30. [Williams], Essential Rights and Liberties. Although Williams' book included a
∑π∏ Notes to Pages 364–69
this time. It is also not clear when the campaign for a separate church began. Possibly relevant to the latter is that in November and December Edwards preached several sermons at the home of a neighbor. Sermons, Proverbs 8:17, pt. 1, II Corinthians 3:18, pt. 2, and John 12:73 (Works of Edwards transcriptions) are dated November or December 1750 with notes that they were preached at ''Neighbor Allyns'' or ''Sgt. Allyns,'' two indicating ''Sabbath evening.''
24. Winslow, Edwards, 262, 365n., quoting undated MS, Beinecke. Addressing their concerns to a number of Edwards' ministerial friends (Thomas Prince, Thomas Foxcroft, et al.), they concluded by remarking that if all else fails, his friends might inquire into founding an academy, adding (in a comment on Edwards' character) that they ''put them all [the founders] in mind that Mr. Edwards dwell in a part of the country where provisions are plenty and cheap and avocations and diversions rare and unusual.'' Winslow, Edwards, 262.
25. Edwards to Hawley, November 18, 1754, Works, 16: 650–52. 26. Edwards to Joseph Sewall and Thomas Prince, April 10, 1751, Works, 16: 368–69, confirms his coolness to the plan for another church in Northampton.
27. Edwards to Hawley, November 18, 1754, Works, p. 651. Shortly after his decision was made to go to Stockbridge, Edwards was importuned to settle in Virginia by a delegation sent by Samuel Davies, a Presbyterian evangelist who was successfully promoting awakening in Virginia. Murray, Jonathan Edwards, 364–65.
28. Misrepresentations Corrected, Works, 12: 498, indicates that Northampton people had financed and distributed the publication.
29. Edwards to Foxcroft, May 24, 1749, Works, 16: 284–85. 30. [Williams], Essential Rights and Liberties. Although Williams' book included a defense of Stoddardeanism, Edwards loaned this book to his parishioners, noting it in his ''Diary or Account Book,'' 27, as ''Rector Wms. Seasonable Plea.'' Kevin Sweeney, ''River Gods and Minor Related Deities: The Williams Family and the Connecticut River Valley, 1637–1790'' (Ph.D. diss., Yale University, 1986), 441. 31. Sibley's Harvard Graduates, 5: 592–97, quotation p. 596; Sweeney, ''River Gods,'' 387–93. His second wife, Elizabeth Scott, was a hymn-writer of some renown. 32. Cf. Hall, ''Introduction,'' Works, 12: 69. 33. While the Northamptonites were waiting for Solomon Williams' published reply, they engaged Ashley to come and deliver some sermons opposing Edwards' views.
34. The other opponent was Chester Williams of nearby Hadley, a more distant cousin. His mother was a Chester and may have been related to the Chester sisters who were married to John Stoddard and Israel Williams. Chester Williams' grandfather was Samuel Williams of Roxbury, Massachusetts, where the clan originated. ''Chester Williams,'' in Dexter, Biographical Sketches, 1: 546.
35. Solomon Williams, The True State of the Question Concerning the Qualifications Necessary to Lawful Communion in the Christian Sacraments, Being an Answer to the Reverend Jonathan Edwards (Boston, 1751), 5–8, as quoted in Hall, ''Introduction,'' Works, 12: 70– 71. For a summary of Williams' argument see ibid., 69–73. 36. Misrepresentations Corrected, Works, 12: 355–60. 37. Ibid., 502. 38. Joseph Hawley to David Hall, May 9, 1760. This letter was reprinted in a Boston newspaper at Hawley's request and is reprinted in Dwight, Life, 421–27. In this letter