Daily union and American. [volume] (Nashville, Tenn.) 1865-1866, 1866-09-15
MACAULAY's DIsCHIPTION OF THE
PURITANS.
A nrIrlIaat and Ilre.1lhe pon.rieture.

brilliant and Lffe-LiIJe Pen-Picture.
] They mistook their own indignant feel
ings for emotions of piety; encouraged in
| themselves by reading and meditation, a
| disposition TO brood over their wrongs, and,
when they had worked themselves up into
hating their enemies, imagined they were
| only hating the enemies Of heaven. In the
| New Testament there was little indeed which,
even perverted by the most disingenious ex-
! position, could seem TO countenance the in
dulgence of maleYolent passions.
But the Old Testament contained the his
tory Of n race selected by GoD to be Wit
nesses Of his unity and ministers of his
vengeance, and specially commanded by
him to do many things which, if done with
out his special command, would have been
atrocious. In such history il was not diff
cult for fierce and gloomy spirits 10 find
much that might be restored TO suit their
wishes The extreme Puritans, therefore,
began to feel for the Old Testament pre-
ference which, perhaps, they didnot distinctly
avow even 10 themselves but which showed
itself in all their sentiments and habits.
They paid the Hebrew language n respect
which they refused to that tongue in which
the discourses of JESUS and the epistle of
PAUL have come down to us. They baptiz-
ed their children by the names, not of
Christian saints, but Of Hebrew patriarchs
and warriors.
In defiance of the express and reiterated
declarations of LUTHER and CALVIN, they
turned the weekly festival by which the
church had, from the primative times, COM
memorated the resurrection Of the Lord, in
a Jewish Sabbath. They sought for princi-
Piles OF Jurisprudence in the Mosaic law, and
for the precedents to guide their ordinary
conduct in the book Of Judges and Kings.
Their thoughts and discources run much on
acts which were assuredly not recorded as ex-
amples for our imitation. The prophet
who hewed in pieces captive king, the
rebel general who gave the blood of queen
to the dogs, the matron, who, IN defiance of
plighted faith and Of the laws Of eastern hos
pitality, drove the nail into the brain Of the
fugitive ally who had just fed at her board,
and was sleeping under the shadow of her,
tent-were proposed as models to Christians
suffering under the tyranny OF princes and
prelstes.
Morals and manners were subjected 70 q
code reassembling that of the synagogue
when the synagogue was in IFS worst state.
The dress, the language, the department,
were regulated on principles reassembling
those Of the Pharisees, WIN proud Of their
washed hands and broad phylacteries. taunt-
ed the Redeemer as a Sabbath-breaker and
wine-bibber Il was sin 10 hang garlands
on n May-pole, 20 drink friends health to
hy hawk, 70 hunt a stag, TO play at chess,
20 wear lovelocks, TO put startch into ruff,
b touch the virgins, 10 read the Fairy
Queen. Rules such as these-rules which
would have appeared insupportable TO the
free and Joyous spirit of LUTHER, and con-
temptible to the serene and philosophical
intellect Of ZUNCLE threw over all life
more than monastic gloom.
The learning and eloquence by which the
great Reformers had been eminently distin-
guished, and TO which they had been, in no
small measure indebted for their success,
were regarded by the new school Of Protes-
tants with suspicion, if not with aversion.
Some precisians scrlpled about teaching the
Latin grammar because the names OF Mars,
Baochus and Apollo occurred in t. The
fine arts were all but prescribed. The
solemn peal of the organ was superstitious.
The light music Of BEN. JoNsoEs masks
was dissolute. Half the fine paintings in
England were idolatrous, and the other half
indecent.
The Puritan was at once known by his
gait, his garh, his lank air, the sour solemn
ity Of his face, the upurned white Of his
ewes, the nasal twangs with which he spoke
and above all, his Peculiar dialect. he EN-
ployed. on every occasion, the Imagery and
slyle Of scripture. Hehraisms violently in
troduced into the English language, and
metaphors borrowed from the boldeSt lyric
poetry Of remote age and country, and
applied TO the common concerns Of English
life, were the most striking peculiarities Of
this cant, which moved, not without cause,
the derision both Of prelatists and iber-
l tines