McFetridge on the religious nature of history

When Loraine Boetter wrote his 1932 classic The Reformed Doctrine of Predestination, he included a chapter titled “Calvinism in History.” The chapter title and many quotes therein are borrowed from Calvinism in History (1882) by Nathaniel Smyth McFetridge, a book which Boettner describes as “splendid” and “illuminating.”

In McFetridge’s classic work, before giving an historical tour showing the influence and legacy of Calvinism as a moral, political and evangelical force in the world, he takes a moment to remind his readers that all history is essentially religious is nature. “Predestination and an overruling Providence are one and the same thing,” he says elsewhere, emphasizing the hand of God in history as well as salvation.

And here let it be remarked that events follow principles; that mind rules the world; that thought is more powerful than cannon; that “all history is in its inmost nature religious” [The United States as a Nation, p. 30, by Rev. Joseph Thompson, D.D., LL.D.]; and that, as John von Muller says, “Christ is the key to the history of the world,” and, as Carlyle says, “the spiritual will always body itself forth in the temporal history of men.” In the formation of the modern nations religion performed a principal part. The great movements out of which the present civilized nations sprung were religious through and through.

What part, then, had Calvinism in begetting and shaping and controlling those movements? What has it show as the result of its labors? A rich possession indeed. A glorious record belongs to it in the history of modern civilization.

That a New Generation May Read the Old Stories

Mary A. Tennent (1890-1971) was a descendant of William Tennent, Sr., founder of the original Log College in Neshaminy, Pennsylvania. In the introduction to her valuable work Light in Darkness: The Story of William Tennent, Sr. and the Log College (1971), she speaks of reading Elias Boudinot IV’s biography of William Tennent, Jr., and how his words impacted her.

Boudinot began his memoir with these words: “Among the duties every generation owes to those whose example deserves and may invite imitation…and when such men have been remarkably favored of God with an unusual degree of light and knowledge…it becomes the duty of more than ordinary obligation to hand down to posterity the principal events of their lives which if known might edify and benefit the world.” While his words referred to William Tennent, Jr., they were even more applicable to his father William Tennent, Sr., for he not only possessed an unusual degree of light and knowledge but faithfully handed it on to his sons and students in the small but significant school he founded and presided over for nineteen years.
…
On re-reading Boudinot’s memoir of William Tennent, Jr., I was struck with these words: “A neglect of this duty (that of handing down to posterity the events of the lives of those deserving commemoration) even by persons who may be conscious of the want of abilities necessary for the complete biographer, is greatly culpable and no excuse for burying in oblivion that conduct which if known might edify and benefit the world.” Thus encouraged, this work was begun not with any idea of edifying the world, but with the small hope that one or more of his descendants may be inspired to emulate him.

The story of America’s first Log College involves remarkable people who did remarkable things. Many writers at our site and elsewhere have undertaken to tell that story. One such writer was Archibald Alexander, who authored Biographical Sketches of the Founder, and Principal Alumni of the Log College (1845), in which he stated:

If I were fond of projects, I would propose that a monument be erected to the founder of the Log College on the very site where the building stood, if the land could be purchased; but at any rate a stone with an inscription might be permanently fixed on or near the ground. The tradition respecting this humble institution of learning exists, not only in the neighbourhood, but has been extended far to the south and west.

A bicentennial stone monument was indeed established at the appropriate site in Warminster, Pennsylvania in 1927, which tells of the legacy of the Log College. The Log College story is not just about the Tennent family, or even the College of New Jersey (Princeton) - the original Log College is the birthplace of something and represents, in the words of Thomas Murphy, “the cradle of the Presbyterian Church in America.” Now here in 2019, by republishing early American Presbyterian literature, and by making known the stories of early America’s Presbyterian leaders in the digital age, Log College Press is working to ensure that a new generation can learn about the hand of God at work in the history of his church. The Log College story has extended far and wide, beyond boundaries imagined by Archibald Alexander, and we are pleased to be a part of those who make it known today.

Read our authors and our biographies and autobigraphies, study church history, and peruse our other topical pages, as well as the new Log College Review. And be sure to explore our bookstore and secondary sources page for many more resources. The story of the cradle of the American Presbyterian Church is a story for the ages, including our own.

Our First Log College Review Article Has Been Posted, Have You Read It Yet?

One of the ideas floating around Log College Press for some time has been to start a “Log College Review” - an online forum for short-form scholarship on the individuals, writings, and theological issues of 18th/19th century American Presbyterianism. By short-form, we mean anything in the 500-2000 word range, something that wouldn’t be long enough to be published in an academic journal, but that carries the same commitment to rigorous academic excellence. We envision a platform for short book reviews and recommendations, both of the primary and secondary literature; for biographical explorations; for discussions of the debates and controversies of the period; for investigations into particular doctrines and streams of thought that marked our Presbyterian forefathers; for studies of homiletical exegesis, systematic formulations, biblical-theological meditations, and experiential discourses.

There are already many wonderful outlets for robust long-form scholarship on American Presbyterianism in annual, quarterly, and monthly journals from seminaries, historical societies, and churchmen such as Chris Coldwell’s The Confessional Presbyterian (don’t miss the most recent issue, with Thomas Dwight Witherspoon as a chief focus). So Log College Review aims to fill a niche for authors who want to engage in writing projects on the 18th/19th century American Presbyterian scene, but whose schedules at this time may only allow them to write shorter articles, or who want to publish pieces more frequently, or who are just starting out in academic writing. We expect the viewpoints of the articles we post to be as varied as the viewpoints of the Presbyterians on the Log College Press website, and we hope to stimulate profitable debate and discussion for the church and the academy.

The first Log College Review article, a brief review of John Williamson Nevin’s book The Anxious Bench, written by Dr. Miles Smith of Regent University, was posted this weekend - you can access it here. We hope to post more articles slowly but surely. If you are a professor, pastor, independent scholar, or student who is interested in 18th/19th century American Presbyterianism and would like to send us a submission, please email it to Caleb Cangelosi (caleb@logcollegepress.com).

If you would like to sign up to receive the Log College Review articles in your email inbox, please visit the Log College Review page. We hope Log College Review will be of value to the people of God, and that through it American Presbyterians will garner a wider audience who will better appreciate all that the modern church has to gain from these saints, who though dead, still speak.

A golden maxim from R.L. Dabney

Counsel from Robert Lewis Dabney on the need for preaching to be both doctrinal and practical:

It is the duty of the preacher so to establish the dogmas of the faith in the understandings of the people, that they shall not remain abstract dogmas, but shall reveal their close bearing upon the life. It was a golden maxim of the Protestant fathers, that “doctrines must be preached practically and duties doctrinally.”

The reasons for doctrinal preaching thus defined, may be all traced to the principle that truth is in order to godliness. Sanctification is by the truth. Man is a reasoning creature, and the word and Spirit of God deal with him in conformity with this rational nature. All those emotions and volitions, which have right moral character, are prompted in man by intelligent motives. To say that one has no reason for his volitions, is to describe them as either criminal or merely animal. In the things of God man only feels as he sees, and because he sees with his mind. A moment’s consideration of these obvious facts will convince you that there cannot be, in the nature of the case, any other instrumentality to be used by creatures for inculcating religion and procuring right feeling and action, than that which begins by informing the understanding. The truth, as seen in the light of evidence, is the only possible object of rational emotions. From this point of view, we easily understand how unreasonable are the notions and demands of those good people who decry didactic preaching. “Such discourses,” they say, “are dry and repulsive. They give us merely theology in its bare bones. They inflate the head with conceit without warming the heart. The aim of Christianity is but to make men feel and act right. Let the preacher then aim directly at the heart, producing right feeling, all will be accomplished.” Now, I might assent to the latter statements, and yet raise the question, How shall the heart be reached, except through the head? How can a rational creature be made to feel intelligently, unless we cause his reason to apprehend that which may be the object of rational feeling? If any affection is produced otherwise, it must be merely animal or else evil. Heat without light is blind, as light without heat is cold. The Sun of Righteousness, like the natural luminary, becomes the fountain of life in his appropriate realm by given heat through light. (Sacred Rhetoric, pp. 52-53)

John Rodgers on "a life of usefulness"

In November of 1808, John Rodgers preached a sermon at the opening of a new Presbyterian church in New York City, at the conclusion of which he left us with profound words to meditate and act upon even today:

As ever therefore sinners would wish to be reconciled to God — to escape eternal misery, and be prepared for unwasting blessedness — and as ever the people of God would wish to enjoy the comforts, the consolations of the religion of Jesus, as they pass through life — as they would wish to grow into a meetness for the inheritance of the saints in light, after a life of usefulness on earth — We most affectionately beseech both the one and the other, to be steady, uniform, and conscientious, in their attendance upon the house of God. Amen. (John Rodgers, The Presence of Christ the Glory of a Church: A Sermon Delivered November 6th, 1808, at the Opening of the Presbyterian Church in Cedar Street, New York)

Shedd on the love of God towards all men as men

In the context of an effort to revise the Westminster Confession of Faith, William Greenough Thayer Shedd argued in 1893 that the Confession already addressed some of the concerns that had been raised. One had to do with the question of the general love of God towards all men.

It is strenuously contended that the Standards contain no declaration of the love of God towards all men, but limit it to the elect; that they make no universal offer of salvation, but confine it to a part of mankind.

The following declaration is found in Confession ii. 1. "There is but one only living and true God, who is most loving, gracious, merciful, long suffering, abundant in goodness and truth, forgiving iniquity, transgression and sin, the rewarder of them that diligently seek him." Of whom speaketh the Confession this? of the God of the elect only? or of the God of every man? Is he the God of the elect only? Is he not also of the non-elect? Is this description of the gracious nature and attributes of God intended to be restricted to a part of mankind? Is not God as thus delineated the Creator and Father of every man without exception? Can it be supposed that the authors of this statement meant to be understood to say that God is not such a being for all men, but only for some? If this section does not teach the unlimited love and compassion of God towards all men as men, as his creatures, it teaches nothing. (Shedd, Calvinism: Pure and Mixed - A Defence of the Westminster Standards, pp. 24-25)

Samuel Bayard on the Lord's Supper

Samuel Bayard (1767-1840) was the son of Col. John Bubenheim Bayard (1738-1808), a Continental soldier and a Continental Congressman from Pennsylvania, of French Huguenot descent. Samuel was noted as a lawyer and a judge, and served as a clerk at the United States Supreme Court. He also served the College of New Jersey (Princeton) as a librarian, trustee and treasurer; and he was a founder and trustee of Princeton Theological Seminary. Additionally, he was a ruling elder at the Presbyterian Church in Princeton, New Jersey.

In 1822, Samuel Bayard published a collection of thirty letters and fifty-two sacramental hymns (some were written by Bayard himself, at least one by Samuel Davies, and other writers, such as William Cowper, are included) on the subject of the Lord’s Supper, addressing the scruples of some believers to coming to the table, and other matters common to all believers who come to the table. The introduction was written by Samuel Miller. James W. Alexander wrote a review of the book in 1840, in which he wrote.

Apart from the intrinsic importance of the subject, the volume derives peculiar interest from the fact that it comes from the pen of a layman, of a son of the Huguenots, and of “ an old disciple;” for the venerable author is now in his seventy-third year….

These Letters do not undertake to discuss the vexed questions concerning the Lord’s Supper which have occupied controvertists. They are eminently practical, being intended chiefly to remove from the minds of timid and desponding converts, particularly young believers, those undue scruples, and that unscriptural trepidation, which have kept thousands from the Lord’s Table. This is a good work, and has been performed in a manner altogether agreeable to what we suppose is the mind of the Spirit in the Scriptures. In connexion with this, the young communicant is in a perspicuous and interesting manner led into the knowledge of what this blessed ordinance signifies and communicates. There is in every page a character of gentleness and Christian benevolence, which renders it as fit to soothe the mind of the hesitating, as any similar manual with which we are acquainted. The author has gleaned from many rich fields, and spread before us the testimonies of a great number of the best theological writers, especially of French divines, whose works are not accessible to most readers.

Take time to peruse these letters, and see what a Presbyterian “son of the Huguenots” had to say about the sacrament of the Lord’s Supper. There is much here to edify the 21st century believer.

Happy New Year and Happy Birthday!

We wish to take this opportunity to wish all of our readers a very Happy New Year! We have grown much in the past year, and we couldn’t have done it without your interest and support. We are excited to see what 2019 holds for Log College Press and its readers.

Meanwhile, January 1st marks the birthday of four of our LCP authors:

• Leonard Woolsey Bacon (Jan. 1, 1830 - May 12, 1907) was a pastor of both Presbyterian and Congregational churches, and a prolific writer;

• William Imbrie (Jan. 1, 1845 - Aug. 4, 1928) was both a Princeton graduate and a longtime missionary to Japan;

• James Calvin McFeeters (Jan. 1, 1848 - Dec. 24, 1928) served as a minister of the gospel for 54 years; he was moderator of Synod (RPCNA) in 1894; he served as President of the Board of Trustees at Geneva College; and he authored several books about the Covenanters; and

• Philip Schaff (Jan. 1, 1819 - Oct. 20, 1893) was a Swiss-born Reformed minister who joined the faculty of Union Theological Seminary in New York City in 1870, and wrote extensively on church history and other matters.

January 1, 2019 also marks the 500th anniversary of the beginning of the Swiss Reformation in Zurich. Ulrich Zwingli’s (who also was born on January 1, 1484) biographer, William Maxwell Blackburn, in Ulrich Zwingli, The Patriotic Reformer: A History , tells us how it began on January 1, 1519:

On New Year s day, 1519, the thirty-fifth birthday of the preacher, Zwingli went into the cathedral pulpit. A great crowd, eager to hear the celebrated man, was before him. "It is to Christ that I desire to lead you," said he "to Christ the true source of salvation. His divine word is the only food that I wish to set before your souls." This was the theme of his inaugural on Saturday. He then announced that on the following day he would begin to expound Matthew s gospel. The next morning the preacher and a still larger audience were at their posts. He opened the long-sealed book and read the first page. He caused his hearers to marvel at that chapter of names. But it was the human genealogy of the Lord Jesus Christ patriarchs, prophets, kings were mentioned in it Jewish history was summed up therein and how forcibly did it teach that all the preceding ages had existed for the sake of him who was born of Mary, and named Immanuel! And there was the name Jesus " He shall save his people from their sins." The enraptured auditors went home saying, "We never heard the like of this before!"

Be sure to check out all of these authors, and more as we commence the New Year! “The deeper you root yourself backward in God’s work in the past, the more abundant will be the fruit you bear forward into the future.” — Caleb Cangelosi

Log College Press is growing!

Log College Press has grown a lot in 2018. We now count over 500 authors and over 2500 free PDF volumes available to read on our site. We have also slowly but steadily been adding author photos, biographical links, and information about where our authors are buried.

Also, our topical pages have been growing. By way of contrast, here is a list showing the number of works for each topical category as of July 31, 2018 and as of December 31, 2018:

Apologetics – 4 / 6
Autobiographies – 16 / 26
Biographies – 109 / 152
Christian Life – 26 / 30
Christology – 20 / 24
Church and State – 66 / 117
Church History – 117 / 165
Commentaries – 36 / 48
Compilations – 16 / 21
Correspondence – 8 / 14
Devotional – 22 / 25
Ecclesiology - 79 / 95
Eschatology – 13 / 26
Ethics – 4 / 4
Family – 20 / 23
Fiction – 14 / 20
Funeral Discourses – 34 / 46
Inaugural Addresses – 25 / 35
Missions – 41 / 84
Pastoral Theology – 6 / 6
Poetry – 24 / 42
Preaching – 9 / 13
Sacraments – 28 / 38
Sermons – 110 / 174
Systematic Theology – 13 / 17
Travelogues – 22 / 32
Westminster Standards – 39 / 45
Worship – 70 / 90

Please check out these expanding resources and check in often for more. We appreciate your support and interest, and we hope to continue growing in 2019, with the Lord’s blessing.

The ED scholarship at Princeton Theological Seminary

The story is told by David B. Calhoun, “Old Princeton Seminary and the Westminster Standards,” in Ligon Duncan, ed., The Westminster Confession into the 21st Century, Vol. 2, pp. 41-42 and by Cortlandt Van Rensselear in The Presbyterian Magazine, Vol. 7 (August 1857), pp. 369-370, of a brother and sister, Robert and Marian Hall, originally of Scotland and raised under the minister of the esteemed John Brown of Haddington, who came to America in 1785.

In 1831, they gave $2500 to endow a scholarship at (what is now known as) Princeton Theological Seminary. In doing so, they said:

Whereas, after a life of nearly fourscore years, much of which has been spent in examining the Word of God, we are fully satisfied of the correctness of the doctrines of religion as laid down in the Confession of Faith, the Larger and Shorter Catechisms, drawn up by the Westminster Assembly of Divines, and as held by the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church of the United States, we desire that the scholarship which is endowed by this our bequest of two thousand five hundred dollars, be called the ED Scholarship, as a witness between us and the Theological Seminary, that the Lord he is God, agreeable to the said Confession of Faith and Catechisms.

Farther, it is our will, that the Professors in said Seminary be careful, that no person holding sentiments inconsistent with the Confession of Faith, the Larger and Shorter Catechisms, be ever admitted to the benefit of said Scholarship.

It was their wish, furthermore, that this scholarship be given to “such as are poor and needy.” When Marian was asked why it should not be called the “Hall Scholarship,” a memorable exchange followed:

“As your brother and self have now founded a Scholarship, it can be called the Hall Scholarship.”

”I dinna wish my worthless name to be remembered after I am dead and gone, but I do wish to do something for the cause of true religion, which shall maintain the truth, as long as the Kirk shall lead, and, therefore, I wish the Scholarship to be named ED.”

Being asked the meaning of the name, she replied, “And dinna ye ken, young mon? E’en go and read your Bible.”

“Well, I have read it, and still I do not recollect the meaning of use of ED.”

“Do you not recollect that when the two tribes and a half, who had their inheritance on the east side of Jordan, had assisted the other tribes to subdue their enemies, and were about to return to their possessions, before they crossed the river, they built an altar? And do you not know that the other tribes were about to make war upon them for the erection of this altar, supposing it to have been intended for an altar of worship distinct from that appointed by Jehovah? The two and a half tribes gave the others to understand that they were entirely mistaken in their conjectures. The altar was not an altar of worship, but an altar of witness, that Jehovah alone was the true God, and that it had been created in token of their views and desires. (‘And the children of Reuben and the children of Gad called the altar ED; for it shall be a witness between us that the Lord is God.’ Joshua 22:34)

She continued, “I dinna like your Hopkinsian. I believe in the doctrines of the Bible, as expressed in the Confession of Faith, the Larger and Shorter Catechisms of the Presbyterian Church, and I wish that the Scholarship be called ED, as a witness between us and the Theological Seminary, that the Lord is God, agreeably to said Confession and Catechisms: and I dinna wish that any person holding sentiments inconsistent therewith, be ever admitted to the benefit of said scholarship.”

And that is the story of how the ED scholarship began at Princeton Theological Seminary.

The Gospel of the Incarnation, by William Swan Plumer

William Swan Plumer, the 19th century Southern Presbyterian pastor and theologian, wrote more than most of us have time to read. But you don't want to miss this excerpt from the 21st chapter of his book The Grace of Christ (available here!) on the beauty and glory of the incarnation of Jesus Christ. The gospel is richly here, soak in it today and lets it truths permeat your soul:

“Our Lord Jesus Christ became incarnate, was made under the law, lived, acted, obeyed, suffered died and rose again for his people.

He came down to earth that they might go up to heaven.

He suffered that they might reign.

He became a servant that they might become kings and priests unto God.

He died that they might live.

He bore the cross that their enmity might be slain, and their sins expiated.

He loved them that they might love God.

He was rich and became poor that they, who were poor, might be made rich.

He descended into the lower parts of the earth that they might sit in heavenly places.

He emptied himself that they might be filled with all the fullness of God.

He took upon him human nature that they might be partakers of the divine nature.

He made flesh his dwelling place that they might be an habitation of God through the Spirit.

He made himself of no reputation, that they might wear his new name, and be counted an eternal excellency.

He became a worm, and no man, that they, who were sinful worms, might be made equal to the angels.

He bore the curse of a broken covenant that they might partake of all the blessings of the everlasting covenant, ordered in all things and sure.

Though heir of all things, he was willingly despised of the people, that they, who were justly condemned, might obtain and inheritance that is incorruptible, undefiled, and that fadeth not away.

His death was a satisfaction to divine justice, a ransom for many, a propitiation for sin, a sweet smelling savour to God, that we, who were an offense to God, might become his sons and daughters.

He was made sin for his people that they might be made the righteousness of God in him. 

Though Lord of all He took the form of a servant, that they, who were the servants of sin, might prevail like princes with God. 

He, who had made swaddling-clothes bands for the sea, was wrapped in swaddling-clothes that they, who were cast out in their blood, might be clothed in linen white and clean, which is the righteousness of the saints.

He had not where to lay His head that they who otherwise must have laid down in eternal sorrow, might read the mansions in His Father’s house. 

He was beset with lions and bulls of Bashan, that his chosen might be compassed about with an innumerable company of angels and of the spirits of just men made perfect.

He drank the cup of God’s indignation that they might for ever drink of the river of His pleasures.

He hungered that they might eat the bread of life.

He thirsted that they might drink the water of life.

He was numbered with the transgressors that they might stand among the justified, and be counted among the jewels.

He made His grave with the wicked that they might sleep in Jesus.

Though He was set up from everlasting, from the beginning, or ever the earth was, yet He became a helpless infant, that creatures of yesterday, sentenced to death, might live for ever.

He wore a crown of thorns that all, who love His appearing, might wear a crown of life.

He wept tears of anguish that His elect might weep tears of repentance not to be repented of.

He bore the yoke of obedience unto death that they might find His yoke easy and His burden light.

He poured out His soul unto death, lay three days in the heart of the earth, then burst the bars of death, and arose to God, that they, who through fear of death were all their lifetime subject to bondage, might obtain the victory over the grave and become partakers of His resurrection.

He exhausted the penalty of the law that His redeemed might have access to the inexhaustible treasures of mercy, wisdom, faithfulness, truth and grace promised by the Lord.

He passed from humiliation to humiliation, till He reached the sepulcher of Joseph, that His people might be changed from glory to glory as by the Spirit of the Lord.

He was matchless in grace that they might be matchless in gratitude.

Though a Son, He became a voluntary exile, that they, who had wickedly wandered afar off, might be brought nigh by His blood.

He was compassed about with all their innocent infirmities that He might perfect His strength in their weakness.

His visage was so marred more than any man, that His ransomed might be presented before God without spot, or blemish, or wrinkle, or any such thing.

For a time He was forsaken of His Father that they, whom He bought with His blood, might behold the light of God’s countenance forever.

He came and dwelt with them that they might be forever with the Lord.

He was hung up naked before His insulting foes that all, who believe on His name, might wear a glorious wedding garment, a spotless righteousness.

Though He was dead, He is the firstborn among many brethren.

Through His sorrow His people obtain joy and gladness, and sorrow and sighing flee away.

Though He endured the worst things, they do and shall forever enjoy the best things

Wonderful mystery! God was manifested in the flesh! Here is no absurdity, no contradiction, no fiction, and yet a mystery that baffles all attempts to solve it, and dazzles all human and angelic vision. Blessed is he, who is not offended in Jesus. Blessed is he, who loves the incarnate mystery, and rests upon it. It is a mystery of love, of power, of salvation. It is the mystery of Godliness. It is the great study of the inhabitants of heaven, and shall be while immortality endures.”

An American Jeremiad by David Caldwell

Although his main aim in life was to serve the Lord as a minister of the gospel, by necessity, David Stewart Caldwell, Sr. (1725-1824) often found himself bound to serve his community in other capacities. He established a “Log College” in his home in 1767 in order to teach young people; he studied medicine and worked as a physician to attend to the medical needs of those around him where doctors were lacking; and he served (unsuccessfully) as a mediator at the 1771 Battle of Alamance between Governor Tryon and the Regulators who were resisting unjust British taxes.

Some refer to this battle as the first battle of the American War of Independence. In any case, the behavior of Tryon, who personally and impulsively executed one of the Regulators on the spot without trial, and later executed several captured prisoners, shocked and disturbed Caldwell. Also, in 1766, he had married Rachel Craighead, daughter of the first American Covenanter minister in America, Alexander Craighead, who had preached against British tyranny as early as 1743 and who had inspired the famous 1775 Mecklenburg Declaration of Independence. So when Alexander MacWhorter and Elihu Spencer came to North Carolina in 1775 seeking a someone to rouse colonial resistance to British tyranny from the pulpit, they found David Caldwell willing to rise to the occasion. Sometime in early 1776, Caldwell preached a sermon based on Proverbs 12:24 (“the slothful shall be under tribute”) titled “The Character and Doom of the Sluggard.” This sermon, known to history (perhaps regrettably) as “the Sluggard Sermon,” preached shortly before John Witherspoon’s famous “The Dominion of Providence Over the Passions of Men,” has been called “a seven-thousand word Jeremiad detailing the sinfulness of political indifference and the wickedness of cowering before a tyrant” (Robert McCluer Calhoon, Political Moderation in America’s First Two Centuries, p. 123).

Caldwell here aimed to stir up his parishioners, many of whom had previously served as Regulators, to support the early resolutions of the Continental Congress on behalf of independence:

We have therefore come to that trying period in our history in which it is manifest that the Americans must either stoop under a load of the vilest slavery, or resist their imperious and haughty oppressors; but what will follow must be of the utmost importance to every individual of these United Colonies; and should be the hearty concern of every honest American. — What will be recorded on the following page of our history must depend very much on our conduct; for if we act like the sluggard, refuse, from the mere love of ease and self indulgence, to make the sacrifices and efforts which the circumstances require, or, from cowardice and pusillanimity, shrink from dangers and hardships, we must continue in our present state of bondage and oppression, while that bondage and oppression may be increased until life itself will become a burden; but if we stand up manfully and unitedly in defence of our rights, appalled by no dangers and shrinking from no toils or privations, we shall do valiantly. Our foes are powerful and determined on conquest; but our cause is good; and in the strength of the Lord, who is mightier than all, we shall prevail.

This sermon had the rousing effect that was intended (on April 12, 1776, the Halifax Convention authorized North Carolina’s delegates to the Continental Congress to vote for independence), and North Carolina did much to embrace and support the Patriots’ cause during the War. Caldwell and his family suffered greatly for their adherence to the cause of freedom: British General Cornwallis placed a £200 bounty on Caldwell’s head, and his house was plundered, his library and livestock destroyed, and his family was mistreated by British soldiers. Before and during the 1781 Battle of Guilford, Caldwell was forced to hide in a nearby swamp. But Caldwell and his wife Rachel outlived this war and the War of 1812.

The two of them, meanwhile, resumed their Log College labors with tremendous success. “Caldwell Academy, which Reverend Caldwell began in 1767, became the most well known and longest lasting of any of the thirty-three Presbyterian log colleges that were established before the Revolutionary War. At the time the academy closed, almost all of the Presbyterian ministers in the South were either graduates of or had taught at the college, about 135 ministers in all. Five governors, fifty U.S. senators and congressmen and numerous doctors had attended Caldwell Academy. Rachel got to know all the students at the academy, was extremely kind to them and instructed them in every way possible on their salvation. It was said that ‘David Caldwell made them scholars, but Mrs. Caldwell made them preachers’” (Richard P. Plumer, Charlotte and the American Revolution: Reverend Alexander Craighead, the Mecklenburg Declaration & the Foothills Fight for Independence, p. 67).

Consecrate Our Children: G.B. Strickler

Among the addresses given to commemorate the 1888 centennial of the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church in the United States of America (which is available to read in its entirety on our Compilations page) is one by Givens Brown Strickler titled “The Children of the Covenant.” It is a brief address emphasizing the Presbyterian doctrine of covenant theology, based on the promises of God, and its outworking in the place of children within the Church. He concludes his address with an important point about the need for parents, as stewards of God’s good gift, to consecrate their children to the Lord.

Another reason for our interest in children is our belief that the Scriptures teach the duty of consecrating them to God in a covenant well ordered and sure. As we consecrate our time, and possessions, and ourselves to God, so should we consecrate our children. God never asks for the consecration of anything that He will not accept. As God accepts parents He accepts their children, and as He accepts the parents promising to be their God and Saviour, so He accepts the children as their God and Saviour. He is obliged to do so, unless we assume that God requires a consecration and then refuses to receive it. The seal of the covenant guarantees that the consecrated shall be accepted, as the rainbow that stretched across the heavens guaranteed that the world should not again be destroyed by water. So the sprinkling of the water of baptism assures parents that their consecration of their children shall not be in vain. By means like these the Presbyterian Church in every age of the world has shown its interest in its youth, and the result has been that Presbyterian children growing to manhood and womanhood have, as a rule, been characterized by clearer, stronger, and more settled views of truth than the children of any other people in the history of the world, and have been as useful, as earnest and as persevering propagators of the truth of God's Word as the world has ever seen.

A 19th century American Covenanter on the blessings of the Christian Sabbath

Writing in 1892, Reformed Presbyterian minister James Calvin McFeeters had this to say about the sweet blessings of the Christian Sabbath:

The Sabbath was ordained also for worship. It conveys two great blessings to man, — the privilege of rest and of praise. These are the "silvery wings" of this dove of peace, that hovers over our earth with a benediction for every one who will look up and receive. The Sabbath comes to anoint the soul with new strength, and lead it into the presence of God, to worship the Creator of heaven and earth. It comes as the shadow of Jesus, whose memorial it is, and his people can sit in the pleasant shade, to be regaled with the cool and balmy winds, which subdue the fever arising from protracted toil. The day is well spent, only when it is given back to God in holy services. This is rest. We worship that we may rest. The holy use of the Sabbath, by the active employment of our spiritual powers, is the best rest for both body and soul. Change of employment brings the perfect rest. To lift up the mind in contemplation of the divine, the heavenly, the eternal, and to assume the attitude of devotion — this is for most people the greatest possible change, and therefore, the greatest possible rest. Hence Covenanters have written in their Testimony, (and try to practice what they write): "The whole day is to be employed exclusively in the public and private exercises of God's worship, except so much of it as may be taken up in the works of necessity and mercy" (The Covenanters in America, pp. 167-168).

May these words be an encouragement to you, dear reader, as the Sabbath day approaches this week.

New Schaff resources at LCP

Although Philip Schaff was from Germany and originally a minister in the German Reformed Church, he later came to America, joined the Presbyterian Church in the USA, and served on the faculty of Union Theological Seminary in New York.

And although he was an exponent of Mercersburg Theology, he was also a very able and judicious church historian. A prolific writer, he published the first volume of his History of the Christian Church in 1858. Volumes 2-4, 6 and 7 were also published during his lifetime, and vols. 5, part 1 and 2 were edited and published by his son, David Schley Schaff, posthumously. Three volumes of The Creeds of Christendom were published in 1877. These two sets, in particular, have been republished to the present day, and remain standard works in church history and historical theology.

These, along with other volumes by these two noted church historians, are now available to read at Log College Press.

19th Century Devotionals for 21st Century Readers at Log College Press

Are you in search of a classic devotional reading for 2019? We have some to offer at Log College Press. Some are intended to provide daily meditations for prayerful consideration on each day of the year; others are general guides to studying the Bible and to Christian living; and still others are full of inspirational thoughts and poetry for the Christian reader. Consider the following:

Daily Devotional Readings for the Whole Year

• James Russell Miller has at least two such compilations of devotional readings for each day of the year: Dr. Miller's Year Book: A Year's Daily Readings (1895) and Morning Thoughts For Every Day in the Year (1906);

• William Rogers Richards published The Truth in Love: From the Sermons of William R. Richards (1912);

• Charles Adamson Salmond wrote For Days of Youth: A Bible Text and Talk For Every Day of the Year (1896) aimed at young people;

• Thomas De Dwitt Talmage authored Choice Readings for Every Day in the Year (1875); and

• Henry Jackson Van Dyke, Jr. wrote The Friendly Year (1900, 1903).

Guides to Bible Study and Christian Living

• James Waddel Alexander wrote Uncle Austin and His Nephews, or, The Scripture Guide - Being a Familiar Introduction to the Study of the Bible (1838);

• James Robert Boyd wrote Daily Communion With God on the Plan Recommended by the Rev. Matthew Henry, V.D.M., For Beginning, Spending, Concluding Each Day With God (1873);

• Charles Hodge authored The Way of Life (1841);

• James Russell Miller published a series of devotional studies covering the whole Bible, of which we have seven out of the eight volumes;

• Alfred Nevin wrote two guides to the study of the Scriptures: Guide to the Oracles; or, The Bible Student's Vade-Mecum (1858) and The Book Opened; or, An Analysis of the Bible (1873); and

• Robert Craig Reed authored Helps to Christian Devotion, Consisting of Dissertations on the Psalms (1833).

Inspirational Thoughts, Sermons and Poems

• Maltbie Davenport Babcock’s Thoughts for Every-Day Living from the Spoken and Written Words of Maltbie Davenport Babcock (1901) was posthumously published and filled with meditations, poems and inspirational thoughts;

• Henry Augustus Boardman’s Mottoes For the New Year, as Given in Texts of Sermons (1882) contains sermons given to encourage believers in the New Year; and

• William Henry Fentress, the blind Presbyterian minister who died so young, authored Love Truths From the Bible (1879), which contains sweet sermons that point to Christ on every page.

There are valuable devotional resources here that may be a help to your spiritual walk in 2019. Consider adding one or more of these volumes to your reading list in the morning or evening, and may these 19th century writers be a blessing to you in the New Year ahead.

Christian, do you experience depression? You are not alone - read this from the journal of David Brainerd

It was a Sabbath evening nearly 300 years ago when young David Brainerd wrote this in his journal:

Lord’s day, Dec, 16. [1744]

Was so overwhelmed with dejection, that I knew not how to live. I longed for death exceedingly: my soul was sunk into deep waters, and floods were ready to drown me. I was so much oppressed, that my soul was in a kind of horror; could not keep my thoughts fixed in prayer, for the space of one minute, without fluttering and distraction; and was exceedingly ashamed, that I did not live to God. I had no distressing doubt about my own state; but would have cheerfully ventured (as far as I could possibly know) into eternity.

While I was going to preach to the Indians, my soul was in anguish; I was so overborne with discouragement that I despaired of doing any good, and was driven to my wit’s-end; I knew nothing what to say, nor what course to take. But at last I insisted on the evidence we have of the truth of Christianity form the miracles of Christ; many of which I set before them: and God helped me to make a close application to those who refused to believe the truth of what I taught them. Indeed I was enabled to speak to the consciences of all, in some measure, and was somewhat encouraged to find that God enabled me to be faithful once more.

Them came and preached to another company of them; but was very weary and faint. In the evening, I was refreshed and enabled to pray and praise God with composure and affection; had some enlargement and courage with respect to my work; was willing to live, and longed to do more for God than my weak state of body would admit of.

I can do all things through Christ that strengtheth me; and by his grace, I am willing to spend and be spent in his Service, when l am not thus sunk in dejection and a kind of despair.

This great saint, the minister and missionary who spent himself in service to God and Native Americans, also struggled with bouts of depression, which is evident in reading his journal. If you are reading this, dear Christian, and you can relate, be encouraged, as Brainered was, by the promises of God for the support of his precious saints. And know that you are not alone. (HT: Victor McKinnon)

The North and the South Celebrate the 250th Anniversary of the Westminster Assembly

One of the reasons I started Log College Press was because I like books, especially old books. Another reason was because I like history, especially the history of books about history. I like seeing how past generations thought about the past, and how that thought has changed over time. The fancy name for it is “historiography,” the study of the writing of history, or the study of the methods by which historians practiced their trade, and the interpretations historians throughout history have given to events in the past. I can probably credit my 12th grade AP American History teacher for this part of my intellectual pleasure, because she would frequently teach us not only about the past, but about how various historians viewed the past.

All that to say, I like perusing books like the two published at the end of the 19th century by the Northern and Southern Presbyterian Churches, that celebrated the 250th anniversary of the Westminster Assembly. The North published Addresses at the Celebration of the Two Hundred and Fiftieth Anniversary of the Westminster Assembly in 1898, while the South published Memorial Volume of the Westminster Assembly one year before (both of these volumes are on our Compilations page). Not only do you find in these works in-depth studies of particular topics from the Westminster Confession of Faith and Catechisms, but you also learn how approaches to the Confession and to the Assembly have changed over the years.

If you appreciate the Westminster Assembly and its written documents, if you enjoy history, and especially if you are such a history nerd that you love historiography, then you will love reading these two books. They’re free on our site, so download them today.

Who was the finest exegete in the history of the Church? - T.V. Moore answers

Thomas Verner Moore was a Biblical commentator of very high rank. In the introduction to his commentary on the books of Haggai, Zechariah, and Malachi discussed his opinion of who constitutes the best expositor of the Bible in church history.

The first expositor of real value was Calvin. His commentaries on the Minor Prophets were delivered in the form of expository lectures in a daily exercise, and extend through one hundred and eighty-two lectures, which were delivered extempore, and taken down as they were spoken. There is probably nothing that he has left behind him which gives a more distinct notion of the man and the times than these lectures. That a congregation could be formed who would take so deep an interest in such expositions admits us to the heart of the Reformation, and lays bare to us the secret of its life, which was, a living grasp of the Word of God. The style of these lectures, the allusions to passing events, and the ocassional abrupt ending of a lecture with the remarks, "we stop here until to-morrow," gives a life-like vividness, and actual presence to these daily exercises, that invest them with unusual interest. Each lecture also ends with a prayer, and these prayers for condensed energy and fervor, grasp of thought, and concentration of the whole spirit of the preceding lecture into devotional forms, are even more remarkable than the lectures themselves. The prodigous intellect of that remarkable man is felt in these prayers more intensely by a careful reader than in almost anything else he has left behind him. But the lectures are very remarkable productions. Calvin had probably one of the finest exegetical minds that God has ever granted to his Church in modern times. He had a direct looking into the heart of the passage, a fine sympathy with the mind of the writer, a freedom from all that is fanciful and foolish, and a justness of thinking that leads him almost instinctively to the correct view of the passage. To some, this may seem to be extravagant laudation, but not to those who have carefully studied his commentaries. Their merits have extorted tributes of the highest character from those whom nothing could move to give such tributes but the most unquestioned excellence. One of the most remarkable of these is from the pen of the man whose name has been embalmed in theological antagonism to his, the celebrated, acute, and learned Arminius. He says, "Next to the reading of Scripture, which I strongly recommend, I advise you to read the commentaries of Calvin, on whom I bestow higher eulogies than Helmichius did, for I consider that he is incomparable in interpreting Scripture, and that his Commentaries are of more value than all that the library of the Fathers transmits to us; so that I concede to him a spirit of prophecy superior to that of most, yea, of all others." (Commentary on Haggai, Zechariah and Malachi, pp. 35-36) - HT: Rocky A. Simbaion

Charles Hodge on Meditation as a Means of Grace

In the context of discussing a recurring theme in sermons by Charles Hodge dealing with the importance of meditation in the life of the Christian believer, Andrew Hoffecker writes:

In a conference sermon on the subject “Meditation as a Means of Grace,” Hodge pointed out the main distinction between meditation and mere intellectual consideration of an idea. The object of the latter is merely to understand intellectually while the object of meditation is to experience the power of God’s Word. He outlines suggestions to aid in this exercise. Believers ought to purpose to do this faithfully, setting aside times when it might be regularly performed. It should be done concomitantly with prayer, i.e., “not only in the formal sense of the word, but also as meaning converse with God.” (W. Andrew Hoffecker, Piety and the Princeton Theologians, pp. 82-83)

Here is the text briefly and directly from Hodge:

Meditation as a Means of Grace

I. What is meditation?
It is the serious, prolonged, devout contemplation of divine things. 1. This is distinguished from mere intellectual examination or consideration. It has a different object. The object of the one is to understand, of the other to experience the power. 2. It is distinguished from casual devout thought and aspiration.

II. It is a means of grace. By means of grace is meant a divinely appointed instrumentality for promoting holiness in the soul. That meditation is such a means is proved, 1. From its being frequently enjoined in Scripture for this end. 2. From the example of the saint as recorded in Scripture. 3. From the experience of the people of God in all ages.

III. Why is it thus salutary? 1. Because God has appointed his truth as the great means of sanctification. 2. Because the truth, to produce its effect, must be present to the mind. "God is not in all his thoughts," it is said of the wicked. "Estranged from God," is the description of the ungodly. 3. The intimate relation between knowledge and feeling, between the cognition and recognition, the … (knowing), and the … (acknowledgment) of divine truth. 4. Because all unholy feelings are subdued in the presence of God, unsound principles are corrected in the light of divine truth. We become conformed to the things with which we are familiar.

IV. Subjects on which we should meditate, are, God, — his law, — his Son, — the plan of salvation, — our own state as sinners, — heaven, etc.

V. Difficulties in the way of this duty. 1. The difficulty of continuous thought. 2. Preoccupation with other things. 3. Indisposition to holding communion with God. 4. Want of method and purpose.

VI. Directions for the performance of the duty. 1. Form the purpose to be faithful in its discharge, from a sense of duty and conviction of its importance. 2. Have a time and place sacred to the duty. 3. Connect it with prayer, not only in the formal sense of the word, but also as meaning converse with God. 4. Connect it with the reading of the Scriptures. Meditate on the word. Read it slowly, with self-application, and pondering its import. 5. Cultivate the habit application, and pondering its import. 5. Cultivate the habit of controlling your thoughts. Do not let them be governed by accident or fortuitous association. Keep the rudder always in your hand. 6. Do not be discouraged by frequent failure; and do not suppose that the excitement of feeling is the measure of advantage. There may be much learned, and much strength gained when there is little emotion. 7. Consecrate the hours especially of social and public worship to this work. Let the mind be filled with God while in his house. (Charles Hodge, sermon preached on Oct. 28, 1855 in Princeton Sermons, pp. 298-299 and Conference Papers, pp. 298-299)