God, Give Us Better Hearts

How should a man have reacted, especially in public, after men burned his home, nearly killing him and his daughter? Boston attorney Josiah Quincy attended court the day after the flagrant fire at Thomas Hutchinson’s house. With the precision of a clerk, Quincy recorded the moment when Hutchinson came into court.

“The distress a man must feel on such an occasion can only be conceived by those who the next day saw his Honor the Chief-Justice come into court,” Quincy recorded in his diary.

Quincy described Hutchinson as having tears in his eyes. His countenance “strongly told the inward anguish of his soul.” Quincy wondered, “What must an audience have felt, whose compassion had before been moved by what they knew he had suffered, when they heard him pronounce the following words in a manner which the agitations of his mind dictated?”

The most obvious change in Hutchinson was his apparel. Gone were his court robes. His borrowed clothing, however, was nothing compared with his emphatic declaration of innocence. “Yet I call God to witness,— and I would not, for a thousand worlds, call my Maker to witness to falsehood . . . that I never, in New England or Old, in Great Britain or America, neither directly nor indirectly, was aiding, assisting, or supporting—in the least promoting or encouraging—what is commonly called the Stamp Act; but, on the contrary, did all in my power, and strove as much as in me lay, to prevent it,” Hutchinson claimed.

He then stated he had nothing to fear but his life, which was “of but little value when deprived of all its comforts, all that was dear to me, and nothing surrounding me but the most piercing distress. I hope the eyes of the people will be opened, that they will see how easy it is for some designing, wicked man to spread false reports, to raise suspicions and jealousies in the minds of the populace, and enrage them against the innocent,” Hutchinson warned.

The chief justice reminded the audience that the courts were designed to prosecute the guilty. “This destroying all peace and order of the community,—all will feel its effects; and I hope all will see how easily the people may be deluded, inflamed, and carried away with madness against an innocent man,” Hutchinson continued.

He concluded with a plea more feverish than the mob who had burned his home the night before. “I pray God give us better hearts!” he cried.

Many may have wondered if his call for better hearts was a Pharisee-like prayer or an example of genuine humility. Only time would reveal Thomas Hutchinson’s own heart. But in that moment all who heard him considered his plea.

PRAYER

Oh, Chief Justice of my soul, whether I find myself falsely accused or in a position to judge someone else, give me a better heart.