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This program is the continuation of the reality that you can be, no, you must be a Christian to be the correct type of activist against tyranny. Sam Adams again proves this reality in every aspect of his life. What summarizes how this was true for Sam is this comment by Rev. Thomas Thacher:
” If he preferred the mode of Divine worship in which he was born and ed ucated to other religious institutions of antiquity, or to other forms in which Christianity has appeared, it was not from the prejudices of education, or mere mechanical habit ; but because he conceived our churches, when confined to their original design, were excellent schools of morality ; that they were adapted to promote the future happiness of mankind ; and because by experience he had known them a powerful auxiliary in defending the civil as well as the religious privileges of America.’In this mode of thinking he was instituted. The purity of his life witnessed the sincerity of his profession, and with the same faith he expired.”
The following was written of Adams in The Congregational Quarterly Vol XI:
As the State and the country emerged from the war, there was a strong tendency to depart from that piety, simplicity, and. frugality which had hitherto been dominant, and which such pure-minded patriots as Adams regarded as the basis of the whole structure of liberty. “At a time,”says Edward Everett, ” when the new order of things was inducing laxity of manners, and a departure from the ancient strictness, Samuel Adams clung with greater tenacity to the wholesome discipline of the fathers.” Even before the close of the war he raised his voice and used his pen against the insidious encroachments of extravagance and a lower tone of morals. Immediately after the inauguration of the State government, when Han cock was elected governor, Boston was gay with balls and glittering entertainments. Hancock had wealth, and loved display, and recklessly led the people in a dangerous path, and an era of moral and spiritual social degeneracy was initiated. Adams’s views on these points give a clear insight into the ruling principles of his life, and they are not inappropriate to our own times. He says:—
” Does it become us to lead the people to such public diversions as promote superfluity of dress and ornament, when it is as much as they can bear to support the expense of clothing a naked army ? Will vanity and levity ever be the stability of government either in states or in cities, or what let me hint to you is of the last importance, in families ? . . . . How fruitless is it to recommend the adapting the laws in the most perfect manner possible to the suppression of idleness, dissipation, and extravagancy, if such recommendations are counteracted by the example of men of religious influence and public station?”
And now the program:
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Segment 3:
