Luther and the Reformation Part 11

There never was a general served with so much cheerfulness and devotion as he. He was of an affable and friendly disposition, readily expressing commendation, and n.o.ble actions were indelibly fixed upon his memory; on the other hand, excessive politeness and flattery he hated, and if any person approached him in that way he never trusted him."

AXEL OXENSTIERN.

AXEL OXENSTIERN, his friend, companion, and prime minister, was of like mind and character with himself. He was high-born, religiously trained, and thoroughly educated in both theology and law in the best schools which the world then afforded. He was Sweden's greatest and wisest counselor and diplomatist, liberal-minded, true-hearted, dignified, and devout. In religion, in patriotism, in earnest doing for the profoundest interests of man, he was one with his ill.u.s.trious king. He negotiated the Peace of Kmered with Denmark, the Peace of s...o...b..wa with Russia, and the armistice with Poland. He accompanied his king in the campaigns in Germany, having charge of all diplomatic affairs and the devising of ways and means for the support of the army in the field, whilst the king commanded it. He won no victories of war, but he was a choice spirit in creating the means by which some of the most valuable of such victories were achieved, and conducted those victories to permanent peace.

When Gustavus Adolphus fell at Lutzen a sacrifice to religious liberty, the whole administration of the kingdom was placed in Oxenstiern's hands. The congress of foreign princes at Heilbronn elected him to the headship of their league against the papal power of Austria; and it was his wisdom and heroism alone which held the league together unto final triumph. Bauer, Torstensson, and Von Wrangle were the flaming swords which finally overwhelmed that power, but the brain which brought the fearful Thirty Years' War to a final close, and established the evangelical cause upon its lasting basis of security by the Peace of Westphalia (1648), was that of Axel Oxenstiern, the very man who sent to Pennsylvania its original colonists as the founders of a free state.

PETER MINUIT.

A kindred spirit was PETER MINUIT, the man whom Oxenstiern selected and commissioned to accompany these first colonists to the west bank of the Delaware, and to act as their president and governor.

He too was a high-born, cultured, large-minded Christian man. He was an honored deacon in the Walloon church at Wesel. Removing to Holland, his high qualities led to his selection by the Dutch West India Company as the fittest man to be the first governor and director-general of the Dutch colonies on the Hudson. His great efficiency and public success in that capacity made him the subject of jealousies and accusations, resulting in his recall after five or six years of the most effective administration of the affairs of those colonies. Oxenstiern had the breadth and penetration to understand his real worth, and appointed him the first governor of the New Sweden which since has become the great State of Pennsylvania. He lived less than five years in this new position, and died in Fort Christina, which he built and held during his last years of service on earth. He was a wise, laborious, and far-seeing man, consecrated with all his powers to the formation of a free commonwealth on this then wild territory. His name has largely sunk away from public attention, as the work of the Swedes in general in the founding and fashioning of our commonwealth; but he and they deserve far better than has been awarded them.

A few years ago (1876) some movement was for the first time made to erect a suitable monument to the memory of Minuit. Surely the founder of the greatest city in this Western World, and of the colonial possessions of two European nations, and the first president and governor of the two greatest States in the American Union, ranks among the great historic personages of his period; and his high qualities, n.o.ble spirit, and valuable services demand for him a grateful recognition which has been far too slow in coming. There is a debt owing to his name and memory which New York, Pennsylvania, and the American people have not yet duly discharged.

And to these grand men, first of all, are we under obligation of everlasting thanks for our free and happy old commonwealth.

WILLIAM PENN.

But without WILLIAM PENN to reinforce and more fully execute the n.o.ble plans, ideas, and beginnings which went before him, things perhaps never would have come to the fortunate results which he was the honored instrument in bringing about.

This man, so renowned in the history of our State, and so specially honored by the peculiar Society of which he was a zealous apostle, was respectably descended. His grandfather was a captain in the English navy, and his father became a distinguished naval officer, who reached high promotion and gave his son the privileges of a good education.

Penn was for three years a student in the University of Oxford, until expelled, with others, for certain offensive non-conformities. He was not what we would call religiously trained, but he was endowed with a strong religious nature, even bordering on fanaticism, so that he needed only the application of the match to set his whole being aglow and active with the profoundest zeal, whether wise or otherwise. And that match was early applied.

When England had reached the summit of delirium under her usurping Protector, Oliver Cromwell, there arose, among many other sects full of enthusiastic self-a.s.sertion, that of the Quakers, who were chiefly characterized by a profound religious, and oft fanatical, opposition to the Established Church, as well as to the Crown. Coming in contact with one of their most zealous preachers, young Penn was inflamed with their spirit and became a vigorous propagator of their particular style of devotion.

As the Quaker tenets respected the state as well as religion, the bold avowal of them brought him into collision with the laws, and several times into prison and banishment. But, so far from intimidating him, this only the more confirmed him in his convictions and fervency. By his familiarity with able theologians, such as Dr. Owen and Bishop Tillotson, as well as from his own studies of the Scriptures, he was deeply grounded in the main principles of the evangelic faith. Indeed, he was in many things, in his later life, much less a Quaker than many who glory in his name, and all his sons after him found their religious home in the Church of England, which, to Quakers generally, was a very Babylon. But he was an honest-minded, pure, and cultured Christian believer, holding firmly to the inward elements of the orthodox faith in G.o.d and Christ, in revelation and eternal judgment, in the rights of man and the claims of justice. If some of his friends and representatives did not deal as honorably with the Swedes in respect to their prior t.i.tles to their improved lands as right and charity would require, it is not to be set down to his personal reproach. And his zeal for his sect and his genuine devotion to G.o.d and religious liberty, together with a large-hearted philanthropy, were the springs which moved him to seize the opportunity which offered in the settlement of his deceased father's claim on the government to secure a grant of territory and privilege to form a free state in America--first for his own, and then for all other persecuted people.

AN ESTIMATE OF PENN.

It may be that Penn has been betimes a little overrated. He has, and deserves, a high place in the history of our commonwealth, but he was not the real founder of it; for its foundations were laid years before he was born and more than forty years before he received his charter.

He founded Pennsylvania only as Americus Vespucius discovered America.

Neither was he the author of those elements of free government, equal rights, and religious liberty which have characterized our commonwealth. They were the common principles of Luther and the Reformation, and were already largely embodied for this very territory[34] long before Penn's endeavors, as also, in measure, in the Roman Catholic colony of Maryland from the same source.

Nor was he, in his own strength, possessed of so much wise forethought and profound legislative and executive ability as that with which he is sometimes credited. But he was a conscientious, earnest, and G.o.d-fearing man, cultured by education and grace, gifted with admirable address, sincere and philanthropic in his aims, and guided and impelled by circ.u.mstances and a peculiar religious zeal which Providence overruled to ends far greater than his own intentions or thoughts.

FOOTNOTES:

[34] See sketch of the plan of Gustavus Adolphus for his colony, page 143, and the instructions given to Governor Printz in 1642.

PENN AND THE INDIANS.

What is called Penn's particular policy toward the Indians, and the means of his successes in that regard, existed in practical force scores of years before he arrived. His celebrated treaties with them, as far as they were fact, were but continuations and repet.i.tions between them and the English, which had long before been made between them and the Swedes, who did more for these barbarian peoples than he, and who helped him in the matter more than he helped himself.

We are not fully informed respecting all the first instructions given to Governor Minuit when he came hither with Pennsylvania's original colony in 1637-38, but there is every reason to infer that they strictly corresponded to those given to his successor, Governor Printz, five years afterward, on his appointment in 1642, about which there can be no question. Minuit entered into negotiations with the Indians the very first thing on his landing, and purchased from them, as the rightful proprietors, all the land on the western side of the river from Henlopen to Trenton Falls; a deed for which was regularly drawn up, to which the Indians subscribed their hands and marks. Posts were also driven into the ground as landmarks of this treaty, which were still visible in their places sixty years afterward.

In the appointment and commission of Governor Printz it was commanded him to "bear in mind the articles of contract entered into with the wild inhabitants of the country as its rightful lords." "The wild nations bordering on all other sides the governor shall understand how to treat with all humanity and respect, that no violence, or wrong be done them; but he shall rather at every opportunity exert himself that the same wild people may gradually be instructed in the truths and worship of the Christian religion, and in other ways brought to civilization and good government, and in this manner properly guided.

Especially shall he seek to gain their confidence, and impress upon their minds that neither he, the governor, nor his people and subordinates, are come into those parts to do them any wrong or injury."

This policy was not a thing of mere coincidence. It was the express stipulation and command of the throne of Sweden, August 15, 1642, which was two years before William Penn was born; and "this policy was steadily pursued and adhered to by the Swedes during the whole time of their continuance in America, as the governors of the territory of which they had thus acquired the possession; and the consequences were of the most satisfactory character. They lived in peace with the Indians, and received no injuries from them. The Indians respected them, and long after the Swedish power had disappeared from the sh.o.r.es of the Delaware they continued to cherish its memory and speak of it with confidence and affection."[35]

Governor Printz arrived in this country in 1642, and with him came Rev. John Campanius as chaplain and pastor of the Swedish colony. His grandson, Thomas Campanius Holm, many years after published numerous items put on record by the elder Campanius, in which it appears that the commands to Printz respecting the Indians were very scrupulously carried out.

According to these records, the Indians were very familiar at the house of the elder Campanius, and he did much to teach and Christianize them. "He generally succeeded in making them understand that there is one Lord G.o.d, self-existent and one in three Persons; how the same G.o.d made the world, and made man, from whom all other men have descended; how Adam afterward disobeyed, sinned against his Creator, and involved all his descendants in condemnation; how G.o.d sent his only-begotten Son Jesus Christ into the world, who was born of the Virgin Mary and suffered for the saving of men; how he died upon the cross, and was raised again the third day; and, lastly, how, after forty days, he ascended into heaven, whence he will return at a future day to judge the living and the dead," etc. And so much interest did they take in these instructions, and seemed so well disposed to embrace Christianity, that Campanius was induced to study and master their language, that he might the more effectually teach them the religion of Christ. He also translated into the Indian language the Catechism of Luther, perhaps the very first book ever put into the Indian tongue.

Campanius began his work of evangelizing these wild people four years before Eliot, who is sometimes called "the morning star of missionary enterprise," but who first commenced his labors in New England only in 1646. Hence Dr. Clay remarks that "the Swedes may claim the honor of having been the first missionaries among the Indians, at least in Pennsylvania."[36] "It was, _in fact, the Swedes who inaugurated the peaceful policy of William Penn_. This was not an accidental circ.u.mstance in the Swedish policy, but was deliberately adopted and always carefully observed."[37]

When Mr. Rising became governor of the Swedish colony he invited ten Indian chiefs, or kings, to a friendly conference with him. It was held at Tinic.u.m, on the Delaware, June 17, 1654, when the governor saluted them, in the name of the Swedish queen, with a.s.surances of every kindness toward them, and proposed to them a firm renewal of the old friendship. Campanius has given a minute account of this conference, and recites the speech in which one of the chiefs, named Naaman, testified how good the Swedes had been to them; that the Swedes and Indians had been in the time of Governor Printz as one body and one heart; that they would henceforward be as one head, like the calabash, which has neither rent nor seam, but one piece without a crack; and that in case of danger to the Swedes they would ever serve and defend them. It was at the same time further arranged and agreed that if any trespa.s.ses were committed by any of their people upon the property of the Swedes, the matter should be investigated by men chosen from both sides, and the person found guilty "should be punished for it as a warning to others."[38] This occurred when William Penn was but ten years of age, and twenty-eight years before his arrival in America.

And upon the subject of the help which the Swedes rendered to Penn in his dealings with these people in the long after years, Acrelius writes: "The Proprietor ingratiated himself with the Indians. The Swedes acted as his interpreters, especially Captain Lars (Lawrence) k.o.c.k, who was a great favorite among the Indians. He was sent to New York to buy goods suitable for traffic. He did all he could to give them a good opinion of their new ruler" (p. 114); and it was by means of the aid and endeavors of the Swedes, more than by any influence of his own, that Penn came to the standing with these people to which he attained, and on which his fame in that regard rests.

FOOTNOTES:

[35] Introduction to Acrelius's _History_.

[36] _Swedish Annals_, p. 26.

[37] Dr. Reynolds's _Introduction to Acrelius_, p. 14.

[38] See Acrelius's _History_, pp. 64, 65, and Clay's _Swedish Annals_, pp. 24, 25.

PENN'S WORK.

But still, as a man, a colonist, a governor, and a friend of the race, we owe to William Penn great honor and respect, and his arrival here is amply worthy of our grateful commemoration. The location and framing of this goodly city, and a united and consolidated Pennsylvania established finally in its original principles of common rights and common freedom, are his lasting monument. If he was not the spring of our colonial existence, he was its reinforcement by a strong and fortunate stream, which more fully determined the channel of its history. If the doctrine of liberty of conscience and religion, the principles of toleration and common rights, and the embodying of them in a free state open to all sufferers for conscience' sake, did not originate with him, he performed a n.o.ble work and contributed a powerful influence toward their final triumph and permanent establishment on this territory. And his career, taken all in all, connects his name with an ill.u.s.trious service to the cause of freedom, humanity, and even Christianity, especially in its more practical and ethical bearings.

THE GREATNESS OF FAITH.

Such, then, were the men most concerned in founding and framing our grand old commonwealth. They were men of faith, men of thorough culture, men of mark by birth and station, men who had learned to grapple with the great problem of human rights, human happiness, human needs, and human relations to heaven and earth. They believed in G.o.d, in the revelation of G.o.d, in the Gospel of Christ, in the responsibility of the soul to its Maker, and in the demands of a living charity toward G.o.d and all his creatures. And their religious faith and convictions const.i.tuted the fire which set them in motion and sustained and directed their exertions for the n.o.ble ends which it is ours so richly to enjoy. Had they not been the earnest Christians that they were, they never could have been the men they proved themselves, nor ever have thought the thoughts or achieved the glorious works for ever connected with their names.

We are apt to contemplate Christian faith and devotion only in its more private and personal effects on individual souls, the light and peace it brings to the true believer, and the purification and hope it works in the hearts of those who receive it, whilst we overlook its force upon the great world outside and its shapings of the facts and currents of history. We think of Luther wrestling with his sins, despairing and dying under the impossible task of working out for himself an availing righteousness, and rejoice with him in the light and peace which came to his agonized soul through the grand and all-conditioning doctrine of justification by simple faith in an all-sufficient Redeemer; but we do not always realize how the breaking of that evangelic principle into his earnest heart was the incarnation of a power which divided the Christian ages, brought the world over the summit of the water-shed, and turned the gravitation of the laboring nations toward a new era of liberty and happiness. And so we refer to the spiritual training of a Gustavus Adolphus and an Axel Oxenstiern in the simple truths of Luther's Catechism and the restored Gospel, and to the opening of the heart of a William Penn to the exhortations of Friend Loe to forsake the follies of the corrupt world and seek his portion with the pure in heaven, and mark the unfoldings of their better nature which those blessed instructions wrought; whilst we fail to note that therein lay the springs and germs which have given us our grand commonwealth and established for us the free inst.i.tutions of Church and State in which we so much glory and rejoice.

Ah, yes; there is greatness and good and blessing untold for man and for the world in the personal hearing, believing, and heeding of the Word and testimony of G.o.d. No man can tell to what new impulses in human history, or to what new currents of benediction and continents of national glory, it may lead for souls in the school of Christ to open themselves meekly to the inflowings of Heaven's free grace. It was the sowing of G.o.d's truth and the planting of G.o.d's Spirit in these men's hearts that most of all grew for us our country and our blessed liberties.

II. THE PRINCIPLES ENTHRONED.

The religious element in man is the deepest and most powerful in his nature. It is that also which a.s.serts and claims the greatest independence from external constraints. It is therefore the height of unwisdom, not to say tyranny, for earthly magistracy to interfere by penalty and sword with the religious opinions and movements of the people, so long as civil authority and public order are not invaded and the rights of others are not infringed. In such cases it is always best to combat only with the Word of G.o.d. If of men it will come to naught, and if of G.o.d it cannot be suppressed. Reaction against wrongs done to truth and right is sure to come, and will push through to revolution and victory in spite of all unrighteous power. It is vain for any human governments to think to chain up the honest convictions of the soul. G.o.d made it free, and sooner or later it will be free, in spite of everything.

It was largely the weight and current of such reaction against arbitrary interference with the religious convictions and free conscience of man that furnished the impulse to the original peopling of our State and country, and gave shape to the const.i.tution and laws of this commonwealth for the last two hundred years. Nor will our inquiries and showings with regard to the founding of Pennsylvania be complete without something more respecting the leading principles which governed in that fortunate movement.