Prof. David
Hackett Fischer gives an overview of the chief characteristics of New England’s
ancestors, who hailed from the coastal southeastern counties of England, mainly
East Anglia and Essex, in his praiseworthy book, Albion’s Seed. Among them were an inclination toward
industrial pursuits, urban living, equality, and rebelliousness against
established authorities in religion and politics (Albion’s Seed: Four British Folkways in America, New York, Ny.,
Oxford UP, 1989, pgs. 42-9).
It is
remarkable how true New England has remained to that inner logos of hers as
sketched by Prof. Fischer (and how insightful he was to see and describe it so
well). She remains as urban, industrial,
and ocean-facing as ever, delving especially into new technologies like
robotics.
But
especially notable is her continuing revolution in the intertwining realms of
politics and religion, particularly the institutions of marriage and family. Prior to their departure from England to
North America, Richard
Hooker in the Preface to Of the Laws of Ecclesiastical Polity
(published in 1594) describes how the Puritans took multiple wives: ‘These men, in whose mouths at the first
sounded nothing but only mortification of the flesh, were come at the length to
think they might lawfully have their six or seven wives apiece . . . .’
Polygamy
would continue famously with Mormonism, dreamt up by New England’s Joseph
Smith, who has an impeccable Massachusetts Puritan family pedigree on his
father’s side. But less famously
known are the destroyers of the traditional Christian family who were part of
the Yankee abolitionist circles. One of
the South’s best apologists, George Fitzhugh, draws attention to one of them in
Cannibals
All! (1857), a fellow by the name of Stephen Pearle Andrews who was in
high standing with the Yankee elite of his day:
‘We wish to
prove that the great movement in society, known under various names, as
Communism, Socialism, Abolitionism, Red Republicanism and Black Republicanism,
has one common object: the breaking up of all law and government, and the
inauguration of anarchy, and that the destruction of the family is one of the
means in which they all concur to attain a common end. We shall quote only from
Stephen Pearle Andrews, because he is by far the ablest and best informed of
American Socialists and Reformers, and because he cites facts and authorities
to show that he presents truly the current thought and the general intention.
Mr. Andrews is a Massachusetts gentleman, who has lived at the South. He has
been an Abolition Lecturer. He is the disciple of Warren, who is the disciple
of Owen of Lanark and New Harmony. Owen and Warren are Socrates and Plato, and
he is the Great Stygarite, as far surpassing them, as Aristotle surpassed
Socrates and Plato. But it is not merely his theories on which we rely; he
cites historical facts that show that the tendency and terminus of all
abolition is to the sovereignty of the individual, the breaking up of families,
and no-government. He delivered a series of lectures to the elite of New York
on this subject, which met with approbation, and from which we shall quote. He
established, or aided to establish, Free Love Villages, and headed a Free Love
Saloon in the city of New York, patronized and approved by the "Higher
classes." He is indubitably the philosopher and true exponent of Northern
Abolitionism’ (pgs. 287-8).
Mr. Fitzhugh
quotes at length from Mr. Andrews’s Science of Society, and a couple of passages
about marriage stand out:
‘Every
variety of conscience, and every variety of deportment in reference to this
precise subject of love is already tolerated among us. At one extreme of the
scale stand the Shakers, who abjure the connection of the sexes altogether. At
the other extremity stands the association of Perfectionists, at Oneida, who
hold and practice, and justify by the Scriptures, as a religious dogma, what
they denominate complex marriage, or the freedom of love. We have, in this
State, stringent laws against adultery and fornication; but laws of that sort
fall powerless, in America, before the all-pervading sentiment of
Protestantism, which vindicates the freedom of conscience to all persons and in
all things, provided the consequences fall upon the parties themselves. Hence
the Oneida Perfectionists live undisturbed and respected, in the heart of the
State of New York, and in the face of the world; and the civil government, true
to the Democratic principle, which is only the same principle in another
application, is little anxious to interfere with this breach of its own
ordinances, so long as they cast none the consequences of their conduct upon
those who do not consent to bear them.
‘ . . . In
general, however, Government still interferes with the marriage and parental
relations. Democracy in America has always proceeded with due reference the
prudential motto, festina lente. In
France, at the time of the first Revolution, Democracy rushed with the
explosive force of escapement from centuries of compression, point blank to the
bull's eye of its final destiny, from which it recoiled with such force that
the stupid world has dreamed, for half a century, that the vita principle of
Democracy was dead. As a logical sequence from Democratic principle, the legal
obligation of marriage was sundered, and the Sovereignty of the Individual
above the institution was vindicated’ (pgs. 291-2).
What Mr.
Andrews’s says in his book in 1851 about disassociating people from the
normative male and female dichotomy of the sexes and the redefinition of
marriage foreshadow what would follow in New England in the decades to come. These seeds were slow to germinate, but now
that they have, they have borne multiple harvests of radicalism in quick
succession – unsurprisingly in Massachusetts, the birthplace of Puritan
Yankeedom:
In 2003, the
Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court ruled
that same-sex couples had a ‘right’ to marry.
In 2023, the
City
Council of Somerville, Mass., ‘unanimously approved an antidiscrimination
ordinance to protect people in polyamorous and other consensually nonmonogamous
relationships.’
Now, in
2024, the Massachusetts Legislature is moving quickly to
approve the use of human surrogates and other techniques to allow LGBT
people to ‘build families’:
‘State
representatives unanimously passed a bill on Wednesday they said would update
Massachusetts law to better reflect the diverse ways people build families.
‘The bill
lays out clear paths to establishing legal parentage for families that have
children through assisted reproduction, like surrogacy and in-vitro
fertilization.’
Somerville
again proves her radical bona fides with the statement of her
representative, Christine Barber, that this legislation will help tear down
‘barriers to reproductive justice’ that other States are fiendishly erecting.
What will
New England radicalism give birth to next?
One shudders to think, considering the foregoing. And, indeed, we may already have an answer
with the new attempt to generate sympathy for ‘minor-attracted
persons.’ The North American Man/Boy
Love Association began in Boston,
after all.
This is a
tragedy for New England. They have been
given a gift by God, zealousness or enthusiasm, but they use it to accomplish
evil ends that grieve God and harm themselves and others.
What a
dishonor to their ancestors! Among their
ancient kinfolk in Old England were holy men and women, who used this gift of
zeal as it should be used – to love God and their neighbor.
St. Botolph, the monastic
founder of Ikenho (+680) for whom Boston is named (a contraction of ‘Botolph’s Town
or Stone’), banished evil spirits and diffused the Grace of God throughout
southeast England and even beyond that region:
‘In Iken St.
Botolph struggled much against the demons who dwelled in that area in great
numbers and vexed him continually. By the power of the sign of the cross and
through his austere ascetic life the venerable man vanquished them and drove
them away from the area.
‘Abbot
Botolph gathered around him many brethren, instructed them in the spiritual
life and became famous as a wise and learned mentor. Everybody saw a loving and
caring father in him. He himself cultivated the land in Iken and thanks to his
labours the formerly swampy soil around Iken became very fertile. Already
during his life, St. Botolph was loved all over England for his holy life,
wisdom, miracles of healing, prophecies and for driving out evil spirits. He
was a good example for his spiritual children in all things. According to his
life, “All loved Botolph: he always was humble, modest, friendly and mild in
communication, proved the truth of his sermons by example of his life… He
taught his monks the rules of Christian perfection and the decrees of the
Church Fathers. He thanked God both in good and sorrowful times alike, knowing
that He makes everything for the good of those who love Him”. The saint
excelled in extreme mercy, poverty and kindness.’
Especially
in the latter words, we see what a contrast there is between the Christian
spirit of St. Botolph and the unmerciful, mercenary, and unkind New England
Yankees.
The life of St. Etheldreda (Audrey),
foundress of the monastery of Ely (+679), is similar. Her family’s life is a rebuke to the Yankee
impiety towards the traditional Christian family and towards traditional
Christian statecraft of governors:
. . .
The rest is
at https://www.abbevilleinstitute.org/the-unbroken-line-of-new-england-radicalism/.
--
Holy Ælfred the Great, King of England, South Patron, pray for us
sinners at the Souð, unworthy though we are!
Anathema to the Union!
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