Part 12

“‘The Lord has arisen, He has indeed arisen.’

“At a certain place where the litany speaks of those who are buried in the churchyard, and of their rising again, we walk out into the churchyard, and the trombone players accompany the hymns that are sung. If the weather is stormy that we cannot go out, this is always a disappointment.

“When I was young, if a child was born in the morning, it was taken to church in the evening to be christened. Religious meetings were held every evening; sometimes a prayer-meeting, sometimes a _sing-meeting_.

“I recollect marriages by lot very well, because they continued until about 1818. All marriages were by lot. Young men and young women were not allowed to keep company, and they did not think about it.”

“They hardly dared to look at each other,” said another person present.

Mrs. B. continued: “If a young man wanted to marry,—of course he had his eye on some one he would like,—he told it to the _Brüder-Pfleger_ (Caretaker of the Brothers), who told it to the minister, and the minister to the _Schwester-Pfleger_ (Caretaker of the Sisters). The name that the young man chose was taken into the lot, and if the lot was favorable he might proceed, but if not he must look out for another. If the lot was favorable it was told to the young woman by the _Schwester-Pfleger_, and if the young woman was willing this sister told the minister. There was a _Brüder-Pfleger_ in each brother-house, and a _Schwester-Pfleger_ in each sister-house.

“Betrothals took place after the young woman had given her consent, in the presence of the conference, composed of the ministers and their wives, and the marriage would generally take place within a week, in the church. The wedding was public, but those who were invited stayed to the _Schmaus_ (feast),[107] which was cake and wine in the church. Thus the ceremony was completed.

“Moravians then dressed with great plainness, much like the Quakers.”

As the Moravians were so very strict about the intercourse of the sexes, they could not have allowed two young men and two young women to sit up together with the unburied dead, as has been the custom among some of our Pennsylvania people.

I spoke upon this point to Mrs. B., who said, “Women always sat up with women, and men with men. However, in old times, as soon as there was a death, the trombones sounded, as they do now, and the body was taken when dressed, immediately to a small stone building called the corpse-house, and here remained until the funeral.”[108]

Mrs. ⸺ said that she lost her parents before she was three years old, and was taken into the sister-house, and her brothers into the brother-house. Even those who had parents living sometimes preferred to live in these buildings.

* * * * *

Some simple details of home-life were given to me by Mrs. C., of Bethlehem.

In their own family, in her youth, they rose about five, and breakfasted at six, usually on bread, butter, and coffee, perhaps with the addition of molasses. At nine they had a lunch of cold meat, pie, and bread and butter; and at a quarter before twelve came the dinner of meat and vegetables. Often they had soup. There was soup every day at the sister-house, and I was told that in cases of sickness it could be bought there.

“We always had pie for dinner. At two we had coffee and bread and butter. This was called vesper. At six was our supper of cold meat, bread and butter, and pickles. We always had pickles, and every day in the year we had apple-butter.”

Mrs. C.’s father was a miller, and perhaps lived more “full and plenty” than some of his neighbors.

She continued: “Every Saturday, we baked bread, pies, and sugar-cake. We made a great many doughnuts, or _Fast-nacht gucke_.” (Shrove-Tuesday pancakes, as we may say.) “We made crullers, and called them _Schtrumpf-bänder_” (“garters,” doubtless from their form). “Nearly all our cakes were made from raised dough. One we called _Bäbe_. ‘Snow-balls’ were made with plenty of eggs, milk, flour, and a little sugar, and were fried in fat.

“At Christmas we always had turkeys; and then we baked a great supply of cakes, from four quarts of molasses and four pounds of sugar, and these lasted all winter. Then every evening before we went to bed we had Christmas cakes, sweet cider, and apples.

“The two o’clock vesper has generally fallen out of use, but if any one comes to town now that I want to invite, and it is not convenient to have them to dinner or supper, I say, ‘Come to vesper.’ Then we have coffee, and always sugar-cake.”

“It would not be a vesper without the sugar-cake,” said Mrs. C.’s daughter.

For a vesper-party for guests, Mrs. C. sets a table, and adds smoked beef, preserves, or anything that she chooses.

She further told me that her parents were married by lot, and lived very happily, and she added that as far as we hear, and have seen, most of the pairs thus married lived happily. But the young people were dissatisfied with these marriages. Although the young man had the privilege of putting in the names of several whom he would like, yet if none of these were drawn he became discontented.

“Should a name be chosen that did not please the young man, I believe he had liberty to withdraw.[109]

“In those times of strict rule, there was no opportunity for the young people of both sexes to become acquainted. This rule originated at Herrnhut. It was on account of it that an unmarried brother who worked in our mill was not allowed to sleep in our house, but must go every night to the brother-house to lodge until the rule was given up, about sixty years ago, and the brother was then allowed to sleep in the mill.”

While Mrs. C. was talking, her husband remarked that if he could find a town such as Bethlehem was in 1822 (when, if I remember aright, he had come to the place a stranger), he would go thousands of miles to get his family there to live. The whole town, he said, was composed of Moravians, and was like one family, living well, all in comfort, plain in their dress, happy and contented with their lot.

OLD BUILDINGS.

The sister-house, the _Gemein-haus_, and the widow-house are still standing at Bethlehem, solid stone buildings with great roofs and dormer-windows. One of them has immense stone buttresses, and all are fitted to withstand the effects of time. Their appearance, indeed, is becoming peculiar. The brother-house is still standing, but has disappeared from view as a separate structure, having been incorporated, as I have mentioned, in the young ladies’ seminary.

The sister-house is owned by the Board of Elders of the Northern Diocese of the Church of the United Brethren (Unitas Fratrum) in the United States, and apartments are furnished to the widows and daughters of servants of the church, rent free. Any unmarried Moravian woman (or widow) may also have rooms here, but not free of charge.

The corner-stone of the widow-house was laid in 1767. This conspicuous building has recently been purchased by a friend of the church. The apartments will be appropriated free of rent to the widows and unmarried daughters of missionaries, ministers, and other servants of the church, including teachers in the seminaries.[110]

The _Gemein-haus_ (congregation-house) was used for the ministers’ families, sometimes three or four, who resided in Bethlehem. It is no longer occupied by these, but by other members of the society. It adjoins the old chapel, where the preaching is in German. These old buildings, especially the widow-house, are in good repair.

One of the most striking circumstances connected with some of the old buildings at Nazareth is the account of the numbers of persons whom they are said to have once sheltered. The sister-house is a large structure, but the brother-house is so inconspicuous upon the street of the quiet little town, being, indeed, occupied as a store and dwelling, and probably sheltering not more than two families, that it is quite wonderful to hear tell of fifty persons having once had their homes in it.[111]

Of one of the most noteworthy buildings at Nazareth I have already made mention. It was called Ephrata.[112] The foundations were laid by Whitefield, the celebrated preacher, who bought five thousand acres in the forks of the Delaware, or where the Lehigh empties into that stream. This tract was afterwards bought by the Moravians. In 1744, thirty-three married couples from Bethlehem moved into this house.[113] In 1749, the “nursery,” of which I have before spoken, was removed here from Bethlehem. Recently this old building has been completely renovated, and the upper floor contains the collection and library of the Moravian Historical Society. The building is called the Whitefield-house, but it might still be called Ephrata, or a place of rest, for the lower part is a dwelling for retired missionary families. Only one family was there at the time of my visit, a widow with children. Little people were running about and laughing below, quite at home.

The “sustentation fund” of the Moravian Church supports the “resting ministers” (such as the Methodists call superannuated ministers) the widows and children of missionaries, etc.

MISCELLANEOUS REMARKS.

An acquaintance said to me in Lancaster, “The people of Bethlehem are not Pennsylvania Dutch. They speak the high German.” I think, however, that the younger people have acquired the Pennsylvania dialect. An elderly gentleman of Bethlehem, to whom mention was made of a work upon the “Pennsylvania Dutch,” etc., replied in this manner (with a German accent): “We don’t want to know anything about the Pennsylvania Dutch. We know enough about them already. We see enough of them on our farms.”

It may be inferred from what has been said that the Moravians are persons of very considerable culture. I may go further, and speak of the thoughtful, spiritual expression of many faces.

As agriculture may be called the vocation of the Pennsylvania Germans in general, so education may be called the vocation of the Moravians. To the support of the parochial school at Bethlehem I heard that about nine thousand dollars are annually appropriated from the income of the church property there. This enables those who have charge to put the terms of instruction very low. These are four dollars, or four to six, annually, for Moravian children.

The daughters of Moravian preachers are entitled to four years’ tuition in one of the young ladies’ schools, either at the celebrated one at Bethlehem, that at Litiz, Pennsylvania, at Salem, North Carolina, or at Hope, Indiana.[114] Besides these institutions, there is a flourishing boys’ school at Nazareth, and a college and divinity school at Bethlehem.

* * * * *

Very few of the Moravians here are engaged in agriculture. They have remained in towns, as it seems, and rarely or never become large and wealthy farmers; a circumstance that I do not comprehend. That religious scruples against the acquisition of wealth, or of individual property, have influenced their actions, I have not been able to discover.

* * * * *

I have not in my reports of aged citizens repeated some of the “orthodox” expressions which they used.

“The distinguishing feature of Moravian theology,” says Appleton’s Cyclopædia, “is the prominence given to the person and atonement of Christ.”

I noticed at Bethlehem a sweet simplicity in speaking to or of the preachers.

A young man told me that Brother W. had sent him, and one of the sisters unaffectedly addressed a venerable bishop as Brother S. One of these gentlemen said to a person, not a member of his church, “Call me brother.”

* * * * *

I have never heard Moravians call themselves Herrnhutters. The favorite name of their churchmen for their organization is Unitas Fratrum, or Unity of Brethren. A venerable preacher tells me that they have been called the _Johannische Gemein_, or community like St. John; or their view the _Johannische Auffassung_, or John-like expression, of the spirit of the gospel, especially as we read in the seventeenth chapter of John the prayer of Christ, “That they, Father, may be one, as we are one.”[115]

* * * * *

I conclude this sketch with an abridged passage from the Mission Report of 1872, an extract which may be interesting to thoughtful minds:

“The celebration of the centenary of the Labrador mission took place at all the six stations on the 5th and 6th of January, 1871. Some of the people assisted in decorating the chapels by fetching fir-tree branches and making festoons. A number of welcome jubilee presents from the Ladies’ Association in London, and other sisters, were distributed, and the services closed with the celebration of the Lord’s Supper; a love-feast, at which printed odes were used; and a thanksgiving service. The brethren of Okak remark, ‘Stillness, not unusually a feature of festive seasons in Labrador, prevailed in a striking degree, and was to our minds more valuable as a proof of spiritual blessings enjoyed than the finest words could have been, especially as the Esquimaux have great readiness in using religious phrases.’”

NOTE.—Christianity was introduced into Bohemia and Moravia in the ninth century. It is claimed that the people of these countries, for several centuries, manifested in matters of faith the spirit of what was afterwards Protestantism. The most celebrated of their reformers was John Huss, who was burned, by order of the Council of Constance, in 1415. The Hussites separated into two parties, of whom the Taborites were defeated by the Calixtines in 1434, and the latter became the national church of Bohemia. A party among the remnant of the Taborites, dissatisfied with what they thought corrupt practices in this church, removed more and more from the Calixtine communion, and at length were permitted to settle on the barony of Lititz. It is claimed that some, if not all, of these were men of God, who had not taken up arms during the war. They afterwards adopted the name _Unitas Fratrum_, or _Unity of the Brethren_. Their pastors were Calixtine priests who had joined the society. Such was the beginning of the Moravian Church. They obtained the episcopal succession from a colony of Waldenses, on the confines of Bohemia and Austria. Toward the year 1500 they had more than two hundred churches in Moravia and Bohemia, and had published a Bohemian Bible and several confessions of faith.

Their numbers and influence increased very much, and gradually the _Unitas Fratrum_ was composed of three provinces, the Bohemian, Moravian, and Polish. But, in 1621, Ferdinand II. began a series of persecutions of all the Protestant denominations in Bohemia and Moravia, known as the anti-reformation. Protestantism was totally overthrown here, more than fifty thousand of the inhabitants having emigrated. In Poland, the Brethren’s Church became united with the Reformed, and the _Unitas Fratrum_ disappeared from the eyes of men, and remained as a “hidden seed” for ninety-four years. In Moravia many families remained, who secretly entertained the views of their fathers, and among these an awakening took place in the early part of the eighteenth century, through the instrumentality of a Moravian exile named Christian David. The desire to live in a Protestant country was felt more and more, and two families escaped in the night, and after eleven days safely reached Berthelsdorf, an estate in Saxony belonging to Count Zinzendorf, a pious young nobleman, who had offered them a refuge. Other Moravians joined them, and in a few years a colony of three hundred persons lived on Count Zinzendorf’s estate. He himself soon relinquished all worldly honors, became a bishop of the brethren, and devoted himself entirely to their service.

* * * * *

Nicolaus Ludwig, Count of Zinzendorf and Pottendorf, descended from a noble Austrian family, was born in Dresden in 1700. His father dying soon after his birth, his education was confided to his grandmother, the Baroness de Gersdorf, who had adopted the idea of Spener, the founder of the Pietists, of _little churches within the church_, having for their aim the promotion of piety and the purifying and sanctifying of the whole church.

The mind of Zinzendorf, when he was a mere child, took an enthusiastic direction, and he used to write letters to the Saviour and throw them out of the window, hoping that the Saviour might find them. At the university of Wittenberg, he applied himself, without direction or aid, to the study of theology, fully resolved to become a minister of the gospel. In 1722 he married, and about the same time gave some emigrant Moravian brethren permission to settle upon his estate of Berthelsdorf. In connection with some others, he labored to instruct them and their children. But it would seem, from subsequent circumstances, that he himself became, in some degree, their pupil.

They were not all agreed in religious opinions, and, with a view to unity, he formed statutes for their government. He was also appointed a warden of the congregation. In 1734 he went, under an assumed name, to Stralsund, and passed an examination as a theological candidate. The same year he received holy orders at Tübingen. On returning from Switzerland, in 1736, he met an edict forbidding his return to his native country, and repaired to Berlin, where, under sanction of the King of Prussia, he was consecrated bishop of the Moravian congregation, and from that time was always called the Ordinary of the Brethren. The order of banishment was repealed after eleven years.

Within this period he visited the islands of St. Thomas and St. Croix, where the Brethren had already established missions. He also came to Pennsylvania in 1741. He remained in this country two years, during which he was very diligently and successfully occupied. He also made several visits to Holland and England. He spent his latter years at Herrnhut, where he died. His remains were borne to the grave by thirty-two preachers and missionaries whom he had reared, from Holland, England, Ireland, and North America, including Greenland. He wrote more than one hundred books. His son, who was an elder of the single brethren, died before his father. His son-in-law, the Baron de Watteville, was a bishop of the Moravian Church.

On the continent of Europe the Moravian system of the time of Zinzendorf is kept up in every respect. The governing board for the whole “Unity,” or whole Moravian Church, meets at Berthelsdorf, in Saxony, in the castle once inhabited by Count Zinzendorf, who devoted his entire property to the good of the church.

A community of goods never existed at any time in a Moravian institution. The _Economie_, or _Economische Haushaltung_ (Economical Household, or Common Housekeeping), seems to have existed for about twenty years, during the Indian wars, when the settlements of the Brethren at Bethlehem, etc., were feeble and exposed to attack.

The numerical force of the Moravians is not great. The number of communicants—home-communicants, if I may call them so—is 12,947 (estimate of 1859?), and over 53,000 mission converts, including baptized children. There are also, as I understand, 80,000 “Diaspora members” on the continent of Europe; for which remarkable movement see the article _Moravians_, in Appleton’s Cyclopædia. See, also, the _Moravian Manual_. This historical sketch is drawn principally from these sources, and from the articles _Zinzendorf_ and _German Theology_ of the same Cyclopædia.

SCHWENKFELDERS.

I had before seen the Schwenkfelders mentioned as a people who, like the Mennonites, Quakers, etc., are opposed to war, but I never became personally acquainted with them until the spring of 1873. At that time, a gentleman of West Chester advised me to inform myself concerning them, speaking of them as a delightful people. On arriving at Norristown, I therefore made inquiry about them from citizens of that borough, and was kindly furnished with several letters of introduction to members of the Schwenkfelder community living about seven miles north of the town.[116]

It was about noon when the stage left me at the house of one who had formerly been a preacher in the society. Here I dined, conversed with my host about his people, and looked at various large old volumes which he showed to me. Then, having been supplied with an escort, I went to a house in the same neighborhood, the dwelling of an elderly brother, who had learned my errand, and had expressed a wish to meet me.

Under his hospitable care, I remained until Sunday evening; he taking me to the meeting-house and other places. Through him I also received a present of several books, giving the history and doctrines of the society.

On Sunday evening he took me to the house of another member, whose kindly care did not cease until he had conveyed me—on Monday morning—again to the borough of Norristown.

MEETING-HOUSE AND GRAVEYARD.

The church which I visited is in Towamensing Township, Montgomery County, and is one of six in Eastern Pennsylvania which hold all the Schwenkfelders now living. I was surprised to find the church in neat order and in good preservation, thus indicating no lack of vitality in this small religious body, which, like a transplanted tree, has thrown out so few roots into adjoining soil. The plain meeting-house stood upon the edge of a wood; the graveyard was neat, and was enlivened by the blossoms of the mountain pink,[117] and the bright sunshine and tender green of May animated the scene.

Among the monumental stones was a rough one bearing this inscription only: “A. R. W. 1745.” And this was, I believe, the oldest here. Of nine years’ later date was a gravestone, still unhewn and irregular in shape, but with a longer inscription: “Psal. 90 v. 7. Baltzer Anders, Gestorben 1754, 56.” The passage cited from the Psalms is the text of the funeral sermon. The rest we may translate: “Balthazar Anders. Died 1754, at the age of 56.”

At the date 1762 we find a carved marble head-stone, but no showy monuments have been erected here. One of the more modern stones says, “Rosina Kribelin, geb. Hübnerin, alt 27 Yahr 5 monat,”—or “Rosina Kribel, born Hübner, aged twenty-seven years and five months;” the feminine termination in being added to both the names.[118]

Inscriptions older than these may be found at the meeting-house in Lower Salford Township, and one of them goes to a somewhat greater length in honor of him for whom it was erected. Translated it reads thus: “In memory of George Weiss, was born in Silesia, and first teacher of the Schwenkfelder community in Pennsylvania; died the 11th of March 1740, 53 years old.”

(The word teacher means preacher.)

* * * * *

Within the meeting-house there were enclosed benches or open pews; the pulpit and the ends of these benches upon the aisle being painted white. The men sat upon one side of the house, the women upon the other; the women removing their bonnets and wearing caps. These caps were not severely plain, like those of the Mennonites, etc., but were trimmed with white satin ribbon.[119]

The Schwenkfelder women bent the knee at the name of Jesus, but this observance has fallen into disuse among the men.