DUTY OF THE SOUTHERN CHURCH THE SAME. 205

ready for Southern martyrdom than other people, but that cannot in the least affect the vital principle here at stake. It is merely a question whether allegiance to the civil authority is a duty of the Church. If that be decided affirmatively, as it clearly must be, then it is as incumbent on the Church to discharge that duty as any other; and if God in His providence call her to suffer, it is as much her duty to suffer in defence of her civil rights and in the discharge of her civil obligations as for any others, for they are all founded on and enforced by the highest religious sanctions.

This path of duty is, too, after all, the only path of safety; for if it shall ever come to a practical question of halters, it may be found that they can be used by the lawful Government of the Union as well as by the abortive Government of the rebellion. And when the future Church historian shall record the sufferings for righteousness' sake endured in this war, he will give a high place in the niche of fame to those ministers of the South, though few in number, who have been incarcerated and hung because they would not bow their necks to treason; while the memory of those who have led the Church astray, and thus prepared an easier triumph for political demagogues, and a more ready altar for the sacrifice of thousands of their countrymen, will go down to posterity with an insupportable load of infamy.

If, for the sake of present safety and peace, the Church may even quietly acquiesce in all the horrid work of this rebellion, without raising her voice in remonstrance to even her own members who are giving all their energies to its support, then there is no duty of Scripture which she may not neglect, and no fact which gives glory to her past history which she may not ignore. Had the Southern Church taken and maintained a righteous and heroic stand,

and been subjected to persecution therefor, she would have come out of the furnace with no such odious smell upon her garments as must now attach to them, for leaping into the front rank of the hordes of treason, winning the earliest and highest honors in its apologetic literature, and leading on its armed legions to battle. We envy not the fame which these men will have in the opinion of mankind, nor the reward which will be meted out to them in the just judgment of God!

CLERICAL DISLOYALTY IN LOYAL STATES.

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CHAPTER VI.

CLERICAL DISLOYALTY IN LOYAL STATES.

It is a phase of the general subject in close alliance with that treated in the preceding chapter, that a similar opposition to the Government is seen in marked instances among clergymen in some of the loyal States.

The great body of the clergy of all denominations in the loyal States, have unquestionably been loyal to the General Government. But not a few, and among them men of ability and influence, have shown decided sympathy with the rebellion; sometimes in overt acts, often in speech and in their writings, and through other methods; and sometimes by a reticence which has been quite as significant as any open line of conduct. Some of this description have been required to take an oath of allegiance to the Government, which they have done reluctantly. would not take it, or their course was such that the alternative was not offered them; and they have voluntarily left, or have been sent out of the country. Others, whose acts have been deemed more highly criminal, have been imprisoned; while still another class have been sent South beyond the lines of the Union armies, as in several instances in Tennessee and other States.

Some

The more numerous cases of disloyalty among clergymen in the loyal portion of the country, are to be found in the Border Slave States and in the District of Columbia. We give illustrations in a few examples, from which others will be readily called to mind by those who are familiar with current events. Similar instances may probably be found in all the Border States.

CLERICAL SYMPATHIZERS IN MARYLAND.

The difficulties which Bishop Whittingham, of the Episcopal Church in Maryland, had with some of his clergy, in the early period of the rebellion, are well known. As a loyal Prelate, he observed the recommendation of the Government in its appointment of Fast and Thanksgiving Days; issued his letter to his clergy, enjoining observance, and prescribed suitable prayers for the service; but from some of the Rectors under his charge, earnest protests were made, clearly revealing their rebel proclivities. The prayers he has written, to be used during the continuance of the war, are even now omitted in some Churches, or the clergy and the Bishop have been brought into open collision upon the issue; while the customary prayer for the President of the United States, co-existent with the Church service itself, is omitted in some cases, or hypocritically uttered.

Other denominations in Maryland, especially in Baltimore, have had ministers in their pulpits who would not observe the public days and service recommended by the Government, by reason of their rebel sympathies.

Ministers in some Churches in Baltimore, as reported in the daily papers of that city, have succumbed to the demand of their parishioners that prayers should not be offered for the President, and have left their charges; while in other congregations, both Protestant and Catholic, where such prayers have been offered, open manifestations of disapprobation have been made, sometimes by worshippers leaving the house during that part of the service, and at other times by significant marks of dissent while retaining their seats. Some ministers left Maryland, by reason of their Southern sympathies, and early cast in their lot with the fortunes of the rebellion.

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DISLOYAL MINISTERS IN THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA.

It is somewhat surprising that ministers should sympathize with a rebellion seeking the overthrow of that Government under the very shadow of whose seat of Administration they live, and whose protection makes their homes safe and their daily bread sure. But so it was, at the beginning of the rebellion, with two prominent clergymen of Georgetown, in the District of Columbia. We cannot account for it except on the principle that they had Virginia blood in their veins, of the modern quality. It certainly could claim no affinity with that which characterized the era of Washington and his compeers.

One of these men is the Rev. John H. Bocock, D. D., at the time Pastor of the Bridge Street Presbyterian Church, in Georgetown. On the call of President Lincoln for seventy-five thousand troops, April 15, 1861, the amiable Doctor said, that "the yellow fever, in the course of the summer, would be worth seventy thousand troops to us," accompanying the remark with significant signs of satisfaction. His rebel proclivities became so demonstrative, at a period a little later, that he was obliged to go South, beyond the lines of the Federal army. He has since given in his full adhesion to the rebellion, and was at one time engaged in superintending a manufactory of the munitions of war in Richmond, where it was reported he was seriously injured by an explosion which occurred in the establishment during the summer of 1863.

The other gentleman referred to is the Rev. Dr. Norwood, Rector of an Episcopal Church in the same city, when the rebellion began. On the latter part of that mournful Sabbath on which the first battle of Bull Run was fought, July 21, 1861, the secessionists of the North, and especially those near the seat of the General Govern