LIBRARY OF THE THEOLOGICAL SEMINARY PRINCETON. N. J. Presented by Eighty years I JOSEPH T. SMITH, D.D., LL.D. ■ . . . ( JUN?S19 EIGHTY YE^^ISf£^ Embracing a History of Presbyterianism in Baltimore, with an Appendix BY JOSEPH T>SM1TH, D. D., LL. D., Pastor Emeritus of the Central Presbyterian Church of Balti- more, Md. THE WESTMINSTER PRESS, PHILADELPHIA, PA., 1899 Copyright, 1 899, by The Trustees of the Presbyterian Board of Publication AND Sabbath-School Work. Dedication. The following pages are dedicated to the ses- sion of the Central Presbyterian Church of Bal- timore, at whose request they were prepared, in memory of long years of loving fellowship, and tender sympathy, and hearty cooperation, and in testimony of the unnumbered acts of kindness with which they, along with the church they served, have brightened the closing years of a long life. Joseph T. Smith. I Contents. Preface Baltimore, its Founders, and its Early Settlers . . First Presbyterian Church and its Pastors . . . Dr. Patrick Allison . . . 12 Dr. John C. Backus . . Dr. James Inglis .... 15 Dr. James T. Leftwich Dr. Wm. Nevins .... 17 Dr. Jere \Vithersjx)on . Second Church and its Pastors PAGE ix Dr. John Glendy • • . . 33 Dr. John Breckinridge . 34 Dr. Rob't J. Breckinridge. 35 Dr. Lewis W. Green . . 39 Dr. Joseph T. Smith . . 40 Dr. George P. Hayes . Dr. Jonathan Edwards Dr. Robert H. Fulton . Dr. Alexander Proud fit Rev. Robert H. Taylor Third Church and its Pastors Dr. George W, Musgrave . 49 Rev. Griffith Owen . Dr. Theodic Prior ... 50 9 »9 25 29 30 45 46 47 47 48 49 51 Fourth Church and its Pastors 51 Rev. George Dugan Pur- Dr. Jacob Amos Lefever. . 52 viance 51 Rev. Mr. Woods 52 Fifth Church and its Pastors 52 Dr. J. G. Hamner ... 52 R. S. Hitchcock 53 Constitutional Church 53 V VI CONTENTS. AisQuiTH Street Church and its Pastors . . . , Rev. Robert W. Dunlap , 54 Rev. J. A. Lapsley Rev. Thomas Warren . 55 Rev. David T. Carnahan . 55 Rev. J. S. Stuchell ... 55 Dr. James S. Ramsay . . 55 Rev. J. S. Noyes .... Rev. George D. Buchanan Rev. Silas Davenport . . Dr. J. Addison Smith . . PAGE 53 55 55 55 55 55 Broadway Church and its Pastors Dr. Thomas E. Peck Rev. F. \V. Brauns . Rev. J. J. Coale . . Rev. John McCoy . 56 Rev. John L. Fulton 57 Dr. George E. Jones 58 Rev. W. J. Rowan . 59 56 59 60 61 Franklin Street Church and its Pastors 61 Dr. William S. Plumer . . 62 Dr. J. J. Bullock 67 Dr. N. C. Burt 67 Dr. Wm. U. Mulrkland . . 67 Westminster Church and its Pastors Dr. Wm. J. Hoge .... 68 Dr. Cyrus Dickson ... 69 Dr. David C. Marquis . . 80 Dr. Wm. J. Gill .... 81 Rev. Morris E. Wilson Rev. J. W. Rogan . . Rev. John M. Allison . . 68 . 81 . 81 . 81 Central Church and its Pastors 82 Dr. Stuart Robinson . . 84 Dr. Joseph T. Smith ... 87 Dr. Thomas E. Peck . . 86 Rev. Hugh K. Walker . . 97 Rev. Silas G. Dunlap . . 86 Rev. DeWitt M. Benham . 97 Madison Street Church (Colored) and its Pastors ... 99 Rev. Robert L. Galbreath, 100 Rev. Joseph Carr . . . . •. loi Rev. Mr. Revels .... loi Dr. Wm. H. W^eaver . . . loi Twelfth Church and its Pastors 102 Rev, C. B. McKee ... 102 Dr. J. M. Jelly 103 Rev. James Hughes . . . 103 Rev. Sylvester W. Beach . 103 Rev. Wm. R. Marshall . 103 Dr. David B. Greigg ... 103 Rev. Jas. M. Maxwell . . 103 Rev. Joseph S. Malone . . 103 CONTEIS^TS. VU PAGE Light Street Church and its Pastors 103 Rev. Henry J. Kaufman . 103 Rev. James D. Fitzgerald , 105 Rev. John H. Potter . . 105 Rev. J. P. Green 105 Rev. G. W. Hair . . . .105 Rev. Kinley McMillen . . 105 Rev. Wm. G. Hillman . 105 Rev. W. M. Everett ... 105 Dr. David J. Beale ... 105 Brown Memorial Church and its Pastors 105 Dr. John Sparhavvk Jones. 107 Dr. Maltbie D. Babcock . . 108 Dr. Frank Gunsaulus . . 107 Knox Church (Colored) and its Pastors 109 Rev.Wm. McC. Hargrave. 1 10 Rev. Alonzo S. Gray . . . 1 10 Rev. Wm. C. Brown . . no Tome Street Church AND ITS Pastor iii Rev. J. Wynne Jones . .113 Grace Church AND its Pastors 113 Rev. Mr. Higgins . . .113 Rev. Edward F. Eggleston. 114 Rev. Charles Hedges . .113 Lafayette Square Church AND its Pastors 115 Rev. Samuel McLanahan. 1 16 Rev. Llewellyn S. Fulmar . 1 18 Rev. Robert J. Rankin . 117 Boundary Avenue Church AND ITS Pastors 118 Dr. George T. Purves . . 119 Rev. Frank E. Williams. , 120 Dr. William Durant . .120 Abbott Memorial Church and its Pastor 121 Rev. J. Wynne Jones . .121 Faith Church and its Pastor 122 Rev. John P. Campbell . 124 Fulton Avenue Church and its Pastor 125 Rev. Edward H. Robbins. 1 26 Viii CONTENTS. PAGE Church OF THE Covenant AND ITS Pastors 126 Rev. William L. Austin . 126 Rev. Henry S. Graham. . 128 Bohemian Church and its Pastors 128 Rev. Vaclav Losa . . .128 Rev. V. Vanek 129 Park Church and its Pastor 129 Rev. George L. Curtis . 130 RiDGLEY Street Church and its Pastor 130 Rev. Edward E. Weaver. 132 Crisp Memorial Church and its Pastors 133 Rev. Charles E. Fisk . . 134 Rev. Mr. Adams 134 Rev. Wm. L. Parsons . . 134 Rev. Thomas L. Springer . 134 Reid Memorial Hope Institute I34 Rev. William Caldwell . 135 APPENDIX. Spiritual condition and progress of the Churches . . 137 The Civil War hS Church Unity ^59 Federation OF Presbyterian Churches 171 Sermon on eightieth birthday 180 Sermon on the death of Dr. Johns 200 Address on acts and deliverances of the General As- sembly during the war 224 PEEFACE. The Presbytery of Baltimore at its sessions in October, 1898, resolved to notice in some suitable way the approaching eightieth birthday of its oldest pastor. A committee to draw up an ap- propriate paper was appointed, consisting of Kev. John P. Campbell, D. D., Kev. Kobert H. Williams, D. D., Kev. J. Wynne Jones, Eev. Howard Taylor, W. W. Spence, J. Abercrombie and W. II. Cole. The Presbytery further re- quested that Dr. Smith should preach a sermon on the occasion. The session of the Central Church arranged that the sermon should be preached in their church on the afternoon of his eightieth birthday, Sunday, November 6th. The committee further requested that he would pre- pare a book giving some reminiscences of the dif- ferent ministers and churches in the city during his fifty years' residence in Baltimore. On dif- ferent occasions he has seen best to review the history of the churches in Baltimore and he has used freely the material thus furnished wherever appropriate to the occasion. He has gone at greater length into the history of the First and X PREFACE. Second Churches and their pastors because these are historic churches, and their earlier history is known to comparatively few. The notice as to the later churches and their living pastors is more brief. In some cases the information is not as full as desired because in the short time al- lowed all the facts could not be secured. In the pages following will be found a copy of the ser- mon preached and the reminiscences of ministers and sketches of church history requested. Baltimore, Md,, December, 1898. EIGHTY YEARS. BALTIMORE, ITS F0U:N^DEES, EAELY SETTLERS, AKD PRESBYTERIAI^ CHURCLLES. The three great powers of Europe, Spain, France and England, contended Avith each other for the possession of the new world. Spain, then the mightiest empire on earth, claimed the whole by right of discovery, and seized upon the West Indies, the Isthmus, Florida, Louisiana, Mexico, and was gradually pushing her way northward. France took possession of Canada and was slowly advancing southward down the great valley and up to the base of the Alieghenies. Between these upper and nether millstones the feeble English colonies along the middle-Atlantic coast it would seem must either be ground to poAvder or shut up in a narrow prison house between the mountain and the sea. But not to Papal Spain, or Papal France, but to Protestant England God has given the magnificent inheritance of the new 2 EIGHTY YEARS. world. Canada, whose broad domains extended from the Great Lakes to the northern pole, passed into the hands of England. The thirteen Eng- lish colonies, in process of time, transformed into independent States and compacted into the mightiest Kepublic the Avorld has ever seen, grad- ually annexed Florida, Louisiana, large portions of Mexico, and extended their ever widening boundaries from the Atlantic to the Pacific, and from the Great Lakes to the sunny Gulf. Then, passing from the continent to the islands along- side, emancipated them from Spanish control and left to Spain not a shred of her old domin- ions in the new world. Presbyterians Avere among the last of the great Protestant bodies Avho sought an asylum in America. The storm of persecution which drove so many from the fatherland fell first upon In- dependents, Catholics and Friends. Presbvteri- ans were left amidst the struggles and triumphs of the Commonwealth and the fier}^ trials of the Kestoration to be purified and disciplined for their glorious mission to the new world. Not till it Avas attempted by Charles II. to enforce the Act of Uniformity, infamous among the nameless infamies of the Stuarts' reign, did Pres- byterians in large numbers come over from Scot- land and the north of Ireland. Midway of the Atlantic coast God had thrust EIGHTY YEARS. 3 a great inland sea far into the land and reaching up toward the precious things of the mountains and of the great valley beyond. With its genial skies and spacious harbors, commanding at once the commerce of the land and the sea, it seemed destined to be the Mediterranean of the new world. In 1632 the Chesapeake with a wide area around, was granted by royal charter of Charles I. to Lord Baltimore. The king was an intoler- ant Protestant, the proprietor was an intolerant Catholic, for toleration was then a thing un- known to either. Since neither could persecute the other, the very, necessities of the case com- pelled the toleration of both religions, and de- spite themselves and despite the intolerance of the age Maryland became an asylum, almost the only one, for the oppressed of every faith. Per- secuted Presbyterians, from Scotland, Ireland, 'New England and Pennsylvania, fled to Mary- land, and Presbyterian churches were established on the Eastern Shore, far down toward the sea, gradually extending westward along both shores, with the advancing population. At the head of the Chesapeake, 200 miles from the sea, God had spread out a magnificent har- bor, large enough to accommodate the commerce of the world. Around it, in 1730, Baltimore town was laid out, on a paltry patch of sixty acres of marshes and ravines and blulfs, but sur- 4t EIGHTY YEARS. rounded with beds of iron and quarries of marble and falls and tumbling torrents, affording, it is said, a larger water power than any similar area of the world. So situated, if the Chesapeake was to become the Mediterranean of the new world, Baltimore would be its Tyre. In 1Y30 the Episcopal Church was established in Maryland, and St. Paul's, the mother of all our Episcopal churches was the first built in Bal- timore town. Soon after, the Catholics, and after them the Lutherans, and then the Friends, built their little wooden sanctuaries, and gathered their little companies of worshipers. ISTot till about 1760 do we hear anything of Presbyterians in Baltimore town. By that time a few had come from other quarters, as Stevenson from Ireland, and Plowman from England, but the larger number came from central Pennsylvania whence they were driven b}^ the difficulties which had arisen between the Colonial Assembly and the Proprietary Government. It is not invidious to say that these men beyond most others, gave to Baltimore its commercial prosperity and in the face of all rivals, St. Mary's, Joppa and An- napolis, made her the Queen of the Chesapeake. Their names are found on our streets and our wharves, and are engraved on our social, educa- tional and philanthropical institutions in letters more imperishable than those on their marble EIGHTY YEAES. 5 mausoleums in the Gay Street and Westminster burying grounds. Among them Avere such names as these : Buch- anan, Patterson, Calhoun, Gilmer, McKim, Mc- Elderry, Murdoch, Meredith, McDonald, Bryson, Chase, Ramsay, Hayes, White, Beatty, George, Hollins, Gregg, Stirling, the Smiths, the Purvi- ances, and the Browns. These names are house- hold Avords, associated with all the great enter- prises of the city and still perpetuated and hon- ored in the persons of their numerous descend- ants. As a specimen of the whole, take from our oldest historic church three of our oldest his- toric families; the Smiths, Purviances and the Browns. Of the Smiths, John, first of the name, came to Baltimore town about 1763, when it was a paltry little village of some thirty houses and less than 300 inhabitants. He founded soon after his arrival the large commercial house of Smith & Buchanan. It was largely through his influ- ence that legislation was secured which trans- formed the basin into the port and made Balti- more a commercial metropolis. He became a member of the committee which transformed the colony into the State and gave the remnant of his life largely to the service of the infant com- monwealth. Eobert, his son, was a leading mem- ber of the House and afterwards of the Senate of 6 EIGHTY YEARS. the State, Attorney-General and Secretary of the Navy of the United States, Provost of the Uni- versity of Maryhmd, and first President of the Eible Society. Another son Samuel, was Major- General in the Army of the United States, the hero of Brandywine and Fort Mifflin, defender of Baltimore in 1812, illustrious in war as his brother in peace. Contemporary with the Smiths were the Pur- viances, Robert and Samuel. They, too, became the founders of one of our largest commercial houses, and cooperated inlluentially in the meas- ures which insured the commercial supremacy of Baltimore. When the long strife with the mother country culminated in the determination to unite the colonies in resistance to the Stamp Act and the Boston Port Bill, the Purviances se- cured the calling of a public meeting at which a resolution was passed pledging the support of Baltimore to the common cause and originating the movement Avhich led to the calling of a gen- eral congress of the colonies. Through all the dark days of the Pevolution, the Purviances were the trusted agents of Congress in securing ships and supplies from Maryland. Robert became the first naval officer and collector of the port. Samuel was made chairman of a committee to cor- respond with the other towns of the colonies to secure their allegiance to the common cause. EIGHTY YEARS. 7 For the high place occupied by Maryland in those times which tried men's souls she is indebted most of all to the Purviances. Judge John Pur- viance, son of Pobert, brought to the bench a wealth of learning, a dignity and urbanity of bearing, and an integrity above all suspicion which elevated the bar of Baltimore to the high place it has maintained ever since. His daughter. Miss Margaret Purviance, gave her life to minis- trations of mercy, following closely the footsteps of the Great Benefactor, as he went about doing good. There is scarce a house of mercy in Balti- more on which her name is not written in letters of light. In how many sorrowing hearts, and in how many stricken households is it enshrined! "When the ear heard, then it blessed her; be- cause she delivered the poor that cried, and the fatherless, and him that had none to help him. The blessing of him that was ready to perish came upon her : and she made the widow's heart to sing for joy." The Browns belong almost to our own genera- tion. We name them here because they were of like spirit with those who had gone before, en- tered into their labors, perfected what they had commenced, and perpetuated their character and influence among us to this day. Alexander, first of the name, came to Baltimore in 1800, founded the great banking house of Brown Brothers, with 8 EIGHTY YEAKS. branches in Philadelphia, New York, Liverpool, London, and credit everywhere. His son, George, inherited his high character and ample fortune, and made the name of George Brown, may Ave not say it, the most illustrious in the long roll call of Baltimore worthies. A model merchant, a model man, a model Christian, with a business sagacity that was seldom at fault, and an integ- rity that was never soiled, he gave his money, his influence, and himself, freely to every good work. Head of the great house of Brown Brothers, founder of the Merchants' Bank, presi- dent of the Mechanics' Bank, father beyond all others of the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad, his material monuments are all around us. But it is his highest honor that he used his influence and his Avealth as talents held from God to be em- ployed for the good of men. Beyond all others he inaugurated the era of beneficence, first in the long succession of the Wilsons, McDonoughs, Peabodj^s, Kelsos, Hopkinses, and Pratts, which have made the name of Baltimore's benefactors illustrious. From his ascending chariot his mantle fell on his widow, Mrs. Isabella Brown. His spirit still lived incarnate in her and still scattered its bene- factions around through her hands. How in- stinctively every good cause turned to her for help, how abundant were her benefactions, and EIGHTY YEAKS. « how much was she beloved of the Lord, for be- yond all Ave have known she was a cheerful giver. When asked for any good cause she al- ways made you feel that the favor was done to her, in affording her the luxury of giving. Not Brown Hall in Princeton or Brown Memorial Church alone, there was scarcely a church in the Presbytery, or a house of mercy in the city or commonwealth, which did not share her benefac- tions. Her mantle fell again upon her son, George S., and thank God, the spirit of George Brown still lives incarnate, not in one family alone, but in measure in the whole Presbyterian household. Examine the statistics of the great institutions which symbolize our common Chris- tianity, Bible Society, Tract Society, Sunday- school Union. Presbyterians may invite com- parison with their brethren of every name. Such were the men who founded the Presbyterian churches of Baltimore, and such the spirit they breathed into them. FIKST CHUKCH. It is diiRcult to fix the time when the First Church originated, for it grew into a church slowly and by successive transformations from a little company of worshipers meeting from house to house without pastor or leader. In 1763 they invited the Eev. Patrick Allison to be- 10 EIGHTY YEARS. come their minister and in the same year erected a little log church. They had no ecclesiastical organization but were governed as a secular as- sociation by a committee or board of directors of their own choice and responsible onl}^ to them. In 1798 the congregation was incorporated by Act of Assembly under the name of the " Com- mittee of the Presbyterian Church in the City of Baltimore." This committee without ordination or relation of any sort to the Presbytery com- bined all offices in itself and administered all af- fairs of the congregation, temporal and spiritual. It was not till the year 1804 that the congrega- tion was transformed into a church by the elec- tion and ordination of elders. Its first elders were Kobert Purviance, David Stewart, Chris- topher Johnson, George Salmon, and Ebenezer Findlay. Their first house of worship w^as a little log building near the corner of Gay and Fayette Streets where Christ Church now stands. Soon after the arrival of Dr. Allison it was determined to erect a new church on the northwest corner of Fayette and North Streets, and in 1766 the church was finished and occupied. It was a plain, brick building 35x45 feet and had thirty- six pews, a large church for those daj^s. This in turn gave place to a larger brick building on the same site which after successive enlargements, EIGHTY YEARS. 11 renovations and ornamentations, in 1792 appeared as the two- towered church, so familiar to all our. older inhabitants. It stood on a hill, for the bluff on a spur of which it was built had not then been leveled. It had a spacious portico ; and an entablature supported by four large, white, Doric pillars, crowned by two steeples, and was ap- proached by a Pilate's stairway of stone steps, long and winding and weary of ascent. In 1853, owing to the encroachment of busi- ness and the removal of many families, it was determined to remove the church further west- Avard, and a lot Avas secured on the corner of Madison and Park Streets and the building com- menced. The old church was sold to the United States Government which leveled the hill and erected the courthouse that now marks the spot. On a memorable Sabbath in 1859 farewell serv- ices were held in the old church, conducted by Dr. Backus assisted by other pastors in the city. None that Avitnessed that scene can ever forget it. Tears dimmed the eyes or rolled down the cheeks of the old men, and all as they bade fare- well to the hallowed spot turned aAvay with slow and reluctant steps. On the following Sunday the ncAV church Avas opened Avith simple but impressive ceremony. The building is an ornament to the city Avhich arrests the steps and aAvakens the admiration of 12 EIGHTY YEARS. the most careless passer-by. It is a masterpiece of art, with its exquisite proportions, its delicate traceries, and Gothic foliage wreathed around its springing arches. It is a sermon in stone, its lofty tower rising above all and its tall spire pointing with fixed finger to heaven. PASTORS OF THE FIRST CHURCH. Dr. Allison, first in the long succession of pastors, Avas born in Lancaster, Pa., in the year 1740. He was graduated by the University of Pennsylvania in 1760. lie commenced at once the study of theology privately, for in those days there were no theological seminaries, was licensed to preach by the second Presbytery of Philadelphia, in March, 1763, and in August, 1763, was installed pastor of the First Church. Dr. Allison was a prince in Israel, " a born leader and commander of the people." With an intellect of a high order and the broadest culture of his times, with tireless energy and rare ad- ministrative gifts, he w^as just the man for the times. For he came to the kingdom in a most important crisis in its history during that great transition era, when old things were passing away and all things were becoming new', the era of Napoleon in Europe and of Washington in America. Accumulated rubbish was to be swept EIGHTY YEAKS. 13 away and foundations were to be laid anew. For such a time as this God had raised up Dr. Alli- son. His long pastorate of almost forty years ex- tended over this most eventful period in the his- tory of the city, the Church and the world. He witnessed the growth of the little village of thirty log houses into a city ; he saw the founda- tions laid of those institutions, commercial, edu- cational and philanthropic which have made Bal- timore what it is. He was cotemporary with the Declaration of Independence and heard the ringing of bells which proclaimed "liberty throughout all the land to all the inhabitants thereof." He accompanied the armies of the Kevolution on many a weary march, to many a bloody battlefield of alternate victory and defeat, during the seven years' war of Independence. He witnessed the transformation of the colony of Maryland, with its royal governor and es- tablished Church, into the free State of Mary- land, with its free Church. He witnessed the adoption of the Federal Constitution wliich made of the many weak and struggling colonies one great nation. In the very same year with the Federal Constitution he saw the constitutions of the two historic English churches, the Presby- terian, and Episcopal, formed after the same model and largely by the same men. And how- ever either, or both, may have departed in any 14 EIGHTY YEARS. measure from their own principles, their con- stitutions bind both to a Kepublican form of government in which the people under Christ are their own rulers and assemblies and conven- tions and presbyteries and bishops are their ex- ecutive agents, constitutional and not arbitrary rulers. In many of these momentous changes Dr. Allison was a most influential actor. He Avas the confidential friend of Washington, chap- lain to Congress when it sat in Baltimore, and shared the councils of the leading statesmen of the day. His studies and experience as a states- man were an education for his higher work as an ecclesiastic. In Americanizing the Westminster Confession and adapting it to its new environ- ment, no influence, not even that of Dr. Eogers or Dr. Witherspoon was more potential than that of Dr. Allison. For seven successive years, dur- ing its whole forming period, he was moderator of the Presbytery of Baltimore. As a preacher he was not brilliant or breezy or popular in the present sense of those terms. Argumentative and unimpassioned, he addressed himself to the understanding of his hearers. His discourses were largely on ethical themes, and the moralities as distinguished from the spiritu- alities of the gospel. He belonged to the old style of those days and was a conservative of the conservatives. He stood in doubt of the Whit- EIGHTY YEARS. 15 fields, Tennants, and Blairs of his time, and looked upon their Avork at first with Avonder, and finally with open disapproval. Under his ministry, what- ever deeper spiritual experiences any might have, religion was looked upon largely as a thing of credible professions and outward moralities. There were neither weekly lectures, nor prayer meetings, nor Sunday-schools, nor Young People's Societies, nor Old People's Societies, nor any of those churches within the church which are now deemed so helpful. At the close of Dr. Allison's pastorate the congregation was large, Avealthy, fashionable, strong in all the elements of mate- rial and social strength, but waiting for power from on high. DR. JA3IES INGLIS. In 1802, full of years and honors. Dr. Allison Avas gathered to his fathers, and Avas succeeded by Dr. James Inglis. He Avas born in Philadel- phia, in 1777, of mingled Scotch and Huguenot ancestors. He Avas graduated at (Columbia Col- lege, New York, at the age of eighteen. Having chosen the law as his profession, he entered as a student the laAv office of Alexander Hamilton, but the Lord had need of him for a higher service and called him by his Spirit for the Avork of the ministry. He prosecuted his theological studies 16 EIGHTY YEARS. under the direction of Dr. Rodgers, and ^Yas licensed by the Presbytery of New York in 1801. Two marked advances took place under Dr. Inglis's ministry — the discharge of the old com- mittee from all spiritual functions by the elec- tion of elders in 1804 and the commencement of weekly lectures. Dr. Inglis was courtly and cultured in his manners and eloquent of the high- est type of eloquence. His polished discourses, though read, were delivered with all the fluency and fervor of extemporaneous speech. The poi- son of French infidelity had infected many of the leading statesmen of the day, permeated the schools and colleges of the land and spread throughout the entire community. What a sad picture Dr. D wight has given of the abounding infidelity of the times. Christianity was largely banished from all courtly and cultured social circles. Dr. Inglis by his learning and eloquence won back many of the alienated classes. At the close of his seven years' ministr}^, merchant princes, bankers, professional and educated men, Avere found in large numbers in the church. In 1819, on a Sabbath morning, Avhile the congre- gation were assembled waiting for his appear- ance, a messenger came to them with the tidings that their pastor had died suddenly of ai)oplexy. EIGHTY YEARS. 17 DR. WILLIAM KEVINS. Dr. Inglis was succeeded by Dr. William Kevins, whose name is as ointment poured forth. He was born in Norwich, Conn., October 13th, 1797, was graduated at Yale in 1816, and pur- sued his theological studies at Princeton. He was installed pastor of the First Church October 19th, 1820. Dr. Kevins was in every way a remarkable man. Of ardent temperament, imperial imagi- nation and exquisite sensibilities. He was a poet, an artist, a musician and an orator. Genial as the sunshine, with that nameless magic of pres- ence which won all hearts. He seemed to be born for a life of luxurious ease and indolent enjoyment, and upon such a life he seems in early youth to have entered. While living with- out God in the w^orld, suddenly there appeared to him, as to Paul on his w^ay to Damascus, a vision of the crucified Saviour, and instantly the whole current of his life was changed. Coming to a church large, wealthy and influential, but spiritually dead, for long years he waited and watched, more than them who watch for the morning, but there was neither sign nor voice. While his preaching was admired for its artistic excellence and attracted crowds of interested hearers, and among them none more interested than William Wirt and his literary friends, the 18 EIGHTY YEARS. church was not quickened, souls Avere not born unto God and his ministry seemed to him to be fruitless. At length, on an ever memorable Sab- bath morning, March 7th, 1827, he entered his pulpit as usual. There were no unwonted stir- rings in his own heart and no unusual signs in the congregation, when he arose and announced his text, "Now is the accepted time." As he went on a strange spirit began to breathe and burn in his words and he spake with another tongue as the Spirit gave him utterance and the Holy Ghost fell upon the entire assembly. There Avas no sound of rushing Avinds or sign of cloven tongues. But the effect of that sermon was no less marvelous than that of Dr. Edwards' on '' Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God," or of Peter's on the day of Pentecost. That Avas the Baltimore Pentecost. And not on the First Church alone, but on the same day, the baptism of the Spirit fell on the Second and Third Churches. Christians Avere revived and lifted up to a higher plane of Christian living and souls in large numbers Avere brought home to God. The evangelical spirit Avhich is in our churches to-day was inbreathed on that memorable morning. In the full noon of his years, and in the midst of his usefulness, Avhen but thirty-seven years of age he died, and dying left to us the precious legacy of his evangelical spirit and a EIGHTY YEARS. 19 new apocalypse of heaven in his "Practical Thoughts." DR. JOHN C. BACKUS. Dr. Kevins Avas succeeded in 1836 by the Eev. Dr. John C. Backus. Dr. Backus was born in Wethersfield, Conn., on the 3d day of September, 1810. A child of the covenant, he was nurtured in a family of affluence and refinement, and surrounded in childhood with all the hallowed influences of a Christian home. Planted in the house of the Lord, brought up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord, he devoted himself in early youth to his service in the ministry. He enjoyed the highest advantages of literary and theological training, and profited in these above most of his fellows. He was licensed by the Presbytery of New Brunswick, and immediately after appointed agent of the Board of Domestic Missions. On his way south he stopped in Baltimore, preached in the First Church, then vacant, was called to be their pastor, and ordained and installed on the 15th of September, 183G. The First Church was then the leading church in the city and in the Presby- tery. Dr. Kevins, whom he was to succeed, was a man of preeminent gifts, "full of faith and the Holy Ghost," and the young pastor, ever profoundly self -mistrustful, was overwhelmed 20 EIGHTY YEAES. with the magnitude of the work before him. But taking hold of the arm of Everlasting Strength, strong in the Lord and in the power of his might, he went forward, " faint and yet pur- suing," perplexed but not in despair. From the hour when he uttered his ordination vows dates the beginning of that long career of supreme devotion and superabundant labors, which ended only with his life. To the people of his charge he gave himself with whole-souled consecration. His preparation for the service of the pulpit Avas most laborious, — investigating, reading up on every subject, and writing out every sermon fully. Even his vaca- tions brought him no rest. The winter's work was mapped out, and materials for it accumulated during the summer holidays. As a pastor, we know not how to speak truthfully of him Avithout seeming to transcend the truth. All the families of his charge, with all their peculiarities of age and temperament, and culture and social position, were borne severally on his mind and heart. His ministrations of all good gifts to the poor of his flock, his tender solicitude for the young, his manly counsels to men of business, his tender sympathies Avith the aged and the infirm as he went out and in among them, made him like John the beloved. There Avas scarcely a phase of Christian experience through Avhich he himself EIGHTY YEARS. 21 had not passed, and the inquiring, the perplexed, the spiritually troubled in every way found in him the counsels of one in whom the same affliction had been accomplished. At the bed of sickness, in the chamber of grief, at the funeral, he was a very angel of consolation. He watched for souls over which the Holy Ghost had made him over- seer, as one that must give account. While pastor of the First Church Dr. Backus was at the same time bishop in the Bible sense of overseer of all the churches. When he came to Baltimore he found but three Presbyterian churches, and while the city was rapidly ex- tending there was no corresponding extension of the church. In 1842 in conjunction with Dr. R. J. Breckinridge, he called a meeting of the lead- ing members of the First and Second Churches, and laid before them a carefully matured plan of church extension, which was heartily approved and in the execution of Avhich all agreed to cooperate. From that meeting began a work of church extension unexampled in this city, and perhaps in any other. As its immediate result twenty new churches were organized in the Presbytery and eight in the city within the following twelve years, and the extension was going on with increasing vigor until arrested by the approaching civil Avar. During his visit to Scotland Dr. Backus called 22 EIGHTY YEARS. on Dr. Chalmers, the Moses of the Scottish Free, Church. The Doctor handed him his book, " Christian Economics," unfokling the Bible plan of systematic beneficence as revived in the Free Church of Scotland. On his return home Dr. Backus secured its adoption by his own church and other churches in the city, and became its zealous advocate in Synods, Presby- teries and Assemblies. For the high vantage ground our Church occupies to-day in the matter of systematic giving we are indebted, above all human instrumentalities, to Dr. Backus. As years rolled on, and experiences ripened and character mellowed, and influence strengthened, his field of usefulness was continually enlarged. The church came to look upon him as a leader and guide. In 1861, he was made Moderator of the General Assembly. He was a member of most of the Boards of the Church, and as a director for many years of Princeton Seminary, his services were invaluable. His voice Avas po- tential in all the courts of the Church and in all its agencies for spreading the gospel throughout our oAvn land. " Full of years and of honors and in the full noon of his influence, as it seemed to us, amidst the tears of the people he had loved and served so long and so well, the pastoral rela- tion was dissolved December, 1875, and he was made pastor emeritus. Release from pastoral EIGHTY YEARS. 23 cares brought no release from labor which was still abundant. How beautiful was the evening of his life, how glorious the sunset splendor which gathered around him, how calmly he fell asleep in Jesus on the night of the 8th of April, 1884: " He died as sets the morning star which goes Not down behind the darkened West nor hides Obscured amidst the tempests of the sky, But mehs away into the light of heaven." In the character and life of Dr. Backus there was a striking unity. His character was well rounded, symmetrical and complete, with no daz- zling qualities or distracting protuberances. All its parts were exquisitely proportioned and blended into a structure harmonious as the dome of St. Peter's or the statue of Michael Angelo. His life, too, was one, — not broken up into shreds and fragments, and flung around here a little and there a little. It was passed in one place, de- voted to one work, and that a great work. Upon the foundations he laid he built, the works he commenced he carried on, the influence he ac- quired he used. The blessings of the fathers came back upon himself and upon his Avork in redoubled blessings from children and children's children. And never was his influence so potent nor his labors so fruitful as in his last days, around which the halo of a consecrated life 24 EIGHTY YEARS. gathered. How unlike the broken, fragmentary life of the peripatetic ministry of these last days ! He Avas, to an extent seldom equaled, unself- ish. As most here knew him, he seemed to have risen above all sense of personal interest or ag- grandizement, above all feeling of vanity or pride or rivalry or personal ambition. Tried often and in many ways, from his very eminence a shining mark for the archers, the arroAvs of envy, malice and detraction fell blunted and harmless at his feet. If he grieved, it was not for himself, but for the cause Avhich suffered. We say it de- liberately, seldom has mortal man lived with such utter forgetfulness of self and such a single eye to his Master's glory. He was preeminentl}^ a man of faith and of prayer. He walked with God. He believed God. He saw God as the pure in heart see him. He saw heaven and the eternal things with the faith which is the substance of things hoped for, and the evidence of things not seen. His closet was to him the very audience chamber of the great King. He was accustomed to set apart frequent seasons of special prayer for his own soul in the crises of his spiritual history, for his church, for the Church at large, for individuals. With absent friends he often fixed a certain time in the day Avhen they would meet in the spirit. Sometimes in his darkened study you Avould find EIGHTY YEARS. 25 him alone ; it was his hour of special prayer. The morning after the loss of a dear child, I found him alone in his darkened study. "All through the sleepless night," said he, " I seemed to be lifted above my sorrow. The Lord was so near and my visions of him and his kingdom were so transporting, that I seemed all the night long to be with him on another Mount of Trans- figuration," — then passed at once to talk of the work so near his heart. And in that life of faith and prayer he found inspiration, guidance and strength for his work. DR. JAMES T. LEFTWICH. Dr. Backus Avas succeeded by the Kev. Dr. James Turner Leftwich, who was installed Oc- tober 28th, 1879. Dr. Leftwich Avas born in Bedford, Ya., January 3d, 1835. His literary education Avas procured partly at Princeton and Yale colleges, and his theological education, at Union Seminary, Xcav York. From the semi- nary he Avas called to the pastorate of the church in Alexandria, Ya., and after serving it for some years became pastor of the church in Atlanta, Ga., from Avhich he Avas called to Baltimore, Avhich he served until the pastoral relation Avas dissolved February, 1893. For almost five years Dr. Leftwich had the priceless privilege of the most intimate com- 26 EIGHTY YEARS. panionship with Dr. Backus. Delicate as their relations were between two spirits of such mag- nanimity there could be nothing but the most hearty confidence and warmest Christian affec- tion. Dr. Leftwich was preeminently a theolo- gian and regarded it as his special work to strengthen the foundations upon which the Church, with all its institutions and activities, could alone securely stand. He labored to un- fold the system of truth and vindicate the polity of the church he loved, and fasten both firmly upon the impregnable rock of the Word. I think Dr. Leftwich had one of the greatest, if not the greatest mind in the Presbyterian Church, and early as was his taking off, his brethren had come to appreciate his greatness. Before he was generally known in the Church at large, a most important committee on the re- vision of the Constitution and method of amend- ing it was ordered by the General Assembly. As I happened to be Moderator of the Assembly at the time, I placed Dr. Leftwich on the com- mittee. The brethren came to me one after an- other and asked, '' Who is Dr. Leftwich ? ^Ye want our best men on this important com- mittee." But Avhen its work was done, and his share in it was known, no one after that asked, Who is Dr. Leftwich ? When the committee on the revision of the Confession, to Avhich this EIGHTY YEAES. 27 looked forward, was appointed, Dr. Leftwich, by common consent, was made a member of it. And it is the testimony of those who were asso- ciated with him that no counsels were listened to with more interest and profit than his. His mind was cast in the Westminster mold. It was clear, logical, impatient of all mist and in- directions and compromises, piercing through all the disguises of error, seeking the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth, and when grasped, holding it with a conviction which nothing could shake. He was eloquent, at times surpassingly eloquent, for he had an imperial im- agination, a rainbow-tinted fancy, the most ex- quisite sensibilities, the most ardent affection, the most polished speech, the rhythm of his sen- tences always falling upon the ear as the sweet- est music. But his eloquence Avas always the eloquence of truth, winged by imagination, in- stinct with celestial fire, indeed, but always the truth. His supreme concern was with those great foundation truths upon which the Church is built — the doctrine of God, Father, Son, Spirit, the Sovereignty of God, his immutable and eternal decrees, his absolute justice and his boundless love, the depravity of man — a deprav- ity universal as to the race and total as to the individual, the necessity of the new birth, the Atonement, the cross and blood-shedding of 28 EIGHTY YEARS. Christ, not his life only, not his teachings only, not his example only, but his Blood, his sacri- fice for sin, as the great cardinal truth of the gospel, and the only hope of salvation of the lost. These great doctrines he believed were necessary to the very existence of the Church of God, and were to be the animating spirit of all its activities. If banished from the pulpit or re- tired to the background, if appeals and appliances from other quarters were substituted in their place, he believed that all would be lost. It Avas his special mission to vindicate these doctrines of grace as the source of light, inspiration and ac- tivity in the Church of God. He came here in the midst of his years and in the full noon of his powers, but scarcely had he entered upon his Avork till that fatal and slow wasting malady, which consumed his life, fell upon him. Seldom has a martyr at the stake endured such tortures in every quivering nerve, and seldom has martyr endured his tortures with greater heroism. How often we have seen him Avhen racked with pain, tottering on his staff from door to door on his errands of mercy. How often he ascended the pulpit when every nerve was crying out with anguish. Ever as we looked upon him Ave saAV the handwriting of death upon his countenance. For Aveeks he Avas at the Johns Hopkins Hospital in this city. It was the privi- EIGHTY YEARS. 29 lege of many to stand by his sick bed and listen to his inspiring words of faith and hope. How calmly, hopefully, joyfully he leaned upon his Saviour's bosom ! Once I visited him, when tortured with pain, he looked up from his bed of suffering and said, " It is all right, brother, it is all right." When at last he was called to pass through the valley of the death shade, he entered it singing the old psalm of faith and victory for the rod and staff of the Good Shepherd upheld and comforted with tokens of his presence and visions of the goodly land beyond. DR. J. WITHERSPOON. Unable to serve the church longer from failing health. Dr. Leftwich resigned his charge in Febru- ary, 1893, and was succeeded by Dr. Jere Wither- spoon, December 24th, 1893. Dr. Witherspoon is a native of Virginia. When called to Baltimore he was pastor of the First Church of Nashville, Tenn., one of the largest and most influential churches in the state. Dr. Witherspoon had been eminently successful as a pastor in Xashville, and the thoughts of the First Church had early turned to him as the successor of Dr. Leftwich. Letters of commendation were received from many quarters and a committee of the church visited Nashville, heard him preach, and saw his work, and Dr. Witherspoon was elected pastor. 30 EIGHTY YEARS. His sweetness of spirit and warmth of sym- pathy and gentleness, and grace of manner won for him universal esteem and the Avarm affection of his brethren in the ministry, who testified to it in many ways. In 1897, he received a call from a church in Richmond, Ya., which he felt it his duty to accept, and the pastoral relation was dis- solved. The church is now vacant. The present officers of the church are William "W. Spence, Dr. Russell Murdoch, Elisha H. Per- kins, Edmund F. Witmer, John Y. L. Graham. Deacons, George W. Rodgers, William Reynolds, J. Frank Bailey, George Leiper Carey, William H. Dix, George K. Witmer, Douglas M. Wylie. The trustees, pastor president ex-officio, Richard D. Fisher, Charles J. Appold, Dr. J. J. Chisolm, John Y. L. Findlay, Albert Fahnestock, Robert M. Wylie, John McKim, John M. Hood, Harry F. Reid, Oscar F. Breese. SECOI^D CHURCH. The second congregation was founded in 1802. At a meeting of the First Church, to elect a suc- cessor to Dr. Allison, Dr. Glendy and Dr. Inglis were the candidates. Dr. Inglis was elected by a small majority and the friends of Dr. Glendy resolved to withdraw, form a second congrega- tion, and invite Dr. Glendy as their minister. They began at once the erection of a church on EIGHTY YEARS. 31 the corner of East Baltimore and Lloyd Streets, which was completed in 1805. In the Telegraph and Daily Advertiser of November 17, 1804, ap- peared the advertisement of a lottery to be drawn on the September following for the benefit of the Second Presbyterian Church then building. The lottery was drawn and yielded the sum of $8,090.00. The church was a large rectangular brick building, its massive walls, without tower or entablature or ornamentation of any kind, its spacious interior with wide, cold brick-paved aisles, high, straight-backed, torturing pews, ob- trusive galleries, narrow tub pulpit, overhung with an umbrella-shaped sounding-board. For half a century it was one of the most conspicuous landmarks in East Baltimore, until taken down in 1851. The Second Church had no infancy of immaturity and struggling. It was strong from the beginning, in numbers, wealth and social in- fluence. In 1804, articles in the form of a consti- tution, were adopted for the government of the congregation under Avhich a committee of thir- teen was chosen to administer its affairs. As in the First Church this committee was the only oiRcial body, and were elders, deacons and trus- tees in one. Their names were James Breese, Thomas McElderry, Thomas Dickson, John Mc- Kim, Jr., James Armstrong, John Rollins, James Slicer, Joseph Spear, Henry Payson, Kennedy 32 EIGHTY YEARS. Long, John Campbell White, Hugh McCurdy, and James Hutton. In 1806, General Smith gave a lot of two acres far out on the Bel Air road, for a burial lot, which was inclosed by a high stone wall. In 1811, the first session was elected and ordained as appears from the follow- ing minute : " On the last Lord's day in April, 1811, in strict conformity with the principles and discipline of the Presbyterian Church, the unor- dained members of the congregation were or- dained elders by their stated pastor with the unanimous approbation of the said society, viz : Alexander Brown, James Sloan, James Beatty, William Yance, Kobert Stewart, William Mc- Donald, William McConkey, William Camp, John Crawford. In 1814, we find the first notice of ofi'ering for the extension of the kingdom ; $50 for missions, $50 for the education of a young man for the ministry and a collection ordered for Princeton Seminary. In 1820, a Sunday-school was organized, con- sisting of twenty-three teachers and thirteen pupils, all females. The instruction was largely secular. The teachers were drafted in detach- ments until the number of pupils demanded the service of all. They met in private rooms, and officers and teachers were fined for late attend- ance or neglect of duties. Weekly lectures and prayer meetings were things unknown. EIGHTY YEARS. 33 PASTORS OF THE SECOND CHURCH. Dr. John Glendy was installed first pastor in April, 1805. He was born in Londonderry, Ire- land, June 24th, 1755. He was educated in the schools of his native town, and on the completion of his theological studies was ordained by the Presbytery of Londonderry. He was an ardent patriot, after the Irish type, was suspected, per- haps justly, of complicity with the great Rebel- lion, and after a series of hidings and hairbreadth escapes, succeeded in making his way to America. Landing in Norfolk, his impassioned eloquence, for he shared the genius of his countrymen, Phillips and Grattan, and threw the same spell over his audience, attracted crowds wherever he preached. An Irishman, with all the brilliant characteristics of his race, he w^as at the same time a Scotch Presbyterian, adhering to his faith with sturdy Cameronian constancy. Courtly in his manners, he had access to all social circles, even the most exclusive. He became the inti- mate friend of President Jefferson, and was a frequent guest at the presidential mansion. He was chaplain first of the House, and afterwards of the Senate of the United States, and was the confidential friend of many of the leading states- men of the day. Until age impaired his facul- ties, the pulpit of the Second Church was a mighty power in Baltimore. 34 EIGHTY YEARS. DR. JOHN BRECKIN^RIDGE. In 1825, when Dr. Glendy Avas seventy years of age, the church, at his request, resolved to se- cure an assistant pastor. Dr. John Breckinridge was elected and installed July 10th, 1826. He was the second of the four illustrious sons of the Honorable John Breckinridge, one of the first United States senators from Kentucky, and at the time of his death, Attorney-General of the United States. Dr. Breckinridge was born at Cabell's Dale, near Lexington, Ky., 4th of July, 1797. He was graduated at Princeton College in 1818, and at the theological seminary in 1822. He was licensed the same year by the Presbytery of New Brunswick, Avas for a short time chaplain of the United States House of Representatives, became pastor of the McCord Church, Lexington, Ky., from Avhich he Avas called to the Second Church. Ardent, enthusiastic and eloquent, with sym- pathies as Avide as the Avorld, ahvays prepared on every question concerning the good of man or the glory of God, always fluent and eloquent, every good cause called to him for help and sel- dom called in vain. Unmatched upon the plat- form, all our great institutions then weak and struggling into existence, looked to him as their champion. Of kindred spirit Avith Dr. Nevins, and laboring side by side with him in gathering EIGHTY YEARS. 35 in the harvest of souls, his influence in the com- munity was large and commanding. Few pas- torh have ever been so loved and the parting with his people was a repetition of the scene at Miletus. The condition of the Second Church was de- plorable. There were no prayer meetings, and not a single person in the church would lead in prayer; and there was scarce a sign or move- ment of spiritual life. The congregation was vexed by internal strifes and protracted con- troversies w4th the senior pastor. Dr. Breckin- ridge labored unweariedly to heal these strifes and elevate the tone of spirituality. The Sunday- school was greatly enlarged and spiritualized. He taught a Bible class of some forty young men which furnished some of the most useful and well-known members and elders of our Church. He was a benediction, not to the church alone, but to the entire city. DR. R. J. BRECKINRIDGE. Worn out by incessant labors he was succeeded by his still more illustrious brother, Dr. Eobert J. Breckinridge, who was ordained and installed JS'ovember 26th, 1832. Dr. Eobert Jefferson Breckinridge was born at Cabell's Dale, Ivy., March 8th, 1800, was graduated at Union Col- lege, New York, in 1819, and admitted to the bar 36 EIGHTY YEARS. in Lexington in 1824. In 1825 he was elected a member of the Lower House of the Kentucky legislature and was reelected for three successive terms. In the winter of 1828-9 he was con- verted and united Avith the McCord Church and retired from, the practice of the law and from public life. The duty of entering the ministry was pressed upon him by his friends, and by his conscience, but there were scruples and difficul- ties in the way. It was not till the great woods meeting on his own farm, in 1831, one of those large Pentecostal meetings then so frequent in the west, that his difficulties were resolved and his duty was made clear. He put himself under the care of the West Lexington Presbytery, and six months after was licensed to preach. As an elder he was a member of the General Assembly of 1832, and from the Assembly went to Prince- ton to prosecute his theological studies, but had scarcely entered the seminary till he was called to the pastorate of the Second Church. Dr. Breckinridge was endowed as God seldom endows a mortal, with the choicest gifts of na- ture and providence, strength of intellect, bril- liancy of imagination and breadth of culture. He was a statesman, a theologian, a lawyer, a preacher, a polemic, an evangelist, and preemi- nent in all. On the very threshold of his minis- try the burden of souls was laid upon his heart, EIGHTY YEARS. 37 and in the winter of 1833, he commenced a series of meetings in the Second Church. Night after night, he preached with the fervor of a AYhitfield and the Second Church rejoiced in the fruitage of a glorious revival. AVith heart of love and tongue of flame, his call and his anointing seemed to be those of a great evangelist, — an Edwards, a Davies or a AYhitfield. But another kind of work awaited him. The church Avas trembling under the first shock of that earthquake which finally rent it asunder. At a meeting of the Gen- eral Assembly, when all counsels were brought to naught and breathless silence had fallen on the body, a young man arose in a remote part of the house, pale with sickness and grasping the pew before him for support. He was a young lawyer, well-known at the bar and at the plat- form in Kentucky, but almost an entire stranger to the Assembly. Almost from the first sentence he uttered the body hung upon his lips and from that hour through all the stormy scenes that followed, Dr. Breckinridge became a leader and a cham- pion. Preeminently the servant of the church, he was at the same time the servant of his gener- ation. On all the great questions of the age, so- cial, educational, political, his trumpet voice sounded out loudly and commandingly. To the world he is known chiefly as the great polemic, a knight panoplied and plumed, with 38 EIGHTY YEARS. lance ahvays at rest, rushing to the fray as to a banquet. To those who knew the man, he was genial and gentle as a child, the most charming of companions, the most loyal and loving of friends. It was my privilege to spend a winter in his house at his table. I think no table talk could have excelled his. His knowledge of men and things was large. His wit, his pathos, his genial humor, his fund of anecdote, his intuition of great truths, his marvelous versatility, turning at once from the most abstruse discussion to the most sportive fancies, made an hour at his table the memory of a lifetime. Positive in his con- victions, imperial in his temper, impatient of all tamperings and compromising, always in every controversy going in for a clear victory or a clear defeat. Few adversaries were more feared and maligned ; few friends more trusted and loved. A high church Presbyterian, advocating some lines of policy which have been rejected as extreme, the Church he loved so well if true to itself, will always enshrine the name of Dr. K. J. Breckinridge. In 1845 Dr. Breckinridge was elected president of Jefferson College, and having expressed his desire to accept the position, the pastoral relation was dissolved. Dr. James H. Thornwell and D. M. Palmer, both of South Carolina, were both elected to the vacant pastorate, but both declined. Dr. Lewis W. EIGHTY YEARS. 39 Green, having accepted the election, was in- stalled in February, 1846. DR. LEWIS W. GREEN". Dr. Lewis W. Green was born in Boyle County, Ky., January 28th, 1806, was graduated at Center College, completed his studies at Prince- ton in 1832, was licensed by the Presbytery of Transylvania, spent two years as professor in Center College and two years abroad among the universities and libraries of Europe, adding to the wealth of learning he had already acquired. On his return he was elected vice-president of Center College, of which the celebrated Dr. John C. Young was then president. Soon after, he was chosen by the General Assembly to the chair of Hebrew and Oriental literature in the Western Theological Seminary. Dr. Green was eminent as a scholar and educator ; genial and courteous, full of information and anecdote he was a most delightful companion. His sermons were elab- orate and ornate, abounding in classical allusions, and lit up by flashes of eloquence. Dr. Green entered upon his duties as pastor of the Second Church with characteristic zeal and energy. But the burden of pastoral cares and pastoral labors pressed too heavily upon him. His health began to fail, and in October, 1848, at his own request, the pastoral relation was dis- 4:0 EIGIITt YEARS. solved and he accepted the position of president of Hampton Sidney College, to which he had been elected. DR. JOSEPH T. SMITH. Dr. Green was succeeded b}^ Dr. Joseph T. Smith, who was installed in April, 1849. Dr. Smith was born in Mercer, Pa., pn the 0th of November, 1818, was graduated at Jefferson College in 1837, studied theology under the direction of the Kev. Samuel Tate, the apostle of Northwestern Pennsylvania, was licensed by the Presbytery of Erie in 1841, and ordained and installed pastor of his native church in Mercer, in April, 1842. Born and reared in Western Pennsylvania, where almost the entire population were Presby- terians of the straightest Cameronian type, and having little knowledge of any other religious bodies save w^hat he read in controversial books, he grew up with a sort of ill-defined feeling that the Presbyterian Church was the Church, and all outside of it were but inheritors of uncovenanted blessings. In this state of mind he received a letter from the Second Presbyterian Church of Baltimore, then vacant, saying that he had been recommended to them as a pastor by the Rev. Dr. Johns, rector of an Episcopal church in Balti- more, and inviting him to visit them. He was EIGHTY YEARS. 41 surprised that such an invitation should come to him and amazed that it should come from an Episcopalian. After visiting the Second Church, and seeing its condition, the call was declined. He returned to Mercer and regarded himself as permanently settled there. Among the letters received urging him to reconsider his decision Avas one from the Rev. Dr. Johns, breathing in every line the spirit of brotherly love. He keeps that letter among his most precious treasures. After stating and urging at length the reasons which ought to induce him to come to Baltimore, Dr. Johns closed his letter in these words : " You may think it strange that one of another denom- ination of Christians should so write. But while I could wish that you and all my brethren were even as I am, yet I rejoice that in every way Christ is preached and souls brought home to God." That letter, more tlian anything else, induced Dr. Smith to come to Baltimore. From the day of his arrival Dr. Johns became one of his most intimate counselors and friends, and when amidst the lamentations of the entire cit}^ he was carried to his burial it was the privilege of Dr. Smith to preach his funeral sermon to an immense congregation, composed of ministers and members of all denominations where for the time all their differences Avere lost in the common brotherhood of Christians. From his associar 42 EIGHTY YEARS. tions with Dr. Johns and afterwards with Dr. Grammar and Dr. Leakin and others of kindred spirit his charity was so enlarged as to admit Episcopalians to share the covenanted blessings with Presbyterians. Dr. John M. Duncan, an illustrious and vener- able man, was then pastor of the Associate Ke- formed Church on Fayette Street, one of the larg- est and most influential churches in the city. He was a great man and a great preacher, of largeness of heart like that which God gave to his servant of old, but he was accused of holding erroneous opinions, and had withdrawn from the Presbyterian Church. Dr. Smith regarded his errors as touching such vital points that the thought of brotherly fellowship with him scarcely entered his mind. On his arrival in Baltimore Dr. Duncan was one of the first ministers of the city to call upon him. He called again and again, and no father, could have been more tender and more solicitous for the welfare of a son, young, inexperienced and unacquainted with city ways. The infirmities of age had come upon Dr. Duncan, and he desired Dr. Smith to become his assistant. Almost every day for a time he came to the study of Dr. Smith, brought his books and his published sermons, explained and defended his peculiar views, but assured the Doctor he could preach to his people without re- EIGHTY YEARS. 43 straint for they would bear everything except Calvinism. And yet despite all his errors and idiosyncrasies, whenever he passed from meta- physical speculation as to the persons of the God- head and their relations to each other, and talked of the love of God, and the grace of Christ, and the fellowship of the Spirit, none could doubt his fellowship with Christ. Mr. Thomas Kelso was a Methodist. His wife was a Presbyterian and a member of the Second Church. Their hospitable home in East Balti- more was always open and seldom without guests chiefly and indiscriminately Presbyterians and Methodists. Here Dr. Smith was thrown into fraternal fellowship with many of the emi- nent ministers of the time. Bishop Waugh, who invited him to join in his ordination of ministers, the elders Edwards, Slicer, Sewell, and many an honored name besides. Amidst associations such as these his old prejudices gradually melted away and he came at last not in word only, but in deed and in truth, to recognize all churches as branches of the one Church. During his whole ministry in Baltimore it w^as his pleasure to enjoy Christian fellowship and fraternal intercourse with brethren of the different churches around him. When he came to Baltimore, there were eight Presbyterian churches in Baltimore, the First, Second, Third, Fourth, Fifth, Aisquith Street, M EIGHTY YEAKS. Broadway and Franklin Street. Their pastors were, Drs. Backus, Musgrave, Purviance, II am- ner, Dunlap, Peck, and Pluraer. To come from his lonely country home, iijto such a fellow- ship as this Avas like translation into another world, of higher companionships and nobler in- spirations. The condition of the Second Church in 1849 was in many ways discouraging. It had been greatly reduced in numbers and resources and vexed by internal dissensions, its strength so weakened in the way, that the faint-hearted be- gan to fear for its very existence. The old church had become incommodious for present needs and unattractive to present tastes, and soon after the installation of the new pastor the question of the renovation of the old building or the erection of a new one began to be agitated, with the excitements and oppositions which any proposal of the kind always occasions. Against the open opposition of some, and the half-hearted consent of others, and these unfortunately the wealthier members, it was resolved at last to take down the old building and erect a new one on the same site. It was a formidable undertaking under the existing conditions, but the trustees at the time were a noble company. The heart throbs as we record their names, for they are all now passed over to the other side. James Mai- EIGHTY YEAES. 45 com, James McConkey, Robert Howard, Horace and Edwin Abbott, AVilliam Crichton, Samuel Fenby ; they devoted themselves to the enter- prise with rare wisdom and whole-hearted zeal. The building was completed and opened for public worship in 1852, the congregation mean- while worshiping in Temperance Temple on Gay Street. During the first three years some sixty families were added and the continuance of the church seemed assured. Under their own burden while heaviest, a mission school was opened in the basement of a room near the penitentiary, and largely through the unwearied exertions of Mr. B. F. Haynes, a member of the church, the Breckinridge Chapel was erected. The General Assembly of 1860 elected Dr. Smith professor of ecclesiastical history and church government in the Danville Theological Seminary, into which two former Baltimore pastors had already gone, Drs. K. J. Breckinridge and Stuart Kobinson, and the pastoral relation was dissolved in 1860. DR. GEORGE P. HAYES. Dr. George Price Hayes was installed sixth pastor in March, 1861. Dr. Hayes was the fourth son of John Hayes, and Orpha Hayes, and was born near Canonsburg, Pa., February 2d, 1838, was graduated at Jefferson College, 46 EIGHTY YEARS. studied theology in the Western Theological Seminary, was licensed by the Presbytery of Pittsburg, in April, 1859, and became assistant pastor with Dr. Painter, in Kittanning, Pa. Dr. Hayes came to the Second Church at the begin- ning of the troublous times of the Civil War. Though strong in his convictions and faithful to his convictions, he bore himself so wisely and charitably to all of contrary opinions that the church came through the storm, not indeed without injury, but without wreck. The church not only survived, but a brighter day began to dawn upon it. In the fall of 1868, Dr. Hayes accepted the position of the financial secretary of Wooster University, and the pastoral relation was dissolved. DR. JONATHAN EDWARDS. Dr. Hayes Avas succeeded by Dr. Jonathan Edwards. Dr. Edwards was eminent as a scholar, a theologian, an educator and college president. Soon after his settlement difficulties and embarrassments arose with which he felt himself unwilling to contend, and after a short time when the brethren had scarcely come to know him, and the church had scarcely begun to feel his influence, the pastoral relation was dis- solved. EIGHTY YEARS. 47 DR. ROBERT H. FULTO]^. Dr. Edwards was succeeded by Dr. Robert H. Fulton Avho was installed in 1872. He was born in Monongahela City, Pa., was graduated with honor in the first class of the united colleges of Washington and Jefferson in 1866, studied theology in the Western Seminary and was licensed in 1871. Dr. Fulton Avas an instructive preacher, faithful and laborious in all depart- ments of pastoral duty. He was eminent as a presbyter, and a most valued member of all church courts. Under his faithful ministry the church was greatly strengthened and blessed. In May, 1883, having accepted a call to the Northminster Church in Philadelphia, his pas- toral relation was dissolved. DR. ALEXANDER PROUDFIT. Dr. Fulton was succeeded by Dr. Alexander Proudfit. He was born in New York City, April 16th, 1839, was graduated at Rutgers Col- lege, 1859, studied theology in New Brunswick and Princeton Seminaries, and was ordained an evangelist by the Presbytery of Ncav York. He was pastor of the church in Clayton, and after- wards in Hackensack, N. J., whence he was called to the Second Church. Dr. Proudfit was abundant and indefatigable in labors, and gave himself largely to furthering 48 EIGHTY YEARS. the interests of the multiplied societies and insti- tutes which he thought helpful to the church. He introduced the Christian Endeavor Society, and was earnest in advocating its claims. He possessed rare administrative gifts and was ever devising something for the suppression of im- moralities, and the advancement of righteousness and peace. He was in many ways a benefactor to the church and to the city. Having accepted a call to a church in Ohio, the pastoral relation was dissolved. REV. ROBERT HOWARD TAYLOR. Dr. Proudfit was succeeded by the Kev. Eob- ert Howard Taylor, the present pastor. He is a native of Philadelphia, educated at Princeton, and came directly from the seminary to the church. He is a young man, ardent in zeal, abundant in labors, and the church is blessed un- der his ministr3\ The church building has been renovated, the old parsonage on the corner of Watson Street, was taken down and a large building erected in its place containing a lecture room, Sunday-school room, ladies' parlor, Bible- class room, and all needful appliances for carry- ing on an enlarged work. The Sunday-school is large and flourishing, and is indeed the nursery of the church. EIGHTY YEARS. 49 The present officers are: Pastor, Eev. R. Howard Taylor ; elders, Robert. H. Smith, John Abercrombie, John McKenzie, Robert J. Kane, Harry G. Evans, Frank R. Haynes. THIRD CHURCH. In 1823, t^yenty years after the founding of the Second Church the Third Church was organ- ized. It grew out of the mission established near Crook's factory. It was feeble from the begin- ning and had a long struggle for existence. A small and incommodious building was finally erected on North Eutaw Street. DR. GEORGE W. MITSGRAVE. Dr. George W. Musgrave was installed pastor in July, 1830, Dr. Musgrave was born in Philadelphia, Oc- tober 19th, 1801:. He was educated at the Clas- sical Academy of the Rev. S. B. AViley, studied theology at Princeton, was licensed by the Pres- bytery of Baltimore in 1828, and was ordained and installed in July, 1830. He was a laborious student and a most in- structive preacher. He told me on one occasion that it was his custom at the beginning of the year to go through his Bible and mark the texts on which he w^ould preach through the year, ar- ranging them with reference to times, and espe- 50 EIGHTY YEAES. cially sacramental seasons. Every day he would write a brief analysis and exposition of one of these texts, then he would select one of these and expand it into a weekly lecture. This in turn he would draw out into a sermon. Every week he wrote at least one sermon whether he preached it or not, and at the time of our con- versation he said he had a large number of ser- mons he had never preached. His presence was commanding, and this, with his sonorous voice, would compel the attention of any assembly. He was a great debater and a controversialist, by taste as well as conviction. He took an ac- tive and influential part in all the exciting con- troversies of his time. Few cared to meet him in the arena and the debates between him and Dr. K. Breckinridge, well matched antagonists, in the Presbytery of Baltimore Avere intellectual feasts to those who heard them. Having been elected secretary of the Presbyterian Board of Publication in 1852, the pastoral relation was dissolved. DR. THEODIC PRIOR, An eminent minister of Yirginia, was the suc- cessor of Dr. Musgrave. His ministry scarcely lasted a year when he felt it his duty to return to Yirginia and the pastoral relation was dis- solved. EIGHTY YEARS. 51 KEY. GEIFFITH 0WET5". Dr. Prior was succeeded by the Eev. GrifRth Owen who served the church from 1855 to 1860. A native of Wales, he was graduated in Jeffer- son College in 1836, studied theology at Prince- ton, became pastor of a church in Philadelphia, and afterwards in Uniontown, Pa. He Avas widely known and respected in Baltimore for his warm heart, his arduous labors and his supreme devotion. After years of struggling the church was finally dissolved and its remaining members attached to the Central Church in 1862. FOURTH CHURCH. The Fourth Church was located on West Balti- more Street, near Fremont, in 1839. It was a small, brick building and the church was feeble from the beginning. REV. GEORGE DUGAN PURVIANCE. The Rev. George Dugan Purviance was or- dained and installed as the first pastor by the Pres- bytery of Baltimore in 1839. He was the son of the eminent Judge Purviance and the brother of Miss Margaret Purviance. He was graduated at St. Mary's College at Baltimore and had his theological training at Princeton. He preached the gospel in its simplicity and power, and was beloved by his brethren and by all who knew 52 EIGHTY YEARS. him. He served the church with zeal and fidel- ity till feeble health required his resignation in 1855. DR. JACOB AMOS LEFEVER. Dr. Lefever succeeded Mr. Purviance in 1856. He is a native of Pennsylvania, was graduated in Pennsylvania College in 1851 and was or- dained by the Presbytery of Baltimore, October 26th, 1856. He is with us till this day, vigorous in mind, and preaching with his old poAver. He is a student and a theologian, positive in his convictions, but genial and loving in his spirit. Under Dr. Lefever a new church building was erected on Franklin Square and the church is now in connection with the Southern General Assembly. He was succeeded by the present pastor, Kev. Mr. Woods. FIFTH CHURCH. In 1835 the Rev. Dr. James G. Hamner, of Yirginia, who had been for some years pastor of the church in Frederick, Md., removed to Balti- more, procured a room at the corner of Camden and Hanover Streets and gathered a congrega- tion of earnest fellow-laborers. A church build- ing, largely through the liberality of Dr. Hamner himself, was erected on Hanover Street. The Fifth Church was organized and Dr. Hamner be- EIGHTY YEARS. 53 came its first pastor. He was an earnest, evan- gelical preacher with a passion for souls. Nu- merous revivals, with large ingatherings occurred frequently during his ministry. At the close of his pastorate the church was served for a time by the Eev. R. S. Hitchcock. It was dissolved in 1862 and its remaining members were attached to the Central Church. CONSTITUTIONAL CHUECH. In the controversies which arose at the time, the sympathies of a large number in the Fifth Church were with the New School party. These withdrew and organized the Constitutional Church in connection with the New School As- sembly. They erected a large and commodious building on South Green Street and called the Eev. Dr. Dunning as their pastor. Under his able ministry the church flourished for a time, and after his dismissal it was served by the Eev. Mr. Noyes. On the reunion of the New and Old Schools, the Constitutional Church was dissolved and members attached to Lafayette Square Church. AISQUITH STEEET CHUECH. In 1842 the spirit of church extension had fallen upon the First and Second Churches and its first fruits appeared in Aisquith Street. In 54 EIGHTY YEARS. N^ovember, 1842, at a joint meeting of the First and Second Churches, the field Avas carefully sur- veyed and it was determined to erect a new church east of the Falls. A lot Avas secured on Aisquith street near Monument, subscriptions were opened, and the building was completed in 1844. In 1880 the old building was exchanged for the German Keformed Church lower down the street. The Aisquith Street Presbyterian Church was organized January 9th, 1844, with forty-seven members, mostly members of the First and Sec- ond Churches residing in the vicinity. The first elders were Isaac Johnson, James Logan, Moses Hyde and John Faulkner. The first deacons, Francis Davidson, Alexander Hamill and David Whitmarsh. EEV. ROBERT W. DUNLAP. Eev. Eobert W. Dunlap was installed pastor October 10th, 1844. He was born in South Car- olina, August 14th, 1817, educated at the Univer- sity of North Carolina and ordained an evangel- ist by the Presbytery of Georgia, in 1838. He supplied for a time the church in St. Augustine, Fla., and was pastor of a church in Columbia, Pa., from 1841 to 1844. He was an earnest preacher and a successful pastor and laid well the foundations of the new church, but unhappy differences arose in the congregation, and after EIGHTY YEAES. 55 struggling with these for a time the pastoral re- lation was at his request dissolved in June, 1850. We can do little more than mention the names of those who followed in long succession. All of them were known to me personally, and as I write their names, and as others read them, how many tender and sacred memories are revived ! The Kev. Thomas Warren was pastor from De- cember, 1851, to June, 1853. The Kev. David T. Carnahan from May, 1854, to October, 18G1. Dr. Hamner served the church for some time as a stated supply, and through his exertion, and largely by his gifts, the ground rent of the prop- erty was purchased. The Kev. J. S. Stuchell was pastor from November, 1862, till February, 1867. The Kev. James Kamsay from July, 1867, to December, 1871. The Kev. James A. Lapsley was called, and was waiting for the appointed day of installation Avhen he died suddenly. The Kev. J. S. I^oyes Avas pastor from May, 1873, to June, 1879. The Kev. George D. Buchanan from November, 1879, to 1882. The Kev. Silas Daven- port from October, 1883, to October, 1888. The present pastor is the Kev. Dr. J. Addison Smith, who was installed February 18th, 1889. The church has suffered greatly from death under his ministry. Six of his elders he has followed to the tomb. But with his large heart and tireless energy and effective preaching, beloved by his 66 EIGHTY YEARS. brethren and honored by his church, Aisquith Street stands fast in its lot. The present officers are ; Rev. J. Addison Smith, D. D., pastor ; el- ders, Robert Kinnear and David W. Glass. BROADWAY CHURCH. After the erection of Aisquith Street Church it was felt that there was urgent need of a church lower down on Fell's Point. The members of the Second Church took special interest in the enterprise, and to further it, in 1843, the Evan- gelical Association, composed of the active young men of the church, A. B. Cross, T. E. Baird and others, was formed. A lot was procured on the comer of Broadway and Gough Streets and the building was completed and opened for public worship in January, 1846. The church was or- ganized in March, 1846, Avith seventeen members, and a congregation Avas incorporated at the same time. The following thirteen persons Avere the original trustees: W. H. Conkling, George A. Yon Spreckleson, Robert D. Fenby, R. D. Mil- holland, William Gardner, Charles Hargesheimer, Robert Hutson, James Slater, John A. Robb, Robert Ulier, John C. Ely, Peter Fenby and E. J. Robb. REV. THOMAS E. PECK. Rev. Thomas E. Peck Avas installed the first pastor June lYth, 1846. Dr. Peck Avas born and EIGHTY YEARS. 57 educated in Columbia, S. C, and licensed to preach by the Presbytery of Charleston. lie Avas a 'high church Presbyterian of the Thorn- well type. He was a profound theologian, gave attendance to reading, and was well instructed in the hard points of theology and the five points of Calvinism. His discourses were log-ical, un- impassioned, addressed to the understanding of his hearers, and Avere masterpieces of systematic teaching. He had little sympathy with many of the popular movements of the times, stood al- together aloof from voluntary societies of every name, and looked with suspicion even upon Sun- day-schools as generally conducted. Under such a pastorate the foundations of the church Avere laid, if not broad, yet deep and strong. In 1858 Dr. Peck having signified his desire to accept a call to the Central Church the pastoral relation was dissolved. REV. F. W. BRAUNS. Dr. Peck Avas succeeded by the Eev. Frederick W. Brauns, Avho was installed April 21st, 1859. He Avas a native of Baltimore, acquired his classical and theological education at the Luth- eran institution at Gettysburg, Pa., Avas licensed by the Lutheran Synod of Maryland, in October, 1850, and united Avith the Presbytery of Balti- more in 1858. He Avas a fine scholar, an earnest 58 EIGHTY YEARS. and instructive preacher, and a devoted pastor, but his health was feeble and the condition of the congregation exacted more labor than he was able to bestow. At his own request the pastoral relation was dissolved February, 1861. Then followed a long vacancy, during which the church was on the verge of extinction, its total income being reduced to $250. It Avas sup- plied from time to time by the Eev. H. L. Singleton, Rev. William H. Cook, Dr. J. G. Ilamner, and others. Dr. Hamner served the church for about two years. His services were altogether gratuitous. All that the congregation could raise with large contributions from him- self were given to the payment of debts. Dr. Hamner was such a friend, not to Broadway alone, but to many a weak and struggling church besides. In 1866, the Presbytery of Baltimore pledged itself for a salary of $1,000, the congre- gation raising what they could. EEV. J. J. COALE. Under this action of the Presbytery the Rev. J. J. Coale, who was graduated at Princeton Semi- nary, was ordained and installed the third pastor April 11th, 1867. Under his able ministry the congregation began at once to flourish, the mem- bership was largely increased, the building reno- EIGHTY YEAES. 59 vated, and in a little time they were able to raise the pastor's salary themselves. In March, 1870, owing to continued ill health, Mr. Coale asked for a dismissal, and against the earnest protest of the representatives of the congregation, Mr. Alexander McClymont and S. M. Johnson, the request was granted and the pastoral relation dissolved. REV. JOHN McCOY. The Kev. John McCoy, a graduate of Jeffer- son and a student of Princeton, was installed fourth pastor January 22d, 1871. He served the church faithfully until December, 1872, when, at his own request the pastoral relation was dissolved. REV. JOHN L. FULTON. In April, 1873, the Eev. John L. Fulton was installed the fifth pastor. He received his clas- sical and theological education in Monmouth, 111. Under his pastorate the church reached the high- est degree of prosperity it had yet attained. The pastor's salary was raised to $1,600. The church was renovated and a parsonage bought, largely by members of the First Church. In 1876, he was dismissed to accept a call from the Central Church of Allegheny. 60 EIGHTY YEARS. DR. GEORGE E. JONES. The Eev. George E. Jones, D. D., Avas installed November Ytli, 1877. He was a graduate of Lafayette College and of Princeton Seminary. He Avas licensed by the Presbytery of Lehigh in April, 1872, and Avas for a time pastor of the Lower Brandy wine Church, Del. Under the pastorate of Dr. Jones the church continued to prosper and its financial condition Avas greatly improved. The pastor's salary of $1,600 Avas raised partly by the board and partly by other churches of the city. In 1880 Dr. Jones offered to release $300 of his salary on condition that the congregation would themselves raise the remain- ing $1,100. The offer Avas accepted and the church became self-supporting. After protracted debates and negotiations it Avas determined to sell the property and rebuild on a lot on East Baltimore Street, near the intersection of BroadAvay. The corner stone Avas laid August 1st, 1887, and the church Avas completed and occupied the folloAving year. Dr. Jones Avas a man of affairs and an in- defatigable laborer, and not in his OAvn church alone. For many years he Avas stated clerk of the presbytery of Baltimore, and, especially after his retirement, the care of all the churches fell largely on him. Owing to failing health Dr. Jones Avas compelled to ask for a dismissal and the pastoral relation Avas dissolved in December, 1893. EIGHTY YEARS. 61 EEV. W. J. ROWAN. Dr. Jones was succeeded by the Kev. William J. Kowan, who was ordained and installed June 17th, 1894. He was born in Philadelphia, Avas graduated at Lafayette College and studied theology in Princeton. Broadway was his first charge, and under his energetic ministry the church is not only holding on its way but reach- ing out for larger things. The present officers of the church are : Eev. William J. Kowan, pastor; elders, Frank C. Loflin, William S. Faust and Joseph M. Hume; deacons, James P. Clark, Alexander McKenzie, Thomas Moore and William W. Tuckey ; trus- tees, William C. Orr, James P. Clark, William A. Johnson, K. W. Mansfield, M. D., and William S. Faust. The following is the statistical report for the church for 1898 : Communicants, 135 ; Sunday-school members, 174. Contributions, Home Missions, $94.00 ; For- eign Missions, $121.00 ; Education, $5.00 ; Sunda}^- schoolWork, $17.00; Kelief Fund, $4.00; Freed- men, $3.00 ; Synodical Aid, $11.00 ; Aid for Col- leges, $2.00 ; General Assembly, $12.00 ; Congre- gational, $1,779.00, and Miscellaneous, $18.00. FEANKLIN STEEET CHUECH. The need of a church on the western side of 62 EIGHTY YEARS. the city to which population was rapidly tending was urgently felt. After careful survey of the field it was resolved to build on the corner of Franklin and Cathedral Streets. Dr. Backus with a large committee from the First Church engaged zealously in the enterprise, and a beauti- ful Gothic structure in which the congregation still worships, was completed and occupied. A large colony went out from the First Church and Franklin Street was strong from the beginning. DR. WILLIAM S. PLUMER. Dr. William Swann Plumer was installed first pastor, April 28th, 1847. Dr. Plumer was born in Darlington, Beaver County, Pa., July 26th, 1802. He was graduated at AYashington Col- lege, Yirginia, studied theology at Princeton, and was ordained an evangelist in Orange in 1827. For nearly three years following he was engaged as an evangelist in Southern Yirginia and Korth Carolina. He became pastor successively of the church in Briery, Ya., Tabb Street Church, Petersburg, and the First Church of Eichmond. Dr. Plumer was a marked man and filled a large space in the eyes of his generation. His appearance was most commanding. Upright, symmetrical and tall of stature, Avith an Aaronic beard carefully tended and flowing far down on his breast; eyes that alternately sparkled and EIGHTY YEARS. 63 burned ; a voice sonorous and of marvelous com- pass, sometimes thundering like Niagara, some- times whispering like the zephyr, sometimes screaming like the eagle when he soars toward the sun, sometimes cooing like the dove when she stoops and flutters over her nest. He was often abrupt in manner and quaint in speech, im- petuous when wrongfully or wrathfully opposed, but gentle and yielding as a child to the reproofs and persuasions of his friends. He was a great preacher in his happy moods, a great presbyter, a great debater, but, above all, he was a man of God. He walked with God and the secret of the Lord was with him. There was not a phase of Christidin experience through which he had not passed nor a question of casuistry which he had not debated if not solved in his own soul. The condition of sinners as under the curse and con- demnation of God's law, conviction of sin, by the in working of the Diyine Spirit, regeneration and conversion in their differences, their varieties, and their evidences, growth in grace and meet- ness for heaven, — these were the themes on which he delighted to talk and to preach. Dr. A. Alexander, himself, did not excel him in searching the inmost heart of his hearers and discriminating a true Christian experience from the false. 64 EIGHTY YEARS. On raj coming to Baltimore Dr. Plumer became my pastor. In all the perplexities of Christian life and pastoral work I turned to him for coun- sel and guidance, and never surely was spiritual guide more sympathetic or more wise. On one occasion, when something in the Second Church troubled me, and I began to think of leaving, I went to his study and told him the story. He listened patiently and when I w^as done, took up the Bible from his table and turned to that ex- quisite passage in Deuteronomy, "As an eagle stirreth up her nest, etc." He read the entire pas- sage, expounded it at length, in his peculiar way, said not a word about my trouble, but left me to infer that sometimes w^hen our nest is too soft the Lord stirs it to compel our upward flight, and I would better learn the lesson and stay where I was. At another time when I told him of some spiritual trouble, he listened and without alluding to it in any w^ay said, " For da3^s past I have been afraid to go out in the street lest I should be left to fall into some open sin," then went on to speak of his sore spiritual conflicts, " fightings w^ithout and fears within," and left me to infer, ^^ the same afilictions are accomplished in your brethren and are a necessary part of your discipline for heaven." One da}^ I met him on the street and abruptly, without salutation, he said, " Brother Smith, can you preach on the EIGHTY YEARS. 65 love of Christ ? I have often tried to do it, I am trying to prepare for it now, but with this wretched heart of mine, how can I ? " and then with tears in his eyes turned abruptly away. A faithful pastor, Dr. Plumer made time to devote to other departments of work. He had almost a passion for writing short tracts, some- times little leaflets of two or three pages. Show- ing me the manuscript of one of these, I said to him, " Why do you devote so much time to fugitive pieces like this ? why not write a book ? " After talking of the matter for some time he said he would write a book, and commenced at once to write the Grace of Christ, the first of the many books he published. When the manuscript was finished he sent it to me with the message : " Ee- m ember, I want you to be perfectly candid in your criticism." After reading it carefully, I said : " Doctor, there is one peculiarity which strikes me unpleasantly. Your sentences seem to be detached and largely independent of each other, and do not move on together toward a common goal." He thought for a while and said, "When I sit down to write, while, of course, the general subject is before my mind, I write down one sentence, and that suggests an- other, and that still another, and so I go on to the end." There was one beautiful passage which addressed itself both to the imagination bb EIGHTY YEAKS. and to the heart. I turned to it and said, " That is an exquisite passage." He replied : " Why, I was just thinking of striking that out. You know I have little imagination," or as he put it, "I cannot say pretty things as others do, and to give the necessary variety, I am obliged to resort to quotations." All his readers know how his books abound in quotations. I bless God that I was permitted to know and worthy to love two such men as Dr. Plumer and Dr. Backus. I bless God for the years during which it was my privilege to enjoy their companionship and counsels. Dr. Backus was a brother with the warm and tender sympa- thies of a brother's heart, with Avhom you could talk and take counsel without awe or restraint. Dr. Plumer was a father, affectionate and kind, but there was a something about him which al- ways inspired awe. With him I always felt as if in the presence of a superior being, whose words of wisdom and counsel were as oracles. Under the pastorate of Dr. Plumer the foun- dations of Franklin Street were securely laid. The church grew in numbers and in influence and ever since has maintained its position as one of our strongest churches. When in the semi- nary at Princeton, Dr. Alexander said to him that he ought to prepare himself to be a theolog- ical professor and these words influenced his en- EIGHTY YEARS. 67 tire ministry. In the preparation of sermons he had the professorship in view, and while in Bal- timore wrote out almost a complete course of lectures on didactic theology. When elected professor in Western Theological Seminary in 1854, on his expressed desire to accept it, the pastoral relation was dissolved. Dr. Plumer was succeeded by the Eev. N. C. Burt of Ohio, who remained but a short time, and he, by the Kev. J. J. Bullock, of Kentucky, Avho was pastor during the troublous times of the Civil War. In 1870, he was succeeded by the Eev. Dr. William U. Mulrkland. REV. DR. WILLIAM U. MUIRKLAND. Dr. William U. Mulrkland was born in British Guiana, was graduated at Hampden Sydney, studied theology at Union Theological Seminary, Virginia, and was ordained at Charlottesville, Va., in April, 1869. He has served the Franklin Street Church since 1870, and though suffering from the attacks of an insidious disease, still stands in his lot and ministers to the people he has loved and served so well. He is an eloquent preacher, a devoted pastor, and many rise up around him to call him blessed. Franklin Street Church is now in connection with the Southern Assembly. 68 EIGHTY YEARS. WESTMINSTER CHUECII. Westminster Church, on the corner of Green and Fayette Streets, stands in the midst of God's acre, and is surrounded by the monuments and memorials of Presbyterian worthies of many generations. The need of a church in that lo- cality was felt, and it was desired to protect the hallowed spot. At a joint meeting of the officers of the First and Franklin Street Churches, it was determined to commence the erection of a build- ing there. A committee was appointed to raise funds, secure the assent of lot holders, and super- intend the work. The committee were Dr. J. C. Backus, Joseph Tajdor, Alexander Murdoch, Archibald Stirling, Daniel Holt, W. W. Spence, and William B. Canfield, from the First Church, and Matthew Clark, John Faulkner, E. H. Per- kins, and John Bigham of the Franklin Street Church. The building was completed and opened July 4th, 1852, by a historical discourse from Dr. Backus. The church was organized in July, 1852, with sixty -one members, and John Faulk- ner and John M. Brown as elders. The lecture room and Sunday-school room were built in 1857 ; the parsonage was purchased in 1858. EEV. WILLIAM J. HOGE. The Rev. William J. Iloge was installed first pastor August 28th, 18G2. He was a child of the EIGHTY YEARS. 69 covenant and inherited from a godly ancestry the blessings of the covenant. Left an orphan at an early age he secured a liberal education, studied theology privately and was licensed in 1850. He was popular as a preacher, and his services were in great demand. Dr. Hoge's pastorate was eminently successful, when to the surprise and regret of his people he declared his desire to accept a professorship in Union Seminary, Vir- ginia, and the pastoral relation was dissolved in July, 1856. In 1859, he became collegiate pastor with Dr. Spring, of the Brick Church, Kew York. On the breaking out of the war he returned to Virginia, and on the 5 th of July, 1864, in a country home near Petersburg, amidst the boom- ing of cannon and the alarms of war, fell asleep in Jesus, whispering, — they were his last words, — " I die, but 1 live in Jesus for evermore." Like Larned and Summerville, and many a noble spirit besides, worn out by cares and anxieties and self- consuming toil, he died in the early morning of his years. " So the struck eagle stretched upon the plain, No more through rolling clouds to soar again, Viewed his own feather on the fatal dart. And winged the shaft that quivered in his heart." DR. CYRUS DICKSON. Dr. Dickson was installed second pastor No- vember 2Tth, 1856. To him I was bound aU 70 EIGHTY YEARS. through life by ties of peculiar intimacy and tenderness, and I cannot more fittingly speak of him than by reproducing here the words spoken at his funeral in Baltimore September 14th, 1881. We were boys together. We were classmates at college. We were settled side by side as pastors during the first seven years of our min- istry and then, separated for a little while, were reunited here. We crossed the Atlantic, traversed Europe, climbed the pyramids, stood on the shores of the Red Sea, together. I have been a frequent inmate of his home since the day he first had a home. I have seen his children grow up round him and have buried his dead. For half a century our lives have run on together side by side. It is hard at this solemn moment to bid away these thronging memories, to bid down these throb- bing emotions and to speak of him calmly, im- personally as the occasion requires. Cyrus Dickson was born in the township of E'orth East, Erie County, Pa., on the 20th day of December, 1816. His childhood Avas passed on the shore of the great lake, and almost within hearing of the thunders of Niagara. He was a child of the covenant, and the descendant of a long line of godly ancestry, some of whom were princes in Israel. Breathing the atmos- phere and surrounded by the hallowed influences of a Christian home his earliest and profoundest EIGHTY YEARS. 71 impressions were of the nearness, the realit}^, the transcendent importance of eternal things. How fondly he cherished the sacred memories of that home and how lasting its impress upon his character ! Western Pennsylvania was then almost a wil- derness. Its first settlers were almost all Pres- byterians of the straightest, purest, strongest type from Scotland, from northern Ireland, from the Cumberland Valley, and the homes of Pres- byterianism in the East, but chiefly from Wash- ington and the southern counties of the State. Dr. McMillan, the John Knox of his age, God had raised up and endued with apostolic gifts, and sent before as a herald, to prepare his Avay in the wilderness. From his log cottage in Canons- burg, the Geneva of the West, there went forth a race of ministers, whose like the world has seldom seen since apostolic times. Their names, if grow- ing dim on earth, are ever growing brighter in heaven. Their labors, if long since ended on earth, still follow them in blessed influences and sanctified souls who have never heard their names. Tate, Eaton, Johnson, Hughs, Satterfield, Woods, McCurdy, Smith, Marquis, these are the honored names of some of these mighty men of old. From the banks of the Ohio to the shores of the Great Lakes they went everywhere preaching the gospel of the kingdom and crying aloud : " Pre- 72 EIGHTY YEAKS. pare thee in the desert, the highway of our God." The pulpit was then what tiie pulpit, platform and press combined are to-day, and their pulpits were the mightiest influence in fashioning so- ciety. The people were poor in this world's goods, but they were preeminently rich in faith. Eternal things were not to them myths or shadows, or soulless abstractions, but present and palpable realities. They saw God, and heaven, and hell, as present and real and these influenced and controlled their whole lives. Religion Avas their chief business and chief theme of conversation. Instead of morning papers and magazines and reviews and cheap literature of every kind the Bible and the con- fession of faith, and Baxter and Doddridge, and Bunyan, furnished almost exclusively their read- ing. Their communion seasons were like the great annual festivals of the Jews. They were held in groves, God's first temples, for no walls could contain the gathering multitude. The services were protracted for many days. The people as- sembled from many miles round, neighboring ministers Avere called in, preaching from the tent was continued, Avith short intervals, almost the entire day ; and far into the night the A^oice of prayer and praise Avas heard in their dAvellings. The Spirit often came down upon them like the EIGHTY YEARS. Y3 rustling wind in the tree tops or the rushing wind of Pentecost. The revival services of those times were Pentecostal. Most remarkable in their na- ture and methods, most lasting in their blessed influences, few scenes in the whole history of the Church so displayed the power of God's Spirit and so magnified the grace of the gospel. It was amidst such influences that the childhood of Dr. Dickson Avas passed and his Christian character formed. The blessed baptism then received left its lasting influence on his whole life. At the early age of fourteen he joined himself publicly to the Lord, and from that hour his pur- pose to enter the ministry seems to have been fixed. He was graduated at Jefferson College in 1837, in the class which embraced the martyr missionary Lowry, and gave as the fruit of the precious college revival so many ministers to the Church. His theological studies were pursued under private instructions, for theological semi- naries were then in their infancy. In June, 1840, he was ordained and installed pastor of the united churches of Franklin and Sugar Creek, in Venango County, Pa. ; in the same year he was married to Miss Delia E. McConnell, the helper of his faith, the sharer of his labors, the charm of his home, the solace of his life for forty years, and a ministering angel at his dying bed. 74 EIGHTY YEARS. Franklin, the county seat of Yenango County, situated at tlie junction of French Creek and the Allegheny River, was then a little village of some 400 inhabitants. Sugar Creek, on the stream of that name was some seven miles dis- tant. The churches in both places were little, rough, wooden structures, with naked w^alls and quaking windows, and rude pine pulpits, lit up at night by flickering tallow candles. The peo- ple were few, scattered, poor, primitive in their manners and customs. The salary was $300. Those churches w^ere just on the edge of what then was almost a w^ilderness, now the oil region of Pennsylvania. The roads w^ere often but blind bridle paths, filled with stumps, and in places, almost impassable from snags. The streams were bridgeless and the crossings of French Creek, and Oil Creek and Broken Straw were often difficult and sometimes perilous. A few feeble churches were erected at long inter- vals, and where they were wanting the lordly pine or the wide spreading oak, or the rude country schoolhouse afforded a sanctuary. The people hungered and thirsted for the bread of life, and it was the delight of the young pastor, mounted on a horse as well known throughout all that region as himself, through hunger and cold and storm to carry the bread of life to those scattered sheep in the wilderness. I often accompanied EIGHTY YEARS. T5 him on what might be called his missionary tours, and saw how his coming was always a festal time. His fame as a preacher began to be noised abroad and other and wider fields began to solicit him. In 1848, he accepted a call from the Second Church of Wheeling, Ya., then just organized. Upon his new field he entered with characteristic ardor. The church grew in num- bers and influence, and became under his pastor- ate, one of the largest and most influential for good in the Presbytery. But a still wider field was open, and in November, 1856, he became the pastor of the Westminster Church, Baltimore. From the very beginning of his ministr}^ in Bal- timore an unusual blessing attended him. Dur- ing the first two years there was an almost con- tinual revival and the people of God Avere quick- ened and a precious harvest of souls was gathered. Then the voice which had been call- ing to him, " Come up higher," called once more. In 1870, he Avas elected by the General As- sembly secretary of the Board of Home Missions. The congregation with one heart and one voice opposed his removal, but his own conviction of duty was clear, and the Presbytery with reluc- tance were compelled to acquiesce. For ten years he filled the office which made his name a household word throughout all Christendom. 76 EIGHTY YEARS. More than a year ago, failing health compelled him to retire from the active duties of his office and to seek in temporary rest strength for new labors. But his work was done, his crown was ready, and the Master had need of him for a still higher service above. He came back to the peo- ple he had loved so well to spend among them his last days and leave with them his precious dust. Slowly we saw the light of life go out. Day by day we saw his steps grow feebler and feebler, his eye dimmer and dimmer, and his elo- quent voice fainter and fainter. On Sabbath morning, September 11th, 1881, his spirit was caught up into the temple above to join in the worship of the great congregation round the throne. Such is the brief historic outline, the setting of the picture. But the picture itself we hesitate to attempt. Portrait painting is always difficult. Those delicate spiritual lines which the soul within traces upon the features it is hard for the most skillful pencil to transfer to canvas. 1. As a man he was richly and in many re- spects most remarkably endowed. There was in him a rare combination of the most seemingly incompatible qualities. Imagination was the im- perial faculty of his mind and seemed to hold all others in subjection. Out of the faintest analo- gies and the dimmest resemblances it fashioned EIGHTY YEARS. 77 ideal scenes and built up ideal worlds. His sen- sibilities were keen, reflecting as a burnished mirror the form of every passing object. His sympathies were quick, and warm and transform- ing. I have seldom known one who could so thoroughly appreciate the situation, enter into the feelings and put himself into the place of another. Imaginative, impressible, sympathetic, affectionate, his temperament was that of the poet and his world the world of romance. And yet with all this there was a strange mingling of the most prosaic and practical qualities. His observations of men and affairs were large and yet minute and circumstantial. His mind was always active, his faculties always on the alert and he was always gathering knowledge from surrounding objects. Of those marvelous extem- poraneous speeches which thrilled his hearers he might say, as Daniel Webster said of his great speech, it took me thirty years to prepare it. 2. These natural characteristics, consecrated by Divine Grace and brought into the service of the sanctuary, gave their peculiar complexion to his character and work as a minister. A devout student of the word, his theology was drawn directly from its pages. The great end of preach- ing as he regarded it was simply to declare the mind of the Spirit, and his preaching was largely expository. But his imagination embellished and 78 EIGHTY YEARS. flung attractions round the most familiar truths, grouping them into new forms and presenting them in new combinations, so that the old was forever becoming new. His ardent sympathies enabled him to discern the application of the truth unfolded to the wants of his hearers, and his ardent aifections enabled him to bring them home to their business and bosoms with rare power. The man embodied himself in the preacher and transfused his own magnetic qual- ity into the sermon. 3. As a pastor he was almost everything that a pastor should be. Kind, tender, S3^mpathetic, he was ever ready to weep with those who wept and to rejoice with those who rejoiced — not in those great sorrows only which rend the heart- strings, but in the everyday annoyances and per- plexities which make up so much of the bitter- ness of every life. He was a wise counselor and a skillful guide. I remember well the impression made by the young pastor among his ow^n peo- ple and throughout the churches of Western Pennsylvania. He did not dwell in a world apart. He knew men, he knew affairs. He was a dweller in this present world of living men and living interests. He could talk with farm- ers, and merchants, and physicians, and lawyers, and judges, with an intelligent appreciation of their affairs and a real sympathy in their per- EIGHTY YEAKS. " 79 plexities. And these sanctified secularities were always a power in his ministry. 4. Of him as a presbyter I need scarcely speak. His promptness in attendance upon all meetings, his readiness to take his full share of labor and responsibility, his quickness, his versa- tility, his large information, his ripe experience, his deep earnestness and magnetic power, are well known. How invaluable his counsels, how effective his agency, especially in composing dif- ferences and healing breaches ! 5. As a secretary. Great as the loss was to us, great as the grief was to him in sundering the ties which bound him here, the Church acted wisely for her larger interests in placing him at the head of her Board of Missions. His qualifi- cations for the work, both theoretical and prac- tical, were remarkable. Few had a larger knowl- edge of this great land in its present condition, or a clearer prophetic vision of its greatness. From the Atlantic to the Pacific, from the Great Lakes to the Southern Gulf, it was spread out before him as a map. He had traversed almost its entire extent. He delighted in collecting statistics and gathering information of every kind concerning it; with its climate, soil, pro- ductions, character of its inhabitants, undevel- oped resources and possibilities for the future, few statisticians were better acquainted. From 80 EIGHTY YEAKS. boyhood, the coming glory of this great land was a delightful theme. His eye always sparkled, and his voice always grew eloquent when he adverted to it. And with those glowing visions there was burned into his very soul the profound conviction that the gospel was the only hope for that future. Those marvelous speeches of his, which so thrilled all hearts in Presbyteries, and Synods, and General Assemblies, and gave such a mighty impulse to the cause for which he pleaded, were just the outflow of that clear prophetic vis- ion of the future greatness and glory of this broad land and the profound conviction that the gospel alone was the conservator of that future. KEV. DAVID C. MAKQUIS. Dr. Dickson was succeeded by the Rev. David C. Marquis, who was installed third pastor in September, 1870. Dr. Marquis was born in Mer- cer county, Pa. He was a child of the covenant and planted in the house of the Lord. Reared in Western Pennsylvania, like Dr. Dickson, he was surrounded on every side by churches who had received the baptism of the Holy Ghost. Some of the noble company of the apostles of Western Pennsylvania, Tate and Satterfield, and Munson, still survived and he was privileged from time to time to sit at their feet. Amid such hal- lowed influences his childhood and early youth EIGHTY YEARS. 81 were passed, and here he received his best educa- tion and anointing. Early in life he gave him- self to his father's God to serve him in the min- istry. He was graduated at Jefferson College and studied theology at the Western Theological Seminary. He is a profound biblical scholar, a thorough Presbyterian and a thorough Calvinist. Of sturdy nature, of strong will and strong con- victions, but tolerant of the opinion of others, a delightful companion, a loyal friend, a brother loving and beloved. It was no easy matter to follow such a man as Dr. Dickson and fill the pulpit which he had occupied. But this Dr. Marquis did. His pastorate was eminently suc- cessful and his influence was felt, not in West- minster alone, but throughout the city and the Presbytery. In October, 1878, the pastoral rela- tion at his request was dissolved. Of the remaining pastors who come so near to our own times we need but give names and dates. Kev. William J. Gill was installed December 18th, 1878, and resigned January, 1884. Rev. Morris E. Wilson, installed December, 1884, re- signed February, 1890. Rev. J. W. Rogan, in- stalled November, 1890, resigned October, 1896. Rev. John M. Allison, the present pastor, in- stalled April, 1897. From various causes Westminster for some years past, has labored under difficulties and dis- 82 EIGHTY YEAKS. couragements, but the skies have begun to brighten and cheering signs of promise begin to appear. The pastorate of Brother Allison, brief as it has been, has been greatly blessed and all hearts are encouraged and strengthened. The present officers of the church are, Rev. John L. Allison, pastor ; Benjamin Whitely, Elijah S. Heath, S. C. Brewster, E. L. Pettit, C. W. Cog- gins and John Templeton, elders ; Eobert Davis, David Conan, Alexander P. Gray, Sr., and J. Kennedy Mattee, deacons. The last statistical report : Communicants, whole number, 302 ; adults and infants baptized, 11 ; Sunday-school members, 131 ; contributed to Home Missions, $305.00 ; Foreign Missions, $213.00 ; Education, $12.00 ; Sunday-school Work, $51.00; Church Erection, $6.00; Relief, $16.00; Freedmen, $9.00; Synodical Aid, $26.00; Aid for Colleges, $8.00 ; General Assembly, $25.00 ; Congregational, $3,985.00 ; Missions, $42.00. CENTRAL CHURCH. The history of the Central Church is in many respects a remarkable history. It has passed through all the vicissitudes and experienced all the changes possible to churches. It has reached the heights of prosperity and sunk into the depths of adversity. To-day trembling for its existence, and to-morrow rejoicing in its abun- EIGHTY YEAES. 83 dant enlargement. There is not a chapter in the history of any of our churches, prosperous or ad- verse, which does not find its counterpart in the Central Church. Hitherto, we have passed lightly over the financial distresses and pro- tracted struggles through which most of our churches have passed and through which so many are passing to-day. The entire history of many from the beginning is that of one long, unbroken, at times almost hopeless, struggle for existence. How many heart-breaks of pastors and pastors' wives, when they were compelled for years to repeat the weary question to each other, What shall we eat, and what shall we drink, and wherewithal shall we be clothed ? We propose here to tell the story of the Central Church at greater length, because it is typical of all these. The reading may bring cheer to some burdened hearts, and inspire hope and courage, too, in some who are just ready to faint in the long struggle, for who knoweth when enlargement and deliverance may come to them ? The Central Church was organized in 1853, as appears from the following record : "Baltimore, April 13, 1853. " At a meeting of the committee of Presbytery for the purpose of organizing a congregation to 84 EIGHTY YEARS. be called The Central Presbyterian Church of Baltimore, the committee, consisting of Dr. J. T. Smith, Rev. Dr. J. M. T. Atkinson, and Elder Wil- liam B. Canfield, met in the lecture room of the Franklin Street Presbyterian Church. Meeting opened with prayer by the Eev. Mr. Atkinson. After a statement of the object of the meeting by Dr. Smith, chairman, the names of the per- sons asking for the organization of the Central Church were read, amounting to the number of eighty-three. On motion it was resolved to elect two elders, and to elect viva voce j whereupon Dr. Baer and John McEldowney were elected elders." Of the eighty-three members, some seventy were from the Associate lleformed Church, and owing to their peculiar views of church polit}^, only two could be induced to serve the church as elders and none as deacons. Immediately upon their organization they called the Rev. Stuart Robinson as their pastor. Mr. Robinson had been serving the Associate Reformed Church for some time with great acceptance, but he was a high church Presbyterian, and the congregation was in- dependent. In a little time there was friction between the pastor and officers of the church and Mr. Robinson's position had become so embarrassing that he accepted the call. A com- EIGHTY YEARS. 85 modioLis liall was procured on Hanover Street, for the temporary use of the congregation. A lot was selected on the corner of Saratoga and Liberty Streets. The erection of a church build- ing was at once commenced and was completed in about two years. Its total cost was some $03,000. A debt Avas left upon it of $30,000, $18,000 of Avhich was made permanent, and rested as a heavy incubus upon the church for many a weary year. Mr. Robinson was highly popular as a preacher, large congregations were attracted, and to the superficial observer all seemed well, but the state of the finances was not satisfactory. Irritating questions arose as to the respective functions of church officers, and the proper policy to be pursued, and in 1856, at the request of Mr. Robinson, the pastoral relation Avas dissolved. Under the pastorate of Mr. Robinson the num- ber of members increased from eighty-three to 257. J. Harmon Brown, John Doane, J. M. Stevenson, Sr., and William Hogg were added to the eldership. In 1855, William Reynolds, Sr., George W. Andrews, W. A. Dunnington, Dr. J. H. Perkins, and William H. Stevenson, were ordained the first deacons. The trustees were George M. Gill, J. Hartshorne, William Miller, G. Armstrong, George F. Webb, Benjamin De Ford and William Reynolds, Sr. The removal 86 EIGHTY YEARS. of Mr. Robinson told at once, and disastrously, upon all the interests of the congregation. Many and for a time uniformly unsuccessful efforts were made to procure a successor. Drs. B. M. Smith, William M. Paxton, William A. Scott, Charles Wads worth, and Dr. Thompson, were succes- sively called, and all declined, apparently for the same reasons — the unsatisfactory state of the finances and the peculiarity of the organization of the church. At length in January, 1858, Dr. Thomas E. Peck accepted a call. For several years he had been pastor of Broadway Church, with large experience and extensive acquaintance in the city. He struggled on for two years and then left to accept a professorship in Union Sem- inary, Virginia. He was succeeded by Hev. Silas G. Dunlap, who remained but a few months. The condition of the congregation now ap- peared to its best and bravest friends to be altogether desperate. Its income was reduced to $1,450. Its expenditures were $3,630. Attend- ance upon all its services had greatly fallen off. Many of its members had united with other churches, and the discouraged remnant were openly debating the question of disbanding. The corporation was bankrupt and the church was dead without hope of revival in itself. If saved at all it must be saved from without. There were at the time three separate interests, EIGHTY YEARS. 87 which if combined and brought into the Central Church might preserve it from extinction. The Third and Fifth Churches had both been dis- solved, but remnants of their membership and fragments of their funds were still left. Several families of the Second Church had removed into the vicinity. Could these three interests be united and combined with the Central Church it might be saved. To accomplish this, representatives of all three, Mr. James Malcolm, Messrs. James and Hugh Warden, Mr. William Crichton, and others of the Second Church, Mr. William H. Cole, Mr. William McLean, and others of the Third Church, and Mr. John F. McJilton, Mr. George F. Needham and others of the Fifth Church, conferred together on the subject. They had throughout the hearty sympathy and cordial cooperation of Dr. Backus, with his great influence and supreme devotion to the cause. After protracted negotiations, they succeeded at last in uniting the three interests. Then they approached the Central, offering to pay off their floating debt, which was large and pressing, to secure the payment of the interest of the perma- nent debt, $1,080 per year, and to provide for the current annual expenses, conditioned upon the calling of Dr. J. T. Smith as their pastor. Dr. Smith was at that time in the theological seminary at Danville, but the condition of the 88 EIGHTY YEARS. seminary too, had become desperate. Drs. Breck- inridge and Humphreys, on whom the seminary Avas mainly dependent, were both entirely dis- abled by sickness. On account of the w^ar, the students who were largely from the south and southwest, dispersed until only eleven were left, and it was evident that the doors of the seminary must be closed. Dr. Smith had some inviting positions within his reach and one of them he was inclined to accept when the call from Balti- more came. It is always hazardous for a pastor to return to a field he has once occupied. The difficulties of welding four such diverse elements into one harmonious whole, and that amidst the agitations and passions engendered by the war, were all apparent. But he had written to Dr. Backus and Mr. Malcolm that, as they Avere on the ground and knew all the circumstances he would submit his judgment to theirs, and upon their representations the call was accepted. He came at once to Baltimore and was installed pas- tor of the church on the 10th of March, 1862, Drs. Backus, Dickson and J. J. Bullock conduct- ing the installation services. The officers of the church were at this time : elders, J. M. Steven- son, Sr., and William Hogg ; deacons, William M. Stevenson, Dr. J. H. Perkins and William Reynolds, Jr. ; the trustees as reorganized, Joshua Hartshorne, J. H. Stimson, Thomas D. EIGHTY YEARS. 89 Baircl, Alexander Eieman, William II. Stevenson, George F. Webb, William Eeynolds, Sr., James Malcolm, William Crichton, Hugh Warden, Wil- liam H. Cole, and George F. Needham. The prosperity of the church and congregation for a few years was altogether unexampled. The pew rents, then the source of congregational revenue, advanced from some $1,400 to $5,200. The offerings from $4,000 to some $15,000. The pastor's salary was doubled, and financially the arrangement succeeded beyond hope. The church membership increased from a little more than a hundred to upward of 400. The congre- gation became the largest in the city. For a time it was the fashion, and all flocked to it. All the agencies and appliances of church activi- ties, Sunday-school, mission societies, ladies' so- cieties were abundant in efficient labors. The prosperity of the church seemed to be assured, and its mountain seemed to stand strong. In May, 1873, the General Assembly met in the church, and in the July following in the great fire on Clay Street, it Avas almost totally con- sumed, and the question of rebuilding at once arose. The resources for building were ample. $28,000 cash in hand, $12,000 actual subscriptions from thirteen persons, $10,000 promised, and an interest in the Saratoga Street lot estimated at $10,000 ; in all $60,000. With this, and additional 90 EIGHTY YEARS. amounts expected, it was determined to erect a building without debt. The question as to the location of the new church gave rise to protracted consideration, some wishing to build on the old site, others pre- ferring to build further west or northwest. While these questions were under consideration another and more serious question arose. Can we build at all ? For the great financial crisis in the closing months of 1873 had swept nearly the whole of the $60,000 away. $15,000 unfortu- nately invested were almost entirely lost. The promised $10,000 failed. The Saratoga Street lot, instead of yielding $10,000, burdened the church with an annual charge of $1,080. JSTearl}^ all was gone, and under the financial pressure no subscriptions could be hoped for. What now shall be done ? Reduced in numbers, and w^ith- out means, how can Ave make bricks without straw, or build without the material to build ? How often daring those dark days we were met with the salutation which met the poor returned Jews of the captivity when they attempted to rebuild their ruined temple. " What do these feeble Jews ? . . . Will they revive the stones out of the heaps of the rubbish which are burned ? " In this extremity, when all hearts were failing them for fear, a meeting of trustees was called in a little back oifice on Courtland Street to consider EIGHTY YEARS. 91 the situation. And when it was fully set forth, a hushed and painful silence followed. Then Mr. Thomas Kensett arose. I can see him now, for my eye was fixed upon him, and his words will be with me forever. " Yes," said he, " it is bad enough, but I will give $5,000 to begin the work." Another and another followed until in a little time, enough was raised to secure the lot, lay the foundations of the church and erect the chapel adjoining. The chapel was completed and opened for public worship on the 20th of December, 1874. Protracted services were held on the oc- casion in which the members and ministers of other denominations united. The church was dedicated to Christian unity from its very foun- dation stone, and there in that little chapel the congregation lingered through five years of Aveary waiting, and the hope deferred that maketh the heart sick. How short those years now seem ! How long they were in passing ! At length an honored lady came to me one day — how can I ever forget it ? — and said, " I will give $5,000 to go on with the building." Another lady said, "And I also will give $5,000." In a little time enough was secured to raise the walls and com- plete the exterior of the building, and now that all means were exhausted, what shall be done ? Business men told us that on business principles we must stop. Are there any principles other 92 EIGHTY YEARS. than business principles upon which we can safely venture '? Have we any promises of God, the great Proprietor, whose are the silver and the gold, which we can safely trust ? Do we hold any se- curities of faith which can be converted into the securities of the market ? AYill God honor our drafts on him in current coin? There were some who took the golden coin in their hands and translated the motto on its face, In God we Trust, into treasures more precious than gold. They believed on their business principles that the promises of God were good security. So they believed and the work Avent on. Materials were to be provided from day to day. Work- men were to be paid every Saturday night. De- mands of many kinds Avere to be met. And al- Avays, sometimes in strange Avays, and at the very last hour, every instant demand Avas met, every note Avhen due, AA^as paid, and the credit of the church Avas kept untarnished. At last the church, a model of simple and severe beauty, so symmet- rical in its proportions, so harmonious in its color- ing, so admirable in all its appointments was completed. On March 8th, 1879, it Avas opened for public Avorship. The pastor preached in the morning, assisted in the opening and dedicatory services by the Rev. Dr. Backus and the vener- able Dr. McCosh of Princeton. Mr. Moody preached in the afternoon and Dr. McCosh in the EIGHTY YEARS. 93 evening. It was a day of gladness, the goal of long weary years of toiling and struggling and waiting, the answer of prayer, the reward of faith, the vindication of God's faithfulness over against our unbelieving fears. But the wilderness was not yet passed. An- other and final struggle remained. There was a debt of $35,000 and an annual deficiency of some $2,800. It was an appalling prospect. Expe- dient after expedient was suggested, tried and abandoned. Effort after effort was put forth to meet by temporary devices successive exigencies as they arose. And all the time the burden was growing heavier and heavier. At last it was de- termined to abandon all tamperings and tempor- izings and make an effort to discharge the debt entirely and at once. A committee of chosen men was appointed and they addressed themselves with earnestness and energy to the task before them. The entire congregation rallied at their call. The people gave, not only willingly, but like the tribes in the desert, superabundantly. Offerings were refused from some who were will- ing to give even beyond measure. At last the $35,000 was raised and the work was done. The annual income for current expenses remained to be provided for. Hitherto it had been raised by pew rents, supplemented by the Ladies' Aid So- ciety and special efforts. These it Avas deter- 94 EIGHTY YEAKS. mined to abandon and secure the whole amount needed by voluntary subscriptions in advance. Subscriptions were at once taken up and enough was secured to meet the annual expenses, ^o debt, no deficiency ! We were like them that dreamed. The Ked Sea was passed, and stand- ing on the other shore we sang our Miriam song of thanksgiving. It was a long dark night, but in it we saw stars we had never seen before. It was a Aveary wandering in the w^ilderness, but the pillar of cloud went before all the way. It was a stern trial of faith, but only " that the trial of your faith, being much more precious than that of gold that perisheth, . . . might be found at last unto praise and honor and glory." Yery much of the dross of the church was consumed in the fur- nace, — its pride and worldliness, its rejoicing in numbers and material strength, and social prestige, Avhich so often converts a church of Christ into a social or religious club, " whose rejoicing is in it- self." Its gold was refined, Walking together through the flames, in drawing near to the Mas- ter, they drew near to each other, and their hearts were knit into the unity of spirit and the bonds of peace. All the time, in many ways and through many agencies the church has abounded in the work of the Lord. The officers of the church, elders, EIGHTY YEARS. 95 deacons and trustees, in times that sorely tried their faith, were found faithful men. The women, as always, were foremost in almost every work. The Ladies' Aid Society and Helping Hand So- ciety were helpers indeed, especially in the dark days of deficiencies. They had their Missionary Societies, home and foreign, and abounded in un- organized and individual as Avell as in organ- ized labors. The Young People's Societies were means of grace to them, and the Young Men's Association provided sociables and public lec- tures and afforded opportunity for many de- lightful reunions and communions. The Sun- day-school through all these years was the right arm of strength to the church. It has been favored from the beginning with a succession of superintendents such as are seldom found : Mr. McJilton, Mr. E. C. Small, Mr. William Dugdale, and Mr. Theodore Miller. Under the superintend- ency of such men the Sunday-school was at once a nursery to the church and a benediction to the community around. But its activities were not confined within it- self, or devoted to its own advancement alone. In 18G5, Mrs. Eachel Colvin, Mrs. William Key- nolds, and other noble women with them, re- solved to establish a mission in southwestern Baltimore. Miss Xehmyer, a woman full of the missionary spirit, was employed to visit the 96 EIGHTY YEARS. families in that region, and a little brick chapel, which had been erected by the Columbia Street Methodist Church, on the corner of Ridgley and Hamburg Streets, was purchased. A mission school was opened in it, and superintendents and teachers were supplied from the church. Xot- withstanding the great distance and the difficulty of access, for thirty 3^ears in summer and winter, in sunshine and storm, their places in the school were always filled. Under the effective and un- tiring labors of Mr. George H. Beatson, the school grew in numbers and in influence for good. In process of time the little chapel disap- peared and a spacious stone church has risen from its ruins. The mission has grown into an organized church, and appears on the roll of the Presbytery as the Ridgley Street Church. The little one has become a thousand. When we look at it to-day and then look back to its feeble beginnings we are ready to exclaim, " What hath God wrought ! " Some years later Mr. Richard O. Crisp, a mem- ber of the church, left a legacy of $50,000 to establish a church near Brooklyn, as " a branch of the Central Church." Under the watchful superintendence of Mrs. Crisp and her super- added gifts, a beautiful stone building, with par- sonage adjoining, was erected on the most com- manding site in Brooklyn. On the 13th of May, EIGHTY YEARS. 97 1888, in the presence of a large congregation, the church was opened for public worship. A church was organized, and appears on the list of the Presbj^tery as the Crisp Memorial Church. The church has given eight of its young men to the ministry, has brought as gifts to the Lord's treasury nearly $500,000, has built three churches, to stand as memorials of God's grace, and to leave as precious legacies to those who shall come after them. These things are palpable, seen and read of all men, but the unrecorded labors, the invisible fruits, the souls blessed, and quickened and saved we can know only in that great day when the books are opened and all the hidden things of time are disclosed. In 1893, Dr. Sanith, who had been pastor of the church for thirty-one years, and had reached the age of seventy-live, resigned his charge. The Eev. Hugh K. AYalker, of Birmingham, Ala., was called as his successor. He entered upon his labors with great earnestness and zeal, but be- fore the results of his work could be fairly seen, he felt constrained by reasons which seemed to him imperative, to ask for his dismissal to enter another field. lie was succeeded by the Rev. De Witt M. Benham, the present pastor, who has won all hearts by his kindly sympathies, and courteous manners, and earnest devotion to his work. Under his faithful ministry it is hoped 98 EIGHTY YEARS. that the time, even the set time, to favor the Central Church has come. The present officers of the church are : the Eev. De Witt M. Benham, Ph. D., pastor. Elders, William H. Cole, Theodore K. Miller, George H. Beatson, Joseph T. Smith, M. D., Benjamin A. Nelson, John T. Hill, Charles W. Benson, M. D. Deacons, Archibald McElmoyle, Louis C. Deitsch, Kobert Cole, William L. Smith, Howard Martin, J. Wilson Cole, William Vansant, T. Turner Tongue, and Hugh Cooper. Trustees, Theodore K. Miller, William H. Cole, A. McElmoyle, George H. Beatson, John C. Eose, Joseph T. Smith, M. D., T. Turner Tongue, Douglas Rose, John Martin, John T. Hill. STATISTICAL REPORT FOR 1898. Elders, 8 ; deacons, 9 ; added on examination, 15 ; on certificate, IG ; dismissed, 18 ; died, 3 ; whole number, 401. Baptized adults, 3 ; infants, 4 ; Sunday-school members, 314. Contributions for Home Missions, $1,038.00; Foreign Missions, $645.00; Edu- cation, $18.00; Sunday-school AYork, $35.00; Church Erection, $337.00 ; Relief, $48.00 ; Freed- men, $19.00; Synodical Aid, $46.00; Aid for Col- leges, $12.00; General Assembly, $50.00; Con- gregational, $8,192.00 ; Miscellaneous, $47.00. EIGHTY YEARS. 99 MADISON STREET CHUECH (Colored). During the same year with the Central, 1853, the colored church now worshiping on West Madison Street, was organized. Presbyterians had always felt and manifested in many ways a profound interest in the large colored population of Baltimore. In those early, slavery days. Christian masters recognized their obligation to provide for tlie religious instruction of their slaves. Mission schools and Bible classes were established among the colored people in different sections of the city, and devoted teachers were always found to serve them. The names of colored members were found on all our church rolls. They worshiped with the white congre- gations and were seen in them all seated on back seats or in the gallery. The relations of the two races and their proper conduct toward each other in the house of God were problems even more perplexing then than now. While all recognized the fact that in Christ Jesus there is neither bond nor free, neither black nor white, practically it was found difficult to manifest this unity in the forms of outward and visible fellowship. The colored people found themselves in many ways embarrassed, and as they thought, hindered in their efforts at self-improvement by their as- sociation with the whites. Many of the more intelligent among them desired a separate organ- 100 EIGHTY YEARS. ization. After protracted and prayerful con- sideration it was determined to yield to their wishes and organize a colored church under the care of a white pastor. A commodious building was erected on East Madison Street, near Park, and the Jlev. Robert L. Galbreath, who was known to have peculiar aptitude for such a Avork, was called as their pastor. His installation was an occasion of unusual interest, and gathered a large congregation of both races. All felt that the experiment was one of great significance, and would be far reaching in its influence. I will never forget the eloquent Avords of Dr. Plumer on that occasion. In charging the pastor I had spoken of the happy results which Ave hoped to see following the transaction of that day. " Yes," said Dr. Plumer, Avho folloAved, " we will see its re- sults, not on earth only but in heaven." He then Avent on to speak of the melodious voices of colored people, and their sweet and inspiring singing to Avhich AA^e had just listened. "And," said he, " Avhen their voices mingle in the new song Avith those of the great choir above, they Avill raise it to a louder, gladder strain." He then Avent on in his eloquent way to speak of their position and our solemn obligation toAvard them, addressing him- self particularly to masters, for slavery Avas then not 3^et abolished, and urging upon them for their own safety, for their country's Avelfare, and for EIGHTY YEARS. 101 the salvation of the souls intrusted to their care, to meet the responsibilities imposed upon them. Mr. Galbreath served the church faithfully for some years. It was well organized and its offi- cers soon became familiar with their respective duties and its affairs were well administered. It has always occupied a first place, as it does to-day, among the colored churches of the city. A long succession of colored pastors followed, some of whom, tried by any standard, were excellent men and superior preachers. Among them were Mr. Eevels, who afterwards became United States Sen- ator from Louisiana ; Joseph Carr, who has occu- pied many important stations ; and William H. Weaver, whose eloquent appeals in behalf of his race led to his appointment as agent of the Board of Freedmen, a position he still occupies. If one did not see Brother Weaver's face while speaking he might imagine himself listening to a Jones, or a Gibson, or a Dickson. For obvious reasons Presbyterian services are not so attrac- tive to colored people generally and their pastors have labored diligently to instruct their people and make them intelligent Christians and give to the understandino; its rio-htful control over their emotional nature. But the colored churches of the city, for two others have been added to the number, are doing a needful and grand work for their race in Baltimore. 102 EIGHTY YEARS. The present officers are : Eeuben H. Arm- strong, pastor ; elders, Cornelius Butler, James J. Fessenton, George E. Fry, William Scott. TWELFTH CHUECII. During the same year, 1853, the first steps were taken toward the establishment of the Twelfth Church. At a meeting of the friends of the enterprise in the nineteenth ward, held in the office of Dr. Joseph H. Perkins and presided over by Dr. Backus, it was determined to erect a church in that locality. A large committee was appointed to secure subscriptions and superintend the work, consisting of Dr. E. II. Perkins, S. W. Barber, Thomas Dixon, Ira B. Canfield, John Bigham, Thomas Harknes, Charles Findla}^, M. Magne, Dr. Joseph E. Perkins, J. M. Dickson and John Rogers. A lot was secured on West Franklin Street, near Fremont, and the building was completed and opened in 1854. It was small and incommodious, but has been renovated and greatly improved. The church was organized by a committee of Presbytery in Ma}^ 1851, and E. P. Horner and D. A. Hollingshead were elected elders. The Rev. C. B. McKee had gathered a Sunday- school in a room on Fremont Street, and con- ducted there a regular preaching service. The school removed into the basement of the new EIGHTY YEARS. 103 building when completed and Mr. McKee served the church as a stated supply until 1855. The Rev. James Hughes was installed the first pastor in 1858. He was succeeded by the Rev. William R. Marshall, who remained until 1865. The Rev. J. Y. McCartney was elected to succeed him but died before he entered fairly upon his work. The Rev. James M. Maxwell succeeded and served the church until 1874. The Revs. J. M. Jelly, Sylvester W. Beach and David B. Greigg, served the church in the order named until 1898. The Rev. Joseph S. Malone, the present pas- tor, has just entered upon his work Avith encour- aging prospect of success. The Twelfth Church has recently, as indeed through almost its entire history, from vari- ous causes been compelled to struggle against hindrances, but we trust there is now the dawn- ing of a better day. The present officers are : Pastor, Rev. Joseph S. Malone ; elders, Levi A. Dodd, William J. Jami- son, Henry Thomas, Charles Barnsley, Dodson Postell. LIGHT STREET CHURCH. In October, 1853, the w^omen of the First Church resolved to open a mission school on Federal Hill in south Baltnnore. They secured the services of the Rev. J. H. Kaufman, licenti- 104 EIGHTY YEAKS. ate of the Presbytery of Philadelphia, to take charge of the work. He succeeded in gathering a large number of children into a hall on the corner of Light and Montgomery Streets. The school prospered, and, as there was no Presby- terian Church, in south Baltimore it was resolved to erect one. The corner stone was laid in the fall of 1854, and the building was opened for public worship in June, 1855. The church was organized with twenty members in April, 1855, and in April, 1856, the congregation was incor- porated under the name of the South Presby- terian Church, which was afterward changed to the Light Street Presbyterian Church. In 1858, a parochial school was opened in the basement ; and in 1862 a parsonage w^as purchased. The church, feeble from the beginning, has been com- pelled all through its history to contend with ad- verse circumstances, but in the face of all dis- couragements has kept on its way faint, yet pur- suing, and has been a benediction to south Baltimore. Its pastors, I knew them all, Avere earnest, self-sacrificing men, enduring hardness as good soldiers. Some of them were men of rare gifts and have left behind them blessed memories and enduring monuments of their Avork. We can but give their names and years of service. The first, the Kev. Henry J. Kaufman, Avas EIGHTY YEAKS. 105 pastor from October, 1855, till September, 1860; Kev. John H. Potter, from October, 1860, to June^ 186T; Eev. G. W. Hair, from October, 1867, to June, 1869; Rev. W. G. Hillman, from March, 1870, to December, 1871 ; Eev. David J. Beale, from April, 1872, to September, 188B; Rev. James D. Fitzgerald, from November, 1883, to September, 1888 ; Rev. James P. Green, from May, 1889, to February, 1892 ; Rev. Kinley Mc- Miilen, from May, 1892, to October, 1896; Rev. William M. Everett, the present pastor, was in- stalled in .May, 1897. The present officers of tlie church are : Rev. William M. Everett, pastor; elders, Levi A. Mer- rill, William L. Beale, Robert E. Lee Butler, William Frank Downs. On account of the approaching civil war there w^as an entire arrest put upon all efforts at church extension during the following fourteen years. BROWN MEMORIAL CHURCH. In 1870, the Brown Memorial Church was erected on the corner of Lafayette and Park Avenues. It was built and presented to the con- gregation by Mrs. Isabella Brown, as a memorial of her deceased husband . The church was organized in January, 1870. Brown Memorial Church was signally favored 106 EIGHTY YEAKS. beyond all that preceded it in several important particulars. The church edifice was presented to it complete and its pastor's salary guaranteed for a time. It was spared the long struggles through which others were compelled to pass. Most of our churches originated in Sunday-schools, estab- lished in little rooms, in the basement or on the upper floor of private dwellings. From this they merged into a chapel, small and rude, but taxing to the utmost the resources of the builders. It was only after long delays and strenuous exer- tions the church at last appeared burdened with a heavy debt, under which it was compelled to stagger for years. The building, too, when com- pleted, was too often small, incommodious and every way unattractive. But Brown Memorial entered at once into a spacious and attractive building, provided for it without debt. Most of our churches were at first but a little band from which men of wealth and social influence and experience in the divine life and the conduct of church affairs stood aloof. But the colony which formed the Brown Memorial Church was strong in all the elements of material, social and spiritual strength. How it is to be wished that other Isabella Browns would found other Brown Me- morial churches and other men from our large churches would go into them and make them strong from the beginning. EIGHTY YEARS. 107 EEV. J. SPARHAWK JONES. The Kev. J. Sparhawk Jones Avas ordained the first pastor in January, 1870. Dr. Jones is a son of the Hon. Joel Jones, and was born in Phila- delphia, June 5th, 1842. He Avas graduated at the University of Pennsylvania in 1862, studied theolog}^ at Princeton, became collegiate pastor with Dr. Backus of the First Church in 1867, and for three years served that church with con- stantly growing popularity till the spacious building could scarcely contain the congregation. He came to Brown Memorial Church with a large acquaintance and an established reputation in the city. His preaching was peculiarly at- tractive. He gathered hearers from all churches and from all sections of the city. In the height of his popularity and in the midst of his useful- ness he was compelled by ill health to seek relief from labor, and the pastoral relation was dissolved in October, 1884. REV. FRANK GUNSAULUS. Dr. Jones was succeeded by the Kev. Frank Gunsaulus, a native of Ohio, educated and or- dained to the ministry in his native State. He was for seven years pastor of a Congregational church in Columbus, Ohio, and afterward of a Congregational church in Newtonville, Mass. In May, 1885, he was installed pastor of the Brown 108 EIGHTY YEARS. Memorial Church. Dr. Gunsaulus is an eloquent preacher with marked peculiarities of style and manner which have the charm of novelty, es- pecially to a Baltimore audience. He was averse to all definitions, impatient of precision in thought, and unskilled in logical discussion. He reached and moved his hearers through the imagination and heart. His imagination was truly creative and he was a poet in the old sense of a maker. He could give to airy nothings a local habitation and a name. He could breathe into cold ab- stractions and dead dogmas the breath of life, and cause them to live and move before his hearers. The limpid flow of his Avords, and the music of his sentences, never failed to charm the ears of his hearers. As might be expected from his antecedents the atmosphere of Baltimore Presbyterianism was not in every way congenial, and he thought he could be more useful in the Plymouth Church of Chicago, to which he had been called. KEV. MALTBIE D. BABCOCK, D. D. The Kev. Maltbie D. Babcock, D. D., was in- stalled in 1887. Dr. Babcock was born and edu- cated in Central Xew York, and is a graduate of Auburn Theological Seminary. Under his min- istry the church is flourishing, as never before. Large congregations crowd the church at every EIGHTY YEARS. 109 service. lie is an attractive preacher, and inde- fatigable .pastor. The church abounds in liber- ality and activities of every kind. Dr. Babcock has been frequently called to other fields but thus far has resisted all solicitation, for his work in Baltimore is not yet done. The present officers of the church are : the Kev. Dr. Maltbie D. Babcock, pastor ; elders, John P. Ammidon, John K. Cowen, E. J. D. Cross, O. F. Day, John Dixon, M. D., P. B. Milliken, I. K. Page, M. D., John E. Eamsey, II. M. Simmons, M. D., Benjamin F. Smith ; deacons, Daniel C. Ammidon, James O. Bates, Alexander Boggs, Jr., A. K. Bond, M. D., Frank M. Dushane, Henry King, E. T. Laurens ; trustees, Thomas C. Basshor, James A. Gary, W. A. Hanway, William Harvey, Jesse Hilles, Frederick A. Hoff- man, Daniel W. Hopper, G. A. Yon Lingen, D. D. Mallory, Calvin S. Schriver, Edward War- field, Charles F. Woods. Iv^^OX CHUECH. In 1875, a Sunday-school, for colored children, under the superintendence of the Second Church, was opened in the McKim school house on the corner of Baltimore and Aisquith Streets. The school grew in numbers, and as there was no colored church east of the Falls, it was resolved to erect one in that vicinity. It was organized 110 EIGHTY YEAIIS. February 15th, 1877, with some fift}^ members. Mr. Frederick McGinnis, and George Devin, were elected elders. Efforts were made from time to time to erect a church building, but all failed, until the enterprise was undertaken by the Presbyterian Association. They secured a lot on Colvin Street near Hillen, and the building was erected and opened for public worship in ]S"ovember, 1892. The first pastor Avas the Eev. William McCoy Hargrave, who Avas installed April 29th, 1877. He was born in Lexington, N. C, in 1847, and was graduated from Lincoln University in 1873. He is a man of cultivated tastes and fine scholar- ship and would do honor to any pulpit. The McKim schoolhouse which the congregation oc- cupied during his pastorate Avas altogether un- suited to their needs. The members Avere few, poor, and Avidely scattered. Under discourage- ments Avhich Avould have overwhelmed any one less braA^e, he labored on till July 4th, 1886, Avhen the pastoral relation Avas dissolved. He Avas succeeded by the Eev. William C. BroAvn, Avho Avas installed in 1887, and serA^ed the church until 1893. The congregation Avas served by temporary supplies until the present pastor, the Eev. Alonzo S. Gray, Avas installed, April 9th, 1897. He Avas born in John's Island, !S. C, took his normal and industrial training at EIGHTY YEAllS. Ill Brainard Institute, S. C, was graduated from Lincoln University in 1893, and spent two ad- ditional years in the study of theology at How- ard Universit}^, D. C. He is a well read theo- logian, a well instructed Presbyterian, with man- ners and diction which would grace any pulpit. He is holding on his way in the face of unnum- bered difficulties, and proves every day the Lord's faithfulness to his promise, " As thy days, so shall thy strength be." The present officers are : Pastor, Kev. Alonzo S. Gray ; elders, William B. Marshall, Samuel E. Distance. TOME STKEET CHURCH. Some fifty years ago a few families from Wales landed at Locust Point seeking for employment. They were copper molders by trade, and when the large copper works were established in Canton they crossed the bay and were employed in the new works. They brought with them their religious faith and the memories of their Christian homes. From time to time and from house to house, they gathered together for social worship. Finally they procured a small hall where they established a Sunday- school with occasional preaching in Welsh. They belonged to different denominations, chiefly Methodists, Baptists and Congregationalists. In 112 EIGHTY YEARS. 1865 thej resolved to unite and build a church for their common use. The Canton company gave them a lot, and poor in this world's goods but rich in faith and abundant in labors they began to build. The men after their day's work would repair to the building and often at mid- night on moonlight nights were seen laboring upon the walls, the women and children joining in their labors. At last on a day of gladness in 1866 the chapel was completed, and the Sunday- school opened within its walls. They had no ecclesiastical organization for some time, but Avere finally organized as a Congregational Church under the pastorate of Rev. Thomas Richards, a Welsh Congregationalist. Mr. Richards remained with them but a short time. On his leaving many members also left and the feeble remnant were discouraged and almost despairing. The church building, in the meantime had become so dilapidated as to be unfit for use. Mr. J. Henry Stickney, so well known in the Congre- gational Church, for his good works came for- ward and repaired and renovated the building. On reentering the chapel the Rev. J. Wynne Jones, a student in Princeton Seminary, was in- vited to take charge of the enterprise. He preached with great acceptance alternately in Welsh and English. The congregation grew, and in April, 1878, a Presbyterian church was EIGHTY YEARS. 113 organized with twenty-three members and the Rev. J. Wynne Jones was called as their pastor. He Avas installed June 27th, 1878. His ministry was blessed and in a little time the chapel be- came too strait for their growing numbers. GRACE CHURCH. A mission had been opened by some members of the First Church west of Druid Hill Avenue. It was prospered from the beginning, and in a little time it was resolved to erect a building for their accommodation. A lot was secured on the corner of Dolphin and Etting Streets, and the present structure was erected upon it. The Rev. Mr. Higgins was invited to take charge of the enterprise, and served for some years with great acceptance. After the readjustments which took place on the union of the New and Old Schools, the building was finally transferred to the colored people. The Rev. Charles Hedges had gathered a congregation on Linden Avenue, and ministered to them for some years. Chiefly from these Grace Church was organized October 12th, 1880, under the pastoral care of the Rev. Charles Hedges. The congregation from its origin has labored under great discouragements, and its financial distresses from time to time have been extreme. Mr. Hedges struggled on and hoped 114 EIGHTY YEARS. on until 1891, when he resigned to occupy an- other field. KEV. EDWARD F. EGGLESTON. Mr. Hedges was succeeded by the Rev. E. F. Eggleston, wlio was installed October 18th, 1891. He is a native of Amelia County, Ya., was grad- uated with high honor from the collegiate de- partment of Lincoln University in 1883, and from the theological department in 1886. He was ordained and installed pastor of the church in Oxford, Pa., by the Presbytery of Chester. After about a year's service there, he removed to Danville, Ya., where, in addition to serving the church successfully, he established the Danville Industrial High-school, which has proved a bene- diction, not only to Danville, but to all the sur- rounding region. The colored churches of Bal- timore have been signally favored in their pas- tors. The Master has sent to them chosen serv- ants furnished abundantly with the gifts and graces of his Spirit. Most of them men of edu- cation and refinement, they have been called to endure hardness almost beyond measure. How often the hearts of those w^ho were admitted to their confidence have bled for them, and how earnestly they have prayed that the Lord would raise up for them friends and helpers. Not the least among these in talents and edu- EIGHTY YEARS. 115 cation and devotion to his Master's work is Brother Eggleston. From his first appearance he won the hearts of his brethren by. his cordial greetings and brotherly sympathies. He appre- ciates beyond most the true position of his race and the exact training needful for their elevation. He is laboring to make Grace Church an object lesson to all the churches of his race around. Under his pastorate the church has been strength- ened and enlarged. A heavy debt, soon after his coming, Avas lifted off, and a parsonage was recently purchased and presented to the congre- gation by the munificence of Mr. W. W. Spence. The present officers are: Pastor, Kev. E. F. Eggleston ; elders, Charles Davage, G. Merritt, Samuel C. O wings, Pratt Wallace, W. G. Thomas, S. Stark. LAFAYETTE SQUAEE CHUECH. The need of a church in the northwestern part of the city was long felt. At one time it was proposed to build the Central Church in that locality. When the Central finally determined to build on its present site, measures were at once taken to erect a church building on Lafay- ette Square. A lot was procured on the west side of the square, a large and commodious edi- fice was erected, and opened for public worship in February, 1880. The church was organized 116 EIGHTY YEARS. on the 23d of February, 1880, with Mr. O. F. Day and Y. F. Small, Jr., as elders. The Eev. Samuel McLanahan was mimediately called as their pastor and was installed in May, 1880. EEV. 8AMUEL McLANAIIAN. Eev. Samuel McLanahan is a native of Penn- sylvania, was graduated at Princeton College and Seminary, licensed by the Presbytery of Carlisle, ordained by the same Presbytery in June, 1877, and served the church of Waynesboro, Pa., as stated pastor and supply until called to Balti- more. Brother McLanahan by gifts and graces is di- vinely ordained bishop. He does not bear the title, indeed, nor even the Presbyterian title of superintendent, or presbyterial missionary. He had no episcopal designation except that of chairman of home missions. But his services as an overseer were invaluable. He has rare exec- utive gifts, both as an organizer and adminis- trator. The churches of the Presbj^tery of Bal- timore never had such efficient episcopal over- sight before. During the short time when he was released from pastoral care he devoted him- self to the work of visitation and superin tendency. Feeble churches and vacant churches and vexed churches and unemployed ministers, all Avho needed a wise counselor and helpful friend found EIGHTY YEARS. 117 them in him. Under his pastorate Lafayette Square Church Avas Avell organized. All the ap- pliances and adjuncts of church work were estab- lished on true foundations. Having served this church for thirteen years, and feeling that the Lord had need of him elsewhere the pastoral relation, at his request, was dissolved July 1st, 1893. REV. ROBERT J. RANKIIS^. The Eev. E. J. Rankin was installed as the second pastor Kovember 28th, 1893. He was a native of Maryland, the son of an honored elder, Samuel J. Eankin, known in all our churches. Eobert was given to the Lord in infancy and was brought up in the house of the Lord. In the dew of his youth he took his father's God to be his God, and gave himself to his service in the ministry. He was educated at Princeton. Seldom has a young man entered upon the min- istry with brighter prospects of usefulness and honor. From his first coming he won the hearts of his people and his ministry Avas eminently fruitful. As a preacher he had that peculiar nameless something which we sometimes call magnetism and sometimes unction. But wher- ever the hiding of his power it was felt in souls saved and edified. Suddenly in the early morn- ing of his years, and just at the entrance of his 118 EIGHTY YEARS. work, he was taken away by death on the morn- ing of June 5th, 1891. To us it seems that his work was not done, but there is no such thing as a premature death to the servant of God. His work on earth w^as done, his crown was ready and the Master had need of him for the higher service above. REV. LLEWELLYN S. FULMER. The Rev. L. S. Fuhiier, the present pastor, is a native of Pennsylvania. He was educated at Princeton and installed the third pastor, June 4:th, 1895. He is a diligent student and instruct- ive preacher. His pulpit he makes his throne of power ; and under his ministry the church is prospered and built up in grace and holiness. The present officers are : Pastor, Rev. Llewel- lyn S. Fulmer; elders, W. F. Rogers, E. D. Freeman, S. M. Rankin, S. R. Hogg, W. J. Mackee. BOUNDARY AYENUE CHURCH. In 1878 some Presbyterian ladies opened a Sunday-school on the corner of Maryland and North Avenues. The northern section of the city was growing rapidly and the population had already overswept what was long known in fact, as well as in name, as the Boundary. The school grew rapidly and it was found necessary to erect EIGHTY YEAKS. 119 a chapel for its accommodation. Mrs. Peyton Harrison purchased and presented a lot in a most commanding situation on the corner of North Avenue and St. Paul Street. A large and com- modious chapel, a Gothic structure, built of Bal- timore County marble, was completed and occu- pied in March, 1880. The congregation grew rapidly and in December, 1883, it was resolved to commence the erection of the main building which was speedily completed. In April, 1879, articles of incorporation of the Boundary Avenue Presbyterian Church were issued to the following gentlemen : W. W. Spence, J. C. Backus, John L. Eeed, W. B. Phil- lips, John C. Barckley, E. B. Hunting, E. H. Perkins, Jr., J. Franklin Dix, Henry D. Harvey, Edmund J. Linn, Albert A. Hassen and Kichard K. Cross. The church was organized by a committee of the Presbytery of Baltimore February 7th, 1880, with eighteen members and William B. Phillips, E. K. Cross, elders ; and John C. Barckley and Edward F. Arthurs, deacons. The Eev. George T. Purves was called as pastor. REV. GEORGE T. PURVES. Dr. Purves is a native of Philadelphia, the son of an honored elder in the First Presbyterian Church of that city. He was educated at Prince- 120 EIGHTY YEARS. ton and occupied the first rank for talents and scholarship. He has been eminently successful as preacher, pastor and professor. Under his pas- torate large accessions were made to the mem- bership. The Sunday-school and all the societies and helpers of church work were in successful operation, when, greatly to the surprise and re- gret of the congregation, he announced his wish to accept a call which had been tendered him from the First Church of Pittsburg. The pas- toral relation w^as dissolved and the pulpit de- clared vacant June 19th, 188G. EEV. WILLIAM DURANT. Dr. Purves was succeeded by the Rev. William Durant, Avho Avas installed June 21st, 1887. He had been pastor of the church in Morristown, N. J. He had been blessed in his ministry there and the thoughts of the congregation were early turned to him. He entered upon his work with earnestness, but for reasons which seemed imper- ative to him, asked for a dismissal, and the rela- tion was dissolved in June, 1892. REV. FRANK E. WILLIAMS. The Rev. Frank E. Williams was installed December 20th, 1893, and still remains pastor of the church. Young, ardent, with overflowing vitality, under his pastorate the machinery of EIGHTY YEARS. 121 church Avork is energetically conducted, and the church abounds in works of faith and labors of love. He is an earnest preacher of the glorious gospel of the blessed God. The church is blessed and prospered under his ministry. The present officers of the church are : Eev. Frank E. Williams, pastor ; elders, Kichard K. Cross, John L. Eeed, J. Hume Smith, T. Mel- ville Prentiss, Franklin J. Morton, Charles W. Wisner, Albert L. Gardner ; deacons, A. M. Bas- table, William M. Powell, Edward F. Arthurs, George H. Porter, J. Kemp Wysham, Eugene M. Hildermann, William G. Garrett ; trustees, Reu- ben Foster, William M. Powell, George B. Hunt- ing, Hiram H. Taylor, John Murdock, Oliver Hoblitzell, Franklin J. Morton, A. M. Bastable, Robert S. Cars well, William H. Bayliss, Walter B. Harvey, and Samuel B. Martz. ABBOTT MEMORIAL CHURCH. The Abbott Memorial Church is located on the corner of Bank Street and Highland Avenue. It grew out of a Sunday-school which had been opened on Bank Street, in 1881. It was organ- ized November 30th, 1882, with twenty -six mem- bers, chiefly from the Tome Street Church. John Charles and George Hughes were ordained elders, and James T. Hopkins and Charles Be van, deacons. The Rev. J. Wvnne Jones was in- 122 EIGHTY YEARS. stalled as pastor, December 10th, 18S3, where he continues to this day indefatigable in labors, ardent in zeal, a minister of mercy to the poor and a benediction to the whole community around. It is called Abbott Memorial for Mr. Horace Abbott. He was for many years one of the trustees of the Second Church, ever ready with his money and his influence to advance its in- terest. He established the large iron works in Canton, known as the Abbott Iron Company, where so many years of his life were passed, and his own fortune and the fortune of others were made. He and his family desired to erect in that locality some more lasting memorial than the works, which already bore his name, and the Abbott Memorial Church stands as that memorial to-day. Mr. and Mrs. Abbott gave $29,000, Mr. Mrs. and John S. Oilman, $8,000, for the build- ing and parsonage. Mr. George H. Brown, and others, purchased the lots for $6,400. The present officers are : Rev. J. Wynne Jones, pastor ; elders, Edward Clark, Cyrus Copper, Enoch Bowen, Joseph T. Wiley, Enoch Webb, Absalom McYey, George Kane, Eobert McDan- iels. FAITH CHURCH. Faith Church, like Westminster, stands in the EIGHTY YEARS. 123 midst of God's Acre, the burial place of the Second, as Westminster of the First Church. In 1ST6, some members of the First Church desired to establish a mission Sunday-school in the vicinity of the cemetery. They rented, and fitted up for the purpose, an old blacksmith shop on the corner of Gay and Chase Streets. In January, a Sunday-school was organized with John Y. L. Graham and E. H. Perkins, superin- tendents, and the school was opened February 2d, 1876. The growth of the school was phenom- enal, increasing from year to year, till in 1887, it reached the number of 1,629. On April 18th, the Eev. J. W. Mcllvane conducted the first preaching service, and this was continued from time to time, by the several ministers of the city. The large increase in the school demanded larger accommodations, and it Avas proposed if practi- cable to erect a chapel on the adjoining burying ground. The trustees of the Second Church conveyed the ground to the Presbyterian Asso- ciation, and the Association authorized the build- ing of the chapel, which opened for public worship under the name of the Faith Chapel of the First Presbyterian Church, and the Rev. John P. Campbell, just graduated from Princeton Seminary, was invited to take charge of the enterprise. In a little time the congregation had outgrown the chapel, and it was resolved to at- 124 EIGHTY YEARS. tempt the erection of a large stone church ah:nig- side. In January, IS 82, a building committee was appointed, consisting of George S. Brown, John Y. L. Graham, John L. Keed, Robert H. Smith, and J. P. Campbell. The church build- ing was opened for public Avorship, November 2d, 1884. The tower was erected in 1885, by George H. Brown, as a memorial of his mother, Mrs. Isabella Brown. For ten years it had been con- ducted as a mission of the First Church. On November 8th, 1880, Faith Church Avas organ- ized by a committee of the Presbytery of Bal- timore with 300 communicants. Martin B. Billingslea, and John Donn, Avere ordained eld- ers ; E. A. Alexander, D. P. Brown, Dixon Guy, Theophilus Hill, and Edward Hyde, deacons. The church Avas incorporated in March, 1895, and the buildings and lot Avere conveyed by the Presbyterian Association to the trustees of Faith Presbyterian Church. KEY. JOHN p. CAMPBELL. On November 28th, 1886, the Rev. John P. Campbell, Avho had so long served the congre- gation, Avas called as their pastor, and Avas in- stalled the December following. The Rev. John P. Campbell is a native of Caledonia, N. Y., AA^as educated at Princeton, and ordained by the Pres- bytery of Rochester. He is a model pastor and EIGHTY YEAKS. 125 an instructive preacher. Under his efficient leadership the congregation from the first grew rapidly in numbers and abounded in good works. It has become one of the largest churches in the city, and its influence for good is felt in the whole community around. Its present member- ship is 569. Nine hundred and twenty were added on examination, and 21:6 by certificate, during his twenty years' labor. Brother Camp, bell has become the patriarch of the Presbytery. While repeated changes have been taking place all around him he still stands in his lot, his in- fluence growing with every passing yeiir. The present officers are : Eev. John P. Campbell, pas- tor ; elders, M. B. Billingslea, M. D., Dixon Guy, Theophilus Hill, and Edward Hyde ; deacons, Dixon Guy, Theophilus Hill, Edward Hyde, George C. Diggs, and Oliver AY. Cummings. FULTON" AYEKUE CHURCH. Fulton Avenue Church is located on North Ful- ton Avenue, near the railroad station. It grew out of a Sunday-school established in the neigh- borhood and conducted largely by members of the Lafayette Square Church. The school grew in numbers and the Presbyterian families in the vicinity thought the field an inviting one. A church Avas organized with twenty-three commu- 126 EIGHTY YEAKS. nicants and one elder in November, 1SS6, and a commodious church building was erected. REV. EDWARD II. R0B13INS. The Eev. Edward H. Bobbins was called and installed as their first pastor. He is a native of Baltimore, esteemed for his own sake, and his father's sake. He was educated at Princeton, and the church under his able preaching and wise and sympathetic oversight, with the cooperation of a band of noble helpers, has grown constantly and healthfully in numbers and influence and usefulness. The Sunday-school has been con- ducted with marked efliciency, and has been, not in name onl^^ but in reality, the nursery of the church. The people of Fulton Avenue Church have been fruitful in good works, and earnest in their efi'orts to carry the blessings of the gospel into the regions beyond. The present officers are: Pastor, Eev. Edward H. Bobbins; elders, George H. Conn, James L. Bidgel}^, Henry A. Burroughs, E. AYesley Hale, Benjamin F. Clark, George B. M. Fosnot. CHUBCH OF THE COYEXANT. This church owes its existence to the unfalter- ing faith and self-denying labors of the Bev. William L. Austin. His heart was moved by the spectacle of the spiritual destitution of a large EIGHTY YEAKS. 127 and neglected portion of the city. As he Avan- dered through its streets and alleys and saw how many were perishing for lack of vision, he re- solved to devote himself to the work of giving to them the gospel. Alone, but cheered by the sympathy of a few faithful friends, he procured a little hall on the corner of Fulton Avenue and Pratt Street, and commenced preaching there to a little congregation of fourteen. A Sabbath- school was at once organized with some forty scholars. The work prospered, and the time at last came for the planting of a church. It was organized November 29th, 18S9, under the name of the Presbyterian Church of the Covenant. For about a year they continued to worsliip in Radcliff's hall, when the place became too strait for them, and a larger hall was procured on the corner of Lombard and Strieker Streets. The present building on the corner of Strieker and Hollins Streets was opened January, 1883. The Rev. William L. Austin was installed the first pastor December 8, 1894-, and continued the work he had thus far carried on in the face of manifold hindrances. There was something sublime in his faith and constancy and unwavering trust in the Everlasting Arm. His brethren, who knew his heart and shared his counsels in those dark days, found an inspiration in his patient waiting and un- Avavering faith. On September 11th, 1896, Avhen 128 EIGHTY YEARS. the wilderness was passed, and the promised land Avas in sight, he died in the vigor of his y^arsand the midst of his usefulness, for the Master had use for him, too, above. His mantle fell upon his successor, the present pastor, the Kev. Henry S. Graham, who has taken up his unfinished work of making the Church of the Covenant a light and a blessing to the region around. The pres- ent officers are: Pastor, Rev. Henry S. Graham; elders, H. S. Sohl, Joseph Cowman, George L. H. Krise. BOHEMIAJST CHURCH. In the -fall of 1889, the session of Faith Church gave the use of their chapel to a number of Bo- hemians residing in the vicinity, who desired a place in which to hold religious services in their own language. The first service was held in the Bohemian language December 2, 1889. On Jan- uary 26th, 1890, Rev. Vincent Pisek, of the Bo- hemian Presbyterian Church, New York city, preached to an audience of seventy persons and administered the sacrament of the Lord's Supper to fifty-five communicants. The work was con- ducted under the care of the session of Faith Church, who in every way encouraged and helped the enterprise. The Bohemian Church was or- ganized by the Presbytery of Baltimore April 22d, 1890. Rev. Vaclav Losa was installed the EIGHTY YEARS. 129 first pastor, but resigned to accept the charge of a church in Clarkson, Neb. He was succeeded by the present pastor, the Eev. Y. Vanek. The congregation had the free use of Faith Chapel until a lot was purchased by the Presbyterian Association, on which a church was erected and opened for public worship October 16th, 1898, in the presence of a large and deeply interested con- gregation. They have at present five elders, four deacons, eighty-nine communicants, 162 Sabbath- school scholars — the descendants of martyrs, the countrymen of Jerome and Huss, inheritors of the blessings purchased by the blood of a noble ancestry ! PAEK CHUECH. Park Church grew out of a mission established by Brown Memorial Church on Druid Hill Ave- nue, near the Boundary. The population was growing rapidly in that region, and the mission increased with it. As there was no church in the immediate vicinity, it was resolved to erect a building and organize a church. A lot was pro- cured on the corner of North and Madison Ave- nues, and a large and commodious chapel was erected upon it. The building was completed and occupied April 15th, 1893, and on the 30th of May following, the church was organized with some twenty-five members from the Brown Me- 130 EIGHTY YEARS. morial Church. They procured the services of the Rev. George L. Curtis, who had just completed his theological studies and been ordained by the Presbytery of Rochester. Brother Curtis is an earnest and eminently evangelical preacher. Park Church more nearly approaches the ideal of an institutional church than any others. Its boys' brigade and societies of different kinds are conducted with great vigor, and the church abounds in Christian activities of every kind. Its membership has grown and, in every respect, it has been prospered. Though from the begin- ning, largely helped and supported by the Brown Memorial Church, it has been an independent organization, and its members have never ap- peared on the roll of the Brown Memorial Church. The present officers of the church are : Rev. George L. Curtis, pastor ; elders. Dr. James H. Frazer, Edward Stinson, Alfred ISTiles, A. B. Crane; deacons, Charles A. Hook and James Shriver. RIDGLEY STREET CHURCH. In 18G5, Mrs. "William Reynolds, and Mrs. Sarah Colvin, with other noble Avomen of the Central Church, resolved to establish a mission in south- western Baltimore. The Central Church, then on Liberty Street, looked out on a Avide field of destitution in that direction. The services of a EIGHTY YEARS. 131 devoted woman, Miss Mary Nehmyer, were se- cured to explore the field. It Avas found that a brick chapel on the corner of Eidgiey and Ham- burg Streets, which had been erected by the Co- lumbia Street Methodist Church, could be pur- chased. It was procured, and a Sunday-school was at once opened within its walls. Superin- tendent and teachers were supplied from the Cen- tral Church. The chapel, especially after the re- moval of the church to Eutaw Place, was far off,, and for a time difficult of access, but for more than thirty years, in summer and winter, in sun- shine and storm, those devoted officers and teach- ers were always found in their place. I thought of giving their names, but the list is too long. They are known in heaven and enshrined in many grateful hearts on earth. T^ie school grew, the population around it increased till the chapel became too small. In 1890 it was taken down and the erection of the church commenced. On the following October the Sunday-school room was ready for use, and in Xovember, 1892, the basement was completed. Services Avere held in it until January, 1896, when the main auditorium was completed. It is a large, imposing stone building, an ornament to the neighborhood, and a monument of the faith and labors of its build- ers. The names of Eeynolds, Colvin, Hall, Tyson, McElmoyle, Beatson, Hose, Deitscli, Dailey, Gra- 132 EIGHTY YEARS. ham, and many names beside, are written in in- delible, if invisible ink, on its foundation stones. For several years a preaching service was main- tained in the chapel from time to time, and con- tinuously, for several years, by the Rev. Mr. Coyle, of Washington, D. C. In 1892, it Avas felt that the time was come for the organization of a church, and in October of that year it was organized with ninety-two members, whose names up to that time had been on the roll of the Cen- tral Church. The Eev. Edward E. Weaver Avas called and installed pastor October, 1892. REV. EDWARD E. WEAVER. He w^as born in Canton, Ohio, June 10th, 1864, was graduated at Wooster University, and studied theology at Princeton. Brother Weaver has done a great and good work for Ridgley Street Church. It was a formidable • undertaking, under the ex- isting conditions, to attempt the erection of so large and costly a building, and brother Weaver gave himself to the work with tireless energy. Courteous and kind and wise, while intensely earnest, he has secured sympathy and help from all quarters. He has labored on amidst difficul- ties and discouragements with whole-hearted de- votion, and can to-day rejoice in the fruit of his labors. Where so many have done well, he has labored more abundantly than they all. He has EIGHTY YEARS. 133 served the church for nearly ten years, and we trust the time has come Avhen he can rejoice in the gathering in of the sheaves. The present officers are: Pastor, Rev. Edward E. Weaver; elders, Eichard Schroeder, Henry Ebert, Richard Spencer, Jr., Frank Walter. CRISP MEMORIAL CHURCH. Mr. Richard O. Crisp, a member of the Central Church, for years resided near Brooklyn. During the later years of his life he became greatly in- terested in the spiritual welfare of the commu- nity in which he had so long resided. He re- solved as the best legacy he could leave to them, and the best testimony he could give of his own personal faith in the gospel of Christ, to erect a church in or near Brooklyn. By provision of his will the sum of $50,000 was left for this purpose, and his wife, Mrs. Annie Crisp, and his brother, were named as trustees to erect the building, and when completed to convey it to the trustees of the Central Church as a branch of that church. A beautiful stone church and parsonage Avere erected on the most commanding site in the vicinity. The church was opened with appropriate services May 13th, 1888. The property was con- veyed to the Central Church, the session of which by the terms of the will took charge of the work; a Sunday-school was organized, 134 EIGHTY YEARS. and the Rev. Charles E. Fisk was engaged to supply a i^egular preaching service. The Crisp Memorial Church was organized under the pas- toral care of the Rev. William L. Parsons, May 4th, 1893. He was succeeded by the Rev. Mr. Adams, and he by the Rev. Thomas L. Springer, the present pastor. The trustees did not confine their expenditures to the amount of the legacy, but Mrs. Crisp has added to it largely, and provided everything needful to carry out the plan in which she so heartily sympathizes. The church is an ornament to the neighborhood, and is surrounded by a population exposed to peculiar perils because of the summer resorts open there. Not the members of the Central Church alone, but the whole community around unite in prayer to God to bless and prosper the Crisp Memorial Church. REID MEMORIAL HOPE INSTITUTE SUKDAY-SCHOOL. In 1887 the First Church opened a Sunday- school in the eastern section of the city near the corner of Harford Avenue and Madison Street. The school grew rapidly in numbers and a preaching service was instituted which has been maintained ever since. A building was erected for the service of the school by Andrew Reid, Esq., and on the 31st of March, 1895, the EIGHTY YEARS. 135 building was completed and presented to the First Church. The Institute at present is served by the Eev. William Caldwell. Situated as it is in a comparatively destitute neighborhood, under Brother Caldwell's ministry its influence for good has been felt in the entire community. APPENDIX. SPIPJTUAL COKDITIOK AND PEOGEESS OF THE CHUECHES. We have already spoken of the spiritual con- dition of the churches in Baltimore during the first sixty years of their existence. They had not yet attained to the idea of the Church as a free spiritual commonwealth, distinct from all Avorldly kingdoms and secular associations. They tried to perpetuate in the new world the State Church of the old and labored to join to- gether what God had ordained should be kept asunder. The Church Avas a civil corporation created by the State and regulated by law. Its members were stockholders in the corporation and its officers, like the directors in other cor- porations, were elected by them and responsible only to them. True, it Avas a religious corpora- tion, but no religious qualification was required either of its oificei's or members. Its officers Avere not ordained or responsible to any higher authority. Its members AA^ere not required to profess repentance toAA^ard God and faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. A Avorldly morality, embod- ied in a reputable life, AA^as the only condition of church membership. The spiritualities of the 137 188 EIGHTY YEARS. kingdom had faded almost entirely away and the dividing line between the Church and world was almost ol)literated. In this regard, the condition of the Baltimore churches was precisely that of all American churches some fifty years before. At that time religion had sunk to its lowest ebb, the gloomy night of Pharisaic Judaism "having a form of godliness but denying the power thereof" had settled down upon the Church. The vine3^ard of the Lord of Hosts, as in the pro- phetic vision, had its hedges all broken down and its pleasant things all laid waste. It was the valley of dry bones with scarce a sign or move- ment of spiritual life. It was time for God to work, for vain was the help of man. In the very darkest hour, the Lord raised up another John Baptist, and sent him forth. " The voice of one crying in the Avilderness, prepare ye the way of the Lord. Kepent : for the kingdom of heaven is at hand." New England, at that time, had imprisoned the faith and almost for- gotten the ^God of her Puritan fathers. The Church had* well nigh ceased to be a spiritual commonwealth, and the ways of Zion mourned. In an obscure village of New England, the Lord raised up Jonathan Edwards to utter in the wil- derness the Baptist's call to repentance. In 1734 he preached his celebrated sermon on Justifica- tion by Faith. We read that sermon to-day and w^onder where was the hiding of its poAver. But the preaching of the old doctrine by which Paul startled a dying Avorld, and Luther electrified a sleeping church, shook New England as it had APPENDIX. 139 never been shaken before. Men were startled as by a trumpet blast from their sleep of world- liness and carnal security, and the powers of the world to come took hold upon them. False hopes in their own righteousness were every- where flung away, and men everywhere began to call upon the Lord. The great truths of sal- vation as formulated by Edwards were taken up by the Tenants, and Blair, and a great company besides, and proclaimed throughout New York, and Pennsylvania and Maryland and Georgia, and everywhere churches were revived, and souls in uncounted numbers brought home to God. But, strangely, while showers of blessing were falling all around, Baltimore had no share in the blessed baptism. Again darkness fell upon the churches, for the history of the American Church is one of alternate declension and revival, and again God visited them with power from on high. The truth as it is in Jesus was given back to the Church and proclaimed from all its pulpits, but, strangely, the preaching of the truth had lost its old power. To some it was but as sounding brass or a tinkling cymbal, to others but a savor of death unto death. The preaching of the truth was in itself found to be powerless to save, and again the Lord came forth out of his place and the Spirit descended in those wonderful revivals which we have al- ready spoken of, extending all over the East and beyond the Alleghenies, all over the settled West, renewing the wonders of Pentecost. But, strangely again, Baltimore Avas passed by, and had no share in the blessings. But the time. 140 EIGHTY YEARS. even the set time to favor her, at last came. AVe have already spoken of that wonderful ser- mon of Dr. jS^evins, and its Pentecostal effects. The isolation of the Baltimore churches was now over, and the Moderates so long in the ascendant, were succeeded by the Evangelicals. Baptized by the same Spirit, Baltimore entered into the communion of saints and thenceforth shared in the blessings of the common Father's household. For a time after their Pentecost, the churches of Baltimore walked in the light of God's coun- tenance and rejoiced in the manifold tokens of his favor. There was a glorious summer of sun- shine and gladness, and this again was followed by a dreary winter. The spirit of Avorldliness came in to grieve away the Divine Spirit. Just at that time men were beginning to enter into possession of the broad inheritance which God had given them. Plains and prairies, mountains and valleys, were giving up their hidden treas- ures. Exhaustless riches waited for him who should gather them, and as new Calif ornias were discovered all hasted to be rich and Mammon be- came the god of the nation's idolatry. Just then in the full noon of their worldly prosperity there came suddenly, as an earthquake or a bolt from heaven in a clear sky, the great commercial panic of 1S57. Eiches made to themselves wings, values melted away, and all conlidence was gone. The rich man of to-day found himself a beggar to- morrow, and the man just reaching out his hand to grasp the golden prize saw it turn into worth- less dross. On every side men with pale lips APPENDIX. 141 and despairing accents were heard exclaiming " Ye have taken away my gods which I have made and Avhat have I more ? " What shall they do, where shall they look fof help? With these anxious questions on their lips three men met in a street in Xew York, in the business center of the city and in the busiest hour of the day. As they talked together one said : " We have exhausted all our resources and vain is the help of man. Let us call upon God and perhaps he will hear and answer." They turned aside into a little room and poured out their hearts in prayer. Parting, they agreed to meet on the next day and at the same hour. When they came together three others had joined their company. Day after day the num- bers increased until the room became too small. Then they repaired to the old John Street Church, and that was soon filled to overflow- ing. They then went to Burton's theater, the largest building in the city. That, too, was soon found too small, for never did Booth or Forrest in their palmy days attract such crowds as gath- ered in that old theater to pray. Merchants, bankers, brokers left their desks, to go and call upon the Lord. All over tlie city, halls, theaters, churches were open for prayer exery day and at almost every hour of the dav. Xever before had such a spectacle been witnessed. The scenes witnessed in Kew York were re- peated in all the cities and villages of the land from Main to Nebraska. It was said that one could go from Xew York to Nebraska, then the western boundary, and not pass through a town 142 EIGHTY YEAKS. or city on the way where the voice of prayer was not heard. It was what Zacharias saw long before in visions. " The inhabitants of one city shall go to another, saying, let us go speedily to pray before the Lord. 1 will go also." New York called to Buffalo, and Buffalo to Chicago, and Chicago to 8t. Louis, and St. Louis to Cin- cinnati, and Cincinnati to Pittsburg, and Pitts- burg to Philadelphia, and Philadelphia to Balti- more, "Let us go speedily to pray before the Lord." The spirit of prayer fell upon Baltimore in measure never witnessed before. Lecture rooms, chapels, churches, were all crowded as each fam- ily prayed apart. The Mechanic's Institute, the largest hall in the city, its whole floor thrown open, was crowded day after day, with men who came together to pray. There was no Edwards, or Whitfield, or Moody, or evangelist of any name, to preach. The multitude came, not to hear but to pray. Sometimes a brief word of exhortation was heard from Dr. Dickson or Alexander Carter or some one of kindred spirit, but only as an incitement to continue prayer. There was a marked progression in these three visitations of the Holy Spirit. First, he came as the Spirit of truth to magnify the truth and make its preaching the great instrument of sal- vation. The kingdom was advanced and souls were sanctified by the truth. But the truth in time, lost its power, and preaching almost ceased to edify the church or bring souls to the Saviour. The truth in itself was seen to be powerless. Then the Holy Spirit was given and the truth APPENDIX. 143 once more became quick and powerful and mighty through God. The churches now have the truth as the instrument and the Holy Spirit as the agent, to make it effectual. But a third thing remains. How can the church reach up to the Divine Spirit and secure his presence and power. The answer was found in these meet- ings for prayer and the power of prayer was gloriously displa3^ed. These prayer meetings had a marked influence on the religious life of Baltimore and left a last- ing blessing behind. They increased the faith of God's people in the efficacy of prayer, and for years following prayer meetings Avere continued with a frequency never known before. Weeks of prayer were frequently held in the large base- ment of the old Central Church where all the rooms were thrown open and were crowded with devout congregations from day to day. Requests for prayer would be read from mothers for sick or profligate sons, from wives for their godless husbands, from children for their parents, from parents for their children, from friends for their unconverted friends. Of course no names were mentioned, but sometimes the intense earnestness of the writer so breathed in every word, and the case Avas so clearly and pathetically described, that the whole assembly would be moved. Some- times answers to prayers, previously offered, would be read and the gladness of the writer's heart would move the Avhole congregation to rise up and sing, " Praise God, from Avhom all blessings flow." Those prayer meetings, in the old Central Church, can never be forgotten by those who 144 EIGHTY YEARS. witnessed them. Sometimes all day union prayer meetings would be held, commencing at an early hour, sometimes at sunrise ; they were con- tinued all through the day and evening, every hour a new leader taking charge. They were distinctively meetings for prayer. The leader would open the hour by a few brief words, stat- ing the subject of prayer. Occasionally a few earnest words would be interjected, but addresses were always few and brief. Generally five min- utes were allowed to the leader in opening. All other addresses were strictly limited to three minutes. A bell stood on the table of the leader and if any would offer to go beyond his time the stroke of the bell called him clown. Gradually these prayer meetings became less frequent and lost their old interest and power ; gradually they lost their distinctive character of meetings for prayer, and long addresses from the leader and others where there was no limitation of time, took the place of prayer. Along with the spirit of prayer there came to believers a sense of personal responsibility for the souls of othei^, and a recognition of the uni- versal priesthood of believers. The duty of per- sonal and earnest efforts to lead souls to Christ, was burned into the hearts of God's people as never before. Secularities too were sanctified. The telegraph was employed to thrill tidings of salvation around the land. The secular press, a thing unheard of before, gave full reports of ser- mons and mingled news from heaven with news of earth. Merchants mingled religious conver- sation with their talks on business, and put re- APPENDIX. 1^ ligious tracts and pamphlets in the bales of goods which they sent to country customers. The city has been visited from time to time by evangelists of different names, and notably by Mr. Moody. Several times he visited the city when the largest halls were procured and crowded week after week to overflowing. There were after meetings and inquiry meetings and all the usual appliances. Again and again there were signs of promise and the blessing seemed about to descend. Earnest souls would gather together 'and watch for the little cloud to over- spread the heavens, but the scenes of 1857 and the immediately following years have never since been repeated. The type of piety within these last few years has undergone a marked change, and this change manifests itself in all departments of Christian life and activity. The topics of preaching, the burden of prayers, and the aims of Christian liv- ing are all greatly changed. Formerly the chief concern of the pulpit was with individual souls, recognizing the fact that each soul is of more value than all worlds. To win the souls of his hearers was the preacher's great purpose and the doctrines of salvation were so unfolded as to shut each one up to the faith of Christ. The sinner as lost and under the curse and condemnation of God's law, the sinner's helplessness, and the necessity of the new birth by the power of the Divine Spirit, justification by faith, personal faith in a personal Saviour, the necessity of holiness, in heart and in life, the marks and evidences by which each must prove himself whether indeed he be in the faith, 146 EIGHTY YEARS. — these were the constant topics of the pulpit. The preacher laid emphasis upon the fact that the kingdom of God is within you, and labored most of all for the coming of that kingdom in the individual soul. The burden of prayer, too, was for ^a stronger faith, a brighter hope and a more abounding love for God. In these last days, the thoughts of men are largely turned away from the kingdom within, to the kingdom Avithout. The great truths by which sinners are aAvakened and Christians are edified and sanctified do not occupy the large place they once did. Work has largely superseded faith, and the labors of the hands have taken the place of the searching of the heart. To the ordinances which God has appointed, the word, sacrament and prayer, innumerable others have been added. Societies of every name are established to pro- mote each individual Christian grace and accom- plish by other means the great ends for which the Church was ordained. Machinery is some- times so cumbrous and complicated that to tend it and keep it moving without friction absorbs largely a pastor's time and exhausts the energies and activity of the Church. Young people and young Christians instead of being gathered to- gether as in the early Church, for catechetical instruction, come together as teachers of each other. The instruction of the young to Avhich pastors and elders a few years ago were accus- tomed to devote so much time and care are now almost unknown. Outward duties are so multi- plied and so exacting as to leave little time for the cultivation of personal piety. It is difficult APPENDIX. 147 to adjust aright the relations of faith and works so as to give to each its proper place. But if faith without works is dead, work without faith is twice dead. The work of the hands cannot take the place of the devotion of heart, and all Christian activities which do not flow from sin- cere love to God and the souls of men and from a heart filled Avith the Spirit of God, are worth- less in God's esteem. If in former times, too much emphasis was laid on the kingdom Avithin to the comparative neglect of the kingdom with- out, Ave are sure that in these last times too much emphasis is laid on the kingdom Avithout, to the neglect of the kingdom Avithin. THE CIYIL WAE. The darkest chapter in the history of the Bal- timore churches is that which eml>races the Civil War. The extension of the Church which had been carried on with such unexampled vigor for some years was suddenly arrested, and for almost fifteen years not a single church was added to the existing number. The very existence of all was seriously endangered, for that brotherly love which is the badge of the Christian, the bond of perfectness, and the foundation on which the Church as the communion of saints rests, was for the time almost lost. "And if the foundations be destroyed, what can the righteous do ? " It is impossible for those who did not witness those evil days adequately to conceive of them. It is impossible in these halcyon days of peace for those who passed through them to live them over again. Maryland Avas a border State. Its inhabitants were, in almost equal numbers, from both sections, the N^orth and the South. Each inherited the traditions, prejudices and passions of its own section. At the outset, the great body of the citizens were on the side of the Union, as was ascertained by careful inquiry at the time. As the war went on, however, there was a marked change in public sentiment. Some of the representatives of the general government were badly chosen, low, unprincipled, mercenary 148 APPENDIX. 149 men, who made merchandise of their office, and their faults Avere charged upon the authority they represented. Baltimore was in a Southern, slave-holding State, and loyalty to its section, it was urged, demanded its adherence to the South. A member of my church, and one of my most intimate friends, was an avowed opponent of slavery and an earnest advocate of its abolition in Maryland. To the surprise of every one, he became one of the most active and pronounced of Southerners. I said to him, "Among all the surprises of these days, the greatest of all to me is that you should be a Secessionist." He re- plied, " You know my opinions about slavery, but that is our own affair, and we will not toler- ate the intermeddling of the Yankees." And that sentiment influenced great numbers besides. As the war still went on all alienations and strifes were multiplied and intensified. Families were divided, sons against fathers, and wives against husbands, and the peace of many a fam- ily was utterly Avrecked. Lifelong friendships Avere suddenly sundered. The dividing line ran through and through all the most tender rela- tions and hallowed associations of life. "Except those days had been shortened, no flesh had been saA'-ed." Mutual confidence, sometimes among the most devoted friends, Avas gone, and an atmosphere of suspicion enveloped the city. Every one kncAv that he Avas surrounded by spies and informers and often feared to speak lest his most harmless Avords should be tortured into evidences of dis- loyalty. Let me give a fcAv incidents Avhich bet- 150 EIGHTY YEARS. ter than any general description will give the picture of those times. A brother minister from Virginia, Avho had been Korth, wished to return home, but was re- fused a passport. He asked me to intercede for him. I went at once to th'e marshal, told his story, and preferred his request. The marshal replied that under other circumstances he would gladly comply, but just at that time, owing to certain military movements on the Virginia bor- der, his orders were imperative to allow no one to pass the lines. After talking some time he pointed to a large case of drawers in his office, and said : *' That is full of sworn informations against men, many of whom you know as among the best citizens of Baltimore. Some of these informations I know were prompted by sheer malice and came from rivals in business or per- sonal enemies. Many of them relate to the most trivial matters, a careless w^ord, or a thoughtless act, tortured into evidence of disloyalty. Yet they are presented, many of them, by reputable men, and urged with the greatest pertinacity. And because I will not become the instrument of angry or malicious men, my conduct is criti- cised and censured and I am exposed every day to unnumbered perplexities from this cause." On another occasion a brother minister from Mississippi came North to visit an aged mother and a sister who needed his care in those troub- lous times. Spies were on his steps, and on his arrival in Baltimore he was arrested and thrown into jail. He sent me a message informing me of his condition and told me his story. I went APPENDIX. 151 to the marshal, related to him the circumstances as I had learned them, told him I had known the accused intimately for many years and believed him incapable of the crime alleged. The mar- shal replied, that whatever the facts were the circumstances were so suspicious as in his opinion to justify the arrest. " But," said he, " on your representation, I will release him from jail on condition that he report at this office ever}^ day until further orders." He was released, and I invited him to be a guest in my house, a perilous thing in those days, for it looked like consorting with traitors and giving aid and comfort to the enemy. He remained in my house for weeks, every day reporting himself at the marshal's office, and every day, on his return, telling me the passports were for sale and he could buy one for a certain price, which his conscience would not allow him to do. I said to him and thought at the time, he must be deceived. It Avas proved, however, in the end, that an official of the gov- ernment made a profitable business of selling passports to any who would pay the price, and for this and other offenses of which he was con- victed he was sent to Sing-Sing. Meanwhile, the brother's sick wife and defenseless family were in the heart of Mississippi, which was over- run and ravished in every direction by the con- tending armies. Early one morning a gentleman came into my study, announced himself as a detective, showed me his badge, and said the marshal wished to see me at his office. My first thought was that I was under arrest for some alleged offense. I 152 EIGHTY YEARS. tried to learn for Avhat purpose the marshal wished to see me, and succeeded at hist in as- certaining that it was with reference to one of our pastors in connection with the week of prayer, which had just been held in the Central Church. I went immediately to the brother's house to inform him of the facts, and then re- paired to the marshal's office. He said that charges had been preferred against one of our ministers, naming him, who it was said had re- fused to take part in the meetings of the Aveek before, because the president and authorities of the government Avould be prayed for. I told him the facts were not as reported to him, for while the brother had refused to take part in the meetings, it was for altogether a different reason from the one alleged. Then he went on to say that he was greatly troubled to know what to do with the accused. Complaints were continually brought to the office against him as one of the most active opponents of the government and disturbers of the peace of the city. Ilis house was represented as a rendezvous of traitors, and his influence in every way was said to be most dis- turbing. What ought he to do ? I replied that, in my opinion, the worst thing he could do would be to arrest or interfere with the brother in any way. His position was well known, his example and influence had already done all the evil they could do. To arrest him would be to make him a martyr in the estimation of his friends, and aggravate the agitations he desired to allay. After some further talk he said, " I think that is right ; " rang his bell, sent a messenger for a pa- APPENDIX. 153 per, then holding it in his hand said, ^' This is a warrant I had already made out for his arrest," then threw it into the fire. A young man came to me on one occasion and said that a friend of his had been condemned as a spy, was imprisoned at Fort McHenry, and sentenced to be shot the following morning. He said that a reprieve had been secured from President Lincoln, but for some reason had failed to reach the officer charged with the execution. I went down to Fort McHenry and told the commanding general the facts as reported to me. He said that he had no discretion at all in the case. His orders were to shoot the condemned the following morning, and unless contrary orders came it must be done. When I reported this answer, the friends of the condemned pro- cured at once a locomotive, went over to Wash- ington, and found that the president was out at" the Soldier's Home. They repaired there imme- diately, roused the president from his bed, for it was far on in the night, and told him their story. He listened patiently, and then replied, in his peculiar manner : "• You Baltimore Secessionists are very strange people. H the country has need of your service, you are nowhere to be found, but if any of you get into trouble you come down to me in shoals. Noav I Avant you to understand this thing must be ended. My party, and the friends of the government are censuring me for my frequent interference in cases like this. They say I am demoralizing the service by my frequent pardons. JS^ow I want you to understand that if any of you hereafter get into trouble, you 154 EIGHTY YEARS. must not come to me. But this poor felloAv, I don't wish him to be shot, and I will give you a pardon, but remember what I say." He sat down and wrote the pardon, and when my young friend came to see me the next day, he said : " You know how I hated President Lincoln, and how I have denounced him ; but he is a noble man, and has the heart of a man, and you will never hear me denounce him again." I never knew a South- erner, however violent his antipathies, who was brought into personal contact with President Lincoln, under similar circumstances, who did not come away feeling as he felt. I might multiply instances like these, indefi- nitely, for we were continually called upon in those dsijs to help our friends in trouble. It was a service of no little peril, for sympathy with the accused w^as always liable to be construed into ■sympathy with their cause. I knew that com- plaints had been made against me because I so frequently interposed in such cases. But I had one assurance of safety w^hich all others did not have. Judge Hoffman, who was collector of the port, and a confidential adviser of the government officials, Avas my firm friend, and sympathized heartily with me. I often went to him to secure his influence in behalf of persons I desired to be- friend, and again and again, he went Avith me to the marshal's office to join in my solicitations. I have no doubt it was his influence which more than once saved me from trouble, and I am glad to have this opportunity of recording the deep debt of gratitude I owe to the memory of Judge William Henry Hoffman. APPENDIX. 155 It was in such an atmosphere as this that the Baltimore churches were compelled to live through long and weary years. Of necessity they shared in the divisions and agitations of the community around. The dividing line ran through sessions and deacons and trustees and congregations, and arrayed them in opposing ranks. Some- times the grace of God Avas not in every case sufficient to restrain the madness of passion. We were sometimes surprised at the unexpected evil of our own hearts, and were amazed at its exhibition in others whom we had regarded as models of Christian character. Sometimes the saintliest souls were crazed with the excitements of the hour. As one example : — I returned from Kentucky to Baltimore on the morning of the memorable 19th of April, 1861. In the after- noon, after the collision of the mob with the Massachusetts soldiers on Pratt Street had taken place, I walked out. The streets were crowded with persons hurrying to and fro, agitated and alarmed, not knowing what was to come. Even my most familiar friends were afraid to speak, or if they did, beckoned me off into a corner. On Baltimore Street I met a lady, a member of my former church, one of the best of women, lovely and gentle and Christlike. Scarcely wait- ing lo exchange salutations, she exclaimed, quivering with excitement, "Nothing would de- light me so much as to plunge a dagger into Lincoln's heart." No one can conceive of the anxiety and trials of pastors in those evil days. Every word in sermon and prayer was closely scrutinized and 15G EIGHTY YEAllS. often most strangely perverted. Two members of my church were among the most pronounced and extreme Union men. On the morning after I had preached on the Fast Day appointed with reference to the assassination of President Lin- coln, one of these gentlemen came to me and said the other was greatly ofi'ended, because I had not sufficiently eulogized the president, but for his part he thought I had commended him too much, for he did not regard President Lincoln as stern enough for the times and doubted whether his taking away was not a blessing in disguise. In the Central Church, of which I was then pastor, the trustees were almost equally divided, and among them were found extreme men on both sides. I trembled at every meeting of the board, for, knoAving the strength of their feelings, I did not see how collisions could be avoided. Sometimes when they met allusion would be made to the war, for it was hard always to avoid all mention of it, but when the fire would begin to burn and their eyes begin to sparkle, they would say to each other : " We will light this out at the ballot box and on the field, but Ave are here to look out for the interest of this church," and through God's abounding grace to his servants there was never once an angry collision. Pastors in those days could not be partisans. I made up my mind from the outset that the issues involved did not touch Christian character. 1 knew the men on both sides and kncAv them alike to be God-feai*ing men. All recognized their obligation to be in subjection to the powers that be. Their duties as Christians to civil gov- APPENDIX. 157 ernment were held alike by both. The questions which divided them related to the proper theory of the government, the relations between the State and Federal authorities, and that was a political question pure and simple, and one which had divided the country from the forma- tion of the constitution. However, in the excite- ment of the hour. Christians might accuse each other of unchristian conduct because of their political differences, pastors could have no share in such accusations. They Avere all alike to them brethren beloved in the Lord. I was a member of the two General Assem- blies of 1866 and 1867, the one meeting in St. Louis and the other in Cincinnati. The war be- tween the States was then ended, but the war in the Church raged as violently as ever. I have wit- nessed excited scenes in Assemblies since, but never any to compare Avith those two Assemblies. The most agitating questions, the declaration and testimony paper, and what shall be done Avith its signers, the strifes in the Synod of Kentucky, the proposed discipline of individuals in churches Avho had taken part in the Eebellion, questions Avhich revi\^ed the passions of war times, came up before the Assembly. Letters and telegrams AA^ere poured into Baltimore often misre])resent- ing the acts of the Assembly and creating the Avildest excitement. When I returned home from the Assembly of 1867, a conference of the brethren Avas held and it Avas proposed that I should deliver a public address explaining and vindicating the acts and deliberations of the As- sembly, so far as to show that Avhether ap- 158 EIGHTY YEARS. proved of or not they furnished no just ground for a disruption of the Church. I objected most strenuously but it Avas urged something must be done to allay the present excitement or our churches would all go to pieces. As I had been a member of both Assemblies and an eye and ear witness of all that transpired it was said that I was the proper person to deliver the address. At last I yielded. When I told my wife what I had consented to do, she replied, " Well, Ave may begin to pack up, for no pastor can stay in Baltimore AAdio undertakes to clefend the action of the General Assembly." The meet- ing Avas called in the old Central Church, the larg- est in the city. The day Avas fixed and notice Avas Avidely circulated. At the appointed time an immense congregation gathered, all eager and agitated. For an hour and a half, an intolerable length in a sermon, I spoke, reading at length the precise Avords of the Assembly, vindicating Avhere I could, and, Avhere I could not, shoAving there Avas nothing to justify any one in leaving the Church. The reading of the exact Avords of the Assembly and explanations of the circum- stances under Avhich they Avere delivered and the ends to be secured tended greatly to allay the excitement. Only tAvo of our churches finally AvithdrcAV and Avhile many in all the rest dis- sented from some of the acts of the Assembly they did not find in them a sufficient ground for AvithdraAval. But the scars of the old conflict Avere sIoav in healing and for years, almost until to-day, tended to repress Presbyterian zeal and paralyze Presbyterian activity. CHURCH UOTTY. In no respect has the progress of the Church during the last eighty years been so marked as in the direction of Church unity. Eighty years ago the several churches were not only isolated but antagonistic. Their chief care seemed to be to build high the separating walls and strengthen their defenses against each other. The great things in which they agreed were retired to the background. The minor things in which they differed were brought to the foreground. After the reaction which followed the great revival the pulpit became intensely controversial. As the controversies Avere between members of the same household they were often embittered as is proverbially the case with family quarrels. My early life was spent where almost the entire popu- lation were Presbyterians, but Presbyterians of different schools. In a little village of some 700 in- habitants there were four Presbyterian churches, Associate Reformed, Seceder, Covenanter, and Presbyterian. The first three Psalm-singing churches were separated by minor and Avhat seems to us infinitesimal differences. All united in arraigning the Presbyterian hymn singers as profaning an ordinance of Divine worship and being guilty of rank idolatry. Some four years ago on a visit to Mercer, I was invited to attend 159 160 EIGHTY YEAKS. a union meeting of all these churches. I sat in the pulpit along with the several pastors from which hfty years before I had been constantly proclaimed as an idolater and offerer of strange lire on God's altar. The churches that were so widely separated fifty 3^ears before now met and worshiped together and cooperated with each other in all good works. As I sat and looked over the assembly I seemed like one that dreamed. This is but one instance of the marked change which has taken place in the attitudes of the churches toward each other dur- ing the last fifty years. AVhile each retains to- day its own view of truth, all hold that truth in love and rejoice to recognize their fellowship in Christ. Church unity as a sentiment and an aspiration has always been enshrined in the inmost heart of God's people. They have gone through the ages uttering the old confession : '* I believe in the Holy Catholic Church." The songs which stir their deepest emotion are those which recognize the unity of the Church and their oneness in Christ — " The Church's one Foundation," " One Family we dwell in Him," " Blest be the Tie that Binds." The serititnent began to be formulated in thought and embodied in action on the revival of the mis- sionary spirit some eighty 3"ears ago. When the Church realized her high mission to give the gos- pel to the world, and then looked around upon her multiplied divisions and saw how these para- lyzed her strength and wasted her resources, the necessity of union was universally recognized. The members of the several churches began to APPENDIX. 161 meet together in Bible societies, and tract socie- ties and union societies of many names, to ac- complisli the work which belonged to them in common. Local unions were succeeded b}^ conventions and alliances of wider scope, and the bounds of brotherhood within the last fifty years have enlarged as never before since apostolic times. I was a member of the Evangelical Alliance Avhich met in New York in 1872. It was a won- derful spectacle, unexampled in Christendom since the great ecumenical councils of the early Church. Men from the East and the West, and the North and the South, from all the continents and from the islands of the sea, of all races and tribes, and colors, and costumes, and languages, came to- gether, prayed and communed together, of the thing's touching the King. All gathered together in '* the unity of the Spirit " and " the bond of peace." I was a member of the Presbj^terian Alliance which met in Philadelphia in 1880, and of the same body again when it met in London in 1888. Members of all the Churches of the great Presbyterian body from all over the world, with all their multiplied diversities, came together day after day, as members of the same familj^, and sat down at the common Father's table. All that I saw and felt at these meetings ]>ersuaded me at once of the practicability and desirabilit}^ of a closer Christian union as a present duty, and the ultimate union of all the churches who profess the faith of Christ as the goal to be sought and surely won. 162 EIGHTY YEARS. In the Presbyterian Church the cause of Church unity received a marked impulse at the General Assembly which met in Omaha in 1887. I was the moderator of that Assembly, and at the open- ing of the sessions one morning I was informed that a delegation from the Diocesan Convention of the Episcopal Church in Nebraska, then in ses- sion at Omaha, was present to present the frater- nal salutations of the Convention. All business was at once suspended, the delegation came for- ward and the chairman, in eloquent brotherly words, breathing throughout the spirit of Christ, presented the salutations of the Convention. The moderator replied, reciprocating the broth- erly feelings expressed, then stepped forward on the platform, reached out his hand to the speaker, and they stood together before the entire Assem- bly extending to each other the right hand of fel- lowship, representatives of the two great historic English Churches, once so closely united and now so Avidely separated. The entire Assembly was moved at the sight, and all hearts for the time were one. This scene prepared the Avay for another that followed on a subsequent day. A communication was received atid read from the Commission on Christian Unity of the General Convention of the Protestant Episcopal Church, addressed " To the Secretary of the General Assembly of the Pres- byterian Church, Omaha, Nebraska." The letter transmitted a declaration put forth by the House of Bishops on the subject of Christian unity, and the action of the Convention in the appointment of a commission under that action. The declarar APPENDIX. 163 tion of the House of Bishops after a historical preamble, goes on : 'Now, therefore, we Bishops of the Protestant Episcopal Church in the United States of Amer- ica, in council assembled as Bishops of the Church of God, do hereby solemnly declare, to all whom it may concern, and especially to our fellow- Christians of the different communions in this land, who, in their several spheres, have con- tended for the religion of Christ. 1. Our earnest desire that the Saviour's prayer " that we all may be one," may, in its deepest and truest sense, be speedily fulfilled. 2. That we believe that all who have been duly baptized with water in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost, are members of the Holy Catholic Church. 3. That in all things of human ordering or human choice relating to modes of worship and discipline, or to traditional customs, this Church is ready in the spirit of love and humility to forego all preferences of her own. 4. That this Church does not seek to absorb other Communions, but rather, cooperating with them on the basis of a common Faith and Order, to discountenance schism, to heal the wounds of the Body of Christ, and to promote the charity which is the chief of Christian graces and the visible manifestation of Christ to the world. But, furthermore : We do hereby affirm that the Christian unity now so earnestly desired by the memorialists, can be restored only by the re- 164 EIGHTY YEARS. turn of all Christian Communions to the princi- ples of unity exemplified by the undivided Cath- olic Church during the first ages of its existence, Avhich principles we believe to be the substantial Deposit of Christian Faith and Order committed by Christ and his Apostles to the Church unto the end of the world, and therefore incapable of compromise or surrender by those who have been ordained to be its Stewards and Trustees, for the common and equal benefit of all men. As inherent parts of this sacred Deposit, and, therefore, as essential to the restoration of unity among the divided branches of Christendom, Ave account the following, to wit : I. The Holy Scriptures of the Old and ISTew Testament as the Kevealed Word of God ; II. The Nicene Creed as the sufficient state- ment of the Christian Faith ; III. The Two Sacraments — Baptism and the Supper of the Lord — ministered with unfailing use of Christ's Avords of institution, and of the elements ordained by him. lY. The Historic Episcopate, locall}^ adapted in the methods of its administration to the vary- ing needs of the nations and peoples called of God into the unity of his Church ; F'urthermore : Deepl}^ grieved by the sad di- visions Avhich afflict the Cliristian Church in our own land, Ave hereby declare our desire and readi- ness, so soon as there shall be any authorized response to this declaration, to enter into broth- erly conference Avith all or any Christian bodies seeking the restoration of the organic unity of the Church, with a view to the earnest study of APPENDIX. 165 the conditions under Avliich so priceless a blessing might happily be brought to pass. A true and official copy. Attest : Herman C. Duncan, Secretary of Co'in^nission. The accompanying paper Avas as follows : Kesolution as Adopted by the Concurrent Action of the House of Bishops and of THE House of Deputies of the General Convention, Convened in the City of Chicago, October 27, 1886. jResolved, That a Commission consisting of five Bishops, five Clerical and five Lay Deputies be appointed, who shall, at their discretion, com- municate to the organized Christian bodies of our country the declaration set forth by the Bishops on the twentieth day of October, and shall hold themselves ready to enter into brotherly confer- ence with all or any Christian bodies seeking the restoration of the organic unity of the Church ; and that this Commission be requested to make a report of its action to the General Convention of 1889. Under this resolution the following appoint- ments were made : The Et- Eev. Alfred Lee, D. D., LL. D., Bishop of Delaware. The Kt. Kev. John Williams, S. T. D., LL. D., Bishop of Connecticut. 166 EIGHTY YEARS. The Et. Eev. Eichard Hooker Wilmer, D. D., LL. D., Bishop of Alabama. The Et. Eev. Abram Newkirk Littlejohn, D.D., LL. D., Bishop of Long Island. The Et. Eev. Mark Antony DeWolfe Howe, D. D., LL. D., Bishojj of Central Pennsylvania. The Eev. George Morgan Hills, D. D., Burling- ton, K. J. The Eev. Stephen Moylen Bird, Galveston, Tex. The Eev. Kinloch Nelson, D.D., Theological Seminary, Virginia. The Eev. Herman Cope Duncan, Alexandria, La. The Eev. Arthur Wilde Little, Portland, Me. George C. Shattuck, M. D., Boston, Mass. William Cornwall, Louisville, Ky. James Murdock Smith, LL. D., Buffalo, K. Y. Henry P. Baldwin, Detroit, Mich. John H. Stotsenburg, New Albany, Ind. The Commission is organized Avith the Et. Eev. the Bishop of Delaware as Chairman, and the Eev. Herman C. Duncan as Eecording and Cor- responding Secretary. Action of the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church in the U. S. A., 1887. [Mhiutes, pp. 133, 134.] The Assembly resolved in the matter of the Declaration of the House of Bishops of the Prot- estant Episcopal Church : " 1. That the statement of principles em- bodied in the Eeport of the Committee on Bills APPENDIX. 167 and Overtures be published in the Appendix to the Mimctes of this Assembly, as a clear presen- tation of the position of the Presbyterian Church on Church union and unity. " 2. That in response to the fraternal request of the Commission of our Protestant Episcopal brethren, a Committee of eight ministers and seven ruling elders be appointed to enter into brotherly conference with the Commission, and with any similar commissions or committees that may be appointed by other Christian bodies, with a view to the earnest study of the relations of the different Churches, and of the way in which the answer to the Kedeemer's prayer, ' that they all may be one,' may be realized and manifested ; said Committee to report to the next General Assembly. " 3. That the following letter be adopted by the General Assembly, signed by the Moderator and Stated Clerk, and forwarded to the Secretary of the Protestant Episcopal Commission.'^ A true copy. William Henry Roberts, Stated Clerk. Response of the General Assembly op THE Presbyterian Church in the U. S. A., 1887. To the Commission on Christian Unity of the House of Bishops and of the House of Depu- ties of the General Convention of the Protes- tant Episcopal Churchy convened in the City of Chicago, October 27, 1886 : Dear Brethren : The General Assembly 168 EIGHTY YEARS. of the Presbyterian Church in the United States of America, now in session at Omaha, Iseb., have received with sincere gratification the " Declara- tion " of your House of Bishops, and your re- quest, under it, for a brotherly conference with us and other branches of the Church of Christ, " seeking the restoration of the organic unity of the Church, with a view to the earnest study of the conditions under which so priceless a blessing might happily be brought to pass." The General Assembly are in cordial sympathy with the growing desire among the Evangelical Christian Churches for practical unity and co- operation in the work of spreading the Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ throughout all the earth, and they respond to your invitation with the sin- cere desire that the conference asked for may lead, if not to a formal oneness of organization, yet to such a vital and essential unity of faith and spirit and cooperation as shall bring all the followers of our common Lord into hearty fellow- ship, and to mutual recognition and affection, and to ministerial reciprocit}^, in the branches of the one visible Church of Christ, working together with him in advancing his kingdom upon earth. Without entering here into consideration of any of the principles which your House of Bishops lay down " as essential to the restoration of unity among the divided branches of Christen- dom," but leaving the consideration of them to the conference Avhich you request, the General Assembly have api)ointed, Ministers — Joseph T. Smith, D. D., Robert M. Patterson, D. D., David C. Marquis, D.D., William Henry Green, D.D., APPENDIX. 169 LL.D., Samuel J. Niccolls, D.D., "William II. Eoberts, D. D., Francis Brown, D. D., Ransom B. Welch, D. D., Avith Biding Elders — Hon. James A. Beaver, Hon. Cyrus L. Pershing, Hon. Robert N. Willson, William E. Dodge, Hon. Samuel M. Breckinridge, Dr. William C. Gray and E. K. Monfort, LL. D., a committee to confer with you and with any similar commissions or committees that may be appointed by any other Christian Churches for conference, with instructions to re- port to the next General Assembly the results of their deliberations. Very truly and fraternally yours, Joseph T. Smith, Moderator. William II. Robehts, Stated Cleric, These papers present clearly the end to be se- cured by the conferences, the Ijasis on which they were to proceed, and the metliod of brotherly conference by which they were to be conducted. Space will not allow us to give the long corre- spondence whicii follows during some seven years. In addition to the letters which passed, three oral conferences were held between the committee and the commission, the first in the house of Mr. J. Pierpont Morgan, in New York ; the second, in the rooms of Emanuel Church in Baltimore; and the third, in the rooms of the Church of the Covenant, in Washington, D. C. All the meetings held were entirely harmonious. JSTot a word or an incident occurred which inter- rupted the unity of the Spirit. The very fact that the representatives of the two great historic churches for so many years could meet together 170 EIGHTY YEARS. in the spirit of brotherly love, was in itself a most inspiring spectacle. The General Assembly of 1894 took action which the Episcopal com- mission regarded as an expression of the desire, on its part, that the negotiations should be sus- pended, and it was finally agreed upon both sides that they should be suspended for the present, but both the committee and the commission in their final letters expressed the earnest desire and confident hope that the negotiations under more favorable auspices would be resumed, and the consummation Avhich both so earnestly wished be attained. FEDEEATION OF PRESBYTEEIAJST CHUECHES. The committee on Church unity, in addition to its conference with the Protestant Episcopal Church was authorized to enter into brotherly correspondence with any similar committees, on the same general subject. Correspondence was opened with representatives of many other churches throughout the land ; as the result of which it was determined at last to attempt a federation of all the Presbyterian churches. The matter was reported to the General As- sembly, they sanctioned the movement and au- thorized the committee to continue the corre- spondence. Conferences with some of the leading members of different Presbyterian bodies were held. A subcommittee was appointed to draft the plan of a federation of the different Presby- terian churches. The subcommittee consisted of the Eev. Dr. E. M. Patterson, Presbyterian, the Eev. Dr. Debaum, Eeformed, and the Eev. Dr. Eeed, United Presbyterian. At the call of the subcommittee the joint committee met in conference at the Mission Eooms, 'New York, on the 25th of April. At this conference the following bodies were represented : The Pres- byterian Church in the U. S. A., Eeformed Church in America, Eeformed Presbyterian Church General Synod, United Presbyterian 171 172 EIGHTY YEARS. Church, and Associate Eeformecl 83^1100! in the South. The draft of a plan of federation was presented by the committee appointed for the purpose and after discussion and slight amend- ment was adopted, and copies were ordered sent to the several bodies represented. It is as fol- lows : PLAN OF FEDERATION. For the glory of God, and for the greater unity and the advancement of the Church of Avhich the Lord Jesus Christ is the Head, the folloAving articles of Constitution and Federal Union between the Eeformed Churches in the United States holding the Presbyterian system are recommended for adoption : 1. Every denomination entering into this Union shall retain its distinct individuality, as well as every power, jurisdiction, and right which is not by this Constitution expressly delegated to the body hereby constituted. 2. Full faith and credit shall be given by all of these denominations to the acts, proceedings, and records of the duly constituted authorities of the other denominations. 3. For the prosecution of work that can be better done in union than separately an Ecclesias- tical Assembly is hereby constituted, which shall be known by the name and style of The Federal Council of the Reformed Churches in the United States of America holding to the Presbyterian system. 4. The Federal Council shall consist of four ministers and four elders from each of the con- APPENDIX. 173 stituent denominations, who shall be chosen, with alternates, under the direction of their re- spective General Assemblies or General Synods, in such manner as those Assemblies or Synods shall respectively determine. 5. The Federal Council shall endeavor to pro- mote united work for the reclamation of the Christless masses in the large cities, towns, and old rural settlements of the country ; cooperation in Home Missionary work by the different de- nominations in the new settlements and among the Freedmen of the South, in such a way as to remove denominational friction and prevent the multiplication of weak and antagonistic organiza- tions where unnecessary ; and the prosecution of the Foreign Missionary work by the different denominations on the same principle of comity, so that different denominations shall cultivate particular fields. It shall also keep a watchful eye on current religious, moral, and social movements, and take such action as may concentrate the influence of all the churches for the preservation of their re- ligious inheritance and the maintenance of their fundamental principles. 6. The Federal Council may advise and rec- ommend in all matters pertaining to the general welfare of the Kingdom of Christ, but shall not exercise authority, except such as is conferred upon it by this instrument, or such as may be conferred upon it by the federated bodies. It shall not interfere with the creed, worship, or government of the denominations. All matters of discipline shall be left to the exclusive and 174 EIGHTY YEARS. final judgment of the ecclesiastical authorities of the denomination in which the same may arise. 7. The Federal Council shall have the jwwer of opening and maintaining a friendly corre- spondence with the highest Assemblies of other religious denominations, for the purpose of pro- moting union and concert of action in general or common interests. 8. All differences w^hich may arise among the federated bodies, or any of them, in regard to matters within the jurisdiction of the Federal Council shall be determined by such executive agencies as may be created by the Federal Council, with the right of appeal to the Federal Council for final adjudication. 9. The officers of the Federal Council shall be a President, Vice President, Clerk and Treas- urer. 10. The Federal Council shall meet annually, at such time and place as may be determined. 11. The contingent expenses of the Federal Council sliall be divided equally between the denominations. 12. Amendments to this Constitution may be proposed by the Federal Council or by any of the General Assemblies or General Synods, but the concurrent action of the General Assemblies and General Synods shall be necessary for their adoption. This is now reported by your Committee as a tentative and suggestive Plan, for the informa- tion of the General Assembly, in the hope that the Assembly will be gratified at the progress which the movement has made. Your Commit- APPENDIX. 175 tee recommends that it be authorized to continue its Conferences with Committees of other Pres- byterian and Reformed Churches, in order to perfect the Plan and report it for final action.. All of which is respectfully submitted. Joseph T. Smith, Chairman. Fkancis Brown, Secretary. In the Committee on Church Unity. Washington, D. C, May 19, 1893. PLAN OF FEDERATION. The plan here proposed is typical of Church unity, both in its result and its method. These eight churches were widely separated by race, by nationality, by traditions, and prejudices, and long and often embittered controversies. There were found among them all types of Calvin- ism, from the hig-hest to the lowest. Varied rites and forms of worship, from bald simplic- ity to liturgical adornments. Diverse theories of church polity, from the High Church Jure Di- vino, intolerant and exclusive Presbyterianism, to the Low Church Presbyterianism, which "em- braces in the spirit of charity those Christians who differ from us in opinion and practice on these subjects." Yet with all their seemingly irreconcilable diversities of race, and culture, and creed, and forms of worship, and theories of gov- ernment, their representatives agree to unite. The proposed union is a real union, " the gathering of many into one." It is not mere cooperation on the one side, nor is it absolute consolidation on the other. It is a federal union. The kind 176 EIGHTY YEARS. of unity we see exemplified in all departments of organic life, the one vine with its many branches, the one body with its many members, the one society with its many officers and administra- tions. It is the kind of union made familiar to us by our civil constitution, the one nation with its many states, the strength of all combined in the nation for ends common to all. The liberties and interests of each secured to the states for ends peculiar to each. It is unity without uni- formity, — unity with allowed and guaranteed diversities, the only kind of unity which at once combines the strength of all and guards the lib- erties of each. The federation principle, which has attained such wide application in these last days, has solved some of the most perplexing problems of statesmanship. It is the mediating principle between despotism and anarchy, and the service it has done to the State it stands ready to do to the Church. In the plan pro- posed, the eight churches are united in the Fed- eral Council, analogous to the general govern- ment, whose powers are expressly defined. Under this the several churches, like the states, have their autonomy secured by express constitutional provision. The plan was unanimously adopted by the representatives of the several churches, and this fact in itself gave ample assurance of the prax3ticability of federation. It had been strange indeed if it had not encountered objec- tions, criticisms and oppositions. The hardest work either God or man ever undertakes is that of making peace. To bring it down to earth the Eternal Son must stoop from his throne and die APPENDIX. 177 upon the cross, " So by the blood of his cross making peace," and nothing less than that cross could make peace between God and man, and peace between man and man. The Assembly heartily approved of the movement toward a federation of Presbyterian Churches. The com- mittee were authorized to continue the confer- ences commenced, and mature, if possible, a plan of federation. In reporting to the Assembly, the committee say : " This is now reported by your committee as a tentative and suggestive plan for the infor- mation of the General Assembly, in the hope that the Assembly will be gratihed at the prog- ress that the movement has made." The com- mittee Avere directed by the Assembly to con- tinue their conferences with the committees of other Presbyterian Churches in order to perfect the plan and report it for final action. Tlie com- mittee, under this direction of the General As- sembly, invited the representatives of the several churches to meet them in conferences which ex- tended over several years. The plan of federa- tion which was framed under the direction of the Assembly was sent down to the Presbyteries for their information and advice. Modifications of the plan were proposed in several particulars, and while these were under discussion at the closing hour of an exhausting session of the As- sembly, a brother rose and moved to lay the whole subject on the table. On such a motion, at such a time, there was no opportunity for ex- planation or remonstrance. The committee had done precisely what the Assembly had directed 178 EIGHTY YEARS. them to do in preparing and submitting to the Assembly the proposed plan of federation. On their invitation the representatives of the other churches had all agreed to present the plan to the highest authority in their respective churches. The committee were greatly embarrassed in their attempts to reconcile them to what seemed a discourtesy, but the action of the Assembly not only put a stop to the movement in our own church but in all the other churches. I do not regard the seven years spent in this service as lost. They were indeed laborious years. The correspondence they required would fill volumes, but there is no part of my life on which I look back with such pleasure and no work in which I have been permitted to engage as of such transcendent importance. The day Avill surely come Avhen Church unity will be real- ized. There may still be oppositions, delays and hindrances, but though the promise tarry, it will surely come, and we Avill Avait for it in the pa- tience of hope. The great Intercessor still lives, and his prayer will surely be ansAvered, " That they all may be one." The faith of the Church in "the Holy Catholic Church" Avill surely be turned into Ansion. The times Avhen these questions of Church unity and federation Avere before the Assembly Avere A^ery unfaA^orable for securing their full and unimpassioned consid- eration. During those years the body Avas occu- pied and agitated with questions relating to the revision of the Confession, Avith trials for heresy, and Avith disturbing questions as to the conduct of the theological seminaries. Now that these APPENDIX. 179 disturbing questions are settled, it might be that the conferences, if still continued, would secure more unembarrassed consideration. The friend- ships formed, the hours of delightful communion enjoyed with the members of the Commission, both individually and collectively, the reception given me as the representative of the Presby- terian Church by the House of Bishops and the House of Deputies at the meeting of the General Convention in Minneapolis are among the most cherished and hallowed memories of a long life. SEEMON" BY EEY. JOSEPH T. SMITH, D. D., LL. D., ON HIS EIGHTIETH BIETHDAY. We are assembled here at this unusual hour on an unusual occasion. The Presbytery to Avhicli we belong has invited you here to listen to the words of an old man of eighty Avho to-day has just reached that goal, so far on in the journey of life and so near to its solemn end. It was my first thought to devote this discourse to personal experiences and reminiscences of the men and ministers I have known, and of the churches with whose history I have been con- versant for the last half century. It was con- cluded, however, to leave these experiences and reminiscences for a book, which will afford ampler space, and to give this hour to a rapid review of some of the principal events of the last eighty years. Those years have been crowded with most momentous events, and the nineteenth cen- tury will be forever memorable in history for the mighty changes it has wrought on the face of nature and in the structure of human society. I have chosen as a text singularly appropri- ate to the occasion the words of Mordecai to Queen Esther in a momentous crisis of the king- 180 APPENDIX. 181 dom. Esther iv. 14. "Who kiioweth Avhether thou art come to the kingdom for such a time as this?" After the manner of the Old Testament the text embodies a general truth in a specific exam- ple, and teaches a universal duty by the object lesson of a particular incident. Passing by the details of the history, let us take up the great truth which lies on its surface — opportunities make duties, and we are debtors to the times in which we live to understand their significance that so we may adjust our conduct to their re- quirements. In trying to understand the true significance of our time we are not left like the secular sci- entists and historians to grope our way unaided through a tangled and threadless labyrinth. The inspired Word has mapped out for us the course of events through all the ages and set up land- marks all along the way, so that we may know not only whence we have come, but whither we are going. Prophecy and Providence thus be- come mutual interpreters, and we look out upon passing events not only in the light of the past, but in the clearer light of the future, to which they are tending. From among the events of the last eighty years we select only those which are palpable and familiar, seen and read of all men, changes on the physical surface of the earth, increased facil- ities of intercourse, improvements in the indus- trial arts, and advancement in all the outward appliances of advancing civilization. In such events as these, outward and material as they 182 EIGHTY YEAKS. are, wo sliall read the forewriting of prophecy and see the linger of God palpa})ly pre})aring- the Avay for the coining of that si)iritual kingdom which is to overspread the whole earth. We notice, First, The opening of highways. The building of roads occupies a large space in the inspired visions of these last days. " I will make ail my mountains a way and my highways shall be exalted." " Cast up, cast up the high- Avays, gather up the stones thereof and make in the desert a highway for our God." Along these highways, when built, " men from the North, and the AVest and the land of Sinim, shall go to and fro and all nations shall flow to- gether." And along these highways, wherever they go, as in the opening of a stream in the des- ert, life and greenness and beauty will spring up, " and the desert and the solitary place shall blos- som as the rose." How exactly the events of the last eighty years answer to these prophetic visions of three thou- sand years ago. When this wilderness continent was to be transformed into a garden, the first necessity was to build roads reaching out to the treasures of forests, fields and mines, along Avhich travelers might pass to and fro, and the ox and the horse drag their heavy burdens slowly along. The great Builder in fitting it up for man's habi- tation, had opened broader highways than these in the majestic rivers, which everywhere flow down from the mountains to the sea. Within these last eighty years Ave have seen these all linked together by artificial rivers affording APPENDIX. 183 waterways of easier transportation in every direc- tion. That was a memorable day in 1825, Avhen the Erie Canal was opened, joining the Great Lakes to the Atlantic, turning the wilderness of West- ern N'ew York into a garden, and pouring the treasures of the great West into the warehouses of the great metropolis. But roads and canals were too cumbrous and too slow for the exigencies of the last days, and, within the last fifty years, we have seen highways cast up strong as iron, smooth as glass, whirling their steam-yoked cars along almost with the rapidity of the eagle's flight. Railroads are but things of yesterday, yet we have grown already so familiar with the spectacle that we have almost ceased to wonder. It was not till about 1830 that the building of that great network of rail- roads which now covers the continent ^vas fairly commenced. The Baltimore and Ohio, the first interstate railroad projected, was slowly drawn out to the base of the AUeghenies. It had been proved by figures that no locomotive could cross the mountains, but the impossible was at last achieved, and the AUeghenies were passed. From their Avestern base iron high- ways branching off in every direction as they advanced, reached at last the banks of the Mis- sissippi, and here all further progress was ar- rested, for just beyond was the great American desert of our boyhood maps. There were vast plains and prairies, the home of the buffalo and of wild beasts and wilder men, and beyond was the vast desert, more terrible than the simoon- swept Sahara, or the great and terrible wilder- 184 EIGHTY YEAES. ness of the wanderings, and still beyond were the Rocky Mountains towering to the clouds and interposing an impassable barrier of rock and ice. But again the impossible was achieved and the Atlantic was joined to the Pacific. That Avas a day never to be forgotten in 1860, when the last spike was driven into the inter- oceanic railroad. Machinery had been so ad- justed that every stroke of the hammer was repeated by the tick of the telegraph in every direction, and when the last stroke was lieard, booming cannon and ringing bells, and shouts of multitudes in all the villages and cities of the land hailed the great achievemeiit. Fifty years ago there was not a railroad west of the Alle- ghenies. To-day they cover the continent in every direction, from the Atlantic to the Pacific, and from the Great Lakes to the Gulf. The prophetic vision is fulfilled. Mountains are made a way, and valleys are exalted, and in the desert a highway is made for our God. "Wherever the railroad goes, hamlets, and towns, and cities spring up along its side and the song of reapers, and the hum of machinery, and music of church bells is heard, and the desert and the solitary place rejoice. And not on this continent alone, but these high- ways are beginning to engirdle the whole earth. Already they span the entire continent of Europe ; already they have invaded Asia, waking the slumbering millions of China, and India, and Japan into new life ; already they have passed over into the Dark Continent, traversing the sandy desert from the Nile to the Red Sea, and waking APPENDIX. 185 the slumbering echoes of the Congo Yalley. Mountains and deserts are no longer prison walls, and all barriers to intercourse have disappeared from the land. Across the sea, indeed, no high- way could be built, but we have seen it in these last days almost bridged. Look at Paul as he started out in his mission around the world in his little rude, uncom passed ship, stealing closely along the shores of the Mediterranean, and look- ing out upon the trackless waters of the Great Sea beyond, over which no pilot could guide his bark. Then look at the modern missionary as he em- barks in a majestic steamship, strong to defy winds and waves, Avith its pilot compass with fixed finger guiding its course across the widest oceans. Columbus wrote in his first letter from the New World to Queen Isabella '' The earth is small, much smaller than I supposed." Ever since it has been growing smaller, until to-day it is contracted almost to a span. All barriers to intercourse on the land have been surmounted, and the wide seas have been converted into great highways of travel and commerce. The nations of the earth are beginning to gather together as one family around one fireside. Christendom stands face to face with heathendom, and a high- way is made for our God, broader and stronger than those old Roman roads along which the first heralds of the gospel carried the glad tid- ings to the nations. We pass to a second event. Second, The casting down of thrones. " I beheld," says the seer in his sublime vision of the last days, " till the thrones were cast down, 186 EIGHTY YEARS. and the Ancient of days did sit." Thrones, — im- perial thrones, kingly thrones, feudal thrones, priestl}^ thrones, despotic thrones of every name, — how these have filled the whole earth, resting as a deadly incubus upon the nations, crushing- individuals into masses, and converting men into serfs and chattels! Society, instead of being the friend and helper, has been the deadliest enemy of man. Eulers, instead of being " like the light of the morning when the sun riseth, even a morning without clouds," have been baleful me- teors blazing through the sky scattering blight and desolation on every side. It^is a strange histor}^ that of thrones ; and the Bible gives us their genesis. They ^vere founded by Nimrod, the mighty hunter, while the earth was yet wet with the Avaters of the deluge. When he had built Eabjdon and Kineveh, the first cit- ies, he laid in them the foundations of those gi- gantic despotisms which in long succession cursed the earth for so many ages. Under them there were no men, but only masses, masses of blood, and bone, and brain, and muscle, welded into a single machine and wielded by a single despotic will. What a terrible picture the prophet gives us of the last of these great world empires : " It was dreadful, terrible and strong exceedingly, devouring, breaking in pieces and stamping the residue with the feet thereof." AVhen the Roman empire was shattered into fragments, rude, blood-stained robber chiefs from the frozen Xorth set up their mimic thrones on its ruins. They too, like the old despots, proclaimed them- selves gods, ruling over men by divine right, • APPENDIX. 187 lords at once of their bodies and their souls. Strange that men should so renounce their man- hood, and crawl cringing and crouching at the feet of a mortal weak as themselves. Not always have they bowed willingly to the yoke of their masters. History is largely made up of the bloody stories of revolts, rebellions, revolutions, uprisings of the people to cast down the thrones of tyrants. Kever has there been such a casting down of thrones as in these last days. In the closing years of the last century, in France, the central kingdom of Europe, there was a great earth- quake, and the thrones of king, and lords, and priests, were leveled to the dust. The long op- pressed people rose up in their manhood and their might and proclaimed "liberty, equality and fraternity " throughout all the land to all the inhabitants thereof. Napoleon, at the head of his resistless legions, swept over Europe like a cyclone, leveling thrones, uncrowning kings, and sweeping the whole continent clear of the old tyrants of every name. True, nations long en- slaved, knew not yet how to be free, and kings attempted once more to rebuild their ruined thrones, but all in vain. " The divinity that hedges about a throne " is gone forever. We saw the people again in 1848, rising up in their might, and causing every throne in Europe to totter to its fall. How marvel ously popular freedom has advanced within the last eighty years. At the beginning of this century there was not a constitutional government in any nation of Europe. To-day there is scarcely one without it. 188 EIGHTY YEARS. It was in a little island of the sea, and by the late-born Anglo-Saxon, the battle of freedom was fought and won for the race. The Anglo- Saxon was born at Runnymede and his infant liberties Avere cradled in Magna Charta. The barons, after long and bloody conflicts, had wrested their liberty from the king, and then the serfs, after still longer and bloodier conflict, won their liberty from the barons, and the Eng- lish people at last were free. The kingly throne of Charles and the priestly throne of Laud were cast down together. A free Commonwealth, modeled after the pattern which God had given long before in the Jewish Commonwealth, was set up, and never again, struggle for it as they may, can the throne of a Stuart or the throne of a Laud, be set up in the fatherland. That little island was too small and too much cumbered Avith the rubbish and ruins of old abuses for the full development of the newly won freedom. A larger and broader, and cleaner theater was needed, and that God had prepared in a new world hidden away beyond the seas. When the fullness of time had come, the little Mayflower, like the Ark of the deluge, laden with the pre- cious freightage from which the new world Avas to be peopled, was guided to its shores, and the great Eepublic of the West appeared. There thrones are things unknoAvn ; the people are their own rulers and that strange thing appears on the earth " a government of the people, and for the people, and by the people." The pre- cious heritage of civil and religious liberty God has given to the Anglo-Saxon, not for himself, APPENDIX. 189 but in trust for the world. Kot for his own sake has God exalted him and given him the dominion in these last days. Of Israel of old, the greatest benefactor of the world, it was said " a Syrian ready to perish Avas his father." The Anglo-Saxon's father was a grim savage, prowl- ing through Druid groves, stained all over Avith the blood of human sacrifice, and something of his old savagery he still retains, something of his old pride and masterfulness, something of his old contempt for inferior races and disregard of their interest. Too often in his treatment of them he has forgotten that while " it is excellent to have a giant's strength it is tyrannous to use it like a giant." But with all his faults, God has raised him up and anointed him to be tlie herald of popular freedom to benighted nations. "Wher- ever he goes, — and Avhere does he not go ? — up and down the earth, the blessings of Christian civilization attend his steps. To-day as Ave look abroad over the earth in Avhat large portions of it are thrones of depotism utterly cast down ! Hoav the masses are begin- ning to struggle up into living men ! Hoav the individual soul, more precious than all the world, and so long lost in the mass, is beginning to rise up and make ready to meet the Lord of souls at his coming ! A third event. Third, The increase of knoAvledge. "Many shall run to and fro and knowledge shall be increased." For long ages knoAvledge had been the inheritance of the chosen few. In all ages and in all lands the great multitude 190 EIGHTY YEARS. have been ignorant, degraded, groveling in the mire of sensuality and sin, till the image of God scarce towered above the brute. In the last days the sun of knowledge Avill rise upon the long midnight of the world and scatter its dark- ness. The mass of minds so long a dead sea of sluggishness, will be stirred by strong winds into new life. The dynasty of mind will succeed to that of brute force, and the power of knowledge will supersede the power of the sword. Has not this Scripture been fulfilled before our eyes, in the marvelous increase of knowledge in these last days ? The stars no longer weave their mazy dances and describe their lawless and fantastic motions through the sky. The astron- omer has followed them in their farthest wander- ings and tracked them to their remotest hiding places, resolved their nebulae, disentangled their milky waj^s, weighed their worlds in balances, and stretched his lines and measuring rods over the broad fields of space. The geologist, descend- ing deep down below the earth's surface, is grop- ing among its deep foundations and reading in its rocky archives its eventful history from the first beginning. The chemist, passing by the grosser forms of matter, is grasping after the subtler ele- ments of which masses are made and the spirit- like forces by which they are ruled. The biolo- gist is daring the more baffling problem of life and organism, and the socialist is attempting the still more baffling problem of corporate life and social organism. And so in every department of science and art. In the greater world of the telescope, and the smaller world of the micro- APPENDIX. 191 scope, the area of knowledge has been enlarged in every direction. With this increase of knowledge has come its wider diffusion. Books are no longer laboriously^ written on parchment and locked up in monkish cells or scholastic cloisters ; they are flung off by steam presses with lightning-like rapidity and scattered around like autumn leaves or morn- ing dewdrops. Papers, magazines, lyceums and common schools are carrying knowledge to the cottages of the poor and making it like air and sunlight, the common inheritance of the race. The knowledge of these last days so in- creased demanded a better organ of speech than the tongue and the steam-press, and a swifter post than the railroad. AVithin the last eighty years we have seen slender poles set up and along them an iron wire stretched as a highAvay through the air. Then the lightnings, the swift- est of messengers, were called down from the clouds, and the challenge of Job seems at last to be answered: "Canst thou send out lightnings that they may go and return again, and say here w^e are ? " They did come and stand around as winged messengers, ready to convey man's mes- sages Avhithersoever he would. No poles could be set up along the sea, indeed, but a way was prepared for the lightning deep down beneath the track of the steamships and the highways of the sea monsters. The Avide globe is engirdled, the ends of the earth are brought together, and thought at last has found a messenger swift as itself. 192 EIGHTY YEARS. Even familiarity cannot altogether blind us to the more than magic wonder of the telegraph. Who can ever forget the emotions with which the first message from across the sea was re- ceived ? Early one morning in 1869 a little company was seen on the Atlantic shore gath- ered around a weird-looking instrument, wait- ing, watching, listening, when suddenly there fell upon their ears from the other shore, three thousand miles away, these words " Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men." Some two thousand 3^ears before those same words, spoken by an angel from the sky, fell upon the ears of the wondering shepherds of *^ Bethleliem, and now they are spoken again to those listeners on the seashore by an angel mes- senger scarce less spirit-like. How'slowl}^, yet surely, man has been recover- ing his lost dominion over the earth ! The horse had long borne his burdens, and the dog kept watch over his folds. The screw and the lever had performed the work of his muscles, the winds had propelled his ships, and the tumbling waters had driven his machiner3^ But within the last fifty years he has laid his hand upon the lightnings and compelled electricity, the might- iest of all forces, the prime minister of Jehovah, to do his bidding, and with such a power at his command his lost dominion must be recovered. Once again, he will be proclaimed sovereign of earth and again his coronation hymn will be sung : " Thou hast made him a little lower than the angels, and hast crowned with glory and honor. Thou madest him to have dominion over APPENDIX. 193 the works of thy hands ; thou hast put all things under his feet." Now that the physical earth is being reno- vated, noAV that man is being emancipated and restored to the dignity of manhood, now that knowledge is increased, and everywhere dif- fused, the way of the Messiah is prepared and the kingdom of righteousness and peace and joy and the Holy Ghost will surely and speedily be set up. How strangely then, reads the following sign of the last days : Fourth, " In the last days perilous times shall come." And here is the inspired picture of those perilous times. ^' Men shall be lovers of their own selves, cov- etous, boasters, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy, without natural affection, truce breakers, false accusers,unconti- nent, fierce, despisers of those that are good, traitors, heady, high-minded, lovers of pleasures more than lovers of God ; having a form of god- liness, but denying the power thereof." Nowhere have material improvements and popular freedom and popular education and in- tellectual enlightenment reacheil such perfection as in this land of ours. And yet, shrink from it as we may, must we not recognize our own fea- tures in this picture of the last days? Look around you. What selfishness ! What greed ! What pride ! What incontinence ! What faith- lessness ! What bitter rivalries and competitions in trade where each is mindful of his own things ! What fierce conflicts between capital and labor, shaking the very foundations of society, corpora- 194 EIGHTY YEARS. tions and syndicates on the one side, arrayed against labor leagues and labor unions on the other ! What lawlessness ! What mob violence, threatening at times to bring back the reign of brute force! What frauds at the ballot box, what corruption in city councils and state legis- latures ! What open revolts against all rightful authority, both human and divine ! a striving to convert men into a herd of wild beasts to be ruled by the strongest ! Agrarianism, commu- nism, nihilism, agnosticism, their name is legion ! What terrible scenes in assassinations, burnings, destructions they have already Avrought, and what terrible things they threaten ! Toward the close of the last days, we are told, a mightier destroyer than any of these shall ap- pear. He is neither the despotic Caesar, nor the false prophet, nor the pope, but an Apoll^^on far mightier than they. His name is Antichrist and his distinctive mark is atheism. He denies " both the Father and the Son '• and so denies the true God. He denies "his father's God and every God," banishes all supernatural beings from the world, says with the fool, " There" is no God." Sages of old had often said that atheism is im- possible, and Cicero long ago declared that no nation or people was ever found without a god. But toward the close of the last century an entire nation was seen openly abjuring God and pro- claiming by solemn statute, " There is no God." From France the deadly poison spread through the colleges and universities of Europe and America. Godless scientists, with fell industry, labored to substitute brute matter, or blind force, APPENDIX. 195 for tlie living Gocl, banish all supernatural exist- ences and leave the Avorld orphaned indeed. From the high places of learning we have seen the infection spread through all classes of society. Popular lecturers, popular novels, magazines, re- views, the whole body of popular literature, was infected, and untold numbers say with the fool in their heart, " There is no God," and live without God in the world. Antichrist incarnate, personi- fied atheism has come. Godlessness, the denial of God, the forgetfulness of God, the living as if there were no God, practical atheism, is the grand characteristic of our age beyond all that has gone before. Popular education, intellectual culture, ma- terial advancement, all the boasted progress of the age, leading on toward atheism and anarchy ! And if this be so, what hope remains for the race ? Is not the demonstration of the pessimist complete, that the end is utter ruin ? Yes, there is no hope for man in himself ; no hope in ma- terial advancement and intellectual enlighten- ment. Help must come from without ; God must interpose or man is undone, and God does inter- pose. Here is the last sign of the last days : Fifth, " It shall come to pass in the last days that I will pour out my Spirit upon all flesh." The Divine Spirit shall descend upon the troubled waters of human society as of old on the unformed chaos, and under his plastic influ- ence, the new heavens and new earth, wherein dwelleth righteousness, shall appear. If history teaches any one lesson it is that there is no re- 196 EIGHTY YEARS. cuperative power in humanity, that the highest intellectual enlightenment may be found in con- nection with the deepest moral and spiritual de- basement. Until man's moral nature is changed by the new creative power of the Divine Spirit, no matter what his environment, he will sink into lower and still lower depths of moral degrada- tion. Look at the Roman empire in its palmy days. The Augustine age of learning, the age of Yirgil, and Horace, and Seneca, and Cicero, the age which transformed Rome from a city of mud into a city of marble and filled it with temples, and palaces, and triumphal arches, and master- pieces of art. And yet it is of Rome, in that very Augustine age, the Apostle draws that fear- ful picture of moral debasement in the first chapter of Romans. What monsters of cruelty and lust Avere those old Roman emperors, the Caesars ! What nameless infamies, in the man- sions of the rich, as well as in the hovels of the poor ! How her Ovids, in mellifluous lines, glori- fied the basest of vices ; and her senators, openly and without shame, reveled in nameless deeds, w^hich elsewhere shunned the light of day ! If no intellectual elevation surpassed that of the Augustine age, no moral degradation ever equaled it. It was in this gloomy midnight of the world, a little company were gathered in an upper room in Jerusalem, and the Spirit of the Lord descended upon them as a spirit of power. From that upper room they scattered abroad over the empire, ignorant and unlearned men, and Avherever they went preaching Christ, idols tottered, superstitions vanished, and thrones fell APPENDIX. 197 down before them. Within three centuries the religion of Christ was proclaimed the religion of the empire. As the first triumphs of the gospel were ushered in by Pentecost, so also shall the last be. Has not the promised Pentecost already come in the signs and wonders of the earlier years of this century? My memory goes back to those days for their traditions were still fresh, their trophies were all around and something of their old power still remained. It was in an age of abounding worldliness and widespread immoral- ity. Dr. 1) wight has drawn a picture of the times dark almost as Paul's picture of the Ko- mans. It was in the midst of these evil days the Spirit was poured out from on high. It came suddenly upon the disciples as in the uppei* room. It rested upon them as a spirit of poAver. It came upon careless and impenitent souls as a spirit of conviction and the powers of the world to come took hold upon them. It fell upon the reapers in the field, upon the workman at his bench, upon the merchant in his counting room, upon the pastor in his study, upon the great con- gregation in the sanctuary. Ko walls could hold the multitudes that thirsted for the bread of life. They gathered for scores of miles around in the open fields, or in the tented grove, and there day after day, and night after night, the scenes of Pentecost were repeated. All over the East and still more signally over the West, in Western Pennsylvania, and Ohio and Tennessee, souls in uncounted numbers were born unto God. Almost every house became a Bethel. Christians were 198 EIGHTY YEARS. revived and strengthened and lifted up into a higher plane in life. The missionary spirit was breathed into the Church. All our great mis- sionary societies had their origin in those re- vivals, and the Church roused from her long slumbers addressed herself at last to her groat work the conversion of the world. And why is not the world converted ? God has gone before, broken down every barrier to the spread of the gospel. He has given to Chris- tian nations wealth, power, and all needful ap- pliances, lie has furnished his Church witli the ministry, oracles and ordinances, and appointed her as the herald of salvation to the world. He has given the promised Spirit to make all these effectual. Why, then, we repeat it, is not the world converted ? There is only one answer to the question. The Church, the ordained institute of salvation, has proved unfaitliful to her high mission. There is no unfaithfulness with God. He has given his Spirit in these last days, but his people have grieved him away by their worldliness, their carnality, and their self-seeking. The Church, by her strifes and divisions, has lost the spirit of charity, and flung away the badge of brotherly love by which she was to be known to the world. She has wasted her energies in internal strifes and consumed her resources in building up walls of separation from her brethren in Christ. When the Church is one then will the great Mediator's prayer be fulfilled and the world will believe that thou hast sent me. The world will be con- verted when the Church is one. Dying souls all APPENDIX. 199 around us, a dying world, is waiting for a united and consecrated Church. God, indeed, might have chosen other instrumentalities, or dispensed with all instrumentalities, but he has chosen the Church as the instrument of salvation and if that prove unfaithful all is lost. Faith cometh by hearing. How shall they hear without a preacher ? and how shall they preach except they be sent? If God's silver and gold are kept back from his treasury how shall the heralds of salvation be sent abroad upon his errands. "Return unto me and I will return unto you," saith the Lord. *' Bring ye all the tithes into the storehouse, . . . and prove me now herewith, saith the Lord of hosts, if I will not open you the windows of heaven, and pour you out a blessing, that there shall not be room enough to receive it." *' Awake, awake ; . . . O Zion ; put on thy beautiful garments, O Jerusalem, for , . . the Lord hath made bare his holy arm in the eyes of all the nations." A DISCOUKSE Delivered May 22, 1859, by THE KEY. JOSEPH T. SMITH, Pastor of Second Presbyterian Church, Baltimore, on the LIFE AND CHAEACTEE OF THE EEV. HENEY Y. D. JOHN^S, D. D., LATE EECTOE OF EMANUEL CHUECH, BALTIMOEE. Fo7' me to live is Christ, and to die is gain. — Phil. i. 21. These words Avere penned by the Apostle Avhile a prisoner in Eome, and just upon the eve of his trial. They may be regarded as his last words — the deliberate testimony of a Christian minister, uttered while standing upon the border- line between life and death, calmly surve3nng both. In writing to the Philippians, who seem to have been to him Avhat the family of Bethany was to the Master, the Apostle admits them to the inmost secrecies of his soul in that solemn hour. He tells them how he is " in a strait betwixt two " — having " a desire to depart, and be Avitli Christ," yet wishing still "to abide with them in the flesh ; " longing for his rest and his reAvard, yet Avilling to labor and to suffer. And then, in tlie volume-embracing words of our text, he sums 200 APPENDIX. 201 up liis Avhole estimate of those two tremendous facts, Life and Death. " For to me to live is Christ, and to die is gain." As if he had said, *' I live, yet not I, bat Christ, who is my life, liveth in me; and the life that I now live, I live by Faith in the Son of God. I live not unto my- self, but unto him who loved me, and gave himself for me. Christ is the beginning and the end ; the center and the circumference; the all in all of my being. I live for no selfish or secular end ; for nothing which men seek after, or the Avorld can bestow. Accounting my life as but a season and an opportunity for doing good, I live only to labor for Christ, and to fill up what is behind of his sufferings, and I am willing to live for Christ. But ' to die is gain ' — infinite and everlasting gain. I shrink not from the approach of the last enemy, for to me Christ hath abolished Death, and put these words of triumph in my mouth : O ! Death, where is thy sting ? O ! Grave, where is thy victory ? The sting of Death is sin, and the strength of sin is the law ; but thanks be to God who giveth us the victory, through our Lord Jesus Christ. And then Faith looks be- yond and above. Henceforth there is laid up for me a crown of righteousness. In my Father's house are many mansions, and Christ has gone before to prepare a place for me, and it will be gain for me to be at home — forever at home — with him." Our detailed exposition of the text will be found in the life and death of that man of God, who has just been removed from among us to join the great cloud of witnesses above. We un- 202 EIGHTY YEARS. dertake this service as a feeble tribute to departed worth — as a new testimony to the grace of God toward his servants, in life and in death — and as a fresh incentive to renewed diligence in the duties of our high calling. It is not of the man we would speak, but of the disciple. It is not the man we would glorify, but the grace of God which was " exceeding abundant " toward him. And our design in this service will be altogether frustrated if it do not redound to the praise of the glory of God's grace. The Kev. Henry Van Dyke Johns, D. D., was born in Newcastle, Delaware, on the 13th day of October, in the year of our Lord, 1803. He was tlie descendant of an old Maryland family, founded by Eichard Johns, who emigrated from EngUmd and settled in Calvert County in 1717. He was the son of the late Judge Kensey Johns, and brother of the late Chancellor of Delaware, and of the present Bishop of Virginia. He inherited from his ancestors the richest of all legacies — the blessing entailed from father to son upon the generations of those who fear God. A child of the covenant, and sealed with the seal of the covenant in infancy, his character Avas formed and unfolded amidst the hallowed influences of a Christian home. His collegiate education was commenced at Princeton, while the college, under the Presi- dency of Dr. Green, was visited with that mem- orable revival which gave so many ministers to the Church, and baptized them with so large a measure of the Spirit. The subject of religious impressions from his earliest childhood, these APPENDIX. 203 were deepened by contact witli the revival spirit, and especially by the ministrations of the late Dr. Archibald Alexander. The following inci- dent, connected Avith this period of his life, is from the pen of Dr. James W. Alexander. " The first person with Avhom I ever talked freely con- cerning the infinite concerns of my soul, was Henry Y. D. Johns, and he has told me that a like remark was true of himself. It was in Nas- sau Hall, then the principal edifice of Princeton College, and in No. 27 in the 'second entry,' a locality fresh in the memory of old Nassorians. We were boys of sixteen, though I Avas about to commence Bachelor of Arts. Such conver- sations begin one scarcely knows how ; in a short time we had unbosomed ourselves to one another, and entered upon a close and tender friendship, which, I trust in God, is never to cease. During the days in which Henry Avas under the work of the law, and humbly doubting Avhether, indeed, he had attained to justification or not, he used to Avalk in the groA^e behind the college, Avhich, alas, Avith other forest shades of my boyhood, has long since vanished away. As he strayed, musing, his eye Avas attracted by a small folded paper upon the ground ; this he picked up, and afterwards showed to me ; it con- tained these Avords : ' And they that are Christ's have crucified the fiesh Avith the affections and lusts.' Gal. V. 24. 'Trf/ yourself hy this: This incident made a deep impression on us both, con- veying to our apprehensions, at that time, some- thing of the supernatural. We haA^e talked it over in later years, and there is reason to believe that 204: EIGHTY YEARS. it had a molding influence on Johns' experience and life." Under these blessed influences the seed, sown and watered through so many years, ripened in his heart into its glorious harvest. Here he received that baptism of the Spirit Avhich made him the evangelist he was. Partly from considerations of health, and partly from the disturbed state of the college during the last years of Dr. Green's administration, he re- moved from Princeton, and was graduated at Union, in 1823. Immediately after his gradua- tion he commenced his studies for the ministry, first with his brother, and then at the General Theological Seminary, New York. He was or- dained a deacon in the Protestant Episcopal Church by the venerated Bishop White, in Eman- uel Church, Newcastle, Delaware, in 1826, and a Presbyter by Bishop Chase, in St. John's Church, Washington, D. C, in 1828. Soon after, he re- ceived an appointment as chaplain in the navy, and was assigned to the vessel which was to con- vey Lafayette back from his last visit to the United States to his native land. After prayer- ful deliberation, how^ever, he was led to devote his life to the pastorate. And in a little unfur- nished hall, with a rude pine table for his pulpit, he gathered and organized his first church, now Trinity Church, in Washington. Thence he re- mo vecl to Baltimore, and ministered, for a time, to old Trinity, under circumstances of great discour- agement. Thence he removed to Frederick, Md., and thence, after the lapse of five years, back to Baltimore, w^here he organized and served for a time St. Andrew's Church. This church being APPENDIX. 205 weak and struggling with many embarrassments, lie was induced to accept a charge in Cincinnati, where he labored with great acceptance until 1842, Avhen he was called to Christ Church, Bal- timore, to which he ministered until the organi- zation of Emanuel, in 1854, in the service of which he died. In asking me to sketch the character of this man of God, so as to give the proper relief to its more prominent features, you have called me to a task to which I feel myself inadequate. My personal relations to Dr. Johns have so endeared his memory, that I can speak of him only with the affectionate partiality of a son for a revered father. My personal intercourse with him was such, that his faults, whatever they were, were never discovered. The only portrait I can draw of him, truthfully, must be all in light ; you must supply the shades. I. Intellectually, he ma}^ be best character- ized, perhaps, by that expressive phrase, " a well balanced mind." His mental faculties, such as they were, were all in a state of happy equipoise. None were wanting, none Avere in excess, and all were blended into a structure, beautiful and sym- metrical as a Grecian temple. He had not Genius, but he had many and varied Talents. He Avas not the Palm, gathering all its riches into its tufted top, and lifting that up to the clouds, and out of reach; he was the humbler Olive tree, covered all over Avith branches, laden with the choicest fruit, and bending down to the earth. He was, through life, an indefatigable student ; 206 EIGHTY YEAKS. feeding his people with knowledge and not with wind. It was his habit to spend the earlier part of every week in reading, chiefly professional ; and the latter part in arranging and elaborating his discourses, not writing, but manipulating them Avith his thoughts till they stood out complete and illuminated in every part before his mind's eye ; scrupulously redeeming for this purpose, every fragment of time, cut up as his time always was, into fragments. His style Avas singularly chaste, almost classic. His language was polished, until, like the clearest crystal, it transmitted without tinging or refracting the light of his thoughts. He had acquired the art, so seldom acquired, of saying exactly what he wanted to say. He was not eloquent, in the popular and profane sense of that word. He knew not, and despised to know how to make the crowd gape and applaud. He practiced no stares or starts, or mouthings, or at- titudenizing, or stage tricks, or pulpit imperti- nences of any kind. Self-possessed, simple, sol- emn, he might have served for the original of Cowper's preacher. But his chief power, and it is the highest species of power— far mightier than the strong arm, or the giant intellect, or the iron will — was the POWER OF GOODNESS. I say it deliberately, and you, who have known him so long and so well, are all witnesses, Dr. Johns approached as near perfection in moral character, as is allowed to mortals. His tastes were all elevated, his sensi- bilities refined, his whole nature recoiled with its very strongest instincts from the approach of anything low or base. His spirit, gentle as that APPENDIX. 207 of a child, loving as that of a mother, Avas the clear reflection of His " who was meek and lowly in heart." He was " clothed with humility," as with a garment, which only heightened Avhile it sought to conceal his excellence. Simple and un- pretentious, always ready to take the lowest place, and to esteem others better than himself ; like the Master, he accounted it his highest honor to be " the servant of alL" Forgetful of himself, there Avas nothing about him to repel the ap- proach of the humblest ; and " nothing Avhich con- cerned man did he regard as foreign to himself." His sympathies Avere quick and Avarm, leading him to enter intuitively, and with his Avhole heart, into the feelings of others — to '' rejoice with those who rejoiced and to Aveep Avith those Avho Avept." Whoever approached him in perplexity or in sor- roAv and did not find him a brother indeed ? O ! how this large-heartedness grappled his friends to him Avith hooks of steel. The purity of his motives Avas transparent, the sincerity of his pro- fessions undoubted. And this goodness made it- self felt everywhere as a mighty power. There Avas a majesty about it which rebuked from its presence everything mean or unmanly. There was an inspiration about it Avhich imparted, at least a temporary, elevation, to all Avho came within its reach. There Avas a charm about it which extorted the homage even of the Avorldly and the profane. How often has the remark been heard from the lips of such, " I like Dr. Johns, for I believe he is a good man." Seldom has the poa\^er of goodness been more signally exemplified in any community. The gentleness 208 EIGHTY YEARS. and purity which surrounded him as a halo, were, however, far from being associated with weak- ness or pusillanimity of spirit. He was firm and inflexible, as was shown more than once in the course of his ministerial life, where the truth was at stake. He was always courageous for the right — a very hero where the glory of his Master, the success of his cause or the liberties of his peo- ple were concernM. But w^e have not yet reached " the hiding " of his power. His Goodness was sanctified and sub- limated into Piety. His Virtues were transfig- ured into Graces. He was a temple of the Holy Ghost ; and the light which shone about him was the light of Heaven. His piety Avas after the earlier, apostolic standard — healthful, genial, ex- pansive, laborious. He was no enthusiast, float- ing through dream-lands, and feeding on visions and ecstasies. He had no revelations, save such as were common to his brethren. The holy things of his own heart he delighted not to drag from their inner sanctuary, and expose to the rude gaze, and ruder handling of the multitude. His religious experiences were eminently sober and scriptural. His religion approved itself, as toward God, in a life of Consecration. " All that I am and all I have Shall be forever thine." These words in his lips, were to be taken in their true literal import. He was preeminently a man of prayer. He saw Him who is invisible. He walked with God. He was often with him on the Mount, talking with him '' as a man with APPENDIX. 209 his friend," till his face shone. Three times a day, it was his invariable custom, from his first entrance on the divine life, to retire for secret prayer. Every important undertaking was com- menced with praj^er ; and in every perplexity he sought first the wisdom that cometh from above. How often w4ien friends have gone to consult him, has he risen up and locked his study door, and said, " Now that we can be alone, let us pray." As toward man his religion approved itself by a life of benevolence. He was always ready to do good. What good cause ever failed to find in him a friend and an advocate ? His time, his talents, his influence, his money, all were freelj^ employed to promote the best interests of society. Through- out his life it was his rule to devote the one-tenth of all his income to charitable uses. And so scrupulous was he in enforcing this rule upon himself, that whenever he received a present, even though trifling — a book, a wedding-fee, a basket of fruit — he put a valuation upon it, and gave the one-tenth unto the Lord. For to him " to live was Christ." n. The gospel he preached was the gospel of the apostles and the reformers — the gospel of the articles and the homilies. His doctrinal views Avere clearly and distinctively evangelical ; sharply distinguished on the one side from Ea- tionalism, and on the other from Romanism. I cannot better ex]^ress them than in his own lan- guage : " Holy Scripture ; the sole source and rule of faith, not Scripture and tradition as its joint rule. Man — a fallen and depraved being, utterly unable by his own strength to save him- 210 EIGHTY YEARS. self ; and our Lord Jesus Christ an all-sufficient and perfect Saviour. Repentance — consisting in the knowledge of sin, sorrow for sin, abandoning of sin, and turning fully unto God. Saving faith — the repose of the stricken soul upon the testi- mony of God concerning his Son Jesus Christ, our only Saviour, Mediator and Redeemer. Par- don — the direct gift of Christ to every one that belie veth with the heart, with no intervention other than the truth and Spirit of God, not de- pendent on a priestly or human agency for its certainty of reception. Justification — a free act of God, in consideration of the obedience and death of Christ, received by faith Avithout Avorks; ' not an inward character in man, consisting of faith as one of a catalogue of justifying graces.' Sanctification — the progressive work of the Holy Ghost, restoring the image of God in righteous- ness and true holiness to the soul, and thus in all scriptural obedience and Godly living, by the truth, making us new creatures in Christ Jesus. Sanctification, being a work performed within us ; Justification, a work performed without us. Jus- tification, rendering us safe in view of death and judgment ; Sanctification giving us evidence that we are safe." Paul could have subscribed such a creed as that, and Luther and Cranmer, for it is the glorious gospel of the blessed God. And in proclaiming these great cardinal truths, he uttered no " uncertain sound," his silvery voice rang them out clearly and sharply, so that all must hear and none could mistake. As a pastor, he chiefly excelled. His great usefulness, and the almost unexampled love his APPE]^DIX. 211 people bore to him were largely attributable to his ministrations at the fireside, and in the sick chamber, and the house of mourning ; his ear- nest personal appeals to the careless and impeni- tent, and his affectionate counsels to those who were asking after the " way of life." His ministry was eminently fruitful. He has left to this city three churches, free from debt, and maintaining regularly the ordinances of God's house — Emanuel Church — Emanuel Chapel, and Cranmer Chapel. The church he served, though one of the youngest, appears from the last jour- nal of the Protestant Episcopal Church in Mary- land, to be the first in the State, in the number of its communicants, and the general evidences of pastoral usefulness. All over this city are those who honor him, and mourn for him as their spiritual father. And in every place Avhere he has ministered, many — how many, the judg- ment alone can declare — have been given him, and will yet be given him, as " seals of his minis- try." Dr. Johns was earnestly, and honestly, and upon n[;iature conviction, attached to the distinc- tive polity of his own Church, as, in his view, most closely conformed to the apostolic model. He was in principle, what he was by profession, a Protestant Episcopalian. I make this remark emphatic, because his hearty sym])athy and coop- eration with evangelical Christians of all churches, have sometimes given rise to the suspicion — a sus- picion which has been even publicly expressed — that he was not fully loyal to the Church he 212 EIGHTY YEARS. served. He held that there was nothing in his relations as an Episcopalian, inconsistent with his higher relations as a Protestant and a Chris- tian — nothing which compelled him, for a form or a rite, *' a baptism or a laying on of hands " to unchurch and hand over to " uncovenanted mercies," millions of the living and the dead, who bore the seal of the Spirit. With the founders and earlier and greater lights of his own church — her Cranmers, and Ushers, and Burnets, and Taylors, and Leightons, and Halls, he held that episcopacy was not a doctrine, but a fact ; not a divine command, but only of apos- tolic example — the best, but not the only form ; so that, while all are bound to accept it, the. want of it does not necessarily, and of itself, exclude from the covenant. He believed that the visible Church, with its ministries and sacra- ments, was but a means of grace, not that grace itself ; an instrumentality for diffusing the bless- ings of salvation, not that salvation itself. But he did not believe that the grace of God was in- separably incorporated with the Church, nor that his truth and Spirit were so tied to the episcopate as to be " of none effect " without it. External forms and rites, and orders and successions in the ministry, however necessary to the completeness, lie did not regard as essential to the being of a church. In his view there was nothing incompat- ible between the ideas of a divinely appointed ministry, and a church which embraces all who believed the truth, and were sanctified by the Spirit of God. Outside of the pale of episcopacy were thousands who gave ample evidence that APPENDIX. 213 they were partakers of the same grace, and heirs of the same promises as those within, and these he rejoiced to acknowledge as brethren. " Al- though," — I quote his own words from a letter addressed to a Presbyterian minister — "Al- though of another branch of the great family of our common Lord, I long to see the cause of true religion prosper everywhere ; and while I could wish all you Presbyterian brethren were as I am, save these bonds of sin which hang around my own poor heart, I am 3^et content to Avish you Godspeed in your own way ; and to re- joice whenever, and wheresoever, and by whom- soever Christ is preached and souls brought home to God." In the language of one who speaks by authority here, " matters of ecclesiastical arrange- ment and government Avere esteemed by him within the privilege of individual choice, and were not ingrafted into the essentials of Chris- tianit}^ itself. He respected the preferences of others, and claimed the same for his own, in the matter of form and order, but he belonged, by the grace of God, also, to that heaven-destined body which his own Church defines as " the Holy Catholic Church, the communion of saints, which is the blessed company of all faithful people." He occupied the broad Protestant platform where we stand side by side to-day, in perfect consistency with his own principles, and in the full integrity of his heart. His professions of fraternal regard toward all, of every name, who bore the imprint of his Master's image (profes- sions so often suspected and suspicious, so often but the cloak of selfish and sinister designs) Avere 214 EIGHTY YEARS. the genuine and unaffected utterances of his heart. Everywhere, in the pulpit, on the plat- form, in ecclesiastical conventions, he main- tained, consistently, and with unflinching firm- ness, the broad principles of Christian frater- nity. His name belongs to no sect or segment of the household of faith, it is the common in- heritance of us all. The whole "company of faithful people '' honored him living, and mourned for him dead, as the champion of Protestant unity. III. His sympathies overleaping all narrow denominational limits, were wide as the world — wide as both worlds. How largely were all our benevolent institutions, our House of Eefuge, our Asylums, our Infirmaries, indebted to his judi- cious counsels, and unwearied labors. "When the ear heard him then it blessed him, and when the eye saw him it bare witness to him, because he delivered the poor that cried, and the father- less, and him that had none to help him ; the blessing of him that was ready to perish came upon him, and he caused the widow's heart to sing for joy." His heart was knit especially to those great twin institutions which unite all who love the Lord Jesus, in direct efforts to save souls. When he spoke of the Bible Society, or the Tract So- ciety, his countenance always glowed, his tongue was always eloquent. He loved them for their works' sake. He loved them as the visible signs and symbols of Christian unity, the broad ban- ner of our common Protestantism flung to the APPENDIX. 215 winds, and rallying around itself all the divisions of the great army of salvation. He was present at the organization of the American Tract So- ciety, in 1825, a scene which all Avho witnessed described as a foreshadowing of heaven — and to use his own language, at its recent anniversary, " From that day to this, I have felt it a privilege and a duty, in the pulpit and upon the platform, and upon every occasion in which Providence afforded me an opportunity, to advocate the claims of this Society, as one of the great move- ments in our Protestant cause ; and I have looked upon it as spreading an influence over the gen- eral literature of our country, with which no other agency could begin to compare. Hence, I most cordially endorse the sentiments of Bishop Mcllvaine, that if this Society were crippled in any way in its operations, it Avould be a day of darkness to our common Christianity ; a day of rejoicing to infidelity and Komanism, from one end of the land to the other." He believed with Dr. Archibald Alexander, when he said, " I doubt whether there is in the world at this time, an in- stitution, the Christian ministry excepted, more efficiently employed in conveying the gospel to all classes of society." Next to the ministry, both these sainted men regarded the Tract So- ciety as the great instrumentality for evangeliz- ing the world. At the time of his death. Dr. Johns was the president of the Maryland Tract Society. " Dr. Johns," I quote the language of its secretary in announcing officially his death, " has presided over this Society during the whole of its exist- 216 EIGHTY YEARS. ence. It is now about fifteen years since the friends of this branch of Christian effort judged best to reorganize the Baltimore Tract Society, one of the oldest associations of the kind in the country, to enlarge the sphere of its action ; and assume the name it now bears. On that occasion it was msftie my duty to call on Dr. Johns, and ascertain if he was Avilling to become our presi- dent. His reply was characteristic, ^I Avould advise you to get a man better suited for the place, but if my services are desired, they shall be cheerfully rendered.' You will all bear wit- ness how fully he has redeemed this pledge. From that day to this day of mourning, it has been both my duty and my happiness, often to call and confer with him as to what was wise and best to do. I have never found him so busy, or so fatigued, that he was not ready to listen to my statements. Nor was it a mere passing consider- ation that he gave to these interests ; but an earnestness of thought, such as men are wont to bestow on their personal concerns. I have never conversed with a man who had a higher appreci- ation of this department of Christian benevo- lence." His services, in organizing and presid- ing so long and so efficiently over the Maryland Tract Society, were invaluable ; and his name will always be preserved among her most pre- cious household treasures. ly. And now we come to the last sad scene of all. His work here was done, and the Master had need of him for a more glorious service above. While he yet went in and out among us, we saw the handwriting of death upon him. A APPENDIX. 217 concealed malady was slowly drying up the foun- tains of life, and embalming his body for its burial. His soul was mellowing and ripening for heaven, and bathing itself continually in the light of God's countenance. Ere yet he ap- proached the dark border river, or |^elt its first ripples upon his feet, he was admitted — as is sometimes granted to pilgrims — to " the Land of Beulah," that heaven this side of death, and close upon its borders, where the birds always sing, and the flowers always bloom,*and the sun shineth night and day, and the shining ones come forth and walk — he stood upon the Delectable Mountains, whence he could see the open gates of the Celestial City ; and so strengthened and cheered by these glimpses and foretastes of the Better Land beyond, he was enabled to go for- ward, singing that blessed Psalm of faith : " Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I Avill fear no evil : for thou art with me; thy rod and thy staff they comfort me." His last sickness, he knew from the first, Avas the Messenger of Jesus to call him home. His sufferings were intense and protracted, till his poor body was weary with its groanings, and its tossings to and fro ; but his soul was kept in per- fect peace ; for God was the strength of his heart, and his portion. Come let us gather around his deathbed and see how a Christian dies. He is looking back over his past "life, and thinking of tliat world he must so soon leave, but there are no regrets ; for his language is " I am now ready to be offered, and the time of my departure is at 218 EIGHTY YEARS. hand. I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith : henceforth there is laid up for me a crown of righteousness." His weeping family are around him ; the mem- ories of dear absent friends come crowding fast upon him ^ but he shrinks not from the stroke which must sunder so many tender ties at once ; for he knows his Heavenly Father will take care of the bleeding hearts he leaves behind, and all will soon be. reunited, never, never to part again. He sees death, the last dread enemy, approach- ing nearer and nearer ; but even as he looks, the monster is suddenly transformed into a Messen- ger of Mercy, his crown of terrors falls off, his dart is broken, his sting withdrawn, and the dying saint sings, " O ! death, where is thy sting ? O ! grave, where is thy victory ? Thanks be to God, which giveth us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ." He looks down into the grave just opening at his feet, but it is no longer a cold, or dark, or silent, or lonely place. It is a hallowed spot — Jesus lay there. His father lies there, his mother, the dear friends of other days. Patriarchs, Prophets, Apostles, all the sainted dead, and he is ready to lie down and sleep by their side. He looks upward ; and his countenance becomes radiant, his filmy e3^e sparkles with more than its old luster, the an- ticipated radiance of heaven surrounds him as a glory ; for he sees his Saviour beckoning him away ; and with glad voice he answers — they Avere among his last words — *' Yes, Jesus, I come ! I come to thee ! " It would seem, as if like the dying Stephen, he saw heaven opened, APPENDIX. 219 and the Son of man standing at the right hand of God, calling and beckoning him away. On his deathbed he left these three legacies. The first is for that people he loved and served so well in the gospel. Said he to those Avho stood around him: "I cannot express the pleasure it has been to me to serve this people; they have been so kind, so consid- erate." The second is for us all. It was in his last night on earth. His sufferings were intense, and he had thrown himself across the bed, Avith his face downward. His brother. Bishop Johns, was by his side, holding his hands ; while a be- loved son pillowed his head. The window^s were thrown open to the night to give him air. Con- trolling his sufferings for a moment, by a strong mental effort, he looked up, and said in a clear calm voice to his brother, "Brother ! it is all AS CLEAR AS A SUNBEAM, AND SO COMFORTING." Eacked with pain ; his faced bowed to the earth ; amidst the darkness of midnight ; his only com- fort the cold night winds that swept over him ; it was noonday in his soul, for heaven's own sunbeams filled and flooded its chambers. The third, too, is for us all. A few hours before his death, he said to those who watched around him : " Before my mind leaves me, I wish to say THREE THINGS. I COMMIT MY FAMILY TO THE CARE OF MY HEAVENLY FATHER — KNOWING THAT HE WILL DO FAR MORE THAN I HAVE EVER BEEN ABLE TO DO FOR THEIR PROTEC- TION ; THAT I LEAVE MY ChURCH TO THE GUARDIAN CARE OF ALMIGHTY GOD ; AND THAT YOU MUST TELL MY FRIENDS, I AM A SIN- 220 EIGHTY YEARS. NER SAVED BY GRACE, AND THAT GOD MY SAV- IOUR HAS NOT FORSAKEN HIS POOR SERVANT IN HIS DYING HOUR." And SO he fell asleep, calmly, peacefully, as an infant sinks to slumber. " He died, as sets the Morning Star, which goes Not down behind the darkened west; nor hides Obscured among the tempests of the sky, But mehs away into the light of heaven." And then, devout men came and carried him to his burial. That funeral, who that witnessed, can ever forget it ? It seemed as if this whole city were draped as a funeral mansion, and every inhabitant came forth as a mourner. That densely crowded church ; its deathlike stillness, broken only by the stifled sobs that could not be sup- pressed — the multitudes who thronged ail the surrounding streets — the long procession — the crowded cemetery — the tears w^hich consecrated the last resting place of one so loved. Hallowed spot! The footsteps of undying affection will often revisit it. Our hearts will often make their pilgrimages there. Softly may the sunlight sleep upon it ; and fresh and green be the turf that covers it. Something more we had intended to say to commend the lessons of such a life and such a death, particularly to the members of that church he loved so well ; to the officers and members of the Tract Society, which he served so long and so faithfully ; and to those who were associated with him in the ministry of the everlasting gos- pel. But we must leave them — and best so, per- haps, to speak for themselves. APPENDIX. 221 And now, farewell ! Brother, farewell ! With trembling hands we have Avoven this garland for thy grave — would it Avere worthier. We bless God that we were permitted to know thee. We bless God that we were worthy to love thee. Yery pleasant hast thou been unto us, my brother ! And now that thou art gone from us Ave Avill cherish all that thou hast left to earth. We Avill Avatch over thy grave. We Avill keep thy mem- ory fresh and fragrant in our midst. We Avill embalm thy name in our heart of hearts. We Avill try to follow thee, brother ! even as thou didst follow Christ. Just translated from among us ; even yet Ave are standing and gazing after the chariots of fire Avhich conveyed thee aAvay. O ! that thy mantle may fall upon us ! Why linger any longer about his graA^e. " He is not here, he is risen." «< Hark ! the golden liarps are ringing, Sounds unearthly greet his ear : Millions now in heaven singing, Greet his joyful entrance there." He Avas Avise to Avin souls unto Christ, and he shines to-day as the brightness of the upper firmament ! " He turned many to righteous- ness," and he will shine " as the stars forever and ever." The croAvn he Avears to-day is all spark- ling — gemmed Avith immortal brilliants — the souls he Avon to Jesus. The mansion he inhabits to-day is very near to the throne ; many Avere Avaiting to meet and rejoice Avith him there, and many more Avill yet go up to join them, and a great multitude Avill gather around him over 222 EIGHTY YEAKS. Avhom he will rejoice forever as " his crown and his joy," and " his works will still follow him." '' Let me die the death of the righteous and let my last end be like his." A word I must say in parting, to the officers and members of the Maryland Tract Society. A dear personal friend, a brother beloved — an honored president, " our stay and our staff," has been taken from us in the noon of manhood, and in the very midst of his usefulness. We shall see his face no more — never again meet him in the committee room. But a voice comes from his grave to us saying : " Be ye also ready, for in such an hour as ye think not the Son of man Cometh. Work while it is day, for the night Cometh when no man can work." O ! how rapidly that night is hastening on, and how soon it will close around us. How many of those who started out on life's journey with us — the friends and companions of other days — have fallen at our side, and are sleeping to-day in some quiet country churchyard, or in our own crowded cemeteries. Already we begin to feel ourselves " strangers in the earth." And what we have to do for our own souls, for the souls of others, for that precious Saviour Avho redeemed us with his own blood, must be done quickly. Here, in this solemn hour, and as over the re- mains of our dear departed friend and brother, let us consecrate ourselves afresh to that great cause whose precious interests are intrusted to our guardianship. We bless God, that here, though bearing many a name other than that APPENDIX. 223 new name we shall all be knoAvn by in heaven, we see eye to eye, and are joined hand to hand, " laborers together " in building up our Master's Kingdom. Let us ever cherish that spirit of brotherly kindness, Avhich so eminenfly char- acterized our lamented president, and which glows in our hearts to-day. Let us not be weary in welldoing. Let us scatter abroad still more widely the leaves of the tree of life, the printed words of God, till they bring healing to all the dwellings of our city and state. And when the Chief Shepherd shall appear, we too " shall re- ceive from him a Crown of Life." ADDRESS ON THE ACTS AND DELIVERANCES OF THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY OF THE OLD SCHOOL PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH, DURING THE PAST FIVE YEARS, ON THE STATE OF THE COUNTRY, BY EEY. JOSEPH T. SMITH, D. D. [Delivered hy request^ in the Central Presbyterian Churchy Baltiino7'e^ on Thursday Evening^ June '21, 1866.'] It is with great hesitation and reluctance I enter upon the duty here assigned nie. My taste and temperament and habits and uniform course of conduct with reference to the questions before us, seemed to disqualify me, above all others, for such a service as this. Brethren and friends, however, to Avhose better judgment I have yielded my own, have thought that I might be able to remove some misapprehensions, relieve some minds of painful perplexities, and shed some light upon the path of duty, in which we all de- sire to walk ; and with the hope, however faint, of accomplishing such a result as this, for the good of our Zion and the glory of our common Master, I dared not refuse the service. It is a sad thing, my brethren, that we are here 224 APPENDIX. 225 at all on such an occasion as this. The storm of war, which has swept so wildly over us, is now past. The sword is sheathed, the confused noise of the warrior no longer heard, soldiers trans- formed into citizens have everywhere returned to the pursuits of peaceful industry again, and the blessed Sun of Peace, breaking through the dun clouds which so long obscured it, again shines brightly upon us. During all these ter- rible years of passion and strife we watched and wept and prayed, Oh! how earnestly, for the peace of Jerusalem, Prizing her above our chief joy, it ^vas our heart's first desire that she might be preserved amidst the perils which tlireatened her. While all along the border, where the tempest broke in its utmost fury, churches were rent, pastors sundered from congregations, and congregations torn and scattered, God in his boundless mercy preserved us ; and when the storm was overpast, our holy and our beautiful house still stood entire, and we, who had so long taken sweet counsel together, were still seen going up to the House of God in company, and sitting together around the table of our common Lord. It was a beautiful spectacle ; and as we rejoiced, we gave God all the glory. We felt as we looked upon it, that Christ's kingdom was indeed not of this world, that his people, whatever dif- ferences might obtain among them as citizens of an earthly kingdom, as citizens of the heavenly kingdom Avere all one — all one in Christ, And now that all is over — that the questions which threatened us are by universal consent settled — it cannot be that Peace shall bring upon 226 EIGHTY YEARS. US all the calamities of War. This blessed clove, Avith the green olive branch in its mouth, which is hovering around the open window of our storm-tossed ark, our own hands cannot surely thrust it away ; — not now, when so great a work awaits us, — Avhen so many desolations are to be repaired — when the w^ounds left upon our own spirits are to be healed — when the cause of Christ in this great city demands our utmost care — when prophetic events so long foretold and anticipated, are palpably moving on to their great accomplishment. I have no harsh word to speak, not one to awaken passion or inflame ex- citement. I would speak the truth, in love, calmly and soberly. Let me ask your prayers, my brethren, that I may be suffered to give no wrong touch to the Ark of God, and that with hearts purified from all passion, and minds emptied of all prejudice, Ave may rejoice together in the fulfillment of the promise, " To the up- right in heart, there arises Light out of Darkness." The Subject which now claims our attention is. What is the duty of those among us, Avho may disapprove of any, or of all the Acts and Deliver- ances of the General Assembly of our Church, during these troublous years past. The single question upon which it is held the Assembly has erred, is that of the relation between Church and State, — the spiritual and the temporal powers, — existing as they do side by side, touching each other at so many points, traversing each other's territories in so many directions, and often so difficult to be discriminated. APPENDIX. 227 The Assembly, it is charged, has over and over again left its appropriate sphere, intruded upon that of the State, and intermeddled with civil af- fairs, which, by the Word of God and the standards of the Church, it is forbidden to handle. Christ's kingdom is not of this world. " Synods and Councils," says our Confession of Faith, " are to handle or conclude nothing but that Avhich is ecclesiastical, and are not to intermeddle with civil affairs Avhich concern the commonwealth, unless by way of humble petition in cases extra- ordinary ; or by way of advice for satisfaction of conscience, if they he thereunto required by the civil magistrate." — Coiifession of Faith, chajp, 31, sec. 4. Such is the doctrine of the Presbyterian Church, and it is one dear to us, for it is one peculiarly our own. It is the doctrine of our common Pres- byterianism, and as a Doctrine no Assembly, or Synod, or Presbytery, or Minister, or Member of our Church, has ever called it in question. It be- longs to no sect or segment of our communion, it is the common inheritance of us all. You would as soon expect to hear an American Presbyterian deny the Divinity of Christ, or his Atonement, as the doctrine here set forth. I have never preached politics, and I never will. As a Minis- ter I have never intermeddled with civil affairs, which belong to the commonwealth, and I never will ; and in this, my brethren, I am sure, all are agreed with me. And now the question recurs in what respects, and how far has the Assembly done violence to this doctrine. We begin with the Act of 1861, 228 EIGHTY YEARS. as first in order, familiar to 3^ou all as " the Spring Resolutions," which we quote in full : " Gratefully acknowledging the distinguished bounty and care of Almighty God toward this favored land, and also recognizing our obliga- tions to submit to every ordinance of man for the Lord's sake, this General Assembly adopt the fol- lowing resolutions : '''-Resolved^ 1. That in view of the present agitated and unhappy condition of this country, the first day of July next be hereby set apart as a day of prayer throughout our bounds ; and that on this day ministers and people are called on humbly to confess and bewail our national sins, to offer our thanks to the Father of light for his abundant and undeserved goodness toward us as a nation ; to seek his guidance and blessing upon our rulers, and their counsels, as Avell as on the Congress of the United States about to assemble; and to implore him, in the name of Jesus Christ, the great High Priest of the Christian profession, to turn away his anger from us, and speedily re- store to us the blessings of an honorable peace. " Resolved^ 2. That this General Assembly, in the spirit of that Christian patriotism which the sacred Scripture enjoins, and which has always characterized this Church, do hereby acknowl- edge and declare our obligation to affirm and per- petuate, so far as in us lies, the integrity of these United States, and to strengthen, uphold and en- courage the Federal Government in the exercise of all its functions under our Constitution ; and to this Constitution in all its provisions, require- ments and objects, we profess our unabated loy- APPENDIX. 229 alty. And to avoid all misconceptions, the As- sembly declare, that by the terms Federal Gov- ernment, is not meant any particular administra- tion or the peculiar opinions of any particular party, but that central administration, which being at any time appointed and inaugurated ac- cording to the forms prescribed in the Constitu- tion of the United States, is the visible represent- ative of our national existence." — Minutes of the General Assembly^ page 329. Against this action, the commissioners from this Presljytery voted, and with fifty-six others protested. I will read from the protest and the answer of the Assembly, such extracts as will bring out clearly the points in controversy. Protest of Dr. Ilodge and others. "We, the undersigned, respectfully protest against the action of the General Assembly, in adopting the minority report of the Committee on the State of the Country. " We make this protest, not because we do not acknowledge loyalty to our country to be a moral and religious duty, according to the Word of God, Avhich requires us to be subject to the pow- ers that be ; nor because we deny the right of the Assembly to enjoin that, and all^other like duties, on the ministers and churches under its care ; but because we deny the right of the General Assem- bly to decide the political question, to what gov- ernment the allegiance ^f Presbyterians as citi- zens is due, and its right to make that decision a condition of membership in our Church. 230 EIGHTY YEAKS. " That the paper adopted by the Assembly does decide the political question just stated, is in our judgment undeniable. It asserts not only the loyalty of this body to the Constitution and the Union, but it promises in the name of all the churches and ministers whom it represents, to do all that in them lies to " strengthen, uphold, and encourage the Federal Government." It is, how- ever, a notorious fact, that many of our ministers and members conscientiously believe that the al- legiance of the citizens of this country is primarily due to the States to which they respectively be- long ; and, therefore, that when any State re- nounces its connection with the United States, and its allegiance to the Constitution, the citizens of that State are bound by the laws of God to continue loyal to their State, and obedient to its laws. The paper adopted by the Assembly vir- tually declares, on the other hand, that the al- legiance of the citizen is due to the United States ; anything in the Constitution, or ordinances, or laws of the several States to the contrary not- withstanding. " It is not the loyalty of the members consti- tuting this Assembly, nor of our churches and ministers in any one portion of our country that is thus asserted, but the loyalty of the whole Presbyterian Church, North and South, East and West. " Allegiance to the Federal Government is rec- ognized or declared to be the duty of all the churches and minister^ represented in this body. In adopting this paper, therefore, the Assembly does decide the great political question which APPENDIX. 231 agitates and divides the countr}^. The question is, whether the allegiance of our citizens is pri- marily to the State or to the Union. However clear our own convictions of the correctness of this decision may be, or however deeply we may be impressed with its importance, yet it is not a question which this Assembly has the right to decide. " That the action of the Assembly in the prem- ises does not only decide the political question referred to, but makes that decision a term of membership in our Church, is no less clear. It is not analogous to the recommendation of a re- ligious or benevolent institution, which our mem- bers may regard or not at pleasure ; but it puts into the mouths of all represented in this body, a declaration of loyalty and allegiance to the Union and to the Federal Government. But such a declaration, made by our members residing in what is called the seceding States is treason- able. Presbyterians under the jurisdiction of those States, cannot, therefore, make that declar- ation. They are consequently forced to choose between allegiance to their States and allegiance to the Church. ''The General Assembly in thus deciding a political question, and in making that decision practically a condition of membership in the Church, has, in our judgment, violated the Con- stitution of the Church, and usurped the prerog- ative of its Divine Master. " We protest loudly against the action of the Assembly, because it is a departure from all its previous actions. 232 EIGHTY YEARS. " The General Assembly has always acted on the principle that the Church has no right to make anything a condition of Christian or minis- terial fellowship, which is not enjoined or re- quired in the Scriptures and the standards of the Church." — Minutes of the General Assemlly, pages 339 and 340. In the Assembly's answer to this protest, they say: "The first and main ground of protest against the adoption of this resolution, is, that the Gen- eral Assembly has no right to decide purely political questions; that the question whether the allegiance of American citizens is due pri- marily and eminently to the State, or to the Union, is purely political, of the gravest charac- ter, dependent upon constitutional theories and interpretations, respecting which, various opin- ions prevail in different sections of our country ; that the action of the Assembly virtually deter- mines this vexed question, decides to what gov- ernment the allegiance of Presbyterians, as citi- zens, is due, and makes that decision a term of communion. " The protestants ' deny the right of the Gen- eral Assembly to decide to what government the allegiance of Presbyterians, as citizens, is due.' Strictly speaking, the Assembly has made no such decision. They have said nothing respect- ing the allegiance of the subjects of any foreign power, or that of the members of our mission Churches in India, China, or elsewhere, who may hold connection with our denomination. The action complained of relates solely to APPENDIX. 233 American Presbyterians, citizens of these United States. " Even with regard to them, the Assembly has not determined, as between conflicting govern- ments, to which our allegiance is due. We ar.e the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church in the United States of America. Such is the distinctive name, ecclesiastical and legal, under which we have chosen to be known by our sister Churches and by the world. Our organization as a General Assembly was cotemporaneous with that of our Federal Government. In the seventy- four years of our existence, Presbj^terians have known but one supreme government, one nation- ality, within our widespread territory. We know no other now. History tells of none. The Fed- eral Government acknowledges none. IS^o nation on earth recognizes the existence of two inde- pendent sovereignties within these United States. What Divine Providence may intend for us here- after — what curse of rival and hostile sovereign- ties within this broad heritage of onr fathers, — Ave presume not to determine. Do these protes- tants, who so anxiously avoid political entangle- ments, desire the General Assembly to anticipate the dread decision of impending battle, the action of our own government, the determination of foreign powers, and even the ultimate arbitration of heaven ? Would they have us recognize, as good Presbyterians, men whom our own govern- ment, with the approval of Christendom, may soon execute as traitors ? May not the highest Court of our Church, speaking as the interpreter of that holy law which says, ' Ye must needs be 234 EIGHTY YEARS. subject, not only for wrath, but also for con- science sake,' Rom. xiii. 5, warn her communi- cants against ' resisting the ordinance of God ' ? Rom. xiii. 2. In the language of the learned Reviewer above cited, * Is disunion morally right ? Does it not involve a breach of faith, and a vio- lation of the oaths by which that faith was con- firmed? We believe, under existing circum- stances, that it does, and therefore it is as dread- ful a blow to the Church as it is to the State. If a crime at all, it is one, the heinousness of which can only be imperfectly estimated.' "In the judgment of this Assembly, 'this say- ing is true' ; and therefore the admission, on the part of the Assembly, that Presbyterians may take up arms against the Federal Government, or aid and comfort its enemies, and yet be guilt- less, would exhibit that ' practical recognition of the right of secession,' Avhich, says the Reviewer, would ' destroy our national life.' "But we deny that this Deliverance of the Assembly establishes any new term of commun- ion. The terms of Christian fellowship are laid down in the Word of God, and are embodied in our Standards. It is competent to this Court to interpret and apply the doctrines of the AVord ; to warn men against prevailing sins ; and to urge the performance of neglected duties. We regard the action, against which these protests are leveled, simply as a faithful declaration by the Assembly, of Christian duty toward those in authority over us ; which adds nothing to the terms of communion already recognized. Surely the idea of the obligation of loyalty to our Fed- APPENDIX. 235 eral Government is no new thing to Presbyte- rians. " And this is a sufficient reply, also, to the sec- ond article of this protest. Having established no new term of membership, this Assembly is not liable to the charge of having departed from the old paths." — Minutes of the General Assembly^ j>ages 342 and 343. There was no question between the Assembly and the protestants as to the doctrine that the Church must not handle political affairs ; the only question Avas one of fact or opinion as to whether the act in question was political. Both agreed upon the principle^ the difference was as to the application of the principle to a certain state of facts. There was no question either as to the judgment of the Assembly, whether right or wrong in itself, but simply and solely Avhether, as a Spiritual Court, it had a right to pronounce any judgment at all upon the subject. Let this be borne distinctly in mind. The decisive question was here settled, and upon the Acts of subsequent years we need but glance. In 1862, {Minutes, p. 624) an elaborate paper was adopted recognizing the fact that the Federal Government was the " powers that be " which are ordained of God, that loyalty was due to it, that rebellion against it might be, perhaps was, sin, that it ought to crush force by force, and that the Church should uphold it. A paper adopted with less opposition, as the Southern Churches were unrepresented and its action re- spected only those in States connected Avith the Central Government. 23G EIGHTY YEAPwS. In 1863 a paper Avas adopted refusing to dis- play a flag upon the building in which the As- sembly met, and reiterating substantially the Deliverances of previous Assemblies. In 1864 an elaborate paper was adopted on the subject of slavery, reviewing the action of the Church upon it, and citing its Deliverances through successive years from 1787 onward (all condemning the system,) reaching this con- clusion, "that in the judgment of the Assem- bly the time has at length come, in the provi- dence of God, Avhen it is his will that every ves- tige of human slavery among us should be ef- faced, and that every Christian man should ad- dress himself with industry and earnestness to his appropriate part in the performance of this great duty." This action is objected against, not only because slavery is a political institution, but because contradictory of previous testimonies of the Assembly. Two Deliverances bring out the precise position of our Church on this whole subject. That of 1818, drawn up by Dr. Baxter, of Virginia, supported by all the Southern mem- bers and adopted by the Assembly unanimously. A few extracts will bring out the main positions taken in this paper of 1818. " The General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church, having taken into consideration the sub- ject of slavery, think proper to make known their sentiments upon it to the churches and people under their care. " We consider the voluntary enslaving of one portion of the human race by another, as a gross violation of the most precious and sacred rights APPENDIX. 237 of human nature ; as utterly inconsistent with the law of God, which requires us to love our neighbor as ourselves, and as totally irreconcil- able with the spirit and principles of the gospel of Christ, which enjoin that ' all things whatso- ever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them.' Slavery creates a paradox in the moral system ; it exhibits rational, account- able, and immortal beings in such circumstances as scarcely to leave them the power of moral ac- tion. It exhibits them as dependent on the will of others, whether they shall receive religious in- struction ; whether they shall know and worship the true God ; whether they shall enjoy the or- dinances of the gospel ; whether they shall per- form the duties and cherish the endearments of husbands and wives, parents and children, neigh- bors and friends ; whether they shall preserve their chastity and purity, or regard the dictates of justice and humanity. Such are some of the consequences of slavery — consequences not im- aginary, but which connect themselves with its very existence. The evils to which the slave is always exposed often take place in fact, and in their very worst degree and form ; and where all of them do not take place, as we rejoice to say in many instances, through the influence of the principles of humanity and religion on the mind of masters, they do not — still the slave is deprived of his natural right, degraded as a hu- man being, and exposed to the danger of passing into the hands of a master who ma}^ inflict upon him all the hardships and injuries which inhu- manity and avarice may suggest. 238 EIGHTY YEARS. " From this view of the consequences resulting from the practice into which Christian people have most inconsistently fallen, of enslaving a portion of their brethren of mankind — for ' God hath made of one blood all nations of men to dwell on the face of the earth ' — it is manifestly the duty of all Christians who enjoy the light of the present day, when the inconsistency of slav- ery both with the dictates of humanity and re- ligion, has been demonstrated, and is generall}'^ seen and acknowledged, to use their honest, earnest, and unwearied endeavors to correct the errors of former times, and as speedily as possi- ble to efface this blot on our holy religion, and to obtain the complete abolition of slavery throughout Christendom, and if possible through- out the world." — BaircVs Digest^ pp. 809, 10. The Paper of 1845, adopted by a large ma- jority, was drawn up by Dr. Rice, of Kew York. Of this Assembly I was a member, and for this paper I voted. Its main features are these : *' The committee to whom were referred the memorials on the subject of slavery, beg leave to submit the following report : " The memorialists may be divided into three classes, viz : " 1. Those which represent the S3^stem of slavery, as it exists in these United States, as a great evil, and pray this General Assembly to adopt measures for the amelioration of the con- dition of the slaves. " 2. Those which ask the Assembly to receive memorials on the subject of slavery, to allow a APPENDIX. 239 full discussion of it, and to enjoin upon the members of our Church, residing in States Avhose laws forbid the slaves being taught to read, to seek by all lawful means the repeal of those laws. " 3. Those w^iich represent slavery as a moral evil, a heinous sin in the sight of God, calculated to bring upon the Church the curse of God, and calling for the exercise of discipline in the case of those who persist in maintaining or justifying the relation of master to slave. " The question which is now unhappily agita- ting and dividing other branches of the Church, and which is pressed upon the attention of the Assembly by one of the three classes of memori- alists just named, is, whether the holding of slaves is, under all circumstances, a heinous sin, calling for the discipline of the Church. " The church of Christ is a spiritual body, whose jurisdiction extends to the religious faith and moral conduct of her members. She cannot legislate, where Christ has not legislated, nor make terms of membership which he has not made. The question, therefore, which this As- sembly is called to decide, is this : Do the Scrip- tures teach that the holding of slaves, without regard to circumstances, is a sin, the renuncia- tion of which should be made a condition of membership in the Church of Christ ? " It is impossible to answer this question in the affirmative, without contradicting some of the plainest declarations of the Word of God. That slavery existed in the days of Christ and his Apostles is an admitted fact. That they did not 2tl:0 EIGHTY YEARS. denounce the relation itself as sinful, as incon- sistent with Christianity ; that slaveholders were admitted to membership in the Churches organ- ized by the Apostles ; that whilst they Avere re- quired to treat their slaves with kindness, and as rational, accountable, immortal beings, and, if Christians, as brethren in the Lord, they were not commanded to emancipate them ; that slaves were required to be 'obedient to their masters according to the flesh, with fear and trembling, with singleness of heart as unto Christ,' are facts which meet the eye of every reader of the New Testament. This Assembly cannot, there- fore, denouTice the holding of slaves as neces- sarily a heinous and scandalous sin, calculated to bring upon the Church the curse of God, without charging the Apostles of Christ with conniving at sin, introducing into the Church such sinners, and thus bringing upon them the curse of the Almighty. *' In so saying, however, the Assembly are not to be undei^tood as denying that there is evil connected with slavery. Much less do they ap- prove those defective'^ and oppressive laws by which, in some of the States, it is regulated. Nor would they by any means countenance the traffic in slaves for the sake of gain ; the separa- tion of husbands and wives, parents and children, for the sake of ' filthy lucre,' or for the conven- ience of the master ; or cruel treatment of slaves, in any respect. Every Christian and philan- thropist should certainly seek by all peaceable and lawful means, the repeal of unjust and oppressive laws, and the amendment of such as are defec- APPENDIX. 241 tive, so as to protect the slaves from cruel treat- ment bv wicked men, and secure to them the right to receive religious instruction. "Nor is the Assembly to be understood as countenancing the idea that masters may regard their servants as mere property, and not as hu- man beings, rational, accountable, immortal. The Scriptures prescribe not only the duties of servants, but of masters also, warning the latter to discharge those duties, 'knowing that their Master is in heaven, neither is there respect of persons with him.' "In view of the above stated principles and facts : " Resolved^ 1. That the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church in the United States was originally organized, and has since continued the bond of union in the Church, upon the con- ceded principle that the existence of domestic slavery, under the circumstances in which it is found in the Southern portion of the country, is no bar to Christian communion. " 2. That the petitions that ask the Assembly to make the holding of slaves in itself a matter of discipline, do virtually require this judicatory to dissolve itself, and abandon the organization, under which, by the Divine blessing, it has so long prospered. The tendency is evidently to separate the Northern from the Southern portion of the Church ; a result which every good citizen must deplore, as tending to the dissolution of the Union of our beloved country, and which every enlightened Christian will oppose as bringing about a ruinous and unnecessarv schism between 242 EIGHTY YEAES. brethren who maintain a common faith.'' — Baird''s Digest^]). 813. In 1846 the General Assembly aiTirmed the agreement of all its Deliverances on the subject of slavery in these words : " Our Church has, from time to time, during a period of nearly sixty years, expressed its views on the subject of slavery. During all this period it has held and uttered substantially the same sentiments. Believing that this uniform testi- mony is true, and capable of vindication from the Word of God, the Assembly is at the same time clearly of the opinion that it has already deliberately and solemnly spoken on this subject with sufficient fullness and clearness. Therefore, ''''Resolved^ That in the judgment of this House, the action of the General Assembly of 1845 was not intended to deny or rescind the testimony uttered often by the General Assem- blies previous to that date." — Bairdh Digest^ i?. 814. The last Assembly affirmed that the actions of '64 and '65 are not contradictory of any previous actions. The seeming contradiction vanishes when we remember that the Assembly held that the mere relation of master and slave was not sinful, and could not be made a bar to communion. This is the fact which the paper of 1845 affirms and draws out to its legitimate consequences. The papers of 1818 and 1864, on the other hand, affirm that the system of slavery, with all the laws, usages and abuses Avhich had actually grown up within and around it was an evil. The APPENDIX. 243 one condemns the system as sinful, the other de- nies that every one implicated in the system is necessarily a sinner. We come now to the action of 1865, which differs in one essential feature from all these. In all former Deliverances the Assembly simply exercised its office of instruction, and propounded its opinions or sentiments as a Keligious Teacher. Here it exercises its power of Government. " I. The right of every Presbytery to exam- ine ministers asking admission into their body, as to their soundness in the faith, which has been long acknowledged and practiced by our Pres- byteries, implies their right by parity of reason- ing to examine them on all subjects Avhich seri- ously affect the peace, purity, and unity of the Church. " II. The exercise of this right becomes an imperative duty, in the present circumstances of our country, when, after the crushing by military force of an atrocious rebellion against the Gov- ernment of the United States, for the perpetua- tion of slavery, many ministers who have aided and abetted this revolt, may seek admission into Presbyteries located in the loyal States. There- fore, " III. It is hereby ordered that all our Pres- byteries examine ever}^ minister applying for ad- mission from any Presbytery or other ecclesias- tical body in the Southern States, on the following points : " 1. Whether he has in any way, directly or indirectly, of his own free will and consent, or without external constraint, been concerned at 244 ' EIGHTY YEARS. any time in aiding or countenancing the rebellion and the war which has been waged against the United States ; and if it be found by his own confession or from sufficient testimony, that he has been so concerned, that he be required to confess and forsake his sin in this regard before he shall be received. "2. Whether he holds that the system of negro slavery in the South is a Divine institu- tion, and that it is ' the peculiar mission of the Southern Church to conserve the institution of slavery as there maintained,' and if it be found that he holds either of these doctrines, that he be not received without renouncing and forsaking these errors. " y. Church sessions are also ordered to ex- amine all applicants for church membership by persons from the Southern States, or who have been living in the South since the rebellion, con- cerning their conduct and principles on the points above specified ; and if it be found that of their own free will they have taken up arms against the United States, or that they hold slavery to be an ordinance of God, as above stated, such persons shall not be admitted to the communion of the Church till they give evidence of repent- ance for their sin and renounce their error. " YI. The General Assembly gives counsel to the several church courts specified in these or- ders, that in discharging the duties enjoined therein, due regard be paid to the circumstances of the case and that justice be tempered with mercy. Especially is this counsel given to churches in the border States, where many im- APPENDIX. 245 pulsive and ardent yonng men, without due con- sideration, have been led away by their supe- riors, or seduced from their loyalty by their erroneous interpretation of the doctrine of State rights.''— Ifimctes 1865, j9. 563. The Assembly just adjourned does not properly come under our notice here, for confessedly, there was nothing political in its Acts and Deliv- erances, save as these contained incidental refer- ences to the Acts of preceding Assemblies. The " Declaration and Testimony " against which, and against the Presbytery of Louisville which adopted, and the individual ministers and elders who signed it, the judgment of the Assembly was pronounced, was a strictly ecclesiastical pa- per, and contained nothing political. The offense charged against those who adopted and signed it, was not political but ecclesiastical. They were condemned for what was declared to be an act of defiance and insubordination against the lawful authority of the highest court of the Church. It was not for the principles they avowed, for those principles were mainly true — nor for the dissent and disapproval they uttered against the Acts of the Assembly, for the As- sembly explicitly recognized their right to dis- sent ; nor for their refusal to carry out any sup- posed orders of the Assembly, for this the As- sembly did not require, but simply and solely because of their open defiance of the authority of a court to which their ordination vows and the laws of Christ's House bound them to submit. I am not saying now that the process was prop- erly conducted, for I do not think so, and voted 246 EIGHTY YEARS. against it, at every step, but simply that the whole matter was ecclesiastical, not political, and the errors, whatever they were, were altogether errors in the mode of conducting a process w^hich it was confessedly competent to conduct. And I give it as my honest opinion from constant and large intercourse with members of the Assembly, and especially of its leaders, and from careful observation of their spirit and purposes, that had it not been for the lavish distribution through the house of the Declaration and Testimony in printed form, which they regarded as an intended insult and defiance of their authority, and for the presence of some Avhom they considered as sent there in open contempt of them as a court of Christ's House, there would have been nothing done at the last Assembly to occasion disquiet to any — nothing but efforts to bind up what was broken. That is my honest and deliberate opin- ion, which you may take for what it is worth. I differed from the policy pursued, but I feel bound to say, that in my judgment, it sprang from a sincere desire to vindicate w^hat was con- sidered the lawful authority and dignity of the highest court of Christ's House. It has been often repeated that the commis- sioners from the Louisville Presbytery were ex- pelled from the house without having a trial. The simple fact w^as that they were suspended from their privileges as members of the body un- til their case should be taken up, when, by ex- press resolution, their right to a full hearing was recognized. And this suspension until their case was taken up was justified by those who advo- APPENDIX. 24T catecl it, on the principle recognized in our book, that wiiere persons are charged with grave of- fenses, the court which takes cognizance of the case may suspend them from their privileges until it can be taken up. It has been charged that the spirit of the As- sembly Avas unkind, particularly toward our Southern brethren. An answer may be found in the following paper, offered by me and adopted almost unanimously : '' Whereas, The churches in that portion of our country lately in rebellion, whose names ap- pear upon our roll, have not been represented in this Assembly, and still remain in a state of sep- aration from us ; and whereas, the measures adopted by this Assembly, if not carried out by the lower courts in a spirit of great meekness and forbearance, may result in perpetuating and embittering divisions already existing, and ex- tending them over portions of our Church now at peace. Therefore, be it '''-Resolved, That this Assembly greatly de- plores the continued separation between ourselves and our Southern brethren, so long united with us in the bonds of Christian love and ecclesias- tical fellowship, and expresses the earnest desire that the way may be soon opened for a reunion on the basis of our common standards, and on terms consistent with truth and righteousness. " Resolved, That the lower courts who may be called upon to execute the measures of this As- sembly, be enjoined to j^roceed therein with great meekness and forbearance, and in a spirit of kind- ness and conciliation, to the end that strifes and 248 EIGHTY YEAKS. dissensions be not multiplied and inflamed and extended still more Avidely, and that the disci- pline of Christ's House may prove for edilication and not for destruction." — Proceedings, 186G,j!?. 99. It is a mistake that the last Assembly requires any oath of any kind from the members of our churches. It is a mistake that it claims or holds Zion Church, in Charleston, S. C, as its property — or that any Assembly at any time went in a body to the rooms of any Loyal League and made political speeches, or rose to their feet and sang patriotic songs. These are little things, men- tioned here only as specimens of misapprehen- sions extensively prevailing and encountered by us upon the streets. And now from this long and tedious review we come back to the simple question before us. The Assembly declares that the Federal Gov- ernment is that ordinance of God which we are bound to reverence and obey ; and that rebellion against it is a sin, to be visited upon those guilty of it as other sins. These two statements em- brace in substance the whole. And now, with- out any question as to whether they are true or false in themselves, had the Church as such a right to declare and enforce them ? If not, did it intermeddle with civil affairs which concern the Commonwealth in such a way and so far as to make it an apostate Church ? In reply we remark : I. These Acts are in entire harmony with the Acts and Deliverances of our Church from its very beginning in this APPENDIX. 249 country. And if apostate now, and because of these, then has the Presbyterian Church in this land been always apostate. In Baird's Digest, under the caption ''• Pastoral Letter on occasion of the old French War," before the Assembly was organized, the Synod of New York says: " We look on ourselves bound, not only as mem- bers of the community, but by the duty of our office, as those who are intrusted with the decla- ration of God's revealed will, to exhort all to implore God's merc}^ for themselves, their chil- dren, country and nation, their and our rightful and gracious sovereign, King George the Second, his royal family, all officers civil and military." The highest Church court distinctly recognizes the reigning King, "the powers that be," as "our rightful and gracious sovereign." — BaircVs Di- gest, :p, 820. Again we find " A Pastoral Letter on the Kepeal of the Stamp Act," in which, after speak- ing of the imposition of unusual taxes, the severe restrictions on trade, the almost total stagnation of business and the danger of being deprived of the blessing of English liberty, from all which they had been delivered by the clemency of the Government, we find these words : " You will not forget to honor your King and pay a due submis- sion to his august Parliament. Let this fresh instance of royal clemency increase the ardor of your affection to the person, family and govern- ment of our rightful and gracious sovereign. We most earnestly recommend it to you to en- courage and strengthen the hands of Govern- ment, to demonstrate on every proper occasion 250 EIGHTY YEARS. your undissembled love for your mother country and your attachment to her true interest, so in- separably connected with your own." — Do.jy- 821. Again, " on the Revolutionary War," after stating that in such a crisis as that of impending war, they felt bound as the highest tribunal of the Church, to speak to the congregations under their care, and after reviewing the causes which led to the war, they go on in these words : " First, In carrying on this important struggle let every opportunity be taken to express your attachment and respect to our sovereign. King George, and to the revolution principles by which his august family was seated on the British throne. Sec- ondly, Be careful to maintain the union which at present subsists through all the colonies; nothing can be more manifest than that the success of every measure depends on its being inviolably preserved. In particular as the Continental Con- gress now sitting at Philadelphia consists of dele- gates chosen in the most free and • unbiased manner by the body of the people, let them not only be treated with respect and encouraged in their difficult service, but adhere firmly to their resolutions, and let it be seen that they are able to bring out the whole strength of this vast country to carrv them into execution." — Do. p. 823. What more has any Assembly said ? See again " Address to the French Minister on the birth of the Dauphin," and " Address to Wash- ington on his election to the Presidency," " Tes- timony against Persecution in Switzerland," " Pe- tition to Congress on Sabbath Mail," and report APPENDIX, 251 presented by Dr. Pluraer and adopted in 1853, from which I quote the three concluding resolu- tions : ^'-l. Resolved^ That this Assembly cordially approves of the provisions of a late treaty Avith the Oriental Republic of Uruguay, already cited, and trusts that the Government of the United States will, by treaty, secure the acknowledgment of the same inestimable rights by all other gov- ernments where it may be practicable. "5. Resolved^ That the people of the congre- gations in our connection be advised to unite with their fellow-citizens in urging upon the Govern- ment of the United States a careful and earnest attention to this matter. " 6. Resolved^ That a duly attested copy of these resolutions be furnished to the President of the United States, to the President of the Senate, and to the Speaker of the House of Representa- tives of the next Congress for the consideration of each of these branches of the Government of our country." — Digest^ p. 788. And so, we submit, the Presbyterian Church from its very origin, especially during the Revo- lution, the only times parallel to our own, has acted on precisely the same principle as did the Assembly during our late civil convulsions. II. All Evangelical Churches, both E'orth and South, have taken precisely the same position and made substantially the same Deliverances as our own. 1. The CoQigregationalists. — The different Con- gregational bodies in the Eastern, Western and 252 EIGHTY YEAKS. Middle States, as all know, Avith one consent took action, the same in substance, far stronger in language than our own. 2. The LiUherans. — The General Synod of the Lutheran Church, in 1862, after a preamble de- claring that the rebellion was against the laAv- fully constituted Government, that that Govern- ment must be sustained as an ordinance of God ; that they feel bound to express their convictions of truth and sustain the great interests of law and authority, Resolved : " 1. That it is the deliberate judgment of this Synod that the rebellion against the Constitu- tional Government of this land is most wicked in its inception, unjustifiable in its cause, inhuman in its prosecution, and destructive in its results to the highest interests of morality and religion. " 2. That in the suppression of this rebellion and in the maintenance of the Constitution and Union by the sword, we recognize an unavoidable necessity and a sacred duty which the Govern- ment ' oAves to the nation and to the Avorld,' and call upon our people to pray for ' success to the army and navy, that our beloved land ma}^ speed- ily be delivered from treason and anarch3\' In 1864 the Synod reiterates and reaffirms its ac- tion." — McPherson, p. 478. 3. The German Reformed. — The German Re- formed Synod of Pennsyh^ania in 1864, resolved " that this Convention deems it right and proper to give expression to the unfaltering devotion Avith Avhich the German Reformed Church in the United States has hitherto sustained the cause of our common country, and we earnestly urge upon APPENDIX. 253 our clergy and laity to continue to labor and pray for the success of the Government in its efforts to suppress the existing rebellion, and to restore peace and union." — Do. jj. 482. The General Synod of the Dutch Reformed Church adopted still stronger resolutions in 1863. 4. The Baptists. — At the General Convention of the Baptists in Brooklyn in 1861, it was re- solved " that the doctrine of secession is foreign to our Constitution, revolutionary, suicidal, set- ting out in anarchy and finding its ultimate issue in despotism. 2. That the National Government deserves our loyal adhesion and unstinted support in its maintenance of the national unity and life." The New York Baptist Convention of 1862 re- solved that " as a religious body we deem it our duty to cherish and manifest the deepest sym- pathy for the preservation and perpMuity of a Government which protects us in the great work of Christian civilization." Similar resolutions were adopted by the Baptist Conventions of New Jersey, Pennsylvania and Ohio. — Do. p. 474. 5. Methodist Protestant. — The Methodist Prot- estant Church at its General Convention in 1862 made a deliverance of a tenor precisely similar to those of the Baptists. — Do. p. 499. 6. Methodist Episcopal. — The Methodist Epis- copal Church in its General Convention in 1864, Eesolved, among other things, " 2. That it is the duty of the Government to prosecute the war with all its resources of men and money till this wicked rebellion shall be sub- dued, the integrity of the nation shall be secured and its legitimate authority shall be established, 254 EIGHTY YEARS. and that we pledge our hearty support and coop- eration to secure this result." " 5. That we regard slavery as abhorrent to the principles of our holy religion, humanity and civilization, and that we are in favor of such meas- ures as will ' prohibit slavery or involuntary serv- itude, except for crime, throughout all the States and Territories of the country.' " Do. p. 498. 7. Protestant Episcojjal. — The Protestant Episcopal Church in the Diocese of Pennsylvania in 1864, Kesolved, '' That we hereby declare our unfaltering alle- giance to the Government of the United States, and that we pledge it our willing devotion and service," and will pray that our now lacerated country may be so reunited, that " there shall be but one Union, one Government, one Plag, one Constitutio^n." In the General Convention of the Protestant Episcopal Church in the United States, held in New York in 1862, the committee to whom had been referred a number of papers on the state of the country, preface their report, which was adopted as the action of the Church on the sub- ject, with the remark, that in framing the reso- lutions, " They have designed to leave no room for honest doubt, or even for invidious miscon- struction as to the hearty loyalty of this body to the Government of the United States." And further, " There could have been no hesitation under any circumstances in expressing now and always our earnest and abiding loyalty and de- votion to our country, its Constitution and its laws, and to all its dulv constituted authorities." APPENDIX. 255 Here follows a series of resolutions expressing their loyalty to the Government, their condem- nation of the rebellion and hope for the speedy restoration 'of our beloved Union, while at the same time they avoided entering upon " any narrow questions, which peculiarly belong to the domain of secular politics." In the long letter of the Bishops to the Churches we find the following : '' When St. Paul, in di- rect connection with the words just cited, exhorts us to ' render to all their dues, tribute to whom tribute is due, custom to whom custom, fear to whom fear, honor to whom honor,' and that ' not only for wrath, but for conscience sake,' we have no hesitation in teaching that the claim to all these duties and manifestations of allegiance and loyalty from us and from all those States so recently united in rendering them, is rightfully in that Government, which is now by force of arms maintaining such claim. The refusal of such allegiance we hold to be a sin, and Avhen it stands forth in armed rebellion, it is a great crime before the laws of God, as Avell as man. This, Brethren, your Bishops teach as official exposi- tors of the Word of God. Less, they believe, they could not teach without unfaithfulness to the Scriptures."— 2>^.j9. 483. 8. All branches of the Presbyterian Church : the United Presbyterian, the Cumberland Pres- byterian, the New School Presbyterian, took pre- cisely the same action. As a specimen of all, I read the Deliverance of the Cumberland Presbyterian General Assembly of 1863 : " Whereas, the Church is the light of the world, and cannot withhold 256 EIGHTY YEARS. her testimony upon great moral and religious questions ; Resolved, that loyalty and obedience to the General Gov^ernment, in the exercise of its legitimate authority, are the imperative Christian duties of every citizen, and that treason and re- bellion are not mere political offenses of one section against another, but heinous sins against God and his authority." — Do. p. 473. We come now to the action of the Evangelical Churches in the Southern States, all of which as- sumed the same attitude toward the Government of the Confederate States and expressed toward it the same duties of submission, loyalty and de- votion as an ordinance of God. And I need not say that the principles in question are the same no matter to what Government applied. The Alabama Baptist State Convention in No- vember, 1860, before war had commenced, or a single State seceded, after declaring that " The Union had failed in important particulars to an- swer the end for which it was created," continued in these words : " While as yet no particular mode of relief is before us, we are constrained to de- clare that we hold ourselves subject to the call of proper authority in defense of the sovereignty and independence of the State of Alabama, and of her right, as a sovereignty, to withdraw from this Union. And in this declaration we heartily, deliberately, unanimously and solemnly unite." — McPherson, j>. 513. In the Georgia Baptist Convention of 1861 : " Whereas the State Convention of Georgia, in the legitimate exercise of her sovereignty, has APPENDIX. 257 withdrawn from the confederac}^ known as the United States of America, and for the better maintenance of her rights, honor and independ- ence, has united with other States in a new con- federacy under the title of the Confederate States of America ; and whereas, Abraham Lincoln is attempting by force of arms to subjugate these States, in viofatiorr of the fundamental principles of American liberty — therefore Resolved " — then follow resolutions to approve and support the Government of the Confederate States, urging the union of all the people of the South in de- fense of the common cause at whatever cost of treasure or of blood. — Do. p. 513. The Methodist, the Episcopal, and I believe every Church South, at once recognized the legiti- macy of the Government of the Confederate States, and assumed toward it the same attitude of submission and loyalty which the Churches North had assumed toward the Government of the United States. Some of the very first notes of war, as you are aware, issued from the pulpits of the Old School Presbyterian Church. Drs. Thorn well and Palmer were universally recognized as the leaders of the body and their voice upon all questions was most potential. On the 21st day of Novem- ber, 1860, in Columbia, S. C, Dr. Thornwell, from the pulpit, discussed the theory of the Govern- ment, the relations between the States and the Federal Government, and advocated the political doctrine of States Rights. Dr. Palmer, from his pulpit, in New Orleans, took for his theme that it was the providential trust of the South "to 258 EIGHTY YEARS. conserve and to perpetuate the institution of slavery as now existing," "with the right un- changed by man to go and root itself wherever Providence and nature may carry it ; " and urges the fulfillment of this trust " in the face of the utmost possible peril." — " Should the madness of the hour appeal to the arbitration of the sword we will not shrink even from the baptism of fire." He then reviews the condition of political parties, and urges Secession as an immediate and impera- tive duty. I allude to these celebrated sermons because they were such potential agencies in pre- cipitating the political catastrophe which fol- lowed. They were Avidely circulated as cam- paign documents, the religious papers of the South, almost without exception, echoed their call, and the several Presbyteries, one after one, stood prepared to renounce all allegiance to the United States and transfer it to the Confederate States. On December 3d, 1860, months before the war commenced, the Synod of South Carolina de- clared : " The Synod has no hesitation, there- fore, in expressing the belief that the people of South Carolina are now called upon to imitate their Revolutionary forefathers and stand up for their rights. We have an humble and abiding confidence that the God whose truth we repre- sent, in this conflict will be with us, and exhort- ing our Churches and people to put their trust in God and go forward in the solemn path of duty which his providence opens before them, we, Ministers and Elders of the Presbyterian Church in South Carolina Synod assembled, would give APPENDIX. 259 tliem our benediction, and the assurance that Ave shall fervently and unceasingly implore for them the care and protection of Almighty God." In the preamble and resolutions adopted by the Presbytery of Charleston, in July, 1861, we find the following : " The relations of the State of South Carolina and ten other adjacent States, and of the people thereof, with the other States and people previously composing the United States of America, have been dissolved, and the former united in the separate and independent Government of the Confederate States of Amer- ica." The United States Government is spoken of as one " foreign and hostile to our own " — " a political power which we, in common Avith our fellow-citizens of all classes and all Churches, have disowned and rejected ; " calls the Confeder- ate authorities " the rightful and legal authorities of the land ; " declares that the people of the United States "have violated the Constitution under which Ave Avere originally confederated, and broken the covenant entered into by their fathers and ours ; " and concludes : " We do most heart- ily, Avitli the full approval of our consciences be- fore our Lord God, unanimously approve the action of the States and people of the Confeder- ate States of America." The first General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church in the Confederate States met in Decem- ber, 1861. It assumed in all its proceedings that the political bonds Avhich had joined them to the United States Avere sundered, and that the Con- federate States Avere an independent government. Their action throughout implicitly — their letter 2G0 EIGHTY YEARS. to all the Churches throughout the world explic- itly — recognized the Confederate States as an actual and rightful government, thus deciding as a Church the political question then in dispute and unsettled between them and the United States, the decision of vv^iich had been committed by both parties to the final arbitrament of the sword. In the Narrative adopted by that As- sembly they say : " In the first place, we notice the relation of our congregations to the great struggle in which we are engaged. All the Fresbyterial Narratives without exception men- tion the fact, that their congregations have evinced the most cordial sympathy with the peo- ple of the Confederate States, in their efforts to maintain their cherished rights and institutions against the despotic power which is attempting to crush them. Deeply convinced that this struggle is not alone for civil rights and property and home, but also for religion, for the Church, for the gospel, for existence itself, the Churches in our connection have freely contributed to its prosecution of their substance, their pra3^ers, and above all, of their members and the beloved youth of their congregations. The Assembly desires to record with its solemn approval this fact of the unanimity of our people in supporting a contest to Avhich Religion, as well as Patriotism, now sum- mons the citizens of this country, and to implore for them the blessing of God in the course they are now pursuing." It is a singular instance of the influence of times of great excitement in swerving men from the most cherished principles of their lives, and one which APPENDIX. 261 ought to teach us charity for each other, that our Southern brethren who had so long and loudly declared that slavery was a political question, with which the Church might not intermeddle, should proclaim to the Avorld, as they did in 1864, that "it is the peculiar mission of the Southern Church to conserve the institution of slaver}^" And we submit that our affirmation is made good — all Evangelical Churches in the country, both North and South, during the re- cent troubles, took precisely the same ground as our General Assembly. III. All Protestant Churches throughout the world reject our American doctrine, as to the relation between the Church and the State. In the Church of England, the king, by virtue of his office, is Head of the Church. He prepared its prayer book, ordained its rites and ceremo- nies, and by his own authority set up its whole framework. The queen at this hour is the su- preme head of the Church, the fountain of all ecclesiastical power. Bishops sit in Parliament, and Parliament is the supreme arbiter in all ques- tions of ecclesiastical law. In all Presbyterian Churches throughout the world, except our own, there is both theoretically and practically a most intimate union of the temporal and the spiritual power. The Westminster Assembly, which composed our noble Standards, Avas convened by oi^der of Parliament, dissolved by it, and all their delib- erations directed and controlled by it. The 23d chapter of the Westminster Confession, as pre- 262 EIGHTY YEA US. pared by them and held to this day as the doc- trine of the Scotch and Irish Presbyterian Churches, declares : " The civil magistrate hath authority and it is his duty to take order that unity and peace be preserved in the Church, that the truth of God be kept pure and entire, that all blasphemies and heresies be suppressed, all corruptions and abuses in worship and discipline prevented or reformed, and all the ordinances of God duly settled, administered and observed. For the better affecting whereof, he hath power to call Synods, to be present at them, and to pro- vide that whatsoever is transacted in them be ac- cording to the mind of God." Think of the president of the United States deciding the ques- tions which occupy our Church Courts, pronounc- ing upon what is orthodox in doctrine and im- moral or blasphemous in practice, prescribing the duties of Ministers and Church Courts, settling and regulating all matters of worship and disci- pline, convoking, dissolving, presiding over our General Assemblies ! Yet all this — it is the doctrine of the West- minster Confession — " he hath authority, and it is his duty " to do, and all this the queen of Eng- land does to this day in the established Church of Scotland, and all "^this the Free Church con- fesses it is her right and her duty to do. And yet alongside of such a doctrine as this she holds fast to the Supreme Headship of Christ, and has made such glorious sacrifices and borne such glorious testimony to Christ's crown and cove- nant. Such is the doctrine of the Presbyterian Church of Scotland, the mother of us all. APPENDIX. 263 And now, the final conclusion from all this is : — If the acts of the Assembly during the last five years have been in harmony Avitli the pre- vious acts of our highest Church Courts from the beginning, — if they have been in harmony with those of all other Evangelical Churches, North and South, if they have been in harmony, not only with the practice but with the doctrine of all Presbyterian and all Protestant Churches throughout the world except our own, — then its error, whatever it be, cannot be either fatal or fundamental — then the question as to the rela- tion between Church and State cannot be an essential one ; and error of doctrine or of prac- tice on such a subject cannot make a Church apostate — then all the doctrines of salvation, and all the ordinances of the Church, its Ministry and its Sacraments, may be preserved entire, while it errs as to a question of only occasional importance and inferior concern. If the General Assembly has become apostate because of its ac- tions in the premises, then is every Church on earth apostate, Christianitj^ has vanished from the world, and the kingdom of God has disap- peared from among men. I know how easy it is ia excited states of mind to magnif}^ " the jot and tittle " into the " weightier matters of the law," but the common sense of all men recognizes the distinction between essential and unessential in questions of Doctrine and Duty ; and will not make the question before us "the Article of a standing or falling Church." And let me ask here, why, when all are in the same condemnation, should our Church alone be 264 EIGHTY YEARS. singled out, as the object of such fierce and per- sistent assault ? And why, when the same guilt must rest upon the conscience of every member of every other Church in the land, should it drive us alone to division and schism ? The truth corrupted is not fundamental. The error imputed is not fatal. The whole question is one which rises into importance only in times of great political excitement, and leaves the doc- trines of Eedemption and the ordinances and institutions of the Church entirely unaffected, and error with reference to such a question never can justify division. This is our first position. The second is, that the General Assembly is not the Church, and its Acts and Deliverances alone cannot make the Church apostate. Our Constitution and laws are found in the Bible and our written Standards. The tribunals to inter- pret and administer them are a series of Courts, of which the General Assembly is the highest. It is a representative body of limited and care- fully defined powers. It is the mere creature of the Presbyteries, subject to their control, liable to be modified or dissolved by them at any time. The Presbyteries are the fountain of all power in Presbyterianism. The Assembly is not a per- manent body, but created from year to year, by the Presbyteries, and when its w^ork is done, it is not adjourned but dissolved, and ceases to be, and another and altogether different body is again created by the Presbyteries. The Assem- bly can make no Article of Faith, ordain no Constitutional rule, which has the force of per- manent and universal law — that belongs to the APPENDIX. 265 Presbyteries alone. "Before any overtures or regulations, proposed by the Assembly to be es- tablished as constitutional rules, shall be obliga- tory on the churches, it shall be necessary to transmit them to all the Presbyteries, and to re- ceive the returns of at least a majority of them, in writing, approving thereof." — Form of Gov. chap. 12, sec. 6. The Assemblies sustain the same relation to the Church that the Congresses elected every two years do to the Government, and constitute, not the Government, but only so many different administrations of it, and are changed in one case by the people, and in the other by the Pres- byteries at will. Their acts depend, from year to year, on casual majorities, and always con- cern, not the doctrines, or order, or life of the Church in themselves, but only the application or adaptation of these to the emergent exigencies of times and circumstances. The Assembly exercises two broadly distin- guishable functions, those of Teaching and of Government. As a teacher it interprets and de- clares the revealed will of God, and applies it to actual circumstances as they arise, just as a pas- tor in his pulpit ministrations. It gives utter- ance to its interpretations and applications of the word of God, but for these it claims no infalli- bility. Our Book expressly declares "that all Synods and Counsels may err, and have erred." The Assembly has never laid claim to infallibil- ity ; always admitted its liability to err, and one declares and teaches what another rejects. Our 2G6 EIGHTY YEARS. Book expressly denies to the Assembly all power to bind the conscience or enforce its own Deliv- erances as the word of God. It expressly recog- nizes the right of private judgment, and every member of the Church not only may, but is bound to sit in judgment upon them, and decide for himself whether they be " according to the word of God, aside from, or contrary to it." " All Synods or Councils since the Apostles' time, whether ^general or particular, may err, and many have erred, therefore they are not to be made the rule of faith or practice, but to be used as a help in both." — Con. ch. 31, sec. 3. " God alone is Lord of the conscience, and hath left it free from the doctrines or commandments of men, which are in an^^thing contrary to his word or beside it in matters of faith and wor- ship ; and the requiring an implicit faith, and an absolute and blind obedience, is to destroy liberty of conscience and reason also." — Con. ch. 20, sec. 2. Every Assembly recognizes the absolute right of protest, dissent and open difference from its Acts and Deliverances, and if rash Avords have been sometimes spoken, and hasty actions some- times taken, which seemed to infringe upon this right, no Assembly has ever deliberately called it in question, and none ever will. All the Acts of Assemblies preceding 1865 were in discharge of the office of instruction. They simply de- clared, as helpers of your faith, what they be- lieved to be the truth, and you are left free to receive or reject their testimony as it is according to the word of God, aside from or contrary to APPENDIX. 267 it. IIow can such instructions bind the faith or Avound the conscience ? Xo Presbyterian surely can regard any man, or any body of men, Synod, Council or Assem- bly, as infallible, or accept their utterances as oracles. We recognize but one infallible Stand- ard of faith and practice — the Holy Scriptures. We know no infallible interpreters of these, but using all as " helps to our faith and practice," every one for himself, in the exercise of his pri- vate judgment, and upon his own personal respon- sibility, receives or rejects. This is the glory of Protestantism. It is a fundamental principle of Presbyterianism, and Ave are amazed that any should doubt or hesitate Avith reference to it. But the Assembly exercises also the poAver of government. It is a court of last appeal, and its judicial decisions once pronounced are per- emptory and final. The Assembly of 1865 ex- ercised its power of government Avhen it required the lower courts — Sessions and Presbyteries and Synods — to examine all applicants for admission from the South into the bodies under their care, upon the subjects of loyalty and freedom, and to require repentance from all Avho had offended in faith or in practice Avith reference to either. Their Deliverance here, though not a law in the proper sense of that Avord, but only an order, took the form of laAv, as it prescribed something to be done, and as such, for our present purpose, Ave Avill regard it. Let us look here at the reason for this laAv — the conditions it implied and the end it was designed to reach, that Ave may see Avhat it really was, for 268 EIGHTY YEARS. a high authority has told us: " He that knoweth not the reason of a law, knoweth not the law it- self." It had respect only to those who had been voluntary participants in the rebellion, and to them only when they made voluntary application for admission. It did not go out to seek them. It Avas enacted just when the war had closed, just Avhen soldiers from both armies were returning to their homes, and in the Border States meeting in the same congregations. It was just after the assassination of President Lincoln, when the pub- lic mind was almost frenzied — that time never to be forgotten of wild and terrible excitement. In the Border States, especially in portions of Ken- tucky and Missouri, where the tempest of passion was fiercest, many churches were threatened with scenes of violence and bloodshed, on the very floors of their sanctuaries, by reason of the pres- ence of these returned soldiers. Members and officers of the churches from these localities ap- peared before the Assembly and its committee and plead that, for their own protection, they must have power over their membership to ex- clude those whose presence threatened to pro- voke violence, until passion should have time to subside. To meet this emergency, and under the impression of representations such as these, the orders of 1865 were passed. In their very nature, as well as in the intention of the As- sembly, they were temporary. They soon ex- pired of their own limitation, having accom- plished all they were intended to accomplish, and became, like multitudes of laws upon your stat- ute books, a dead letter. APPENDIX. 269 Such, beyond all question, the last Assembly regarded them. I stated without question or re- buive, openl}^ on the floor of the Assembly, that the Presbytery of Baltimore had not enforced them — that I did not believe there was a single Session within its bounds which had done so. Some twenty others stated the same fact on be- half of their Presbyteries and Sessions, and no one was called to account. There Avas not a word said publicly or privately about enforcing them, which ever came to my ears. The reason of the law does not now apply to the churches even of the border, and its reason ceasing, the law itself has passed away. Not only by silent acquiescence, but by posi- tive action the last Assembly declared its judg- ment that the orders of 1SG5 w^ere not now of force. '' It having come to the knowledge of this body that some of the ministers under our care, not able to subscribe to the recent Testimonies of the General Assembly on the subjects of loyalty and freedom, and that some who have not signed or formally approved the Declaration and Testi- mony, do, nevertheless, hesitate to comply with the requirements of the last Assembly, touching the reception of members from the South, known, or supposed to have been in sympathy with the rebellion ; therefore, ^'' Resolved^ That while we would treat such ministers with kindness and forbearance, and would by no means interfere with the full and free discussion on their part of the Testimonies and requirements referred to, Ave deem it a sol- 270 EIGHTY YEARS. emn duty which we owe to them and to the Church, to guard them against giving counte- nance in any way to dechirations and movements whicli are defiant of the Assembly's authority, and schismatical in their tendency and aim, and we do earnestly exhort them, in the name and for the sake of our common Lord and Master, to study and pursue the things which make for peace." — Proceedings^ 1866, jy. 103. This resolution, for I know its history, was designed to declare two things : First, that lower courts who should fail to carry out the orders of the Assembly of 1S65, were not to be held to account for such failure. Second, that those who refused in a spirit of defiance to the Assembly's authority, and expressed that refusal in terms of defiance, should be held to account not for the refusal but for the defiance. This is expressed still more plainly in another resolution : " The dissatisfaction and discontent consequent upon the Deliverances of the Assembly of 1865 are abating with increased knowledge of the de- sign and propriety of these decisions, and it is confidently believed that maturer reflection will produce a fuller acquiescence in the authority of the Church. It is alike the past and present purpose of our Church to preserve within its fold all who sincerely and earnestly love its order and doctrines, and to fan into life and energy every lingering spark of genuine attachment to our faith and order, which may exist in those por- tions of our country where the spirit and unre- lenting power of the rebellion drove many true APPENDIX. 271 and loyal Presbyterians into a hostile attitude toward the Churcli and the Country. With this enlarged and Christian view it is appropriate to declare, that Avhilst the testimony and authority of our Church are to be obeyed, the fullest Chris- tian liberty of opinion is tolerated and protected, and no enforcement of the Deliverances of our Church is expected or demanded, except that which will debar from our couimunion and Church courts all those who refuse to submit to " the powers that be," and remain in willful an- tagonism to the manifestations of God's j)rovi- dence and the authoritative decisions of our Church." — Proceedings^ 18G6, ^;>. 107. And still again : " Wliile tiie last Assembly but fulfilled its duty in issuing these injunctions, (those of 18G5,) it left their application tothe p>^^'- sons concerned^ entirely to the loicer courts.^'' — • Proceedings^ p. 100. This expressly recognizes everything we have affirmed as to the order of 1865. But why, it is asked, was not the Act in ques- tion explicitly and formally repealed ? For two sufficient reasons. First, because the majority would not consent to its repeal, in the face of what they considered a spirit of rebellion against its rightful authority in the case. And second, because many who would have consented hekl that as each Assembly is independent in an im- portant sense of every other, one cannot repeal the Acts of another. And now I affirm here, in presence of you all, in my own behalf and in behalf of every pastor and ever}^ Session in this city, the Assembly has 272 EIGHTY YEARS. put no burden upon our conscience. It has bound no fetters upon our hands. We preach and we administer the laws of Christ's House just as we have always done. We exact no new terms of communion, we require nothing more than we have always required of those in our communion, or of those seeking admission into it. Extraordinary measures have passed away with the extraordinary times which called them forth, and like the soldier we leave the field and lay aside the harness for the peaceful walks in spiritual industry again. As to the j^ast at least our course is clear. There is nothing there to drive us from the Church of our fathers. AVhat the future may have in store for us is known only to God. We are told that the spirit of violence and fanati- cism has taken such thorough possession of those we once delighted to call our brethren in Christ, and of the Church we once so loved, that it can never be exorcised. I cannot discern the spirits, I cannot foresee the future, but I will wait at least till the evil come. We may be told that the New and the Old School Churches will unite in the North as they have already done in the South, and a new flood of fanaticism will be let in upon us. I do not know what shall be on the morrow, but, meantime, I will stand in my lot and wait till the predicted evil comes. "Suffi- cient unto the day is the evil thereof," and prophets of evil are not always inspired. It may be that truth has somehow lost its old om- nipotence, and error has seized upon its power — APPENDIX. 273 but I do not believe it. And however truth nmy be obscured and buried for the time in the dust of the arena where she struggles, she will rise again. " The immortal years of God are hers." And I will toil, and pray, and wait, and watch for her hour of triumph — for come it Avill, however long delayed. Great truths always make their way slowly and work themselves by almost imperceptible degrees into the life of the Church. It was through the lapse of ages and alternate victories and defeats often repeated, Ave have at last acquired the glorious trophies we possess to-night. It was reserved for the Presby- terians of this land to discover ar\|l propound to the Churches all over Christendom the true theory of the relations between Church and State. Not one of them ail has yet attained to that theory, though they are slowly making their way toward it. And even if we do not always clearly dis- cern and unfalteringly carry it out to all its prac- tical conclusions, every fresh failure serves but for a new warning and a new incitement for the future, and so helps on the final triumph. And now, since our consciences and our hands are left free, we are at liberty to look at the practical evils of separation. 1. The law of love is the fundamental law of Christ's House. Sins against truth, as against every other doctrine and every other grace are but sins against the statutes of the Kingdom; sins against charity are sins against its very Constitution. Do violence to any other law of the House and you only rend away a pillar from 274: EIGHTY YEARS. its portico or a stone from its walls ; do violence to the law of love and you tear up its very foun- dation and make the whole building a ruin. " The greatest of these is charity." " God is love, and he that loveth not, knoweth not God." " A new commandment," said the great Founder and Legislator of the Kingdom, " I give unto you, that ye love one another." "Hereby shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if ye have love one to another." "Love one to another," that I appoint as your badge and your rallying cry. That I give unto you with these bleeding hands, starred with my tears and striped with my blood, as^our consecrated banner-flag, ever to wave before your ranks and distinguish you amidst the gatherings of the hosts. We may err as to our duty in what belongs to us as mem- bers of the Church and what as citizens of the State. "We may not always discern the dim boundary line which separates the secular from the spiritual, and sometimes may transgress upon the one side or the other ; and the error may be recovered and forgiven, and work no fatal injury to our souls. But if Ave have lost " love one to another," Ave have lost our badge, Ave have lost our banner, Ave have lost everything, and neither God nor man can knoAv us as Christ's disciples. " A neAv commandment I give unto you. That 3^e love one another. By this shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if ye have love one to another." Strange, my brethren, A\4ien we speak so often of our zeal for truth and tell so often of our sacrifice for principle, Ave should speak so little of our zeal for charity and tell so little of APPENDIX. 275 our sacrifice for love. " Above all things put on charity." If it be indeed true that Christians of the l^Torth and Christians of the South "hate each other with such a cruel hatred " that they cannot dwell together — if it be indeed true that those who once loved and trusted each other, and went up to the House of God in company, can love and trust each other no longer, then is the glory departed. If passion and hatred be the only ground of separation, then indeed are we no longer Christ's disciples. And should these im- pel us still further to break the bonds of external unity and rend asunder the boci^ of Christ, which is his Church, then are we guilty of the sin of schism. It is no small sin to rend and separate what Christ has made one, — no small sin to make a fresh wound in that scarred body of his, — no small sin to introduce division and strife into the household of faith, and plant the seeds of discord and contentions among those who are called to dwell together in love — to charm by fell incantations the serpent into the bowers of our only earthly Paradise. We pray God that the guilt of schism may never rest upon your soul or upon mine. 2. "Whither shall we go, if we go out self- exiled from the house of our fathers? Where but Cain-like to wander as fugitives and vaga- bonds upon the face of the whole earth, houseless and homeless ? We can find no Church Xorth or South to shelter us, for the same leprous spot is upon all alike. Independency — A Presbyterian 276 EIGHTY YEARS. without Presbyterianism ? The house is too small, and it rests upon a foundation of narrow and shifting sands. In a little time the questions which now absorb us, and to our excited feelings loom up so largely as to fill the whole spiritual heavens, will be altogether forgotten or dwarfed and dwindled down to their true dimensions. When these political feelings, heated as they have become, in the fires of this fierce contro- versy, shall have cooled down — when new parties shall have arisen, and new issues been joined, confounding all the lines and landmarks of the present, and ranging us in new^ ranks, we will look back upon the passions of the hour as but the distorted visions of a distempered dream. No ! the passions and excitements of the passing day, dignify and baptize them by whatever hal- lowed name of truth or principle we may, are not broad enough or firm enough to furnish a foundation on which a Church of God may rest. The world is covered all over with the wreck and ruin of such, built as they were upon the sands, " and daubed with untempered mortar." 3. The wounds inflicted by these last terrible years are not yet healed — shall we open them all afresh ? Through our families and our congre- gations shall we plow fresh furrows of discord and division, before the marks of the old are ef- faced ? Shall we present to the world the spec- tacle of strifes and debatings in the House of God — the home of Love and the sanctuary of Peace ? Shall we bring upon ourselves the shame of wrangling with each other in secular courts for APPENDIX. 277 the temples of our God ? Shall we lay up for ourselves a heritage of alienations and antipa- thies to spoil our future peace, and soil and sear our souls ? Shall we transmit to our children a legacy of discords and divisions, and poison their opening minds with the deadly nightshade of our strifes ? Shall we plant in this community the seeds of a hereditary hate, which shall spring up and ripen into their fearful harvest long after we are slumbering in our graves ? Shall we em- body and make perpetual the passions of the hour which have brought upon us such a terrible baptism of blood ? Would we embalm and transmit them as monuments and memorials of these evil days ? Would we vivify and leave them behind us to scatter among our children poisoned arrows and death ? No, my brethren ; let us extinguish them in our own hearts. Let us destroy every monument and every memorial of them which we had thought to leave behind. Let us repair witli united hands the desolation they have already wrought ; and be careful that we do not transmit them as a legacy of strife and blood to our children and our children's children. It is easy to plant the seeds of heredi- tary strife, for our children catch our spirit, in- herit our passions, and prolong our conflicts. And here, upon the border, with those passions which lately burned so fiercely, still smoldering, let us be careful that our breath fan them not into a fiercer flame. God is calling us — loudly calling us to ministries of love. Whose hands shall be busied in binding up these bleeding wounds if not ours ? If the Church be not found 278 EIGHTY YEAKS. at this hour engaged in the blessed work, by whom shall it be done ? As for me, I cannot leave the Church of my fathers. As soon would I think of forsaking the mother who bore me, for a rash act or a hasty word. She received me into her shelter- ing arms in infancy ; sprinkled the waters of bap- tism upon my brow ; cherished my childhood ; led my tottering steps to her sanctuaries, and surrounded me all my life long with her blessed ministries of instruction and of love. God is in the midst of her, for I have seen his glory and felt his presence, and, as I trust, experienced his grace in her temples. The provisions of her house have been sweet to my taste, and under her shadow have I sat these many years with great delight. Kindred and friends, one after one, have I seen them ascend from her courts in the chariots of fire, to join the ransomed Church above, and their memories still hallow her sanc- tuaries. And with these memories of all she has been, and all she has done for me and those most dear to me, still fresh and warm in my heart, I cannot, no, I cannot forsake her now. Times of trial and conflict may come. But such were no new thing in her history, baptized as she was in the blood of persecution and nurtured amidst the storms of revolution. She bears to- day the scars of many a conflict, but from each in turn she came forth victorious. The smell of many a furnace is upon her to-day, but the flames of each kindled upon her not to destroy, but only to purify and preserve. We glory in her past history. We bless God for all she has APPENDIX. 279 been permitted to do for his truth and his worship, and for the salvation of men. And to-day she still stands amidst the tribes of Israel, her glorious banner streaming, as of old, in the front rank of the Sacramental Host. What though confusion may happen for the moment to a little portion of her ranks, the mighty host is still moving onward, for her God is with her — her Glory and her Defense. And never, perhaps, has he given such abundant tokens of his pres- ence and his power in her sanctuaries as during the past year. Never, perhaps, was his Spirit more largely poured out or more numerous con- verts gathered into her bosom. Ah, my breth- ren, this is what we want, — to have our minds turned away from these ephemeral questions to the great things which pertain to the King. A revival of religion, an outpouring of the Holy Spirit upon our churches, and our own souls — how soon this would hush all these agitations and unite all our hearts in the unity of the Spirit and the bonds of peace. Princeton Theological Seminary., LiDraries ill i 1012 01250 9701 Date Due f -flfc^