Confession of Samuel Fay, March 14, 17851

Introduction

Samuel Fay, son of Samuel and Tabitha Fay, was born in Marlborough and baptized in the Marlborough church on May 16, 1705.2 His parents were among the first inhabitants of Westborough when the town was set off from Marlborough in 1717.3 Fay married sixteen-year-old Deliverance Shattuck in Watertown on December 15, 1726, with the Watertown records stating that they were both “of Westborough.” Deliverance, the first of their fourteen children, was born on November 15, 1727.4 Eight months later, on July 7, 1728, Samuel and Deliverance Fay were admitted to the church and their daughter was baptized.5 Deliverance died in early 1754, and two years later Samuel married widow Elizabeth Cutter and, in effect, started a new family, with eleven children born between 1757 and 1775. The birth of so many children did not go unnoticed, with Parkman noting on his return home from an ecclesiastical council in Bolton, “Hear that Mr. Samuel Fay has a 24th Child.”6 People in Westborough were obviously counting—and talking.

Parkman’s relation with Samuel Fay, Jr. (as Parkman called him before the death of the elder Fay) was unexceptional in the years of Fay’s first marriage, with the minister visiting the family during illnesses and deaths and Fay doing errands for Parkman and lending his hand with other town residents to cut and haul wood as part of the minister’s regular allotment of firewood. Something changed, however, after Fay’s second marriage. The first indication of difficulties came when Fay told Parkman that he was “disturbed” that the minister had not visited his children “when He was under Trouble in the Months Past; and especially when he went to Albany.” As Parkman explained his failure to visit, he did not recall that he had been “Seasonably informed” of Fay’s trip to Albany; indeed, as Parkman recalled, he had been in Sutton when Fay left. Besides, he himself had been “confined by Lameness and Sickness some part of the Winter, but, in brief, he being so often from home, I did not think of Visiting the Family, till I might enjoy the Company of the head of it.”7 Parkman did not record Fay’s response to his excuses.

A year later, Fay was “greatly offended” with Parkman’s wife for “innocently commending his.” According to Parkman, Fay asserted that “people envied him his Happiness and found fault with divine Providence.”8 Several months later, some disagreement arose between Fay and Eliezer Rice, with the latter coming to Parkman on a Saturday and informing the minister that he had “taken the previous Steps etc.” That is, Rice had followed the admonition in Matthew 18:15–16, first, “if thy brother shall trespass against thee, go and tell him his fault between thee and him alone: if he shall hear thee, thou hast gained thy brother,” but then, “if he will not hear thee, then take with thee one or two more, that in the mouth of two or three witnesses every word may be established.” Since Rice had sought, without success, a resolution of the conflict, Matthew 18:17 outlined the next step: “And if he shall neglect to hear them, tell it unto the church: but if he neglect to hear the church, let him be unto thee as an heathen man and a publican.” Since communion was appointed for the next day and there was no opportunity to “call the Church together” on the matter, Parkman wrote to Fay to advise him “to suspend coming to the Communion for the present.”9 With Rice and Fay not in a relationship of brotherly love, it was not appropriate for Fay to take communion.

The next day, before administering the Lord’s Supper, Parkman asked Fay whether he had received the letter, to which Fay replied that he had received a letter that morning “but did not know what was in it, for he could not read writing.” Parkman told him that he had sent the letter as soon as he received Rice’s complaint and told him the substance. Fay asked whether “the man” was a church member (presumably Parkman’s had told him that there was a complaint without identifying who made it), and he “Supposed that person was not allowed privilege etc.” (that is, the Lord’s Supper). To this supposition, Parkman replied that the man “was not cut off from Such privilege as these” and advised Fay to leave so that “the Communion might not be disturbed.” Fay left, “saying as he went that he counted he had met with hard Treatment.”10

With his departure on that day, Fay stayed away from church for the next four years, with Parkman attempting a reconciliation on several occasions before a mutual exchange of hands, with the church then voting to restore him after he made a suitable confession.

Their reconciliation lasted until 1772 when Parkman’s son Breck borrowed Fay’s horse for a trip to Boston. While Breck was in Boston, the horse died, and despite both Parkman’s effort to achieve a reconciliation and the appointment of a three-man arbitration committee, Fay was not satisfied. Two of the church’s deacons found Fay “very much disturbed” with Parkman, who, Fay insisted, should make Breck pay for his dead horse or “or turn him out of Doors if he will not.” Fay would not, he insisted, attend church “till he had Satisfaction.”11 Fay was not satsisfied, and as late as August 3, 1780, two years before Parkman’s death, the minister made a visit to the Fay home, “his wife having been lately much indisposed—but he treated me with roughness.”12

The grudge that Fay bore toward Parkman presumably went to the grave with Parkman’s death on December 9, 1782, but it took more than two years before Fay could be persuaded to make a confession and be restored to the church. On October 21, 1784, the church appointed a five-man committee to “converse” with Fay about his absence “bothe from Public Worship and Ordenances a very considerable part of the Time in years past.”13 On January 9, 1785, the committee reported that they had found “some marks of Penetence” in Fay and that it was likely that Fay would “make Christian satisfaction” to the church. Fay had promised to be at the meeting, “but sickness prevents.”14

Two months later, the committee reported that Fay showed “marks of Sorrow in that he had absented himself from public Worship and Ordinances.” Fay send a written “Acknowledgement to the Church for this Desorderly Walk” and asked the church’s forgiveness, whereupon the church voted “to Receaive him to their Charity.”15 Thus, at age seventy-nine, Samuel Fay was restored to his place in the church. He lived for another eight years, dying in October 1793.16

The Confession

To the Church of Christ in Westborough Derly beloved Whereas I the Subsiriber have for a Longe time neglected to attend on publick Worship and the ordinance of the Lords Super to the grief of my Christian brethren, and hereby have given ocation to the Church to be out of Charity with me, I am now Sensible of this my fault and ask the forgivness of god and the Church and desire to be restored to the Charity of the Church and the ordinances of the Lords Super