Part 5 (1/2)

The picturesqueness of the population was accentuated by the presence of a growing number of negro slaves which a Dutch vessel had been the first to bring to America.[22] But, as we shall see later, slavery never was welcomed as an inst.i.tution in this region, and never gained a firm foothold. Tobacco culture and other causes, which operated to the encouragement of slavery in Virginia and Maryland, did not appear in the northern colonies; where, moreover, the temper and taste of the people were not such as to make easy the development of slavery.

As in early New England, the domestic and social affairs of the Dutch colony were always intimately a.s.sociated with religious traditions, and, as in New England, the theory of religious liberty found a varying and often a grotesque application.

The early theory of the colony was that of complete religious liberty, and at no time was there an intolerance comparable to that which prevailed among the Puritans, who sought liberty but yielded little; but the laws of the colony favored the Protestant Reformed Church, and it alone. To be sure, the West India Company commended freedom of belief, and the early Governors, partly, doubtless, because they were too busy with other matters, and partly because occasion had not yet arisen, caused little trouble by any att.i.tude toward questions of faith or wors.h.i.+p. But when the colony grew to considerable proportions, and the mixture of races brought about by the advertised liberality of the Dutch settlements began to bring up the social and religious questions inevitable in such a community, there were many clas.h.i.+ngs and disputes and bitternesses.

Stuyvesant was as definite and immovable in his ideas about church-going as about everything else. He believed in established authority, and personally resented the impertinence of people who saw fit to take a position at variance with what seemed to be set forth and settled by the established power. When the Lutherans, in 1654, sought to hold meetings of their own, Stuyvesant reminded them of the duty of attending the good Dutch church, and refused them premises for their meetings.

Appeal to Holland, whose position Stuyvesant's mental methods certainly did not represent in this instance, forced the Director to let the Lutherans alone; and possibly the rebuke was responsible for the fact that the Anabaptists on Long Island escaped serious trouble shortly afterward. But Stuyvesant hated the ”cursed Quakers,” with whom he had many bitter differences, going so far as to hang up one preacher by the arms and lash him for defying his authority.

Of Catholics Stuyvesant had an even greater horror. In 1654, he pa.s.sed an ordinance forbidding the keeping of Ash Wednesday and all other holy days, as ”heathenish and popish inst.i.tutions, and as dangerous to the public peace.”

To the intermittent religious squabbles brought on by the determination of Stuyvesant to stick to the letter of the law rather than to take the popular Dutch view of moderate leniency, the West India Company finally put a stop by ordering Stuyvesant to ”let every one remain free so long as he is modest, moderate, his political conduct irreproachable, and as long as he does not offend others or oppose the Government.” These terms, rather than any ever offered by Stuyvesant, represent the real sentiment prevalent among the Dutch people.

In the s.h.i.+p which brought over Governor Minuit, in 1626, came two _ziekentroosters_, or ”comforters of the sick,” who were frequently found filling positions as a.s.sistants to ordained clergymen. By these two men the early religious services of the New Amsterdam colony were conducted until 1628, when another s.h.i.+p from Holland brought out Jonas Michaelius, who was sent by the North Synod of the Netherlands. It was Michaelius who ”first established the form of a church” at Manhattan. He was succeeded five years later by Everardus Bogardus, whose congregation left the upper loft of the horse-mill for a small building dedicated to church service. In 1642, a new stone church was built within the Fort, and in the year of Stuyvesant's coming Bogardus was succeeded by Dominie Johannes Megapolensis, who led the church for twenty-two years.

Meanwhile the Long Island settlers who wished to attend divine service were obliged to cross the river to New Amsterdam. In 1654, however, Midwout (Flatbush), which had begun to a.s.sume an importance as a settlement that promised to give it the position that Breuckelen afterward a.s.sumed, established a church. An order was issued in February, 1655, requiring the inhabitants of Breuckelen and Amersfoort (Flatlands) to a.s.sist Midwout ”in cutting and hauling wood” for the church. The Breuckelen people objected to working on the minister's house, but were forced, under the Governor's order, to a.s.sist throughout the work.

This first church in Kings County, built under the supervision of Dominie Megapolensis, John Snedicor, and John Stryker, occupied several years in the building; but that it was used before its completion is indicated by the fact that in August, 1655, Stuyvesant convened the inhabitants to give their opinion as to the qualifications of the Rev.

Johannes Theodorus Polhemus as a ”provisional minister,” and to decide what salary they would pay him. The report of the Schout was that the people approved of Mr. Polhemus, and that they would pay him 1,040 guilders (about $416) a year.

Polhemus belonged to ”an ancient and highly respectable family” in the Netherlands, had been a missionary in Brazil, and had come from that country to New Amsterdam. He was a devout Christian, and his faithfulness does not seem to have been questioned, but when, in 1656, the magistracy of Midwout and Amersfoort sought permission to request voluntary contributions from the three Dutch towns, Breuckelen protested, declaring that ”as the Rev. John Polhemus only acts as a minister of the Gospel in the village of Midwout, therefore the inhabitants of the village of Breuckelen and adjacent districts are disinclined to subscribe or promise anything for the maintenance of a Gospel minister who is of no use to them.” By way of showing their good will to Mr. Polhemus personally, they urged that the minister might be permitted to preach alternately in Breuckelen and Midwout. If this were done they were ”very willing to contribute cheerfully to his support, agreeable to their abilities.”

The Director and Council replied that they had ”no objection that the Reverend Polhemus, when the weather permits, shall preach alternately in both places;” but although Midwout consented, Gravesend and Amersfoort objected, these villages having contributed to the support of the Midwout church, and Breuckelen being ”quite two hours' walking from Amersfoort and Gravesend, whereas the village of Midwout is not half so far and the road much better.” To this was added: ”So they considered it a hards.h.i.+p to choose either to hear the gospel but once a day, or to be compelled to travel four hours, in going and returning, all for one single sermon, which would be to some very troublesome, and to some utterly impossible.”

As a way out of this difficulty the Director and Council decided that the morning sermon should be at Midwout, which was about the same distance from each of the three other towns, and that the afternoon service should be changed to an evening service to be held alternately in Breuckelen and Amersfoort. In recognition of the situation of Midwout, that village was to give annually 400 guilders, and Breuckelen and Amersfoort each 300 guilders for the support of the minister.

This seemed like an amicable settlement, and might have remained such had not Breuckelen been dissatisfied with the preaching of Mr. Polhemus.

The dissatisfaction expressed itself in a protest sent to the Director and Council, in which the people of Breuckelen reminded the Director that they had never called the Reverend Polhemus, and had never accepted him as their minister. ”He intruded himself upon us against our will,”

said the protest, ”and voluntarily preached in the open street, under the blue sky; when to avoid offense, the house of Joris Dircksen was temporarily offered him.” Moreover, Mr. Polhemus was accused of offering ”a poor and meagre service,” giving, every fortnight, ”a prayer in lieu of a sermon,” by which they could receive ”very little instruction.”

Often, when they supposed this prayer was beginning, it was ”actually at an end.” This they experienced on the Sunday preceding Christmas, when, expecting an appropriate sermon, they heard ”nothing but a prayer.”

”Wherefore,” continues the protest, ”it is our opinion that we shall enjoy as much and more edification by appointing one among ourselves, who may read to us on Sundays, a sermon from the 'Apostles' Book,' as we ever have until now from any of the prayers or sermons of the Reverend Polhemus.” All this, the protest hastened to say, was intended in no offense to the preacher, whose inabilities were recognized as resulting naturally from the fact that in his advanced years ”his talents did not accompany him as steadily as in the days of yore.”

To this protest Stuyvesant responded merely by directing the sheriff to ”remind those of Breuckelen, once more, to fulfil their engagement, and to execute their promise relative to the salary of Mr. Polhemus.” Amid their discontent, and in consequence also of the poverty of many of his paris.h.i.+oners, the poor preacher suffered not a little for want of the ordinary necessities of life. In the winter of 1656, his house being not yet completed, he and wife and children were forced to sleep on the floor. When Sheriff Tonneman complained to the Council of having been abused while attempting to collect the odious tax, Lodewyck Jong, Jan Martyn, ”Nicholas the Frenchman, Abraham Janesen the mulatto, and Gerrit the wheelwright,” were each fined twelve guilders ($4.80); and when Jan Martyn sought to hire the public bellman to defame Tonneman, he was ”obliged to beg pardon, on bended knees, of the Lord and of the court, and was fined twenty-five guilders ($10) and costs.”

Wearied of his efforts to coax and threaten the Breuckelen opposition into paying the tax, Stuyvesant at last (in July, 1658) forbade all inhabitants of the three towns to remove grain from their fields until all t.i.thes were taken or commuted. There was no escape from this, and the tax was paid.

Two years later Breuckelen secured a preacher of her own in the person of the Rev. Henricus Selyns,[23] a preacher whose ancestors had been prominent in the earliest days of the Dutch Reformed Church, and who had been reared in the traditions of this flouris.h.i.+ng denomination. He engaged to serve Breuckelen for four years.

When, in September, 1660, Dominie Selyns preached his first sermon in the Breuckelen barn which served as a house of wors.h.i.+p, the population of the village was one hundred and thirty-four persons, representing thirty-one families. The preacher had been promised a salary of one hundred florins, but when an effort was made to raise funds the magistrates found themselves under the necessity of appealing to the Director for aid. Stuyvesant offered to pay one hundred and fifty guilders, provided Mr. Selyns would also preach every afternoon at his ”bouwery” on Manhattan Island. This arrangement was duly made. In 1661, when Breuckelen received from the West India Company, by request of Dominie Selyns, a bell for the church, there were fifty-two communicants. Meanwhile, Mr. Selyns was living at New Amsterdam, and in 1662 an effort was made to induce the preacher to live in Breuckelen, on the theory of the schepens that, if he did so bring himself among them, ”the community would be more willing and ready to bring in their respective quotas.” It does not appear that the Dominie found it convenient to live in Breuckelen, but there is no doubt of his zeal nor of his popularity. When, in 1664, the Dominie returned to Holland, it was with the regrets and good wishes of the little band of Breuckelen paris.h.i.+oners.

The Dutch att.i.tude toward education was in many respects very different from that which prevailed among the English. At the time of the settlement of New England and New Amsterdam, Holland was far in advance of other European states in ideas of popular education. Mr.

Campbell[24] places Holland two hundred years in advance of any other country in Europe at the time of the Puritan emigration. There was, indeed, an extraordinary contrast between ”the free cities” of the Netherlands and their neighbors at this time. ”The whole population,”

says May,[25] ”was educated. The higher cla.s.ses were singularly accomplished. The University of Leyden was founded for the learned education of the rich, and free schools were established for the general education.” Common schools had, indeed, been founded in the sixteenth century, and in the seventeenth the children of all cla.s.ses were taught at the public expense.

Such ideas of educational democracy had not appeared in England at the time when education first began to be considered in this country. Mr.

Draper[26] notes that there was no school but the Latin school in Boston for thirty-five years after the pa.s.sage of the so-called compulsory education law of 1647. Nor did the early Ma.s.sachusetts schools receive all the children of the people. ”No boys were received under seven years of age till 1818. No girls of any age were admitted prior to 1789. It was one hundred and forty-two years after the pa.s.sage of the so-called compulsory school law of 1647 before Boston admitted one girl to her so-called 'free schools,' and it was one hundred and eighty-one years thereafter before girls had facilities equal to those enjoyed by their brothers.”