e professor of divinity. But many country parsonages
that were tenanted by men of fame as writers and teachers were greatly
frequented by young men preparing themselves for the work of preaching.

The change to the modern method of education for the ministry was a
sudden one. It was precipitated by an event which has not even yet
ceased to be looked on by the losing party with honest lamentation and
with an unnecessary amount of sectarian acrimony. The divinity
professorship in Harvard College, founded in 1722[249:1] by Thomas
Hollis, of London, a Baptist friend of New England, was filled, after a
long struggle and an impassioned protest, by the election of Henry Ware,
an avowed and representative Unitarian. It was a distinct announcement
that the government of the college had taken sides in the impending
conflict, in opposition to the system of religious doctrine to the
maintenance of which the college had from its foundation been devoted.
The significance of the fact was not mistaken by either party. It meant
that the two tendencies which had been recognizable from long before
the Great Awakening were drawing asunder, and that thenceforth it must
be expected that the vast influence of the venerable college, in the
clergy and in society, would be given to the Liberal side. The dismay of
one party and the exultation of the other were alike well grounded. The
cry of the Orthodox was "To your tents, O Israel!" Lines of
ecclesiastical non-intercourse were drawn. Church was divided from
church, and family from family. When the forces and the losses on each
side came to be reckoned up, there was a double wonder: First, at the
narrow boundaries by which the Unitarian defection was circumscribed: "A
radius of thirty-five miles from Boston as a center would sweep almost
the whole field of its history and influence;"[250:1] and then at the
sweeping completeness of it within these bounds; as Mrs. H. B. Stowe
summed up the situation at Boston, "All the literary men of
Massachusetts were Unitarian; all the trustees and professors of Harvard
College were Unitarian; all the _elite_ of wealth and fashion crowded
Unitarian churches; the judges on the bench were Unitarian, giving
decisions by which the peculiar features of church organization so
carefully ordered by the Pilgrim Fathers had been nullified and all the
power had passed into the hands of the congregation."[250:2]

The schism, with its acrimonies and heartburnings, was doubt