The Folly of Revolution: Thomas Bradbury Chandler and the Loyalist Mind in a Democratic Age by S. Scott Rohrer (review)

IF 0.3 3区 文学 0 LITERATURE, AMERICAN
Daniel Diez Couch
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Crary, and Mary Beth Norton, as well as more recent studies by Maya Jasanoff and Phillip Gould, Rohrer finds an unexplored, and important, story of loyalism in the figure of Thomas Bradbury Chandler, the Anglican minister at St. John's in Elizabeth Town, New Jersey. Rohrer makes a convincing case throughout <em>The Folly of Revolution: Thomas Bradbury Chandler and the Loyalist Mind in a Democratic Age</em>. He situates Chandler as a major theological and political node in a network of colonial Anglican ministers, explaining Chandler's education, ideological formation, mission to further Anglicanism in the colonies, and resistance to American independence. For Rohrer, Chandler's life and worldview constitute an \"alternative vision\" that \"has receded from historical memory\" (3). Indeed, even as <em>The Folly of Revolution</em> provides a finely detailed biographical study of Chandler's life, it simultaneously tracks the broader intellectual milieu, with particular attention to the eighteenth-century debates surrounding Anglicanism and evangelicalism, as well as republicanism and monarchism. In many ways, for Chandler, the problems of evangelism and republicanism were one and the same. Rohrer's study does an admirable job of examining a range of intellectual traditions through the lens of Chandler's life and learning.</p> <p><em>The Folly of Revolution</em> begins by unfolding a central question for Chandler throughout much of his career: \"How could social and political order <strong>[End Page 481]</strong> survive when subjects had the right to challenge authority?\" (4). Beginning with his schooling at Yale, where Chandler rejected the Congregationalism of his youth, Rohrer takes us through the minister's meticulously monarchical positions, the most vital of which was his goal of establishing an Anglican bishop in America. He became friends early in his life with Samuel Johnson, one of the chief Anglican ministers in the colonies, a man who fought fiercely for the creation of a colonial episcopate. Chandler took up this cause when Johnson no longer could. In support of his position, Chandler \"did not look to the ancient world for guidance,\" unlike many other American intellectuals, instead opting to examine late seventeenth-century Royalist thought (12). Chandler, Rohrer reveals, carefully studied the parliamentary quarrels that scholars such as Edmund S. Morgan have revealed as so central to the crucible of revolutionary American thought. Unlike the Patriots, however, Chandler took the High Church monarchical side, particularly in the cases of the nonjurors who refused to swear allegiance to William and Mary and the Bangorian controversy, two proceedings that deeply shaped Chandler's worldview. As Rohrer chronologically tracks forward through Chandler's life as the book progresses—successively examining his early life and schooling, his push for the Anglican episcopacy, his counterrevolutionary sentiments, and finally his exile and return to the United States—he simultaneously delves into the past that shaped the Anglican minister's religious and political positions. In this way, Rohrer's study provides an important means of understanding how seventeenth-century British history mattered for loyalists, not just Patriots.</p> <p>The details of the past matter for understanding Chandler's perspective, a point that shows Rohrer's sensitivity to Chandler's own identity as a historian (<em>The Folly of Revolution</em> primarily relies on records of Chandler's library for its reading of his intellectual background). When Parliament deposed James II in 1688 and replaced him with William and Mary, a group of nine Anglican bishops refused to take an oath to the new sovereigns, explaining that \"Parliament, acting on behalf of the people, cannot place someone on the throne. Such a thing was unnatural, and against all reason, in a divinely ordered universe\" (73). Chandler concurred with this sentiment. In his historical studies Chandler sided with the so-called nonjurors and was alarmed by British republican thought...</p> </p>","PeriodicalId":44043,"journal":{"name":"EARLY AMERICAN LITERATURE","volume":"88 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.3000,"publicationDate":"2024-08-07","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"EARLY AMERICAN LITERATURE","FirstCategoryId":"1085","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.1353/eal.2024.a934212","RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"0","JCRName":"LITERATURE, AMERICAN","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0

Abstract

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:

Reviewed by:

  • The Folly of Revolution: Thomas Bradbury Chandler and the Loyalist Mind in a Democratic Age by S. Scott Rohrer
  • Daniel Diez Couch (bio)
The Folly of Revolution: Thomas Bradbury Chandler and the Loyalist Mind in a Democratic Age
s. scott rohrer
University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, 2022
248 pp.

In many ways, S. Scott Rohrer claims, British loyalism in the colonies during the eighteenth century remains an untold story. Despite canonical studies by scholars including Robert M. Calhoon, Catherine S. Crary, and Mary Beth Norton, as well as more recent studies by Maya Jasanoff and Phillip Gould, Rohrer finds an unexplored, and important, story of loyalism in the figure of Thomas Bradbury Chandler, the Anglican minister at St. John's in Elizabeth Town, New Jersey. Rohrer makes a convincing case throughout The Folly of Revolution: Thomas Bradbury Chandler and the Loyalist Mind in a Democratic Age. He situates Chandler as a major theological and political node in a network of colonial Anglican ministers, explaining Chandler's education, ideological formation, mission to further Anglicanism in the colonies, and resistance to American independence. For Rohrer, Chandler's life and worldview constitute an "alternative vision" that "has receded from historical memory" (3). Indeed, even as The Folly of Revolution provides a finely detailed biographical study of Chandler's life, it simultaneously tracks the broader intellectual milieu, with particular attention to the eighteenth-century debates surrounding Anglicanism and evangelicalism, as well as republicanism and monarchism. In many ways, for Chandler, the problems of evangelism and republicanism were one and the same. Rohrer's study does an admirable job of examining a range of intellectual traditions through the lens of Chandler's life and learning.

The Folly of Revolution begins by unfolding a central question for Chandler throughout much of his career: "How could social and political order [End Page 481] survive when subjects had the right to challenge authority?" (4). Beginning with his schooling at Yale, where Chandler rejected the Congregationalism of his youth, Rohrer takes us through the minister's meticulously monarchical positions, the most vital of which was his goal of establishing an Anglican bishop in America. He became friends early in his life with Samuel Johnson, one of the chief Anglican ministers in the colonies, a man who fought fiercely for the creation of a colonial episcopate. Chandler took up this cause when Johnson no longer could. In support of his position, Chandler "did not look to the ancient world for guidance," unlike many other American intellectuals, instead opting to examine late seventeenth-century Royalist thought (12). Chandler, Rohrer reveals, carefully studied the parliamentary quarrels that scholars such as Edmund S. Morgan have revealed as so central to the crucible of revolutionary American thought. Unlike the Patriots, however, Chandler took the High Church monarchical side, particularly in the cases of the nonjurors who refused to swear allegiance to William and Mary and the Bangorian controversy, two proceedings that deeply shaped Chandler's worldview. As Rohrer chronologically tracks forward through Chandler's life as the book progresses—successively examining his early life and schooling, his push for the Anglican episcopacy, his counterrevolutionary sentiments, and finally his exile and return to the United States—he simultaneously delves into the past that shaped the Anglican minister's religious and political positions. In this way, Rohrer's study provides an important means of understanding how seventeenth-century British history mattered for loyalists, not just Patriots.

The details of the past matter for understanding Chandler's perspective, a point that shows Rohrer's sensitivity to Chandler's own identity as a historian (The Folly of Revolution primarily relies on records of Chandler's library for its reading of his intellectual background). When Parliament deposed James II in 1688 and replaced him with William and Mary, a group of nine Anglican bishops refused to take an oath to the new sovereigns, explaining that "Parliament, acting on behalf of the people, cannot place someone on the throne. Such a thing was unnatural, and against all reason, in a divinely ordered universe" (73). Chandler concurred with this sentiment. In his historical studies Chandler sided with the so-called nonjurors and was alarmed by British republican thought...

革命的愚蠢:托马斯-布拉德伯里-钱德勒与民主时代的忠君思想》,作者 S. Scott Rohrer(评论)
以下是内容的简要摘录,以代替摘要:评论者 革命的愚蠢:S. Scott Rohrer 著 Daniel Diez Couch (bio) The Folly of Revolution:Thomas Bradbury Chandler and the Loyalist Mind in a Democratic Age S. Scott Rohrer University Park:宾夕法尼亚州立大学出版社,2022 年,248 页。斯科特-罗勒(S. Scott Rohrer)称,在许多方面,18 世纪殖民地的英国效忠主义仍然是一个不为人知的故事。尽管罗伯特-M-卡尔洪(Robert M. Calhoon)、凯瑟琳-S-克拉里(Catherine S. Crary)和玛丽-贝丝-诺顿(Mary Beth Norton)等学者进行了经典研究,玛雅-贾萨诺夫(Maya Jasanoff)和菲利普-古尔德(Phillip Gould)也进行了较新的研究,但罗勒发现,在新泽西州伊丽莎白镇圣约翰教堂的英国圣公会牧师托马斯-布拉德伯里-钱德勒(Thomas Bradbury Chandler)这个人物身上,还有一个未被发掘的、重要的效忠故事。罗勒在《革命的愚蠢》一书中提出了令人信服的理由:托马斯-布拉德伯里-钱德勒与民主时代的忠君思想》一书中,罗勒提出了一个令人信服的观点。他将钱德勒定位为殖民地圣公会牧师网络中一个重要的神学和政治节点,解释了钱德勒的教育、思想形成、在殖民地推进圣公会主义的使命以及对美国独立的抵制。在罗勒看来,钱德勒的生平和世界观构成了一种 "另类视野","已从历史记忆中消失"(3)。事实上,尽管《革命的愚蠢》对钱德勒的生平进行了细致入微的传记研究,但它同时对更广泛的思想环境进行了追踪,尤其关注了十八世纪围绕英国圣公会和福音派以及共和主义和君主主义的争论。对钱德勒来说,福音主义和共和主义的问题在很多方面是相同的。罗勒的研究通过钱德勒的生平和学识审视了一系列思想传统,令人钦佩。革命的愚蠢》一开篇就提出了钱德勒职业生涯中的一个核心问题:"当臣民有权挑战权威时,社会和政治秩序 [第481页完] 如何才能生存下去?(4).钱德勒在耶鲁大学求学时摒弃了青年时期的公理会主义,罗勒从他在耶鲁大学的求学经历开始,带我们回顾了这位牧师一丝不苟的君主立宪立场,其中最重要的是他在美国设立圣公会主教的目标。他早年与塞缪尔-约翰逊(Samuel Johnson)成为朋友,约翰逊是英国圣公会在殖民地的主要牧师之一,此人为在殖民地建立主教团进行了激烈的斗争。钱德勒在约翰逊力不从心时接过了他的事业。为了支持自己的立场,钱德勒 "没有像其他许多美国知识分子那样从古代世界寻求指导",而是选择研究 17 世纪晚期的保皇派思想 (12)。罗勒揭示说,钱德勒仔细研究了埃德蒙-摩根(Edmund S. Morgan)等学者认为是美国革命思想熔炉核心的议会争吵。但与爱国者不同的是,钱德勒站在高等教会君主制一边,尤其是在拒绝宣誓效忠威廉和玛丽的非陪审员案件以及班戈之争中,这两起诉讼深深地塑造了钱德勒的世界观。随着本书的进展,罗勒按时间顺序追溯了钱德勒的一生--连续考察了他的早年生活和学校教育、他对圣公会主教职位的推动、他的反革命情绪,以及他最后被流放和返回美国的经历--他同时深入研究了塑造这位圣公会牧师宗教和政治立场的过去。通过这种方式,罗勒的研究为我们提供了一个重要途径,让我们了解 17 世纪的英国历史是如何影响效忠者而不仅仅是爱国者的。过去的细节对于理解钱德勒的观点很重要,这一点显示了罗勒对钱德勒自身历史学家身份的敏感性(《革命的愚蠢》主要依靠钱德勒图书馆的记录来解读他的知识背景)。1688 年,当议会废黜詹姆斯二世并由威廉和玛丽取而代之时,九位英国圣公会主教拒绝向新君主宣誓,他们解释说:"议会代表人民行事,不能将某人推上王位。在一个神圣有序的宇宙中,这样做是不自然的,也是违背常理的"(73)。钱德勒同意这种观点。在他的历史研究中,钱德勒站在所谓的 "非法学家 "一边,并对英国的共和思想感到震惊......
本文章由计算机程序翻译,如有差异,请以英文原文为准。
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来源期刊
EARLY AMERICAN LITERATURE
EARLY AMERICAN LITERATURE LITERATURE, AMERICAN-
CiteScore
0.30
自引率
33.30%
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62
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