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32 HISTORY OF MARYLAND.
Some were notoriously immoral; some utterly incompetent, and the laity
either sneered or were shocked. "Fanaticism, deism and licentiousness,"
says Dr. Hawks, "still found a wide field in which they worked effectually."
George Whitefield, the famous preacher, when he came to Baltimore in 1740,
found " a sad dearth of piety in Maryland." The Rev. Thomas Bacon, the
learned and laborious compiler of the Laws of Maryland, who had a parish
in Frederick County, writes to the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel
in foreign parts, that " infidelity has indeed arrived to an amazing and shocking growth in these parts. And it is hard to say whether it is more owing
to the ignorance of the common people, the fancied knowledge of such as
have got a little smattering of learning, or the misconduct of too many of
the clergy." He adds: " In this unhappy province, where we have no
ecclesiastical government, where every clergyman may do what is right in his
own eyes, without fear or probability of being called to account, and where
some of them are got beyond the consideration of common decency, vice
and immorality as well as infidelity must make large advances."1 Doctor
Chandler, who came to the province in 1753, during Governor Sharpe's
administration, wrote to the Bishop of London that " the general character
of the clergy, I am sorry to say, is most wretchedly bad. ... It would
really, my lord make the ears of a sober heathen tingle to hear the stories
that were told me by many serious people of several clergymen in the neighborhood of the parish where I visited." Another letter to the bishop from
a Maryland rector gives the history of a brother clergyman who had just
been inducted. Dr. Hawks found it at Fulham, among the American
archives. The priest was an Irish vagrant who had strolled from place to
place on this continent, now in the army, now school teaching, now keeping
a public house, now marrying and next abandoned by his wife, ajways in
debt, always drunk, always absconding, he is yet, without any change of
character or manners, inducted into holy orders, and sent to Maryland, where
he is drunk in the pulpit and behaves otherwise so disgracefully that finally
he flees the State of his own free will.
This is a sorry condition of things. It has lasted nigh a hundred years.
It is attended with a rapid spread of other denominations through the State,
as well as a rapid increase of unbelievers.' The Methodist appear. The
Catholic churches spread into the Western part of the State. The Presby- -
terians, German Lutherans, Baptists and Quakers, all make headway.
Meantime, from 1720 up to the Revolution, there is war and bitter hostility
between the people and the Established Church. On one side is the church,
sometimes allied with the Proprietary Government, sometimes at war with
it; on the other are the people, the legislature, the groat lawyers and leaders.
These are not hostile to the Church of England, for they are members of
1 Bacon's own domestic life has not escaped of another man, and was involved in trouble-
scandal. He married, when late in life, a some litigation in consequence,
woman who was the wife, only half divorced,
| Title | History of Maryland - 2 |
| Creator | Scharf, J. Thomas (John Thomas) |
| Publisher | J. B. Piet |
| Place of Publication | Baltimore |
| Date | 1879 |
| Language | eng |
| Type | Books/Pamphlets |
| Title | 00000057 |
| Type | Books/Pamphlets |
| Transcript | 32 HISTORY OF MARYLAND. Some were notoriously immoral; some utterly incompetent, and the laity either sneered or were shocked. "Fanaticism, deism and licentiousness," says Dr. Hawks, "still found a wide field in which they worked effectually." George Whitefield, the famous preacher, when he came to Baltimore in 1740, found " a sad dearth of piety in Maryland." The Rev. Thomas Bacon, the learned and laborious compiler of the Laws of Maryland, who had a parish in Frederick County, writes to the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in foreign parts, that " infidelity has indeed arrived to an amazing and shocking growth in these parts. And it is hard to say whether it is more owing to the ignorance of the common people, the fancied knowledge of such as have got a little smattering of learning, or the misconduct of too many of the clergy." He adds: " In this unhappy province, where we have no ecclesiastical government, where every clergyman may do what is right in his own eyes, without fear or probability of being called to account, and where some of them are got beyond the consideration of common decency, vice and immorality as well as infidelity must make large advances."1 Doctor Chandler, who came to the province in 1753, during Governor Sharpe's administration, wrote to the Bishop of London that " the general character of the clergy, I am sorry to say, is most wretchedly bad. ... It would really, my lord make the ears of a sober heathen tingle to hear the stories that were told me by many serious people of several clergymen in the neighborhood of the parish where I visited." Another letter to the bishop from a Maryland rector gives the history of a brother clergyman who had just been inducted. Dr. Hawks found it at Fulham, among the American archives. The priest was an Irish vagrant who had strolled from place to place on this continent, now in the army, now school teaching, now keeping a public house, now marrying and next abandoned by his wife, ajways in debt, always drunk, always absconding, he is yet, without any change of character or manners, inducted into holy orders, and sent to Maryland, where he is drunk in the pulpit and behaves otherwise so disgracefully that finally he flees the State of his own free will. This is a sorry condition of things. It has lasted nigh a hundred years. It is attended with a rapid spread of other denominations through the State, as well as a rapid increase of unbelievers.' The Methodist appear. The Catholic churches spread into the Western part of the State. The Presby- - terians, German Lutherans, Baptists and Quakers, all make headway. Meantime, from 1720 up to the Revolution, there is war and bitter hostility between the people and the Established Church. On one side is the church, sometimes allied with the Proprietary Government, sometimes at war with it; on the other are the people, the legislature, the groat lawyers and leaders. These are not hostile to the Church of England, for they are members of 1 Bacon's own domestic life has not escaped of another man, and was involved in trouble- scandal. He married, when late in life, a some litigation in consequence, woman who was the wife, only half divorced, |
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