Conclusion

Abstract

This chapter emphasizes how religious revivals in central and western New York were reduced in the mid-nineteenth century and how the corresponding ultraism eventually diminished, but never disappeared entirely. It reviews demographic shifts that had contributed to the rise of the Burned-over District and facilitated its end as well. It also considers the Latter-day Saints, Millerites, Shakers, and Oneida perfectionists as the four of the most prominent new religious movements associated with the Burned-over District. The chapter highlights the nineteenth century that saw New York's population dispersed farther west, taking with them their new ideas about religion and the ordering of society. It describes the Burned-over District as both the epitome of many national trends in religion and social reform and as a catalyst to those trends.