The Rutland daily globe. [volume] (Rutland, Vt.) 1873-1877, 1877-08-16

tiers OF 1.-THE grants, those land 1ObberS
and free-booters along the Hudson, toward
whom the catamount from Landlord Fay's
tavern sign grinned angry defiance. Here,
early in May, 1775, mustered that patriot
band whose ears had but just caught the
echo of the first shot at Lexington, and
from here they went forth under the lead
ership of Ethan Allen, Gin the name of the
Great jehovah" to the capture of Fort Ii
conderoga and from here marched Stark,
with his braves and the Green Mountain
Boys, just across the border, where they
made the 18th of August immortal and to
this place they returned, bringing their foes
captive, and their own dead for burial
| With such "reminiscences of these early days
! and associations of place, l am to speak to
you, but cursorlly and briefly, Of what
| these suggest,-of the New Hampshire
| Grants, and of Vermont, and how this came
to be a state, and somewhat of its charac-
teristics hundred years ago, and since, and
now.
This land of ours, which we now call
| Vermont, had before 1860 become extern
sively known to the men of New England
| by exploration, the visits of hunters, and
the numerous military expeditions, which,
starting from the heart of New England,
had, for successive years during the French
and English war, traversed it. The cession
| of Canada to Great Britain and the con-
clusion of peace left these lands open for
settlement, undisturbed by further terrors
Of French and Indian inroads. The in
| ducements to immigration and settlement
here, we of this age should reckon not in
viting. There were no prairies spread out
in readiness for the plough no open pas
lures ready prepared for sheep and oxen I;
no tropic climate and fruits inviting to rest
| from labor and to easy fruition nor yet
fresh discovered gold fields to set on fire
the lust of men and draw them, as by a
| sucking whirlwind, from the four corners
| of the earth, in a mad rush to fortune-or a
/ grave but, on the contrary, valley and
mountain sides covered with forests which
kept out the sunlight, and concealed below
their interlacing roots the possible meadow,
pasture and cornfield, but possible only to
the sweat of labor and the pain of toll !;
short summers, with frosts both late and
early long winters bound in ice and buried
in snow. But to men like our grand-sires,
trained to labor and hardship, the sons of
| generations of men to whose axes the sight
of tree had been constant temptation,
there was nothing in climate or savage feat
ures of the land to deter from following the
| emigrating instinct of the race and so long
as they could, in the minds eye, sec among
the dissolving forests the comfortable home
stead, the waving grainfields, the garden
and the orchard, the school house, the meet
| ing house, the mill and the village, creations
Of their industry, they were rather melted
| than repealed by the difficulties which ma
ture had interposed in the way to such
fruition With the thought of lettering
their condition, in mere prosaic sense, the
love OF adventure, the love of the new and
untried to find what may be in it, love Of
the free life of the woods and of new So
ciety, doubtless, added romance to the
movement. Yet it was no Texas or Cali
fornia that allured them.
Another reason ror this early emigration,
particularly from Massachusetts and Con-
necticut, and which prevailed to a consider
able extent, partook of n religious character
and was akin to that which impelled their
ancestors, the Puritans and the Pilgrims, to
leave their homes in England for the sake
of founding a church of their liking and
freedom of worship in the New England
wilderness for it is written of these early
| immigrants by one of their number, that
"Great numbers of the early settlers on the
New Hampshire Grants were of the sect of
New Lights. or Separates, who fled from
persecution in the New England States,
and found an asylum here, where they
enjoyed their religious liberty" This
| persecution spoken OF came naturally
Of the ideas then prevalent that
one of the functions Of government
was to aid the church enforcing upon the
whole community conformity of doctrines
and worship "to the word of God, that
is, practically, conformity to the prevailing
religious belief, and those standards of be-
lief, or profession, called orthodox, to be
found in certain accredited Platforms. u
Upon the New Lights in doctrine, and the
Separates from the standing order, it bore
hard to be compelled by law to lay
toward the building of meeting houses
which they would not attend, and to con.
tribute to the support of ministers to whom
they would not listen, and this, while sus
tanning, unaided, their own systems Of
worship and teaching; and then, If theil
own ministers Glanced to be caught preach
ing outside the limits of their own parish
without orderly invitation, to see then
treated as poachers or tramps, with finei
and the stocks The religious liberty which
they enjoyed in this their asylum they
founded and established. They stamped
upon their earliest church records theil
reputation of the doctrine of State inter
ference with matters of religious doctrine
and. worship, and made their plan of or
ganization as a church a charter of religious
liberty. Thus in organizing 1.-THE churcl
OF Christ in Bennington" December 3
1863, the first church organization of thu
New Hampshire Grants, it was agreed an(
voted to except, from their adoption of tn,
Cambridge Platform, that part in respec
Of using the civil law to support the Cos
pei" and also that part in respect of tn
civil magistrates coercive power"
, Whatever else may be said of the relig
, ious teachings, customs and observances o
+ the New England of that day, it cannot b
/ denied that they trained up a peopl
. mighty in the Scriptures, schooled to grea
i acuteness of intellectual perception b.
4 study Of the metaphysics of theology
/ practice Of its dialectics, and clash OF dis
/ cusson of the mysteries of religion and til
' entanglements of creed and that the stud
, Of the questions Of church government
! educated them to knowledge of the princl
pies of all just government, and their ap
q plication to the affairs of the state. Bigot
. shall we call themH They were indeed re
4 ligious according to the law and logic of re
Z ligion, rather than in its emotions and Ell
! thusiasms. l would rather say Of ther
that they were God-fearing men, and so i
I fear of no one else orderly, self-restrained
q though self-reliant in thought and will
:. | btouhNly btuliO iiiSu otlll III OppOolIiOl
e stout in resistance, determined in self-dt
i Tense of their rights against aggression.
/ Though these first immigrants were mos
# ly farmers, not greatly conversant wit
II books, save the One Book, yet coming froI
/ the then most enlightened part Of Americf
d the home of the school house and the NEE
: ing house, and of those little town demot
Il racles, training schools for the science {
II | nonular self Government thew were nv n
J. means rude, and had that practical educ