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Subject: THE SALEM BOOK, Salem, NY MDCCCXCVI Cont'd
Date: Sat, 18 Mar 2000 17:40:28 EST


Please correct errata in first installment:
paragraph #1, line #3 to read Salem, NY
pargaraph #2, line #1 insert is IN respect
paragraph #2, line #2 insert origin, LIKE the early
paragraph #2, line #15 insert every QUARTER of
paragraph #3, line #1, spelling APPROPRIATE
paragraph #3, line #5, delete repetition of OF THE
paragraph #4, line #4, become THRIFTY, vigorous

(Sorry for the finger goofs and poor proof reading, csholem)

SECOND INSTALLMENT:

Dr. Clark immediately upon his appointment retired to Ireland and
preached his first discourse at Ballybay (the original seat of the Salem
congregation) on the 3d day of July, 1749, but six days after his appointment
to the field. He found here a wide sphere of usefulness. Some of the
ministers of the Synod of Ulster were following "New Light" errors, whereby
several congregations were becoming dissatisfied and solicited Dr. Clark to
hold meetings in their neighborhoods. His preaching was acceptable and
popular. Large audiences were gathered wherever he made appointments. Under
his labors, the societies which had been formed at Ballibay and Clanerrees
each grew to be so strong that at a subsequent meeting of the Burgher synod
unanimous calls for his permanent settlement were presented from both these
places, a third call being at the time presented to him from a congregation
near Perth in Scotland.
Dr. Clark decided to accept the call from Ballibay. He accordingly was
ordained and installed over that church by a committee of the Glasgow
Presbytery on July 23d, 1751. Although Dr. Clark was now settled over a
particular church, his labors were by no means limited to its bounds. Indeed
throughout his life, wherever he was located, he felt a deep interest in the
spiritual welfare of the whole country around him, going to different and
often distant neighborhoods to preach, wherever a group of hearers could be
assembled. Because of Dr. Clark's zeal, piety, and soundness in the faith,
the number greatly increased of those who left their former teachers and
resorted to him, whereby the enmity of his opponents became excited to the
highest pitch, and they determined to leave no stone unturned to break him
down and expel him from the country. It became known to them that Dr. Clark
entertained scruples with regard to taking the abjuration oath in the manner
prescribed by law, namely by kissing the Bible. Therefore by obtaining a
warrant against him as a person disaffected to the government, they could
have him committed to prison until he should purge himself of disloyalty by
taking this oath. It was from the rival Presbyterian church in Ballibay that
the persecution against Dr. Clark proceded. The plot was kept a profound
secret until they obtained an opportunity to serve the warrant when
Dr. Clark should be at a distance from Ballibay--they evidently being fearful
that if the attempt was made to arrest him there, in the midst of his
friends, it would cause such excitement, such exasperation and perhaps
rioting, that the most deplorable consequences might result. It became known
that Dr. Clark was to preach and moderate a call for a pastor at Newbliss,
January 23d, 1754, and it was resolved to execute the warrant at that time.
George Kerr, a member of Mr. Jackson's church, took the lead in the
proceedings and was accompanied by several others of the elders and members.
They reached Newbliss when the services were in progress and arrested Dr.
Clark just as he had closed his sermon. The audience, on learning what was
being done, would immediately have rescued him, but he mildly bade them to
calm and do no harm or violence to any one. All that night he was kept under
guard at a tavern. The next day under a strong guard of horse and foot,
which Kerr had raised, being fearful of a rescue, he was taken, amidst the
tears of multitudes along the route, fourteen miles to Monaghan jail there to
await trial. April 8th, 1754, was the day of trial. When the judges
examined the warrant upon which he was committed, they found it defective
and ordered his immediate release. A new writ was obtained against him April
24th, on which he was arrested and again imprisoned. During that summer his
congregation, residing from eight to eleven miles from the jail, were able to
repair thither for Divine services upon the Sabbath. Each week as many as
the space would contain gathered inside the massive walls in a dense cluster
around the preacher, aged matrons and youthful maidens being mingled among
the worshippers regardless of the dolefulness of the place. Parents brought
their infrants to him in the jail for baptism. Thither also came the
betrothed young men and maidens to have their marriage ceremony peformed.
During Dr. Clark's imprisonment many aged and pious men went down to their
graves, bewailing their sad case in thus being deprived of their beloved
pastor's counsels and prayers in their dying hours. Among this number was
the venerable Samuel Rutherford, one of the Westminster Assembly of Divines.
Such a degree of affection as existed between Dr. Clark and his flock has few
parallels. Scarcely a day passed but he was visited by some of his church
members, every one taking evident pleasure in rendering him any service in
his power. We do not find any indicaion of the number of months he remained
in prison at this time or the manner in which he obtained his release. His
military service in which he jeopardized his life in defence of his king, and
in opposition to the pretender, was an evidence of Dr. Clark's loyalty, so
much stronger than anything his enemies could adduce in proof of theirs, that
on coming to know the facts the public would naturally be indignant against
those who had resorted to such high-handed measures; for, after his second
release from prison, no further attempts appear to have been made to harass
him in the courts of law, or otherwise interrupt him in the discharge of his
ministerial duties.

The several months imprisonment to which the arbitrary laws of the
country had subjected him, because he could not violate the dictates of his
conscience , was so vexatious and unjust that it served to wean him and a
large portion of his flock from their attachment to the land of their birth,
and to induce them to seek a new home in the wilds of America, where they
could cherish their religious convictions, free from the strong arm of evil
authority, by which they were so stringently restrained in their native land.
Preliminary to this important step, Dr. Clark had been in correspondence
with Hon. Robert Harper of Columbia College in the city of New York, and had
furnished him with the names of one humdred families in the North of Ireland
who were desirous of coming to America. Mr. Harper obtained a warrant from
the governor, to survey and lay off a tract of forty thousand acres, from the
ungranted lands north of Kingsbury and Queensbury and around the head of Lake
George, on which to locate these families. About the same time, Dr. Clark
received letters from two places in America which were desirous of obtaining
a minister, inviting him to come and settle with them. Upon his laying these
letters before Presbytery and stating that he thought his labors would be
more effective in some other place than Ballibay, the Presbytery acceded to
his wish and appointed him to labor one year in America, without disturbing
his pastoral relations to the Ballibay church. Thereupon he and those who
had decided to accompany him, made the final arrangements for their
departure. His last discourse in Ballibay was preached from I Corinthians
2:3 ,
"I was with you in weakness, in fear, and in much trembling"-- a passage
which he says in a letter to them long afterwards, "contains the history of
my six years sojourning with you." In the following devout terms Dr. Clark
briefly relates the voyage across the ocean, of the "Pilgrim Fathers of
Salem," "May 10, 1764, we sailed from Newry. The all-gracious God carried
three hundred of us, safe over the devouring deep in the arms of his mercy.
Praised be his Name! We arrived safe in New York, July 28th."


End of Installment Two
More to come.

Cordelia






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