ing which, after allowing a reasonable time, | regular Sabbath services at the usual hours. they are resold to other persons. But if After announcing their intention by public all the required conditions be fulfilled, they advertisement, they proceed to organize a become absolutely the purchaser's, and church, that is, a body of believers, accordmay be bequeathed or sold like any other ing to the rules of the communion to which property. they belong. If Presbyterians, the Presbytery appoints a committee to organize the church according to the Book of Discipline, by the appointment and consecration to office of ruling elders, after which it falls under the care of the Presbytery. A pastor is next called and regularly inducted. Meanwhile, the congregation may be supposed to be increasing, until strong enough to exchange their temporary for a permanent place of worship. In this way new swarms are every year leaving the old hives, if I may so speak, in our large cities, and new church edifices are rising in various localities where the population is extending. Instead of being sold in fee-simple, the pews are sometimes merely rented from year to year. This prevails more in large towns and villages than in cities, and in such cases the churches must be built solely by "subscription," as it is called, that is, by sums contributed for that special object. Should these prove, in the first instance, insufficient, a second, and perhaps a third subscription follows, after a longer or shorter interval, The seats in some churches, even of our largest cities, are free to all. Such is the case with all the Quaker, and most of the Methodist meeting-houses; these are occupied on what is called the "free-seat" plan, and have the advantage of being attended with less restraint, especially by strangers or persons who may not have the means to pay for seats. But there are disadvantages also in this plan. Families who regularly attend, and who may bear the expense of the church, have no certain place where all may sit together, and in case of being delayed a little longer than usual, may find it difficult to get seats at all. The Methodist churches, accordingly, are coming more and more into the other plan in our large cities. Where they have not done so, and also in the Quaker meeting-houses, the males occupy one half of the house, the females the other; a rule, however, observed more constantly in the latter than in the former body. Church edifices, or meeting-houses, on the freeseat plan, must, of course, be built by subscription alone. A more common practice in forming new congregations, and erecting church edifices, is this: The families who engage in the undertaking first obtain some place for temporary service-the lecture-room attached to some other church, a courthouse, a schoolroom, or some other such building*-and there they commence their * In Philadelphia there is a building called the Academy, built for Mr. Whitfield's meetings, the upper part of which is now divided into two rooms, each capable of containing 400 or 500 people, and both constantly used as places of worship, one permanently by the Methodists. The other has been occupied temporarily by colonies, which have grown into churches, and then gone off to houses which they have built for themselves. In this way that one room, as I have often been told, has been the birthplace, as it were, of more than twenty different churches. It is rented to those who wish to occupy it by the corporation, to which it belongs. In the lower story there are schools held throughout the week. The church edifices in the chief towns and cities are, generally speaking, large and substantial buildings, especially in the more densely-settled districts. Those in the suburbs are often smaller, and not expected to be more than temporary, as they give place to larger and better structures in a few years. In the cities and larger towns, whether on the Atlantic slope or in the Valley of the Mississippi, they are, in nine cases out of ten, built of brick; a few are of stone; and in the New-England cities and towns of second and third rate size, they are often built of wood. As for the cost of church edifices, it is difficult to speak precisely where the country is so extensive. In the suburbs of our large cities on the seaboard, from Portland, in Maine, to New-Orleans, some may not have cost more than from 5000 to 10,000 dollars; but in the older and more denselypeopled parts of those cities, they generally cost 20,000 dollars and upward. Some have cost 60,000 or 80,000, and yet are comparatively plain, though very chaste and substantial buildings. A few have cost above 100,000,* without including such as Trinity Church at New-York, belonging to the Episcopalians, or the Roman Catholic Cathedral at Baltimore, for these very elegant and expensive buildings have cost at least 300,000, if not more. There may have been, in States assemble-are allowed to be used as places of worship on the Sabbath in a case of exigency. The church in which the late eloquent Dr. Mason was last settled as a minister in New-York, cost, I believe, rather more than 100,000 dollars. It was an excellent, large, tasteful, substantial, brick building. Yet it, and some others in the lower parts of the city, whence business is driving the people to the upper part, have been torn down, and their sites are covered with shops and counting-rooms. The congregations have mainly emigrated to about a mile and a half, or two miles northward. So matters go in our London. The chapel of the University of New-York is used for the same purpose; and the Court-houses through- Trinity Church is not yet finished. It is a reout all the land, and even some of the State-houses-markably fine specimen of Gothic architecture. I that is, those in which the Legislatures of the several have not heard what the cost will be, but, including teen churches, and several of those very large. Newark, in New-Jersey, has about 20,000 inhabitants and seventeen churches; Rochester 22,000 inhabitants and twentytwo churchers. some cases, a useless expenditure of mon- | of 16,000 souls, has fifteen churches; Newey on interior decorations, but in general, Haven, for about 14,000 souls, has thirteen, the churches, even in our largest cities, many of which are of large size; Poughare neat and rather plain buildings exter-keepsie, on the Hudson, has 9000 inhabinally, but exceedingly comfortable within. tants and twelve churches; Troy had, in The village churches of New-England 1840, a population of 25,000 souls, and fifare, for the most part, constructed of wood; that is, of beams framed together and covered with boards; and being almost universally painted white and surmounted with steeples, they have a beautiful appearance. The church-going bell every Sabbath sends forth its notes far and wide amid the hills and dales of that interesting country. In other parts of the Atlantic States, though often of wood, like those of New-England, they are still oftener of brick or stone, or of unpainted frames and boards, which is especially the case in the South. On this head the reader is referred to the works of Drs. Reed and Matheson, and to that of Dr. Lang, as containing much accurate information with respect to church accommodation in the United States. CHAPTER IV. TLEMENTS. Any one may be satisfied, by careful inquiry, that even our cities and large towns, HOW CHURCHES ARE BUILT IN THE NEW SETas respects churches, may well bear a comparison with the best supplied in any part of Europe. Boston, for instance, in 1840, BUT it is in the building of places of worhad fifty-eight churches, many of which ship in the new settlements of the Western could accommodate from 1000 to 1500 per-States, and in the villages that are springsons, and that for a population of about ing up in the more recently-peopled parts 88,000 souls. New-York had that year of those bordering on the Atlantic, that 159 churches for about 310,000 inhabitants; we see the most remarkable development namely, forty-one Presbyterian, of all of the voluntary principle. Let me illusshades; fourteen Reformed Dutch; twen-trate by a particular case what is daily ty-seven Episcopal; eighteen Methodist; occurring in both these divisions of the eighteen Baptist; eight Roman Catholic; country. nine African (Methodist, Episcopal, Baptist, and Presbyterian); five Friends' meeting-houses; three Lutheran; three Moravian; three synagogues (there are now five or six); two Unitarian; three Universalist; four Welsh and smaller denominations; and two Mariners' churches. This is from a published statement which may be depended upon as rather within the truth. The church accommodation of the Protestant population is in much higher proportion to their numbers than that of the Roman Catholics to theirs, partly owing, no doubt, to the liturgical services of the latter requiring less church accommodation than the sermon preaching" of the former. Philadelphia is better supplied with churches than New-York. Those of all the leading denominations there have greatly increased during the last few years. The Methodists, I learn from one of their bestinformed ministers, have, in the course of the last fifteen years, built in the city and suburbs above twenty churches, most of which are capacious buildings; and the Episcopalians and Presbyterians have increased the number of theirs nearly in the same proportion. But our second and third rate cities and large towns are far better supplied than either of these two places. Salem, in Massachusetts, for a population the value of the ground, I should think it cannot be less than 300,000 dollars, and may amount to 500,000. Let us suppose a settlement commenced in the forest, in the northern part of Indiana, and that in the course of three or four years a considerable number of emigrants have established themselves within a mile or two of each other, in the woods. Each clears away by degrees a part of the surrounding forest, and fences in his new fields, in the midst of which the deadened trees still stand very thickly. By little and little the country shows signs of occupation by civilized man. In the centre of the settlement a little village begins to form around a tavern and a blacksmith's shop. A carpenter places himself there as at a convenient centre. So do the tailor, the shoemaker, the wagon-maker, and the hatter. Nor is the son of Esculapius wanting; perhaps he is most of all needed; and it will be well if two or three of his brethren do not soon join him. The merchant, of course,.opens his magazine there. And if there be any prospect of the rising village, though the deadened trees stand quite in the vicinity of the streets, becoming the seat of justice for a new county, there will soon be half a dozen young expounders of the law to increase the population, and offer their services to those who have suffered or committed some injustice. Things will hardly have reached this point before some one amid this heterogeneous population, come from different a like kind is taking place every year, in hundreds of instances, throughout all the states. Settlers of one denomination are sometimes sufficiently numerous in one place to build a church for themselves at the outset, but in most cases they hold their first meetings for worship in schoolrooms or private houses. points of the older states, intermixed with wanderers from Europe-Irish, Scotch, or German-proposes that they should think of having a church, or, at least, some place of worship. It is ten chances to one if there be not one or more pious women, or some pious man with his family, who sigh for the privileges of the sanctuary, as once enjoyed by them in the distant East. What The rapid increase of the population in is to be done? Some one proposes that some of the new villages and towns of the they should build a good large school- West, when favourably situated for trade, house, which may serve also for holding re- is astonishing, and strikes one particularly ligious meetings, and this is scarcely soon- in its early stages. Thus, when in the er proposed than accomplished. Though State of Alabama in February, 1831, I vispossibly made of mere logs and very plain, ited the town of Montgomery in company it will answer the purpose for a few years. with a worthy Baptist minister, in the Being intended for the meetings of all de- course of an extensive tour through the nominations of Christians, and open to all Western States in behalf of one of our preachers who may be passing, word is benevolent societies. It was then hardly sent to the nearest in the neighbourhood. more than a large village. On the night Ere long some Baptist preacher, in pass- of the second of the two days we spent in ing, preaches in the evening, and is follow-it, we preached in a large schoolhouse, ed by a Presbyterian and a Methodist. By-and-by the last of these arranges his circuit labours so as to preach there once in a fortnight, and the minister of some Presbyterian congregation, ten or fifteen miles off, agrees to come and preach once a month. Meanwhile, from the increase of the inhabitants, the congregations, on the Sabbath particularly, become too large for the schoolhouse. A church is then built of framed beams and boards, forming no mean ornament to the village, and capable of accommodating some 200 or 300 people. Erected for the public good, it is used by all the sects in the place, and by others besides. For were a Swedenborgian minister to come and have notice given that he would preach, he might be sure of finding a congregation, though, as the sect is small in America, and by many hardly so much as heard of, he might not have a single hearer that assents to his views. But it will not be long before the Presbyterians, Methodists, or Baptists feel that they must have a minister on whose services they can count with more certainty, and hence a church, also, for themselves. And at last the house, which was a jointstock affair at first, falls into the hands of some one of the denominations and is abandoned by the others, who have mostly provided each one for itself. Or it may remain for the occasional service of some passing Roman Catholic priest, or Universalist preacher.* Such is the process continually going on in the West, and, indeed, something of * In some places in the Southwestern States, the primitive and temporary churches built for all denominations, in the new villages or settlements, are called "Republican churches;" that is, churches for the accommodation of the public rather than for any one sect. Large schoolhouses, also, erected for the double purpose of teaching and preaching, are called Republican meeting-houses. which, if I remember rightly, was the only place for holding religious meetings existing there at the time. We had a good congregation, though a circus was held hard by. Just three years after, when repeating the same tour, I spent a Sabbath and one or two days more at the same spot, but under amazingly different circumstances. In the morning I preached in a Presbyterian church built of frames and covered with boards, and every way comfortable, to at least 600 persons. The church, which reckoned 100 members, had got a young man as pastor, to whom they gave a yearly stipend of $1000. At night I preached in a Baptist church, built of brick, but not quite finished, which could hold 300 persons at least. Besides these, there were one Methodist Episcopal and one Protestant Methodist church, each, in so far as I can recollect, as large as the Baptist church. Then there was an Episcopal church, not less in size, though probably with a smaller congregation, than the Baptist church. And, withal, there was a Roman Catholic church, though not a large one, I believe. All this after an interval of only three years! Eventful years they had been. A revival of religion, which took place during one of them, had brought many souls to the knowledge of salvation. This was, it is true, an extraordinary case, yet something very similar in kind, although not in degree, is going on at a great many points in the West. I know not what reverses the town of Montgomery may have since undergone, but what I have stated occurred, I know, between the years 1831 and 1834. On the Genesee River, a few miles above its entrance into Lake Ontario, in the State of New-York, stands a town, incorporated as a city, called Rochester. The place is famous for the vast quantity of flour made at its mills. Twenty-five years ago, it could show but a few houses scattered here | the trustees, where there are such. Where and there, where now there is a well-built the seats are free, as is the case with very and flourishing city, containing, when I many churches of all denominations in the was there about two years ago, 22,000 in- interior of the country, the minister's salhabitants, and twenty-two churches, many ary is raised by yearly subscription. In the of which were large and fine buildings, Methodist Episcopal churches, with few capable of accommodating congregations exceptions, the ministers are supported by of from 1000 to 1200 persons each. Among collections among the members, quarterly these churches there were two for Ger- public collections, &c. Sometimes, also, mans, and another, I learned, was soon to recourse is partially had to subscriptions, be erected for French and Swiss. especially where there are stationed" or non-itinerating ministers. Churches and church property of every description are held, in the United States, by trustees chosen by the congregation to which they belong. The laws of almost every state provide for this. These trustees, who may be two, three, or more in number, are authorized to act for the congregation, to whom they report, from time to time, the state of the common funds. They are charged, in most cases, with the collection of the pastor's salary, as well as with the general collection and outlay of money for the congregation. Without their consent the church edifice cannot be given to any other than the ordinary religious services of the sanctuary. 66 Among the Protestant denominations, the amount of the pastor's salary is determined, in most cases, by the churches themselves. In the Methodist churches, the amount is fixed by the General Conference. In ordinary cases, he receives so much for himself, a like sum for his wife, and so much for each of his children, according to their ages, with certain perquisites besides, such as a family dwellinghouse, a horse, &c., making up altogether a comfortable maintenance for himself and his household. The collections of each "circuit" are expected, generally speaking, to suffice for the salaries of the ministers who occupy them, any deficiency being made up from funds which the Conference may have in hand for meeting such contin denominations, with two exceptions, receive fixed salaries from their people, and are expected to devote themselves to their proper vocation, and to "live by the altar." The exceptions are a part of the ministers. of the Baptist Church, and all the Quaker preachers. These support themselves by their labour, or from other sources, and preach on the Sabbath. In some cases, several, if not all of the churches in a city, belonging to a particular communion, are held by a common board of trustees. All the Methodist Epis-gencies. The clergy of all evangelical copal churches of New-York are so held. One corporation has the proprietorship of four of the Reformed Dutch churches in that city, and another holds Trinity Church, and perhaps some others belonging to the Protestant Episcopal denomination. In all denominations, according to general practice, each particular church and congregation has its own trustees, and manages its own "temporal" affairs, being such as relate to the church edifice, the ground on which it stands, and any other property or stocks belonging to it; and it is only on questions of right to property that the Civil Courts, or even the State Legislatures, or Congress itself, can ever meddle with the affairs of the churches. CHAPTER V. THE VOLUNTARY PRINCIPLE DEVELOPED.-HOW The Baptists agree with the Methodists in not considering a college education, or an acquaintance with the Greek, Latin, and Hebrew tongues, or the natural and moral sciences, indispensable for a preacher of the Gospel; hence by far the greater number of them have had only an English education, together with such theological knowledge, derived from English sources, as has qualified them, in the opinion of the authorities in their churches, for undertaking to preach the Gospel. In both these denominations, however, there are not a few truly learned men, who have passed through the curriculum of some college, and have diligently added to the acquirements of their preparatory course. The Universally where the seats and pews regular itinerating ministers of the Methoare the property of individuals or families, dist churches receive salaries, and devote and generally where they are rented by the themselves wholly to their ministerial callyear, the salaries of the pastors, and some-ing; whereas very many of the Baptist times all the incidental expenses, are raised by a certain yearly, half-yearly, or quarterly rate upon each pew. The proportion for each pew is fixed by the trustees, or by the elders, or by a committee appointed for that special purpose, but in most cases by UNDER this head we find different measures adopted by different churches, and in different parts of the country. ministers, as has been already stated, especially in the Southern and Western, and to a certain extent in the Middle States, receive no salaries at all, or none of any consequence, so that they must support themselves in some other way. The preachers among the Friends, who, as the reader is probably aware, may be women as well as men, receive no regular salaries; but those of them who, under the belief that they have a call from the Spirit to give themselves wholly to the work, travel through the country, visiting the Friends""meetings," and preaching in other places, generally, nay, always, if their own means are not abundant, receive considerable presents. he receives a good many presents. His marriage fees are of some amount. In other parts of the country, and especially in the West, the clergy are not so well provided for. The practice in New-England of giving them presents, whether casually or regularly, and at some set time, does not prevail elsewhere to the same degree. The salaries of the clergy in the largest and wealthiest churches of the principal cities are handsome, though generally no more than adequate.* Fifteen hundred dollars, 1800, 2000, 2500, are the sums commonly given, and, in a few cases, 3000, 3500, and even 4000. The Presbyterian Church in New-Orleans, I believe, gives its pastor 5000, and the highest of all is that of one of the bishops in the Episcopal Church, which, I have been told, is 6000.† It is not easy to give any very satisfactory answer to the question, Whether the ministers of the Gospel are well supported in the United States? Using that phrase in the sense which many attach to it, I should say, in giving a general reply to the question, that they are not. That is to say, few, if any, of them receive salaries that would enable them to live in the style in which the wealthiest of their parishioners live. Their incomes are not equal to those of the greater number of lawyers and physicians, though these are men of no better education or higher talents than great numbers of the clergy possess. None of the ministers of the Gospel in the United States derive such revenues from their official stations as many of the parochial cler-abled the trustees to contribute largely, gy of England have, to say nothing of the higher dignitaries of the Church in that country. There are few, if any, of them who, with economy, can do more than live upon their salaries; to grow rich upon them is out of the question.* Yet, on the other hand, the greater number of the salaried ministers in the United States are able, with economy, to live comfortably and respectably. This holds true especially as respects the pastors of the Atlantic, and even of the older parts of the Western States. In New-England, if we except Boston, the salaries of the Congregational, Episcopal, and Baptist pastors are, in the largest towns, such as Providence, Portland, Salem, Hartford, NewHaven, &c., from 800 to 1200 dollars; in the villages and country churches they vary from 300 or 400 to 700 or 800, besides which the minister sometimes has a "parsonage" and "glebe," that is, a house and a few acres of land, and, in addition to all, The statements made by foreigners, in writing about the United States, are sometimes sufficiently ludicrous. For instance, M. Beaumont, in his "Marie, ou Esclavage aux Etats-Unis," accounts for the great number of churches there by the great number of ministers of the Gospel. He says that the ministry is not only very honourable, but very lucrative also; that most of the preachers make a fortune in a few years, and then retire from the ministry, which is the cause of there being so few old men in the pulpits of that country. Anything more absurd on such a subject I cannot imagine. But I will do M. Beaumont the justice to say, that I do not blame him so much as the stupid creatures who gave him such information. The gay Frenchman probably did not set his foot in more than half a dozen churches when in America, and of these not one, it is likely, was Protestant. Some churches have permanent funds, which go far towards the pastor's support. The corporation of the collegiate churches of the Reformed Dutch Church in New-York, four in number at present, has enough from this source to pay the salaries of the four pastors. The corporation of Trinity Church (Episcopal) possesses vast funds, the income from which has en towards the building of churches in the State of New-York. Three of the Presbyterian churches in Newark, New-Jersey, which is nine miles from New-York, and contains 20,000 inhabitants, have permanent funds sufficient for the support of their public services. But, generally speaking, a permanent fund is found to be rather injurious than beneficial to the churches in the United States. If out of debt, that is, if they owe nothing for their church edifices, lecture-rooms, vestry-rooms, &c., they need no endowment; the hearts of the people will do the rest. I speak of the churches in the older parts of the country. The measures we take for the support of churches in the new settlements, and which are weak as yet, I shall show hereafter. It often happens that ministers are not * The clergy are expected to be examples of hospitality and benevolence. They entertain a great deal of company at their houses. Nothing is more common than for ministers of the Gospel, when visiting any place, whether in town or country, to stay with their brethren; and no men among us give so much, in proportion to their means, to all the religious and philanthropic enterprises, as our pastors of every denomination. I refer to the Bishop of New-York, who, if he has to pay for a suffragan to take his place as pastor of a church, or co-pastor with others in two or three churches, as well as bear his travelling expenses when visiting his diocese as I doubt not is the case-will not have more than is necessary to sup port a large family in so expensive a city as NewYork. As for New-Orleans, it is the most expensive city for supporting a family in the whole Union, and 5000 dollars there would in that respect be not more than half the sum in Philadelphia. |