HITCHCOCK, EDWARD
(24 May 1793, Deerfield. MA-27 February 1864, Amherst, MA). Education: Attended Yale Divinity School, 1820. Career: Principal, Deerfield Academy, 1816-19; minister, Conway, MA, 1821- 25; president, Amherst College, 1845-54; professor of natural theology and geology, Amherst College, 1854-64.
Edward Hitchcock came to maturity at a unique time in modem history. Scientists were making unprecedented progress at unraveling the mysteries of the earth, and yet the sciences were at a stage where an ambitious person could become expert, as Hitchcock did, in a half dozen disciplines. Moreover, although human beings were finding new ways of explaining the material world, the new information did not "contradict" the Bible so emphatically as did later theories, particularly Darwinism. So it was possible for someone to be a botanist, geologist, mineralogist, chemist, zoologist, physiologist, astronomer, natural philosopher, a minister, and a college president-particularly if that person had the wit and energy of an Edward Hitchcock.
The son of a hatter, Hitchcock worked as a farm laborer to support himself at Yale. The strain of his studies is said to have forced him to withdraw from divinity school in poor health, but he continued theological and scientific studies on his own. In many respects Hitchcock was a religious conservative. Raised a Unitarian, he became a Congregationalist after concluding that the doctrine of the Trinity was valid. After leaving Yale he served as minister in Conway, Massachusetts, for four years, then resigned to join the faculty at Amherst, where he could give fuller play to his scientific interests. But he remained faithful to his religious ideas.
While at Amherst, Hitchcock was commissioned to do a report on the geology, botany, and zoology of Massachusetts; the results of this and other studies brought him renown as a scientist. Hitchcock wrote many books, some of them scientific, some advocating temperance, and some demonstrating the compatibility of religion and science. An adept administrator, he was a leader in founding the American Association for the Advancement of Science. He is also credited with having put Amherst on solid footing during the decade he served as president.
With his devotion to religion, his fascination with science, and his boundless energy, he reminds one of Cotton Mather*. But while a person could combine all these roles in one office a century before, with the new age, science in America began to move away from the oversight of ministers. Rather than a minister interested in science, Hitchcock became a scientist interested in religion. In his belief that natural phenomena illustrate spiritual truth, he helped prepare the way for other Congregational clerics and lay persons, who a few years later, tried to absorb Darwinism without abandoning cherished beliefs about humanity and God.
Bibliography
A: Elementary Geology (New York, 1841; and many subsequent editions); Religious Lectures on Peculiar Phenomena (Amherst, MA, 1841); The power of Christian Benevolence (Philadelphia, 1851); The Religion of Geology and Its Connected Sciences (Boston, 1852); Religious Truth Illustrated from Science (Boston, 1857); Reminiscences of Amherst College [largely autobiographical] (Northampton. MA. 1863).
B: DAB 9. 70-71; DARB, 206; NCAB 5. 308-9; NIT 6 March 1854. 5.
Edward Hitchcock came to maturity at a unique time in modem history. Scientists were making unprecedented progress at unraveling the mysteries of the earth, and yet the sciences were at a stage where an ambitious person could become expert, as Hitchcock did, in a half dozen disciplines. Moreover, although human beings were finding new ways of explaining the material world, the new information did not "contradict" the Bible so emphatically as did later theories, particularly Darwinism. So it was possible for someone to be a botanist, geologist, mineralogist, chemist, zoologist, physiologist, astronomer, natural philosopher, a minister, and a college president-particularly if that person had the wit and energy of an Edward Hitchcock.
The son of a hatter, Hitchcock worked as a farm laborer to support himself at Yale. The strain of his studies is said to have forced him to withdraw from divinity school in poor health, but he continued theological and scientific studies on his own. In many respects Hitchcock was a religious conservative. Raised a Unitarian, he became a Congregationalist after concluding that the doctrine of the Trinity was valid. After leaving Yale he served as minister in Conway, Massachusetts, for four years, then resigned to join the faculty at Amherst, where he could give fuller play to his scientific interests. But he remained faithful to his religious ideas.
While at Amherst, Hitchcock was commissioned to do a report on the geology, botany, and zoology of Massachusetts; the results of this and other studies brought him renown as a scientist. Hitchcock wrote many books, some of them scientific, some advocating temperance, and some demonstrating the compatibility of religion and science. An adept administrator, he was a leader in founding the American Association for the Advancement of Science. He is also credited with having put Amherst on solid footing during the decade he served as president.
With his devotion to religion, his fascination with science, and his boundless energy, he reminds one of Cotton Mather*. But while a person could combine all these roles in one office a century before, with the new age, science in America began to move away from the oversight of ministers. Rather than a minister interested in science, Hitchcock became a scientist interested in religion. In his belief that natural phenomena illustrate spiritual truth, he helped prepare the way for other Congregational clerics and lay persons, who a few years later, tried to absorb Darwinism without abandoning cherished beliefs about humanity and God.
Bibliography
A: Elementary Geology (New York, 1841; and many subsequent editions); Religious Lectures on Peculiar Phenomena (Amherst, MA, 1841); The power of Christian Benevolence (Philadelphia, 1851); The Religion of Geology and Its Connected Sciences (Boston, 1852); Religious Truth Illustrated from Science (Boston, 1857); Reminiscences of Amherst College [largely autobiographical] (Northampton. MA. 1863).
B: DAB 9. 70-71; DARB, 206; NCAB 5. 308-9; NIT 6 March 1854. 5.