Call number
Publication
New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.
Physical description
ix, 275 p.; 23 cm
Notes
See also among PCAHC collections, Missionary Society of Connecticut, 1759-1948. Microfilm, twenty rolls of 35mm film.
From the Preface:
"As the title of a recently published book Professor James Bissett Pratt uses the question which he addresses to his present-day readers, Can We Keep the Faith? He has the impression, he writes, "that the young people of our day feel much less interest in 'God, freedom, and immortality,' in the incarnation, the relation of God to man, and most of the fundamentals of the Christian faith . . . than has any generation of young people since the Protestant Reformation.
The same problem was propounded in the closing years of the eighteenth century, when many people in the new United States felt that Christianity was facing a serious crisis. Attracted by the alluring philosophies and the less-demanding variations of religion which had been brought across the Atlantic from Europe, and distraught by a quarter-century of conflict with the French, the English and the Indians, followed by a decade of independence which afforded no respite from pressing political, economic, and social problems, many Americans seemed to be turning away from the faith of their fathers. Whether Christianity could survive was questioned by some; others believed that it would be so changed as to be ineffective in checking the dangerous moral deterioration which in their opinion had already progressed too far.
"Can we keep the faith?" Only the future holds the answer to Professor Pratt's question; but the people of more than a century ago replied with a resounding affirmative. The triumph of infidelity did not materialize. Indeed, the first half of the nineteenth century was an age of faith, a period when most people lived their lives without questioning the existence and power of God, His close relationship to man, and the basic tenets of Christianity. Supernatural religion was in the ascendancy. Alexis de Tocqueville, who visited the United States in 1831, wrote, "There is no country in the world where the Christian religion retains a greater influence over the souls of men than in America."
How is this significant development in American intellectual and religious history to be explained? The triumph of fidelity occurred because the champions of orthodoxy everywhere rose up against the foe and by valiant and vigorous efforts succeeded in routing him in what is here termed the Second Great Awakening, second in time to the Great Awakening of Jonathan Edwards and George Whitefield but no in importance in American history. In this study attention is centered on Connecticut, but the Awakening in that state was paralleled by more or less similar developments throughout the country.
CONTENTS
Preface
I. The Land of Steady Habits.
II. The Challenge to Orthodoxy.
III. Counter-Reformation.
IV. Going Over into Macedonia.
V. Orthodoxy Forges New Weapons.
VI. Design for Reform.
VII. The Age of Benevolence.
VIII. The Religious Minorities.
IX. New Wine in New Bottles.
Bibliographic Note. [pp. 240-258]
Index.
From the Preface:
"As the title of a recently published book Professor James Bissett Pratt uses the question which he addresses to his present-day readers, Can We Keep the Faith? He has the impression, he writes, "that the young people of our day feel much less interest in 'God, freedom, and immortality,' in the incarnation, the relation of God to man, and most of the fundamentals of the Christian faith . . . than has any generation of young people since the Protestant Reformation.
The same problem was propounded in the closing years of the eighteenth century, when many people in the new United States felt that Christianity was facing a serious crisis. Attracted by the alluring philosophies and the less-demanding variations of religion which had been brought across the Atlantic from Europe, and distraught by a quarter-century of conflict with the French, the English and the Indians, followed by a decade of independence which afforded no respite from pressing political, economic, and social problems, many Americans seemed to be turning away from the faith of their fathers. Whether Christianity could survive was questioned by some; others believed that it would be so changed as to be ineffective in checking the dangerous moral deterioration which in their opinion had already progressed too far.
"Can we keep the faith?" Only the future holds the answer to Professor Pratt's question; but the people of more than a century ago replied with a resounding affirmative. The triumph of infidelity did not materialize. Indeed, the first half of the nineteenth century was an age of faith, a period when most people lived their lives without questioning the existence and power of God, His close relationship to man, and the basic tenets of Christianity. Supernatural religion was in the ascendancy. Alexis de Tocqueville, who visited the United States in 1831, wrote, "There is no country in the world where the Christian religion retains a greater influence over the souls of men than in America."
How is this significant development in American intellectual and religious history to be explained? The triumph of fidelity occurred because the champions of orthodoxy everywhere rose up against the foe and by valiant and vigorous efforts succeeded in routing him in what is here termed the Second Great Awakening, second in time to the Great Awakening of Jonathan Edwards and George Whitefield but no in importance in American history. In this study attention is centered on Connecticut, but the Awakening in that state was paralleled by more or less similar developments throughout the country.
CONTENTS
Preface
I. The Land of Steady Habits.
II. The Challenge to Orthodoxy.
III. Counter-Reformation.
IV. Going Over into Macedonia.
V. Orthodoxy Forges New Weapons.
VI. Design for Reform.
VII. The Age of Benevolence.
VIII. The Religious Minorities.
IX. New Wine in New Bottles.
Bibliographic Note. [pp. 240-258]
Index.