Virginia Magazine of History and Biography
Volume 109 / Number 2
ABSTRACT:
"All That is Pure in Religion and Valuable in Society": Presbyterians, the Virginia Society,
and the Sabbath, 1830–1836
- Forrest L. Marion, pp. 187–218
Historians of the early Jacksonian era have devoted little attention to Sabbatarianism and usually have focused
on the reform movement in New York. This has led to a view of Sabbatarians as basically coercive and radical.
However, a study of the movement in Virginia during the 1830s reveals that Sabbatarians there were neither coercive
nor radical. Instead, they were non-coercive, even moderate, in their approach to promoting the better observance of
the Christian Sabbath, or Lord's day. The movement in Virginia, as viewed through the activities of the Virginia Sabbath Society,
was marked by spiritual and socioeconomic concerns. The former interest, though relatively intangible, was the primary one
and involved the observance of the day by whites; the latter concern, far more tangible, was of secondary importance
and involved the day's observance by blacks and the interplay between the races. Presbyterians dominated the
Virginia Sabbath Society, but the other major Protestant denominations were represented as well--Baptists, Methodists,
and Episcopalians. These Virginians advanced the cause of Sabbath observance solely through moral suasion, for example,
the publication of pamphlets, tracts, preaching, church resolutions, and the exemplary example of its members. An irony of the
movement involved the tendency of evangelicals, including Sabbatarians, to favor "whiggish" policies--internal improvements
and commercial enterprises. Yet many Sabbatarians feared that those very improvements and enterprises threatened the
observance of the Sabbath, as more and more people traveled on new transportation routes (roads, canals) and vehicles
(steamboats, desire for railroads).
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