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Library 1994.THE BRICK CHTJRCHA meeting of the Elders, Deacons, and Trustees of the Brick Presbyterian Church was held at
the close of divine service on the 25th day of May, 1856, in the church. Mr. Holden, Elder, was
chosen Moderator.	■»
It was Resolved, unanimously, “ That we have heard with great satisfaction the history of our
church and congregation, and of the labors of our Pastor, and of the progress of religion in the
church and congregation during his past ministry, terminating his history with our present change
of the location of the church edifice ;
That judging the historical discourse useful in its encouragement to faithful and devoted pas-
tors, as well as conducive to the edification of Christians in private walks, a copy be requested
for publication, and that Me. Holden, Elder, Me. Haeding, Deacon, and Me. Mills, Trustee,
be a committee for this purpose, and to see to the publication, and that it be recommended to
them to procure a copyright to control the correctness of the publication.”
Rev. De. Speing—Dear Sir.
It affords us pleasure to communicate to you the preceding resolution, adopted last Sabbath
morning, and to express the hope that you will comply with the request contained in it at your
earliest convenience.
With great respect,
HORACE HOLDEN, }
RICHARD HARDING, j- Committee.
DRAKE MILLS,	)
In Session, Nov. 11th, 1858.
“ Resolved, that Dr. Spring be respectfully requested to furnish for publication a copy of his
ast sermon preached in the old church in Beekman street, and of his Dedication Sermon
preached in the new church, and that the Clerk of the Session take the necessary steps for that
purpose.”—Extract from the Minutes.
HORACE HOLDEN, Clerk of Session.
Bbick Chuech Chapel, Nov. 16,1858.
To Hobace Holden, Esq., Clerk of the Session of the Brick Presbyterian Church of the city
of New York—
My Deae Sib:
My reply to the note of the Committee of the ruling Elders, Deacons, and Trustees, dated 25th
of May, 1856, in which I felt constrained to decline the publication of the discourse there re-
ferred to, was dictated by a reluctance to publish a narrative so familiar in its character, and
having so many allusions to myself. I now comply with the request of the Session for that dis-
course, and also for the discourse lately delivered at the dedication of the new church, not be-
cause I judge either of them worthy of being published, but because they are memorials of
events which it is thought best to preserve.
Your affectionate Pastor,
GARDINER SPRING
TWO DISCOURSES:
THE FIRST DELIVERED ON THE 25th OF MAY, 1856, AS THE CLOSING
SERMON IN THE OLD BRICK CHURCH IN BEEKMAN STREET:
THE LAST ON THE 31st OF OCTOBER, 1858, AT THE
DEDICATION OF THE NEW BRICK CHURCH
ON MURRAY HILL;
BY
GARDINER SPRING, D. D., IL. D.,
PASTOR OP THE BRICK PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH IN THE CITY OP NEW YORK.
NEW Y 0 E K :
PUBLISHED BY M. W. DODD,
506 BROADWAY.
1858.
-
Jij-MEMORIAL OF GOD’S GOODNESS.
“ We have thought of thy loving-kindness, O God, in the midst of thy temple.
That ye may tell it to the generation following ; for this God is our God, for
ever and ever ; he will be our guide even unto death.”—Psalm xlviii. 9-14.
The present service closes the public worship of God
in an edifice where it has been enjoyed for 88 years.
For whatever purposes this hallowed ground may be
hereafter employed, experience has convinced us that
it is no longer a fit place for religious worship. We
have admitted this conviction reluctantly ; we have re-
sisted it too long. It is now forced upon us by con-
siderations which we have no doubt God approves, and
the best interests of his kingdom demand.
With the future we have less to do, on the present
occasion, than with the past. The Brick Presbyterian
Church has, from its origin, occupied a position suf-
ficiently prominent to justify, even in the eyes of the
men of the world, some historical notices, which may,
perhaps, be viewed with interest by others as well as
ourselves.
It requires no great labour and very little research to
furnish the historical outlines of a Christian congrega-
tion, which dates back only 88 years. The first accountMEMOKIAL OF GOD’S GOODNESS.
we have of Presbyterianism in this city is the combina-
tion of several Presbyterian families from England,
Scotland, Ireland, France, and New England, in the year
1706, who were in the habit of assembling together on
the Lord’s-day, in a private house, and conducting their
religious services without the aid of any Christian minis-
ter. The following year they worshipped occasionally
in the Dutch Church in Garden Street, and in the year
1716, formed themselves into a regular Presbyterian
church, under the stated ministry of the Rev. James
Anderson, a native of Scotland. For three years this
infant church assembled for public worship in the City
Hall, then on the corner of Nassau and Wall Streets ;
and in 1719, they erected the first Presbyterian church
in Wall Street, out of which was formed the Church of
the Seceders in Cedar Street, under the pastoral charge
of the Rev. Dr. Mason, the elder, and also the Brick
Church in Beekman Street. The corner stone of this
edifice was laid in the autumn of the year 1766, and on
the first of January, 1768, it was opened for public
worship, by a discourse from the Rev. Dr. Rodgers, its
first pastor. The congregations worshipping in Wall
Street and in Beekman Street remained for a series of
years one church, under the same associated pastorate,
the same Board of Trustees, and the same bench of
Ruling Elders. This identity of interest was preserved
during the whole of the Revolutionary war, and down
to the year 1809. During the war, these two Presby-
terian churches were the objects of the special vengeance
and indignity of the enemy. The church in Wall Street
was converted into barracks, and the Brick Church intoMEMORIAL OP GOD’S GOODNESS.
7
a hospital—defaced, stripped of their interior, and left
in ruins, and the parsonage house burned to the ground.
On the return of peace, and while these edifices were
being repaired, the congregations statedly worshipped in
St. George’s and St. Paul’s, through the unsolicited and
generous courtesy of the vestry of Trinity Church.
After having been repaired at great expense, the Brick
Church was re-opened in June, 1784, by a discourse
from Dr. Rodgers, from the words of the Psalmist, “I
was glad when they said unto me, Let us go into the
house of the Lord.” The ministers successively asso-
ciated with Dr. Rodgers, after the conclusion of the
war, were the Rev. James Wilson, from Scotland, the
Rev. John McKnight, and the Rev. Samuel Miller/
These congregations, in their united capacity, and for
many years after the present pastor of the Brick Church
came to the city, established and sustained a large paro-
chial school, in Nassau, between Liberty and Cedar
Streets, and relinquished their funds for this object to
the Public School directors, on the expressed condition
that no child whom they should recommend should be
excluded, and that the Bible should be daily read in the
schools.
Serious inconveniences were found to attend the ar-
rangement of this collegiate charge ; and by an amicable
stipulation, in the year 1809, the congregations, till
then united, were formed into separate and distinct
churches ;—the Rev. Dr. Rodgers retaining his re-
lation to both, and the Rev. Dr. Miller the stated
pastor of the church in Wall Street—Dr. McKnight
voluntarily resigning his connexion with both the
churches. •8	MEMORIAL OF GOD’S GOODNESS.
Such was the state of the Brick Church the year be-
fore the ordination and installation of the present pas-
tor. The eldership consisted of men well known, both
in civil and ecclesiastical life, and venerable for age and
character. ‘They were Abraham Yangelder, John
Thompson, William Ogilvie, Benjamin Egbert, Thomas
Frazer, John Bingham, John Mills, and Samuel Osgood,
to which were added, shortly after the separation of the
churches, William Whitlock, Richard Cunningham, Ren-
sellaer Havens, and John Adams. While all these
gentlemen were men of worth and influence, the ruling
spirit among them, and the man eminent for discern-
ment, practical wisdom, ardent piety, and vigorous
action, was John Mills.
The age and infirmities of Dr. Rodgers had released
him from all duty, and the great object of the church
now was to secure the services of a stated pastor.
There were divisions among them arising from the
separation previously referred to, from ancient feuds,
personal animosity, and political excitement. A call
was presented to the Rev. Dr. John McDowell, of
Elizabethtown, in New Jersey, which, though sustained
by a large majority of the congregation, he declined ac-
cepting. Subsequently a call was presented to the Rev.
Dr. Andrew Yates, of East Hartford, Connecticut, and
though unanimous, was declined ; Dr. Yates giving the
preference to the Professorship of Moral Philosophy in
Union College. Three efforts were subsequently made
to induce the congregation to call the Rev. Lyman
Beecher, then of East Hampton, Long Island ; but for
want of harmony, this measure was abandoned. Sub-MEMORIAL OF GOD’S GOODNESS.
9
sequently, in May, 1810, the Session deputed two of
their number to procure the services of the Rev. Dr.
Speece, of Yirginia, on trial; this effort was also un-
successful. At the same meeting they also appointed
the same committee “ to proceed to Philadelphia, during
the sessions of the General Assembly, and make appli-
cation to any of the Presbyterian ministers that may he
convened there, whose piety and talents would, in their
judgment, render him acceptable to the congregation,
and earnestly solicit such minister to make the church a
visit of two or three Sabbaths, with a view to a per-
manent settlement as pastor ; and in case they should
not find any minister there suitably qualified! that they
make inquiry of the ministers present; and if they re-
ceive well grounded information respecting any minis-
ter whose piety and talents would probably make him
acceptable to the congregation, that they take such
measures for procuring a visit from such minister as
they may think proper.” There is no record on the
minutes of the Session of the action of this committee,
and no report of the results of their appointment.
At a meeting of the Session, on the 28th of May,
1810, the first resolution was adopted which relates to
your present pastor. He had not a single acquaintance
in the congregation, nor does he know by whom, nor by
what means his name was presented to the Session.
He had passed through the city the preceding week, and
preached a single discourse in the church in Gedar
Street, under the care of the late Dr. John B. Romeyn,
and who was then in Philadelphia. While there, a spec-
tator of the transactions of the Assembly, the Session10
MEMORIAL OF GOD’S GOODNESS.
passed the resolution inviting him to supply the pulpit.
He accepted this invitation, and occupied the pulpit the
first Sabbath in June, preaching in the morning from
the words, “ Wherefore come ye out from among them,
and be ye separate, and touch not the unclean thing,
and I will be a father unto you, and ye shall be my sons
and daughters, saith the Lord Almighty and in the
evening, to a crowded audience, from the words, “By
the grace of God, I am what I am.” I hold in my hand
the identical discourses which I then preached, and have
often been filled with wonder that these two jejune and
puerile discourses should have decided the question on
which so many interests depended for time and eternity.
But the hand of God was in the whole procedure. At
the close of the morning service, and in the church, the
Session had a meeting, at which Dr. Rodgers presided,
and which the Deacons and Trustees were invited to at-
tend, at which they unanimously resolved that notice be
given from the pulpit, at the close of the afternoon and
evening service, that the congregation assemble the
next day to take into consideration the propriety of
making out a call for Mr. Gardiner Spring to become
the stated pastor of the Brick Church.
On the following day that meeting was held, the Rev.
Dr. Milledoler, then the pastor of the church in Rutgers
Street, presiding, and a unanimous call was made out
for the proposed candidate. I was greatly embarrassed
by this unexpected invitation. A call had already been
presented to me from the church in Andover, Massa-
chusetts, from the Park Street Church in Boston, and at
the same time I had been requested to receive a call11
MEMORIAL OF GOD’S GOODNESS.
from the church in New Haven. The elders cff the
Brick Church were urgent for a prompt and immediate
decision, on account of the peculiar state of the congre-
gation ; and though I did not formally answer the call
till the 6th of July, I gave to Mr. John Mills, the lead-
ing ruling elder, such intimations of my purpose that
they had a right to consider me, and did consider me,
as their minister. It appeared to my own mind the
call of the Great Head of the church to a field of labour
too important to be compared with others, and too un-
equivocal to be misunderstood. Unfitted for it as I was,
yet encouraged to believe that I should have strength
according to my day, I accepted the solemn charge, and
was ordained by the Presbytery of New York, and in-
stalled"the pastor of this people on the 8th of August,
1810. Of the Presbytery by which I was ordained, con-
sisting of Rev. Dr. Rodgers, Rev. George Faitoute,
Rev. Peter Fish, Rev. Philip Milledoler, Rev. Samuel
Miller, Rev. John B. Romeyn, and the Rev. Ezra Stiles
Ely, not one remains.*
The fathers, where are they ? and the younger pro-
* Among those who were subsequently received into it, the following minis-
ters also sleep in the dustRev. William Boardinan, Rev. John Teasman, Rev.
Henry Blatchford, Rev. Philip M. Whelpley, Rev. Samuel Whelpley, Rev. John
B. Romeyn, Rev. Mathias Bruen, Rev. Henry P. Strong, Rev. Mathew L. R.
Perrine, Rev. Joseph S. Christman, Rev. Henry Hunter, Rev. Elias Crane, Rev.
Daniel Newell, Rev. Seymour P. Funk, Rev. Stephen N. Rowan, Rev. E. W.
Baldwin, Rev. Daniel Carroll, Rev. Joseph Sanford, Rev. Henry White, Rev.
George W. Perkins, Rev. Erskine Mason, Rev. Truman Norton, Rev. A. J.
Graham, Rev. John Little, Rev. S. Earned, Rev] E. Holt, Rev. Walter King,
Rev. Ward Stafford, Rev. Elavel S. Mines, Rev. Isaac Lewis, Rev. F. Cham-
berlain, Rev. Albert Judson, Rev. George Bourne, Rev. Robert Birch, Rev.
Moses C. Searl, Rev. Charles M. Oakly, Rev. George Carrington, Rev. John
Anderson, Rev. Nathaniel S. Prime, Rev. Ichabod S. Spencer, and Rev. Samuel
E. Cornish.12
MEMORIAL OF GOD’S GOODNESS.
phets do not live for ever. The distinguished indi-
viduals to whom I was under the greatest obligations,
so long as they remained members of the Presbytery,
were the Rev. Dr. Miller and the Rev. Dr. Perrine, both
of whom filled the office of Professor of Church History
and Government in our theological seminaries, and died
full of years and full of honours. Their uniform friend-
ship, their kind and gentleman-like deportment toward
me, their wise counsels, their active assistance in my
arduous work, the interest they took in my usefulness,
and the influence they exerted in my favour in seasons
of solicitude, conflict and depression, demand from me
this public and grateful acknowledgment.
During the first year of my ministry, I was constrained
by necessity to the preparation of those discourses
which I could most easily prepare. My subjects were
such as were most familiar to my own mind, rather than
those which were demanded by the character and con-
dition of the congregation. But no sooner did it please
God to give me the confidence of the people, than topics
were carefully selected with a more special regard to
the indications of divine providence, and the wants of
those to whom I was called to minister. Both the
elders and the people expected from me discourses that
were addressed to the popular ear and taste. There was
a standard of preaching and a feeling on this subject
which tried and embarrassed me, and which led to a
carefully prepared discourse from the words, “ Speak
unto us smooth things.” God was pleased to put honour
upon this discourse, and to produce the conviction on
the minds of those who heard it, that the preacher’sMEMORIAL OF GOD'S GOODNESS.
13
business is to preach His truth, and leave the conse-
quences with Him, and that instead of aiming to please
men, his great aim ought to be to please God, who trieth
the hearts.
There was at that time prevalent in the city a sort of
hybrid theology, half Arminian and half Antinomian—
tinctured with the views of “ Marshal on Sanctification,”
on the one hand, and the ritualism of High Church Episco-
pacy on the other—which, young as I was, I felt myself
called on to investigate and resist. In the main, it
was evangelical and Calvinistic, but it was hyper-
Calvinism, and not that hind of Calvinism which is
taught in the Bible. Some of my own people were
not a little imbued with it, and it led to a series of dis-
courses on the “ Discriminating traits of Christian char-
acter,” in which the agitated questions were treated,
not polemically, but practically. These discourses the
Great Head of the church condescended to attend with
his blessing, and to make the means of disturbing false
hopes, and bringing many persons out of darkness into
his marvelous light.
It was the preparation of these discourses which first
directed my own thoughts to the discussion of subjects
in a series of discussions, comprising from twenty to thirty
discourses on the same general topic, so many of which
have been delivered in this sanctuary, and subsequently
found their way to the press. The most important of
the series was that which, in the order of time, immedi-
ately followed the discussions on Christian characteris-
tics. It comprised a system of theology, and consisted
of more than one hundred discourses. It was the great14
MEMORIAL OF GOD’S GOODNESS.
effort of my life. The preparation of these discourses
occupied more than three years of laborious and continu-
ous study and preaching. Yery many of them were
delivered on the evening of the Lord’s day, and
to very large audiences. Nor do I know that any
series of sermons preached by me have been listened to
with greater interest, or have been more extensively
useful. It was a system of theology not prepared for
the schools, but for the people. And while it blinked
no hard questions, save those which the word of God
bid us to let alone, its main object was to show the bear-
ing of every truth upon the conscience and heart; to
exalt God, and to lay the sinner humbled and without
excuse, trembling, yet hoping, at the foot of the cross.
The practical application of every doctrine was the most
laboured part of almost every discourse ; nor have I
ever preached to more solemn audiences, nor with more
evident tokens of the divine favour and presence, than
when preaching some of these discourses. One of
these, I well recollect, cost six weeks’ labour ; and
I mention this not for the discouragement, but the en-
couragement of those ministers who, in the vigor of their
days, are willing to be working men.
My preparations for the Sabbath have been habitu-
ally, almost always and uniformly made in season ; never,
to my recollection, except in two instances, deferred to
the last day of the week ; nor do I know of any better
way of gaining time, labour, knowledge and health, than
such an arrangement. One little circumstance, in con-
nexion with the series of theological discourses, deserves
here to be mentioned, that gave interest to them.MEMOBIAL OF GOD’S GOODNESS.
15
During their delivery in the winter season, in addi-
tion to the Thursday evening lecture, there was es-
tablished a Bible-class, or rather a theological class, in
“the old Session-room,” comprising all of both sexes
who chose to attend, for the purpose of reviewing, ex-
amining, and enforcing, by question and answer, the
discourse of the preceding Lord’s day. It was a large
class, often numbering more than a hundred, and,
though it consisted of gentlemen in professional and
literary life, of merchants and mechanics, and teachers,
and ladies of greater and less distinction ; and though
all liberty was allowed of proposing questions on sub-
jects of difficulty, it was a religious class, and was under-
stood to be a religious service. There was no restraint,
but the most unembarrassed and cheerful discussion;
yet there was no rudeness, no frivolity. It was one of
the most interesting and solemn services of the season,
and gave solemnity and interest to all our other services.
God was with us by the influence of his sacred spirit.
And when we came to the practical application of any
such great doctrine as man’s depravity, the sovereignty
of God, the nature of holiness, the nature and necessity
of regeneration, the great atonement of his Son, and
the retribution of his punitive justice, many a time did
proud heads droop, and the question was answered by
a tear. Men and women are now living who, though
widely scattered, will never forget this beautiful service.
And here commenced the first memorable outpouring of
God’s spirit upon this people. Not far from thirty of
this class, principally young, were here turned from the
power of Satan unto God, some of whom have died in16
MEMORIAL OF GOD’S GOODNESS.
faithand hope, some of whom live to exert a Christian
influence, and some of whom are eminent for their use-
fulness in the gospel ministry.
God had graciously given testimony to the word of
his grace, as here preached, at earlier periods. The
thought has no doubt often crossed the minds of re-
flecting Christians that those who have occupied a place
on the earth during the last fifty years, have lived in a
remarkable age of the world, not only as it respects
science and the arts, and the progress of civil society,
but in regard to the cause of vital piety. The period,
commencing with the year 1792, and terminating with
1842, was a memorable period in the history of the Am-
erican Church. Scarcely any portion of it, except the
high church Episcopalian and the Unitarian churches of
Massachusetts, but were graciously visited by copious
effusions of the Holy Spirit. From north to south,
and from east to west, our male, and more especially
our female academies, our colleges and our churches
drank largely of this fountain of living waters. It was
my privilege to enter upon the course of academical
life not far from the meridian of this bright day. There
were no subjects that interested my mind more deeply
when I began my ministry among this people, than those
revivals of religion which passed over the land of my
boyhood. This interest increased with time and official
labours and responsibility, and exercised a most import-
ant influence upon my whole course. Sparse clouds of
mercy had been hovering over the congregation during
the first four years of my ministry, and not a few,
especially of those in middle life, had been brought intoMEMORIAL OF GOD’S GOODNESS.
17
the kingdom of God. The year 1814 was a year of
severe labor and deep solicitude ; as it drew towards
its close, of great discouragement and depression. It
seemed to me that I must abandon my post, and that
neither my mind, my heart nor my health were ade-
quate to its constantly accumulating duties. My intel-
lectual resources seemed to be exhausted, and drained
dry. Many a time, after preaching, did I remain long
in the pulpit that I might not encounter the faces of
the people as I left the church ; and many a time when
I left it did I feel that I could never preach another
sermon. Yet I labored on week after week, without
discovering to what extent the Spirit of God was carry-
ing forward his own noiseless work. I perceived no-
thing to encourage me but an unusual enlargement and
urgency in prayer, a greater facility in the selection of
fitting themes for the pulpit, and more freedom and
earnestness in declaring the whole counsel of God. God
remarkably interposed to relieve my mind from its de-
pression, and gave me such enlarged and delightful
views of his truth, that my whole ministry received a
new and cheered impulse. It was easy, also, to perceive
that the spirit of grace and supplication was being
poured out upon the people. The weekly prayer-meet-
ing and the weekly lecture were full of interest. Days
of fasting and prayer were occasionally observed, and a
Saturday-evening prayer-meeting was established by
the young men of the congregation. Our Sabbaths
became deeply solemn and affecting ; we watched for
them like those who watch for the morning, and I verily
believe we anticipated them with greater pleasure
218	MEMORIAL OP GOD’S GOODNESS.
and expectation than the sons and daughters of earth
ever anticipated their brightest jubilee. This was the
first strongly marked revival of God’s work among this
people ; and I take this notice of it because it was so
emphatic an expression of God’s goodness to your young
minister. Poor a thing as I have been, and still con-
tinue to be, it was this work of grace which made me
what I am ; which gave me entirely new views of the
great objects of the ministry, and made my work my
joy. I- loved it before, but never so ardently as
then. But for this early season of mercy, during the
summer of 1814, I do not see how I could ever have re-
mained among you. It was the Lord’s doing, and it is
marvelous in our eyes. The ingathering was not great,
but it was the finest of the wheat. I may not mention
their names.
This was but the beginning of days of mercy. The
commencement of The year 1815 was the dawning of a
still brighter day. The last Sabbath of the old year and
the evening services of that Sabbath will be long re-
membered. Eight or ten persons, during the following
week, were found to be awake, and in earnest for their
salvation. The whole winter was a day of the right-
hand of the Most High. The cloud of mercy extended
itself through the following spring, and summer, and
autumn. In the month of November the Bible-class
was reorganized, the Saturday evening prayer-meeting
was renewed, and God appeared to take the work into
his own hands. There was complaint and hostility ;
there were* not wanting apprehensions in the minds
of some of the pastors and churches in the city thatMEMORIAL OF GOD’S GOODNESS.
19
the work savored more of fanaticism than intelligent and
sober thought. But the apprehensions were groundless.
The blessing was near ; the sacred influence was silent
as the dew of heaven. There was no outbreak and no
disorder. There was prayer. There was solemn and
earnest preaching. There were unexpected and un-
thought of instances of seriousness among the gay and
frivolous, in the families of the rich as well as the poor,
among the immoral as well as the moral, and many
were the instances of conversion to God. The third
Thursday of January was set apart by about thirty
members of the church as a day of fasting, humiliation
and'prayer. It was in a private house in the rear of St.
Paul’s, in Church street; and such a day I never saw
before, and have never seen since. It was closed under
strong and confident expectation that God was near,
and that his spirit was about largely to descend upon
the people. And so it was. A delightful impulse was
given to the work by this day of prayer. The promise
was made good, “Before they call I will answer, and
while they are yet speaking I will hear.” The weekly
lecture, attended on the evening of that day, was perhaps
the most solemn service of my ministry. The subject of
the discourse was suggested by the words, “ Marvel not
that L said unto you, Ye must be born again.” God
was with the hearers and the preacher ; his spirit moved
them as the trees of the forest are moved by a mighty
wind. There is good reason to believe that the minds
of more than one hundred persons were deeply im-
pressed with a sense of their lost condition as sinners,
and their need of an interest in Christ, on that evening.20
MEMORIAL OF GOD’S GOODNESS.
Enemies were silenced ; members of other churches
came among us to see and mark the character of the
work for themselves, and all classes were constrained to
confess, “ This is the finger of God.” Between one and
two hundred attended the meetings for religious inquiry
and conversation, and deep solemnity pervaded the
whole people. There was great eagerness for religious
instruction, and great satisfaction in the soul-humiliating
and soul encouraging doctrines of the cross. The work
was rapid. The period of awakening and conviction in
many instances was very short—so short that older
Christians began to doubt the genuineness of such con-
versions. There was no reason for the doubt. Some
of the brightest and most enduring Christians amongst
us were those very persons whose conversion was
almost as sudden as that of Saul <5f Tarsus. The
gathering of this protracted harvest was rich, consisting
sometimes of thirty and forty, and at one communion
of more than seventy, filling the broad aisle of the
church—a lovely spectacle to God, angels and men.
There have been five seasons of the especial out-
pouring of God's spirit upon this people during the
ministry of their present pastor. They were inter-
spersed between the years 1812 and 1884, more or less
copious, but always seasons of delightful refreshing,
from the presence of the Lord. If the tree is known by
its fruit, they are proved to have been the fruit of God’s
Spirit. The subjects of this work of grace have in al-
most all instances run well; they have turned out intelli-
gent and active Christians. Many of them have been
called to their last earthly rest; nor shall I forget theMEMORIAL OF GOD’S GOODNESS.
21
blessedness and the blessed scenes of their last hours.
Many of them are ministers of the gospel, and more the
wives of ministers. Many of them are teachers and
superintendents of Sabbath-schools. Many of them are
ruling elders and deacons in other churches, while some
remain in the honourable fulfilment of these offices
among ourselves. Yery many of them are scattered
through this wide land, and distant churches and the
distant wilderness are made glad for them. I never was
so gratefully impressed with this fact, and with the high
privilege of preaching the gospel in this sanctuary, as
on an unexpected tour through Western New York and
the Western States on the Upper Mississippi. Every-
where I met those who remembered the young minister
and the Old Session Room. I heard of the death of
some far away, and it was affecting to learn that in
their last hours their thoughts of grateful praise were
turned toward these scenes of mercy.
It will be found by an inspection of our records, that
after the separation of the Brick and Wall Street
churches, and before the installation of the present pas-
tor, the session were faithfully employed in acts of pain-
ful discipline. Church discipline is not less truly an
ordinance of Cod than church communion. No church
can prosper that connives at heresy or immorality
among its communicants. This unwelcome duty was
faithfully pursued for several years after my settlement
among this people, and has been discharged with per-
fect unanimity ever since. In the early part of my
ministry, there were some avowed infidels in the church,
who were the disciples of Paine and Palmer ; there22
MEMORIAL OF GOD’S GOODNESS.
were, also, avowed Universalists ; there have been from
time to time immoral men and licentious, whom no
means could reclaim, and they have been cast out. It
has often been at great sacrifice of feeling, and some of
interest and influence that these acts of discipline have
been performed ; but however reluctantly and cauti-
ously, it is a work which has been done. There have
also been evils in the church at large with which the
Brick Church has sympathized, and in the pressure of
which it has endeavored to exert a healing and conserva-
tive influence. The great schism in the Presbyterian
Church in the United States, which issued in the exci-
sion of so many churches in Western New York, was
one in which this church took no part, and which it
endeavored to prevent. We saw and felt that there
were errors in doctrine and in church polity that were
at variance with our standards; but it was our judgment
that there was a constitutional remedy for them, and
that it ought to have been adopted. We had no con-
fidence in the men who were the leaders of the New
School party, and believed that their aims were to
secure exclusive power ; but we could not believe that
the mass of their followers were not true to our stand-
ards, and could never be persuaded that such a whole-
sale excision, without any previous trial, was consistent
with sound Presbyterianism. Yet all our sympathies in
doctrine and in polity were with the Old School. We
were crowded to the wall, and called on to decide
whether or not our allotment should be cast with the New
School, who had abandoned themselves to leaders with
whom we had no sort of sympathy, or with the OldMEMOBIAL OF GOD’S GOODNESS.
23
School, with whom our doctrinal views and views of
church order were in unison, while we disapproved of
their excinding acts. Nor did we long hesitate, but
formed our decision, after having frankly expressed our
dissent from their measures, to remain with the
excinding party. This was an unhappy division, though
overruled for good. There are hundreds of as good
men and sound Presbyterians in the excinded churches
as are to be found among ourselves ; and when time, that
great healer, shall have purged them of the unhallowed
leaven, and fostered, a more fraternal spirit in both
these branches of the great Presbyterian family in this
land, we doubt not they will once more become united
and harmonious. Blame was imputed to us by
both parties for our neutral course ; but we did not
think it neutral. Our decision to remain with the Old
School was prompt and firm, and not less prompt
and firm was our Protest against its excinding acts,
and that Protest now stands on the records of
the presbytery. We did not deem this a neutral
course ; nor could we, with an honest conscience, have
adopted any other, without fomenting still further
disunion, and forming, as was seriously thought of, a
third party in a church which ought ever to have been
one.
In those great and benevolent enterprises for which
the age in which weiive has been distinguished, it has
been the privilege of the Brick Church to bear her part.
Taking the forty-six years of my pastorate together,
no church in the land has given more bountifully
to the cause of domestic and foreign missions. It24
MEMORIAL OF GOD’S GOODNESS.
has done not a little also in the work of educating
poor and pious young men for the gospel ministry.
Boston, New York, Elizabethtown, Princeton, and the
West and far West to this day have eminent minis-
ters, in the Congregational, Presbyterian and Dutch
Reformed Churches, who were beneficiaries of this
church.
Of God’s goodness toward myself, I might write
volumes without exhausting the theme. My own life
and the life of her he so early gave me, have
been spared to us, while the great mass of the
companions of our youth among this people sleep
among the dead. It is a coincidence which an old
man may he pardoned for taking notice of, that this day
on which we now meet, completes the fiftieth year of
our married life. It was on the twenty-fifth of May,
1806, the Lord’s Day, that we were united in bonds not
to be severed but by death. This twenty-fifth of May,
1856, also the Lord’s Day, celebrates our “ golden wed-
ding,” and we are both well pleased in thus inviting you
to this religious celebration which looks back upon so
many interesting facts in the narrative of oui pilgrim-
age. Thirteen of our children were born in the midst
of you, and baptized in this house of God ; and you have
generously borne with their failings and ours. Six of
the fifteen have died since our connection with you, and
you have sympathised with our trials, and liberally pro-
vided for our wants and theirs. Your unexpected
bounty to us two years ago, when I was thousands of miles
from you, and knew not of the generous arrangement
so nobly made in order to relieve the solicitude of theMEMOBIAL OP GOD’S GOODNESS.
25
evening of our days, demands this grateful and public
acknowledgment.*
My labours among you have been, for the year
past, curtailed and embarrassed, by the visitation of
God. The world of sense has been for the most
part shut out from my obstructed vision ; a heavy cloud
has hung upon it, which I know not will ever be so re-
moved that I can labour among you with comfort or
usefulness. I how to this visitation ; I am not unhappy
° The bounty here referred to, and so unexpectedly dispensed, will the better
appear from the following documents :—
New York, 7th June, 1854.
Pursuant to public notice given from the pulpit, a meeting ot the male members and stated
hearers of the Brick Presbyterian Church in Beekman Street was held this day in the church,
to consider and determine, agreeably to said notice, upon a subject of interest to the congrega-
tion, embraced in the eighth section of the act to provide for the Incorporation of Religious Socie-
ties, in relation to ministers’ salaries.
On motion, Samuel Marsh, Esq., was called to preside as Chairman, and Moses Allen, Esq.,
was appointed Secretary.
The notice under which the meeting was called having been read, the following resolutions
were offered, and, after having been duly considered, were unanimously adopted:
I.	In consideration of the arduous labors of our excellent pastor, for a long series of years, at a
salary below the average amount paid to many clergymen of this city, to remunerate in some
measure his past services, and more adequately compensate them in future, Resolved, That the
salary of the Rev. Dr. Spring hereafter be fixed at five thousand dollars per annum, commencing
with the present fiscal year.
II.	Resolved, That the preceding resolution be communicated to the Board of Trustees, and
that they be requested to ratify the same, agreeably to said act.
III.	Resolved, That Horace Holden, Samuel Marsh, Moses Allen, Guy Richards, and Ira Bliss,
be a committee to communicate these resolutions to the Rev. Dr. Spring, and to express to him
the undiminished confidence and affection of this.church and congregation, and their earnest
prayer that God may long preserve him to be His minister to this people.
SAMUEL MARSH, Chairman.
Moses Allen, Secretary.
At a meeting of the Board of Trustees of the Brick Presbyterian Church, on the 13th of June,
1854, Mr. Holden presented to the Board a certified copy of the proceedings of a meeting of the
congregation, held in the church, on Wednesday, the 7th day of June ult, which was read and
ordered to be entered on the minutes.
Whereupon, on motion, it was unanimously Resolved, That this Board do approve of, and
hereby ratify and confirm the aforesaid proceedings of the congregation, fixing the salary of the
Rev. Dr. Spring at five thousand dollars per annum, to commence the first day of May last.
A true copy from the minutes.
THOS. EGGLESTON, Clerk.
New York, 13th Jime, 1854.
Rev. Dr. Spring.
Dear Sir : The undersigned have been appointed a committee to communicate to you the26
MEMORIAL OF GOD’S GOODNESS.
under it. I have no doubt of tbe care and faithfulness
of our Heavenly Father in thus laying his rod upon me.
I have never been unhappy in my work, but have
greatly rejoiced in it as in every view my chosen ser-
vice ; thankful above all earthly things that God was
pleased to put me into the ministry. I have never re-
gretted the choice for a moment. I have found trials
in it, but not one more than were required by the im-
perfections of my own character, my position and my
usefulness ; and were I now in the bloom of youth and
secular promise, of all employments in the world I
accompanying resolutions, passed unanimously, at a meeting of the congregation, and subse-
quently in like manner ratified and confirmed by the Board of Trustees.
It affords us great pleasure to discharge this duty, and it is only embittered with the regret
that this act of justice has been so long delayed, much of which delay may be chargeable to our
own negligence or forgetfulness, not to use a harsher name.
It is gratifying to be able to state, that on this occasion but one sentiment pervaded the entire
meeting; not the slightest dissent was manifested in thought, word, or deed. It was the spon-
taneous expression of grateful feelings from full and thankful hearts.
For almost half a century you have occupied the same post, and the same sphere of labor and
of duty.
Some of us have sat under your ministry for more than forty years, and during that long
period can bear testimony to your untiring industry, your unbending integrity in the exhibition
of gospel truth, amid conflicts and parties, and your entire devotion to the appropriate duties oi
the ministry.
We feel too that it is neither flattery to you nor vain boasting in us, but a thankful expression
of gratitude to God, to say, that yours has not been an unprofitable ministry, nor your influence
been confined to this church. We can see traces of your faithful preaching, marked by the
Divine Spirit, not only in our own city and vicinity, but in almost every State of this vast re-
public ; and we expect, if we are ever so happy as to arrive at our Father’s house on high, to
meet multitudes there of those whom neither you nor we have known in the flesh, brought home
to glory through your instrumentality.
It is a source of delightful reflection to us, that in the early evening of your days, after so long
a ministry among us, you retain the undiminished confidence and affection of your whole people,
an affection as warm and fresh as crowned the day when first you devoted your youthful prime
in this church, to Christ and his cause.
Our beloved pastor! these expressions but feebly represent our own sincere emotions.
We would humbly commend you to the Great Head of the church, and earnestly pray that He
may preserve you yet for many years to come, to preach the everlasting gospel to this people—
that He may make you perfect, stablish, strengthen, settle you, and finally, when our warfare is
accomplished, that He may receive you and us to that blessed communion where our love shall
be for ever perfect, and our joy for ever full.
Respectfully and affectionately,
HORACE HOLDEN, n
SAMUEL MARSH, /
MOSES ALLEN, >- Committee.
IRA BLISS,	l
GUY RICHARDS, )MEMORIAL OF GOD’S GOODNESS.	27
would choose that of a minister of the gospel. With all
my unworthiness, I would go to the throne and say,
“ Here, Lord, am I ; send me /” This conviction grows
upon me as my infirmity gradually disqualifies me for
the labors to which I have been accustomed. I cannot
speak of the glad emotions which fill my heart as, in
the suspension of my more vigorous studies, I some-
times look over the thousands of manuscripts I have
been allowed to prepare, and reflect upon the privilege
of having been permitted to utter so much precious
truth to this beloved people. It is a delightful view to
my own mind that, with all my deficiencies, God has
not permitted me to be a loiterer in his vineyard, and
that, however imperfectly, my work has not been negli-
gently done. What my motives have been another day
will show. Of one thing I am confident, that I have
been devoted to it, regardless of all other voca-
tions. My great cause of solicitude now is that I shall
wane, and fade, and faint, and die “ of having nothing
to do.” I find these days of unreading and unstudious
repose the greatest trial of my life, except my sins. I
ask your indulgence, your sympathy and your prayers,
that God would give me a cheerful mind, and so direct
me in the employment of my time that my life may not
become a burden, and that I may not be a cumberer of
he ground. Yet, I may not, I do not, distrust him.
Because thou hast been my help ; therefore, under the
shadow of thy wings will I rejoice.
And now, in this brief review, what shall we say!
One thought forces itself upon your minds and my own!
It relates to a theme on which I have so often dwelt in28
MEMOBIAL OP GOD’S GOODNESS.
this sacred desk: The goodness of God, how wonderful is it!
The rising and setting sun proclaim it, and every star of
the dark night. Like the milky way, it fills the heavens
with its whiteness, and like the rainbow painted on the
cloud, it spans them with its prismatic beauty. The
atmosphere we breathe is surcharged with it, and
it is conducted off in its ten thousand electric forms.
Every bird, fish, and worm, every buzzing insect, every
plant and flower, and every blade of grass inhale it.
Every sea, every lake and fountain, every river and
stream, and sparkling dew drop receive alike their
riches and their beauty from this uncreated source.
How much more richly and purely, then, does it flow
here in the sanctuary where all its streams are confluent,
and from the mountain tops of Zion send gladness
through the city of our God ! We cannot comprehend
the love that brought the Lord of Glory to the manger
and the cross ; that here proclaims the glad tidings of
great joy, and that sends forth his Spirit to call the
wanderers home. “ 0 that men would praise the Lord
for his goodness!” “How great is thy goodness to
them that fear thee, to them that put their trust in thee
before the sons of men!”
I love this place where I now stand—
“Here my best friends, my kindred, dwell,
Here God, my Saviour, reigns.”
Had any one told me twenty years ago that I should
live to see it abandoned as a place of religious worship,
I should have thought him a romancer, if not a mad-
man ; yet the hour of abandonment has come. On anMEMORIAL OF GOD’S GOODNESS.
29
occasion like the present, something is due to this
ancient sanctuary. The speaker stands here for the
last time; and you, beloved friends, meet for the last time
in the consecrated place where we have so often as-
sembled for the worship of God. As before intimated,
I am not ignorant of the defects of my ministry. Yet,
have I this thankful conviction, that, so far as I have
known it, I have not shunned to declare the whole
council of God. If I have not, testify against me this
day. We call upon you to witness, we call upon the
sainted spirits of the departed to witness, we make our
appeal to the walls of this hallowed edifice, if the truth
of God, detached from the systems of human philosophy,
from the misnamed improvements and ultraisms of the
age, and from the popular daubing with untempered
mortar, has not been proclaimed from this pulpit. This
house has also been greatly endeared to us as “ the
house of prayer,” as the “house of prayer for all
people.” Many are the seasons which the living and
the dead have here enjoyed in sweet communion with
God and one another. This house has been our thankful
resort in prosperity, in adversity it has been our refuge.
Here the aged and the young have come for the first and
last time to commemorate the love of Christ at his table.
Here our children have been baptized, and their children
after them, and here we have wept and prayed together
as God has called them from these earthly scenes.
Here other generations have listened, as you now listen,
and around this spot and beneath it are the sepulchres of
the departed. I seem to stand to-day amid generations
that are past, so vividly does my imagination peopleso
MEMORIAL OP GOD’S GOODNESS.
these seats with faces and forms whose place now
knows them no more. Pleasant, yet mournful are these
reminiscences ; memory has no associations more de-
lightful than those which run by the waters of the sanc-
tuary. This house has also been the stranger’s home.
Of this and of that man it shall be one day said, that
“ he was born here.” Many a wanderer from other
lands, and more from distant regions of our own
broad territory, have here sought and made their
peace with God; while many a backslider has been,
restored, amid scenes which have given joy to the
angels of God, and told of the years of the right hand
of the Most High. Recollections of individual charac-
ter and deep and tender interest gush upon us to-day,
which, while we must suppress, are full of thankfulness
and praise. “We have thought of thy loving-kindness,
0 God, in the midst of thy temple,” that “ we may tell
it to the generations following,” and that “this God is
our God for ever and ever, and will be our guide even
unto death.”
But our work and our privileges in this house of God
here have an end. It is His voice which to-day says to
us, “ Arise ye, and depart hence, for this is not your
rest.” We have occupied it too long ; and although it
has been for the benefit and enlargement of other con-
gregations, it has been not only to the diminution of our
strength, hut to the injury of our habits as a people,
and almost to the breaking up of our second service on
the Sabbath. Notwithstanding the doubts of some, and
the officious and uncalled-for interference of others, we
ourselves are satisfied that this once tranquil and cen-MEMORIAL OP GOD’S GOODNESS.
31
tral spot is no longer a place of repose either for the
preacher or the hearers. We have no longer the unob-
structed privileges of the gospel. Our weekly lecture
and our weekly prayer-meeting, as well as our Sabbath-
school, are of necessity discontinued ; while it is at no
small inconvenience that a single religious service is sus-
tained on the Lord’s day. The question has been asked,
Why not leave this church as a church for strangers, and
for the hotels and boarding-houses in this part of the
city? To this we have this conclusive answer, We our-
selves have proposed to do so. At a meeting of the
Presbytery of New York, I myself made the proposi-
tion to the churches that this congregation would sub-
scribe $50,000 for that purpose, on condition that the
other congregations would unite in raising the balance
of $150,000. The Presbytery received the proposal
with favour, and appointed a committee to take it into
consideration. That committee reported against the
proposed arrangement, and the Presbytery and the con-
gregations dropped the subject.
We have come to the conclusion, therefore, to quit
this edifice, not indeed without difficulty, but deliber-
ately. And we owe many thanks to those who, amid
all the turmoil from without, all the foreign influence,
and all the gradual dereliction from our services of our
own congregation, have stood by us in this crisis of our
history. For years we have been almost in transitu;
and it has put in requisition no small degree of attach-
ment to the house of their fathers, and no small degree
of Christian principle, to make the sacrifices that have
been indispensable to our continuance as a well organ-32
MEMORIAL OF GOD’S GOODNESS.
ized department in the house of God. While none of
us are without lingering attachments to these ancient
courts, few if any among ourselves now question the
expediency, the duty of the removal. We have been a
harmonious people for six and forty years ; and we are
now harmonious in this great and agitating question.
And although we cannot say that we leave these walls
without regret, we can say we leave them for conscience
sake, and at the bidding of our divine Leader. The
house does not belong to us, but to Him; and therefore
we are bound to husband the property entrusted to us
for the best interests of His kingdom. We bid it adieu,
to follow the guidance of his providence, and pitch our
tabernacle under the pillar and the cloud. These seats
will no longer be occupied by us ; this pulpit will hence-
forth be silent. To you who have long rejected the gospel
as here proclaimed, it now makes its last call. Prayer
will no longer ascend from this altar ; the songs of this
temple will now cease. Farewell, then, thou endeared
house Of God ! thou companion and friend of my youth,
thou comforter of my later years, thou scene of toil
and of repose, of apprehension and of hope, of sorrow
and of joy, of man’s infirmity and God’s omnipotent
grace, farewell! Sweet pulpit, farewell! Blessed altar,
farewell! Throne of grace, as here erected, and where
God no longer records his name, farewell!
But not to Thee, 0 thou that hearest prayer, thou God
of Zion, who dost still dwell with man on the earth—
not to thee, who hast said, “ Wherever I record my name,
I will come unto thee, and I will bless thee,” do we say
farewell!	“ The desire of our souls is to thy name,MEMORIAL OP GOD’S GOODNESS.
33
and to the remembrance of Thee. Whom have we in
heaven but Thee, and what is there on the earth that
we desire beside thee ?” Even now, at this late, this
last hour, from the bottom of our hearts do we say, “ If
thy presence go not with us, carry us not up hence.”
If we forget Thee, ever blessed and adorable Saviour, or
the church which thou hast purchased, or the Mount
Zion where thou dwellest, let our right hand forget her
cunning, let our tongue cleave to the roof of our mouth,
if we prefer not Thee and these above our chief joy !
Nor, my beloved people, is it to you that your pastor
says farewell. These brick walls and this plastered
ceiling, and these pillars and seats, do not constitute the
Brick Presbyterian Church. Ye are these constituents,
and “ ye are our glory and joy.” The winter of life is
too near for me to have much personal interest in your
arrangements for the future. My personal interests and
repose would he the better consulted by remaining
where we are. My heart’s desire and prayer to God,
and my most vivid hopes, are for your usefulness and
benefit, rather than my own. I would not see you a
dispersed people. And while it is with concern that I
say this, it is with hope rather than fear. I would fain
live to see you lengthening your cords and strengthen-
ing your stakes. But whether I live or die, God will
assuredly be with you, and bring you to the place of his
sanctuary. “If I shall find favour in his eyes, he will
show me both it and his habitation. But if he say thus,'
I have no delight in thee, behold here I am, let him do
as seemeth good unto him !” Thus far he has led us on
in mercy.
334
MEMORIAL OF GOD’S GOODNESS.
These days of solicitude and agitation will soon be
over. The “root of Jesse” yet stands as an “ ensign
to the people, and his rest shall be glorious.” Only
take diligent heed and be very courageous to do his will,
to love the Lord your God, and to walk in his ways, and
to keep his commandments, and to cleave unto him, and
to serve him with all your heart and all your soul, and
his presence and blessing shall be with you and yours
for a great while to come ! The Lord bless you and
keep you ; the Lord cause his face to shine upon you,
and be gracious unto you ; the Lord lift up his counte-
nance upon you, and give you peace! His name be
upon you and your children! Amen and amen! And
let all the people say, amen 1DEDICATION SERMON;
PREACHED ON THE LAST LORD’S DAY OF OCTOBER, 1858, AT THE
OPENING OF THE BRICK PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH ON
MURRAY HILL, IN THE CITY OF NEW YORK.THE SANCTUARY.
“ Ye shall reverence my sanctuary.”—Leviticus xix. 30.
Strong has been the desire of him who addresses you
to see this auspicious day ; more strong than his expec-
tations. The removal of a church hallowed by so many
affecting associations as those concentrated around the
place of our fathers’ sepulchres ; a church that has borne
no' insignificant part in our national history, and where
so many distinguished men and fathers of the American
Revolution worshipped; a church, the foundation of
which was laid with their own hands ; a church memor-
able for the power of God in the conversion of men, and
endeared to so many now scattered over this broad land ;
was an enterprise which none of us anticipated without
misgivings of heart, and none counted on accomplishing
without difficulty. These difficulties met us on every
side ; but “having obtained help of God, we continue
to the present day,” the same organized community with
which such multitudes have identified their sweetest
hopes, where their graces flourished, whence their pray-
ers ascended, and on which they now look down in the
gladness of anticipation and with the fervor of praise.
We have no ordinary cause for thanksgiving to God,38
THE SANCTUARY.
and for mutual gratulation that, after an exile of two
and a half years, we at length assemble in these courts.
We meet on this day of our holy solemnities to dedi-
cate this edifice to Him to whose name and praise, we
trust, it will ever be devoted. We would honour Him,
by putting honour upon the institutions of his own ap-
pointment ; He himself would have us reverence his
sanctuary.
The subject of this discourse, therefore, is that one
great word—
The Sanctuary, comprising, as it does, the Divine
presence—its moral power—its benevolent influence—
its conservative principles^—and its social character.
We reverence it,
I. In the first place, as the House of God.
When we come to it, we shut the door on the world,
and think of the Great and Glorious Being who occupies
it. It was his early promise, “ In all places where I re-
cord my name, I will come unto thee, and I will bless
thee.” His presence consecrated the field and the stone
where Jacob slept. It consecrated the bush on Horeb,
and the “ tabernacle of witness” in the wilderness. It
consecrated the Temple at Jerusalem as “ an habitation
for the mighty God of Jacob,” and made its history the
history of earth and heaven. It was holy ground, be-
cause God was there. No uncircumcised could enter it,
nor any unclean thing be offered on its altars. When
the Hebrews were exiles in a strange land, their harps
hung upon the willows, because they had no symbols of
the Divine presence. When their temple was pillaged
and burnt, and the wall of their city broken'down, andTHE SANCTUARY.
39
its palaces destroyed with fire, and they became tribu-
tary to foreign kings ; their glory was departed, because
the Shekinah was gone, and the God of Israel was no
longer among them. And when, in after times, their
temple was desecrated by all the rites of Paganism, and
the statue of Jupiter was set up on the altar of burnt
offering, it was no longer a sanctuary. And now, when
the proud Moslem sits upon the throne of David, and
the mosque of Omar stands on Mount Zion, how em-
phatically is the lesson inculcated on the world, that the
God of Israel dwells no longer in Jerusalem, no longer
in Mount Gerizim, but with every assembly of worship-
pers gathered in his name.
This is the high privilege of every Christian sanctu-
ary. If the Pagan world reverences its temples as the
dwelling-place of its deities, how much more ought
Christians to look upon their sanctuaries as sacred in
' the sanctity of their Oracle, and the presence of their
God.
Solemn thought, that the King Eternal, immortal
and invisible, before whom the loftiest and the holiest
are lost in amazement, bows his heavens and comes
down to these earthly courts! Yet is it a thought that
cheers us, because, while he comes in the splendor of his
rectitude, he comes in the gushing tenderness of his
compassions ; while he comes to stamp disappointment
and mockery on every hope which rests not on him, he
comes as the refuge and hope of the lowly ; and comes
not so much in the glory that encircled Sinai, and made
the prophet tremble, as in the winning loveliness, the
blended and attractive glory which shines in the face of
Jesus Christ.40
THE SANCTUARY.
Well may we turn aside to see this great sight, “ God
with us,” within the walls of an earthly temple. In lowly
reverence we fall before this present Deity ; the celes-
tial here bending to the terrestrial; the unseen and all-
seeing One dwelling in the frame-work which is of man’s
device. “ How dreadful is this place!” yet how delight-
ful! “Surely this is none other than the house of
God, and the gate of heaven!” Well may all hearts
shout with joy at the condescension of this reconciled
God. The sanctuary is the presence chamber of the
King of Kings; his own royal banqueting-house, and
the “mountain of his holiness.” If we look into the
book of nature, or into the revelations of conscience, or
into the writings of human philosophy and the specu-
lations of science, we find nothing that answers the ques-
tion, What and where is God? It is an absolute,
abstract Deity the human mind always thinks of, until
he is revealed in the person of his Son. The sanctuary
draws aside the veil, behind which the great Jehovah
“ dwells in the thick darkness.” There we find the God
whom we are not afraid to think of and to hold fellow-
ship with, and who, to all the varied attributes of great-
ness, adds those varied manifestations of goodness which
command our submission, our filial love, our trusting
confidence. No earthly joy and honour, no patronage
of the rich and learned, no crowded assemblies, no arm
of flesh, no tokens of public favour, can be to us instead
of his presence and glory. What are all the formality
and gorgeousness of worship, if he who is a Spirit be
not here worshipped in spirit and in truth ? What is
all human teaching, with its well digested thoughts andTHE SANCTUARY.
41
charms of utterance, if God’s own lips speak not, and
the soft whispers of his love breathe not? Say to us,
thou God of Zion, “ My presence shall go with thee,
and I will give thee rest!” We would behold the
beauty of the Lord, as we have seen it in the sanctuary.
Our prosperity depends upon the bright visions of his
glory. 0 that he would walk amid the golden candle-
sticks, and make this place of his feet glorious ! The
inward tokens of his presence are the best pledge that
we shall enjoy the outward tokens of his favour. Give
us these, and there will not be wanting those who will
say, “We will go with you, for we have heard the Lord
is with you.”
II. We reverence the sanctuary, in the second place,
FOR ITS MORAL POWER.
Men are apostate and sinful. Sin has impoverished
them. They have wants which nothing but unearthly
resources can supply, “ having no hope and without God
in the world.” Iniquity is their ruin. So long as ini-
quity rankles in their bosoms, it proves the sharpened
tooth of the undying worm ; the fires of perdition can-
not be quenched, so long as men remain the victims of
wickedness.
It is no marvel, therefore, that the most comprehen-
sive purpose of the Divine mind terminates in securing
and perpetuating the interests of holiness. His works,
his providence, together with the rich and varied mani-
festations of his great and glorious nature, ever have had
for their object the great interests of holiness in the
world in which we dwell. The mightiest movement his
wisdom and love ever dictated aims at here constructing42
THE SANCTUARY.
a highway that shall be called “ the way of holiness/7
Holiness is the ultimate good. There is nothing better
that God seeks after, and nothing else he has made such
sacrifices to secure.
In the accomplishment of this great work the sanctu-
ary has a part to perform, which can be performed by
no other instrumentality. Where no vision is, the
people perish. Men rarely become moral, never reli-
gious, dissociated and severed from the house of God.
If the sanctuary has an interest in the happiness of men,
it is a happiness that is inseparable from a holy and
virtuous character. What it most seeks to promote is
a character that God loves, a character that is progres-
sively like his own, a character cherished by all that is
binding in the obligations of law, all that is rich in the
plenitude of grace, all that is tender in the sympathies
of our Great High Priest, and all that is stimulating in
those “ exceeding great and precious promises” whereby
his people are made partakers of the divine nature.
Do you ask, How the sanctuary effects this great object ?
we answer, By the power of truth, the power of prayer,
and the power of the Holy Ghost. Here is the truth of
God, presenting the thoughts and affections of the in-
finite to the finite, and opening that exhaustless store-
house of motives so wondrously suited to man’s intel-
lectual, moral and sensitive nature. Here is the Spirit
of all grace, without which truth is powerless, and with
which it receives the welcome of the warm affections, is
enthroned in the chambers of the inner man, and sancti-
fies and saves. Here, too, is that heaven-ordained spirit
of grace and supplication, setting in motion all otherTHE SANCTUARY.
43
instruments, and agencies, and demonstrating man’s
impotence and God’s faithfulness as a prayer-hearing
God.
We may not speak loosely when we speak of this
moral influence of the sanctuary. It is not the mere
form of godliness it would secure, but the power ; it is
not names, but things ; it is not the shadow, but the
substance. Pagan ablutions, and Papal crosses, and
sprinklings are not piety. The ostentation of religious
Observances, and the decencies of a visible morality are
sometimes found among the scoffers at all heart religion.
A Christian creed and a Christian profession are not
unknown among those who are dead in trespasses and
sins. Inspept the fruits of the sanctuary, and it will be
found that it is the rain of heaven and the sun of
righteousness by which they are matured, and the hand
of the sanctifier that gathers them. Holiness has taken
the place of sin, gladness the place of sorrow, light of
darkness, hope of despair, life of death, where the
sanctuary is clothed with power. Nor do we hesitate
to say that, various as are the means by which the
world is converted to God, and beautifully cooperative
as they are, the pivot on which the machinery rests, the
main shaft that impels it, its motive power is the fire on
God’s altars. To this hallowed spot the church militant
and the church triumphant look with hope, and here from
under the sanctuary the waters issue that give life to the
world. The very walls of the sanctuary are monitors,
and the entrance in at the doors reads the lesson,
“ This is the way, walk ye in it.” There is no safer
path, nor is there a more effective repulse to the44
THE SANCTUARY.
Tempter than to say to him, I am going to the house of
God.
I love to look at the sanctuary in the retired village
or the crowded city ; in the bold foreground, or the
retreating shadows of the distant landscape. It is God’s
vineyard, where “ the vine flourishes, and the tender
grape appears,” while around its consecrated walls is
“ God’s acre,” where the plants of righteousness, thickly
set and deep, are gathering their immortal bloom. The
beauties of holiness and the glories of immortality are
there. Yes, I love to look at such a scene, and to say
when I look at it, “ How goodly are thy tents, 0 Jacob,
and thy tabernacles, 0 Israel; as valleys are they spread
forth, as gardens by the river’s side, as lign aloes
which the Lord hath planted, and as cedar trees beside
the waters!” The dewy eve, the blushing morn fade in
comparison with this garden of God, sparkling in the
beauties of holiness, and fragrant with its sweet perfume.
Bashan languisheth, and the flower of Lebanon languish-
ed ; holiness never withers, its leaf is green even in the
year of drought. Glorious beyond all but the fore-
telling pen of prophecy, are the bright destinies of the
sanctuary : glorious to feel and enjoy, glorious to be-
hold, and in seasons of darkness and despondency, glori-
ous to look for. When that hope is realized, there will
be the jubilee of the world. The ingathering of the
great harvest year shall have come, when the “ plowman
shall overtake the reaper, and the treader of grapes
him that soweth seed, and the mountains drop down
sweet wine, and all the hills do melt.” Intimately con-
nected with these, thoughtsTHE SANCTUARY.
45
III. There is a third reason for this religions reverence
for the sanctuary, and that is its active benevolence.
The Church of God, from its origin and organization,
from the laws by which it is governed, and the profes-
sion and character of its members, from the peculiar
privileges it enjoys and the means of its advancement,
from its opportunities for usefulness, and the promis-
ed favor of its Great Head, possesses notoriety and
preeminence. She is like a city set on a hill, which
cannot be hid. While generation after generation has
passed away, and thrones and dynasties have vanished,
and proud institutions have crumbled to the dust, and
every ancient work of man is lost; this great work of
God remains—a living community in a dying world, a
spiritual community, youthful and vigorous, where all
things else grow old and decay.
God’s sanctuary is everywhere invested with this
commanding position, in order to impose upon it the
obligations of active service : “ To whom much is given,
of him also much shall be required.” Its mission is to
“ do good and communicate.” It is not erected to be
looked at and admired, but to speak to us, to act upon
us. Its province and its office are to send out its sym-
pathies to the ignorant, and enlighten them; the wander-
ing and reclaim them; the lost, and save them. We
hold of very little account that cold and dead orthodoxy
which paralyzes effort. The professed Christian who
folds his hands and congratulates himself that he has
nothing to do for a world that lieth in wickedness,
because believing is his business, and not working, is in
nothing better than the slothful servant. An enlightened46	THE SANCTUABY.
belief in the doctrines of grace, so far from diminishing
Christian diligence, impels to it by superadded obliga-
tions and motives. Our obligations to holiness and to
every form of active service, are just as real and just as
binding as they would have been, had the Saviour never
fulfilled all righteousness ; just as real and just as bind-
ing as they would have been had we been justified by
the deeds of law. If salvation is of grace, it is unto works,
we are fellow-workers with God. He works in us that
we may work. We look to him as though he did all,
and we labor as though all the work were our own.
We have this treasure in earthen vessels, that the excel-
lency of the power may be all of God and not of us ;
yet do ‘ ‘ we strive mightily, according to the grace that
worketh in us mightily.” Nor is this cooperation the
less obvious and delightful because our agency is human
and his divine. It is “the worm Jacob” that is to
“ thrash the mountains, and beat them small, and make
the hills as chaff.”
Such is the creed of the sanctuary, and with this it
stands in the midst of a perishing world. None are
overlooked by it, old or young, far off or near. Em-
phatically are the young its charge, because God has.
committed them to it; it is the sanctuary that modifies
and moulds their character. It has a larger heart, too,
and a more enlarged vision than this. It looks over
this sin-struck earth, and cares for the heathen at home
and the heathen abroad. Its thoughts, its counsels, its
prayers, its gifts, its deeds of self-denial and endurance
form no inconsiderable part of the history of the Church
of God.THE SANCTUARY.
47
You wonder, perhaps, that I utter such obvious
truths ; not only would I utter but enforce them. If God
requires it of his ministers that they be working men,
he also requires it of his churches that they be working
churches. What kind of a light would that be that
does not shine, or what sort of a church is that which
has no forthgoing activity ? What is Christianity with-
out the benevolent deeds which Christianity produces ?
We do not ask what the sanctuary is, so much as what
the sanctuary does. There may be a dead sanctuary as
well as a dead faith. A dead sanctuary ! what is it ?
There is no heart there, and no active pulsations ; it is
no living temple ; it is Death ! If it acts not, it lives
not; its sublimest devotions are but sounding brass and
a tinkling cymbal, without its active character. If this
edifice is worthy the place it occupies, and the cause to
which we devote it, we must have an honest and an
earnest Christianity, permeated with more of the popu-
lar element, employing more heads, more hearts and
more hands. We must have a willing people, and lay
under contribution every tribe, every family, every
man. This is what sanctuaries are built for. They are
not built for the minister, but for the people. The
minister is not the church, nor is the pulpit the sanctu-
ary. It is the solitude of his toil that is very apt to dis-
hearten even the most courageous laborer. The differ-
ence between a ministry standing alone and a ministry
upheld and encouraged by the favor and cooperation of
an effective church, cannot be known this side eternity.
Negligence is the sin of Christians, and it is no small
sin. The want of well-doing is one of the devil’s forms48
THIS SAN CTUAliY.
of evil-doing. The Saviour’s maxim was, “ I must
work.” I must “ work the work of him that sent me
while it is day; the night cometh, in which no man can
work.” We cannot prolong the day of labor an hour.
Time does not wait for our indecision, nor death for our
delay. It would be a lamentable narrative hereafter to
be told, that the generation which is now passing
through this house of God has left no luminous track
behind it.
Nor let it be thought that we derogate from the dig-
nity and sacredness of our subject, when we remark—
IV. In the fourth place, that the sanctuary is dis-
tinguished for its CONSERVATIVE PRINCIPLES.
It is no enemy to reform and progress ; yet is it no
part of its principles or its policy to “do evil that good
may come.” It hails every aggressive movement on the
kingdom of darkness; yet it is not heedless of conse-
quences. Reform and progress are its great object;
yet it has no organ of destructiveness. While it is not
blind to existing evils, it dreads the evils of premature
reform. So long as it acts in its true character, its aim
is to make the world wiser, better, and happier; nor
will its work be accomplished until “ the Lord God shall
cause righteousness and praise to spring forth before all
nations.” Yet it does not run riot, even in advancing
the right and eradicating the wrong, lest by ill-timed
and unhallowed zeal it should lose more than it would
gain.
If the world in which we dwell is so impregnate with
wickedness that it cannot endure the teachings of
heavenly wisdom without secret hostility, or open tur-THE SANCTUARY.
49
bulence, we may not forget that the bitterness, the tur-
moil, the angry invective and strife of the world belong
not to the house of God. It is no friend to rancour
and bitterness, even in a good cause. We accord to it,
nay we claim for it its controversy with evil; and it is a
controversy which is uncompromising. But we see not
why it may not breast itself in the very front of the
battle, without “ scattering fire-brands, arrows, and
death.” It is not the fiery meteor, but rather is it like
the moon, wading in her brightness through a night of
storms. Embarrassing, obscuring clouds it may look
for, but it shines by its own light, pure and white,
though making its way through Egyptian darkness. It
is no thunder cloud, filling the hearts of men with fear ;
nor when its seals are opened, do the stars of heaven
fall to the earth as a fig tree casteth her untimely figs.
No, no! Soft and gentle breezes blow from Mount
Zion; the sun of righteousness lingers upon its sum-
mit, and bright visions open upon the vale below.
The longer I live, the more am I convinced that this
is one of the great characteristics of the sanctuary. It
was not the earthquake, nor the strong wind, nor the
fire, that made the prophet wrap his face in his mantle,
but the still, small voice.
We forget our office when we needlessly ignite and
inflame the worst passions of the human heart, and
strike blow after blow upon the foundations of public
tranquility. The great statute-book of the sanctuary is
a cautious instructor, enforcing its lessons with “the
meekness of wisdom.” There is much that it teaches,
and some truths which it does not teach ; wisely leaving
450
THE SANCTUARY.
the great principles it inculcates, like the leaven hid in
three measures of meal, to their quiet and progressive
power. If the Apostle Paul could have had the private
ear of Nero, I have no doubt he would have told him
truths which the Spirit of God would not allow him
publicly to declare to the Christians at Rome. His ob-
ject was not to agitate and revolutionize, hut to regene-
rate and reform. Sudden changes in the polity and
affairs of the world the sanctuary does not look for. It
aims not so much at rudely undermining old institutions,
and demolishing old landmarks, as at leaving them
silently and gradually to crumble and wither under the
subduing power of truth and love. A few wild and un-
seasonable blasts of the trumpet may produce a storm
which even the “ Sermon on the Mount,” a thousand
times repeated, cannot assuage. There is no such re-
forming power as the cross of Christ. And the beauty
of the reform is, that it is accomplished without doing
any harm. When the sanctuary concentrates the energy
of its intellect, the ardor of its emotions, and its fiery
zeal, in a prolonged crusade against some one social evil,
it is very apt to lose sight of its appropriate work, to
exhaust its vigor in a foreign service, and in the end of
its eccentric course, take up the lamentation, “They
made me keeper of the vineyards, but my own vineyard
have I not kept.”
Our own land stands first and foremost of all lands in
the unshackled influence of the sanctuary. For his re-
ligious principles no man is here accountable but to his
Maker. The church has no jealousy of the State, and
the State has no jealousy of the church. We haveTHE SANCTUARY.
51
no inmingling of the cross and the clay. There is no
ecclesiastical domination to dictate the measures of the
government, and “ no Star Chamber to trample the
rights of conscience under the heel of arbitrary power.”
Our obligations, therefore, as American churches, stand
abreast with our high privileges. In a land where the
people influence the government, rather than the go-
vernment the people ; where public opinion originates
the laws ; where the church can prosper without the
State, better than the State without the church; and
where the religion of the gospel stands confessed as the
only bulwark of national security, the sanctuary has
obligations of no ordinary kind. Our free institutions
do not adhere to our soil or climate, nor do our rich
prairies nourish them, nor are they imbedded in our
mountains ; they rest on the influence of the sanctuary.
Selfish politicians, noisy patriots, and profligate court-
iers, are not for the State to lean upon. Our prosperity,
our union is inseparable from our Christian character.
The severe schooling and steady habits of our fathers
laid the foundation of our greatness, and it has thus far
been protected and sustained by the laws of that king-
dom which is not of this world. What the future will
be, we know not; if we have fears, it is because we
have fears for the influence of the sanctuary ; and if we
have more and stronger hopes than fears, it is because
the sanctuary is his abode who “ ruleth the raging of
the sea, and stilleth the tumult of the people.” Mer-
curial and fiery spirits may find a place within its walls,
and threatening voices and mighty thunderings may agi-
tate it; but there are words of peace above the howl-52
THE SANCTUARY.
ings of the storm. If a bright horizon is yet to open
upon us ; if “young America,” with her head-strong
impulsiveness, is preserved from the turbulence of
anarchy ; if, in the murky atmosphere that now and
then envelops us, and if, amid the hoarse and sharp
rumbling of the cavern beneath us, we avoid or survive
the earthquake, it will be because “knowledge, with
strength of salvation, is the stability of our times.”
If it so happens that we live in an age when these
thoughts are unwelcome, or are looked upon with sus-
picion, or will be misinterpreted and abused, the more is
the pity, and the more is the need of them. Well as-
sured am I that the time will come when they will re-
ceive a hearty response from all right-hearted men, and
that experience will show that “ wisdom is justified of
her children.” We ask for this house of God that it
may be baptized with the spirit of wisdom, and long re-
main as God’s witness to whatsoever things are lovely,
whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things are pure,
whatsoever things are honest, whatsoever things are of
good report. Should the time ever come when it ceases
to be the reprover of wickedness, and at the same time
the patron of good order, some weeping prophet may
survey its ruins and say, “ How is the gold become dim,
and the most fine gold changed !” Give us this spirit-
ual, this conservative character, and our “walls will be
salvation and our gates praise.”
V. We reverence the sanctuary, in the last place, for
ITS SOCIAL AND FRATERNAL CHARACTER.
There is but one true religion in the universe. The
religion of heaven and the religion of earth, varying asTHE SANCTUARY.
53
they do in measure, are in their nature essentially the
same.
The sanctuary is the house of prayer for all people.
It is the symbol of man’s brotherhood, and stands forth
as the sacred asylum of fatten humanity. So far from
being appointed for one nation, one clime, one class, or
colour, it recognizes no distinction of names or persons,
and no covenant of peculiarity. Of all places in the
world, it is the place where Jew and Gentile, rich and
poor, bond and free, wise and unwise, seamen and
landsmen, the stranger and the home born, are regarded
with a Christian impartiality. And why should it not
be so ? They are alike the offspring of the same Al-
mighty Parent; invested with the same intelligent and
immortal existence ; subjects of the same moral govern-
ment ; equally the heirs of sin and the curse, and the
offered salvation ; all born to trouble, as the sparks fly
upward ; all destined to lie down in the grave, to stand
at the bar of the final Judge, and, as they employ this
day of grace, to be at last associated in the same blessed
heaven, or in the same awful hell.
All have a common interest, therefore, in the house
of God. Attractive it may be to the rich, but never
ought to be repulsive to the poor. One of its peculiar-
ities is, that “ the rich and the poor meet together” at
its altars. It speaks to all: to the peasant in his hut
and to the king on his throne ; to the saint in his closet
and the criminal in his dungeon ; to the children of
want and woe everywhere. It is the great leveller ; not
by obliterating all human distinctions, but by making a
distinction that absorbs them all; not by depressing the54
THE SANCTUARY.
high, but by elevating the low, and raising both to the
dignity of “the sons and daughters of the Lord God
Almighty.”
Man is a social being; his religious privileges, and
obligations, and hopes are intimately inwoven with this
great element of his nature. Most beautifully and
wonderfully are the social relations made subservient to
his immortality. Christian churches are not more cer-
tainly the nurseries of the church in heaven, than
Christian families are the nurseries of the church on
earth. If you survey the lands where God’s altars are
thrown down, or have never been erected, you will be
apt to find them lands where the social and domestic
ties are sacrificed to those that are more public ; where
the endearments of private life are usurped by a proud
ambition, and the allurements to personal piety are lost
in the clamor and bustle of the world. “ Come, thou,
and all thy house into the ark this is the voice which
issues from the sanctuary of God. Our attachments to
the sanctuary may well be expressive of our attachment
to the worship and the God of our fathers; and well
may they be strengthened by the sweet memories of the
domestic circle. I would not part with these sacred
reminiscences. 0 how sweetly they sometimes come
back upon us in the days of pensiveness and grief; and
when we stand in silence over the honoured grave of
the departed, and where, amid the many bonds that
united us, none is more valued than that which bound
us to the house of God ! We honour the solitary cham-
ber where grief is bathed in tears, and the mourner
takes refuge, by himself, in the bosom of eternal love ;THE SANCTUARY.
55
but it is not as when assembled Israel, in the day of
their rebuke, bowed together in heaviness at the even-
ing sacrifice. We sympathize with the publican when
he went up alone to the temple to pray ; but it is a
more cheering scene to look at which the Psalmist
speaks of when he says, “We took sweet counsel to-
gether, and went to the house of God in company.”
There is beauty and forth-going praise in the lonely star
that twinkles in the retiring cloud ; but it falls short of
the beauty of the spangled heavens, nor is it the adoring
anthem when “ the morning stars sang together, and all
the sons of God shouted for joy.”
And may we not extend these thoughts to the great
brotherhood of churches of every name ? Christian
men are Christian men everywhere. Though they have
been dispersed through different ages of time, and are
now dispersed through different sections of the church
of God, they are the same Christian men everywhere.
Though they differ in their intellectual endowments and
acquisitions, and even in their spiritual character, joys,
and influences, they are still good and Christian men.
Like scattered rays of light and love, they all radiate
from God’s sanctuary. Their religion is one ; they
themselves are constituent parts of the one body, of
which Christ is the head; one temple, of which he is
the Deity ; one sphere, of which he is the sun.
Whence, then, this moral chaos ? Why this scatter-
ing of the one fold of the Great Shepherd ? Whence is
it that the old faith and the old charity are separated by
almost impassable barriers ? Why this “ party coloured
blazonry,” and this “cross-firing” of the hosts marshal-56
THE SANCTUARY.
ed under the Captain of our salvation? We plead for
God’s sanctuary ; and on its behalf we ask for what we
have ever given, and hold ourselves ready to give—the
interchanged tokens of love and influence, which the
Bible not only justifies, but demands. That book of
God has its standard of church fellowship, and here it
is : “ Grace be with all them that love our Lord Jesus
Christ in sincerity!” Here it is still more definitely :
“In Christ Jesus, neither circumcision availeth any-
thing, nor uncircumcision, but a new creature. And as
many as walk according to this rule, peace be on them,
and mercy upon the Israel of God !” Here it is again,
in the words of our loving Master : “Father, I pray
that they all may he one, as thou, Father, art in me, and
I in thee, that they may be one in us, that the world may
believe that thou hast sent me !” Who can stand before
such an appeal as this ? Where is now the stern Ana-
baptist, and the unyielding pretender to apostolic suc-
cession, and the sturdy champion of the exclusive divine
right of Presbytery, and the devout advocate for the
literal version of the Psalms of David, who of such fig-
ments would erect a wall of brass around the sanctuary ?
We have no desire to be regarded as “ uncommon
pretenders to charity.” Ye are our witnesses that we
are not slow in “ contending earnestly for the faith once
delivered to the saints.” Yet we have no war, except
with error and sin ; and where the error is radical to
the Christian system, or essential to the Christian charac-
ter, it is a war of extermination. But we have long
since learned that conformity is not essential to unity,
nor to Christian fellowship. “ The kingdom of God isTHE SANCTUARY.
57
not meat and drink, but righteousness and peace, and
joy in the Holy Ghost.” The more the faith and fellow-
ship of Christ prevail, the more will they lead his fol-
lowers to fellowship with each other. The sanctuary
calls upon us to receive and acknowledge all Christians,
of every name, who are Christians indeed. 0 we are
sick at heart of this dismembered body of Christ! Nor
do we mean in this matter to be fettered by sectarian
intolerance, or awed by the authority of men. Blessed
be God, the time is coming when the “watchmen shall
see eye to eye, and lift up their voice together, and
with the voice together shall they sing.” We look for
such a day, and on this side the heavenly world. And
what a beautiful expression of the object and design of
the sanctuary and of the spirit of heaven! The sanctu-
ary below is but the vestibule to the sanctuary above.
We would not come to it, feeling that we are dissociated
from any one of the families of the redeemed, any more
than we are dissociated from “ the house not made with
hands, eternal in the heavens.” There the earthly sanc-
tuary terminates in the companionship of “ an innu-
merable company of angels, and the spirits of just men
made perfect, and God, the Judge of all, and Jesus, the
Mediator of the new covenant.”
Such is God’s sanctuary. Who can appreciate it ?—
its object, its toil, its solicitudes and discouragements,
its expectations and successes, its honours and rewards ;
what is there on the earth to be compared with these ?
In its moral power and permanent influence it stands
preeminent above the forum, above the Senate house,
above the battle field, and above the press. Thought58
THE SANCTUARY.
looks to it for instruction; the wounded conscience
looks to it as its refuge, and the burdened heart for its
repose. Lisping childhood looks to it, and buoyant
youth, and vigorous manhood, and hoary age. Christian-
ity looks to it as its defender, and as the heaven-desig-
nated herald of its glad tidings. The history of the
sanctuary would be the history of Christianity, in all its
lights and shadows, in all its depression and triumph, in
all its conflicts and victories. Nations live or die as
their sanctuaries rise or fall. Woe to the land that is
not the land of the Sabbath and the sanctuary! All the
world over, with the exception of those temples where
God once dwelt, and from which his glory is departed,
an intimate sympathy will be found to exist between
the sanctuary and the best interests of men. If Scot-
land, from having been “ one of the rudest, one of the
poorest, one of the most turbulent countries in Europe,”
has become “ one of the most virtuous, one of the most
highly civilized, one of the most flourishing, one of the
most tranquil,” it is because “ He that dwells between
the cherubims there shines forth.”
When a body of Puritans in the North of England,
and after them a body of the “ Scotch-Irish” removed
to this western wilderness, in order to enjoy liberty of
conscience, their rallying point was the house of God.
And now, like a wreath of perennial flowers, every-
where adorning hill and valley, their scattered temples
are inmingling their hallowed incense with the winds of
our mountains and the spray of our iron-bound coast,
A right-minded foreigner can hardly pass through the
length and breadth of this land without observing thatTHE SANCTUARY.
59
one of our strong peculiarities is a religious reverence
for God’s sanctuary. What citadels of strength are
these unnumbered Christian temples, everywhere lifting
their spires toward heaven! Should ever the time
come when a barbarous deluge, like that which inun-
dated the fairest portions of Europe during the Middle
Ages, passes over this fair land, among its first and
most ruthless desolations would be found a desecrated
or a desolated sanctuary.
These thoughts give interest to this welcome hour.
While the tide of life has been sweeping away the land-
marks of the past, some few remain who saw our ancient
sanctuary in its glory, and still more who witnessed its
decay. Thanks to God, the overflowing waters have
thus far been restrained from invading these altars.
We have lived to see the top stone of this edifice laid,
and its doors open to us. We have nothing to ask for
in the external and material arrangements of this house.
It is not a gorgeous edifice ; it has no decorated walls
and arches, and no splendid magnificence. Yet are
there stability and comfort, and tasteful architecture,
which do honour to the genius and fidelity of those em-
ployed in projecting, erecting, and embellishing it.
“ Strength and beauty are in his sanctuary.” We have
sufficient interest and sufficient gratification in the ex-
ternal and the material; God grant that we may have
a deeper feeling for the internal and the spiritual!
Why should the visible captivate us, and the lust of the
eye and the pride of life charm our hearts to those things
that are seen, instead of attracting them to the unseen
realities, of which these symbols, these appearances are
only the shadow.60
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The sanctuary is more than ornamental architecture,
and harmonious music, and external worship. We look
above and across the visible to Him who is invisible.
It is the selected spot where the Almighty architect
forms the materials of “the living temple, built up with
lively stones, an holy temple in the Lord, an habitation
of God through the spirit.” It is God’s house, and we
come to dedicate it to him. And there is, in my humble
judgment, no superstition, but great propriety and truth
in these acts of dedication. There is, and there ought
to be, as wide a distinction between the house of God
and all other places of public resort, as between all that
is secular and all that is sacred. The one is a select and
consecrated territory ; the other belongs to the business
of the world. Secular themes and secular objects have
their place, but that place is not the sanctuary. From
our hearts we dedicate this edifice to the God of heaven.
It is nothing to us if He do not occupy it. Stand up,
all ye people, and before God, angels and men, con-
secrate it to his worship and honour, to whom it be-
longs !—each one of us humbly looking to him, that he
would fill it with his great glory. Be it ever sacred to
him by whose name it is called !—sacred to his mercy-
seat and his praise !—sacred to his pure gospel, to his
own ordinances, to the fellowship of the saints, the
conversion of men, and the comfort and edification of
those who fear God and love his Son. Sacred place!
“ Arise, 0 Lord God, thou and the ark of thy strength!
Let thy priests be clothed with righteousness ; and let
thy saints shout for joy !” From this good hour let this
house be devoted only to sacred and religious uses.THE SANCTUARY.
61
Here let all that is sacred be put in motion, and all that
is secular be put at rest. In his name, to whom we
have thus solemnly dedicated it, we say to you, rever-
ence God’s sanctuary. Prize his ordinances, and teach
your children to prize them. There are fountains of
mercy here ; a river the streams whereof make glad the
city of our God, the holy place of the tabernacles of
the Most High. Bend over this living fountain and
drink to the full. Lift up your hands in the sanctuary
and bless the Lord. The Lord, that made heaven and
earth, bless thee out of Zion.
It will not be looked for, on the present occasion,
that I should repeat those historical notices that were
given in the last discourse that was delivered in our
former edifice. It is natural for those who are in an
advanced period of life to look forward ; Christianity
looks forward with hope. “ The Brick Presbyterian
Church in the city of New York” will not, we trust,
prove recreant to its character nor its trust. There
have been periods when we have had some misgivings
as to the course this church has pursued; yet, upon a
deliberate review of it, it is our welcome conviction that,
under the Divine favour, the true purpose of the sanc-
tuary, notwithstanding all our imperfections, has been
here, in some good measure, accomplished. When we
look at the number and standing of those ministers
of the gospel whom its prayers and its bounty have
sent forth to the world ; when we advert to the part
it has taken in organizing some, and in sustaining other
institutions for the spread of the gospel; when we
think of the multitudes to whom the gospel has been62
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here preached, and the multitudes who hail from this
church as their spiritual birth-place ; when we recall its
conflicts with error and its conservative influence ; when
we set before our minds the two generations of the
Lord’s people who have gone from us to the upper
sanctuary, and dwell with such gratified emotions upon
the scenes of trial through which they passed, and upon
their peaceful departure ; and when, in our present sur-
vey of this people, we count so few among this adult
population who have not named the name of Christ, we
bow our knees in humility and thankfulness before the
God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, that, much
as we have to deplore, we have not run in vain, neither
labored in vain “ yet not I, but the grace of God that
was with me.”
We enter upon our new career under few circum-
stances of discouragement and many of bright anticipa-
tion. We are at a sufficient remove fi'om our sister
churches to forbid all interference or rivalship, while
we are in the midst of a population that give us wel-
come, and bid us God’s speed. With no ordinary
gratification, also, we greet the return to our number
of so many of those who, because the place has been
too strait for us, have for a short season been the
adornment of other and more convenient churches.
We need them, and here, we trust, they will once more
find themselves at home.
In the name of the Lord, therefore, we set up
our banners. It is an eventful age of the world in
which our enterprise receives this new impulse. They
are cheering scenes we look upon, as from this mountTHE SANCTUARY.
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of vision and this hour of hope we look down on the
ages of mercy that already begin to visit our guilty
world. Even now is the “ earth helping the woman.”
The halls of science, the inventions of art, the resources
of commerce, and above all these, the facilities of inter-
national intercourse, are becoming tributary to Him in
whom all nations shall be blessed, and even the battle
of the warrior has prepared the way for the Prince of
Peace. More than all, the everblessed and adorable
Spirit of God is coming forth to the bright conquests of
the “ latter-day glory.” The crisis is approaching, and
startling events may be looked for in the future history
both of the Church and the world. Nor may you be
dismayed, my brethren, if mercy and judgment, still
stand abreast in the redemption of men. If the spirit
that now worketh in the children of disobedience is
gone up with his legions on the length and breadth of
the earth, it is but to herald his own overthrow, and be
the precursor of “ quietness and assurance forever.” A
few fleeting centuries, and the work of the sanctuary
will be accomplished, and the church militant enjoy her
repose.
I have before made the remark, that I did not favor
the removal which we have lived to witness, from per-
sonal considerations, for it must be clear that the small
remnant of my ministry would have been less precari-
ous and less toilsome had the removal never have
been effected. As Israel said to Joseph, I now say to
you, “ Behold, I die ; but God shall be with you.'’ Yet
while I live, I ask no greater joy than to preach the
gospel to this people. It would be no grief of heart to64
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me to die on the harvest field. I would die in the
midst of you, and hope that the grandchildren of those
whom I have attended to their graves, will give me a
resting place, ever quiet and “Ever Green,” amid their
fathers’ sepulchres, and where so many sheaves have
been gathered in fully ripe from this field of labor. Nor
have I. anything more to ask for this house, than that
the God of Zion would here record his name, and that
among the glorious things that shall be spoken of this
city of our God, it may be said that “ this and that
man was horn in her, and that the Highest himself hath
established her.” May we not, my brethren, this day
offer the prayer, and indeed cherish the hope, the con-
fidence, that “the glory of this latter house shall be
greater than that of the former!” Long may this
sanctuary stand upon this holy hill, as God’s witness to
the favored city and land where we dwell! Here may
successive generations begin their everlasting song, and
your living and dying prayer and mine be, “ Peace be
within thy walls, and prosperity within thy palaces!”
And when the last trumpet shall shake all things earthly,
may every living stone of this spiritual temple bear
yonder immortal inscription, “ Holiness to the Lord !”
How sweet the thought that, worms and sinners as we
are, we ourselves may then exemplify truth, “ Behold,
what hath God wroughtand in that far off land where
the Lord is the light thereof, and the Lamb its glory, our
voices, with those of the loved and venerated who have
gone before us, shall swell the chorus, “Blessing, and
honor, and glory, and power be unto Him that sitteth
upon the throne, and to the Lamb, forever!” Amen !