A Speaking Aristocracy: Transforming Public Discourse in Eighteenth-Century Connecticut

by Christopher Grasso

Overview

As cultural authority was reconstituted in the Revolutionary era, knowledge reconceived in the age of Enlightenment, and the means of communication radically altered by the proliferation of print, speakers and writers in eighteenth-century America began to describe themselves and their world in new ways. Drawing on hundreds of sermons, essays, speeches, letters, journals, plays, poems, and newspaper articles, Christopher Grasso explores how intellectuals, preachers, and polemicists transformed both the forms and the substance of public discussion in eighteenth-century Connecticut.
In New England through the first half of the century, only learned clergymen regularly addressed the public. After midcentury, however, newspapers, essays, and eventually lay orations introduced new rhetorical strategies to persuade or instruct an audience. With the rise of a print culture in the early Republic, the intellectual elite had to compete with other voices and address multiple audiences. By the end of the century, concludes Grasso, public discourse came to be understood not as the words of an authoritative few to the people but rather as a civic conversation of the people.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780807847725
Publisher:	Omohundro Institute and UNC Press
Publication date:	03/08/1999
Series:	Published by the Omohundro Institute of Early American History and Culture and the University of North Carolina Press
Edition description:	1
Pages:	524
Product dimensions:	6.12(w) x 9.25(h) x 1.17(d)

About the Author

Christopher Grasso is associate professor of history at the College of William and Mary and editor of the William and Mary Quarterly.

Table of Contents

Contents

Acknowledgments List of Illustrations

Introduction

Part I: Meaning and Moral Order
1. The Power of the Public Covenant
2. Only a Great Awakening: Jonathan Edwards and the Regulation of Religious Discourse
3. Legalism and Orthodoxy: Thomas Clap and the Transformation of Legal Culture

Part II: Cultivation and Enlightenment
4. The Experimental Philosophy of Farming: Jared Eliot and the Cultivation of Connecticut
5. Christian Knowledge and Revolutionary New England: The Education of Ezra Stiles

Part III: Revolution and Steady Habits
6. Print, Poetry, and Politics: John Trumbull and the Transformation of the Public Sphere
7. Reawakening the Public Mind: Timothy Dwight and the Rhetoric of New England
8. Political Characters and Public Words

Conclusion: The New Politics of Revolution and Steady Habits

Appendix 1: Connecticut Imprints Appendix 2: Connecticut Election Sermons Appendix 3: A Note on the Historiography of the Great Awakening

Index

Illustrations

Figure 1. Gurdon Saltonstall, A Sermon Preached, MS, First Page Figure 2. Eliphalet Adams, Necessity of Judgment, Title Page Figure 3. [Elisha Williams], Essential Rights, Title Page Figure 4. Jonathan Edwards, MS Sermon on Ezek. 44:9
Figure 5. The Parishioner, Title Page Figure 6. Thomas Clap, The Religious Constitution of Colleges, First Page Figure 7. Jethro Tull's Wheat Drill Figure 8. Peter Oliver's Drill Plow Figure 9. Portrait of Ezra Stiles
Figure 10. Ezra Stiles's Sketch of Medallion Figure 11. Ezra Stiles's Sketch and Explanation of His Symbol of the Spiritual Universe Figure 12. A Gentleman Riding into Town as the Deferential Townsfolk Bow before Him Figure 13. Town Meeting
Figure 14. M'Fingal at the Liberty Pole Figure 15. Connecticut Courant, Mar. 23, 1795, Front Page Figure 16. Dialogue at Quarter Day, June 19, 1784
Figure 17. David Daggett, Sun-Beams May Be Extracted from Cucumbers, But the Process Is Tedious, Title Page Figure 18. Congressional Pugilists
Figure 19. American Imprints, 1700-1800
Figure 20. Connecticut Imprints, 1700-1800
Figure 21. Connecticut Imprints, 1750-1800: Government/Civic and Literary/Educational
Figure 22. Connecticut Imprints, 1750-1850: Religious and Other

What People are Saying About This

Nathan O. Hatch

Grasso's signal achievement is to integrate the cumulative legacy of evangelical preaching, legal reasoning, enlightenment science, republican ideology, literary sensibility, and political debate.

From the Publisher

[An] outstanding new book. . . . A wide variety of scholars will be fascinated by this book. Even though there have been many fine studies of eighteenth-century intellectual history, few are as sophisticated, as subtle, and as learned as A Speaking Aristocracy.—Journal of American History



Grasso has written an important book. Historians of public life throughout the early modern Atlantic world will want to explore his account of how the learned men of eighteenth-century Connecticut—the speaking aristocracy—reshaped their discursive practices in an age of revolution.—American Historical Review



A significant contribution to our understanding of high culture in one place and time. . . . Engaging.—Journal of the Early Republic



This book is a wonderful portrait of leadership and public discourse in the Revolutionary era. Grasso's signal achievement is to integrate the cumulative legacy of evangelical preaching, legal reasoning, enlightenment science, republican ideology, literary sensibility, and political debate.—Nathan O. Hatch, University of Notre Dame



Grasso's book, among its many strengths . . . convinces us that how people think about themselves is supremely worthy of the historian's study. It becomes essential reading for all serious students of American civilization.—William & Mary Quarterly



Grasso traces not simply the transformation of the modes of discourse, and of the membership of the speaking elite, but also throughout this fine study analyzes the words and ideas of their eighteenth-century world.—Connecticut History



A hugely impressive book, with an engaging style and a nice eye for anecdote.—Times Literary Supplement



An extraordinary work of scholarship, . . . A Speaking Aristocracy is unquestionably the finest study of revolutionary Connecticut ever written—and more significantly, the most impressively comprehensive account of the continuities and changes that worked upon eighteenth-century Connecticut before and after the Revolution.—Joseph J. Ellis, Mount Holyoke College



Although Dickinson is mentioned briefly in only four separate instances, Grasso's well researched and organized study advocating anger as a 'mode of inquiry' may stimulate scholars to revisit Dickinson's poems and letters.—Emily Dickinson International Society Bulletin



Going beyond the old tropes of 'Puritan to Yankee' or the 'Decline of Calvinism,' Christopher Grasso's refreshingly diverse portrait of eighteenth-century Connecticut intellectual life does justice to both the staunch conservatism and the creative dynamism of this rich provincial culture. A Speaking Aristocracy pulls together multiple strands of religious, scientific, literary, and political discourse for the first time, giving attention to the subtlety of individual thinkers as well as to the transforming power of external events. What emerges is a deeply researched, subtle, and compelling story of continuity and change that challenges all easy generalizations about the stability and homogeneity of the early Connecticut elite.—Ruth Bloch, University of California, Los Angeles

Joseph J. Ellis

Unquestionably the finest study of revolutionary Connecticut ever written.

Editorial Reviews

[T]here have been many fine studies of eighteenth-century intellectual history, few are as sophisticated, as subtle, and as learned.

"Journal of American History"

ÝT¨here have been many fine studies of eighteenth-century intellectual history, few are as sophisticated, as subtle, and as learned.

"Journal of American History"

A hugely impressive book, with an engaging style and a nice eye for anecdote.

"Times Literary Supplement"

This book is a wonderful portrait of leadership and public discourse in the Revolutionary era.

Nathan O. Hatch, University of Notre Dame

"[T]here have been many fine studies of eighteenth-century intellectual history, few are as sophisticated, as subtle, and as learned.

"Journal of American History""

"A hugely impressive book, with an engaging style and a nice eye for anecdote.

"Times Literary Supplement""

"This book is a wonderful portrait of leadership and public discourse in the Revolutionary era.

Nathan O. Hatch, University of Notre Dame"

A significant contribution to our understanding of high culture in one place and time.

"Journal of the Early Republic"

Historians of public life throughout the early modern Atlantic world will want to explore his account.

"American Historical Review"

From the Publisher