! i Jiiii 'ihi liijiilil! i!!^; , S'U CD LIBRARY \ Theological Seminary, PRINCETON, N. J. Hhelf, 0/ 7 C^ Section.... liook^ ; 0, ^ A DONATION ! ^)V7^^^^rescnted. And most assuredly the fear was well grounded. I wish here to record a few lines as to the charac- EEV. THEODORE CLAPP. 99 ter of Judah Touro's philaiitliropy. The name of Jolm Wesley, founder of that large, respectaljlo de- nomination, the Methodists, is enrolled on the list of eminent British philanthropists. For what reasons ? Because, among other virtues, we are told that, by a life of the most unexampled economy, he saA'ed, in the space of fifty years, one hundred and fifty thou- sand dollars out of his income, to be devoted to the cause of charity. J\idah Touro, by habits of frugal- ity not less strict and admirable than those of the eminent Christian just named, during a half century accumulated five hundred thousand dollars, to be used in promoting the same sublime purpose. Mr. Wesley is praised because he was so generous in his donations to the church that was nearest to his heart, and of which he was the principal originator. Mr. Touro gave to the church which he most loved not less tlian the great Wesley did to the Methodists — two hundred and twenty thousand dollars. I have never heard of but one religionist in the United States who can be compared with Mr. Touro, as re- gards the liberality cf his benefactions to his own church ; and he bestowed nothing on other denomi- nations. But Mr. Touro gave more to strangers than to his brethren. On the former he conferred three hun- dred thousand dollars ; on the latter, but two hun- dred thousand. With a generous profusion, he scat- tered his favors broadcast over the wide field of humanity. He knew well that many of the recipi- ents of his bounty hated the Hebrews, and would, if possible, sweep them into annihilation. In this 100 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF respect, did he not recognize the principle upon wliicli God himself distributes his bounties among men ? For Jesus declares that the Fatlier loves and blesses his enemies as much as he does his friends. So the person I am speaking of consulted not the ill- desert, meanness, prejudice, or sin, of those whom he was pleased to help, but only how they might be best raised from debasement and destitution. If God were to pour out on his foes vengeance instead of love, his throne would crumble, and the universe be reduced to chaos. Indeed, this feature of Mr. Touro's beneficence is so exalted, noble, and godlike, that I should but mar and obscure the bright ideal by the most impressive description that language could give. He once saw, when standing at the door of his counting room, a poor, lost inebriate, in the hands of the sheriff, passing on his way to prison for debt. Mr. Touro stopped him, and spoke kindly to him, as he had known him in better days. Ascer- taining the sum for which he had been apprehended, he immediately paid it, and effected his release. It amounted, with costs, to nine hundred dollars. He said, " I do not much expect that it will be of any benefit to the individual himself, but I have per- formed the act for the sake of his family." It was a time of great business depression in New Orleans, when Mr. Touro became the proprietor of the church edifice and grounds. Many of the society fell in the preceding epidemic. Some who were most prominent in settling Mr. Larned had just compounded with their creditors. Tlie friends of the institution were few, feeble, impoverished, bank- REV. THEODORE CLAPP. 101 rupt, and pushed to the very brink of ruin. A noble Israelite snatched them from the jaws of destruction. From that day down to its destruction by fire, he held it for their use, and incurred an additional ex- pense of several thousand dollars for keeping it in repair. For myself he professed the strongest per- sonal regard, and showed it by giving me almost the entire income of the church — the pew rents — for about twenty-eight years. He might have torn the building down at the beginning, and reared on its site a block of stores, whose revenue by this time would have amounted to half a million of dollars at least. He was urged to do so on several occasions, and once replied to a gentleman who made a very liberal offer for the property, that " there was not money enough in the world to buy it, and that if he could have his way, there should be a church on the spot to the end of time." This man was a Jew. Is there a Christian society in New Orleans that has ever offered the Unitarians the slightest assistance, or even courtesy ? Is there one that would put forth a hand to help them to-day, if they were in danger of perishing? Is there one that would not rejoice in their complete, absolute destruction ? The Unitarians have aided materially towards the erection of all the orthodox Protestant churches in the Crescent City. But when they were burned out, and asked for one of the or- thodox churches to hold meetings in occasionally, the fiivor was denied on the alleged ground that by showing such a kindness, they might indirectly en- courage the dreadful heresies which we were labor- 9* 102 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OP ing to promulgate. It was this spirit that burned Servetus, that kindled the fires of the auto defe, and has "condemned to the wheel, rack, gibbet, or cross, the noblest benefactors of our race. But in this emergency, the aforesaid Hebrew came to our relief. He purchased a small Baptist chapel for us to wor- ship in, free of charge, till he could put up a larger building for the use of the congregation. The question is often asked, whether Mr. Touro was as liberal in the matter of private donations as in his public charities. We cannot give an arith- metical answer to this question, for he followed most scrupulously the injunction of our Lord, " Let not thy left hand know what thy right hand doeth." It has come incidentally to my knowledge, that since my settlement in New Orleans, the amount of his private benefactions has not been less than thirty thousand dollars. It no doubt far exceeded this statement. Touching this matter, did space allow, I could give many interesting anecdotes. Though Mr. Touro was exact, rigid, and methodical in his business transactions, this trait of character had not its origin in covetousness. When his impulses led the way, he poured forth his money freely as water. I was in his counting room one morning, when he told me, weeping, that he had just signed a doc- ument resigning his legal title to the entire estate of an only sister, recently deceased. It was worth, if I remember aright, about eighty thousand dollars. Ho refused to take the smallest fraction of it, and requested his friends at the north to distribute it for charitable purposes, in the manner which they REV. THEODORE CLAPP. 103 thought would be most agreeable to her, were she still living. Had avarice been his ruling passion, would he have allowed such a windfall to escape his grasp ? It has often been said by persons in New Orleans, that Mr. Touro did not do for myself particularly, as much, all things considered, as I had a right to expect. But do they know the principles which governed and directed his acts of kindness to me and mine ? He often said, " Mr. Clapp, you are alto- gether too profuse and indiscriminate in your chari- ties. I admit that you are economical in your hab- its and mode of living ; but were you to come into the possession of a fortune, you would give it all away in a year or two, unless you had an overseer appointed." I might have done so then, but I am sure that I should not do so now, if I had the chance. It was his honest conviction that I ought not to have access to much money at a time. But most of my friends are not aware of the magnitude of the benefits which he was actually pleased to confer on me. Besides allowing me to take nearly the whole income of the pew rent, he gave me in small sums, from time to time, not less than twenty thousand dollars. "Whenever I told him that I was out of money, he always supplied me, saying, " that was the last he could let me have, for the church ought certainly to yield me enough." Indeed, it was entirely owing to the unwise profusion of my cliari- ties, that I did not leave New Orleans with an ample competence for life. The title "Philanthropist" is the most honorable 104 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OP surname on earth. It has been most justly bestowed on Judah Touro, and he will wear it till time is no more ; it will be inscribed in light immortal on the diadem of his everlasting reward. I thank God for my acquaintance with this man ; I thank God that he was my friend ; above all, I would be thankful for the hope of meeting him in that brighter exist- ence, where those who love each other will be sep- arated no more. Daniel Webster once said in an address before the Hebrew Benevolent Association of New York city, " We are indebted to the Jewish nation for revealed religion, for the most important blessings and refinements of civilized life, and for all well- grounded hopes of immortal bliss beyond the grave." It is a trite and commonplace remark, that charita- ble institvitions have never been known to exist, ex- cept in those lands illuminated by the light of rev- elation. When we look along the shores of the old pagan world, we behold the relics of mouldering cities, pyramids, palaces, temples, villas, obelisks, military columns, spacious ampliitheatres, and stat- ues erected to immortalize heroes, poets, and schol- ars ; but nowhere in those regions do we meet the remains of free public schools, orphan asylums, hospitals, retreats for the destitute and unfortunate, nor monuments intended to perpetuate the memory of those who consecrated their lives to the meliora- tion of humanity. They are found only in those lands which have derived their ideas of glory from the Hebrew Scriptures, and from the life and teach- ings of Him who uttered the parable of the good Samaritan. REV. THEODORE CLAPP. 105 What a striking evidence of the divine origin and necessity of the Bible ! This sacred volume has taught the world, that for man there is no heritage on earth Avorth the seeking, worth the asking, worth the having, but an upright and beneficent life. This is that building spoken of by our Saviour, that rests upon an immovable basis. When the rains de- scend and the floods rage, and the winds blow and beat thereon, it cannot be overthrown, for it is founded upon a rock. The names of those who built the Egyptian pyra- mids are lost in oblivion. But if, instead of rearing piles of magnificence for self-aggrandizement, they had employed the same means in founding institu- tions for the deaf and dumb, hospitals, and other philanthropic establishments, their memories would have been preserved green and flourishing by grate- ful millions ; they would have floated down on a gathering tide of glory to the last syllable of record- ed time. I staid in New Orleans this year, 1822, till the middle of May. The congregations were constantly as large as the house would hold. My extemporane- ous style of preaching seemed to be generally accept- able. Some, however, did not like me at all. One gentleman of strong mind and great reading, and a confirmed Deist, stopping me in the street one day, spoke thus : " Since my settlement in New Orleans, I never went inside of a church till Mr. Larned came here. I attended his meetings every Sabbath, not because I believed in his ideas of rehgion, — they were revolting to me, — but to enjoy the indescribable 106 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF charms of his natural eloquence. I heard you preach yesterday. As a didactic performance, your sermon was respectable, perhaps equal to an ordina- ry discourse of Mr. Larned ; but your delivery is far less interesting. He seemed to speak because he could not help it ; you speak in a labored manner, as if it was a very unwelcome task. There is nothing to interest me in your manner, and your doctrines I repudiate ; but when you come across poor, sick, and suflfering people, call on me ; it will always give me pleasure to aid in relieving them." He was as good as his word. I cannot tell how many hundreds he gave me, in times of public dis- tress, to be distributed according to my best judg- ment. I offered to give — but he never would receive — vouchers for the faithful manner in which the funds intrusted to my hands were disposed of. Tor aught he knew to the contrary, the moneys given Avere used for my personal emolument. Another gentleman, a Calvinist, communicant, and a constant attendant on church, urged upon me, every time I saw him, the importance of getting up in the Crescent City such revivals of religion as were flourishing at the north. " It makes me weep in secret," he said, " wlien I think of the number of unregenerate souls here that are hurrying to the re- gions of eternal woe." Yet this man, though he was wealthy, never could be persuaded to give me ten dollars to relieve a sick, indigent, dying family. But his creed was the very type of evangelical purity. He knew the Westminster Catechism by heart, and was eternally talking about justification by faith EEV. THEODORE CLAPP. 107 alone, man's utter inability to do any thing good, the glories of electing grace, and the certainty that eternal damnation must be the portion of all those who die in their sins. I have often revolved in my mind the question, which of these characters was most acceptable to God, the Deist, whose heart and life were full of goodness and mercy, or the Calvin- ist, whose belief and worship were in exact accord- ance with prescribed, accredited formulas, but whose daily walk yielded no fruits of purity or disinterest- edness. In general, I found the state of society in New Orleans more agreeable than I had imagined. Most of the gentlemen whom I became acquainted with were distinguished for superior refinement and wide knowledge of the world. Their frank, easy, open, and generous hospitality was truly delightful. Most of the families that I visited received me without ceremony, as a friend whom they loved and confided in ; not as a person preeminently holy, so purified from the attachments of earth as to have no taste for the scenes and enjoyments of society. One day I was invited to take tea in a family of our congrega- tion, and pass the evening with a small number of friends. Being called to attend a wedding, I did not reach tlie house till near ten o'clock. Instead of a few persons convened simply for an hour's conversa- tion, there was a large, gay company, whose move- ments had resolved themselves into a dance, and were directed by a band of musicians. Now, if I had fol- lowed the advice of one of my venerable instructors at Andover, I should have instantly retired, that I 108 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OP might not, even in appearance, have sanctioned, for a moment, a species of recreation so inconsistent with the dignity and seriousness of a Christian Hfe. But as I was pohtely conducted to a chair in the midst of a circle of ladies, who preferred looking on to an active participation in the festivity going for- ward, I determined to make myself at home, and commit what I had been taught to regard as a hein- ous, unjustifiable indulgence, by witnessing an en- tertainment pronounced, among Presbyterian clergy- men generally, to be sinful and injurious. Tliere was, however, in my heart, no sense of violated duty, no feeling of guilt. I realized then my accountabil- ity to God, and that were I to die instantly, my future interests would be just as safe as if called to draw my last breath in the pulpit, at a funeral, by the bed of the dying, or in the sacred seclusion of the closet. I spent an hour or more in this cheerful circle, where all things to the eye and ear were refined, orderly, and decorous. The hearts of that company were visible only to the Omniscient One. I shall refer to the impressions made on my mind by their external appearance. Before me stood the young and happy, upon whose fates and fortunes the som- bre shadows of adversity had not yet gathered ; their minds were bright and buoyant, their steps elastic, their ears opened to the melodies of sound, their eyes radiant with pleasure. As I was meditating upon those comely brows, flushed with the bloom of early life ; the fair forms of feminine grace and loveliness ; the dignified, accomplished manners of REV. THEODORE CLAPP. 109 those more advanced in years ; the music ; sprightly conversation, wit, love, gayety, and joyousness which characterized the whole scene, — a sweet, profound, unwonted perception of God's goodness captivated my soul. Such intense feelings of piety I had never before experienced. I said to myself" It has, indeed, pleased God, ' to make man but a little lower than the angels, and to crown him with glory and honor.' If he is so beautiful here, what will he not become in that future state, where our loftiest ideals and actual attainments both will regularly advance in a progression that is infinite ! " I was rapt in delight- ful visions of a spiritual world. This thought took complete possession of my mind. God is too good not to provide for us something nobler, better, greater, more permanent, and more satisfying than the transitory possessions and pleasures of time. Can he present to us the chalice of existence, and then dash it from our lips just as wc begin to taste its joys ? Is not his infinite love a pledge that he will never treat us so cruelly ? "Would a kind par- ent promise his children favors which he never in- tended to bestow on them ? Can God awaken irre- pressible desires of continued, unending happiness, only to be crushed out and disappointed forever ? Nothing in mathematics is more certain than the doctrine that the inherent, essential desires of our moral nature will be completely gratified. Can they be, if deatli is an eternal sleep ? If the Holy Spirit ever breathed on my heart, it was on that occasion, amid the music, thoughtless- ness, levity, ceremonials, and sensuous attractions of 10 110 AUTOBIOGEAPHY OP an evening party. There, if ever, the inspirations of God touched and ennobled my soul. Said a lady who was sitting next to me, " Mr. Clapp, you seem to be in a brown study. Are you thinking out a sermon 9 „ " No, madam ; but a glorious subject for a ser- mon has just entered my thoughts. We are cheated, we are deceived, by the very constitution of our na- ture, if the pleasures of this evening are not a preli- bation and foreshadowing of purer and ever-increas- ing joy beyond the grave. If a bird or a beast could cherish a conscious desire of happiness, this fact would prove its title to an endless life." " Indeed," continued the lady, " you have made a notable discovery — the seeking of happiness even in amusements demonstrates our immortality. Had you not better preach on the subject next Sabbath ? " Her suggestion, though made facetiously, was fol- lowed. I took for my text Isaiah xxviii. 20 : " For the bed is shorter than that a man can stretch him- self on it, and the covering narrower than that he can wrap himself in it.^^ I began by saying, " 0, the mis- ery, depression of spirits, gloom, ennui, and despair of those who live below their highest capabilities and aspirations ; who live in a merely physical and sensual existence — a world of the bodily and animal senses ; who never soar to feel their divinity, by expatiating over the immortal regions of truth, knowledge, beauty, and virtue ! Whatever may be the good purposes for which the animal appetites and passions were given us, they are a source of continual sorrow and unhappiness to the pure and spiritual mind — REV. THEODORE CLAPP. Ill a mind that longs to rise to God, and live above the plane of animal sensation only, which is so fatal to honor, glory, and happiness, yet so inspiring and in- vigorating to vice. The unrestrained indulgence of a single natural desire, or passion of the physical man, is enough to darken, prostrate, and destroy the soul. This habitual neglecting to subject appetite to a sense of duty is the real source of all the sin and degradation on earth. " Moreover, as intimated in the text, the person who gives himself up to self-indulgence is never satisfied. He chases a rainbow that is painted on a cloud, and . retreats before him as he advances, till finally it van- ishes forever from his view. Not one of all the irre- ligious millions who have lived, ever sat down for one moment contented with present attainments, without longing after some remote and inaccessible good. They spent their days only to be Joroken by toil, to be wasted by sickness, to be racked with pain, to be desolated by one surge of sorrow after another, till called to enter ' that undiscovered country from whose bourn no traveller returns.' Yes, my friends, like a pendidum, they were con- stantly vacillating between the ecstasy of hope and the lifelessness of possession — struggling, striving, and wearying themselves out, till the curtain of mor- tality fell, and their busy, restless, disappointed hearts, crowded with plans, cares, and anticipations, forgot to beat, and all their fluttering anxieties were hushed forever in the cold silence of the tomb. Without timely repentance, in like manner shall we all perish. 112 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OP " What signifies this solemn fact, testified to by universal experience, that our material bed and cov- ering are too small for iis ? What mean these im- measurable longings, which no eartiily forms of beauty and bliss can satiate ? They teach us, my friends, that at death we shall not be turned into cold clay or dry dust, lifeless, senseless, and thought- less, forevermore ; that the soul of man will last as long as the throne of God ; that it will live through more years, ages, centuries, and cycles than there are drops of water in the ocean ; and even then the morning of an endless existence will scarcely have dawned around us ; that we have been created .to tread the broad and boundless pathways of a desti- nation that has no limits. Solemn, sublime, incon- ceivable, transporting thought ! If we realized it, all the material possessions and glories around would seem to u^ but as worthless spangles in the dust we tread on — but as the baubles and playthings which little children use in the sports of a summer's after- noon. The pressure of sin would be removed from our bosoms ; free, elastic, and joyous, we should stand upon the lofty eminence of Christian faith, and look out upon a perspective of loveliness, rising and spreading, in all the glories of immortality, beyond the dark ruins of earth and time." Such, in substance, was the sermon suggested to my mind by witnessing the profusion, splendor, and beauty of a social entertainment. Tlie lady above mentioned remarked to me tlie next day, that last Sunday's sermon was the best I had yet preached, in the judgment of all the congregation. " We had REV. THEODOEE CLAPP. 113 better make a party for you once every week." Inci- dents similar to the one just narrated, liavc given birth to most of tlie discourses which I have delivered in New Orleans. A settled minister cannot adapt his homilies to the wants of his parishioners, unless they are all embraced in his parochial visits ; unless he is on terms of the most familiar, unreserved, and intimate intercourse with them, so that they are in- duced lionestly to communicate to him the thoughts, feelings, doubts, fears, hopes, and secrets of their inmost souls. Never until I went to New Orleans had I any just conception of the best mode of preach- ing, nor the class of subjects which should be gener- ally introduced into the pulpit. On the 20th of May, 1822, indispensable business called me to leave the south on a jaunt to New Eng- land. I returned to my post of labor before the ep- idemic of that year had terminated. On my way up the river, I made a pause at Louisville, to take upon myself the vows of wedlock. I was married the 31st of May, 1822, to Miss Adeline Hawes, a beautiful and interesting young lady, originally from Boston, Massachusetts, but at that time a resident of Ken- tucky. For thirty-tive years we have been sharers of each other's joys, consolers of each other's sor- rows, and helpers together amid the allotments and vicissitudes which were ordained for us by a wise and merciful Providence. We have had six chil- dren ; three of them — one son and two daughters — are in the spirit land ; three sons survive. The eldest is settled in the Crescent City ; the second is in 10* 114 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF Chicago ; the third and youngest is with his parents in Louisville. We have reason to bless God for the degree of health and prosperity which have been bestowed upon us in perilous times gone by ; that we still live in peace and competence ; and above all, that we are permitted, through Christ, to cherish the glorious hope, that after having finished the eventful journey of human life, we shall meet in those eternal scenes of beauty and of bliss which await the children of God in a brighter and better world. EEV. THEODORE CLAPP'. 115 CHAPTER YI. GENERAL REMARKS UPON THE EPIDEMICS WHICH HAVE PREVAILED IN NEW ORLEANS. ASIATIC CHOLERA IN THE FALL OF 1832 AND THE SUMMER OP 1S33. There have been twenty very sickly seasons dur- ing my residence in New Orleans. The yellow fever raged violently in 1822, '24, '27, '28, '29, and '30. The epidemics that prevailed in '27, '28, '29, and '30 were extremely fatal. In 1829, more than nine hundred persons died from yellow fever alone ; yet no report of these awful visitations was published in the medical journals of the day. In the excessively warm summer of 1832, my strength was so much reduced, that a change of climate was prescribed by friends and physicians. I started with my family in a steamboat, bound for Cincinnati, intending to spend the remainder of the season at Niagara, Montreal, and Saratoga Springs. But when I reached Ohio, news came that the chol- era had made its appearance at Quebec and other places. It was travelling with great rapidity. In one short month this terrific pestilence walked unseen from the capital of Lower Canada westward to De- troit, and in a southern direction to Lake Champlain, Albany, and New York. It seemed to prefer follow- 116 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OP ing the courses of great rivers, like the St. Lawrence, Ohio, and Mississippi. Dr. Drake, of Cincinnati, expressed the opinion that within a few weeks the disease would break out in all our principal cities. Fearing that New Or- leans miglit be attacked during my absence, I imme- diately abandoned a journey which held out such an attractive prospect, and retraced my course down the river. I could not get rid of the presentiment that a period of imprecedented calamity impended over the Crescent City. The previous summer, in the month of August, a frightful tornado had swept over and inundated New Orleans. The Creoles said that this was the forerunner of some friglitful pesti- lence. I proposed to leave Mrs. Clapp and the chil- dren with her aunt in Kentucky, till the overflowing scourge should pass through the land. But she declined acceding to the proposition, and quoted these memorable words of Scripture : " Whither thou goest, I will go ; and where thou lodgest, I will lodge ; thy people shall be my people, and thy God my God. Where thou diest will I die, and there will I be buried : the Lord do so to me, and more also, if aught but death part thee and me." We arrived at New Orleans, on our return home, about the 1st of September. The weather was most sultry and oppressive. To most of my friends our conduct appeared so unwise, that they hardly gave us a cordial welcome back. I said to them, " ' Though neither a prophet nor the son of a prophet,' I see a dark cloud suspended over us, which will soon discharge a tempest of unparalleled violence REV. THEODORE CLAPP. 117 and destruction." That very week, several cases of yellow fever occurred in the Charity Hospital and boarding houses along the levee. It soon grew into an epidemic, and carried off hundreds during this and tiie succeeding month. On the morning of the 25th of October, 1832, as I was walking home from market, before sunrise, I saw two men lying on the levee in a dying condition. They had been landed from a steamboat which ar- rived the night before. Some of the watchmen had gone after a handbarrow or cart, on which they might be removed to the hospital. At first there was quite a crowd assembled on the spot. But an eminent physician rode up in his gig, and gazing a moment, exclaimed in a loud voice, " Those men have the Asiatic cliolera." The crowd dispersed in a mo- ment, and ran as if for their lives in every direction. I was left almost alone with the sufferers. They could speak, and were in full possession of their reason. They had what I afterwards found were the usual symptoms of cholera — cramps, convul- sions, &c. The hands and feet were cold and blue ; an icy perspiration flowed in streams ; and they com- plained of a great pressure upon their chests. One of them said it seemed as if a bar of iron was lying across him. Their thirst was intense, which caused an insufferable agony in the mouth and throat. They entreated me to procure some water. I attempted to go on board the steamboat which had put them on shore. But the staging had been drawn in to prevent all intercourse with people on the levee. Thence I returned, intending to go to the 118 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OP nearest dwelling to get some relief for the unhappy men, whom all but God had apparently deserted. At that instant the watchmen arrived with a dray. Happily, (because, perhaps, they spoke only the French language,) they had no suspicion that these strangers were suffering from the cholera. If I had pronounced that terrific word in their hearing, they too might have fled, and left the sick men to perish on the cold ground. I saw them placed on the vehicle, and subsequently learned that they were corpses before eleven o'clock A. M. the same day. I walked home, attempting to be calm and re- signed, determined to do my duty, and leave the consequences with God. I said nothing to my fam- ily about the sick men whom I had met, though they thought it strange that I had taken so much more time than usual in going to and from the market, and observed that I looked uncommonly thoughtful and serious. I felt that the hour of peril had come. I said in silent, inward prayer, " God, thou art my refuge and fortress ; in thee do I trust. 0, help me, and strengthen me, for vain is the help of man. His breath goeth forth ; he returneth to the dust ; in that very day his purposes perish. 0, happy is the man that hath the living God for his help, whose hope is in Jehovah his God." I felt a delightful sense of my dependence ; that Providence was my shield and buckler, and that nothing could befall me or my family, which, if we did our duty, would not work out results great and glorious beyond all thought and imagination. It seemed to me that, REV. THEODORE CLAPP. 119 trusting in the Most High, I could trample under foot pain, sickness, death, and every other evil. The weather, this morning, was very peculiar. The heavens were covered with thick, heavy, damp, lowering clouds, that seemed like one black ceiling, spread over the whole horizon. To the eye, it almost touched the tops of the houses. Every one felt a strange difficulty of respiration. I never looked upon such a gloomy, appalling sky before or since. Not a breath of wind stirred. It was so dark, that in some of the banks, offices, and private houses, candles or lamps were lighted that day. Immediately after breakfast I walked down to the post office. At every corner, and around the prin- cipal hotels, were groups of anxious faces. As soon as they saw me, the question was put by several per- sons at a time, " Is it a fact that the cholera is in the city ? " I replied by describing what I had seen but two hours before. Observing that many of them ap- peared panic-struck, I remarked, " Gentlemen, do not be alarmed. These may prove merely what the doctors call sporadic cases. "We do not yet know that it will prevail to an alarming extent. Let us trust in God, and wait patiently the developments of another morning." That day as many persons left the city as could find the means of transmigration. On my way home from the post office, I walked along the levee, where the two cholera patients had been disembarked but three or four hours before. Several families in the neighborhood were making preparations to move, but in vain. They could not obtain the requisite 120 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OP vehicles. The same afternoon the pestilence entered their houses, and before dark spread through several squares opposite to the point where the steamer land- ed the first cases. On the evening of the 27th of October, it had made its way through every part of the city. During the ten succeeding days, reckoning from October 27 to the 6th of November, all the physicians judged that, at the lowest computation, there were five thousand deaths — an average of five hundred every day. Many died of whom no account was rendered. A great number of bodies, with bricks and stones tied to the feet, were thrown into the river. Many were privately interred in gardens and enclosures, on the grounds where they expired, whose names were not recorded in the bills of mortality. Often I was kept in the burying ground for hours in succession, by the incessant, unintermitting arrival of corpses, over whom I was requested to perform a short service. One day, I did not leave the cemetery till nine o'clock at night ; the last interments were made by candle light. Reaching my house faint, exhaust- ed, horror-stricken, I found my family all sobbing and weeping, for they had concluded, from my long absence, that I was certainly dead. I never went abroad without kissing and blessing them all, with • the conviction that we should never meet again on earth. After bathing and taking some refreshment, I started out to visit the sick. My door was thronged with servants, waiting to conduct me to the rooms of dying sufferers. In this kind of labor I spent most of the night. At three o'clock A. M., I returned REV. THEODORE CLAPP. 121 home, threw myself down on a sofa, with directions not to bo called till half past five. I was engaged to attend a funeral at six o'clock A. M., 28th Oc- tober. In the progress of my round on this occasion, I met with a case of cholera whose symptoms were unlike any thing that I had before witnessed. The patient was perfectly free from pain, with mental powers unimpaired, and suffering only from debility and moral apprehensions. From his looks, I should have supposed that he was sinking under some kind of consumption, such as prevails at the north. He was an educated man, whose parents, when living, were members of the Presbyterian church. His will had just been made, and he believed himself to be dying, which was actually the case. I have said that his mind was uninjured ; more, it was quick- ened to preternatural strength and activity. When I took his hand in mine, he said, " The physicians assure me that I must soon die ; I am unprepared ; I look back with many painful regrets upon the past ; I look forward to the future with doubts, fears, and misgivings. What will become of me?" I replied, "What, sir, is your strongest wish ? " He answered, " That it may please God to forgive and save me, for Christ's sake." I added, " If this is the real wish of your heart, it will be grat- ified, no matter how wicked or unworthy you may be. Is your father living ? " I inquired. He said, " No, sir ; I saw him breathe his last in my native home. He died happy, for he was good. Nev6r shall I for- get that last prayer which he uttered in behalf of his 11 122 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OP surviving children." " Suppose," I continued, " you were absolutely certain that death Avould introduce you into the presence of that beloved parent, and that he would be empowered by the Infinite One to make you as happy as he pleased, and to receive you to his bosom and embrace forever ; would you not most willingly, joyfully, and with perfect confidence, commit your fate for eternity to the decision of such a pure, kind, aifectionate father? " He answered in the affirmative. I said, " Is it possible that you have so much confidence in an earthly parent, and at the same time can hesitate to commend your spirit into the hands of that heavenly Father, who loves you as much as he does himself, — whose love is tran- scendent, boundless, infinite, everlasting, — who can- not allow you to perish, any more than he could de- stroy himself? " " I see I am in an error," he exclaimed. " God, help me and strengthen me." I then made a short prayer. " Can you repeat with all your heart, as in the presence of God," I asked, " the words which I am about to utter ? If you can, say them aloud, along with me. ' My Father, who art in heaven, thou hast prom- ised that thou wilt evermore draw nigh to those who draw near to thee in true and earnest prayer ; that thou wilt hear their cry, fulfil their desires, and help them, and save them. Have pity upon me, God, according to thy loving kindness ; according to tlie multitude of thy tender mercies, hide thy face from my sins, and blot out all mine iniquities. Create vvitliin me, a clean heart, God ; renew within me a faithful spirit ; cast me not away from thy pres- REV. THEODORE CLAPP. 123 ence, and take not thy Holy Spirit from me. Carry me in thine almighty arms, and finally receive me into glory. Thongh my flesh and my heart fail, be thou, God, the strength of my heart, and my por- tion forever. These blessings I humbly implore in the worthy name of Jesus Christ our Saviour ; and unto Thee, the only wise God, the King eternal, im- mortal, and invisible, be ascribed praise and thanks- giving, glory and dominion, now and forevermore. Amen.' " Every word of this prayer he repeated after me in a distinct and audible voice. At the close, he ex> claimed, " It is finished ; " then gazing with a fixed eye, as upon some object on the ceiling over him, he said, " God be praised, I see my father." Doubting as to what he meant to say precisely, I asked, " What father do you see, your heavenly or your earthly father ? " He answered, " My earthly father. Can you not see him ? There he is, (pointing upwards,) smiling down upon me, arrayed in splendid garments, and beckoning me to follow him to the skies. He is going — he is gone." On the utterance of these words, his arm, which had been raised heavenward, fell lifeless, and he breathed not again. There was a smile, and expression of rapture on his face which lingered there for hours. It was the only good- looking corpse which I saw in that epidemic. His form was magnificent, his breast large and arched, his whole appearance that of statue-like repose. There he lay before me, as beautiful as life itself. His countenance wore such a smile of ecstasy, I could hardly realize that his immortal spirit had fled. I laid my hand on his heart. It moved not. 124 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OP This incident mado a lasting impression on my mind. It deepened, it strengtliened, immeasurably, my belief that the soul survives the body. " Who knows," said I to myself, " but every one of these hundreds that are dying around me, when they draw their last breath, are greeted by the disembodied spirits of those whom they knew and loved on earth, and who have come to convoy them to the scenes of a higher and nobler existence ?" Shortly after this, I was standing by the bed of a young lady in her last moments, when she called to me and her mother, saying, " Do you not see my sis- ter (who had died of yellow fever a few weeks be- fore) there ? " pointing upwards. " There are angels with her. She has come to take me to heaven." Perhaps these facts are in harmony with the doc- trines of modern spiritualists. One thing I know. There is not a more delightful, sanctifying faith than this — that as soon as we die, glorified spirits will hover about us, as guardian angels, to breathe on our souls their own refinement, and to point our way to the heavenly mansions. The morning after the death scene which I have just described, at six o'clock, I stepped into a carriage to accompany a funeral procession to the cemetery. On my arrival, I found at the graveyard a large pile of corpses without coffins, in horizontal layers, one above the other, like corded wood. I was told that there were more than one hundred bodies deposited there. They had been brought by unknown per- sons, at different hours since nine o'clock the even- ing previous. Large trenches were dug, into which REV. THEODORE CLAPP. 125 these uncoffiiied corpses Avere thrown indiscrimi- nately. The same day, a private hospital was found deserted ; the physicians, nurses, and attendants were all dead, or had run away. Not a living per- son was in it. The wards were filled with putrid bodies, which, by order of the mayor, were piled in an adjacent yard, and burned, and their ashes scat- tered to the winds-.- Could a wiser disposition have been made of them ? Many persons, even of fortune and popularity, died in their beds without aid, unnoticed and un- known, and lay there for days unburied. In almost every house might be seen the sick, the dying, and the dead, in the same room. All the stores, banks, and places of business were closed. There were no means, no instruments for carrying on the ordinary affairs of business ; for all the drays, carts, carriages, hand and common wheelbarrows, as well as hearses, were employed in the transportation of corpses, in- stead of cotton, sugar, and passengers. Words can- not describe my sensations when I first beheld the awful sight of carts driven to the graveyard, and there upturned, and their contents discharged as so many loads of lumber or offal, without a single mark of mourning or respect, because the exigency ren- dered it impossible. The Sabbath came, and I ordered the sexton to ring tlie bell for church at eleven o'clock A. M., as ■usual. I did not expect to meet a half a dozen per- sons ; but there was actually a congregation of two or three hundred, and all gentlemen. The ladies were engaged in taking care of the sick. There was 11* 126 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF no singing. I made a very short prayer, and preached a discourse not more than fifteen minutes in length. It made such an impression that several of the hearers met me at the door, and requested me to write it down for their perusal and meditation. I complied with the request. Here it is. My text was the passage found in Isaiah xxvi. 3 : " Thou wilt keep him in perfect peace whose mind is stayed on thee, because he trusteth in thee." I began by rehearsing the closing lines of Bryant's " Thanatopsis : " — " ' So live, that when thy summons comes to join The innumerable caravan, which moves To that mj-sterious realm, where each shall take His chamber in the silent halls of death, Thou go not like the quarry-slave at night, Scourged to his dungeon, but, sustained and soothed By an unfaltering trust, approach thy grave Like one who wraps the drapery of his couch About him and lies down to pleasant dreams.' " My friends, death is a dispensation of love. Re- flect that as many persons die every hour as there are tickings of the clock in the same time. All die. Not only the idiot, the fool, and the reprobate, but also the best, wisest, and noblest, are laid in the grave. That law which sweeps over all, irrespective of moral character, cannot be a punitive infliction. Man would die if he were as spotless as an angel. Were it not for the grave, how soon would this globe be filled to absolute repletion ! We die sim- ply that we may awake to a new and nobler exist- ence. We cease to live as men, that we may begin to live as angels. There is a certain animal that REV. THEODORE CLAPP. 127 exists first iii the shape of a worm. Its appropriate element is water. At length it sinks in insensibility and death. After a while, its grave opens ; it comes forth from the grovelling dust a new being, an in- habitant of the air, with beauteous wings and plu- mage, to bask in the sunbeams, to sip the aroma of the flowery world ; to move through the atmosphere, a creature of ethereal endowment and loveliness. In the same manner, the soul of man must drop its " mortal coil," that, disengaged from earth, sense, and sin, it may be transformed into a being adapted to the scenes of a higher and incorruptible existence. Reflect upon the declaration of Jesus, that all who die shall be made immortal. He also teaches that in the immortal state they will sin no more, hunger no more, thirst no more, weep no more, die no more, but be like the angels of God in heaven. There is no difference between the good and the bad, as to the eternity of their duration. This is admitted by all orthodox divines of every school and denomi- nation. Tliere is nothing frightful in death, except to the unenlightened imagination. It is the slightest evil that crosses the path of human life. Na}'', rather, it is not an evil ; it is the greatest blessing. It is dust only that descends to dust. The grave is the place where we shall be permitted to lay down our mortality, weakness, diseases, sorrows, and sins, to enter upon a higher existence, with angels, and the spirits of the just made perfect. We are taught by the apostle Paul that it is impossible for either sin or pain to go along with us into the unseen world. " There the weary are at rest." Glorious prospect! 128 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OP In the eternal state, there are no bodies, no sickness, no wants, no groans, no injustice, no forms of de- pravity. " Yes, my friends, if we looked at the subject aright, we should rejoice in the thought, that before another setting sun, before we reach our homes to- day, death may come to release us from these bur- dened, tempted, frail, failing, corruptible bodies, that we may enter upon the wonders of a life immortal, whose progressions will constantly increase, in the freshness, extent, beauty, and plenitude of divine, unfading, and unimaginable cliarms. Do not be alarmed, my friends ; death cannot hurt you. ' But,' you may ask, ' is there nothing for us to do, that we may die in peace ? ' Yes, in the language of Scrip- ture, ' you must cease to do evil, and learn to do well.' If you are conscious of living in the com- mission of any sin, however dear, you must resolve, before you rise from jowr seats, to renounce it for- ever, and cast yourselves on that boundless mercy, revealed by Him who is the conqueror over Death, and saith to us all, ' He that trusteth in me shall NEVER, NEVER DIE.' " Our eternal existence and bliss depend upon laws which we can neither create, cancel, nor mod- ify. They will be brought about in God's own time and way ; by influences just as resistless as those that produce day and night, the descent of rivers, the tides of the ocean, or the succession of the seasons. May the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, tlie love of God, and the fellowship of their Holy Spirit, be with you all, to-day and forever. Amen." REV. THEODORE CLAPP. 129 In the above homily, I stated what I sincerely be- lieved to be sound, scriptural views of death. Any doctrines calculated to inspire men with a dread of the grave are false, heathenish, and atheistical. The next day, a gentleman said to me, " I verily be- lieve that your sermon, yesterday, saved my life. I went into church frightened, weak, in utter despair ; I came out calm, resigned, full of hope, and able to tread cholera, death, and all other ills under my feet." For several days after this Sabbath, the plague raged with unabated violence. But the events, toils, trials, and gloom of one day, in this terrific visitation, were a facsimile of those that characterized the whole scene. A fatal yellow fever had been spread- ing destruction in the city six weeks before the chol- era commenced. Thousands had left it to escape this scourge. So that, at the time of the first chol- era, it was estimated that the population of the city did not exceed thirty-five thousand inhabitants. During the entire epidemic, at least six thousand per- sons perished ; showing the frightful loss of one sixth of the people in about twelve days. This is the most appalling instance of mortality known to have ha]> pened in any part of the world, ancient or modern. Yet, in all the accounts of the ravages of this enemy, in 1832, published in the northern cities and Europe, its desolations in New Orleans are not even noticed — a fact which reqiiires no comment. The same ratio of mortality in Boston, the next twelve days, would call for more than twenty-three thousand victims. Who can realize this truth ? The same epidemic 130 AUTOBIOGEAPIIY OF broke out again tlio following summer, in June, 1833. In September of the same year, the yellow fever came back again. So, within the space of twelve months, we had two Asiatic choleras, and two epi- demic yellow fevers, which carried off ten thousand persons that were known, and many more that were not reported. Multitudes began the day in apparently good health, and were corpses before sunset. One morn- ing, as I was going out, I spoke to a gentleman who resided in the very next house to mine. He was standing at his door, and remarked that he felt very well ; " but I wonder," he added, " that you are alive." On my return, only two hours afterwards, he was a corpse. A baker died in his cart directly before my door. Near me there was a brick house going up ; two of the workmen died on a carpenter's bencli, but a short time after they had commenced their labors for the day. Often did it happen that a person engaged a coffin for some friend, who himself died before it could be finished. On a certain even- ing, about dark, a gentleman called on me to say a short service over the body of a particular friend, just deceased : the next morning I performed the same service for him. I went, one Wednesday night, to solemnize the contract of matrimony between a couple of very genteel appearance. The bride was young, and possessed of the most extraordinary beauty. A few hours only had elapsed before I was summoned to perform the last offices over her coffin. She had on her bridal dress, and was very little changed hi the appearance of her face. REV. THEODORE CLAPP. 131 Three unmarried gentlemen, belonging to my con- gregation, lived together and kept bachelor's hall, as it is termed with us. I was called to visit one of them at ten o'clock P. M. He lived but a few moments after I entered the room. Whilst I was conversing witli the survivors, a second brother was taken with cramps. There was nobody in the house but the servants. They were especially dear to me be- cause of their intrinsic character, and because they were regular attendants at church. We instantly applied the usual remedies, but without success. At one o'clock in the morning he breathed his last. The only surviving brother immediately fell beside the couch of the lifeless ones, and at daylight he died. We laid the three corpses side by side. One family, of nine persons, supped together in perfect health ; at the expiration of the next twenty- four hours, eight out of the nine were dead. A boarding house, tliat contained thirteen inmates, was absolutely emptied ; not one was left to mourn. Persons were found dead all along the streets, particularly early in the mornings. For myself, I expected that the city would be depopulated. I have no doubt, that if the truth could be ascertained, it would api^ear that those persons who died so sud- denly were affected with what are called the pre- monitory symptoms hours, perhaps a day, or a night, before they considered themselves unwell. In this early stage, the disease is easily arrested ; but when the cramps and collapse set in, death is, in most cases, inevitable. Indeed^ that is death. Then, nothing was known of the cholera, and its antecedent 132 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF stages were unnoticed and uncared for. Hence, in a great measure, the suddenness as well as the ex- tent of the mortality. Nature seemed to sympathize in the dreadful spec- tacle of human woe. A thick, dark atmosphere, as I said before, hung over us like a mighty funereal shroud. All was still. Neither sun, nor moon, nor stars shed their blessed light. Not a breath of air moved. A hunter, who lived on the Bayou St. John, assured me that during the cholera he killed no game. Not a bird was seen winging the sky. Artificial causes of terror were superadded to the gloom which covered the heavens. The burning of tar and pitch at every corner ; the firing of cannon, by order of the city authorities, along all the streets ; and the frequent conflagrations which actually oc- curred at that dreadful period, — all these conspired to add a sublimity and horror to the tremendous scene. Our wise men hoped, by the combustion of tar and gunpowder, to purify the atmosphere. We have no doubt that hundreds perished from mere fright produced by artificial noise, the constant sight of funerals, darkness, and various other causes. It was an awful spectacle to see night ushered in by the firing of artillery in different parts of the city, making as much noise as arises from the en- gagement of two powerful armies. The sight was one of the most tremendous which was ever pre- sented to the eye, or even exliibited to the imagina- tion, in description. Often, walking my nightly rounds, the flames from the burning tar so illumi- nated the city streets and river, that I could see every REV. THEODORE CLAPP. 133 thing almost as distinctly as in the daytime. And through many a window into which was flung the sickly, flickering light of- these conflagrations, could be seen persons struggling in death, and rigid, black- ened corpses, awaiting the arrival of some cart or hearse, as soon as dawn appeared, to transport them to their final resting place. During these ineffable, inconceivable horrors, I was enabled to maintain my post for fourteen days, without a moment's serious illness. I often sank down upon the floor, sofa, or pavement, faint and exhausted from over-exertion, sleeplessness, and want of food ; but a short nap would partially restore me, and send me out afresh to renew my perilous labors. For a whole fortnight, I did not attempt to undress except to bathe and put on clean apparel. I was like a soldier, who is not allowed, by the constant presence of an enemy, to throw off* his armor, and lay down his weapons for a single moment. Morn- ing, noon, and midnight, I was engaged in the sick room, and in performing services over the dead. Tlie tliouglit that I myself should be exempted from the scourge — how could it be cherished for a mo- ment ? I expected that every day would be my last. Yet, as I said before, I did not have the slightest symptom of the cholera. Two things render this fact very remarkable. First, I took no regular meals during all this time, and really suffered a great deal from hunger. Peo- ple stopped sending to market, and cooking, in a great measure. They were afraid to eat any sub- stantial food. One day, passing by the house of a 12 134 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF Spanish gentleman, a total stranger, I smelt some- thing savory, and took the liberty to go in. He, with two or three others, was dining. On the board there were shrimps, eabbage, and bacon, with a good supply of garlic. I told them who I was, and begged for something to eat. They treated me very kindly. I sat down, and gratified my appetite with fish, vege- tables, boiled ham, garlic, and a glass of gin, and then went on my way refreshed. Meeting a physi- cian at the next square, I told him what 1 had done. He exclaimed, " You arc a dead man ; you will be attacked with the cholera in one hour." But I felt not the least inconvenience from the dinner I had eaten. I am satisfied that in cholera times, one may partake of any diet that he likes, in. moderation, with perfect impunity. I have always acted on this belief. More are killed by medicine, starving, and fright, than from eating improper food. A mistaken opinion as to this subject has arisen from the fact tliat multitudes have been seized with chol- era directly after receiving a breakfast, dinner, or supper, and have immediately ejected their food as it was taken. Hence they have fancied that what they ate brought on sickness. No. One of the in- varialjle effects of the cholera is to suspend the pro- cess of digestion ; and of course one of the peculiar consequences of the disease is falsely ascribed to the deleterious influence of some species of food. To be sure, gluttony and intemperance may bring on this epidemic ; but they are hurtful at all times. Secondly, my escape was wonderful, considered in another respect. For fifteen days in succession, the REV. THEODORE CLAPP. 135 atmosphere was loaded with the most deadly malaria, and every species of noxious imi)urity. I had to encounter not only the general insalubrity Avhich always infects the air when cholera prevails, but to this were superadded the constant inhalations of the sick-bed effluvium which emanates from corpses in every stage of decomposition, in which life had been extinct for days, perhaps, and the offensive smells of the cemetery. Most of the bodies laid in the ground had a covering of earth but a few inches in depth, and through the porous dust there was an unimpeded emission of all the gases evolved from animal matter, when undergoing the process of pu- trefaction. The sick poor were often crowded to- gether in low, narrow, damp, basement, unventilated rooms. Many times, on entering these apartments, and putting my head under the mosquito bar, I became deadly sick in a moment, and was taken with vomit- ing, which, however, passed off without producing serious effects in a single instance. Let the reader imagine a close room, in which are lying half a dozen bodies in the process of decay, and he may form a faint conception of the physical horrors in which I lived, moved, and had my being continually for two entire weeks. My preservation has always seemed to me like a miracle. It is true, some con- stitutions are not susceptible of the cholera. Some can never take the yellow fever or small pox. It is not improbable that my safety ought to be ascribed to some peculiar idiosyncrasy, Avhich enabled me to breathe the air of this plague with impunity. 136 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OP In 1822, I knew an unacclimated gentleman who slept on the same bed with an intimate friend, wliilst he was sick of the yellow fever : on the morning of his death, he himself, his clothes, and the sheets, were absolutely inundated by a copious discliarge of the vomito. After the funeral, he continued to oc- cupy the same room, and had the best health all that summer and autumn. During the next tliirty years, he never left the city for a day, and was never sick. I have known numerous instances of the kind. Such phenomena doubtless result from natural causes ; yet they do not happen without the appoint- ment and providence of our heavenly Father. An atheist, in the midst of the first cholera, spoke to me, one day, the following words, in substance : " Mr, Clapp, you are laboring very hard among the sick and dying ; I admire your benevolent and self- sacrificing spirit ; you aid in imparting to the wretch- ed victims medicine, nursing, &c. By these material agencies, I believe you have already saved some lives. All this is achieved in harmony with the philosophi- cal relation of cause and effect. But do you really imagine that your prayers can accomplish any good whatever ? The cholera has a certain mission to fulfil. It will march forward to its destined goal, regardless of the cliants of choirs, or the prayers of saints. Its movements arc determined by blind, un- discriminating, and resistless laws. " When you ask God for favors in behalf of a sick man, which will be conferred upon him sooner or later by the operation of inevitable, necessary laws, your petitions are of course entirely useless. It is EEV. THEODORE CLAPP. 137 equally apparent, that when you implore that assist- ance of Heaven which cannot be granted consistently with the ordinances of nature, your prayers are ut- terly nugatory. They cannot avert the cholera, nor any of the innumerable ills to which we are liable, any more than by a word you could stay the cat- aract of Niagara, or arrest the planets in their course." This gentleman was apparently as moral a man as I have ever met with. Just, sincere, self-denying, kind, exemplary in all his life and conduct, I re- spected his character and motives, and felt that I was bound to answer his interrogatories honestly. " In the first place," I replied, " we pray because we cannot help it, any more than we can help breathing. It is an irrepressible tendency of our nature. I have not seen a person die in this epidemic, in possession of his reason, who did not wish to have me pray for him. You cannot, by reasoning, prevent men from eating when they are hungry, or seeking the refresh- ment of nightly repose after the fatigues of the day. So neither can you dissuade them from pray- ing in scenes of sickness, trouble, and death. They want prayer just as much as they want the light and air of heaven. Now, suppose it to be in point of fact, philosophically considered, inefficacious ; still, it gives the sufferer, at least, temporary consolation. It makes him feel as if he were in the hands of a Supreme Being, who will take care of him, tlie ever- blessed and only potentate — potentate over the laws of nature, over the events of time, sickness, death, and the grave. Call it a delusion, if you please ; yet it 12 * 138 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF inspires the dying man with a soothing and unfalter- ing trust, which enables him to meet a final hour with composure, feeling the triumphant assurance that though death must destroy his body, it cannot separate his immortal soul from God, from the soci- ety of spiritual beings, nor from eternal communion with a beauty and grandeur infinitely surpassing those of the visible, material creation. " Besides, I must say, that to me your reasoning is inconclusive. Your assertion is, that the universe is so organized, that the efficacy of prayer is an ab- solute impossibility. Now, prove it. Assertion is not proof. You take the ground that the laws of nature, forsooth, will not permit the Supreme to an- swer the jnst, sincere, devout, and reasonable peti- tions of his children. He is prevented from doing so by difficulties of his own creating. Allow me to ask, ' How do you know that such is the case ? Have you seen every thing? Have you travelled quite through the regions of immensity ? Have you vis- ited all these worlds upon worlds that revolve in space ? Can you tell what " varied being peoples every star " ? Is your reason capable of receiving all truth ? Is your knowledge the measure of all that is possible in a boundless universe ? Can you stretch your inch of line across the theatre of our Creator's works ? ' Why, sir, you cannot prove it to be absurd for God to work miracles in ansAver to prayer. Yes, for the accomplishment of special purposes, and with reference to particular persons and exigencies. He may consistently, for aught we can show to the con- trary, actually suspend the laws of nature, cause REV. THEODORE CLAPP. 139 heat to lower instead of raising the mercurj of the thermometer, rivers to ascend on an inclined plain, water not to drown, poison not to kill, fire not to consume, and cold not to freeze. " But, waiving this point, to me it is plain, that with- out the aid of miracles the Almiglity could answer prayer by the mere arrangement or instrumentality of nature's eternal and unchanging laws, as you call them. The power of arrangement simply may pro- duce results to us vast and immeasurable. Take as an example what in the scientific world is called galvanism. This, as you know, is in nature identi- cal with lightning. You are familiar with the ef- fects of this tremendous agent. You also are aware that it is a power awakened by the mere using of certain arrangements of various substances. If a finite being can achieve so much by wielding nature's laws in a particular direction, what cannot the Infi- nite One accomplish by similar means ? Remember that the cholera, or any other epidemic, is an effect. What is its cause ? Some substance, poison or ma- laria, (call it what you please,) imperceptible to the senses, of whose nature and properties we are conse- quently ignorant. It is admitted that for every poison in nature there is an antidote : that is, some substance, which, if brought to bear upon it, can destroy or neutralize its deleterious tendencies. It is perfectly easy, then, for the ever-present, omnipo- tent Fatlier, by the mere order or juxtaposition of different substances, to turn away disease, in answer to prayer from individuals, families, or cities. By the use of natural laws, it may please God to pre- 140 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF serve me in this pestilence, which is now destroying hnnclrecls on every side. Suppose that, with your limited intelHgence, you had the power to arrange and direct the laws of nature throughout the State of Louisiana. In the exercise of such a commission, what could you not achieve ? You might raise its inhabitants to heaven, or sink them to perdition. How easy, then, would it be for the infinite mind, by similar means, to answer the prayers of his chil- dren, from the angel who bends before the glories of the unveiled throne, down to the humblest believer that treads these low vales of sin and sorrow ! De- pend upon it, nothing is more reasonable than the doctrine that God hears and answers prayer. On this topic nothing is more absurd than scepticism. The largest faith, as to this point, is nearest the truth." This argument against my unbelieving friend was strikingly illustrated and confirmed by what actually occurred in the city, a few days after our interview. The cholera had been raging with unabated fury for fourteen days. It seemed as if the city was destined to be emptied of its inhabitants. During this time, as before stated, a thick, dark, sultry atmosphere filled our city. Every one complained of a difficulty in breathing, which he never before experienced. The heavens were as stagnant as the mantled pool of death. There were no breezes. At the close of tlie fourteenth day, about eight o'clock in the evening, a smart storm, something like a tornado, came from the nortli-west, accompanied with heavy peals of thunder and terrific liglitnings. The deadly REV. THEODORE CLAPP. 141 air was displaced immediately, by that wliicli was new, fresh, salubrious, and life-giving. The next morn- ing shone forth all bright and beautiful. The jDlaguc was stayed. In the opinion of all the medical gen- tlemen who were on the spot, that change of weather terminated the epidemic. At any rate, it took its departure from us that very hour. No new cases occurred after that storm. It is certainly, then, in the power of God, not only by wind and electricity, but also by other means innumerable beyond our powers of discernment, to deliver a city from pestilence, in answer to the prayers of his children. Some one has said that " a little philosophy may make one an unbeliever, but that a great deal will make him a Christian." I think it very wrong to apply disparaging epithets to any person on account of his honest opinions on religious matters. A minister should never de- nounce, but he may discuss, and entreat with all long-suffering and forbearance. I said to this gen- tleman, as he was leaving me, " Your philosophy may be right and mine wrong. You are a highly gifted man. I bow to the superiority of your genius. You are wise, prudent, and sagacious, as to all mat- ters appertaining to the present world. You are no- ble and upright in your secular plans and enterprises. Yet allow me to assure you that, by neglecting com- munion with God in habitual prayer, you suffer a loss, a diminution of happiness, that no words of mine can depict. There is a higher wisdom in heaven and earth ' than is dreamt of in your philos- ophy.' Prayer would make you a happier being. 142 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OP Prayer would impart to you, amid tlic mournful vicissitudes and trials of earth, a deep, calm, and immovable peace — a prelibation of that which is en- joyed in the spirit-land of the blessed and immortal." The young man with whom I had the above collo- quy was the son of a Presbyterian clergyman. He manifested great respect and love for his father, but complained that he would never allow him to reason about religion. He actually supposed that all the follies and absurdities of Calvinism were taught in the Bible. " I cannot believe in such a book," he said. I replied, " Neither could I, if your supposi- tion were correct. But I cannot find a distinguish- ing doctrine of the Calvinistic system in the Scrip- tures." It is a curious fact, that though this man died in unbelief, yet he sent for me to visit him on his death bed. He fell a victim of the second cholera, which occurred in June, 1833. Entering his room I found him in perfect possession of his faculties. He said, " I am about to die. My belief is unchanged. I hold that man is nothing after death. Yet I look upon my decease with no apprehension. I have no solicitude and no regrets. I am in peace with all the world. To me existence has been a great blessing. But I am willing to take my exit from the stage of life, to afford room for a successor. I shall soon close my eyes, never again to open them ; never again to gaze on this beautiful and magnificent universe. I have sent for you because I love and respect you. I also wanted to have you see with what calm, conscious serenity I can submit to my fate. EEV. THEODORE CLAPP. 143 ' Like bubbles on a sea of matter borne, "\Ve rise and break, and to that sea return.' " " Do you indeed love my society ? " I inquired. " Now, suppose it was optional with you, when you die, either to be anniliilated, or, leaving behind your lifeless dust, to pass off to a world destined to enjoy forever the highest means of both physical and men- tal happiness, where sin, pain, want, sorrow, and trouble cannot enter, where you would meet all the lost and loved ones of earth, to be separated from them no more, and where you would rise from one scene of knowledge, refinement, and bliss to another without ever reaching the ultimate boundary of im- provement. You like to see me here — would you not like to see me hereafter ? " " I confess," he replied, " that a conscious, intelli- gent, continued, ever-progressive existence is the most glorious destiny which we can conceive of. It is a captivating ideal. It is so lovely that men cling to it in defiance of reason and argument. I conceive that we are so organized that we cannot help loving and longing for immortality." " Do you not remember," I continued, " the lines of Addison, — ' 'Tis the di^•^nity that stirs within us ; 'Tis heaven itself, that points out an hereafter, And intimates eternity to man.' Again allow me to recall to your recollection the words of the poet, whom you just now quoted, — ' He sees why nature plants in man alone Hope of known bliss, and faith in bliss unknown ; Nature, whose dictates to no other kind Are given in vain, but what they seek they find.' " 144 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OP " Yes," he went on to say, "poets and preachers agree in their charming descriptions of a higher and heavenly Hie beyond this vale of tears. But every grave which is dug refutes their imfounded theo- ries." I then suggested this thought. " You hold that there is no God ; that some blind, unintelligent, resistless law caused you to be born, to grow up, to go through the mingled allotments of the past, and will, in a few moments, command you back to mix again with the elements whence you were taken. Now, what evidence have you that this same stern, unrelenting influence may not cause you, after death, (according to the metempsychosis taught by Pythagoras,) to enter the body of some brute, or to sink to lower and lower degrees of wretchedness throughout eternity ? If we are not in the hands of a Father whose attributes are infinite love, wisdom, and power, then we have nothing to hope for, and the worst to fear, then the doctrine of endless mis- ery, whicli your good, venerable parent believed in, may turn out to be true at last." As I perceived that he was fast declining, T stopped the conversation at this point, and requested the fa- vor of bidding him farewell, as I did all my dying friends, by rehearsing a few texts of Scripture, and of- fering a prayer. I opened the Bible, and pronounced some sentences from different chapters, giving what I believed to be the true sense of the original, in my own words. " Jesus Christ has abolished death, and brought life and immortality to light in the gospel. For we know that when our earthly tabernacles shall be dissolved, we shall enter a building of God, an REV. THEODORE CLAPP. 145 houso not made with hands, eternal in the heavens. As the children of Adam must all descend to the tomb, so they must all one day bo made alive m Christ. The fature state will be the complete an- tithesis of the present. " This side the grave all men are mortal ; beyond it, they will all be immortal. Here, all are corrupti- ble ; there, all will be incorruptible. Here, all are in a greater or less degree sinful ; there, all will be holy. Here, all are weak ; there, all will be strong, incapable of fatigue or infirmity. Here, all are de- based ; there, all will be made glorious. All who die, both good and bad, just and unjust, shall be raised up again, and admitted to a resurrection state. And in that resurrection state, they shall hunger no more, thirst no more, weep no more, sin no more, die no more, but be as the angels of God in heaven. And there shall be no more curse, but the throne of God and the Lamb shall triumph over all evil." This reading was followed by a prayer, in nearly the following words : " My Fatlier, who art in heaven, I commend this beloved friend, from whom I am soon to be separated for a short time, to thy infinite love and mercy, through Jesus Christ our Lord. I thank thee for the assurance that he can- not be crushed nor hurt by the forces of time, nature, death, or the grave. I bless thee for the revelation of the gospel, that his soul is a germ of thine own infinite, eternal, uncreated, and unchanging life ; that therefore it must live, and advance in knowl- edge, worth, brightness, and beatitude, long as thy ever-blessed throne shall endure. Amen." At the 13 146 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF conclusion, lie exclaimed, with a feeble but distinct voice, " So mote it be. I fear nothing." He spoke not again. Fifteen minutes afterwards, his pulse ceased to beat. I cannot believe that this man was insincere in the views which he expressed concerning the soul's ever- lasting extinction. He gave every evidence of an undoubting assurance in the reality of those opinions which he avowed. He led a most moral, upright, and charitable life. He did not disbelieve on account of his great wickedness, nor because he was afraid of punishment in a future state, according to the usual representations of the pulpit. He was alto- gether too intelligent and noble to be actuated by a principle so debasing. His was a mind singularly earnest, honest, and conscientious. He met the final scene in this brief drama of existence with an un- shaken equanimity, and expired as calmly as an infant falls to sleep in its mother's arms. I go so far as to say, that he left the world in the exercise of a humble and Christian spirit. As he was breath- ing his last, the image conveyed in the following stanza was forcibly impressed on my mind : — " How sweet the scene when good men die, When noble souls retire to rest ! How mildly beams the closing ej'e, How calmly heaves th' expiring breast ! So fades a summer cloud away ; So sinks a gale, when storms are o'er ; So gently shuts the eye of day ; So dies a wave along the shore." In all my experiences, I never saw an unbeliever die in fear. I have seen them expire, of course, REV. THEODORE CLAPP. 147 without any hopes or expectations, but never in agi- tation from dread, or misgivings as to what might befall them hereafter. I know that clergymen gen- erally assert that this final event passes with some dreadful visitation of unknown, inconceivable agony, over the soul of the departing sinner. It is imagined that in his case the pangs of dissolution are dread- fully aggravated by the upbraidings of a guilty con- science, and by the unwillingness, the reluctance of the spirit to be torn with ruthless violence from its mortal tenement, and hnrried by furies into the pres- ence of an avenging Judge. But this is all a picture of superstitious fancy. It is probable that I have seen a greater number of those called irreligious persons breathe their last, than any clergyman in the United States. Before they get sick, the unaccli- mated are often greatly alarmed ; but when the en- emy seizes them, and their case is hopeless, they invariably either lose their reason, or become calm, composed, fearless, and happy. This fact is a strik- ing illustration of the benevolence of our Creator. If men's minds were not disturbed by false and mis- erable teachings, they would not suffer in death any more than they do when they fall asleep at night. Death is called a sleep in Scripture. " Death is the sleep of the weary. It is repose — the body's re- pose, after the busy and toilsome day of life is over." Even the convulsive struggles of the dying are not attended with pain, any more than the sobs and groans with which we sometimes sink into the slum- bers of nightly rest. This is proved by the testi- mony of those who have been resuscitated after they 148 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OP became cold and pulseless, and restored again to life and breath. Their agonies were all seeming, not real, they tell us. Persons without religion often die uttering words whicli indicate what are their strongest earthly loves or attachments, their " ruling passion." A young man of my acquaintance was once in that stage of the yellow fever superinduced by the beginning of mor- tification. Then the patient is free from pain, some- times joyous, and very talkative. The individual I am speaking of was perfectly enamoured of novel reading. One of Walter Scott's romances was daily expected in New Orleans. Not many minutes before his death, it was brought to his bed by a friend whom he had sent to procure it. It was placed in his hands, but he was no longer able to see printing. The pages of the book, and the faces of his friends, were growing dim around him. He exclaimed, " I am blind ; I cannot see ; I must be dying ; must I leave this new production of immortal genius un- read ? " His last tliought was dictated by his favor- ite pursuit and passion. Men must carry into the other world the character which they possess at the moment of death. I knew another gentleman, whose admiration for the Emperor Napoleon amounted to a monomania. He had collected all the biographies, histories, and other works tending to illustrate his life and charac- ter. This one theme had taken such exclusive pos- session of his mind, that he could neither think nor converse on any other subject. He was taken with the yellow fever. I went to see him when he was REV. THEODORE CLAPP. 149 near his end. I took him by the hand, and hardly had time to speak, before he asked me what I thought of the moral character of Napoleon. The gentlemen standing by could not suppress a smile. I replied, that according to the representations of Las Casas, and others most intimately acquainted with him, Bonaj^arte was a firm believer in God, a divine prov- idence, Jesus Christ, and immortality ; and that it gave me great pleasure to believe in the correctness of their statements. He was of course delighted with the answer given. I read from the Bible. I then asked him if there were any particular subjects or favors which he would have embraced in my prayer. He answered, " There is but one blessing which I crave of Infinite Goodness — that after death, I may be conducted to those celestial regions where I can enjoy the sight and society of the great- est and best man who has lived — the late Emperor of France." Poor man ! He could think of no higher, no nobler destiny. It would be well were all to remember that great, glorious thoughts, habitually cherished, spontane- ously fill the mind in a dying hour, to bear it aloft and buoyant over the dark gulf. In all my experiences in New Orleans, I have met with no dying persons who were terrified, except church members who had been brought up in the Trinitarian faith. Let me not be misunderstood. I do not mean to insinuate that these individuals were not good Christians. They were perfectly sincere, and this very sincerity was the cause of their fear and apprehensions. One, to whom I allude, em- 13* 150 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OP braced the Calvinistic doctrine of election. He was a just, conscientious, most excellent man. I knew him intimately. His last words were, " I have no hope ; all is dark. There is a bare possibility that I may be saved." This was the language of honesty. For he held that salvation would be conferred upon only a part of mankind, elected to this destiny by a decree of God — eternal, immutable, and altogether irrespective of character and works, and all the remainder would be doomed to eternal woe, without any regard to their merit or demerit. No honest man, with such a creed, could die without the great- est dread and anxiety. For if God has inflexibly determined to destroy a portion of his children, however pure and good they may be, no one can know absolutely, from his character, that he is among the saved ; no one can feel certain of en- joying final, everlasting happiness. When I first entered the clerical profession, I was struck with the utter insufficiency of most forms of Cliristianity to afford consolation in a dying hour. Paul says, the revelation of Jesus was given " to deliver those, who, through fear of death, were all their lifetime subject to bondage." Ancient pagan literature invariably represents death as the greatest calamity of human existence ; it was denominated the stern, terrible, insatiate, cold, bitter, merciless " foe." It was the avenue to an eternal night ; where the fair, the venerated, and the loved would be lost beyond recovery. If all this were true, we might justly say, " Speak not to us of consolation ; there is no consolation ; there is no support for such a lot as EEV. THEODORE CLAPP. 151 ours ; nothing but dulness can bear it ; nothing but stupidity can tolei-ate it ; and nothing but idiocy could be indifferent to it." Jesus came into the world to announce the sublime doctrine that no one ever was, or ever will be, injured by death ; that death is not so much as the interruption of existence ; that death, indeed, is only death in appearance, while in reality the spirit's life is progressive, ever continued, and immortal. Whoever, then, advocates those views of death, the belief of which tends to make its recipients afraid to die, ignores the messages of the gospel on this momentous theme. The great prominent truth of the Bible is, that, in every instance, " the day of one's death is better than the day of his birth." All these efforts to make death a scarecrow, to frighten men into the church, are as low and de- basing as they are irrational and anti-Christian. Death is not the enemy, but the friend, of man. Not the blue sky, not the richest landscape, not the flowers of spring, not all the charms of music, poetry, eloquence, art, or literature, present to our contemplation any thing so lovely and magnificent as death and its consequences, viewed through the tel- escope of the New Testament. Yet almost all the clergy, for fifteen hundred years, have employed their utmost genius, learning, and oratory to portray, in colors so appalling, that nobody who believes them can think upon the grave but with the deepest dread, dejection, and horror. It would be quite as wise to bring up our children atheists, as to corrupt their mhids with the apprehension that the dissolution of 152 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OP the body may conduct them to everlasting evil. It would be better, safer every way, for our children to believe in annihilation, than in endless misery. In the cholera of June, 1833, the disease first in- vaded our own family circle. Two daughters, the eldest four, and the youngest two years of age, died about the same time. I was so fortunate as to pro- cure a carriage, in which their bodies were conveyed to a family vault, in the Girod cemetery, wliich had been constructed and presented to me, some years before, by the trustees of Christ Church, Canal Street — a church characterized for large, generous, and noble sympathies. I rode in the carriage alone with the two coffins. There was not a soul present but myself, to aid in performing the last sad offices. Most desolate and heavy was my heart, at the thought that they had left us to come back no more, — " No more would run to lisp their sire's return, Or climb his knees the envied kiss to share." The chastening hand of the great Ordainer was so heavy upon me, that, chilled and discouraged, I should have sunk into the gulf of utter scepticism, without the supporting hope of meeting the lost and loved ones again, in a brighter and better world. EEV. THEODORE CLAPP. 153 CHAPTER VII. CHANGE IN MY THEOLOGICAL OPINIONS AND STYLE OF PREACHING. LIBERAL COURSE PURSUED BY THE CON- GREGATION, WITH RESPECT TO THESE MODIFICATIONS. GENEROUS MANNER IN WHICH I WAS TREATED BY MY PRESBYTERIAN AND OTHER TRINITARIAN BRETH' REN IN THE MINISTRY. It is a truism among all the learned of the present day, that religious faith is produced by influences which we can neither create nor destroy. An hon- est man is no more accountable for his belief than he is for the movements of his heart and lungs, the features of his face, color of his hair. In general, it may be said that faith is the result of evidence. In some cases, it is brought about through those exer- cises of the mind which are by nature unavoidable. Thus faith in a great First Cause, in the existence of the soul, in justice, and immortality, is insepara- ble from human nature. It is not less essential to man, than to possess the prerogatives of perception, speech, memory, hope, fear, and desire. But many forms of faith are created by one's voluntary efforts. For example : faith in the Bible, in phrenology, mesmerism, homoeopathy, democratic institutions, the Copernican system, geology, &c., is acquired by observation, study, and research. In examining and weighing the facts and evidence appertaining to these subjects, one may be fair or unfair, just or unjust, impartial or prejudiced. If a 154 AUTOBIOGEAPHY OF man investigate Christianity itself, with no other motive than an earnest and sincere desire to obtain the truth, and honestly comes to the conclusion that it is false, he is not to blame for such a conclusion. He cannot help it any more than he can avoid the belief that two are less than eight. When I entered the ministry, many of my opin- ions, though sincerely held, rested only on the prin- ciple of implied faith, or authority. In New Orleans, I had to encounter just, wise, and noble men, belong- ing to each of the different denominations in Chris- tendom. For some years after my settlement, I was invited, almost every Sabbath, to preach on some particular subject. This fact imposed upon me the necessity of looking into the foundation of many doctrines, whose truth I had always before taken for granted. Hence I became a very hard student. When not engaged in out-door vocations, I was constantly occupied with my books and studies, in order to prepare myself for a wide and almost boundless range of pulpit discussion. One day, it was incumbent to prove that Samson actually lived, and performed the extraordinary feats recorded in the book of Judges. The next Sunday, I was called to explain the cherubim and the four wheels, in the first chapter of Ezekiel, or the deluge, or the destruction of the Canaanites, or Jonah and the fisli, or the case of Shadrach, Meshech, and Abednego, who came out unhurt from the midst of the burning, fiery furnace. Every biblical difficulty was brought to me for solution, and it was my especial province to elucidate all the dogmas which REV. THEODORE CLAPP. 155 have been professedly derived from the sacred vol- ume since the days of TertuUian. I noticed, indeed, no invitations but those which had the stamp of respectable names, and such as I had reason to believe were dictated by a worthy desire to obtain knowledge, and promote the advaaicement of Christian truth. These efforts to meet the wants of those who had a right to call on me for spiritual information enlarged my views, changed and rectified many of the opin- ions which had been imbibed from venerable teach- ers, and opened to me wonders and beauties which I never should have seen, had my life been passed in the regular, quiet, prescribed routine of ministe- rial duties in a New England parish. I will illustrate this remark by relating an inci- dent. The only university in Louisiana, at the time of my settlement there, was located in New Orleans. From the beginning, all the presidents, professors, and officers of the institution, had been of French extraction, either Creoles or foreigners. One of the most popular and efficient members of the board of administrators was an English gentleman, of splendid talents and acquirements. It was his wish to place some northern man at the head of this college, " in order," as he said, " to Americanize its usages, stud- ies, and course of discipline." The pastor of the Presbyterian church was recom- mended to him as a person qualified to fill the office. This was done without my knowledge or consent. It happened in the spring of 1824, Judge W. — the gentleman above mentioned — came to church one 156 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OP Sunday morning to hear me preach, not (as he after- wards said) because he felt any interest about my re- ligious tenets, but to form a general estimate of my abilities as an orator and scholar. The subject of the sermon on that occasion was the horrid dogma of endless punishment. It was taken up at the partic- ular request of a lady, whose husband undisguis- edly and strongly repudiated the doctrine. She said that he was a model of every virtue that coiild adorn home or society at large, but all this would be of no avail, unless he became a disciple of Clirist. To become a Christian, and to embrace the Calvin- istic creed, were things, in her judgment, perfectly coincident. For myself, I then thought that the doctrine of eternal suffering was true, and that a belief of it exerted a most salutary influence on the heart and life of its recipient. " Most happy," said the good lady, " shall I be, if you succeed in rec- onciling my husband to this solemn, sublime article of the Christian faith." At the outset, I told the hearers that this doctrine was inexplicable to human reason ; that it was based entirely on the authority of revelation. So I con- fined myself simply to a rehearsal of those texts, which, as I imagined, taught the eternity of future woe. After the audience had dispersed. Judge W. remained, and was introduced to me. We walked home tojjether. I found him learned, liberal, pol- ished, and courtly in his manners. In the course of our conversation he remarked that he had once studied the subject on which I had been preachmg, REV. THEODORE CLAPP. 157 with special attention. It happened thus : After leav- ing the university, he endeavored to prepare himself for taking holy orders in the Episcopal church. But it was out of his power to find the doctrines of the Trinity, the vicarious atonement, endless punish- ment, plenary inspiration, and some other articles in the Bible. He therefore abandoned the idea of obtaining ordination, and became a student in one of the Inns of Court, London. Judge W. was a superior linguist, and well versed in the original Scriptures. When parting with me that morning, he said, " Mr. Clapp, I have a particular favor to ask. You told us in the sermon just delivered that there are hundreds of texts in the Bible which affirm, in the most un- qualified terms, that all those who die in their sins will remain impenitent and unholy through the ages of eternity. I will thank you to make me out a list of those texts in the original Hebrew and Greek. That some of such an import occur in our English version is undeniable ; but I think they are mis- translations. I do not wish to put you to the trouble of multiplying Scripture proofs touching this point. Two, five, or ten will be amply sufficient." I replied, " Judge, it will give me great pleasure to grant your request. I can furnish you with scores of them be- fore next Sunday." He smiled, saying, " I do not deny it," and politely bade me good morning. I was perfectly confident that the judge would be con- vhiced that he had most egregiously misunderstood and misinterpreted the word of God. I rejoiced in the thought of his speedy discomfiture. 14 158 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF " For fools rush in where angels fear to tread ; Distrustful sense with modest caution speaks ; It still looks home, and short excursions makes ; But rattling nonsense in full volleys breaks, And never shocked, and never turned aside, Bursts out, resistless, with a thundering tide." The very next day, Monday, before going out, I made, as I thought, the best arrangements for col- lecting the proof texts which had been solicited. A table was set in one corner of my study, well fur- nished with the appropriate books — lexicons, He- brew and Greek, concordances, commentaries, Eng- lish, Latin, and German, with standard works on the Pentateuch, the history and antiquities of the Jew- ish nation. I had no authorities in my library but those which were of the highest repute among Trin- itarians of every denomination. With the help of Gaston's Collections and the references in tlie Larger Catechism of the Presbyterian Church, the access was easy to all the passages of Scripture which are relied on to prove the doctrine of endless sin and sorrow. I began with the Old Testament in Hebrew, com- paring it as I went along with the Septuagint and English version. I hardly ever devoted less than an hour each day to this branch of my studies, and often I gave a whole morning to it. Having been elected to tlie presidency of the New Orleans col- lege, I was in the enjoyment of constant intercourse with Judge W. Almost every week lie inquired, " Have you discovered yet the proof texts which you promised to give me ? " I replied, " No, judge, I am doing my best to find them, and will accommo- REV. THEODORE CLAPP. 159 date you at as early a period as possible." During that and the succeeding year I read critically every chapter and verse of the Hebrew Scriptures, from Genesis to Malachi. My investigations were as thorough and complete as I could possibly make them. Yet I was unable to find therein so much as an allusion to any suffering at all after death. In the dictionary of the Hebrew language I could not discover a word signifying liell, or a place of punish- ment for the wicked in a future state. In the Old Testament Scriptures there is not, as I believe, a single text, in any form of phraseology, which holds out to the finally impenitent threats of retribution beyond the grave. To my utter astonishment, it turned out that orthodox critics of the greatest celebrity were perfectly familiar with these facts. I was compelled to confess to my friend that I could not adduce any Hebrew exegesis in support of the sentiment that evil is eternal. Still, I was sanguine in my expectations that the New Testament would furnish me with the argu- ments which I had sought for without success in the writings of Moses and the prophets. I scrutinized, time and again, whatever in the Gospels, the Acts, and the Epistles, are supposed to have any bearings upon the topic, for the space of eight years. The result was, that I could not name a portion of New Testament Scripture, from the first verse of Mat- thew to the last of the Apocalypse, which, fairly in- terpreted, affirms that a part of mankind will be eternally miserable. But the opposite doctrine, that all men will be ultimately saved, is taught in scores 160 AUTOBIOGEAPHY OP of texts, which no art of disingenuous interpretation can explain away. Here I should say that at the time above mentioned I had never seen or read any of the writings of the Unitarian or Universahst divines, not even those of Dr. Channing, with the exception, perhaps, of one or two occasional dis- courses that had been sent to me through the post office. During the whole ten years my studies were confined to the original Hebrew and Greek Scrip- tures, and the various subsidiary works which are required for their elucidation. My simple, only object was to ascertain what '■^ saith the Lord'''' con- cerning the final destination of the wicked. It is an important, most instructive fact, that I was brouglit into my present state of mind by the instru- mentality of the Bible only — a state of mind run- ning counter to all the prejudices of early life, of parental precept, of school, college, theological semi- nary, and professional caste. My circumstances at the time furnish conclusive proof that I could not have been actuated by any selfish, mercenary, or improper motives whatever. I was well aware how much was hazarded by ven- turing to interpret the Bible for myself; that the public proclamation of the results which had been forced upon me would call down the severest anath- emas of the church ; that, naked and almost alone, I should encounter the bristling spears of that large army, which, though it repudiates the use of the wheel, the rack, and gibbet, still employs, for the purpose of preventing free inquiry, the more cruel engines of scorn, contempt, obloquy, and misrepre- REV. THEODORE CLAPP. 161 sentation. It is sad to tliiuk that if in this land of boasted freedom a clergyman feels bound, in con- science, to interpret the Scriptures differently from the majority of the denomination to whicli he be- longs, it is impossible to follow his private judgment without imperilling his good name, his standing in the ministry, and even his Christian character^ with- out being driven like chaff before the storm of pop- ular prejudice and persecuting clamor. From this account the reader will perceive my meaning, in the remark that faith is, in a great measure, produced by causes which are entirely above and beyond human control. In March, 1824, it became my duty in the pulpit to avow a faith which ten years afterwards I was compelled by the providence of Almighty God to repudiate. I say Divine Providence constrained me to adopt this course ; for my introduction to Judge W., his com- ing to hear me preach, the particular theme dis- cussed on that occasion, the request which led to a new and thorough examination of the Scriptures, and to a decided revolution in my theological views, were the appointments of the Infinite Intelligence. As a parent takes his feeble, tottering child by the hand, when treading a rough, difficult path, so Heaven was pleased to guide me through the mazes of error and superstition, in which I had wandered from childhood, into the broad, beautiful fields of evangelical truth. On the first Sabbath of July, 1834, I proclaimed distinctly from the pulpit, for the first time, my firm, conviction that the Bible does not teach the doctrine 14* 162 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OP of eternal puiiislimeiit. It was the happiest day that I had ever experienced. I felt that now I could vin- dicate the ways of God to man. I felt that revealed religion, like the stars of the firmament, reflected the glories of our Creator. I kept repeating to my- self for weeks the following Unes : — " And darkness and doubt are flying away ; No longer I roam in conjecture forlorn ; So breaks on the traveller, faint and astray, The bright and the balmy effulgence of morn. See Truth, Love, and Mercy in triumph descending, And nature all glowing in Eden's first bloom ; On the cold cheek of death smiles and roses are blending, And beauty immortal awakes from the tomb." Some of my friends wonder that I should be so much attached to New Orleans. One reason is, that it is endeared by those sacred associations which assure me that my origin is divine, and my destina- tion eternal life. It is natural that I should love a place where I was permitted, for the first time, to catch glimpses and revelations of the infinitely Beau- tiful — where, amid perplexities, discouragement, and despair, the Holy Spirit came to my relief, and enabled me to gaze upon the outspreading glories of an everlasting, universal Father, the unchanging, almighty Friend of man, however low, fallen, dark, or depraved ; the place wliere, in the twinkling of an eye, I became a new man, was born again, and with indescribable rapture looked out upon another and more glorious universe than that which addresses the senses. Yes, it was in the Crescent City, (and I can never forget it,) not in my native place, not in New Ha- REV. THEODORE CLAPP. 163 veil, Boston, or Andover, but in New Orleans, where I learned to take shelter from all the ills with which earth can assail us, under the brooding wings of In- effable Goodness. Yes, there, amid " the pestilence that walketh in darkness and the destruction that wasteth at noonday," it was my privilege to feel the heart of Infinite Love beating close to my heart, and to be assured that it will throb forever through all the pulses of my mental and deathless being. Can I ever forget the place or time when I actually felt the arms of everlasting Power, Wisdom, and Benefi- cence clasping me about as the fond mother hugs the babe to her bosom to soothe its grief and hush its sighs ? To me the mysterious problem of life was solved on the banks of the Mississippi. There I was first led to repose on the bosom of my God, and to say, " Thou wilt guide me with thy counsel, and at last receive me into glory. Whom have I in heaven but thee, and whom on earth do I love in comparison with thee ? Though my flesh and my heart fail, God is the strength of my heart, and my portion forever. My soul thirsts, longs, lives, prays, and toils to be- come one with thee, for assimilation to thee, for the constant unfolding and enlarging of those men- tal powers which constitute thy glorious image." As it is natural to be thrilled at sight of the wide- ly extended prairie, the firmament of heaven, or the boundless expanse of the ocean, so the heart remem- bers the spot wliere it was first warmed and lifted up by those unfailing hopes, which, crossing the gulf, of death, the line of time, and the boundaries of the visible creation, connect our fates and fortunes with 164 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OP the wide, boundless scenes of an imperishable here- after. I can recall a single day, in New Orleans, dur- ing which I received an amount of happiness more than sufficient to counterbalance all the sufferings of my life ; nay, more, which enabled me to regard these very sufferings as instruments by which Heaven is working out for me kinds and degrees of good inconceivably great and glorious. But this spiritual enjoyment to which 1 allude never entered my soul until I had been brought to see that God is incapable of destroying his own children, or, which is the same thing, allowing them to be destroyed. One of an opposite faith may be a very sincere Chris- tian, but he can no more taste the peculiar delight which I am now speaking of, than a blind man can perceive the beauties of the rainbow. In conjunction with a more thorough knowledge of the Scriptures, the peculiar events of my profes- sional career had an extensive influence in modify- ing and changing the theological opinions which had been imbibed in New England. It was among the sick, prostrate, and suffering that the true interpre- tation of the Bible began to dawn upon my mind. I felt that the teachings of nature, providence, and grace must be harmonious. I had been reading books from a child, but as yet had not studied pro- foundly the mysteries of human life. Upon the principles of faith acquired at Andover, I saw the crowds around me hurried, by an unseen, resistless power, through the ordinances and appointments ; the sudden alternations of health, sickness, prosper- ity, and adversity ; the scenes of endurance, priva- REV. THEODORE CLAPP. 165 tion, and disappointment ; the painful sunderings of the ties of friendship, affinity, and affection ; and* the other indescribable vicissitudes, fates, fortunes, and trials, which are condensed into the short span of this momentous existence between the cradle and the tomb, only as preparatory to a final residence in the dark regions of inconceivable, unbounded, and hopeless ruin. The more I thought upon the sub- ject, the more deeply was the idea impressed, that such a destiny was utterly irreconcilable with infinite love. I used often to say, " If God be our Father, could he expose us to an evil that has no limits, and which no finite power can avert ? " It was conceded on all sides that we could not save ourselves. The very best arc more or less sinful and unworthy at the moment of death. No degree of virtue, then, attainable on earth, can prepare us for immortal blessedness. True, I had heard, all my life, that the only basis of salvation spoken of in the gospel was the grace of God through Christ. But the doctrine had been uniformly presented to my mind in such a shape, and with such surroundings, that I had never discerned its genuine character and bearings. Con- stantly was I reminded that we could do nothing towards saving ourselves, and yet, at the same time that fiiith, repentance, and holiness before death, were the indispensable prerequisites to eternal life. Upon this ground, it appeared to me self-evident that the vast majority of my fellow-beings must perish everlastingly. No hopes could be rationally enter- tained for the final deliverance even of those who die idiots, or those who sink into the grave during the period of infancy. 166 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OP "Whilst ill this state of perplexity and distress, I 'was called one afternoon to visit a remarkably inter- esting young man, sick of the yellow fever. I had often met him in company, and enjoyed his conver- sation. Every body admired him for his extraordi- nary talents, and the moral charms of his life and character. One of the deacons of the church hap- pened to be in my study when I was sent for, and being an intimate acquaintance of the afflicted fam- ily, he accompanied me to the sick room. The usual services were performed. Within five minutes after- wards, he expired. The mother uttered shrieks of grief and despair, enough to melt a heart of ada- mant. I tried to make some soothing remarks, but she refused to be comforted. As she was a commu- nicant of the church, and beyond all question a very pious lady, I referred her to the inexhaustible riches of a Saviour's mercy. " But the mercy of God," she replied, " is limited. Our beloved James is now, I fear, in a world where the blessings of a Creator's love will never be known. He was noble, kind-hearted, faithful, true, and good, but he was not religious. A few days ago he told me that he did not believe in the Trinity ; that in his opinion the Son of God was inferior, subordinate to, and dependent on the Father. Dying with such sentiments, how can I entertain the faintest hope of ever meeting him in a better world ? " I replied very promptly, and perhaps with too much warmth, " Madam, in the unseen world, the catechism of our church is not the criterion by which persons will be acquitted or condemned. You say your son EEV. THEODORE CLAPP. 167 was honest, and most exemplary in the discharge of all his duties. What more could he have done ? If he is lost, who then can be saved ? " " Do you mean to intimate," she inquired, " that one who expires disbelieving the supreme divinity of Christ, will ever be admitted to the kingdom of heaven ? " " 1 hope so," was the answer ; " nor do I read any thing in the New Testament which forbids such a hope." But this thought was more shocking than consolatory to her. In a few weeks she left our so- ciety, and went to another church. A purer, more affectionate, or conscientious woman I have never known ; but the sentiment " had grown with her growth and strengthened with her strength," that the gospel holds out no promise of forgiveness and restoration to those who leave the world in error and unbelief. The reflection arose in my mind, " Can that be true religion, which represents death as a calami- ty so great and terrible, that it excludes, of necessity, a great part of mankind from entertaining even the hope of a better and blessed life beyond the grave ? " As we were returning home, my friend the elder remarked that it seemed to him quite unaccountable that infinite mercy should be limited by any thing whatever — by time, nature, space, death, human folly, or corruption. " Can Infinite Mercy be gratified if a single child be left to wander forever in sin and unhappiness ? Has this young man gone to a world where he will have no further opportunities of ac- quiring truth and becoming holy ? Was such a doc- trine really taught by Jesus Christ ? How dark and 168 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OP desolate, then, the prospects of that future state ! But I suppose it must be so. The clergy ought to understand this subject." These questions opened for me the way to another field of inquiry, analo- gous, indeed, to the one I had been exploring so long, but of a somewhat different phase. Reachhig my study, I took down Cruden's Con- cordance to the Holy Scriptures, and turned to the word probation. To my great surprise, I found that there was no such word in the Bible. Yet the fol- lowing phrase is contained in almost every sermon : " P/"o/;a^io/z will end with the present life." I had hoard Dr. Woods assert that if a man's accountable existence on earth was not more than twelve months, in this short space of time he must establish a good character, or he would be eternally ruined. No op- portunity will be afforded a person after death to qualify himself for a happy immortality. It struck, me that nothing could be more absurd than the sen- timent that Infinite Wisdom had endued us with the capacity of an endless being, in which there could be no progression after the dissolution of the body. I had already prepared a complete list of the passages adduced in support of the doctrine of everlasting woe. They were constantly spread out on my table, like a map or chart which a ship master consults in navigating his vessel through difficult and dangerous waters. I looked them over and over most care- fully, through the winter of 1833 and 1834, to see if they contained the affirmation, or any thing which in the remotest degree savored of it, that the state of man in the present life is probationary — a REV. THEODORE CLAPP. 169 season of moral trial, upon the proper improvement or abuse of which depends our eternal weal. I found not a Bible argument in support of this dogma. On the contrary, I read therein that " God doth not pun- ish forever, neither is his displeasure eternal. For as high as heaven is above earth, so great is his mercy. As far as the east is from the west, so far hath he removed our transgressions from us. He will not deal with us according to our sins, nor re- ward us according to our iniquities. Even as a father pitieth his children, so doth the Lord pity the sons of men. For he knoweth our frame, he re- membereth that we are dnst. As for man, his days are as grass ; as a flower of the field, so he flourish- eth. The wind passeth over it, and it is gone, and the place thereof shall know it no more. But the mercy of the Lord is from everlasting to everlasting, and his goodness to children's children. God is rich in mercy, plenteous in mercy, delights in mercy. Mercy shall triumph over justice. He will not af- flict forever, because he delighteth in mercy. He is gracious and full of compassion, infinite, immutable, and everlasting in his benevolence. Mortality shall be swallowed up of life ; " and so on to an indefinite extent. How large, how cheering, how magnificent are these views of man's iiltimate destiny ! In the the- ory of theologians, the grace of God is jejune, narrow, circumscribed, inefficient, conditional, contingent, liable to be frustrated by the obstinacy, blindness, follies, whims, and caprice of feeble, fallible, erring, and unhappy mortals. Li the Bible, it is an impar- 15 170 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OP tial, universal, almighty, ever-living, ever-present tenderness ; a sea of compassion, in which all the guilt, sin, and unworthiness of our race will be lost and absorbed as a drop of rain is lost, when it falls into the ocean, and is seen no more. Having reached what seemed to me an important crisis in my theological career, I could not reconcile it with the principles of honor to conceal from the church tlie new phases of my spiritual position. For ten years I had been employed in revising my faith. 1 had searched the Scriptures anew, unbiased by fear or hope, in regard to the final results. All this was done in the sacred seclusion of my heart and study, alone with God, and the enrapturing beauties of divine, eternal truth. There was no clerical nor lay friend witli whom I could converse with respect to the new direction of my researches, and their effect in enlarging my intellectual and moral horizon. Besides, it appeared to me wrong to communicate to others the change of sentiments towards which I was drifting, until they had assumed the shape of clear, full, and undoubting convictions. No doubt a sagacious, observing, regular attendant on my minis- try might have detected the fact that I was not standing still, — that I was passing through a mental revolution of some kind or other. An intelligent Presb^^terian — a noble, generous, constant hearer — said to me one day, " There has been of late a great alteration in your style of preaching ; I cannot di- vine the cause." In reply, I said, " I am not con- scious of any such cliango. Will you be so good as to describe your impressions touching the matter ? " REV. THEODORE CLAPP. 171 He answered me thus : " In your addresses to sin- ners, your tone is more mild, gentle, and persuasive than formerly. It seems as if you do not look upon their guilt as quite so awfid and aggravated as it is represented to be in the Bible. I want to have you speak to these godless, desperate men in your old- fashioned way. You should lighten, anathematize, and pour out upon them the denunciations of an offended Heaven. You should speak to them oftener of the horrors of that future world, ivhere the fire is not quenched, and the ivorm never dies.'' During this transition, I had no books to aid me, written by liberal divines. And really I did not require them. Among all the Unitarian and Univer- salist writings which I have seen, no work, as to ex- pansion or liberality of spirit and sentiment, is com- parable with the New Testament, especially the Ser- mon on the Mount, the Acts, and the Epistles. Finding myself firmly fixed in the new views to which I have alluded, I determined to state them explicitly from the pulpit. Accordingly, on the first Sabbath of July, 1834, I arose in my place after prayer, and remarked, " that I could no longer be- lieve in, avow, teach, or defend, the peculiar doctrines of the Presbyterian church." These doctrines were specified as follows : particular election, the vicari- ous atonement, original sin, physical inabililr/, and endless punishment. It was said that I was unable to find these senti- ments in the Bible ; that my reason ignored them ; and that hereafter I should deem it my duty to wage against them, both in and out of the pulpit, a war 172 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF of utter extermination. I then selected tlie subject of future punishment as the theme of my homily at that particular time. My discourse was unwritten, though I had before me copious notes of Scripture references. In conclusion, I gave them my new creed, in plain, simple, unambiguous terms. I will here transcribe it. " There are not three persons in the Godhead ; there is but one Being in the universe, of infinite, uncreated power, wisdom, and love — the Father of all mankind, the Father of a boundless majesty. Jesus Clirist was not merely a teacher, exemplar, martyr, for the truth, but he was literally and verily God manifest in the Jiesh — officially, not actually a God. He came to enlighten, forgive, and sanctify all men ; to immortalize the race ; to carry them buoyant over death to the fel- lowship of saints and angels in glory. He knows all hearts, and in the redemption of mankind, performs actions which require divine attributes ; so that we are certain that God was in Christ Jesus, (as there is a finite spirit in my body, now speaking to you,) ' reconciling the world unto himself, not imputing to men their trespasses.' " All mankind are brethren, equally dear in the sight of God, and will eventually be saved by the renewal of their hearts through faith, repentance, holiness, and the forgiving grace of which Jesus Christ is the channel and dispenser. In this life, men are under a system of perfectly just and equita- ble rewards and punishments. No sin can ever be forgiven, until he wlio committed it has suffered a deserved retribution, and heartily repented of the same. REV. THEODORE CLAPP. 173 " Pure religion and undefiled consists in loving God with all tlie heart, and our neighbor as ourselves. It is happily expressed by the three terms piety, purily, and disinterestedness — proper feelings to- wards God, holiness of life, love, and kindness, and brotherly affection for all. " The Holy Scriptures are the record of a divine inspiration. By inspiration, I mean a supernatural influence, which quahfies its recipient to set forth moral and religious truths, free from material, fatal, or essential errors. Tliese articles constitute the platform on which I now stand, and hope to main- tain so long as I live. * He who these duties shall perform, Faithful, and with an honest heart. Shall safely ride through every storm. And find, indeed, that better part.' ' The principles embraced in the above creed are my faith to-day, essentially, and have been for the last twenty-two years. When I came out of church, my friends gathered round me, especially the trustees and elders of the society. They were all astonished ; some were pleased ; many were alarmed ; but none were of- fended. One of the most influential members pres- ent remarked, " Mr. Clapp, I cannot subscribe to the declaration which you have made this morning, but I think you have taken the only right, honorable course. You have sliown your colors ; you have frankly avowed your real sentiments ; we know who you are, and on what to depend, and what you mean 15* 174 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF to teach in future. But I am afraid that, if the truth be on your side, you are at least fifty years in advance of the age. Christians in general will struggle desperately, and a long time, before they will part with the doctrines which you have openly rejected. Consequently, those of us who adhere to you will be branded, all over the United States, as errorists and dangerous heretics." Others addressed me in terms equally kind, noble, and forbearing. Nothing of a bigoted, scornful, censorious, or self- righteous spirit was manifested. Indeed, New Or- leans is the most tolerant place in Christendom. All the misrepresentations abroad touching my character and opinions have been set afloat by strangers and non-residents. Before this out-door assembly dispersed, it was proposed to postpone all action on the subject till I had delivered a course of sermons on this new gos- pel, as it was called. To this I joyfully acceded. I commenced the very next Sabbath, and kept on im- interruptedly till Christmas. My congregation gave me a fair, candid hearing, and said repeatedly that they would support me if convinced that I was right, however much it might subject them to public odi- um and unpopularity. The members of my society were singularly independent. With them, the au- thority of great names did not amount to much — " names which serve to guide the multitude as the bellwether guides his willing, faithful sheep, all of which will jump just as high as he does, even after he has knocked tlie fence flat on the ground." To pur- sue calmly, honestly, the investigation of truth in its REV. THEODORE CLAPP. 175 most retired, latent recesses ; to confess it when it is in disgrace ; to endure contempt and ridicule in its behalf; to suffer for it with a martyr's unflinching constancy, require a firmness, a greatness of soul, a superiority to all selfish considerations, which is the very essence of moral heroism. My friends supported me with an undaunted, un- shaken, unwearied resolution. Most of them are now gone. Forever fresh and sacred will be their memories in my heart. They have their reward. Only a small number at that time — I think not more than half a dozen — left me ; but a great many more joined the society on account of the stand which I had taken. It is natural for free men to love a free church, whose spirit is as wide and expansive as the heavens over us. And the seceders, too, were good men, true and conscientious. Those of them who are living at this day are my warm, steady, faithful friends. Indeed, I did not make an enemy by my Declaration of Religious Independence. Those who most dissented from me in opinion respected my candor and fairness. Here, as in every other de- partment, it holds true that " honesty is the best pol- icy." Those clergymen make a fatal mistake who suppose that an honest avowal of their opinions, however latitudinarian they may be, will detract a particle from their good standing in the public esti- mation — will lessen in any considerable degree their influence and usefulness, or diminish the num- ber of tlieir friends and patrons. Many persons have thouglit that the doings of the Mississippi presbytery towards me in the emergency 176 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF just spoken of were cruel, bitter, and vindictive. Tliis opinion I could not indorse without many qualifications and apologies for my opponents. With one exception, I believe that all the members of that body, in their measures with respect to my- self, and the church over which I presided, were actuated by pure and worthy motives. The relations between us had been most cordial and friendly. They felt no hostility to me personally, but were alarmed at what appeared to them the shocking errors into which I had fallen, and was endeavoring, by all means in my power, to propagate. Had I been in one of their places, I should have acted just as they did. I concede to others the same rights which I claim for myself. A clergyman of great celebrity passed through New Orleans in the autumn of 1834. He called to see me, and spent several hours in my study. In the course of our conversation, he said, " Depend upon it, the doctrine of Goers infinite, eternal wrath is a main pillar in the gospel of our Lord. What is there in the Bible, as you interpret it, which is fitted to restrain, alarm, arouse, and convert the base, igno- rant, hardened sinner ?" I replied, " The doctrine of endless woe, as I be- lieve, since its first promulgation, has never prevented a single sin, a single species of crime, nor reformed a single sinner. On the contrary, it has operated, immeasurably, to multiply and increase the very mischiefs it was intended to suppress. To pure, conscientious persons it has been a rack of torture, a source of unutterable anxiety, gloom, and despair. EEV. THEODORE CLAPP. 177 Instead of reclaiming the "wicked from the paths of turpitude, it has made them more reckless, desperate, and depraved. The unfounded tenet that the Creator is capable of frowning upon his children forever, and following them with his curse and displeasure through interminable ages, for the sins committed in this frail^ erring, imperfect state of existence, has contributed, more than all the other corruptions of Christianity combined, to swell that tide of vice, crime, and immoralities, which for ages has rolled its dark and troubled billows, foul as the recesses of the Stygian pit, across this footstool of Jehovah. " To me it seems more corrupting than any other idea that has ever afflicted our Aveak, sinful, unhappy, and misguided race. It represents the Father of all as inexorable, a boundless fountain of cruelty itself, gives him a character darker than Erebus, and pre- sents him in that light which must, of necessity, prevent the believers thereof from cherishing one sentiment of cordial affection for their Creator. And whoever does not love God will be sure to sin against him. The very thought of almiglity ven- geance is enough to cover earth with sackcloth, and spread over the face of heaven the gloom of absolute despair. We cannot be more perfect than the God whom we adore. Whatever we look upon as supe- rior, we assimilate to. If we embrace a sentiment which represents the Creator as cruel, partial, or revengeful, this belief, in spite of ourselves, will tend to harden and destroy all the finer feelings and sen- sibilities of our nature; make us, though ever so 178 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF sincere, sour, morose, exclusive, and bigoted ; and impart to our characters the most harsh, stern, and rc]nilsivc features. As the stream cannot rise higher than its fountain, so no one can surpass, in moral excellence, the Divinity at whose shrine he makes the continual offerings of supreme homage and adoration." The clergyman continued, " By what arguments, motives, or inducements, then, do you expect to re- claim the erring, sinful, and incorrigible ? " I answered, " They can be subdued by nothing but the power of gentleness, the melting influence of compassion, the omnipotence of love, the control of the mild over the turbulent and boisterous, the com- manding majesty of that exalted character which mingles with disapprobation of the offence the sin- cerest pity for the offender. A depraved heart will yield to nothing but love." Let me illustrate my idea by relating a couple of anecdotes. Some time ago, I was called to visit a man con- fined in the calaboose of this city for murder. He had been tried, and was condemned to be hanged. The sheriff of this parish was a very humane person, and always procured a priest or minister to repair to the cells of those who were about to suffer the death penalty. The individual I am speaking of had been reared in the Protestant faith ; so the duty devolved upon me to administer to him the consolations of religion. I found him intelligent, shrewd, but most fearfully hardened and reckless. I asked him if he entertained any expectation of being pardoned by the governor. I found that he had no hopes of this kind. When I urged upon him the importance REV. THEODORE CLAPP. 179 of making some preparation for the great change he was to pass through so soon, I was met with the assertion tliat he wanted not the prayers, the in- structions, or tlie counsels of any clergyman. " I know as much about the future world," said he, " as you do, and am qualified to do my own praying." I had the New Testament in my hands, but he re- fused to hear me read a word of it. He said that he had solicited the sheriff, as an especial favor, not to allow him to be annoyed by the intrusion of min- isters of any denomination. He was a native of Europe, an educated, well-informed man, and a con- firmed, scoffing atheist. Seeing that my presence was not agreeable to him, I rose to depart. When I took him by the hand, he said, " I per- ceive that you are a sociable man. I feel very lonely, and should be most glad to see you often, if you will not obtrude upon me the subject of religion, which I utterly abhor." I promised to call every morning at ten o'clock, till the day fixed for his execution. Walking home, I said to myself, " There must be some good tiling which this poor man loves. I will try to find out what it is, and make it the subject of some moralizing which will be agreeable to him, and per- haps may indirectly reach and soften his heart." When I visited him the next morning, I told him that I had not called as a clergyman, but as ?i friend, and should indeed be happy to say something that he could listen to with gratification and profit. I began the conversation by making some inquiries about his family. His mind at once reverted to his childhood, youth, and early home ; his parents, 180 AUTOBIOGEAPHY OF brothers, and sisters ; his first warm loves, and first bright hopes, ere he had wandered from innocence into the dark regions of sin and ruin. In a few moments he sobbed and wept like a child. I wept with him ; it was impossible to refrain from it. The prisoner was a young man, not over twenty-five years of age. He had ardently loved a yourg lady of his native place, who was married to a rival, and he ascribed his fall to this disappointment. When I left him that morning, he seemed to be a new being. His countenance had lost its haggard and ferocious aspect, and become humanized, mild, and gentle in expression. " Pray," said he, " bring to-morrow some book to read, which may help to divert me from the terrible thoughts that prey upon my heart." On the third day, I took along with me Campbell's Pleasures of Hope and Thomson's Sea- sons. In the space of twenty-four hours, his mind was so changed, that he said, " Sir, I am sorry for the manner in which I treated you during our first interview. I recant the declarations which I then made, and hope you will forget them. Last night I dreamed that I was in my native place and home. The rapture I enjoyed aroused me from my sleep to consciousness, and the bitter certainty that I shall never see that home again. that I could cherish that hope of meeting my beloved relatives and friends once more ! 0, I shall lose my reason before the hour of punishment arrives ! 0, pray for me ! O, teach me ! Are there no powers above to pity and bless me ? " I knelt down and offered a prayer, to which he heartily responded amen. REV. THEODORE CLAPP. 181 From that day forward, he gave himself up impli- citly to my guidance and direction, and became, I believe, a sincere penitent. Yet not one word was ever said to him about the anger of God, or future punishment. The very morning that he was doomed to suffer the sentence of the law, I passed a good deal of time in his cell, besides witnessing the awful catastrophe. Among other things, he said, " If I had known from early life that God was my Father, that he truly loved me, as a devoted mother does the babe of her bosom, and desired only my present and everlasting welfare, I should have been saved from a sinful life, and from this shocking and igno- minious fate." I will mention another incident to illustrate the point, that genuine repentance chiefly springs not from fear, but from the thought of the horrible in- gratitude towards Supreme Love which the com- mission of sin evinces. Several years ago there was a lady — a mother — residing in one of the Northern States, distinguished for her wealth, social position, and her religious character. She had a favorite son, for whose advancement in life great efforts had been made. But notwithstanding, he became a profligate and vagabond. I had known him in our school-boy days. The mother addressed to me a letter concern- ing her lost child. From the latest information, she believed that he was wandering in the Southern States, and besought me, if I should meet the hapless fugi- tive, to acquaint her with the facts, and extend to him such offices of kindness as I might judge expe- dient. 16 182 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OP A few days after the receipt of this letter, the young prodigal made his appearance in New Orleans, and found his way to my study. He was in a most Avoful plight, both physically and morally. In man- ners he was rude, audacious, and grossly profane. He wanted money. " Money will do you no good," said I, " unless you reform your life." " Reform ! " replied he ; " 'tis impossible ; it is entirely too late. I have no hopes ; I can never retrieve my steps. I have nothing to live for. I am the execration of all who know me. I have not a friend left in the wide world." On his saying this, I went to my desk, and took out the above-named letter from his mother. Showing him the superscription, I asked him if he knew the handwriting. He replied, with a changed, thoughtful air, " It is my dear mother's." I opened and read to him one paragraph only. In a moment he seemed as if struck by some unseen, resistless power. He sank down upon his chair, burst into tears, sobbed aloud, and convulsively exclaimed, " God, forgive my base ingratitude to that beloved mother! " Yes, the thought of that fond parent in a far dis- tant and dishonored home, wlio cherished for him an undying affection, who overlooked all his baseness, who never failed to mingle his outcast name with her morning and evening prayers, saying, (and this was the sentence 1 read to him,) " my heavenly Father, I beseech thee to preserve, forgive, and redeem my poor lost cliild ; in thy infinite mercy be pleased to restore him to my embrace, and to the joys of sin- cere repentance ; " — the thought of such tenderness REV. THEODORE CLAPP. 183 broke his obdurate heart, and tlie waters of peni- tence gushed forth. To make a long narrative brief, from that liour lie was a reformed man, and is now an inhabitant of his native place, shedding around him the blessed influences of a sober, useful, and ex- emplary life. Now, I ask, what, probably, would have been the effect upon that young man's destiny if a letter from his mother had been read to him couched in a style directly the reverse — a letter which breathed only of scorn, indignation, wrath, hatred, and menace ; which uttered only the harsh tones of bitter upbraid- ings, reproach, and denunciations ? Would it not have operated to harden his heart still more ? to have given increased vigor and intensity to his des- perate passions, and to have plunged him hopelessly into the abyss of ruin and degradation ? If all sinners could be brought to see that the Father in heaven actually cherishes for them a ten- derness infinitely greater than that of this mother, for her son, that he truly pities them, and pleads with them to return, by all the wonders of Calvary and all the sufferings of Jesus, and that he wills nothing but their highest good, — however contempt- uous, proud, haughty, selfish, and nnfeehng they might be, they could never again lift the puny arm of rebellion and disobedience against a love so amaz- ing, so boundless, and ineffable. Love only can overcome evil. A man is not truly penitent in the highest degree till he can say, in the words of Paul, " For I am persuaded that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor IS-l AUTOBIOGRAPHY OP powers, nor things present, nor things to come " — no being, no event, no created thing, no enemy, not even my fearful guilt and unworthiness — shall be able finally and forever to separate me " from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus my Lord." Every thing else may fail ; friends may die ; the earth, with all that it contains, be dissolved ; but the throne of Divine Love will remain unmoved. The waves of eternity may beat thereon ; they have no power to weaken, overthrow, or sweep it away. The above scene has been described in words as like those which were actually uttered as my memory is able to recall. I can vouch only for the substantial truth of what is recorded in this chapter. REV. THEODORE CLAPP. 185 CHAPTER VIII. EPIDEMICS OF 1837 AND 1853. REMARKS ON THE POP- ULAR VIEWS AS TO THE INSALUBRITY OF NEW OR- LEANS. THE CAUSES OF YELLOW FEVER, AND ITS REMEDIES. — ITS BEARINGS ON THE MORALS OF THE CRESCENT CITY. It is not necessary for the purpose of the present work that a detailed account, in chronological order, of the epidemics which I have witnessed in New Orleans should be spread before my readers. I have dwelt with some particularity on the great cholera of 1832. I have virtually passed through the same scenes of toil, anxiety, and suffering, at least twenty times. To describe my experiences minutely, during each of these periods of trial and hardship, would lead me into useless repetitions. I should only be exhibiting to spectators a succession of pictures of one uniform, unvaried, heart-sickening, and depress- ing gloom. Tliere is a wonderful sameness in the sombre realities of the sick room, the death struggle, the corpse, the shroud, the coffin, the funeral, and the tomb. Let me ask the reader to pause here a moment, whilst I attempt to suggest a general but very inade- quate idea of my labors and sufferings in each of the campaigns above referred to. The term of a sickly season in New Orleans has never been less than six weeks. In a majority of cases it has ex- 16* 186 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OP tended from eight weeks to ten. In 1824 it began early in June, and did not entirely disappear till the November following. On an average, it is within bounds to say that the duration of each epidemic spoken of in these pages was at least eight weeks. Multiply eight by twenty, and the product is one liundred and sixty. Hence it follows that since my settlement in Louisiana I have spent over three entire years in battling, with all my might, against those invisible enemies, the cholera and yellow fever. In those three years I scarcely enjoyed a night of undisturbed repose. When I did sleep, it was upon my post, in the midst of the dead and wounded, with my armor on, and ready at the first summons to meet the deadly assault. A gentleman of New Orleans, who was in the bat- tle, of the 8th January, 1815, on the plains of Chal- mette, by which General Jackson became immortal- ized, was one of my neighbors during the first cholera. He stood his ground manfully one day. The next morning I saw him making all possible despatch to cross Lake Pontchartrain into Florida. As I was passing by to attend a funeral, he spoke to me thus: "I consider it no sign of cowardice, but common prudence, to run away from the enemy that is now desolating our city. On the battle ground, under Old Hickory, we could see the enemy, and measure him, and cope with and resist him, with visible, sure, and tangible means. But here is a foe that we can- not see, with his fatal scythe mowing down hundreds in- a day. When contending against the British, also, we had this advantage ; every night there was a com- REV. THEODORE CLAPP. 187 plete cessation of hostilities ; and by sound sleep we were recuperated, and awoke each morning ready for the struggles of another day." He then repeated the following stanza from Campbell : — " ' Our bugles sang triice, for the night-cloud had lowered, And the sentinel stars set their watch in the sky, And thousands had sunk on the ground overpowered, The weary to sleep, and the wounded to die.' " But this terrible conflict allows no truce. The enemy is as active at night as in the daytime. I have chartered a schooner, and shall be off with my family in a few moments. I have always had the reputation of being a man of nerve and courage. But you see now how pale and trembling I am. I can stand unblenching to receive the assault of sword, bayonet, musket or cannon balls ; but this dark, unseen, infernal enemy makes me as feeble and timid as a child. I am afraid we shall be nabbed, some of us, at least, before we get into the pine woods. Farewell ; I never expect to see you again." But on his return at Christmas, he found me in good health, and learned, with surprise, that I liad not experienced a day's illness all the preceding summer. Though this man was not a member of any church, and rather sceptical in his religious tendencies, he became one of the firmest friends and supporters I ever had in New Orleans. He used to say, " Mr. Clapp, I neither know nor care any thing about your theology, but I know that there is some- thing in your bosom that makes you intrepid in times of peril, disaster, darkness, and death. I know, sir, 188 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OP that no array of terrors can drive you from the post of duty, and that, consequently, you are the very minister for New Orleans." In addition, let the reader admit to his imagina- tion another important particular, essential to even a distant and faint impression of the endurance allotted me in those " times that tried men's souls." The exercises of our minds in sleep and dreaming are determined, in a great measure, by the nature of our employments through the day. An agreeable day's work lays up a stock of delightful thoughts and sentiments for tlie silent, peaceful hours of the succeeding night. What, then, think you, must have been the images before my mind during that portion of each night, when an epidemic was pre- vailing, in which I attempted to sleep ? As to per- fectly sound, dreamless sleep, it was almost a total stranger to me. Under the most favorable circum- stances, I could only doze ; and the various sights, horrors, and shudderings of the previous day, or week, or month were constantly passing in review before mc. In those disturbed hours I often talked aloud, or prayed over and soothed and encouraged the dying sufferer. At anotlier time I would pro- nounce a soliloquy in view of some broken-down, scathed, and ■ bereaved widow, with her fatherless children, and earnestly supplicate the blessing of Heaven in their behalf. If I had seen during the day an uncommonly severe 'case of agonizing and dying, the terrific image haunted me without inter- mission for a long time, awake or sleeping. Perhaps there is no acute disease actually less painful than REV. THEODORE CLAPP. 189 yellow fever, although there is none more shocking and repulsive to the beholder. Often I have met and shook hands with some blooming, handsome young man to-day, and in a few hours afterwards, I have been called to see him in the black vomit, with profuse hemorrhages from the mouth, nose, ears, eyes, and even the toes ; the eyes prominent, glis- tening, yellow, and staring ; the face discolored with orange color and dusky red. The physiognomy of the yellow fever corpse is usually sad, sullen, and perturbed ; the countenance dark, mottled, livid, swollen, and stained with blood and black vomit ; the veins of the face and whole body become distended, and look as if they were going to burst ; and though the heart has ceased to beat, the circulation of the blood sometimes con- tinues for liours, quite as active as in life. Think, reader, what it must be to have one's mind wholly occupied with such sights and scenes for weeks to- gether ; nay, more — for months, for years, for a whole lifetime even. Scarcely a night passes now, in which my dreams are not haiinted more or less by the distorted faces, the shrieks, the convulsions, the groans, the struggles, and the horrors which I witnessed thirty-five years ago. They come up before my mind's eye like positive, absolute reali- ties. I awake, rejoicing indeed to find that it is a dream ; but there is no more sleep for me that night. No arithmetic could compute the diminution of my happiness, for the last forty years, from this single source. Setting aside another and better world to come, I would not make such a sacrifice as 190 AUTOBIOGEAPHY OP one. epidemic demands, for all the fame, pleasures, and gold of earth. What, then, will you think of twenty ? A clergyman said to me not long since, " You have indeed had a terrible time in New Orleans. You will be rewarded for it some time or other, but not here^ not here. A suitable remuneration awaits you in the kingdom of God, beyond the grave." I shocked my friend exceedingly by saying, " I neither expect any such remuneration nor desire it. I have had my reward already. Virtue is its own reward. I am no more entitled to a seat in heaven for all I have done, (supposing my motives to have been holy,) than the veriest wretch that ever expi- ated his crimes on the gallows." I repeat it, every person who does his duty receives a perfect recom- pense this side the grave. He can receive nothing afterwards, except upon the platform of mercy. For the good deeds done in the body, there is no heaven but upon earth. When will Christian ministers learn this fundamental truth of the gospel ? " The soul's calm sunshine, and the heartfelt joy, Is virtue's prize : a better would you fix ? Then give humility a coach and six, Justice a conqueror's sword, or truth a gown, Or public spirit its great cure — a cro\vn." In my efforts and struggles in New Orleans, I can- not presume to say that duty was always uppermost in my mind. Duty is to me an important, but a cold word. Yet I can assert, unqualifiedly, that I was not actuated by selfish, mercenary considera- tions — by any regard to the advantages of earth REV. THEODORE CLAPP. 191 and time. I did but follow the impulses of my na- ture. I love my fellow-beings, and when I see them in want, pain, sickness, and destitution, I fly to their relief because I cannot help it any more than water can help running downwards, or fire can help burn- ing. . I deserve neither praise nor reward for acting in this manner. It is but a necessary carrying out of those spiritual principles which God has given me, and the very exercise of which is heaven itself — is the " divinity stirring within my soul." The per- sons who speak of Christians as not being fully re- warded in this life, it seems to me, have yet to learn the alphabet of revealed religion. Again, during these seasons of trial, there is a constant drain on one's sympathies, which does not operate to lower or dry up their current, but to make it constantly more deep and rapid. It is often said that the power of sympathy is blunted and be- numbed by familiarity, and being frequently exer- cised in the same way. This opinion has been ex- pressed by the great Dr. Paley, of England, a divine whose defective powers of sensibility and imagination rendered him utterly incompetent to discuss many of the most interesting topics belonging to our spir- itual nature. My own experience testifies that the oftener a professional man, either a physician or a clergyman, witnesses the distress and pain of a fel- low-being, the greater will be his sympathy for suf- fering. As a general fact, the old physician has a much larger stock of tenderness than that with which he began his professional career. The medi- cal gentlemen of New Orleans are to a remarkable 192 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OP degree humane, sympathetic, and charitable. Every picture of woe and agony which experience has hung up in the gallery of their memories has added to the nobleness of their hearts. But it is said that increase of sympathy is of course increase of happiness. I doubt the truth of this proposition. To sympathize, in cases of dis- tress and misfortune, is to have a correspondent feel- ing of pain experienced by another. I have often seen a man come into a room where his intimate friend was dying of the yellow fever, and in one minute after reaching his bedside, turn pale, faint, and become violently affected with nausea and vom- iting. I have seen the mother repeatedly go into convulsions at the sight of spasms in her beloved child. I might mention instances of this kind to an indefinite extent. Is such sympathy a source of happiness ? To be sure, this part of our nature is divine, and prompts us to deeds of magnanimity, of heroic sacrifice. And a magnanimous, self-sacri- ficing mind is happy, compared with one that is coarse, selfish, and unfeeling. Yet sympathy with sufferers is in every instance a painful emotion. A physician once said to me, " I had some time to sleep last night, but was kept awake by a painful remembrance of the agonizing scenes I beheld yes- terday afternoon.'-' I will illustrate the position of a minister in New Orleans with regard to this matter, by relating a single item of my own experience. I was called one afternoon to attend the funeral of a gentleman who died of the yellow fever. He was a total stranger to REV. THEODORE CLAPP. 193 me. I bad never heard of liim in his life. I was introduced to the widow, who was sitting in the same room with the corpse. She had the stare, the ghastly face, and wild expression of a maniac. I tried to speak some fitting words to her. I said, " Madam, it is our privilege to be assured that what- ever befalls us in this life, however cruel and myste- rious it may appear, is the ordination of God, and is consequently intended to subserve our happiness." At this point, she interrupted me, saying, with loud, excited tones of voice, " Do not speak to me of a God or Providence. Behold that corpse," (pointing to the remains of her deceased husband.) " If there was a good God controlling human affairs, he would not have robbed me of my children first, and then taken away my husband — the only stay, prop, and support left me on earth." I could say nothing more. After a very short service, the funeral pro- cession moved off. A gentleman who lived next door to the deceased rode with me in the same car- riage to the cemetery. From him I learned the little that was known of the history of the deceased. He arrived in New Orleans the last of May, three months before his death, perfectly destitute ; he obtained a situation that yielded him a bare competence, by obligating himself to stay the whole year in the city. The epi- demic broke out. He was a man of honor, and would not leave his post. He had two interesting children, a son and daughter, who died but a few days before him. The widow was left .without a dol- lar, and had not a single female acquaintance to 17 194 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OP sympathize with her. On my return from tlie funer- al, I called at the house to see her again, hoping by that time she would be more tranquil, I found her lying on a mattress, in the same room where her husband had expired. Slie herself had just been seized with the yellow fever. There was one hired servant in the house, and a colored nurse, who were preparing to leave immediately, because they had not been paid for their services. I assumed the debt which they alleged was due, and persuaded them to remain till the lady died or recovered. They said there were no provisions in the house, no fuel, and no comforts. I gave them enough to carry them through the night, promising the amplest remunera- tion for the future, if they would but faithfully take care of the sick woman. On my way home, I called a physician to her aid. When I saw her early next morning, she was ex- ceedingly ill. Finding that there was nobody to do any thing for her but myself, I started off at once on a begging tour, for my own means were exhausted. After running two or three hours in a blazing sun, I obtained the requisite assistance. At that time there were no Howard societies, no benevolent or- ganizations, in the city. There was no concerted action with respect to objects of charity, but every thing was left to- the spontaneous generosity of indi- viduals. Yet, when I reported that a family was in want, it was easy to procure the needed aid, by giv- ing my personal attention to the matter. But this took up a vast deal of my time. To the credit of New Orleans be it said, that her inhabitants have REV. THEODORE CLAPP. 195 always been munificent in their donations for the relief of the sick and indigent. This unfortunate lady, after a most severe attack, became convalescent. The hand of charity paid all her expenses — house rent, servants' hire, undertak- er's bills, &c., till the return of autumn. Then a sufficient sum was raised to send her, with the re- mains of her husband and children, to her distant relatives. I mention this incident, not as any thing extraordinary ; it was with me an every-day occur- rence. But it may serve to show what kind of hap- piness accrues from the exercise of Christian sympa- thy. There is certainly something in it superior to mere selfishness. I have kept myself in a state of pauperism by benefactions of the kind above named. My charities for thirty-five years, in New Orleans, were not less, on an average, than one hundred dollars a month, or forty-two thousand dollars in sum total. And this was expended upon persons abject, poor, unknown, and unhonored, who could make no re- turn except that of a thankful heart. The moral history of the lady I have been speak- ing of is so interesting, that I cannot pass it by entirely unnoticed. When restored to health, she became very much attached to me, and very com- municative. Her intellect was of the highest order, and her reading extensive. In person she was not beautiful. But she, as well as her late husband, was a confirmed sceptic. On a certain time, she said, " My own history is sufficient proof that there is no God. I look back upon a life of unintcrmitted sorrow and disappointment. I married against my 196 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF parents' consent, and they disowned me. My hus- band became a bankrupt, and at last we immigrated here to retrieve our shattered fortune. " You know the sequel. I often say to myself, ' "Why did I not die in infancy ? Why was it that I have been subjected to the terrible, crushing burdens of such an adverse lot ? Now I have neither hus- band, nor children, nor family, nor means, and no friend to help me, except yourself. Let the fortu- nate praise their kind Creator ; but I am a wretch doomed to eat the bread of a bitter and neglected lot — to walk sadly and alone through this cold, un- kind, uncongenial world, till permitted to enter upon the repose of the tomb.' " By conversation and the help of appropriate books, I endeavored to inspire her with higher, more ennobling, and more cheering sentiments ; with what success will appear -from a passage in a letter which she wrote to me some years afterwards. In the succeeding winter she returned to her native place, taking along with her the remains of her husband and children. She was kindly received by her relatives, contrary to her anticipations, and became comparatively a happy and a truly pious woman. Slie wrote me many times after her departure, but is now an inhabitant of the spirit world. In one of her last letters she recorded the following words : " Suffering has humbled my pride and soft- ened my heart. I remember when you first told me that human life was not intended to be a scene of enjoyment, but a school of discipline, where, by a series of trials and instructions, the higher and REV. THEODORE CLAPP. 197 nobler capacities, which the Creator has implanted in the soul, might be developed and brought into activity. I now look upon the losses which I sus- tained in New Orleans as in reality the greatest blessings. Had my husband and myself lived there till we had become prosperous and wealthy, free from trouble, I should never have known that there was any higher good than the pleasures of time and sense. " But now I behold and commune with an infinite Father. I no longer look upon my existence as a mystery, a curse, or a misfortune ; but I feel that each passing day spreads before me glorious oppor- tunities to be improved, and glorious forms of hap- piness to be enjoyed. My health is feeble, and the physicians have pronounced me to be in a hopeless decline. Yet I am happy, and take much exercise abroad. My family bestow upon me every possible kindness and attention. Every pleasant evening I walk to the cemetery, and linger, till the setting of the sun, around the tombs of my husband and chil- dren. I have no doubts, no fears, no despondency. The graves of those I love are upon the summit of a beautiful hill. From this spot I look out upon the calm splendors of the departing day ; the golden and azure beauty of the skies, with the inspiring faitli that beyond them are those brighter regions, where I shall soon meet the true, good, and beauti- ful whom I have lost, to be separated from them no more. Under God, you were instrumental in bring- ing me out of darkness into the light of a pure and happifying faith." I could relate instances of a 17* 198 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OP similar description, sufficient to fill a volume. And I have referred to the subject simply to enable the reader to form a faijit idea of the peculiar scenes in which my professional life has been passed. But imagine what was, usually, my condition after the termination of an epidemic. Health reigns again throughout the city ; absentees, with strangers, are rushing back in crowds. The weather is as charming as that of paradise. All is stir, bustle, cheerfulness, gayety, and hope. Were one unac- quainted with New Orleans, to drop in upon us at this moment, he would conclude that we were among the happiest of communities. No hearses are seen wending their way to the burying grounds. The doctors are comparatively at leisure. The posts of employment, made vacant by the recent mortality, are soon filled by strangers, as young, ardent, hope- ful, and sanguine as were their predecessors, and destined, most of them, to share the same fate. But there is one class of persons whose hands and atten- tion are still occupied by the melancholy duties devolved upon them by the epidemic which has just closed. The work of the clergyman, occasioned by this visitation, is protracted through the succeeding win- ter, the year, and perhaps many succeeding years. Poor families, in greater or less numbers, have been left destitute and dependent. They have none to look to but the minister, who stood by, in the dark hojir, to pray, soothe, and support them, when their beloved husbands and children were consigned to the grave. They conclude, as they ought to do, that REV. THEODORE CLAPP.' 199 " pure religion and undefiled before God and the Father is, to visit the widow and the fatherless in their affliction." Though entire strangers, simply because I was with them in the season of sorrow and bereavement, they would come to me for counsel and aid, with as much confidence as if I had been a brother by the ties of natural affinity. I was re- garded as the common friend and benefactor of the unhappy of every age, church, character, clime, and complexion. I have labored as much for those belonging to Orthodox and Catholic societies as for poor heretics and outsiders. I have always felt that any one who could say, " I am a man," had a sacred and imperative claim to my sympathies and kind in- terposition. Neither God nor mortality hath any respect of persons. From Monday morning to Saturday night this class of sufferers used to besiege my doors, and draw upon my pecuniary resources. Young children had places provided for them in asylums, or private fam- ilies. Older boys, of a suitable age, were appren- ticed to some merchant, mechanic, or planter. But there is a great demand for such situations after an epidemic is over. There is often much difficulty in obtaining them. I could not tell how many weeks I have spent in hunting patrons for fatherless, for- saken, indigent boys. Tlien the widows were to be taken care of, and their wants, taste, capacity, and even whims could not be disregarded. Some had never been trained to any useful employment what- ever, and had not the requisite skill to use the needle. What could be done for them ? Why, they 200 AUTOBIOGILVPHY OF would tell me that they were able to manage a boarding house in excellent style, and there was one close by which they could procure, if they had only two or three hundred dollars to start with. Mr. Somebody would advance the funds, if I would be so kind as to indorse a note for them. The note is executed ; the establishment is opened under apparently favorable auspices. But, in the space of a few months, through mismanagement, it fails, and to prevent being protested, I have the note to pay. The lady, then, perhaps, finds a second hus- band, and embarks once more upon the dangerous sea of matrimony. In a short time, she comes to me with some doleful story of maltreatment and desertion, and wishes me to put her upon the way of obtaining a divorce. Another, Avho had an excel- lent situation in a good family as a seamstress, had some misunderstanding with the lady of the house, and she has resolved not to live there another day. She modestly asks me to get another place for her, and she expects me to attend to it without. delay. A third walks into my study when I am absorbed in meditating a discourse for the next day, and in- forms me that the man to whom I lately married her, and who seemed to be the very pink of moral- ity, is not as good as he ought to be — is quite lati- tudinarian, indolent, and intemperate in his habits. The landlord threatens to turn her out of doors, unless the rent is paid before sundown. To prevent this catastrophe, she wants a loan of twenty dollars, which she will certainly return some day next week. REV. THEODORE CLAPP. 201 She obtains her request, and has hardly left the room before a fourth calls, to let me know that her son, for whom I got a place in a certain store, ware- house, or counting room, is overworked, besides being subjected to indignities which his father would not allow him to submit to an hour, if he were alive. His month is out, and she is determined that he shall never set his foot in that establishment again. It would be better for him to be in his grave than longer to endure such ill usage. She is succeeded by a fifth visitor, who, addressing me with much warmth and a look of upbraiding, says, " You, sir, recommended a certain family as the best and safest place for my daughter in the whole city. But she is not only made a menial of, instead of being treated as one of the daughters, but the gentleman who, you said, was so pious, meeting her yesterday alone, offered her a gross insult ; and I have taken her home that she might not be abso- lutely ruined." In this way I am, perhaps, interrupted all Saturday morning, till the hour for dining has arrived. Next day, in all probability, the weather will be delight' ful, and I shall have to speak to a large audience, and among them will be many strangers of dis- tinction, who have lately arrived ; I am entirely unprepared. These thoughts weigh heavily upon my mind, and make me sick. I am so nervous that I can neither cat nor sleep till the labors of the Sabbath are over. Heaven have mercy upon a clergyman incessantly molested by trials and importunities like these. 202 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF They make tlio salubrious months of the winter almost as undesirable as the preceding autumn, which was so saddened with pestilence and death. When a man is buried, he can trouble you no more ; but these survivors of the conflict may follow you to your grave. Yet these imfortunate persons are not to be blamed for the course they tak-e. They can do no better, as a general fact. Upon every principle of honor and religion, the community is bound to take care of them. In New Orleans this, obligation is recognized. A few years ago some cliaritable ladies belonging to the different religious denominations of the city, Protestant and Catholic, started an institu- tion called the Widows' Home. It was fostered by benevolent individuals, and by the legislature of the state. Dr. ]\tercer, formerly of Natchez, Mississippi, but now of New Orleans, a man not only of wealth, but munificence, — another Poydras, Touro, or Law- rence, — has taken this establishment under his especial patronage. He has already bestowed on it fifty thousand dollars, and is prepared to increase his benefactions, if they shall be needed. This gentle- man lias higher and nobler aims than to make his fortune merely subservient to his physical enjoy- ment — to the throwing around him, in the greatest superfluity, the luxuries and refinements of genteel life. He gives bountifully to churches, schools, mis- sions, almshouses, and other institutions. He does all that becomes the opulent friend and helper of humanity to elevate it in knowledge and virtue, and animate it with hopes of a more glorious destiny hereafter. REV. THEODORE CLAPP. 203 The two most fatal yellow fevers which I have witnessed were those of 1837 and 1853. In tlie former year there were ten thousand cases of fever reported, and five thousand deaths. The epidemic broke out about the middle of August, and lasted eight weeks. This is the greatest mortality wliich was ever known in the United States, if we except that which occurred in the cliolera of New Or- leans, October, 1832. The year 1837 is memorable for the introduction of what is called the quinine practice. It is now, I am told by the physicians, generally abandoned. By some persons abroad, our doctors have been much blamed for thinking to over- come the yellow fever by the above-named medicine. For myself, I do not wonder that they made such an attempt. It had been recommended by the most celebrated practitioners in the West Indies, and in other tropical regions. New Orleans has always been blessed with the most learned, skilful, and com- petent physicians ; but they are neither omniscient nor omnipotent. The cause of yellow fever is to this day a profound mystery. It has been said that this is a true but humiliating confession by Dr. Dow- ler, of New Orleans. I quote from an article of his, published in the New Orleans Directory in 1854: — " Heat, rain, moisture, swamps, vegeto-animal de- composition, contagion, and numerous other alleged causes are altogether inadeqxiate and unsatisfactory. This might be shown by travelling over hundreds of inconclusive and contradictory volumes, filled with special pleadings, diluted logic, theoretical biases, and irrelevant facts. 204 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OP " It is most certainly the duty of every writer on yellow fever to explain the cause of it, if he can ; but it is equally his duty not to sin against the deca- logue of logic, any more than against the decalogue of Moses. Fortunately, the conditions, if not the causes, of yellow fever are to a considerable extent known. For example, it is known to be connected — no matter how — with the warm season of the year, with unacclimated constitutions, with aggregations of people in towns and villages, &c. It rarely attacks rural populations unless they crowd together so as to become virtually towns. " A correct appreciation of these conditions is next in importance to the discovery of the cause of yellow fever. Probably the former may prove, after all, the more important ; for the discovery of the cause by no means warrants the conclusion that it is necessarily a removable or remedial one. The seeds of plants taken from Egyptian mummies contain the vital principle after the lapse of thousands of years, and will grow when the proper conditions shall be present, as heat, moisture, and earth, while the vital cause is in the plant. It is, therefore, a fundamental error to require a writer to explain the ens epi- demicum, or to receive the alleged doctrine of conta- gion as the only alternative, when he cannot show what the cause is. "It is better to acknowledge ignorance than to advocate an error. It is better to keep a question of this sort open, tlian dogmatically to close it against investigation. In the former case, the truth may be discovered ; in the last, never. To knoiv ignorance is EEV. THEODORE CLAPP. 205 preferable to ignorance of ignorance. To know that as yet we do not know, is the first step to be taken. Despair is not philosophical. The possible who can limit ? If the cause of yellow fever has not been discovered, it may yet be ; and when discovered, it may, or may not, be controllable. If it should never be discovered, any more than the cause that pro- duces on the same soil a poisonous and a nutritive plant, it is probable that at least its essential laws and conditions may be ascertained, so as to afford advantages and protection equal to those derivable from the knowledge of its true cause. All the les- sons of philosophy teach that yellow fever has a cause, without which it cannot appear, and with which it cannot fail to appear. Its antecedents and sequences must prove, when known, as invariably connected and simple as any part of physics. " The diversity of opinion on this subject among the learned is wonderful. Dr. Rush and others af- firm that the plague left London as soon as coal was introduced into the city as fuel. Now, the part of New Orleans most severely afflicted with yellow fe- ver in 1853 was in the neighborhood of the foun- deries, where vast quantities of coal were used. Sometimes the firing of artillery in the streets and public squares has been followed by the retreat of the epidemic ; at other times it has added an impetus to its march, as the eating of a salt herring was once followed by the recovery of a Frenchman and the death of an Englishman. The same is true of tar- burning. Milk, coffee, London porter, and various other articles have sometimes cured the black vomit, 18 206 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF at others they only helped on the disease. A process which has cured the yellow fever one year, the very next will destroy all the patients." Consequently, when an epidemic sets in, the phy- sicians are in a quandary. They begin, perhaps, with medicine that was most efficacious in a former year ; but it kills rather than cures. In this case what can they do ? They must practise empirically. It is inevitable. They must travel blindfold, in a great measure. If they knew the cause of the com- plaint, they could apply medicines with skill and success, and avoid painful, and often most fatal mis- takes. I have always sympathized with the physi- cians in New Orleans. Their duties in a sickly sea- son are most arduous and responsible. Often have I seen them in a few weeks reduced to their beds by anxiety, toil, watchings, and disappointment ; and multitudes, instead of thanking them, have cursed them, because they did not at once expel the epi- demic from the city, which they could no more con- trol than they could raise the dead. Lately, our physicians have repudiated the use of drastic medicines in the treatment of this disease. They rely upon gentle remedies, the keeping up a constant perspiration by rubbing, and various exter- nal applications. The system of therapeutics at present adopted in New Orleans, with respect to diseases in general, approximates, in many particu- lars, to that prescribed by the homoeopathic faculty. It is certainly much more successful than tlie prac- tice which was prevalent some years ago. In one of the earlier epidemics, I saw a physician, in his first REV. THEODORE CLAPP. 207 visit to a patient, who had been ill but four hours, take from him, by the lancet, fifty ounces of blood at one time. The sick man was bled till he fainted. He then ordered him to swallow, at once, three hun- dred grains of calomel and gamboge. So the physi- cian himself testified. This sort of practice now would be regarded as certainly inevitably destruc- tive of life. In May, 1858, I went to Boston, Nahant, and Ni- agara, for my health. When at the Falls, I heard, by the telegraph and private letters, that the yellow fever had again become epidemic in New Orleans. This was in the warmest weather of July. Leaving my family, I immediately hurried home by the most expeditious route. I went in a steamer to Charles- ton, thence by railroad to Montgomery, on the Ala- bama River. From that place I took the mail route to Mobile, and reached the levee in about one week from New York. I was put out at the depot just before daylight. This is on tha banks of the river, about a mile from the centre of the city. Whilst waiting to get my baggage, I could smell the offensive effluvium that filled the atmosphere for miles around, resembling that which arises from putrefying animal or vegetable matter. As I rode upwards towards the heart of the city, I became quite ill, and on rcacliing my resi- dence was seized with fainting and vomiting. I took a bath, and was partially relieved. I then ordered some tea and toast, intending to spend the next twenty-four hours in my room, for I was completely overcome by fatigue and want of sleep. But the 208 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF hackney coachman knew me, and, contrary to his promise, spread the news of my arrival. Before I had time to change my apparel, I was called on for professional services. In about one hour after entering my domicile, I left it to breathe the pestilence of a sick room. Here I found a phy- sician, who was one of my parishioners and intimate friends. He exclaimed, " I am very sorry to see you here. I did not suppose that you could commit sucli an imprudent act as to come directly from tlie salubrious regions of New England into this cliarnel house, this receptacle of plague and death. It will cost you your life." From that day forward till November, I was enabled to attend to my duties every day. I was not seriously ill for an hour. At this time, the city was full of moisture. It had been raining more or less every day for two months. And this falling weather lasted till the 20th of September. Some medical gentlemen thought that tlie severity of the epidemic was owing to the exces- sive rains of that summer. But the constant showers washed the gutters every day, and kept them clean. Besides, immense quantities of lime were strewed along the streets, yards, and squares, the exhalations from which were supposed to be antiseptic. It is a curious fact, that in 1837 the season was remarkably cool, clear, and dry. The weather resembled that of the so-called Indian summer. Yet the pestilence was never more destructive. And this very year, the fever was as virulent in the balmy, delightful weather of October, as it had been in the preceding rainy months. I judge, therefore, that the yellow REV. THEODORE CLAPP. 209 fever is not affected, one way or the other, by mete- orological changes. On the day of my arrival, it rained incessantly from morning till night. In the space of twelve hours, the interments were over three hundred. The same day, I visited two unacclimated families belonging to my own church, who were all down with the plague. In these families were nine per- sons ; but two of them survived. I knew a large boarding house for draymen, mechanics, and humble operatives, from which forty-five corpses were borne away in thirteen days. A poor lady of my acquaint- ance kept boarders for a livelihood. Her family consisted of eight unacclimated persons. Every one of them died in the space of three weeks. Six unacclimated gentlemen, intelligent, refined, and strictly temperate, used to meet once a week, to enjoy music, cheering conversation, and innocent amusements. They had been told that it was a great safeguard, in a sickly summer, to keep up good spir- its, and banish from their minds dark and melan- choly thoughts. They passed a certain evening to- gether in health and happiness. In precisely one week from that entertainment, five of them were gathered to the tomb. One of the most appalling features of the yellow fever is the rapidity with which it accomplishes its mission. There is some difficulty in arriving at the true statistics touching the epidemic of 1853. It was supposed by the best informed physicians that there were fifty or sixty thousand unacclimated persons in New Orleans when the epidemic began, about the 18* 210 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OP 1st of July. From that time to the 1st of Novem- ber, the whole number of deaths reported were ten thousand and three hundred. Of these, eight thou- sand died of the yellow fever. The physicians esti- mated that thirty-two thousand of those attacked this year were cured. Of course, if this calculation be true, the whole number of cases in 1853 was forty thousand. The horrors and desolations of this epidemic can- not be painted ; neither can they be realized, except by those who have lived in New Orleans, and have witnessed and participated in similar scenes. Words can convey no adequate idea of them. In some cases, all the clerks and agents belonging to mercan- tile establishments were swept away, and the stores closed by the civil authorities. Several entire fam- ilies were carried off — parents, children, servants, all. Others lost a quarter, or a third, or three fourths of their members, and their business, hopes, and happiness were blasted for life. The ravages of the destroyer were marked by more woful and af- fecting varieties of calamity than were ever deline- ated on the pages of romance. Fifteen clergymen died that season — two Protestant ministers and thirteen Roman Catholic priests. They were strangers to the climate, but could not be frightened from their posts of duty. The word fear was not in their vocabulary. Four Sisters of Cliarity wore laid in tlieir graves, and several others were brought to the point of death. It is painful to dwell on these melancholy details, but it may suggest profitable trains of thought. Set before your imagi- REV. THEODORE CLAPP. 211 nations a picture of forty thousand persons engaged in a sanguinary battle, in which ten thousand men are killed outright. One thousand persons will fill a large church. Suppose ten congregations, of this number each, were to be assembled for worship in Boston, on the 1st day of July, 1858, and that on the first day of the following November, in the short space of four months, all should be numbered with the dead. This mortality would be no more awful than that which I have witnessed in the Crescent City. In a letter which was written by myself to the Rev. Thomas Whittemore, September, 1853, are the following lines : " Let us look for a moment at a rainbow of beauty spanning this dark cloud of pes- tilence. During the past season of gloom and afflic- tion, the inhabitants of New Orleans have displayed a degree of heroism, a power of philanthropy, to me absolutely unparalleled. Families of wealth and ease, instead of going over to the delightful watering places in this vicinity, on the sea shore, to enjoy themselves, have passed the whole summer in the city, and devoted their days and nights to the taking care of poor, stricken-down, forlorn strangers, who had no claims to their charities but the ties of our common humanity. I know one gentleman and lady in independent circumstances, who have had under their charge, in the course of the summer, as many as thirty poor families, and all strangers to them. These they have taken as good care of as if they had been of their own kith and kin. Such things have been common all over the city, and in all 212 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF classes of our heterogeneous population. The mem- bers of the Howard Association have achieved mir- acles of benevolence. I hesitate not to say, that this city, in the late fearful visitation, has given to the world an example of Christian philanthropy as lofty as can be found in the records of all time. I have often thought, that if our northern brethren could have been in New Orleans the past summer, they would no longer entertain a doubt but that a slave- holder may be a Christian — the highest type of man, the 7iobIest ivork of God. Every means which ingenuity could devise or benevolence suggest has been employed to avert and mitigate the evils of the plague. More than two hundred children have been made orphans, and the ladies within and around the city are making clothes for them, and doing every thing possible to promote their welfare. " Another thing which has deeply impressed my heart is, the northern sympathy which has been dis- played towards New Orleans, notwithstanding the people of the free states are so widely separated from us, in opinion and feeling, with respect to the subject of slavery. Laying prejudice and antipathies aside, they have shown that divine benevolence which dis- dains all the limits dictated by selfishness, and looks upon every human being within its reach as having a sacred and imperative claim to its kind offices. What more could have been done for us than has been done ? I should like to shake hands with Mr. Gerritt Smith, and thank him with all my heart for his munificent subscription for the relief of the suf- ferers in our late epidemic. And Boston, the me^ REV. THEODORE CLAPP. 213 tropolis of my native state, has given for us, I be- lieve, a larger amount, in proportion to her popula- tion, than any other city. Massachusetts should be the first in all noble and illustrious charities, as she is confessedly preeminent in the glories of science, social refinement, and pure religion." Such were my impressions of these scenes, which were com- mitted to writing at the time they occurred, in the autumn of 1853. Thucydides has bequeathed to us a tragic and striking description of a plague which, in his day, took place at Athens. He tells us that demoraliza- tion raged there equally with the epidemic — that all the ties of friendship, of affinity, of moral responsi- bleness, of honor and religion were dissolved. All the refinements of civilized life, according to his statement, were swept away by a deluge of licen- tiousness — wild, frantic excesses, neglect of the sick and dying, the plunder of houses, murder, and other atrocities too awful to mention. The narratives of the plagues which have prevailed in Europe in mod- ern periods contain similar statements. Are they credible ? If so, then it is certain that mankind are infinitely better now than they were in the olden times. In the epidemics which I have witnessed, instead of unusual depravity, an extraordinary degree of be- nevolence has prevailed, shedding a heavenly light upon the dark scenes of the sick room, the deathbed, the coffin, the funeral, &c. Yet, with respect to this subject, New Orleans has been most shamefully mis- represented. In the summer of 1824, an English 214 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF officer came into our city on his way from Jamaica, West Indies. He was an intrepid, well-informed, interesting man, and was induced to visit New Or- leans simply to gratify his curiosity. It ha])pened that he came to our church one Sunday morning ; after the services, I had the honor of making his ac- quaintance. He said he was glad to be with us in days of mourning, disaster, and death, for he wished to become acquainted with all the phases of suffer- ing humanity, and had much rather see New Or- leans in the sickly season than in the healthy period of winter. He accompanied one of our physicians to the Charity Hospital, and walked with him through all the yellow fever wards. He used no pre- cautions, and seemed to be entirely s\iperior to fear. We admired his courage, equanimity, and gentleman- ly bearing. After a fortnight's sojourn, he left us in good health. On his return to England, his travels in the United States that summer were published. A copy of the work fell into my hands. In turning to that portion of the book descriptive of his experiences among us during the time just mentioned, I was astonished at the assertion, that New Orleans, in the midst of a dreadful epidemic, was full of merriment, intemper- ance, and gayety. He says the sick were neglected and abandoned ; that crowds rushed every night to balls, operas, and theatrical amusements ; and that intoxicated persons were often seen uttering profane and ribald language when employed in burying the dead — in performing the last sad offices which hu- manity calls for. Words more false, defamatory, and EEV. THEODORE CLAPP. 215 unjust could not be written. Similar fictions are propagated in our northern cities concerning New Orleans every time an epidemic prevails there. Yet the fact is, that in the darkest days its inhabitants have deported themselves nobly, and recognized the sacred claims of religion and humanity. Many of these libels are circulated in letters professedly writ- ten by persons who were eye and ear witnesses of the scenes which they described. It seems to give some men peculiar delight to de- preciate and vilify human nature. It is easy to be severe, harsh, satirical, and disparaging in comment- ing on the behavior of our fellow-beings. But no one was ever too charitable in his views of other men — their motives, principles, character, or con- duct. It has been my lot, for the last forty years, to reside in what are reputed to be the worst places in the civilized world ; yet to this day I have not met a person so hardened, so brutal, as to be capable of treating with indifference, neglect, or levity, the suf- fering forms of humanity within his reach. In New Orleans, I have been often struck with admiration to see persons in the lowest walks of life making every possible sacrifice of time, ease, and money in attending on the sick, soothing the dying, and pro- viding tombs and a decent burial for those who were absolute strangers, and utterly destitute. I go so far as to say, that I have never, in a single instance, seen poor and wicked people (as they are called) declining to perform all the offices of charity in their power to the ill and distressed around them. This most terrible form of sin has sometimes, perhaps, 216 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF been manifested in the higher circles of humanity. I have never behekl it even there. When I hear liuman nature run down, — prayed, preached, or talked against, — I feel that it amounts to a virtual impeachment of God's own perfections. It is but a depreciation, a slandering of his own glorious work. I have witnessed noble and disinter- ested actions among all classes of mankind, not ex- cepting the rudest and most vulgar. I knew a woman, herself impoverished, and so ignorant that she did not understand the meaning of the phrase " self-sacrificing benevolence^'' take a sick child from an adjoining house, whose father and mother had just died of the yellow fever, and watch over it till worn out with fatigue and anxiety, without the slightest hope of any reward, and when even her own children were dependent upon her daily labor for subsistence. I saw much of this woman, on whom the proud and fashionable, perhaps, would look only with contempt. She was faithful, sincere, truth-loving — the just, conscientious, generous friend of the poor, cast down, forgotten, and suffer- ing, who could make no return for her kind doings. Yet she had never been a member of any church, and could not read her Bible. I have seen poor young men, standing on the vesti- bule of mercantile life, close their stores, suspend all business, give their days and their nights, their toil and their money, to the relief of sick, indigent, and helpless strangers, from whom they could neither wish nor hope for the smallest remuneration. I have known them to carry on this work of charity, EEV. THEODOIIE CLAPP. 217 till their health was -unclermined, and their lives were offered up as a sacrifice on the altar of philan- thropy. And these persons were not members of any Christian church. What is religion, or philos- ophy, falsely so called, arrayed against such facts as these ? I was once at Niagara when a man was carried over the falls. For fifteen long hours he clung to a log jutting out from between the rocks in the middle of the cataract. Thousands were spectators of the awful scene. What was their conduct ? The suf- ferer was a mere youth, about twenty years of age, one of the laborers engaged in excavating a canal, — a foreigner, without a relative near, — in the humblest possible condition and circumstances ; yet the multitude looking on wrung their hands, sighed, struggled, and wept, as if he were united to them by the tenderest ties of affinity and love. What efforts were made for his deliverance ? Had it been practi- cable, almost any sum of money might have been raised to effect his rescue. For what ? Because his life, on selfish principles, was of the least value to any person present ? A gentleman from the Southern States offered a reward of one thousand dollars to any individual who would suggest a feasible plan for saving him. Shame on the traducers of man's lieaven-descended nature. They simply felt that the sufferer belonged to the great brotherhood of human- ity. This was the secret of their excitement, their sympathy, their tears, and labors for his salvation. Now, during the prevalence of an epidemic, the people of New Orleans act in the same way. They 19 218 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF are in the highest degree earnest, excited, serious, anxious, ready, one and all, to pour out their treas- ures and their hearts' blood, if it could avail, to save the victims of disease from the jaws of destruction. The pulpit, literature, })hilosophy, and even poetry, lend their combined influence in helping on the work of misrepresenting and blackening the glorious traits of our holy nature. The preacher sometimes tells us that there is no real goodness outside of the church. Who were the three hundred men that laid down their lives at the Straits of Thermopylas, to vindicate the liberties of their native land ? Who were the thousands that have labored, toiled, and died, in New Orleans, in the cause of benevolence ? What estimate would be formed of their characters, if they were tried by the line, square, and compass of the Westminster Catechism ? Call up from the mists and shadows of l^ygone ages those noble and sublime forms, those right, enlarged, generous, phil- anthropic men, who poured out their lives for the common weal. These men, in our day, would not, on examination as to their creed, be admitted to the communion of any Orthodox church. No, nor would the Son of God himself. The church has done more to propagate mean conceptions of human nature than all the other influences which have tended to corrupt, darken, and debase our misguided race. 1 repeat it, our books of travel, our history, poe- try, romance, — the entire body of our literature, — newspapers, reviews, works on political economy, &c., all aid the pulpit in undervaluing and carica- REV. THEODORE CLAPP. 219 turing human nature. I have never seen a letter, published in the northern religious newspapers, pur- porting to be a picture of the moral state of things in New Orleans, which was not a gross libel. Every one is exclaiming, " See, behold, how awfully wicked the world is ! " I cannot join in this hue and cry ; I long to exclaim in and out of the pulpit, " Behold how good and noble mankind are ! " I have mixed and conversed with the operatives of Birmingham, Manchester, and Glasgow, and other manufacturing cities of Great Britain. I have seen the lazzaroni of Naples, and the most depressed classes of Europe ; among even these I witnessed the manifestations of disinterested love, which Jesus Christ defines as constituting the essence of true religion. The very worst person has something of this nobleness in his bosom. It is a perfection, the idea of which, however dim and undefined, is more or less the germ and element of every human soul. Go to any state penitentiary, collect its inmates, set before them the picture of a man " who loves the most unlovely of his fellow-beings, as God himself does ; who is accustomed to sympathize with the most ignorant and debased ; to give to the most un- charitable, if in need ; to forgive those who are actuated only by revenge ; to be just to those who would rob him of every farthing, if they had an op- portunity ; to repay ceaseless hate with never-sleep- ing love;" would they not gaze upon the portrait with the profoundest satisfaction and delight ? But all know that it is impossible for a human being to sympathize with any virtue, unless he has in his own 220 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF bosom some true pcrccptious of its cliarms, and a capacity to become clotbed tberewitb. I bave often come across tbe heroism of divine love in tbe hum- blest Avalks of life, in the very lanes and hovels of society. And on such occasions I always thank God and take courage. Cicero, in one of his moral treatises, remarks that our aflfectional nature constantly improves. Be- ginning with the tender sensibilities of home, it imperceptibly enlarges, from the love of parent, brother and sister, to those more expanded regards which embrace the vast society of human kind. Pope has thus paraphrased the thought : — " Self-love but serves the virtuous mind to wake, As the small pebble stirs the peaceful lake : The centre moved, a circle straight succeeds ; Another still, and still another spreads Friend, parent, neighbor, first it will embrace, His country next, and next all human race." Setting aside the Bible, with all its propitious influ- ences, I have long thought that the progress and experiences of human life, themselves, without any other instrumentalities, except the Holy Spirit, which operates on every heart, often inspire the soul with those meek and gentle affections that are the essence of evangelical holiness. I have been in the habit of asking persons, in their dying moments, whether they could, with all the soul, forgive their enemies — their bitterest enemies. Invariably they have answered in the affirmative. " We forgive all, as we hope God will forgive us," I ask, Do not all such persons die in possession of the right spirit ? For Jesus declares the forgiveness of enemies to be REV. THEODORE CLAPP. 221 the highest type of love. He tells iis that in heaven love is the only, the universal, and all-controlling principle of action. It has glowed, and been grow- ing more intense, in the bosoms of angels, from eternity. Here we may be neglected, forgotten, despised, injured, and trampled upon. But be not discouraged. All things will come out right at last. Raise your eyes, saitli Jesus, to that spirit land where all things are radiant with the beams of an unbounded benevolence. There we may anticipate perfect love and confidence, the interchange of beneficent deeds only ; a complete union of tastes and feelings, hearts and fortunes. There we, and all wliom we love, are destined to become more inti- mate and endeared, beauteous and refined, as long as eternity shall last. To me it is plain that the gospel affirms this doc- trine : that no creed, no scheme of redemption, no power of faith, or repentance, is sufficient to insure one's salvation who hates his brother. Equally positive is it in asserting, that all who die in the exercise of a forgiving spirit will go to heaven. Tliis category embraces all mankind, excepting in- fants and idiots. I know the clergy generally teach that death, of itself, has no power to change or im- prove the moral character. A more erroneous doctrine was never taught. Mere dying does more towards sanctifying a man than all the preceding acts, events, and influences of his life. It is the furnace by which he is purified, and prepared to enter, some time or other, upon the scenes of a purer and nobler exist- ence, with angels and the just made perfect. 19* 222 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF CHAPTER IX. THE STATE OF RELIGION IN NEW ORLEANS THIRTY-FIVE YEARS AGO. THE ROMAN CATHOLIC CHURCH OF LOUISIANA. ITS AUSPICIOUS INFLUENCE ON THE HIGHEST WELFARE OF ITS VOTARIES, MORAL, SOCIAL, AND SPIRITUAL. THE PECULIAR DIFFICULTIES WHICH CHRISTIANITY ENCOUNTERS IN NEW ORLEANS AT THE PRESENT DAY. Multitudes suppose that genuine Christianity was not introduced into New Orleans till after its ces- sion to the United States, the beginning of the present century. The first American missionaries, who visited the place shortly after the close of the last war with Great Britain, in their published let- ters and reports, expressed the opinion that the preaching of the gospel was as much needed in New Orleans as in any other spot in the whole world. They affirmed that there the pure faith of the New Testament was unknown and untaught. Yet the Catholic religion had been flourishing in that place from its commencement, one hundred years pre- vious. Churches, schools, asylums, nunneries, and other institutions, such as are usually found in Catholic communities, had been built, with great labor and expense. When deliberating on the expediency of making a settlement in New Orleans, I was told by divines of my own denomination, that if I went there, the most formidable enemy of the gospel would be REV. THEODORE CLAPP. 223 arrayed against me — namely, the Papal cliurch. From a child I had been taught to regard Popery as the man of sin, the great adversary of all goodness, described in the Epistles and the Apocalypse by St. John. In the chart of interpretation, pronounced orthodox at the north, numbers, dates, persons, places, and events were particularly laid down, to prove that all the evils, woes, and calamities men- tioned in the book of Revelation were the maledic- tions of Heaven, denouncing the Roman Catholics. My instructors assured me that the Catholic faitli was rapidly spreading in the western and southern parts of our country. It should be counteracted, they said, as far as possible, by sending out Protes- tant missionaries, and establishing Sunday schools throughout the great valley of the Mississippi. One can hardly imagine how strong, blind, and hateful were the prejudices against this Christian sect which deluded my mind when I began a profes- sional life in New Orleans. I liad been there Init a few weeks before I was invited to dine at the house of a liberal gentleman, where I was introduced to several Catholic priests. I found them intelligent, enlarged, refnied, and remarkably interesting in con- versation. Not a syllable was uttered about the dif- ferences of our faith. I was charmed with their style of manners. They left their clerical robes at home, and deported themselves with all the ease, elegance, and affability characteristic of well-informed and polished laymen. Before we separated, I was assured that they would be happy to see me at their private residences any time, and in the most free and 224 AUTODIOGUAPHY OP unceremonious manner. Gladly did I avail myself of an opportunity to cultivate their acquaintance. I wanted to obtain some personal knowledge of their peculiar faith, principles, and ceremonies. Hereto- fore, all that I had learned concerning these topics had been derived from Protestant writings and con- versation. I was anxious to hear them speak for themselves. In this respect my desires have been completely gratified. The first time that I was alone with a Catholic priest was an epoch in my existence. I was encouraged, contrary to my expectation, to propose whatever questions I chose in regard to his religion. I did so, and was always answered with apparent candor, directness, and sincerity. It seemed to afford him great pleasure to impart the information which I was solicitous to acquire. In a long conver- sation we discussed the principal articles of the Catholic creed — the authority of the pope, the worship of images, transubstantiation, the infallibil- ity of the church, auricular confession,