"It is better to marry than to burn": Anglo-American attitudes toward celibacy, 1600-1800

Journal of Family History

Volumn 24, Issue 4, 1999, Pages 397-419

  Seeman, Erik R ^a  

^a UNIVERSITY AT BUFFALO   (United States)

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EID: 0033211787     PISSN: 03631990     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1177/036319909902400401     Document Type: Article

References (120)

1. 1. The Latin root of "celibacy," caelebs, simply means unmarried. In this article, however, I will be using the term celibacy to indicate a state of sexual renunciation, because writers in this period used the word that way.
2. 2. The best works in this field include Peter Brown, The Body and Society: Men, Women, and Sexual Renunciation in Early Christianity (New York: Columbia University Press, 1988); Jo Ann McNamara, A New Song: Celibate Women in the First Three Christian Centuries (New York: The Institute for Research in History and Haworth, 1983); Dyan Elliott, Spiritual Marriage: Sexual Abstinence in Medieval Wedlock (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1993); Clarissa W. Atkinson, "'Precious Balsam in a Fragile Glass': The Ideology of Virginity in the Later Middle Ages," Journal of Family History 8 (summer 1983): 131-43; and John K. Yost, "The Reformation Defense of Clerical Marriage in the Reigns of Henry VIII and Edward VI," Church History 50 (June 1981): 152-65.
3. 2. The best works in this field include Peter Brown, The Body and Society: Men, Women, and Sexual Renunciation in Early Christianity (New York: Columbia University Press, 1988); Jo Ann McNamara, A New Song: Celibate Women in the First Three Christian Centuries (New York: The Institute for Research in History and Haworth, 1983); Dyan Elliott, Spiritual Marriage: Sexual Abstinence in Medieval Wedlock (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1993); Clarissa W. Atkinson, "'Precious Balsam in a Fragile Glass': The Ideology of Virginity in the Later Middle Ages," Journal of Family History 8 (summer 1983): 131-43; and John K. Yost, "The Reformation Defense of Clerical Marriage in the Reigns of Henry VIII and Edward VI," Church History 50 (June 1981): 152-65.
4. 2. The best works in this field include Peter Brown, The Body and Society: Men, Women, and Sexual Renunciation in Early Christianity (New York: Columbia University Press, 1988); Jo Ann McNamara, A New Song: Celibate Women in the First Three Christian Centuries (New York: The Institute for Research in History and Haworth, 1983); Dyan Elliott, Spiritual Marriage: Sexual Abstinence in Medieval Wedlock (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1993); Clarissa W. Atkinson, "'Precious Balsam in a Fragile Glass': The Ideology of Virginity in the Later Middle Ages," Journal of Family History 8 (summer 1983): 131-43; and John K. Yost, "The Reformation Defense of Clerical Marriage in the Reigns of Henry VIII and Edward VI," Church History 50 (June 1981): 152-65.
5. 2. The best works in this field include Peter Brown, The Body and Society: Men, Women, and Sexual Renunciation in Early Christianity (New York: Columbia University Press, 1988); Jo Ann McNamara, A New Song: Celibate Women in the First Three Christian Centuries (New York: The Institute for Research in History and Haworth, 1983); Dyan Elliott, Spiritual Marriage: Sexual Abstinence in Medieval Wedlock (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1993); Clarissa W. Atkinson, "'Precious Balsam in a Fragile Glass': The Ideology of Virginity in the Later Middle Ages," Journal of Family History 8 (summer 1983): 131-43; and John K. Yost, "The Reformation Defense of Clerical Marriage in the Reigns of Henry VIII and Edward VI," Church History 50 (June 1981): 152-65.
6. 2. The best works in this field include Peter Brown, The Body and Society: Men, Women, and Sexual Renunciation in Early Christianity (New York: Columbia University Press, 1988); Jo Ann McNamara, A New Song: Celibate Women in the First Three Christian Centuries (New York: The Institute for Research in History and Haworth, 1983); Dyan Elliott, Spiritual Marriage: Sexual Abstinence in Medieval Wedlock (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1993); Clarissa W. Atkinson, "'Precious Balsam in a Fragile Glass': The Ideology of Virginity in the Later Middle Ages," Journal of Family History 8 (summer 1983): 131-43; and John K. Yost, "The Reformation Defense of Clerical Marriage in the Reigns of Henry VIII and Edward VI," Church History 50 (June 1981): 152-65.
7. 3. All biblical quotes are from the Revised Standard Version.
8. 4. Will Deming, Paul on Marriage and Celibacy: The Hellenistic Background of 1 Corinthians 7 (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1995); John C. Poirier and Joseph Frankovic, "Celibacy and Charism in 1 Cor. 7:5-7," Harvard Theological Review 89 (January 1996): 1-19.
9. 4. Will Deming, Paul on Marriage and Celibacy: The Hellenistic Background of 1 Corinthians 7 (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1995); John C. Poirier and Joseph Frankovic, "Celibacy and Charism in 1 Cor. 7:5-7," Harvard Theological Review 89 (January 1996): 1-19.
10. 5. Brown, The Body and Society, 32.
11. 6. Ibid., 64. See also McNamara, A New Song.
12. 6. Ibid., 64. See also McNamara, A New Song.
13. 7. Elliott, Spiritual Marriage, 32, 77-87.
14. 8. Ibid, 98.
15. 9. Steven Ozment, When Fathers Ruled: Family Life in Reformation Europe (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1983), 3-25.
16. 10. Martin Luther, "A Sermon on the Estate of Marriage," in Luther's Works, edited by James Atkinson (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1966), 44:9.
17. 11. Steven Ozment, "Marriage and the Ministry in the Protestant Churches," in Celibacy in the Church, edited by William Bassett and Peter Huizing (New York: Herder and Herder, 1972), 40.
18. 12. Quoted in Joel F. Harrington, Reordering Marriage and Society in Reformation Germany (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1995), 63.
19. 13. William Gouge, Of Domesticall Duties (London: W. Bladen, 1622), 209-10.
20. 14. Ibid., 234-35. See also Daniel Rogers, Matrimoniall Honour (London: Thomas Harper, 1642), 176.
21. 14. Ibid., 234-35. See also Daniel Rogers, Matrimoniall Honour (London: Thomas Harper, 1642), 176.
22. 15. The Humble Advice of the Assembly of Divines . . . Concerning a Confession of Faith (London: Robert Bostock, 1643), 43.
23. 16 The Humble Advice of the Assembly of Divines . . . Concening a Larger Catechism (London: Evan Tyler, 1647), 38, 39.
24. 17. Quoted in James T. Johnson. "English Puritan Thought on the Ends of Marriage," Church History 38 (December 1969): 430.
25. 18. William Seeker, A Wedding Ring, Fit for the Finger (Boston: T. Green, 1705), 25,29. This sermon was originally preached and published in England.
26. 19. Ibid., 24-25.
27. 20. Ibid., 21.
28. 21. Gouge, Of Domesticall Duties, 212. See also George Tully, An Answer to a Discourse Concerning the Celibacy of the Clergy (Oxford, UK: Richard Chiswell, 1688), 1.
29. 21. Gouge, Of Domesticall Duties, 212. See also George Tully, An Answer to a Discourse Concerning the Celibacy of the Clergy (Oxford, UK: Richard Chiswell, 1688), 1.
30. 22. Richard Meggot, The Rib Restored; or, The Honour of Marriage (London: J. G., 1656), 8.
31. 23. John Cockburn, The Dignity and Duty of a Married State, 2d ed. (London: H. Hills, 1697), 6.
32. 24. Quoted in John Rogers, "The Enclosure of Virginity: The Poetics of Sexual Abstinence in the English Revolution," in Enclosure Acts: Sexuality, Property, and Culture in Early Modern England, edited by Richard Burt and John Michael Archer (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1994), 235.
33. 25. Some scholars have used circumstantial evidence to argue that John Milton adhered to a religious vow of celibacy. This theory is effectively discounted in John Leonard, "Milton's Vow of Celibacy: A Reconsideration of the Evidence," in Of Poetry and Politics: New Essays on Milton and His World, edited by P. G. Stanwood (Binghamton, NY: Medieval and Renaissance Texts and Studies, 1995): 187-201.
34. 26. Rogers, "Enclosure of Virginity," 240; Richard L. Greaves and Robert Zaller, eds., Biographical Dictionary of British Radicals in the Seventeenth Century, 3 vols. (Brighton, UK: Harvester, 1982), 1:185-86.
35. 26. Rogers, "Enclosure of Virginity," 240; Richard L. Greaves and Robert Zaller, eds., Biographical Dictionary of British Radicals in the Seventeenth Century, 3 vols. (Brighton, UK: Harvester, 1982), 1:185-86.
36. 27. Christopher Hill, The World Turned Upside Down: Radical Ideas during the English Revolution (London: Penguin Books, 1975); Christopher Durston, The Family in the English Revolution (Oxford, UK: Basil Blackwell, 1989).
37. 27. Christopher Hill, The World Turned Upside Down: Radical Ideas during the English Revolution (London: Penguin Books, 1975); Christopher Durston, The Family in the English Revolution (Oxford, UK: Basil Blackwell, 1989).
38. 28. Quoted in Philippa Berry, Of Chastity and Power: Elizabethan Literature and the Unmarried Queen (London: Routledge, 1989), 66.
39. 29. Richard Baxter, A Christian Directory (London: Robert White, 1678), 2:6. In Matthew 19:12, Jesus described some situtations in which celibacy was lawful: "For there are eunuchs who have been so from birth, and there are eunuchs who have been made eunuchs by men, and there are eunuchs who have made themselves eunuchs for the sake of the kingdom of heaven. He who is able to receive this, let him receive it."
40. 30. In Virginia in the early 1790s, Methodist itinerant Jeremiah Minter had himself surgically castrated to suppress his lusts. He was expelled from the ministry when his act came to light. Christine Leigh Heyrman, Southern Cross: The Beginnings of the Bible Belt (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1997), 132.
41. 31. Baxter, Christian Directory, 2:14.
42. 32. E. A. Wrigley and R. S. Schofield, The Population History of England, 1541-1871: A Reconstruction (London: Edward Arnold, 1981), 209-10.
43. 33. David R. Weir, "Rather Never Than Late: Celibacy and Age at Marriage in English Cohort Fertility, 1541-1871," Journal of Family History 9 (winter 1984): 346. Weir's figures show a less dramatic increase in the population of never married than the numbers in Wrigley and Schofield. Although the latter would be even better for my argument, the former are more convincing. It is also important to note that these figures are for birth cohorts: the members of the 1616 cohort, for example, would have lived through the 1670s and 1680s.
44. 34. Marriage Promoted (London: Richard Baldwin, 1690), 27.
45. 35. I use the term Puritan New Englands denote the period from 1630 through the Mathers, that is, through the 1720s.
46. 36. For example, John Demos, "Notes on Life in Plymouth Colony," William and Mary Quarterly 22 (April 1965): 264-86; and Philip J. Greven, Jr., "Family Structure in Seventeenth-Century Andover, Massachusetts," William and Mary Quarterly 23 (April 1966): 234-56.
47. 36. For example, John Demos, "Notes on Life in Plymouth Colony," William and Mary Quarterly 22 (April 1965): 264-86; and Philip J. Greven, Jr., "Family Structure in Seventeenth-Century Andover, Massachusetts," William and Mary Quarterly 23 (April 1966): 234-56.
48. 37. Daniel Scott Smith, "Parental Power and Marriage Patterns: An Analysis of Historical Trends in Hingham, Massachusetts," Journal of Marriage and the Family 35 (August 1973): 425. My figure is extrapolated from Table 3.
49. 38. Elizabeth Deering Hanscom, ed., The Heart of the Puritan: Selections from Letters and Journals (New York: Macmillan, 1917), 261.
50. 39. That the demographic context was not determinative of cultural attitudes is evident in the experience of Pennsylvania Quakers. Members of the Society of Friends also lived in an area with much "empty" land but their religious views led them to avoid criticizing celibacy. See Karin A. Wulf, "'My Dear Liberty': Quaker Spinsterhood and Female Autonomy in Eighteenth-Century Pennsylvania," in Women and Freedom in Early America, edited by Larry D. Eldridge (New York: New York University Press, 1997): 83-108.
51. 40. See especially Susan Dwyer Amussen, An Ordered Society: Gender and Class in Early Modern England (Oxford, UK: Basil Blackwell, 1988), 67-179; and Martin Ingram, Church Courts, Sex, and Marriage in England, 1570-1640 (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1987).
52. 40. See especially Susan Dwyer Amussen, An Ordered Society: Gender and Class in Early Modern England (Oxford, UK: Basil Blackwell, 1988), 67-179; and Martin Ingram, Church Courts, Sex, and Marriage in England, 1570-1640 (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1987).
53. 41. Larzer Ziff, Puritanism in America: New Culture in a New World (New York: Viking, 1973), 14.
54. 42. Mary Beth Norton, Founding Mothers and Fathers: Gendered Power and the Forming of American Society (New York: Knopf, 1996), 39.
55. 43. Samuel Willard, A Compleat Body of Divinity (Boston: B. Green and S. Kneeland, 1726), 675. This sermon was originally delivered in 1704.
56. 44. Ibid., 674.
57. 45. Quoted in Edmund S. Morgan, The Puritan Family: Religion and Domestic Relations in Seventeenth-Century New England, rev. ed. (New York: Harper & Row, 1966), 29.
58. 46. Quoted in Ibid., 62-63.
59. 47. Experience Mayhew, Indian Converts; or, Some Account of the Lives and Dying Speeches of a Considerable Number of the Christianized Indians of Martha's Vineyard, in New-England (London: Samuel Gerrish, 1727), 175-77.
60. 48. Willard, Compleat Divinity, 674.
61. 49. Hanscom, ed., Heart of the Puritan, 261.
62. 50. Norton, Founding Mothers and Fathers, 38-42.
63. 51. George Elliott Howard, A History of Matrimonial Institutions (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1904), 2:152-58.
64. 52. Ibid., 2:153.
65. 53. See especially John Canup, Out of the Wilderness: The Emergence of an American Identity in Colonial New England (Middletown, CT: Wesleyan University Press, 1990). The Bradford quote is on p. 21.
66. 54. Cotton Mather, Ornaments for the Daughters of Zion (Cambridge, MA: S. Green and B. Green, 1692), 77.
67. 55. Thomas Laqueur, Making Sex: Body and Gender from the Greeks to Freud (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1990), 5-6.
68. 56. Thomas Humphreys, Marriage an Honourable Estate (Boston: Z. Fowle, 1752), 4. This sermon was originally published in London in 1742.
69. 57. Weir, "Rather Never Than Late," 346.
70. 58. Leonard W. Labaree, ed., The Papers of Benjamin Franklin (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1961), 4:228.
71. 59. John R. Gillis, For Better, for Worse: British Marriages, 1600 to the Present (New York: Oxford University Press, 1985), 109-34.
72. 60. Hillel Schwartz, The French Prophets: The History of a Millenarian Group in Eighteenth-Century England (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1980), 280.
73. 61. Henry Abelove, The Evangelist of Desire: John Wesley and the Methodists (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1990), 49-73.
74. 62. Clarke Garrett, Spirit Possession and Popular Religion: From the Camisards to the Shakers (Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1987), 14.
75. 63. Humphreys, Marriage an Honourable Estate, 10. See also Cockburn, Dignity and Duty, 16; and the anonymous tract, Marriage Promoted, 24-42.
76. 63. Humphreys, Marriage an Honourable Estate, 10. See also Cockburn, Dignity and Duty, 16; and the anonymous tract, Marriage Promoted, 24-42.
77. 63. Humphreys, Marriage an Honourable Estate, 10. See also Cockburn, Dignity and Duty, 16; and the anonymous tract, Marriage Promoted, 24-42.
78. 64. Ibid., 14-15.
79. 65. John Hawkins, An Essay on the Law of Celibacy Imposed on the Clergy of the Roman Catholic Church (Worcester, UK: M. Lewis, 1782), 193.
80. 66. Lee Virginia Chambers-Schiller, Liberty, a Better Husband: Single Women in America, the Generations of 1780-1840 (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1984), 11.
81. 67. Bartlett B. James, The Labadist Colony in Maryland (Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1899); Julius Friedrich Sachse, The German Sectarians of Pennsylvania (Philadelphia: Printed for the Author, 1899), 62.
82. 67. Bartlett B. James, The Labadist Colony in Maryland (Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1899); Julius Friedrich Sachse, The German Sectarians of Pennsylvania (Philadelphia: Printed for the Author, 1899), 62.
83. 68. E. G. Alderfer, The Ephrata Commune: An Early American Counterculture (Pittsburgh, PA: University of Pittsburgh Press, 1985).
84. 69. Quoted in Patricia J. Tracy, Jonathan Edwards, Pastor: Religion and Society in Eighteenth-Century Northampton (New York: Hill and Wang, 1980), 78.
85. 70. Richard Woodbury to William Parsons, letter of May 23, 1744, Nicholas Gilman Papers, Massachusetts Historical Society, Boston (hereafter MHS).
86. 71. Erik R. Seeman, "Sarah Prentice and the Immortalists: Sexuality, Piety, and the Body in Eighteenth-Century New England," in Sex and Sexuality in Early America, edited by Merril D. Smith (New York: New York University Press, 1998), 116-31.
87. 72. William G. McLoughlin, ed., The Diary of Isaac Backus (Providence, RI: Brown University Press, 1979), 294.
88. 73. Diary of Ebenezer Parkman, MHS, February 23, 1773.
89. 74. Rhode Island Colony, Acts and Resolves, March 1749 (Newport, RI: James Franklin, 1749), 53.
90. 75. Francis G. Walett, ed., The Diary of Ebenezer Parkman, 1703-1782 (Worcester, MA: American Antiquarian Society, 1974), 292.
91. 76. Sally L. Kitch, Chaste Liberation: Celibacy and Female Cultural Status (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1989), 168. For the same gendered dynamic in the second century, see Brown, The Body and Society, 67.
92. 76. Sally L. Kitch, Chaste Liberation: Celibacy and Female Cultural Status (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1989), 168. For the same gendered dynamic in the second century, see Brown, The Body and Society, 67.
93. 77. James Meacham, A Concise Statement of the Principles of the Only True Church (Bennington, VT: Haswell and Russell, 1790), 13.
94. 78. Testimonies Concerning the Character and Ministry of Mother Ann Lee (Albany: Packard and Van Benthuysen, 1827), 177.
95. 79. Ibid. See also Stephen J. Stein, The Shaker Experience in America: A History of the United Society of Believers (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1992), 41.
96. 79. Ibid. See also Stephen J. Stein, The Shaker Experience in America: A History of the United Society of Believers (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1992), 41.
97. 80. Daniel Rathbun, A Letter from Daniel Rathbun (n.p., 1785?), 56; Benjamin West, Scriptural Cautions against Embracing a Religious Scheme (Hartford, CT: Bavil Webster, 1783), 5.
98. 80. Daniel Rathbun, A Letter from Daniel Rathbun (n.p., 1785?), 56; Benjamin West, Scriptural Cautions against Embracing a Religious Scheme (Hartford, CT: Bavil Webster, 1783), 5.
99. 81. West, Scriptural Cautions, 6.
100. 82. D. Rathbun, A Letter, 41; West, Scriptural Cautions, 14.
101. 82. D. Rathbun, A Letter, 41; West, Scriptural Cautions, 14.
102. 83. Amos Taylor, A Narrative of the Strange Principles, Conduct and Character of the People Known by the Name of Shakers (Worcester, MA: n.p., 1782).
103. 84. D. Rathbun, A Letter, 99. See also West, Scriptural Cautions, 13; Valentine Rathbun, An Account of the Matter, Form, and Manner of a New and Strange Religion (Providence, RI: Bennett Wheeler, 1781), 13.
104. 84. D. Rathbun, A Letter, 99. See also West, Scriptural Cautions, 13; Valentine Rathbun, An Account of the Matter, Form, and Manner of a New and Strange Religion (Providence, RI: Bennett Wheeler, 1781), 13.
105. 84. D. Rathbun, A Letter, 99. See also West, Scriptural Cautions, 13; Valentine Rathbun, An Account of the Matter, Form, and Manner of a New and Strange Religion (Providence, RI: Bennett Wheeler, 1781), 13.
106. 85. D. Rathbun, A Letter, 67.
107. 86. V. Rathbun, An Account, 12. See also West, Scriptural Cautions, 3, 7.
108. 86. V. Rathbun, An Account, 12. See also West, Scriptural Cautions, 3, 7.
109. 87. West, Scriptural Cautions, 7.
110. 88. Ibid.
111. 89. See also V. Rathbun, An Account, 20; D. Rathbun, A Letter, 62.
112. 89. See also V. Rathbun, An Account, 20; D. Rathbun, A Letter, 62.
113. 90. Laqueur, Making Sex, 5-6; Nancy F. Cott, "Passionlessness: An Interpretation of Victorian Sexual Ideology, 1790-1850," Signs 4 (winter 1978): 219-36.
114. 90. Laqueur, Making Sex, 5-6; Nancy F. Cott, "Passionlessness: An Interpretation of Victorian Sexual Ideology, 1790-1850," Signs 4 (winter 1978): 219-36.
115. 91. Chambers-Schiller, Liberty, a Better Husband; and Joan Perkin, Women and Marriage in Nineteenth-Century England (London: Routledge, 1989), 207-32.
116. 92. Barbara Taylor, Eve and the New Jerusalem: Socialism and Feminism in the Nineteenth Century (London: Virago, 1983), 183-216.
117. 93. Emanuel Swedenborg, The Delights of Wisdom Concerning Conjugial Love (Philadelphia: Francis and Robert Bailey, 1796). This was originally published in Latin in Amsterdam, 1768.
118. 94. The phrase is from Jon Butler, Awash in a Sea of Faith: Christianizing the American People (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1990).
119. 95. "Teens Are Saying Give Chastity a Chance," Los Angeles Times, September 24, 1993.
120. 96. For example, "A Roman Catholic Bishop in Florida Resigns, Admitting He Molested 5 Boys," New York Times, June 3, 1998.