Content provided in partnership with
Who were the evangelicals?: conservative and liberal identity in the Unitarian Controversy in Boston, 1804-1833
Journal of Social History, Fall, 1997 by Marie Kuplec Cayton
scholars and gentlemen; dignified, gracious, genuine, sweet; fond of elegant studies, of good English, of courteous ways, of poetic expression; of the amenities of life. They were conservative of existing institutions in so far as they allowed the free movement of cultivated mind, and desired no change except in the direction of mental emancipation. . . . [T]hey were contented with things as they were and disliked innovation.(29)
Their parishioners Frothingham described as "industrious, honest, faithful in all relations of life, charitable, public-spirited, intelligent, sagacious, mingling the prudence of the man of affairs with the faith of the Christian." They were not, however, "reformers, or ascetics, or devotees."(30) Of his grandfather, Peter Chardon Brooks - the richest man of his time in Boston and a Unitarian Frothingham wrote,
- Most Popular Articles in Reference
- The importance of understanding organizational culture
- Credit card attitudes and behaviors of college students
- What factors attract foreign direct investment?
- Libraries Need Relationship Marketing - mutual interest marketing concept, ...
- How to set performance goals: employee reviews are more than annual critiques
- More »
He joined the church, and was a consistent church member. . . . His was the calm, rational, sober belief of the thoughtful, educated, honorable men of his day. . . . Speculative theology he cared little or nothing about. He was no disputant, no doubter, no casuist; of the heights of mysticism of the depths of fidelity, he knew nothing. . . . [H]e said little about any thing connected with religion. His allusions to that subject were few. His concerns were with this world. . . . If others had convictions, he was glad of it, but such thoughts as he had he preferred to keep to himself.(31)
Beecher himself saw Unitarians as men of "stratagem and duplicity," who relied "upon wealth and the favor of the great" to advance their cause.(32)
We know far less anecdotally about the conservatives, beyond the fact that to their opponents they were bigots. Beecher spoke of his "labors among the middle class and the poor," and to judge by orthodox rhetoric about Unitarian wealth, it is a safe assumption that on the whole, the conservatives were less well-off socially and economically than the liberals.(33) Beecher also said of his congregation at Hanover Street, "There was a flock of young people of the middle classes."(34) From the wealth of organizations for young men supported by Beecher in particular and the orthodox in general, we might surmise that the orthodox rank-and-file may have been on the average younger as well.
Research by scholars both confirms and fills out our picture of the Unitarians. Conrad Wright, for example, in a 1985 study of ministers, churches, and the Boston elite, finds that "men of affairs" who participated most often in civic and benevolent societies were Unitarian.(35) Jane and William Pease, in an extensive study of occupation and church affiliation, found that the single most important factor associated with Unitarianism was wealth, the most frequently associated occupation that of merchant.(36) Richard Eddy Sykes, in a study of liberal religionists in Massachusetts as a whole in 1800, found them associated with people in the highest quartile of wealth, and disproportionately "engaged in trade, transport, and the professions," with Unitarian parishes through 1870 having "22 times the number of lawyers, 20 times the number of bankers, about twice as many merchants, and approximately 28 times the number of manufacturers which we could have expected if their membership had reflected the total working population."(37)
Find Research Guides for:
Find Featured Titles for: Home & Garden
Most Popular Articles in Reference
- The importance of understanding organizational culture
- Credit card attitudes and behaviors of college students
- What factors attract foreign direct investment?
- Libraries Need Relationship Marketing - mutual interest marketing concept, ...
- How to set performance goals: employee reviews are more than annual critiques
- More »