removed (which was in October last)12 he promised to Polly, if she would go with him he would not take her among the Shakers but would buy a place three miles from them. Upon these / terms she consented to go, rather than to be separated from her children. Not withstanding this he took her directly among the Shakers. He had also promised that she should go to visit her friends, on Seven-mile creek. Some time in February last, my stepson John Irvin went to see Polly, and she proposed coming with him on his return, to see her friends on Seven-mile, to which James at first consented, and bridled a mare for her to ride. But I suppose instigated by the Shakers, he took the bridle off the mare’s head and said if she went, it would be against his will. She told him she was only going on a visit, according to what he had before promised, and would soon return. John Irvin promised to bring her back in a few days or send some of

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her friends with her. Accordingly I and my stepson William Irvin went with her. On our arrival at Shakers-town we found that on the same day on which Polly started on her visit, James had advertised her in a public news-paper as follows: – TAKE NOTICE, that this day my wife Polly left my house and board without any just cause and contrary to my mind, I therefore forewarn all persons from trading with her, or harbouring her, as I am determined not to pay the debts she may contract. JAMES SMITH. Turtle-creek, Warren county, state of Ohio. February 24th, 1810. / The next day after Wm. Irvin and I arrived with Polly at Turtle-creek, being on Monday March 5th, we applied to James to know what he would do for her, he had to consult the Shakers, and nothing could be done but by the direction of David Durrow. Finally the conclusion and answer signified, that whereas Polly had eloped contrary to the mind of James, nothing could be done for her; unless she would confess her sins to them and receive their testimony; to which she replied, she would rather suffer death. She then asked of James the privilege of seeing her children. He told her where they were, and said she might go and see them, but refused to go with her. Wm. Irvin and I went with her to the house where the children were, and asked to see them. We were told by John Woods,13 and Malcom Worley14 that James had committed the children to their care, and she should not see them. We used entreaties and finally threatened Woods & Worley with the civil law but all in vain. That night we retured into the country, the tender mother in deep distress, bereft of her children, not knowing whether she ever would see them again. Tuesday, March 6th, We returned to Shaker-town, to try again, if by any means Polly could be admitted to see her children. A short interview was granted on condition that she must not converse with her children expect in the presence of the Shakers. When she was about to take her leave of her children, / her eldest son laid hold on his dear Mamma, and wept bitterly. O! mournful scene! I there beheld the tender child forcibly wrested by the iron hands of a despotic Shaker, from the affectionate arms of a weeping mother. – The feelings of my heart, I cannot describe. My son before he received the Shaker’s testimony, was kind to me and affectionate to his wife, he received me into his house, and gave me every reason to expect his succor in my declining age. To see him not only seduced from Christianity, but divested of the feelings of humanity, to see my kind daughter treated with savage barbarity, her heart-rending sorrow, made a subject of mock and exultation, my dear grand children forced into despotic bondage, which tends to the ruin of both soul and body, was too much for human nature

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to bear. This is the fruits of Shakerism! James was naturally friendly; a dutiful son, a kind husband, and a tender father: He is now a dupe to those deceivers. Before he left Kentucky, he frequently told me their chief Elder David, was infallibly inspired and could do nothing wrong, and that he must implicitly believe and obey him; this he called believing and obeying God. We again applied to James to know if he would do any thing for Polly, he told her privately she might go into a house which was on land which he had bought about a mile from Shaker-town, and no / one should dispossess, or disturb her. He also gave her a part of the household furniture. Wednesday, March 7th,15 Wm. Irvin started home. The same day the Shakers came to us, and proposed to give Polly one third part of all James possessed, provided we would sign an instrument of writings, which was false and illegal, implying that she had eloped. Under this idea James said he rejoiced that he was now clear of a wife. The same evening after this had passed, three Shakers came to said house and ordered Polly out immediately, under the idea that James had nothing, having given up all to God. But Mr. Bowman who had a lease of the place, came and warned the Shakers off the plantation, and admitted Polly to stay in the house during his time. Tuesday March 13th, I and some others went again with Polly to see her children; we found her eldest son about eight years of age, chopping in a clearing, his hands were very sore and all his knuckles bleeding; when Polly complained of bad usage, John Woods, said she ought to be thankful to them for the privilege of seeing her children, and ought not to talk so, that if he was in James’s place, she should never see them again. The Shakers are a hidden people, they say they are not of this world, and all others they call the world, and have no connection with them, only to buy or sell whatever they can, so as to make gain / or bring money into their treasury. Their leaders I believe, live in ease and luxury, and conceal their principal views from the lower class, who are slaves. One of the men above mentioned who had left them told me, he believed that Elder David stored up liquor for their own use, which was as far as possible concealed from the common people. He said that he saw Elder David’s Stewart16 at one time buy several barrels of rum and wine, which were taken to his lodging. Little can be known of Shakerism from their publications; M’Namars’s pamphlet17 and a piece printed in an Almanac,18 give but a faint idea of it. Besides their language is so ambiguous, that no one who is unacquainted with their style can fully understand them. For instance, when they mention Christ, they mean Anna Lee, or the unction or spirit in her. When they say in the piece called the religious Register published in an Almanac, “The mission of Christ into the world, was to save his people from their sins, and before him, behind him, or at the side of him, there never was a soul saved, but in him,” they deny the personal-

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ity of Christ, what they mean is the unction or spirit, and that this unction or spirit is come the second time without sin unto salvation, into Anna Lee, and that those only who believe and obey this testimony can be saved. When the Shakers first appeared in the Western country19 they were covered with sheep’s clothing, / they pretended to be meek and inoffensive, that they would not violently resist nor seek redress at the civil law on any account, but in proportion to their increase in numbers, power and influence, the disguise is in some measure thrown off. I rejoice in the freedom of our American Constitutions, that all men are priviliged to worship God according to the dictates of their conscience. Yet I clearly see that this class of people under their protection are endeavouring to sap their foundation. They condemn all religion except their own as antichristian; they also condemn all government both civil and ecclesiastical except their own. Let Shakerism predominate, and it will extirpate Christianity, destroy marriage and also our present free government, and finally depopulate America. According to their scheme civil and ecclesiastical government are blendid together, theirs is a despotic monarchy. The Pope, their chief20 has the treasury in his own hand, money creates influence, their’s is a money making scheme. It may be thought the enlightened state of Americans is a sufficient security, but from the progress of Shakerism for a few years past. I think it is time for the friends of liberty and of mankind to bestir themselves. Popery had its beginning; the assumed infallibility of the Pope, was the source of his power and influence; which was arbitrarily exercised over all who believed in him / which is precisely the case with David Durrow. The supremacy of the Pope, prevailed until 10 kings and their people became subject to him. If American freemen are enlightened to know their rights and the value of their privileges, Tories21 have also encreased in subtility and artifice. I believe if all the Despots on earth and all the infernal Spirits had united to invent a plan to destroy Christianity and enslave mankind, Shakerism could not have been exceeded. Satan is transformed into an angel of light, and his ministers into ministers of righteousness. Holiness is their theme whilst they bind fetters on poor deceived souls, disturb the peace of families, and society; violate marriage, which is an institution of God, the nearest, the happiest relation in social life. Who would have thought that Shakerism could have succeeded as far as it has already done in our Western country? Soon after the arrival of the three first Shakers22 who came hither, some men of learning talents and apparent piety, joined them, it may be they were traitors in heart before, and the more readily acceded to their treasonous scheme. All who join them of this description take the place of recruiting officers; who are actively employed in their master’s service. They compass sea and land to make one proselyte, and he is ten fold more

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a slave to Pope David than they are, for they partake of David’s benefice, & the proselyte becomes his slave. / They have a large party on Turtle-creek, another on Eagle-creek,23 both in the state of Ohio. Also a considerable number in Kentucky,24 and on the Wabash river.25 But admitting there is no general danger as to our government shall not the innocent be protected? Shall the children be torn from the mother’s breast and subjected to servile bondage, and she be left without redress? The Shakers teach their deciples, that it is a virtue to be without natural affection. If then under the influences of this doctrine, men become monsters, & abandon their wives, shall we suffer the mother to be robbed of her tender offspring, by a father professedly destitute of parental affection; and by him consigned to bondage? Here is a species of involuntary servitude. And the rights of conscience, are also violated, children under the terror of the lash must kneel and dance to the Shaker’s Idol Anna Lee. Thus the principles of servile subjection are to be ingrafted in them, that they may be wretched dupes and pests to society; and under the pretence of worshipping God, the root of civil and religious liberty is deeply wounded. I do not conceive that the Shakers in general, who have come to mature age, are voluntary slaves, they have been artfully decoyed into it, by the promise of greater liberty, they are objects of pity, seduced, bewildered, and lost under strong delusion, / kept in bondage, by the fear of hell, or the terror of the whip. It may be enquired, can the Legislature constitutionally interfere? I leave this question with politicians of the present day to answer. But I ask again, if a law can be past to prevent black and mulatto persons from residing in the state of Ohio, except they give bond with sufficient security, because they have been degraded and unmanned by slavery, can we not touch a treasonous nest which is hatching and breeding among us? I am an old man, my time of service in this world is near an end. I have fought for liberty in the American revolution. I have in my weak manner been an advocate for it in conventions and legislative assemblies, and now when I see a snake in the grass or a poisonous worm gnawing at the root of the TREE OF LIBERTY, shall I not at least cry out, TAKE CARE!! P. S. Since I wrote the preceding, I had an interview with two women, who had been three years with the Shakers; also with one of the aforesaid men. From these I received some additional information respecting the Shakers. From what is stated in this pamphlet, it may be seen all those who have left the Shakers agree in their testimony, / and do not contradict each other. Yet, as the success of Shakerism depends entirely on secrecy, their leaders do every thing in their power to conceal their principal designs, not only from the world, but also from their own common people, therefore, some of those who have left the Shakers have made discoveries, which the others have not.

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I lately conversed with that girl, already mentioned, whom the Shakers concealed from her father, after he left them. She is now about sixteen years of age, and was three years with the Shakers, inured to implicit faith and obedience. She says, that while her father was threatening the Shakers with the civil law, if they would not give her up, they took her before a civil Magistrate, and by their menaces compelled her to swear falsely; viz. That they had not concealed her, but that they had repeatedly told her to go to her father, and that she would not, but hid herself. It can easily be proved that they took her before a Magistrate, and that she did swear as above stated. But this does not corroborate with the Shakers’ raising a riot, and taking her from her brother by violence before this, as before mentioned. She also says, that when the Shakers saw that this scheme would not answer their purpose, they fell upon another plan to keep her from, which was this; They told her she must be married to a young Shaker, and M’Namar was to perform the ceremony; that she must also be bedded with / this man, otherwise it would not be a legal marriage; she replied, that this was contrary to what they had taught her, would she not go to hell if she did so? They said, that on this extraordinary case, it would be right; that they must use every means to subdue the devil, the world and the flesh, and to support and increase the kingdom of God. She also said, that she did not like the man, whom they were forcing her to marry, and rather than be compelled to marry a man she did not love, she made her escape and came to her father. I also lately conversed with another women, who had been three years with the Shakers. She says, that they hold it to be right to tell lies to the men of the world; that they ought to take every method in the compass of their power, to subdue the devil and the world, and build up the kingdom of God; she also told me many other things, but in substance the same, as already mentioned as told by others. One of the aforesaid men, whose testimony I have mentioned already, told me since, that he saw a considerable number of women in Elder David’s lodging, drinking wine very freely. He then thought that this was the way his hard labour was going, and therefore left them. I was lately conversing with a Shaker who denied that their leaders were living in luxury. It is generally granted, that they are learned, cunning, artful men. Can it be supposed that they have no / design in forming such a wonderful money-making machine, without some way to lay it out or to make use of it? The shakers ridicule the Bishops of the church of England as mercenary creatures, or worldlings, who take so much for their preaching. If the bishops of the church of England, by receiving the tenth part of their peoples’ labor can raise such immense sums of money, what must David Durrow raise now, and as Shakerism increases, who receives the whole of the labor of his subjects; and not only that, but also all that they or their ancestors ever had made; for they must bring all with them, to be given up to Pope David and his cardinals with the additional

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benefit; that is, that they have no children to maintain. Since they settled in the Western country, a Shakers woman has rarely been seen to suckle a child; if they beget children, they put them out of the way, or by some means prevent propagation; because this would be an injury to their money-making plan. Can it be supposed that all their money is designed only for the support of their riding ministers, who deceitfully live low when they are travelling about making Proselytes? If the leading Shakers do not intend to live sumptuously on their money, they must have something worse in view; that is, to collect a fund in order to raise and pay an army of Tories whenever an opportunity offers. I believe they have both these ends in view, and that the leading Shakers live in luxury in wine / and women as far as their plan of secrecy will admit of. The Shakers pay their fine rather than attend musters; they pretend it is against their conscience to fight. I believe it is against their principles to lift arms, or to do any thing in favor of American liberty; it is evident that Elder David is a despot, that his subjects yield implicit obedience, and when he says fight, it may alter the case. When they first came among us, they put on the appearance of a very humble sort of people, they would discourse delightfully with those they were endeavouring to proselyte to their scheme, on the beauty of holiness, and perfection; and would tell them without these, none could see the Kingdom of God, that they had done very well so far; but must go farther, that they could not be freed from sin in the dispensation they were now in; but if they would only confess their sins to them and receive their testimony; they should surely be saved from sin, and get fully into the Kingdom of God. They would express this in such terms as to make the proselytes believe that they should be immediately freed from sin & they should receive heaven & perfect happiness as soon as they received their testimony; but afterwards, when the proselytes complained that they were not free from sin, according to their expectation, but were in greater bondage and distress than before; the Shakers would tell them that they are not to receive this happiness and deliverance immediately, / that it must be procured by their own suffering. This they state in such a way that their deliverance and happiness are always prospective. They tell those who are fully under their yoke, that they must suffer on till death. Their sufferings among the lower class, are chiefly hard labor and low living. It is a sentiment among the Shakers, that it is a sure symptom of a hypocrite to die in peace, or to rejoice in their last moments, that the true christian must suffer until the last, and die in deep distress. The injury that Shakerism has done, or may yet do to religion, I leave for the Ministers of the gospel to enquire into; I speak of it as a political evil, under the pretext of divine worship. I appeal to my fellow-citizens, who live near the Shakers, if they do not know and believe a considerable part of what I have written to be true. Every one who believes the above

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statements and testimony, must see that Shakerism is in every respect destructive to mankind, to soul and body, church and state. Since I published the piece on Shakerism in the public newspaper,26 I hear that a Shaker has positively and vehemently asserted that he will sue me at the civil law. But I fear that he dare not do it. I do not think they want Shakerism investigated; it cannot bear the light. If they would only proceed in / this way, I apprehend the world would then have a clearer discovery of the dangerous and treasonous nature of Shakerism, than by any thing contained in this pamphlet.

[ANON.], ‘WHO ARE THE SHAKERS?’

[Anon.], ‘Who Are the Shakers?’, American Commercial Daily Advertiser (Baltimore, MD), 15 August 1810.

The anonymous author of this article lived in central Kentucky, probably south of Lexington. It was originally printed in the Kentucky Gazette published in Lexington. The author offers a brief history of the sect and its founder Mother Ann Lee only to conclude that she was ‘a raving woman among her deluded followers’ (p. 203, below). Although the piece is decidedly negative in tone, the author distances himself in a small way from the fear mongering of Colonel James Smith by refuting Smith’s inflated number of Shakers in the western county. Rather than the two thousand claimed by Smith in his ‘Attempt to Develope Shakerism’ (reprinted in this volume on pp. 179–88), he says there are only three to four hundred, which was probably much closer to the truth. The author cannot help but to offer some grudging admiration of the Shakers, writing, ‘They conduct their missions they improve, they build, and publish books with great facility’ (p. 204, below). They are especially impressed by the Shaker’s Testimony of Christ’s Second Appearing (Lebanon, OH: From the Press of John M’Clean, 1808): ‘What society in the country but themselves would not have found it a very serious thing to have printed and bound a work of 600 pages? But this they have done, though neither rich nor numerous’ (p. 204, below.) Despite this acknowledgment of their diligence, the author sees (like Smith) that such ambition and skill could easily be turned against the fragile settlements of the Ohio and Wabash River Valleys. With hostilities between Great Britain and the United States burgeoning into what would become the War of 1812, one theatre of which was adjacent to the Shakers, the author sees conspiratorial undertones in the sects’ pacifism. They claim that a member of the West Union, Indiana, Shaker community told a relative that ‘“the Shakers would ultimately prevail in the United States, and in the event, as the Shakers would not fight, the British would again be masters of the country”’ (p. 205, below). This reputed quote from a Shaker perfectly echoed similar claims made in the works of James Smith, particularly when paired with the Shakers’ friendly – 201 –

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relationship with the Shawnee Indians. This author makes the further (almost certainly scurrilous) claim that former Vice President Aaron Burr visited the Shakers during his potentially treasonous 1805 journey west of the Appalachians. The combined intended effect of these allegations was to paint the Shakers as an alien body or cell within American society that was plotting its downfall from the inside. This was tried in 1782 by the Dialogue appended to Valentine Rathbun’s Brief Account (reproduced in this volume on pp. 22–7). The author hammers the point home with his assertion ‘we humbly conceive they ought to be reckoned among the foes of liberty and the constitution’ (p. 205, below). Within the month that this article was published a mob would descend on the Union Village, Ohio, Shaker community.

[Anon.], ‘Who Are the Shakers?’, American Commercial Daily Advertiser (Baltimore, MD), 15 August 1810.

WHO ARE THE SHAKERS? Is an enquiry which has been made by many respectable subscribers – and such information as can be obtained, we conceive ought to be given. They are a sect which was founded in 1774 by Anne Leese, or Anne Lee,1 whom they dignify with the appelation of mother, and venerate as a second Saviour, and the representative of the Holy Ghost. She arrogated to herself the title of “Anne the Word” and has been so fortunate as to have found followers abject and weak enough to allow the impious assumption. The party at this moment believe, that as the order of the deity is male and female, or father and mother, Jesus Christ the son came to represent the father, or male order of deity: and Anne the daughter, came to represent the mother, or female order of deity. Such actually appears to be the standing of a raving woman among her deluded followers. The sect first took its rise at Bolton in England, from a set of enthusiastics called the French Prophets,2 and it afterwards became something more successful at Manchester3 where it found a leader as well as a proselyte in the matron Anne. They like the French Prophets pretend to miracles, tongues, prophecies and the like evidences of a present deity; but it is rather an unlucky circumstance for their pretensions that nobody knows any thing about their miracles, speaking with tongues and prophesying, but themselves. From Manchester in England, they emigrated to the state of N York, and having some accession to their party, established themselves at Lebanon4 in that state, at which place they remained for a considerable time, in a languishing state, without any increase of numbers or consequence, miracles notwithstanding; but finding in the west, a state of things better suited to their views, they dispatched in the spring of 1805 (if our information is correct) three emissaries,5 for the purpose of proselytism and the extension, of their society.

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The human mind must have reached a certain point of degradation before it could have been susceptible of impression from men of this cast, or prepared to swallow the absurd and blasphemous fictions of Shakerism. This point, we believe was unfortunately occupied by a set of enthusiastic reformers in this country who were commonly known by the name Schismatics or New Lights.6 This party too, we are informed, had entirely surrendered themselves to the impulse of feeling or rather bodily agitation in religion, had abandoned the plain doctrines of the Bible, dissolved by a formal act the wretched remains of church government against them, disclaimed creeds and confessions, decried order and regularity of worship, as formality and dullness in religion, and after various revolutions of opinion, settled down at last, it is said in the Socinian7 doctrine. Among those people the Shaker emissaries were but too successful, for out of six8 of their original preachers, Three9 were proselyted to Shakerism with a number of their people; and it is to the precincts of that party that the successes of those deceivers have been almost exclusively confined. The first Shaker establishment in the western country was formed at Lebanon in Ohio,10 the second on Eagle creek11 in the same state, the third in Mercer county12 in this state, near the mouth of Dick’s river, the fourth in Logan county,13 the fifth in Bussero14 in the Indiana territory not remote from Vincennes – and the sixth in the neighbourhood of this place.15 With respect to their number, we have no certain account; the best information which we could obtain, though not positive, we are nevertheless disposed in some degree to rely, represents them as much less numerous than what Col. Smith16 has stated. We believe we should be more correct than otherwise, in allowing their total to be only 3 or 400. They have, it seems, been grossly and malignantly slandered, and a Mr. John Dunlavy,17 one of their leaders, has thought fit to appear in their defence. – We must observe that this weak and wretched effort18 will tend more to the conviction of intelligent persons than disbelief of the reports he endeavours to expose as incredible and malignant. We have no doubt there are many innocent, undesigning, industrious people in their society – indeed we know several of that description, but we really think evidence is wanting to extend this charitable opinion to the whole party. To say the least concerning them, there is something mysterious which hangs over their operations and mocks the investigation of usual calculation the enquiry. To mention one particular only, whence comes their money? They conduct their missions they improve, they build, and publish books with great facility. What society in the country but themselves would not have found it a very serious thing to have printed and bound a work of 600 pages? But this they have done, though neither rich nor numerous, in the publication of the work now before us, entitled the Testimony.19

[Anon.], ‘Who Are the Shakers?’

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As they appear to be disturbed at the evil reports that are going upon them, we will mention another; which, though it has reached us through a respectable source is not published as fact, but may be disproved if false. It is said that a certain Robert Gill20 (a Shaker of Indiana) told his brother-inlaw, a Mr. Ledgerwood, that the Shakers would ultimately prevail in the United States, and in the event, as the Shakers would not fight, the British would again be masters of the country. Mr. Ledgerwood made the communication to Gov. Harrison,21 who immediately sent for Gill, who refused to come; the governor sent again, with a warning that if he again refused to obey his order, he would send a file of men for him. Gill then came and denied the assertion, but the fact was nevertheless credited upon the assertion of Mr. Ledgerwood, who is a man of unquestionable veracity. Such is the report; if false, it can be disproved – governor Harrison and Mr. Ledgerwood are accessible and will, it is presumed, be applied to by the party to contradict the report if unfounded. We have no wish to interfere with the concerns of any religious society – and by no means a disposition to persecute the Shakers; we could wish that no violence whatever should be resorted to against them, whether legally or otherwise, unless they shall have first violated the laws of the country. Their persons, their property and their worship, shocking as it is, should be protected. But we must be pardoned if we say that their creed as published to the world, impresses the mind very unfavourably towards the leaders of the party. The wild extravagant painting of the male and female in deity,22 the indwelling of a She Holy Ghost in Anne Lee,23 the denial of Christ’s resurrection,24 the appeals to tongues, miracles and prophecies, with out evidence, and many other things published in their testimony, would seem to be designed to burlesque all religion whether natural or revealed. They declare their high esteem for our happy constitution but we must say their professions liable to suspicion when they are seen to pursue with inveterate malice the great authors of the glorious reformation, as well as the work itself, which has been justly considered as giving birth to civil and religious liberty in the world. A writer of eminence (who was no priest) on this subject observes – “That spirit of free enquiry which incited the first reformers to shake off the yoke of ecclesiastical tyranny, naturally begot just sentiments of civil liberty, especially when irritated by persecution. When such sentiments came to be united with that bold enthusiasm, that severity of temper and manners that distinguished some of the reformed sects, they produced those resolute and inflexible men who alone were able to assert the cause of liberty, in an age when the christian world was enervated by luxury and superstition: and to such men we owe that freedom and happy constitution which we at present enjoy.” And when the Shakers are seen to vilify the first reformers and torture history to blacken their illustrious fame – we humbly conceive they ought to be reckoned among the foes of liberty and the constitution. And that the most of them will

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amalgamate whenever opportunity offers we are also induced to believe both from circumstances and experience. What other than a view of this kind could have induced Aaron Burr25 to honour the Shakers and other equally singularly religious sects, and not the old established societies of the country, with his attention and presence, at their places of worship and elsewhere, whilst he was recruiting in this country?

‘MOBBING THE SHAKERS’ AND ‘EXPEDITION AGAINST THE SHAKERS’

[Anon.], [‘Mobbing the Shakers at Union Village, Ohio’], Supporter (Chillicothe, OH), 8 September 1810. [Anon.], ‘Expedition Against the Shakers’, Democratic Press (Philadelphia, PA), 1 October 1810.

The popular outrage resulting in part from James Smith’s publications finally resulted in a mob action against the Shakers at Union Village, Ohio, on Monday, 27 August 1810. In a journal the Shakers recorded what ensued. Aug. 27 A Great gathering of people here to day, for the avowed purpose of driving the ‘Old Shakers’ out of the country. The number was supposed to be a thousand or more – 4 or 500 of whom were under arms, and the remainder appeared to come as Spectators. Those who held themselves as Spectators began to assemble about 9 oclock, A.M. and about 1 oclock P.M. The armed force made their appearance, & marched up to the Meeting house: After making some halt there, they proceeded to the Elders’ family, where the Old believers resided; and after searching the house & Examining the people, to see whether any of the younger Believers wished to leave – promising protection if they would comply with their terms; but finding none to go, they returned to Amos Valentine’s family near the Meeting house; and after a similar Examination there, with a like result, they dispersed; and before dark they were all off the ground. They affected to believe that the Society were held in involuntary bondage by the Leaders, hence their offers of liberty, protection &c. The replies of the Society to the haughty demands of their oppressors were pointed, yet mild & pacific; & this was doubtless a means of disarming our foes; they found the Society attending to their duties, neither dismayed nor Enraged.1

News of the mob action was reported in newspapers throughout the United States. Reprinted here are two such accounts. Notes 1

‘Daily Record of Events of the Church Family’, 1805–61 (Union Village, OH), Shaker Collection, V:B-230, OClWHi. – 207 –

[Anon.], [‘Mobbing the Shakers at Union Village, Ohio’], Supporter (Chillicothe, OH), 8 September 1810.

We are informed that on Monday last several companies of malitia from the counties of Warren and Butler, accompanied by a large number of citizens amounting in all, to about one thousand, assembled at the Shaker settlement, on Turtle creek, in the county of Warren, for the purpose of compelling the Shakers to deliver up three grand children of Col. James Smith of Kentucky, and some other young persons, who were said to be detained by them against their inclination. Committees were appointed on both sides to confer on the matters in dispute. The conference being had, it was reported by the Shakers, that the children were in Lebanon jail with their father (which however was not the case) – and finding none who wished to be liberated, the multitude dispersed, after informing them that if their pestiferious society was not broken up by the first of November next, they might expect to be visited again. In justice to the persons concerned in this transaction it ought to be observed, that no acts of violence were committed either on the persons, or property of the Shakers. {...} Western Spy.

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[Anon.], ‘Expedition Against the Shakers’, Democratic Press (Philadelphia, PA), 1 October 1810.

EXPEDITION AGAINST THE SHAKERS This subject having considerably agitated the public mind, the editor is induced to lay before his readers a cursory view of the circumstances, which transpired on Monday last, at the place commonly called Shaker Town,1 about four miles west of this place, believing that notwithstanding it has already become a subject of pretty general notoriety it will not be altogether uninteresting to some of his distant subscribers. This assemblage of people was occasioned by the circulation of multifarious reports prejudicial to the faith and manner of living among this society – some alledging that their living in celibacy was only a pretence, and that they had secret vaults wherein were thrown their infants – others that they held involuntary servitude, rigorously inflicting punishments upon all those whom they retained under their jurisdiction, and that a number of this description were anxious to be liberated, but could not escape the vigilance of their oppressors; these together with a number of others having gained credence with the public, wrought them up to a degree of phrenzy too great to be endured without investigation. Accordingly Monday last being the day agreeably to previous arrangements, set apart for the purpose, about 500 men under arms, commanded by majors Robinson and Potter, marched to Shaker Town for the purpose of making the examination with respect to the truth or fallacy of said reports: they marched up in order, and formed a line near the meeting house, when it was ordered that a committee should be appointed to confer with the elders of the society. The shakers, though apprized of the expedition, were all engaged about their ordinary business, and did not appear to manifest the least spirit or disposition for resistance. The committee met the elders at a retired spot a short distance from the company, and proceeded to make propositions on the part of the people to the following effect, viz – That they, together with their society, must either immediately relinquish their faith and manner of preaching, or abandon the country on or before the first day of December next, and that – 211 –

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in case they did not agree to these proposals compulsory measures would be resorted to in order to force a compliance. These propositions were not acceded to on the part of the shakers, they claimed protection under the auspices of our government, alledging that they had a right to worship God according to the dictates of their own consciences without molestation – observing at the same time that they were not averse to any persons of civil deportment searching their houses, and asking questions they thought proper. The committee then returned somewhat irritated at the reception they had met with, and mingled among the mass of the people. Judge Dunlavy2 being present, at this stage of the proceedings rode up among the crowd, demanding them in the name of the state to disperse, requiring all civil officers to aid in effecting the foregoing orders, and to take cognizance of the proceedings, this demand had not the desired effect, some of the company uttering the most bitter invectives against him the his interference. Proclamation was then made to all those who had claims to make for children or relatives to come forward and make them known, and that the claimed should be restored to the claimants, if not freely given up by dint of arms. A number of claims were immediately instituted and the examination commenced – A warrant had been previously obtained against one Amos Valentine,3 a member of that society, upon the affidavit of two or three witnesses, that he had exercised cruel and inhuman treatment towards a lunatic child which he had under his controul – the warrant was legally executed, and the child was brought before the officer and examined, but did not appear to exhibit any indications of cruel usage. The company then proceeded to examine the large frame house occupied by the elders and heads of the society – they explored every part of the building, in order to ascertain whether the suspicions entertained against those people were genuine or fallacious – every person they met with was interrogated with respect to their situation, and whether they would exchange it for any other, they all replied in the negative – several other houses passed a similar scrutiny, and we are informed that no discoveries have been made to warrant the reports which have been circulated with such avidity. Thus the day passed without any violence being used on either party. About 5 o’clock the company began to disperse, and all evacuated the ground before dark. It is computed that the whole number who attended this truly novel and extraordinary transaction exceeded one thousand, altho’ the number actually engaged in the expedition did not amount to more than four or five hundred ! ! ! [West. Star.

SMITH, SHAKERISM DETECTED

James Smith, Shakerism Detected: Their Erroneous and Treasonous Proceedings, and False Publications Contained in Different News-papers, Exposed to Public View by the Depositions of Ten Different Persons Living in Various Parts of the States of Kentucky and Ohio (Paris, KY: Printed by Joel R. Lyle, 1810).

Following the mob action at Union Village, Ohio, on 27 August 1810 (see the article [‘Mobbing the Shakers’] reprinted in this volume on p. 209), James Smith redoubled his efforts to attack the Shakers in print. Smith and Shaker leader Richard McNemar conducted a war of words in the pages of Lebanon, Ohio’s Western Star newspaper. Due to the sporadic survival of issues of the Western Star from 1810 some of these writings have been lost. However, enough survives to illustrate the extreme feelings on both sides of the conflict surrounding the fate of James Smith’s grandchildren, and the general anxiety caused by the radical religious and social practices of the Shakers. The culmination of Smith’s anti-Shaker publishing was his magnum opus Shakerism Detected, which was copyrighted on 21 November 1810,1 less than three months after the mobbing of Union Village. Shakerism Detected offered an innovation in anti-Shaker writing through the use of affidavits by former Shakers and non-Shaker witnesses. Although, as Shaker Richard McNemar pointed out in his response to Shakerism Detected (entitled ‘Shakerism Detected &.’ Examined & Refuted, in Five Propositions), six of Smith’s ten witnesses were his relatives. These included Smith’s son, three stepsons, daughter-in-law and her brother.2 Nevertheless, this technique would be used over and over again in subsequent anti-Shaker publications. In his preface Smith refers to a ‘long publication’ by McNemar denying one of Smith’s chief claims – the infallibility of Shaker leaders. McNemar’s answer to Smith, entitled ‘SHAKERISM! The Developer of Shakerism Developed,’ was published in July 1810. The only surviving newspaper it can be found in is Liberty Hall, of Cincinnati, Ohio for 25 July 1810. McNemar refuted Smith point-by-point, employing a style that he would use throughout the 1810s and 1820s when answering the charges of apostates. McNemar then upped the ante by challenging the motivations of the ‘Black Boys’ in 1765, thereby striking at the core of Smith’s reputation as an upright – 213 –

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patriot. This escalation surely factored into the 27 August 1810 mob action at Union Village, and provided ample justification for Smith’s final pamphlet. Smith took the bait offered by McNemar’s criticism of his heroic past, writing that McNemar ‘represented my burning the Indian goods and war-like stores, near Sideling-hill as high-way robbery’. Consequently a large portion of Shakerism Detected is an autobiographical defence by Smith for happenings forty-five years prior. Smith even included a specimen of doggerel verse about the heroism of the Black Boys – written, ironically, to a popular tune also used by the Shakers. In rising to defend himself and his past Smith allowed McNemar to divert him from the main thrust of his ire, the Shakers. Smith maintained that McNemar’s criticism of his actions against the British in 1765 was evidence of sympathy for them in 1810, a serious accusation on the eve of the War of 1812. He taunted that when McNemar’s ‘beloved toryism was plainly struck at, you kicked and pranced like a horse when his sore back has received a heavy stroke’ (p. 218, below). Smith continued his allegations that the Shakers were secretly colluding with the Shawnee Indians in advance of a British attack on the frontier. He used an affidavit from Stephen Ruddle, a Baptist preacher who had lived among the Shawnee and spoke their language, to illustrate the (alleged) shocking discourse between the Shakers and the Shawnee at Greenville, Ohio, in the year 1807: what is the reason that the white people are always cheating red people out of their country and land: Now said they, if white people would give us back our country, then we would believe them. But yet, they said, they believed that there were still some good white people that loved red people. Now said they, there are our friends, the shakers; they are honest; for, said they Richard M’Namar told us that the white people had cheated us out of our land; but as for his part, he lived on their land, it was true; but as for them, that is the shakers, they did not consider the land as their own, but only as rented of them, and that they should come and get what grain they pleased; and were it in their power, they would give them back their country; but as they were but few, they could do nothing for them yet, but he told them to continue their own worship, and not to mind the white people when they come to you with their book which they call the word of God, as that book is good for nothing now–it was once good, but bad men had changed it and made it bad. – But the Great Spirit had now revealed to Indians the same that he had to the shakers; and now they were brothers. (p. 232, below)

McNemar skilfully rebutted Ruddle’s claims in his reply to Smith. He found an affidavit from Ruddle dated 22 September 1807, that was published in the Scioto Gazette and offered Ruddle’s affirmation, as an interpreter, of the peaceful intentions of the Shawnee.3 McNemar had clearly challenged Smith’s authority to write anything regarding Shaker life or theology, and Smith was forced in Shakerism Detected to respond specifically about how long he lived with the Shakers: ‘I was with the shakers about a week, and went with them night and day to your places of worship, and where they were preaching or making proselytes; insomuch that some supposed that I had really fallen in with, & joined the shakers, I stayed with

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them until I was tired of them, and I believe that they were heartily tired of me’ (p. 219, below). McNemar also questioned whether or not Smith was actually the author of his first anti-Shaker article ‘An Attempt to Develope Shakerism’, and proposed that it was actually written by David Purviance, a former colleague of McNemar’s in the Springfield Presbytery. This charge hit a nerve with Smith who felt compelled to produce affidavits that he had actually written the work. Smith was still driven by his quest to retrieve his grandchildren from the Shakers, and more information is presented about that sad story in Shakerism Detected. Smith’s stepson William Irvin travelled to Union Village with Polly Smith so she could see her children. He alleged that John Woods (who would later apostatize and publish his own narrative, included in this collection), who had care of the Smith children told him to ‘go home, & quit my whoring, meaning for me to quit my wife. Polly had a little sugar in her pocket, and she gave it to me to desire them to give it to the children, but they refused that; she then rode off weeping’ (p. 221, below). Smith’s obsession with the Shakers’ supposed belief in the infallibility of their leadership is also reiterated, this time supported by a quote from Shaker missionary Issachar Bates: ‘I am infallibly right, and therefore cannot be wrong in any case whatever.’ Another humorous incident was recounted by Irvin as further evidence of the Shakers’ doctrine of infallibility – and James Smith Jr’s smoking habit: ‘James Smith was smoking his pipe; I told him, that agreeably to his faith, he ought not to smoke; he said he did not know; and then asked one of his brethren if Elder David smoked, they said he did; well said Smith, I will smoke too – why, said I – can Elder David do nothing wrong? No replied Smith, he cannot, and I will smoke as long as he does.’ James Smith Jr’s conversion to Shakerism left his father sad, bewildered, and adrift in his old age. He produced an affidavit from Lexington printer John Bradford who had printed Smith’s 1799 autobiography An Account of the Remarkable Occurrences in the Life and Travels of Col. James Smith. The affidavit stated that Smith Sr had assigned copyright to his son for the work, and also given him twenty acres of land, with the understanding that ‘james Smith junr. agreed to decently support his father Col. James Smith, his life time’. Since his conversion to Shakerism Smith Jr had sold his Kentucky property and failed to honour his agreement with his father. At the end of his long life this betrayal by his son, paired with what Smith perceived as an existential threat to the country whose liberty he helped to secure, drove him to suggest a military solution to the Shaker problem. I suffered much in procuring the happy liberty that we now possess, I lost my old Brother in the contest, I had also a cousin capt. James Smith that was killed at the skirmish in the Buckwheat field: and I myself was nigh unto death (while in the army) with the camp fever; I also lost almost all that I possessed by the depreciated money. After all this can I bear to see my grand-children raised up traitors to the free government that protects them, to be pests of society and slaves to pope David? (p. 225, below)

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This Smith would not countenance. Instead he proposed that the militia be excused if, owing to the failure of civil government to address the problem, ‘they send the shakers off to live with their beloved Shawanoe prophet and his brother’. Finally, deserted by his son, but still fired by his patriotism, Smith returned to what he knew and loved best. On 12 September 1812, the Reporter of Lexington, Kentucky, reported ‘Col. James Smith, of Indian memory … who is nearly 80 years of age, has gone to join our army.’4 Shortly following his brief and remarkable return to the battlefield in the War of 1812 Smith passed away on 11 April 1813.5 Notes 1. 2. 3. 4. 5.

The printed copyright date on the surviving copy of Shakerism Detected at the Library of Congress is obscured, but it appears to read ‘21st day of November’. R. McNemar, ‘Shakerism Detected &c.’ Examined & Refuted, in Five Propositions (Lexington, KY: Printed by Thomas Smith, 1811), [p. 2]. Ibid., p. 5. Reporter (Lexington, KY), 12 September 1812, [p. 2]. Reporter (Lexington, KY), 8 May 1813, [p. 3].

James Smith, Shakerism Detected: Their Erroneous and Treasonous Proceedings, and False Publications Contained in Different News-papers, Exposed to Public View by the Depositions of Ten Different Persons Living in Various Parts of the States of Kentucky and Ohio (Paris, KY: Printed by Joel R. Lyle, 1810).

TO THE READER. I HAVE brought forward five witnesses (being duly sworn) that prove almost all that the shakers have denied and asserted in their writings against me,1 to be false, and consequently what I have written to be the truth:– And whereas Richard M’Nemar,2 in his long publication3 positively and vehemently denied that the chief shakers held infalibility, – this I have effectually proven by different depositions and also by their own writings; and infalibility is the snake in the grass that will as certainly produce despotic bondage as fire will light and heat:– Whereas M’Nemar, in his publication, has represented my burning the Indian goods and war-like stores, near Sideling-hill4 as high-way robbery, I have given a brief statement of the cause, rise and progress of the Sideling-hill expedition, with proper vouchers attending it:– I have brought four witnesses duly sworn – proving, that the shakers have for three years past, been using artful measures to excite the Indians to fall upon the defenceless frontiers, belonging to the United States. I expect that I have plainly made it appear to the most of my readers, that the shakers are fundamentally & practically opposers of the United States’ government and enemies to the peace & happiness of mankind:– Whereas much has been published on shakerism in the publick papers, especially in the state of Ohio; therefore I have quoted and collected the principal arguments, taken from different authors and set them in one connected view: – 217 –

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because many may read this that do not get the papers, and scarcely any one gets all the papers that treat on this subject. / When the shakers first came5 to this western country, they appeared to be a very meek humble sort of people, and said that they were altogether free from sin; but when their beloved despotic money-making machine was struck at by Shakerism Developed6 they were irritated out of measure and wrote in a most scurrilous and illnatured manner, and as their system, is founded on falsehood and supported by secrecy and deceit, they vehemently denied or asserted any thing that they thought would answer their purpose. In order to represent this in a proper view, we shall take notice of M’Nemar’s letter to the rev. col. James Smith: WESTERN STAR7 July 6, 1810. “James, in this enlightened age when every subject lies open to free enquiry, the author who would command respect, must not only be well acquainted with his subject, but also impartial in his manner of treating it.” If I had known but little about shakerism, and had only spoken of your erroneous faith & mode of worship in a very weak and imperfect manner, you could have borne this patiently; but when your beloved toryism was plainly struck at, you kicked and pranced like a horse when his sore back has received a heavy stroke. You say “passions heated by falsehood must cool off when truth comes on the carpet, as fox-fire disappears before the light of the sun” – you have accidentally hit the truth for once; but it is wrong applied Richard, and it is verified, in you; in your second letter to me you have cooled off very much when truth made its appearance concerning your treasonous proceedings with the Indians;8 but you must come lower yet Richard, and your highly / esteemed shakerism “must evanish like fox-fire disappears before the sun.” You say, “I think it a duty which I owe to you and my fellow-citizens, to summon you in a public manner, to recall the distorted & false picture of shakerism so called” I shall sit your summons, & let the world see that it is a true statement that I have made of shakerism. – You tell me “you profess to have nothing to do with the shakers’ faith, mode of worship, &c. if so, you have nothing to do with shakerism, for the faith of any people must be the beginning corner, from which their real character is surveyed” – I have nothing to do with the shakers’ faith or mode of worship any further than it hath a direct tendency to injure the peace and happiness of mankind; for instance your holding infalibility, is the corner tree that includes political, popish, despotic bondage in your survey. – But more of this hereafter. – You tell me, “first you introduce yourself, as having been a resident among the shakers, according to agreement, having come to live with them five years ago, and from that time to the present, diligently endeavoring to find them out &c. This you know to be a wilful falsity and of no small importance as a foundation for the

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rest.” I do not know this to be a wilful falsity, no, it is a well known truth by the neighbors around you that I was with the shakers about a week, and went with them night and day to your places of worship, and where they were preaching or making proselytes; insomuch that some supposed that I had really fallen in with, & joined the shakers, I stayed with them until I was tired of them, and I believe that they were heartily tired of me. You tell me, “on the Sabbath you attended our meeting and gave a public address in favour of / what you saw among us.” – How could you tell such a story as this, when there was about two hundred spectators present at this time, that were not shakers. The truth of the story was this; the shakers were opposed & interrupted in their worship insomuch that they had to leave off their dance and go home. During the time of this interruption I spoke publicly, and said that it was contrary to the laws of our country to oppose, interrupt or disturb any people in their way of worship, and this I would now say; but I never said any thing in favour of the shakers’ faith or mode of worship; and for the truth of this I appeal to the spectators. You say, “you have asserted, that the shakers drove Polly9 from the house that she had lived in while among them, and took her children from her. This is a groundless slander – Polly was kindly treated by James10 and all the society, whilst she stayed in the place. It was voluntarily of her own choice that she went off with William Smith and John Irvin,11 contrary to James’s mind who pointedly and repeatedly warned her not to go with those men, and the same morning that she went off, she, herself had previously sent the children to school, and this she cannot deny” – You have asserted that my saying that you drove Polly away is a groundless slander. But you shall now see what John Irvin Esq. William Irvin,12 William Smith, Joseph Bay13 and Polly Smith say upon oath:– State of Ohio, Preble County sct. Before me Jacob Romane one of the justices appointed to keep the peace in and for the county aforesaid, personally came the undersigned John Irvin Esq. and William Smith, and being sworn according to law depose and say, that some time in the last of February 1810, we received / a letter from Polly Smith in Shakertown14 by her brother Joseph Bay, stating her distress by living among those people and praying us to come without delay to see her and give her some advice. Joseph stated to us that James Smith himself wrote the letter in her name & furnished him with a horse and requested him to come and fetch it, which the said James Smith afterwards told me was the truth. – We accordingly went to Shakertown and stayed about four days. James Smith at first appeared willing to let his wife Polly come with us on a visit; which he acknowledged he had promised her; but when the time drew near that we were to start, he appeared unwilling, and said that he had altered his mind, John Irvin told him that he supposed he had asked Elder David15 whether it was right to let Polly go or not;

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upon which he answered yea; for he might be mistaken but Elder David could not. We then wished him to let her go and see her friends and we would fetch or send her safe home in six or eight days, upon which he appeared to agree and went and caught a horse for her and led it to the door, and then pulling off the bridle said that it would look too much like sending her away. We therefore told him to go and bridle her sister’s horse (Peggy Bay) which was to go with her; we then prepared to start, and Polly told him how to manage the affairs about the house till she returned; ( John Irvin only remembers that James Smith said that Elder David was infallible) said deponent further saith that just at the time of starting, James then told Polly his wife that if she went it would be contrary to his will, and warned us against harbouring or crediting her on his account. I do hereby certify that John C. Irvin Esq. & / William Smith came voluntarily before me, and were sworn to the above statement according to law. Given under my hand this 27th day of September, 1810. JACOB ROMANE, Justice of the peace. John Irvin further saith that the same time when he was in Shakertown – viz. last February, that he had considerable conversation with Isachar Bate,16 and that he particularly asked Bates if there was not at least a possibility that he might be mistaken in some case; to which Bates answered nay; he then asked him if he pretended to infalibility; Bates replied, yea, I am infallibly right, and therefore cannot be wrong in any case whatever. STATE OF OHIO, PREBLE COUNTY, Sct. I do hereby certify that John Irvin Esq. came personally before me, and on oath acknowledged the above addition to his former deposition. Given under my hand this 2d. day of October 1810. JACOB ROMANE J.P. The deposition of William Irvin. About the first of March last, I, William R. Irvin, went home with Polly Smith to Shakertown, on Turtle-creek,17 when we got to the house we found no one there, not any of their property. It being nearly night, we went to William Bones’s to stay all night. Next morning we went to Shakertown to try if she could see her children, where we found James Smith junr – Polly, his wife, asked him if she could see the children, he said she might go to the school-house & see them; she wanted him to go with her, and he refused to go; we then went to the schoolhouse: we there enquired for the children, and they would not tell any thing about them; we then went to / John Woods’s18 and called at the gate; Woods & Malcom Worley19 came out; we asked them if Polly could see her children; Woods said no; we told them that we had seen James Smith, & that he had told Polly to go and seen them; Woods said that they were left in his care, and they

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were not to be seen; we made use of every intreaty that we were capable of, but all in vain. I then proposed to let Polly into the yard, and let the children come to the door and she will sit on her horse, and the rest of us will stay out in the lane, but they would not. I then threatened them with the civil law; Woods ordered me to go home, & quit my whoring, meaning for me to quit my wife. Polly had a little sugar in her pocket, and she gave it to me to desire them to give it to the children, but they refused that; she then rode off weeping. We then went to William Bones’s, and myself went again to see James Smith, to tell him we were not admitted to see the children – a number of them then said that she never should see them again, without she would receive their testimony. I heard them likewise tell her the same. Now there was another small event that took place:– James Smith was smoking his pipe; I told him, that agreeably to his faith, he ought not to smoke; he said he did not know; and then asked one of his brethren if Elder David smoked, they said he did; well said Smith, I will smoke too – why, said I – can Elder David do nothing wrong? No replied Smith, he cannot, and I will smoke as long as he does; this ended the day. – Next morning, James Smith and Malcom Worley came to Wm. Bones’s to let us know, that on certain conditions she might see the children, and that was, not to have any conversation with them but in their presence; we went to Woods’s and / the children were brought forward; after a short interview, we got up to start, and the oldest boy attempted to go to the door to see his mother start, when James Smith and some other of their men took hold of the little boy and held him forcibly; the cries of that child and the mother at that time were too much for me to describe. I asked them if there was no tenderness in them; they replied there was no room for tenderness in their hearts. WILLIAM R. IRVIN. State of Ohio, Preble County sct. That the above named William R. Irvin came personally, and voluntarily before me, the subscriber, one of the justices appointed to keep the peace in and for the aforesaid county of Preble, and was solemnly sworn to the truth of the above statement. Given under my hand, this 28th day of September 1810. JACOB ROMANE, J.P. Richard,20 you tell the world that my saying, that the shakers drove Polly away from the house she lived in while among them, and took her children from her, “is a groundless slander.” At the time she left Shakertown, she only went on a visit, upon promise, and by James’s own consent, until his judgment had to give place to Elder David’s infallible command. It was Elder David that forbid her to go with John Irvin when they were on horseback or just about starting, for when James said if she went, it would be against his mind – he only acted as a machine,

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even as much so as a spinning wheel, this fully appears by his own acknowledgment to John and William Irvin. And after Elder David in this indirect manner forbids Polly to go on this visit, and the very next day advertiseth her in the news paper21 as one that had wickedly eloped, prohibiting any one from harboring her, and when she / returned to Shakertown found the house that she had lived in stripped and evacuated, her children taken, and she was told that she should never see them, except she would confess her sins and receive their testimony. All this is included in the above affidavits, and will more fully appear when Joseph Bay and Polly Smith’s depositions come forward hereafter. Now Richard was it just or generous in you to publish me to the world, as a groundless slanderer, for calling all that you did, driving Polly away, and saying that her children were taken from her? The affirmation of Polly Smith, taken at Caneridge.22 August 20th, 1810. Saith that the statement made in the tenth twelfth and thirteenth pages of the pamphlet entitled Shakerism Developed, as relating to her own treatment by them at that time is a just statement of facts as they truly did accrue. Also further saith that whilst she was among the shakers, she heard them say it was necessary when a man and woman joined their body who had a family of children, that it was best to separate them; putting the man in one place and the woman in another, and their children in a third place, the more easily to kill natural affection – and also saith that she saw James Smith senior write the piece23 that was first published in the Western Citizen on shakerism, and David Purviance24 was not there when it was written. POLLY SMITH. STATE OF KENTUCKY, BOURBON COUNTY. I Aquila Parker justice of the peace in and for the county and state aforesaid, do certify that the aforementioned Polly Smith did voluntarily / appear before me, and solemnly affirm and sign the above affirmation at the time and place above-mentioned. Given under my hand and seal this 20th day of August 1810; AQUILA PARKER J.P. The affidavit of JOSEPH BAY, taken at the Court-house in the town of Paris on the 21st, day of August 1810:– Who being of lawful age and duly sworn, saith that the facts as stated in the tenth page of the pamphlet entitled Shekerism Developed, relating to the treatment of Polly Smith by her husband James Smith junr., he this deponent was personally present at that time, and saw the transactions, and that it is correctly stated as they were transacted, and also, that he was present when the three shakers

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came to the house where the said polly smith went into by direction of her husband, and the shakers ordered her out of said house, telling her that James had no property, as he had given all up to God, as stated in the 13th Page of said pamphlet. JOSEPH BAY. STATE OF KENTUCKY BOURBON COUNTY Sct. I Aquila Parker one of the justices of the peace in and for the county aforesaid do certify that the above named Joseph Bay did personally and voluntarily appear before me at the time and place stated in the introduction to said affidavit, swore to and signed the same before me, as witness my hand and seal this day and data above written. Aquila Parker j.p. YOU say. “The same morning that she went off, she herself had previously sent the children to school; and this she cannot deny.” – This is the truth Richard, and I intend to give you and your fraternity credit for every sentence of truth / that I can find in any of your writings. – You say, “when you and William Irvin came with Polly she was not debarred from seeing the children at a suitable occasion.” – This is not true Richard:– William Irvin and others also tell you upon oath that she was debarred, except she would confess her sins &c. and it is well known that there was no mob about at that time, or at least no one ever heard of any such thing. “You insinuate that on March 6 you returned to Shakertown (as you call it) to try, if by any means Polly could be admitted to see her children. This James you know to be a gross misrepresentation; for you know that your son James and Malcom Worley went to you early that very morning to William Bones’s, and invited both Polly and yourself to come and see the children; which accordingly you did, and had liberty to be among them as much as you pleased, and the free access that she has repeatedly had to them since (of which I am a witness) proves the whole statement of the matter to be maliciously false.” – You say that James and Malcom Worley came and told us we might see the children But it was on certain conditions. And was there any thing like falsehood or misstatement or inconsistency in saying we would go and try if by any means Polly would be admitted to see her children? No: for you had deceived us so often before that I could not believe any thing that a shaker would say without trial. You say that we had liberty to be among them as much as we pleased; this is not true Richard; see Shakerism developed page 13, what we were told, on March 13, and the time you spoke of, was March the 6th. – And Joseph Bay and Polly Smith have said upon oath that from the tenth including the 13th Page is / justly and truly stated, and it is word for word the same in the said pages in said pamphlet, as in the piece I first published in the Western Citizen25 which you had reference to. And the whole of what you have violently denied concerning the usage Polly

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received at that time is included in said pages; and said deponents were eye and ear witness to the whole of it. And John & William Irvin and William Smith saw a considerable part of the transactions. – You assert that the whole statement of the matter is maliciously false, but I have already proven by five witnesses that it is all true; and if you had said on oath what you wrote against me, I could find as many witnesses as would prove you perjured. – You say that my son James, “was the only person who interposed any authority over the child on the occasion,” that is in taking him from his mother. This is not true Richard – see Wm. Irvin’s deposition. You say that Polly was well used “till the time of her elopement,” This is not true, for she never eloped, it was only a false advertisement of David Durrow’s that said so. See John Irvin’s deposition. After describing David Purviance, you say “I mean that David who assisted you in preparing the materials of your publication &c.” You insinuate that it was David Purviance that at least assisted in preparing the materials for said publication. But it is not so – see Polly Smith’s deposition. And Mr. Boman and others saw me write said piece, and heard me read it when I was near Shakertown, above forty miles from where David Purviance lived. You say “that they hold no man to be infallible; but each as a free agent to stand or fall, according as he is obedient to infallible truth.” – Richard, / can it be that you have the audacious impudence to deny that the shakers hold their inspired leaders to be infallible? Yes you have denied it in the lines above, in the strongest terms; but your denial is a well known falsehood. Why did you deny infallibility? Because you well knew that was the snake in the grass, that would as certainly produce despotic bondage as fire will light and heat; therefore, you tried to conceal this poisonous, distructive serpent that is gnawing at the root of the tree of liberty. Now Richard, if I do not prove that your leaders who profess to be inspired, also hold infallibility, and that their followers must implicitly believe and obey them; if I do not prove this I will never again call the shakers tories. – See John and Wm. Irvin and Wm. Smith’s depositions, and see the following quotation:– “The first point of faith in relation to testimony, is to believe that he who bears it, is a true messenger and witness of Christ; in whom the spirit of truth continually abides, and whatever instruction, reproof or counsel is administered by such, it comes from Christ, who speaketh in him; therefore all who are taught in this manner are strictly and properly taught of God, and in obeying what they are taught they yield obedience to Christ.” M’Nemar’s pamphlet – page 81:– 26 This long pamphlet was written by you Richard, and published by and with the consent of Elder David and his council; yet you positively have denied what you yourself stated in said pamphlet in the strongest terms. You wanted, if possible to evade this well known truth; because you know that infallibility is the corner

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stone of your political, despotic, money-making building. But more of this hereafter; when other depositions come forward. / You ask me “By what spirit were you influenced, at the schoolhouse, last March when you vauntingly said, that it you were as you had been in the days of your youth, the shakers’ houses should have been laid in ashes and they expelled out of the country ere that time, and that we need not think it strange if such an event should take place.” There is some truth in this story, but it is wrong stated and intermixed with falsehood. I told you that I would try every regular and legal measure; that I would apply to the press and let the world know what sort of people you are, and that when government would find out what your designs were, I expected that I would recover my grand-children by law. But if it should be possible that you could evade justice by pretending to Worship God according to the dictates of your conscience; perhaps the military spirit that I was possessed of in my youth might again arise and I be under the disagreeable necessity of taking my children from you by force. I suffered much in procuring the happy liberty that we now possess, I lost my old Brother in the contest, I had also a cousin capt. James Smith that was killed at the skirmish in the Buckwheat field: and I myself was nigh unto death (while in the army) with the camp fever; I also lost almost all that I possessed by the depreciated money. After all this can I bear to see my grand-children raised up traitors to the free government that protects them, to be pests of society and slaves to pope David? It is well known that I have as yet constantly opposed men rising in arms against the shakers without legal authority: because it is an exceedingly bad example; and also impolitic for it has scarcely ever been known that men rising in this way ever succeeded. Supposing men / were to go in this way and not under regular command; is it not almost certain that some of the foolish sort that might be among them would commit some outrage that no wise man could justify? Then some would take the shakers’ part and some the opposite, and so get to contending among themselves; and this might be a means of encreasing shakerism. It is generally supposed that the shakers are just in their common dealings; and the reason is obvious, they deal all for ready money, but when they can have any opportunity to defraud, they embrace it. – See Abraham Irvin’s deposition. STATE OF OHIO PREBLE COUNTY Sct. This day personally came before me Thomas Beasley one of the justices of the peace for the aforesaid county, Abraham Irvin, and being sworn according to law, deposeth and saith that about eight years ago James Smith junr. agreed with his father, Col. James Smith, to take the printed Journals27 of the above named Col. James Smith, then in the hands of John Bradford, printer in Lexington Kentucky, together with the copy right of said Journals; for and in consideration of which the said James Smith junr. was to pay the above named John Bradford

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the balance due him for printing said Journals; and this deponent further saith, that at the same time the above named James Smith junr. agreed to take twenty acres of land out of the northeast corner of the land which his father bought from Col. Garrard on Stoner, joining Smith and Irvin’s mill-dam for and in consideration of which he, the said james Smith junr. agreed to decently support his father Col. James Smith, his life time; and this deponent further saith, that above-mentioned Journals and copy / right were a joint contract, and that the above named James Smith junr. has since he joined the shakers positively refused to comply with the abovementioned contract. ABRAHAM IRVIN. I do hereby certify that Abraham Irvin came voluntarily before me and was sworn according to law that the above statement was true. Given under my hand this 28th day of September 1810. THOS. BEASLY Justice of the peace. Whereas the above contract was only a verbal one and could not be recovered by the law of Kentucky because the time was a little past that made verbal contracts binding; those holy sinless people do deny paying a contract where there was value received. What is shakerism? If the infallible Elder David tells a man that he may break his contract & cheat his father he must do so, or according to their faith go to hell for disobedience. Can we have any dependence on a shaker’s oath? If Elder David tells them what they are to sware, they must do as they are commanded; because they believe that obeying Elder David is obeying God and that they will go to hell if they disobey. Is it not strange that those sinless people should be guilty of roguery and falsehood & betrayers of their country, as will hereafter more fully appear? Richard says “I will also ask you a question. Did you Col. Smith constitutionally interfere when at the head of the Black-boys,28 you burned and destroyed the property of your peaceable fellow-citizens on Sideling-hill in the state of Pennsylvania?” – Richard you have stated this patriotic Sideling-hill expedition, in as false a light as your other writings. I shall give a true statement of / said expedition with proper vouchers attending it. After Bradock’s war29 in the year 1763 almost all the nations of Indians united against the white people, and a hot war ensued; the Indians besieged Fort-pitt,30 and cut off the communication for nearly one whole summer. That same fall a campaign went out against the Indians under Boquet,31 who was Col. commandent; he had a hard fight with the Indians at Brushy-run, and chiefly through the assistance of the Virginia volunteers, and some few Pennsylvania rifle-men he gained the battle and raised the siege. The next year in 1764 another campaign was carried out against the Indians by said commander. I was then a

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servant under King George32 in a Pennsylvania company of rifle-men and also Indian interpreter. The army proceeded on to near the forks of Muskingum.33 We found that the Indians by two year’s war, and having no trade during this time with any nation of white people, were reduced to poverty, they were almost naked and very scarce of ammunition. Under these circumstances, they appeared willing to hold a treaty of peace. – Col. Boquet as a condition of peace positively demanded all the white prisoners that the Indians had among them, and that they should immediately give an account of the number of prisoners that they then had, this they did; and also delivered up three hundred prisoners, who were not half the number they had. The Indians then said that it was late in the year and the prisoners far scattered, that they could not collect them then but that they would bring them in the next spring and deliver them up. – The Col. then told them that he would make a cessation of arms for six months on condition that they should deliver up all the next spring; and as a security of this he demanded / six of their chiefs as hostages; which he said he would keep until the prisoners came in. But before we came to Fort-pitt the hostages ran all away; and as the condition of the cessation of arms was broken there was consequently no peace at that time with the Indians. The next spring in the year 1765 there was the prospect of war between England and America and a great rumor on the account of the tyrannical proceedings of Great Britain’s asserting that they had a right to to tax us without our own consents or that of our representatives. – About this time England appeared determined to force the Stamp Act34 – America almost unanimously opposed it. Under these circumstances, a large number of wagon-loads of Indian goods and warlike stores were sent from Philadelphia to Henry Polan’s in Cumberland county35 on their way to Fort-pitt to supply the Indians. On this the country was much alarmed; and collected and demanded of those who had the care of said goods and warlike stores to shew them by what authority they were carrying said goods to the Indians. But this they would not do, but threatened them with the civil law and British troops if they would attempt to meddle with them. The country was then in an awful dilemma, apparently between two fires; we suspected that the British had secretly encouraged those people that were carrying said goods, because it was not likely that they would run such a risk contrary to the law that then existed without any encouragement. But this we could not prove, yet it appeared that the British were sending those warlike stores to the Indians, in order to have them armed and ready, in case America should continue in their rebellion, as it was then called. – As this part of / the frontiers suffered hard by two years’ Indian war, and many of them had buried their scalped friends, wives and children without sheet or coffin; therefore the general cry of the country was stop them, stop them! we cannot bear to see those warlike stores going to supply our savage enemies; contrary to law or justice. Yet as the British troops

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were stationed at Fort Loudon36 near this place, there was a great backwardness among the people in doing any thing against them. At length seventy pack horses were loaded with said goods in order to proceed to Fort-pitt. A number of armed men then arose and met said brigade at the place where Mercers-burg37 now stands, & desired them to store up said goods until they could show legal authority for carrying said goods to the Indians. This they would not do, but still threatened them with the civil law and the British troops. Said armed men followed said brigade over one mountain to the Big Cove and desired them again to store up said goods; but their answer was as aforesaid. A small party then sallied out into the mountains in disguise and waylayed said brigade near Sideling-hill; and made them surrender; and burned seventy horse loads. A considerable part of said loading was lead, scalping-knives and tomahaws. Those things we could not fully destroy but we threw them into the fire. – We then returned to the settlement and burned a large quantity of powder that was deposited there. The commander of Fort Loudon sent out his troops and took a number of prisoners without applying to a civil magistrate, and laid them in the guardhouse in order to have them tried by a Court-martial. He said that rebels had no right to the civil law. Among all those prisoners there / were but two that had been at the burning of said goods; they had also a venerable old gray headed man in the cold guard-house; and they even alledged no crime against him only that he had talked saucy. – We then raised a little army and encamped near Fort Loudon, and sent out scouting parties and took the British, prisoners, if they moved out any distance from the Fort, and set a guard over them in our camp. – While we encamped here the country supplied us with every thing that was necessary, and it was not very long until we had doubly as many British prisoners in our camp as they had of ours in the guardhouse. Then the commander sent out a flag and we settled the cartel and exchanged prisoners and gave them two for one, and we told them that we expected that we would be able to do so during the war. The commander said that was an insult upon King George; we told him that we paid no respect to King George, while he and his troops used us in such an unjust and inhuman manner as they did. He said that we were downright hardened rebels and that we were guilty of treason in speaking against King George and he hoped to live to see us every one hanged. After this they again made an attempt to carry goods to the Indians; and we had like to have taken them but they drove into Fort Loudon; but had to send their horses out to pasture – there we burned their packsaddles and whipped the drivers, and also demanded of the commander a number of rifle guns which he had taken from the country; but he refused giving them – we then took the commander prisoner as he rode out from the Fort, and kept him until he wrote to his under officer to give up said arms – and when we received said arms, we let the commander return to his station. /

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After this we were sued in Carlisle for said goods; and stood the action. We employed Mr. Ginens an eminent lawyer. Our opponents could not or would not shew by what authority they were carrying said goods; at a time that there was no peace with the Indians – therefore we were cleared by law. – After this Sir William Johnson38 the Indian agent made peace with the Indians and the Stamp Act was repealed. Then we had a cessation of arms until the war again broke out at Boston.39 IN order to give the reader some additional ideas of the Stamp Act and the Sideling-hill expedition I shall insert a few simple verses that were frequently sung at that time.

ON LIBERTY. Freedom and liberty they are very good. They ought to be prais’d like to our daily food, But bondage and slav’ry Americans abhor, Whilst, freedom and liberty, they ever adore. Where freedom takes place, wealth & knowledge abound, But cruelty’s a thing that learning doth confound Where people are slaves they’re ignorant & poor So it is not for naught that we freedom adore. Those that are born free their talents may improve In acts of benevolence of kindness and love, For freedom’s a thing that doth human nature raise, For this very cause, we freedom do praise. Granvil40 I am told was the very first man, Who proposed stamp duty to be laid on our land, \ Against our consents: so their power we’ll deny, To what’s unconstitutional, we’re loth to comply. In the province of New-York there’s good fellows I do hear, That act like bold heroes, and strangers to fear, The governor’s effigy and coach they did burn, For offering to make slaves of those that are free-born. Calender and Crochan they both did agree, To carry warlike stores to our savages enemy, But their being obstinate made them fare much the worse, When they deni’d the civil law we govern’d them by force. ALSO the following lines were sung at that time to the tune of the “BLACK JOKE.”41 Ye patriot souls who love to sing; What serves your country and your king,

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Writings of Shaker Apostates and Anti-Shakers, 1782–1850: Volume 1 In wealth, peace and royal estate; Attention give whilst I rehearse, A modern fact, in jingling verse; How party interest strove what it cou’d; To profit itself by public blood, But justly met its merited fate. Let all those Indian traders claim; Their just reward, in-glorious fame. For vile, base and treacherous ends: To Pollins, in the spring they sent, Much warlike stores with an intent, To carry them to our barbarous foes, Expecting that no-body dare oppose, A present to their Indian friends. Astonish’d at the wild design, Frontier inhabitants combin’d, \ With brave souls, to stop their career, Although some men apostaitiz’d, The bold frontiers they bravely stood, To act for their king and their country’s good, In joint league, and strangers to fear. On March the fifth, in sixty-five, Their Indian presents did arrive, In long pomp and cavalcade, Near Sideling Hill, where in disguise, Some patriots did their train surprise, And quick as lighting tumbled their loads, And kindled them bonfires in the woods, And mostly burnt their whole brigade. At Loudon, when they heard the news, They scarcely knew which way to choose, For blind rage and discount; At length some soldiers they sent out, With guides for to conduct the route, And seized some men that were traveling there And hurried them into Loudon where They laid them fast with one consent. But men of resolution thought, Too much to see their neighbors caught, For no crime but false surmise; Forthwith they join’d a warlike band, And march’d to Loudon out of hand, And kept the jailors pris’ners there, Until our friends enlarged were,

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Without fraud or any disguise. Let mankind censure or commend, This rash performance in the end, Then both sides will find their account. \ ’Tis true no law can justify, To burn our neighbors’ property, But when this property is design’d, To serve the enemies of mankind, It’s high treason in the amount.

WE the subscribes do certify that we lived in Cumberland country, in the settlement near where the abovementioned Sideling-hill expedition or burning of the Indian warlike stores was transacted, and that we were well acquainted with the cause, rise and progress of the aforesaid event in March 17, 1765 &c. And we do certify that the above narrative contains a just and true statement of the cause, rise and progress of the Sideling-hill expedition, or the burning and destroying the aforesaid goods and warlike-stores; and we do also certify, that as far as our acquaintance reached; that every rank of citizens heartily approved of the abovementioned proceedings, excepting interested persons. Royalists or Tories. State of Ohio, MontSamuel Kyle, senr gomery County, Dayton William Petterson, Col. Robert Petterson 42 Township State of Ohio, Butler Country, Middletown Warran county Deer Field State of Ohio, Clearmont country

James Piper William Thompson, Col. Thomas Paxton43

You stated the Siderling-hill proceedings Richard as high-way robery; and through the whole of your publications you have artfully represented me as a man of a most infamous character and as \ one that was both a rogue and liar; but what must the world think of you, Isachar Bates and John Dunlavy,44 when I have proven almost all that you have written to be notorious falsehoods. In order to support your own character and shakerism, you have not only endeavoured to stigmatise my character, but also, all those that were engaged in said expedition, which were first and last above one thousand men; and many of them have since that time borne high commissions – one who was a bold, active, constant hand in said expedition has of a long standing; perhaps fifteen years, been a member of Congress, and now is a member of that honorable body; but

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the most of those worthies have departed this life. – In order to support your treasonous, cause you not only strike at the characters of the living but turkeybuzzard like, you have been picking at the dead.

EXTRACT TAKEN FROM THE OHIO CENTINEL. I am now riding taking depositions. I can prove all that I have asserted in Shakerism Developed; and much more. As an evidence of this I shall lay before the public one affidavit, which I said nothing about in any of my writings against the shakers, which is as follows:– The affidavit of Stephen Ruddle,45 taken before me Joseph L. Stephens, a justice of the peace for Bourbon country, and at the house of said Stephens on the 4th day of September 1810. Said Ruddle being of lawful age and duly sworn, saith that in September, 1807, he had an interview with the shawanoe Prophet46 and his brother,47 and after some conversation he mentioned \ something about religion to them; they then told him that they knew very much about religion; but said they, what do you know about it? He answered that he had the word of God, and showed them his Bible. They said, you white people use that book only to deceive red people to which he answered that if the white people had wronged them it was not the book’s fault for no good man that adhered to that book would wrong them or do them any injury. Well, said they, what is the reason that the white people are always cheating red people out of their country and land: Now said they, if white people would give us back our country, then we would believe them. But yet, they said, they believed that there were still some good white people that loved red people. Now said they, there are our friends, the shakers; they are honest; for, said they Richard M’Namar told us that the white people had cheated us out of our land; but as for his part, he lived on their land, it was true; but as for them, that is the shakers, they did not consider the land as their own, but only as rented of them, and that they should come and get what grain they pleased; and were it in their power, they would give them back their country; but as they were but few, they could do nothing for them yet, but he told them to continue their own worship, and not to mind the white people when they come to you with their book which they call the word of God, as that book is good for nothing now – it was once good, but bad men had changed it and made it bad. – But the Great Spirit had now revealed to Indians the same that he had to the shakers; and now they were brothers. – Now, said the Indians, they have given us corn and wheat, and we believe them. \ Other white people will tell us many good things, but never give us any thing. – Said deponent further saith; that in 1810 he had also an interview with the prophet’s brother, at Tawa-town48 who told him he very well knew what the white people wanted to do with the red people, for he had friends that always

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told him what the white people intended to do with red people, but he would not tell who these friend were, who made known to them the designs of the white people; as they had told him not to tell therefore he would not. The Shawanoe prophet at this time had influenced about fifty of the Shawanoes, & about two hundred of the other tribes to fall in with his plot in opposition to the United States, and said prophet threatened the other Shawanoes if they would not fall in with his terms he would cause the said two hundred to fall upon them. Those peaceable Shawanoes said that they believed that the dancing people, meaning the Shakers, had set the prophet and his people wrong. STATE OF KENTUCKY, BOURBON COUNTY, Sct. Stephen Ruddell personally came before me, Joseph L. Stephens one of the Justices of the peace in and for the country aforesaid and voluntarily at the time, and place stated in the introduction to said affidavit swore to, and signed the same. – As witness my hand and seal the day and date above written. JOSEPH L. STEPHENS, J.P. Richard, if you had acted as an honorable citizen of the United States ought to have done, you would have told the Indians that their pretended friends, the British, after they had fought hard for them, made over their land by contract to us; / and not withstanding we had beat the English & them both, and might have kept their land by force, yet we condescended to purchase it from them, and while they continued peaceable we would not encroach upon them, only by purchase and their own consent. If you had spoken to the Indians in the above manner, this would have been the truth. But you are guilty of treasonous falsehood in various respects, and this I can prove.” Now, Richard, bring an action of slander against me if you please. I never called any man a liar, or any one me as I can remember, until I met with these pretended, sinless people called shakers, & now it appears that I cannot avoid it. When the Apostle Paul had to do with one just of your kind & character, Richard he found it necessary to use harsh language & said “O full of all subtilty, & mischief; thou child of the devil thou enemy of all righteousness! will thou not cease to prevent the right ways of the Lord? I continue to assert that the shakers are fundamentally and practically enemies to the United States’ government, and disturbers of the peace and happiness of mankind – this I can prove if legally called upon. JAMES SMITH.

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WARREN COUNTRY, STATE OF OHIO Sct. Before me Enos Williams a justice of the peace in and for said country personally appeared John Davis,49 John Wilson50 and Robert Wilson,51 each of lawful age, who being sworn according to law, depose and say, that the statement contained in Col. Smith’s pamphlet entitled Shakerism Developed in the sixth, seventh and eighth pages is true and justly stated excepting three things that \ need explaining, – viz. – Where it is said that Elder David has taught the shakers that when assaulted by the men of the world, they might borrow their own spirit and beat them; the said deponents say they only had it by information and not from Elder David himself. – Concerning the education of children, as stated in the seventh page of said pamphlet – It was so when we were with them, but they may have changed the gift since we left them; which is a common thing. Said deponents further say that some time in March 1807, David Durrow, Richard, M’Namar and Benjamin Young went out to the Indians52 & afterwards told said deponents that they gave them ten dollars, and told said deponents to keep this a secret and tell no man; and about the first of May, said year, about five and twenty or thirty Indians came into shakertown53 and the shakers sent them off with twenty-seven horse load of provisions. – In August the same year about fifty Indians came in again and loaded about fifty horses with provisions; the shakers also gave them about twenty-five dollars to buy ammunition in Lebanon. At this time by the orders of Elder David, the whole society were collected together and strictly charged to keep this a secret. After this a shaker woman died,54 and the whole of the shakers were collected together and Elder David told them that the Indians could not be saved if that woman had not died for them and for the sins of that people; – said deponents also say that it is a common thing for the working hands to pull off their hats and shoes on entering Elder David’s chamber, because they are told that the place where he is, is holy ground. The shakers teach their disciples that it is a less sin to tell a lie to the world than to discover \ the gift. By the gift is meant to believe and obey Elder David and keep his secrets. Elder David forbids his people to read the Bible, and tells them that it would put ill in their heads. Elder David teacheth his deciples that they must not think their own thoughts, except they are in union with his, for he is holy and cannot err, and that he is infallible. They teach in their private assemblies a different doctrine from what they preach in public when they are making proselytes, because they say they must take people by guile, and if they did not take artful measures they would never get one to join them. The common people by times take hold of Elder David’s garment, and say “Behold the Lamb of God which taketh away the sin of the world. The women have also to kneel down before Eldress Ruth55 and kiss her feet and say “Behold the Lamb of God which taketh away the sin of the world.

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Elder David hath the absolute command of his people; insomuch that the victuals that are brought to the table of the working hands must be particularly nominated; they do nothing but by his orders, and them they must positively obey. He compels them to dance and calls them serpents and devils if they attempt to disobey. This deponents also saith, that the shakers say that the soul of General Washington came to them after his decease and confessed his sins; and also the ancient prophets and apostles!!!56 N.B. As for the third thing needing explanation, leave out or omit in the 7th page, throughout the states of Ohio, Kentucky and the Indiana Territory. Also concerning the punishing of the boy for taking the cake mentioned in the \ seventh page of said pamphlet, John Davis did not see it; also the one striking the other with his fist, as mentioned in the 8th page, John Davis saith that he did not see it. John Davis does not remember how much money the shakers gave the indians to buy ammunition; but heard the shakers say that they gave them money for that purpose. JOHN DAVIS. JOHN WILSON. ROBERT WILSON. Sworn and subscribed before me at Lebanon in said country, the 6th day of October1810. ENOS WILLIAMS, Justice of the peace. The abovementioned deponents (viz.) John Davis, John Wilson and Robert Wilson are the men that I had an interview with, as mentioned in the 6th page of “Shakerism Developed;” & though I took in writing what they had to say in haste, late in the night; yet they have sworn to the whole of it, with only a few immaterial alterations; and as said deponents were jointly sworn in one instrument of writing, it might be expected that some might see or hear what the others did not. With these few exceptions only, said deponents have jointly sworn to what is contained in the 6th, 7th and 8th pages of “Shakerism Developed;” and also to what is additionally written in the above depositions. Notwithstanding the shakers have in their own verbal declarations, which now appear by the depositions of John Irvin Esq. William Irvin, John Davis, John Wilson and Robert Wilson, & also by their own writings in M’Namer’s pamphlet,57 page 81, as already quoted, likewise in the shakers “Religious Register,”58 infallibility is held out in the plainest terms – yet when “Shakerism / Developed” pointed out the certain effect that this doctrine would produce, (viz) absolute bondage, and the shakers apprehended that this secret was now discovered and they in danger, then by and with the consent of Elder David,

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M’Namar in his publication positively denies that they hold infallibility; and says “That they hold no man to be infallible.” – What are we to think of the shakers when they positively deny their own assertions, and also their public writings? Is it any wonder that they have denied all the plain truths that I have published in the news-papers and in “Shakerism Developed?” Issachar Bates says that my piece in the Paris paper59 contains “sixty-one palpable non-truths, misrepresentations and false statements for facts, which to the discerning are evidently rooted with the deepest prejudice. The attempt is a scandalous lie-bill altogether” As I have proven all that I have written to be true, by the solemn oath of ten different persons of undoubted veracity, I shall now leave it to the impartial reader to judge who it is that has been guilty of publishing a scandalous lie-bill. Whereas shaker infallibility and implicit faith and obedience is now proven by the solemn oath of five persons, and their own public writings, must not every one see that shakerism stands in direct opposition to the United States government? Because assumed infallibility and implicit faith, and obedience were the sources from whence popish despotic power flowed, and spread over all Christendom, and were the causes of the loss of the lives of millions of the human race; before we arrived to that degree of liberty that we Americans now possess, and after fighting hard for our liberty, shall we suffer a / treasonous and treacherous nest to be hatching and breeding among us? If Shakerism succeed and be not suppressed by the civil law, will it not cause a civil war? May not fire and water as well dwell together as shaker bondage and American liberty? We know what shocking effects infallibility and implicit faith and obedience have produced in the world; and have we any reason to believe or expect that it will be any better now? For shakerism far exceeds popish bondage, or any thing that ever was known in the world. The Pope and his cardinals and other officers, received a large part of his people’s labour; but our modern Pope David receives all that his people can make by their work; and not only this; but also all that they or their ancestors ever had made; for they must bring all with them and give it up to Elder David, to be disposed of as he sees cause. Shakerism includes in it all kinds of political evils; it disturbs the peace of families; separates husbands and wives; robs women of their tender offspring destroys natural affection; dissolves the marriage covenant, which is the main pillar of any state or kingdom; it prevents propagation, takes people’s money without any compensation; and perhaps murders infants; (but this I cannot yet prove) it is raising a young generation systematically enemies to American liberty, it enslaves mankind, and if it predominates will finally depopulate America. Are all these injuries to be admitted and patiently borne with, under the pretence of worshipping God according to the dictates of their conscience. We have no objections to Mahometans, Pagans or Roman Catholic’s worshipping God

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their own way if they do not injure others. But supposing the pope of Rome / was to come into our country and had influence sufficient to erect a political Popedom, and would agree that his people should be taxed as other American citizens, while his power was insufficient to oppose, in order to regain his former power, would this be publicly admitted of under the pretence of worshipping God? And shall we admit of a secret attempt of a worse kind? – There scarcely ever was a salutary law or constitution made but evil designing members endeavored to evade it or to pervert it to answer their own base purpose. Whatever shakerism might have been originally, I apprehend they have changed the gift. as they term it, that is general orders – with a design to cause that clause in our constitution which admits of all men worshipping God according to the dictates of their own conscience, to discomfit itself, and to erect a monarchical government and shelter themselves from being prosecuted by the loud cry, which we have already heard in the news-papers, not only from the shakers, but also from others: “O let them alone, it is persecution to meddle with them.” I have nothing to do with their faith or mode of worship and I have said nothing against it – it is their actions that I oppose. Does it not evidently appear that their design is to overturn our free government in a future day? Theirs is a wonderful money-making scheme, and money gives power and influence. The shakers now have nothing to do with our civil law; among themselves. Elder David’s mandates is their law – he can administer rewards and punishments – his authority is absolute and is punctually obeyed. And is not this a despotic governmet already erected within our / free states? And is this with all the complicated growing evils that attend it, to be dispensed with?

An extract from “Liberty Hall”60 Oct. 24th 1810. In your piece contained in the “Western star” October 6th, 1810, you tell me Richard “If your pamphlet of affidavits is like that which you have given as a specimen; that is mere hearsay, and that too from such as are said to be plotting against government, it will merit but little notice from the public or the public’s well wisher.” You talk very impertinently about Stephen Ruddle’s deposition, which is the only specimen that I have as yet given. You came from Pennsylvania Richard – and did you never hear that a jury in Carlisle, in 1764 condemned John Money for wilful murder; and that he confessed and was hanged, on presumptive evidence only? And is there not as long a chain of corroborating circumstances, & as strong presumptive evidence accompanying Stephen Ruddle’s deposition as that which hanged John Money? 1st. Stephen Ruddle is well known to be a man of veracity; he was a long time among the Indians and speaks the Shawanoe tongue well; he is a Baptist

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preacher, and was year after year a missionary among the Shawanoes, and had the greatest opportunity of finding out the treacherous proceedings of the shakers. 2d. Different Indians, in different years all agree in their stories. 3d. Richard’s shakerefied oratory: he told the Indians not to mind the white people when they come to them with a book which they call the word of God, as that book is good for nothing now; it was once good, but bad men have / changed it and made it bad; but the Great Spirit had now revealed to Indians what he had to shakers, and now they were brothers. This is just what the shakers tell their proselytes, when they get them fully into their belief – that the Bible is good for nothing now, it was once of use but they are come now with a new Revelation and a new Dispensation, and that the Bible is of no more use than an old Almanac. – Can any one believe, Richard, that such Shaker sentiments would ever have entered into an Indians head, if you had not told them these things? 4th. The Indians acknowledged that they had received rent, about that time, both corn and wheat, &c. – For the proof of this, see Davis and the two Wilsons depositions – they say on oath that the shakers about this time gave the Indians about seventy horse-load of provisions, and also about twenty-five dollars to buy ammunition and charged their people to keep this a profound secret. 5th. Can it be supposed that the shakers were so liberal to the Indians, and also careful to charge their people to keep secret their giving the Indians money to buy ammunition, without any evil design? And that after they went out first to the Indians and gave them ten dollars and invited them into shakertown. 6th. You say that from the time the Indians left Shakertown, or from the time they left Greenville, “From that time to this you have never seen or spoke to one of them”. This is not true – see John Biddles deposition. WARREN COUNTY, STATE OF OHIO Set. Before me, Enos Williams, a justice of the peace in and for said county, came personally / John Biddle of lawful age, who being duly sworn according to law, deposeth and saith, that after the time the Indians were in Shakertown at Turtlecreek, that Issachar Bates told him that he himself, Benjamin young and Richard M’Namar had been out at the Wabash, and that they had been at a feast with the Indians. This deponent is not certain as to the particular time, when Bates, Young and M’Namar feasted with the Indians, on the Wabash, but saith that it was a considerable time after the Indians left Shaker town last, and after they left Greenville, and further this deponent saith not. JOHN BIDDLE Sworn and subscribed the 8th of Oct. 1810. ENOS WILLIAMS, justice of the peace. Your denying this well known truth, is a circumstance against you Richard.

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7th. Who are these two Americans that paid the prophet’s brother a visit, one in the course of last winter and one lately, and had informed them that Gov. Harrison had purchased the lands without the consent of government, and that one half of the people were opposed to the purchase &c. as contained in the “Ohio Centinel?” It is presumed that it was the shakers. 8th. It is well known that ever since the shakers held their first conference with the Shawanoe prophet and his brother, that the prophet has been constantly stiring up the different tribes of Indians to fall upon the frontiers belonging to the United States. We have now both positive and strong presumptive proof of the shakers treasonous designs. – Stephen Ruddle’s affidavit is positive that the Indians told him what he has sworn to. All that is wanting is that the Indians are not legal witnesses. We have sufficient, positive / proof that the shakers hold infallibility and implicit faith and obedience; and all their treacherous dealings with the Indians is only a sprout, spontaneously springing from this fatal root, infallibility and implicit faith and obedience. An extract taken from the “Lover of peace and justice,” in his answer to Thomas Freeman’s61 “Retrospective view of Shakerism”62 continued in four numbers in the “Western Star.” Mr. Freeman has said much; and that with great propriety; on the awful effects of persecution – but where are the persecutors? Col. Smith has said nothing against the shaker faith or mode of worship, it is their proceedings that he endeavors to expose to view, and it was their conduct that the militia opposed. Mr. Freeman has also written largely and pertinently on the great danger of tumultuous companies rising in arms without legal authority. I agree with him in this also. But what was the cause of aboat four hundred armed men,63 and about as many unarmed marching into Shakertown? Perhaps the cause will be fonnd to originate in the civil department. Col. Smith in various news-papers, ever since May last, has advertised the shakers as enemies to American Liberty, and disturbers of the peace and happiness of mankind, and said he would prove it, if legally called upon. And though it is well known that the shakers applied to the civil law when they were in the wrong, and cast; yet they never brought a writ of defamation against him, which was a tacit acknowledgement of guilt. There was more evidence against the shakers before the militia arose in arms, than what was against Aaron Burr64 when he was tried on suspicion at Frankfort. Why then did not the civil / power stir in this important concern which is now like to raise disturbance among the citizens? But it may be asked, whose particular business was it to put the civil law into execution? Was it not the chief magistrate65 in Warren country, who lived near Shakertown, that ought to have done it? It is reported that the Judge, and also an eminent Barrister, by some means, are in favour of the shakers. If the Judge had only been as intent in putting the law into execution against the

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shakers as he was in endeavouring to disperse the militia – would it not have prevented their rising in arms? Did he think that the militia officers were all tories, and that they would patiently bear to see the defenceless frontiers betrayed into the hands of the Shawance prophet and his brother, and their barbarous crew? Mr. Freeman says “I am no advocate for shakerism. “But let any one of discernment read his four elaborate numbers contained in five different news-papers, and he will see that he is an advocate for the shakers – and can any one suppose that a lawyer will labour hard for nothing? – He pretends to be against the shakers foolish enthusiastic and superstitious notions, which he knew the law could not take hold of; and adds “Col. Smith says can the legislature constitutionally interfere?” It appears by the connection, that it was concerning shaker fathers robbing women of their tender offspring that he spoke, for every one knows that we have law sufficient to take an account of opposers of the U. States government and betrayers of our country. Mr. Freeman says the legislature can interpose, and proposeth a vague plan which he well knew could never be put into execution, and says “I’ll venture all I am worth there wont be a shaker / in Warren country in three years from this date.” I shall now examine Mr. Freeman’s plan for expelling the shakers. – In his proposed law for that purpose he says that evading the marriage covenant or for a man’s leaving his wife, “he shall deliver up to his wife and for the use of her and her heirs all his estate real and personal. You well knew sir that such a law as this would never be enacted, because the legislature in years past had hard work to make the marriage covenant less binding than it formerly was. But your plan would be beyond anything that ever was known. Again you say if any one “shall undertake to forgive or pardon the sins of others, or have their sins pardoned by others &c, shall be fined in a sum not exceeding one thousand dollars, nor less than five hundred.” I find that falsehood will produce inconsistency. Notwithstanding Mr. Freeman’s great outcry against persecution. If such a law was general, the Roman Catholics would be expelled from the United States. I despise the thoughts of persecuting even the Roman Catholics; let them worship God any way they please if they do not injure others. Did you intend sir, when you said you were no advocate for shakerism, and proposed laws to expel them, to blindfold the people or lull them to sleep? You need not think, sir, to catch old birds with chaff though Balaam should give you his house full off gold and silver. Upon the plan you have proposed, if Aaron Burr had only been a shaker, and sheltered all his doings under the pretence of worshipping God, nothing must he said or done against him, or the outcry must / be persecution, persecution, & at last contradict your own scheme by proposing an unconstitutional persecuting law. If all that common fame has said concerning the Judge and Lawyer in Warran county should be only groundless surmise, it may now be known.

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Whereas there are now depositions of four different persons published in the news-papers, which contain positive and strong presumptive evidence that Richard M’Namar (and consequently the other leading shakers as they are under absolute command) has for three years past been taking artful measures to excite the Indians to fall upon the white people belonging to the United states. I shall also propose a plan for dispersing or expelling the shakers. That is let the militia lie still for some considerable time, and the judge exert his authority in bringing M’Namar and the shakers chiefs to trial but if the civil department will do nothing in this important concern will not then the militia be excused, should they send the shakers off to live with their beloved Shawanoe prophet and his brother? This matter is now become truly serious, and certainly something ought to be done soon, in order to preserve peace among our citizens. My desire is that it may be settled in an orderly and legal manner. A LOVER OF PEACE AND JUSTICE. The shakers have published a piece in the “Western Star,” Lebanon October 6th, 1810 – wherein they deny what has been published against them, and profess great loyalty and fidelity the United States government – seventeen shakers have signed this publication. When we consider the many falsehoods that have already been proved against them, and that their system is founded on falsehood and supported by secrecy and deceit WHO CAN BELIEVE A SHAKER!!! /

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA District of Kentucky Sct. Be it remembered, That on the 1st day of November, in the year of our Lord 1810, and in the 35th year of the Independence of the United States of America, JAMES SMITH of the said district hath deposited in this office the title of a Book, the right whereof he claims as author in the words and figures following, (to wit.) “Shakerism Detected, their erroneous and treasonous proceedings, and false publications contained in different news – papers, exposed to public view, by the depositions of ten different persons, living in various parts of the States of Kentucky and Ohio, accompanied with remarks, by Col. James Smith of Kentucky.” In conformity to the act of Congress of the U. States entitled “an act for the encouragement of learning by securing the copies of maps, chats and books, to the authors and proprietors of such copies, during the Term therein mentioned,” and also to an act entitled “an act supplementary to an act, entitled an act for the encouragement of learning by securing the copies of maps, charts, and books, to the authors and proprietors of such copies during the times therein mentioned

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and extending the benefits thereof to the arts of designing, engraving and etching, historical and other prints. JOHN H. HANNA, Clerk of the District of Kentucky.

BAILEY, FANATICISM EXPOSED

John Bailey, Fanaticism Exposed, or, The Scheme of Shakerism Compared with Scripture, Reason, and Religion: And Found to be Contrary to Them All (Lexington, KY: Printed at the Reporter Office by W.W. Worsley, 1811).

The Reverend John Bailey was born in Virginia on 4 May 1748. He emigrated to Kentucky by the autumn of 1784. In 1785 he established the Rush Branch Baptist Church near Stanford, in present day Lincoln County. In 1792 he moved to Logan County, in the south-central Barrens region of the state, where the Kentucky Revival would first break out in 1798. Bailey participated in the first state constitutional convention in 1792, and the second in 1799. He moved back to Lincoln County in 1799 and used it as his home base while he travelled and preached. He was known as a particularly powerful orator. Around 1800 his peers accused him of being a Restorationist, or one who wishes to reject creeds and embrace the spirit of the primitive Christian church. In 1803 Bailey withdrew from the Baptist church and formed the Southern Kentucky Association of Separate Baptists. He died on 3 July 1816.1 Bailey’s residence in Lincoln County would have put him in contact with the Shaker missionaries who passed through there in 1805. The very first anti-Shaker work printed west of the Appalachians was printed in the Lincoln County town of Danville in 1805.2 The specifics of Bailey’s interactions with the Shakers are unknown. His work is principally a theological objection to Shakerism, and he makes no mention of ever meeting a Shaker, or of attending their worship. Instead, Bailey relies on lengthy quotes from the Shakers’ Testimony of Christ’s Second Appearing, which was printed at Lebanon, Ohio, in 1808. He echoes the objection of other anti-Shaker writers of the Revolutionary generation in labelling Shaker converts people sadly ‘duped into folly and slavery in a free country’ (p. 248, below). Bailey accuses the Shakers of misusing and misinterpreting the Bible to support their radical religious goals, writing ‘To determine a system of doctrines and then torture the scripture to justify and support it, is as criminal and unfair in its degree, as to put a martyr upon the rack and torture him till he consents to embrace what he never believed’ (p. 252, below). For examples of this practice – 243 –

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he points to the Shakers’ rejection of the Trinity – Father, Son and Holy Ghost. Instead, Shakers believed in a dual Godhead: God the Father, and Holy Mother Wisdom. Mirroring that dual order, Shakers taught that the Christ spirit was first conveyed through the male: Jesus; and secondly, through the female: Ann Lee. Bailey calls these beliefs ‘fruits of proud Phariseical work mongers; pride, arrogance, and blasphemy’ (p. 255, below). Consequently, Bailey is also highly offended by the Shakers’ gendering of the Holy Ghost (Christ spirit) as female. He argues ‘it is an unfortunate circumstance for them that the scriptures always speak of the Holy Ghost in the male gender, and I challenge them to produce a text that speaks of the Holy Ghost in the feminine gender, without torturing it out of its meaning’ (p. 250, below). In fact, Shakers did not assign a gender to the Christ spirit, but only recognized that Ann Lee, a woman, had been the vessel for its second appearing on earth. Finally, Bailey rejects the Shakers’ belief in a spiritual, rather than a physical resurrection. He goes to great lengths quoting the New Testament to demonstrate that Jesus returned in flesh and bone to his disciples and challenges the Shakers to deny that fact in the face of so much scriptural evidence. The last portion of Bailey’s work is remarkable for its overt millennialism in light of his orthodox rejection of so much of the Shakers’ theological speculation. In a lengthy musing on the advent of the Christian millennium, Bailey declared ‘I am greatly persuaded that the sixth seal is opened’, and that ‘North America was the first among the group of oppressed nations that arose from her political slumber’ (p. 263, below). Bailey viewed the American Revolution as the precursor to the upending of oppressive regimes around the world, and the beginning of liberty and religious freedom for all. In contrast, he viewed the authoritarian system of Shakerism as a threat to that liberty. He would have been chagrined to know that the Shakers also viewed the American Revolution as God’s work in creating a free country where religious tolerance held sway.3 The only known Shaker reaction to Bailey’s work is a brief mention in the preface of Pleasant Hill, Kentucky, Shaker John Dunlavy’s 1818 publication the Manifesto, where he calls Bailey’s writing ‘puerile superficials’.4 Ultimately, Bailey’s work passed largely unnoticed by both the Shakers and later anti-Shaker writers. Its purely theological bent and lack of a personal thread in the narrative make it less compelling than other anti-Shaker publications of its time, such as those of James Smith. Notes 1. 2.

J. H. Spencer, A History of Kentucky Baptists, From 1769 to 1885, Vol. 1 ([Cincinnati, OH]: Printed for the author, 1886), pp. 79–81. This being the Village Dialogues: Between Farmer Littleworth and Thomas Newman, Rev. Mr. Lovegood, Parson Dolittle and others by Roland Hill; to which is Added by Another Hand, an Account of the People Known by the Name of Shaking Quakers (Danville, KY, 1805). The only extant copy of this imprint is lacking all the pages after page 2. The

Bailey, Fanaticism Exposed

3. 4.

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content that is present is a direct reprint of an item originally published in Theological Magazine, 1:1 (September/October 1795) as: ‘A Short Account of the People Known by the Name of Shakers, or Shaking Quakers’. See Crosthwaite, ‘“The Mighty Hand of Overruling Providence”: The Shaker Claim to America’, pp. 93–111. J. Dunlavy, The Manifesto, or, A Declaration of the Doctrines and Practice of the Church of Christ (Pleasant Hill, KY: P. Bertrand, Printer, 1818), p. iv.

John Bailey, Fanaticism Exposed, or, The Scheme of Shakerism Compared with Scripture, Reason, and Religion: And Found to be Contrary to Them All (Lexington, KY: Printed at the Reporter Office by W.W. Worsley, 1811).

SCRIPTURE teaches us to look up to Jesus Christ alone, for pardon and forgiveness of sin, who is exalted to be a prince, and a saviour, to give repentance to Israel, and the remission of sins. Acts, v. 31. “Neither is there salvation in any other name under Heaven given among men.” Acts, iv. 12. Reason teaches us to believe that he who enjoins a reasonable service will not demand an unnatural sacrifice; therefore we are commanded to present our bodies as “living sacrafices, holy and acceptable to the Lord, which is the light and life of God in the soul of man, teaches us that its fruits, or pure religion before God and the father, is to “visit the fatherless children and widows in their afflicion, and to keep yourselves free from the world.” James, i. 27. But Shakers are so far from visiting the fatherless and the widows in their affliction, that they make use of all their influence to seduce fathers and husbands away from them, and leave them in the most forlorn and afflicted circumstances. /

FANATICISM EXPOSED, &C. THERE lately fell into my hands a piece entitled “Christ’s second appearing,”1 written by the people called Shakers, and published in New Lebanon.2 The piece is well written, and contains some worthy remarks respecting the original corruption of christianity, the progress of Anti-Christ, the spurious doctrines, and persecuting spirit of many of the reformed churches, collected from some of the most authentic, histories. But when I read those parts of the book which contain the principle and doctrines upon which their sect is founded, I was surprized, because in my opinion, their aim is to destroy the authenticity of the holy scriptures, subvert ancient apostolic christianity, and lay a foundation for religious devotion to grow out of ignorance and fanaticism. And as they hold pretensions to high degrees of inspiration, and are sent to introduce a new dispensation, com– 247 –

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monly called the “Latter day Glory, or the Millennium kingdom of Christ,” I have taken the liberty to examine their mission, and compare it with scripture authority, to see whether their vouchers and qualifications will tally with the divine precedents; and if they do not, I have a right to reject them as / impostures. Whenever knowledge is a duty, ignorance becomes a crime; and the more so, when the means of information is within our reach; and if it is a duty to examine, it is right to censure or approve: therefore I have taken the liberty to examine. They constantly assert, and without reserve, that they have received power from Almighty God to judge the world; and that Christ is in them, and by them is judging the world at this time, and that he will never appear as a visable judge, nor any other way than through and by them to judge the world. Man in his fallen state, and before the knowledge of the true God was made manifest through divine revelation was an easy prey to the cunning and crafty who by feigned words and fair speeches, deceived the hearts of the simple: but that they should be duped into folly and slavery in a free country, where the bible is in almost every man’s hand, is truly astonishing. God in mercy and condescension to the weakness of man, has been pleased to favour our fallen race with two dispensations, or communications of his will; and these were handed to us by Moses and Jesus, both of Jewish extraction. But to avoid imposition, he vested them with power to work miracles in the face of the public, and silence their opposers, whose prejudices had not rendered their consciences callous to the strongest evidence, and thereby gave incontestable evidence that they were sent of God. Moses receives his commission at the extraordinary appearance of the burning bush; God assures Moses that he would be with him; and the first thing that we hear of Moses with Pharaoh is a public demand of all the Jews, “let all my people / go.” Pharoah disputes Moses’s commission and refuses to let the people go. Moses gives Pharoah and the Egyptians a proof of his mission by inflicting on Egypt and the Egyptians ten severe judgments; neither would he be discouraged until he had brought out of Egypt five hundred and sixty-five thousand Jews. He did not tamper with the Egyptian government to know whether they would receive his mission as Anne Lee3 did, who was driven from England with her mad companions, to take shelter under the friendly and free government of America, where truth and error may contest each other without the interference of civil authority. The Lord wrought wonders by Moses in Egypt at the Red Sea, and in the wilderness, to prove to the unbelieving and untractable Jews that he was sent of God. Shakers, you cannot do so; but with a daring arrogance can only say ‘we know we are sent of God.’ Man being deceived and full of the madness of fanaticism, either through ignorance or design, or both, wish to deceive others, and as I conceive this to be the case with the Shakers, without better evidence, I can neither believe their mission, nor receive their testimony. Moses taught the Jew-

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ish people to look forward, and expect a time when a new dispensation should supercede the old, by fulfilling the prophecies and abolishing the ceremonial worship: when the desire of nations (the Messiah) should come. Accordingly when the fulness of time was come, God send forth his son made of a woman, made under the law, to redeem them that were under the law. He was clothed with power from God to give full and sufficient evidence that he was sent of God, by working miracles in the presence of his opposers, and in direct opposition to their prejudices: witness, the miracle / of healing the impotent man at the Pool of Bethesda, John v. The Jews reasoned among themselves and concluded that Jesus must be a bad man, because he had done this miracle of healing on the sabbath day. Oh, bigotry! how often has thy tongue slandered the character of the just, when in thy judgment they have only infringed some of the rites of thy church, or transgressed some of the tradition of the elders. But Christ answered, “my father worketh hitherto, and I work:” as though he had said “many good offices has my father done for you on the sabbath day; and in imitation of my father I work, for the son of man is lord also of the sabbath.” Their clamorous language and persecuting spirit continued; then he told them to search the scriptures, for they were they that testified of him: “ye sent unto John, and he bare witness unto the truth;” with the rest of his miracles, together with the heavenly doctrines he taught, and the godlike spirit of meekness, goodness, and love which he exhibited, abundantly testify that he was sent of God. Do Shakers produce such credentials for their mission? They do not; and until missionaries in the world produce such evidence, or at least something similar, to attest the truth of their mission, the church, and the world have a just right to believe that the gospel is to continue without alteration or addition, and all who attempt to alter or change it, ought to be looked upon and treated as impostures. The next thing that I shall examine is their constitution, or ground upon which they came together as a society or body politic, and see how the holy scriptures will justify their conduct in that particular. “About the year 1770, when the present testimony / of salvation and eternal life was fully opened through Anne Lee, according to the spiritual gift and revelation of God, that extraordinary woman, concerning whom so many things have been conjectured, and who at that time was received by the society as their spiritual mother.” [Introduction, page 21.]4 This appears to be the foundation of this sect, as Shakers themselves acknowledge: that their mother5 is in co-operation or equality with Jesus Christ – [page 436] “Then the man who is called Jesus, and the woman who is called mother, are surely the foundation pillars of the church of Christ.”6 These in their judgment, are the judges and saviours of the world. They have been in judgment upwards of forty years and have made but poor progress; for instead of Anne Lee

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judging the world, the world has judged her, and consigned her to prison,7 and banished her and her companions from England to America. Does this look like the son of God, who will come with power and great glory, and every eye shall see him; at whose appearing all the tribes of Death shall mourn? Surely not! Thus while the Shakers set Anne Lee upon a level and make her equal to Jesus Christ, they make him but half a savior; he is lame in the work of man’s redemption without Mother. Does scripture, reason, or religion teach such deeds? They do not; nor any thing else but mad fanaticism. The folly and blasphemy of such stuff is too ridiculous to merit a serious refutation. If Mother and her children are now judging the world, and she has one half of man’s redemption in her hands, why not pay the same degree of honour and adoration to her as to Jesus Christ? The Shakers may, for aught I know; for / without mother, Jesus Christ is little more than a name with them. She appears to have the Holy Ghost under her controul, which the Shakers say was not revealed until the days of Anne Lee, and then they tell us the Holy Ghost as mother, was revealed by Anne Lee the daughter. What strange absurdities! First, Anne Lee is chosen by the society as their spiritual mother; now, they tell us that the Holy Ghost as mother, was revealed by Anne Lee the daughter. But it is an unfortunate circumstance for them that the scriptures always speak of the Holy Ghost in the male gender, and I challenge them to produce a text that speaks of the Holy Ghost in the feminine gender, without torturing it out of its meaning. Another hard case appears to be against them, as they say the Holy Ghost never was revealed but by and through Anne Lee. Both of these assertions are false; as to the first, many texts might be produced to prove this fallacy, but I shall content myself with one or two: John, xiv. 26. “But the comforter, which is the Holy Ghost, whom the Father will send in my name, he shall teach you all things, and bring all things unto your remembrance.” The Holy Ghost is here spoken of in the male gender he, not she nor they. What they mean by the revelation of the Holy Ghost, I cannot well understand; they surely cannot mean his being revealed in any mode or form; if they do, and Anne Lee has really revealed him, why do they not shew him to the world? For then he would no longer be a revealer himself nor incomprehensible, being modified into person, may be comprehended, at least in idea. But as the scriptures no where speak of the Holy Ghost being revealed, but as a revealer, the above idea cannot be their meaning; therefore I must seek for another, / and as I am not certain what their meaning is, I hope they will excuse me, if I should suppose that it is the gift of working miracles, prophecying and the knowledge of different languages; and if this is what they mean, these were all exhibited in the days of the Apostles, and in a much higher degree than Ann Lee or her successors have yet made manifest. “And they were all filled with the Holy Ghost, and began to speak with other tongues as the spirit gave them utterance. And there were dwelling at Jerusalem Jews, devout

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men of every nation under Heaven. Now when this was noised abroad, the multitude came together and were confounded, because that every man heard them speak in his language:” Acts, ii, 4, 5, 6. Has Mother or her successors manifested greater degrees of the sprit than this? if she has not, why so great a noise about nothing. I have no doubt that she and her children have arrogance enough to tell us that she has; but until people will give up common sense for nonsense and renounce reason for folly, they will not believe them. To believe in Jesus Christ and love one another, is the commandment of God; but Shakers are so uncharitable that they damn the church and the world, by the lump. Unmerciful judges! have they no danger to apprehend from that awful sentence of St. Paul: Gal. i, 8, 9, “Though an angel from heaven preach any other gospel than that which we have preached to you let him be accursed.” Their whole scheme appears to be founded on conjecture or whim. What scripture or reason have they to conclude that the original sin was Adam’s cohabiting with Eve, his wife? none: for if I should suppose that the original transgression was their eating the fruit of some natural tree in the midst of the garden, which was forbidden; or that he neglected to / dress and keep the garden; or that he neglected for too long a time to have knowledge of his wife; or that he took a nap of sleep at some unusual hour; I should have at least equal authority with them for the most loose of those conjectures; and far better ground to rest some of them upon, than they have. For Adam was positively commanded to dress the garden; he was positively forbidden to eat of the fruit of the tree of knowledge, of good and evil; he was positively commanded to be fruitful and multiply: and how he could be fruitful and multiply without copulation, is a mystery equally unintelligible as Shakerism. – Where there is no restraint upon the propensities, passions, or appetites of man, there can be no sinful curiosity; but the moment there is a prohibition by a superior authority, an enquiry arises in the mind wherefore? And this appears to have been the case with our parents in paradise. We need not believe that there was any natural evil in the tree of knowledge, nor any poisonous effects in its fruit; that was impossible, for all was pronounced by the creator to have been very good; but the transgression of a prohibition enjoined by the creator, and if they had been prohibited by the same authority from turning their faces to any particular point of the heavens; or from drinking of any particular spring; or from going to a distant part of the garden, the transgression might have been of equal magnitude, and in its effects equally destructive as it was from eating the fruit of the forbidden tree. But it was the pleasure of the creator to make proof of this obedience by the most simple and easy rule, and therefore he forbids them the fruit of a certain tree. But as the genders were divided, and the man and the woman stood personal and distinct, and were possessed of propensities, passions / and bodily organs for the express purpose of copulation, and in addition to receive a command to be

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fruitful and multiply, and at the same time to be under a restraint from obeying that command upon pain of death, transgresses every rule of propriety, and justice, makes reason revolt, and attaches such a character to the ever blessed, and adorable God, as would make the most despotic tyrant of the East blush to have such a character tacked to him. But the Shakers tell us “that the criminality of that knowledge arose from an unseasonable and untimely use of those bodily organs and animal passions which were created to be under the government and direction of a superior law.” [Pages 61 & 74]8 But what criminality from Adam’s knowing his wife when she is acknowledged to be bone of his bone and flesh of his flesh? – there could be none unless it was criminal to know himself, for “they shall be one flesh.” But if Adam’s untimely and unseasonable approaches to Eve, was the transgression by which he lost his innocence, and forfeited his natural life, with that of all his posterity, then (to reverse the idea) his timely and seasonable approaches to her would have maintained his innocence and his natural life, together with all his posterity, without the assistance of elementary food; and then it would be hard to tell the use of all the delicious fruits in the garden of Eden. But what would the times and seasons have been that Adam might have eaten of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, and continue in his innocence? never to all eternity, unless God had removed the prohibition, “for in the day thou eatest thereof, thou shalt surely die.” Therefore if the tree of knowledge is to be taken in an allegorical sense, why not the tree of life and all the trees and fruits of the garden? / Then the Pagan notions of Pandora’s box, and the Mundin egg, are equally descriptive of the fall of man, and all the evils of nature, as Moses’ story about Paradise and the forbidden fruit: they are all nothing more than ideal tales or religious fictions. But as Shakerism is founded on mystery, all their wild notions are but what might be expected by departing from the literal sense of scripture. We know from divine authority, that the Jewish ceremonies, and many of the prophecies, and all the parables of the new testament, have a mystical signification, and the truths which they point out are to be sought for; and the most simple inference is the most likely to be right. But spiritualize plain historical facts, promises and threatnings, is the way to run into error and delusion without end. A departure from the literal sense of the scripture has been the fatal source of divisions among Christians. To determine a system of doctrines and then torture the scripture to justify and support it, is as criminal and unfair in its degree, as to put a martyr upon the rack and torture him till he consents to embrace what he never believed. The scriptures were written for our learning; and the Apostle Peter tells us that no scripture is of private interpretation; but Shakers tell us that they are all written in mystery, and that they were never intended for the natural man (or reasonable man): but for the spiritual man. Popes, fanatics, and deceivers have too long hid themselves behind the veil of mystery and their own spiritual inter-

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pretations; until the gospel, and true gospel religion is brought into contempt, and a sufficient ground furnished by the pretended advocates of the gospel for the growth of infidelity. Ten different spiritual interpreters may have as many different meanings upon the same text: it is / naturally impossible that they should all be right, but it is very probable they all may be wrong. Now where shall we find any authority for a spiritual meaning upon the plain historical facts of the garden of Eden, the tree of life, the tree of knowledge of good and evil, and the fig leaves of which Adam and Eve made themselves aprons? I answer no where but in the Shaker’s brain. But such a departure from the literal sense of scripture is a gross charge of insincerity upon the divine character, who by the mouth of the prophet Jeremiah challenges the wicked and rebellious house of Israel to the bar of reason to try the rectitude of his conduct, and the equity of his ways: “Come O Israel, and let us reason together! are not my ways equal, are not your ways unequal, O house of Israel?” We know that no man knoweth the things of man, save the spirit of man that is in him; so the things of God knoweth no man but the spirit of God; but the invisible things of God are one thing, and the plain record of divine revelation is another thing. If the scriptures are written in mystery, they have the wrong name, for instead of their being called the record of divine revelation, they ought to be called the record of divine mystery. And if they were written in mystery; and the key to that mystery has been concealed by providence for nearly four thousand years, and has been reserved to be put into the possession of the Shakers only: what a shocking charge is this against the divine procedure! The church and the world in all ages might join with the prophet Jeremiah, and exclaim “Oh God, thou hast deceived me, and I was deceived!” Upon this supposition, the scriptures were given rather to bewilder and embarras the understanding, than to inform the judgment: they must / belong to another race of being, and not to reasonable man. Those than can rest their soul’s eternal salvation on such stuff may: for my part, I cannot. But these are some of the effects of departing from the literal sense of scripture: one has a dream, another has a vision, a third has a prophecy, and a fourth has a revelation, till at last an oracle is produced, and it pronounces a new scheme of religion; then vain and proud man falls down and worships his own invention as the Jews did the golden calf. Charging the scripture with having a double meaning has been the cause of calling councils to frame creeds and confessions of faith: those holy fathers through the spirit of self conceit, and the love of supremacy have fancied themselves possessed of the spirit of infallibility; their urim and thumim9 has pronounced an oracle and they call it orthodox; and the tender mercies of the holy catholic church has been abundantly manifested in the administration of wholesome severities upon heretics. The next thing that comes under consideration is their state of celibacy. It will be acknowledged by all christians, and likely by the Shakers themselves, that the

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ancient practice of human sacrifices among the Pagans and apostatised Jews, was an abomination to the Lord; but Shakers, in an indirect manner, make use of the same practice in their state of celibacy, by checking the propagation of posterity, which God has appointed to be done under such restrictions as the scriptures have laid down. The only difference between the ancients and the Shakers is that the Pagans offered living victims, and the Shakers offer in germ or sperm; but when the one or the other are done with a view to please God Almighty, they are equally an abomination in his sight; for, as was before observed, / he that enjoins a reasonable service can never be pleased with an unnatural sacrifice. Mutual wants, self-love, and a desire to propagate our species are the principal bonds of civil society in this depraved state of man; and when any one of these is wanting in an individual the person is of little use to society. Mutual wants impel man into society with man; self-love, or the principle of self preservation teaches us that every man’s wants are greater than his strength, and of course, each man needs the assistance of his neighbour in his turn; the love of propagation keeps up society between the sexes, which bond of their union is to be regulated by prudence or scripture, or both: “be fruitful and multiply,” was the first command in this respect: Gen i, 28. Nevertheless to avoid fanaticism: “let every man have his own wife and every woman her own husband.” 1st Cor. vii, 2. “I will therefore that the young women marry, bear children, guide the house, give none occasion to the adversary to speak reproachfully.” 1st Tim. v, 14. And in the same chapter, beginning at the first verse, the Apostle tells us the effects of a seducing spirit and doctrine of Devils are speaking lies in hypocricy having the conscience seared with a hot iron, forbiding to marry. Among the doctrines of Devils, forbiding to marry is one; but I am aware that Shakers will say they do not forbid to marry, in order to avoid the censure of the above commands. But will they admit any one man or woman into full society, and give them their testimony, and equal privileges, who live in full and free connection with one another as man and wife? I am inclined to think they will not, and quote Christ’s argument with Saducees, in their justification. Mark, xii, 25, 26, 27. “For when they rise from the dead they neither marry nor are / given in marriage, but are as the angels which are in heaven. And as touching the dead that they rise, have ye not read in the book of Moses, how in the bush God spake unto him, ‘I am the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacobs.” He is not the God of the dead but of the living. Here Jesus speak of the present state of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob; that at the time the burning bush appeared their souls were in a state of living existence some where, though their bodies had been dead for upwards of three hundred years, or else the angel would not have spoken as he did in the present tense, “I am the God of Abraham,” &c. and at the same time speak of the resurrection altogether in the future and totally unconnected with the affairs and business of this world, for “when they shall rise from the dead,”

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&c. Thus the Redeemer confuted the two fundamental errors of the Saducees, and proved the resurrection of the dead and the immortality of the soul. But for poor blind mortals to dogmatise on identity of the resurrection bodies, is folly in the extreme, when it did not appear to the divinely inspired John. “But we know that when he shall appear, we shall be like him for we shall see him as he is.” Cease then to be wise above that which is written; and though we may not cease to enquire, let us be modest enough at least to cease to dogmatise when the scripture ceases to inform. The Shakers have been at some pains to ridicule the trinitarian creed, because it holds three persons in the Godhead, that is, the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, all equal in essence, power and eternity; which they conceive to be little better than idolatry and the polethism10 of the Pagans. And in order to make a creed fit for Christians to believe in, and upon / the belief of which they may have their eternal salvation secured, they have introduced a fourth personality, that is, Father and Son, Mother and Daughter;11 that from henceforth it is to be hoped that the fool will no more say in his heart, there is no God, for here are three or four already. And if his holiness and the successors of Anne Lee are taken into the number, the personalities in the Divinity, in process of time, may almost amount to as many as are contained in the Pagan Pantheon. But I forbear to satirize, and only ask them how they could have the audacity to clamour against the trinitarian creed, because it acknowledges three persons in the Godhead, while they themselves hold those three in their creed, and add Anne Lee to the number. For as the Father was revealed by the Son, they say that the Mother (or the Holy Ghost) was revealed by the Daughter (or Anne Lee.) But these are the fruits of proud Phariseical work mongers; pride, arrogance, and blasphemy. “Shakers, no more advance this wretched scheme, Nor plume yourselves by robbing the supreme; No more exalt proud man at the expense Of Jesus’ merits and omnipotence. Would God on you bestow his gracious rays. You’d own his power, and sing aloud his praise, To moles and bats you’d fling your idols then, And give to God what now you give to men.”

The next thing that comes under consideration is their notion about the resurrection. This is the last thing that I shall consider of the errors of Shakerism; and it is of more importance to the establishment of the gospel than all the rest; as upon the truth of the resurrection the whole superstructure of gospel doctrines and the gospel church depends. The Apostle / Paul says that if Christ be not risen our preaching is vain: “Your Faith also is vain; ye are yet in your sins; yea, and we found false wi[t]nesses of God, because we testify that God raised up Christ from the dead, whom he raised not up if the dead rise not.” – And as the

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phrase resurrection signifies the raising up of something that has been laid down, therefore whenever we read of a resurrection to come, the scripture refers to the bodies of mankind which are dead and laid in the grave, as in the case of Lazarus: John xi. and the doctrine of Christ, marvel not at this, the hour is coming when all that are in their graves shall hear his voice and come forth, they that have done good unto the resurrection of life, and they that have done evil to the resurrection of damnation. The Apostle comforts the Thessalonian christians with the same doctrine: “Weep not for your dead as without hope; for the Lord shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God: and the dead in Christ shall rise first.” But as the resurrection is a doctrine upon which the hope and comfort of all christians are built as well as the certainty of all the other promises, and the truth of the gospel in general; and it being a doctrine so generally believed by all denominations of christians, that I need not multiply texts to prove it. And the Shakers themselves acknowledge the resurrection in their own way; it only remains for me to consider whether there shall be a resurrection of the body or any part of the body both of the just and unjust; and whether that body of Jesus which was crucified upon the cross, and laid in Joseph’s sepulcher was ever or never raised from the dead. Now the Apostles were witnesses chosen of Christ for the express purpose to testify the truth of the resurrection, / as he well knew what opposition that doctrine would have to combat in a sensual and superstitious world, who are not willing to believe any events to be of God which they cannot account for upon principles of reasoning: and the doctrine of the resurrection can only be accounted for by the miraculous exertion of omnipotent power, any easier than how the first parents of the human race could be produced without such a miraculous exertion; admitting the resurrection of the body of Jesus to be a fact, as on the establishment of that fact the resurrection of the whole human race depends, both of the just and unjust. And having brought the matter to issue, let us call forward the evidence, and hear their testimony: beginning with the Apostle John. John, you are charged with falsifying in the matter of the resurrection of Jesus, or at least of speaking of the resurrection in such mystical or dubious language as to have deceived the church who have professed to believe your account of the resurrection in all ages of the gospel. Say, was the body of Jesus that was crucified and died on the cross actually raised from the dead or not? – First epistle of John, beginning at the 1st verse. “That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have handled of the word of life.” Luke, what have you to say in this matter? After his resurrection he appeared unto us, and we were so overjoyed to see him that we could hardly believe our own eyes and were greatly astonished, “and he said unto us why are ye troubled, and why do thoughts arise in your hearts? Behold my hands and my feet, that it is I myself,

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handle me and see: for a spirit hath not flesh and bones as you see me have. And when he had / thus spoken he shewed them his hands and his feet.” Luke, xxiv. 38, 39. “And he said unto them, thus it is written and thus it behoved Christ to suffer, and to rise from the dead the third day: and ye are witnesses of these things.” Luke, xxiv, 48. The next witness to be examined in this case is Peter. Peter what have you to say in favor of the resurrection of Jesus? was his body that was crucified upon the cross, dead and buried actually raised from the dead or not? The Shakers say that it was secured and taken care of by the angel that rolled away the stone from the door of the sepulchre; what do you say to this matter? “Him, being delivered by the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God, ye have taken, and by wicked hands have crucified and slain; whom God hath raised up, having loosed the pains of death: because it was not possible that he should be holden of it. For David speaketh concerning him, I foresaw the Lord always before my face; for he is on my right hand, that I should not be moved: therefore did my heart rejoice, and my tongue was glad; moreover also, my flesh shall rest in hope: because thou wilt not leave my soul in hell, neither wilt thou suffer thy holy one to see corruption.” Acts, ii 23, 24, 25, 26, 27. “He seeing this before, spake of the resurrection of Christ, that his soul was not left in hell, neither his flesh did see corruption. This Jesus hath God raised up, whereof we are all witnesses.” Acts, ii, 31, 34. “For David, after he had served his own generation, by the will of God fell asleep, and was laid unto his fathers, and saw corruption: but he whom God raised again saw no corruption.” Acts xiii, 36, 37. The next witness to be heard in this case is the Apostle of the gentiles. Paul, you are called upon to testify the truth concerning the resurrection / of Jesus; was his crucified body raised from the dead, or was there only an apparition appeared unto you and your fellow Apostles? I verily thought within myself that I ought to do many things contrary to Jesus of Nazareth: but when it pleased God to reveal his Son in me, immediately I conferred not with flesh and blood; “for I delivered unto you first of all the gospel which I received, how that Christ died for our sins, according to the scriptures; and that he was seen of Cephas and then of the twelve: and after that he was seen of above five hundred brethren at once; of whom the greater part remain, but some are fallen asleep; after that he was seen of James; then of all the Apostles: and last of all he was seen of me also, as one born out of due time.” 1st Cor. xv, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8. “Of one Jesus which was dead, whom Paul affirmed to be alive.” Acts, xxv, 19. With a great number of other testimony in point to the question, but this is enough. Now let us try the credibility of the witnesses. – One of three things must be true: first, that they were not possessed of common sense; that is, they were deficient in seeing, feeling, and hearing, and consequently were deceived themselves; or secondly, that they must have had an interest in deceiving others: or thirdly, the facts they attested must be true. As to the first objection, could it be possible

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that a man possessed of such a revolutionary spirit as Jesus had would make use of men to bear testimony to facts that would rouse the fear, and astonish the rulers of the whole Roman empire who had not common sense? this objection is too unreasonable to have any weight in an unprejudiced mind, therefore they could not be deceived themselves. Twelve men bearing uniform testimony to the truth of any fact is / sufficient to establish it, and if the testimony of twelve men is not sufficient, the testimony of a thousand would not be sufficient, for the same reasons. – Suppose twelve men came from Lexington to Danville and proclaim that they saw a man in the town of Lexington put to death in a barbarous manner, and that they saw him alive again the third day after his death, would not the inhabitants of Danville draw this conclusion from the report, that the men were mad, or that they had an interest in deceiving others: but when the men were interrogated and were found to give reasonable answers they would no longer conclude they were mad, but that they had an interests in deceiving others. But put these men into prison for a time, then carry them to the public whipping post, and in the face of the public scourge them severely, then torture them by slow degrees, and lastly put them to death; and all the while under the promise that they should not only be liberated but should be raised to preferment if they would recant their testimony, and for them to remain firm to their last breath; no man or set of men could believe that they had any separate interests in the relation of such a fact but that it was true. This supposition is a picture of the Apostle and first Christians; they were told by their Lord they should be brought before kings and rulers for his name sake, that they should be cast into prison and put to death, which they abundantly experienced, but never once swerved from the truth of their first report. And Shakers, what have you to say to all this? – Luke, and Jesus himself, says that he had flesh and bones after his resurrection; John says that they had seen, heard, and handled him; Paul says that he was dead, buried , and rose the third day; Peter says / that his flesh saw no corruption; “For David after he had served his own generation, by the will of God fell asleep and was laid unto his fathers and saw corruption: but he whom God raised from the dead saw no corruption.” And it is evident that the Apostle draws a comparison between the dead body of David and the dead body of Jesus, when he says that David saw corruption and Jesus did not. Let us see what you have to say to all this; Shaker answers: – “As mankind were created and endowed with a reasonable soul or spirit for that purposes capable of immortality, therefore it is the soul of man alone that is the subject of the resurrection.” Page 571.12 “Not that the disciples ever learned or taught others that Christ Jesus resumed the same natural appearance of sinful flesh which was laid in the new tomb. “It is most manifest according to the sense of the gospel the rising from the dead had no respect to the natural body or tabernacle of Jesus nor any of his followers.”13 Page 577.14 “And if the same

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natural body that was crucified of the Jews, arose from the dead and could enter the room when the doors “were shut, why did not the same body come forth from the tomb without assistance? the natural was taken care of and secured by the angel who rolled away the stone from the door of the sepulcher. The “Lord took from the door of Moses, and in like manner at this day Satan has the confidence to dispute about the body of Jesus.” Page 580.15 “The separate state of the wicked only is called death, and that of the righteous only called sleep.” Christ did either rise from the dead or he did not: now if he rose from the dead he must have been dead before the resurrection; and it is farther evident that that part only of Christ that was dead rose from the / dead. Now you say the soul only is the subject of resurrection and not the body: was the soul of Christ ever dead? was the soul of Christ ever subject to corruption? he that was holy, harmless, and undefiled, and was separate from sinners, he in whose mouth was found no guile. The Apostle Peter tells us that he was put to death in the flesh, that he died for our sins, that his body was the subject of execution on the cross, that his body was the subject of torture and mockery, that the only of so pure a being could be the subject of corruption and that he never saw corruption. What nonsensical language does the Apostle make use of when he says ‘neither did his flesh see corruption’ if it never rose from the dead, as you say. You say the natural was taken care of by the angel as the Lord took care of the body of Moses. – Who told you so? Not the scriptures! The scriptures say that God raised Jesus from the dead; but the scriptures say nothing about the resurrection of Moses: this is another idle, wicked, blasphemous whim of your own brain: and farther you say that Satan has the confidence to dispute about the body of Jesus: Where did you get that? Did you ever hear Satan dispute the resurrection of Jesus? If you ever did, you must have a more friendly correspondence with him than any of Christ’s disciples who believe and confess his resurrection. Take care that you do not belie the Devil as you have done the Apostles, for though he is the father of lies yet it is possible to belie him, and it must be a man old and bold in wickedness that would willfully belie a Devil in order to pervert a truth. The Devil knows better; he remembers and eternally will remember, the awful moment when his infernal power was broken, his territory ran sacked, and the keys of Hell and Death taken out of / his possession by a risen Jesus! No, it is the Devil who instigates infidels, unbelievers, and Shakers to dispute the resurrection of the body of Jesus, contrary to his better knowledge; for as he is the father of lies he is a deceiver, and by his emissaries is desirous of palming the deception which they are guilty of upon the Apostles and those Christians who defend the resurrection of Jesus. That Jesus assumed different appearances after his resurrection is not denied, and that the dead body of Jesus was the subject of the resurrection is not denied but believed by all christians and is acknowledged and will be acknowledged as long as the gospel is held as a truth. So did Jesus assume a different appearance at his transfiguration; and what of that? did it prove that it was not the same body?

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Surely not! Much more when the body of Jesus had passed under the moulding hand of omnipotent power could it assume different appearances. The Christians are said not at all to sleep, but they are all to be changed; and because it does not yet appear what we shall be, shall we therefore dispute the power and promise of God in the resurrection? If this whimsical fiction of yours had been the meaning of the Apostles, why did they not tell the world of it at once? They might have told it and saved themselves and the Church a great deal of persecution in the first ages of Christianity. It was not because they wanted language, but because they told the simple truth in every thing that was necessary to be believed in order to salvation. The resurrection of Jesus, and the general resurrection both of the just and the unjust by virtue of the resurrection of Jesus; salvation by free grace; a holy life; and future rewards and punishments were the leading and fundamental points taught by the Apostles; and that in a / plain and simple manner that the ignorant and unlearned could plainly understand them: neither did they cover their designs in dark and ambiguous language as the Shakers do who say their writings are all in mystery and will admit of a double meaning. – Your language appears to be an irreverent sneer when you speak of human dust: “What has God to do with rotten bones, corrupted flesh.” Do you know all the properties of matter? Do you know all the extent and power of the laws of nature? Do you know how the human body was formed at first, or how the bones, sinews, arteries, nerves and muscles are formed now? You do not. You are not able to tell all the properties and qualities of a single hair on your own head, nor the smallest atom that floats in the tractless regions of the air! Cease then to be bold and arrogant when the power and designs of omnipotence are in question. The being, use and end of man lies before the Almighty, and it is enough for us to know and believe that the end which he had in view in his creation will be accomplished in his time. He has been pleased to reveal to us so much of his will respecting man as is sufficient to strengthen our love to him and learn our duty to each other; he has given great and precious promises which open a prospect beyond the grave for the hopes of the pious and faithful to rest upon; and in addition to all this gives the ernest of his spirit to encourage his children to learn the lesson of submission to his will by lessons of trial and adversity. And now brother Shaker I must take my leave of you; my rough manner of communication I fear will offend you rather than edify; but it is not for me to flatter, especially where I think the honour of God and the authenticity of the sacred record is the / object. If anything in these sketches should appear too rough I hope you and all my readers will excuse it as I am a man of rough manners and have never had the advantage of a polite education. I write as I think, and my aim is to strengthen the faith of the wavering and to support the character of the God I worship, and discover to my fellow men what I believe to be prevarication or interpolation of the sacred text.

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CHRTST’S SECOND APPEARING. THE latter day glory, or the millennium kingdom of Christ, and his personal appearance as king in that kingdom, are subjects which have occupied the hope and attention of many Christians of almost every denomination ever since the Christian æra; and however they may have differed in other points of faith they have generally agreed to believe this in some form or other: and it is a subject in which Christians are so deeply interested that it may properly be said to be a key to unlock a great number of the prophecies which remain yet to be fulfilled. And without a tolerable knowledge of the millennium many of those prophecies appear to be useless or superfluous as they will not apply to any other event in the divine œconomy without straining them out of their own meaning. Therefore I would exhort all those who look for Christ’s second appearing to remember the exhortation of the Apostle: “Now we beseech you brethren by the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ and by our / gathering together unto him, that ye be not shaken in mind or be troubled neither by spirit, nor by word, nor by letter as from us, as that the day of Christ is at hand; let no man deceive you by any means, for that day shall not come unless there come a falling away first.” 2d Thes. ii, 1. 2, 3. “Scoffers say where is the promise of his coming?” 2d Peter, iii, 4. Shakers say “he is come in us,” but they are both impatient of the fulfillment of the prophecies, and it will be much to their advantage if they should be ready to receive him when he does come. Therefore I will take the liberty to drop a few sketches and give it as my opinion as an introduction to Christ’s second appearing, and if they should be any advantage to my readers they are welcome to them, and if not I have the consolation to know that my motives have been pure in writing them. Numerous prophecies relate to this interesting event; but as I intend to speak only of its introduction, it cannot be expected that I should collect the numbers of prophecies that apply to the various events to take place in that kingdom. – The second appearing of Christ and the setting up of and establishment of his kingdom on earth, in which his will is to be done on earth as it is in heaven, is a subject for which preparation has been making ever since the first propagation of the gospel, if not ever since creation. I shall begin its introduction with the opening of the sixth seal: “And he opened the sixth seal, and lo! there was a great earthquake, and the sun became black as sackcloth of hair, and the moon became as blood, and the stars of heaven fell unto the earth even as a fig tree casteth her untimely figs when she is shaken of a mighty wind, and the heavens departed as a scroll when it is rolled together and every mountain and island were moved out of / their places; and the kings of the earth, and great men, and the rich men, and the chief citizens, and the mighty men, and every bond man, and every free man hid themselves in dens and rocks of the mountains, and said unto the rocks and to the mountains, fall on us and hide us from

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the face of him that sitteth upon the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb; for the great day of his wrath is come, and who shall be able to stand?” Rev. vi. beginning at the 12th v. and continued to the end of the chapter. I have several times heard the above passage spoken of as particularly referring to the last judgment, or final state of things; but I would just remind the friends who hold that opinion, that all the events here spoken of and many more, are to take place at the opening of the sixth seal. Neither is there any thing said here, or in any of the events spoken of under the sixth seal about the resurrection of the dead, the burning of the earth, or the last judgment, all which events stand immediately connected with a thorough change of the earth from its present state. And as the last judgment is not included in any of the events under the sixth seal, we are to seek for another meaning, and as it is an invariable maxim with me never to depart from the literal sense of the scripture without a manifest necessity, so it is here. There appears to be an absolute necessity to dispense with the literal sense of the three first verses of the above passage. – Those verses contain a prophecy, and have evidently a mystical meaning which is to be sought for, and the most simple inference is the most likely to be right. Then let it be observed that the earthquake with the removal of the mountains and islands out of their places, signify revolutions in kingdoms and state governments; and the consternation in the heavens / of the sun, moon and stars, signify revolutions in the church and church governments; and considering the subject in this point of view, the whole process under the sixth seal becomes easy to understand. I am greatly persuaded that the sixth seal is opened, and this earthquake has began to take place, and its contents fall with terror and confusion on the kings of the earth, their dependents and auxiliaries, as in verse 15, “and the kings of the earth, and the great men, and the rich men, and the chief captains (or great generals) and the mighty men, &c. hid themselves in the rocks of the mountains,” &c. This is a revolutionary day: it appears that the sixth seal is opened. Turn your eyes to the kings of the earth; they are panic struck through all Christendom: one revolution after another, wars rising, men’s hearts failing them for fear, and looking after those things that arc coming upon them. The kings of the earth mark their steps with blood and human carnage; while their dependents and auxiliaries feed and fatten upon the spoils. “Why do the heathen rage, and the people imagine a vain thing; the kings of the earth set themselves, and their rulers take counsel together against the Lord, and against his anointed, saying let us break their bonds asunder and cast away their cords from us; he that sitteth in the heavens shall laugh, the Lord shall have them in derision; then shall he speak to them in his wrath, and vex them in his sore displeasure: yet have I set my king upon my holy hill of Zion. Be wise now therefore O ye kings! be instructed ye judges of the people, lest he be angry and ye perish from the way.” ii Psalm. Some invisible agent has poured light into the human mind; or let it be by what means soever, mankind begin to have more

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noble conceptions of their own dignity, / and to avow their own natural rights and privileges; and every discovery thus made and avowed falls in equal proportion on all monarchs and monarchical governments. North America was the first among the group of oppressed nations that arose from her political slumber: she arose from her political lethargy and formed a new æra in the page of history. Her revolution, policy, commerce, and freedom are objects of envy and terror to despots, and if she maintains the usual spirit of her government will become the object of imitation to the oppressed nations of the earth. France follows her example; but there was work for France to do; but in her turn she shall equally feel the shock: and so it will continue till all the old spurious oppressive governments like mountains and islands will be moved from their places and liberty and the rights of man arise upon their ruins. Churches and church governments must share the same fate, under the similitude of a consternation among the sun, moon, and stars, verse 14. This will completely correspond with the prophetic declaration of the kingdom and power given to our Lord Jesus Christ, Psalm ii, also Psalm cx, “The Lord said unto my lord, sit thou on my right hand until I make thine enemies thy foot stool.” The next event that is to take place under the sixth seal, is an angel ascending from the East, having the seal of the living God. Rev. vii, 2, 3, 4. “And there were sealed one hundred and forty and four thousand of all the tribes of the children of Israel, of every tribe twelve thousand. I have before said that the legal and gospel dispensations were introduced by Moses and Jesus, and both of Jewish extraction; hence it is reasonable to conclude that the Almighty will not alter his mode of / procedure in the introduction of the next dispensation but that it will be opened by the instrumentality of the Jews. And why not? That people though stubborn and rebellious at this time have many great and precious promises in their favour; they are still beloved for their father’s sake, and every prophet and Apostle whose writings are held to be canonical have been Jews. And there can be but little doubt that the hundred and forty four thousand sealed Jews will receive a commission and be appointed to a certain work; that is, to preach the everlasting gospel to all those that dwell upon the face of the earth, to every nation, and kindred, and tongue, and people, Rev. xiv, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8. These are styled the first fruits to God and the Lamb, i. e. in that dispensation: They are to open the government of that glorious kingdom and set it in full motion: and the effect of their preaching will be the conversion of a great multitude that no man can number of all nations and kindreds, and tongue, and people. Rev. vii, 9. The farther effects of this preaching will be the downfall of Babylon, or final destruction of the power of Antichrist. Now if twelve Jews, the Apostles, were sufficient to bear testimony to, and propagate the gospel in its present persuasive dispensation, so that it has made its way in opposition to tyranny, ignorance, prejudice, and persecution, and has triumphed over them all, what an amazing light may we expect to be transfused when twelve

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times twelve thousand Jews sealed and commissioned by Almighty God shall go forth as one man to spread the joyful tidings of that kingdom? Well might the prophet cry out in astonishment, “And at that day the light of the moon shall be as the light of the sun, and the light of the sun shall be as the light of seven days.” Isaiah, xxx, 26. / And all this is to be accomplished at the opening of the sixth seal: these will be the ministers of light and power, for the conversion of the nations to the love and reception of the truth, to make ready a people prepared for the Lord. These will follow the Lamb whithersoever he goeth, and will administer the doctrine and government of that kingdom in so incontestable a manner that none will refuse their testimony but the most hardened and rebellious, and that against the strongest evidence. Nevertheless good will so far have the controul over evil that the knowledge and worship of the true god shall be uniform, and peace shall cover the earth as the waters do the sea. War shall cease for a while to the end of the earth. But before the personal appearance of the Lord Jesus Christ the seventh seal will be opened; and one of the events to take place at the opening of the seventh seal will be the gathering together the army of the first Gogg in a hostile manner against the sons of liberty and religion: and the means by which they will be instigated to persecution and war your may read Rev. xvi, 13. “And I saw three unclean spirits like frogs come out of the mouth of the dragon, and out of the mouth of the beast, and out of the mouth of the false prophet; for they are the spirit of devils working miracles, which go forth unto the kings of the earth and to the whole world, to gather them together to battle to the great day of God Almighty.” They shall make war with the Lamb, and the Lamb shall overcome them for he is the Lord of Lord and King of kings, and they that are with him, are called, and chosen, and faithful. When the army of Gogg is completely marshaled and ready to make a strike upon the children of God, behold the Lamb will appear with power and great glory, and then shall all / the tribes of the earth mourn. We have seen the kings of the earth and their dependents panic struck by the revolutionary spirit that prevailed at the opening of the sixth seal; but when Jesus shall personally appear, he will work a greater miracle in the deliverance of his children than the Lord wrought by Moses in the deliverance of the children of Israel at the Red Sea. The army of Gogg shall fall in the valley of Hamon Gogg. Ezekiel, xxxix, 11. To get an account of this mighty army and the object of this enterprize read the 38th chapter of Ezekiel throughout; there you will see that their aim is to make a final destruction of God’s people and the peaceful kingdom of the millennium; but to the astonishment of the whole earth, they shall be freed by a miracle greater than that which was wrought in the destruction of the Egyptians at the Red Sea. “And this shall be the plague wherewith the Lord will smite all the people that have fought against Jerusalem: their flesh shall consume away while they

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stand on their feet, and their eyes shall consume away in their holes, and their tongues shall consume away in their mouths.” Zachariah, xiv, 12. “And in that day saith the Lord I will smite every horse with astonishment and his rider with madness; and I will open mine eyes upon the house of Judea, and will smite every horse of the people with blindness.” Zachariah, xii, 4. Thus the kingdom of peace and righteousness and the knowledge of God and true religion will be established. The righteous dead will be raised, and reign and administer in joint heirship with during the term of one thousand years at least: then the Jews his people will be willing in that day / of his power; and the nations of the Gentiles being conformed to the divine government, the kingdom will come, and his will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Thus I have dropped you a few of my thoughts as an introduction to the second appearing of Christ and the latter day of glory.

FINIS.

SILENT CORRECTIONS

Rathbun, ‘Caleb Rathbun Aged Nearly Seventeen Years’ p. 139, l. 6,

Eleazar Ran] Eleanzar Rand

p. 139, l. 16,

Eleazar Ran] Eleazar Rand

Rathbone, Reasons Offered for leaving the Shakers p. 161, l. 12

preaced] preached

p. 173, l. 41

he] the

Smith, ‘An Attempt to Develope Shakerism’ p. 183, l. 16,

se] see

p. 181, l. 22,

ight] light

p. 184, l. 25,

ighteousness] righteousness

[Anon.], ‘Who Are the Shakers?’ p. 204, l. 12,

two] too

– 267 –

EDITORIAL NOTES

Rathbun, A Brief Account of a Religious Scheme 1.

2.

3. 4.

5.

6. 7. 8.

9. 10.

11. 12.

13.

in the year 1774: Mother Ann Lee (1736–84), founder of the Shakers, and eight followers arrived at New York City on 6 August 1774. Aboard the ship were Ann Lee, her husband Abraham Stanley (sometimes given as Standerin), her brother William Lee, James Whittaker, John Hocknell and his son Richard Hocknell, James Shepherd, Mary Partington and Nancy Lee (niece of Mother Ann) (Bishop and Wells, Testimonies, p. 8). place called Nisqueunia: spelled a variety of ways in early texts, this is Niskeyuna, the first Shaker settlement in America where Mother Ann Lee lived beginning in 1776. It eventually became the Shaker village of Watervliet, New York, which did not close until 1938. she talks to them: the Mother is Ann Lee. so form the charm: notated versions of early Shaker songs, none of which were written down before the 1830s, record songs of Mother Ann’s time as single melodies without English language words (there are a handful of exceptions). This reference to sounding a ‘concord’ is particularly interesting as it suggests Ann Lee and others improvised simple harmony while singing. left her husband, in New-York: according to Shaker sources Ann Lee’s husband Abraham Stanley (or Standley, or Standerin) found work as a blacksmith in New York City, but then got very sick. After Ann Lee nursed him back to health he decided not to continue in the faith and he left her (Bishop and Wells, Testimonies, pp. 10–11). church at Stillwater: Rathbun was a Baptist minister. means of leading any person: Rathbun personally led most of his family and relatives, as well as his Baptist congregation, into Shakerism. another from the State of Rhode-Island: a reference to Jemima Wilkinson (1752–1819) who preached as ‘Publick Universal Friend’ and established a community at Jerusalem (today’s Penn Yann), New York around 1790. balled: bald. scene of disturbance and confusion: the Gordon riots (for Lord George Gordon, 1751– 93) of 1780 in which anti-Catholic and war weary lower-class Londoners rioted against the Papists Act of 1778. At least 285 were killed and hundreds wounded. His Majesty: King George III (1738–1820). Committees of Correspondence: many colonial North American cities and regions formed revolutionary bodies to correspond with like-minded entities throughout the colonies. This insured a coordinated policy in opposing British oppression. Lord Mansfield: William Murray, first Earl of Mansfield (1705–93). – 269 –

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Notes to pages 23–39

14. Lord Bute: John Stuart, third Earl of Bute (1713–92). 15. Lord North: Frederick North, second Earl of Guilford (1732–92), served as prime minister of Britain from 1770 to 1782, during the American War of Independence. 16. Lord Germaine: George Germain, first Viscount Sackville (1716–85), served as secretary of state for America to Lord North during the American War of Independence. 17. posse comitatas: posse comitatus, under English common-law the statute that allows law officers to conscript able-bodied men in times of crisis to arrest criminals or keep the peace. 18. Their leaders, our agents: the explicit accusation that Mother Ann Lee and her English Elders were British agents. 19. Bishop: this is ambiguous, but may refer to Frederick Cornwallis (1713–83), archbishop of Canterbury from 1768 to 1783. He was the twin brother of Edward Cornwallis (1713– 76) who commanded British forces in North America during the Seven Years’ War.

Taylor, A Narrative of the Strange Principles, Conduct and Character of the People Known by the Name of Shakers 1. 2. 3. 4.

5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10.

11. 12. 13.

14.

few Europeans: refers to Mother Ann Lee and the eight English followers who travelled with her to North America. opens his mind: when a convert confessed his sins to a Shaker, effectually joining the sect. The Mother: Mother Ann Lee. all records and general orders: Taylor is unclear here, if he is alluding to written documents then none have survived. The first printed Shaker work, Joseph Meacham’s A Concise Statement of the Principles of the Only True Church, According to the Gospel of the Present Appearence of Christ … (Bennington, VT: Haswell & Russell, 1790), postdates Taylor’s pamphlet. The earliest manuscript sources for Shaker governance and doctrine are Father Joseph Meacham’s ‘Way-Marks’ (OClWHi, Shaker Collection, VII: B-59), which were written in the 1790s. God’s witnesses: Mother Ann Lee and the Elders. in his Church: the Shakers. out of the order of natural generation: the Shaker justification for celibacy. Diana of the Ephesians: the Temple of Artemis or Diana, a centre of pagan worship at Ephesus in classical antiquity. Elect Mother: Mother Ann Lee was popularly referred to as the ‘Elect Lady’, or ‘Elect Mother’, due to her reputation of being a vessel for the Christ spirit. Second Number: Taylor’s promised second ‘number’ on the Shakers was never published, and is presumed lost. His only subsequent writing on the Shakers was a denial of the Narrative, also included in this volume on pp. 29–40. West’s separate church: this reference has thus far proven elusive to researchers; it is perhaps an evangelical church inspired by British preacher George Whitefield (1714–70). John Parkinton: actually Partington, an English follower of Mother Ann Lee’s, he left the Shakers after her death (White and Taylor, Shakerism, p. 69). Nisqueunia: this site eventually became the Shaker village of Watervliet, New York, which did not close until 1938. See note 2 to Rathbun, A Brief Account of a Religious Scheme. Ocknell: John Hocknell (1723–99), who came to American with Mother Ann Lee in 1774. He was Elder of the Church Family at Watervliet, New York, until his death.

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271

15. Harvard: Mother Ann Lee and her English Elders arrived in Worcester County, Massachusetts, and based themselves at the house of Shadrach Ireland by June 1781. 16. two hundred miles: converts to Shakerism from eastern New York and the Berkshires travelled to visit Mother Ann Lee and the Elders as they preached throughout New England. 17. joyce: joists. 18. next publication: see note 10 above.

West, Scriptural Cautions Against Embracing a Religious Scheme Taught by a Number of Europeans 1. 2.

3.

4. 5.

6. 7.

8. 9.

Woman: Mother Ann Lee, the leader of the Shakers. her own husband: Ann Lee’s husband Abraham Stanley (or Standley, or Standerin) accompanied her to North America, found work as a blacksmith in New York City, but then fell quite ill. After Ann Lee nursed him back to health he did not continue in the faith and left her (Bishop and Wells, Testimonies, pp. 10–11). Nah. iii. 4: ‘Because of the multitude of the whoredoms of the wellfavoured harlot, the mistress of witchcrafts, that selleth nations through her whoredoms, and families through her witchcrafts’. Europeans they stile the Church: the early Shakers generically called themselves ‘the Church’. The Europeans referred to are Mother Ann Lee’s English followers. does not bless their mother: Mother Ann Lee’s successor James Whittaker wrote a blistering letter denouncing his own parents that was published in 1790 as a part of the Shakers’ first printed work A Concise Statement. doctring: should likely be ‘doctrines’. abstain from meats: although some nineteenth-century Shaker families were vegetarians, this is probably not a specific rule against eating actual meat, but part of the general abstemiousness practised by the early Shakers as part of their mortification of their bodies, or ‘the flesh’ as they termed it. West discusses this practice further on. ‘Meats’ here likely refers to a variety of foodstuffs. affectations: should be ‘affections’. French prophets: the Camisards were Protestant rebels who waged a guerrilla war against the royal Catholic army in the Cevennes region of southern France from 1702 to 1715. They were led by inspired prophets, some of whom travelled to England. The Shakers claimed them as an early influence (Youngs, Testimony, pp. 407–8).

Rathbun, A Letter, from Daniel Rathbun 1. 2.

3.

4.

James Whittacor: Whittaker (1751–87) came from England with Mother Ann Lee and succeeded her as leader of the Shakers when she died on 8 September 1784. European scheme: the Dialogue appended to Valentine Rathbun’s Brief Account (reprinted in this volume on pp. 22–7) asserted that the Shakers were agents of the British crown and sent to dupe the Americans into pacifism during the Revolutionary War. having been in the Romish dominions: it is unclear what Valentine Rathbun is referring to here; had he been to French Canada? There is no record of his having travelled to Europe or South America. V.R.: Valentine Rathbun, Daniel Rathbun’s brother and an ardent anti-Shaker writer, authored the preface.

272 5. 6.

7.

8. 9. 10. 11.

12. 13. 14. 15. 16.

17.

18. 19.

20. 21. 22.

23. 24.

Notes to pages 63–6 mother: Mother Ann Lee, founder of the Shakers. Elijah Wile’s: Elijah Wilds was a Shaker convert who lived at Shirley, Massachusetts. His house was a centre of Shaker activity in the early 1780s. He committed suicide by slitting his throat in 1791. drink’d too hard: Mother Ann Lee and her brother William Lee (1740–84) were regularly accused of alcoholism, it is a common theme in Shaker apostate and anti-Shaker publications. Harwood to Wooburn: for ‘Harwood’ read Harvard, Massachusetts, this may be a typesetting error. ‘Wooburn’ is Woburn, Massachusetts. Nathan Kindale’s: Nathan Kendal, in whose house Mother Ann Lee hid from a mob (Bishop and Wells, Testimonies, p. 113). elder William: William Lee, Mother Ann Lee’s natural brother. William Mories in the town of Norton: William Morey of Norton, Massachusetts. He defended the Shakers against a mob and was hit in the face so hard that some of his teeth were knocked out (Bishop and Wells, Testimonies, p. 120). Ashfield: Ashfield, Massachusetts, was a centre of Shaker worship during the winter of 1782/3. Enfield: Enfield, Connecticut, home of the Meacham family and a hotbed of Shaker activity. New-Providence: now called Cheshire, Massachusetts, a locale in Berkshire County where a cluster of Shaker converts lived. Richmond: in Berkshire County, Massachusetts, in the heartland of Shaker activity on the border with New York state. Nisqueunia: the first Shaker settlement in America where Mother Ann Lee lived beginning in 1776. It eventually became the Shaker village of Watervliet, New York, which did not close until 1938. See note 2 to Rathbun, A Brief Account of a Religious Scheme. Sam. Fitch’s: Samuel Fitch (1735–1818), who was jailed on a complaint by Valentine Rathbun. He also visited Mother Ann Lee when she was jailed at Poughkeepsie, New York, in 1780. He was later a member of the Hancock, Massachusetts, Shaker community. widow Goodrich’s: many members of the Goodrich family converted to Shakerism, the specific identity of the ‘widow Goodrich’ has eluded the editor. Esq. Grant: Judge Eleazar Grant (1748–1806) had settled in the King’s District of New York by the 1770s. He was very active in local politics, serving as justice of the peace (1786–98), and supervisor (1798–9) of the Canaan District of Columbia County, New York (which included New Lebanon); he was also a master mason and postmaster (Ellis, History of Columbia County, New York, pp. 320–4). He tried Mother Ann for breach of the peace (Bishop and Wells, Testimonies, pp. 190–4). John Partington’s: from this reference it seems that Partington, one of Ann Lee’s English followers, had established a separate residence from the Shakers at Niskeyuna. cursing their parents that were unbelievers: See note 5 to West, Scriptural Cautions. dancing stark naked together: the Shakers were often accused of dancing naked by early detractors. For another instance, and the reaction of a defender of the Shakers in 1796 see Goodwillie, The Shakers in Eighteenth Century Newspapers, Part Three, p. 41. mother’s funeral: Mother Ann Lee died at Niskeyuna, New York, on 8 September 1784. William Scale’s: a brief biography of William Scales (1741–1807) can be found preceding his Mystery of the People called Shakers (reprinted in this volume on pp. 119–29). However, before he became an apostate he was an ardent defender of the Shakers, and

Notes to pages 66–76

25.

26.

27.

28. 29. 30. 31. 32. 33. 34.

35. 36.

37. 38.

39. 40.

41. 42.

273

was in correspondence with Daniel Rathbun to that end. None of this correspondence is known to have survived. Joseph Meechem: Joseph Meacham (1742–96) succeeded James Whittaker as leader of the Shaker Church. He instituted communal living among the Shakers and also appointed Lucy Wright as his female counterpart in the Ministry, establishing a precedent for coequal male and female leadership. with their blood: this must have been in Scales’s letter to Daniel Rathbun, written while Scales was still a Shaker. No sentiment of this kind is to be found in Scales’s extant antiShaker writing (reprinted in this volume on pp. 119–29). so is the Mother Christ, and a Saviour to us: Samuel Fitch is quoted as saying to Mother Ann ‘Christ is called the Second Adam, and thou art the second Eve’, to which Mother Ann replied ‘Flesh and blood has not revealed it unto thee, Samuel; but God has’. (Bishop and Wells, Testimonies, pp. 209–10). the church: the early Shakers generically called themselves ‘the Church’. Elijah Sloson’s: Elijah Slosson (1735–1809) became a member of the New Lebanon, New York, Shaker community. Preston: in Connecticut; the Shakers visited in September 1782 (Bishop and Wells, Testimonies, p. 127). Stonington: in Connecticut; the Shakers visited in September 1782 (Bishop and Wells, Testimonies, p. 127). Windham: in Connecticut; the Shakers visited in September 1782 (Bishop and Wells, Testimonies, p. 127). Amos Rathbun: (1737/8–1817), brother of noted apostates Valentine and Daniel Rathbun; he was a member of the Hancock, Massachusetts, Shaker community. taking money of her people: the formal communalism of property that Shakerism is known for did not begin until later in the 1780s, but it is likely that early followers of Mother Ann Lee contributed financially for the mutual support of their fellow believers. Isaac Chancy: a non-Shaker resident of Ashfield, Massachusetts, where the Shakers were very active in the early 1780s. Talmage Bishop: Talmadge Bishop (1730–96) was the first resident of the New York/ Massachusetts border to encounter the Shakers at Niskeyuna, New York, in April of 1780, and to bring news of their teachings back to his family and neighbours. The Shakers claimed him as their first American convert (White and Taylor, Shakerism, pp. 99–100). the world: a Shaker term for non-Shakers and everything physically and geographically beyond the bounds of the Shaker church and communities. George Darrow: (1747–1822) brother of Shaker convert David Darrow, his land was deeded to the James Whittaker on behalf of the Church in 1786. He did not join the Shakers and eventually immigrated to Ohio. John Spires: John Spier (1746–1833) became a member of the Watervliet, New York, Shaker community. Barrington, in Court time: In August 1783 Samuel and Dyer Fitch, and Elizur Goodrich, were committed to jail in Great Barrington, Massachusetts, in southern Berkshire County. Mother Ann Lee visited them there in jail (Bishop and Wells, Testimonies, pp. 167–8). my wife: Sarah Rathbun (née Higbee). Knap’s wife: Mary Knapp (1735–1820) became a member of the New Lebanon, New York, Shaker community.

274

Notes to pages 77–88

43. so do you in your order: confession of sins, or as the Shakers termed it ‘opening the mind’ was a prerequisite to joining the Church, and henceforth living free from sin. 44. master key to Popery: Rathbun is here referring to the popular anti-Catholic work by Antonio Gavin, The Master-Key to Popery, which was reprinted numerous times in England and America during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. 45. Rufus Cogswell: became a member of the Hancock, Massachusetts, Shaker community. 46. Joshua Burtch’s: Joshua Birch (1721–1806) became a member of the Hancock, Massachusetts, Shaker community. 47. Benjamin Ellis: (1756–1837) became a member of the New Lebanon, New York, Shaker community. 48. Joseph Bennets: Joseph Bennet (1752–98) lived in New Providence (now Cheshire), in central Berkshire County, Massachusetts. 49. Ebenezer Cooley: (1737–1817) became a member of the New Lebanon and Watervliet, New York, Shaker communities. 50. Israel Chancey: (1743–85) became a member of the New Lebanon, New York, Shaker community. 51. Joshua Cogswell: (1714–99) became a member of the Hancock, Massachusetts, Shaker community. 52. book called the French prophets: the French Prophets, or Camisards; see note 9 to West, Scriptural Cautions. Exactly which book Rathbun has quoted in his work has yet to be determined, but they could possibly be: a translation of Francis Maximilian’s Théâtre Sacré des Cévennes under the title A Cry from the Desert, or Testimonials of Miraculous Things Lately Come to Pass in the Cevennes (London, 1707); Prophetical Warnings of Elias Marion (1707); The Prophetical Warnings of John Lacy; A Relation of the Dealings of God to His Unworthy Servant, John Lacy (1708). 53. John Lacy, Esq.: or Lacey (1664–c. 1737) was an upper-class Englishman who joined and promoted the French Prophets. He belonged to the congregation of Edmund Calamy (see note 54 below), and experienced visions and spoke in tongues. 54. Sir Edmund Calamy: (1671–1732), was an English Nonconformist divine and historian. 55. elder William’s death: William Lee died at Niskeyuna, New York, on 21 July 1784. 56. Sir Richard Buckley’s: Sir Richard Bulkeley. 57. Bunnilfieds: Bunhill Fields is a cemetery in the London borough of Islington. 58. Doctor Ames: Thomas Emes (d. 1707), a physician allied with the French Prophets who publicly declared that Emes would rise from the dead on 25 May 1708. The British government placed guards around his grave in fear of a riot. He did not rise. 59. merry Andrews: a term for a clown or a buffoon. 60. that woman Jezebel: Rathbun is referring here to Mother Ann Lee. 61. Hannah Kindale: Hannah Kendall (1760–1820) was a member of the New Lebanon, New York, Shaker community. She was then sent to be the first female minister, or ‘Mother’, of the Canterbury, New Hampshire, Shaker community. 62. Jonathan Slosson: (1759–1845) became a member of the New Lebanon and Watervliet, New York, Shaker communities. 63. Hannah Goodrich: (1763–1829) was a member of the Hancock, Massachusetts, Shaker community. An older relative, also named Hannah Goodrich (1752–1820), was the first female minister of the Canterbury, New Hampshire, Shaker community.

Notes to pages 88–117

275

64. Job Bishop: (1760–1831) was a member of the New Lebanon, New York, Shaker community before he was sent to be the first male minister, or ‘Father’ of the community at Canterbury, New Hampshire. 65. Desier Sanford: Desire Sanford (1760–1847) became a member of the New Lebanon, New York, Shaker community. She had only one arm. 66. the mother: Mother Ann Lee. 67. Pitman Cook: (1756–1845) became a member of the Hancock, Massachusetts, Shaker community. 68. Harwood: for ‘Harwood’ read Harvard, Massachusetts, this may be a typesetting error. 69. sharp and bloody: this alleged physical brawl between Mother Ann Lee and her Brother William Lee was reported by other anti-Shaker writers. See Reuben Rathbone’s Reasons Offered for Leaving the Shakers (reproduced in this volume on pp. 151–78) for a full account of this alleged altercation. 70. Eleazer Goodrich’s: (1751–1812) was a member of the New Lebanon, New York, Shaker community. He was the husband of the female Ministry Eldress at New Lebanon, Mother Lucy Wright (aka Lucy Goodrich). 71. Tyringham: in southern Berkshire County, Massachusetts. A Shaker community was established there that lasted until 1875. 72. Nathan Goodrich: (1745–1806) became a member of the Hancock, Massachusetts, Shaker community. 73. Ezekiel: Ezekiel Goodrich (1749–83) who lived in Hancock, Massachusetts, but was not a Shaker at the time of his death. 74. filthy dreams: nocturnal emissions, for an account of Shaker I. N. Youngs’s struggle with the same issue see G. Wergland, One Shaker Life: Isaac Newton Youngs, 1793–1865 (Amherst, MA: University of Massachusetts Press, 2006), pp. 35, 42–44. 75. give up our estates to you: Shaker communalism was not formally introduced until 1788, when the Church Family at New Lebanon, New York, was brought into formal gospel order. However, it is clear that converts to Shakerism contributed material goods and money to the general welfare of the movement and its members. 76. building a large vessel with it: a reference to the Shakers’ West Indian trading ship Union, see Goodwillie, Shakers in Eighteenth-Century Newspapers, Part Two, pp. 27–51. 77. Esq. Joseph Bennet: probably Joseph Bennet Sr, who died in 1788 at Watervliet, New York as a Shaker. 78. David Meechem: David Meacham (1743–1826) became a member of the New Lebanon and Watervliet, New York, Shaker communities. 79. Joseph Merkum: Joseph Markham (1742–1817) became a member of the Hancock, Massachusetts, Shaker community. 80. professor in the baptist order: Rathbun belonged to the Baptist Church. 81. my eldest daughter: possibly Sarah (Sally) Rathbun, born in 1760, but whose fate is unknown.

‘Spectator’, ‘The People Called Shakers’ 1. 2.

the Mother: Shaker founder Mother Ann Lee. Whitefield and Watts: The Shakers did believe that the spirits of those who had died before Mother Ann Lee’s ministry converted to Shakerism in heaven. There are numerous accounts from the time of internal spiritual revival known to scholars as ‘The Era of Manifestations’ or ‘Mother’s Work’ (1837–c. 1855) of the spirits of famous personages

276

Notes to pages 117–39 from biblical times to the early nineteenth century appearing to the Shakers to confirm their acceptance of the Shaker faith. See, for instance, A Return of Departed Spirits, reproduced in Volume 3 of this collection, pp. 89–109.

Scales, ‘Mystery of the People Called Shakers’ 1. 2. 3. 4.

5.

ATTENDITE HOMINES, ET SPECTACULUM IN SANUM VIDETE: Latin, meaning ‘All men heed, and witness this insane spectacle’. Catholic: here Scales uses this term in the sense meaning ‘universal’, rather than to indicate affiliation with the Roman Catholic Church. Georgetown, in Vassalborough, in Kittery: towns in Maine, which was a District of the state of Massachusetts until 1820. dealing with them in all respects: this testimonial to Scales’s civic standing still exists in the manuscript ‘Vassalboro Town Clerk’s town meeting records and vital records, 1771– 1960’, held by the Vassalboro Historical Society. Joseph Sanburn: Scales is slightly confused here, John Sanborn of Enfield, New Hampshire, joined the Shakers with his wife and children. He left the faith, and committed suicide by hanging himself in 1785. His wife and children remained with the Shakers, see V. C. Sanborn, Genealogy of the Family of Samborne or Sanborn (Privately Printed for the Author, 1899), p. 141.

[Anon.], ‘For the Western Star’, Western Star 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8.

New-Lebanon: the Shaker community at New Lebanon, New York, the seat of the Lead, or Parent Ministry, which had spiritual authority over all Shaker communities. Hancock: The Shaker community at Hancock, Massachusetts, was formally brought into ‘gospel order’ in 1791. Shaker converts had been living at the site since 1780. Chief Elder: See note 25 to Rathbun, A Letter. Chief Matron: Lucy Wright (1760–1821) was the lead Eldress in the New Lebanon, New York, ministry from 1796 until her death. old first mother: Mother Ann Lee, founder of the Shakers. Esq. Grant’s: See note 19 to Rathbun, A Letter. first order: the covenanted members of the Shaker community who had consecrated their property. black Joke: an English folk tune dating to around 1730. Shaker Richard McNemar used the same tune for a Shaker hymn entitled ‘The Seasons’, see H. E. Cook, Shaker Music: A Manifestation of American Folk Culture (Lewisburg, PA: Bucknell University Press, 1973), p. 34.

Rathbun, ‘Caleb Rathbun Aged Nearly Seventeen Years’ 1.

2.

Valentine Rathbun, jun.: (1756–1824), the son of the noted Shaker apostate writer Valentine Rathbun. He remained a member of the Hancock, Massachusetts, Shaker community until his death. Job Bishop: (1760–1831) was a member of the New Lebanon, New York, Shaker community before he was sent to be the first male minister, or ‘Father’ of the community at Canterbury, New Hampshire.

Notes to pages 139–49 3.

4. 5. 6. 7.

8. 9. 10.

11.

12.

13. 14.

15. 16. 17. 18. 19.

277

Eleazar Rand: Elezar Rand (1763–1808) was sent from the New Lebanon, New York, Shaker community to the Harvard, Massachusetts, community to become their First Elder, or ‘Father,’ in 1791. He remained at Harvard until his death. Walker: probably Jonathan Walker (1737–1826) was a member of the New Lebanon, New York, Shaker community. David Slason: David Slosson (1759–1840) was a member of the New Lebanon, New York, Shaker community. Henry Cluff : Henry Clough (1754–98) was Joseph Meacham’s successor as Elder in the Ministry of the New Lebanon, New York, Shaker community. Elizur Goodrich: (1751–1812) was a member of the New Lebanon, New York, Shaker community. He was the husband of the female Ministry Eldress at New Lebanon, Mother Lucy Wright (aka Lucy Goodrich). Joseph Mechum: See note 25 to Rathbun, A Letter. David Mechum: David Meacham (1743–1826) became a member of the New Lebanon and Watervliet, New York, Shaker communities. Lucy Goodrich, the mother: (1760–1821), more commonly known as Lucy Wright (her maiden name), she married Elizur Goodrich, and both converted to Shakerism. She was the lead female Eldress in the New Lebanon, New York, ministry from 1796 until her death. Hannah Goodrich: either (1763–1829), who became a member of the Hancock, Massachusetts, Shaker community; or an older relative, also named Hannah Goodrich (1752–1820), who was the first female minister of the Canterbury, New Hampshire, Shaker community. Shaker village in Hancock: the Hancock, Massachusetts, Shaker community, located in central Berkshire County. At their peak size the Hancock Shakers’ property abutted that of the New Lebanon, New York, Shakers on the west. Comstock Betts: (1762–1845) was a member of the Hancock, Massachusetts, Shaker community. Ezekiel Goodrich: there were two men named Ezekiel Goodrich who were Shakers. One lived from 1749 to 1783, and the other lived at the Hancock, Massachusetts, Shaker community and died in 1822. The young man mentioned here seems to be a third Ezekiel Goodrich who was at New Lebanon, New York, and left the community (See Youngs and Brown, ‘Domestic Journal’, New Lebanon, New York (1856–69), Shaker Collection, V:B-71, OClWHi. Westfield: Westfield, Massachusetts, is a town fifty miles east of the Hancock, Massachusetts, Shaker community. Jonathan Southwick: (1759–1828) was a member of the Hancock, Massachusetts, Shaker community. David Southwick: a member of the Hancock, Massachusetts, Shaker community. Eliphalet Comstock: a member of the Hancock, Massachusetts, Shaker community. Hudson: Hudson, New York, in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries was a major port on the Hudson River, thirty-two miles south-west of the Hancock, Massachusetts, Shaker community.

278

Notes to pages 149–61

Valentine Rathbun Letter, Western Star 1.

2. 3.

Morral Baker: (1750–1833) from Rehoboth, Massachusetts; Mother Ann Lee stayed at his house when she preached there. He also was Captain of the Shakers’ ship Union. He became a member of the New Lebanon, New York, Shaker community. Rufus Cogswell: a member of the Hancock, Massachusetts, Shaker community. Pittsfield: Pittsfield, Massachusetts.

Rathbone, Reasons Offered for Leaving the Shakers 1.

2. 3.

4. 5. 6. 7.

8.

9.

10. 11.

12. 13.

14. 15.

16.

from that people: Reuben Rathbun left the Hancock, Massachusetts, Shaker community on 24 July 1799, with Elisabeth Deming. They were married sometime between that date and February of 1800 (when his pamphlet was published), as Reuben refers to her as his wife in Reasons Offered for Leaving the Shakers. Niskauna: See note 2 to Rathbun, A Brief Account of a Religious Scheme. cross: the Shakers used the term ‘cross’ to denote a sacrifice or suppression in many different contexts. One might take a ‘cross’ against the flesh, i.e. become celibate, or ‘cross’ their ugly nature, meaning to suppress it. mother: Mother Ann Lee, founder of the Shakers. William Leas: William Lee, Mother Ann Lee’s natural brother. James Whittaker: See note 1 to Rathbun, A Letter. prisoner four months: Reuben Rathbone’s arrest, trial and imprisonment, at New London, Connecticut, was a result of slanderous statements he made against a young woman in the town while there as a Shaker missionary. This episode is the subject of a forthcoming article by Christian Goodwillie. labor in Songs: the early Shakers sang mostly wordless tunes as an expression of the spirit within them. In the context of Shakerism the word ‘labor’ is usually synonymous with the act of worship. Shakers could labour in song, dance or spoken testimony. among three men: Upon James Whittaker’s death three potential successors emerged in Calvin Harlow, Joseph Meacham and David Meacham (White and Taylor, Shakerism, p. 71). Elder Joseph Meachem: See note 25 to Rathbun, A Letter. New-Lebanon in 1788: Joseph Meacham formally instituted ‘gospel order’ in the Church family at the New Lebanon, New York, Shaker community in 1788. This formalized communal living and the hierarchical organization of Ministry Elders, Family Elders, Trustees, Deacons and rank and file Believers that was practiced by the Shakers throughout their history. Hancock: The Shaker community at Hancock, Massachusetts, was formally brought into ‘gospel order’ in 1791. Shaker converts had been living at the site since 1780. Calvin Harlow: (1753/4–95) was sent from the New Lebanon, New York, Shaker community, to be the first male minister, or ‘Father’ of the Hancock, Massachusetts, Shaker community, when it was gathered into ‘gospel order’ in 1791. Mother Church: the Shaker community at New Lebanon, New York, the seat of the Lead, or Parent Ministry, which had spiritual authority over all Shaker communities. Parents: a Shaker term for the spiritual mentors, male (Father) and female (Mother), sent by the Church at New Lebanon, New York, to educate Shaker converts in how to live as a Shaker in ‘gospel order’ within a community. Ministers: male and female Shaker spiritual leaders who had care over all of the communal families in a given Shaker Bishopric (organization of multiple communities) or families within a single community.

Notes to pages 161–75

279

17. Elders: male (Elder) and female (Eldress) Shaker leaders who had care of a communal family, which was a component part of a larger Shaker community, which usually consisted of multiple communal families. 18. such a new thing: Mother Ann Lee’s on 8 September 1784, left a void in the leadership of the Shakers on the female side. This was theologically problematic as the sect had brought the Christ spirit back to mankind through the female vessel of Ann Lee. Through the ministry of James Whittaker there was no female leader standing with him, a situation which Joseph Meacham changed with the appointment of Lucy Wright (1760–1821). 19. their parents: the ‘parents’, eventually called ministry, of the Hancock community in 1791 were Father Calvin Harlow and Mother Sarah Harrison. 20. their Elder sister: The first Eldress in the Church Family, at Hancock, Massachusetts, was Jennett Davis (1763–1828). 21. laboring for mortification: an early Shaker practice of severe physical activity and privation of nourishment, meant to help the soul transcend the physical body through suffering. 22. Henry Clough: (1754–98) was Joseph Meacham’s successor as Elder in the Ministry of the New Lebanon, New York, Shaker community. 23. her whom he called his mother: Lucy Wright was the lead Eldress in the New Lebanon, New York, ministry from 1796 until her death. 24. she that was called our mother: Sarah Harrison (1759/60–96) was the first Eldress of the Hancock, Massachusetts, Shaker ministry. 25. wrote a pretty lengthy letter: no copy of this letter is known to survive. 26. I looked to as my Elder: probably Nathaniel Deming (1766–1845), who had succeeded Calvin Harlow as first in the Hancock ministry upon Harlow’s death, December 20, 1795. 27. the first mother: Mother Ann Lee. 28. same natural infirmities: Rathbone seems to be referring here to menstruation. 29. entered into in writing: the Hancock Shakers first entered into a written covenant in 1796. 30. great demands for wages: apostates’ claims for back wages were a constant problem for the Shakers, who usually chose to settle with the apostate in order to avoid larger problems. For an early example of this see the case of William Dodge, Goodwillie, ‘The Shakers in Eighteenth Century Newspapers, Part Three’, pp. 39–63. 31. Deacons and Overseers: Shaker Deacons (later expanded to include Trustees and Deacons) managed financial, legal, business and real estate transactions for the communities. 32. June 30th: of 1799. 33. shut out their natural relations: see Reuben Rathbone’s letter to his father Valentine Rathbun: (date unknown), Shaker Collection, IV:A-30, OClWHi. 34. my father’s house: Valentine Rathbun, Sr. 35. Daniel Rathbone: Reuben Rathbone’s uncle Daniel Rathbun Sr; the book referred to is A Letter, from Daniel Rathbun … to James Whittacor, Chief Elder of the Church, Called Shakers, which is reproduced in this volume on pp. 55–112. 36. appointed for that purpose: children in Shaker communities were placed under the care of a deacon (for boys) or deaconess (for girls) in a ‘Children’s Order’. 37. one after another: fourteen male members ranging in age from twenty to thirty left the New Lebanon community between February 1796 and December 1799, see: ‘Elders First Order. Names and Ages of those who have been gathered into the Church; With the place of their Birth, and time of coming … Departures, Death, etc. Written by Isaac N. Youngs’ (1856), pp. 121–5, Ms. 326, Hancock Shaker Village, Inc. Sisters Anna White and Leila Taylor addressed this wave of apostasies in their 1905 book Shakerism: Its Meaning and Message, in a section entitled ‘The First Defection’. They wrote:

280

38. 39. 40. 41.

42. 43.

Notes to pages 175–83 ‘About a year before the first break, Father Joseph, Mother Lucy and Elder Henry had foreseen the danger and had labored earnestly to prevent the sad catastrophe. The Elder of the Children’s Order led in the apostasy, which lasted for a few months. The Youth’s and Children’s Orders were then combined and in the spring of 1796 were dissolved altogether, the young people being placed with the First Family’ (White and Taylor, Shakerism, pp. 102–3). where he was agoing: this is tragically ironic, as Reuben Rathbone was killed in 1807 by a falling tree. my wife: Rathbun left with his female counterpart in the Church Family Eldership Elisabeth Deming. effeminacy: an eighteenth-century term for homosexuality. the Mother fell to beating William Leas: See Daniel Rathbun’s A Letter, from Daniel Rathbun (also reproduced in this volume on pp. 55–112) for another reference to this alleged altercation. in the army among soldiers: Rathbone served in two militia companies during 1777, see headnote. ignis fatuus: Latin, meaning a ‘foolish fire’.

Smith, ‘An Attempt to Develope Shakerism’ 1.

Issachar Baits: Issachar Bates (1758–1837) was one of the three missionaries sent from New Lebanon, New York, on 1 January 1805, to open the Shaker gospel in Ohio and Kentucky. Bates was a key figure in the development of the Shaker communities in Ohio, Kentucky and Indiana. He returned to the Shaker community at New Lebanon, New York, in 1835. For Bates’s full story, see C. Medlicott, Issachar Bates: A Shaker’s Journey (Lebanon, NH: University Press of New England, 2013). 2. John Mitcham: John Meacham (1770–1854) was one of the three missionaries sent from New Lebanon, New York, on 1 January 1805, to open the Shaker gospel in Ohio and Kentucky. He returned to the Shaker community at New Lebanon, New York, in 1818. 3. Benjamin Young: Benjamin Seth Youngs (1774–1855) was one of the three missionaries sent from New Lebanon, New York, on 1 January 1805, to open the Shaker gospel in Ohio and Kentucky. He served as Elder of the South Union, Kentucky, Shaker community until 1836, when he was recalled to the Shaker community at New Lebanon, New York. 4. James Smith’s: James Smith Jr lived at Cane Ridge, Bourbon County, Kentucky. 5. Turtle-creek: the Ohio settlement that became the Shaker community of Union Village. 6. David Durrow: David Darrow (1750–1825) served as the Ministry Elder of Union Village, Ohio, from 1805 until his death. He was the lead spiritual authority over all of the Shaker communities west of the Appalachians. 7. three others: in his subsequent work Shakerism Detected (also reproduced in this volume on pp. 213–42) Smith names John Davis, John Wilson and Robert Wilson as the men he spoke to. 8. holly: holy. 9. October last: of the year 1809. 10. March last: of the year 1810. 11. John Woods: John Woods joined the Shakers in 1805. He was a school teacher in the Union Village, Ohio, community. He left the Shakers in 1821 and published his own apostate narrative Shakerism Unmasked, reproduced in Volume 2 of this collection, pp. 365–420.

Notes to pages 183–99

281

12. Malcolm Worly: Malcolm Worley (1762–1844) was the first convert to Shakerism in Ohio. He was a key member of the Union Village, Ohio, community. 13. Eagle creek: a settlement along the Ohio River in south central Ohio State. Shakers lived there from 1805 to 181l. 14. number in Kentucky: the Shakers consolidated there converts in Kentucky into two villages: Pleasant Hill and South Union. 15. on the Wabash river: the Shakers established a village on the Busseron Creek, a tributary of the Wabash River. The village was called Busro, or West Union, Indiana.

Smith, Remarkable Occurrences, Lately Discovered Among the People Called Shakers 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10. 11. 12. 13. 14. 15. 16. 17.

18.

19. 20. 21. 22. 23. 24. 25. 26.

Issacher Baits: See note 1 to Smith, ‘An Attempt to Develop Shakerism’. John Mitcham: See note 2 to Smith, ‘An Attempt to Develop Shakerism’. Benjamin Young: See note 3 to Smith, ‘An Attempt to Develop Shakerism’. my son James Smith’s: See note 4 to Smith, ‘An Attempt to Develop Shakerism’. Turtle-creek: See note 5 to Smith, ‘An Attempt to Develop Shakerism’. Anna Lee: Mother Ann Lee, founder of the Shakers. also of our Bodies: The Shakers preached a spiritual, rather than physical, resurrection. Elder David Durrow: See note 6 to Smith, ‘An Attempt to Develop Shakerism’. three others: See note 7 to Smith, ‘An Attempt to Develop Shakerism’. different societies, called families: Shaker communities were organized into mixed-gender celibate families headed by male Elders and female Eldresses. an assembly of the Shakers: a Shaker worship service, or meeting. October last: of the year 1809. John Woods: See note 11 to Smith, ‘An Attempt to Develop Shakerism’. Malcom Worley: See note 12 to Smith, ‘An Attempt to Develop Shakerism’. March 7th: of the year 1810. Stewart: steward, as in a house servant. M’Namars’s pamphlet: Richard McNemar’s publication The Kentucky Revival (Cincinnati, OH: From the Press of John W. Browne, 1807), was the first full length work published by the Shakers. piece printed in an Almanac: Smith is here referring to either Browne’s Western calendar … eighteen hundred & seven (Cincinnati, [Oh.], Printed at the press of John W. Browne, [1806?]), or Browne’s Western calendar … 1808 (Cincinnati, [Oh.], Printed at the press of John W. Browne, [1807?]). Both of these Almanacs contained information about the Shakers. first appeared in the Western country: the Shaker missionaries arrived in Kentucky and Ohio during March 1805. The Pope, their chief: a reference to David Darrow; see note 6 to Smith, ‘An Attempt to Develop Shakerism’. Tories: American citizens who sympathized, or were loyal to, the British government. three first Shakers: the missionaries sent from New Lebanon, New York, on January 1, 1805. Benjamin Seth Youngs, Issachar Bates, and John Meacham. Eagle-creek: See note 13 to Smith, ‘An Attempt to Develop Shakerism’. in Kentucky: See note 14 to Smith, ‘An Attempt to Develop Shakerism’. Wabash river: See note 15 to Smith, ‘An Attempt to Develop Shakerism’. in the public newspaper: Smith’s An Attempt to Develope Shakerism, reproduced in this volume on pp. 179–85.

282

Notes to pages 203–5

[Anon.], ‘Who Are the Shakers?’ 1. 2. 3. 4. 5.

6.

7.

8.

9. 10. 11. 12. 13. 14. 15.

16. 17.

18. 19.

20.

Anne Lee: Mother Ann Lee, founder of the Shakers. French Prophets: See note 9 to West, Spiritual Cautions. Manchester: Manchester, England. Lebanon: New Lebanon, New York, the centre of Shaker authority. three emissaries: On 1 January 1805 at 3 a.m. Benjamin Seth Youngs, Issachar Bates and John Meacham left New Lebanon, New York. They opened the Shaker gospel in Kentucky and Ohio during March 1805. Schismatics or New Lights: names given to the revivalists in southern Ohio and Kentucky during the peak of the Kentucky Revival. Schismatics actually separated from the Presbyterian Church and formed the Springfield Presbytery. Future Shakers Richard McNemar and John Dunlavy were among this group. Socinian: Socinians rejected the trinity and original sin. They also believed that God was not omniscient because this would mean that human free will was impossible. Therefore revivalists who believed in a person’s free will to choose to come to Christ and be saved were often termed Socinians. six: the author is referring to the six signatories of The Last Will and Testament of the Springfield Presbytery, which was appended to Richard McNemar’s Kentucky Revival (1807). These men were Richard McNemar, John Thompson, Robert Marshall, John Dunlavy, Barton W. Stone and David Purviance. Three: the author is incorrect, only Richard McNemar and John Dunlavy became Shakers. Lebanon in Ohio: the settlement that began at Turtle Creek in 1805, which was later renamed Union Village. Eagle creek: See note 13 to Smith, ‘An Attempt to Develop Shakerism’. in Mercer county: the settlement originally called Shawnee Run, that became Pleasant Hill, Kentucky. Logan county: the settlement originally called Gasper Springs, that became South Union, Kentucky. Bussero: the Shakers established a village on the Busseron Creek, a tributary of the Wabash River. The village was called Busro, or West Union. of this place: it is unclear where the author is writing from, other than that his article was originally published in the Kentucky Gazette published in Lexington. He could have been referring to the Shaker settlement at Paint Lick Kentucky, which is south of Lexington. The Shakers had a small contingent living there under the leadership of Matthew Houston until 1808. Col. Smith: Colonel James Smith (1737–1813) wrote a number of articles and pamphlets against the Shakers. See his works reprinted in this volume. John Dunlavy: (1769–1826) was a Presbyterian minister, member of the Springfield Prebystery with Richard McNemar (who was also his brother-in-law), and a member of the Shaker community at Pleasant Hill, Kentucky. this weak and wretched effort: possibly a reference to an unknown published defence of the Shakers by Dunlavy. the Testimony: The Shakers’ first large-scale publication explicating their theology, and placing it in a historical context. The first edition of the Testimony of Christ’s Second Appearing was published at Lebanon, Ohio, in 1808. It subsequently went through four editions. Robert Gill: according to J. P. MacLean, Shakers of Ohio (Columbus, OH: F. J. Heer Printing Co., 1907), p. 345, Robert Gill was one of the first Shaker converts at Busro

Notes to pages 205–19

21.

22. 23. 24. 25.

283

(West Union), Indiana. One of the Shaker families that was gathered there was located on his property. Gov. Harrison: William Henry Harrison (1773–1841) was governor of the Indiana Territory during the War of 1812. He was elected the ninth President of the United States in 1841, only to die on his thirty-second day in office. male and female in deity: Shakers believe that the Godhead was comprised of God the Father and Holy Mother Wisdom. They did not believe in the trinity. She Holy Ghost in Anne Lee: the Shakers believe that the Christ Spirit returned through the ministration of Mother Ann Lee. denial of Christ’s resurrection: Shakers believe in a spiritual rather than a physical resurrection. Aaron Burr: (1756–1836) former vice president of Thomas Jefferson who killed Alexander Hamilton in a duel in 1804, and was then charged with treason in 1807 for an aborted attempt to separate the western territories from the United States of America.

[Anon.], ‘Expedition Against the Shakers’ 1. 2. 3.

Shaker Town: a generic name used by non-Shakers to refer to Shaker settlements. It refers here to Union Village, Ohio. Judge Dunlavy: Francis Dunlevy (1761–1839) brother of Shaker John Dunlavy. Amos Valentine: (1766–1855) was a member of the Union Village, Ohio, Shaker community.

Smith, Shakerism Detected 1.

writings against me: Smith is referring here to the Shakers’ statements in Ohio newspapers of the time, some of which have survived. 2. Richard M’Nemar: Richard McNemar (1770–1839) was a Presbyterian minister and leader in the Kentucky Revival. He converted to Shakerism in 1805 and became its chief defender through his publications. 3. long publication: McNemar’s answer to Smith, entitled ‘SHAKERISM! The Developer of Shakerism Developed,’ was published in July 1810. The only surviving newspaper it can be found in is Liberty Hall, of Cincinnati, Ohio for 25 July 1810. 4. near Sideling-hill: a reference to Smith’s controversial 6 March 1765 destruction of trade goods, including arms, that were en route to Indians in western Pennsylvania. 5. shakers first came: the Shakers arrived in Kentucky and Ohio during March 1805. 6. Shakerism Developed: Smith’s first pamphlet, reprinted in this volume on pp. 179–85. 7. WESTERN STAR: a newspaper printed in Lebanon, Ohio, that was a venue for controversial writings about the Shakers. 8. proceedings with the Indians: the Shakers met with contingents of Shawnee Indians at least three times, once at the Shawnee Village of Greenville, Ohio, and twice at the Shakers’ settlement at Turtle Creek (Union Village), Ohio. 9. shakers drove Polly: Polly Smith, wife of James Smith Jr. 10. James: James Smith Jr, son of James Smith (author of this pamphlet). 11. John Irvin: James Smith Sr’s stepson. A letter by him to Eunice Chapman attacking the Shakers was published in Chapman’s Account of the Conduct of the Shakers (also included in this collection). 12. William Irvin: James Smith Sr’s stepson.

284

Notes to pages 219–29

13. Joseph Bay: Polly Smith’s brother. 14. Shakertown: a generic name used by non-Shakers to refer to Shaker settlements. It refers here to Union Village, Ohio. 15. Elder David: David Darrow; see note 6 to Smith, ‘An Attempt to Develop Shakerism’. 16. Isachar Bate: Issachar Bates; see note 1 to Smith, ‘An Attempt to Develop Shakerism’. 17. Shakertown, on Turtle-creek: ‘Shakertown’ was a generic name used by non-Shakers to refer to the Shaker settlements in Kentucky, Ohio, and Indiana. It refers here to Turtle Creek (Union Village), Ohio. 18. John Woods’s: See note 11 to Smith, ‘An Attempt to Develop Shakerism’. 19. Malcom Worley: See note 12 to Smith, ‘An Attempt to Develop Shakerism’. 20. Richard: Richard McNemar. 21. advertiseth her in the news paper: See Smith’s Remarkable Occurences, Lately Discovered Among the People Called Shakes (also reproduced in this volume on pp. 187–99) for the text of James Smith Jr’s advertisement warning others not to harbor Polly or incur her expenses on his credit. 22. Caneridge: Cane Ridge, Bourbon County, Kentucky. 23. write the piece: Smith’s Shakerism Developed (reproduced in this volume, pp. 213–42). 24. David Purviance: (1766–1847) was a member of the Springfield Presbytery along with John Dunlavy and Richard McNemar (both of whom became Shakers). He went on to be a founding member of the Stone-Campbell Christian Church (Disciples of Christ). 25. piece I first published in the Western Citizen: Smith is referring here to his ‘An Attempt to Develope Shakerism’, which is also included in this volume on pp. 179–85. 26. M’Nemar’s pamphlet – page 81: Richard McNemar’s publication The Kentucky Revival (Cincinnati, OH: From the Press of John W. Browne, 1807), was the first full length work published by the Shakers. 27. printed Journals: Smith’s An Account of the Remarkable Occurrences in the Life and Travels of Col. James Smith (Lexington, KY: Printed by John Bradford, on Main Street, 1799). 28. Black-boys: Smith’s guerrilla force that conducted protorevolutionary activities in western Pennsylvania during the early 1760s. 29. Bradock’s war: British General Edward Braddock’s (1695–1755) campaign in the summer of 1755 against French and Indian forces at Fort Duquesne (modern day Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania), which ended in defeat for the British and American colonists. 30. Fort-pitt: aka Fort Duquesne, and now Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. 31. Boquet: General Henry Bouquet (1719–65) commanded British and colonial American forces during Pontiac’s War in 1763. 32. under King George: King George III of England. 33. Muskingum: a river in south-eastern Ohio that is a tributary to the Ohio River. 34. the Stamp Act: the controversial British Stamp Act was a tax levied in 1765 on paper goods – such as newspapers, playing cards, legal documents – produced for consumption in North America. 35. Cumberland county: in central Pennsylvania. 36. Fort Loudon: a British colonial fort located in modern day Franklin County, Pennsylvania. Smith and his ‘Black Boys’ forced the British command to evacuate the fort in 1765. 37. Mercers-burgh: Mercersburg is a borough in Franklin County, Pennsylvania. 38. Sir William Johnson: (c. 1715–74) was an official of the British Empire who served as Indian Agent in upstate New York. He negotiated with the Iroquois Confederation.

Notes to pages 229–35

285

39. war again broke out at Boston: the Battles of Lexington and Concord, Massachusetts on 19 April 1775, and subsequent engagement at Bunker Hill in Boston on 17 June 1775, were the first military actions of the American Revolution. 40. Granvil: George Grenville (1712–70) was prime minister of Great Britain when the Stamp Act of 1765 was levied. 41. BLACK JOKE: an English folk tune dating to around 1730. Ironically Smith’s archenemy, Shaker Richard McNemar, used the same tune for a Shaker hymn entitled ‘The Seasons’, see H. E. Cook, Shaker Music: A Manifestation of American Folk Culture (Lewisburg, PA: Bucknell University Press, 1973), p. 34. 42. Col. Robert Petterson: Pennsylvania native Colonel Robert Patterson (1753–1827) served in the Revolutionary War. He was one of the founders of Lexington, Kentucky, and Cincinnati, Ohio. He eventually settled in Dayton, Ohio. 43. Col. Thomas Paxton: (1739–1813) served in the Revolutionary War and General Anthony Wayne’s expedition against the Indians in Ohio in 1794. He was one of the first settlers of Clermont County, Ohio. 44. John Dunlavy: (1769–1826) was a Presbyterian minister, member of the Springfield Prebystery with Richard McNemar (who was also his brother-in-law), and a member of the Shaker community at Pleasant Hill, Kentucky. 45. Stephen Ruddle: a Baptist preacher who lived with Shawnee for a year and spoke their language. 46. shawanoe Prophet: Tenskwatawa, or ‘the Open Door’ (1775–1836) was a religious leader of the Shawnee Indians. 47. his brother: Tecumseh (1768–1813) was a leader for Indian tribes in Ohio, Indiana, and the Great Lakes region during the War of 1812. 48. Tawa-town: Today’s Ottawa, Ohio, originally an Ottawa Indian town, located in northwestern Ohio. 49. John Davis: at one time a member of the Union Village, Ohio, Shaker community. He apostatized and became an enemy of the Shakers. 50. John Wilson: at one time a member of the Union Village, Ohio, Shaker community. He apostatized and became an enemy of the Shakers. 51. Robert Wilson: joined the Shakers at Union Village, Ohio, in 1805 and left the community around 1811. 52. went out to the Indians: the Shakers visited the Shawnee Indians at their village in Greenville, Ohio. The events of this trip were recorded in a journal kept by Youngs, see B. S. Youngs, ‘A Journey to the Indians, Miami near Lebanon, Ohio, 3d month. 1807’, Edward Deming Andrews Memorial Shaker Collection, ASC 860, De-Wint M. A transcription was published by E. D. Andrews, ‘The Shaker Mission to the Shawnee Indians’, Winterthur Portfolio, 7 (1972), pp. 113–28. 53. came into shakertown: the Shawnee did visit the Shaker settlements at Turtle Creek (Union Village), Ohio. 54. a shaker woman died: Prudence Farrington died at the Turtle Creek (Union Village), Ohio, settlement on 11 April 1807, see McNemar, Kentucky Revival p. 103. 55. Eldress Ruth: Ruth Farrington (1763–1821) was the first female Ministry Eldress at the Union Village, Ohio, Shaker community, known as ‘Mother Ruth’. 56. prophets and apostles!!!: during the 1840s the Shakers claimed they were visited by many famous historical personages, see A Return of Departed Spirits in this series for more information. Also, see Crosthwaite, ‘“The Mighty Hand of Overruling Providence”: The Shaker Claim to America’.

286

Notes to pages 235–59

57. M’Namer’s pamphlet: McNemar’s Kentucky Revival. 58. Religious Register: this is possibly a reference to the German-language publication Rel igions-Register (New Market, VA: Ambrosius Henkel, 1809), which contained a lengthy article on the Shakers. Smith makes it sound like the Shakers published this item, but likely they did not. 59. Paris paper: probably Western Citizen, the first newspaper published at Paris, Kentucky. 60. Liberty Hall: a newspaper published by John W. Browne at Cincinnati, Ohio. 61. Thomas Freeman’s: little is known about Freeman, but he may have been a lawyer in Lebanon, Ohio. See N. W. Evans and E. B. Stivers History of Adams County Ohio (West Union, OH: Published by E. B. Stivers, 1900), p. 177. 62. Retrospective view of Shakerism: only two instalments of this series are known to survive, on is a fragment in the 29 September 1810 issue of the Western Star newspaper of Lebanon, Ohio; and ‘No. V’ published in the 13 October 1810, issue of the Western Star. 63. four hundred armed men: a reference to the mob that descended on the Union Village, Ohio, Shaker community on 27 August 1810, see the article [‘Mobbing the Shakers’], reproduced in this volume on p. 209. 64. Aaron Burr: See note 25 to [Anon.], ‘Who Are the Shakers?’ 65. chief magistrate: probably Francis Dunlevy (1761–1839), brother of Shaker John Dunlavy.

Bailey, Fanaticism Exposed 1.

2. 3. 4.

5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10. 11.

12. 13. 14. 15.

Christ’s Second Appearing: The Shakers’ first large-scale publication explicating their theology, and placing it in a historical context. The first edition of the Testimony of Christ’s Second Appearing was published at Lebanon, Ohio, in 1808. It subsequently went through four editions. published in New Lebanon: Bailey is wrong here; the first edition of the Testimony was published at Lebanon, Ohio, in 1808; the second at Albany, New York, 1810. Anne Lee: Mother Ann Lee, founder of the Shakers. [Introduction, page 21.]: Bailey is quoting here from the 1808 edition of the Testimony. The substance of his quote is correct, but the word order is different and somewhat garbled compared with the original. their mother: Mother Ann Lee. Church of Christ: Bailey’s quote is accurate here. consigned her to prison: Ann Lee was imprisoned in Manchester, England, and also Albany and Poughkeepsie, New York. [Pages 61 & 74]: Bailey is quoting here from the 1808 edition of the Testimony. urim and thumim: Objects used for divination in ancient Israelite culture. polethism: polytheism. Father and Son, Mother and Daughter: The Shakers did, in fact, reject the trinity. They believed the God-head to be dual, male (God the Father) and female (Holy Mother Wisdom). Jesus and Ann Lee were the male and female vessels, respectively, for the Christ spirit. Page 571: Bailey is quoting here from the 1808 edition of the Testimony. followers: This is a paraphrase of content from page 575 (not 577) of the 1808 edition of the Testimony. Page 577: Bailey is quoting here from the 1808 edition of the Testimony. Page 580: Bailey is quoting here from the 1808 edition of the Testimony.