FREE BOOKS

Author's List




PREV.   NEXT  
|<   127   128   129   130   131   132   133   134   135   136   137   138   139   140   141   142   143   144   145   146   147   148   149   150   151  
152   153   154   155   156   157   158   159   160   161   162   163   164   165   166   167   168   169   170   171   172   173   174   175   176   >>   >|  
ents.[159:1] It was doubtless owing to the firm and judicious guidance of such a pastor that the intense religious fervor of this first awakening at Northampton was marked by so much of sobriety and order. In later years, in other regions, and under the influence of preachers not of greater earnestness, but of less wisdom and discretion, there were habitual scenes of extravagant and senseless enthusiasm, which make the closing pages of this chapter of church history painfully instructive. It is not difficult to understand how one of the first places at a distance to feel the kindling example of Northampton should be the neighborhood of Newark. To this region, planted, as we have seen, with so strong a stock from New England, from old England, and from Scotland, came, in 1708, a youth of twenty years, Jonathan Dickinson, a native of the historic little town of Hatfield, next neighbor to Northampton. He was pastor at Elizabeth, but his influence and activity extended through all that part of New Jersey, and he became easily the leader of the rapidly growing communion of Presbyterian churches in that province, and the opponent, in the interest of Christian liberty and sincerity, of rigid terms of subscription, demanded by men of little faith. There is a great career before him; but that which concerns the present topic is his account of what took place "sometime in August, 1739 (the summer before Mr. Whitefield came first into these parts), when there was a remarkable revival at Newark.... This revival of religion was chiefly observable among the younger people, till the following March, when the whole town in general was brought under an uncommon concern about their eternal interests, and the congregation appeared universally affected under some sermons that were then preached to them." Like scenes of spiritual quickening were witnessed that same season in other parts of New Jersey; but special interest attaches to the report from New Londonderry, Penn., where a Scotch-Irish community received as its pastor, in the spring of 1740, Samuel Blair, a native of Ireland, trained in the Log College of William Tennent. He describes the people, at his first knowledge of them, as sunk in a religious torpor, ignorance, and indifference. The first sign of vitality was observed in March, 1740, during the pastor's absence, when, under an alarming sermon from a neighbor minister: "There was a visible appearance of much soul-co
PREV.   NEXT  
|<   127   128   129   130   131   132   133   134   135   136   137   138   139   140   141   142   143   144   145   146   147   148   149   150   151  
152   153   154   155   156   157   158   159   160   161   162   163   164   165   166   167   168   169   170   171   172   173   174   175   176   >>   >|  



Top keywords:
pastor
 

Northampton

 

revival

 

people

 

scenes

 
Jersey
 
Newark
 

England

 
native
 

neighbor


interest

 

influence

 
religious
 

concern

 
general
 

brought

 
uncommon
 
present
 

concerns

 

interests


eternal

 

account

 

chiefly

 

Whitefield

 

religion

 

remarkable

 

observable

 

congregation

 

August

 

summer


younger

 
attaches
 

torpor

 

ignorance

 

indifference

 
knowledge
 

describes

 
trained
 

College

 
William

Tennent
 

vitality

 
visible
 
minister
 

appearance

 

sermon

 
alarming
 

observed

 
absence
 

Ireland