BX 8495 .G26 T47 1891 
 Thirkield, W, P. 1854-1936. 
 Rev. Elijah H. Gammon 
 
QUARTERLY BULLETIN 
 Gammon Theological Seminary 
 
 Rev, Elijah H, Gammon 
 
 A MEMORIAL ADDRESS 
 
 BY 
 
 V 
 
 Wilbur P. Thirkield, D. D. 
 
 Delivered on Founder's Day, December Twenty-Third 
 1891 
 
 ATLANTA, GEORGIA 
 
Digitized by the Internet Archive 
 in 2014 
 
 https://archive.org/details/revelijahhgammonOOthir 
 
Memorial Address. 
 
 THIS is our Founder's Day. In other years we have 
 observed it with joy and gratitude, and with messages 
 of hearty congratulation to our living friend and ben- 
 efactor. Now out from us and away into the heavens 
 he has passed to his reward. Henceforth this is also our 
 Memorial Day, on which we shall not only contemplate his 
 work, but shall also celebrate the character of the man who built 
 his thought and life into this Institution which we cherish as his 
 enduring monument. 
 
 This is no time for unconsidered tribute or indiscriminate 
 praise. Like one before him, Mr. Gammon would rather change 
 the established rule of necrology, "Say nothing but good of the 
 dead," and substitute for it, " Say nothing of the dead but truth " 
 He who was honest to the core and loved the truth would, if 
 he could speak to us, ask on this Memorial Day only the tribute 
 of unadorned and simple truth. Standing in the presence of his 
 rounded life, in all honesty we may say : Here is a man of 
 wisdom, energy, fortitude ; of unbending integrity and indomi- 
 table perseverance ; a man of genuine mental and moral texture 
 through and through ; without vanity and free from ambition, 
 and of religious sincerity almost severe in its inflexibility. If 
 at times stern and severe seemed this man, yet sterner and 
 severer was he with himself than with others ; a man whom we can 
 think of as stoic or martyr, but never as one given to "softness 
 or needless self-indulgence ; " — in short, "at all times equally 
 without pretension or parade, a simple-living, nobly-daring, much- 
 enduring man." A strong lover of the truth ; a stout advo- 
 cate of justice and humanity ; a preacher of righteousness ; the 
 poor man's friend — a son of God. 
 
 The mind loves a shining mark. The emblazoned deeds of the 
 orator statesman, soldier, stir the imagination and command the 
 homage of men. The quiet deeds of even the great and good that 
 have larger and more lasting significance in the welfare of a race 
 or the life of a nation, go almost unheralded and often unsung. 
 
4 
 
 Great influences flowing forth from such a quiet life we are to 
 bring to record this day. Here are no "moving deeds of flood 
 and field " to chronicle ; no triumphs of statesmanship or bril- 
 liant achievements of forum or pulpit. We are to consider the 
 simple life of a plain man, who thought and lived out his life in 
 this common-place world ; a life that can be surveyed and mapped 
 out ; the life of a preacher, yet one for years more largely taken 
 up with the plannings and figures of business that men call sec- 
 ular, than with the unseen and intangible realties of the world 
 eternal ; a life marked by no angelic visitants, glorified by no 
 recorded visions celestial. Yet we are to look into the life of 
 one who loved God and achieved large things for his fellowmen ; 
 who, amidst the world of business and the love of money and the 
 deceitfulness of gain, cherished a noble purpose and a high phi- 
 lanthropy. We are to walk in brief companionship with a man 
 who poured the matured powers of heart and brain into an insti- 
 tution for the redemption of a race and the spiritual uplift of 
 humanity. If a life is to be estimated by results, then here is a 
 life not to be measured by human measuring lines or computed 
 by man's arithmetic. If to live in lives made better by our life 
 and work is not to die, then here is one who mightily lives. If 
 the measure of greatness is influences set in motion and sus- 
 tained, that through all generations shall help mankind to 
 larger life and spiritual power, then here is a life that lays large 
 claim to greatness among men. 
 
 The name we commemorate is Elijah H. Gammon. His life 
 is marked by some of the tender, heroic, enduring qualities of 
 the old prophet whose name he bore. He was a man of the 
 mountain-type, strong, rugged, stern ; yet, clothed as are the 
 mountain sides with verdure and flowers, so he, to those who 
 knew him best, with a tenderness and beauty of nature befitting 
 his heroic mould. 
 
 For years associated with him, in relations almost filial in 
 their trustfulness and growing veneration, when, on the third 
 day of last July, among the granite hills of his own native New 
 England, the tidings came of the death of this father in Israel, 
 
5 
 
 I felt that an Elijah had indeed been called for, and my heart 
 cried out : " My father ! my father ! the chariots of Israel and 
 the horsemen thereof ! " 
 
 Who that knew him could doubt his triumphal end ? Dur- 
 ing all his closing years, his thoughtful, prayerful, unselfish 
 planning for a School of the Prophets, had prepared him for a 
 prophet's ascension and a prophet's home. We go on with our 
 work, as did the companions and friends in the Prophets' School 
 at Jericho, and we see his face no more. Men say, " His life has 
 gone out." No ; his life is going on. " His light quenched." 
 No ; his faith in God, witnessed by his princely beneficence, has 
 set his light as a star in a golden candlestick. The candlestick 
 is removed, but the light shines on. 
 
 " Were a star quenched on high, 
 
 For ages would its light, 
 Still traveling downward from the sky. 
 
 Shine on our mortal sight. 
 
 " So, when a great man dies. 
 
 For years beyond our ken, 
 The light he leaves behind him, 
 
 Lies upon the paths of men." 
 
 Youth. 
 
 Elijah H. Gammon was born on Gilman Pond plantation, 
 now Lexington, Maine. The year was 1819, December the 
 month, the day the 23rd. 
 
 The oldest son, he early knew the humble, toilsome life of a 
 Yankee farmer's boy, hardening his tissues by severe labor; 
 felling the pines ; rolling rocks from the fields and building those 
 stone fences, to stand gray and lichen-covered for generations ; 
 trudging off through the snow to the district school; studying 
 his lessons of nights by the light of pine knots ; hearing sermons 
 in the humble meeting-house from the Methodist itinerant. On 
 the little farm of his parents, struggling against poverty, the 
 toilsome youth of Mr. Gammon was spent. The home was 
 humble, but its four walls did not limit the horizon of an aspir- 
 ing mind. God's world was in clear view, and he had a mind 
 open to the divine significance of things. 
 
6 
 
 He was well born, inheriting from a poor but honest and 
 sturdy ancestry a stout body, a clear brain, good natural sense, 
 strong, healthy instincts ; the very best ground out of which to 
 grow solid manhood. 
 
 The Preacher. 
 
 The two facts that stand out clear in the life of Mr. Gam- 
 mon in Maine, are his conversion at the age of seventeen under 
 the preaching of James Farrington, and his entrance on the 
 work of the ministry at the age of twenty-four. 
 
 Recognizing God's special claim upon him in a divine call 
 to the ministry, at the age of nineteen he is teaching school to 
 assise himself in his preparation for this work. Licensed to 
 preach in 1843, he is appointed to Wilton, in which place he 
 marries Miss Sarah J. Cutler. In 1851 failing health from 
 bronchial difficulties induced him to join the large company of 
 New Englanders, who had found a milder climate and large 
 fields of usefulness in Illinois. Here he entered the Rock 
 River Conference and filled appointments at St. Charles, Jeffer- 
 son street, Chicago — the nucleus of Centenary church, which, 
 in later years, his thought and devotion did so much to build up 
 and sustain — and Batavia. In 1855 occurred the death of his 
 wife. At the close of his first year at Batavia in 1855, his 
 qualities as an administrator called him into the presiding elder- 
 ship, where his systematic energy and skiU found a larger field 
 in organizing and directing the work of the church Mr. Gam- 
 mon was married in 1856 to Mrs, Jane C. Colton, a woman of 
 superior culture and noble Christian character. In 1858 his 
 health again .breaks; the old bronchial trouble takes chronic 
 hold on him ; and that year he takes a superannuated relation to 
 the Conference. 
 
 Mr. Gammon was a man of the first order of native ability. 
 Of large brain and strong powers of reasoning, he placed not so 
 much dependence on printed books as some men. The world of 
 nature and human life was an open book to his observant mind. 
 He worked carefully his own natural resources. He knew the 
 Bible, and was a preacher of the Word. The quality of his 
 preaching is indicated in his choice of texts, a record of which 
 
during the greater pirt of l8o3, '54 and '55 we have. They are 
 texts suggestive of the basal doctrines of Christianity ; texts 
 which are a call to solid thinking on life and destiny. Numbers 
 of them reveal a sympathetic heart open to the trials and strug- 
 gles of his people. As a pastor he was methodical, tender, pains- 
 taking. He 
 
 " Lived himself the truths he taught, 
 White-souled. clean-handed, pure of heart.'" 
 
 Two incidents come to us from the life of tliis preacher of 
 righteousness which are prophetic, and should have record here 
 as throwing light on the special philanthropic work that crowned 
 his liYe The)' show that this pouring forth of the best treasures 
 of thought and planning and giving in his last years, more espe- 
 cially for the sake of a race struggling up out of bondage, was 
 the result of no mere whim or caprice or sudden impulse of gen- 
 erous sentiment for the Negro. 
 
 Away back in Maine when anti-slavery men were few and a 
 hated band, he took his stand against slavery. Being solicited 
 to open with prayer a meeting called in the interests of the 
 Mexican war, he refused, because he believed that the war was 
 in the interests of unrighteousness. He voted the first aboli- 
 tion ticket and continued on that line tdl Emancipation. 
 
 Up to the time that he entered the Rock River Conference, 
 no anti-slavery resolution had been passed by that body. He 
 suggested, at an early session, to one of the leading members, 
 that action on this vital subject should be taken, and he was 
 thus indirectly instrumental in securing the passage of the first 
 resolution against slavery in that conference. 
 
 The Man of Business. 
 
 For a full year after he was forced by failing health to leave 
 the pulpit, Mr. Gammon waited before entering upon a settled 
 business. The choice of the enterprise into which he finally 
 put his thought and strength is a revelation of the sagacity of 
 the man, guided, as we believe, by Divme Providence. His 
 prophetic eye saw the immense harvests to be gathered out of 
 the great West and the possibilities of machinery in reaping 
 them. His influence and success in developing this industry is 
 
H 
 
 simply phenomenal when we remember that up to the age of 
 forty his only experiences had been those common to a farmer's 
 boy, a school teacher and a Methodist preacher. Yet, from 
 Easter's Implement World, we have this remarkable tribute to 
 the business ability and genius of the man: 
 
 " It is hardly possible to measure the influence Mr. Gammon 
 had in the successful improvement of the methods of reaping 
 the harvests of the world, and also it is not too much to say that 
 the development of the harvester and binder used to-day every- 
 where in all grain-fields from what was known and used twenty 
 years ago is largely due to him. He was connected with its 
 progress almost from the beginning and with the experiments 
 made until the development into the successful machine used 
 to-day by thousands of farmers." 
 
 Under the guidance of events, ordered by a wisdom higher 
 than his own, the man himself, with his keen insight, unerring 
 judgment and power to see mto and measure the demands of 
 the future, furnishes the only explanation of this remarkable 
 record of achievement. He had the mind that would grasp 
 large plans and hold them clearly before him till he could see all 
 round and through them ; yet also that mastery of details, which 
 is the strength of successful execution. 
 
 His life was not found between the lids of his ledger. His 
 soul lived outside the mechanism of business. He stood aloft, 
 master of the machine. He was not like that man of business 
 spoken of by Hazlitt who, merely yoked to a go-cart, destitute 
 of imagination, had " no ideas but those of custom and interest 
 on the narrowest scale ; " but rather belonged to that class of 
 men alluded to by Burke in his speech on the India Bill, " mer- 
 chants who acted in the spirit of statesmen." 
 
 The Philanthropist. 
 
 As a preacher, Mr. Gammon's active work was over thirty 
 years ago. As a man of business, his marked success with its 
 record of honor and probity, would inevitably have been forgotten 
 along with the careers of other men of affairs. It is as a philan- 
 
9 
 
 thropist that his name will be known and honored among men. 
 We give honor to this man not chiefly because this Institution 
 bears his name, or because he gave his half-million of treasure 
 to found and perpetuate it ; but for the reason that this Semi- 
 nary largely embodies his life. Emerson speaks of an amiable 
 and accomplished person who undertook a practical reform ; yet 
 he was never able to find in the man the enterprise of love he 
 took in hand. Hence his action was tentative and could not in- 
 spire enthusiasm. 
 
 Not so with Mr. Gammon. Back of all his giving was a great 
 soul filled with love for humanity, and a firm and well-formed 
 purpose to incarnate his life in a form that should live for the 
 cause of God and man, and thus perpetuate his ministry that was 
 cut short. He deliberately set his mind to the task of choosing 
 the field of his beneficence. Once chosen, tested, adopted, the 
 work represents not merely his money. The best thought 
 and energy of the man are poured into it with a devotion as delib- 
 erate as' it was devout, and which finally kindled into an enthusi- 
 asm that made luminous and glad his closing years. 
 
 Mr. Gammon's relations to the beginnings of this Seminary are 
 illustrated in that peculiar type of deliberation in which an acute 
 observer has discovered four processes : "When E. H. Gammon 
 had an important subject upon his mind, he would conceive an 
 idea and allow it to germinate without mentioning the subject to 
 any person ; this process might take months. Next he would 
 begin to ask questions about it in a way so quiet that only to 
 those who knew him well would there be any indication of his 
 thoughts. The third step was the suggestion to those with 
 whom he conferred of various hypotheses as to their conditions, 
 limitations, cost, probable results. After this a long period of 
 silence, out of which he would emerge with a matured plan. Af- 
 terward it was difficult to cause him to vary." 
 
 Cherishmg a plan of large beneficence, his mind turns towards 
 the South as a possible field for profitable investment for the 
 kingdom of God. He sees here a race that has shown since 
 emancipation elements of stability and power in their intellectual 
 
10 
 
 and religious life. With a genius for religion ; with largely an 
 untrained ministry ; with their future hinging on the intelli- 
 gence, purity and stability of their church life, Providence ut- 
 tered a Macedonian cry for an institution especially devoted to 
 the preparation of a trained and consecrated Christian ministry. 
 In an hour of conscientious meditation, some such call must 
 have reached Mr. Gammon. 
 
 Seeking light on the subject from his old friend. Dr. Fuller, 
 he is encouraged and his mind is directed towards Atlanta. At 
 about the same time Bishop Warren has taken up his episcopal 
 work in the South, and God lays on his heart the burden of a 
 trained ministry especially for the colored race. Providence 
 brings these men together. The story of the beginnings and 
 the progress of their work in which they builded larger than 
 they knew, is best told in the account given in the Christian 
 Advocate by Bishop Warren himself: 
 
 " Having been in partnership with him in his most important 
 business, I wish to put on record some knowledge gained in that 
 intimate relation. While I was under a burden of soul and im- 
 portunateness in prayer for the means of educating the leaders 
 of our half-million church members in the South, Brother Gam- 
 mon caused it to be intimated to me by Dr. Fuller that he was 
 interested. I immediately started for Chicago. The result of a 
 long, earnest and comprehensive conversation was that we would 
 go into partnership to establish a theological school at Atlanta. 
 He was to put in $25,000 and I $20,000. I depended on the 
 Lord's treasure in the hand of his stewards to back me. He 
 needed no backing. Before we got through we each had put in 
 more than we proposed. When the school building was finished 
 we dissolved the partnership of business, but kept the one of 
 heart, which had grown to be far dearer and more important than 
 the other. To the end of his days we were known to each other 
 as ' my partner.' 
 
 " Soon after the school was finished he took out all the money 
 I had put in and built a hall for Clark University, adjacent, and 
 honored me by calling it by my name. He never knew that 
 
11 
 
 the Theological Seminary was to be called by his name till it was 
 (lone. When he saw that the Seminary had a need he met it. One 
 day he said to Dean Thirkield's wife: 'This great school-hall 
 is not a fit place for you and your little children Come out on 
 the campus and select a .spot for a house ' He built it. And 
 then built three more for other professors. A library building was 
 needed. He met it with one of the most artistic buildings that 
 ever delighted a well-trained and appreciative eye. 
 
 "Then he took the School into full membership to love and 
 to cherish till death part. He meant to endow it with a quarter 
 of a million dollars. He did. The result may turn out that he 
 wrought larger than he knew ; certainly larger than we knew. 
 It was a wonderful and rare opportunity, and this old-time abo- 
 litionist from Maine had matured the insight to perceive it. The 
 opportunity was not far behind Lincoln's; millions, for thousands 
 of years, shall call him blessed." 
 
 He has found a wise and zealous partner in Bishop Warren, 
 who is warmly seconded by Dr. Rust, and the commodious and 
 well-appointed hall is .soon rising on the commanding site, spe- 
 cially purchased for the building. Twenty thousand dollars of 
 his gift endowed the chair of the first professor, Mr. Gammon's 
 only stipulation being that he should be a young man. 
 
 The Dean of the School, then a department of Clark Univer- 
 sity under the presidency of the Rev. E. O. Thayer, entered 
 upon the work of organization and instruction, October 3d, 1883, 
 with two students in attendance. A full three years' course 
 of study is projected. A single professor, for two years, is 
 left to carry on the School. This was the experimental stage 
 of the work. With much deliberation and some tokens of 
 abiding interest, Mr. Gammon waited and watched the experi- 
 ment. Information as to the progress and possibilities of the 
 work was always welcomed by him. These years of observation 
 and careful inquiry satisfied his mind as to the urgent necessity, 
 and the large possibilities of permanent usefulness of a thor- 
 oughly equipped school for the training of ministers for the 
 ever-enlarging field of Christian enterprise, especially among the 
 colored people of the South. 
 
1-1 
 
 When his mind in its deliberations had once passed the ex- 
 perimental stage, those who had at times been inclined to dis- 
 couragement at his reticence and seeming lack of hearty co-op- 
 eration, were astonished at the large plans, the matured ideas, 
 and the marked enthusiasm which, at one bound, he brought 
 into the work. He had not been idle or indifferent as to the 
 enterprise. Those four stages of that deliberation of a peculiar 
 type were in "this long period of silence" bringing forth that 
 "matured plan" from which "it was difficult to cause him to vary." 
 
 It has been thought that a better view of the man himself — 
 of his relation to this work ; of his high hopes and his growing 
 enthusiasm, as the result of clear planning and settled convic- 
 tions, might be best conveyed through e.xtracts from Mr. Gam- 
 mon's letters. 
 
 In the spring of 1885 came a memorable letter, for the first 
 time revealing his large plans and his lofty and devoted pur- 
 poses as to this enterprise, which had been silently maturing 
 for, who can say how many years ! 
 
 " Twenty-nine students is a large showing for the second 
 year. I expect great results from your school. * * * 
 I hope and intend that it shall be the best theological school of 
 the whole South." * * * 
 
 In July, 1885, after a personal visit to Batavia, when matters 
 as to the future of the school were fully discussed and the plan 
 of endowment and enlargement definitely settled, and a second 
 professor provided for, he gives most enthusiastic assurances of 
 his entire devotion to the interests of the Institution : 
 
 "If you have your ordinary success in drawing the students 
 in and teaching them, and I have ordinary business success, we 
 will make that Institution such a power in the South as no one 
 outside conceives of. I intend to devote the balance of my life 
 to the interests of that school. I have faith in it ivithout a doubt. 
 [Italics his.] Please secure all you can for scholarships, in your 
 travels, as that will fill up the school with good students." 
 
 Later, in 1885, he writes in high hopes : 
 
 " I believe if you and I live ten years, we will see your scliool 
 
in 
 
 occupying a position in the front rani<. ; doing a work fully equal 
 
 to Garrett or Drew, and so recognized." 
 
 His growing enthusiasm in the work was inspiring : 
 
 [1886.] "If I prosper in business and your faith fail not, * 
 
 * * we will have sixty students there next year. Won't that 
 
 be glorious " 
 
 His "glorious" anticipations were happily more than real- 
 ized, the attendance being sixty-one. 
 
 The abiding interest of his epi.scopal "Partner" always de- 
 lighted him : 
 
 [1886.] " I received a letter from Bishop Warren last week 
 full of enthusiastic confidence as to the wonderful effects of the 
 school." 
 
 The remarkable address of Dr. (now Bishop) Haygood at the 
 Fourth Annual Opening of the school, wherein he gave the Insti- 
 tution a place of possible importance and responsibility second 
 to none in the Methodist Episcopal Church, and in the entire 
 South, gratified but did not surprise his hopeful and prophetic 
 soul, as the following letter shows : 
 
 " I wrote you a few lines in haste, yesterday, of Dr. Hay- 
 good's speech as printed in the Journal. His whole speech must 
 have been a wonderful production. I think the preachers of 
 the South should generally have a copy of it, and possibly a 
 judicious distribution of it in the North would do the school 
 quite as much good. You must have had a glorious time. 
 
 " What amazed me was that Dr. Haygood's views so fully 
 coincided with mine. I did not think there was a man, North 
 or South, who agreed with me on the importance of your school ; 
 but Dr. Haygood seems to be fully up to my measure. * * * 
 It rejoices me exceedingly that he takes the same view of the 
 subject. They are words fitly spoken, and their influence will 
 never die." 
 
 As Mr. Gammon studied the situation, he became convinced 
 that this school, to fulfill its largest usefulness, should be inde- 
 pendent in its organization and government, and thus sustain 
 the same relation to each school in the entire system of educa- 
 
tional institutions of the Freedmcn's Aid and Southern Educa- 
 tion Society. His careful study of the field, and his long expe- 
 rience as a trustee of Garrett Biblical Institute, had led him to 
 this view. 
 
 The following points are therefore important as outlining his 
 plan. He writes, Feb. i8, i8<S7: 
 
 "They [the Freedmen's Aid Board] will hardly ignore my 
 proposition or put it off indefinitely, as it contemplates securing 
 the school an endowment of not less than two hundred thousand 
 dollars at my death, I reserving the revenue from it during my 
 life. The conditions are : 
 
 "First. That it be made an independent school, under the 
 control of the Freedmen's Aid Society. 
 
 " Second. That they support the professors, except the sen- 
 ior professor, during my life. 
 
 " TJiird. That they give the school what lands it needs, as 
 Dr. Rust and I can agree upon. I want some land west of Cap- 
 itol avenue. I also want to help the school with what means I 
 have to spare in building, etc., during my life." 
 
 What noble purpose ; what generous confidence are here : 
 
 [1887 ] " I would like to see it the best theological school of 
 the whole South, white or black. I am certain that we are on 
 the right track, and have made no mistake thus far." 
 
 We lay claim to the name philanthropist for our founder^ 
 because of the spirit of the man, as indicated in this account of 
 his splendid beneficence. He did not wait till in sight of the 
 grave and then cast off his wealth as a possession he could no 
 longer use ; but, living, he poured out his treasures ; yea, more, 
 he gave the ripe thought of his last years — planned, and prayed, 
 and wrought for the equipment of this Seminary. The measure 
 of his philanthropy is not in that he gave ten thousand dollars 
 to Garrett, five thousand dollars to the Maine Wesleyan, thou- 
 sands to churches and aid to many struggling students. The 
 mere catalogue of benefactions is no measure of the real phil- 
 anthropist. The -man Jiimself, his motive, his purpose, his sac- 
 rifice, his unselfish enthusiasm, his giving of thought and time 
 
15 
 
 and heart for humanity — these are the test of genuine philan- 
 thropy. The history of this man stands the test. 
 
 " Not what we give, but what we share, 
 For the gift without the giver is bare." 
 
 Before the Seminary was opened, he traveled through the 
 South with Mrs. Gammon to view the field. To most men of 
 wealth, the opening South was a name for business opportunity 
 and gain. Their journeyings revealed to them mountains of 
 coal, great beds of iron, railroads, cotton mills, lands, forests, 
 water power. They saw an emancipated race, representing 
 raw labor and profitable toil. The entire outfit meant opportu. 
 nity for gain — a kingdom of wealth and power in this world. 
 But here is a man who had given thirty years to iron and 
 machinery, lands and business. His keen eye sees these mate- 
 rial resources, but does not rest there. He is looking for higher 
 things ; for a kingdom that is not of this world ; for an invest- 
 ment of money in mind ; for making his wealth count for the 
 Kingdom of God. 
 
 He sees a race numbering millions, with millions more 
 to come. Out of two centuries of slavery, they have come 
 with two positive inheritances — the English language and the 
 Christian religion, without which their marvelous strides forward 
 and upward in the last twenty-five years never could have 
 been chronicled. They have reared the fabric of vigorous and 
 aggressive church organizations. They have built more than 
 ten thousand churches. A membership of a million and a half 
 has been gathered. The form and vitality of the Christian 
 religion has been preserved by a ministry largely ignorant, and 
 often with low ideals of life and false conceptions of religion. 
 The church is the centre of their social as well as religious life. 
 The ministry is the centre of power, and to a great extent holds 
 in its grasp the weal or woe of these people. 
 
 The race is rising into intelligent thought and independent 
 purpose. A crisis is on the churches. The problem is how to 
 hold the rising generation to the Church, by a ministry with lit- 
 tle mental discipline or spiritual culture. The call for trained 
 
16 
 
 ministers is growing urgent. It soon will be imperative. Yet, 
 for these ten thousand ministers, preaching and to preach to ten 
 millions of their race who shall look to them for light and guid- 
 ance, there is not a single theological school in all the South, 
 with liberal equipment, devoted distinctively and solely to the- 
 ological training. 
 
 We lay claim to the title philanthropist for this man, in that 
 ne sees, seises jipon, and occupies this immense opportunity for 
 the redemption of a race. 
 
 Why did his philanthropy take this form } 
 
 He did not endow this school merely for the sake of the 
 Methodist Episcopal Church. He wanted to help all his fellow- 
 men through all the churches. It was entrusted to the care and 
 direction of the Methodist Episcopal Church, as best adapted 
 through its spirit, organization and government in the South, to 
 carry out his plans. 
 
 His benefactions took the form of a theological school 
 because he believed that the ministers held the centre of power, 
 and were to be the leaders of their race for years to come. 
 
 He established an institution open especially for the Negro 
 race, not because they were black, but because they were the 
 most needy of all men. He simplyjgave practical expression 
 to his faith in the fatherhood of God and the brotherhood of 
 man. He was no sentimentalist as regards the Negro. He 
 simply had a heart as broad as humanity — a great heart backed 
 by conscience — and without prejudice, it went out to this race as a 
 part of God's family, needing the touch of Christ's hand, through 
 him. He shared the view of Lowell: 
 
 " In the gain or loss of one race 
 All the rest have equal claim." 
 
 Those strong words, addressed by Wm. Morris to Elizabeth 
 Fry in his "Vision of Saints," may well be spoken of this friend 
 of ours : 
 
 " O clear-eyed soul, 
 
 That saw undimmed the light above the mists 
 That blinded worldly eyes ; because it knew 
 
 The Rule of Right — one with the Law of God ! " 
 
17 
 
 How many eyes, blinded by the mists of prejudice, failed to 
 see the possibilities of usefulness among a despised people, just 
 struggling out of conditions entailed by bondage — or seeing, 
 spurned to link name and life-work to a recently enslaved race. 
 
 But here is a sun-crowned soul, whose eyes are "above the 
 mists;" his conscience true to the " Rule of Right ;" his pur- 
 pose " one with the Law of God ; " and so he builds his life into 
 God's ever-widening plans for a race ; and now, ascended, takes 
 his place alongside of those lovers of their fellow men to whom 
 the Master has said : " Inasmuch as ye did it unto one of the 
 least of these, my brethren, ye did it unto me. Enter thou 
 into the joy of thy Lord." 
 
 The Man. 
 
 "The tna?i is more important than the preacher," is a saying 
 of Mr. Gammon to Dr. Buckley, when in 1864, he had removed 
 to Detroit and was seeking a pastor for himself and his family. 
 This is just like him. He believed that the crown of creation 
 is a man. Strong as he stands before the world as preacher, 
 merchant, philanthropist, as we have seen — the real hiding of 
 power is in the man himself. 
 
 He was a well-made man. Nature made him strong all 
 through. There was a great deal in the man, of original endow, 
 ment and capacity for growth. He was no mere accretion, but 
 grew as an oak. Large of body, strong of brain, orderly, well- 
 balanced, he was built up to stand "four-square to all the winds 
 that blow." 
 
 A man given to deep thought, he might well say — "My mind 
 to me a kingdom is." He had a genuinely live, vigorous mind ; 
 plenty of brains, and he knew how to use them. The greatness 
 of the man lay in his strength and rectitude of will, rather rhan 
 in versatility of intellect. He had the basis of scholarship. 
 With the mind of a statesman, thorough training, good health and 
 opportunity to exercise his powers would have given him a high 
 place in the affairs of church or state. He was fitted not so 
 much for leadership, as for counsel. He had wisdom and fore, 
 sight that could plan a campaign, and a will to carry it through. 
 
18 
 
 Integrity in its original meaning and deepest sense, was illus- 
 trated in his character — completeness, moral soundness. Double 
 dealing, false words or dissembling looks cannot be thought of 
 him "The inner substance and the outer face " were a har- 
 monious whole. He was no man to play a part. 
 
 Such was his breadth of view and largeness of h.iart, in his 
 sympathy for humanity, that over his portrait in jour library, 
 might truthfully be written the words uttered by Governor John 
 Albion Andrews, th^ brave, great-hearted War Governor, of 
 Massachusetts, at the Martha's Vineyard Camp Meeting : 
 
 " I know not what record, of sin may await me in another 
 world, but this I do know; I was never mean enough to despise 
 a man because he was poor, because he was ignorant or because 
 he was black." 
 
 Nurtured in the close and frugal habits of New England life, 
 frugality became the unconscious habit of his life. His salary 
 for the first year in the ministry was one hundred dollars, and 
 he saved a portion of that sum. Here was laid, in close living 
 and hard experience in saving, the foundation of subsequent for- 
 tune. He was misunderstood, as he lived on, holding to the 
 great fortune that was so rapidly multiplying in his hands. In 
 this there was purpose. Seeing his entire life in the light of his 
 closing years, we mus:; siy, here is a man who did his duty as 
 God gave him to see it. How much easier to have yielded to 
 the plans of others and to have scattered the fortune that, in his 
 very latest years, so amazingly increased, and made possible the 
 realization of his largest plans. His experience in old age gives 
 indication that he always cherished some large and noble plan 
 of beneficence with which to crown his life work. 
 
 His modesty was genuine and unaffected. During all these 
 years, never a spoken word in public. It has been noticed that 
 the enthusiasm of the students, at sight of the dear old gray 
 head, embarrassed him. Asa Trustee, his spirit of modesty ap- 
 pears in the following : 
 
 " My convictions are very strong upon this point, but I have 
 no more rights than any other trustee. I voluntarily surren- 
 
1!) 
 
 dered all my rights, so that it could not be said that I wished to 
 control the school b\- my position or influence." 
 
 And what self command was his. He held his powers in 
 control with the grip of a moral giant. No one could think of 
 him as showing the flutter and weakness of mere hurrv. He 
 knew what haste meant, but with what calmness, tranquility, 
 strength, did he face every emergency. 
 
 Gravity marked his bearing. He walked as one conscious 
 of grave responsibility. His spirit of reverence and de\'outness 
 were marked. "He was a devout man ; one that feared God and 
 prayed to God alway." Who gave alms to the poor, and builded 
 a synagogue. 
 
 He never trifled with God's word. He did not have so much 
 respect for the doctrines of men. 
 
 His devout and worshipful spirit found expression in joining 
 his brother-in-law, Captain Newton, in building a beautiful tem- 
 ple of worship in the town of Katavia. 
 
 It is significant that his benefactions took that form. The 
 choice of such an artistic plan, shows his delight in the beauty 
 of the Lord's house. Truly, 
 
 •' His soul was full of awe. 
 
 And reverence for all sacred things: 
 And brooding over form and law, 
 
 He saw the Spirit's wings." 
 
 Far removed from the sentimental, yet Mr. Gammon was a 
 man of strong and even tender sentiment. True, in him, intel- 
 lect and will predominated. Yet he delighted in nature, and 
 had a fondness for the best in painting and sculpture. He was 
 movetl by the real, the strong, the genuine. I'nderneath all was 
 a heart of peculiar tenderness, which did not a[)pear on all occa- 
 sions. Few men \vere more generous in their appreciation of 
 straightforward, unselfish work. Like most men capable of 
 the highest friendship, he had few close friends. These he 
 grappled to his heart with hooks of steel. He confided in them, 
 encouraged them, trusted them. 
 
 If I were asked to simi up the character of this man in a 
 single term, I should utter the one word : " Gexuineness." 
 
20 
 
 This quality of reality, sincerity, honesty, incorruptibleness, 
 was ingrained. He saw through the mere show of things. He 
 hated shams. He was even inclined to look askance at all that 
 savored of the sentimental. Mere rank or station counted little 
 with him. He stood aloft, strong ancj fearless in his own integ- 
 rity. He was no mere eye-servant, waiting for the verdict of 
 his fellows or the suffrage of the world, in order to determine 
 his course of action. He preserved a manful spirit of indepen- 
 dence. He was a man of conscience. He opened his soul to 
 the light ; then followed that light that is from above. Man was 
 not his master. He was the servant of God. Man's approval or 
 condemnation were felt, but did not turn him from the line of 
 light that, shining from above, marked out God's path for him. 
 He was a bold believer, and a strong doer of the Word. An 
 honest doubter, 
 
 "He fought his doubts and gathered strength, 
 
 He would not make his judgment blind, 
 He faced the spectres of the mind, 
 
 And laid them : thus he came at length 
 To find a stronger faith his own ; 
 
 And power was with him in the night, 
 Which makes the darkness and the light. 
 
 And dwells not in the light alone. 
 But in the darkness and the cloud." 
 
 In the one fact of the conversion of this sturdy, thoughtful 
 son of New England, however, we find the tap-root of his char- 
 acter. Without the influence of the Christian religion, the life 
 and work of Elijah H. Gammon cannot be accounted for. He 
 was a man of faith. He was rooted in God. From Heaven 
 came the strength, inspiration and guidance that made the man. 
 Fixed as is the oak in the earth, with roots girding the granite 
 beneath, yet free in its upward growth of trunk and limb and 
 leaf, drinking in the sunlight and tossing its branches in the 
 storm ; so was his soul fixed yet free in God. 
 
 Last Days. 
 
 It is a grateful memory, that of the last five months of Mr. 
 Gammon's life among men, three were spent on this Campus — 
 
21 
 
 a spot that had become the centre of his constant thought and 
 affectionate interest. 
 
 Though much of the time in painful weakness, yet his delight 
 was in the Seminary and its future. A new building for chapel, 
 lecture rooms and offices occupied much of his thought. He 
 studied plans for it, and figured out the finances of the enter- 
 prise ; he longed to live to see this hall, completing the group 
 of main buildings, rise on its granite foundations. 
 
 Though he said little, yet it is evident that he thought much 
 of that other building, "the house not made with hands." 
 
 He did not want to die, but he was not afraid to die. He 
 knew his stewardship was ending. The best calculations of his 
 last years were given to the getting in readiness of nis accounts 
 for the Last Day. 
 
 One night, in the home of his much loved niece, he sat 
 thoughtfully over the pages of an open "Guest Book," in which 
 he had been asked to write. For years the home represented 
 by that book had been his delight. But he was now looking 
 beyond the temporal, as he wrote — "Yours in hope of im- 
 mortality." Leaning back thoughtfully, he said: "You see 
 what I have written. That's the one thing I think about most 
 — the hope of immortality." 
 
 Soon after, lovingly attended by Professor and Mrs. Craw- 
 ford, he went to his Batavia home. Here his last days were 
 brightened by the presence and ministrations of the beloved wife, 
 who, for thirty-five years, had been the inspiration and joy of his 
 life ; a rare woman, spiritually minded, generous, devout ; who 
 into all the plans of Mr. Gammon, entered with a personal inter- 
 est and enthusiasm that cheered and sustained him in his most 
 beneficent purposes. 
 
 In great peace, on July 8rd, he entered on immortality, leav- 
 ing on record as his final word and testament : " I commit my soul 
 to God and the Word of His grace, trusting in and through the 
 merits of our Lord Jesus Christ, to obtain everlasting life." 
 
 "The chariots of Israel and the horseman thereof have 
 
•i2 
 
 stooped for another Elijah. Whether it was honored more by 
 the first passenger than the last God only knows." 
 
 From the beautiful Batavia church, his body was carried to 
 Graceland Cemetery, and laid beside the cherished daughters, 
 and the greatly beloved and only sofi, Charles Wesley. 
 
 The work of his hands in sowing and reaping was over. But 
 his soul is living and working on through thought and purpose 
 nobly embodied. 
 
 He, who, by his prophetic wisdom, had done more than any 
 one man to send forth reapers whose multiplied powers should 
 gather in the vast harvests of the great West, as the shadows 
 of his day began to lengthen, standing near the Master and 
 looking out upon the great fields of the South, heard a voice 
 saying : 
 
 " Lift up your eyes and look on the fields ; for they are white 
 already to harvest ; and he that reapeth, receiveth wages, and 
 gathereth fruit unto life eternal." 
 
 He could not go, but he could prepare men, and send them in 
 his stead. And the significance of his response may be realized 
 in the more than two-score of spiritual harvesters, who as 
 Alumni of this .Seminary are even now out in the fields reaping 
 harvest of souls. With a work only well begun, with an Institution 
 equipped for the centuries, "who can so forecast the years" as 
 to give an estimate of the harvests to come that the sons of 
 Gammon shall reap and gather into the Kingdom, 
 
 Praise God, he lived to see some results of his work ; and it 
 is a grateful memory, on this his day, to recall how his last days 
 were gladdened as he saw 
 
 " Ere his eye was darkened, 
 
 The sheaves of the harvest bringing; 
 And knew, while his ear yet hearkened, 
 
 The voice of the seraphs singing." 
 
Quarterly Bdlletip. 
 
 FEBRUARY, 18!>2. 
 
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 AND February. 
 
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