Wise, of Ipswich, Massachusetts, in 1710 had issued a satirical tract entitled, The Churches' Quarrel Espoused, and later, in 1717, a more serious production entitled, A Vindication of the Government of the New England Churches. In 1772 a new edition of these tracts, published by subscription, came from the Boston press. 1 The enduring quality of the task Wise had performed is shown by the fact that, while these two slight volumes had been conceived as a protest against the encroachments of ecclesiastical tyranny in the first two decades of the century, they now, a half -century later, served equally well to voice the deep passions and impulses of a people who for the moment were engrossed in the concerns of civil government. 2 Wise rejected the ideals of monarchy and aristocracy for the church, and took his stand upon the proposition that democracy alone stands the test of reason and revelation. 3 Of all systems, democracy alone cherishes the precious interests of man's original liberty and equality. It alone serves effectually to restrain the disposition to prey and embezzle, and to keep the adminis
- 1 Cf. A Vindication of the Government of the New-England Churches, etc., Boston, 1772. The first edition of 500 copies was quickly subscribed for, and a second was published the same year.
- 2 An edition of Wise's tracts was published as late as 1860, by the Congregational Board of Publication. From that edition the citations are drawn. The following from the " Introductory Notice " is of interest:".... some of the most glittering sentences of the immortal Declaration of Independence are almost literal quotations from this essay of John Wise [i. e., Vindication of the Government of NewEngland Churches], And it is a significant fact, that in 1772, only fpur years before the declaration was made, a large edition of both those tracts was published by subscription in one duodecimo volume. The presumption which this fact alone suggests, that it was used as a political text-book in the great struggle for freedom then opening, is fully confirmed by the list of subscribers' names printed at the end, with the number of copies annexed." Page xx et seq.
- 3 Ibid., pp. 48-50, 54, 56.
